#in lieu of actual fic

[faejilly]

*barges through the door* PARKER POV OF ELLIOT FINDING OUT THAT HARDISON GOT HIM OMEGA PREGNANT

This made me snort-laugh in delight, and then I pictured it, and then I swapped it around in my head that Hardison was pregnant, and both versions were AMAZING? Pregnant!Eliot, all grumpy and nesting, and then pregnant!Hardison who is only grumpy when someone makes him drink something besides orange soda and THEN! BECAUSE HE'S SO TALL, HE COULD BE SO SO PREGNANT BEFORE HE STARTED SHOWING, and then I wished I could art instead of fic.

But then I attempted to fic again, (only I had lost track of the prompt and kept going with pregnant!Hardison) and I feel as if Parker would actually have figured it out before Hardison even and then think because she figured it out (and she's bad at figuring out relationship/people cues so often) she's think that Hardison and Eliot would both HAVE to have already known and she's just waiting for them to tell her and she gets why they wouldn't immediately, like, obviously, she's not good with kids, she doesn't know how to interact with anyone normally and it'd be so easy to fuck up a child, they need so much, and she'd hate if they ended up with a childhood like hers...

(And then I stopped laughing because I'd made myself sad, join me in the Parker feels y'all.)

And then she's made herself worried and wonders if that's really why they haven't told her, they don't know how to tell her that they're worried about her and their kids, but they'd be their kids, she'd love their kids so much!

Only then, maybe they wouldn't be hers, too? Maybe the problem is Hardison and Eliot think they'd just be 'their' kids and she'd only be... Aunt Parker or something.

(And she's been DELIGHTED at being an Aunt to some of Nana's fosters, but this is different, and she's not sure why, or how to explain it, and Eliot and Hardison still haven't said anything and like. What if she's got everything about their relationships wrong and it's not that they don't know how to tell her, it's that it never even OCCURRED to them to tell her anything because it's not about her at all?!?!?!?!?)

and Hardison and Eliot are all trying to figure out how to ask what's wrong with Parker to the point that Hardison STILL hasn't actually realized he's pregnant and he's getting all flustered and they're having the weirdest almost-argument because he's worried about her but trying so hard not to push but he's clearly just getting more and more upset and she keeps trying to get him to calm down and rest it can't be good for him and Hardison's all what the fuck are you talking about?

And that's when Eliot finally gets it.

*Insert his italicized oh here*

(And then they're all a little emotional and melodramatic and kind of yelling but in a good way until they all figure out what's going on and they're all on the same page and they're a little scary in the baby stores as they go shopping to decide how to set up the nursery, and they end up having even more kids on purpose via a couple different combinations of parents and foundlings and they're all very happy and ridiculous, the end.)

But I never did manage to write it, so I guess this is all you're going to get. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[vericey]

"They’re fashionable, Furina had told him weeks before, surrounded by a cloud of blue silk in the tailor’s fitting-room. At Neuvillette’s shoulder, a seamstress had hovered, breathing uncomfortably close to the place where his gills should be as she measured the circumference of his neck. Besides, with your height, a little bit of a heel will have everyone bowing down before you even have to speak. Humans respond better to orders from tall people.

Neuvillette had looked at Fontaine’s Archon, barely over five feet even in her own high heels, and sighed. She had claimed her presence was necessary for the tailoring of his official robes, and her advice sorely needed for the garments underneath, but he suspects she had primarily been motivated by the complimentary cake and sparkling wine that the shop’s owner had foisted on her the minute she stepped through the door. She had licked a dab of cream from her thumb and glared at him until he acquiesced, and allowed himself to be poured into the odd boots brought forth by a shop assistant."

[mittenlady]

i have made a series for all my klavquill fics… if u even care…

[blkkizzat]

@ 𝙭𝙓𝘿𝙞𝙜𝙞𝙂𝙤𝙙69𝙓𝙭 𝙞𝙣𝙫𝙞𝙩𝙚𝙨 𝙮𝙤𝙪 𝙩𝙤 𝙥𝙡𝙖𝙮...

AND GOD KNOWS I'M TRYIN', BUT THERE'S JUST NO USE IN DENYING... ❤︎︎︎︎ THE OTAKU IS MINE ❤︎︎

⏯︎︎ OTAKU!GOJO X BIMBO!READER SERIES

bunny, how on earth did you end up dating this huge otaku nerd? urgh, you actually like him and match his freak too? and he buys you what?! omg! what will your friends think?!

⏯︎︎ 𝐏𝐑𝐄𝐒𝐒 𝐏𝐋𝐀𝐘

𖦏 genre: college au

𖦏 ratings: 18+MDNI. unprotected, ecchi gojo, dubcon, cnc, bdsm, puppy play, public sex, creampies, spanking, sugar daddy/baby dynamics, edging, squirting, threesums, femdom, the ridiculous ass pervy pet names gojo gives you & reader is called 'bunny' in lieu of 'y/n'. each story will have warnings on its story page.

𖦏 pre register: comment to be tagged. i may not respond to everyone but rest assured if you comment you will be tagged!

𖦏 gamer's guide: all fics are listed in chronological order, but likely won't be written in chronological order. summaries subject to change slightly. they also will be written over time so please don't rush me for the next installment but feel free to ask me questions i love talking about this lil freak❤︎︎

⏯︎︎ 𝐌𝐀𝐈𝐍 𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐑𝐘:

𝐥𝐯𝐥 𝟏: ❝ DIGIMON—BUT MAKING U CUM IS MY REAL HOBBY! ❞

𖦏 your best friend gojo is a hopeless otaku virgin with zero rizz that's still obsessed with digimon—despite being a grown ass man. you're a slut who despite her best whoring efforts—can't cum. you'll take his v-card and he'll fix your broken pussy, deal? ⏯︎︎ plays: 13.3k

𝐥𝐯𝐥 𝟐: ❝ STICKS N' STONES MAY BREAK MY BONES BUT CHAINS N' WHIPS EXCITE ME! ❞

𖦏 so now that you have a filthy rich boyfie who is completely obsessed with you and has moved you into his house, you're winning, right? or you will be at least— if can survive a trip to the sex dungeon. don't worry it's professionally sanitized after each use! ...what? that's not what you're worried about? oh... ⏯︎︎ plays: lvl in-progress

𝐥𝐯𝐥 𝟑: ❝ AND ALL OF THAT WAS OKAY, CAUSE IT WAS IN A 3-WAY!❞

𖦏 the three of you: you, gojo and geto are like peas in a pod, especially since its summer! and if two of you start f*cking in that pod well its only natural that the third want to join in, right? besides, you both already want to f*ck him. just make sure your current boyfie doesn't get too jealous from how hard you are moaning on your other besties' joystick. your only his ecchi angel, remember? ⏯︎︎ plays: lvl in-progress

𝐥𝐯𝐥 𝟒: ❝ IN THE BEDROOM I BE SCREAMIN', BUT OUTSIDE I KEEP IT QUIET—OR TRY TO AT LEAST!❞

𖦏 you can only keep your relationship underwraps from the rest of your friend group for so long. but you need to ease them into the idea first! although, when there's a yacht party for nanami's bday how is your uber clingy otaku boyfie supposed to keep his hands off of you when you're looking like the most perfect pervy princess in that itty bitty swimsuit? ⏯︎︎ plays: lvl in-progress

𝐥𝐯𝐥 𝟓: ❝ YEAH, HE MY MAN, HE WAS NEVER YO TYPE! ❞

𖦏 school is back! thankfully you somehow manage to instill some kind of decency into your otaku boyfie over the summer so he can come across as normal enough to make his own friends. but did you do too good of a job? wait, he actually has a lil rizz now? you mean you aren't the only girl attracted to him anymore... hol'up! ⏯︎︎ plays: lvl in-progress

𝐥𝐯𝐥 𝟔: ❝ MOVE IT UP, DOWN, LEFT, RIGHT, OH—SWITCH IT UP LIKE NINTENDO! ❞

𖦏 hey, when did you become freaker than your otaku boyfie? so he caught you touching yourself to his femdom p0rn when he came back early from a business trip? yikes! now he wants to try it out with you? don't worry you will do a great job training your new play puppy boyfie! ⏯︎︎ plays: lvl in-progress

⏯︎︎ 𝐒𝐈𝐃𝐄 𝐐𝐔𝐄𝐒𝐓𝐒:

𖦏 soundtrack: [ x ] 𖦏 moodboards: [ lvl 1 ] 𖦏 amazing art by amazing readers: [ x ] 𖦏 faq/thirsts: [ x ]

©𝐛𝐥𝐤𝐤𝐢𝐳𝐳𝐚𝐭 𝟐𝟎𝟐𝟒. 𝐝𝐨 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐚𝐥 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤𝐬 𝐨𝐫 𝐠𝐟𝐱, 𝐝𝐨 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐬𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐞.︎︎

[hyunsvngs]

wc: 2.5k

warnings: 18+ MINORS DO NOT INTERACT. this is a piss fic, unrealistic shower sex, PISS like seriously, oral (m & f rec), inexperienced reader, switchy jisung (he's whiny), dirty talk, unprotected sex & creampie, brief hair pulling, brief choking

a/n: and when i said my return to stayblr would be a piss fic i meant it! AND THANK U TO 🐇 anon for commissioning this u are a babe <3

˚ʚ♡ɞ˚

Jisung’s patient. He was ever so patient with you all along, actually, hands roaming your sides hesitantly over your t-shirt when you first made out. You had to physically move his palms onto your skin for him to take some initiative - “I’m not a virgin, Jisung,” you’d squeal, legs thrashing in protest.

You've finally gotten to the point where Jisung will touch you. He tries to initiate sex more often than not now, and you’re a happy recipient. There’s never once been a situation around him where you haven’t wanted to fuck him - he’s a beautiful person, to say the least, with his big round eyes and even bigger cock. He’s delicious.

In fact, you’re sure you’ve gotten to the peak of your sexual relationship with him until you hear the bathroom door open. It’s a normal day, save for the fact that you were about two seconds from pissing in the shower after skipping that step. It’ll save time, you can just do it in the shower - until you hear the rustling of clothes, a sweet tune being hummed, and then the shower curtain is being pulled back to reveal your honey-skinned boyfriend.

He crowds behind you in the shower, and you’re left with wide eyes. Skipping your pre-shower pee on the toilet is one thing, but you’re getting a little desperate now and you’d thought you could just let it go in the shower. Now, your boyfriend is naked, pressed against you with his nose brushing up against your neck. His hands trace your sides absentmindedly, dipping down to stroke over your tummy. His hair is already damp from the water, and it curls inwards to frame his face, tickling your skin. 

“Jisung…”

He hums, pressing a kiss into your neck. “Do you want me to get out, baby?”

You shake your head. You don’t. You don’t think you’d ever not want him around you, especially not naked. “It’s not that.”

“Let me help you relax, my baby. Can I?”

You’re getting desperate to pee now. In lieu of words you nod, shaky, and he reaches for your shower gel. Instead of squirting it on your loofah, he dribbles it straight into his hands, and the feeling of his wet, soapy palms on your back is more than relaxing. His hands run down your skin, over your shoulders, just barely tracing your breasts, and then he presses down on your tummy just that little bit firmer. 

Oh God. You feel a drop run down your thigh, and it definitely was not the water. 

“Jisungie,” You say, and Jisung pauses. He hums in response, and you sigh. “I just- I needed to pee, so I was just gonna-“

His hands pause. “Here?” Jisung says. His voice is shaky too now, and you realize his fingertips are starting to dig into your sides. “Oh. Oh, right.”

It’s a little awkward. The shower still beats down on you both, and Jisung’s hold just gets tighter and tighter until - oh. He’s hard. It presses against your ass, thick and throbbing, and you feel him shuffle a little to try and avoid you feeling it.

“You’re… hard?”

“You’re naked in front of me talking about- about peeing,” He whispers, and when you turn to him his cheeks are red. He scrunches his eyes shut, looks to be willing his erection away, but it stays unflagging. You move fully to face him, hands moving to his shoulders. “I- Baby. Would you let me see? Do it- do it on me. Or just-”

“Jisung,” You gasp, eyes wide. He’s into that? That’s new. It’s new even for your time of sexual exploration, and it has you shifting from one foot to another in decision. Can you? Will you? You realise that yeah, you will.

“I’m sorry,” He blushes. He’s still hard, but embarrassed - you know that just makes him even hornier. You’re going to do it. 

“I’ll do it. For you.”

He immediately drops to his knees.

“Will you? Oh, will you, jagi?” You’re not sure you could say an outright no. You’re nervous, sure, with how new this all is, but the water from the shower is beating down on Jisung’s honey skin so rapidly that well - you want to see him get even wetter. You let out a shaky breath, thighs trembling, and then you’re nodding. “Oh, baby. I love you. I love you, I love you, I love you-“

“Jisungie,” You say, voice timid. He nods in response, runs his hands up your inner thighs, palms dewy with the water. His round eyes earnestly look up at you, bottom lip quivering. He looks innocent, and it’s almost as if he didn’t drop to his knees immediately upon hearing that you needed to pee. “Help me, honey. Help me relax.”

He has to. He dives in, mouth wrapping around your clit, and you let him nudge your thighs apart with his fingertips. It’s a little precarious, balancing in the shower, but the suction around the pudge of your clit has you gripping onto the shower curtain with trembling hands. Jisung’s nothing if not a good eater, and he always finishes his meal - his tongue dips down to your slit with a deep groan at your taste. 

“Y’ready for me now?” He murmurs into you, the vibrations making you whine. He pulls back and reaches up with a firm hand, pressing on the base of your tummy, just where your bladder rests. His eyes flicker up to you, intense and dark, and you don’t think you’ve ever seen this look on his face before. He looks downright debauched, waiting for your piss and still trying to take control of the situation like he always does. “Be a good girl for Sungie, yeah? Piss all over me. Get me dirty with it.”

“Fu-uck,” You whimper, lips falling apart. You’re heaving wet breaths, body still subconsciously fighting against the urge to let go, but a firmer press on your bladder has the trickle starting without your permission. 

“Oh, baby, yeah,” Jisung keens, his other hand moving to rub circles against your clit. When he pulls your mound backwards with his thumb, the stream erupting from your pussy only gets stronger, hitting Jisung’s chest and soaking his skin with it. It trickles down his skin, eventually hitting the smattering of his pubic hair and the base of his cock, and Jisung whines with it. “Oh my god, baby, you’re so sexy. More! More, give me more, pleasepleaseplease, be a good girl for me.”

“I am being good, Jisungie,” You moan, the relief of your bladder emptying all too satisfying. It just keeps coming, and when the stream finally trickles out, Jisung surges forward to wrap his lips around your clit. A sharp suck has you gasping out a whine, gripping onto the mess of his hair, but he can only flick his tongue over you once, twice before he’s sliding up onto his feet.

He crowds into your space once again. He turns you around, your back facing him, and the whole situation is so precarious that you’re terrified that one of you is going to break a limb. Your pussy is so wet at this point though that you know you’re going to let him take you here, just like this, raw and messy.

“Bend over,” He ushers, forcing you into the corner of the shower. The shelves containing all of your toiletries rattle with the harshness of his movement, and you squeal, gripping onto the sides.

“Jisungie, baby, I’ll fall-”

“You won’t. I-I’ve got you, jagi, I promise,” Jisung insists, and he crowds behind you once again. With a swift movement, his cockhead presses against your hole, still slick from the mess you’ve made all over him, and he uses one hand to brush it through your folds teasingly. “Do you want it? F-fuck, baby, tell me.”

Your head is spinning. Of course you want it. He always fills you up so good, and he’s so caring, so thorough with his touches. “I want it. I want it, I want it, I want it, please-”

He sinks inside of you with his own sharp keen. He’s so thick that the stretch has you reaching out to clutch onto the built-in shelves tighter, your lips parting in a deep sigh. “That’s it. G-god, that’s it, Jisung.”

“Yeah? You like it?” He moans, and you see his hand emerge over your head. He grips onto the shelf for leverage, and then his hips start to smack into your ass, eager and messy. You groan out for him regardless, with his length filling you up just right. “That’s it, yeah? You l-like it like that, baby?”

“Yes, yeah, Jisungie, I like it like that,” You nod eagerly, eyes fluttering shut. You hear his feet hit the floor in an effort to reposition himself, and when he manages to get better footing, the next thrust is so sharp it has you crying out. “Ah! There, therethere, please, please!”

He groans in pleasure at the change of angle, his cock hitting you deeper, and his hand moves upwards to tug at your hair. The movement bends your back to rest your head on his shoulder, and the water from the shower is completely forgotten - it could be ice cold now for all that you know. He’s gripping at your waist, hips, and your tits, pulling you back onto his thrusts and shaking every bottle on the shelf, and all you can do is whine and moan through every thrust. 

“It’s so- it’s so good,” Jisung huffs, head lolling against yours, and you have to turn and look at him. His hair is positively soaked by now, dripping down his face, and his lips stay parted, moans and whines tumbling out from deep inside his chest. “T-thank you, baby. For pissin’ on me, and- and this, fuck, your pussy is so fucking good, so tight, so wet.”

His voice is strained, garbled as if he’s trying to force the words out, and you gasp out at a particularly rough thrust. His thrusts are getting more uneven, less precise, and his teeth start to nibble at your shoulder. 

All of a sudden, you feel a familiar wetness flood inside of you. Jisung’s orgasm is sudden and intense, his hips stilling as he empties deep inside your pussy, his muscles trembling and his breath ragged.

“F-fuck,” He moans, pushing at your ass to slide you away from him. “Baby, on your knees. Get on your knees, please, you gotta keep it hard.”

He has at least part of his mind still intact, you assume, because he flicks the switch on the shower and leaves you both standing there drenched. Still, you don’t let it deter you, dropping to your knees to suckle at his soaking wet length. He’s covered in a mixture of his cum and your wetness, and you moan when the flavour hits your tongue, bobbing your head on half of his shaft.

“Yeah, like that, just-” He cuts himself off with a grunt, pushing your head down further on him. It makes your eyes water, but you persevere, suckling on his length. He’s getting into a headspace that he doesn’t get into often - he’s being rougher with you, more eager to take, take, take, and you can only let him. “Fuck. Fuckfuckfuck, hnng, baby, baby, suck on it. Please, please, pleasepleaseplease!”

It did work, at least. His erection stays unflagging even after him cumming inside of you, and he lets you play around for a little - you swirl your tongue around his cockhead, suckling on it a little, but it’s your tongue dipping into his piss slit that has him yanking at your hair.

Jisung pulls you upwards, tongue immediately pressing between the seam of your lips while his hand wraps in your hair, and then he’s ushering you out of the shower. “Over the sink,” He says, breathless, his eyes round and wide. “Please, baby. Let me fuck you over the sink.”

“O-Okay,” You respond, voice hoarse, but it’s a quick movement for you to hop out and bend over for him. Jisung’s back inside of you in his own swift movement, cock stretching you out once more, and the hand that swats at your ass makes you gasp. “Jisung-”

“I have to make this pussy cum,” Jisung rambles, and you nod eagerly, hands propping you up on the sink. You see your reflection in the mirror, Jisung’s hair soaking wet and water dripping down his chest, and the sight makes you clench down hard. He gasps, sharp and loud. “Ah! Ah, baby, careful, lemme- lemme make you cum, please. Been- been so good for me, pissin’ so nice and then sucking me- let me make you cum, let me-”

“Harder,” You insist, fingers wrapping around the edge. Your gaze is focused on the mirror, on the way your bodies move together while Jisung fucks into you. He listens to you, hips slapping against your ass harder while also fucking into you deeper, which is just as hard to handle. His cockhead kisses the bottom of your cervix with every thrust, making your eyes roll back into your head with a sharp keen. “Yeah! Yeah, yesyesyes, baby, Jisungie, more, just a little- a little more, I’ll cum, I’ll cum-”

“Yeah?” He groans, dragging you upwards with a firm hand around your throat. His lips press a kiss into your hairline, quick and swift, and you see his face appear right next to yours into the mirror. It’s then you notice how fucked out you look - your lips are swollen, hair wet and messy, drool slicking the bottom of your chin. “Cum for me, baby. G-good girls cum nice and easy, just like this, right? C’mon, jagi, cum nice and pretty for me.”

You can’t help it. It only takes a few more thrusts, well-calculated and deep enough inside you to have you shaking, and you’re coming apart around him. You feel his cock get wetter with your release and it’s as if he can’t help himself either - he presses his hips against you, firm and deep, and he’s filling you with his cum for the second time. It’s less than it was the first time, but it still fills you with warmth and makes you whine, hips trying to buck backwards for more, more, more.

“So pretty, jagi,” Jisung whispers, pecking your cheek with a way too innocent kiss. You groan in response, body feeling completely worn out, and he slides his softening length out of you with a whine.

“We’re going to have to shower again,” You murmur, half-collapsed on the sink. Jisung only coos, wrapping his arms around your middle and nuzzling into your back.

“Let’s take a bath this time, jagi,” He suggests, pressing a wet, open-mouthed kiss into your skin. “That way we can lay down this time when we fuck. Duh.”

“Jisung!” You shriek, swatting at him. He giggles in response, scurrying off to flick at the taps of the bath. You huff, slowly peeling your body off of the ceramic. “Don’t be so crude.”

“Baby, you just pissed on me. I think that’s, like, the definition of crude. You're crude.”

[thebluester2020]

ok but reading your latest sdv headcanons has given me an idea. You wrote Sam being horns for farmer in a sundress and it's has unlocked in me the feminine urge to be railed in a sundress. I'd love to see your take on it with the sdv bachelors.

SDV Bachelors x Fucking Farmer In A Sundress Summary: Bachelors to you looking too pretty in a sundress. [Includes; Elliot, Sebastion and Lance (From SDV Expanded)] Warning(s): No established relationships (I'm in a mood for FWB relationships + unrequited love what can I say?), Elliot low-key sluts out the reader, Elliot and the reader are kinda tipsy in his part but the sex is consensual dw, Sebastion is kinda a needy hopeless romantic and jerks off to the thought of the farmer, Alex and the farmer have sex outdoors like true outdoorsy people do 💪. Side notes: I only included three bachelors because- lol I gotta put all my focus on this other SDV fic. It's a bit longer so I need more time on that.

MINORS AND AGELESS BLOGS DNI

°❀⋆.ೃ࿔*:･°❀⋆.ೃ࿔*:･°❀⋆.ೃ࿔*:･°❀⋆.ೃ࿔*:･°❀⋆.ೃ

Elliot

The man nearly keels over when he sees you in a sundress. It was when you first introduced yourself to him actually! After that though? He was hooked on you like a drug.

Not necessarily in a perv way but more so in an "I definitely have a crush on them" type of way.

But he more or less keeps it in his pants until he spots you again but this time? It was at the Stardrop Saloon and both you and him were tipsy after sharing a beer.

Tensions were flying and after you placed a hand on his thigh? Y'all were fucking in one of the more secluded rooms in the saloon because y'all didn't have a chance in hell of making it home.

♡ - "Oh Yoba...Fuck—" A choked up uncharacteristically needy whine escaped the lips of the writer as he fucked you on the wooden floors of the Stardrop Saloon.

Despite the tipsy haze his vision had however, no amount of beer could dampen your beauty and the fact that you were the most captivating person in this entire tavern. From the first day he met you to now, those were his thoughts but tonight? Oh, they increased tenfold when you waltzed through the doors, unaware of how you stole his very breath with your outfit.

A simple brown sundress that was mid-thigh length and only had thin spaghetti straps to keep your outfit up upon your shoulders. The deep v-neck of your dress barely leaving your dress to the imagination as small beads of sweet dripped down your skin and between the valley of your chest. Combined with the scent of your perfume, how you looked at him when you sat beside him and the light application of your make-up.

All of it served to make him absolutely dizzy.

To the point where the quickly growing tension between the two of you, fueled by your brief touches and your conversations growing more and more naughty.

There was no way that the two of you could wait to get home to either of your houses.

No, it needed to be handled now.

"Y-You must've wanted this to happen, my dear...didn't you?" He moaned in your ear as his chest was pressed against your back. His thrusts sloppy and rough as he hugged you so tightly you had a mind to think he was trying to bury himself into your skin. "Yoba your sooooooo pretty." He continued to pant into your ear like a dog in heat.

You responded with a breathy moan, your head turning briefly to slot your lips against Elliot's. Quickly, Elliot lightly bit at your lower lip, prompting a gasp from you that allowed his tongue to slip in. His tongue tasting every area inside your mouth before you two parted with a single string of spit still connecting the two of you.

When Elliot's eyes refocused on yours, however, his moans began to increase in volume as his thrusts started to pick up pace in lieu of his impending orgasm. He swore he was falling deeper and deeper into the pit of his crush that he had on you, to the point where he dared to say that he was falling in love with you.

"Y/N...Oh fuck..." Elliot continued to moan your name as he grew closer to his orgasm, his moans getting higher and higher as he struggled to hold onto his sense of self and not spill out the fact he had a bigger crush on you than this moment could portray.

But, you beat him to it. "Elliot...I-I love you, s-so m-much." You said.

Another choked-up grunt spilled from Eliot's lips at the confession before you felt your insides being flooded with a searing heat, his own orgasm pushing you over the edge as you shuddered at the force of your climax. Your vision temporarily went black before you slowly returned back to Earth. Your skin was sticky with sweat whilst your slick drenched the back of your thighs and Elliot's cock.

"So..." Elliot spoke, breaking the post-climax silence. "You love me, hm?"

Sebastion

I'm going to spoil myself a little and imagine he saw you in a sundress once and practically never again.

However, that didn't mean he didn't stop thinking about it.

After seeing you, he developed a crush on you that he was too shy to really do anything about (completely ignoring the way you visited his room constantly to deliver frozen tears to him).

So to satiate his lust for you?

Masturbate ofc, with you being front and center in his mind.

♡ - He's tried so hard to avoid doing this.

But, he feels like a little self-credit is due here. It wasn't like he wanted to be in this position right now! Where he was left alone in the middle of the day due to his family apparently wanting to go to a town event that didn't interest him in the slightest. And although he was currently lying in bed, trying to doze off, his mind wouldn't leave a particular thought of you.

It was around the time when you came to visit his mother for some supplies he believes. The smell of perfume that smelled like lavender and cherries brought him out of his room he admits, Sebastion never smelled anything like it and it was as intoxicating as wine...and like a dog expecting a treat, he followed it out of his room and up the short case of stairs before he peeked around the corner and saw you.

A simple black sundress with a skull plastered on the front where the top of your breasts threatened to spill out.

Suddenly, his mouth was dry and his cock was hard.

Now he was here, in his bed, and hornier than he'd ever been before, and you were the cause. But Sebastion couldn't bring himself to feel too bad afterward when he began to palm himself over his pants, sucking in a sharp breath in-between his teeth as the image of your started to appear in his mind like someone had cast a spell on him.

It was as if you were really there. The smell of your perfume from that day, the sundress, your soft skin and kind smile...everything. And when the vision of you started to trail kisses down his neck and down his front...lifting up the front of his hoodie and everything until you finally reached the place he wanted you to touch most when you wrapped your pretty pink-tinted lips around his leaky cock.

He could've sworn you were really there.

Looking up at him through your long lashes as if he were the most important person in the world, the only one in the world deserving of your time and attention. No matter how unrealistic it may have been, a shut-in like himself? Dating the prettiest person in the valley?

A laugh almost slipped from behind his hand as he covered his lips, his free hand desperately tugging at his dick to the vision of you. Soft pants escaped his lips as he honed in on the image of your head bobbing up and down on his cock, lewd sucking and slurping leaving your lips.

He was so close...sososososo close...until you stopped.

You moved to sit up, winking his way before you lifted up your dress a little and moved to straddle him, pulling your panties to the side before you slipped down onto him.

He nearly came in his pants at the thought of how your wet walls would feel around him. How soft and warm they would be as they hugged his dick so tightly that he feared the air inside his lungs would all but be choked out, his moans increasing in volume and growing increasingly needier and needier as he imagined your soft touches. Your nails raking down his sides and leaving delectable goosebumps in their wake as you moved your hips up and down.

"Y/N...Oh fuck...! Y-Y/N..." Sebastion moaned as you began to quicken your pace, the sound of his name from your lips getting him off more than he was prepared to admit to himself before...there was suddenly a knock at his door. The way the vision in his head slipped away so fast, it nearly made him want to cuss out the person who dared to knock as well as cry at the same time.

Until he heard a familiar "Sebastion? Are you awake? I have a gift for you!" Immediately, his cock twitched at your voice, his brain's imaginations started to conjure back up again as the slightest feeling of...hope, perhaps started to dot his mind.

It seemed he had a bigger crush on you than he thought.

And he prayed that one day, his imagination would come true that you liked him just as much.

Alex

He's bold when he sees you in a sundress. He first sees you in one when he's visiting your farm (Evelyn wanted him to deliver some home-baked cookies to the farmer, how sweet of her)

So check this out, you're doing your farming work and you drop something.

You thinking that no one's around, you get on your hands and knees to fully pick the item up and this steals Alex's breath to the max because he gets a perfect view of your underwear.

A lacy blue thong that, in his mind, couldn't even be considered underwear!

Right then and there, he wants to fuck you.

Luckily, you've been wanting to fuck him as well!

♡ - An unabashed moan left your lips as your hands slightly slipped on the dirt beneath you, the sounds of grunting and slapping from behind you nearly drowning out the sounds of the cicadas from the summer heat.

You'd been attracted to Alex for a while, a simple and sweet-hearted crush that stemmed from the fact that he more or less made his attraction clear to you.

From the way he'd call out your name and invite you to hang out with him, to how he'd initiate close contact with you whenever the both of you were around each other to even now! Even as he pistoned into your needy pussy, your slick dripping down onto the dirt below as he pressed his hand down into the dip in your back to force you into an arch, your heart still got a fuzzy feeling out of your crush for him!

Though...you suspected that, at this moment, calling your attraction a mere "crush" wasn't exactly correct.

"F-Fuck—" Your breath caught in your throat when Alex leaned some of his weight down onto your back, his fingers moving to circle and pinch at your clit.

"Ssshhiiittt." He moaned hotly into your ear, a cocky chuckle following suit choked up aht-aht-ahts left your lips as he sped up his thrusts, a boiling coil beginning to form in the pit of his stomach. "You must've really wanted this to happen, huh farmer? Do you even hear yourself?" Alex said, your cheeks burning even more as Alex suddenly slowed his thrusts to grind his hips into you, the sound of your sticky slick sticking to the front of Alex's thighs making you both want to burst into flames out of sheer embarrassment as well as dig a hole to hide away in.

Of course, however, your newfound lover wasn't going to allow that to happen. Not after he'd been waiting for an opportunity like this to happen since the moment the two of you had met! The sound of your moans slipping from your pretty lips, wet and glistening from your heavy make-out session minutes earlier, the way your breasts bounced underneath you, flushed as pink as your face whilst your hard nipples were practically begging to be played with!

The sheer orgasmic rush that Alex felt...figuring out that the pretty farmer was a whore just waiting to be broken in by the right man. His cock twitched inside of your cunt at the mere thought, his thrusts resuming their original speed as more thoughts of you flashed through his mind.

Maybe a different position, on the bed perhaps? Your fingers dipping into your pussy as you moaned out his name and begged for him to take you against the wall?

Or even him fucking you on a table? In his room?

"A-Alex...~!" You cried out as your pussy began to twitch, a familiar burn beginning to tighten within the pit of your stomach.

"Dirty farmer, don't you dare cum without me." Alex hissed into your ear, a moan escaping his lips afterward. "Y-You need to have some energy to go a few more rounds...I-I'm breaking this pussy in."

At the thought and the act of Alex dragging your further on his cock, his cock pressed up against a spot deep inside of you that made stars appear in your vision. Your body convulsed from the sheer force of your orgasm as your thighs twitched whilst the energy drained from your arms. You would've plopped onto the ground had Alex not held up for your torso, his heavy panting and the warm full feeling inside of you a sign of his orgasm.

"You came a little earlier than me..." He clicked his tongue in false annoyance.

"Guess we have to go again, huh? Let's hope no one comes along farmer girl~"

[reidmotif]

Always Bet on Black

Summary: Reader realizes she has an advantage at the Bureau's Casino Night, when Spencer can't seem to take his eyes off her and her dress.

Prompt: The BAU throws a casino night charity fundraiser. Spencer is a menace. Someone has to find a way to distract him.

Couple: Spencer Reid/Fem!Reader

Category: Smut

Content Warning: drinking, gambling (i have never gambled in my life nor have i played poker or blackjack. this will be super apparent in this fic. many apologies), nipple play, oral sex (f!receiving) hickies, Reader POV, unprotected penetrative sex

Word Count: 3.7k

Masterlist

“And that’s another win to the gentleman on my right!”  The dealer announces for what feels like the millionth time that night. There's a shit-eating grin on Spencer Reid’s face as he leans over the blackjack table, wrapping his arms around the hearty stack of chips in an almost in an exaggerated manner, pulling it back towards him much to everyone’s dismay. 

My dismay, especially, because while- yes, this is for charity, and what Spencer’s doing could be characterized as noble in some roundabout way, it was getting a bit repetitive. Spencer was so focused, a thousand times more than anyone else at that table, his brain working a million miles a minute to provide him with the best course of action when it came to gambling.  

And so far? It worked perfectly. While everyone else was taking their chances and betting away, praying that the odds would line up in their favor, Spencer Reid did fucking math, and suddenly the odds were his bitch.  I was beginning to understand why every casino in Las Vegas had him banned now. If he was giving the BAU Casino Night a run for their money like this, I can’t imagine the Bellagio being too pleased with having him either. 

I sighed at the thought, and it seemed Spencer picked up on it, the corners of his lips turning upwards, trying to feign a chagrin expression as he stacked his chips on top of the other. 

“Something wrong, (Y/N)?” He says, looking at me. “Are you not enjoying yourself?” 

Spencer Reid is usually nice, humble, and sweet. In all honesty, I should not be feeling this hostile and sore at the fact that he’d managed to beat me almost every single time we’d played blackjack. My embarrassment was only heightened when I thought of how I’d (stupidly) bragged beforehand that I’d never lost a game in college. 

How quickly my streak was destroyed. 

My pride was bruised, and the man in front of me knew it. 

“I’m enjoying myself just fine.” I say, trying not to grit my teeth as I say the words. 

“You look a bit hot.” He says, referring to my face that had gotten slightly red after the most recent loss I’d taken. “Would you like me to get you a drink?” He asks, his gaze turning less cocky, and more sweet and polite. 

I melt a bit. “Okay. No need to be a sore loser.” I think to myself. “This is a sweet man, and he’s offering you a drink. Yes, he’s destroying you right now and knows it, but it’s not like he’s acting like a complete dick about it.”

I nod at his words, sending a small smile his way. 

“A drink would be great actually.” I finally respond, and he gets up, pushing his chair in. 

“I’ll be right back.” He says, turning away from me, and sauntering towards the bar.

 I take a second to admire him as he walks away, the suit and tie ensemble he picked out for the night complimenting him so well. I’d never say it out loud, considering we were coworkers, but something about seeing him so dapper, so much more.. mature brought out a warm feeling in my stomach, one that made me shift in my seat as I tried to rid myself of thoughts of grabbing him by his tie, placing a hand on his perfectly sculpted jawline, pulling him against me and- no! 

He. Is. Your. Colleague. Snap out of it! 

In lieu of my wandering thoughts, I’d realized I had actually heated up quite a few degrees and in an attempt to combat the sudden body heat, I shrugged off the shawl I’d been donning for most of the night. I felt the cool air hit my exposed shoulders and chest, and relaxed a bit, starting to feel my temperature lower. Right as I did so,  Spencer returned to his seat, holding two drinks. 

I turn towards him, still seated. He’s sitting in his seat, facing towards me as well, and I instinctively reach over to grab the drink in his hand, expecting him to meet me halfway and transfer the cup to me.  But instead of the expected interaction, he seems a bit dazed, an intense expression on his face as he bored his eyes into me, studying me almost. It’s an expression that causes me to raise my eyebrows at him. 

“Spencer?” I say. “Hello?” I wave my hand a bit, trying to break him from his trance. “The drinks?” I add, and that’s what seems to break him out of his preoccupied stupor. He blinks a bit before shaking his head.

“Sorry. Sorry. I spaced out there for a moment.” He says, hastily handing me my glass and turning away completely from me, taking a sip out of his. I can notice a small tremor in his hand as he sets down the liquid on the table, and I’m a bit concerned. He was just fine a moment ago. Did someone say something whilst he was at the bar? Did he choose to ponder some life-changing information as he took his seat at the table? Was he losing it for no reason at all? 

Regardless of what it was, I didn’t have the time to contemplate it further or question him about it because the dealer was beginning to shuffle the deck of cards again. 

As the next game started, there was something fundamentally different about Spencer. He looked  almost panicked, even going as far as to loosen his tie as he played. I thought I’d maybe imagined the changes, until finally, I got a real indicator that something was off. For the first time that whole night- he lost. 

My mouth was agape as the dealer announced the house win, and as I looked between him and the table, he didn’t seem all that fazed, simply shrugging as he attempted to get up. Before he could slip away, I grabbed his arm and brought him a bit closer to me, so that I could speak to him over the sounds of the bustling party around us.

“Spencer- wait. Is something wrong?” I ask, the genuine concern in my tone apparent to anyone who might’ve walked by. 

“Yeah, no. Um. Why wouldn’t it be?” He says, his eyes everywhere except me. It was almost comical. The ceiling tiles couldn’t be that interesting. 

I grip his arm a little harder, urging him to look at me, to talk to me. “You lost! That hasn’t happened all night! Was someone- did something happen? Are you feeling okay?” I ask, my eyes trying to meet his. 

He gulps, finally looking at me. “Statistically, card counting can’t actually work every time so I was bound to lose at some point right?” He says, a little shakily, and despite his words making logical sense, the notion that something was wrong didn’t leave me. 

“You promise?” I say, looking at him as intensely as I possibly could to ensure he wouldn’t try to evade giving me an honest answer. 

He gives his signature, flat smile, nodding. “I’ll be fine. Look. I’m gonna go play some other games. Maybe rack up my luck somewhere else.” 

I lick my lips and finally let go of his arm, nodding. “Have fun.” I say, and he gives me a little wave. 

“You too.” 

For the next hour or so, I found myself dabbling at the other assortment of games offered by the Bureau that night, until yet again, my path crossed with Spencer, who seemed to be on a pretty hefty winning streak- if the stack of chips he’d accumulated wasn’t a clear sign of that already. 

I stood by the table, slightly out of his view,  a little amazed by the way his eyes followed the deck and everyone’s movements so precisely. The level of focus required to do what he was was absolutely no joke, and I couldn’t help but admire in silent awe at the exactness of the whole process. It only made him that much more attractive in that moment, if that was even possible. 

“Royal flush.” He announces, fanning his cards as everyone at the table groans. It’s only then when his gaze meets mine, watching him, and I can observe the signs of a tell-tale blush creeping up his neck. Odd.

“(Y/N)! Hello.” He says, quickly. “Still liking the party?” 

“I am, thank you.” I say, my eyebrows slightly furrowing at how oddly he’s behaving. “Mind if I join the next round?” I ask, already starting to take my seat. 

“Yeah, yeah. Of course.” He says, clearing his throat and turning his entire body away from me. Spencer and I usually got along just fine. There was nothing ever particularly sour about our relationship, and I’d like to think that in the time I’d spent at the Bureau, our shared experiences had brought us closer. However, the way he was acting as of right now, like we were strangers or mere acquaintances threw me off beyond belief. 

It was official, something was off.

I leaned over a little closer, trying to get him to look at me.

“Spencer, I know I’ve already asked but is anything-“ I start, and I can see him glance over, and then almost rapidly turn his gaze away.

“No! Nothing’s wrong. Let’s play.” He rushes out, his words teetering on almost being high pitched. 

It didn’t evade me however, in that short microsecond he took to look at me, his gaze dropped partially down. I internally followed his line of sight to realize that my breasts were practically spilling from my dress. I knew that it was a bit showy, but didn’t think much of it when I’d chosen to wear it for this occasion. The event was black-tie, and so I’d fished out a number I’d haphazardly bought during an online shopping spree. It was black and sparkly, but the main caveat of the dress was the gorgeous bodice in the front, managing to give a good show of cleavage whilst pushing up my breasts and making them all that more appealing to anyone who noticed.  I began to connect the events of the night, realizing that someone clearly had noticed.

Spencer’s losing streak had coincidentally begun once I’d lost the shawl that was once covering my chest. 

An idea slowly entered my head. An experiment, if you will. As we started another game, I barely paid attention as my fingers slid over to what looked like a glass of water on Spencer’s side. 

“Spence?” I murmur, tapping his shoulder.

“Mm?” He asks, not even taking a moment to look away from his cards. 

“Mind if I take a sip from your water?” I ask, keeping my voice saccharine and innocent.

I can see the look he shoots me, his eyes slightly narrowed in surprise but he quickly looks away. “Yeah, um. Sure. Go ahead.” He responds dismissively, as if talking to me for even a second longer would result in him breaking out in hives. 

 Totally out of character. For all the closeness in the world, Spencer Reid would never have shared a glass of water. 

As I began to sip the water, I did something that could be categorized as deeply stupid, but in the name of my experiment, it was absolutely necessary. I slightly tipped the glass, allowing the cool water to run down my neck and drip onto the swell of my breasts. I made a show of getting up, touching my chest to try and rid myself of the moisture that was now coating my breasts. 

“I’m so sorry, Spencer. I’ll get you another glass of water.” I say,letting my breasts bounce a bit as I stand up,  and when he looks at me, it’s more apparent than ever that his eyes aren’t gracing mine anytime soon. Not when I was like this. 

I grinned in secret as I turned around,  quickly bringing over a replacement glass to him, leaning over so that if he were to simply turn his head even slightly to his left, he’d get a direct look at what he simply couldn’t seem to take his eyes or mind off tonight. 

“Uh. Thanks.” He stammers again, shakily drinking the water as he miserably failed at not looking. Bingo. 

When the next round of our game commenced, he lost horrifically, as expected. His mind was in an entirely different dimension, and I couldn’t help but feel a bit of pride, knowing it was me who’d rendered him dumb. So unfocused. So unlike himself. It wasn’t until I felt a tap on my shoulder, noticing Spencer’s hand carrying out the action. 

“Walk with me.” He says, simply. His tone was so sharp and commanding, I found myself listening with no hesitation, following as we moved to a more secluded bit of the party. 

“What are you doing?” He asks in an accusatory tone, his voice a hushed whisper. 

“What do you mean?” I respond, a faux naivete in my words, which he only scoffed at. He leaned in closer, his brows furrowed. I could notice a small vein popping out from his forehead, and the sight only increased the ache I’d begun to feel in my panties since he’d directed me here. 

“You know what I mean.” He says, dangerously. “You’re flaunting yourself.” He adds, his jaw tight. “You know what it’s doing to me. You’re enjoying it.” I could tell he wanted to say so much more, the grit in his tone leading me to believe there were some much cruder words he wished to utter to me.

 Regardless, the authority in his tone only spurred me to try and resist. It was so hot watching him like this. Maybe a bit fucked up to say that, but it didn’t matter in that moment. I only wanted to test the limits. To see the new man I could bring out in Spencer Reid tonight. 

“So what if I am?” I say, biting my lip. “It’s a party, Spencer. We’re all having fun, aren’t we?” 

“No.” He responds, darkly. “I’m not having fun.” 

A proposal came to mind. One I knew that would pan out deliciously, since I’d now gotten a look into his extensive lust tonight, and just how desperate he seemed. I leaned forward to whisper to him, my lips teasing the outer shell of his ear. 

“Win another game, and I’ll show you just how much fun you could be having.”

He immediately pulls back. His eyes narrow, and I can see the weight of my words course through his mind, evaluating the odds of my statement before clicking his tongue. 

“See you in 30 minutes.” is his response, as he walks away, beckoning me to follow him to yet another Blackjack table. I grin, sitting beside him. 

My presence doesn’t seem to phase Spencer whatsoever this time around, his laser-point focus uninterrupted even as I stared shamelessly at him. It wasn't until the game seemed to be reaching its turning point, in which Spencer had to decide whether drawing or staying would bring forth a better outcome for him. I watched as he mulled over the decision for a few seconds before his eyes locked onto mine, gaze intense. 

“Draw.” He voices, not even paying mind as the dealer announced his win. 

Spencer gets up without a word, and I can see him head towards a hallway that houses a few restrooms in the building. 

“Sir- your winnings!” The dealer calls out, but I smile apologetically, starting to follow Spencer to a more secluded area of the party.

“Sorry. He’s probably a bit preoccupied. I’ll let him know!” I respond, already turning around and making my way to the same hallway Spencer had gone down, finding the bathroom and opening it. I knew Spencer would be there, but what I didn’t expect was to be pulled into his arms, greeted by Spencer’s lips insistently pressing against mine, his free hand clutching the back of my head, as his other hand went to click the lock into place. I responded with a momentary bout of shock, but quickly found myself melting into his touch, wrapping my arms around his neck. 

“You like watching me lose, is that it?” He whispers harshly, in between kisses. I can feel the anger, the lust and passion, all rolling into one as his lips meet mine, over and over again, creating the sweetest of sensations that wracked my whole body. 

“Mm. Not just you losing. You losing because you’re distracted. Because of me.” I say, my tone a bit dazed and breathy from the intensity he was putting me through. 

“Can you blame me?” He murmurs, his lips now trailing down my neck, paying close mind to a particular spot on the side that left my knees weak. “You wear this dress and expect me to not take my eyes off of you?” 

His hot breath grazes over my skin and I can feel myself shiver. I’m completely overwhelmed by him. The feel of his hands caressing the small of my back and waist, his smell of his cologne wafting around me. I can only breathe unsteadily, and hold onto him, a needy whimper slipping past my lips. 

“Shh. You’re okay. I got you.” He murmurs. His tone was sweet, soothing, but his actions were anything but, as his fingers slipped around to find the zipper on my dress. 

In an instant, his mouth was finally all over my breasts, his mouth leaving a few marks on the expanse of my chest before his tongue began to sweep over my nipples, swirling around the raised bud, leaving me grappling to his shoulders, as more moans poured out from within me. 

“You like that?” He breathes against my skin, and I nod, frantically. I’d never expected to go this weak, but he was so much more skilled with his mouth than I’d ever expected.

“Please. Keep going.” I moan, and I can feel his hands on my thighs, urging me into his arms. I comply, and can feel myself be lifted to the bathroom counter, his hands squeezing the fat of my hips before dropping to his knees. His fingers looped around my underwear, and I attempted to move in a way that would aid him in their removal. As soon as they were off, he stuffed them into his pocket, and moved to lift my dress up, his face disappearing into my now spread legs. 

And suddenly he was everywhere, tongue swiping over my clit in rapid motions, flicking against me in a way that had me immediately squeezing my thighs around his face, to which Spencer responded by pushing them apart, leaving me shaking. 

“Oh god, Spencer. Oh-” I moan, over and over again, my hand gripping onto the strands of his hair. My eyes squeeze shut as I feel my orgasm rapidly approaching, my legs trembling more than ever. 

“Spencer- I’m gonna-” I groan out, my grip tightening, and I look down, watching him devour me with so much precision and focus, the same I’d seen during his playing all night. I watched as his eyes met mine, his lips sucking around my clit and in a fit of moans, I found myself releasing all over his tongue, my body shuddering as he worked me through my orgasm, moaning against my core. 

He rose from his knees and planted a long, deep kiss on my lips, and I moaned as I tasted myself on him. My hands started to go for his belt, desperate to feel this man inside me. As soon as his cock was freed from the confines of his briefs, I guided him towards my entrance, gasping as I felt him push into me, immediately filling me up. I breathed in sharply from the pleasure of the sensation, my eyes screwing shut before opening them to see his eyes staring back at me. He gave me a moment to adjust, watching my face for any sign of discomfort, but there was none, only the carnal desperation I felt for this man. I nodded to let him know I was ready,  and suddenly, like a man possessed, he began to jut his hips towards mine, causing me to whimper and dig my nails into his back. 

He moaned as he slammed into me, over and over again, while his mouth kissed at my neck, at my jaw, my lips, murmuring my praises over and over again. 

“I’ve wanted this for so long.” He groans, my hips firmly gripped by his large hands, keeping me from slipping off the counter. “And that dress. Fuck. God, I want you.” 

I nod, too overwhelmed with pleasure to even speak, rather opting to moan his name and nod furiously. 

He kept one hand on my hip, while the other trailed down to where we were joined, and began to rub fast, hard circles over my already sensitive bud, the action causing me to gasp out and open my eyes, letting him know that my second release of the night was inevitable. 

“You wanna cum, pretty girl?” He mumbles, keeping his voice low and his fingers diligent on my clit. 

“Please,” I sob out, my voice breaking with just how much I needed this right now. How much I needed him. 

“Come for me.” He murmurs, and as if under a spell, I do, coming undone rapidly in his grasp, my head falling against his shoulder as he continues the movement of his hips until I feel him still, and then spill into me, his breath heavy and chest heaving. 

I pull back, my forehead meeting his as he stares at me in a bit of a trance, our breaths mingling as we both came down from what had just happened. 

“I think.. you should probably cover up.. after that.” He murmurs, grinning a bit at the wide array of marks he’d just left on my neck and chest, undeniably exposing us. 

“Right you are.” I giggle back, leaning in for another kiss.  This time sweeter, softer.

I was definitely wearing this dress again for him.

  hello!! oh my god!! it has been so long since i've posted a fic. finals are over! i am free! i promise we will be back to a more normal schedule now (can i do weekly fics? who knows. i'll try). as usual, thank you for any and all reblogs, likes and comments. it's been a long time since i've even thought about writing, so i hope this is up to everyone's standards. this was written for @imagining-in-the-margins office party challenge. so, you know. look at the other fics there too! sorry for clearly not knowing anything about card games. also also, just a fun fact. i envisioned readers dress being meredith grey's prom dress from s2ep27.. hehe. okay, i've already talked enough. thank you thank you thank you for reading and supporting!!!

[yoongihan]

Girl Code - HHJ - OneShot

pairing: art professor hyunjin x admin femreader

genre: office au, university au, coworkers to lovers, angst, fluff,

romantic trope: enemies to lovers (I DID MY BEST OKAY?)

word count: ~4k

rating: T (for at least one objectifying comment)

warnings: hyunjin in glasses, with paint streaks on his clothes and person; mc is kinda rude to him; someone is actually a horrible person in this; characters drink but everyone is of age; hyunjin is older (about 28), mc is 24; probably some cursing because it's me and cursing is my native language;

a/n: story #5 in the skz as romantic tropes collab with @jl-micasea-fics. this is a little bit of her fault too as when the magic school photos dropped she mentioned hyunjin as an art professor. i chose this trope (e2l) to challenge myself as it's not my regular jam annnnnnd i don't know if i really did it all that well. i did try. please be kind to this chronic f2l writer. i apologize for any typos or mistakes. i am my own editor.

-----

Pretty Privilege.

It’s not a thing you personally have experienced, to your knowledge. Maybe you have. Maybe once amongst your friend group, you were considered the stand out and someone gave you a pass because they liked the way your eyes are shaped, or how you smile with teeth, or whatever.

You’ll allow that.

But generally, you hate that it even exists. Pretty privilege. Isn’t it enough to get to be pretty in this world? Without the world groveling at your feet and simultaneously pushing any obstacle out of the way for you? 

So when Professor Hwang is hired as the new art professor at the university where you admin, you take an immediate dislike. After, at first, the overwhelming surge of attraction because he truly is the prettiest human you’ve ever seen outside of screen. 

Even when your work friends discuss romance, and when Juhye from the Performative Arts department (she has basically the same job as you, just different department) mentions that she thinks he might be interested in her, you join in that yes, he’s very attractive and seems nice, and of course he’d be a great partner for her.

Even if you kind of hate him. 

And since you admin in the same department as he teaches (Fine Arts, obv), it’s your job (according to your friends and the unspoken rules that you really wish were spoken and written down) that you hype her up when he’s in the vicinity. You have to.

Girl Code: requiring you to promote her, and not be too friendly with him because one does not want to violate Girl Code.

Once in undergrad was enough and you would do anything not to experience that ostracization ever again. 

Unspoken rules that make life more difficult that it already is. You feel very much like you hyping Juhye is as subtle as a truck, and in doing so you are as awkward as well, whatever is very very awkward.

“You locked yourself out again?” You do your best not to hiss at him, but in over one semester of him being on the faculty, the man has locked himself out of his Canvas account at least a dozen times.

Hyunjin, Professor Hwang, as he is to his students, gives you the most sheepish smile, and deep down you acknowledge that it’s cute as hell. This man who could be art himself, looking self-conscious that he can’t be trusted with the basics of technology. 

“I know. I don’t know how I do this.” He shrugs, straightening his wire-rimmed glasses. “Isn’t my laptop supposed to save that info for me, so I never have to try and remember?”

“It is.” You think to offer that he can bring his laptop and you can look to see if Google, or whatever browser he uses (probably like Firefox or something equally horrendous), is saving his passwords, but you don’t. Because it’s not in your job description and: “Juhye’s pretty good at that kind of stuff. I’m sure she could make sure it’s doing that. Saving your passwords, login info.”

He hums in lieu of a response, moving from in front of your desk to behind you to see what you’re doing. He doesn’t ask, which makes you bristle, but you’re not doing anything confidential and he’s not really breaking your personal bubble, so you can’t say anything. 

“I’ve never asked,” he begins as though talking to you while you’re working isn’t annoying. “But I assume, this isn’t what you went to school for. Did you study tech…stuff?”

You’re mildly amused that he doesn’t use the official term ‘computer science’. But just mildly. You can still dislike someone and still find them amusing on occasion. 

“No.”

There’s silence, minus the sounds of your typing and mouse-clicking. 

“What did you study?”

You don’t like lying. It’s not a thing you prefer to do in life. You do, everyone does, but you try avoid it as much as possible. So even though you know this might interest Hyunjin and you know you should not interest him, ever, you tell the truth.

“Photography. I mean, I studied business, too, but mostly photography and mixed media art.”

There’s silence yet again.

“Which is why I’m here. In this department.” The silence has become unbearable. 

“Photography?”

He’s going to ask to see something.

“You good at it?”

You turn to look at him. He seems genuinely curious, not like he’s about to pass judgment. But, he’s hard to read. That perfect face can look very RBF according to Juhye (which she thinks just makes him all the more mysterious and sexy) and even blank which gives you less on which to assess him for. 

His hair pulled back in a ponytail and black textured turtleneck make him seem even more aloof, like the rich pretty boy in an anime. 

“My grades and graduating GPA said I was.” You put very little stock into quantifying art and creativity into numbered grades, but you did graduate well enough to please your parents. 

He rolls his eyes. “Oh okay then.” 

God, he’s annoying. 

“Anyway.” You turn back to your computer. “Everything is reset. Your email has the links to come up with a new password. Try to write it down somewhere, or you know, memorize it.”

“No space,” he replies. “No space for memorizing meaningless words and numbers and symbols.”

“Really? What’s your brain full of then? Creative genius?” You don’t even hide your sarcasm.

He laughs. “I hope so. Mostly just images of all the greats I studied. And then my students and what they do. It’s a photo album that never ends and changes order. Often.”

He’s slipping by you toward the door that leads out of the Fine Arts offices. You stare at him, his words lingering. 

“Thanks again,” he says, halfway through the door. He smiles at you, a small one, a polite ‘this is how we socially interact’ type smile.

It’s still so stupid beautiful. You hate it.

–

At the next day’s lunch, you dutifully let Juhye know about how you encouraged Hyunjin to bring his laptop and technology woes to her and she brightens and preens, and you almost feel like maybe you don’t hate him. 

It’s a small consolation. 

One of the benefits (there are just a few) of working at the school that you attended, in the department you majored in, is use of the facilities. Not whenever you want as the current students and professors get first claim on any studio, extra supplies, or the dark room. 

In two years of working post-undergrad, you’ve learned when the down times, the lesser claimed times were. Certainly not before midterms or finals. Nor right when the semester begins because all the overachievers feel like studio or dark room time will somehow make all the difference. 

But right now, in the in between times, you can book some dark room sessions which encourages you that someday you might ‘make’ it as a professional photographer, that you aren’t losing your skills. 

You’d taken a day to drive up to the nearest mountains to one; soothe your soul with nature (and pollen sadly) and two: take a new set of photos. As with everyone else in the 21st century, you use and manipulate digital photographs as well, but you also do film because it’s its own thing. 

As you turn on the red light bulbs in the darkroom, negatives now fully developed, you smile because film and the process of getting from undeveloped roll of film to tangible photo makes you happy. It’s a comforting process that you can almost do in your sleep. With how late it was when you went to bed last night is a good thing because two cups of coffee is not doing its usual thing. 

There’s a knock on the door of the dark room and your smile immediately drops. 

Damn students (it’s a fruitless grievance because it is their right as they are paying a ridiculous amount for this education, but ugh, it’s annoying to be on the bottom rung of the hierarchy).

“Occupied.”

“I left something in there that I need.”

It’s like every muscle of your body tenses, and every nerve sets alight. 

“Professor Hwang?” Like you need to confirm. 

There’s a pause, like he’s registering your voice before he says your name. 

“Yes, I’ve got the safe lights on, but if you make sure everything is off out there, I can open the door.” Sooner he comes in, the sooner he can leave. 

There’s a low chuckle. “I know the drill.”

You bristle at the patronizing tone.

“Everything is off.”

You open the door and mentally curse him. Even with the lights which you’d considered an unflattering shade of red, he still looks like art. 

Art like a rendition of a fallen angel or romantic vampire with the shadows on his face and red tinge his neck-length brown hair takes on. His glasses are horn-rimmed today, his white shirt pink in the light and sleeves rolled up, black slacks. There are at least three paint smudges on his forearms.

He nods and gives you a polite smile. It’s the most reserved he’s ever been with you, at least since first meeting. You would never describe him as outgoing by any means, but certainly friendly, amiable. He doesn’t hold any of the underlying snobbery of other art professors who have lived so long in the ivory towers of academia and the art world, that any one not well-versed is unworthy of such allowances as kindness or care. 

For all his faults, Hyunjin is not the worst. 

You step back, aware that you are essentially, just staring at him like a moron. He slips in, glances at the negatives out that you’ve just developed.

“Pleased?” he asks as he moves toward the shelves of chemicals and random items (things left and abandoned by years of students and professors - your favorite is a tiny figurine of the black cat from Kiki’s Delivery Service. No one has taken it back, as though left here on purpose by someone in the past six years. He’s the official mascot of this particular dark room and therefore your favorite). 

“Pleased?” you repeat.

“With your work?” He grabs some acrylic paint tubes off the shelf. “What you just developed?”

Now you feel stupid. Obviously that’s what he’s asking about. Not if you’re pleased to see him. That would be stupid. You aren’t. Surely even he can see that.

“Um, not sure.” You return to the film and its small images. You set one image over the projected enlarger so it’s visible to the both of you. It’s not much, a solitary tree, slightly off center in the frame. “Haven’t had a chance to see if it was a total waste of roll or not.”

Even though you don’t look to see him move, you feel him stand slightly behind you to also take in the image. 

You hold your breath for a number of reasons. 

One; because you don’t need to breathe in his cologne which is actually really lovely (so you hate it).

Two; because his nearness is off-putting as he’s not really breaking any social rules by being too close and darkrooms aren’t exactly spacious, but dammit he’s close. 

Three; because you actually want to know what he thinks.

That last one pisses you off the most. You and he don’t dabble in the same medium (he’s painting and drawing; you always stuck with photography, sometimes mixed media) so who is to say his thoughts are at all valuable.

Not that he isn’t skilled. Every professor in the Visual Arts department is, even the ones you dislike the most.

Like him. 

“It’s lonely.”

You flinch at his words, his voice seeming loud in the quiet of the room. 

“Being asymmetrically composed, the tree feels even more out of place and lost.”

You force yourself to continue staring at the project and not turn to see his expression. Because you might show your thoughts and those don’t need to be discoverable by Professor Hwang Hyunjin.

“I like it. Even if it’s a bit out of focus.”

You lean into the projection to see that he is correct. There is a slight blur to the edges, fuck it all. 

You straighten back up. “Intentional.” Not that you moving in and checking it wasn’t a damn giveaway that you are lying like a lying liar, but maybe he’s stupid.

“Ah.”

Maybe a little. Or he lies too. 

“Are you entering any contests or doing a showing?”

Does he truly want to have a normal conversation right now? In the dark room? Alone? When you are working on your own stuff?

You take a few steps away, turning off the projector. 

“I don’t have anything specific in mind. Just keeping a hand in, you know?”

He nods, the shadows lengthening then shortening on his face. “Not that this subject matter is relevant, but you know our theatre department is looking for a photographer? Dr. Kim mentioned it just yesterday.”

“They are?”

“You can do action and work with that type of lighting?”

You work hard not to sneer. “Yes. The photography program here is pretty thorough.”

He shrugs. “I would hope so, though I must admit I know little of Dr. Cha’s work with students. And only the bare essentials of the craft.” He’s smiling, looking far less like a work of untouchable art and more like someone who regularly laughs; at himself and at the absurdity of the world. 

The dried paint on his cheek is wrinkled and breaking with that smile. 

You mentally shake yourself. 

When you don’t say anything, making the silence veer on awkward, he clears his throat. 

“You should apply. I think you’d do well.” He laughs now. It’s silly. “Not that I have much understanding the ins and outs of course, my recommendation is probably worth little.”

“You’d say something?”

“To Kim? Sure.” 

“With one photo?”

He now looks amused. “I’ve seen your instagram, too. Dr. Cha often shares his former and current students’ work and I follow her.” He starts to the door. “I’ll say something.” He holds up the paint tubes. “Thanks for letting me in.”

He opens the door before looking back. “Have a good night.” And disappears through it. 

The room feels strange now. The red hue seems not as striking, and the air carries that hint of piquancy of his cologne.

You do a physical shake of yourself now before returning to make some prints. 

–

When you see Juhye out for drinks with the rest of your compatriots Friday night, you ask her. 

“Why didn’t you tell me about the theatre photographer position?” She works in the Performative Arts department, even updates the website. Of all people, she would be one of the first to know. 

She’s had about two more cocktails than you which means her eyes take several moments to focus on you. You lean against the bar next to her, waiting. 

“Why would I?”

You bite your tongue to retort. “Because I’m a photographer.” 

She wrinkles her nose, saying your name in the most patronizing tone you’ve heard since high school. “They want professionals.”

You jerk back as though she swung a dagger at you. 

But you try again. Because friends. And Girl Code. “I applied though. Would you say something to Dr. Kim please?”

She takes a deep breath that you can hear despite the loud house music pumping in this bar. “Honey,” The sickly sweetness of the condescension makes you want to gag. “We’re friends and all, but I am not risking my name just because you think you can do something like this. Real friends tell each other the truth.”

As she finishes this quasi-sermon, the bartender produces another drink for her, and a receipt to sign. She does, scrawling also her snapchat username. He takes the slip, makes eye contact with her and smirks before moving to another patron. 

“What was that?” you ask, still processing her apparent disregard for your dreams and talent. “I thought you were ‘in love’ with Professor Hwang?” You are petty enough to do finger quotation marks. 

She rolls her eyes and shrugs, already looking past you for the rest of your group. “I am. But wanting a luxury car doesn’t mean that one can’t ride in a station wagon.”

If you’d had more liquor, maybe you could have thrown up on her as you currently feel ill, both disgusted and horrified. 

To equate humans to cars reeks of objectification and lack of seeing someone as a whole person. 

And you might hate Hwang Hyunjin, but you know he’s more than just a beautiful (on the surface) man. 

Juhye slips by you to find the others as you realize how incredibly shit of a friend she is. Of a person. In fact, you turn to stare at her back in astonishment because you thought you were good at reading people, at sifting through the kinds of people you want to surround yourself with. Juhye has never been someone you were incredibly close to, but you thought she was decent, even if her taste in men was lacking.

“I didn’t know you came here.”

As though your life is a full-on drama, you turn back to see that in her place is Hyunjin. He’s got a martini glass in hand, the liquid a vibrant green. 

“Rarely,” you answer tonelessly, your brain still trying to understand the revelations of the last five minutes. You nod to his drink. “What’s that?”

He grins, alcohol having warmed his smile. “Appletini.”

A surprised laugh exits your mouth before you realize it. You assumed he’d probably drink something like fancy single malt scotch or absinthe (the green). Here he is, this impressive and young art professor, one who has had an extolled art showing in the last year (you might have researched him some when you realized how much you hated him), drinking the equivalent of Apple Jacks in a martini glass. 

His smile is a little cute.

He isn’t wearing glasses right now, which is a shame, but his t-shirt and jeans give him less of that art prof vibe, and more of the cute guy you meet at a bar. 

“Good?” you ask, finding yourself bewildered and amused.

He nods emphatically, offering it to you as though you’re friends who share.

You shake your head, even though you sort of want to. 

“Thank you. I should go.” It might be the lighting, but he looks way too cozy with his hair tucked behind his ears, the wind from outside making it tousled. 

You look around to see Juhye and several of your friends over at a booth. They are watching with piercing eyes. 

Juhye whispers to another.

You feel it. The momentary terror of doing something wrong, the violation of the code in talking to your friend’s crush.

“Before you do.” He sets down his drink, inching a bit closer to you. “I talked to Dr. Kim. About the job? I can’t say for sure, but I think he was definitely looking forward to talking with you about it. I showed him your series with the cyclists by the Han River, from your insta. One of my favorites of yours.” 

You feel your eyes itch all of a sudden, a sudden tightness in your throat. You force back the tears that threaten. 

“I…thank you.”

His smile gets even bigger, his eyes nearly squeezed shut in his joy. 

You need to go. Like now. 

“Of course. What are friends for? Or at least, coworkers.” He giggles. 

Friends. The spike of anxiety lessens. Because you know what real friendship is. And it’s not in whispers and unspoken rules and carelessness. 

It’s thoughtfulness, it’s giving without asking for anything back. 

“If you get the job, I expect you to buy me a drink.” His playful words make you tense all the more, because you see it. You see how kind he is.

He sees you.

“I’m kidding,” he says almost as quickly. “I just–”

“I know.” You meet his eyes and smile though you imagine it’s more teary than warm right now. “I’ll definitely buy you another appletini if I get it.”

There’s no RBF right now. Only sparkling eyes, turned up lips, and kindness. 

And you need to go.

“Sure. Um, bye.” You race out of there like being chased by a supervillain. 

–

It’s the end of the school year, and even though you still work during the summer (a lowly admin’s job is never done), you feel the excitement.

Because you’re changing departments. After photographing and doing promotional shots of the university’s spring musical, Dr. Kim wants you on staff full-time, to capture all of the Performative Arts department; the classes, the productions, even the silly open mics that the students and professors do every month. The website, the newsletter, the alumni magazine; all have a credit of yours by the time May ends. 

You feel like maybe you haven’t been treading aimlessly post-university as much as you thought. 

“So,” Hyunjin says, before taking a sip of his luminescent green cocktail. He leans on his elbows across from you. “We aren’t in the same department any more.” There’s a pout at the end, a small, silly thing that makes you roll your eyes, but deep down, you think it’s (he) is adorable. 

“I know. You’ll have to bug someone new when you forget your password. Again.”

His pout doesn’t leave. “They might be nicer to me.”

In the months that followed that night at the bar, you decided to apologize to him. It was in his office, when he was sorting through papers and you were nearly on your way home for the day. You had succeeded in avoiding Juhye and him for three days when you got the email from Dr. Kim for a quick interview. 

So you stopped by to thank him, then apologize for being rude.

“You hated me? Huh. I thought you were just kind of grumpy. It’s cute.”

To say you were simultaneously both flattered and outraged (he’d not even been offended, once?) would be understatement. 

He likes to tease you about it now.

“But to go back to my original thought,” he continues, reaching out to steal a fry from your plate. “No longer in the same department. We’ll have to try and see each other instead of just happening to run into each other.” He raises one eyebrow at you.

“Yeah. Ugh, are you a clingy friend?”

“Not really.” He pauses, taking another drink before setting it back down. “I am…a little bit of a clingy boyfriend.” 

You’re holding your breath again. 

You can acknowledge that you and Hyunjin aren’t just coworkers, he’s not your enemy (if he ever was) anymore. You’re definitely more friends with him than anyone else from work (you’ve pulled away from Juhye and her little group and honestly, you don’t miss them). 

Being friends, being friendly and open with Hyunjin has its own drawbacks because now you have to contend with how lovely a person he is; how talented, funny, goofy, and compassionate. Which makes it difficult. When you hated him, he was easy to keep at a distance.

Now that you like him, you might really like him.

“Uh, we aren’t dating.”

“What do you call this?” he asks, nonplussed that he’s brought up your entire relationship as a topic of conversation, as though you’re discussing the weather, or the latest student’s project. He points at your mostly empty plates, his martini glass, your half-full gin and tonic. Then he points at you and then himself.

“I’m paying though.” Spring in academia is a sprint to the finish and though he’d been joking about you owing him a drink if you got the job, you are currently owning up to it now that the semester is over. 

“So? Is it only a date if I pay?” He tsks at you. “I thought you were a feminist.”

Your glare doesn’t have the same bite as it used to. It’s too fond. 

“This is a date?”

He leans across the table, adjusting his glasses as though it’ll help him see you better. Even with familiarity, you still feel a bit overwhelmed by him. 

“I want it to be.”

There is no policy about coworkers dating at your university, just that professionality reigns at the school. There is no reason why you and Hyunjin cannot date. Even though you often feel like professors are on another level compared to the administration. 

He’s not even that much older than you. 

Perhaps it’s remnants of being so worried that you might break ‘Girl Code’ if you’re at all nice to him because of Juhye’s ‘claim’ that you are hesitant. Maybe you need to acknowledge that he is so much more than what you or Juhye reduced him to in the beginning.

Maybe you realize that you have been ‘dating’ him awhile without even comprehending it.

Maybe you also lean across the table, letting your lips brush against his stunning ones (if you painted like him, those lips would probably show up in a piece) and hear his soft exhale as though he relaxes. Because he realizes it too.

You like each other. A lot. 

His soft kiss in return gives you actual heart flutters.

“I guess I don’t mind a clingy boyfriend. Especially one who is still marked with paint on a date.” You point to the streak of white at his jaw. 

He takes your hand in his, gaze dropping to look at his drink, but his smile can’t be hidden.

“Good.”

---

(c) yoongihan 2024. please do not steal, translate, repost, or whatever. stray kids belong to themselves and all idols used in this piece are just the inspiration for characters and do not in any way reflect the actual humans.

[lovingperfectionsblog]

I'm Not A Spy?

Max Verstappen x Reader

Summary: There’s no way THE Max Verstappen got you flowers, absolutely no way. 

Warnings: Swearing, other than that, just silliness and fluff. 

Word Count: 1616

Authors note: This was literally a dream I had and I was encouraged to write it as a fic by my absolute dream of a friend @0-atmilk-latte so thank you sugar <3 I hope it’s okay. I really want to get back into writing my silly little stories so, let's try to do this. 

______

Enemy territory. 

This is where Max stood currently. Dead center in front of the Mercedes motorhome door, where everyone could see him. 

And every single person to walk through those doors sent him glares that would make sure he knew he was on enemy territory. 

He knew it was risky. Redbull merchandise adoring him. Sticking out like a sore thumb. It was a risk he was willing to take. 

“Horner send you?” Toto stepped through the doors after watching Max stand there for the past hour, “Although, I can't imagine who Horner would be giving those to?” eyes flicking between Max’s face and the bouquet of flowers he was currently white knuckling. 

“No sir, these are for your assistant.” Max tried to sound confident but even he could admit Toto was a terrifying man and this entire situation was feeling far too similar to the idea of trying to get your fathers permission to ask you on a date. 

“From?” Toto knew he was making Max squirm, but the only thing that would bring him more joy was if it were Horner himself standing in front of him instead of Max. 

“From me sir.” Max tried to stop his hands from shaking, the rustling of the leaves and flowers becoming oddly unbearable as he tried to stand his ground in front of your boss. 

“Why?” As much fun as Toto was having, he was also curious. He knew Max had been eyeing you up these past few weeks, paying more attention to you, attempting to talk to you every opportunity he could. He had even caught Max attempting to make small talk with Lewis and George, which he was now assuming was a bid at getting closer to you. At the very least attempt to make everyone around you like him in the meantime. 

“Because I was hoping to ask her to dinner sir.” Toto couldn't hide his surprise at Max’s honesty. Expecting at the very least some work around to that answer after some back and forth. 

God Max irritated him. He had no choice but to add this to the increasingly growing list of things he respected Max for and it infuriated Toto to no end. 

It didn’t mean he couldn't stress Max out in the meantime. 

“Well,” he let out a chuckle, “good luck then son.” 

“Boss, what’s the redbull scum doing on our turf?” George shouted towards Toto as he made his way towards the motorhome. 

Toto didn’t even give Max an opportunity to answer before he was shouting back, “Apparently he’s here to ask my assistant out to dinner.”

“Oh, makes sense why he’s been so nice to me and Lewis these last few weeks.” George made his way up to the entrance, joining his boss and rival, “Is this why you wanted to hang out in Monaco the other day?” 

Toto and George could only laugh at the uncontrollable blush that had made its way across Max’s face at being called out. 

And the situation was only made worse by, “Morning Boss, George,” you eyed the odd one out, cocking an eyebrow up in question, “and Max?” 

“Well then, go ahead,” was all that came from your boss in lieu of a greeting from any of them. 

And suddenly Max felt shy. All that previous bravado had clearly been used up with Toto, leaving none for the actual important interaction. 

He had to do something and soon, because you were standing there staring at him, waiting, for, well, something. 

Next second there was a bouquet thrust in your direction, gripped to near smithereens between Max’s hands. Your eyes darted between the flower and the three men in front of you, one completely avoiding eye contact, the other two doing a poor job to hide their smiles as they watched the interaction between you two. 

“What’s this for?” you refused to take the bundle from Max, unsure of what was happening. 

“You.” It was all Max could get out. 

“From?

“Me?” 

“Why?” 

“Jesus.” 

Toto barked out a laugh at the near identical conversation he and Max had just had. 

The flowers rustled in front of you as you assumed Max shook them for you to take. 

He would never admit that it was his nerves. 

You hesitantly took the flowers, eyeline switching between max and the, admittedly beautiful, bunch of flowers you were now holding. 

There was a long silence as you just stared at the flowers, eyebrows furrowing. Neither Max, Toto nor George fully understood what was going on in your mind. The silence extended so long that even Toto began to feel nervous, so he could only imagine what Max was feeling as he just stared you down just as intensely as you were staring at those flowers.  

Just as Toto reached out to nudge Max in an attempt to get him to say something to you, you began violently shaking the flowers. Petals and leaves began flying everywhere. Whole flowers landed on the floor at your feet. At least one had hit Max in the face. Toto stepped back in fear. Max shielded himself from the onslaught. By the time you were done, all that was left in your hand was one measly flower consisting of maybe four petals and a few leaves. The rest lay at your feet after your massacre. 

All three boys stared on in horror as you stood there breathless. Eyes fixed on Max like he was your prey. 

Everyone could hear the gulp from Max’s throat as he took a single step backwards. 

“You think just because I’m some girl and you’re the Max Verstappen in your fast little redbull you can treat me like some pawn in your weird little game?” you spat the words at him. 

Max desperately looked over to Toto and George for some help, but even they looked too scared to intercede on his behalf. 

“This isn’t some game, I just,” 

“You just what? Thought you could spy on my team?” you didn't even let him finish before throwing out a secondary accusation at him. 

“Spy?” George hadn’t meant to have that come out as loud as it did, but suddenly all attention was on him as he hid slightly behind Toto. 

“Obviously George. He probably put a listening device in the flowers to spy on us.” All three looked at you like you were insane, “Why else would he be giving me flowers?” 

“To ask you on a date.” The silence that followed Toto’s comment was deafening. 

“No.” It was all you could get out. 

“No to the date or no to him giving you flowers for that reason?” Totot was desperately trying to be the voice of reason here. 

“To him giving me flowers?” You’d yet to look at Max since the original accusations. 

“Why would Max be spying on us? Redbull is the fastest team on the grid?” George was emphatically nodding along with what Toto was saying, trying to get you to see that this was completely innocent. 

“I’m not a spy?” Max had finally spoken up, far too alarmed at the accusations beforehand to offer much more than this, beyond thankful to Toto for helping him explain. 

“Then what’s with the flowers?” You were sharp and blunt and Max couldn’t help but fall just that little bit more for you as he watched you defend your team. 

“To ask you on a date.” Max hesitantly pointed at Toto, showing that the original reason that was offered was correct. 

“You want to take me on a date?” Max could only nod, “and these flowers were to ask me on a date?” Another nod, smile growing as he watched your cheeks flush, “in front of my boss?” you side eyed your boss, hoping he’d take the hint to get out of there. 

“In my defense, I didn’t expect him to come talk to me, not stick around” Max’s eyes refused to leave you, a little nervous to at this point. 

“I’m not going anywhere, is it a yes or not?” Totot refused to budge, his massive presence looming over both you and Max as George peaked over his shoulder to continue watching the interaction. 

“Yes,” you watched as Max’s smile grew even wider than before, him already grabbing his phone out of his pocket so you could put your number in it for him, “as long as you promise you aren’t a spy!” you emphasized by shoving his phone, now containing your number, into his chest as a warning. 

“Not a spy. I promise,” Max stuck his pinky out, waiting for you to reciprocate, giving you the most legal of all promises, the pinky promise, “so it’s a date.” 

You nodded as you wrapped your pinky around his own, “A date.” 

After a moment Toto coughed, catching your attention and forcing you to let go of Max and straighten out your attire, “We should go, yes, we have, there’s work, yes, job, okay, bye” and with that, you had disappeared through the Mercedes motorhome doors, soon followed by Toto who clapped a hand against Max’s shoulders, muttering a “well done boy” as he followed you in to begin the day, leaving Max to stare after you as George sidled up next to him. 

The two stood in silence, Max staring at you as Toto clearly teased you about the interaction, and George stared at Max, gearing up to do some teasing of his own. 

“Never thought The Max Verstappen would be into women who scared him” 

“Shit, she’s so scary.” Max nodded along with his own statement before making George choke on his coffee with the next one, “I think I’m going to marry her.” 

[literaila]

"i don''t wanna get you sick"

from either reader or peter (sorry if you've already written a fic like this)

where’d you get your medical degree

tasm!peter x fem!reader

warnings: the ask says it all.

a/n: in lieu of sick season. and because of many illnesses (such as writers block, and insanity) which are preventing me from writing anything serious

*

“no,” you whine, pushing him away. “don’t touch me.”

peter is looking down at you with an incredulous look on his face. his hair is loose and his eyes are close, and he’s unbelievably pretty. like you have to blink a few times, just to make him appear normal—and a little less blurry.

you think he’s smiling too, but you can’t really see it. you might be dreaming.

“is there any particular reason why not, bub?”

his hands near you again, cold fingertips on your jaw, around your head. you groan and move your face away from them—even though it feels wonderful.

“i don’t know where those hands have been.”

peter snorts. “trust me,” he says, tilting your head back to him, “you do.”

your stomach turns, and suddenly his hands are a saving grace, so you grab both, holding them to your cheeks.

“change your mind?”

“cold,” you sigh, leaning as close as you can get to him.

“you’re burning, love, and not the elvis kind.”

you shake your head, eyes closed. “not funny,” you mutter.

“can you look at me real quick?”

you moan and close your eyes even tighter. “i’m tired, peter. come back when we’re open.”

“just let me see those pretty eyes and then you can sleep. i’ll even get you some comfier clothes. and some water.”

you move your legs around, feeling the stiff polymer pants you wore today, assuming that you wouldn’t be halfway to death by 3pm.

“how bout some ice cream?” you ask, opening one eye.

it is not lost on you that peter is trying to flirt with you. or that he’s frowning.

“your pupils are big,” he says, concisely. “did you get drugged?”

you giggle, moving away from him, his fingertips suddenly ticklish. “yes, from my computer,” you grin at him, closing your eyes again. “at my office job.”

“okay, stoner, what medicine did you take?”

you frown. “none.”

peter is frowning back. you can feel it. but you’re not going to open your eyes, just in case he’s suddenly brushed his hair or something. put on mascara. who knows what lengths peter would go to surprise you.

“wait,” you hold a finger up. “whatever’s in my bag, i think. i took it at work.”

peter sighs, patting your leg before he moves about the room, looking for a purse you must have lost.

you actually can’t really remember how you got home in the first place.

“if your fever gets any worse, we’re going to the doctor.” peter says this from across the room, and you’re pretty sure he’s not even talking to you. “here. this is just acetaminophen. how long ago?”

your face is pushed into the pillow beside you. it smells like peter, so you keep it there.

“loopy, can you just answer this one question?”

“the pillow is speaking to me.”

peter puts a hand on your back. “i am so sure you’re on drugs,” he says, almost adoringly. “the pillow is telling you that you need to clean up. trust me, we’re close. let’s get you into pajamas and then i’ll find you some stuff.”

you don’t move. maybe you didn’t hear him.

“bub,” he says, a bit louder, sterner. “c’mon, it’ll only take a sec.”

“not moving.” your voice is muffled. “ever.”

“how am i supposed to kiss you, then?”

you turn and peek out at him, lip curling at the mention. and then you cough. “you cant kiss me. i’m sick.”

“it’s disappointing that you think that would deter me.”

“if you’re sick how are you supposed to take care of me?”

“i’ll always take care of my baby,” he swears, leaning into you. if you were of right mind you might realize he wants a kiss. you might realize what you want.

but you only nod approvingly, and then smush your face back into his pillow.

peter groans. his hand moves to the back of your head, and he massages your scalp for a moment. “i know those clothes aren’t comfortable,” he pulls at your tight blouse, the one you wear when you want to feel good about yourself and you don’t mind neglecting to breathe. “even though it looks good on you. you’re sweating through it.”

your muffled voice returns: “do i smell?”

it’s a miracle that peter can understand anything you’re saying. “just like you,” he sniffs, “and maybe a bit like coffee? did you spill something on yourself?”

you don’t move. just hum into the pillow, hacking up a lung into it.

peter shakes his head. “i’m gonna need to wash that. up, baby. a shower would help your sinuses, but we’ll change if you’re tired.”

“baby,” you giggle to yourself.

“yes, baby, because you have de-aged significantly in the past hour. do i have to carry you to the closet?” his voice is teasing, but you’re not really sure that you can hear anything.

you finally turn, sitting up so you can look at peter. “am i being difficult?” you ask him, worriedly. your skin has shifted colors, and your voice is more like rock on rock. but you still frown at peter. “i’m sorry. you don’t have to do anything. i can change.”

but as you say it you double over in a coughing fit, and while you can feel peters hand on your back, you’re almost worried he’s already left.

“don’t be ridiculous,” he whispers when you’re silent again, swallowing. “i like taking care of you. though, i’m not loving that cough. do you need some water?”

you look at him, checking his eyes for something that you’d never be able to recognize in this state. and finally you nod, silent.

peter kisses your forehead and leaves for the kitchen.

you sit there, trying to keep your back perfectly straight. even through the overwhelming urge to lay back down in the bed and suffocate in the blankets.

you really just want to smell that pillow some more.

your head is pounding, and you try to remember if you even took that medicine in the first place. how long you’ve been sitting there. if peter even took your temperature in the first place.

but peter is back before you figure it out. “here,” he hands you a glass of water, watching you with narrowed eyes. “drink all of it.”

“i’m not thirsty.”

he glares at you and you smile, sipping on the water.

he smiles back, sitting down next to you and feeling all over your face with his hands. “what’s the status report?”

“still sick, but my mental capacity is coming back.”

“oh good,” peter says, leaning back but not letting go of you. “i was worried when you didn’t laugh at my elvis joke.”

you snort and lean right back into him, your head against his chest. he smells a lot better than cheap cotton.

“sorry ‘bout your pillow,” you cough out, leaning away from him suddenly so you don’t spit in his face.

“it’s fine. i enjoy a little snot with my sleep.”

“gross, peter.”

he grins down at you, kissing the top of your head again, because he is beyond adorable. then he sombers, still staring, carefully evaluating you. “do you want some more medicine? i think we’ve got some cold stuff in the cupboard.”

“the sleepy kind?”

“probably. take some of that. do you want to shower?”

“not really,” you say, letting him hold your head up. “i’m a little dizzy.”

peter frowns at you. “i’d make sure you don’t fall,” he offers.

“that’s okay,” and then you, once again, hack up some mucus in front of his face and sigh pathetically into your own hands.

“how about some tea? for your throat?” his hand moves yours away, brushing the hair out of your face.

“peter, it’s okay.”

you kiss his hand and push it away.

“the teas okay?” he frowns. “as in yes?”

“i’m okay,” you repeat, shaking your head at him. “you don’t have to do anything else. i’m fine.”

“you’re sick,” he corrects.

“i’m a big girl. i just need a nap. i’m probably not even sick.”

you emphasizes this point by choking down a cough, making your eyes water.

peter raises a brow.

you smile, tightly. “i’m just gonna go change now—“ you stand up, and then fall back down. your head spins as you feel peters hands wrap around your waist, his lips pressed against the side of your temple.

“just let me help,” he whispers, into you. “i’m not busy.”

“you had a long day.”

“i just want to cuddle with you anyway. i can take a few extra steps—like making you tea and getting you medicine.”

you shake your head. “i can do it.”

“i miss high you,” peter sighs. “c’mon, bub, stop being stubborn.”

you frown. “you’re the stubborn one. go swing and save someone else,” you tell him. “i just need a nap.”

“then i’m napping with you.”

you tilt your head back, groaning, and regretting it immediately when there’s a sharp stab in the front of your eyes.

peter kisses your now exposed neck, moving his hand so it keeps your head still. “you probably need to go to the doctor.”

“don’t be dramatic.”

peter scoffs. “you’ve got a fever of 103 degrees. i’m not dramatic.”

“i think i missed the era where you got your medical degree.”

peter scowls at you, pushing your sweaty hair out of your eyes and making sure you can see his conviction to never ever let this go. “it’s called webmd. it’s a wonderful place.”

“peter,” you whine, trying to push him away.

“baby,” he whines back, but smiles as he picks you up, like a literal baby, making sure not to jostle your head. “pajamas. what do you want to wear? and what’s the verdict on the tea?”

you sigh and lean your head into his neck. you don’t appreciate this, but it’s hurting to keep your eyes open. you cough into him, muffling yourself from the world. “can i wear your shirt?” you say, softly.

peter smiles like he’s won the lottery. you can feel it against your head. “yup,” he pops, “but it’ll cost you.”

“what?” you ask, sniffling.

“a kiss.”

he pecks your cheek, then your nose, and carries you away.

*

[mokulule]

The Number You have Called Cannot Be Reached - part 8

Part 1 | Masterlist

Ship: Dead on Main (Danny/Jason) Warnings: angst/depression and canon typical violence So I promised this like months ago, and then got overwhelmed by having to manage the taglist resulting in me not updating this fic despite actually having written the next part. So that said this is the last time I'm tagging people, please subscribe to the masterlist - I'm gonna link it both here at the top and at the bottom. Anyways enjoy the next part:

Jason could handle this. He had handled this for years. The Pits were a known enemy. It shouldn’t effect him to this degree. But he could handle this. He could go about his day without putting heads in duffel bags, that had got to count as a win. The fact that he was avoiding his family, was just a precaution. Jason had everything under control.

Not like when he’d fled the Cave after assaulting Bruce in his stupid sweater.

That had not been his proudest moment. But the thing that really got to him was how he didn’t remember doing it. He didn’t even remember going to the Cave. When he tried to think it was all a green haze. The last moment of real clarity was opening Ghost’s bag and seeing nothing but dry protein bars. Knowing in his gut this was all he ate and that he stood with his food, and no way to give it back to him.

When he had fled the Cave, he’d gone home shaking like a leaf, and sunk to the floor trying to get his head back on straight. He didn’t know how long he sat there with his back against the door, just trying to breathe and search his memory. Eventually, though he didn’t know after how long, he found his phone and looked up the news. It had been a great relief to find that Red Hood had not been sighted, so he likely hadn’t been out on a murder spree he couldn’t remember.

But now it was days later. There had been no more green hazes. Things were under control.

Maybe he hit a bit harder, and a bit longer, when he went out. But it was the normal amount? Wasn’t it? Definitely not much more than normal, if it was more. That he was sure of… like 80% sure of. Jason rubbed the front of his helmet in lieu of his brow - It didn’t really help. What had Bruce even said that set him off? He barely remembered, something that felt demeaning, but the words escaped him no matter how many times he turned them over in his head. Normally he wouldn’t question himself that like, of course Bruce would have said something demeaning, he always did. He didn’t trust Jason, never would again. There would always be suspicion and doubt. But now…

Jason’s hand clenched into fists. Now having been without the Pits’ influence, having seen Bruce trying to reach out to him, as awkward and resigned as it had been, he wasn’t so sure.

He wasn’t sure he could trust himself.

Maybe this was all Bruce’s plan? Another of his famous gambits - this one to fold Jason back under his control, with the pretense of love and family. Because surely he had been right all along and Jason needed to be watched, couldn’t be trusted on his own.

Jason ripped the helmet off his head, only barely stopped himself from throwing it. He gasped and breathed in deep, like a man drowning. He was the one in control, he reminded himself firmly. Not the pits. Not Bruce.

There was sound in his comms and he hastily pulled the helmet back on. Ghost had been sighted. He had to go. If he could just talk with Ghost, figure out what this was.

Ghost ran away. Immediately, as if he could sense Jason.

It was okay, Jason could handle this.

Oo o oO

Barbara tapped the space bar absently without actually pressing it. Keeping half an eye on her leftmost monitor which showed the program she used for the surveillance in Gotham, no persons of interest were pinging tonight so far, no alarms had tripped for about an hour. She had time to ponder the conundrum that was their reoccurring thief.

If the thief was building something the other night was proof the loss of the spectral calibrator, hadn’t put a stop to the progress. The thief never ran in the same direction so they still didn’t even have that to go by to narrow down where he stayed, when he wasn’t giving them the run around.

The odd reaction to Jason hadn’t made a reappearance. In fact the moment Jason joined them the thief disappeared immediately: density shifting into the ground. Jason was not happy about it to say the least.After the backpack full of barely edible off-brand protein bars had been delivered to the cave by Jason, Barbara would agree with Jason that whatever situation the thief was in, it was worrying if this was all that he ate. She still held by her assessment that the photographic evidence was of too low quality early in their run-ins because of the strange electromagnetic interference he gave off to actually judge if he’d lost weight - but he did look very gaunt now.

She leaned back in her chair. A cup of coffee was warm between her hands, she breathed in the familiar scent as she considered the known facts.

Name assumed to be Danny Fenton, potentially legally Daniel Fenton, though they’d been unable to find a match to his physical appearance and rough age in their databases. He hadn’t actually spoken to any of them, it was a very real possibility he was a foreigner, but they’d checked and he wasn’t wanted by any foreign intelligence services.

The phone was baffling.

It was a brick, and it looked like something from the early 00s, from around the time when handheld phones really started to be something everyone had.

Tim had asked for Barbara’s help after he hadn’t been able to recover the erased text messages for some days. Tim had filled her in on his discovery that while all the numbers coded into the phone led to a “the number you have called cannot be reached” message when called from the phone - some of the numbers were actually active when looked up; the Jazz one led to a pizza place and the Dad number led to an elderly woman with Chinese heritage who had no relation to anyone named Danny or Fenton. The rest of the numbers weren’t currently in use.

It was odd however that despite those two numbers being in use, they still got the cannot be reached message. Tim had suggested the program which made the phone able to piggyback on the mobile network without a sim was faulty, but it had been easy enough for Barbara to disprove by calling a local number which connected with no problem. Tim was brilliant but sometimes he got too caught up in his complicated theories that he forgot the simple things.

Her recovery program for the text messages had just finished running (this was her third attempt). She took a sip of coffee, leaned forward and promptly nearly spat it out when she saw the result. It went down the wrong pipe when she tried to recover and she coughed and sputtered. Carefully she put her cup on her desk before she spilled it.

Finally her airways were clear and she rubbed the bridge of her nose. Somehow this was Dick’s fault.

She had recovered the messages. They were there - time stamps and all. The last message received was over a decade ago in 2009 and wasn’t that ominous? But that was a side note to be pondered later, because the contents of the messages, oh this was malicious.

Somehow, before deletion every single message had been changed to “Ghost”.

Not just a single ghost, no, entire messages teasing at their original length, but just changed into ghost ghost ghost ghost ghost. A whole litany of ghosts.

And it was definitely Dick’s fault.

Next

So that was it, hopefully I will be able to get back in the swing of things now. Commentary and tags are a great motivator and I read them all. As stated this is last time I tag people, so in the future you can subscribe to the masterlist or on Ao3 where the edited and hopefully better version eventually goes up.

Tag list of doom part 1:

@thewondersoflebanon | @gin2212 | @busterkeel | @apointlessbox | @spoopyspoony | @charlietheepic7 | @proper-idiocy | @serasvictoria02 | @zgirlly | @emeraldcorpral | @mushroom-jack | @v-inari | @8-29pm | @quirky-gardener | @vehan-tikkun-olam-and-stuff | @mars-the-witch | @elthepickle | @thegatorsgoose | @impulsiveasshole |

@tired-yet-awaken | @luagi-the-bestest | @britcision | @autumnwulf | @little-pondhead | @asphyxia778 | @sarina-elais | @may-rbi | @onlyhereforthechaos | @somuchyikes | @yjfk | @rosiea184 | @screamingtofillthevoid | @ailithnight | @writer-extraodinaire | @samgirl98 | @hanahaki-disease | @riverdancingwerewolves |

[hwanchaesong]

━⁠☞🍽️First Course: It's always this, it's always that. The never ending demands you have failed to meet. How much more can you take of this bitter situation? 🥢

🎧: Olivia Rodrigo - Enough For You

wc: 1.4k

genre & warnings: angst angst angst (no happy ending here with hj), reader learns how love must work in a relationship, lovers to exes, marriage, other idols appearance, cursing, insecurity, just pure angst :D

a/n: this is a part of The Sour Restaurant series. if y'all want, you can read the other album inspired fics of other groups here.

You watch Seonghwa and Mina sway to the romantic music for their first dance as a newly wed couple, and your heart flutters with joy seeing them so happy.

No, jealousy was never an option for this one because you've seen their journey together. How their relationship blossomed and now, they are entering a new phase of their lives together. It was truly magnificent.

"Hey. Mind if I join you?" a voice brought you out of your reminiscing, turning your head to look at the source and you were dumbfounded to the core.

The man that you have been avoiding for the rest of the day is standing in front of you in his full glory, an awkward yet hopeful smile on his face as he awaits your answer.

"Yeah, Hongjoong. Go Ahead." you replied, returning the smile before sipping the now warm champagne in the goblet that you have been ignoring for the past few minutes in lieu of admiring the pair in the middle of the reception area.

A moment of silence, and he dared to break it.

"It's been a while since I last saw you. How's life?" he inquired, making small talk and you fight off the urge to leave him there alone, but no can do, you're not gonna be childish in the presence of your ex-boyfriend.

"It was good," then you paused, blinking and correcting yourself, "no actually, I have been living the best life."

He was taken aback at your slightly ironic tone, not used to the way you're speaking, like you're a completely different person after your separation, and only a month has passed since.

"Well, as for me.."

He trails and you roll your eyes, you did not ask how he's doing and certainly not interested. But you maintain your poise, not wanting him to see that he's having a negative effect on you.

"I've been miserable... without you, at least."

You whipped your head to look at him incredulously, an aghast scoff coming out of you unconsciously at his audacity to tell you that.

Wasn't he the one who decided to end your relationship? He was the one who destroyed a 5-year long bond, so what the fuck is he on about?

"Are you serious?" he looked offended when you asked him that, like he was pulling a stunt or something but who could blame you?

"Why would I even joke about that?" he mutters back, frowning when your confused expression turns into an appalled one.

He really isn't serious, right?

After all the shit that you have to go through because he's always wanting, needing, and looking for more in you.

You've never really seen the importance of going outside all glammed up, your friends and family have always complimented your bare face. A natural beauty, as they liked to call you. Then you saw the girls that he dated back when he was younger, and it made you insecure.

So you learned how to do hair and make-up. Buying expensive ass hair curlers, eyeshadows, foundations, lipstick, brushes and all that shit just for him to say to not notice what you have been doing.

You observed him to no end, taking notes of his likes and dislikes. His favorite dishes and drinks, colors and style of clothing, heck, you even memorized the song that he's been humming to for days.

The books beside his bed and on his shelves weren't left untouched by you. Every page was read dutifully so you could relate to him whenever he tells you a story about a recent book that he had bought.

But it seems that your efforts were all in vain, as there is always something that is lacking in you.

"The colors of your outfit are not matching."

"Oh, I'm actually trying a new kind of coffee today."

"No, wrong author, I can't believe you'll make a mistake about this."

It may be the emotional attachment or the undying commitment that you hold dear for him are the reasons why you continued to change yourself for him. In your eyes, he is absolutely perfect, and you're determined to fit in his aesthetic.

You were determined to make him accept you.

But as they all say, the more you burn, the more you turn yourself into ashes that will inevitably crumble.

And the snapping point was nigh when you're tired and he couldn't even bat an eye on your well-being.

"Is that what you're wearing tonight?" Hongjoong eyes your appearance, black dress and clean hair and make-up, and if you ask anyone, they'll say that it's simple yet elegant.

Truth to be told, you don't have the energy to go all out for the event that you're attending. Still, you did your best to look presentable, and you did a great job, you think.

It was a hellish week for you. Finals are coming up and you're dying from all the studying, you're also struggling in your part-time job because of the lack of sleep. The worst one was the nagging of your parents, constantly asking you about your plans for the future.

Everything was taking a toll on you and the last thing that you wanna hear came from the very same person that should have been a source of comfort.

Hongjoong sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose, "Just.. stay put in one place. I can't have you embarrassing me further than this."

There you go, you lost it.

"Embarrass you?" a deriding tone rode along with your words, "What the fuck does that mean?"

"Y/N, do you see yourself? I told you to do your best, and this isn't what I envisioned." he mumbles, expression souring when you exuded such an attitude in his words.

"Ah." it was flat, the way you said it, as you were suddenly hit with the realization that even when you restart and destroy yourself, it will never be fucking enough for him.

Gosh, he could've at least acted better. Feigned care and faked affection, but he can't even give you that.

And you're so fucking done with his bullshit.

"I will not come with you anymore. Go alone." you muttered, turning in your heels and heading to the bedroom.

"What? Y/N, stop being a child."

"No, Hongjoong. I need you to stop being a know-it-all, go fuck yourself."

That was the first time you stood up for yourself, and damn did it feel good. Like you're finally free from his restraints, and it's addicting.

He rolls his eyes at you, muttering a 'Suit yourself.' and exiting the house, not even an ounce of concern at your sudden outburst, and that was all you needed to make a cathartic decision.

That was the day you left without a trace, and you can finally breathe without him cursing you into the darkness of being inadequate.

He blew your phone up, messaging and calling you, and you were disappointed when it ceased just after a day. It says a lot about him though, on how much of an asshole he is.

Especially after a mere three days and he's already posting a new bimbo in his social media accounts.

At the present time, you're tempted to spill the alcohol in his face and probably ruin his expensive suit.

How could you even believe him that he's serious, that he's not kidding when he made you feel like a clown.

You chuckle, staring straight ahead, "Did your new girl dump you or something?"

"No. I just realized that it's different, you know? If it's not with you then it doesn't feel right." he admits, looking down at his shoes because frankly, he is ashamed of gazing into your eyes.

You couldn't help but ridicule him, standing up from your seat and straightening your dress, shooting him a dangerous glare, "I told you this before, and I'd repeat it a thousand times."

You smile wickedly, flipping him off, "Go fuck yourself."

You walk away, not paying attention to his desperate calls, the polite facade is gone in the wind and the only thing that you could think of is that you're not gonna allow him to break your heart and soul anymore.

You have only started to regain your true self, not the image that he wanted you to have, and you'll be damned if you'll let him get inside your head again.

Kim Hongjoong was a lesson, one that you'll never forget and never forgive. Maybe you loved him too much, but at least you now know that if someone truly loves you, that person will accept you for who and what you are.

taglist:

@acciocriativity @iarayara @stolasisyourparent @shakalakaboomboo @xdannix @nsixns

[toxintouch]

Yooooooo, you write fan fictions, don't you? Halloween is, like, right over there *points*. would you be willing to do one of mhin taking sparrow ghost hunting? and maybe even having a "guest appearance" of a certain shadow manipulator?

if this has already been done, could you point me in the right direction?

thank you~

I've never seen a fic like that but omg. This is such a brilliant idea, I love how all the pieces come together so perfectly–Vere being said to be responsible for his fair share of local ghost stories, mentions of Mhin and haunted houses in the Uquiz results… Premium thoughts.  I had a lot of fun writing this, ty for giving me the prompt!! :>

It took a couple of extra days but it's also longer (~2900 words) so hopefully that makes up for it.  p.s sorry if u meant it to be more gen bc I wrote romantic pining lol Volume Warning! Ambiance (~BEAUTIFUL FOX NOISES) for y'all /j

Cold Spots

You pull your cloak tighter around yourself, sheltering your remaining body heat from the howling wind.  

You ignore the shiver that creeps down your spine.

You’ve been warned that the night is chilly in Eridia at this time of year, but you haven’t quite scraped together enough coin to afford more layers.  So you huddle closer to the swaying lamplight of the Wet Wick, attempting to leech warmth from the cheery (if occasionally overwhelming) atmosphere of the bar.  You’re on edge, wary about straying too far from the Wick’s affable open doors and the balmy light spilling out of them.

You crane your neck to peer as far as you can around the corner without moving, eyeing the myriad of nearby alleyways, all full to the brim with shadows, searching for a familiar splash of moonlight and blue sweeping through the night.

 That’s when you feel eyes on your back.

You freeze, all of your senses on high alert.

“You’re where I asked you to be.”  Mhin says in lieu of a greeting.  You startle, reeling around to face them.  Even when you're expecting them, they have the uncanny ability of sneaking up on you.

“You say that like you’re surprised.”  You chide, in mock affront.  “You’ll notice that I’m also on time.”  Your giddiness shows on your face, a smile tugging at your lips.

“Don’t act so pleased with yourself,” they snipe while rolling their eyes, “for anyone else, that’s the bare minimum.”  They frown, looking you up and down with their arms tightly crossed. “...Is that what you’re wearing?”

Any further quips you have for them die in your mouth, drowned out by nervous chuckling.  You realize they must be asking (in their own way) if you’re not going to get too cold.  You know you could just ask Leander or Kuras for some seasonally appropriate attire but you’d rather not rely on further charity if you can’t help it.  Hence: “I’m, um, warm blooded?”  You mean to inject an appropriate amount of bravado into your voice, but it comes out as more of a question.

Mhin sighs, long eyelashes brushing their cheeks as they close their eyes for one long moment.   “Sometimes I wonder…  Fine.  Let’s just get going.”

The floorboards shriek beneath your feet as you step across the threshold.  The entire shack seems to groan and sway, protesting audibly against the wind.  You stick close to Mhin’s back as they hold their gas lamp up, casting an eerie glow about the interior of the abandoned building.  Their keen eyes do a quick sweep before they nod decisively and usher you inside with a single precise motion.

The bellow of the wind sounds almost like a scream as the door shuts behind you.

“So, what are we looking for, exactly?”  Your voice comes out hushed, the haunting atmosphere insisting that you behave accordingly.

“Likely nothing.”  Mhin responds.  “Actual ghost sightings are very rare.  And of those, few recorded instances come from trustworthy sources.  People in Eridia can be quite superstitious.  Count on rats or other pests.  It’s more plausible that this is a mere infestation rather than–”

The roof above your heads gives a long, low creeaaaak.

You both pause for a beat, listening to silence.

“How would we know if it's a real ghost?”  You ask, more out of curiosity than anything.  You’re not about to waste the opportunity, if Mhin is willing to keep talking.

“Depends on the type of ghost.”  Another protest from the floorboards as Mhin wanders further into the dark.  Since you don’t have a lantern of your own, you have no choice but to follow close behind.  Unless you want to stumble around with nothing but the shatters of dusty moonlight cast through the cracked windows to guide your way.

Mhin and you make a quick round of the small building, finding it mostly empty, only a few pieces of broken furniture left behind.  You draw closer to the back wall, carefully avoiding moth-eaten curtains, heeding Mhin’s warning about a small step.  Based on the layout, you think this place might have been a bar or entertainment hall of some sort.  You imagine it had a nice, cozy parlor at one time, though now it’s fallen into squalor.  As Mhin examines the walls for signs of pests and other clues, you examine the graffiti strewn across them: crude jokes and lewd drawings, mostly.  Some scattered names, belonging to people and gangs you’ve never heard of before.  

Framed in the center, though, there's a huge riot of colorful paint.  An abstract painting with no proper canvas.  It's beautiful, somehow, though hauntingly morose.  The artist has contained their work in a neat square, not a single streak of color escaping the precisely imposed prison.  You’re not sure what the intent of the artist was choosing somewhere like this to display it…  

“Is there a type of ghost that makes artwork?”  You wonder aloud.  You almost wish that Mhin would hand you the lantern so you can get a better look.

Mhin clicks their tongue, sparing barely a glance toward the makeshift painting.  “I wouldn't define that as art.”  Mhin follows the line of the wall to the corner, their lantern held up to the wall.  “That’s just…paint.  If you’re looking for ghosts, try looking for scratch marks.  Those are a possible indicator, though not always a reliable one.  A sudden feeling of hot, or cold–any otherwise unexplainable temperature change.  A strange odor…”

You give the air a sniff.  “...I don’t smell anything.  Do you?”

“Dust.  Rotting wood.  And you’ve stopped using Leander’s bath soaps, which I’ll commend you for.  Why anybody would want to smell that strongly of–”  Mhin stops and gives a short whiff, their mouth slightly parted.  Their brows furrow. “It is unusual…I don't see or smell any signs of rats or roaches.  No vultures either…”

“Maybe something else scared them away?”  You posit.  You shuffle closer to Mhin, not liking the way the shadows around you seem to flow and ebb the longer you look at them, your mind making up shapes.  There’s a silly part of you that wants to feel Mhin’s cloak between your bandaged fingers as reassurance that they’ll stay close.  They’d probably hate to know that you see them as something to cling to–a source of comfort, safety.

You try to take another step closer to further dampen your trepidation, but instead you trip over– something–and stumble directly into Mhin.  They catch you on impulse, strong and quick enough to steady you with one arm while holding the lantern with the other.  You breathe an apology, your lips bumping against their chin as they help you get your feet back under you.  

You both search the ground to determine what knocked you off your balance.

It's a dirty old rug, rucked up at one edge.  

A long line of what appears to be claw marks lies half uncovered below it.  Mhin kneels beside the marks, studying them intently, carefully moving the rug to reveal yet more splintered wood.  “I’m not sure what could have done this,” they admit.  “The marks are fresh, but none of the dust was disrupted…”

The floorboards groan another protest, though it bounds off the walls in strange ways, making it difficult to pinpoint exactly where the sound originated.

“Aural contortions.”  Mhin announces.  “And a feeling that you’re being watched.  Reflective surfaces will behave oddly as well.  Hold this.”  Mhin hands you the lantern (more: shoves it into your grasp, really) reaching into their satchel.  Their nimble hands pull out a handful of alchemical concoctions, one which shines like the inside of a seashell, a tiny silver locket, which they flick open to reveal a small mirror.  There’s symbols etched into it, so old and worn away you can’t make them out.

You draw the lantern closer at their behest, illuminating a small smile spread across their face.

Is Mhin …Having fun?

“Is there anything I can do to help?”  You ask, hoping they don’t notice the warmth in your voice. Getting scolded would kind of ruin the mood.

Mhin glances up, blinking at you like they almost forgot you were there.  Their tongue peeks out, wetting their lips as they consider.  “Yes,” they finally agree, “would you–”

The lamplight is smothered by an unknown force.

The cracked streams of light from the window are gone, leaving you in darkness.

Mhin swears, their voice distorting as if they are suddenly very far away.  A moment ago they were crouched beside you, but the shadows surrounding you are so inky you can’t make out their silhouette at all.  Instinctively, you reach your hands out in front of you before freezing and reluctantly forcing them back down.  If both you and Mhin end up stumbling around with hands outstretched, there’s a possibility that they might accidentally grasp onto you and disrupt your bandages.  (You wish you had given into your desire to hold onto them earlier.)  

You whisper their name, frantic, hoping they can hear you.

“I’m here,” Mhin assures you, their voice pitched low and cautious.  You feel the gentle press of a foot against yours, a light tap of reassurance against the side of your sole.  “Stay close.”  There’s a brush of fingertips against your back.  “If the entity is particularly powerful, it will be able to move objects,” Mhin cautions, “but a ghost should never be capable of causing harm to humans directly.  And there’s not much in here that it could throw.  Just stay calm.  If you don’t keep your emotions in check, it will only be more incensed.”

Light flashes through the room again in a spotlight, guiding your gaze to a particular area of the building.

The abstract mural is defaced, dripping black liquid splattered boldly across the wall like arterial spray.  You retreat a step, feeling something wet beneath your feet.  There’s a sharp, astringent tang in the air.  Musty and earthy-floral.  Old velvet and leather, parchment and fresh paint.

You realize, with a sinking feeling of cold terror, that the black ichor on the wall spells your name.

    Eyes on you.  

Touch like a gossamer spider web.  Brushing against the nape of your neck.

“Mhin,” you whisper urgently.  “Something just–”  

The cold hits you then.  Bone deep and all consuming.  Judging by the way Mhin swears, they must feel it too.  Whatever this unknown entity is, it’s close.  And it wants…

Shadow flickers, fingers reaching for you, claws grasping, white glint of teeth.

Mhin sneers audibly, reaching for you and reeling you in by your cloak just before the figure can snatch you up.  Their arm wraps around you, guiding you with them as they recede.  They sweep their stiletto in a wide arc and you hear the clang of metal on metal, though you have no idea what it was that Mhin hit.  Their night vision must be immaculate–you can hardly see more than the fresh glint of their stiletto blade.

“Turns out it is a vermin infestation.”

A bark of laughter.  

Very familiar laughter.

The door starts to rattle on its hinges, moving to the rhythm of Vere's glee.  Mhin walks over to it, dragging your shaking body with them.  With a definitive kick from Mhin and a final cackle from Vere, the door bursts open.

Mhin tugs you out into the open air and slams it behind them.

“Awful fur-bag.”  Mhin spits the words out like the mere thought of Vere leaves a bad taste in their mouth.

You’re far enough away that the black paint clinging to both of your shoes is no longer leaving footprints, but you can’t say the same about the bone deep cold.

You’re shivering so hard your teeth start to chatter, adrenaline magnifying the chill in your bones.  How did Vere even do that?  You rub your arms and nearly stumble into Mhin in the process.  Their features twist into a half-formed scowl, eyes sweeping you before softening into something more delicate.

You find yourself staring into eyes that seem to catch the moonlight, words caught in your throat.

“You’re freezing.” Mhin murmurs, resting a hand against the curve of your cheek, testing your temperature.

You’re surprised at the contact.  Mhin is always so careful about touching you–it’s something you appreciate, usually, this unspoken agreement between the two of you; Mhin doesn’t ask intrusive questions, just makes silent hypotheses and treats your personal space with care.  You appreciate it–usually–but sometimes, (constantly), you wish…

Mhin’s thumb pets against your jaw.  They glace away from you as they do, unable to hold your gaze, but they don’t remove their hand, even as the moment hangs heavy in the air.  Their hand is soft, you think, fingertips like silk, though you can feel the thick calluses built up at the meat of their palm.  Likely hard won and harder lost, trophies from their time as a freelancer and whatever secret misfortune befell them what led them to Eridia.  Unthinking, you nuzzle into their touch, luxuriating in the coveted feeling of skin on skin.  You have half a mind to turn your head, press your lips against their calluses, kiss them like you’re drawing poison from a wound.

Mhin catches your chin between their thumb and pointer finger.  Their grip is assertive, certain.  You’d worry that you’ve angered them somehow, but the intensity of their gaze, the subtle tilt of their head, the flush of their cheeks, the featherlight caress of their breath on your lips…

–You think they might–

They back away abruptly in one smooth stride.  Their hands work quickly at the intricate clasp on their cloak.  Oh, now they’re really looking away.

“Wear this while we head back.  You didn’t come to this city to die of cold.”

They look at their bracers pointedly as you hesitate, as if itching to adjust them.  You slowly reach out and put the garment on.

The trek back to the Wick is uneventful.  The occasional star glances out from the pall of clouds constantly lingering in the Eridian sky.  You look for the waning moon, finding its reticent light and following it home.  You return Mhin’s cloak at the door, careful to hold it in a way that allows them to take it without having to touch you – touch your bandages.  

Mhin looks, oddly, a little reluctant to see it returned.  You’re not sure how else you can possibly read their body language.  Their hunched shoulders, the downturn of their mouth, their uncharacteristic lingering.  Holding the cloak in their hands like they can’t quite decide what to think of it.

They let out a sharp breath.

Mhin levels you with a pointed glare as they settle their mantle across their shoulders, affixing the clasp without need to look down.  “Buy some warmer clothes.” they order, “Tell Leander that the contract is complete and the buyer’s ‘ghost problem’ is solved.  The building should be fine for renovations, just tell them to start their renewal project on a day when the Senobium is actually holding Vere’s leash.”

  “You’ll come back for your cut tomorrow…?”  Confusion rolls off your lips.

“No.”  Mhin crosses their arms again.  “I just told you to buy some warmer clothes, didn’t I?  Consider it hazard pay.”  Again, that disgusted tone Mhin reserves for Vere.  “Even with that taken into consideration, you’ll still owe me, though.  Don’t forget.  I’ll collect some day; everyone does in this city.”

You’re not sure what to say.  Mhin is insisting that this is just a loan, and you believe that wholeheartedly.  But that doesn’t mean it isn’t charity.  Mhin’s also offering you transparency–an open disclosure of the deal you’re agreeing to.  You take their cut, buy what you need, and resolve to pay it back when you can.  And if Mhin needs something similar in the future, you’ll return them in kind.  

You think you stumble over your words a little, but you agree to their offer.

“I’ll be back to collect another contract.  Hopefully something that’s not a waste of my time.”

And a promise to come back is a promise to see you again, isn’t it?  To include you in their life?  Is that what you’re supposed to take from this?  That Mhin cares for you, even if they won’t–

  Or is it your foolish heart, showing you a path that isn’t really there?  

“Goodnight, Mhin.”  You say the words, but their back is already turned, steps already taken.

   ✦ EXTENDED ENDING...? ✦

You putter around in your room at the Wet Wick as you go about your nightly routine. The occasional cheer or thud from below only accentuates your nervous energy, punctuating your reluctance to settle down and get into bed. You smooth the covers with your bandaged hands and fluff the pillow before extinguishing the lamplight. You tug the bedding up above your shoulders, fighting to get comfortable. As your eyelids finally start to droop, the flicker of a shadow catches your attention.   It dances and sways and bends and grows until suddenly it is right in front of you.  On top of you. Silken, blood red drips down onto your face, a knife gleam smile too close for comfort.  You breathe in a gasp, wondering if you should scream. “Vere, what–” “Shhh,” he coos, pressing a finger lightly to your lips.  His breath is hot against your skin. “I only came to keep you warm, pet.”

✦Heat Signature (Vere Continuation) ->

[anto-pops]

To the Victor Go the Spoils - Sebastian Sallow x Female!Reader

Summary: Since Sebastian can't hold himself accountable and show up to Quidditch practice, Imelda takes matters into her own hands and bans him from being around you until the upcoming game is finished. It's something easier said than done.

Alternatively summarized as you and Sebastian having a terrible time in lieu of Imelda's no-sex-ban, but good things always come to those who wait.

Based on a request I received! Hope you like it anon :)

Word Count: 4.8k

Warnings: 18+, aged up characters, explicit content

Full fic can be found here on Ao3! 

It’s not like you couldn’t tell Sebastian was overwhelmed. He wore his emotions on his sleeve, despite his efforts to always hide them. A boggart could mirror him in a flash and betray his fears and his thoughts, but even then you would know what to expect beforehand, because you knew him better than anyone. 

Between classes, the new Quidditch season, and his new goal of becoming an Auror, Sebastian felt like he was being pulled in a thousand different directions all at once. Realistically, it shouldn’t be so difficult for him to prioritize one task at a time. That’s how easy it would be to solve his problems; he only needed to slow down and take a breath before diving back into the bottomless workload. But it didn’t matter what he told himself or how he rationalized everything– he was still stressed and on the verge of tearing his hair out. 

You watched as Sebastian pushed around a sausage on his plate, his breakfast mostly untouched while he warred with the thoughts in his head. 

“You should eat,” chimed Ominis from across the table, tired of listening to the scrape of Sebastian’s fork on the platter. “Don’t you have Quidditch practice in an hour? You’ll need the energy.” 

“Not really hungry,” Sebastian replied monotonously, and you frowned. 

Popping your last piece of sliced fruit in your mouth, you jabbed at Sebastian’s sausage with your fork and held it up to his lips imploringly. “Eat. He’s right, you’ll be useless out there if you’re running on fumes.” 

Pressing the greasy meat to Sebastian’s freckled lips garnered a small smile from him, but that was it. He gingerly pushed your hand away and shook his head, letting his chin fall against his palm with a sigh. “Sorry darling, really though. I think I’ll throw up if I try at this point.” 

Grumbling something about ‘taking better care of himself’, your trio’s attention was then grabbed by the sound of the Great Hall doors being thrown open. The fact that Imelda had the strength to actually make the monstrous slabs of wood ricochet off the wall was terrifying, but the feeling paled in comparison to the fear you felt when your eyes landed on her furious expression. 

“Sallow!” she bellowed over the chatter in the dining room, and a hush seemed to fall over the crowd. “Where the hell have you been?” 

Sebastian’s back was to the doorway, but you watched as his eyes pinched shut at the sound of the Quidditch captain’s voice. Merlin’s beard– this was just what he didn’t need. Ominis fought a smile at the sound of Imelda stomping over to where you were seated, and when she came to stop behind you, you cast a pleading look over your shoulder at her. 

“Imelda, he’s not feeling great today–” 

“Bullshit,” she cut you off, and your mouth snapped shut with an audible crack. “He’s not feeling great but he still has time to run around school instead of coming to practice? I think not. Get your ass up, Sebastian, I’m not letting you miss a third day.” 

His dark eyes made a full circle in his skull, but he sighed, already resigned to his fate. There was no arguing with Imelda when she was in one of her moods, and he knew he’d already done enough to piss her off by blowing off Quidditch practice two days in a row. He wouldn’t put it past her to kick him off the team entirely if he started to grouse. 

Sebastian shot you a smile as he stood from his seat, although it kind of looked more like a grimace. Before he could move to head for the doors, he watched as Imelda snatched the fork you’d skewered his sausage with. She spun towards him, her free hand flying to his face in a split second, and when her fingers pinched his nose and jerked his head up, Sebastian’s mouth was left open long enough for his Captain to shove the food between his lips. 

“Mmph–” the sausage hung limp in Sebastian’s slack mouth, his eyes widening at the brazen action, but Imelda only nodded once, pleased with her handy work. 

“There. Eat that on the way. And you,” she pointed a crooked finger at you, making you pause. “Unless you’re going to drag Sallow’s lazy ass to the field every day this week, stay away from him. He’s useless to me if he can’t play right and something tells me you’re a bigger distraction than you are a help.” 

An indignant sound resonated from your throat, but before you could formulate a retort, Imelda had spun on her heel and was dragging Sebastian out of the Great Hall by the fabric of his cloak. He cast one last irritated glance at you over his shoulder, sausage link perched between his lips, before he disappeared completely from sight, and you scoffed. 

“Unbelievable. Who the hell does she think she is?” 

It was a mostly rhetorical question, but Ominis chuckled across from you and scraped his remaining breakfast into a pile before answering. “She is the Captain of the team. Honestly I’m surprised it took her this long to drag Sebastian back to the field. He has been rather… preoccupied, recently.” 

Exasperated, you exclaimed, “Yeah, with school! She can’t seriously think I’m to blame for him blowing off practice. Sebastian is going to do what he wants to do, we both know that.” 

Ominis shrugged before spooning his last bite into his mouth, choosing his words carefully as he chewed and swallowed. “True. However, you have to admit he has spent every waking minute of his free time this week with you. It’s not a bad thing, don’t get me wrong, but we also know Sebastian will always prioritize what he likes to do over what he should do.” 

It frustrated you to admit it, but Ominis had a point. Whatever, if Imelda wanted Sebastian to herself to focus on Quidditch, then so be it. The big game against Gryffindor was in three days. You could keep your distance from Sebastian for that long, for his sake and maybe for yours as well. It pained you to admit it, but you had been putting off studying for your exams, preferring to get tangled in the sheets with Sebastian late at night and canoodle like teenagers. 

Convinced the rest of the day would be boring and slow moving, you sighed and rose from your seat. “Come on, let’s head to the library. Might as well spend the next three days catching up on some reading.” 

Ominis neatly organized his cutlery on his plate before plucking his wand from the table and standing. “That’s the spirit. I wouldn’t worry too much, three days is nothing in the grand scheme of things.” 

For some reason, you didn’t believe him. 

—

Imelda made good on her word to keep Sebastian away from you in his free time. Every time you saw him around school he was wearing his Quidditch uniform, grass and dirt stains accumulating on his knees and elbows with each passing hour. He looked beyond haggard, but he seemed to be in good enough spirits when you finally sat beside him in charms class a day later. It was the first chance you’d been given to talk with him since the other morning, and Sebastian seemed as eager to be around you as you were to be beside him. 

“Hey stranger,” he whispered with a smile as Professor Ronan started on a tangent about responsible wand usage. 

Your grin was ear splitting, “Hey yourself. How has practice been going?” 

He shrugged nonchalantly, flipping through his textbook to give the appearance of following along in the lesson. “As good as it can be, I guess. Imelda’s new trials are brutal but effective. I like to think we’ll crush Gryffindor to dust come this weekend.” 

“That’s good. Is she still keeping you on a short leash?” 

At that, Sebastian’s face fell, his brows slamming down in disbelief. “You have no idea. Do you know what she told me after assaulting me with that sausage the other day? She said ‘no hanky-panky until we win the game’. Apparently my having sex is a distraction and she won’t have any of it.” 

Sebastian groaned under his breath when you lifted your hand to muffle your laughter. “Wow, she isn’t messing around this time. Did she put you in a chastity belt or something?” 

“Thank fucking Merlin she hasn’t, but I wouldn’t put it past her. It’s the most counter productive thing I’ve ever heard in my life. How is not having sex going to win us the game? If anything it’s detrimental to my performance– I’m all strung out and whiny.” 

“Honestly, I think it’s just her own unique form of punishment for skipping practice,” you murmured. “Better sort out your time management skills fast, who knows what she’ll do in the future if you start slacking off again.”

Before he could reply, Professor Ronan was instructing the class to pair up and practice a new spell. Free from Imelda’s piercing gaze for one blessed hour, Sebastian didn’t hesitate to place his hand on your shoulder, silently claiming you as his partner. 

The rest of class breezed by fairly quickly, and afterwards when everyone had been dismissed to head out to lunch, you found yourself being led down a corridor into a dark, dusty broom closet by Sebastian. You felt your boyfriend’s hands on your waist as he guided you backwards against the wall, and then his lips were on yours, chasing away the hollow feeling that had existed in your chest since he’d been kidnapped from the Great Hall the day prior. 

It was frantic and desperate, both of you trying in vain to taste as much of the other as possible. Your hands were everywhere; in his hair, scratching down his chest, then underneath the pressed fabric of his dress shirt as your fingers danced across his burning skin. Sebastian’s tongue delved deep in your mouth, swallowing the tiny mewls his kisses pulled from you with deep rooted pride. When his knee nestled itself in between your spread legs and pressed against your core, you couldn’t help but moan loudly at the sensation, wanting instantly to feel more of him after one mere day of trying not to be a distraction. 

As Sebastian’s hand came up to undo the top button of your blouse, light suddenly flooded the dirty closet, sending the two of you scurrying apart flushed and panting. 

“Well well, my little bird was right. You were being naughty. Tsk tsk, Sallow.” Imelda had her hands firmly planted on her hips, an utterly devilish smile playing on her lips. “Out you go, dear. Sebastian needs to eat lunch and then it’s straight to the Quidditch pitch for practice.” 

“For fuck’s sake, Reyes. Is nothing sacred anymore?” Sebastian’s hands raked through his disheveled hair, looking like the textbook definition of ‘frazzled’ and ‘horny’. 

“My rules are sacred, and you damn near broke the most important one. You seriously can’t keep it in your pants for two more days? It’s not like I’m asking you to cut off your manhood and leave it with her. It’s just pathetic at this point.” 

An elaborate string of profanities fell from Sebastian’s lips as he strode out of the closet past Imelda, his hands curled into fists at his side. He said nothing to you on his way out, but you already knew he was in for it now. His erection had been painfully obvious pressed against your thigh through his trousers. 

Imelda was still standing in the doorway, taking in your own unkempt appearance with a coy smirk. “You can have him back after the game, I promise. In the meantime, I would go clean up if I were you. You look like you’re in heat.” 

She turned to leave then, the closet door drifting shut in your face as you gaped at the empty space where she had disappeared from. 

That woman was unbelievable. You silently wished Sebastian luck with the brutal case of blue balls you knew he would be sporting for the rest of the day. 

— 

The game was unbelievably intense. 

Imelda had definitely put her team through the ringer in the days leading up to Saturday, but the same could be said for Gryffindor’s players. Every time Slytherin scored, Gryffindor seemed to bounce back almost instantaneously with a point of their own. Your eyes had been glued to Sebastian the entire time, watching in awe as he zipped around the field and evaded bludgers with a finesse you couldn’t help but cheer for. 

He scored the next point, psyching out Gryffindor’s keeper with a fake throw towards the left hoop before angling his arm at the right one. The quaffle soared through the ring, and the crowd around you roared in support. 

“Sebastian scored!” you exclaimed and grabbed Ominis by his forearm, shaking him wildly with enthusiasm. “It’s fifty to forty now– we might actually win this!” 

“Where is Slytherin’s seeker?” he asked, your excitement palpable enough to get his heart racing. 

You searched the field for the woman in question. Clarisse Brown was scanning the pitch below her from high above, her eyes narrowed in concentration. All the noise from the stands did little to deter her focus, and you watched with rapt interest as her gaze zero’d in on the Gryffindor seeker across the way. 

“She’s close to the goal post on her side– no hang on, she’s diving! She’s following Gryffindor’s seeker, I think they’ve spotted the snitch.” 

Everything else happened so quickly, you barely had time to commentate any of it to Ominis before you were watching the two seekers tumble against the grass after the tiny, golden ball. A hush fell over the crowd as the players untangled their limbs from the ground, but then it was Clarisse shooting upright, the snitch clasped victoriously in her hand. 

“She caught it– Slytherin got the snitch! They won!” 

The celebration started almost instantly. Throes of screaming students funneled down onto the field to hoist Clarisse high above their heads, whooping and cheering and chanting songs to praise the hard earned triumph. 

You and Ominis stayed in the safety of the emptying stands, but even from far away, you saw Sebastian’s head turn towards you. His gaze was one of thrilled success, and when he took in the sight of you beaming at him, a different sort of look passed over his features. 

One that you were eager to see up close. 

—

The Slytherin team certainly knew how to throw an after party. The common room was in a celebratory uproar, goblets of spiked pumpkin juice being passed around as chatter filled every nook and cranny of the otherwise dim, quiet room. Truly, you’d never seen it so packed. 

Sebastian didn’t give a shit though. He didn’t care about toasting to his team’s victory, nor did he care to even congratulate Clarisse on catching the snitch in the first place. 

No, all he cared about was getting you upstairs on his bed. 

You had no choice but to practically skip to keep up with Sebastian’s long-legged stride as he led you to his dorm. His grip on your wrist was like a vice, unrelenting as he weaved through the scattered groups of people you encountered on the way. A few of them looked as though they wanted to congratulate him– maybe even strike up an actual conversation– but the look on his face must have been downright primal, because everyone of them backed up with wide eyes and hushed whispers. 

You flushed under their knowing stares. Merlin.

When Sebastian tugged you through the threshold of the dorm, his lips were on yours in a heartbeat. He pressed you against the still closing door, and as it latched shut, you were jolted by the weight of Sebastian leaning against you. His hands were winding in your hair, tugging you against his mouth urgently in some desperate attempt to taste you. You wrapped your arms around his neck, kicking your legs up to hook around his waist as you shamelessly rolled your hips against his, and the throaty growl he let loose had heat pooling in your gut instantly. 

“Worst fucking week of my life,” he groaned the statement against your lips, and you couldn’t help but snicker. “I’m serious, I’m gonna kick Imelda’s ass if she ever tries to impose her rules on me again.” 

That wasn’t going to cut it. You hadn’t spent the last three days waiting to get your boyfriend back from Imelda for him to start talking about her with his cock rutting against you. “Can you not bring up Imelda and just fuck me already?” 

An animalistic sound came from Sebastian then, and he pulled away from your lips long enough to stare at you in a way that had you dizzy with arousal. “With pleasure, darling.” 

He was quick to throw you down on his bed, hastily muttering a locking charm on the door before he tossed his wand on the dresser and ripped his jersey over his shoulders. The dried sweat on his skin glimmered against the glow from the hearth in the center of the room, leaving your mouth watering, and you rushed to kick off your boots to speed things along. 

Sebastian was on you in an instant, kissing you senseless as one deft hand slid under your waistband and flicked the button open. He trailed his soft lips down the curve of your jaw, then lower along your neck, and he paused to suck at the skin there as he tugged your trousers down from your hips. You lifted your ass to assist, and once the restrictive material was gone, Sebastian straddled your waist so he could press his clothed member against the thin cotton of your undergarments firmly. 

You moaned at the contact, tilting your head back to grant him easier access to your fluttering pulse. He licked a broad stripe down the sensitive skin of your throat while his hands began undoing the clasps of your shirt. 

Sebastian’s gravelly voice vibrated against the wet skin of your neck, snapping you out of your pleasure induced daze. “Do you want me to bend you over or do you want to look at me while I fuck you?” 

Damn. “I-I want to see you. Feel like I haven’t had the chance to all week.” Your hands punctuated the statement by trailing up the delicious curve of his spine, drawing a shiver from him. “Is that okay? What do you want?” 

When he pulled away from your flushed neck, his eyes darkened immeasurably further, and the longer strands of his hair falling into his face gave him the appearance of some impassioned, sex-driven lunatic– but you weren’t about to start complaining. Not when he scooched down your prone form to start unbuttoning your shirt, and certainly not when he poked his tongue through his lips in thoughtful concentration. 

“I just want you, I don’t care about anything else. Fuck– not even jerking off helped– it’s like there was a mental block I couldn’t get past.” The last button fell open, and Sebastian slid the material off of your shoulders, his eyes hungrily roving over your naked body. His fingers trailed up your smooth stomach before kneading your breasts in his heated palms, drawing a strangled gasp from your throat. “Did you touch yourself at all this week or were you waiting for me?” 

You were embarrassed to admit that you had tried, but before you could tell him as much, Sebastian was pinching your nipples slightly and twisting, causing you to arch into his touch as a high-pitched moan sounded from your kiss swollen lips. “Mm, Sebastian–” 

The sound of your voice threatened to send him over the edge right then and there. “There is no wrong answer, I’m only curious…” 

He trailed off, lessening his ministrations against your breasts so you could reply. “Y-Yes. I tried, but it wasn’t the same. It never is.” 

That cocky smirk was taking up his entire face, and you knew then you should have just lied, because now his ego was bound to grow out of control. 

“It never is, hm? Then what do you want– what do you need to get off? Say the words, darling, and it’s yours.” 

Despite the delectable feeling of his hands working you into a frenzy, you wanted to smother him for taking so long. Was three days worth of stolen glances and a crippling case of blue balls not enough to push him into action? Of course not. Typical of him to still find a way to make you beg for what you knew he wanted more than anything. 

Your hands flew up to grip the belt loops on his painfully tight trousers, tugging his hips down so they were flush with the slick cloth separating your heat from him. “I need you– I need your cock inside of me, please Sebastian. My fingers just aren’t the same–” 

He silenced you with a particularly aggressive kiss, breathing heavily against your cheek as his teeth came to nibble at your bottom lip before he pulled away entirely to unfasten his belt. You’d never seen him move so quickly, his quidditch trousers coming to pool in a wrinkled heap against the stone floor, and then it was just his briefs in the way. They disappeared just as fast, his cock springing free and arching proud against the hair below his navel, and then Sebastian was scaling up the bed like a predator. 

When he kissed you again, he started to slide your soaked panties away, letting you kick them off when they got too low for him to follow. He placed his fingers against your overwhelmingly slick entrance, relishing in the needy gasp his featherlight touch pulled from you. 

You caved completely to Sebastian as he pushed a slender digit inside, working you open slowly as your spine curved off the mattress and you whined loud. Sebastian let himself bask in the sight of you for a moment despite his baser urges; you looked great spread for him like this, rocking down onto his finger as your hands fisted in the sheets beneath you, and when you cracked open your half-hooded eyes to gaze up at him, the tenderness in your expression tugged at something in his chest. 

Tentatively, Sebastian added a second finger, slowly pushing inside you and pausing briefly to give you a chance to adjust to the intrusion, but you were already writhing under him, feebly searching for something more. 

“Something the matter?” he purred the question, feeling rather smug when you narrowed your eyes at him. 

“N-Not to be ungrateful, but your fingers aren’t cutting it– ah!”

Sebastian had pulled his hand back and plunged his digits back in, crooking the tips of his fingers up in search of that magical spot that always reduced you to a moaning mess, and it didn’t take him long to find it. He knew your body better than you did. “Not cutting it, huh?” 

You shivered as he proceeded to rub the long appendages along your pulsing walls, seemingly focused on hitting your sweet spot every time, and Merlin, was he succeeding. The pleasure was undeniable, your stomach tensing and twitching as warmth rapidly pooled in your gut, and when the pad of Sebastian’s thumb came to roughly press against your clit, there was no stopping the keening sob that ripped from your mouth. It was glorious– absolutely everything you had been dreaming about all week– and you frantically clawed at the tops of Sebastian’s rounded shoulders in a silent plea. 

“Fuck, please Sebastian– I want you– I wanna come on your cock, I’m not gonna last long, please–” 

He was pulling his fingers out of you in a flash, those strong hands coming to grab at your hips and haul you down the bed so you were flush with his leaking member. The feeling of your slick rubbing against his shaft had him seeing stars, and when he aligned himself and finally pressed into your welcoming heat, his head tipped back as a groan slipped through his clenched teeth. 

“Merlin, you’re so fucking perfect– fuck–” 

It wasn’t a slow descent by any means, but it wasn’t fast either, and you were grateful seeing as it gave you the chance to really feel Sebastian’s cock fill you up. The blunt head reached so deep, way deeper than his fingers or your own, and your nerves lit on fire when he pulled back and rammed into you, his skin slapping against the shapely curve of your ass. Every sensation amplified the fire that had nearly crashed through you minutes earlier, and once he set a steady rhythm, you were writhing in earnest underneath him. 

“Shit,” you gasped after one especially rough thrust. “Fuck, fuck, Sebastian–”

“F-Feel good, darling?” Sebastian whispered, adjusting his grip on you so he could lean closer, and the new angle allowed him to shamelessly rut against you after each plunge of his cock, his own orgasm building quickly after three days of torturing himself without you. 

“Yes, fuck yes, s-so good– right there–” 

The sight of you moving harder against him, panting and keening and trembling, pulled filthy praises and moans alike from Sebastian’s lips. He didn’t think he’d ever wanted to cum so bad in his life– his pace had a mind of its own as he brainlessly thrusted into you, relishing in the feeling of you shaking and tightening around him before your nails were scraping deliciously down his back, and the sting had his cock twitching in a telling manner inside of you. 

“I’m gonna come darling, I’m– fuck–”

You beat him to it, his aggressive tempo sending you falling over the edge with a loud, drawn out cry of his name. Sebastian fucked you hard and fast through it, taking advantage of your pulsing heat to chase his own orgasm as he wound his fingers through your unruly hair and tugged hard enough to make your eyes roll into the back of your head. 

That did it.

Sebastian buried his face in the crook of your neck, his teeth biting at your collarbone as he whimpered your name over and over before his hips faltered and he was coming deep, and the sound of his moans coupled with the feeling of him filling you to the brim only served to push you higher. 

Completely spent, Sebastian let most of his weight fall on top of you as the ebbing waves of his orgasm coursed through him. 

“Holy fuck,” he heard you mutter from beneath him, and he cracked open a bleary eye to see you gazing contentedly at the ceiling. Removing his fingers from your hair to trail lightly over your cheek, you let him drag your face into a lazy, satisfied kiss, the lush scent of him filling your brain with mind numbing bliss. “Mm, missed you.” 

Sebastian’s voice was muffled against your lips when he spoke, “Never agreeing to something like that again. Quidditch can fuck right off– I don’t care.” 

Snickering quietly, you wrapped your arms around his sweaty back and tugged him sideways firmly so you could lay on top of him, careful of where the two of you were still connected. “And here I was going to say this was almost worth the wait.”

“Then you, my dear, are a sick and twisted masochist.” 

That got a real laugh out of you. “Hardly. When I think about it, it was nice seeing you in your uniform all sweaty for three days. Lots of dirty thoughts to fill in the gaps.” 

The awareness in his eyes came flooding back as he stared up at you wide-eyed, and you made a point to commit his gaping expression to memory. “You… wait, what?” 

You fought a smile as you shrugged nonchalantly, “You look good in a uniform. What else is there to say?” 

Following the bob of his throat as he swallowed, Sebastian’s voice sounded tight when he asked, “Do you want me to put it back on?” 

“Not now,” your fingers traced the sharp outline of his collarbones, gliding lower until they came to splay in the sparse collection of hair at the center of his hips. “I can think of a few other things I’d like to watch you do instead of strip all over again.” 

“Only a few?” 

“You’re incorrigible.” 

The rest of the night went by in a blur, with everyone celebrating Slytherin’s victory in the common room by drinking and dancing. All the while, you and Sebastian stayed sequestered in his dorm, intending on taking full advantage of the locked door before his roommates inevitably returned to soil the fun. You two would never need to know that Imelda stood guard at the bottom of the stairs, shooing away any meandering students to different wings of the foyer. It would be her own secret to keep. 

After all, she figured she kind of owed it to you for being such a good sport about the whole thing. 

[hiskillingjar]

Strade with a clingy reader? (I apologize if someone has already asked for this)

lots of requests for this one sooooo i wrote a fic for it!! i also have a headcanon post stacked in the drafts for the other boys (gender neutral) sooooo here we go!

6000+ words, the most lovely and dubious of consent, also posted on archive of our own cus. ya know. it's long babeyyyy

It was rare that you went to Strade’s bedroom door after a nightmare.

Rarer still that he actually let you in.

When you slipped into his room, the opening and closing of his door almost silent and the slow padding of your bare feet against the carpet even quieter, his still body and slow breathing (deep and low, almost a snore but not quite) made you think, for a moment, that he was still asleep.

You wondered if you should just slink away and leave him to it. That was until he wordlessly lifted the corner of his duvet, without even opening his eyes first to greet you, in a silent invitation for you to join him. 

It's so wrong and (honestly) borderline perverse that such a small gesture made your heart swell in your chest to the point of nearly bursting out of your ribcage, but you couldn't help it. 

At least that’s what you told yourself. 

It was easier to play the victim than acknowledge that you might have been at least a little complicit in your captivity.Though you always had a way of blaming yourself for these sorts of things. 

That’s probably what a therapist would have told you, if you had one.

With a hidden smile that you hoped he'd never see (lest he possibly use it against you, and he probably would), you climbed into his bed, effortlessly slotting in next to him as he wrapped a thick arm around your middle and pulled your body close to his, like you were two pieces of a puzzle that naturally fit together without even a degree of forcefulness. His bare, hair-fuzzed chest was sweaty against your back and stuck to the thin vest that you wore in lieu of pyjamas, but the warmth was comforting and pleasant, like sleeping next to a radiator or space heater, so you didn't mind. 

It was nice to be reminded that he existed, you thought as you pressed back against his warmth with a peaceful sigh, to be reminded that this wasn't all some dream concocted by your sick, messed-up mind, desperate for a semblance of comfort and company, no matter the cost to your mental state. 

At least when he was real, you couldn't be blamed for liking the attention, the moments of sweetness, the quiet mornings where he was too tired to pull his mind games on you or hurt you.

Those moments kept you gentle and kind, and, for the most part, pliant to his whims. 

It was your only method of survival, after all, staying sweet on him in spite of it all.

"Come here, buddy," Strade murmured, still half-asleep, his slow breathing like wine, heavy and addictive, and his low voice (his accent thickened with sleep) as smooth and as comforting as velvet, suffocating and all-encompassing, like the warmth and dark of the room, like a pill bug curled up under a mossy log, like a foetus in the womb. "Come here..."

You didn't say anything as he pulled you in even closer, your hips pressed tightly together, his broad thigh wrapping around yours and caging you down against the expensive mattress. You could feel the first stirrings of arousal through his boxers against the thin gusset of your shorts, but you didn't mind, not all that much.

It was too early for worries, surely, too early to be concerned that he might take advantage of your need for comfort and closeness, and take your body as he so often did. 

His arms pulled you into him again, and though he was hot, burning hot (almost too hot, like you descending down the pits of Hell itself), he was also strong and powerful and comforting (and, and, and, you always made explanations for him) and safe. 

You couldn’t possibly resist turning to face him (at least you told yourself that you couldn’t resist), nestling your head into his soft chest, into the crook of his shoulder, and breathing in his scent, gasoline, motor oil, a little sweat (he hadn’t showered yet and you kind of hoped that he wouldn’t until later in the day), the soft musk of effortless masculinity and tan skin and thick hair.

Against your better judgement, you felt safe here.

He was strong. He made you feel small and protected and loved, in a funny sort of way. He was powerful. He was in charge of the house, the looming patriarch of your fucked up little family, like a husband with a doting wife,, and he held all the power that came with that position in a way that so naturally suited him. 

He reached a hand up to stroke through your hair, mussed and a little matted from sleep, and kissed the top of your head very lightly, grumbling lowly in satisfaction as you nestled in even closer, your arms reaching and squeezing around his middle, your legs tangled up with his as you clung like a babe did to its mother.

He was comforting. He made you feel safe.

He made you feel safe.

What a sick joke.

Had the you from three years ago been able to see you now, you had no doubt that they would have begged Strade to kill them, that fateful night in the basement.

Better dead than as a psychopath murderer’s (rapist’s) little lap dog, his little wife, his perfect little hostage.

But he was not your enemy, at least not for now.

He was merely a slumbering beast, a lion, a wolf, his chest rising slowly with each calm breath, up and down, and his eyes gazing lazily down at you as he assessed his prey with the placid and amused detachment expected from a predator.

"My, my, you're awfully clingy this morning," Strade crooned quietly with a low chuckle, the hand in your hair drifting down to your shoulders, feeling the warmth of your skin as it slid underneath your shirt (roaming over the scars that marked your skin). "What, did you have a bad dream or something?"

"Or something," You mumbled, pressing your face a little harder against his chest, trying to make him feel your weight on top of him as he so often did with you. He probably wouldn’t have noticed it much (despite your weight gain over the last three years), but you knew you were doing it, so that’s all that mattered. "I just want to feel you...feel you against me."

"Mm, promises, promises…" He said with another laugh, shaking his head as his thick fingers roamed the notches of your spine. "Normally, you'll do anything you can not to feel me, fraulein...why the change of heart, hm?"

His stubble dotted cheek grazed against yours, the bridge of his nose nestled right up against your jaw, inhaling your scent as you did him, and when you looked up (as he was gesturing for you to do), his golden eyes (so vibrant, even when the room was so dark) were half lidded (still tired) and teeth-achingly fond. 

He was always so good at showing just how fond he was of you, after all.

“What, do you feel like being a good girl for me today?”

You didn't answer his question, not properly. You couldn’t bear agreeing or disagreeing with him, not today anyway.

You didn't say anything, in fact, but you didn't stop him either as he pushed the fingers of his free hand back through your hair, cradled your skull (curling his fingers into a fist) and brought you in for a deep kiss, which you acclimated to almost instantly, clinging onto him even tighter.

It was pathetic, and at least you knew it was fucking pathetic, to admit to yourself that he was everything you wanted before all of this, that he embodied everything you fantasised and masturbated to when you couldn’t get a real person to touch you. It was probably even more pathetic to admit that you still wanted it, in spite of the psychosexual dynamic that was as close to any kind of Stockholm Syndrome as anything else (like it was a real condition anyway). 

You still felt awful and unbearably guilty, in spite of your new found honesty to yourself, that every inch of you continued to yearn for him and crave the feeling of his touch, instead of fighting for your life to be free of him. 

But you always had a way of feeling guilty about the things that you wanted.

You had no doubt that a therapist probably would have said that to you too.

The bruises that seemed to always paint your skin ached slightly, like just being near him, the fire that he was, was enough to set every nerve alight, but the sensation was addictive.

You wanted to get lost in him. 

You wanted to let him make you his, whatever the cost of that submission was.

So, instead of wallowing in your own self pity or lying to yourself (as your fellow captive was so prone to do), you let yourself wrap your arms around his neck and pull him towards yourself, deepening the kiss and letting him take you as he wanted (as he always wanted).

Understanding your need without words (since he was always so strangely attentive of that sort of thing), his kisses gradually grew rougher. 

His sharp cannibal teeth grazed your parted lips as he kissed you hungrily, sucking your tongue, biting down, making you squirm and writhe and moan. His hands roamed down the length of your body and dug into each trembling curve and slope of newly acquired fat, squeezing you so tightly and pressing your body against his so forcefully, it almost hurt. 

This was what he wanted, though, and you knew that: you losing control, giving him full access to you, your bruises, your body, hurting you. 

You were sure that he was going to tear into you one of these days, when he bit down on your lips again, a rupture of blood streaming from your mouth, staining his tongue. You were sure that he was going to make you bleed even more and glut himself on your blood completely, but you didn't care. 

You wanted him, still wanted him, in spite of all of that, in spite of his violence and hunger.

And the more you gave in to him, the more he wanted to take from you.

His mouth wandered down from your lips (his slack tongue drooling a dangerously pinkish string of spittle over your lips and down your chin) and to your neck, making you shiver and gasp even more, gripping onto him tightly, arms around his shoulders, legs tangled with his and squeezing tightly.

"I like this," He mumbled softly, pulling back from your neck (after leaving a bite in his wake)  for just a moment and rubbing his forehead against yours, a smile dimpling his features and making him look all the more sickeningly fond of you. "This attitude turn. You're normally so...brusque with me, so dismissive. It's not all that becoming of someone in your position, you know."

"You can't have minded it too much," You replied, your tone as flat as usual, though your arms tightened around his neck and your legs clung even tighter. "I'm still alive...have been for nearly three years, now."

"Mm, that's true," He agreed with a nod, one hand descending down your body, groping your hips, the soft flesh of your ass, palming the shadowed bruises that covered your flesh. "I guess you're cute enough that I can handle a shitty attitude now and then. But, this..." He laughed again before digging his teeth into his bottom lip and grinding his hips down against yours completely. "This really is too cute for words. Maybe you should keep it up, hm?"

"Maybe," You replied coyly, your own eyes flitting downwards as your hips bucked in unison to his grinding, pressing the two of you together even more.

This was the place he liked to bring you, right to the very edge of your most intimate and darkest desires. It was his way of tempting and playing with you, you guessed, an overgrown child playing with his food, playing with his favourite toy until it broke, while you begged and pleaded for him to pull you back from that edge, before it was too late and you fell over it and succumbed to them completely. 

You found that you were (often) pushed far over the edge, and had been for a while as he climbed on top of you and pinned you down to the mattress with his heavy body (pressing his weight into you), his lips against your neck, leaving kisses, bruises, bites and harsh marks on your skin.

You writhed and mewled at each burning pulse of pure shock from his teeth, his tongue, but the pain was such a sweet sensation...almost as good as the satisfaction he felt watching your skin purple and bruise, evidence of what he did for you that everyone would have the chance to see (if he ever let you leave the fucking house again).

This was just how he loved, you told yourself, because surely he must love you to have kept you around this long.

Your pain was his pleasure. It was as simple as that.

"Are you alright?" He asked you as he pulled back and looked in your hazy eyes.

"No," You rasped as you reached up to touch one of the worst bites, hissing as you felt wet oozing out of you, mingling with saliva and spittle. "I'm bleeding."

"Well, that’s hardly a concern of mine," He chuckled, evidently a little turned on by your honest answer as he leaned down to kiss your lips a little more, his strong arms bracketing your neck and shoulders as he loomed in view. . 

His tongue pressed inside your mouth, pushing past the barrier of your lips, and dragged against yours in a sleepy and slow, massaging sort of way, in spite of his violence and how much your bruises were throbbing. He had the potential to be soft and gentle with you, and displayed that potential to you readily only to take it away just as quickly. 

An overgrown child playing with his food. Playing with his favourite toy until it broke.

"I want to make you bleed more," He murmured, kissing the corner of your mouth with a slight smirk, groping hands travelling down your hips to wrangle your shorts down your legs and throw them to the side. ”I always do. That’s when you look your best, you know?”

"Mmhmm?" You hummed against his lips, threading your own groping hands through his hair and pulling him closer to you, not bearing to have him away from you for even a moment.

“Mm,” He rubbed his forehead against yours again, his breath warm on your skin as his hips slotted between yours, and you felt the heat of his erection through his underwear against your thigh. “Makes me that much crazier about you.”

You didn't stop him as he initiated another deeper kiss.

But you never stopped him.

"Mmph..." 

You groaned lowly at the back of your throat as your fingers curled into fists in his hair and pulled hard. It was the most amount of power he would ever let you have over him, you knew that, as you tethered him closer to you, to your desires, as he sucked on your mouth, his tongue delving hungrily against yours, again and again, invading you as he pushed closer to you.

You wrenched your head back, away from the kiss, with a harsh gasp (breaching the surface of the water before drowning)  as he slid his hand up between your thighs, feeling the wet heat that lay at the top of them and devling his fingers inside without even a moment of hesitation or any kind of resistance. Dripping wet, pre-cum smeared between your thighs, you were that fucking eager for him.

God, you were fucking pathetic. 

You hissed painfully as you felt him bite down on your neck again as he slowly finger-fucked you, the scruff of his stubble itching your skin as his teeth dug in deeper. You did your best to retaliate, curling your fingers tighter into his hair and pulling on it. You’d tell yourself that you were trying to get him away from you, to release yourself from the painful clamp of his jaws, but you knew that that wasn’t the truth, not really.

It still felt good to do, though. 

Strade growled lowly at the pain in his scalp, and his free hand planted itself in the middle of your chest, pinning you to the bed, holding you down like a struggling animal, stopping you from flinching too much or squirming away from him as he dug his teeth even deeper, grinding them together to make the pain that much worse.

Your mind was hazy, torn between the excruciating pain of his bite and the overwhelming pleasure of his thrusting fingers inside of you. 

Your body was so exposed, so vulnerable, to everything he wanted from you.

Strade was in full control of you, as he so often was, and you ached for it. 

"God…do you even know how much I love you?" You rasped shallowly, finally letting go of the fists of hair you were still clinging onto, as he pressed another bite against your shoulder, lighter but still painful.

“Hm?” He hummed airily against your skin, a light hearted smile gracing his features as his hazy eyes glanced upwards, eyeing you as he pressed his fingers a little deeper inside of you, rubbing against a bundle of nerves that always made you tremble.

“Ngh-!” You groaned, fisting your fingers into the bedsheets in lieu of clinging to him even more, your eyes squeezing shut as you tipped your head back. “Ahh…I do love you. I do. I shouldn't, but I do. So much I can barely stand it..."

“Hm…no wonder you’re so clingy this morning,” He replied, his voice full of good humour, as it often was, like he was telling an especially mean joke that he’d never let you in on. “You’re all loved up. How sweet~” 

He kissed you again, his body pushing down against yours, grinding into you as he slid his fingers from inside you and tucked down his boxers, finally revealing his hard cock and letting it smear a line of pre-cum against your bare skin. His hands bracketed your hips as he kissed you more forcefully, biting down again, and slid down to your thighs to part them further, spreading you open.

He sucked on your sore mouth hard enough for the stream of blood to start trickling again and delved his probing tongue back into your mouth, tasting your blood, evidently (by how hard his cock was) getting more and more turned on as it smeared on his tongue, stained his teeth, made him that much more hungry to see you writhe and tear into you.

You didn't care. 

You'd welcome him tearing into you, if he stayed this close, if he kept kissing you.

"So sweet," He murmured thickly against your lips, in something between a growl and a purr, as he pulled away from the kiss, a smear of blood painting his own lips. "So fucking desperate for it. Do you like this, liebling? Do you like me hurting you like this?" He asked, his voice husky, his breath hot, as you felt him slot his hard cock against your entrance (rubbing against your clit), ready to breach the barrier and take you, as he so often did.

"I like you kissing me," You were breathing hard, your eyes going down to try and watch as he pushed into you, though, of course, you saw nothing but his belly pressing against yours, his tan skin achingly warm (and hot). "Even if it hurts...I like that you're doing it, all the same."

"Is it painful?" He murmured, licking his lips and breathing heavily as he breached your entrance and slid inside of you, easily. “Does it hurt so much, fraulein? Can you barely even take it?”

In spite of the lack of resistance (pathetic, fucking pathetic, god, you hated that you wanted him this badly, you hated how wet you were and how ready your body was for his invasion), there was something intimately painful about the stretch. It was like your cunt was struggling to take all of him in, even though it had done this countless times before, like your body itself was rejecting the painful force behind his initial thrusts and making you clench down even tighter around him.

"Ngh!" You cried out, your back arching and your head thrown back, as his hands covered shadowed bruises painting your skin, digging in, tearing into you. "I-It's torture...the worst pain imaginable…"

"Oh, you poor thing," He murmured with a giddy, rasping little chuckle, like your admission was everything he needed to let go of any sense of composure that he might have had before (if he ever had any). "But there's nothing you can do, is there? No, no, nothing at all."

“Mph,” You whined, your shaking hands going up to cover your sweating face as he gripped your hips tighter and slid even deeper inside of you.

“And I don’t think you want to do anything, either.” He continued, his eyes that of a predator, wide awake and ready to tear into his prey. “You want to be taken like this, forever. Hmm…” He laughed, shaking his head fondly. “Wunderschon, ja? You’ll always be mine and I don’t even have to try…”

Who's to say that love needs to be soft and gentle?

You think you had heard that once in a literature class…or maybe it was a fucked up movie you watched, when you didn’t have this, when you tried to scratch the itch with film recommendations on forums and shock sites. 

All the same, this kind of love (because it had to be love, it had to be, it had to be) was clearly as good as any other, both for you and for Strade.

It seemed that every time you cried out in pain or writhed underneath him, like you were squirming to be set free, it was enough to make him lose his mind and push even deeper inside of you, caging your body down with his, filling you up completely in an erratic need to take your body, by any means necessary.

"Show me your face." He commanded then, his voice hoarse with desire as he dipped his head down to your level again, his thrusting hips stilling for just a moment. “Let me see you.”

"Don't...hah, please don't look at me," You whined, begging, pleading, still covering your face with your hands, trying to pull back, though for what reason, you weren’t quite sure.

“No, don’t fight me.” He chided like he was scolding a child, an animal, wrapping his fingers around your wrists and wrenching them down forcefully, with a strength you often forgot about and yet, were often well acquainted with. “You know you won’t win, don’t you, fraulein? I won’t let you…”

He was clearly enjoying this much too much to let you pull away now, as he pulled your hands away completely, pinning them down to your chest and  forcing you to hold eye contact with him.

You stared up at him, your gaze caught somewhere between fear and dazed detachment.

The light streaming in from the rising sun outside softened his hulking body into dark, curved silhouettes, and the round, paper lantern behind his head (cheap, replaceable, something that reminded you of home, you said) made him look like some cheap facsimile of an angel, your own personal Heaven when he should have felt like Hell.

An angel to some, a demon to others. You knew you heard that in a movie before. 

"Good girl." He praised, the hand pinning your hands still and compressing your chest  reaching up to stroke your cheek (bruised, scarred, probably imagining bruising you even more). “Good, pretty girl. So lovely, so sweet when they’re behaving…”

You didn't even try to hold back a little giggle, your cheeks flushed as he took your chin in hand and pressed your head back against the pillows, a look of (almost) genuine affection in his golden eyes as he considered you further, as his thrusting hips continued, pushing deep and making your body clench up tightly with pleasure. 

“That’s it, there we go,” He continued to praise, his chest against yours as his free hand slid down to your trembling thighs, hiking them up around his waist and forcing your body to bend painfully in two. “No fighting now, liebling, no fighting me…it makes it so much nicer, doesn’t it?”

“Y-Yeah…” You stammered, your legs tightening around his full waist as his pace picked up, his hips slamming against yours and forcing out gasping little moans with each painful thrust. 

“Mm, you’d really do anything for me, wouldn’t you, sweetheart?” He asked again, the hand on your cheek descending down your neck as his expression grew hungrier and more feral, more desperate for you. “Anything at all?”

“Ahhh…” You groaned, your body growing tight and your mind erratic and manic, as he pushed against your sweet spot multiple times, grazing it but not quite stimulating it enough to feel good. “Yes, yes, yesyesyesyesyes-”

"Oh yeah?" He drawled, interrupting you and running his tongue over his teeth (his sharp cannibal teeth) as he pushed into you again and again, hard enough to get you yelping and the headboard of his bed to start slamming against the wall rhythmically. Thank god you didn’t have neighbours who would hear. "Would you die for me, sweet thing?"

"You-ah!" You interrupted yourself with a yelp when he pulled back enough to slap you hard across the cheek, so hard that it made your ears ring and your head spin. You might have stared up at him, wide eyed, shocked and surprised that he would do something so brutal, so cruel, if you weren’t currently being fucked out of your mind. "Nghh, y-you know I would, you don't...don't even need to ask me."

"Good girl," He praised you (he was, at the very least, good with praise when you were in this kind of headspace), taking your cheeks in hand again and pinning your head down to the pillows and mattress more forcefully, his golden eyes half lidded with desire. "What about killing, hm? Would you kill for me?"

"Strade," You whined, your body arching as his hips continued to ruthlessly slam into yours, each barbaric thrust punctuated with a huffed growl. "God, please-"

"Answer the question!" He barked, letting go of your face to slap you once, twice, three times. You wouldn't have been surprised if your cheek was bruised up again after this, but you couldn't bring even a part of yourself to care about that now. "Would you kill for me?"

"Mmph..." You squeezed your eyes shut (your ears were ringing and your vision was spotted with white, you couldn't hold on). "Yes, yes, I'd do whatever you wanted me to do. Goddd..."

"Sick puppy," He chuckled victoriously, gradually slowing down his thrusts and considering you further with a wry tilt of his head. "You really would do anything for me, wouldn't you? How pathetic.”

You whimpered and raised your chin to hide your burning cheek against the pillow. He was gracious enough to let you do that, this time. 

"That's what I like about you," Strade growled, pressing his face into your shoulder and barring his teeth as he huffed out grunts and groans, his thrusts picking up in pace as he got more desperate to claim you. "Such a fucking suck up. I bet I could tell you to piss yourself and you'd do it, wouldn't you?"

You moaned brainlessly in vague agreement, not quite listening to what he was asking, demanding from you, feeling like your throat was closing up on any potential words you might have been able to say.

"Mm, I'll remember that for later," He huffed out a laugh (hot against your sweaty skin) as he pressed another harsh bite into your shoulder, not hard enough to bruise or bleed (like the others) but enough for your eyes to shoot wide open, and to force a shriek from your lips like a dying animal. "So disgusting, fraulein. I'd have the sense to be grossed out, mph,” He stopped speaking for a moment, his drooling mouth slack as you tightened up around him again. “I-If your pussy wasn't clamping my cock like a fucking vice…god-!"

You howled out again, a full throated scream that would wake neighbours and housemates if you had them (barring…well, the obvious) as he pressed a bite against the sensitive skin of your throat. Unable to contain your pain with just the scream, your legs instantly tensed around him and your arms wrapped tightly around his neck. You even went so far as to dig your nails into the dense meat of his back and drag downwards, sure to leave behind a nasty mark in their wake. 

It was as close as you could get to hurting him, and you'd take the chance to show him even a modicum of pain possible, at every opportunity. 

You weren't crazy enough to not enjoy that, after all.

"Hrghhh, you fucking slut," He growled under his breath through a pained hiss through his teeth, the ‘pet-name’ rasped amidst a slur of German that you didn't understand (and you generally understood it well now, three years in.) "So, that’s how you wanna play, you little cunt?” He demanded, pulling himself upwards and glaring down at you, like he was about to pounce, as he so often did on the victims that came after you. “You wanna take all of me, don't you? So, fucking work for it."

You yelped loudly as he took a sudden and firm grip of your bruised hip and shoulder, and switched the positions forcefully, rolling you onto his front and lying back on the mattress, all the while keeping his cock firmly lodged inside of you.

"Work for it! Schnell, hund!" He ordered again, taking hold of both hips (digging his fingers and bitten fingernails in hard enough to leave a new batch of bruises and crimson crescents) 

While he ordered you around (in a tone that always made your cunt throb, in spite of the shame that caused you), he managed to push his cock deeper and deeper inside of you, thanks to his new leverage on your body, manurvering and handling you like you were a doll in his lap, a toy that he could use however he liked.

You continued to whine and moan like the desperate idiot that you were as he dragged you downwards at a pace you could barely keep up with, your hips coliding with his painfully and barbarically. That did, however, very little to stop you from bouncing brainlessly on his cock, your trembling legs tightening around him (as they so often did) and your hands curling into fists against his soft chest, doing everything you possibly could to keep up with him.

"There we go," He praised, gentle in spite of his harshly barked orders, one hand trailing down from your hip to grope your ass indulgently. "You're doing such a good job, liebling, you are making me so, so proud..."

"I love you," You whined desperately, hotly, biting down hard on your bottom lip as you continued to bounce his cock even harder, even faster. "I love you, I love you so much..."

"Mm, I love you too, sweetheart," Strade crooned with a broad, indulgent smile, his other hand reaching up to grope your chest as it heaved, up and down, newly pierced breasts bouncing in time with each of your erratic thrusts. "I love your pussy, anyway," He continued with a mean chuckle, pushing deeper inside of you as his calloused thumb dragged over your pert nipple, making you shriek. "And these tits, and how nicely your body bruises at the lightest of touches. Like you were made for me to destory over and over and over again...however can I resist?"

He sat up the best he could, in spite of your consistent thrusting, the hand on your ass pinning your body still against his chest as he pushed as deep as he could inside of you, like he was impaling you on his cock…and you certainly yowled loudly enough that it sounded like that.

"That's all that matters though, isn't it?" He asked breathlessly, leaning forward and pressing his forehead against yours again, close enough that you could feel the heat of his body against yours. He was so hot. "That I love you...doesn't matter which parts I love, right?"

"Mm...mmhmm," You nodded, biting your lip to hold back your whimpers and whines, as the hand on your chest went down to grab one of your fists and thread your fingers together, giving him full oppurtunity to pull you in even closer. "Tell me you love me...t-tell me you'll never let me go..."

"Oh, mein schatz," He crooned, his eyes softening with delight, drawing circles into the back of your palm and smiling up at you, breathless, a heaving silhouette in the darkness of the room. "Of course, I love you...and of course, I'll kill you before I ever let you go again."

Your bitten lips, blooming and beaten with hot blood, trembled hesitantly, much like the soft, scarred thighs bracketing his hips, as a smile pulled at your features, giving away instantly just how deliriously happy you were to hear him say those words, and mean them. 

"Keep me, keep me forever, never let me go..."

"Never ever," He agreed with a shake of his head, holding your hand tighter as his thrusting grew erratic and hectic, and each string of words became grunts and growls. "That's my promise to you, liebe. And you're more than welcome to hold me to it..."

You couldn't think of anything else to do, other than kiss him. 

You pressed your fingers into his hair, now slightly damp with sweat (he worked so hard to provide you, like a good man did), and pulled his lips to yours, finally, finally, probing his hot, wet mouth with your tongue and tasting your own blood on his mouth. 

He let you do it, too, moaning softly against your trembling lips and finally admitting his own sensual, desperate hunger for you. He cradled your skull in hand, not gripping or pulling on your hair or trying to wrangle you into some semblance of submission, and let his body still completely, feeling your sinking hips on his and spilling over inside of you with a human-like murmur of subdued pleasure.

And that was all you needed.

You clenched down tightly on him with a wretched gasp, as you felt the warm seed claim your insides and spill down your thighs, and it was enough to push you far, far over that edge yourself.

In lieu of anything else (because how could you do anything else), you heaved out a tired groan between your whimpers of pain and excruciating pleasure, falling forward against Strade's heaving chest as he flopped back on the bed himself, his lungs taking in slow swallows of air, adjusting himself as you settled against him.

Your vision was still blurred with white spots, but you somehow felt grounded all the same as you felt his warm hand slowly stroke through your hair and down your sweaty back. 

You let out a soft purr, a sleepy smile on your face as he continued to stroke you, like an animal in his lap. 

“As loyal as a dog." Strade murmured fondly, tilting his head forward to kiss the crown of your head and nuzzling into your warmth. "Mm, no, actually. A dog has the good sense to growl or bite when you kick it. You just seem to cling harder.” He laughed kindly, giving his head a little shake, dragging his cheek against yours. “Even Ren isn’t as bad as you~”

You murmured sleepily, not responding to his teasing, too tired to, curling a little closer against him and shivering with pleasure as you felt a stream of his seed trickle down your thigh.

"Hmph…go back to sleep, love," He then said softly, gently, (more gentle than he should be), giving your head another kiss as he sat up a little more, swinging one leg over the side of the bed. "I've got work to do. You can stay up here, for now.”

"Noo, don't go..." You pleaded quietly, curling your fingers against him and nestling against his chest again as he swung the other leg down and started to stand. "Stay, stay with me, please..."

"So clingy," He chided with another laugh, ruffling your hair. "Settle down and go to sleep. I'll come back soon, okay?"

Strade’s voice was gentle and fond, but you knew that his word was law and he wasn’t to be argued with.

So, you slid back into the bed and curled your body in tight, shivering as he pulled the duvet upwards and covered your naked body.

“Thank you,” You said with a tired smile, letting your fingers drift down between your legs, feeling his cum still oozing out of you. “That was…it was nice.”

“Good,” He smiled, leaning in to kiss your head again, before standing up straight.

“Sleep well, mein schatz. I’ll be back up soon.”

[sssilverstoned]

while you can still smell them ꩜ ln4

type: full length fic

word count: 3.9k

title from: i wish you roses by kali uchis

warnings: some fluff, angst, but like it's a happy ending. cursing bc i'm me, italics are memories

lily said: you know me i can never leave well enough alone. i thought this little snapshot of the break that was never really a break would be cute! for context, i'd suggest looking at the ig au linked below! this would be taking place in between part 2 and 3.

part 1

part 2

part 3

masterlist

You've only seen Lando cry on occasions that called for it. When family members died, when racing got too much for his mental, in some awful, awful moments. Maybe that's why it hurts so bad to see him cry now.

"A break feels a lot like you should add 'up' to that statement," he had said, turning away from you, looking out at the stars. You were sat on his balcony, feeling suffocated by the apartment. But the AC was on and working fine, and windows were open. Your emotions were suffocating you, that was more fitting.

"We can't keep on like this, Lan," you say in a broken voice, the lump in your throat thick and threatening. "It's not fair to either of us."

He doesn't realize he's crying until the drop hits his nose, making it quirk up in surprise. He swipes at his face, a pawlike move to get rid of the teardrops.

"Do you not love me anymore?"

His question makes you sob. Full body, head dropping to chest, your hands writing in your lap. The sound of you breaking down turns him back to you, rushing to the chair you've melted into. He lifts your face in his hands, and you take a breath when you see his face, discolored with tears.

"I'll always love you," he makes out of your words, just barely. "I, I just, it's not the same,"

"We can fix this, us. We can work on it together," Lando's brain is whirring at hyper speed, damage controlling the last 8 months of your lives together.

The cracks began to become schisms when he committed your largest pet peeve, which was ignoring things out of ease. Blissful ignorance, if you will.

It was small things, like forgetting about date nights in lieu of longer trainings or prolonging trips. Sometimes he forgot to water the plants, or didn't move laundry over, and that was manageable. That's what every couple encounters. What every couple does not encounter, was the intense pressure of racing a car for a living.

He was frustrated, with Zak, with anything papaya colored, and with his own self-doubts. He carried that frustration in his chest, and it came out in some of the words he spoke to you, and actions he took. You eventually stopped offering to come over and cook, because dinners were becoming continuously tense, and you were uncomfortable. Felt like a nuisance.

But at the same time, you were both so codependent. Without anything being said, you two began to avoid things you assumed the other wouldn't like, and asked for permission to do the smallest of things. You first noticed it when your sister pointed had asked you to come go with her out of town for the weekend, and you hesitated. "I'll have to ask Lando," you had told her. She bit her tongue.

Lando was just as bad, he had quite literally lost the ability to sleep when you weren't around. It made Grand Prix weekends an actual nightmare when you weren't there, calling you at any times in the day or night.

"Are you alright, it's 4am,"

"Sorry, can't sleep again. The melatonin does nothing,"

"Did you try the tea my mum got you?"

"Baby I just," he scrubs a hand down his exhausted face. "I just need you here."

"I can't just get up and go to Australia."

"I'll get you a flight, or maybe we can-"

"Lando," you say in a sterner voice. "I can't."

He's quiet for a moment, and you wonder what's going through his head. You hardly raised your voice or got intense, certainly never at him. But then again, recently, you seemed to never know what was going through his head.

It was silly to think that Lando was the same man that you began dating. You were 19, you would pray that he had changed somehow over the span of 5 years. But there was something missing that once was. The relationship was becoming more of a task, and that wasn't right. Which is what brought you to this moment, brought you to telling him you needed to talk.

"Lan," you whimper, bringing a hand up where his hold your face on either side. You don't even have to say anything more, he knows you better than you know yourself. And he begins to cry harder.

"I've never loved anyone but you, baby."

"I know."

"I can't, I really don't want to live without you," he shakes his head, standing back up to his full height. His hands stay busy, though, ripping through his hair.

"I'm not going to go away," you explain, agonized that you're calmer than he at this point. You stand from the wicker chair, but don't edge closer to him. "But my career is unpredictable right now, 6 months in Marbella is a long time. And you're, well, everywhere. And you need to focus on that."

"I've multitasked for 5 years," he says bitterly, making you sigh. His eyes are back on the stars, and his back to you makes your eyes blurry again.

"I'm not happy." You finally blurt, making his body stiffen. "I'm really not."

When he looks at you again, his expression reads clearly with fatigue, with anguish. "Please, baby, don't,"

It's your turn to clutch his face, bringing his forehead to touch with yours. Through your contact, you feel the heaves of his body, the breaths he's trying to control. "It's not forever," you whisper, mustering courage. "But we need to stop acting like everything's fine."

"I don't see myself without you."

"You're not," your hold tightens, he leans further into your palm, "but we've grown up together. The flower pot's too small now," you try to joke, he barely can fake amusement.

"I'll buy a thousand new pots."

"We need to clean up the broken one, first." His jaw clenches, you soothe it with your thumb. "Yeah?"

"Yeah." He says back, almost silently. "Still wear that Mclaren shirt on race days, I need the luck."

You finally crack a smile. "I'll wear the hat too if my hairstyle permits."

He kisses you, almost convincing himself this if is the last fix he can get for a while, he needed it now. Not that either of you know it, but you both have the same thought. You both notice that your cheeks have each other's tears on them now, not sure which ones came from whom. You were on the same page in that regard, at least.

꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜

"You should ask y/n out," your best friend says to Lando in the middle of a party. He chokes on his drink, not expecting her to come up to him like she did, and not expecting the words out her mouth.

You all were freshly 19, still congregating in someone's living room to try to have a good time. He knew your friends better than he knew you, the newest of the group in town, only having moved to the area with your family when you were 16.

"Should I, now?" He says, recovering from his fright.

"Yeah," she replies, ignoring the sarcasm. "She goes on about you, it's cute. She'd hurt me if she knew I told you, though. Not sure what she sees in you," his eyes narrow at the girl, which she ignores once again. "You'd be lucky to have a girl like her in your life."

That much, he knew. You were fiercely loyal to your friends and family, and treated him with a kindness that made him melt every time. You were funny, and genuine, and not to mention, the most beautiful person he's sure he knows.

When he bumps into you later at the party, he asks you what you're doing the following evening.

That was the story he'd tell people with a proud grin when they ask how you two got together. All you recount is how he nearly ruined your cute top with a shitty guinness.

He's struck with the memory when he sees the guinness logo in the ads on the walls of a restaurant. "Mate," Max all but snaps his fingers. Lando locks back in, humming for what he missed.

"Was just curious if you wanted to go out tonight. They've been texting in the chat about it, I saw you never responded."

Clubbing wasn't as fun as it used to be, not when you weren't dancing your heart out beside him, or waiting in bed with your nose in a book when he came home because you weren't feeling like going out. It felt like a waste of his time, and like he was sucking the fun out of other people's nights.

"'M alright," he says with a tight mouthed grin. "Gonna sit this one out."

Max looks at his friend, seeing through his response. "When's the last time you went out?"

If he had to take an educated guess, you last graced his apartment that night on the balcony, 4 weeks ago. So, 4 weeks ago. Perhaps longer, judging by the schisms. "A while. Not up to it."

"You're torturing yourself."

"I'm not interested in getting shitfaced, Max."

Max looks away for a second, quickly weighing the pros and cons of asking what he's been wanting to for the last, well, 4 weeks. "Do you think Y/n is wallowing too?"

The sound of your name makes his fingers twitch inadvertently, almost like a flinch. "That's not fair."

"I'm serious, Lando. You said she needed a break because she felt like you two were co-dependent and not actually working through problems, and look at you. You're not functioning without her. I mean, it's your fucking birthday next week, and you haven't brought it up once, you realize that, right?"

He knows he's right. Nothing he said was out of line, or wrong, and that's why Lando has nothing to say back. He wants to argue, to prove him wrong, but he can't. He's seen your ads and campaigns, the beautiful shots of you promoting luxury brands and names that your fans only dreamed of owning. Despite the distance, he was so proud of you still. You worked hard, were disciplined and humble through your success. He had texted you when the Dior campaign had launched, and the message of your thanks, with a smiley face, made him, for just a second, think that things were back to normal.

When they left the restaurant, and ran directly into fans, Lando tried to put on his best face for them, smiling for selfies and signing what was gestured toward him. When a sweet looking girl with glasses shyly spoke up, telling her favorite driver where she was visiting from, his tired eyes light up. "You're from there?" He confirms, and she smiles with an eager nod.

"Y/n is too," he almost mumbles, but every fan in earshot heard it. The typical squeals followed, the hushed whispers amonst themselves on if they'd push the questions they were itching to ask or not. And heard it they did, as the encounter made its way onto social media and gossip pages. But Max was right, his mourning period needed to be over, if anything was going to change for the better.

You call him on his birthday. It was nerve wracking, which made you bitterly laugh, because never did you think you'd be nervous to talk to Lando Norris of all people. One of the few people in the world you wholeheartedly trusted.

It had only been about a month since you requested time apart, and he had honored that. The texts were sparse, the calls nonexistent. Although, that was sort of what had brought you to this point anyway. But you were working on yourself, and your career at the same time, and things were looking better. Change never happened overnight, but the journal your therapist recommended, and the disappearance from social media besides professional posts were great starts.

You bite at your cuticle as the phone rings. You take your cell away from your ear, chest panging at the contact name "Lan <3" at the top of the screen. Was he really going to screen your call? Is that what you deserved, possibly?

"Y/n," he finally answers, and you quickly bring your phone back to your ear.

"Hi," you say awkwardly. "Happy birthday, Lando."

"Thank you," he says stiffly. "I'm happy to hear from you."

"Yeah I um, haven't really been on my phone here," you bite harder on your finger. "I think it's nice here, you'd love Marbella."

"I'm sure I would," he says with what you can hear is a smile. "I miss you, you know?"

"I miss you too," you concede, "how have you been?"

"Not great, I won't lie. Much rather would hear about you."

"'s not my birthday," and he smiles a bit at that.

"Well, racing's fine. But Max is sick of my shit, says I've been wallowing."

"Oh. I'm sorry."

"Yeah."

You don't really know what to say, you've rarely been the perpetrator of his negative feelings. No relationship was perfect, but you all hadn't really hit a communication wall until now. It was uncharted, scary territory. "Well, I wanted to wish you a happy birthday, that was all. Have a good day, really. 24 is a big one. Kobe year, that's what someone said to me. I hope this year is great for you."

"Y/n, wait," he halts your beginnings to hang up. "I'd like to come to see you soon, I've got some time before Abu Dhabi and maybe I could swing by Spain on the way."

"Lando," he absolutely hates that you're calling him by his whole name. Lan, that's what would you called him almost exclusively. Lando feels so formal from you.

He needs to hear it, you know he does. He needs to hear that you want to see him, that you need to see him just as much as he yearns to put eyes on you once more. But you were constantly afraid of accidental manipulation, holding him by some invisbile garotte. But this was his first birthday you hadn't celebrated together since you were 19, that meant something.

"Please focus on racing," you implore, and squeeze your eyes shut before adding, "but you if you'd like to come and it won't be an issue in your plans, you're more than welcome."

꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜꩜

You saw the posts, it wasn't very hard. Fans utterly disappointed that you and Lando hadn't been seen together in ages, putting pieces together quickly after you didn't post for his birthday. It didn't make you feel worse, to be truthful, and to your surprise. You were sure there'd be a barrage of insults hurled your way, maybe a cheating rumor or two. But really, all there was to see were requiems for your relationship, nostalgia for what once was. What did cause you to delete instagram from your phone, was the response to the podcast.

You were single for the time being, that's what you and Lando had agreed on when he visited you. It wasn't an invitation to go out and find the next man to lay in your bed, but you both had agreed that it wasn't healthy to hold out in anticipation of your rekindling.

"You're the only girl I've, you know," he awkwardly trailed off, scratching the back of his neck. He sits up in bed, linens pooling around his hips. Hooking up with your now ex-boyfriend, might've not been your brightest idea, sure, but you were both human, at the end of the day.

"Fucked?" you tease, remaining comfortable against your plush pillow. "I know. First few times kinda showed that."

He looks back at you pointedly. "You cried the first time."

"It hurt!"

He rolls his eyes, shaking his head in fake annoyance. You grin. "I'm sure the girlies are gonna have a field day with you being single now,"

He rolls his eyes again, laying, or rathing slumping, back into the pillow next to you. His arm instinctively comes around the top of your head, you try not to lean into it. "I think I really will finally listen to you and focus on racing."

You turn on your side, admiring his profile as he stares up at the ceiling, probably tangled in his thoughts. His nose sloped perfectly, the little freckles dotting his skin like constellations. Your boy.

"I told my mum."

He snorts. "She hates me now, I'm sure."

"Mm, no, her first ask was what I did," your mom was Lando's biggest fan, through and through. Of course, you were her daughter, but she was convinced he was cosmically made perfectly for you.

He looks at you then, realizing your eyes have been on him the whole time. He copies your position, turning to you so your bodies lay parallel, nowhere to look but each other's eyes.

"Do you regret that I'm the only boyfriend you've ever had?"

You immediately shake your head in denial of the question. "No, not at all," you were lucky, if anything. "You?"

"Well, I've had other girlfriends,"

"Ouch?"

"You knew that," he chuckles, and yeah, you did. "But I don't regret that you're the only one I've been serious about. I still am."

"I know. I am too."

"An ex-boyfriend doesn't lay in bed with you, you know."

"And an ex-girlfriend doesn't still remind your team when your doctor's appointments are,"

"Fair enough, guess we're just weird."

You share a matching grin. "So weird."

So once Alex uploaded the Call Her Daddy episode you were a guest on, and it was official to the masses that you had been single for now almost 4 months, the articles came in. The timelines of you and Lando's relationship, the rumors of him leaving clubs with random girls. You'd be lying if you said you didn't zoom in on some of their faces, relaxing when you recongized most of them as friends or even family members. He wasn't yours to be worried about, you suppose, but you also knew that any girl he decided to share his time with would be a lucky one.

Your friends had tried to get you on dates, that wasn't a lie when you said that on the podcast. But you weren't ever excited to get to know someone new, small talk was painful and you didn't feel comfortable going home with them.

But then, a few weeks later into February, you get a phone call from Lando. "Hi," You answer, pleasently surprised.

"Hey there," he says, sounding slightly out of breath. "How are you?"

"I'm good, great even. Finished up everything down here, leaving Marbella next week to head back home." Home was London to you, not Monaco. You constantly visited, had a family flat there and everything, but couldn't leave officially becuause of your career.

"Congratulations, everything looked stunning," he compliments, and your stomach flutters.

"But um, how are you? I'd ask if you were relaxing, but I'm sure training's well underway."

"Meh, more or less. I'm heading to Surrey next week, actually. Got some stuff to do at HQ."

"Oh," Surrey was only about an hour and a half from where you were in London. "Would you, well, not assuming anything, but if you'd have time to spare, it would be great to catch up?"

This isn't why Lando called you, you fully know this. Who knows what he picked up the phone for, he could be calling to let you know he's eloped with someone he's met in the 6 months you've been apart.

"I'd love to," you hear his grin in his voice. "You haven't moved, have you?"

Not only had you not moved, but you haven't changed much about your flat either. Same bedding, same color schemes, same photos decorating your tables and walls of your friends, family, and Lando. He never took the photos of you down either, and that photo from your 21st birthday was still stuffed in his wallet.

You order takeout, sitting across the kitchen island from each other acting like it didn't feel like your first date again. He acts like he doesn't want to reach out for your hands as you animatedly use them to share stories of Spain, and you act like you don't want to push the curls back that threathen to land over his eyebrows.

The food gets cold as you two catch up, a few glasses of wine becoming a whole bottle gone. You actually can't remember the last time the two of you had done this, and perhaps, absence had truly made your hearts grow fonder.

"Bahrain is on leap day," Lando says, making you gasp.

"That's got to be good luck, no?"

"It's just the first practice,"

"But still, you're starting your first weekend of the year on a special day like that," you muse, "so exciting. I'm excited for you,"

His chest warms at endearment in your voice. You truly and honestly rooted for him through everything, that was one of the things he was most grateful for about you. He knows you don't truly care about all of this, if he won or lost, but that you care about him and his development, how he sees himself and his profession. He fell in love with that about you.

"Would you come?"

You hesitate, daring to look at him from where you had begun to clean the countertop. "To the race? "

He nods, and turn back to the counter. "I don't know, Lan. Is that where we are?"

He hopes so. He's missed you something horrible, prays you missed him just as bad.

Lando takes the cloth from your hand, replacing it with his own. "I know it's only been about 6 months, and that's not enough time to say everything's well and dandy," you fight a smile. "But I want to work through things, with you. I've had nothing but time to consider what was off with us, and I want to be better. For you, more than anything. Yeah, I learned how to be just Lando. But I know I prefer being Lando and Y/n."

You bite your lip, finally meeting his eyes. "I want to take it slow."

"We can do that,"

"So, I don't know if I'm ready for the race. But, my birthday's coming up,"

"It is,"

"And we'll be in Dubai. My sister did it up, got this crazy plan going since it'll be my 25th."

"Quite the old woman you're becoming,"

"Oh get off that," you scoff, pushing his chest. He chuckles and pulls you back into him, where you go willingly. "But, if you can, I'd love for you to come to the dinner."

He raises an eyebrow with a smirk. "You want me to fly to Dubai just for your birthday dinner?"

"You'll be in Saudi Arabia then anyway,"

The smirk gets bigger. "You know my schedule already, love?"

"You're so fucking cheeky, can't stand it," you feign annoyance, but never move from his arms.

He holds you, as your arms delicately find themselves behind his neck, not daring to kiss just yet. To really be honest, you're not sure if you're ready to take that whole plunge.

"I'm happy to be back, even if things are slow. They can be molasses for all I care."

"Thank you for being patient with me," you lean your forehead against his. However, this time, neither of you are crying. Nice, for a change.

"I'd wait decades for you, my love."

After a beat of sweet silence. You speak up once more. "One thing though," he hums to prompt your continuance. "I'm pretty sure, when it's said, it's Y/n and Lando, just so you know."