#i threw a pretzel at their window lol

[prince-dongju]

Apple juicing it up with @snuperateez #justadultthings (featuring Shrek 2)

[jaehyunfirstlove]

You decide you’re ready to have a baby. The catch? You’re not seeing anyone at the moment. Enter your best friend, Jeong Jaehyun. Will he be the answer to your dilemma?

Pairing: best friend!Jaehyun x f.reader

Genre: best friends to fwb to lovers, fluff, angst, smut (18+ only)

Warnings: mentions of infertility, pregnancy and childbirth, sperm donors, IVF (in vitro fertilization), fertility drugs, mood swings, fingering, unprotected sex, cum play, nipple play, breeding kink, oral sex (f.receiving), dirty talk, pregnant sex, rough sex

Word count: 10.6k

Taglist: @jaehyunnie77​ @mrg-jjh​ @keeach​ (send me a message if you want to be tagged in future fics)

A/N: this was only meant to be a short fic but it morphed into this monstrosity. I tried to tag for everything but if I missed anything please let me know. Inspired by the fact that Jaehyun wanted to be a teen dad (but they are not teens in this story, just thought I’d make that clear :) Also please excuse my unimaginative name for the baby, I’m terrible at coming up with names lol

Disclaimer: I am not a medical professional so please excuse any inconsistencies.

“So what have you got planned for today?” your best friend, Jaehyun, asked you as he took a sip of his coffee, shielding his eyes from the sun’s rays coming through the window of the cafe.

It was your weekly Saturday brunch, at which Jaehyun would show up, nine times out of ten, hungover, wearing dark sunglasses, a baseball cap, a black t-shirt and sweats. There was never a deviation from this outfit, even on the times when he came not hungover.

“Oh not much, just an appointment at the fertility clinic this afternoon.”

Jaehyun paused, as you took a sip of your latte. You couldn’t see the look in his eyes through the sunglasses but his fork had stopped midway to his mouth. It hovered in the air, scrambled eggs sliding off of it and plopping onto the plate below.

“The where?” he asked, tipping his head to look at you above the top of his sunglasses.

“Fertility clinic. Looking into getting a sperm donor.”

The matter-of-fact way you were saying everything seemed to shock him, his fork still not moving towards his mouth or back onto the plate.

“Excuse me, a sperm donor?”

You put your coffee cup down, and sighed. “I don’t know why you’re so shocked, I told you before I wanted to have a baby.”

“I thought you were joking!”

“Well I wasn’t!” you don’t know why you were being so indignant, maybe because all you’d heard from everyone around you, from your parents to your doctor to the lady that sold you pretzels from a street cart, was negative. You shouldn’t have a baby without a partner, was the main point of contention, but how was that going to happen if you weren’t seeing anyone, and hadn’t had a serious relationship in almost a year.

“But a sperm donor, Y/N?” he asked, after mulling over what you just said.

“Yeah? What’s wrong with it?” you countered. You were so sick of everyone around you criticizing your plan.

“I don’t know, what if he’s like, a serial killer or something?”

“They do psychiatric assessments on everyone who donates.”

“That doesn’t mean he doesn’t have an undiagnosed illness-”

“Oh for fuck’s sake, Jaehyun!” you’d had it, letting out an exasperated huff, “Do you have a better idea? Do you want to be my sperm donor?”

You weren’t at all serious, you were just mainly upset and unfortunately, taking it out on him, but he actually sat back in his chair, eyebrows raised, as if he were contemplating it.

“Anyway, forget it. I don’t need your approval. I just hoped that you’d support me, of all people.” You couldn’t help but pout. He was your best friend and he’d stuck with you when no one else had. You may have said you didn’t need his approval but deep down you wanted him to be on your side.

He leaned forward, took his sunglasses off and looked you in the eye. “Of course I support you,” he said sincerely. “If this is what you want, then I’m with you one hundred percent of the way.”

You smiled, your heart feeling lighter, and just as you took a sip of your latte he said the one thing that would complicate your life forever.

“But I get to be that sperm donor.”

You spluttered, almost choking on your latte. “I wasn’t being at all serious, Jaehyun,” you chuckled nervously, but one look at his face and you could see he was being completely serious.

“I just don’t like the idea of some stranger being the father of your child,” he said quietly, looking down at his plate of food while he said it, “might as well be me, right?” He looked up at you hopefully.

You didn’t know what to say. This was your best friend, the one you’d grown up with, the one you’d catch tadpoles with, the one you’d drag to the playground with you, the one you told all your innermost secrets to. The one who knew you best. Didn’t it make sense then, that he would be the one to share this with you, in the end? You looked at his face; open, sincere, beautiful. You knew he was attractive, with the trail of broken hearts he’d leave in his wake, but you hadn’t really looked at him in that way before. Suddenly he was a new person to you, and now you didn’t know how to feel.

“Jaehyun, I-” you rubbed your hands together nervously, still unsure of what to say, “it’s a big thing, you know? This will change the rest of your life.”

He nodded, but there was no trace of hesitation in his actions. In fact, he looked as sure as anything. “Yeah that’s a given. But I’ve thought about it and I’m ready.”

“Jaehyun, you’ve literally thought about it for, like, the few minutes we’ve been sitting here.”

He smiled, “Actually I’ve thought about it for a long time.”

“About being a sperm donor?”

He laughed. “No, not specifically a sperm donor. But it’s a start,” he shrugged. “So what do I have to do?”

---

Jaehyun accompanied you to the appointment at the fertility clinic, where they outlined the plan and what was required of the two of you. It didn’t sound too bad, but you did find that having Jaehyun there to support you was really helpful. Every time the doctor explained something that made you nervous you would look over at him and he would smile confidently at you, sometimes squeezing your hand if you looked particularly concerned.

It was the fertility drugs they gave you, that threw your world into chaos. They had warned you of the side effects but you didn’t think it would be this bad. Your mood swung back and forth like a pendulum, one moment you were happy, the next you were crying into your cereal. You were irritable more than you had ever been in your life, and constantly snapped at every little thing. Not to mention that your breasts were sore and you had nausea, making you feel like you were pregnant already. You felt bad for Jaehyun when he was around for your mood swings and irritable moments, but he handled it much better than you thought he would. He’d give you your space when you needed it, but also sit by your side when you didn’t want to be alone. You found yourself thinking about how he would be as a father, but then you would remember that he was just the sperm donor.

One day, when he was sitting beside you on the couch, rubbing your back after you’d cried over your coffee order being wrong, you ended up asking him how much he wanted to be involved.

“We didn’t talk about the ‘after’,” you said, still sniffling. He stopped rubbing your back and looked at you.

“What do you want the ‘after’ to look like?” He asked, his tone level and gentle.

You had visions of Jaehyun rocking the baby to sleep, of Jaehyun seeing the baby walk for the first time, of Jaehyun teaching your child how to ride a bike, piano lessons, soccer games, first day of school. The perfect family. Except he wasn’t your husband, he wasn’t even your boyfriend. You didn’t know what to ask of him.

“I don’t know,” you whispered. He went back to rubbing your back.

“I’ll be as involved as you want me to be,” he said softly, “my only request is that I get to be a part of their life.”

That sounded fair, you thought. This was certainly going to be more complicated than getting a stranger as a sperm donor.

---

You went through several cycles of IVF, but none had been successful and you were losing hope. Not to mention the fertility drugs were really taking a toll on you, and the doctor had recommended taking a break. You were devastated, seeing it as the end of your dream, no matter how much the doctor reassured you that it wasn’t.

“There has to be another solution,” you pleaded at one appointment. Jaehyun hadn’t accompanied you and you felt yourself falling apart without his presence.

“Well, of course there’s the surefire way,” the doctor shrugged.

“What’s that? I’ll do anything!” you were hopeful once again at the doctor’s words.

“Regular sexual intercourse.”

Of course, you thought bitterly. You couldn’t help but think this was society punishing you for doing this without a husband. Undeterred, you resolved to discuss it with Jaehyun.

---

The look on Jaehyun’s face when you broached the subject was one you had never seen on him before. It was a mixture of shock, terror, resignation, and… something else, almost like acceptance, as if this were the natural course of things.

You resolved not to make it weird, it was just sex after all, and you would get a baby out of it, and that was the most important thing. However, your palms still got sweaty at the thought of it, your heart racing imagining him naked. You’d gone swimming with him plenty of times, went on beach outings often, and you realized you’d always avert your eyes from his bare chest. You figured you were just doing it to be polite, but you had no trouble looking at other men’s chests (you were only human, after all). You shook your head of your thoughts, while waiting patiently for him to agree or disagree to your request.

“I know it’s weird,” you began, when he still hadn’t said anything, “but I promise it won’t change anything in our relationship.” You needed him to agree, and at this point you would say anything to convince him. He looked at you thoughtfully, before he nodded.

“Okay, I’m in.”

---

You’d been keeping track of your cycle and had the days you were ovulating marked on your calendar, which you had shared with Jaehyun. It was agreed that he would come to your place after work, where you would have sex in the hopes of making a baby.

The first night you were nervous, pacing your room as you waited for him to come over. When the doorbell rang you literally jumped out of your skin. When you opened the door you were relieved to see that he was nervous too, although he tried his best to hide it. He joked around with you, trying to keep the mood light, and you had to admit you appreciated it. But when you got to the bedroom, you both went quiet. Jaehyun stood at one end of the room and you stood at the other, the bed looming between you.

“Do you want me to turn around while you get undressed?” he asked awkwardly, and you realized you hadn’t thought through the details.

“Um, yeah, sure,” you replied, and when he turned around you hastily undressed and jumped under the covers. “Done,” you advised, and he turned around. He didn’t make a move though, just looking at you pointedly, until you realized and turned your head away. Once he was done undressing you felt him lift the covers and get into the bed with you, and you couldn’t stop your heart from hammering in your chest.

“Y/N,” he said softly, because you still hadn’t turned back to him. “Can I touch you?”

You bit your lip, still not looking his way, and nodded. His touch made you jolt, even though his hand was warm, the electricity you felt made all your nerve endings feel like they were on fire.

“Is this okay?” he asked, his hand moving tentatively across your stomach. You nodded but you realized you were panting already, and he had barely touched you. “Tell me if I do anything you don’t like,” he suddenly whispered in your ear, and then he was kissing your neck.

You weren’t prepared for the intimacy, you had really only thought about the intercourse part. You hadn’t prepared yourself for the kissing, and the touching, and how he was so good at making you feel good. You felt like you weren’t supposed to enjoy it, that it was supposed to be “just sex” because you were friends and you weren’t doing this because you loved each other, you were only doing it to have a baby. But the more he touched you, the more he kissed you, the more you fell under his spell. You felt like you should tell him to stop, to just get on with it, but you knew he was doing it to get you nice and wet and therefore more comfortable to take him.

His kisses started to move along your jaw, towards your lips, and when he was finally there, his lips on yours, you felt a panic bubble up in your chest. It was too intimate, too much for someone who wasn’t yours. You pulled away, and he looked at you in surprise.

“No kissing on the lips,” you managed to say, maybe that would be enough to keep it less intimate, you told yourself. He nodded without saying a word, his hand coming up to your breast.

“Is it okay if I touch you here?” he asked, his eyes on yours. You thought for a moment and decided it was okay, and when you nodded he cupped your breast tentatively, all the while watching you for your reaction. When you didn’t pull away he squeezed gently, rubbing your nipple with his thumb.

You pressed your lips together, trying to suppress a moan, because everything he was doing was making you feel so good. He kept watching your reaction, and when he was satisfied that you were reacting favorably he got bolder, his hand slipping down between your legs.

You yelped when he touched you there, your legs involuntarily closing and trapping his hand. He froze, looking at you with wide eyes.

“Sorry,” you apologized, flushing with embarrassment, “reflex reaction.”

“It’s okay,” he said softly, as you slowly opened up your legs again. He moved his hand slowly, gently, just rubbing the inside of your thigh. “You can relax, Y/N, I promise I won’t hurt you.” His words were soft, his tone gentle, and it did wonders to calm and soothe you.

You nodded, giving him the go-ahead, and he reached tentatively with his finger, just lightly touching your folds. The electricity you felt when he first touched you came back with a vengeance, and you almost melted right into the bed. Your reaction encouraged him though, and he pressed his finger further in, rubbing your wetness around. When he was satisfied with the state of your arousal he got into position between your legs, placing the tip of his cock at your entrance. He paused, looking you in the eye, gently stroking your cheek.

“Ready?” he asked gently, “I’ll go slow.”

You nodded vigorously, to be honest the anticipation was killing you and you were very much aroused, wanting him to just get on with it. When he pushed into you though, you realized you should really be careful what you wished for. The feeling of him stretching you was almost too much, every inch he pushed in agonizingly slow amplifying your arousal to a dizzying degree. By the time he was seated all the way inside you you were panting, almost out of breath already.

“Okay?” he asked, through gritted teeth. You could tell he was holding back for dear life, but he purposely went achingly slow to make sure you were comfortable.

“Yes,” you said, having adjusted to his size, “you can move now.” Your pussy clenched involuntarily around him and he hissed.

“Don’t do that, Y/N,” he groaned, “I won’t last.”

“Sorry,” you said sheepishly, and as if to get you back he snapped his hips, making you cry out.

“Fuck!” you screamed, and that definitely encouraged him, and he set a pace, fucking you into the mattress. You felt your toes curl, a familiar knot building in your stomach. Once again, you thought, you felt like you shouldn’t be enjoying it as much as you were, it was more important for him to come inside you. “Come on, baby, come for me,” you whispered in his ear, hoping the dirty talk would encourage him.

“Almost there,” he grunted, and as much as you tried not to enjoy it, the way he was drilling into you felt too good. You bit your lip and grasped at the sheets, trying to keep your orgasm down, but he took it as a sign that you were about to come. He reached between you and thumbed your clit, and at that moment your orgasm exploded out of you without warning. He groaned as you clenched around him, finally spilling his seed inside you. You were dizzy, mind hazy from your orgasm, but you were content at the feeling of his cum inside you. He started to pull out, then stopped.

“Oh,” he said, and you looked up at him to see why he was saying that.

“What is it?” you asked.

“It’s leaking out of you,” he pointed down between your legs. You panicked.

“Well you’re not supposed to pull out right away!” you wrung your hands frantically, “push it back in!”

He looked at you incredulously, before looking down at his already softening cock, realizing it was useless at that point. So he just used his fingers, gathering up the cum that had leaked down and pushing it back into your pussy. You bit your lip again, because the more he pushed in, the more aroused you became, surprised that you weren’t oversensitive at this point. He must’ve noticed your reaction because he didn’t stop, pushing in further and further, in and out, faster and faster, until you were coming again, pussy pulsing around his fingers.

You took a deep breath to regulate your breathing, while he pulled his fingers out of you and sat back.

“Are you okay?” he asked, when you still lay there, unmoving.

“Yes,” you responded, staring up at the ceiling.

“Well, I guess I’ll get going,” he said awkwardly, when you didn’t say anything else.

You nodded, still staring up at the ceiling. “Same time tomorrow?”

“Yeah, I’ll be here.” He dressed without saying anything more and left the room.

---

He came over again the next night, and you repeated the same awkward scene from the night before. This continued for a few cycles, with no success, and again you were losing hope.

“Maybe there’s something wrong with me,” you said dejectedly one day. Jaehyun looked over at you, concern etched on his face.

“The doctor said you were fine,” he replied, attempting to soothe you.

“Maybe there’s something wrong with you then,” you huffed, but Jaehyun just shook his head.

“Y/N, they put us through a bunch of tests and said we’re both fine,” he put a hand on your knee to reassure you.

“Then why isn’t it working?” you lamented, on the verge of tears.

“Do you want my opinion?” he asked hesitantly. You looked up at him in surprise.

“Yeah, of course,” you replied, curious as to what he had to say.

“Well, I’ve been reading those links the doctor sent, and it said stress is a big factor,” he stated carefully, “I think you just need to relax, and let it happen.”

You were floored. On the one hand you were touched that he had actually read the links the doctor had sent (you had been too impatient to bother), on the other hand, what exactly did he mean by ‘letting it happen’?

“Let’s do things differently next time, what do you think?” he had a twinkle in his eye that was starting to alarm you.

“What do you have in mind?” you asked suspiciously.

“You’ll see.” He smiled, much too widely for your liking.

---

The next time came around and you were more nervous than you were the first night, and if this was his idea of making it more relaxed he was already failing miserably. When he showed up at your door though, you almost didn’t recognize him. 

Instead of a t-shirt and sweats, he was wearing a crisp white button-down and jeans that sat sexily on his hips. Instead of his hair flat and falling in his face he had it pulled back, with just a few strands falling over his forehead. He also smelled incredible, a musky scent that forever trapped you in his hold, and made you want him in every way he would let you.

He smiled at you, but not in the way a friend smiles at a friend, and when he leaned in to give you a kiss on the cheek you almost passed out from the warmth of his lips and the intoxicating scent emanating from his skin. He walked past you to the bedroom, leaving you standing there with your mouth open and your underwear dampening.

When you finally collected yourself, you went upstairs to hear the bath running. You walked into the bathroom to see him drawing a bath, candles surrounding the tub, flower petals in the water, and the most luscious smelling bath bomb marinating in it.

“Jaehyun, what-” 

“Shh,” he put a finger to your lips, and even that act was so sensual you had to squeeze your legs together, “let me take care of you.” He reached down and turned off the water. “Get undressed and get in the bath, and I’ll come back and help you get relaxed.” He left the room and you did what he said, calling him back in once you were in the bath and the cloudy bubbly water reached the tops of your breasts.

He had such a calm and serene look on his face that it almost threw you off, but then he was taking your puff and squeezing body wash on it.

“May I?” he asked, and when you nodded he gently took your arm and ran the puff along it. He did the same with the other arm, and that simple act, along with the warmth of the bath water, did wonders to soothe you. You felt like you were floating, with the calming scents of the bath bomb, and his gentle touch. He started to run the puff along your neck and you bent your head back and sighed. Soon enough he was dipping below the surface of the water, running the puff between your breasts, and you sighed even deeper as he got lower, past your stomach, and lower still. The puff was forgotten, and now it was just his hand, reaching down between your legs. It all felt so good, you spread your legs even wider, wanting more.

“How does it feel?” he whispered, so close to your ear you shuddered.

“So good,” you couldn’t help but moan, and then his hand was there, cupping your pussy.

“I want to make you feel good, Y/N,” he purred, his voice like honey, “will you let me make you feel good?”

“Yes,” the word came out on a long exhale, as he plunged a finger between your folds, and you couldn’t help but fall apart. He fingered you until you came, water splashing all around you as you writhed in pleasure. When you were done he picked you up out of the bath, not caring that his clothes were getting wet, and carried you to the bed. You couldn’t care that you were probably soaking the bed, because his lips were on your neck, hot and urgent, leaving marks that you’d have trouble concealing the next day.

You pulled at his shirt, wanting it off already, and he obliged, throwing the damp fabric to a corner of the room. You rubbed your hands all over his chest, feeling the firm muscle there, then down to his abs. He groaned against your neck when you undid his belt and slipped your hand over his hardened cock.

“Fuck, Y/N,” he hissed, when you wrapped your hand around it and pumped.

“Don’t come yet,” you whispered, taking your hand away, opting instead to pull the rest of his jeans and boxers off. You wrapped your legs around him, encouraging him to enter you, but he pulled back slightly.

“Slow down,” he breathed, and you could feel him smiling against your neck, “this isn’t a race, Y/N,” he continued kissing down the column of your neck, down to your chest, “relax, and let me make you feel good.”

You finally relented, relaxing as he’d ordered, letting yourself melt into the mattress as he sucked on your skin. Your body was on fire, both from the heat of the bath you just had as well as the way his lips were ruining you. When he got down to your lower stomach you realized where he was headed, and instead of fighting the pleasure you were feeling you simply gave in. As soon as his wet tongue collided with your wet folds you let go, moaning wantonly at the feeling. Every sound you made spurred him on, every jerk and jolt of your body gave him the impetus to push you to the height of pleasure, until you were yanking at his hair and convulsing around his tongue.

“That was fucking hot, Y/N,” he almost growled, wiping at his chin as he moved to hover above you, “I almost came.”

“Don’t,” you panted, trying to catch your breath, “you need to come inside me.”

“You want it? Want my cum inside you, fill you up,” his voice was deep, intense, a tone you’d never heard from him, and certainly words you’d never heard from him, but it certainly was doing the job and making you very aroused.

“Oh god,” you exclaimed, unaware that dirty talk was something you liked. Your previous boyfriends hadn’t been this filthy, but you found you loved it.

“I’m gonna fuck you hard, and you’re gonna take all of my cum,” he continued, voice raspy, breath hot in your ear, “I’m gonna knock you the fuck up, and watch your belly grow with my baby.”

“Jaehyun!” you cried out, losing yourself completely. You grabbed a hold of his neck and pulled him down, and for a split second you saw his eyes grow wide as you smashed your lips against his, your no-kissing rule forgotten. He kissed you with the same passion and intensity that he ate you out with, and you wondered why you had ever put that no-kissing rule into place if he could make you feel like that with his lips. You moaned when his tongue entered your mouth, just as he slid his cock inside you.

This time you didn’t hold back, allowing yourself to feel everything. The way his cock slid in and out of you, the way the tip kept hitting that spot so deep inside you. The way his tongue moved in your mouth, the way his hands rubbed up and down your body, sometimes squeezing your breasts and flicking your nipples. Your hands roamed over his back, feeling his muscles move, and when you felt your orgasm start to build you dragged your nails against his skin.

“Fuck, Y/N, I’m gonna come,” he broke from the kiss to drop his head down to your chest, his thrusts getting harder but more erratic.

“Oh god, do it,” you panted, your orgasm about to burst out of you, “fill me up, baby, I want your cum so bad.”

That was enough to send him over the edge, and he pulled you flush against him as he came inside you, the particularly forceful thrusts triggering your own orgasm and making you clench around him. He let out a loud groan as you milked him, fingernails digging into his back.

When you were both done you held him against you, not wanting to let him go. He obliged, just holding you, his face tucked against your neck. You could feel his hot breath against your skin and that, along with his arms around you and his weight on top of you was all oddly comforting.

“I’m gonna pull out,” he finally said, when he had gone soft inside you. You sighed but nodded, and once he had pulled out you clamped your legs together, trying to keep as much of his cum inside you as you could.

He dressed quietly and you watched him, heart stuttering in your chest, your mind reeling. You had promised him that the sex wouldn’t change anything in your relationship, but you couldn’t believe how wrong you were. You wanted to reach for him, wanted him to stay, but you held back.

“Thanks for that,” you said quietly, and he turned to you and smiled.

“You’re welcome,” he said sincerely, “I’ll do anything for you,” and he brought his hand up and cupped your cheek, his eyes soft as he looked at you, “you’re my best friend.”

You smiled at him, but inside your heart was breaking. How could you ever think you could do this and keep your friendship as it was?

---

A few weeks later you were late, and although you tried not to get your hopes up you couldn’t help but think this was it. You waited to take the pregnancy test, wanting Jaehyun to be there no matter the outcome.

“What is it? What’s wrong? You said it’s an emergency.” He looked so concerned when he came over, and you almost felt bad for not saying what it was about right away.

“I’m late, Jaehyun,” you announced nervously.

“Where do you have to be?”

“No, I mean my period! I haven’t gotten my period yet!”

He paused, the pieces finally falling into place, and his face suddenly lit up. “Oh shit!” He covered his mouth with his hand as he looked at you with wide eyes.

“Come with me, I’m gonna take a pregnancy test.” You led him upstairs where he waited outside the bathroom door while you took the test. You placed the stick on the counter and opened the door to let him in.

“Well? What does it say?” he asked, rubbing his hands in anticipation.

“It’s gonna take a few minutes,” you answered nervously, “I can’t look, tell me what it says.” You turned away, so anxious you thought you would pass out.

“One line, so far,” he stated, and you tried to stay calm but your heart was beating out of your chest.

“Hold my hand,” you reached behind you and he took your hand in his, squeezing to comfort you. He was silent for a while, and you couldn’t take it anymore. “Well? What does it say now?”

“I see…” he started to say, and you so desperately wanted to turn around but you were too scared.

“What?! Just say it!”

He pulled you to him, turning you around and lifting the stick up to your eye level. “Two lines.”

You blinked a few times, wanting to make sure you were seeing it right, but every time you opened your eyes there were two solid lines. You were pregnant.

“Oh my god,” you whispered, both of your hands going up to cover your mouth. Jaehyun whooped in celebration, jumping up and down with glee. You saw the genuine happiness in his face and so many emotions ran through you that the only thing you could do was burst into tears.

“Aw, Y/N, don’t cry!” he laughed, gathering you into his arms, thinking you were just crying from happiness. But it was so much more complicated than that. You were getting what you wanted, a baby, but you hadn’t prepared yourself for all the complications of having a baby with your best friend, who you may have developed feelings for.

---

The first trimester was hell. You were throwing up every morning, and feeling nausea for the rest of the day. You had an aversion to most food, even hating the smell of certain things, like meat. The only things you could keep down were bread and noodles, and you wondered how the baby could grow when that was all that you ate. But at every appointment the doctor reassured you that the baby was doing well and developing at a good rate. Jaehyun insisted on going with you to your first ultrasound and as much as you wanted him to, you also dreaded it.

When the fuzzy form of your baby showed up on the screen for the first time you felt a surge of happiness overcome you, tears springing to your eyes at the sight of the tiny figure on the screen. You heard Jaehyun inhale sharply and turned to look at him. The awe in his face was so endearing it made the tears run down your cheeks, and seeing your reaction he wrapped his arms around you and pulled you in for a hug.

“That’s our baby,” he whispered, his voice almost breaking, and you cried harder.

“Congratulations!” the technician said, patting you both on the shoulder. You felt like you should correct her, tell her that although the baby was technically yours and Jaehyun’s, you weren’t together and wouldn’t be raising the baby as such. But how do you explain that to a complete stranger? You looked over at Jaehyun, who was smiling from ear to ear, shaking the technician’s hand and making no move to explain the situation.

Later, as you were getting ready to leave the clinic, you saw the technician hand over a copy of the ultrasound picture to Jaehyun. He took it happily in his hands, as if it were the most precious thing in the world. As he walked towards you he slipped it into the plastic window spot in his wallet, where your drivers’ license should be, but his now housed a blurry black and white photo of your baby.

“Hey, wanna get something to eat to celebrate?” he asked, slinging an arm around you as you both left the clinic.

You shook your head. As much as you wanted to spend time with him, you found it hurt more than it helped. Once the baby was born you’d have to deal with him being around more often, so it was better to save up your strength for that.

“I’m actually really tired, I just want to go home and rest,” you answered without looking up at him, “besides, I’m still off most foods.”

“Oh, okay, makes sense.” He said, removing his arm from around your shoulder and stuffing his hands in his pockets. He didn’t sound upset or offended, but when you looked at him out of the corner of your eye you saw a flash of emotion cross his face, almost like hurt or disappointment. You felt bad, knowing you had been avoiding him, even giving up your weekly brunches, but you felt it was better this way.

“Listen, I’ll let you know when the next ultrasound is, okay? You can come with me again.” You wanted just to wipe the look of disappointment off his face, and luckily it worked.

“Yeah, that would be great! Thanks so much, Y/N,” he leaned down and hugged you, and it was the closest he’d been to you since the last time you’d had sex to make the baby. You held him close, committing the feel of him and the scent of him to memory, before you pulled away and walked towards your car.

---

If the first trimester had been hell, the second trimester was heaven. Miraculously the nausea disappeared, and you found yourself actually craving food. You felt more energized and less tired, and slept so much better. Your belly was starting to grow, and you actually had to start shopping for maternity clothes. Your mood was so much better, but what really came back with a vengeance was your libido. During the first trimester you couldn’t even think about sex, but now, it was all you could think about.

Usually your vibrator would do the trick, but there were always moments where you’d think about Jaehyun, think about how good he could make you feel. Sometimes just thinking about him fucking you was enough to get you off, but when you really thought about him, about the feeling of his cock parting your folds, or the feeling of his strong hips pounding into you, his face sweaty and his scent overpowering the air between you, nothing was better than the real thing.

Which is how you found yourself one night, holding your phone and dialing his number without hesitation.

“Hey, what’s up,” he answered, his voice sounding distant. You realized you hadn’t spoken to or seen him in weeks, and instantly you felt terrible.

“Um, actually nothing. I’m sorry if I woke you.”

“You didn’t wake me,” you could hear him shuffling around, like he had been lying down and started to sit up, “is something wrong, Y/N?”

He always saw right through you, you could hear the concern is his voice, and there was no turning back now.

“Could you come over? I think I need some… company.” You didn’t know if you could just ask for sex over the phone, and was it really only sex that you wanted? Or did you just want him there, with you.

“Yeah, yeah, sure, I can come over,” you heard more shuffling, like he was getting dressed, “are you sure you’re alright?”

“I’ll be better when you’re here.” You answered truthfully.

When he showed up at your door you couldn’t stop yourself from pulling him towards you and hugging him tightly. He didn’t protest, just held you and rubbed your back gently.

“What’s wrong, Y/N?” he asked softly against your hair.

“I miss you,” you admitted, voice muffled against his chest because you were too ashamed to look at him.

“I’m around, you know,” he chuckled, “you’re the one who cancelled our brunches.”

You pulled back and forced yourself to make eye contact with him. “No, Jaehyun, I miss you.” You touched his chest when you said it, giving him a look laden with meaning. He understood right away, his eyebrows rising slightly. You took him by the hand and pulled him inside, leading him upstairs and to your bedroom. He let himself be led, but once you were behind closed doors he suddenly took you into his arms and kissed you. The kiss wasn’t subtle, or gentle, it was intense and forceful, his intent surely to rile you up. It definitely worked, because you could feel wetness pooling in your panties as he stuck his tongue down your throat.

“You want my cock again,” he growled, breaking from the kiss to suck a line down your throat. You gasped at his aggressiveness, but you had to admit it really turned you on.

“Yes,” you breathed out, as he stripped you of your clothes and pushed you towards the bed. You fumbled at his clothes, trying to get them off but you found your limbs were weak from the way he was handling you. He took over, stripping off the rest of his clothes, his cock springing forward when he pulled his boxers down. You admired it for only a second before he turned you around, pushing you onto your hands and knees on the bed.

“You like my cock, don’t you, you like me fucking into your little pussy,” he spoke so low, his chest flush against your back so you could feel the reverberation of his voice.

You didn’t have a chance to answer, because he rammed his cock into you, a scream tearing from your throat as he went as deep as he could.

“Fuck, you’re so tight,” he groaned, his hands gripping your hips as he started to pound into you. You weren’t sure how pregnant sex would feel, since so many things were changing in your body, but you weren’t prepared for what you got. It felt like your entire body was on fire, pleasure coursing through every part of you. He hit places inside you that you’d never felt before, and all of it was like nothing you’d ever experienced.

“Jae,” you panted, “Jae, oh my god!” your orgasm was coming on, super fast and beyond your control.

“You’re gonna come already, baby? Alright, come on, come all over my cock,” he reached down, and although it was a little awkward because of your belly, he managed to get to your clit and rub it with the pad of his thumb.

Your vision went white when your orgasm hit, your fingers and toes going numb as your pussy clenched around his cock. You could barely hold yourself up, your upper body falling to the bed as you convulsed around him. He kept going, fucking you through it, and when you stilled he pulled out and lay you on your back. He gave you a moment to catch your breath, before he entered you again. You cried out at the oversensitivity, but he went slowly, and soon enough you started to feel pleasure again.

“I can keep going,” he said, as he fucked into you at a slow but deliberate pace, “you want more, don’t you?”

You nodded vigorously, already feeling another orgasm building. He propped himself up then, and pounded into you, the bed shaking from his harsh thrusts. You gripped and pulled at the sheets, unable to contain the needy whines and moans coming up out of your mouth. You forced your eyes open to see him hovering over you, a look of intense concentration on his face, his brow sweaty, hair falling into his eyes. When he saw you looking at him his concentration faltered, and he bent his head down for a kiss. You were expecting a kiss to match the intensity with which he was fucking you, but instead it was soft, gentle, lingering. You felt something in it, something above and beyond what he was doing to you, something that carried you where you most wanted to be but didn’t dare go. The orgasm you had then was different, not just purely physical, not just filled with lust, but something more elevated, more emotional.

He broke the kiss to grunt loudly as he came, spilling more of his seed inside you. When he was done he pulled out, and sat at the edge of the bed.

“Y/N,” he said, and you don’t know why he sounded so defeated. You sat up, preparing yourself for what he was going to say.

“Jaehyun,” you reached for him but thought better of it, your hand dropping into your lap.

“I can’t keep doing this with you,” he said, his voice quiet but determined, “it’s fucking me up and I don’t know what to do with myself.”

Your heart sank. He was pulling out of your life, and it was all your fault for doing this to him. “I’m so sorry, Jaehyun.”

He got dressed hurriedly, without looking back at you, and before he opened the door to leave he turned back.

“You need to decide for yourself what you want me to be,” he still didn’t look at you, opting to look at the floor instead, “I’ll always be here for you, but I need to know where I stand.”

The door closing behind him echoed in the room, the absence of him already settling into your heart.

---

You went through the rest of the second trimester on your own, too ashamed and heartbroken to see Jaehyun, and too confused to sort out your feelings. He’d text you once in a while to ask you how you were doing, how you were feeling, but there was no talk beyond the pregnancy. He didn’t come to any more of your doctor’s appointments, nor did you ever invite him to any more in the first place. The third trimester hit even worse than the first, your belly was now so big it was almost uncomfortable to do anything, you now had constant heartburn, and you were going to the bathroom every ten minutes because of the weight on your bladder.

About a month before your due date, you were making dinner in the kitchen when you felt an uncomfortable tightening in your abdomen. You clutched your stomach, gripping the counter in alarm and wondering what you should do. The feeling came and went, but returned after a few minutes. Concerned, you called your doctor, who advised you to come in to the hospital just to get checked out. As you were getting ready you got a text from Jaehyun, asking how you were doing.

Jaehyun: hey just doing my check-in

JH: how is it going today

Me: well it’s probably nothing but

Me: just going to the hospital to get checked out

JH: wait what

JH: let me take you

Me: i should be ok

JH: Y/N pls let me take you

Me: ok

JH: thank you i’ll be right there

You sighed, wishing you had never told him and made him worry. Luckily you didn’t have to wait long since he lived nearby, and soon enough he was pulling up to your house. You didn’t bother to wait for him to come to the door, coming out as soon as you saw his car. You were locking the front door when the uncomfortable feeling came back, making you double over, clutching your stomach.

“Y/N!” you heard Jaehyun yell behind you, and soon enough his arms were cradling you as you crouched over. “What happened? What’s going on?”

His voice sounded frantic, terrified, and when you looked up in his eyes he looked so scared that it made your chest ache.

You smiled weakly, trying to placate him, “Don’t worry, it’s probably just false labor,” you patted him on the arm and soon enough the feeling went away. “My doctor just wants me to come in and get checked out, just in case.”

He nodded, but didn’t look reassured at all, creases of worry still lining his face. He also didn’t let you go, holding onto your arm as you walked to the car. At the hospital he didn’t leave your side, until the doctor came to do your examination.

“I’ll wait outside,” he said hesitantly, but you could tell he didn’t want to leave at all, eyes looking longingly back at you as he left the room.

After the doctor examined you and reassured you that it really was just false labor, you were cleared to leave and found Jaehyun in the hall, pacing. Once he saw you he ran up to you, searching your face with frantic eyes.

“Well? What happened?” he’d taken your hands in his, and his palms felt cold and clammy.

“It was nothing, just false labor, the doctor told me to go home and rest.” You reassured him, squeezing his hands and smiling softly at him. He let out a long breath, collapsing into a nearby chair.

“Oh my god, Y/N, I almost died!” he passed the back of his hand over his eyes dramatically, and you suppressed a giggle at his overdramatic show.

“Don’t laugh!” he sat up and looked at you incredulously, “I lost ten years of my life just now!”

“I’m sorry, I’m really sorry,” you pressed your lips together trying not to smile. He broke into a wide grin then, pleased with himself that he had managed to lighten your mood with his sense of humor.

“Come on, let’s get you home.”

---

The drive from the hospital had been quiet, both of you realizing that there was still this huge wall between you, and neither of you were brave enough to breach it. He walked you to your door in continued silence, and once you reached your doorstep he turned around to walk back to his car.

“Jaehyun,” you called, unable to stand it anymore, “do you wanna come in and talk?”

He turned around, a mixture of hope, fear, and resignation on his face, and nodded.

The time apart had made you realize how much you missed him, and seeing him again had made you realize how much you still wanted him to be a part of your life. You were hoping to salvage something of your relationship, but you were fully aware that you could never go back to what it had been.

You sat him down on the sofa and took a deep breath.

“Jaehyun,” you began, getting more and more nervous as you went on, “I know I made things weird, even though I promised I wouldn’t,” he opened his mouth to say something but you stopped him, determined to get out what you wanted to say. “I was so focused on having a baby that I didn’t think about what involving you would mean, and what it would do to our friendship. I think I was just naive, I didn’t think anything would change, and I was so wrong.”

He sat across from you, and even though he was just inches away it felt like he was miles away, like an unfathomable chasm had opened up between you. Then he looked up at you, hesitant, but determined.

“Y/N, we can’t go back and change things anymore. What’s happened has happened.” He tilted his head to regard you, taking a deep breath before moving on, “so I just need to know one thing.”

“What is it?”

“Do you want me to be a part of your life?”

“Yes. Always.” You answered truthfully, without a doubt in your mind. He smiled, but there was still something behind his eyes.

“Hey, do you remember that pact we made in eighth grade?” He suddenly asked, his eyes twinkling.

“The marriage one?” you scanned your eighth grade memories and that was the only pact you could think of.

“Yeah, the one where we said if neither of us are married by the time we’re thirty, we’ll marry each other?”

“Yes, I remember.” It was during PE class, when you and Jaehyun were sitting in the field while everyone else was running around chasing soccer balls. You don’t remember how the subject came up, but soon enough you were doing pinky swears and Jaehyun was fashioning rings out of blades of grass for you and him to wear. You both had a good laugh over it, and never thought about it again until this moment.

“So what if we didn’t wait?”

“What do you mean?”

“What if we didn’t wait until we’re thirty, what if we just did it now? I mean, we’re having a baby together already.”

“Jaehyun, are you proposing right now?” you said it as a joke, even chuckling to yourself, you weren’t taking the whole thing seriously at all, except Jaehyun wasn’t laughing.

“I mean, I don’t have a ring, but…” he looked around the room, and seeing your spider plant on a nearby table he picked a leaf off and rolled it around itself, making a ring out of it, and slipped it on your finger. You were speechless.

“Jaehyun, you’re serious.” You managed to say after the thoughts stopped running through your brain. You hadn’t really thought about marriage, none of the guys you’d dated had ever made you think about it. You knew you wanted kids, but marriage was something you figured you couldn’t achieve, never having found the right guy. Yet here he was all along, Jeong Jaehyun,  your best friend, someone who knew you inside and out. A dawning realization hit you then, that maybe none of your relationships ever worked out because you kept comparing them to Jaehyun, and no one ever held up. You were in love with your best friend, and you didn’t even know it.

“Well?” he asked, with raised eyebrows and hopeful eyes. You stared at the leaf ring on your finger, turning it around and around, your heart and mind finally finding peace in your realization. You looked up at him, cupping his face, and he looked like he was bracing himself for a possibly negative response.

“Yes.” You answered, smiling brightly at him, and it took him a moment to realize you weren’t turning him down. His face broke out into a wide grin, his dimples as deep as ever, his eyes shiny. He pulled you in for a hug, but your belly made it somewhat awkward.

“Oh my god, Y/N, you’re huge!” he looked down at your belly in awe.

“Jaehyun what the fuck!” you smacked him on the arm, slightly offended.

“No, I meant I was too busy being worried about you that I never noticed how big your belly had gotten.” He reached out his hand tentatively. “Can I touch?”

“Of course,” you said, happy that you could share this with him. You took his hand and placed it on your belly.

“Can you feel the baby move?” He asked, eyes growing wide when his hand landed on your stomach.

“Sometimes, mostly when I’m lying still though.” You let him rub his hand over your stomach, endeared at how awestruck he was, his mouth forming a little ‘o’ as he moved his hand around. He suddenly leaned forward, his face getting very close to your belly.

“Hey little one,” he called softly, and your heart clenched at the sight of him talking to the baby in your belly, “I’m your dad.”

Suddenly you felt a jolt in your ribs, as the baby stretched and kicked inside you.

“Oh my god, Y/N! Did you feel that?” Jaehyun clapped excitedly.

“Damn right I felt it,” you groaned, patting your stomach, “keep it down in there, kicking mama in the ribs really hurts!”

Jaehyun burst out laughing, gathering you in his arms and hugging you tightly. “That was adorable!” he exclaimed, and your heart felt warm as you wrapped your arms around him.

---

You decided to just do a small backyard ceremony for your wedding, neither of you fond of big parties that meant even bigger expenses. Jaehyun moved into your house since he had been rooming with a friend, and once all of his things had been moved in and installed, you were left alone with each other once again.

You don’t know why, but your first night as a married couple felt like the first night you’d had sex, awkward as hell. Once again you stood on either side of the bed, unsure as to what to do.

“Bed?” he finally asked after you’d both stood there for too long.

“Bed,” you answered, and you both got in at the same time. You couldn’t help but laugh at your awkwardness, and that certainly broke the tension. You turned to your side, the only way you could get comfortable with how big your belly was, and he slotted his body behind you, wrapping an arm around you and resting his hand on your belly. You sighed contentedly, loving the feeling of being in his arms.

“This is nice,” he whispered, but his breath against your ear made you shiver, and suddenly contentment wasn’t the only thing you were feeling. Not to mention his hand that was on your belly had moved to your hip, fingers tracing wide circles over the fabric of your sleep shorts.

“Jaehyun,” you didn’t mean to, but his name came out in a moan, and his hand stopped its circuit, the faintest bit of pressure being applied to your hip.

“Y/N?” he questioned, but you were taking his hand and moving it up to your breasts. Once he cupped them you moaned again. “Holy shit, Y/N, your boobs are huge!”

“Jaehyun!” you reprimanded him, but he apologized quickly.

“Sorry, sorry, I just-” he cupped and squeezed, feeling the weight of them, “wow,” was all he could say.

“Well they won’t be this big for too long, so you better take advantage of them now,” you encouraged, and he did, tweaking your nipples until you were moaning into your pillow.

“Tell me if I do anything that hurts, or makes you feel uncomfortable, okay?” he whispered into your ear, before he started to plant wet kisses along your neck and shoulder. Your mind went hazy at the feeling of his lips on your skin, and soon he slipped a hand down, past the waistband of your shorts.

You inhaled sharply when his fingers found you wet, when he gathered some of your arousal to rub it around your clit. You moaned loudly when he made circles around your bud, pressing your face further into your pillow.

“Don’t do that, baby, I wanna hear you,” he pulled the covers off and pushed your pillow away, helping you take off your shirt and the rest of your clothes so you were fully exposed to him. He looked at you, lust and hunger clouding his eyes. “Fuck, you look so gorgeous knocked up with my baby.”

Your pussy clenched at his words and you pulled at his own clothes to get him to take them off. “Come here and fuck me, husband.”

Your words ignited something in him, and he bent down, throwing one of your legs over his shoulder and pushing into you. You cried out, not caring anymore how loud you were being, the feeling of his cock inside you throwing you into the heights of pleasure. Once you started though, you couldn’t stop, moans and whimpers and whines tumbling out of your lips as he pumped his cock inside you.

“You like it, don’t you?” he growled, “you like my cock so much you let me knock you up.”

You moaned even louder at his words, your orgasm starting to build in the pit of your stomach. “Yes, god, yes!”

“You want my cum, baby? Look at where it got you, huh? You let me come inside you and now you’re knocked up.” His voice was raspy, deep, and it cut right to your core.

“Fuck, Jaehyun! I’m gonna come!” you warned him, grasping at the sheets as your orgasm hit you, your pussy pulsing around his cock. It didn’t take much longer for him to come, one last thrust that took your breath away, and he spilled his seed into you.

“Are you okay?” he asked, brushing aside a strand of hair that had fallen into your face, “did it hurt at all?”

“No, not at all, it felt good,” you smiled at him, wanting to alleviate his concern. He looked relieved, before he bent down and kissed the swell of your stomach.

“Sorry, baby,” he said sheepishly, addressing the baby, and you could only laugh, rubbing a hand through his hair as he smiled up at you.

---

The next day Jaehyun had left for work, and you were almost out the door yourself when you felt something gush between your legs. You figured you knew what it was and, resolved to stay calm, you quickly called Jaehyun.

“Babe, what is it?” he answered on the first ring.

“I think my water broke.” 

“Okay, stay calm, I’m on my way back.”

It didn’t take long for him to come back since he’d just left, and you drove to the hospital all the while holding tightly to his hand. The contractions started then, not too bad at first but as time went on the pain was hard to bear. By the time you reached the hospital you were grimacing in pain and Jaehyun was yelling for someone to come and help you.

You labored for hours, Jaehyun never leaving your side, giving you strength even when you felt like you had no more to give. You wondered how you could have ever done this without him, without his unwavering support, his cheerful but calm demeanor raising you up when you felt like giving in. Soon enough you had a healthy baby in your hands, a boy that an ecstatic Jaehyun had already dubbed his ‘mini me’.

---

If you had known what the first few weeks with a newborn would have been like you would have seriously rethought having a baby in the first place. You were exhausted more than you had ever been in your life, catching sleep for only those precious moments when the baby would sleep. Your breasts were sore from breastfeeding, and if you never saw another poopy diaper in your life it would be too soon. What made it all worth it, was the look of pure innocence in your baby’s eyes, and the way your husband would stare at him like he was the most precious person in the world.

One night you were woken again by the baby’s cries, and trudging to his room you were surprised to see Jaehyun already there.

“Sorry to wake you,” he whispered, “I was changing him and he lost his binky.” You stood in the doorway and watched as your husband expertly handled your son, swaddling him in his blankets and making sure the pacifier was situated in his mouth. “Go back to bed, I got this.”

Jaehyun had done many things during your time together that you considered sexy, but this was probably the sexiest thing he had ever done. You walked back to your bedroom, mentally reminding yourself to reward him when you were more awake.

You lay in bed though, unable to fall back asleep. Your mind was racing, anxieties resurfacing at that dark and quiet time of night. Jaehyun eventually came back, sliding into the bed and spooning you, his arm coming to wrap around your waist.

“Jae?” you whispered, hoping he hadn’t fallen back asleep right away.

“Hm? I thought you were asleep.” He sounded tired, tightening his arm around you.

“Is this the life you wanted?” you asked him, rubbing his arm that was wrapped around you.

“Absolutely.” He answered, without hesitation.

“No, I’m serious.”

“So am I. Why wouldn’t you think I was being serious?” he suddenly propped himself up on his elbow so he could see your face.

“Because you had a life before this, and now it’s just-” you waved your hand in the air, “me and the baby.”

“Just you and the baby? Y/N, you and Yuno are the most important things in my life right now.” He pressed a soft kiss to your cheek. “Yeah I had Friday night drinks and Sunday basketball games, and that was fun and all, but you two are my family now.”

“Don’t you miss it?”

“If I did I’d just go and do it? So no, I don’t miss it right now. Maybe eventually? But that doesn’t mean I’d love you and Yuno less.”

It wasn’t the first time he’d told you he loved you, but you knew you’d never get tired of hearing it. You’d been surprised when he’d told you he’d been in love with you for a while, not daring to say anything about it for fear of ruining your friendship. When you’d told him that you wanted to have a baby he knew that there was no one else in the world that he wanted to bear his children except you, and he was relieved when you accepted his offer of being a sperm donor. He had been prepared to be just that, but the sex threw everything into chaos, including his feelings for you and his resolve to keep your relationship as just friends. He felt himself falling even deeper for you, but his heart couldn’t handle the push and pull he was feeling from you. He never wanted to pull out of your life, and he spent more time staring at his phone waiting for you to call or text than he dared to admit. Bringing up the marriage pact had been a gamble, and he was terrified that you’d say no, but when you said yes, he could barely contain his happiness.

“Listen,” he said, taking your hand in his, “this life is more than I could have ever asked for.”

“Really?” you asked, turning to look at him, “With me?”

“Baby, it’s always been you.”

[woahajimes]

the batfamily is stupid as hell and they're self isolating because SOMEBODY got covid (steph) and then SOMEBODY (cass-- who also has covid bc uh stephcass) sneezed on tim who drank from jason's cup without knowing it was jason's cup and anyways everyone in the manor got covid so ✨self isolation for 2 weeks✨

ANYHOW they were all bored out of their minds and jason was about to throw damian out the window bc siblings right

SO BASICALLY cass came up with the big brain idea of a competition (prize being complete immunization of sibling interaction UNLESS they ask for it-- eg. "hey can you open this for me")

teams were made (just two people per team-- duke/damian, jason/cass, steph/harper, dick/tim)

there were "rounds" and these consisted of

round 1: person a has to feed person b a whole jar of peanut butter and they could switch places ONCE (team to finish last was disqualified)

round 2: they had to recreate this picture and had ten minutes to do so, at the end every team compared pictures and alfred decided whose was the worst and that team was out

round 3: they had to run five laps around the manor with their team member on their back, first person to get through the finish line (for the fifth time, there was a picture taken each time they crossed it) won.

simple, right?

WELL NO

first round basically went like this:

jason: NO FUCK YOU AND YOUR STUPID PEANUT BUTTER cass: jason: okay okay ill go first

tim went first, harper went first, and duke went first (duke didn't want to go first but he lost to rock paper scissors so)

tim puked in the first two minutes but alfred had forgotten to clarify that if you puke you're out so basically he kept eating

cass and jason were the first ones to switch

dick and tim switched immediately after (they were waiting for someone else to switch)

steph and harper fucking DIED

"im never eating peanut butter after this"

"by GOD EAT FASTER ITS NOT EVEN A SOLID"

"CAN YOU NOT SHOVE THAT SPOON DOWN MY THROAT"

"IM NOT GOING TO LOSE IN THE FIRST ROUND FUCK YOU"

duke and damian finished first and when ppl asked how (they're the youngest ones, people were sure they couldn't handle it) damian was like "i simply moved all my internal organs to the side" and duke was like "tf you literally ate two spoons and a half"

STEPH AND HARPER LOST and tim laughed (his team got to the next round by literally a second) so harper and steph both threw him the containers and spoons

second round:

tim thought he had a big brain for calling dibs on being on the pool mat but nOOO (duke was on the pool mat, damian was the lightest so yeah--- jason was on the pool mat solely because cass called dibs on jumping and crushing him-- imagine all the chaos)

literally they(jason/cass) took 14 pictures total and all of them were fucked up because of jason (his hands weren’t in the right place, both his legs were picked up)

duke and damian couldn’t do it skjdfhskfh they were D Y I N G (every two minutes you heard a really loud scream/groan with a sudden splat and yeah)

steph and harper had never laughed harder

cass was so done with jason she literally shoved him off the pool mat

tim was literally dead they had taken the shot around 20 times and none of them looked good it was horrible (dick didnt even apologize for crushing tim 90934757894 times -- not every shot was decent so they deleted around 40)

when the timer went off, alfred carefully took all the phones (jason’s phone was somehow at the bottom of the pool and jason was tired(tm) so he asked cass to get the phone pls and cass just got in the pool and shoved the pool mat over (and then got out)

after around 20 minutes of alfred going through the pictures, he decided that the best ones were dick and tim’s (how i have zero idea but)

and then the worst ones were duke and damian’s (so jason and cass made it to the third round)

cass asked alfred why theirs weren’t the best, and alfred said “well master jason’s arm looks very off and he looks genuinely scared” and cass was like “GODDAMNIT JASON” and lost her shit 

LAST ROUND: 

so they did think this through and basically cass on jason’s back and tim on dick’s back

jason: HA! YOU’RE NOT FASTER THAN I AM! dick: i don’t need to be??? you’ve got CASS on your back. you know what that means? jason: .... you wouldn’t.. tim, on dick’s back: *snorts* YEAH OKAY

cass: what are they talking about?  jason: NO NOTHING jason: you might want earbuds or something to like... block the sounds... they’re gonna be wanting to distract you cass: yeah well. I’m not distracted easily

the timer goes off, tim on dick’s back, and they’re pretty even for the first two laps, but then tim’s shoe falls off and tim’s like “WAIT MY SHOE” and dick goes “WHAT THE FUCK” 

and tim is like “whoa youre right KEEP RUNNING” 

cass on jason’s back: HEY STEPH CAN YOU PASS ME THE PRETZELS

update: cass does get pretzels and gives jason a few  jason: CASS THATS MY NOSE cass: OH OOPS LOL

dick: tim i think its time to pull out our secret weapon tim: yeah you’re right tim: tim: HEY CASS *starts humming to ‘levitating’ by dua lipa* tim: 🎶 if you wanna run away with me-  🎶

jason: NO  jason: NOOO CASS COVER YOUR EARS DONT LISTEN TO THEM cass:  🎶 IF YOU WANNA RUN AWAY WITH ME I KNOW A GALAXY WHERE I COULD TAKE YOU FOR A RIDE  🎶

(you may ask how this distracts jason but it just DOES)

dick takes this as a head start and runs faster (theyre on their third lap now- both)

tim gets a bit too excited and leans too much and makes them both fall over (they were abt half a lap ahead)

tim: GET UP GET UP dick: THIS IS YOUR FAULT TF YOU MEAN 

cass:  🎶 YOU WANT ME  🎶 jason:  🎶 I WANT YOU BABY  🎶  *runs past them*  dick: HOW jason: JUST DONT FIGHT IT 

karma’s a bitch (and dick paid steph) and jason slipped, causing them to fall almost the exact way that tim and dick fell

dick and tim have now caught up to them, as jason and cass pick themselves up

jason: we should switch cass: yeah alright do you want me to momentarily kill you so we can distract the others and then you wake up and we run jason: ...no cass:  jason: ... maybe

*two seconds later*

cass: HE’S DEAD! MY POOR BROTHER HE’S DEAD! steph: YEAH WE KNOW YOU MOMENTARILY KILLED HIM GET UP cass: ok jason lets go stand up 

they keep going and dick stops for a second (theyre ahead)  dick: hey its your turn now tim:  dick: yeah i know you cant cmon climb on

COMEPLETE HEADCANON jason and cass won anyways thank you for coming to my ted talk

[saethepaperclip]

OM! bros on a plane p2

-lol guess who got addicted to jujutsu kaisen, anyway i might start posting some jjk content along obey me content-

Satan- The most chill of the brothers. He's read about airplanes enough to know exactly how they work and not be too worried. He was honestly pretty exited to see the process irl tho. Got irritated when people on the plane and in the airport wouldn't shut up so he could read (sensory overload go brrr). He was pretty tense during landing but that was about it. Threw a temper tantrum when he couldn't find his luggage at baggage claim.

8/10- landing was a bit rough but he likes flying

Asmodeus- He was super exited. Purposely left metal in his pockets to set off the metal detector and have to get pat down. Spent the whole flight flirting with everyone within at 15 foot radius of him, which was everyone. Watching the scenery outside the window shut him up for the majority of the flight, as he was excitedly talking to you about the view, or taking Instagram pictures. His hand was of course on your thigh the whole flight too. Getting baggage wasn't hard either as he had taken the liberty of decorating them beforehand.

81/2 /10 only because rushing to catch flights i hard while wearing stilettos and airport lighting washes him out

Beelzebub- He doesn't mind flying but the problem is food for him. Since you can't bring food through security you have to buy snacks overpriced at the gate which sucks. He tried to eat a lot before but was still hungry the whole time. You guys had to bring a whole carry on packed with food, it was all gone not even 30 min in tho. Beel almost ate the flight attendant when she only gave him one bag of pretzels.

3/10 not enough food and he can fly on his own so whats the point

Belphegor- The easiest but also hardest to fly with. Easy because he all he brings is a blanket and 1 extra outfit. His carry on is his pillow, and he keeps things like his DDD, charger, and money in his pocket so going through security with him is a breeze. He also would sleep through most of the flight so you wouldn't have to worry about him freaking out like some of his older siblings. He's also the hardest to fly with because of multiple reasons. He didn't want to walk through the airport to the gate so you kinda just have to drape him over you suitcase and drag him along which got a lot of strange looks. His ears pop really badly in high altitudes so he was not having fun despite chewing gum the whole time, and it was hard to fall asleep which made him cranky. He doesn't care how many strangers he will make uncomfortable to find a good sleeping position. You look across the aisle to see him draped across the poor guy sitting next to him. This is also a problem cause he has gotten felt up by the woman he was leaning on once, and another time the guy cuddled with him, so please try to get seats next to each other. He's basically the equivalent of the guy who was sitting behind me on the flight i was writing this on. The dude fell asleep with his head between my armrest and the wall so i have to lean forward to write so i don't bother him. He's about my age and pretty cute so it was sorta comforting. When we were landing we both leaned again my headrest to look out the window too. He was leaning forward and I was leaning back on either side of the headrest to look out the window.

-that's it bye-

[deniigi]

@puffins-studio is my Selkie Verse enabler.

We were chatting about where Mike would fit in the Selkie Verse and then this AU of an AU happened lol

Title: twin hearts twin coats

Summary: Mike’s an unruly little seal who wants nothing more than to give Jack high blood pressure and he is on a crusade not to make a single friend in Ireland. Unless they’re Matty’s friends. In which case, he needs to steal them.

Context: Matt and Mike are born as rare twin seal pups. This bit assumes that Mike was there for all of Whispering Seas but then fades out of view for a bit as he does his own thing until Matt gets his coat back.

-------

For as long as the two been walking, Jack had been missing a twin.

Usually, it was Mike.

Usually, Mike was trying to sink his sharp little teeth into something he knew Dad did not want him too.

Usually, whatever he was trying to swallow whole would result in a call to poison control and Jack would be on the line for half an hour, reading through ingredients with a patient but stern woman while Mike beamed up at him, proud of his latest accomplishments.

After Matt’s year of hell with foster care, however, Mike had been traumatized. And had taken to keeping Matt within sight at all times.

You would have thought that that would have prevented Mike from being the missing twin these days.

But no.

No, now Jack wasn’t missing one twin.

He was missing two.

Constantly.

Both of his children were un-findable at practically all times.

Grace did not have these problem with the boys. Grace simply made a sound in her throat that Mike called back to immediately, regardless of where he was.

Jack did not have this power.

Over Mike, anyways. Jack had more power over Matty because Matty had a deep-ingrained instinct to only want Daddy when he was upset. But that shit didn’t exactly have range, now did it?

Grace told him he should simply learn how to make the throat-noise, which was easy for her to say: as if Jack could make seal noises.

Jack could barely speak a form of English that folks around here understood. He wasn’t makin’ any damn seal noises. He’d just figure out how to find his kids, thanks.

He was good at it, anyways.

His boys were eight.

They were on the way to being geniuses and criminal masterminds, but they were not there yet, so Jack had a good 76% chance of finding them in the first place he looked.

The bathtub.

He always looked in the bathtub. And, like he said, 76% of the time, there they were. Both of them. Looking guilty as hell—big liquid seal eyes or not.

Matty usually got quiet and scared of punishment around then and would make sad tiny seal noises at Jack and let himself be hauled out of the water and rubbed down with a towel.

Matty was the good twin.

The extremely traumatized twin. Jack didn’t like to think too much about how compliant he became in the face of a stern tone. It was enough that he was home again and that he was healing. Slowly. Very shyly.

It was enough. Matty was allowed to be a little fragile.

Now Michael had no shame and, true to character over the last eight years, refused to feel anything about his disobedience but ‘caught.’

Jack loved Mikey, the little shit, with his whole heart, but that big smile and those baby blues did not work on him anymore.

Up you go, monster-child. And into towel-hell—yeah, yeah, whine all you want. Look how nicely your brother did it.

As soon as towel-hell was over, Mike went tearing out of the bathroom, turning back only to hiss at Jack and then run into the door. Jack watched him vanish out of sight and then sighed. Matty pawed at his side, making those little throat-sounds.

“You’re okay, baby,” Jack said. “No one’s in trouble.”

Matt clung to him and hid his face in Jack’s belly.

Really, he was the one who should have been trouble. He was the one who Jack should have been chasing after to grab the hand of—to be keeping a constant vigilance over to prevent him from falling off cliffs and getting too far out into the surf.

But no.

That would be Mike.

That would always be Mike.

A pot banged and clattered in the kitchen.

Matt covered his ears and made even more urgent sad chirps.

Jack sighed harder.

“Come on, let’s go make lunch before your brother destroys the whole lighthouse,” he said.

 ----

 Matty had Foggy and thank fuck he had Foggy because that gave Jack time to go pry Michael out of whatever deathtrap he threw himself into after school.

Jack didn’t understand what this kid wanted from all the dark places he crawled into.

Was it adventure?

Was it the bugs?

Was he trying to fish?

Mike was more seal-like than Matt. Grace noted this with approval. He jumped into the water and swam deep and ate fish whole and let Mags groom him with minimal fuss while Matt wailed and whined like all those things were a death sentence.

He was simply more human, Grace said. The seal behavior didn’t come as naturally to him, so he was resistant.

Jack thought it was more like Matty had enough sense in him to not want to be suffocated by pelts and people prodding and prodding and dragging his fuzzy little coat this way and that.

Matty was a sensible child.

Foggy was slightly less sensible, but he had the right spirit. He was a good friend for Matty.

Mikey refused to make friends.

“They’re boring and human,” he told Jack. “I want a friend with more style.”

Mikey was a New Yorker through and fuckin’ through and he talked like a fuckin’ Newsie no matter how hard Jack tried to get him to imitate his mama’s cadence.

That accent would serve him no decent purpose when he was older, whereas something more Irish would at least make him come off as friendly. Jack knew—boy, Jack knew.

“Why don’t you try making friends with Foggy, too?” Jack offered, once the Trouble Twin had been dumped in the boat. Mike popped up and immediately tried to jump ship. Jack pushed the boat further away from the dock with his foot and got a face of pure betrayal.

“I don’t want a friend like him,” Mike snapped. “He’s gooey. I ain’t got time for some fruit snack.”

For fuck’s sake, child.

“Just because Foggy doesn’t wanna steal footballs with you, doesn’t mean he’s not a good friend,” Jack said. “He don’t like the church, Mikey. It’s not you, it’s the church, son. I told you this a thousand times.”

“If he’s scared of the church, he’s gonna be scared of shenanigans, Dad,” Mike said. “I live for shenanigans. No, we just ain’t compatible, Father.”

For.

Fuck’s.

Sake.

Jack wasn’t letting this one watch any more tv. No more Guys & Dolls. It was bad for everyone.

“Michael,” Jack said.

“Jonathan,” Mike shot back, haughty as hell with his arms crossed and back straight as a board.

“Son, you need to make friends,” Jack said.

“I got loads of friends at home,” Mike said. “And we’ll be home in no time. I don’t need any more ‘til then.”

Mike hated Ireland.

Jack could not understand this.

There were rocks to climb and there was sand to dig in, there were clams to bang against each other, bricks to throw, a local witch to antagonize—this was Mikey paradise. Or it should have been.

But no.

Mike had learned the word ‘cosmopolitan’ and, even though he thought it meant ‘good enough to be in a magazine,’ he’d declared Ireland not that and had set out on a crusade against being happy with it.

Grace said he was too much of a city boy was all. She said that he’d realize after some time that he was lonely and he’d do what he’d always do, which was charm half the girls at his school and become a popular kid within days.

It had been months now, though, and Mikey was still refusing to budge.

It was exhausting.

“Boy, you’re givin’ me heartburn,” Jack told him.

“Well, you’re givin’ me Lupus,” Mike said.

God.

No more House either.

 ---

 Matty came home around four thirty, which Jack could tell made Mike green with jealousy. Mike wanted to stay out like him, but he didn’t want to be associated with Foggy or his sister.

They weren’t cool enough, apparently. Or tough enough.

Jack didn’t know what that meant. Foggy had helped them relocate Mike’s brother. That was plenty bad-ass to Jack, but what the fuck did he know about kids?

Clearly nothing, since Mike had outsmarted him again and somehow managed to watch a whole three Emergency Vets reruns while he wasn’t looking.

This child wanted to give himself nightmares.

“What did you and Foggy do, hm?” Mike nagged as Matt struggled with his shoelaces. Matt sat down to go at them better and Mike flopped down next to him.

“Hm?” he pressed.

“Made homes for ants,” Matt said. “They live in hills. So we made some for them. Put leaves on top to make sure they stay dry ‘nd stuff, you know?”

No. Mike did not know.

“Ants bite you,” Mike said.

“Only if you’re mean,” Matt said.

“No, they got grains of sand for brains,” Mike said. “They’ll bite you.”

“Well, they got a home now, bitey or no,” Matt said.

“Hey, let’s make a cave—”

“I want a snack.”

“Cave then snack.”

Matt tried to work through that order of events and Jack sighed before he agreed.

“Boys,” he said. “Close the front door. It’s gonna storm. No caves for now.”

Mike turned back to him mutinously.

 ---

 After an hour of shooing the babes away from windows and then telling them that it was time to settle down and do indoor activities or listen to a book on tape, the house had gotten quiet.

That was trouble.

Jack put a lid on the pot on the stove and began the Hunt.

The kids were not in the tub. They were in their room.

They’d made a blanket fort.

It wasn’t a good one—they didn’t have that many blankets, but they had some pillows and Mike had a flashlight. They’d cuddled up in the middle of the room with a pile of pillows from the couch and the spare duvet and were nestled up against each other in their coats.

Mike hissed when Jack parted the sheet curtain they’d gerry-rigged around the perimeter of the nest. Matty turned his way and made a happy throat-sound.

“You two getting into trouble?” Jack asked, folding himself into a pretzel to join them on the duvet. Matt immediately wriggled up to climb into his lap, which Mike scowled at.

Mike was of the opinion that this was ‘baby’ behavior. He was highly concerned that his sibling was still exhibiting it, as if Mike didn’t immediately bury himself into Grace’s side when she came up to take the two of them out for a swim.

Jack pulled Matt into his arms more comfortably and reached over to snag his coat to drop over him.

“Are we telling ghost stories?” he asked the boys.

Matt said yes. Mike told him they weren’t ‘doin’ nothin’’ which meant ‘yes, I am trying to give my brother dreams about banshees again and your presence is destroying all of my hopes and life goals.’

“I have a ghost story,” Jack told them.

“Lana’s not dead, Dad,” Mike said. “You can’t tell ghost stories about ladies who aren’t dead.”

“You ain’t gotta be dead to haunt stuff, son,” Jack told him. “Lana will haunt the blue apartment long after we’re all gone.”

“Nuh-uh,” Mike said. “Me and Matty are gonna live forever. Selkies live for hundreds of years.”

Oh really, now?

“Come here, oh ancient one, then,” Jack said, holding out a hand. “Come indulge a poor, aging human.”

Mike huffed but allowed himself and his coat to be dragged over to join Matty in Jack’s lap.

“A long, long time ago,” Jack told them, “There was a guy trying to raise two squirmy little kids.”

Mike rolled his eyes by rolling his whole head into Matt’s so that he’d giggle.

“Was he a boxer, Dad?” Mike asked.

No, oldest child.

He was a lighthouseman.

Mike sighed harder than ever.

Damn, everyone’s a critic, huh?

“One day, the lighthouseman’s two squirmy kids went out to play on the beach in a storm,” Jack said. “They transformed into seals. But the sea was strong and the tide rose high and it swept them away from shore. They went all the way out to sea, far from their home. And they were lost and scared. But soon they decided that being scared wasn’t any help anymore, and they picked a direction to swim for shore. They went from island to island, asking the people there if they’d seen the lighthouseman because the kids were worried you know? Because their old man was just human, unlike them, and the sea back home had been so strong and the tide so high that it might have crashed against the lighthouse and taken the lighthouseman away. But no one had even heard of a such a guy.”

Matt dug fingers into his sleeve and made a soft distressed sound.

“One day,” Jack said, kissing the top of his head. “The kids came across a load of swans in the middle of the ocean. So they asked the swans, ‘have you seen our dad? He’s kinda tall with a busted up nose.’ And they said, ‘no, we lost our dad, too. Maybe we can help each other find them?’”

“Did they?” Mike asked reluctantly.

“Of course they did,” Jack said. “The swans were secretly the children of Lir. They knew what it was like to be separated from their father, but, unlike those kids, they knew their father wouldn’t recognize them. So they flew up and the kids swam after them all the way back to Ireland, so that they wouldn’t end up like the Children of Lir, waiting hundreds of years for their dad to bring them home.”

Matt did not like this story.

Matt had had plenty of bird people in his life. He wanted no more. He wrapped himself around Jack’s neck and made grumpy sounds to indicate that he was done with this whole story business.

Mike’s little brow stayed furrowed.

“You’d recognize us right away,” he said. “We wouldn’t be like the Children of Lir, Dad, first off, ‘cause we wouldn’t ever leave you by yourself. Second off, because Mum’s carryin’ your soul for forever, so even when you’re old and dead, we’ll still have ya. And third off, ‘cause you’re a hero. We could find you just by sniffin’.”

Matt made louder grumpy noises to remind everyone that he didn’t like this conversation.

Jack hummed and rubbed Matt’s back and used the other hand to smooth down Mike’s hair.

“Maybe you’re right,” he said. “But that don’t mean that I don’t miss you guys while you’re paddlin’ around in the sea without me.”

“TUNA,” Matt snapped.

Jack was startled.

“Tuna?” he asked.

“I’m hungry,” Matt said. “Let’s eat tuna.”

“You hate tuna,” Mike reminded him. “I’m the one who likes tuna.”

“Well I hate tuna less than I hate stories,” Matt snapped. “So I wanna eat tuna.”

Ah.

Bless him.

Okay, tuna it was.

 ---

 Grace told Jack to stop telling the kids that he was going to die. She said it was making them cry out in the sea. She reminded him that she didn’t take the damn kids to the sea to cry. She took them to fish. And they were still both shit at fishing.

Jack apologized.

But he didn’t feel too bad.

The fae in the woods told him he didn’t have too much longer in human form. He didn’t want the boys to be surprised.

Lord knew that they’d already been surprised enough over the last few years.

 ---

 Mike decided that he wanted to learn how to sail and, in lieu of him finding children his age to play with, Jack set to teaching him how to row. It was a good start. Grace approved. She even went out and found a little tub with a set of oars for Mike to play around in.

He immediately nearly drowned by taking it out into the bay.

Jack set him on the other side of the sandbar by the lighthouse and he did better. He was closer to where Matt and Foggy liked to play too, so if something went wrong again, the other kids would start shouting.

After a whole afternoon of no shouting, Jack went out to collect the munchkins and found Foggy out in the bay chatting with Mike with hands on the edge of the tub.

That was surprising.

What was not was the fact that Matt and Candace were digging a fuckin’ hole in the sand. Again.

Foggy must have gotten bored of them.

Jack watched as Mike took ahold of his wrist and heaved hard and brought Fogs over the end of the little tub. They both tumbled down into it.

Then Foggy popped up and leapt right back out into the water. Mike nearly followed him, shaking his oar after him.

Jack couldn’t help but snicker. He left them to it for another ten minutes before calling the boys in.

 ---

 It was hilarious.

It was adorable.

It was the cutest fucking thing Jack had ever heard, indignant as Matty was, standing on his toes, all puffed up and agitated.

“Mikey’s got a crush on Foggy and he won’t clear off,” he’d told Jack.

He didn’t appreciate Jack’s giggling.

“Foggy’s my friend,” Matt told him. “Mike can play with Candace.”

Uh-huh.

Sure, son. That was gonna go down real well.

“Daddy.”

Jack forced himself to stop laughing. He cleared his throat.

“That’s not how these things work, bud,” he said. “Why don’t you talk it over with Mikey?”

“I did,” Matt said. “An’ he told me to bug off.”

Ah, you poor child.

That was older brothers for you. Jack knew the feeling intimately.

“He’s rude,” Matt complained. “An’ he’s stealin’ my friends. He’s already stolen my identity, Dad. Tell him to stop.”

It would never not be funny that these kids thought that people confused them out of spite.

“You can both be friends with Foggy,” Jack told him. “Unless Foggy only wants to be friends with one of you.”

Matt puffed up and then deflated.

“Mikey’s got loads of friends at home,” he mumbled. “Why do I gotta share my one friend when he doesn’t share any of his?”

Oh, baby. No, it wasn’t like that.

It was just that Mike was outgoing, that was all. He just had that special knack for being around people. Jack didn’t know where he’d gotten it from, both he and Grace were not people-people. Matty was the natural extension of their mutual social awkwardness. Mike was more like Jack’s own brothers, actually. Smooth, suave, and oh-so likable.

Dangerous shit, that was.

He would be unstoppable after 14 years old.

“Here, come here, you,” Jack said. “Having friends isn’t about the number of ‘em. It’s about having fun. You have fun with your brother all the time, don’t you? And Foggy brings Candace along with you two all the time. Why don’t you guys try to be friends as a group of four, huh?”

Matt didn’t love this idea, but he relented.

“Only if Mike stops tryin’ to be a pirate,” he said. “He keeps hittin’ me with that stick.”

Ah. Okay. Well, that Jack could do something about.

 ---

 “But I am a pirate, Dad. I’m stealin’ Matty’s friends.”

For.

Fuck’s.

Sake.

Jack could not with this boy. He simply could not.

“Son,” he said. Then paused.

No. Mike wouldn’t hear anything he said.

This was a job for Grace.

 ---

 “Is that what Jesus would do?” Grace snapped.

Mike sulked.

“No, Mum,” he groaned.

“Then why’re you doing it to your brother?” Grace demanded.

“Cain didn’t like his brother,” Mike mumbled.

“Michael. You are named for a saint.”

Mike groaned with his whole body somehow.

“I’m sorry God,” he said.

Grace vibrated.

Jack didn’t know who to protect here.

“I just wanna be a pirate,” Mike explained. “And pirates steal things. They gotta, Mum. It’s how they make a livin’.”

Grace’s eyes narrowed.

 ---

 Grace did this occasionally.

She kidnapped one of the twins for some personal time with them. Jack was grateful for it because that twin was usually Mike and he usually came back looking guilty as hell.

It wasn’t that Jack didn’t love his kid. It was just that Mike didn’t really show much regard for his authority.

Affection? Oh, sure. Both boys wanted nothing more than to show Jack everything they’d ever done or made. They wanted to be cuddled and tossed around and tickled. It had been ages before they understood why Dad didn’t come out swimming with them anymore—they couldn’t show him their cool seal tricks that way.

But authority? For Mike?

Nope. This kid was on the path towards trouble, and he’d probably already be there if his mama didn’t routinely take him under her flipper and remind him that he needed to think about other peoples’ feelings.

Matty, of course, had decided early on that personal time with Mum was a punishment, however.

When Jack came home without Mike, in full awareness that Mags was probably just gonna throw him in the water and tire him out until he was pliable and open to suggestion, Matt sniffed all around him and came up in tears.

It took a good ten minutes to convince him that Mike would be coming home.

What helped were some cheerios and letting Matt smell the tuna that was to go into the tuna salad sandwich that his brother was currently obsessed with. Jack reminded him that he wouldn’t be making two different kinds of sandwiches for dinner if there wasn’t gonna be someone there to eat them.

Matt played with the dry cheerios in the bowl Jack had given him and quietly asked him if Mike would be mad if he learned that Matty wanted to be a human hero like Jack.

Jack’s heart melted.

Grace had told him that Matt had told her this. But Matty hadn’t said it to him directly and he sure as hell hadn’t told Mike.

That was fair—the second bit. Mike, like most other selkies, tended to see humans as replaceable things. Kinda boring. Kinda selfish. Not overly worth his investment unless they were investing in him.

Jack thought that Mike might change his tune if he realized that his twin thought humans were kind of grand.

Or maybe not. Who knew what Mike would think.

“I think that if you tell him, he might be really confused for a while,” Jack said.

Matt dropped his handful of cereal back into the bowl and squirmed all the way back in the chair.

“’M not hungry,” he said.

Aw.

It’s okay, little one. Things will get easier with time.

 ---

 Objectively speaking, it wasn’t long after that that Jack died.

It was what it was.

His kids were ten. They were safe. Mags tried to wrangle them.

Jack went to sleep.

Five years, he slept.

He woke up to Matty having a breakdown and Mike nowhere to be found and it was another three years before Jack managed to have enough awareness and mobility in the afterlife to get both of them to not fuckin’ do that shit.

Then it was another four years before Mike reappeared out of thin air and announced he was stayin’ in the city and where the fuck was his evil twin, which coincided with Matt showing back up from orientation at law school to shriek at Jack that Foggy was there! Foggy was back! Foggy was studying law with him and staying in his dorm and OH MY GOD, DAD, IT’S FOGGY.

Kid was love-fucking-sick.

Grace told him to watch his mouth. Matty didn’t know yet. They needed to let him figure it out on his own.

Jack thought that it had already taken Matty a good 16 years to realize that the reason he hated his brother crushing on Fogs was because he was crushing on Fogs. He was not the most self-aware of people. He deserved a little help.

Grace told him that he would speak to their younger son only upon pain of being stuffed into her flute.

Jack did not like the flute.

So he kept mum. But only in Matt’s presence.

This did not include Mike’s presence. Because Mike had other problems which looked like him trying to join a local mob, deciding that they weren’t cool enough for him, and then bouncing off to go join a pod of selkies, making enemies of all of the guys in it and then coming back to New York from a trip to Florida in the arms of a pixie who was actively trying to kill him in his sleep.

Mike was, predictably, a hot mess.

And he loved it.

God help this boy. He required all of Jack’s energy.

“Michael,” Jack reminded him exhaustedly when he stopped in the street as a gal with butterfly wings glanced over her shoulder at him. “You’ve got one at home and she’s mad enough to spit.”

“Uh-huh,” Mike said without listening.

This fucking kid.

“Hey, pops, why don’t you go be someone else’s angel for like, twenty seconds over there, huh?”

Hm. No, you’re right, what a great idea—AHAHA. No. Nice try. Jack wasn’t born yesterday.

It was his new purpose in death trying to keep this one on the straight and narrow. He’d been assigned the mission by a nun. It was now a holy quest.

“You can’t say that about everything Mom tells you to do,” Mike scowled.

He did not, however, pursue Ms. Butterfly wings.

“Where’s Matty, anyways? None of you will tell me where Matty is,” Mike pouted.

Matty was, according to Grace, being heartsick because Foggy had gone home for the holidays.

“Mass,” Jack said.

Mike rolled his eyes.

“I’m not goin’,” he said. “I’ve got a job, Dad. Tell Matt to get one, too.”

A job, huh?

What a job. Sluggin’ people on behalf of other humans.

“I can feel your disappointment and—oh, wait? It’s my life? I can do what I want? I am allowed to sustain myself with offerings however they come? Oh my god, Father. What sense you speak. You’ve turned over a new leaf, truly.”

This?

This was a Grace problem.

 ---

 Jack didn’t expect Matt to be the one who came home with a secret violent identity.

Then he didn’t expect Mike to be the one to break down Matt’s door and stand over him and ask him what the fuck he was thinking.

Then he didn’t expect Mike to be the one to bodily drag Matt out to sea in an attempt to bring him back to his roots.

Mike nearly drowned his brother.

It was certainly one way to get everyone back on the same page. Jack wasn’t about to lie and say it was the best way, but it was definitely a way.

Mike came to church and accused him and Grace of keeping Matt’s secrets from him. Not just the devil, but the coat situation and Foggy.

Mike was justifiably upset, but Grace pointed out that Mike’s current approach to humanity did not exactly jive with his brother’s existence, and not even Mike could argue with that. Although he did try. Let it be known that he tried.

He kept cutting himself off though, saying that Matt was different from other humans. Matt wasn’t like them. He was better than them. Which was exactly what Matt took issue with. And unfortunately for Mike, his brother had supersenses, and that included super hearing.

Grace asked Jack out to go calm Matty down.

He was pretty upset.

He tucked himself into Jack when Jack got to his hiding place on the roof of his loft and asked him why Jack had told Mike about the coat to begin with.

But Jack hadn’t told Mike about the coat. No one had. Mike found out these things on his own. He was clever like that.

“He’s always treated me different,” Matt said. “I thought it was ‘cause I’m blind, but it’s always been ‘cause I’m more human, hasn’t it?”

Horrible things to hear your kids say to each other.

Also untrue.

“Mike doesn’t treat you different because you’re blind or you’re human, bud,” Jack told him. “He treats you different because you’re his brother and he’s protective of you. That’s where this is coming from. It’s nothing you did.”

“Doesn’t feel like it,” Matt said.

Well, no.

It probably didn’t.

 ---

 Mike came around. And he came around by encountering the Hell’s Beast that little baby Franklin Nelson had become.

Foggy, to put it kindly, was one hell of a selkie.

He was huge, to start with. He’d grown from a chubby, pale little glow worm to a good three hundred pounds of enormous, white seal. He was staunchly traditional, if flexible, in his dealings with other fae, and he had zero patience for humanity while somehow acting entirely in their favor.

Foggy was a selkie in a textbook somewhere. He had to be. He was paranoid and untrusting of humans, but he would throw himself in the line of fire to protect anyone who he dealt with. And Mike, who’s relationship with humans tended to be more on the Trickster spectrum than the whole Noble Being one was a smidge intimidated.

At first.

Then he was violently jealous.

And let’s just play this record once more, shall we? Take it from the top.

He nagged Matt to bits, asking him to give up his bond with Fogs and to entrust his human soul to Mike.

We’re twins, Mike argued, it’s only right that I guard your soul.

Matt told him he’d lived his mortal life in plenty of dumpsters, thanks. He was looking for a change in the afterlife.

Mike told him he’d get him the nicest dumpster blood money could buy.

Matt told him to try to take the question to Fogs and see what would happen.

Mike took that to heart.

Grace asked Jack what they’d done wrong to end up with a stubborn devil-child and a vulture selkie.

Jack thought it was probably the tugboat.

Foggy, however, thought that it was the fact that Mike had zero impulse control, manners that only came out when he didn’t have the upper hand in a situation, no respect for boundaries, and shit fashion sense—not to mention a lack of interest in fae hierarchies, a fondness for antagonizing people, and, in Foggy’s opinion, a brain that didn’t properly register pain chemicals or empathy.

He told Mike that Matt’s soul was his and that if he wanted, he could fight him for it and Mike decided that that was a vow good enough for his little brother.

He switched tact and began trying to court Foggy instead and, to his credit, it sure as hell de-escalated the situation.

 ---

 Grace told Mike that Matt was going to get his coat back, but they didn’t hear from him. Jack wasn’t sure what to do, but Grace said that they didn’t have time to wait.

When they got home and Matty was trying to relearn how to swim and struggling like a zebra on a tightrope despite having both Grace and Fogs there to keep him from sinking, Mike reappeared in a pew at the church.

Jack found him and settled in next to him.

Mike asked him if Matty was okay.

He’d gotten the message only a few days ago. His hands were a little shaky when Jack smoothed his hair back and told him that he was just fine.

And not only was he fine. But he was very recognizable now. Or he should be, to Mike more than anyone else in the world.

Mike asked if Matt was still angry with him. If Foggy was still hellbent on chasing him off.

Jack thought that maybe, what Matty really needed right then wasn’t his mama or his bondmate, but his brother. His twin.

It had been a long time since Mike wanted a hug.

He told Jack that he was sorry for being a dick all these years.

Jack told him that he wasn’t a dick. He was fiercely independent and even if Jack didn’t always agree with him, he was still proud of him and proud of that drive and that passion.

He asked him if he was ready to go make up with his brother and Mike nodded instead of saying yes out loud.

 ---

 Matty’s new coat was white for the time being and Mike would not and could not drop that. He cooed at Matt and told him he was too fluffy to swim. Grace had to break them up before they got to neck-slamming.

But at the end of the day, Mikey was right.

Matt’s new coat was a baby’s coat. And Matt was a good 14 years out of swimming practice. His muscles had forgotten how to work as a seal. He was angry about it, which was endearing, but not especially helpful.

He explained to Mike that he’d made a deal with Fisk and Mike went dead quiet before exploding at him and once they’d mutually worked through that argument, the intensity of the swimming lessons rocketed up. Grace stood back and pulled Foggy back with her and they watched on as Mike harassed Matty back into fighting shape.

After the third night of Matt’s refresher course, Jack went to go check on them and found them piled together in their coats on Matt’s couch.

You couldn’t tell where one began and the other ended and to Jack, it felt like home.

He found threw a blanket over them both and took the time to kiss both foreheads before turning off the light and letting the purples and pinks of the billboard outside wash over them.

It was its own kind of rippling sea.

---

[justeverythingprettymuch]

High School AUs (based on real experiences I’ve had) pt. 1

I know no one asked for this, but I kind of wanna share these wild rides with someone, so here goes lol

(Part 2)

1. I was waiting to get picked up after staying at school for a Shakespeare lecture, and you were waiting to get picked up after band practice. A dog suddenly ran past us in the parking lot, so we debated whether or not we should tell anyone. 2. I saw you getting really uncomfortable because of Creepy Tom not leaving you alone, so I swooped in and pretended I needed you for an emergency. 3. We tutor freshman in the same time slot every week, so we always go together to pick up the students from their classes and sometimes end up just talking shit with them instead of doing any work.

4. Your best friend and my best friend used to date, and they only broke up really recently, so they still kind of have feelings for each other. We end up joining them when your best friend is trying to win mine back, so we spend about an hour sharing exasperated looks.

5. We've known each other for three years and you stop by every day to steal my pretzels since I never eat them, and one day I forget to pack them and you get super offended. You end up dragging me to the store so you can buy pretzels for yourself and gummy worms for me.

6. We have a free period at the same time, but none of our other friends do, so we usually spend it together talking shit or having weirdly deep and philosophical debates.

7. Your birthday is the same night as prom night, so you throw a huge after party at your house since your parents won't be home. I get there later since I wanted to go home and actually have a shower first, so when I walk in most of the people have calmed down a little. I find you on the couch watching a basketball game while eating a giant bowl of ice cream. Are you okay??? Aren't you meant to be getting hammered like everyone else??

8. Your birthday is the day after prom night and when we go to the after party, you get wasted and make me promise to buy you gummy lollies for your birthday. Now, every year, I turn up at your door with a giant bag of gummy lollies and people think I'm really weird, but you always get super excited.

9. We're at a party and you're so wasted you keep forgetting that we've already met, so you keep coming up to me just to tell me that I'm really pretty.

10. You were really drunk at a party and kept telling me I'm really pretty, but now it's Monday and we're in the same physics class and I don't think you remember.

11. We went out drinking with some friends, but you found out that most of us had nowhere to stay the night, so you offered to let us sleep on your pull-out bed. In the morning, you're walking around in a robe and flip-flops, and as I give you a goodbye hug, you whisper "I'm not wearing anything under this."

12. I have to leave your house really early after a night of partying because I have to go have breakfast with my mother. My make up hasn't smudged, my hair isn't a mess and I brought a change of clothes. You keep giving me weird looks until you eventually just ask; "How do you still look perfectly fine????"

13. I'm staying over at your house for the night, but we've been roaming around the city with our friends all night and we were drinking at the park. When we finally sneak back into your place, it's 4:30 in the morning and we have to get up at 6 so that you can get ready for work. You text me later saying you were still drunk for most of your shift, but you got lots of tips, so you don't think it was a problem.

14. We got really bummed out at a party, so we spent a large portion of the night lying down in the middle of the street just staring up at the stars and talking about life.

15. I walked into your house and found you in a kimono while slow dancing to old rock songs. I'm a little embarrassed to say it isn't even the weirdest thing I've seen you do.

16. Your best friend's been trying to drunkenly teach me about cars over a slice of pizza for the last hour, but I can't understand what he's even saying, so you save me by forcing me to dance with you.

17. We both got really drunk at a friend's birthday party, but I'm the first one to wake up in the morning. When I look around, I'm lying on the floor next to you, while you're hugging a giant '1' balloon, which you've apparently dubbed 'Janine'.

18. Neither of us wanted to be in a stuffy room all night, so we went outside and made a hobo fire in the park. I'm pretty sure someone's called the cops, but you're really warm, so I don't really care.

19. We've been acquaintances for years, but for some reason, we both keep getting dropped off really early this year, so we've made a habit of hanging out in the locker bay before school. We just kinda sit against the wall and talk shit until a teacher comes in to shush us.

20. It's the middle of the night and I heard you knocking on my window, but I'm not wearing anything other than an oversized t-shirt, so I kind of panic for a few minutes. When I finally pull on some pants and open the window, you liteRALLY JUST PICK ME UP AND PULL ME OUTSIDE because you want to go for a walk.

21. There's this guy who lives down the road from us and he's been an asshole to us for the last week, so you decide we need to exact revenge. You know where his bedroom window is, so we start knocking on his window and then running away repeatedly, until eventually he and his dad come outside to yell at us, but we're already halfway down the road.

22. You're the most intimidating guy in our year and there's this creepy guy who won't stop trying to get me to go out with him, so one day you just come up to me and call “Dibs” REALLY loudly while we're in the library. I want to yell at you about how totally fucked up that is, but then the creepy guy is coming over to yell at you because apparently “He saw me first”, so you deck him and say “Woman aren't property.” I don't know whether to hit you for the hypocrisy, or to applaud you.

23. You're the most intimidating guy in our year and everyone knows you've already got tattoos, even though you're BARELY a junior. Everyone assumes it's some kind of gang tattoo, but you show me one day and it's actually just tattoos of Poseidon and Aphrodite. You then tell me that they represent your parents because your father has always loved teaching you about the ocean and how to fish and he's the strongest man you know, and because you're mother is the most beautiful woman you've ever seen, and she's also the most confident and powerful. You're such a cute dork, I'm gonna cry.

24. You ask for my help on a project, but I can barely understand your notes, so I have no idea what you even need help with. Do you just wanna see what I wrote so you have an idea of what you're meant to do?

25. You and your roommate recently got a goat, despite barely having a backyard, and you love sharing stories about your goat in our class. One day you walk in and start telling us about how your goat got out of its pen and was wreaking havoc in the neighborhood, and our teacher just pulls up an article on the projector and apparently your goat got into the local news, and you're just laughing SO HARD.

26. We were at a party and you were drunkenly dancing on a wall, but then you slipped off and hit your side on the way down. I try to patch you up, only to find that you've ripped off half the skin on your side and might have broken a couple of ribs??

27. It's literally 3AM and you won't go to sleep until we've had some burger king, so I guess we're going.

28. You live a couple of blocks away from me, and you came to my house for a sleepover, but you left something at yours, so now we have to walk all the way there in the middle of the night while wearing onesies. Also, your parents are home and are super concerned??

29. It was your birthday, but you don't really like having parties, so you just invite me over for a sleepover and we spend the whole night playing horror games. In the morning, one of our other friends come over to make us pancakes, but we're zombies and they don't know how to use your stove, so they don't really come out right.

30. We're at a party and you get into some kind of fist-fight with your best friend. It leads to you falling off the patio, and he ends up laughing so hard he trips over a vodka bottle. You both sprain your ankles and I'm the one that has to fetch the ice and make sure you don't go do anything else that's stupid.

31. I get locked out of my house and it's pouring down outside, so I text you and ask you to come save me because you're the only person I know that lives nearby and has a car.

32. We ditch school after lunch because it's the last day of the year and none of our teachers even care anymore, so we go sit in the park and I make you a flower crown.

33. We joined the human rights club, but the teacher couldn't make it this week, so one of the new guys decides to take over for the day. We're all expecting him to just talk about another human rights case, but he starts yelling about how we should just decapitate everyone and neither of us really know what to do.

34. The teacher who runs the human rights club just brought out a giant box of colourful badges and we start trying to get every colour, but I end up finding the only bronze one.

35. You're my new physics tutor and you're super cute, but my sister keeps calling me and I'm so sorry, but I've really got to take this and find out what's going on.

36. Our friends got into a really stupid and petty fight, but one of them threw the other one's bag over a fence, so now we're all being called into the office to talk about it.

37. We used to date, but now we're just sort of acquaintances and we both wear leather jackets to school, so whenever we see each other we just smirk and say "Nice jacket" as we're passing.

38. My best friend broke up with you while she was really drunk, so you call me in the morning to ask if she was being serious and I kind of don't know how to break it to you that I was the one holding the phone and cheering her on because you're kind of an asshole???

39. We're in the same art class, but we always get permission to sit in the side room away from the rest of the class because our teacher thinks we're the quietest people in his class. In reality we spend the entire hour just shit talking everyone and having huge discussions about issues we're having, so we never actually get any work done.

40. Our section of the art room is usually really quiet, until someone brings up Harry Potter (or some other fandom we're all in), then we're all suddenly debating REALLY loudly and getting mad at anyone who don't know what the fuck they're talking about.

41. We get asked to help out during our school's open evening, but neither of us know what the fuck we're doing, so we spend most of the night just making sarcastic comments as we pass each other, or making "save me" faces at each other. Our teachers think it's hilarious.

42. Our English teacher has been trying to get our class to focus on the next scene in Othello for the last ten minutes, and she almost does it, until you turn to me and ask in complete seriousness "Who the fuck is Cassio?" and I burst out laughing. 

43. Our physics teacher has pretty much given up on our class because it's Friday last period, so literally none of us care anymore. He offers to take us to the park so that we can “learn about rotational motion” on the merry-go-round, but he can't be bothered writing up the health and safety forms, so he just says "Don't die, or I'm failing you for everything."

44. You take food and nutrition, so you've got permanent access to the school kitchen and the coffee machine. After a long day, you text me and ask if I want free food and coffee.

45. I got surrounded by a huge group off people in a really small room and started having a panic attack, so you dragged me outside for fresh air and charmed everyone into leaving me alone, even though I was meant to be answering their questions.

46. For some reason you have a yo-yo, and every time the teacher looks away, you fling it out and make it do the dog-walking trick, until you accidentally fling it too far and hit me in the face.

47. You're the angsty kid that sits alone and glares at everyone, but my friend and I decide to go talk to you and find out you're actually really good on a guitar and like the same music as us.

48. We're in the same French class and sit at the same trio of desks with your best friend. We don't really talk much, until one day you guys are bickering so much that the teacher puts me in the middle and you keep trying to bicker around me.

49. We've somehow become the group that adopt younger kids that don't have anyone else to hang out with, so we're now surrounded by like six younger kids and don't know what to do??

50. You're two years older than me, but we somehow became friends, so we always talk when we get the chance. At the end of the year, right before you graduate, you come up to me and kiss me, then you leave before we can even talk about it.

Okay, so that’s it for now. My life is so weird. If you end up using one of my prompts for a story, I’d love it if you could tag me or send me a link so I could read it??

[sewgeekmama]

My very first Halloween memory is from around 3-years-old, when my mom took the clothes off a giant doll and dressed me as Raggedy Ann. We went around the neighborhood trick-or-treating and when one house turned off its lights and wasn’t quite in the Halloween spirit, my mom picked me up, handed me a bar of Dove soap, and let me draw all over their windows.

That may not be the best example of parenting, but I had the best time and have been hooked on Halloween ever since. I’ve been so excited to share my love of Halloween with my son and this year was the best yet! We did fun events, he put together his own costume and for the first time, didn’t fall asleep while out trick-or-treating. In fact, he got a lot of compliments on his enthusiasm for yelling “Trick-or-Treat” nice and loud and holding out his candy bucket. And in case you’re wondering, we left the soap at home. Can’t get away with that stuff these days! lol

Our first Halloween party was at Atlantic Beach Country Club, where he decided to be Batman at the last minute. So I put on my favorite bat dress and went as Batmom. He did the Halloween parade and picked up candy along the way. He was pretty excited about it and tore through his stash before we even left the event.

Our next event was at the Beaches Town Center for their annual kid’s Halloween party. There was another last minute costume change, this time to Superman, so I made myself a matching tank top by printing the symbol out on iron-on paper. It was too hot out to wear a full costume so I threw on a cape and some red pants and was ready for comfy Halloween fun.

He played games, got more candy, decorated cookies, did the parade and ran into lots of friends.

On the big night, he once again decided to be Batman, so I put together a last minute Catwoman costume. I enjoyed spontaneously creating my outfits like a Halloween Project Runway.

I had so much fun watching him run up to houses and shout “Trick-or-Treat” just like we practiced. The streets were filled with kids running this way and that, houses were decorated and everyone was dressed up. Our neighborhood has a great energy on Halloween night and it reminds me of trick-or-treating when I was little.

And then it was done! Now we have a bucket of candy to deal with. A handful or two mysteriously disappears every day, but luckily he has not noticed. He seems a little obsessed with pushing an all-candy diet. He was really confused by the people handing out pretzels and keeps asking me why someone would do such a thing. I think there should be more of that. It would be a great way to stock up on snacks if everyone just handed out little packs of pretzels and goldfish crackers. (total mom statement there) Of course that would leave a lot of disappointed kids, because it’s not Halloween without that massive pile of candy at the end!

So how was your Halloween? What costumes did you do? Tell me all about it 🙂

Making Happy Halloween Memories My very first Halloween memory is from around 3-years-old, when my mom took the clothes off a giant doll and dressed me as Raggedy Ann.