#i think mark should go a little feral at that i think he should almost do something he regrets but holds back at the last minute

[willosword]

i think they should reaaaally dive into mark and oliver's beef in the adaptation i think they should be having a screaming match and mark should grab oliver's arm a little too hard and scare himself half to death because without the proper restraint he could easily turn into the spitting image of his dad ^_^

[chuluoyi]

✎ all of me

- gojo satoru x reader

you understand that some things in marriage just needs compromise. and he soon understands too, when you're at your most vulnerable and he fails to be by your side when you need him the most

genre: angst, hurt/comfort, established relationship (you're married & have a son!) argument, feral gojo, mentions of injury & blood, fluff

note: if it isn't obvious by now i'm in the mood of angst-hurt/comfort this week HEHE :)) this is longer than the usual love entry, so i hope you'll enjoy it!

a part of gojo's love entries

general masterlist

Bantering with your husband is not uncommon―in fact, it happens on daily basis.

"Satoru― I'm talking to you!"

But having serious arguments with him is another matter entirely.

Your fists tightening at your sides, facing his unamused expression. How insufferable is he? You told him that everyday, but right now, he's truly surpassed previous levels of infuriating behavior.

"And I can hear you, sweetheart," he retorted, casting a glance your way. The term of endearment he used for you sounding almost like a sneer to your ears and you felt offended.

"I don't think you're taking this seriously," you griped, trying to calm your emotions, still balling your hands. "Someone is following our son on his way back from school―how can you be this... flippant?!"

Numerous photograph of your son exiting the school building from different angles had arrived in your mailbox, and if it wasn't a creepy warning from those who placed a target on his back, then you didn't know what it was.

Satoru let out an exasperated grunt. "I'm telling you, I'll pick him up for the rest of the week. No one will lay a hand on him."

You gritted your teeth. "And I'm telling you, they're trying to make you do just that. Even morons know not to mess with you― they're leaving hints, and you're taking the bait!"

Contrary to what you believed, Satoru felt just as worried as you upon knowing that someone might have marked his precious son, who was now six years old and had recently started attending preschool.

But this is where your approaches differ. You are always the cautious one, overanalyzing each detail, while he leans towards being impulsive, often resorting to brute force.

"Who do you think can stand a chance against me?" Satoru challenged with a real sneer this time. "Remember my words, wife, no one is going to hurt me, you or our baby. I'll end them where they stand."

"That's not the point!" you threw your hands in the air, irate. "Satoru, they're going to take advantage of―"

"Look, I don't want to argue with you." Satoru's gaze was hard on you, his tone clipped, and it made you stiffen. "His safety comes first— and you, of all people, should know I'd never let anything happen to him. You need to quit nitpicking and have a little faith in me."

"I know you are more than capable, but you are not―!"

And then he said it, and his words piercing through you like a knife―

"Don't compare me to you," your husband remarked a little too coldly. "I can do things you can't. Just rest your pretty head, I'll take care of the rest."

Nevermind that he blatantly dismissed your skills as a jujutsu sorcerer, nevermind that he totally didn't listen to you at all―he just went and made himself look like some sort unparalleled god, forgetting how much his hubris could actually take him.

And all these thoughts only made you angrier.

"So be it then." You tried desperately to hold yourself from shaking because you'd be damned if you showed it to him. "A word of advice, Satoru: beware of your arrogance."

With those words, you spun around, marching off toward your son's room, because no way in hell was you going to sleep with that obnoxious prick tonight.

But when you caught the sight of your baby scuttling away from the gap in the door, a fragment of your heart crumbled. Oh. He has seen it all.

In Gojo Satoru's mind, he is made of two things: a powerful jujutsu sorcerer and a family man.

With his immense strength, comes a certain responsibility. And with that responsibility, certain habits have formed. If you just took a few seconds to breathe and looked back throughout the past decade he'd spent with you, you'd know that in fact―

It was also his way to shield you. Satoru stands by the principle that you and his little boy must be protected at all cost, and he most certainly would pull all stops to do just that.

But frankly, he couldn't deny that he felt insulted by how defiant you were. Did you really think he would let anyone ever touch your―his―son? He wouldn't, they'd meet his wrath first and you should've known that.

Still, something akin to guilt nudged at his conscience as he lay alone in your shared bed that night. It felt strange not having you cuddling him. He felt empty.

. . .

None of your shampoo-scented pillow, none of your nightdresses, all of it replaced by a single photo hanging in the wall and the urn of ashes—

Abruptly, he jerked his eyes open, shaken from the most dreadful nightmare he had experienced—

Of you no longer by his side.

“Mama.” Your little boy looked up to you with his doe-blue eyes in the next day, his hand gripping yours. “I’ll be fine.”

You were accompanying him to the preschool. While Satoru had requested Ichiji to drive him, you insisted on tagging along to keep a watchful eye as well. You'd leave your husband to pick him up later just as he wanted.

“Huh?” you turned to him, tilting your head.

“I'll stick by Uncle Ichiji's side the entire time,” he replied in a murmur. “And papa will be picking me up too later. If there are bad guys, they'll get him first.”

You bit your lip, feeling a wave of guilt wash over you. Your boy witnessed your outburst last night and hadn't inquired about it until now, and even then, he was trying to reassure you.

“So… don’t fight.” His round, cerulean eyes then darted towards you, blinking hesitantly, causing you to catch your breath.

He looks so much like Satoru. At six years old, he was the spitting image of him, except his personality—he took after you in that area. It was as if your son was a softer, more innocent version of him. And your heart twisted, remembering your argument last night.

Don't compare me to you.

With a sigh, you bent down to be eye-level with him and managed a smile, holding both of his little hands. “I’m sorry… it was just misunderstanding last night, okay? Don’t worry.”

“…really?”

“Really. Mama and papa were just tired,” you tried to reason, a thin smile on your face. "It's going to be okay, just like you said, yeah? Papa will beat the bad guys out there."

“Will he pull through...? If they bring a knife, and he's just there laughing, they can cut him.”

A giggle escaped your lips at your baby's innocent wonderings, easing the ache in your heart as you recalled how Satoru humored him in so many ways.

You gently poked your son in the cheek. "Nah, do you remember what he always goes on about?"

He puffed up his cheeks in response, his expression turning sour as if combing through memories of hundreds of shenanigans Satoru had instigated to recall his words. You let out a hearty chuckle, finding him so adorable.

"He's strong, he's going to win. He always does."

"Oh. Mmm." Your son scrunched up his nose cutely, before looking away and squeezing your hand. A sincerer smile bloomed in your lips, heart melting at the sight of your growing munchkin.

You will protect him. And maybe you could patch things up with Satoru later that night. Maybe yesterday you were just too paranoid.

That was the plan... at least until your son suddenly screamed—someone wrenching him from your grasp. Without a second thought, you reacted, flipping the attacker away from you and him.

. . . and that was the beginning of how everything started to unravel so terribly that day.

"Gojo-san...! There's been an incident!"

He got that call right after he finished some things with Yaga. Satoru teleported to the preschool right away, only to be greeted by a scene of utter chaos.

Several teachers stood outside the building, and police officers were present at the scene. It was all a blur of cursed energy until his eyes caught sight of—

His little boy, red-faced and obviously in fear, was clinging to Ichiji, who was frantically making calls. Some teachers gathered around him were seemingly trying to coax him to speak.

He didn't waste a second to dash towards him, tearing through the crowd.

"Are you okay? Hey, buddy, what happened?" Satoru pulled him away from Ichiji and turned him over, crouching to his level to check for any signs of injury or harm.

And upon seeing him actually here, his son's eyes immediately welled up with tears, and Satoru felt a chill run through his veins as he broke into sobs, which quickly turned into heart-wrenching wails.

"Mama—! F-find mama—!" the little boy choked out through his tears, clutching onto his shirt tightly and crumbling in his embrace, thoroughly inconsolable.

Satoru's sharp gaze quickly swept over the scene, seeking any clues, while he tightened his hold over him. It was then he noticed traces of your cursed energy mingled with blood.

They hurt you.

"Hey, kiddo—listen to me, it's going to be alright, yeah?" Satoru said, gently pulling away to wipe away his tears, holding the boy's face tenderly in his hands. "Go with Ichiji for now, okay? I'm going to bring mama back, I promise."

He didn't need to be told twice. Your son is always obedient when it matters the most. He gave him a small nod, still shaking with tears.

"Don't worry," he flashed a reassuring smile and ruffled his hair. "I'm the strongest, remember? I'll get her back," he vowed once again. "She'll be fine. Wait for me until then, yeah?"

Ichiji was ready to leave as he had called for those in headquarters as backup in case anything were to happen again. Trusting him to keep his son safe, Satoru took off as soon as he could no longer see the sight of his son's tear-streaked face trying to watch him as the car pulled away.

"I won't repeat myself— where is my wife?"

Satoru wasn't playing this time. He skipped past taunts and just plain threats. These little fries, he thought.

The man he held by the throat was in a lot of distress. "Hyaaa! It's him! Please, please, let me go! I'm acting under orders!"

He then flung him across the wall— might have added more cursed energy than necessary.

At the moment, his entire focus was on trying to locate you. He couldn't let his mind wander to anything else; in fact, he didn't permit himself to.

It didn't take him long to piece together the general location of where you were through the residual of your cursed energy. They stationed several hooligans in this abandoned warehouse to stall him, but he got rid of them quickly and he could sense that you were close by.

"It's Gojo Satoru!"

"Run! Ruuuun!"

What a pain. They picked the wrong person to mess with, and Satoru's lips curled into a manic grin as he opened his palm, pulling them in—

"Cursed Technique Lapse: Blue."

Chaos erupted as the building collapsed around him. He hoped you would realize he was here and manage to avoid getting caught in the wreckage. He was sure you'd know though.

And true to his thoughts, soon he found you— blasting your attacker away with a powerful kick.

Satoru thought that you were a sight to behold, really. And he was about to call out to you when he felt it.

It happened almost in an instant. The way his heart dropped to his stomach, and how his body reacted, barely whispering the incantation for Red as he shot it at something lurking behind you—

At that moment, the only thing you were aware of was the foul stench of a curse. Time seemed to stop before the overwhelming force of Red expelled it away from you.

But before then, you experienced a searing, white-hot pain that scorched through your flesh and pierced your abdomen—

"Y/N―fuck―!" The voice that came from Satoru's throat was raw and laden with panic.

He pulled you against him protectively as you collapsed, blinded by pain. He immediately felt warmth spreading across his lower body—your blood was rapidly drenching his shirt, and he felt a shiver down his spine.

You held onto him tightly while suppressing your scream, feeling every bit of your strength drain away along with the dark crimson blood that poured out of you.

"―toru―" you managed to croak amidst the scalding pain, curling and whimpering in his hold.

"Hey― sweetheart, please―" his voice rang in your ears, as he pressed down on your wound. His hands were shaking, and you clawed at him and groaned in agony. "I-I'm taking you back now― You're going to be alright, yeah?"

The wound was beyond anything you had experienced before, causing you to cry out and gasp for air. It was almost as if something fried your insides. It was hard to stay conscious.

"I've got you now. You're going to be okay." His voice was coarse, as he hurriedly carried you out. And he tried not to let the full-blown panic take over him when your body went limp in his arms, your breaths slowing, head lolling in his chest.

"You're going to be alright! You hear me, sweetheart? You're going to make it. Our baby― he's waiting for you. I promise you, you're going to be fine―"

Perhaps he was trying to tell that to himself, because despite the excruciating pain, a wave of reassurance washed over you.

You were in the arms of the strongest sorcerer alive, what more could you possibly afraid of?

A special grade curse. They had actually unleashed a potent curse and likely aimed at him as their final card—until it veered off course and struck you, leaving a searing gash across your abdomen.

Satoru felt numb as he sat in the waiting room in his bloodied uniform. You got hurt so terribly right in front of his eyes, and all he could feel was this profound void that seemed to bore through him and pierced his soul.

He was supposed to protect you. He said it to your face that nothing and no one would touch your son, and it was in his wedding vows that he'd protect you with his life too.

And yet what happened?

If only he was faster. If only he was able to pull you to him and protect you with his infinity—none of this shit would have happened.

Seeing your face twisted in agony and smeared with blood made him feel sick to his stomach. Inside that OR, you hovered on the brink of life and death, and he was here, unable to do anything.

Satoru rested his head against the wall, feeling a sharp pain surge through his chest. He remembered waking up to your face every morning, the way your touches felt, and how you had brightened his world for the past decade. If he lost you now... he wouldn't survive it. He would wreck anything, everything—

"Papa!" and came his voice of reason. Satoru immediately discarded his bloodstained jacket by instinct, throwing it away before his boy could see it, with Ichiji and Megumi closely trailing behind.

His son crashed himself into him and threw his little arms around his torso, crying—and in that very second, the thump of his heart sounded louder in his ears. Somehow it felt like a knife that twisted his insides.

"Hey, kiddo." Satoru repositioned him so that he would sit on his lap and hugged him, patting him in the back. "There, there... it's alright, yeah? Mama is inside, she'll get better soon."

Your little boy pulled away and wiped his eyes, and Satoru chuckled as he helped him blow his nose. His child was incredibly adorable, and his actions mirrored yours to such an extent that it made Satoru's heart soften.

"Mama g-got hurt trying to... tell me to g-go..." the boy suddenly said amidst his quieter sniffles. "And... she s-said... papa— i-is strong and g-going to win..."

You believe in him. Ignoring the ache in his chest, only able to reply him with a "Yeah..."

Not long after, Shoko emerged from the operating room and informed him that the surgery had been successful, though you would likely need to have a one-week stay in the hospital for observation. He intended to move you to the VIP suite and stay the night there, but then he remembered his son, who was holding his hand.

Satoru crouched down and patted him in the head, fixing him a smile. "See? Mama is okay, but she needs to sleep here to get even better. Now you go home first with big brother Megumi, yeah?"

Your son adored Megumi and often begged you to let him stay over at his place, but this time he looked hesitant, fiddling with his little fingers. "Really? Mama will be home... soon?"

"Mm-hmm, the more she sleeps here, the faster she'll go back home, alright?"

And with that, his baby nodded and Satoru turned to Megumi with a nod. "Thank you for this, Megumi."

The boy whose life he had once saved on some sort of a whim, now grown up and shared the same concern he had for you, Fushiguro Megumi had never before witnessed his benefactor expressing such sincere gratitude for anything before.

When you came to, your body felt as heavy as lead.

The discomfort in your abdomen made you flinch, and you almost let out a groan until you turned to your side and saw him.

Satoru was asleep while sitting in the sofa next to your bed, dark circles evident under his eyes. It might have been your imagination, but his cheeks appeared to be slightly red too.

You tried to recall what had happened to you when it came back—you urging your son to run away as you let yourself being taken away, almost escaping from that warehouse, the flash of excruciating pain, and Satoru's stricken voice.

So he must've been here since last night. Any remnants of your disagreement seemed to have vanished, seeing him there with you, barely covering himself with the blanket, with a frown still marking his forehead even in his sleep.

You wanted to reach out to him until the movement sent a sharp jab to your stomach and you cried out a bit.

In that split second, Satoru's eyes jerked open, and realizing you were awake, his gaze locked onto yours. "Y/N—" But your strained whimper and expression told him everything. "Does it hurt? I-I'll get Shoko, wait—"

And then he hit the call button. Throughout it all, he kept a firm grip on your hand for reassurance. A few minutes later, Shoko arrived and examined your wound, subsequently administering painkillers to alleviate your discomfort.

"It's going to leave a scar," she explained grimly, showing the mangled skin where the curse had made its mark on you, and seeing that, Satoru clenched his fists.

Shoko sighed, empathizing with her friend's frustration. "It's going to fade with time, don't worry. You did well, Gojo. You brought her here quickly. Had you been even slightly later, there could have been an irreversible damage to her organs."

But your husband remained quiet, unable to bring himself to look at you. And after she left, you tried to finally voice your question to him.

"O-our—"

"He's fine," Satoru immediately answered, squeezing your hand. "Our boy is fine. I'll tell Megumi to visit later—he's with him."

A sigh of relief came out of you. "Thank... goodness."

But his expression seemed to fall even further after hearing your response. Satoru settled himself on the seat next to you and lowered the rail on your bed, allowing you to be even closer to each other.

"Do you not feel any pain anymore?" he asked then, gently tucking a strand of your hair behind your ear. He looked so sad, a stark contrast of how he usually was, and it bugged you.

"No... I feel fine now."

"Then, can I hug you?"

Of course you nodded without a second thought, and carefully, he wrapped his arms around your body, pulling you close and resting his face on the crook of your neck.

You knew what it was. Satoru was still visibly shaken by what had happened to you, and he wasn't great at expressing himself, so he tried to find consolation through this physical closeness instead.

"I'm okay..." you patted his back, trying to convince him. "I'm alright now, yeah?" But to your surprise, suddenly his whole body started to shake. "Satoru...?"

“…’m sorry.” His voice was barely above a whisper as he nuzzled you. “I shouldn't... have let you get this hurt...”

It always amazes you how Satoru always gets this distressed whenever you sustain any injury. You had seen him cry precisely two times now—once after you gave birth to your son and experienced severe bleeding, and now.

"It's not your fault..." you whispered in response. "You... have protected me well."

He held you tighter, his tone faltering. "I didn't."

"You have..." you stroked his hair, trying to convince him. "I'm still here, aren't I?"

Hearing you say that made Satoru's chest ache. The thought of something like this happening to you was unimaginable, and now that it had, he couldn't come to terms with seeing you hurt right in front of him.

"Don't—" he choked on his voice, his breath trembled against your neck. "Don't ever put yourself in danger again. If something happened to you, I wouldn't be able to live with myself..."

You couldn't make that promise. Despite the pleading in his voice, you knew deep down that your son's life—and his—meant more, and given the chance, you would obviously save theirs for yours.

“Satoru... I love you, you know that, right?”

So you simply embraced him close, hoping that in this life, you would live long enough that he would never have to see you like this again.

Epilogue

"Papa, how do I become stronger?"

Satoru blinked when his son asked him that so innocently and curiously, taken aback as he led him to your private room later that afternoon. "Oh? What brought this on?"

His first and only son, a perfect miniature of himself, pursed his lips. "I don't want Mama to get hurt again..."

Satoru's heart warmed at his baby’s sincere words, and despite himself, he chuckled.

"What's funny?" his son leveled a glare at him. "I'm being serious."

"Well, aren't you such a good boy? Don't worry, kiddo, I'll teach you my ways~"

"What ways?"

"Well, no need to rush, pumpkin. First of all, you will have to harness your skills and then you have to be more like me—"

"Do I have to be like you…? Is there no other way?"

"—? What's wrong with being more like me?"

"Everything...?"

[lucyandthepen]

sweet cream, cold brew | lmh ( m )

something about mark lee keeps you up at night, and you’re pretty sure that it isn’t the lingering smell of espresso on his shirt.

alternatively: mark is shy until he isn’t.

read the second part here!

pairing: nerd!barista!mark x reader verse: college au rating: r ( minors, do not interact! ) warnings&tags: unprotected sex, oral (f!receiving), fingering, slightly possessive/jealous dialogue, mark has a thing for tummy bulges because why not, implicitly that also means he has a big dick, a slight???? exhibitionism kink (not actually something that happens, only talked about), johnny exists in this simply to trigger something vaguely feral in mark, reader is a little bit assertive and schemes to get mark's attention, jaehyun is a nosy lil eavesdropper, i think that should be it?? word count: 26.4k

a/n: hello so this was a mess and honestly not a fic i would say showcases my best plot-wise but… what can I say apart from booty wurk mark has me in a chokehold and I needed to release some thoughts and feelings !!! please do not expect too much from the development of the story; i fear it’s quite long and choppy because my ideas were all over the place and i was wringing my hands and brain constantly and i was eager to get to the spicy parts !! this is also not beta’d/proofread, it’s currently almost 1am, and i’ve been writing this on and off for a full week with very few breaks so it honestly felt like a fever dream for me LMAO please forgive any oversights and mistakes; i’ll try to go back on them another day and fix them little by little! finally and …most importantly belated happy birthday, my beloved morkly!

p.s. this will probably be flagged as ‘mature’ by tumblr, which means there’s a high likelihood it won’t appear in tags or searches. please consider reblogging to boost the fic, if you feel so inclined!

You’ve heard tell of how caffeine has inherently addictive properties. 

The more of it you have in your lifetime, the more likely you are to experience symptoms of withdrawal whenever you try to have orange juice for breakfast in its stead. It sounds bad, actually, considering most addictive substances are, but you suppose that its benefits somehow outweigh its milder drawbacks. You’re not much of a coffee connoisseur the way some people — see: your best friends, Yeji and Jisu — are, trying one cafe after the other in pursuit of being able to nominate the winning beans of 2023 (an annual heated debate they participate in for no better reason than their own slow and useless entertainment during their six-hour long breaks), but you do know you’ve only ever experienced good things from having a cup every so often: better energy, a more focused approach to mental activities, and the ability to drive through fifty percent of a road trip without needing pop punk music blasting out of your speakers to keep yourself alert. 

The three of you are generally particular about the coffee you drink, only in different ways. While your friends have a tendency to demand only the best from any establishment — lest the staff hear fiery commentary about the flatness of the brew or the evident coarseness of the grind — you, on the other hand, are a singular individual of rather simple tastes. All you need to survive long days is a glass of vanilla sweet cream cold brew. No modifications to the sugar level or fancy new milk types are necessary; you’ll drink it as it’s served in a grande cup (or a venti, when things prove particularly grueling). 

Of course, you’re strict about other things in the experience of consumption —  like where it’s served and, more importantly, who serves it to you. 

While Yeji and Jisu have rated the Liberal Arts building’s on-campus Starbucks branch as a five with the strict label of POEO — ‘passable on emergencies only’ — branding the menu as “nothing revolutionary” and criticizing most baristas for subpar brewery, you happen to be extremely drawn to the place. Initially, you may have argued that this has to do with the fact that it’s walking distance from most of your classes, confined to the same general compound on campus, so you can always grab a quick recharger whenever needed, no matter how short the timeframe to do so is. Sometime later on, you may have found yourself asserting that the layout of the cafe, albeit small, is very convenient, considering that every table is situated next to an electrical outlet, so you’re never out of battery (important to other students for their laptops and powerpoint presentations, important to you because you have an unhealthy obsession with passing time on TikTok, scrolling past video after video of ASMR girls clicking their twenty-inch long acrylics with their crazy candyland designs), and this makes you feel at ease. 

A month ago, you finally came clean to yourself and, soon after, to your friends, and they came to understand, albeit begrudgingly and with no small amount of amusement, what made this Starbucks unbeatable in your eyes; it had one thing no other coffee shop could lay claim to.

What you know of Mark Lee is accrued from two major sources: long, surreptitious glances in the Modern World History class you share, and irritatingly brief interactions when you place your order from the other side of the counter behind which he stands, long fingers always poised to punch in your order at the speed of light. Sometimes, those encounters get cut even shorter when irate upperclassmen start prattling their orders out before you can even say anything past your own, except even this has its own consolation prize — an apologetic smile at you that seems only for you, although you’re not sure how much of this assumption is true. You’ll just believe it as you feel it. 

And what you’ve learned about Mark Lee has funneled down into two key points for you: first, he is single, a fact you were clued into when a group of his friends came to the coffee shop and sat around the table next to you. You hadn’t been eavesdropping; they’d just been pretty loud, but you’d also perked your ears the moment the one everyone seemed to call “Hyuck” — you aren’t sure if it’s his full name or a nickname, and you don’t particularly care — had leaned in for a conspiratorial whisper about having a vague master plan to set Mark up with an old high school friend’s younger sister that he was just waiting to spring on said Mark, busy slaving away on their six impossible orders near the espresso machine. 

You don’t really know what became of that plan, nor if anyone had telepathically been on your side to outright call it crazy (someone should have had a better reason than you, anyway) since the next moment, Hyuck’s voice becomes significantly louder when it orders the one named Jisung to collect the completed coffee and snacks waiting for them on the counter. However, you feel safe in the assumption that even if it had happened, no repercussions had followed, seeing as Mark still presently comes and goes from his shifts alone and in no clear hurry to meet any cute girls that are sisters of high school friends of his friends. Or, maybe you’re just ignoring what could be truth, but that’s whatever. 

Second, you’ve learned that Mark Lee should not actually be your type — at least, in theory. 

Saying you’re out of his league would be a bit juvenile, but if you had only so many words to describe the situation, you’d say so under duress. It isn’t so much that he’s beneath you in any way, but your interests and general social circles run different routes. Yours tend to be more classically patterned after constantly changing trends, and the people you interact with all seem to have similar goals; you like to call it ‘vibe networking,’ which, from experience, involves connecting with both groups and individuals that are equally aware that they will benefit in some way from any resulting acquaintanceship — whether it be by climbing the social ladder a couple of rungs or being able to call in a quick, off-the-charts favor for something very important and/or very exclusive down the road. You and your friends spend a significant amount of time in a year watching your style and image, something quite a lot of kids in the first couple of years of college tend to do, which means that while you don’t particularly like to spend your time following your grade trajectory, you do have quite a lot of pseudo-friends that all seem to offer something entertaining or helpful to you. 

Mark, on the contrast, prefers to keep his circle very close to his heart, it seems — that which acts as a receptacle for all his interests. You can tell that he likes to be up to date less with trending movies and more with comic books, a separate beast of a world that’s rather unknown to you. More than once, you’ve overheard him chat with his friends about Spider-man Issue Number Whatever-It-Is or engage in somewhat lively (sometimes rowdy, thanks to the Hyuck fellow) discussions about some webtoon you’ve come to understand is called Solo Leveling, which seems to have to do with monsters and hunters — two things you know next to nothing about. You’ve also never seen Mark holding anything remotely close to a magazine; his hands are always filled with either a freshly opened comic or a beat-up textbook. Maybe once or twice, you’ve seen him on his phone, but when you peeked over (surreptitiously, of course) on those occasions, you were met only with brightly colored panels and a singular word: BAM. 

In conclusion — you and Mark Lee live very different lives, likely never truly meant to intersect. 

And yet, you want him — not even in a way that speaks only to your curiosity, but in a manner that feels slightly delusional. More than once, you’ve found yourself having to shut your jaw close after realizing you’ve been watching him steam milk with your mouth slightly agape. Maybe it’s his side profile, which gives you a great view of the way his jaw tenses every time he puts whipped cream on someone’s frappuccino. Maybe it’s his eyes, which always seem to twinkle like he’s harboring some special secret every time someone in line asks for his recommendation on how to spice their order up. Maybe it’s his hands, steady and agile, with just the right showing of veins through the skin to tell you they’ve probably got significant strength to them too. Or maybe it’s just his mind — that thing he always manages to show off in class, working faster than lightning even when the rest of you are in your natural eight-in-the-morning stupor.

Whatever the reason for your interest, Mark Lee makes sure the Liberal Arts building’s Starbucks has you as a regular customer. 

You’re fully aware that this is the twenty-first century, which is why you could, as Yeji and Jisu have so kindly made known, simply ask him out. Under normal circumstances, you would have.

Unfortunately, in this particular area of your life, separate from all others, you’re something of a traditionalist. 

Actually, you just want to know what Mark asking you out would look like. Curiosity has fully gotten the better of you — how can it not, with how he breaks eye contact with you the moment it happens by accident in class, or with how pleasantly and shyly he smiles when you say ‘hey’ to him once you’re about to order? You’d like to see, first-hand, as a recipient of the experience itself, what he would look like taking control of a particular situation like that — something someone like him, so mild-mannered and laid-back, never really seemed to do upfront. 

You’d like to think you’ve given him clear signs. There’s a reason you always come in during his shift times, and it’s the same reason for why you have the same damn drink from the menu over and over again despite not even caring too much about coffee in the first place (something he admittedly doesn’t know and probably wouldn’t puzzle out, given how often you’re in that Starbucks, anyway). It’s that you want him to remember you.

Selfishly, it’s that you want him to think just a little bit more about you every single day. 

But if he does, Mark has never made it very clearly known; apart from taking your order in his genial customer service demeanor or letting a look of brief recognition pass his face over when you cross paths in the hallways, he’s never really shown heightened inquisitiveness about you. For all your differences, only you seem to actually care.

Frankly, that frustrates you, because if you have to think about him unhealthily, it would only be right for him to do that for your sake too. Still, you’ll shrug that hit on your pride off for as long as you can get his attention one way or another.

All you really need is for your plan to pan out as well as you think — and hope — it will. 

The thing is, you’re not even that bad at math. You’ve never really excelled at it, of course, but you wouldn’t go so far as to say you’re in dire need of help from anyone — the kind of help that feels like babysitting, at least.

However, Mark Lee doesn’t know that, and you’re not compelled to make that fact known to him when you notice that he’s leaning on the counter with his elbows, shoulders rolled forward and head bent down. He’s twirling his ballpoint in hand, wrist hovering over a worksheet, and you’re briefly distracted by the rapidly moving shadow underneath it.

His head snaps up when you gently knock on the counter, and the rest of his body follows suit, straightening as he shoves the paper away, one edge crumpling in on itself as it meets resistance in the form of the pastry display glass.

“Hey — hi, _________.” He knows your name, says it easily, and while you’d like to believe it’s because of his unprecedented interest in you, you know that it’s just because you’re always here and always having him write your name on the side of your cup. “Can I get you the usual?”

There’s no particular reason you order what you do; maybe it’s just rooted in the fact that when you first asked Mark for a recommendation, he said that the Vanilla Sweet Cream Cold Brew was pretty good, and you were inclined to believe him (while pointedly ignoring the fact that it was, at the time, a new item all of the baristas were required to push to indecisive, slightly moony-eyed customers such as yourself). Whatever the case, you found the drink generally palatable, and you were also able to score the first of many smiles that fed into your two-semester-long infatuation with him, so it was basically a win-win scenario for all. He even got to do his job by getting some rube (see: you) into trying a new product.

“Hey, Mark.” You’ve long since given up pretending that you don’t know his name and have to check the tag on his cute green apron (why is it cute? You don’t know. It’s the same, standard, Starbucks green, but Mark makes it look homely and natural, somehow). You’ve been here way too many times over the last academic year for a nonchalant, were you talking to me? approach to work, anyway. “That, plus a lemon loaf, if you don’t mind. What’ve you got there?”

His eyes follow the trail of yours over to his wrinkled worksheet. “Oh — no, sorry. It’s nothing.”

“Is it secret?” Your bottom lip juts out, and you see his Adam’s apple bob dangerously, a small telltale sign of minute nervousness before he lets out a short laugh. “Didn’t know we kept stuff from each other.”

You don’t know what makes you say that so naturally. The both of you don’t do much beyond exchanging pleasantries.

“We — uh, well, it’s just a worksheet. For Park Hyosung’s class. College algebra?”

“I’m in Kim Junghwa’s. Can I have a look? I want to know if you’re suffering just as much as I am.”

He pauses, considering your request for a moment, likely wondering if there’s any harm in it before he smooths the paper out and turns it towards you. His handwriting’s a little messy, but his solutions are extremely neat. You see, like, one erasure, max. You also don’t see anything that interests you — except the name written at the top. Still, you can see at a general glance that more than half of his answers are correct; the logic of his organization is way too elegant and his writing’s too sure to be anything else. You whistle low, and his eyebrows shoot up.

“Something wrong?”

“Pretty much the opposite. How is it that you’re doing this without breaking a sweat?”

“Oh, well — it’s not…” He doesn’t even know how to brag. Yet another item in the perpetually growing list of things you find cute about Mark Lee. “I mean, anyone… can?”

“I must not be anyone then.” You meet his quizzical look with a wry smile. “Either you guys are leaps and bounds ahead, or I’m really not going to make it through this semester.”

Another silence passes, just for a fraction of a second — short enough to be passable to others, but long enough for you to wonder if your humor code isn’t up to par with the rest of the world’s — before Mark’s chuckling lowly. His large palm comes down, covering a majority of his answers in the process.

“You’re kidding. I’m sure you’re doing just fine.”

“Mark, look at this face.” You gesture to your evidently dumbfounded, blank expression. “Does this look like the face of someone that’s doing just fine?”

You’re pleased to hear another laugh from him; you don’t know if he really finds you funny or if he’s just the type to be easily amused. You don’t want to know, anyway; assuming is better than actually finding out.

“That bad, huh?” He slides the worksheet away again, like he’s afraid his correct answers are going to offend you into leaving the cafe. Instead, his hands start working on your order, grabbing a cup and scrawling the shorthand of the drink on one of the little boxes. “Ever think about getting a tutor, maybe? If you really feel like you’re drowning, that is.”

“A tutor? I guess that depends. Are you free on weeknights?”

The marker makes a soft screeching sound as he drags it down with too much force, ruining the penmanship of your name. Mark takes a moment to stare at the mistake on the plastic before he looks at you, pointing the rim of the cup towards himself. “Sorry — am I free—?”

“You said I should get a tutor, right?”

“I thought — no, sorry, I was thinking more like one of those department-assigned tutors you can ask the faculty for, or something.”

“Oh. Are you not one of them?” You sigh, albeit a little over dramatically. Thankfully, he doesn’t really cotton onto your acting, too caught up in befuddlement at the turn of the conversation. “That’s a bummer. I was kinda hoping that if I was going to ask for help, I’d get an actual genius. You know — someone like you?”

You can tell by Mark’s expression that he’s torn between denying your compliment again and responding to your actual question; he looks both relieved and miffed when the student behind you clears her throat.

“Sorry, but— you know that there’s a line, right?”

You both apologize, Mark’s much more sincere than your own, and you step aside. His gaze follows you for a moment before it snaps back to the next customer, his voice abandoning that bemused uncertainty it had taken up with you. You don’t really mind; as far as you’re concerned, any dent in his barista persona when he talks to you is a step in the right direction.

You hang around the pick-up area, receipt in hand, watching Mark clear the line before moving to the actual stations near the kitchen area. There’s a concentration on his face that you find all the more attractive; he has a habit of chewing on his bottom lip when he’s trying to focus on getting the drizzle just right inside the cup’s cylinder.

He tends to try his best at everything, you figure. Not an unattractive quality — not by a long shot.

Mark finishes your drink first; the milk’s still only seeping, cloudy, into the coffee when he brings it over. He doesn’t even have to call your queue number, opting to meet your eye — albeit slightly nervously — instead. You reach out to hold the cup, a calculated move that allows you to brush hands against his without him being able to pull back on instinct. He doesn’t, nor does he really seem to want to, but his jaw tightens as a flush creeps along the curve of his ears.

“You really won’t help me?”

Your question’s abrupt, almost a little demanding, even if your voice is sweet. You’re not above asking this much, anyway, even if you technically want him to make the first move. The redness sinks down to his earlobes.

“I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t really say anything,” you tease. The cup’s on the counter now, so he can easily relinquish it to you at this point, but he still hesitates, only one hand slipping out from under the heat of your palm. He uses it to rub the back of his neck, chuckling softly, and you take this as a green light. “What time does your shift end?”

“Five-thirty. You sure you wouldn’t want someone better?”

You pull your cup slowly to yourself, and his hand, still lightly trapped by your own, follows for a few inches before he’s withdrawing, the counter between the two of you forcing the distance. A smile follows the shaking of your head, and you take a small sip of the drink before you respond simply.

“There’s no one better than you.”

Mark is a prompt kind of person; you learn this when, at five-thirty, he comes over to your table, tugging his apron off over his head. Of course, you might attribute that to his overall personality, but the fact that you spend the remaining two hours of his shift casting him glances from the left side of the coffee shop might have also been a contributing factor. The looks you give him aren’t even furtive; they’re deliberately long, so you never miss whenever he looks over to you from time to time.

He doesn’t hold eye contact for very long (he does it well enough when he’s talking to customers, but it’s not like you’re ordering another cold brew from across the room at that point), but you can read snippets of his thoughts through the fleeting gaze exchanges. He’s curious as to why you’re asking for help, now, of all times, when the semester’s more than halfway over. He’s surprised that you asked him, of all people, because he just can’t conceive of a world that isn’t within a television show where this kind of abrupt, overt request makes sense. He’s flattered that you even asked him out of the blue. He’s equal parts anxious and eager to know what’s meant to happen after his shift, once he starts fulfilling your request.

Most of all, he’s unsure if he’s reading you right — if what it feels like you’re doing is something he’s attaching too deep a meaning to. If he’s right in reading your signs.

You don’t really mind it; you like knowing that Mark somehow wears his heart on his sleeve, even if he tries to remain neutral for the sake of appearances. You also bask quietly in the fact that he’s looking at you twice as much as he ever has in the time you’ve loosely known each other. Still, his bubbling confusion and inquisitiveness seem to be interfering with the rest of his work, especially when you notice that he’s been wiping down the surface of a table two down from where you are for more than seven minutes.

In the hopes of easing whatever tension might be in his heart, you offer him a small smile, but that’s only met with his eyes immediately glazing over and inching a couple of centimeters above your forehead, where the story of Starbucks’ origins is drawn out in a faux-manga style. He pretends to find it interesting, as if he hasn’t seen it a million times from coming into this establishment day after day — you know it well enough, and you don’t even have to, considering you don’t work here — and you can’t do anything but hold back your laughter.

A small part of you says you should just give him the affirmative answer to his biggest question, but every other cell in your body says that it’s no fun if he doesn’t ascertain it for himself.

He has his school bag and textbook in tow when he approaches, taking the seat across from you. There’s a steely resolution on his face, like he’s been emotionally preparing himself for such a daunting task, but it eases up the moment you laugh lightly.

“You don’t have to act like I’m going to eat you.”

“I’m still not sure why you’re suddenly asking me to help you,” he admits. He’s also very honest, you note. Again, not an unattractive trait. “I’m not complaining. I just didn’t think you even had an opinion of me.”

“Why’s that?” You’re genuinely surprised. Mark drums his fingers on the front of his textbook, thoughtful — less for the sake of thinking what to say and more for the sake of considering how to say it. It’s clear he wants to avoid calling attention to the fact that before now, you two have had no reason to run the same track, let alone sit together and talk at a coffee shop, as if you’ve always been the best of friends.

“Genuinely just thought I was the guy who gave you your afternoon coffee every day,” he finally settles. Your eyes widen, and another laugh escapes you — a little louder this time, enough to call the attention of a couple of jumpy freshmen nearby.

“Well — let me put it this way.” You lean over slightly, cupping your chin in your palm. “Was I just the girl you made coffee for every day until now?”

There are clear cogs turning in his head; his eyes unfocus slightly as he thinks of the possibilities. His silence suddenly makes you somewhat nervous; your tone had been confident, and you’d only said that to prove a point, to push him in the right direction, but you realize that you hadn’t previously factored in the possibility that he might simply say yes — or, worse, say no just to avoid hurting your feelings.

You watch his lower lip curl in; he uses his tongue to smooth out the skin that’s slightly dried from work fatigue. You would much rather it peeked out, so you could imagine it against your own. His response is mumbled in a lower register, but you catch some key syllables — didn’t… not … stranger — pretty … you?

“Sorry?” You ask patiently, but the fact that he turns red and laughs again — something you realize is not only a trademark of his personality but also downright delicious of him to be doing — is all the answer you need to let the apprehension seep from your shoulders. “I didn’t catch that.”

Mark clears his throat. “No, I… didn’t think of you that way. I mean… you’re my classmate.”

“Sure,” your tone’s breezy, but the somewhat sloppy confirmation of interest in you makes your heart soar. He just needs more of a push. “And we’re basically friends, right?”

“Yeah.” His voice is unsure at first, like he can’t seem to wrap his head around the concept. You can tell that Mark’s notion of friendship is likely based on shared interests, of which you admittedly have none. Technically, if you were his friend, you’d spend less time just telling him the exact same order every single day and more time sitting around a table trying to learn how to play Magic: The Gathering with him. Still, he takes one long look at your grin and suddenly gains confidence in his next words, as if it somehow convinces him that the briefness of your old conversations had been a mutually agreed-upon thing and not the product of social distance between the two of you. “Yeah. We’re friends.”

“Right. Friends help friends, don’t they? I’d definitely feel more comfortable having a friend teach me than some stuffy upperclassman I don’t know.”

You see Mark’s lips move slightly, in such small movements you could have imagined it as breathing if you didn’t care too much (which you do). He mouths, to himself — friends help friends. For some reason, that boosts his conviction even further, and he nods.

“Makes sense. Well — for as long as you don’t mind me, then.”

“Mind? I asked you, so I should be saying that.”

“I’d never mind — I mean, of course I don’t mind.” He’s quick to correct himself, and you have to stop your own hand from reaching out to try to satisfy your curiosity, the desire to know just how hot his cheeks get when he blushes. “More than happy to help, actually.”

“And I’m more than happy to be here.” You beam at him, and he mirrors your smile. You don’t know what it is about the look on his face — the brightness in his eyes, or the slight lift of his eyebrows, maybe — but it gives you the impression that he might be feeling at least a fraction of what you are: the feeling of your heart lifting off a few inches from your rib cage. “Since we’re on the same page, I hope — should we get to it?”

From the moment that Mark opens his textbook to a chapter on inverted parabolas, he assumes a personality you feel you haven’t seen from him before. You realize that you really do know him in only two limited capacities — his classroom persona that seems to really only view himself and the material, focused on the board and the professor’s words (even up until the useless anecdotes) to absorb as much information as possible, and his more genial customer service form, always happy to assist in the trained, easygoing way you’ve come to meet so often.

Right now, he’s a blend of both, yet somehow neither all at once. He’s quick to catch the parabolas you draw, either wrongly or downright poorly. Despite initial hesitation, he always manages to say something; there’s already a pattern to how he does it, from his slightly awkward, “Ah, sorry, actually —” to the way his finger traces over what you’ve written, outlining the right curve. You find his interruptions so endearing that you start drawing them wrong purposefully — not enough for him to realize your schemes in their entirety, but enough to cast you a few amused glances, like he can’t imagine why you’d map out such an absurd graph. You get the feeling he wants to actually laugh at how ridiculous you’re acting, but he can’t tell if you’re seriously struggling or not, so he settles for a smile he thinks he does well in keeping to himself, but that you catch anyway. He’s patient, even when you have to rip out pages from the back of his notebook because of your ‘mistakes,’ like he’s still catering to your request for an extra pump of syrup for your coffee on sleepy days.

But there’s also that side to him that comes out when he suddenly remembers the distance between you that, before today, had felt unlikely to be closed. It peaks at odd moments, like when you’re borrowing his pen because yours is currently holding your slowly unraveling bun up, and your fingers brush against his. It surfaces abruptly when you lean in to watch what he’s drawing until he realizes how close you are, arm lightly grazing his, and his pen freezes, ink blotting on the paper for a second. It’s in those times that you can almost hear his brain churning out questions — like he’s wondering if you’re just oblivious or if you’re doing something on purpose that he can’t quite believe. Like he wants to ask you what’s on your mind, but he just doesn’t know how.

If he asked, you would reply without missing a beat. The answer, after all, is simple (him). But Mark never raises the question, only does something without fully acknowledging what he’s doing — the adjustment of his glasses on the bridge of his nose, the ruffling of his hair as though to shake off his thoughts, the clearing of his throat to normalize his tone before he explains something you’ve just asked about. There’s always that light tinge of pink to his face that makes him look even more endearing, and it fades and returns every so often for the better part of two hours.

By the time he rubs oncoming fatigue out of his eyes, the sun has already set; there are far fewer people around you at this time, and for as much as you like spending time with him and breathing in the scent of his shirt — always a tinge of Downy, barely cutting through the much more overpowering scent of espresso and sugar — your back has begun hurting from your front-heavy posture and determination to have your face as close as rationally possible to Mark’s. Still, you don’t miss out on the fact that the act of him cracking his neck to relieve tension makes your lips curl inward, trying to stifle an inappropriate noise in reaction to the view.

“I feel like I talked your ear off,” he pipes up, sounding a bit sheepish. “Sometimes it’s hard to know when to stop once you’ve gotten started. I’m just hoping I didn’t bore you to death.”

“Meanwhile, I’m here hoping you aren’t sick of my questions already.” You smile, closing your notebook and hanging the clip of your pen on the spiral. Your arms stretch up first, followed by your back, a light twist to relax your posture into normalcy again. Mark’s breathing falls quiet, like he’d been preparing to say something in response but had let it die in the back of his throat instead. You let your eyes drop, expecting to see him looking at you, as he mostly has been — on and off — since his shift ended, but his eyes are far lower than yours, the telltale redness now growing in evident splotches across his cheeks.

The hem of your shirt has ridden up; while there’s nothing outrageous about it, there’s a short expanse of skin that it reveals, for a brief moment. His eyes are slightly glossy, brow furrowed like he’s trying to find a solution to something he can’t fully understand. You’re not even sure about what he could really be looking at, or if there’s something he’s just thinking of that caught his attention while his eyes focused on a rather unfortunate spot. To test your theory, you suck in your stomach slightly alongside an inhale.

It should be objectively funny to watch Mark blink unevenly, left eye going first before his right tries to catch up, but you manage to stifle your laughter — poorly, though, because you end up coughing a little and breaking him out of his strange trance. You avert your eyes quickly enough for him to look vaguely relieved that you hadn’t caught him looking. So he thinks, at least.

“Anyway.” You feel bad that you have to tear his mind away from whatever faraway land it must be trying to burrow a hole in; the dazed expression on his face dims into hastily hidden embarrassment. You don’t want him to feel awkward, so you just busy yourself with packing up, making an unnecessary show of stuffing your notebook back into your bag as if it isn’t half-empty at this point. “I really appreciate you taking the time to help me.”

“Any time.” His first attempt is a little raspy, maybe from overuse of his voice today, so he clears his throat and tries again. A slow smile builds on your lips. “Any time, really. I’m glad that this is actually helping you; you pick things up surprisingly fast.”

“Wait, really?”

“Yeah. Give it a couple of weeks, and you’ll probably be ready to tackle it on your own again, I’m sure.”

He smiles reassuringly, but all you can think about is how that’s not good. You should pretend to be a little dumber next time, or this will end much too prematurely.

The next five minutes pass in silence; you don’t expect to be knee-deep in conversation anyway since, as much as you try to convince him, you aren’t actually anywhere close to being those kinds of friends yet. There’s an unspoken rule to the give and take of things, where he pauses for you to get an item off the table and push it into your bag before he does the same with his own belongings. Neither of you really intersect paths, save for the moment you both grab your phones and stand at the same time.

His jaw falls open like he’s preparing to say something, then shuts as if he’s better decided against it. You decide to take the initiative to say what you’re assuming he wants to. “Same time, same table?”

“Oh — uh, yeah, for sure.”

You want to ask him to walk out with you. You want to lace your fingers with his, tug him out, and kiss him under the green and white glow of the sign outside. You want to know if kissing his collarbone means you’ll taste a hint of coffee. You think about doing it all somehow, especially since he’s fighting back a slight smile at the promise of tomorrow.

But it just isn’t the right time.

Instead, you place a hand on his shoulder, giving it a light squeeze. The slow movement of his throat — yet another hard swallow — isn’t lost on you, and his eyes land on where the two of you connect. With a grateful smile, you bid him a soft goodbye, taking your leave first.

You don’t look back — at least, not until you’re fully in the cover of the darkness outside. On the gravel path, just out of reach of the lamplight, you chance one last glance back into the store. Mark is still rooted to the same spot, his backpack slung over one shoulder, staring at the table like he’s dissociating from what just happened — like he can’t believe the last couple of hours.

Your smile grows when you see his own, and his hand comes around to the back of his neck, rubbing it lightly like it gives him small comfort to let him know that it was real.

Baby steps, you remind yourself. You’ve already got one foot in the door, after all.

As the days trickle by, you fall into a more comfortable standing with Mark; there’s a routine to your meetings that seems to eliminate the initial and abrupt awkwardness of that first day. You come into that Starbucks at four, greet Mark, who doesn’t ever have to ask for your order, and spend the next hour and a half slowly sipping on it until the ice has thinned and watered down your drink substantially. In that time, you allow yourself to do whatever you want (as if you’ve ever done otherwise anyway), and what you usually want the most is a good view of him. You therefore use most of the minutes you have on hand to regard him from different angles — from the side when he’s frothing milk, upfront when he turns to leave cups on the pick-up counter, from the back when he’s clearing tables — interspersed with moments of checking your TikTok feed, clearing group chat messages, and sometimes re-curling your bangs with a portable iron from the school’s co-op center, a relatively new purchase you tote around these days. You do essentially anything in between to avoid acting too suspicious while he works.

Sometimes, you catch Mark’s eye too; the more your meetings increase in number over the course of a few weeks, the more deliberately he looks over at you, and the longer it lasts. You feel like you’ve made significant progress when your gazes lock and he smiles slightly, albeit a bit unsurely, instead of turning away like he used to. The other day, he’d even passed by while apologizing for how long you always waited for him — not that you ever minded, something you made a point to clarify with him before he walked away, carrying a couple of chairs from the back room with him to replace rickety ones.

That he’s able to transport them easily, as if he’s lugging a bag of apples from the grocery, does not escape your watchful eye.

What you like the most is that you start to learn more about him in a way that isn’t fueled only by your expectations and, therefore, limited by your imagination. You find out that he’s from a close-knit family with a rather cushy background, and this barista job is just for interest funding and experience, in that exact order. Most of his earnings are funneled into the things he collects, which apparently isn’t limited to comic books and special edition blu-rays with director’s cut but also a rather stupendous amount of PopMart blind box figurines. Apparently, he particularly likes the Skullpanda series even if he hasn’t completed it yet; your last session together had adjourned thirty minutes earlier than usual so that he could catch a pre-rush hour inner circle train to Hongdae, where the flagship store was set to open on that day. He’d promised to show you his pulls (as long as they weren’t embarrassing dupes). You learn that he likes to listen to loud music when he studies to stimulate his mind, and he has a playlist that’s just a jumble of songs from Punk Goes Pop volumes that makes him feel empowered for some absurd reason, like he’s going against the grain. You don’t really get it, but you do like that spiced-up rendition of Ariana Grande’s Problem that he let you listen to once.

Of course, there are things that you find out not through conversation but through continued, closer observation. You notice that he likes to put on chapstick even if his lips aren’t particularly dry, but he does worry on them often, most especially when he’s thinking hard about something. He has a habit of saying honestly… at the start of every other sentence, as if he’s concerned you won’t take his word on anything, even though he’s just talking about how unnaturally hot it was at noon despite it still being spring. He has long eyelashes that you’re equal parts attracted to and jealous of, and he bites the inside of his cheek whenever he wants to pep himself up after grueling shifts. He plays beats you’re not even sure he knows he’s creating against his knee with his fingers, so enthusiastic and consistent in this habit that you want to offer your thigh instead. His shoulders always go first before he laughs, and he does this thing where he raises his hand to cover his mouth at the start of it, which is a shame, because you’d do anything to keep seeing him smile like that — or, better yet, to be the reason for it.

Then there are those things you notice he tries to hide. He always turns his face halfway to the side when he blushes, something he seems to do without fail every time you smile at him. He has to temper the intensity of his grin when you take the time to compliment him on how cool his shirt is, or how nice his hair looks today, or how smart he is, like he doesn’t want you to know how good it makes him feel even if you want him to feel good about it, around you, because of you. Sometimes he denies it for the sake of responding, and his voice always lilts on the first syllable in his refusal to accept what you say, even though he knows you won’t take it for an answer.

And after a couple more careful experiments, you notice that Mark, out of the many things he’s interested in, seems to have a particular thing for your stomach.

You don’t know if it has anything to do with him not really seeing much of it in real life in his own time or if he just has his own kind of fixation on it, but you start to cotton on by the fourth time you meet. An hour of being hunched over a table that’s not at the greatest height in relation to your neck and torso has you stiff, and you’d leaned back in your chair, arms pulling to the air, hoping your spine might feel like realigning if you exerted enough tension pressure that way. Your shirt hadn’t ridden up this time, considering it had been tucked into your jeans, and it was because of this that you’d caught a flicker of something new in his face that you hadn’t seen before.

You could have sworn it looked like disappointment.

Of course, he hides it quickly, as he does with most of his emotional candor, but it’s enough to make you suspicious — enough to make you wonder if Mark is also just keeping something to himself. Or maybe you’re just projecting your own presently secretive nature onto him. Regardless, you think it’s odd that whenever you stand up or stretch, his eyes almost immediately fall to your midriff, like he wants to challenge your clothing into a staring contest before he thinks better of it.

You don’t mind, anyway. He can look as much as he likes. Maybe when the weather’s warmer, you’ll even cater to that interest and wear a crop top. Hopefully, that’ll be the push he needs to act on human instinct and ask you out or, like… bend you over. Maybe.

You’re often plagued with these kinds of thoughts in between the ones you try to keep as family-friendly as possible — now, more so than ever.

Sometimes, it’s easier, especially when you’re caught up in talks with him; despite the fact that he doesn’t seem like much of a conversationalist when it comes to generic matters, when either he or you are enthusiastic about a particular topic, he has a tendency to get carried away. There’s nothing impure about how his eyes light up when you remember to ask him about the movie he saw with his friends over the weekend or the way he hums old Nickelodeon cartoon theme songs under his breath whenever he’s looking for a page in the textbook. It’s more of a situation where you’ll observe something and immediately run with it despite it being an objectively normal action.

Like right now, as you’re watching him turn his pen between his fingers. Now, while he’s shaking his knee in mild impatience, as if he’s trying to will the answer to the worksheets you’ve both been trying to get through for the better part of the day faster. You’d made copies of the problems your professors had assigned and exchanged them under the premise of being able to practice more intensely.

However, whereas Mark is actually focused on solving, you’re just watching him out of the corner of your eye, wondering if he’s ever been told that his fingers are fuck-worthy on a singular, unique level or if it’d feel good for you to ride the thigh he’s currently moving, jeans and all. You consider the feeling of his warm palms on your bare waist as you do it, and you end up wondering if that’s what crosses his mind whenever he sneaks glances at you, too.

You’d know the answer to all those things if he’d fucking ask you out. Maybe you could do it after all. Maybe you should, instead of relying on slowly increasing the probability over such a long period of time. Maybe if you asked nicely, Mark might pull the shades down on the storefront windows and rail you against the glass.

You’re so lost in thought that it genuinely startles you when he plops his textbook over the worksheet, rattling your eraser dangerously close to the edge of the table. You’re still clutching your heart while he rubs his eyes a little too violently.

“Can’t,” he groans, and his neck gives into the weight of his head, allowing it to loll backward. “I feel like the numbers are just melting into each other. I swear, I thought I could read words out of them.”

“Maybe we were a little too ambitious with the double worksheet agenda,” you admit, even though you’ve barely gotten past half of yours and certainly haven’t touched a single item on his. “Should we call it a day for now?”

“Yeah,” he agrees, although he still takes the time to encircle his final answers before clapping his palms to his cheeks (an act that has your mind dangerously close to wandering off inappropriately again) to wake himself up. “Woah. I didn’t even notice how dark it is already. I’d say time flies when you’re having fun, but I’m not too sure about the ‘fun’ part of it…”

You trace his gaze towards the glass; the moon’s already out, surrounded by a smattering of low-light stars. You hadn’t realized how late it had gotten, probably because your mind had been on R-18 mode for most of the afternoon. Also, the days are getting generally shorter, but that fact doesn’t make you feel as embarrassed, at least.

“You got a ride?”

The question once again shocks you out of your small trance, and you turn back to him with wide eyes. “Well — no. Wait, I didn’t know you had a car. Why’d you take the subway, then?”

“Oh — no, sorry, I… don’t.” He looks suddenly sheepish, eyes dropping to the shiny surface of the table for a moment before they snap back up, as if he’s actually actively reminding himself to look at you. “I was wondering if you wanted me to — actually, more than that, are you going home already? Not that you need to stay; it’s not that important, but…”

You try to gloss over the fact that he had just been about to initiate another huge step in the right direction (i.e. offering to walk you home) by beaming at him, maybe a little too widely, if only to mask your disappointment at the sudden shift in conversation. “I have nothing waiting at home for me but a sandwich dinner and Singles Inferno, so hit me with whatever it is.”

“Oh, cool.” His lips turn up, and the corners shake, this show of happiness once again tamped down by his own inexplicable desire to maintain a safe distance. How are you supposed to tell him you’re desperate to bridge that gap without using those exact words? “I came from the flagship store yesterday — the one in Hongdae that I told you about?” He allows the smile to widen slightly when you nod in genuine understanding. “Got the last six boxes of the collection I’ve been trying to finish.”

You whistle appreciatively. “Can I ask you for a loan on my next phone bill? You know, once I’ve upgraded to something pricier.”

“Nah — just itching to complete the set,” he laughs. You wonder if he’s been doing that more often because he knows its crippling effect on you, though you doubt he’s that sly. Again, maybe you’re just projecting too much of your own motivations onto him. “This was probably about two months of saving up combined.”

“No new Iron Man issues to look out for, then?” Your voice is warm even though it takes on a teasing tone; Mark’s hand rubs the back of his neck, and his expression is a little sheepish, but you’re happy that the times he used to go completely quiet, opting only to blush at your attempts to act more familiar with him are pretty much gone now.

“Maybe next month.” You also like that he doesn’t really treat his hobbies as secrets, neither out of shame nor snobbishness. He explains these things to you the same way he does the topics you study — with an air of contentedness, like he’s happy someone listens to him without interrupting. On your end, you have no qualms with listening to his voice for hours, wondering when he’ll stop using it to greet you when you come through the door and when he’ll start saying your name in a way that makes you feel like you’re the only one he sees whenever you’re near. It’s a win-win situation (sort of). “I was actually debating between this collection and a really rare copy of Spi— well, never mind that. I just thought — since you were asking me a bit about blind boxes last time. You know, if you wanted to. With… me.”

As much as he’s become comfortable talking to you about things that don’t involve coffee orders and school, you can’t say that you aren’t doing your fair share of the work in connecting the dots; the demand for your efforts is exponentially higher in moments like this, when you think he’s trying to ask you something but can’t seem to find less-than-eager words to avoid what he thinks might spook you.

Luckily, he augments his fragments with action; reaching into his backpack — which you notice seems to be bulkier than usual — he starts extracting small brown boxes, all with the same design; it seems, for lack of better words, aesthetically gothic, and you reach out to pick one up, turning it over and examining the print on each side with vague interest. Mark starts laying them out on top of each other until there’s a small, somewhat unstable pyramid in front of him, then shifts his attention fully to you, just as you’re putting the box in your hand atop all the rest.

“I’d love to.” You beam as he does, and there’s a wondrous relief in his eyes that tells you he’s glad you manage to catch onto his words — or lack, thereof — surprisingly well. “For as long as you don’t blame me for any bad draws.”

“The contents have already been decided by my own hand — sort of,” he chuckles. “Point is, I would never do that to you. But I won’t lie; I kind of want to rely on your luck a little more.”

“What makes you think I’d have any of that running through my system?”

“Not sure — beginner’s luck, maybe? You just kind of look like one of those kinds of people to me — like… you’re just made of good things.”

You don’t know how to take this compliment; on the one hand, it’s easily one of the sweetest things Mark has ever said to you that doesn’t involve anything with actual sugar content. On the other, you know you’re not as lucky as he makes it sound, considering you’re still striking out on getting past the borderline of friendship with him. All you can do is smile, nodding and making to move closer to him by sliding into the next seat.

It’s hard to ignore the sight of him stiffening; something like surprise mingled with both fear and interest flashes strong across his face, but you don’t do anything to acknowledge the slight change in atmosphere, choosing to settle down comfortably and clap your hands. “So. What are the rules? What can I do, and what can’t I?”

“Uh.” His throat constricts at the right moment, the syllable getting caught and causing him to clear his throat. You know that this is the nearest you’ve ever been to him, the sleeve of your shirt tickling his arm. Upon closer, albeit brief inspection, you note that he’s also rather veiny. That doesn’t do your impurity any favors. “Not… really rules, or anything like that. Just — these are the ones I’ve been looking for. Not that you can really control it, but in case you were curious about that.”

You squint intently at the scaled-down images he points out. There’s one that looks like a penguin caught in an oil spill; another that seems to be in a polar bear costume, dozing; and — “What’s… halo? Halo…bios?”

“It just means marine life,” he answers quickly, like the thought means close to nothing to him to know something that obscure. Whoever said that smart is the new sexy wasn’t joking. “Like… all things that live in the ocean, that kind of thing.”

“And you know this because?”

He pauses, looking thoughtful. “I’m not sure. I guess I must have just learned it when I was curious about what it meant some time ago. Isn’t that how we all learn things?”

You shake your head incredulously, and he smiles a little apologetically. “You never cease to amaze me.” Your nail drums against the silhouette of one with a question mark on it. “What’s this supposed to be? Can you draw your own figurine, or something?”

“No.” He’s clearly amused, but his expression’s still patronizing enough for you to not feel too bad about saying something idiotic. “It’s a secret design — a money drainer, basically. You could buy a full set of this and still not get it. Some people will open hundreds without any luck, so it’s really rare.”

“You don’t want it?”

“I try not to get too caught up in the secret thing,” he admits. “Otherwise…”

“No rare print comic books for the rest of your life, basically?”

He taps his nose, and you both share another laugh. It’s nice, you think, to have come this far — to be someone Mark can share his interests and thoughts with. You may have been stretching the word to its limit when you first punched your way into his social life and called yourself his friend, but it feels more real now, more natural to think about and say. Even if he still sometimes seems to be hyperaware of the gap between the both of you, there’s no denying, at least, that it’s been significantly reduced, and this much is a testament to that.

“Well, leave it up to me. I’ll let all of this beginner’s luck rub off on you,” you announce with overflowing albeit unfounded confidence.

You both decide to open a box each at the same time; Mark suddenly panics and asks you not to unseal the foil bag right away without looking at the card inside first, earning him one slightly alarmed look followed by a burst of laughter at his pained expression when you pretend to rip open the packaging. Comparing pulls, you identify them using the set chart — your luck doesn’t seem to be operating at full capacity yet because you can only offer him the card of one that looks like a floppy pigeon, which he responds to with a slightly apologetic grimace before saying he’s already pulled that thrice in the past. He, on the other hand, is turning the card of the polar bear over in his palm, trying not to make you feel bad for your duplicate pull by slipping it under his textbook when your eyes land on it.

The second round isn’t much better; both of you manage to pull something he’s already added to his collection, and as you’re ripping the seal to your third box, he pauses and watches you. You think it’s because he’s concerned about the obvious shit luck you’ve had thus far and wants to snatch it from you before your negative energy transfigures whatever’s inside into something he doesn’t want, and you’re just about to offer the half-opened package to him before he pushes the one on his end to you.

“No way, Mark.” Your eyes are wide, a palm up to reject it. “If that turns out to be another dupe by my hand, I’m literally going to walk into oncoming traffic.”

He has to control his amusement at your words so that it doesn’t completely shake his voice into incoherence. “I picked all of these while I was there, so if anything, you’re only riding off my bad luck. Besides, this is your first time doing this. I want you to have fun.”

“But,” your voice is pained. “Your money.”

“It’s not a big deal. With how few I need to complete them, I was definitely bound to run into more repeats than new ones.” He taps the front of the textbook — or, at least, the part of it not buried under the figurines and sealing tapes yet. “Probability mathematics.”

“I thought we already ended the study part of the day,” you grumble but concede, putting aside the one you half-opened to tear the top of his. You’re careful when you shake out the foil packaging, making sure to place it upright on the table before extracting the card. Both of your faces fall — yours more than his — when you see it’s a repeat of the polar bear.

“Almost. It would’ve been a pretty lucky pull earlier, so it’s technically not bad,” he tries to reassure you, but you childishly feel like you’ve been the sole source of his disappointment thus far. “Try the last one.”

It’s irrational, but you’re suddenly anxious about it. For some reason, you’re worried that this will topple the carefully constructed ladder you’ve propped up against Mark’s tower of social defense. Even if he’s being genial about your rotten pulls, you don’t know how much of it is just resignation to dismay on his part.

You say a small prayer, then fully rip off the seal; you don’t even take out the packaged figuring anymore. You just shimmy the card out of the box, turning it over when you notice it’s upside down.

For a moment, your shoulders deflate. It’s closest to this pastel purple figurine in the middle of the line-up, its stupid puckered lips almost taunting you. He hadn’t even mentioned it as something he’s looking for, so you almost feel like this has come to a horrible full circle. But then he grabs the box, checks the list, and looks back at your card again. He looks shell-shocked, and you’re not sure if it’s the strong air conditioning directed towards the two of you or if it’s just his hands, but the image he’s holding is shivering slightly.

You look more closely at it, and something just doesn’t feel right. Color palette aside, there are notable differences — different colored lips, a more intricate ear design, and closed eyes. It’s…

“Dream eater,” Mark’s voice is hushed, almost reverent, and very, very close to your ear. “It’s the secret one. You’re… incredible.”

“What are you talking about,” your words are just as raspy; you’re not sure if you’re actually choked up with emotion or something — over a figurine, you have to remind yourself. “You picked all of this. I just ripped open the box.”

The hush that falls over the both of you feels very concrete, weighty on your shoulders. His fingers creep towards the foil packet — the only one he actually opens because there’s no way he’s not keeping it. The shiny purple head gleams under the fluorescent, the glitter around the star and moon designs catching the light as he turns it left to right, like he’s worried it’s a fake. You can tell why people want these things so much; there’s a thrill in you that lingers, makes you feel warm and alert. It’s anticipation, despair, excitement, and triumph all in one sitting.

You’re stroking the smooth curve of the design by the ears lightly when Mark speaks up again and says the most outrageous thing.

“I want you to have it.”

“What?” You actually have to pop your ear canal in front of him with your pinky to make sure he knows how ludicrous he sounds. “This is… you said it was crazy rare.”

“Yeah. And you pulled it, with your magic. That’s like… unimaginable luck. Even more than beginner’s luck.”

“Like I said, I literally just opened the box.”

“No — you have like… the golden touch.”

“Please,” you hiss, a genuine testiness to your voice. “Do not. I was just here for the ride — the experience, and all.”

“Seriously, take it.”

“Absolutely not—”

It’s a chaotic moment of him trying to hand you the figurine and you outright rejecting it, with both your palms working hard to push it back to him. Instead of nudging the plastic back, though, you end up placing the full force of your hands against his fingers.

There’s no actual spark when you touch, but your reactions make it feel like there might as well have been; you even lock eyes in startled unison, like you can’t believe that just happened, before you pull away quickly, Mark drawing the figuring back to his torso while looking away towards the counter, where a lowerclassman is wiping down the stains. You want to scream at your warped reflection in the window. You barely initiate contact with him, but you imagine that if you ever did, you would prefer to not be saying something as abjectly negative as absolutely not while doing so.

Your mind flails in an attempt to mitigate the issue and water down the embarrassment, and clearly he’s struggling to figure it out too, because he pipes up before you can piece your thoughts together.

“No, really.” His tone is a lot milder and, consequently, a lot more persuasive this way. “You should take it. I want you to.”

“It’s not mine. This is your thing — your hobby.”

“That’s why I’m giving it to you. I swear — I want you to keep it.”

“Why?”

He lapses into silence again, but his face is much redder than earlier. His mouth opens in an attempt to say something, but he just manages to uh his way back into a state of quiet, which gives you a chance to speak instead.

“We can… share it,” you suggest. “Shared custody…. ish.”

His eyebrow cocks involuntarily, and his jaw falls again, but all he does in actual response is nod — slowly at first, then with more sureness to the act.

“Yeah. We can share it. I’d… like that.”

You’re glad that the bulk of the awkwardness has fizzled out fairly easily, and when you think about it, this feels like a pretty good course of action; you like that it’s this little link between the two of you now — something you share that no one else can touch.

Mark, you notice, is smiling as well — more to himself than towards you, it seems. His thumb grazes across the face of the figurine, slow across the lips, and you’re once again falling into a pit of nonsense by wondering when he’d do that to you.

“Thanks for staying with me, _________,” he finally says, and your heart jolts and melts all at once. “And for… doing this. For chatting with me. And giving me your luck, and all that. Great way to end the day… with you.”

You say no problem, but you instantly regret it when you realize you could have just said it didn’t have to end just yet.

“__________? Hello? Come back down to Earth?”

“Shut up,” you sigh at the guy seated across you — Seo Youngho, an upperclassman, your Gender Studies classmate, and current project partner, waves in front of your face. You shoo his hand away, which only joins his other one as he throws them in defeat above his head. “Stop moving. Be quiet. Don’t talk.”

“That’s the same thing as shut up and be quiet. What’s up with you?” He demands. “Fifteen minutes ago, you were full of ideas. Now I feel like I’m talking to a wax figure.”

You’d been engrossed in your report for the last hour and a half, and the subject matter is admittedly something you enjoy — the role of gender in Twenty-First Century Korean marketing and advertisement, a title Youngho had taken more than ten minutes to type into the Google Docs header because he was pissed off at how the numbers looked like in the fonts he chose. He’s an enthusiastic classmate and someone you’ve come to be friendly with, not only because he’s genuinely approachable but also because he has fits of nosiness and talkativeness at the strangest moments, so a chunk of your relationship is mostly based on social terrorism on his part. You like him well enough most of the time — save for the last fifteen minutes of this hour.

Because Mark had just come in for his shift fifteen minutes ago, and suddenly Youngho is much too noisy for your taste, and his head is honestly way too big to the point that it gets in the way of your opportunities to see Mark behind the counter. You even resent him for choosing a booth instead of your usual table all of a sudden, because your view of the central barista’s area is much more limited from this angle, especially since the huge espresso machine is in the of your field of vision.

You’re also (currently and abruptly) mad at Youngho because you remember that he’s the reason you’ve had to skip out on a couple of sessions with Mark. Like, it technically isn’t his fault that you have a lot of research to do for the literature review section of the paper, nor is it his fault that this is your final requirement that comprises a whopping forty percent of your grade, but like… you’ll blame him anyway. So you’re much more irritable, and you’ve definitely been missing Mark’s presence. In fact, you kind of just want to shove Youngho’s balloon head away and call Mark over to sit with you, but you’re not that much of an animal to actually do that.

Probably.

There had been inquisitiveness across Mark’s face when he’d come in; his eyes had trailed to the table at which you usually sat, surprised to find two guys hunched over a single phone there instead of the usual you, waiting for him with your eyes bright and your smile wide. You’d like to think it’s because he’s gotten as used to seeing you as you’re used to waiting to see him — like he just expects you to be there.

You hadn’t really known how to call his attention to where you were, especially since Youngho was prattling very matter-of-factly about the academic journal he’d unearthed yesterday and how he thought it would be useful in reshaping the methodology of your paper (whatever). There was a moment in which you briefly considered ordering another cup of coffee just to get in line to talk to him, but your hands were already shaking from the venti you’d had to keep yourself from passing out in front of your partner.

So you’re more than relieved when, half an hour into his shift, Mark finally steps out from behind the huge machine, a mug of water for himself in hand, and turns away from the front of the store to drink it — only for your eyes to lock as he twists his torso in your general direction.

The mug stops just inches from his lips, but you could swear he smiles at you briefly when he recognizes you, so you return the favor. Youngho’s face contorts into abject befuddlement, turning around to see what you’re grinning at.

“Oh, you poor sap,” he snorts, finally letting the puzzle pieces fall into place.

“What?” You’re still distracted even if Mark has taken a gulp of water and is now attending to a gaggle of girls still in the throes of discussing what to order.

“What what? You gonna spend the rest of the day eyefucking Mark Lee from over here? At least let me get a different table.”

“Shut up,” you repeat sullenly, coming back down to his level and finally — albeit reluctantly — meeting his eye (just because Mark isn’t looking your way). “What were you saying about the sample size?”

“That it’s much too large to be feasible, a point we closed twenty fucking minutes ago,” he says pointedly. “Is it a thing for baristas or a thing for smart guys?”

“It’s a thing for Mark Lee,” you sigh, following Youngho’s suit and shutting your laptop close. You’re at least glad he’s not annoyed that you’re delaying work for a crush, or maybe he’s also just equally lazy at this point. “You ever look at someone and think you would give it all up for a chance to hit that?”

“No, because this isn’t a porn movie, and I’m clearly not the main character in whatever’s going on in there.” He jabs at your forehead; you swat his hand away again.

“Well, I would.”

He rolls his eyes. “So do it, dumbass.” He says this so simply, like he can’t imagine why you’d be holding yourself back, which is a valid thing to feel, except it’s not really any of his business.

“Can’t.”

“Because?”

“Because it doesn’t fit into my elegant master plan. Also because I want him to ask me out. I just want that victory.”

“Oh yeah, there it is.” Youngho leans over, wiggling his fingers at your ears like he’s greeting a next-door neighbor. “Hey, delusion. Good to see you. Do you even understand how crazy it is that you’re taking a Gender Studies class while waiting for your dick-in-shining-armor like a damsel in distress?”

“Asshole,” you grumble, violently opening your laptop monitor again. “Get back on Google Drive.”

Thankfully, Youngho complies, and the next two hours pass in relative silence and productivity, with you hammering out a vague references list that he promises to format in your stead so you can ‘spend more time dreaming about Mark Lee between your legs.’ You want to strangle him, but there are far too many people in the cafe for you to get away with it. Also, aforementioned Mark Lee would only be a witness to your criminal record, and while you think there’s something romantic in killing for love, or whatever, you’re not sure it’d make the best impression on him.

“Next week’s my birthday,” Youngho announces as he stands to tug on his jacket.

“Congratulations,” you say wryly, peeking over his bulletin board torso to see Mark tugging off his apron and picking up his school bag. Your heart hammers in your chest as he looks over at you briefly, and something like embarrassment passes over his face before he busies himself with neatly folding the fabric. “Go away.”

“Usually people look uncomfortable for not knowing and then start thinking about what gifts to get the celebrant, but I always felt you were kind of a revolutionary.” He snaps his fingers right in front of your eyes, and you look up at him, a little offended. “I’m having a get-together — and by get-together, I mean it’s gonna be a rager. You should come.”

“When?”

“Next Thursday.”

“Can’t,” you chew on your lip, wondering if Mark is leaving. His movements seem particularly slow, but you wonder if he’s just taking his sweet time because he has nothing better to do. Of course, he would have something better to do if Youngho stopped fucking obscuring you from him and vice versa. “Busy. School… whatever.” Not completely untrue. Most of what you do with Mark has to do with school.

“This moony-eyed thing is just not for you, I fear.”

“Are you going to be here all day?”

“Are you? Why don’t you just fucking ask him out, you lunatic?” You can’t imagine why he sounds so exasperated. It’s not like this is his problem — or his business, for that matter. “Maybe if you did, you could fuck him and move on with your life and be an actual contributor to society’s development.”

“Has anyone ever told you how nosy you are?”

“Constantly.” He brings his palms down on the table, the thud shaking you out of another oncoming stupor. “Think about it. Maybe it’ll make you stop making that stupid face.”

“You’ve got a stupid face,” you mumble, sulking as he pinches your cheek as a goodbye before heading out of the shop.

At least you finally get to see Mark in full, glorious view — and you get to watch him come closer, although his stride is somewhat cautious.

“Hey.” Even his voice sounds unsure — almost like the way he used to sound earlier in your friendship. “I didn’t want to interrupt you and… your friend?”

“Oh. Well, you wouldn’t have been interrupting,” you inform him, completely genuine. “He was spouting a lot of nonsense.”

“You guys seemed pretty close.”

“I guess it’s a proximity thing,” you sigh, and Mark raises his eyebrows slightly in question. “We’re partners.”

“Oh.” The way he draws out the syllable is slow. “That definitely makes sense.”

The silence stretches out between the two of you again, with Mark checking his shoelaces. You almost grab your head; it hadn’t occurred to you until now how damaging missing meetings with him would be to your friendship. You feel like you’re slowly being dragged back to square one, and you want to give him an explanation.

“He’s actually… I haven’t been able to see you because I’ve been working on something with him.” you offer, trying to answer a question he didn’t even ask. “Sorry about that. I swear I’ll be back on track tomorrow.”

“No, no — I completely understand.” He pauses thoughtfully. “Thank you… for telling me, though. I— uh, appreciate that.”

“I’d love to see you tomorrow, though.” You try injecting more pep into your voice. “I’ve really been behind on my algebra. I’ve definitely been drowning without you.”

“Oh, yeah.” A small smile graces his lips, but you can’t tell if the reluctance behind it is from fatigue or something that looks oddly like sadness. “I’m down for tomorrow. Same time, same table, right?”

“Yeah, for sure.”

“Cool. See you, _________.”

You watch him turn on his heel, walking to the front door, and something like fear mingled with desperation clutches your heart. Fuck the traditional route, you think. You don’t know what it is about how he’s acting now, but it’s making you feel like he’s slipping through your fingers. All that hard work — there’s no way you’re letting him go.

“Mark, wait.”

You’re at his side, fingers curled into the sleeve of his jacket before you can figure out exactly what you want to say. You feel as surprised as he looks at your sudden liveliness in action, and his gaze trails from your clenched fist to your face slowly, like he’s trying to memorize this whole position.

Your exhale’s shaky, but even still, you try not to sound overtly self-conscious when you ask, “Do you like Chinese food?”

Something in the furrowing of his brows tells you he can’t seem to see where this conversation is headed, and that slightly bothers him. “I like it well enough. Why?”

“There’s this really good dim sum buffet near my mom’s office. We tried it before — the Xiaolongbao is awesome.”

“Hey, that sounds pretty cool. I love Xiaolongbao. I’ll definitely have to check it out then.”

You want to tear your hair out. “How about — you know, checking it out with me? Tonight? You know… together. With me.” You already fucking said that.

You’ve never seen Mark blink this rapidly; he looks like he’s trying to crunch large numbers in his head. A small part of you actually worries that he’s malfunctioning, but just when you think he’s going to glitch out completely, he clears his throat. It bothers you how uncomfortable he looks. “Tonight? Oh man… it’s my cousin’s birthday tonight. I can’t… reschedule. Well, obviously. Maybe some other… time?”

Your ‘oh, yeah’ is small, and so is the ghost of Mark’s smile. You can’t help but feel like he’s pitying you a little, although he doesn’t seem like the type, but the thought of it alone makes you want to puke. He makes no motion to move, and you think he’s extending this awkward moment out on purpose until you realize you’re still hanging onto him and he has no way of telling you to let go nicely.

Fingers unfurling from his sleeve, you take a careful step back, but when he walks away, it feels like you’ve gone much, much further away.

The worst part is that you can’t even figure out why.

Luckily, the next few times you see Mark, you manage to rebuild a rather shaky bridge back to where you had been. You even manage to strong-arm him into sharing an apple fritter one afternoon, and you know it’s a bit sad to think about it a particular, untrue way, but you can’t help but pattern what you’re doing into some kind of pseudo-date. Pathetic isn’t a word you normally associate yourself with, but you’ve been borderline desperate for progress where there seems to be none, so you take small victories where you can get them.

Unfortunately, you haven’t been able to revisit your stupid dim sum plan; sometimes, he says he has somewhere important to be, but most of the time, it’s actually your fault. No — it’s Youngho’s fault, because he keeps bothering you to finish the project. You’re aware that he can’t do it himself, but since he’s informed of your current plight, he could at least stand to be more sympathetic.

And you hate the way Mark looks every time you splutter out that you have to take a rain check for that reason; it’s not even disappointment, or something, which would be much more understandable. It’s this mysterious kind of faraway look, where his eyes glaze over a bit and he seems suddenly very lost in thought — or completely dissociated. He never strays away from his normal response of “next time, then,” but that ‘next time’ fades into the weekend and into the start of next week, and you have to spend every other evening with an annoying Seo fucking Youngho on a Google Meets call instead of eating soup dumplings loveshot style with Mark Lee.

Thursday night rolls around, and the former performs the most irritating stunt yet: blowing up your phone with so many KakaoTalk messages that it almost buzzes off the table during your session with Mark. Luckily, he seems to have learned a thing or two from his comic books, catching it before it hits the floor.

“You sure you don’t want to answer it?” He asks, gingerly handing the phone to you like he’s afraid it’s going to explode from all the pinging.

“Without the shadow of a doubt,” you sigh, flipping the screen downwards. Buzz.

“It kind of seems important. Or, like… urgent.”

“He’ll live. Unfortunately.”

Mark falls silent, fiddling with the page he’s on. He’s neatly highlighted the formulas on the page with blue ink, and his finger keeps scratching at the slightly wet paper. Buzz.

“Didn’t you say you two were partners?”

“Yes. Also unfortunately.” Youngho is actually a great person, but you kind of hate how Mark’s paying more attention to his texts than to you right now. “What did you get for number ten?” Buzz.

“A hundred and twe— are you really just going to let it keep ringing like that? What if he’s… I don’t know. In trouble? Like, he needs you?”

You smack your phone on its back, hoping that the punishment reaches Youngho because he absolutely is in trouble — only with you. “He’s just making a racket because it’s his birthday and he probably wants a bunch of people to trash his parents’ house, or something.”

“Sounds like fun.” The dubious tone in Mark’s voice indicates that his idea of fun definitely isn’t that. Buzz.

“Not really, but I assume he’ll only pipe down if he manages to get his way.”

“He must really want you there.”

There it is again — that weird, distant expression that makes you feel like he’s trying to free himself from the tethers of the earth. You close your textbook in defeat; it wasn’t even like you got the answer to number ten correct anyway. Buzz.

“He just wants everyone there, I bet. But I probably should show up so he shuts up.”

“Oh — yeah, okay. We’ll call it a day, then?” He’s avoiding your eye as he starts packing his things, which is actually impressive because you have practically nothing but your book to keep in comparison to his pencils and protractor, so you just stare, willing him to look at you.

You want to know what’s going on in his head. You want to know what’s going on in his heart — what he thinks of you, why he seems warm one second then almost like a stranger the next. You want to know if he knows you like him and if him not doing anything even if he knows is a sign that he doesn’t like you back. You want to know if he’d let you kiss him, if he’d kiss you first, if you can meet not because of sweet cream cold brews or algebra but because you just want to be together.

You just don’t know how to ask. For as much as you like him, for as much as you want him, you haven’t figured out the most basic part of this — if you mean anything more than a two hour talk to him at all.

“Mark.” This feels awfully like the dim sum conversation, only somehow ten times more disastrous. “Come with me.”

“Sorry?” The appalled look on his face makes you squirm in your seat.

“I don’t really want to go, but maybe if we go together… we can just hang out a bit and leave once it’s boring… I think it’d be fun,” you explain lamely, deciding at the last second to drop the with you that had originally come with your sentiment.

“I don’t think your… partner will like someone uninvited showing up.”

“I’m inviting you.”

“I’m pretty sure that’s not how it works.”

“You’d be, like, my saving grace or something — my excuse to scram. We’ll say we came right from a study session; we only popped in halfway through for the sake of greeting him a happy birthday. Then we can just go. We can say — uh, we’ve got more work to do.” You’re practically begging him at this point, and you don’t even get why. You just don’t want him to leave looking the way he does — confused and a little detached. You want the Mark that had smiled at you while giving you your coffee — the one that had kindly pointed out an arithmetic mistake in the most gentle way possible. You want to open blind boxes with him, whine about your rotten luck, and part ways with his warmth still against your coat sleeve.

You don’t know what comes over you then, but you pluck up the courage and initiative to slip your hand in his. He stiffens a little, but you don’t care; your fingers squeeze his in urging.

Something in his expression breaks — cracks first, then falls away, before he’s nodding, still looking vaguely thoughtful.

“If you think it’ll help you, then… okay.”

The bus ride to Youngho’s neighborhood is uneventful because it’s quiet. You stand close to Mark at all times, but you barely touch, save for the times your knuckles accidentally brush his when you lurch forward slightly as the vehicle comes to a dangerously abrupt stop. He doesn’t ask anything about the party or the company that’ll populate it, which is just as well, because you don’t have a clue.

You know it’s the right house because the door’s wide open and there’s music coming from inside; you can’t make out much more than the deep bass pumping through the concrete, but you’re pretty sure it’s making your heart jump in your chest even more than it already is. There are quite a few people you vaguely recognize on the lawn, and even more that you absolutely don’t; a good number of them glance at you and Mark as you step through the threshold then look away, probably deciding you’re of no real consequence or harm to their moods.

Youngho’s easily spottable because of his massive height; he towers over the rest of his guests, and the red plastic cup in his hand calls even more attention because he’s lifted it over everyone else’s heads. You throw Mark an apologetic glance that he responds to with a short nod before you dive into the crowd alone, trying to weave your way to where you’d last seen Youngho.

“Bro, finally!” Youngho greets you, pretty much shouting over the music. “Where’s the gift? Did you leave it on the table?”

“Happy birthday, Youngho. Do you know how close you were to being blocked?”

“I see you brought mister espresso with you,” he ignores your comment completely, nodding to Mark. When you turn back to see him, you notice he’s squishing his arms closer to his sides, trying to minimize the space he takes up. “So what? Y’all get to hook up already?”

“No. I brought him here because we were in the middle of something and someone,” you stop, offering him a pointed look that’s also ignored. “Wouldn’t stop texting.”

“Cockblock,” the guy next to Youngho, who you now realize has been eavesdropping, singsongs. “Oh, sorry. You looked angry when you stomped through the crowd, so I wanted the juicy details. Name’s Jaehyun.”

You take the hand he offers you briefly, introducing yourself. When you say your name, realization dawns on his face, and he jabs his forefinger at you.

“Oh, dude. You’re that girl — the Starbucks Showstopper.”

“The what?”

“That’s what his friends call you.” He scratches his ear, seemingly racking his brain for more information. “I’m with Mark and a couple of his friends — Lee Donghyuck and Na Jaemin — in College Algebra.”

You completely gloss over the fact that you’ve finally found out the real government identity of the mysterious figure named ‘Hyuck.’ “They… talk about me?”

“From time to time. Not really. Once or twice. Donghyuck only calls you that because Mark apparently keeps blowing them off to hang out with you.”

“How do you know this?”

“I have ears. It’s not hard when they talk like no one’s around.”

You shush Youngho’s exclamation of and you’re saying I’m nosy?, your heart hammering hard in your ears, practically drowning out the music. “What… what else did they talk about?”

“Not sure. Something about not seeing you that often these days. Jaemin teasing Mark about getting dropped now that you don’t need his help anymore. Donghyuck piling on and saying you’ve got a boyfriend.”

“What?”

“Don’t shoot the messenger.” Jaehyun still inches away from you when your voice rises in pitch and decibel. Some people around you start, then move away as well, as if scared you’re going to incinerate them. “They were just teasing him that you probably ditched him after you started dating someone. Your partner in some project, or what.”

“Oh gross.” The realization hits you like a speeding truck. Youngho’s expression is affronted.

“First of all, you bitch. Second of all, as if I would date someone who didn’t even buy me a gift. Or want to come. Or yelled at me after coming. Wow — now that I think about it, you’re terrible, _________.”

“Oh, shit; that someone was you?” The only person that isn’t tense in this conversation is Jaehyun, who laughs point blank at Youngho’s sour face. “I think they were offering to put you into one of their Death Note notebooks. Sucks for you, hotshot.”

“What a smudge on my good name,” Youngho sighs mournfully. “On my special day, too.”

“I desperately need you two to be quiet for one second. I have to — where’s Mark?”

Even when you stand on your tiptoes, you’re not nearly as tall as the two of them; it’s Youngho, with his freakish height, who manages to spot Mark by the bowl of nachos, looking as though he’s trying to decide if they’re safe for consumption. You hardly excuse yourself; actually, all you say is a distracted “later” that dismisses Jaehyun’s cooing that something’s going down and you should clue him into all the mess later as a thank you. Your appreciation of his sudden and somewhat short-lived presence in your life is still up in the air.

Mark’s busy making a sour face at the sip of punch he’d just taken; he only straightens up when you’re right in front of him, putting his cup down next to the nachos. “Hey. Did you get to find… um…”

“That’s not important.” Your hand bunches the fabric of his jacket in a death grip, something he barely has time to register, let alone question, before you’re tugging him through the throng of people. You want somewhere quiet, somewhere private, and you initially consider the lawn, except you know it’s strewn with cups and has stragglers debating whether to go home or not. You can’t risk any of them being expert eavesdroppers like Jaehyun, so you make a beeline for the stairs instead.

“We’re not leaving yet?” He has to shout over the music, but there’s no resistance in his stride; he follows you up and waits patiently, although a little perplexed, as you check the doors on the second floor. Two are locked, one is a bathroom, and the other is a messy, musk aftershave-scented place you can only presume is Youngho’s room. Talking in front of a sink and a toilet doesn’t feel like it’ll be very productive, so you just drag Mark into the bedroom, kicking aside the crumpled shirt on the floor — which you could’ve sworn you’d seen Youngho wear for class yesterday. “_________, what’s going on?”

“Mark Lee,” you burst out, ignoring the fact that his eyes widen slightly at your tone. “What’s your fucking deal?”

You don’t think you’ve ever sworn in front of him before; that much is evident when he continues to gawk silently, unable to find words to respond to your question. Or maybe it’s just the volume and force with which you demand an answer. The problem is that you don’t even know what kind of reply you want. A small part of you nags that this is uncalled for, especially at this level, with you practically caging him into an unknown room. In fact, even now, you’re still embarrassed at your behavior, wondering if you’ve gone too far and stepped over a line between you.

But the source of all your frustrations is, in fact, that line — one so strangely drawn, clear at some points and almost invisible at others. Sometimes, he seems simply content with the barest minimum of friendship: talking to you, helping you, politely laughing at your (terrible) jokes. But there are also times he blushes too hard for it to not mean anything, times that he makes you feel like you could mean a little something more to him too.

Yet, from there, he wavers, stepping back so as not to get entangled in something you don’t understand — like when he grows distant every time you mention Youngho to him. You don’t understand why he would unless he echoed, even just a little, the longing in you. But you also don’t get why he stays and builds more walls around himself, like he’s determined to ignore all the other signs — like he doesn’t want to know if it’s really true and will just accept the assumption that it is. You hate not knowing where you stand with him, and while you could easily ask, you know you don’t want to.

And for a long time, you’ve convinced yourself that it’s because you want to see Mark step out of his comfort zone and initiate something, but the ugly truth is staring at you: it’s simply just that you can’t stand the idea of seeing him come to the conclusion that you can’t be anything more to him than someone he makes a sweet cream cold brew for every so often.

There’s a moment of tense silence between you two, where you’re just staring at each other — him, perplexed, and you, agitated — and the only sound that passes is the faint but unmistakable voice of Youngho going who has the cake cutting knife? from somewhere down below. You try not to get caught up in the fact that Mark still looks cute when he’s dumbfounded.

“Sorry?”

“What,” you repeat pointedly. “Is your deal? Why have you been acting so weirdly around me these days? I thought — I thought we were… getting closer. I thought… we…”

You’ve confirmed it now; you’re the epitome of cowardliness. You can’t even say I thought we liked each other — because you know that you do, but you still can’t honestly, assuredly tell if he does. Maybe you just read too deeply into the smallest things — smiles before he asks for your order, glances at you when he thinks you’re not looking, sharing the dream eater figurine — to fuel your own emotions without really checking the depth of his.

“I thought we were cool,” you reroute your words, and they come out flat and lame. “But just when I think you’re warming up to me, you suddenly pull away. Like… you’re afraid of me. Or you don’t like me. I don’t know.”

“It’s not — I don’t — I’m not afraid of you,” he stumbles over his words, and even in the darkness of this space, you see his face turn bright red, very quickly. His feet shuffle, not because he’s lost his balance but because he seems to want to get rid of a sudden restlessness. “I do like you. We are — we were getting — we’re close. We — we’re friends. You said that, and we are.”

“Is it only because I say we are that you agree?”

“What? No, I—” His hand passes over his face, slowing at the curve of his chin. “I really like being friends with you. I like being around you.”

“Then why do you act so weird these days? Like — you’ll be fine one moment, then you’ll back off, like you suddenly remembered you don’t want to be around me.”

“It’s not like that. I’m — I don’t get…” He takes a deep inhale, recalibrating himself for a moment before his voice comes out again, less strained this time. “I just don’t want you to feel uncomfortable around me.”

“How could I?” There’s something more than confusion coloring your voice; there’s hurt, too, and he looks as surprised as you feel at hearing it. “I wanted to be your friend. I was the one that asked you to hang out. I was the one who wanted you to talk to me, to help me, to go to a goddamn dim sum place with me. Why would I feel uncomfortable? Or are you just using this as some roundabout way to say you feel uncomfortable?”

Mark falls silent, and you don’t know why this speaks volumes all of a sudden. His eyes are trained to the tips of his sneakers, which are rising in soft bumps every few seconds; he’s curling his toes inside them. You feel like you’ve gotten the worst answer possible, and something grows cold in your chest.

“You feel uncomfortable around me.” You rehash, but it’s no longer a question. “You don’t know how to get rid of me.”

“No, it’s not that.”

“You think I’m only using you.”

“No.”

“Then what?” Your voice breaks, no longer out of anger, but a desperate sadness. The moment your eyes feel hot and prickly, you decide you want to end the conversation. It’s embarrassing, you think, for someone like Mark Lee — whom you like, who only ever sees you as a friend — to see you get choked up at a fucking birthday party at someone else’s house.

A beat later, you’re mumbling a half-hearted forget it, and you detest overdramatics, but you hate the idea of being in a room with someone who’ll never return your feelings even more right now; you push past him, already on the thought of calling a cab home instead of taking the bus so that no half-drunk businessmen coming from their company dinners see you crying.

But something warm wraps around your wrist, then closes over your hand, and you’re unable to move, Mark’s palm pressed against the back of yours. When you look back, you notice he’s still not looking at you, but his ears are practically on fire with how red they are, and you feel his fingers tighten slightly, tremble slightly against yours.

“It’s not that. I didn’t ever want you to think — I heard about you two. That you were dating someone. Seo Youngho.”

“What does that matter?” Your words come out a little more bitterly than you expect, and you have to remind yourself to reel it in. “That doesn’t explain your discomfort.”

“I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable,” he repeats, still evidently careful in choosing his words. “Because you wanted to be friends.”

“I don’t understand,” you state bluntly. In the back of your mind, you note that Mark’s grip keeps tightening and loosening, unsure of whether to keep holding on or let go. But there’s something else, too — the soft graze of skin against yours, his thumb gliding over your knuckles.

“That was all you said you wanted to be, right?” He waits for a response, but when you don’t give him one, he lets out a shaky breath and continues. “You kept saying — we were friends. You wanted us to be close like that. I just wanted to respect it, even if…”

“Respect what?”

“That you didn’t want… anything else.”

The music downstairs is a bit tamer now; you hear the door opening and closing every so often, signaling guests leaving here and there, but there are still enough footsteps downstairs for you to know that there’s a crowd Youngho hasn’t gotten rid of and therefore has to attend to. That much is good; you’d get slapped with a homicide charge if he came up here all of a sudden.

“You were jealous.”

Mark’s fingers pinch the bridge of his nose for a moment. “I tried to stop. I don’t have a lot of practice with — well, I didn’t know how to approach the situation. I thought I was still acting normally; I didn’t think… I didn’t want you to feel weird and stop hanging out with me just because… I couldn’t fix it.”

“Your friends are assholes,” you mumble, and he finally meets your eye, equal parts startled and amused. “We aren’t. Weren’t. We never were dating.”

“Even without that, I thought… it was a bit embarrassing. Liking someone like you — someone as pretty as you, as nice as you — I thought it would make you feel weird. Then you’d start avoiding me too. Or, worse, you’d keep doing it just because… you… felt bad for me.”

You don’t know what you find more ridiculous — that you hadn’t seen figured it out or that you could have avoided all of this if you’d just been a little more honest with him too. Mark’s hand starts loosening around yours, a little too much, and you turn your palm and grip his hand before he can escape. He stiffens again, just like earlier, but you now understand better why he does.

“I just wanted to keep hanging out with you as much as I could. I thought… It’d be fine, just spending time with you, and I’d be able to like you for a while, on my own, then…” He looks a little pained. “Then just let you go. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry you couldn’t let go?” You sigh softly, your palm guiding his until they connect, face to face, and you can finally lace your fingers into his. There’s no resistance, but his hand trembles slightly in yours still. “If there’s anything you should be apologizing for, it’s that you ever thought of doing it.”

Something clears in the air, lightens in his expression, and he chuckles, albeit a little shyly still. “It’s because I never thought someone like you would like someone like me.”

“I like you.” And it feels right to say it now, not at all out of the blue, never in fear of an answer he’s already given. “I like you when you smile at me every time you ask for my order. I like that you never get impatient when I’m getting my answers wrong. I like seeing you excited when you talk about a new series you’re looking forward to — something new you really want to collect. When you blush, when you laugh loudly, when you spin your pen in your hand — I like you in all those times.”

“Even when I’m jealous?”

“Especially when you are.” Your free hand comes up to cup his jaw, and you’re reminded of the fact that you’ve wanted to feel the strength of the angle under your palm for ages now. It’s not at all a disappointment, and your heart flutters irregularly in knowing you could’ve done this a long time ago, but it doesn’t matter because you’re doing it now, and fuck if Mark Lee doesn’t look good this close to you. “So be jealous — because now, you know you can be.”

Kissing him is better than you imagined, and you’ve imagined a little too much to be embarrassed at this point; there’s a heat to his lips that matches the one across his face, an upturn to them that makes you smile too. The setting’s not at all an expected one, but you’ll take it, not because it’s dark or because it’s private but because Mark’s in here with you, and you would have kissed him in a brightly lit football field full of people for as long as he’d let you.

You’d like to think he’s flushed for a reason other than shyness when you pull away, even if his laugh is quiet and breathy. In fact, when you murmur not enough, he’s the one that closes the gap this time, offering freely what you ask for with such little eloquence. The natural trepidation in his mouth relaxes, gives way to a curiosity that keeps you locked for so long that you forget you need to breathe, much more intent on finding out if Mark’s tongue tastes as good as you’ve imagined for so long.

It doesn’t; it tastes even better.

It’s still not enough, not by a long shot, but you have to resurface before you pass out like this, and even he looks a little dazed when you pull away — not in a bad way, with a grin on his face that you can only classify as endearingly goofy: slightly lopsided and a little shy, but with an unmistakable air of satisfaction.

“Months,” he mumbles, his lips still dangerously close to yours. Your eyebrows rise in questioning, and he laughs in that infectious way that makes you want to join in without even knowing what the punchline is. “I’ve been thinking of kissing you for months.”

And you do share the laughter this time, not out of amusement but of a happiness that spills without restraint. “But you’re suddenly holding back now?”

“Just letting myself bask in the moment, I guess. Letting it sink in so I remember everything.”

The two of you stand there quietly, still trying to fully parse the progression of events, and a small part of your mind registers that Mark’s thumb is still drawing circles on your skin. It’s also not enough — this touch, this closeness. You know now that he’s been thinking of you for months, and it reminds you that you spent that time dreaming of him too. And you remember you’ve always wanted to be even more familiar with him, and suddenly the desire is overwhelming; he’s right here, and you don’t ever want him out of your grasp again.

“Where are you going?” He’s only curious for the sake of it; there’s no alarm in the question because you keep your fingers tightly woven in his, tugging him along as you walk past him to the door. He’s still staring in wonder after the lock clicks shut. “What’s… happening now?”

“You waited months to kiss me, right?” He nods in response at your question. “I’ve been waiting just as long to have you too.”

His mouth falls open, but he doesn’t manage to say anything; his jaw tightens just as quickly when he feels your free hand trail down his chest, feather-light and asking for a green light. Your index finger stops just above his navel and draws back slowly, but not before you feel the shiver that runs down his torso.

“We don’t have to if you don’t want to,” you murmur, giving his hand a little squeeze. “But I just want you to know — I want to. I want you.”

A thoughtfulness settles on his face, and his eyes graze over yours, trying to read your seriousness. You don’t know how honest you look, but your words hold enough truth in them. A silence stretches over the next minute, but to you, it feels like an eternity, and you lose the test of patience somewhat, smiling softly at him.

“You don’t want to?”

“I—” His tongue peeks out, running over his bottom lip. “I do. It’s not that I don’t want to, but…”

“You seem worried.”

A hesitant nod. “I’ve never — well, no, I have, but not — with someone like you.”

“What’s someone like me?” You laugh airily.

“Someone pretty like you — I don’t know. Someone who seems to know exactly what they want. Someone who seems like… they could do better than me.”

“Mark.” You can’t keep the incredulity out of your voice. “I do know exactly what I want. I want you. The rest — I don’t care about. As long as it’s you, I want it.”

He cracks a smile, half of relief, half of disbelief. You don’t miss his hand coming up to press, warm, against your waist. “For real?”

Your fingers curl into the front of his shirt — an anchor to bring you closer, until the tips of your noses are brushing. “For real.”

The third time you kiss is slow, almost careful; there’s lingering worry in the line of his mouth that your lips try to ease until his slightly part under the movements of yours. You feel the tension leave his form in waves — first in his shoulders, then in his arms, until you’re able to press yourself closer and feel the slight give of his frame against your smaller one. He’s radiating an immense amount of body heat that’s pricking your skin and keeping you alert, and you’re hyperaware of the smallest things — the weak tremble in his mouth, the slight roughness of his teeth under your tongue, the ridges of his palate above it.

He tastes nothing like what he smells, you learn. Instead of the air of earthy coffee stuck to clean linen, you inhale a combination of spearmint and mild saltiness that’s made slightly sharper by the lingering splash of alcohol from his accidental sip of punch earlier. You decide then and there that this disparity is important to you; it makes you feel like you’re the only one who can have this experience — that everyone else can know his scent, but now, only you can know what Mark Lee tastes like.

You have to keep your wits about you to avoid this addictive stimulation of your senses; you let go of his hand only to lock your fingers around his neck, and there’s a show of trust in how he lets you lead him backwards, until his knees are hitting the edge of the unmade bed. The kiss breaks as he’s forced to settle on the mattress, and he looks up at you in what can only be described as a quiet kind of awe. He doesn’t complain when you place your hands, heavy, on his shoulders, using his sturdy form to keep you stable as you move to straddle his lap.

“I feel like,” his voice is hoarse as he speaks up. “We should have picked a different location. Someone… could walk in.”

“I locked the door,” you remind him, a light reassurance in your voice. He doesn’t say anything immediately, but it’s clear there are cogs turning in his head, and you think it’s unfair that he’s thinking way too hard about something else that isn’t you, right now, in this position. In a bid to rectify this, your face presses into the side of his neck, breathing in that familiar scent and leaving a light kiss on his skin right after. Your lips mark the moment he swallows hard at the contact. “Besides, would you really be that unhappy if someone did?”

His hands tighten against your waist, prompting you to leave another kiss against his collarbone. “What — what do you mean?”

“You wouldn’t like it if someone — say, Youngho — walked in to see me on your lap like this?”

The silence that follows your words is tense, and you can tell that Mark’s breathing has become shallower. Again, you can feel his throat constricting slightly, and you can’t help but laugh breathily as you nip at his skin, just under his Adam’s apple. He’s surprisingly easy to tease, you realize — quick to turn speechless and prone to hanging onto your words.

To say that you wouldn’t want to use that to your advantage would be a downright lie.

“Tell me,” you urge, your tone deceptively gentle. “You wouldn’t want him to see you kissing me like this? To see me wrapped around you, begging for more, saying your name over and over? You don’t want him to watch you take me — so he knows you’re the only one that can?”

A strangled groan punctuates your words, but it comes from him; his fingers dig hard into your side with barely constructed restraint. “What do you want from me, _________?”

“I want to know if kissing me was the only thing you wanted for months.”

You pull your head away, nudging his chin with the tip of your nose. Another groan escapes him, and his head tilts back slightly, almost like he’s praying. But when his gaze comes down to meet yours at your level again, you see a firm resolution in his eyes that stirs your heart — which takes off the moment he shakes his head, slowly but surely.

“Then,” you whisper. “What do you want from me?”

He doesn’t say so much as shows; he takes from you your breath, steals another kiss that’s now firmer and more openly demanding. Suddenly, his mouth can’t seem to stay still, trapping your lower lip in between his, drawing out your taste until it mixes with his against his teeth. You feel your head growing light again, and you’re pleasantly surprised that it’s suddenly become difficult to keep up with his lips, asking more from you without restraint. A hum of need sounds in the back of his throat, vaguely dissatisfied, and he’s telling you wordlessly that it isn’t enough right before he attaches his lips to the base of your neck, just above your collar. You think he’s just about to return the favor, but a laugh leaves you when you realize he’s taken it a step further, his teeth grazing your skin lightly, soft nips signaling how eager he is to sink his teeth in with only his slowly weakening self-control stopping him from doing it. Mark’s breathing is slightly labored when he pulls his lips away, warm breath fanning over your chest.

“It’s crazy — and stupid,” he croaks out, voice slightly raspy. “But I want it, and I don’t.”

“What do you mean?” Your fingers drag into his hair, combing it upward messily from his nape. He leans in for a quick kiss that’s somewhat misplaced, landing on the corner of your mouth instead of squarely atop it.

“I want them — him to see us. To see me with you, kissing you — fucking you, too. I want everyone to know we’re like this.”

You’ve never heard Mark say anything so forwardly before; a sweet, warm flush builds in your face, pleased at how comfortably he manages to say it — pleased that he’s saying it to you. “Then what’s the problem?”

“I don’t want him to see you.” There’s a bluntness to his words, but hiding behind them is an undertone of pleading — a serious request. “I don’t want him to see how pretty you look. I don’t want him to see you when you’re bare, or how you look when I’m inside you. I don’t want him to see—”

His voice wavers and dies, and you wonder if he’s embarrassed, but when you read his expression, you see an unyielding longing. A smile tugs at your lips, and your hand comes around to cup his chin, thumb extending upwards to drag his lower lip down.

“You don’t want him to see what’s only yours.”

He swallows hard again, but he doesn’t wait long to nod. Understanding passes between the both of you, silently but completely, and Mark presses his face to your throat, feeling the hum resonate as he places another long, firm kiss there.

“You’re mine,” he whispers, in a way that almost feels like he wants to convince himself of something impossible to believe. He doesn’t even wait for your affirmation, prefers to read it in the way you shiver lightly once his lips travel further down. His kisses trail past the collar of your shirt, and his hands are unabashed in how they seek skin, pushing the fabric upward so he can settle the palms of his hands, warm against your waist. Oddly, they don’t travel upwards; they only brush against the dip, down slightly over the upward rise of your hips, then upwards again, almost soothingly. It’s almost like he wants his mouth to meet them, but he stops halfway, sidetracked by the curve of your breasts.

He barely pulls away, only does for a moment, enough to meet your eyes.

“You’re only mine,” he repeats, his voice softer now. You realize he’s still waiting for some confirmation, and when you do, you’re quick to give it to him — quick to erase any doubt.

“I’m yours,” you affirm in the same tone, in the same careful volume. “Only yours, Mark.”

Whatever else he wanted to ask for, he knows you’ve given assent; that much is clear when he buries his face between your tits, inhaling your scent. You briefly wonder if he might feel just as intoxicated around you as you do around him, if your pleasant dizziness in being this close to him, in tasting and smelling him is something he experiences too, but you don’t get much time to dwell on it the moment you feel his lips part, a slight wetness seeping through the fabric. He’s kissing your chest, teeth grazing just above the cup of your bra, nipping without any real objective other than to feel the pad’s slight resistance to his mouth.

You almost miss what he says as he shifts his head, lips brushing over the curve of your breast — another breathless ‘mine’ that isn’t ever punctuated; his lips still stay parted, mouthing at the cloth, like he’s desperate to feel what’s underneath through it. There’s pressure where his tongue presses flush against the shape of your tit, tightness whenever he chooses to nip, attempting to take the flesh and all that’s between you and him between his teeth.

Not enough, you think, even when a whimper of need bubbles out of you; you want to be closer, your thighs pressing against the sides of his. You’re close in almost every way, but you still inch yourself further forward, enough to feel the taut hardness in his jeans. Your hips settle right there, letting fabric ride against fabric as you center yourself.

No sooner do you press yourself flush against him do you gasp; the light sting sends a jolt up your spine when his teeth close around your nipple through your bra, and when you look down at him, you see the corners of his mouth pulled up in evident satisfaction. He’s quick to atone, his tongue dragging your shirt slightly upwards in his attempt to soothe, and for some reason, the push of fabric and the barely-there feeling of motion leaves you tingling.

“Mark.” Your voice comes out in a whine, but in the haze you’re in, you don’t really have a clear idea of what you’re asking for. All you know is that you want more of him, and for as much as he’s already given you in kisses and words, you aren’t even halfway down the list of everything else you wish you could demand from him. You say the only thing that comes to mind — the only thing that really encompasses what you feel. “Mark, I want you. I want more of you.”

His hands on your waist are replaced by the significant tightness of his arms, locked around your torso; you don’t even have the time to take in your awe at the fact that he can easily carry you, turn you over until you’re on your back, until he’s already eased one knee between your legs.

The way he looks down at you is a mixture of hesitation and desire, but the former’s erased when you reach out for him, murmuring another ‘more’ so you can pull him in. With one palm pressed against the mattress, he lets his free hand graze against your side again, bolder in its movements, and his fingers trace a path up to your breast, squeezing the soft flesh through layers. Your back arches upwards in response, eager for more contact, for touch that’s almost there but not quite, and he smiles when you make a noise of frustration from his fingers tweaking the soft nub of your nipple.

“Mark, please—”

“Would you really let him see you like this?” His thumb’s still idly grazing over your breast, following the rise and fall of its curve. You swallow hard, trying to keep your voice level despite the growing want that threatens to break through it. “Would you really let him watch you… get fucked?”

You shake your head, and his brow furrows.

“I’d let him watch you fuck me,” you correct him, and the confusion in his face gives way to pure satisfaction the moment you make this nuance clear. “It has to be only you.”

His grip tightens briefly against your breast again, and he leans down, pressing a surprisingly chaste and brief kiss to your lips.

“Then I’ll unlock the door next time and give him a show.”

You don’t know if it’s what he says or what he does after — his hands bunching your shirt upward until the hem’s just below your neckline — that makes your breath hitch, but you decide it doesn’t matter when you realize you’d much rather be focusing on the journey his lips take, slick against your stomach as he presses languid kisses down to your navel. His fingers hook into the waistband of your jeans, the weight naturally pulling them down, and you see his muscles tighten for a moment as he stops himself from tugging them off completely.

Mark’s mouth is unparalleled in its attentiveness, seemingly intent on making sure he’s covered every inch of your stomach in warm kisses, but you only realize he’s somehow stalling when he starts the cycle again, his nails digging into the taut elastic of your jeans as though to remind himself to curb his desire.

You take the initiative instead, raising your hips slightly to signal your want, acutely aware of the fact that you brush lightly against his thigh when you do so. His eyes lift first, followed by the rest of his face, and he’s watching you quietly. You might have thought he was unsure of what to do all of a sudden again, but his knee pressing closer, an unmistakable pressure against you, is enough to tell you that he’s only curious to know what else you’ll do.

The second time you grind against his thigh, his hands catch your hips, keeping them aloft just long enough for him to tug the band of your jeans downward; he peels them off you with surprising ease, returning to the same position between your legs, hands still firm on your waist. With that done, he only has the thin garter of your panties left to curl his fingers into, bunching it into his fists when you roll your hips up one more time. You manage a shaky noise when you feel the stark difference — the roughness of the denim against you, the stick and drag of flimsy cloth. Mark lets out a low but unmistakable hiss.

“I can’t believe—” his idea is cut short by the movement of your hips again, and his grip tightens, knuckles pressing into your skin. “Can’t believe you’re here. I can’t believe we’re doing this.”

“What am I supposed to do,” you breathe out, the sound momentarily getting stuck in your throat. “So that you know it’s real?”

His fingers relax their hold, palms now pressed against your thighs; they travel between your hips and your knees, a soothing and thoughtful motion. “God — I don’t know. I just want — I just want you so badly. Like… I’m going to go crazy if I don’t have you now.”

You lean up, your weight resting on your elbow, and your other hand reaches out; Mark meets you halfway, bending just a little lower to press his cheek against your palm. There’s something intimate, something so giving about the way he turns his face to your fingers, pressing a fluttering kiss just under your thumb. The tips of your fingers trace the shape of his lips, even when they pucker again under your digits.

“Take me,” you murmur quietly. “Right now — from now on, every part of me is all for you.”

His exhale is shaky, but his fingers have a sureness to them; they slip under your thighs, cradling the backs of your knees, and lifting until they’re folded over your chest. You don’t even have the time to wonder if you should feel exposed all of a sudden; his breath warms the inside of your thigh as he presses his lips there — not a kiss, just a touch as he speaks.

“I want to taste you,” he mumbles, partly distracted with the act of inhaling the mild scent off of your skin. “Every inch of you — I want to know just how sweet you are.”

He lets his hold on your thighs relax, letting them fall apart; he busies his hands with your panties instead, hooking a finger into the strip of cloth just covering you. It’s clear you’re both aware that the fabric sticks light to your skin, poorly masking your wetness, and interest mingled with hunger flashes across his face as he pulls it aside.

“You’re so pretty,” he says, sounding like it’s a comment more for himself than anything else. His gaze flickers to you for a moment before it moves back to your pussy. “The prettiest fucking girl in the world.”

The pressure of his thumb between your folds causes you to forget what you wanted to say, and you know Mark had been nervous, but you realize that it doesn’t mean he’s supremely inexperienced by any means; there’s a quiet, understated confidence in the way he rubs slow, thorough circles, moving upward towards your clit. Your face, your neck, your whole torso feels flushed, but you power through the instinct to tilt your head back so that you can keep watching him — the minute changes in his expression, the slowly building strength in his touch.

“I want to taste you,” he repeats, looking up at you. “I want to know what you taste like when you cum against my mouth.”

You’re not sure if you’re gawking because you can hardly believe Mark Lee — your eternally blushing, mild mannered campus crush — had said all those words strung together into such a lewd sentence, but you’re sure as hell not going to deny him. Your hand travels down your torso, and he watches, curious at first, then awestruck when your index and forefinger settle against either side of your folds, pulling them apart in offering.

His eyes end up transfixed on your pussy again, observing how your fingers ease your folds further apart the more he massages his thumb against your slit. His mouth is slightly agape, intent on drinking in the sight, unaware that you’re trying to memorize this view of him too — Mark Lee, touching you, wanting you, eager to take you fully.

“I’ve always wanted to see what it’d look like with your face between my legs,” you say in a hushed tone, but he catches it anyway, briefly looking up at you again. “I’ve always wanted to know what your tongue would feel like against my pussy.”

Your index finger bumps against the tip of his thumb, and he stops its motions, allowing you to move his digit down until the pad of it hovers just in front of your tiny hole. You can see one cheek tucked between his teeth, bitten to muffle the groan you wish you’d heard louder.

“Won’t you show me?”

You think you hear him rasp out a ‘fuck yes’ before he bends down, pressing his half-open mouth against your pussy. The squeal of delight that leaves you is half-strangled as his thumb curls, hooking into your entrance. It starts a shallow, distracted motion, with his attention funneled much more clearly into keeping his tongue working. Flush against your slit, it drags up, and he releases a guttural noise at your taste, lips pursing slightly on the way back down — like he can’t stand not trapping every drop of wetness with his mouth.

The intensity of his tongue, the idle thrusting of his thumb — you’re not sure what you want to focus on more, and the result is you whimpering incoherently at the starkly contrasting combination of the two. Mark moves his mouth like he’s never tasted anything as good in his life; the sounds between your thighs are wet, sloppy — almost embarrassingly so — but you don’t have the presence of mind to dwell on that because Mark Lee is eating you out and that’s really all that you can think of.

The tip of his tongue suddenly flicks upwards; you keen, long and low, when it starts to circle your clit in that same intense, circular movement his thumb had gotten you used to. Your sensitivity skyrockets, and you’re completely unable to control the upward bucking of your hips, but Mark stays supremely unperturbed, his free arm winding under your thigh to keep the both of you steady. Your noises are growing embarrassingly loud, and you realize just how needy you’ve become when you vaguely notice that there’s a pattern in what you’re saying — his name, over and over again.

“Did you do that too?” He asks softly, his words slightly muffled against you. “Say my name, I mean — when you thought of me.”

“God, yes.” Your voice comes out strained, teetering on the edge of slurring. “So many times — every single fucking time.”

“Promise me something.” He lifts his head, and you see a fieriness in his gaze.

You nod — at this rate, whatever he’d ask you to do, you would without question. “Anything.”

His thumb presses in deeper, up to his knuckle and you reflexively tighten around his digit, but he keeps it anchored there, pushing down against your walls. He drinks in your gasp, the widening of your eyes, the way you chew on your lip with a singular kind of contentment on his face.

“Promise me — from now on, you’ll make sure I’m always there to hear it.”

The only kind of assent you’re able to make is a moan as he dives down again, mouth buried in your warmth, his nose pressed tight against your clit. His tongue moves in strong strokes, broad swipes that push your folds apart further, and his thumb, while not moving, increases in pressure to the point that you feel a heaviness adding to the growing pleasure. Your hands fly down, seeking some kind of sense and reason, and you thread your fingers into his hair, grip tightening as your climax builds in stride.

“Mark, I’m—” close, you want to say, embarrassingly so, but the moment he hears his name, his lips attach to your clit, and there’s suddenly so much more pressure as he sucks, almost like he’s desperate to draw out your orgasm. He chooses this of all time to start moving his thumb again, and this time, his movements are anything but slow and idle; they’re filled with the intent to drive you over the edge. “Fuck me, oh my god—”

“I want to,” he murmurs, pausing for just a moment to drag the tip of his tongue around the nub. “God, I want to. Let me see you cum first; let me taste how sweet you are.”

His thumb stops, buries deep into your pussy, and you’re not sure why this, of all things, is what pushes you beyond control; you’re only half-sure you say his name when your orgasm hits, the rest of your consciousness much too clouded by pleasure. He doesn’t stop, revels in the way you squirm under him as he hums low and keeps his tongue working against your clit. His licks become longer, more thorough as you come down from your high, your cries softening into whimpers as his tongue both attempts to clean you up and makes you messier in the process. His arm is still curled around your thigh, keeping you from inching away from him, even if instinct and stimulation are telling you to.

You’re barely lucid when you sit up, and Mark inches back, somewhat startled; you grab the front of his shirt, and the sight of his mouth, slick and glistening from your wetness, only makes you more curious to know what you taste like on him. You find out how tangy it is, how rich the two of you are together on his lips, and you’re able to fully appreciate the skill of the mouth that kisses you deeply, leaving traces of you against your tongue and teeth.

“Please — fuck me.” It’s the only thing you can say at this rate, only half-coherent and still trembling with desire, but Mark doesn’t seem to care that you’re stuttering over such a simple request. His thumb wipes traces of saliva off the corner of your mouth, kisses it clean for good measure, then straightens up, his hands working at his belt. You almost miss the fact that his hands are shaking slightly as he undoes the buckle and tugs it out from the loops.

You want to help — it’s the least you can do, after all, and your fingers push the button of his jeans out through the hole, his hands working in tandem to tug the zipper down. However, your movements falter when you hear a noise from just outside the room — the sound of the doorknob being jangled, the thud of a body gently hitting the door, as though worried it’s stuck. You glance up at Mark, ready to reassure him, but he either hadn’t heard or doesn’t care because he’s too busy stepping out from the pool of denim at his ankles, and you get completely sidetracked by the bulge straining against his boxers.

You almost ignore Youngho’s voice grumbling ‘Jesus Christ, now of all times? from behind the door, but you leverage it instead.

“Should we let him in?” You ask, tone innocent despite the evident deviousness in your words. It pays off, though; Mark’s cock twitches unmistakably under thin fabric, and he actually looks like he’s considering it. “You’re just about to fuck me, after all. Weren’t we going to — what did you say? Put on a show?”

He worries on his bottom lip, like he’s unsure if you’re serious, but in the end, he shakes his head, reaching out to smooth your hair away from your face and ushering you to lay back down. The lips that meet your forehead are gentle, almost apologetic.

“Not now,” he murmurs against your skin. “Right now, you’re all mine.”

You laugh lightly, nodding, and he chuckles too, but the sound of it slowly dies down when your finger hooks into the garter of his boxers. You can feel his breathing hitch as you tug it down, the elastic catching when it meets the shape of his cock, but you don’t make any move to free it just yet — for some reason, you want to see him do it.

“Show me.”

He complies without hesitation, one hand dragging the elastic down over his thighs, the other curling around the base of his length, and your face flushes as satisfaction works through your system at the bare sight of him.

Mark Lee is big — not monstrously so, but enough for you to make a pleased noise as your hand joins his, fingers barely wrapping around his girth. You give his shaft a gentle squeeze, and his exhale stutters, watching you stroke him, long and thorough in your movements. Your palm swipes over the tip, leaking precum, allowing it to slick up your hand enough to keep your movements smooth. You’re fixated on the tension in his lips, the throb of his cock against your palm, and the way his gaze never leaves your face, like a small, amazed part of him still can’t believe what you’re doing, even if you’re both half-naked already.

“I want to suck you off,” you plead, grip tightening slightly. He grits his teeth, stifling another groan, but he shakes his head clearly enough for you to slow your movements in mild surprise.

“Can’t — not now. I need to be in you so badly.” His breathing’s sharp and heavy, like he’s trying to keep himself in check. “You don’t even know — how long I’ve wanted to feel you.”

Your hold relaxes, and you let him maneuver you, his renewed hold on your hips dragging you closer to the edge of the bed. In this position, he can spread your thighs further, and you angle yourself optimally — enough for him to get a full view of your pussy, wet and still aching from your last orgasm.

“You don’t know how badly I’ve wanted to know how tight you are,” he continues, and there’s a faraway look in his eyes that makes you think he might be entrenched in fantasy. “How much I would have killed to see you — have you like this. I’m not gonna be able to wait anymore.”

His fingers dig into your sides, thumbs stroking your stomach in a weak pattern. The underside of his shaft presses against your folds, still half obscured by your panties, in a way that’s heavy enough to make you mewl, your hips reacting before your mind can, and he hisses softly as he feels his length glide along your slit before you relax your stance again.

“I can’t wait,” he reiterates, a breaking in his voice that sounds almost tortured. You don’t want him to either, want to see him buried to the hilt inside you, and you raise your hips again in need. “I want you so much it’s driving me crazy.”

“Then take me.”

And you’re not sure if it’s a demand or a plea, but he no longer stops himself; his hand fists his cock a few times, coating the slick of precum along his length before he lines the tip up with your entrance. His other hand’s flush against the inside of your thigh, a light pressure ensuring he always has enough space to fit himself between your legs — enough space to bottom out completely.

Mark’s considerate in his pace — maybe he knows he’s big, or maybe he’s just naturally careful, but he allows you the time to adjust to the stretch. Your nails almost puncture holes into the sheets, your grip so tight you wonder if it’s just to brace yourself or to hang onto the last threads of your sanity. He’s only halfway in, but you’re pushing fullness already, and he stops when his cock meets slight resistance, looking up at you in concern.

“You’re not—?”

“It doesn’t hurt,” you reassure him softly, and it’s true; the adjustment brings about slight discomfort, but it’s almost nothing to you — not compared to how much more you want. “Give me everything; I want all of you inside me.”

He pauses still, trying to read your expression for any lies, but when he can’t find any, he nods, his jaw tensing as he presses both palms against your thighs, keeping you open as much as possible to accommodate him. He doesn’t even stop when you whimper, feeling a tightening twitch in your pussy that also causes him to groan, until inch by inch, you’ve taken him, his hips flush against yours.

He doesn’t move — not yet, his eyes trained to where you’re connected like he’s once again unable to believe what he’s doing. You hear him mumble something to himself that you want to hear too; you squirm slightly, and he hisses through his teeth, looking up at you and finding the questioning in your face. He offers you a small smile, albeit somewhat strained.

“You’re tighter than I thought.”

“You’re bigger than I thought,” you hum, and neither of you is really to blame; the tight fit, the slight breathlessness it leaves you with, is perfect, you think — just what the both of you need. “Did you often think about fucking me?”

“Probably just as often as you’re making it sound like you thought about having me fuck you, I think.”

“Don’t get cocky,” you warn, but there’s no real heat in your voice.

“I won’t. But it makes me feel good — knowing you wanted me just as bad.”

“I still do.” Your gaze is lazy, a little hazy, even if you’re anticipating so much. Even just the feeling of Mark, throbbing inside you, is already slowly building the pleasure in your stomach again; you wonder if you could cum like this, given enough time, given enough patience. “I’m still waiting for you to fuck me. God, Mark— please.”

He chuckles good-naturedly, but even that’s drowned out by the long moan that leaves you once he draws his hips back; your body’s mildly shocked into a new adjustment, feeling a sudden emptiness that’s quickly mitigated by him filling you back up again. The pace is slow, almost torturous, although you know he isn’t doing it to get a rise out of you. He wants to ease you into speed, careful to help you adjust fully; his restraint in his movements is all the more evident on his face, in the furrowing of his brow and the determination in his gaze. Even with that, he can’t help what he says, so intent on controlling everything else he does that he lets his words spill out over your noises.

“Pretty,” he grunts out, and when your walls twitch around him, he accidentally thrusts sharper — just enough for you to whimper a little more loudly, and he has to reel his strength back again. “God, you’re beautiful. I should’ve told you sooner how much I wanted you. All those times I had to imagine you wrapped around me like this, wondering how much tighter you’d get once you came on my cock. All those times you drove me crazy while I was alone, when I could have been in you— I could have found out how good you felt. How pretty you’d look under me. And you’re still even prettier, even better than I ever dreamed.”

There’s an erratic melody of moans under his words, spilling from your mouth, and the fact that he riles himself up enough to increase his speed slightly doesn’t escape you. He’s a little less careful now, seemingly entranced by the view he gets, watching his shaft disappear into you only to come out glistening, and a part of you hates the idea of snapping out of his reverie, but the majority of your thoughts now lean towards wondering how much more you can get him to break free of his own self-imposed restrictions.

“I wanted to ask you so many times.” His eyes snap up, coming back into focus as he takes in the sight of you, flushed, hair tousled, gaze darkened. “Almost every day — I sat there, thinking about how all I could do was go home and fuck myself, frustrated you weren’t doing it for me. I should have taken you home with me right then and there — should have let you watch me touch myself thinking of you, should have let you touch me into cumming on your fingers.”

His breathing staggers as he leans in, eager to see you clearer, to hear your words, slowly becoming airier as they come out. For a moment, his gaze falls, torn between watching him move into you and meeting your eyes, but he ultimately chooses the latter once you speak up again, your tone even more hushed than before — like it’s meant to be a secret between just you and him.

“But there were times I wanted you even more than that, to the point that I almost felt like I couldn’t wait.” His eyes widen slightly, a few precious seconds of wondering if he understands what you mean, right before you confirm what he thinks. “I thought about making a move right then — I should have kissed you. I should have asked you.”

“Asked me what?” His voice is gruff with the effort to keep himself in check despite the fact that it’s clear to the both of you that it won’t last.

Your lazy smile’s illusionary; it hides the triumph swelling in your chest at knowing that he asked exactly what you hoped him to.

“I should have asked you to fuck me in front of everyone there.”

“God,” his eyes squeeze shut, his grip tightening. “Please. I can’t—”

“I should have bent over for you there, begged you to stretch me out right after our session,” you continue, bordering on merciless. “Mark, you don’t know — how badly I wanted to be on your lap, your cock in me, with everyone watching. How much I wanted you to fold me over that table, have people watch you pound me, have them listen to how good you make me feel. No one would ever even wonder; everyone would know I’m yours.”

You pause, allowing his eyes to fly open once again, and there’s a pleading in them that’s begging for release. Your eyes soften along with your voice, but you’re this far gone; you should at least see it through.

“And everyone would know you’re mine too.”

“Fuck,” he growls, and his hips stutter before new resolve fills him, his hips driving into you with the force of a strength you didn’t even know he had in him; your thighs tremble at the intensity, at the renewed impact, and feeling him drive his cock deeper into you has you crying out somewhere between a moan and a sob. “Fuck, _________. If I had known you’d thought about me like that — God.”

It’s your turn to shut your eyes for a while, allowing yourself to focus on his movements, breaching your tightness even faster now. You feel his hands skim up your sides again, fingers digging into the fabric of your bra and pulling them down until your bare tits are cupped in his hands. You shiver as his thumbs pass over your nipples, toying them into firm nubs.

“One day,” he hums out, his voice giving way to a slight hoarseness again. “I’ll do it. I’ll fuck you in front of him — in front of Youngho, in front of everyone. I’ll let them wonder how tight you are, how fucking warm you are, and I’ll let them leave knowing no one can know but me.”

It’ll never happen, you both know, but something about agreeing to something so absurd is what has your body almost shaking in longing, and it’s what causes him to press in deeper, folding your legs closer to your torso. Your hands do what little they can to help, keeping your thighs apart so as not to obstruct his view. You can tell it’s somehow not enough, not really all of what he wants when his brow furrows, and he shifts his weight, pushing into you at a new angle.

The stark difference has you gasping before you can control it. Immediately, Mark stops, and you’re already shaking your head before you even hear him say anything, presuming he’s paused out of concern. But before you can say you’re fine, his hushed voice cuts through the silence.

“Do that again.”

“What?”

“Do it again,” he mumbles, sounding distant. “Breathe in. Suck in your stomach.”

You’re not one to complain at such a simple request, albeit a little odd, so you comply, inhaling enough to tighten your torso. You’re surprised when you feel his cock twitch inside you, and you blow out the air alongside your question. “Mark, what are you—”

“I can see it,” he says in utter disbelief. “When you’re like this, I can — I can see my cock inside you. Just a bit.”

Your eyes follow his gaze, fixed just below your navel. From this angle, without any movement, you can’t see a thing, but you assume he’s not one to abandon fucking you so intently without good reason, so you press your palm against your stomach, just above your pelvis. Nothing really feels significantly out of place — up until the point when Mark draws his hips back again, and you feel the backward slide of his cock.

Your throat tightens, and you don’t really understand the feeling that spreads in you — a unique kind of arousal, knowing how deep he is inside you and how you’re taking all of him in despite the fit, because of the fit. Your hand falls away, allowing Mark’s to take its place, and he exerts just a little more pressure against your stomach in an attempt to get the most out of the experience when he thrusts back in. He groans, feeling the bulge push back up, and he quickly picks up the same pace, renewed in intensity so he can experience the rapid rise and fall he creates under his palm.

The faster he goes, the harder he presses, and you’re not sure if he knows it, but the onslaught of friction is what’s making you whine and squirm even more; you’re trapped, in the best way possible, in his hold, your hands back to clinging to the backs of your knees like a lifeline. Pressure from the outside builds on the slowly growing pressure inside, a knot in your pelvis that’s coiling so tightly you feel like you can’t breathe. If Mark notices how close you are, he doesn’t make it known; he’s busy feeling the outline of his cock against your stomach, and when he looks up at you again, his eyes are hazy.

“I would fuck you every single day, every single hour if I could feel this every time,” he whispers in a way that’s almost reverent. “Let me — I want to keep seeing you like this. I want to feel how deep I am inside you, too. Let me fuck you all the time.”

You nod, and your first attempt to say something is just another choked sob. When you do manage to get something out, it’s broken in tearful stutters. “M-Mark, I’m s— I’m so close… I’m — fuck—”

“Do it.” It’s not a harsh command but an urging made on short breath; through your misty vision, you see tension in Mark’s face and shoulders, like he’s bracing himself for something too. You barely register the ping in the back of your mind, too focused on the way he’s pressing his palm harder on your stomach, the way his hips quicken their pace — he’s close too. “Let me feel you — want to feel you cum all over my cock.”

You inhale, not to speak but to let out a loud whimper; your teeth dig into your lower lip as you try to stifle the moans that threaten to follow, but in the end, you whine out his name. Your thighs threaten to close, trembling as you finally reach your climax, an impossible explosion of pleasure, and you have to squeeze your eyes shut so that you don’t get dizzy from the stars that burst around your vision.

“Fuck.” Mark’s voice is strained, his one hand still firm against your stomach, the other sliding against the inside of your thigh. “You get even tighter — you feel even better when you cum.”

“Mark,” you hiccup, unable to do anything but flutter around him as he pistons harder into you. You don’t even know what you’re asking for when you say ‘please,’ but he somehow seems to, and you trust that your body’s saying something you can’t fully detect in this state, with your mind floating in the aftermath of ecstasy.

“I know,” his tone is soothing in contrast to the intensity of his thrusts. “I’ve got you. Just a little more — where do you want—?”

You blink slowly, his words sinking in at too leisurely a pace; his hips stutter dangerously before you’re able to respond. You barely even do that, your hand gently brushing over the one against your stomach, but he catches onto the meaning quickly enough.

You’ve never heard your name said in such a beautiful way; hearing him moaning it lowly is enough to make you whine again, and that noise is drawn out when he shifts and slips out of you fully. Your brain’s fuzzy, but your senses are at least sharp enough to drink in the perfect sight of him cumming — the way he leans his head back, jaw taut and eyes shut, as he pumps his cock and the heat of his release against your skin, pooling against your stomach once he finally cums. You see a shiver run through him, and then he’s still for a while in this position, the both of you basking in the afterglow of your highs.

You’re still weak and sensitive when Mark finally comes back down, a lucidity you don’t have right now coming back into his gaze. All you can do is smile when he leans in, catching your lips in another kiss — one that’s surprisingly soft and slow in comparison to everything else, but still leaves you breathless when he pulls away.

“Let me clean you up,” he murmurs, and you hum in agreement, your body limp as you watch him move off the bed and pull a handful of tissues from a box on the desk on the opposite wall. Even his hands are gentle when he scoops you up, shifting you until your head can lean against the pillows. They carry a scent you’re not used to, and your nose scrunches, rejecting the change, but that’s quickly overpowered by Mark’s familiar coffee-and-linen one when he presses next to you, careful as he wipes his cum off your stomach and thoroughly cleans between your thighs. From somewhere down below, you still hear hushed voices, and the front door slams shut again. People are still in the middle of leaving, but you know Youngho will likely run out of guests soon, and this makes you feel like the timing’s suddenly become urgent.

“I want to date you properly,” you start, slightly slurred but unmistakably blunt. Mark’s gaze snaps to yours, slightly amused, as he balls the tissues up in his fist. “You never asked me, so I’m asking you.”

He looks perplexed. “I just never thought you wanted me to, so I didn’t try.”

You reach up, locking your fingers into his hair and using your grip to pull him down. Your kiss is a little demanding, with a tinge of excess frustration, and he pulls away laughing lightly.

“Do you still think I don’t want you to?”

Mark hums thoughtfully. “I think you made a lot of things clear tonight. On my end, I was happy enough to be near you.” He smiles down at you, and in the faint light, you can see the flush slowly return to his cheeks. “Having you like this — dating you… there’s no way I’d say no.”

Your shoulders relax, satisfied with his answer, and you beam up at him — an act he easily returns, breathtaking and endearing all at once.

Moments later, you feel his arm wind around your waist; he allows you to lean into his side, his other hand crossing over his lap to stroke your thigh. His face turns, pressing a kiss to your hair, and you feel his lips move, hear the quick rush of a whisper. You tilt your head, eyes slightly wide in questioning. “What was that?”

He shakes his head at first, trying to pass it off as nothing. But when it’s clear your curiosity won’t abate, he chuckles softly, his hand gently cupping your chin so that you can only look at him. His thumb strokes your bottom lip gently, as if trying to coax the same words out of your mouth before he murmurs them to you one more time — and this time, he sounds fully convinced of them.

“You’re all mine.”

[hellsslibrary]

can i request fucking the sass/brattiness out of bllk boys like chigiri, rin and sae? istg brats make me go feral i just want to put them in their place

"To silence the impudent by force does not mean to remove from oneself the insults uttered by the impudent lips."

#a.n. : Personally, I don't think Rin would be his usual self in bed, but who cares? It turned out delicious because it's almost a gathering of my favorite boys.🧎🏻

MASTERLIST is here.

!!Warnings: top!dom!m!reader, brat taming obvi, hair pulling (Chigiri), use of degrading words, they are kinda in the sub-space in the end(?), spanking, there are a things like praise but it is very imperceptible, fingering, anal sex, blowjob (I tried to diversify the parts, yes), a little dacryphilia, bites and hickeys, pet names, shower sex(Sae), kind of semi-public sex(Sae), deep throat(Rin), kind of soft Rinnie (a wolf in love is no longer a predator lol, but he's still a bitch yeah).

Chigiri Hyoma.

You felt your anger leaving your body with each passing second, leaving room for some other feeling. It could be described as something that was absolutely tearing your soul in two from the completely opposite emotions inside you. As if you were ready to tear someone apart just because of the mixture of feelings of satisfaction and dissatisfaction. You felt yourself calming down, but at the same time, you were starting to get even angrier.

Ah, yes, lust. Pure and undisguised lust. Especially for the one who is lying under you right now. Even now, some words manage to fly out of his plump and slightly bitten lips, the meaning of which you do not really understand, but by the shine in his pink ones, like a spinel necklace... You almost wanted to blindfold these eyes, so as not to see this bold shine... But of course, the key word is 'almost'.

"Is that all you can do? After you held me so tightly and whispered so many threats..."

Your ears catch this phrase and you almost unconsciously smirk. And really. Why are you still showing him mercy if he behaved like a complete slut today, thirsting for only two things - you and your boundless attention? Well...

"Should I be firmer with you? Your nature will show itself again anyway," you state the fact, licking your already wet lips, peering onto Chigiri's strong torso, watching how his sculpted muscles tense from your sharp thrusts.

"But th-then what's, fuck, the point of all-all this? You're a-acting like a child, pre-pretending to be smart when they're just repeating the same phrase..."

Your hand on his thigh tightened so much that he even whimpered slightly, and you immediately released your grip. There was no need to give him more sensations than you planned, especially not the unpleasant ones.

A soft "sorry" escapes your lips as your thumb rubs the red mark of your palm on his soft skin, which will most likely turn into a bruise. You lean in and your lips collide, both of you hissing slightly as your teeth click together, and then his arms wrap around your shoulders as your tongues finally intertwine.

But of course, he thought you were apologizing for the earlier action. How stupid, right? His eyes widen as he feels you slip out of him...

And a surprised gasp escapes his lips as you suddenly break the kiss and roll him over onto his stomach. His eyes narrow a bit as you thrust into him again, much more roughly than you had originally. All the air is expelled from his lungs in one thrust, causing him to whimper, almost inaudibly, and grab the sheets beneath him, making them squeak pitifully.

"I don't think you'll show up for practice tomorrow, Hyo."

His eyes widen and he's about to turn around to ask what you're even talking about. But he bites his tongue as he feels your thrusts resume. Your hands on his sides and the way your thumbs press into the small of his back, causing him to arch even further, more than his back would allow for.

"You... A-ah, what do y-you mean?" an almost pathetic cry escapes his lips, his face resting on the pillows, hiding his probably very adorable face from you.

"I don't know... Maybe I'll fuck you so hard that you won't be able to get out of bed... Or maybe you'll be in such a state that you won't be able to show yourself to others out of shame... Who knows?"

Your voice is almost dripping with sarcasm, even though you were being serious to some extent. Your hand slides higher, tangling in Chigiri's hair, and immediately pulling his head back, causing him to throw his head back with an almost squeak.

"If only you could see yourself... You look even more beautiful than usual, my mistress," you smirk lightly, biting the thin skin behind his ear, causing him to openly groan.

Drool runs down the corner of his lips and down his chin as his ass trembles slightly from your thrusts, as does his entire body. His hips try to move in time with your thrusts, but even he has a hard time doing so.

"I have to keep going, right?" the question escapes your lips, and he nods desperately, trying to get out at least a word, but any word that wasn't a moan or even a cry was stuck in his throat.

Sae Itoshi.

Your eyes almost glisten at the sight before you. The self-proclaimed linebacker's body was barely able to stand, although he held up surprisingly well for his situation. He leaned against the shower wall, trying to muffle his moans as much as possible so that no one would hear his moans or any other sounds from the locker room.

He was just teasing you a little, touching you in a way that was too obvious a couple of times during training, and you were very lucky that no one noticed. Otherwise, you would hardly be able to explain why his fingers slid under your jersey or the elastic of your shorts.

And he? He wouldn't even bother explaining.

"Will you keep quiet? It's no use, dear, it's too late for all this... Do you have any idea how hard it is to train with a boner, and with a view of your figure from behind?" your voice was almost honey-sweet as your fingers disappeared inside him with a slick sound, accompanied only by Sae's quiet, almost inaudible sounds.

Your free hand moved one of his ass cheeks to the side, watching as he squirmed at the sensation and your hand almost automatically slapped his ass cheek. You immediately felt a kick to your leg, obviously because someone might hear the slap.

Although they all saw that you went to the shower together. It wasn't surprising, but Sae usually didn't allow you to do that. So no one was thinking anything too explicit... But they could of course.

"Stop it! We'll get spotted, idiot," Sae whispers, biting his lips hard, trying to muffle any sounds that were trying to escape him, which wasn't too hard since he wasn't particularly loud, but...

It's hard to hold back when you're being fingered like they're trying to punch you in the gut or something. It was hard for him to do that either.

He was barely able to stand, and the slippery floor and his rapid breathing from not only the situation but also the hot shower weren't helping. He wanted to grab onto anything to make sure he wouldn't fall.

And you, being the good boyfriend that you are, were going to make sure of that!

His turquoise eyes widen in surprise as you turn his torso to face you, forcing his legs to wrap around your waist while you hold him up, then sit down on the tiled floor, still holding his fingers in place. You had to adjust the position of your fingers in obvious discomfort, but the look on his face was worth it.

"What the hell are you doing?" the question falls from his bitten lips as Sae almost chokes on the words, grabbing your shoulders, grateful that you are both now sitting up.

You tilt your head to the side slightly as he buries his face in the crook of your neck. And he jumps when he feels another slap, knowing he won't last like this for much longer.

"I'm not done, Sae... Don't hide your face, I can't hear you, so I don't want to not be able to see you either," you whisper right into his ear, causing his back to arch from your hot breath.

You feel his nails literally digging into your skin, but you'll take care of that later. Right now, you need to see his face up close, while his insides are being rearranged by just three of your fingers.

He reluctantly pulls away, sitting over your lap and resting his kneecaps on the tiled floor. The older Itoshi looked divine... Arched like that just from you and such poor stimulation. Almost on the verge of tears. But he's not so fucked that he's ready to lose his pride.

"This hasn't even started and you're already like this... What will you be like later, baby?"

He just exhales loudly in response, and immediately twitches when he feels a slap on his inner thigh, too dangerously close to his cock. His knees shook and he felt an all too familiar sensation, he clenched around you unconsciously, but then whined pathetically when you deprived him of stimulation.

"No, you won't cum... Let's finish taking a shower and continue in a comfortable place. This is not a good place to fuck your brains out, handsome," Sae didn’t know if he wanted to kill you, he could sit back on your fingers, considering that you pulled them out but didn’t push them away, or he could even take your dick and sit on it...

But he will obey, realizing that much more awaits him ahead, for now.

Rin Itoshi.

Your lips stretch into a smirk, slightly trembling due to your growing pleasure. Your hand didn't even need to hold the brunette's head anymore, kneeling in front of you. He was doing just fine on his own.

Although his burning gaze should have been intimidating or at least stressful, it only served to fuel your arousal. His lips wrapped around your cock, his cheeks hollowed out, adding extra stimulation to your cock, and to be honest, you could definitely cum just from the sight of tears on his eyelashes.

His hands were clinging to your thighs, squeezing the flesh beneath his fingers, slightly choking with every deep throat he took, but the younger Itoshi was clearly doing a lot better than he had been doing a few minutes ago.

"So? You don't want to tell me anything?"

He shook his head at your question, as much as he could with your cock in his throat, of course. Of course, he's not ready to give in and surrender to you completely just yet.

But that's easy to fix. Your fingers slide through his hair, squeezing it and pulling his head lower down your shaft, causing his nose to collide with your pubic bone, causing him to pull away and clear his throat.

"Is there anything you want to tell me?" you repeat the question, looking at him thoughtfully, wondering if his ego will crumble now or if you'll have to make the crack deeper.

"... I'm sorry," he whispers almost inaudibly and inaudibly, and you wouldn't understand what he said if you weren't waiting for it.

"What should I forgive you for, Rin?"

He looks up at you, still displeased, leaning closer and licking a stripe along your shaft from the base to the head, licking your slit, causing you to moan slightly.

"I'm sorry for being a bad boy... But I'll do it again sooner or later anyway," he shrugs, barely visible, taking a part of your cock into his palm and beginning to suck on your head.

"Oh, I'm sure. I need you to learn your lesson now... And then later."

His turquoise eyes flick up to you, and he deliberately runs his tongue along your slit a couple more times before he starts to swallow your cock again, taking in more and more each time.

He doesn't break eye contact at all, his eyes just squinting slightly as his throat tries to adjust to the intrusion again, but he manages just fine.

Though, once you feel him using his tongue again, you raise an eyebrow, watching as Rin pulls away from you.

"And here I thought you were capable of more than teaching me to behave just for a while," he utters smugly as he licks your cock, as if he knows it gives you indescribable pleasure, especially when he looks at you with those eyes that glitter with anything but submission.

"Naughty boy," he squeezes your thighs completely as you grab the back of his head, starting to impale his mouth on your cock yourself.

His eyes squeeze tightly as he tries to relax his throat as much as possible for you. Itoshii clearly enjoyed this, otherwise he would have given you the signal to stop a long time ago, but he only continued to make moans mixed with the sound of choking.

"You will understand where your place is, don't worry, precious boy."

A tear rolls down his cheek, but he makes some kind of agreeing sound, which also sounds like he is pleased, considering how the corner of his lips twitches into a semblance of a smile. Oh, you will be convinced that he will be good, unbearably good.

[strangersteddierthings]

The Interview

Inspired by this post by @xoxoladyaz. Read on Ao3.

-

Eddie wakes up to one single missed call from Gareth on his private phone.

No one calls his private phone.

He dials back instantly.

"Hey Eddie," Gareth greets. He sounds tired.

"What's up? What's happened?" Eddie asks, a thousand and one scenarios running through his mind. Gareth is in Indianapolis, and Eddie's thoughts are filled with only his uncle back in Hawkins.

"Nothing's happened that we can't deal with, or rather, that I've already been dealing with. But, uhh, there's an interview you should watch. Let me send you a link-" there's a pause as Gareth does just that "-and just call me back after you've watched it. I know we usually ignore the shit people say about us but this- it's different."

"Okayyyy," Eddie says slowly. "I'll watch it."

They hang up without goodbye because Eddie's just going to call him back after the video. Opening his messages he sees the link, and then Gareth sent a follow up text you need to watch from 12:32 onward.

The video is nearly two weeks old already, and YouTube shows him a face he knows. Robin Buckley looks older but it's definitely her. Her hair isn't styled much differently than she had it in high school, just above her shoulders and a little wild. She's wearing a three piece suit in emerald green, slightly oversized on purpose by the look of it. She's sitting in a chair, cradling a grammy with one arm, as the interviewer sits across from her.

Eddie taps the screen and drags the progress bar closer to the 12-minute mark and listens. He hears the tail end of Robin's response to some question about her album before the interviewer asks what must be the question Gareth wants him to listen to.

'So, I think everyone is dying to know if you and Eddie Munson are friends. You're both from Hawkins, Indiana. Isn't that correct?' the interviewer asks.

Robin's smile slips a bit, 'I- uhh, this is going to be unprofessional of me but I made a promise to someone regarding if I was ever asked about Eddie Munson. So, can I have one minute to make a phone call before I answer your question?'

'Oh. By all means, make your call.'

Eddie watches as Robin is brought her phone by someone who is probably her personal assistant. She wastes no time in unlocking it and finding whoever in her contacts list.

'No time for formalities. I've been asked about Munson. Can I tell the truth?' Robin's mic isn't strong enough to pick up whatever answer she gets on the phone but she shakes her head to whatever answer she's been given. 'I told you, I love you more than this career and I've already got the grammy. I'll handle the fallout. It's not about me. It's about you.' What follows is a few seconds of silence before Robin nods and says goodbye, ending the call and passing the phone back to the PA.

The interviewer's eyebrows are up to her hairline in shock. 'That sounds ominous. You think it's career ending?'

Robin grins and it's almost feral. 'Corroded Coffin's fans have always been ruthless, and perhaps a bit heartless, so what I have to say will certainly set them on the attack. To answer your original question, yes, Eddie Munson and I are from Hawkins. We even shared band class in high school, but that's the end of what connects us. We are not friends, but we once were.'

'Can you elaborate on that?'

'Our friendship ended ten years ago when he ruined my best friend's life for fame and fortune, and Steve's never really known a day of peace since.'

Eyes wide, the interviewer leans closer, 'Steve? As in, Hey Steve, Steve?'

Robin nods, 'Just the one.'

'Are you prepared to talk about how one song ruined your friend's life?'

'That was the purpose of the phone call. Yes, I think people should know the truth. Munson vented his bullshit breakup rage into a song and fucked off out of town. A week after its release, his fans doxxed Steve. He wasn't out to his parents, you see, and Corroded Coffin's fans, Eddie Munson's fans, outed him. They sent hate mail to his house by the ton, it seemed. The fallout from that- the aftermath-' Robin cuts off as her eyes water and she swipes at them, smearing some mascara across her cheek. 'I'm sorry. I almost lost my best friend, the platonic love of my life, that day.

'It's public knowledge, what happened, you can look it up online if you know what to look for. But it is also so incredibly personal. I want to be the one to say this because it's important. What you do in life, it has consequences, and sometimes those consequences are for other people. Whether you think it will, or not. I'd rather people hear it from a human voice, from someone who loves Steve, and not the journalist view. No offense,' Robin shoots the interviewer a sweet smile.

'None taken, please continue.'

'Steve was hospitalized, I won't give the details,' Robin says, in a watery voice as she's clearly trying to not cry at the memory. 'When Steve was finally released from the hospital, there was no one but me to pick him up. And he's going through this while nursing a broken heart. He and Munson had only been broken up for maybe a month before Hey Steve came out.

'In less than two months, Steve had lost his parents, his home, all his belongings, and the man he thought he'd marry one day. And to top it off, that man gets to become rich and famous off a venomous, hate-filled song about their breakup. It talks about Steve like he's coward for not willing to be out, yet, and how... what's the line, about conformity?'

'Conformity holds your leash, baby, so run to the end of your chain and bark,' someone off camera shouts.

'Yes, that, thanks. Accusing Steve of picking 'conformity' over his love. Steve wasn't picking conformity, he was picking safety! And the worst part? The hate mail has never stopped. Steve lived with me and my family for a few months after getting out of the hospital before the hate mail got too much, and someone showed up at my childhood home, looking for him, threatening him. They had a gun. It was traumatic. I was still in my senior year of high school-' Robin cuts off, taking deep breaths.

The interviewer reaches across to place a comforting hand on Robin's, 'I can't even imagine what that must have been like.'

Once Robin has composed herself, she says, 'sorry, this is a lot. I've had ten years to come to terms with it, and I've waited seven for someone to ask me about Munson. I didn't think it would be this hard.

'And it's not- I can't blame Munson, or Corroded Coffin, for everything that happened. He doesn't control his fans. But he's never said anything about the treatment his fans give Steve. And if they're like this towards Steve, are they like this towards all his other ex's? Does Munson not care, or, almost worse, does he not even know?' she stops again, getting a faraway look for a moment before looking at the interviewer again. 'I had to help Steve move again. Just last month. They're still finding him. Sending him hate. Doxxing him.' Now she looks at the camera directly, "Eddie Munson. Call off your fans. Stop playing Hey Steve at concerts. Isn't a decade of hurt enough?'

There isn't a lot that makes Eddie feel anything these days, he'll admit. A decade of fame has made him a bit cynical and callus. However, Robin had said something that made his insides squirm. He swipes across the screen, rewinding the video to hear Robin say Steve had lost his parents, his home, all his belongings, and the man he thought he'd marry one day. Swipe. -ents, his home, all his belongings, and the man he thought he'd marry one day. Swipe. The man he thought he'd marry one day. Swipe. Marry one day.

He pauses the video. That can't be right. That has to be a lie Robin is adding. To garner more sympathy or make Eddie, and therefore Corroded Coffin, look worse. Steve and he had been young and naive when they'd dated. There was no way they'd have ended up married, even if Eddie had stuck around Hawkins longer. Gay marriage wasn't even legal when they broke up in 2013.

Eddie unpauses, skips forward to the end and listens to Robin speak directly to him. Stop playing Hey Steve? The song that rocketed Corroded Coffin into the limelight? No way. And call off his fans? Like they're dogs he's supposed to control or something. The video ends and the YouTube algorithm shows him a number of react videos. Eddie clicks on one and falls down the rabbit hole.

At first the algorithm shows him responses in his favor. Videos made by his fans defending him, or strategically picking apart what Robin had said. Eddie wants to agree with them, he doesn't think he's done anything wrong other than live his life, but then.

Then a video of a guy wearing merch sold during their tour last year plays. He's on the right side of the video while a screen recording is on the left. It takes him less than five minutes to get Steve's past addresses found. And Eddie is... well, he's a little horrified at how long the list is. At the short amount of time Steve's spent in any one place is.

The guy in the video reads out the state, city, and how long Steve lived at each address. The longest one is when Steve made the jump from Florida to Maine, where he lived for 19 months according to the video, and that was years ago.

And then the guy, he fucking starts to speculate about where Steve might have moved to next.

"We can't know for sure, but it looks like he headed back west? You can see from the last 3 addresses he's been just jumping state lines to the next place. I'm guessing Oklahoma, Kansas or Nebraska next. If Steve thinks he can try and ruin Corroded Coffin through Robin Buckley, then it's up to us to prove him wrong," the guy is saying, and Eddie thinks maybe this guy is just exaggerating but the comment section is already filled with other people saying vile shit about what they should send to Steve or what they'd like to do to him physically and-

Eddie clicks off the video, to the next recommended. The more he watches, the angrier they seem to get. He goes to the search bar and looks for new react videos.

He finds that everyone has an opinion. He watches videos where his own fans express their disappointment in him. They talk about how Corroded Coffin runs an antibully campaign and then allows their fans to bully an ex and for not calling out the ones doxxing people, wanting to know which was the reason - does Eddie not know, or does he not care? Eddie didn't know. Truly. But he can't help but wonder if he didn't know because he didn't care.

He'd written all his feelings into a song, and now that he's older, he can see that a lot of what he was feeling is an exaggeration and dramatization of what really happened. But the point is, he'd written out his feelings and moved on.

The man he thought he'd marry one day.

His stomach twists uncomfortably as Robin's voice rings in his mind.

He continues his spiral down YouTube until Gareth calling him again breaks through and he answers.

"How is this the first time I'm hearing about Robin's interview?" Eddie demands.

"You've got a damn good PR team, that's how. I guess you fell down the rabbit hole, then?"

"How'd you-"

"Is been almost 4 hours since we talked. Doesn't take that long to watch a 30 minute video."

"Oh. Alright. So, why did you want me to watch the video? Am I supposed to respond to Robin?"

"No. People don't actually want to hear from you. They want to hear from Steve. And that's why you needed to watch. 'Cause Robin's announced that Steve's finally ready to make a statement. Robin's going to post it on her Twitter. Tonight. So, we've got to be ready. If anything Robin said turns out to be true, we might have a problem on our hands. A slander lawsuit being just the beginning."

"Fuck."

"What a way to sum it up," Gareth chuckles into the phone before his tone becomes serious, "hey, how are you doing, though? With it all?"

He thinks about it, and how he really feels, before answering. "It's been years since I've thought about Steve, y'know? I... I've had that luxury. I didn't know.... Did you?"

"No. Hell no! I'd of said something. I mean, shit man, we run an antibully campaign 'cause high school was shit to us. If I'd known at all we'd have been telling them to fuck off. Harassment's just what they call bullying adults."

Eddie swallows. "Guess we just have to wait and see what Stevie has to say."

"I'd come sit on the couch with you and refresh twitter frantically but, well, Indy's a bit of a ways off. I'll call after Robin's posted, then?"

"Yeah, man. Let's see the damage," Eddie sighed. "Talk to ya later."

"Bye."

Eddie digs out his laptop and pulls up Robin's twitter page. He adds an auto-refresher extension and sets it to refresh every minute before opening his phone and pulling up YouTube again.

[redr0sewrites]

Continuing from your jealousy HCs for Blade, I especially like the idea of reader topping Blade. His jealousy is painfully obvious at times and I think he would try to deny it, that he's not jealous and that he just finds it annoying that you're talking so sweetly to another man. He'd become a little mean and petty, kinda like a cat.

What better way to assure him than to leave your claim all over his body, kiss, bite, and mark him up. Fuck him rough and good, all while whispering sweet nothings into his ear, how well he's taking you, how good he is for you, how you only have eyes for him. Make him cum over and over again, 'till he's shaking and trembling from pleasure. That should make him remember he's the only one you want, or... does he need another reminder 🫣

your sooo real for this anon<33333 bladie is sooooo yummy and pathetic when hes jealous. hope u enjoy~

🥀Cw: smut, sub blade, jealous sex, dirty talk, marking, bondage, praise/degradation, overall filth, gn reader/can be read as a strap or a dick, etc

🥀 minors dni

"im not jealous. i have no idea what your talking about," blade spoke firmly, yet his eyes refused to meet yours.

"aww, its okay to admit it bladie~ your so cute when your jealous", you hum, stepping closer to him until your chests were pressing together. blades breathing was short and ragged, and a pink haze tinted his cheeks. his dark hair framed his face as he looked down at you, his eyes wild with lust.

"im not..." his voice was rough and throaty with arousal, thick and rough and full of desire. you giggle, pushing him back against the bed and he obeyed you perfectly. you pinned him down, even though you were much smaller than him he was always so submissive- how cute!

"do you need a reminder that I'm yours?" you move to straddle him, and his breath hitches as you rub up and down his thick thighs. he nods slowly, and you smirk. in a few sharp tugs, clothing was being discarded and blade was face down, ass up in the sheets, your cock rubbing against his ass. he squirmed, a quiet mewl falling from his lips as you slowly rocked against him.

"how needy~" you whisper in his ear, and he whimpers in response. you entered him suddenly and almost immediately began to fuck into him roughly, his whole body began to tremble with each thrust.

"nghh~ i- im not- please-" blade was gasping, his voice cracked with pleasure as you continued to fuck him senseless. in response, you yanked his hair harshly and began to nip and bite at his neck and shoulders. blade only seemed to grow more and more feral, his hips bucking back against your strap.

"im yours, and your mine. dont forget that, hmm bladie?" blade sobbed in response to your words, he was squeezing you so tight you were sure he was close. his whole body was quivering and his moans grew louder and louder as tears began to form in his eyes.

"im- im sorry- please im close~ ngh- plea-" blade shook, eyes rolling back as your hips continued snapping against his, the sound of skin slapping against skin filled the room.

"you taking me so well, such a precious little slut. go on, you can cum~" blade opened his mouth in a broken moan as his orgams ripped through him, shoulders shaking as he practically collapsed against the bed, however you didnt stop.

"wha- i- mhm~" blade sobbed, tears were streaming pathetically down his flushed cheeks.

"are you sure you werent jealous?" you ask, voice laced with arousal and malice. he tried to speak, but words failed to form as broken moans and whimpers spluttered from his lips.

"i- im sorry- i was, i was! im yours!" his needy whines and pleas only made your own arousal grow, and you began to fuck into him faster and faster. he began to moan and gasp louder, hips shaking and face flushed.

"wha- mhm- ngh~" his voice shook with arousal, his hair was sticking to his forehead with sweat and his eyes were rolling back with every thrust.

"aww, you really thought i was done with you bladie?"

not me dropping smut and then leaving again for 2 days 💀 schools been kicking my ass but ive been getting back into writing so thats good ajsjsj- ANYWAYS HOPE U ENJOY ANONN

[negans-lucille-tblr]

The Fan | Jensen x Reader | Oneshot

Summary: Y/N has an unhealthy obsession with a man with a filthy mouth and an oral fixation he’s hell bent on ruining her life with. 

Rating: 18+

Pairing: Jensen x Reader

Tags: audio porn, porn AU, dirty talking, daddy kink, praise kink, slight degradation, oral fixation, oral sex galore, use of sex toy, masturbation, public masturbation, Jensen has a filthy filthy mouth in this one, it might make you feral be warned…

WC: ± 4K

A/Ns: I shouldn’t be trusted to write porn when I’m feeling feral because this is absolute filth and I just wanna thank Laura for commissioning it and sending me further down my crazed rabbit hole. <3

Want your own commission? Find out more here!

Jensen Ackles Masterlist

“Oh fuck, baby girl, you take Daddy’s cock so fucking well in that tight little cunt, don’t you?” he coos as your whole body starts to break out into a light sweat. “Best damn pussy I’ve ever fucking had, sweetheart.” 

You whine, your back arching off the bed, your head fuzzy with your impending orgasm as your eyes flutter closed and you try to stave it off just a little while longer. 

“Look at you, so fucking perfect, you were made for me, made for my cock inside you. Daddy’s perfect little slut,” he growls, gasping for breath at the end of his sentence, moaning deep from his chest. “Tell me what you are, I wanna hear you say it.” 

“I’m your perfect little whore, Daddy,” you whine out, your fingers working your clit to the very edge of sweet release.

“That’s fucking right you are, baby, feel so fucking good on my cock, fuck, making Daddy wanna fucking cum. Do you want that? Hm? Do you want Daddy’s cum deep in that pussy? Maybe I should put your panties back on you and send you out. Let you walk around the store with my cum dripping down your thighs. Oh you like the fucking sound of that, don’t you?” he chuckles darkly, and you gasp for air, the feeling of the cock pistoning in and out of you almost too much to bear anymore. 

“You’re not going to cum again are you?” he asks. “You know how I feel about you cumming when my mouth isn’t down there to taste it. Do you need my tongue in that cunt again, baby girl? Or are you still craving Daddy’s cock? Look at you, so fucking desperate you don’t even know what you want anymore, you just want to be used, don’t you? You just want Daddy to use that fucking cunt over and over until I’m through with it. I’ve fucking got you, baby girl, you’re mine and everyone fucking knows it. I’ve marked you up good, you wanna see your skin, fucking covered in my claim.” 

You can’t take anymore, and you cum hard, screaming out in pure ecstasy as your climax washes over every inch of you, and you’re left gasping for air, squirming on the edge of over-stimulation as the cock continues to piston in and out of you at the steady pace you’d set it at. 

Your eyes flutter open and you’re brought back to the room, your earbud falling out, letting the natural ambience of your bedroom fill your eyes, the very faint sound of the actor’s voice still bleeding through the forgotten earpiece. Your body is still trembling, goosebumps erupting over every inch of you as you finally reach for the dial beside you and slow the machine down until it’s come to a stop, and you carefully remove the toy from inside you and whimper at the loss of contact, even if you are thoroughly done. You reach for your phone to pause the audio, realising there’s still ten minutes left. You never can make it to the end of one of his audios. That man is far too good at what he does, and it’s a crying shame he doesn’t do videos, though you realise that audio gets you off far better than visual does nowadays. You don’t even think you’d care what the guy looks like, if he can make you cum that hard and that many times with just his words, he could look however he wants and you’d still fuck him. 

Somehow, the guy seems to be all your biggest fantasies wrapped up in one dirty mouthed human, and you’re actually starting to worry about your real dating life, given you’re never going to find a guy that will ever come close to your favourite audio actor, you’re sure of it. Still, it doesn’t stop you from trying, even if your nights do end like tonight; alone and getting yourself off with your best investments yet; your fuck machine and Patreon subscription to ‘Dean Winchester’.  You hadn’t even needed a machine before Dean, and you actually had more real life sex with real life men, but over time you ended up settling for mediocre one night stands less and less, rathering going home to Dean, instead. You know your obsession is borderline unhealthy at this stage, but if the guy would stop putting out the best audios you’ve ever heard, then maybe you’d stand a chance. 

*

Work is so mind-numbingly boring, you find yourself watching the clock on the wall and praying that the last twenty minutes would hurry up, so you can get out of the office for the weekend. With the weekend upcoming, you don’t have time to start a new project, but you finished your last one two hours ago, and have been desperately trying to seem busy for your boss’s sake since then. You sigh and twist yourself left to right in your office chair, and practically leap at your phone the second it goes off next to you. Finally, something to do. 

You’re quick to glance around you when you realise that the notification is from Patreon, and you open it cautiously to see Dean has posted a new audio. It’s rare for him to post something mid afternoon on a Friday, and you read the title and the audio information, eager to find out what your Friday night is going to entail. 

Daddy can’t get enough of eating that sweet pussy (with toys)

Contains: Excessive oral sex, daddy kink, use of toys, praise, degradation, slight humiliation, mocking for multiple orgasms, soft dom, aftercare 

You look around the office, feeling your pussy getting uncomfortably wet already, and rub your thighs together, reaching into your purse and grabbing your headphones, before quickly making your way towards the bathroom. You would normally at least try to wait the extra hour, and for  the comfort of your own home, but this one sounds too good to wait. You just want a little glimpse; at least that’s what you tell yourself as you lock yourself into a bathroom stall and eagerly put an earbud in, making sure your phone is definitely connected to it before you turn the volume up a little. 

“Hey, baby girl,” Dean hums through the headphone, and instantly the wetness doubles.

You shift uncomfortably in your heels, and take a seat on the closed toilet lid, hitching your dress up enough to get to your soaked panties. You can just have a little play, it’s not like you’re busy, and no one will know what you’re doing in here. 

“Have you missed me? Aw, I can tell,” he coos, “have you been waiting for me all day? I’ve had a long week, and I was thinking I could use some stress relief,” he explains. “I’ve been thinking about you since I left you naked in bed this morning, been thinking about that sweet little pussy, about how good you taste. My cock has been hard all fucking day just thinking about tasting you when I got home.” 

You try your best not to moan out loud, your fingers now pulling the ruined material of your panties to one side as you take a shuddered breath in and start to tease your swollen clit. 

“You don’t mind if I help myself, do you?” he asks, and then a low hum rumbles through him. “Fuck, let me take those panties off, wanna see that dripping little pussy properly. It’s gonna taste so fucking good, you always taste so fucking good, you’ve got Daddy addicted, d’y’know that?” 

You rush to remove your panties over your heels, wanting to keep up with the fantasy now playing in your mind’s eye, and you quickly stuff them into your blazer pocket. 

“Don’t worry about making dinner, I’ve got enough to feast on right here,” he chuckles lowly, and then the sound of his lips smacking over something fills the quiet, and he moans under his breath. “Tastes fucking good, baby girl,” he praises. “That pussy was made to be eaten, and look at it, practically dripping for me, such a naughty little slut, hm? You want a finger inside you?” 

Instantly you slide one finger inside your warm, wet cunt, and your eyes roll as you throw your head back. 

“So fucking tight, baby girl, you like having something inside you when I eat that pussy, don’t you?” he laughs, “then why don’t you use the dildo I got you? It’s right here, I’ve got it, let me see if I can make it fit.” The sound of vibrations accompany Dean’s hums of approval, and you wish with everything in you that you were home right now, where you could reach for your own vibrator and slide it inside you like Dean’s doing in your fantasy right now. “Fuck, baby girl, you take it so well, does that feel good? It’ll feel better when my tongue is back on that clit.” 

“Jesus,” you whisper under your breath, pushing a second finger inside you in a desperate attempt to mimic the toy you’re imagining. 

“Don’t worry about me, baby, I’ve had a cockring wrapped around my cock all day, I’m gonna be fucking you for hours yet. Now you just lie back and let me take care of that sweet little cunt.”

The bathroom door opens outside of the stall, and you jump to remove your fingers, even though whoever has entered won’t see what you’re doing, you still don’t want to get caught out somehow.  The obscene noises of Dean ‘eating you out’ are still playing into your ear, and you rush to pause the audio in an attempt to calm yourself down a little, hearing the clicking of heels on tile as someone enters the stall next to you.

“Y/N?” you hear Amber call out. 

“Yeah?” you call back, your voice shaky and not trustworthy, right now.

“You coming to the bar with us?” Amber asks. 

You stand up and flush the toilet to complete your facade, heading out of the stall and quickly beginning to wash your own juices off of your fingers before Amber somehow notices. 

“Not tonight,” you insist, your mind very much on the remaining twenty three minutes of Dean’s new audio, and the date with your machine you’ve found yourself with suddenly. 

“C’mon, you’ve not been out in forever, plus, Sascha insists that this new bar has the hottest guys,” Amber explains as she also exits her stall and stands at the sink beside you, washing her own hands. 

“I gave up on men a long time ago,” you remind Amber with a chuckle. 

“Oh c’mon, I’m all for silicone friends, but you’ve gotta get a real dick at least once in a while, and girl for you, it’s been a while.” You laugh at her bluntness and shake your head. “You’re coming, even if I have to pay for your drinks all night,” Amber insists. 

You sigh and roll your eyes, before nodding reluctantly, guessing one drink won’t hurt if it gets Amber off your back. 

“Great,” Amber beams, reaching forward to undo the top button of your dress so your cleavage is far more on show than it was before. “There, let’s go.”

*

One drink has somehow turned into three, because every time you say you might leave, Amber is quick to buy you another cocktail, and you feel bad wasting her money by not drinking it first. You’re hyper aware of the fact your panties are still stuffed into your blazer pocket, and your pussy is completely bare and exposed under your dress, and the only thing you can fully focus on is the remainder of Dean’s audio you want to listen to. You really do have a problem, apparently. 

By the fourth drink, you offer to pay, feeling bad that Amber is footing your bill all night, and you guess you owe her one drink before you finally go home to your machine. You stand at the bar and shift uncomfortably from foot to foot as you wait to be served, your mind running wild with all the ways Dean is going to fuck you tonight, and when the barman finally stands in front of you, you realise you’ve forgotten what Amber wanted. You guess your way through a list of a few different cocktails, figuring one of the girls will drink them even if Amber doesn’t, and as the barman moves away to make your long order, you hear a scoff beside you. 

You turn your head to look at the man, and are kind of taken for a moment because he’s pretty attractive. Sascha was right, the men at this place really are better looking than the rest of the bars around town. Maybe they have some weird lighting, or something. 

“Sorry, sweetheart,” he laughs easily, and his voice shoots straight to your core. Jesus, has it really been that long since a hot guy has talked directly to you? “It’s just I’ve been stood here for over five minutes, and that bar man is only serving the hot girls,” he explains. 

Your brain takes a second to process what he’s saying, and then you scoff and shake your head. 

“Clearly not, he just served me,” you counter. 

“I stand by what I said,” the stranger insists, after his green eyes have raked up and down your body a couple of times. Is this guy actually flirting with you? You find yourself staring for a moment. There’s something very familiar about him, but you’re fairly sure you’d remember ever meeting a guy this attractive. 

“Do I know you?” you ask him, frowning. 

His green eyes light up and he laughs softly, shaking his head. 

“Urm… don’t think so,” he finally offers, shaking his head. But his hesitance only confuses you more. 

“Are you sure? I swear I know you somehow,” you insist. 

The guy begins to blush, and he clears his throat before looking around himself. 

“Well, what if I said my name is… Dean,” he slowly offers. 

Your eyes widen immediately, and you’re not sure if you want the ground to swallow you whole or if you want to kiss the man. His voice that’s what you know, that’s what’s so familiar, and that’s why you’re having this kind of reaction to just talking to some guy. So you’re not that desperate, after all… or maybe you are, depending how you look at it. You would’ve never placed him as Dean Winchester, no matter how intimately you know his voice, because you never would’ve actually expected him to be more attractive than the picture you’d painted in your head. And you never would’ve expected to bump into him at a bar in town of all places. 

But then the realisation hits you fully. If this guy is Dean Winchester then he knows that you listen to his stuff, and he knows that you listen enough to recoginise him. 

“Oh my god,” you gasp, your cheeks burning. “Oh my god, I’m so embarrassed, I’m so sorry,” you fumble to apologise, but Dean just laughs and shakes his head. 

“Why are you sorry? I love meeting fans.” 

The word fan only makes your skin crawl more, he’s going to think you’re some psycho, some desperate woman that needs audio porn to get her kicks. 

“Oh god,” you groan, now feeling your skin crawling in shame. 

“Don’t be embarrassed, sweetheart, really,” he reassures you, reaching out to grab your shoulder. “Honestly, I’m flattered a girl like you listens to me.” 

“Oh sure,” you scoff, not believing him for one second. You want to tell him you don’t really listen to his stuff that much, but then you realise that might be insulting, and you don’t want to tell him you’re as big a fan as you are, or you’ll just look even more pathetic to him. “Listen, I’ll leave you alone,” you conclude. 

“Oh,” he replies simply, before licking his lips and nodding his head. “Yeah, sure, if that’s what you want.” 

You can’t help but feel like you’ve insulted him somehow, and you swallow hard, rushing to explain. “I don’t wanna seem like some creepy fan,” you excuse. 

“Sweetheart, I’m the one that hit on you,” he laughs. 

Your eyes only widen further, “you were hitting on me?” 

“Yeah, well… I thought I was… I did call you hot, didn’t I?” 

“I guess,” you agree, now feeling embarrassed for a whole new reason. The guy that has given you more orgasms than all the other men in your sexual history put together has hit on you. “I’m sorry, I just always assumed that a guy like you would be married, or at least dating someone.” 

“Nah, my work is just as much for my benefit as it is yours, trust me,” he laughs softly. “So, can I at least buy you a drink, even if it’s just to thank you for liking my work?” 

*

“I can’t believe I’m going to tell you this,” you confess, already drunkenly laughing behind your hand as you look over at him. 

Dean – or Jensen, you’ve now been told his real name is – seems to wait patiently for your confession, and in the two or so hours you’ve been sitting together drinking and getting to know each other, you somehow feel like you’ve known him for years. Maybe that’s because of the porn, but either way, you’re actually about to say this out loud. 

“The audio that you released today?” you prompt, and a smirk grows over Jensen’s plump lips.

“Yeah…” he prompts. 

“Well, I didn’t get to finish it, but let’s just say I started it in work… in a bathroom stall… and I’m still a mess. I was dying to get home to finish it.” Your confession doesn’t leave you as embarrassed as you thought it would, not when Jensen only smirks harder, and then bites his bottom lip as his green eyes look around the bar. 

“Well… why don’t I just… show you what the rest was like?” he asks, blinking at you. 

“What?” you ask, feeling yourself beginning to sober up at just the very thought of what Jensen’s implying. 

“What if we… y’know, re-enacted it?” 

*

“So how far did you get?” Jensen asks, breathing against your neck.

You crane it, pushing your head back further into your pillow as you moan softly, dragging your nails through the soft hair on the nape of his neck. 

“Not very, you’d just pulled out a vibrator,” you explain breathlessly, your heart thudding in your chest. If this man is this good at kissing, you’re not sure you’ll survive the rest of it. And you already know what a filthy mouth he’s got from the dirty talking. And from talking to him tonight, you were more than excited to find out that his audios are a true reflection of his own kinks.

“Do you have one?” Jensen prompts, and you blindly reach under your bed for the box that holds your toys, throwing the lid off carelessly and wrapping your hand around your favourite vibrating silicone friend. 

You produce it in front of you, stopping Jensen in his tracks as he smirks, taking it from you and throwing it to the bed next to you both. 

“I don’t have a cock ring though,” you add with your own smirk, and Jensen chuckles lowly. 

“Don’t worry, I’m covered,” he tells you smugly, taking your hand and pushing it under his boxers. Your hand meets soft, warm velvety skin, and as it gets a little lower, you feel the rubber ring at the very base of his swollen cock. 

“Do you always go to bars wearing one of those?” you sass, wrapping your fingers around his erection and growing pleasantly surprised at the thickness. 

“I had it on for the audio this morning, y’know, for authenticity, and figured I’d leave it on because I was so horny. Meeting you was just the bonus,” he explains. 

“What else do you do for authenticity?” you tease, gasping when Jensen’s teeth sink into the delicate skin on your neck. “Do you…” you struggle to regain your composure, grinding your core up against his bare thigh, your slick coating his skin. “Do you actually eat pussy?” you finally manage to ask. 

“Unfortunately not. It’s been a while since I got to eat a pussy… don’t mind if I fill up on you, do you, baby girl?” 

“No, Daddy,” you whimper, not even ashamed at how quickly you submit to him. 

“Oh, someone’s been listening to my work… such a good little whore, f’me, aren’t you? Bet you taste fucking delicious.” 

Suddenly, Jensen’s face is gone, and you feel his hands grab the backs of your thighs and push your legs backwards, spreading you open. He doesn’t waste any time dining on your pussy, making sounds far more obscene then the audios could ever capture, and just when you thought this man couldn’t get you off any harder, you’ve finally felt his tongue for real, the stubble on his face rub along your delicate skin, you’ve finally felt exactly what this man can do to you. 

Your fingers comb through the hair on the top of his head, and Jensen only ever pauses to bite and suck on the flesh at the insides of your thighs, before returning to licking and sucking your pussy like a starved man. Your back arches into his touch, and you nearly lose your mind when you see him blindly reach for the dildo you’d given him, turning it on to a low rumble as he presses the tip to your entrance. 

“So fucking tight, baby girl, you like having something inside you when I eat that pussy, don’t you?” he growls, his voice slightly deeper and far more reminiscent of his “Dean” persona. 

You moan loudly, bucking your hips desperately as he begins to fuck you with your vibrator, and you find yourself torn between wanting his mouth back on your pussy, and wanting his cock replacing your toy. Amber’s right, sometimes you just need the real thing. Especially when the real thing is as tempting as Jensen’s. 

“Fuck, Daddy, feels so good, please don’t stop,” you beg, feeling his mouth back on your cunt in an instant, and he laps at your arousal and moans loudly around your clit when he sucks it between his lips. “Holy fuck,” you shout, staring up at the ceiling, not sure you’re even going to survive this. 

Jensen’s rutting against your mattress, but seems to be in no rush to finish eating you out any time soon, and your thighs tremble either side of his head as he coaxes your orgasm to the surface. 

“That’s it baby,” Jensen pauses for a brief second to say. “Cum f’me,” he growls. “Cum on Daddy’s tongue, c’mon, perfect little cunt, tastes so sweet, you’re gonna cum for me, aren’t you?” he chuckles, looking up grinning at you like the devil. 

“Yes,” you whine, encouraging his mouth back on your clit as he now fucks your vibrator in and out of you so much better than the machine has ever managed to. 

Jensen doesn’t stop to talk again, he just hums and moans against your skin until you’re cumming hard and fast on the toy, and he’s quickly removing it to lap at your juices that are practically flooding out of you. 

As always when you listen to his work, your first orgasm does little to stave off the arousal he’s elicited from you, but luckily, it seems Jensen’s not done with you, because he licks his lips clean and hums, rising back to his knees between your legs. He begins stroking his cock in his hand, his eyes several shades darker as he looks down at you. 

“So,” he smirks, guiding the tip of his cock towards your soppy entrance, only teasing it with his tip before tapping the heavy length on your sensitive clit, making you squirm. “Which of my audios should we re-enact next?” he asks. 

“Any one that requires that inside me,” you reply, watching Jensen chuckle under his breath. 

“I couldn’t agree more.”

Want your own commission? Find out more here!

[star-suh]

Hardcore

Bang Chan x Male Reader

cw: idol au, dom top chan, pwp, facesitting, deepthroat, hair pulling, marking, spanking, slapping, choking, degradation, fisting, gaping hole, bit of dumbification, jackhammering, mating press, breeding, cum swallowing, hate sex, ripping clothes, cockwarming.

an: 😬 this man makes me go feral sometimes

—

yn was laying in the couch, his head hanging over one side of it. gurgling sounds could be heard in the living room, chan was there fucking the other's mouth “fuck at least that throat of yours can do wonders with my cock. you really know how to milk one hmm?” he slapped yn's cheeks and resumed his pace, forcing the other to deepthroat him. “maybe this is the only way to make you shut the fuck up for once”.

chan an yn were idols, each one from a different group, and they just began to hate each other for an unknown reason. every time they passed each other in the backstage of the music shows or year-end awards shows they looked at each other with anger plastered in their eyes, those glares were like hundreds of daggers stabbing at each other. until finally one day the tension exploded, their companies contacted them to do a collaboration (as a way to put an end to the rumors that the two hate each other's guts) and that's how we ended up here right now, chan banging the other's mouth, pulling his hair to thrust hard and deep.

with some final thrust chan came inside yn's throat clogging it with his thick cum, the other trying to swallow it but ended up spitting some of it “fucking asshole i almost choke–” not wanting to hear his annoying voice chan sat on top of yn, riding his face. chan gets up so that yn can breathe a little and sits on him again, repeating the action a few more times.

yn was stunned, there was so much happening that he doesn't realize when chan rips his shorts and underwear leaving his ass bare, “what the fuck you son of a bitch those were my favorite shorts”, “ask me how many fucks do i give” the other responded.

without warning chan impaled his thick fuckmeat on the tight hole, drawing a guttural moan out of him “you… asshole” tears rolled down his face while he punches chan in his chest “you're breaking me in.. hngh.. half.. you. bastard”..

chan positioned yn in a doggy style with the excuse of not wanting to see his face “this way i won't feel so disgusted” he mentioned. yn didn't pay attention to him since the only thing he focused on was how good chan's cock felt inside him. chan began to spank yn, enjoying the recoil caused by that and how it was slowly taking on a reddish color.

looking for a way to be able to thrust much rougher chan put his hands on the sides of yn's neck and began to choke him, also using it to push yn back so his cock goes deeper. yn's eyes were rolled back, spit coming out of his mouth, sex was clouding his mind and all he wanted now was to cum and get it over with quickly.

the room was now a mess, it reeked of sex and sweat, chan and yn have been fucking for hours. in the mating press position and he squeezed so hard that chan had no choice but to release his load inside the other. “why the fuck do you came inside.. it's disgusting coming from you” yn slapped chan but he didn't seem to like it, so he decided to do some payback, "fine, you son of a bitch, if that's what you want, then i'm going to get all my semen out of you. just don't complain later” suddenly, yn found himself in the jackhammering position. chan was being much rougher than he had been before, his cock never failing to hit that sweet spot. when he emptied his second load inside of yn chan said in a mocking voice “ow.. i'm so sorry yn i came inside you again”, “you did it on purpose you fu-aughng!!” yn cried feeling a sudden stretch, then he realizes chan was fisting him. his fist going in and out smeared with his semen "what do you think now yn? should i continue until there is not a single drop of cum inside?", yn could feel chan's fist making its way into his insides, how the knuckles scratched his prostate deliciously, he could feel every vein in chan's muscular arm "you're going to pay… for this.. augh.." he cried.

after finishing his fisting session, chan stopped to appreciate yn's destroyed hole, how agape it was and how it was clenching into nothing "it's cute how he tries to wink at me" chan joked, “i don't think you're going to be able to walk these days”.

chan folded yn and resume the fucking, but this time the thrusts were sloppier yn could feel that chan was already reaching his peak and that was when he took advantage and started scratching chan's back leaving long red and burning marks as part of his revenge, in addition to biting and twisting his nipples and punching his firm delicious pecs, "let's see how you'll cover those marks, imbecil” yn laughed with the last strength he had...

the next day yn woke up feeling sore down there and feeling a heavy weight on top of him, then chan wakes up too, realizing that they both fell asleep on top of each other with the top's cock still inside yn's ass "get off of me" yn pushes chan and when he tried to sit up he couldn't due to the pain he was feeling "hahaha deserved" chan laughs. suddenly he feels a slap on his back that hurt his wounds making him scream in pain "goddamn it… it hurts a lot”. “deserved" yn murmurs, struggling to stand up to go to the shower.

[johnwickb1tsch]

Sympathy for the Devil ~ Part 4

A Donaka Mark x housekeeper!Reader fic, based on @discoscoob 's concept & bot! Warnings: Donaka Mark is a bad man with a soft spot for you. dark romance, possessive behavior, nonconsensual voyeurism, red flag red flag girl!🔺, psychological games, power imbalance, eventual dubcon/nsfw.

one. two. three.

Four. 四

While Donaka Mark touched himself, you sat up in your bed and scribbled furiously in your journal, trying to exorcize him from your mind, trying to alleviate this weight from your skin. You write about what happened in the garden–and then you write about what might have happened, if you actually had a spine, and no sense of self preservation, and didn't prefer your risks to solely play out on a page. 

For lack of a better word, what you put down in your journal is pure filth, and you know when the first rays of morning shine through your window you should tear out those pages, destroy them, ensure no one else ever puts eyes on the raunchy ruminations of your feral pen. 

But…you don’t.

You keep them, hiding your little notebook in your underwear drawer. Who would ever find them there? Who would even be interested? 

Donaka should be focusing his energies on cultivating his next new champion, but instead, he cannot stop thinking about you. 

Your innocent defiance, your bravery in the face of such a terrible monster. He has no delusions about what he is. He can’t tell if you do. All your talk of misunderstood creatures–he thinks that maybe you’re not as innocent as you seem. That maybe, you have a dark and fearless side just waiting to be brought out, something deep inside you–something only he could mine from you. He will have it. He will work you over your fear of him, until you gladly surrender. He will not rest until you are his, body and soul. Maybe he employs you, but he wants to own you.

And Donaka Mark always gets what he wants.

***

A week later, you are cleaning the hallway when you spy Donaka training with another martial artist in the gym. He is mesmerizing, deadly and powerful. The fight that ensues–and the temple-like setting of his training area–are both like something out of a level of Mortal Kombat. When he takes his opponent down with a loud kiai–you can't help but half jump out of your skin, gripping your broom. When he lifts his gaze to find you there gawking at him, you know you are caught out.

He feels a flash of pleasure at the way you gasp and jump at the sound–he feels it more than hears it. He is attuned to you, he knows where you are at all times. Not just because he is constantly watching you on his cameras–he feels you, when he concentrates and closes his eyes. 

You are his.  He doesn’t really take his gaze off you as he stands up and briefly bows to his training partner. He can see how you are clearly preparing to run, and he doesn’t want you to get away just yet. He crooks his finger at you as his partner packs up his things to go, and you really have no choice but to go to him on the mat. His eyes rake over you as you join him. Maybe you’re looking at him the same way, as he dries the sweat from his glistening skin with a towel, his muscles flexing. 

Would it kill him to train with a shirt on?

You feel like this is a trap he constructed–you’re not wrong. 

“Almost done,” he says, letting you know you can clean up the mats soon.

"Yes, Sir." Finally you have the grace to avert your eyes, and not ogle this beautiful man. You notice he has a long, thick scar right down the center of his abdomen, and you wonder what happened to him. You tear your eyes away, before you can follow that line down further, the dark tuft of hair peeking out of his pants that practically invites you to indulge in yet more dirty thoughts about this man.

He smirks down at you, savoring your obeisance. 

“Ever tried martial arts?”

You are so not telling him about your childhood dabbles, after watching his brutal and precise practice. Instead you lean on your broom, relaxing slightly. “I clearly have a black belt in Tae Sweep Kun Do.” 

He snorts in answer. “Very funny. But martial arts are not a joke. The way of the warrior is a serious pursuit.” 

“I mean…” You cannot help your insouciant smile now. “Jackie Chan movies are pretty funny. Rush Hour? Timeless classic.”

Maybe if you annoy this man enough, he will give up on torturing you with the sight of his utterly biteable pecs. Almost as though he senses what you’re doing, his focus just intensifies on you, that knowing smirk in place. 

He takes another step closer to you, standing so that he could reach out and touch you if he wanted to.

“I could teach you,” he offers, “If you ever decide to take it seriously.”

The thought of him manhandling you under the pretense of teaching you floods your body with an annoying wave of desire, your grip tightening on your broom. You avert your eyes, certain he sees it all. 

“Thanks, but…when would I ever need to hit someone? All I'd have to do is tell them I work for Donaka Mark...they'd probably shit themselves and run away." 

Donaka lets out a short bark of laughter at this unexpected answer, amused by your response. 

He takes a step closer to you, commanding your gaze with a single finger under your chin, craning your neck to an almost uncomfortable angle. That single, possessive touch lights you on fire. “Such a filthy mouth on such a pretty girl,” he teases darkly.

"Sorry, Sir," you apologize quietly, your throat full of sand. You feel him tense to move, maybe to near closer, or touch you more, and you panic. “I’ll be back soon to clean up in here," you say, backing away and fleeing to your next task. 

Which includes hiding in the servants quarters for a little bit to catch your breath, your body crawling with need from that one. Little. Touch. You know you’ll be writing a lot in your junk journal that night to get it out of your system. Desire will eat at you all day, you’re certain, like some kind of parasite robbing you of your sanity. It isn’t pleasant, this thing you feel for Donaka Mark. It’s uncomfortable, and dangerous, and you wish you knew how to cut it out of you.

He’d watched you go with equal parts satisfaction and frustration for flustering you–usually he revels in a long game of corruption, but more and more lately he just wants you in his hands, and you keep running away from him. You are trying his patience, with your bad jokes and your big eyes looking at him. 

Soon, he is going to shut you up with his cock stuffed inside you, and his mouth on yours. You don’t know it yet, but you’re even going to beg for it. He always gets his way.

Later, he will watch you scribbling in your journal, curled up in your skimpy pajamas on your tiny bed, from a hidden camera placed in your room. You’ve become his favorite late night show. He wonders what makes your hand move so furiously across the page, and sometimes between your legs. Is it him? He hates it that you have a secret he’s not privy to–yet. He gives zero thought to this violation of your privacy. You live in his house. 

You belong to him.

[kagamesayu]

c/w . gender neutral reader, implied smut, dacryphilia, shidou is a weird little guy who keeps nudes of you wc: 496 a/n . i swear i like other characters i don't only go feral for this blonde roach reblogs and comments appreciated ✧*.

shidou ryusei loves passionately. he loves in ways most people do not.

that's what you tell yourself as you look at his room, littered with nudes of you. a sigh leaves your nose, dumb smile on your warm face as you sat on ryusei's lap, watching him show off another of his 'treasures'.

"- and this is when ya wore that sexy white lace lingerie and i came all over ya!" he grins widely while looking at the a picture of you in said lingerie. you could tell it was one of his favourite pictures. it had its own picture frame and was decorated aesthetically.

you were sat on the bed, eyes looking straight to the camera as a tan hand held your chin in a firm grip. a thumb dipped into your mouth, forcing it open and showing the stringy ropes of cum that settled on your tongue. your eyes were half lidded, tear stains running down your cheeks.

you remembered that night, it was valentines and you'd wanted to do something special for him. you took a week off from work and even prepped yourself, knowing how intense ryusei could be. you'd texted him saying he had a 'present' and took a teasing picture of yourself with your legs crossed.

usually it took him a while to come home, he'd always get a drink or bring some cool shiny stone home and show it to you like an excited bird, but that day he'd come home straight from training. you still remember the rabid shaking of the keyhole and the way he slammed the door open, running into the bedroom almost drooling.

the aftermath of that stunt was aches and marks all over your body, ruined clothes and a damn well satiated ryusei. he was practically glowing after that night.

he looks up at you on his bed, eyes gleaming. "think we should get ya some new clothes doll."

"ryu, you tore up those clothes."

"yeah? and?"

"they were worth $2000."

"...and? think i'd skimp out on spending money on my baby?" he smirks, bringing a hand onto your hip and patting the flesh.

that was true, he usually spent a lot of money on you. food, clothes, games, anything you wanted he'd get it for you.

"i'll order some online for us." you roll your eyes, a joking sigh leaving your lips as you rested closer into his chest. "c'mon babe you know i can't get enough 'f ya!"

"i know ryu, i know." if the way he held you right now wasn't telling, then all the other...incidents in the past said enough of his possessive nature over you. Every time you both went to a bar he'd almost always start a fight with anyone looking at you. No matter what gender and who it was he'd square the fuck up.

But...a part of you loved that he'd do so much for you. He'd do anything for you, and you wholeheartedly returned the gesture.

[renlyslittlerose]

Kinktober Day 24 - Tattoo

For anon who requested: Obi Wan going feral when he sees Anakins gotten a tramp stamp~ 🥰

I Wear It Just For You - 1,093 Rating: E Content: Established Relationship / Explicit Sexual Content / Anal Sex / Tattoos / Bottom Anakin Skywalker / Top Obi-Wan Kenobi

---

Obi-Wan knew he should have been upset, disappointed, perhaps deeply annoyed by Anakin’s insolence. And he was. But it was difficult when said insolence resulted in such a beautiful vision.

Anakin lay beneath him, hips in the air and face pressed deep in the pillows, skin flush with exertion and slick with sweat that beaded up along the curve of his spine and the dips in his hips. Bruises blossomed out along the swell of his ass and the sides of his hips, fingerprints and teeth marks branded across him by his very upset, disappointed, and deeply annoyed Master.

But it was the tattoo in the centre of his low back that continually tugged away at Obi-Wan’s attention.

It was the heraldic emblem of the Open Circle. Their heraldic emblem, branded on Anakin’s skin in thick black lines that shifted and rippled with each graceful movement. It wasn’t large but wasn’t small, either. It sat perfectly against his low back, just visible along the banding of his trousers to those who were looking. Obi-Wan would have called it elegant, almost, were he willing to give Anakin any credit for being so foolish.

Anakin had admitted he’d gotten in down in the lower levels after a particularly raucous night with some of the men from the 501st. He’d had a little bit too much to drink, and was surrounded by too few steady voices, and had in a fit of inspired spontaneity decided to get a tattoo.

‘I thought getting your name would be a little too on-the-nose,’ Anakin admitted with fluttering lashes and breath that smelled like sugars.

Maybe Anakin had thought of getting Obi-Wan’s name tattooed along his perfect body; or maybe he’d just said it to quell Obi-Wan’s ire. Whatever the reason, Obi-Wan really didn’t care. His lecturing could come later - for now he would enjoy the sight before him.

“Master,” Anakin whimpered, voice slightly muffled by the pillows.

Obi-Wan could hear the curl of pride in his voice, swathed in the aching need of his pleasure. Glancing up Anakin’s body Obi-Wan could see the smallest of smirks playing on his lips. He shoved into him harder, causing Anakin to let out a loud moan.

Perhaps it was how it looked on Anakin’s body, skin still pale where the sun couldn’t dance along him, tattoo bright and bold, black lines stark against the supple skin and taught muscles. Or maybe it was the meaning behind it; the open circle signifying the power they held both together and apart, the two of them a unit with a bond that couldn’t be broken no matter how much Obi-Wan knew it ought to be. Or maybe Obi-Wan really did enjoy Anakin’s attempts at driving him mad, and that this was just a physical reminder that Anakin would buck and twist and strain against Obi-Wan and his ideals until they were both left ragged and sore from the attempt to break free.

Either way…

Gripping Anakin’s hips harder, Obi-Wan dropped his gaze back down and watched the tattoo shift and stabilize as he fucked deeply into Anakin. Anakin was relaxed and warm around Obi-Wan’s length, knees tucked up beneath him as he rocked back into Obi-Wan’s embrace, voice breathy and sweet in the muggy air as Obi-Wan shoved his cock in and out. Sliding his hand along Anakin’s low back, he covered the tattoo with his palm and closed his eyes, breath coming out in swift puffs as he neared his completion.

Maybe he’d get one as well. Perhaps not his low-back - Obi-Wan had standards, after all. But perhaps on his shoulder, or maybe the curve of his hip right next to the base of his cock, easily hidden but still present to those who knew where to look.

Which would only be Anakin. Would only ever be Anakin.

“Thinking of getting one yourself?” Anakin huffed out, his smug smile back on his pretty lips.

Obi-Wan realized he’d let his walls down entirely, his thoughts flooding Anakin as if they were his own. With a glare he slipped his hand back around and started tugging Anakin’s cock, causing Anakin to let out a delicious little wail. His walls tightened then, sinking Obi-Wan in as low as he could go, and the pair froze in a stalemate, their cocks locked in each other’s tight embrace.

“I think it’d look hot on your hip,” Anakin said through gritted teeth. “I could admire it while I suck your cock.”

Obi-Wan’s grip faltered then, his grip relaxing just a bit. Anakin let out a satisfied huff and relaxed his walls in return, giving Obi-Wan permission to continue.

“Don’t know if I could pull off a tattoo,” Obi-Wan said as he increased his pace again, hand and hips a flurry of movement. “It’s all a bit permanent.”

“And dedicating your life to the Order isn’t permanent?”

“I can leave if I want.”

“But you won’t.”

Perhaps not. Not unless I had a good reason.

Obi-Wan could feel his orgasm drawing near, Anakin’s own fluttering along his body and through their bond. Curling over him, he started humping into Anakin at a rapid pace, pain and pleasure swirling through his groin and low back as he fondled Anakin’s cock, pushing into the spongy head before stroking his length with a lazy wrist and a tight grip. Biting down on the back of Anakin’s neck, Obi-Wan groaned as he released.

Anakin arched back into his touch, elbows dug into the mattress as he shoved back, his own orgasm ripping through him. He huffed and writhed, body tensing before relaxing, coating Obi-Wan’s hand in his come.

Sometimes, when Obi-Wan was feeling equally aroused and poetic, he wished that he could stain Anakin’s insides with his seed - mark him for all eternity, letting the galaxy know that Anakin might be the Chosen One, but he was Obi-Wan’s in all the ways that he could be. It was possessive and perhaps unlike how a Jedi should act, but in moments such as these Obi-Wan really didn’t care.

Sitting back once he was done, Obi-Wan slipped from Anakin’s body, sighing as he did so. Anakin flopped down onto the bed and spread out, his own louder groan breaking through the silence. With heavy-lidded eyes Obi-Wan admired the tattoo once more.

He supposed this mark of ownership - of attachment - would have to do.

[quinloki]

period sex and aftercare and /BUGGY/ are so big brained can i ask for those two plus dacryphilia with buggy and croco-baby and maybe a secret third character (your choice) if you feel up to it!!! Thank yooouuu!!! :o)

Alright, I got ONE MORE KINK ASK after this and I'll be all done with them \o/ Holy shit I can't believe how many asks I got for this (And how much fun I've had dealing with them.)

It helps a lot that I love kinks, kinky people, one piece characters, and learning/educating >.>

Alright we got Period Sex, Aftercare, Dacryphilia (the crying kink) - For Buggy and Sir Crocodile - and since you called him Croco-baby I'll add Donquixote Doflamingo to this.

I am surprised with as often as I feel like I've seen the crying kink pop up that I haven't already done it for ANY of these guy =O

And also yay \o/ AFTERCARE ASK \lol/

Go go alphabetical!

Buggy:

Period Sex - FUCK Yes - It's messy, it's red, it's kind of flashy actually, and Buggy loves it. You don't grow up on the most famous pirate ship in the world without being comfortable with all sorts of things. I feel like everyone under Roger's flag was, we'll say educated, and as such I can't see anyone from that crew being put off by menstruation.

Plus, orgasms are a cure for some, and there's one way to find out if it works for you to alleviate any cramping you may be feeling. You're going to be a complete mess by the time it's done though, Buggy's a little blood-lusty, surprisingly maybe, but he gets feral, and more so than with lipstick or makeup, he loves to "mark" you.

Aftercare - Oh god you don't even know - He is a terribly stressed clown, but I also think he's a big damned softie too. Buggy really is just as comfortable brushing your hair as he is ordering the crew around. Maybe more so, honestly. All that hair he has though, and that makeup he wears, the man's skin and hair care routines are on point as much as his eyeliner game. He will take care of you after every session, even if he subbing or bottoming some of it.

I think Buggy's desire to serve is almost as strong as Sanji's honestly. If you're an important person to him, he doesn't want to let you down, and he will devour your praises. But he's also The Captain™, and no matter what his role was, he's going to provide you proper aftercare.

Dacryphilia - No. - Sure sometimes tears happen. Sometimes you're so overwhelmed they slip out, sometimes you are chocking on the impressive package this man has. Sometimes tears happen, but Buggy doesn't like tears. He doesn't want to see you cry. If your makeup smears he wants it to be cause of sweat and pleasure and touch, not because you're crying. He's not even good at handling happy tears, let alone any other kind.

Buggy's more of let-him-do-the-crying-for-both-of-you type. He'd happily be the only one stressed to the ends of his capacity, than to have you worry. (Which probably worries you xD it's a bit of a cycle like that).

Sir Crocodile:

Period Sex - Yes - He doesn't mind the mess. The cause doesn't bother him. The only reason it doesn't rate higher is because it's hard to know if your period will heighten your pleasure or your pain - that lack of control bothers him, no matter how well or fast he can adjust accordingly.

He also doesn't see it as marking you the same way some others do. It's your blood, not his. It has a scent that isn't his or his cigars. If anything it's an annoyance because you should smell like him, and you shouldn't ever be hurt enough to smell like blood. You shouldn't be close enough to violence to even know what blood smells like, at least as far as he's concerned. But he'll soothe your cramps and discomfort in any way he can when it's that time.

Aftercare - Oh god you don't even know - As said before, Crocodile is all about control, and aftercare is required for control. You don't want to leave your little bottom/sub spiraling with all sorts of thoughts on their own. Whether we're talking toxic AU or not. Aside from the control though, he enjoys it. It's time to bond, to discuss, to connect. The more he knows about you the more control he can exert.

The more control you can hand over.

Plus, as beautiful as you are in his clutches, you're just as beautiful in his care.

Dacryphilia - FUCK Yes - Oh please cry for him. Sob in terror or pleasure or pain, he's not picky. Your face in tears is as lovely as your face contorted in pleasure. The only requirement is that those tears are his fault. No one else is allowed to make you cry.

As much as he will pull tears from you - and most sobs of pleasure as long as you're good - he'll kiss them away so sweetly. Brushing them aside so kindly, and with such praise.

Donquixote Doflamingo:

Period Sex - FUCK Yes - Not only is it a mess, it's a bloody mess. Doffy's a bit twisted and I can see him actually smearing the mess all over you while he's taking a break between railing you. He's not doing it so much to mark you, as he is to almost degrade you. He'll tell you how dirty you are, covered in blood and cum and tears - he 100% gets into degrading you during it.

Sometimes being on your period can make you more sensitive to pleasure, and sometimes it makes you more sensitive to pain - it doesn't matter as far as he's concerned. He'll get his pleasure at the least, and he'll enjoy turning you into a mess in the meantime.

Aftercare - Yes - Unless he's truly into you, don't take this as some kind of kindness. Aftercare is a good time to learn and bond, and for Doffy that generally means it's a great time to reinforce all his manipulations. It lets you think he cares (again, *maybe* he does), and pulls you closer into his grasp.

A truly skilled puppeteer doesn't necessarily hide the strings, he just makes sure you don't pay attention to them when you should be >.>

Dacryphilia - Oh god you don't even know - Cry for him, please. Crumble to pieces in pleasure, fear or pain - whatever it may be that you've earned at the point in time. If you're overwhelmed in pleasure he'll promise you such sweetness and devotion. If you're overwhelmed with fear he'll admonish you softly and forgive you magnanimously. If pain stains your face he'll have you begging for forgiveness, a forgiveness he'll bestow on you when he feels like it.

Perhaps after you've gone raw and hoarse from tears and begging.

Much like others who enjoy making their partners cry, it is a pleasure reserved entirely for him and no one else. Members of his immediate family may get an understanding pass, circumstances depending, but anyone beyond that is likely to be dealt with swiftly.

[jazeswhbhaven]

The Encounter of Two Flames | React | Final!

I'm ngl I forgot I didn't do the last day lmaooo but let's do this nowwww.

Even though it's pretty much everyone has seen it already and there's no point in marking it as a spoiler I'm going to go ahead and dive in on this. Now if this is the first post you're seeing of my previous reacts: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3

If you don't need any of dat, then let's get on with itttt *btw I was wrong and there were only 9 days for the story instead of 10*

But quick recap is that we were left off with Luci showing up to aid Satan after he helped Sitri get over his depressive self-harm moment that nearly burned the entire town down.

Because yah Satan did the thing and ripped his heart out so Sitri could drink his blood from the source like how they first met and junk.

So Luci gave Satan over to Paimon and now Rin is standing up too, the cutie.

Wait...who are you talking to??? <_<

FORASSSSSS???@?@?@?@>

He was spying on them the entire time, it's like I almost forgot Foras could do that lmao I just didn't think this would be remotely relevant...and this is the first time Foras got to meet Lucifer and he was very nice about it.

Wait, Bimet and Eligos now too????? AHHHH>>W>W>????

So Eligos and Bimet were there watching because they share borders and found this important. Eli does admit they should have helped but he's glad it worked out.

ngl Eli the shit was happening for quite a while ya'll sure waited quite a long ass time....

ANYWAYS

Apparently Beel was there well in fly form anyway too. Like did everybody pretty much just show up in Gehenna and just stood around waiting for what Satan would do, I'm kinda being salty about that but when you think about it Satan would of being like "nah"

Mammon ofc was like "Sitri belongs to me so I had to check" and I'm crying because even back then....oh Mammon the man that you are...

Rei is adorable he grabbed onto Luci's sleeve and was trying to say something and I'm like THE BABYYYYYY

He's like a stern older brother lmao

But yeah apparently Jjok can't speak with he is Rei so that answers some speculations. That literally means we won't be hearing that little ridiculous cute squeak toy voice come out of this hot man lol he's literally just silent.

Jjok is so mad lmao he's wondering why he can't speak in his high rank form. So even though we know he can't speak even he doesn't know why he can't.

Luci ofc is like "then don't transform" doing his blunt answer thing and Jjok is like "awh man but I look so coooooolllll" which is on point for his character.

Awh well Jjok has gotta love his fond family more for sure than just someone he admires. I think it's cute of him.

Luci just says to himself that Satan will always have people watching him no matter how small he is. (not everyone still dunking on him for his size goodness)

So we're back in Gehenna after this little scene and Sitri was on probation and all that stuff but Paimon and Leraye are encouraging him to rest up

What's this?

Nah Sitri who you fuckin'?

Tell the class...we won't jump you....cause ya know Solomon ain't there nor is MC so...

who you fuckinnnnnnnnnn

Oh a text? That's who you fuckin' probs I'm callin' it... lmao

So Satan is telling Sitri he's being too mean because the person everyone is wondering who is texting Sitri rn is none other than-

Yup Amy

And Sitri explains that he just wanted to know how he was feeling and that there was other stuff in the text message after that but he said "I ain't readin' all dat" and blocked him lmao

The energy from this devil is real.

Ppyong wonders though why it is that Sitri hates Amy so much when he's normally nice to everyone.

So, how I'm going to interpret this...

I think that Sitri sees himself in Amy, like the brute and feral part of himself that was uneducated and doing just whatever. That raw power and sense of being able to do whatever the fuck he wanted carelessly. He relates to Amy in so many ways it bothers him and he doesn't like being reminded of it, it's like looking at a constant mirror over and over of the behaviors you never want to see that you have of yourself deep down.

But at the same time he can't really blame Amy for that, but unfortunately that's his gripe and his grudge and he won't let go of it no matter what.

And also, it seems that Satan knows truly what it is but because his mischievous and entertained by their banter he doesn't want them to make up like ever.

ugh why won't bae answer my texts like????? LMAO i'm just messin' around.

But at the same time this shit is cute of him. Like he's honestly waiting on a response or like a huge paragraph of Sitri cussin' him out or something

he has a crush on Sitri so bad it's c r a z y.

But anyways he actually cares about him? That's super sweet. I told ya'll in the beginning it seemed like Sitri is way more harsh about their banter than Amy is. On his side it's more like boyish pranks whereas Sitri keeps doing shit to literally inconvenience or damn near kill him lmao

And then it says at the end of this event that the day of Sitri and Amy chilling out on their stuff has yet to come but Gehenna was at peace and their devils are strong and had their own bonds with one another.

And there we have it lovelies. The Satan and Sitri event which kinda felt more like a Sitri event again. I'm slightly disappointed as we didn't really get that much Satan lore and tons more about Sitri instead. I'm actually really starving on some Satan lore because already have so much of the other Kings and barely anything with him...

I'm wondering what the deal is about that. Do the devs just not like Satan as much so therefore put priority into his backstory and other things like his c a r d s on the back burner?

Justice for my OC's man like frfr he out here gettin' crumbs.

But anyways the reason I'd like more insight on him too is that I'm getting into Tokyo Revengers and since this is literally Satan and Belphie's territory in terms of their design and personality type, I'm really just like Y E S ? ? ? MORE??? WHEN ON THE BOIS DAMN.

At any rate I guess we'll all just have wait or just keep griping that we never get anything on Satan and maybe the devs will peep that and listennnn

But thank you all as always for sitting in and reading my stuffs <3 ya'll are cool. Stay simpin' for your faves. -your lovely adminnnnn

[billietherock]

There was no Weirdmageddon (pt6)

By Billietherock

(Gore Warning)

Chapter 2 (pt3)- Deal

Bill was so mad he could barely speak. Did Stanford Pines, some shut in who can barely speak to another person just shut Bill Cipher down? Why yes he did. Stanford shifts his weight from one foot to another, a little nervous for what would happen next.

“My thought was, well you could prove it first? Like how serious you are about this whole thing since… I’m putting my mind and body on the line and you have nothing to lose from this… deal…” he notices how red Bill was becoming.

“Serious?” Bill mutters,” You think I’m not serious?!”

Ford shakes his hands in front of him as Bill grows to immense size,” no no, I never said you weren’t serious. I just want you to prove that me giving you free reign of my body isn’t a massive mistake!”

Bill grabs Ford and glares at him,” I HAVE BEEN NOTHING BUT HELPFUL AND ENCOURAGING TO YOU. WHAT MORE PROOF DO YOU NEED?!”

Ford couldn’t speak, Bill was choking the life out of him. Bill’s anger turns to annoyance as he shrinks back down, giving Ford room to breathe. Ford takes a few wheezy breaths as he collapses onto his knees.

“Haha I get it. Except, I don’t.” He folds his arms,” what’s your plan here Fordsy. Are you going to make me cut off my arm or something?”

Ford shakes his head,” it should be easy for you. All I want you to do,” he wheezes,” is show up on my doorstep. Simple, then in return I’ll take you to do human activities.”

He takes a few more breaths before he returns to his feet,” I just want you to prove you’re just as serious as me, and you’re willing to listen. And uh maybe, if you're feeling adventurous… help out in the lab… like physically?”

Bill was still angry, he was angry that some human would call him out like this… put him in a tough spot.

“ I can just find another scientist, Stanford Pines. I don’t have to be your muse anymore.” But they both knew there wasn’t really anyone else, not with Ford so close to the portal’s completion.

There is a long pause, both the scientist and the demon lost in their own thoughts. The scientist hoping that lessons he learned from Stanley as a teen would pay off. The demon because he was insulted and humiliated in the span of five minutes, but more intrigued then he ever had been before.

“ I just have to show up at your doorstep, Sixer?”

Ford nods,” yes. Then I’ll take you for a night in the city, you can even pick where we get to eat. After that I would be more open to letting you use my body more often.” He smiles at the end, as if that would make Bill feel any better.

If looks could kill, Stanford knew he’d be dead where he stood. The look that Bill was giving him showed nothing but malice and contempt, Stanford figured this would happen at some point, Bill is a demon after all, but he still wasn’t prepared for when it actually did. When Bill went feral.

Bill looks at his own hand and then at Stanford, then back at his own hand and then at Stanford. He snaps his fingers.

Stanford wakes up, his neck felt sore like he has whiplash or something. He noticed fresh blood under his fingernails. He scrambles to look in a mirror or some other reflective surface, but all he found was that machine in the corner. It however worked for his purposes.

He sees that his neck is covered in scratch marks, and already bruising horribly. He notices a stinging in his knees and sees blood starting to leak through his jeans. His hands hurt from what he assumed to be how hard he was choking himself. He looked like he was just possessed and in all honesty he probably was, and he should have expected it.

He sighs, and left to go clean himself up, but just then he steps on… a pen. He kneels down painfully to pick up the pen, and then notices a piece of paper with a bloody hand print. He looks at his right hand and notices how bloody it seemed to be… it may have explained the scratches on his neck. He turns the paper over and gasps almost immediately, reeling from the pain.

Quickly drawn in the corner was Bill. Stanford smiles a little, this was something he had to document, a possession with other evidence besides mutilation, this was fantastic news. What was better was the few sentences next to the drawing of Bill.

It read,

“Dear Sixer

You have your deal

Don’t ever do that again

Next time you do you won’t be called Sixer

See you soon

Bill Cipher”

[mama-qwerty]

Thinking about Dread again.

Was going through my saved images and came across these, from the third season.

My deranged beloved has become a sad little meow meow.

So pensive. So frustrated. So defeated.

(My favorite image of him in this scene. I love that pose, it's so natural and conveys so much about his mental and emotional state.)

I still think the way they handled his 'redemption' completely missed the mark, and could have been done much better had they planted a few seeds to begin with. But the pacing of the whole series felt so odd, and I wonder if they had something different planned before Netflix (possibly) cut their time shorter.

(For the record, I think that's part of the problem with the Knuckles series. It felt like there should have been more in that, but Paramount told them they only had 6 eps to do what they wanted in 12.)

But Dread? My beloved little gremlin of a pirate? Oh, he had so much potential. He could have been this wild card, this character who continued to be him despite everything, who was so anti-Knuckles it was entertaining and fun and just a joy to watch him have so much fun being a bastard.

I get that they couldn't keep a Knuckles as an absolute asshole, but watching this delightful character go from this

To this

without seeing anything in between was jarring. The last we saw of Dread before season 3 started was him fighting with Ren as Sonic and Nine took the shards away. He was enraged to have lost his Beauty. Again. We have no idea what happened after that, but this descent into depression seemed sudden and out of character.

But considering how he behaved after his first loss of the shard (when he lost his first ship and crew), maybe this isn't that much of a stretch. He ran before, jumping nose first into denial, and tried to cover his feelings of defeat by being a party pirate. Now his Beauty is lost once again, and he's in a strange city, on another planet (in another universe!) and has made himself at odds with the people there. (With his other him.) He couldn't even contact his crew because he'd turned on them before leaving.

So here's Dread, completely out of his element, the one thing he'd lusted after his entire life gone. It would figure that he'd maybe have a bit of Ren's depressive state, and fall into a "What's the point? What I want always seems to be just out of reach. I'll never have my one true desire." mindset.

And maybe, since the shards were all gone, he's feeling some kind of mental shift. I've theorized that the shard's energy was what made Dread so batshit, and now that it's gone, maybe he's starting to think a little more clearly than he'd ever done before. Instead of that drive to "FIND HAVE KEEP" that gem, he's feeling like a failure for not being able to fulfill that quest. That duty. Because maybe to him, it didn't feel like the normal greed of pirate plunder, the urge to just take and steal and collect as much booty as possible. Maybe to him, because he's a Knuckles and they're hard wired to protect, it was something more personal.

That shard, according to his instincts, was his to protect. And now that it's gone, he's a failure and feels empty. He's coming down off that energy, the inexplicable hold the shard held over him, and is essentially going through a withdrawal of sorts, and dealing with the possibly conflicting emotions it dredged up.

There was so much potential for him. And the writers wasted it, by having him simply join in on the attack on Nine without examining his (very likely) ulterior motives. I don't like that they used that Jack character to draw Dread's selfish desires back out - those should have still been there! The whole agreement to join in should have been a plot to simply get him near his Beauty so he could pull a double cross.

This made it seem like Dread didn't even think about his Beauty during the whole battle. WHAT?? Being near it should have made him almost feral with the want to get to it. I would have loved to have seen him be another obstacle to the shard, so the heroes didn't only have to deal with Nine and his endless army of bots, but also this deranged pirate who was overcome with treasure lust.

Missed opportunity.

Ah well.

Just lookit this handsome bastard.

My beloved. Dread is possibly my absolutely favorite variant of Knuckles. I just love him.

[oohnotvery]

Edges of the Night (Chapter 16)

**tw/cw implied suicidal thoughts**

Thank you so much for keeping up with this story   I loved writing that last chapter but truthfully, I haven’t had the stomach to read the comments yet because I’m scared!

In other news, one of my favorite characters to write is angry, outraged, incensed, deranged Scully. I think those were Gillian’s best moments on the show, and I can just picture her seething and frothing with fury here. I hope you enjoy my iteration of Angry Scully.

She didn’t mean to do it.

She didn’t mean to fall asleep.

She knew better than to let her guard down, not while Mulder was spouting off crazy things like your life will be better without me. But he had settled them so comfortably in the bed, forehead to forehead, and his arms had felt so good around her shoulders, and his breathing was so slow and steady in her ear, and her body was so exhausted from fighting for so long . . .

The moment she opens her eyes, Scully knows what he’s done.

She sits up so fast her vision blurs. She whips around to the other side of the bed, finding his place empty, gone cold many hours ago.

Panic, then fear, then anguish hit her like tidal waves, and then she’s sprinting through the upstairs rooms. He’s not anywhere to be found, so she flies downstairs, tripping over the last step. Alan appears out of nowhere and reaches out to steady her but she shakes him off.

She zeroes in on Frohike, who looks awfully suspicious leaning against the front door.

Indignation swells in her chest and she storms over to him, reaching out to yank him away. Her fingertips are just brushing the edge of his jacket when Byers throws an arm in between them, blocking her. Without thinking, her hand flies out and she smacks him across the cheek. Byers stumbles backward in shock and she gapes at him, surprised by her own actions.

A long moment passes where the entire room falls still with anticipation. Scully’s gaze locks onto Byers’ bewildered look, and as a red mark slowly starts to bloom across his cheek, she blinks.

“I’m so sorry,” she breathes.

He shakes his head slowly and raises a palm to his face, as if to check whether she really did slap him. His eyes turn somber. “No, we’re the ones who should be apologizing, Agent Scully.”

She glances around at Frohike and Langly, who are studying her with awkward, guilt-ridden looks. Sensing Alan and Skinner nearby, she twists around, seeing them standing shoulder-to-shoulder like a pair of soldiers. A low, boiling sensation curls hot in her belly.

Each and every one of these men betrayed her.

Each and every one of these men helped Mulder leave her.

“You have to tell me where he went,” she warns them all darkly, her voice trembling with rage. If Alan is put off by her intensity, he doesn’t show it.

Byers shakes his head remorsefully. “We don’t know.”

She turns on Frohike, stabbing a finger at his chest. “You have to know. If he were going to tell anyone where he was going, it would be you.” Her chest heaves and she sees a flutter of acknowledgement in Frohike’s eyes. She seizes on it. “You do know where he went, don’t you?” Her eyes turn feral, accusatory. She steps forward, pushing Byers aside. “Are you going to tell me, or am I going to have to shake it out of you?”

The little man looks momentarily alarmed, but then his face assumes a mask of composure. “I—I don’t know where he is,” he says weakly, “and I would do almost anything to take this pain from you,” he adds with sincerity. His brow creases in agony. “But I—I don’t know . . . .”

“You’re lying.”  

He shifts uncomfortably and she wonders if she really has it in her to hurt him, if she’s really willing to do that to get to Mulder.

“I won’t—I can’t—I don’t know where he is,” he repeats defeatedly, but he is unwilling to meet her gaze.

“Then you are dead to me,” she spits. Frohike’s eyebrows shoot up and she steps in closer, lowering her voice. “You think you know what’s best for Mulder? Or for me? Do you think Mulder gets to decide what’s best for my life? When am I going to get to make my own goddamn choices?” She whips around to face the rest of the room. “When are any of you going to realize that my life isn’t yours to manipulate?”

“Dana,” comes Alan’s soothing voice, and she draws in a lungful of air, willing herself to breathe. But there’s no air in this room. No air, no life, no hope. She turns over her shoulder to glance back at Frohike, whose face has turned pale with shame.

“I don’t know, Dana,” he finally whispers, and a flicker of doubt slides down her spine.

If Frohike isn’t lying—if he really doesn’t know where Mulder is—then there is no hope of ever seeing Mulder again.

Despair slips into her bones, begins to paralyze her muscles. Her vision spins and she takes a staggering step forward, pushing past Frohike to open the front door. Wintry air blasts her face as she stumbles down the porch steps and into the shelter of a grove of pine trees. She glances up at the darkening sky through tired eyes and prays for night to consume her. And then she turns her back on the house and throws up.

**

The plan is simple.

Skinner delivers the details to her a few hours after she storms out of the house, but only after trying and failing to get her to eat. He doesn’t bother apologizing or even acknowledging her anger. Instead, he is all FBI boss, briefing her on the facts and only the facts.

In the morning, he will drive her and Alan to the nearest regional airport, where they will board a plane for San Diego and, as Skinner shares through gritted teeth, “return to your normal lives.” To appease friends, family, work, the media, and the shadowy cohort of villains that has done this to her, Scully will sit for one short press briefing about her recent experience. She will tell the world that Fox Mulder kidnapped her and that once he was apprehended, he took his own life. If asked about her own gunshot wound, she will say Mulder inflicted it upon her.

She closes her eyes at this detail. It is beyond excruciating to think about publicly blaming Mulder for her suffering.

Skinner, she learns, is expected to return to the FBI as if nothing happened. He doesn’t offer up the details of his own experience and she doesn’t press.

She doesn’t really care, not about him, and certainly not about the Gunmen. When they try to bid her goodbye the next morning, she refuses to acknowledge them beyond a curt nod. She knows she should thank them for saving her life, for helping them get to safety, for providing a safe house in Montana, for coming to her rescue in the hospital . . . but she can barely look at them, much less speak. She’s afraid if she does open her mouth, it’ll be just to blast them all with another angry tirade.  

But she’s operating on pure tunnel-vision. All she can see is Mulder, alone in this great vast world, alone in his suffering, never to see her ever again.

**

It’s Scully’s fifth time going down to the beach this week. She’s exhausted and her body needs rest, but she every time she closes her eyes, she sees Mulder. It’s been a week since she left the house out in West Virginia, a week since she and Alan flew back to San Diego.

Her life has been intolerable since returning: an unbearable press conference followed by a visit from her mother, an awkward phone call with her boss about taking leave. Oh, and then whatever happened last night.

Alan has visited her apartment every day since they returned to the west coast. He’s been good to her in a way that she hadn’t anticipated, especially since her behavior has been objectively unpleasant. First, the poor man was an unknown onlooker during her heartfelt reunion with Mulder; then he witnessed her enraged outburst at the house; and now that they’re back home, he’s got a front-row seat to her complete physical and emotional withdrawal.

But it hasn’t stopped him from bringing food over every night, or from running to the store for pain meds when her shoulder injury brings her to tears, or from filling her prescription antibiotics, or from driving her to the press briefing, or from changing the channel anytime the news mentions Mulder.

He hasn’t pressed her for anything, not for reciprocity, not for physicality, not for intimacy, not even for conversation. She assumes he’s anxious to return to the way things were between them, but her body feels more closed off than ever. Every night after he leaves, she cranks up the shower and slips inside to cry. Alan hasn’t so much as touched her hand since they left the home in West Virginia.

But tonight as he was preparing to leave, he took a step into her and gave her a quick, friendly parting hug. Their bodies didn’t even touch; just a brief touch of his arms around her shoulders. But it startled her so badly that she jerked away, and then watched with a sense of uncertainty as he apologized, then left.

Simply put, she isn’t ready for another man to touch her body. She’s relieved he hasn’t tried to kiss her. Even though she knows it’s absurd to want this for the rest of her life, she wants Mulder’s lips to be the last hers ever touch.

After Alan leaves, she debates slipping into the shower and giving into the desire to purge her emotions with a long cry. But tonight, the hug seems to have left her bereft, and a shower sounds emotionally exhausting. Instead, she tries to sleep, but like every night, rest doesn’t come easy. She’s considering taking a dose of the sleeping pills she used to rely on so heavily, but something about the prospect of drugging herself has been off-putting since she returned. So instead, after an hour of tossing and turning, she slips into sandals, loose pants, and a sweater, and heads down to the beach, just like she has every night for the past few days.

Her emotions confuse her as much as they overwhelm her. She knows, logically, that her brain is trying to process trauma. She recognizes the symptoms, knows that this vacillation between numbness and hyperarousal is normal. She recognizes that the ping-ponging between disconsolate grief and gut-wrenching anger is also normal. She also recognizes that her anger feels better than her grief, and so she nurses the anger whenever it comes up.

As she stomps down the sand towards the ocean, she feels overcome with fury. Fury towards Mulder, who once again decided he knew best. Fury towards Skinner and Frohike for the same reason. Fury towards Alan for touching her tonight. And most agonizingly, fury towards herself for falling asleep the day Mulder left.

Here on the beach, her muscles tense as that fury washes over her, as it burns through her system. It leaves her gasping aloud and clenching her fists so tightly that her skin breaks under her sharp nails.

The fury sings through her so fast and so feverishly that she keels over, clutching at her aching stomach. She knows she can’t go on like this. The rage inside her is exhausting.

She’s staring down at the waves lapping at her feet when it hits her—for the hundredth time this week—that she may never see Mulder again. That, even if she spent the rest of her life searching for him, she may never find him. As this thought overwhelms her, her anger slowly starts to morph into agony. She pushes at that feeling—no, go away—because while the anger is exhausting,the heartache is literally unbearable. She knows she cannot let herself give into her anguish. But before she can tame the thoughts and feelings whirling in her mind, her body catches up to her grief, and sweat breaks out along the back of her neck. She collapses to her knees. Waves crash around her legs and waist and saltwater stings at the small cuts on her palms. Her eyes burn.  

How is she supposed to go on? What does life even look like without Mulder?

A strangled laugh escapes her. Hell, just a few weeks ago, there was a perfectly clear, perfectly pleasant answer to that question. Life without Mulder looked like Alan, and beach life, and a stable job, and California. Life without Mulder looked like sleeping pills at night, a mental blockade in her mind, and a heart that was partially stonewalled.

And then Mulder re-entered her conscious mind, and now here she is, as bereft as a grieving widow, lonely, heartbroken, angry, disconsolate. A large part of her wishes that he had never tried to save her life in the first place.

What is my life without him in it?

Scully stares out at the sea and her thoughts drift to another lifetime, to all the times she watched her mother valiantly hold back tears as her father sailed away. Her father dictated her mother’s life and emotions for so long. He called the shots with his comings and goings. And Maggie Scully was always expected to accept his choices.

A wave laps at her wrists and Scully’s mind starts to shift, to turn. Why is she, too, letting these men control so much of her life? What if she told them—all of them, Skinner, Mulder, the Gunmen, the super-villains who wanted Mulder dead—that her life is her own? That her choices are hers to make? That she’s in control of her own narrative?

Fuck you, living out the “normal life” that Mulder so desperately thinks she needs.  

Fuck you, California and Alan and a prosperous career as a doctor.

Fuck you, a life built on choices other people made for her.

She stares out at the deep, dark, ocean, and begins to imagine the weight of the waves gliding over her body, begins to fantasize about the calm, peaceful pull of the sea as she slips down, down, down.

She could do it, right here, right now. She could wade out into the ocean and make her own fate. This time, the choice could be hers. Slowly, she rises to her feet and takes a step deeper into the sea. The waves pull at her knees, like they’ve heard her thoughts and relish the idea of this sailor’s daughter joining them in the saltwater depths.

How else can she take back control? she thinks erratically. Is this really the only way?

She stands in the breakers for a long time, so long that the moon rises above her head and tiny fish start to nip at her ankles. Everything and nothing pass through her mind. The hopelessness of her future, the grief that will follow her wherever she goes.

Will her life be bearable?

Grief is a noose around her neck, dragging her deeper into the water. And then, out of nowhere, she feels it. The tiniest, most insignificant trickle of hope.

Because Mulder isn’t dead, nor are they estranged. He’s out there in the world, alive and in love with her, and that means she can find him. As long as she’s alive, she can spend the rest of her life looking for him. And for a few critical moments, this faint sliver of hope is enough.

With one last look at the sea, she drags her feet out of the heavy, wet sand and slowly, resolutely walks back to the beach.