#idk i just was intrigued about this and why i never see anyone mention this scene

[sondheim-girly]

ok im gonna get my yap on, because Brody Grant has so much power in this fandom and I need to talk about why. Am I overthinking this? Yes. Is everything I’m about to say super obvious? Also yes. But who cares.

Ok so some might say “oh the fandom just likes him cuz he’s hot” and the thing is, yes hes hot, but so is the entire cast? And I can’t think of anyone else in the cast who can break the fandom with one single appearance. I think the key of it is the fact that hes unpredictable and always leaves us wanting more. See, back before the Tonys he was doing a lot of press, both for opening and as a nominee. And then post Tonys, you had a three month drought where we practically didn’t get any content of him. However we were still riding high from the pre Tonys interviews, so the obsession continued to stay strong. And theres an element of someone not having their entire life and personality on public display that makes them so much more exciting. And then he disappears for an entire month, then comes back blonde and posts a bunch of photos from his trip in Tokyo. He then goes on to start appearing in the occasional Soc Saturday after not appearing in one for literally months, then is in sky’s Instagram, and starts posting on Instagram more!! So hes giving us just barely enough content to keep us sustained, but also leaving us wanting to much more. Theres also a level of mystery that’s just super exciting cuz you literally never know what he’s gonna do. Is he gonna disappear for a month and go blonde? Is he gonna show up on Soc Saturday and yell about a guy named Mike? Who knows. Not to mention how… mysterious the post he just made was? Like who even knows why he posted that?? No clue, but it’s wonderful.

now of course this is how he has maintained this strange hold on the fandom, but how did he get it in the first place? Of course hes good looking, but hes also absurdly talented, and a very charming person. He’s interesting because he has this kinda edgy ‘persona’ tho idk if that’s exactly the right way to describe it, but then you watch an interview with him and hes this super duper genuine, thoughtful, interesting guy! And then u see a clip of him with the cast and hes just really silly and funny. And so he has all these sides to him which is very intriguing. And he just has this like- really sweet smile and also I think the ear cuff and fingerless glove combo is something that definitely had a major effect on the fans. Ok ive kinda lost the plot.

also theres something about him having social media and rarely using it. Because then it’s like oh we could get content but you never know when- there are a lot of cast members who are super active on social media so we get used to it, or actors who don’t have it at all, meanwhile Brody can just get on there, say something, explode the fandom, then leave. Hes also very intentional about what posts he leaves up, which we can tell from his occasional cleansing of his account. Idk what my point is here but I wanted to say something about this

anyways this is my yap. It’s unedited and completely chaotic but I hope y’all enjoyed it.

[verathena14]

Any thoughts on when we gonna see the meteor shower promise, considering nomura already hinted that Riku gave Sora the necklace? At least it was in the drafts to have Riku giving us a crown keychain we see on Oblivion just in a different color.

ough, this is a tough one... tbh I don't theorize much about kh, I'm just here for the ride! my hope (best case scenario) is that the meteor shower promise gets acknowledged (one way or another, I'm hoping it'll be something like the Chirithy Dream Eater sigil reveal!) in Missing Link and possibly revealed in KH4? again, that's like... best case scenario. I think it would tie in really well with the whole "thank Namine" plotline, and maybe thanking Namine would somehow give Sora back his memories? possibly?

tldr: I really don't know, but I hope it gets revealed in KH4 or alongside the resolution of the "thank Namine" plotline.

[dear-slim]

Hello, i would like to Em in the 2000s x reader that the reader is a pop singer. She was nicknamed the "Princess of the Industry" or "Good Girl" because she has a sweet and shy personality. which the reader has never even had a boyfriend. which em does not believe that she is really like that (of course, this is the entertainment industry) He mentioned her in his songs such as "a good girl? of course I want to fuck her to forget the world." no idk 🫠 when he had to go up to receive a prize with her. he thanked his fans and talked about her that he actually wanted her more than an award (because he still thought she was not a good girl) and people were very angry with him that he talked about her like that. because the reader is loved by people and she is a really good girl. which motivates him to want to play with her a little more

you can choose the ending yourself, which I have but I'm not sure if it will be good, which I think of 2 types 

1. He knew the fact that she was actually a good girl, so he felt like getting to know her more. 

2. He played with the reader until she really fell in love with him and she was pregnant. And she knew the truth at that time that he was just playing with her for his fun. but at that time he actually loved her, you can change the ending scene as you like! ✨ (I want a happy ending🥹)

sorry, English is not my main language.🥲

Thank you✨

Warnings: Smut, 18+ degradation, swearing, mean comments, sexualising, cute!reader

Pairing: slim shady x fem!reader

A/N - I love this request so much! I put ‘Slim Shady’ instead of ‘Eminem’ on the pairing coz it feels more…suited 😉

The Princess of Pop. The little Good Girl of the industry. That’s what you were known as. And, well, it was almost like it was a rule of the Hip Hop world to hate anyone and everyone who sang Pop. It was so…cringy and cheesy and just weird, and everyone hated it. 

But no one hated it more than Marshall Mathers. He despised that one, specific genre from the pit of his heart, so who better to shed his anger on than the girl who all the crazy pop fans absolutely adored. 

In fact, not even just the pop fans, basically everyone knew who you were and it ignored Em more than he’d ever care to admit. Well, he’d gladly admit it in a song. “Man, she’s so damn infuriating,” Em groaned for what seemed like the hundredth time in that hour alone. 

“C’mon, man, you ain’t even met her,” Dre said, his voice sick and tired of saying the same words again and again to his prodigy rapper. “I know but her and her stupid bows and frills and…god, not everything is sunshine and rainbows!” Em said, his voice coming out in a groan.

time skip 

Of course you’d heard the song Em has written. Everyone and their mother had heard it, it was a great song, but it wasn’t a secret to anyone who the song was about. You. Particularly the lyric, ‘a good girl? I’d fuck her to forget the world’. 

Of course, being a pop artist, you didn’t have the assets to be able to retaliate or write a song back, but you were still intrigued by the song. It had basically just been a song questioning your innocence, or however he put it. And your fans, as well as some of his, were very perplexed. 

Why was he dissing your behaviour? And what did he mean thta you were faking it? It didn’t take an awfully smart person to see that you were the sweetest person to ever exist. And him to express his lust for you? They’d seen him make similar references or Britney Spears or Christina Aguilera but you were different…fuck, you’d never even had a boyfriend. Not that Em believed that.a

You were standing in the middle of the stage, wearing your sweet little pink dress, a bow on the back of your head as you adjusted the microphone to be pointed at your lips as you held the envelope in your hand. You’d been invited to the MTV awards to read out some of the names for the awards. 

“And the Award for The Best Rap Video is…” you opened the envelope, a smile on your lips, “oh, Eminem,” you said, smile faltering slightly, but you fixed it nonetheless. Basically just proving Em was right on saying you were a fake ass bitch.

“Uh, thanks,” he said, walking onto stage and taking your place in front of the microphone as you stood politely to the side. Your outfits couldn’t have been more different, with him wearing a matching grey jogger and hoodie set, and you in a damn princess-like dress. 

“I don’t really have a speech planned for this, you know what I’m sayin’?” he said into the microphone, chewing his gum between every few sentences, “but, uh, thanks to, like, Mr Dre…Dr Dre,” he said, the camera panning to Dre. “Nice trophy and stuff…heavy,” he said, weighing it up in his hands. 

“Rather take something else home with me, though,” he said, his eyes flickering to you for the briefest of seconds, barely even register-able if you’d blinked. Your cheeks tinged a little pink but you said nothing, showing no reaction as he walked off stage, casting one final look to you. 

The after party was a hell of a lot more lively than the awards, with people drunk everywhere, celebrities talking and shouting and cheering over everyone as you sat with some classic other singers, like Britney and Christina. “What was the speech about, man?” 50 asked, raising a brow to Em. 

“Thanking people and shit,” he said, with forced innocence as 50 rolled his eyes. “What’s that about ‘takin’ something else home’?” 50 quoted him. “Maybe I want something other than the award,” Em said, a slight smirk playing across his features. 

It didn’t take long for Em to notice you were a bit tipsy, your words slurred and your giggle being louder then you probably intended. And to think people genuinely believed you were innocent? He’d intend to change all of that and prove that stupid little lie wrong. 

You didn’t even know when Em had brought you to his house, you must’ve blacked out, but you were well aware that he was carrying you into his place, shutting the door as your eyes fluttered open. “Em,” you mumbled, a lot more sober than you had been before as you looked up at him. 

You could feel his legs moving up the stairs, where were you? “Shut up,” he said, his voice sounding pretty pissed as you made a sound, not entirely coherent. Your body bounced as he dropped you onto his bed, your legs parted a bit, arms splayed behind you. 

“Sick and tired of people thinking you’re such an innocent little fairy,” he scowled as you sat up, well, attempted to, before his hand pushed you back down. “Em…” you said again, your voice more coherent as his hand pushed down a little more firmly onto you chest, your lips parting, 

“You’re not a fucking angel, Y/N,” he sneered, his voice holding a hint of mockery, “some fucking little pretty princess who wouldn’t hurt a fly,”. You stayed silent, your eyes wide, Em’s words hitting you like a ton of bricks. “How many guys have you really fucked, hm?”. 

Again, you stated silent. “Didn’t expect you to answer,” he scowled, “so what am I? Your twentieth? Thirtieth?”. You didn’t protest as he lifting the bottom of your small skirt, his fingers trailing oh we your panties, which were already slightly wet. “Whore,” Em smirked, pushing his joggers down with his free hands whilst moving the thin material of your panties. 

Your legs squeezed together as he traded over your sensitive bundle of nerves, a scowl on Em’s face at the movement. “Keep it open,” he snarled, forcing your knees apart, throwing your legs over his shoulders as he worked on sliding his finger into your core, a whine on your lips, legs shaking as he curled his digit.

Your cunt clenched round his finger subconsciously as he scoffed again, rolling his eyes. “How fucking needy can you be, Y/N?” he mocked you again, but you paid no mind, too focused on his finger deep in your heat, coated in your juices, his other hand holding your body down. 

Another whine left your lip as he pulled his finger out, your hips moving closer to him to try and make him push his fingers back into you. “Knew you weren’t innocent,” Em rolled his eyes, pushing the head of his thick cock through your folds, a moan on your lips. 

Your eyes rolled back at simply the feeling of his tip stroking against your sensitive clit, even more so when he aligned the entrance to his cock with your hole. “Em!” you shrieked as he slowly pushed into your core, your warm cunt welcoming his cock with your juices. 

“Fuck, calm down,” he said, “it’s not a damn broomstick,”. Your nails clawed at his back, leaving deep red lines across his skin as he raised a brow. And…was that a hint of fear in your eyes? “Y/N,” he said, his eyes widened for a split second before he masked it with a neutral expression, “how many times have you done this?”. 

“I-I haven’t,” you said honestly, his jaw going slack. So, you aren’t lying about…everything? You whined again, trying to move your hips down, to create some sort of friction. “Y/N, I can’t be your first,” he said, his tip hanging inside of you as you clenched round him again, almost as if you were trying to refrain him from moving his cock out of you. 

“You’re already in me,” you said, trying to grab his wrists as he looked down. There was a part of him that would love to take your virginity, for him to be your first, to have you moaning his name and thinking about him like that, with no other guys…he’d love that. 

“You sure?” he asked. That was all he needed. To make sure he had your full and final consent. As soon as the word ‘yes’ left your lips, he pushed his cock fully into you, your warm cunt squeezing tightly round him, silky and velvety around him. 

“God, you’re tight,” he said, his breaths coming out in short pants as he slowly pushed his tempo up, his hips snapping into to yours. “Oh f-fuck,” you gasped, eyes wide as the sound of his cock plunging into your wet juices echoed in the room. God, you looked so good, all spread out under him, for him. 

You could feel a knot building in your stomach as Em angled his hips, the tip of his cock hitting that one point that seemed to turn the volume of your moans up to maximum, and make your eyes roll and your cunt clench round him in that perfect, hot way. 

“I’m close,” he groaned, his head leaning forwards for him to nip and pepper kisses along your collarbone, small pink marks forming on your supple skin. “Do you want me to cum in you?” he asked, lifting his head from your neck to ask the words. 

“P-Please,” you said, cunt clenching round him, your body shooting into little, small spasms, your hands clawing at him as your own orgasm washed through. The whines in his ear from you was enough for him, his cum shooting in thick hot spurts inside of you, spilling down your thighs. 

Besides, what harm could one time do? And he liked the look of you like that for him, as he tranced his cock over your folds, pushing his cum back into you. “Em,” you gasped, hands resting on his shoulders, the bulge of his muscles beneath your hands. 

You stayed under him, your legs still over his shoulders, tilted slightly upward so his cum stayed inside of you, your breathing slowing, Em’s body covered in a light sheen of sweat. “You good?” he asked, moving you to sit on his lap as you nodded, your eyes closed slightly. 

time skip

You’d slept with Em, and you hadn’t even gotten his number. So you’d had to begrudgingly drag yourself to his studio, waiting outside as the door stayed shut. And then finally, after nearly a whole minute of waiting, it opened. “Y/N?” Em raised a brow. 

“We need to talk,” you said, a slight flicker of worry crossing his face as he let you on. “I just… didn’t think it’d happen in one time, a-and I thought I’d be o-okay,” you said, the words all spilling out, somewhat incoherently, before his hand rested on your shoulder, snapping you out of it. 

“Slowly,” he said, leading you into the private section of the studio and sitting you on a chair as he knelt in front of you, his eyes locked on yours. “What happened?” he asked. “I-I’m pregnant,” you said, steadying your breath as his eyes widened. 

“How long?” he asked. “Not sure,” you said weakly, “it’s yours, though,”. Em nodded slowly, saying nothing. “D’you wanna keep it?” he asked softly, moving his hand to brush a strand of hair behind your ear. “Yeah,” you said softly, your eyes welling up a bit. 

“Shhh, it’s okay,” he whispered, pressing a kiss to your cheek, on the edge of your lips, “I’m gonna be here the whole time, okay? I promise,”.

[k0juki]

Good things take time

Joost Klein x fem!reader

English is not my first language, so feel free to point out any mistakes or errors! Also the pictures is not mine! Credit goes to owner! Not edited! Also BIG thanks to the @catherinewithu!! Couldn't do it without her.

Summary: If you promise something, you have to keep it. But even Joost makes a promise and doesn't keep it, just like you.

Warnings: alcohol, both sad y/n and Joost, mentions of sex but nothing is here!

A/n: I have mixed feelings about this xdd. Idk if it's happy ending...

Wc: 2.8k

---

Joost. Joost fucking Klein. That man was always very charming and he didn't even have to try. He was always the center of attention whereas you were just somewhere back, trying to fit in. Looking for your kind of people that lay back just like you. And if a year back someone would have said to you, that you're going to be in love with this man, you wouldn't believe them. Probably laugh in their face. You and Joost? Ha, you could never... could you?

He was the god of the party. Whenever he walked into a room, it was like the atmosphere shifted. People gravitated towards him, drawn by his effortless charm and infectious energy. He had this way of making everyone feel like they were the most important person in the world, even if just for a moment. Yeah, you know, Joost.

You and him met pretty easily, not in some grand, starstruck way, but through friends. It was at one of those low-key gatherings that start with a few people and end up with the entire social circle crammed into a living room. Joost was in his element, entertaining the crowd with stories and jokes. You watched him, intrigued by how natural it all seemed to him.

As the night went on, you and him somehow ended up in the same conversation circle. It wasn't long before you were chatting like old friends that have always known each other. He asked about your interests, your thoughts on music, movies, and life in general that night. And you found yourself opening up more than you usually did, his genuine interest made it easy.

Then, you started seeing each other more frequently. Your encounters were never planned, but always felt serendipitous. You ran into each other at the shop center, at friends' houses, and even at the grocery store. Each meeting felt natural, unforced, but then it wasn't just for talking and sharing stories. Now, you and Joost were friends, but with benefits. Of course you didn't mind at all at first. But after some time you wasn't so sure anymore. At first it was just because of some release. But after some time, you started to feel some...things.

Then came the night of this unforgettable party. You didn't want to come here at all, but your friend, f/n, she promised it's going to be just for a few hours and that Joost is going to be here as well. Maybe, that's why you actually agreed to go here. She knew about you and Joost, and how you actually felt about him. But she promise to not say anything.

Joost was, as usual, the center of attention. But this time, at this party, it felt different. Every time your eyes met across the room, there was a spark, a silent understanding that something was shifting between you and him. You watched him laugh, dance, and engage with everyone, yet somehow, it felt like he was always aware of where you were and what you were doing, of who you were speaking with and when you looked at him.

It was like sixth sense.

It started to get hot here, or maybe it was just the alcohol that flowed through your blood. Either way, you needed some fresh air, so you excused yourself from your friend that was just as tipsy as you and you made your way out by the back door that went to the garden. There wasn't anyone, but it wasn't so surprising. Whole party was thrown inside because of the cooler weather.

Enjoying the muffled sounds of a party in the house behind you, you were startled when you felt someone's hand on your hip.

"Hey, hey, easy here. It's just me."

Joost.

"You scared me for life." Turning your head to look at him, you notice how his pupils were big.

"I'm sorry princess, I will try not to scare you away from me." You laughed it off. He was definitely a teaser. It was in his nature, to make people laugh, to forget everything, to enjoy their time with him.

"What are you doing here so alone, hm?" He whispered in the cold night and ran his hand that he had on your hip up and down. To warm you a bit. "It's cold out here."

"I know, but I needed some fresh air. I couldn't breathe in there." You said and pointed back at the house. Leaning your head on his shoulder you closed your eyes, but the drinks that your friend made you drink with her were a little bit stronger for your liking, so whenever you closed your eyes you felt the whole world spin, just like right now.

"Yeah, you're right." Joost put his chin on the top of your head after he kissed it, just as you relaxed in his hold. You always enjoyed his presence, but it wasn't just because of his personality, it was because he made you feel things that you believed that were never there. He was different, he made you feel different. Like no-one else before had. He lifted his hand from your hip and placed it on your arm, "You're cold." he said and raised his head for yours.

"It's nothing." You chuckled, "I will manage." you tried to assure him, but your skin was really ice cold.

"Yeah, in bed with a fever tomorrow morning. Come on, let's get inside." He took your hand in his and together you made your way to the house. He let you go in first, holding the door open for you like a true gentleman he is with a smile on his face. "Lady's first."

You returned his smile, never letting go of his hand. It wasn't strange for you to hold his hand and kiss here and there, but you weren't together, it made some people questioned your real relationship. But what they didn't know was that you and Joost have been sleeping with each other from time to time. And you had to admit, you were totally scared of your future with him.

He doesn't feel love. He never felt that way. You knew it because before you and him started to sleep together, you and him made a promise to not catch feelings, it's just gonna be about a sex. Nothing more, nothing less. And you knew you had crossed that line, but you couldn't tell him anything. That would ruin everything, it would have ruined you. So you swallowed your feelings and told yourself to not, ever, let or somehow show your feelings for him. Even though it hurts you.

"I need to find f/n. She's somewhere here and I need to stop her from doing something stupid." You told Joost and he actually laughed at that because he knew her and what she was capable of.

"That sounds like a good idea. I will be in the living room if you want to look for me after you find her." Joost winked at you with smug on his pretty face and left you here standing with red cheeks. No matter how many times he had flirted with you, you always gave in and let his charm affect you.

---

It took you some time to find f/n, but you also have found some other friends that were looking after her as well. They were leaving and told you they are taking f/n home too.

"Noo, Y/n I don't wanna go home." f/n pouted and hugged you before others basically dragged her off of you.

"You have to. I will text you in the morning, okay?"

She protested, but eventually gave in. Leaving the party and looking forward to your text when you will be leaving.

You went to the kitchen and poured yourself a drink, not so strong this time and then you started looking for another person, Joost. But he already told you where he's going to be. Making your way through bodies to the living room, you greeted some faces you recognised. Sending friendly smiles and little waves. But just as you stepped to the living room, you couldn't help the shock that went thru you.

He was sitting here with some girl. No, the girl was sitting on his lap and what was even worse, they were making out. How his left hand was running through her hair and how his other hand was on her waist, keeping her closer, just like he did before with you. All you could do was watch the scene before you.

"Y/n?" Joost's voice was barely making any sense, but he knew that was you who he was kissing right now. He was so sure of it.

"Actually I'm Mila."

"You're not Y/n? My Y/n?"

"I can be her, if that's what you want."

"You're not her?" Joost asked the girl that he assumed was you, but she pulled him back to kiss her. He wasn't complaining, but he was hoping that was you who he was kissing right now and not some random chick.

When they pulled away to breathe, Joost looked around the room and saw you standing in the back with a shocked face and how it, in a matter of seconds, turned into a pained expression. That was the real you. You weren't sitting in his lap right now.

What were you thinking?

It hurt. It all hurt so much. You really thought he felt something for you, just like you did for him. But you were wrong, so, so wrong. "Y/n?" His words were slurred. "C'mon it was just for fun, you know that right?"

Drunk words are sober thoughts.

You heard him say somewhere towards you in his now drunk state, you couldn't even properly look at him, all you could do in that moment was to turn around and leave. On your way out of the house, you passed by people that gave you this kind of sympathy look. Did they think you and him were together too? You weren't, and he made that crystal clear.

"Y/N!" He was calling for you to stop, but you didn't. "Y/n! Can you stop for a second?!"

"What!? What is it Joost!?" You turned to him, stopping in your tracks. Barely holding tears in your eyes.

"What's wrong with you?!" Joost almost shouted, but held himself back because of other people near you two.

"What is wrong with me?" You had to ask. "With me?"

"Yeah, you're acting like I fucked that girl right infront of you, and even if I did, we're not together so it doesn't matter."

"I can't believe this." You avoided eye contact with him. "I'm such an idiot." Whispering, you looked down, letting the tears freely fall.

"What? So it's mine fault?"

"No it's mine."

An awkward silence was between you two.

Joost sighed looking down and put his hands on his hips. "Look Y/n, let's just get inside, get some drinks and forget about it. It wasn't that big of a deal anyway." He insisted and took a few steps towards you, trying to reach for you, but you backed down. You turned back around and said.

"Yeah, you're right, it's not that big of a deal anyway."

With that, you made your way home.

---

That was two days ago, and from that time you felt like shit. You barely slept and eating food was bad too. F/n was worried about you, she insisted on talking to him, herself or you. But everytime she threatened, you told her to stop. That you're going to deal with it by yourself. She stopped after that.

Two fucking days.

Your phone was blowing with missed calls and hundreds of unread texts from Joost, but you didn't want to talk to him. Not right now. His words still hurt you. "It's not that big of deal anyway." Yes, you promised something to each other, but his words hunt you.

As you laid in your bed and re-thinking every detail of that night, soft knocking brought you out of your head. At first you didn't want to get up and answer, if it's important then they will try it later.

But the soft knocking was getting louder and more annoying. You slowly got up and made your way to the door. Ready to scream on anyone that was behind them.

"Y/n?"

That made you stop in your tracks. Joost? What was he doing here? You didn't want him near you at all. That's why you distanced everyone.

"Y/n, open the door."

His knocking stopped and you saw his shadow under the door and how he was stepping from one side to another.

"Open the door. Please."

Joost begged. And that's something you never heard from him before. Part of you wanted to let him in and hug him, but the other not at all.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry for what I said that night." You heard him say behind the door. Him still waiting for you to open to him.

"You didn't say anything wrong. Only truth." You muttered on the other side.

"Yeah, but..." He sighed and leaned his head on the door. Closing his eyes for a moment before speaking again. "You didn't deserve that."

That made you cry. He was right, you didn't deserve it like that.

"I hear you cry." He lifted his head from the door and tried to open them again. "Please don't cry."

"You made me look so fucking stupid." You cried more. "I thought...I thought that we-"

"I'm sorry."

You took the handle and slowly opened the door, letting that awkward silence spread all around you and him.

"What do you want from me?" You finally asked as your eyes were red and swollen from crying for the past two days. Just like his.

"I don't know." He admitted. "Probably everything..."

"That's a lot."

"I know I want you in my life." He began. "I'm scared that if I told you how I feel, you're going to leave me like everyone else."

"And why would I do that?"

He didn't say anything to that. Like you had caught him off of guard. But that didn't mean that you felt any better. You wouldn't admit it, but you didn't feel better.

"My heart always seems to be disappointed." You admitted quietly, letting it sink in. "Maybe it was made just to be shattered into thousands pieces."

"No, no, don't say that. It's not the truth, you don't believe that." His eyes were pleasing yours to say otherwise, but he didn't find what he was looking for in them. "Do you?"

"What if I believe in that?"

Now you were more scared of his silence than your damaged heart. Is this it? Is this the very end of yours and Joosts path?

"Are you going to say something?"

"I'm sorry." He stepped closer and opened the door fully. "I'm sorry that I hurt you, I don't know what I was doing...I was drunk a-and I know that it doesn't change anything, but I'm still so sorry and I need you to know it." He kneeled before you and hugged your waist. Trapping you in his hold.

"Joost." You didn't know what to say. Or what to do at that moment.

"I love you." He breathed out. "I don't want you to disappear from my world, because you are my world."

You stopped breathing for a moment. He loves you? Joost loves you? From all of the people he knows and ever met, he loves you?

"I need you to know how I feel." Joost admitted and held your legs tighter. "I should have said that sooner."

---

A/n: I could do better.

Don't copy or translate my work!

[mysecretlittlelibrary]

Secrets That Whisper & Shout

Pairing: Moonknight trio (Steven mainly) x Reader

Word Count: 3.9k

Warnings: idk brief mentions of violence

Genre: fluff & minor angst

Summary: you are extremely intrigued by your neighbor and the voices you can sometimes hear in his head because of course your neighbor seems extra susceptible to your powers

***

It's an interesting way to live life, being able to see into people's minds. To alter their memories, control their actions, hear their deepest inner thoughts even if you're not trying to sometimes. It can be weird but you just try your best to live your life normally. Right now the biggest hindrance to your delicate balance of normal is your neighbor. He lives across the hall for you and unfortunately, for some reason, you keep finding yourself inside his mind. It happens when you let your mental guard down for a little too long. You've always compared people's minds to houses, or offices full of filing cabinets, your powers give you a key basically but it seems like your dorky neighbor's mental door is never closed let alone locked.

The weirder part is what you hear when you do find yourself in his mind. For most people, the voice in their head sounds like them- and while you've never really spoken to your neighbor, you know for a fact there's no way he's simultaneously a nervous Brit, a cocky American, and a grumpy Spanish speaker. There are three voices in his head as opposed to one, they speak to each other and seem entirely independent of one another. You haven't intentionally done any snooping in his mind but you can imagine his mental filing cabinets are entirely different than any you've been in. It's not really your business though so you never look into it. No matter how curious you are about how and why he has three voices in his head. 

You know very little about your neighbor. From accidentally listening to his mental debates you think his name is Steven. The other voices have names too but you're unclear who is who because you've never stuck around long enough to discern that. He's not very social and only leaves his apartment for work or errands. He hardly ever takes phone calls and he never really calls anyone- except, around the time you moved in he used to call his mom pretty often but you think she never answered and eventually, those calls stopped. The strangest detail you've realized is sometimes he'll sneak out of his apartment, through the window and you have no idea where he goes or what he does but he's always back within a week. You don't mean to keep tabs on him, sometimes you cast your magic out to scan for threats and you'll notice the lack of presence in the apartment across the hall.

He's a curious case, your neighbor across the hall, and today you've decided you're going to bite the bullet and speak to him. Your curiosity about him is the main reason and you hope that being able to assign personhood to the voices you hear will quell it even a bit. You cross the hall and knock on his door confidently before you can convince yourself not to on one Saturday afternoon when you know he's home. You checked first. There's some shuffling on the other side of the door and eventually, it opens a bit hesitantly but it opens.

"Hi! My name is y/n. I live across the hall from you." You say, your chosen tone is friendly but soft.

"I'm- Steven. Can I help you?" He asks sizing you up.

"I hope so! I was baking cookies and even though I went to the store before I started I guess I didn't make a complete list of things I needed because it turns out I actually don't have enough sugar so I was just wondering if you had any I could borrow by chance?" You ask. You are baking, but you also definitely have enough sugar, it just seemed like the simplest way to initiate conversation. A bit cliche but it's a classic for a reason.

"You want to borrow sugar?"

"Yes. A cup if you have it." You hold up your measuring cup with a smile. Steven pauses for a moment before he answers.

"Sure. I've got some. Come on in I'll pour some for you." He says walking into his apartment. You follow him in glancing around. The studio style flat is full of books littered everywhere, it's the first thing you notice when you walk in. Steven takes the measuring cup from you and quickly grabs his container of sugar to pour some.

"Thanks so much! I'll bring by some cookies to repay you!" You tell him.

"Oh, no thank you. I appreciate the offer but I am vegan and I'm sure you don't intend to bake vegan-friendly cookies so-" He trails off with a shrug. You frown but make a note of the information. He's vegan. "I've never seen you before." He says after a moment while he puts up his bag of sugar.

"That's probably because you don't leave much besides for work. I've lived across you for over a year." You muse.

"Hey! I- I leave!" He turns to look at you.

"To do your laundry at the witching hour when you're the least likely to run into people?" You smirk a bit at him.

"No." He huffs.

"Thanks for the sugar, Steven. Hope to see you around more." You toss over your shoulder as you walk back into your apartment.

You do make a handful of vegan cookies for your neighbor, even though it wasn't your plan, after checking to find that it really is just a couple of minor changes, vegetable oil instead of butter, water or nondairy milk instead of eggs, and since you don't already have vegan chocolate you leave out the chocolate chips- at least according to the recipe you found. They're basically sugar cookies and you only make six for Steven, some of which you sprinkle with cinnamon to make up for their plainness, but you imagine they're a decent thanks for the sugar you borrowed- even if it was a ploy.

A couple of hours later, you knock on Steven's door again, this time with a small Tupperware container for the cookies you made him. He opens it again with the same confused frown after a few moments.

"Hi again! I know you said not to bother with the cookies because you're vegan but I wanted to say thanks anyway so- I adjusted my recipe to accommodate. They're sugar cookies except two of them are cinnamon, I wasn't sure if you like cinnamon so I didn't make them all cinnamon but the cookies are vegan. So, thank you, for the sugar." You say handing him the plastic container.

"You adjusted your recipe so that I could have some cookies?" Steven doesn't seem to believe the words even as he says them.

"Yes. I know you said I didn't have to bring any but I wanted to anyway. Since I did use your sugar to make them."

"Thank you. I appreciate the effort. I can't wait to try them."

"If you ever need anything, just knock." You tell him and wait for his cautious nod. "I'll be seeing you." You say leaving without waiting for him to agree with that statement. From then on, Steven does in fact make a point to speak to you more often. The first time is a couple of days later, he runs into you in the elevator and tells you he enjoyed the cookies. He'll definitely speak to you when he sees you around the building but it's on you to actually make plans if you want to see him otherwise and sometimes you do. You invite him out to lunch, have him over for tea, suggest movies to watch together, you even visit him at work every once in a while. The first time you went to his job you didn't even know he worked there, I mean he'd told you he worked at a museum but you never thought to ask which one, but once you knew he worked there you definitely made a point to pop in and say hi when you're around and he's working. It takes a while but you manage to build a pretty good friendship with him over the next few months to the point where you're hanging out a couple of times a week these days. In fact, he's supposed to be over later today to show you some movie he's been dying for you to see. For now, you're sitting on your couch reading a novel until he gets here. It'll be another few hours before he comes knocking at your door. 

You've really enjoyed getting to know him, more than you expected to honestly. He's as sweet and awkward as he comes off at first glance but there's something endearing about his gentle shyness even when he's raving about whatever thing has most recently captured his attention. You find yourself looking forward to the time you spend together more than you like to admit. You have no idea if your fondness is reciprocated to the same extent and you also have no idea how to broach the subject with him. Much like a skittish animal, you're always careful about how you make changes to your dynamic. It's something you try not to dwell on, if he likes you or if you'll tell him you like him and how to do so, things are good between you two and as they say, if it ain't broke don't fix it. 

Your head snaps up at the sudden rush of fear you sense. The book in your lap long forgotten anyway as you had been lost in your thoughts until the dread you felt in your very bones pulled you from them. It's not your own though, that panic, and you have to take a moment to pinpoint the source. You gasp when you realize it's coming from Steven. It's been a while since you felt someone's feelings so uninhibited and you rush out of your apartment before you can even consider a plan. He must be in trouble for you to feel his alarm this way. When you reach for his doorhandle you hear some sort of crashing sound inside and you force open his apartment door to find Steven evading someone attempting to corner him in the apartment.

"Steven!" You gasp when the masked intruder chucks some sort of dagger at him.

"Y/n?! Get out of here!" Steven shouts at you from behind the couch. You ignore him and charge the attacker by launching yourself using Steven's side table. The attacker can't react quickly enough to the kick that you aim directly at their chest and they go down hard. You don't give the stranger a chance to get up and strike either of you, taking advantage of their disoriented state you slip into their mind, 'suggesting' that they leave and forget they ever came here, forget Steven even exists and forget you while you're at it. When the masked assailant stands again they climb out of the window they came through without saying a word.

"Are you alright Steven?" You frown turning your attention to where he's frowning from behind his kitchen counter. When did he move behind the kitchen counter?

"What just happened?" He blinks at you.

"I am- a magical being of sorts-"

"Like a witch?"

"Something like that. I mean- I can do magic in the more traditional sense, like spells and such but most of my powers are telepathic. I can read minds and alter memories, reshape reality-"

"What?" You hardly register Steven's shocked exclamation.

"I mean that can take a lot of energy depending on the scale, like I obviously can't do it for everyone, everywhere, at the same time but like- I could say, make it look and feel like there are spiders all over this room." You shrug.

"Why would you ever-"

"Arachnids are a common phobia, it's gotten me out of some touchy situations." You say.

"That doesn't explain what just happened though." Steven shakes his head.

"Oh, I can control people if it comes down to it. I just- made the person leave and forget you exist."

"You can do what?!" His eyes widen.

"I don't use it! Usually. I've only done it a couple of times to protect myself or someone who really needed it." You shrug.

"And your protection was to force someone to do something else against their will?!"

"Hey, that person was literally trying to kill you! I could've taken the violent route instead but I'm not a fan of it!"

"So that man-"

"Doesn't remember being here, doesn't remember attacking you, doesn't even remember you exist. You're safe." You say.

"Holy shit."

"Look I wanted to be honest with you because I care about you but if this is too much for you to handle then- I will leave all I ask is that you keep my secret to yourself."

"You won't just... take it from me?"

"I don't want to. And I won't, unless that information in your hands becomes a threat to my life."

"Have you ever used them on me? Your powers?" He asks. You pause for a moment considering how to answer. Admittedly he doesn't seem to be taking all this super well, you wonder if it would be worse to just say no but looking at him you can't bring yourself to tell the lie.

"I have. Not- on purpose and nothing altering. No mind control or memory changing or reality reshaping- absolutely nothing that changed anything about you it's just that sometimes your thoughts are loud. You yell in your head a lot- in several voices. Sometimes I can hear them." You explain.

"You can hear them? The different voices?"

"Yes. I don't quite understand it but I never snooped I just- would leave when I realized it was happening again." You say.

"I think you should go." Steven says avoiding your gaze. Your shoulders drop for a moment that you're sure he doesn't see.

"I see. Alright but Steven-"

"Your secret is yours. I won't tell anybody." He says quietly. You nod although he's still not looking directly at you.

"Okay. If you need anything- my door's open. Otherwise, take care- Steven." You say and exit his apartment before he can respond. Steven's reaction hurts more than you'd like it to, you suppose you wouldn't have been able to keep the secret from him forever though. It would've come out eventually, especially if you got any closer to him as you had considered. 

The next two weeks are weird. Steven doesn't text you, or call you, or come over for tea or lunch, you make a point not to visit him at work as you are positive he's avoiding you based on the fact that he's clearly adjusted all of his habits so as to not run into to you around the apartment building. That- you think stings more than his initial reaction. To think he was so put out by your revelation that he no longer wanted to even risk seeing you... Whatever, you wouldn't dwell on it. The world keeps spinning. A sudden knock on your door interrupts you before you can focus back on what you were working on. With a confused frown, you walk over to the door and look through the spyhole to see Steven standing in the hall, and that surprises you immensely. For on that knock was sharp and harsh in a way you've never heard Steven knock on anything ever, but also for him to just show up at your door after 2 weeks is... unexpected. You pull open the door and lean casually against the frame.

"Hello." He nods and you immediately notice he does not sound like himself. You quirk an eyebrow at him.

"Steven? Hi. What are you doing here? And- why are you talking funny?"

"I'm not Steven my name is Marc Spector." He says.

"Did you hit your head or something?" You snort crossing your arms in confusion.

"No? I'm perfectly fine."

"Right except your name isn't Marc Spector it's Steven Grant. Unless you've been lying to me since we met which- would certainly be interesting but I don't think that's what's happening here." You say.

"Not quite. See we have a... condition-"

"Do not tell me about what's wrong with your body!" You put your hands up to stop him.

"It's psychological." He says.

"Oh okay. Proceed." You say.

"It's called dissociative identity disorder. My mind is- fractured. Essentially this body houses more than one consciousness." He explains.

"This sounds very Jekyll and Hyde and if you're coming to me to say you're a serial killer I don't-" You trail off when suddenly something clicks. "Holy shit you're one of the voices in Steven's head!" You gasp. You knew he sounded familiar but you didn't pinpoint it until just now.

"First of all, it's my head okay I am the original. Secondly- Steven told you about us?!"

"If he did do you think I would sound as confused as I do right now? No, he didn't tell me anything. I just realized why I recognize your voice." You say.

"Recognize my voice?" Now he's looking at you like you're crazy.

"I can hear you sometimes. You are quite loud- especially compared to the other one."

"You can hear us?" His eyes are wide as saucers.

"Yes, never on purpose though. I'm a telepath. I can read minds and change memories and alter reality and stuff like that so- sometimes I can hear you- which by the way we still haven't answered the billion dollar question why are you here?"

"Steven has been moping around for over a week now and every time we force him to leave he looks longingly at your door so I came to find out what the hell you did to him because I swear-"

"I didn't do anything to him. I told him I was a telepath and he freaked. He's been avoiding me since. All on his own. And before you start throwing around threats I'll warn you Marc Spector that I could take hold of your entire fractured little mind without even breaking a sweat. So tread carefully if you're going to start swearing things." Your eyes narrow at him.

"He's been avoiding you?" He blinks.

"We talked about my powers, he asked me to leave, and so I did. Probably assumes I'll take advantage of him using them or something." You shrug.

"Well you did just threaten me."

"It wasn't a threat it was a warning. Besides I'd never hurt Steven, you I don't know and you did start a pretty menacing sentence that prompted me to- never mind."

"Now I'm confused. If he's avoiding you, why is he moping around the apartment?" He frowns.

"You're asking me. You're the one that shares a body with him." You say.

"Explain to me exactly what went down?"

"I was in my apartment and someone attacked Steven- I don't know who or why but could feel it so I went over to help and I used my powers to get rid of them."

"What'd you do? Launch him out the window?"

"No? I just made him forget about us and where he was but when he mindlessly climbed back out the way he came in without attacking us I obviously had to explain some things. I guess Steven didn't take it all that well." You shrug.

"That doesn't sound right. I think you should talk to him."

"I- don't think he wants to do that." You shake your head.

"No. No, this has gone on long enough. Hang on." Marc says.

"Marc seriously mind your-"

"Y/n?" He grimaces. You recognize immediately that it's Steven you're talking to now.

"Steven- one the uh- voices? Marc? He thinks we need to have a conversation. Does he make a habit of meddling in your life this way?"

"Less often than you might think but- I do owe you an apology." His head drops.

"What for, exactly?"

"How I- handled things before. I was... cold, it's just that when you said you could hear Marc and Jake I was worried about what else you-"

"I'm sorry, who is Jake?" You shake your head at him.

"The identity disorder thing- there are three of us as far as we know. Myself, Marc, and Jake." Steven says and you nod as you piece it together.

"Would it be presumptuous of me to guess that Marc and Jake are not your only secrets?"

"No actually. Marc is an avatar."

"Of what?" You ask. Steven's shocked confusion prompts you to fill in the gaps, "I've met avatars for each of the sins so, one of those maybe? Or a celestial body of some sort? The moon perhaps- I'm guessing you don't mean in the same sense as the cartoon boy because people with elemental manipulation do not refer to themselves that way in real life so-"

"Khonshu." Steven says when you trail.

"What?"

"He's- Khonshu's avatar."

"Egyptian God. Interesting. Correct me if I'm wrong he's the god of justice, right?"

"That's right." He nods.

"So the guy that was attacking you a few weeks ago was probably mad at him for- something related to that."

"Most likely. Can't imagine a museum guest putting a hit out on me for not having any more pyramid pens or something." Steven scratches the back of his neck and you chuckle a bit at his joke.

"Interesting."

"Look- that day, I wasn't sure if this was something I was ready to tell you. I've never told anyone this before, the only person that knows is Marc's ex-wife, so when you said you could hear our thoughts I was worried you knew more than just that there were voices in my head and- I'm sorry." Steven trails off with a sigh.

"So- what changed? Why are you telling me now?"

"Well Marc revealed himself to you." Steven says. "But more than that I just- really hate not being able to talk to you. I like my life way more with you in it but I- after how I reacted I sort of figured I'd earned my misery, that I didn't deserve your forgiveness because when you chose to trust me with your secrets I turned you away, I even judged you, instead showing literally any modicum of support of the person I care about. I made an ass of myself."

"I wasn't upset with you, you know. I mean as far as shitty reactions go yours doesn't even make the top 5. You didn't tell the apartment building to gather their pitchforks so- I count that as a win." You shrug.

"I would never-"

"I know." You nod. "While we're- confessing our sins anything else you wanna share?" You ask with a chuckle. Steven holds your gaze for a long moment and there's a brief second where you consider finding out for yourself what he's contemplating so hard, you won't of course, but the silence drags long enough to make you want to rescind the question. Eventually, Steven's hand grabs your arm and yanks you towards him. His eyes are so wide at the action you'd think he's not the one who pulled you but before you can ask him about it his lips are on yours. The kiss is short and a bit unsure but his mouth is soft against yours and when he pulls away still with that wide-eyed look you do nothing but blink at him for a moment.

"I- I'm so sorry that was- I mean Marc was- I didn't plan- I wasn't going to-"

"Steven." You place your hand against his cheek to halt his frazzled rambling. "Did you want to kiss me?" You ask.

"I've wanted to kiss you for months." He breathes.

"Then don't apologize. I've wanted to kiss you too."

"Really?"

"Yes so- I think I'm going to do it again." You say pausing long enough to give him an out. When his eyes flutter closed you take that as your sign to lean forward and connect your lips again. You're sure in that moment you could do this forever and you silently wish to whatever powers above that you'll have that long to do it as many times as you wish.

***

A/N: I'm thinking of turning this into an anthology (like There is No Right Way) of the moonknight trio dating a telepath because I think it would be interesting idk- anyone interested in more of this dynamic?

[bratbarzal]

On Your Side (NH13) / Chapter Five

Pairing: Nico Hischier x Fem!OC Poppy Jensen*

*I say it's an OC, it's just a name and third person POV. I use minor character descriptions because I don’t get on with writing vague reader inserts/YN for long-form, story heavy fics, but I will generally try to avoid including race and body type or really any physical descriptors. I’m always open to feedback on my writing, or how to be more inclusive.

WC: 17k (holy moly)

Chapter Warnings: I tried to sprinkle some fluffy flashbacks and smutty references later in here just to lighten the mood but this is angsty!! probably cursing I honestly can't remember, and serious warnings rn mentions of hacking/gossip blogs/blackmail/cyber bullying/nudes being leaked, talia is her own warning tbh. I tried not to make a cliched ex comes in between them plot and idk how it comes across but yeah I was trying to toe the line between it being interesting/different and then going too far and not being able to write around it which is why the plot kind of fixes itself quick and is a leeeetle bit bad but there's some unresolved bitterness in that relationship for sure lmao she has a LOT 2 say!! did I mention there's angst in here? insecurity/self-doubt and miscommunication!!! in abundance!!! but!! luke is a cutey patootie in this I wrote his part with a lil smile on my face 💖 also a ridiculous conversation about huffing glue lmao

Series Masterlist

Previous Part (Chapter Four)

A/N: ok so in the grand scheme of things this is both a filler chapter and also like a pivotal point in the story to set something later up, but when I was planning this entire fic out, the only directive I gave myself for this specific chapter was insert angst. you wouldn't believe the amount of times I've written and rewritten and gone back and forth on what's in here. it's the kind of instruction only a complete melon would give themselves and I clearly just hate myself in ways that are spooky and strange to submit myself to this kind of torture.

and I hear your cries of hasn’t this fic just been angst so far??? yes!! you may be correct!! but you don’t get a rainbow without a bit of rain hun!!! grab an umbrella!!! I promise good will come of this lmao

I'm sorry this one took so long, it's the only chapter I didn't have any kind of plan or direction for obviously and I tried to come up with so many different options for the talia plot before I landed on whatever this is, but the next one I do have some scenes written out in my plan so shouldn't be as long in between. my goal has always been a chapter a week but like I said the other day work has been a lot for me the past couple of weeks so I am genuinely sorry for making you wait!!

you guys were very fun and very kind to me after the last chapter so please please please lets keep the good vibes going come chat to me about your thoughts about the fic about the weather about anything!! 💓

Nico

When Nico and Talia had first started dating, there had been an element of excitement to the dynamic. Nico hadn’t properly dated anyone in a while - had casual flings here and there, and for the most part spent his time swallowing down his burgeoning feelings for his best friend - and there was a novelty to starting something with someone new.

He had all the intentions of building something serious with her. She was fun, got on with his friends, had ties close to home that meant he wouldn’t be putting a wedge between the two of them should he want to travel back in his breaks, and sinking his teeth into the challenges of a relationship was something that actually intrigued him.

He liked planning dates, liked buying gifts to see that buzz of joy and gratitude it would elicit, and he liked the companionship - liked having someone there when he came back from a long roadie or a tough string of games. 

He liked it so much he never really opened his eyes to the fact that Talia didn’t. 

She didn’t like the dates he planned - didn’t like the restaurants he chose, the movies he wanted to share with her, the bars him and the guys frequented. She didn’t like America, didn’t like their coffee shops, thought their pastries were packed with too much sugar, their portion sizes were too large for her ever to enjoy going for lunch, always complaining about feeling bloated and sluggish after every meal. She hated Jersey - wanted to spend all her time across the Hudson, looking down on everyone she met and everywhere they went together. She didn’t make much use of the gifts he bought her - let every bouquet of flowers die a quick, careless death, said the watch he bought her didn’t go with enough of her other jewellery and turned her nose up at every effort he made to make his apartment feel more like her home. 

She wasn’t all that comforting when it came to companionship, either. Rolled her eyes when he came home aching and exhausted, went out without him on the days he was coming back from a roadie and returned home when he had long retired to his bed. She would always want to meet up with her girlfriends instead of hanging around the team, and only ever wanted to come to games if she could bring her own entourage - mostly to show off her connections and hardly ever to actually support him.

And so, despite the initial attraction, despite the excitement that first came with their blossoming relationship, Nico can only look at Talia with disinterest and frigidity now.

He barely greets her as he opens the door to his apartment, moving aside to let her in and waiting for her to trudge her small case in behind her before he closes it, leaning against the surface and watching her discard her bag and keys on the counter with familiarity.

When she turns to face him, running a hand through her hair and huffing out a big sigh, he takes in her dishevelled appearance.

Even when travelling, Talia usually takes great pride in her pristine exterior - hair blow-dried, outfit co-ordinated and steam-pressed to perfection, not a crease or stain in sight, and usually a light layer of makeup to cover the slight imperfections like the darkened under eyes and redness around her nose. This isn’t like her.

She looks like she’s been messing with her hair the whole 8 hour flight out and beyond, her eyes are rimmed-red with smudges of brown at the corners, her lips are chapped and swollen like she’s been crying, and her sweatpants don’t match her hoodie. It’s almost like she’d thrown on whatever she could find and caught the first flight out, fresh out of bed.

“What’s going on?” He cuts straight to the chase, losing all formality and courtesy. He should feel bad for his callous greeting, but she had broken up with him over text not even a month ago - she doesn’t exactly deserve outstretched arms and a warm embrace, he thinks.

“Hi Talia, how have you been, Talia? It’s nice to see you Talia.” She mocks, a frown overtaking her features immediately. “I’m absolutely amazing, thanks for caring, Nico!” Sarcasm spews from her tongue like pure venom, and his eyes practically roll into the back of his head.

Nico pushes himself off of the door, heavy footsteps leading him into his kitchen where he can make himself a coffee to get through this. His watch reads 6:05 - far too early for her antics - and rising to her nagging is only going to make things worse.

“Do you want a drink?” He asks, as he busies himself with his coffee press, unable to look at her too long without the pricks of guilt irritating him.  He doesn’t even know what he has to feel guilty about.

“I’ll get it myself,” she scoffs, venturing over to the fridge and pouring out some orange juice - her movements around his space eerily natural. She slams back most of the drink as he works out how to brew his coffee - but she sees right through him. He’s hardly ever used the press before, and he’s just doing so now to avoid her in whatever capacity he can. “I need money.”

Nico’s almost positive he hasn’t heard her right - that there’s some kind of mix up between her standard German and his Swiss - and he slowly turns to properly face her, brows slanting into a deep frown as he assesses her expression.

She has a hand on her hip, her jaw set and her eyes darkened and serious. 

“You have money.”

Talia comes from money - her father is some kind of film producer and her mother an artist, if Nico remembers correctly - and she makes good money, herself. She’s been a print model since she was scouted in some market in Munich since she was 15, has had her face plastered in ads in magazines and catalogues around the world. She’s hardly strapped for cash. She gets things gifted to her by whatever company she can get a hold of. What could she possibly need him to give her money for?

“Not enough.” Her tone is cold, her demeanour the same, and if Nico can still gauge her emotions correctly, there’s an element of blame that she is starting to shift towards him, and his whole body starts to feel tense.

“Not enough for what?”

He can’t quite tell what feeling washes over him - worry, at the thought she’s gotten herself into some kind of trouble, stress, at the thought this could be a recurring thing, and potentially pity, at the way she’s so clearly carrying the weight of something heavy - something she’s lugged all the way across the Atlantic on a long haul flight with her.

“Not enough to pay the guy who’s blackmailing me not to leak the videos that I sent to you.”

“What vide-“ he bites back, and the immediate arch of her brow tells him all he needs to know. “Oh.”

Shit.

“Oh? That’s all you have to say?” She sneers, fury in her gaze and dismay in her tone. “You’ve ruined my life, and all I get is an oh?”

“Whoa, slow down, I’ve ruined your life?”

Nico has never been one to shame any girl for sending explicit pictures - he’d been more than willing to receive them at the time - but he hadn’t ever forced her hand. He hadn’t even asked her for them, in the first place. 

She’d taken it upon herself to spice things up, as she had put it at the time, when the team had gone on the road in early December. It was just after he’d returned from his injury - a time in which he’d spent mentally distanced from her as he’d focused so much on getting back to the game, their relationship consisting mainly of not-so-passionate sex to avoid aggravating his injury and hardly of any kind of meaningful conversation - and she had thought that keeping him on his toes on a roadie would mean he’d come back more interested than ever.

If he’d been looking out for red flags at the time, he might have caught that blaring one; needing to try new things only a few months into a relationship to keep it fun and light.

He’d been in his hotel room in Seattle, freshly showered and ready to throw himself straight into bed when his phone had started to ping. It was suggestive texts at first, are you alone? And I’m thinking about you. Then it had been pictures, hands over lingerie and fingers between glossy, pouted lips.

And then videos, one after the other before he had any chance to respond - her phone set up far enough away that her whole body was in frame, touching herself while laying on his bed and calling out for him.

He had called her instead of sending anything back, and as he realises the severity of the situation, a selfish part of him is glad he did so.

“Talia, I didn’t even save those videos, and I definitely didn’t show them to anyone else.”

Nico could never. Not only for the fact that he was raised to be a decent human being, but he has a sister - if anyone ever did that to Nina, he’d tear them apart, limb from limb. 

“You’re the only person I’ve ever sent anything to.” She seems to have made her mind up, and Nico feels as if his heart plummets through his torso at the realisation. She’s travelled all this way because she genuinely believes he’s the cause of this - that he’s shared intimate videos of her without her consent, to someone who would extort her for them. “And he sent me some pictures as proof, had information about me like the address of this apartment.”

“Talia, I swear on my mother’s life, I wouldn’t do that to you - to anyone, not ever.”

Tears well in her crystalline eyes, and Nico waits with bated breath as she assesses the situation in her head. 

He isn’t a liar - he has never given her a reason to think he is one. In their time together, he had always been honest, always been loyal, and he hopes at the very least - despite her obvious distain for him now, and how little she ended up caring about their relationship in the end to cut it off in the way she did - she thought of him as kind. 

He can do nothing but be patient, let her come to whatever conclusion on her own, and it’s only when he spots the quiver in her bottom lip that he takes an apprehensive step forward, ready to console her if needed.

She practically throws herself into his arms, wrapping her own around his waist and bawling into his chest, and all he can do is hold her and wait. He tries to rub a soothing hand up and down her back, holding the other against her head as her body wracks with sobs. All he can feel is the pounding of his own heartbeat, pulsing throughout his entire body until it’s all he can hear, too.

Nico does his best to comfort her, shushing and cooing and whispering how it’s going to be alright, but it does little to help. She’s beyond relief.

“There’s a guy who said he can track whoever is doing this to me,” she sniffles as she pulls herself away. “He’s in Jersey City Heights, he’s some sort of ethical hacker, whatever that means, I’m going to meet him and he’s gonna go through my phone.”

“Do you want me to come with you?” Nico doesn’t even hesitate to ask - if not to protect her, and make sure she isn’t unknowingly getting herself into an even more dangerous situation, then to protect himself too. If someone has Talia’s pictures, and she only sent them to him, there’s a possibility his phone had been hacked, and if this guy is as ethical as he says, maybe he can check Nico’s stuff, too, just to be safe.

She gives him an appreciative smile, eyes still glassy and cheeks flushed. “I’d really appreciate that.”

“I’m gonna shower, then we can go. You can grab whatever to eat while you’re waiting.” He backs away from her completely, only just able to acknowledge the ache in his muscles once the intensity of the situation has settled a little, and he just needs to stand under the steaming spray and clear his mind before he properly immerses himself in her company. 

He has a lot more than this whole mess that he needs to think about, and maybe a shower can bring him a little clarity on how exactly he’s going to explain himself to the beautiful girl whose bed he had abruptly left not even an hour ago. 

“Why are you dressed?”

Nico stops in his tracks.

When he had got back to his apartment, he’d made a little effort for it to seem like he’d been there all night. He’d gone through to his bedroom, mussed up his sheets to make it seem like he had been sleeping in them - and not with the anticipation that Talia was going to be entering his bedroom, but with her, he never knows - trying to retrace the steps of his usual routine before he goes to bed, he had closed all the blinds, had moved his gym bag by the door.

But he hadn’t changed.

Still adorned in his sweatshirt and jeans from the night before, the clothing feels all that much heavier on his body as she brings attention to it, and he quickly racks his brain to come up with a valid excuse that doesn’t rouse further suspicion.

“I fell asleep in these clothes.” As easy as the lie comes out, he doesn’t feel great saying it. Doesn’t feel like erasing the night he had shared with Poppy is for the greater good, even if it is just to Talia, but avoiding another difficult conversation is a must right now - especially when he’d already lied to her on the phone. “Was out late with the guys last night, Timo threw a party for my birthday.”

“Right,” she drags out, and when he turns back around, she casts a scrutinising glance over him, top to bottom. “Sorry, I forgot.”

“No worries,” he shrugs, genuinely not offended. She has no reason to remember his birthday. Not anymore. “Like I said, help yourself to whatever, I’ll try not to be long.” 

When he undresses for his shower, he’s thankful he hadn’t had the foresight to change in anticipation of Talia’s arrival. He probably would have donned a t-shirt and some shorts, oblivious to the visible indents on his thighs where Poppy had dug her nails in as she took him in her mouth.

His chest and torso are littered with scratches, some faint, some a little deeper, and he can’t get the right angle to see his back but he imagines they’re the same - the memory of her clutching at him as both of their climaxes approached is vivid enough for him to picture the marks she left behind.

He groans as the thought of her brings back that swirling feeling in the pit of his stomach, as he notices the blooming arousal pool there, and feels himself harden as he steps under the spray of his shower.

If his phone had been on do not disturb through the night, he could be in the shower with Poppy, instead.

He could have woken up to her in his arms, could have pecked at her sleep-swollen lips until it brought her out of her slumber, and spent his morning making up for lost time just like he had promised her last night. He could have made light work of the pleasure he had given her the night before - could have had her underneath him in her bed, tangled up in the mess of sheets and falling apart before they shared a morning shower, where he’d have held her up against the tiles and would’ve moved into her until they couldn’t tell where he ended and she began. He’d have made her breakfast, something sweet, so that as she sat and watched him atop the kitchen counter he had tasted her on for the first time not even 12 hours before, he’d press his tongue into her mouth after she had eaten and savour the flavour of strawberries that had settled between her lips.

Instead, he’s here, turning the temperature of his water down until any and all excitement in his body is dampened, and all he can focus on is the effect the cold has on all his other aching muscles.

Once he has showered and gotten dressed - and has come to the conclusion that any further thoughts about Poppy need to wait until the Talia problem is resolved and out of his hands, he finds his ex girlfriend sprawled across his couch, music playing from the speaker in the corner, and taking helping herself to a whole new level. 

Her case is opened where she had left it by the door, and she’s set herself a little vanity up on his coffee table, fixing her appearance before they leave.

She’s changed out of her mismatched sweats, has dressed herself in jeans and a sweater, and has found an extension cable long enough for her to plug in whatever hot tool she’s currently running through her hair.

“You take the longest showers in the history of man,” she rolls her eyes, not even casting a glance his way as she focuses on her own reflection in the little mirror she must have brought with her. “I do not want to know what it is you get up to in there.”

“I was barely 30 minutes, are you ready to go?”

“Yeah, almost,” she runs the tool through her bangs until they flick out at the edges on either side of her face, and it reminds him of all the times he had watched her while waiting for her to finish getting ready. It makes him feel uneasy how familiar it all is, how she’s so quickly made herself at home again in his space.

He wants to tell her she needs to pack her stuff back up, that she won’t be staying here and needs to give his keys back, but the weight of the situation at hand dawns on him before he can open his mouth.

He’ll wait until they get back later, his decision depending on the outcome of their visit to her hacker friend.

As much as he doesn’t want her around, he isn’t going to kick her out with no place to go if her life is still shrouded in unsafe circumstances. 

Talia unplugs her stuff, wraps the cord around the handle of the brush she was using, and places it on a mat she must have brought with her so it doesn’t burn through the surface of the table. “Kay, let’s go.”

She marches ahead of him, picking up her bag and keys on the way out and leaving him to lock up while she calls for the elevator. They wait together in silence, his heart thudding an anxious rhythm in his chest as he anticipates the arrival of the elevator - and thankfully, it arrives empty.

He tries to distance himself from her as they enter, him standing in one corner, and hoping she takes the other, but she doesn’t quite get the memo, standing obliviously in the centre as she types away to someone on her phone and he presses the button to go to the basement.

Nico watches the numbers go down with bated breath. His floor, the next, the next one after that, and he uses any good will he has left with the universe to hope and pray it skips the floor coming up - but, as is just his luck, the elevator comes to a stop with a soft thud, and the doors open to reveal the very situation he’s been hoping to avoid. 

Jack walks straight in, eyes cast down to the phone in his hands, distractedly typing away and not even noticing the button for the parking level has been pressed before he pushes it, himself.

Luke notices straight away, halting in his movements to enter the space as his gaze flickers between the two people already occupying it. 

He diverts his eyes when they meet Nico’s head dropping as he steps in and stands beside his brother, uttering a quick greeting of, “Hey, Cap.”

Jack’s attention is captured immediately, spinning at an almost dizzying speed to face his captain, phone disregarded into his back pocket. “Schao! I thought you’d be at-,”

He’s thankfully able to tune into his perception before he carries on with his train of thought, a subtle movement in his peripheral diverting his gaze to the figure stood to the side of Nico. 

“Talia. Hi.”

“Hi, Jack.” Nico cringes inwardly at how disinterested she sounds. “Luke.” Talia had never really cared for Nico’s teammates - especially not the younger guys like Jack and Luke. She was quick to pass judgement, making comments on their maturity, or apparent lack-thereof, and wasn’t the biggest fan of how close Nico was with the pair. Didn’t like the time or attention he gave them considering the close quarters they lived in, and had always been resentful. She always claimed her English wasn’t good enough to hold a proper conversation with them, but he’d seen her enough around her American friends to know it wasn’t true.

“We’re just meeting up with some of the guys for breakfast.” Jack says, cautiously, in an attempt to fill the silence. The invitation remains unspoken, but Nico can tell in the way the younger boy cocks his head and meets his eye that he’s gauging his current situation for the morning.

“We have plans.” Talia must be able to tell what he was getting at, too and Nico can see Luke’s eyes narrow as soon as the word resonates in his head. Plans. Pre-meditated. Made before she had sprung all of this on him within the last hour or two. Panic stirs within him, and his throat itches to speak the truth, but it’s just not the right time to do so with Talia stood beside him. If he starts getting defensive, she’ll start asking questions, and the boys will have to bear witness to him skirting around the matter of Poppy. 

It’s not a good look no matter which way he swings it. He’s stuck in a thick, dark, tarry mess of not wanting to hurt anyone’s feelings but making all the wrong decisions. A minefield of not knowing how to explain himself without raising a million questions on either side, and hoping one of the brothers might toe the line of the boundaries of their relationship and just straight up ask why Talia is here.

He knows he has fucked up without the way neither of them are looking him in the eye.

He knew it the second Poppy’s door had locked behind him this morning - he doesn’t need Luke refusing to meet his gaze, doesn’t need Jack’s shifting side eye to tell him he’s made a mistake. 

“I’ll text you later.” Nico says, mainly to Jack but still trying to meet his brother’s eyes with no luck. It’s an attempt to say something, without saying anything. A silent beg not to jump to conclusions about what they’ve seen - and, although he knows they wouldn’t, not to tell anyone else. Not whichever of the guys they are meeting up with, not anyone else on the team, and definitely not Poppy.

“Yeah, sure,” Jack mutters in a poor attempt to hide his discomfort, and an even worse attempt at masking his relief when the doors ping open on the parking level.

“Have fun with your plans,” Luke huffs out, his tone like a tight fist clutching at Nico’s chest despite his courteous choice of words.

“We will,” Talia forces a smile. Nico gets the feeling she isn’t as oblivious to the tension as he hopes she is.

The four of them separate into their pairs with mumbled goodbyes, Jack and Luke heading off to Luke’s car on one side of the garage, and Nico and Talia heading to his on the other, and Nico can’t even let out a sigh of pseudo-relief before Talia jumps on him.

“That was weird.”

“We broke up, they weren’t expecting to see us together.” He quickly excuses as he starts the car up, turning on the heat and hoping the soft buzz of the air will fill the silence enough that she doesn’t feel the need to talk. 

“It’s been like 3 weeks, most couples get back together after their first breakup.”

Has it only been 3 weeks? He thinks, shuddering at how little time had actually passed between her sending that text and him restoring balance to his life.

“We’re not most couples,” he shrugs, shutting that train of thought immediately as he starts to make his way out of the parking garage, ascending the ramp where the doors open up to reveal the dull beam of the winter morning sun. “You dumped me over text a week before Christmas, we’re not getting back together.”

“Oh yeah, I bet you were real cut up about it,” she jibes, sarcastically. “Probably landed straight in the bed of some desperate puck bunny more than happy to take your mind off of how awful I was to you.”

His mind immediately goes to Poppy, to last night, to her bed - and despite the complete bullshit Talia has fabricated in her head, despite how much he wants to tell her she has it all wrong, he can’t bear to twist himself even further into knots to skirt around mentioning the girl who did make him better.

“We’re not having this conversation right now.” He decides, tapping at the screen in the console of his car until he brings up the navigation. “Put in the address you need, we’re not too far from The Heights.”

The location she enters into the system is for an unassuming condo in a quiet, suburban area. The neighbourhood itself is picturesque, the buildings colourful, the paths lined with trees that seemed to flourish even in the midst of winter, and when Nico pulls up across the street, he notices the amount of families around - parents walking their kids to school and couples with dogs getting their morning steps in. It’s the last place he imagines some hacker to be shacked up, but maybe that’s the point.

He still doesn’t entirely understand the ethical part.

“It’s the one with the red brick and the balcony,” Talia points to the other side of the road as she unbuckles her seatbelt, and Nico looks over at the building as if he’s going to be able to see all the secrets stored within it.

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah, number 414.” She shows him the messages she has exchanged with the guy, and sure enough, the address matches up. “C’mon, the sooner we get in there, the sooner we can figure this out.”

He follows her across the street, adjusting the cap he wears atop his head and making sure it conceals his identity from anyone with eyesight good enough to catch it, trying to shrug off the discomfort of the whole situation as he waits for someone to pick up the buzzer Talia relentlessly presses.

He hears a different kind of buzz, lighter, like the manual zoom of a camera, and cranes his neck to assess their surroundings as they wait, before he catches sight of the device in the top corner of the porch, facing directly onto them.

He hears the click of a lock as soon as his eyes make contact with the thing, and cautiously tries the handle on the door until it pushes all the way down, letting them into the building. 

The door to the ground floor condo is open, and stood in the entrance is a guy no older than 20, dressed in all black with dark, beady eyes framed by wire-rimmed glasses. If Nico could find it in him to see the humour in the situation, he’d laugh at how he looks like Luke - a mop of curly brown hair, tall with a slim build and ever so slightly poor posture.

He straightens up as the two of them approach, Nico keeping Talia behind him as he assesses the safety of the situation. If they’re being lured into some kind of trap, he could definitely take this guy - he can’t even maintain direct eye contact, never mind manage to subdue a man of Nico’s stature.

“You didn’t tell me you were bringing someone, Talia.”

He’s soft-spoken, his voice ever so nasally, and despite the fact that he’s talking to the girl behind him, his gaze has settled on Nico’s chest.

“My name’s Nico.” He introduces himself, holding out a hand to shake. He thinks he can write him off as a threat, for now, and if making him feel comfortable encourages him to help them, he wants to put him at ease. “

“I know who you are.” He doesn’t shake Nico’s hand. “I’m Myles. Come in.”

Myles doesn’t wait for the two of them, marching back into his place and leaving the door open for Talia and Nico to enter and close behind them. 

Nico isn’t surprised by the space - from his brief encounter with the resident so far, it fits him to a tee; neat, impersonal, furniture that looks fresh out of a catalogue. He follows him over to the corner of his living room, a PC set up with several monitors that he can’t tell are on until they’re standing straight in front of them.

Myles throws himself down into the large swivel chair, spinning until he’s facing the two of them and crossing his arms over his torso with disinterest. “So, nudes?”

Straight to the point. Nico can’t exactly be mad at it.

Talia steps out from behind him, handing her unlocked phone to Myles. “The messages started last week, just after New Years. Straight to my number, not in DMs or anything, but the number doesn’t even come up for me to call it from another phone or anything, just says unknown.”

Myles takes her phone and plugs it into his setup without even looking at whatever she has opened on it, and Nico watches as the screens come alive with mirrors of the device and some other apps that launch as soon as it connects. 

“That’s more helpful than you think, they have to use an app to be able to anonymously text you, makes it easier to identify them.”

The way Myles talks is monotonous and detached, but the way he works is anything but. His fingers move quicker than Nico’s eyes can track on his keyboard, typing away at whatever as different things flash up and leave his screen. It like something straight out of a spy movie.

“So we can find out who it is just from that?” He asks, arms folding over his chest as he watches in almost-awe.

“Not exactly. If it is a hacker, I could identify their signature. Doesn’t mean I could identify them, but we can work around it potentially.”

Talia throws herself down on the couch behind them exasperatedly, sighing loudly and making her displeasure known. “You told me you could track them down, that’s what I’m paying you to do.”

“I told you I could help you, I didn’t say I could specifically track anyone, that’s not how this works.”

“How does it work then?” Nico asks.

Myles wheels his chair to the side to make room for Nico to get closer, and starts walking him through the process, pointing through the different apps he uses and explaining how he uses them. One deciphers which app the person used to message Talia. Once that’s been deduced, he uses another to enter a backdoor into that app’s servers, perusing through them until he finds the account that sent the text, making sure the date, time and then content line up. Once he’s found the account, he can see the other texts sent from it, and a gallery spreads across two screens, with maybe hundreds of pictures, videos, messages and transactions all to or from that same account.

“You’re telling me you have the power to do all this and you don’t use it to like rob banks or something?”

“Ethical hacker, clue’s in the name.” Myles shrugs. Nico looks back to Talia, her jaw set as she picks at her nails out of boredom. It’s probably taken about fifteen minutes for this guy to work an absolute miracle, and she looks like she couldn’t care less. “We use all this information, and the access I have on the server, to shut this dude down and cut his con before he can do it to anyone else.”

“Whoa whoa,” Talia shoots up, “Won’t that make him mad? Make him just post all the photos?”

“I doubt it,” the hacker comments, bringing up a couple of the photos on the screens, some of Talia, some of another girl, making Nico divert his eyes. “They’re not even real.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Excuse me?”

Talia and Nico both question at the same time, leaning in to get a proper look to confirm what is being told to them. The other pictures Myles had brought up, the ones of other girls, are actually kind of the same. The same poses, the same backgrounds, the same outfits, or lack thereof, just different faces and different hair.

“They’re called deep fakes. Photoshop, essentially.” He has that aloof tone to his words again, and Nico can’t quite believe how simple it seems for him to say. “They put a bunch of your pictures into an AI generator and give it instruction, like put this face on a body posed like this or wearing that. I’d assume the video they have is the same.”

“How is that even possible?” Talia gasps, pushing herself forward and snatching the mouse from Myles’ grasp. She clicks into what she assumes is the video, and it starts playing before she can think better of it, thankfully without any sound. 

It’s Talia - that much is obvious from the initial close up of her face - but Nico doesn’t recognise anything else about it. He doesn’t recognise the room she’s in, the bed she’s on, the things she’s doing. He’s never seen this before. It’s definitely not one of the videos she had sent him, and when he looks closer, he realises the little moles on her ribs aren’t even there.

None of it is real.

“You said he sent you the photos? You didn’t realise they weren’t the ones you took?” He can’t conceal the bite in his tone, his brows furrowing as he looks at her in disbelief. She’s flown out here, disrupted his peace, blamed him for blackmailing her, and she can’t even recognise what is or isn’t her own body. 

“They looked real, I-,” Her shock disappears as quickly as it had come about, her mood shifting and a glare all of a sudden being directed at her ex boyfriend. “I wouldn’t have accused you if they didn’t look real, Nico.” She snaps, frowning at him like this is his fault. “You have no idea what it’s like to be threatened like that, I won’t have you blame me for panicking.”

Slivers of guilt seep into his subconscious, and he takes a deep breath, diverting his gaze uneasily and letting out a big sigh.

He knows he should be a little more compassionate, but there’s panicking, and then there’s this.

She had accused him of ruining her life.

“What about the rest of it?” Nico asks, “Like how did he get her number or have my address? You said he had other information?”

“He did,” Talia nods, looking over to Myles.

“The address he probably got when he got your number, and he could have got that from anywhere. Could be something as small as you ordering something online and the store having a data breach, or clicking a link that shared your IP address, and getting your phone information from that.” Myles starts his typing again, keeping a tight grip on his mouse so that it can’t be snatched again. “I could probably find out actually, they’re pretty easy to spot, do you clear your history often?”

“I wouldn’t even know how to do that,”

“Perfect,” Again, his fingertips work at lightening speed, and Nico watches as instagram opens on one of the screens. “Yeah, a DM sent to you from… Devils_tea. You opened a link to a shared drive to upload some pictures, the drive probably had malware and the pictures have location metadata.”

Nico rolls his eyes, that small ebb of pity washing almost completely away, and before Talia can stop him, Myles carries on. “Some of the pictures you sent them are the ones they used for the AI photos, look your face in this one is the exact same as this photo they threatened to leak.”

Nico recognises these photos. The ones that had been plastered all over social media when their relationship had leaked. Pictures of them back in Switzerland, on a weekend trip to Ibiza, selfies of them in his apartment, and even a picture of the two of them with his parents back at his family home in Valais.

He has been far too oblivious to Talia’s games for far too long, he realises. 

Of course she had been the one to leak everything - who else would have had those photos - but he hadn’t even considered it would be her; she had faced the harshest aftermath for it, why would she subject herself to all the subsequent grief that came with people knowing about their relationship?

Thank God for this guy’s lack of social cues, Nico thinks, or he would never have known that for as long as they had been together, she had been violating his revered privacy and trust.

“Nico, that wasn’t-,” Talia’s panic is evident, wide eyes, trembling hands raised in defence, “I must have been hacked,”

“Actually, there’s no-,” Myles begins to interject, fingers working again to fact check, but Nico doesn’t need him to validate what he already knows.

“Shut up,” Talia snarls, with a finger pointed at him, “You don’t know what you’re talking about, we’re done here.” She reaches forward to snatch her phone back, yanking out the wire that connects it to his monitors and throwing it onto the desk. “We’re leaving, and if you think I’m paying you anything, you’re deluded.” 

Talia marches past them and straight out of the condo, slamming every door she possibly can behind her. Nico can only cringe as the sounds of her stomping footsteps echo until they fade out - until she’s probably outside and waiting for him back at his car.

“Doesn’t she want me to shut this thing down?”

“I’ll pay you.” Nico sighs, reaching into his pocket for his phone and trying to push down the feeling that arises when he’s met with a blank lock screen.

Poppy hasn’t messaged him. 

Not that he deserves for her to make it easy, to let him off the hook and pretend he hasn’t royally fucked things up with her.

“If you stop him, does he still have all the photos? He could still release them?”

“Yeah, but they’re pretty easy to validate as fakes, especially when you have the source material. I don’t think this guy is sophisticated enough for a full blown hack into her phone for the real thing. I couldn’t find evidence of any breach of her cloud or her device.”

Nico nods, but the information does little to quell the anxiety that squeezes his chest in a vice-like grip. 

This whole morning has been nothing but a giant waste of his time. From the second his eyes opened, to this moment right now, he’s made nothing but mistakes.

Not putting his phone on sleep mode before he and Poppy went to bed had been a mistake. Taking Talia’s call had been a mistake. Not waking Poppy up had been a mistake. Leaving without a note, without a text, leaving at all - it had all been one error after another, and all he has left to do is face up to the fact.

He can’t do anything to dwindle the panic rousing in every fibre of his being, the scarring marks left by torturous lashings of regret that whip at his skin.

He’s never felt so ashamed of himself, in such disbelief at his own decisions.

Why didn’t he just wake her?

She’s the most level-headed, acceptable person he knows. She would have understood. He hadn’t had a reasonable explanation at the time, and he doesn’t really have one now - but she would have accepted it, whatever he could have told her, she would have listened, waited until he could give her more.

He needs to see her, to explain, before it’s too late.

If he thinks about the feeling settling in his stomach, if he can compare it to anything, it’s like running from a blazing inferno of doubt and insecurity, licks of fire racing to catch up to him, the soles of his feet pressing into the sizzling ground - and Poppy is the cool embrace of safety.

She is light cracking through a window he just needs to break through to make it out.

If he can get to her quick enough, if he runs, and runs, maybe he’ll make it before he’s jiggling at a red hot handle that won’t move, won’t give, won’t budge.

If he can just talk to her, maybe the morning from hell will be outweighed by the days of resilience, weeks of efforts, years of loving her in whatever capacity, and the promise of something better.

He just needs to get rid of Talia.

The car journey back to his apartment is carried out in a deafening silence. She had tried to talk to him when he’d made his way out of Myles’ condo, when he had found her waiting by his Mercedes with crossed arms and a sour look on her face, but he’d told her he didn’t want to hear it, that they’d deal with it in private.

He hardly wanted a showdown with her in the middle of the street.

And so, she sat in his passenger seat, jaw set, glaring out the window and letting out the occasional huff or puff for attention that he wasn’t entertaining.

The elevator ride up to his place had been the same. Silent, filled with the type of tension you could cut with a knife, and all he could do was ignore her continued petulance and take deep breaths to calm himself down. In through his nose, out through his mouth, overlooking the way she tapped her foot in his peripheral vision, and almost audibly rolled her eyes every few seconds. 

“Would it have killed you to defend me in there?” She scoffs as soon as the door closes behind them in his apartment, “You just let him accuse me of all that stuff and completely invade my privacy!”

Nico screws his eyes shut and pinches the bridge of his nose.

He can’t blow up, can’t stoop to her level. He won’t feel good after the fact. He knows how Talia operates, should have known she’d immediately play the victim card, and he isn’t falling into the trap of arguing to the point of being in the wrong.

He’ll say something he regrets and she’ll use it to her advantage, somehow.

“You asked him to go through your phone, Talia.” He sighs, making his way over to the kitchen and getting himself some water. Chugging at it does little to soothe the burning feeling prickling at the back of his mouth, or the itch of his tongue to spit out a scathing retort. “He’s shut down the guy behind it, he can’t message you or anyone else with any more threats, you should be happy.”

“I should be happy?” She follows him wherever he tries to get away, crowding his space and jabbing a pointed finger into his arm. “You have no idea what I’ve been going through this past week. I thought my career was over! How was I supposed to know it was fake?”

“You didn’t even look at the pictures-,”

“Because I was panicking! I was upset, you can’t expect me to be able to recognise what’s been photoshopped when I’m scared like that!”

“But you can fly straight over here and pin the blame on me for ruining your life? You weren’t too upset to point the finger, Talia,”

“Don’t be an asshole, Nico, it doesn’t suit you.” 

“I’m being the asshole? You don’t even care about the trail of destruction you leave behind you, do you? You send private pictures of us, of me, of my family to random people online who you don’t even know, for what, Talia? For money?”

“I don’t need their money-,”

“So it was just for the attention? You get to parade our relationship around like it means nothing more to you than a title, and once you get your fifteen minutes and a few more instagram followers, you just jet back home and dump me over a text?”

“Oh my God,” she cries, flailing her arms dramatically, following him yet again as he makes his way into his living room, picking her stuff up after her that she had discarded here before they left and throwing it into her travel bag. “Stop playing the victim, for Christ’s sake, you’re hardly heartbroken over it. I know for a fact you’ve been hooking up with someone, one of the girls messaged me that they saw you leave a party with her on New Years!”

“So that’s what this is?” Nico snaps, pointing to her, to her stuff, “You think I’m moving on so you fly back out here and spring this bullshit on me, try to make me feel bad?”

“You have some nerve, Nico,” Talia scoffs, folding her arms across her chest and levelling him with a darkened glare.

“I have nerve? You’re the one who broke up with me out of nowhere and think that you can just march back here and make demands, Talia, blaming me for something that was entirely your own doing.” He’s getting sick of walking on egg shells around the topic. If she hadn’t have been messaging people she wasn’t supposed to, this would never have happened - it’s no one’s fault but her own, and as harsh as it may be, he wants to wash his hands of the whole thing. “Calling me in the middle of the night, telling me I ruined your life, saying I need to give you money?”

“Out of nowhere?” Of course she would only pick up on that, he thinks. “My God, you are so self-absorbed.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“Do you think that dating you is easy?” She questions with a measured step toward him. “Do you think I want to spend my life waiting around for my boyfriend, only for him to only ever come home grumpy,” another step, “Or whiny,” and another, “Or too tired and achey to do anything? And that’s when you do come home at all and aren’t half way across the country with the communication skills of a candle. It’s a constant uphill battle trying to get even a second of your attention, Nico, so God forbid I tried to gain some kind of advantage from being with you.”

Her words are starting to cut, but he tries not to react, tries not to bite back. He can count several ways in which she gained an advantage being with him, just off the top of the head - a girl like Talia is never shy of attention. Her courting gossip blogs and sending them private information is probably just scraping the barrel of the ploys she made for exposure while she was with him.

“I didn’t break up with you out of nowhere, I put up with you and the whole circus that comes with you for months, but God, is it exhausting being with you.”

“You knew what you were getting into, Talia. You knew my job, knew my life.” They had met initially through mutual friends - hockey friends of his back home, even - and she has other friends who happen to be wives or girlfriends of athletes. She can’t say she came into the relationship completely oblivious to the downsides of dating a professional player.

“Not really,” she shrugs, “All the other guys can find some sort of balance, but not you. All the other girls get a proper boyfriend, someone who spends time doing what they want to do, who sticks up for them when their psycho fans start to turn on them, who doesn’t keep them hidden away like some dirty secret.”

“That isn’t fair, I can’t control that stuff, Talia, it’s not my fault.” He wants to point out that she was the one engaging in their gossip and riling them up, but he can’t keep harping on about something she refuses to acknowledge. He doesn’t have the time, patience or energy for it anymore.

The initial ‘leaking’ of their relationship had caused their first major fight. Fans online had somehow - although Nico can now hazard a guess as to how - found out about the two of them, had dug into Talia, her background, her family, her job, and had found some pretty toxic posts on her social media. They had been old posts, and she had told Nico that wasn’t the kind of person she was anymore - and he had no reason not to believe her, had never seen or heard her act in the ways she had online in what she called her misguided youth - but someone in the PR department at the Devils had cottoned onto the topic, and had warned Nico of speaking out in her defence when the pitchforks started to raise.

He’d told her he supported her, but he couldn’t do so publicly - not without upsetting people within the organisation he had worked so hard to gain the respect of - and she had told him she understood. They hadn’t been together that long, it would have been a little unreasonable for him to put her above his work in the ways she was expecting, but she clearly doesn’t see it that way, now.

“Maybe not, but if I’d have known that being with you meant having my life invaded, my career ruined, I never would have followed you back here, Nico.” She sounds more solemn now - regretful, even - and as deep as her words cut, she says it like a piece of advice, “I just hope whatever poor girl you’ve got tangled up in your mess this time knows what she’s getting herself into.”

“And what’s that?” His throat feels tight as he speaks all of a sudden, his resolve in defending himself fading, and he tries to gulp down whatever lump is forming there but the feeling doesn’t budge.

This is what she’s good at.

Turning the tables. Reducing him to uncertainty of himself, of his actions, of his memory of their time together.

“A one-sided relationship with a guy who will never be able to put her first.”

There’s a point in every game he has ever had the misfortune of losing, as the seconds count down in the final third, where he has to come to terms with the fact that there’s no possible way for him to win. It’s sort of comparable to the way his insides churn when he’s on a plane and it drops into descent, like his body is falling at a different speed to his surroundings, or the feeling he gets in his gut when he’s hiking, and he dares to take a peek over the edge of whatever mountainside he’s trekking up, where his body can predict the fall, and his mind has set on there being nothing he can do about it.

This feels like all those feelings.

“Whoever she is, and I know she exists, she doesn’t deserve that. It’s not fair.”

Nico’s heart pounds in his chest, echoing and thrumming in his ears until all he can hear is the beat reverberating, ricocheting around his skull.

He can put Poppy first.

So many parts of their lives are intertwined, it would be so easy to make it work. They work together, they live close, he speaks to her more than he speaks to anyone else in his circle. They’ve spent more time together as friends than he has with any other girlfriend he’s had.

He’s wanted her for years, of course he can do it.

Except, deep down, he knows he can’t. Being in a committed relationship with someone is an entirely different ball game to a friendship, no matter how close he and Poppy have been over the years.

He knows there’ll come a point soon into the season where he has to knuckle down and focus, can’t let anything or anyone distract him, and he’ll close himself off. It’s what he has always done. He gets in his head, starts to carry too much weight that he can’t shift until that final buzzer blows - and he can only hope that it happens with his team in the playoffs. Winning, thriving, succeeding. And for that to happen, he can’t prioritise anything other than the game he’s already dedicated his life to, his training, and most importantly, his team.

It isn’t about what he wants.

What have you done? He thinks, his chest aching.

Talia is right.

Poppy doesn’t deserve that.

She doesn’t deserve him only being there in the physical sense, if she even gets that at all. Doesn’t deserve him getting snappy and stressed, doesn’t deserve him not being able to give her time, or give her attention or affection like he wants to, or like she’s worthy of.

“I need to go.” He manages to choke out with a shake of his head, shouldering past her to pick up his jacket - needing to be out of this conversation and away from Talia. “Leave the keys, I don’t want you here when I get back.”

He needs to see Poppy.

He never should have left her - he wishes with everything in him that he had soaked up the time he had with her before everything came tumbling down around him. And somewhere deep within him, there is a fragile, wilting piece of hope that clings to the belief he can make things right. He just needs her to hone in on it. If anyone can reach into the deepest cracks of his insecurities, can show him he’s overthinking things and everything is not as hopeless as he has made it out to be, it will be Poppy.

Poppy

The first time Poppy had ever fallen asleep beside Nico was at a movie night in Jack’s old apartment he shared with Ty Smith. Jack had invited more people round than could reasonably fit in their living room, and so everyone was smushed in - each chair and every inch of floor space used to its full capacity. 

Nico had attempted to save Poppy a space, to give him credit. He had scowled at each of his teammates who tried to throw themselves down in the tiny slot beside him - prime space, corner of the comfiest couch, facing the tv directly, a small table to the side where one could keep their drinks and snacks - only, by the time Poppy got there, he had barely gotten away with man-spreading to make room, so the small section of the couch between Nico and the arm rest had become her designated spot.

It was cosy, to put it nicely. He had to swing his arm over the back so that she wasn’t being assaulted by the hard dig of his shoulder with every laugh, and her closest leg was pretty much on top of his for most of the film.

She’d known the guys for almost a year - had been working in media, attending every game, home and away, and had integrated herself into the group pretty closely - and she felt pretty comfortable around everyone.

It wasn’t the kind of dynamic she had anticipated falling into when she first got the job with the Devils. She was supposed to start getting serious about her life - cracking down on mingling with co-workers and throwing herself into new social circles, and focusing on building a career for herself, climbing through the ranks and attaining the kind of success and happiness she could shove in her family’s disapproving faces - but the guys had charmed her.

Jack had been somewhat relentless in his pursuit of Poppy’s friendship. He rarely took no for an answer when it came to inviting her out. He was new to New Jersey - a much younger player in a slightly older team - and his rookie season had been rough, so it came naturally to Poppy to want to provide comfort. She introduced him to some of her friends, showed him her favourite spots close to his apartment, found him a decent barber, picked up extra fruit whenever she went to the farmers market near her parent’s house and took it over to his and Ty’s place when she came back home so she could mother him into having his 5-a-day as if he didn’t have access to the best nutrition coaches in the country. Despite her best efforts, Jack had weaselled his way under her skin in the way only a brother could.

Nico’s charm was entirely different.

Nico’s charm came in the form of convenience at first - in the oh I live that way, I can drive you and I have some time, I can do some media stuff for you type of way. Convenience blended into companionship - I haven’t eaten either, we should go for lunch together and I’ve been wanting to watch that movie, do you want to watch it with me?

It turned into grabbing food together, even on days neither of them were working - breakfast, brunch, lunch, dinner, even coffee or sometimes drinks if they could meet up with the rest of the team. It turned into him spending time at her place, whether it was helping her paint her apartment, putting up her new wardrobes, or just binging whatever crazy long series Poppy had decided to start over from the beginning - she provided him with a sense of familiarity and calm he couldn’t really find in anyone else he had met in his time in the states. She became his person, his home away from home, away from home.

And he became hers. 

There wasn’t as much she had to escape; her job not as strenuous, the expectations of her not as high, but when things built up for her - when her mother became overbearing, or her latest endeavour into a relationship crashed and burned - Nico was there. He’d make sure she had a distraction, made sure she was looking after herself, and, in turn, would look after her as well. He made sure she got home safe on nights out, or when they returned from a roadie and landed late - he would always make sure to see her off into the comfort of her own home before he went back to his own. 

And that first time she’d fallen asleep beside him, he’d done the same.

He’d wrapped an arm around her to make her as comfortable as possible for as long as he could, and when the movie had finished - when her face was burrowed into the side of his chest, soft snores falling from between her lips - he gently drew her back to consciousness with his hand stroking at her cheek.

She’d been a little startled, hand shooting up to wipe at her chin and thankful she hadn’t been drooling on him - although with the easy smile he was giving her, she had thought he of all people wouldn’t have minded. 

“Movie’s done, do you need a ride home?” His voice had been low and soft as not to worsen her apparent disorientation, and his hand was still lingering by the side of her face.

She had nodded, blinking away her sleepiness, and working her way up from the couch and onto her feet, stretching out her muscles as Nico did the same.

The two of them bid their goodbyes to the rest of the guys, made their way together to Nico’s car, and he had driven her back to her apartment, chatting on the drive about work and training. 

Poppy had been cramming to prepare for her interview for the Foundation at the time - had been getting herself seriously worked up, staying up late, getting up early, barely allowing herself any time for anything fun - and Nico had seen right through her. 

He’d stopped her before she got out of the car, had held her hand, rubbing at her knuckles with his thumb, and had told her that she should get some proper rest, and that she was going to absolutely rock their world in her interview in a few days time. And, knowing she was going to ignore any instruction he gave to make herself some decent dinner and go to bed early, had ordered her favourite Japanese takeout to be delivered a good half an hour after she got inside, with a text that followed telling her to sleep straight after she had finished.

She’d never expected to drift asleep with him on Jack’s couch - had never expected to open her eyes to the sight of his looking so warmly back at her.

And she hadn’t expected the same thing this morning, because, as her eyes drifted open to the intrusive light peaking through the cracks in her curtains, it wasn’t the first time she had woken up.

The first time had been to subdued movements, a slight groan of her bed frame, and the soft pattering of footsteps leading away. It had been to a hushed voice, the creak of her bathroom door, the flush of a toilet and the uttering of a name she had hoped she would never have to worry about again.

Talia.

The rest of his words had been uttered in his own language, but that she could understand.

She had acted purely on fight or flight instinct, laying back and pretending she was asleep - although as soon as she did, she regretted it, her mind racing at the million and one other possibilities she could have gone with. Sitting up, waiting for him to come out and asking him what was going on being the most rational.

But when had she ever gone with the most rational thought?

She tried not to react as she felt his presence, felt the soft press of his lips to her skin, or the placement of her bunny in her arms. Tried not to follow him as soon as he departed her bedroom, beg him to come back and whatever was going on could wait until the proper turn of the morning. Tried not to get up and go after him when the click of the lock to her main door echoed throughout the empty apartment.

And she tried not to cry as she laid in bed, overthinking herself back to sleep, thoughts racing to the point of exhaustion, and hoping when she woke up again it had just been a god-awful dream.

But it hadn’t.

The spot beside her in bed is empty, not even a crease in the pillow to prove he was ever there - only the t-shirt of his she still adorned, the one that when she takes a deep inhale, still smells like him, and the distinct aching between her thighs.

She finds more evidence of their night together in the bathroom, where she undresses herself with sore muscles and glances in the mirror to see the spattering of purple marks forming on her chest and neck. Her fingers trace over them lightly, her fleeting touch bringing vivid images forth of his lips pressing to her skin, practically able to feel the pressure of her flesh being nipped and bitten again.

He had been so attentive to her - so in tune with what she needed and wanted, and so ready to give her whatever that may be. He’d been gentle at some points, and purposeful at others, and every little thing he did, he did it with sweet disposition.

The kind of man who treats a girl like that doesn’t just leave her in the dead of night with no good reason, right?

Her mind races despite her body going into auto-pilot throughout her morning routine. Her shower is over in the flash of an eye, she strips her bed, starts her laundry, makes herself some tea and gets herself dressed - all the while weighing out all the possibilities of what could have taken him away from her, and what she would be able to understand. 

That quickly turns to her imagining the worst, and a tight, constricting feeling starts to consume her chest. 

There isn’t a single part of her apartment she can get away from the thoughts buzzing around her brain - her kitchen marred with the memory of what had happened on the counter, her couch, her bedroom, her bathroom - all carrying distinct memories of Nico that she needs to bench until she knows the truth.

She mistakenly thinks her escape might lie in her phone. There might be a text there waiting, explaining everything and relieving all the anxiety that has welled up in her very core.

Nia’s warnings from the night before don’t ring quick enough in her mind as the screen comes to life, the immediate barrage of notifications flooding in.

2 missed calls from Mom

Mom: Just calling to remind you of proper table etiquette in case it has slipped your mind, I won’t have you embarrass me in front of a Lyon.

Mom: Cutlery going from the outside in, hold your wine glass by the stem and dab with your napkin, don’t swipe!

Mom: Also let the man tuck your chair in and pay the bill, this 21st century woman nonsense is very unbecoming!

Mom: And I don’t want to have to bring this up but for the love of God, Poppy, have some class. I don’t want to hear mutterings of your promiscuity at the next luncheon.

Whoever taught her mom to text deserves a prison sentence, she thinks.

Tucker Lyon standing a girl up and ghosting her attempts to contact him is what’s unbecoming, not her trying to pay her half of the meal.

She can picture her mother as she reads the texts, sipping on her Manhattan on the couch in the great room, her dad already having retreated to bed at that time, and her having nothing better to do than sit and stew on her daughter’s sex life.

If she knew what was really going down last night, her mom would probably have a conniption.

Knowing she’ll no doubt be getting a call later that evening, Poppy swipes away at her text thread with her mom, immediately checking the notifications she hasn’t long received from her best friend.

Nia: hey if you happen to release yourself from Nico’s wandering hands at all today me and Kelsey are grabbing breakfast by my work!!

Nia: if you need refuelling we’ll be at Marco’s at 9 😘 

Perfect. Therein lies her escape. Breakfast with her best friends, where they can hopefully talk her down from the ledge she’s precariously placed herself on.

A catch up with her girls, and then she can distract herself with work.

Poppy: I’ll be there!!

“Hasn’t he text you or anything?” Nia asks, covering her mouth as she chews on her breakfast bagel, the three girls sat around a table inside their favourite cafe close to Nia’s office.

When Poppy and Nia had first moved in together, they rented an apartment in Hoboken, not too far, and their tradition of grabbing breakfast at Marco’s carried on despite Poppy living further down the river and working even further away in Newark. 

Kelsey had lived in Manhattan at that time, but she stayed over so often with the other girls that she practically spent majority of her week there, and so Poppy and Nia’s routine became hers.

Poppy had given the two of them a brief rundown of her night with Nico, a safe-for-work version of events, all leading up to the mysterious early morning phone call and swift departure.

“Nope,” she sighs, swiping to refresh her messages as if she hasn’t put her phone on loud just to be alerted when he does reach out.

“Have you text him?”

“Nope,” she repeats, putting the phone down and leaning back in her chair, running a hand through her already messed up hair. She’s going to have to throw it up if she wants to look any sort of presentable when she gets to work later.

“Is he usually this pathetic at communicating?” Kelsey asks, manicured nails swiping at a bunch of Sweet’n Lows like she’s trying to play Tetris with the packets. 

Kelsey hasn’t met Nico before, not that Poppy can remember.

Despite considering her one of her closest friends, their personal lives have never quite intertwined like that - not like hers and Nia’s.

In college, things were different. They were coming into their own together, figuring out just what they wanted their personal lives to be, and so Kelsey, Poppy and Nia would all share pretty much everything, just to have someone there to validate their feelings.

But that changed once they graduated.

Kelsey moved in with her boyfriend, Liam - who just so happens to be Poppy’s idea of hell-spawn.

The kind of guy her mother would probably love.

Liam worked on Wall Street, couldn’t go five minutes of conversation without talking about stocks or investment funds. His native language was risky money moves and belittling remarks, and he treated Kelsey like an accessory to parade around in public and discard in private.

Poppy had tried a few times to open Kelsey’s eyes to the way that it was, but it soon became apparent that she had to let her friend make her own mistakes, and some parts of their lives didn’t have to cross over.

They broke up around Thanksgiving, and Poppy had tried with all her might not to show her relief, but it has made her somewhat resentful when it comes to other relationships - like no one can be happy if she isn’t.

She knows it isn’t malicious, but she restrains from letting Kelsey all the way in, all the same.

“Not really,” Poppy lies, not wanting to clue her in on the Big Freezewhere he didn’t speak to her for months on end. It doesn’t entirely help her case. “I just don’t get why he’d sneak out to see her of all people, he told me they weren’t ever that solid, that he wasn’t happy with her.”

“Ooh, what if she’s pregnant?” Kelsey is entirely oblivious to the horrific realm of possibility she has just opened Poppy up to, evidenced by the casual chuckle and subsequent sip of her coffee. “Maybe she’s back to baby-trap him.”

Poppy thinks she would have to flee the state.

Nico is a family guy - if Talia is pregnant, he’d force himself to love her again, if he ever even stopped, for the sake of their gorgeous brown eyed, floppy haired baby, and push Poppy to the side just like he had before. And she’ll have to watch him from the sidelines, yearning for what she had just managed to touch the tips of her fingers to before it was violently yanked from her grasp. 

Maybe she’d have to flee the country even - move somewhere remote where she doesn’t even have the chance of being reminded of hockey, let alone of him.

Somewhere with no coffee shops that she’d enter, and the smell of fresh pastries would remind her of all the breakfasts they had together. No railways, where she’d be reminded of his love for model trains every time she came across the tracks. No weird club music that he loves so much, or dorky wizard franchises he chastises her for never having seen.

Maybe Antarctica. They only have penguins there. No real civilisation that she knows of. No brown haired, dark eyed Swiss Gods with deep, honeyed voices that make her knees weak and dimpled smiles that do even worse.

She wouldn’t be able to cope with losing him like that, living her life in an endless mental cycle of what ifs and maybes.

“Kelsey, I beg of you to read the room,” Nia chastises, swatting the girl on her arm before taking Poppy’s hand in her own. “Don’t listen to her, she just wants us all to be single at the same time.”

“Sue me for wanting to have fun! It would be just like college, you and me full-body plunging into the dating pool. Imagine the chaos, Pop, you don’t wanna be tied down to a guy hung up on his ex right now.”

“Dating pool?” Nia scoffs, turning to glare at her, “You’re hardly dry from your last relationship.”

“I’d rather be a grape than a raisin, Ni.” Kelsey chides back, and Poppy can’t help the twitch of her lips at the horrific comparison. 

“You’re really gonna listen to a girl who says that?” Nia asks, unable to mask the glint of humour in her eyes, and Kelsey bites back a smile, too.

Despite the ache in her chest at the thought of any of it - of Nico leaving her this morning, filling her up with empty words and false promises, potentially knocking up an ex girlfriend he is still secretly hung up on even though he told her otherwise - she manages to crack a full smile.

“You are terrible at analogies, Kels,” Poppy tries to hide the grin behind her cup, sipping at her tea and letting the warmth of it soothe the pain in her throat. 

“I’m trying to encourage you to be a strong, independent woman here!”

“She is a strong, independent woman,” Nia defends, “She also happens to be a chronic over-thinker with a deep seated fear of confrontation.”

“I don’t fear confrontation.”

“Then why are we here chit-chatting about hypothetical scenarios when you could just text him and ask what’s up?”

“Maybe ‘cause that’s scary?” Poppy scoffs, only half joking. “What am I supposed to say, hey I just so happened to eavesdrop on your private conversation before you fled my apartment this morning, and despite me not understanding most of it, I definitely heard you mention someone, so could you just let me know if your gorgeous model ex girlfriend is pregnant with your perfect specimen baby?”

“Sounds like you’ve got it all figured out, you don’t even need us.”

Poppy rolls her eyes.  

She could text him. Could be casual about it, a good morning or even an are you okay? Those don’t warrant the alarm bells she’s afraid of raising - the ones that blare out with the siren sound of run, this girl is unhealthily attached to you already!

But she doesn’t want to be the pathetic girl chasing after the guy sending her clear messages that he doesn’t want her.

It’s easier said than done not to overthink the whole thing - not to second guess everything he had said, or everything she had done last night.

She feels like she had rushed things. It was so impulsive, so charged, and after spending the majority of her week away from him, she just hadn’t been able to help herself. And that makes her feel like a hypocrite. She had told him that night he had first kissed her that things between them had gotten intense. It had been the whole reason for spending a few days outside of each other’s company, and in the first possible instance, she had thrown herself at him.

It was desperate.

And maybe that scared him.

It sure as hell scares her.

“I don’t know what to do,” She groans, throwing her head into her hands and scrunching her eyes shut to try and drown out the endless doubt. 

She feels two hands rub at either sides of her back, “Listen, Pop,” Nia is the first to attempt to console her, as always, and Poppy holds her breath for the harsh reality check she’s about to throw her way. “You know I am the one person who would usually be trying to convince you to cut your losses and run when it comes to guys who are no good, but this is Nico. I’ve watched the two of you ignore your feelings for far too long to let you get in your own way, now.

“And you’re forgetting I saw him last night, before you got there, there isn’t a chance in Hell he would have left you like that without a good reason. I don’t for a second think he’s still hung up on her.” Nia casts a side eye to Kelsey.

The only problem is that Poppy isn’t sure there’s a reason good enough. Not when it comes to Talia. Not when the memory of those months of radio silence is still so fresh for her.

“I have to go to work in a building where his face is plastered everywhere, Ni, I can hardly forget his entire existence until he deems me worthy of an explanation. Who leaves after a night like that without even a note or a text?”

“An idiot,” Kelsey mutters around her drink, rolling her eyes when Nia sends her another death-glare.

“I’m not asking you to forget, I’m telling you to wait.” Nia frowns, but her tone remains consoling and warm. “You need to stop letting what this thinks,” she flicks at Poppy’s forehead, “Get in the way of what this knows.” She points to her chest on the left side. “You know him. You know how much he likes you.”

She does.

She knows Nico, she trusts him.

She can only judge him based on his actions so far - the ones that tell her that he cares. He leads with his heart, it’s his most attractive attribute. He’s gentle and loving and she needs to focus on those things over anything else.

“Ugh, corny,” Kelsey drags, and despite her repeated efforts to discourage her, Poppy knows she isn’t being entirely serious. “If he has any non-stupid hot athlete friends though, I’m first in line when the two of you kiss and make up for double dates.”

Guilt pricks slightly at Poppy’s chest - for making her recently single friend sit here and listen to her complain about something so monumentally small compared to the breakdown of the long-term relationship Kelsey had just endured. Even if it was perceivably toxic.

“You’d make such a good WAG, Kels.”

It’s a poor attempt to make up for it, but it seems to console her friend all the same, a giant grin breaking out and flashing her perfect pearly whites.

“I know.”

Poppy tries to distract herself with work. Tries to make her way through her inbox of seemingly never ending emails and her list of ever-growing tasks. She types up lengthy responses, puts together a presentation, makes a bunch of phone calls she’s been putting off for God knows how long, sorts all her invoices out - she even sends a fax. In the year 2024. It’s her most productive work day she thinks she’s ever had.

She zeroes in on the ground every time she moves through the building. Ignores the pictures that line the walls of the Rock, pushes down the memories of all the times she’s walked these very halls by Nico’s side, and she thinks she’s done just about enough to clear her mind for the time being.

She hasn’t thought up some heart wrenching scenario in at least an hour by the time she’s wrapping up for the day.

She’s making her way back to her office after dropping some files off for Elaine when she catches sight of a mop of curls over the top of the chair by her desk.

Luke is sat in her chair when she enters, swivelling around and staring at the ceiling.

“You’re gonna make yourself sick doing that, you know.”

“You’re such a mom,” he scoffs, standing up and clearly trying not to sway, “You ever tried having fun? I think I saw a glue stick on a table out there,” he points through the door into the wider office space, where there are a few, less private cubicles and a common area. “We should go sniff them, let loose a little.”

“Is that why you’re here on your day off? To huff glue?”

“Yeah, I don’t get to let loose enough. Being a rookie in the NHL is hard, Poppy,”

“Bummer for you.” She pouts, mockingly, swerving past him as he rounds her desk and sits on the other side, flicking at the bobblehead version of his older brother that stands by her computer. “If you’re chasing a high can you do it with one of the other departments, it’s not a good look for the Youth Foundation.”

“I won’t tell if you don’t.”

When Luke had first joined the Devils, she hadn’t expected that she would warm to him the way she has - but, surprisingly enough, considering the fact they’re brothers, their relationship recently has started to mirror her and Jack’s.

Luke is funny. He’s sarcastic and a little silly, and it can be nice to have him around when work gets a little stressful. He doesn’t let the pressures of his own career outweigh those of hers, and, despite the gap in age, she actually enjoys his company.

But he never seeks her out like this.

Their interactions have always started through other people. Group conversations that dwindle to just the two of them, or he usually accompanies Jack to bug her and carries on when Jack’s ever-so-busy schedule takes him elsewhere.

She can’t think of another time he’s just shown up in her office alone.

Especially on his incredibly rare day off.

“Why are you actually here?” She asks, casting a suspicious but half-playful glare his way as she starts to pack up her things. 

“Came to see if you wanted to join us for dinner.”

“Aw Lukey,” she reaches over her desk to pinch his cheek, “I’m flattered and all but I’m a little too old for you.”

“Ha ha,” he swats her hand away, “Us. Me and Jack. Maybe a couple of the others if they’re free but you can pick where we go if you make a decision quickly, we were thinking a steakhouse.”

She narrows her eyes at him, expecting him to crack a joke about her being old, but he just looks back at her awaiting a response. “Why?” She drags out the question, her movements stopping completely.

“Maybe ‘cause humans need sustenance to live? What do you mean, why?”

“Why would you want me to tag along on your bro date?”

“Don’t call it a bro date,” Luke cringes, “Just remembered you were working today and we were in the area, don’t know why you’re being weird about it.”

“You’re being weird. You guys never let me choose where we eat. Don’t you remember that time we grabbed dinner when you guys drove me home and Jack told me to stop being a pussy about my seafood allergy ‘cause he wanted sushi.”

“Don’t blame me for the crimes of my brother, Poppy, he was obviously joking.”

“I had to eat tofu, Luke, I don’t find that very funny.”

“Are you coming or not?”

“That depends, how do you have your steak?”

“Well done.”

“Oh! Then absolutely not.”

“Remind me never to try to be nice to you again.” He scowls as they make their way out of her office, and she locks up behind the two of them.

“Gladly, it’s creeping me out.” She grabs at his elbow before he can carry on, stopping him in the otherwise empty common area where she knows no one is around to listen in. “Is something going on, seriously?”

Luke rolls his eyes, but she knows him well enough that it’s only done in an attempt to avert from her gaze. 

Bingo. He’s hiding something.

“I just thought you might want some company.” He shrugs, shoving his hands into his pockets and twisting his lips to keep from saying much more.

“Why?”

If Poppy wanted to spend her life getting a straight answer out of people for a living, she’d have become an interrogator. What is it with these guys and their inability to answer a simple question?

“Jack said you left the party last night with Nico.”

Poppy’s eyebrows scrunch so close together that she can feel a deep crease form between them. What on earth does that have to do with asking her to dinner? Or being overly nice to her?

Unless-

“You’ve seen him?”

“This morning.”

“Oh.”

All of her efforts from throughout the day seem to have been for nothing - an immediate rush of insecurities flooding her mind.

Where did he see him? What did he say? Was he okay? Was Talia there?

She feels like she can gauge an answer from the way Luke looks. Sheepish, almost, like he doesn’t want to say something he knows will hurt her feelings.

She had to have been with him. He wouldn’t just show up to her office like this if it wasn’t something that would seriously hurt.

She wishes she wasn’t the kind of person who did this - who filled in the gaps of conversations and always came out with the worst possible outcomes - but she can’t help it. She’s been doing it all her life, and there’s rarely ever an instance where her instincts have led her astray.

She knows it’s some weird part of her mind protecting her, but she needs to do something here. Nia’s words from earlier ring like a warning. Don’t let what her brain thinks get in the way of what her heart knows.

Her heart knows Nico wanted her. Knows Nico liked her. Knows Nico wouldn’t do anything to hurt her.

She needs to figure things out for herself and stop running, stop letting her mind fill in the gaps of a situation it can’t even comprehend to begin with.

She reaches her arms around Luke’s shoulders, stretching up on her tip toes to pull him into a hug before rubbing her knuckles into his curls, affectionately.

Luke Hughes is sarcastic and silly, and he cares enough about her to not want her to be alone if she’s going through something.

“Thank you for the offer, Luke, but I’ll be alright.”

“Are you sure?”

She nods, a tender smile tugging at the corners of her stubborn lips. It takes over her face, eyes glinting fondly and cheeks warming. 

“Yeah, you can walk me to my car if you’re that worried about me though.” She loops her arm through his elbow as they make their way to the parking lot, and when they get there, he makes sure she’s in her car and has set off before him and Jack leave.

As if her day can’t get any worse, the elevator in her building is cordoned off with tape and a sign when she gets home, and she has never regretted moving up a floor as much as she does when she’s trudging up 6 flights of stairs.

She’s exhausted. Emotionally and physically, and she just wants to throw herself into bed and pretend the last 24 hours were a terrible dream.

Only, as she rounds the final corner to get to her door, any hopes of that go straight down the pan when her eyes land on Nico, standing in front of her door with his hands buried in his jacket pocket.

He looks tired too - hair messed where he’s no doubt been taking his cap on and off for however long he’s been stood here, running a hand through the tresses until they’re all askew. 

His shoulders are slumped, and he doesn’t even greet her with that pretty smile he usually gives her.

His lips do curve up a touch - limp and half-hearted, not even enough for a dimple to form - but it doesn’t provide the comfort she had thought it would.

She feels anxious. A culmination of the day’s emotions washing over in one go. Sad, regretful, nervous, disappointed - all things she shouldn’t be used to feeling when it comes to Nico, but are all too familiar when she takes the last few months into account.

“Hi.” She gives a weak smile of her own.

“Can we talk?”

She wishes he’d have just said hi, back. That might have relieved the tightness in her chest just a little.

Nothing good ever comes of can we talk?

He steps aside as she approaches, maintaining a safe distance as she opens the door and enters her apartment.

The Nico from yesterday might have brushed past her, the graze of an arm or a lingering hand, but this Nico doesn’t. He barely even meets her eye.

He closes the door behind himself, watching as she discards her bag and keys to the console table on the side, and while she’s turned away from him, she tries to let whatever emotions need to come out cross her features where he can’t see them.

She needs to be cool about this, she thinks.

If she doesn’t get her back up, doesn’t get agitated, she won’t scare him off.

“Are you okay?” She asks once she’s turned to face him, not liking how he stands unmoving by the door. He hasn’t made any effort to settle in - his jacket still on and his hands still hidden in the pockets.

“Shouldn’t I be the one asking you that?”

She realises now that she can get a good look at him that the expression he wears is one of shame. Guilt. Apprehension. She needs to be careful and toe the line before he gets consumed by it, she realises.

She steps toward him a little, and he doesn’t back up - not immediately, not obviously - but he hardly welcomes her approach, either.

She doesn’t like feeling this way when it comes to talking to him - feeling uneasy and unsure, but there’s a part of her that’s tired of having to prompt him for answers.

He had been the one to leave this morning. Why can’t he just come out and tell her why?

“I’m alright,” she shrugs, not wanting to scare him off with the truth. “Super tired, though, can we sit?”

She wonders if he thinks about the same things she does as they make their way to the couch. Wonders if he can feel the scratch of her nails on his torso, or the brush of her lips against his, as they sit in the spot where not even 24 hours ago, their bodies had been intertwined.

He doesn’t sit right beside her as he normally would, and she finds herself missing the way his thigh usually brushes against her own.

She doesn’t know where to start or what to ask, and so she basks in the silence for a little - finding comfort in the fact that, despite the mess they’re currently in, they aren’t quite at the end yet.

But a part of her feels it coming.

She’d known it this morning if she lets herself listen to the rational voice in her head. As soon as she’d heard him say her name, as soon as he’d left, a part of her knew that was it, and maybe if she’d let herself believe it at the time - hadn’t talked herself down and convinced herself she was being irrational - she could have protected herself from all the ways this is going to hurt.

“I’m sorry.” He says, and when she looks up, he’s looking down where his large hands are now clasped together in his lap.

“For what?” She manages to choke out.

“Last night, I,” she digs her nails into the palms of her own hands to stop herself filling in the gaps as he figures out what he wants to say, but it’s no use.

He’s sorry for last night.

Last night, he made a mistake.

Last night, he was drunk, he was confused, he was just looking for something or someone to keep him occupied.

“I care about you so much, Poppy.”

That sentence shouldn’t be the one that fills her with dread, but it is.

“You’re my best friend, and I love you,” he does look up as he says this, eye meeting hers in an attempt to convey his honesty, but she sees more of the truth in his glassy gaze than she hears in his words. “This morning, I panicked, and I just needed some time to figure out what I want.”

No, no, no.

She’d rather he tell her what actually happened than do this. Than pretend he left because he doesn’t want her.

“I love you-,”

“You said that, already.” She can’t help the bite in her tone as she prepares herself for the hit. The I love you, but.

“You’re so important to me. Being your friend, it’s like it’s what keeps me sane lately.”

She chews at the inside of her cheek as she feels the tears start to well at her lash line.

“Poppy, I don’t want to mess up what we have,” he shakes his head as his gaze drops, dark eyes darting to focus anywhere but on her own, pleading and watery as she watches him slip away. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You don’t think this is hurting me?” She feels weak as her voice breaks, “You don’t think this is already messy?”

She reaches out to take his hands in hers, digging in to unclasp them, to try thread her fingers through, but he doesn’t make it easy.

“Nico, I love you, too, you know I do, we can figure it out, you don’t have to run away from me.”

It’s a desperate attempt and she knows it is, but she needs to know she tried. When she’s sobbing into her pillow and crying herself to sleep tonight, she needs to know she didn’t just let him go without a fight.

“I can’t give you what you want, I can’t be in a relationship, I’m no good at it.” 

Regardless of what she had told herself earlier, about taking what he says at face value, and trying not to fill in the gaps like she does so often with everyone else, she can’t help herself. When he says, I can’t be in a relationship, he means with her. He can’t be with Poppy. He would be no good with Poppy.

“Why are you doing this?”

“I told you-,”

“No, you said before that you’ve wanted this for as long as you’ve known me, you don’t just wake up and change your mind, not after-,” Poppy starts to feel panic building within her like a flipped over sand timer. Rising and rising until she starts to feel nauseous, getting harder with each second not to jump to conclusions. 

The voice inside her that tells her he got what he wanted and decided it wasn’t for him sounds caustic and bitter, and if she hadn’t wound herself up so much about this whole situation over the course of the day - the past week, even, or the months before - she might have been able to fight off the way it so easily convinces her.

“I have to put the team first, it doesn’t matter what I want, I have to focus on them, on hockey.”

She’s too caught up in her own emotions to notice how weak he sounds - glassy eyes unable to catch the glint in his. All she can hear, all she can see, is the minute hints of a cover-up - that she isn’t getting the whole story, that he’s lying to her, and that the excuse he’s giving is cowardly.

He still hasn’t mentioned the call, hasn’t mentioned Talia, hasn’t explained why he left her, why he didn’t say anything, why he didn’t come back.

“And you didn’t know that before?” She scoffs, pushing herself up off the couch and stepping away from him, “I can’t believe you would do this to me.” She wipes the tears from her cheeks as soon as they fall, but she can’t rid her skin of the feeling that they were there, her flesh damp and sore.

“I know we took things a little too far last night, but that doesn’t mean-,” She almost thinks he notices how bad that hurts her, referencing the night they shared as a mistake - an instance where they got carried away, and not where they followed through on years worth of built up tension and adoration for one another. She doesn’t even have to fill in the gaps, this time. Took things a little too far is clear enough. “We can still be friends. I want to be friends.”

“Friends?” Poppy jeers in disbelief, turning completely away from him now and missing the tears that drop from his own cheeks - missing the way his chest cracks and stretches open in a last ditch demonstration of his vulnerability, his desperation not to lose her completely. “You should go.”

“Poppy,”

“I can’t,” she tries so hard not to cry, knowing she won’t be able to stop, but the words come out in a choked sob, and her voice carries on in the whiney way she always hates. “You told me you wanted more, you said I was yours, and I’m supposed to just act like it never happened? Just accept you didn’t actually mean the things you said?”

“I meant them,” he says, defiantly, so sure of himself that it makes her head spin. “I wouldn’t-,”

“No, you didn’t. You’re a liar. You were either lying then, or you’re lying now. I don’t know which is worse. I can’t be your friend. I can’t pretend like you can that I don’t feel the way I feel.”

“Please, Mohn,” His fingertips just manage to reach out to land on her forearm before she shucks him off, wincing as if his touch has pained her.

“Don’t.” She takes an immediate step back, arms crossing over herself as a defence mechanism, body language screaming at him to go away, and she watches his pleading eyes drop to her arms just as she feels the cold of the metal there - so in tune with her every thought despite his denial of their true connection. Her arms move before her mind can make the decision, before it can remember what even sits on her skin, and her shaking fingers fumble to unclasp the jewellery adorned on her wrist. “You should take this back.”

Nico shakes his head, stepping back and away from the outstretched hand that holds her gemstone bracelet like it’s an actual danger to him. “No, that’s yours, Poppy.”

“I don’t want it.” She knows she’s the one that’s lying now. She wants the bracelet. She wants him. She doesn’t want him to leave. She wants to be his friend over being nothing. 

But she doesn’t want to hurt.

Looking at him hurts.

Remembering last night, remembering their kiss, the things he has said, the things he has done, it all hurts, and she can’t keep hold of a constant reminder of the pain, can’t wear it on her person at all hours of the day just to know deep down that the man who gave it to her will never want her the same way.

“I want you to leave.”

“Please,” he begs again, head tilting as devastation floods his features, brows pushing together, tears welling at the corners of his eyes, “We need to talk about this-,”

“No, you were right, we went too far, it was a mistake.” Her voice breaks as she says things she knows she doesn’t mean, but he’s already put it out there, so she doesn’t see the harm in echoing his own opinions. “There’s nothing more to talk about.”

She can’t look at him anymore, and so she drops her gaze to his hands, stepping and reaching forward and forcing him to take the bracelet from her before she rounds the couch and heads to the door.

If he isn’t going to give her the whole truth, she isn’t going to entertain part of the story, and she needs him gone so she can give in to the way her body wants to fold in on itself.

It takes him a minute to gather himself, but she refuses to look his way, waiting by the open door to her apartment and staring at the floor in front of her until his shoes appear.

“I do love you, Poppy. I’m leaving because I don’t want to upset you any more than I already have, and I’ll give you space if that’s what you need, but I’ll be here when you want to talk about this. I mean it when I say I can’t lose you.”

 She doesn’t say anything. She can’t say anything.

There’s a stabbing pain that’s building and building in the centre of her chest, and she doesn’t even think she can breathe in his presence.

He clasps a hand around her upper arm, and leans into her, his lips pressing a firm kiss into the crown of her head, and he lingers there for a moment before he retreats. 

She manages to push the door closed behind him, the click of the lock louder than ever, and waits a good few minutes in silence before her body is wracked with a silent sob.

The one time she had tried to be brave and fight her own intuition, and this is where it gets her.

So much for Nico wouldn’t do anything to hurt her.

Next Chapter

Taglist: @alwaysclassyeagle @bunbunbl0gs @idgaf-if-youre-here @youflowerr-youfeast @thearchersstuff @bellsdi0r @wonderheartz @jjgsunflower @butterflies35 @kenziepickle @josierosie @laheyxlover @mrsmattytkachuk (sorry if your tag hasn't worked btw)

[illyabata]

scars are A Thing™ with wriothesley and nobody can convince me otherwise, idc if there is zero mention of his scars or their meaning when he comes out idc it’s my permanent headcanon that scars and their stories are simply entangled with his character idc

so now i give you: wriothesley who is fascinated by your scars

tw: discussion of scars lol, but in no way do i indicate their origin unless it’s stretch marks. however if talk of scars at all is triggering to you, dont read!! it’s sweet fluffy stuff, but that doesn’t matter if it will trigger you. please take care :)

sfw, big brainrot under cut

theyre so much smaller than his, more delicate, just like you. doesnt matter if compared to other people you are big or tall, he’s such a big guy that he makes you feel small no matter your size or height. and no matter what your scars look like to you, to him they are beautiful. to him they are delicate.

he’s enamored by all of your scars no matter their origin—stretch marks, however, seem to intrigue him the most of all. he’s absolutely transfixed by them, and you can never understand why. he’s simply mesmerized by the way the blemished skin stretches as he thumbs and presses it, watching the discoloration flatten itself only to bloat back when he leaves it alone. for some reason he just seems so puzzled by the concept of natural scarring of the body; nothing had happened to harm you for these to appear—they’re simply the product of change, your skin either going through rapid periods of expanding or shrinking. he thinks they’re pretty.

he’d spend so long just running his rough fingers over your skin, absorbed in the feeling of the puckered tissue under his own blemished hands. whether the scars are stretch marks or from something else, he loves them, he loves you.

this might sound weird but i just like to imagine you both spend time gently tracing each others’ scars as comfort, like it sounds weird in words but it makes sense i promise. there is something intimate and fascinating about scars, no matter what they’re from; it’s truly like the language of your body’s history, a record of what has occurred. you can resent them or be proud of them, it really depends on the person and situation—but regardless, scars are always a record, and that is a constant no matter the person.

and if you’re not comfortable with that level of touch or that much attention on your scars, that is absolutely okay. he’s not going to make you uncomfortable, he’ll always ask if it’s okay before he looks at or touches them—or touches you at all, really. he never wants to hurt you. and if you say you’d rather he not touch your scars, he’ll understand and just show you he loves you—all of you—in some other way.

like idk about anyone else or if its just me and im fucking insane but sometimes i get lost looking at my own scars; sometimes the human body at work is just kind of fascinating to watch, and even more so in retrospect. it’s like holy fuck you’re looking at its handiwork, you can plainly see how the skin has been so masterfully rebuilt into this little woven bandaid of cells, carefully crafted to not only rebuild but protect. your body has looked after itself, and it will continue to do so. and thats just kind of a fascinating thing to me idk😭

some extra thoughts about scars, not really to do with wrio; red brackets will indicate the end of it if you want to skip: [[ it usually replaces any feeling of disgust i have because instead of focusing on the bad feeling of remembering where they came from or being sad at the way they look im able to think about how cool it is the way my body recovered and made my skin even stronger; it didnt just wipe it all away and give me a clean slate so i could forget, it pieced the cells together again bit by bit until it had not only replaced the wound but enforced it—so instead of forgetting the bad feelings, they were replaced by wonder. sort of like a sign that says “proof that where once there was pain, now there is strength”. it’s kind of like how they say you don’t just try to quit bad habits, you must replace the bad habit with a good one. you can replace the bad feelings associated with your scars with new feelings, whether they are good feelings or neutral feelings or meh feelings. ]]

before you, he understood scars to be an ugly thing—a source of shame, a show for others to marvel at if he left them uncovered, for them to ogle at and whisper about as if trying to guess the origin of the wounds was a sort of entertainment to them. and then in the fortress of meropide, his scars felt much less like a source of shame and more like an intimidation factor (which wasn’t something he necessarily felt good about, but it was something that he benefitted from as the duke). but when you came along and he began to know you, suddenly they were this beautiful, fascinating phenomenon that lead him to view his own scars in a different light.

he’s a powerful, strong man, yes. he’s intimidating and feared, but he is also loved, and all for good reason—he is solid and safe, an image of reliability to others. and sometimes it could weigh him down when he couldn’t seem to let another help carry the burden.

the way you made him feel, though, tracing his big ugly scars like they were rivers, like they weren’t repulsive—it changed him entirely, and it changed the way he saw himself. in the overworld, he was a criminal brute slathered in the proof of his savageness. in the fortress, he was the rock-solid standard for redemption, and he had to uphold his firm reputation. but with you, he was able to be fragile; with you, the walls he had built to protect himself from both sides of fontaine’s society came tumbling down, because he didn’t have to pretend when he was with you.

if such a small, sweet thing like you could see him in such a kind light with so much love in those eyes of yours, perhaps he was not so bad after all.

everyone else in all of teyvat could believe he was truly a bad guy like he sometimes enjoyed playing at—but it wouldn’t matter, because there you were in his bed every night, held fast in his big arms as you mindlessly traced the long, thin writings engraved in his skin, letting the stories they told lull you to sleep.

[theuncannyshii]

I think saiki with a tomboyish girl who's actually really sensitive would be a bit fun like idk bcz saiki seems like he likes girls like Teruhashi 🤭🤭

Plus I've never seen anyone write abt saiki with an introverted reader, Like since Saiki is an INTP I'd LOVE to see him be with an ENTP or ISTP or INFP reader ykykykyk😋😋

i like the way you think

• Reader is tomboyish and introverted but has an adventurous streak (classic ISTP or ENFP vibes). They're not afraid to get their hands dirty but secretly blush at small compliments or sweet gestures.

• Saiki initially notices how you act confidently in public but always take time to retreat when overwhelmed. He finds it odd but… oddly relatable.Tough Exterior, Soft Heart: While you're comfortable joking around with others and teasing Saiki, your sensitivity shows in quiet moments—like getting teary-eyed at a heartfelt story or overthinking a casual comment.

• You admire Saiki's calm and collected demeanor but assume he finds you "too much." Saiki secretly admires your straightforwardness and adaptability, even if you throw him off with your unpredictability.

• You’re busy fixing something (like a vending machine or a random gadget) when Saiki happens to walk by. You make a self-deprecating joke when you struggle, and Saiki telepathically remarks, “It’s not broken; you’re just using brute force.” You snap, “and you think you can fix it, genius?” Saiki casually hits the machine, and it works. Cue your annoyance, but you're secretly impressed.

• First Emotional Slip! You tell a story about a pet you had, and Saiki notices your voice gets softer. You quickly play it off with a sarcastic remark, but he catches how your hands shake slightly. Saiki thinks, 'So, they're sensitive despite the act. I’d better tread lightly… or not mention it at all.'

• After a loud, chaotic group outing (with Nendou and the gang), Saiki teleports away… but reappears when he sees you sitting outside alone, looking tired. Without saying a word, he sits next to you and hands you a coffee jelly. You’re shocked but grateful, though you tease, “Aw, is this how you flirt, Saiki?” He just stares blankly, but his ears go slightly pink.

• During a casual conversation about why Saiki doesn’t date, you offhandedly say, “I mean, not everyone can date someone perfect like Teruhashi.”Saiki smirks (inwardly) and deadpans, “Perfect isn’t my type.” You’re flustered but try to recover by saying, “So what is your type? Don’t say ‘quiet girls.’”

• Saiki: …She has no idea she’s my type, does she?

• You pull Saiki out of his comfort zone without overwhelming him. While he normally avoids chaotic people, your quieter side gives him a sense of balance.Your resourcefulness intrigues him; he often finds himself watching you fix or build things and even subtly helps when you're stuck.

• Your sensitivity teaches Saiki to be more empathetic, and though he won’t admit it, he starts picking up on your emotions faster than he does for others.

• You two develop a teasing yet supportive relationship. You openly call Saiki out on his bluntness, while he learns to subtly comfort you during vulnerable moments. Teruhashi notices Saiki spending more time with you and gets jealous, which you jokingly play into: “Sorry, Teruhashi, guess I’m stealing your spotlight.” Saiki internally thinks, Spotlight? She doesn’t even realize how she stands out. Saiki realizes he doesn’t mind the occasional chaos if it’s with you—and you, in turn, appreciate the quiet, grounding presence he provides.

[jewishgirlrevolt]

Objective review of episodes 1&2 of Agatha All Along, Coven of Chaos, whatever SPOILERS!!!! So many SPOILERS

It's intriguing. Agatha is woken up and we see that Westview knows exactly who she is and just kind of humored her as "Agnes" playing a long. She's the "cookie" neighbor.

Aubrey Plaza is awesome. I haven't seen her in much. So I have nothing to compare her performance to. Just that I thought she was good.

The Witches Road song is cool. Good harmonies.

What else: Some jump scares in episode 2.

What am I forgetting?

Ah yes: So Teen is um....a goth, witchcraft nerd. He's kind of like a male Willow Rosenberg. What is interesting is that Teen doesn't have a name or backstory that Agatha can hear. It gets all muffled. But he did drop that his mom died.

If he is Billy, his Jewishness is going to be a quick flashback to his bar mitzvah and will probably never be mentioned again. Because as we learned children, superhero films are apparently allergic to words like "Jewish."

There is still hope that he turns out to be Agatha's son, however. His obsession with Agatha, the fact that in the cool opening sequence where Agnes thinks she's a detective, her tragic detective backstory is her missing child. So maybe he is her son and those whole Billy Kaplan thing is a misirect. I hope. IDK. I'd rather he be anyone but Billy. But I have no hopes.

Ironically, the only time I could have maybe believed Joe was Billy Kaplan was when he was being a bitch to Agatha in her detective world. And not whatever we got later. There are some hints about how he wants the road for power, to fly and blast people. Why he wants those things we do not know. Also, he does have a boyfriend who is just "Boyf" and he "worries."

Also he better not be Billy because I have to say, a Jewish kid casting spells in Latin really rubs me the wrong way.

If you forget or don’t think about Billy. The shoe has potential. I’m just not sure what to make of it yet. Good mystery. All characters serve a purpose. Idk what purpose teen serves. But we’ll find out.

[itsonlyfanservice]

https://www.tumblr.com/itsonlyfanservice/761751957725691904/i-noticed-one-very-interesting-detail-and-i-want?source=share

I wanna like, comment on and reblog your post so bad, but I'll keep this anonymous because I don't want people seeing my blog (being a lurker is the best thing for me right now, I don't wanna disturb my peace by inviting drama). Anyway I just wanna say you are 100% correct. It's always been this way. I noticed this very early when I was new to the fandom and I wasn't even Jimin biased (I was drawn to JK's personality because it reminded me so much of my own and I was intrigued by the person he becomes every time he's near Jimin)

This fandom has just never liked Jimin receiving any kind of praise or being acknowledged for his talents or his beautiful personality, and I don't know why. You can just never praise Jimin without people coming at you with some "well x member is better, x member also does this, x member did that too". Even when you come across a BTS video from an OT7 page that highlights Jimin, the comments section will be riddled with praises for other members: "omg but can we please talk about Tae here" "JHope's jawline tho" "Nah it's JK for me" (and these comments will have hundreds to thousands of likes with the ones that praise Jimin barely going over 50 most of the time, and I'm not even kidding)

The thing is I wouldn't be bothered at all by the member praise, I'd just brush it as ARMYs being weird and OT7ifying anything BTS as always. And there's nothing wrong with noticing other members in a video. But the problem is that it only happens with Jimin. Other members receive praise and almost all the comments agree and add to it, but Jimin gets praised and it's like they try to shift the focus. When I was baby ARMY, I felt like I was walking on eggshells regarding Jimin all the time and that whenever I praised him, I had to make sure I insert something about another member too just to create "balance" and not be called an anti, because somehow that's how ARMYs made you feel if you liked Jimin (I felt the same way as a Jikooker, by the way. I couldn't hype their bond without feeling the need to mention their bonds with other members because then I'd be labelled a delulu joker , even though at the time what they had was just a beautiful friendship in my eyes. I feel like the two go hand in hand; being a Jikooker and a Jimin lover idk)

And then there's the thing with establishing anyone who shows special attention towards him persona non grata. Once someone with a huge following (like the YT reactors, big accounts on X) says Jimin is their bias, ARMYs will immediately start watching them like a hawk, waiting for any opportunity to take their words, twist them and accuse them of being diet/undercover Jimin solos. Other members, especially JK, also grab attention from those people like Jimin does, but you'll NEVER see ARMYs giving them grief or calling them JK solos and BTS antis just for praising something about JK the way they do with Jimin biased people.

I can't tell you how many times I've had to see Jimin-biased defend themselves and reiterate that they are not solos and antis of BTS but just like the fcking dude, to getting their accounts suspended because they got mass reported. Just recently a new ARMY dad called ARMYs out for harrassing him just for always pointing out how impressed he is with Jimin and even said "I thought there was such a thing as a bias in this fandom and that most fans have one, so why is it suddenly a problem for me to have one?"

And yes, they do treat Jimin's fans like the scum of the earth, especially his solos. Solos are scum indeed but there's just this weird reaction to PJMs in general that the fandom has as a whole compared to other solos, when the other members' solos, especially Jungkook's, are exceedingly diabolical. You'd think PJMs are the ones who've been harrassing a member for years, always trying to frame him for any and every scandal under the sun, harrassed his family members and managed to get to them by successfully involving the media, prompting them to delete posts about their own son, creating fake accounts and news articles about how his success is manufactured and that his fans are streaming his music through fraudulent means, set the Korean Ministry of Defense on him in hopes that he'll be outed and his life will be ruined.

All of this, for me, has long proven that ARMYs (not all, of course, but a very large majority) just do not like Jimin. For what reason, I don't know. But there's always been this subtle vibe like they don't really consider him a member of BTS. Maybe it's less about dislike and just more about indifference. It's how people have been treating the Jimin hate like it's just another Tuesday.

Responses to it being "just ignore the weirdos/they are just jealous of Jimin/block and move on, it's not worth your time", to people expressing genuine outrage and effectively working to have accounts taken down immediately when the hate is about another member. I used to think Twitter was just a shit app that doesn't really utilize the report button, until I saw just how perfectly fine it works when it's about a BTS member who's not Jimin.

It's how people were so appalled last year and wrote long-winded posts about how PJMs are the absolute scourge of the earth for saying Jungkook slept with BangPD for all that "payola" with Seven, when for literal YEARS before 2023 (as early as 2016) it was JIMIN who was receiving these same allegations from Taekookers and Jungkook solos about how he's been sleeping with the boss for success DAILY, calling him a nepo baby. During FACE era, posts from JJKs were going around talking about they bet he let each and every producer there c*m in him for those Like Crazy remixes.

I'm not at all condoning any hate towards the other members, nor do I believe that tit for tat is the way to go about things. But it really fills my heart with such bitterness seeing how ARMYs never move against the hate Jimin faces beyond writing a half-assed "the hate against Jimin is so forced" comment and calling it a day. But when it's about someone else they come with full defense, calling out PJMs by their name (when they NEVER call other solos out by their name, by the way) and effectively drive them off any platform. Why can't it be the same about all solos and every person who writes a single bad word about BTS?

Anyway this got unnecessarily long. I had a lot more to say but it has escaped my mind, thankfully. I broke my own heart all over again by writing this.

Damn, you literally said everything I wanted to write, but I was just too lazy and thought no one would read it 😩

I am very surprised by this attitude. Jimin is superfluous in the group, his fans are superfluous in the fandom. Everyone can talk about everyone, but not about Jimin. And I don’t even understand where this demonstrative ignoring came from. You can’t throw it off to the general tkkrs here. Absolutely everyone does this, no matter what bias they have, which is strange.

[tg-pilled]

Let's discuss: Queerness in Tokyo Ghoul!

To start off, I just want to mention that these are things I have noticed. Nothing is necessarily canon (or non canon) but it's something I'm very interested in. I've been learning a lot in the queer horror club I'm in and it's been really fun dissecting Tokyo Ghoul in the same way!

This will go character to character. It's not going to be a complete list as there's SO much to cover but...

Kaneki: Not to state the obvious but his friendship with Hide surpasses a Lot of what heteronormativity usually allows. I don't think he's even fully aware of his attraction until after he meets Touka. Because Hide had been such a permanent fixture in his life growing up, they never really had ever been apart. Their bond is deep and strong and definitely can be looked at from an extremely queer perspective. (I'm not trying to say that all men who show affection to one another are queer because that is simply not true.) Once he becomes a ghoul and he has that separation from Hide, I think that is when his sexuality is fully recognized. Especially in the manga, his bond with Hide runs deeper than with almost every other character. I'd say the exception to that rule is Touka in :re. In the manga during the death kiss, he didn't even know if Hide was real or not. He was in such a state of disorientation and confusion but Hide was still the one that he saw. Of course, Hide was actually there with him. But because Kaneki was in such a delirious state, surely he could have hallucinated the death kiss to be with Touka? Or anyone else? Why specifically did Hide come to mind during that time? Again, he was in a moment of crisis and Hide had always been that stability for him but it's just curious to think about...

Hide: I've seen and read so many different rumours about how Sui Ishida intended for Hide to be canonically bisexual. However, I can't find that interview or confession ANYWHERE in a way that makes it clear that Sui Ishida actually said that so we will disregard that for now. Setting that aside, Hide has a very intriguing point of view of Kaneki. His insight on Kaneki's life is the closest we get to an outside perspective of Kaneki's behaviour from an intimate view. Obviously we see other ghouls, CCG members, etc. studying the way Kaneki behaves but we never see it in the same way that we do with Hide. That boy has been taking notes on Kaneki since he first started acting odd. He caught onto Kaneki being a ghoul with ease (ofc this depends on the version as well. We are ignoring the live action version because it screws up the source material.) No matter how hard Kaneki tried, he could not get Hide to stop caring and stop observing. Hide went undercover in both the CCG and ghoul world to make sure Kaneki was okay. His life centred around Kaneki. That in itself is a confession of love and not in the platonic way.

Uta: Setting aside the way he looks at Renji for a moment, his entire being breaks the norms which is what queerness and queer history has always been. Uta quite literally makes masks so ghouls can create a whole other identity surrounding their otherness. His entire presence screams queer-coded.

Tsukiyama: I don't think I need to explain this one much tbh but his obsession with Kaneki cannot be overlooked. It is obviously super creepy in a lot of way and he crosses a TON of boundaries. However, that level of obsession is definitely not in a "you're my guy pal, let's go lift weights at the gym" (idk what cishet men do I'm sorry). His fascination with both the male and female ghouls feels very queer to me even though it is to an extreme that needs to be observed and dissected with caution.

Nico: He is the embodiment of a gay stereotype. Obviously not all rep is good rep but he definitely fits the mold and he is definitely queer, no doubt about it.

Mutsuki: Without a doubt, he is trans. Many people argue "oh he only transitioned so he could become a Quinx Squad member and change his identity better blah blah blah." HOWEVER. I raise you: once Urie found out his assigned gender at birth, why did he feel so deeply uncomfortable? Obviously, he was worried that Urie would tell everyone and their mom but even after Urie kept that a secret, he was still nervous. It's almost like he didn't want to be treated differently because of his assigned gender at birth and transition... There is a lot about Mutsuki that could have been handled better but I also think that him keeping his preferred name, pronouns, etc. is so important. Not once did Urie question it, he just wanted Mutsuki to keep doing his job well. Mutsuki is a very complex character and you can dissect his storyline from a million povs but I think first and foremost that he is trans and that there isn't really a question as to whether or not he wants to be referred to as a man or not

Overall, all these characters are only a small part of an even LARGER queer analogy! Tokyo Ghoul is about a man learning to grapple with being both ghoul AND human. Taking this into account, a ton of queer people have to be worried about being 'found out' or 'outed' because we live in a world where it is dangerous for queer people to exist still (much like it is dangerous for ghouls to exist). Kaneki is coming to terms with the fact that he might not be fully human (or the societal norm). Learning to deal with that, especially when you feel like you're the first EVER because you have no prior experience or relationships with other members of the LGBTQ+ community is terrifying! That feeling of 'otherness' or 'monstrosity' is unfortunately something a lot of queer folks have to go through. The CCG has a very religious/governmental parallel to it and could even be used as a metaphor for the hate that queer people receive from institutions that benefit from our suffering. However, Akira AND Amon both empathize with Takizawa eventually and are subject to abuse and rejection because they love and care about someone in the 'other' community. Haise's transition and morphing with Kaneki is a beautiful metaphor for how many queer people will try to be 'normal' or conform to society for protection but you always kind of know your identity is there. As mentioned earlier, Uta makes masks for other ghouls so they can create a separate identity to protect themselves when trying to exist. That feeling of two separate identities, two separate worlds that you think cannot combine is SO common in the queer community. Kaneki feeling like he isn't enough of ghoul OR human to fit into the world at all is often how queer people are treated too. Being told you're not enough of something and being rejected by communities who allegedly were there to protect you. To conclude, I'd like to say thank you for reading all this (if you did) and also feel free to add on, debate, or include things I'm missing! Also I wrote this very very sleep deprived so I'm sorry about my grammar. Okay goodnight oomfies

[youremyheaven]

I fell in love with a ketuvian who has uttara bhadra sun+jupiter and rohini moon.. he also has 12th house placements. I can tell you he was like a perfect man for everyone, but also unnoticed. Handsome and yet away from public eye. Wise and yet indecisive at some point(?) but when he comes to a conclusion, he will follow through with his choice. I admired him so much even when he told me everything about his life. Our situationship only lasted for 3 months, and yet here I am 4 years later still wondering if whatever he felt for me was true. I’m not really asking for advise but i only wanted to share(unless hehe). I never blamed him for anything tho, he has his choices to make, there was so much burden being shouldered. If anyone of our babies here have any experience with the same placements i mentioned, i hope i could hear them too. Hi to our precious admin, if this is alright to share here thank you very much.

I hope our discord members share there experiences too if they may! ❤️

UBP Sun & Jupiter, Rohini Moon, Ketuvian with 12h placements

I think people with heavy 12h placements are kind of unforgettable. they have something to them that makes them sooo special. its a very heavy energy ngl, you can always tell that these people are going thru tough stuff but their 'darkness' or suffering makes them more alluring somehow? 12h or pisces rashi is commonly found in the charts of manyyy iconic celebs and sex symbols. the darkness and mystique makes them vv intriguing despite them being so elusive. they're so hard to reach and penetrate energetically but this is exactly why people go crazy for them. the less they try, the more they magnetize others.

Your guy has pisces rashi AND 12h placements, no wonder you feel this way

but that said, you said you doubt whether "whatever he felt for me was true" and i think that's very Moon + Ketu,, Ketuvians are so detached that one often wonders whether they care about u at all. Moon's nature is ever shifting, one day its waxing, next day its waning, this means Moon dominant individuals are very moody and change their mind about things frequently. if you ask them about xyz today they'll say one thing but ask them 2 weeks later and they'll say something entirely different. this can be vv confusing and disorienting for others. Moon is also linked to manipulation but since idk this person, I can't say he was like that.

but all in all, i think our attachment to certain individuals, esp those who are no longer part of our life, says more about us than them?? youre capable of intense feeling and empathy, thats why he still lingers in your mind. you think of him positively for the most part, you view him in a nuanced way but focus on his light, i think you're very loving and giving as a person. but sometimes we can be too loving.

romanticizing our experiences and our lives is wonderful but sometimes it prevents us from seeing situations and people for what they actually are. try to think about it objectively, was this guy actually as amazing? think about his behaviour in different instances? did he ever say things or do things that were 'off'? our memory is very partial so we often only remember what we want to, so its possible you now dont remember any of his 'bad' qualities but i think it will give you immense peace to let go of this connection. you can wish them well and try to forget them. our minds create their own experiences, the more you think about him and try to dissect him, the more you take away from a time that is already past.

be content with the memories but let everything else goo

just my 2 cents,, i hope i dont sound like im trying to tell u what 2 do or anything (even tho thats literally how ive worded things lmao)

others with similar experiences, how did ya'll cope?

[akookminsupporter]

I honestly don’t care too much about the whole jk 🚬 thing, just like I didn’t care with V nor with Suga. I can not like something and still love/like and respect the people who chooses to do those things. Like me not liking the idea of vaping and my sisters doing it — you do you I guess 🤷🏻‍♀️. Also, don’t know why people are so surprised about the fact and the possibility of him and any other member/idol smoking, because just like drinking is very popular in Korea, as far as I know smoking rates are kinda high too. So yes I was surprised at first, for reasons like the ones you’ve mentioned (his voice, health and smell sensibility), but overall I was like “oh, okay so he does that too”. We also need to remember and understand that even if we see it on footage and/or by hearing them talk about it —still we will never know the pressure, exhaustion and stress they go under on a daily basis, and because of that, it is never our place to judge how they choose to enjoy and release themselves, specially if it’s not affecting/hurting anyone. Now, the only thing that intrigues me about this whole thing is why now are we being bombarded with so much… idk a good word so I’m just gonna name it “crude/sensible/private moments” of them (all of them in a way). Like the V and Jennie video, I just don’t see how 10 years in the industry have been so relatively “smooth”, but now in this second chapter it feels like we have had one revelation after another ? I’m not saying it’s planned, but I also don’t think it’s entirely coincidental, specially with how the members (like RM and JK in recent lives) have been expressing themselves and slowly removing/breaking the “idol standard” frame.

Let's talk a bit about the last part of your message.

I think I mentioned in one of the Asks I posted a couple of hours ago, that I think the reason we are seeing more of the guys' private lives is because fans are not respecting those moments like they used to. I don't think it's because the guys are now doing this or that, I want to believe that no one is naive enough to believe that before those 7 men stayed at home doing nothing, apart from working. Now the lack of content has caused many to look for any way to find out about them. And now they are quicker to justify why a video or photo etc. spreads much faster. Many don't care about the guys and respecting their private lives, many care about feeding the parasocial relationship they have created with them. Or feeding that obsession. That addiction; because what's the point of knowing what they do in their spare time if we're supposed to be fans of their music and variety content?

"specially with how the members (like RM and JK in recent lives) have been expressing themselves and slowly removing/breaking the “idol standard” frame."

As for this part, I think it's because they really understand the power they have, not just in Korea but in the industry in general. I don't know much about other kpop groups but it's clear to me that no other group has the power that bts has. And it's important to clarify that I'm not talking about popularity, that's something different although no one has the popularity that bts has but in this case, I'm talking about power. Of influence.

Although there are some groups that are quite popular globally they don't have the power and influence that bts has and this is proven by the participations that bts has had in important stages outside of music. Yes, those appearances are also due to the popularity of the group but mostly due to the power and influence they have. Even if that influence was only on their fandom, that would be huge because bts fandom is huge and that's something that I think everyone with full knowledge of the facts recognises.

And BTS knows it. The members know it. They are positioned enough in the industry and society I think, to shake up the status quo - once again - of what it is to be an Idol. A kpop artist and even a Korean artist. I think that also applies to their relationship with the fandom. Joon and jungkook particularly, they're more vocal in expressing what they don't like, in calling out the fandom for doing or saying something they don't agree with and that's important. I think they've understood that the image that we had of them and that maybe they were projecting was a little bit unrealistic and in this new stage of their careers, they're trying to be more honest or honest enough. Real.

[nishipostitz]

haikyuu boys who made time capsules with you

 starring! hinata, tendou, bokuto x gn!reader

tw! drinking in hinata’s and bokuto’s, mention of cemetery in tendou’s. it’s not a bad thing though! maybe? idk..

hinata would be such a cutie when opening the capsule with you. he has a very vivid memory of how you even agreed to make a capsule. the capsule was made 5 years back when both of you were in your third year of high school. you guys had just started dating then. hinata may have forgotten how you ended up making a capsule, but he would never forget what was put inside of it. okay, it might be gross to hear now, but he probably put a piece of a steam bun in there or something. or maybe a snatched hairtie from the coach.. or maybe a cigarette butt, idk, that guy is..... anyways, what you buried inside was nothing that special. just a pencil that hinata had given you when you forgot your pencil pouch at home. some other things, like stickers you would put on your notebook and EVERYTHING. so when you guys opened up the capsule, the amount of memories rushing back inside your heads was enough to make you both nostalgic. and so after that, you guys called up the karasuno team to plan a hangout, even inviting coach ukai for some drinks because everyone is legal!

tendou introduced the idea of the time capsule at first. you were questioning the suggestion, but you were also intrigued. because in your mind, you thought that the time capsule wouldn’t even be stay underground for more than a week or so. but lo and behold, you forgot about it after burying it.... tendou and you weren’t really dating yet. you guys were in the friends but mutual pining stage. so still shy. like c’mon, you guys BOTH know you got a thing for each other, but no one wants to say anything first. aside from that, tendou suggested the idea because he wanted to see where you guys would be in the future when you actually open the capsule. so now as you two are a couple, you came back to where you buried the capsule and dug it out. the spot was not the best because it was really close to a grave site. your high school selves would’ve never guessed the cemetery would expand this much. so you were getting the dirty looks from some people. like ‘have they got no shame doing this is broad daylight?’ and all that... but alas! you got the capsule out and the people around you had released a breath they didn’t know they were holding. inside, you saw a magazine that tendou would share with ushijima. you also found some treats in there. but what you both were surprised to see were his finger tapes. oh the memories 

bokuto was dead beat drunk when he randomly mentioned the idea of the time capsule to you. you had actually forgotten about it. so you dragged drunk bokuto with you to sober him up. surprisingly, he was able to remember where it was. it was no surprise that it would be outside of akaashi’s house though.. but him being drunk and all, you guys decided to reminisce the past. bokuto had snuck out of practice early that day, saying how his mom fell down the stairs- and you both gathered all the things you wanted to bury. bokuto laid out his singular knee pad, a ball pump, a piece of a sandwich, while you had stolen some drunk guy’s alcohol bottle off the street and your diary. bokuto was confused at first, but when you explained why you had an alcohol bottle, he understood. “I wanted to see if we would be able to drink when we come back to dig this out”. so here you were, both cringing and ‘ew’ ing at the old bottle. “I may be drunk, but I know gross when alcohol when I see one” and you both broke out into fits of laughter. 

let me know if you guys want a part two or not!! because I kinda wanna write for more characters, but I've run out of ideas T_T and feel free to request anything! for now, I'm willing to write about anyone and anything LOL

[myreygn]

Demon Slayer or atla for the shippy meme?

why not both! :D

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KNY

lowkey otp: uzusane!! i think i just started shipping them because i liked them individually and wanted to throw them together but i read some really good fanfics and they grew on me so much, pushing my rarepair agenda til i die!

highkey notp: giyutan and uzuzen, i just don't like the thought of these 20 something year olds meddling with teens. giyuu in my head is like a brother to tanjiro and tengen and zenitsu have an extremely entertaining dynamic but it doesn't read ship to me at all.

[softly] don’t notp: i'm getting kinda hooked on rengiyuu, i just thought about it because i needed to put some characters into an incorrect quote but ever since they've just been on my mind.

highkey otp but i’m scared of saying it because it’s not a very popular choice: NEZUSEN! and no this is not a typo, i'm talking about nezuko and senjuro. this comic by one of my favorite fan artists got me intrigued and i love the idea of them getting together some time post canon when they're all grown up, like a really nice reunion story would be so cute.

highkey otp and anyone on my tumblr knows it: it is so cruel that you'd make me decide but i think. and i hate to do this because it means i can't mention all of the other options but i think i have to go with sanekana. there's so many demon slayer ships that are so near and dear to my heart but sanekana is just. idk man. they're everything to me.

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ATLA

lowkey otp: agaiiiiin so many options... i have to say yueki, yue and suki. idk i just always have them in the back of my mind when i think about zukka and come on they would make such a kickass couple.

highkey notp: tokka. i think toph's little crush on sokka is adorable but they're siblings your honor i'm sorry.

[softly] don’t notp: this is my time to come clean and tell you that i never truly got over my maiko phase. not entirely, at least, like i have other ships that i definitely prefer but they're just hnnngh i cannot sit here and pretend like "i love zuko more than i fear you" means nothing to me.

highkey otp but i’m scared of saying it because it’s not a very popular choice: i need you to stay with me. this started off as a funny idea from a shitpost but. jetkojin. jet zuko and jin. i loved jin so much, i would've loved to see more of her and just imagine throwing her into the already spicy jetko mix, like we all love some jetko right but now make it POLY. marvelous experience.

highkey otp and anyone on my tumblr knows it: maileemaileemaileemaileemaileemailee- i feel like my life is more peaceful ever since i have accepted them as my otp, they're everything to me and i could not be happier.

[mamamittens]

I'm contemplating what to do for Hancock's jewelry and bouncing ideas in my head for the two new Oh Sweet Child requests.

Pending thoughts for jewelry

I'm thinking something like a choker but it's a snake that gently bites the end of its tail. I've long had a motif that folks connected to the RA have a pearl somewhere in their jewelry so maybe the eyes?

Perhaps some scales are gemstones depending on what kinda snake I do though keeping it mostly gold would match with her usual tastes ngl.

Considered a hanging chain from the fangs to a teardrop ruby that is meant to hang between or just under her breasts. I forget if there's a specific name for this but it's usually only done to compliment a plunge neckline or draw the eye to the breasts in general for women--I've never seen this in men's jewelry fashion unless you count dog tags or a ring that is meant to hide under a shirt when desired. Maaayybe 'drops' of rubies down the chain as a sexy intrigue piece that also hunts at how damn dangerous this woman is to get close to.

Okay, so thoughts for Whitebeard's platonic end

I'm not entirely sure on what I'll have for his. Maybe reader has a bad dream (cliche I know lol) and ends up talking to him in a little heart to heart.

Oh! Or maybe reader sneaks out when everyone has passed tf out during a party to try and either escape or get fresh air without being hounded. Idk. Depends on when this takes place cause at the end of Sweet Child they've pretty well resigned to sticking around.

Anyway, party walk, the reader thinks everyone is asleep but as it turns out, Whitebeard tends to be a very light sleeper when on deck and it leads to a soft conversation.

I've tried very hard to not have too much detail in reader's past so it's not specific to anyone--no mention of family or friends--but I have mentioned some vague nothings about "shit choices" implying the marine enlisting wasn't entirely by choice. I didn't have any specific plans for that or secret btw, I just needed something to give the reader a reason to not fold immediately into Whitebeard's crew.

Anyway, I thought it'd be sweet if part of this heart to heart is a conversation about wanting to have a choice in a world that very much doesn't really let you have that. Not knowing what they want to do with their life because they haven't had the ability to put much stock into the future--which is ultimately why they're so passive about their fate despite having a desire to leave.

Which naturally leads to Whitebeard talking about the different reasons he "adopts" his children. The one relevant to the reader is protection and a desire to see them flourish. He didn't seem them out but he knew when they arrived that he wanted them to be apart of his family.

Maybe he suggests they start writing about the many dangerous animals they seem to have a natural ability to charm. At the very least, it gives them an excuse to go after them and well... It's hardly the most dangerous hobby any of his children have picked up Whitebeard adopts feral pirates almost daily he feels kinship at how much reader loves things that could and would rip them to shreds.

And finally Izo.

Izo gives me the most trouble because as far as I'm aware of he's a fan of his guns and he likes cross dressing--if only just in cosmetics and performing traditional Japanese activities that are usually reserved for women like dancing.

I'd need to double check that last part honestly but that's where I'm at right now for understanding his character.

And he hasn't really shown up so I don't have any real basis for his stance on the reader--nor do I have any direction for the request. But I feel like he'd admire the reader not caving into the crew quickly given that it shows they do have dedication and standards.

But I'm pretty lost in bonding for either romantic or platonic senses. At least without getting into conversations about gender which would be difficult to dance around without assigning the reader a specific gender outright.

I know from comments most assume the reader is female and in rather hoping that's because the readers are mostly female as opposed to me missing glaring red "THIS IS NOT A MAN" flags... Which would make me sad cause y'all it's really hard to write some of this stuff without committing to a sex or gender 🥲

But! The point is that from the sounds of it so far, at the very least the reader doesn't typically do any of the cosmetics associated with feminine presenting fashion. So I'd need to be very careful in phrasing to avoid breaking this without talking about "well I'm a dude and dudes don't usually wear lipstick where I'm from" or "I was never a girly girl growing up" cause of the obvious reasons (at least I hope it's obvious).

I'm just not sure what kind of common ground they'd bond over so there's a strong chance it'll be a bit before Izo's comes out, unfortunately.

Perhaps a conversation about duty? And growing last what you'd previously assumed would be your entire life??? That'd be interesting and a unique point only the marine!reader could come from given the drastic difference from marine to full on pirate.

Anyway, I need to sleep now before I completely fuck myself up for work Monday lol

Btw, Melody hasn't been forgotten I just set it down for a moment while I consider how/if I'll drag out the next part before I move Koala into the story.