#it takes them a while to put two and two together

[sugarwarachan]

horny brainrot: bnha

andy's notes: ahhhh i've missed y'all!! getting back into the swing of things (work was hell this week) and hope you like this particular bit of filth while i crack into prompts

content warnings: 18+, nsfw, smut, not free of spoilers just by character names alone lol, pregnancy kink, panty kink, oral fixation, brat taming, oral m!receiving, cnc, throat fucking, scent kink, slightly yandere behavior with feathers, size kink

characters: kirishima eijiro, tenko shimura, shinsou hitoshi, hizashi yamada, aizawa shouta, keigo takami, shouto todoroki

kirishima has the nastiest pregnancy kink, no one can convince me otherwise, so he's delighted when he finds out you have one, too. but when you're trying for a baby, your everyday life becomes horny hell because he insists on treating you like you're already pregnant. when you want to do something around the house, he tells you to "think of the baby," wide grin on his face when you flush and squirm your legs together. shows you maternity clothing ads of all the things he can't wait to buy you, patting your tummy. "you're gonna look so good in this sundress when your bumps start to fill out, honey." it gets so bad that literally the mere swipe of his thumb across your lower belly makes your pussy clench. (you get a positive pregnancy test two weeks later)

tenko puts on a pair of your silk panties because he has "nothing of his own left to wear" but he's actually been thinking about how the material would hug his balls ever since he pulled them off you days ago. the silk clings to his dick, dragging over the shaft with a feather-like caress. he groans and ruts his hips into his palm. pre-cum darkens the silk. arousal unspools in his belly and his cock twitches, aching at the fact that your cunt rested here, right where his balls now hang. your pretty pussy lips dragged over this fabric too, leaving your juices on the gusset. he rolls into the mattress, humping your pretty pink sheets. he hears whimpering and whining and realizes it's him drooling out your name into the pillow as he cums harder than he ever has

when you're done being a mouthy little brat, shinsou loves to cup your jaw and sink two fingers into your mouth, the cold metal bands of his rings clinking gently against your teeth as your cheeks hollow, sucking and humming around his digits like the greedy little whore you are. "look at me," he says, tipping your head back and holding your gaze. "keep your eyes on me while i keep your mouth full.''

hizashi loves when you take charge, when you tie him to a chair and stuff your panties in his mouth while giving him the sloppiest head of his life. he ruts his hips up into the delicious hot suction of your mouth, but you hold him down and pull away with a plop. you smear spit and pre-cum over your lips with the head of his dick, smirking when it twitches. you do this for hours, until his dick is flushed dark, engorged and aching, balls drawn up so tight against his body your mere breath against them is torture. when you finally let him cum, he explodes down your throat and onto your lips, a creamy gloss that you lick away after

the first time you broach aizawa about cnc you don't miss the way his jaw clicks shut like he's swallowing down every thought. "you're sure?" is all he asks and then you get a questionnaire in your email a few days later regarding hard limits. cut to a month later, he's fisting your hair and bullying his cock down your throat. "break eye contact and i'll paddle your ass raw." you're already slobbering all over his shaft, drool slipping down your chin and neck. your eyes burn with tears and mascara and you know you look like a fucked-out mess, but your body is tingling, flying. "you love to be used like this, don't you?" aizawa fucks even deeper into your mouth, rocking into the curved concave of your throat. "nothing more than daddy's little cumdump?"

keigo gave you one of his feathers for a totally normal reason, he swears - not because he wants to keep an eye on his attractive personal assistant on your off time. it backfires, though, because you know all about his feathers' capabilities. the first time you stroke the feather keigo thinks he imagined it. but no, the more he interacts with you, the more he memorizes your scent, the swollen bud of your lower lip. when he feels you kiss his offering, it nearly brings him to his knees. but he scents you next, the musky sweetness of what can only be your arousal. when he lands on your window sill and sees the feather slipping between your thighs, you merely smile and ask him what took him so long to get there

shouto "doesn't have a size kink" todoroki hearing you whine "it won't fit" when he slots the head of his cock against your pussy. he's never really paid attention to how much smaller you are than him, how much his body overwhelms yours. he'll have to work hard to make sure you're ready for him. he rubs your swollen clit with his thumb, the palm of his hand hot on your belly. your pussy jumps and flutters around the thick head of his dick, already flushed red and weeping. he taps your belly button, knowing that's where he'll be soon. "i'll make it fit."

2025 © all works belong to @sugarwarachan. do not repost, translate, or steal any of my works pls. reblogs and comments always appreciated <3 If you'd like to be added to my general taglist, let me know!

general taglist <3 @cielito--lindo, @one-scarred-mofo, @uekarashi, @waterfal-ling, @iluvikeu, @bach-ira

[queeniewithabeanie]

The Phantom Zone Problem

Dpxdc Prompt #76

Clark is, for the first time in a while, nervous for a JLA meeting.

The Justice League, through the means of their dark division, had finally gotten into contact with, and set up a meeting with, the king of the infinite realms. Since it was such an important meeting, it was restricted to the founding members. The goal was to set up a tentative alliance.

Key word being was.

The minute the ghost king appears on the Watchtower, his eyes lock onto Clark with disgust he previously thought only Lex Luthor held for him as the king spat out, "Superman".

Clark's immediate thoughts are how did he mess this up already, before Bruce takes the wheel and asks what Clark was thinking in a more... diplomatic way.

"King Phantom, whatever Superman has done please explain so we may fix it. We hope to make an ally out of you today."

Translation: Tell us how Clark fucked up so I can hopefully salvage what little chance we have of working together.

"Well first off, he's Kryptonian which means he's taken up sending his worst criminals to the Phantom Zone," he says as if that explains everything.

At the JLA's bewildered looks he continues.

"Here let me explain it to you more clearly. Imagine that the infinite realms and this universe are neighboring houses, and your worst criminals are raccoons you've found digging around in the garbage. Sending them to the Phantom Zone is the equivalent of taking the raccoons and putting them in your neighbors' yard."

Phantom eyes Clark again.

"Basically, its really rude, and since the explosion on Krypton—the problematic neighbors moving away so to say—we thought we wouldn't have to deal with it anymore."

Clark is going to pack away the fact that this king just compared his species going almost entirely extinct to rude neighbors moving away and is instead going to try to salvage what he can of this meeting.

Though it is flashing alarm bells in his small-town farm-boy goody-two-shoes brain that he's being considered a bad neighbor.

Ma and Pa would be so disappointed.

[grotesquevi]

ㅤㅤ ㅤㅤ I WANNA BE THE TATTOO INK THAT SWIMS ㅤㅤ ㅤㅤ ㅤㅤ ㅤㅤ ㅤㅤ ㅤㅤ DOWN THROUGH THE NEEDLE IN YOUR SKIN.

cw  # 18+ mdni, public sex, use of strap-on (it’s refered as cock/dick too) strap sucking, use of pet names.

side note  # if you recognize this, might be because this is a request from my previous blog vicorices (terminated blog 2025-2025 r.i.p) this is my new account. i'm trying to get all my writing back up slowly and with my whole heart. check out my arcane directory to see the process of re-uploading fics.

to be fair, sevika did want to marry, the thing was organizing a wedding.

you've been running non-stop the last months so she gets you're burnt out. your fianceé can be many things, but her patience it's a golden treat even when she don't have time to properly fuck you lately, she knows you'll be back to your own self after the celebration, and sevika’s not afraid of having to put up with your grumpy side any time of the day.

she can handle you, simple as a summer day with the air conditioner turned on. what she cannot handle instead, was that backstabbing shit you were pulling on her after being so well behaved, playing the part of an understanding wife until one of your friends give her the first photo and she has to look at it twice to be sure she's looking at it right, cause there's no way you're standing in a tiny polaroid picture wearing a purple set of underwear, comfortably laying around in bed — a bed you share with her every night.

it sends her into a spiral. the music is loud in a room full of celebrating guests and still, her mouth is suddenly dry and she feels like it has been a fucking year now without having sex, so dramatic as she's searching for you even when you're already looking at her, raising your champagne glass in a silent toast with a playful smirk.

and she thinks you'll have the decency to be kind to her after all, but your friends kept the photos coming, and each one seemed to be more obscene than the last one as she looked at them a couple of times afraid someone else could see it before tucking it away in the safety of her suit. at first a casual set of purple lingerie that scaled insanely quick to a very close frontal shot of your full lips slightly parted, and sevika can recognize your hands squeezing your tits together for the picture, you fucking tease — the third picture steals the air from her lungs at the sight of you already on your knees, looking up to the camera with nothing on top.

did your friends see them too? do they know how low they are helping you play? you're making her put up a show ‘cause you're laughing at her face, her erratic movements, how she forgot to keep on talking to the guests, show some manners from a zaunite already in the council, but shit she's so weak. you've deprived her for what? a month or two? can you really expect her to behave and not to act up stupid? you're wearing this beautiful white gown and sevika cannot help but wonder, truly wonder, by the look in your face, what are you wearing down all that expensive fabric.

low.

you're looking at her while you talk to your close ones and sevika fights the need to drag you away from everyone as the photos kept appearing randomly, hitting her in the worst moments, cause she thinks she got it figured it out, that she finally collected herself as the minutes pass until another friend appears with a sinful picture and she thinks to herself, she's going to have a word or two with you about that teasing game she didn't agree to be a part on.

how can she be mad at you anyway? when you're so good at taking those photos for her? when you look so beautiful making your underwear to the side to have a look of your soaked pussy you so eagerly show to the camera lens? you're biting down your lip cause you really are enjoying it, showing that nasty side you cannot hide and she just loves to have every single time.

her devotion to you knows no barrier at that point, cause people are laughing loudly, singing and dancing under the changing lights and the bands playing in the background, yet sevika's blatantly stealing you from the rest and there's no point in saying no when she's pulling you to the tiny photobooth you thought it'd be cute to take up pictures for the guests and have a little token of your union to your wife to take home, closing down the red curtain to corner you against the camera wall.

"did you like the photos?" you have the audacity to ask with a smile on your lips — "it's a reward for being so good to me all this time."

"is this your idea of reward, doll?" sevika cannot hide the smirk on her face, not when she’s actually enjoying all the talking for once. "haunt me the whole night until i can finally get you alone?"

"it's fun" you try to defend yourself, but you already lost the whole case as her big hands fall against your figure, tracing your sides as she mocks your words: you have different views of fun clearly. "i was going to make it up to you later, vika. the two of us."

"make up to me you say," she chuckles, almost not believing you "well take care of me now then. i deserve it."

she does it really, so you let her push you around, use force to pin you down against the wall as she takes what she's been anxiously craving, cursing against the complex fabric of your wedding dress until she's able to grip it in one hand, noticing the same purple set she saw before in the pictures.

"fucking slut doin' this on purpose" sevika shakes her head in disbelief as she takes a look of your body in the colorful lingerie "and you were going to be cruel and make me fucking wait to have you? on our own wedding day?"

"vika-"

��you took the photos, fuckin´ deal with it.”

“what if someone comes in?”

“i’ll tell them to fuck off,” she promises quickly like she thought about it all already “it’s our day, our wedding.”

there’s something about the way she’s saying it that makes you oblivious to the rest, makes your head spin cause you forgot about your worrying, the guests, the cake and everything in between. so you're not aware of when you pushed the red button on the screen of the photobooth, nor when it activates it's original purpose when sevika's fully into making out with you, capturing the sight of your figures blending together in the same picture — by the second shot you can notice the smirk on her brown lips and in the third, it's not really visible as she seems to be too close to the camera lens, making the image blurry as she attacks on your neck.

maybe it's the thrill of being discovered, the fact sevika can feel the flash of the photos being taken, but she wishes to be patient again — have it in at least a couple of hours on her actual wedding night for a chance, privately, but the strap she choose willingly to wear in a way of fully teasing you, was now pushing against your leg and you have to stop for a second with your brows furrowed.

"is that-" sevika's nodding and you want to say something, but you find amusing to know your wife is wearing a strap-on to your wedding celebration, one you surely have seen already.

"make up to me," she repeats once again, serious this time "for being cruel. after that you can explain me how you took those pictures."

no one interrupts anyway. the music's too loud, the sweat in the air is too strong and guests already drank a lot so no one gives a shit when you're getting on your knees, when sevika's toying with your hair as you're the one to unbuckle the belt from her pants, the one who kisses the happy trail of her lower belly without protesting, noticing the blue silicone as her pant pools in her ankles and your wife cannot seem to care about anything but the sight of you on your knees.

"get it wet" sevika's less gentle now as she's pointing to her fake cock, licking her lips like she can taste yours in them before adding: "so i can fuck you good, okay?"

to be fair — it's just an excuse, cause she knows you're dripping in your pretty purple panties, that the dildo would split you open yes, stretch you out even without making much effort, but she just wants to see how you do it, how you become a drooling mess, salivating all over the floor, getting your dress wet totally unaware of everything else.

and hell she wishes she could feel it all, cause you look so pretty with your mouth full it's insane, pushing against the rubber to take it in your throat further until you make yourself gag, and your wife takes care of you, so she's pulling away but in all honestly the sight of you debauched already only spurs her on 'cause the amount of saliva coating your lips connecting you to her dick makes her insane, cleaning the corners of your mouth with her thumb.

"easy there, get used to it and take it slow," her voice is rough as she helps you put your hair up in a ponytail vika holds in her mechanic fingers, watching your polished moves as you get to work again, relaxing until the tip of your nose is touching her skin, and your eyes are watering but she can feel your breathing on her, the friction between her legs every time you move to take her deeper, the fabric of the harness consistently rubbing between her legs — "there you go bunny. s'good taking it all, go on keep sucking and don't get distracted."

you want to do good, desperate to please her over and over again, you can take it. that's what she says as her hips involuntarily thrust against your mouth, and it's so slippery the rubber cock slides inside your bucal cavity and she's roughly hitting on the back of your throat until there's this sound you make involuntarily each time the strap invades your mouth and makes you choke, leaving you a mess as you're drooling all over your tits.

her flesh hand does a good job on making you move, fingers tightening in your hair as she sets an steady pace against your mouth, swollen lips that close around the shaft as she pushes it deeper, cleaning up your tears cause she don't want your make up to be ruined, all pretty trying hard for her.

she's going to cum like this, inevitable. you're looking up to her with your big eyes, a damn smirk cause even when you're struggling you're having so much fun you cannot help it, and once again she's needy for more than what she'd like to admit.

the movement of her hips rubs her right in the spot when sevika's already so sensitive soaking her inner thighs, forcing her cock in your mouth — it's so good, you're so damn good.

so she cums around nothing, your sloppy movements as you suck on her strap, that zoned out look you have that only makes her moan hastily, leaning against the photobooth to press that fucking button again that's been randomly taking pictures now capturing the features of your wife as you now disappear from the frame, the pleasure on sevika's face she's unaware before pulling you upwards again, making you stand as she parts your legs with her knee forcing you to turn around to have a good view of your ass.

"my good little cocksleeve, always ready to be stuffed," she praises, leaving wet kisses on the expanse of your shoulders, going down your spine as she don't bother to take your panties off, no, she wants to fully fuck you in them "spread yourself open, help me sink in you."

your hands come up to grip on your asscheeks, pulling them aside to help your wife reach deeper, use you better by all means. the tip of the cold silicone wet with your own saliva kisses your entrance, and you melt away when sevika's finally fucking you until the base of her cock disappears inside your warm cunt, holding you still even in a secluded space.

she's shoving her fingers in your mouth, making you suck on her digits with a hungry look: lame, she's gonna cum again and she's acting up so fucking lame.

"fucking take it," the damn camera flashes again and sevika has lost count of how many pictures are waiting outside the booth of you two, but she's too busy to say something when she's sinking inside your drenched pussy, pulling on your hair as she grips on the curve of your hip, making you move with her as her movements get rougher, each time more demanding, deeper — "that's it. make space for me, it's not that hard, isn't it?"

she's on a sinking ship either way: slow is now overrated and she would rather dive in headfirst to openly drown in you.

was that so bad? i mean, you're married to her now.

[bucketbueckers]

WILD MOUNTAIN THYME

pairing: paige bueckers x fem!reader

content: au, language, slight spoilers for sinners (2025) but it kinda deviates from the plot a bit, angst, blood, death, ending is happy but happy could be debatable tbh, complicated history between reader and paige but they love each other a lot 😕, smut, make up sex(ish), oral (r!receving) (bc what is sinners if not a movie about eating puss), scissoring, spitting 👅, what do you call sex when your partner is trying to kill you but they Can't so they're fighting against their nature and their body and mind but they get you off so it all works out (kind of?), period typical mentions of racism, homophobia, & misogyny, minor historical inaccuracies, slight soulmates, horribly rushed ending, terrible proofreading

wc: 22.5k

synopsis: You and Paige Bueckers had a complicated history. You existed in that weird plane between lovers and something doomed by a bitter narrative, a relationship marred by the hatred of your time and the impossibility of desire. The two of you weren’t ordinary — you were an orphan taken in by a Hoodoo practitioner, and Paige, who wasn’t quite something or the other, was a woman who just couldn’t seem to stay out of trouble. You should have known that she’d leave one day, not one to be tied down in a place she clearly didn’t belong. There’s no misery worth complaining about in the Mississippi Delta, but when Paige returns from Chicago with Smoke and Stack in tow, you realize they’d brought with them a whole lot more than ambition and foreign liquor.

notes: i have nothing to say besides i love sinners and i really hope y'all like this one 🙏 if you're hesitant about reading bc you haven't seen sinners, you really don't need movie knowledge, although i have a link to a totally legal website if anyone's interested in watching. this one was a challenge to write but im happy w how it turned out (even though i definitely failed my exams because i wrote half of this in a day when i should have been studying)!! please be gentle in the inbox bc i hurt myself with the end too but i debated three different endings and thought this one was Right 💔 as always tho i hope y'all enjoy 🫶

When it happens, you’re surprised. Almost devastatingly so.

You’re surprised because you know that you love Paige Bueckers. You had told her as much. You’re surprised because she had told you the same. Because she promised that one day, she would get the both of you out of the Mississippi Delta. That she’d take the both of you north, perhaps somewhere more tolerant of two women being together. It comes as a shock to you because of the way in which she left – silently, unassuming, simultaneously remorseful and unforgiving.

It’s surprising because she’d clearly been thinking about it for a while. She didn’t leave like she’d shared a stranger’s bed for a night, guilty and ashamed and clumsy all in one. Paige left in the same way you’d once watched a ranch hand put a horse out of its misery when it broke its leg – like it was inevitable, carefully thought out, meant more to save you than to keep you in pain.

That was the confusing part to you. You thought that you and Paige were fine. Having grown up together, you were friends for a long time until it blossomed into something more. Perhaps something more taboo, but you were never quite sure how something so pure could be considered wrong. You knew that you and Paige were unconventional. The Mississippi Delta was all thorns and flames, a region wherein its history was stiflingly pressed down on everyone who wasn’t white or male or wealthy. So, you knew that to be young, and women, and in love in the Delta was difficult, but that had never seemed to be an issue – not one that you would have allowed to tear the both of you apart.

She left you in the morning, and the night before was perfect in a way that gives you emotional whiplash. Annie, a Hoodoo practitioner who had taken you in at a young age, was out, leaving you alone in your shared home. You were standing at the counter, carefully layering pie lattice over a thick bed of apple filling, when Paige knocked and let herself in like she lived there her entire life. She may as well have, considering how much time she truly spent with you.

You grinned at her when she made her way into the kitchen, carefully toeing off her shoes, knowing Annie’s rules. She was carrying a bag in her hand which she set down on the counter before she pressed up behind you, her arms encircling your waist and her lips dusting a sweet kiss to your temple. “Smells good,” she’d commented, watching your fingers work the pie crust.

“Thank you,” you responded. “Flattery doesn’t mean you get to taste it before it’s finished, though.”

Paige sighed, the sound wounded and dramatic, and you laughed because you knew her so well. “What if I make you a deal? We can negotiate.”

You rolled your eyes, cutting the excess crust off of the edge, missing her warmth when she pulled away to reach for the bag she’d walked in with. “You’ve been spending too much time with Elijah,” you muttered. “Always tryin’ to swindle us good folk.”

You didn’t need to look over to see the mischievous grin on her face. “I prefer the term ‘looking for a bargain.’”

“A pig’s a pig even if you put lipstick on it,” you retorted, and Paige huffed something under her breath that sounded a lot like mockery. She pulled a container out of the bag, presenting it with a flourish, her smile wide like she’s holding diamonds. You glanced at her, then at the container, a smile of your own growing despite your attempts at trying to be nonchalant. “That ice cream?” you asked.

“Of the vanilla variety,” she said snootily.

“My favorite,” you hummed.

Paige pretended to look surprised. “Wow!” she exclaimed. “I had no idea. Although I heard it pairs real well with pie.”

“Baked pie,” you said gently.

“Pig’s a pig,” she responded immediately. “Baked or otherwise.”

You couldn’t help the sharp bark of laughter that ripped from your chest as you shook your head fondly. Reaching for a spoon, you dipped it carefully into the filling, still warm from combining the softened apples with the sugar syrup, and you held the utensil out for Paige. With a beaming smile, she enclosed her lips around the spoon, humming in happiness. It almost reminded you of when the two of you were younger and you always begged Annie to share the spoon when she was baking. That made you realize just how long you and Paige had been in each other’s lives, and how badly you wanted to stay in hers.

“That’s all you’re getting,” you chastised. You couldn’t keep your expression neutral for too long – Paige had looked so soft, so earnest, so full of love that it made something in your chest swell and slam against a cage made of bone.

But she’d just leaned in, a gentle hand settling on your hip, and pressed her mouth to yours with a sort of gentleness that feels like the flutter of eyelashes against your cheek and the warmth of the sun pouring in through the windows in the early morning. When she pulled back, the both of you were smiling, and she promised, “I got all I need.”

Your smile widened. She wasn’t talking about the apple pie waiting to bake in the oven. She wasn’t talking about the container of ice cream resting on the counter, already melting and the condensation sweating outside. In a language only the two of you could understand, she meant you. The two of you. The bond that you share and the love that you’ve nurtured despite society’s turmoil. It was sweet in a way that made you question how she could be so gentle, so in love with you, and leave you before the sun rose the morning after.

She spent the night. Once the apple pies were finished, you cut them into even slices while she carefully portioned out scoops of vanilla ice cream onto the top. She had looked so focused, leaning down to compare the amounts, and when she was sure, she handed you the plate that had more ice cream melting from the heat of the desert.

You and Paige retired to your bedroom, curling up in bed together with your slices of pie, bodies pressed together tightly under the blankets. You ate pie until your stomachs ached, laughed until tears slipped from your eyes, and kissed until her hand burned against your waist and the taste of her began to blend with the sweetness of the ice cream and the warmth of the pie.

It escalated from there. With the moon as your witness, you were sure that her lips had touched every inch of your skin and her hands knew the map of your body like it was her own. Like it was something sacred. That you were something to revere, to deserve, to love.

It felt different. Softer, vulnerable. Almost as though words weren’t enough and she was trying to fill in the blanks with her hands. You didn’t know at the time that it was an apology. You never considered that it was a goodbye, that your last memory of her would be one of love and not of her leaving you with the warmth of her body lingering in the sheets next to yours.

You laid together in bed, legs tangled and sheets bunched up at your chests. Your nose was tucked into the crook of her neck. She smelled like warm pie, like something earthy and sweet from her cologne, like something heady from the sweat that had glistened on her skin while she made you fall apart for her. The night was quiet, alive with the sound of crickets chirping, the slow drag of the wind through the crack in your window. You were asleep, breathing gently, ignorant of how Paige laid awake for hours.

It would have been so easy for her to change her mind, she thought. To stay in bed with you until late morning, to pull you back under the covers when you tried to dress. To begrudgingly (happily) follow you out for breakfast, then entertain (annoy) you at Annie’s shop, sneaking kisses when you weren’t organizing the roots or helping customers. It would have been so easy for her to tell Elijah and Elias that she wasn’t going to go with them to Chicago, to tell them that as terrified as she was, she was willing to be strong. For you. 

The south may never let the two of you be in love. In your lifetime, you may never be fully accepted for who you love. And that was scary, because all Paige ever wanted to do was love you in the open. Proudly, unashamedly. The thought of keeping your love indoors made her sick. You deserved someone who you didn’t have to hide with. That someone may never be her.

The letter she had tucked into her pocket was nothing more than a cop-out. She knew that she wouldn’t be able to leave your side if she had to look you in the eyes and tell you the reasons why she was leaving. It was an apology because literally and metaphorically, she could never be the man for you. She couldn’t be what society deemed as proper, couldn’t be the person to hold her family together, couldn’t be the one with the guts and the confidence to stay.

So her decision was made. She didn’t sleep a wink that night. As soon as the first breaths of sunlight poked through the window and the first rooster announced the moon’s retreat, she carefully slid out of bed, pushing her pillow to your chest, her heart shattering as she watched you bury yourself further into the blankets, seeking a heat and a body that wasn’t there anymore. She placed the note on your nightstand, tucked next to the satchel of black cohosh you keep for protection.

Paige stared at you for a long while, throat burning with the struggle of keeping her tears at bay. She watched the gentle rise and fall of your chest as you breathed, tried to commit your image to memory – the slope of your nose, the way your hair billowed out on the pillows, the dark bruise you sported under your jaw because selfishly, she wanted you to remember her after she left. She just didn’t know how badly you’d ache in her absence.

Unable to resist, she brushed a featherlight kiss across your temple, if only to remember the way your skin felt beneath her lips, and you hardly stirred. She wasn’t sure if that made her feel better or for worse.

Then she was gone. And you were left to pick up the pieces of yourself.

“This all for you, honey? Just the thistle and the High John?”

The little girl peeking over the edge of the counter nods at you quickly, and you don’t bother to hide your smile as you carefully pinch off the High John and put it safely into the small, cloth bag. Thistle is quick to follow. You tie it gingerly, holding it out to the girl �� Elise, you think her name is, a regular at Annie’s shop, and you make eye contact with her. Her brother Will ambles quietly behind her. “Now, you remember Miss Annie’s rules, right?” you ask her. “Don’t sell none of that on the way home.”

Elise smiles at you brightly, tucking the bag of roots into her dress pocket. “Yes, ma’am,” she agrees sweetly. In return, she hands you a folded up piece of paper – more like a credit than actual currency, but you and Annie both knew how hard people had to work to obtain these bills.

“Thank you,” you say, and the two children skip out of the shop.

From across the room, Annie glances at you. She’s busy rearranging and restocking her wares. Her lips curl into a smile, one that’s a quiet kind of pride, a silent appreciation. “Those kids love you,” she comments. You drop your head in a gesture of shyness. Finally satisfied with her work, Annie crosses the room and you hand her the currency. “I mean it. You remember the other day when you were stuck tending to the goat?”

You huff a little, leaning back against the counter with your arms crossed. “That goat hates me,” you mutter.

Chuckling, Annie continues, “Well, all Elise and Will could ask was, ‘Where is she? Can we see her? Can we say hi?’ Think they come more for you than for the roots.”

You laugh. “You know that’s not true,” you say.

Annie just gives you a knowing look, but before either of you can say anymore, you hear the crunch of gravel under tires. Instantly, your hair raises on end, knowing that you mostly get foot traffic. Cars were rare, especially amongst those who shopped with Annie.

You crane your head, glancing out the window, but you can’t see much. You and Annie share a look. You follow the older woman to the back door, peering out, and you simultaneously relax and tense up at the sight.

There’s a man squatting next to the grave of Annie’s late baby. He’s dressed formally, pristine, and he’s laying down white flowers next to the clearing. His blue hat sticks out like a sore thumb. You know instantly that it’s Elijah – or Smoke, as most people know him by, and Annie sucks in a deep breath next to you.

If Elijah is in town, then you’re sure that means Elias – Stack – is too. And if the twins are back in town, then that means–

“Let me go talk to him,” Annie interrupts your thoughts, already stepping outside before you can say anything else. For respect and privacy, you close the door behind her, but you almost jump out of your skin when you turn around and you spot her in front of you. You react before you can think better of it.

“Jesus!” Paige exclaims. She catches you by the wrist, a blade gripped firmly in your hands, surprise on her features and an amalgamation of feelings on yours. Guilt, shock, anger. Despite the fact that seeing her again pisses you off beyond belief, your body doesn’t know what your brain does – it still yearns for her as if the two of you were years younger, more immature and devastatingly in love when being in love was the last thing two women of your statuses should have been.

You missed her. You hate that you do. But you know you couldn’t be surprised by it, even if it’s been months – or closer to over a year.

“You welcome in all your customers like that, or just the tall and pretty ones?” she jokes, but her humor does little to diffuse the tension. Your eyes narrow and her face falls slightly. Paige, not unkindly, carefully pries your fingers off of the blade in your hand and closes it in on itself, handing it back to you handle-first.

“You can’t just creep up on people like that,” you mutter, pocketing the blade, and putting space in between your bodies like you know that she and her are more of an inevitability than a possibility. You’d fall right back into her without a second thought. “I could have killed you.”

Paige hums, shoving her hands into her pockets, and that’s when you get a good look at her. Growing up, Paige was never a woman for wearing dresses, something that clearly got her into a lot of trouble with a lot of people. She’d pretended like she never cared for their perception of her, but you knew it weighed on her, even when she dressed how she preferred. Now, she’s wearing a pristine pair of black loafers paired smartly with a deep, purple suit so dark that it looks black. Her blonde hair is pinned back in a low bun.

Despite the distance, it’s clear that time has been kind to her. She’s aged beautifully – no longer the sixteen year old girl you’d found crying in town, trying to hold onto both parts of her family like it was sharp, unforgiving barbed wire. Paige had always struggled to belong. You should have known that insecurity and fear would take her far away from you, but you wish you’d fought a little harder for her, even when you bear guilt and anger of your own.

Maybe she should have fought a little harder for you, too, but you’re older now. Wiser. You know the both of you could point fingers at each other for as long as you wanted to, but it would solve nothing.

“I don’t know about kill,” she muses, a charming grin right back on her face. “I taught you to fight. I know you.”

Confidence seems to be something she’d picked up in Chicago, too, or maybe it’s just audacity. The audacity to come waltzing back into yours and Annie’s shop like she wasn’t the one who left you before the sun came up with nothing more than a note, an apology, and the aching feeling in your chest that you may truly never be happy again unless it was with her. The audacity to joke with you like there’s not a greater distance between you and her than there is distance between Mississippi and Chicago. The audacity to claim that she knows you when, if she did, she would have stopped hiding behind a bravado she picked up from Stack and started with an explanation. An apology. Anything at all to let you know that what the two of you had wasn’t something you hallucinated and that she loved you in the first place.

You don’t humor her, your face twisting up. “What are you doing here?” you ask instead, your tone flat. That cracks through Paige’s poised exterior, her throat bobbing like she’s resisting the urge to flinch. You take a step closer to her. She stands several inches taller than you, but you stare up at her fearlessly. “What ran you out of Chicago? Was it the Irish mob? The Italians?”

Paige presses a little closer now, something in her eyes flashing recklessly, her body eclipsing yours. You don’t stumble back, nor do you avert your gaze from hers. If anything, you push your chest into hers, feeling your heart beating out of your ribcage, her breath fanning against your skin. “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” she mutters, brows furrowed in quiet anger.

“Don’t I?” you snarl. You pinch the fabric of her suit between your thumb and index finger, tugging it slightly, and in her surprise, she falls against you, her arms shooting out to cage you against the counter. But you hardly react. “You’re wearing a pinstripe top. Italian. Tweed trousers. Irish. Playing both sides again, aren’t you? Both at the same time?”

Paige says your name firmly, like she’s begging you to stop talking. You don’t, feeling the anger of her abandonment hit you again. “You can’t always be in two places at once,” you hiss. “But you always will be ‘cause you keep fucking running away.”

That makes her anger return tenfold. “I’m not running,” she scoffs.

You reach into your dress pocket, producing a worn scrap of paper, and you slap it against her chest with a firm noise. “Yeah?” you whisper, cocking your head. She holds onto your wrist with one hand, and with the other, she unfolds the paper, her body stiffening at the sight of the words scribbled in an all too familiar, messy scrawl. Her words, the very ones she’d left with you when she went off to Chicago, leaving the Delta behind in the fading shadow of the night. “What do you call this, then?”

She’s silent, her throat bobbing under the weight of her apprehension. You wonder if she’d admit it. If she’d apologize. But her blue eyes find yours, glassy with unshed tears, and you don’t realize you’re crying until her palm raises to wipe the water off of your cheek. Her hand lingers, though – her skin warm against yours, callused and rough from time but soft in a way that reminds you that it’s Paige in front of you. You’re not sure if that reminder is supposed to comfort you or make you cry harder.

“A regret,” she murmurs finally.

Oh.

Your eyes search hers. For deceit or for honesty – the difference between the two can be hard to tell apart most times. But you see earnestness. It makes you soften.

“I walked away,” Paige admits, her voice breaking. “From the one person in my life who’d made me feel like I belonged. Like I had a place. Like I was more than who my parents were or who my parents weren’t. I left a note and I ran to a city that cared for me even less than the Delta did.” She pauses, trying to find the words. “I regretted that decision every morning when I woke up on a dirty mattress in Chicago and realized I wasn’t next to you.”

“Was it worth it?” you ask, if only to hear the answer.

Paige doesn’t hesitate. “No. None of it ever was. Not when I had to lose you.”

“Why did you go?” You can feel the hesitation in her body, and you press a little further into her. “And make sure you tell me the fucking truth, Paige. No bullshit.”

“I didn’t deserve you,” she murmurs. “Shit, I still don’t. You deserve to be loved in the open, by someone who can provide for you and keep you safe. That was never gonna be with me.”

“I never wanted any of that,” you seethe, fisting your hand in her suit, dragging her closer to you. Her breath hitches, remorse and guilt on her face, but you continue speaking. “Do you understand that? I never needed anyone to provide for me, to keep me safe. I just wanted you to be with me.”

Paige doesn’t break eye contact when she utters, “They’d never let us be in love.”

You swallow your grief. “And what about we?” you say. “What about what we want? I’d rather love you in the dark than someone else in the sun.” You’re both silent. A lone tear slips from Paige’s waterline. You wipe it away gingerly, and her hand catches yours by her face, tangling your fingers together. “I just wish I got the chance to tell you that before you left.”

She nods, the motion like acceptance. Like she understands where you’re coming from – that she always has. That maybe she just needed to hear those words from you to understand it was never about what she thought you deserved, but about what the both of you wanted. As two women in the Mississippi Delta, it was always difficult to carve out that space for yourselves, to want so openly, to want each other so openly. You and Paige have been defying the norm for years now. You’d always thought that it would catch up with you. The love you had for Paige eclipsed that fear.

“Wasn’t the mobs in Chicago,” she confesses under her breath. You cock your head at her, and she deflates. “At least…not yet. The twins wanted out – something about coming back down here to open a juke joint. They brought liquor. Irish beer and Italian wine. They asked if I’d return and I…” The words get caught in her throat. She tries for a smile, but it doesn’t quite reach her eyes. It’s one that says I’ve done everything I’ve could so maybe it’s time to let someone else do what I can’t. “Figured it was time to stop running. From us.”

“For good?” you murmur.

“For as long as you’ll have me,” she responds, thumb brushing across your knuckles. “If that’s still on the table.”

You tilt your head back, far enough away just to look at her. To study her. She’s older now. So are you. The two of you weren’t always going to have a simple story, on account of the both of you being women and being completely different people. But you loved each other, and while you’ve never made it any less complicated for each other, you knew in your heart of hearts that you would take complex with her rather than easy and loveless with anyone else.

But you’re not one to kneel. Bravely, you ask, “And how do I know you mean that?” That gives her pause, something in her expression falling – like guilt and acceptance and a I deserved to hear that all in one. “How do I know I’m not going to wake up tomorrow and you’ll have left another note?” you continue. “You hurt me, Paige. I laid in bed for days and wondered why I wasn’t enough for you to stick around. That doesn’t go away overnight.”

“I know,” she admits, her voice cracking. She meets your eyes, the blue in them so easy to drown in, water shimmering on the surface like sun on the waves. “I can’t undo that. Believe me, I tried.” She laughs a little self-deprecatingly. “Every day I prayed that leaving you was a bad dream I’d eventually wake up from. That I’d find the courage to tell the twins that I was getting on the first train back here to right my wrongs before you slipped through my fingers completely. But I couldn’t – I thought I fucked us up. For good. I thought that we were something I couldn’t save or be enough for.”

Your chest is tight, but you can tell that Paige has more to say, so you remain quiet, your fingers trembling in her hold. She takes a deep breath, trying to find the right words to say, but her shoulders sag in a way that feels like acceptance. Like finally understanding that she may never say or do the right thing, but the effort in honesty is more than enough. You’d always try to fill in the blanks. You didn’t need her to be perfect. You just needed her to be here.

“I know I hurt you,” she continues. “But I also know that I love you – that I’ve been in love with you since we were sixteen and you showed me what home is supposed to feel like. I know that I missed you.” Paige swallows thickly, not breaking eye contact, and she flattens your palm against her chest. You can feel the steady thump of her heart beneath your fingertips. “I missed you here.”

You can tell how much this means to her. You can tell that she’s genuinely remorseful, that she’s probably spent months beating herself up for leaving you in the way that she did. “I’m not expecting you to forgive me immediately,” she murmurs. “I can’t erase a year’s worth of pain overnight. Asking for one more chance is a lot, but I also know that I’d spend the rest of my life and then some making it up to you. I’m not running anymore. Not from you. Not from us. I’m not going to fuck this up again.”

You knew what your answer would be long before she answered you. Maybe you just needed to hear it – the promise, the vow that she’s not going to repeat her same mistakes twice. It makes the tension in your chest ease up, the lines on your face soften, and your shoulders relax. Your palm is still on her chest, so you lift your hand to trace the line of her collarbone absentmindedly. “I’m making pie tomorrow,” you say, glancing up at her with a wry, softer grin. It’s not forgiveness, but it’s something close to it, and Paige smiles brightly because she knows. “You should come by.”

She leans in ever so slightly, her lips brushing yours, and it makes your breath hitch at the contact. Her hands drop to hold you by the waist, her grip both firm and reverent like she’s committed to not letting you go unless you ask. “You gonna let me have the spoon?” she asks coyly, and your smile grows.

“Maybe,” you whisper. Then, you pull away slightly, enjoying the expression of shock on her face. “Now, tell me why you’re really here.”

Paige laughs, the sound full and relieved, and it makes you feel just a little bit more gone. “Already told you, baby,” she says. The nickname softens every sharp edge you’d whittled while she was gone. “The twins wanted to open a juke joint. Smoke came by to ask Annie if she’d cook.”

“Smoke did?” you echo, raising a brow, knowing about his and Annie’s lost baby. You knew that him coming here took a lot of guts. He wouldn’t have if he didn’t mean it. Paige hums in confirmation, the sound respectful as she knows the story, too. “They’re serious, huh?”

“Mmm,” Paige agrees. “Bought the old mill and everything.”

You exhale a little breathlessly, a smile on your face despite it all. “And you?” you ask. Paige’s eyes blink open, something curiously reckless in them. “Where do you fit into all this?”

“Was just hopin’ you’d still like me enough to dance,” she answers, her eyes bright and yearning. Her lips brush yours again, the touch like electricity after so many months of being apart.

You pretend to think about it, which makes Paige shake her head with a laugh and a grin. “Get me a bottle of that Italian wine and you’ve got a deal.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Paige murmurs, her eyes finding yours again with a flicker of hope. You can’t hide your amusement nor the love you have for her, so you finally give in, your lips meeting hers with a deliberate softness. She sighs against you as you press up on the tips of your toes for better leverage. Literally and metaphorically, it feels like coming home again. Your body could never forget Paige nor the way she makes you feel, even if the both of you were dealt an unfair hand of cards.

You feel her grin against your lips, adjusting the angle of her head to deepen the kiss. Your fingers tangle in the loose hair at the back of her neck, warmth creeping into every crevice of your body.

The kiss doesn’t last nearly long enough. You can hear the turn of the lock at the back door and you and Paige pull away from each other quickly, working on adjusting your clothes as Annie and Smoke walk in, a quiet air around them as well. Annie meets your gaze – a brow raising in both question and concern. You nod at her, mustering a small smile, and her features relax, drawing your silent exchange to a close.

Finally, you gather your belongings, letting Paige lead you out towards their truck. There’s only space in front for Smoke and Annie, so you and Paige opt to sit in the back with the liquors, which you’re not too upset about. It gives you the time and the privacy to curl up next to Paige, your argument and reconciliation not completely forgiven nor quite forgotten. Right now, it’s enough for the both of you, knowing that you’ll have the rest of your lives to figure this out. You know that neither of you are going to let this slip away again.

Once you all make it to the old mill, you all get to work. You and Paige work on sweeping the floors and cleaning while Annie works on frying the catfish. Countless friends stream in – old and new – like the Chows, Delta Slim, a pioneering blues performer who you’d thought to have mostly been a legend, Smoke and Stack’s cousin Sammie, and even Cornbread, who’s been hired to play bodyguard.

Everyone’s in high spirits, laughing and enjoying the time. You catch Annie looking at you and Paige with a fond look in her eyes and you try not to blush too much, even when Paige spins you around to the beat of whatever tune Slim is plucking on the piano.

Before you know it, everything is ready. Paige helps to set out the liquor, smiling wryly at you when she stashes a bottle of her wine in her suit, and you laugh as you serve a patron some of Annie’s catfish. The old mill fills fast, people looking for a break, to have fun, to let loose and listen to Sammie sing the blues.

For this one moment in time, everything feels…right. Peaceful. Like there’s not a single worry in the world, and you think that you can get used to this. The sound of soul in your ear, of laughter and love swirling around you, the heavy feeling of Paige’s gaze on you while she regales some of the customers with charming stories about who knows what. Her eyes find you more than appropriate, though, and you find it hard to stay polite in front of everyone.

But she sidles up to you, empty wine glass in hand, and her smirk is mischievous, loose, like she’s about to ask you to do something you can’t quite say no to. Her hand finds your waist behind the bar, palm warm against your skin, and you raise a brow at her. “Think I can convince you to stop workin’ for a bit and have a drink with me?” she asks, gaze predatory and sharp. “Pretty sure I owed you a glass of wine.”

“Sounds like you’ve got ulterior motives,” you comment, looking up at her through your lashes. “You tryin’ to get me tipsy?”

“Just relaxed,” she murmurs, her eyes trailing your figure unashamedly. “Anything after that is purely coincidental.”

“I’m sure.” Your tone is flat, but your eyes are amused. “Would have thought that you’d give it a few more days before you tried finding your way under my skirt. Just this morning you were begging for me to forgive you.”

That sobers her instantly. She blinks at you like she’d forgotten all about that, and it makes you swell with affection for this idiot in front of you. “We don’t have–”

You can’t help but laugh, tanging your fingers in the collar of her suit, and you gently drag her a little closer to you. It makes her breath hitch, but the look on her face makes it all worth it. “Pour me a glass and meet me in the back,” you murmur, releasing her. Just before you walk away, you offer her a teasing smile. “And don’t keep me waiting.”

“Yes ma’am,” she rushes out, already reaching for another glass under the bar, and you know she’s hot on your heels as she follows you to the back. You leave the door slightly ajar and she shuts it as soon as she’s in, the lock clicking into place as you take a seat on top of the table tucked into the corner. Her gaze is a little predatory when she steps forward, looking as though she wants to ravage you but be respectful about it – like she doesn’t quite know where the two of you stand after your difficult conversation that morning.

But she doesn’t say anything. She doesn’t rush to fill the silence, even as she holds the wine glass in between two fingers and slowly tips the bottle over, filling it with the dark red liquid. Your eyes follow the way her fingers move, the veins in her wrist that protrude, and it’s then that you’re reminded of just how beautiful Paige Bueckers is.

It’s not something you consciously forget. You haven’t seen her in a while, and this is the first time in a good amount of time that you’ve allowed your walls to fall down. To allow yourself to want her so openly. It makes you ache because you know she wants you to and this entire thing – her pouring the wine for you, her fingers lingering on yours when she gives you the glass, is more of a formality than anything else.

You wait while she fills her glass, too, and then you tap the sides in cheer. “To a successful first night,” you murmur, catching the dark of her gaze over the dim lighting.

“To you,” she says. “And to us.”

To hide the blush growing on your cheeks, you roll your eyes slightly, tipping your head slightly to drink the wine. You like that Paige’s gaze is hooked on you, following the bob of your throat as you swallow the wine. She already looks like she’s unravelling and all you’ve done is drink. “Always have to one up me, don’t you?” you state, and she takes a sip of her own wine. The flavor is pleasant – not too sharp, but not too sweet. You can see why Paige and the twins played the Italian mob like this. They make excellent wine.

“Just wanted to be honest,” she retorts. “Something actually worth toasting about.”

You raise your brows, watching her figure as she takes a seat in the chair next to the table, her gaze locked onto yours. “Are you not actually into the juke joint?” you ask, curious.

She shrugs a shoulder. Her eyes linger on the way your skirt rides up your legs when you cross them at the knee. “This was the twin’s project,” she says, not unkindly. “I was just here to help. And to stop running from the things I love.”

You snort into your wine. “That sounds like something to unpack.”

“Probably,” she admits. “Sometimes…I look at a good thing, and my first thought isn’t that it’s good. It’s how devastated I would be if I were to lose it.” That makes you soften, and you reach for her hand, intertwining your fingers. “I think that’s why I was so scared of…staying. I thought I wouldn’t be allowed to be happy for long, that it would be taken away from me. I didn’t want to lose you. I guess it was easier to leave than to risk it.”

“But not anymore?” you question.

She shakes her head. “Still lost you,” she says. “Just in a different way. One that hurt a lot more.” Paige takes a long sip of her wine before she speaks again. “There was this Italian guy I met while I was in Chicago. He caught me at a bad time. I was drunk off my ass at a pub, and I guess he recognized me from running with the mob. He took me home and I started rambling about you. About missing you. How you’d give me peppermint to chew on when I was plastered because it would help my headache.” That makes you crack a smile as you listen to her go on. “Think I got really upset and lost it, and then he says, ‘How lucky you are to have loved someone so strongly that saying goodbye is hard.’ I woke up the morning after. My head hurt, and all I could think about was you and how not having you turned me inside out.”

Paige pauses for a long moment, clearly having more to say. You just brush your fingers across her knuckles. “I don’t think I’m scared of that anymore,” she confesses. “Not – of losing you. I don’t ever want to do that again. But I don’t think I’m scared of loving you. That’s a blessing by itself. And no matter how long…or how short…I think I’m lucky to be able to do that.”

You swallow thickly, realizing the seriousness of the moment, and you admit, “I don’t want you to feel like you have to run from me.” That catches her attention. “I don’t want you to feel like you have to do this alone. We’re…together.” Your voice catches on that word, unsure if that’s a term you should still use to describe your relationship, and you think that was a good choice because Paige’s face lights up. “I just want you to choose me when it gets hard and trust that we can figure it out.”

“I will,” she states firmly. “God, I swear to you, I will. I’m not gonna fuck this up again.”

You smile at her, gently, because you know she’s not going to. Not when she swears like her life depends on it. “I trust you,” you promise her. “But even if you do…it’s gonna be okay. I don’t want perfection. I just want you.”

That makes her smile turn a little tender, a little bashful. “I can work with that.” She finishes the rest of the wine in her glass and her voice is a hoarse when she says, “Think you might be stuck with me now.”

Your smile turns a little mischievous. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

When she looks at you again, her gaze is a little dark, hungry. “Depends on how you look at it.”

You set your wine glass down, not bothering with a response before you shift on the table, facing her fully, and you cup her cheeks in your hands as you pull her against you. She’s quick – groaning against your lips like she’d spent the entire day thinking about the next time she’d get to kiss you, and her arms encircle your waist, fingers pressing firmly into your skin.

She tastes like wine and something unmistakably Paige that makes your head spin. Her lips drag against yours, already making something in your core swell with heat and tighten, her tongue brushing against your bottom lip in permission. You don’t give it to her, tangling your fingers in the loose bun at the back of her head and tugging slightly, and she gasps a little breathlessly at the feeling.

“You’re a brat,” she mutters, standing from the chair fully. The movement forces you to disconnect your lips and with the natural pause, you slide your hands under her suit top, pushing the blazer down her shoulders.

“You’ve got a lot of groveling to do,” you retort. “Something about spending the rest of your life making it up to me, I think.”

Her resulting smile is a little sharp when she looks at you. “Oh, is that so?” she murmurs. You nod, already reaching out for her, and you wrap your arms around her neck while you connect your lips again. It’s wet, hot, and the both of you slide against each other with little restraint, the alcohol in your veins loosening the both of you up and intensifying the feeling. “You just want me on my knees, don’t you?” Her voice had dropped low, her tone teasing and rough, and it makes you squeeze your thighs together, which was obviously something that she picked up on. “You liked that?” She says it like it’s a surprise to her, like she’s discovered a secret you didn’t want to share, and you feel her grin as she kisses you again, drawing a moan from your lips when she squeezes one of your thighs.

“Would that make you feel better, baby?” she coos, fingers trailing a hot path between your thighs, pressing against the thin lace of your underwear. You’re already breathing heavily, and judging by the way she sucks in a deep breath, you’re sure that she’s found the wetness at the apex of your thighs. “You’re soaked for me and all I’ve done is kiss you. Still all mine. Doesn’t matter how long I’m gone.”

Your cheeks burn, and your fingers grapple for stability on her shirt. She leans in to press another filthy kiss to your lips, her tongue probing out to trace your bottom lip again, and you’re too lost in the feeling to open up for her. She doesn’t like that – an annoyed sound building at the back of her throat when she bites down on your lip – just a gentle nip, enough to get your attention but not enough to truly hurt, and she slips her tongue inside while you gasp.

It’s pure dominance from then on out – she unravels you with her lips while her fingers rub maddening circles against your clit over the lace. She was right. She hadn’t done much, but she’s always been good at tearing you apart. Even if she hasn’t been near you in months, she still knows what works, how much pressure you need, exactly where to touch you. And your body responds like it knows Paige’s touch. It doesn’t embarrass you to admit that there wasn’t anyone else while she was gone. This feeling has been building ever since the day that she left, and you suppose that it is her responsibility to handle it.

She breaks away from your lips to trail kisses to your jawline, sucking a dark spot at the edge of it. You can feel her smile against your skin as your mouth falls open in wordless pleasure. Her fingers are insistent, continuous, as she follows a path across your skin that only she’s the expert in, her lips enclosing around the lobe of your ear, the spot behind it that makes you shiver, your pulse point, the base of your throat where your necklace glitters.

Paige lingers, a little breathless at the sight of you, and the hand not tending to your leaking cunt reaches up to cup your breast, thumb tweaking your nipple over your top. Moaning, your head falls back, giving her ample space to work with, and she latches onto your neck immediately. Her teeth scrape against your skin, drawing a ragged sound from your throat. Her words vibrate against you when she speaks. “So fucking beautiful,” she murmurs, punctuating her words with another kiss, her tongue poking out to trail across your body.

It makes you shiver for an entirely different reason now. You reach up with one of her hands to cup the back of her neck, pushing her a little closer to you, and her finger swipes a little more firmly against your clit, making you keen. “Please, Paige,” you beg. “Need you, need more.”

“I got you,” she promises, finally sinking to her knees. Breathless, you clench around nothing, instinctively spreading your legs for her as she peers up at you through her lashes. Her palms are warm against your skin as her hands slide up your thighs, pushing your skirt up to give herself more space to work with. “Keep your eyes on me.” You don’t have the brain space to ask Or else what? but you’re so high strung that you don’t want to test her.

The edge of her smirk is hungry, predatory, like she’s seconds away from drooling, and it makes you ache. She presses her lips to your thighs, littering gentle kisses across your skin while she makes her way towards your cunt. Needy, you cup the back of her head with your hand, encouraging her to get a move on, and her smile softens as she listens to your wordless command.

She tangles her fingers in the lace covering you and pulls it down with an agonizing slowness, breath catching at the way a strand of your slick sticks to the fabric and snaps when the stretch is too great. Then, almost deliberately, she folds your underwear, setting it gently on the chair she’d sat in, and you’re seconds away from beating the shit out of her. “Paige,” you hiss, trying for an assertive tone, but you just sound whiny.

She doesn’t respond – she doesn’t have to. She slides her hands under your thighs and lifts your legs gently over her shoulders, opening you up for her, and she groans at the sight like you’re one of the ancient wonders of the world. Paige doesn’t waste anymore time before she dives in, her tongue already relentless as she strokes from your leaking entrance to your aching clit, moaning against you and already addicted to the taste. You whimper, head lulling back as your fingers tighten in her hair, but she nips at your clit. It doesn’t sting, but it gets your attention, and you return your gaze down to her.

Your slick already coats her mouth, glistening in the light, her eyes hooded and pussy drunk in the way she always gets when she gets to put her mouth against you. She’d once joked that she could die happy down here and you truly never realized how serious she was until now. Her brows are pinched, pleasure evident on her face like she’s the one moments away from falling apart, and her tongue traces every sopping inch of your cunt as though she’s afraid to let a single drop go to waste.

Her tongue slides in to drink directly from the source. Her nose brushes against your sensitive clit and it sends a lightning bolt of white hot pleasure up your spine, curling low in your belly, and drawing a whimpering moan from you. She works you like it’s her last day on earth and getting you to come is her only chance at salvation. Her pace makes you a little dizzy, her tongue going from hole to clit to kissing the aching bud until the pressure makes your hips buck. She’s everywhere all at once as though she’s trying to reacquaint herself with your cunt, like she’s trying to make up for lost time.

She said she’d make it up to you. You think she’s doing a damn good job, especially when her fingers tighten around the fullness of your thighs, pushing herself in deeper, and you spread yourself open a little more, too far gone to care about much of anything that’s not how good Paige Bueckers looks when she’s on her knees with her face buried in your cunt.

And then she starts talking. There wasn’t a chance in hell that you were going to last after this, not when she’s holding onto you like she’s the one who’s about to float away, and whimpering, “Missed this.” The whine in her tone makes you a little crazy, your fingers tightening in her hair, your hips bucking against her face as you try to chase a high you know she’d rather die than deny you. “Missed you so fucking much, baby. Missed the way you taste. The way you sound – fuck, the way you fall apart for me.”

“Please,” you choke out, but you’re not quite sure what you’re begging for. Paige nods anyways, the motion causing you to gasp when her nose brushes against your clit again, and she somehow doubles her pace, her tongue sliding against you with a vicious efficiency that all but pushes you to the edge. You’re teetering on it now, inches away from slipping off completely, and you ramble, “Shit, Paige, so close. You’re so fucking good, love you so much–”

Your words get stuck in your throat when she latches onto your clit and sucks. You’re almost sure that she breathes the very soul out of your body as you crumble completely, your legs tightening around her head as your hips buck wildly against her mouth. The sounds spilling from your lips are unrestrained, unintelligible, but Paige hums against you and drinks up every drop from your cunt like you’re the first sip of water she’s had in years. She’s always a little messy when she’s got a glass or two of wine in her system, but you think you like her this way – when she behaves like your pleasure is the most important thing to her and that she died if you weren’t unravelling on her face.

Sensitive, you cry out softly, tugging her back by the hair to give you room to breathe. But she doesn’t budge, her grip tightening on your thighs, and she glances up at you, brows tented, chest heaving, her expression nothing short of begging. Her face is slick, lips, cheek, nose, and even her neck covered with your arousal, and it makes something in your core simmer with heat. “C’mon, baby,” she pleads, her tongue already working you again. The oversensitivity makes you tremble, but you’re bucking into her mouth mindlessly, needing to come for her again. “One more. Lemme give you one more.”

You’re nodding, but you know she can’t see it, her tongue already sliding through your folds and lapping you up with a fervor. It won’t take much – you know she knows that, and she hums against your cunt in pleasure when you leak into her waiting mouth. “So fucking good for me,” she mutters against you. She’s lost in your pleasure, which makes you ache again, already teetering dangerously close to the edge.

This time, you don’t even have the chance to warn her. Her teeth close around your clit, nipping gently enough to make your hips twitch, then soothing the sting with a harsh suck. You spill over her instantly, your second orgasm somehow feeling stronger than the first one, and your head falls back in desperate pleasure while her pace finally slows. Paige helps you ride out the aftershocks, her tongue cleaning every inch of you before extracting herself from your cunt with great difficulty. If you were any more conscious, you might be able to see the way she stares forlornly at you while she draws back, like she’s a soldier heading off to war.

You can’t focus on anything but the way her palms rub your thighs soothingly, how she unfurls your hands from her hair and tangles your fingers together to help bring you back down to earth. The hand not holding yours curls around your neck as she lifts herself into a standing position, pulling you into her body, pressing her lips gently to your temple while she strokes the hair at the base of your neck.

Strangely, that’s what actually brings you back into a state of coherency, because her lips are sticky and wet from where she’d just spent the better part of fifteen minutes sucking the soul out of your body through your cunt. “You need to wash your face,” you mutter, not actually that bothered by it, and you wipe your own slick off of your forehead immediately.

Paige catches your wrist, slipping your finger into your mouth and sucking gently, her cheeks suctioning from the pressure. If you could feel your legs, you might knock her ass to the ground and return the favor, but the surprisingly serious expression on her face gives you pause. “Don’t waste that shit,” she reprimands you, gingerly wiping the rest off of your face and licking it off her fingers. “Haven’t had you in over a year and you wanna deprive me?”

“And whose fault is that?” you retort, not really intending to be mean about it, and Paige narrows her eyes at you.

“I just gave you two earth-shattering, mind-numbing, toe-curling–”

“Get to the point.”

“Two orgasms,” she emphasizes. “Two. How many more until I’m out of the doghouse?”

You roll your eyes, a little amused by how fucking annoying she is, and you curl your fingers in the collar of her shirt to plant a chaste kiss to her lips. You can taste yourself, but it doesn’t bother you. “You’re an idiot,” you mumble.

“You love me,” she fires back.

At that, you can’t really help your smile, and the next kiss you press to her mouth is a little more gentle. Softer. Full of something that words can’t really convey, even as you admit, “I do.”

The beaming smile on her face would be a little endearing if you forgot about the two orgasms she’d just drawn from you. “I love you, too,” she promises, and part of you aches for a different reason now. You’re not sure how long you’d been waiting to hear those words from her again, but it makes warmth bloom in your chest, curling around your heart like it belongs there.

She helps you back into your lace underwear, only half pretending to not miss seeing you naked, and the two of you leave the back room with your empty wine glasses in hand. At the bar, Annie raises her eyebrows at you knowingly, but you don’t say anything for both of your sakes – Annie practically raised you, and there were things she just did not need to know. Paige, blessedly, keeps her mouth shut, but she smirks at you as though she’s already thinking about the next time she can have you.

Spirits are high in the juke joint. You can spot Smoke brooding on the second floor, something you’re not really surprised by, and you have no clue where Stack is. You spotted Mary a while ago, which didn’t really surprise you, either; she always had a difficult time staying away from trouble, but so does the blonde who’s lingering in your shadow, not wanting to let you out of her sight.

The party rages on for another twenty or so minutes – everyone is still singing and dancing. Delta Slim is still plucking away at the piano, and you’re deep in conversation with a woman who frequents Annie’s shop when you hear a commotion at the front door. That’s what actually surprises you. The night had been peaceful so far. Cornbread hadn’t actually had to enforce his bouncer duties, but it seems there’s a time and a place for everything.

You follow Annie (and Paige follows you) to the front door. You step up behind the twins, then Mary’s behind you, and you’re all a little concerned at the sight. Standing at your doorstep are three individuals. They’re holding three different guitars and the man on the far right has a lantern clutched in his grasp. They’re white, so you can see why their arrival gives everyone pause.

“We heard a tale of a party,” the white man at the front says. You struggle to place his accent, your head cocking in confusion. There’s something…off, about him, something lurking beneath the surface, and you can’t place that, either. But your gut is never wrong. You nudge Annie, a silent conversation passing between the two of you, and she nods. She suspects it, too. “Drinks, food, blues music and the like.”

Cornbread looks perplexed. “You did?” he asks, his tone believing.

“We like to drink,” the man says. “We happen to be musicians, and, uh…we walked here. So, we hungry as dogs.” The other man with the lantern backs this up with a very emphatic woof woof! that disgusts you immediately. You shift uncomfortably and Paige curls an arm around your waist subtly. “You wouldn’t mind us coming in, now, would you?”

Cornbread narrows his eyes. “I think y’all are in the wrong place,” he states.

“What makes you say that?” the woman asks.

The man turns his gaze from cornbread to the twins, his features softening. “You fellas must be the owners of this establishment.”

“That’s right,” Smoke agrees. “And you are?”

They introduce themselves – the man in the middle is Remmick, and his companions are Bert and Joan. But when Sammie comes into view to check on his cousins, Remmick’s expression shifts. “You must be that voice I heard from out here. It was beautiful.”

“Goddamn beautiful,” Joan agrees unsettlingly.

“Even through these walls,” Bert adds.

You narrow your eyes, only half listening to the rest of the conversation as you try to place why these travelers unsettle you so. It’s not the color of their skin – far from it. It’s the almost robotic detachment, the way they’re here, uninvited, and Joan and Bert have positioned themselves  on either side of Remmick and far enough behind him to be considered respectful. They’re not equals. Remmick holds a sort of power over them, and you feel like you’re nearing the answer the more you stare at them, at the way Remmick stares into the juke joint as if searching for something.

The conversation passes. Questions like where are you from? Are you Klan? Even an unsettling rendition of Pick Poor Robin Clean that makes your hair stand on end. Smoke ends it abruptly, not a fan of the lack of blues, and Remmick points out that he and his friends have a lot of money they’d like to spend. They exchange a few more words before they walk away with an exaggerated slowness, stopping just short of the road leading into the woods.

“They gave me the willies,” Pearline, another of the singers, mutters.

“Crackers at night time will do that to you,” Stack says. Then, Smoke and Stack start arguing over why they’re here, if they’re actually Klan, before Smoke firmly states, “Don’t let them in.”

That seems to be the end of that, and the tension dissipates slightly. You return to the bar with Annie and Paige in tow, something uncomfortable settling low in your gut, and you top off your glass of wine and you take a long, slow sip of it. “I don’t trust them,” you declare in a huff, feeling Paige’s hand slide soothingly around your waist. “That man barked.”

“Woof, woof,” Paige imitates, and you wrinkle your nose at her in a way that makes her face fall. “Not funny. Got it.”

“I don’t either,” Annie admits. She glances up to the second floor where Smoke and Sammie are locked in conversation. Something makes her lips twist as she cleans a glass, something that looks a whole lot like I hope he knows what he’s doing.

Across the room, you spot Mary and Stack conversing, then you watch as Stack slips a small handgun into a holster tucked under her skirt. You know what her plan is long before Mary walks smoothly to the bar, sidling up next to you and Paige, looking at the taller blonde with a quiet request. “They’ll listen to us,” Mary says, her tone soft, spoken like it’s one of the quiet truths about the world and society that you’ll have to accept. “Remmick and them. The twins aren’t breaking even – too much plantation credit. The juke joint won’t be able to operate for another night if they can’t afford it.”

Paige draws her bottom lip between her teeth. You know her well enough to understand that she’d made up her mind. You give Mary a gentle look and she nods solemnly, stepping away from you two and giving you some privacy.

“Five minutes,” Paige utters, her voice hardly above a whisper. You might not be able to hear her over the thrum of the crowd. “Just to feel them out and keep an eye on Mary.” You don’t say anything, only looking up at her with an expression of calm concern, and she reaches for your wrist, pressing your palm to her hip where you can feel the outline of her holster, the handgun settled against her skin, unassuming.

You had a bad feeling about them, although it was significantly better for Paige and Mary to be out there together, both armed, than to let one or the other go alone. You didn’t like the situation, but you couldn’t do much. Sucking in a deep breath, you enclose both of Paige’s hands around yours, bringing them to your lips, and the both of you close your eyes as you pray over her. For safety, for protection. For the clear eyes to spot deceit. When you finish, she brushes a quick, gentle kiss to your cheek, squeezing your hands once before walking out of the door side by side with Mary.

Your chest is tense the entire time that she’s gone, but you try to keep yourself distracted, chatting with Annie while the two of you work the bar in tandem. She serves the fried catfish while you pour the drinks, an easy rhythm between the two of you. Even though you’re busy with the crowd, your eyes still trail off to the front door, hoping to see the tall blonde walk in sooner rather than later.

Eventually, she does, and Mary’s right behind her. You feel as though you can finally breathe a sigh of relief, although you wrinkle your nose when you watch Mary throw herself onto Stack and lead him into the back room you and Paige had already visited not even an hour prior. You suppose it’s a happy night for everyone, and you smile fondly at Paige as she rounds the bar once more, her palm finding your hip. “How’d it go?” you ask in a hushed whisper.

“Nothing to worry about,” she reassures you, but she doesn’t add anymore, which confuses you. Her hand presses against you a little more firmly, a knee slipping between your legs, and you can’t help but gasp at the pressure.

“Paige!” you hiss, glancing around, your heart in your throat. Annie is occupied with an inebriated man who is struggling to cut his fish, but it doesn’t make you relax anymore. Her grin is sharp, eyes dark, and you can smell the wine and something distinctly minty on her breath as she leans in. “You’re insatiable.” You try for a reprimanding tone, but you just sound a little breathless, feeling a heat coil low in your belly when she pushes you down on her knee slightly. “We just–”

“Still gotta make it up to you, don’t I?” she murmurs, the muscle of her thigh flexing under your weight, and you sigh softly at the drag, trying to not look like she’s ruining you in a room full of people. “Let Annie handle this. You deserve a break.” Her lips find the shell of your ear, her voice a rumbling, low timbre when she says, “You deserve to feel good, baby. Lemme help you.”

Still breathless, all you can do is nod, and she guides you upstairs, the both of you searching for a quiet corner. Paige pushes open the door to the loft area and her lips are on yours before the door clicks shut. She’s insistent, ravenous, something so different from the way she kissed you downstairs. Her hands curl under your thighs, lifting you easily, and she presses you against the door.

Your fingers tangle in her hair, ruining the bun she’d messily fixed after your earlier rendezvous, and she groans against your lips when you tug. She disconnects your lips, her head tilting back in pleasure at the slight sting of pain, and you don’t waste any time before you’re leaning into her. You sink your teeth into her neck, your tongue soothing over the mark. Her hips buck like the feeling of your lips on her neck already has her close to the edge. You trail your lips down, nipping at the vein protruding from the side of her neck, the tender area where her neck meets her shoulder. Paige’s fingers tighten around you, her muscles straining, and it sends white hot desire to your core when your palms slide down, feeling the definition in her shoulders and her biceps.

Your lips meet again and Paige breathes into you like she’s trying to gather your taste, to eat you alive. Her tongue meets yours, hardly needing permission this time around, and you sink into it, letting her unravel you. It’s a lot – the feeling of her teeth in your skin, the dangerous, almost instinctual way she kisses you, the primality in how she squeezes bruises into the skin of your thighs. It’s rough, heady, and right now, it is perfect.

You break away long enough to speak, your chest heaving. When you meet her eyes, her pupils are blown out, the darkest blue you’ve ever seen them, and you swear you see the smallest fleck of drool spilling out from the corner of her lips, but you can’t be too sure if it was from her or you. All you know is that you need her – right now. You need her, pressed bare skin to bare skin, her hips rutting against yours, her mouth on your chest or your neck or quite literally anywhere. “Need you,” you whimper, your lips brushing against hers, and she squeezes you once that feels like some strange mix between a warning and an apology.

She lifts you off of the door, her teeth scraping against your collarbone as she leads you backwards. There’s a fleece blanket spread out on the floor, the one that had been used to cover the piano during transport, and she lays you against it gently, a devastating contrast to the viciousness in which she’d kissed you with. Something in you aches at the sight of her. The heat coiling in your belly, the pulsating feeling between your legs, begging for attention. You’ve never needed anyone more than you need Paige right now.

When you peer up at her through your lashes, you’re almost taken aback by how different she looks. Her fingers are trembling as she unbuttons her dress shirt, but there’s simultaneously a stark rigidity in her spine, a tense feeling in her shoulders. It’s like she’s fighting between two different parts of her – her brain and her body, or something else otherworldly, like maybe some instinctual urge.

At first, you wonder if she’s only doing this because she feels as though she truly has to make up for her absence in making you feel good. Maybe something had gotten lost in translation or jokes that didn’t land well. So you reach out, stopping her movements when your fingers wrap around her wrists, and her entire body goes still. The tremor is gone. Her shoulders sag with something like realization, or relief, as though a weight had been lifted off of them. And her eyes – which had been burning with a heat, a desire you don’t think you’ve ever seen before, have calmed.

Gently, you whisper, your tone echoing a promise, “You don’t owe me anything.” You watch her throat bob as she swallows, her eyes trailing from your eyes, to your lips, before honing in on your neck, where the pulse from the organ behind your ribcage thrums in your neck. “We don’t–”

“I want to,” she breathes out, shrugging out of her shirt, and your eyes follow the lines of her body. You didn’t get to see them earlier. Her breasts are covered by her bra, something worn yet unshakingly reliable, the firm lines of her muscles crossing over one another and dipping beneath the waistband of her pants. Paige leans down, her hands pressed into the floorboards on either side of your head, her arms caging you in. The position shouldn’t make you feel as safe as you do, but she dips her head down to kiss you again. It’s gentler, more like what you’re used to from her, and the difference makes your headspin. She goes from rough to demanding to gentle and soft within minutes, and your body struggles to catch up.

“Wanna make you feel good,” she whispers, her voice wrecked, as she scrapes her teeth against your neck again. She pauses, her nose nearing your pulse point, where you’re sure she can feel the way your heart beats for her. Paige breathes in, like she’s trying to memorize the way you smell, and she presses a gentle kiss to your pulse point. She lingers there, her breath hitching, almost as though she’s forcing herself to keep moving. Like she knows she’s doing something she shouldn’t quite be doing.

“Wanna watch you fall apart for me,” she continues, her tongue darting out to lick the salt off your throat. She hums at the flavor and you arch into her. Paige leans back on her heels, reaching out for you, and she quickly unzips your dress at the back. “Wanna see you. All of you.” She punctuates her words by slowly pulling the fabric down, revealing miles upon miles of glistening skin, and her breath hitches at the sight. You’re bare, nipples already pebbling from the cool air of the room, and she sneaks in a feel as she pulls your dress down your torso.

It comes off easily. You lift your hips to help her out, leaving you in nothing but your lace, which is still damp from earlier. Her gaze lingers, and naturally, you spread your legs for her, allowing her to settle in between you with something like wonder on her face. But there’s something in her expression that’s still pinched.

You forget all about her weird behavior when her lips enclose around one of your nipples, her hand reaching up to fondle the other one. The pressure is otherworldly, all but forcing you to press up against her, and her free hand shoves your hips down with ease. You gasp a little, already sure that you’re leaking again, but she hums deep in her throat, the sound sending a shockwave straight through you.

“Paige,” you whimper, your voice breaking around a moan as she alternates, her mouth finding your other breast. “Please touch me.”

She laughs, fingers tracing the waistband of your lace, slipping under when you least expect it. But she doesn’t find your clit. She doesn’t press against you in the way that you need, doesn’t slip her finger inside like she usually would. She’s trying to draw out your pleasure, to make you beg for it, and that thought alone makes you wetter. “I am touching you, baby,” she teases. Her lips leave your breasts to trail down your stomach, nipping gently, soothing the sting with her tongue.

Huffing, you wrap your legs around her waist, tugging her a little closer to you, and something dangerous flashes in her gaze. “Don’t be a jerk,” you chastise, trying to sound strong, but your voice is breathless, full of need, and Paige knows it.

She grabs your thighs, pressing your legs back down onto the blanket, and leans over you with something dark in her eyes. “Don’t be a brat,” she retorts. The tone of her voice makes your entire body burn. “Think I don’t know what you need?” Her palms press against your stomach, fingers poking where she’d sucked brusies against your sensitive skin. It makes your hips jump. “You think I don’t know how to touch you? That when you’re turned on, and I press here…” Her palm finds your stomach, pressing down precisely, and a gasp falls from your lips. The smile on her face is far too smug. “…You make those sweet little sounds for me?”

“Paige,” you cry out again, feeling your need seep out of your cunt, surely staining your lace.

But she just keeps going. “You think I don’t know exactly how to fuck you? To make sure you feel me?” She shakes her head, lost in it, and she tangles her fingers in the waistband of your underwear. “I know you, baby. I know you’re soaking through this fucking lace for me. Know you’ve been wet all fucking night. If I had my way, I would have had my head between your thighs for hours until you cried for me.” Paige pulls your lace down slowly, her jaw falling open as she reveals your dripping cunt.

She glances at you, a satisfied little smile on her face, gaze heated, gone. “Is it that serious?” she coos, her tone teasing, eyes dropping to your thighs. “So fucking wet for me. Just want me to take care of you, huh?”

That’s when you spot it – the shining, viscous liquid pooling at the corner of her mouth, sliding down her chin, her neck. She’s fucking drooling. That realization hits you like a fucking truck, arousal seeping out of your weeping cunt, and you’re a little breathless when you ask, “Is that serious?” while you gesture to her lips.

Almost as though she’s coming back to herself, she reaches up, fingers finding the spit leaking out of her mouth, and she stares like she’s been caught. Something clears in her eyes. Embarrassment, maybe. Probably something else. Feeling your heartbeat in your cunt, you reach out for her hand, wrapping your lips around her fingers, and moaning in pleasure at the taste of her spit.

You can hear her groan – impossibly wrecked, destroyed entirely. She watches with rapt attention as you take her fingers down to the base, your tongue sliding between them, making sure you get every drop. When you’re done, her fingers are soaked, coated in your own saliva, and you drag a finger across the remainder pooling at the base of her neck. “What’d you say earlier?” you whisper, tone saccharine sweet. “‘Don’t waste that shit’?” You pop your own finger in your mouth while her brain catches up with her.

Ruined, she wipes her chin and her neck, offering her hand to you, and you don’t waste any more time before you’re taking her fingers in your mouth again, making sure to maintain eye contact. She groans, the sound low and devastating in her throat, her eyes not once moving away from you. When her hand is clear, she wraps it around your throat, not applying any pressure, but the hold is firm enough to push you back down onto your back. 

“Open,” she commands, and you do so wordlessly. The hand on your throat holds you still while, slowly, she lets her spit pool on her tongue, letting it fall into your mouth. You shudder at the feeling, your body impossibly hot, and her smile is a little reverent when she releases your throat to push your jaw up. You swallow immediately. Paige rewards you with a bruising kiss, groaning at the flavor of your combined tastes.

There’s no more foreplay from there, the both of you burning for each other. She fumbles with her belt buckle and shucks off her pants and boxers with an unnatural quickness. You reach for the hem of her bra, not wanting to be alone in your nakedness, and she raises her arms to allow you to pull it off of her.

The first press of her skin against yours feels like a lightning strike to your overheated skin. It makes you gasp, and she takes advantage of your pleasure to slip her tongue inside again, already working on pushing you to the edge with her lips alone. Her hands trail down to your thighs, pushing them open even more. She fits against you like a puzzle piece, pulling you flush against her, and you’re sure you ascend completely at the feeling of her wet cunt pressing against yours.

You both let out keening moans, your name falling from her lips while a curse falls from yours. Your fingers grapple for purchase on her back, your nails sinking in and scratching, and she moans against your lips at the sting of pain. Her forehead presses against yours, her hips rolling sensually into yours, and when your sensitive clits brush against each other, desire shoots up both of your spines simultaneously.

Her arms are caging you in again, the bulge and ripple of her muscles dragging you closer to a long awaited peak. Her hips roll with a newfound intensity, your combined slick making the slide impossibly smooth, and every brush of her clit against yours makes a moan tumble from your mouth. You’re unable to say anything, the pleasure immense and the words caught in your throat, and Paige kisses you like she understands, anyways. It’s needy, desperate, and reverent all in one.

Paige’s hips slam against yours, the both of you chasing your highs, and she releases your lips to press her mouth to your neck, directly over your pulse point. She kisses it, sucks a deep, bruising mark into your skin, and noses against your skin like she’s trying to memorize the way you smell – the way your blood smells as it courses through your veins. 

And then her teeth scrape against your neck. It makes you keen, tilting your head back to give her more room to work with, and she whimpers against your skin like the pleasure is too much. Her hips keep moving, even when her lips stall, but she mouths against your neck, almost as though she’s trying to gather confidence for something. Like she’s at war with her mind and she can’t make a decision. Like there’s something stopping her from sinking her teeth into you completely and feasting.

Eyes glazed over from pleasure, you finally peer up at her through your lashes, wondering why she’s pausing. Hesitating. Why she’s whining against your skin like she’s simultaneously hurt and seconds away from combusting with pleasure.

The sight above you isn’t one that you’d been expecting. It sobers you instantly, only halfway, the bump and grind of her clit against yours still sending shockwaves up your spine. There’s drool pooling at the corner of her lips again, but what truly gathers your attention and steals your breath away is the sharpness of her canines, the fangs protruding from her mouth. Her bottom lip is bitten raw, blood staining her mouth and dripping down her chin, as if she’d bitten her lip trying to prevent herself from biting you.

It’s then that you realize why the travellers had given you so much pause. Why you didn’t trust them. You’d been able to sense that lurking beneath the surface, they weren’t as they’d appeared. It wasn’t an inherent evilness. Even with Paige hovering above you, fangs out like she’s about to eat you alive, you can tell that she’s not evil. But she’s not herself either.

“Can’t,” she whimpers, almost as though she’s coming back to herself. You realize she’d been so weird ever since she returned with Mary because she’d been afflicted, fighting her mind and body and something else purely instinctual from the very moment she’d been let back into the juke joint. There’s something else in her head pressuring her to do something that she clearly doesn’t want to do – turning you, killing you – and she’s fighting every synapse and urge in her body to keep you safe. “I fucking can’t, ‘m so sorry.”

Her body and mind are split down the middle. Her fangs poke out, lips twisted up like she’s battling every urge to sink her teeth into your neck. But her eyes are as clear of a blue as you’d ever seen them. She doesn’t want to do this, doesn’t want to be this monster. Doesn’t want to hurt you anymore than she already has.

Then, there’s a flash of red in her eyes, something glowing, and she cries out as her head shoots back, her fangs digging into her lip again. She breathes heavily, and when she glances down at you, the red is gone and tears are pooling at her waterline. Blood dribbles from her lips, staining her teeth red. Your heart is caught in your throat, mouth open in disbelief and fear – not of her, but of what will happen if you lose her.

“Can’t hurt you,” she mutters again, her voice hoarse. “Won’t.” Her entire body shudders as she battles the urge. “Help me. Please, baby.”

Your fingers are trembling when you nod, wrapping your arms around her, and pulling her closer. She cries out like the temptation is blinding, pressing at every crevice of her body, but you trust her. God, you do. Despite everything that has led up to this moment, you know you’re safe with her. That she’d never hurt you. “It’s okay,” you promise, your voice steady, breathing hitting her ear. “You’re okay. Just move with me.”

You can feel her nod shakily, her hips resuming their slow motions against yours, and it’s this – this human connection, this bond between the two of you that’s more than just physical – that stabilizes her, tethers her to the reason why she can’t bring herself to sink her fangs in your neck and drain you like the urge in her brain is pressuring her to. “You won’t hurt me,” you whisper, squeezing the back of her neck, and she nods again. “Say it. You won’t hurt me.”

“I won’t hurt you,” she affirms, no hesitation, her forehead resting against your shoulder. Her breath comes out in a shudder, the pleasure coursing through her veins muddling with the uncertainty in her head. Paige noses against your neck, breathing in your scent, and something in her shoulders relaxes.

“You are not what he made you,” you say, one of your hands brushing through her hair.

“‘M not – fuck –” The words get caught in her throat, but she presses more firmly against you, and she breathes through it. “I’m not what he made me.”

Your lips find her cheek, her temple, grounding her, and your hips start meeting hers. “You are Paige Bueckers. You’re safe.”

Her voice is rough, but her tone is a little clearer when she repeats it. “I’m Paige Bueckers,” she whispers into your neck, her lips kissing your skin, almost like an apology. Like gratitude. Like a literal You are the only person keeping me here right now. “I’m safe.”

Your palms come up to cup her cheeks, pulling her out of your neck to meet her gaze. Her eyes are startlingly blue, tears slipping from her eyes, and her fangs are mostly gone. There’s still a slight edge on her canines, but you can feel it. She’s rejecting the bloodlust, the pressure of the hivemind she’s been trapped under. You kiss her gingerly, tasting the salt of her tears and the iron of the blood on her lips, and she sobs against your lips like that was the one thing she needed to remember who she was.

“I love you,” you whisper – you promise, and her hips are still chasing yours.

But you don’t give in. Not until Paige presses her forehead to yours, swearing vehemently, “I love you, too.”

You hold her gaze. Your eyes are steady, sure, and hers are trusting. She trusts that you’ll get her through to the other side of this, just as you trusted that she wouldn’t give into the feeling. So, you smile at her, faithfully, and you whisper, “Come back to me.”

She does. You latch onto each other as you fall apart in tandem. She’s still holding herself up by her hands, but her body shudders through the aftershocks as you kiss her temple, her nose, her lips, murmuring gently to her. You pull her onto your chest, her arms giving out, and she curls up next to you while she hiccups through the remainder of her tears. Her legs tangle with yours, her face tucking into the crook of your neck, her arms holding onto you like she’s afraid you’re going to run.

But you’d promised – the both of you did. There’s no more running from the people that you love. You brush her damp hair off of her forehead, kissing her skin gently, and it makes her shiver. You don’t think you’ve ever seen Paige look like this – scared of herself. Of what she is. She looks so young. It makes you hold onto her a little tighter.

“Where are you?” you whisper to her after a while.

She hardly shifts. “With you,” she promises. The last bit of tension in your shoulders dissipates. Paige is silent for a long moment. Then, you feel the heat of her tears dampening your skin, and you tighten your arms around her as she cries. “I’m sorry,” she chokes out, the same way a sinner might as he stands before God on judgement day. “I’m so sorry. I almost–” Whatever she was trying to say gets stuck in her throat, and you trail your fingers soothingly up and down her back as she finds coherency. “I almost hurt you. Again.”

“You didn’t,” you remind her, your voice firm. “You couldn’t.” Her breath catches like she’s trying to force herself to believe that. “I trust you. In every definition of the word. I trust you, Paige. If I’m not safe with you then there’s nowhere else I’d be able to survive. You didn’t hurt me. You have nothing to be sorry for. It’s not your fault.”

Paige nods; then, brokenly, she murmurs, “It’s not my fault.” You hum in agreement, feeling her body relax against yours. You both lay in silence for a moment until she speaks up again. “You saved me.”

“You saved yourself,” you retort. You cup her cheek, your finger tapping against her temple, and you draw her eyes up to meet yours. “Up here. You did that. I just helped you down here.” You press your palm to her chest, where her heart is. She settles her hand over yours, sinking into you.

Then, Paige stiffens like she’s just remembered something. “Mary,” she states simply, and the dread seeps back into your chest.

“She took Elias to the back when she got back in,” you mutter. Paige glances at you once before the both of you haul yourselves to your feet, redressing quickly, and you make your way downstairs.

The both of you are already too late. The juke joint has been cleared out, with only a select few people remaining. Smoke, Annie, Pearline, Sammie, Grace Chow, Delta Slim. They all linger around the door to the back room. Mary’s missing. So is Stack, but Paige winces like she knows exactly where he is and what happened to him.

Annie catches sight of you first. Her face crumples with relief and she marches over immediately, pulling you into a tight hug that you eagerly reciprocate. “You’re okay,” she breathes out.

“I’m okay,” you murmur, mostly to soothe her, and Annie pulls away. She takes one glance at Paige and she stiffens, knowing that she’d left and returned with Mary. Her eyes narrow, but none of you get the chance to say anything before a handgun cocks and Smoke is pointing the barrel directly between Paige’s eyes.

She flinches, not because of the gun aimed at her. But because Smoke is one of her best friends and he hadn’t hesitated before he turned the gun on her. “Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t kill you where you stand,” he says firmly.

For that, Paige has no real answer, but you step in between her and the barrel of Smoke’s gun. “Because she wouldn’t kill us,” you declare, your voice soft, yet it echoes in the emptiness of the juke joint. You glance back at her. Paige’s eyes are shining. “Couldn’t kill us.”

Smoke looks at Annie, who looks at you. Something in her features softens. “They’re not Haints,” she announces. “They’re vampires. Fangs, red eyes. Garlic, silver, sunlight, and wooden stakes are lethal. When they’re turned, they’re killed. Their soul is trapped inside their body and they’re unable to move on. But…there’s always a rare case. Sometimes souls are shared.” Annie meets your gaze again. “You’re the reason why she’s resisting the curse right now.”

You nod solemnly, already knowing as much, although you didn’t have the vocabulary for it. Smoke’s eyes linger on you. Then Paige. Then Annie. He lowers the gun, sliding it back into the holster, and Paige relaxes immediately. So do you. You step back, linking your fingers together. The tension in the room doesn’t completely dissolve, but it’s not nearly as heavy now.

Everyone starts making preparations. Annie assembles jars of pickled garlic. Silver jewelry is shared. Chairs are broken down and whittled into sharp, wooden points. Paige helps, but she’s a lot slower, her fingers trembling around the stake in her hand because she knows she’s holding the one thing that could ever kill her. You stick close by her if only to offer support, and you converse in hushed murmurs.

“You can’t stay here forever,” you say. Her throat bobs, quiet acceptance on her face. “The sunrise will kill you.”

“I’m not leaving you,” she argues.

You look at her. Your features soften. “Paige,” you whisper, your voice cracking under the weight of your emotions. “You couldn’t kill me.”

“Won’t.”

“I can’t kill you,” you confess. “Won’t.” She pauses, her gaze meeting yours. “I can’t sit here with you until sunrise and watch you burn up.”

“I don’t want to die.” Her voice is a quiet murmur. “I don’t want to be where you aren’t.”

You reach out, plucking the stake from her hands. She’s shaking. You slide into her lap, her arms immediately encircling you, and you press your foreheads together. “I don’t want to lose you either,” you say. “Which is why I want you to run when I tell you to. I’ll find you.”

She chokes on a laugh, but it’s watery. “I thought we said no more running,” she says, trying to keep the mood light, and you can’t help your giggle.

You kiss her gently. “If you die, you’re running away from me. You owe me.” She nods against you, her smile a little softer. “Promise me you’ll go when I tell you to.”

She’s silent for a moment. Her fingers trace your skin, the blue of her gaze searching yours. And she gives in. “I promise.”

You kiss her again. You hold onto her for a little longer, and then the both of you get back to work.

There are a few interruptions as you do. Stack returns with Mary in tow, asking to be let in. Obviously, no one lets that happen. Then Bo Chow returns – Grace’s husband, and you can sense that she’s moments away from giving in. At least, until Remmick shows up next to Bo and says something in Mandarin that makes Grace lose it. She’s dragged away kicking and screaming while someone slams the doors closed.

You can hear Remmick and the rest of the vampires locked in another haunting rendition of Pick Poor Robin Clean. Grace is at her wit’s end. You and Paige stay close, but commotion draws your attention. Smoke and Annie are holding Grace back while she thrashes. All you hear is, “Come on in, motherfucker!” and you know that your night is about to get a whole lot worse.

The subsequent fighting passes in a blur. You hardly remember it. You drive your stake through the chests of a few vampires, and so does Paige, even if the look on her face makes it look like she’s killing herself, too. You think you’re starting to make good progress until you see Stack hovering over Annie’s body, his fangs in her neck.

Everything goes devastatingly still. The fight still rages on. Gunfire echoes through the rooms, the cries of staked vampires falling on deaf ears. All you can see is the way Annie’s jaw hangs slack, pain etched on her face, and you can hear the agony in Smoke’s voice. Paige’s head turns, her face crumbling at the sight of her body.

She doesn’t hesitate. She tackles Stack, punching him clean across the jaw and disorienting him. The infighting causes a ripple of confusion among the vampires and it gives Smoke enough opportunity to stake the one holding him down before he rushes over to Annie.

You’re already next to her when Smoke falls to his knees next to her. He applies pressure over the wound at her neck, but you rest your hand over his, your fingers trembling. “It’s too late,” you tell him, your voice choked up.

Annie manages a nod, and with a weak voice, she wheezes, “You promised.” Her gaze is locked on Smoke.

He knows. With shaking hands, he reaches for his discarded stake. You wrap your hand around it, too, and together, you and Smoke both murmur, “I love you,” and Annie nods again like she understands. The both of you drive the stake through Annie’s chest, finally allowing her to move on and be at peace.

Her death causes a massive retreat. Paige grabs onto you, joining the rest of your friends as you hurry upstairs with Sammie. Delta Slim hangs back, cutting his own wrist cleanly, and drawing a crowd of the remaining vampires and allowing the rest of you the chance to escape.

On the second floor, there’s a door leading to a staircase outside. Smoke is ushering all of you out of it, and one by one, you make your way down. You glance up at the sky, noting how close to dawn you are. With your heart in your throat, you grab onto Paige’s hand, and you force her to meet your gaze. “Go,” you command.

She swallows thickly, glancing behind you to the crowd of vampires who have made their way out to intercept you. She doesn’t want to leave you. Not when this is what you have to face without her.

“You promised,” you remind her, your voice cracking when you recall that those were Annie’s last words, too. Paige seems to recognize that, nodding, and she presses her forehead to yours once more.

“I’m sorry,” she murmurs again, kissing you gently. You just hold onto her a little tighter. “Please be okay.”

“I will,” you swear – because you will be. Paige has made sure of it. “I love you.”

Paige glances up at the sky, at the way the sun has begun to peek out from the horizon. She bows her head in a defeated acceptance. “I love you, too.”

Then she’s gone – her figure disappearing behind the trees. Her absence still aches. As strong as you try to be, you don’t know what the morning holds.

The sun comes up while Remmick and Sammie are locked in on each other in the shallow pond. Smoke comes up behind you, looking defeated, and you wonder about what happened to Stack. All around you, the vampires clutch their heads in agony as the sun blisters their skin, bright balls of orange flame encompassing everything.

The night ends in a way that makes you wonder if it’d even happened at all. There are no piles of ash, no indication of what just transpired if not for the blood on everyone’s clothes or the burn marks at the front of the juke joint from Grace’s molotov cocktail. The morning is still. Quiet. You watch as Smoke and Sammie hug each other tightly, as if they can’t believe that they’re even alive. Smoke sends Sammie off. He was supposed to help his father with the morning service, and the fact that Sammie goes willingly reminds you more of a trauma response than anything else.

You watch the sunrise with Smoke. Neither of you say anything, a shared sort of grief in your heart. When he looks down at his dog tags, at the chest of weapons he’d stashed in his truck, you know of his plan before you think he does. Gingerly, you wrap him in a hug, and you murmur, “Say hello to Annie for me.”

His fingers tremble when he hugs you back. “I will,” he promises. “Go be with her.”

You nod, releasing him. You find a car that had been left behind, find the keys left on the seat, and you drive a little catatonically back to Annie’s shop. The sun is well into the sky by the time you make it there. Everything is quiet. Unmoving. You cut the engine, step out, and make your way to the door. You open it.

Paige has you in her arms before the door even closes. You sink into her embrace, clutching onto her tightly, because she’s somehow still the one thing that makes even a little bit of sense in this fucked up world. She lets you cry into her chest and you’re pretty sure that she’s crying into your shoulder, but the two of you just remain locked in each other’s arms. She doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t ask you if you’re okay or how you’re feeling. She knows. She gives you the space to quietly grieve, to not be strong. The both of you had lost so many people tonight. Friends. Family. Everything else.

She didn’t expect you to be okay. You didn’t know how long it would take for things to feel okay. To feel normal. Maybe the truth is that you might never feel normal again. Your girlfriend is stuck under this curse for the rest of her days, even though she’s still Paige Bueckers, but there’s so much you’ll need to learn. To do. You’ll have to change so much about your lives just to survive.

But you’d made her a promise a while ago. You would rather love Paige in the dark than have anyone else in the sun. You hadn’t realized the irony of your words until now, but you mean it. As long as you and Paige have each other, this new part of your lives might not be so difficult. It will just be yours. For now, that’s all you can really ask for.

“You still makin’ pie today?” she asks, her voice soft and exhausted at the edges.

It draws a light laugh out of you. It relieves you to know that you could still be happy after this. “Yeah,” you promise. “I’m making pie today. And you can have the spoon.”

Paige holds onto you a little tighter after that. And she doesn’t let go.

Life after the night at the juke joint is…different. An adjustment.

Sammie disappears to only God knows where, although in the years after, you’d heard whisperings of a blues singer who’d taken the world by storm. As much as you cared for him, you struggled with keeping up with him and his adventures. He reminded you too much of that night and everyone you’d lost – Annie, Smoke, Delta Slim, the Chows. Even Cornbread.

But Paige doesn’t remind you of the horrors. It’s always a little different with her, even if she isn’t what she used to be. She’s trapped in that supernatural plane between being human and something not quite. Following Remmick’s death, she was no longer shackled to that all-consuming hivemind of hate and malice. Not that she was fully in it in the first place – her heart was a little too human. She’s more like herself now than she was that night, which does bring you some comfort.

You’re not comforted by the fact that her soul is trapped in her body, though. Not comforted by the fact that she’s dead, yet she’s still living half of a life for your sake because she’d been unable to kill you while under the spell of vampirism and you were unable to kill her yourself, too. Paige is a walking folktale, unable to touch silver, eat garlic, or feel the sun on her skin. She hides in the shadows during the day and comes out during the night if only to feel your skin against hers.

You’re not an ordinary pair. You’ve never been – two women connected by fate and bonded by love in Mississippi. You fell in love despite the fact that the world thought you shouldn’t. You survived the attacks at the juke when it was improbable. Now, you’re still two women learning to navigate life as one of you ages and the other remains stuck at 23.

After that night, you return to town. You try your best to explain to Lisa, the Chows’ daughter, what happened. You don’t think she believes you – you wouldn’t either. But life goes on for her, even though her parents never return. You take over Annie’s shop, still serving Elise and Will and telling them that Annie and Elijah had actually gotten married and moved out of the Delta. They were too young for the truth, and you didn’t have the heart to explain it to them.

During the day, Paige helps you in the shop, confined to the shadows indoors, staring longingly out the window. She’d once told you that she never realized how much she’d miss the sun until it was gone. That made you feel a little guilty, but she just kissed you, forgiveness and atonement on her lips. She wasn’t going to hate you for being unable to kill her when that was also a crime she’d committed.

At night, she’s glued to your side, trampling gently over weeds and grass in the woods as you search for roots for the shop. You don’t practice the craft like Annie used to – it wasn’t your place. But honoring her memory makes you feel less like you’re drowning. Only after sunset is Paige able to go outside and feel the ground beneath her feet, inhale the fresh air without burning up. Truthfully, it brings you both closer, just having to figure out different ways to love each other.

Neither of you run, even when it’s hard. Paige is there to console you after horrible dreams of that night. You’re there with remedies when her gums ache. Her pain is a little more instinctual than it is medical, but it does bring her some relief. 

Stack and Mary came to visit one day. Paige had stood glaring at your side while the two of them spoke with you. They meant no harm. They told you that much when they knocked on your door and asked for an invite inside. Perhaps foolishly, you’d believed them, but you chose to believe they were capable of goodness despite their new nature, just as Paige was. Stack told you about a place they’d come across during their travels, a state in New England – Connecticut. It would be a fresh start away from the horrors of the Delta.

You weren’t sure. Part of you wanted to keep up Annie’s shop, honoring her practice and her traditions for as long as you could. It was difficult to be incognito when half of the town disappeared suddenly one night and the juke joint was littered with bodies. Stack and Annie hugged you before they left, telling you to visit if you ever found the time. You could only nod, and Paige was only able to breathe once they were gone.

You’re tangled in bed together that night, your head on Paige’s chest, listening to the juxtaposition in the sound of her breathing despite the lack of a heartbeat. You never knew that you’d miss that sound, either. Her nail drags up and down your arm soothingly, almost lulling you into a slumber, but she breaks it to murmur, “Connecticut?”

“It’s pretty far,” you respond. “A lot colder than it is here.”

“I wouldn’t be able to tell,” she jokes, which rips a surprised laugh out of your chest. Her finger pauses in its movements, but she shifts, slinging a leg over yours and pulling you closer. That wasn’t anything new – Paige was always physically affectionate, long before Remmick turned her into this. Now, it means something different. You’re warm. Having you close makes her feel a little more alive, even if the skin-to-skin contact can’t fully replace the lack of her own body heat. “We can’t stay here forever,” she continues, her voice softening. Then it breaks when she says, “I can’t stay here forever.”

Her family had long since been shattered down two lines. Still, it weighs on her, the idea of never seeing her parents again, or her siblings. She couldn’t keep them and lie to them about the nature of her being. She also knew they would never believe her fully or see her the same. It would be impossible to explain to people why you continued to age, yet Paige remained the same for years. Impossible to explain why no one ever sees her in town anymore, not even for the holiday celebrations she’d loved as a kid.

“I know,” you whisper.

You had no one left here besides her. All of your friends had passed during that night. Your only connection to the Delta was keeping Annie’s memory fresh. But customers would dwindle, and you know better than anyone else that Annie would tell you to move on. Be happy. 

You shift in bed, craning your head to meet Paige’s eyes, and you find that she’s already looking at you. She’s soft, her hair mussed, flowing down her shoulders in wavy strands. She has an imprint of your teeth on her neck from where you’d gotten a little too carried away but she wears it more like a badge of pride than a symbol of irony. Her smile is so tender, her hands cradling you like you’re her entire world, because you are and you know it and she knows it.

It makes you ache a little. But it’s a good ache. You don’t have to give the idea any more thought before you’re asking, “Well, how do you feel about the snow?”

She kisses you gently on the lips, chaste, innocent, something that makes you feel warm all over. “Anywhere’s good as long as it’s with you.”

It takes a few days, but eventually, the two of you make it to Connecticut. You settle down in a small town called Storrs, and honestly?

It’s really, really nice.

Storrs is nothing like the Delta. It doesn’t get nearly as hot. You feel a little more free here. And while you do miss the authentic fried catfish, you think that you can turn Storrs into your home. Your neighbors are kind and they don’t ask questions about you and Paige – they just leave you be. It’s not in a way that makes you think they don’t care about you; rather, it feels like respect and grace, because you weren’t different. You and Paige weren’t something to be stared at. You just were, and your neighbors seemed to understand the value in minding their own.

You and Paige attend three different welcome dinners, getting to know your neighbors and their families. They tell you what life is like in the neighborhood and which establishments were hiring. They send you home with leftovers and you make sure to clean and return them along with one of your homemade pies. It’s a comforting tradition of feeding and taking care of each other.

Paige lands a position at the local high school as an assistant coach for their basketball team. She knows next to nothing about the sport but the position had been vacant for years. She’s a quick study, though – she’d helped lead the team to the district championship by the end of the year. You were teaching language arts at the elementary school, having always enjoyed a good book, and the kids loved you, too.

And so your routine was simple. Not monotonous enough to be boring, but stable enough to be peaceful. Paige would drop you off at the elementary school with a kiss goodbye and a surprise in your lunch bag. It was always a sweet little note consisting of reminders to breathe and to smile. She’d drive to the high school, where she’d scout other teams and draw up training plans or practice drills, often being a role model to her boys and keeping them on the straight and narrow. They came to her for any and everything – advice on how to be better players. One even asked her how he should ask out his crush, which had endlessly amused the both of you as you chatted over it at dinner.

You asked her what she advised him to do, obviously. She’d gotten a little quiet, a small sort of smile spreading across her lips as she brought a piece of chicken up to her mouth. “Told him to be honest,” she said after a moment, looking at you meaningfully. You softened. “That he shouldn’t be afraid to want her.”

“Sounds familiar,” you commented wryly, and she smirked at you over a glass of water.

“Sounds real,” she shot back.

Your kids, while younger, aren’t lacking for stories, either. You tell Paige about the time you watched a boy push a girl on the playground during recess, only for the girl’s friend to step in, hands on her hips like a disappointed mother lecturing an unruly kid. He’d gotten punished, obviously, but it warmed your heart to see the girl standing up for her friend like that – without hesitation.

Then, on the same day, one of your students came to the front and loudly demanded to know where babies came from.

So maybe children came in all shapes and sizes.

Months passed. You and Paige don’t change. You’re still hopelessly in love, finding new ways to love each other. It’s all about the intention and effort and reading the nutrition labels on your food to make sure the suppliers hadn’t slipped garlic in there or making sure to keep the curtains drawn on the days there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. It’s buying large umbrellas and telling your new friends that Paige has a severe skin condition where she burns easily in the sun and you have yet to find a sunscreen that works. It’s cuddling up with her late at night, pressed skin to skin with hardly an inch of space left between your bodies, because Paige craves the body heat like she craves having you next to her.

The school year eventually ends and over the summer, you and Paige visit Stack and Mary, as promised. They’re still down south. Mary looks radiant and when you hug her, you congratulate her on keeping Stack out of trouble. Stack had nudged Paige with a raised brow and a look that clearly said I’m keeping her out of trouble. You make a joke about needing an invite into their home and the four of you laugh about it three hours later when you’re all a little tipsy from the wine.

Seeing them makes you feel like you haven’t completely lost anything. That you can still find your family so long as you know where to look and as long as you trust them. You spend a few days with the two of them, and then you and Paige make your way back up to Storrs.

You teach, reminding your students of the importance in looking between the lines, in reading and learning from the source. Paige coaches, instilling grit, passion, and integrity into her players. It wasn’t about being perfect or anything of the sort. It was about doing what you loved with all that you were. The two of you live on, happily.

A year passes. Then two. You’re transferred from kindergarten to the second grade after one of the teachers retired. Paige gets promoted to head coach after winning the district championship win and taking her team to the state finals. You’re turning 27 this year and Paige is still 23. She likes to joke that she’s being preyed on by an older woman and you wish that she wasn’t virtually invincible because you’d like to flick her head just once and have it mean something.

The fact that you’re aging and she’s not isn’t really a concern right now. You’re happy. That’s what matters.

Paige asks you to marry her a year after that, when you’re 28. You say yes, obviously, and Stack and Mary make the trip up to see the both of you. Your wedding is intimate, private, not quite official but official in every way you need it to be. On legal documents, no one would ever know that you were Paige Bueckers’s wife, but you knew that, she knew that, and your closest friends knew that, so it was good enough for you.

You teach. She coaches. Storrs is your home now, even if you miss the Delta and everyone who didn’t make it out. Their loss isn’t your gain. It’s your memory and you honor them everyday. Slim, when you listen to the blues, thinking about how much he’d like this new shit, as Paige calls it. The Chows, when you go to the grocery store and smile at the elderly couple who runs it. You always pay a little too much, pretending not to hear them calling about your change when you walk out. But when you return days later and find that they’ve repaired a light fixture or have a new cash drawer, you can’t find it within yourself to mind too much.

TIme is constant. It moves. It’s unyielding. You get older. Paige doesn’t. But it’s okay.

Years pass. A decade. Two decades. Paige eventually steps down from the head coaching position at the high school because she’s supposed to be almost fifty but doesn’t look a day over twenty. Your neighbors ask how she remains so youthful, and her smile is always a little sharper when she says, “I’ve got great genes.”

She doesn’t look at you like you’re anything less than the woman she’s been in love with since she was sixteen. You don’t forget that, not when there’s crows feet at your eyes and your forehead is beginning to wrinkle. Not when teaching is catching up with you and the hair at the crown of your head starts greying. But you don’t give it up. Paige looks at you like you’re still the most beautiful woman she’s ever seen in her life. She finds other employment opportunities, ones where nobody knows who she is and wouldn’t be confused by her image.

She builds stuff now. She’s a carpenter. She plays basketball in her free time when she’s not working on projects and offhandedly, you comment, “Well, you could always enroll at that college a few miles away and play ball for them.”

You could tell she was always really into that idea, but something was keeping her here with you. You would never find out why and Paige would never tell you if you asked. But the truth was she just wanted to spend as much time with you before your age started actually catching up with you. Paige liked going on your late-night walks, breathing in the cool air and making you laugh by telling jokes that aren’t even funny anymore. Paige liked that you’d try to play basketball with her, even if you couldn’t fully dribble the ball between your legs. You knew that she just liked “defending” you, which meant that her hands wandered everywhere the ball wasn’t, but you liked it too, so you never called her out for it.

Nobody tells you how difficult it can be to be nearing sixty and being in love with someone who’s been twenty-three for three decades. You don’t have the same energy you did when you were younger. Paige didn’t love you any less.

Years pass again. You’re nearing seventy. You retired from teaching a few years ago, but you’re still active in your community, keeping up the local garden and smiling at the daughter of the elderly couple at the grocery store. Your neighbors ask you about why they don’t see Paige anymore and you can’t quite meet their eyes when you say it’s difficult for her to get out because of her arthritis.

You’ve lived a good life – that much you can admit. You survived, you got to keep Paige, and you made a career for yourself at the elementary school. You were afforded a lot more happiness than you ever thought you would have. You wonder what it would be like if things were different – if you and Paige were both cursed to be forever young, or if the both of you hadn’t made it out before the sun rose. You like what you’ve built, so this life was good enough for you.

The 90’s roll around and in spring of 1991, you’re sipping on tea when Paige quietly informs you, “I think I’m going to apply to UConn.”

You try for a wry smile. “Perfect. A twenty three year old with, what, sixty years of basketball experience? That’s just what that new coach needs.”

That made her laugh a little. “I think I’m prepared enough to walk on,” she teases. “Hopefully those freshmen don’t pick my pockets.”

You raise your brows at her and she relents like she’s accepting the possibility that she will get embarrassed by eighteen year olds. Like…actual eighteen year olds. Then you soften, setting your tea down, and meeting her gaze. “You’re serious?” She nods shyly. “Well, just make sure you bring your own pen and paper to class,” you say, lips quirking again. “Us teachers aren’t made of money.”

She laughs again, the sound gentle. Paige stands to brush a kiss across your temple, murmuring, “Don’t worry. I’ll be the best student ever.” She’s off to locate the application, and you smile at her retreating figure.

Neither of you are quite sure how, but she manages to get in. You didn’t consider the fact that her diploma was awarded in the 20s, and truthfully, you don’t really want to know what she did to get her application accepted. By fall, she’s enrolled full time at the University of Connecticut. In August, she walks directly into Geno Auriemma’s office, requesting to walk on in tryout. Afterwards, Paige will tell you that Geno stared at her for a solid minute and a half until she felt like she was slowly being gaslit. “What the hell,” Geno had said, standing up from his desk. “I’ve got time today. Let’s see if you can actually hold a ball, hotshot.”

You knew that Paige could do a lot more than hold a ball. Considering the fact that Geno let her join the team, you guess he figured out that Paige could do a lot more, too.

Everyday, she comes home with stories from practice, telling you about the drills they ran and how Geno sees perfection and demands something more. She doesn’t have to tell you for you to know that she really likes the intensity, the rigor. Geno works them so hard that she forgets she’s able to live forever because one practice makes her feel like it’s her last day on earth. You’re just happy that she’s happy.

You attend all of their home games, unable to be seen with Paige until the both of you are home and you can congratulate her on a good game. But the next four years pass quickly. The first three are winless. You and Paige both know that the Huskies are very close to a national championship win.

In 1995, they finally earned their long awaited one. Their first program win, Geno Auriemma’s first national championship win, and Paige’s, too. She’d led her team there, filling out the stats sheet, and she cried when she held the trophy for the first time.

It must be different for her, you think, to have been cursed to live forever from a young age. There will be no growing old for her. No children or grandchildren to ask her what it was like to win UConn’s first national championship. There will be no huffing and puffing about dentures or anything of the sort. She probably won’t be remembered after this year, but winning feels like building something permanent. It feels like being alive – like truly alive, and you wonder if she holds any resentment towards you for being unable to save her at the juke joint.

But the kiss she dusts across your cheek afterwards, the long hug she pulls you in – sweat and all – makes you feel like she could never be angry at you for that. Especially not when she murmurs, “Thank you for giving me this life,” and you realize that the two of you had sacrificed so much for each other without truly knowing it. Whether the two of you realized it or not, you made something beautiful with the life you’d been given. Not many people can say that.

Paige doesn’t keep the championship net, only the small fragment that she’d cut down. She leaves hers with Geno, who obviously doesn’t understand why she wouldn’t keep it, but he’d coached her long enough to realize there’s no arguing with her.

You think that this is what happiness feels like. What love and fulfillment feels like. All you really know is that you were glad to do it with Paige.

After the national championship win in 1995, the years pass in a blur. You’re slowing down. You can feel it.

You’re well past 90 in 2000 when you realize that this was it for you. You’ve lived a long, good life. You’ve seen a lot, touched the lives of many people around you, and you know that there’s not much waiting for you here. Having no tangible family, assembling your will is an easy task, opting to have your wealth donated to the UConn women’s basketball program anonymously.

In early July, the evening is just beginning to wind down when Paige finds you sitting on the porch. The sound of crickets echo around you, the distant hoot of owls cooing, accompanied by the sound of squirrels running through the underbrush. She takes a seat next to you on the sectional, not a day past twenty, a staunch dissimilarity from you.

You’re both silent for a moment. Contemplative. You don’t have to say anything to know that the both of you are likely thinking the same.

Softly, she murmurs, “I’d like to watch the sunrise with you,” and you know better than anyone what she means by that. What the consequences of that mean.

So you do. She grabs a blanket from inside, large enough to drape over your shoulders, and she helps you onto the earth. Paige guides you to the edge of your property where a small pond rests, the glow of the moonlight reflecting off of the still waters. You sit together, your head on hers, and you spend the entire night talking.

You reminisce about the first time you’d met – you, adjusting to life in the Delta, and Paige, wanting desperately to get out of it. The both of you laugh when she recalls the first time she’d ever met the twins. Elias claimed they were cousins, baiting her perfectly. You remember all of your firsts. The morning when she left you for Chicago – even now, she still apologizes for that, to which you respond with, “Well, don’t leave me in our next life. How about that one?” and she laughs, a determined little smile on her face as she declares, “I’d spend every moment of it looking for you.”

The hours trickle by. For years, you’d thought of this moment, about what would occur when one of you inevitably decided that it was time to go. You imagined nerves. Uncertainty. Fear. Now, you’re comforted by the knowledge that you and Paige are just going to find your way back to each other no matter what. All you feel is a deep rooted peace, like you’ve finally earned a happy ending after the turmoil of your life. Maybe in the next one you’d be able to love her openly, but your promise from this one stands: you’d rather love her in the dark than take someone else in the sunshine.

You hear the chirp of birds before you see the sunrise. You feel Paige stiffen next to you, knowing it’s more of an instinctual discomfort than it is pain or fear, and you wrap her hands in yours, calming her with the heat of your body. She tries to relax – she does, but the both of you know this is it. It’s a heavy feeling, not one of a damning finality. One of hope, because no matter what, there’s so much more waiting for you both.

You glance at her. Paige is already looking at you, her gaze reverent and full of love, and she dusts a kiss to your wrinkled cheek. The sun is rising higher now, the rays poking through the trees and peering above the early dawn clouds. Her body begins to shimmer, some sort of golden flame licking at her skin, and she breaks your stare to look up at the sky, a slow smile curling on her lips.

“I love you,” she whispers to you, something like a promise. A vow, one that will hold true for more than this moment. “Don’t keep me waiting, okay?”

You smile, too, reaching up with your hand to cup her cheek. It’s warm to the touch. “I’ll see you soon,” you swear. “I love you.”

Her hand wraps around your forearm, leaning into your touch, and she presses the lightest ghost of a kiss to the inside of your wrist as the gentle flames consume her completely. Before you know it, Paige is gone, and your hand falls to your side limply.

But you’re not too far behind, either. You wrap the blanket tight around your body, leaning your head against the rich soil, and you gaze out at the pond before you, memorizing the blue of the water, the peace of the moment, the beauty of the life you and Paige managed to create for yourselves when it all felt impossible. Content, you shut your eyes, knowing that it’s finally time to rest.

(The next time you open them, Paige is standing before you, her arms extended wide, and you sink into her embrace like you know it’s the one place you’ll always belong. Like she’s the one place you’ll always be able to call home. And maybe it’s because she is. Maybe it’s because the two of you are just getting started, and you have so much time together. Your lives are just beginning.)

bonus

Coach Geno Auriemma, now in his sixties, is poring over recruitment film in his office during a calm day in May 2015 when his associate head coach, Chris Dailey, knocks on his door. She enters moments later, iPad and clipboard tucked close to her chest with a pensive expression, and sits down across from Geno.

He looks up, brows raised and lips drawn into an unimpressed line. He hardly seems concerned by CD’s expression as he says flatly, “What did Stewart do now?”

CD ignores that comment. “I was looking through the middle school film. Watch #1 in blue.” She flips the iPad around, pressing play on the video on screen. Geno hones in on the player in question – blonde, perhaps a little undersized compared to her peers, but he can tell this is an eighth grader playing on varsity. She’s dribbling the ball at the top of the key, calling for a screen, and she ducks around the defender on the right, stopping just short of the free throw line and shooting the ball gracefully from the midrange. It sinks in – because of course it does – and the player backpedals for defense.

It’s then that the camera catches her features. It’s grainy, but Geno can recognize that face anywhere. The assured confidence, maybe a little misplaced and delusional, but it’s almost as trademark as the midrange pullup. Something in him simultaneously softens and breaks.

In 2000, Paige Bueckers, the player who had won UConn’s first national championship for women’s basketball in 1995, had disappeared. Not a trace. She had no family to reach out to, and when Geno approached police and authorities for a wellness check, he’d been told that there was no record of her. Nobody could explain how she lit up the court every week yet ceased to legally exist. It would become one of UConn’s greatest memories. Surely everyone had just missed something.

But this? This wasn’t a coincidence.

“Paige Bueckers,” CD says quietly. “Same face. Same jumper. Same player.”

“Born 2000 or 2001?” Geno asks. CD nods resolutely, and the head coach leans back in his chair. At his age, he’d thought he’d seen everything, but this takes the cake completely. “Well,” he mutters after a while. “Guess I must have really pissed someone off to have to coach her twice.”

In the same office years later, the 2020 season has just begun, and Geno is waiting for a student to arrive for a meeting. Her name had sounded so familiar to him, and after the whole situation with Paige Bueckers, Geno is learning to trust his gut a little more when it comes to things that feel more like fate than coincidence.

There’s a gentle knock at his office door, and he calls for the student to enter. That’s when you walk in, a little flushed from your walk over, bag slung over your shoulder. Geno knows he’s never seen you before in his life, but there’s still something familiar about your face, the energy you’ve brought into the room simply by sitting. You’re a kinesiology major – pre-med, you’d specified in your email to him, inquiring about whether or not the conditioning team would have any space for a freshman looking to intern.

If you were any other person, he would have told you that his hands were tied with the season’s preparations and recommended that you reach out to the conditioning team. But this was different. You were different, and so was that blonde point guard from Minnesota whom he’d put his heart into recruiting – not because she would change the program. She’d already done that back in 1995. He did that because he knew God didn’t put people in his life twice in a row for no good reason.

You and Geno talk for a few minutes, and he’s no closer to placing where he knows you from until there’s another set of knocks on his door. He has half a mind to send them away, but in walks Paige Bueckers, and that’s when the entire room stills. You and Paige lock eyes like he’s not sitting a few feet in front of the both of you, awestruck expressions on both of your faces like this isn’t the first time you’ve met – even though it is.

In this life, at least.

You introduce yourself to Paige and that’s how Geno realizes. He knows that infatuated look in Paige’s eyes. It was the same one she had so many years ago when she was clearly in love but couldn’t quite be honest about who it was and whatever fashion it came to be in. Geno may never understand the true nature of why Paige had kept you a secret while she was at UConn in 1995, but he knows what this is.

It’s not a coincidence. He wasn’t the man to believe in fate or luck. But this is just how things are supposed to be, so he bites back a smile when Paige stands in his office like a bumbling idiot in your presence.

“Well, Bueckers?” he says dryly, which gathers both yours and Paige’s attention. The blonde’s ears are slightly red, which amuses Geno to no end. “You gonna keep flirting with our new conditioning intern or are you gonna show her around the facility?”

You look at Geno with a gleeful expression, shock lacing your features, and Paige stutters over her words as she nods, saying, “Yeah, I got you, Coach.” Clearly having forgotten what she’d initially come in to pester him about, Paige holds the door for you, shutting it gently, and Geno can hear your shared laughter through the walls.

He smiles to himself, leaning back in his chair with crossed arms. This wasn’t the first time you and Paige have met. He knew that much to be true even if he couldn’t prove it. He also knew that this wouldn’t be the last time, either, and he would never admit it, but he’s really, really grateful to have been part of yours and Paige’s stories twice.

[quailfence]

[Image description taken from alt: Image 1: It's dark world Kris and Noelle from Deltarune drawn side by side, both pointing their index finger to the front like a gun with the other hand put on their back, standing oppositely in symmetric manner. Noelle is also closing her left eye as if taking an aim for the finger gun she's making. There's little hearts and sparkles emerging around the point where their fingertips meet, in a same manner when they use ACT in-game. The frame is drawn in a style that Sonic Advance 3 character select screen has (with the nameplate and team up combination). The team up name for these two is 'Memory Lane'; referring to how they've grown together as childhood chums, then have been somewhat standoff since an incident, then again reunited through an adventure reminiscing their past thanks to the event of Chapter 2.

Image 2: It's dark world Berdly and Kris from Deltarune drawn side by side, Berdly standing with his back to Kris, making 'number one' gesture with his left hand with a smirk on his face. Whereas Kris is just doing simple shrugging off gesture to the front. The frame is drawn in a style that Sonic Advance 3 character select screen has (with the nameplate and team up combination). The team up name for these two is 'Light Nerds'; referring to Berdly initially mistaken 'Lightners' as 'Light Nerds' due to Queen incorrectly informing the word to Berdly on purpose. Also it refers to how both of them qualify as an actual nerd in-game. (In Kris' case, Susie particularly mentions that Kris is a nerd right before the first arcade battle of Chapter 2.)

Image 3: It's dark world Noelle and Susie from Deltarune drawn side by side, Noelle blushing with happiness while holding a small box of light candy(chalk), unable to look at either the front or Susie. Susie is sitting next to Noelle while shyly sweating and biting on a stick of light candy(chalk), also facing opposite to Noelle and avoiding eye contact. The frame is drawn in a style that Sonic Advance 3 character select screen has (with the nameplate and team up combination). The team up name for these two is 'Beauty and the Beast'; referring to how Noelle is stated like an angelic figure whereas Susie is sometimes portrayed with a beast-like petulance, and how they kind of became a loving pair by the end of Chapter 2. I set a rule to make the team names only with two word segments but had to make an exception here. End description.]

Deltarune but it's Sonic Advance 3 team up screen (again)

part 1: [x]

[frightfullytreeish]

buck has jee-yun for the day and eddie tags along bc he's feeling wistful for when christopher was that age, and inevitably they end up in a claire's accessories where jee demands one of these bad boys because she's started pre-school now and has a Best Friend

but then because 5 year olds are tyrants she demands that buck and eddie also need to get one and she stares at them until they put it on. and they're both like haha okay if the lady insists! ;) and they fight a little over who gets to be best and who is relegated to friend (you should be friend, buck tells eddie, purple looks good on you) and then they put on their necklaces and chuckle a little, while jee nods in approval, and for the rest of the day whenever they catch sight of their necklaces (hard to miss, very sparkly) they grin at each other

and then they take jee back home and life goes on and when buck's alarm goes off the next morning he knocks the necklace off his bedside table while grabbing for his phone, and he decides it'll be funny to wear it to work as he is best after all. when he gets to the station chim clocks it immediately, oh he says you two are adorable, and buck turns to see eddie in the changing room also with his half of the sparkly heart. they fistbump (obviously) and then fit the two halves of the heart together (obviously), which means leaning in really close as these necklaces were intended for children not big beefy firefighter necks, close enough that their faces end up a little smooshed together and buck says we uhh we might need longer chains and eddie shrugs and says I dunno I kinda like it and he pats buck's pendant where it sits in the hollow of his neck

Also bobby is there

[takenbypeter]

Sleeping Together

Bob Reynolds x reader

Word count: 1243

Synopsis: Helping Bob fall asleep

1 AM.

You couldn’t sleep, which wasn’t uncommon. It wasn’t hard for you to sleep though all you had to do was put on some quilts and some background noise and you were usually fine. But tonight? Tonight you needed a snack. Which is why you found yourself heading to the common kitchen in the middle of the night. 

A week had passed since the Void incident and since Valentina’s so-called Watchtower hadn’t been completed yet, she’d set you all up in an Airbnb, with each getting your own room. 

While the thought was nice, it took a minute to get used to sleeping in the same house as semi-strangers. Especially since you could hear Alexei’s snoring from a mile away. 

“Hmm,” you let out a sigh as your lips pressed together while you looked at the contents of the fridge. Nothing good it looked like. 

Opening the pantry you took one look in there too before ultimately giving up and just grabbing an orange from the fruit bowl. After taking a napkin you began your journey back to your bed, but something stopped you, or more like someone stopped you. There on the couch in the living room space was Bob. He was pressed against one side of the furniture, book in hand as his eyes stayed glued to it and he was biting his bottom lip. 

Curiously you tilted your head as you walked over. You sat down on the seat that was beside it and peeked at his face. It looked dreary and he had bags under his eyes. 

“Bob?” You asked and your voice seemed to break him out from his spell.  

He glanced up first, then at you, “oh hey,” he said with a tiny tired smile appearing on his face. 

“You look exhausted. Have you been sleeping?”

He nodded, “yeah I slept that first night we got here.”

You waited for him to continue his sentence but that was the end. “That’s it? You haven’t slept since then?”

He shook his head, “nah, not really. The first night I passed out for like eleven hours. But since then it’s just been hard.”

“Sleeping?”

He nodded explaining more, “when I’m alone in bed that’s when some dark thoughts come. I’m just trying to keep them all at bay for now.”

“So you’ve just been out here the whole week?”

He nodded and you frowned, staring at the orange in your hand. Setting your late night snack aside you got up and held your hand out. He glanced at your hand. 

“Let’s go.”

He took your hand, blindly trusting in your action, “where are we going?” You pulled him up and then spun around pulling him behind you. “To bed,” you said point blank, causing him to stop in his tracks and you turned around to the man. “Relax. You need to sleep and you said you didn’t want to be alone so, you won’t be.”

His eyebrows knit together showing he was unsure of all of this but you both continued on towards his bed area.

Once there you let go of his hand and lifted his bed sheets, “go on,” you said and despite his hesitancy he got in. Once in, you wrapped Bob’s blanket around him, and put some calming music on. 

Taking your position on the seat across from his bed you just sat there.

A minute must’ve gone by before he spoke up. “This is weird.” He threw the blanket off from the upper half of his body, staring at the ceiling while doing so, “I can’t go to sleep with you watching me.”

“I won’t watch. Look, I'll close my eyes and just sleep here.”

He sat up, “sleep there? That makes me feel worse. You sleep here instead. I’ll sleep there.”

“What? No. Okay, you know what…” you knew he wouldn’t let this go so you push yourself off from the chair and lift up the blankets, “move over please,” you command trying to be as polite as possible. He did so, but still asked, “what are you doing?”

You laid down facing him, giving your two bodies  enough space between them, “there, now we’re both comfortable, right?” You asked, shutting your eyes. 

Another minute went by and you kept your eyes shut as he shifted around in bed. He did again. Then again. He did it about two more times before you interrupted, “what is it?”

You opened your eyes, finding his position once again facing you, “I don’t know, I just can’t relax. Can you talk to me?”

“About what?”

“I don’t know.”

He gave you an apologetic look which you could make out in the dark hue, “sorry.”

“No it’s alright…I just have to think. Um, how are you feeling about joining the team?”

“Good,” was all he said. 

“Do you feel welcomed?”

He smiled a bit but you could make it out in the darkness. “Actually I do, aside from some snide remarks, I’m starting to feel like this is what a family is sort of supposed to feel like.”

His response made you feel light on the inside, you were happy for him. “Good, that’s honestly great.”

A small silence overtook but it wasn’t there long. 

“How ‘bout you? Do you feel like we’re a family here?”

“I…” you closed your mouth, “I definitely feel close but I’m not sure if I feel at that level yet.”

“…did you have a hard family life too?”

“I did, it was…” you paused and he filled in the word for you. “Complicated?”

“…complicated,” you repeated, “here though, it feels…fun. Like hanging out at a cabin with friends.”

“Yeah I can understand that.”

The room felt comfortable now as the tension in the air lightened. 

“What book are you currently reading?” You asked which seemed to spark his attention again. 

That opened the trenches as he went off, explaining the book's synopsis which of course led to another topic, then another. And before you knew it, you both were nodding off, pleasantly enjoying slumber together. 

Without knowing it morning came and the sun shined on your face through the window. Your eyes batted open as the light heated your body. 

You were slowly but surely waking up and once you fully came to, you realized that you were far closer to Bob than you remembered last night. In fact, you were still facing each other but somehow you were so close that your legs had become entwined together while your head was resting underneath his chin and his arms were around you. 

Feeling taken aback by how you two ended up this way, you moved a bit causing Bob to lean back slightly and look down at you. “You awake?”

At the question you instantly backed yourself away from him and seated up. 

He followed your motion sitting up as well. “Sorry, I would’ve moved but I didn’t want to wake you,” he said and you shook your head still baffled but okay. “‘S fine, I just…” you glanced around, unsure how to even end your sentence, “I should let you get ready, it's going to be another long day,” you said, shooting him a comforting look before leaving his bed and exiting his room. 

Once out you stood by his door, your hand still on the handle feeling confused. Why were you confused? You were confused because that had been one of the best sleeps you had ever had.

[katnipp]

don’t fall for me— aeri uchinaga

genre: FLUFFFF

synopsis: when y/n joins giselle and yeji for a special toxic cover, their playful smiles and quiet touches light up the room

—

y/n wasn’t even supposed to be in the lineup.

she was halfway through rehearsals for her own group’s comeback stage when her manager pulled her aside with a phone to her ear and a look that said, you’re not going to like this, but you’re not going to say no either.

“julie’s out,” the manager said. “flu. they want you to sub in for the ‘toxic’ special stage.”

pause.

“with giselle and yeji.”

longer pause.

“…and it’s tomorrow.”

⸻

within the hour, y/n was in a different building, in a different rehearsal room, wearing someone else’s outfit and letting a coordinator stick safety pins into her side while another adjusted a mic pack against her spine.

“you’ve danced with yeji before, right?” one of them asked.

“yeah,” y/n murmured, absently watching herself in the mirror as they twisted her hair into a sleek ponytail. “we did a cover together last year.”

“and you and giselle… trained together?”

that made her blink.

trained together.

they had. that was true.

but the word didn’t come close to covering it.

⸻

they’d trained in the same company, same class. same 11 p.m. vocal lessons and convenience store dinners, same flickering hallway lights and shared stretches in too-small practice rooms.

y/n had liked her almost immediately. it was hard not to like giselle. she was sharp and funny and annoyingly pretty, quick to roast and quicker to defend. and she had this way of glancing sideways at you when she was trying not to laugh, like your existence was a secret joke you were both in on.

they weren’t particularly close—trainee life didn’t leave much room for softness—but there was a pull between them, something quiet and gravitational.

they would always end up stretching near each other. switching water bottles by mistake. sharing earbuds on the floor, shoulder to shoulder, pretending they weren’t both listening for the other’s breath between beats.

y/n had kept it casual. had tried to. until one night, weeks before giselle’s debut was announced, she’d been crying alone in a stairwell after a brutal evaluation. and giselle—who wasn’t even in that building that day—found her.

no words. no questions.

just sat beside her. leaned their heads together.

after that, it was different.

after that, y/n had to delete half her private playlist just to stop hearing giselle’s voice every time she put on her headphones.

⸻

the night giselle debuted, y/n got one text:

don’t stop.

your turn’s coming.

and when it does—i better be your first collab.

she hadn’t deleted it. not even after all this time.

and now, here she was. wearing a corset she hadn’t rehearsed in, standing in a dance studio where her crush from two years ago was currently warming up, all because julie had a fever.

⸻

“look who finally showed up,” came a voice from behind her, and god, of course it was her.

giselle was in a black cropped hoodie, hair already tied up, rings on three fingers like she’d just walked off a music video set. she had a bottle of pocari sweat in one hand and the exact same teasing smirk she always wore when she knew she was winning.

y/n turned slowly. “don’t tell me you missed me.”

“i was gonna fake an injury if they didn’t get someone hot to replace julie,” giselle said, shrugging. “lucky me.”

yeji coughed somewhere across the studio.

“you always this full of yourself?” y/n asked, arching a brow.

giselle tilted her head. stepped just a little too close. “only when you’re watching.”

⸻

the first rehearsal was chaos.

yeji was the most professional, obviously—precise, focused, probably could’ve done the choreo blindfolded.

giselle… was giselle.

she picked things up fast, made jokes in between takes, somehow looked more like a pop star mid-sweat than y/n looked after full glam. and whenever they ran the chorus again, her hands landed just a bit lower on y/n’s hips than strictly necessary.

“again,” the choreographer barked. “cleaner transition this time.”

“got it,” giselle murmured, stepping behind y/n, fingertips ghosting up her side. “you good?”

“fine,” y/n said. not fine.

they moved in sync. the beat hit. giselle’s breath skimmed her neck.

after the third take, y/n dropped her water bottle.

after the fifth, giselle whispered, “you keep flinching.”

“your hands are cold.”

giselle leaned closer. “you sure that’s the reason?”

y/n didn’t answer.

⸻

the fans noticed immediately.

by the time the teaser dropped, ship tweets were flooding timelines:

“why is giselle looking at y/n like she’s the main course 😭”

“i just KNOW there’s history here. look at the eye contact. LOOK AT IT.”

someone dug up an old photo from trainee days. blurry, pixelated, barely visible—but unmistakably them, standing side by side during a showcase lineup.

caption: “this wasn’t just casting. this was fate.”

⸻

day of the performance.

the room was loud. stylists buzzed. someone’s jewelry set had gone missing. giselle was sitting on the floor, bent over her phone, and y/n was trying not to stare at the curve of her neck.

they hadn’t talked much that day.

too many people. too many eyes.

but right before they were called to the stage, as the others filed out, giselle touched her elbow.

“hey.”

y/n turned.

she held out her pinky. “for luck.”

y/n blinked. “what?”

“new ritual. just for us.”

y/n hesitated—then hooked their pinkies together. soft. warm.

giselle smiled. “don’t fall for me.”

“too late,” y/n whispered, too low for anyone but giselle to hear.

⸻

on stage, it was a fever dream.

the lights. the bass. the sound of their heels on the glossy floor.

every movement felt magnified. every look between them was real.

when giselle’s arm slid around her waist, y/n didn’t need to fake the shiver. when their hands touched during the last chorus, y/n’s fingers curled instinctively toward hers. and when giselle leaned in during the outro, whispering the final “don’t you know that you’re toxic” in her ear—

y/n almost forgot there were cameras at all.

⸻

after the stage, chaos.

staff cheered. stylists swarmed. someone threw a towel over y/n’s shoulders. her ears were ringing.

and giselle—still breathless, still smiling—passed her a water bottle.

“you killed it,” she said softly.

y/n took it. their fingers brushed. neither of them moved.

“you too.”

a long pause.

“hey,” giselle added, a little quieter. “if we did a unit together… would you hate it?”

y/n’s heart stuttered. “depends.”

“on what?”

“if i’d have to pretend again.”

“what if you didn’t?”

and then yeji yelled, “we have to go!” and the moment broke like a wave.

⸻

a fancam hit 500k in three hours.

“y/n looked like she wanted to kiss giselle. and giselle looked like she was already thinking about the second date.”

—

[ofstarsandvibranium]

Given the World

Fandom: Marvel

Pairing: Bob Reynolds x GN!Reader

Summary: You like to bring little souvenirs for Bob whenever you travel for a mission.

Marvel Masterlist

You and Bucky were assigned as security detail for a senator in Hawaii. Being part of the new Avengers, you expected various kinds of missions, especially when Val was the orchestrator of the group. Being part of security was the tamest mission you could receive and you were gonna be in Hawaii for a month? Easy.

What wasn't going to be easy was leaving Bob.

You and he were in this weird kind of limbo. You two started off as friends, then the more you hung out with each other, you became best friends. Then, on a random night where you two were cuddled up and watching a movie, you two kissed and confessed your feelings for each other.

You two never put a label on it, but you were together. You didn't say you were exclusive, but you were. There were times you wanted to have the "what are we?" talk but every time you got close to it, you chickened out.

Yeah, you can punch, stab, and kick your way out of any situation, but feelings? Fuck. Feelings were hard and you didn't know how to navigate that.

But still, you tried to show Bob your feelings through other means, and that was through gifts.

Bob still wasn't cleared to go on missions, so he had to stay at the Watch Tower while you and the others travelled all over the world, helping people.

You brought him various keychains, mugs, plushies, books, etc.. You'd take pictures and send them to him. Anything to show that you thought of him.

Now with the Hawaii mission, you started thinking of what little things you could potentially bring back for him.

Even now, as you pack and Bob watches you do so from your bed, you think of him.

"Maybe a book? You said you liked history so maybe I can find a book about some of the local history? Oh!" you look at him with bright eyes and a smirk, "What about a coconut?"

He snorts, "You wanna bring me back a coconut?"

"I'm trying to think out of the box here! I'm trying to stray away from all the keychains, mugs, and magnets-"

"I like all of my keychains, mugs, and magnets."

You sit at the edge of your bed with a pout, "I wanna try to get you something different."

He softly smiles at you and scoots closer to sit beside, "I'll love whatever you bring back for me. Even if you don't bring back anything at all, knowing that you want to bring me back something is enough. You know I appreciate you regardless."

You nod and let out a deep exhale, "I know, but I always feel bad about leaving you here. I want you to experience everything I do."

"I will eventually. Once I get my powers in control and don't let the other guy out, I'll be out there with you, defending senators and civilians alike."

You snort and lean into him, resting your head on his shoulder, "At least I'm going with Bucky. Aside from you, he and I get along the best." You then move away, heading back to your open suitcase on the floor.

"A month long mission with a handsome super soldier in paradise. Yeah, that's the dream right there," Bob says it with a playful smile, but you see it in his eyes: the insecurity.

You look at him with a sad frown. You hate how ingrained his self-doubt is in him.

"I promise you, nothing will happen."

He clears his throat and nervously rubs his hands on his sweatpants, "No yeah. I know. It was just joke."

"Robby," you say his nickname softly as you approach him again, sitting on his lap. You wrap your arms around his shoulders and you stare into his eyes, "I'm interested in no one but you. I have feelings, really strong feelings, for no one, but you."

"I know," he replies softly and he looks away in shame, "I'm sorry." He takes hold of your hips to help ground himself.

"I understand. It's okay," you give him a quick kiss on the lips, "I got you."

"I got you," he repeats back to you.

You both rest your foreheads against one another and sit in silence. You listen to his breathing, you feel his fingers dig into your hips.

"I love you," he whispers, "and if you don't feel the same, it's okay. Because I'll still love you even if you don't love me."

You chuckle, "How can I not love you, Robert Reynolds, when you're all that I think about? Is your collection of souvenirs not proof of how much I care about you? Doesn't matter if I'm one mile away or one thousand, you're on my mind and being away from you for a month is going to be hell for me."

His lips perk up into a small smile, "Is it bad that I kind of find it comforting that you'll be as much as a wreck as me when you're away?"

You throw your head back in laughter, "Absolutely not."

His laughter joins yours and you feel yourself feel lighter. You suppose feelings aren't that scary after all.

____________________________

Bucky smirks at you as you and he follow Senator Collins and her husband around Aloha Stadium. It's a free day for the senator and he and her husband wanted to do some touristy things around the island.

You and Bucky follow her along with her regular security detail. However, your attention is divided between work and all the different trinkets you can buy Bob. Already your tote bag is filled with some funny t-shirts and a hat woven from palm leaves.

Bucky found it amusing and adorable how often you were straying from the group to buy something new for yourself or Bob.

"We're supposed to be working."

"I'm paying attention!" Your bag looks even heavier now.

Bucky snorts, "You trying to bring the whole island to him or something?"

"Gift giving is one of my love languages. Leave me alone."

"Love, eh?" he cocks a brow at you, "So you two made things official official?"

You nod, "He said it first. He was feeling insecure about me being here with you for a whole month. I reassured him that I'm not interested in anyone but him and then he told me he loves me."

Bucky grimaces, "He thinks you and I-"

"I know, right. As if you're not madly in love with Sam."

"...I'm not madly in love with him."

"Suuuure, Buck. Anyway, all of this," you pat your tote bag, "is just me bringing back some of the world to Bob, because he deserves it."

The super soldier chuckles and shakes his head, "You two are disgustingly cute."

_________________________

You dump out two tote bags filled with gifts for Bob. He looks at the pile on his bed and then at you, "Honey-"

"I was on an island for a month and they had cool things! Look," you hold up a palm tree figure, "I know you don't smoke anymore, but this is a palm tree bong and I thought it was hilarious. So I bought it for you."

Bob looks at you in confusion and amusement, "I-Well alright then."

"I swear that's the weirdest thing I bought for you. Everything else is pretty tame."

Bob grabs a t-shirt and unfolds it. He snorts and reads it, "'I got lei'd in Hawaii'?" He laughs and tosses the shirt onto the bed, "You're lucky I love you, because that's horrible," he says pulling you to sit on his lap, "Thank you though. I appreciate all the gifts and I'm happy you're back."

"You're welcome and same. I wouldn't want to be anywhere else but here with you," you peck his lips and hold him tight.

Bob will never tell you, but he thinks the best thing the world has given him, was you.

[naomi-nana]

✎ᝰ itsy bitsy spider . twisted wonderland

in which, you have a pet spider and you offered to put it on top of their hands. how would they react?

featuring : the overblot gang

cw : f!reader, leona's and jamil's are short, bad grammars, added little hcs for idia, and leona!!

a/n : hello, thank u anon for requesting this!! i had sm fun writing this request LMAO especially idia's and azul's(theirs are really long as u can see). i hope u'll enjoy reading this just as much as i enjoy writing this fic!!

RIDDLE ROSEHEARTS

when you invited him to come see your pets on the weekends, riddle didn't thought much of it. you always ramble about how cute your pets back at your dorm were, and how much you miss them whenever you're in class together. riddle thinks it's cute and great how responsible you are to your pets, and he wants to learn more about taking care of animals with you.

so imagine his reaction when he sees a spider cage on your nightstand.

"what in the sevens' name is that?! you're telling me, those 'cute, innocent,' pets you've been keeping in your dorm are spiders?!" he's startled and refuses to come closer to the cage. he would also pull out his phone to search if it's illegal to own a spider or not.

if you take out the spider and try to put it on his hands, chances are, the sentence 'off with your head!' will leave his mouth faster than the spider landing on the palm of his hands.

he was freaked out at first, but began to feel weirdly attached to the spider. it's just a small, harmless(no, who told u that) animal, right? and you're also following all the rules to take care of the spider.

he would often ask you how the spider is doing, and would make sure you're taking care of it well. would also ask, "i trust you've been feeding the little spiders properly?" every single time in the morning.

in conclusion: 8.5/10 reaction. he's scared, but he doesn't mind.

LEONA KINGSCHOLAR

doesn't freak out

if you ask him, "aren't you scared of them?", he would scoff and closes his eyes, seemingly deep in thought. then, after a few minutes, you realized he already dozed off. you then punch his stomach lovingly.

okay, he's awake now, and ready to hear you ramble about your spiders(begrudgingly). if you try to put them on the palm of his hands, he'll blink at the creature and then caress it slowly. he would later reveal that there are many spiders in the sunset savannah, and that him and his brother used to play with it when they were kids.

"they're a lot bigger and dangerous back at home," he says, putting the spider back in your hands. leona thinks that it's endearing how you can act so casual with an animal that many are afraid of. not like he's gonna admit that ever, though.

in conclusion: 3/10 reaction. he doesn't care.

AZUL ASHENGROTTO

are you perchance trying to kill him

he's NEVER seen that thing ever in his whole life. what is that? why does it have eight legs like him? is it fast? oh, god—it's jumping towards his face!

"name, i respect your wishes to take any animal under your wing regardless of their danger. but, could you please not bring that monster closer to me? ever?" he would then force you to sign a contract to put that spider at least ten meters away from him.

you just laugh, of course, brushing it off as you try to put the spider on the palm of his hands. "you—get it away from me, now!" he yells, sprinting away from you immediately while you chase him around with the spider.

after jade and floyd stops you from chasing azul around(they were bribed), azul finally calms down, glaring at the little spider in your hands.

when he realizes how pathetic he's currently acting, he would go on a rant about how octopuses are generally cautious and likes to observe things that are unfamiliar to them. he convinced no one.

as the two of you are busy discussing the fate of your innocent spider, behind you are two eels whispering near each other's ears. "jade~ we should buy a spider for azul next time, aha~" floyd grins, earning a chuckle from jade. "you're right, floyd. i'm sure it will be interesting to see, fufufu."

in conclusion: a restraining order/10 reaction. no explanation.

JAMIL VIPER

pray for yourself because either your spider is going to die today or jamil is the one who dies instead

"why would you bring that stuff here?! don't try to get it anywhere near me." the two of you now looks like you're playing tag in the kitchen(you're not to jamil. this is war.)

if you try to put it on his hands, get ready for you and your little companion to be smacked by a cooking spatula while he lets out an earsplitting scream. because why the hell would you do that? no, don't grin at him. stop it, don't approach him.

in the midst of war, kalim enters the kitchen and saw whatever the hell you guys did and decided to join because, "that looks fun!" jamil is now surrounded.

"for god's sake, just leave me alone!"

in conclusion: you're not friends with him anymore/10 reaction. you do feel bad for him, though.

VIL SCHOENHEIT

no

wouldn't let you get close to him with that spider. he's not that scared of it, he's just absolutely disgusted by that ... thing. he hates how squiggly and small they are. ugh, just thinking of it makes him shiver.

"get that bug out of my sight at once. do i have to tell you twice?" harsh. but once he learned that it's your pet, he began to somewhat accept that it's your decision to keep something as dangerous as that in your room.

if you try to put it on his palms, get ready for him to scream and lecture you for an hour straight about it. why would you put that thing on his skin? what if he starts to have an allergic reaction that he doesn't know about? what if it makes his skin burn, huh? huh?????

if you whip it up when you hang out with him, expect to see him move a little farther from you. just a little. he doesn't like how unpredictable that thing is. one blink and it could already be on his face.

"look, i don't mind that you like bugs. just ... don't put it anywhere near me." he would warm up to the spider thing eventually, and would sometimes asks if your little spider is still doing well to this day.

in conclusion: 8/10 reaction. he's just weirded out by it.

IDIA SHROUD

"WUT. you keep that thing as a pet? are you sick? that's literally the final boss of a dungeon but the smaller version. although it looks a little harmless, so i guess it's more of an elite enemy instead of a final boss? n-no, don't put it anywhere near me ... hey—HEY!"

he's freaked out and refuses to talk to you for a day. don't get him wrong, when he and ortho were kids, their parents used to give them a spider as a gift. although ortho was mostly the one who took care of it.

it's just that, three days after that, the spider crawls out of its cage when the two were asleep. and when idia woke up, it was on his face. so he's understandably pretty traumatized about it, lol.

if you try to put your little friend on the palm of his hands, his soul will leave his body approximately 0.354 seconds before you even move your hands towards his.

after a few minutes of sitting in silence while staring blankly at your spider, idia strangely feels as if the spider is literally him. it's small, and it immediately walks back when he gets a little closer to you.

has he found yet another animal to relate to?

expect him to start talking to the spider when you're not around. "little spider, you're exhausted to be around other people, too? wow. we're so similar it's almost insane. we're like, those stereotypical twins in every single video game ever." (jade and floyd claims to feel their ears getting hotter for some reason)

in conclusion: 10/10 reaction. it's funny to see him talk to animals.

MALLEUS DRACONIA

he's amused at how your eyes seem to light up the moment he accepted your offer of putting your companion on his hands. he thinks the little spider is intriguing, and he wants to know more about it.

he would ask you plenty of questions about spiders. "what does it eat? is it a carnivore? or does it prefer vegetables instead? hmm, bugs are such curious creature. tell me more about it, child of man."

he's really happy that not only does he get to share about gargoyles with you on your night strolls, he also gets to listen to you ramble about your pet.

expect him to show up with foods, cage, and a literal terrarium for your spider the next day. when you say that he doesn't need to buy those things for your pet, he's confused and a little disappointed that he doesn't get to co-parent with you.

although later on you tell him that you were just surpised. you don't mind if he wants to become the second parent of ur spider!!!

"your little companion is very interesting. though i'm much more curious as to what compels you to keep it as a pet. i would love to hear more about it. so, will you come over to diasomnia with your spider next time? i shall wait for your arrival."

in conclusion: marry me/10 reaction. not only is he supportive, he's also as curious as you are with the spider!!

naomi-nana. do NOT repost, do not use (with or without permission), do not recommend or talk about my works outside of tumblr.

[tittykittyqt]

ᰔGeto who works at Victoria's Secret as a cashier and one day meets you!

VS WORKER!GETO is the best employee out of everyone in the store. Making sure to be extra nice to the ladies when checking out, recommending various lingerie sets to those who needed help—he’s always lending out a helping hand. Of course, the women absolutely loved it. Skipping the other registers just to go to his,desperate for his help.

It was a Monday,only a few people in the store. Geto eyeing all the couples as the men usually pick the most hideous lingerie sets for their girlfriends. He can’t help but feel bad for the women, knowing he would do much better if he had a girlfriend. Lost in his thoughts while putting the new limited edition panties out—he snapped back into reality as someone poked his shoulder.

“um hi!are those the new limited edition ones?”—geto could’ve fell right onto his knees once you were in his sight. You,all pretty and dolled up asking him such an obvious question. The growing tent in his pants shows how excited he is about a gorgeous girl like you approaching him. “hey pretty girl, yup these are the limited ones. here I’ll show you all of em”. Laying out the 6 new pairs of panties, he watches how your eyes have that sparkle in them as you observe the pairs.

His eyes fixated on your expression, imagining you in a light pink lingerie set—lying down on his bed with your legs spread wide with a wet spot on your cloth clit. “ugh I don’t know which one to pick!”, coming up behind you and picking up one of the panties. His bulge pressing against your ass as he places his large hand on your waist. “Hmm I think this one will look good on you”—holding up a light pink lace thong with a small white bow on the front. Noticing the small gasp that left your mouth and how you slightly rubbed your thighs together—his boner getting bigger as your ass slowly grinds against it. Thankfully there isn’t much people in the store!

“you should try it on for me sweetheart, you’ll look so good”. Next thing you know, you and Geto are in one of the dressing rooms. Geto sitting down, you in between his parted legs. One of his hands caressing your waist as the other one softly grips your ass. “hmm you look so cute baby”, his hand sliding down to the front of your panties as his thumb rubs against your cloth pussy. Letting out a soft moan, he smirks as he observes your cute face. “you like that huh?so wet for me”—turning you around as your back faces him, lifting you up onto his lap and spreading your legs apart.

“be a good girl and don’t make any sound,okay baby?”. You nod as you reach to take off the panties he chose, his hand swatting yours away. “nu uh, those stay on”—his big hand reaching under the lacey panties as he begins to rub your wet clit in circles. letting out quiet whimpers as the pace of his fingers quicken. Your pussy sounding like literal mac and cheese due to how wet you are. “Hmm look at you baby, so beautiful and wet. Fuck your pussy is so cute too”— squishing your cheeks together as he forces you to look at yourself in the mirror facing the two of you.

fingers sliding down towards your small hole, entering one finger and slowly another. A small moan escaping your mouth as you grip his wrist. “remember stay quiet pretty girl, wouldn’t want someone walking in on us hm”. His two fingers pumping in and out of your hole, the wet noises making geto leak through his pants with pre cum. Too occupied with the cute women gripping his fingers, he failed to realize one of his co workers was calling for him outside the dressing room.

“Hey! Geto! Get your ass back to the register there’s a big line forming”. Ignoring his obnoxious co worker’s yelling, he’s so absorbed in the sounds of your wet cunt and your cute moans. Well too absorbed since his co worker opened the door to the dressing room—the sight of you and Geto, his fingers stopping midway as the both of you stared at the worker.

“what the fuck are you doing.”

a/n: I headcanon that geto is an absolute munch and that he’s SUPER good with his fingers

[tw1sters]

Put a Ring on It

Jake is an impatient man, even more so when it comes to you. When he sees you for the first time in months, his self-restraint is tested. Spoiler: he doesn't pass.

▸ PAIRING: Jake "Hangman" Seresin x F!Reader ▸ WARNINGS: NSFW 18+, pwp, semi-public, inappropriate use of naval academy class ring (fully inspired by inappropriate use of malfoy signet ring lol), fingering, dirty talk, lots of cursing ▸ WORD COUNT: 3.4K ▸ A/N: currently in my established relationship pwp era so here's another one. been thinking about that ring for a while now. please mind the warnings!

—

Fucking Hangman and his fucking fragile ego. And his fucking hand.

It’s true that the situation isn’t exactly ideal – you fly in to visit for the weekend, taking only a couple of days off from work to spend time with your boyfriend, who’s currently off on a special assignment at the San Diego base. You haven’t seen Jake in two months; with him constantly on the road and you buried in meetings with your current project, it’s virtually impossible to find the days to actually fly to see each other. 

To say he is deprived is a massive understatement.

When you arrive on base, he pulls you into a crushing kiss. Literally crushing. His arms, which have probably gotten even bigger since you last saw him, are wrapped around you as his lips capture yours. His moan reverberates throughout your entire body. You barely notice his squadmates jeering and booing around you. When he slips his tongue past your lips, as much as you enjoy it, you know it’s time to stop.

After all, you are on government property and they probably have the authority to hold you prisoner should you commit indecent exposure.

“Jake,” you breathe, pushing at his chest for him to release you. He continues peppering your face with kisses, and a laugh bubbles up your throat. “Okay, okay. I get it, you missed me.”

He hums, his hair coiffed back, ruffled in the wind. Your heart somersaults in your chest. Sometimes you forget to truly appreciate how attractive he is. Neatly trimmed dirty blonde hair, strong jawline, that stupidly gorgeous grin. Don’t get you started on his hands. You marveled over them enough the first time you met and he’s definitely shown you how talented he can be with them. 

“Been too long, sweetheart,” he whispers, nuzzling his face into your neck. You can feel his mouth begin to work on you again and, before you fall apart in front of his teammates, you gently nudge him away, pulling an annoyed grunt from his lips. “Killin’ me,” he mutters.

“Not in front of your team, Seresin.”

When Rooster calls your name, you perk up and shoot him a smile. “Are you coming to the barbecue tonight?” He asks. 

Jake groans. “Absolutely the fuck not. I need some quality time.”

“What barbecue?” You cock an eyebrow at the two of them.

“Hangman didn’t tell you? We have a beach barbecue at The Hard Deck later. Whole squad’s going to be there and obviously Penny and Mav are setting everything up. Took us a couple of weeks to get everyone together. Even Coyote’s girlfriend is coming.”

Well, now you have no choice. You look at Jake who’s already groaning, preemptively reacting to your response. You shoot him a look telling him to behave before turning back to Rooster with a tight smile. “Of course we’ll be there.” 

Rooster grins, “Awesome, I’ll catch you there. I need to drop off some of my stuff first.”

“Sweetheart, you’re killing me,” Jake says, a hand on his wounded heart. Ever the drama queen.

Rolling your eyes, you sigh, “We can’t not go, Jake. The crew’s going to be there, along with your bosses, might I add.”

“They’re just going to eat and get drunk.”

“Exactly what I want to do after the week I’ve had.”

Jake stands in front of you, hands grasping your waist as he pulls you close and ducks his head to kiss you again. “I know how to get you to relax, release all that pent-up tension.” 

Heat crawls up your neck as you feel the pulsing between your legs. Jake isn’t the only one who’s been particularly needy. You’ve lost count of the number of times you’ve had your hand down there. While you can still satisfy yourself, it isn’t the same as having Jake there with his veined hands, lickable abs, and filthy words. 

Phone sex is a common occurrence, but you’re only left wanting more. 

Before Jake can get you even more hot and bothered, you lick your lips and hold him at arm’s length. You make sure his grabby hands stay in yours, foiling his every attempt to grope you in public. There are officers around for god’s sake. “We’ll stay for an hour, say our hi’s, get some food and drinks, then we’ll head back to your place,” you try to reassure him. 

“You and your desire to please people will cock block me to hell, sweetheart,” Jake grunts. “You say an hour and I already know we’ll be staying there well past.” 

“No, it’ll just be an hour. I promise.”

Jake learns early on in your relationship that there are certain promises you do not keep. Although you are great at holding yourself accountable for things revolving around him, the chances of those promises coming true slim down to near zero when other people are involved. Too many times have you promised him you’ll only stay an hour – particularly at boring events that you drag him to (or he drags you to) – because you feel terrible if you don’t offer the host the time and appreciation they deserve for organizing. 

And you love Penny. That woman is impossible to adore. No one else can keep Mav on his toes like her. Thus, Jake certainly expects you to give her your utmost effort to be present.

Proving his point right, you and he are currently on hour number two. You try to ignore how restless Jake is getting. He’s rocking on the balls of his feet, grumbling under his breath, his hands beginning to wander again. The annoyed jitters radiating off him seem to amuse the others, especially as you’re striving to give whoever you’re speaking to your full undivided attention. 

So far, it has been Penny, Mav, Nat, Bob, and Javy. The current one on your list is Bradley, who’s going on and on about the training they did today. With at least three drinks in his system, nobody can get Bradley to shut up. 

You’re nodding along to the story, throwing in a few questions here and there to toss Bradley off the scent. The scent being Jake’s hand continuously sliding up your leg and under your skirt. You swat his hand away, yanking it off you every few minutes or so, but he is relentless. Thankfully, the two of you stand with your backs towards the ocean, and everyone else is in front of you. None of them the wiser to the shit Jake is pulling behind your back, literally.  

Jake’s large hand cups your asscheek and massages it slowly, pulling them apart until you can feel even your pussy lips parting. The light breeze that sneaks into your underwear has you freezing. Your subtle efforts to remove his hand are to no avail. Instead, knowing he overpowers your grip, he only gets bolder. 

His hand alternates between squeezing your ass and tracing the line of your panties. You bite back a shiver every time he does. You can feel wetness pooling between your legs, and how damp your underwear has probably gotten. At this point, you aren’t hearing a single word coming out of Bradley’s mouth anymore. Fortunately, you don’t think Bradley fully comprehends whatever he’s saying either. He’s stumbling slightly on the sand, close to toppling over each time. 

Jake doesn’t even try to help and you can’t bring yourself to either, not when Jake is tempting you so deliciously. 

When Jake carefully runs a finger over your slit over your damp panties, you feel your brain fogging up. Bradley’s words are beginning to blur together, and so is his face. Jake smirks proudly, sensing how distracted you are even as his squadmate drones on. 

Fucking asshole. 

His index finger slips underneath the fabric, tugging it slightly to the side as he runs it over your bare pussy. You can feel him collect your juice slowly and use it to drag his fingers along your lips. Struggling to swallow a moan, you let your eyes slip shut only momentarily, hoping that Bradley doesn’t catch on. However, when Jake dips not one, but two fingers into you, a squeak escapes your lips before you can catch it. 

Your cheeks immediately flame with the sound. While Bradley is drunk, he isn’t completely inebriated. 

He stops halfway through his sentence as he frowns. You can’t bring yourself to say a single thing, your face tight and body tense. Meanwhile, you don’t even need to look over at Jake to see how pleased he looks with himself. Bradley’s eyes dart between the two of you, the realization slowly sinks in as he begins to trip backwards. The panic sets quickly on his face.

“Oh no. No, no. I’m not going to be around for this. There are things I wish I did not know and this is one of them. You guys are nasty,” he manages to get out before he is rushing away towards Nat. He wraps an arm around her and you can hear him ask her to protect him from potentially scarring his eyeballs. 

This team is built on drama queens. 

Jake’s hand disappears from your body only to wrap around your hand as he drags you inside. He ignores your protests as he whisks you past Penny and Mav, one of which is looking at you knowingly and the latter who raises a confused brow. 

Your boyfriend leads you, fighting to keep up with his long legs, towards the back area, into a hallway hidden from the crowd outside. He wastes no time before he’s pressing you up against the wall and dropping his head to capture your lips. A moan involuntarily rises from your throat now that no one is around. 

Your hands slide up his toned arms and wrap around his neck as you pull him in deeper, relishing in the feel of his fit form against your soft body. Jake is all sharp lines and hard edges, a figure he maintains very proudly. You can taste the beer on his tongue as you breathe in a scent that’s so undeniably him.  

Even kissing him is doing wonders in getting you one step closer to satisfying your wanton need. Your mind doesn’t think twice as you let your hands explore the body that you’ve missed for so long. Your nails drag along his neck, down his chest, unbuttoning his beige uniform along the way. 

“Let me hear you, sweetheart,” Jake grunts as he hikes your skirt up around your hips. He hisses when he sees the wet spot on your panties. “Fuck, look at you. You’re so wet, darlin’. You miss me? Miss my hands on you?”

You bite back a whimper when Jake presses a thumb against the spot, rubbing the lace deeper into your pussy to collect more moisture. “Jake, please, you’ve been teasing all night,” you groan. 

“Yeah? Where do you want me?” 

“Want your fingers inside, please,” you whine, fingers digging into his forearm as he uses his knee to separate your legs. With his thigh against your core, you’re likely beginning to soak his pants, especially when he nudges against you. 

“Ask nicely,” Jake whispers in your ear, chuckling when you growl at him. 

“Seresin, you better move it along or I might find someone else who’ll do the work,” you bite back. When you attempt to pull away, Jake moves faster. One hand swoops and fastens up both your arms above your head, his hips pin you against the hard surface, and the other cups your cheek. A strangely intimate gesture despite the mess he’s put you in. “Fuck you,” you snap at him.

“Oh, you’d like that,” he teases, eyes twinkling devilishly. “You look so pretty when you can’t go anywhere. Trapped with me.”

You hate, but secretly enjoy, that that does the trick for you. Your cunt tightens involuntarily. This is your form of foreplay. The mocking, the banter. You love that he can overpower you, love how easily he cages you in. 

“God, I missed you,” Jake leans in and kisses you again, just enough to leave you wanting more. When he backs away slightly, you find yourself chasing after him. The taste of him and the warmth of him. “Missed this pretty pussy even more.”

“Then put your hands on me,” you say through gritted teeth. 

“Your wish is my command.” He looks down at you, blue-green eyes almost iridescent as they observe you with rapt attention. The back of his hand skims your jaw, fingers brushing against your lips. His eyes darken into shadows when, as he grazes his ring down your throat, your breath hitches. The metal is cool against your heated skin, a brief reprieve in the slow torture he puts you through. His hand journeys further down along your cleavage, visible above the neckline of your dress. From his height, he has a front row seat to the curves of your tits. “Fucking stunning,” he mutters to himself. 

Your skirt is still pooled around your hips, the hem swiping the back of your legs. His hand continues its path south until he’s touching you again, fingertips delicate above the fabric. 

“And these panties,” Jake huffs, “my favorite.”

You knew what you were doing when you got freshened up earlier. The underwear was an easy pick - a little red number with delicate floral lace trimming. The back barely covers your ass cheeks, giving him easy access to his actions throughout the night. 

The friction of the lace against your sensitive pussy has you squirming, his fingers urging the flimsy fabric against your skin. Your head falls back with a thud against the wood. His touch is insistent as he encourages the pulsing squeezing your insides. 

Jake flits his fingers around the fabric, shoving it to the side like he did earlier. Instead of putting them inside you, he continues to tease your lips. Every time he touches you just a little firmer, a little deeper, you press your thighs together. His US Naval Academy class ring imprints against your thigh. 

There’s something about the feeling of it. A consistent reminder that it’s there. A reminder of his role in the Navy. There’s something about that power that has your stomach flipping. He’s not only competent in taking care of you, but they put this man in an aircraft to keep this country safe. 

A large part of you loves that. You adore how protected it makes you. But also how small it makes you feel. 

As your thoughts spiral around the implications of his little piece of jewelry, he is slipping a finger past your folds. Your juices are coating the digits, making it easier and easier to push into you. He alternates between sinking deep inside of you, scraping your walls with determination, and stroking the outsides lightly, a gentle tease that has you fidgeting for more. You’re tempted to descend on his fingers, using him to fuck yourself, but Jake doesn’t allow that to happen. 

He brings his hand slightly higher. When the ring’s engravings touch your clit, you inadvertently jolt. Damn you and your traitorous body. Ever the perceptive one, Jake’s eyes light up in understanding. As if he needs more ammo to use against you. 

“Oh, do you like that, sweetheart?” He beams, bright eyes sparkling in delight. “You like my ring on you?”

Another fuck you sits on the tip of your tongue, but it never comes out when he purposely presses the ruby against your clit. You jerk again in his touch, but he doesn’t slacken his touch. Every time you try to twist away from him, his grip tightens, bruising around your wrists as he rubs the cool stone against you. 

“You’re so filthy,” he says in your ear, teeth nipping your lobe. Your teeth clamp your tongue to prevent a moan from coming out. You refuse to give him the satisfaction. “Look at you squirming with my ring on you. So fucking naughty.”

Your breath leaves your lungs as you wrestle to control the electricity coursing through your veins. Every single fibre of your being comes alive, flares skyrocketing into the night as he thumbs your sensitive nub while his fingers continue exploring your insides. His fingers coil inside you in that delicious way that has your toes curling. “Jake, please,” you plead, “that feels so good, don’t stop.”

He pumps his fingers in and out of you slowly, going deeper each time. He goes knuckle-deep and you feel his ring buried inside you. The ridges are exquisite against your skin and the ring’s stone only adds to the width of his fingers. It fills you up fully. 

Tears prick your eyes at how wonderful everything feels. All of his movements – his large hand wrapped around your wrists, his fingers caressing your insides, the press of his ring impressing upon your skin – culminate in this tantalizing symphony of desire. Every single stroke is another melody in this performance, the tunes coming together in a beautiful composition. 

Your body is at the mercy of his hands as he continues his ministrations. He fingers you faster until you’re barely able to hold yourself up. Releasing your hands, he instead uses his free hand to grasp your jaw again, tilting your head so he can kiss you. He pushes his tongue through your lips and bends around yours. He tastes you until your knees nearly cave. 

“Jake, I can’t–” you gasp, “I can’t take it anymore. Please let me come.”

“God, you’re fucking gorgeous, sweetheart. Look at you so needy in my hands. I’m the only one who can make you feel this way.”

“Yes, fuck, only you,” you echo desperately, your hands now clinging to his shoulders to hold yourself up. You’re so close to your orgasm, the feeling climbing and chasing you through this maze of hunger. 

Jake’s chest rumbles with laughter. “Not what you were saying earlier, when you were threatening to go to someone else. Do you really think anyone else can make you feel the way I do? Do you think anyone else knows your body like I do?”

“N-no,” you stutter weakly. “Only you, Jake.” Another expletive leaves your mouth as he presses against that particularly effective spot. “Christ, if you don’t finish me right now–”

He clicks his tongue. “So impatient,” he murmurs, nipping your lip. But he does what you ask. His fingers move more intentionally as his other hand moves from the back of your neck to your front, forcing off the tiny straps of your dress until your upper half is exposed. 

As he torments your cunt, his other hand grabs your breast over your bra. The matching piece of lingerie is thin so you can feel his every squeeze, every pinch of your nipple. You’re writhing in his hands and there is nothing you can do to stop it. Your fingers bury in his shoulders as you whine, pussy clenching around his fingers. 

“That’s it, sweetheart. Just like that. Come for me,” he coaxes, his voice so gentle against the filthy squelching of your cunt. “Come for me, sweetheart.”

With a few more pumps and a brush of his thumb against your nipple, you fall apart in his hands. The climax wracks through your entire body like an earthquake, your entire being trembling with the pleasure that surges through you. Your pussy tightens around his fingers that are prolonging your orgasm. 

His fingers are a wet, sloppy mess and you look absolutely ruined. Your dress is barely clinging to you and your mind is still a haze of pure, unbridled lust. Jake, on the other hand, is smiling wide at you. Cocky prick. 

“Good?”

You huff, leaning against the wall as a last resort. “Good.”

When your eyes fall between his legs, you see the erection tenting his pants. Your mouth practically salivates at the sight, enticed. Your body signals that you’re ready for round two and Jake is in no state to be showing his face in front of his friends again. 

“Can’t wait to have your mouth on me tonight,” Jake grins.

You roll your eyes. The last thing you need is to feed his ego. You’ll never give him that sense of gratification. “In your fucking dreams, Seresin. After the stunt you pulled, you’re lucky if I don’t completely blue ball you tonight.” Slipping back into your dress, you push him off you, flicking your hair over your shoulder. 

His face falls as you walk away. “Wait, you’re kidding, right? Sweetheart, you wouldn’t do that to me!”

[as-sweet-as-a]

can't rid myself of jealously - d.w.

summary; dean tried to make you jealous cos he thinks its hot, but it doesn't exactly go to plan warnings; drinking, kind of insecure!reader words; 940

It was late. Too late. You were tired and just wanted to crash back at the motel. But, since the job had been a success, Dean insisted you all went to the bar. So, here you were. Sam was nursing a singular beer, complaining about how he should be back in the room. Castiel was stood awkwardly by the bar. Dean, of course, had already had two beers, trying to get everyone more awake.

“Look, see, they’re having fun.” Dean grinned and nodded at a group of girls that were hanging around by the jukebox. You rolled your eyes and sipped your drink.

“I’m going to the bathroom,” you mumble. After you’d finished your business and splashed cold water on your face, you left. However, when you went to rejoin the group, you only saw Sam and Cas. Dean was gone. You looked around and your eyes landed on the girls by the jukebox. One of them transferred their bright pink cowboy hat to his head, making him chuckle. He caught your eye and winked at you. You felt your stomach boil.

“You’re discontent.” You jumped, not realising Castiel had appeared next to you.

“Uhm, I guess.” You shrugged and took your drink back off of him, sipping it. “It’s Dean. He’s trying to make me jealous?”

Castiel tilted his head and shot you his confused puppy look. “Hm? But you’re not jealous.”

You nodded. “Mhm…”

Sam approached you and Castiel, glancing at Dean and rubbing the back of his neck. “Hey, I’m about to head back. Dean said we’re good to take the car, something about not thinking he’d even be able to drive back later.”

You nodded and left the bar with Sam and Castiel, Sam placing a comforting hand on your shoulder.

You loved Dean, of course you did. His old habits? Not so much. Usually, you’d laugh it off. Or, if you were in a more confident mood, you’d go over and show yourself off to whoever Dean was flirting with while Dean grinned and wrapped an arm around your waist proudly.

He returned an hour or so later. You could tell because of the hushed voices of Sam and Dean in the hall. The lights were off in your motel room. You were under the sheets, swallowed by one of Dean’s hoodies and a pair of sleep shorts. Your eyes were fixed on some trash TV show about fishing.

The door creaked open and you heard Dean kick off his boots. He slid into the bed behind you. You could smell the beer on his breath and the sickeningly sweet perfume the girls were slathered in. You could also practically hear his grin. His arm fell over your waist as he began to pepper your neck in kisses. You shrugged him off, unamused.

Dean let out a low laugh. “Woah, hey. What’s this about, hm?” He joked, assuming you were playing hard to get or just messing around.

“Headache.” You mumbled.

He huffed a laugh. “Oh, really?” He leaned back in to kiss your jaw. You shrugged him off again. His eyebrows furrowed this time. “Sweetheart? What’s going on?” His hand began to softly run up and down your side and his tone turned gentler.

You stayed silent, curling up more.

“This is about those girls, isn’t it?” He asked. He took your silence as confirmation. “You know I only want you, right?” He nudged his nose against your shoulder.

“Mhm…” You couldn’t really help feeling insecure because of the bar. You were in dire need of a shower after runnng through the woods all day, your hair was dishevelled, eyes tired, and clothes dirty. Those girl were put together, nice dresses, well-groomed, pretty. Dean liked pretty. And right now, you didn’t feel pretty.

Dean sighed, mumbling your name softly with a sigh. He gently turned you onto your back, still rubbing your side. You didn’t realise you were about to cry until Dean was brushing your waterline with his thumb. “Talk to me.” He urged gently.

You sighed, unable to hide anything from the man you loved. “Dunno… just those girls from the bar.” You were almost whispering, hating how small you sounded.

“It’s never bothered you before. Besides, I think it’s hot as hell when you come over and show yourself all off and shit.”

You gave a weak amused smile at that. It was quick to fall. “It was different this time. I think I’m just tired from the hunt nd those girls were like… crazy pretty. I guess I was just feeling a bit off.”

Dean looked almost offended. “Pretty? Baby, they’re gremlins compared to you.” He explained. You shot him a ‘watch it’ look. “Okay, sorry, not gremlins, feminism and all. But, what I’m trying to say is that you don’t have to worry. I only have eyes for you. You’re the most beautiful girl in the world to me, okay?”

Despite feeling more convinced, you couldn’t help but tease. “But you have to say that, you’re my boyfriend.” You grinned.

“Hm, well, could those girls kill a wendigo in 2 minutes and 57 seconds?” He teased right back, leaning further above you, almost on top of you.

You rolled your eyes playfully and chuckled. “Probably not…”

“Damn right.” He grinned and leaned in to kiss you. You kissed back, of course,

The kiss got deeper until Dean was over you, trailing his lips down your jaw and neck. You noticed that he seemed distracted. “Dean, you okay?”

He paused lifting his head. You noticed that his eyes were fixed on the TV, squinting slightly. “That fish is fucking massive…”

[rueclfer]

hiiiiihiiiiiihiiiiya

for the job fair (super congrats btw!!!!) i was mayhaps thinking about pro-athlete keigo (what kind you can decide based on what u think is hottest) and physical therapist reader ;) keigo keeps getting injured and flirting/distracting reader while they’re working?

mayhaps a very no nonsense reader who just “did you do your stretches😐” everytime he shows up and he’s delusional and flirting with them anyways

i love this event idea soooo much good luck with all the submissions!!! and congrats again 6k!!!!!

hhiihihaiiiihiiiii cartteerererer!!! HEHEH THANK U FOR THIS athlete keigo is ALWAYS. on my mf mind and i just think pro hockey keigo is just so. So SO. yeah.

athlete!keigo // job fair

event m.list

it’s been a busy morning in the office. this season has given you multiple players dealing with the consequences of neglected injuries from past years, making it your job to put together meticulous warm up and recovery routines for them.

your eyes shift towards the sound of the door clicking open. you expect it to be the head coach checking in on the paperwork, but when you swivel around in your chair, you’re met with the captain- long sandy hair pushed back with a wire headband, sweat drenched gray cut off t-shirt, and a limp to match that pout on his face.

you blink at each other for a moment.

“did you need something, takami?”

“i think i pulled something.” he pressed his lips together in a tight line.

you match his expression, nodding towards the treatment table where he quickly hobbled over and comfortably laid flat on his stomach like he’s done dozens of times before.

you cock an eyebrow as his shy smile, “you sure you’re not just here to skip out on your conditioning?” 

“i just lead us through two sets of stadiums and a million passing drills before coach let me come here,” he rolls his eyes, “but you know, i somehow suddenly always feel like a million bucks when i get to see you.”

“cool it, takami,” you groan, “is it your hamstrings again?”

he nods his head in response.

“what’d you do before practice?”

you move over to him, pressing your thumbs into the back of his thighs and feeling around for the tightness.

there’s some sort of satisfaction in hearing the hiss of air exiting through his clenched teeth as you dig into his muscles. you can’t help yourself from smiling at the image of his cheek pressed against the table, eyes shut tight, and knuckles clenched white from the pain.

“had lunch with the boys,” he squeaks out, “ran through some old matches, saved a kitten from a tree, helped an old lady across the street…”

your eyes flicker up to meet his. you resisted the eye roll once you’re met with a cheeky grin and a slight chuckle escaping his lips.

“and stretched?” you deadpan, “like i told you to?”

his smile falters.

“well-” he begins.

“idiot,” you cut him off, “are you trying to ruin your career?”

his cheeks deepen in color as he tries to stammer out the right words.

“no, but-”

“on the floor, takami. on your back.” you instruct, stepping away from the table.

keigo slides off the table and squats down onto his back. he looks up at you with a wobbly smile as he slides his hands behind his head, enjoying the view from the floor.

you bring his leg up against your body, gripping his shin for support as you slowly lean into it, giving his hamstrings the time to adjust to the stretch.

“jesus fuck,” he winces, hands flying to grab the back of his thigh for support.

“that’s what happens when you don’t stretch. especially on conditioning day.” you press further, stepping up his side for leverage. “you should know better.”

“no complaints here, babe,” he hisses, “but fuck, take a guy to dinner first before you have him in a position like this.”

you feel heat crawl up your neck as he looks up at you with a pained smirk.

“take me to dinner for wasting my time to stretch you.”

his eyes beam and his leg stiffens against you, making you turn your attention towards him.

“it’s a date then. no take backs.” he quips. “tonight or whenever you’re free.”

you blink at him. surely your face had gone red at this point.

“maybe," you mutter, "only to remind you how to properly warm up though. nothing more.”

“a warm up is exactly while i’ll need.”

[alotofpockets]

What friends are for | Kyra Cooney-Cross x Reader

5k celebration prompt: "That's what friends are for, right?" - "Right, because you're definitely not more than friends."

Woso masterlist | Words: 1.2k

-----

When Kyra joined Arsenal, the two of you instantly became friends. While she had found comfort with her fellow Aussies, she gravitated towards you. Her second week at the club? You already labelled yourselves as best friends.

Steph and Caitlin were happy to see Kyra make a new friend. They loved her of course, but she could be a little pest, and they were grateful that her energy would be divided between more people than just the two of them.

It didn’t take long before they started questioning if the two of you weren’t more than friends though. The two of you seemed to be glued to each other’s sides. From pitch walk partners, to always linking up for drills, to being over at each other’s places all the time. Yet whenever they asked, Kyra always told them you’re just friends. 

Movie nights had become your favourite thing to do with Kyra. It had become a tradition for the two of you to have at least one movie night a week. Movie nights always included a sleepover, so today’s one did as well.

Kyra opened her door and smiled when she saw you standing on her doorstep, your kit bag slung over your shoulder. “Come on! I am so excited about this movie.” She said as she pulled you into her apartment. You put down your kit bag next to the door and kick your shoes off. “You picked without me?”

She looks at you dead serious, “Yes, you picked without me last time, so now it’s my turn.” You knew picking last time was going to come back to bite you in the ass, but it was movie night, so you’d have fun no matter what. “Alright Kyky, what movie did you pick?”

“Home Alone!” She yells from the kitchen, where the microwave had just dinged to let her know the popcorn was done. “Home Alone? It’s May, why are we watching a Christmas movie?” 

Kyra walked back into the living room, “I love Home Alone, and so do you, so no complaining.” You playfully rolled your eyes and sat down on the sofa. Kyra sat down beside you and handed you the popcorn, “See, I knew you would give in.” 

You shove her lightly, before cuddling into her side. It was by your own definition the most comfortable way to watch a movie. Together you watched, laughed, and ate your popcorn. And once the movie was over, you made your way over to Kyra’s bedroom. She had a one bedroom apartment, as did you, so you had always shared the bed.

The next morning, you woke up cuddled into Kyra's side. It wasn't unusual, this is how you woke up most sleepovers with Kyra. You got up to get a headstart on breakfast while you let Kyra sleep a little longer.

“You're too good for me.” Kyra states as she follows the smell of her favourite pre-training breakfast. You smile at her groggy morning voice, “I try.” 

Kyra drove the both of you to training. Once she parked the car you jumped out, since you had a session with the physio in five minutes that you had almost forgotten about. In your haste you quickly run past Steph, who had just gotten out of her car. She watches you with an amused smile on her face, and then turns to Kyra.

“Finally got the missus to move in, and now you’ve scared her off?” Kyra rolls her eyes. “I think she actually enjoyed herself quite well. She even made me breakfast.” Steph looked at her with eyes of disbelief, how could she not see it. “What? That’s what friends are for, right?” She asked when she noticed the look Steph gave her. “Right, because you’re definitely not more than friends.” The older Aussie told her while rolling her eyes, before walking off, leaving Kyra to trail behind her.

You had made it just in time for your physio appointment, and with some tape applied to your knee, you were free to join the rest of the girls for training. The day started with some warm-up exercises before working on the rest of the planned training session.

To finish the session off, you were playing a little 5v5. Everyone on the team always got super competitive while playing 5v5, even if it was just to be named winners of today’s session.

Apparently you and Katie got a little too competitive, because when you were jumping up to head the ball, Katie’s head collided with yours. The two of you fell to the ground, each clutching your heads. 

The medical team was quickly by your sides, but Kyra was quicker. She hadn’t even been on either of the teams, she was just sitting on the sidelines, yet she had gotten up and sprinted across the field to get to you as fast as she could. She crouched down by your side, quickly getting some of the grass off your face. “Are you okay? Are you hurt?” The medical team pushed her to the side. “Kyra, you need to give us some space.”

She stood to the side watching them do checks on you, but then to her side she saw Katie already standing up, fully cleared by the medics that were checking out, and something within her snapped.

“Look what you did!” She snapped, lunging towards Katie. Luckily Caitlin caught on to Kyra quicker than she could do anything and stepped in between her and Katie. Before either Caitlin or Katie can say something, you speak up. “Kyky, don’t.” It was all you had to say for Kyra to fully stop, making it so that Caitlin didn’t have to hold her back anymore. 

Katie chuckled at how easily you were able to stop her from her anger. “Ha, your wife said you're not allowed to hit me.” Caitlin quickly stepped forwards again and sent her girlfriend a disappointed look. Katie held up her hands in surrender. “It’s not my fault she’s whipped.” She said under her breath as she stepped back.

Kyra kept her eyes on Katie, the girl who hurt you. Her eyes were filled with anger. “She’s up.” Caitlin said to Kyra, and she quickly focussed back on you instead. “Are you alright?” You nod, “Yeah I’ll be fine. Maybe a bit of a black eye.” You could see Kyra’s eyes turn angry again, so you put your hand on her arm. “Breathe, Kyky, I’m okay. Katie did nothing wrong.”

She let her eyes focus back on you, to double check if you were really okay. Then she nodded slowly. “Can you maybe get me an icepack?” Kyra smiled, “Yes, of course. One icepack, coming right up.” She didn’t have to run, but she did.

While she is occupied doing that, you head over to Katie. “Sorry about her. Are you alright?” Katie’s smirk grows, “Even speaking for her like you’re married I see.” You roll your eyes. “Grow up.” You say jokingly. “Fine fine, I’m good. Seems like you got the worst of it, you’ll be okay?” You nod, “Yeah, I should be good. I think I’ll have myself a nurse 24/7 for a bit though.” You say as you watch Kyra sprint back with an icepack. “Lucky you.” Katie says as she pats your back as she watches your eyes shine just a little brighter as you watch Kyra nearing.

-----

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[headdinthewall]

TAPED TEMPERS ──  g.clarke  ౨ৎ ⋆｡˚

summary : in which your lost-tempered ‘argument’ is caught on george’s stream, and his viewers have something to say about it a/n : next post will either be INSIDE part three or a tiktok trend post ! this is not proof read it’s also 3AM so there might be an abundance of mistakes, sorry if it’s really bad! content : established relationship ,, arguing ,, a lot of swearing on readers behalf ,, hate comments ,, a little bit of angst & comfort ,, family planning at the end

─────── YOU’D HAD A terrible day. You were late for work, though it wasn’t a big job and George was constantly reminding you that you didn’t have to work, it was nice to have your own thing to do. On top of that, it seemed to be ‘treat customer service like shit’ day, because you’d had an abundance of horrible people come up to you, when all you were trying to do was serve them coffee. The third thing that ruined your day? Some arsehole thought a good way to ‘flirt’ with you was to bump into you while you were holding a hot cup of coffee. And just to put the cherry on the cake, your bus was late, it was raining, and George was too busy filming to be able to come and pick you up.

To put it simply, you were in a very, very sour mood when you got back to the apartment.

You slammed the door shut behind you, locking it with much more force than necessary. You grumbled curses under your breath as you tried to run your hand through your hair.

Key word, tried.

A frustrated whine/cry/groan left your throat as your fingers got tangled in the wet, knotted strands of your hair.

It was quiet, and there were two pairs of shoes missing from the entry ways shoe rack, but you could hear George talking in his room, so that meant Arthur and Chris were the ones out.

As you walked towards the kitchen, you stumbled over a pair of trainers you recognised that had been carelessly strewn across the floor and you lost it.

“George, how many fucking times do I have to tell you to either keep your shoes in your room or put them on the fucking rack?!” You shouted, picking them up.

You took note of the sink full of dishes and wanted to rip the hair out of scalp and peel the skin from your bones.

“And the fucking dishes too! I did them for you last time it was your turn, but I’m not fucking doing it again! You’re 25, wash the fucking dishes!”

You practically threw his bedroom door open and slapped his trainers on the floor, an expression on your face that was nothing short of absolutely livid.

“Chat, I’m gonna have to cut this stream short, apologies—“

“Oh yeah, ‘sorry chat’ ‘sorry chat’ how about ‘sorry reader, for leaving the house a fucking mess’?!” You yelled.

He cut the stream short, “Okay, I’ll do it, I’ll do it.” He said softly, tucking his chair under his desk and making his way into the kitchen to do the dishes.

“Honestly, I’m tired of coming back to a shit tip of an apartment, George. And you’re talking about us wanting to move out and get our own house? Well not if this is how you’re treating an apartment!” You lectured him, almost like a mother would her son.

The crash out was entirely unneeded, but the stress and constant fuck-ups of the day had finally caught up to you and were just spilling over your tongue.

“Okay, well if we lived together there wouldn’t be half the mess there is here, because Arthur and Chris make half of it themselves!” George argued while washing the plates.

“I’m not talking about their mess! I’m talking about your mess! The trainers on the floor were yours, it’s your turn to wash the dishes and you’ve been procrastinating it like a fucking year 11!”

“It’s not even that deep, reader! It’s a couple of dirty dishes!”

“Yeah, exactly! A couple of dirty dishes, so why cant you fucking take five minutes to clean them?!”

George sighed, knowing to just nod at your words when you were in this state. You let out a loud huff and slumped down on the couch.

After 10 minutes, the water stopped running and the sound of ceramic clattering together stopped. There was a dip in the couch beside you and George was there, arms open with a sympathetic look on his face.

You bit your lip, tears brimming in your eyes as you just fell not-so-gracefully, sideways into his embrace, tension dissipating from your body upon contact. His arms enveloped around you and he rested his chin on top of your head.

“What happened, hm?” George asked calmly, “Why are you in a bad mood, my lovely?”

“Everything that could’ve gone wrong today, has gone wrong.” You croaked, sniffling as tears traveled down your face, rolling over the hills of your cheeks. “Everyone I served at work today was a fucking arsehole, my bus was late, it rained on the way home, some wanker bumped into me and spilt coffee all down me. God, it was fucking dreadful today.”

“Oh, my darling, I’m sorry.” He mumbled into your hair, kissing it softly. “Think about it like this, yeah? Not everything that could’ve gone wrong today has. You could’ve lost your keys, but you didn’t. A car could’ve driven in a puddle while you were going past, but it didn’t.”

You nodded, wiping your cheeks with the backs of your hands. George shifted you, lifting your head with his hands on your cheeks.

“Also, an old witch could’ve cursed you to be an ugly bastard forever, but that never happened. You’re still beautiful.” He joked, kissing you softly.

“I’m sorry.” You whispered, “I shouldn’t have shouted and sworn at you like that.”

“It’s alright. I probably deserved it. Especially if we’re going to be moving in together soon, need to make sure I’m on my best behaviour.” He smirked, kissing your forehead, practically smothering you with affection, trying his absolute hardest to rid you of any negative thoughts and feelings of the days events.

“I love you.” You mumbled.

“I love you too, my darling.”

a combination of tweets & comments on youtube

user1 anyone else mildly concerned about the way reader spoke to george during last nights stream?

user2 🚩 🚩 can’t believe she spoke to him so violently

user3 i could never let my partner talk me like that, i’d just walk out on them

user4 massive ick the way reader shouted at george last night!

user5 now imagine if he had shouted at her like that… it would be a whole different story

user6 the fact that she portrays herself as a cutesy girl online but speaks to her boyfriend like that behind closed doors is just… ugh

user7 nah… her audacity. he literally pays her bills, pays for her clothes and got her half the fame she has

user8 you’d never catch me staying in a relationship like that.

─────── THE NEXT MORNING, George was setting up his phone against his monitor on his desk, ready to film a tiktok as he sat in his gaming chair.

“Um, hello everyone. I don’t normally do a video like this, so … apologies for the weird switch up, but I’ve seen a lot of comments circling on youtube and twitter about my girlfriend, and I just want to clear a few things up. One, yes, she did yell at me last night. Did I deserve it? Kind of. I— I will admit that I did commit a bit of an oopsie last night, but we’ve had our own conversation and settled things, what you saw in the stream was just … her shouting at me. You guys are acting like I was just getting an onslaught of verbal abuse, which didn’t happen. Two, please don’t involve yourselves in my relationship. I appreciate each and every one of you for your support, but … yeah. I promise that our relationship is 100% healthy, and it has been for a year now. Me and reader don’t need any sort of … advice, if you will, about how to communicate. The odd argument will happen in a relationship, but what matters is how you deal with it, which we have done.” George held two thumbs up.

“Also, please stop sending her hate. We woke up this morning and a number of you have sent her DM’s claiming that she’s a ‘horrible girlfriend’ and that she doesn’t deserve me. Again, please stay out of my relationship and my private life and just … appreciate what I do share with you and the content that I do put out. I think reader actually wants to say something …” He looked over at you off screen.

You shimmied out of bed and appeared on camera, wearing one of George’s shirts that came down to your upper thigh.

“Hi everyone! Um, leave me alone, please and thanks.” You shrugged, “No, but seriously, please stop sending me messages saying ‘apologies to George now’ ‘you shouldn’t speak to him like that’ and whatever else you guys — for some reason — think is acceptable to text me. I can assure you that me and George spoke and it’s all been dealt with. Another thing is, I’m not apologising to you guys. Why? Because I’m not dating you guys. I don’t owe you guys anything apology or a reason as to why I behaved like that, but I did owe it to George, and—“

“The owe has been made.” George interrupted, putting on a fancy voice. “El Clarko is pleased and happy.”

“Exactly, so … yeah. But thank you to those who were defending me in the comments. Love you all!” You blew a kiss to the screen.

“Yeah, sorry for the weird post, just thought this was necessary to put across because reader was getting hate and it was making us both quite upset, and I wanted to address the whole situation. Thanks guys, see you later.” George finalised before ending the video, rewatching it over and then posting it.

Once he had done that, you got back into bed with each other, legs entangled with your head on his chest and his fingers dancing along your bare thigh.

“Do you want to look at houses online today?” George muttered, using his spare hand to comb through your hair.

“Sure.” You hummed, your throat vibrating against his chest. “Two bedroom? Or one?”

“What would we need two for?”

“I dunno …” Lie. “Maybe … I dunno, just in case … y’know …”

“Just in case what?” George frowned, completely oblivious as to what you were trying to get at.

“In case we get a baby Clarkey.” You mumbled shyly.

“You want a baby Clarkey?” A smirk slowly sores across his face.

“Yeah— No— I dunno, I was just thinking … What if it happened?” You shrugged, looking up at him. “What are you smirking at?”

“Oh, nothing.” He chuckled, coming forward to kiss your forehead, “We can look at two bedroom houses if that’s what you want.”

“That’s not a free pass for you to cum in me.” You spoke quickly before he got any ideas, but you both knew you were treading lightly on the topic, quite open to the idea of kids, especially now you were both mid-20s.

“Okay, okay.” He said with a dramatic sigh.

You stared at each other, sleepy eyes looking at sleepy eyes. Eyes full of love and adoration, the idea of starting a family together being a blossoming thought in both of your minds.