#i woke up and it felt like i had fallen asleep 5 minutes ago i did not rest well

[timiddot]

my day is off to a bad start its my only shift this week (will probably explain in a post later but its not my fault its corporates) and i couldnt fall asleep until past 3 am last night because my body Loves to not fall asleep when i have work in the morning. so i got less than 4 hours of sleep and my earbuds had NO CHARGE today so i had to get some cheapy wireless earbuds and a stupid fucking dongle so i can listen to music

[m00nsbaby]

Helping you with homework.

Moon system x reader. - Headcanons.

Steven.

God bless Steven Grant's heart.

Although you didn't enjoy asking for help with things like this, you knew your boyfriend was the right person for your history assignment.

Unfortunately, remembering dates was your kryptonite.

"I'll explain it to you, okay?" He put on his glasses, and you sighed.

How were you supposed to concentrate when he looked like that?

You watched him go to his room and return with at least six different books in his arms.

And you pushed your chair so close that your shoulders touched.

It started well; you were understanding the timeline from prehistory to the Middle Ages.

However, you didn't take into account that once Steven started talking about his hyperfixations, he didn't stop.

By the second hour, you weren't sure if you were still retaining anything, so you did what your instinct dictated.

You hugged his arm, the one he wasn't using to underline sentences in his book, and your cheek rested against his shoulder.

Steven's heart raced, as it always did when you touched him spontaneously.

"Am I boring you already, love?" He kissed your hair, and shortly after, you felt the weight of his cheek against your head.

"Never," you simply said as the letters began to dance in front of your eyes.

The truth was that his voice relaxed you. Steven had a tendency to speak quickly, his accent resonating in your ears and warming you to your core, but when things got intimate, his voice seemed deeper.

He spoke slowly to make sure you didn't get lost in his words.

You yawned, and he noticed but didn't say anything. In fact, he kept talking.

And talking.

And talking.

Until your eyelids grew heavy.

"And with that, we conclude the topic of feudalism." You had fallen asleep about 10 minutes ago, hugging Steven's arm and feeling his slow breath against your body.

He chuckled, a sound you didn't even register.

Steven didn't feel bad about it; he knew school was taking its toll on you, and that day you hadn't taken your usual daily nap.

He knew better than anyone that you needed rest.

And because he had once read that people feel sleepy when they're comfortable with someone.

He didn't mind having to continue your assignment by himself, doing everything possible not to move you from his shoulder.

And taking breaks now and then to place a hand on your forehead to keep you from falling forward when you nodded off.

The next day, you woke up in your bed, and Steven had already gone to work.

Under a note with a happy face drawn on it were the seven pages of your handwritten essay.

You ended the day with the highest grade in your group, several congratulations, and many embarrassed smiles that screamed, "I didn't even lift the pen off the desk all night."

Marc.

"I beg you." "No."

"Marc?" "No."

"Please?" "I said no."

You had been following him around the house for about 5 hours. Usually, you had no trouble completing your responsibilities from start to finish, but on days like today, you didn't even have the energy to turn on your laptop.

And Marc, of course, had already decided that there was no way he would help you with something like this.

In his school days, he didn't even do his own homework.

"Please, please, please." "I said no."

After begging for the 46th time, you finally gave up. The rest of the day passed just as boringly until dinner when you took the last sip of coffee from your cup.

"I'm not going to do it." After a week of constant sleep deprivation, you decided that you could afford to sleep for 8 hours just this once.

Marc looked at you in silence for a few seconds before nodding his head.

"Then let's go to sleep."

You obeyed, and you both went hand in hand to bed. Like every night, you felt him press you against his body with both arms.

The exhaustion in your body made you give in in less than 10 minutes.

But Marc couldn't sleep.

At 12:27 in the morning, he quietly got out of bed.

And at 01:53, you woke up. The fear of not feeling your daily companion almost made you cry like a little kid.

You got up to look for him, and it wasn't difficult at all. The light from your laptop illuminated the entire dining room.

And the sound of the keys echoed through the house.

"Marc?" "No," he replied again. Admitting such gestures was not his strong suit.

Still, he pushed the chair back to give you space, and you dragged your feet to sit on his lap.

You sat sideways, your head resting on his shoulder as the warmth of his body relaxed you from head to toe.

He kept typing.

You don't know how long you slept there, but a while later, you felt him carry you to bed.

And just a few hours later, your alarm went off, with Marc's arms crushing you against his chest, and your laptop patiently waiting in the dining room.

Jake.

Spanish was never your strong suit.

And you knew very well that Jake was the one who could help you, but once you asked him, you knew he wouldn't stop bothering you.

He, on the other hand, was an expert in both things: speaking fluent Spanish and teasing you.

"Jake?" "Yes, honey?" "Can I ask you something?"

And as you suspected, he didn't leave you alone all day.

"Could you pour me a glass of water?" "¿Perdón? No te escuché." (Sorry? I didn't hear you.)

You looked at him with a furrowed brow.

"¿Y bien?" (Well?)

"Un… vaso de… agua." (A glass of water.) "¿Por qué?" (Why?) "Por favor." (Please.)

You rolled your eyes for the 17th time that day.

And he kissed you for the 23rd time.

"¿Amor?" You looked up from your phone. "¿Cómo se llama esto?" (What's this called?) You watched him point to his fork.

You were 12 seconds away from murdering him with your own hands.

"Tú puedes." (You can do it.) He sounded like the host of a children's program. "Te…"

"Te…" You stared at him, waiting for more clues. "Neeee." "Dor."

Kiss number 27.

You won't deny that you didn't hit him multiple times and gave him full-body shoves since you needed all your strength to at least get him to move.

And he mocked you every time.

"I hate you." "No-oh. Intenta de nuevo." (Try again.) "¡Te odio!"

At least this time he made you laugh.

It turns out that all day you didn't get around to doing the study session you had planned for the day.

And you probably learned more than if you had done it.

Still, you cursed when you felt your boyfriend's hands on your shoulders as he approached you from behind.

You looked up, and he leaned down to your height, with that mischievous smile that seemed permanently etched on his face.

"What?" "Te amo." (I love you.)

You blushed.

"Te amo." you said back as you received a chaste kiss on your lips.

You had lost count.

"Eres el amor de mi vida." (You're the love of my life.) Another kiss. "Espero algún día encontrar las palabras para hacerte saber cuanto te amo." (I hope to someday find the words to let you know how much I love you.)

You stopped paying attention once his lips started brushing against yours as he spoke.

"Te amo." he repeated, placing another kiss on your lips.

And when you thought the day was over, he didn't miss the opportunity to test your patience once more.

"Goodnight, babe." "No te entendí." (I didn't understand you.)

In the darkness, you heard the thump you gave his chest.

"Buenas noches." You kissed his shoulder.

And yes, the next day, you let him enjoy his multiple "I told you so" moments when you passed the exam.

[spooky-pomegranate]

Testing His Will

Captain Price x F Reader (18+) 🔥 Word Count: 3.2k

Summary: Price desperately wants to be physical with you but after you’re injured he worries he’ll be too aggressive. His fear only intensifies when you kiss him for the first time.

————————————————————————

“Will you sleep with me?”

It had been some time since Price’s will had been tested like this. You had felt so warm when you straddled him. And bloody fucking hell, the way you had rocked your hips when he’d squeezed your beautiful soft body, he’d nearly snapped. The kiss had been so goddamn slow and passionate that it would have been so easy for Price to give in, to take you right then and there, to feed his appetite and satiate your own greedy cravings. But he had stopped. He’d told you to get some rest. He’d given you your own clothes and he’d drawn the heavy curtains. He’d pulled back the covers and he’d helped you to bed. He’d been so good.

But then you’d asked him that question…

“Will you sleep with me?”

…and Price felt like the gods were punishing him.

“Yes.”

It was a stupid answer. But how could he deny you? How could he say no when you had kissed him like that? He wasn’t sure he would get a minute of sleep laying next to you, but that didn’t matter. He could just stare at the ceiling and count each of your breaths. He’d be good and keep his hands to himself, because if he wasn’t, if his hands did touch your body, they would be demanding, impatient, and rough. Price couldn’t do that to you. No, he couldn’t be aggressive. Not when you were still harboring some major injuries. He didn’t want to hurt you. Not again. Never again. Right now you needed to be held like porcelain and he wasn’t capable of it. So yes tonight he would sleep next to you, but no he would not touch you.

It was 5:00 am when Price got out of bed. You had fallen asleep almost immediately and he guessed from your deep breathing you probably wouldn’t wake up any time soon. With another warm body under his sheets, Price had also managed to get a few hours of sleep. That was a feat these days. He often struggled with night terrors but last night…last night was different. He’d slept soundly with no dreams at all. He did however wake up with a throbbing headache.

Price quietly walked to the bathroom and grabbed a handful of painkillers he kept in the medicine cabinet. Washing them down with some water from the sink he caught his reflection in the mirror. He didn’t look nearly as bad as he was expecting considering he’d been pistol-whipped, kicked down a flight of stairs, and head-butted a few hours ago. He had a small cut on his cheek and a bruise on his temple. It could be worse. He’d definitely survived worse. At least this time he didn’t fall out of a bloody helicopter. He was still sore, but it was nothing a hot shower couldn’t fix.

The water was running over his face, trickling down through his beard and onto his chest when Price heard a knock. His eyes shot open wide. Your voice called out from behind the door.

“Price?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you in the shower?”

“Yeah.”

“Can I come in the bathroom?”

Panic. He should say no. He should be good. He should tell you to go back to bed.

“Yes.”

Fuck. He shouldn’t have said that. You pushed open the door and Price watched as you stepped into the bathroom. You were wearing a t-shirt and tight running shorts. Your hair was messy from sleep. Even through a foggy glass door and heavy steam, Price could feel his body react to the sight of yours. Bloody hell, what was he doing?

“I got worried when I woke up and you weren’t in bed.” You kept your eyes on the tile floor as you spoke. Your voice was sleepy.

“I’m sorry… I’m right here.”

“Umm, I was wondering… would you mind if I came in there with you?”

Price stood still as the water cascaded down his body. His dog tags stuck to his rapidly pounding chest. If he let you in you would see him… all of him. He was growing hard at the thought.

“I promise I won’t steal all your hot water.”

You laughed and it broke Price. Of course, you could come in.

“I wouldn’t care if you did. Come on.”

You tore away your clothes, throwing them on top of Price’s, and walked over to the foggy shower door. Price’s heart jumped to his throat. There would be no going back from this. You grabbed the metal handle and pushed open the door. He turned away from the showerhead and faced you. The hot water beat down against his back.

You smiled as your eyes met Price’s. He noticed they were large and fierce. Your pupils were so dilated they blacked out their normally striking color. Price raked his eyes down your body. Your curves were every bit as beautiful as he had imagined, but your ribs were marked by large black and blue marbling bruises. They were a reminder for Price that he had to be careful with you. You needed to be touched with tenderness.

But that would be a challenge with how you were looking at him. Vicious, hungry, and desperate. Price watched your face as you scanned his body, gazing over his shoulders, his chest, his stomach, and finally down to his throbbing cock.

You moaned at the sight and he laughed.

“Let’s get you cleaned up huh?” Price needed to touch you now. He couldn’t wait a single moment longer. Carefully he grabbed your hips and switched positions so the hot water was running down your back. He reached for the shampoo bottle and squirted some into his hands. Then gently he moved his hands through your hair, working the liquid into a sudsy lather. You took a step forward and rested your forehead on his furry chest as he continued to rub and knead. You didn’t seem to mind that his hard cock was pinned against your belly. He felt himself twitch as a sickly sweet whine escaped your lips.

“Does that feel good?” Price asked.

“Yes, sooo good.” You sighed and lowered your shoulders, tension clearly falling off them. Then suddenly you took a hard step back and looked up at him. Had he scared you off?

“I didn’t come in here so you could take care of me again Price. I wanted to take care of you… please.”

Fucking hell. What had he done to deserve this? Price watched as you took the shampoo bottle from his hands and set it back on the shelf. You picked up some body wash and poured it into your hands.

“Can I?”

Price nodded and you touched his chest, rubbing your hands through his short dark hair there. You pressed your fingers deep into his tense muscles and whispered a string of honeyed praises as you massaged him.

“You’re so strong.” “Shit, look at your muscles.” “They’re so big.”

Somehow Price managed to stay quiet as you whispered all those things to him. It wasn’t until you said…

“You needed this didn’t you?”

…that Price let out a deep rasping groan.

“Fuck, yes.” He immediately growled.

His answer must have excited you because a red blush spread from your cheeks down to the top of your chest. You both stood still for a moment. Price watched as a cluster of soap bubbles slid from your neck down through the valley of your breasts. He’d never seen something so beautiful in his life. He had to taste you again.

Price grabbed your jaw and tilted your face upwards. You rushed to meet his open mouth, tongues colliding in an urgent fervor that had been missing from last night. You tasted so sweet and delicious. He tried to contain himself as you sucked on his tongue and whined. Fuck there you went, testing his will again.

He broke away and started to kiss down your jaw and neck. His tongue was licking a long stripe by your collarbone when you sighed and weakly spoke.

“Price, please let me make you feel good.”

Price picked his head up. You pressed your forehead against his and thread a hand into the hair at the back of his neck, pulling slightly. He nodded and you slid your other hand down in between your bodies, moving it over Price’s broad chest, across his hard stomach, and then lower.

“Fuckkkkk.”

Price hissed as you wrapped your soft hand around the base of his cock. He grabbed your hips and buried his head into the crook of your neck, nuzzling his beard against your skin. He wanted to thrust into your hand and pound away until he came but he didn’t. He let you stay in control.

“You’re so big.” God, you sounded so sweet.

You were stroking Price at a tormentingly slow pace. Up and down you squeezed him like you were in no rush to ever leave the shower. He grunted into your neck before sucking and licking his thanks.

Price swore he must in heaven. Nothing could have prepared him for how good you were making him feel. But bloody hell did he want you to move faster. He thrust his hips up into your hand, hoping to find more satisfaction.

“Do you want me to go faster?” You whispered earnestly in his ear.

“Mhmmmm.” Price hummed in affirmation, his face still buried in your neck. You wasted no time giving him what he wanted. Your movements became frantic as you stroked him faster and tightened your grip. You let go of the back of his neck and added your second hand, leaving no inch of him untouched. Price took a hand off your hip and slammed it into the wall behind your head. He wasn’t going to last much longer like this.

“Mmmmm gonna come if you keep that up.” He grunted and raised his head from your neck. You kissed him. It was searing.

“It’s okay. Come for me Price.”

Price started to thrust his hips up into your hands, wildly chasing his own end without care. He was panting chest heaving as you focused your touch on his sensitive tip. He kissed you again and again, tongue swirling inside your mouth, teeth pulling the delicate and wet skin of your lips.

“Fuckkkk that feels so good.”

Price brought his head back down to your neck and buried it in your collarbone. He couldn’t hold on any longer.

He felt lightheaded as he came, painting your hands and stomach with his release. You continued to touch him through his bliss but you slowed your movements each time he shuttered. When you finally let go he was out of breath.

“Thank you.” Price huffed.

“You’re welcome.” He smiled and you laughed. That was slowly becoming Price’s favorite sound. He grabbed a wash cloth and helped you clean up his mess. Gently swiping over your body, he felt the water start to grow colder. Goosebumps began to form over your skin.

“Let’s get out of here. You’re getting cold.”

Price stepped out of the shower first and held your hand as you followed. He grabbed a fluffy large towel from a cabinet next to the sink and dropped to one knee. Starting with your calves he slowly dried each inch of you. He took his time, drinking in every beautiful mark. Now that you had shown him your gorgeous body he wanted to remember every single detail of it. If you never let him touch you again he would always have this moment. He could come back here again in his mind.

But Price wasn’t satisfied with just toweling you off and memorizing your figure. How could he be when you had been so sweet and giving? He hoped you say yes to his next question. He wasn’t sure what he would do with himself if you said no.

“I know you said you didn’t want me to take care of you in the shower, but please can I beautiful? You were so good to me. Let me be good to you.”

You looked at him again with those eyes. Those vicious, hungry, and desperate eyes. Please, please say yes he thought.

“Yes.”

Before you could even finish saying the full word Price grabbed your hips and lifted you off the ground. He kicked open the door to the bedroom while you wrapped your legs around his hips and your arms around his neck. Price walked over to the bed and gently set you down on the edge. Careful, he had to remind himself. You needed to be handled delicately.

“Lay down in the middle of the bed and spread your legs open for me.”

————————————————————————

You crawled to the middle of the bed and opened your legs just as Price had commanded. From the moment you saw his entire body in the shower, you had been dripping from in between your thighs. But that wasn’t supposed to be about you. The shower had been about him.

Price was constantly putting your needs ahead of his own. He’d told you to run, leave him behind, and save yourself at your apartment. He’d let you take his room that first night he carried you here, and he’d put you to bed when he clearly wanted to do more with you. If you were going to repay him you would have to catch him off guard. So that’s what you did… and God was it worth it. The look he had in his eyes when you stepped into the shower was pure heaven. The way his nose crinkled when he got excited and the noises he made when he was coming, fuck you never wanted them to stop.

But then, just moments ago in the bathroom, he asked you that question and you’d said yes. Now you were here and Price was standing at the foot of his bed looking down at you like he wanted to devour you. You thought your heart might explode. Price's voice was deep when he spoke.

“You look perfect like this.”

You squirmed under his gaze. He approached the bed and started to kiss your lower legs. You loved the feeling of his beard brushing against your skin as he worked his way higher. He alternated between licking, sucking, and kissing in varying patterns, giving both of your legs equal attention all while using his strong arms to keep you spread open. When he reached the flesh of your upper thigh he looked at you and groaned.

“Can I taste you?”

Afraid that your own voice would give out you simply nodded. The fire in his eyes burned brighter.

“Good girl.”

Price wasted no time lifting your thighs over his shoulders and burying his face in between your legs. He lapped at your wetness and groaned when you arched down into his face. You couldn’t help but whine. You were so eager, so impatient to grind further into him. Desperately needing to feel more friction, you tried to move on your own. But Price wouldn’t have it. He reached up and pushed down on your stomach with one arm, pinning you onto the mattress. You were in his complete control. His strength was on full display. He raised his chin and gave you the most wicked smile.

“Fuckkk you taste so good.”

Your whines turned into whimpers.

“More. Please Price, more.”

Price caved to your pleas. He moved his tongue to your clit and started flicking slowly back and forth. His strong wet tongue on your bundle of nerves felt so good that you needed something to hold onto. Your hands reached down and grabbed fistfuls of Price’s short hair. He closed his mouth over your clit and sucked, making the most carnal noises. You loved his grunts and groans.

You yanked him hard in a weak attempt to get him to stop. You needed just a minute to catch your breath, but he kept his head glued in between your thighs. Spurred on by your harsh grip, Price started to move his tongue faster and faster. You realized then he was only going to stop once he had made you come. This would be the death of you. Your head was spiraling.

“Oh my God, that feels so good. Please don’t stop. Please don’t stop.”

You were a babbling mess when Price finally broke away from your center and kissed your thigh. But he didn’t let you collect yourself. Instead, he slid a finger inside you, curling it upwards and finding that sweet gummy place.

“Is that the spot? Right here? Is this where you like it?”

Price was smiling when he asked those questions. Smug bastard. He must have known from the way you were whining and moaning, that you were putty in his hands. He had to know that you were drunk on his touch. Your head snapped back against the mattress as slid a second finger inside of you. You could feel the pressure building in your core. How did he always know what you needed?

“Do you want my mouth again? Would you like that?”

“Yes Price, please. Make me come. Please.”

You were begging. Anything he wanted to hear you would give him. Anything to have his mouth over you again. But Price wouldn’t make you plead any further. He brought his mouth down and sucked on your clit hard while continuing to pound away with his fingers. You let go of his hair and grabbed the sheets, yanking them to your chest. You were on the edge, any second now you would fall. You just needed a push. Price raised his head from between your thighs. His blue eyes stared up at you through his lashes.

“Be a good girl and come for me.”

Price’s hoarse voice was all the push you needed. Your orgasm crashed over you rough and fast. You clenched around his fingers as he continued to fuck you with them. You let go of the sheets and reached down and grabbed his forearm with both hands, nails digging into his skin. Your body thrashed against the mattress. You could feel your pulse rapidly beating in your throat.

“There you go beautiful. Take what you need.”

You rocked your hips forward as Price lowered his chin and tasted you again. God how you loved the sight of him in-between your thighs. Every bristle of his beard against your skin made you twitch with overstimulation.

After he had thoroughly cleaned you with his tongue he climbed up on the bed and laid next to you, curling you against his chest. You tried to catch your breath as he rubbed small circles into your hip. The two of you laid together in content silence.

“I guess it’s my turn to thank you now huh?” Your voice was weak when you finally spoke. He laughed.

“Absolutely not. I think I might have enjoyed that more than you did.”

“There’s no way that’s possible.” It was your turn to laugh. You couldn’t remember the last time someone made you come like that. You laid your head back on Price’s chest and listened to his heartbeat. You felt safe for the first time in days.

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This is an excerpt from my much larger work on AO3. If you would like to read the whole story thus far here is the link. If you are just here for the *spicy bits* I have more fun excerpts called "Violence and Timing" and "Falling Apart" here on Tumblr.

[badcaseofcasey]

Steddie Soulmate/Met as Kids AU - Part 7 (The End) Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7

a/n: we’ve made it to the end, folks! I have had so much fun posting this and seeing all of your reactions as I went, so thanks for coming along on this ride with me! I’ll be posting the full fic to AO3 soon, so keep an eye out for that. Without further ado, the final installment (for now…)!

The next thing Steve knew, he was blinking back against the light, the room filled with a warm late morning sun. He and Eddie had gravitated towards each other during the night and he woke up with his arm slung low across Eddie’s hips. They were still facing each other so Steve could see Eddie’s peaceful expression as he slept.

Steve let out a huge sigh of relief when he felt Eddie’s breath moving his arm up and down where it rested. According to the clock on the nightstand, Steve had gotten a miraculous six hours of sleep without waking up from a nightmare or tossing and turning over worries about whether or not everyone was safe. Steve knew it was likely because the person he worried about the most had been lying safely next to him.

The other benefit to sharing a bed with Eddie was that he got to watch as the other man slowly woke, eyes scrunching up to keep out as much of the light as possible, to stay in his cocoon of sleep as long as he could. It was adorable, Steve didn’t mind admitting it, and he couldn’t help the smile across his features either.

“You see something you like?” Eddie asked, voice rough with sleep. “Just saying, it’s been a while since I’ve woken up to a pretty boy in my bed looking at me like that.”

Steve huffed out a laugh. “Take me out to dinner first, Munson.”

Eddie’s eyes slowly opened and Steve noticed, not for the first time, that they were the color of molten chocolate when the light hit them just right.

“Morning,” Steve said. “How do you feel?”

“Like a bunch of interdimensional hell beasts used me as a chew toy,” he responded. “But I feel less like that than I did yesterday, so I’m going to count it as a win.”

“Good,” Steve said.

They were both quiet for a few minutes, soaking in the warmth of the sun streaming in through the windows and of each other’s body in the bed next to them. Eventually, Eddie sighed and held his eyes open.

“I think I promised you a conversation,” Eddie began.

“That you did,” Steve said, steeling himself.

“I just want to know… What does all this mean to you?” Eddie asked. “Because for a long time, I had this idea in my head of what would happen when I found my soulmate again, but then we did see each other and it was… not like that. But recently, things have been different and I know you and I both aren’t the same kids we were at the park, or even the ones we were in high school. So.”

“So,” Steve agreed. “I see why you’d want to talk about that.”

“And I grew up with this image of my soulmate as this dragon slayer, the person who could battle away anything that was bothering me and make it all okay again. And not two weeks ago I watched you do literally that - with demobats instead of dragons, but still.”

Steve laughed slightly. He was suddenly self-conscious about where his arm rested on Eddie’s hip, but when he tried to pull it back, Eddie just scooted closer to keep Steve’s hand where it was. Eddie’s arm was steadfastly around Steve’s shoulders as it had been when they’d fallen asleep.

“And, to put it all out on the table,” Eddie continued, “because I literally almost died and that puts things in perspective like no other, let me tell you, and because I’m sick of not saying it anymore - I’ve kind of been falling steadily head over heels in love with you since I saw you kill a demobat with your teeth, and I don’t see that changing any time soon.”

Steve sucked in a breath, eyes wide. He wasn’t quite sure he had heard Eddie correctly. After everything he’d done to basically reject Eddie over the years, he hadn’t dreamed that Eddie could really love him. And yet, here Eddie was, admitting it out loud and without shame that he didn’t just love Steve, but that he was in love with him. And wasn’t that a miracle, in and of itself.

But Steve must have been processing in silence too long, because it was Eddie’s turn to try and pull away, muttering about how he didn’t expect anything, and how he knew that there were such a thing as platonic soulmates, and it was okay if Steve didn’t feel the same way - and that just wouldn’t do.

Steve used the hand on Eddie’s hip to keep him still and brought his other one up to cup Eddie’s cheek where it rested against the pillow and angle his face so that Steve could press their lips together in a sweet, but sure kiss.

Eddie sucked in a breath as soon as their lips touched and Steve could sense his surprise even before he pulled back to look at him.

“I’ve already got the one platonic soulmate,” Steve said. “And honestly, she’s kind of a handful. Not sure I could handle another.”

Eddie looked at Steve like he was a wondrous thing and huffed out a laugh. “Thank god. Because I was talking a big game about being fine with whatever you were ready for, but I think it honestly would have killed me if you had wanted to keep things friendly.”

“Definitely not,” Steve smiled before leaning in to kiss Eddie again, this time angling his body a bit more on top of Eddie’s so Eddie’s head could rest on the pillow.

They stayed like that for hours, swapping gentle kisses - and some not so gentle - and basking in the glow of being together and on the same page for the first time since they were kids in a park fighting dragons. 

Steve had nearly stopped in his tracks when he pushed Eddie’s shirt up to feel the warm, still-healing skin and saw his own handwriting snaking along Eddie’s rib cage. Eddie had been right - there were a few letters missing and a few others stretched into scar tissue, but they were still perfect to Steve, and it felt like a punch to the gut to see them there for the first time, proof that Steve hadn’t lost Eddie after all.

Eventually, they would leave the safety and stillness of their bed to start their day, running into Wayne in the kitchen who gave them a knowing look when they arrived together from the downstairs bedroom. They would find their way around each other, adjusting when needed to fit the other into their respective lives. Eddie never did move out of Steve’s place, even when he was fully-healed, not until they all moved out - Wayne to his new trailer, furnished by a shady wing of the US government, Eddie and Steve to their first apartment together.

And though the rest of the dragons they would face were of the metaphorical kind rather than the interdimensional hell beast variety, they would always face them together.

taglist: @infinitetrashbag @vampireinthesun @swimmingbirdrunningrock @maya-custodios-dionach @thev01dd @obsessivlyme @a-little-unsteddie @anything-thats-rock-and-roll @spectrum-spectre @red-panderz69 @magpiemuseum @minjintea @finalmoondragon @thatonebadideapanda @estrellami-1 @freyaforestafay @biatcgh @sadcanadianwinter @im-sam-fucking-winchester @bidisastersworld @justanothergirlwithobsessions @anaibis @thing-a-ling @rosered93 @newtstabber @void-o-chaos @thegingerrapunzel @baron-zemo-trash @katireads @child-of-cthulhu @the-s-is-silent @i-must-potato @hellomynameismoo @lovelylilbadone @theotalksalot @lydi-cyan @background-noise-headache @idontgetpaidenoughforthisshit @slitherynchiken @grapefruitgalaxy @bookbinderbitch @luthienstormblessed @blues-tunes @murdblurdock @grtwdsmwhr @xpaperheartso

[kumoriyami-xiuzhen]

Hakuoki Shinkai Tenun no Shou Stellaworth Booklet “Her Long Day” Part 6

Still haven't figured out what I should do next.... I sorta wanna go translate the Shimabara Disturbance drama, but the tl I found has some parts that are missing text, and I just don't wanna go look up what I ned to fill in those gaps...

whatever. maybe i won't do that. good night. 😂 i'm too tired to think right now. waking up before 6 am really messes me up unless i'm travelling.

Hakuoki Shinkai Tenun no Shou Stellaworth Booklet “Her Long Day” Part 6

Translation by KumoriYami

Chǒushí · Kazama Moment 《1~3 o'clock》

It was 3 o'clock, the time when all plants slept, and when the gates of the underworld [I guess?] were open.

If things were as usual, I would have fallen asleep long ago…

Unfortunately, today I woke up, perhaps from hearing the sound of insects.

"……Huh……？"

As I huddled under my blanket, I heard something outside… a minute sound.

The chirping of insects was wrapped in the sound of the wind and the sound of footsteps on gravel.

...Was that the sound of a cat or dog walking by…?

I lifted up my groggy head head, and opened the door a finger-wide crack, and looked outside——

"——I didn't think you'd be awake at this time."

"……Eh？"

"Could it be those watch dogs are forcing you to work day and night?"

"……!"

My weary mind immediately cleared up, and my eyes widened.

Standing there was the one who had repeatedly crossed swords with the Shinsengumi and declared that he was going to take me away—.

"Kazama-san——"

"——Be quiet."

"Wah!?"

Just as the yell was about to leave my throat, my mouth was covered, and I could only desperately twist my body.

But Kazama-san's arm was like it was made of stone, and I couldn't pull away at all.

"It's useless, although female oni have powerful/strong vitality, their strength cannot be compared to that of a male oni."

"Uh——"

"……Listen, just stay quiet. As long as you promise not to yell, I will let you go."

I did my best to nod, and to my surprise, Kazama-san really did let me go."

"Why are you come here at this time? Could it be that you wanted to take advantage of how everyone's asleep..."

"That's ridiculous. Do you think that I'm the sort of vulgar man who would attack a woman at night?"

“……”

What happened just now, I did really feel that this was similar to being attacked…. I always felt there was a sense of incredulity with this, so I asked again.

"….Then why did you come here? It doesn't seem like you've answered my question yet..."

"……This flower/These flowers."

Kazama-san hesitated for a moment and handed me a flower.

"This is… a sunflower/These are... sunflowers…?"

"That's right. Early this morning, beautiful sunflowers bloomed in the garden of a house in the Satsuma Domain, and since I thought it'd be a waste if only I admired them. Thinking that, I involuntarily thought of your face. You are surrounded by a group of insensitive men all day long, and have no opportunities to see such beautiful flowers."

"Um......"

If Kazama-san's words were true, he really came just to send me this flower/these flowers…

"…….Even if you say that, with you suddenly coming here, I can't believe it…"

"Why suddenly? Is there something strange about a husband who treasures his wife giving her flowers?"

"——Wife?"

"Of course, you are my wife."

…………As expected, I couldn't communicate with this person. Kazama-san slowly extend his hand towards me, who was at a complete loss for words.

"Of course, if you want me to take you away right now, isn't that another matter?"

"I don't....!"

I trembled and hurriedly took a step back.

Kazama-san's hand abruptly stopped.

".......?"

"Hmph… Who would have thought that there would be a watchdog awake at this time."

Kazama-san sighed, turned around, and then disappeared into the darkness.

"——Let's meet again someday in the future. Next time, it will have to be in a place where no one will disturb us."

Yinshi · Sannan Moment 《3~5 o'clock》

——At that moment, a voice came from the depths of headquarters.

"——Apparently an uninvited guest came?"

"Ah…… Sannan-san……!!"

"——Oya. To go as far as to intrude at this time, how truly careless."

Sannan-san looked in the direction Kazama-san disappeared in and lowered the hand he had on his sword.

At the same time, I collapsed to the ground, as if the ties around had me had been unraveled.

"……Fu……"

"It's alright, Yukimura-kun. Did you get injured?"

"Nn. I'm okay. Thank you……"

I sat paralyzed on the ground and looked up at Sannan-san,, and noticed tha tmy hands were shaking.

Although he was joking about that bitter experience, it really could have been quite dangerous.

——If Sannan-san hadn't come, what would have happened?"

While I trembled as I imagined that, Sannan-san, he——

"……Forgive me/I apologise."

He took hold of my hand, and slowly pulled me so I could stand up, then he wrapped both of his hands around my hands.

"——As expect you're terrified, your hands are still shaking now."

"……Yes. As soon as I thought that I was saved, all the fear came bursting forth……"

"I'm sorry. If I was able to notice a bit sooner, you wouldn't have been so scared."

"N-No, it's not Sannan-san's fault! You saved me…"

"……Hehe. Yes. At least the worse was avoided."

Sannan-san urged me to sit down, and the two of us sat by side in the corridor.

Even though my body was still shaking now, he smiled.

"It's alright, I'll sit with you here and accompany you until you calm down."

"……"

"Apparently, I'm meddling——"

"No….. if Sannan-san doesn't mind…. please."

Perhaps my words went against his expectations, so Sannan-san's eyes wiedened, and he was speechless.

".......Are your words sincere?"

"Nn... is that no good....."

".......You aren't afraid of me even though I've become a rasetsu?"

Sannan-san gazed into my eyes, and I laughed/smiled.

"......I think that genuinely scary people wouldn't say that sort of thing. Although it's true that Sannan-san hasbecome a rasetsu……."

"……But?"

"But, I think that your heart is the same as it was before."

Actually, until just now, Sannan-san had been saying consoling words to me,…. .

"......Oya. After hearing such adorable words, I can't do anything bad now."

Sannan-san stroked my head, as if to say that he had surrendered.

"Then… until you can peacefully fall asleep…"

Afterwards, Chizuru's moment

—Then, after that—

Sannan-san stayed and chatted with me until the sky faintly became green.

I completely calmed down and returned to my room as well.

"Today… I should say yesterday, a lot of things happened from morning until night……."

I got under the blankets again, and what happened all day long began to gradually resurfaced in my mind again.

"Waking up early, seeing Souma-kun, cooking together with Heisuke-kun…… going on patrol……"

If I fall asleep now, I didn't know if I'll be able to sleep before daybreak.

"......In the middle of the night, Kazama-san came over for some reason…. then… Ah, Hijikata-san…. I don't know if he'w awake after that…"

Incredibly, as soon as I was covered with the blanket, I immediately felt drowsy. Tired to the point where I couldn't resist.

"……"

With my narrowing field of vision, between the gaps of dreams of reality, I mumbled to myself.

"……Tomorrow too…… I'll work hard……"

Until I was woken up again shortly after by the sound of birds, a new day was about to start again. I finally slept peacefully again so I could get a moment's rest——.

----end----

[candy8448]

Physics paper 2 (final exam!!!)

Gcse rambles

Our school let us come in after break time if we didnt do geography so i got to lay in 3 extra hours (i had fallen asleep at 6pm last night, woke at 2am, slept again at 4am and woke again at 6am 0.0) and i walked to school.

Because i wouldnt be able to get the dinner ladies to sign my shirt or notebook cuz they wouldnt be in school after school, i got them to sign my notebook and they all thanked me for involving them all in this becausd nobody else had asled them (we couldnt sogn shirts just yet cuz we couldnt take them into the exam woth writing on)

There is a cleaner in the school who is really nice and she is so sweet and i made her a card but the past two or so weeks she was nowhere to be seen and im so sad i couldnt give it to her, or get her to sign my shirt or notebook

The exam honestly was just a blur because i was too excited to get to signing sjirts that i dont remember anything

Anyways right after we ran outside and they had hired an icecream truck!! And they paid for each of us to have a free icecream!! And we went around signing shirts and it was fun and all (this is my favorite "tradition" that we do in school, i had come PREPARED with all of the colours and a pouch to carry them all in that my grandma made like almost 2 years ago)

One of the history teachers signed my shirt and i noticed he had a prigress pride pin which was tiny, but as i walked away, i said "nice pin" and he looked kinda bamboozled and a bit embarased as i quickly scrambled away. Later i found out from my friends who were actually taught bt him that he has two lesbian daughters! So that's really nice to know, that's a great thing for him to do, that's so nice and sweet!!

Then we had a leavers assembly where they gave out prizes apointed by each teacher of each subject (i didnt get one :( ) and one girl got a special prize for attendance. She only missed HALF A DAY in the PAST 5 YEARS?!?!? HOW??!?!? everyone was shocked cuz we would all go insane, they gave her a £40 voucher and a massive art folder with art supplies because she is going to do art in college and honestly she deserves it cuz that is crazy!

One of my friend got a gift bag (one of the prizes) and another friend gave him another so he had 3 so i half begged/asked him to give me one and he gave me one with a plant sprout which coincidentally my sister is obssesed with house plants

The rewards were so fun, usually uts jut mediokre claps but this time there was full cheers, claps, celebrations, and it was so loud and fun and great

They gave us free copies of our whole year group photo and tutor group photos which was really cool of them, and my tutor gave us all in our tutor group a photo of our tutor in year 7 (aww) with a message on it. It was super sweet cuz she was the best, she joined the school the same year we had but in yr 10 we couldnt have her as a tutor and half way thru year 11 they gave us a maths teacher to teach us maths in the mornings instead, but my tutor was my safe-space and i could go to her for my problems and home situations and she was the best. I started tearing up when i gave her a hug good-bye.

I wanted to get my drama teacher's sign but she had already left since we had gone an hour after school time :(

I took last minute selfies with all the friends who i talk to less but are still like best friends and such, one of them wrote his phone number on my shirt since i didnt have it yet (I messeged him when i got home) and it was honestly sad seeing the hall emptying.

In year 7 they told us "in the year 2024 you guys will be leaving us, isnt that crazy" and it felt like forever away, it started feeling like this would never end and even until the last week, while i knew it was going to end factually, i still hadn't processed what that actually meant, i still dont hink ive processed that i will never come back again, and that is crazy!

Me and my friend since when i moved down here in year 2 stayed behind to take photos of the school building, and we started walking to the bus stop and it was all sentimental. This was the only time ever where i didn't want to go to school.

Its crazy how my best friend since year 2 is continuing with me into the same college. Im glad.

Its sad ill probably lose contact with many of my friends. As much as we say we will stay in contact, its hard, ive not been in contact with my primary school friends and we stopped contact with my yr 8 friend so close after she moved away. Its really sad tbh. I will miss them

Our leaver's hoodies were apparently delayed to we will be invited one last time to collect them. I wont be able to be there for results day so im glad i have one more chance

Anyway, here are some memes, im going to make a seperate post with my entire gcse slander compilation very very very soon, keep an eye on my blog!

Enjoy your summer! We've all deserved it!

And it felt like it would never end and that this would be our whole lives, and it was hell most of the time, but goodbye secondary school!

[nathank77]

3/19/24

5:41 a.m

So last week I ended up taking a higher dose of xanax multiple days. 2 days in a row. Then the day after a half. And then like 2 days after a half...

I also started mixing Benadryl and hydroxyzine in to the days I took the half because I had taken the 1 mg so many days..

I might have fucked myself. Let me go into depth.

To start I've noticed on Xanax I can usually fall asleep in 2 hours and stay asleep for 5 hours. If I get up to pee I'm fucked... I end up tossing and turning and being unable to fall back to sleep. If I don't pee I can usually pass right back out..

Sometimes I pee and I've been taking hydroxyzine and Benadryl right after I go so I can fall back to sleep and get my 7 hours. It has worked...

I'm worried those other days I took the half and mixed hydroxyzine and Benadryl in when i took the xanaz not hours later bc i had taken a 1 mg so many days that week. I mixed in the hydroxyzine and Benadryl bc of the interaction of sedation...

So out of these two weeks, I have fall asleep on a half mg of xanax twice... without adding Benadryl and hydroxyzine in a couple hours later to knock myself out...they were spread out like the 9th and the 14th or something like that.

Two nights ago I took the pill at 5:41 a.m and I ended up not falling asleep and taking a Benadryl 25MG and hydroxyzine 25MG at 8:22 a.m. I ended up closing my eyes ay 8:41 a.m and falling asleep prob by 9 am. I woke up at 3 p.m. I got about 6 hours of sleep. It wasn't enough but luckily the hallucination wasn't any worse..

Last night 3/18 I took the half at 5:05 a.m. I had one of the worst nights ever. I took benadryl 25MG and hydroxyzine 25MG at 7:42 a.m....

Then I still hadn't slept and I took another 25MG of both hydroxyzine and Benadryl at 8:55 a.m. I closed my eyes at 9:12 a.m and failure. I opened them at 9:48 a.m and I tried again. I either fell asleep for like 30 minutes maximum from 9:48-10:33 cause it is a little fuzzy but I def didn't sleep the entire time.. I must have fallen asleep by 11 a.m I didn't dose anything else past 9:48 8:55 a.m. I figured I'd just accept I couldn't sleep. I slept from 11 a.m to 3:30 p.m. I got only like hours of sleep maybe 4 hours and 45 minutes. Or 30 who knows...I went to the dentist obv.. and yea the hallucination wasn't terribly bad or anything but- I'm exhausted... and I'm aggravated. It's not terrible but it felt worse today than yesterday or a day with full sleep. I mean but I can attribute that to less concentration and focus as well as just irritatiablity...with lack of sleep and not being able to switch from Xanax to something better for sleep such as estrazolam... but yea it wasn't like the voice got creative or intelligent but it seems more intrusive and more stressful to deal with.

The days I slept without hydroxyzine and Benadryl on a half MG were, 3/16 but I did take Benadryl and hydroxyzine at 1:03 p.m when I woke up and peeded. But nonetheless a half MG did knock me out without any other drug. And then 3/9 which I didn't use hydroxyzine or Benadryl at all.

I'm worried I fucked myself but idk. We will find out. I was stressed about my dentist appt. Idk what happened Sunday.. cause I wasn't stressed. I'm hoping since the 16th occurred that will happen for me tomorrow night..

My eye doctor appt is at 3 p.m. There is no way in the world, I'm getting up for that appt with I mean even 6 hours of sleep cause I got to get up 2 or 2:30 the latest...so I'm taking the full MG tonight and I should sleep like a baby. If not I suppose I'll add Benadryl at some point and then hydroxyzine at another point... I don't think it'll come to that.

So tonight I should knock out on 1 mg.. tomorrow I'm hoping the half will be effective without anything else. I mean I have bloodwork on the 20th I'll skip it if I fall asleep late. It's not stressful I can reschedule. Tbh I'll reschedule the eye exam too if I absolutely have to. I'll see what happens. Let's cross our fingers that the half will be effective tomorrow when I'm less stressed cause I've had back to back responsibilities but yea I'll cancel worse case and sleep in.

Moving on I am seeing my doctor on the 28th about my insomnia. I'll be face to face with her and I'm going to tell her my black hairy tongue has not healed and show her as it's a direct side effect of xanax. And then I'm going to ask for estrazolam 2mg or doral 15 mg. She was only going to give me 7.5 mg of temazepam and on the benzodiazepine equivalency chart 20-30 mg is equivalent to 0.5-1.mg of xanax which is why I didn't do it.... although I did this all over the phone so maybe seeing me a month later face to face and seeing my tongue hasn't healed and it's not yeast or viral... Maybe she will hear me out. I need something equivalent to the 1mg xanax I am on.

I'm going to ask her for doral 15mg or estrazolam 2 mg and show her the chart and say the only reason I'm sleeping is fucking xanax and it saved my life but I'd rather my tongue stay this way and sleep then risk full blown insomnia.

I picked estrazolam 2mg bc they come in 1 and 2 and 2 is equal to 1 mg of xanax per this chart... it's a better insomnia benzo cause it's made for insomnia unlike xanax... and if she won't do that cause she wants to do the lowest dose possible then I'll ask for doral another insomnia benzodiazepine that comes on 15 mg tablets... it's equivalent to 1MG of xanax. I'll show her the chart, and I'm hoping face to face Interaction, and facts will help my case. I won't hold my breath. I expect I'll end up going to the psychiatrist... but Prohealth is fucking reliable af. That's the issue. Psychiatrists are not. Maybe I'll just have black hairy tongue for the rest of my life to make sure I sleep. I don't think I'm going to depend on a psychiatrist and end up getting fucked in the end....

Prohealth is truly reliable and once I get another benzodiazepine from someone else they will stop prescribing it. I may not be able to get her to reperscribe it....

So yea I'm stressed about that. Hopefully BHT and face to face will change things when I show her this chart.

At some point I may start smoking weed again, I mean I didn't need to take 400 different drugs to sleep. I slept solidly throughout the night and my fucking tongue needs to heal. I hope the 28th goes well. Weed is a big decision I'm really going to think about it and see how the 28th goes.

Also what makes matter worse is my sleep environment.. I can't sleep in silence bc otherwise I hear the voice. It's maddening. I don't want to listen to being scared bc I want cartoon mental pictures. Happy ones. Not realistic ones...

So I listen to bobs burgers or American dad. Something with a lot of dialogue bc it tunes the voice out. Unfortunately there is all this singing and loud noise. Bare in mind I turn it down as much as I can where I can hear the dialogue clearly but i do need hearing aids.

Bobs has to be at like 18 or 19 volume. American dad for some reason can be at 14 volume. Nonetheless it isn't a good slept environment. Loud noisy singing and clattering versus hearing happy birthday 50000 times. And not to mention trying to think positive thoughts and think over aka align with the voice so that's what I hear. I gave up on that months ago.

Either way I guess I'll figure it out. I just took my 1 mg Xanax. And I fucking hate Kristen fucking dew. I've don't nothing this week with her but later this week I will. I got to get my general health taken care of first.

Weed may need to happen cause I feel like a pilll head popping everything I can just to hit sleep stage one.

Beyond that- my thyroid is clearly close to normal. No doubt. Graves can cause insomnia. I haven't seen a single fucking improvement in that regard unfortunately.

Hopefully it's still higher than it should be and once it normalized it fixes it... idk... I have options but it's getting down I might as well smoke a little weed everyday and go back to sleeping like a baby at the risk of making psychosis worst. I'll still have xanax....

Idk. I don't feel entirely hopeless but I am truly worried about the half MG losing effectiveness. Nonetheless I will sleep everyday and soon it will be 7 hours again. And I'll cancel things if i have to, to get my 7 hours. There is no reason to stress out.

I just wrote a book but it helped. Cause this is one of the reasons I can't sleep in silence. Even if this POS hallucination shut up finally, I don't have a ton of positive thoughts but if it did stop Id start listening to being scared again.

Lastly I hate having to see Mike again. I saw him today and he cut me off so much as I tried to explain my Xanax/sleep schedule thing that it took me about 55 minutes to get it out when I would have been able to say it all in 25 minutes if he just shut up about movies and BS and let me talk... I had so many othet things I needed to talk about hence the book I just wrote.

I got to find another therapist who can read a fucking room stfu and listen and wait until I stop talking. I want your input but fucking let me finish what I'm fucking saying so I can get it fucking out

I'm ending this rant with the equivalence chart cause it's factually I need a higher dose of another benzo. I carefully picked estrazolam and especially doral cause it comes only in 15 mg capsules...... please prohealth fucking help me.

[xxmolls]

A song I wrote called “Sammy.”

I wrote this song the summer I turned 18, right after I graduated high school (2008).

My mom took me on a trip to visit some family friends in Seattle. Their house was right on Lake Washington.

I wasn’t sick yet (that would happen the next summer), and my brain was on some kind of manic creative binge. I was constantly writing songs at that point in my life. I heard lyrics in every conversation, and I always needed a musical instrument nearby to transcribe a melody running through my head. I was frequently writing songs in my dreams (though I’d usually forget them when I woke up).

On this trip to Seattle, I was worried about being away from my guitar for too long. The summer before, I had found an acoustic Gibson Southern Jumbo Deluxe from 1973 in a local pawn shop and used all the money I’d saved from my summer job to buy it. It had some cosmetic cracks on it, which made it a “player’s guitar” and significantly lowered the price to where a high schooler like me could afford it. I hated being away from it for too long. It felt like an extension of my own body. I loved it so much that I had even fallen asleep clutching it to my chest before.

Because I sure as hell didn’t trust the airline with my guitar, I had to go to Seattle without it. In its place, our family friends let me use an acoustic guitar they had bought from Walmart years ago while I was staying at their house. I think i remember it having nylon strings. It may have technically been a classical guitar. I had also just bought a mac laptop for my first year of college, and I was obsessed with Garage Band.

I spent much of our trip to Seattle in their basement writing songs on that shitty Walmart guitar and recording demos on Garage Band (I sound like a real fun guest, I know). The whole time I was looking out their back door and seeing Lake Washington.

I wrote “Sammy” during my time as their basement troll (or Trull, maybe I should say…). I used a lot of imagery from what I was seeing out their back door. The moody country vibe of the music was probably inspired by that scenery too.

I wanted to use a two-syllable name in the chorus, and I remember having a discussion with my mom that I needed a gender neutral name. My reasoning at the time was I wanted to not use pronouns (besides I and you) or a gender specific name so that anyone could sing my song without having to change the words.

I think it was my mom who suggested “Sammy.”

I also drew on my recent first trip to a casino for song inspo. The legal gambling age in Washington state is 18, so we went to a nearby casino. I won 5 dollars, and immediately said “I’m done” (I also almost got arrested for cheating, but I still don’t completely understand how that happened).

I recorded a demo on my laptop a few minutes after I wrote the song, using the shitty Walmart guitar and dubbing over with some creepy ass background harmonies with the reverb turned up to 11. Later on I added some lap steel myself (even though I didn’t know how to play lap steel, but 18 year old Molly didn’t let that stop her from faking it). The resulting early demo was kind of cool, though INCREDIBLY rough. Maybe I’ll share it in the future.

This recording is from when I recorded in Austin. It features some really cool session musicians (some are family friends). I don’t like how my voice sounds on it. This may have been the trip to Austin when I unknowingly had shingles and a super sore throat. Or maybe the recording session where I had a huge goiter in my neck. I’m just gonna go with that explanation. It makes me cringe less when I listen to the recording.

I have been asked a lot “who is Sammy?” A bandmate used to tell people that Sammy is my dog.

Maybe Sammy is someone I haven’t met yet. I sure as hell am not looking for their ass when they disappear in the mountains, though. That was strictly dramatic poetic license. Sorry, future Sammies.

Here are the lyrics:

I dreamt of a place where the pine trees hang low

The lakes look like oceans and there's mountains capped with snow

I went there last night as I was driving in the dark

The casino lights finally hit their mark

I lost all my money, but I didn't care

There were hints of your shampoo lounging on the stairs

I looked for you everywhere, but it was just so dark

You were gone before I could tell you

You'd finally won my heart

Sammy, oh Sammy

quit hiding in the dark

Sammy, oh Sammy

You've finally won my heart

The pinks of the flowers all turned to blue

as I lost all hope that I'd be able to catch you

You remind me of a butterfly the way you slipped from me and fled

But you've always been out of reach

flying high above my head

I finally fell asleep one night and dreamed of you once more

I was so far from home, so tired and so poor

I took my last paycheck and lost it on a game

I went into the mountains

and cried out your name

Sammy, oh Sammy

I'm callin out your name

Sammy, oh Sammy

I've spent everything in vain

[teddypickerry]

Hello hello could I request a Jess mariano thing where reader is twins with Lane and Jess goes to the antique every few days and buys something as an excuse to see the reader and Luke just keeps telling Jess to tell them he likes them

𝐀𝐍𝐓𝐈𝐐𝐔𝐄 𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐑𝐄 𝐁𝐎𝐘.

pairings — jess mariano x fem! y/n kim

warnings — cursing, mentions of sex

word count — 1.5k

a/n — this is the cutest plot ever wtf. i love it, thank you for requesting!!! final post before novemred (check out my masterlist ifykyk). also my taglist form is avaliable now!!

LUKE DANES noticed his nephew's common disappearance the day his cook, caesar, had a free day meaning luke was on his own. which he wasn't supposed to be due to his nephew's daily job in the diner. specifically on the days in which the diner was at its peak or when caesar was out — which was today. but as luke asked lorelai gilmore to watch the diner (bad move) so he could find jess, the boy was nowhere to be found. he wasn't in the apartment that luke had seen him in just an hour ago.

forty minutes later, an ill-tempered diner owner was serving customers who ordered way too much peach pie, noticed his nephew entering the diner. the bell dinged as the teenager entered an unreadable expression on his face. as per usual.

"where the hell have you been?" luke questioned his nephew as jess looked up at his uncle, frowning his smile as he shook his head. the cap wearing biff loman wannabe noticed the bag in jess's hand as he approached the stairs. and all he could hope was, a human head wasn't in it.

last time luke made an assumption on what his nephew did in his 9 - 5, he had suspected that jess received a serious amount of money via being a male escort. but he was proven wrong when he found out his nephew was just a really reliable walmart employee. not luke's proudest moment but, you know.

two days later, jess woke in a rush. he only had twenty minutes before he was expected to be in the diner. but he had to make a pit stop. so, the teenager threw on a talking heads t-shirt over his red shirt he had already fallen asleep in. threw on a pair of pants and made his way to the bathroom to brush his teeth and run a hand through his hair. he decided on not spiking it up today, considering he heard y/n kim tell her best friend rory gilmore that she liked when boys wore their natural hair. jess thought he kind of looked like an 1800s pioneer boy but if you thought differently, then that was enough reward for the ugly haircut.

a pair of converse rushed down the stairs, feeling for his wallet in his pocket. when he felt it he approached the diner. rushing past caesar, knowing he only had nine minutes until work time. he could tell his uncle and co-worker were watching him bolt out the door, crossing the street. he slowed once he got near kim's antiques, turning down the next road so they would think he was going to the music store on the next block.

jess felt like an idiot doing this until he shook his head and made his way to the store. kim's antiques was the most mortifying place in town - besides taylor doose's bedroom maybe. jess wouldn't be surprised if there was a hole in the ground that the man slept in, with his eyes wide open and a basket of pine cones to naw on. but, kim's antiques homed lane and y/n kim. two seventeen year olds who were both seemingly normal human beings. and then mrs. kim. who even frightened jess.

he opened the door, the bell ringing as well. the packed room was like a maze as he walked around it pretending to be interested in the items. none of which he could even name. his hands were in his pocket as his head poked around, looking for the thing that he actually wanted. and there she was. y/n kim. the most amazing girl jess had ever had the pleasure of knowing. not that jess knew too many interesting people, but she was by far the most.

her long black hair rode down her back, matching her black pants. a white sweater she sported, which obviously only showed how beautiful she was. he could get lost staring at her in which he did when he didn't notice satan come up behind him. "what are you doing? you're stealing?"

"jesus!" jess nearly cursed to himself as he backed up, stepping away from the women as she scowled at him. "jesus as in, jesus lover, i am." jess hinted at sarcasm which he was sure the woman didn't pick up on as she nodded in approval. "good, we are a shop of god."

"mama, i think there's a customer interested in the chair in the kitchen." y/n attempted to save jess as she made her way over towards the two. jess perked up at the sound of the girl's voice, trying to make it unknown. she gave him a small smile with her perfectly pink lips. "what chair? so many chairs!"

"in the kitchen. with the green table." the girl told her mother as jess stood looking between the two. mrs. kim perked up as she made her way towards the kitchen. "that is a good chair."

y/n turned her head to jess, a smile slightly growing on her face as she crossed her arms. "well, you've been in here quite a lot lately."

her words seemed to take him aback as he turned towards a table and began to mess around with the old cards and such. his gaze glancing up at hers. "well you know, i needed a...." he glanced around the room his eyes landing on an old picture frame. "...picture frame. there's a picture of luke i just gotta frame, y'know. it's just sat on the sad old shelf luke made. i just love looking at luke."

jess's words produced a giggle from the girl making a smile form on his face. like he just won the lottery. in which he felt like he did. "okay well it's on me since you've become somewhat of a regular," she told him as she began to walk away before turning to look at him once more. "your hair... i like it."

when jess arrived back at the diner, just a minute before his appointed arrival with a picture frame in his hand, luke gave him an odd look. "ooh did you quit walmart? get a picture framing job? picture framer! i didn't take that picture he framed me!" lorelai snorted to an unamused jess as he made his way behind the counter to place the picture frame. and then grab a coffee pot to begin to serve the customers.

"what's up with him? did he watch the episode of fantasy island where tattoo leaves the show randomly? that ruined us all." lorelai touched her heart as she spoke, making luke roll his eyes. "get rid of your insanity or you will be served decaf." 

the inn owner gasped dramatically before shutting her mouth and sipping on her coffee. luke sighed as he threw his cleaning rag over his shoulder. "well he's been disappearing lately. i mean he's jess, he does that. but every time he comes back with this orange bag and he's all zoned out." 

"wait, orange bag?" lorelai questioned the man as he furrowed his eyebrows, not seeing how this was an important part of the story. "like the one's from kim's antique's? lane and y/n always give us them for groceries and stuff. bright, neon?"

"woah, i mean yeah but what would jess be wanting at mrs. kim's place?" luke wondered aloud making lorelai smile brightly at the clueless man. he was like an eleven year old boy who just learned what sex was, and wanted nothing to do with it. "have you ever thought about the possibility of jess wanting one of two items at mrs. kims?"

"what are you on about now?" 

"lucas."

"oh- oh. that's... huh." luke nodded as he watched lorelai's daughter rory enter the diner, accompanied by y/n kim. the two girls spoke in hushed voices as the young gilmore glanced over at jess, laughing as if part of an inside joke. luke turned to glance over at his nephew, lorelai doing the same. it was a safe bet that jess wasn't swooning over lane by the look on his face. he desperately tried to hide it, glancing down at his notepad as he forgot what he was writing. but his eyes couldn't get off of her. the two approached luke and lorelai making the adults turn away from jess. "hey girls."

"hi lorelai, luke." y/n greeted as she and rory took a seat at the counter beside lorelai. she was only a few feet away from jess, turning to glance at him. he was already looking at her which only made both of their hearts race. "hey jess, quick question?" luke butted in, a smile burning through his teeth. jess was about to contradict so he could stare at the pretty girl some more but luke got right in his face. "can i borrow a hundred? i know you're made of money now, since you work at walmart.'

"don't got it," jess mumbled with a straight face making his uncle hold up his hand to cup his ear. "you what now? old man hearing."

"i don't got it, uncle luke. is that what you wanted to hear? your nephew is poor. woo-hoo. let's have paris hilton throw a party." the boy spoke in his normal voice that could argue for hours but lacked the want to do so. his uncle smiled gratefully as he patted his shoulder. "and why doesn't my little boy have a bunch 'a money? is it because he's spending money left and right to get a girl-"

"oh look, taylor just walked in." jess told luke, making the diner owner turn around frantically. only to see three girls holding in their chuckles. jess took this time to grab his jacket and head out the door, luke calling out for him. "you're supposed to be working!"

"i'll be back," y/n told the gilmores as they shared a look, the girl running out of the dinner and down the sidewalk. "jess!" she called towards the dark haired boy making his way to the bookstore. he turned around at her words, his body stopping the moment he saw her. she made her way over towards him, stood directly infront of him. "you can get the girl, you know, if you want. your chances are pretty good."

"oh yeah?" his lips curved up to create his classic bad boy smirk that formed his mystique. she gave him a smile and a nod, him looking away before looking back down at her and smiling. "but you have to buy two more items. i think you're about to spend enough to buy me a car." y/n joked making the boy grin as he pulled her into him, and god, it felt right.

[yandere-sins]

A Merman’s Tale

And now, for the finale... Thank you all for sticking around and reading this story ♥ Took much longer than anticipated, but I hope you guys enjoyed it and thank you everyone for sending in your thoughts and chats about this story ♥ Please make sure to read the warnings and prepare for a long last chapter! Enjoy!

Warnings: Yandere, Violence (Manhandling the reader, Killing of a fellow merman), Gore (Blood Mention, Teeth Mark mention, Mention of losing a leg), Reader breaking/giving up, Mermaids, Big monsters with big features, Possessiveness, Pregnancy, Mention of Abuse, Very long post

[Part 1] - [Part 2] - [Part 3] - [Part 4] - [Part 5]

»»———————— ♡ ————————««  

Atreo's fascination for your wounds was sickening.

Not just on the surface of 'he put them there,' but also from the pain he induced by dragging his wet fingers over the still bleeding flesh, saltwater mingling with your blood. You let out a long, pained groan as he once again clawed deep in your shoulder, licking his lips while grinning like the madman he was. Even when you two were resting, he seemed hungry for more of the delicious milking you two did just minutes ago. Or had it been hours? Lost in the feeling of pain and pleasure you didn't know how long you had been lying on top of him, face planted in his chest and his hands roaming your sore and weeping body.

At least his breathing was helping you calm down. You had fallen asleep right after getting fucked by him, but you weren't spared his attention-seeking touches that woke you up in a bad mood. "You good, little coral?" he asked, his voice vibrating in his chest and causing goosebumps on your body. A shitty reaction, but after being thoroughly sensitized to him by now, who could blame you?

"- am not," you grumbled, barely able to raise your voice. "Water," you added laboriously, and Atreo's torso twisted beneath you. Not enough that it could throw you off—he was way too massive for that—but you felt every bone and muscle churn inside you as he did, causing you to hiss in pain.

Immediately he halted before his hands gripped your arms, forcing you to bend and move to his will. "What's wrong?" he demanded to know, and you could feel his concern and worry as you continued to groan in pain.

"Stop! Just stop!" you yelled at him. Miraculously, he listened to you. A small victory after being ignored many times before when you asked him to stop at any point prior to this. "Ah, fuck," you groaned, forcing your way up and off him with Atreo's help. His eyebrows furrowed as he rolled himself on top of you, propping his massive body on his arms at each side of your body. Atreo's genuine display of concern passed you as you kept moaning and feeling your wounds open and bleed again. But it was there, his touch against your cheek gentle as he called for your attention.

"Human…" he grumbled, forcing your head straight up again. But you could barely open both eyes, even when he carried the weight of your head in his hands for your relief, your body heating up even more against his cold skin. "Human, tell me what's wrong!"

His demand was dully noted by your throbbing head, but you let out a long sigh as you leaned into his palm, nuzzling it to spread the cold all over you. "It hurts," you complained softly, muttering into his hand. "Everything hurts…"

You didn't need him to touch your forehead to know you had a fever, even though it was still low. Naturally, your body was doing the best it could to help you, especially while you were always in danger with Atreo so near. But forcing at least one eye to open, glancing into his, he didn't seem to be so fearsome anymore. If anything, it was him who looked scared.

It was just for a moment, his expression turning serious almost immediately as he caressed your face carefully, soothingly spreading the natural cold of his body. Almost as if he was trying so hard to finally understand you better. "You are very warm… What do you need, pearl? Tell me what I have to do and I will."

God, if only you knew. Medicine, rest, protection. Everything except the last being things you wouldn't be able to get here. And even so, no protection from him. "Water," you repeated weakly, and Atreo reached over to the nightstand, taking the magical keg from it. It was a wonder that thing even survived the vicious fucking you two went through, feeling like Atreo trashed everything with his tails—including you. But he held up your head for you, so you wouldn't have to strain yourself, letting the water flow down your throat with a few gulps. It did help. A little bit, at least.

But not enough.

Taking a deep breath once the water cleared up and was removed from your throat, you looked over at Atreo, hovering over you and putting away the keg with a somber expression on his face. Very different from his usual chipper, egoistic or predatory demeanor. When his eyes flashed back to you, he lit up for a moment, his body tensing and showing off his refined muscles as if he was trying to woo you with his mighty appearance. However, he immediately returned from wanting to impress to being concerned again as you didn't react favorably, staring motionlessly in his direction. Hovering over you, he brought his face down, dragging his lips shallowly over your cheek and jaw. Hearing the rumble of a purr coming from him, soothed your mind, even if your body was unable to relax.

"Is it better?" he asked, and you let out a breath you didn't know you were holding, too exhausted to show all the tension and fear he installed in you. Slowly, you shook your head, and Atreo bared his fangs. Not in anger. Or at least not anger directed at you.

"I… We… What do you do about your wounds?" you asked him softly, hoping he'd not get mad at your question again. Instead of an answer, he scoffed, puffing his chest proudly, and you knew exactly what he would say. It was almost as if you knew him well already. "I don't get wounded," he announced, and if not for feeling weak, you might have laughed at the lie. You knew he had scars. Even if they were barely visible, you could feel them when you did touch him.

When you didn't answer, a weak smile the only thing changing about you, he looked away, roaming your body. The reflection in his eyes was a pitiful sight, but it humored you that his expression turned even grimmer the longer he looked at you. "Do they hurt? My… marks…" he asked hesitantly, reaching another finger out to caress them. You flinched. Hard. Maybe even before he touched you, but it was enough to make him recoil. His attention snapped to you, and you curled up in pain, be it physical or mental.

"I didn't want to- I…"

Well, that was new. You hadn't seen Atreo flustered or overwhelmed before, and you certainly didn't prefer it to his dominance and egotistical ways. Maybe things had changed. He did talk a lot about mates and life together. Pups, as he called it. You shuddered, remembering his love-drunk rambles while he plowed into you with no regard. Urgh, you really didn't want to think about the pain below your waistline, your brain mercifully hiding it to keep your sanity.

Atreo looked around now, and you weren't sure what he saw. It was hard to follow his quick movements, harsh twists and turns, but whatever it was that caught his eye, he only grew more concerned, it seemed. Exhausted, you let your head fall to the side, cushioned by a pillow. It was nighttime again, the room not very bright even with the blue lights above you. But the water surrounding the bed didn't look as clean anymore, and you had an inkling why.

Blood. Ew.

Yeah, you hated that. Especially since it was your blood. But it seemed to do the trick as it unsettled Atreo, even more than it unsettled you. "Are you still bleeding?" he asked, and you lazily lifted your arm, which you could feel throbbing even though you didn't doubt the other wounds looking just as poorly. Drips of blood fell from the injury, and Atreo almost paled. "It's not supposed to take this long to close…" he muttered, and you huffed, not needing to say anything to remind him you were human. His weird underwater logic wasn't applicable.

Taking a deep breath, you settled back into the bed completely, losing even the last bit of strength. Atreo moved into action much more rapidly than you thought he would, gathering the blanket he had thrown off in his mating frenzy. It was sopping wet, but he still placed it over you, shaking you ever so slightly as he moved to wrap it around you, even if you had to endure the stinging of your wounds. "I'll…" he mumbled, seemingly still thinking about what to do.

"I'll be back," he finally explained, having come to a conclusion as it seemed. "Don't leave, and be quiet while I'm gone, Mate."

You wanted to scream, "Of course I'm not going anywhere, you bastard!" but instead, you just grunted in understanding, your eyelids leaden. Everything seemed to want to knock you out these days, but you understood why. Reality wasn't better than your dreams. Atreo kept tugging you in some more, purring and smoothing the woven material over you until he could be sure you were dozing off comfortably. All with as much care and gentleness as he possibly could muster. You let out your breath as you heard him slither away, the water swapping around as he exited the room, and you suddenly felt very free with his presence gone. Enough so you could drift off to sleep in peace, not caring if it would be a good or bad dream you'd have.

»»—————♡

Stirred by the sound of water, you awoke, still dazed and uncoordinated. The blanket had kept you surprisingly warm, or perhaps the pain had saved you from thrashing and throwing it off, so it had time to heat. Time was a non-existent concept underwater, but you felt like you'd been out for a while and yet, not long enough. The aching all over your body hadn't ceased, but it felt like your wounds had closed at least, even if you felt no less dirty and hurt.

"Atreo…" you mumbled, wanting to scold him for waking you. When had you two become close enough that you thought you could scold him? Whatever. He made you into this mess, so he could endure some verbal lashes from you as well. You barely settled back against your pillows when you felt his weight creep up on top of you, hands falling to your sides. A palm cupped your cheek, thumb traveling from the tip of your nose over your lips that parted instinctively, but you forced them close quickly, getting nicked by his claw. Groaning over the new pain, you tried to open your eyes, finding them to be glued and crusty. You'd have to rub them first, so you merely sighed, still not strong enough to fight with him.

Much to your frustration, Atreo returned to licking your wounds, and you groaned, annoyed. "Pretty, pretty human," he mumbled, his voice so hoarse and growly, it felt weird against your skin. Peeling you out of your warm blanket, he nibbled at your shoulder, traveling to your collarbones and down to your tits, leaving a tickling sensation everywhere. You shuddered, feeling your anger rise until he found his way to your bite mark, tasting it with an appreciative chortle. You cried out briefly in pain as his tongue licked you incessantly.

His hand clasped over your mouth before the sound could even travel beyond the bed and you choked, suddenly robbed of air as the huge palm covered most of your face. "Shhh!" she hissed at you, and suddenly, things turned from weird to alarming. Forcing your eyes open, you expected your—your?—monstrous merman with his gray skin and endlessly dark eyes to look at you. But after the initial annoyance settled, your eyes finally managed to focus, snapping wide open when you met his gaze.

Not black, red. Clashing with the blue lights inside the nest. Instead of gray skin, the mermaid was much brighter, white almost, with pitch black markings dragging down his back and tail like a blanket. And he was large. Atreo was a huge monster, but this one should have barely fit the hole in the ground used as an entrance. You had no idea who he was, what he was, or why he was here. But for a moment, everything was silent, no bubbling water or loud breaths around you. The calm before the storm.

And before you knew it, you screamed.

Much, much louder than you ever had before.

Forcefully you were crashed into the bed, more brutal and crude than Atreo ever did it, perhaps caused by your assailant's size compared to Atreo's. Your body was already in pain before, but this sure as hell didn't help. Something cracked beneath you, and it was either the bed or your back. All you could think was fuck, fuck, fuck, and how you'd fit into this body wholly. It was massive, gigantic, absolutely enormous. Swallow-you-whole-sized. And now this giant body moved forward, his forehead bumping into yours while his eyes never closed to blink, only staring at you. "Shhhhhhhhhh!" he repeated himself, this time even more incessant, and you whimpered pitifully, tears shooting into your eyes, as a reaction to this intruder.

You had questions—so many of them. But even if you had a chance to talk, you probably wouldn't have been able to utter a word. "Do you want him to come and rip us both apart?" the unknown merman hissed, and your breath hitched as you realized who he was talking about. The situation really didn't look so good from an outsider's view. And you had tiredly promised Atreo to stay quiet and inside, though, to your credit, that's exactly what you did. But you didn't want to know how he'd interpret this situation.

So you shook your head as best as you could, and he huffed, his hand remaining. Still, he returned to your body, loosening the eye contact and returning to lap at what he could reach. "So tasty," he murmured, and you shuddered some more, goosebumps erecting all over your still intact skin. "And so… wasted."

The merman looked up, his expression less than subtly annoyed, and you could barely understand the reason. "I can't understand how he can toy with you like this and leave you to bleed out." Lips curling into a grin, he crooked his head to the side, a truly nasty expression on his face. "I thought only we orcas played with our food, but it seems we're not the only one."

"Helped me find you, though," he admitted, burying his massive head in your chest and taking a deep breath. "You have such a lovely smell. And you don't taste half bad either, even though I was surprised to find a live human."

You were still in a lot of shock, trying to understand everything he was saying and unable to look away from this new threat. For the first time, you wished Atreo was here. You didn't like how Atreo looked at you, but you realized you liked this… orca, even less. All you wanted was peace and quiet to heal and gather your strength. Why was there one disaster after the other coming for you?

Feeling the tears sting in your eyes, you bit your lip, trying to stay as quiet as possible as you sobbed into his palm. His expression didn't turn rueful, but also not confused as you cried like Atreo had. Just plain indifferent. "It hurts, doesn't it?" he asked you, plain and simple. A fact, rather than the question it was worded as. You nodded, and he let his eyes skim over you. "Can imagine. At least we eat our prey after playing."

His words weren't as comforting as he might have thought, though perhaps, he just didn't care. Too fast for your liking, a grin returned to his lips. There was nothing sincere about him, no expression and no action. A killer, psychopath, perhaps. He had no empathy for your misery. Instead, he reveled in it and his superiority that he believed to have over Atreo. And yet, you were foolish enough to listen as he spoke, fixing his gaze back on yours.

"Do you want to leave? Go back?"

Your eyes widened. Deep down, you knew that you couldn't trust these human impersonators. That mistrust must have shone through your eyes, and the merman grimaced in return. "Ah, come on," he chuckled. "No need to be so wary. I'll get you back to shore for, let's say, a small price."

Free hand falling to your leg, he dragged it down, briefly brushing past the bite mark there, and you shuddered. Not just from pain but from fear of his offer. He wasn't wrong. You could complain about how unfair it all was, especially that you had to pay for your freedom. Still, in the end, if leaving and getting out of this misery at only the price of your leg was an option, it was worth the risk. You just had to be put on a lively beach and you'd probably be saved before bleeding out. The pain didn't really matter in your consideration. Only survival and freedom, with or without your leg.

He could see you were considering it, his grin turning into a smirk as he was probably thinking about his dinner. It would be double the victory, taking you from the sharks and getting to eat human meat even if it wouldn't be much. But from what you gathered, he seemed to like playing more than actually feeding. Maybe it was a mad deal. Perhaps you were an idiot for thinking this could work. It was still at least your leg on the line. But you gently muttered the word he wanted to hear into his palm, "Okay."

You must have gone completely insane to agree, but as your situation turned out to be, it was either this, dying, or staying with Atreo—possibly until you die pitifully in this underwater home because of him or even worse: old age. The thought alone of spending the rest of your life here, bored until you go crazy, was scary enough to make the price worth the loss.

"Then," he muttered, tapping his fingers to his lips. You cringed, remembering what Atreo did to supply you with oxygen. The orca grinned wider, seeing your eyes drip with disgust. "I think you know what to do."

He finally let you go, retracting his hand and allowing you to take a deep breath. It was appalling to think you'd have to cling to him, rely on the air of this stranger. But there were crazier things you were going to do than this. Like sacrificing your leg. Maybe when you got to shore, you'd manage to kick him and make a run for it. That was unless you were too far from the beach and had to swim. There was no way you could race him if it came down to that. Reaching forward, you ignored all the sore bones and strained muscles trying to hold you back, aiming for his huge neck to hold on to.

However, before you could find a grip on his body, he suddenly jerked, his eyes widening once again. Though this time, it wasn't in intimidation, and it wasn't fear or domination as he didn't even look at you. It was an expression you knew well, perhaps too well.

Fuck.

In a matter of seconds, limbs were flying, claws were grabbing at everything around you, and you let out a horrified scream as you cowered into yourself, watching as the merman was dragged out of the nest, briefly getting stuck in the hole because of his size before being pulled through it regardless. Cold wet slapped into your face, keeping you in the present, the water level rising briefly as you could watch the fish outside the nest hurriedly swimming away.

And then, in a cloud of blood and stirred-up sand, two massive bodies mingled.

No, not two. More, with new ones joining by the heartbeat.

You couldn't breathe, couldn't stop looking. It reminded you of those wildlife documentaries of piranhas swarming around the chicken those reporters would hang into the water. The tumbleweed of bodies must have started beneath the nest but now was floating upwards, coaxing you to follow, to keep watching. But it hurt too much. Your whole body ached to move, and the bed was unsteady after enduring both Atreo and the orca.

Luckily—or in your case, unluckily for you—you didn't need to wait long.

Perhaps a few more breaths until a shadow dropped to the ground. Before you could lean forward to see who it was, something jumped out of the water, ramming into you with full force and throwing you back into the pillows. This time, you opened your eyes right away, knowing whose face it was hanging in front of you, dripping seawater on you. Atreo seemed crazed, completely mad as he bared his fangs, his visage deformed by aggression. Not surprising after the fight, but still scary to witness.

You ducked away from him as he kept glowering at you viciously. Was it guilt? Or maybe just the submission he had bitten into you? But when he opened his mouth, you expected him to scold you and ask why you agreed to the deal. What you were doing with the orca. Instead, he grabbed your shoulders, squeezing them tightly.

"Mine!" he yelled furiously, his eyes falling from yours to your neck, arm, and side. Everywhere he bit while screaming "Mine! Mine! Mine!" repeatedly.

"You're mine, do you understand?!"

Shaking you, you couldn't hold back the tears, sobbing uncontrollably. What should you do? What would appease him? Was he angry with you, or was this just his way of assuring himself you were still here with him? How could you make this right?

Without thinking, you forced your arms up, even against the grip on your shoulders he had. His strength was unmatched, but you had to do what you could with your limited reach. Crying, sobbing, you threw yourself at him, hugging him tightly and squeezing your eyes shut. If he was angry enough to throw you off him and into a wall, you didn't want to see it.

"Yours!" you yelled, agreeing with him against your will and better judgment. "I am yours!"

And against your expectations… that did it.

You felt his wet, scaly tail wrap around your legs, snaking all the way up to your hips, and Atreo's hands fell from your shoulders to your back, allowing you to cling to him. "That's right," he muttered, rubbing his face into your hair while you shook. "All mine."

The two of you remained like this for a while, every other thought than appeasing your captor banished from your mind. "I fell asleep… I was so tired. I didn't know," you sobbed against his neck, feeling all the scales running down from under his hair. But you continued to nuzzle up to him, even dragging your tender cheek against his gills affectionately. "You reached for him," he confronted you, and you sobbed harder. What now? Would Atreo believe a lie?

But before you could attempt to escape the grizzly fate you had already created in your mind, he hugged you tighter against his chest, whispering his words so quietly you almost didn't hear them. "I thought I lost you. That he'd take you with him. That you'd leave me…"

"No," you breathed. Liar. "Never."

"That's right." Atreo noticeably relaxed, the tension leaving his muscles. "How dare that bastard comes for you! He should have never gone so far as to touch you!"

He believed it. You couldn't believe it. Atreo always seemed so skeptical and wary around you. Declaring you as his mate really did change him. Good for you.

At least as good as this situation was.

Even though he seemed hesitant to let go, he eventually pushed you away, caressing your face for a second before letting his eyes roam over you, checking you. You let him do as he pleased and tried to help lift your arms and legs when you could, but now that the tension seemed to fade, it felt almost worse. The question nagging on you, you decided to ask when he turned you around to examine your back, probably searching for traces of his enemy. Though aside from the bruises his actions probably caused you, there wouldn't be so much to see.

"Is he dead?" you asked, whispering softly. Careful not to make yourself look guilty by showing too much worry. Instead, you opted for playing scared and intimidated. Once again, he believed you, and you counted that as a total success. With his massive arms wrapping around you, Atreo pressed you against him in a way of comforting you, purrs rumbling in his chest, and you touched his arm, feigning thankfulness for his protection.

"He won't bother you ever again," he revealed, and you were surprised that he didn't boast and show off his victory. You had a hunch that by the looks of it, other mermaids had joined the tussle, and it wouldn't be a surprise if the orca was simply overpowered in the end. Kind of felt bad. But knowing Atreo would give up his victory of tearing the orca apart himself to be with you was… dreadful.

Picking you up, he wanted to settle you in, but felt the broken parts of his bed as he leaned on it and growled in frustration. Instead, he pulled you on his lap and, from a pouch you hadn't noticed being thrown through the room before, fished out a small box of what seemed like ointment. It smelled like a punch to your gut, but you tried to swallow the bile rising in your throat as Atreo began smearing it all over your body.

He wasn't frugal with coating the cuts and bruises he could find, though he did hesitate at his marks. It was clear that he didn't want or intended to let them fade away, but eventually, Atreo overcame his hesitations, applying a light layer of his mermaid medicine.

Once that was done, the stench wasn't as putrid or noticeable anymore, probably shut out by your senses to endure it. Atreo grabbed the blanket again, wrapping it around you until you were warm and cozy. Using his body to make up for the broken parts of the bed, he rested you on top of him, and you yawned, the happenings nothing short of exhausting in all possible ways. The whole adventure had been exhausting, with you being in constant pain and enduring threats to your life that you didn't even wish on your worst enemy. But here you were, still alive, no inch closer to the freedom of living your normal human life.

You were done with it. Even if you tried, you didn't think you could fight it. You hated it, and it felt like you were disappointing everyone, especially yourself. But there was just so much pain and fear involved that you could no longer handle resisting. Atreo was winning. Slowly but surely, he had been breaking you, cracking your will whenever he could. When Atreo spoke next, cradling you against his chest like a child, asking, "Who do you belong to?" you replied in his favor.

"You."

"Who?"

"You, Atreo."

"Who?"

You yawned. "You. Always."

"That's right."

His hand was a mix of cold and comfort against your back, gently rubbing it and effectively lulling you into sleep. All you wanted was to fall asleep and wake up from this nightmare for real this time. Pretend like nothing happened and maybe come to your senses in a hospital after you swallowed too much seawater. Maybe it was just a coma dream after all.

And if not? You'd try. Try to get hurt less, try to endure your new life, and gain the favors of anyone who'd come to you, especially Atreo. There was no use trying to escape on your own again, and no one else would probably dare to come over for a while after what happened to the orca. But even if you could just have the chance to heal, maybe that would help you start a new fight and find your way out.

From now on, it could only get better.

There was only room for improvement in your situation. You couldn't sink any deeper than the bottom of the ocean you had already reached.

»»—————♡

You thought.

But as the curious faces of countless mermaids of all ages peered into the nest with translucent walls that Atreo called your home, you remembered your thoughts of that night bitterly.

With your belly swollen, you were due to give birth soon. Birth to the first child of the pack leader and his chosen mate. Atreo's hand cupped yours, rubbing over your abdomen housing and creating his kid. He already knew, way back when the orca tried to help you, what he had done to your body. Being extra careful now that you were carrying his spawn to term. Pup, that's the word he used for it.

Turned out it was a whole tribe event when someone was pregnant, and Atreo loved showing you off. You had to beg for privacy and clothing to cover yourself with. You got neither, and it took a long time to get used to the ogling of just as naked half-humans as you were. From morning till night, merfolk looked at you, waiting, hoping to catch a glimpse. As if it wasn't enough that the idea of their leader with a human was already perceived with scorn, they laughed at you with no shame at the size your belly grew to accommodate the monster inside or at your tiny little legs and the way you were fed by hand since Atreo wouldn't let you do anything on your own.

It would be a water birth. So much you had decided. A proper spectacle that fitted someone as eccentric as Atreo was for abandoning traditions and taking you as his mate. Everything else, from your diet to exercise, had been directed and conducted by Atreo, and you spent your whole pregnancy either in his arms or in your bed, suffering with little to no relief from modern medicine. Though, to his credit, he brought you to the surface a few times—when he felt like you deserved it—so you could swim around until you were exhausted.

There was nothing around you when you breached the water. Just... ocean. No mountains or harbors in sight. It was terrifying. You doubted the orca could have helped you—would have helped you. It was probably just a way of playing with you for his amusement. Being able to swim around for a while was almost healing after being stuck below the surface for so long. But everything else was as despairing as it could be. You always felt hundreds of eyes watching you aside from Atreo now. Waiting, curious and famished. You almost considered it lucky if this pregnancy was going to kill you in the end, but Atreo seemed to have a different opinion.

"You're going to be such a good parent," he purred, stroking your plump tummy. His eyes roamed from your belly to your breasts, just as ready and eager to have this baby as you were to get it out of you. His gaze went from affectionate to excited, and you knew he could barely wait for a taste. So far, you had denied it to him, saying it was all for the baby, and he seemed to respect that at least. Who'd know if your baby would even drink milk? This was as new for you as it was for the merfolk who were wholly underprepared for your kind of pregnancy. But Atreo was excited regardless. Nothing and no one could destroy his happiness, it seemed, not even his fellow merman and maids teasing him about his choice of mate and strange child that was soon to be welcomed into the tribe.

"And then we can finally…"

His sentence drifted off, as did his hand, below your belly and between your legs. Credit to him, he seemed to understand that the massiveness he could fill you was a bit too harsh for your pregnant body. It didn't save you from bites and arguments while your hormones were raging. But he became a little more agreeable, and perhaps that was the only perk of pregnancy and the most freedom to act and speak your mind you'd ever get in your life again. Unless you were forced into another pregnancy, that is.

Swatting his hand away, you glowered at him, reminding him with a subtle nod about the onlookers. Atreo pursed his lips and let out a long, annoyed sigh. As if he was the one suffering and not you. Idiot.

"When do you think it's time?" he asked you, back to grinning from ear to ear like the proud dad he was.

"Not sure. A week? A month?"

He sighed again, this time in longing. He was much too excited for an event you were not. And if you were honest, as much as you wanted the baby gone from inside you, you'd probably miss being treated almost decent by Atreo as long as you were pregnant. And you really could refrain from babymaking ever again if you were to survive the pregnancy. Because Atreo wanted more. He told you as much. Seven, eight. A couple dozen if your body would do it. You had no idea how long merfolk supposedly lived, but he said it as if it was the most natural thing in the world. His world. And yours now, too, sadly.

"It'll come when it comes. You can't rush these things–"

A sudden sting in your abdomen and you felt water that was certainly not the one swapping around you gushed out. You stared at the wall in horror, meeting the curious eyes of a younger mermaid. She cocked her head to the side, not understanding what was happening.

You can't rush. And you can never expect these things.

That's how your life was now. And you'd sink deeper and deeper no matter what you did. Even if you thought you had reached the bottom of the ocean, there was another hole opening up for you to slip into.

And Atreo would follow you, no matter where and how far he had to go.

All for his mate.

[pensat-i-fet]

A Manchester Affair (Rúben Dias): Chapter 6

Chapter 5

Chapter 7 

Masterlist

Wattpad

When she woke up a couple of hours later, Lucía felt like a new person. Her body still felt weak, but most of the symptoms were gone.

She was no longer feeling hot because of the high temperature, but because of Rúben's body next to hers. He had also fallen asleep, but not before putting his arms around her to hug her tightly. She tried to get up without waking him up but the moment she moved, his eyes opened.

"Are you ok?"

"I am, yes. A lot better".

She tried to get up now, but he stopped her. "Don't move. I'll bring you whatever you need".

"It's ok. I can get up. I don't feel dizzy anymore and it'll be good to move a bit after spending the day laying down", she said, stretching.

"I'm serious. Stay here. Are you hungry? Thirsty?"

"Rúben", she said, trying not to laugh. "I need to pee. You can't help me with that".

"I can take you to the bathroom…"

"Oh my God, stop it!", she told him, laughing at how serious he actually was.

She could notice his eyes following her while she walked to the bathroom. And when she got out, he was still sitting in her bed staring at her.

"See? All good!"

"You almost fainted in front of me a couple of hours ago. Don't judge me for worrying".

"Yeah, well, migraines suck".

"I've never had one".

She frowned at him. "I hate you".

And that, finally, made him laugh.

"Rob brought me food, you can have some if you want".

"Rob?"

"A colleague from work", and then she realised what time it was. "Shit! I missed the match! What happened?"

"3-1 win for United".

"What?", she was shocked by that score. Arsenal had not lost a match this season. In fact, they had won all of them. "Who scored?"

"Ummm, two from Rashford and the other goal was scored by the new guy".

"Antony?"

"Yes, that one".

"I'm so happy for him", she said, with a huge smile on her face. He was a good friend while they both were at Ajax.

"Let's celebrate by eating".

"So, do you get these migraines often?", asked Rúben while they ate.

"Not really. I have 2, maybe 3 per year. They knock me out, though".

"Is there anything you need? Medicine or something?"

"Hydrating is the main thing and", she looked around to notice she had finished the drinks Rob brought, "I ran out of drinks. Great".

"I'll go buy more", he said, already getting up.

"Rúben, you don't have to. I can just drink water".

"No, I'll go. It's fine".

Just as he said that Lucía’s phone rang. She had many messages she still didn’t feel like answering. 

"Hi, Scott. Congrats on the win!! You want to come to see me?", she looked at Rúben, who nodded. "Sure. When will you be here? Ok, see you in 10. Bye".

"I'll go get the drinks. You can let me know when he is gone and", he continued, looking away from her, "if he doesn't leave, I'll leave the bag outside of your door".

"You don't need to hide from him".

"You say that, but your face says otherwise. It's fine. I just care about you being fine".

"Rúben".

But he didn't listen. He just left, and a couple of minutes later, the doorbell rang.

"Hey".

"Hi! You don't look so bad".

"Thanks?", she laughed.

"That came out wrong. My mum used to have migraines and she looked terrible after them. I expected the same for you but you look the same. Maybe a bit paler. Have you eaten?"

"I just did. I took a nap that did wonders for me".

"Amazing", he said, giving her a hug. "Do you need help with anything?"

She thought about the plan for the rest of the day. "I need a shower. I feel gross".

"I can't help with that. Erik won't like it".

She rolled her eyes at him and laughed. "How about you take the clothes off my bed so we can put clean ones when I'm done showering?"

"Yes, Ma'am", he said with a salute.

**

"I can stay with you tonight if you want", said Scott while he helped her make the bed. "You have two spare rooms".

Her mind went to Rúben. His mood had changed when he found out Scott was coming and now this…but she wanted him to stay. The problem was she wanted Rúben there too, but that wouldn't work. How did she find herself in this situation?

"Hold that thought. I need to text someone before I forget", she told him, leaving the room.

Lucía: Scott wants to stay here to make sure I'm fine but I can tell him no.

Rúben: do you want him to stay there with you?

Lucía: I mean, it would give you a break from looking after me. You’re probably tired of me 😂

She saw the three dots showing up and disappearing multiple times until he sent a simple "ok". She didn't know what to answer back and then another text showed up telling her he was leaving the drinks by the door. It made her feel horrible for him but she hadn't done anything wrong, right?

Lucía went to tell Scott that it was ok for him to stay.

"Should we watch a movie?", he offered. And she nodded.

When she heard some noise outside the door, she ran to it.

“I’ll be back in a second, my neighbour was picking something up for me”, she told to a confused Scott.

“Ok”.

“Hey! Rúben!”

When he turned around he looked at her like a teacher who was about to scold a child. “What are you doing out of the house? Go back inside. What if you faint again?”

“I won’t. I needed to talk to you. And thank you, for everything”.

“No need to thank me, it’s just what friends do. I’m sure McTominay would have done the same if he didn’t have a match today”.

Instead of stopping to think about the meaning of his words, she just hugged him. “Thank you”.

And when she turned around, she noticed the door was closed and she didn’t have her keys. 

“You’re not going inside?”, asked Rúben.

“I’m waiting until you leave so you don’t realize I’m locked out of my house and I have to ring the doorbell”.

She only heard a light chuckle and his footsteps as he went back upstairs.

**

The next morning she woke up feeling fine. A bit tired but the migraine was definitely gone.

"Morning little Lu".

"Morning Scott".

"You look good. Are you feeling better?"

"Fresh as a daisy", she smiled.

"Good. The team was falling apart without you".

"I know".

Once everything was ready, they both went to wait for the lift. And because fate seemed to want to laugh at her, when the doors opened, Rúben was there.

"Morning", she said.

"Morning", he answered back.

He and Scott looked at each other, not knowing how to react. Scott knew she had a couple of City players as neighbours, but she had never mentioned who.

"This is awkward", he said, laughing. "No offence, mate. It's just funny she lives surrounded by another team's players. She works for my team, you know? We need to find you another apartment, Lucy. Or you can move in with me".

Rúben didn't really answer. He just made a weird noise that she guessed kind of sounded like an agreement.

The door opened and they all got out quickly. Lucía noticed Scott putting his hand on her back. It was a gesture that meant nothing to them. But what would Rúben think?

She turned to look at him but found him already turning to go to his car.

"Bye! Have a good day!"

"You too", he answered without really looking at her.

**

"You ok?", was the most asked question she had that morning. Everyone was treating her like she was going to break or something. While she was still mad at herself for getting sick on matchday. She kept asking all the players for updates on their fitness but they insisted on asking about her instead. 

"I'm fine, guys! Can't you see?", she said, hoping it would stop their nonsense.

"Yeah, it seems like Scotty looked after you really well", said Bruno, and Lucía could tell what he meant with his tone.

"Really funny".

"What? It's true. He ran to look after you like a knight in shining armour. Didn’t even stay for the post-match talk".

"Leave it", she heard Licha say, "you are making her uncomfortable".

She sent him a look that said thank you.

"I'm just saying that you and Scott can stop pretending. No one cares if you two are dating or doing whatever it is you’re doing".

"But we are not dating!", she said to Bruno, annoyed at him.

"Who aren't you dating?", asked Scott when he was getting closer to their table.

"You".

He laughed. "Well, yeah. I knew that much".

"Then tell your teammates. They love gossiping".

"Well, you didn't even say goodbye after the match to go to her. And you are always hugging and stuff like that. And you spent the night at her place. I don't know, you can't blame us for assuming", tried to say Bruno to defend himself.

"Yeah, I spent the night there in her spare room. I'm not going to apologize for looking after my friend", he shrugged. 

“Whatever you two say”, said Bruno, not convinced. 

And with that, they all moved to the next topic and left her alone…for now.

**

On the way to her apartment, Lucía changed her mind and pressed Rúben's floor on the lift instead of hers.

"Hi. What are you doing here?", he said when he opened the door.

"I wanted to clear the air between us. And to apologize just in case Scott’s comments offended you. He’s just…he says the first thing that comes to his mind without thinking".

"It's alright".

"And, you know, the next few weeks are really busy with European matches and things like that so, we won't see each other much but I just wanted to say that and see you, I guess".

"Ok".

She was about to say goodbye and leave when he finally talked. "We can see each other on Wednesday or Friday, maybe".

"Sure. I'll check my calendar and let you know", she smiled.

"And maybe we can do something outside of here?"

"What do you mean?", she was confused by his comment.

"Like, go have food somewhere. Go watch a movie. I don't know".

A part of her wanted to say yes, but it sounded too much like a proper date and the idea of it scared her. Between these walls, she felt safe. How she would feel outside remained a question mark. 

"Sure. I mean, friends do that", she said with a nervous laugh.

"Yeah. Um…I need to go meet the team soon. Sorry to cut this conversation short".

"That's fine. Have a good trip and match". 

"Thank you".

And after a quick stare contest, they said goodbye and she left. Even an idiot could tell that didn't go too well but what was she supposed to do? Rúben confused her a lot sometimes. And she didn't like that. She did like him, though. More and more every day. And it terrified her.

**

That next Friday Lucía met Rúben, who she hadn’t seen at all since Monday. After some debating, they decided to go to the cinema and maybe grab some food afterwards. He was buzzing after scoring his first Champions League goal and she couldn't help but love how he talked about it. Like a kid who just got his favourite toy.

“So you like horror movies?”, asked Rúben while he drove them to the cinema.

“Yes. It’s a family thing”.

Even though that sounded like the simplest comment, it made her remember how bad her relationship with her family was. They had barely talked in the last 10 years and the last time they did, her dad praised her ability to always find an excuse to avoid visiting them. But she knew how that visit would go and that she'd be much happier avoiding it until it became literally impossible to do so.

“Family tradition of watching horror movies then?”, laughed Rúben. “Your Christmases must be fun”.

Lucía just said yes and changed the subject. Talking about her family with other people was always the hardest thing to do.

The movie ended up being just alright but she had a good time watching it. It had been a while since she went to the cinema.

“Did you enjoy it?”, she asked Rúben when they both were on their way back to the car. 

“Can I say no without you thinking I’m a coward? I didn’t like the jumpscares”.

That made her laugh. “It’s ok. It wasn’t great. I’ll make you a list of good horror movies that don’t just rely on silly scares”.

“Or we could watch a comedy”.

“Are you going to sleep with the lights on tonight, Dias?”, she teased him.

“I might. I'll have to hug you extra tight if I have a nightmare”.

And she had to bite her lip to not laugh at his cute reaction. The movie didn’t scare her at all. 

**

The rest of the evening had gone well. But there was something about Rúben’s behaviour that made Lucía uncomfortable. And she felt bad about feeling that way in what was a stupid vicious cycle. 

“Today was great, don’t you think?”, Rúben asked again when they were about to fall asleep.

“Yeah, it was fun”.

“It was. It was nice to be out together and just do things together in general, right? We should do it more often”.

“Yes”, she said, giving him the smile she knew he wanted to see before cuddling him and closing her eyes.

That night he didn’t make her sleep with the light on because he was scared about a movie, but he managed to scare her with his words.

[pcvensies]

*.• what do the jjk boys do when you have a nightmare.

{ itadori yuuji, fushiguro megumi, gojo satoru, nanami kento + female reader }

Itadori Yuuji.

Your rooms are next to each other at the school, because of you both coming in last.

Because you two didn’t know many people there, and were the new ones, you had grown very close.

That was around a year ago, and now, you two were dating.

Yuuji knew you had nightmares sometimes, being a sorcerer wasn’t easy.

So when he woke up to your pained screaming, he rushed to your room as fast as he could which was very fast!

He opened the door, and found you in your bed, your sheets all tangled, and your palm pressed against your chest as you gasped.

Your teary eyes found his figure, and his heart shattered at the sight of your terrified eyes.

He rushed to your bed, holding you in his arms as he knelt next to you.

Yuuji’s hand held your head to his chest, as you sobbed, fists clenching onto his tshirt.

“Shhh... it’s me, babe... just me princess, you and me”.

His fingers combed your hair softly, lips pressed against the crown of your head as he cooed you.

“You’re safe, okay? I’m here now, I’ve got you”.

You held onto him like if he was going to disappear, or someone was going to take him away from you, and he noticed.

Yuuji let go of you for a second, hands cupping your face as he laid down, pulling you back with him.

You rested your head on his chest, and he wrapped his arms around you, pressing a small kiss to your temple.

He held you in silence for a few minutes, humming little melodies in your ear, as your breathing started to match his.

“Yuuji..?” “Right here, princess”.

He looked down at you with those brown puppy eyes of his, and you felt warmth grow inside of you, calming you down.

You sniffed, and he wiped away a tear that rolled down your face, leaning down slowly to press a sweet kiss against your lips, then your nose.

His hands roamed up and down your back, his gentle touch grounding you again. He was here. Yuuji was here, and you were safe.

“I’ll always be here”, he whispered as he caressed your cheek, and your eyes closed again.

Fushiguro Megumi.

Megumi didn’t have a heavy sleep, he never has have.

So when his phone started vibrating at four in the morning, he woke up immediately.

Your name popped up in the screen, and he frowned, worry shaking away any kind of tiredness he could have in him.

“Y/n?” “...” “Babe, are you okay?”.

He was away in a mission with Itadori and Nobara, and anxiety started growing inside of his chest, knowing how far away he was from you.

His heart stopped when he heard you sob from the other side of the call.

“Angel, what’s wrong? Please talk to me, let me help you”.

His voice helped you to calm down a little, and you took a deep breath as you managed to speak.

“N-nightmare”.

Megumi sighed softly, relief filling his body, and he put the phone away from his ear.

You heard silence for a few seconds, before the Facetime screen appeared, and you picked up.

His face dropped at the sight of you, tears rolling down your cheeks and red eyes looking at him with panic.

“Do you want to tell me what happened, angel?”

You told him how you had dreamt of him dying in the mission, and your boyfriend sighed softly.

He turned on the small light besides him, and he gave you a small smile.

Your heart started beating normally almost immediately.

“Still in one piece, see?”, he reassured, giving you a soft look that was only for you to see.

You nodded slowly, arms wrapped around yourself, and he noticed you were wearing one of his tshirts.

“Smells like you... sorry I took it”.

“Don’t apologise, please. It looks better on your anyways”, he spoke softly, and smiled, “Why don’t you try to sleep again, huh? I’ll be right here”.

“You don’t mind? I don’t want to keep you awake, ‘gumi...”, you said shyly, worried that he wouldn’t rest well, and would be tired during his mission.

He shook his head, laying down again, as you did, resting his phone against the nightlight so you could still see him.

“I’ll sleep better if you’re with me, angel”.

Gojo Satoru.

Satoru sighed deeply, opening the door to your apartment and dropping his bag at the door.

It was late, almost three in the morning, and he had just arrived back from a week-long mission turned into ten days.

It got complicated, and the elders hadn’t allowed him any contact with home, as he ‘had to remain concentrated on the mission’.

He knew it was a punishment to him, but it angered him that you got some of it too.

He took off his shoes, followed by his blindfold, and he walked to the kitchen to pour himself a glass of water.

That’s when he heard it, a soft whimpering coming from your shared bedroom.

He ran to the room, senses still in alert, and opened the door with a push.

Nothing was there, just you, twitching in bed as you mumbled in your sleep.

“No... No, no please... P-please don’t... Not S-Satoru...”.

Gojo walked to the bed, kneeling in front of you, and he shook you softly, hand in your forearm.

You opened your eyes at the unexpected touch, jolting up and screaming.

“Hey, hey... It’s me, little one, I’m home”, he spoke through your soft cries, as he took your hands, guiding them to his face.

Your shaky fingers caressed his skin in the dark, soon finding his hair, and then his shoulders.

A sob left your lips as you pulled him into your body, his weight making you both fall in the bed.

He turned you around, so you were on top of him, and he chuckled softly.

“Someone really missed me, yes?”, he asked softly, pressing a kiss to your head, “It’s alright, baby, really... I’m alright”.

You nodded against his chest, face buried in his clothes, and he caressed your hair gently, feeling your breathing slow down.

“They... I had a bad dream, and you... y-you... they had...”, you struggled to find the words, but Satoru already knew what you wanted to say.

His blood boiled with anger, rage for what those old bitches were putting you both through. But he simply clicked his tongue, pulling you from his chest so you could look at him.

“Here, look at me, Y/n. I am the strongest, remember?”, he asked, and you nodded slowly, “No one is taking me away from you, alright? No one, bunny”.

You nodded again, rubbing your eyes, and Gojo covered you both with the blankets as you kept looking at him, still shocked by his presence.

He looked down at you, a sweet smirk plastered on his face, and he held your chin with his fingers, pulling you closer to his face to kiss your lips.

“I’m sorry for being late, little one... I’ll make it up to you, ye-“, he started speaking, playful tone disappearing as he realised you had fallen asleep again.

“Sleep well, Y/n... I’ve missed you too”.

Nanami Kento.

It was 5 pm when Nanami’s phone rang, but he couldn’t pick it up.

He was in the middle of a mission with Gojo, fighting a special grade that had taken a school.

His eyes coloured with worry when, at seven, Ijitchi came to pick them both up, and informed him that you had called to ask for your boyfriend.

“Please, drive me directly home”, he asked, ignoring Gojo’s questions about what had happened, or if you were alright.

He knew the white haired man was being genuine in his worry for you, but he couldn’t think about anything.

When he got home, he called for you as soon as he opened the door, but you were already there.

Your frame was cuddled on the couch, a blanket over your shoulders as your head rested on your knees, which you were holding to your chest.

“Darling, what happened? Are you sick, is everything alright?”, he asked, walking to you.

You didn’t give an answer before throwing yourself onto his arms, your own wrapping around his neck as you started crying.

Kento knew what had happened as soon as you did that, and he held you gently, rubbing your back with one hand, as the other pulled your legs to wrap around him.

He walked to the kitchen with you in his arms, and with one shift hand, he put water to boil.

“Do you want to tell me what you saw, my love?”, he asked gently, looking at you as he sat you on the counter, his hands brushing some strands of hair away from your eyes.

You shook your head, and he hummed in understanding, hand now on the back of your head to pull you closer.

He kissed your forehead sweetly, fingers running through your hair as his free hand held one of yours, thumb running over your knuckles.

When the water boiled, he poured it in a cup, and threw in a bag of tea and some sugar.

Kento carried you back to the couch, sitting down with you in his lap, and he held the cup for you, as your arms were still wrapped around his neck.

He wasn’t much of a talker in this situations, knowing his words were not what you needed, but his presence and touch.

He caressed your back with his free hand, and pressed another kiss to your forehead as you rested your head against his shoulder.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t pick up, darling”, “It’s okay... You’re here now, and that’s what matters”.

He rested the cup in the table, wrapping his arms around you to hold you as close as possible, and smiled when you pressed a little peck to his shoulder.

“That’s all what matters...”.

[cecilysass]

The Boy on the Beach (5/16)

Read on AO3 | Tagging@today-in-fic

Chapter 5: Who Do You Think You're Fooling?

The soundtrack for this chapter is Loves Me Like a Rock, by Paul Simon, from his 1973 album There Goes Rhymin’ Simon. This song peaked at #2 on the Billboard Hot 200 in October 1973.

November 23, 1973 Victorville, California

The bus rattled. Scully’s eyes were half closed, and her face tilted at the blurred landscape outside the window. In hazy half-sleep, she saw it again: Mulder’s face, weeks ago, desperate, intent.

“I don’t have all the answers to what you’re saying—I don’t. But whatever else might be true, I know I need you.”

Not weeks ago, decades away now. All by herself on this bus, with no one even to see or to know, the memory made her flush. She had wanted to believe him so badly, and it made her ashamed, so ashamed.

*** The first thing she did when she settled into the seat on the Greyhound bus—hours ago, back when it was still the middle of the night—was pull out the body cam.

Her reasonable side told her it probably wasn’t sending images anywhere. Even if it were, it was questionable anyone would ever receive the images. It was questionable a timeline currently existed where anyone would be looking.

Turning the device over in her hands, Scully knew that just didn't matter. She knew she would do it. She felt the need to do it almost instinctively. It was like dropping a message in a bottle into an infinite sea: an action you took for yourself, to feed your hope.

With the lights of the bus terminal in San Diego still spilling garishly through the window, she took the camera in her hands and aimed it straight at Mo’s cardboard Ameripass.

Mo giving her the Ameripass had been such a miracle. She should document this little act of human decency, she reasoned, sending the moment out into the oblivion. She pressed the button she knew would take a still photo.

Whir and click.

A few hours later, Scully had fallen asleep with her head pressed uncomfortably against the window. She woke, blinking in confusion, to the fuzzy lights of Los Angeles, streaming past through the glass. It was an unfamiliar Los Angeles, different from the one she knew from so much travel with Mulder. She stared blearily. In her mind, clouded from sleep, it struck her as amazing—like seeing a natural wonder—this L.A. of the past. She wished she had someone to share the experience with.

In the darkness of the bus, she felt for the body cam again, and, barely awake, pressed it flush to the window in the direction of the city lights, placing pressure on the button.

Look, infinite universe, she thought. But that wasn’t honest. She wasn’t really dropping bottles in an infinite sea. She knew who she was talking to, and there was no point in pretending otherwise.

Look, Mulder, she corrected herself. It’s 1973 Los Angeles.

The button pressed all the way down.

Whir and click.

*** Hours before, back in the San Diego Greyhound terminal, just minutes after she said her good-byes to Mo and Silvia, Scully almost had a failure of nerve. Part of it was the sundress. It made her feel short and out-of-character, like someone who should be picking flowers instead of attempting something significant.

Feeling vulnerable, she had walked stiffly to the counter, her lips in a grim line, and presented the Ameripass with the name Maureen O’Byrne typed across it, fully expecting to be challenged. But just as Mo had predicted, the man only glanced uninterestedly at the pass, glanced at her, and handed her a ticket.

“Listen, you have red hair, I have an Irish name,” Mo shrugged, back at Casa Que Pasa. “Nobody is going to question you about the damn Ameripass. Don’t overthink it.”

Once she stepped on to the bus, Scully had followed Mo’s directions to the letter. Find a seat near the front of the bus, Mo said, because the bathroom in the back stinks. Plus, Mo added, you want to be somewhere closer to the driver in case you end up sitting next to a toad.

“But don’t sit directly behind the driver,” Mo warned, “in case he wants to put his own bags on that seat, because then he’ll ask you to move at the last minute. If that happens, you’re fucked. There probably won’t be any good seats left, or only one next to some toad.”

Scully had nodded studiously, absorbing Mo’s words, assuming that “toad” in this context meant something like “creep” or “pervert” or “sex offender,” someone who would not respect the boundaries of a young woman travelling alone on a bus. Mo didn’t know that Scully was armed, or that Scully was Quantico-trained in basic self defense, but this seemed like sound advice anyway.

Mo had just recently returned from an epic, eventful trip to Minneapolis using her Ameripass — good for unlimited Greyhound bus travel anywhere in the continental U.S. — to visit her sister. The pass was good for 30 days, and, Mo said triumphantly, there were four days left. So long as Scully could use it within those four days, she was welcome to travel as far as Greyhound could take her.

“It’s just going to go to waste otherwise,” Mo had said, folding Scully’s hand around the cardboard pass and patting her fingers. “So it works out perfectly. Do your thing, pilgrim.”

Hours later now, sitting slumped against the green-tinted window on the bus — thankfully, no toads next to her — Scully felt a pang of regret at leaving Mo and Silvia behind. For a little while there, in their company, she had not felt quite so alone. Obviously she hardly knew them, knew nothing at all about their lives really, so this sentimentalism was a bit silly. Still, they had shown her such unexpected kindness. For no reason other than just that they felt they should and could.

And they were the only people in 1973 who knew her name.

She sucked in a breath, staring out the window at the bleak brown California landscape rushing by, trying to keep this swell of sadness at bay. She stirred in her seat, limbs restless, looking around the bus at those sitting around her.

A middle-aged couple, sitting a row ahead of her and across the aisle, were sharing a newspaper and a bag of gumdrops. The woman had a beehive hairdo and tortoiseshell cat-eye glasses, like Scully remembered her Aunt Olive wearing at one point in her childhood, and the man wore a bow tie she thought was probably old-fashioned even in 1973.

“You want a section to read?” the man offered a part of the newspaper, noticing her watching him. “It’s yesterday’s paper, but we’re done with the front section.”

“No,” Scully said with a small, tight smile, “but thank you.”

The man lifted the front page and directed it towards Scully, tapping it with his forefinger. “Golly, can you believe this? Ten years,” he said, whistling lightly. “I can hardly wrap my mind around it. Seems like yesterday to me.”

Scully quickly scanned the headline: “Americans Observe Tenth Anniversary of President Kennedy’s Assassination.” Yesterday, she realized: November 22, 1973, the day she arrived.

“I will never forget where I was when I heard that news,” his wife added. “I was at the dentist’s office, and they made an announcement that the President had been shot, and we turned on the radio, and we all just sat there in the waiting room and cried. You remember that, Joe?”

“I was at work,” nodded the man. “Covering Larry’s shift. Can’t believe that was ten years ago.” He turned to Scully. “Where were you, miss?”

In my mother’s womb. Not born yet.

“I was … at home,” Scully said, thinking of something her mother had told her about her own memories of that day. “Listening to music on the radio.”

She leaned back against her seat, introspectively, remembering Mulder telling her once that Byers was born the day Kennedy was assassinated. That meant yesterday was Byers’ tenth birthday. She wondered how little boy Byers spent the day. She imagined him wearing a tiny suit to his birthday party.

“You want some gumdrops?” the woman interrupted her reverie, looking over her glasses at Scully. “We got a whole bag, and Joe gets sick if he eats too many.”

Scully’s brow crinkled. She would normally say a confident no to gumdrops, but she was hungry, and her next meal was not a solidly worked-out plan. “I’d love some,” she said, a hesitant smile. “Thank you.”

The woman leaned over her husband to fill Scully’s palm with a small sparkling heap, and as she did so, Scully noticed her eyes run over her ring finger. “Not married yet?” she said with a sad, sympathetic look, as if it were a shameful secret.

“No,” Scully said, slipping some gumdrops into her mouth to avoid saying anything else. Gelatinous. Sugary. Not especially flavorful.

“Aw, pretty girl like you, I wouldn’t worry too much,” the man said, no doubt attempting to be kind. “You still have some years to start a family.” His eyes took in Scully’s dress and his expression wavered a moment, as if he were second guessing his words, maybe wondering whether hippie girls even wanted babies.

Scully just nodded awkwardly, chewing her gumdrops. Mentioning that her career was a high priority to her didn’t seem like it would get her very far here.

She thought, with a sudden stab of sorrow, of the IVF technology that didn’t even exist in 1973. The technology that might have made her a mother, although probably not the sort this couple imagined. And not with the man you imagined, either.

Her eyes fell on the man’s newspaper again, sitting half-folded on his lap, and she had an idea. “Sir,” she said, suddenly, leaning forward, swallowing. “I think I would like to look at that newspaper, if you don’t mind.”

“Of course,” he said, folding it up and handing it to her. “Yesterday’s news, but it’s like you’re going back in time, right?”

Scully smiled, weakly, looking over the paper. She then subtly shifted her body so that the chatty couple would not be able to see what she was about to do next.

Reaching into the old duffel bag that Silvia had given her, her fingers found the body cam apparatus. Scully’s eyes quickly scanned the back of the bus. The seats were not very full right now. A woman and a small child three rows back were sleeping, propped up against one another.

No one would be able to see. She slowly lifted the camera from the bag, keeping it low and out of sight, and framed the front page of the Los Angeles Times sitting on her lap, making certain the date would be visible.

This is what year it is, she thought, methodically straightening the paper so that it was even. This is where I went, Mulder.

With satisfaction she pressed the button.

Whir and click.

Berkeley, California 20 Hours After Scully Vanishes 1999

Everyone was being tactful about it, but Mulder was being strange and possessive about the images Scully sent. He had them arranged perfectly in two rows of three on the table — the table he had now completely claimed as his domain in Hays’ lab. Anish helped him clear his space of almost everything else, just a desktop computer and a phone, so Mulder was using it as a kind of makeshift office.

Anish appeared regularly with cups of coffee, bagels, questions, and Mulder knew, like him, the young man probably had slept very little. There were now also a few other grad students who were starting to become involved in the case of the time-traveling FBI agent. He found them all surprisingly... helpful. They were open-minded, eager, ready to help him research or brainstorm an idea.

But Mulder was in charge of the photos. He didn’t even like other people touching them.

Now that Skinner was here, Mulder sat very close to the table, refusing to back up his chair, forcing Skinner to stare at the images over his shoulder. Mulder watched the assistant director’s face carefully as he moved from photo to photo.

When Skinner had returned to the lab that afternoon, he’d taken a look at Mulder’s wild hair, rumpled clothes, bloodshot eyes and sighed deeply. He had tried his best to convince Mulder to leave with him—to leave these poor grad students alone—and to go back with him to the field office. But he had also refused, adamantly, to let Mulder speak to Hays. Other agents had that covered, Skinner insisted, and it was better for everyone if Mulder kept his distance.

Unless speaking to Hays were an option, Mulder could see no point in leaving.

The lab was, as of now, his only link back to Scully. He didn’t put it quite like that in his explanation to Skinner, but Skinner’s face seemed to take in his meaning anyway.

So the assistant director agreed to look at the photos with Mulder there, listening to Mulder’s explanations with a kind of cautious interest. He leaned in closely to each image, his eyes skimming over them, closely absorbing the details for himself.

“There’s a difference between the first group of photos and the second,” Mulder told him. “The first photos were accidents, probably taken by the camera on its own. But now she’s sending them intentionally, deliberately choosing her images.”

“How do you know that?” Skinner looked at him, a furrow in his brow.

Because, Mulder thought. Because I know who this message is for. She’s saying, Mulder, it’s me.

“Take this one, for example,” Mulder lightly touched the corner of photo 4. “The one that came around midnight, the bus pass. Those are her fingers, holding the corner of the pass, aiming the corner towards the camera. She wants us to see that she’s getting on a bus.”

“You’re certain those are her fingers?” Skinner said.

“I’m certain,” Mulder answered, looking hard at the photo. Skinner didn’t question why he was certain, for which Mulder was glad. Photo 4 was his favorite. Seeing those small pale fingers, the intention behind what they were showing him, had been almost like hearing her voice.

Skinner regarded him, his expression stony. “Okay, Mulder. What about Photo 5? What’s your theory about what is going on there?”

“Obviously blurry, very little in focus to identify, but it looks like city lights at night. She may have thought she was showing us where she was, but it is harder to see than she might have guessed. We see one sign that says ‘car wash’ over here, and another that seems to be the name of a Chinese restaurant. Possibly this was taken from the window of a bus. We thought it was San Diego, but now we’re not so sure,” Mulder said. “Because of …. well, the next photo.”

Skinner leaned over to look closely at Photo 6. It was a closely framed image, just a newspaper, sitting on someone’s lap, possibly Scully’s.

“Yeah,” Skinner said. “Los Angeles Times. And the date here at the top. November 22, 1973.” He looked sharply up at Mulder.

“Which also fits with what Mrs. Scully said this morning, when I called her,” Mulder said, biting the corner of his lip slightly. The conversation with Maggie had not been pleasant. “I emailed her the bedroom picture, and she also guessed 1973. Scully would have been nine years old, if she were in a typical, you know, timeline situation.”

Skinner rolled a chair up next to Mulder’s at the table, watching him very closely. “Huh,” he said.

“Notice the way the newspaper is perfectly framed in the photo, sir,” Mulder said. “Symmetrical. Not an accident. This is Scully showing us the exact date, the location. So that when we know more from Hays, we’ll know where to get her.”

Skinner nodded grimly. “So somehow she got herself on a Greyhound bus to Los Angeles,” Skinner said. “Why?”

“It’s not her final stop,” Mulder said. “Anish and his friends found some 1973 Greyhound bus routes online for me, and it looks like she most likely had to go north through Los Angeles in order to continue on east. At any rate, I know where she’s headed.”

Skinner crossed his arms and leaned back, eyeing Mulder carefully. “You do?”

“I do.”

“And where’s that?”

“She's going to Albany,” Mulder said. “She’s going to Albany, New York.”

Skinner scowled. “I don’t follow, Mulder. Why Albany?”

“Because that’s where Hays is in 1973,” Mulder said, bringing his hand down on the table unexpectedly hard. He swallowed. “He’s junior faculty at University of Albany in 1973. Which she knows very well, because we discussed it, and she remembers details. She knows that in 1973 Hays is already working on the research that will lead up to this experiment. And she’s Scully, sir, so she’s strategic. She thinks that her best chance of getting back here is to find him and question him. And she wants to get back to us. To 1999, I mean.”

Skinner exhaled, his eyes still on Mulder, wary. “Okay,” he said, after a beat. “You may be right.”

Of course I’m right, Mulder thought. I am the goddamned profiler, and I am the goddamned expert on Dana Katherine Scully.

“We can confirm as she sends more images,” Mulder said. “I imagine it’s difficult for her, because she probably feels she can’t use the camera device easily in public, and there’s not a lot of privacy on a bus.”

“All right,” Skinner nodded. “Then all we can do is wait for more.”

“But there’s more to report, sir,” Mulder said. “My team and I have been working on more.”

“Your ... team, Mulder?” Skinner cast an uneasy glance at Anish, who was at his computer six feet away, pretending not to listen to their conversation.

“Take a look at this,” Mulder handed Skinner a small file of paper, including a printed photo of a middle-aged woman.

“What am I looking at?” Skinner’s eyes were narrowed.

“Our research on Maureen Jean O’Byrne.” Mulder said. “That’s the name on the bus pass. Maureen O’Byrne, known by friends as Mo. Born April 2, 1949, age fifty, resident of San Diego, California, originally from Minneapolis, Minnesota. Social worker. Graduate of University of California, San Diego. Lives with her longtime partner, Silvia Raygoza, who runs a shelter for victims of domestic violence. I spoke to them both on the phone this morning.”

“And?”

“They’ve never heard of Scully,” Mulder said. “Never met anyone by the name Dana Scully, not now, and not in 1973. They were certain. Mo O’Byrne definitely never gave her a bus pass.”

“Well,” Skinner lifted his eyebrows. “Maybe Scully was, uh ... creative in how she got her hands on the bus pass. She’s not without her talents.”

“Agreed,” Mulder nodded. “But this is what’s really wild, sir. Mo O’Byrne could be certain Scully never took her bus pass because she still had it. She went to some ancient file cabinet somewhere and produced her 1973 Ameripass from a scrapbook, with four days still left on the pass.”

Skinner’s eyebrows raised. “Okay,” he shook his head. “So help me out here, Mulder. What does it mean?”

“It means that whatever Scully is doing, whatever effect she is having in the past,” Mulder said, “it doesn’t seem to be affecting our present. At least … not yet. We don’t seem to be experiencing the consequences of her actions. Because if Scully had ended up walking away with Mo O’Byrne’s bus pass in the past, then 50-year old Mo O’Byrne wouldn’t have it now.”

“Multiverses,” called Anish, who forgot he was not supposed to be listening. “She’s in another multiverse, on another timeline, that has no causal relationship to this timeline. She might be impacting some Dana Scully’s present, but not ours.”

“Maybe,” Mulder said, his head whipping around to look at Anish. “Or maybe it doesn’t work like that. Maybe the effect builds up … and our timeline changes suddenly, snaps like a rubber band into a new reality.”

“She’s affecting more than bus passes,” chimed in Anish’s colleague Georgette, sitting at the next desk from Anish. She was also not supposed to be listening. “She was in her childhood home, right? Did she talk to anyone? Her family?”

“Her mom had no memory of it,” Mulder said, biting the corner of his lip. “But Scully would probably have chosen not to speak to them on purpose, if she could avoid it. To avoid disrupting the timeline.”

“If she jumped into herself as a kid,” Anish said, “like, if her adult body took the physical place of her child body, then when she left her home, she pretty dramatically changed her timeline. Her kid self basically was kidnapped. From her family’s point of view.”

Mulder nodded gloomily. He had thought of this, too. That was a grave change in an established timeline, the sort that could alter Scully’s whole future, that could send her on trajectories that did not involve medical school or the Federal Bureau of Investigation or the X-files. If there was going to be a sudden switch over into a new reality, an adjusted timeline, Mulder himself might, all at once, not remember Scully at all. She might just vanish from his mind. Be replaced by a new partner, a whole new history. Or, really, who knew what was possible? Maybe he would be dead. Scully certainly had saved his life often enough, and if she had never been his partner, that would no longer have happened in the same way. He felt his jaw clenching.

Skinner was watching him. “All right,” he said. “Listen, Mulder—and, uh, team,” he made a half-hearted gesture to the grad students, “let’s focus on what we know, the information that’s coming in right now. We can’t imagine every worst-case scenario we’ve ever seen in a movie or read in some comic book.”

He looked significantly at Mulder. “You’re not going to be able to work if you do this ‘anything goes’ bullshit, and we need you to be the one to help us with these images, Mulder.”

Mulder nodded, shakily.

Then, his own hands trembling just slightly, he picked up the photo with the bus pass, to stare at Scully’s fingers again.

November 23, 1973 Las Vegas, Nevada

In Las Vegas, Scully needed to change buses, something she found herself looking forward to. She was feeling achy and restless; it had been hours since she had a meal. She hoped there would be someplace in the bus terminal to get some real, non-gumdrop food.

The Greyhound terminal in Vegas in 1973 the Friday after Thanksgiving was as surreal as one might have expected: brightly lit, choked with people, some entirely too dressed up for their environs, others looking wrinkled and despondent and hung over.

There was a little snack counter. Scully, nearly faint with relief and hunger, eagerly purchased a cheeseburger and a milkshake with her 1988 twenty dollar bill.

Everything cost almost nothing in 1973, she realized. Her burger was only 75 cents. She had plenty of change, which was useful; she would need it for the rest of the trip. (And after that, who knew?) She found a vending machine and bought an additional assortment of snacks, which she tucked away in her duffel bag for later.

Unwrapping the foil from her burger with giddy excitement, she sat down on a bench. There was, perhaps, a twenty minute wait before the next bus. Scully sank her teeth into her cheeseburger, closing her eyes, in bliss, to savor it. Maybe she should buy a second one before the bus came, she thought. Only 75 cents, after all.

A flash of something sparkly from the corner of her eye caught her attention. She looked up to see Elvis walking past her, in his complete white characteristic jumpsuit, replete with rhinestones and sequins.

Scully’s mouth dropped. She scrambled around in her seat to see him better.

Of course it wasn’t the real Elvis. Why would the real Elvis be taking a Greyhound bus? Although, she realized, the real Elvis was alive in 1973, and maybe somewhere in Vegas. No, this was a convincing impersonator. He seemed to be in the middle of an intense argument with a woman wearing frosted lipstick and a coordinating white halter jumpsuit.

The woman in the halter was saying something angry to Elvis, something difficult to make out and laced with profanity. Scully took a deep, thoughtful sip of her milkshake and watched them closely.

“What it boils down to is that I can’t fucking trust you any more,” the woman said, her voice cracking as she emphasized each word. “You haven’t been the same man since you came back from Vietnam. Everyone says that.”

“It’s you that hasn’t been the same, Nancy,” Elvis hissed. “I’m the same man I always was. You say you love me, but you sure act otherwise, don’t you?”

“You can’t love someone if you don’t fucking trust them,” Nancy retorted, as they walked away.

Scully’s eyes tracked the pair as they moved across the terminal, stray remnants of their angry words still trailing behind them. She swallowed her milkshake.

The couple’s fight should not remind her of Mulder. She and Mulder were not a couple, never had been a couple. It was just embarrassing for her to have these associations. But it only seemed to take the slightest push to tip her over into thinking of that awful morning at her apartment. His determination. Her fury. In the weeks since she hadn’t been able to get any of it out of her mind.

The most horrible moment, the moment that made her physically ill: when his mouth was behind her ear, when painful shivers were moving through her and she was ready to give over entirely, and she was hit with cold, clear certainty. A pattern lighting up before her face, and oh, how metastatic it was. He had peeked inside of her mind, knew precisely how she felt about him, and was looking to use it for the purposes of his all-important mission.

She couldn’t even fully express the violation of that, the humiliation of that. Her creeping suspicion that he might have done it before, even without the insight of literal mind reading, and that it had worked. Her horror that she was so weak, so predictable, so unprofessional.

Scully slowly chewed her cheeseburger. Separated now, across this chasm of time from Mulder, this certainty about his betrayal seemed … less certain. Because whatever else she knew about Mulder, whatever his flaws, surely she knew that she trusted him?

Later, she was getting on to the bus, still sucking the remains of her milkshake through the straw, when she noticed a postcard someone had dropped lying on the curb. It was bright and gaudy, from a casino and hotel she didn’t know, that she didn’t think existed in 1999, The Dunes.

She bent down to pick it up. It was blank, unwritten.

On the bus she turned the empty postcard over again and again in her fingers, thinking of Mulder and his troublesome visions. She had been so angry, so frustrated with him for his talk of putting the mission first. How many more times must she watch him self-destruct? How many more times must she see him put himself, and her, on the sacrificial fire?

She still believed he was wrong. She still thought he had childishly misconstrued his own purpose. Seeing no balance, seeing no gray area. But it was who he was. This was the man he had become when his sister was taken. Wasn’t it simply cruel – and futile – to blame someone for being who they were?

Besides, Scully thought, you are hardly in a position to criticize Mulder for taking on a quest at great personal cost.

She wondered if someone would loan her a pen.

Berkeley, California 84 Hours After Scully Vanishes 1999

Fifteen photographs now. Spread out over the table in five rows of three.

The original three, the outliers, at the top. Those were the three Mulder believed were taken at random by the camera. But since then, as Mulder kept telling Skinner: there was a definite, recognizable pattern.

First, Scully took pictures of things that had some personal meaning to her. Sometimes, the meaning was indecipherable, even to Mulder. Like the sweater. There was a photo of a sweater (a cardigan, he thought it was, technically) sitting on a bus seat on day two, and Mulder’s best guess was that Scully had somehow acquired a warmer layer and was just happy about it.

But usually Mulder could figure out her thought process. There was a shot of a movie marquee sign playing The Exorcist, for example, and he knew it was one of her favorite films. She was probably amazed at seeing it playing in a theater, on its first release, so she took a picture.

Second, there were pictures showing him where she was: giving specific information about her location. For hours the images would stop, and Mulder assumed during this time she was probably asleep. Then, like a miracle, an image would surface again, demonstrating she had moved across the continent some great distance: a picture showing an Illinois rest stop sign, or the identifiable skyline of downtown Pittsburgh.

Sometimes the images combined both purposes. There was one image that showed a road sign marking the turn-off and number of miles to Kroner, Kansas. It showed where she was, yes. But Scully had also seen the sign and thought about lovesick weathermen and flying cows, of that oddball case that was simultaneously in their past and in her future.

Or there was the haunting image from Las Vegas, the image of the postcard. Mulder and the grad students could tell it was Las Vegas because the postcard had the logo of a now-defunct hotel and casino on it, The Dunes.

Scully had written a message, and as the image filled in on the monitor, Mulder just stood and stared at it, his body rigid at the sight of her neat and recognizable handwriting, motionless by reading what she had written: “Saw an Elvis impersonator. Thought of you. Wish you were here. - DKS”

Nothing is going to stop me from getting her back, Mulder promised himself. Even if it means living the rest of my fucking life in this lab.

Knowing Scully as he did, he guessed she had her doubts about whether he would ever see these pictures she was taking. He speculated that she might be taking these photos more for herself than for him, as a way of offering herself comfort.

That idea made him inexpressibly sad. Not for himself, because he did receive her messages, after all—but for her, not knowing that he had. He pictured her writing a postcard to him in some lonely bus terminal, taking a picture, all the time feeling that it was a futile act. That was not what life for Scully was supposed to be. Acts of sad futility were not supposed to be her modus operandi. If happiness was supposed to be sacrificed for his mission, it was not supposed to be hers.

“Mulder,” Anish’s voice interrupted his thoughts. “Heads up. There’s a new image.”

“Is she in Albany?” Mulder said, springing up from his table. “Did she get there?” Her last image had been in Port Authority in Manhattan, so he knew she was close. She would have only needed to take a Greyhound upstate, a relatively short leg of her trip.

Skinner was standing with Anish over the monitor, watching the image finish filling in. He glanced up at Mulder as he approached.

“Well?” Mulder said. “Did she make it to Albany?”

Skinner’s expression was inscrutable. “As a matter of fact, no,” he said. “She is in Providence, Rhode Island.”

Mulder scowled and pushed past them to see. Sure enough, the monitor showed a tourist sign saying “Historic Providence, Rhode Island, Est. 1636” in a swirling typeface, meant to evoke a colonial past. In the sign’s background, he could see the contours and shadows of buildings, a cityscape, downtown Providence. The picture looked to be taken from a bus window.

“Providence,” Mulder shook his head, dumbfounded. He had been so certain he would see evidence she was in Albany. “But .... why? Why would she go to Providence?”

Skinner said nothing, but kept his eyes trained on Mulder.

“Unless the bus was rerouted for some reason,” Mulder said. “But she would have found a way to tell us that, wouldn’t she?”

“Let’s go sit down at your table, Mulder,” Skinner said, touching his arm. Anish, tactfully, moved back to his own desk.

Mulder looked in faint surprise at Skinner. “Do you think she knows Hays isn’t in Albany? Maybe she has reason to believe he is at an academic conference somewhere.”

At the table, Skinner slid a chair out, sat down, and gestured for Mulder to do the same. But Mulder remained standing, still staring, perplexed, across the room at the monitor.

“She isn’t looking for Hays,” Skinner said. “Come on, Mulder. You must have guessed by now.”

“Guessed? Guessed what?” Mulder looked now at Skinner, who had a look of grim certainty on his face that made him uneasy.

“Jesus Christ,” Skinner shook his head and put his fingers on his temples. “This is a hell of a blind spot for you, Mulder. If I’m being honest, you’re scaring me.”

“What?” repeated Mulder urgently. “What do you know?”

“She’s going to Martha’s Vineyard, you dumbass,” Skinner said.

Mulder just stared, dumbly.

“She’s clearly trying to get there fast. Presumably before November 27, 1973. That’s a date you still recognize? You haven’t lost all perspective yet?”

Mulder still said nothing, but sat down now, next to Skinner, in a stunned silence.

“I‘m pretty damn sure she has in mind to offer Samantha Mulder—the Mulder siblings—her protection as a trained federal agent, although I have no idea how.”

Mulder looked at his own hands, considering this. He shook his head, stubbornly.

“No. She doesn’t know what changing the timeline like that would do,” Mulder said softly. “It might make it impossible for her to return.”

“I‘m sure she has given some thought to the implications of that,” Skinner said. “Don’t you think she has? This is Scully.”

“She should be trying to get back,” Mulder said, his voice rising a little. “It— it doesn’t sound like her. To go off-mission like this. To do something so risky and irrational. I don’t think you’re right. She wouldn’t do it.”

“One hell of a blind spot,” repeated Skinner. “Have you not noticed that she does some pretty batshit crazy and risky things sometimes? And have you noticed she does them always, always, always for the same motivation?”

Mulder looked up at Skinner uneasily.

“You, dumbass,” Skinner said. “For your well-being. This definitely tracks.”

Mulder couldn’t say anything.

Skinner sighed. “All right, listen. How can I put this so you’ll get it?” he said, a kinder quality to his voice. “You know how you feel about her, Mulder? All that stuff you probably don’t tell her? Well, I think it’s ... a pretty safe bet that’s how she feels about you, too.”

There was an uneasy pause.

“I don’t think that’s true,” Mulder said.

Because there was no world, no timeline, no universe, in which anyone could feel about Fox Mulder the devastating love he felt for Scully. He couldn’t even put the feelings into words.

Skinner just looked at him with a sad, curious expression that Mulder couldn’t completely process.

Mulder’s voice trembled when he spoke. “Sir, I don’t even know what happened with Samantha that night, exactly. And I was there the first time. I don’t know for sure whether it could be stopped … by anyone, much less a single agent, with no back up, no one to call for help, no Bureau support. I don’t know what kind of danger Scully might be putting herself in.”

Skinner nodded. “Yep,” he said. He sighed heavily. “Yep, I know.”

Neither man spoke for a moment. Skinner looked up at Mulder again. “The good news is, Mulder, everything you know about that night, every detail, she knows, too, since she is one of the few people on the planet who has been listening to you.”

Mulder met Skinner’s eyes, and his view of his boss went blurry. He blinked. A few tears fell.

“I don’t know what one person could do,” Mulder said, his voice broken. “Against … them. Alone like that.”

Skinner inclined his head. “Well, technically speaking, she wouldn’t be all alone .... exactly, would she?” he said. “I mean … she’d be with you.”

A bonus track for this chapter, the number one song on the Billboard chart the week of 11/25/73, the week Samantha Mulder was abducted: Photograph, by Ringo Starr.

Source:

“Learning to Love the Bus on Across-Country Odyssey,” New York Times, 27 October 74

[laskyy]

Hi everyone! This was a request made by @jiungbun, Thank you so much for requesting! I hope you enjoy it and feel free to leave critiques if you have any 💖

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P1harmony when their s/o wakes them up with kisses

Tw: kissing

Genre: fluff

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Theo:

You woke up around 5 minutes ago and realised that Theo had to go to work soon, but he was still sleeping and he looked really peaceful.

You were thinking of a way to wake him up without him getting moody or even mad at you, so you settled with kissing him. You kissed his cheeks softly, then his forehead, his nose and then his lips.

(rest of Theo and the other members under the cut!)

Eventually you kissed his eyes that were closed and they sprung open.

"Good morning." Theo said with a groggy voice as he put his arms around you, so you wouldn't get away from him.

"Morning Tae! You have to go to work soon." You said as you tried to get out of his hold.

"More kisses and I'll consider." Theo said with a smug smile as he closed his eyes and puckered his lips childishly. And obviously you kissed him and you guys stayed like that for a while.

Keeho:

Everytime you and Keeho would sleep together (just sleeping, nothing else) you knew that It would be impossible to wake him up.

He just refused to get out of your arms, he was that clingy, but you loved it.

Today wasn't different. You tried calling his name softly but he didn't even move, so you had to try a different aproach.

You started giving him soft kisses across his face as you played with his hair softly and you got a reaction from him.

"Oh my god I loved that!" He said as he slowly opened his eyes.

"How about payback?" He asked as he too, started pressing his lips on every inch of your face he could reach.

Jiung:

Normally Jiung would wake up before you, but today that wasn't the case.

As you woke up earlier you had time to admire how angel like he looked in his sleep, and you felt really lucky to have him in your life.

He just looked so soft you had to kiss his cheeks and then the rest of his face, because he just looked so cute you couldn't resist.

"Is this real? Am I dreaming?" Jiung asked in a small voice signalling he was still tired.

"I don't think you are." You said as you giggled and continue to kiss him as he pulled you even closer to his body.

Intak:

You and Intak were really tired after your date so when you reached your house you guys settled for a 3 hour nap before he headed back to the dorm.

You woke up feeling very warm due to the fact that you were squished against Intak and he just looked so fluffy you swore he wasn't real.

Your little bubble was popped when you realised you had to wake him up so he could head home, but on the other hand you still wanted some affection, so you decided to wake him up with kisses.

You kissed every inch of his face and you're pretty sure he felt ticklish because he woke up giggling and he decided to hold you closer against him.

"We should nap together more often if it means I get this treatment every time."

Soul:

Soul and you had fallen asleep while watching a movie on the couch and when you woke up before Soul you notice the awkward position he was sleeping in.

You were sure that if he stayed like that for much longer that he would be in pain, so you thought it was best to wake him up.

But the problem was that he looked so peaceful you felt bad, so you started littering small kisses across his very cute face in hopes to wake him up softly.

"I must be in heaven no?" Soul asked as he leaned further in your soothing touch.

"I mean you're an angel so I think so ." You said as you both giggled and went to sleep comfortably on the bed.

Jongseob:

You and Jongseob had gone to sleep very late because you were up all night listening to some songs he had self-produced and Jongseob was even producing some songs as well.

You woke up and you could see that Jongseob really needed to sleep, he was working very hard and his body was basically aching for some rest.

You stayed awake for some time admiring him until about 3 p.m., because it was already late and he needed to eat something so you had to wake him up.

You kissed his forehead twice and then moved along to his soft cheeks and started pressing as many kisses as you could and eventually Jongseob woke up and smiled softly at you.

"Good morning there, I see you're cuddly today" He said as he cuddled you and kissed you cheeks as a reward for the affection he got.

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I hope you guys enjoyed this! And sorry for the inconvinience but the Keeho imagine might only get published during the weekend so please be patient! Remember to take care of yourselves and feel free to request! Also please pray for our boys in Enhypen, let's wish a speed recovery to the members who tested positive and let's hope the members who tested negative keep safe as well! Love you guys 💖💖💖

[violettelueur]

— JUJUTSU KAISEN EPISODE TEN || IDLE TRANSFIGURATION

↳ featuring : fushiguro megumi + kugisaki nobara + zenin maki + inumaki toge + panda + ieiri shoko from jujutsu kaisen

↳ warnings : EXTREME grammar issues

↳ form : story

↳ published : 11 march

↳ pronouns : she/her

↳ word count : 1,8k

↳ synopsis : within the jujutsu world, there were three famous clans to be aware of, the Kamo clan, Zenin clan and the Gojo clan. However, unknown to many sorcerers there was one last family that was known to be apart of the three, only for them to disappear after the golden era leading some to speculate that they had died in battle after the sealing of ryomen sukuna, but....

↳ previous episode : small fly and reverse retribution 

↳ next episode : narrow-minded

↳ barista’s notes : let me admit, it’s getting a bit difficult to write the series because the episodes in the anime does not match with Y/N’s timeline/story right now since Itadori and her are in two completely different situations, but i am trying my best ╲ʕ·ᴥ·　╲ʔ i hope you enjoy today’s episode even though, once again, it isn’t that interesting at all to be honest... but at least nanami will appear in the next one!

BEFORE READING, I NEED YOU TO BE AWARE OF THIS:

1. the whole story belongs to Gege Akutami and the credits go to them and them only.

2. the spell curses used belong to Tite Kubo due to them being the ‘Kidos’ being used on the manga and anime ‘Bleach’ - but none is mentioned in this chapter.

2.5 for the ‘cursed spells’/kidos (bleach) i will link this video here and tell you the time stamp to check out what i am intending to show - remember i add a few twist here and there by adding the katana to link with Y/N’s cursed technique

no cursed spells used this episode..

3. if you are confused on anything, please don’t hesitate to message me since i know this whole thing is so confusing.

“Y/N has been sleeping a lot lately, don’t you think?” Zenin asked curiously, as she looked towards the direction of where you were, which was under the usual tree at the track field that you were peacefully sleeping under with your track top used as a pillow for the time being.

“Kelp,” Inumaki replied, as he was also looking at your direction with his classmate while nodding his head in agreement - he was worried since it seemed like everyone was tiring you out due to the 5 vs 1 practice matches they would do…with you being the sole target that no one could defeat yet.

“Did we tire her out that bad? Has she been getting any sleep?” Panda continuously questioned, leading the rest of the second-years to look at you with concerned expression while the other first-years were sitting between you to keep you company after you woke up.

“It’s so boring with you, I want Y/N to wake up soon…” Kugisaki muttered as she looked down at you with a pout on her face causing her classmate to give off an irritated expression before soften up once he turned to look down at you as well.

To them both right now, you seemed to be so in peace for the first time in a while as your breathing was set at a steady and light rhythm with few spots of sunlight shone down your face due to the leave areas the leaves above you three right now, there was also no sort of hints of you having a nightmare at all, no wrinkles could be seen to indicate that there was any right now.

Fushiguro and Kugisaki couldn’t deny the fact that they both could sense that they were improving in their combat skills with you as their mentor and opponent during the practice matches since each time as each match went by, they seemed to last a second longer than they did before leading them to be motivated and encouraged by the small but satisfying achievement.

“We don’t seem to get a scratch on her though,” Fushiguro commented, as he admired your face to see no indication of you even fighting all five of Zenin, Inumaki, Panda, Kugisaki and himself, it seemed as if you didn’t even lift a single finger during training today. However, the same could be said with them since you were also practising your reversed curse technique on them ever since you had been taking lessons with Ieiri Shoko - to which you had to admit, Gojo was right when she didn’t explain the concept of the technique really well.

“Do you think we’re making her use too much of her cursed energy?” Kugisaki asked in an anxious tone, as she was concerned about the number of times you had fallen asleep during the training session during the week since you were using both some cursed energy during training as well as healing their wounds to improve your use of the reversed cursed technique that you were aiming to perfect it by the time of the Kyoto Sister-School Goodwill Event.

“I don’t think so, she processes an immense amount of it but it’s probably because she isn’t getting enough sleep,” Fushiguro quietly answered causing Kugisaki to look up at him in confusion since even though you and her were quite close with one another, she still knew so little about you when it came to jujutsu.

Fushiguro, however, knew almost as much as he was allowed to due to Gojo’s explanation about your background the other day when he had a conversation with him.

“The L/N clan are the stability of the Jujutsu world, as much as I hold the fate of this world, Y/N is someone that can support it’s pillars to keep it up, that’s probably why the Zenin clan wanted an alliance by marriage...to obtain one or all those pillars to themselves”

Deep in thinking, Fushiguro couldn’t help but wonder what Gojo meant by those words. From what he could recall, once Gojo mentioned your role within this complex world of jujutsu sorcery, he also mentioned something that your ancestor did to make sure Ryomen Sukuna was sealed for the time being as they weren’t able to cast the cursed spell that was specifically needed to exorcise the special grade curse, yet a year ago, the phenomenon of the rumoured ‘falsified’ technique seemed to be used during the Night Parade of a Hundred Demons - which lasted for only a short 0.5 seconds - leading Gojo to suspect that you had already executed something that no other sorcerer from your clan had ever achieved.

Yet, Fushiguro had no idea what it was.

However, before he could even utter out a comment to Kugisaki, from the corner of his eye he noticed something shining from the corner of your eye causing the shikigami user to turn his head slightly to have a closer look only to suddenly discover an unexpected tear swiftly rolling down to the side to which caught him by surprised.

Steadily, Fushiguro reached out his arm to wake you up from your slumber to ask what was wrong, only for someone to beat him to it as an arm with what seemed to be a white coat sleeve suddenly appeared into his view.

“Y/N, can you wake up for me?” the person asked, as they gently shook your shoulders which completely surprised Kugisaki since she was in a daze after it had gone silent between her and Fushiguro.

After a few seconds, a groan could be heard from you as you gradually opened your eyes before steadily blinking a few times to let your eyes focus on the setting in front of you only to come across Ieiri, who was looking at you with a small smile on her face while the prominent dark eye circles were completely visible to you even when you were in the tree shade.

“Shoko-san?” you quietly called out, before grudgingly sitting up as you stretch your arms to release some of the stiffness that was building up leading to the Jujutsu Tech doctor to explain the reason why she had woken you up.

“I have someone I want you to practice your technique on since you progressed a lot over the past few weeks, is that okay?” she questioned, causing you to nod and smile at her before your mind came to a sudden question that you had in mind.

“Is it really okay for me to heal the person? Wouldn’t they want you to be in their care?” you asked curiously, before covering your mouth to let out a small yawn.

“Don’t worry, I asked him if he would allow it this once and he agreed,” the doctor stated in reassurance before standing up from her crouched position that she was in. “I need you there in about a few minutes, take your time to wake yourself up,” Ieiri stated before walking away in the direction she came from to go attend the sorcerer that needed to be healed at this moment in time.

Tilting your head to the side, you felt a sudden click before doing the same to the other side to relieve some of the tension that was lingering from your sleeping position - having a track top as a pillow wasn’t as comfortable as you wanted it to be.

“Gojo, when you come back do you want to come with me to get some drinks?” Kugisaki asked with a bright smile on her face causing you to smile excitedly at her as you agreed to the invitation since you were craving orange juice quite a bit.

Standing up on your feet, you rolled your shoulders back to hear the familiar cracks that released some more firmness from your bone and muscles. However, before you could even take a step forward on going to the designated location that you needed to be, you noticed that there was someone else who was standing next to you, leading you to give a side glance to see Fushiguro ready upon his feet, while Kugisaki had already rushed to Zenin’s side.

“I’ll take you there,” Fushiguro randomly stated to you, causing you to give him a perplexed look.

“I don’t think that’s needed, I know where to go and you need to train more,” you informed the shikigami sorcerer before informing the second-years that you needed to go for some time, which they understood, as you then processed to walk in the same direction that Ieiri went. However, you didn’t expect the erratic-hair sorcerer to follow you regardless of your previous comment.

“Didn’t I say you didn’t need to take me there, you drag?” you questioned, as you continued to make your way to the infirmary only for Fushiguro to not answer you at all causing you to let out a sigh of frustration as you decided not to fight against his decision since you knew he wasn’t going to listen to you - he never did to be honest.

“Are you okay?” Fushiguro asked bluntly, leading you to once again look at your classmate in confusion since it was the most random question he could ever ask.

“Yeah, I’m fine, what’s the reason for you asking?” you commented, as you placed your hands in the pockets of your black nylon cargo joggers leading the sorcerer next to you to look at you with an expressionless look on his face.

If you were really okay, you wouldn’t have shed a tear in your sleep right? Or maybe he was overthinking it?

Fushiguro wasn’t quite sure.

Ever since you and him met, you have never shown a side of vulnerability to him at all, you have never shown a hint of fear, sadness or insecurity to him or anyone else ever from what he could remember. From Fushiguro’s perspective, one side of you was calm, supportive and intelligent due to both your knowledge of everyone’s techniques as well as your battle tactics that you can come up suddenly on the spot, the other side of you were just your moody side when you would yell at him or flick his forehead randomly to express your irritation when he wouldn’t listen to you - which he did quite often than he would like to admit.

“No reason, just worried about you,” Fushiguro mentioned, hiding his real intention of why he questioned your wellbeing, as continued to look at what was in front of him to avoid making eye contact with you since he could feel your eyes peering at him with curiosity filling them.

Sighing once again, you slap the back of his head causing him to groan since you put more strength than you intended to. “You shouldn’t worry about me Fushiguro, be selfish,” you commented before walking faster to be ahead of him, leaving him confused about what you had just mentioned to him.

“Be selfish?” Fushiguro muttered in confusion leading you to turn back to look over your shoulder before smiling at him.

“You were going to take me there right?” you asked, as you halted your movement causing the shikigami user to finally catch up to you while you had a lingering question in the back of your mind.

‘What was that dream?’

© violettelueur 2021 : written and published by violettelueur - do not steal or repost

[illumilu]

there’s only one bed” - illumi zoldyck x reader

a/n: a very stereotypical cliche for fanfics, but, yk what? cringe makes the world go round. so here, have my drabbling of what would happen if you were to spend an unwanted night in the same hotel bed as the adultrio. i feel like i may have made this way too long again, but who cares?? this time it’s with illumi! aka loml ...

summary: after a lengthy car trip, you arrive at the hotel with illumi, but to your horror (wink wink), there’s only one bed. including: you dreaming abt him when he’s literally right in front of you (embarrassing). this is part two of a three-part series, with the adultrio. hisoka is already written and chrollo will be coming soon!

warnings: no particular trigger warnings, lowercase intended, a lot of fluff! and cuddling! only on your part though, since illumi is basically awkwardness personified... no nsfw <3

illumi zoldyck:

- the trip to the hotel had taken 6 hours. 6 hours in which you had fallen asleep multiple times, cramped your legs, somehow made every sleeping position dangerously uncomfortable, cracked your neck and twisted your back, possibly to the point of no return.

- for mr zoldyck, or rather, “illumi”, as he had instructed you to call him, the trip was no problem. his upbringing, which consisted of mainly torture, included staying awake for as long as a fortnight at a time. 6 hours may as well have been a few minutes. 

- “the silent son of the zoldycks” was his reputational nickname, or, rather, “lifeless koi fish”, as your friend, hisoka, enjoyed calling him. either way, illumi was not going to let a car ride tire him.

- when you had first met him, he had scared you. a lot. the entire “trained dangerous traumatised assassin” storyline was one that felt like a threat. you were undoubtedly taking a risk by working with him, but it was one you were willing to; it may have been twisted, but murder was your forte, and you were searching for a partner.

- over time, you had grown to be less intimidated by him.

- you were now colleagues with him, working on a new assassination.

- shockingly, planning murder took time, and who better to plan it with than the assassin himself? you had spent the past day on a “business trip”, paid for by illumi’s grandfather, where you sized up the area and familiarised yourself with yorknew.

- all for the big night.

- tonight was the day before the murder of the ten dons.

- illumi and kalluto would carry out the murder, while you made sure everything went smoothly, via a small mic attached to his clothes. the entire operation was based on trust, and would therefore be executed like clockwork.

- you had taken the necessary mental images and kept the targets in mind; all that was left was a night at a pre-booked hotel and then it would be go-time.

- you had assumed that the hotel would be high-class, with doormen, perhaps some marble flooring and pillars - it was the zoldycks who were paying, after all, and you knew they had money to spare. 

- “we’re here.” illumi stated blankly, face reflecting in the window. admittedly, he did look a little bit like a koi fish.

- you nudged past him to look out of the window, leaning over to get a good view.

- oh.

- it seemed you had made quite the overestimation. it was a simple, plain building with a few stories. no doormen or extravagance could be sighted.

- you supposed keeping a low profile was important, but the depressing accommodation was somehow making you wearier.

- the two of you didn’t exchange any conversation on the way up to your room, but you were used to that. 

- you and illumi had met around 5 months ago, and most of it had been comfortable silence. you hadn’t expected it to be like that - in all honesty, you had expected him to kill you - but illumi seemed... calm around you. 

- it was probably because you shared such an odd passion with him; the logistics of murder. you assumed it gave him a chance to loosen his harsh demeanour and enjoy himself. the both of you had worked on multiple murders together, focusing on theory and planning, but this was a huge assassination. nevertheless, you knew he could pull it off; illumi was smart, you had to give him that.

- finally, you arrived at your hotel room, sighing from the lengthy stairway winding up to your unnecessarily high room. you assumed it was for safety purposes, but for god’s sake; why did safety have to be so enervating?

- illumi pushed the door open, and you walked in with him. finally, you could catch some rest.

- except, you couldn’t. 

- a singular bed placed in the middle of the room.

- “why.” you thought to yourself tiredly. 

- you stood there silently, waiting for him to say something. 

- then, you remembered that he was illumi. he obviously wouldn’t see anything wrong with the situation. 

- the bastard.

- it didn’t help that he gave you no visible reaction when you stared at him with your face scrunched up expectantly, as if to ask what his plan was.

- “is there a problem, y/n?” illumi asked, his tone flat as usual.

- you took a deep, worn out breath, clearing your throat.

- after a bit, you shook your head. this was strictly professional. illumi wouldn’t do anything, because he was illumi. nothing would happen.this was an important night, where rest and a clear mind were essential. blame it on the fatigue, and nothing else. you were just exhausted. there was nothing else to it. nothing.

- “no. i’m just a little tired.” you dismissed.

- a silence skimmed past.

- “my grandfather... he often tends to be absentminded. occasionally, he forgets to do certain things, or plan them correctly, i suppose. you could say this is a prime example of such.”

- “zeno forgot another goddamn bed, hm?” you laughed nervously.

- illumi stared at you once again, blinking a few times, in a methodical manner, face neutral and robotic. you smiled awkwardly and remembered that he was not one to laugh at jokes. or anything, for that matter. 

- you wondered if he laughed at bloodshed. or maybe hisoka.

- “i’m going to... go to set up my stuff now.” 

- turning your back to illumi, you winced at the uncomfortable air. even after all your time with him, you never learnt to stop trying to lighten the mood. the mood was literally just always unnatural, in some way. that was another one of illumi’s specialties.

- after some time, in which you had finalized tomorrow's plan and each changed into comfortable clothes, you watched illumi tie his hair up from across the room. 

- his hair had always fascinated you. 

- you had always wanted to touch it. honestly, even when you had first met him, apart from his magnetic eyes, you had been drawn to his hair. you imagined it felt like silk sheets, caressing over one’s hands as smoothly as honey. you were glad he grew it out; in fact, upon seeing his teenage photos, you had laughed so hard you ended up getting a nosebleed from hitting your face. illumi had been left in confusion for a while.

- you realized how random you sounded. why were you reminiscing so much? 

- shaking yourself back to your senses, you admired as he artfully twisted his hair into a loose bun, strands of hair cupping his elegant, pale face.

- what a beautiful koi fish.

- most people couldn’t compute that illumi had true, human feelings. after all, it would be hard to believe a man like him felt anything. but, of course, he did, unhealthily so. he channeled all his trauma and hurt into his villainy, and received happiness from his villainy, anger from his villainy and occasionally fear from his villainy.  however, there was one emotion he could never grasp. he hated himself for it, but soon realised he could manipulate his hatred into villainy, too.

- illumi was a man who could manipulate anyone or anything he wished. 

- except himself.

- internally, he had always felt at a loss whenever he confronted his emotions. but, after he had met you, something had changed. as he caught you staring at his hair through the hotel mirror, he couldn’t help but feel something small stir inside of his stomach. not evil, not happiness, not hatred, not anger. perhaps, friendship?

- this tinge of new emotion inside of him initially made him feel uneasy, but that worry morphed into giddiness, a childish high buzzing somewhere in his core.

- eventually, he stood up to face you and suggested going to sleep. you checked the time on the wall clock. 8 in the evening. well, illumi had always been particular. you agreed that rest was essential for tomorrow.

- you hesitantly took the left side, and, upon seeing your choice, illumi followed to lie on the right.

- after a few minutes, you looked back at him, noticing illumi fell asleep abnormally quickly. you furrowed your brow quizzically at the rock-like manner he was in. frankly, he looked like a plank when he slept. you almost laughed, but held it in for his sake. 

- he had a very specific sleep schedule, as did the other zoldycks. he could go to sleep immediately at his own command, and stayed perfectly still as he did so. he woke up at 5 in the morning every single day, without fail, almost like he had some sort of alarm clock planted in his body. 

- looking at him lying there like a block, you smiled softly. illumi was quite the conundrum to you. you often speculated whether he ever got what he deserved; love, affection, anything really. you knew about his past from when he had told you nonchalantly, within a few weeks of your acquaintance. you always hoped he’d find someone to love him, but doubted whether people would bother looking beyond his bleak surface, and into his excellent mind. lost in thought, you found yourself getting drowsier. you also fell asleep generally quickly, limbs aching from the stupid car ride.

- the night passed.

- illumi was the first to wake up at 5am, stoic and in the same place he had fallen asleep in. no surprise there.

- but you. 

- that was the first thing he saw when his eyes opened.

- he did not expect you to be lying on him lazily, snuggling into his body, arm and leg comfortably wrapped around his side. you were breathing lightly, face burrowing onto the ridge of his chest.

- i suppose you didn’t expect to be there either, which he realized, but the point still remained.

- why were on you his chest.

- “y/n.”

- no answer.

- illumi could have pushed you away; in fact, he could have blown you 983 metres away (his personal record). 

- but he didn’t.

- it wasn’t the thought of disturbing your comfort that stopped illumi from hurling you into oblivion. it wasn’t the fact that he explicitly enjoyed it, either. he remembered that the mission was today; if he were to wake you, and you hadn’t slept enough, you wouldn’t be at your upmost performance.

- the murder of the ten dons was his priority, right? yes. it was. there was no doubt about it. that was the only and final reason he wouldn’t wake you. end of discussion. 

- so, illumi stayed there, waiting for you to wake up and get off of him. 30 minutes passed, and he watched you for every single one.

- hard as it was to admit, watching you rise and fall in sync with his chest made the spark of emotion in his core grow fervently. what had that foreign feeling been? yesterday, he had settled at friendship, but now he wasn’t so sure.

- you looked so peaceful while you slept. less confusing. he remembered the time you had accidentally complimented his hair when the two of you had first met. he had found that amusing. he remembered the time you got a nosebleed from hitting your face too hard - it was after laughing at his teenage pictures, which perplexed him greatly. he remembered the times you two had sat together, working and theorizing on missions, accidentally meeting eyes or brushing hands. one time, you had dipped one of his pins in ink and scratched his name on some paper “for fun”. you had handed it to him and, for some unknown reason, the scrap was still tucked safely in his wallet. your unrivaled intelligence, your idiotic sense of humour, your smile, your lack of common sense, your twinkling eyes that so ironically contrasted his, everything. everything crossed his mind while he lay there.

- illumi found it strange how people remembered the oddest things at the oddest times. 

- why did he think of that now, as you were sleeping? even worse, on the day of a meticulously planned assassination. why couldn’t he manipulate his emotions to stop fluctuating around you so much?

- it all frustrated him.

- why had he let you call him by “illumi” so quickly? mr zoldyck would have been fine. and why had he been so lenient with your antics? no one else got to touch his pins. why did he feel like keeping you on his chest forever, and keeping you safe? most importantly, why was he thinking about you so much?

- his contemplation came to a halt when he heard you stir a little in your sleep.

-  finally, you’d wake up and he could forget about this entire problem.

- he watched you, expecting you to get up soon.

- you began shuffling around, brushing against his chest, and soon your eyes fluttered open, hazy and glazed over. it almost seemed like you were still in a dream, in some sort of half-sleep.

- “huh?” you whispered quietly, still lying on illumi. you looked up lazily, meeting eyes with him.

- “oh... i get it...” you hummed quietly, falling back onto his chest.

- he furrowed his brows.

- “why are you here?” you hugged him from the side, softly laughing at your ridiculous dream. he tensed up at you embracing him, but soon relaxed after realizing what was going on.

- illumi looked at you, one eyebrow raised. did you... think you were dreaming?

- to be honest, he found it kind of entertaining, the way you were fawning over him. if he let you stay there, he could figure out a lot of things about his newly found emotion. it could be worth it. just not today.

- illumi came back to his senses fairly quickly; you were obviously awake now, so why couldn’t you get off of him already?

- “y/n.”

- “mmm? what? so serious all the damn timeee, illum-” 

- “you aren’t dreaming. get off.”

- SHIT

- SHIT SHIT SHIT SHIT SHIT

- you jolted off him immediately, staring down at illumi zoldyck. 

- the real illumi zoldyck.

- oh my god what. what. what. what.

- every nerve in your body began to panic, and, in the stress of trying to find the correct words to say, you just ended up making some sort of incomputable “aaaahhh” noise and jumping off the bed.

-  illumi had finally gotten up and was now staring concernedly at you.

- an awkward pause.

- “let me just start by saying i did not-”

- “y/n. we have more pressing priorities for today. i don’t care.”

- illumi zoldyck had lied. even to himself. he did care. and so what if he ignored it until it festered so intensely inside of him he couldn’t do anything but tell you? he cared about you. and he knew it.

- “ok. you’re right. you’re right! illumi. one question. was i like that the whole night?”

- “i don’t know. i woke up at 5 and you were there.”

- you looked at the clock. it was 6am? what had he been doing for an hour? you opened your mouth to ask but closed it soon after. you recalled your thoughts about illumi growing up void of affection, or love, or appreciation. 

- some questions were best left unanswered.

- “how long was i... mumbling like that?”

- “a few minutes.”

- you gulped. there were a few things you had to come to terms with. shutting your eyes firmly, you apologised profusely, annoyed at yourself.

- “y/n. i don’t care.” he lied once again.

- “you’re right!” you rambled - “the ten dons are today! it doesn’t matter what i said... none of it matters, we can both just forget it!”

- you sounded like you were trying to convince yourself more than anyone.

- “so all we need to do is go over the plan one last time, get kalluto, and then we’ll carry it out, and soon enou-”

- “stop it. you’re wasting time. just go and get ready.”

- you sighed and smiled weakly. on the inside, you were sure your soul had died a little.

- while you left to change, overcome by embarrassment, illumi lingered by the bed for a few seconds. he tried to push down whatever he was currently feeling, but it was no use. the feeling in his core had risen up to his throat, a burst of something waiting to leave his lips. 

- for the first time in a while, illumi zoldyck smiled. not at murder, or at power, or fulfillment, or achievement, or even villainy.

- illumi zoldyck had smiled at the thought of you.

- let’s just say illumi had trouble focusing on his mission. 

i am honestly so fucking sorry you had to read that whole thing. the way i am literally in love with illumi zoldyck and ended up writing 2857 words bye bye bye i’m so sorry!!! PLZ what?? anyways,, i feel like i heavily underwrote hisoka now, since i did such a prologue thing for this! honestly i feel like this one came out a little boring, im sorry again AAAAA just agh; chrollo should b coming when i have time but i have exams rn so idkkkk hh

either way, likes or reblogs or whatever are super appreciated, but don’t feel forced to or anything! either way, i feel like no one’s gonna see this with my reach LMAOO but anyways thank you for reading, if you made it here! feedback and tips for writing on here are always helpful :)