#ignore the weird wording I'm trying to avoid search

[justanotherrpmeme]

Anguished Declaration of Love starters

"I can't keep pretending anymore. I love you." "Please don't hate me after I say this, but… I'm in love with you." "I've been carrying this around for so long, but I can't stay silent anymore. I love you, and I'm sorry if that makes things weird." "I never thought I'd say this, but… I'm in love with you, and it's tearing me apart." "I've been trying to find the right words for weeks, but they all seem inadequate. I love you." "I know this might ruin everything, but I have to tell you… I've fallen for you, hard." "I'm terrified of what you'll say, but I can't keep this to myself any longer. I love you." "I'm not sure if you feel the same way, but… I need to tell you that I love you." "I wish I could go back to the way things were, but I can't deny how I feel. I love you, and I hate myself for it." "I've never been more scared in my life, but I can't hold it in any longer. I'm in love with you, and I don't care who knows." "I've tried to bury these feelings, but they keep resurfacing. I love you, and I'm sorry if that complicates things." "You deserve to know how I feel, even if it's painful. I love you, and I can't pretend otherwise." "I don't know if you'll ever forgive me for saying this, but… I love you." "I never wanted to burden you with this, but I can't keep it inside any longer. I love you, and I'm terrified of what that means." "I know we agreed to keep things platonic, but I can't ignore how I feel anymore. I love you, and I understand if you don't feel the same way." "I've spent so long convincing myself that I didn't feel this way, but it's impossible to deny now. I love you, and I'm sorry if that changes things between us." "I've been rehearsing this moment in my head for weeks, but now that it's here, I don't know what to say… except that I love you." "I don't expect you to feel the same way, but I need you to know that I'm in love with you."

[AVERT] The sender avoids eye contact, their gaze flickering nervously around the room as they struggle to find the right words. [TREMBLE] The sender's hands shake uncontrollably as they try to steady themselves, betraying the depth of their emotional turmoil. [STUMBLE] The sender's words falter mid-sentence, stumbling over their confession. [QUIVER] The sender's voice quivers with emotion as they bare their heart to the receiver. [SWALLOW] The sender visibly swallows, before finally mustering the courage to speak. [FLINCH] The sender flinches slightly as they anticipate the receiver's reaction, bracing themselves for possible rejection. [SWALLOW] The receiver visibly swallows nervously as they process the sender's words. [STARE] The sender stares intently at the receiver, searching their eyes for any hint of reciprocation or rejection. [FLUSH] The sender's cheeks flush with embarrassment as they lay bare their feelings. [STEP BACK] The sender takes a hesitant step back, as if preparing to retreat in the face of potential rejection.

[soullessdianthus]

Soft!Bo Sinclair X Fem!Reader | Headcanons

>> PART 2

Author's note: Basically, how Bo's heart softened and spared you from death. And yeah I'm kinda fucked in the head for writing him this way, but HEAR ME OUT━ I consider doing a part 2 to extend the topic hihi (like, what life in Ambrose with him later looks like or smth + NSFW obviously), but these are my first headcanons, so please be considerate. <3

Warnings: it's a bit lenghty, sorry, canon typical violence, SFW (lot's of comfort)

Word count: 1.1k

Before your first "visit" to Ambrose, you and your friends set up a camp in the nearby woods - you were on a camping trip around Louisiana, for fun I guess or maybe during some break in your school/work

Bo watched your group from the tree line that night, he saw how poorly they treated you, how ignoring and demeaning they were towards you, why on Earth would you spend time with them?

He formed a strong opinion about those people right then and somehow took a little, tiny bit pity on you

When the car mysteriously broke down during the night, you along your companions took a walk to the small town nearby, searching the local mechanic

He was quick to find you, sitting on a pavement in front of a gas station

The man was charming, you admitted to yourself finally, especially when his bright irises traced your every step around the station

Bo looked enchanted, amazed by your personality, the way you talked, your appearance or all at once

But when some of your friends began to disappear few hours later, the true horror began

You stuck between the weirdly abandoned houses with two of your companions who were quick to seal your fate

They used handcuffs they found on the policeman wax figure to strap you to the metal pipe on the gas station - as a fucking offering to the killers chasing after the tourists

"Wh- THE HELL YOU'RE DOING?!"

"Creating a distraction I guess" they responded, trying to justify their actions, before running off, abandoning you to die alone

No matter how hard you struggled against the tube or the handcuffs, there was no way you could escape this without cutting your palm off

Obviously you wanted to avoid that option

And then, out of bloom, he appeared - dressed in a blue coverall, sweat drops shining over his forehead, tousled hair sticking to his temple - clearly running after your "friends"

Bo noticed you in an instant and a wide smile twisted his face - such a prize as you, being placed (offered even) in front of him like a gift? best day ever for our man Bo

And if you are considerably way younger than him, let's say early twenties - he would take an extra intrest in you (being more vulnerable for manipulation *COUGHS*), also extra points if you have daddy issues

Come on, this guy just wants to be worshiped by younger girl and tells her what to do, okay?

"My, my, what do we have 'ere?" he asked rhetorically, slowly lurching toward you "Little fuckers left ya behind? Tsk, tsk"

You froze in place petrified, but... he didn't seem to want to hurt you

Bo swooped your loose hair behind your ear, before carefully examining your form - all this time you stood still

Because what else could you do? You were immobilized, ffs

"Don't worry darlin', Imma take care of 'em, yeah? Just stay right here"

He placed a goodbye-kiss on top of your head, before returning to his "duties", the hunt wasn't over yet

So you stood there helpless, bound to the metal pipe outside of the gas station for God knows how long, wondering what will happen to your friends and what will happen to you

You took a peek inside the wax museum and soon enough you found out the town was in fact empty - there had to be a correlation, right?

Besides you saw the man with a weird mask and long black hair stab one of your companions in the neck - so the conclusion was quite simple

When Beauregard came back with a pair of tiny keys looped on his thumb, you gave him a merciful stare with glossy eyes, non verbally expressing the thought "please, don't kill me"

"You're a smart girl, ain'tcha? Gonna be good, yeah? That means 'no troubles', got it?" Bo spoke softly, his voice enchanting you with sweet venom

He unlocked the handcuffs and set you free, while you gently nodded your head, agreeing to being "good".

"T-Thanks" you massaged the bruised wrist, devouring feeling of "freedom", before he placed his big palm on your lower back

It was so warm

"Come, you must be tired, huh?" Sinclair guided you to walk along him, heading to the house on a hill

His house

Bo invited you inside, opening the doors and guiding you once again with his hand

If he only could, he would hold you, touch you, fondle your flesh all the time - you were fucking magnetic

You politely entered the house, feeling his presence on your back - at this point you wanted to punch yourself in the face for thinking that you're safe now, that he wouldn't hurt you - he probably just killed your friends

But the man took a weird liking to you, maybe it was your bargaining chip to survival?

It was already dark outside when Bo led you to his room upstairs

He caught a clean t-shirt from the drawer and placed it in your hands

"Why are you doing this? Why are you kind to me?" you kept your head down, fingers digging into the material of his shirt

There was a dead silence for a seconds before he responded

"Such a girl like you doesn't deserve to be treated like trash, yeah? You had shitty friends, doll"

You finally looked up at him

He was smiling, it was a gentle smile, a caring one

"Now, maybe we should finally rest, hm? It was a long day"

You did not protest when he pointed with his finger to the bathroom, where you could change into the clean clothes

Neither when he changed into his pajama and guided you towards his bed

The adrenaline and emotions from the whole day kept you on a constant survival mode - but of course, you thought about escape

Yet you didn't

Somehow you made it this far

But now you were lying in bed beside him, under one sheet

You tried to remain calmness, but the tears overfilled your tired eyes - you started crying, trying to remain as still as possible

But Bo felt your curled up form shaking and a few weeps could be heard though you tried to hide it

"Come 'ere" he spoke through the darkness of his room "come, sweetheart. There's no need to cry"

When you turned around to face him, his arm was already opened, inviting you into his embrace

And you foolishly succumbed into his touch

This should feel wrong, but it didn't

He was so warm

Bo brought you even closer to his chest, letting his heat radiate through you

Oh, to have him take care of you &lt;3

You melted into his touch and soon after fall asleep in his arms

Bo never wish for his precious girl to cry like this again

[an-spideog]

haigh a chara tá siúl agam go bhfuil tú ceart go leor! i was wondering do you know any resources for learning Gaelainn? despite being from munster, in school we just learnt standard irish, but id really love to learn more munster irish. is breá liom do bhlag btw tá sé an-cabhrach <3

Míle baochas :) I do indeed know several resources, I made use of a lot of them lol, there's kind of two categories - Stuff about the dialect and stuff in the dialect. I'll start with 'about'.

Info about West Munster Irish

There's only 1 modern textbook I know of which teaches munster Irish, and it's kind of a rough read lol. This is Teach Yourself Irish (1961) (audio). The book is really really dense, one paragraph will contain a lot of information, and that can make it pretty easy to miss things, but it's still a very useful book - and much easier to use if you already have some Irish. It teaches Cork Irish but Cork and Kerry are quite similar (Kerry has a stronger Gaeltacht though so you're more likely to hear Kerry Irish). This book also has a weird transcription system for how to pronounce words, ignore it, learn the sounds of the language separately, and listen to the recordings that come with the book. Their system is buckwild and nobody else uses it.

You should also skip the sections labeled "rules for aspiration" and "rules for eclipsis", rather than reading them right at the start and use them as a reference if you ever need to.

An Teanga Bheo - Corca Dhuibhne is a great book to get some knowledge on Kerry Irish as long as you can read Irish pretty well, since it describes lots of the important features. But it's a reference text and an overview, not a textbook. If you don't feel that comfortable reading in Irish or want to be able to search, you can use this online translation

Shameless plug, I talk about Munster Irish on my youtube channel, and I try and share info which people wouldn't find easily otherwise, new video maybe out this weekend maybe. An Loingseach on youtube - He sometimes gets bogged down in the linguistic weeds and doesn't edit his videos at all lol, but he knows his stuff.

There's a blog called corkirish.com and it has some useful info on it but the guy who used to run it is an awful shitter, I'm hoping that with more other people sharing resources we can make that blog irrelevant.

If you're at all interested in linguistics, there's more technical books describing the dialect which can be useful as references.

The Irish of West Muskerry - This is a book talking about the pronunciation of Cork Irish, in English, but using a lot of phonetic terms and symbols. Quite useful if you know how to read them.

Gaeilge Chorca Dhuibhne - This is a book talking about the pronunciation and structure of Kerry Irish, in Irish, again using a lot of linguistic terminology. This one will be getting an updated English version at some point soon, hopefully.

The Linguistic Atlas and Survey of Irish Dialects (LASID) is a series of books showing the results of surveys where they went around to different Irish speaking regions and asked them what words they'd use for specific things, it gives you really cool maps like this: (Showing you how "Gaeilic" is used in donegal, "Gaeilge" is used in Galway, and "Gaelainn" is used in Kerry)

This map is actually from a web version of the first book which is quite handy. The second book isn't available as a site but there are pdfs and it only focuses on munster so you can see some differences with in munster.

Stuff in the Dialect

Things to Read

We're probably the luckiest in terms of things to read when studying the Munster Dialect because there have been so many authors, and so many authors who write very dialectally. So a lot of munster features you see very prominently in writing.

Books by Maidhc Dainín Ó Sé (a lot of fiction as well as one autobiography)

Books by Peig Sayers (There's school editions of at least her main book (Peig), try to avoid those and find the dialectal version in a library (Peig - a scéal féin), and she has written other books)

Books by Pádraig Ó Cíobháin (I haven't read any of these yet personally and I've heard they can be quite hard by nature of being very poetic and sometimes abstract)

Fiche Blian ag Fás by Muiris Ó Súilleabháin (similar to Peig, this is autobiographical)

Books by Tomás Ó Criomhthain (similar to Peig and MÓS these are autobiographical)

Books by Peadar Ua Laoghaire (Fiction, these are quite old - 100 years - and that can make them more difficult, but they can be pretty good)

Béaloideas and Dúchas.ie - these ones are harder to read than the others for various reasons but can often be a lot more interesting. Béaloideas is a journal of Irish folklore which you can find on JSTOR for free, and dúchas.ie has typed and handwritten stories collected in ireland, overlapping with Béaloideas to some extent. They can be harder to understand since sometimes the writing is intentionally over-dialectal to preserve the traits, but it's often more interesting since you can find fun little stories about different things. Stories from these collections are also sometimes put into smaller books or collections. (Béaloideas ó Chléire, an Seanchaidhe Muimhneach) you can usually find those books on Archive.org

Things to Listen To

Beo ar Éigean - Chatty podcast, one of the hosts has kerry Irish

Saol Ó Dheas - Munster Gaeltacht news show, not the most interesting if you don't live in the munster gaeltacht but there's a lot of it and the host has really good Irish, so you can focus on that even if the stories aren't gripping lol

Cartlann Bhóthar na Léinsí - Munster Archive show, they pull out older recordings of even more traditional speakers, and the host has very good Irish too, the older recordings are quite challenging to understand, but can be good.

Things to Watch

Seal le Dáithí - Talk show on TG4, host has Kerry Irish

Ros na Rún - Some of the characters have Munster Irish, it's a minority though

What did I do?

This isn't necessarily a guide, it's just what I did specifically.

After learning standardy Irish at school, I started talking to people on discord (Craic le Gaeilge and Celtic Languages), this was really helpful because I got to talk to a lot of knowledgeable people and get conversation practice even without being near to Irish speaking areas or events.

I also started listening to Beo Ar Éigean to practice my listening. I stuck to standard for a little while here and got to grips with basic grammar stuff because I was focusing on exams and stuff, but eventually I was taken with Munster Irish because some of the people I talked to a lot used it and because I liked synthetic forms. So I started working through Teach Yourself Irish with the help of people on discord, and that gave me a good basis in munster specific grammar and forms. From there I asked lots of questions (v important) and read the Irish of West Muskerry because I'm a nerd, wouldn't really recommend this if you're not that interested but it is kind of fun if you are. That helped me get a better understanding of Irish pronunciation (and spelling as a result of that). (I also read Peig at some point here) After that I started listening to a lot of Irish, trying to do at least 2 hours a day over one summer. An Saol Ó Dheas every day on my commute to work, and other stuff too, just trying to get as much exposure as I could. I use the host, Helen Ní Shé as my "language parent" - that is, I try to model my speech after hers. And currently I'm still focusing on just getting more and more exposure, and I've been reading more books in Irish.

[ato-catto]

Hi! I’m not sure if you take requests but I enjoyed reading your recent Trunks post! Would you consider doing anything NSFW for Trunks? If not, could I just request anything about Trunks (not necessarily NSFW)? Thank you so much!

Sorry this took so long! Here you go!

Trunks yawned, stretched out on the bed in just grey sweatpants. His purple hair was unkempt and strewn across the pillow behind him, his eyes lidded and tired.

You walked in, swimsuit clad and dripping from the Capsule Corp pool.

You and Trunks had grown up together alongside Goten, but evidently, those two were almost entirely a different species from you. Built like Greek gods that could fly and do things you couldn't even imagine.

Trunks tired eyes locked on yours and his mouth quirked into a gentle smile.

"Heyyyy.." He sat upright and rubbed his eyes. His nose was a little blushed from the sun. "Been swimming?"

You nodded, suddenly very self conscious of your bare skin. Not like he hadnt seen it before- but in such a closed off room where he was also half naked.. it was enough to make your stomach lurch.

"Yeah. I was going to ask to use your shower? Gotens using the main one." You looked away because your eyes automatically drawing to his abs, which honestly was pretty rude.

But he didn't mind. He chuckled, and snaked a hand over his chiselled stomach. "Sure. I'm not gonna stop you."

Your eyes follow his hand, and you swallow, half imagining what it might feel like if that was your own hand...

Okay. So maybe you had had a crush on Trunks since you guys were pre teens, but now he had grown into a big, tall strong young man you couldn't help but feel a little different around him- especially when he was.. less clothed.

You try to edge past the bed towards the bathroom door, but he sits up and looks at you with blue, searching eyes.

"Somethings up with you lately. What is it?" He half demands, catching your wrist and looking up at you.

You immediately go red, all the way up to your ears. You yank your hand away, or atleast try to.

"What? I don't know what you're talking about." You grumble.

He just looks at you with a look that was calling out your bullshit without words. "Uhuh. Sure."

He stood, coming to about a head above you, and half trapped you against the adjacent wall with his body. If you really wanted to, you could turn and leave.. but you just couldn't.

His arms came to rest on the wall either side of your head, his eyes still searching yours.

Dastardly little ass.. he was trying to provoke a reaction out of you. And he was getting it.

"You're lyingggg..." He said in a sing song voice.

Your cheeks only got hotter. "I'm NOT. Move Trunks, I'm trying to shower, not be interrogated."

"You could leave. I'm not even touching you." His voice is low and gravelly, and the vibrations from it make your abdomen tighten. "I just wanna know why you've been acting weird for the past few weeks. You're not different to Goten. It's just me. You avoid me, you look away whenever I try catch your eye, and you spend less time with me in general." He raised his eyebrows. "Either you really hate me or its the complete opposite."

He knew what he was getting at.

"Yes Trunks. I hate you. I hate my bestfriend." You sigh and roll your eyes- ignoring the hammering in your chest. He looked like eerily Vegeta from this angle- it was a little unnerving.

He smirked. He was NOT buying it. "You like me, don't you..?" He leant a little closer.

Your eyes went wide. Your secret was discovered AND he was so close you could feel his breath.

"What!? No! Don't be ridiculous!!"

He got closer. And closer, glancing down at your mouth with some sort intention behind his eyes.

"So if I just...." He pressed a sudden kiss against your lips, your eyes going wide and hands coming up in some sort of self defense.

He pulled away, smirking. "Do that.. You won't react, right?"

You couldn't speak. Your throat was closed and all you could muster was a squeak. He chuckled, closing his eyes and withdrawing slightly.

"Told you." He touched your cheek. "I'm always right."

You just stared at him in disbelief. Your lips tingled.

"I-"

He came back closer, and sealed the space between you again. You looked so hopeless standing there with those pink tinted cheeks... it only seemed right to give you more. He would never admit he liked the swell in his chest when he did it. He felt like he had a shot of Tequila.. he was buzzing.

He roped fingers through your hair and deepened the kiss, the both of you panting slightly when your mouths opened and parted, Trunks taking the opportunity to swipe his tongue across your bottom lip and then into your mouth, making you whine softly in surprise.

18+ segment. Minors DNI.

Your nipples hardened, poking through the thin material of your swimsuit, and brushing against his chest as he pushed himself against you, pressing you harder into the wall. His breath was ragged, his hands coming up to your chest and pulling at your swimsuit. Once he found bare skin his breathing halted and he pulled back to look down at what he had revealed.

Your hands came to cover them but he quickly moved them away. "Do you wanna... Go further?" He murmered, palming your breasts.

Your core said yes. Infact it screamed yes. To be satiated by HIM sounded like absolute bliss. But... should you? Would this just be a one night stand to him? "Depends." You breathed, watching his hands as they toyed with you.

"On what.." His eyes flicked up to your face.

"What are we?" You asked, your voice barely above a whisper.

He seemed to think for a moment. "What do you want to be?"

"Together?" You suggest sheepishly. He grinned softly and dipped back to your mouth. His kiss was a silent confirmation.

He picked you up under your thighs and turned, lowering you down to the bed, not once parting from your lips. His toned body caged you against the cushioned surface, the room filled with pants and small groans bubbling up from both of you.

Trunks hand slipped down between your legs, making you tense and hum. He moved his lips to your neck and began working your womanhood through your swimsuit, muttering things against the skin of your neck, making you shiver.

"I've wanted to do this for so long.." His voice was breathy and husky.

You couldn't find words, heat pooling in your lower abdomen as he gently bit into the base of your neck, sucking on the supple flesh. Without even directly touching your womanhood, he was getting you closer and closer to unravelling. "T-trunks!" You whined, leaning into him to muffle your cruel as you crumbled, undoing under his touch. He rubbed hard through the last moments, his gaze capturing yours, his mouth parted as he watched your face go through the stages of orgasmic bliss.

"That's it.." He murmered, putting his forehead against yours, his purple hair falling around your face  as your eyes rolled back into your skull and you finally crescendoed. "Come for me."

[queenoftheworldisdead]

Off Schedule

Chapter 8

Note: knocking the rust of my writing. send me a note if something is weird. i dont bite

Summary: Your boss is going through a divorce, but it seems you are the last to know. Emotions flare between you, your boss and his business partner. What will you do?

Warning: 18 + only, slow burn, fluff, balance of power dynamic

Brad Pitt x Reader, Keanu Reeves x Reader

Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7

💐

Jen looked gorgeous. Her baby bump fully present almost stealing the show while the happy couple took their vows.

Despite the joyous atmosphere you sat uncomfortably in the wedding venue, but hopefully hid it well. It was hard to forget consequences of your action, especially when facing the ex-wife, surrounded by her loves. You felt like an interloper, you shouldn’t be here. You were more surprised you hadn’t burst into flames in the pew.

Brad wasn’t here thank god. You hadn’t seen him since that night and thanks to your hiatus from work you wouldn’t be forced to.

“You may now kiss the bride,” the officiant announced proudly as the attendees erupted in cheers and applause. You joined in the pageantry as guilt continued to eat-away at you. Only a few more hours of this before you were free to go home a wallow in the shame of your mistakes.

💐

The short walk to the reception was magical. Behind the venue guests were led down a dirt path. White flower pillars wrapped in fairy lights highlighted the trail leading to a white massive outdoor tent.

The strong scent of flowers wafted out from the opening of the tent. The inside was just a gorgeous as the outside. Flowers draped the ceiling and walls while large center pieces overflowed with blush grapes and pale flowers.

The room boomed with music while the liquor flowed freely. You would be abstaining too scared to make another drunken mistake.

There were too many tables, finding your seat was becoming a challenge. The place cards written in golden calligraphy were beautiful, but hard to read off the stark white background. You squinted, leaning toward each card trying to make out the characters.

“Do you need any help?”

You felt the gentle touch on your shoulder before his soft words hit your ears. Keanu hid his chuckle from the sight of your startled face.

“Oh hi… I didn’t know you were coming. I didn’t see you during the ceremony.”

“I just got back, I tried getting a hold of you, but never got an answer.” He explained.

You frowned in confusion. You hadn’t had any messages from him. Your phone was working you were sure. Sarah and Zoe both had texted you just yesterday.

“Something must be wrong with my phone… I never-,“ You tried to explain as you dug out your phone and quickly scan through your messages. Nothing.

Not even older messages from him. Weird.

He stands beside you watching over your shoulder as you tried to figure this out. You search his name in your contacts and its there, but when you click on it your stunned to find out that he is blocked.

“I don’t know how this happened. I swear I didn’t.” You plead your innocence with wide eyes. The way he looked at you somehow you knew he believed you to your relief.

“No worries these phones are always doing something crazy, it might have to do with a software update.” He suggested. That had to be the case. You’d seen notifications to update before, but always ignored them so that might be why.

“Weird. Of all people. I would’ve preferred if it blocked my mom instead.” You joked.

“That’s a relief I thought you might be avoiding me.”

💐

Keanu led and you followed as he helped you find your seat. He was the only face you recognized and you hoped that his placement was close to your own.

“I think this is us.” He proclaimed picking up two placards holding them side by side. You could kiss Jen for this.

“So how are things at the office?” You enquired as he pulled out your seat.

“It’s been busy, but your absence has been felt. Do you miss it?”

“I'm actually thinking about quitting.” You confessed sheepishly.

“Really?" Surprise and confusion riddled his face. You felt bad, but it was a thought that had been plaguing you for a while. Things at Terrilum were overly messy and you weren’t sure how much worse it was going to get. You needed peace and stability and you were sure you wouldn’t find it there.

“Yeah I’ve just been there for so long and I think its time.” You squirmed a little in your seat. You avoided his looks of concern and focused on the happy people dancing on the dance floor. Your mood was coming down just thinking the of bizarre soap opera you found yourself in and you wished desperately to escape that.

“Well I’m sorry to see you go. If you need a reference I would be happy to help.” Keanu offered. He still looked a bit disappointed, but he wasn’t going to press it seemed. You were thankful for that.

“Thanks, I’ll most definitely take you up on that.”

“Um-mm well while I have you here..” Keanu started but hesitated. You felt the familiar bundle of nerves tightening you belly as you wait in anticipation.

“I hope you don’t mind, but since you were unable to read my messages before, I was wondering if I could ask you in person again.”

“Ask me what?” You asked on the edge of your seat.

“If you wouldn’t mind... I'd like to take you on a date? A real one this time.”

💐

You blinked dumbly at him. For how long you weren’t sure. The question had caught you off guard.

“I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable…Umm I’m sorry I just thought.” He hurried to apologize, but you were quick to stop him.

“Wait! Wait!” You blurted out excitedly, holding your hands up haltingly. “Sorry,” you began lowering your hands and your voice in an attempt to sound more demur. “I’m mean I would love to.”

“That’s a relief.” He said with a grin, clearly entertained by your theatrics. “I’m ashamed to admit I’ve had a bit of a crush on you for a while, but never really had the courage to speak up.”

“Really?”

The news was unbelievable. It felt like you were in a dream that you didn’t want to wake up from.

The joy was short lived though. Your smile faded slowly when you spot a dark cloud in the horizon. The sight of him melts away the new found happiness and slamed you back down to the cold reality.

Brad. You thought he wasn’t coming. You hadn’t seen him during the ceremony either. Keanu followed your line of sight to find his friend and business partner.

Brad hadn’t spotted you both yet, that was good at least. Too busy congratulating the happy couple. Keanu waved over his buddy to your horror. An overwhelming urge to escape on coming doom enveloped your body. You needed to get out of here and fast.

“Um. Sorry… I just realized it’s getting late.” You lied, fumbling through your bag blindly, desperate to find your phone. You needed to order a hire car and get out of here.

“They haven’t cut the cake yet. Stay for a bit and I’ll take you home.” Keanu offered as he turned his attention back to you. Warmth bloomed on your exposed leg when he touched you there. His touch was comforting and you wanted to soak in it.

He was sweet, but you couldn’t take the chance of facing them both.

You smiled tightly disguising your discomfort the best you can. By the look on his face you could tell he wasn’t going to take no for an answer.

You sneak a glance in Brad’s direction. He seemed to be getting closer. Damn it. You felt trapped and needed to escape.

“Um ok you’re right, but um I’m gonna go to the ladies I’ll be right back.” You lied pointing a thumb in the direction of your escape. He didn’t get up when you shot to your feet. Keanu just nodded in understanding and you’re grateful when he wouldn't follow suit.

You didn’t look back. There were no bathrooms in the direction you were headed, only catering. The only restrooms were back at the main venue, and to go there you would have to pass by you know who.

Clumsily you slip through the catering door. The faint scent of cigarette smoke caught your nose and you followed it. If they are smoking then there is a back door somewhere.

The staff looked at you confused, but say nothing. Ignoring the stares you ordered the fastest option for hire car despite the price.

Damn it. The next ride was twenty minutes away.

💐💐💐💐💐

[you-know-honey]

A Pɑct With The Rɑin

Rain x f!reader

Sumary: Demons don't know love, so what would our nervous, timid ghoul do when feeling such a strong emotion?

Word Count: 9914

Note: bad english, I try to describe as best I can a nervous breakdown based on my own experience but since I always forget those moments I will do my best.

Rain moved the fork back over the plate, causing an awkward sound that was ignored by everyone else at the table. It was strange for him not to have even touched the portion of paella that was on his plate, he was just carrying the grains of rice back and forth and at this point she was sure that it was completely cold. She sighed and she took a long sip of water.

She was hungry but found herself unable to take a bite of any food, even if she was his favorite, which happened to be paella.

No one had asked him if there was something wrong with him, anyway he wasn't sure he could give an answer to that question.

"I'm leaving," she gave up and extended the plate toward the center of the table.

That was the first time everyone turned to see him. It already seemed strange to them that if he hadn't finished all the paella portions by himself, leaving food on the plate would be much more strange.

"What are you taking about?" Sodo replied, bringing the plate back to Rain, he still had half of his food on his plate. "Don't be stupid, you must take care of your vessel"

Rain looked at his plate for a few seconds before looking back at Sodo. He was right, he had been avoiding touching food for days, perhaps the lack of food caught his attention more than his strange state but it didn't seem to work.

"It cold" he answered simply. He wasn't in the mood to talk more than necessary.

"So? Don't expect me to heat it up? Go to the microwave."

Rain sighed, lifting his shoulders and letting them fall heavily. He took the plate from him and walked to the microwave.

The device was next to the bar where the brothers who had arrived late were putting food on their trays.

They all ate together, ghouls, sisters and brothers of sin. Scrambled in a huge dining room with long wooden tables, the windows were so high up that the sunlight didn't shine where it should. But Cumulus had made some strange contraption with mirrors and now it practically illuminated the entire place.

That reminded Rain of how weird it was to eat all together but basically ignore each other after walking through the door. The ghouls were of the same rank as the other inhabitants of the abbey, except clearly the Popes or Sister Imperator. They never ate with others, Rain remembered a meeting room in the papal pavilion that they rarely used for dinner. Although they always ended badly.

He rested one of his hands on the wall behind the microwave and put the plate inside, taking a few seconds to decide the perfect temperature, hoping that it wouldn't be dry or cold inside, in the best case scenario that it wouldn't explode.

"Rain?"

Oh no….

He recognized that voice. His tail tensed and a shiver ran through his body slowly. He moved his hand away from the wall as if it were burning him and desperately searched around him, among the sea, for the brothers and sisters of sin at the source of that voice.

He met her in line, waving with her free hand. And it all started.

His hands began to sweat uncontrollably, his feet demanded that he run but his legs felt weak at any moment, his stomach felt empty but filled with a strange fluttering, cold currents ran through him one after another, his heart seemed to stop and then run wild, his breath held in his mouth….

Her mind felt overwhelmed and she took advantage of the moment when you turned to choose what kind of soda to drink to run away.

She abandoned her plate of paella and crossed the doors with a skill she didn't know she had, almost carrying a sister of sin between her feet.

She ran as far as she could until she reached the library where he hid behind one of the bookshelves, holding her chest until her breathing began to calm down. A look of frustration appeared on her face as she slid to the floor and wrapped her cloak around herself to avoid the sunlight, although with the lack of cleaning of the windows it wasn't very necessary.

The library in the west wing was abandoned, he didn't even know it existed until he saw it from the bell tower. At that time he didn't know it was a library because of the amount of dirt on the windows. It was filled inside with enormous stone gargoyles that hung from the walls, yellowish bones and non-human or animal made up the chandeliers that had stopped having candles for years, the books inside that library were large and heavy, capable of disappearing if he sneezed. He didn't like making noise, he had taken it as his little secret place. Because of the strange air currents and the cold that seeped through the walls even if it was midsummer.

He decided to use it as a secret place the first night he began to feel the terrible symptoms of his mysterious illness.

He started spontaneously.

You rolled up the sleeves of your habit to continue taking clothes out of the dryer in a hurry, the afternoon sun was the most efficient, although for you it didn't last long enough. You didn't like the assigned task at all, it was humiliating.

It wasn't the clothes. You were bothered by the reason why you ended up washing dirty habits. During a Black Mass some idiot had slid his finger from your spine to your butt when you stood up to recite a song with the rest of your sisters. You reacted before thinking and let your fist hit the guy's face accompanied by the insult 'Stronzo' that came out of your mouth in Italian, to which everyone turned around amazed to hear those words from your mouth.

The guy got cold feet when he felt all the eyes on you and honestly so did you. In the end the only idiot there was you.

Sister Superior scolded you horribly when everything was over and as punishment you had to wash the clothes of the brothers who had been offended by your words, especially the cretin who touched your butt. You swore intermittently like an impressive faith but you didn't believe they would listen to your prayers.

Those guys seemed to take advantage of the opportunity and dirty as many clothes as possible to order you veritable mountains of bedding with suspicious stains, rock-hard stockings, and tunics with wine on them.

"Idiots," you muttered as you grabbed the last basket of linens and walked towards the hidden part of the garden that was lined with clotheslines.

You began to place one neatly white sheet after another, securing them to the rope. At least when they were all dry everything would be over for you and you would surely find a way to get back at them.

You sighed in relief before feeling a cold gust of wind that made the habit in your head fall behind your heels. I tear the sheets and other clothes violently. Ruffling your hair with malice.

You knew that kind of gale, and you just closed your eyes hoping it was a joke.

But it became clear not when thin drops of rain fell on the bridge of your nose. You looked at the sky and huge gray clouds began to gather excitedly over the sky. A thunderclap accompanied by more wind warned of the arrival of heavy rain.

"God you're a fucking son of a bitch." You smiled and felt the curtain of rain fall on you, on your hair and on your work.

You admitted it, it seemed as if God had punished your dirty mouth, sending you even more rain of drops as thick as pennies.

You ran from one place to another trying to grab as much clothing as possible, clutching it to your chest to prevent it from getting more wet, which didn't really matter because you yourself were starting to get soaked, your hair was sticking to your face, disturbing your vision.

You didn't give up even in your clothes that were clearly soaked. Your tears of frustration were confused with the raindrops that were sliding down your face.

Then everything stopped, you could still hear the patter of the rain falling but suddenly you no longer felt it and the aroma of wet earth and mud filled your nose.

"Are you OK?" You heard a sweet, soft male voice in the periphery.

At the entrance to the secret part of the garden there was a ghoul. Your breath held in your chest, normally you didn't interact with them, the other sisters said it wasn't convenient. But there he was, asking about your condition in an elegantly concerned tone.

He maintained a straight posture despite having his uniform soaked, one of his hands was extended to the sky and it seemed that perhaps that was what stopped the rain, you looked over your head and saw the drops of water breaking against an invisible ceiling. In the other hand he had a small bouquet of lilies of the valley, lavender and some mint leaves, the smell of those flowers and the earth under your feet helped you relax before answering.

You pushed away a wet strand of hair that was beginning to try to get into your mouth. "Did you do that?" You asked, curious rather than afraid of the demonstration of skill.

"Yes," he answered dryly, trying to formulate more than that word "it seemed like you had problems."

"Yes," you replied, "thank you for that." You smiled unconsciously.

He lowered his hand and approached you, his step was elegant, he walked with grace. He took the sheet in front of you and draped it over his arm.

"What are you doing?" The question was accompanied by a look of absolute surprise.

"Eh?" He seemed bewildered by your question "I'm trying to help, I thought… maybe you needed help" he excused himself, as he did so you could see his small fangs protruding from between his lips.

You couldn't help but examine him curiously, you had never been even remotely close to a ghoul.

“Thank you,” you whispered as you pulled back another bedsheet.

He was cute, you couldn't deny that, he wore his uniform immaculately despite dripping water. He had a beard that was just forming and his wavy hair fell short on his shoulders completely dry. You admired on his head some small black horns speckled with some blue dots that became accentuated when they reached the tips and seemed to shine and although it was something you had never seen before, what surprised you most was seeing his tail swinging behind.

"Excuse me…are you…" You heard him and realized that you were looking at him without any shame. He seemed a little embarrassed and his pointed ears were dyed a light blue blush.

"I'm sorry," you apologized and began to continue removing the sheets and clothes.

The silence wasn't awkward but it wasn't something you'd like either. You turned to go back to the laundry room but you collided with someone's chest and a mint smell invaded your nose.

"I'm sorry, I wanted to help you-"

You tried not to hold on to him and stand on your own but your feet slipped and you knew you would end up on the ground. You had no choice but to hold on to the vest. They both fell to the ground with the sound of a gasp coming from both of their throats. You felt his hands wrap around your waist as if he was also trying to catch you when you fell.

You started to laugh when you saw how the clothes in your hands were covered in mud when they fell. The ghoul next to you looked at you completely strange before laughing with you and after a few minutes you were both trying to catch your breath lying on the ground.

"What is your name?" You asked, turning around and throwing the sheets somewhere.

You would then take care of washing those missing pieces again and if not, you could buy others. The demon seemed surprised by your question, even with both of you on the ground.

"Rain" he responded and a light blue blush rose to his cheeks and ended in a cute smile.

You smiled, it was a sweet name and quite fitting for the situation. A giggle escaped your lips and Rain's smile trembled.

"It is funny?" I ask you.

"Not at all. It's a nice name Rain. Very fitting for this I would say" you pointed to the rain on both of you that still didn't touch you.

"What is your name?" He asked back and you couldn't deny that the blush on your ears was cute as hell.

"Y/N" you answered simply, there was nothing special about your name like there was about Rain's.

"I like it, it's cute" he responded with a full fanged smile.

"Thank you" you leaned back on your elbows, you could feel the water draining from your neck to your waist and I couldn't even imagine how horrible your hair must look, wet, tangled and full of mud. "Satan…what a shame…" you murmured.

You usually didn't get along with strangers. Meeting new siblings always represented a risk for you but with the water demon by your side none of that happened, you were comfortable and it was not at all like the sisters had described it to you.

"You know…" he turned to look at you, leaning back on his elbows as well, he didn't seem to care that his spotless suit was now stained with mud and weeds everywhere. "You're not at all like the other sisters describe you."

"They describe us?" He looked surprised and his tail rested on her thigh.

"Yes. They say they are flirtatious, even more so than Terzo or that they have a horrible temper and-"

Rain started to laugh, at first he tried to hide it but finally he burst into laughter.

"Who told you that?" she asked as he recovered from his fit of laughter. "It's half true"

"Half?" You felt a little silly saying it, but curiosity was your great quality.

He settled better on the floor, sitting with his legs crossed and you did the same without really knowing why, although you could notice how long his legs were and how his hands were fine and thin.

"Swiss is the one who flirts" he laughed again and looked behind him as if he hoped no one was after him "Sodo is the one with the horrible temper…between you and me" he got close enough to whisper in your ear, telling you a secret "We call him gremlin" his laugh resonated in your ear canal and it seemed even softer and sweeter.

They laughed together, they chatted for so long that the moon welcomed them and only then did you realize how late it was and how the cold was beginning to penetrate your bones thanks to your wet clothes. You didn't want to stop talking to him, he was interesting and everything that came out of his mouth never stopped surprising you.

You learned more that night about demons than in all your demonology classes. Although you only learned more about a certain water demon.

You discovered his love for lakes in the summer, he didn't like public pools because of their dirt and since there wasn't one in the ministry, he would drive hours to get to a lake on the outskirts of the city.

His collection of river stones and seashells, he even showed you some photos on his cell phone.

His love for books (if it's about sea adventures, even better)

And he destroyed the mystery of the Loch Ness Monster, assuring you that there was nothing and that humans were very imaginative.

His love for lilies of the valley and as always he asked Mountain to grow some.

He showed you photos of the shark-shaped lights that he had and that he only needed one to finish his collection, in addition to the stuffed animals. Sliding the screen to show them to you but a group photo from a sleepover was posted, he was asleep and a boy with vitiligo was putting makeup on him in an exaggerated way.

You laughed when you saw that photo and he passed it on as fast as he could.

"Sorry, I didn't know that was there." Rain moved some things around on her phone, maybe changing the folder photo.

"You can tell they're having a good time," you responded, trying to contain your laughter because your stomach was starting to hurt.

You never stopped listening to him, your eyes looked at him in amazement like those of a deer dazzled by a car.

Then you felt that strange sensation in your lungs, the itch in your nose and finally the result, a loud sneeze.

"Are you OK?" He asked, it didn't bother him that you had basically sneezed on him. His tail moved cautiously through the wet grass and approached your skin, feeling it cold. "Satan…you're going to catch a cold in those soaked clothes"

Rain stood up, Ilgiving you his hand to lift you off the ground.

"It's nothing, it's just cold" you tried to say but your nose was already stuffed up.

"It's a cold"

"And what about all this?" You pointed out the majority of dry sheets that you managed to get out in time and the poor ones that were left on the floor with you.

Rain didn't know what else to say, because of how your skin had felt, it was already too late to avoid the cold and if it hadn't been for the fact that he had started a very pleasant chat with you, you would have finished your work several hours ago.

"I'll help you. It's the least I can do after entertaining you for so long."

You really appreciated the help. And getting to work together they began the work, Rain elegantly folded the sheets, much better than you could have done, you did the least laborious part and picked up the sheets that were still hanging on the clothesline. He didn't speak during the task, something you were a little grateful for, since you didn't see yourself able to complete the task if he opened his mouth. They simply sent each other smiles every time their gazes connected.

You didn't want him to notice that you were dying of cold, your legs felt numb and you had to hold back some sneezes. Although without knowing it he already felt all this, he was deeply saddened and when he finished folding the sheets he walked towards you, he couldn't let you freeze from the cold in those dirty and soaked clothes.

You struggled a little with the sheet that finally split and fell into your arms. When you looked up, his chest was the first thing you saw. "Damn!" You gasped exhilarated and fortunately that time you didn't slip. "How are you so silent? You're going to scare me to death." You placed a hand on your chest, trying to relax your heart.

Rain let out a soft laugh. Music for your ears.

"Of course I don't want to kill you. You're soaked, I'm going to help you."

Before your amazed eyes he opened the palm of his hand and some raindrops began to fall on your palm, forming a puddle. It was as if he had opened a small window in the strange, invisible 'roof' that he had placed over the garden. The water fell and the puddle formed an even larger sphere of water.

"It's magic…" you were unable to get out of your admiration for everything that was happening.

"Something like that" the path behind you, now you could hear his footsteps on the wet earth.

The small window closed and you felt a cold hand slide over your shoulder.

"What are you doing?" you asked surprised, trying not to give in to the urge to turn around.

"I will clean the mud"

His words were simple, he didn't say more than what was necessary even if that left you with more doubts in your head. So you let him do whatever he planned.

You felt your hair move, some grass blades fell to the ground next to you. You were as still as a statue. The hairs on the back of your neck stood up as you felt the water seeping through your locks, you felt it move, dance in your hair, clean every bit of mud that remained and extract all the water until it was completely dry.

Rain sighed.

You couldn't avoid it anymore. You turned. He was startled, between them there was a sphere of water dirty with mud. Your hand went to your hair, it was dry, silky and shiny.

"You-? How did-?" You couldn't complete any sentence. Your hair was as beautiful as if you had paid for a luxury hair treatment.

"Will you let me finish?" He smiled. That silly smile that didn't come out of his mouth.

"Uh-huh…" you turned around again, keeping more questions in your head.

You couldn't feel it but you knew that something was happening and you just had to look down to see the sphere moving all over your clothes and leaving them clean and dry in its wake, the water rotated on itself, you were more than amazed watching it rise through your habit. .

A squeal left your mouth as the sphere slid down your back.

"Very cold?" Rain asked.

You nodded.

The water became warm and continued its journey through the habit, the sensation was strange. You felt the water pass through your entire body, making your skin crawl completely. You stayed calm as much as you could because you didn't want to burden him with questions so you just let the magic continue.

The sphere of water moved until it was in front of you, the water was dirty but somehow not stirred. The mud was at the bottom and reminded you of a snow globe.

A body behind you advanced until it was close and rested its chin on your shoulder.

"Yes, you can touch it."

You gently moved your index finger towards the sphere, it felt normal, but there was something that made you know that there was more to it than water and mud.

The sphere fell to the ground and the earth absorbed the water. A sigh stuck in your throat.

"You don't seem very happy…" Rain asked in your ear.

"Can everyone do magic like that? Is it a gift or something? How do you make water have a shape? I felt something else inside the water, was there something?-" He cut you short, he knew you would have questions but you were starting to blurt out one after another another hastily.

"It's a gift, it's no big deal" You were surprised how he acted as if it were something X and unimportant. I must have been used to those things but for you it was simply magical.

"If it wasn't a big deal I could do those things. It's special" The blush returned to his cheeks, although you couldn't see it.

The first butterfly had been born in his stomach and fluttered.

"I must go," the sensation alerted Rain, like a cat's intuition alerts her. He thought maybe something bad was happening with him, although it probably wasn't anything serious.

"Because?" You asked quickly, it was late but you wanted to hear him a little more.

Rain pointed to a lighted window far away, it was the wing of the ghouls, separated from the others. "Too late, I must return to them." You sighed secretly, it made sense and even you yourself had to go back inside.

You nodded as he walked backwards back to where he entered. "Thank you for the help Rain, and for the class on demons."

“Sleep well Y/N.”

That was what he expected to hear, a smile formed on his face and he turned to leave. He disappeared into the night and mist shortly after.

As soon as he left you could notice how sore your cheeks were from smiling so much all that time. It had been totally worth it even so, Rain had been a most kind and chivalrous ghoul, you had sighed more in his presence than in that of anyone else, he was a huge well of knowledge and you were very interested. The night and its breeze embraced you, it was cold, your fingers were cold. You walked straight to the entrance when something caught your attention in the corner of your eye.

You turned to get a better look under the poor moonlight. A small bouquet lying on the grass, fresh and shiny from the cold dew.

"Oh no…" Rain must have left it there when they sat on the grass and then completely forgotten.

You took it and the perfume of the mind quickly entered your nostrils, it was quite comforting. Maybe it even reminded you of the smell that surrounded Rain.

He was a good boy, a true gentleman, from his attire to the way he spoke and especially the way he acted. It made you smile just thinking about it. You hoped that this encounter wouldn't just be a one-night thing.

"I'm here!" Rain pronounced as he entered the room and left his muddy boots at the entrance with the rest.

"Where were you? The tea got cold." Mountain appeared in the kitchen doorway, with his apron on, along with the smell of pasta.

"I picked some flowers…" she tried to decide if she should say everything that had happened or just leave the sentence hanging.

"And the flowers?" asked Phantom who was walking along the high ceiling of the living room together with Aurora, both of them touching up the paintings of the Milky Way that the latter had made. Rain realized it was true, her empty hands reminding him of what her mission was supposed to have been.

He was very amazed, he was rare in forgetting things. He had come to that part of the garden by mere chance while he was enjoying the rain and stealing some plants from Mountain's garden. Seeing you surprised him, he could identify your tears from the rain while you ran from one side to the other grabbing sheets. No Sister of Sin had really interacted with him, but he wasn't a monster and helping you wouldn't bother him. And then he had just let himself go, the sensation of it reminding him of the comfort he felt when he was underwater.

"I forgot, I guess…" his voice wavered.

Aurora made a clearly strange face. That was not normal for him.

"Dinner will be soon, can you tell the others?" Mountain asked as he stirred the pasta and took out plates.

Rain nodded.

He walked down the hallway until he reached the living room. Sodo was covered in blankets in front of the TV, playing Mario Card with Cirrus and apparently he was having a bad streak, Cumulus was lying on the couch playing with a gust of air between her fingers while laughing at Sodo's stupid expression.

"But what the hell is that horrible smell?" Sodo asked, turning his head like an owl in the direction of Rain who felt his skin crawl.

"Mountain says dinner will be soon" Rain repeated as he retreated to his room.

"Take a shower! I don't know what you smell like but I don't want to smell something like that at dinner!" Sodo shouted as he continued trying to recover in the game.

Did he smell like something? Rain couldn't understand what he meant by that. No one had told him that he smelled like anything, especially something unpleasant. Although knowing Sodo even the most delicious smell would be horrible in his nostrils.

When he arrived at his room he opened the door and the pre-recorded sound of the ocean wave greeted him. He had a slight dim light in the room and little by little he turned on each little shark light and smiled instinctively. His mind was filled with images of the little adventure he had had that night in the garden.

"Y/N…" he uttered out of inertia, savoring the name between his lips.

Then a flutter of wings turned his stomach. His smile faltered, I thought maybe it was hunger. But when the memories came back to spin in his mind. His face forced him to smile like a fool and the fluttering returned, accompanied this time by another, they danced in his stomach with emotion.

Rain lay back on the bed, somewhat scared. He felt waves of excitement and euphoria hit the shores of his mind and distort memories into imaginative scenarios that had never happened, but there was definitely something in common about them. The echo of your laughter or a quick flash of your eyes or the image of your hands in the thick water.

Rain was really scared, unable to move in bed or scream for help. He was trapped in his mind and the cold spasms his body caused her, a strange way to get the euphoria out of his body. He barely knew basic human emotions, this was new. He made him dizzy like a fever of ecstasy. His body began to tremble. The smile didn't go away, somehow he liked the feeling, maybe because it was new or because they had something in common. You.

After a while everything calmed down and he was able to move his body with ease, he was breathing heavily while a drop of sweat rolled down his face.

The episode had passed or so he thought.

He wanted to remember the events of the day, but every time he tried those strange sensations came back to the surface.

"Rain hasn't arrived?" Mountain asked as she served plates full of pasta on the table. "I thought I would be the first at the table."

"I'll go get it." Swiss got up out of nowhere, he had arrived recently. He walked quickly straight to the ghoul room but there was an essence in the environment that revived his own memories and that made his spine and tail bristle equally.

When he reached the door he could hear the panting inside the room. When he opened the door he was hit hard by the essence of a human emotion that he knew very well by then.

He found Rain sweating, lying on the bed on his back, panting and in a state of agitation that was just beginning to subside.

"Rain…are you okay?" Swiss asked, trying to keep his tone cheerful.

He stood up quickly with one hand on his chest as if he were trying to keep his heart inside the flesh of his body. "Of course"

He seemed to have panicked and started looking for more comfortable clothes in his closet, completely avoiding Swiss's gaze.

That was the first night, and things hadn't stopped.

When you handed him the bouquet the day after your meeting at breakfast, a blush rose to his cheeks but he accepted it with pleasure.

When they walked through the garden chatting freely, a flutter was added to his stomach, a sign that if he had taken it at that moment he would not be where he was.

The more they met and spent time together, the more Rain felt flutters inside her stomach, at first she thought that maybe her body was being attacked by some disease but that was quickly ruled out. Then a worse idea crossed her mind, maybe it wasn't the body that was sick, maybe he himself was sick and that terrified him more than any symptom. She immediately thought that if the Clergy found out that he was 'broken' he would be returned to hell and even though it was his home he did not want to return. He didn't want to leave them. He didn't want to leave you.

At first he thought he could solve it himself, find the reason for his 'symptoms' and eliminate the root of the problem. But when his investigations pointed to you he stopped.

He understood everything when during the summer he took you to the lake he used to go to, you accepted and like a gentleman he offered to teach you anything. He ignored the symptoms all that day as much as he could. He ignores the insomnia and excitement that kept him awake all night, the fluttering that became so strong as the scheduled time to leave approached, he ignored how his heart beat desperately when you took his hand with a backpack in hand like an angel. Coming down from the clouds, he controlled as best he could his gaze melting over you as he drove to the lake.

And he knew he wasn't that strong, because inside the water, with your hair floating above your head, covered by the faint sunlight at that depth, with your hands and legs clinging to his body so as not to move away, with your eyes on him. But above all with a nervous smile on his face, he knew that he couldn't bear it.

He held his hands on your hips, going up until he felt your ribs, feeling how they contracted every time you released air that turned into bubbles, he didn't understand how even under the cold water he felt like he was burning from the inside out, like the tranquility that he had always felt. Now it was devoured by a flame inside him, a flame that begged his skin to merge with yours, the fluttering in his stomach was so intense that it had made his brain dizzy, he felt primitive. But totally flooded by a need to possess, to take what those strange symptoms wanted and although you didn't notice it, his lost in you.

It was then when he realized that he couldn't be strong, not with you, these symptoms made him long for you with raw desperation, with total lack of control. He felt lost in your skin, in your eyes or in your voice. Possessed by a desire of unknown origin that he could not keep under control. Trapped by the instinct to possess you like a demon to an unusually good soul. He felt capable of ruining you, of taking all the air from your lungs and taking your soul like a sip of life in a certainty of death.

He couldn't ruin you like that. But he couldn't stand feeling like he was allergic to your presence, your humanity, your soul.

"Fuck!" He screamed, feeling how the symptoms were coming back with excessive force from inside him. He hit his head against the wood of the shelf behind him, with enough force to splinter the wood and make it creak. He felt a warm liquid drip down his neck and down his back. He didn't care. He was tired of those symptoms. He preferred the pain physical to the torture that was brewing inside him.

He couldn't stand them, they overwhelmed him, there was a slight sensation that he could define as happiness but it was nothing compared to the rest of the whirlpool that trapped him. So he walked away completely, he avoided hearing you, seeing you or even feeling your presence nearby. But that was killing him from the inside, something inside him was gnawing at him, he couldn't help but look at things that reminded him of you, even outside the Ministry there were things that he had bought for the mere fact of thinking that you would like them.

He tries to talk about this with Phantom, since he was a quintessential ghoul, but he, being new, does not know what he is and is embarrassed to confess that he is "defective" to others. Especially Sodo, he trusted him but when he was upset he used to reveal secret information, he didn't do it as a bad friend, it was just difficult to close that sharp mouth when he was angry.

He slammed his head again harder than before against the wood, pushing that 'analysis' out of his mind to relax his heart in his chest. Causing one of those heavy books to fall to the ground with a loud, dusty crash.

He got up heavily, he couldn't mess up that place too much or someone would know that he had been visiting.

The book was heavy and older than expected, made of some type of metal which surprised him. He passed his hand along the corner of the deck, it had been many centuries since he had seen something like that, he thought that things like that were still lost in the tomb of the pharaohs. The lid was made of obsidian, and the leaves were silver with carvings in a language now lost. His hand slid faster than it should and he opened a clean cut on his fingers.

"Ugh" he quickly moved his hand away from the book. The feeling of physical harm was not something she liked, in general having a human vessel was a strange feeling. A drop of blood fell on the cover, revealing an unusual shine.

Rain was curious, if it weren't for his current situation he would have gone through every book in the library. He hold the book to the dim glow of light from the dirty window. Carved on the obsidian was a snake coiled at the bottom of a pit in what seemed to be a cave, with rubies in its eyes, a very long row of teeth and emerald scales. The book must have been worth a real fortune, but it must have been more valuable in another way so Sister Imperator wouldn't have auctioned it off to gain more funds for the Ministry.

Him blood ran down to the beast's mouth and he seemed to see a gleam in her eyes. A cold ran down her back, she could only buy it with the abyssal coldness of the ocean.

He didn't dare open the book. Something inside him told him that he should keep his distance. His tail tightened around his chest in fear.

He pushed the book back to his place.

"What the fu..?" He asked himself as he felt that he was hitting bottom much earlier than he should, since he still stood out from the rest. Rain preciono el libro con mas fuerza hasta escuchar un mecanismo activarse.

The ground vibrated at his feet, he thought it was a tremor but nothing outside seemed to move, the stone walls next to him creaked and opened. Hitting Rain with a strong, salty breeze. The gills on his neck opened wide, showing that he somehow recognized that place.

He looked out a little, darkness greeted him, humidity dripped from the walls and some green algae were next to the moss on the steps carved into the rock that descended in a snail shape towards the depths.

He could hear the echo of the choppy water crashing against the steps, as if there were a coast in there.

Something was calling him inside, something was asking him to come in. Not like a ghoul, he asked him to come in as what he was, a water demon.

"Do you want answers?" whispered a foreign voice, a voice that came from that newly discovered passage."Don't you want to be fixed?.."

There was something he recognized in that deep, raspy voice. His own instinct forced him to take one step forward and then another. Going down the slippery stairs, while his gills were glad to feel the salty air. Darkness enveloped him completely but he could see perfectly into that dark place.

When he reached the bottom he could feel the sand under his skin and the light splash of salt water on his face.

"Hello?" He spoke to the emptiness of the place, his voice echoed in every stone of the cave and was carried by the tide.

The dark water swirled and from the depth emerged a scaly head, with bright ruby eyes and emerald scales, just like in the book.

"Do you want something…" he whispered, although the corners of his mouth didn't move. "There is something inside you…something is wrong with you my demon…" the creature mocked.

A sigh caught inside Rain's mouth and he fell to his knees on the wet gray sand.

"My lord Leviathan?" He asked fearfully, watching the small waves hit her knees.

She didn't expect to find his legion leader in a place like this. Was that his entrance to Earth for when Year Zero will arrive? A thousand questions ran through her mind, but above all he was terrified. His leader knew something was wrong inside him.

"Get in the water…" he murmured, wagging his tail at Rain, splashing water on her face. The being showed a grimace of disgust that wrinkled her face "You reject your nature" he spat the words with disgust. "Enter the water…I'm going to repair you"

"Will I go back to hell?" He asked fearfully, with his gaze still fixed on the ground, squeezing the sand under her fingers, possibly he wouldn't feel it again for a long time… maybe never again.

The being did not respond, it simply buried its head. He didn't like the questions, he knew it well, he had already given the order, if he wanted to get rid of this 'illness' everything would be normal again, he would be normal and he would be able to approach you again without those overwhelming symptoms.

I sigh and look at the stairs. Going back would be easy, disobeying and simply fixing it on his own was a few steps away but this was something he couldn't do, he wasn't that strong.

I slowly take his arms out of the jacket, accompanied by the shirt and vest, the belt, the pants and finally the shoes. His feet were refreshed by feeling the abyssal tide and in general his entire naked body responded with pleasure.

His tail unwraps from his chest, his gills and fins getting ready to return to his natural environment.

First he sinks his feet and with each step a feeling of drowsiness invades him, as if every nerve in his body had completely relaxed. The water covers his face and his lungs empty and close, he won't need them for a long time. Under water everything is different, each noise is heard differently. He was breathing again, swimming in an abyssal void.

He can see the ruby eyes at the bottom and swims towards it, hypnotized and wishing for a remedy for his 'illness'.

You ran as much as you could down every hallway you knew but nothing. No brother of sin could tell you anything about Rain and you weren't brave enough to ask the ghouls about it. There was only one way to try to find out where she was. The security cameras.

You were quite surprised by the ghoul's attitude, he had been spending an exquisite time together for months and out of nowhere he ran away from you as if you had leprosy. Although if you analyzed his behavior he had been quite strange lately. When they went to the lake he seemed quite tense and when you were in the water you had felt like you were prey in a lake of piranhas, on the way back he hadn't said a word other than a simple 'goodbye' when I'll leave you in your room.

You sighed when you reached the Security Room, you knocked on the door several times but no one opened, you knocked even harder, even hitting the door with the tip of your boot.

"What do you want?" asked an annoyed man as he finished taking a drag on his cigarette and put it out at the door, leaving a mark on the wood.

You tried to keep his gaze on him successfully.

"I need to see the cameras from this afternoon" You took a step forward with the intention of sneaking into the room but he denied you passage.

"Reason? I don't see any authorization card" he was quite arrogant and that bothered you.

You couldn't admit the real reason, a Sister of Sin shouldn't get involved with ghouls. So you lied about the one thing you couldn't play with.

"They've been stealing things from Sister Imperator's room," the veins in the guy's neck tightened, saying her name was like calling the devil, you prayed she wasn't around. You remained calm although inside you were nervous as hell.

He examined you for a couple of seconds before letting you in and closing the door behind you. You were stuck with him.

The room was small and quite uncomfortable, full of monitors on the walls and on the table, some were labeled with dirty adhesive tape, there was a horrible smell of cigarettes and you were sure that you would have to wash your habit as soon as you left that place. The guy was behind you, watching your every step.

" I Can?" you asked pointing to a chair to sit on.

"As you wish" he responded with disinterest.

You sat in front of one of the monitors that focused on one of the floors, the quality was not the best. The mouse was sticky and you really felt like throwing up when you touched it but you did your best and went back a couple of hours into the recording, a sigh stuck in your throat as you saw Rain running with a hand on his chest looking back like if someone followed him.

"A ghoul stole it?" the guy asked behind your back, you had almost forgotten he was there.

"No" you said dryly and continued searching but at some point he disappeared from the recordings. You were frustrated, Rain wasn't someone who played those kinds of childish games but you wouldn't give up.

"What's that?" You asked, turning in your chair and pointing to the largest screen, you had lines that delimited a building and letters inside the rooms as well as colored dots, some with numbers, others without.

"It's the monitoring screen, it says where the important people are." I hesitate to tell you, it wasn't something the brothers of sin should know.

"Okay…" your eyes moved eagerly looking for a blue dot on the huge map and you found it, blinking in a huge room.

You found it.

"I'm leaving" you said and approached the door quickly.

It wasn't difficult to find the place where it was, you had never been there and in fact you had to sneak through some secret corridors of the old abbey. But the feeling of entering that room was making you sick.

You felt as if you were in turbulent waters and your stomach was being encouraged to empty its contents, you were dizzy and your eyes felt blurry.

You weren't poisoned by any of the food, you knew well that those symptoms were caused by some strange force within the library. You walked through the hallways with as much haste as your weak state allowed.

"What is this?" Under your feet was a layer of water that emanated a salty and maritime smell, your boots squelched with each step as you approached the source.

A chill ran down your spine when you arrived, the stone was wet and you couldn't see anything at all in that darkness. Opened in the stone, some catacombs announced themselves before you with gusts of wind and the clear sound of the coast.

"Rain?" You muttered into the void, afraid to take the step and enter. "It's not funny." You felt stupid saying that. But you were sure that he was in there, you didn't know why but he was there.

You tried to take a timid step towards that darkness but you slipped on something and your hand held tightly to a protruding part of the stone, an echo resounded throughout the place lighting faint torches that shed their light on you and the silhouette of the place.

Your chest tightened, your mind screamed at you that you shouldn't be there and your feet just wanted to run away. But a flash glimpses in the corner of your eye and you turn.

You recognize that golden piece, even though it is far away you know what it is and your body runs towards it. Towards the small dark sand beach.

The blood in your veins travels faster as you approach, no matter how many times you slip, you fall to your knees on the pile of clothes.

You know who it belongs to, you search through it desperately as if you were going to find it deep down but you won't.

"Rain!" You scream but no one responds and the echo of the cave mocks your despair. "RAIN!" you shout, holding his shirt in your hands.

Nobody answers. The water shakes vigorously and you feel that a force from the depths invites you to enter.

The marine darkness scares you, you fear what's there, you fear being in that place… but you can't leave… not without him.

You take a sigh and crawl over the sand to the water, you carry his shirt in your hand, as a symbol of good luck, as if a piece of clothing could keep you safe.

You look up before the water covers your head and with pain you open your eyes under the cold, salty water, you sink, the water sinks you and now the surface is distant, almost like a mirage. The cold chills your bones and elevates your habit, you press your shirt against your chest. Something cold brushes against your ankle, you move away and look but there is nothing.

You try to pronounce Rain's name but it comes out as bubbles that also sink, the hair on your neck rises when you find pairs of reddish reflections in the darkness, next to you and below you. You feel in danger, you know that you are in danger and for the first time you think that if you die there no one will find you.

Your heart stops when several hands hold your legs and pull you to the bottom, the little air you have in your lungs escapes and you fight to get back up but it is impossible, you hear laughter and murmurs, your gaze meets that of other demons. Beings scaly, with a toothy smile and bulging red eyes, with claws that hurt your skin and make it bleed, they group around you like piranhas, trapping each of your limbs and holding them with the sole intention of devouring them when the last breath leaves you mouth.

Your tears mix with the water, you know that there is no way to get out of something like this, there are more hands on you than you can count, more claws that cut your skin like little needles than you can see. You accept that you will die, that it will be painful but that it will end quickly.

"Go away!…" a wave crosses the water and the demons get scared like cats and move away, still hanging on your body. You can barely hear the voice, it sounds dry and broken. But it's too late, your lungs can no longer find air inside them and before giving in, close your eyes.

Rain turned his head in surprise as he saw how his leader scolded a bunch of minor demons, rarely showing any interest in them.

"Follow me…" Leviathan moved with agility in the water, even though he was enormous and heavy like the earth itself. "I found your problem…"

Rain nodded and followed him, excited and afraid of what his leader was going to show him. The huge snake stopped and hissed in the darkness, some thin algae like bioluminescent threads emerged from the darkness and gathered on a body in the water, giving light to the situation.

Rain held back a gasp with his hands but he could hear it inside him with pain. He tried to get closer, but he was pushed by Leviathan's tail to stay in his place, he couldn't remove the grimace of terror from his face.

"No…" he murmured, his voice breaking.

Your body floated in the void, your hair rose above you like a fan, your skin was sadly illuminated, your habit was torn and threads of blood flowed from your skin that hit his nose with force, whetting the appetite of the others demons, ready to destroy you. Rain's stomach churned with bitterness, you looked like a bloody martyr.

"She's the problem…" Leviathan approached you, he entangled himself in your body, even though he could bite your head off in one bite and he wouldn't be even close to being satisfied, that was something Rain feared. With his tail the huge snake opened a clean wound in your chest. Rain couldn't help it, he approached as fast as he could, but his leader kept him away.

Rain's eyes reddened and tar-black tears ran down his cheeks "Stop it…please stop…" he begged his leader as he tried to get closer to you.

From the wound Leviathan continued cutting until he reached your heart, which was still beating slowly but beating. The snake exposed your heart to Rain.

"Eat it…" ordered the snake.

"No…" Rain denied with her voice broken as the monster pushed your heart into her hands. "Please…"

"She makes you weak! She infected you with her humanity…. Eat it! Eat it and be free of your illness…" Leviathan's voice became furious at the refusal of his servant. "She's stopping you?"

"I don't want to hurt her. My lord, don't make me do this." Rain caressed your unconscious face lovingly, the image of you sleeping on his shoulder when you decided to watch movies together appeared in his mind, torturing him more. You were sweet, brave, funny. His mind tormented him with memories of both of you, of the image of your laughter, the sparkle in your eyes, the sound of his name in your voice, the feel of your touch.

All his 'symptoms' returned, strongly, with desperation taking over his entire body, filling it with adrenaline and a vestige of anger.

Leviathan took out his iron tongue and tested the energy of the water. "She has trapped you," the beast pronounced mockingly. Thunderous laughter gathered around him, coming from the henchmen.

Rain sighed and looked at your heart in his hands. He knew why everyone made fun, refusing your leader's orders was an offense, Leviathan had taken it better than he expected but he was not happy, he was a lying and treacherous monstrosity, he would take advantage of any opportunity to hurt you and show that once again he was right.

"It's funny don't you think?" Leviathan brought his face closer to Rain, making him press your heart against his chest, causing a grimace of pain to appear on your face.

"I don't know what you're talking about, my lord," he pronounced firmly.

"Of course you know, you're not stupid, Rain. You choose to be loyal to her rather than me." A laugh echoes through the place. "I'm not going to stop you, after all, you are my demon, you are eternal and you belong to me, she, on the other hand… "Leviathan brought the golden tip of his tail to your neck and opened a small bleeding wound. "She is mortal and will perish like all of her race," he spat out those words in disgust. "And when she dies you will return here and be punished for your insolence."

"You can't kill her!" Rain shouted with a bravery he didn't know he possessed.

"Of course I can!" Leviathan shouted back "but I won't… tell me Rain, do you see me unable to wait? How long do you think she will live? 30 or maybe 50 more years? How long can you keep her safe before her fate catches up with her?"

Rain's face changed with terror. She knew that no matter how much she protected you, even if she kept you in a bubble for the rest of your life, all humans had a debt to pay with death and you were no exception.

Leviathan continued.

"You bite my hand for the passing life of an insignificant human, there are millions like her, with her face or her body. It turned you into a stupid demon Rain and i think you are my favorite, I expected more from you. I will have all your eternity to Make you pay for that… and I'll enjoy it." Rain didn't care about the insult, that was insignificant. The mention of his own eternity crossed a dangerous idea in his mind, risky for him.

"She's worth it." Even if that strange illness consumed him, he no longer cared.

Rain walked away from Leviathan, as if it were nothing, and approached your body. The wound in your chest was still open, hidden by your destroyed habit, he sighed and placed her forehead against yours, returning your heart to hers. The wave of life, Rain through your body, Rain left a trail of kisses on your chest to close the wound.

Sigh.

He put his hands inside his own ribcage, muffling cries of pain like simple whimpers, clawing his way through the crunching of ribs and the tearing of flesh, he extracted his own heart, it was beating fast, dark blue in color.

A shock of surprise spread throughout the abyss, Leviathan himself had no idea what his servant was planning to do.

His claws clung to a piece of his heart until he tore it out and made a river of dark green and blood gush out. Rain felt weak, the pain was killing him more than the act itself. His trembling hand still held the piece of his heart and pushed it into your mouth.

"Eat from me" he began to speak, her voice trembled and you could feel her desperation "Drink from me" he cupped her hand to contain her blood and emptied it over your lips.

"Don't you dare…" Leviathan exclaimed, rising in anger, but it was too late, when your body accepted the flesh and the blood descended to rekindle the flame of your soul.

A pact was being carried out, one never seen before.

"Where you go I will go, where you stay I will stay. I offer my eternity before you, I share my immortality with you. Where you live I will live. I give you what I am so that you may have power over me, I belong to you. Yours to possess, yours to obey. You possess me in body and soul…" He finished by placing his lips on yours, just a touch, without intensity, but with desperation. Wishing it worked.

In the deep abyss a deal was sealed that would last an eternity until the end of time.

"Mine…" your bloody lips murmured with difficulty.

Hi, I know I've been missing for quite some time and I'm sorry for that. I got caught up in family celebrations, but I've been writing quite a bit and I plan to do a second part of Tower Of Cups, just give me some time and I'll have it soon. I promise. I hope you like this Rain fanfic, I have another one planned but I don't have the story guide yet.

[audioaujom]

(9) Back to Square One

LTWF Hub, < prev, next >

Hello and welcome back! Things are bad and getting worse as usual. I don’t have much to say, I think the mess speaks for itself. Enjoy!

Word Count: 1313

--

Between Virgil being missing, Roman’s ever increasing rage, and the weird smug smile that Janus had been wearing for the last few days, Patton was at the end of his rope.

If Logan wasn't avoiding Patton before he definitely was now, ignoring all of the latter’s attempts at contact over the weekend and leaving him stranded with an agitated Roman.

Patton loved his roommate, he really did, but Roman was stressing him out even more than he already was—and it was starting to become too much.

“What use is campus police if they won’t even investigate!” Roman was yelling, pacing long lines from the dorm door to the windows. “He’s been gone far longer than 48 hours and they have turned up squat!”

“You have to give them time, Roman.” Patton sighed, sitting on the bed and listening to the same rant for the fourth—fifth? sixth?—time. “This is awful, but… you know. They're… busy.”

It's not that he didn't understand—he was just as angry and scared and upset about Virgil being missing—but he was so tired of being angry and scared and upset. 

“They're useless.” Roman continued, barely listening. “I may as well search this entire campus myself!”

Patton’s attention was drifting, his laptop open on the bed beside him but discarded and his phone charging nearby. “Okay.” 

“And oh boy, if that snake shows his face in front of me this week, my rage will make Lyssa blush!” 

“If you say so.” Patton mumbled, staring down at his hands. Roman’s words were blurring together.

“This is the worst!” Roman declared, finally stopping in his incessant pacing and throwing his hands in the air. “Everything is awful and I'm angry!”

Patton nodded distantly, completely unfocused. “Yeah.” 

By the time Monday rolled around Patton wasn't looking forward to his classes, for the first time dreading his astronomy class. Every step up the stairs was heavier than the last, Patton nearly turning around and leaving several times—though he ended up in front of the classroom door all the same. A small spark of relief cut through his panic, though, when he saw Logan sitting at his desk. Normally he would be in a discussion with the professor, another student, or Janus—who strangely was nowhere to be found—to avoid talking to Patton.

Patton tentatively stepped into the classroom, internally lighting up as Logan turned to him and stood up to greet him.

“Hello. Are you here for Stars, Galaxies, and Cosmos class designation 1060-10462?” Logan asked, Patton’s hopes crumbling in his chest at the flat words.

What… is he talking about?

“...what?” Patton chuckled awkwardly in an attempt to relieve the tension that only he seemed to be feeling, trying not to panic. “Don't be silly, you… you already know that I am. What are you talking about?” 

Logan nodded, the action uncharacteristically mechanical. “That is good to hear. My name is Logan, and I’ll be your ATA for this semester.” 

“Logan, what are you…?” Patton stared, hoping for Logan to be joking or even just momentarily malfunctioning—though something deep in his stomach knew better. “What happened to you?”

“I'm afraid I am unsure as to what you are talking about.” Logan’s apology was lifeless, his unblinking digital eyes unfeeling. “I'm quite alright.”

“But you— it’s— it's me, Patton, I—” Patton was desperate, his panic growing as he reached out to grab Logan—only for the latter to step back and cut him off.

“It's nice to meet you, Patton. Feel free to find an open seat.” 

Tears were misting in the corners of Patton’s eyes, his hands falling uselessly back to his sides. “Why don't you recognize me…?”

“Am I supposed to?” 

“Yes! You— I— We—!” None of his words were coming out right, choking off in the sob barely contained in the back of his throat. “Did none of it… mean anything to you? Can you really just… forget that all so easily?”

“I’m terribly sorry if I’ve done something to offend you.” Logan seemed a little more sincere, but something about it felt… wrong. “But I do not believe we have met prior.”

“We… we were going to chart the stars.” Patton said miserably, sniffing hard to try and keep the tears from finally overflowing. When Logan just stared at him, confusion unchanged, he tried again with, “Andromeda, you said.” 

“That would be impossible.” Logan shook his head, all that was left of Patton’s relief shattering into a swirl of murky heartbreak. “How and why would we attempt to travel in space like that?”

Patton nodded a little, wiping at his eyes as he turned away. “...Please excuse me.” 

In an instant he dashed back out of the classroom, leaving Logan standing alone in the doorway.

“Oh—!” Logan exclaimed mostly to himself, watching until Patton was completely out of sight. He blinked a few times, before turning back towards his desk. “How odd.”

Having seen the entire exchange, Professor Sanders came jogging up to Logan as soon as Patton was gone. 

“Logan, what happened?” He asked, concerned. He knew that those two had been spending a lot of time together, having been the one to approve Logan’s request for out of class time in the first place. “Did Patton say where he was going?”

“No.” Logan shook his head, before shrugging. “I simply introduced myself and he seemed rather upset.”

“...what?” The professor trailed off, now mostly confused. “What do you mean?”

“I asked if he was here for this class—Stars, Galaxies, and Cosmos class designation 1060-10462—and he got upset.” Logan explained plainly, one hand coming up to adjust his glasses. “I'm afraid I don't understand the problem.”

“Someone in tech must've messed up and reset you.” The professor sighed in heavy annoyance, pinching at the bridge of his nose. “Could someone make sure Logan makes it to Dr. Villarehal’s lab, please?” 

Patton was running blindly through the halls, partially blinded by his tears.

Does Logan really not remember anything?

Is everything really gone?

After all they'd been through, Patton just couldn't handle the flat out rejection—stumbling as he heard Logan’s dismissive voice over and over again in his head.

I don't believe we’ve met? That would be impossible? What… happened to him?

Patton came to an abrupt stop as he ran face first into someone, who steadied him gently by the shoulders. He looked up to apologize but the words died in his throat as he found himself staring into familiar green eyes.

“Oh, dear.” Janus said softly, letting go of Patton as soon as he tried to pull away. “What ever could have happened to make you so upset?”

“No, Janus, I—” Patton shook his head, though his resolve to keep running was completely gone. His legs wobbled underneath him again as another sob threatened to break out, Janus catching him before he could fall.

“Oh, shh.” He shushed softly, pulling Patton into a light hug. “Just come here.” 

Patton tried again to pull away, but it was weaker this time. 

He did really need a hug.

Janus smiled in understanding, letting Patton fall back against his chest and tightening his arms just a little. “It’s alright, darling. Let it all out.”

“But I—” Patton’s last protest was barely audible, cutting himself off as he finally let himself continue crying.

“No one will fault you for this, so let me be there for you right now.” Janus continued, rubbing small circles onto Patton’s back. “Clearly something has happened, and you need this.”

Patton hated how comforting and soft the words were, letting himself sink into the hug to relish in its warmth.

Maybe just this once, it would be okay. He needed all the comfort he could get.

However, Patton was buried too deep in the hug to notice the widening smirk on Janus’ face as he continued to mumble comforting words to the crying boy.

Yeah… all according to plan.

[doberbutts]

I've had a long post churning in my head about this but I'm kind of chewing on something else first.

Now I've mentioned but not really gone into detail about how people have decided to simply Make Shit Up about me and for the most part I've just ignored it and blocked the worst offenders. Sometimes I'm not allowed to reblog a random completely unrelated post in the wild because someone I've never even heard of has blocked me but for the most part it's pretty whatever. Since blocking the worst offenders my askbox has been fairly peaceful.

However... I want to talk about this.

Part one of "people making shit up"- it's interesting that I've gone on record saying again and again that rape is possibly the worst thing you could ever do to someone, that I have close family members and friends and former partners who've been raped and I find the problem deeply personal, that I've broken up with partners because I did not trust them not to rape me, that my first sexual experience if it was anyone else I'd call it assault but I struggle to think that way about it for myself, that I would rather die than be raped, that I really dislike a lot of media that depicts certain sexual scenes in positive manner because of a solid lack of consent... and all of that is very findable in a search of my blog for the word.

What you will also find is an argument with terfs on whether consensual sex with strangers who don't tell you anything about themselves is rape, and a solid "I do not give a fuck what consenting adults do in their spare time".

Similarly, the closest thing to pedophilia you'll get is a discussion of how a church member preyed on me when I was 16 and how my parents intervened before it progressed past a certain point, as one of the main factors in distancing myself from the Christian faith before my total break from the church, and, similarly, overall personal disgust for witnessing ageplay but same "I do not give a fuck what consenting adults do in their spare time" and "please be at least somewhat normal about fanfiction and use your fucking brains I beg you". Also very easily findable with a basic search on my blog.

Also interesting that "someone who is in dogblr" believes I hate or hated pit bulls. I don't want one, that's true. I'm honest about their use in dog fighting both historical and modern, that's true too. I do hate scotties and corsos due to personal experience. I'm very upfront about that too. When I get talking about pit bulls I generally do bring up the racial aspect, because I'm black, and I care about black topics, and our dogs are certainly a topic. I like the aesthetic of a good solid amstaff. I've trained several and they've been both some of the best and some of the worst clients I've had. There's a gamebred pit that spent every weekend in my house over spring/summer while I helped his owner on a favor. I also don't want the risk of dog aggression if it's not also a doberman. I've planned my pack dynamic out pretty well to avoid that and the risk is too great for me to try it.

This one I've brought up before but this is the one that's probably the worst. A post discussing how WHITE feminists were putting "black lives matter" in their bio and yet saying stupid shit like "men don't have to worry walking alone at night" and "men aren't in danger walking down the street" as if police killings of black men aren't literally a major reason why we even have the black lives matter chant in the first place. Somehow got translated to "black women are more harmful to black men" and yet when I asked for receipts for what racist shit I say about black women none were given. Literally the world's worst whisper down the lane.

Me: raceplay is weird as fuck to me and I don't like it at all, I block on sight when I see it, also the government shouldn't control what you as a consenting adult do in the privacy of your own home as long as it's with other consenting adults

Them: so you think raceplay is okay

Me: how dare you say we piss on the poor

I do find it interesting that I don't think I've tagged a single one of my posts transandrophobia and also I rarely use any word to describe what my experience is, really the only times I ever use the word is to say "hey it doesn't seem to matter what word we use, we get shouted down regardless" or if I've like. Reblogged from someone else who's used that word. But cool I guess.

Also I've spoken to Saint like twice and it was to clarify something being claimed about him. Like I don't think it's a crime to talk to the guy but also. It's weird that I'm "regularly involved" with someone who I haven't talked to directly in over a year and when I did it was to ask if something was true or get his side of the story. Also are we just... doing guilt by association now? Because talking to someone on good terms doesn't inherently mean you 100% believe or condone everything that other person does or says. It means you're able to have a conversation and treat others with basic respect and human decency before deciding how you judge them.

Anyway. There's not really a point to this. It's something that I see kick around from time to time when one of my posts gets popular and as said before generally speaking I just block the worst offenders and continue ignoring it.

But really like. People do just make shit up. If anything is ever claimed about someone ESPECIALLY when it's something that can be weaponized? Ask for proof. And if no proof is given then most likely it's a case of Making Shit Up. I would LOVE proof of any of these claims. Please, by all means. This is a sideblog that cannot leave replies or asks and I can count on one hand how many posts I've deleted and still have plenty of fingers left over. So prove it. Prove that I am this person.

Otherwise, I know it isn't true. You know it isn't true. So there isn't any reason to continue to spread it outside of pure maliciousness and bullying. High school level tactics.

[mikeymeowmeow]

my first time writing for anything trigun, this is with tristamp knives and vash in mind and is also a college au? also probably ooc, my bad

fluff, knives and vash (my god it is Not plantcest please dont take it like that)

he wasn't sure what led to such an intense situation, but next thing he knew he went from chilling with someone he thought was a nice person to getting forced into a fight with them. vash didn't want to fight them by any means, especially under such sudden circumstances. but when he refused, that angered the person so much more and vash did not leave the situation unscathed.

now he's sitting on the rickety old bench near the college campus, twisting his hair in his fingers and trying to ignore the hurt he feels.

he calls knives

"vash-?"

"can you bring some donuts to the fountain--", he thinks about the way his mouth is still heavily bleeding and the sting the sweetness of the donuts will cause, "--and maybe some water and a towel?"

"vash, what happened? are you okay, do i need to fight someone for yo-"

"nai, please." he hangs up.

it isn't long until his brother arrives, dressed in his usual long white jacket with that stupid design on it. he looks tense and aggravated, carrying a small box of donuts and a large, water-bottle-shaped towel.

"vash, what happened?" knives asks sternly, not allowing room for vash to wiggle out of answering.

he sits and thinks for a moment, lets his twin settle down beside him. he searches and digs for a reason, the cause for such a reaction out of nowhere, but he just can't place it.

"i don't know. 'm sorry. thank you." vash panics and quickly takes a long sip of water to wash out the blood and avoid talking.

knives turns slightly more to vash, knee pressing to his and he's able to clearly see his face now.

"vash. who did this?" he places a finger on vash's knee, a subtle-and-very-knives-way of saying its okay.

"some- some guy? i don't know. we were talking and he just got really angry or something. i think i did something weird?" vash is still searching for an answer, a reason, so he isn't too sure what to say to his brother.

knives sighs but backs off, putting a bit of space between the two of them and leaning his head back. a stray drop of water flies onto his face every now and then. vash is still hunched over, elbows on his knees and head in his hands. he sits like that for a moment longer, before reaching over his brother and grabbing a donut.

knives resists the urge to smack it out of his hand for fun.

not many more words are exchanged between the two. they mostly just sit together, enjoying the sound of the fountain, the cool air, the night sky. it isn't until much later that they actually retreat back to their dorm, vash having fallen asleep at the fountain and knives pestering him to, "wake up, it's cold and i'm tired, loser."

[paigedarling0506]

Ephemeral: Chapter 02

Black Bucket Hat ❁

*.☽.*

"OH, MY GOD!"

My hands flew to my mouth as I gasped upon seeing his face. I was so surprised because, despite the rage written all over it, he looked very handsome. His eyebrows furrowed as he glared at me but that did not even make me blink. His disheveled hair was making it harder for me to look away. Like there was some sort of magnetic pull that I couldn't explain.

It was probably my exaggerated reaction that annoyed his face and instantly changed to panic. It seemed that he just noticed that he wasn't wearing his hat anymore. His body jerked as he hurriedly turned around to retrieve the bucket hat from the ground. He didn't waste any time putting it back on before tilting his head down. I suddenly sensed that he was trying to hide his face.

That's weird. Was it a mistake that I saw his face? I don't know but it somehow felt that way.

"A-are you okay?" I hesitated. 

He didn't answer, totally ignoring me as continued to look the other way. I watched him stand and immediately made a few steps away from me as if making sure that he was far enough for me to peek. I got confused about why did he seem awkward all of a sudden. Why had he become so tense? I threw him a scrutinizing look. I searched him from head to toe then my eyes stopped on his right hand. It was bleeding. He must have used it as support when he landed on the ground or it must've hit a stone or something sharp. I looked at the area where we landed and saw several small, pointy rocks. I flinched imagining how much it must have hurt. I got worried, so I absent-mindedly stood and walked toward him. However, as soon as he saw me move, he made hasty steps backward to avoid me.

"No." He refused, extending his left hand and demanding I stop from getting closer. "Don't come near me." The demand in his voice was evident. My forehead creased as I tried to understand his reaction. I just didn't quite understand his behavior. He seemed...he's not scared though, I was sure. 

"Your hand is bleeding, let me see it," I told him pointing to his right hand.

He lifted his bleeding hand and it seemed like he just realized that he was hurt.

"I'm fine." He announced.

"No, you're not." I insisted as I watched his blood dripping on his skin.  I didn't know how deep the cut was but it was bothering me. My eyes narrowed as I gazed at him hoping to somehow check his reaction but it was impossible because he was wearing the bucket hat again. Was he perhaps a criminal? If he was, he would've done something bad already right? I debated in my head as I continued to watch him. He was trying to hide his identity, I concluded after a few more seconds of observing him. For what possible reason, I didn't know yet. 

"I promise, I won't look at your face." I cautiously told him. "Just...just let me see your hand," I added, feeling responsible for what happened to him.

When he didn't show any signs of objection, I took the chance to come near him. Contrary to what I just said, I was tempted to look up at his face. I used every ounce of energy I have to stop myself to break my word. I shouldn't do it if I wanted him to trust me. I felt him twitch as I carefully reached for his injured hand. For some reason, I was instantly distracted when I took a closer look at it. It was not because of the blood but because of his beautiful hand. I couldn't help but adore it. He had slender fingers with equally beautiful nails. His skin felt so smooth as well, making me a little insecure about my own hands.

I've never seen a man's hand this beautiful. I heard him clear his throat and my private bubble exploded.

I shook my head as I came to my senses again, feeling a little embarrassed. I did my best to focus on the wound. I was right, there was a cut and it was about an inch though I couldn't say if it was deep or not. All I knew was that it continued to bleed.

"It must have been one of the rocks," I told him, making sure my eyes don't leave his hand. "We need to stop the bleeding."

"It's not going to kill me." He reasoned out, his tone flat and close to being harsh as he removed his hand from mine.

It was just then I noticed his voice. It wasn't so deep but it did sure have its character. There was authority and seriousness in his tone too. Who is this man? Is he perhaps someone famous? Before I could start gushing over his voice, I forced myself to think of something I could do. Ignoring his protest, I opened my purse and fished for a small bottle of water and a handkerchief. 

"I know it's not going to kill you but..." I paused. "It's bothering me," I added as I attempted to hold his bleeding hand again. He protested by refusing to let me hold him. I looked at his face which I could not see anyway. I took a deep breath. I didn't understand exactly but I felt the need to take care of that hand. 

"Will you just let me help you?" I said firmly. "Please."

I was also surprised at my tone. I certainly didn't sound like I was begging him. It was more of telling him to let me.

"I promise I'll stop bugging you after." 

He didn't answer but I felt him relaxed so I took it as an agreement. I slowly reached for his injured hand. I felt him watch my every move so I made sure to do it right. I asked him to hold his hand steady as I poured water on his wound.  Just as I expected, his hand jolted a little because of the water contact. Right after clearing the blood, I folded my handkerchief vertically and gently tied it around his hand.

"There, it'll stop the bleeding for now," I announced after making sure that it was tied securely.

I saw him lift his hand next to his face, probably to examine what I had done. It was just then I noticed my handkerchief. I watched him stare at the light pink and flowery handkerchief tied to his hand.

He must think that it was too girly but that's all I have with me. 

"You didn't have to do this." He said and his statement sounded flat. 

"Yes." I snapped, a bit annoyed which caused him to stop what he was doing and turn my way.

My eyebrows furrowed, frustrated.  

"Let me guess, I shouldn't have stopped you from jumping too right?" I couldn't help but be sarcastic.

I heard him scoff. 

"Who told you I was going to jump?"

Though I couldn't see his face clearly, I could imagine how he looked annoyed as well.

"I saw you." I insisted confidently. 

"What did you see?" His tone was challenging.

"I saw you preparing to jump," I answered, making sure he'd feel the firmness of my words.

"No, you were the one jumping to conclusions." He replied emphasizing the words 'jumping' and 'conclusions'.

Then it hit me. Uncertainty suddenly hit me.

I suddenly felt my face heating upon realizing that maybe he didn't plan on jumping.

What if he was just really standing? Gah, how could I be so impulsive?

If he was right, then everything was my fault. And to think that he did lose his balance earlier because I came rushing towards him made me feel more uncomfortable.

"I'm sorry," I muttered, my voice automatically sounding unsure. "You're right, I shouldn't have assumed," I added as I turn away from him.

I faced the view trying to hide the embarrassment that was already written all over my face. I sighed, I had been embarrassing myself in front of him for the nth time. Biting my lower lip, I gazed at the community where I live to take my mind off of the situation. The houses looked small from where I stood but I could still recognize the town center where my aunt's flower shop was located.

I closed my eyes and filled my lungs with air because this was what I came here to do. To take in the view and relax. I forgot it for a second because of what happened but it was high time I remind myself. 

"You know..." He muttered. 

I immediately opened my eyes and looked at him.

I noticed that he was now standing a few feet away next to me with his eyes on the view as well. 

"I was just doing the same thing before you almost killed me." He added.

I couldn't hear any sarcasm in his tone now. It sounded like a plain statement like he was just really telling me about it.

I sighed, he was right. I was wrong. He was just admiring the view and my stupid brain came up with something morbid. I tilted my head down, admitting once more that I made a mistake. 

"I guess, I just didn't think of the possibility that someone might like this place the same way I do," I replied, feeling apologetic.

He looked my way and all I could see were his nose and his lips. Basically, only the parts of his face that weren't covered by his black bucket hat. And maybe it was because the other parts of his face were hidden that I almost had my jaw dropped when I saw his lips form into a small smile. The way the corner of his lips turned upward and formed an upward curve. 

"Me too." He said.

I didn't know how to respond to that but mostly because I was still speechless by how beautiful his smile was.

What was happening to me? This guy seemed so mysterious and I am drawn to him. First his face, his hand then his voice, and now his smile. 

I shook my head, silently scolding myself. 

"Do you live there?" He asked, breaking my train of thought.

"Y-yeah..." I muttered. "You?"

He moved his head sideways.

I waited for him to speak but he remained quiet. 

"I have a feeling I shouldn't ask you a follow-up question," I said cautiously.

He must have found it funny as he let out a small laugh all of a sudden.

I bit my lower lip to stop myself from gaping at him again like I had been doing almost the whole time.

Gosh, his laugh sounded so good. What is happening to me?

We stood there for the next few minutes without talking to each other. However, I find myself secretly glancing at him a few times. And the more I think about it, the more I realized that there must be something about him. Well, based on what he's wearing, he was trying to hide his identity. Like he was concealing it. His voice, his aura, his stance, and his undeniably good-looking face which I openly saw earlier. Something was telling me that I shouldn't have seen him up here. 

He must be someone famous. I concluded right after I dismissed the thought of him being a criminal. This man was way too handsome to be a hideous person. 

"Are you trying to figure me out?" He asked, glancing at me before looking at the view once more. 

Getting caught and getting startled by his question, I looked away. He must have seen me gawking all this time.

"It's okay." He added. "I should have been more careful anyway."

Turning to him, I watched him as he shoved his hands inside his pockets. I looked at him from head to toe.

"Sorry, I was just...I just get this feeling that you're someone famous." I answered as I carefully watched his reaction.

He did not even glance at me when I said that.

"If you are..." I trailed off as I faced him this time.

He didn't respond but I could sense his uneasiness as he lifted his left hand to fix his hat before turning away.

"You might be wondering why I haven't recognized you yet after seeing your face." I paused to check if it was okay for me to continue and he didn't seem to mind. "Well, that's because I left South Korea after middle school and just came back recently," I added hoping that the unsolicited information from me would help.

I heard him clear his throat as he took a deep breath. 

My eyes fell on his injured hand and realized that if he was indeed famous, he could sue me for what happened earlier.

What did I get myself into? I couldn't be imprisoned three months after going back here.

"Name." He muttered, turning to me this time. "What's your name?"

I hesitated for a bit but realized that I was at fault here.

"Hae Won," I answered. "Park Hae Won."

"Hae Won." I heard him say as if testing my name on his mouth.

He remained silent for a moment, making me uncomfortable because I didn't know what he was thinking. He was probably thinking of suing me. 

"Hae Won?" He called.

"Yes?" I absent-mindedly answered upon hearing my name.

I saw him nod.

"Nothing. I was just making sure you weren't making up names."

"You're not going to sue me because of what happened to your hand, right?" I asked worriedly.

I saw his lips form into a lopsided smile before turning around to leave. I followed him with my eyes while I remained standing on my spot. He was about a few steps away from me when I got the courage to open my mouth.

"So, I guess I'm not supposed to know who you are." 

He stopped on his feet and turned around to face me.

"I hope you don't." He replied, his lips giving away a subtle smile once more.

I didn't know how to react to that. I was speechless for a second as I watched him leave.

When he was already out of sight, I inhaled and filled my lungs with air as I turned to the wondrous view in front of me.

That was weird. I thought.

A beautiful kind of weird. Actually.  *.☽.*

[kieshartzishere]

I don't think some of you understand the sudden change of mood and annoyance when these shit pop out. (I just saw a recent one about childbirth????? Huh?????)

Before anyone tells me off on how I keep finding these, it's not like I'm trying to SEARCH for them. If anything I'm actively trying to avoid these things.

I look up a tag of a character, I get an x reader of sucking off their friend or something that doesn't even have the character tag I searched in it. And it's followed by 6 of these.

I scroll through my dashboard reblogging about a cute ferret where the joy of seeing one gets crushed by having to see an x reader because Tumblr thinks I'll like it because of #writing.

"Oh just ignore it." Buddy, I'm trying to. I can still see certain words as I try to scroll past in a panic.

"It's not that hard to not care for it." And it's not that hard to tag the most general term ever because all x readers are, and not surprisingly, x readers.

"you can give it a try before you judge it." a.) I am acespec and so is like 50 % of my mutuals, I do not wish to know what to know how I fuck this guy in riverdale. b.) I have. many times. thinking I was weird for not enjoying this types of fics and sometimes even disturbed.

TAG YOUR POSTS RIGHT

I have nothing against people making, reading, or enjoying x Readers, but TAG IT as "x reader" plEASE. it is the most general and self-explanatory term out there because it literally is a damn x reader by nature. It won't automatically be filtered out when it has "[character] x reader" and I find it strange you can have other specific tags but not actually have "x reader with it." Sorry, this is probably just a pet peeve of mine but honest to God, this can go for everything.

[nierreplicantver122474487239]

(serious thoughts about the k/fka blog)

I never really started the blog with specific goals or guidelines in mind but generally speaking these were things I tried to promote

a sense of humor

being an autodidact (to the degree that someone who went to public high school can be an autodidact)

critical eye towards the cultural establishment (the actual establishment based on practices and institutions founded by like European nobility and the Catholic Church not ghostwriters being paid by the word)

he's not a remote figure

obviously none of these things are possible or palatable in the current climate which seems to be half last-minute power grab before the perceived rapture and half weird gay people looking for even weirder and gayer people to bully. this would be less of a problem if 1. people responded by actually participating in the serious quote/analysis parts of the blog and 2. it didn't create a massive vacuum that misc. reactionaries could astral project into. literally the only people left on the blog are people who think he's a representative of whatever genocidal pet project they have in mind and people who are so obsessed with cultivating this proper intellectual image they can't handle the parts of him that aren't perfectly beautiful and victimlike. like benjamin's essay about the 10th anniversary of his death isn't even particularly nasty or irreverent and it's still not as appealing to the "snobs" as a random flowery snippet from the letters. it's just so deeply dishonest and not good for the environment. why are you blowing a gasket about how it's racist to relate to him on a personal level when you're spamming the crying uwu emoji in every brod post and completely ignoring all the birds-eye view posts about the state of austro-hungarian medicine or the publishing industry in fin de siecle prague. you do realize that there is a person on the other end of this that can see your activity

and of course throughout all of this there's a bunch of people trying to be friends with me or looking up to me as some kind of political/moral paragon while being blissfully unaware of the fact that I'm actually in (insert group) that they wanted against the wall yesterday. this has sort of been a running theme with my germanistik experience where competence in western art forms/languages has frequently been the only thing separating me from being treated like complete garbage (or in the case of vienna, the only thing keeping me from being assaulted) and the feeling doesn't get less creepy the more times it happens. I neither like nor trust using him as a shield as he wasn't able to really defend himself this way in life and there's no reason to believe it'll work out better in death. I mean I personally know and understand that there are external points of contact and similarity between the two of us that would justify me relating to him on a human level in front of any sane historian but the people who are making a half-living panicking about bad femininity and autism are generally not historians or operating in good faith when it comes to history.

in conclusion the situationists were right and I'm gonna do my best to end the blog on a bad note and then it's just gonna be my private archive for all the clippings I've accumulated over the past 6 years. it would be kind of fitting for the blog to begin with a stalking incident and end with a completely different stalking incident but I'm gonna hope that people have moved on. or not,

[luveline]

oh my, can we possibly have a james x shy!reader, where he gives her flowers but it's her first time receiving flowers? <3

OMG YES tysm for ur request ♡ fem!reader

There's a ferocious knocking coming from the front door. You look down at your naked thighs and decide not to answer. By the time you're dressed they would've already lost interest, a cold caller no doubt.

You sieze up and wait for them to leave. After a few minutes you relax and click play on your movie again.

"Shortcake, I know you're in there!" calls a familiar voice.

"James," you say, startled.

There's no way he would've heard you. His insistent knocking begins again. You practically fly off of your bed in your hurry to stand, searching your slightly messy room for something to wear. There's nothing, of course, because all of your trousers (pyjamas included) are currently on a high speed spin in the tumble dryer.

For lack of any better options, you pull on a hoodie that's always been too big for you and hold it against your thighs to avoid any potential flashing, and then you rush to the door.

"James," you say, opening the door just enough too see him.

Any plans of shooing him away go out the window when you see what he's holding, a bouquet three times the size of your head. It's literally bursting from its cellophane wrapping, a dazzling array of lavender, yellow, rose-red and greens. Fragrant enough to smell it clearly though he stands a good two feet away from you.

"Hey," James says, beaming at your startled expression. "I'm sorry to drop by unexpectedly."

"That's okay."

He graciously ignores your breathlessness and nods his head. "Could I come in?"

"James," you say again, sheepish. "I'm not," — heat like nothing you've ever felt washes over you, so embarrassed that you could just die on the spot — "wearing any trousers."

"Oh." He frowns at your embarrassment. "I'll wait here if you want to find something?"

He doesn't seem perturbed by the gentle rain outside. His sleeves have grown dark with wet, and raindrops play in his curls.

You shake your head and open the door. "You have to come in, it's raining."

"I won't look," he assures you.

You usher him very gratefully and wizz off to the tumble dryer. The jogging bottoms you pull out aren't really dry but you couldn't care less, more than aware that James has likely just seen a lot of skin that he's never seen before. Well, never seen before from you. He's likely seen a lot more than that of other girls.

You fluster yourself thinking about it. You're so distracted by the thought and trying to get rid of it that you'd totally forgotten about the flowers.

You're not sure what to say. Forbid you assume they're for you, you stop in front of James and his bouquet with a hesitant smile.

"They're for you," he says knowingly.

You smile and make a little gasp as you do, self-deprecating and overjoyed at once. "They're stunning. Really, really pretty. Thank you."

He hears the hint of confusion.

"Right," he says.

James runs a hand through his hair. "Would you want to go on a date with me? I know we've been for food after lecture and coffee and things, but I guess I'm trying to ask you out, uh, romantically?"

He offers the flowers.

You take them on instinct. James seems very encouraged by this, his smile near blinding. He presses his lips together and waits for you to speak. All your words have dried up like cotton in your mouth.

"I know you're-" He holds your gaze. He has a very gentle expression in place. "Well, I know you. You don't have to answer now. Or even say yes. But I think you're lovely, and I wanted to get you flowers even if you wanted to stay friends."

You're so happy you could cry.

"Nobody's ever got me flowers before," you say lightly.

"No? That's weird."

You cringe self-conciously. "You think so?"

"Absolutely I think so. Did you attend a school for the blind, before uni?" he asks seriously.

You sigh and raise the flowers up toward your face to hide your smile. His golden laugh rings out, and he closes the gap between you both to bend at the waist and peek at your face in the flowers.

"Yeah?" he asks through a laugh.

You nod, hoping he understands your enthusiasm even if you can't quite show it.

[angstsupremacy]

How dare you?

summary You start getting close to a cute guy at a party but your best friends brother isn't so happy about it.

pairing(s) JJ Maybank x reader, Rafe Cameron x reader

warnings jealous!Rafe, one or two curse words, mentions of drinking, fighting, angst angst angst.

a/n I'm a sucker for jealous Rafe so this will definitely need a part 2. Enjoy! / 1.9k words.

You're grateful for your best friend, you really are, but at the moments like these you wished she never got a boyfriend. After you and Sarah spent the whole afternoon getting ready for the party of the summer, John B had to show up and steal her away from you. You weren't actually mad at her, quite the opposite, you wanted her to have a good time, just like you wanted to have it yourself, but the problem is that now, with her gone, you knew basically no one there.

You stayed at Sarahs' lots of times before, since your families are business partners so you visit Outer Banks quite often, but you never actually got to get to know anyone besides the Camerons, or to be precise only one of them. You did say hi to Sarah's infamous older brother in the kitchen once, but after he just side eyed you, you figured it was better to avoid him but you just couldn't ignore how irritated and annoyed he seemed whenever you and Sarah were around. Especially you. It's like he had something against you but you couldn't quite distinguish what. And you decided that you won't care because there was something more important you had planned this summer instead of dealing with his nonsense- meeting a certain someone.

You never actually met any of the pouges but your best friend told you more than you needed to know about every friend of her boyfriends', especially about a hot blond one. Sarah was supposed to introduce you to all of them tonight but it seemed like she had more important things to do right now. After slowly beginning to feel lonely, you decided that you didn't get ready for nothing. If Sarah wasn't here to introduce you to people, you were gonna do it yourself. It can't be that hard, right?

You just needed a few shots to boost your confidence.

As you were approaching the bar you heard an unfamiliar voice from behind calling for you. "Y/n!?"  You turned your head to meet a face you recognised from one of Sarah's friend group photos. "I'm JJ", he shouted, leaning over so you could hear him over the loud music "John B just texted and apparently the lovebirds aren't coming back here so Sarah asked me to keep an eye on you". You were taken aback by this sudden situation and you knew your friends did this on purpose. You were already too tipsy to answer anything but a flirty "Not complaining" while sipping on your drink. The only thing you could focus on was the smirk on his face. God, he looked so good.

You two quickly took off, jokingly gossiping your friends and being a bit too touchy considering you were complete strangers an hour ago. JJ was in the middle of describing the way him, Pope and John B got in a fight with the kooks a few days ago, when you felt something change in you. You were looking at JJ but you couldn't hear a word, this weird feeling completely taking over you. It could be because of the 3rd drink you had tonight but no, you've felt this before, just before you'd catch him staring at you. And that's when you knew, you were being watched.

While JJ was too occupied reenacting the fight for you, your head hurriedly searched through the crowd, hoping you're in the wrong. But that's when your eyes met his. Rafe's blank stare from across the room made you freeze immediately. His face looked completely serious and collected but you could see the way his brows slightly scrunched up. He was judging you. It's almost like he was mad. You looked away immediately, trying to shift your attention back to JJ who didn't happen to catch your change of demeanor. "Could you take me some place more quiet, please", you asked, interrupting his vivid storytelling, not actually minding the loudness. You just needed to get away from there. Get away from him.

The two of you grew to like each other's company so much that neither of you wanted to leave the party yet, so you found the only slightly quieter place at the party- the porch. JJ noticed you shivering from what he thought was just the night breeze outside. But oh, if he only knew.  He covered your shoulders with his jacket and a little "there you go". You were silent for a while, feeling sort of cozy and safe just being wrapped up in his jacket. You put your head on his shoulder when he finally broke the silence. "I never thought a girl like you would hang out with a guy like me", he said quietly, almost like he didn't want to wake you up, even though he knew you weren't asleep. You couldn't help but lift your head off his shoulder, murmuring a sleepy and confused "what?". "I mean, me being a pouge and all", he said more clearly, finally turning his head to face you. You never really thought about it that way. "Oh, I honestly couldn't care less about your 'rivalry' with the kooks, I just don't get it. But if I had to choose...", you said with a teasing smile forming on your face, "I'd join up with your 'gang' ". He let out a chuckle, lightly bumping his shoulder into your side. "I'm really glad to hear that", he said smiling at you, the sudden eye contact making you blush.

You spent the rest of the party enjoying JJs company. Laughing at his jokes made you forget why you two were even out on the porch, so you quickly grabbed his hand and ran back in when you heard your favorite song playing. All you wanted right now was to dance because your mission was complete. You met the person you came to the party for and you hit it off instantly. Nothing could ruin this night for you.

What you didn't know is that Rafe wasn't letting this go. You really thought you could laugh so loudly and have a good time with his biggest enemy in front of him. On his part of the island. And on top of that you tried to hide from him? Didn't you see how he was looking at you earlier? Wasn't that enough for you to realise that he didn't want you there. Didn't want you with him. And you just ignored his obvious warning and continued flirting with someone else? But no, he can't do anything yet. He hasn't told you how jealous he was every time you'd hang out with Sarah. Of course SHE claimed you. He's always been intrigued by you but he couldn't stop thinking about all the stuff his sister must've put in your head. He's Rafe Cameron, he couldn't just come up to you and get rejected. It would hurt his ego and reputation forever. But this? This was even worse. Who do you even think you are? How dare you? You were moments away from following this pouge into a first empty room all giggly and shit. And God, he didn't want to imagine what could happen next.

JJ cupping your face in the corner of the room got Rafe out of his trance. Seeing him kiss you was the last straw and he couldn't hold back anymore. His fists clenched as he was approaching the two of you and just seconds later, he was grabbing JJ by his shoulders, pushing him off of you.

You were taken aback and it took you a moment to realise it was him. Rafe was holding JJ by his collar and you could notice the rage in his eyes. You collected yourself and tried to separate the poor boy from Rafe's grip but he was too strong. "What do you think you're doing, huh?", he shouts, looking at you with narrowed eyes, keeping JJ in a chokehold.

You couldn't believe this was actually happening. Why does he think he can just come up to you like this and ruin your night. He couldn't do this. Not right now. Not like this. Not after he's been ignoring your existence ever since you got there. And now, he has the audacity to hurt the guy you like? Who does he even think he is? How dare he? In front of all these people?

You glared at him in disbelief, unsure of what to say. There was so much on your mind. You wanted to yell and scream because he took this too far. The only thing you were able to do at the moment though, was cry. You knew you had to do something to put him back in his place but it's was so late and you were so drunk. You couldn't think straight and you felt so overwhelmed that you just ran away.

He knew it. He knew he fucked up and seeing you cry wasn't exactly what he had planned. Not like he planned anything. He knew he couldn't follow you because he didn't know where he would even begin explaining himself. If you'd even let him to.

After JJ finally escaped from his grip, he ran to catch up to you. Yes, he did want to confront Rafe but he figured he'd deal with him later. Right now, your wellbeing was his number one priority.

You wandered off far from the party but your muffled sobbing gave you away. He noticed you sitting on the beach, face buried in your hands, when he approached you carefully. "U okay?", he asked worriedly as he sat next to you. "I'm so sorry" was all you could say before breaking down again, putting your head on his lap. He caressed your hair as he spoke in a calming tone, not trying to upset you even more: "It's okay. I'll take care of it", he whispered as you sat up again. "I'll take care of you".

You were still shaken up. After all, this was the first time someone so furious and agitated came over to you, demanding an answer to a such an absurd question. You started believing that it wasn't even aimed to you, it had no reason to be. The only logical explanation you could come up with in your current state was that you just got caught in a pouge-kook fight that had nothing to do with you. Rafe did attack JJ after all. You convinced yourself that the question was meant for JJ but you couldn't figure out why. You weren't sure if you even wanted to know. Calming yourself down with the new theory, you finally started speaking. "He just wanted to get revenge on you for beating up his friends the other day, right?", you said with confidence, thinking you've finally figured it out. You wondered if your reaction was too dramatic considering the situation had nothing to do with you. You could've helped JJ instead of getting freaked out by an ignorat jerk. "God, he's such an asshole, why does he dislike you so much?", you asked as JJs face looked at you with confusion. Could you really be this oblivious? "Y/N...That wasn't about disliking me. It was about liking you". You freezed at his words, refusing to believe what he had just said, when that weird feeling came over you again. You felt Rafe's intimidating presence as you turned around, shivering. It was him and he was just steps away.

[brothermouse]

I have thoughts about this.

See, I have this weird habit were, whenever I see a search bar and have some time to kill I will see what that website thinks about Mormons. It's a weird hobby, I know, but it's been interesting. I bring this up because on more than one occasion I've come across some Jewish news sites with search bars. What's interesting is that on these different sites in different articles with completely different authors that have touched on Mormonism they have all ended up saying one similar thing about us: Mormons don't like discussing theology.

From Jewish perspective I can see how they get that from us. Judaism has a VERY robust culture of debate and they are very comfortable telling you that they disagree with your particular reading whereas Mormons will mostly smile and nod rather than cause a fuss.

I thought about this particular cultural difference for a while and there are a few things I noticed.

First: Jews are more comfortable with arguing about Judaism because you simply can't argue someone out of Judaism. No matter how energetic the argument is, at the end of the day, neither party will walk away less Jewish. No matter how convincing the logic, nobody gets uncircumcised.

That's not the case with Mormons. Everyone tries to argue us out of our community. There's even entire industries based around arguing people out of Mormonism. People send their kids to college with money they make ripping up our community. Most Mormons are not very keen on participating in that.

The second this is this: People seek in their communities what is denied them in broader society. I imagine that most conversations that Jews have with non-jews about Judaism are, at best, ill informed, at worst, maliciously ignorant. When you spend all week going over what "kosher" means for the thousandth time and explaining that, no, there is no space laser, it makes sense that you would crave an intelligent, well informed conversation. Then it doesn't matter that the other guy thinks you're fundamentally wrong, he has ✨ legitimate sources!✨

Most of the time when Mormons discuss Mormonism with non-Mormons it feels like an attack. Anti-mormon arguments are so diseased with fallacies and flawed logic that there's no way to come out on top. Between the stawmen and the shifting goalposts and the appeals to authorities we've never heard of nearly discussion of our faith feels like an unending stream of sucker punches, low blows, and cheep shots. We associate religious debate with bizarre, inconsistent tangle of traps that follow no rhyme or reason.

(quick story time: on my mission someone asked us how we define a "Christian". We gave our definition and they gave theirs which was something like "Someone who accepts Jesus as their savior and doesn't believe in baptism". Dear reader, they were a Baptist. A Baptist that didn't believe in baptism. Seriously, what the fr*ck? I'm still trying to wrap my brain around that)

So, when us Mormons go into our communities, we do everything we can to avoid even thinking about the Bizarro World Debate stage. Unfortunately that leads to an avoidance of ALL debate. Meaning we don't really have the skills to have healthy, safe, useful and necessary debates. We are so over exposed to debate as an attack that we don't know how to not do that.

I don't know how we fix that. But I do know we HAVE to fix it.

The best thing I can figure is to encourage "stupid debates" where the outcome doesn't matter, the topic doesn't matter, and the side you support is irrelevant.

I guess that's why I throw out weird arguments like "Hatsune Miku is possibly a demon" or "the Word of Wisdom technically allows cannibalism" or even "There are five immortal beings on the earth and one of the is Sasquatch". Because somehow in my brain, I figure that if we stop taking debates about our community so seriously, then we can start debating the serious things.

Reading up on the concept of ethnic mormonism right now, which is fascinating stuff! I can really identify with a lot of what's being said about mormonism as a culture even when the doctrine is at odds. But it's also forcing me to think abt how divided our church is. Our culture is tearing itself apart by rejecting our queer members, by numbers-based fellowshipping, by our extreme black and white way of thinking and our us v them mentality. We're supposed to all be honey bees working together to build zion. Honey bees don't have infighting!! It's heartbreaking to watch the church eat itself.

[writerlyhabits]

Bed Rest

Pairing: Din Djarin x reader

Word Count: 1.5k

Request: “Reader takes care of a sick Din send tweet ”

Warnings: mild language, pre-established relationship, helmetless Din but it's dark and technically no creed is broken, its just fluff. I did spell a Mando'a word funky, but that's cause he says it weird, just trust me on this one, kay?

AN: Okay.... this request has been sitting in my inbox for a hot minute and I'm so sorry, but every time I opened the doc all thoughts just left my brain and I couldn't make anything I liked. I know it's short, but I think keeping it short and sweet made this a lil easier.  @deceiverofgodss you're wonderful as always ty 💛 Thanks for requesting, I hope you all enjoy!

Din Djarin is a complicated man. 

There are many layers to him, both on the surface and buried behind the layers of his beskar armor. He’s clever, his brain moving faster than you could even comprehend to get your party through high-tension situations. He’s kind, offering his genuine thanks wherever he could, and – as you’d noticed on more than one occasion – tips generously where it is deserved. He has his hard edges, but there is a softness to him in his lingering touches at the small of your back, and when he cradles his foundling to his chest. 

But he’s also one of the most stubborn men you have ever met. 

As of late, he’d been sleeping for far longer than normal, had been partial to cranking the heat up at the inns, and you could hear his stuffy nose affecting his ability to speak – even through the helmet. Din was very clearly sick, or at the very least under the weather, but would he admit to it? Of course not. He powered through, acting like nothing was wrong. 

It was getting on your nerves. 

So you took matters into your own hands. 

“Love,” he whined, having traded your preferred mesh’la for one he could pronounce without hindrance from the blockage of his sinuses, which you kept commenting on and he kept ignoring. “Where did you put the tracker?” He was searching the front table – where he most definitely set it down beside his vambraces the night before – not looking over at you. 

“I haven’t seen it,” you feigned innocence, and you admittedly could have been a better actress, but in his state that was the last thing he would notice. Which was exactly why you had taken to hiding the fob in your hands behind your back. 

He couldn’t go on this hunt. If he didn’t run himself into the ground and make his symptoms worse, he would get himself killed trying to function despite of them. 

For a moment you thought you were going to get away with it, until the traitorous device beeped in your hands to remind you it was still working. Dank farrik. Your Mandalorian turned around steadily to face you, the intimidation of his dark visor lost on you because you knew he was avoiding making himself dizzy by moving his head too fast. 

Usually, this would become an unfair game. You would try to keep it close to your body, using every defense you had to fend him off, Din’s large strong frame being able to overpower you with little effort as you both laughed. Sick Din, however, simply sagged his shoulders in disappointment. 

“Please don’t make me take it from you, I can’t.” 

Sometimes it was so hard remembering just how human Din was underneath all of the beskar. Seeing him act just like any other man with a cold was refreshing. You just wished it also came with the usual desire to sit around and do nothing. 

“You can’t?” You repeated, eyebrows shot up on your forehead as you waited for him to hear what he was saying. “Din, if you can’t overpower me, how the hell do you think you’re going to be able to hunt down a bounty?” 

“It’s different, I won’t have to-” 

“Din.” Your firm tone had taken to sounding similar to his, even causing Grogu to look up at the two of you from his spot on the chair in the corner, and Din halted his argument. “You’re sick, you need to rest. If you don’t stop and take care of yourself, it’s only going to take longer before you can get back out there.” 

You let him sit with that reality for a second, watching as his visor turned to look at his green child across the room. You knew where his thoughts were going; the longer he couldn’t hunt, the longer it would take for him to provide for you all. The longer you kept Grogu cooped up in the shabby inn, and it was only a matter of time before you went out and took the bounty out yourself. 

You were not incapable by any means. In fact, he loved having you by his side in battle, the two of you being able to read the other as if by some ancient jedi mind trick. But he was fiercely protective, and you knew he wouldn’t be able to handle the idea of sitting on the sidelines while you were on the hunt, unable to come to your rescue should you need it. 

All of this, you knew, went through his head as he turned back to you. You knew each other too well for his thoughts to be any kind of mystery to you, just as yours were second nature to him. Which meant that he knew you were prepared to fight him on this. 

So he sighed in defeat. 

“Fine.” 

“Good choice. Now take your armor off and get in bed.” 

“Mbesh’la, I don't think that’s-“

“Mbesh’la,” you taunted back, making fun of the way his congestion morphed the usually elegant word. You could practically hear his eye roll. “C’mon, I’m gonna get you soup from the shop downstairs. When I come back, I’ll help you out of the rest of it,” you finished sweetly. 

Din nodded in reply – a slow movement to avoid a headache – and you slipped the tracker into your pocket. Just to be safe. He made an attempt to start discarding his gear, gloved fingers fumbling with the clasps of his cloak now that they were free of his weapons. 

Before he struggled for long, you walked up and gingerly took his hands in yours, removing his leather gloves with a tenderness you rarely got to share with your Mandalorian. As you got the material over his large hands, you kissed his knuckles before reaching up to unfsaten the clasps he’d been struggling with, folding it across your arms when it released. You gave him a sweet smile, and placed one hand on the side of his helmet to bring it down towards you, leaving him with a keldabe kiss before you made your way out of the room. 

When you came back with the soup in hand – a large bowl for Din, and a small one for the foundling who never stopped eating – the room was dark, save for the oranges of the sunset outside peeking in through the cracks of the drapes. On the sizable bed in the middle of the room were your boys, Din cast in the shadows of the room as he laid on his side, and Grogu playing happily with his father’s helmet from his spot on top of the covers. Din’s hand was resting against the child’s back, and you just about melted at the sight. 

And then Din sneezed. 

At the very least, it amused the child, a laugh gurgling out of him at the ridiculous sound. It reminded you to keep moving, delivering the steaming bowls to a grateful Mandalorian, smiling at his quiet thanks. Only leaving them for a moment, you went into the fresher to run a cloth under hot water, bringing it back out to the shadow of a man tilting the edge of the bowl to his lips. 

Success. 

You made your way back to the side of the bed and began your usual dance, moving around him comfortably while never focusing on the patch of shadows where his face would be, trusting you not to find the features that may slip into the light while he was without his helmet. Your gaze landed on his dark curls, brushing them away from your peripherals to place the warm towel to his forehead, pleased with the quiet groan that left his body. 

“Keep this here until it gets cold. It’ll help you keep warm,” you instructed, pressing a kiss to his temple before you turned to walk away. The hand not supporting his soup reached for yours before you could get far, squeezing your hand as he found his words. 

“Could be warmer… There’s room for you to join us,” he offered, as close to a formal request as you would be getting out of him in this state. It brought a soft smile to your face as you looked down at your hands, woven together in his attempt to keep you close. 

You squeezed his hand with a promise to be right back, following his lead and changing into softer clothes more suitable for the sauna that was waiting for you under the covers. While you were up you tidied up the small space a little, stalling to let the other two finish their soups, smiling to yourself when you watched Grogu climb up into his fathers arms as the empty bowls were placed to the side. 

Coming back to them, you crawled into bed behind Din, wrapping your arms around his chest as you nuzzled into the muscular planes of his back. You listened to his breathing, his strong and steady breaths unaffected by his condition, and his heartbeat thumping in his chest. When his breathing relaxed, the tension in his limbs went right along with it, and only then were you able to follow him to sleep. Your Mandalorian could rest, giving his body the time it needed to recover. And you would enjoy every quiet, laidback moment it brought you and your little family.

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