#if I ever do it it’ll just to learn new languages at this point

[xannerz]

honestly used to daydream abt having multiple degrees and being that sorta 🤪lifelong learner🎓 but law school devastated me so much I’m averse to the idea of taking cc classes for funsies now

[georgiapeach30513]

With Your Touch, Part 8

Summary: There's some things that need to be discussed

Pairings: Lloyd Hansen x Reader

Rating: explicit

Warnings:  explicit language, explicit sexual content, D/s dynamics, teasing, fingering, degradation, praise kink, humiliation kink, toy play, slight voyeurism, unprotected sex, creampie, mentions of cum play, bit of breeding kink, mentions of spanking, 18+ ONLY

Word Count: 6.1K

Previous

Series Masterlist

Lloyd leans into Lyla’s bedroom, smiling at you unable to leave her. You don’t say anything, or even move, you just stare at the precious Lyla Bee. A soft smile turns your mouth up. So often you show your love for her. It isn’t something you have to do, it’s something you choose to do daily. It’s the sexiest thing you can do. You love an extension to him.

He’d have to make it official. Eventually give Lyla a sibling. He’s enjoying playing with your body, but he seriously can’t wait to see you swollen with him. To see you around your father and he understands the love that the two of you have. And he knows what a good girl that you are.

Lloyd fully intends on exploring your sweet obedient ways. He wants to push you to your limits, with your complete consent as well. “She’s so beautiful,” you coo down at your daughter. You don’t want anything in this world to ever harm her. If you could keep her this little you would. Freeze time so everything stays this sweet always.

It’s an odd thing to accept that she wants you to be her mom, but also Lloyd. There’s no way that you could love her any more than you do, even if you birthed her. You could spend hours just looking at her. Watching how her lips pucker up, and she even makes smacking noises with her mouth when she’s extra tired. She learns something new everyday, and you don’t want to miss a second of her life.

Lloyd walks up behind you, wrapping both arms around your front. He settles his chin on your shoulder to stare at this beautiful angel with you. “She really is. She’s spectacular.”

“I don’t think her wants her daddy to go back to work,” Lloyd knows exactly what you’re trying to pull. You’ve been laying it on thick all week about his returning to work.

“I think her mama is trying to guilt trip her daddy into not leaving.”

“But it’ll be lonely out here,” he doesn’t have to look at you to know that you're pouting. He doesn’t want to ignore your fears, but also doesn’t want to let you know that this is fully working on him. He’d almost choose to never go back. But you need boundaries. And he has no problem giving them to you, and also enforcing them.

He inhales swiftly, turning his head to kiss on your neck, “I’m going to make it a point to come home every night. Sometimes maybe every other night,” you groan, pushing your ass into his back, and your eyes go wide. His soft kiss turns to a nibble on your neck as he walks you out of her bedroom.

“Why are you hard?”

Groaning, he cups your covered mound, and you whimper. His hands are so large. You’ve had them in you. You still haven’t gotten used to that. Lloyd Hansen has been inside of you. Swimming inside of you. “Lloyd?” You whimper, and he drops his arms from around you, sitting on the couch with a plop, and you see his tightened jeans. “Lloyd!”

“Oh, shut up,” it’s playful, he grins at you. He rubs his hand over his bulge, smiling, “You know, when she goes to sleep, it’s time for mama and daddy to have fun,” the sinful bastard, “But first, we need to establish some boundaries.”

Your brow raises, while you look at him inquisitively, “Dolly, it’s just to make sure that I never take advantage of your trust. You have no idea the ways I want to play and use your body, but you have to give me permission.”

“You have it,” you earnestly answer. Your feet swish back and forth, eyes going glassy as you stare at him. Naturally going into a submissive state, Lloyd has a deep urge to destroy you like this. Just so he can lift you back up. He can’t take advantage of something your body naturally craves.

“You truly don’t understand. Sit,” listening immediately, Lloyd grins, “Good girl. You listen well,” you preen, leaning towards him. “You do well with praise. Noted,” he hums, staring over your body a moment. You’re so reactive to him. Sitting up straighter, and shoulders shimmying. That slight smile tickling the edges of your plump mouth.

“I have very distinct — needs,” that didn’t sound bad. “I haven’t done relationships, and I fear that I could be too much,” that could be putting it lightly. He’s extremely needy, and is prone to stress. He needs you to unwind.

“Why’s that?”

“There’s this bit of a humiliation mixed in with degradation that I enjoy,” inhaling sharply, you find yourself staring at the fabric of the couch. You didn’t know how to press him for more information. “Do you want to be my slut?” You tremble, but nod your head. “Why?”

“I’m just yours?”

“Just mine.”

“That’s why,” Lloyd smirks, “If I asked you to stop, would you?” He makes a weird noise with his mouth, looking up at you, “What does that mean?”

“Sometimes in intense sessions, you say stop because you feel it’s what you should say, but you desperately don’t want me to stop. Hence, the need for a safe word, and the need for me to read your body language. Safe word?”

You think long and hard. You know it needs to be something you wouldn’t normally say out loud. Something easy to remember, easy to say, easy for him to understand even if you whisper it. “Nightingale,” Lloyds eyes blink rapidly, and you’re afraid you said something wrong.

“It’s beautiful,” the smile that lights up your face has him feeling all fuzzy in his stomach. The way your body reacts to him is too addictive. You’re more dangerous than he ever thought about being, “The nightingale is often associated with Venus. I think that’s perfect for you.”

“What do you mean by humiliation?”

Lloyd hisses between his teeth. His hands drag up his thighs, that one is a bit more complicated, “When my fingers are buried so deep into your cunt, do you want me to tell you that you’re taking my fingers like my sloppy little slut?” You look just like a puppy. Nodding your head, and scooting closer to Lloyd. “Do you want me to make you clean up your mess with your tongue for my own enjoyment before I let you fuck yourself with my cock?”

Gulping you nod, “Yes.”

“What about what I mentioned last night? Put the toy version of my cock inside of you, pulling your panties up, and asking you to pour me some bourbon. Maybe ask you to get on your knees to wipe something out of the floor, and I can stare at that toy puckering out your lingerie while you crawl around?”

“My god, yes,” you’re such a slut. Maybe it’s a slut for him. Possibly a slut for the praise, but regardless, a slut. “Yes. I want to play with the little Lloyd toys.”

He chuckles. Reaching over to a drawer, and retrieves out the little toy. He’s bright pink. “Ooh! I want to call him LJ,” it didn’t take a genius to know why you wanted to call the toy that. “What do you want me to do?”

“I want you to behave, and listen. Stop pouting,” his voice is still soft, but the command is obvious. “I want you free use,” you furrow your brows, staring into his eyes. “Anytime I want you, I can use you. With discretion of course. I will never fully share you. I will never let another man look upon your body if you don’t want it. I-I,” he stutters, “I want you to explore your sexuality. If you want someone to join us, I would consider it, but everything is with your say so.”

“Wait another man in the bed with us?” he watches your face intently. Making note of how you’re not disgusted, you’re curious.

“Or woman,” you scrunch your nose up, shaking your head no, “It’s not that bad.”

“I just don’t want to share you.”

“I know you don’t, sweetheart. But sometimes we just have to get it in when we can, and if you’re dripping with my seed, you’ll just have to suck it up, even if people are around,” you are a peculiar and funny little thing. Trying to work out different scenarios. “Let’s say that there is a visitor here, and we’re in the middle of something. We finish up as much as we can. But maybe I can’t fully clean you up. I get off on knowing that you're soaked in my cum, while we have company.”

“Yes,” one simple word is all that he needs to hear. You are truly a slut for him. For wearing him. He reaches over towards you, tugging at the hem of your shirt, and you pull it off with so much enthusiasm. Lloyd leans over just a bit for an open mouth kiss on each nipple. Kissing and sucking on the tender flesh until they’re peaked and pebbled up.

“Take off your bottoms,” you listen. “Such an obedient little one. Now, turn around. I want you laying back on my thigh,” this time you don’t move as quickly. Stubbing up and pouting at him. Refusing to listen to his command, and he slaps at the side of your rear. “Behave, and do as I said, so I can play with you and LJ.”

You may huff, but you listen. Laying back on him, and he taps on your thighs to spread your legs wide open. “What other colors of the little Lloyds are there?”

He leans over your body, gazing intently at your split before he barely flicks your sensitive pearl, “One is blue, and the other is purple,” he is too enthralled in your clit, and you’re becoming too aroused to pay attention. “What are their names?”

“Umm…”

Waiting too long, he squeezes your bundle of nerves between his thumb and forefinger, causing you to arch your back in surprise, “What are their names?”

“L-L-Leonard,” that isn’t what he was expecting. “The blue one, he’s Leonard. The purple is — he’s,” you look down your body, watching as Lloyd plays with you. Comparing the thickness of his fingers to your body. But it’s not overtly sexual. He’s having fun exploring your folds. “His name is — Lennon.”

All L names. You would do that. “You do realize I could have you airtight without me ever being inside of you? I could have LJ in your tight little pussy, Leonard in your ass, and Lennon in your mouth. Watching you go dumb on three cocks that might be shaped like me, but they’re not. And then if you get extra desperate, I could push myself in your cunt. Right beside LJ. Do you think you can handle four of my cocks?”

“No,” he plunges a finger into your warmth, and you try To capture his eyes. He didn’t look disappointed, but he does seem less animated. You don’t like seeing him like that. You want him to look proud, “But I would try.”

“Such an eager little whore. That’s why I like you, you know. You would do anything to please me, wouldn’t you?” Breathlessly you answer him. Nodding your head as he dips another finger into your body. Having you spread out, naked, and vulnerable is his favorite. He’s fully clothed, but he gets to look at the work of art that is you.

Venturing deeper into your cunt, he watches your face with every small movement he makes. Learning what makes you tick, and what you enjoy. Listening to the change of your breathing, and the slight differences in your sounds. And then pulls out of you too soon. He caresses your lips with his fingers, making the pillows look glossy with your essence. And then his meaty fingers go into his mouth where he sucks off the rest of your honey, “Hmm, you taste so sweet.”

He licks his lips, reaching over to grab LJ, and brings it to your mouth, and you suck on him enthusiastically. Trying to show him how much of the toy you can take, but he pulls it out of your mouth, and lowers it to your entrance. Lloyd teases the toy around your hole, and without commandment, you spread out further. Angling your body for easier entrance. He slowly breeches through your walls.

His mouth falls open right along with yours as he studies your body opening up, and accommodating him, LJ. The sounds that your body makes is a symphony, ringing in your home. He becomes obsessed with you. Pushing and pulling out the hot pink toy. Your slick coats the fake version of him. Each push into you, he goes deeper.

Deeper.

Deeper still.

Until he can push it in balls deep, and he holds it there. You took every inch. Every thick veiny inch of the fake him. His free hand cups your breast, and he pinches on your swollen nipple. Perfect. You take him so well. While you may have your toys, he has you as his toy. The things he could do to you. It’s not even innately about sex with you as much as giving you pleasure. He finds pleasure in that.

You’re so reactionary to being filled with him that it nearly makes him weak thinking about you waddling around the house with this stupid dick inside of you. Have you get on all fours while you simulate backing up on him. God, your body is immaculate.

“Lloyd,” you pant out, looking between him, and the immobile toy. You need something else, and he’s not giving it to you. It’s both frustrating, and hot as fuck, and it confuses your brain, “Lloyd? Daddy?”

“Yes, baby?”

“I want to come.”

“You’re such a sweet girl. Can I just play with you?” Your body needs some release. It needs anything besides this torturous nothingness. “Why don’t you play with your clit, and let me just watch you get yourself off.”

His eyes look over to the clock, and he smiles. Still holding that stupid toy fully in you. The depth of it gives your belly a funny feeling. An ache you can’t explain. It doesn’t hurt, it’s not fully uncomfortable, but it is different. “Use both hands. Spread those lips far apart, and let me see that cute little swollen clit of yours.”

You follow his instructions. Letting him see the button before creating tight circles on your body. Your hips start to buck up as you imitate sex. Rocking on the couch just to make your tits bounce. Putting on a show for him so he will want to fuck you. Will want to at least let you come.

Your body climbs with pleasure, and you close your eyes. Envisioning that he is hovering over you. Pushing his length as deep as he can, and a lewd moan escapes your puckered lips. He feels so good deep in your body. He feels good with his weight over you. Filling you up with every inch of him, and with his load right in your belly. “Daddy, I’m so close.”

“There you go, princess. You’re right there aren’t you?” Giving him a head nod, he takes his hand off the toy. Bringing both of them to your tits, and he tweaks, and pinches them. Watching as your swaying body creates the friction with the toy you needed. Sucking the hot pink rod into your body, and lifting up so it pulls out. Little desperate slut, “Such a needy little slut. You’re taking every inch of that pretty little cock. But…”

Lloyd doesn’t get to finish his sentence. His fingers let go of your tits, and he pulls your hands off your body. Keeping them spread so you can’t touch yourself, but your body still searches for movement. “Shh,” he says, but you’re too busy trying to jump over the edge of euphoria. “Dolly, don’t you hear the doorbell ringing?”

“What?” You halt. Listening with haggard breaths, and the doorbell rings again. “Lloyd, no!”

“Don’t pout. Just get dressed. Leave the dick inside of you,” you gawk at him. “I said what I said, Dolly. Dressed, with the dick still inside your body. “It’s just Ari. He arrives almost directly on the dot when I ask him.”

You sit up, starting to pull the wretched pink toy out of your body, and Lloyd tsks you. “I don’t want this in me when Ari is here.”

“Do you remember what we said just moments before?”

“Yeah, but you tricked me. You knew he was coming tonight.”

He actually rolls his eyes at you before grabbing your chin, “What’s your safe word?” You shake your head no, “Either say it, or put your fucking clothes on,” you stare at him a moment, unmoving. “Each second I count is how many spankings you’re getting. One,” you don’t dare move. You can be just as stubborn as him. “Two. Three. Four. Five.”

You cross your arms over your chest. Trying to ignore him. “Six. Seven.”

“Fine!” Your voice is a bit raised as you reach for your shorts. Leaving the panties in the floor, and hope they embarrass him. And you grab your shirt. Asshole. He sits there with his legs crossed looking awfully proud of himself. “Aren’t you going to open the door?” You ask him. He got too comfortable, and now you’re dressed, and still aching to find some release that is just right out of your grasp.

“Nope. You are,” your mouth falls open. “Go on, princess. Let daddy’s friend in. He’s been waiting on you to act like the good girl I know you are,” fucking tease. Standing up. You wince. Not in pain but because the movement sends an odd sense of pleasure through your body. “Ari’s waiting. Go on, waddle for me, baby.”

You aren’t going to waddle. You won’t give him the satisfaction. You’re going to walk very oddly, sure. But you hold your chin up high. Refusing to let him know you see his cocky little smile as you make your way to the front door. Smiling up at Ari as you open the door.

His eyes drift down your front with a smirk before he walks past you and into the living room. And you stand at the front door, trying to regulate your breathing. You aren’t going to let him see you struggle. “Sweetheart, Ari and I would like something to drink.”

The fucking asshole. This is so wrong, and still there’s that part of you that enjoys it way too much. A sexual secret that you and Lloyd share, while you have company. Knowing that Lloyd knows what is inside of you. Wonder how he’d feel if Ari knew. If Ari saw. You get the most devilish grin on your face. You didn’t care if people knew that Lloyd could destroy you with his dick. And Ari is bound to know all the sick twisted ways Lloyd gets off.

“Did you mean for her to answer the door with her nipples hard as a rock?” Ari motions his head toward the discarded panties on the floor. Lloyd would get you all worked up right before Ari came here. Edging is his favorite hobby.

“You should see my dick,” Ari rolls his eyes as he settles back into the couch, and then he makes a face of disgust before moving to the chair. “Why did you do that?”

“You’re on a couch with a hard on. Your girlfriend is walking around in short shorts, bra less, and nipples protruding. And that spot was warm,” chuckling, Lloyd pops his fingers into his mouth, moaning, “You’re truly sick. You know that?”

“Have you seen her?”

“I think you’ve seen enough of her,” Lloyd scoffs. His crystal eyes roam down the hall, trying to listen to hear what you’re doing. He hopes you’re fucking yourself. Knowing how frustrated you are, he hopes you’re doing something to get yourself off. He’ll watch the footage when Ari leaves.

“Lloyd, everyone is getting restless. You either need to take an extended break, and let me resume power, or come back. But the mercenaries need to know what’s going on. You can’t hole up here with your slut forever.”

“You’re not saying that in a derogatory way are you?” Ari shakes his head no. “I mean, she is my slut. She’s my girlfriend, Lyla’s mom, my future baby mama, future wife,” Ari clears his throat, “What?”

“That’s another thing. Someone got wind of Candy sniffing around. Me thinks she knows how much you’re worth, and either she’ll hold Lyla over yours and her head, or you’ll have to pay her off.”

“Write her a check,” Lloyd grunts suddenly. The idea of that woman coming and taking Lyla from you is sick. She didn’t even give her daughter a name!

“See the problem with women like her, she’ll always come back for more. You need it legally settled that you and Dolly are her parents. The lawyers are drawing up a petition for adoption. You know, it’ll need to be legal. She will come back.”

“Then I’ll put a bullet through her head,” he’s so annoying and ridiculous that Ari can’t even comprehend his little tyraid. “She won’t have our daughter. Lyla doesn’t even know her. Do you know who puts her to bed every night? Who bathes her every day? Pushes her in that stupid expensive pram? Goes to mommy and me classes for singing and yoga? Who is teaching her to walk? And who has been planning a first birthday party for her? Not some fucking whore who wasn’t worth the money I paid, and who poked fucking holes in the goddamn condoms.”

You flinch walking back into the living room. Getting an apology from both men. You take a deep breath, handing Ari’s bourbon on the rocks to him, and definitely not waddling to Lloyd to give him his. He pulls you nearly into his lap. Leaning you so far onto him, your ass is pointing towards Ari, and you playfully look towards him. He sees it. See the outline of Lloyd’s little dick inside of you.

His lips curve up into a devilish smile, and he raises his brows. Holding his cup up as if to cheers you, and you wiggle your as a bit. Smiling right back before Lloyd smacks over the protruding toy, and you lift up, moaning so loud that Ari chokes on his bourbon. Your face heats up with the most delightful embarrassment and you hide it in Lloyd’s chest.

“Stop looking,” he warns Ari, who still refuses to look away.

“Stop putting it out on a platter for me to stare at,” Lloyd is too fast. Reaching into your shorts, he tugs out the toy, and drops it onto the coffee table. Leaving Ari to stare at something besides yourself. Now it’s a hot pink replica of Lloyd’s cock, shining in the light, and soaked with your honey, and…

“I knew it,” he whispers more to you, even if Ari hears it. “Now that everyone can get their mind out of the fucking gutter. Dolly, Ari tells me we may have some issues with Lyla Bee’s birth mother. It seems she is pushing for leverage, and she’s using our daughter.”

You sit up immediately. Going into mama bear protective mode, despite the soaked dildo on the table. “She won’t take my daughter.”

“Ari doesn’t seem to think paying her off is enough.”

“It won’t be,” Ari raises his cup towards you. “No, it won’t. Women like her know that you would pay anything to keep our daughter with us. She’ll know your weak spot, our weak spot.”

“So she needs a bullet in her head,” that isn’t at all what you meant.

“No!” Ari bursts out laughing, but you’re serious. “I know what you do. But maybe — I think we need, I mean if you’re okay with it, but maybe we should do something legal. I mean what if I adopted her. If she’s legally mine there’s nothing that woman can do, right?”

“Thank you!” Ari raises his hands up, and looks at Lloyd, “She gets it. So, I’ll talk to the lawyers and get the ball rolling. We’ll tell them the address of Dolly and Lyla are to be held off as long as possible. You know you’ll have to go through a background check, and,” he grimaces, looking at the stupid forgotten toy again, “It’ll probably be easier if you’re married.”

“Oh,” you answer in surprise, looking up at Lloyd who remains emotionless. his control on his emotions can be frustrating, “That will be something we’ll have to discuss. But — whatever it takes. I need my daughter,” it’s amazing how quickly you accepted her as yours. With as much time as you spent with her, it just made sense. And now you also get to share her dad. “Is that why you came by?”

“Yeah. And Lloyd promised me a show of you fucking yourself with the dildo,” you’re stunned. Unable to look at either one of them, and Lloyd is no help. He’s completely frozen in place.

“Maybe next time.”

“I was only kidding. I know he has a weird little obsession with his dick, and his toys,” the toys of his dick, or you as the toy? You aren’t sure how Ari means, or if he means both. Doesn’t matter. “I’m sure I’m going to leave, and he will make you perform for him though, and I suppose he’ll want to look and see how wide your cunt is spread,” Lloyd clears his throat.

“Have the two of you watched a girl do that together?” Ari answers yes quickly, while Lloyd groans. “Oh. So you’re really close?” The two seem close. Possibly more than colleagues because who watches a girl masturbate with their best friend with them?

“We didn’t have sex with her at the same time. It was more or less entertainment, and you’re not a paid for show. Anyways,” leaning forward, he places the cup on the table before lifting himself up. “You two have fun with that conversation,” and he leaves.

You swallow deeply, keeping your eyes on LJ. Contemplating how you want to start this conversation. “Do you want to share me?”

“I want you to be happy, and I’ll do whatever experiences you want to keep you that way. If you don’t want Ari to see you riding the toy, or just playing with yourself, you don’t have to. It is not a requirement, and I’m perfectly satisfied with that. Your pleasure is my pleasure. I do enjoy watching you pleasure yourself. I enjoy staving off my own arousal to watch you get off. I like that desperate feeling when I finally sink into you.”

Inhaling deeply, you take off your shirt, and step out of your shorts. Grabbing up the dildo of Lloyd, you suction it to the floor, and stand over it. Keeping your eyes on Lloyd, and he scoots the table to the side, and leans back on the couch. Your knees slowly bend as you sink to the floor. You’re not performing. You’re just watching him. Seeing what it is he truly likes.

Getting to your knees, you hover over the nine inches that make up Lloyd before sinking over him. He stares so hard at the toy splitting you open. He doesn’t even touch himself. He just watches as you slowly bounce over it. “Would you want Ari to see me like this?”

“Would you want him to?” He answers a question with a question, so you pinch your nipples. Trying to make him squirm, but it does nothing.

“Possibly.”

“Then maybe,” infuriating. He can’t even fully answer.

“Would you would want Ari to fuck me?” Straight forward is the best way.

Lloyd sucks in a beat of air, “I’d prefer he didn’t.”

“Would you want Ari to watch you fuck me?”

“I wouldn’t mind it, but only if you wanted it, and were comfortable,” at least he’s being honest. Lloyd’s kink isn’t about sharing you. It’s about showing off what he has.

“Would you let Ari touch me, while you’re fucking me?”

“You know Ari is a bit of a cuck, right?” Your brow raises as you look at him. “Ari enjoys watching people have sex. He enjoys fingering a woman when she’s filled with cum so he can make a mess of her used hole. He enjoys writing on her body how much of a slut she is before he watches a man fucks a load into her. Or him. He doesn’t care who is getting fucked. He likes watching. He enjoys cleaning cum out of her pussy. He enjoys fucking women, and men fucking him. Ari enjoys the art of voyeurism that turns into participation. He enjoys the art and beauty of sex and pleasure. It’s not about love as much as it is about enjoyment. So tell me Dolly, do you want Ari to finger you while eating my cum out of your swollen pussy?”

You don’t know how to answer that. It’s so much information all at once. It’s raw and vulgar. It’s hot as fuck. But to have someone do that to you, you just don’t even know. It’s too much happening at once. Way too much. “You don’t have to answer now. But now that you understand Ari’s odd little choices in sex…”

“Have you ever fucked Ari?”

There’s a bit of a hesitation before Lloyd shakes his head, “No. It’s not like that. He participates, yes. But…”

“Your love has remained platonic?”

“I think you think he’s a third. Ari has no problems finding partners. But he enjoys the ways that I can degrade, humiliate, and praise a sub all at once. You couldn’t handle him,” you didn’t know what that meant, and you no longer have a desire to discuss Ari. You want Lloyd inside of you immediately.

“Fuck me,” he cocks up an eyebrow, smiling. “Fuck me like you love me,” he stands. Removing his shirt, and pulling down his pants and underwear at the same time. The pretty cock springs free as he walks out of his pants and towards you, and lifts you right off the toy, and onto his own cock. Wrapping your legs around his waist as he carries you into the bedroom.

He crawls the two of you onto the mattress, and lays you down gently. His body weight lowering on top of yours. Lloyd uses his nose to pet around your face. Smoothing his skin across the perimeter of your jaw, inhaling your scent as he lifts your arms above your head. Weaving his fingers in yours before he rolls himself in and out of you.

A steady rhythm of thrusting. He’s so soft and deliberate with his movements. Continuing to trace your face with his nose. Whispering your name, “I love you. We don’t have to invite anybody into our sex life. You’re more than enough. And I need you to understand that. If you don’t want Ari to ever see you in the position he did tonight, I need you to vocalize that, okay?”

“Okay,” you pant out. Arching your back to take more of him. You want him all over you.

“You can take all the time in the world to decide that. You can change your mind at any time,” the idea of Ari is exciting to him, but not necessary. Especially if it meant losing you. That is what mattered; you and Lyla. Not some kinky sex and cum play.

“I know,” he knows this is the worst time to try and get you to comprehend what could be a difficult sex life. But he isn’t lying. It isn’t a performance. You’re his obsession. Just you. You are more than enough for him. “What did you know earlier?” your chest heaves as you try and get the question out. “When you took LJ out of me.”

“You left your cream on the toy,” he laughs up against your neck. His mouth and hips are both a work of art, and the most sinful parts of him. “You got yourself off before you came back into the living room didn’t you?”

“Maybe,” he bites your neck, starting to suck on the skin hard. “You’re going to leave a mark!”

“Tell the truth,” he demands before sucking even harder. Sending every synapse in your brain into overdrive.

“Yes! Yes, I was leaning over the counter, and — and I was — I was — Lloyd!” He stops his movements, and you squeal. “Stop!”

“Then answer me.”

He starts a steady pace again, and then pounds into you so hard you see stars. His pace changes to slow, but rough jabbing movements, “I was just playing with my clit, and — and humping air. I was pretending it was you. Daddy!”

You’re wrecked. His movements are so slow, but they hit every right spot. Maybe it’s the blinding stabs into you that has every muscle in your body tightening up. He fucks into you so hard that the hairs on your body stands up, your toes curl, and your fingernails dig into his hands. You wish you could touch some other part of his body. You’re a goner.

Each thrust becomes harder. Deeper. Just. Right. There.

In. The. Perfect. Spot.

“Daddy!” Everything blurs. Lines disappear, and your body is numb with pleasure. Breathing so erratically as stars light up your vision. “Daddy!”

Jolting your body up the bed higher. Until your hands hit the head board, and he drops them. Slamming his hands above you, and he rockets himself into you. Pounding you so hard that your body lurches higher on the bed. Your head starts to knock against the padded board, and you start speaking in tongue to the heavens above as pleasure so deep in your body locks your bones into place.

Lloyd grunts, gritting his teeth as he remains pistoning into your clenching cunt. Your body is locked down, and this high lasts so long that you forget how to breathe. How to even be a human. Bright light floods into your mind, and then a loud, “Fuuuck,” before warmth spews inside of you, and your walls pulse around his cock. Milking him dry.

“My god, if you want me to marry you, I’d do it tomorrow,” you hum as he settles over you. He kisses around your neck. Using his fingers to trace the delicate lines on your neck and collarbone. Something is missing, and now he knows, “We’re going to have to fix this before I go back to work,” he still has to deal with The Verb, and your disgusting father. But he’s going to make sure everyone knows that you belong to someone. Even if you didn’t understand the significance, others would. He’s sure the neighbor down the street that stared at you when you dropped the keys to your car too long would understand exactly what it meant.

He had to make it be known that you were claimed, and unavailable. In every way possible. “Yeah, you’ve got a nasty little hickey on your neck.”

“What?” Your hand feels around your neck where he bit you. Thinking you could see with your eyes before you roll over on top of him. He sighs when he feels himself drip out of you. He doesn’t even care that you’re giving your own mark on him because you’re also grinding your greedy little twat on his stomach. You’re just as insatiable as him.

You nip on his creamy skin. Sucking and kissing over him. You want this ugly thing to last. Moving lower to give him another hickey. And another. If he’s going to leave you, you’re going to make sure everyone knows that he comes home to you. Home to fuck you. And home to his family.

You sit up on him, smiling at your handy work. “There. Now you can go back to work, and show everyone how you have a slut living with you.”

“Yeah yeah. Just keep grinding, and get yourself off on my stomach. I’ll walk around with this stupid thing if that makes you feel better. And I’ll worry about those seven spankings another day,” you forgot about that threat. But he didn’t.

In some weird way, you like knowing that he’ll walk around with red bruises all over his neck. Not that you didn’t trust him. It’s just fun to think that everyone knows he’s getting laid on a regular basis. That he can come home to his Dolly. Home to you. Home to your daughter. And his family.

And you have every intention of letting him use you.

Next

Masterlist

Taglist: @tis-thedamn-season @marveloustaylortot @pono-pura-vida @peaches1958 @seitmai

@smile1318 @andydrysdalerogers @cjand10 @midnightramyeoncravings @kmc1989

@pandaxnienke @theinheriteddutchess @rainydayandmondays @buckybarnesisdaddy @patzammit

@xoxo-ls @rebeccapineapple @slutforchrisjamalevans @marvel-wifey-86 @jesevans

@ughdontbeboring @infantasywonderland @vampy-doll @i-like-to-read-13 @missacidburn928

@charmed-asylum @superflannel @hisredheadedgoddess28 @lostinspace33 @abbyyourlocalmilf

@saranghae012 @rogersbarber @tas-renee @kmm-fluv

[waggledoogledoggle]

SOMEONE GIMME MULTI-LINGUAL JED AND OCTAVIUS PLEASE

I NEED IT.

JED AT THE VERY LEAST KNOWS SPANISH AND ENGLISH IF NOT ALSO MANDARIN BECAUSE OF THE RAILROAD. LIKE, Y’ALL, HE CANONICALLY ON SOME LEVEL ACTUALLY KNOWS SPANISH

“No comprendo, amigo!” HE SHOUTS THAT AT THE AUGUSTUS BUST. IS THE ACCENT SHIT? YES. BUT IM CHALKING THAT UP TO ACTORS CHOICE CAUSE GUESS WHAT. HE CONJUGATED IT FUCKIN CORRECTLY.

GIMME JED SPEAKING IN ENGLISH COMPLETELY NORMAL BUT THEN HIS BRAIN DECIDES TO FORGET THE WORD IN ENGLISH SO HE JUST STOPS FOR A MOMENT AND STARES AT NOTHING, SO HE JUST SAYS IT IN SPANISH AND OCTAVIUS JUST STARES AT HIM LIKE ‘…tf?’ BUT THEN THEY GO TO CARRY ON THE CONVERSATION AND LIKE HALF A BEAT LATER JED JUST SHOUTS THE WORD IN ENGLISH CAUSE HE REMEMBERS IT NOW. LIKE:

“I mean, I ain’t ever seen such a mess! Hell we even had to get a new… uh…”

“…”

“…”

“Jedediah?”

“…mesa…”

“…mesa?”

“I… can’t remember it in English right now… but I’m sure it’ll come back to me… uhm, anyways, yeah we had to get a new one of those, which sucks cause it was the only good one in that tavern! I ain’t ever seen such a brawl, I mean- TABLE!”

“Jupiter- Jedediah what the fu-”

“That’s the word! Table! Alright, we’re good now, as I was sayin-”

AND OCTAVIUS? DUDE IS A FUCKIN ROMAN GENERAL, SO NOT ONLY DOES HE KNOW LATIN, BUT HE IS ALSO LIKELY FLUENT IN GREEK. SO ENGLISH IS HIS FUCKIN THIRD LANGUAGE

SO YOUR TELLING ME, THERE HAS NEVER BEEN ONE SINGLE MOMENT IN BOTH CANON CONTENT AND NON-CANON CONTENT WHERE OCTAVIUS FORGETS THE WORD IN ENGLISH SO HE COMES UP WITH SOME BATSHIT CRAZY SOUNDING DESCRIPTION OR MAKES A SOUND EFFECT AND JED JUST HAS TO TRY TO FUCKIN GUESS WHAT HE MEANS.

“Hey Octy, did ya see where lil’ Ted went?”

“Yeah he went on the- the um- the horse tornado.”

“…what?”

“You know, the horse tornado.”

“…do you mean the ‘Carousel’?”

“That’s the word! Yes, the Carousel, yes.”

OR

“He went on the… Jed how you say *makes helicopter noises*”

“…oh! Helicopter.”

“Yes! That.”

AND I WANT IT TO GET TO THE POINT WHERE JED STARTS GETTING IT FIRST TRY NO HESITATION WHILE EVERYONE ELSE IS LIKE “WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK DID I JUST WITNESS, HOW DID YOU GET ‘PEN’ FROM HIM SAYING ‘BLEEDING INK STICK’”

And even better. I want Jed learning Latin for Octavius once he finds out English is his third language. Because if Octavius learned his first language, then he’ll be damned if he doesn’t do the same for Octavius.

I BEG OF THEE, PLEASE

(Edit: yes I know that Jedediah Strong Smith irl knew some/the basics of Latin lmao, what I meant by 'learn Latin' was work to become fluent in it like how Octavius is fluent in English, my bad for not explaining more clearly lol)

[daechwitatamic]

II. My Devotion's Been an Ocean || KNJ

(banner by @/itaeewon)

Title: My Feet to Follow, and My Heart to Hold (Masterpost)

Rating: NSFW - minors dni

Genre: college!au, roomie!au, angst, s2l, the absolute slowest of burns

Pairing: Namjoon x female reader, unrequited Taehyung x reader

Beta'd by @/kookstempo @/casuallyimagining and @/toikiii - thank you endlessly!

Summary: You know a lot about the many types of love thanks to Kim Taehyung. You love him as the only person you see as “family”, you love him as your very best friend, and you love him as the beautiful, funny man he’s become. But when a twist of fate during your senior year has you rooming with his good friend Kim Namjoon, you just might find that you have plenty left to learn about love. 

Lesson One: there are such things as a right way and a wrong way to love and to be loved.

//

You and Namjoon get used to living together.

Section Warnings: language, drinking, pov switch to Namjoon at the end

WC: 7k

The world is mine: blue hill, still silver lake, Broad field, bright flower, and the long white road A gateless garden, and an open path: My feet to follow, and my heart to hold. - Journey | Edna St. Vincent Millay

Monday August 31

Monday passes quickly, the biggest event being that your wifi finally gets installed. You don’t see Namjoon all day - his room is empty when you get out of bed. You spend most of your day lazing around in sweatpants, enjoying having high-speed internet at your fingertips again.

Although there aren’t classes due to the federal holiday, the cafeteria on campus is open since the administration knew most students would have moved in over the weekend. You could walk there - your apartment to the student center is a shorter walk than the student center to your furthest class - but Taehyung offers to drive you. Laziness, and a few minutes of time alone in his car, win over practicality. 

Once you’ve made your plates and commandeered a small table near the back of the caf, Taehyung asks you, “So, how’s roomie life?”

You shrug. “Nothing to tell. He hasn’t even been home today. But I think it’ll be fine. I have a feeling we’ll just each… do our own thing.”

Taehyung nods. “That’s better than big drama. Do you remember Jungkook’s roommate last year?”

Your eyes widen. “Oh, god, the toilet paper hoarder.” 

Jungkook’s university-assigned roommate had indeed hoarded every extra roll of toilet paper in a secret location, meaning that if a roll ever got used up by anyone who wasn’t him, they could never find the new rolls to put out, even if they’d bought the replacements. Not only had Jungkook had to buy and then hide his own replacements, you and Taehyung had gone over and tried to help him search around for the hoard while his roommate was out, to no luck. 

Taehyung snorts into his plate. “Man, that kid was weird. JayKay’s so lucky we had room for him this year.” 

“I haven’t seen the place yet,” you point out. “Any major decor changes?”

Taehyung laughs again. “Just Jungkook’s punching bag. I swear, Jimin’s gonna break his wrist playing around with it.”

“Unlike you and your perfect form.” You roll your eyes.

“Hey,” he says defensively, pointing a finger at you. “When I’m goofing around, I don’t hit it hard enough to hurt myself.”

When you’re done eating, you walk back to Taehyung’s car. It takes literal minutes to get back to your brick building, and he idles at the curb.

“You want to hang out for a while?” you ask, hopeful. “We got the wifi installed today, we could watch a show?”

“Can’t,” he says apologetically. “I have plans with someone later.”

Plans with someone. That was Taehyung-speak for a date, or maybe “date” was the wrong word. Regardless, it meant he was seeing a girl later, getting something from her that he wasn’t getting from you.

“Ah,” you say. “Use protection.” You unbuckle as he scrunches his face at you.

“Don’t be gross,” he grouses. 

“You know I have no choice,” you tell him solemnly as you climb out of the car. You pause, resting your head on the top of the doorframe, peering at him. “Good luck in class tomorrow. Text me if you want to eat or anything.”

“Yeah,” he says, nodding, already thinking ahead to his schedule. “Lunch around one?”

“I’ll text you, I have to go look at my schedule,” you admit. You shut the door and wave goodbye, heading inside. You don’t say love you in goodbye; you never do when you know he’s leaving your company for another girl’s. As if, with this one silly little rule in your own brain, you can punish him for it, when in reality there’s no way he even notices. 

Namjoon still isn’t home, so the apartment is silent and empty. You decide to devote your evening to prepping - both physically and emotionally - to start class tomorrow. You check your schedule, organize your books, make sure your laptop is charging. You get in bed early just out of sheer boredom. Around eleven pm as you’re scrolling around mindlessly on your phone, you finally hear keys in the lock, the thump as the door shuts again, Namjoon’s footsteps approach his own bedroom. You wonder absently where he was for fourteen hours. 

It occurs to you that you know nothing about his personal life beyond that he’s a grad student. You don’t even know his concentration of study. 

You wonder if you should go out to say hi, maybe under the pretense of getting a drink. Then you hear the sound of his door shut, and minutes later the boiler kicks on as his shower demands hot water. So, you stay put, turning out your light and setting your alarm for morning.

Friday September 4th

Your classes go well. The first week is always the professors going through the syllabus and outlining their expectations, anyway. Today, your morning class seems like it will be interesting, but tough; you’ve had this professor before and she’s a notoriously hard grader. You’d done okay with her the year before, though. Your second class, after lunch, is better. It’s a poetry course, which is your concentration, and you’ve had this professor - Professor Jemisen - twice already. He’s pretty laid-back, an easy grader, but you always find his lecture topics and assigned readings to be really interesting. 

He also gives homework on the first week, which most of your professors don’t: an assigned reading and reflection for the first poet on the syllabus, plus a prompt to write your own, pulling inspiration from that poet’s choices in style, rhyme scheme, and use of imagery. You’ve already got an idea as you walk out of class and head in the direction of your new building - this particular poet used a lot of nautical imagery, ships and captains, and the ocean itself was always very nearly a character of its own. 

You think as you walk, inspired by the lecture fresh in your head, toying with some ocean imagery and how you could stitch it into a turn of phrase. When you reach your building and sling off your backpack to hunt for your keys, you decide to stay on the steps for a minute. The sun is shining but it’s breezy, and it’s really pleasant. You pull out a notebook and some paper and start to draft what you might turn in.

Pulling pulling pulling, each 

cresting wave a daunting hill.

Who would try to fight the tide,

the dark, the depth, the chill?

My devotion’s been an ocean.

I fear it always will.

One thing that the deep sea is:

it’s never still.

You frown at it, pen between your teeth. You like the idea of the shorter final line, but the flow is off. You’re still considering this - as well as already thinking about how you’ll need at least one but probably two more short pieces like this for the assignment - when someone stops in front of you, their silhouette blocking the sun and casting you in a sudden shadow.

“You locked out?” a deep voice asks.

You look up (and up, and up) to find Namjoon peering at you, concern on his face.

“Oh,” you say stupidly. For some reason, you feel embarrassed, like you’ve been caught doing something silly, as if doing homework outside during nice weather was something strange and secret, and not completely normal. “I was working on an assignment. The sun - it was nice out here. I’m not locked out.”

“Gotcha,” he says easily, fishing in his pockets for his own keys. You struggle to stand, knees a little achy after using them as a table for the last half hour or so, closing up your notebook. You might as well go inside, now. You aren’t going to write anymore at this point, anyway.

You follow Namjoon upstairs, trying to find a good distance to put between you: you don’t want to be right on his heels, nor do you want him to have to hold the door for you for an awkward amount of time if you’re too far back. 

Inside the apartment, Namjoon drops his keys on the counter and heads for his bedroom door. Over his shoulder, he calls, “Have a good night.”

A good night? The sun isn’t even setting yet. 

But, it seems Namjoon means what he says. He disappears into his room, leaving his door open just about three inches, and he doesn’t come out again for the rest of the afternoon.

You stay in the living room through the afternoon, preferring to do Professor Jemisen’s poetry reading by the large, living room windows. You can hear Namjoon doing whatever in his room - the clacking of keys for minutes at a time, bumps and clacks as his wheeled desk chair moves and taps the table as he shifts in it, occasionally his footsteps as he crosses the room towards his attached bathroom. Sometimes you hear him mutter a curse, bang once on the desk with - you presume - a fist. 

You wonder idly what he’s doing - gaming, maybe? - as you finish your homework. You submit your assignment. The sun sets. You cook an easy one-pan dinner. You wash up the dishes you made while cooking, you put the leftovers in the fridge. You go shower and wash your hair, emerge back into the living room in your pajamas, and heat up some water for chamomile tea. 

Namjoon’s door hasn’t moved at all, still open just enough for you to be able to tell that he hasn’t turned on any of the lamps even though it’s gotten dark; the only light from the room flickers blue and white, a tv or computer screen. The same sounds filter through the small gap as you let your tea steep - the chair, the keyboard, Namjoon’s low voice as he mutters to himself, something rhythmic and lilting, before the typing starts again.

When you turn out the kitchen and living room lights, close to midnight, and head to bed, he’s still typing away in there, the room still cast in black and blue.

Wednesday September 9

You’re surprised to find him in the kitchen Wednesday morning. You come out of your room at a clip, pretty ready to head over to campus - you’re just trying to find your wallet. 

Namjoon is sitting at the breakfast bar, a mug of steaming black coffee in front of him, scrolling on his phone.

“Hey,” he says, sounding a little surprised to see you, too.

“Do you not sleep?” you ask, before realizing how bratty you sound. “I just mean, you were still up when I went to bed, and now you’re up before me.”

Luckily, he smiles at this, a bit sheepishly. “Not as much as I should,” he admits. “I got… I was working on something last night, so I was up later than I meant to be. I’d love to sleep in today - trust me - but I have to be on campus in–” he glances at his watch, “--twenty minutes.”

“Me too,” you say, starting to hunt around the living room. “But I can’t find my wallet.”

“Is it this one?” he asks, pointing to the counter near the spot that you’ve both wordlessly designated as the place to drop your keys. 

“Yes,” you say, sighing with relief. You slide your wallet into your bookbag and zip it back up. You pat your pockets, checking - phone, keys, yes. “Are you walking over? Want me to wait for you?”

He considers this for a second. “No, go ahead,” he decides. “I need to get a few things organized first, I don’t want to hold you up.”

“Okay,” you say easily, hiking your backpack up a little higher on your back. “By the way, I won’t be around tonight, I have work. If you want the leftovers from what I cooked last night, feel free. They’ll go bad after today.”

Now Namjoon looks really surprised - his eyebrows jump and everything. “Really? Wow, thanks. I appreciate it.”

“Sure,” you shrug. “I hope you like it.” You glance at the clock and murmur to yourself that you need to get going. “See you later,” you call over your shoulder as you leave. As you turn to give this goodbye, you see him watching you go with a small smile on his face, mostly hidden behind his large hand, fingers pressing against his mouth.

–

You have your senior thesis class on Wednesdays - it’s a double, with a break for lunch in the middle, and it’s with Professor Jemisen again.

“Two days in a row, huh?” he asks you as you pass his desk. You give him a quick smile and pick a desk near the middle of the room. As class starts, he outlines how the thesis will work - an intensive study and analysis of one or two poets’ works, as well as your own portfolio project. 

“We’ll spend the first half each week working on the anthology study,” he tells the room, scanning the crowd of sleepy seniors to make sure everyone is listening. “After we break for lunch, we’ll spend the second half workshopping your portfolios. It’s going to be a lot of work, and you’re going to need to be ready to go each Wednesday. If you’ve made it this far half-assing it, I’m warning you today that it won’t get you to pass your thesis. I’d like to remind you that you must pass Senior Thesis in order to graduate.”

He spends the rest of the morning session going over some options for the anthology study, showing examples of previous students’ final thesis projects to model what he’s looking for. 

By the time he flips the lights back on and you all stagger back to life, slowly shifting to pick up backpacks and shoulder bags, rising unsteadily from your chairs, your head is spinning. You could walk across campus to the student center and get real lunch, but this particular academic building has a coffee shop and a fast-food area. You opt for french fries and a juice, finding a few girls you’re familiar with and joining their table.

“This sounds like it’s going to be a lot of work,” one of them, a girl named Gloria, laments. You’ve had a few poetry courses with her over the last three years; she’s a talented poet, good at using a biting, precise syntax. 

“I know,” you agree, twisting the top off your juice. “Any ideas whose anthology you might use?”

She hums, eyes far away, mentally flipping through poets she likes enough to type twenty-five pages about. “Not sure yet,” she finally admits. “You?”

“No,” you lie. Professor Jemisen had said there would be no repeats - if someone else picked a poet, no one else could choose them. You already knew exactly who you wanted, and you didn’t want to lose your chance. In fact, you leave the lunch break early to go stake your claim.

“Can I go ahead and put in my choice?” you ask Professor Jemisen as you re-enter the room, about twenty minutes before the second block is scheduled to start.

He frowns good-naturedly. “You don’t want to think about it a little? I’m not going to let you change in the middle.”

You shake your head, sure. “No, I know who I want.”

Professor Jemisen nods somewhat absently, looking around the scattered papers on the table before him. He finds what he’s looking for and lifts it, reaching to take the pen from behind his ear. 

“Okay,” he says, finding your name on the roster. “Let me have it.”

“Edna St. Vincent Millay,” you tell him, mind already whirring, thinking ahead to which works would fit your thesis. “I was thinking of coming from a feminist angle… how she was so progressive for her time, how she pushed boundaries as a woman and as a writer.”

Professor Jemisen nods slowly, considering this. “That sounds promising. I look forward to seeing what you come up with, Y/N.”

Pleased, you take your seat, pulling up your school email and catching up on a few things while you wait for class to start again. 

–

You actually like your part-time job at the on-campus bookstore. The busy season can be a little exhausting - those first few days when it seems like the entire campus comes at the same time to get their required reading. But after the initial rush each semester, it’s a pretty laid back job. Since this is your third year there, your boss trusts you with a little more responsibility, which is how you ended up getting the closing shift twice a week.

Almost no one comes in after regular dinner hours, which means once you’ve done a quick sweep through to make sure nothing got put away in the wrong spot and the items that need restocked are handled you can just sit around behind the counter and talk shit with your coworker, Kris. Kris started with you last year, and you get along well.

“Do anything fun over the summer?” you ask absently, leaning back in your chair and crossing your legs, happy to be seated for a little while. Outside the store’s high windows, it’s dark. The lighting in the store is relatively dim, giving you a cozy, sequestered feeling.

“Went with my parents on vacation,” Kris tells you. “Barely survived.”

“Yikes,” you say. 

“How about you? Any family trips?” they ask.

“Nah,” you say easily. “Just hung out with Taehyung, the usual. The biggest event from my summer was Penny bailing on the apartment with me.”

Kris makes a grumpy noise. “I wish I could afford it,” they complain. “I would have loved to help you out and live off campus.”

“That would have been fun,” you smile. “We would’ve made trouble.”

Kris cackles, a deepy, throaty sound. “We would have. The roommate is okay, though?”

You shrug. “Yeah, Namjoon’s really nice. He’s clean and quiet, so I really can’t complain.”

Kris sits up, eyes widening. “Wait, Namjoon? You’re living with Kim Namjoon? The TA?”

You hesitate. “Is he a TA? I’m not sure.”

They wave a hand at you. “It has to be the same,” they say insistently. “How many Kim Namjoon’s can there be on a campus this size?”

“Probably only one,” you admit. 

“Probably only one,” Kris echoes in agreement. “And he’s beautiful. I honestly blame him for almost failing Medieval Lit last year. I was too distracted.”

You can’t help it, you crack up. “You failed Medieval Lit because you tried to take it on top of a full courseload,” you object. “And you tried to write your final paper about The Legend of Zelda.”

“I had solid evidence for my thesis!” Kris balks loudly. You’re laughing so hard you’re nearly crying, remembering how strongly you’d tried to help them focus on a better topic for that paper. Kris doesn’t listen to reason - not even when it comes from you. “And I’m telling you - it’s because I was staring at his gorgeous dimples instead of listening to the lecture!”

Gorgeous dimples? You haven’t noticed. To be fair, you’ve barely interacted with your new roommate; not a lot of chances to see him smile.

“How do you find all these beautiful men?” Kris laments, tugging at their purple hair in emotional distress. “It is truly unfair.”

You laugh; Kris spent much of last year bemoaning how much time you got to spend with Taehyung - and by proxy, Jungkook and Jimin. Kris had a collective crush on the whole bunch, starting from when they shared Freshman Seminar with Jungkook. 

“They find me,” you shrug. “And you know I’m blind to the beauty, anyway.” Well, that was almost all the way true. There was one exception.

“You know,” Kris says thoughtfully, “they really don’t hang out with other girls. You’re the only one.”

“That’s not true,” you object. “Have you seen those idiots at a party? They’re like magnets. It’s almost gross how easy it is for them.”

“I don’t mean at parties, I mean in their circle,” Kris explains. “You’re the only one they let into the group.”

You consider this, weighing the validity of it, searching for reasons. “I think it’s because they all know -”

Kris cuts you off, eyes glinting with mischief. “They all know that you’re so in love with Taehyung that you won’t bother the rest of them?”

You know they’re teasing and that they mean no harm, but it stings a little. You let out a quick laugh, trying to cover it. “I was going to say they all know that Taehyung and I are a package deal,” you say, the words tasting like arsenic on your tongue. “But maybe you’re more right.”

Kris seems to hear the change in your tone, and their gaze softens a little. “Anything new with that?” they ask delicately.

Anything new. You consider for a moment the version of the story that Kris knows: the close friendship, the feelings you have. How does it look from the outside? Can they see the situation with more clarity than you? You’re afraid to ask, afraid to give the question any attention.

“What could be new?” you ask, the lie dripping from you. “We were best friends last year - we’re best friends now.”

Kris gives you a side-eye good enough to be a viral meme. You ignore them, turning away gladly when the bell over the door dings. A grubby-looking freshman comes in and stands before the spinning rack with your electronic accessories - knock-off airpods, charging cables, usb drives. He grumpily sorts through the chargers and grabs one, slapping it down on the counter in front of you.

You ring him up silently and he leaves after paying. Kris is still watching you, and you dread turning around.

“You know,” they say slowly, “he was at a party I was at the other night. With a girl.”

You force yourself to shrug. “Taehyung dates. We aren’t together - he’s allowed. We’re just friends.”

They look at you evenly, then purse their lips and visibly decide to drop it. “Okay,” they say lightly. “If you say so.”

“I say so,” you mutter, deciding to go check the stock room for absolutely nothing, just to walk away.

When you get home, sometime after nine-thirty, Namjoon’s door is shut - a little sliver of that same blue light slipping underneath the crack below the door. Your leftovers are gone from the fridge, the container washed and put away.

Thursday September 10th

Thursday brings heavy rain - the all-day kind, the kind whose noise permeates the whole day, greeting you as you struggle to consciousness in your bed, adding steady percussion to the quiet music you turn on. The kind that makes you turn on lamps in broad daylight, the darkness outside making it that much harder to stay awake.

The kind that brings a barometric pressure headache, just for you.

[12:02 PM] Tae Bear 🧸: This is Taehyung, looking for signs of life [12:02 PM] Tae Bear 🧸: anyone in there? Hellooooo? [12:04 PM] You: shhhhhh why are you being so loud??? [12:05 PM] Tae Bear 🧸: ohh she’s got a weather headache [12:06 PM] Tae Bear 🧸: :( [12:07 PM] You: i want to push my thumbs through my eyeballs [12:09 PM] Tae Bear 🧸: you have such a way with words [12:14 PM] Tae Bear 🧸: you take anything for it? [12:15 PM] You: left the prescription stuff at lin’s house [12:15 PM] You: like an idiot 🤡 [12:17 PM] Tae Bear 🧸: ugh i’m sry [12:18 PM] Tae Bear 🧸: hope it passes quickly [12:19 PM] Tae Bear 🧸: lemme know if you feel good enough to come to dinner at the caf w me later

You don’t answer, pressing your head back into the darkness of the couch cushion beneath you. The pressure across your browline is nearly unbearable. You had managed to get up and get dressed, drinking a mug of coffee out of sheer desperation, before collapsing onto the couch. You set an alarm on your phone for when you need to leave for class and pray that just resting and closing your eyes until then will help, at all.

You don’t know how much later it is when you hear the front door open and close. You hear a muted thump as Namjoon (you assume) drops his bag in the entryway, then his footsteps tracing through the kitchen. The fridge opens, closes with a click, and then the footsteps approach. 

They pause somewhere in your vicinity. 

You can almost feel the unspoken alarm. It must look bad - you aren’t even laying down, just slumped sideways from a sitting position, body twisted to hide your face from any source of light. You raise one pitiful hand and wave. 

“Hi,” you say, not sure he can hear you through the couch cushion.

“Uh,” Namjoon says, taking one step closer, “are you… okay?”

“Relatively,” you say, rolling your head to squint at him through one eye. The soothing yellow lamplight seems stabbing, and you squint a little harder, trying to block it out. “I get bad headaches sometimes when it’s like -.” You wave a hand at the windows. Rain pounds against them, happy to finish your sentence for you.

Namjoon makes an understanding and sympathetic noise. “Can I do anything for you?” he asks after a minute, sounding a little ill at ease. “Does anything usually help? Do you need to go back to sleep or something?”

“I have class at two,” you grumble. “I don’t want to skip this early in the year. And yeah, I used to have a prescription for these kinds of days, but I guess I forgot to pack them.”

Namjoon disappears into his room, midconversation, which confuses you so much that you actually make yourself sit up, your head spinning from the change in position. You see the light shift in his room - he must have turned on the bathroom light. You can hear the rummaging of items, the rolling clatter of pills in bottles. He returns with a white bottle in hand, holding it out for you to read the label.

“You take these?” he asks, pushing his glasses back into place as you peer at the name.

“Not at that dose,” you laugh. “What are you, an elephant?”

He frowns playfully, pretends to pull the bottle away. “Well, I’m not going to share if you’re going to call me names,” he teases. “You think a half would be okay?”

“You don’t mind?” you check.

He scoffs lightly. “Of course not. I never use them all. I get about one bad migraine every six months, that’s all.”

“You’re a literal life-saver,” you tell him. He gives you a gentle smile, and you notice - really notice - those dimples Kris mentioned. 

They are cute. Damn.

He places half a pill on the table before you, screwing the cap back onto the bottle as he walks into the kitchen.

“Oh,” you call after him, feeling a little like you should stop him. “Hey, I can get my own…. drink,” you finish lamely as he sets a cup of water next to the pill. 

“Don’t worry about it,” he says, something warm in his voice, and then disappears into his bedroom again. 

You’re staring absently at his empty, open doorway as you take the medicine. He’s a mystery, this roommate of yours. There are probably lots of sides to him that you haven’t seen yet, many things you haven’t discovered about him. But you decide, right there, that he’s nice. 

–

[1:41 PM] You: i left my headache meds in your bathroom :(

[1:59 PM] Lin: oh noooooo

[2:02 PM] You: :( can you mail them? is that legal? Lol

[2:17 PM] Lin: i’ll find out 

–

[4:36 PM] Namjoon: did it help??

[4:37 PM] You: :( why are you so nice

[4:39 PM] You: took it from Death Mode to a dull pounding 

[4:43 PM] Namjoon: i’m really glad

[4:44 PM] Namjoon: i was going to order smth for dinner in a bit - you want in?

[4:47 PM] You: oh yes pls

[4:49 PM] Namjoon: Ondubu Menu.pdf

–

[4:41 PM] You: just said (typed) the word ‘pounding’ to my roommate

[4:42 PM] You: can i die now???????

[4:42 PM] Kris: lmfaooooooooooo i love you

[4:43 PM] Kris: the context, i BEG

[4:45 PM] You: i mean very unsexy context lol 

[4:46 PM] You: was in regards to the HEADACHE FROM HELL >:(

[4:47 PM] Kris: let’s work on sexying up the context 

[4:48 PM] You: bye 🚶‍♀️

[4:49 PM] Kris: #TeamNamjoon

[5:24 PM] You: #TeamYN 

[5:24 PM] Kris: #TeamDimples

[5:25 PM] You: we’re done here

–

[6:06 PM] Tae Bear 🧸: dinner at the caf? want me to come pick u up?

[6:08 PM] You: sorry, i ate, namjoon ordered us takeout

[6:09 PM] Tae Bear 🧸: ah. okay.

[6:12 PM] You: come over later?

[6:13 PM] Tae Bear 🧸: headache?

[6:14 PM] You: all better :) come over?

[6:19 PM] You: tete... please?

[6:20 PM] Tae Bear 🧸: yeah

[6:21 PM] Tae Bear 🧸: yeah i will

–

“I’m glad you feel better,” Taehyung tells you from his end of the couch. 

“Me. Too.” You wiggle your feet against his ribs. “It was truly terrible this morning.”

You’re on opposite sides of the couch, as usual, one blanket thrown over your legs. You balance your laptop on your thighs, trying to work on some homework. Taehyung scrolls through his phone. 

“I was thinking, you guys should have people over this weekend,” he muses, not taking his eyes off his screen.

“Like a party?” you clarify, still typing. 

“Mhm,” he nods. “A housewarming?”

You laugh a little. “That’s kind of last minute, Tae. You offering to help buy all the snacks and drinks? And clean?”

He meets your eyes long enough to make sure you see him roll his. “You don’t need help,” he grouses. 

You sigh, hating that you don’t hate the idea. “Could we keep it kind of lowkey?” you ask, as if you wouldn’t be the host, and thus in charge of these decisions.

“Just the guys?” Taehyung suggests, sounding a little hopeful now that it seems like you’re cracking. 

“Yeah,” you nod. “Jungkook, Jimin… maybe the others? I don’t remember all of their names.” You mean Namjoon’s friends, the ones who had helped him move in.

“I’ll ask the groupchat,” Taehyung promises.

Friday September 11th

In the end, Taehyung gets confirmation from Jimin, Jin, and Jungkook - the others seem more like maybes. Although you’d asked to keep it small, you feel the need to diversify a little, and you extend the guest list to include Kris, plus Gloria and a few more of the girls from your classes.

Of course, needing to maintain a positive roomie experience, you make sure you ask Namjoon if it’s okay. In the morning, you wait a while after you hear his shower run to make sure he’s properly awake, and then knock on his door.

“Yeah?” he calls, sounding a little distracted.

“Namjoon?” you ask, nudging his door just a little. Yeah isn’t the same as come in, necessarily. “I wanted to ask you something.”

He’s sitting at his desk, his back to you. At your words, he reaches up to pop out his airpods, and clicks to minimize the screen he had up - what looks like a word doc, from your vantage point in the doorway. 

“Okay?” he says, stretching his long legs towards you, leaning back in his swivel-chair. 

“Did Taehyung talk to you about tonight?” you venture.

“Tonight?”

Why are you nervous? 

“Yeah,” you say. “He had an idea to have your whole group come hang here, like a little housewarming thing? He said he’d text you all.”

Namjoon glances at his phone, as if to corroborate your story, but doesn’t turn the screen on to actually check for the text. “I didn’t see it,” he admits. 

“Oh,” you say. “Okay. Well, he should have invited all of you guys. I mean, you don’t need to be invited, you live here. I just, um, I wanted to make sure it was okay with you? To have people over tonight?”

You watch it on his face as he understands that you’re asking for roomie permission. He sits back up, already starting to swivel back around to his screen, nodding easily. “Yeah, of course. Thanks for asking first.”

You frown at his back; you hadn’t really felt like the conversation was over, but he’s already pressing his airpods back in with his thumbs, feet tapping with the bass.

“O-kay,” you say, backing out of his room. You have a date with a vacuum cleaner before your living room fills with people. On your way to the closet where the vacuum lives, you text Taehyung, begging him to make a liquor run for you.

–

The truth is Namjoon forgets what you asked him about twenty seconds after you leave his room. He gets back to work, trying to get back into the flow he’d had before you knocked. He doesn’t hear you leave for class, doesn’t think about it again when he leaves for his own an hour later. 

[4:49 PM] Namjoon: bar tonight?

[4:50 PM] Yoongi: did we not…already have plans with you tonight?

[4:51 PM] Hobi: no, we did

[4:53 PM] Namjoon: we did? idr. can the plans be bar at 8:30?

[4:55 PM] Hobi: you’d rather do that??

[4:57 PM] Namjoon: than what?

[5:00 PM] Yoongi: we were supposed to go to your place?

[5:01 PM] Yoongi: taehyung texted us yesterday

[5:03 PM] Namjoon: oh yeah

[5:05 PM] Namjoon: i mean you all know i love taehyung…

[5:06 PM] Hobi: but…..

[5:07 PM] Namjoon: but do i want to sit around my living room with a bunch of undergrads tonight?

[5:08 PM] Yoongi: i get the feeling the answer to that is ‘no’

[5:10 PM] Namjoon: so, i repeat. bar? 8:30?

[5:10 PM] Yoongi: 👍👍

[5:15 PM] Hobi: that won’t hurt your roomie’s feelings???

[5:16 PM] Namjoon: she’ll be fine

Still, when 8:30 rolls around and Namjoon notices you bustling around the living room like a crazy person, he feels a stab of guilt in his stomach. Resigned, he asks, “Can I do anything to help you get ready?”

“Taehyung is supposed to be helping me get ready,” you grumble, as you line up a bowl of chips next to a smaller bowl of popcorn. “But is he here helping? Despite this being his idea?”

“That feels rhetorical,” Namjoon observes. You shoot him a look. 

There’s a knock at the door, which saves him from your wrath, he thinks. As he watches you hurry to the door, wiping your hands once on your jeans out of nervousness, he knows he can’t leave - not yet. Silently damning both his conscience and his mother for raising him to have one, he texts the guys that he’s running late. Then, he reaches over and pops the top off one of the beers you’ve set out.

He might as well, right? 

It’s an entire hour later than he finally feels like maybe he can slip away. Taehyung finally showed up about half an hour ago, three girls slipping through the front door behind him. Namjoon can’t help it - his eyes fly to your face, watching for a reaction. If you’re upset, you don’t show it, instead hurrying to show them around, pointing out where to grab drinks and where the bathrooms are located. 

When Jungkook and Jin arrive - clearly having pregamed - Namjoon rises, inching his way closer to the door. Someone with a mop of bright purple hair comes through the door with Jimin, and the volume in the room triples instantaneously. 

Now’s my chance, he thinks, and glances your way to see if he'll make it out unnoticed.

Would it not be easier to say, ‘hey, Y/N, this was fun, but I have plans with Yoongi’? He wonders. Probably, but that would potentially result in seeing the hurt look on your face, and he’s trying to avoid that. 

On the couch, you sit close to Taehyung, legs touching, his arm over your shoulders. You’re laughing maniacally at something, using his torso to hold yourself up as you cackle, eyes squeezed shut. He looks down at you, smile large and boxy, laughing along. 

Namjoon grabs his keys and slinks out the door. 

“Look who decided to show up to the gathering that he planned,” Yoongi drawls when Namjoon finally slides onto the barstool beside him. Hobi gives him a sheepish look, one that says sorry about him… but also, he’s right. 

“I felt bad leaving,” Namjoon explains. “No one was there yet, and then I wanted to finish the beer I opened…”

“Mhm,” Yoongi intones, and Namjoon almost asks him what that’s supposed to mean, but decides to let it go. 

They talk over a pitcher of beer, Hobi filling them in on how auditions for his dance team are going, Yoongi on his current classes. 

Namjoon’s phone buzzes against his leg and he slips it out of his pocket far enough to see your name on his screen. 

[10:03 PM] You: did you… leave??

[10:04 PM] Namjoon: yeah

[10:06 PM] You: it wasn’t bc of us right? I thought you said this was ok???

[10:07 PM] Namjoon: no it wasn’t. just not really my scene. have fun though

[10:10 PM] You: ah ok. i just assumed since some of ur crew are here you’d join us

Yoongi’s chin is practically on Namjoon’s shoulder as he peeks at his screen. 

“She wanted you to hang out, you dick,” he says. 

Namjoon balks, shaking his head. “She’s just trying to keep the peace. Doesn’t want drama with her roommate.”

“No, dude,” Hobi insists, peeking over Namjoon’s other shoulder, giving him a perfect angel and devil scenario. “You are, in fact, an asshole. She’s definitely upset that you left.”

Namjoon growls in frustration, shimmying his shoulders to knock his menaces loose. “I don’t want to talk about Y/N. Let’s talk about something else.”

From either side of him, Yoongi and Hobi exchange a knowing look. 

“What?” Namjoon demands. 

The shared look now incorporates some eyebrow movement. Then, cool as a cucumber, Yoongi leans back in his seat, takes a long pull from his beer glass. “So,” he says, so casual, “how are things with you two, anyway?”

“What you two?” Namjoon counters. 

“The roomies,” Hobi supplies. “The odd couple.”

“We are very not a couple,” Namjoon says flatly, irritation simmering. 

“But seriously,” Yoongi pushes. “How is it?”

“It’s fine,” he says, a defensive edge in his voice. He pauses, tries for a second to get his act together. “As far as roommates go, she’s good. Keeps the shared areas clean, isn’t noisy. She’s not rude or anything.” He shrugs, hoping this will be enough to get the jackals off his scent. 

“That’s good,” Hobi says, nodding. “Do you talk or anything?”

“Nope,” Namjoon says, which is true. “We just kind of do our own thing.” 

“Her ‘thing’ being Taehyung, right?” Hobi asks innocently. 

Namjoon shakes his head. “I don’t think anything’s actually going on there. To her dismay, it seems.”

“I wonder why,” Yoongi muses. When the others look at him in confusion, he explains, “I mean, why nothing’s going on. It seems like they’re attached at the hip. What’s missing? What’s stopping them?”

“He is,” Namjoon tells them. “How she looks at him, and how he looks at her… it isn’t the same. It just isn’t there for him. I won’t presume to know how he feels, but it seems like he’s just enjoying the benefits of her company until she figures out that it won’t go anywhere. If that ever even happens.”

He hadn’t realized he had an opinion about this until the words are out of his mouth.

“Kind of sad,” Yoongi remarks, pouring himself another beer. 

“Maybe she just needs someone to snap her out of it,” Hobi says thoughtfully. 

“Maybe,” Namjoon agrees, and changes the topic as smoothly as he can.

Honestly, he agrees with Yoongi. It is sad - even from the outside, even from the limited interaction you’ve had, he can see the stars in your eyes when you look at your best friend. And he can see the disappointment that swims there when Taehyung, just by existing, lets you down, over and over again, day after day.

Maybe you do just need a distraction, someone new to divert your attention. But Namjoon can easily see that it’ll be an uphill battle for whatever poor soul tries that route, and he doesn’t feel like he has the emotional energy for it. He’s been there and done that before, and he doesn’t like to repeat mistakes.

No matter how cute and funny he might find you.

He hurries to drown that thought in another pint of beer. 

Thank you so much for reading!!! Let me know what you think!!! Theories? Questions?? Keysmashes???

Section III will post on Friday, January 27th - hope to see you there!

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[tamelee]

I love the way you write, you're so articulate, I wish I could write like that 😭 I'm guessing you get good grades in school? Do you have advice on how to write articulately and clearly while also sounding professional? Like in essay writing?

Huuuu, that’s very kind of you 🥹;-; I’d never imagine anyone saying that to me… ever. 

Well, my grades are good, I have my last exams soon ^^

I do have a few tips! Or rather, there are things I’m still currently learning that may be helpful to you as well📝: 

(Sentence) Structure: I read a book called ‘elements of style’ by William Strunk (revised edition) recently and I learned that no matter how grammatically correct your sentences are, there are still ways to improve its structure. (I had to learn it all over again in English -.-) This is a big topic so I'll name a few specifics you can dive into.

Learn the difference between active and passive voice (passive isn’t bad and sometimes necessary, but active is almost always preferred). Don’t mind all this on your first draft though. It’ll only hinder you.

Study MRU (motivation-reaction units), often used in Fiction writing, but it helped me for essays as well. It is the logical pattern of cause and effect introduced by Dwight V. Swain and I read about it in 'techniques of the selling writer'. Here's an article on the topic as well.

Mind paragraphs. There are different rules for this depending on what you’re writing, but it helps its readability. For Essays especially it’s always good to keep topics separate and lead the reader to your conclusion in a way that makes sense. (It's sorta like holding their hand and going like "because of this... there is this... and therefore... and so.... that's why....") This may need some reorganizing of your premises/subjects at times. I especially need to organize my thoughts before I even start writing.  

Understand what it is that you need to write about and delete everything that isn’t relevant. If you’re like me and you get a ton of new ideas once you delve into a subject, then it’s good to keep a folder (or something similar) for these new ideas. Often these are entire topics on its own and including these into another will only make both unclear and your conclusion muddy. So, ask yourself whether it strengthens your point, or if it’ll make it more confusing. If it won’t make a difference then delete it anyway or save it in your folder for later.  

I always learned that objectivity is important in order to sound professional, though it depends on the kind of essay you’re writing. If you need to convince the reader of something then transparency about your own opinions can help your conclusion be more honest, but be careful of sounding preachy as well. I had to learn all these things when I still studied marketing/communication in entertainment, but it often makes me feel slimy because it’s all very manipulative. (Hence, I quit that path.) It's in fiction as well. Some authors let their own views bleed through their characters in such a way it becomes uncomfortable because it doesn’t argue for the story nor adds to the character— it attacks the reader’s personal morals which possibly gives them an ass-spanking while they’re at it which just really isn’t necessary. Emotional language is fine I think. Sometimes I got compliments from teachers especially because I didn't sound too professional, it requires a bit of knowledge when you can get away with it probably. Just make sure you can back up your arguments/statements and possibly add different views as well. In a way it's more about the confidence in which you present an idea than sounding professional and not being able to understand all the 'why's' I believe.

This one isn't that relevant for school-essays, but sometimes when writing one the question isn't clear. It helps both you and the reader to reformulate it in the beginning. Essays as well as stories are often nothing more than a problem you need to give an answer to. Even if there's no question, it helps to make one anyway so you don't wander off endlessly and drown in a sea of possible subjects you could write about.

Something that may help you as well— I created a roadmap for myself and the different types of things I have to write. That way I always know what to do first and it helps me structure both the essay and my process as I can get easily distracted otherwise. Making more decisions than necessary makes me freeze up, but with a roadmap I don’t have to do either.

Uuh, I've probably picked up on tons of helpful things lately, but I think these are great to start with. I hope they are helpful to you.

I always wanted to (story-)write, but gave up on it and decided to learn how to draw instead. Then, I sort of realized that I was being an idiot, because that desire never left and I had to write other things anyway— like this for example, and simply accepting the fact that no one can understand the load of incomprehensible rubbish I wrote, just wouldn’t do. You can check my older posts… it’s awful. If I ever intentionally want to give myself another headache, I’ll go and read those. 

It’s definitely not perfect now, but hopefully I improved though. I think so. Sometimes I still get scolded as I tend to ping-pong between thoughts suddenly and I can hardly tell the difference between BrE/AmE. (As I grew up I learned English mostly through a sort-of-aunt figure from Canada that always forced me to watch British tv with her.) But, the past few months I especially had to write many essays and (argumentative) case studies so I decided to learn and become better in writing. If that translated back to Tumblr then I'm happy and you’ve made my day >< 

[garricks4thwingqueen]

Breath play with Garrick? 👀

Experimenting with Garrick

Request:  Breath play with Garrick? 👀

Experimenting with Garrick 

Synopsis: Riorson Reader X Garrick Tavis. You have been in a relationship with Garrick ever since you were fostered together after your parents rebellion. You two have seen it all and t been through all alot which has led you to trying a lot of things in the bedroom. There was one thing that neither of you have yet to try though and that was breathe play. Even with your new signet of air manipulation it had never occurred to you two to try something like that until you had learned about from a fellow squad mate that just so happened to be dating your brother. 

Trigger Warnings: Breathe play, Safe word, swearing. 

Word count: 1447

  Y/N POV

     It was just after the battle at Basiath and you had been comfortably back at Riorson house. Well as comfortable as one could get with 100 plus cadets and some whatever number of gryphon riders. You had never been more thankful for our own bedroom in your own home than you were now.  It meant that you could get privacy but above all else it meant that you and Garrick could still sleep peacefully in the same bed at night and not crowded around a million other cadets. 

   Being close proximity to your brother's ex pissed you off enough that you looked forward to the time you and Garrick got to retreat to your room at night. However before doing so tonight you were sitting in front of the fire talking with your squad when Garrick, Xaden and Bodhi were off training in the yard. You couldn’t help but roll your eyes as Sawyer was having a conversation with Jesinia; where he had clearly been taught sign language by Ridoc.  

   You had been roped back into the conversation with Rhiannon and Violet; which had now landed on the topic of your sex lives. You groaned and said “do we have to?”..

    Rhiannon let out a chuckle “Oh come on Y/n it’ll be fun!”  “Yeah but she’s with my brother.” You groaned and gestured to Violet. 

   “Well I umm do have something interesting to say.” She almost stuttered. “Oh?” You asked your curiosity now, almost picked even though you most certainly should not be wondering about Xaden’s sex life even though it was now pretty clear whenever Xaden and Violet were having a heated moment when a random thunderstorm happened. They really need to learn to control their signets you thought to yourself. 

  “Have either of you heard of breath play?” Vi asked as you and Rhiannon glanced at each other and then shook your heads no. “Well it kinda constricts your breathing to a point.” You weren’t going to lie to yourself, this had you wanting her to explain more. “How do you two, well you know you.” Asked. Violet chuckled “Well his shadows are a major factor and so is a safe motion.” “Safe motion?” You asked. “Yeah instead of a safe word since I can’t easily open my mouth as his shadows act as a rope tied tightly around my neck.” “If I get too uncomfortable or can’t breathe; I tug his ear two times.”  “And you honestly find that arousing?” Vi nodded. “You and Garrick never?”  You shook your head no; “I mean we’ve been together for several years even though we were separated for two when he came here and until I started; so we’ve tried lots of kinks but never that. With me being just 5 feet; height kinks are our favorite. But maybe we will toss a little spice in the bedroom tonight.” “Better make sure those sound wards are in top shape tonight.” Rhiannon smirked. “Very funny Rhi.” You smirked and tossed a throw pillow in her direction. 

                            Later that night Garrick’s POV

  I smiled as Y/N came out of the attached bathroom in just one of my black t-shirts. “You look very cheeky tonight my little one.” I said standing off the bed and pulling her into my arms. “The girls and I were talking.” “Oh yeah about what my angel?” I hummed starting to pamper kisses over her neck and shoulder knocking us back on the bed. “About our sex lives.” “Really you didn’t share anything too much did you my little one?” I asked her and pulled my shirt over her head revealing her fully exposed breasts and beautiful body. I usually hated the rebellion mark but on her it looked absolutely beautiful and hugged her arm perfectly. Being Xaden’s younger sister she had the second biggest one and I had the third biggest. I also admired her new dragon relic she gained in October from Oirre, the green dragon she bonded that hugged her hip and went up to just under her breasts. 

      She shook her head no. “Good girl.” I said starting to lightly massage her breasts. “But Violet did and I think we should try something.” “Oh?” I asked detaching my lip slightly from her left breast. “Yeah it's called breath play.”  “Is that safe? I’d never do anything to hurt you or make you feel uncomfortable, my little one.” “Yeah.” She said running her fingers through my thick hair, my fingers still making work all over her body, one of them finally resting on her clit. “Go on.” I murmured, kissing all over her and rubbing light circles on her clit.

   She whimpered before speaking; “They use a safe motion; like she tugs his ear two times if she is starting to feel uncomfortable. They use his shadows to restrict the air flow around her neck but I was thinking we could use your hand over my mouth and nose or something like that.” I nod “Only if you promise to tape my shoulders two times if you get two uncomfortable.” 

   “I promise Gare I will.” She whimpered at my touch as I was now sliding two fingers in and out. “Ok how do you wanna start baby girl?” “Have sex like normal? And then you just whenever you're ready?” I nod my head lining my lower half with hers. “Are you ready for me; my sweet little one?” I asked lightly brushing my tip against her entrance. 

  “Yes Gare.” She moaned as I slid into her and started to lightly thrust as her legs wrapped around my waist and I started to suck on her breasts once more. I kept the steady pace going but increased my thrust just slightly as I looked her in the eyes. Seeing her lust and desire in those pretty onyx eyes made me know she was ready for me.  “Remember to tape my shoulder two times.” She nodded and said “Yes Gare Bear.” Good girl I whispered still thrusting into her as I placed my right hand over her face. 

  I could feel her suck in a breath as my left hand easily covered her mouth and nose, my fingertips resting just under just in between her eyes. She whimpered and started squirm beneath me as I felt her get wetter to the touch as I applied slightly more pressure with my hand against her face. “That's my good girl. Take this so well for me.” I cooed as I wrapped my fingers around her neck but not too tightly; this was only our first time trying this and I didn’t want to hurt or scare her; my thrust still at a faster rhythmic pace inside of her. 

   She moaned as loudly as she could as I could feel her squirm even more underneath me. With this I knew she was very close to coming undone as I applied the most pressure to her face that I could feel comfortable doing so, I could her hair breathing getting more shallow. But I wasn’t too worried just yet as I knew her air manipulation signet was helping her and that Oirre wouldn’t let her go too far. 

  “That’s my good girl.” I said again. “Do you want me to remove my hands when my pretty girl comes for me?” I asked; smiling as she tapped my shoulder two times.” “Good girl.” I breathed removing her hands and I could literally see her inhale of oxygen as we both came undone at the same time. “Garrick.” She moaned so damned loudly I’ve never been more thankful for soundwards than at this moment.  “Gods Y/N.” I moaned as we both finished. 

    “How did that feel my little one?” I asked, placing a soft kiss on her forehead as I held her close. “Fucking exhilarating. When you moved your hands, and I got the fresh breath of air at the same time I came. It was-” I chuckled cutting her off “It was damned near sexy seeing that lust in your onyx eyes. Would you again baby girl?” “Yeah, I think I’d like to but not every time.” I nodded and hummed in agreement. “Why don't we get in that large tub of yours and get cleaned up before bed.” She nodded and clung onto me as we stood. “Maybe we will need to change the sheets too.” She giggled looking at the mess we made over my shoulder. “Yeah, we may want to. I love you Gare Bear.” She said contentedly into my chest. “I love you to my little one always.” I said softly, turning the tub water onto the perfect temperature. 

[possibilistfanfiction]

wn prompt: “All my longings lie open before you”

in the middle of a holy war, in the middle of battles that feel unending, that feel like eternity all over again: anguish and confusion and grief and loss and yearning —

in the middle of a holy war you hold beatrice to you in the dark of the night.

it’s quiet in the room they’d given you at cat’s cradle, one of the nicest ones with a queen bed and a bigger dresser. no one had even bothered to ask if you’d wanted your own rooms; no one had even bothered to extend any condemnation — just a wink from camila when she’d shown you to it. 

moonlight drifts through the curtains and you trace along the words you know are inked into bea’s skin, even if you can’t see them in the dark, even if you hold her hand from behind and bury your nose in her sweet-smelling hair. 

‘are you all right, ava?’

her voice is groggy, like she’d just woken up, but it settles something inside you and you can’t bring yourself to regret waking her, even in the middle of the night. ‘yes,’ you say. ’no.’ she turns over and gently touches your face, checking for tears, for scrapes, for something in your eyes, unnameable, that she’s somehow always been able to find. ‘tell me something good.’

it’s quiet, desperate; you have felt so, so much loss. 

‘one day, we’ll go back to la, if you want. and we can drive to the desert. it’ll be so beautiful.’ she wipes the hot, stubborn tears under your eyes with the pads of her thumbs. ‘we’ll rent a house, and we’ll make dinner together, and, when it gets dark, we’ll bring an air mattress outside to the yard; we’ll have lots of blankets, and everything will smell like rain in the distance. we can see all the stars in the sky.’ her voice is soft, aching. ‘and the joshua trees all around, strange and beautiful. i’ll hold you, and we’ll have hot chocolate.’

‘spiked?’ your voice is rough but bea doesn’t say anything, just graciously grants you a laugh. 

‘sure.’

‘you do love me.’

‘i do.’ her eyes are so serious and gorgeous in the moonlight. ‘we’ll be able to hear all the sounds of the desert, and i’ll teach you about all the constellations we can see.’

you kiss her; what else can you do?

‘we’ll go back, to the desert and the mountains and the sea. i’ll learn how to pray in a new language and probably get more tattoos; i’m sure you’ll paint our walls ridiculous colors. you’ll take up pottery and we’ll accumulate, eventually, a record collection of all the music we’ve danced to when we can’t sleep.’

‘bea.’ you swallow, hold her to you and bury your face in the crook of her neck. 

‘there will be no more angels or demons. just us, and our bed, and the rest of the world. and i’ll kiss you then, when it’s all over.’

‘you are…’ you shake your head, count her freckles in the dark: more every day you spent in the sun. ‘you are consecrate.’

‘you believe in that now?’

your smile feels a little helpless. ‘only with you. how could i not?’

‘all my longings lie open before you.’

you kiss her, like a promise neither one of you is sure you can keep. you ache for it more than anything you ever have. and then you kiss her again, let her press you back into the mattress. she pushes up your sleep shirt and touches your hips with her hands, with her lips, with her teeth. you bite into her shoulder as she takes you into her mouth; you feel the halo glow as your legs shake — unbound. and you touch her after, just like she likes, just like you’ve gotten to learn: your fingers curling into her, hot and slick, your tongue flicking against her pulse point. she says your name like no other words exist.

you imagine it all, as your wrist burns and she trembles all around you: a living room with candles that smell like cedar and clove; lavender and rosemary in the garden; learning to bake cookies and stealing her sweaters and arguing over what takeout to order. you’ll fall asleep watching movies on the couch. you'll have your friends over for brunches where there's far, far too much food. you’ll make tea and she’ll play her violin. you’ll look at her in absolute awe, one very holy, warm night, in a wispy white dress, barefoot, at sunset; she’ll have on a loose white linen suit. you’ll promise her everything; when she comes you realize you already have — beyond heaven and hell and death: a life, with her.

she settles her head against your chest. you trace up and down her spine; she shivers.

‘when it’s over,’ you say, like a prayer and a promise. ‘i'll slice persimmons from the farmer's market in the fall and wake you some mornings with figs and honey.' you long for it, with your whole soul. 'let’s grow old together.’

she nods, turns to kiss, just once, softly and like morning you may never see, over your stubbornly still-beating heart. 

[sunbeamedskies]

Languageaholic/Wanderlust/Toxic vs. Positive Travel

This is so cathartic that I’m already back

Man, the post before this is one of the most personal ones I’ll ever write. It’ll probably just become a regular thing though

For years, one of the main things I worked on was learning as many languages as possible. I wanted to travel the world and speak to everyone as much as possible in their native languages. I wanted to surprise people and speak back to them in anything other than English. I still do! 

However, this became somewhat unhealthy. I would never be able to decide whether to work on my core 7 languages or the 13 total I had studied the most. I went back and forth in my mind and it attached itself to my OCD. I would think about it way too much and not end up making enough progress in general because of it

I still achieved a lot that I’m thankful for, but one thing I didn’t realize until later was that hyperfocusing on languages was also a method of running away from the fact that I wasn’t writing. I forgot I was even supposed to be trying to write or do anything creative. Conversely, when I finally started working on my previous book, I only minimally kept up with my languages. A little piece of my soul felt like it went missing. I’ve realized recently I still haven’t balanced my continued language learning goals with my writing goals well, but I am determined to do so

Eckhart Tolle warned that people who love to travel a lot can fall into the trap of feeling temporary relief when the new place you’re in distracts you from the troubles in your mind. Then when the new place becomes a little old, you lose that relief and are off to a new place to get another temporary rush. I’ve always been someone who wants to travel everywhere, and when I did my first Eurotrip last year, this warning rested in the back of my mind

As the blog post below this exemplifies, traveling absolutely does not rid you of all your problems. It has enriched my life though, and I am happier being elsewhere than where I grew up. I don’t feel I belong where I grew up, and there is nothing wrong with leaving anywhere you don’t belong. I try to be as aware of my feelings as possible to avoid just traveling for the initial rush. Staying longer in certain places and really dealing with your issues is one way of avoiding toxic travel patterns

Some in my family don’t understand my strong wanderlust. They may love traveling too, but believe I do it for too long or don’t get why I’m going to certain places. I think ancestral trauma subconsciously affects how they view it. Safety is even more important to them than most, and ridding myself of a ‘normal’ life by filling it with some new unknowns gives them anxiety. They’re still happy for me a lot of the time though, which is more than others can say

I’ve never really wanted a normal life. I do want five or six kids and to be married someday, but I want to do it in my own time and raise them a little uniquely. I want homebase to be a couple different places and to always continue traveling as much as possible. I’ve learned to not be as judgmental of the white picket fence life though- I think some can balance that kind of life with new adventures if they make the effort, and as long as people are happy, so what if what’s right for them isn’t the same as what’s right for me?

Most people who follow me on here will stick to the shorter political/social commentary posts and never read these, and that’s fine. These personal entries are mostly for me. I do want to be brave and start crossposting them on my other socials though. I am a very open person who will gladly discuss all of these posts in person with people, but there is a tinge of nervousness surrounding the thought of people I know actually seeing these

I think my 2014 Tumblrina self would be proud. She always wanted to do consistent personal posts at some point in the future, and goddamit do I miss 2014 sometimes

Galaxy leggings forever

Love,

J

[queer-advice-hotline]

Hi 😅 I hope this is okay to ask, I’ll try to be brief but will probably fail at that. Basically I’ve been raised in a Christian household, very conservative too. But I met a far more liberal Christian friend and over time .. sort of am to the point I think I might be left-leaning too (definitely more than my family). This scares me. I don’t want to disappoint my family by being liberal …

She also recently talked to me about evolution which I was never taught about, the most I learned was reading a single textbook that talked about it around college. And … it all makes sense. I even went to the religious science site my dad says proves evolution is false and I can’t find any actual proof evolution is false. Everything is evidence to the contrary and .. I’ve listened to videos about experiments where cells clump together and start getting more complex and it’s honestly so exciting? That’s so cool? But … I can’t help but think of how disappointed my family will be about this, too …

But the worst part .. I’ve been holding off on looking into LGBT stuff because I don’t know what I’ll find. I’ve never had a crush on an actual guy (I’m a girl), even though easily over 20 guys have expressed interest in the past, some just said I was hot and kind of asked me out, others expressed wanting to marry me. I’ve never dated, ever. I only like fictional characters really, and the only strong connection has been literally 12 years of loving a character. My affection for him went into full force when I empathized with him, but I’m also autistic and he’s my special interest, so idk how that factors into it. Some of my friends say I’m demi, but I’ve insisted I’m straight and I’m just picky. I don’t know if I am. I also … have met or been friends with three girls over the years, or presumably girls, that I know I wanted to spend time with or get to know, I’d be nervous around (but I also have anxiety ..) or still think about sometimes. But I don’t think I’d want to have sex with a girl … idk, it’s really confusing because my mom always told me people think they’re LGBT because of wounds, and I definitely have been wounded in the past. But I also … I just don’t feel attracted to most people … but I also can find any person attractive or pretty? I just don’t necessarily want to do anything with them? Like recently I saw a video game character who I felt very Eh about, like he’s pretty I guess, until I learned he has trauma and now he seems more appealing because I empathize with him.

But … I don’t know what to do. My faith is extremely important to me and I know I have to have some sort of spirituality no matter what. But I just … I just can’t be LGBT. It’ll destroy my family and I might not have a place to live if I decide I am. Especially if I got a partner like that. I don’t know … I know I’m already such a disappointment for disagreeing politically and .. probably believing in evolution, and now I need to look into LGBT stuff because I need to know if what I’ve been taught is wrong, but I’m so, so, so scared. I can’t … be this. I just can’t. I don’t know if I am.

I’m sorry, this was kind of a vent and I’m sorry if any language is poorly-worded. I’m living in a constant state of anxiety right now so I am probably saying things wrong and I apologize. I just don’t know what to do. If you read this, thank you - and I hope you have a good day.

I think coming to terms with your identity may help you, even if you don't tell anyone. Your family doesn't have to know until you're ready to tell them, or they never even have to know at all.

It's important to remember that you don't need to rush into anything either. This is a pretty big change from what you described as your lifestyle, so it makes sense that you are having a lot of feelings of anxiety over this. Rushing into a new identity won't help you, especially if you aren't ready for it.

As for you religion, you can be religious and lgbtq, there are plenty of quuer people who are religious, and talking with some of hem might help you. They could give you advice on your family and you identity. Any religious quuer people feel free to reply to this with advice.

[writting-for-a-chain-of-heros]

Dating Four Hc (update+ edit)

The smith is smitten

Smithy smitened!

Smitten smithy!

When he falls in love,he tends to fall hard

He can’t stop thinking about you

His face feels hot and weird whenever he’s around you

Most people tend to go through a sort of puppy love phase at the beginning of every new relationship before mellowing down later but with four, he’s stuck FOREVER being utterly infatuated with you like a lovesick fool

His feelings are varying and intense but they’re genuine and true to you

He always has the most unyielding  energy to go out and do the most grand of acts of love for you but will later learns to better handle himself as time goes by between you two.

Gifts ,gifts,gifts galore!

His love language is giving and receiving gifts as well as acts of service and quality time

Depending on which color feels more prominent that day he can go either from making you some of the best weapons,jewels and armor you can ever find in Hyrule to baking you  the most delicious treats to carrying and lifting any heavy or small work you need help with getting done or just simply basking in each other's presence in complete silence together.

Has never properly dated anyon before in his life

Well, I mean, he has kinda gone on a lot of dates before but they were almost all minish people & possible one or two other non minish people (Which is a complicated story for later)

So he's never really ever been in an actual normal committed relationship with a person before

Unless u are a minish then this would be a lot easier for him to handle

So He secretly feels very nervous the first time you two start dating

He's still going to try to find his footing on how he’s supposed to act with you now that your both in a relationship.

On one hand he likes what you guys had before dating and wants to continue that easy going relationship you two share as friends

But on the other he wants to take things a little further then what you have now by being able to hold your hand and show just how much he enjoys/loves being with you (and also other added bonuses)

So he’s going to be taking little nervous steps at the start of your relationship to test the boundaries of what you're probably ok and not ok with

He’ll get sick of it eventually and just take you somewhere to talk about how you want this relationship to be

It’ll be a little bit hard for him to pluck up the courage to ask (since he won’t exactly know how to start a conversation like that) but he does surprisingly do it and tries to do it as early into your relationship as he can with you

After all there’s no point in beating around the bush now,right?

Once you've establish your dos and don’ts he'll make sure to jot them down into his memories and keep it all locked in.

Even if some of the things you state don’t exactly make sense or seem a bit ridiculous,he’ll respect them no matter what.

You never should feel like you have to make up an excuse or come up with a false reason over something that makes you uncomfortable.

Once everything is settled and,lets say, you are comfortable with physical affection-then this man is almost never going to stop keeping you in his arms and have your hands laced together 

Half the time he'll forget you two are still holding hands, so when either one of you have to part ways, there’s always going to be a little moment where both of you either accidentally start go to the same direction or end up tugging on each other before you stop to let each other's hands go.

Four on his own is a mega dork

Like a HUGE dork

He’ll do the most cheesiest things to get a kiss from you or try to set up situations where your both stuck together for a while

He knows he doesn't need to do any of it,he knows he can just ask,but in his mind he likes to go the extra mile to earn your kisses and love

He likes to tease you

He's usually subtable about it but definitely really likes to mess with you alot 

Also be prepared for him to shamelessly use his strength to his full advantage whenever he messes with you

He’s also a bit of a mischievous prankster and don't think that just because you're his spouse that he’ll go easy on you. 

He actually likes to do it to you the most

A lot of his pranks are mostly harmless & fun, nothing too serious

But as much as he enjoys tormenting you he also loves to have you joining in on his practical jokes a lot more often once you're dating

He’s more then once made an utter fool of himself in front of you to try and impress you

If your both with still with the chain when you both start dating (and even before dating) he’d try to do some flashy moves or impressive tricks during their little sparring matches to try and get your admiration

He’d always turn or side eye you to see if you saw him and often times during this he’d get a boot kick to the side of the head soon after or simply lose his stance and get himself hurt trying to dodge the last attack at the last minute

This usually ends with a smug looking Four or an embarrassed looking Four who humiliated himself in front of you and everyone

But you still come to congratulate him and show him how proud you are of his valiant effort

If he wins you have to give him pecks all over his face and tell him how great he was as a reward

If he loses then you have to give him kisses anyways to help heal his bruised pride

It’s the only thing that can save him from being pouty all day about making himself look stupid in front of you

He loves to hold you close in the mornings and run his hands over your skin

Just feeling the difference in texture with your body's skin and his while you both cuddle to be mesmerizing to him

He likes to be the little spoon and have you wrapped around him

He feels warm,safe,loved and for the first time in a while as a hero,a little cared for (protected)

It’s a great and wonderful feeling,it’s one of his favorite position and times when he’s with you

He can also be big spoon, too

He loves this just as much as being the little spoon because he can tuck your head under his chin and feel you flushed against him close.

It’s like he gets to keep you safe and to himself while he runs his hands through your hair.

You look peaceful and amazing + he can look at you as much as he wants without having to look up!

In fact he’s the one who gets to look down at you!

He doesn't really mind which one you two do,as long as your cuddling then he’s in heaven

To him all that matters is the physical closeness and how long you both stay together

All cuddle sessions are very long and he won’t accept it to be any shorter

If you try to leave,then he’s not letting you go

Your trapped now with him and there’s no escape

You should know your his now and he’s not letting you go for anything

Well,you might as well get comfortable and enjoy it while you're here..

[yuriririnnie]

Someone Great

A/N: I haven’t written fanfiction ever since I temporarily gave up hardcore fangirling a couple of years back. I’m so out of touch, but creativity has been creeping onto me lately because law school is eating up most of my life.

Do you wanna guess who she'll end up with? :)

Prelude and part one under the cut! ❤

—

PAIRING | Park Jongseong (Jay) x reader

WC | 1.6k

GENRE | fluff, angst, slice of life

WARNINGS | explicit language

SYNOPSIS | I was told that I was going to love six boys in my life before I meet the one I'm going to love forever.

—

PRELUDE

Seven boys. I am going to love seven boys in this lifetime.

I went to a Chinese temple once when I was 10 because my mother was a hardcore fortune junkie and believed in these superstitions. She made (forced more like it) me come with her to see if I was going to grow up rich or something and while I myself didn’t believe in it, I let her do what she wanted because really at that point in life I never saw myself as anything or anyone once I reached my twenties. 

Not sure if they still have this now, but I inserted a coin in what looked like a gacha machine and pulled out a piece of paper (I vividly remember that I pulled a number 15) which supposedly contained my future and how life would be like for me in terms of health, wealth, love, and everything else. 

It said that I would meet and love exactly six men in my life before I meet the one for me. Back then I never obsessed on boys or the idea of dating in general, but as a young girl, it sparked my interest because the concept of love was something new. I kept that single piece of paper until I graduated college. 

—

ONE. THE FIRST.

Everyone remembers their first. First crush, first date, first hug, the first hand they’ve ever felt, and the first pair of lips they’ve ever touched with their own. 

His name was Park Jongseong. We called him Jay. 

Jay was the perfect first love. He was handsome, kind, lit up the room whenever he entered, valued his friendships, and was the ultimate momma’s boy. I met Jay when I was 13. He was 14, an only child of a business man, learned how to drive at 16, and was the boy of my dreams. 

He was tall, slender, had jet black hair that was often pushed back to show his sharp, manly features. He had a small scar at the top of his nose in between his eyes, and often had a cut in the middle of his lower lip. At first it made him look like a bad boy, someone your mother wouldn’t dream of you ever end up dating. But deep inside, he was kind, caring, and really embodied my love language (which is of course, acts of service). I dedicated literally every Taylor Swift song to him and thought that I was going to love him forever. 

I vaguely remember the day we met, but I do remember the first time I went out with him. I was so impressed by how much he spent on me considering we were just kids and didn’t really get much for a weekly allowance (at least that was the case for me). He was every boy a girl could ever hope their first love would be. He treated me to lunch, held my hand in the movie theater, and I even got my first kiss when he dropped me home that one day. 

“I’ve never done this before.” Because I really hadn’t yet. The closest form of intimacy I’ve ever had were hugs and hand-holding, and most of these didn’t even come from certain “significant others.”

“Just close your eyes.” He seemed experienced. 

Was I supposed to feel embarrassed for not knowing where to put my hands? When should I open my eyes? Should I say thank you afterwards?

See, these are the things I wished they taught us at school. 

And then, in the midst of all this overthinking, our lips touched. 

My first kiss was memorable because we laughed it off immediately after. He asked me how it was and I replied with, “Felt like a rough wilderness, but I guess it’ll feel better later on.” He never let that go because it was the object of literally every inside joke we have among our friends. 

Jay took care of me a lot. He made sure that I ate during lunch and that I received gifts every “monthly anniversary.” He took me to the movies, drove me around, even taking the long ways to places just so we can spend more time sightseeing. He would hold the door for me, carry my heavy bags full of high school necessities, and wipe the sweat off my forehead after cheerleading practice.

We had a lot of fun dating throughout those years, but when I turned 16, I got more and more exposed to school activities, boys in general, and learned more about myself and what I loved doing. Jay was extremely supportive in the things I did, and even if I didn’t get along that much with his mom, he continued to love me as though I was the only woman in his life. 

One fateful morning, I woke up after a busy day at school (we stayed up until midnight for a runway where I had to represent my class and model for the students who helped design clothes based on a theme) and I’m not sure if it was due to exhaustion or the gradual turn of events between Jay and I, but this was something I will always remember even up to this day. 

It was the day I realized that I was no longer in love. 

Going back to that very day, I was so angry, frustrated, and even disgusted with myself for even thinking about dumping my dear boyfriend. My dear, sweet, caring, Jay who treated me like I was glass. But the hardest part of it was accepting the fact that I no longer felt the same. I no longer felt the heat of the sun in my body whenever we touched. I no longer felt the sweetness in the laughs that we shared. I no longer felt the butterflies in my stomach when in fact it used to feel like there was an entire amazon in there. Everything just felt so empty. Was that how it was supposed to feel like? 

I forgot when and at what point I stopped loving Jay, but I knew that he did not deserve me the very moment I even started to doubt my feelings. The night before I finally admitted to myself that I no longer loved him was actually NORMAL. He picked me up from school, we laughed, shared stories, held hands, and even kissed before I hopped off the car when I reached home. Yet, I knew I couldn’t keep these feelings away from him. I couldn’t hide them in the depths of my young heart. I was just too small, and the feeling only grew more as I made every little thing that he did for me a big deal. 

“Did I do something wrong?” He choked. I felt the shock from his voice. He sounded like he felt every kind of negative emotion all at once. 

I took a deep breath and said, “I just don’t think I feel the same anymore.” 

“All of a sudden? Have you been feeling like this for a while?”

“I don’t know.” I really didn’t know. I just knew that even if I was still so young at the time, I spent three years of my young age with Jay. It was my first time ever sharing a huge chunk of my life to someone else. Back then, it felt like a mini-forever. 

It was a 23-minute phone call. 

We broke up that night, and I cried myself to sleep for the first time. 

It was my first heartbreak, and it wasn’t even for a guy who hurt me. He didn’t even try to hurt me. 

Jay lingered for a while. I understood why he held such as a special place in my life and I knew that he was someone my young heart had to experience to know what it was really like to reciprocate a feeling. He was my first leap of faith, my dip in the pool before I dove in, the sweet sensation at the tip of my tongue before I took a bite. I still so clearly remember how he held me the first time we hugged, and the scar he had on his lip when we first kissed. 

I was his first love, and he mine. 

[blushblush-readerinsertsnthings]

Hello there! Are you doing requests? If yes, can you do some dating headcanons for Seth, Poe and Scale pls?

yes, absolutely! some of my favorite bois <3 <3 <3

POE

Honestly, dating him is about what you’d expect, with a few little surprises sprinkled in for fun. Gotta keep things fresh, can’t have you getting super bored of him. He’s the kind of guy who likes to hang out in graveyards and he’s a bit morbid… but at the same time, he’s definitely down-to-Earth. Compared to some of the other guys, he’s almost normal.

Writes poetry about you sometimes? While he doesn’t advertise it, he’s a romantic at heart. He likes doing those sappy things, comparing the touch of your hand in his hair to the cool breeze of a mausoleum, and your kiss is like the first breath that the dead take upon resurrection… perhaps he keeps writing these things because you’re the first person to truly appreciate his dark, flowery language.

He texts you a lot, especially if you have a job or studies that keep you away. He’s got more free time, being a student (one who can admit to slacking off somewhat in areas which don’t interest him), so he can get slightly bored and when he’s bored, his mind wanders to you. To see Hey. Hanging out in the library. And I’m thinking of you. I might check out this book… wanna come summon demons with me later? ;) with a picture of him smirking behind some ancient-looking tome makes you very happy. Maybe you’ll even consider it! Would be a hell of a way to spend a Saturday night, huh?

‘Melancholy flower’/’melon cauliflower’ for a vegan emo isn’t the only pun he has up his sleeve. He’s also got other small references too, and puns aren’t his preferred method of one-lining. If it’ll get you to smile, however, he’ll use them. Particularly if he feels awkward and doesn’t think he has much else to say, he’ll pun. A well-timed quip of, “Well, look at that. Good for them; they’ve got one foot in the rave.” in response to a couple of elderly partygoers decked out in glow sticks will have you giggling, at least. Or he hopes it will. He almost wishes you’d never stop laughing, it’s the best sound he’s ever heard.

In addition to just texting you a bunch, he also loves to send you naughty pictures. Nothing too bad that anyone else would be appalled to seeing on your phone… just tiny things to tease you. Photos of him wearing a new pair of skeleton underwear accompanied by a caption of, What do you think? Too many bones? 😉 Or maybe a pic of his hand resting on his bare thigh, with the excuse that he wants to know what you think of the nail polish he just put on. All’s fair, isn’t it? He definitely wants you thinking about him.

For all that he pretends to be a dark and troubled bad boy, his ideal date night is… getting some takeout, watching a horror flick, and falling asleep on the couch cuddled up in your arms. (Or with you cuddled in his. He’s not picky about that part, as long as there’s cuddling going on!) Often when that happens, he’ll wake up in the middle of the night, gaze fondly at you for a few minutes, and then drift off with a hint of a smile on his face. It’s so disgustingly domestic and he hates how much he loves it.

SCALE

A relationship?? What’s… what’s that??? He’s clueless. And he’s not clueless by virtue of not being intelligent, because he’s very smart. He just… has struggled in connecting with people, for a very long time. Before you, he never really had romance with anyone. His mind was laser-focused on his job, so it was as if he never had time for anything else. Just… be patient with him. He loves you, but he’s very much still learning how to exist inside a romantic relationship.

That said, he’s surprisingly good at knowing how to be a partner. That might be mostly because he’s aware and observant, to the point that he just… notices things about you. He knows what your preferred morning drink is, and he knows what it looks like when you’re tired or in pain, and his heart has begun to beat to match the cadence of your speech. And if there’s something he doesn’t know, he has no shame in asking. (Well… usually.) He brings you a drink or painkillers if you need, encourages you to rest when it seems you’ve been overworking, and he knows how to make you laugh. He very much takes pride in being the best partner for you that he can be.

Uh. Well. It’s. It’s just. He’s an assassin! He’s a serial killer who takes commissions! His lifestyle, while entirely badass as far as he’s concerned, is also dangerous. He’s excellent at what he does, but the fact is that sometimes he has a bad day or his target has a good day. To say nothing of rivalries or competition between assassins, particularly during ‘open’ hits that directly pit them against each other. He will come home injured, it’s just a matter of when it happens. Hopefully you’re not too attached to your carpets, because he’ll stagger in dripping blood all over them, begging you to let him take care of himself. Of course, that’s impossible, so there will definitely be times you’ll have to patch him up in the bathroom. He can’t go to the hospital, right? He… he trusts you to take care of him.

He has quite the singing voice, even if he vehemently denies that he likes to sing. Often he’ll start by humming while the two of you are relaxing and snuggling, and if you insist on watching a musical during movie night, he’ll usually start to sing along in a low voice. For whatever reason he’s embarrassed by it! Although the urge to sing ‘rose’ when he got transformed into a dragon, that is absolutely not to say it wasn’t there before. Singing relaxes him, and it might just be because he’s unpracticed in being vulnerable around people that singing in front of others, even you, flusters him a bit. Though… he likes it if you fall asleep to his singing. That’s flattering.

He can get… possessive. Nowhere near Cole levels of possessive or anything, but his one sore spot is that he is petrified of the idea that he might not be ‘cool’ in your eyes. He’s convinced that you’ll wake up one day, look at him, and go, “Oh, my GOD, you’re so boring.” before walking out of his life forever. And he can’t take that. He will do literally anything in the name of keeping you interested in him. Actually, up to and including admitting that he’s afraid you think he’s boring and that you’re going to leave him. However, it’s a win-win; you get the emotional openness and some meaningful intimacy out of him, and he gets the reassurance that you’re super fascinated with him and you’re not going anywhere. Honesty is SEXY!!!

SETH

Is it getting hot in here, or is just because he’s dragging the essence of hell behind him? Who knows at this point? It’s really his game and you’re just along for the ride. Maybe that’s how you like it. If that wasn’t how you like it, you probably wouldn’t be with him. He likes to do dangerous things, so you’ll have to be careful exactly which ones you do with him. He forgets sometimes that humans can’t take the kinds of abuse that demons can! So if he mentions a ‘vacation’ to his ‘hometown’ by ‘a beautiful lake’, guide him toward something else. That beautiful lake is made of fire, down in hell, and to you it’d be less a vacation and more like a nightmare. Oops! He tried.

Shockingly okay with the whole arrangement he has going with you. It’s a shame he can’t manipulate you, because you sort of see through all his tricks and no-sell any of the bad ideas, but he’s not too broken up. He’s convinced he’ll eventually find something you’ll fall for, so now he’s just biding his time. Except… during that time, he finds himself actually falling for you. That comes with not wanting to hurt you or betray your trust, which means that slowly he loses the urge to manipulate you at all. He goes from wanting your soul to just wanting your heart. Awwwww~!

You wanna wear his hoodie? He’ll let you wear his hoodie. Hell, if his clothes fit you, he’ll let you wear all of them. Not only is he totally fine walking around wearing very little or nothing at all, demons are possessive creatures by nature. It hits that button to see you covered in things that are his, which makes him a very happy little shit-stirrer. You’re so hot wearing all his clothes, (or, indeed, wearing replicas of them if his happen not to fit you), he might just decide to pin you down and kiss every inch of you.

Yes, he’s a demon. And a troublemaker. However, he’s also the Avatar of Woe. Being that he is that, he… has this strange kind of depression. His boredom and anguish and occasional apathy drive him to seek thrills, usually. Other times, though, the woe part overtakes him entirely. If he’s allowed himself to be vulnerable with you, there are times you’ll find him in bed, sobbing uncharacteristically, bunched up in the blankets and completely lost in sorrow. How you react will determine whether or not he lets you see that side of him ever again. As much of a front as he puts up, when the woe hits, all he really wants is to be held and comforted and know you’re there for him.

He’s kind of always touching you in some way, almost as if to stake his claim on you. If the two of you are out walking, he’s holding your hand. If you’re sitting around, he’s got an arm around your waist. He likes to have his hands on you, he likes to be touching and kissing and cuddling. In some ways he forgot what it was like to have a real romance with somebody, and apparently, he’s missed all those small, normal, soft touches. He’s making up for lost time and massive amounts of touch starvation, sue him!

[wouldntyou-liketoknow]

Day 9: Plants

(Disclaimer: only one of the characters in this story belongs to me. If you’d like to learn more about LevianthanPat, go here. This story is actually something of a sequel to the first time I wrote about him and EldritchPlier, who belongs to the Markiplier Cinematic Universe. CryptidXian is yet another one of the LxianEgos made by @sammys-magical-au; go here to learn more about him.)

(Trigger Warnings: body horror, implied sleep problems, implied nightmares/night-terrors, gore, blood, organs, body horror, strong language. Please let me know if I missed anything.)

(If you’d like to use distorted fonts like the one you’ll be seeing in this story, then I recommend going to FancyTextGenerator.)

Day 1 Day 2 Day 3   Day 4 Day 5 Day 6 Day 7 Day 8 Day 10 Day 11 Day 12 Day 13

It feels like only a moment or two has passed since you closed your eyes for the night. 

Now you’re reopening them and finding yourself in something that is most certainly not your bed. Most other people would probably panic in this situation, but you don’t. You know you don’t have to.

For one thing, whatever you’re lying in isn’t a bathtub full of ice, either. ‘Matter of fact, as you push yourself to sit up, a decent amount of leaves fall away from your face to join the rest in the pile around you. They all come in lovely shades of red and orange and yellow; it makes sense, considering the state of the trees outside your apartment. 

For another thing, you can’t feel the leaves as you brush them away from your clothes. It’s not that your skin is numb—everything within touching distance just doesn’t have the texture it should have. The leaves don’t crunch or crackle under your weight (very unsatisfying, I know).  

You’ve learned to recognize this hazy, near-weightless sensation. 

You’re asleep right now. You’re dreaming. 

And you have enough experience to brace yourself right now. You may not know how or when it’ll happen, but you absolutely know that there’s going to be a twist here.

Hundreds of years of scientific progress have already passed. Research has grown, numerous experiments have been documented, and people can still only throw their best guesses at the concepts of sleep and all its weirdness.

You doubt humanity will ever be able to fully understand sleep. 

A bit of a pessimistic outlook, yes, but you have every single damn right to be a pessimist. 

It’s been months since the constant stream of nightmares started plaguing you. 

Ten months, to be specific. 

Ten. Whole. Months. Of having a raging dumpster fire for a sleep-schedule. 

(To be fair, you’d be lying if you said you weren’t a bit relieved that the nightmares didn’t finally end at nine months. Because timing like that would’ve just been begging fate to open a whole new horrific can of worms for you. . .)

Sure, this has paved the way for you to become a somewhat lucid dreamer, but that’s not really a silver lining. Just because you’re aware of when you’re dreaming doesn’t necessarily mean you have any more power in aforementioned dreams than you did before. 

You’d think that, at this point, you would’ve been able to adjust the nightmares. 

You’re sure that you could’ve adjusted to them, but you cAN’T, BECAUSE THE DAMN NIGHTMARES ARE ONLY HALF OF YOUR PROBLEM!

You heave a sigh, dragging your dream-hand down the side of your dream-face. It feels like how the plume of smoke rising from a freshly-ignited scented candle looks.

Yeah, the impending scenario is going to suck, but there’s no point standing here and getting yourself worked up over it. In fact, that’ll probably just make things even worse whenever they do decide to happen.

Might as well just take it in stride. 

You pick yourself up, pulling a dream-leaf from your hair and letting it flutter down to the ground, which is blanketed by long, unkempt grass. Turning around in a small circle, you realize that you’re in the middle of. . .some kind of garden? There’s a decent amount of trees surrounding you, all at varying distances from one another, but it seems only one of them has actually shifted colors and shed its leaves. 

All the rest are in full bloom, their branches covered in flowers. You can recognize a crabapple here, a cherry blossom there, a few different Cape Myrtles. The explosions of color are so pretty that it takes you a few seconds to realize how the trees are twitching. Not swaying like they would in the wind—there’s no trace of a breeze around you. Twitching. Like wayward muscles in a person’s arms or legs.  

You chew your lip, making a note to not get too close as you start walking. The grass almost feels like water around your ankles. It’s not wet (thank God, because having to deal with wet socks on top of a nightmare would just be needlessly cruel); it just seems to have the same weight as a creek or a pond. 

You keep your head on a swivel, miraculously alert and aware for a sleeping person. You know there’s really no point, but you’d still rather at least see the danger coming than be caught off-guard. So, of course it doesn’t take too long for you to discover the patches of flowers that are growing around the bases of the spastic trees. It takes even less time for you to realize how the aforementioned patches apparently go on as far as the eye can see. Sure, there’s enough space for you to wander without accidentally harming any of the flora, but they’re still pretty much everywhere. 

It makes you think of anatomy textbooks, of their chapters on the circulatory system, to be exact. The grass-pathways can be compared veins, which would leave the flower patches and trees in the roles of larger organs. 

Logically speaking, wouldn’t that make you a germ? A foreign, invading virus?

You’re not sure, but that doesn’t mean you want to find out.

Even with your paranoia, you just can’t help but pause to kneel down and get a closer look at the flowers. You immediately have to rethink that choice when several stems all pivot in place in order for their blossoms to look back at you. 

A mix of roses and peonies, each one coming in either a dark or pastel hue. They’re all gorgeous. The slick, rolling eyeballs in the centers where the pollen should be. . .well, they come in different colors too, along with different pupil-shapes. Some of them are welling up with tears, which drip out between the petals and plop down into the soil. 

You have to swallow a lump in your throat, but at the same time, you don’t think the eyes make their flowers look bad. Just a little strange. It could be worse: they could be shooting lasers in your face.

For whatever reason, you offer a polite nod to the flowers before standing back up and continuing your stroll. Even as you move farther and farther away, you can’t stop feeling all those little eyes on you.

You’re casting a shadow—all of the plants are as well—but it’s dim and flickering. You can see everything just fine, but the light beaming down on this environment is dull. That doesn’t take away from all the colors, but it still makes you feel like there’s a thin dusting of tarnished brass over everything. 

You look up, craning your neck. 

The sky is completely and utterly filled with clouds. Rather than white, they’re a mixture of gray and a deep shade of mottled yellow, along with a tint of otherworldly blue around the edges. They really do look just like clouds always seem to look in abstract painting: a bit jagged around the edges, still and purposefully layered. You can’t see any trace of the sun (if there even is a sun in this dream). 

You keep glancing down at all the flowers you pass. Plenty of them have teeth lining their petals, along with little tongues that waggle up at you without making a sound and uvulas in the place of their stigmas or styles or whatevers. (None of these ones burst into song, to your slight disappointment.) 

A number of the flowers actually appear normal, if not simply weird-looking all on their own with no help from ever-shifting dream rules. Orchids of the bat, monkey-faced, naked-man, et cetera variety. A plethora of chimeras, pitcher plants, voodoo lilies, sundew, swaddled babies, dancing girls, baneberries. . .Hell, you even come across a few classics: sunflowers, tulips, sweet williams. 

But they all seem to have a sort of. . .fleshy aura. Like they’re bound to become abnormal one way or another and you’ve just so happened to catch them before the changeover. You don’t know how to make sense of them. 

Sooner or later, you come across a hill. It’s a small one, but standing on it can offer a good view of all the other flora around here. It’s also topped with one tree, keeping it  sequestered from all the others. You move slowly, carefully, squinting up at this particular tree. Once you’ve scaled the hill, you realize that it isn’t twitching at all. It’s standing perfectly still, like a normal tree should. Curious, you begin to pace around it. 

Your instincts tell you there are trees just like this in the real world, but you’re still positive that you’ve never actually seen one. It seems to be about thirteen feet tall, covered in reddish-brown bark. Oblong, glossy green leaves adorn its branches, many of which end in little clusters of hanging fruit. The berries are a cheerful color, soft orange enveloped by red, perfectly spherical with rough-yet-fuzzy-looking surfaces. They look a bit similar to strawberries, but you predict they’d taste a little more tart. A mild, sweet scent is wafting off of it from all angles. 

While it doesn’t have an entire patch of smaller plants to loom over, there’s still a generous amount of black flowers growing close to its trunk. You rack your brain as they stare at them. Morning glories? Hibiscus? No. . .hollyhocks. 

You’re so proud of your memory that it takes an embarrassingly long few seconds for you to notice movement between the flowers’ stems. (It’s honestly kind of hilarious, considering how you’ve been bracing yourself for whatever is going to make this dream into a nightmare.)

But then, out of the corner of your eye like The Shining, you see a gnarled, pale hand rise from the ground.

You freeze in place. A prickly sensation crawls along your spine. 

As you watch, the hand is lifted higher and higher into the air on an unnecessarily long arm. There seems to be an elbow-esque joint every twelve inches. By the time it could easily tap you on the nose, the hand dips back down, causing the rest of the limb to arc with a series of pops and clicks. The hand hovers by one of the hollyhock blossoms. A few bony fingers reach for those dark petals; sharp nails protrude from the cuticles, but they don’t tear into the flowers. No, they’re just. . .gently probing them. Almost like a curious toddler would. 

That allegory dies a quick death as the long, low creeeaaak of a tree branch breaks the silence, as you look back up to find a ghoulish face, angled upside-down, mere inches from yours. With nostrils ever-so-slightly flaring like a raccoon and dead, milky-white eyes drilling into yours, the creature announces, “฿ØØ.”

You don’t scream, but a high-pitched, unintelligible noise still escapes your lips as you reel back. You trip over your own feet, feeling as though a bucket of icy water has been dumped over your head as you collapse onto the grass. 

The creature snickers at your shock. As it turns its head rightside-up, bangs of black hair fall into place just above its eyes, matching the stubble growing along its jaw and above its lips. Its head ever-so-slightly pushes toward you. This helps you discover how its neck looks a lot like that arm protruding from the hollyhocks. The only difference is that it’s even longer. As you get to your feet and back away, you see how the creature’s neck is poking out from behind the fruit tree.

That’s. . .not possible. 

The tree’s trunk is thin enough to wrap your arms around. There’s no way it can actually be hiding the rest of this entity’s body.

And yet, that’s exactly what it’s doing. (Or maybe this creature just doesn’t have a torso? Who’s to say? Not you, that’s for sure.)

“₳Ⱨ, ₮ⱧɆ ØⱠĐ Ø₦Ɇ-₮₩Ø ₱Ʉ₦₵Ⱨ ₮₳₵₮ł₵,” Mr. Nightmare-Humanoid-Giraffe proclaims, speaking in what you believe to be a thick Portuguese accent. “ł₮'₴ ₳Ⱡ₩₳Ɏ₴ ₣Ʉ₦₦Ɏ.”

“. . .W-where the hell did you come from?” You blurt. You know that’s not the nicest thing to say right after meeting someone, but Mr. Nightmare-Humanoid-Giraffe literally started this off with a jumpscare. 

“₮ⱤɄ₴₮ ₥Ɇ, ɎØɄ ĐØ₦'₮ ₩₳₦₮ ₮Ø ₭₦Ø₩. ɆVɆ₦ ł₣ ₮ⱧɆ ₴₮ØⱤɎ ₩₳₴₦'₮ ₩₳₳₳₳₳₳Ɏ ₮ØØ ⱠØ₦₲, ⱧɆ₳��ł₦₲ ł₮ ₩ØɄⱠĐ ₴₮łⱠⱠ ₱ⱤØ฿₳฿ⱠɎ ₥₳₭Ɇ ₮ⱧɆ ł₥₱ØⱤ₮₳₦₮ ₱₳Ɽ₮₴ Ø₣ ɎØɄⱤ ฿Ɽ₳ł₦ ₥ɆⱠ₮.” Mr. Nightmare-Humanoid-Giraffe raises an eyebrow. “₦Ø₩ ₮Ⱨ₳₮ ł ₮Ⱨł₦₭ Ø₣ ł₮. . .ł ₵ØɄⱠĐ ₱ⱤØ฿₳฿ⱠɎ ₳₴₭ ɎØɄ ₮ⱧɆ ₴₳₥Ɇ QɄɆ₴₮łØ₦.”

The way your stomach sinks feels even worse that it would in the real world. 

You realize far too late that this entity isn’t just a product of your brain. He’s not just another nightmare. 

He’s a sentient being. He’s in a weight class of his own. 

And the fact that something like him is interacting with you while you’re dreaming does not bode well.

“I don’t want any trouble,” you insist, holding up your hands defensively. “I’m literally asleep right now. If I’m trespassing—or if I did anything to disturb you, I-I swear I didn’t mean to.”

The closest section of Mr. Nightmare-Humanoid-Giraffe’s neck is pushed upwards, folding horizontally. Two joints bend by either side of his head, pointed toward the sky. It’s only when the arm extends further from the hollyhocks, along with a second arm that stretches around from somewhere just out of eyeshot, and glides closer to him, hands spreading in a lame gesture that you realize he’s simply shrugging without shoulders. “₮ⱧɆⱤɆ'₴ ₦Ø ₮ⱤØɄ฿ⱠɆ. ł ₲ɄɆ₴₴ ł ₴ⱧØɄⱠĐ'VɆ ₭₦Ø₩₦ ɎØɄ'Đ ₣ł₦Đ ɎØɄⱤ ₩₳Ɏ ⱧɆⱤɆ ₴ØØ₦ɆⱤ ØⱤ Ⱡ₳₮ɆⱤ.”

“. . .What?” Somehow, you’re caught even more off-guard than you already were. “What do you mean by that?”

“ØⱧ, ₵Ø₥Ɇ Ø₦. ɎØɄ ₭₦Ø₩ ₩Ⱨ₳₮ ł ₥Ɇ₳₦,” Mr. Nightmare-Humanoid-Giraffe chuckles, lightly shaking his head. Even with the total lack of irises and pupils, he’s still able to give you the classic Seriously? look. “ł'₥ ₦Ø₮ ₮ⱧɆ ₣łⱤ₴₮ ₥Ø₦₴₮ɆⱤ ɎØɄ'VɆ ₥Ɇ₮. ₳₦Đ ł ₩Ø₦'₮ ฿Ɇ ₮ⱧɆ Ⱡ₳₴₮, Ɇł₮ⱧɆⱤ.”

You can practically feel the color drain from your face. You don’t try to stop yourself from nodding. You’ve been taking sleeping medication, practicing healthy bedtime rituals, yadda-yadda-yadda. 

And even if that stuff has been helping a little, it’s still pretty damn useless in the face of certain things.

Two things, to be precise. And they both start with P. (Well, as far as you know. You haven’t been able to learn their full names; apparently because you need multiple forked tongues for correct pronunciation. You’re still not sure why either of them bothered sharing this information, since you don’t exactly have faces to put those partial names to.) 

Mr. Nightmare-Humanoid-Giraffe watches you think, his face-splitting grin becoming thoughtful. He tilts his head to the side, edging just a little closer to you. The way his neck contorts through the air almost reminds you of a caterpillar climbing a tree. 

“How do you know about that?” You wonder aloud. You’ve learned that it’s pretty common for creatures like him to just know many things without actually having the means to, but you’re still curious. Besides, if he’s content with just chatting, then maybe he’ll stay that way until you’re able to finally wake up. 

“฿Ɇ₵₳Ʉ₴Ɇ ł'VɆ ₴ɆɆ₦ ł₮,” he answers. “₴Ⱨ₳ĐØ₩₴ ₥₳₭Ɇ ₱ⱤɆ₮₮Ɏ ₲ØØĐ ₲₳₮Ɇ₩₳Ɏ₴ ł₣ ł ĐØ ₴₳Ɏ ₴Ø ₥Ɏ₴ɆⱠ₣. Ɇ₴₱Ɇ₵ł₳ⱠⱠɎ ₩ⱧɆ₦ ₮ⱧɆɎ'ⱤɆ ฿Ɇł₦₲ ₵₳₴₮ ฿Ɏ ₣ⱠØ₩ɆⱤ₴.”

Your train of thought screeches its way into a collision. “Wait—so. . .so, you’ve been in my room before?”

“ɎɆ₳Ⱨ, ₳ ₣Ɇ₩ ₮ł₥Ɇ₴. Ø₦₵Ɇ ₩ⱧɆ₦ ɎØɄ ₩ɆⱤɆ ₳Ⱡ₴ɆɆ₱, ₮₩ł₵Ɇ ₩ⱧɆ₦ ɎØɄ ₩ɆⱤɆ JɄ₴₮ ØɄ₮ Ø₣ ₮ⱧɆ ₳₱₳Ɽ₮₥Ɇ₦₮,” he replies, very much unbothered by the way your jaw drops. 

You blink. You blink again. You begin to pace around in a small circle, hands subconsciously rising to grasp at your head like it might fall off. 

Memories of previous nights barge their way between your ears. The red light outlining your bedroom door from the other side. . .the pair of glowing eyes on the rippling figure looming against the glass of your window. . .their respective, concerning-yet-oddly-personable voices calling out to you, going back and forth between squabbling with each other and trying to convince you to let one of them inside. . .

“Do you know them?” You finally ask. You’re not sure where that question came from, but it feels like it could be important. 

For the very first time since you saw him, Mr. Nightmare-Humanoid-Giraffe’s smile fades. He clicks his tongue and chews his lip.“ɎɆ₴, Ʉ₦₣ØⱤɆ₮Ʉ₦₳₮ɆⱠɎ.”

Your nights of being a literal captive audience for Plier and Pat’s disputes have been terrifying enough. You never would’ve guessed that the one classic vampire rule could apply to outer abominations, but you damn well haven’t forgotten to thank your lucky stars for it. 

. . .Except now you’ve just learned that apparently not all surreal horrors have those limitations and you’re talking to one that’s pretty much had access to more than enough blackmail material and if he’s been able to do that then how many others have been sneaking in while you’re unaware and—

“ɎØɄ Ⱨ₳VɆ ₲ØØĐ ₮₳₴₮Ɇ ł₦ ₣ⱠØ₩ɆⱤ₴, ฿Ɏ ₮ⱧɆ ₩₳Ɏ,” Mr. Nightmare-Humanoid-Giraffe mentions. His seemingly-unconnected arms draw closer to each other, folding across his che—uh, neck. The left hand’s palm supports the elbow of the right arm as its hand idly grasps his lower jaw. “ł ₮ØØ₭ ₴Ø₥Ɇ ₵Ⱡł₱₱ł₦₲₴ ₣ⱤØ₥ ₮ⱧɆ ₱Ø₮₴ Ø₦ ɎØɄⱤ ĐɆ₴₭. ₳ⱠØɆ VɆⱤ₳, ₲₳ⱤĐɆ₦ł₳, ₳₦Đ J₳₴₥ł₦Ɇ, Ɽł₲Ⱨ₮?”

You’re snapped out of the near anxiety-attack in a way similar to a rubber band breaking. 

“Um. . .yeah, that’s right,” you cough, thinking of the three green friends you recently purchased from that nursery downtown. You’ve personally named them Sonny, Cher, and Yasmin, but that information doesn’t really seem relevant right now. Besides, there’s a good chance the monster already knows that.

Mr. Nightmare-Humanoid-Giraffe nods, and his grin reappears so quickly, like it never left his face to begin with. Despite his unsettling demeanor, you can still detect some genuine gratitude. “ł'VɆ ฿ɆɆ₦ ₥Ɇ₳₦ł₦₲ ₮Ø ₳ĐĐ ₮ⱧØ₴Ɇ ₮Ø ₥Ɏ ₵ØⱠⱠɆ₵₮łØ₦ ₣ØⱤ ₳ ₩ⱧłⱠɆ ₦Ø₩.”

You nod back, mind momentarily going blank. You’ve learned that there’s a slew of unsavory truths behind even the most unassuming things, but this guy’s apparent fondness for horticulture doesn’t seem too nefarious. (Read: seem. You still need to stay on your toes.)

About thirty seconds of painful awkwardness pass the two of you by.

Mr. Nightmare-Humanoid-Giraffe lowers one arm in order to drum his nails on the fruit tree’s trunk. 

You rock back and forth on your heels, biting at the inside of your cheek. And right as you have an idea of what to say next, a long, low, gurgling sound breaks the strange silence. Several more join it.

You and Mr. Nightmare-Humanoid-Giraffe glance down just in time to see how the black hollyhocks are trembling. The nearest one leans forward, with a round lump in its stem that definitely wasn't there a few minutes ago. You watch with confusion and mild dread as the lump works its way up, pushing at the plant’s green skin from the inside. Then, once the lump settles at the part where the petals all gather at the base of the flower’s head. . .it retches like a drunk college student on helium. 

The hollyhock angles its blossom downward, and to the tune of a long, sickening sssqqquiii-plop! a slimy heart is pitched out, landing on the grass with a solid splat. Strands of blood cling to the black petals. The bloom quivers in a way that almost looks like heavy breathing.

A small scream tears through your throat as you stagger back, unable to take your eyes off of the new mess.

. . .Well, that last part changes once all the other hollyhocks start spitting out a variety of wet organs, the blood threatening to spray on your clothes. You know it’s just dream-blood, and you know you’re just wearing dream-clothes. But you also know that there will always, always be unpleasant side-effects to touching blood that’s just leaked out of something it shouldn’t possibly be leaking out of in the first place. 

You clamp a hand over your mouth; the wave of nausea that rolls over you feels itchy and sweaty and poisonous. 

Mr. Nightmare-Humanoid-Giraffe, meanwhile, heaves a sigh as he leans toward the flowers. “ⱤɆVɆⱤ₴Ɇ Ⱨ₳₦₳Ⱨ₳₭ł,” he announces in a grim tone. His smile vanishes again, this time being replaced by a guilty wince. “ł ₥Ʉ₴₮'VɆ ฿ⱤØ₭Ɇ₦ Ø₦Ɇ Ø₣ ₮ⱧɆ ⱤɄⱠɆ₴ ₩ł₮ⱧØɄ₮ ⱤɆ₳ⱠłⱫł₦₲. . .Đ₳₥₦ ł₮, Đ₳₥₦ ł₮, Đ₳₥₦ ł₮. . .”

His neck encircles the tree, giving it some space as he examines each of the gore-spewing flowers. The worry in his features grows worse and worse. If not for your reasonable disgust, you’d probably feel sympathy. 

Eventually, he stops what you can only categorize as his method of pacing. His neck arches like that of a striking cobra as he purses his lips, obviously thinking. “₦Ø₮ Ⱡł₭Ɇ ł ₵₳₦'₮ ₮₳₭Ɇ ₵₳ⱤɆ Ø₣ ₮Ⱨł₴ Ⱡ₳₮ɆⱤ,” he murmurs. After retracing his path around the fruit tree, his milky-white eyes wander back over to you. 

Your breath hitches in your throat. You feel your eyes twitch and grow to the size of dinner plates. Your body doesn’t feel light anymore. It feels heavy, far heavier than what the scale in your bathroom suggested the last time you used it. A sensation that can only be described as pin-and-needles mixed with overwhelming heat oozes along your skin. You keep backing away. Mr. Nightmare-Humanoid-Giraffe. . .well, he doesn’t lunge at you. He doesn’t look angry enough to do that. But he’s still following you, still staring at you.

Out of nowhere, your ankle collides with something solid, and you fall back. 

You don’t topple into the grass. You don’t crash down onto anything.

Your vision swims, the world around you becoming an awful mix of spiraling colors and noise as you fall and fall and fall and—

Your ears pop as your eyes snap open. You gasp for air, sitting up with enough force that it’s a miracle you don’t trebuchet across your bedroom.  Your hands fly to your head, scrubbing at your eyes, pressing at your temples. 

And as your vision adjusts itself to the darkness, as you roll your shoulders to try and force yourself to stop shaking, you happen to peer over at the pots on your desk. 

Sonny, Cher, and Yasmin peer back, still and silent as always.

. . .Or, they are now. 

You swallow a lump in your throat, wondering if you actually just managed to catch Cher’s snow-white petals quivering.

@sammys-magical-au @inkbedos

[grailfinders]

Fate and Phantasms #300: Vritra

today on Fate and Phantasms we’re making another demonic snake dragon goddess, Vritra. she might have class disadvantage against the other one, but her name’s faster to type so I’m grateful for that. Also, unlike Ibuki Douji, Vritra turns into her giant snake dragon rather than summons one, so that’s fun!

she’s a Moon Druid for the aforementioned snake-turning-into, as well as an Eldritch Knight Fighter to turn that snake into a proper dragon while still being dang good with a vajra.

check out her build breakdown below the cut, or her character sheet over here!

next up: didn’t we just have an MMA santa?

Race and Background

I know we just pointed out the similarities between ibuki and Vritra, but the latter doesn’t spam invincibilities in her bossfight, so she’s a Lizardfolk instead of a Yuan-ti. it also helps with a little combo later. we’re using the new version of lizardfolk, so you won’t be able to craft stuff, though tbf you were given your spear so it’s no big deal. you still get a Swimming Speed which is kind of ironic as a goddess of drought, but you also get to put those pointy teeth to use with a Bite attack, an unarmed attack that deals 1d6 slashing damage. you can even use your Hungry Jaws to bite as a bonus action Proficiency times per day, and those attacks also give you temporary HP equal to your proficiency bonus. the first of many stops on our way to immortality.

on top of the swimming thing you can Hold Breath for up to 15 minutes at a time, and your Natural Armor basically gives you permanent mage armor- plus if your AC would ever be lower than 13 + dex it stays there anyway. you also have your Nature’s Intuition giving you proficiency in Animal Handling and Stealth. you also get +2 Strength and +1 Constitution.

I certainly wouldn’t call you a normal Acolyte, but you do have a lot of knowledge involving the gods and are kindasorta one yourself, so that’s proficiency in Insight and Religion.

Ability Scores

immortality is definitely what the experts call a “long-term” goal, but we can make it easier on ourselves and start with Constitution as high as possible. it won’t help our being a giant snake, but it’ll give you extra health to survive when the giant snake thing falls through. secondly, pick up some Wisdom. technically the monster army you can summon is a bunch of demons, but if it looks like a snake and quacks like a snake, that’s animal handling. third is Strength. you gotta chuck spears at people, and we can’t get psi warrior, sadly. your Intelligence isn’t as high as I’d like, but it’s still above average. I learned from my mistakes with Calamity, don’t worry. however, that does mean our Dexterity isn’t that good- thankfully you’ve got your scales to make up for it a little. finally, dump Charisma. turns out killing entire nations with your droughts makes you unpopular, who would’ve guessed?

Class Levels

1. Fighter 1: we’re starting as a fighter, both for the extra HP and also to nab that sweet, sweet Constitution save proficiency. you’re also proficient in Strength saves, as well as Athletics and Intimidation.

as for your Fighting Style, the Thrown Weapon style lets you draw weapons as you throw them, seriously reducing the action economy cost of chucking shit around, while also letting you deal an extra +2 Damage with thrown weapons. you also get a Second Wind once a short rest, it’s another way to heal yourself on you bonus action.

2. Fighter 2: second level fighters can make an Action Surge once a short rest for an extra action. that isn’t super useful since we’re going moon druid pretty soon, but more actions equals more biting or stabbing, so it’s never a bad idea.

3. Druid 1: now that we’re tough and fast, let’s get snakey. as a druid you know Druidic, it’s a written language that not only can only druids write and read, but other people won’t even know it’s there most of the time. somehow druids are sneakier than actual rogues- wild. you can also cast Spells now by using your Wisdom. grab Mold Earth to make walls… slowly…. and Frostbite to start freezing rivers shut.

okay maybe not specifically with this spell, but it’s got the theming down.

you can prepare your known spells each day, so it’s not a huge issue to grab spells as you want them, but I’d definitely check out more defensive stuff like Entangle and Fog Cloud, y’know, set up obstacles for your enemies. also Protection from Evil and Good to fuck with gods, bc fuck those guys.

4. Druid 2: at second level Moon druids can use their Combat Wild Shape as a bonus action, turning into a creature of CR 1/3 their level or lower (rounded down, at least CR 1 as a limit). they can do this twice per short rest, and each usage lasts half your druid level hours. you take the creatures physical stats (strength, dex, con, and HP) and when you drop to 0 in that form you turn back with as much HP as you had beforehand. you can also take class and racial feats into the wild shape with you as long as they physically make sense. so like, you probably won’t be able to keep your swimming speed as a tarantula. you can’t cast spells, but you can concentrate on them.

you can also use your bonus action to heal yourself by spending spell slots, what a surprise.

you won’t get a swim speed allowed until level 4, so no snakiness until then. in the meantime, you can use those wild shape charges to summon a Wild Companion for a regular-ass snake, but you could also use them to just. turn into something else. we’re not cops here, we don’t care if you break character.

5. Druid 3: third level druids get second level spells. it’ll be a while until you’re a dragon, so in the meantime check out Enlarge/Reduce to be an even bigger snake next level. by the time you hit level 8 that’ll let you hang out in the same size category as the Terrask! also grab Earthbind and Warding Wind to use two more elements to block peoples’ paths.

6. Druid 4: fourth level druids get another cantrip, and since there’s only one element we haven’t picked anything up from yet, grab Control Flames. you also get your first Ability Score Improvement, with which we’re grabbing the Piercer feat. now you can re-roll one die of piercing damage each turn, and your critical piercing attacks deal an extra die of damage! that’s nice for your spear, and hey, guess what kind of damage snake bites do?

speaking of snake bites, your Wild Shape Improvement lets you turn into animals with a swim speed now, so snakes are on the table! right now the best options on the table are the Giant Poisonous Snake and the Constrictor Snake, both of which have less than 20 HP! less awesome! maybe just grab a tiger or something for now, it’ll be a hot second til we get a good option.

7. Druid 5: fifth level druid, third level spells, and it’s time for immortality! …a bit. grab Feign Death to at least make it look like you come back from the dead later, or if you can figure out a way to cast it on yourself after your death, Revivify. also grab Elemental Weapon to make a magical spear that can skewer even divine enemies, and Conjure Animals to conjure your snake army. eventually, once you can upcast it. for now, you can turn into a giant constrictor (next level), and you can summon a giant constrictor at the same time! trippy!

8. Druid 6: like I just said, sixth level moon druids can turn into CR 2 creatures, so a Giant Constrictor is now available to turn into, with a hearty 60 HP per transformation and the ability to squeeze a creature into submission. also worth noting, at this level your wild shapes gain Primal Strikes, so their attacks count as magical for overcoming resistances and immunities to nonmagical damage, which I’d bet most gods have.

9. Druid 7: seventh level druids get fourth level spells, so you can use either Blight or Control Water to start causing proper droughts. there technically isn’t a drought option in the latter spell, but parting water or redirecting the flow away from where it usually goes can work if you’re creative.

10. Fighter 3: now that we’re finally on the right path magically, let’s head back to fighter to start kicking ass! as an Eldritch Knight you get another set of Spells based on your Intelligence, and most of them have to be Evocation or Abjuration. check the handbook to figure out what spell slots you’ve got each level, they have a page for that. or look it up online, there’s probably plenty of calculators to use.

thankfully your cantrips don’t care about that limitation, so grab Sword Burst to swing your spear around like you just don’t care, and Ray of Frost for more icy goodness. for your leveled spells, Frost Fingers finally lets this build that’s supposed to be about someone who freezes water actually freeze water, and Shield is just good. it’s a good spell, and your AC isn’t that great so it’s useful. you also get one spell of any school this level, but we’re gonna replace it later so grab what you want!

one last thing- you can use your Weapon Bond on your spear, so as long as its on the same plane as you u can summon it as a bonus action! also you can’t be disarmed

11. fighter 4: use this asi to nab the war caster feat! it lets you use spells as opportunity attacks which is like, boring! but it also gives you advantage on concentration saves to keep a spell going after you take damage! you can’t re-cast stuff as a snake, so it’s important you keep it up!

you also get another spell, and earth tremor is another way to block peoples’ way with difficult terrain! it’ll also deal damage to anything in the area

12. fighter 5: fifth level fighters get an Extra Attack each action, and yes you can take this into your wild shape.

13. Fighter 6: sixth level fighters get another ASI, so bump up that Strength for better spearings. it doesn’t help when you’re a snake, but it’s nice.

14. Fighter 7: at seventh level your War Magic speeds up your spellcasting, so if you cast a cantrip as an action you can now attack once as a bonus action! yippee!

you also get the real good ice spells this level- rime’s binding ice can freeze people in place, and now that you’ve got 2nd level spells you can replace that first any-school spell with dragon’s breath, giving you the ability to breathe fire, acid, cold, lightning, or poison for up to a minute!

15. fighter 8: eighth level fighters get another asi, so bump up that wisdom for stronger spells! that doesn’t help your fighter spells, but a lot of those won’t need your intelligence either, like Magic Weapon. with this, you can add a bit to your attack and damage rolls, and it’ll also punch through those pesky resistances against nonmagical damage. D&D isn’t as modular as some other rpgs are, so this is the closest we’re getting to “anti-god” tech without homebrew. still, talk to your DM, killing a god sounds like a cool high-level campaign idea.

16. Fighter 9: ninth level fighters are Indomitable, letting you re-roll a failed save once per day. if you’re gonna be immortal, you’re gonna need to pass those death saves.

17. Fighter 10: at tenth level, eldritch knights get another reason we won’t have to focus on magic that much, their Eldritch Strikes. basically, whenever you smack someone with a weapon attack, they get disadvantage on their next save against one of your spells before the end of your next turn. however, spending two turns to set up one thing is dumb. let’s speed it up a bit, and get your NP at the same time.

turn one- cast dragon’s breath on yourself to get a dragon’s breath as a bonus action, then use your main action to turn into a giant snake. turn two, use your hungry jaws to bite as a bonus action (RAW it’s your lizard bite, but c’mon DMs be cool about this) and then whatever you snatched up will have disadvantage on your breath save that turn. repeat up to six times for a well-cooked enemy.

to make your attacks more accurate you could use True Strike but that’s bad, just attack twice. for a spell that is actually useful, Darkness will give you the aesthetic of your NP, a cloud of magical darkness nothing can see through (except a surprisingly large and growing number of races and classes) though this also uses concentration, so you’ll have to choose between the fire and the smoke.

18. Fighter 11: eleventh level fighters get a second Extra Attack each action for up to three per action, six per turn, or seven with your hungry jaws. wild shapes weren’t really made for this kind of thing, so take advantage and do some crazy damage.

also you can cast Arcane Lock for one last barrier between humanity and whatever the hell you have that they want.

19. Fighter 12: use this one last ASI to bump up your hp with some Tough ness. now I know what you’re thinking- “if concentration’s been so important, why’d you go with this feat instead of more constitution?” good question! because Tough is a feat. it gives you 38 HP this level, and an extra 2 next level, but the important part is it is a feat. feats can be brought over to your snake forms. that means not only do you get 40 more HP, but your snakes also get 40 more hp! maybe. talk to your DM first, don’t spring this on them. if they say no, then yeah just go for more constitution. If you really want to game the HP system you can always pick up a relic sloth wild shape, which also kind of fits in with your whole “immoveable blockade” lore.

anyway, we’re getting off topic. more HP good, tough druids = most hp. maybe.

20. Fighter 13: our last level of the build is for one more use of Indomitable, so you can re-roll two failed saves a day to get even tougher. you can also cast a Glyph of Warding to create traps in case of anyone trying to tamper with your dam. now you can either set them up to re-freeze any water that leaks through as a Spell Glyph, holding a copy of frost fingers or binding ice, or you can set up Explosive Runes to take care of any pesky humans showing up to break the water out. either way, they’re very useful.

Pros & Cons:

Pros:

right off the bat, you have a shitload of HP, with just over 200 normally, and somewhere between 120-200 extra from wild shapes depending on how your DM takes tough, plus you have options to heal yourself, and get temporary HP. this all feeds further into pro #2-

you’re great on defense. you have plenty of options to slow or freeze enemies in place, and you can create plenty of environmental hazards with earth tremors and controlled water, making getting from point a to b an absolute nightmare even if there wasn’t a giant snake sitting in the only way in.

you’re a powerhouse alone, but you’ve also got summons available, and enough concentration power to keep them going for quite a while. the only thing worse than fighting one giant constrictor with your feet frozen to the ground is fighting three. or like, 16 smaller creatures, your choice.

Cons:

we put absolutely nothing into your dexterity, so even with those scales your AC is garbage. which is bad if you plan on turning yourself into a literal giant target. it’s a good thing you have plenty of HP to chew through.

you’ve also got low charisma, so even if you have a good reason for setting up a lair somewhere, good luck convincing the townsfolk.

multiclassing gave us some good spell slots, but only low-level spells. getting advantage on an upcast Dragon’s Breath is cool, but I would have killed to be able to grab Wall of Ice from the druid spell list.

[lilioopdf]

edit: no one’s gonna see this but i talked too much and realised i should prob put a page break thing but in conclusion: we need things that make us happy. literature and history was always mine, and i tied it so deeply to my identity that i didn’t know what to do once i stopped studying those. writing helps. ive always been writing. one day i’ll be a literature student again. (even if i sob through that degree because of the papers). writing helps me believe that not all is gone and out of reach.

today my friend talked abt how he missed physics and learning about physics and exploring physics and this friend is actually really clever and i swear he’s a bit of a prodigy but anyway

he went to some event where he got to experience physics things (sorry im useless at this stuff so idk what he did) but be got to build stuff and explore labs and weird chemicals and everything

and he said he’d been reading up less on physics and engaging with it and everything because his school rejected him from physics clubs (which is insane to me bc i know some vv talented people from my old school who went to their new school and got rejected from communities theyve won national competitions in but anyway) and because of heavy academic commitments and everything (for context we live in one of the most academically rigorous countries in the world

i think i feel the same way about writing and literature in general because

writing was always so tied to literature for me and i don’t think i’ve ever remembered a time where i wasn’t even writing simple scenarios down? in 2016 i had a routine of lying on my stomach on the floor and drawing while listening to the radio and it was then that i realised that i wanted to get out of the country

but i also knew i wanted to study literature then and i knew it when i was rereading the same books at four and when it rained when i was seven and when i was drawing at 8 and at 12 before i entered secondary school and at 14 before we could even pick our subject combinations

and i was in love with literature and every single class that i went to but then my last time studying it properly didn’t turn out the way i wanted and like i wasn’t ever able to actually move on from it because it’s always been so tied to my personality

like i was always so history and english oriented and im not bad at other things bc i do it well when i want to but my languages and humanities were always up there

like id have a basic conversation with someone and then they’d go and tell someone’s else how well spoken i was or like id always be put at the front of school events and important events even with ministers just for my communication skills and like ive always attributed it to like everything literature like id tell myself oh must be because im a lit student and this and that

and even at this new place i realised not everyone wants to actually work in art history and music and theatre and dance and so i felt okay enough to tell people i would probably go into comms/pr and the first thing people would say was oh that suits you so much actually

and tbh ive never considered communications before this year but childhood friends and teachers always said they could picture me as a reporter or journalist even when i had no plans of doing that and look how it actually turned out to be kinda true so that’s kinda cool

ive been yapping so much in this post but my point is that i genuinely didn’t know what to do with myself when i stopped properly studying english lit this year. my english lit teacher (so so good by the way, i had the best and most loveliest teachers ever) is not even in the school anymore because she got promoted to somewhere really good and doesn’t even teach lit anymore.

but like idk writing makes me think it’ll be okay. im studying art history rn which is cool i love it but i think ill always be reaching out for literature no matter where i’m at and my friend put it perfectly when he said his event gave him “a glimpse into the life (he’s) always dreamt of pursuing”

like yeah i think we all need something that helps us hold onto hope especially in such a shitty world and i think 8 year old me would love this and i talked a lot but i needed to get it out because i beat myself up for not taking literature again but maybe not all is lost, just a little harder to find

[arickaandherfictionalothers]

The boy in the forest behind her cabin

(Aricka x “Four”/Steve Harrington.)

(When Will goes missing, Aricka discovers a boy in the woods behind her on a rainy night in Hawkins. What happens next changes her life forever)

He just kept staring at the wall. That was the unnerving thing.

17 year old Aricka Hopper was sure that when she looked back on this night ten years from then she would either highly regret it or it would be the dearest memory she had.

She had been helping her friends and dad look for a missing boy- 12 year old Will Byers- when she found this boy in the woods behind the cabin she shared with her dad. The police chief.

Clearing her throat, she walked over to the boy’s line of sight. “So.. you never answered my question earlier.” She pats her chest. “My name is Aricka. That’s what everyone calls me. Unless you’re my friend then you call me Ari. Or if you’re my dad I’m kiddo.” She reaches out, hesitantly taps the boy’s chest. He flinched back at the touch but doesn’t do anything else. “What is your name? What do they call you?”

He tilts his head, confusion painting his features. He had the most expressive brown eyes, and a fine layering of freckles and moles on his cheeks. He was pale, like he’d only been exposed to sunlight a few times.

Hesitantly, the boy holds out his wrist, laying it in her free hand- and then she could see a faint number tattooed on his skin- 004. “… Four?” She breathes. That’s not a name. A number can’t be a name.

This boy-Four- didn’t even have a first name, for crying out loud. What did they- whoever he ran away from- do to him-?!

She takes a steadying breath. “First off, I’m not calling you Four. That’s not- no. You deserve a real name. A true name. A first name is important. It gives you some that’ll always be yours. Did they ever call you something else?”

He shakes his head. Repeatedly. “Can’t you talk?” She asks gently. “Like me?” Slower head shakes this time. “They didn’t teach you how to talk?” Firmest head shake no yet.

Her heart tore apart slightly. Then her famous stubborn streak followed by her equally famous smile broke through. She carefully gripped his hand- the one with the number on it. “I will.” A promise. “Anything you want to know. I’ll teach you.”

His eyes widen and brighten simultaneously as she says that; and then he motions between the two of them before crossing his index fingers together side to side. “You know ASL-! That’s good, we can communicate that way too,” Aricka says. “I’m a little rusty but I’ll relearn. We can both learn a new language together. It’ll be fun!”

Then he does something he hadn’t that entire night- he smiled. And she found she liked being on the receiving end of this boy’s smile. “So- what does that sign mean, Four?” She asked- she didn’t want to call him that, but until they decided on a name that would have to suffice.

He does it again, crosses his index fingers on both hands together and points at himself, then her. He got a little frustrated, then saw her collection of vhs tapes and found a copy of ET. He points to ET and Elliot. “… OH!” She exclaimed. “ET and Elliot are friends -! You’re saying-,” and then she pauses, realizing what he was saying. “Four, are you saying I’m your friend?”

He nods, albeit a bit shyer this time. She smiles again, reassuring this time. She hesitantly copies the motion, looking at him for confirmation. He nods when she gets it right, repeating it once again, but this time with more force. More meaning.

Best friends.

She smiles. “Best friends. Aricka and Four.”

*time skip*

Years later, Aricka throws herself into Steve’s arms- they’d finally defeated Vecna. His nose was bloodied and his face was covered in sweat, but they’d done it. Together.

“Best friend- girlfriend,” Steve says. Aricka laughs around a sob.

“Best friend- boyfriend.” She echoes.

And so they were.

————————

@astralshipper @rosieshipper @hyperionshipping @yeehawselfshipping @letsgofoletsgo @tsundere-selfship