#i will shove cheese down your throat until your eyes are made of cheddar you psychopath

[colaboyxbepis]

[yandere-society]

Scream

Pairing: Jungkook x reader

Synopsis: It’s been a year since your mother was slaughtered, with no leads pointing to any possible suspects. It’s been an up-hill battle for you to accept what happened— especially with no answers or closure— and the citizens of your hometown have been sleeping with one eye open ever since. But now, the mystery killer has decided to make an anniversary visit, and is making it known that they not only have a dire love for infamous horror films... but they also have their targets set on you and all of your closest friends.

Word count: 8k

Headline: Small Town Woodsbroro Is Waking Up Screaming Once Again!

Warnings: dark themes; Gore; Smut; Crackhead humor (only because I promised my bff I’d give her an honorable death scene); Foul language; Jungkook is psychotic; Graphic depictions of him killing your mom/friends; we’re also going to pretend that it’s outrageously easy to get away with murder; dont fact check me on anything you read here; rough sex; mask kink. 

Admin: @tatertotthethot​

Baley was high as a fucking kite.

 So high, that she didn’t care about it being 1am as she blasted the Cha-Cha slide at full volume. 

  So high, that she was completely disregarding her lactose intolerance whilst making herself a triple layered, sharp cheddar grilled cheese that was bound to have her ass blasting right back off by 3am. 

  So, outrageously stoned, that she was totally unaware of the masked killer standing just outside the glass doors in her kitchen, watching her every move.. With her beat up, hogtied boyfriend laying out next to him. 

  “Now it’s time to fawnky! To the right now—“ 

  She crab walked along with the instructions, spatula in hand. 

  “To the left!”

  “Take it back now, y’all.” 

  Ghostface grimaced beneath his mask, eyes stalking the stoned woman with disdain. She was  the epitome of “crackhead energy” and it pissed him off how much she resembles you. It only makes sense, being as you two have been best friends since kindergarten— probably soulmates in a past life— but it is within that fact that Ghostface has grown to absolutely fucking loath her. 

  She’s too much like you. She keeps up with your humor and probably has more of your heart than he, himself, has earned a place in yet. He knows good and well that if it ever came down to you having to pick between him and her, you’ll pick her. 

  That simply will not do. That’s exactly why he is about to rid you of that option— or, as he sees it, the dilemma. 

He growled and  swung at the air, wishing he could just bust in and end her already.

  “How could you be in love with that creature?” He hissed at Taehyung, the built-in voice box beneath his mask altering it enough to remain anonymous. The question was quite hypocritical, being as he was in love with a girl that most would consider Baley’s second-half, but only you were an exception to being so.. abnormal.

  “Mmmph—“ Taehyung drearily gurgled out from beneath the strip of tape over his mouth, tears breaching his eyes as he watched Baley’s precious, uncoordinated ass do the “Charlie brown”. It looked more like a fucked up gallop.

  “What is the sex like, dude?” Ghostface ripped the duck tape off Taehyung’s split lips. “That’s a serious question.”

 “Boo bear..” was all Taehyung could muster up, more scared for her than himself.

  Ghostface gagged and slapped the tape right back on with a little too much force, having to take a second to regain his composure before pressing the call button on Taehyung’s phone. The Spotify music thankfully cut off as her phone rang out from the counter.

  Baley was only upset for a split before she spotted the name on her phone screen, and was quick to answer it with a sickening amount of glee.

  “Angel muffin!” She cooed. Gross

  “Hi, boo bear..” Ghostface flipped his middle finger up at Taehyung before clutching his Bowie knife back down to his side. 

  “Oh my God, What was that? You sound like Corpse, mixed with the bear from Five Nights At Freddy’s.” 

  “The bears name is Freddy, dumbass.” 

  Baley neck rolled back in offense.

  “Are you trying to get pegged or prolapsed? Might wanna remember who the fuck you’re talking to, the next time you call this cellular.” She snapped, hanging the phone up with a viscous pout. She still somehow managed to pick back up on the beat and cha-cha’d real smooth as she took the pot off the eye and turned the stove off, visibly upset.

  Ghostface stood there for a moment, processing what she just said, before turning towards Taehyung. 

“She claps your cheeks?” 

  Taehyung glared back at the screaming-ghost mask, bracing himself when a gloved hand reached out to once again rip the ductape off his lips. 

  “It’s not sus!” He immediately defended. “I have a gspot up there for a reason. I am not ashamed to use it.”

  “I don’t give a fuck about that!” The killer snapped out. “why would you let that.. unstable individual insert something into your rectum—“ 

  “You’ve got a whole lotta nerve calling somebody else unstable,” Taehyung deadpanned, and with that, his mouth was once again resealed shut. 

  He called Baley’s phone again, just as she was about to take a bite of the sandwhich that she’ll, unfortunately, never get to eat. 

  “What, fucker?” She scorned.

  “I can see you.” 

  “Oh, yeah?” She sarcastically spat. “Then what am I doing?” 

  She clenched her buttcheeks in and hunched her back out, her body resembling a question mark, before vigorously gyrating her body- mostly just her spine. Jungkook knows from the various tiktoks you’ve shown him that he was witnessing the inverted-twerk. 

  “Hm? Tell me, fuckboy. What am I doing?”

  ”Something a fucking cockroach does after I spray Raid on it. How the fuck do you clench your buttcheeks like that?” 

  Baley halted in mid thrust, surprised but not exactly fearful (yet) as she whizzed around to face the sliding glass doors that led into her back yard. It was pitch black outside, and all she could see was her own reflection starring back at her. She was also too high to care about the fact that she had the hood of her sweatshirt over her head and the strings pulled all the way out, which  only exposed the center of her face in a squished circle. 

  “I use my glutes. You know that. Why haven’t you come in?” She asked, not superstitious but a lil-stitious. 

  “This isn’t Taehyung.”

  “Okay, Isn’t Taehyung. Why haven’t you come in?” 

  “Because I want you to come out here.” The killer responded, grinning at the visible unease finally creeping into the girls stance.

  “Okay, babe— I hate to be a bummer here, but considering that today is the one-year anniversary of Ms. (L/N)’s murder, this isn’t very Cash Money of you. Can you please just come in and.. stop?”

  He let out a chuckle, a dark one. 

  “Boo bear?”

  “What, Isn’t Taehyung?”

  “Turn on the outside lights.“

Ghostface put the speaker on the phone and sat it on the ground as he crouched over Taehyung, pulling him to sit up straight. He watched as Baley apprehensively padded over to the light switch by the door. He could practically feel her heart beating in-sync with Taehyung’s racing one as he placed the knife to his neck, smiling beneath his disguise.

  The lights flickered on, and she screamed, terror finally bringing the seriousness out in the situation. 

  “HANG UP OR MOVE A MUSCLE AND HE DIES!” The killer roared, knowing she was still too high for her survival instincts to kick in. Any sober, sane individual would’ve probably caught on to the fact that they were gonna die no matter what she did. What was just making it easier for himself, knowing her dumbass was gonna comply.

  “W-What do you want me to do?” 

  See?

  “Be a good girl, and come here.” 

  “Quit trying to seduce me, you sick son of a bitch. My boyfriend’s literally right there!” She croaked out, voice shrill with exasperation. 

  The killer plunged the knife into Taehyung’s arm, making him jolt to life with a pain-filled howl. Baley began sobbing out, apologizing profusely. 

  “Your boyfriends going to get gutted like a fish if I have to repeat myself. Drop the phone and come here.” Ghostface seethed, wrenching the knife back out on the last word.

   Baley reluctantly— and stupidly—  did as told. She let the phone fall from her hand, then jumped out of her skin as the Bluetooth reconnected in the house and started playing WAP. She tried not to sing along despite the situation as she padded over, shaky hands rising to cover her mouth.

“N-Now what?” She asked. 

  “I just figured your last words should be said face-to-face. Is there anything you two would like to say to each other?” He asked, that being the only generosity he’d be willing to spare as he ripped the tape away from Tae’s mouth, one last time. 

Baley dropped to her knees, so much despair in her eyes. So many things she wanted to say. She recollected herself and caught her breath in just enough time to utter final goodbye: “I-I-I said certified freak..” 

  Tae’s eyes closed as a single tear escaped, nodding his head in understanding. “Seven days a week...” 

  “GAH!” The killer roared out, wrenching  Taehyung’s head back to slice his throat before shoving him away and lunging  at Baley. 

  She landed on her back with him on top, and he wasted no time as he began slashing her apart, in any way he possibly could. He let all the pent up rage and annoyance he felt towards her, out on her body. It was worse than the brutality he inflicted on to your mother this time last year. He’d only stabbed her a total of 19 times— one for every year she failed you as a mother. With Baley, he didn’t stop tearing into her until WAP ended. And damn, did it feel good. He finally felt like he’d purged his soul clean.

  This may all seem reckless, but Jungkook was actually just lucky. In order to mask his true motive behind all this, he had to find another one to cover it with. It was simply convenient that Baley’s father is the town mayor, and after a little digging, he made the grand discovery that he was also having a secret affair with (Y/N)’s mother. In fact, the mayor had several mistresses throughout the town. 

  Jungk—er, Ghostface.. chopped off one of Baley’s fingers and slid the glass door shut, writing the same words on it that he wrote on your mother’s bathroom mirror.

  CHEATING PIG!!

  Yes. When he did this last year, the police had to dissect through your mother’s long line of past sexual partners, and had to track down the father you never met for an interview. No leads came about, because it was all time wasted, anyways. Now, with this new addition, the mayor will not only have to set the scandals ablaze again by having to publicly confess his infidelity to the town and police, but they’ll have to lead on another pointless investigation for every woman he’s cheated with— over a dozen of them. They’ll have to also charge him with withholding crucial information from the investigation as well, but what’s so fucking comical about it all is that.. NONE of it has anything to do with any of this. It’ll just be another cold case with no leads. 

  And maybe, just MAYBE you’ll be smart enough to ditch this place and come with him. That’s all he wanted. You have nothing left and nothing to come back to now, and as long as you give in to him and leave, there won’t have to be anymore lives taken. You could start a new life and never experience another hell like the one he’s creating here. If only you’d say yes.

  “May you both continue to clap each other’s cheeks in the deepest depths of hell,” he told the mauled corpses as he walked off, so happy to have Baley gone that he almost wanted to skip to his car. 

  Now, he will go home and clap your cheeks to complete the cycle.

  —

“Damnit, bitch, pick up,” you huffed in frustration as Baley’s FaceTime continued to roll over, telling you that she’s unavailable. You thought you could power through today with your newly adapted ability to suppress shit, but it was hard when you’re left alone to reminisce. You just couldn’t shake the fact that the date on today’s calendar marked the same day that your heart, soul, and peace of mind was so horribly torn apart. 

  It didn’t help that you also missed your mother terribly. She wasn’t always the best, but she still loved you, and you loved her. Oh, God. Mom—

No. No. Don’t think about her.

You tried calling Baley one more time and couldn’t fight off the tremble in your hands, nor the tears at your water ducts as it rung through till the end. Damnit. 

  You couldn’t be angry. She doesn’t owe you the company— especially since you two have already been FaceTiming all day. But she was good at distractions, always able to drag you out of your shell of deprecation with her chaotic sense of humor. She is one of the only two people you have in your life that are capable of doing such, but you knew you’d get scolded if you blew up the others phone. Jungkook hates being hounded and rushed, having already told you that he’ll be there any minute. But he’s taking way too fucking long it seems, and you just hate sitting here, waiting.

  You can’t shake the feeling that you’re being watched. The feeling first crept up on you this time last year and never left. You felt so venerable to the cruel world when you’re alone, especially since the maniac is still out there.

  You still resent the police department  for practically giving up on your mother’s case after 9 months. “Cheating pig” was the only lead they got and yet, it pointed them no where. She wasn’t in a relationship. She didn’t even like relationships. And still, they deemed it a randomized attack— no leads, no motives. Nothing. Just a local woman stabbed in the chest 19 times while taking a shower. Like some Psycho remake. No signs of forced entry. No evidence of sexual assault. Just a very passionate, yet unexplainable massacre with a useless message left behind. 

  It doesn’t make sense. And even though you wish to never have the attacker come back, you can feel it in your bones that they will wish to clarify it one day. 

  “Fuck it.” You breathed out, heart slamming against your chest and paranoia gnawing at your insides as you quickly scrolled to Jungkook contact. But then, just as your thumb twitched to press the call button, your door bell rung and you sprung up to your feet, making a mad dash to the door. You checked the peep hole first, just knowing it was gonna be him, but was disappointed when it wasn’t. That still didn’t keep a rush of relief from washing over you when you did see who it really was, though. You forced a welcoming smile on to your face as you unlocked all 7 bolts from the door, and opened it to greet Namjoon and Hobi with a hug. 

  They were cops, currently in their uniforms, also old friends from highschool. They’ve been looking out for you ever since last year, always making sure you knew you were safe beneath their watch. They use to take turns guarding your house until they were told to stop, but you were extremely happy to see them both here at the same time tonight.

  “Everything okay?” Hobi asked, having noticed the shake in your limbs during the brief embrace. He leaned back and observed the tension in your eyes, even though you were hoping to hide it. 

  “Yes, just— today,” was all you could say, and didn’t have to clarify for them to understand. 

  “That’s why we’re here. We got permission to guard your house tonight,” Namjoon explained, eyes drifting over your shoulder and into your house. “Are you alone?”

  “Yes, but Jungkook should be here any minute now. He had to go to South Korea for a week for his fathers birthday and just flew back in tonight, but apparently there’s been some huge wreck on the main highway and everyone has been stuck.”

  That bit of information was actually true. However, Jungkook was lucky enough to have just miss it.. because he’s the one that actually caused it. It was honestly dumb-luck as to how he did it, but kind of amazing when given details.

  He was in the express lane, him and the car behind him hitting 80mph. He recognized the car as the one that was parked beside his back at the airport, because he had stopped and took a moment to judge the driver for how worn down and raggedy the tires were. One bad pot hole or nail in the road would strip that sucker straight from the rim. 

  And that’s exactly what inspired him as he recognized the car, an idea sparking that could soon serve as an alibi in the future. He already had a hand out the window, smoking a cigarette. He still has those iron steak-nails he used at his construction sight. They’re 5 inches in length, subtle enough to casually drop out of a car window along with the cigarette. If they hit just right... 

  He gave it a try, honestly thinking it wasn’t going to work.

  But holy fucking hell, did it.  Not even a second after he dropped it, did the car suddenly swerve out as it’s tires screeched and sparks flew. Rubber scattered out amongst the road as the car continued to spin out, getting struck by a the car in all 6 lanes of traffic, ultimately causing a huge pile up in just under 10 seconds. It was the most destruction he’s ever witnessed and it happened so fucking fast he almost ran himself off the road just watching from the rear view mirror.

  “NO FUCKING WAY!” Jungkook had squawked out as his head rapidly whipped back and forth to witness the massive mess he just created behind him. He was smiling like the maniac he is, undoubtably impressed with himself. He did it so lazily, too. But it only pumped him up even more for what he needed to do- the whole reason he even thought to do that. He only wanted something major enough to buy himself maybe an hour’s worth of time, so that when/if he gets interrogated in the future, they can check the traffic reports for a registered wreck to fit his alibi. But considering that he just shut the whole damn highway down, it’ll not only register but definitely make tonight’s news. 

  “Ah, yeah. We heard about that. 36 cars piled up. Can’t believe nobody was killed.” Namjoon said.

  “How the fuck did that even happen?” You wondered, baffled.

  “Some dickhead was going 80 an hour on an old tire and it wiped out after hitting a nail on the road. Thankfully, he only has a broken nose and whip flash, but with all the cars that got totaled— I don’t even want to know how much the cost of damage would be. But it caused 5 miles worth of traffic back-up.” 

  “Mm..” you grimaced, shaking your head. “Well.. would you guys like some dinner? Maybe some Coffee?”

  “Ah, thanks, but there’s no need. We’ve got all the energy drinks and McDonald’s we need. You just chill out for the night, we’re right out here if you need anything,” Hobi assured, making you genuinely smile for the first time in the past two days. 

 But that was just before a familiar car pulled up that had your mood skyrocketing.

  “FINALLY!” You broke out, sprinting down the steps and over the driver side of it right as the man of the hour stepped out. He welcomed you with open arms and easily lifted your feet up of the ground.

  He looked just as good as he smelt. You’ve missed him more than words could describe in this past week— and Jungkook knew it. Of course, he had offered to take you with him so that you could finally meet his parents. But as predicted, you declined, saying that it’d be too much to meet his mother when the anniversary of your own’s death was approaching. 

  You continued to squeeze your arms around his neck for the next several seconds, and it wasn’t until he heard you sniffling and felt your shoulders shake that he realized you were crying. He couldn’t help but like that type of reaction. He was hoping the distance would torment you, maybe teach your ass a lesson.

  “Don’t cry,” he rumbled in your ear as he pressed you hard against his lower half,  making sure to up the intimacy of the embrace as he felt the eyes of the onlookers in the yard. 

He waited for a second before peering over at the officers, who were awkwardly standing beside their cars. He gave a wave, pretending as if he were sheepish about them having to witness this. 

  “How’s it goin, guys?” 

  “Fine, fine,” Hobi responded. “Don’t mind us. We’re just here to watch out for you guys.”

  “I appreciate that. Really.” He said in his best acting voice, even flashing a dimpled grin that gave off nothing but innocence as the two got into a patrol car, nodding to him in welcome. It actually makes things more convenient for him. They’ll be able to backup his whereabouts later on.

  He pondered this while returning his attention to you, coaxing you out of your emotional outburst.

  “I’m sorry. It’s just been so hard not having you here. Fuck, I’m so glad you’re back.” You breathed in and sighed out, and he could tell by the end of the last sentence that you were more-so talking to yourself, clinging to him one last time just to greedily soak in the physical presence of his body. He felt something ache in his heart, as well as his jeans. 

  “Well, I’m here now. Maybe next time, you’ll just go with me,” he lightly chided, hand coming up to pet your head as he kissed the top of it. 

  “Yeah.. I started regretting it after the first hour you left.” You whispered out, meeting his lips. You kissed each other a couple times, probably more than necessary. But it calmed you down and made you feel steady again. “Come on, I made you something to eat.” 

  He got his duffel bag out from the back seat and slung it over his shoulder before taking your hand,  following you inside. It boosted his ego knowing that the two men watching from the tinted windows of the car were secretly jealous of him. They had a thing for you. Almost every straight guy in highschool did. That’s why he never minded what you wore, and was more than happy to let you flaunt yourself to their eyes. He liked teasing others, knowing they’ll never have such a prize as you.

  Once inside, you were quick to relock your bolts. You were very strict about that now, taking extra precautions to prevent a potential attack. It kind of humored him knowing that it was him, a resident inside this very home itself, that those locks were meant to keep out. You’re literally locking yourself in with the killer.

  “Damn, you cleaned the hell out of this place.” He ogled, not only taking in the immaculacy but smelling the pinesol and bleach amongst the floors and counter tops. All the laundry was folded, not a speck of dust in sight. You even cleaned the grout amongst the kitchen flooring, it seemed. Nothing looked out of place. 

   “I had to do something to keep from wigging out,” you shrugged, walking over to start the microwave for him to heat up his dinner plate. He left his duffel bag by the door and grabbed himself a beer before sitting at the table, noticing it’s prestigious shine. 

  “Did you polish it?”

  “Yeah...” you said as you scratched the back of your neck, somehow embarrassed. 

  “It’s looks amazing in here, kitten. Really. I know you did it to cope but still, you did a damn good job.” He praised, feeling a little bad. He knows this took a lot of work, and it sucks that you opted to do all this just to keep the anxiety of his absence away.

  “Thank you,” you sighed, taking his plate out and sitting in down in front him, then handing him some utensils. 

“Where’s your plate?”

  “I already ate, silly. I’ll munch with you, though.” You began making yourself a salad as he began to eat, complimenting you on how good it was. He doesn’t know that you’ve been awake for two days straight, and that you’re still battling off an anxiety attack. You were expecting it to vanish now that he’s here, but the sleep deprivation was getting to you. 

  So, you decided to reminisce on better memories. The old days; back when you first met him.

  It was senior year of highschool, and he was the new transfer student from South Korea. He was the punk-emo guy that stood out amongst the crowd. All black clothing, more band shirts than anything. He had that messy mop-hair going on, and approximately 6 piercings on each ear, along with a studded labret to boot. 

  From day one, he was the most attractive guy you’ve ever laid eyes on.  Much to his exterior trope, he was anti-social and didn’t seem friendly at all. The only time you personally heard him speak for the first few months of school was when he’d answer the teacher for roll call. 

You only had one class together, chemistry. He’d always sit at the back of the classroom, and you’d remember the giddiness you’d feel just before walking into class and making eye contact with him, even for just a split second. You heart always skipped a beat and would threaten to seize up whenever Baley would lean over and tell you that he was looking at you again. Of course, that would be all the interaction you could get, being as you refused to engage any further. But life seemed to play out like a Wattpad fic back then. 

  Around the middle of first semester, your teacher was fed up with all the chatter amongst friends, so she decided to assign seats. Jungkook’s was still at his designated one, but you had to sit directly in front of him so that Taehyung could sit closer up, next to Baley. It’s also thanks to that class that the two of them fell for each other. It was also the same day she issued a partner-assignment that had to be done with the peer behind you. 

 You remembered having to play it cool, turning your desk and chair around to face him head-on for the first time ever. You anticipated that he’d still be sporting that ice-cold, disinterested glare, but he actually seemed pleased. He wasn’t actually smiling but he had a friendly glint in his eyes, like he welcomed you.

  “Hello,” he started off, naturally confident in himself.

  “Howdy,” you responded, immediately hating yourself. You’ve never uttered such a word in your life and you don’t know why the fuck you decided that that was the perfect moment to try it out. 

  He only snorted back at you, though, amusement swirling in his colorless eyes. You were intimidated by that as well. They were jett black. No distinction between his pupils and his irises. Just solid, black orbs boring into you.

  You then continued to battle with basic communication.  

“So, uhm.. wh—..” 

English, motherfucker! Do you speak it?!

“What parts do you wanna do?” You rushed out.

  “I’ll get the information together and answer the questions, as long as you create the PowerPoint and present it to the class,” he said without missing a beat, as if he’d already decided on that for the both of you. 

  “What criteria, though?” You asked, still waiting on that part. 

  “All of it...” He reiterated in a “duh” tone. 

  “That’s not fair to you, though...” you continued. 

  He arched an impressively sharp brow. “How?” 

  “You’re literally doing all the hard work.”

He shrugged, and you tried not to drool when you saw all his rings and the veins on his hands and fingers as he took his phone out. “I learned this shit back when I was freshman in South Korea. We’re way ahead of y’all there.” 

  “Oh.. well.. I can at least do the images and label them.” 

  Stop starring at his fingers.

  “Mm,” he hummed with a lack of conviction, still looking at his phone. “No offense, but no.”

  “Uhm.. okay..” you frowned in dejection, not sure how to respond to that. 

  “I said no offense,” he grinned up at you apologetically. “I just know you’re bad with visualizations.” 

  “What? I have an A in here. How do you even know that?”

  “The teacher got onto you for messing up the labels on the last test. You got all the functions right but failed to match them to their description.” He said without any hesitation, and you were just as stunned as you were embarrassed. But he didn’t seem to be insulting you, and even reassured you of it. “Again, no offense. I just think it’s best for the both of us if I do it.” 

  “Okay. Cool,” You agreed, deciding to let him have it. Your face still burned, though. 

  “You still have an important role, don’t worry. Presentation is worth 40%, so you’re still gonna have to put in work and present it accordingly.” 

  “I can do that.” You nodded, suddenly feeling like you were sitting before a full grown man rather than a teenage boy. You couldn’t help but ask: “How old are you?” 

  “19,” he mused, as if he knew what you were thinking. He didn’t even ask you why you asked, and instead returned his attention back to his phone screen. “You?”

  “18,” you muttered, your eyes reconnecting to his hands like magnets.

    You really wanted to compliment them but decided against it, being as you were no longer as confident with this situation. Sure, he deserves to know how beautiful his hands are but you’re weren’t going to be the one to say it. You were expecting a cheeky personality at most, just because it fits the mischievous bad boy bullshit you read about in teen fiction, but you were instead met with a blunt and mature persona that made you intimidated in a way that you’ve never experienced before. He almost seemed.. authoritative to you. 

  “I see you like my rings.” He smirked, eyes not even looking back up at you. You had spaced out whilst tracing the path of his veins again, and immediately cut your eyes down to your own phone, feigning innocence.

  “Whatchu mean?”

  “Everyone like my hands, for some reason. I see you’re no different.” 

  “I ain’t even looking at your hands. Maybe you’re just too conceded,” you shot back, leg nervously pouncing as he lifted his head up to peer at you. 

  “Really?” He sarcastically challenged, making your insides stir. He sat up straight and pulled his hands back under his desk. “So the gold rings didn’t even catch your eye?” 

  “Your rings are silver.” You said without even thinking, then straight up face-palmed when you caught yourself.

  “Thought so.” He openly grinned, and the little notion caused butterflies to erupt in your tummy. He pulled his phone back out and still wore that playful grin of his as you bashfully held his gaze. “Now, if you think you can manage to tell the truth, what’s your phone number?” 

    It’s amazing looking back at those memories, because you’re now starting to think that maybe Jungkook just knew back then that you two were going to hit it off. He’s always seemed so sure of himself when it came to you, always knew what the next move was gonna be and never once sent mixed signals or struggled to express how he felt towards you. He’s the most straightforward person you know, so much that it’s almost unnatural at times. If he was ever bluffing about anything outside of being playful, you’ve never been able to call it. 

  But damn, are you madly in love with him. You guess his ability to always remain focused and blunt is perfect for a person like you. He keeps you moving... well, for the most part. He wants you to move back to South Korea with him, and although you know you’ll eventually give in, you’ve been trying to hold off on it for as long as you can. 

 It won’t be as easy for you as it was for him. Jungkook was already fluent in English when he came here, thanks to his mother’s bilingualism. He hardly even had an accent from how well adjusted he was to your language. You, however, don’t know a bit of Korean. For you to go there, it would impair you in almost every single way. You won’t be able to go anywhere without him. You won’t be able to read directions or road signs. You won’t be able to go out and eat or order off the menu if there isn’t any pictures. You won’t be able to work. You’ll have to adapt to a whole new culture and way of communication, just to properly function outside of your home without him at your side. 

  Which, brings along another point, you’ll be without any friends. You don’t want to live in a world where you can’t go out with Taehyung and Baley whenever you wanted. You’ll be lonely as hell and home sick, he’ll be your only source of humanly contact until you learn.

  You’ve told yourself that if the two of you remain stable for one more year, then you’ll go. You are ready for a change, but if you could just get one more year of preparation, you’ll be ready to go. You’ll take that leap of faith with him. 

  “What is it, kitten?” He finally asked, the prolonged silence getting to him.

  “Nothing,” you lied, but didn’t want to divulge. “How was your trip?” 

  “Nice, but I was bummed out the whole time.” He shot you a look that made you pout in apology, but continued. “I talked all about you to them, showed them pictures. Almost fucked up and showed my cousin your vagina.” 

  You choked on your salad, which made him laugh. “I told you to put those in your hidden folder.”

  “There’s so many, I just haven’t taken the time to pick them all out. It’s okay though, they only saw your face. They all think very beautiful— especially my mom.”

  Your smile grew at that, “Yeah?” 

  “Yeah. So does my grandmother and my aunts. They were passing my phone around more than the dishes.” He snorted to himself, “They were even more surprised to see how much I smiled in our selfies. Which... I should warn you, when you do finally see my parents house, don’t be surprised when you spot our photo booth pictures framed in the hall. My mom went feral when she saw how much of a simp I was being in those.” 

  “She printed those out?!” You almost cried.

  “Yes, she did. She printed each one individually and framed them side-by-side.” 

  “Aw, Kookie. I should’ve just went. I’m so sorry.” You pouted, guilt causing your heart to sink.

“You weren’t ready, angel. They understood,” He assured you, leaning forward to take your hand in his. You suddenly wanted to cry again. 

  “But I promise to go next time. Or whenever you wanna take me. I swear, I’ll go.” You said in determination, and was a little thrown off by his reaction.

  His face went blank for a moment c like his brain needed a second to buffer. 

  “You will?” He inquired, that being the first time you’ve actually agreed or expressed any type of want. “Why now?”

  “Because it sounds like they really want to meet me, too? What’s wrong?” 

  “Nothing. That’s great. I just figured you wouldn’t be moved by that. You really wanna go now?”

  “Yeah. Your family sounds so nice.” 

  “Was that what kept you from coming?” He interrogated, and it’s clear that he genuinely had no faith in you ever entertaining the idea.. which was a little disheartening. You’ve never said you’d never want to go, you’ve always kept a window open for later. You not sure why he’s so surprised. 

  “No, not necessarily. I wasn’t ready to meet them but if they’re that excited to meet me, then.. of course it’ll make me want to meet them, too. And get a little taste of South Korea.” 

  “Alright, I’ll plan a trip,” he had to say with forced enthusiasm, which you bought as you kissed his lips. Inwardly, though, he was screaming. If all it fucking took was a little conviction by saying his family was nice, just to make you consider.. them maybe he wouldn’t have had to do what he just did. 

  Whatever. Extra insurance. He had to tell himself, and decided to retrain his thoughts back on you as he remembered something.

  “I have a special surprise for you.” 

  “Yeah?” 

  “Mhm,” he stood up and walked over to his duffel, fishing around before pulling something out. “Close your eyes.”

 You did as told, and waited about 10 seconds. 

“Open.”

You almost shit yourself upon hearing the voice, then came closer to shitting yourself when you took in the familiar Ghostface mask that you seen in the movie Scream.

  “WHUZZZUUHHH!” He drawled out while doing the cowabunga fingers, and you couldn’t help but laugh. 

  “Where the hell did you get that?”

  “Halloween store. I got it in Korea.”

   That was a lie. He’s had two of these masks for over two years, both of which he got from Party City here in America. He bought one to kill your mother in— the same one he just wore to kill your friends in— and the other one was meant for what he wanted to do now. He wanted to fuck you with it on. He’s not sure why, but why not? You might  discover you have a mask kink. 

  “What the fuck is up with the voice?” 

  “Sexy, ain’t it?” He animatronically purred out, and it wasn’t until he fully stepped forward and began undoing his belt that you realized he was already shirtless. 

  Your eyes grew wide as you landed back in your chair, unable to decipher if this was a joke or not. You soon realized it wasn’t as he was now popping his button loose and unzipping his pants— his hardening dick print becoming more prominent. 

  “You’re not fucking me with that mask on,” you blurted out, sticking your foot out to stop him from advancing any closer.

  “I’m fucking you with this mask on,” he argued, grabbing your ankle. “Consider it pay back for the time you refused to give me head unless I let you wear your Burger King crown.” 

  “No, Darth Vader.” You tried pulling your leg back but soon wound up almost getting drug out of your chair and onto the floor. Your unease soon turned into giggles and screams as wound up besting your play fight, his mask only coming off long enough to go down on you at the kitchen table. 

  And that’s what set the night off. You went from getting your pussy eaten at the dinner table to getting your throat wrecked on the living room couch. Then you were forced to watch yourself get rammed up against your body mirror in the bedroom, and now you’re bent up like a pretzel amongst your bed.

  “Ah— GAH!” You grunted in struggle, finding it hard to cuss like you wanted being as a hand was firmly constricting your air supply. You watched the masked man above you as he heatedly fucked into you, his chain dangling above your face. Your ankles helplessly swayed around his shoulders with each brutal slap of his pelvis. Your face still stung from the actual slaps of his palms, causing you to flinch any time his hands moved. You noticed done time throughout all this that he was hellbent on making you look at that damn mask. You weren’t complaining, though. Just more-so concerned about how hot it must be under there. 

  But then he slowed down for a moment, trying not to cum again as he lowered his face to yours, and finally decided it was time it come off, being as you were ready for a kiss.

  “T-Take that damn mask off—“ 

  Wrong move.

  He growled and ripped your hand away as you tried removing it yourself, and you were stunned by how much aggressive he became— more aggressive than he was already being, as if truly lashing out. He man-handled you, flipping you over and plunging back into you with way too much force. You yelped at the intrusion but could do nothing else as he pinned your hands behind your back, picking his speed right back up. He kept your hands locked in place with a single one of his own before clapping the other around your mouth, darkly chuckling at the fright on your face. 

  “I meant it when I said it’s staying on,” he rasped, pushing into you so deep that veins protruded from your neck in strain. 

  He couldn’t explain it— or maybe he could. But he felt extremely powerful when he wore this mask. It took him all of two rounds to finally admit to himself that it turned him on, knowing you were getting off to the very same face that your loved ones last looked at in sheer terror. He didn’t realize up until then that he somehow considered Ghostface as a different alternative to himself, one he was growing to like a little too much. It even made his dick more sensitive to the feel of you, making you seem tighter. And warmer. And sluttier.

  He’s sure he began speaking Latin somewhere in the midst, but it wasn’t until he saw tears surfacing in your eyes that it dawned on him that his hand had somehow traveled up to cover your nose, as well as your mouth. A moment of panic shot through him when he dropped it and allowed you to breathe, thinking you were gonna make him stop. But much to his pleasant surprise, you only coughed out and mewled, head collapsing on the pillow as you pushed against him, a silent demand keep going. So he did. He made sure to keep the punishing pace up and running. Your body violently jolted with each slam, ass bone aching at the brutal impact. Each thrust was felt like a punch to your cervix and someway or another, you were okay with it. 

 Little did he know, it was actually because you didn’t want any type of deja vu happening. He fucked you in all the ways you liked the night before you found out that your mother was slaughtered inside your childhood home. You didn’t want tonight to be anything like it. So you let him hurt you. 

  If only you knew history was going to repeat itself, no matter what the two of you did.

  It didn’t take but a few more strokes before he lost his ability to hold off, and emptied himself inside for the third time since he’s arrived back. 

  Once he did that, the blinds were illuminated in a dim grey, hinting at a sunrise. After a quick shower and clean up, the two of laid there, the mask finally gone. 

  “What are you thinking, baby?” Jungkook wondered, starring up at the ceiling. You haven’t said much of anything since that last bit. “Did I hurt you? Scare you?” 

  “No. I could take it.” You said, and it sounded genuine. But he still wanted to know what was on your mind. “I just don’t know what the hell I would do if I didn’t have you. You’re the only person I know that’s never even accidentally done wrong by me. You’ve been nothing but good.” 

  A void clouded his mind, emotional absence taking place of everything else. It’s a defense mechanism that he’s certain only comes up to block out any sense of guilt or remorse. He kept his gaze up at the ceiling, even as he felt you crane your neck back to look up at him. 

  “I love you, Kookie. Thank you for being here.” 

  “I love you too, baby,” he said numbly, those words being true... but his next words were not. “I could never imagine myself doing anything to hurt you.” 

  Being as he wasn’t planning on looking down, you crawled up for a moment just to kiss him, unbothered by the distant stare in his gaze. You then laid back down and got comfortable, readying yourself for a good days sleep.

  “I think it’s finally time I start seeking happiness again, instead of contentment.” 

  That’s when it hit him. You didn’t notice how his heart cleaned beneath your head, nor was there any way you could feel the tension in his gut. He can’t say he feels full remorseful for what he did, because that would require him sympathizing for the innocent lives he’s taken away, with no rational reason. He simply didn’t feel anything for them. He was only concerned your pain, especially knowing it was unnecessary now. His trip to Korea was enough to motivate you to move on and consider a change of scenery. You didn’t need any fear to drive you out, you just needed time. God only knows how far of a set back this will be now. The fact that you’re laying here, currently thinking that life will only go up from here, when he knows damn good and well it’ll be in shambles again before the day ends.. 

  He really needs to work on his impulses. Maybe homocide shouldn’t always be the first option he leans towards. It was just more fun that way.

  But moments like this weren’t fun at all. He remembers how grueling it was last year, waking up with you at the sound of the doorbell going off. He remembers the grim look on the sheriffs face as he told them that they found your mother, dead. It was his arms that had to pick you up off the floor as you crumbled down and screamed, his ears that rung as he held you, not knowing how to console you. For the last year, it’s been his shoulder you’ve cried on, his company keeping you sane, his reassurance telling you that everything was going to be okay.... When it was his hands that caused every single bit of grieve all along.. and was about to cause even more.

  So, he did the only thing he could do in that moment. He held you and mentally apologized, hoping that there was some way to telepathically tell you that you mean more to him than life itself, and that’s he’s so sorry for letting it drive him crazy at times. He’s still clinging to the original intention that you’ll say fuck it and flee with him, but he regrets going about it so recklessly. 

  You were fast asleep now, snoring even. He only hoped the discovery of the bodies would hold off long enough for you to get some much needed sleep. But it seems the universe was done working in his favor. 

  Those same, familiar knocks sounded off at the door, and he immediately ordered you to stay put as it woke you up.

  “Probably just them checking up. Go back to sleep.” He whispered, assertively pushing your head back down and pulling on some sweats before going to the door. 

  It was the sheriff, same look on his face as last year.

  “Sir?” Jungkook frowned, posing cluelessly. 

  The sheriff looked ghostly pale, like he was nauseated and on the verge of tears. Jungkook knew why but he had to act like it was a throw off. 

  “Sir..?” He repeated.

  “Y’all’s friends.. Baley and Taehyung were found this morning.” 

  He had to stall and blink, as if he wasn’t catching on to the implications. The sheriff reluctantly continued.

“Baley was found, dead on arrival. Looks like the killer has returned.” 

  “Wh-What?” Jungkook stuttered, acting like he was bewildered. The sheriff’s next words, however, would spark a more genuine reaction.

“And Taehyung was found unconscious, but still alive.”

  Jungkook’s veins ran colder than ever before, all mimicked emotions becoming sincere in that moment.

  “Someone attempted to cut his throat, but aimed too high and cut his under jaw instead.” 

Jungkook could only stare at the sheriff, probably just as pale in the face now. 

“He’s in critical condition. Doctors don’t know if he’ll make it just yet, but there’s a fighting chance that he might.”

[sombrasaiyan]

One | An Interview of a Lifetime

About the Fic

Table of Contents

Next Chapter

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷ BEAUTIFULLY SHAPED SNOWFLAKES FLOAT IN THE FROSTY AIR AS the coldness of the winter day only made this short girl shiver even more with nervousness and being cold. She always hated winter, especially since it brought up bad memories of her past. Her fated interview with the CEO of Ox-King corporations didn't start until an hour later, but knowing her and her bad luck, somehow she was going to be fucked by something invisible.

She pops open her dingy old red backpack she's had since junior high and pushes through her binder, books, and paperwork trying to find her notebook filled to the brim with her notes that was going to help her get through today. The long spiky ebony haired discussed with everyone in her small friend group to get down every possible question, scenario she might be put through, or absolutely anything was now jotted down and available in her notebook, and the boy who was her same age was laughing at the sight of her frantically skimming through her notes.

"Caulifla, calm down. You've gone through those darn notes like a hundred times already." He reminds her with rolled eyes underneath his sapphire colored sunglasses. "You're going to get this interview aced guaranteed." He declares, patting her shoulder a couple of times.

Caulifla casts a glare at him and crosses her arms, shrugging his hand off her shoulder. "Tarble, your ass better not be saying that cuz you're my friend." She then begins to read her notes from page one, carefully reading everything word for word.

The shorter haired spiky haired friend of hers defensively threw his hands in the air as he replies, "Look, Caulifla. I'm not saying this because I'm your friend. I'm saying this because I know it's true," He pulls out his phone upon it vibrating in his pocket as he reads his new text message from his older brother, asking about how the whole interview went with Caulifla. Of course his older brother simply assumed they left this early because the interview was around this time according to him. So, Tarble had to assure his brother that it wasn't time yet. "Besides, you got plenty of mock interviews from Vegeta who practically interviews people daily."

Caulifla huffs in frustration at his words as she clasps her hands on her face. "Ughh! I should've squeezed another one of those mock interviews in! It would be super duper helpful!" She whines.

Tarble nearly laughs, but shoves it down his throat to avoid getting punched. "Vegeta would be laughing his ass off right now because you're going bonkers." He then puts his hands on Caulifla and shakes her back and forth. "Quit worrying! You'll get the job!"

"Fine, fine, fine. Will ya hand me a breakfast sandwich already? I'm starving! And while you're at it, give me my orange juice already. It better not have any pulp in it." Caulifla says as she sits up in her car seat, tossing her notebook on top of her backpack so she doesn't messy it with stains.

"Yeah, yeah princess whatever you say." Tarble mutters as pulls out her order of two sausage egg and cheddar cheese breakfast sandwiches on an English muffin, two crispy warm hash browns, and her orange juice with no pulp.

Caulifla forcefully pulls her first sandwich away from Tarble and begins to peel the foil off of it as she keeps a glare on him. "Hey, you're not allowed to call me princess." She takes a bite out of her sandwich as Tarble opens up his sandwich, a bacon yellow egg and pepper jack cheese one.

"Oh goodness me! Forgive me Caulifla! I forgot only older men who you crush on are only allowed to call you that!" Tarble waves a hand in the air for effect. He takes a bite out of his sandwich as he adds, "So when are you going to confess to Vegeta that you have feelings for him, anyway? When you're eighteen and ready to lose your virginity to him?" Tarble nudges her as Caulifla almost gags on her breakfast sandwich and fiercely shook her head.

"You know I don't like Vegeta like that." She retaliates.

"Bullshit!" Tarble says loudly, causing Caulifla to flinch in her seat. "You're saying you don't like Vegeta like that, but who's the one who sent him those artsy craft Valentine's Day cards from the time he was in elementary school with us to when he was in junior high with us for a year! Who's the one that sent him sing-a-grams on Valentine's Day in high school? Who tried giving him a hundred bucks just cuz he graduated, when no one thought he would? Who would accept all the invitations to stay at the beach house in the summers just so she could secretly spend time with my brother? Who shared her first kiss with him and stayed a night alone with him in the beach house!" He points his sandwich at Caulifla accusingly.

With each and every words that escapes Tarble's lips, Caulifla could feel her face grow hot and no doubt the radish red glow had spread across her cheeks. "Alright, alright I get it. You've been keeping tabs on me, detective Tarble. But I'm not talking until I get my lawyer Cabba involved." She takes another bite of her sandwich as she really thought about it. Her feelings for Vegeta were still vibrant in her heart, but would they still be there by the time it was her birthday?

Today was finally the last day of Chi-Chi interviewing all of her potential candidates for her son Gohan. Aside from her work load, this minor inconvenience already added into her stress aside from the fact that her husband wouldn't get a job. Of course he wouldn't since he was sitting comfortably on a throne of cash all thanks to his wealthy wife and father-in-law. Since she had started hosting interviews, she laid off on the screaming sessions toward her husband and forced a wide wicked grin in his direction when he casually walked into her office with a sandwich in hand or some other food, asking her what she was up to.

It's not like he really cared, Chi-Chi knew he didn't even remember that she was looking for a babysitter for their child. No matter how much she reminded Goku he always seemingly forgot.

Chi-Chi's long black hair was draping down her back as she quickly lifts it up and attempts to pull it back in her usual bun, accompanied by a set of bangs that framed her face beautifully.

Soft footsteps approach her office, too light to be Goku's as cold sweat dreads across her body. She immediately stopped trying to make her hair into a bun as she stares ahead, hoping it wasn't the young girl here for her interview. Of course Goku would blindly let her in without letting Chi-Chi know!

"Don't worry, Chi-Chi! It's just me!" The indigo haired woman declares as she looks around the office, smiling at how sunlit it was due to the curtains being pulled back. She was always used to light bulbs lighting up Chi-Chi's office instead. The woman's dark eyes lower towards what laid in Chi-Chi's fist: a couple of black scrunchies, and maybe due to how nervous Chi-Chi was, she hadn't been able to properly do her hair. "Do you need my help?"

"Oh Launch, thank Kami it's you." The black haired woman sighs in relief, then nodding soon afterward. "Please, if you don't mind." To her words, the woman with bouncing long hair smiles as she quickly walks over and takes the scrunchies out of her soon to be sister-in-law's hand and begins to do a perfect bun for her.

"Are you really that nervous, Chi-Chi?" Launch teases with a giggle as she tightens the bun. "You shouldn't be, you should be relieved that this is the last interview and then you can choose to have the perfect nanny!"

"Ahh, thank you."  Chi-Chi lightly laughs, easing her own tension. "How are things coming along with your wedding planning?" Chi-Chi moves herself back to her desk, organizing for the millionth time all her pens, paper, loose paper clips and staple.

Launch reddens, closing her eyes as she couldn't wait to finally be married to Raditz. Her wedding was seven months away, but just thinking about it all just made her so happy and excited. "Oh! I haven't really started it yet, after all I still need a wedding planner." She winks at Chi-Chi's jaw drops quickly staring up at Launch with widened eyes.

"Are you saying what I think you're saying?!" Her open mouth turns up into a big smile with a pair of twinkling eyes to boot.

"Uh-Huh!" Launch nods happily. "Of course I'm asking you to be my wedding planner. You're the most organized, neat freak I know. If you want to be my wedding planner, it's open exclusively for you!"

Chi-Chi waltzes herself over to Launch and practically jumps into a hug. "Of course I'll be your wedding planner! I would love to plan your wedding!" The office is then filled with their squeals as the two dance around in their embrace.

Tarble parks a few feet away from the Ox Mansion as his jaw drops at how big the mansion was. He didn't believe that Goku getting married to Chi-Chi would land him such a big house! "Damn, maybe I should've gotten Chi-Chi pregnant." Tarble mumbles as Caulifla takes deep breaths one after another. This was it. This was her big moment to step in as the nanny of the CEO of Ox King Corporations. Well, almost. It was just the interview and that's why she had to ace it.

"Nasty pig, she's like four years older than you." Caulifla smacks his head before turning to look at Tarble in the eye. "This interview shouldn't take long, so don't you dare go down the street and look at all the fancy houses and local bakeries."

"Yeah, yeah sure. Unless you're not out here in twenty minutes I'm going to assume you already got the job and you're just changing diapers." Tarble says as Caulifla rolls her eyes.

"Fat chance!" She then unbuckles her seatbelt and throws it off of her, popping open her car door as she steps out. "I'll see you in a few, okay?" She closes her door.

"Good luck!" Tarble hollers before rolling up the passenger's window.

Caulifla takes deep breaths and carries on wearing her black dress clothes, brushing possible leaves that fell on her during the times she was outside as she approaches the grand golden gates to the house. She could see the house ahead alongside a couple of cars and a limo. Caulifla swallowed, imagining herself stepping into this place every day seemed unreal.

Taking her seventeenth deep breath of the day, she presses the button to make her presence known, a loud buzz follows soon after. Then the voice of a woman speaks on the small black speaker.

"Ox-King residence." She says in a stern yet raised tone.

"Hello! I'm Caulifla Sadala, here for my interview ma'am." She replies quickly.

"Ah! Caulifla Sadala, yes! Let me open up the gates to let you in." Replies the voice, which no doubt was Chi-Chi.

The gates creak with the sound of them being pried open as Caulifla quickly walks into the property. Her eyes roam around at the Ox statues, purple car and lime green car, the lush green grass and carnations frosted with ice, everything was so beautiful. She then walks careful steps up the marble stairs as she stands at the doors with intricate details and golden door knobs. Before Caulifla could attempt to pull it open, a woman with a soft smile answers, standing in front of her a few feet away.

"Ah, Caulifla. It's so nice to meet you, come in." says the woman with a nice hairdo and wearing a navy skirt that reaches her knees, a white blouse with frilly ruffles on it, and then a matching blazer to top it all off.

"Hello, Chi-Chi it's so nice to finally meet you too." Caulifla says with a big smile, her voice sounding so foreign to her. She then quickly follows Chi-Chi through the house, holding back from gazing upon it for fear she'd be distracted and lose her potential boss.

Chi-Chi stands before a door, opening it as she approaches her chicory colored desk, adorned with her office supplies and papers. "Come, take a seat." She gestures toward one of the chairs across from the desk as Caulifla hurriedly makes her way over and takes a seat, sitting up straight.

"Alright, for starters, where did you hear this job?" Chi-Chi looks up from her clipboard, eyes matched on Caulifla.

"Oh! I heard about this job from one of my closest friends, Vegeta! He's the son of Vegeta Sr., and owns a company." At the mention of Vegeta's name, Chi-Chi almost winces, but her eyes widen as her eyebrows arch up. Caulifla could've sworn she almost jumped in her seat but brushes it off and continues, "I used to babysit all the CEOs' kids and sometimes they'd keep in contact with me so I can babysit personally for them."

Chi-Chi nods in approval, writing this down in her notes, recalling the references on Caulifla's application. "And what was that like?" She asks.

"A bit disastrous at times, I'll admit. Since most of them are pampered, they expect me to give them free candy or toys or comply with them . . ." Caulifla pauses to think, and to properly say her words so she wouldn't potentially swear. "But, since I don't really like bratty kids, I don't soften or sugar coat stuff for them. I treat them just like they act—like childish brats. After they got babysat by me so often, they already knew what I expected, well behaved manners, speak when allowed, of course they're allowed to have fun and scream and stuff but they have to follow the rules their parents enforce."

Chi-Chi writes all the words she could, nodding at everything Caulifla said. After she was done writing, she looks up from her notes. "Okay, do you have any thing in your schedule like a job, school, or activities?"

Caulifla had to go through her head to remember if she even had anything on her schedule. She was on winter break right now, so she didn't have to go back to school until January. No jobs since last year, and frankly that's it, she couldn't think of anything that would intervene with babysitting Gohan. Unless . . . She ended up letting herself get strung up in a sexual relationship with Vegeta then that could possibly take up her time, but Caulifla wasn't about to say that to Chi-Chi.

"Ah, well as of right now no. I'm on winter break until January third and will be graduating from high school this June." Caulifla answers, smiling at the woman.

After many more questions and what seemed like forever, the interview was finally over. Caulifla stood up from her seat and maneuvers herself around Chi-Chi's desk to shake her hand. Chi-Chi takes her hand and shakes it a couple times.

"I'll contact you by phone for further consideration. It was a pleasure to meet you Caulifla."

"Thank you, it was a pleasure to meet you too, Chi-Chi."

[candycityy]

Some (established relationship) Rivetra birthday crack/fluff, ft. awkward!Levi, because I can.

Levi sucks at giving gifts.

Maybe it's just the fact that he's awkward as fuck, but the notion of having to find something nice for another person fills him with equal parts dread and exhaustion. Honestly, how would he know what they'd want, anyway? He'd much rather just shove a couple of coins in their direction and call it a day.

The whole concept of gifts had been a culture shock to him, after leaving the Underground—not that he didn't understand what it meant to get someone something, but just the whole song and dance about it, of how every even remotely special occasion called for a gift of some sort. The first time he'd heard of it, a squadmate was asking him to contribute something to Erwin's promotion hamper, and he'd almost snorted, assuming it was a joke; the fucker had just been promoted to Commander of the Survey Corps, honestly, wasn't that gift enough?

Fortunately, his squad knows better than to ask him to contribute things; they just ask for money whenever they're doing a group gift, which he's happy enough to part with. And with matters outside the squad, well...he still doesn't really get why people thing he's so fucking terrifying, but in this, at least, he's happy to be excluded.

Well, until now. Unlike him, Petra actually does enjoy gifts; she's one of those crazy people who likes giving them, who handwrites cards and wraps presents in nice paper and glittery ribbons (another thing he doesn't get. He's supposed to spend time and money on wrapping paper that's just going to get torn into shreds?) and somehow, considering how they're dating and all, he doubts she'd be content with his usual fare of a few coins and a curt happy birthday over breakfast.

He briefly considers staging a training accident; surely, she wouldn't expect a gift from him if he were in the med bay recovering from a debilitating but non-life-threatening injury?

"Aha," Hanji says, briefly pausing in her monologue about Titan reproduction (he hadn't been listening in the slightest, but that's never been a deterrent) to point her spoon dangerously close to his face. "I recognise that look. You're thinking again, aren't you."

"None of your business." He pokes morosely at his dinner, and misses. The tines of his fork strike the porcelain with a rather unpleasant metallic screech that makes them both wince.

"It's not a good look on you, you know," she comments, shovelling a fragment of potato into her mouth as Levi watches with barely veiled disgust. "Thinking. You're much better off playing the role of the macho action hero, all brawn and no brain—"

"I will stab you with this butter knife," he threatens, with a kind of despondent savagery. The woman just leans on her elbow and waits, perfectly unruffled.

He chews, swallows, and after a long pause, finally admits, "Petra's birthday is coming up."

"And you're thinking about what to get her?" Hanji smirks. "Sweet."

"I'm thinking about why surface-dwellers have so much time and energy to bother with stupid things like gifts," he grumbles, spearing a chunk of broccoli with more aggression than strictly necessary.

"Well, they're a welcome distraction from the terrors of daily life, don't you think?" She pushes her goggles up her nose with a kind of practiced impatience, and continues, "I think...Petra probably would want something heartfelt. You know, something you wouldn't give to anyone else."

"I wouldn't give anyone anything, from the start."

"You know what I mean." Hanji rolls her eyes. "The gift's gotta make her feel special. Maybe something with a sort of significance, or meaning, or...oh! Something handmade? How good are you with handicrafts?" She eyes him, looking rather less hopeful than he'd like. It rankles him.

"I'm pretty good at carving," he snaps. Hanji brightens.

"Ooh. Wood?"

"Flesh." He shovels the rest of the stew into his mouth, ignoring her snort of indignation, and stands up. "Don't choke on your food, Four-Eyes."

==

In his time in the Underground, he'd learnt precisely two things about food: one, to defend it with your life, and two, if you chuck a bunch of ingredients into a pot and apply heat, you can call it a casserole, which is a fancy-sounding name for something that barely counts as a dish at all.

Furlan, being unable to cook for his life, had been put on permanent ingredient-gathering duty (read: theft) instead. Isabel, on the other hand, had an irritating tendency to get distracted, disappear off to fuck-knows-where with the food still on the stove, and promptly forget all about it. By the process of elimination, Levi had took over most of the cooking.

Being easy, flexible, and requiring very little attention, casserole had quickly become his signature dish. And yeah, he wouldn't call himself good by any means, but as far as he's concerned, no-one'd ever gotten food poisoning from a dish he'd made, which he counts a win.

Still, he figures that not poisoning anyone is a pretty low bar to set for a birthday dinner for his girlfriend.

For the eleventh time since entering the store, Levi wonders if he should just forget it. Get her some bauble or trinket, that glittery shit that girls always like. But against his will, Hanji's irritating voice drones in his head: something heartfelt. Something you wouldn't give to anyone else.

Levi scowls darkly at a shelf of cheese. "What the fuck's the difference between cheddar and mozzarella, anyway?" he mutters to himself, before giving up and shoving both into his basket.

He continues wandering through the store, grabbing whatever he thinks will go well together. He barely glances at the price tags as he goes, too distracted by his thoughts—does she like chickpeas? Or was it lentils? Are those different?

(Of course, he pays for his inattention dearly, when the cashier coolly informs him of his total and he almost chokes. Well, he really should've known; the storekeeper in the Underground always did seem to loathe them with an aggressive vengeance.)

==

Carrots—potatoes—beef. Levi measures out the ingredients carefully and scoops them into the pot, eyeing the stew bubbling cheerfully over on the stove, and allows himself a brief moment of smugness.

He's outdone himself, even if he says so himself. Everything's been planned, down to the last detail. In the morning, he'd presented Petra with a new fountain pen, a perfect decoy gift, especially since she'd mentioned earlier how she'd been needing one. He hadn't missed the flash of disappointment in her eyes—shitty Four-Eyes had been right for once, he supposes—but she'd schooled her expression into one of appropriate delight quickly enough, and exclaimed over it as necessary, and he'd known she'd fallen for it hook, line, and sinker.

He's even timed this whole dinner thing perfectly, getting the guys to keep her back for a bit after training (which they'd agreed to, albeit with some snickering) so he could prep for the meal. She'd be in the showers now, he guesses; and now, with the brick oven all heated up and the dish nicely in place, he probably has about twenty, thirty minutes before the next step of the plan, when he'll go to retrieve her from her room under some pretense or another, lead her to the dining hall, and—

"Levi? What's going on?" Petra rubs her eyes, strolling into the room and and sniffing the air curiously. "Are you—are you cooking?"

What the fuck.

"Petra." He tries his best to block the stove, desperately searching for a way out. "You're back early. This is, uh...an experiment. For Hanji. It could blow up any second, so off you go now."

Petra does not oblige. Her eyes narrow, and she tries to peek around him. "Your experiment is stew?"

"It's not stew, it's...Titan bait," he improvises wildly, making her brows lift in disbelief. "Seriously, Petra. Go away." His eyes dart to the wall clock; he needs about fifteen more minutes, at least. "Didn't Eld...didn't the guys ask you to stay for a bit?"

She shrugs, still craning her neck to try to see the contents of the kitchen counter. There's a hint of a grin on her face now. "Auruo was bragging again about something-or-the-other, and bit his tongue, and I slipped away in the commotion. Levi, is that cake?"

"I told you, it's Titan bait. Now get out, that's an order." He tries to keep his tone cold and steely, a feat which is proving much more challenging than usual with his very pretty, very annoying girlfriend standing on tiptoe, trying her best to peek over his shoulder.

Judging by her expression of keen amusement, he fails quite spectacularly.

"Levi," his irrepressible subordinate goes, her eyes gleaming, "your cake—sorry, Titan bait—says 'Happy Birthday, Petra'."

With a frustrated exhale, he gives up trying to block her, and slumps back to the kitchen counter. Petra waits, tapping her foot, still looking thoroughly amused. Her hair is still damp from the showers, he notices. But despite the fact that she has a towel around her neck and is dressed in a ratty old t-shirt and a pair of sweatpants—her standard evening attire—his breath catches in his throat. She's beautiful.

"Okay, fine," he grumbles, tearing his gaze away. "I'm cooking. It's for you. Happy birthday. You're still a brat."

She laughs, and the sound makes his lips pull into a reluctant smile, too. "I never took you for the domestic type, captain," she teases, leaning into him and winding her arms around his back. "Stew? But didn't you already give me a gift, though?"

"Casserole," he corrects. "It sounds fancier. And that was a decoy—this was supposed to be a surprise. I mean, I thought...since it's the first time you're having a birthday, well. With us, like. Together." He clears his throat, and silently wills himself not to do anything stupid and embarrassing, like—Walls forbid—blush. "Remind me to have a talk with Auruo, will you."

"Well, count me surprised," she says, leaning in and grinning up at him.

He rolls his eyes.

"Anyway. Since you're here so early," he goes, gazing at her with a look of utmost seriousness, "here. You can help to chop the onions."

Petra blinks, indignant. "Seriously?"

"Nah, I'm kidding. That's for ruining my surprise, you brat."

==

"...Levi?"

"Yeah?"

"Thanks."

"Happy birthday, Petra."

[neerasrealm]

Smoke Break

In which Jeff the killer gets some subway. And also some violent urges. Just a short fic because I started thinking about Jeff and the timespace between his origin story and him showing up at Slender Mansion. TW for violence and murder Word count: 1630

The sound of rain was typically considered a comfort to people. A gentle noise that beat on the pavement in a steady, calming rhythm. The rain drenched the streets and houses, making the world dark, yet the water glistened in the little light that came from headlights and windows. The golden glow from the windows he passed by seemed to cover him in a false warmth. The light should have illuminated a boy who was calm, content with life even as he walked through the rain, but it instead showed a scarred and burnt face with sunken eyes that looked around suspiciously. His mouth was pulled down into a frown, despite the smile carved into his cheeks.

The rain didn’t comfort him. It made his headache feel worse. He grit his teeth for a few moments before loosening his jaw again. He slid his hands into the pocket of his stained, white hoodie and looked up around him as he walked through the rain. He shivered, feeling soaked to the bone. His stomach growled and he looked up, his eyes landing on another glowing window front. 

Subway. Eat fresh. Jeff ran his tongue over his lips and walked quickly over to the door to the small restaurant. He pulled his bandana up over his mouth, then stepped inside, pausing for a moment. He registered the ding over the door as he entered. It was warm in here, and bright. Quiet. Dark hair hung over his face, obscuring most of his vision. He stood there, soaking in the warmth until a noise came from the other end of the restaurant.

‘’Hey, you okay there?’’

A male voice. He looked up, peering at the singular employee through wet hair. He walked away from the door, toward the counter. He could smell food in the air and it made his stomach growl. Peppers and onions and cheese, mixed with the smell of bread. He looked up at the employee. ‘’Evening.’’ he grunted. 

The employee, who seemed to be named Matt going by his name tag, smiled in greeting. ‘’Good evening,’’ he replied. ‘’Can I get you anything?’’

‘’Uhh...yeah…’’ he paused for a moment, scrunching up his nose. The pounding in his head had started getting worse the moment he stepped inside, but he tried to ignore it. ‘’Can I get…’’ he pursed his lips for a moment, his vision blurring for a second. ‘’A chicken sub with cheddar, jalapenos and some barbecue sauce��?’’ he shook his head. God, his throat felt dry, and his voice sounded like shit. ‘’And some water.’’ 

The employee nodded. ‘’You want that toasted?’’

‘’Yeah, yeah.’’ he looked around the place. It was empty, save for him. No other customers. He looked up at the employee. ‘’You working alone tonight?’’

‘’Nah, nah,’’ Matt replied calmly. He adjusted the glasses on his face. Square lenses. They reminded Jeff of his brother. ‘’My coworker’s out back. Taking a smoke break.’’ he gave Jeff a small smile before finishing the sub. He put it in the oven, then grabbed a water bottle from the fridge. He put it on the counter and typed a few things into the cash register. ‘’That’ll be $4.50.’’ 

Jeff pulled his hand out of his jacket and put a five dollar bill on the counter. He took the water eagerly, squeezing it quietly in his shaking hand. Shaking...he hated when his hands shook. It was a bad sign. He grit his teeth until he was given his change and receipt. He turned and walked over to one of the small tables, sitting with his back to the employee. He opened the water bottle eagerly and drank down about half of it. It was cold, and he could feel it sliding down his throat and into an empty stomach that growled hungrily. He winced. 

‘’Just get the food and leave.’’ he told himself. ‘’Eat and go.’’

‘’Your order’s done.’’ Matt called behind him. Jeff pulled up his bandana again and walked over to the counter, taking the sandwich. The employee tilted his head, seemingly noticing that Jeff was shaking. ‘’You okay, sir? You look a little...pale.’’

Jeff shook his head. ‘’I’m fine. Just a late night weirdo.’’ he replied. The employee laughed a bit and nodded.

‘’If you say so.’’ he shook his head in amusement. Jeff smiled under his mask and turned, sitting with his back to the counter. He unwrapped his sandwich and took a bite. Then another. The food made his stomach growl painfully, but it also made him feel better. Even though the trembling was getting worse. 

Ringing. His ears were ringing again, making him grit his teeth and suppress a whine. The ringing was almost the worst part. The high pitched noise made him flinch. He was always sensitive to noise, and this didn’t help. The noise suddenly spiked like a screeching in his ear and he smacked a palm flat onto the table. He froze, his body twitching, leg bouncing in anxiety.

‘’You okay?’’

He didn’t reply, just squeezed his eyes shut and grinded his molars together. He heard footsteps approaching him from behind. ‘’Run, run, run, run away.’’ he wanted to say but his mouth wouldn’t open. Like it was stitched shut. He felt Matt’s hand on his shoulder and he flinched, nearly screaming at the touch. 

‘’Hey, you alright?’’ Matt leaned closer, trying to look at his face, obscured by wispy black hair. Jeff trembled. 

Whispers filled his ears. ‘’Weak’’, ‘’coward’’, ‘’disappointment’’, ‘’hopeless’’. He slapped his hands over his ears, screwing his eyes shut and whining. ‘’You’re a monster. A freak. Get the gun get the gun get the gun-’’ teeth bit down on lips hard enough to bleed. ‘’Hold him down, hold him down! Gimme the knife, Keith!’’ 

He slowly dragged his head up, the voices filling his head like a symphony that sung only his own traumas. He inhaled sharply, taking steady breaths, trying to calm himself. ‘’Are you okay?’’ Matt asked again. Mismatched eyes flicked to him, glinting in the light. He saw the employee flinch, finally seeing the burns and scars on his pale face. ‘’C-Can I help you…?’’

Jeff stared at him for a moment then slowly stood up. His hand slid down his side, feeling the outline of the knife handle hidden in the waist of his jeans. ‘’...yeah…’’ his voice was soft. ‘’Yeah you can help me…’’ he stepped toward Matt, who backed away cautiously. Jeff glanced at the table behind the employee, mentally planning his actions. He suddenly lunged forward, grabbing Matt by his shirt and shoving him against the table. He yelped, eyes wide and full of panic as he stared down at Jeff. 

‘’P-please man I-!’’

‘’Shhh…’’ he hated when they pleaded. He gulped, swallowing down his nerves. ‘’Just...let me…get it out…’’ his voice dropped, feeble and shaky. Barely a whisper. He slid the knife out of his waistband, holding it up. Matt whimpered and thrashed. He was close to a foot taller than Jeff, and much less skinny than him, yet he couldn’t get the boy off of him. He tried to scream, but the moment his mouth opened a bundle of dirty cloth was shoved into his mouth. ‘’Just be quiet. I...I hate the screams…’’ Jeff shook his head. Matt whimpered, a tear escaping his eye. Jeff took a deep breath and drew the knife back. Then he lunged again. With a muffled shriek from Matt, the blade buried deep into his gut. Jeff drew it back and stabbed again. And again. And again. He counted the stabs in his head. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Seven. He always felt obligated to stop at seven. 

The blade dripped with blood as Jeff released his victim. Too in pain and too weak to scream, the cloth fell from Matt’s mouth. Yet he still tried to escape. He stumbled, collapsing against the glass case on the counter. Jeff calmly padded over to him. He raised the knife and stabbed again. Seven more gashes. This time he dragged the blade, leaving long cuts down the man’s back. Matt whimpered and slid to the ground, sobbing feebly. Crimson pooled around him. Jeff knelt down to him and rolled him over. He took off his glasses, looking at them for a moment. He breathed on the lenses, then cleaned them off with the hem of his shirt. He placed them down on Matt’s chest, then put the blade to his throat. 

‘’I’m sorry.’’

A slice, and the subway employee was gurgling blood. Another two minutes and he was unconscious, waiting for death. Jeff knelt over him, taking calm, even breaths. The ringing was gone, the voices had disappeared. The throbbing in his head had stopped, letting him relax and think straight. The smell of blood filled his nose, and somehow it was a comfort. Comfort, comfort...it was only temporary. The calm faded away in minutes, replaced with the typical racing thoughts. ‘’Oh god I just killed someone.’’, ‘’Why did I do that?’’, ‘’There’s blood on my hands.’’, ‘’I’m a monster.’’

He gulped. The guilt, the guilt...there was only one way to get rid of it. He tossed his leg over the body, straddling Matt. He guided his knife down and sliced along the man’s cheeks, leaving two long gashes in his face. A glasgow smile, just like the one on his own face. ‘’That’s it…’’ he whispered. ‘’Smile...you’re...happy…’’ he swallowed thickly, feeling sobs threaten to escape him. He registered one rolling down his cheek and he abruptly stood up. He shoved the bloody knife into his waistband and grabbed his water, chugging it before dropping the empty bottle. He snatched up his sandwich and walked out into the storming rain. Absently, he wondered when Matt’s co-worker would finish their smoke break.

[sonicgetsrawed]

Sharp Cheddar

A modern Varian x Hugo one shot!!! The cheese is relevant in this one!! I’m putting it under the cut cause it got pretty long! Enjoy!!!

Hugo draped his arm across his face, trying to block out the sun that streamed in from the window. He was normally a morning person but he had submitted his last project for the semester and thought he deserved to sleep in a little bit. He rolled over, fully intending to pull his boyfriend into his arms only to be met with an empty bed. He groaned sitting up and shoving his glasses onto his face. A deep frown settled into his features noticing that Varian’s side was still made up. He shook his head, the idiot probably fell asleep in their lab again. He kicked the blankets off with the sole goal of dragging Varian to bed and ordering in. The semester had been stressful for both of them. Quite frankly he was surprised their relationship survived. Their relationship had been fairly new at the start of the semester, having been in the same dorm room the previous. They had been at each other’s throats then, until one particularly explosive argument ended in an equally explosive make out session. From there they started an actual relationship deciding to move in together off campus. Varian had insisted on getting a two bedroom apartment, claiming that he would be sleeping in his own room. That lasted two weeks and now the second bedroom was used as a lab space now, so it wasn’t a total loss. And they worked on opposite schedules so they both had time in the lab. They had learned very quickly that working together would lead to arguments, and that almost led to breaking up. Although once the fight was resolved it led to making up, which he quite enjoyed. But they had been doing too much of that lately, he was looking forward to having a relaxing few weeks of peace as they prepared for the next semester.

He padded across the room, not bothering to check his phone, the only person he wanted to talk to was in the same place as him anyways. He opened the door, surprised to see Varian in the kitchen. He had his back turned to him, various sand which ingredients spread about on their island.

“Love you too, Dad. Okay, I will. Bye.” Varian said, hanging up his phone and slamming it onto the counter next to him. His shoulders were hunched up to his ears and Hugo kissed any ideas of having a relaxing day goodbye. Varian’s dad was another major source of their arguments. He did not approve of their relationship in the slightest, always saying that Varian deserved better, could do better. Was he right? Absolutely, but he had a habit of taking things he didn’t deserve and he had no intentions of letting Varian go without a fight.

He made his way over to the smaller male. He still might be able to salvage this. He wrapped his arms around his middle, placing a kiss to Varian’s cheek and trailing down to his shoulder. “Good morning.” He was testing the waters, trying to gauge where Varian’s mindset was at. He was always on edge whenever he spoke to his dad.

“It’s afternoon. You slept in.” Varian said simply, only relaxing slightly in his touch.

“I know.” He replied, although he really hadn’t expected to sleep in that long. “Did you sleep at all?” Despite keeping his tone light, Varian shot him a warning glare over his shoulder. Hugo sighed as Varian escaped his grip, pulling a butter knife from the drawer. He pushed himself onto the island, watching with concern as Varian put the sand which together a little too roughly. “What did he say this time?”

Varian slammed the knife down on the table, bangs covering his eyes as he hunched over the counter. “Same thing as last time. Same thing as every time. I just can’t do this anymore, Hugh.”

He wanted to pull Varian into his arms, rub soothing circles on his back, and let him cry his eyes out. Instead he got defensive, he wasn’t even sure why. Maybe it was the fear that he might actually lose Varian this time. “Do what, exactly?”

“This! The fighting with you and my dad! It needs to stop.” Varian yelled, looking up at him with desperate, pleading eyes.

“Okay. Then tell him! This isn’t my fault. I’ve tried talking to him but he doesn’t want to hear it. You can’t blame me for this!” Hugo argued, letting his anger cloud his judgement.

“I-I’m not-“ Varian started, frustrated tears welling in his eyes.

“Yes, you are! You always get like this when you talk to him! You-you let him brainwash you!”

“He doesn’t brainwash me! Do you hear how ridiculous you sound?!”

Hugo had a retort ready on his tongue. It died when Varian deflated, tears falling in steady drops. He hated when Varian cried and it absolutely broke his heart when he was the one that caused it. “Var-“ He tried reaching out.

Varian backed away, out of his reach. “Maybe he was right. Maybe we moved to fast. I don’t even know what kind of cheese you like!”

“Cheese? What does that matter? I lo-“ He couldn’t bring himself to finish his sentence, they hadn’t said those words yet and he didn’t want to say it like this. Not as a cop out in an argument, Varian deserved better than that, he was better than that.

“It matters because I feel like I don’t know you. I feel like you don’t know me. I don’t want him to be right, but I’m tired. I’m so tired, Hugo.” Hugo reached out again, desperate to keep Varian here, to keep him in his arms, but he slipped through his fingers like everything else that was good in his life. He didn’t know how long he sat there with the forgotten sandwich ingredients, eventually he had pulled himself together enough to move from his location. He wiped away a few of his stray tears. He wouldn’t accept defeat this easily. He would show Varian that they did know each other, and while his pride was his downfall he swallowed it and shot a quick text message to a number he didn’t even bother to save into his phone. It didn’t take long for him to get a reply. He quickly changed and jotted a quick note to Varian in case he came looking for him. Thankfully the meeting place wasn’t too far from his apartment.

He had to remind himself constantly that he was doing this for Varian to prevent himself from bolting from the pastel colored cat cafe. The blonde girl in front of him smiled kindly at the employee that handed her her drink and pastry. The foam cat on top of her coffee glaring into his soul, mocking him, with those beady foam eyes. His staring contest with the foam animal didn’t last long as Rapunzel dipped a piece of her pastry into the coffee, wiping the animal from existence.

“I’m so glad you wanted to meet up.” She said, a bit too cheerily for his liking.

“It’s not like I had a choice. I don’t have anyone to talk to about this.” Hugo responded, finally meeting her eyes. Normally he wouldn’t admit such a thing but he was feeling unusually vulnerable after the fight.

“Right, sorry.” She popped another piece of pastry into her mouth, taking a sip of her drink before continuing. “What happened this time?”

“We had another fight. He wants me to talk to Quirin.” He spat the name out. He had never gotten along with Varian’s dad no matter how hard he tried.

“So talk to him. If Varian sees you’re trying to fix things he’ll be satisfied. All he wants is for you to try.” Rapunzel explained as if it were the easiest thing in the world.

“It’s not that simple.” She raised an eyebrow, waiting for him to continue. “Var thinks we don’t know each other.”

“Then show him you do.” She replied, eyes narrowed with a fire he had only seen a handful of times. It’s what made Rapunzel more bearable than the rest of Varian’s friends, her unwillingness to back down or give up on anything or anyone.

“How?” He asked, slumping forward in his chair, suddenly glad for their setting. No one he knew would dare set foot in this establishment and see the mess he was.

“You know, Eugene would probably suggest doing some big romantic gesture, but it’s all about the little things. The cupcakes he brings me when I’m sad, the extra paints he surprises me with on his way home from work, waking up early to get me coffee before I go into work. You know, things like that. They show you really care and know a person. Those mean more to me than any big gesture ever could.” Rapunzel explained, smiling as she lost herself in her memories.

“So bring him a cupcake?” Hugo asked, pushing his glasses further up his nose.

“No. You have to tailor it to you two. If you copy us it’ll just be an empty gesture. It has to come from the heart.” Rapunzel still had that stupid smile on her face, but he got the message. He stood an idea striking him.

“Uh, thanks, I guess.” He said as an afterthought as he headed out the door, not sticking around to hear her excited squeal.

It was dark by the time he returned to the apartment, various bags in his arms. He struggled to get the key into the lock and get the door open but he eventually got it. It was dark inside, which meant that Varian was likely still in the lab. He placed the bags on the counter and switched on the lights, eyes going wide at the sight that met him. The room had a giant blanket and pillow fort in front of their TV, lights strung from the ceiling, but Varian was nowhere to be found. He smiled softly to himself, setting up his horde of food in the middle of the fort. He couldn’t believe that someone would go through so much effort for him. He didn’t get much done before the door opened again. He pulled Varian inside before he could even properly process that he was there, pressing him against the closed door and kissing him like his life depended on it.

He reluctantly pulled away. “You did all this for me?”

Varian nodded, still trying to catch his breath. “Yeah. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have taken out my anger on you. I-I know that this doesn’t make up for the things I said, but I hope it’s a start.”

“I’m sorry too. You had a point about not knowing each other.” Hugo admitted, leading Varian to the fort. “So, I wanted to prove you wrong. It’s different food from all your favorite places.”

Varian made his way around the feast. “You got gyros?” Hugo nodded. “But you hate them!”

“But you don’t.” He said as way of explanation. “And.....” He shoved another tray into Varian’s hands.

“A cheese platter?” Varian raised an eyebrow, biting his lip in a way that sent his heart fluttering.

“Yup. I realized I don’t know what kind of cheese you like either. So, we’re going to try them all.”

Varian beamed before lighting up as if he just realized something. He dug around in the bag he hadn’t noticed before and pulled something out, placing it in his hands. “Do you have any idea how hard this was to track down?”

“Is this?” He asked staring in awe at the small blue toy car in his hand.

“Yeah. You said you always wanted one. It’s a little banged up, but we can repai-“ Hugo claimed Varian’s lips once again, relishing on how the other melted against him.

“It’s perfect. I love it.” He hesitated before deciding to speak his feelings. “I love you. I love you, Varian.”

“I love you too. I-I love you so much. I’ll talk to my dad tomorrow. We’ll work this out.” Varian responded.

“There’s no need. I already asked him to meet me tomorrow.” Hugo said.

Varian’s eyes lit up. “What did I ever do to deserve you? I love you.” Varian laughed, the sound like music to his ears. “I could say that forever. I love you.”

Hugo laughed this time, the sound quickly swallowed by Varian tackling him to the ground lips pressed against his the entire way down.

[split-n-splice]

woops...another short chapter. Next is longer, promise.

[Chapter Guide | FFn | Ao3]

33. Aura of Others – 6

Soon enough, the beeping of the alarm clock that didn’t belong to her woke her. Even if she’d wanted to wake up, fighting off sleep when someone hit the blessed snooze button was impossible given the sleep aid still in her system. She groaned wretchedly when the beeping sounded off again, and blearily hoped hearing it wouldn’t become the norm. She didn’t mind the bed or the poofy bedding or anything else – but that clock could go to hell.

Shego pulled herself up onto the mount of pillows and collapsed before she could reach the accursed clock to mangle it. It was Saturday. She didn’t have to wake up at any set time on a Saturday. If Drakken wanted to, that was great. But he wasn’t going to get her up with a mere grouchy order to do so and a shake of her shoulder.

He was given the middle finger in reply – enough to let him know she was aware of his attempt to wake her, and enough to let him know she wasn’t ready to be woken.

The mattress shifted. And shifted again. And – he was bouncing. The imbecile madman was bouncing next to her, like a petulant twerp trying to get her up for the day, bouncing on his knees and disjointedly enunciating her name to make sleep definitely impossible.

“Knock it off, Wes—Will— Drakken!” she snarled and grabbed one of the numerous pillows to strike him with. The force plowed him sideways.

Just as she turned to glare in his direction, the gesture was returned, thwapping her upside the head. Hand snapping out in reflex, she caught the pillow, feeling the fabric rip. It certainly did the trick to wake her.

When the surprise wore off a split-second later, she shot daggers up at Drakken. His eyes flew wide and he released the gutted pillow and threw his hands up as he realized he’d made a grave mistake by hitting her back, even as harmless as it was. He sprang back as she lunged at him. She wasn’t sure what she was going for – his throat to wring his neck? – but she’d underestimated the size of the bed and felt stupid crawling after him instead. She managed to give him a shove though, only to come toppling off the edge of the bed gracelessly with him.

Drakken let out a squeal. She’d heard the shrill sound before, but it was especially startling when his eyes bugged behind his glasses and he curled up with her fingers still dug into his sides, his knee catching her in the stomach. Tangled in the sheets drug with them, she pushed against him in a scrambling effort to break free, but each inadvertent poke and prod drew a strangled laugh or squeak from him.

Perturbed, Shego deliberately reached under an arm before she could convince herself she didn’t want to go there.

Sure enough, he jerked and writhed and sucked in air and swore at her, “Dammit – Shego – stop it! I’ve got a pounding headache.” His smile was more of a grimace as she snuck in another probing tip-tap along his side, and his arms clamped down tight. She could believe the headache part. He may have laughed, but he didn’t look like he found the experience particularly enjoyable. Still, it was hard to believe what she was seeing.

“You can’t seriously be ticklish,” she criticized, kneeling over him.

Drakken gasped for air, still wincing against his hangover. “I’m not,” he practically wined in defense. “Not usually. I-I mean. You’re not?” She didn’t have to answer that. He was only trying to shift the subject away from his unconvincing lie.

Yet she answered anyway. “Nope,” she popped. Just as she sat back, he got a peculiar look in his eye that made it hard to believe he really had a headache after all. Maybe he was a better liar than she thought. “Doc. Doc, don’t – don’t even think about it!”

As he began to sit up, a crooked smile crossed his face and his fingers teased the air in threat. It was a little too creepy for her taste. If she weren’t still under the influence of her suppressant, she would have burned him when she caught him by the wrists, pinning them to his gut and driving the wind out of him as she shoved him back down.

Drakken wheezed as she scowled down at him. His glasses sat crooked on his nose and his hair had dried in a total mess. He wasn’t wearing a shirt. She really wished he was wearing a shirt. He blew a puff in defeat and grumbled, “Fine. But I’d still like to test that theory.”

It wasn’t a theory. It was a fact. And even if it wasn’t a fact – it was still too hazardous to test. Then again, she was medicated. Shego scoffed. “Not by groping me, you aren’t,” she scoffed.

“I wasn’t—!” he began in defense and grunted through grit teeth as he let his head drop to the floor. He winced at the impact and skewed his frown back up at her. She should get up and go – any time now would be good – but she stayed hovered over him, securing his hands safely to his belly. Her eyes cut back up to his as he asked, “Can I guess—?”

“Guess all you want.” She lurched back, releasing him as if he’d burned her. “I’m not— hey!” The instant she let go, before the denial could leave her lips, swift fingers skittered up her sides to her armpits. The fleeting feathery touch caused a bigger reaction than she could have anticipated, and she couldn’t be sure she liked it as she seized and squirmed at the same time. A strangled yelp no more elegant than his ticklish squeals escaped her throat and she wanted nothing more than to kick him for it.

The man sat up with her and chuckled proudly, until she caught the offending hands to squeeze them, her nails digging into the backs. His smirk didn’t yield as she ground out in warning, “You’re playing with fire, Doc.” If only she had the firepower at the moment to prove her point.

“I know.” Drakken’s arrogant shit-eating grin was ultimately too close – but that was perhaps on her, given she was technically in his lap. If it weren’t for rank morning breath, she might not have been so opposed to it.

Shego jerked back and let go as she shifted away, untangling herself once and for all from the bedsheets wound up around them. “Ugh,” she groaned, waving a hand in front of her face. “Were you midnight-snacking on cheese?” she accused.

His smile fell and his face tinged purple – a deeper purple, anyway. “You’re one to talk!” he snapped back, getting to his knees and frowning up at her. “You took the bag for yourself and fell asleep on it.”

“I did?” she blurted, following his gesture toward the bed. Sure enough, a bag of cheddar in the sheets stood testimony, as did the shredded cheese flattened to her shirt... or rather, Drakken’s shirt – the same faded concert tee from the other night – worn over her own. She had no recollection of any midnight cheese indulgences. Her face burned as she wondered what other indulgences she might have had – but she didn’t ask aloud.

Mostly because Drakken was grumbling in addition, “And you snore. Loudly.”

She was already flustered. She didn’t need him rubbing anything else in. “Wow,” she scoffed. “Turn down the charm, will ya?”

“One of us has to make up for the difference.” He smoothed back his disheveled hair and pointed a finger-gun her way. He scratched his neck then and peered around her just as she began to turn away. “Uhm. Don’t go out there.”

“Why not?”

“My mother’s asleep on the couch.”

Shego paused. “Your mother?”

“Yes,” he said and began to explain with an excess of sporadic hand gestures. “You know. The mother who showed up unannounced in the middle of the night last night because I got in a teeny-tiny little argument with her yesterday over the phone, and it turns out my cousin’s wife gave her my address and now she’s here. That mother.”

Shego rubbed her temples. “Oof,” she breathed. She hardly remembered any of it. Certainly no mention of a heated phone call or his cousin’s wife. “She rode a motorcycle here, right?”

“Yes.”

“Rad.”

Drakken clearly didn’t think so, by the shudder he gave. “She may not look it, but she’s a bat out of hell on wheels. She must have been furious if she broke her oath not to ride again, let me tell you.” He cracked a flimsy smile, but it was far from genuine. “I was scared shitless last night.”

Shego crossed her arms and glanced between the door and him again. Her eyes fell on the clock above the bed. It was only a quarter past six in the morning. It had been around midnight when she’d collapsed in his bed. The bedding was a disaster now, but it was still tempting to pull a blanket over herself and dissolve back into it, cheese or no cheese.

Instead, Drakken was passing her, patting her shoulder and lowering his voice to advise she meet him in the garage – without being seen.

[jimlingss]

The Deli Diaries [1]

Chapter 1 || Chapter 2 || Chapter 3 || Chapter 4 || Chapter 5 || Chapter 6 || Chapter 7 || Chapter 8 || Chapter 9 || Chapter 10 || Chapter 11 [Finale]

➜ Words: 1.5k

➜ Genres: Fluff & Cuteness, That good ol’ slow burn, Slice of Life

➜ Summary: Working at a grocery store deli is absolutely unbearable (and you’re also perfectly aware of how dramatic you are). But it seems like something, or rather, someone might make the job a bit more manageable.

➜ Warnings: Mundane-ness that might make you bored to death

➜ Notes: Apparently, I don’t hate my job enough....now I’m writing about it. Whelp, might as well put all this information to use.

You hate your job.

It’s absolutely excruciating and you are so not being dramatic. They pay you minimum wage to work like a literal cow, running around with your pants on fire, trying to get everything done. Aside from making salads, pizzas, chickens, having to deal with customers, cutting meat and slicing cheese, and washing endless pots and pans, by the end of the day you always feel icky and disgusting. The red apron tied around your body is always splashed with soap and grease. If you even try to rub your eyes and relieve them of any itch, they always end up stinging painfully because your face is dirty, your hands are dirty, and you wouldn’t be surprised if your eyeballs were dirty as well.

And they have the audacity to call you slow and lazy around here…..so what if you are?!

“Hi, how can I help you?”

You have a slight skip in your step, securing your gloved hands behind your back, smile cracking at the forced enthusiasm. But the customer, like always, can never tell, and they tiredly point, pressing their index finger right on the window and printing a distinct fingerprint mark on the otherwise clear glass.

Your left eye twitches, considering how you’ll have to clean the windows….again.

From your angle, you can’t even tell what they’re pointing at!

“Hi, can I get four hundred grams of the honey ham shaved and falling apart?” The woman watches as you slide open the door of the meat case, squatting down to spot and lift the heavy ham. “That one, right there.”

“Okay.” You hold it in your hands, preparing to turn around and place it on the slicer. “Would you like any samples while you wait?”

“No thanks.”

Not only do you hate your job but it’s humiliating. You don’t mean having to wear a dirty apron that looks like a toddler puked all over you or a lunch lady’s hair net (which you combat by wearing a work hat — no one needs to see how atrocious your forehead looks with your hair completely pulled back). It’s demeaning how you’re selling your soul for capitalism….you need money, goddammit. And you need a lot of it. At least if you want to get a new phone, backpack, laptop, and textbooks for the upcoming school year. But it’s the most humiliating when they call you up and ask if you want to take a shift on your day off. The day of rest you’re supposed to have. A day to finally breathe and have freedom…….and just like that, it slips from your grasps.

You have no choice but to throw away your sanity and accept for the sake of money. It’s then and there that you’re reminded no one’s forcing you and you’re willingly doing this.

“Hi, do you need help?”

“Yes.” The man looks up. “I’d like a size four of the chicken cheddar salad please. Also, a size three of the potato salad.”

Your coworkers are nice and pleasant most of the time. The company is a pretty great company, union and benefits and all. You’re known for being good at customer service too. (No one can really tell you’re dying inside when you raise your voice a pitch and force a bright smile). But so what?

You still don’t like this job.

9:40pm.

Twenty minutes before it’s ten o’clock. Twenty minutes before you can clock out, leave this hell hole and crawl back to the hole you came from. Twenty minutes and you still have to clean the slicer, throw away three garbages, put plastic overtop the meat case and olive cart, and pull the rotisserie chickens that are left out there.

Twenty minut—

Why the fuck is there a guy standing there?

You blink. Once. Twice. Just to make sure your exhaustion isn’t playing tricks on you.

But nope. Yup. There’s really some dude standing there, facing the wall blankly like some kind of ghost and if he really is alive, you might just kill him. The fuck is he thinking when you’re about to close in twenty minutes and you have a shit ton of stuff left to do?! How rude.

“Hi.” You approach and for once, without a smile. You’re even slightly glaring, tone completely cold. Time is ticking and all you want is him gone. “Do you need help?”

“Uhhh…..” The stranger stares at you like a deer in headlights, as if he didn’t know you’d actually come up and talk to him. You’re not sure what he was expecting standing there. Maybe he’s an idiot. “Y—yes?”

THEN WHY DON’T YOU ASK ME FOR HELP INSTEAD OF JUST STANDING THERE?!

It booms inside your skull, threatening to spill off your tongue. But you hold back, not wanting to get reported and fired by your manager. It just boggles your mind how many people need help, but they don’t speak up at all. You’re not a mind reader. How are you supposed to know that they need help?! Is this what they think being polite is?! All they need is a nice ‘excuse me’ but nooooo, they choose to stand there motionlessly until you notice them. It’s so annoying—

Wait a minute. He’s that dude from produce. He works here.

The recognition finally hits you and you glance down at his name tag. In bold black text, it reads: ‘Jimin’.

You clear your throat, forcing the fading irritation not to show. “What would you like?”

“Ummmmmmm…..” He draws out the syllables, eyes darting around the meat case. “Uhhhh….”

He hasn’t decided?! God, maybe you should just slam your head against the concrete wall and try to get some kind of worker’s compensation. Though, instead, you choose to lean back and if you had any energy, you’d roll your eyes too, but you’ve been working for more than eight hours now and you’re so done. He doesn’t deserve your sass.

“I’ll take….”

But on a second look, dude’s kind of cute. You know you’ve made eye contact with him a few times when he was stacking up bananas and cucumbers in the produce section. To be fair, you’re supposed to look up every once in a while for customers like him (who stand there without making a peep, thinking that they’re being polite) and your eyes accidentally stray off to his own, right when he was looking up as well.

If you weren’t so pissy, you’ll admit he’s a pretty attractive guy, the kind that makes your palms sweaty if you think about it too much. He’s got a relatively adorable face, messy dark hair, puffy cheeks and cute eyes...not bad...not bad at all.

“Hello?” The male in front of you dips down, brows lifting, trying to catch your attention and you snap back into reality.

“Sorry, my bad. What did you want?”

“I’ll take some...uh...pepperoni.” He points, thankfully at a distance away and not pressing his dirty finger all over the clean glass windows. You like him already. “The pepperoni sausage.”

“Okay.” You slide the window open, taking the sausage before you look up at him. “How much?”

He frowns and quirks his head to the side, repeating you, “how much?”

“Yeah….like how many grams do you want?” It’s as if the guy hasn’t ever ordered from a deli before. “How many slices do you want?” 

“I….I’ll take a hundred grams.”

“Alright then.” You try do it as quickly as possible, throwing the meat on the slicer, rowing your arm back and forth vigorously, spinning on your heel to chuck the slices on the scale, making sure it’s a hundred before you punch the code in, printing a receipt, shoving everything in the clear baggie before slapping the sticker on top. “Here you go. Anything else?”

Jimin’s mouth was wide-open, brown eyes still big and staring at you, like he was about to say something important. But as he takes the plastic bag from your hands, his lips seal. “No...thank you.” 

“Have a nice night.” You shut off the slicer, turning around, rushing to clean and get all your closing duties done before you have to stay late. Oh yeah...did you ever mention that because you’re at the bottom of the totem pole behind here, they don’t pay you overtime ever?!

God. You hate your job.

As you sigh, moaning and groaning inside your head, body on autopilot and waiting for ten o’clock, you never realize that Park Jimin has stared at you for longer than necessary; and not in the same creepy way as that service clerk guy (who gives you stalker-ish vibes and you’re not just imagining it cause the other girls have agreed too) but rather, Jimin’s gaze is softened and timid. It’s only after a five-second delay that the boy finally turns around, and he, too, sighs, lugging his legs away, shoulders slumping, cursing himself for missing yet another opportunity.

[actualarishok]

What Magic Feels Like

This is a 1.5k word drabble for my dear friend @fairithilien about our Wardens, Marek Surana (mine) and Fenny Brosca (hers). It’s cute and sweet and if you like it you can commission one like it or something totally different from me! Enjoy!

“Marek?”

“Yes?”

“What does magic feel like?”

Instantly, his mind brought a thousand answers forth, but his tongue was still and unsure. Magic felt like warmth in his veins, like the sudden sharpening of all your senses at once, like the feeling of strong hands gripping slender shoulders or those same hands defending one mage and attacking another-

No. None of those were right.

“Magic…feels good.” He was lame. He had no simple answer.

Predictably, Fenny puffed her cheeks at him in a pout. “All right, smartass. Can I get a real answer?”

He could feel a flush rise to cheeks mismatched thanks to a nasty scar, and quickly dropped his gaze to the fire pit burning before them both.

“Magic…feels like this.” He reached, and his hand took her own. He pressed his other hand to the back of Fenny’s, bringing her palm to his own chest as his eyes slid up to look at her himself. It feels like the way you look when you smile, he thought silently. He let energy flow, thrumming the electricity between both his hands. He knew it would, mostly, slide off her like water from a duck’s back, but the bits that remained would tingle warmly like it did for him.

After a moment he released her, slow and soft as he waited for a reaction. She looked down at her hands, then up at his face, and his heart fluttered as her eyes met his own. His cheeks flushed.

“…Well?”

She smiled at him and he was certain she would be able to see the tips of his ears turning pink.

“Is that how you feel all the time?”

“Only when I use my magic,” he lied. “Yes,” his brain supplied, his thoughts drawn to the warm feeling in his chest when he went to wake Fenny for her watch, or the way his stomach fluttered when she laughed at his sarcastic jokes.

He loved her and he’d never tell her, because they might die, because the thought of losing her made his soul cry out in protest. He loved her eyes, the way the beautiful brown and gold brightened his mornings and soothed his nightmares. He loved her.

He could never, ever tell her. “It took some getting used to.”

“Ha! I bet.” She grinned at him and turned to the fire, prodding at the tubers roasting in the flames with a stick. They smelled delicious, familiar. Like home.

When had this scrappy, tough little dwarf and her improvised cooking become home?

Home had been the Circle with its heavy rugs, soft robes, bland food and watchful Templars, but he felt more endeared towards the dwarf he’d known for a few months than he did towards the people in the tower he was raised in. Home was calloused working hands, wide shoulders, close-shaven hair and a casteless tattoo. Home was worn leathers, sharp knives, and sharper wit.

Home was Fenny, and he wouldn’t have it any other way. Marek reached back to pet Bacon, the dog whuffing at his sleeve and licking his hand before letting him return it to his lap, the slight clink of an enchanted ring on scale maille just another quiet noise in the camp that, though it was never in the same place twice, he called home.

Marek would curl up in his bedroll tonight wanting to ask Fenny to join him, if only so that he could keep laughing. It was so much easier to live every day with her nearby-without her, his thoughts drifted to darkness. Without her his dreams were filled with Darkspawn and nightmarish demons.

Without her, he was weak.

Marek rolled his head from side to side, feeling satisfying pops in his stiff neck as Fenny stabbed a tuber. “Smells like I’m going to have to give it to Bacon and Eggs,” he teased.

Fenny’s own dog audibly gave an excited whine; he was always hungry. Bacon himself let out a disbelieving huff behind him, and Fenny laughed.

“Don’t be rude or I’ll eat your tuber as well as my own, pretty boy.”

He blushed dark again, eyes widening a touch. Every time she called him that his heart nearabout leapt from his throat, and he barely recovered in time. “Eat my dinner and I’ll shrink your boots a size.”

“Then I’ll do what the elves do and go without!”

He looked down at his bare dirty toes and sighed. “You’ll get hurt, you’re not made to go barefoot.”

“Try me!”

“I will not touch your boots.”

“That’s more like it,” she said cheerfully and with a grin.

Marek desperately wished to tell her he loved her, again and again and again.

“Fenny?”

“Yeah? Here, it’s hot.” She held out a stick with a speared tuber on it. “Hold this while I go see if Alistair is hoarding all our cheese!”

“Oh, uhm, go get the cheese first. I can wait.”

She trotted over to Alistair’s pack, the human already sleeping in his own bedroll complete with loud snores, and squatted to dig through it.

“Just tell her,” the spirit inside him murmured. “I’m curious how it will go.”

“You’re curiosity itself, you can survive,” he bit back silently. “I can’t.”

“You’re being a lovesick coward, Marek.”

“No. I’m protecting her.”

“She protects you.”

He pursed his lips. “I must protect her from anything I can. If all I can keep from her is inevitable heartbreak, so be it.”

“What happened to your thirst for knowledge, boy?”

“It’s hidden by my sense of self-preservation.”

Before he could make sense of the spirit’s reply, a tap on his head tore him from his thoughts with an undignified yip.

“Fenny to Marek! Marek! Anyone home?”

He looked up at her from his position on the ground. “Sorry. I got…lost in my own thoughts.”

“Dingus. I found the cheese-Alistair is such a liar, he said he ate this cheddar already.”

“Cheese-hoarder.”

“It could be worse, remember the sausages Eggs stole from that shop?”

He rolled his eyes, glancing to the mabari now licking itself. Dignified. “And we had to pay a full gold piece to make up for everything he and Bacon ate? How could I forget.”

“Don’t sound so droll,” she snorted, slicing the cheddar in her hand with quick movements. He took the proffered slice. “You were laughing just as much as me at the shopkeeper’s face!”

“Yes, and then he questioned where an elf got a gold piece and you decked him.”

Fenny busted up into snickers as she tried to stuff cheese inside her hot tuber without burning herself, and Marek felt that curious burning again as he wondered what she’d do if he told her.

Would she laugh? Would it be even more beautiful than every laugh before?

Would her eyes light up, her lips quirk into a smile, her eyes crinkle with happiness or mirth?

He squashed the curiosity like a bug beneath his foot as he pulled his belt knife to slice into the tuber. Steam puffed out when he punctured the crispy skin, and he stuffed his cheese into it without looking, fixated on Fenny’s face as she shoved tuber and cheese into her mouth.

Maker, if she was still adorable with her face full of food, he was definitely done for.

He was more delicate with his food, a fastidious habit left over from Circle table manners, but he laughed when a drop of melting cheese started to dangle precariously from her tuber. Before he could blink, he reached out to scoop up the cheese droplet with one thin finger, and deposited it on her bottom lip just shy of her mouth.

She froze, and so did he, and then-

She licked the cheese off her lip, said “Dork,” and took another bite.

Marek started to laugh, shaking his head. “Eat slower. There’s plenty, you know there is.”

“Force of habit,” came Fenny’s reply through a mouthful of mostly cheese. “You know that.”

“Mmm. This is why Eggs and Bacon love you, they get to consume dropped crumbs.”

Bacon whined at him. “You do too, Bacon,” Marek retorted softly.

“Woof!”

“Shhh, Alistair’s sleeping.”

Fenny snorted. “He sleeps like a rock. Trust me, I’m a dwarf.”

“Yes you are. I figured that out when I realized you were shorter than me.”

She tugged one of his ears and he swatted at her with no real venom behind it, smirking.

“Rude!”

“But I’m right.”

“I’m gonna dump you in a river.”

“I’d love that,” Marek smirked. Fenny paused, snorted at him, and then let out a yawn so big that Marek was sure he heard her jaw crack.

“Fenny, I’ll take first watch.”

“Are you sure? You did have to do a lot of magic today…”

He shook his head at her with a smile. “I’m not as tired as I thought I’d be. You go ahead.”

“Mmm’kay. Nightie night.”

“Goodnight, Fenny.”

As she turned for her bedroll, Marek solidly planted his gaze on the fire until he heard soft snoring.

He loved her, and he would rather die than forget.

Marek Surana committed the sound of Fenny Brosca’s gentle snoring to memory, and wondered if she dreamed.

And then, as the moon rose round overhead, he answered her question aloud.

“Magic feels like you.”

[mrsbenedictbridgerton]

This Unspoken Thing 1/3

A baby mini fic.

Emma and Killian were kinda enemies. Now they are kinda friends, but there is this unspoken thing between them. A pull and a want that they haven't yet given a name to. And stubborn Emma Swan just wont admit it...

(Inspired by GoTG 2!)

AO3/FF.NET 

Emma Swan was in no way avoiding Killian Jones.

Someone had to go rustle up some food for the impromptu birthday party that had somehow came about. And that someone may as well have been her.

The fact that she could hide in the kitchen for as long as she could get away with was just a bonus.

Really.

“Need any help?”

Emma jumped just about a foot in the air at the sound of a softly accented voice, her head narrowly missing the upper edge of the refrigerator. “Dammnit Killian, some warning please.”

She looked back over her shoulder to see her friend’s teasing smile.

Friend.

Oh that was a weird word to say when concerning Jones.

Friends. Amigos. Buddies. Pals. All very strange words for someone who only a few months earlier was, what some may have called, her enemy.

“Sorry,” he shrugged softly, letting the door close behind him.

He looked tired; the shadows under his eyes speaking of the lateness of the hour that had seen them leave the bar last night and the number of rums they had both consumed while trying to outdo each other.

That was what they did. Always competing. Kind of unavoidable when you are rival bail bonds persons.

Who could drink the other under the table? Who could tell the most outrageous (yet true) work related tale? Who could choose simply the best obscure little restaurant that their motley group of friends would just love so much?

Her stomach squirmed a little as she thought of the bottle of rum that they kept in the liquor cabinet. She was definitely sticking to beer tonight.

“Sure,” she quipped - perhaps a little too high pitched - before making to turn back to her search for food.

(Hoping he would take the hint.)

“But Emma-”

“Hmm,” she murmured as she picked a block of cheese and a - hopefully fresh - jar of olives from the shelves.

“Can we talk?”

“Little busy here Jones,” she said, shoving the block of cheese under her chin so she could grab a tub of guacamole.

“It’s about yesterday. And that dance.”

Slowly, Emma pivoted on her heel. With the block of cheddar still wedged under her chin and both hands occupied, she tried her best to look in his direction, hampered by the restraints of anatomy and dairy products. The little palpitations that had faded with her hangover, began to return.

She’d kinda hoped he’d forgotten about that.

(Really hoped.)

He gave her an odd look, before reaching out and taking the cheese from her grasp, his fingers swiping against the skin of her neck as she whispered, “Thanks.”

And then came the awkward silence she’d been dreading. The skin he had touched tingling with electricity as his blue eyes studied her - the way they had a thousand times before - with a mixture of judgement and curiosity that she couldn’t quite deal with right now.

“So you danced with me.”

“And you danced with me,” she retorted with a small shrug,  trying to look as nonchalant as she could with tupperware and a half empty jar of olives in her arms.

The muscles in his jaw flickered - the way they always did when he was frustrated (though, damn, she hated that she knew that).

She knew him better than most.

He knew her better than most.

Fuck.

He cleared his throat and took a step closer. “Aye I did. After you accosted me on the dance floor.” He paused and then raised a brow, “Swan, your arms were like that of an octopus. I felt violated.”

His voice had a teasing edge, which made a smile flicker traitorously at her lips - but she knew he was reaching for an explanation as to just why she had - yes she admits it - got down and dirty with him on The Rabbit Hole’s dance floor.

It all flashed back.

Grinding her ass into his crotch. Her hands balling into the damp material of his shirt. The flush on his cheeks as she’d slung her arms around his neck. The practically indecent way she had plastered her body against his on the sweaty, packed dance floor.

Oh holy hell, what had she done?

(Oh GOD she hoped no one else had seen.)

She took a deep breath and nonchalantly popped out her hip, doing her best impression of someone totally confident and not feeling completely out of their depth. “Are you complaining?”

Then he did that thing he does where his eyes rake over her and make her feel all tingly and sexy and-

(No. No. No.)

“Never,” he replied, his voice noticeably lower, cutting right through her.

She needed to break the moment.

Emma took the chance to empty her arms of their contents and then open one of the cupboards above the work surface to find the large bowl she needed for the nachos. If she had thought that that would have sent Killian away, she was wrong. Instead he sidled up beside her and took the bag of chips she had already gotten ready and ripped them open.

“You still haven’t answered me,” he sang a few seconds later.

He was persistent, as always.

(It’s what made him so good at his job.)

She needed to end this conversation- or at the very least steer it away from his inevitable assumption-

(That she had a thing for him-)

Dampening her lip with her tongue, she let the first lie that appeared in her head fall from her lips. “I was trying to make Graham jealous.”

“Graham?” he spat, as if the name was the most disgusting thing ever to pass his lips. “Why the bloody hell would you want anything to do with that tosser?”

“Hey!” she cried, jabbing him in the ribs with her elbow and then tossing her hair over her shoulder. “He’s a good guy. Decent. Hardworking.”

(That much was true. Graham Humbert was decent and kind and good and- well, all the things she should want in a man. So they say.)

“Your brother’s partner,” Killian offered, folding his arms and observing her with a disbelieving eye.

She turned her head and gave him a sarcastic smile. “Gee, I never noticed.”

His expression changed as their eyes met - softened somehow, his smile shifting somewhat. Their eyes fixed for a long moment, until he looked away and began opening a bag of tortilla chips. “Well, I’m actually surprised you’re interested in him. I thought you went for the more… rugged, roguish type.”

“Oh, like you?” she replied, so quickly the words had left her mouth before she could stop herself.

He took a quick breath. “Yes, actually.”

Wordlessly he poured out the chips and then crumpled up the bag, the crackle of the plastic wrapper occupying the silence their voices had left behind. Emma picked up the jar, running her hand over the lid as she waited for him to say something else.

Anything else.

Because there was a wordless tension brewing between them, and not for the first time. She heard him sigh.

She looked across at him; he was rubbing his hand over his stubbled jaw.

“When are we going to do something about this?” he asked quietly.

His words turned her heartbeat into a steady thud in her chest and she sucked in a deep breath.

“About what?” she replied. Going for breezy but instead it came out all strained and awkward.

A torturous second stretched out as the two watched each other.

Then he took the container of olives she was trying to open, his large, strong hands opening it with a soft pop. He placed it back on the countertop and her arms fell limply to her sides. No barrier between them, not even a jar of pickled vegetables.

“This thing between us,” he said, eyes searching hers until she looked away, not wanting to go… there.

“There is nothing between us, Jones,” she insisted.

Killian rested his arm on the countertop, leaning in towards her. “Emma, there has been an unspoken thing between us for months now.”

Furrowing her brow, she looked him square in the eye. “It was just a dance, Killian. Don’t read anything into it. I was drunk. You were drunk.”

She backed away from him, folding her arms, creating another barrier between them.

“There is no thing here. Unspoken...or otherwise.”

He looked like he was going to say something, but then thought better of it. Instead, he simply shrugged and whispered.

“If you say so.”

And before she could say any more, he left the room.

A/N: The next part is pretty much written so I’ll get it up asap...

[colaboyxbepis]

HELP. I CAN'T LIVE NORMAL ANYMORE. WHATWHATWHAT II 17 MADE ME CRY TOO HARD.

[musingsdeme]

Silly Love Songs

There are exactly twenty-two cassette tapes in the shoebox under the passenger seat of the Impala. There have been exactly twenty-two cassette tapes in that box since Dean was twenty-five and bought a copy of Abbey Road and Combat Rock from a record store in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Most of the tapes were John’s, inherited right alongside the Impala, the soundtrack of a life on the road: Motorhead and Lynyrd Skynyrd; Black Sabbath and The Kinks; there’s even some Springsteen in there that Dean is pretty sure belonged to his mom before everything went to hell. Dean (and even Sam) can pick some of them out without even looking: Kashmir’s label has worn off from being handled so many times; Back in Black has a noticeable chip in the left corner; Heaven and Hell is weirdly heavier than the rest. Dean’s lived by this music; driven back and forth across the country to the sounds of those tapes. There are exactly twenty-two cassette tapes in the shoebox under the passenger seat of the Impala, until one day, there are exactly twenty-three.

ao3

Dean discovers the twenty-third tape on a Tuesday evening in May. The weather is turning swiftly towards summer; there’s a heavy golden glow hanging in the air from the setting sun, it smells like earth and light when he steps outside the bunker, climbs in the Impala, and rolls down the windows. It’s almost eighty still and it’s the perfect weather for grilling up some burgers, and that’s exactly what he’s gonna do. Dean’s got a smile on his face as he heads to the grocery store. There’s a lot to celebrate. The Mark of Cain is long gone, Cas is human (of his own choice) and more relaxed than Dean’s ever seen him, Sammy is not in any kind of danger or trouble (in fact, when Dean headed out the kid was happily geeking out over some boring shit in the Men of Letters archives). If they kept a kept a tally (which they would never do for fear of calling down catastrophe) it would proudly declare that IT HAS BEEN [37] DAYS SINCE OUR LAST LIFE, DEATH, OR HELLISH FATE SITUATION. That’s something to be damn happy about.

On the way to Trader Joe’s, Dean listens the steady rumble of the engine. He drums his fingers on window ledge, reviews his mental grocery list, and smiles at nothing. He’s been doing that a lot lately: smiling at nothing, humming even, bouncing on the balls of his feet, laughing. It’s partially because there isn’t some arcane brand on his forearm making him want to kill everything in sight, but it also has a lot to do with the fact that he kissed Cas for the first time thirty-seven days ago.

They were bloody and exhausted, sweating, and covered in ash in the wake of the ritual that cured Dean, laying grace against the mark, cleansing his soul of the curse. They were lying there, tears in both their eyes, on the floor of the dungeon. Cas had laid his fingers against Dean’s cheek, a whisper of a touch, and Dean had closed his eyes, overcome with Cas’ gentleness, letting it radiate through his whole body.

He didn’t run away like he had some many times before, afraid, embarrassed, undeserving. Instead, for the first time, Dean let himself lean into Cas’ touch. Unhindered by bloodlust, everything else flooded to the surface—affection and relief and gratitude—it was all right there in front of him. For the first time in a long, long time, Dean felt alive. Miraculously, fully, alive, and, buoyed by that heady sensation, he reached out for Cas, when so many times before he had flinched away. Dean laid a heavy, shaky hand against Cas’ hair and he smiled through a broken cheekbone and a bloody mouth. Cas’ eyes shown bright and full and so damn relieved, so damn happy. He leaned forward, and Dean met him half way and it was the most fucking amazing, wonderful moment that Dean had ever had in his whole life.

So yeah, on this bright sunny evening in early summer, Dean has a lot of things to be happy about, and a pretty sizable chunk of those things include Cas: Cas at his side, Cas in his bed, Cas smiling more, Cas frowning less, Cas stealing his clothes, Cas drinking coffee, Cas holding him at night. Dean is almost forty but he feels so light, so airy, he swears sometimes he could fly.

He whistles his way through the grocery store. Loading his cart with ground chuck and freshly baked burger buns, sweet potatoes and bell peppers and onions, tomatoes, cheddar cheese. He grabs a pineapple and some blueberries (for pancakes tomorrow), remembers to grab the granola and Greek yogurt Sam asked for, and the Orange-Mango juice that Cas is crazy about. He waits in line, making funny faces at the toddler in the cart in front of him and making small talk with her mother. He pays and loads everything into brown paper bags and then into the trunk. He twirls the keys around his fingers and slides behind the wheel.

“Time to get home, Baby,” he says, patting the wheel.

It’s at that moment, on this beautiful Tuesday evening in May, with the sun shining and the Impala loaded down with groceries, that Dean decides what his ride home needs is some tunes. He reaches into that old shoebox ready to let chance decide what he’ll listen to, expecting something familiar, but his hand grabs a tape that he doesn’t recognize.

He at first thinks that Sam’s tried to sneak some Indie crap into his sacred space, but when he pulls out the tape, the writing across the front is not Sam’s messy scrawl, it’s the sharp, slightly slanted lines that belong to Cas. All in capital letters, precise and pointed, the label reads FOR DEAN.

Dean’s heart jumps immediately to his throat, where it beats much faster than normal. There is a rubber band wrapped around the tape to keep a folded piece of paper attached. With trembling hands, Dean removes the rubber band and unfolds the paper. He half expects it to be a track list, but what he finds is Cas’ tightly packed writing filling the page from top to bottom.

“Dean,” it reads, “please, play the tape and read along.” The ‘and’ has been underlined enough that Dean can see the glare that Cas would use to punctuate if he were speaking aloud.

Dean turns the tape over in his fingers, bites his bottom lip. He feels like he’s standing on the edge of a cliff, about to jump. His palms are damp and he shakes his head.

“Nut up, Winchester,” he mutters and he shoves the tape into the deck.

It takes a few seconds to start playing, but when it does, Dean can’t help it, he laughs; it’s a strange, strangled, wet laugh. Fucking Jason Mraz. Really, Cas? Does that make Dean Colbie Caillat? He shakes his head bemusedly, and rubs his eyes before he reads what Cas wrote:

“1. I would like to think that the reason that I included this song on this tape is obvious, but, in case that it is not, I wish to make it abundantly clear how lucky I feel to be in love with my best friend. You are the dearest and best friend that I have ever known in all my incredibly long life, to share not only this profound bond, but also the deep and abiding love that I feel for you is a gift that I had never hoped to experience, never thought to experience, and I am incredibly grateful to have the privilege of loving you as our relationship has evolved to include numerous forms of love: friendship, camaraderie, family, and romantic affection.”

“Jesus Christ, Cas, you can’t just say shit like that,” Dean grips the steering wheel, realizing that’s probably why Cas wrote it down.

It continues like that, for every song on the tape, Cas has written a note explaining why it’s there, what it has to do with him and what it has to do with Dean and, most importantly, what it has to do with the two of them together. The notes are earnest, they’re heartfelt, and they keep Dean oscillating between muffled laughter and silent tears.

Dean listens and he reads; he follows along right down the line.

“2. Given that we did, quite literally, find love in the most hopeless of places (I’m referring to Hell, though a case could also be made for Purgatory and some rather difficult situations on Earth) and times (the Apocalypse comes time mind), I thought that this song was apt. I don’t know that I have ever told you this (indeed, I know I haven’t, fearful of how you would react), but I loved you the first time I beheld you, Dean. Your soul shown so brightly amongst the desolation of that place, and when I held you in my grace I was changed fundamentally from the being I once was. I have never felt so close to another.”

Dean has to wipe his eyes and sniff, “C’mon, man.”

When he hears the third song, he laughs.

“3. I understand that you have a deep, abiding (and partially clandestine) love of Taylor Swift. I was hard-pressed to choose amongst her many works (all of which are quite catchy). This, however, seemed most appropriate as one of your most admirable qualities is your ability to ‘shake off’ the burdens that the world and fate have presented to you, and continually find beauty and joy in spite of hardship.”

“4. Dean, I would very much like to hold your hand every day for the rest of my human life. Nothing would bring me more happiness than to share this and other simple pleasures with you.”

“You’re such a damn sap, Cas,” he mumbles, wishing Cas were with him, wishing he could hold his hand through this, rub his thumb against Cas’ palm, press a kiss against his knuckles.

Boyz II Men sings “I’ll Make Love to You” as the fifth song, and Dean rolls his eyes and smiles when Cas uses his notation to basically quote the whole damn thing, with particular emphasis on holding Dean all through the night.

Dean is chuckling to himself when he flips the tape.

Elvis is in sixth place:

“6. Dean, I could not help but fall in love with you, with the beautify of your soul, with the strength of your character, with your capacity for love and you abidingly loyalty, with your laugh and your smile, with your stubbornness and your passion, with your compassion, with your capacity for forgiveness and your willingness to give all that you have to those you love. I did not know at first that that is what I felt for you, others realized it long before I did, and they did, in fact, try to stop me from falling in love with you. They tried many, many times, but no one could ever break that bond, Dean. You and I, we are stronger when we are together, the ties that bind us are far greater than any scheme or machination that they have yet to concoct on any realm of existence. And I will continue to love you and fall in love with you every day”

Dean thinks about Zachariah, about Naomi, about Cas hiding in Purgatory, and Dean’s own bullshit. He thinks about all the crazy, stupid shit that’s come between them and all the stupid, crazy shit they’ve overcome, and it’s suddenly crystal clear how many times Dean has fallen in love with Cas, with his gentle hands and fierce spirit, with his strength and faith and determination; how he has always, always been there when Dean needed him.

REO Speedwagon comes on next.

“7. I feel this song encapsulates much of what I’ve experienced in the past few years. It was difficult to ‘hold back’ how I felt for you, even more difficult to express the depth of the affection that I carried for you in a way that I thought you would accept. I am happy that we no longer have to ‘fight this feeling” but can, instead, embrace it.”

When One Direction comes on Dean is startled into a laugh.

“8. Despite the inherent paradox in the lyrics, I thought of you when I first heard this song. It seems so often you undervalue your worth, undervalue that which makes you truly beautiful, and it pains me (and also Sam and all those who care for you) to see you be so unaware of and so cavalier with your person. You are the most beautiful soul I have ever beheld and I wish you could see how I see you. You glow Dean, you are ethereal, you are the sun.”

Chicago is next with “Just You’N’Me,” and for the second time, Cas, uses his allotted space to basically quote the entire thing (“You are my love in my life, Dean, you are my inspiration”). “You Make Me Feel So Young” follows (“I have never known what it was to be young, to feel youthful, or carefree. For something as old as I, literally older than dirt, youth seems a alien sensation, but, when I am with you, I feel a sense of wonder and excitement that I have never before known. I see things differently, I experience things differently, and for the first time. It is a gift.”)

The last song plays “A Thousand Years” and Cas writes simply: “I have loved you with all that I am, and will continue to do so as long as even a part of me exists in this, or any, universe”.

When the tape stops, Dean is left in silence. There are tears on his face and his heart is a slow, steady, painful beat in his chest. He feels overwhelmed, filled to the brim, shaking, and all he can say is “Christ, Cas.”

He wipes his eyes, clears his throat, and heads for home.

*

He doesn’t bother unloading the groceries when he gets there. He just scrambles out of the Impala, and moves like a man on a mission, quick and purposeful and a little faster than normal.

Sam is exactly where Dean left him, hair a little messier and notebook a little fuller, still buzzing with scholastic energy. He looks up when Dean comes in.

“Hey, Dean, guess what I found in the—” he frowns, “Where are the groceries?”

“Trunk,” he tosses Sam the keys, “Change of plans: we’re orderin’ in tonight.”

Sam frowns more deeply, “Um, okay…everything all right?”

“Where’s Cas?”

Sam’s frown starts to take on a worried edge, “I think he’s in the kitchen. Dean, are you sure that you’re—?”

Dean stalks off towards the kitchen while he answers, “Totally fine, dude. Unload the groceries and order some pizza or something.”

Sam mutters a reply that Dean doesn’t make out; he doesn’t really care presently.

Cas is, in fact, in the kitchen, rooting through one of the cabinets near the stove.

Dean’s heart swells and his fingers tingle with nervous energy.

Cas doesn’t turn around, but Dean can hear the smile in his voice.

“Dean, you’re back,” he pulls a box from the very back of the cabinet, “I was just about to make some tea would you like—” he turns, pauses, and tilts his head, “Where are the groceries?”

Dean rolls his eyes. How is that the biggest issue right now? How awesome is it that that’s the biggest issue right now? Can’t they tell he’s having a goddamn moment?

“I need to talk to you,” Dean says. His voice comes out much gruffer than he intended. Cas’ forehead furrows, but he permits Dean to grab his wrist (smooth warm skin, and strong tendons beneath Dean’s fingertips) and allows himself to be dragged away.

Dean tugs Cas along in his wake and neither of them speaks until Dean pulls them both into Cas’ room and closes the door behind them.

Cas stands before him, increasingly concerned, tension in his shoulders and a worried frown on his face. He’s gonna get wrinkles, Dean thinks, how goddamn lucky is he that he gets to see that happen. Apparently Dean’s bemused smile does nothing to decrease Cas’ preoccupation because he starts forward as if he’s going to lay a hand on Dean’s forehead, not to heal, but to check for fever. Affection washes over Dean in a wave of warmth. He intercepts the gesture, holding up the tape. Cas drops his hand and takes a step backwards.

“Cas, what is this?” Dean asks, tone serious.

All of the tension leaves Cas’ body for a second, Dean can actually see all the puzzle pieces slotting into place in Cas’ mind as he works out Dean’s behavior in response to the cassette in his hand. He touches the back of his neck and shuffles on his feet, suddenly nervous.

“It’s a mix tape.”

“Cas,” Dean says, voice low, “why did you make this?”

Cas frowns, blinks several times, and then stands straighter, “I was speaking with Claire last week, texting actually, and she commented upon the changed nature of our relationship.”

“Of course she did,” Dean quips. She was probably damn sassy about it too.

Cas’ mouth twitches, “Yes, well, she said that all we were missing now was a letterman jacket and a mixed tape to be a complete cliché.”

Dean barks out a laugh, “The whole angel and human thing wasn’t enough for her?”

There’s definitely a smile on Cas’ face now, “Apparently not.”

“Kids, man,” Dean shrugs.

“Well, I suppose this caused me to reflect,” Cas continues, “I obviously have no letterman jacket to give to you—”

Dean interrupts, “Woah, if anyone’s giving anyone a letterman jacket it’s gonna be me.”

Cas rolls his eyes, “—obviously neither of us has a letterman jacket to give the other, but I was given to understand that mixed tapes were common in courting practices among young people of your generation.”

“Courting practices?” Dean repeats, torn between amusement and wanting to hide his face in his hands. He’s being courted by a former angel who has actually thought about how he would have wooed Dean in the early 90s.

“So I asked Charlie to help me because it is surprisingly hard to make a cassette tape,” he continues, “have you considered updating the sound system in the Impala?”

Dean glares, “Really, Cas?”

He shakes his head and grins, “I suspected as much. Charlie was all too happy to help me actually produce the tape. When I told her what I wanted to do she responded with, what she referred to as a ‘velociraptor screech’, which actually bore very little resemblance to the vocalizations of a velociraptor. Charlie helped me with the mechanics, but I chose the music and I, uh, wrote the note.”

They stare at one another for a moment. Cas shuffles on his feet again, and Dean is held in thrall, overwhelmed by the gesture of it all, by all the things that Cas said in that note, by the contours of his face, by the fact that Cas is here with Dean, and, if what he said is true, always will be. It’s a heady feeling, makes Dean’s eyes sting and his throat tighten.

“Did you, uh, like it?” Cas finally asks uncertainly.

That’s apparently all Dean needs to move.

“Cas, that was the cheesiest,” he takes a step forward, “corniest,” he’s in Cas’ space, “dorkiest,” he pulls Cas into his chest so that they are flush together, and Cas freezes for a moment in the warm embrace of Dean’s arms, “sweetest fucking thing that anyone has ever done for me in my entire fucking life.”

Cas licks his lips and hesitantly brings his arms to wrap around Dean’s waist, “So you liked it, then?”

“I fucking loved it,” Dean swears into the warm, tanned skin of Cas’ neck. He kisses him just beneath his ear, “Thank you.”

The final bit of tension in Cas’ shoulders melts away, he rubs a soothing circle against Dean’s side, “I meant all that I said,” he assures, pressing a kiss into Dean’s hair.

Dean buries his flushing face more firmly into Cas’ neck, “No song has yet been written in a human tongue that could encapsulate the way that I feel for you.”

Dean’s eyes burn and he holds Cas tighter.

“Nothing could ever come close to expressing what you have given to me,” he pulls them apart so that Dean is forced to look at him, wide, watery eyes and all, “all that I feel,” Cas wipes his thumbs against Dean’s cheekbones, catching the tears, “when I am with you.”

“Cas,” Dean tries, voice thick.

“I love you, Dean Winchester,” he says with such warmth in his eyes and voice that Dean feels that he’s drowning in it. Cas leans forward and he presses their mouths together. It’s gentle, slow, and Dean feels it from the crown of his head to the tips of his toes. It’s like sunlight, warming him all over, deep into the core of him. He’s breathing heavily, shaking, overcome.

When they come up for air, Cas rests their foreheads together, holding Dean’s shaking fingers in his own steady ones, cradling them against his chest. Dean can feel Cas’ heartbeat against his knuckles.

“What do you want, Dean?” he asks, voice rough, but tone so, so tender. Dean could say he wanted to go on a picnic, and Cas would walk out of this room and pack a damn basket without a second’s hesitation.

Dean knows he could ask for anything, anything at all, and what comes out of his mouth is heartfelt, “Lie down with me?”

Cas smiles, presses a kiss against Dean’s lips, “Of course.”

He pulls Dean gently by their linked hands and settles him down on the bed. He undresses Dean reverently, carefully. He removes Dean’s shoes and his shirt, he undoes his belt, and slides off his jeans, he takes of Dean’s boxers, freeing his slight erection. Cas brushes a hand through Dean’s hair and kisses his mouth, soft and lingering. Then Cas undresses himself, quickly, purposefully, while Dean watches. He has tan lines from running and working in the garden: the toasty brown of his torso ends just below his belly button, and a swathe of milky skin extends to just above his knees. When they are both naked, Cas settles onto the bed, turning on his side to face Dean, who reaches out for him.

They’ve had sex before, and it’s awesome, every time, because it’s Dean and it’s Cas and they’re together, which is inherently awesome. How could it be anything else? Even when Dean accidentally trips over his own jeans while giving a strip tease, and face plants into the bedframe and Cas has to bandage his head in between some awkward explanation to Sam, even when one or the other of them is too tired to get it up, even when Cas says something that makes Dean laugh hysterically right when things are getting hot and heavy. It’s always awesome.

Cas asked Dean what he wanted, and all Dean wants right now is to be close to Cas, to feel him, to know he’s there.

When they comes together, it’s slow touches and kisses. It’s Dean tracing the shape of Cas’ body: his face and his shoulders, his back, his stomach. It’s Cas laying worshipful kisses, gentle and wet against Dean’s skin, interspersed with endearments. He presses them against Dean’s eyelids, his collarbone, his chest. Cas works Dean into hardness, slow and steady strokes of his hand around Dean’s cock that send heat, electricity running through his nerves, coiling low in his belly. Dean does the same for Cas. The first touch of their cocks together, hot, velvety skin and pulsing heat, is almost too much for Dean. Cas twines their fingers together, working over them both, climbing to that precipice together. Cas’ mouth is warm against Dean’s, his tongue smooth and wet. They’re sweating; Dean’s eyes burn, their hearts beat frantically. Dean can’t look away and Cas can’t either, they watch each other, eyes locked. They jump over the edge together and when they come down from that high, sticky and sated, Dean has tears in his eyes, running down his cheeks. He takes shuddering breaths, while Cas pulls him close, wraps him tight and safe in the circle of his arms, and presses kisses to the top of his head.

“Shhh,” he murmurs, “shhhh.”

He hums a song that Dean doesn’t know but he feels the love in it down to the very marrow of his bones.

Dean has to work his mouth several times before he’s able to get anything out past a shaky sob, but he finally manages, with his eyes closed tight, and Cas’ heartbeat just beneath his ear, “I love you, too, Cas.”

Cas tightens his hold on Dean, pulls him closer, as close as he can. It hurts a little bit, but Dean doesn’t mind.

“I know, Dean,” he sounds so sure, so certain, “I know.”

*

Dean doesn’t keep the twenty-third cassette tape with the others. He keeps it and Cas’ note in his room, in the top drawer of his desk, next to a picture of his mom.

When a month later, Dean decides to make good on his Mark of Cain bucket list and take a nice long vacation, he makes sure to move the tape to the car. The Carolinas should be fucking gorgeous this time of year. It’s just him and Cas on the road; Sam is gonna meet them at Myrtle Beach next week (“get all the loud sex out of the way before I show up, please.” Dean makes no promises). Dean loads their duffels in the trunk just after dawn, stores some snacks and the cooler in the back seat. Cas brings two steaming cups of coffee for the road. Dean starts the Impala and smiles at Cas, who is still a little bleary eyed.

It’s the twenty-third tape that Dean pushes into the tape deck just before they pull out of the garage. Cas smiles at Dean and takes his hand. They hit the road to the sound of a love song.

*

Cas’ mixtape for Dean

1. “Lucky” Jason Mraz & Colbie Caillat 2. “We Found Love” Rihanna 3. “Shake it Off” Taylor Swift. 4. “I Wanna Hold Your Hand” The Beatles 5. “I’ll Make Love to You” Boyz II Men 6. “Can’t Help Falling In Love” Elvis Presley 7. “Can’t Fight This Feeling” REO Speedwagon 8. “What Makes You Beautiful” One Direction 9. “Just You 'N’ Me” Chicago 10. “You Make Me Feel So Young” Frank Sinatra 11. “A Thousand Years” Christina Perri

[xoleahbeanxo]

Sing! A Side Story: Chapter One

Alright, here you go. A silly side story fanfiction I wrote for the movie Sing. It’s only three chapters long and nothing really impressive but I sure as hell liked writing it. I hope you like reading it.

Song: You’ve Made Me So very Happy. Artist: Blood, Sweat, and Tears

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKuqaZ0DQtk

I’m Losing My Mind

           Did I remember to get milk? The hyena shifted his weight from one leg to the other, trying to concentrate on his thoughts on the one burning question. The chattering of dozens of patrons behind him, in front of him, and all around him blocked out any sane thoughts that filled the void between his ears. Lemme see, coffee creamer; check, cottage cheese; check…Milk – Again the thought was whisked away, this time, it rode on the sound of a hollow beep from the cashier’s scanner. It was just a beep, the same uneven rhythm that ticked down his mortal existence in this god forsaken, over crowded store. How could it rob him of all of his thoughts so easily? Got the cheddar cheese and the crackers for Ashley’s snacks, what about the milk? Lee looked over at the pile of bags in his cart, his teal eyes traced over each contour of every mound for the milk and then…

           “Did you find everything alright, sir?” The warm voice pulled him away from his search.

           The hyena looked across the conveyor belt to the young otter girl slipping the pack of pull-ups into a bag, along with some other bathroom items Lee purchased. He stared blankly at her for a long second as if he’d just been awakened from a nap.

           “Milk,” Lee’s lips mimed and the otter girl leaned closer as if to hear.

           “I’m sorry?” She spoke, her pretty features and young age made Lee suddenly very aware of his own age.

           Thirty-six, wasn’t old enough to be so forgetful. It also meant he wasn’t young enough to stand there like a deer in the headlights at such a simple question. I really can’t leave without the milk, was the only thought that ran through his head. Through the haze in his mind, he could see the otter’s face shift to something more sympathetic, as if he were pitiful? The look was a warm smile that was meant to smooth the next thing that came out of her mouth.

           “I’m flattered, sir, but I’m already dating someone.” There was a lilt in her tone, one that teased but also warned the older hyena that there was no way in hell he stood a chance.

           “What? Oh no, I’m married. I was just wondering if I…”

           “Listen chubs, you need to get a move on,” The large elephant grumbled from behind him. She gave Lee a nudge with her cart. “You wanna play Casanova? Do it on your own time, I got stuff I gotta do today.”

           “Excuse me?” A low tone ringing filled the hyena’s ears making his own words sound muted. “I just…”

           “$127.36 is your total, sir.” The otter giggled and adjusted the name tag clipped to the strap of her brown apron.

           “Right,” Lee felt a fire come to his cheeks as he quickly fished out his wallet. “Thanks…Ann.” He read the tag and swiped his silver card through the machine.

           “Sure thing…” Her small hand welcomed the long receipt that rolled out into her fingers. “Thanks for coming, Lee.”

           Lee nodded and took the receipt. She gave him a warm smile. It was the type of smile a young person gave an elderly person, when they said something that wasn’t particularly funny. The hyena pocketed the receipt and started away with the cart. He could hear the elephant behind him say something admonishing about him wasting her time. It sent fire through him…but it wasn’t hot enough to ignite the refuse bin in his tired soul. Instead, he hurried through the automatic door and into the parking lot.

           “Daddy!” An all too familiar voice called to him from across the parking lot.

           The sound was enough to cool the fire in his face the moment he heard it. Ashley fought against her mother’s hand as she tried to escape. The white Pitbull had a firm hand on her, though.  Still, the half hyena, half Pitbull girl fought as ferociously as any caged tiger would, to the point that she almost pulled her mother clean off of her feet. Lee chuckled and hurried to meet with them.

           “Hey, babe.” Her cadence was as warm as her smile. “How did it go?”

           “Daddy!”

           “Oh,” Lee thought for a moment about everything going on in the store but it all vanished on the warm summer breeze. Everything plaguing him from before was cemented as a bad memory that didn’t warrant a second thought, at least not for now.

           “Daddy!”

“It went fine, just fine, Ellie.” His voice sounded displaced.

           “Daddy! Daddy!”

The smiled drifted away from the Pitbull’s face. “We’ll talk about it later then, hon.” She offered.

           “Daaaad!”            “It’s nothing, really.”

           “Alright…” Ellie looked skeptical but thought it easier to just let it go.

           “Dad! Dad! Dad!”

           “What, Ashley? I’m talking to your mother,” Lee’s voice struck sharper than he wanted it to. His angular eyebrows softened in the next instant, when the guilt slipped in. It added to the pile of refuse that already existed in his gut.

           The little girl didn’t even seem to care about her dad’s impatience, she just went right one talking. “Did you get me a toy?”

           Lee felt a hot flush come to his cheeks at the question. He popped the trunk of his old, beat up car with the expired plates. It was just another something that unintentionally got pushed to the bottom of the priority list or maybe just pushed to the back of his mind. It had long since become a few more pounds of guilty refuse that weighed him down.

Lee’s chest grew heavier as he fought to load the bags into the trunk. Each bag compressed his chest a little more. He took a deep breath against the heavy weight but it didn’t help.

           “Daddy, did you get me something?”

           “NO! I just got groceries.” Lee snapped again and immediately felt guilty for it.

           For some reason, the question cut deep. It was such a simple question, one that came before, during, and after every shopping trip they’d ever gone on. That’s why Ellie offered to keep Ashely back at the car, while Lee did the shopping. It was the only way he could managed to have a clear thought, so he didn’t forget anything…

           “I…forgot the milk.” Lee sighed.

           It was such a small thing but it felt like the weight of the world settling on his shoulders, crushing the breath from his lungs. The hyena hung his head and pushed his glasses up, so he could rub his eyes, trying to sooth the headache that was starting to prick deep in his skulls.

           “What the hell is the matter with me?” Lee felt a lump forming in his throat.

           A warm hand settled on his back and an even warmer voice teased the crest of his round ear. “It’s alright, love. We’ve got enough to get us through until Friday. Let’s get home.”

           Lee looked up at her through his blurred vision and found his smile again. “Sound good, thanks for understanding, honey.”

           Ellie nodded and scooped up Ashley to wrestle her into the back seat. Lee adjusted his glasses on his muzzle and turned to his task of putting the rest of the bags in the car.

           Something orange flashed bright against the sunlight and slapped against the side of his face. It wasn’t heavy but it startled him enough to hip bump the cart. With one hand he scrambled to snack its handle before it had a chance to roll away with the other, he thrashed around and pulled the thing from his face. He glared at the black text scrawled across the page. Singing competition, auditions, prize money, $100,000. It was such a jumble of words that he had to read it again. Each word pulled Lee’s mind into a wonderland of a time when he was much younger and less emotionally downtrodden than he was now. 

***

Lee was on a stage, the bright lights shown down on him. They were so impossibly hot that they prickled his flesh with sweat underneath the blanket of yellow fur. The faceless crowd spread out before him, cheering. He clenched a microphone in his hand. It was like a lit stick of dynamite threatening to go off at any moment and he was a powder keg with a plan of burning down the house.

“I love you so much, you see, you’re even in my dream, I can hear you…baby, I can hear you calling me. I’m so in love with you. All I ever want to do is, thank you baby…thank you baby. You’ve made me…”

***

Lee crumpled the piece of paper up and tossed it on the ground. “Who has time for this?” The hyena shoved another bag into the trunk.

“Sir?” A soft and familiar voice came from behind him. “Lee, you dropped something.”

The hyena looked up and saw the otter girl, Ann, holding out the crumpled orange piece of paper out to him. He looked at the wad of paper, following it up her arm to the warm smile on her broad muzzle. Lee was once again made very aware of his age.

“Thank you,” His words clung to the dry feeling in his mouth. “I’m so clumsy, I’m always dropping things.” Lee quickly took the balled up paper and shoved it in his pocket just as quickly.

“You also forgot your milk, silly.” Ann giggled and held out the jug to him. “I’m sorry it took me so long to get it to you but Agnes was having one of her ‘above everyone else’ kinda day.”

Lee face brightened up as he looked at the milk. A stunned smile slipped to his lips as if someone just handed him a check for $100,000 dollars. “Oh my god, I…”

“You got the milk.” Ann giggled before starting back towards the store. “Take care, Lee and we’ll see you next time.”

As quickly as she appeared, the otter girl retreated. His gaze followed the younger girl across the parking lot as if she were the shining light of heaven itself. Lee held the milk close to him as if it were the most precious thing he’d ever held in his life. It was such a simple thing but a victory nevertheless. At least to Lee it felt that way.

“Ahem,”

Lee turned to see Ellie leaning on the roof of the car. The throat clearing was meant for him but her gaze also followed the younger otter girl.

“I did remember the milk after all.” There was a childish excitement in Lee’s voice.

“That’s…good, hon.” She spared a glance at him before looking back at the girl.

Still enamored by his success of remembering the milk, he missed the desperate frown on his wife’s face. He missed the helpless arch of her eyebrows and sad look that filled her eyes as she watched the otter walk away. Lee just held the jug aloft as if it was the head of Medusa and he was the one to sever it from her shoulders.

Lee nestled the jug amidst the bags in the truck as if it were a rare bird’s egg before closing the truck. He rounded the car and climbed in in. Ellie settled into her seat, buckling up. She looked over at him with the same sad question in her eyes.

Lee wasn’t stupid but he also wasn’t the most intuitive when it came to reading people. His excitement over remembering the milk or perhaps the fact that he wasn’t losing his mind after all only made it harder for him to read Ellie’s current mood. It led to several fights between them in the past and though they were always quick to recover and move on, it still happened and would happen again.

“I’m fine, really I am. Better now, in fact.” Lee tried to reassure her but not for the thing she needed the reassuring over.

Lee threw the car in reverse and started away, picking up pace as he rounded the corner and hit the main street. The thought of going home with his wife and kid melted the stress away just as quickly as it had set in. He managed to remember everything he went into the store for and that was something to silently celebrate in the back of his mind. The one thing Lee hated more than anything was dragging out to the store for one item just because he’d forgotten it. You did good, Lee told himself as he missed the still unsettled gaze from his wife sitting next to him.

[fortunatowrites]

Appetite for Destruction

A prompt i submitted to a writing contest forever ago that I had forgotten about. They never reached out to me, so I’m assuming I was not picked and can share this now. If i recall right, the prompt was something simple has incredibly high stakes.

Clarence Caputo blinked the sweat out of his eyes and focused on the task at hand. Already he had spent a tremendous amount of time and effort to meticulously knead out the dough he had hand-crafted. It was spread upon a large metal pan and he was now making sure the crust was incredibly evenly spread across the baking pan.

Wiping the sweat off of his brow, he quickly rushed over to a drawer and flung it open. It clattered loudly as it caught on the unit itself and rattled everything inside. He rummaged through the tools within and pulled out a hand blender. Then he ran over to the cupboard and pulled out a large empty can and filled it with nearby tomatoes. This kitchen was basically his second home. It was large and accommodating for the restaurant staff, but today was a very special day and this was a very personal pizza he was crafting. A task that would require his own personal touch and his alone.

The buzzing and whirring was barely noticeable to Caputo as he began making the pizza sauce. There was a shrill tone in his own mind that was drowning out everything else as he quickly added in dashes of herbs and spices. Finally, he turned back to the clattered ruins of his once organized tool drawer. Withdrawing the ladle he desperately needed, he began to scoop out the sauce into dollips upon the dough. His nerves were on fire as he carefully spread the sauce to the edges of the crust, trying to keep a nice hearty amount of sauce spread out.

“Clarence!” a voice shouted from the kitchen doors.

Clarence Caputo was deaf to the world outside his kitchen. Maybe even just outside his immediate area. His heart was pounding as he began to grate fresh cheddar into a bowl. The mozzarella sat idly by, almost aware of the fact that it would be next. A container with a lid for sprinkling on top was nearby; it contained the final cheese known as parmesan.

“Clarence!” the voice called out again. “Clarence, please!”

Finally, Caputo was snapped out of his trance and looked up to the kitchen doors. Still his hands worked frantically and grated away the chunk of cheese. A look of worry was on the face of a woman that Caputo knew only in this moment as Kelly. Her last name would be lost to him until he was certain his task was done.

“Kelly? Is something wrong?” he called.

“Jeremiago wants to try our line of sodas,” she said, almost in a scared fashion.

“Give him a glass for every one we have on the menu. Give him anything he wants!” Caputo spoke firmly as he grabbed the chunk of mozzarella and a cheese knife.

“We’re out of Dr. Cola! What do I tell him!?”

Clarence fumbled cutting the cheese and the knife clattered onto the countertop. His breath caught in his throat and he quickly threw one of his arms in front of his face to catch his terrible cough. He choked but for only a moment. With a sharp intake of breath, he settled himself and walked over to the kitchen doors.

Kelly’s eyes met his and seemed to be desperately pleading for an answer as he cooly placed one of his hands on her shoulders. With his other hand, he fished money out of his pocket and shoved it into her hands.

“Go to the grocery store and grab a case of the cans. A twenty-four pack. Now. I’ll talk to him.”

Kelly nodded and turned around. Clarence immediately grabbed her arm.

“Go through the back.” Kelly blinked away tears and nodded again. She quickly ran out the back of the kitchen. Clarence took a deep breath and readied himself. Once he found his nerve, he then walked out into the dining area.

Three other employees stood idly by sweating bullets and holding up an arm with a towel draped over it. They had run out of the napkins quite a while ago. They were all watching the only table in the restaurant that was currently occupied. Earlier today, there had been more customers, but when this guest of honor arrived, they all were forced to leave. Some people stood outside the restaurant currently, but the guards of the guest of honor were making sure no one else entered.

“Mister Jeremanto,” Clarence Caputo spoke with his most pleasant voice.

“It’s pronounced Jeremiago,” a deep voice rattled back. “Please.”

“Ah yes, my error. I am deeply sorry, my royal ambassador Jeremiago. I understand you wish to try all the sodas on our menu?” he asked, his voice beginning to crack.

The man stood up. He was seven feet tall and wider than the biggest linebacker Caputo had ever seen. A deep purple glow was emanating from the obsidian-crystalline skin that coated the man. He was wearing a strange space armor of fantastic colors, covering everything below his neck with the exception of his forearms. His arms appeared to be made of quartz and his hands were almost human. The most notable exception was that his left hand had two thumbs, one on each side.

“Master Chef Caputo,” he boomed, “I would be most delighted to try your Earthly soy-dans. I believe trying each one will help me in passing judgement of whether or not your planetoid should be moved into our empire. Please don’t worry if you fail to move me, for it will be a quick process to bulldoze your planet and build a new outpost of our own upon it.”

Caputo gulped loudly as one of the servers broke into tears. The server quickly ran to the bathroom and tried to hide. Caputo looked back to Ambassador Jeremiago.

“We will prepare for you all the sodas we can. I do hope you find one to be enjoyable. The Dr. Colas soda though is one to be saved for last! I’m having my most trusted employee fetch you a fresh batch. It’ll be ready with your pizza!”

Caputo began to sweat as Jeremiago eyed him with his glowing yellow eyeholes. If there were pupils or eyeballs inside those sockets, Caputo certainly couldn’t see them.

After a few minutes of staring, the alien sat back down in his seat. He began to rap his fingers along the table. The strangeness of an eleven-finger-rap seemed to unsettle Caputo just a tad more. Finally, the alien spoke.

“That sounds most enjoyable. Please, do not let me interrupt your baking process.”

Caputo gave a quick bow to him and slowly rushed back to the kitchen. As soon as he made it through the kitchen’s doors and out of sight, he bolted back to the pizza. The mozzarella was sliced up in almost no time at all before Caputo carefully and quickly spread the slices across the pizza. There was a stick of pepperoni behind him that he began to chop up quickly as well. The time seemed to drag for an eternity as he spent only a few minutes preparing the pepperonis.

Once they were all sliced up, he quickly spread them across the pizza and then almost literally threw it into the oven. It was an agonizing wait as he watched the timer he had set up next to the oven. Yet again he became deaf to the world, the only sound he could hear was the tone. He tried to focus and the tone was replaced by the steady clicking of his timer.

Kelly came running back through with the sodas as the timer finally went off. Caputo and Kelly locked eyes and they immediately knew this was going to be it. This was the eleventh hour of their restaurant and the world. Caputo had prided himself on his cooking, thinking it was fantastic enough to get this restaurant up and running. But did he truly believe it was good enough to save the world? There was only one way to find out.

Caputo carried out the pizza on the pan with oven mitts and set it before the ambassador. Empty glasses sat around the table and were pulled aside by Kelly as she opened a can of soda for the guest of honor. His rocky face crackled with noise as he formed a smile.

“Why, this looks scrumptious!” he spoke.

Hope filled Caputo’s heart.

“I wish all the soy-dans were like this!” he said as he began to bite upon the can and stuff the whole soda into his mouth.

Hope and color drained from Caputo as the ambassador then turned to the meal.

“This looks...acceptable. Let us begin the process of consumption,” spoke aloud the crystal alien.

Everyone watched with a mix of horror and suspense as the creature ate. Surprisingly, he was eating the pizza in a perfectly normal fashion. He went through the entirety of the pizza and then, to surprise everyone a bit further, he picked up the pizza pan and began to eat that as well. Once he was finished, he sat for a moment and dabbed at his face with a towel.

“Well, let me take a moment to truly appreciate and digest this meal.”

They all waited five painfully long minutes.

“That was… Acceptable.”

There was a cheer.

“But I believe the true test is desert! I am very interested in trying this cake meal!” he spoke quite chipperly.

Caputo threw up.

“My word!” shouted the ambassador. “You earthlings are quite the strange bunch. I’ll have you know that in our culture, it is quite rude to expel bile in front of other people. Please do not do that again.”

“Ah yes, of course,” Caputo said as he staggered into the kitchen. “Kelly, a moment please.”

Kelly ran into the kitchen. Caputo immediately thrust his wallet into her hands.

“Run down the store and grab the biggest cake you can. I can’t do that again.”

Kelly nodded and ran away. Caputo had always preferred desserts from the grocery store’s bakery anyway. And if the alien didn’t like it, at least he knew it wasn’t entirely his fault.

[colaboyxbepis]

Y'all wanna ask my oc (Mocha) a question in the comments and I'll respond how she'd respond?

[colaboyxbepis]

Y'ALL. LETS GET THE FIRST TAG ON THIS POST TRENDING!!!