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intoloopin-archive · 8 months ago

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A CHAPTER: THE SHARP AND THE BLUNT (PART 1/2).

tw(s): panic attack. dubious consent (haruki is very weird and forward about initiating sex!). alcohol abuse & alcoholism. semi-smut? (there is making out). miscommunication (a warning because I personally think it's constant and frustrating). insinuation and direct discussions of sexual trauma, abuse by a past partner, abuse of workplace power and stalking. internalized homophobia (in part one, a hint). If I missed anything, please tell me! starring: Lee Hanjae. Fukunaga Haruki. featuring: Dylan Hwang / Hwang Chihoon. Their fellow LOOPiN members (old OT10, no Gyujin, a lot of Beomseok). Delilah Franco. Oh Sunyoung. Choi Sangwon. Blonde Bob Piss Girl (a serious character).

timeline: quick flashback to 2018 | early to the end of mid 2022.

word count: 13,405 words. author's notes: welcome everyone to hanruki fuckery part 1 a.k.a the most frustrating and life draining four months in Hanjae's whole entire life a.k.a big sadness, the piece split into two. this one is over 23K long, and was originally intended to be read in one go but! It Got Too Big. The conclusion will be coming out later this week! prepare for a Haruki all in par with the one in the prologue, which falls in between this mess on the timeline. this is a work of a whole month, but it's also a work of two years: a whole central plot, planned and done. title's from this song! give it a listen once you get trought the bigger picture, maybe, for catharsis purposes. stay safe! remember you deserve to be safe, always!

November 12, 2018.

Hanjae had vowed not to cry anymore when he got this job – in the same vehement way he had promised at twelve that he would no longer make a sound if he wailed after school, face buried under piles and piles of unfinished homework, to medium success, just the right amount of it to call it success.

He could still tear up once in a while, if things got though, and that was it; a clause added after his first exhausting week as a trainee. The number escalated to once every two business days after he was shoved to debut on LOOPiN, out of all the upcoming boy groups there were.

There was a story taunting the New Wave Music corridors back then. Someone did something unspeakable to someone else, and it caused an expulsion, followed by the immediate need for a new rapper, a new dancer. And there was Hanjae; a BBC trainee for three months, far removed from the Boy Of The Week gossip, who couldn’t exactly sing but had great enunciation, and had been dancing before he was even walking…

He cried now, openly, defeated. It had been an awful day for LOOPiN 2on1.

Their short lived promotions had played out like a sunset: a big golden start – so much press, so much momentum, so many views on the ‘Baby Don’t Stop’ dance practice video, where he and Haruki were using plain shirts and even plainer jeans – quickly diluting into the darkest of times – the controversies, LOOPiN first ones, and exclusively about them.

A resurrected Facebook photo of Hanjae on his graduation with a bandage around his hand, matched with the lingering traces of his poorly removed tattoo there painted him as a school delinquent; Haruki’s drop out stories reintroduced him as the big drunken failure of KArts’s international program.

They were going to stop going to music shows, the company had decided that day, and Sangwon told them on the drive back that they had just done their last one. They had gone up on stage as a duo for the last last time.

With a strong sniff, Hanjae unburied his face from in between his knees and looked at his hand, at the faint shape of a badly drawn rose on his skin. His dad had been adamant about getting it out the moment he took a look at it, still involved in protective plastic. He used the little money off his college safe to arrange a laser session that Hanjae skipped. A year later, Hanjae managed to schedule another one with the partial sponsor of MBN, the company he was stuck on before BBC. He had to do it in a shady place, at a bigger cost: bad skin scarring.

His mom had been relieved to see it fade even more nonetheless, up until the black tattoo turned into something that almost looked like a peculiar and old scar, if you didn’t give it a second glance; and no one was ever giving Hanjae a second glance.

“Let that be a lesson,” she told him, nose turned up and away from him. “Don’t jump head on into things again, Lee Hanjae. That’s no way to live. Watch yourself, watch your company. You’re not a kid anymore. Do you have no goals? Do you want nothing for yourself? Are you that selfish? Can’t you think, for once, about something that isn’t–”

Haruki was the one who found him, sitting on the floor, small and tense against the laundry machine, waiting for everyone’s clothes to be cleaned – the member’s, Sangwon’s, the cleaning auntie's aprons she had forgotten on top of the dinner table last week. Cleaning was always his scapegoat way of attending to something, even if very small.

Maybe if the company decided to drop him, he thought, Hanjae could still be around as the dorm’s janitor.

“So you’re not from Seoul,” Haruki said, leaning against the door frame with an air of mischief around him, something light on his step despite it all.

It was a statement, not an ask, because he knew this. It was one of the few trivia points they had exchanged during pauses on music shows or water breaks in between choreography practice – ‘What’s your age? What’s your blood type? How many siblings? Oh, none? You’re so lucky, Hanjae, so lucky. All siblings are demons. You aren’t missing a thing.’

Hanjae didn’t even startle; Haruki often popped up at places like that, picking up conversations from days, weeks ago like they were merely put on pause.

Without uttering a word and barely looking up, he still nodded his head no.

Haruki nodded back, a pacifying smile showing up on his face, said, “Cool. Great. How about I show you a place?”

‘The place’, he informed Hanjae, was not all that nice, or clean, and he really shouldn’t wear nice shoes or nice clothes tonight, but at least it wasn’t far, at least they had permission.

“Who’s permission?” Hanjae asked, taking the pile of clothes to the dryer, smoothing wrinkles off them just for something to do.

Haruki waved manager Choi’s front keys in his hand, and Sangwon’s horrendous keychains clanked against each other: a green pine tree and a colorful ball. “The one that matters. What do you say, uh? You’re in? Can I count you in?”

He could count Hanjae in.

[...]

They stopped by a convenience store on the way, some couple of blocks down the dorm, and by then night had already conquered all of Seoul. Inside, the middle aged lady behind the counter rushed to give Haruki a hug, a paper bag and a discount.

“He’s a street cat I found,” she leaned in to explain when she caught Hanjae anxiously looking at him going straight to the back of the store, near the freezers, near the alcohol, with the ease of someone who could do so with his eyes shut. “He’s a good foreign friend.”

“I’m not!” Haruki shouted back, but he was grinning. “Are you not watching the news?”

The noona playfully rolled her eyes, joked back, “What news? You’re not on the news!”

She hushed Hanjae to go catch up with him with an enerved wave, told him to take a look around. “It’s on the house,” she winked. “You’re both so skinny, and you must be working hard, so just take something tasty and leave quickly.”

Trailing a couple feet behind Haruki on the aisle, Hanjae picked up a package of noodles and a modest four-set of Terra cans to accompany his endless Heineken bottles, light green on light green. While Hanjae bagged everything with caution, Haruki slipped a red won note on the balcony when the owner stopped paying attention to them, and off they went again.

Haruki made them walk ten more minutes to the left, and the left, the left again, coming to an abrupt stop in front of an abandoned lot, pure dirt and weeds, the sort that seemed to have turned into an open dump for the neighborhood. It looked no different or less disgusting than the million of others around less central Jungnang; it didn’t look like it could be a spot.

Yet Haruki kept braving straight through the grass without stopping, guiding Hanjae behind him to only step where he was stepping, to keep his eyes glued to the floor and watch out for broken glass. He settled when they were deep into the lot, mere feet away from a big hill. There was a clean view of an uneven street if you looked down, he said, filled with houses that were almost all pretty. Hanjae chose to just trust Haruki’s word on that; he couldn’t dare to come close enough to the drop to peek and see.

Haruki standed the bag of drinks for him to hold, and Hanjae had to do so with both hands. From a spot behind them, he pushed two retriable chairs out of a bulk set against a moldy tree, the metal in them corrupted by rust on the edges, and set them up, sat down, tapped at the other seat with his foot in invitation.

Hanjae took a long and anxious moment to comply. Under him, the chair dangled sideways even if he stayed very, very still.

With the convenience bag back in his domain, Haruki cracked three beers open, and handed Hanjae one, kept the other two: one in each hand, a Heineken and a Terra.

“Never had this one. I heard they’re the same thing,” he said, taking a sip from each and frowning, analyzing them. Hanjae stayed quiet.

He had only drank with his dad and uncles one time, at last year’s Chuseok, and hadn’t been much of a fan of anything. Still, he took a sip of beer.

Haruki at least had grace enough to let him swallow and contain a grimace before asking, with a strange edge to it, “So are you? A bully. A problem child. Part of a gang.”

“No,” Hanjae said, too quickly, too eager. He cleared his throat. “I’m really not, hyung, no.”

“How did it get there, then?” Haruki's look was razor sharp on Hanjae’s once tattooed hand, hard enough to make him freeze. “And why did you remove it? Just to be a trainee?”

Hanjae opened his mouth, but only to take a shaky breath in, swallow a bit more of bitter alcohol. In front of his fleeting eyes, Haruki eased just as quickly as he had hardened.

“Hanjae, we’re teammates now,” he told him. “I showed you my good spot. You can’t give me one word sentences anymore. You can’t lie.”

Hanjae considered this, and considered him from the corner of his eyes. Haruki was the LOOPiN member that Hanjae had come to know best, mostly because they didn’t have a choice, but still, he made an effort, he talked to him; he didn’t let Hanjae fall adrift. And he could have easily turned into an island: from the moment he had been transferred to New Wave, he had been an outsider, a last minute solution to a problem no one would explain to him – who left? Why? Was he worse than them? Was he better?

“You’re better,” Haruki had said, when Hanjae brought it up, late at night while they had dinner alone, in the practice room, sweating and panting – a week until their debut happened. He was the only one who had bothered to tell him so. He sounded like he meant it, too. Hanjae remembers catching a glimpse of himself in the mirror over his shoulder, hair bright brown and unfamiliar, thinking even for a fleeting moment: I’m doing enough.

It was fair for him to be the first to know – the first for Hanjae to disappoint.

“I got it removed before,” he heard himself say. It was a secret, so it came out like one: whispered, slow. “Before I wanted to train. I got it with friends– my dance crew friends. It was our logo, or at least, it was going to be, one day. But I… I did a bad thing, and it stopped making sense. It didn’t fit. I didn’t fit, so. It had to go.”

The vagueness did nothing but pique Haruki’s interest. He seated more properly, then less properly; ended up putting his feet on the seat of the chair, slouching with his head supported on his knee, the exact body language of, ‘Tell me, tell me, tell me.’

“My friend– my best friend, from childhood, our team captain. He used to have a girlfriend. A girl from our class, a dancer too, someone he had been in love with forever. Later she became part of the group, and we got close, we turned into friends, and then not. Not quite that. They broke up and one hour later we got together, on the same day. We got caught. It was a mess. Everyone thought it was a shitty thing to do, that it was cheating, cheating on everyone. But I just wanted her to be my girlfriend, back then– Back then, I wanted a girlfriend more than I wanted anything...”

Hanjae felt it coming, again: the desire to recoil a bit more on himself in shame. How pathetic he had been, then; how miserable, how sad, how lonely.

He took a timid peek to the side, ready to see an irk of dismay on Haruki’s face, some justified disgust, and was surprised to not see any of that. Haruki had grown passionate and invested in the whole story, something new in his eyes, a third bottle halfway drained in his hand.

He moved his chin up, as if saying, ‘Go on’, but Hanjae couldn’t. He drained the rest of the beer.

Haruki clicked his tongue like that wouldn’t do. He shoved his chair a few inches closer so he could grab at Hanjae's arm and said, all at once, “We can not– Hanjae, look, listen, we can not be blamed for all the things, the crazy things we do when love…!” He didn't finish the sentence, just amended it into another one: “You were a teenager, you both were, and very, very brave. Very brave to tell her and date her and keep dating her even if. They were just– bad friends. Just bad friends.”

They weren’t bad friends, Hanjae knew; they weren’t the ones in the wrong. But it hurted to say it out loud, to admit what he knew was still true: how easily he burned bridges for attention, for affection, so he never did. He just knew – looked at his reflection on surfaces and knew.

He rolled and rolled the tap of the Terra until it fell off, into the can. “Did you really quit college, hyung?” Was what he asked the wind.

Haruki shifted on his seat; Hanjae could only tell because of the way it creaked. “More like college quit me,” he said, with a sad huff of air that might have been a laugh, and dropped Hanjae’s arm, drank from his bottle too.

Sadness fell over them like a veil from then on. The Terras ended and Haruki didn’t mind sharing all the other stuff he had, and the longer it went on the less shy Hanjae felt about asking. At some point Haruki said, “I guess we really fucked up, uh – with 2on1,” and Hanjae, whipping a foam mustache off his face, “Minwoo’s not talking to me,” and Haruki, almost falling over with laugher, “Oh, my, I bet not! Ha. I bet not…”, and turned reticent, fell quiet.

His eyes, Hanjae had noticed, kept darting to a spot ahead in between conversation, beyond the drop of the hill, dazed. He violently shook his head sideways everytime he caught himself drifting too far away, and ran a hand over his face, rubbing at it in a way that made Hanjae look at him in worry.

Haruki found it hilarious each time. “What is it,” he eventually said, slower than normal, harder to understand, “With you, your face?”

He got up from his chair, a sudden move that sent it falling to the floor, a loud squeak, and walked even closer.

In front of Hanjae, right in front of him, he leaned forward until he got both his hands on his face, and said, pushing the corners of his mouth up, “The mood is so– Bad! So bad! Smile! Big smile! C’mon, give me a big smile!”

There had been dirt on Haruki’s hand, and Hanjae could vaguely taste it, with how close to his lips he was pressing. He still wore his inner braces back then; he kept cutting his tongue on the same spot, never healing, never telling, and he could feel the inside of his cheeks pressing onto that sharp place, about to be pierced through.

For a moment, they stayed quiet, looking at each other head on. Hanjae was not smiling. His heart had picked up a quick pace inside his chest, was drumming – Haruki was so close, and he was so beautiful, a true magazine type beauty, all symmetry, and Hanjae knew this, but not with this much conviction, not with so much emotion.

“Ah, you know what? I like you. I decided. I do like you, now…” Haruki said, and then he grinned, bringing his face even nearer. He took a breath and Hanjae felt it on his own nose, and didn’t know what to do about it; his mind, for a moment, went static. “Nothing will happen to you, friend. I promise it. ‘Will not let it.”

Hanjae’s held breath was a painful thing to let out of his chest. “Was something– Was something going to…?”

Haruki huffed a laugh and gave his cheeks two playful taps, said, with a new found determination, “Handsome guy. Do not get sad. I will fix this for you,” and let Hanjae’s face go.

He straightened his back up and swayed slightly to the side, running a hand over his hair, fixing his bangs back into place. Haruki told him, “Late. No booze. Night over”, and extended that same hand for Hanjae to take – Hanjae who still felt like his face had gone numb, blood rushing to it.

He took the hand, and they made their way back to the dorm that way, hanging close; Like magnets, Hanjae remembers thinking, idly, and then not idly at all. Haruki’s hands were leaving behind a pressure everywhere they touched, a heat that Hanjae couldn’t shake off – he just couldn’t shake it off.

Later, when Hanjae layed in bed, sheet drawn over his entire body, he could still feel it. When he woke up the morning after, nauseated but still in the group, still safe, he could still feel it.

If he closes his eyes now, right now, he can still feel it – the sad sort of burn of a premonition misread.

January 13, 2022.

Los Angeles is sunny in a way Haegon would love to see and pretend to hate – a saddening thought Hanjae had since they landed, and that comes back to haunt him while he looks at the city passing by on the van’s window, sidewalks all golden.

Haegon’s not a loud person in his eyes, but his absence is a loud thing, pouring the life out of everyone, mostly because of the way it had been forced on them.

It had been a horrifying way to open the year: having to come forward right on the first day of 2022 to the press, headlining Haegon’s mugging and the accident, his follow up hiatus and excuse out of their ‘We Do’ promotions in the USA. And then there was having to deal with Haegon in private, angry and disappointed, not wanting to take his pain medicine, shoving his room’s door in everyone's faces, dismissing every checkup attempt with an annoyed, “It’s just a minor concussion, what the Hell! I’m not fucking dying! Get the fuck off me, I’m fine, get off, just fuck off already to the States without me! Go on! Just– just leave me already!”

They’re driving out of some media company studio around the center of Los Angeles, where they filmed two twenty minute videos in a roll, more embarrassing games than actual interviews, and Hanjae has already spent all of his ability to mend English words together.

It could have been more fun, one of their staff said, but they had to pass on the puppy interview format because of Taesong’s allergies, and Jiahang’s been dead set on pretending to be sad about it during the entire ride back to the hotel; crocodile tears and all.

Hanjae has to deal with him from the last seat on the far opposite side of the van, resting his fried blonde head against his shoulder, sighing loudly, because Dylan is also not here to amuse him – he took a bus home to Santa Monica and will stay home until they leave in two days time.

Hanjae doesn’t like provoking Taesong, doesn’t like to spoil Jiahang, but that means very little in the grand escape of the group, that goes about poking fun of Taeng like it’s a sport, that’s stuck in a position where they really can’t say no to J.J, who owns company shares; he shoots the meek figure of Taesong an apologetic look as Jiahang’s act carries on, trying to tell him: ‘I’m not a part of this, I just don’t know how to stop it.’

Thankfully, the hotel isn’t that far away, and it’s a quick torture – up until things takes a turn for the worse.

As they park and start to step out, Beomseok’s long arm blocks the door before he and Jiahang can put a single leg outside of the car.

“Stop,” he tells J.J, harsh enough to make Hanjae stumble a step back. Beomseok points a finger right at Jiahang’s face, and inch from touching his nose, says, “Stop being a fucking problem. Stop.”

It makes Jiahang livid, turns his ears bright red. He takes long stomps to the elevator, and Hanjae has to jog to keep up with him – Jiahang really has the longest legs Hanjae has ever seen on a person.

“He’s got such a stick up his ass!” He keeps on saying, barging into the room they’re both sharing with Dylan and Zhiming – angrily tossing his bag into his ‘cheap dollar store bed with the cheap dollar store sheets’ that made him go into a very similar rant last night. “He thinks he’s the only one who cares about Gon, the only one who can bother. He’s so wrong. I’m fucking worried too! I’m calling him too! I miss him! I’m more of a friend to him than that weirdo is. He’s so weird. He thinks he owns Haegon and everyone and everything, just because he’s older, just because he trained for like, one billion years! Like it’s my fault Starship thought he was too ugly to join NO.MERCY!”

“You were being annoying, Jiahang,” O.z deadpans from the corner he’s tucked in, without looking up from his manhwa.

Jiahang grunts louder. “Yeah, that was the point. Taesong knows I’m just joking around! Everyone knows!”

Zhiming lowers the comic from his face, flipping a page. His eyes have deep dark circles behind his thick glasses, marks that never go away. “Unnecessary.”

Jiahang rolls his eyes, putting his hair up on an ugly bun. He turns his back to Zhiming’s bed and mouths at Hanjae, mocking, ‘Unnecessary’.

Hanjae shrugs at him, and that annoys J.J too. He angrily puts on a movie on the tiny TV, gets a hold of his bed’s pillow and wraps himself around it, mumbling something under his breath still. The tags on the streaming app read comedy, musical. He chews on a poor nail while humming along the first song, and Hanjae tries to humor him with a tiny, “Is that Ariana Grande sunbaenim?”

It doesn’t work. Jiahang shoves his face into his pillow and says, miserable and muffled, “I can’t do this anymore. I can’t hang around with you, you’re so lame. I miss Dylan so much.”

“He invited you to go with him,” Hanjae says, helplessly. “You said you didn’t want to.”

“Of course I didn’t want to! I would have to sleep on the floor. In a bag, on the floor. And I don’t think his grandma would like me – I don’t think anyone in his family would like me,” he turns his face around, off the pillow. Hanjae can hear clearly when he says, “He needs time alone with them. For the anxieties.”

“The anxieties?” Hanjae asks him, very slowly.

Jiahang presses his mouth shut tight, straights himself up again. He undoes his ponytail, tosses his long, long hair from one side to the other, behind his ears.

He takes a quick look at Zhiming, and Hanjae does too, and they go by uncaught; O.z’s got his big headphones in now, eyes glued to his comic book.

Jiahang is still careful to whisper, “The rest of you don’t get what it's like, when you’re away from your home every day, when you know all the people you’re going to see aren’t all the ones you know – when you got family that’s like, old, and you know that time’s passing. You’re losing days with them. It gets scary, after a while. Dylan’s grandad will be 82 this year, hyung – that’s a terrifying number, that’s a maybe. That’s the anxiety. Mine, his– Zhiming’s, too. Foreign member anxiety.”

Hanjae nods, sharp. Jiahang makes a face at him, brighter – smiles, says like a tease, “Not Haruki’s, though. Haruki doesn’t miss Japan at all, if that’s what you’re wondering. He’s not anxious about that.”

Hanjae blinks. Opens his mouth, closes it, blinks again. “I wasn’t going to ask–”

“Sure thing. Suuuuure,” J.J says slyly, and goes back to watching TV, and Hanjae does too. Gulps, keeps looking at the movie, tries to pay attention.

Jiahang put on korean subtitles for him, yet he keeps talking – explaining everything. It’s a nice enough movie, he says. Good songs, nice enough movie.

They’re reaching the end of it, seeing every main character gather in a protest around town, when Haruki barges into their room.

“Are any of you not gonna rot inside this hotel?” He asks, loudly, quickly. “Is anyone going to do anything? Catch some sun?”

“Hanjae’s supposed to be going out,” Zhiming tells him. He’s also watching the movie now, has Jiahang by his side, explaining to him what he missed.

“Oh?” Haruki says, and looks around the room, eyes a little clouded, until they land on Hanjae. He smiles, and it stretches across his face quick and big, like he’s actually glad to see him, like the effect is instantaneous. Hanjae can’t for the life of him look at it head on. “Perfect. That’s just perfect, I’m going with you, Hanhan, just wait for me to get changed!”

“Okay,” Hanjae says, and hops off the bed too quickly, sits back down. “I– Waiting.”

Immediately after Haruki leaves Jiahang gives him a long look over Zhiming’s shoulder, and Hanjae pretends not to see it.

“You’re too easy,” he says, with a disapproving nod of his head, and Hanjae pretends he doesn’t hear it, pretends it doesn’t sting.

It’s humiliating, being reminded that people know – that they look at him and know, and he’s reminded of it constantly.

“Hanjae’s sad, sad bisexual awakening,” was how Jiahang put it, sing-a-song in the studio, while making this very single they’re promoting now. “Worse, worse than Minwoo’s– Is that a verse? Can we put that on a song, on the album?”

Minwoo said, for the two of them, “Fuck you.”

And there that one time, the one he remembers clearly, when Seo CEO said he wanted to sit down to watch them practicing ‘Love Me Right’ before the big release, and Taesong pushed Hanjae aside, told him, “Hanjae, you– if you need to check the choreo, please look at the instruction video. Don’t look at Haruki like that, there’s no need to look like you–”

There had to be a separation, he realized; he had to get it under control.

So Hanjae made friends with the people Haruki seemed to not stand, which sometimes meant everyone, but mostly meant J.J and Beomseok – two extremes of very opposite lines. He’s built a line of separation, wrapped himself up in Haruki repellent, and he tries to live by it.

It’s a frail line, a shitty line, and it comes crashing down all the time, with the little moments; single minutes where things feel kind between them, different. A bottle of water and a perfectly folded towel passed to him backstage, a group conversation where Haruki eventually says, like clockwork, “And you, Hanjae? What do you think?”; no one else says that. There’s this lingering nearness coming from him, like there's always something Haruki wants to say or do but can’t, something he wants to check.

It makes Hanjae wonder – makes him come back to that one friendly night, hang on to it. The way Haruki had been so near, his exact tone of voice when he said that he liked him, considered him a friend, thought he was handsome, was going to fix whatever was wrong.

[...]

“So what are we doing?” Haruki asks when they step onto the sidewalk.

“Just filming my Loop Log,” Hanjae responds. “Deadline’s tonight.”

“Shit, that,” Haruki groans, taking his cap off to push hair out of his eyes, putting it on again. “I forgot all about that. ‘Haven’t filmed mine either. ‘Think I lost my camera.”

“I can help you look,” Hanjae offers. “When we get home.”

“Well, thank you,” Haruki says, and steps closer, slides an arm over Hanjae’s shoulder, tells him, “For now, I guess we’ll just have to stick tight. LOOPiN 2on1, reunited in L.A…!”

At Hanjae’s timid request, Chihoon made him a list of what he should get to ‘live his best tourist life’, what the fans might want to see him try: pancakes, bacon and eggs, ice cream, anything in the menu that looks like it could have come off a cartoon, any ‘house specials’.

They go into the nearest place listed with the camera on hand, and have to explain with their Frankenstein English that they want to make a vlog, can they make a vlog? They can, a waiter says, but only in a specific area; they get taken there.

Hanjae orders the house special, and it's a crazy looking Banana Split. Haruki settles for waffles, and they decide to start filming when the food arrives.

Any chance of small talk between them goes fully stall when Hanjae asks, right at their waiter steps away, as the opening topic: “Have you talked to Haegon?”

Haruki’s dangling hand on the table stills. He smiles weird, notices it looks weird, drops it: “Ah, no. No…” and goes silent, makes Hanjae go silent too.

The food comes, they start filming. Hanjae’s meticulously trying to extract a tiny piece of strawberry from a block of ice cream, all while only looking through the camera’s lens, when Haruki’s phone jumps to life, ringing.

He takes it out of his pocket, places it screen flat on the table without looking at the receiver once, mutes it with one hand, adds a mountain of maple syrup to his food with the other.

“Not important,” Haruki reassures Hanjae when he catches him looking at the buzzing phone, an inch away from falling off the edge. He forks the food and stands his hand across the table, says, with his Idol voice, “Wanna try?”

It’s good sweet food, all of it. The camera goes back and forth between them, hand to hand. Haruki makes him pretend they’re shooting a commercial, at some point, makes him do a different pose with every bite, and Hanjae tries to not lose control of his face with all the wooing, all the praise.

It’s fanservice, and Haruki’s good at it. It makes for good content. Everything: good.

Outside, bill paid, they take shelter from the sun and check the recording; thirty raw minutes of footage.

“Hanjae,” Haruki says, looking up after skimming the video, solemn. Hanjae leans a bit forward, eyes a little wide.“The Log will turn out very boring if this is all we do.”

It is, indeed, not the best vlog Hanjae’s ever made. Not that he’s ever been any good at them, or at anything on the media side of the job outside of music covers or choreography making. He’s seen the views on his solo variety content, Sangwon walked him through them all last month, said: nothing special.

They barely talked in 30 minutes – Hanjae didn't initiate a single conversation with him.

Quickly, Haruki’s eyes narrow as he scans the area around them, and Hanjae tries to keep up. He looks for a long moment at the barracks of food, at a man selling balloons, and finally lands far ahead, on a group of kids running on the sand. The leading one trips on air and falls face first on the ground, immediately wails, and they let out matching startled, horrified laughs.

Haruki jogs until he’s in front of him, and turns to walk backwards, closer to where the sidewalk gives into the beach.

“You wanna do that?” He arches a perfect eyebrow. “Run around on the beach with me. Like we’re in a movie.”

Hanjae steps on a stone, lands his other feet on the ground wrong. “I– No.”

“No? Well, I’m doing it! It’s what the vlog’s missing! Trust me, if we do this, it’ll fix everything,” he says, and before Hanjae can even think of what to reply, turns around and starts running on the sand, straight ahead.

Haruki’s already bent over near the ocean when Hanjae catches up with him, folding his jeans until they stop at his knees, barefoot. He insists: “Let’s go, let’s do it, you’re already here, it’s going to be fun, the fans will like it, let’s do it, let’s do it!”

With a resigned sigh, Hanjae unties his sneakers.

Haruki approaches a family nearby and asks for a beach chair, gets a yes. They place the camera cautiously on it, set it with a big zoom ahead. Haruki leaves his phone there, too, with a careless toss, and Hanjae can hear it announcing another call as he steps away, trailing exactly behind him – footprint over footprint, back near the ocean and then on the ocean.

“I thought– Hyung, I thought we were going to just walk,” Hanjae says, stopping. The salt water is a chill foam around his foot.

“Yeah,” Haruki flashes him a smile over his shoulder. He’s about to be knees deep, is taking his Hawaiian shirt off, Hanjae realizes now, with a flush. “We’re walking. Into the water.”

Hanjae catches the shirt when he throws it over his shoulder, looks at it, up at him. He takes a step closer. “Manager Choi’s– Haruki, he’s going to complain!”

“Fuck him!” Haruki tells him with a laugh. He says, with meaning: “Fuck him, fuck New Wave, let them complain, I’m going for a dive and no one can stop me!”

And then he dives, swims, disappears under the water for a long moment. Hanjae stays planted where he is, at a loss of words. When Haruki reemerges, pushing a curtain off black hair off his eyes, and walks back splashing water at him. By the time they’re side by side again, it looks like Hanjae took a dive, too.

“Are you…” He starts to say, eyeing Haruki worryingly, but then the family from before calls back to them, says they’re leaving, they need the chair back, and Haruki claps him on the shoulder, smiles widely, races him to reach them.

“Look,” Haruki says when they’re checking the footage, back on the sidewalk, showing Hanjae a clip: the two of them, a little blurry, walking. “We even got your good smile.”

“My good smile?” Hanjae echoes.

“Not to imply you have a bad one, because you don’t have a bad one,” Haruki says, and bumps their shoulders together. He has just put his shirt back on, is wearing it unbuttoned. “You just have one that’s relaxed, easy. A rare one.”

“Hm,” Hanjae responds, looking away, rolling a rock under his feet.

The walk back to the hotel is calm, windy. The sky’s cotton candy pink and it all looks like a movie, Hanjae thinks. He looks down, and their hands are loose, hanging close, like it would be in a movie.

The end credits roll when they get in the hotel’s lobby, and find Sangwon there – just right there. He catches sight of them immediately, like an alert dog; a quick jump off his seat, a stall near.

He seems to consider them like an equation, frowning: he takes in their wet hair, the wet clothes, the leftover traces of sand, solves it, fumes.

“Do you have any idea,” he says, and he’s struggling to look at the two of them, to not just gawk at Haruki – to not bare his teeth to Haruki only. “Any idea, you two, of how irresponsible this whole stunt was? You’re out on a foreign land. You know no one – no one. When I– The company, if the company calls, you pick your phone. It’s how it works. Pick your phone, immediately.”

Hanjae checks his own phone, a quick glance: no calls.

“Choi-nim,” he says, not looking directly at him, because he lost the ability over the years. Sangwon’s gaze now makes him incredibly anxious. He takes the camera out of where its hanging around his neck, stands it. “I notified– On the calendar, I added– We were just filming–”

“No need to explain, Hanjae,” Haruki interrupts, and puts a hand on Hanjae’s shoulder, steps in front of him, puts himself between him and Sangwon. “Go up. You did nothing wrong. It’s okay. Hyung’s going to solve this with the manager.” He turns straight to Choi-nim and bows, so pristine, so polite: “I take full responsibility for today. It was all me. I’m really sorry if I caused you stress.”

Sangwon considers him for a long moment, taking in the bend of his elbows, like he’s trying to measure his sincerity – there’s almost none of it, Hanjae can tell. He sighs, and then he adjusts his shirt, picks at the cufflinks of his uniform, breaths – his nostrils taking over his entire face.

“You’re dismissed,” Sangwon tells Hanjae, icely, with a corner of the eye glance.

“Sir, I–”

“Dismissed.”

“Go on,” Haruki encourages him, giving Hanjae’s shoulder a firm tap. And then he runs a hand over Hanjae’s hair, messes it up until his wet bangs are glued to his forehead, which he’s never done before; not with him, not with anyone, as far as Hanjae’s aware.

Hesitantly, Hanjae steps away, goes to take the elevator. He keeps looking at them over his shoulder, watching them trail away with growing uneasiness. Haruki keeps looking back at him until he can’t: Sangwon gets the door of the hotel open, shoves him by the shoulder out.

Up in his hotel room, Hanjae showers for a long time. There’s sand on a spot on his elbow where Haruki gave him a tap, and it takes him a while to notice.

He comes off the shower and goes straight to laying down. Zhiming, who had been awake when he came in, is also in his bed now, fully still.

He turns over once, and then again, goes back on his side. “Zhiming hyung?” Hanjae whispers. “You’re awake?”

When Zhiming finally responds, it’s with a minimal grunt, a tiny quick of his socked foot. “What.”

“Do you,” Hanjae chews on the words, “Do you think I have a good smile?”

A pause, a loud sigh. “You’re an Idol. You should hope so.”

“Okay. Okay, so what about– What about me do you think, what looks bad?”

Slowly, very slowly, Zhiming raises his upper body on his elbows. His air is a mess, recently dyed from gray to black too quickly. Without his glasses, he’s forced to squint at Hanjae, even this close, with their beds separated by a very narrow space.

“What the fuck are you even talking about?”

Hanjae takes in a sharp breath, and nods – puts a hand over his eyes, nods again. Stupid, so stupid.

“Nothing,” He says. “Nothing, just– Forget it. I’m sorry, just– Sorry.”

Zhiming goes back to laying down with a loud ‘oof’. He says, a crude whisper, “Don’t go out alone with him if it’ll make you come back like that.”

And with that Hanjae decides he must sleep, immediately, and end this day already.

It was just a day, he tells himself, rubbing at the scarred spot on his hand; a flower in eternal bloom, once. Just one good day. Drop it, forget it, erase it.

February 15, 2022.

“C’mon, you guys, c’moooon! On a scale of one to ten–”

“Na Seungsoo,” Minwoo’s voice rings out like a warning; an elastic pulled far above its limit, about to snap back into place, hard. “Shut your goddamn mouth.”

“She’s right there,” Haegon adds, equally as ultraged. “Are you dumb? Do you want to die?”

“Light up, you two. We’re just talking hypotheticals. I’m not actually gonna fuck our mananger,” Seungsoo says, crossing his arms, raising his chin high – his posture the embodiment of a practical joke about to take action. “That would be desperate and unprofessional, and I am none of these things.”

“You’re extremely unprofessional,” Jiahang laughs at him, a little mean – all his laughs have something a little mean about them, Hanjae can’t help but notice, when Seungsoo’s involved. “And extremely desperate. You just fucked our sound assistant. We no longer have a sound assistant, because you fucked her.”

“So did Jimin!”

“A fluke,” Zhiming defends himself. “Not happening again.”

“It’s never a fluke with you, Seungsoo. You’re such a man whore. A man whore for staff. Even Sangwon could have pulled you when he was around if he had a pair of tits,” Haegon notes, and Seungsoo gasps, mutters, scandalized, ‘You bastard!’, raises a fist up as if he’s going to hit him, and everyone’s laughing. Hanjae contributes with a grimace. “You’re that gross, you’re really that disgusting, all it would take–”

Behind them, Dylan begins to violently choke on a bite out of his granola bar, hard enough for the whole photo studio to freeze.

Taesong stands up immediately to check on him, and so does Jungwha, their three day old manager, Choi Sangwon’s definitive substitute and the topic of Seungsoo’s most recent infatuation: she rushes forward to aid alongside an assistant, a cup of water materialized out of thin air on her hand, like a trained lifeguard.

It’s too early for any of them to get a good read on her, but Hanjae has working eyes, so he will admit Junghwa is good looking in a mature sort of way, a bit above the ‘K-Pop staff adequate’. She’s not far from Seungsoo’s type, given the fact that he pretty much doesn’t have one. Hanjae has seen him flirt with Seo CEO’s third ex-wife, the second ex-wife, all of Minwoo’s half sisters and, in a disastrous attempt, Dylan’s mom. ("She's just so young, Chihoon! I thought she was your cousin!"

"I don't have a single cousin and you know that! You went for my mom, you animal, the least you can do is own it!")

“Holy shit, Chihoon,” Seungsoo says, tapping him on the back with one hand, fanning him with the other. “You’re alright?”

“My bad– False alarm, guys, my bad–!”, Dylan mutters, still coughing, watery eyes quick in their attempt to scan the room for something, someone.

Hanjae follows their frantic trail until they land on the quiet figure of Haruki by the coffee machine, his back to them, shoulders rigid and on display – wearing the same suit outfit Hanjae has been put on, his in a shade more close to purple than blue.

It fits Haruki splendidly, as must things do.

“Alright, boys, hey, boys!” Jungwha calls out when Dylan’s lungs go back to normal, clapping her hands one loud time. “Break’s over! It’s the real deal, now! So let’s try to have a good day at work today! Fighting!”

They’re set to scatter in trios and duos, the old unit formations, except for Haegon, who’s still on hiatus, still has stitches all over the crown of his head. He only made it because Haruki insisted, and he’s always insisting, lately: “How can we do well without our cheerleader,” he told Haegon in the morning, “Our cute, adorable cheerleader, my very favorite little brother–!”

“Hi,” Hanjae mutters, tapping Haruki gently in the shoulder. Haruki jumps, catching his breath, and Hanjae drops his hand, shoves it behind his own back. “Ah, sorry, if I– I was just going to say we should–”

But Haruki is turning and splinting in front of him before all the words are out, growing out of earshot, out of hold, entering a hallway on the left.

Hanjae, embarrassed, follows.

They’re supposed to go to room 4, but Haruki walks right past it. Hanjae calls back to him from the door, says, “Hyung, that’s not the–”, and then his voice falters, dies out.

Haruki’s already quick pace has grown even quicker, and he’s now running towards the door at the end of the corridor, the one with a red sign written ‘TERRACE’ over it – really running, to the point his body almost slams against the metal when he stops. The door handle makes a loud noise as he tries to push it open, can’t make it, tries again, harder – manages to step out with a strong shove. Hanjae goes after him, frowning, worried.

Outside, the terrace is a gray space, almost the same tone as the sky – rain’s a strong promise on the horizon, a reasonable fear.

Haruki’s standing right at the center. He tries to take in a big and loud gulp of air, can’t, makes a choking sound, lets out a hiss. Hanjae can feel the acute panic coming off him like electricity, gluing itself to his very own skin. He reminds himself to breathe.

Haruki stands an arm out and that’s the distance between them, that’s the nearest he’ll let Hanjae get.

“What’s– What’s happening, what’s wrong, what–?”

“Just,” he’s trembling bad. “Leave, I need– Leave.”

“Now?” Hanjae asks, and he’s making himself bite down on the trail of: ‘But the shoot’, ‘But the gig’, ‘But the job’ so hard, he’s actually got his teeth sinking on his lip.

Haruki nods, sharp and final, and Hanjae feels himself nodding back, frenetic. “Okay, stay– stay here, okay, you’ll leave– we’re leaving, just stay here.”

Hanjae walks back into the building with his head very low, tries to not walk too quickly to bring attention to himself, feels like he’s falling; feels like the whole world is looking at him. He holds his breath while sneaking back into the room they’re using as a closet, picks his and Haruki’s things like a thief: pushing everything into their bags without folding, eyes anxiously looking behind his back, flinching at every outside noise coming through the door.

Haruki’s phone is the last thing he grabs. He only becomes aware of it because it starts ringing. He looks at the screen, a quick run of his eyes. The contact name reads: ‘Don’t Answer Don’t Answer Don’t Answer.’

On the roof, Haruki’s sitting on the floor, resting his forehead against the wall. The back half of an air conditioner hangs close to him, and the leftover water pools near his feet, turning the hem of his pants dark.

They put on the yellow raincoats, plastic hood all the way up, and make a clumsy escape out the studio; Hanjae babbles something at the receptionist about there being equipment in the van, and the woman gives them a distracted ‘go ahead’ nod, an empty courtesy smile.

They walk without a plan, enter on the first bus that stops close: Haruki on the lead, completely reticent, Hanjae only following. There’s still a trail of glitter going down his neck, shiny with sweat, red from stress, Hanjae notices when they sit down. He’s still crying, still whipping at his runny nose with the expensive fabric of his shirt.

Hanjae looks down at his own clothes, the suit vest with no shirt under, a design piece New Wave doesn’t own – he’s wearing eyeliner, a strong smokey eye. They look expensive, and to an outsider, probably peculiar, weird. They don’t even have masks on…

Maybe, Hanjae hopes, trying to hold on to any trail of optimism possible, they could pass as very dedicated cover dancers, maybe–

The sound of Hanjae’s phone ringing makes them both jump in their seats. Haruki comes out of his state of anxious inertia to put a hand on his knee, pressing on it to get his attention. He says, through his teeth, “Do not– Hanjae, do not.”

Hanjae lets the phone ring out. He looks at the receiver: Uhm Junghwa (Manager).

Haruki’s peeking at it too. “Off,” he says, and it’s off.

It’s raining when they step out of the bus. They get maybe five feet down the sidewalk when a phone rings again – this time, Haruki’s. He comes to a sudden halt, and Hanjae bumps into his back and gets a close view of how, in an act of blind rage, he throws it hard on the floor.

“Fuck!” Haruki says, and steps on it once, twice, cracks the screen then the whole device in half. “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

Hanjae looks at him, wide eyed, mouth hanging open, and watches him pace around, a tense moment, until he loses all steam, goes sit by the closest wall.

Haruki stays for a long time there, one hand gripping the fence, the other pressing over his face, being rained on. Cautiously, Hanjae slides his raincoat off, squats down, close to him, and stands it over both their heads. Rain drips directly into his shoulder, makes a cold path down his neck.

“I hope your–,” a hiccup, a sniff, a faint and unconvincing attempt from Haruki of laughing them both off, “your fantasy’s still– still up.”

“My…?”

“Can you not,” Haruki says, a hiss, “Not look.”

Hanjae complies, doesn’t look. Behind them, a car runs close to the sidewalk, splashes a wave of rainwater on their backs.

“Sasaeng?” Hanjae tries, “Is it a sasaeng, or…”

Haruki lets out a bitter snort. “Imja,” he says, and it makes more sense that he means ‘owner’ rather than ‘marriage partner’; Hanjae can’t hear anything else, can’t connect anything else to something he knows and decode it.

His throat has gone dry, sandy. He clears it, and still, his voice comes off clipped. “Your…? Ah. Ah, I didn’t know– Didn’t know you have someone you were–”

“You know him,” Haruki says. “For years. You– you’ve known him. He gave you your job– Made your job happen.”

It takes a long moment for it to click, for the shape of manager Choi to come to Hanjae’s mind. Haruki’s looking at him like he’s expecting Hanjae to do something horrible: mouth set for a fight, eyes so red they look like they’ve been painted over.

“Hyung,” Hanjae breathes. His voice is an even quieter thing, afraid. “Do you mean– Are you being serious?”

“Am I! Am I serious?!”

He’s up again, quick – Hanjae loses his equilibrium and falls back on the street. Haruki doesn’t wait for him to get up to resume stomping.

It takes two street turns for Hanjae to understand they’re detouring from the dorms.

They sit on another bus stop bench, hop on another bus. A quiet and tense drive, this one. Haruki’s no longer crying, just grinding his teeth.

They go to the front gates of a tiny building, their final destination, and Haruki tells the security guard an apartment number, wais to be buzzed in. He does soon, and Hanjae, yet to be told to leave, goes up with him on the stairs.

Delilah gets the door he bangs on, and Hanjae’s stuck blinking at the sight of her, who shouldn’t still be in Korea. Haruki barges into her place like a hurricane: shoes still on, pushing her a little back, closer to the wall.

They both stare at the spot he occupied on the corridor a second ago, a held breath.

She recovers much quicker than he does. Deh tucks a long lock of her caramel hair behind her ear, greets him with an awkward, “Hanjae, hi. Hi...”, and Hanjae gets overwhelmed by too many things at once; how glad he is to see her, the shame of how they had parted. Her sad face when she told everyone she couldn’t stand to work with them anymore.

“You’re back.”

“I am! I am back!” Deh says. “How could I not! Europe’s too gray for me. The food’s too bad, and...” She sucks air through her teeth, takes an anxious look behind her, back inside. “... And all that.”

Hanjae shakes his head, agrees – agrees to all that even though he has no idea what all that is. There’s a pool of spit on his mouth, and he has to concentrate on gulping it down, has to try more than once.

“Hanjae, baby, look– I’ll send him on his way later. Maybe tonight. Or tomorrow morning. Just…” She trials off. “Please don’t tell the others we met, okay? I don’t want Seungsoo looking for me or asking around. I don’t want to see him again, ever.”

Fair, Hanjae thinks. After everything, fair.

Deh flashes him a final grim before closing the door, still awkward, and it doesn’t last. She drops it for a split second, fully drops it, looks instead concerned, anxious.

Hanjae waits a moment, then moves before he knows it. He presses his ear against the shut door, closes his eyes and hopes to catch anything. A creek of wood. A vacuum cleaner being turned off. The sound of someone channel surfing. Deh saying what might be, “Haruki, what do you want me to do? I can’t know, love. I can’t know if you don’t tell me.”

Another sound drowns everything, nearer. Someone from the apartment on the left starts to unlock their door, it’s about to walk out, and it leaves Hanjae panicking, it makes him jog all the way out of the building, nonstop.

He makes the inverse way back home, alone. His own phone is a hot thing in his back pocket. When he gets to the dorm, Chihoon is the first person he bumps into, planted right beside the shoe rack. Hanjae’s seen him in this set of clothes, short shorts and a knockoff Pokemon shirt, more than he’s seen his own dad’s face these last few years.

Dylan grabs at Hanjae when he notices it’s him, pushes him back out quickly. He puts a finger in front of his mouth – quiet.

“I’ve given you some cover,” he whispers. They’re circling the house, Hanjae realizes, going to the backyard. “Said you were not feeling well. It won’t fly with Minwoo or Taesong, so think of something. And you're not gonna get paid this month, because of the clothes. Neither of you will.” He looks around, eyes sharp in a way Hanjae didn’t think they could be. “Where is he?”

“Deh’s,” Hanjae blurts out, and remembers he promised not to speak of her, grows meek.

He’s tired, deep in the bones tired, from all the walking, all the running. The socks inside his sneakers are still wet, his fingers have gone cold.

“Good,” Dylan says, remarkably unsurprised. “That’s good enough.”

There’s a moment of silence between them. In Hanjae’s head, a pinned image every time he blinks: Haruki’s eyes, red like a bruise.

“Chihoon hyung, I think– I think there’s something wrong with–”

Dylan’s grip on his arm is steady, but no longer comforting when he says, “Hanjae, listen, yes. Yes. Something’s wrong. Too many things–” He shakes his head, clicks his tongue once, and again. “No need for you to worry about it, because there’s nothing you can really do, okay? It’s been too long, now. The time for anyone to really do anything, over.”

He looks like he doesn’t want to be saying it, like all those words taste bitter, bad.

“So just keep being nice,” Dylan concludes, and his voice breaks at the end. “Be nice with him right now, alright? And patient, and normal, just like always, and…”

Dylan doesn’t say what else. He looks down, and Hanjae follows. Near their feet, a trail of black nicotine ash and tiny bits of paper; someone’s worry, someone’s wait.Kind, maybe, Hanjae concludes on his own. Maybe kind was what he was going to say.

March 12th & a Bit Of 13th, 2022.

Sunyoung immediately strikes Hanjae as someone who’s never held a small house party before, and it’s a bit painful to see her try.

She greets them at the door, a little overdressed: Chanel earrings, Chanel bag. “Is that everyone?”, she asks, craning her neck to peek behind them, and when they mumble ‘yes’ she visibly withers.

Taesong steps in front of them to give her a gift – a flower vase so yellow Zhiming had to look away from it, rubbing at his eyes.

She stares at it for a minute, frowns hard, then composes herself, says, “Ah! Thank you so much, oppa! This is so– Yeah, thanks! But you didn’t have to! Gon, baby! I said they didn’t have to!”

“I told you they don’t listen to me,” Haegon mutters. There’s a dark cloud over his face and Sunyoung seems to not mind it. She squeezes his arm when he passes her by, smiles at him prettily.

She checks the corridor one more time, and for a moment Hanjae thinks she looks sad; that she looks angry.

The party is a housewarming party for the brand new double storey apartment in Nine One Hannam she’s sharing with her BombShell leader Yoorim, who strongly opposed herself to throwing anything. Hanjae catches a glimpse of her looking displeased and bothered behind the kitchen aisle, and bows his head a little – she rolls her eyes, turns her back on him, disappears behind a small group of people.

Beomseok refused to come, decided to take the afternoon to go grocery shopping, the night to visit family he can’t take Haegon to see; the side that calls him a parasite. It had been a clear jab, right at Haegon’s face. Even Minwoo thought it was insensitive, and his response to the invite had been nothing but a disgusted face that spelled out ‘no’.

Hanjae watches him move through the living room, greeting some people. Haegon’s been here yesterday, and the day before that, and if Hanjae’s not cautious, he’ll stay over despite their early shooting tomorrow.

“That old man put you on babysitting duty, eh, Hanhan?” Seungsoo leans in to whisper to him, somehow with a drink in hand – white wine. The smell of his cologne is already stuck to the collar of Hanjae’s bottom up by osmosis.

“He’s just concerned. It makes sense to be concerned.”

On their first day back from L.A, Haegon had announced over dinner that he now had a girlfriend: they met last week, and had been dating for three days. The situation had driven Beomseok crazy. Haegon asked if him if wanted to meet her every day for two weeks straight, and he said: no. He eventually got around to meet her and said with even more conviction: no, break up, now.

It’s an age gap, even if very small, but she’s about five years his industry senior, he told Hanjae. And Sunyoung’s from YG Entertainment, the face of too many brands. She’s going to eat him alive, spit him out, leave him heartbroken and Beomseok is going to have to deal with it, and he doesn’t want to have to deal with it.

“She can just like him. People can just like him,” Taesong tried to intervene, high pitched, and Beomseok cutted him off right away, said, “No. No, there’s something– Be serious, Taesong. No.”

The front door dings again, and it takes a long minute for Haegon to untangle his arms from Sunyoung’s waist and let her go get it. Hanjae watches her walk across the house, a firm walk of a supermodel, of someone important, and gets embarrassed with how bad he is at this, how obvious.

Another glimpse her way, and the person with their two feet planted on the ‘welcome home’ carpet is Haruki. He also said he wouldn’t come but gave no excuse, yet: here, dressed nicely. He’s got the same convenience store from years ago under one arm, the one from a memory.

They talk, talk, talk, and he still won’t leave the entrance. Haruki makes her laugh, the most genuine thing Hanjae’s seen Sunyoung do all night. He sees her look at him, look around, then lean closer again: point upstairs and give Haruki a thumbs up as he finally makes his way in, into the stairs and out of sight.

Sunyoung’s back on the couch, to Haegon, and Hanjae makes himself look. They’re fine, they appear very fine, holding hands, he doesn’t have to watch them all night, there’s no need to watch them at all, and–

Hanjae goes up the stairs, which he knows it’s technically off limits. He tries to not let his eyes wander to the photos on the walls, the books on the shelves tucked next to an award behind protective glass, a big shiny plaque framed above it.

There’s only one door with light peeking through, right at the end of the corridor. He taps at it three times, and waits. Another three taps, slightly stronger.

“Occupied,” a voice says from the inside – a tone he knows. “All night.”

Hanjae can’t think of what to say: can’t think of anything at all, for a second. He gives the door another hopeful tap, waits more, and he lets out a sigh of relief when it creeks open. He goes in, closes it quietly behind him, and looks down.

The room’s a bathroom, straight out of a home decoration magazine, all black and white. Haruki seems to be setting up an improv bar on the floor, in the big space between the bathtub and the sink. There’s a bottle of something Hanjae can’t read, blue and half empty, tucked in between his legs like a treasure.

“Ah, you,” he waves at Hanjae’s vague direction, not looking up. “Hello, you. I’m just– Don’t mind the mess. Someone made me something once. ‘Trying to put it together.”

Hanjae hums. He can’t make his hand ease its grip on the doorknob.

It’s been weeks since they abandoned the shoot, and since then Haruki’s been avoiding him constantly. Looks at him from across rooms and seems pained, constantly, and Hanjae hasn’t had the heart to come near.

“What is happening?” Haruki asks, suddenly, and tries to land a smile. He blinks a lot and then not enough looking up at Hanjae. “Down. Down there.”

“Nothing much.”

“How is he?”

“Haegon?” Hanjae asks, and Haruki nods at him loosely, mouths the name without making a sound: ‘Haegon’. “He– Uh, he seems alright.”

“Great couple, yes or no? For our maknae, is she great?”

“I– I don’t know.”

Disappointment flashes vividly through Haruki’s face, and it lands on a sad shagrin. “You don’t know,” he says, to himself, and goes back to emptying his bag with a slouch to his shoulders.

‘Be normal’, Dylan had said that day, his only instructions: ‘Be nice.’

Hanjae lets go of the door and goes to sit in front of him, legs crossed like his are. “What’s it supposed to taste like? The drink.”

There’s no humor in Haruki when he says, “Acid.”

He offers a thermo bottle to Hanjae filled with the failed replica. Hanjae takes a tiny sip and can’t swallow it, feels like his tongue is on fire, and it makes Haruki huff a laugh. “More disgusting than that.”

He makes more combinations that demand more tasting, and Hanjae at times struggles, at times doesn’t – Haruki empties a Soju bottle and refills it with Somaek, calls it ‘Hanjae’s palette cleanser’. He also makes Hanjae go downstairs to grab things they don’t have: more cups, ice and fruit juice, if Sunyoung has any, which she does – too many options.

Hanjae comes back from the trip and sets all his findings at Haruki’s feet, then feels weird about it, exposed about it, and pushes some of it closer to himself.

The bottle opener, they notice a minute later, has disappeared. Hanjae thinks he took it with him to the kitchen and abandoned it on the counter. Worry not, Haruki says; worry not!, because he knows how to open them with his front teeth. It’s a hidden skill, a secret talent.

Haruki asks him to hold a bottle close to his face so he can prove it, and Hanjae does so, but it’s a frail grip, not good. Haruki puts a hand over his to make it steadier, makes it worse. Another hand, a shove closer until their knees are touching. Hanjae adds his free hand into the pile, the lonely hand, and Haruki looks straight at him – looks like he’s saying, ‘Bet?’

It takes a second, really. A pop and the lid comes off in the company of an enormous foam eruption. Haruki gets both his hands away, does a smiley flourish: ‘ta-da!’

“But you shook it! Too much, you–!’ He laughs, and can’t stop laughing. Hanjae’s still holding the bottle and tries to hand it to him, but Haruki shakes his head ‘no’. “For you. It is for you.”

It’s bland beer, he takes notice when he drinks it, but somehow it tastes sweeter.

From the corner of his eyes he catches a glimpse of metal in a corner, and it’s Haruki’s new phone, exiled.

Hanjae is surprised to hear himself ask him, “Are the calls– the calls still coming? The ones from–”

“Always,” Haruki responds, eerily nonchalant. “Always will.”

“It’s not over, then? You still–”

“It is. It is over. It is over the way it can be over.”

“What wouldhe,” Hanjae closes his eyes, reiterates, “If it’s over, what would he still want with you?”

“What do you think,” Haruki asks, staring fixedly at the alcohol going from one bottle to the other. A bit of it it’s running straight to the floor. “What do you think people want with me?”

It’s said– weird. Something in his uncaring tone makes a lump of sadness form in Hanjae’s throat.

“Hyung, you know that, if you everneed to talk to anyone about anything. Me and the guys, we all– We all listen. We would listen.”

“Anything?” Haruki pretends to be impressed. “Big. That is big.”

“Seriously. I’m being serious.”

Haruki looks up at him. Even more alcohol spills to the floor.

“Okay. Okay, anything. Anything…” he hums, dropping the bottles, mimicking being in thought with an obnoxious pout. His mouth is now a purple dot, and his eyes a shiny brown daze...

Hanjae often catches himself wondering if he just knows. If he looks into a mirror and just knows that he’s beautiful in a way that looks hand drawn, that looks meticulously planned: a subject of equal envy and admiration. If Sangwon ever told him that, and if so, how many times, had it come close to enough, had he used the right words to say it, did Haruki believe him when he said it, or if he didn’t – what did it make him feel? What exactly did he make him feel?

Hanjae always thought he was so mean, so bitter. He can’t remember ever hearing him say anything nice to anyone about anything.

Hanjae’s staring, he’s realized, and his eyes hurt. He makes them look down to where Haruki’s got a firm hold around the slim of a bottleneck, tapping a weird rhythm into it, impossible to decipher. He has long fingers with hard skin on them, which isn’t something you would expect. He used to paint, used to do calligraphy; used to go to a prestigious arts academy during high school, all boys.

Hanjae’s still starring, and he’s too close to drunk to properly command himself to stop. He hears Haruki huffs an unheard laugh, suddenly, short and maybe frustrated, maybe not that, and Hanjae’s head snaps up to his face to meet it.

He’s being stared at, too – is being analyzed, too.

“I thought of something. Something I want to say, a thing,” Haruki announces. The grin on his face suddenly looks very, very sharp, like there’s something tugging the corners of his mouth up. “I will whisper to you. On your ear. ‘Gimme your ear and I will tell.”

And with that he comes forward, a sudden and ungracious movement, and doesn’t stop when they’re front to front, an inch apart. He climbs Hanjae up – actually climbs him up, his legs around the middle of his body, cageing him in.

Haruki grims again and it’s lazily, in slow motion. He puts a hand on Hanjae’s chin, tips it high, says, “Not your ear.”

He turns his head to the side. His nose rovers near Hanjae’s head, and Hanjae tries to escape it in reflex, but they’re all too slow, drowned in alcohol.

Into his ear, lips touching skin, Haruki says, “I know you like me. For a very long time. Since that one time. Ever since we went out, we got drunk, that one time.”

“Sorry,” Hanjae mutters, hushed.

“‘Sorry’,” Haruki laughs again, like that’s the funniest word there is, like it’s the meanest. It rings so loud, it has an echo. “Now you sorry?”

Hanjae sinks more into the floor, almost laying down, and Haruki follows, saying, “Are you going away? This close? I am this close, and you going away?”

They’re kissing before Hanjae fully processes how, and it’s a weird kiss at a weird angle; Haruki won’t bend his body all the way down, and Hanjae has to keep craning his neck to meet him midway, his elbows pressing against the tiles, hurting.

He feels a hand slide up his shirt almost immediately, and Hanjae understands, with drunken horror, that he’s being undressed – quickly.

“Ah, wait–” He says, and then can’t get out anything else: Haruki shoved a thumb inside his mouth, in between his teeth, as he goes for the spot where Hanjae’s shoulder and neck meet.

“You smell like home here,” he says, a goosebump. He buries his face there, opens his mouth above it, bites and sucks hard enough to make Hanjae jump – for him to know it’ll leave a pinkish mark, evidence–

It’s exactly then and there that someone bursts in through the door, says a curse loudly, startles the two of them slightly apart, knocks the air out of their lungs.

“Close your eyes! I need to pee right now, right now, close your eyes!”

It’s a tall woman, this one – Hanjae sees her quick rush to the toilet and closes his eyes tight shut.

“If any of you try to act funny and take a single peek, I’ll fucking castrate you both– Hey! Hey, you, back on the floor, don’t come near, I’m fucking serious, I’ll kill you, you fucking–!”

The door clicks shut, and it takes Hanjae a moment to take in the lack of heat above and around him, to correlate the two: Haruki’s gone, walked out, left him.

From the side, he hears an instrident, “Can you at least cover your fucking boner, dude?!”

Hanjae rolls to his side, facing the opposite wall to where the toilet is; he pushes his knuckles into his shut eyes, for good measure. He waits for the girl to finish peeing, and tries not to have an anxiety attack or a heart attack or a nerve attack about everything that happened in the last ten minutes: Haruki on top of him, Haruki no longer on top of him, having to hear a stranger peeing.

“I’m done,” she announces, and he turns back to the same position as before.

There’s little dots of light in his vision, dancing. The girl’s using the sink now, and she has a blonde bob, so blonde and so short. It follows the shape of her mouth and up, even shorter at the back.

“Not a word from you, ever,” she warns, drying her hands on her skirt, pushing it down more, back in place. She gives him a pointed glare that makes Hanjae look down at the state he’s in, at his busted open shirt, a single button in the middle holding it all together. “Not a word from me. Now get the fuck out, please. People need to use the bathroom.”

And she gets going too, without closing the door all the way. The hum of the party downstairs carries over.

Hanjae inhales, looking at the bright ceiling light. His fingers have gone pruney where they were holding him.

[…]

Eventually Hanjae has to get out of the suite, and do a walk of shame back to the housewarming party. He takes down with him all the glass and cups he can manage, not a lot of them, goes straight to the kitchen sink, and begins to wash them, it’s done with them, goes for all of Sunyoung and Yoorim’s dishes.

Around him, the kitchen has emptied out – on the front the living room, mostly emptied out, too, except for little clicks. He spots J.J right in the center of the one installed in the couch, gesticulating enthusiastically, telling someone some story until they make eye contact. He stops, excuses himself, rushes near.

Up close, Jiahang looks at him, up and down, bug eyed, and Hanjae understands he didn’t do a good job of piecing himself back together.

He got a glimpse of his face in the mirror before walking out: lips glossy, bangs far apart and sticking up, somehow, not all the buttons of his shirt tucked in the right cases.

“Hanjae, oh my God. Dylan, Dylan, look!” He calls out, and Hanjae sees Chihoon appear on his left, face slightly dazed. “Oh my God, Dylan! Hanjae!”

“You fucking animal!” Seungsoo, coming out of nowhere, slaps him on the chest hard. “Who? Who who who who?”

They’re all too close, too soon, and Hanjae can’t look anyone in the eyes for too long– he just can’t.

He catches a glimpse of Blonde Bob Piss Girl in a corner, looking bored, on her phone, and stares at her for a moment too long. Everyone follows, looks at her too, and his bandmates erupt into enthusiastic ‘Eeeeeeh!’s. Someone, proprably Seungsoo still, raises his soupy arm up so he can be given high fives, and Hanjae doesn’t know what to do – to let the lie linger or to kill it. What can he even say? What can he say if not that–

Hanjae finds himself grabbing Dylan’s sleeve and tugging at it, leaving behind a damp. He feels like a little kid that broke something, suddenly – overwhelmingly so. “Where ‘d Haruki go?”

“Dude, I didn’t see him. You sure?” Chihoon asks, and Hanjae’s not; he’s not sure.

“Whaaaaat? Haruki came? Haruki’s here?”

“Great. Another one to hunt down. We’re never gonna leave this fucking place in time,” Jiahang whines. “Yoorim noona’s going to delete my number.”

Hanjae asks all of them at once, “We’re leaving?”

“Yeah, you didn’t hear? Sunyoung and Haegon ditched,” Seungsoo says, and Hanjae’s stomach drops. “It’s her house and they ditched, disappeared, poof! Yoorim’s pissed, told everyone to leave. And Taeng’s freaking out! Someone broke his little vase, someone spilled something on him. I think he’s gonna snap. We need to get that freak home.”

“Shit.”

“Yes, Hanjae,” Seungsoo laughs. “Old man was right, after all… Shit.”

[...]

They do a small search around the apartment, the balcony, and conclude: no Haruki anywhere, so they group everyone they have to leave, go wait to be picked up on the sidewalk in front of the Nine One Hannam gates.

“You just dreamed him up, Hanhan! Wouldn’t be the first time,” Seungsoo jokes. It’s a bad joke. O.z shoves him in the chest hard about it, tells him, “Quiet.”

Hanjae looks straight ahead, not at them. In front of him J.J keeps bouncing on the wheel of his feet, saying, ‘I’m going in the front, I’m passenger seat, forget it, it’s me me me me,’ even though no one’s putting up a fight about it.

Minwoo pulls up soon enough on the curve in one of the two black company vans, and downs the window just to give them all an open scowl, then a frown. “I’m only seeing seven of you.”

J.J circles the car to get to the front door, struggles a little to get it open. “Hyung, you’re not gonna believe.”

“I don’t wanna hear it, Jiahang.”

“Shut up, you do. You really really really really do. You were–,” and then he becomes aware of the slouched figure of Hanjae trailing behind him, turns and frowns. “What did I just say!”

“No, I’m…” Hanjae looks at Minwoo looking at him, one eyebrow raised, says, “Sorry.”

Minwoo pinches at his nose, hard. “Just get in the goddamn car, Hanjae, Jesus Christ.”

Hanjae thinks, out of everyone who has a driver’s license, Minwoo drives the shittiest. He needs glasses, he never wears them, he grumbles curses at every slow driver and every rush driver and every driver, in general.

On the way home, he stops the van only once, by popular demand. Taesong steps out to vomit, and spends the rest of the ride jittery about it, cracking his knuckles even when they make no sound.

“We’re so fucked,” Chihoon says when they park inside the dorm’s garage, rubbing his eyes. “It’s 3AM. We’re so fucked.”

While everyone rushes to their rooms to piece pajamas together and form a long row to shower, Hanjae’s elbow to elbow with Dylan, going up the stairs to the second floor as quietly as they can.

He and Haruki have, by far, the best room in the whole house: spacious, with a nice window. It used to be Haruki and Sangwon’s up until he got fired – some excuse about rooming with the manager to learn Korean quicker, about making sure Haruki wouldn’t sneak beer into his room. It makes Hanjae sick now, seeing it, standing so close to it.

Dylan tries the handle once, and the door doesn’t budge, only makes a stubborn click – locked.

Hanjae dries his hand on his jeans, still wet, somehow, asks him, “Is he– He’s in there? Or…?”

Chihoon rests his head against the mahogany and sort of sighs, sort of laughs. “Yeah, definitely home. He’s the only one with the key to lock me out. Classic. Just classic.”

“Get my bed,” Hanjae says – implores. “Use mine, you can– mine, I’ll couch.”

“You’ll couch?” Chihoon looks at him with the trembling smile of someone who’s about to laugh. It falls off his face quickly when he takes in the guilt Hanjae knows he’s wearing openly on his face.

“Hyung, I–” It’s out of his mouth before Hanjae even knows it. “Tonight, something – Something has happened, and I think, think I should– say.”

Dylan’s giving him an analytical once over, and he stops at his moving hands, on his marked neck, looks at the door again – locked.

“Hanjae,” he says his name like it’s an insult, and for a moment Hanjae feels like it really is – his name, an insult.

He crumbles. “I’m sorry, so, so sorry, we just– I didn’t mean to– It was just, just a kiss, I think, and I– I–”

“You kissed him?! ‘You think’? What does that mean? What do you mean ‘you think’?!”

Hanjae looks around and then down, behind him. “Dylan…” he manages, airy, and doesn’t know what he wants the rest of the phrase to be, where he’s trying to take it.

Chihoon’s mouth hangs open, a painful disbelief, and then slowly shuts.

“You know what,” he says harshly, but not angrily – he sounds more disappointed than anything, more tired than anything. “I don’t want to know. Not now. I’ll know, just– Not now. But fucking Hell, Hanjae, you. You just had to, didn’t you? You saw an opportunity and you just had to.”

Hanjae’s breath catches. Dylan is a figure in his eyes, growing blurry.

“I’m taking your bed,” he announces. ”Eveytime he kicks me out from this day on, I’m sleeping on your bed.”

He storms off, his bare feet on the floor a sound until it isn’t anymore.

Hanjae knocks on the door, a small tap. Nothing.

He thinks of saying it again: sorry. But no one’s around to hear it, no one’s around to accept it. There’s no point.

#fictional idol community #fake kpop group #kpop au #kpop fanfic #kpop oc #&& ⠀ [ . . . ] hound on a hunt ⠀⸻ writing .#&& ⠀ [ . . . ] hound on a hunt ⠀⸻ haruki .#&& ⠀ [ . . . ] hound on a hunt ⠀⸻ hanjae .#&& ⠀ [ . . . ] hound on a hunt ⠀⸻ dylan .

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adayinflash · 4 months ago

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Until These Strings Can Sing

TWs: Gore, implied kidnapping, implied murder

(I'm so so so sorry for writing a piece like this after Dashing Upon the Rocks, I was listening to Long Awaited Journey by Alon Mor and that album makes me wanna write Nasty shit)

The world fades out, leaving nothing but a blank expanse any further than an arm’s reach away. Fingers quaking with two hours exertion, rosin permeated sweat burning my eyes, my bow’s hair frayed and frizzled, I strike the final note of my solo, my aria. As the echoes reverberate and fade, the myriad echoes of applause and cheering fill the space left behind. Under the blinding lights that make me sweat through the undershirt protecting my suit, I take a bow, a second, a third, in each direction, before striding off stage.

As the audience begins to stand and file out of their aisles, I fall into an unfortunately poorly padded chair, the fatigue washing over me all at once now that I’m away from prying eyes. The only eyes watching me are those of the venue staff, who, bar the two budding musicians who were assigned to me, are too busy preparing for tomorrow’s symphony to pay me any mind. The two child prodigies, who each seek to one day surpass me, look me up and down, with respect, even if they aren’t awed by my presence, and the elder of the two hands me a bottle of water while the younger prepares my violin’s case.

A singer went missing last week. Last known whereabouts place her in the car ride home from her last show. A mezzo-soprano with vocal chords and a diaphragm molded since childhood to produce the most beautiful music known to man. Sporting one of the largest vocal ranges ever recorded, her official designation as a mezzo was often ignored so she could be placed in other roles, as only the finest gowns, those made for the opera’s lead, would be worthy of serving as the frame to hold an aria sung by her.

I was invited to one of her recent performances. I joined her backstage after the show, and though she was under strict vocal rest, in preparation for her next showing, she was very kind and warm, her manager explaining how a duet between us had been on her bucket list for many years now. We both recognized the difficulty of setting up such an arrangement, however, so we settled on her coming out to see one of my recitals down the line, once she had gotten free from her current obligations, though we never managed to see that through.

Instead, the last showing of Götterdämmerung would become the last performance of her life, though by no means the last time her voice would be heard. With a scalpel in one hand and forceps in the other, from her throat I pull out the strings that let her voice fly so beautifully across the concert hall, and place them in a jar of saline solution. The strands vibrate and writhe, as if trying to emit a final scream, knowing how they will be corrupted from their original form.

Removing the excess tissue from the strands takes two days, and braiding sets of three strands into strings tight enough to cut glass takes a week more. Each string is tensioned across a steel frame before being dried in the sun for nearly a month. Only six strings survived the drying process, the rest snapping as the gradual dehydration induced cracks.

I remove the steel strings from the tuning pegs and begin to tighten the strings that shine ever so slightly crimson, when they catch the light just right. It seems that she and I will get to play a duet together after all, her voice intertwined with every note I play.

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girlbowser · 1 year ago

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Unpopular HS opinion I have - Cascade sucks.

It's not that Cascade sucks *as a piece of art.* It's fantastic. But as a story continuer? It very poorly communicates information, it "ties up" loose ends without giving the viewer enough time to process it emotionally (as compared to the End Of Act 4 flash, where there are additional panels prior to the start of Act 5, that summarize the emotional state of everyone involved), and most importantly, it prepares the reader for the immediate next bit Almost Not At All.

Like, the fact that Hussie had to essentially lampshade the fact that there was no plan for the Beta Kids / trolls following Cascade in-universe? That's telling, IMO.

It feels like the plan was "get to cascade get to cascade get to cascade" and in that regard, it's very good. But it left the first intermissions almost nothing to work with. The first Jade John intermission with the bucket is awful. And the worst part is that it's not spent on coming down from the climax of Cascade, there's no falling tension -- instead, it turns what Should essentially be aftercare for the readers into MORE RISING TENSION, to build up Act 6.

No WONDER people felt like they weren't jiving with Act 6. Hussie did a poor job of managing the buildup!!!!

100 Homestuck asks!

Remember it’s good etiquette to send an ask to the person you’re reblogging from!

When did you first get into Homestuck?

How quickly did you finish reading the comic?

How many times have you read HS?

Ever made your own chumhandle?

Ever made a trollsona?

Ever made a kidsona?

Ever cosplayed a HS character?

Ever bought HS merch?

Ever made an MSPFA?

Ever drank Faygo?

Favorite Alpha kid?

Favorite Alpha troll?

Favorite Alpha character overall?

Least favorite Alpha kid?

Least favorite Alpha troll?

Least favorite Alpha character overall?

Favorite Beta kid?

Favorite Beta troll?

Favorite Beta character overall?

Least favorite Beta kid?

Least favorite Beta troll?

Least favorite Beta character overall?

Favorite guardian?

Least favorite guardian?

Favorite Alternian ancestor?

Least favorite Alternian ancestor?

Favorite carapacian?

Least favorite carapacian?

Favorite Friendsim character?

Least favorite Friendsim character?

Favorite sprite?

Least favorite sprite?

Favorite pale ship?

Favorite pitch ship?

Favorite flushed ship?

Favorite ashen ship?

Favorite vacillating ship?

OTP?

NOTP?

BROTP?

Character you’d choose to be your moirail?

Character you’d choose to be your kismesis?

Character you’d choose to be your matesprit?

Character you’d choose to be your auspistice?

Character you’d vacillate quadrants with?

Character you’d be best friends with?

Patron troll? Are you happy with them?

Zodiac troll? Are you happy with them?

One character you didn’t like at first, but like now?

One character you liked at first, but don’t like now?

One ship you didn’t like at first, but like now?

One ship you liked at first, but don’t like now?

Alpha kids or Beta kids?

Alpha trolls or Beta trolls?

Beforus or Alternia?

Derse or Prospit?

The Felt or The Midnight Crew?

Grimdark or Crocker Tier?

Red team or blue team?

Meat or candy?

Trolls, humans, carapaces, or cherubs?

Have you played Hiveswap? Do you like it?

Have you played Friendsim? Do you like it?

Have you played Pesterquest? Do you like it?

Have you read the Epilogues? Do you like them?

Have you read HS2? Do you like it?

Have you read SBAHJ? Do you like it?

Classpect you identify with currently?

Classpects you’ve identified with before?

Do you like your God Tier outfit?

Ship headcanons?

Character headcanons?

Meteor trip headcanons?

Earth C headcanons?

Do you like bloodswaps? Do you have a favorite?

Do you like kidswaps? Do you have a favorite?

Do you like speciesswaps? Do you have a favorite?

Do you use quadrants IRL?

Do you like celebrating 4/13?

Do you use Pesterchum, MxRP, CheRP, or other HSRP platforms?

Favorite Homestuck act?

Favorite Homestuck moment?

Favorite Homestuck panel?

Favorite Homestuck flash?

Favorite Homestuck soundtrack?

Favorite Broadway Homestuck song?

Favorite Homestuck fansong?

Favorite Homestuck fics?

Favorite Homestuck fanartists?

Favorite Homestuck AU? Demonstuck, Kingdomstuck, etc.?

Favorite hemocaste?

Favorite typing quirk?

Favorite MSPFA?

What would your strife specibus be?

What would your planet be?

What would your lusus be?

What caste do you feel you’d belong to, regardless of your zodiac?

What characters do you relate most to?

One unpopular HS opinion you have?

One popular HS opinion you agree with?

#homestuck #hs meta #unpopular opinion #cascade

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insidiousclouds-2 · 4 years ago

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Note to self, prepare an entire month in advance if you're going to do an October challenge.

#skel.config #i am very sorry i havent been able to do anything for skeletober like i promised #i wanted to make a deal with myself that i was capable of achieving a month long goal of a series of artworks #unfortunately i overestimated myself and neglected my mental health #i prepared poorly and i had awful time managment #i did draw a few things i was proud of #but i do need to be able to plan ahead for future things and take into account that i need to take care of myself #motivation is a fickle thing and doesn't come easy #i have been attempting to be more consistent with medication and self care but theres always something to forget #i will draw when i can and what i can #in the mean time #im just going to focus on commissions and my personal health #it really cant go on like this anymore.#i need to be able to promise something... and have it actually come true.#im tired of empty promises #vent #tags vent #skel.txt

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phantasmalnightmare · 10 months ago

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"Alas, I was not hoping for that to not be the reason." Gundham tried to sound mysterious, but internally, he was horrified that he hadn't picked up on the subtle nuance. He didn't want Sonia to think poorly of his intelligence, but he did tend to be a bit of a himbo with stuff like this. The way she picked at every minute detail and was able to interpret their secret meetings with a keen eye, only made him that much more in awe of her. It only made him love her even more, if that was possible. It didn't surprise him then either, when she confidently answered his qualms about the plank. Of course she'd looked into it herself, long ago.

The breeder blinked, not expecting the burst of genuine laughter that exploded from her. He couldn't help but chuckle as well in response, something he hadn't done since he'd woken up. "W-well.." He finally managed to get out. "I would not know what a romantic embrace is like... Not many are immune to my poison." It was only a half truth, his cheeks flushing as he thought back to the moment he'd first seen her after he'd awoken from his pod. The embrace he'd given her then had been one of pure desperation, that he'd never let her go again.

He didn't know how long he could go on, hiding his feelings. Not that he thought he'd ever have the courage to confess to Sonia either, but he'd already held her hand tonight. This really, felt like a date, and beyond that, it had been so comfortable. They'd gone out on a few outings together before their days as remnants, and he'd always been at ease around her, despite his mistrust of others. He felt like he didn't deserve that type of companionship after what he'd done though. Besides, he didn't trust that he couldn't fall back into despair someday. He'd only just managed to hang on to enough of his humanity to push her away during those times: The one he didn't want to hurt most of all. If he fell back into his old habits, would he have the willpower to do it again?

"It is the same for me. There are gaps in my memory. I am.. not sure if I wish to remember more." He knew that there would be good memories that would someday return to him, but they would likely be bittersweet. Any loved ones he'd had were long gone, some taken by Gundham's own hand. He smiled in a wan manner as they exited the building. "Those do sound like the types of tomes that you would peruse." They all fit her to a tee. He couldn't help but notice how much she enjoyed romance, and he hoped that someday a prince charming would come and sweep her off her feet like she surely wanted, but the thought made envy rear it's ugly head.

"I enjoy true crime, mysteries, paranormal, and fantasy. Fuhahaha!" There was typically romance in the fantasy too, and while that wasn't his main focal point, he did enjoy it as well. He didn't want to admit it though. "I quite enjoy dark stories as well. My Favorite series is 'Cirque Du Freak'." Gundham let out a breathe he didn't realize he'd been holding, after the former Princess accepted his invitation to dinner. It was late, but he knew if she'd said no, part of him would have felt like he did something wrong.

"Not a problem. You needn't do any of the preparation." He headed to the restaurant, and from there, entered the kitchen, turning on the lights as he went. He hoped no one else noticed that they were there. He had no desire for anyone to interrupt their "date", just as much as he didn't want to get roped into cooking for a third person. He peeked into the fridge, as well as the cabinets, taking a mental inventory of which ingredients were available. There was pasta, a good selection of veggies, chicken and steak, broth, potatoes.. "Is there anything that you are in the mood for? I educated myself on how to create a variety of dishes. My mother.." His throat tightened painfully as he paused. He hadn't spoken of her since he'd woken up either. "She poisoned me quite often with her concoctions.. So I acclimated quite quickly."

Well, shit. She'd only intended to attempt to diffuse the attention, taking a combined practical yet heartfelt approach about the fictional intimacy onscreen. Instead, she'd unintentionally spoiled the movie for him. Sonia's eyes widened, horrified at her own actions, and she felt her cheeks grow warm at his response. "Goodness, I really am sorry," She apologized quietly, not wanting to talk over the chaos unfurling in the film. By now, the ship had hit the iceberg and the first class passengers were under the assumption they'd be permitted back into their cabins shortly. "It is just that, in the beginning of the film, she is introduced as 'Mrs. Calvert,' I thought it must be intuitive." Even if it hadn't been a repeat viewing of the film for Sonia, these were the sorts of details she kept track of in movies. So when the masked killer in a horror movie or the culprit in a murder mystery were unveiled, she was often close, if not right on the mark with her guesses. Romance movies didn't offer quite the same amount of deduction, but she still tried not to ignore the little details present.

She wasn't about to confirm that sex could be beautiful. It had been once for her, before she'd even stepped foot upon the campus of Hope's Peak Academy. Growing up quickly was part of being royal, physical intimacy included: and yet she hadn't found herself engaged in such pursuits again until her time as a Remnant. Memories she wished she could forget and hadn't managed to, no matter how hard she tried. She couldn't remember all the names and faces she'd debauched, tortured, abused, and often killed in her quest for manipulation, fulfilling her sexual appetite, and despair. The ones she did were the ones she'd clearly hurt the most, Kazuichi amongst them.

She grimaced beside Gundham, not at the people making a jump for their lives off the side of the ship and Jack and Rose swimming towards a floating door, but at her own acts of brutality. People praying for their lives on-screen hadn't exactly helped: some of her victims had done the same before they'd died at her hand, or by those who eagerly followed her orders. "No, there is not," She confirmed to him, just as Rose let go. "Though I think I read once that plenty of experts tried to test the theory using people of similar builds on a similar plank of wood: it failed every time."

Even despite the ending, tossing the necklace overboard before greeting everyone who had died in the disaster in heaven, it had been a depressing choice of a film: a historical disaster within the frame of a doomed love story. Something she thought Gundham had been aware of when he'd picked it out, but instead as the credits rolled, her hand still clasped in his, Sonia could only stare before doing something she hadn't done in months, perhaps years.

She laughed. Truly laughed, at his assumption as to what the film had been about by cover alone. "An embrace...like that?" She said, the corners of her eyes crinkling as she tried to utter her words through giggles. "But that is a romantic embrace if there ever was one!" He'd let her hand go in the process, and she brought it to her mouth to stifle some of the residual laughter in an attempt to settle down. "I have never had a brother, but I certainly would not expect one to hold me like that, like he has searched his entire life for me and, despite the hardship they have faced and what lies ahead, he refuses to let me go." That was the sort of romance she'd once dreamed of and believed she deserved. Times, unfortunately, had changed.

She followed after him, gathering her own garbage and tossing it into the proper bin. It was a relief to be off the romance topic, if just for a little while: it was becoming difficult, to even speak of it in an abstract sense, or between two fictional characters, and not look into his multi-colored eyes, study the scars on his face, and still see something of the boy she'd met at Hope's Peak, with his army of hamsters and a kind disposition to all animals, even the ones many found frightening. She vaguely remembered him bringing a live bear to class once, showing his classmates how it mimicked his every pose and followed his every command. He'd been so darkly charming then, she'd gone tongue-tied in his presence. A rarity for her at the time.

"I am not sure how it is for you," She replied, wiping the last of the popcorn residue from her fingers into a napkin before depositing it into the garbage too. "But the Neo World Program supplemented some memories I had forgotten and overlooked others. There's things I want to recall but cannot, and then there are things like film trivia, which comes to me the more I watch the available movies and read the available books in the library. I think that is why I do it, to test the capabilities of my memory after everything."

One of them, anyway: the other was far more obvious. So she didn't have to focus entirely on her activities as a remnant. Without fictional stories to focus on and liquor to drink, she'd be in a constant state of nightmares, asleep and awake. "What novels do I enjoy?" She repeated, as if he'd asked her to choose a singular chocolate truffle in a dessert buffet. "Plenty really, sometimes whatever I can get my hands on. I like a puzzle I might unravel in a good mystery provided it does not resurrect things I would like to forget, but otherwise I have always enjoyed gothic novels, and gothic romance. Otherworldly adventures with a love story: those always took me away from a royal castle and into another sort of castle entirely. Haunted, by ghosts, secrets, and regrets. What about you?" An embarrassing question to be asking the person she'd been hopelessly in love with for years: she couldn't even remember what sort of books he'd liked. Something that would have been terribly important for the Sonia before The Tragedy to know. "What do you like to read?"

She'd laughed, she spoke easily and openly when she hadn't done so in weeks, maybe even months, since she'd awakened from the program. It was both the strangest thing and yet the most natural, leaving the theater and walking beside him. As if they'd been to plenty of films together before joining Ultimate Despair, and they were simply picking up on where they'd left off. Even the night didn't feel quite as daunting: not as humid, not as a gloomy reminder that she'd soon need to sleep and be beholden to whatever horrible memory her brain decided to replay for her in vivid shades of red, the all-too-familiar copper scent, and the sounds of screams.

"The restaurant?" She repeated. She knew exactly what he'd meant, in the unique way he conveyed his thoughts and opinions. Sonia instead clarified it for herself: after a three hour film, she'd guessed he'd want to return to the animals, or his cabin, after what surely had been a long day for him. But Gundham had a point: all either of them had really eaten was popcorn, and her stomach rumbled at the thought of an actual meal. "Yes, I would like to eat something. But as you say, the dinner hours are over and our friends have found it fit to ban me from the kitchen. I kept wasting resources, as Hajime put it, after my fifth attempt at cooked fish. Fuyuhiko was sick for several days."

#more than a princess #☾✩☽ such is the will of casualty ic gundham tanaka #☾✩☽ verse: danganronpa---- post neo world program #//Gundham wants to remember more of their peaceful moments from before #but doesn't want to really remember anything else #chef Gundham is in the house #Time for romantic homecooked meal~

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jangofctts · 3 years ago

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Hello, ex fic writer again! Apologies for using your askbox as an Adrian ficdump but he is so big, and so dumb, and I have a mighty NEED. (Also if the marker isnt already taken would you mind if I used the 🤖 ?)

It never really occurred to Adrian that while he might enjoy punishing criminals he might enjoy the idea of you doing the same to him.

It started when a customer got a little too friendly with you at Fennel Fields, you were a waitress there and you had a habit of attracting attention whether you liked it or not. It was easy to understand why, you were the most pretty girl in the restaurant in the world, and every time Adrian saw you he felt the air escape his lungs just that little bit more. You were way out of his league, but it didn’t mean that he couldn’t stare from afar and at least dream of a perfect life with you.

You were everything he wasn’t, you were mild-mannered, you always made sure to be as nice as possible even to the people who didn't deserve it, and he loved that about you, it's what made him obsessed with you in the first place. Even when the other co-workers pointed out his own flaws and lack of social skills you were quick to defend him, and damn it if he thought he couldn’t fall more in love you manage to prove him wrong every single day.

The problem, however, was that other men noticed you too.

While he hated when customers blatantly flirted with you he couldn’t do anything, you weren’t his, so all he could do is watch with jealousy as the third guy of the day writes his number on his receipt in hopes that you’ll call back. The one respite he managed to get was you taking the receipt and throwing it into the nearest bin the moment they left, without fail. Even if Adrian couldn’t have you, he was satisfied that no one else could either. Maybe it was a bit creepy, but the thought never crossed his mind as he watched you take another order, this time from an older man. He was slightly overweight, his hairline was receding and he tried to poorly cover it up with a bad comb-over.

He had, as Adrian called it, massive creep vibes.

You took his order as normal, and he guesses that the man made some awful pickup line because you seem to be getting more and more uncomfortable. Again, the creep tried to make a pass at you, but unlike the other times you tried to make it very clear that you weren’t interested, but he obviously wasn’t getting the hint. You tried letting him down gently, his sweet honey bee always trying to do the right thing, but that changed when he started getting handsy with you. As he watched the greasy mess of a man place his hands on your ass, Adrian was already drawing up locations where he could dump the body safely when you interrupted his thoughts and gave the stranger possibly the most embarrassing talking down to he’s ever seen. It was like a parent talking to a disobedient child, Adrian almost pitied him.

Almost.

The guy was clearly uncomfortable, not expecting you to say anything back, and you even managed to draw attention from the other customers before he left with his tail tucked between his legs. Adrian had never seen you angry before, but seeing you admonish the guy was probably definitely the hottest thing he’d ever seen. If you noticed how hard he was you never said anything about it, but for once he was grateful he was a busboy instead of a waiter because it would be more than a little difficult to hide his arousal from the public, and more importantly from you.

After that little public display you plagued his thoughts more than usual, the dark look in your eyes playing on repeat in his head all shift, the way confidence radiated off of you in waves as your fingers twitched in preparation to strike him, barely held back by your morality. The contrast between his adorable honey bee and the vengeful goddess he was blessed to witness sent him into a fucking spiral.

The moment he arrived home he practically ran to the bedroom with zero care towards the uniform he was currently shedding off of himself. Maybe if he was in a better mood he would have had the patience to throw his discarded clothes into the dirty laundry, but his dick was becoming uncomfortably tight in his boxers and he needed to solve it now. By the time Adrian made it to his bed he realized how desperately he needed to cum when just the feeling of taking his underwear off made him release a breath he didn't even know he was holding. As he relaxed into the soft sheets he imagined you, your pretty features, your voice, anything and everything his rattled brain could begin to focus on. It felt dirty, the idea of jerking off to someone who probably didn’t even know or care about his existence, but the moment his fingers began to squeeze at the base of his cock all care was thrown out the window.

He tried to keep some form of self-control, really he did, but he was fighting a losing battle as images of you played on repeat in his head. He imagined it was him that you were berating, your words cutting through him as his hand struggled to keep a slow rhythm, the slow grind of his hips betraying his urge to try to make his pleasure last as long as possible. He imagined how you’d look towering over him, those same darkened eyed leering at him while he waited patiently for you to touch him, hands at his sides and cock obscenely red and leaking. Maybe he was being punished, maybe he didn’t follow your orders and you were angry with him, his pleasure-driven brain was either too hyperactive to think or too fucked out to care as his hand picked up speed.

In the back of his mind he realized he was mumbling praises as if you were in the room with him, the walls listening in to his hopeless pleas as if by some miracle the universe would grace him with your presence.

He tried to imagine his hand was your own, how small it would feel around his cock? Would it be big enough to wrap around? It was probably softer than his own, you’d probably look down at him with those beautiful eyes, make him sit and watch as he became helpless to the gratification you gave him.

Maybe you’d make him beg for it first, wait until his cock turned as red as his uniform before you even entertained the idea of touching him. He felt himself get louder as a groan erupted past his lips, a line of pre-cum slowly falling down his shaft. Adrian knew his neighbors might probably complain but didn’t give a shit as he let every breathless moan escape his bruised lips. Was he biting them before? He could faintly taste copper and it only enhanced the blindingly hot sensations he felt as his free hand began to grasp at his hair, briefly imagining it was your own before he felt his eyes roll back at the thought. It eventually found its place gripping the bedsheets, knuckles white as he lost himself to his passion, his moaning damn near pornographic.

Scratch that, Adrian was definitely going to get a noise complaint tomorrow.

He looked like a mess, curly hair sticking out in all directions, drool slowly leaking from the side of his mouth, his face flushed a delicious shade of red while his hips danced to the rhythm of his hand with reckless abandon. It hurt to breathe, he even felt his hand begin to cramp as he fully surrendered himself to you, offering everything he could give, his body, his sanity, all to a version of you he knew he would never have. He looked pathetic, felt pathetic, but couldn’t bring himself to stop as a particularly hard twist of his hand left him whimpering, tears pooling at his eyes. Soon enough Adrian came with a strangled noise, eyes squeezing closed as he felt his tired hips move on their own, his cum making a mess of his stomach and thighs. He couldn’t even bring himself to care, his own breathing ragged and wheezing as the sheer force of his orgasm sent him to an early sleep. When he woke up he felt tired, in every sense of the word. He was dirty, his body ached, but even through all that he could only think of you.

“Fuck.” he thought to himself. He was seriously a grade A pervert now, jerking off to his own co-worker, but at the same time his shame was overshadowed by his newfound determination. He wasn’t satisfied with just being your co-worker, not anymore, he wanted you all to himself, would go as far as to say he needed you more than he needed air. For once Adrian was happy as he got cleaned up and ready to go to work, because now he had a new goal in life, to gain your affection. Even if it meant he couldn’t look you in the eyes for a week, much to your confusion.

hOLY SHIT BRO THIS IS SO FUCKIN DELICIOUS IM. i am sweATING AT WORK IM AGDKDHJE yOU HAVE BLESSED THE INBOX IM. gOd the thought of adrian just loosing it over you fuCk this is sinful and immaculate

#HOLY SHIT #also yUh feel free to be 🤖!!#ask #keida answers #adrian chase x reader #vigilante x reader

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machineheralds-ho · 3 years ago

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If you're still taking requests - Viktor with an SO who likes to leave him cute little notes (and also some spicy ones from time to time) in his books, journals etc.

A/N: aw cute i love this. hope you enjoy!

warnings: slightly nsfw

The notes first began a few months into your friendship.

She was Professor Heimerdinger’s new assistant - a role that Viktor was prepared to give up in the wake of his and Jayce’s work taking up most of his days. As such, she would dip into the lab every so often.

Heimerdinger had feigned this as his assistant learning from his top two students. Viktor saw it as a poorly concealed way of Heimerdinger keeping an eye on him and Jayce.

His anger soon simmered upon getting to know his replacement - you. You were kind and intelligent, and cheeky in ways that had even Jayce barking with laughter on occasion. You were the sun, Viktor decided, and he enjoyed basking in your rays.

The notes began fairly innocently and, as stated, a few months into your friendship. The first of them was a reminder to sleep taped to his desktop. Beneath the words had been a very crude drawing of Viktor asleep in his desk chair, his hair wild atop his head.

He had snatched the note and crumpled it into his pocket before Jayce could see it, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

The notes continued, along with your friendship, which grew behind the confines of the lab.

You were a force of nature, and Viktor could tell from the confident quirk of your mouth and the slide in your gaze, and you were well aware of Viktor’s affections for you. And yet… he was not fearful, because in your own lingering touches and undivided attention, he knew he was not alone in his want.

One day - the day after he had first kissed you, lit by the dim low of the lab - he finds a small sticky note pressed into the first page of his journal.

Did you hear about the two red blood cells that fell in love? It was all in-vein.

His ears turn pink, and he doesn’t hear Jayce calling him, but it’s all worth when he sees you that afternoon and kisses the cheeky smile from your face. ‘You liked that?’ You ask him, smile like the sun. ‘I’ve got way more where that came from, Viktor’.

At least twice a week, Viktor will find an anecdote or joke lodged into his notebook, or whatever book he happened to be reading at that time. Viktor was not sure how, but on the occasions that you would sleep at in his rooms, he would find a new note inside the pages of the book on his bedside table – the very next day.

You were a mage, he was sure.

One day, after a particularly warm night with you, you had slipped into the lab with a steaming cup of coffee each, for Viktor and Jayce. Viktor had looked at you, remembering the feel of his lips on your neck, and your hands on his skin.

He warms at the sight of you.

Then, when Jayce’s back is turned, you slip something from your pocket and proceed to walk up to Viktor, so close that he could count your freckles, and slap a sticky note onto his chest.

You wait until the exact moment he blinks and pulls the note away from his chest, his eyes widening, before you smile brightly, turn sharply, and begin asking Jayce questions about the Hexcore.

Viktor stares at the words in front of him, cheeks red and trousers a little tight.

I can still feel you today.

That night, he huffs at you for making him so flustered at work, before pushing his cane aside and showing you exactly how riled up your note has got him, right up against the wall outside of his room. He is quite pleased that he manages to bring you to orgasm without even taking you to his bed.

The notes continue, on and on. Reminders to eat, to sleep, to take breaks from work. Sometimes, they will be finished sentences in bickers cut short, or distractingly not lab appropriate memos that that he can only let go of once he has left the lab to find you.

He never tells you, but he saves them; the little notes. They turn, gradually, into piles of these sneaky notes, tucked neatly into his bedside table. The older ones curl in on themselves, their stickiness long gone, but he treasures them all the same.

There is a day, he thinks, when he will show them to you; these little trinkets of the timeline of your love for him.

But not today.

Not yet.

#viktor arcane #viktor #viktor x reader #viktor x oc #arcane #arcane viktor #ask #prompt #request #oneshit #reader

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criminalmindzjunkie · 4 years ago

Text

Love Sick

Masterlist

Summary: A story about how Spencer’s worst decision ever somehow ends up being his best.

A/N: Happy Valentine’s Day, my loves! This fic is loosely based on a request I got about Spencer faking an illness to keep the reader from going on a date.

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Fem!Reader

Content Warning: swearing

Word Count: 4k

Spencer has done a terrible, awful thing.

He wants to argue that he doesn’t know what came over him, but that would be untrue and he’s already met today’s quota on little white lies. Spencer knows exactly what possessed him to call you up at seven thirty on a Saturday night, and it wasn’t so that the two of you could discuss the weather or the recent upward trend in the stock market. Spencer’s spontaneous (panicked) phone call to you was a brazen attempt to abate the green-eyed monster that had been whispering dreadful things in his ear for the better part of a week.

To put it simply; Spencer is jealous, and he’s dealing with it rather poorly.

So poorly that he’s resorted to sabotage.

As he sits on his couch and worries at a hole in the bottom of his designated lounging sweatshirt, Spencer attempts to justify his actions. His tiny fib won’t hurt anyone . . . except, perhaps, one annoyingly perfect and stupidly handsome veterinarian. But Spencer can live with that. Potentially scorning an animal care specialist isn’t the thing that has his stomach in knots. That, he can live with. Spencer doesn’t even have pets, so there’s no longterm consequences as far as the vet is concerned. The notion of lying to you, on the other hand?

Spencer is positively sick with nerves.

He’s not sure why. Spencer’s gotten rather good at lying to you. Several months of pining for you from across the hallway of your shared apartment complex has turned him into quite the master of deceit, after all. He was a sucker from the moment he opened his door and lay his eyes on you, arms outstretched and wielding a plate of homemade sweets. The cookies were lovely, but the breathtaking smile on your face is what really did him in.

Since that first day, Spencer’s gone out of his way to ensure that he’s on the receiving end of that smile as often as possible. His efforts are never in vain; for reasons unbeknownst to him, you seem to enjoy spending time with him just as much as he did you. This mutual fondness results in most of Spencer’s off days being spent in your company. Spencer was certain that, with time, he would work up the nerve to ask you out on a date. He’s halfway to convincing himself that you might even say yes when your cat makes the unfortunate decision to steal a brownie from your plate and gulp the whole thing down.

Enter, aforementioned veterinarian.

The sound of your door opening from across the hall has Spencer breaking out into a cold sweat. His hand is halfway to his forehead, ready to wipe away the perspiration when he pauses. His body’s anxious reaction might just help him sell his story. Yes, Spencer thinks, this is a good thing. Authenticity, and all that.

Several soft footsteps are muffled by the door that separates him from you, and then his doorknob jiggles as you struggle to fit your key into the lock. A jolt of adrenaline surges through Spencer and in the blink of an eye he’s on his feet and sprinting to his bathroom in the name of authenticity. If he wants to keep up this ridiculous façade, and he really, really does, Spencer is prepared to fake it until he makes it. The alternative is far too mortifying. Failure is not an option.

Spencer cringes when he lifts his eyes to meet his reflection. He’s been told more than once that he’s an absolutely terrible liar, and the wide, guilty eyes that stare back at him confirm this. All it will take is one look at him and you’ll know something’s amiss. Perhaps it isn’t too late for Spencer to come clean. It would be embarrassing, yeah, but no less embarrassing than it would be an hour from now when you call him on his shit. But then again, there is always the possibility that you will get angry with him and leave, and Spencer isn’t willing to risk you walking away from him. Not tonight.

Spencer barely has the time to splash some cold water on his face and dive to the bathroom floor before you’re pushing open the door to his apartment and calling out his name. His brain, the part that isn’t rendered useless in his panicked state, reminds him of just how many germs can be found on the average bathroom floor. It’s enough to make him pause, but only for a moment. He takes a deep breath before slumping over against the toilet.

Showtime.

“M’ in here,” Spencer calls out in his croakiest voice. It comes out exactly as he intended, all rough and pitiful. Maybe he can pull this off, after all.

The soft pitter patter of your bare feet makes his heart rate increase exponentially. Spencer steels himself, recites a reassuring mantra in his head. I can do this; I can do this.

Spencer’s poor, overworked heart gets a much-needed rest when you step into the doorway. In fact, he’s almost certain it stops completely at the sight of you in a tiny red dress. A tiny red dress that leaves very little to the imagination. Spencer can’t even see past his mounting panic to enjoy the way you look. That damn red dress serves as a brutal reminder of why he’s sitting in his bathroom floor, clutching his toilet bowl and damn near drowning in a nervous sweat.

The thing is, Spencer hadn’t intended on sabotaging your date with the vet. He had every intention of staying in, wallowing in his sorrows and waiting up for you. Spencer even said this to Derek, who was kind enough to call him and remind him of how big of a jackass he was. Spencer didn’t need the reminder. He was well aware.

But then Derek said something that made Spencer’s blood run cold.

“And what exactly do you plan to do if she doesn’t come home?”

So, really, it’s Derek’s fault that Spencer promptly ended the call and dialed your number. It’s also Derek’s fault that Spencer is about to give the most convincing performance of his entire fucking life.

“I’m sorry I called you, but I didn’t know what else to do. I just feel so awful.” And he does feel awful, just not in the way you think.

You’re quick to close the distance between the two of you, dropping to your knees and brushing stray pieces of hair away from Spencer’s clammy forehead. His skin sings where your hand grazes it. If he didn’t have a fever before, he will if you don’t stop touching him.

“Don’t ever apologize, Spence. I wish you’d have called me sooner,” you murmur. Warm, concerned eyes drag across Spencer’s bedraggled appearance. “How long have you been feeling sick?”

Spencer gulps. “A few hours, I guess. I ate my leftovers from last night for lunch. Maybe that’s what’s wrong.”Lies, lies, lies!

Your brow furrows. “That’s strange. I ate mine, too, and I feel fine.”

Spencer doesn’t really have an argument for that, so he fakes a pained groan and rests his head against his arm. He closes his eyes and prays the intro to theater class he took in high school will pay off.

You must deem his act convincing enough because you press a soft kiss to the top of his hair and stand. Spencer hears the sound of a cabinet opening, followed by the sound of running water.

The tender touch of your hand on his shoulder has him raising his head and looking up at you, inquisitive. You place a cold washrag to his forehead, and Spencer melts into the touch. It feels heavenly against his hot skin.

“Do you think you could manage to take a shower?” you prompt, earning a feeble nod from Spencer. He doesn’t even have to fake the way he trembles as you run the damp cloth down his neck. “I think I have some broccoli and cheddar soup at my apartment. I’ll go change and grab it while you shower.”

Elation spreads through Spencer, pouring from his heart until it reaches the very tips of his extremities. He can’t believe his scheme hasn’t blown up in his face already.

With the help of your outstretched hand, Spencer rises to his feet and braces himself against the shower door. You make no move to remove your hand from his, and that gives him the courage to ask his next question.

“What about your date?”

You shrug and an easy smile spreads across your face. Spencer feels faint. He blames it on his imaginary illness.

“Don’t worry about that. The only thing I’m concerned with right now is taking care of you.”

Spencer bites down hard on the flesh of his cheek to keep a smug grin at bay. This is a victory he’ll have to celebrate at a later date.

Spencer enters his living room, freshly showered and donned in clean pajamas, to the sound of your voice speaking quietly into your cellphone. He halts just before he enters his kitchen, straining to catch a snippet of your conversation. As he leans closer to the sound of your voice, Spencer halfheartedly chastises himself. First, he deceives you, now he’s resorting to eavesdropping. Rock, meet bottom.

He’s just about to wrench himself away and retreat to the couch, when:

“I really am sorry about cancelling, especially on such short notice.” A short stretch of silence follows. “Next Saturday? Oh. Um, yeah, I’ll let you know, okay?”

Spencer is very much like a popped balloon; the earlier feelings of elation leave him in a harsh gust. Next Saturday? He barely managed to derail this Saturday’s date! No way he could get away with it a second time.

In the midst of his inner turmoil, Spencer misses you exchanging goodbyes with the vet before collecting Spencer’s bowl of soup. He’s still standing there, absolutely crestfallen, when you round the corner. You nearly collide with his chest, narrowly avoiding it by skidding to a halt in front of him. Your eyes run up his frame, assessing him, until they rest on his face.

“You scared me, Spence,” you chuckle. You cock your head to the side. Spencer imagines his expression is none dissimilar to that of a disgruntled frog. “You feeling okay? You’re not going to puke again, are you?”

Honestly, he might. The idea of you rescheduling your date with the vet is about as vomit inducing as it gets.

“I’m fine,” Spencer says on an exhale. Funnily, it’s probably the biggest lie he’s told all day. “The shower helped.”

His delivery is flat, but you don’t seem to mind. You smile up at him, relieved, and Spencer’s chest aches.

“I was thinking you and I could watch a movie?” you offer, and Spencer nods his assent. He can’t fathom turning you down. Not when you’re wearing an old sweatshirt you stole from his closet and a pair of fuzzy socks with little hearts on them. The ache intensifies.

“What are we watching?”

You plop down on the couch and look at him expectantly. He follows in suit, settling in beside you.

“I was thinking that you could choose,” you murmur as you place the bowl in his hands. Spencer shoots a teasing smile your way as he raises the spoon to his mouth.

“You mean, you’re actually going to let me pick the movie? I should get sick more often.”

His cheek earns him an exaggerated roll of your eyes.

“Don’t know what you’re talking about,” you mutter. “You always pick the movie.”

He can count on one hand the amount of times he’s gotten to pick the movie.

Spencer is about to launch into an impassioned rebuttal when the feeling of your fingers scratching against his scalp renders him speechless. His eyes dart to your face as you concentrate on scrolling through the TV guide, seemingly unaware of the effect the simple act has on him. Meanwhile, Spencer’s brain is short-circuiting.

You begin to read off a list of potential movies to him, but Spencer barely hears you. He’s practically purring as you twirl his curls around lithe fingers, his eyes threatening to flutter closed as an intense feeling of euphoria washes over him. Maybe it’s because he’s touch starved, or maybe it’s because it’s been so long since someone just looked after him. Whatever it is, Spencer embraces it wholeheartedly.

“-heard it’s pretty good. So, what do you say, Spence?”

Spencer pulls himself back to the present, blinking lazily at you. You’re looking at him, expectant, and Spencer’s eyes flit to the TV. His eyes skim its contents, reading briefly about a movie in which some family moves into a haunted house.

His face breaks out into a grin and he nods, because Spencer’s known you long enough to recognize that watching a horror movie usually results in you pressed tightly to his side and clinging to his hand. He also knows that nine times out of ten, you choose to watch a horror movie over anything else. No wonder he always lets you choose.

And sure enough, not even ten minutes in, Spencer is ditching his bowl of soup and pulling you into his arms. Once you’ve draped a blanket around the two of you settled in, you glance up at him.

“How are you feeling, Spence?”

Spencer responds by saying that he’s suddenly feeling much better.

Spencer Reid - 1, Veterinarian – 0

Spencer’s not sure at which point he fell asleep. All he knows is that he certainly does not remember sprawling out across your body, nor does he remember tucking his head into the crook of your neck. But this is how he finds himself when the sun begins to pour in through his windows the next morning, and Spencer can’t bring himself to care about how he came to be there.

Spencer guesstimates that it’s no later than seven in the morning. You’re still fast asleep underneath him, your chest rising and falling rhythmically with every breath. It’s early, and it’s Sunday, and Spencer can’t think of a single reason to wake you. Instead, he snuggles in closer, because he’d be a fool not to enjoy this while it lasts.

Unfortunately, the shrill sound of Spencer’s ringing phone shatters the serenity. He prays that it won’t disturb you, that you’ll remain oblivious and continue to sleep, but that hope is shattered when you begin to shift underneath him. Spencer makes quick work of peeling himself off of you before dashing to his kitchen and snatching his phone off the table.

He’s prepared to verbally assault whoever has the audacity to defile the sanctity of lazy Sunday mornings when a quick peek into the living room finds you still fast asleep on his sofa. He smiles, soft and fond, before pressing the accept button and bringing the phone to his ear.

“Hello?”

“I was beginning to wonder if you were still alive.” Spencer’s smile transforms into a grimace. Apparently, Derek Morgan doesn’t believe in lie-ins. “I was preparing myself for a rescue mission.”

“It’s seven in the morning. I was asleep.”

Derek lets out a low whistle. “Who pissed in your Cheerios, Pretty Boy?”

“You, when you decided that it was acceptable to ring me before eight,” Spencer whisper shouts. He knows that he’s being touchy, to say the least, but who can blame him? Five minutes ago, he was cuddling with the most beautiful girl he’s ever had the privilege to lay eyes on. Now, he’s shooting the breeze with a colleague. Obviously, Spencer would prefer the former to the latter.

“Jesus, kid. I’m going to take a wild guess and say that girl of yours didn’t make it home, after all. You okay?”

The guilty feeling returns and Spencer cringes. “Uh, define ‘okay.’”

Derek curses on the other end of the line. “I’m sorry, kid. Try not to beat yourself up about it, okay? There’s plenty of fish in the sea, you’ve just gotta put yourself out there. How’s this; you and me will go out next weekend and bar hop. I’ll teach you some Derek Morgan tricks of the trade. Soon enough, you’ll have forgotten all about her.”

“I don’t know, that might be hard.” Spencer scratches the back of his neck. “She’s asleep on my couch right now.”

A long stretch of silence comes from the other end of the line, and Spencer thinks for a moment that the call dropped. Unfortunately, he isn’t that lucky. A booming laugh erupts from the speaker and makes him jump out of his skin.

“My man!” Derek laughs, incredulous. “I didn’t think you had it in you, I’ll be honest.”

“It’s not what you think-”

“How did you manage that? Did the Good Doctor make a grand romantic gesture? Damn, I really hate that I missed that.”

“No, there were no gestures. And it’s not-”

Derek cuts him off. Again. “How’d she take the news? I’m assuming she took it well, if she stayed the night.”

“I didn’t tell her anything!” Spencer spits out, frustrated. “I… I told her I was sick. She came over to take care of me, and we fell asleep on the couch.”

Spencer’s proclamation is met with another long silence.

“So, you sabotaged the date?”

Spencer winces. “I did not sabotage it. I just… manipulated the situation a little.”

“Oh, you certainly did,” Derek chuckles. “How did you pull that off? I’ve seen you try to lie. That shit is laughable.”

Spencer opens his mouth to defend himself, but the pitter patter of socked feet approaching him from behind has his mouth running dry.

“Yeah, Spencer. How did you pull that off?”

Spencer had been correct in his earlier assumptions. The inevitable moment in which you called him out on his shit has arrived, and it’s every bit as mortifying as he expected. So mortifying that he can practically feel the blood drain from his face. And the thing is that he knows he deserves whatever you’re about to throw his way… it’s just that the thought of you being angry with him kind of makes him want to cry. And that would only add to the mortification.

He turns around slowly, his body rigid, until he’s met with the adorably rumpled vision of you with your arms crossed and your hair sticking up in all directions.

Spencer’s never seen anything quite so mesmerizing, and it hurts because he knows he’s ruined everything. He’ll never get to watch another scary movie with you tucked neatly against his side, or wake up in your arms again. He’ll never get to kiss you.

And the worst of all; Spencer will never get to tell you how he really feels. It’s a crying shame, because he thinks he could have been really good at loving you.

“Hey, Derek, I gotta go.”

Spencer presses the end call button and immerses himself in what has to be the most awkward stand-off of all time. You stand there, arms crossed, head cocked to the side with one hip jutted out. Spencer isn’t sure how you manage to look intimidating and endearing at the same time. He supposes the fuzzy socks are to blame.

Minutes pass, but they feel like hours. Spencer is approximately three seconds away from dropping to his knees and groveling when you finally speak.

“You sabotaged my date.”

Spencer lets out a strangled laugh. Perhaps humor is the way to go? It couldn’t hurt to try. In his opinion, the situation couldn’t possibly get any worse. “I think sabotage is a strong word. I prefer the term obstruct.”

You let loose a laugh of your own, but this one holds no humor. “And I prefer keeping the company of people who don’t lie to me.” Okay, maybe it can get worse.

Spencer visibly deflates. It was a stupid idea. He’s never been a funny guy.

“I am so, so, so incredibly sorry.” Sorry for lying to you, that is. Spencer isn’t in the least bit apologetic for ruining your date. Given the chance, he’d do it again - in a more tactful way, of course. Preferably, in such a way that didn’t involve him laying in his bathroom floor.

Spencer attempts to take a step forward, only to be rooted to the spot when you fix him with a look. He’s not funny but he is smart – smart enough to know better than to push it.

“Why did you do it?”

Spencer was really hoping you wouldn’t ask that.

“I-I…”

Apparently, an eidetic memory doesn’t stand a chance when it comes to confrontations involving pretty girls. One quirk of an immaculately plucked eyebrow and Spencer loses the ability to recall a single word of the English language. It’s tragic, really.

“Spit it out, Spencer.”

“I didn’t want you to go on the date.” It’s like ripping off a band aid, the way the words tumble from his lips. It’s painless at first, but then the sting sets in when he realizes what he’s done.

Your lack of reaction doesn’t help. Your face remains passive, as if he didn’t just offer himself to you on a silver platter. Spencer squirms uncomfortably.

“Why didn’t you want me to go on the date?”

God, this is excruciating. You’re clearly out for blood, and the twinkle in your eye shows just how much you’re enjoying this. Spencer would have never taken you for a sadist.

“Because…” Spencer trails off and allows his eyes to drift closed. If he’s going to do this, he’s going to do it his way. With his eyes closed, because he can’t bear the thought of looking you in the eye when you reject him. “B-Because I like you. A lot.”

Spencer hasn’t had a lot of practice at being wrong. In fact, he’s spent the majority of his life being right. It seems the universe is making up for that now, because he can’t seem to get a single goddamn thing right today.

You laugh at him. You actually laugh in his face. Mortified doesn’t even begin to cover it.

“You like me.” It isn’t a question.

Spencer keeps his eyes shut tight.

“Y-Yeah.”

You know how they say if you take away one of a person’s senses, all of the others are heightened? Spencer couldn’t disagree more. In the midst of his despair, he’s completely unaware that you’ve crossed the room and are now standing directly in front of him until you speak again.

“Well, that’s rather unfortunate,” you sigh. Spencer inhales a sharp breath when he realizes you’re close enough to touch. Still, he keeps his eyes closed.

“Uh, why is that?”

Spencer nearly jumps out of his skin when your hand reaches up and caresses the side of his jaw.

“Because, Spencer,” you murmur, silky and sweet. “I was hoping you just might love me.”

Spencer’s eyes fly open and he’s greeted by a lazy, contented smile. It’s similar to the one that greeted him when he opened his front door on that very first day, but it’s better somehow. Later reflection will determine that it’s better because it’s the kind of smile reserved just for him. And that’s all he’s ever wanted, really.

“W-What?”

“You heard me.” You tilt your head up and rest your palm on Spencer’s chest. His heartbeat is erratic, thundering hard against his ribcage. He’d surely be embarrassed if he wasn’t about to faint from shock. “Do you love me, Spencer Reid?”

Spencer doesn’t even have to think twice.

“More than anything.”

“Good.” Your thumb brushes across the apple of his cheek, eliciting a full body shudder. “I was beginning to think you would never catch up.”

Spencer must be hallucinating. That, or this is all a dream and any second now his alarm is going to go off. He subtly pinches himself on the thigh to test the theory. You can imagine his surprise when nothing changes. He doesn’t wake up in a pile of his own drool, and now the skin on his thigh stings.

“You . . . You like me, too?”

You shake your head. “No, Spencer. I love you, too. Why do you think I bake you cookies and spend all of my free time in your apartment?”

“Because my couch is better than yours?” Spencer deadpans.

“I mean, that certainly doesn’t hurt. But it’s not the only reason.”

“What about the vet?” It must be his guilty conscious talking, because Spencer cannot conjure up any other reason he has for asking such a moronic question. He, personally, could not care less about the vet. Full offense intended.

“Cameron is a nice guy, sure,” you trail off. Spencer doesn’t miss the way your eyes drift down to his lips before returning to his eyes. “But he’s not really my type.”

“And what is your type, exactly?” A giddy grin finds its way to Spencer’s face. He’s notorious for being chronically clueless, but even the master of imperception himself can see where this is going.

You snort, and it’s adorable. “Liars, apparently.”

It’s impossible to determine who moves first, but that doesn’t really matter. What does matter is the end result of Spencer’s lips colliding with yours. It’s earth-shatteringly lovely; slow and sweet and tentative. There’s no rushing, no frantic fumbling of hands. Just the reverent drag of your lips against his, warm and intoxicating.

Spencer eventually regains the use of his limbs and when he does, he’s snaking one arm around your waist as the other entangles itself in your wonderfully unruly hair.

You sigh a happy sigh against his lips and Spencer’s heart soars. In a completely unforeseen turn of events, the possibility of more lazy Sunday mornings is now back on the table. Thank God he’s better at lying than he gave himself credit for.

God, and Derek Morgan’s meddling ass.

#spencer reid x reader #spencer reid x you #spencer reid self insert #spencer reid #spencer reid fanfic #spencer reid fanfiction #criminal minds fanfic #criminal minds fanfiction #spencer x reader #spencer reid fluff

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minor-solemnity · 4 years ago

Text

Care

1.2k words of the purest fluffy comfort!

The only signs that exam season is taking its toll on him are the black-blue ink stains on his fingertips and the slight hollowness under his eyes. Annoyingly enough, these slight imperfections only add to his already good looks. He looks like one of those French philosophers or a Romantic poet.

Summer should, by all accounts, be your favourite season. As a child you used to love the feeling of the sun on your bare skin, the excitement of cold juice and ice cream in the park, the feeling of complete and utter freedom that came with the promise of summer holidays. You still do love all these things, childish though they may be.

The problem is simple. You do not love exams. You do not love spending long hours toiling away at your revision notes until arithmancy equations and transfiguration incantations blur on the page in front of you. You especially do not love hearing the younger years screaming with laughter and having fun outside in the warm summer evening because they’re twelve and their exams don’t matter. You never thought you’d be jealous of second years, but here you are, glaring at the window next to you with unbridled hatred and wishing you could hex everyone under the age of fifteen for having the gall to not have to worry about their future just yet.

You glare over your pile of messily stacked notes at a sixth year Ravenclaw who approaches. He catches one look at you and immediately pivots on the spot and retreats from whence he came. Good. For about twenty minutes, you’re left in blessed silence to stew in your anger over the injustice of having NEWTs in the summertime. You manage to review your first set of notes for transfiguration before your vision starts swimming again and you start sorely regretting your decision to skip lunch and dinner in favour of holing up in the library.

A shadow passes over the desk and you turn to tell this person to leave too when you meet Tom’s vaguely amused gaze. He leans against a nearby bookcase, looking far too put together for your liking. The only signs that exam season is taking its toll on him are the black-blue ink stains on his fingertips and the slight hollowness under his eyes. Annoyingly enough, these slight imperfections only add to his already good looks. He looks like one of those French philosophers or a Romantic poet.

In comparison, you feel like you wouldn’t look out of place with the hags in Nocturn. “You weren’t at dinner,” Tom says, eyeing the spread of quills and parchment laid out before you with a raised eyebrow. “Or at lunch for that matter.”

“I’ve been busy.”

“Oh, I can see that. You look… a little out of sorts.” Coming from Tom, who rarely turns his sharp tongue on you, this is code for ‘you look like an acromantula chewed you up and spat you out’. If you weren’t so tired and hungry and stressed, you’d be insulted. He slides into the chair opposite you and begins to pack your things away.

Immediately you’re leaning over the table, practically scrambling in your attempt to get him to stop. “They’re in an order, Tom!” You hiss and ignore the several shushing sounds from surrounding tables. “Stop packing my stuff away, I need to revise!” Your pleas fall on death ears and Tom easily bats your hands away as he continues his awful mission to destroy any chance you have of passing your Transfiguration NEWT. “You’re going to make me fail.”

He levels you with an unimpressed glare. “You’re going to make yourself fail.” All traces of amusement have left his expression and you suddenly feel very small under the weight of his reproach. “If you keep missing meals and spending every waking second in this place, you’ll end up in the hospital wing before you’ve even sat your first exam.” He sounds so reasonable. You hate it when he’s reasonable. It makes it very difficult to argue with him. You scowl at him and he rolls his eyes back, but you can’t deny the flash of genuine concern that you see flit across his expression. It’s enough to make you fall back in your chair and watch as he tucks the last set of revision notes into your bag.

He walks around the table and hold his hand out for you to take, which you do and promptly have to sit back down again when the world spins violently and spots appear in front of your vision. Straight away, he is crouching down beside you, his hands on either side of your face as he tilts your head so he can more clearly see whether or not you’re about to faint. “I’m fine,” You mumble, “It’s just head rush.” He makes a sound in the back of his throat that tells you he does not believe you in the slightest and when you finally meet his gaze, all you can see is poorly hidden worry and exasperation playing in his dark eyes.

“We’re going to leave now.” He says decisively, and, with more care than he would probably like to admit, helps you up again and gently leads you out of the library, one hand pressed firmly against the small of your back, the other carrying your bag.

Once you’re in the dungeons, you expect to take the familiar route back to the comfort of the common room, instead, Tom leads you down a series of passages that you rarely had the need to travel down until you come to a stop outside a painting of a bowl of fruit. He leaves your side for just a moment and you watch curiously as he runs his fingers over the painting. The painting swings open and you stare, slack-jawed as the kitchens come into view.

“I… How did you even know…?” It says something about the state you’re in that you’re unable to string a simple sentence together and for the first time since you’ve left the library, Tom’s expression breaks into that amused little smile of his. He leads you through the portrait hole and sets you down on one of the benches that line the cavernous room. The house-elves don’t seem all that surprised to see him and you watch as he talks with one of them. You can’t hear what he says, but the set line of his spine gives you the impression that he’s being very serious.

Sitting in the warmth of the kitchens, you begin to feel the true strength of your tiredness. Exam season has never been a good time for you; in fifth year you’d run yourself ragged trying to prepare and though you’d promised Tom you’d learnt your lesson, it seems like old habits die hard. Without you noticing it happen, your eyes slip shut and your head falls against the wall behind you as sleep takes hold of you.

You’re woken by a hand gently stroking your hair and Tom swims into sight. He’s holding a large mug of something hot and a plate of your favourite snacks is sat on the bench beside you. Fondness overwhelms you as you take in his expression which is at once dryly amused and concerned. “I need you to take better care of yourself,” He murmurs, pressing the mug into your hands. “It’s not so easy to protect you when the enemy is your own stubbornness.”

You smile softly and nod your head, “You still manage though.”

He hums in agreement and presses a soft kiss against your forehead, “I said it was harder, not impossible.”

#tom riddle #tom marvolo riddle #tom riddle x oc #tom riddle x y/n #tom riddle x you #tom riddle x reader #tom riddle imagine #tom riddle imagines #tom riddle fanfic #tom riddle fanfiction #tom riddle fic

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queenofbaws · 2 years ago

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queenieee (said in the same way josh says sammy) hope ur doin well this fine saturday!! and i would Love to have our favourite fuck no the movie agent manager man conrad approaching any of the quarry survivors about how he can make em a lot of money if theyre willing to tell their story :]

at-least-but-not-exactly-six sentence sat(or)sunday!!! ---

He’d been friends with Josh long enough to know better than to go around asking questions. Even if he did deign to actually answer said questions (which hardly ever happened), nine times out of ten you walked away from the whole deal wishing you could unhear what you’d just heard. It was a talent, really - just not one that helped Conrad do his job.

So had he maybe walked into this a little...under-prepared? Sure, that argument could be made. Would he be walking away empty-handed? Oh no. Oh no, no, no.

Not for what he was getting paid.

Getting in hadn’t been a problem. He hadn’t really expected it to be, but in backwater towns like that, you could never be too sure. Sometimes the locals caught a whiff of your cologne and shut their doors before you could open your mouth. Maybe they saw the kind of car you drove. Maybe they just decided they didn’t like the look of your face. It’d happened before.

But lucky him, all it’d taken was one dimpled half-smile and his best ‘aw shucks’ tone, and the woman working the front desk had all but led him back by the hand.

The dimples weren’t helping much now, though...not now that the door was closed. For whatever reason, it didn’t seem Sheriff Hackett was the kind to swoon under his charm.

“Out,” he’d said, riiight as Conrad was getting to the good part of the spiel - the juicy part. It was obvious he’d meant for that to be the end of it; he dropped his eyes back to the paperwork he’d been filling out when he’d first walked in, pretending for all the world like he was alone in the office again...but Conrad wasn’t buying it. He was holding onto that pen just a little too tight, a little too much like he was weighing the pros and cons of stabbing it down onto one of his hands. “Not interested.”

“I gotcha, I gotcha...” He didn’t move to stand up, but did move, knowing full well it’d draw his eye. Conrad leaned back in his chair, hands lacing behind his head, and heaved a world-weary sigh into the afternoon air hanging heavy in the room. “Look, I get it. Seriously, I do - family stuff gets so messy. It’s always like, are people going to judge me because of what my family did? Is this going to reflect poorly on me, somehow? If people find out one of my siblings was going around eating human flesh, am I ever getting invited to another barbecue?”

Sheriff Hackett’s eyes were dark and perfectly fucking still as he stared him down from the other side of the desk.

Which just went to prove his point: Move enough and they will look at you! Whether they want to or not. Conrad couldn’t help but smile again. “I know you’ll never believe me on this one, but that last hypothetical was one hundred percent not about you. I’ve got this buddy you should meet sometime, though...well, ‘buddy’ is maybe a generous word...sort of more like...this absolute maniac who - ”

“You’re going to get out of my office on your own, or I will make you,” Hackett said slowly, firmly, using the same kind of cop-voice he’d been threatened with tens (if not hundreds) of times before during his tenure working alongside the Horror Harem themselves. The Blackwood cops, to be fair, had been slightly more bumbling than the Big Bad Wolf of North Kill over here was trying to make himself out to be. The tone had been the same, though.

Conrad lifted his shoulders once, then leaned a bit farther back in his seat, taking in the photos and accolades the sheriff had hanging on his walls. None of the family, he noticed. Not a one. “Yeah, so...here’s the thing, man. I had part of my ear sliced off by a pirate, once. Not the yo-ho-ho kind either. Takes a little more than that to get me all hot and bothered, know what I mean?” His smile widened. “Just for future reference. Going forward. You get me. Now, where was I...oh, right. My clients have been talking to a lot of people about the whole...’Hackett’s Quarry fiasco.’ And I mean a lot. General consensus in the room was mayyybe we need to talk to someone who has a...slightly different perspective on the - ”

The pen in his hand didn’t break - not that he could see, anyway - but there was a loud sound, not unlike a bone being cracked as its plastic body snapped. “Get out. Of my fucking. Office.”

Oooh, he was so close to getting this guy, he could almost smell the ink of the check Washington would be printing him.

#fudgeroach #six sentence weekend #queenie writes supermassive #fuck no: the movie #aaaaaaash!!! i am indeed having quite a chill weekend - i hope you are as well!!!#and HOOOHOOOOOHOOOO HEE HEE HEEEEEEE you know i cant say no to fuck no: the movie ;)c

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jiminrings · 4 years ago

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hey hannah! hope you are doing great darling ( ˘ ³˘) ♡ i may have a request in mind, a university/college au with jock!jk and shy art major!yn or an olympics au? with olympic athlete!jk and olympic athlete!yn (you decide which sports!) thank you so much in advance ♡

never (k)not you

pairing: jungkook x y/n

wordcount: 5k

glimpse: established relationship ft. jock!jk and shy art major!y/n, y/n gets an unexpected pep talk and jungkook doubts himself, and either so much tears or so much dUST according to kook

notes: baby ok FIRST OF ALL, i’m so sorry i only got to write this now :(( it’s been three months since you sent in this request bUT well it’s here now :D thank you so much for requesting and waiting!! i really hope ur still here or else i-i... will lose it

if you squint, best friend!tae is actually rich kid tae both from the art major drabble and insufferable!!

lunch with taehyung either makes the both of you the LOUDEST motherfuckers in the planet or it’s just comfortable silence

comfortable silence’s more common whenever the two of you are in public because to put it simply

he’s cold and you’re shy!! makes sense

but god just mention his girlfriend’s name oNCE and he’ll talk your ear off and you get genuinely excited when he is

he just needs to mention gouache for less than a second and you will genuinely freak

then suddenly the both of you are the chattiest beings ever and absolutely no one will yield until they get the final say

but this

this just feels weird...

because it’s lunch and you’re not talkative and the silence is most definitely not comfortable

you just know tae has something up his sleeve and will probably catch you off-

“are you and jungkook a thing?”

...

......

it’s never actually registered in your head that you and jungkook are a THING but absolutely no one knows

literally no one

not even the dust living underneath your bedframe!! or if guardian angels existed, then they’d probably be clueless as fuck

lol wait what was that cold gust of wind on ur arms

jungkook is the dreamiest man alive and he’s been your boyfriend for what?? two years now??

and the two of you, and more of him actually, insisted to keep it private

your relationship is none of anyone’s business and it uh.,. it literally seems to be that way because sometimes even yOU forget that you’re in a relationship

jungkook avoids you like the plague and you keep to yourself like you do with all your gouache

this dynamic of no one knowing has been so instilled in you that tae’s innocent (?) question is enough to make you spiral little by little

taehyung was just harboring an idea ok

because like two days ago when you went out with him and his girlfriend for ice cream, jungkook was there too by himself

and that just seems like pure coincidence

but then they dOn’t seem like coincidences anymore when he realizes on the same day how many classes he was in where you were in

and you don’t even have the same major!!!

or when he’s walking you home because your apartment is literally on the right side of his girlfriend’s (changbin’s on the left) and he’s taking every possibility he gets

but it just so happens that uh... jungkook’s always there from a distance? like when the two of you are walking and that guy just hAD to be there at the back??

goddamn it tae should’ve gotten his parents’ offer for personal security while he’s studying in campus :((

“woah woah wOAH what’s the matter?” you panic when he shoves you inside your apartment the moment you manage to open it

“this fucking jungkook guy is either stalking you or me and it’s starting to get on my nerves!!”

“... taehyung-“

and then he realized that oh... ok... i see

what if this guy has a crush on you??

but it didn’t make sense because why would this soccer guy (no offense) that’s a jock (no offense) who always either looks high with how giggly he is (no offense) or bereaved with how he scowls (no offense) could POSSIBLY like you???

you who’s the art major (no offense) with your clothes almost exactly like he is (no offense) that he has an inkling that either you were copying him or him copying you (no offense) and the shyness that you absolutely wouldn’t talk to anyone unless they go first and tHAT even became a tough cookie for him!! h i m

wait

on another thought...

that does make sense

you and jungkook are more likely to be a couple than anyone else more alike to either of you, no offense :D

and the way now that you’re frozen and scoffing like ur voicing mater’s engine in cars

“w-what? FUCK no!!”

mhmmm

yeah that’s the spot

taehyung means this in full offense but you’d be absolutely bankrupt if ever you wanted to try your hand at poker when your tell is literally cussing in capital when you’re flustered

this is the equivalent of your mom leaving you by the line to the cashier at the grocery when she needs to get something and you’re next at the line and you have no money on you and you’re too hesitant to tell the person behind you to-

“why? are you thinking of asking him out?”

he hears you seethe and that’s only the second time he’s heard you actually do that so he may have straightened his posture a lil

you wouldn’t hold it against taehyung because jungkook is one fINE specimen and tae doesn’t stare from that description anyway

you just can’t help but feel a lil.....

ಠ_ಠ

because you know that jungkook is yours and when it comes to things like these, you can’t do anything about it

how could you??

fine... if taehyung tries to-

smack!

the fact that your friend has a gigantic palm for one doesn’t soothe the gears in your head

you’re positive that your brain actually shook inside your head for a split second

“i already have someone, dumbass.”

taehyung has to remind you again to which you immediately awe in remembrance, a sheepish smile on your face bc for a moment, you actually considered begging for tae to back the fuck off without making it seem you’re already with jungkook

he waves you off because you’re about to coo at him again, a small smile on his face because he wouldn’t forget how he’s so lucky

it’s nice to be in love!!

you should probably try it some time

but then again, taehyung’s starting to think that you’ve been in a longer relationship with jungkook than him in one, so he thinks that he should be the one taking notes from you

“can i, uhm, ask how did you know?”

you don’t mind swallowing your pride because you already know you can’t bullshit your way out of this one, a timid look on your lap

sheesh

tae’s pride seems to swell up because his suspicion’s right just by oNE singular try

“because i’m rich kid kim :) don’t you know that?”

see now this is only one of the few times that he’d gladly take his title

rich kid kim was coined by the courtesy of changbin, his girlfriend’s friend :/

it just seemed to STICK on everyone else after then

changbin was the first to narrate his actions like he’s the lead star of a poorly-produced netflix film

what’s wrong with rich kid kim? is his greeting every time he crosses paths with changbin

he was just pissy that oNE time!! it was ONE time

taehyung thinks of the whole jungkook situation and relates it to him as much as possible because ya know,,, he is the main star and koo’s just a second lead

ok changbin’s netflix narrations are really rubbing off on him

“think of jeon jungkook as an elitist that everyone wants to be close with, and yet he actually looks like one of the good guys — like me — and he looks like he wants to shoot himself in the foot when he gets offered caviar oNE more time, and then you’re like uh, the comic relief???”

he spews his interpretation all in one breath effortlessly and you’re just blinking slowly to try and digest it all

it’s oddly too specific

hol up now why does it sound like he’s been actually waiting for you to ask him that

HOLD ON YOU’RE THE COMIC RELIEF???

“a clowN?” is what you react first and tae can’t believe that that’s the only thing you picked up from his perfectly sound analogy

“uhhhh like a bartender? a waitress? someone that isn’t a socialite,” he shrugs as he tries to make amends, remembering that the last time he went to a rich kid kim party, no one was technically in pennywise shoes nor juggling bowling pins

“are you trying to insult me tae?”

:((

yIKES are u gonna cry

“what?? no!! no!!” he launches from his seat as if he was falling and that catches him a couple of glances from rich kid kim loyalists (there’s a lot of things he’s unaware of), about to punch the floor if only their lord and savior didn’t take it in stride, “i’m not trying to insult you, but it’s how you take it, y’know?”

his nonchalance puts you on the edge even more, launching from your seat and uh you don’t exactly have any concerned fanbase there to worry for you

“so i sHOULD?? tae you’re basically saying that-”

alright that’s it

he needs to actually get through you this time because more often that not, you are so fucking stubborn that it beats him

he glares at you, eyes looking comically large and pissy as he’s stopped in the middle of slurping from his cup noodles to talk some sense into you

it feels like an eternity until he finishes his noodles and you were almost tempted to just eat the remaining portion to fasten his pace

“in rich kid kim terms, or reality y/n terms?”

you’re almost too scared to answer but you already do before you can even process, raising two fingers

and for a moment, you think tae’s actually gonna go easy on you!

whew you definitely aren’t prepared if-

“do you come out together by the main door? or from the back?”

your eyes are as large as they could possibly be and if you stay in that same shocked and taken-aback state, you’d need to look for those creams with how much your eyebrows and your forehead are creased

u-uh well now that i think about it-...” okay maybe you and jungkook don’t come into uni by any of the several hundred main entrances at all, but that doesn’t mean-

“does he hold your hand? carry your backpack? doesn’t matter if you have a dumbbell in there or not, does he carry it?” tae lists item after item, racking through his mind as these were also all the things he does, and all the things he’s picked up from everyone

“does he bring your water? lend his hoodie when you’re not even sniffling? pick a fight when someone even looks at you the wrong way? read something relatively romantic in english lit, then text you about it? brag about you to his friends? does he-...”

...

....

okay

you are awfully too silent for even your nature

tae was blissfully obvious just two seconds ago when he was enumerating boyfriend traits (that he himself exhibited, excuse you) left and right

then he started to realize that you weren’t stuttering nor interjecting on the side

he’s :O when you’re standing up from your seat, straightening out your hoodie, one that isn’t jungkook’s, that you’ve been anxiously wrinkling for the past ten minutes

“excuse me, tae. i have uh.. i have a lot to think about.”

everything he’s said made a solid number on you because not even distracting yourself becomes successful

not even your mini fixation on gouache helped you because so far it really sucks

it’s become a routine of jungkook to come over to your apartment almost everyday that it practically feels he’s living with you

he knows where you keep your milk and how cold you want the AC to blast and how you organize your groceries

and yet jungkook can’t-

“koo do you love me?”

it’s a question that was sprung so suddenly because come to think of it, you’re knitting and jungkook’s head is buried in your thighs while he tries to take a nap

he doesn’t bother trying to figure out your thought process because it’s a question that’s so simple that it seemed trivial

jungkook’s a dream when he nods and hums to your thighs, making you tread your hands on his hair instead of your roll of yarn

“mhmmm. more than life itself.”

he loves loves you!!! he doesn’t even know why you’re asking

“okay,” you hum back, crouching down to press a kiss on his nape that he appreciates because he’s a little ticklish on that spot, “hold my hand tomorrow then.”

:-)

jungkook launches from his position on your thighs, sitting up immediately that it’s gotten him dizzy

“... w-what?”

oh boy here it goes

you don’t feel like dancing around this issue anymore because after all, you do have the right to stick your finger in this!!

he’s your boyfriend i mean like what’s not clicking

“it’s not that big of a deal, jungkook. it’s not like i asked you to propose to me or something.”

his eyes widen more at that, his cheeks puffing out and it makes you realize that taehyung was right and it dOES look like he’s hiding a goldfish in there sometimes

you try to bite back a laugh at that but jungkook is devoid from any entertainment at all, looking like you just asked him to pick between you and the universe

“you uh want me to propose??”

he has his hand awkwardly caressing his nape and his cheeks flush as he’s trying to process things

yeah he DOES love you and he’ll marry you eventually but you’re doing this now!!! as in now??

how’s your wedding gonna work? god, can the two of you decide on the menu for your reception? does this mean your aunts and his aunts would mee?? no no that could not possibly be-

“you don’t need to,” you sheepishly mumble and you’re not gonna deny that marrying jungkook did cross your mind every once in awhile

you aren’t against it but marriage is not the issue at hand!! it’s just about him hOLDING your hand tomorrow and not forever now

“so you don’t want me to?”

...... christ where is this going to

there’s palpable tension in the air and you just feel like giving up, sinking further into the couch and koo’s reading TOO much into it

what if you slouching on the couch means you’re breaking up with him and you wouldn’t marry him even if he was the last person alive

“if you aren’t ashamed of me, or if you don’t feel like dYING when i’m five feet away from you and your jock friends-“

“lovie i-“

your ringless hand raises and prompts him to shut up, palms a little sweaty and fingers tired from stress-knitting

“then hold my hand. tomorrow. please.”

:-)

okay fine then

last night wasn’t exactly the best experience because you felt a little too distant even if he was enveloping you into his arms

last night, kook didn’t even dare to try and press mischievous kisses from your jaw to your shoulder because you felt untouchable with how wringed you were

then he had breakfast by himself much earlier and had to practically sHAKE you awake to whisper that he’s gonna leave earlier because he has a plan, and then proceeds to tell you to act as if you didn’t know that he has a plan, then go back to sleep and forget altogether that this literal rude awakening even happened

if you ask him, he is wearing the most boyfriend fit ever in this entire universe

which is uh his regular outfit of a fit shirt and a cool-looking jacket with chunk boots thrown on top of it

BUT!!!!

hear him out ok

he’s wearing a bracelet

uh huh

a bracelet...... that has the iNITIAL of your name

yuh how romantic is that

man both hallmark and netflix must be bankrupt because of jeon jungkook!! he’s sure of it

he just knows

the big deal of it all is jungkook waiting for you by the stairs, bouncing on heels out of displaced nervous energy because he’s too jittery to just coolly lean against the wall

“kook?”

you’re tilting your head at the sight, a little lost but more on fond as he smiles squarely

“y/n! it’s uh, it’s you! wow!!”

he exclaims but not without tucking his hands into his pockets and non-discreetly looking around your surrounding before he deems it clear enough, which is what you still find useless for him to even do it!!

the whole point of this is to not care!!

he’s gingerly placing himself beside you and although it’s not exactly what you asked for, it makes you sigh a breath of relief because it’s been tOO long that you’ve been next to him in this public atmosphere

he’s not exactly far, but he isn’t exactly bumping shoulders with you either

there are some glances alright

jungkook has a loose grip on you but you could fEEL how his hand is so sweaty

he’s just looking at the floor and he allows you to guide him because if not for you, he would’ve been bumping into both lockers and people non-stop

u actually have first period together but you typically sit rowS away but now he’s just sitting on the chair right above yours

he isn’t next to you but he’s literally above you, so maybe you’ll take it

you can’t exactly text taehyung how it’s going because he could see everything from where he’s seated at

this was supposed to be an enjoyable time :(

a nice, giggly, warm enjoyable time with jungkook

but being this unrestricted meant him being so rigid that quite frankly, you’ve grown sick and wary of it in less than an hour

you’re making your way to the library and jungkook’s sTILL following you when you were sure he wouldn’t have

and if you ask him, he doesn’t know either why he followed you

he jus did it without thinking even if it meant him taking quick steps behind you with his head down

he doesn’t know why you’re here and he feels a little guilty that he should know it if this was already a part off your routine

but this time, jungkook can’t look at you because this time, you’re the one who’s unreachable

who kNOWS what your empty stare could possibly mean

“we don’t have to do this anymore, y’know.”

that’s the quickest way to conclude it, nodding to yourself surely

meanwhile, jungkook is a millisecond away from a goddamn mELTDOWN

“w-what do you mean?”

“this!” you genuinely chuckle and even wiggle your hands around to make a point

he swears to god rn that he is gonna BLUBBER

“a-are you breaking up with me right now?”

his voice is already cracking and it reminds him that oh, yeah, the two of you are in the library and he’s about to cRY

you’re gasping when you take his trembling hand and jungkook wants to snatch it back and beg you to hold it tighter at the same time

oh no :-)

“it’s okay. i don’t mind anymore. and what, we’re gonna graduate like a year from now! doesn’t matter anymore.”

but wait it SHOULD matter

he’s gonna cry oh god oh god he’s gonna-

“you don’t need to change for me.”

:((

so that’s what

jungkook cries and it’s from relief that no, you aren’t breaking up with him

“o-okay,” he nods as he wipes his own tears that are blurring his vision and there’s sO much that he actually worries if it would budge his contacts

he just wants a hug from you to console him like you always do

but instead, you look around, settle on tapping his chin, then standing up

“cheer up. i’m gonna go eat lunch with felix.”

and then yOU’RE the one leaving him

quick

does he really look like a red-nosed, bleary-eyes, puffy-lipped mess??

say sike rn lads

jungkook clearly doesn’t look the best and he doesn’t exactly know what he was doing when he came out of the library and marched over to hang out with his friends like he always did

but something’s just different

he looks like someone whose world turned upon him and has nothing left to himself

surprisingly, it’s not hobi who’s the only one thinking of that

his friends are all ????

“y’okay man??”

namjoon’s the first to break the silence and everyone sighs because they were all holding a breath just by looking at jungkook’s distraught state

“yeah! just, uh, just —“

he’s back to being preppy in an instant but he can’t establish eye contact, swinging his arms by his sides and looking around just to look natural and gOD IS THAT YOU??

you’re you

you’re there, walking with felix and your backpack on hIS shoulder

.,., the same backpack that he’s bought you one birthday ago, on tHIS dude’s shoulder strewn as if he didn’t panic in between which variant should he buy for you

you look blissfully unaware that he’s cried himself just by thinking about you and your words and lack of actions just awhile ago

“nothing.”

jungkook grits out and suddenly, he isn’t sad anymore :D

just uh

just a lil frustrated :D agitated :D or maybe feeling a little inadequate and outraged :D

this other mini breakdown going on his head doesn’t go unnoticed because here he is, so close to injuring his fist with how tight he’s clenching it

the guys, however.,.,

seokjin whistles and goes as far to squint his eyes intentionally that he looked like a distraught chihuahua, immediately grabbing jungkook’s actions as he nods his head to your direction

“y/n, right?”

jungkook froze and everyone is just waiting on him, mouths a little parted because they’ve caught on jin’s little plan and somehow, he might’ve struck a chord sO hard that-

“keep your fucking dick in your pants, seokjin.”

WOAH WOAH WOAH WOAH

everyone’s reacting to his seething like a flock of seagulls to a piece of bread

yeah they’ve seen the youngest of their group mad, but not tHIS type of mad that he looks like he would’ve hit his hyung with a skillet upright if he had one onhand

everyone’s visibly offended besides seokjin, the man mentioned just amusedly shrugging his shoulders with a dimpled smile that unintentionally provoked jungkook even more

“told you,” yoongi gives up his last batch of cookies to namjoon, a long-winded bet finally coming to an end because of what was only supposed to be a harmless question by jin

“if y/n was your girlfriend, you could’ve just said so!!”

jin ruffles his hair and it doesn’t exactly take a genius to see how he cares for you!!

jungkook looks out for you in ways he couldn’t even notice doing

he always had two umbrellas in his backpack and when it was raining, he’d leave one on purpose by the front of this specific locker

hoseok actually borrowed an eraser without permission from kook once, but then he found a combination of tampons n napkins that he grimaced because what :// those aren’t even the good brands!! he has a sister and now has a handful of knowledge about monthly visits, so he takes note to talk to jungkook about it some time

there’s even an extra sweater in his backpack that always remains unotuched

one time, jimin complained that he was cold and turned to jungkook, full-well knowing that the fucker had oNE more sweater tucked in his bag, who just plains-out ignore him and even tch!s him under his breath

they somehow had a clue all along and now that jungkook realizes, he may be a little dENSE

OH RIGHT

WHY WOULD HE HAVE KEPT YOU HIDDEN

that’s entirely stoopid of him

what was the reason lmao

this time, jungkook’s more than eager to make it up to you

eVEN if you’ve insisted that nothing was wrong!!

it was just the last day before christmas break so it went by considerably fast-paced because even the professors were a little antsy to come home!!

that didn’t stop him, because clearly, jungkook holds your hand tight this time and he’s looking straight ahead

he looks proud

he feels natural and giggly the whole day that you couldn’t stop either because it’s a complete 360 from yesterday

wouldn’t absolutely stop holding your hand and following you

even kisses the top of your head like a kitten repeatedly

eVEN SAT IN A CLASS HE DIDN’T HAVE TO BE WITH YOU

something’s up with jungkook alright

the two of you are back again on the couch — you knitting, and him buried and napping on your thighs

it’s a bit of a shock when he grabs your hand all of a sudden, a half-sleepy and full-on dreamy look on his face when he’s looking up at you from being laid down on your lap

a red silicone band :D

you’re still speechless when he’s sliding it on your ring finger, admittedly getting the wrong finger the first time which is why he’s sheepish and holding back a giggle

“jungkook....?”

unsurprisingly, it looks good on you

he seems to think so himself when he’s giving you another one, holding his hand out and you’re doing the same without even an explanation present

“it’s a placeholder :)”

a placeholder?? hold on ur heart is a lil fragile

your eyes widen and your lips downturn on instinct, making him giggle as he smushes your cheeks to just let him explain

“all this marriage talk just had me thinking-”

“are you PROPOSING right now??”

both the mix of panic and excitement stains you clearly, mouth dropping open as you try to fumble for atleast something to wipe your face with

hee-hee

“maybe i am, maybe i’m not :)”

jungkook’s such a romantic it’s SICKENING

his mind drifts off and you can’t blame him!!

his family’s well-off so maybe he could cash in his next ten birthdays for a loan or maybe even a house to help ease the two of you in

maybe the two of you could even build it from the ground up

the two of you could also move into this nice apartment after graduation!! he’s been eyeing it for quite awhile actually

“you wanna get married early?”

“maybe i do, maybe i don’t :D”

jungkook’s faux nonchalance makes you grin yourself, the both of you knowing what answer he’d yield anyway

“as long as it’s you,” you declare surely, bending down to press a kiss on his nose that tickles him and makes his heart full

“as long as it’s me?”

jungkook smiles cheekily at your statement pressing kisses on the top of your thighs that’s got you fumbling at him to just embrace you immediately

he’s a little bulky with all the muscles he’s gained and worked on, a little pressured when he’s sitting on your lap upright and won’t absolutely stop kissing you sweetly

“you should start on knitting your wedding garter now :D”

#feedback pls and thank u :D hAPPY CHRISTMAS EVE!!!!#jungkook #jeon jungkook #jungkook imagine #jungkook imagines #jungkook drabble #jungkook drabbles #jungkook oneshot #jungkook oneshots #jungkook au #jungkook x reader #jungkook x y/n #jock!jungkook #jungkook angst #jungkook fluff #jungkook fic recs

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