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highvern · 2 months

Text

When in Rome

Pairing: Choi Seungcheol x f!reader

Genre: fluff, smut, angst

warnings: alcohol consumption, cheating, nudity, mentions of drug use, explicit sexual acts (unprotected sex, dirty talk, oral, swallowing)

Length: ~24k

Note: excited to have this for the @svthub world tour collab! thank u to @gyuswhore for helping, @wonuvs for fact checking my shitty italian, @the-boy-meets-evil for making sure i actually finished this fic bc i live to torture her and everyone else who contributed to this over the months it took me to finally write it!

this is from cheol's pov which was a new challenge but i loved it (i will never do it again). i'll be out of town when this goes up but can't wait to read everyone's feed back!!!

Summary: After months of no contact, Seungcheol isn't sure what to expect when he sees you again at Jeonghan's wedding. He's prepared to apologize, to grovel, to bear the weight of a cold shoulder. Whatever it takes to have you back, his best friend since diapers; or whatever will ensure the last third of your trio has the best day of his life. But when he overhears the most recent development in your relationship, he must come to terms with something he was never prepared for, or risk losing you for good.

m.list

This blog is intended for 18+ only! Minors/blank blogs will be blocked.

There are fewer places Seungcheol hates more than airports. Dentist offices, his grandparents’ house during the holidays when they ask about grandkids, and even the time he ran into his elementary school science teacher the first time he was buying condoms at the pharmacy, all were more favorable than the hustle and bustle of an international airport.

Seungcheol likes to be straightforward and direct. Something that becomes seemingly at odds with the average person traveling because at the one place everyone has somewhere to be, they act as if they have all the time in the world.

But the simple thought that it's all temporary, that his personal ninth circle of hell is the only thing standing between him and a week in Italy is enough to grin and bear it.

On the other side of the terminal, his best friends are waiting for him. It’s not as if they haven’t seen each other for long; Jeonghan and Sofie were at bar trivia last week as their last hurrah before tying the knot. As usual they wiped the floor with everyone, rousing several allegations of cheating that Jeonghan deserved. But Seungcheol is about to watch them get married and it makes him a little misty around the eyes because he loves his friends more than anything.

The only concern, which is less of a concern and more of a titanic size anchor sinking in his gut, is that you’re one of Sofie’s bridesmaids. And you haven’t spoken to him since New Years when you revealed you were moving to New York with your boyfriend, Johnny.

Another place Seungcheol dreads, right next to the airport, is anywhere Johnny happens to be. He’s everything you aren’t: abrasive, arrogant, catty, disorganized. And those are just the traits at the front of the alphabet.

You had a plan. A list of criteria he had to listen to over and over again after each failed date. Even the guys Seungcheol set you up with after carefully vetting didn’t seem to make the mark. It was respectable, commendable. You wouldn’t settle for anything less than “perfect.” Whatever that meant to you.

At a bar, three years ago, Johnny approached you. Seungcheol watched from across the table as you mentally ran over your checklist. Johnny met the physical ones: tall, good hygiene, well kept appearance. The other things would need more investigation. What did he do for work? Was he close with his family? Kids? Opinions on cheating at bar trivia?

The more Seungcheol learned about Johnny after your detailed debrief from a few dates the more confused he became. Johnny worked in banking. You hated finance bros and called them scum of the dating pool. He was an only child and only talked to his parents on holidays and birthdays. You had grand dreams of close grandparents and houses full of cousins. He didn’t want kids. You did. He didn’t think bar trivia was that serious. Seungcheol watched you threaten Jeonghan’s life on more than one occasion over the use of Shazam during the music round. Johnny was everything you said you didn’t want.

And then you followed him across the country after two years of dating cut with three breakups.

It didn’t make sense.

When Seungcheol pulled you aside after you announced you’d be moving, trying to figure why you thought living with the man who once asked if you really needed to wash bath towels if you only use them when you’re already clean, you told him to mind his business. Later that night, after enough drinks to make everything blurry, you two got into a screaming match on the sidewalk with your shared friends attempting to play referee. It was the last time you two spoke.

In over twenty five years of friendship, founded on the backs of elementary school shenanigans under a reign of terror of one Jeonghan Yoon, you and Seungcheol’s real fights can be counted on one hand.

The sixth grade field trip where you and Jeonghan left him out, senior year of highschool when the girl Seungcheol took to prom argued about his parents taking more pictures with you than her, and junior year of college when Seungcheol caught you making out with his frat brother after ditching him under the guise of having a stomach bug. That was it. Three fights, all of which were resolved within a week because as stubborn as you both are, you’re best friends.

Five and a half months of not speaking, except when you called Seungcheol in the middle of the night without leaving a message and when he tried calling you back in the morning you didn’t answer. Not until a month later when he finally swallowed his pride and texted a half hearted apology to which you responded with a quarter of forgiveness. That was it.

But Seungcheol won’t dwell. He refuses to make things awkward for Jeonghan and Sofie during the most special week of their lives. Knowing you, you’ve probably already come to the same resolution. The only person you’re closer to than Seungcheol is Jeonghan with Sofie a close second. If there is anyone you two will agree to put aside an argument for, it's them.

The sun has already begun setting when he makes it through customs and out towards the Arrivals, painting everything in buttery yellow.

“SEUNGCHEOOOOOOOOOLLLLLL!” Sofie screams, hands cupped around her mouth.

She’s half outside the cherry red sports car. An Intermeccanica Italia Spyder because Seungcheol knows three things in life: expensive watches, expensive whiskey, and expensive cars. Sofie’s family happened to have plenty of the last and Seungcheol assumed the first two as well.

When Sofie became his study partner in law school she ended up following him on Instagram. He assumed from the way she carried herself, perfect posture with tailored clothes and an ‘air of society’ as you called it, that she was well off. But then, during a late night gossip session, you and he did a deep dive and found out Sofie wasn’t just well off. Her family had more money than God.

But everything on the surface was a contrast to who Sofie really was. Heiress to a fortune but studied more than anyone in their class just to graduate second. Perfect posture and tailored clothes are a stark contrast to her favorite bar where she’d outdrink anyone, and cheer when the prize for trivia was cheap plastic margarita glasses.

Or right now, where she belts Seungcheol’s name again like some drunk frat boy while sitting in a car worth more than his life.

Seungcheol jogs to where she waits, already smiling.

“I would have brought a ‘Welcome back from rehab’ sign but my mom thought you’d be embarrassed,” Sofie says as she hugs him over the console.

“At least make it ‘welcome home from prison’ so people won’t walk in my way.”

“I’ll make sure Jeonghan remembers you have a preference,” she calls over the wind.

Technically, the house (which is really a mansion) is almost an hour from the airport. With Sofie’s driving it only takes twenty minutes in which Seungcheol thinks he might need to start going to church.

The pebbled driveway crunches underneath the tires as they approach the imposing building he’d call home for the weekend.

In the evening light, the house is more daunting. An imposing stone facade rises from the ground, akin to a small castle than an actual home. Smooth stone with detailed carvings, windows with huge shutters, and on the top floor, a balcony, fenced with wrought iron, juts out.

Even after years of seeing pictures, Seungcheol still can’t believe his friend grew up here. He can’t believe it actually exists and isn’t some set from a historical drama.

Sofie throws the car in park right in front of the door before jumping out.

“By the way, there were some issues with one of the rooms.” Sofie drops her voice, “My aunt and uncle are fighting again, so I hope you don’t mind sharing?”

Seungcheol knows most of the guys coming to the wedding. Worst case scenario he’s stuck in a twin size bunk bed with a weird cousin. And with how busy he’ll be as best man, his room will be for sleep and not much else. “Yeah, that’s fine.”

“Perfect! Just leave your stuff, everyones out back.” Sofie pushes him as hard as she can manage which isn’t much at all given she’s five foot nothing.

The garden is filled with bodies upon bodies crowded together, some old, some young. Seungcheol recognizes a few faces in the mix: Soonyoung, Joshua, Seungkwan. More friends from law school. Jeonghan’s sister waves from across the way. Everyone seems to be paying attention to whatever is happening at the iron garden table.

And then, like a scene in a movie, everyone parts for a second and time freezes.

Seungcheol would recognize you anywhere. Even if he can’t see your face, he knows it's you. The curve of your shoulders, the tilt of your head. The bark of laughter as your chin drops forward. He knows it's you and the weight in his stomach lightens and leadens in an odd cycle.

He missed you.

Then everything comes back into real time. Wine and cards. Then he sees the chips on the table, your stack to the side significantly higher than anyone else's.

Months of ruminating over what he’d do when reunited fly out the window. Seungcheol doesn’t waste a minute as he approaches, hand on the back of your chair as he peeks over your head to sneak a glance at your hand.

“Who let you talk them into poker?”

You’re already smiling when you tilt back to look at him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Oh, how he missed you.

“She said she didn’t know how to play,” an old man grumbles from the side.

Seungcheol doesn’t recognize him but he’s got the same expression as all the people you’ve sharked before: mildly impressed and slightly murderous. Two other guys sit at the table, one old enough to be his grandfather looks almost proud. Seokmin fills that last seat, head in his hands at being swindled so easily.

“I said,” you start, throwing your gaze to him. “I hadn’t played in a while.”

You look back up at Seungcheol for some kind of support. Eyes round and innocent in a way you both know you’re not. Pool, cards, darts, any game a man a few drinks in could beat you at was easy fodder for your con. Usually it ended with free drinks, sometimes money, but mostly it’s Seungcheol playing referee for the disillusioned guys you swindled while wearing a bright grin.

Tossing a few chips towards the three men at table with a smart ‘don’t spend it all in one place,’ you rise and throw your arms around Seungcheol like everything is normal.

“Hi,” you whisper into his neck.

Seungcheol’s hands are already curled around your waist, pulling you in tight. “Hi.”

“I missed you.”

Seungcheol doesn’t think to question the sudden rush of familiarity after months of silence. Every fight in your long friendship ended this way; you both stew and stew until one day things snap back to normal. It’s how it’s always been.

“I see that you can’t even greet your best friend.” Jeonghan coughs from the side.

Seungcheol squeezes you tighter at the jab. It’s Jeonghan’s wedding but Seungcheol saw him last week when dropping the couple off at the airport to come here. He’s far more interested in dragging out his reunion with you as long as possible. “I’m in the middle of that actually.”

He scoffs in response, walking away. “Whatever, I see too much of you anyway.”

There’s glasses of wine waiting when you break apart. Seungcheol keeps closeby, not that you seem eager to go anywhere. His staring is obvious but he doesn’t care. You’re really here and the cold shoulder he expected to find is nowhere to be found.

Another two hours of celebrating, filled with drunken toasts and more card games with Sofie’s family that only end with you digging into their pockets even deeper, fly by before the exhaustion of a day starting in one continent and ending in another catches up to him. You’re too busy arguing over if Jeonghan cheated in the last round to notice Seungcheol slipping away from the table and towards the door leading inside.

Sofie is in the kitchen just beyond, another bottle of wine sloshing in hand as she talks animatedly on the phone. “Okay, look. I am on vacation. I’m about to get married. I literally left notes for everything I'm not working on during my wedding week. Figure it out. Bye.”

She hangs up without response, tossing her phone on the counter before taking a swig straight from the bottle.

“Good?” Seungcheol asks.

“Oh, you know, just the usual. I leave and suddenly no one knows how to do their job.” Sofie rolls her eyes. “What’s up? Need another glass?”

She raises the same bottle and the thought of more wine nearly turns his stomach.

Seungcheol brushes her off, moving to the sink and rinsing his glass with finality. “I think I’m gonna crash for the night.”

“Really?” she asks. “But the party just started!”

“For you maybe, some of us have been cramped on a plane all day.” He feels it. In his back and knees. The cramp in his neck from passing out halfway through and waking up bent at ninety degrees. And the hours he spent agonizing through emails with the inflight WiFi because even on vacation he can’t sit still for more than one minute. But now it’s a ticking time bomb before he curls up in a chair and passes out until morning.

Sofie snatches his glass before shooing him away from the sink and taking his place. “I forgot you’re an old man now.”

“You’re the same age as me?”

“Anyway,” she sings. “I know we promised you’d have your own room but—”

“That’s fine. I really don’t mind rooming with one of the guys.”

“Well… you and Y/N were the only ones not sharing and she said she wouldn’t mind for the weekend.”

“Huh?”

“I thought it wouldn’t be a big deal! Seokmin and Kwan agreed to share and room with Josh so things are pretty tight but I can see if we can switch things around and—”

“No, if she’s okay with it then it's fine.” Seungcheol says. “We just haven’t talked since, you know?”

Sofie seems to soften at that. “I know. But it looked like everything was fine outside.”

“Yeah,” Seungcheol sighs. “I missed her.”

“I know she missed you too.”

“She said that?”

“Oh please, neither of you have to say anything, you’re both pathetic,” she says while pouring another glass. “But I think this weekend will be good for you guys! Like old times.”

Old times. Before the fight. Before you moved away.

“Yeah, just like old times… At least we aren’t sharing a bed, right?” He jokes.

“Actually,” Sofie grimaces.

The one solace Seungcheol is gifted is the bed is massive. Almost the entire room is dominated by the plush mattress, a dresser, and a chair in the corner. He considers sleeping in that instead for all of a minute before realizing you probably wouldn’t let him and the absolute torture it’ll do to his neck.

At least the forced proximity won’t be awkward since you’ve silently agreed to leave the past behind you. He can’t imagine Sofie would consider this solution if you were still mad at him, even if it was her wedding week. The realization lightens the weight on his shoulders an ounce more.

Seungcheol throws his bag down at the foot of the bed. It’s no big deal; sharing a room with you. Childhood sleepovers had been the norm, a few nights in college you’d shared a clunky old twin bed when you both were too drunk to find your ways home separately. Your first apartment together, when you two had to share a mattress on the floor for the first weeks because all your money went into paying rent, flash in his head. Old times.

Thirty minutes later, freshly showered and in clean clothes, Seungcheol heads back downstairs for a glass of water before bed.

He remembers where the kitchen is after Sofie’s short tour, trapezing through the huge house easily. Behind different closed doors he catches glimpses of pre-sleep conversations: couples spitting harsh whispers to each other, a few cartoonish voices reading bedtime stories to an audience of childish giggles. But when he reaches the threshold of his destination Seungcheol stumbles into an entirely different atmosphere.

“You haven’t told him yet?”

“No. I didn’t feel like the kind of thing to say over text,” you whisper.

“Well you could have called him!”

“And say what? ‘Hey Cheol, I know we haven’t talked in months because we got into a huge fight about my boyfriend but Johnny and I–’”

Seungcheol strains his ears to hear the rest of your sentence but fails to decipher anything before Jeonghan’s voice cuts in. Whatever ‘it’ is, you seem keen on keeping it a secret.

“Just tell him.” Jeonghan says through a mouthful of something. “I’m sure he’ll be happy.”

His mind races with a million possibilities, all related to Johnny, all things you wouldn’t have told your best friend of over twenty years because of some stupid fight. Something you don’t know how to tell him over the phone, something you need to tell in person.

The realization strikes like lightning.

You and Johnny are engaged.

Thirst forgotten, Seungcheol turns back the way he came. He thinks through the new information as he stumbles up the stairs.

How could you not tell him? How could he make you feel like you couldn’t tell him? How long have you been hiding this? And why did Jeonghan and Sofie know before he did? Was everyone in on the secret and he was the odd man out?

You and Johnny weren’t even that serious when you moved away; or, that's what Seungcheol thought. In all honesty he fully believed it was some joke when you told him. A drunken practical joke taken too far but you didn’t laugh when he did. There was no punchline to share. The boxes were packed away and then the moving truck came and you left with it.

Everything else hits him in the seclusion of the bedroom. Your shared room. He doesn’t even have the luxury of coming to terms with your latest surprise in private.

Seungcheol isn’t happy. He is, but because you’re you, argument aside. The past few months are the longest you’ve ever gone without each other and seeing you again lifted a weight off his chest he’d come accustomed to in months of silence.

It’s an easy decision. If Johnny makes you happy enough to tie your lives together then Seungcheol can bite his tongue. You’re his best friend and by default he’d never think anyone was good enough for you but if you loved Johnny, if you were this serious about him, then Seungcheol would support you.

Even if it meant there would always be a Johnny sized ravine between you.

Seungcheol wakes far before the sun breaches the horizon. The room still washed in the shadows of early dawn grants him some peace to think over his own conflicts with the news, your quiet snores a backing track from across the bed.

On your side facing him, Seungcheol gets the first good look at you in what feels like forever. Even with the size of the bed barely a foot of space separates your bodies. You hand twisted in the hem of his shirt like even in your sleep you can’t stand to be apart more than necessary.

You look ridiculous; hair a mess and limbs splayed. But your face is soft in sleep, eyelashes fanned on your cheeks and lips in a pout.

There’s an odd flutter in his stomach. He wasn't lying when he said he missed you. But now things are complicated.

He hadn’t slept at all last night; mind constantly replaying the conversation he heard in the kitchen, formulating his reaction when you finally let him in on the ‘surprise.’

Perhaps under different circumstances he wouldn’t struggle with news. Seungcheol wants you to be happy. Johnny is the problem in the scenario. They never got along, barely spoke outside of the few times forced circumstances required them to. Seungcheol was polite. Johnny was polite.

Seungcheol wanted to kill him and he’s certain Johnny felt the same.

Relationships naturally take priority over time but Johnny seemed to creep in and choke Seungcheol out of all the places he’d been firmly planted for years. Another reason he isn’t happy.

Monday night Bachelor? Canceled, because Johnny plays beer league softball with his friends and you started going to that.

No more sleepovers at Seungcheol’s after a night out because ‘it makes Johnny uncomfortable.’ Fair complaint. Seungcheol wouldn’t appreciate his girlfriend sleeping over at a guy's house after drinking if the roles were reversed. But Seungcheol isn’t some guy and you were his best friend before you were Johnny’s girlfriend.

Traditions at Christmas felt hollow without you. The first one you spent meeting Johnny’s family in Minnesota you texted Seungcheol the entire time about how cold it was, how they were a 5k on a holiday type family despite the fact there was three feet of snow outside.

All small details that mean everything to Seungcheol, never meant as much to you.

And that’s why he doesn’t like Johnny. Because he made Seungcheol realize that.

It’s not that you and Johnny didn’t work. Seungcheol just couldn’t wrap his head around why you wanted to overlook all the glaring differences to make it work.

But pointing that out left him with a cold shoulder lasting six months so he plans to keep his mouth shut.

You tried talking to him before bed but gave up when he pretended to be asleep. It took everything he had not to give in and talk into the early morning. Six months was more than enough ground to cover for you two to catch up; he was promoted, you had an entirely new life in another city that he wanted to hear all about. His insane neighbor from across the hall, who you both are sure sells drugs, is actually a preschool teacher (mysteries of the universe). And he knows you probably have kooky neighbors of your own in New York.

But, in all honesty, he didn’t want to hear stories with Johnny’s name attached. Wasn’t ready to hear you say you’re engaged. It’s one thing to know it. But the second the words leave your lips then it’s real. Then Johnny is here to stay and it's only a matter of time before you two are arguing again.

Especially when everything said months ago was still fresh in his mind. Words he’d stand by no matter what. But Seungcheol has figured out that there are conversations he’s allowed to have with you and ones that should never see the light of day if your friendship is to survive. Johnny is one, the other is a memory from college that remains vivid no matter how hard he tries to forget.

But this weekend wasn’t about you and him, it's about Sofie and Jeonghan. If Seungcheol can dive into focusing on them, maybe he’ll survive.

Today is the one day reserved for sightseeing before ‘the inevitably disorganized shit show of an Italian wedding’ as Sofie puts it.

Seungcheol has already seen some of the big things thanks to his study abroad in undergrad: the Colosseum, the Trevi Fountain, the Pantheon. So for today, he'll stick by whatever you want to do. You’re the building nerd architect.

When he finally finds the willpower to roll away, carefully extracting your grip on him before ducking from the sheets, you stir enough to release a sleepy whine in protest before burying back under the blanket.

It’s odd but he notices you’re not wearing a ring. Seungcheol looked closely if you took it off before bed but nothing stands out in the bathroom or on the dresser. He assumes you took it off to make the weekend about Sofie and Jeonghan rather than yourself. It’s something you would do. Or maybe it’s at the jeweler’s for repairs. Maybe Johnny had gaudy taste and bought a ring so flashy you refused to wear it.

Seungcheol doesn’t know but it strikes him as strange.

The kitchen is already bustling with life even at such an early hour. Family and friends trickle in one by one, joining Seungcheol at the table with cups of coffee and munching on fruit and biscuits as their hangovers ebb. Quickly, the peace he preserved in the early quiet melts into loud laughter and a million buzzing conversations.

You melt into the chair beside him, eyes barely open as you snag his cup and scowl after finding it already drained.

“Coffee?” you mumble.

Seungcheol pushes his plate of unfinished fruit and a half finished pastry you way. “Sofie’s mom is brewing more. But it’s strong.”

“Oh trust me, I know,” you say around a mouthful of jam and dough. “I drank a full cup the first day I got here and felt like Sonic.”

“That’s how you know it’s good.”

“You’re insane.”

“What are your plans for today?”

“So there's this church, the Santa Maria Sopra della Minerva. It’s near the Pantheon!” you ramble, peeling another orange. “It’s just beautiful and it's got a statue by Michelangelo next to the altar and the design is incredible.”

Seungcheol can’t help but laugh at your enthusiasm. A city filled with ancient buildings and history is right up your alley.

He remembers how you pouted when he came back from his trip in college after yours to Venice was canceled due to ‘not enough student interest.’ The only thing that managed to quell your anger was all the pictures Seungcheol took with you in mind. Close ups of the tiniest details about ancient designs tour guides pointed out to disinterested business majors but he knew you’d care if you’d been there. If you were there then you’d probably be leading the tour yourself whether the guide liked it or not.

“Mind if I come with?” he asks over his fresh cup of coffee.

“Duh,” you roll your eyes with a smile. “I waited for you to get here to go.”

Sofie’s uncle, the one not under threat of murder by his wife, agrees to drive you both out. He drives at full speed from the second he hits the gas pedal. With the windows down. The breeze is as nice as a wind tunnel and cuts off everything Zio Berto tries to point out except for his screams at other drivers.

On the other side of the back seat, you’re turning green. Seungcheol is glad the window is already down because if you get sick, he will too. And Sofie would refuse any payment for the cleaning fee, Seungcheol is morally opposed to ruining such a nice car with vomit.

The city whips past outside the windows, cobblestone streets slowly growing more crowded as the car edges closer to the center city. Berto finally slows down to avoid pedestrians and mopeds but only by a fraction. He doesn’t seem to share Seungcheol’s concern about body fluids clashing with the car design.

Finally, after what feels like a century, the car jerks to a stop. You don’t even pretend to be polite and exit immediately, hands on your knees while dry heaving for air.

“I’ll be around. Have fun!” Berto calls from the driver's seat. “Call me when you’re ready to head back.”

Seungcheol waves him off and when he turns back where you were standing, you’re already gone; circling the elephant obelisk in the center of the cobblestone courtyard.

“Isn’t it so cool?” You gush, snapping photos.

The exterior of the building is unassuming. Flat sandstone brick without much detail but you see the things that are important. In a few minutes you’ll be in tour guide mode, pointing out the smallest crack no one would see unless they already studied the church's history in depth.

“Soooo cool,” he jests. He appraises the statue with you, turning his head this way and that.

You slap his shoulder, “Don’t be a jerk!”

“Okay, okay. Give me the tour.”

“It was built on the ruins of a temple of Isis.”

“Okay, and why the elephant?”

“The obelisk was taken from the Church of San Stefano del Cacco down that way,” you point. “It's originally from Sais in Egypt but got moved all the way here. The elephant was commissioned by the pope to display it based on a book that was popular at the time.”

“Interesting.”

You point at the inscription on the plinth before continuing, “that’s from the book.”

Sapientis Aegypti insculptas obelisco figuras ab elephanto, belluarum fortissima, gestari quisquis hic vides, documentum intellege robustae mentis esse solidam sapientiam sustinere.

“Whoever you are, who sees here the figures of the Egyptian wise man carved on the obelisk carried by the elephant, the strongest of wild animals, understand the symbolism to be that a strong mind supports firm wisdom,” you translate.

“I didn’t know you read latin.”

“I don’t. It’s in English on the other side,” you laugh. “But I do know, the guy who designed the statue made it look like it's farting because the pope told him to change the design from what he originally wanted.”

“Really?”

“Yep. He said having it stand on four legs was dangerous so the sculptor added the saddle and a cube at the base, but he also made its butt face the convent so the friars would have to see its ass every time they came out.”

“Wow.”

Seungcheol circles the statue and sure enough the tail is angled to look like it's blowing wind.

“I’m pretty sure it’s a lie but I’d like to think people were that petty hundreds of years ago. Now all people do is subtweet and post vague Instagram stories. I want someone to hate me so much they design an entire statue just to minorly inconvenience me each morning.”

You’re fully of facts Seungcheol would never know. It’s one of the best parts of visiting places with you. It’s not just some building or some random statue. You give the architecture a new life.

Seungcheol’s mind flashes back to the first time he accompanied you and Johnny to a monument back home. In the five minutes you’d been there, he realized Johnny truly did not care about your interests.

The look on your face that day told him you realized Johnny didn’t care either.

It’s the same pact everyone that moves to D.C. makes to visit all the museums and monuments and landmarks. Good intentions with zero realistic goals. Except you’re stubborn and the drive to say you did something means Seungcheol has tagged along to thirty out of the one hundred and fifteen on your list. Johnny missed most either from work trips or some other excuse and the one Seungcheol missed had been the only one Johnny came to because of the flu.

Safe to say the first time visiting together was a shit show. Johnny didn’t pretend to evaluate the ‘important’ parts, didn’t ask questions or bother reading the placards detailing events of significance, raced through the entire thing to leave you and Seungcheol behind. It’s not like you or Seungcheol were overwhelmed with beauty and needed hours but Johnny finished his round after less than thirty minutes and told you to text him when you were done.

So Seungcheol did the only thing he could to get back at Johnny without upsetting you: walked as slow as possible, pointing out things he knew you’d know more about, and dragging things out so Johnny was stuck waiting in the frigid winter wind outside to suffer.

You knew what he was doing, obvious from the way you hook your arm through his and give an affection squeeze. Your smile didn’t reach your eyes but you both pushed through.

Thank whatever powers be that Johnny wasn’t here now.

“See the windows?” you ask, pointing to the three different sized circular windows hanging over the main doorways.

“Yeah,” he nods.

“Well you can’t tell from here but they’re rose tinted.”

Seungcheol tries to see what you’re talking about but the windows are dark and covered in some kind of lacquer that makes them look gray and dusty rather than pink.

“And why is that important, Professor Y/L/N?”

“Because it’s the only medieval church in Rome like that!”

You continue rambling off facts, talking a mile a minute as your point at different things and walk Seungcheol around the exterior. A few other people's ears perk up as you go on about how the details had been done over and over; first Romanesque, then Gothic then, some guy named Carlo Maderno added Baroque designs inside, and friars who put in stained glass windows.

By the time you take a breath, the crowd has taken a closer interest in the windows and the elephant statue due to your brief history. A few look at the flood plaques which are some of the best preserved records the city has.

Seungcheol hangs onto every word. He doesn’t care about the old church, it’s an interesting bit of history sure but he could be outside any church in Rome and have the same reaction. He cares about the church because you care. And your passion about old windows and flood markers make it the most interesting place in the world right now.

“Go stand on the steps so I can take your picture,” you demand.

“Do I have to?” Seungcheol jokingly complains.

“Just go.”

Seungcheol poses as you direct, flashing a few silly poses you laugh at. He manages to wrangle you into taking a few photos as well. Ones that will probably be sent to your mom and never see the light of day other than her Facebook. Your Instagram is reserved for, in order: buildings, animals, food, and the rare picture of you with friends at some sort of occasion (wedding, graduation, the time Jeonghan broke his leg drunk on a city scooter and ended up in the ER).

You’re in the middle of pretending to hold the Leaning Tower of Pisa when someone approaches Seungcheol.

“Would you like us to take your photo?” an elderly woman asks. She is a quintessential tourist: fanny pack, camera around her neck, sun burnt around the ears. A man in a matching shirt approaches with her, donning the same gear and pink tinge. Seungcheol recognizes them from a few minutes prior when you gave your lecture about elephant butts and petty sculptors.

“Sure, thank you.”

He hands over his phone and joins you on the steps. You both pose like normal adults, smiles plastered on your face while Seungcheol gives you bunny ears and you pull his hair.

“Beautiful couple!”

“Oh, we’re not…” You both object.

“We’re on our second honeymoon.” The man croons at his wife, chuffed when she rolls her eyes and focuses on the camera screen. “You two?”

“We’re here for a wedding.”

“Wow! Married in Rome,” the wife gasps. “How romantic.”

It isn’t the first time you two have been mistaken for a couple. Anytime you’re with him or Jeonghan someone assumes you’re dating. Occasionally, you’d play it up, make an entire story about how you met, how long you’ve been together, biting your tongues the entire time as each detail is more ludicrous than the last.

Jeonghan takes the cake as the most ridiculous. Two tornado chasers that ran into each other ten years ago and never let go. Him and Seungcheol, not you. Which really threw the waitress off. Never mind the fact you all were sophomores in college, high as kites and stuffing yourselves full of hashbrowns in a greasy spoon diner for Seungcheol’s birthday.

“Did you two meet here?” the husband asks.

“Oh no, we actually met in a competitive bowling league,” you fib, wrapping your arm through Seungcheol’s.

What the hell?

“Romantic!” The wife belts like she actually believes nothing could inspire love like sharing shoes with countless strangers and cheap beer.

Seungcheol would take the piss under any other circumstances. Except this time you’re actually engaged and the last time you two pretend to be a couple was when you fake proposed to him in a fancy restaurant to score free champagne and dessert to celebrate the end of law school.

“Would you mind taking a few of us?” the man asks.

You snap a few pictures on the wife’s phone and after more coos of ‘romantic!’ and a few thank yous they melt into the crowd.

“Alright, let's go inside.”

“Lead the way.” Seungcheol feels more awkward than before, cheeks red but not from the sun beating down

Upon entering the church, he discovers the inside is much more interesting than the outside. Holy water stoups are held up by marble. Two statues flank the entrance. There’s more things to see than Seungcheol’s brain can handle but he follows behind you, mind lingering on the scene outside.

“‘My husband’?” Seungcheol asks.

“What? We won’t see them again. Who cares?”

Probably your own fiancé but just as Seungcheol opens his mouth a priest silences him with a sharp, “SHH!”

Passing through a high stone archway, you enter the nave. The ceiling, cobalt and gold with motifs of biblical figures and cherubs, rises high above.

“Look!” you whisper. “Isn’t it cool?”

Your point at a marble Jesus wearing a bronze loin cloth.

Cool isn’t the word he’d choose but he goes with it.

“Michelangelo started it but two other people had to finish it for him.”

“Oh.”

“But people still call it Michelangelo’s statue because it’s more impressive. Besides, he did most of it before his apprentice took over.”

He observes the paintings and statues, the stone work that bulges from the walls like they’re trying to come alive and escape their immortal capture. There’s even a tomb and shrine with incredible detail.

It takes two hours to see everything and another thirty minutes to make your way out of the church because you both keep catching missed signs or there's some tiny piece of the ceiling with an odd detail.

He missed this.

Outside, you open your phone and look at the message from Sofie. She made the recommendation to come down here and gave an extensive list of everything else to be done in the area. There’s so many options it would take at least a week to see half of them.

“This hotel has a rooftop restaurant that’s supposed to have a good view of St. Peters,” you say.

The restaurant would have a great view of the city, if it wasn’t shut down for renovations. The staff don’t even let you near the elevator before you’re both swept outside and back on the street.

“Well…” Seungcheol starts.

“Should we call Berto?”

He doesn’t want to. Partially because Berto’s driving might kill him and also because he doesn’t want to end his time with you just yet. One of the things he missed about you living in the same city was weekends in museums for hours. Now that he has it again, he hesitates to cut the time short.

“Wait, I think we’re near one of the parks we visited when I came in college.”

“Oh my god,” you gasp sarcastically. “Did you study abroad? I never knew!”

“Shut up.”

Seungcheol pulls out his phone and dials Berto’s number. “Hey, Berto. No, we're good, everything is fine. But I was wondering how far away is Villa Borghese from us? Oh really? Would you be able to come drop us off? Awesome. Thanks man.”

“Well?”

“He’ll be here in five.”

Five minutes turns into fifteen and in that time Seungcheol burns out. Jetlag and the dull thrums of city streets make him sleepy. You sit in front of him on a bench outside the church. He thought he was better at hiding it but he’s pretty sure if he sits down, he’ll fall asleep.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” you ask once Berto arrives. “We can go back to the house if you want.”

There’s an unofficial official itinerary for today.

Anything before four is fair game. After that there is a welcome cocktail party at a fancy restaurant in the city one of the De Luca’s family friends own.

If Seungcheol doesn’t go home now then it’ll be a close call to nap and shower in time. Not that Sofie is exceptionally punctual about things like that but Seungcheol is.

“I don’t want you not to see stuff just because I’m tired.”

“Cheol, I’ve been here all week with Sofie and Han. I promise this was the only thing left on my list of stuff to do. Anything else would have been a bonus.”

“Only if you're sure.”

“We can always come back again. I’m pretty sure Sofie’s mom is decorating a room for me.”

Yeah, because most men are fine with their fiancée taking international trips with another man. Not that you’d listen or Johnny has the balls to say something about it. But Seungcheol knows the chances of coming back here together, like this, are slim to nonexistent.

“Alright. But you can’t bring it up in an argument.”

“I can and I will.” The corner of you mouth twitches as your head shakes before opening the back seat for him. “Now get in the car, old-timer.”

Seungcheol falls asleep on your shoulder in a blink. Berto is quiet (or the open windows drown him out enough that Seungcheol can pretend) and the heat of your body next to his lulls his heart. It’s not a peaceful rest and his neck is killing him by the time Berto pulls into the driveway, but it’s nice.

Seungcheol beelines for the bathroom while you slip into the kitchen. Something about centerpieces or napkins or tablecloths; he isn’t really sure but Sofie’s mom says it's urgent so he goes upstairs alone, showers in record time, and dives under the covers.

His dreams are filled with blue and gold elephants, He wakes to the sound of your voice blended with the sound of water.

You’re singing. More so humming some off key melody that bounces off the shower tiles and echoes straight into his brain. It drags him in that liminal space between waking and dreaming where anything is possible. Maybe he’s still dreaming. Of you and him, back when you shared an apartment and things weren’t so complicated. When there weren’t secrets and omissions and he didn’t have to bite his tongue.

His eyes stay closed, refusing to budge until the last minute.

The shower turns off but the humming continues, louder now that you’re out of the bathroom and collecting your things.

You must think Seungcheol is still asleep because when his eyes slit open, only enough to decipher your hazy silhouette, you’re in nothing but a towel. A very very tiny towel that hides nothing but the necessary bits and even then only barely.

He can’t wake up now. Not when you bend over to look in your suitcase for Seungcheol closed his eyes just in time. But it doesn’t stop his brain from latching on to every sound in the quiet of the room; the humming tickling across your lips, the wet thump! of your towel on the ground. Oh god, now you’re not even wearing a towel.

Seungcheol won’t be that friend. He never has. Or has always tried not to be. But teenage hormones make a young boy’s brain untamable so it’d be a lie to say he’s never thought of you like that. But despite his feelings, Seungcheol has made sure they never became a factor in your friendship.

Even though there is a peace of his soul that will always belong to you.

So he pretends to be asleep, forcibly controlling his breathing while you shuffle around the room none the wiser to his rising predicament.

Finally, you disappear back into the bathroom to change and Seungcheol’s lungs stretch with air until they burn.

You look pretty. Objectively. You glow in the late afternoon sun pouring in from the window, a ditsy floral print dress of orange and cream that hugging your figure; delicate collar bones on display under the flimsy straps and the column of your neck bare save for the necklace you’ve worn everyday since your parents bought it for your sixteenth birthday.

“C’mon sleepy head,” you whisper.

Seungcheol is thrilled his gawking is easily disguised as jetlag.

He changes in the bathroom. Taking a moment to grip the sink, his reflection stares back in the mirror. It’s the exhaustion and dehydration making his brain muddle. Nothing to do with you or him.

It’s fine. Everything is perfectly fine.

The downstairs foyer is in complete chaos but Sofie commands the room like she always does from the top of the stairway.

“Alright, ladies and gentlemen. Are you ready?” She yells like a WWE announcer.

Cheers rise up from the gaggle of adults. Cousins, friends, parents, aunts and uncles. Most of them Seungcheol has never seen before and is pretty sure neither have Jeonghan or Sofie but it’s fine. The more the merrier.

Except when different cars end up filled to the brim and you end up sitting on Seungcheol’s lap instead of a seat.

His heart leaps with every bump, yo

ur hair flying into his face and leaving the sweet smell of perfume to flood his senses. Seungcheol can’t even think about that because Sofie’s Zia Linda puts her husband's driving to shame.

At some point you nearly fly out the open window–Why does no one believe in keeping the windows up?– and Seungcheol is forced to wrap an arm around your waist to keep you from ending up a part of the cobblestone road.

“Sorry,” you say. The squeeze at his arm tells him your thankful at least something is stopping you from becoming roadkill.

“It’s fine.”

If you notice his strained breath, you don’t say anything.

The rooftop restaurant is gigantic but with everyone it feels small and crowded. Below, all of Rome spreads out. Lights twinkle in the distance and the moon is heavy overhead, ready for a night of revelry. It’s a welcome party so things are casual, finger foods and drinks flow heavily while everyone mingles.

Sofie and Jeonghan laugh at their own table, holding court with family and friends that flood in and out with congratulations. They’re good at it. Jeonghan ventures on the more introverted side but Sofie could have a meaningful conversation with a pile of rocks.

You're off at another table, talking with Soonyoung and Seungkwan, a second glass of wine in hand. Laughter rings out and he feels drawn to it like a siren call. It was foolish to worry that the scar from Johnny wouldn’t heal over eventually. All you two needed was time.

Seungcheol barely leaves your side during the party. You dance and drink and dance some more until you’re both left in a heap at the same table by the dance floor. Soonyoung and Seokmin provide ample distraction, taking to the floor to do…something Seungcheol hesitates to call dancing because it resembles a child's idea of a circus.

Dancing, food, and wine leave him feeling loose and sleepy. You’re not much better, head on his shoulder and hand tangled with his across your knees.

“Cheol?”

“Yeah?”

“I missed you.”

“I missed you, too.”

His shirt is unbuttoned, sleeves rolled high. In the back of the car on the ride home, you trace the muscle of his forearms draped over your waist until it lulls him to sleep.

Back at the house, you, Sofie, Jeonghan, and Seungcheol throw out sleepy goodnights and I love you’s before retreating to your separate corners of the house. Jeonghan is technically staying in a room in the same wing as you two (Sofie’s house is big enough to have an east and west wing which still shocks him). Something about family tradition and bad luck for the wedding but Jeonghan follows his fiancée like a shadow to her room at the opposite end of the house without theatrics.

And then there’s just you two.

You lean on each other the entire walk up, like you need the other support or you’ll crumble to the floor and sleep there. Honestly, it’s not a bad idea. Seungcheol has slept in worse places.

The stairs present their own challenges. You go first, Seungcheol right behind in case you fall backwards which has happened enough times that it’s become a habit to walk this way when alcohol is involved. But it doesn’t solve the issue of you tripping up.

Which you do with an effortless lack of grace on the last step.

“Oh, shit!” you giggle.

Seungcheol laughs so hard his knees buckle and he flops on the floor next to you like a dying fish.

“Shhh!” you slur, finger pressed to his lips. “People are sleeping.”

But you're cackling now and he can’t breathe from the painful quaking laughter rooting in his belly. He’s on his back, and you prop up on your arm to loom over him. Twin smiles breaking your faces, eyes watering with drunken mirth.

You go silent first, tracing his features silently like they must be committed to memory. Seungcheol does the same. You’re exactly the same as the day you left. Except for the vacation glow from being here for the past week. He recognizes all the parts of you he’s known for a lifetime. The silver scar on your chin from learning to ride a bike and crashing into a tree. The color of your eyes. The blush of your mouth.

The finger pressed to his lips traces along the plump flesh, then his chin, then it circles the back of his head and you’re ducking down.

Alarms go off in Seungcheol’s head screaming:

DANGER! DANGER! THIS IS NOT WHAT FRIENDS DO! DANGER!

“Wow, it’s late,” he laughs horsley as he rolls away and to his feet.

You jump away, dazed for a second before laughing as well. “Yeah, let’s um…let’s go to bed.”

He can’t quite read your expression. Several emotions swirl across your face but Seungcheol can barely look at you without feeling his face heat so he doesn’t linger.

Seungcheol takes the bathroom after you finish, rushing through his night time routine in sober silence.

You're drunk. That’s the only reason you’re trying to kiss him. Or he had something on his mouth and you can’t find the words to tell him. It was a mistake. A momentary lapse of judgment that didn’t mean anything.

It wasn’t even a fraction of an almost kiss. Your noses barely touched, it doesn’t count.

When he comes back into the room, you’re curled up on the bed in your pajamas asleep.

Seungcheol circles to the other side, slipping under the covers and getting comfortable. The room feels smaller after what just happened. But it wasn’t a big deal. Nothing happened. You both were drunk and missed each other. You never would have kissed him.

Despite the fact the first, and only, time you two kissed was in very similar circumstances.

Rolling over, you find him and cuddle into his chest. Seungcheol opens his arms for you on instinct.

“Did you have fun today?” you ask into his collarbone. The vibration of your voice tickles but it’s dulled from Seungcheol’s heart thudding wildly.

“Yeah.”

His hand smooths the back of your hair, down your back. You readjust, throwing a leg over his own and pulling him in tight.

“Good,” you say around a yawn. “Me too.”

Seungcheol tamps down the piece of him that wants to indulge in this. Just holding you, pretending things outside the door don’t exist and it’s just you and him and no one else.

But he can’t do that.

“You know,” he starts. “I’m happy for you no matter what, right? You and Johnny…I’m happy for you.”

Seungcheol waits for a response that will never come because you’re out cold, snoring against his chest.

You’re still asleep when Seungcheol wakes around noon. Sometime in the night you shifted to the far side of the bed, taking the blanket with you. He doesn’t try to wake you, still confused at exactly what happened last night.

Seungcheol isn’t naive. He knows what women look like when they want to be kissed, when they're thinking about how his mouth will feel against theirs. Usually he revels in it; loves the flare to his ego, the chance to tease before giving in.

But to see the expression on your face sent him into a panic. He’s seen it once before, indulged in it, and it ruined his life for the better part of college. Lips parted, eyes glassy as you stared. All the telltale signs were there: the lift of your chin, hands twisted in his shirt, eyes drooped low.

And the worst part was you did all that despite having a fiance waiting back home none the wiser. Even if Seungcheol couldn’t stand Johnny, he’d never do that. Never allow you to do that.

Even if he wanted nothing more than to feel your lips on his.

He heads as far away as he can. Turns out it’s down stairs for breakfast. Sofie is at the kitchen table, typing on her laptop.

“Morning,” Seungcheol croaks.

“You look like shit. Wild night?”

“Just some old timers thinking they’re twenty one again.”

“What assholes.” She laughs. “How's Y/N?”

Seungcheol freezes like a kid with his hand in the cookie jar. Sofie couldn’t know what almost but certainly didn’t happen in the hallway last night. “She’ll probably need an exorcism but she’ll survive.”

“By the way, I meant to give her this last night but everything was crazy. Can you pass it off? Jeonghan and I have to take my grandma to lunch and she’s already called twice sooooo…”

“Yeah, go. Have fun.”

Sofie is up and out before he can blink, a tiny piece of cardstock left in her place.

Kira Long

Artisan Jeweler

Her social media and number are at the bottom but Seungcheol doesn’t need more information.

He hides around the villa most of the day. Catching up with the guys around the pool, feigning fatigue when you come out to join. The gardens are big enough for him to disappear into for a few hours before he needs to go and get ready.

Unfortunately, that also means you are getting ready.

A leg.

That’s all Seungcheol sees when he opens the door.

Your leg specifically, propped on the dresser while you apply lotion in nothing but that damn skimpy towel designed to torture him.

“AH!” you shriek, shocked by his sudden entrance.

“I’m sorry!” he shouts.

The fabric unravels around your chest and suddenly you're naked and Seungcheol is not looking.

“What the fuck? Have you ever heard of knocking?”

He’s not.

“Why are you naked?”

The ceiling is very interesting.

“Because I wanted to scare you.” you scream sarcastically. The door to the hallway is still open. Seungcheol either stays in with you or goes back out because it can’t stay open much longer. He makes the fatal mistake of locking himself inside with you. “Because I thought you’d knock, you fucker! Jesus fucking Christ, turn around.”

Seungcheol saw you naked.

He hides in the bathroom like a wimp until it’s time to leave.

—

It’s a short walk to the church down the street for the rehearsal ceremony. It’s all a blur given the million and one things flying through his brain; most of them you. You in your towel. The fact you’re engaged. You looking at him like you’re dying to be kissed. The fact you’re engaged. How everyone has assumed you’re a couple this entire weekend and you’ve played along. The fact you are engaged to a man that isn’t him and Seungcheol can’t help but feel bitter about it for a completely different reason than he ever thought he would be.

Luckily, the ceremony is only planned to last less than an hour. He knows he isn’t subtle but he tries to grin and bear it for his friends. He can see the same sentiment in you. Your smile doesn’t quite fit but Seungcheol can’t think about what it could be about.

“Do you take this man…”

Was it his rejection? It wouldn’t make sense if it was. You’re his best friend but not even that dictates cheating. You weren’t the type; in your own words cheating was more pathetic than ghosting someone as a form of break up.

He doesn’t get it.

“I always love you even though you sleep like a princess, my love,” Sofie gushes.

“And I’ll forgive you for snoring like an old man, love of my life.” Jeonghan fires back.

They’re saving their real vows, the one Seungcheol helped Jeonghan with, for the ceremony. Even with all the confusion swirling in his head, he can’t wait for Sofie to hear what Jeonghan has in store.

The priest is less than impressed but moves forward like he can’t wait to have them out of his congregation as fast as possible.

“Okay, and you two leave and the wedding party follows…”

Seungcheol offers his arm to the Maid of Honor, Maria, guiding her back down the aisle where Jeonghan and Sofie bicker. You follow with Seokmin, break away the second it's polite with some excuse about needing the bathroom before you dissolve into the crowd.

The dinner is back at the house. The outside is lined with chairs crowded around tables covered in exploding bouquets and candles. Family members and friends weave to and fro, drinks and food flowing heavily.

You’re talking to Seokmin in the corner of the courtyard, a glass of wine already in your hand as you laugh along to whatever the other man said.

“So Sofie said you’re a lawyer?” Maria asks.

“Yeah, that’s how we became friends. I actually was the one who introduced her and Jeonghan.”

“Wow, so you’re a lawyer and a matchmaker.”

Seungcheol laughs at the compliment. Introducing Sofie and Jeonghan had been a complete accident with unintended consequences. “I wouldn’t say that. I thought Sofie would strangle him the first time they met.”

“Oh, I heard all about that. When Sofie told me they started dating I thought she must’ve meant a different Jeonghan.”

Maria makes good company through the first rounds of drinks before dinner is served. She takes his focus away from you, how your leg presses against his under the table. She grew up down the road, went to school with Sofie all the way through undergrad. Her boyfriend, Jihoon, is a surgeon back in Seattle while she works in marketing. Unfortunately getting time off for a second year resident verges on impossible so he couldn’t come to the wedding.

“You two are so cute together, how long have you been dating?” Maria asks before taking a swig of her drink.

“Oh we’re not together,” Seungcheol corrects swiftly.

You give a tense nod of agreement.

“Really?”

“Yep. We grew up together. She’s like my sister.”

He sounds like an asshole. The words are bile but there can be no room for incorrect interpretations. This weekend had been nothing but confusing so far. Seungcheol needs to set himself straight on where he stands with you.

“Oh,” Maria nods. “Okay. So Y/N, are you dating anyone?”

“Actually I—”

Your response fizzles out because Jeonghan’s dad rises from his seat for a speech.

“I want to take a moment to express my deepest appreciation to everyone here this weekend to celebrate Sofie and Jeonghan. I remember the first time he told us about her, how happy he was and thought ‘oh this poor girl doesn’t know what she’s gotten herself into’.” There’s a smatter of laughter throughout the room. Sofie leans into Jeonghan’s shoulder and he places a kiss on her temple. “But then I met Sofie and I can say, without a doubt, there are very few people more perfect for each other than those two. Sofie, welcome to our family.”

Dinner passes, course after course and more wine until Seungcheol physically can’t have any more. You and Maria hit it off, rambling about Jihoon’s two cats and the abandoned kitten that hangs out around his work he’s trying to bribe into coming home. You barely look at him during the conversation but he prefers it.

Dessert comes with coffee and then everyone dissolves. Some stay around the tables to chat and drink and laugh, others help clean up. But Seungcheol, Jeonghan, and the groom's party head for the back gardens, Seungkwan already queueing up the song for one last practice.

It’s tradition, in southern Italy at least, for the groom to serenade his bride-to-be the night before their wedding. Seungcheol couldn’t believe Jeonghan was planning to go through with such tradition but he’s seen the man do more for Sofie than he thought he was capable of so it shouldn’t come as a shock.

The warm summer air does good for his mood, as does laughing with the guys when Soonyoung and Seungkwan get into a wrestling match after debating if they step-shuffle for three or four counts. But they all agree with four because it’s easier to remember.

The top floor balcony at the front of the house turns out to be Sofie’s room. The light floods out of the open doors, and two sets of giggles pour down to where they stand.

Jeonghan cups his hands around his mouth and calls, “Juliet, Juliet! Let down your hair!”

“That’s not the saying.” Seungcheol corrects.

“Shut up, I’m talking to my wife.”

“That’s not the saying!” Sofie laughs from above.

You and Sofie peek over the side of the iron terrace, grins already splitting your faces. You knew what was happening. It’s why you whisked Sofie away with whatever distraction you could think of while the men gathered outside for a quick last minute dry run. Something about broken heels and needing to borrow a pair of shoes.

“Sofie Cosima De Luca, you are the love of my life.” Jeonghan yells. He’s drunk on love (and a lot of champagne). “I can’t wait to marry you tomorrow. I just hope after this you still want to marry me. Hit it!”

The obscenely large speaker Seungcheol carried out starts humming the instrumental to Sofie and Jeonghan’s song. The very one Jeonghan drunkenly serenaded her with in a dingy bar, back when she didn’t believe he could handle a serious relationship and he was hopelessly wrapped around her finger.

“I’ve got sunshineeeeeeee on a cloudy day…” Jeonghan croons.

“Oh my god,” Sofie cackles.

Everyone else joins in, harmonizing in the back along with the choreo Seungkwan and Soonyoung came up with. A simple side step with occasional jazz hands (much to Soonyoung’s tipsy dismay). “I guess you’d say what can make me feel this way?”

“MY GIRL,” Jeonghan belts his line, smiling dumbly.

You’re watching the shenanigans unfold, smiling as well. But while you're looking at everyone else, the only person Seungcheol can look at is you; the way your eyes gleam in the moonlight, your chin tipping back to laugh when Jeonghan’s voice cracks. You’re breathtaking. For a brief moment, barely a passing thought in the roaring river of his brain focused on his cue to sing and side step when needed, Seungcheol imagines what it would be like if you two were the only ones around.

Chalking it up to the moment, Seungcheol thinks about anything else as they finish the performance.

The music dwindles away and all that's left is Jeonghan staring up at his future wife as the rest of the group takes exaggerated bows. Other guest peek from windows or the edge of the drive way, cheering loudly.

“Bravi! Bravissimi!” Sofie cries as you both clap. “Can I make a request?”

Jeonghan nods like an eager puppy in response.

“Sing the Thong Song!” you both request through giggles.

“That's for after the wedding.” Jeonghan winks.

Time for Seungcheol to do his best man duties and prevent Jeonghan from making a complete ass of himself. "Alright Casanova, let’s go.”

“I’ll see you tomorrow!” Jeonghan calls over his shoulder, fighting against everyone ushering him away.

“Don’t be late!” Sofie demands.

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

After returning Jeonghan to his room for the night, Seungcheol heads back to his completely unprepared to see you again. Too many feelings swirl in his head. Feelings he thought he finally left back in college.

He remembers only a few key events of his early childhood. When he lost his first tooth, when he broke his arm for the first time, and his soccer game at four years old when Jeonghan and he rubbed dirt in each other's faces and rolled in the grass instead of playing. But other than that, his life has been distinctly divided into two parts: before you, and after you. He remembers when you marched into the first day of second grade with a sparkly blue bookbag much too big for your little body. You went to the front of the class, introduced yourself loud and proud, and then looked around the room like you were daring anyone to say something back.

And like any other childhood friendship is made, you sat at Seungcheol and Jeonghan’s table and asked if they wanted to be your friend. Without even considering the options, they both agreed. From then on out you’d always been Seungcheol, Jeonghan, and YN. Friends in elementary school, all through middle school, and even into the far reaches of highschool when Seungcheol played sports all year while you and Jeonghan did theater. It never occurred to any of you to be apart. Until Jeonghan stayed home to attend university in your hometown. And then it was Seungcheol and YN. Jeonghan came to visit when he could and vice versa. But at university it was you two against the world.

The first time Seungcheol realized he liked you was in third grade after you dumped chocolate milk on Jeonghan’s head because he put a bug in your lunchbox. He married you on the playground and made mud pies to celebrate. And then in high school when Seungcheol realized you weren’t just a girl but a pretty girl and the hormones of his teenage body latched onto that fact and plagued his dreams with the information.

And he never did anything about that crush because he knew it wasn’t worth losing you to act on those silly notions. They passed just like he thought, melted away as time went on and you both dated other people.

But that night freshman year of college…

It doesn’t matter.

Because you have a fiancé and Seungcheol is happy for you.

The sound of running water echoes from the bathroom as Seungcheol enters your shared room. At least it delays the inevitable awkwardness.

Or he thought it would.

“Hey, Cheol?” you call from the door.

“Yeah?”

“I forgot my clothes. Can you bring them to me?”

“Ugh, yeah.” Seungcheol scrambles for the pile of clean pajamas at the corner of the bed, snatching them up and stepping closer to the door that separates you. “Here.”

Mind caught on other things – like not remember that he caught a glimpse of you make last night, barely a second, no real detail except creamy skin and details his brained filled in on its own accord to his own chagrin – Seungcheol trips over his own feet and slams into the piece of wood head first.

The only thing stopping the door from flying straight into the wall is you.

“Shit!” you exclaim following a ricocheting ‘thump.’ “What the fuck, Cheol?”

Clutching his forehead, Seungcheol is oblivious to the tangle of limbs you’ve both collapsed into.

“Fuck, sorry.” He blinks against the stark brightness of the overhead light. You’re clutching at your face, hands cupped around your nose and eyes filled with tears. “Here let me see.”

Your eyes crack open enough to glare at him, narrow and rimmed red. As if he didn’t feel awful enough.

Without a second thought, he strokes across the curve of your knee soothingly. “I won’t touch it, I just wanna make sure it isn’t broken.”

A hand shakenly falls away to unveil your perfectly fine nose. Seungcheol tips your chin up, moving in for a closer look just in case. But everything is fine. You’re not even bleeding, just a runny nose that definitely hurts worse than it looks.

The initial rush of panic ebbs only to be replaced with awareness. Seungcheol is kneeling between your legs, your towel is definitely too short, and the beads of water caught on your collarbone are down right taunting him. He needs to get away.

Now.

“Oh my god,” he gasps, moving back.

Your face morphs into horror at his tone. “What?”

“You’ve got a huge bat in the cave.” Seungcheol rises to his feet, offering you a hand up while ignoring the way your chest struggles against the tie of the towel as you come to your feet as well.

“Fuck you,” you laugh, pushing him away. “Give me my clothes and get the fuck out.”

Seungcheol does just that. As the lock latches back he’s left alone with nothing but thoughts of you.

He remembers. That night you two have never spoken about. And probably would never discuss even under the threat of life and limb. A drunk kiss, in the stuffy bar that didn’t care if your IDs were fake as long as you had money.

Seungcheol remembers the way you felt in his lap, the taste of your mouth, the breathy whine against his lips when he first pulled away from the kiss. Maybe that last detail was a hallucination but it felt real. The heat of your body haunted Seungcheol for the week after it happened.

Not even Jeonghan knew about it.

And he’d rather die than open that can of worms. The first time Seungcheol had a crush on you in high school, he swallowed those feelings and never let them see the light of day. Because you’re his best friend, his longest friend, and if it was between the risk of losing you from his feelings (that he was certain would fade eventually despite the fact they never have) or keeping you in his life, then he’d stay silent if it killed him.

It’s your turn to disappear the next morning. You’re side of the bed is long cooled by the time Seungcheol’s alarm goes off, a piece of him gone with it.

His dreams hadn’t helped. A faceless woman, not even sounds or sights or tangible things he could identify. But he knows the feeling. That alluring warmth of a body firm against his own, the kind that leaves him aching when he wants up. Seungcheol knows it's you. It’s the same images that have plagued his subconscious since adolescence when he’d wake up to messy boxers and the inability to look you in the face for days after.

Feelings he’s long suppressed came out last night. Seeing you in the window, in the bathroom, it’s all too much. And now it chases him into sleep; the one place he thought he might have peace.

Luckily your absence means there's no awkward explanation of why he’s hard. The trip to the bathroom is more of dejected desperation than eager need. Seungcheol hops into the shower and takes care of it, careful to keep his thought as abstract as possible or risk you popping up in his fantasy. Dreaming about you is damning enough. He doesn’t need to add to the guilt weighing on his conscience.

The rhythm of the water lulls his brain into a cycle. He can’t do this. He can’t go another minute

He can’t even survive Jeonghan’s wedding. How he will sit through yours with a grin will be a true test of his acting ability.

But that is future Seungcheol’s problem. Right now he needs to get through today and then tomorrow and after that he’ll be on a plane back home where he can ruminate in the isolated confines of his apartment.

He just needs to focus on one thing at a time.

Right now, it’s getting downstairs in the next ten minutes or risk losing tee time with Jeonghan and the other groomsmen.

There’s only two people he’d ever turn to in a time like this, except he can’t talk to either of them because one is the problem and the other is getting married in a few hours. The last thing Jeonghan needs is to hear about an issue between his two best friends.

Which is why he’s the first to pick up Seungcheol’s mood.

“You look like shit,” Jeonghan greets.

The other mill about the kitchen, snagging leftover pastries and fruit. Usually Seungcheol is the first to show up, not the last. But Soonyoung still seems to be missing.

“Thanks.”

“Rough night?”

“Couldn’t sleep.”

“Well if you’re tired you can always join the girls at the spa.” Jeonghan offers. “Sofie said they’re doing mud baths.”

The wedding isn’t until this afternoon leaving the entire morning free. So the boys play golf while the girls go soak in mud.

“That sounds…horrible.”

“I know,” Jeonghan nods. “Alright gentlemen, let's head out.”

Seungcheol eats shit the entire morning. He usually scores around seventy five but he’s destined to break well over a hundred today and even Jeonghan pretends he doesn’t notice.

“Do you ever think about why nothing happened between you and Y/N?” Jeonghan asks right as Seungcheol prepares to swing.

Kicking a man when he’s down is more of a guideline for his best friend rather than something to avoid.

Seungcheol’s shot flies wide, straight into a fairway bunker a good thirty yards behind everyone else’s ball. He watches for another solid minute, deflating. “No.”

“If you’re gonna lie, at least make it believable.” Jeonghan chides, setting up his own tee.

“I’m not lying.”

“Humor me. It’s my wedding day and I’m trying not to freak out.”

“You’re freaked out?”

“Dude, of course I’m freaked out. We’ve never gone more than a few hours without talking since we started dating and I haven’t seen her since last night. So just let me focus on something else,” Jeonghan sighs.

Seungcheol thinks about his next words wisely. Jeonghan can smell bullshit a thousand miles away, and playing mind games right now feels a little unfair. “I don’t wonder why nothing happened anymore.”

“Lying again but whatever.” Jeonghan grabs for his drive and lines up the shot.

“Why are you asking?”

“I don’t know. Everyone thought you two would end up together eventually and then you didn’t. I’ve got a lot of people asking and I wanted an official response because you’re not exactly subtle and she isn’t stupid.”

Jeonghan’s shot lands square on the first cut, fifty yards ahead of Seungcheol’s ball.

“Yeah, well.” Seungcheol huffs. “If she noticed, she never said anything.”

“Okay but did you ever say anything?”

Jeonghan hands his club over to his catty before they start towards their respective zones. Seungcheol and his friend trailing behind.

Seungcheol argues. “You just said I wasn’t subtle?”

“You aren’t,” Jeonghan snorts. “But Y/N is about as impressionable as rock.”

“Did you think something was gonna happen?”

Seungcheol reaches his ball first. All the other guys are further ahead but Jeonghan sticks by.

“No.” Jeonghan says. “But I know you kissed her.”

Seungcheol turns to the other man, mouth gaped in shock. “How the fuck did you know that? Did she tell you?”

“I KNEW IT.” Jeonghan points at him like a little kid tattling on his friend. “ I fucking knew it! Sofie owes me fifty bucks.”

“What?”

“Y/N is a better liar than you, I’ll give her that but I knew something was off that first week I came to visit. I knew you didn’t have the balls to sleep with her so I must have been something else.”

Jeonghan asked you if you remember the kiss. Jeonghan and Sofie know you kissed. You remember the kiss. But you never said anything. If that doesn’t solidify Seungcheol firmly in the friendzone then nothing else would.

“You made a bet with your fiancée on whether your best friends kissed or not?” Seungcheol shakes his head in disbelief.

“You’ll understand when you have a successful relationship.” Jeonghan touts.

The catty hands over Seungcheol’s driver. He looks about Seungcheol’s age, maybe younger, and by the look on his face he’s trying very hard to pretend he isn’t listening to the unfolding drama.

Another person to witness how hopeless he is. Great.

“It doesn’t matter. It was a mistake.”

“You never know,” Jeonghan shrugs, following his catty further up the fairway and ending the conversation.

Back at the house, you’re nowhere to be seen while Seungcheol showers and changes. It’s for the best. No sleep, a horrible golf game, and now all the feelings that returned over the weekend have left him with nothing but a foul mood.

Every step is dragged out so he doesn’t have to pretend you two are fine. He can’t afford another blow out right now because today is meant to be for Jeonghan and Sofie. Even if Jeonghan thought he should talk about it, Seungcheol couldn’t do it anymore. He wouldn’t do it anymore. But the time it takes leaves his head spinning out of control.

You’re pretending nothing is wrong. Cuddling up to him, calling him your husband. You nearly kissed him. You would’ve if he didn’t stop you. You always said cheating was worse than heartbreak but now here you are, capitalizing on his feelings for whatever satisfaction you selfishly crave; using Seungcheol to hurt your fiancé in secret. Who you seem dedicated to pretending doesn’t exist.

It’s a nasty cycle. Feeling used, disbelief of who you’ve turned into in months away, that piece of him that always craved something more with you flowering only to wilt because it’s not real.

You don’t want Seungcheol.

You never have.

The wedding party gathers outside the church. Sofie is tucked away in a private room until her grand entrance. She wanted everyone to be surprised, leaving her bridesmaids to mingle with the groomsmen until it was time to for the ceremony to start.

The lavender bridesmaid dress is nothing special. A tie at the top keeps the entire thing up, the front void of any details. The open back adds a flash of skin but other than that there isn’t much to it. But you’re wearing it and Seungcheol can feel his heart jerk as the fabric flows around your curves. The universe is taunting him with what he’ll never have.

He doesn’t stare despite the fact that every time he blinks his gaze automatically searches for you. It’s hard to ignore the only person he sees in a crowded room. Even if he’s pissed at you.

You excuse yourself from Seokmin, creeping over to where Seungcheol stands with a grin. “You clean up nice.”

“Thanks,” he nods.

“Is something wrong?’

A shot of annoyance flashes through him. Now is not the place. Last time he felt like this, you two got in a screaming match on a snowy sidewalk. “No.”

You shake your head, hand coming to rest on his arm in an act of comfort. “Are you sure? Because you’ve been acting weird.”

Betrayed by his own body. Half of him wants to get on the next flight home and block your number so he can forget all of this. It wouldn’t work. The times tried anything remotely of the sort only leave him in circling thoughts day and night.

The other half of him wants to wrap you in his arms and take whatever you're willing to give him. The half that could act like Johnny didn’t exist, at least not in this little bubble where nothing else exists but you and him. Because he's selfish and he’s been in love with you for years and he would never expect something in return for his feelings but he can’t take it any more.

But he can’t pretend anymore.

Pretending he’s never been jealous of your boyfriends, and that the night in college when you kissed meant nothing. That it didn’t flood his brain everytime he looked at you; that it didn’t leave more questions than answers. He’s been pretending everything has been fine, that seeing you asleep on his chest doesn’t make his heart hurt, and that he was stronger than the temptation to kiss you last night.

He remembers that night with clarity despite how drunk he was. Thought it meant you felt the same way he had for years.

“Cheers to finally being adults!” you scream, tequila shot raised over head.

Seungcheol laughs. Nothing is that funny but he’s nineteen and drunk in a dingy college bar with his best friend . “Adults!”

Someone passes by and knocks you forward, straight into Seungcheol's chest where you keep laughing as you look up at him.

You’re close. Closer than ever before. He could count all your eyelashes if there weren’t four of you floating in his vision. But Seungcheol doesn’t need to see clearly. Not when you’re already kissing him.

He’s kissing you.

It’s sloppy and drunk but his brain doesn’t think in big picture. It’s all feeling. Your hand in his shirt, a sweet sigh against his chin when you break away for a second just to come right back. Your mouth tastes like alcohol and lime and he’s never had anything better sweep across his tongue.

Thank god for the booth because you’re in his lap now, grinding against the seam of his jeans until he’s hard and when you finally realize you say his name.

And then Seungcheol pulls away, turns his head, and vomits before blacking out.

He hates that he thinks about it. He thinks about it all the time. What if? But there’s no more what ifs. There's only right now. Just you and him and the widening space in between that's become unnavigable.

“I’m acting weird? I’m not the one rubbing herself all over me, calling me her husband to strangers, and trying to kiss me.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“I can’t believe you would do something like this. Why would you put me in this position? Do you think it’s funny?”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“I’m happy for you, really. I just think it’s best if we don’t talk for a while. I think you need to sort things out with your fiance.”

Now that seems to get your attention. “Seungcheol, what—”

The music swells from the organ inside, cueing the ceremony and effectively silencing your questions.

Good. It’s better that way. Seungcheol is weak for you in all the ways that matter and he knows if he had to stand there for another minute then your hurt expression is all it would take for him to fold and pretend he never said anything.

You join the other bridesmaids and Seungcheol ducks inside the church after the wedding planner opens the doors. One by one the other groomsmen walk in: Joshua, Seungkwan, Soonyoung, and finally Seokmin. Each line up further down Jeonghan’s side. Then the bridesmaids follow.

Sofie’s cousin, who Seungcheol met once, glides down the aisle followed by another taller cousin who looks nearly identical. Then it’s Sofie’s roommate from college, Mona who Josh had been trying to get with all weekend.

You walk up the aisle, a smile plastered on your face but it doesn’t reach your eyes. You won’t look in his direction.

Everything is slipping through his fingers and you both have to pretend they aren’t.

Everyone turns to watch Maria, and then Sofie. But the only person Seungcheol is paying attention to is you.

The ceremony flies by. Sofie cries, Jeonghan cries.

Sofie cries even harder when Jeonghan recites his vows in Italian. It’s odd, watching his two friends who usually are the couple laughing in the corner, be so vulnerable. Declaring their love for each other in front of a few hundred people.

“Sofie, sin dal primo momento in cui ti ho incontrata, sapevo che ti avrei voluta nella mia vita per sempre. Che tu mi amassi o odiassi, per me andava bene, perché significava che avresti pensato a me tanto quanto io pensavo a te. Mi hai dato il privilegio di chiamarti mia, e non posso aspettare di farlo per il resto delle nostre vite.”

Six months of using Seungcheol as practice, along with Sofie’s cousin, and he sounds decent. Jeonghan wouldn’t win any awards for his language skills but everyone’s faces melt around the room. Even the people that don’t know a word of what he’s say can feel the earnest dedication he has to Sofie. Even Seungcheol gets misty eyed.

“Io, Jeonghan, prendo te, Sofie, come mia sposa e prometto di esserti fedele sempre, nella gioia e nel dolore, nella salute e nella malattia, e di amarti e onorarti tutti i giorni della mia vita.”

“I, Sofie, take you, Jeonghan, as my husband and promise to be faithful to you always, in joy and in pain, in health and in sickness, and to love you and every day honor you, for the rest of my life.”

Then they kiss and Sofie screams something along the lines of “we’re married, bitches!” much to the priest demise before exiting the church.

From there it’s chaos.

The entire wedding party is corralled for endless pictures while everyone else heads back to the villa for the reception. You don’t look at him and Seungcheol refuses to acknowledge you until your parents are forcing you two together for awkward pictures like its high school prom.

By the time it’s over and he gets to the reception, the party is in full swing and the sun is setting.

Dinner is a blur. He makes his toast, short and sweet like Jeonghan told him to. The night progresses and people flood the cleared area serving as a makeshift dance floor in the center of the courtyard.

Seungcheol sips his wine. Three glasses in an hour because he isn’t sure what to do with his hands when his obligatory dance with Maria is over and he’s avoided being dragged on the floor by one of Sofie’s more zealous aunts because she herself demands a dance.

“How does it feel to be Mrs. Yoon?”

Sofie turns to watch Jeonghan twirls her great grandmother. Or more like Nonna Cosima leads him. She’s surprisingly spry for someone pushing triple digits. “I think he’s gonna be a great first husband.”

His gaze settles on you, Seokmin leading you across the floor in a ridiculous fashion. The younger man is trying hard to make you laugh and it seems to be working.

“She thinks you’re mad at her,” Sofie says.

“Maybe I am.”

“Care to share with the class?” She prods but Seungcheol doesn’t break, using the ending of the song to find a table at the edge of the makeshift dance floor. “Fine, but I feel like if you’re gonna pout at my wedding I should at least know why. Especially because I owe Han fifty bucks because you can’t lie to save your life.”

Seungcheol is mad. But mostly at himself. For tricking himself into thinking maybe, just maybe, there could be something more. That in all the improbable universes you returned his feelings, this would be one.

And he did all that knowing you’re dedicated to someone else who is so entirely wrong for you.

“What did she tell you?” Seungcheol asks.

“That’s not how this works. No pay, no play.”

He studies Sofie for a minute. She’s good at keeping her cards close but she knows about you and Johnny. It wouldn’t be a far leep to assume she knows about everything else.

“God, you sound like Jeonghan.”

“Have you and Y/N talked? Like, really talked, since you got here?” There's a weight at the end of that sentence but Sofie doesn’t elaborate.

“Care to be more specific?” he asks, grabbing for another glass.

“I’ll take that as a no then.” Sofie takes the seat beside him.

His chest tightens. This is it.

“About her and Johnny?”

“So she did say something…” Sofie fishes.

“No she didn’t. But I heard you guys in the kitchen the night I got in.”

“You did?” she gasps. “And you didn’t say anything to her about it?”

His jaw ticks in annoyance. “What’s there to say? ‘Congrats on your engagement, you’re too good for him’? I don’t think that's what she’d wa—”

“Wait, wait, wait.” Sofie throws her hands up, eyebrows furrowed in confusion. All around the party continues. “You think Y/N is engaged? To who?”

“Johnny! Who else?”

Her drink sloshes over the sides of her wine glass, narrowly missing the white gown and falling to the cobblestone. “Oh my god, you’re an idiot!”

“Excuse me?”

“She’s not engaged, you dipshit,” she goes on. “Oh my god, you’re both so stupid. I told Han, I told him we should’ve said something.”

“What?” he says quietly.

Sofie continues as if Seungcheol hasn’t spoken at all, “I can’t believe she hasn’t told you.”

“Told me what?”

“She broke up with him!”

She broke up with him. She (you) broke up with him (Johnny). You and Johnny are done. It’s like he’s hearing the news from underwater.

“She broke up with him.” He repeats dumbly.

Someone cheers and then applause follows but Seungcheol is lost in his mind. You and Johnny aren’t engaged. You two aren’t even dating. Haven’t been.

“When?”

Sofie’s face softens. She knows. The first time he introduced you to Sofie she assumed you two were dating. She didn’t like Johnny for a lot of the same reasons Seungcheol did, but also because she thought you two were meant to be together. “A week after she moved.”

That phone call the week after you moved. It must’ve been something to do with you and Johnny. But why didn’t you answer messages the next morning? Why would you break up with Johnny and then refuse to tell him? Why would you let Seungcheol think he was being used as the other man?

“So this entire week…”

“She was supposed to tell you. I told her to tell you months ago but does she listen to me? Nope.”

“Do you know why?”

“Now that is something she needs to tell you.” Seungcheol looks where you're dancing with Seokmin. Your smile doesn’t reach your eyes but you laugh when the man dips you almost to the floor and struggles to lift you back up. “But first you need to apologize.”

“Is it that bad?”

“When I imagined someone crying at my wedding it wasn’t because of you.”

Seungcheol winces, “She cried?”

“Yep. You owe me a nice ass wedding gift for that one.”

“Sofie, I’m sorry I—” he tries to apologize.

“Cheol, don’t worry about it.” She pats his arm. “It was actually a nice distraction from the insanity this week.”

“Easy for you to say.”

“It really is.” Sofie rises from the table, snagging a glass of champagne from a passing tray. “Now if you’ll excuse me, my husband owes me a dance. And Cheol?”

“Yeah?”

“You should tell her how you feel.”

Seungcheol takes his chance at Sofie’s departure. With the change in music Seokmin bows out and you're left on the dance floor alone. Cast in the soft glow of garden lights and candles, you’re tragically beautiful. Soft around the edges in a dreamy haze. Seungcheol feels like he’s intruding by approaching you but he needs to apologize before you both return to your separate corners of the country tomorrow night.

“Hey,” he greets.

You look at him apprehensively, eyes dark, before speaking. “Hi.”

You’re just as petty as Seungcheol so he knows if you’re speaking to him then there's some kind of hope he hasn’t completely ruined your friendship. But it could also mean you’re about to rip him a new one in front of everyone for not the first time in his life.

Hopefully, it’s the former.

“Mind a walk?”

“We’re at a wedding.”

Jeonghan and Sofie curl tightly around each other at the center of the courtyard. It’s clear from the way both their faces soften, lax grins reaching their ears, that the world has stopped spinning just for them.

“I’m pretty sure we could light them on fire right now and they wouldn’t notice. Besides, Sofie gave me her blessing,” he jokes but you don’t laugh.

“Fine,” you say before stalking towards one of the paths leading to more secluded parts of the house.

People drape across different parts of the villa as you two walk in silence to find some privacy. The gardens are full of chatting elders, kids running around in the dark or falling asleep in some adults' holds. After ten minutes with no luck at seclusion, Seungcheol has half a mind to go back to your room and talk it out but he doesn’t. The idea itself freezes his blood.

It’s not until you're deeper into the maze of shrubs and bushes that the voices and music fade. The silence is so tense he might shatter under the pressure.

You whip around to face him, still five paces ahead.

“What did you want to talk about?” you deadpan.

Seungcheol thought through every thing he wanted to say, all the questions and whys and what ifs he’d collected during this trip but they abandoned him now that they have the chance to be answered. Instead, all that comes out of him is a shaky, “I’m sorry.”

You wait for him to elaborate but he doesn’t. He’s apologizing for more than he could put in words and he’d list them off until the sun comes up if he starts now.

“Okay. Is that all?” you ask.

“Sofie told me about Johnny.”

You blanche. “She did?”

“Yeah, she did.”

“What did she tell you?” your arms draw tightly around your center. Like you’re holding your heart from spilling out your chest.

Seungcheol regurgitates the limited facts Sofie shared, which is that Johnny hasn’t been in the picture for months and you never deemed him worthy of that information.

“Why didn’t you just tell me?”

“I tried. But you didn’t answer your phone and I felt so stupid afterwards and… I just couldn’t do it.”

It hits a nerve deep in his heart. How could it have been easier to spend months pretending he didn’t exist then tell him your relationship ended? More anger slips through. The nasty kind that makes him say things he doesn’t mean but Seungcheol tries to reign it in.

“So you just ignored me and thought that’d solve all our problems?”

“No!’

“Then why didn’t you say something?”

“Because I moved cities for a guy I didn’t even like that much! I changed my entire life for him just to prove a point. Because you were right about him and I was wrong and only took a fucking week to realize that after I screwed everything up. I should have listened to you but—”

“So you lied to me because you didn't want me to say ‘I told you so’?” Seungcheol fumes. “Are you serious?”

“I didn’t lie to you!” you object.

“Yes you did! You stopped talking to me for months! Months. I can’t even remember we went a week without talking but you dropped off the face of the planet,” he rants. “I thought you were happy in New York with Johnny but apparently I’m the last to know anything. If you had just told me I wouldn’t have said anything. I would have gone up there and moved you back home myself.”

“I don’t want you to fix my mistakes!”

“Then what do you want? Because from where I’m standing I have no idea. All week you’ve been acting weird and because you didn’t tell me I thought you were using me to cheat on your boyfriend. How do you think that makes me feel?”

“I didn’t mean to. Things just kept happening and I got swept up before I could tell you.”

Seungcheol was nothing more than a meaningless distraction, a rebound.

“So it didn’t mean anything to you?” he asks.

“No!” you cry. “I was just distracted.”

“Distracted? Are you serious?”

“You know what? Forget it. You don’t want to listen to me, you just want to be mad and yell.”

You’re right. Seungcheol does want to be mad and yell and pull his own hair out because what you’re saying isn’t helping untangle the knotted mess of his brain. It’s making it worse. Your confessions are watering that seed of hope in his chest despite the fact he knows nothing will ever happen. Even with Johnny out of the picture.

“Why did you break up with Johnny?”

“I—” Your eyes close. Pulled tight like you’re finding the courage to tell Seungcheol some dark secret. “He…” you swallow. “I broke up with him because…”

Seungcheol tenses, prepared for the absolute worst. You moved your entire life for the guy and broke up with him a handful of days later. There had to be a reason. “Because why? Did he do something?”

“No!” you correct. “I wish he did, I probably wouldn’t have felt like such a bitch but he didn’t do anything at all. I just realized we didn’t work.”

“You didn’t ‘work’?”

I told you so, indeed.

“Yeah. It’s kinda difficult to be with someone when you're in love with someone else,” you reply.

Suddenly, Seungcheol wishes he never brought it up. Another guy. One that isn’t him. Again. He’s the other man. Those gut feelings, the nagging voice at the back of his head that reminded him time and time again you couldn’t feel the same has its own ‘I told you so’ moment.

But that’s not what makes him feel horrible. He’d suffer from overthinking as long as needed just so you wouldn’t look so ashamed.

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

Seugncheol waits for you to elaborate. More silence except for the crunch of your shoes across the stone walkway. A bench comes into view and you slip into one of the spots before speaking again.

“I…I always wondered why those dates never worked out. Like, I would like someone but then they didn’t want the same things or they’d want the same things but I didn’t want them. And I guess Johnny was my last ditch effort because maybe if I knew from the beginning things weren’t gonna work out then I’d never be disappointed.”

Seungcheol isn’t sure what to say so he stays quiet.

“And I thought I could just live with it. Knowing I didn’t have what Jeonghan and Sofie have. Like who actually gets that in their life? But…”

“But?”

“But then I realized that there was only one guy my whole life that’s actually been everything I wanted and I was comparing everyone to him.”

“Who?”

“You.”

Him. You’ve compared every guy you’ve dated to him. He’s the person you want, the man you’ve measured everyone up to and found them wanting.

You’re in love with Seungcheol. You broke up with your boyfriend for Seungcheol.

You love him back.

“It’s fine, if you don’t feel that way about me. I’m okay with it. I wasn’t planning to tell you because I expected anything. I just… part of the reason I didn’t say anything is I know you don’t think about me like that but this week I thought— I don’t know what I thought. But I didn’t want to lie to you anymore.”

“You…what?”

“Let’s just agree to pretend this never happened, okay? We should get back to the party.” You move to rush past him but Seungcheol hooks an arm around your torso, light enough you could break through if you really wanted to but you stop all the same.

There is no way in hell you drop that bomb on him and leave him to deal with the aftermath alone.

His voice is unrecognizable to his own ears. “You broke up with Johnny because of me?”

“Yeah,” you swallow. You refuse to look at him, focusing on the neatly clipped grass your heels sink into.

“Because you’re in love with me.”

You flounder. It isn’t a question. It’s a fact.

“How long?” Seungcheol presses.

“What?”

“How long have you been in love with me?”

“It's always been you.”

Seungcheol’s heart detonates into a million pieces.

“You?” His pulse is sprinting. You’re in love with him. Have been. Maybe as long as he’s been in love with. Impossible for it to be longer because there's no moment in time when Seungcheol didn’t carry his feelings for you like an old friend. “You didn’t say anything.”

Your eyes are wet again, more tears he wants to brush away but he can’t do anything but stare. “I didn’t want to ruin our friendship.”

“You wouldn’t have,” he whispers back.

“What's supposed to mean?”

Your nose brushes along his, eyes soft as you glance at his mouth.

Seungcheol won’t let himself kiss you yet. He can’t. The first time he feels your lips on his in years has to be in private because he shakes at the idea of it, a part of him chips away from just imagining even the most chaste brush. But mostly because he’s terrified that once he starts, he knows he won’t be able to stop.

“Do you remember that night in college?” he asks. You’re stunned speechless by the abrupt shift in topic but the words fall out of his mouth before he can think of a better way to say what needs to be said. He continues, “when we did a million shots and you kissed me?”

You snap back, slapping a hand on his chest and nearly teetering to the ground. “You bitch! You kissed me!”

“So you do remember!”

“Of course I remember,” you declare. “I thought you didn’t remember.”

You remember. You remember how his mouth tasted, how you ground into his lap, the feeling of his hands on your ass. All of it sticks with you like it stuck to him.

“Trust me, I remember.”

“Well, why didn’t you say anything?” you huff.

“I was going to but you told me you started dating whatever-his-name before I could.”

“Because I thought you didn’t like me back!”

“I’ve liked you since the first day I met you.”

“Really?”

“Yep.”

“You should’ve said something.” The admonishment means nothing. Not with the way you smile at him. It makes his heart soar, hope bursting at the seams.

“I didn’t even know you realized I was a dude until college, why would I say something?”

“Trust me, I knew you were a guy way before college.”

“And we’re back to the original question: why didn’t you say anything?”

It's ridiculous. Utterly comical and unimportant of who said what when because they’re being said now and Seungcheol never has to pretend he isn’t hopelessly in love with you ever again.

You cozy up into his chest, fingers tracing the collar of his shirt. “Wow, barely five minutes we’re already fighting.”

“We’re not fighting.” His lips burn the word into your hairline, arms wrapping around your frame so his fingers can finally, finally, trace the bared skin of your back.

“Oh really?” You laugh. “Then what are we doing, oh wise one?”

“We’re having a spirited conversation over the fact you kissed me and never said anything.”

“And now we’re fighting over whether or not we’re fighting.”

“We’re not fighting.”

“You’re exhausting.” Your eyes roll. He can’t see it, not with how you duck into his neck, but he knows you did it. Because Seungcheol knows you better than anyone else.

“Wouldn’t have it any other way.”

“And you kissed me.”

“Well then there's only one way to settle this.”

“Which is?”

Seungcheol doesn’t answer. If Jeonghan could be lit on fire and not think of anyone but his wife, then the world could fall to dust and the only thing on Seungcheol’s mind is the way your mouth feels against his.

It’s light at first. Airy because you’re both still laughing over arguing if you’re fighting or not. But then Seungcheol loses his balance and you help by curling a hand around his shoulder but refuse to stop kissing him and the world blinks out of existence for a second.

All the cliches start making sense. Two halves of a whole, puzzle pieces slipping together, all the things poets could say in a million more eloquent ways than him.

But Seungcheol feels at home for the first time in his life.

It’s not easy maneuvering a full grown woman up and into his lap. It’s especially not easy because you’re you and you’re more stubborn than anyone he’s met in his life which means you object to every step, huff and puff at a brief second of broken contact, but the second he spins you around and drags over his lap you melt.

Your tongue glides along his, sending a tsunami of want through his bones. You whimper. Or maybe he does. Seungcheol can’t tell what's up and what's down right now. He finds the open back of your dress and relishes in the arch of your spine, the choppy breath he can feel beneath his palms.

The silk bow holding your dress up teases his hand as Seungcheol traces the notches of your spine. No one would see. No one except him and the moon and the stars who’ve all stopped to watch. He wants to. God, he wants to but he doesn’t.

You tug at his hair and your name floods his tongue like a curse.

Draped across his lap in nothing but thin satin, you can feel all of him. How his cock hardens against the back of your thighs, shaky breathes in his lungs wrecking into your own chest. You're not wearing a bra. None of that tape or the sticky thing you’d leave hanging in the bathroom when you lived together. Seungcheol knows because he thumbs over the soft swell of your chest and you respond with a rock of hips that leaves his mouth watering.

The last time he kissed you, that fateful night freshman year of college, Seungcheol thought about it every night for months. He thought about it in the shower, in his bed. His mind would wander towards the memory during class and when he walked around campus.

Now he’ll think about this for the rest of his life.

A shrieking laugh almost sends you to the ground in haste to break away, but Seungcheol catches you in time.

“Um…” you choke. Your lips are swollen, eyes a little dazed.

“We should go back inside.”

“Yeah.”

“Just, give me a minute.”

“Why?” Your smile grows steadily as you press more firmly into his predicament.

“I have an issue right now.”

“What kind of issue, Cheolie?” you stare at him through your lashes, finger tracing down the front of his shirt until you reach the button of his pants.

“Oh God,” he grunts as the heel of your hand rocks into him. “You’re actually evil.”

Your lips trace over his jaw, sucking and nipping at the lobe of his ear until he shudders. “Don’t you want me?”

“I do,” he breaths. “Shit.”

His hand squeezes across your ass, your breasts, mindful of how much freedom you’re giving him. To feel you like this, to touch you the way he’s wanted to for years.

“Then have me,” you moan.

“Don’t say stuff like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like you want me to fuck you right here.”

“But I do want you to fuck me.” Your hand is in his pants. “Right.” A tight squeeze on his cock. “Here.” He ruts into the next one.

His insides spark with a hot kind of electricity at the idea of you jerking him off where anyone could see. But he wants to touch you. And that he doesn’t want anyone else to even imagine. He’s shared you enough with the world.

Seungcheol wants a piece of you that's just for him right now.

“Fuck, okay. Stop.”

“What’s wrong?”

“We’re going back inside.”

“Oh?”

Seungcheol doesn’t give into your obvious goading. It’ll just waste more time. Give you another chance to wring him out to dry and he knows if you get his pants down far enough it’s game over for the both of you.

He rushes you through the garden, all but dragging you behind him in his haste to get you somewhere secluded. He’d settle for a broom closet at this point. Anywhere he can have you alone.

But you won’t go down without a fight.

You slow to a near stop, whining, “My feet hurt.”

Seungcheol leads you back over another stone bench, immediately kneeling and grabbing your ankle. The pebbles of the path dig into his knee but the slit of silk revealing your bare legs is a good distraction.

“Alright, Cinderella. Let’s get these off,” he jokes. The buckle is delicate and keeps slipping from between his fingers no thanks to your help.

“I can do it myself!”

You try to kick him off but Seungcheol catches your calf easily. Instead of focusing on the teasing stretch of skin, he watches the way your nose wrinkles indignantly after thwarting your attempt to catch him off guard. You’re cute. Probably because he’s in love with you and the rush from knowing you love him back has him feeling a million miles tall.

“Cheol?”

“Yeah?”

Pulling your foot into his lap, Seungcheol brushed his fingers against the knob of your ankle. The tiny buckle that refuses to come undone. Your shaking doesn’t help much.

“Cold?” he asks.

You nod furiously. Warmth hangs in the air but Seungcheol won’t assume your comfort; the silk you're wrapped in doesn’t provide much coverage against the elements. It doesn’t provide him any protection from a wild imagination fueled from years of pining. Without a thought, he shakes off his jacket and hands it to you before moving back to your shoe.

Looming over him, Seungcheol feels your breath hit his forehead. He wants to look up but you’re too close. Too tempting.

He finally undoes one shoe, then the other. But you don’t say anything and neither does he from his spot between your legs. It’d be easy. So easy to bunch your skirt around your waist, part your legs, and make you cum on his finger. Then his mouth. Then his cock.

You’re thinking the same thing. A hiccup of breath rustling the hair on his forehead, your hands stroking the muscles of his neck give you away.

But when he starts, he knows he won’t be able to start. He’ll want nothing less than all of you. Give all of himself to you. If you’ll have him.

But a hard stone bench isn’t the place to worship your body the way you deserve. He’d be a gentleman. Even if it killed him to wait any longer. You were worth waiting for. Seungcheol would wait a million more lifetimes if he got to feel like this again.

No shoes means he’s carrying you the rest of the way. He’s done it before and you’re not that heavy but he’s been drinking. And then there's the matter of all the blood in his body heading south, so he struggles more than usual.

“You’re sure you’ve got it?” you cling on for dear life when he nearly stumbles under the first step.

“Sorry, I haven’t been carrying a lot of full grown women around lately.”

“I thought you were looking a little small,” you goad.

“Small?” he objects.

“Yeah, small.” You squeeze over his biceps and his chest like you two aren’t sneaking around a packed mansion where anyone could stumble by. His resolve slips further out of reach at the dig of your nails. “Been skipping the gym lately?”

He feigns dropping you, laughing when you scramble for hold under threat of falling flat on your ass.

“Asshole!” you laugh.

Things fizzle back to comfortable silence. Your companions are far off laughs and the loud music from the courtyard. The garden is all but abandoned, not a single soul in sight. It makes it all too tempting to find another bench and take up what was interrupted earlier. The heat of your breath against his ear with each giggled whisper didn’t help. Neither did the warm weight of your thighs in his hold or the firm press of your chest against his back.

It’s a mistake to look over his shoulder. Your eyes shine in the moonlight as you stare back, a smile lifting the corner of your lips.

Seungcheol focuses back on the hallway, double checking for any passersby. There’s nothing indecent about a man giving a woman a tipsy piggy back ride.

But there is something entirely inappropriate about how hard he is while doing so.

And Seungcheol knows you know. Or if you don’t then the universe has a personal investment in his suffering. Every step is more difficult than the last because your thighs squeeze around his torso, and your hands find their way down his chest, and then there’s the giggling every time he back tracks because a drunken guest stumbles by on the way to their own room.

You’re sneaking around like two idiot teenagers and it might kill him from lack of blood to his brain.

But Seungcheol wouldn’t have it any other way.

He pauses at the last staircase to catch his breath. There’s no reason you’re still on his back other than the fact he doesn’t want to let you go and the position is the only reason he hasn’t found a dark corner to do whatever you please yet.

“Awww poor Seungcheol, tired already,” you coo.

Your teasing tone makes his blood boil, worse how you readjust your hold with more squeeze and stretching that leaves him with nothing but horribly inappropriate thoughts of what you’ll do after he gets up the stairs.

Finally, the hallway housing your room appears and he can’t get through the door fast enough.

You're pressed flat between the door and his body in a blink, fully at Seungcheol’s mercy as he kisses you again.

“Wait,” you mutter.

Seungcheol sucks along your bottom lip. You pull him closer, arching into his chest. Your stomach is soft against the gentle grinds of his cock. He doesn’t want to wait anymore.

“We—hmmm,” you sigh. “Need to talk about this.”

Seungcheol pulls away from your mouth, trailing scorching kisses down your neck that leave you shivering. “What about it? I love you, you love me. Feels like that's all there is to it.”

The second he says it, Seungcheol knows he’s wrong. But he doesn’t want to think about the fine details. He’s never done long distance but you’re only a train ride away.

“Cheol.” You prod a finger into his collarbone until he dips back.

“I mean it’ll suck being in different cities but it’s not forever right? We’ll figure it out.”

You dip your chin. “I’m not staying in New York.”

“Oh. That’s—” he cups your cheek, pulling your gaze to his. “I’ll go wherever you need me.”

You smile up at him and everything goes blank. In that moment, he vows to do anything you ever ask if it means you’ll keep looking at him like that.

“I’m moving back to D.C.” You kiss the words into his palm, eyes never leaving his.

“Really?”

“Yeah.” You smile. “Sofie’s friend needed a roommate and my job agreed to let me go remote so…”

“When do you move back?”

“Two months. They want to wait until the busy season is over.”

“But then you’re back. For good?”

“For good.”

It feels like you're promising a whole lot more..

You have Seungcheol for good too. As long as you want him, he’s yours. Probably for long after too.

He’s so happy, it burns across his skin. It can’t be contained. This is all real. He fights the urge to pinch himself because not even in the wildest of his dreams did he think this was possible.

"When you come back home.” Home he thinks. Home with him. Where you belong. “We're going on a date. And you're going to let me pay, and woo you, and take care of you because I love you. Okay?”

Your hands twine around his shoulders before you respond with a nod, “Okay.”

In the privacy of your room, you’re the one that tugs the knot holding your dress up. The silk slips down your chest revealing inch after inch of what he’s only dreamed off. When it pools around your waist, Seungcheol almost falls to his knees.

You shiver in the cool bedroom air. His eyes drink in the way your nipples peek under his gaze. Every inhale shakes in your lungs and he thinks this might just be enough for him to die peacefully. The silk trickles like water down your figure until you're left standing in nothing but skimpy panties.

“Fuck,” he curses.

Your hands flash to cover your chest, “What?”

“No, don’t,” Seungcheol reassures. His hands find yours, tracing along your thumb. “You’re just…”

“Just?” you ask.

“Wow.”

“I’m wow?” you laugh.

Seungcheol takes another step into your space. And then another and another, your dress crumbling to the floor and leaving behind nothing but the thin band of your underwear for him to remove. Your knees hit the mattress and he follows you down into the cushion.

You're soft and warm like afternoon sunlight on a winter day under his wandering hands.

“You’re wow,” he responds, angling your chin so your mouth can meet his, noses grazing against one another.

You don’t have the patience to hear Seungcheol ramble about how perfect you are. Instead, you drag him into a desperate kiss, tongue teasing his. He’ll wax poetically later. Right now he wants to give you whatever you demand.

More kissing, the prickle of your teeth along his lip, and Seungcheol is pretty sure he’s never been harder in his life. It’s humbling and exhilarating all at once. Ready to crumble into nothing from some light petting.

He takes his revenge on the curve of your shoulder and it turns out to be extra sensitive. Every nip and suck along your collarbone leaves you panting, hands scratching up his back for some relief. He wonders what else is sensitive.

He laves against your nipple in maddening slowness. You torture him as well, ankles locking at the base of his spine while you grind against him and make more noises he’ll commit to memory forever.

“God,” you whine when Seungcheol finally breaks and rocks down into the tempting heat of your core.

He needs more.

“Do you think about this?” he grunts with another torturous press. He could come like this. You could come from this. Two adults, reduced to dry humping like horny teenagers.

“I think about you all the time,” you gasp.

“What do you think about?”

“You.”

Seungcheol snickers, “More specific.”

“Touching me, kissing me. Anywhere. Everywhere.”

A swell of neanderthal pride blooms in his heart. The image of you, touching yourself with his name on your lips breaks another piece of his self control that wants to savor this.

“Here?” he kisses the swell of your breast, waiting for a nod to move on.

“Here?” A suck on your nipple again until the bed sheets threaten to rip from your hold.

“Here?” A bite at your hip bone.

His fingers part your core, wet at first contact even over your panties. “What about here?”

“Everywhere. I’ve thought about you touching me everywhere.” You sound like you might start crying if he doesn’t fulfill that fantasy soon.

But he’s dying to know every little thought you’ve ever had about him. If you think about him a fraction as much as he thinks about you. Not just like this, but when he sees a building he’d never think twice about and know you’d have something to say about the construction of the window arches, or when he walks through the park and sees two dogs meeting for the first time and can hear your voice whisper ‘best friends!’ like you’re right beside him. You’re in everything. Every part of who he is.

Your panties come off and he licks between your legs slowly, savoring every part he can while you twitch and curl beneath him.

“Cheol,” you whine.

There's no need to elaborate. He feels it too.

Your back bows under his touch, and Seungcheol watches you touch yourself with rapt attention. You grab your breasts and squeeze, nipples visible between fingers.

He sucks your clit, tongue lashing at the sensitive nub. A million times Seungcheol thought about doing this and never did his brain imagine the sounds you’d make, the way you taste, the rough tub at his hair. You're hot and wet under his mouth and all Seungcheol wants is more, more, more.

“Tell me how it feels.”

“So good—fuck—it’s so good,” you gasps as he fucks your opening with his tongue, collection your flavor.

His finger wedges inside your tight walls. You angle your hips, sinking them deeper. Seungcheol pauses for only a moment before giving you a second one. The sting across his scalp from your frantic tugging leaves him straining against the zipper of his slacks.

He cups your ass, dragging you closer to the edge of the bed where he kneels. Your legs spread wider to grant him the space to savor the pink of your folds under his tongue without obstruction.

Your pitch rises, moaning through a third finger joining the mix and a rough lap of his tongue that has you kicking the sheets.. He can feel it; your end just over the hill. A few vulgar flicks of his tongue and its release in long waves that make you keen his name horsley.

You melt into a boneless heap. Occasional twitches of muscles flooding with pleasure the only sign of life.

Seungcheol mouths up your stomach, sucking a nipple between his teeth for a second before moving on to your mouth. If all you want to do tonight is kiss and let Seungcheol worship your pussy, then he’ll oblige. But the way pull at his clothes hints at what you want. He draws you back into his lap, your body hot against his, mouth coaxing yours open.

“Good?”

You giggle against his mouth. “I can’t feel my toes.”

He can’t stop touching you. Probably won’t ever stop now that he knows what it means to call you his. To know your body. You’re no better. Your hands rake through his hair, goosebumps erupting as you tug him exactly where you want.

The soft lines of your throat, the intoxicating taste of sweat and perfume flooding his tongue. It’s better than anything his sorry excuse for an imagination could come up with.

You tug at his shirt, up and up until it’s forgotten on the floor. Your bare chest against his lights an inferno of want. Seungcheol pushes apart your limp thighs, making space for himself to grind against your sensitive core through his own trousers.

Seungcheol remembers a crucial fact as you slip a hand in his pants and tease his leaking cock.

“Wait,” he mutters into your jaw.

You don’t stop, slowly jerking him off, teeth cutting into the vein on his neck. “What?’

Seungcheol savors your touch before responding, thrusting through your first with blind want. “I don’t have condoms.”

“Oh.”

“I can go and try to find some but I—” he rambles.

“Cheol.”

“—everyone is probably still at the party so—”

You shut him up with a hand over his mouth, “I’m on birth control and I’m clean.”

“Oh.”

Oh. Seungcheol’s brain swims with lewd imagination; you stuffed with his cum, pussy stretched and worn from his cock. Feeling you raw, again and again until your helpless sweaty messes.

“Unless you want to use them then that's fine!” you hastily supply.

He cups your face, smiling as you ramble about how okay you are with using condoms. Your face is warm, eyes avoidant while you enthusiastically declare you want to do whatever makes him comfortable. Which is an entirely new problem because if your goal is to make him comfortable, then neither of you will be leaving this bed for the foreseeable future and at some point people will start looking for you.

Seungcheol rolls over. You take advantage of the opportunity for free command of his lap, forcing his pants down until he’s as bare as you. He preens under your wide eye stare, ego flaring under your wide eye stare. Leaning back on his palms, he grows cocky from your silence.

“Like what you see?” Seungcheol goads.

Your gaze cuts to his, eyebrows arched in your own challenge. A flare of fear zaps up his spine.

He loves it.

Seungcheol is accustomed to taking the lead in bed. Some girls want him to be domineering, others prefer to sit back while he naturally takes the reins.

But you’ve butt heads with him in every aspect of life, hopefully this would be no different. He’s hoping you might even try telling him exactly how you want him.

“You’re so hard for me,” you whisper. Your hand reaches out, thumbing at the leaking head of his cock with seductive confidence.

Seungcheol nods in agreement at a loss of words under your touch.

Your head cocks to the side curiously, empty hand slipping between your thighs, making space for the head of his cock to nudge against your clit. “Do you wanna fuck me?”

He nods again.

“Good,” you smile. You hide in his neck, nosing along the tense muscles straining to break out from his skin. “I thought about you fucking me like this. When we were in high school. I thought—I wanted you to be the first.”

“Really?” he asked dazedly.

Your first. Not Stoner Ricky from Calculus. But him. You wanted Seungcheol to have you first, possible be the only one for each other. It’s a lie if he didn’t think of you in the back of his mom’s car while Tiffany Something took his virginity. Your lips, your voice instead of her nasally pornographic sounds, when he came it was only because he closed his eyes and thought of you.

He tells you that and earns a deep bite on his shoulder.

You continue, “I’d watch porn or read those smut books, and I always pictured it was you.”

“God.”

You sink on his cock, pussy stretched on his length, stars flaring across your vision. There's not enough air in the room to breathe through the tight squeeze wrecking your guts. You’re in the position of control but Seungcheol can already see submission gaining control. You won’t admit you can handle his cock but pride warms his veins at how much energy it takes for your stunted rhythm.

“Fuck,” you curse.

“Yeah? Feels good having your pussy stuff with my cock?” Your nails bite into his chest in response. Pink lines flare in their wake, one he hopes are still there tomorrow.

Seungcheol drags you into a kiss, a dirty culmination of teeth and tongue and your satisfied sighs and his needy grunts. You suck at his lips, focused on that rather than riding him.

“Taping out already?”

You ignore the dig. It takes the barest twinge of his arm and you’re rolling on your back, legs spread in invitation. He sinks into the space reserved just for him, sliding deeper than before. Now he’s the one that needs a moment. Squeezed to death between your walls is the sweet torture he’s ever experienced, the wet sloppy drag of your cunt, bare for him and him alone.

It’s an act of bravery to pull out for the sake of thrusting back in. If he was confident enough you could get off without his hips sinking deeper then he’d never do it, content to keep his cock wedge inside you and play with your clit and tits until you cry from the pleasure. But he really wants to fuck you.

“God, feels so good.” You break. He keeps his pace steady, building you up until you muster a way to squeeze him tighter and his skins on fire.

He hoists your leg up, a deeper stretch that leaves him muttering about how good you feel. The wet slap of your cunt grows louder, sloppy clashes of his pelvis against yours.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he chants, stomach caving. The urge to cum is nipping at his heels but Seungcheol is better than that. Better than a quick fuck, at least for this first time. He wants to hear more of your sounds, fold you in every position he can imagine.

“More,” you grunt. “Fuck me harder, baby.”

He gives you what you ask for; plowing you into the mattress until the headboard slaps against the wall. “You like that?”

“Love it—shit. I love it.” You prop yourself up, shoving a hand between your bodies to swipe messy strokes across your clit. Seungcheol collects more sounds from the back of your throat, rough growls and stuttered squeaks. His cock is heavy in your guts, soaked with your arousal and his cum.

Your mouth finds his. Panting breath and loose tangles of lips. It’s a race against time with his vision bleached white. Your stomach caves with effort to meet each stroke with one of your own.

“I love you,” he groans.

You clench at his words, growing wetter if possible. Flailing against the bed, he hooks your other knee under his elbow and presses flat, pinning you down under his mercy. “I love you,” you whine back. “I-I—”

Your orgasm floods your veins, brain fuzzy and disconnected from anything beyond Seungcheol. He takes over the circles around your clit. Calloused fingers providing sick friction until you can’t take anymore.

“Wanna feel you come, Cheolie. Please,” you beg.

Something snaps and he’s rushing to pull out, jerking off over your stomach with your hand to help.

Rope after rope shines in the dim moonlight. He can’t even try to pretend the thrill of cumming inside isn’t on the forefront of his mind as the drips of his spend stare back at him. But you look like a fantasy come true cover in his cum, skinned flushed, eyes glazed and chest heaving. His own Venus come to life.

He pushes back in, spent cock sensitive to the squeeze of your cunt. Seungcheol doesn't want to be anywhere else. Now that he has you, he can't imagine a moment without you.

Sinking the weight of his hips, your legs lock him in. A combination of cum, sweat, arousal, and a few tears sticks between your sweltering bodies. Neither of you care, too enamored with cataloguing every bare inch of skin with in reach of your mouths.

‘Ugh,'' you groan. “I need a shower.”

In the bathroom, where so many horrible dangerous thoughts have plagued Seungcheol since the start of this trip, it’s peaceful. The thrum of the shower drowns out any sound beyond your sleepy huffs and his hums of content.

As the water heats you press him into the edge of the sink, kissing him as if there's all the time in the world to do just that. That seed of need that has been growing steadily in his gut since he kissed you in the garden comes alive again. You seem to ignore the prod at your thigh though so Seungcheol ignores it too and shepherds you into the stall.

He washes your back with soapy hands and you coif his hair into a shampoo mohawk and it’s feel right no matter how ridiculous he probably looks. You twist every time he touches your waist, shrieking in laughter because you hate being tickled.

Seungcheol is happy. It floods his veins, shoots through the tips of his fingers tracing your hip, forcing a content grin on his lips despite the fatigue of the day. He rests his forehead against your own and takes his first deep breath since New Years.

“I don’t want this to change anything."

“What?” you pull away.

“No!” Seugncehol shouts, wincing at the voluming. “Not—I didn’t mean that I just meant…I-I want you to feel like you can tell me anything. No more secrets. Okay? No matter what changes between us you're still my best friend. If I'm acting like an ass I want you to tell me. If you change your mind then-"

You watch him, features softening. “I won't."

You distract him with your own touches; it’s nice at first. Then it’s nothing short of blissful agony. Teasing nails across his stomach and sides, firm against his body in a way that leaves him weak and wanting. His heart thuds sporadically under your lips as his cock swells against your stomach.

“Y/N,” he sighs.

You kneel in front of him, smirking at how easy he is. You rub his cock with a slick grip. Your mouth comes into play slowly; kissing his hip, then his thigh, your tongue drags up the side until you suck the head between your lips and Seungcheol almost collapses.

You hold his thighs, guiding him further down your throat until there's no more space and you gag. He isn’t sure what to do with his hands but it doesn’t matter because he’s cumming. Fast.

Without missing a beat, you swallow everything he gives you.

“Oh god—fuck.”

“Good?” you ask, still licking against the head of his cock.

Rather than answer the obvious, he pulls you to your feet with a gentle kiss to your forehead. He’ll make it up to you back in bed. For right now, you curl into his chest, tracing shapes into his collarbone as the water slowly turns cold.

He pats you dry, ruffling your hair in the humid bathroom with all the time in the world before dragging you back to bed. You snuggle under the covers, still naked. Seungcheol joins immediately, rolling on top of you and caging his arms on either side of your head.

“Hi,” you smile from underneath him.

He can’t help but grin back. “Hi.”

You make love slowly this time. Your back to his chest, Seungcheol curled around you like a second skin, whispering his adoration in your ear until you lurch and cum with a cry. Then he does it again. And one more time because nothing is better than the taste of his name on your tongue.

This time, when Seungcheol finishes, it’s inside you. And when he tries to pull out, you protest with a sleepy threat before slipping into the land of dreams.

“Well, well, well,” Jeonghan tsks from the foot of the bed. “What do we have here?”

You’re still curled in Seungcheol’s arms, bare skin on bare skin only obscured by the blanket he had half a mind to drag over your two in the early hours of the morning. He’s still inside you for Christ Sake.

And yet Jeonghan and Sofie stand like two cats who caught the canary; unperturbed by the state of things. More like they’re delighted.

It might go down as the shortest honeymoon in history because Seungcheol is going to murder them.

“Aren’t you supposed to be on a boat in Greece somewhere?” Seungcheol croaks, pulling you closer and forcing the blanket overhead. Maybe if he ignores them long enough they’ll go away.

“We were just leaving and wanted to say goodbye since some people decided to ditch our wedding. Now I see why.”

“Jeonghan,” you croak.

Jeonghan preens smugly. “Yes, whore?”

“Get out or I’ll show Sofie that video of you from Halloween.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“What video from Halloween?” Sofie asks.

“Jeonghan,” you warn. You’ll do it. The video of Jeonghan sobbing in a party city wig about how much he liked Sofie before they started dating is one of the few pieces of blackmail against him.

“Fine. But when I’m back next month I want an explanation.”

“What video from Halloween?” She asks again as Jeonghan pushes her out the door.

“I hate him,” you say.

Seungcheol hums his agreement against your shoulder, tracing the skin with his lips until you shiver. “Me too.”

“Now, are you gonna do something about that,” you rock back into his pelvis, a tight squeeze around his cock he bucks into. “Or can I get up?”

“Roll over.”

Seungcheol fucks you for the nth time in so few hours. You whine and whimper and melt into the mattress under his weight, face buried in the pillows in an effort to stay quiet. He doesn’t care that the sun is heavy in the sky and half the house must be able to hear the way he groans around the syllables of your name.

He doesn’t care one bit.

Seungcheol has seen you in plenty of relationships, been in several of his own, but he’s never been in a relationship with you.

Turns out all the daydreaming and what-ifs couldn't come close to reality.

It’s better.

Most things are still the same. You two still bicker about everything. He finds your hair all over his apartment. His clothes magically disappear from his closet only to turn up at your place. You call him a stubborn jackass and he calls you a drama queen (both in regards to how he loads the dishwasher).

And he loves that even while dating you two refuse to change.

But Seungcheol also loves all the new things. The firsts you get to share.

The first time you visit home as a couple, your mom spots him kissing along your knuckles as you approach the house and she starts crying. Loudly. He spots his dad hand his mom twenty bucks but not before your dad hands over another ten.

Apparently, everyone was waiting for this to happen.

His dad claps him on the shoulder and your dad shakes his hand and suddenly he’s no longer Seungcheol, childhood best friend who lived down the street. He is Seungcheol, boyfriend. He’s known your parents since he was in elementary school and his mom texts you more frequently than her own son.

But none that matters because, at the ripe age of thirty, you two are banned from sleeping over during the visit for the first time in your lives.

He’s got a suspicion it’s because none of them know how to handle their kids finally dating. You and Seungcheol have never been normal but they’re trying.

Even if he sneaks out like he’s a teenager and climbs into your window in the dead of night. Now that's a fantasy come to life.

Back in the city Seungcheol discovers more ways things have changed.

You spend almost every night at Seungcheol’s apartment. When your sublease ends after four months there isn’t a big production about moving in with him. You had a key since he moved into the place years ago. Your stuff ends up in his spare room, which becomes ‘your’ room but you both call it the guest room and it's a new level of domesticity he’s never had.

In the mornings, you find him in the bathroom if he forgot to drop a good morning kiss on your forehead (something he’s started doing on purpose because you totter in with your eyes still closed and pajamas wrinkled, diving straight into his chest and grumbling incoherently until he gives in). It’s enough to make his heart squeeze even after the hundredth time).

Or how you constantly find a reason to touch him. Curled around his back while he makes dinner, shimmying under his arm when he’s reading case files on the couch. A hand through his hair while you cuddle in bed. Your shared bed, in your shared apartment. Which he is embarrassingly giddy about but you are too and that makes him feel better. You meet for lunch, at either of your offices, and he can see the instinct to drop into his lap making your fingers twitch but only because his own flex with the urge to pull you in first.

The first time you go to a baseball game together and end up on the kiss cam and he doesn’t have to pretend to not notice or awkwardly wait for the cameraman to catch the hint, because you’re kissing him until his ears grow hot and the crowd hoots wildly.

In the best way possible it’s weird. He doesn’t know how to date someone he’s been in love with for as long as he can remember. A lot of it feels like being friends. Like whatever was there before is the bones and all the new things filled in the empty space between.

There isn’t really a guide or set timeline but you’re figuring it out.

And Jeonghan helps. In his own Jeonghan way.

“You guys have been softcore dating since highschool. Just think of it like dogs. You’ve dated for a year now, right? That's like seven years for your guys.”

Seungcheol will tell you later tonight, after you’ve said yes, how the last part of your trio gave his blessing. How Sofie helped him pick the ring (which was really Seungcheol picking the ring and her providing moral support via muzzling her husband).

But for right now, he watches you across the table, laughing at something the waiter said, the weight of the velvet box burning a hole in his pocket.

And he knows the next first you have together will be the best one yet.

Taglist: @tomodachiii @cvpidyunho @miniseokminnies @ddaengpotate @arycutie

@gaebestie @primoppang @gyuguys @mine-gyu @doremifasire

@missminhoe @toplinehyunjin @crvs4vldtn @prettygyuuu @sliceofwoozi

@writingbarnes @dokyeomkyeom @christinewithluv @minwonfairy @idkjustlovingbts

@wobblewobble822 @futuristicenemychaos @seungkw1 @horanghaezone @jespecially

@scoupsjin @isabellah29 @luvseungcheol @crisle19 @iamawkwardandshy

@lukeys-giggle

Fic taglist:

@sourkimchi @aaniag @sillygirl-bee17 @xcynthiaaa @bath1lda

@blondechann @accalus @talk-inriddles @junniesoleilkth @yoongznme

@christinewithluv @rakshithanotrao @cherryluster @sarahmoonlxght-blog @linminhgk

@min-core @helloiliketits @atsumulovemail @whoa-jo @asyre

@telepathylftv @firstmatecherry @wonuskie @softiesoga @anthropologymajorkpopmultistan

@maxsanee @mischiefmanaged90 @randomworker @bouclesdefeu

@smoooore @hanipopeta

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thewispsings · 4 months

Text

little norris — f1 grid (teaser)

pairing. f1 grid x norris!reader

summary: everyone loves when landon's little sister attends races, especially the racers.

…

“What do you mean little norris is here?” Carlos Sainz spluttered, looking around the group of men, seeing the same bewildered expression on their faces.

It was two hours before the race, Charles, George, Oscar, Max, Carlos, Daniel, and Lando were catching up inside of Mclaren’s hospitality, that was until Lando dropped the bomb, his sister, more well known as little norris, was there.

“Yeah, I’m going to go meet her at the gate,” Lando muttered, turning around to the couch and picking up his phone before pocketing it. “You could join me-” he turned back around, only to find that the space, which was previously occupied by his friends, was now completely empty. Looking around, with furrowed brows, he scoffed, “Assholes.”

Walking up to the gate, Lando smiled at the sight of his baby sister, he was well aware of the cameras on them. And while he was very well used to it, you still seemed slightly uncomfortable. It had been a while since you had come to a race, three moths or so. So being around this many cameras, was not your usual day-to-day.

Still, you smiled brightly walking up to your big brother. Greeting each other, you hugged tightly, although you hadn’t been at a race for more than a year, you had Lando had seen each other less than a week ago. Only a year apart, you two had always been close, basically being best friends since your birth.

“Can you explain why your friends are very persistent about me visiting them today?” you questioned, now in the great comfort of Mclaren’s hospitality, you sipped on your orange juice, raising a brow to your brother.

Confused, Lando questioned who and what you were talking about. You explained that for the past ten minutes or so, you had been bombarded by messages from some of his closest friends. All begging you to visit them.

“Those Muppets!” Lando scoffed loudly, shaking his head in disbelief. “The second I brought you up, they ran away to do god knows what!” he rambled.

You shrugged, pausing for a second before pulling yourself up with a groan. Lando watching your movements in confusion. “Where are you going?”

You avoided eye contact, pursing your lips, and slowly walking towards the exit. “You’re going to see them!” Lando pointed an accusing finger at you, standing up and staring at you with betrayal.

You sped up, looking over your shoulder with a frown, “I’ve missed them!”

note: lmk if you would like to be tagged in this!

#f1 x reader #charles leclerc x reader #oscar piastri x reader #max verstappen x reader #george russell x reader #carlos sainz x reader #daniel ricciardo x reader

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heeliopheelia · 4 months

Text

GET HIM BACK! (s. jake)

MINORS DO NOT INTERACT

includes: making out, skin marking, fingering, unprotected sex, riding, brief hair pulling, choking, slight bulge kink, degrading, praising too, slight exhibitionism, facial, cursing

word count: 3.3k

synopsis: 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘴𝘪𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘩𝘰𝘸 𝘪𝘵 𝘸𝘢𝘴 𝘴𝘶𝘱𝘱𝘰𝘴𝘦𝘥 𝘵𝘰 𝘣𝘦 𝘰𝘯𝘭𝘺 𝘢 𝘴𝘶𝘮𝘮𝘦𝘳 𝘧𝘭𝘪𝘯𝘨, 𝘪𝘵'𝘴 𝘸𝘦𝘪𝘳𝘥 𝘩𝘰𝘸 𝘢𝘵𝘵𝘢𝘤𝘩𝘦𝘥 𝘺𝘰𝘶'𝘷𝘦 𝘨𝘰𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘯 𝘵𝘰 𝘢 𝘨𝘶𝘺 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘮𝘦𝘵 𝘧𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘸𝘦𝘦𝘬𝘴 𝘢𝘨𝘰

note: i really hated the build up to the one i posted before so i rewrote it as promised... sorry for the confusion guys ⋆౨ৎ˚⟡˖ ࣪

guts event masterlist ⋆♱✮♱⋆ main masterlist

“Your parents home?” Jake breaths out the words right into your mouth as he runs his tongue over your bottom lip.

It’s been mere three minutes since you first heard his loud and obnoxious bike speeding down your quiet street. He’s careless and tact-less as always, and for some reason that’s what draws you in even more.

He never keeps you waiting long. He doesn’t beat around the bush. He’s always one foot out the door of wherever he is, always waiting for a single call or text from you. He knows what he wants and is always vocal about it, a go getter type of a man.

So it was expected to have him climb up the low roof of your porch and hear his gloved hand knocking on your window not even ten minutes after you texted him a not so innocent wanna come over?.

As if that was even a question. Of course he wants to come over, wants to see you any chance he can get. He doesn’t need to think for a second to grab his helmet and ride to wherever you are, so needy for him. He’s known you for less than two months – met you at a party and kept hooking up weeks after, and yet here he is, wrapped around your finger, with nothing else in his mind but you.

You’re not much better yourself, dreaming of his beaming face every night that you somehow don’t end up spending with him. You’ve grown attached to him, so attached that the tearing inside your chest becomes more hurtful whenever you’re not with him, day by day he takes a firmer grasp of your feeble heart.

Your hands are grasping onto his worn out t-shirt, kissing him greedily and breathlessly as he giggles into your mouth, pulling you closer and closer into his chest.

“They came back an hour ago,” you answer, raising on your toes to make the angle more comfortable for the both of you.

Slowly, he pulls away and presses a gentle kiss to the corner of your mouth, then to the other one. “That’s kinda inconvenient, no?” He asks, nosing at your cheek and you close your eyes and nod your head, melting as the leather of his glove brushes against your skin as he lifts your chin up with his fingers.

His warm lips are on yours again, hand pulling your face upward to leave you breathless in a matter of seconds. “Wanna go out with me?” He whispers in your lips. He hums when you shake your head. “No? Jay’s party’s still going. We could go, hm?” He kisses you again even when you shake your head no. “Wanna just stay here?”

“Yeah,” you breathe out quietly, eyes never meeting his.

“Okay, as you wish, baby,” Jake smiles into your lips. “I don’t mind. Anywhere with you is good.”

Before you get the chance to swoon over his words even more, he’s pushing you backwards and against your dresser, putting his helmet down on it before caging you in between his flexing arms. He kisses you dizzy then, angling his face to the side to press and suck on your lips better.

It’s so Jake-like to make you forget about all of your surroundings, to kiss you into oblivion until your lips are swollen and burning. You never complain – why would you when you know you can only have him for this summer, before college starts again and you’ll be out of your hometown for another year. You always take him in, again and again, because you’re scared you’ll wake up from this dream too soon and never see him again. And you can’t let that happen.

This time he pushes his tongue inside your mouth, the warm muscle working against yours. Your hands finally relax from where they’ve been clutching onto his black top so desperately, only to travel up into his hair. You tug on it gently, feeling the slightly sweaty strands underneath your fingertips.

Jake pulls you flush to him, pushes his hips into yours for any type of fraction and groans lowly in his throat when he gets what he’s been craving for for the past hour.

“Couldn’t wait till tomorrow to see me, baby?” He teases, but you’re nodding your head quickly before he even has the chance to finish the sentence. He smiles into your lips as your desperate fingers pull his shirt up and off of him, leaving you pressed to his toned chest.

The two of you messily make your way to your bed, bare of any duvets and blankets as it’s too hot to sleep under any. You fall on top of him and part your lips only to latch onto his neck, tongue lapping over the bite marks you leave afterwards.

Jake chuckles at your feverish suckling onto his skin, never objecting to being marked by you. He tugs on the leather gloves with his teeth, pulling them off and throwing them on the floor, fingers immediately going down to follow your lead and dispose of your top. You’re only wearing underwear underneath the big t-shirt you sleep in and the sight makes Jake’s mouth water. He runs his hands over every inch of your burning skin, impatiently unclasping your bra as you’re still busy with his bruised neck.

You pull away, visibly pleased with yourself, then lift yourself on your arms and smother his swollen lips again. Jake grunts, kissing you almost just as fervently, hands going lower and lower until he grabs a handful of your ass and rolls his hips up into yours.

You let out a whimper at that, an even louder one following when his slim fingers skim over the soaked cotton of your panties.

“You need to be quiet, doll,” he chuckles breathlessly, drowning the sounds you make with his lips when he slips his fingers underneath the fabric and gets a feel of your slick pussy. “I don’t think we would want your parents walking in on us like that, hm?”

“Y-Yeah,” you stumble out, shifting as you’re laying flat on his chest, face buried in his collarbone and eyes fluttering when his moves only grow bolder. You shudder slightly, feeling his long digits teasing your clit with butterfly touches.

“Ease up, pretty girl,” Jake coos, other hand wrapping around your waist to keep you steady when the first of his now soaked fingers slips inside your tight hole. You nuzzle into him further, breath becoming unsteady as you whine quietly. He moves his hand, burying it deeper and skimming it over your walls.

Couple seconds later he adds in the second finger, the heel of his palm pressing to your clit and making you jolt slightly in his firm hold. He strokes inside you slowly, feeling you progressively getting wetter with his every push. You’re panting, hot breath hitting his skin and making his dick twitch in his pants.

He’s plunging his fingers deep inside of you, your walls squeezing him and stretching out his lips with a satisfied smile. You can’t help but buck into the air in the little space that Jake gives you, when he picks up on his pace. His fingers thrust in and out of you, one by one, never losing their rhythm.

Curving his fingers, his knuckles brush against the spongy insides of your hole, making you moan shakily.

“You good?” He asks, the hand on your waist caressing you gently.

You sigh, hands reaching up to squeeze his shoulders. “Yeah,” you whisper because that’s all of your voice that you can muster.

“Yeah?” He can’t help but tease and you can hear the grin that’s plastered on his pink lips. But this time you only respond with a nod of your head.

With your face buried in his skin, hands wrapped around his neck tightly, you know you’re cumming when the warm wave hits your stomach breathlessly. You’re whimpering in his collarbone, really trying your hardest to keep quiet, but with the twitching pleasure spreading through your body, and his hard bulge pressing into your stomach, it’s quite difficult to stay sane.

Jake gives you a second to breathe before removing his dripping fingers and unbuckling his pants with it. He somehow manages to shake out of his jeans while keeping you steady on his chest and you shiver when you can feel his warm cock resting between your bodies now.

“Stay still for me, baby,” he coaxes you before shifting you on his hips.

Next second, you can feel his tip prodding at your sensitive pussy and he glides his cock between your glistening folds, coating it in your slick. He readies you with a squeeze at your waist, and slowly starts sinking his length inside of you.

“Wait, Jake-,” you choke on your words when he buries himself entirely inside of you, stretching you out and making you lose your composure completely. “I’m still s-sensitive,” you mumble out, about to nuzzle your face in his neck when his hands grip your waist.

“Now, up you go,” he says and lifts you up, making you sit on his hips and take in even more of his cock.

You moan rather loudly, sinking your teeth in your bottom lip to stop yourself from spilling any more sounds. Jake slowly rolls his hips up into you, quiet grunts leaving his own mouth as his hands settle on your hips. He starts guiding you up and down carefully until you’ve fully adjusted to him.

He only lets go once you’ve picked up on a steady pace, bracing your hands on his stomach, the feeling of his hardened muscles making your cheeks heat up. The way your pussy spreads around him is making him go crazy, and now and then he realizes that the combination of feeling you topping him and looking so fucking pretty at the same time, is nothing less than lethal.

You’re so soft under his hands, soft around his cock, soft hands pressing on his abs – everything about you is so damn soft. You’re making him feel almost too good. To ground himself, one of his hands goes up to your hair and tugs on it slightly, making you arch your back and show your pretty, glistening with sweat neck.

He grits his teeth when you speed up slightly, eyes misty and sparkling down at him in your dimly lit bedroom. You’re riding him so well, taking his heavy cock with little struggle.

“So good,” he pants out, fingers digging into your ass. “You’re doing so good.”

You can feel your muscles straining whenever you lift yourself up, tired legs making you drop down onto him a little more forcefully than you initially planned but you’re rewarded with his low moan and eyes shutting tightly, long lashes brushing over his cheeks.

The room feels almost too hot, the house is too quiet for the lewd noises coming out of both of you. Your rhythmic bouncing on his aching cock soon changes to messy grinds as your knees give out and thighs burn. Your movements are shallow and visibly weakened, so to help you up, Jake brings his knees higher and roots his heels into your mattress only to thrust up into you, meeting your hips halfway.

You mewl, your legs twitching when he makes your hole take even more of him. He can feel your slick mixed with his precum seeping out and covering his stomach, and he desperately needs more.

Swallowed by the haze, you push your hips backwards and try to meet his thrusts, making his moves stutter and a strangled groan bubbles up his throat.

“You’re so fucking tight,” he says through clenched teeth before grabbing you by your hips and pulling you off of him. Before you get the chance to ask what he is doing, you find yourself with your back slammed to the mattress, and Jake’s hands grabbing your calves and throwing them over his shoulders.

When he enters you again, you feel your eyes rolling back a little but before any sound can make its way out of your throat, Jake’s veiny hand slaps over your mouth as he leans his face closely to yours. Your whimpers are muffled now as he picks up on his previous pace and the now changed position makes your walls clump down on him even fucking tighter.

“Keep it down. We don’t want your mom barging in and seeing her daughter folded in half like a slut, do we?” His words only make you moan louder as your fingers dig into his toned shoulders. At your reaction, Jake’s lips spread with a sly smile as he raises his eyebrow. “Do we?” He asks breathlessly, watching as your eyes glisten in the dark room. “You really wanna get caught? To let somebody see you like that? Naughty, fucking, girl. Well, there you go.”

His hands leave your mouth and settle on your stomach instead. You just can’t predict his moves anymore, too absorbed in the pleasure spreading through your body, so when he pushes onto your stomach and presses you even deeper into the mattress, a loud moan ripples out of your lips. Jake groans too as he can feel himself moving so deep inside you underneath his fingertips. He pushes onto you even harder. Your head rolls backwards until you’re nearly facing the headboard.

It’s quite difficult to breathe and you’re not sure whether it’s from the stifling summer air that’s gotten into your room or the veiny hand that’s suddenly latched onto your throat. His hot cockhead seems to be hitting everywhere where you need it most. Nothing but dumb squeaks leave your parted lips and he thrives off of every single one of them, even deepening his thrusts to hear them grow louder.

His thighs clash into yours loudly and you yelp when he leans even more forward and the one hand that’s currently not on your throat clutches the headboard tightly. You can’t even do anything when the wood starts rattling against your wall.

“You like getting fucked like this? Who would’ve thought,” he hums, grinning down at you with the teasing glimmer in his eyes.

His thrusts are deep, making the tip of his cock kiss your cervix over and over again. The moans you sob out are like a shot of adrenaline in his veins, better than any drug he’s ever tried and suddenly the thought of having you to himself only for the next week crosses his mind. He’s not sure how he’s supposed to breathe without you now that he’s almost sure he’s addicted to you.

He works his length deep inside you. Your vision threatens to turn black and you’re already out of breath when he presses onto your throat a little harder. You send him a half-lidded look and he moves his hand away from your throat to push your sweaty hair away from your forehead because nothing can fucking take the sight of your fucked out face away from him.

Your lips are parted with the ragged breaths leaving them, hands fisting his hair and legs beginning to tremble against his chest.

“So pretty, all for me. All because of me.” You nod thoughtlessly at his words, mind taken over by the feeling of the soon to be approaching high. “So lewd too. Where did your shame go?”

“C- Close,” is all you’re able to say. You can feel every vein on his cock more prominently with every next thrust of his, all of your senses besides touch evaporating. You can’t even hear any more of his dirty words when your climax hits you like a truck, making you let out a loud moan.

Jake wraps one of his arms under your waist and lifts you up slightly, now folding you in half and making your orgasm hit twice as hard. He slows his hips down for a moment to help you ride it out, thrusting his dick with deep strokes.

He’s letting go of you soon enough, quickly forgetting about your sensitive self as he feels the twitching and aching between his legs begin, waiting for his own release. With a groan, Jake braces both of his flexing arms on the headboard and ruts his heavy cock into you feverishly, making you see stars and cry out of overstimulation.

You have to bite on his shoulder to stop the sudden scream from leaving your throat, your whole body ricocheting with his hard thrusts. Your thighs are drenched and so are his, so the skin slapping against skin sounds even louder than before, leaving the backs of your plush upper legs red and stinging.

He loves having you like that, limp because he’s fucked you just that good but body no less responsive to all that he keeps giving you.

“So fucking good,” he repeats himself before abruptly pulling out of your spasming pussy. “Get down here, baby.”

Your heart pounds in your chest as you only nod and eagerly pull yourself down on the bed with your wobbly legs. Once you’re lowered enough, Jake angles his swollen cock right above your face and strokes himself quickly, only to couple seconds later cover your face with the thick white ropes of his release. You flinch slightly, closing your eyes as the warm liquid hits your cheeks, lewdly licking everything that’s sputtered over your lips.

“Oh, fuck!” Jake groans, a little pitchier than before, nonetheless just as pretty. You lift your head up from the mattress and swiftly engulf his leaking tip with your lips, milking him until he’s dry. Jake shudders above you and moans, watching you through almost closed eyes as you suck on his softening cock.

You pull away when there’s nothing else to take from him and the doe eyed look you’re giving him makes him weak in the knees. He drops down next to you, brushing your hair away from your cum stained face before giggling and picking up the shirt you’ve thrown on the floor. He gently cleans you up with it, then leans forward to drown you with his lips.

You could kiss him for eternity, be buried with his soft lips on yours. He’s gentler now, pressing his mouth on yours and leaving peck after peck on them.

“I think I’m in love with you,” he whispers suddenly, hazy, nose brushing against yours and making you smile the softest smile at him. “There’s never gonna be anyone else like you, YN.”

And with your heart in your throat, you can only swallow harshly and speak through your clenched throat. “Love you too, Jake.”

There’s silence between the two of you for a moment as you just stay in the moment. Heavy breaths, gentle touches brushing against each other’s bodies and soft voices making promises you most likely won’t be able to keep.

“You won’t forget about me, right?” You whisper quietly, looking up at him with misty eyes as he glazes his thumb over your bottom lip.

He shakes his head immediately, flashing you this charming smile of his you’ve gotten so used to over the past two months.

“How could I?” He’s just as quiet. Then he gently takes your hand in his and presses it to his chest, allowing you to feel the hammering of his heart. “All of this is yours. I’ll wait for you.”

And that’s all you need to hear right now.

The two of you get dressed, giggling and smiling like fools as there’s nothing much left to say. Your hip is leaning on your dresser when he steps closer and kisses you again, sucking on your lips sensually and slowly, procrastinating as long as he can only to not part with you yet.

His gloves are back on his hands, helmet under his arm as he turns back to you and tries one more time, grabbing your smaller hand in his. “Go out with me now?”

You don’t know how you’ll be able to face your parents tomorrow.

You don’t wanna say goodbye to him tonight.

So with a smile on your lips, you nod your head and climb out of the window – hands intertwined together and his helmet safely tucked on your head.

But he was so much fun and he had such weird friends

And he would take us out to parties and the night would never end

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#carly's 2k event ⛧☾༺♰༻☽⛧#enhypen #enhypen x reader #enhypen imagines #enhypen hard hours #jake imagines #jake x reader #sim jake smut #jake sim hard hours #jake sim x reader #enhypen jake x reader #enhypen jake smut #jake sim smut #sim jake x reader #sim jake imagines

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supernovafics · 4 months

Text

𝐍𝐄𝐖 𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐄

pairing: eddie munson x fem!reader

word count: 2.3k words

summary: in which it’s hard to see eddie with anyone who isn't you

warnings: friends to lovers to friends again (kinda), explicit language, alcohol consumption, very brief mention of weed, pining, angst

author’s note: this is fully inspired by the song "new love" by girl in red. enjoy<333

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。. .・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

“She’s right over there. Should I do it?”

“Yeah, go for it.”

Eddie nodded at your words and then he was standing up from the long patio chair that you, him, and Robin had been occupying for the past thirty minutes, and heading over to where his newest crush stood with a few of her friends.

Robin let out a laugh. “I don’t get it.”

You turned your head to look at her. “What?”

“How you guys can still be friends right now. You only broke up like two months ago.”

Making the promise to stay friends post-breakup was the only thing that made the breakup feel a thousand times less terrible. And it sounded easy enough— you and Eddie were simply just going to go back to how things were before you started dating.

“We’re better off as friends,” He had said to you that random Wednesday night back in January and you nodded understandingly. It was amicable and mutual, and eventually— maybe, hopefully— the barely five-month relationship would be a funny little story to reminisce about with each other years down the line.

You took a long sip from the red cup in your hand and then shrugged at Robin’s words. “I don’t know. This just works somehow. It’s better.”

You had been telling yourself that lie a lot lately— maybe almost too much. But, it was easier to pretend that that lie was the truth and that everything was fine, instead of thinking that maybe you made a mistake that night when you found yourself agreeing with Eddie and let things end between the two of you.

“No offense, but so weird,” Robin said with a shake of her head. “So, who’s this new girl he’s into anyway?”

“I honestly don’t know.”

Eddie had told you a lot about her— how she saw one of his band’s shows recently with a few friends and how she kinda ran in the same-ish circles— but most of what he said about her went in one ear and out the other. Hearing him ramble on and on about a new crush hurt more than you thought it would. Even more than when you two were actually just friends and you were harboring what felt like a hopeless crush on him for years before finally admitting it.

Breaking up was supposed to save you both from more heartbreak in the long run, but most of the time it felt like it was only making things worse. Sometimes you wondered if Eddie felt the same way— if he regretted it as much as you did.

It was almost too obvious that he didn’t, though, because he didn’t waste a second moving on.

New girl, new crush, new love. All of which wasn’t you anymore.

You looked away from where he stood next to the girl— you were only fifty percent sure her name was Ally. She was happily laughing at whatever Eddie had just said to her, and he was smiling widely.

“I’m gonna go inside and attempt to find the bathroom,” You told Robin before downing the rest of what was in your cup and placing it on the ground, and then standing up.

She looked up at you. “Want some help?”

“No, it’s okay,” You shook your head. “I’ll be right back.”

You kept your eyes down and away from Eddie as you walked into the house, a place that was way too small to have this many people in it. The inside was packed to the brim with a bunch of unfamiliar faces, and that was the main reason why you, Robin, and Eddie immediately retreated to the backyard once the three of you showed up. The only reason you all knew about the party was because of a friend of a friend of someone that Eddie met at The Hideout a few weeks ago.

You maneuvered through the throngs of dancing people and groups of friends talking loudly over the blasting music and headed up the stairs, hoping that it would be a bit more calm.

The universe must have been somewhat on your side because you found the bathroom on your first try. You didn’t even need to use it, you just wanted a moment of quiet. And even though you could hear the muffled sounds of the song playing downstairs through the shut door, it was still good enough.

You leaned back against the sink and let out a long breath.

It was hard not to think about Eddie with Ally and how happy they looked, even though it was only one of their first few conversations. All you wanted to do was take her place. All you wanted was for him to want you like that again.

It wasn’t supposed to be this hard, this complicated. Being just friends again was supposed to be the best thing to do, and you now wanted to bitterly laugh at yourself for stupidly believing that thought two months ago. Most of the time, that night played back on what felt like a continuous loop in your head. You kept wondering if you should’ve done things differently; if you should’ve, maybe, fought harder to keep what you two had.

“I don’t think we should do this anymore.”

You had immediately laughed at Eddie’s soft-spoken words, thinking that he was joking, but when he didn’t join in, you were furrowing your eyebrows in confusion. “What?”

“This just doesn’t make sense, y’know? We’re graduating soon, and then we’re gonna be going in completely different directions. You’re leaving Hawkins, and I already know that I’m gonna be stuck here.”

You were quiet because you had no idea how to respond to that. Maybe it was only half-right— yes, you were going to be headed to a college that was not in Indiana at the end of the summer, but you truly couldn’t imagine Eddie being “stuck” anywhere.

“We’re better off as friends,” He continued. “Neither of us can get hurt that way.”

It was all so surprising and felt entirely out of nowhere, but you could tell by how he said the words that he had been thinking about this for a while. There was a part of you that could understand what he meant, the sad why behind it all, so you decided to lean into that. Because, in a way, he was kind of right— the deeper you fell for each other, the more painful the heartbreak would be in the end, and the harder it would be to leave in August.

But, shit, you were already in way too deep.

You still felt yourself nodding in agreement with him anyway, even though it was the last thing you wanted to do. “Okay.”

“So… just friends again?”

You simply nodded again and gave him a small smile. “Yeah, of course. Just friends.”

Now you felt so dumb for saying that, for agreeing to the idea. You couldn’t be “just friends” with Eddie Munson anymore.

There was a loud knock on the door that abruptly pulled you out of your thoughts.

“Sorry, one sec,” You yelled out to the person on the other side.

You let out another breath and didn’t bother looking in the mirror to see if the sadness you were feeling was written so clearly across your face. Mainly because you knew that it definitely was and it would be too hard to replace it with a fake smile, anyway.

A random girl was rushing in before you were even fully out of the door, and you hoped that she was doing better than you were at that moment, but it didn’t entirely seem like it.

You decided that you wanted to go back outside and settle yourself back in your spot on the patio chair next to Robin, and you also really wanted another drink. The idea of blurring your thoughts for the rest of the night didn’t sound like the worst idea ever.

You made your way to the stairs and before you even started heading down, you spotted Eddie walking up. He easily noticed you too and he smiled before meeting you at the top of the stairs after a second. He looked at you for a moment and then his eyebrows furrowed in concern.

“Hey, you okay?” He asked, reaching out to place a hand on your upper arm. It was such a subtle and simple action, but it still made you feel way too many things at once. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, I’m fine,” You answered, giving him a weak smile, and then immediately changed the subject so that he wouldn’t question you further right then. “How’d it go with Ally? That’s her name, right?”

“Yeah, it is. But, that ask-out completely crashed and failed because she said that she just started dating someone.”

“Oh, sorry,” You told him, not because you actually felt it, but because it simply felt like the right thing to say at that moment.

“It’s fine,” Eddie shrugged. “What’s the dumb saying? There’s other fish in the sea or whatever.”

You let out a forced kind of laugh. “Yup, right.”

“You sure you’re okay?”

For a second, you considered lying again; it would’ve been the best and simplest thing to do. You could’ve said that you weren’t feeling well and you needed to just head back outside and get some air— you should’ve just said that. But then, suddenly, all you could think was fuck it.

“I can’t do this.”

He looked at you, confused. “Do what?”

“Be friends with you. I can’t go back to how things were with us before we dated. And I know that I have been doing it for the past two months, but I can’t anymore.”

“But, we decided—”

“I know,” You interrupted him. “I know what we decided, but that doesn’t mean that it’s been easy to do this. To just turn off my feelings and pretend that I’m not still in love with you.”

Surprisingly, it actually felt good to finally be honest about everything that you had forced yourself to bury over the past few months. It felt as if a weight was being lifted off of your shoulders.

“It’s not easy for me either.”

You couldn’t help but scoff and roll your eyes at Eddie’s words. “Yeah, because talking to Ally out there looked really painful and hard for you.”

“That doesn’t…” He trailed off as he shook his head. “That doesn’t mean anything. I promise. It doesn’t mean that I don’t miss you, or us.”

“Then why are we even doing this right now? What’s the point?”

You two had somehow moved away from the stairs and instead were standing further down the hallway, closer to the bathroom that you had left barely two minutes ago.

“I just,” Eddie began and then sighed. “I know it’s gonna hurt like hell letting you go in a few months, and maybe doing it this way is easier. It’s not at all easy, but maybe it’s better? I don’t know. Most of the time it feels so fucking stupid, and I feel like an idiot for what I did that night… But, maybe it was the right thing to do.”

You considered his words for a moment. Just like that night two months ago, a part of you could recognize that he was at least a little right. But, this time you decided against leaning into the small part of you that wanted to simply agree with him because it made things seem “easy.”

“You know me,” You ultimately said, stepping a little closer and finding his hand. “I overthink everything. I think about every possible outcome for any and every situation. But, this is the one thing that I don’t want to think that far ahead about. And maybe that’s stupid. And maybe we will end up feeling terribly heartbroken at the end of the summer, and we’ll regret not just leaving things like they are right now. But, I’d rather that, than to keep pretending that everything is fine and normal. Somehow that feels so much worse. Why can’t we just enjoy this, us, for what it is before we have to give it up?”

Eddie didn’t say anything at first and that worried you. You braced yourself for the inevitable rejection, and you were already telling yourself that you would be okay with it because at least you tried this time around— you had finally said the words that you wished you’d said that night.

But then he was kissing you. It was abrupt and sudden and you hadn’t seen it coming, even though it was exactly what you wanted to happen. He was pulling his hand away from yours and immediately reaching up to cup your face in both of his hands. They were cold, but you still felt as if you were on fire.

It was probably only him that could affect you this much and this easily. You didn’t realize how much you missed the feel of his mouth on yours and how much you missed having him close to you in this way until it was finally, finally happening again.

Your mind briefly traveled back to the last time this happened. It was the night before the breakup and the two of you were smoking weed in your backyard, sandwiched together in one patio chair instead of sitting in separate ones because it just felt right to do, and the close proximity allowed your lips to easily find his.

“I love you,” Eddie mumbled against your mouth now, which also reminded you of that last time. “I’m sorry I made us lose the past two months.”

Your hands were fisting themselves into his black t-shirt, pulling him impossibly closer to you. “It’s okay. Doesn’t matter.”

And technically, it really didn’t, at least not in your head. You were just glad to be here in this moment with him. It wasn’t too late. You two still had time.

“It’ll be okay,” You told him in between kisses. Maybe you two should have found a bedroom or simply moved anywhere that was out of the dark hallway and away from potential prying eyes, but that didn’t feel like the most important thing to do right then. “Whatever happens in the end. It’ll be okay.”

Eddie was nodding as he pressed you back against the wall and his hands dropped to your waist. “Okay.”

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。. .・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

let me know ur thoughts<333

#eddie munson imagine #eddie munson smut #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson fluff #eddie munson angst #eddie munson x fem!reader smut #eddie munson x female reader #eddie munson x y/n #eddie munson x you #eddie munson fanfic #stranger things fic #stranger things imagine #stranger things smut

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eightstarr · 2 months

Text

what's mine — ellie williams.

summary: the day you left for this assignment, ellie remembers thinking it would be okay— or maybe it was you who said it, your hands over her tense shoulders, her fingers tugging at your shirt, “you’ll be okay.” she goes home and knows it to be true, like words from a god. she’ll be okay and you’ll be back. what’s left to do but count the hours?

warnings: descriptions of violence (not very detailed), suggestive content near the end!

notes: uhhh i love being dramatic and i think it shows here. all i think about is the action of coming home to someone who loves you and how it is as meaningful now as it was a thousand years ago and as it will be in a hundred years but whatever haha sorry about that guys. if you read this i love you btw

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୨・┈﹕✦﹕﹕✦﹕┈・୧

Being without Ellie is disorienting. The first week feels like walking alone in a dark room, feeling the walls for a light switch, running into sharp corners that stab your sides. You miss her like it's a sickness, less a longing and more a threat to whatever you’re made of.

There's a small community way outside of Jackson offering a trade. Maria makes it sound simple, like everything else. “They know us, it’ll be quick. You pick up the supplies, drop off our part of the deal, and come back.”

It takes 26 days. The exchange is simple but the journey less so, you and three others have to carry home the much needed medical supplies through herds of infected and a heavy storm that slows you down and cuts off your communication for three terrifying nights.

Ellie wanders the house and feels like a stranger, sickly, a sleepless corpse searching for living blood. The light coming through the windows feels too bright and her skin abnormally cold. She knows, or thinks, that if she’s not careful she could get lost in it— merge every wall together until there’s nothing left to see but a stark flatness, an unfamiliar box. The space is not huge. It's not a tall castle or a manor in the countryside or anything fitting to the theatricality of loneliness, but it’s your home. So much of you is in it. Ellie finds herself focusing on a different thing each passing day, clinging to them with a nauseating desperation, a hundred random pieces of you scattered like breadcrumbs to keep her sane. A book with a folded corner somewhere along the first half of the story, your favorite mug next to the sink, an old pair of jeans ripped at the knee on your side of the drawer. Too many things for you not to come back.

“Do you think I'm losing my mind?” she asks, a soft wrinkle between her furrowed brows, her eyes focused on a random spot ahead. “I mean, it’s been two weeks,” she’s trying to sound like it's not as bad as it looks, like she finds any of it funny or interesting instead of plainly horrifying. The sole of her shoes hits the floor in an anxious rhythm, mocking her— tap, tap, tap, tap. “Isn’t that fucked up?”

Dina curses at the lighter until it flickers back to life with a weak orange flame, holding it near the end of the half finished blunt. She inhales and passes it over, breathing out, “You’re not crazy.”

A pause. Ellie lets the comment comfort her for a single second before it flies right through her head, sounding more quiet than usual when she admits, “...I have this feeling like someone took something from me.”

Dina raises her eyebrows, her chuckle cut off by a short cough, smoke itching her throat. “You mean, like… what’s her name?” she squints her eyes and tries to remember.

The name worms around Ellie’s head like it has been for days, bold letters, clear as day. She makes no attempt to let it pass through her lips, self aware and unrelenting at the same time, maybe finding some indefensible satisfaction in the fact that it can be forgotten. Cruel, you'd tease, and Ellie would smirk a lot like she tries not to now.

Dina gives up a second later, “Whatever— the girl that volunteered to go with them before you could. You're blaming her?”

“I guess.”

“Hm. That’s a little…”

“Don’t say crazy—”

“Crazy.”

“Fuck you,” she rolls her eyes. “It’s not like that.”

“So you’re not jealous?”

Ellie scoffs, tongue pressed against the inside of her cheek. Dina argues unlike anyone else. She’s confident, her goal clear and her strategy already lined up before you get a word in, loaded like a gun. But her strongest contender, perhaps the only one, might be Ellie’s simple stubbornness. “I’m concerned. She got picked over me even though I've studied that route a hundred fucking times. I could've done a better job,” she says, steady and tireless like bulletproof glass.

“At getting the supplies or at taking care of your girlfriend?”

“You’re starting to sound like Maria.”

Dina pauses for a short moment before she shrugs. “Maria makes good points.”

Ellie takes one last hit of the blunt and flicks it across the room to die out somewhere on the permanently damp floor. She tries to believe it. No one took you, she thinks, you left dutifully like anyone else in Jackson would've, like Ellie would've. It’s a dangerous trip but a job like any other, the same risk of deadly infection that comes with any of them. She should be used to it by now. Does it not also exist every other day of the year?

Still, she can't remember the last time she didn't see your face for this long. You’ve been dating for a little over three years, living together for half of that— it's a terrifyingly meaningful chunk of your young lives, months and months of seeing you everyday, of falling asleep with her face on the crook of your neck and waking up with your fingers pressing into her waist. You've built a world where things like this don’t happen, where all Ellie can think about as she leaves home is the way you hum in the mornings, soft and sleepy and so fucking cute, when you wake up to her back against your chest and her hair on your face. She thinks about her own laugh, how shy it sounds, how your lips press to her head before she turns around to claim a proper kiss.

But now you’re not here, and she’s too terrified to even utter the words out loud, and there's a hole in her chest where you should be that makes her feel insane everywhere she goes. It's an open wound leaving a hazardous trail of shame and memories, humming in her ears like a boiling kettle, who took what's mine?

Ellie has never considered herself to be the jealous type, but she never was the type to sleep with her back turned to someone this comfortably, either. It’s different with you. It's theatricality, it’s the coldness of that bed at night, it’s your legs tangled with hers like growing roots now disjointed. It’s a thing, breathing and alive, screaming at nothing— I miss you, I miss you, I miss you.

Is that girl you went with hanging from your every word in that way she always does? Is that a shameful thought to have? Ellie wipes it clean in a second and finds it immediately there again, at the front of her mind like a message on a cloudy mirror. She can't think about anything else. Is the storm keeping the two of you awake? Does a part of you find the girl brave for volunteering? Is she turning to look at you and asking, just loud enough, are you asleep? That fall earlier was rough, how are you feeling? Is she looking at your wounds like they matter more than doing a good job? Is your blood, warm and red and yours, on her hands now?

The last of the smoke spills past her lips in a sigh. Ellie pulls her knees closer to her chest and tugs at the loose thread on your ripped jeans.

—

There’s a comfortable weight that keeps you under, the loving press of her arm resting over your chest, her thumb brushing your chin. The sun feels warm where it’s draped across Ellie’s back, white tank top wrinkled slightly up her waist.

She watches you until you let out a little sigh, squint one eye open and then slowly the next, a smile stretching your lips as soon as your sight focuses on her. She looks beautiful. She looks just like she did before you left, your girl.

It’s weird— you’ve showered, scrubbed your hands clean and raw, changed clothes. And still you feel like you’ve brought in something dirty, like it’ll be stuck on you for a while, the grime, the guns, the storm. Your muddy shoes must still be sitting by the front door. Something in your head screams that you should get rid of them, burn them like an evidence of guilt. Do you look anything like you did before you left? You feel like a worn version of yourself, sticky and darkened. It’s a ridiculous worry to have, but the thought comes hand in hand with embarrassment and you can feel it crawling up your neck. You cover your face with your hands and groan tiredly, shy.

Ellie laughs, warm like musk, salve on a wound.

"Are you watching me sleep?" you mutter, voice ridden with exhaustion and joy all at once. The thing, love, obsession, both— breathes along with you. "Freak."

"Yeah, I was,” she shifts to sit on your lap, one knee on either side of you, spilling her confession easily. Ellie leans over to push your hands away from your face and press her lips to yours, passionate but short lived, still softly brushing against each other when she says, "I missed this face."

You chuckle, eyes tracing over her freckled cheeks, hands squeezing her thighs, feeling strangely like you’re being washed clean. “I missed you.”

Ellie closes her eyes and rests her forehead against yours, her fingers caressing your cheeks, looking at you again when her thumb brushes against the ridge of a scar. It’s a warped line that almost follows the shape of your cheekbone, from your hairline to somewhere near the corner of your lips. She'd seen it last night, nauseous with worry and relief to have you back, her vision clouded. The morning reveals it in a different, heartbreaking light. It’s okay, you’d said during the night, your hands on either side of her face much like hers are on you now, didn't even need stitches. Ellie tries to let that sink in, make the guilt feel any better. But it can't. Maybe you’d been saved the prick of a needle, but she knows it still hurt, she knows it bled and stung. It feels like a betrayal. If I can't save you the pain, she thinks, I owe you the witnessing, the chance to clean its wry edges, pat it dry. "How'd you get this one?" she asks, as softly as she can.

You’d been prepared for the question but not the devastation in her eyes. It falls over you like a ton of bricks, her love making your chest ache and sinking you back into the memory.

There was an empty house, or what looked like one. Pieces of broken glass scattered over the rotting wood of an old, wobbly table. A man's hand placed forcefully on your head. The side of your face rammed into the table with a thud when he pushed you down, the faint pain of something slicing into your cheek made worse by your struggle to get free. A kick and he stumbled back. A slice of your knife and he fell dead. You don't think the fact will do much to comfort Ellie. So, in hopes of sparing her, you hum and shake your head. "Come here," you say, or beg, a hand on the back of her neck like fond guidance. "Let me kiss your pretty face."

She feels soft like satin on your lips, tastes like honey and black tea. Ellie kisses like she argues, experienced and unruly all at once, with a point to make— I need you and I want you to know it. Her tongue slips past your parted lips and brings a muffled sound from your throat that almost makes her pull slightly away, if it weren't for the feeling of your fingers tightening on her neck to have her closer. A faint thought crosses Ellie’s mind, a feeling like pity for the person she was before you, whoever that was, an old self who couldn't know what it's like to be devoured so caringly.

She brushes her nose against yours and you let out a sigh that sounds painfully like a prayer, her short hair a dark veil over your eyes when she turns her head to press kisses on your cheek. "You can't leave me like that again," she breathes out.

You swallow her words, a confused wrinkle between your eyebrows. “Ellie—”

A kiss cuts you off. You slide your hands up her thighs to her waist, a surprised hum vibrating against her lips when she wraps her fingers around your wrists and squeezes, as if to keep them there. She leans back and stares into you, and for the first time since you’ve known Ellie, you can't tell if she's commanding you or begging. “I won’t let you.”

It’s a gesture. It goes beyond the reality of your lives, the fact that any day either one of you could be made to leave again, that any day either one of you could die. It means I missed you. It means I need it to be me who looks after you. It means I love you.

Your stomach flutters, hungry with an urgent craving. And like you have every day since you’ve known Ellie, you find yourself unable to deny her love or the indulging promise of a different world— but maybe those mean the same thing. "I'm not leaving you," you say, breathless, and it might as well be true.

Ellie makes a sound in response that feels painfully close to a moan, a soft mmhm that clouds your head of anything that may or may not exist outside of this room. The tip of her nose brushes against your neck and then continues its way down, her fingers sneaking inside your shirt, pulling up the fabric and pressing kisses over the skin that’s revealed. "I love you," she says, almost near the band of your underwear, her blushed lips parted. You feel her breath against the burning fire in your lower stomach, reaching out to cradle her cheek against your hand. She feels hot, flushed pink under her freckles, and you’re not sure if she hears you say I love you, Ellie as much as she watches you mouth the words. She presses her face further into your hand, wetting her lips with the tip of her tongue, begging as if she’d ever have to, “Baby, I need— please.”

You don't hear yourself say yes, but the look in her eyes says you must have.

#ellie williams x reader #ellie x reader #ellie williams headcanons #ellie williams fic #ellie williams imagine #ellie williams x you #ellie williams x female reader #ellie williams smut

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hornychristianprincess · 3 months

Text

wasted (leehan x fem reader) pt 3

paring: leehan x fem reader genre: smut, fluff, angst, fuckboy!leehan word count: 15k bc i'm a slut for this man SRFKLHSDLK summary: everything in your life is affected as your relationship with leehan progresses. warnings: explicit sex scenes, oral (male and female receiving), expressions of insecurity and self-esteem issues should you wish to read on ao3, click HERE.

At the library on a Saturday night, you, Leehan, Riwoo, and Giselle sit at the same table, studying for your approaching midterms.

“Y/N,” says Leehan. “Can you send me the pdf file you found for the English textbook?”

You nod, quickly finding the file on your phone and airdropping it to Leehan the Lion . “Just sent it.”

“Thanks,” he mutters, before returning to writing notes on his laptop.

This is about as exciting as your interactions get with Leehan when you’re among your group of friends, studying or going to the caf or finding some event on campus to go to.

It was the ultimate whiplash, then, to experience Leehan when you were alone.

Because in the month or so that’s passed since the night of the lunar eclipse, every few days you could look forward to the what are you doing? text that usually led up to some of the most satisfying, passionate sex of your life.

The friends-with-benefits arrangement the two of you were in had quickly become the center of your life. It felt like you were always in limbo as you awaited his latest text, and when you got it, it didnt’t matter what you were doing – you were always ready to surrender to him, to surrender to pleasure that was beginning to feel like the only thing that made you excited to wake up some days.

You had sex sometimes three, sometimes five times a week. Where it happened didn’t really matter to either of you — in the bathroom at a party, the confines of your dorm room, in the backseat of his car.

Everything in your life had been shrunken to make space for what was now your top priority.

And whatever negative impacts were to come of such decision-making were yet to be seen when it felt like the high you received from his attention was blinding everything else.

It was always weird to have to face him in settings like this the next day, to hear him speak to you so casually as if his face wasn’t buried between your legs less than 24 hours ago. Still, you kept up your end of this unspoken bargain to pretend as if you weren’t anything but acquaintances.

“I have midterms for every class. I’m feel like I’m gonna die of stress,” said Giselle, throwing her long brown hair over her shoulders. Giselle was one of the people who rode with Jaehyun during the lunar eclipse, and although you didn’t get much time to speak with her then, you’ve since gotten close by hanging out more.

“That’s why you need to find the right vice. Food…drugs… orgasms, ” replies Leehan playfully, quirking a teasing eyebrow in her direction. He chuckles as Giselle rolls her eyes at him, and as much as you hate yourself for it, you can’t help but notice how his eyes linger on her even as she returns to her textbook.

Occasionally, you’ll observe the fact that the sense of humor and charm that made you fall for Leehan in the first place is not something that he reserves for only you, and it makes you just the tiniest bit sad.

It’s nice to feel, even if it’s not true, like the moments you share alone in your bedroom are ones where he feels safe to show you things no one else gets to see. Like you hold the key to pieces of Leehan that no one else can access.

So in times like these where you’re presented with evidence that says otherwise, it makes you feel like there is nothing special or significant about how you and Leehan got to where you were. Perhaps it was just a case of right place right time, like he could’ve met anyone – Giselle, even – and done the same things he’s done with you.

Then again, the interaction you just observed could’ve been completely innocent and it’s you that’s overthinking it.

At the end of the day, if you were keeping score, the fact that you’re the first person with whom Leehan has offered up his body to on a regular basis feels like more than enough evidence that what you share is special.

In fact, you’re pretty sure he’s gonna fuck you after this.

You know because in the hour or so later when the library is about to close and you’re wrapping up your study session, he says, “Y/N, you live near the mail center, right? I’ll walk with you; I need to drop something off before I head home.”

It takes every bit of self control you have to not break out into a smirk – he knows exactly where you live, and it’s because you fuck there almost every time. “Sure,” you reply, in the most neutral voice you can possible muster.

“See you guys later,” you’re saying to Riwoo and Giselle as you pack up your things and head out.

It’s past midnight and almost completely dark outside by the time you and Leehan leave, save for the few street lights that illuminate the sidewalk. For no reason in particular, it’s silent between the two of you. You might’ve found such an atmosphere to be awkward if it weren’t for the fact that your dorm was only a 5 minute walk away. And, when it comes to Leehan, you can never be too presumptuous in trying to interpret his moods; being the person that he is, something you’d usually interpret as disinterest could actually mean a plethora of non-threatning things for him.

On the way there, you approach what’s essentially an alleyway, a narrow space between two dorms that is deserted and dark. You don’t think anything of it until suddenly, you’re tugged inside of it and everything in your line of sight goes dark.

And before you can ask questions or react, your senses are flooded by the feeling of Leehan’s lips pressed against yours.

It’s amazing how your body adapts to the sudden gesture before your mind does. While it takes you a moment to internally acknowledge that you’re not in danger, your skin ignites with electricity the moment his lips touch yours.

If a bystander were to observe the passionate, needy, almost desperate way he’s kissing you, they’d think that you’re someone he hasn’t seen in years, someone who he’s eager to make up lost time with.

He doesn’t stop at just dominating your mouth with his tongue. His hands, like calloused vines, wrap themselves around your body, setting fire to whatever pieces of exposed skin he can find. And when you whimper against him, he adds to the sound with a groan of his own.

But no, this isn’t a kiss of two lovers who have been separated by time, or location. Leehan is just a person who is steadfast in his commitment to doing everything in his life earnestly. And it’s one of the many reasons why you are enamored by him.

When he pulls away to look at you, you can see even in the dark the expression of relief on his face. It’s as if kissing you was an urge he has been suppressing until now, and having gotten his fix, he’s left in a state of contentment.

“What was that for?” you ask, adrenaline and arousal running through your veins in such an fiery combination that you find your voice comes out weaker than usual.

“Just had to get it out my system,” is what he says indifferently in reply, and with his lips curling into a smirk, he heads out of the alleyway and continues on the path to your dorm. You follow him, feeling like the arousal you had been suppressing the entire time you were at the library with your friends has now doubled in a way that makes your knees wobbly as you walk.

It’s silent between the two of again as you approach the building to your dorm, although now you feel confident in assuming that it had always been searing sexual tension that was keeping him from being his usual talkative, bubbly self.

It could be confusing to someone else, then, why — even as you’re locking the door to your room with him inside of it – you still aren’t all over each other in the way your earlier interactions might’ve preluded.

But it’s because you just have one more confirmation you need to make before you can truly let go of your inhibitions, and that’s the question of, “Is your roommate here?”

Your roommate, lovely girl, would usually be here in the dorm at this time. But already having a feeling what you’d be getting up to tonight, you transparently informed her through text that im so so sorry but i’m out with you know who and i could reallllyyy use some dick tonight. buy you food to make up for it? just before you left the library.

“No. She’s out studying,” you tell Leehan.

When you meet each other’s gazes, Leehan’s eyes sparkling as if he’s just been told he’s won the lottery, you can sense the exact moment when the both of you realize there’s no longer a need to wait. And so, like animals excitedly tearing up freshly-killed prey, it’s in a messy, rushed flurry of movements that you both take each other’s clothes off.

Before Leehan, you don’t think you ever experienced an attraction for someone so intense that it caused you to push furniture over in the process of trying to get to the bedroom. But with him, the sound of a glass vase breaking doesn’t feel so concerning when you’re too busy trying to make it to the bed, take off his clothes, and not break your kiss all at once.

There’s something so humorous about your shared vigor, causing you to both smile into the kisses you share, remaining playful even among such intensity.

“You’re roommate’s a lovely person, isn’t she?” he remarks as he backs you up into your bedroom doorframe, throwing the jacket you had been wearing on your rug in the process. “I’ve gotta apologize to her one day. Poor girl’s had to hear so many things.”

You hate how much his words ring true, because truthfully, tonight was one out of several rare occasions in which you’ve been given enough foresight to warn your roommate before Leehan comes over. Other times, things between you two have blossomed too spontaneously for a warning, or, your phone died while you were out together, giving you no means to let her know he was arriving.

“ Ew . Don’t talk about her like that. It’ll make me think you have a thing for her,” you reply in reference to the lovely person and poor girl attributions, and although you’re mostly joking, the insecurity from before about his interest in other women still remains present in the forefront of your mind.

And it’s not at all helped when, even jokingly, he makes remarks like, “Hey — I’d never say no to inviting someone else into our activities.”

At this point, you’re standing in nothing but a bra and panties in front of him, preparing to give your body up for his pleasure, which is why you think it’s fairly reasonable that you reach out to swat him in response to such cheekiness.

But he seizes your wrists before you can make contact, laughing at your reaction in that way that, as annoying as it is to acknowledge right now, makes him look so, so sexy. “I’m kidding, baby,” he chides apologetically. “I’d never share you. Want you too fucking badly to even think about it.”

It’s in moments like these that you can’t help but get butterflies from Leehan, especially when he leans in to kiss you languidly right after. This habit he’s taken of calling you all sorts of pet names, from princess to baby to sweet girl, is something that has made your attraction to him increase tenfold.

How could you help it, when his deep voice by itself is like a weapon specifically designed to torture you?

“Are you needy, baby?” asks Leehan teasingly, as his hand is now stuffed in your underwear, and his forehead is pressed against yours as he pushes you against the hard surface of your dresser and fingers you expertly. “Was what we did two days ago not enough? Did I not fuck you good enough?”

It’s actually because the sex from two days ago – and the day before that and the day before that and the days since you met him – was too good that you find yourself needing little stimulation to get wet at the thought of fucking him again. But of course, you don’t admit this, not needing his ego to get any larger than it is. “Shut up and fuck me.”

But Leehan doesn’t pay your cheek any mind, reacting only with a scoff as he busies himself with getting on his knees in front of you. Pressing his face against the skin of your bare stomach, he remarks, “You smell like me. It’s so fucking sexy.”

Leehan is the most wayward person you’ve ever met. But you can surely count on him in moments like these to make your entire body feel like it’s on fire, knowing exactly what buttons to push and places to touch to get a rise out of you. All he does is leave chaste, delicate kisses along the skin from your sternum to your belly button, but the fact that he maintains eye contact as he does it, and the implication that he makes when he says, “And I bet you taste like heaven, too,” makes you feel like you’re experiencing something so ethereal it’s as if you’re out of your own body.

You’re looking down at him as he kisses at the spot just above your pussy, and it’s at that moment that you decide you want him too badly to wait any longer. Fingers that had once laced themselves in his hair now tug on the strands, pulling him up and off of you. “Leehan. Inside of me. Now.”

You watch as his eyes scan your face to tell if you’re being serious or not, and if you could see yourself through his gaze, you know you’d be convincingly earnest in your desire to have him. Once he confirms this for himself, he pops up from his previous position kneeling on the ground, and looks at you with his head cocked to the side in a expression of challenge. Pushing you up onto the dresser, he quirks an eyebrow to say, “Have I ever told you that I find you sexiest when you’re telling me what to do?”

At this, you smile, playing into his confession by commanding, “Kiss me,” before leaning in to meet his lips. And when his hand travels between your legs, you know it’s not to touch you, but to reach into the top drawer of your dresser where you’ve allowed him to stash some condoms. It’s with excitment that you hear him tear open the package, sliding the latex onto his hardened cock.

There’s a moment just before he lines his cock up with your slit where he pulls away from your lips, reaching a hand out to hold your jaw in place so that your eyelines are level. And when he simply just stares at you silently, allowing his eyes to graze your features with an awe-stricken expression on his face, you can’t help but look away as the intensity of his admiration becomes overwhelming.

He chuckles at your obvious shyness, hand never leaving your jaw as he continues to view you like you’re a delicate statue he’s entranced by. “Don’t you think it’s too late to be shy after everything we’ve done together?” he says jokingly, and even though you feign disagreement with a roll of your eyes, you make no effort to suppress the smile that appears on your face as you bask in his teasing of you.

“I can’t help it,” you reply, comfortably meeting his gaze now. “You’re just really fucking handsome.”

You’re sure he’s heard these words hundreds of times in hundreds of ways, and yet you can see his eyes-widening as if you’ve said something sincerely touching. Perhaps the words hit differently when heard spontaneously, genuinely, without any pretense behind them.

It’s without any warning that Leehan pushes himself inside of you. Caught off guard by the feeling of his cock entering you inch by pleasurable inch, you can only make a mental note to apologize to him later as your fingernails dig into the skin of his back. Luckily, he doesn’t seem to mind, too focused on leaning his forehead against yours and watching with greedy eyes as his cock enters your pussy and leaves it with a creamy sheen.

“Jesus fucking christ, Y/N,” he remarks in awe, managing the words through a shaky exhale as he moves to hook his arms underneath your thighs. He pulls your body closer to the edge of the dresser, bringing his cock even deeper inside of you. He hasn’t even started fucking you properly yet, and still you let out a series of elongated sighs and moans, wrapping your arms around his neck for a sense of comfort.

It’s when you’re completely pressed together in a skin-to-skin embrace that he finally begins to thrust inside of you at a pace that you’re used to. As clumsy and unsure as he can sometimes be, Leehan never fucks you erratically. It’s always with a controlled, focused pace that he pistons his hips into yours, knowing your body so well that you never have to tell him when to slow up or go faster.

When you first met Leehan, you couldn’t understand the concept of kissing being considered an intimate act between two lovers.

But now, as he leans in to press his mouth against yours, his tongue exploring the depths of your mouth, it’s with suprsing clarity that you realize why some people like to refrain from kissing entirely when they hook up with someone.

You’re at your most smitten when being passionately tongue-kissed through an unforgiving onslaught of thrusts, a part of you wishing that this sex could become a permanent fixture in your life and not just a transactional, temporary high.

It’s only when he slots a hand between your bodies to tweak at your clit that it becomes impossible for you to meet his kiss, feeling too much pleasure to hold back your open-mouthed cries. Leehan then moves to kissing your neck, and it’s some of the most sensual affection you've ever received as he allows his tongue to drag across your skin, suctioning his lips on sections of your shoulder where you’re sure he’s leaving hickies.

He goes up your body in this sequence until he reaches your ear, mumbling, “You take care of my cock so well,” as he licks at the shell of your ear and sinks his teeth onto your earlobe. “It’s why I’m never coming off of you. It’s too fucking good for me to stop.”

Transfixed by the sound of his voice, the feel of his cock, and the stimulation you receive on your clit, you can feel that it’s only a matter of time before your pleasure reaches it’s crescending point. “Leehan,” you mumble out, grabbing onto fistfuls of his long hair as if it’s the only thing keeping you tethered to Earth. “Come with me.”

He denies this request with a click of his tongue, mumbling the words, “You first,” into your ear as his thrusts increase in impact. It’s in a sad attempt at a kiss that you press your mouth against his, feeling his intensity and passion just as the same even as you devolve into just grazing your tongue against his mouth.

Your orgasm hits you in a feeling that’s akin to a bunch of puzzle pieces fitting perfectly together at once; the combination of his cock, his closeness, and his endless circling of your clit leaves your body seizing with what is surely one of the most pleasurable feelings of your life.

And as you feel his movements becoming rapid and untethered, knowing that the feeling of your tighetning cunt will soon become too pleasurable for him to bear, it’s with satisfied foreboding that you watch him give you his last, hard thrust.

There are a least of couple minutes that pass where neither of you move, the only sounds being your successive heavy breathing as you both come down from intense highs. Leehan makes the first move by carrying you your bed, where he plops you down on your back and makes a very sexy whimpering sound as he’s forced to pull out of you.

Even once you’re separated, he still plops down on the bed to rest next to you. A forearm’s length apart, you long for him to touch you, even if just for a moment.

“Shit,” he mutters, an outburst that has you confused until you notice his eyes and their fixation with your bedside alarm clock. “I didn’t realize how late it is. I really don’t want to drive back to my apartment at this time.”

Then stay, is what you think to yourself, but these are words that you would never dare to actually vocalize.

There was truthfully one instance just a month or so prior when you suggested he might leave a bookbag in your room so he didn’t have to walk home with it in the rain. Not too soon will you forget the way a usually upbeat Leehan turned cold on you within seconds, neglecting to say more than a see you later as he almost sprinted to leave your apartment.

You’d be lying if you said his eagerness to leave after the sex is finished wasn’t at least the slightest bit dismaying.

The delusional part of you wishes he could at least pretend like he didn’t just come here to fuck you and nothing more.

It would be nice to believe that the sheer enjoyment of your company would be enough to make him want to stay afterwards.

And what’s worse is that every time, he comes up with some way to express how much he probably should stay. Like just now, how he mentioned how late it was. It frustrates you more than anything.

Because no matter how much he says he doesn’t want to leave, he always does.

And at this point, you wish he would just do it decisively instead of trying to soften the blow.

“Did you hear about the party we’re having this weekend?” you hear him ask suddenly, his body in a sitting position as he gets up to put on his clothes. “Ha. We . Well, really Jaehyun.”

Though you find it difficult to have casual conversation with him when your mind is elsewhere, you indulge him with a truthful shake of your head. “No. What’s it for?”

“Halloween. He’s asking everyone to dress up,” says Leehan, having already made it to the other side of your room. If you were in more of a spirited mood, you might laugh at how he mentions dressing up for Halloween as if it’s something that’s beneath him. “Don’t worry that he didn’t tell you. He just came up with the idea yesterday.

The fact that Jaehyun hadn’t mentioned the party to you wasn’t even a thought that occurred in your mind. You were more so concerned with the logistics of deciding to throw a party during midterms. Stressed beyond relief with your own course load, you couldn’t imagine deciding to attend anything extracurricular at this time of year.

But then, the idea of making such plans seems a lot more plausible when Leehan says, “Are you coming, pretty? I think it would be cute if we went with with matching costumes.”

It’s because of moments like these that your feelings for Leehan can be so conflicting. At the beginning of your day today, he sat around you with your other friends and acted as if you were nothing more than acquaintances. Followed you to your dorm and fucked you as sensually and passionately as a boyfriend would. Is getting dressed and preparing to leave within minutes of reaching his climax. And now, he calls you pet names in a non-sexual context and tells you he wants to wear a couple’s costume with you. Constantly affronted with gestures that are both hot and cold, you can never be too sure whether it’s you that’s delusional or him that’s sending mixed messages.

Nonetheless, you cannot help yourself from replying, “Sounds fun. I’ll be there,” even though you know you that you shouldn’t. Even though you know you have far too much on your plate academically to be going to a party on a school night. Even though you know your actions should not be so predated on his. Knowing all of this, you still find yourself not the least bit concerned, only excited, as you think about attending the party together.

“See you then, gorgeous. Have sweet, x-rated dreams about me,” is what he says as he finishes putting on his discarded clothes, standing in your bedroom doorway as he prepares to leave. His silhouette casts a shadow over your dimly lit room, covering your naked, vulnerable body.

“Shut up,” you mumble weakly as you move to throw a pillow at him, a part of you wishing that all of your interactions felt as sweet as this one did.

>you: hey i’m at the halloween store picking out costumes, what were you thinking?

Five minutes before you were planning to head out to Jaehyun’s party, you reread this text from two days ago over and over, the delivered in the corner almost taunting you. Just 13 words took you at least an half an hour to send because you couldn’t stop wondering if it was too vague or too forward or if you shouldn’t have even said anything all.

And now, as you sit on the cold bench outside of your dorm waiting for your Uber to the party, wearing a cheap angel costume, you realize now what a mistake it was to send that text.

You suppose the misunderstanding you’ve found yourself in started with your assumption – based on Leehan’s last words to you as he left your dorm just a few days ago – that you’d be shopping together to find matching costumes for Jaehyun’s party.

But when the party was inching closer and he had yet to reach out, you ventured to a PartyCity on your own. It was then that you sent the text after much internal laboring, ultimatley thinking that maybe he was busy with midterms and would be grateful that you had taken the initiative on both your behalf's to buy the costumes.

Even as you were halfway through the checkout line and still nothing from Leehan, you bought a matching devil costume for him anyway, plastic red horns to match your sparkly halo. Maybe, when he was less busy, he’d eventually reach back out, still interested in going to the party with you and grateful you saved him the trouble of picking out a costume.

In your mind, there were a billion rational possibilities for why he wasn’t responding that would still ultimately end in your original plans to attend the party and dress together.

It wasn’t until an hour before the party and still no response from Leehan that you were forced to accept you’d be going to this party yourself. A billion questions arose in your mind. Was something wrong, explaining why he had been M.I.A after making plans with you? Had he forgotten about the party entireley?

Did he just…no longer want to go with you anymore?

As you stood up to enter your approaching Uber, you try to remind yourself that the party was being thrown at Leehan’s apartment – there was no way that he was oblivious to what today was. If he hadn’t responded to your text, it didn’t necessarily have to be for malicious reasons. Maybe he just genuinely forgot, or was one of the many people who went offline during midterm season.

Either way, you were beginning to think that you were worrying too much for no reason. After all, it isn’t the end of the world that you aren’t arriving together in matching costumes.

Or, maybe it’s the couple of shots you took while getting ready finally kicking in and causing your rationality to dissipate.

Arriving at Jaehyun’s apartment, you already knew that knocking on the door would be futile; without entering, you could hear the loud sounds of bass burning through a speaker that you could guess would make any outside noise intelligible. Instead, you took your chances at twisting the doorknob, and sure enough, it was unlocked. It seemed dangerous to you, but you walked in anyway to find a cacophony of purple, green, and orange strobe lights, illuminating the sizeable crowd of people filling the space.

Decorations of cobwebs and skulls adored almost every surface, and as you walked further inside, you noticed the array of drink bowls spread out against a long table.

You observe impressively that Jaehyun went as far as hiring a DJ, a guy dressed in a vampire costume who jerks his upper body back and forth to the rhythm of the music.

It’s almost like a scene in a coming-of-age-film come to life, mountains of young adult bodies bouncing in a hypnotic fervor while drinks in red solo cups are sloshed up and down in the process.

Making your way through the crowd, you spot several of your newfound friends, plus others Jaehyun introduced you to at the lunar eclipse. You wave particularly to Riwoo, Giselle, and Sungho – dressed as an elf, cat, and fireman respectively – but really , who you’re looking for is Leehan.

In the first five minutes or so of your search, you have no luck in finding him. You do, however, run into Jaehyun, whose sleeveless jean vest with no shirt underneath immediately gives away his costume as Ken from the Barbie movie. You giggle at the realization, taken aback even more when Jaehyun drapes an arm clumsily over your shoulder, bringing you in closer.

“I’m so glad you could make it, Y/N!” he shouts, competing with the loud music, and just barely – you almost want to drag him somewhere quieter, away from the DJ booth, but the longer you look at Jaehyun, taking in his wobbly, red-faced disposition, you realize he must be drunk. Trying to force him into any extended movement in his current condition would be futile.

“Thanks. Hey, have you seen Leehan?” you ask, skipping any pleasantries. You want to get an answer from his as quickly as possible before he becomes incoherent.

To your dismay, he shakes his head no. “He’s not coming. Told me he had a study date he was going to.”

You hope the absence of light outside from the shitty strobes obscures the expression of disappointment that is surely on your face right now, or even better that Jaehyun is too drunk to remember you asking this at all tomorrow morning.

“You’re not still interested in him, are you?” asks Jaehyun, the smallest glimmer of rationality breaking through his drunken fervor as he seems to be sincere in asking. You force a smile, wanting to get away from him as quickly as possible before he’s able to notice the difference.

“No, of course not,” you dismiss with a small laugh. You give Jaehyun a friendly pat on the arm before identifying where the drinks are so you can head there next. “Thanks for having me.”

Beelining for the punch table, you fill a red solo cup with a mixture of liquids from all three bowls and throw it down without investigating what you’ve just ingested. To your dismay, rather than dulling your emotions, the alcohol brings out your festering resentment. Towards Leehan, towards this entire situation.

Truthfully, with your own midterms looming and a mountain of late assignments you’ve allowed to pile up over the last few months as you prirotized sex with Leehan, it was against your every best interest to show up tonight.

You had checked your assignment-board this morning to discover that two essays worth 40% of your grade were due at 11:59 tonight.

A class you were already failing with a 60 was requiring you to submit revisions for a paper tonight, too.

And yet, you made the decision to come out tonight – promising yourself you’d make it home at a decent enough hour so that you could at least submit something – because of Leehan.

You were encouraged to wake up this morning and the morning before this morning because of your excitement at the notion of coming to this party with him by your side, wearing matching costumes and sharing drinks and hopefully spit by the end of the night, too.

If you were being completely honest, all of your days were beginning to feel like that — like the only thing you had to continuously look forward to was seeing or experiencing Leehan in some way shape or form.

Experiencing his laugh and his weird habit of bringing up the most random topics at the drop of a dime. Seeing his dimples pop out when he smiles at you and feeling like it’s the cutest thing in the world.

It’s becoming clear to you now that his absence has just as big — no, a bigger emotional impact that his presence does.

You’re angry because you know you didn’t create this excitement out of nowhere: he told you he wanted you to come to this party. You went solely because he said he was going to. If he didn’t want to come tonight, if he had plans, he could have warned you.

You’re angry at yourself for believing him.

Worst of all, you’re angry because he’s on a date and it confirms all of your biggest insecurities about you not being enough for him.

And it’s at this point that you acknowledge how woefully unequipped you were to say yes to the proposition he gave you the night of the lunar eclipse. Because if it means having to experience the profoundly soul-crushing reality of his disinterest in anything having to do with you other than quick, indulgent sex, you’d rather die a million times.

You feel your phone buzzing and reach into your bag to grab it unfeelingly. It’s a notification from Leehan. And as if you needed one more reason to feel like shit tonight, the nofication reads, Leehan questioned your message: hey i’m at the halloween store picking out costumes, what were you thinking?

You’re so tired of trying to analyze Leehan’s every action and gesture in an effort to convince yourself that maybe there’s some large reasoning behind his indifference. Instead of searching for any additional explanation behind in the question mark, you simply decide that he’s an asshole who had no intention of going out with you tonight.

And it’s with that steely acknowledgement that suddenly, you feel like you’re about to throw up all of the liquor you’ve just consumed. Taking a deep breath to stop yourself from spilling your guts right then and there, you decide it’s time to go home.

In your haste to leave the party, you don’t bother to try and yell excuse me to the 20 or so people blocking your way to the exit. You simply squeeze past who you can and push past who you can’t, not even caring to look back at those you shoulder check until you’re turned around by a pull against your forearm.

Face-to-chest with a figure you don’t immediately recognize, you body seizes up in fear, a condition that’s only slightly alleviated when you recognize the person’s voice as they exclaim in a deep voice, “ Whoa, whoa whoa . Hey, Y/N.”

It’s in slight annoyance that you look up to meet Leehan’s gaze, finding him staring down at you softly. It appears that he’s just walked into the party. In a space full of people dressed as mythical creatures, he looks out of place in his leather jacket and jeans, but also oh so attractive. His hair gathers in front of his face messily, the dark brown locks in a rare state of curliness. He doesn’t have to wear plastic horns to look devilish.

“Are you okay?” you hear him ask loudly over the sound of the music, his hand now resting on the apex of your arm. Feeling both defiant and embarrassed to tell him the true answer to his question – that no , you’re not okay because you foolishly thought you could count on him to be there for you when he said he would – you don’t answer.

And in a move that only contributes to the growing feeling that all Leehan truly cares about when it comes to you is sex, he doesn’t even allow you the time to answer, even if you wanted to. “You look pretty, angel ,” he says only seconds after his last remark, using both of his hands to smoothe down pieces of your hair messed up by your headband.

A compliment that would usually cause sparks to fly throughout your stomach now only annoys you, especially as you catch a whiff of fruity, feminine perfume on his body.

“You smell like someone else,” you tell him plainly, too drunk to hide what it is you’re thinking. And you can see that the remark and the resentful tone in which you say it takes him aback, even as he chuckles in an attempt to remain composed.

“Because I was driving for Uber, tonight, pretty,” he says, and before you have a chance to question his excuse, he continues by asking, “How much have you had to drink?”

“Why does that matter?” you retort with a scoff, convinced he’s about to try and spin this on you by suggesting your valid anger is a result of your drinking.

But then he puts on that signature smirk of his, those wretched dimples of his coming out as he leans down into your ear to say, “Because when I ask If I can take you to my room in about five minutes, I want to make sure I’m not taking advantage of you.”

Yout hate that those words and the implication of sex have you immediately aroused and pliant, even as you grapple with the feeling of being just a physical object to him.

Because as much as you dislike him right now for what he’s put you through emotionally, his renewed attention feels like the perfect solvent to your wounds.

“You wouldn’t be,” you reply softly, your voice coming out small and weak as you maintain unbroken eye contact with him.

“Yeah?” he replies almost mockingly, bringing a hand up to stroke your cheek. “Why do I get the feeling that you want me to take advantage of you?”

It feels like your mind and heart are on two different accords as your face remains passive and unaffected yet what comes out of your mouth is, “Take me to your room and find out.”

It’s less a feeling of shame but more like acceptance that comes over you as you follow Leehan back into the throes of the party, his hand leading you through the crowd of people and towards his bedroom.

Deep down, you know that the excuse he gave you earlier about his whereabouts was bullshit. Never once before has Leehan mentioned driving for Uber, and even if he did, it still wouldn’t justify his complete lack of regard for the plans you made and his lack of regard for you , refusing to notify you in advance that he wouldn’t be available.

But when faced with the proposition of sex, it seems foolish to deny it so that you can… what ? Continue to stew in feelings that will just leave you feeling empty, hurt, and worthless? Question him about being on a date when you know you have no right to?

Having sex will at least guarantee you a few moments of mind-numbing bliss, even if only a temporary high. Better that than have to face the reality of your own complicated nest of delusion.

As you’re let into Leehan’s room, hearing the sound of him closing the door shut behind you, you’re hit with the sudden realization that in the three months or so you’ve known him, you’ve never been in here before.

His room has all the markers of a college boy’s sense of taste – dark colored furniture and bedsheets, posters scattered on the wall with no real order, random piles of mess occupying corners of the room.

In a space that is otherwise unremarkable, your attention is piqued by a square, rectangular tank on top of his dresser.

“You have fish ,” you remark in a tone that is both matter-a-fact and questioning, something about your drunken state making you more curious than ever about the tank and it’s inhabitants.

Throwing his jacket onto a random chair, Leehan comes up next to you and lets out a chuckle as he takes in your awe-stricken expression. “For some reason, I forgot you haven’t been in here before,” he observes, and when he watches you just continue to stand still, eyes transfixed on the fish but still remaining a few feet away from the tank, he gestures for you to follow him to it. “C’mon. Sit.”

You can’t help the way that your limbs move eagerly and excitedly towards the tank, where Leehan pulls up two extra chairs for you both to sit and view it together.

Fish of all different sizes and shapes swim around in vibrant blurs of pink, orange and beige. You watch it all in awe, not sure if it’s because you’re tipsy or simply curious, and as Leehan explains what each type of fish is called, you hang onto every word.

“...this one is called a corydoras catfish. The rest of them are shrimp,” he explains, pressing his finger up against the tank as he points out each fish and the attributes that differentiate them from one another.

In one corner of the tank, a group of fish swim frantically around each other, as if fighting.

“Usually they come right up against the tank when I sit in front of them like this. I think they’re mad because I haven’t given them any fish food.”

“Don’t you need to feed them?” you ask in genuine concern, turning to look at Leehan who only smirks.

“Are you trying to imply that I’m a negligent father, Y/N?” he retorts dramatically, his body tensing in mock offense before he relaxes and explains, “Don’t worry. They’re supposed to eat the algae on the rock. For some reason, they’re just being hesitant.”

“Maybe the algae isn’t what they want,” you chime in with a reasoning tilt to your quiet, contemplative voice.

“Just because the fish food is what they want doesn’t mean I should give it to them,” Leehan retorts simply, and maybe it’s the drunk, cynical part of you that thinks he’s making reference to your relationship. That you’re the fish who just can’t help but want something it can’t have, and he’s the sensible overseer that remains in control of what you will receive.

But if Leehan is making some sort of larger, metaphorical reference to your relationship, he surely moves on from it quickly, becoming wistful and contemplative as he says, “I’ve been raising fishes all my life. Sometimes when I’m stressed I’ll just sit in front of the tank and talk to them.”

He presses his hand flat against the tank, his lips twitching into a prideful, paternal smile. “Because I know that unlike humans, they’ll never judge me.”

You find that your eyes never stray from the side of Leehan’s face as he talks, feeling almost like you’re a purveyor to this private, intimate moment he’s having. It feels like a privilege to be able to observe Leehan in moments like this where you’re given a genuine glimpse into his inner personhood.

But you’re pushed out just as quickly as you’re let in, watching as he promptly gets up from his seat by the tank and makes his way over to the bed. You turn your body in your chair to face him, and find that he’s now staring at you lustfully, gesturing for you to join him.

And as dismaying as it is to see him abandon the brief moment of emotional vulnerability just as quickly as it began, you stand up anyway, making your way to him.

Your movements toward him are slow, shy almost, and you can tell it pleases Leehan as you stand between his legs and are brought forward by his hands pushing at your lower back. He looks up at you, communicating wordlessly with just his sensual gaze how much he wants you. Your lingering anger from before stops you from making the first move, but even so, you don’t resist when he leans in to press a soft, steady kiss against your lips. Finding something almost apologetic about the innocent gesture, you put aside all of your inhibitions and decide to deepen the kiss, leaning your body fully into his and relishing in the groans he makes against your mouth.

Passion quickly bleeds into the both of your movements until you’re kissing in a crazed, frantic manner. His hands that previously only looped your hips now wander across the expanse of your back, and with one forceful tug, your zipper comes down your dress. You’ve only just allowed the fabric to slide down your shoulders before he’s pulling the dress down himself, exposing your nipples to the cold air before covering them with his hot mouth. Tongue swirling around your hardened nubs, you nuzzle a hand in his hair and throw your head back in contentment.

It’s with a wet pop that he pulls off of you, leaning upward to lock your lips once more. But because you're both incredibly and overwhelming horny, the kiss lasts for barely a few seconds before he’s pulling away to voice his plans for your body.

“Want you to sit on my face,” he mumbles, voice gruff and deep and dripping with desire. “Wanna put that pretty pussy of yours in my mouth.”

Smirking in reply, you rest your head against his, eyes closed as you weather the currents of several shocks of arousal that travel up your body and make your legs feel like jelly. “I want that, too,” you confess, your voice sounding wispy as your body loses the strength to be assertive. “Also kinda want your dick in my mouth.”

His eyes light up at this, and with a hand on your chin that brings your face level with his, he says, “How about this: You hop on my face, and I’ll let you suck my cock. Sound good?”

Something about Leehan’s enduring leadership has the effect of making you feel intimidated, so much so that all you manage is a shy nod in response to his words, which he luckily accepts without any further prompting. You’re better at speaking with your actions, anyway, knowing that there’s a wordless understanding in the way that you kiss him hard and passionately while your hands push him onto his back.

It’s with greedy, fast-moving hands that you strip him of his clothes, desperate for the instant bliss that is his mouth against your clit, the instant satisfaction that is his cum shooting down your throat. Once you have him fully naked, the fuzzy halo headband you’ve long forgotten about the only shared item of clothing between the two of you, you begin to adjust so that you may assume the required position.

But your movements are suddenly halted when Leehan sits up suddenly, muttering the word “Wait,” as he maneuvers the both of your bodies so that you now lay on the complete opposite side of the bed.

“That’s better,” he mumbles contentedly.

“What?”

“Just don’t want the fish to see what I’m about to do to you,” he replies, an answer so baffling that all you can do is laugh in reply. Your reaction barely phases him as he moves to drag your body onto his, and just like that, his kookiness is forgotten and your focus becomes tethered to the feeling of his breath against your awaiting pussy.

He blows a few teasing, cool breaths against your dripping core, and before he has the chance to make you succumb to the pleasure of his mouth, you reach out to begin your own enjoyment of his heavy, hard cock.

His member is veiny and substantial in your hands, reddened tip dripping with beads of precum that you lick away without thought of how it will impact Leehan. You feel his body seize with a jolt of pleasure from the direct contact with his most sensitive body part.

And as if trying to get payback, he begins his assault on your pussy by sucking your clit into his warm, wet mouth.

From there, it becomes a competition of wills, a battle to see who can be least distracted by the pleasure they’re receiving in order to make the other fold, or at the very least, reach their climax.

It’s a war you feel yourself pitifully losing as your drunken fervor somehow makes every casually overwhelming sensation feel 10x more heightened. You feel yourself inching closer and closer to release with each blissful flick of his tongue against your clit.

Still, not forgetting about Leehan and his pleasure, you fight through the mental haze of your own gratification and concentrate on making slow, purposeful pumps of his cock within the ring of your hand.

Sucking Leehan off is an activity you’ve gotten more than enough experience in to know what it takes to make him come. You gather all of the moisture in your mouth and wet his shaft with your spit. You press teasing, chaste kisses on his sensitive tip. You swirl your tongue in circles and continue stroking him with your hand.

And then, when you can feel his thighs tensing as he grows tired of your teasing, you offer him relief in the form of taking him fully in your warm mouth.

Leehan’s self control is impeccable, even as you’re bobbing your head up and down his cock. He drags his tongue through your folds and finds himself at your hole, licking up the arousal there and fucking you open with his tongue. The only sign he shows of his own impending release are in the groans that he lets out against your mound. You can feel something overwhelming begining to build in your stomach, and though your body tries to squirm away from it, he holds you against his face.

You pitifully moan with his cock fully lodged in your mouth, and with a few final thrusts of his tongue, the knot in your stomach comes undone. As your orgasm overwhelms you, it’s difficult to continue moving your head.

But Leehan’s too close to let his climax slip away from him, so it’s in desperation that he begins bucking his hips into your mouth at the same time he’s licking you through your orgasm. You just relax your jaw and let out restrained whimpers as Leehan fucks your mouth, not stopping until he finishes with a groan.

“My god, Y/N,” Leehan mutters breathily, turning you both on your sides, unraveling his limbs from yours until you’re no longer skin to skin. “We should do that position more often.”

You nod lazily in agreement, and with the little strength left in your limbs, you sit up to meet Leehan in the middle of the bed for a wet kiss.

The position is slightly awkward, the two of you laying in opposite directions, twisting your bodies unnaturally, but kissing each other is a habit so addictive that even as you’re pulling away, he pulls at your hair to bring you back in for just a few seconds longer.

It’s comforting to fall back down onto the bed and feel Leehan’s fingers gently caressing the skin of your ankle. In your sleepy, post-orgasm haze, you’re filled with a sudden surge of contement in regards to your decision to come here tonight.

You feel the fabric of a blanket kissing the sides of your body, and when you look over to find Leehan getting comfy in bed, it’s with satisfaction that you begin to do the same.

But then, the blanket you were just about to pull onto your body is snatched off of your skin, and when you look over at Leehan, you see him tucking himself in with a sleepy, content smile on his face. It’s just as you’re sitting up that he flutters his eyes closed, and with a sleepy tilt to his voice he says, “Hey, if you see Jaehyun on your way out, can you ask him to call me? I wanna know what time he plans on ending this.”

There’s a second after those words hit your ears where you’re not sure if you misheard him, slow to move from where you are in his bed. But as the implications of the statement hit you horrifically and all at once, it’s with a heavy feeling of shame weighing down your body that you reply, “Sure,” going to gather your discarded things from the floor.

The humiliating act of putting on your clothes after being dismissed so casually is almost instantaneously sobering. You catch a view of yourself in the display of your phone and notice that your plastic halo headband has been bent 90 degrees, likely from how rough you were. Your hair is strewn in every direction. Your mascara is smeared and ruined, running down your cheeks in squiggly, broken lines.

You’re a mess. He made you a mess for the sake of his pleasure. And instead of cleaning you up, Leehan has essentially just kicked you out onto the street.

Only Leehan could cause such a dramatic shift between feeling like you were safe and desired to feeling like you’re just a worthless speck of nothing attached to the bottom of his shoe.

It’s just as you’re about to open the door to leave that you hear him call your name, and with your back turned to him, a hopeful part of you thinks that maybe, just maybe, he’ll say he changed his mind and wants you to stay.

But instead, as if to turn the knife in more, when you turn around, you find him staring boredly at his phone.

Instead of regret on his face, you see neutrality.

And instead of asking you to stay, he just says, “Thanks so much by the way. For the sex and the favor.”

It’s with a forced, robotic sense of calmness that you’re replying. “No problem, Leehan.”

And then you leave his room, never feeling so profoundly insignificant than you do in this moment.

There’s nothing quite worse than waking up with a terrible hangover, a panging feeling of emotional emptiness, and then having to send a string of desperate emails to your professors asking for deadline extensions. But that’s exactly what you do in the aftermath of the Halloween party, and by the grace of all things holy, you’re granted an extra few days to get your assignments in.

So grateful for the chance to resuscitate your failing GPA, you focus your efforts on finishing your assignments and almost forget about the cause of such misfortune, until you’re reminded when your phone suddenly buzzes with a text.

>leehan: what are you doing?

Messages of this sort usually have the effect of leaving you excited and giddy in anticipation of Leehan’s inevitable arrival to your doorstep. But now, all you feel is annoyance as you read the text and plague yourself over what to say.

You type and delete several versions of a response that ultimately boils down to i’m too busy trying not to fail all of my classes which i wouldn’t be failing if it weren’t for all of the time i spend either thinking about you or fucking you , but in the end, you resolutely decide not to respond at all.

In fact, in a move surely colored by the resentment you’ve allowed to grow for far too long now, you turn on read receipts so he knows you chose to disregard him on purpose.

You then continue typing away at one of the three essays that are past due, hoping you can forget about Leehan and return to the focus you had before receiving the message and being reminded of the past week’s events. You’re pleased when you look up after a few moments to see that an hour has passed and your attention hasn’t lingered.

Just as you open a new tab to begin the reading for your second essay, the indistinguishable sound of a knock at your door stirs your attention otherwise.

You look around your shared dorm space. Your roommate went home for break already and hasn’t been here for the past few days. Assuming she communicated that to her friends, you know whoever’s on the other side of the door shouldn’t be for her.

It could be an RA, though you couldn’t imagine why.

Deciding to confront your curiosity head on, you get up to open the door and feel your eyes widen when it’s Leehan leaning against the doorframe.

Dressed comfortably in a hoodie and cargo pants, he looks up to greet you, smirking at the sight of your looming silhouette. “Hello,” he says casually, as if his sudden appearance was known to you before now.

There’s a strange mixture of excitement and dread that swirls inside of you the moment you see him. Because on one hand, just a look from him is something that gives you uncontrollable butterflies. You truly do like being around Leehan. But you feel like you have no control over the fact that you will let him in, even though you have every reason not to.

He’ll fuck you, give you some of the best pleasure of your life, and will leave right afterwards, making you feel shitty.

You’ll exerience the greatest high followed by the greatest low.

And already in anticipation of how terrible you’ll feel in the aftermath of this inevitable scenario, it’s as if you’re body is already making space for the knife that will surely tear through your heart when this ends.

“What are you doing here?” you ask, though you already have a strong feeling what the answer will be.

He’ll play coy, changing the subject by asking another question in response to your question.

“Aren’t you gonna let me in?” he says next, even though you both know the true reason why he’s come.

And because you like to feel like you have even the smallest semblance of control over the situation, you don’t give in to him easily, making a face of mock contemplation before replying, “Not if you don’t answer the question first.”

“Did you know that peppermint dwarf angelfish require a very specific type of fish food?” he asks, and because you’re so used to these divertive, weird diatribes he’s always so inclined to go on, all you can do is try and follow along. “I had to come all the way up here to find the only shop in Korea that sells it. And while I was already up here, I figured it wouldn’t hurt to stop by your dorm and say hi.”

You tilt your head as you stare at him, considering bitterly whether he could be telling the truth or not.

But of course, his serious expression quickly melts into a smirk as he explains himself. “I’m kidding, Y/N. Not about the fishes, but about why I’m here. I wanted to see you, so I came.”

There’s something that’s really disgustingly cocky and self-centered about him just showing up to your door without warning with the unsaid though obvious expectation of sex.

And yet, would he be wrong to have that expectation, when so many times before you’ve let him for that exact purpose?

He must be able to see the conflicting thoughts you’re having reflected on your expression, because from behind his back, he reveals a bouquet of flowers. You don’t know how you didn’t notice he was holding them until now, a colorful array of peonies and roses with, upon further inspection, a bunch of cardboard fishes placed among the petals.

You can’t help but smile as you take them from him.

“I brought flowers?” he says, his voice titled in an expression of this being an olive branch, his way of expressing apology, though for what you don’t know. For showing up here unannounced? For putting you through so much obvious emotional turmoil? You’re not sure.

There is something at least a little romantic about him boldly showing up at your doorstep instead of waiting for you to respond to his text. Though, through another, more cynical lens, you could also call it kind of creepy. Should you go with the latter interpretation, you know you would be sending the worse kind of message by letting him in anyway. You’d essentially be confirming to him that this relationship is on his terms, that he can show up to your place whenever he wants to get his dick wet, regardless of if you’re busy like you are now.

But isn’t that what this has always been between the two of you? Once again, you feel helpless in the face of the unbounding energy his presence causes. You can only watch the rest of the nights events play out like a bad movie you’ve seen far too many times, like you’re a witness from outside your own body and life.

You walk away from Leehan, leaving your door open so he knows he can come in. You place the flowers neatly on the table next to the entrance. It’s when you face the kitchenette of your dorm that you realize just how cluttered the place is; too stressed about your schoolwork, you haven’t put any thought into keeping it clean.

“Sorry,” you mutter sheepishly under your breath as you hear Leehan come in and close the door behind him. “It’s kind of a mess in here.”

He chuckles, as if to agree without having to say it plainly and hurt your feelings. You turn to face him and find that he’s already looking at you, a penetrating expression on his face as he asks, “Are you okay?”

You’ve never found that question as hard to answer as it is right now, especially when it’s his voice doing the questioning.

Should you say that you’re on the verge of failing all of your classes, a circumstance you’ve never once had to worry about until he came into your life, causing a whirwhild of uncontainable emotions to take over your life?

That you’ve been questioning everything when it comes to your own self-esteem and worthiness because it feels like you’re nothing if you’re not validated by the fleeting yet addicting warmth of his gaze and attention?

In the time that it takes you to think, you realize that Leehan has come closer, his body in front of you so that now you can’t escape from the kitchen counter against your back that blocks you in completely. Dazed by the proximity of him, you forget what you were asked, and are grateful when he doesn’t press you for an answer. It’s better for both of you if you don’t respond, anyway, because your honesty would surely kill the mood.

“You know what might make you feel better?” he asks, and you fight back a cynical giggle at the fact that he doesn’t even have to hear you say it to know that you need to be made better. “Fucking the shit out of me.”

As always, his moments of sudden candor simultaneously make you laugh and cringe because of how ill-fitting they are to the persona he occupies in your mind. You’ve always liked how awkward and strange Leehan is, which is why his fuckboy tendencies have always landed uneasily for you.

It becomes too easy, then, to tease him by pretending you didn’t hear his outward expression of desire. “I don’t like the way you look at people,” you say, trying your hand at his usual divertive tactics. “It’s like you can see through them.”

You can always appreciate how even when you sidestep his advances, Leehan always plays into your banter, never pressuring you into action. “It’s because I can. BOO!” he exclaims, mouth open in an o shape as he childishly expresses fright. You muster a laugh at his playfulness.

After that, you’re both silent, and you know it’s because you’re both tired of playing games. You’re at the point now where it becomes obvious in both of your piercing gazes that you want to fuck, and now it’s just about who will make the move first.

Suddenly conscious of Leehan’s long hair and how it hangs over the sides of his face, you reach your arms up to take pieces of it into your hands. There’s a rubber band on your wrist that you use to try and put it in a ponytail so you can see his features better, but before you can finish, he takes the opportunity of your increased closness to kiss you.

The intensity of his kiss knocks the air out of your lungs, and you let go of his hair before you can finish tying it up. Because of your close proximity, it falls over the sides of your own face, obscuring the rest of the world from you so that it’s just him in your vision.

His hands rest on the apex of your hips, and he pushes you slightly so that you’re completely backed up against the kitchen counter. You’d thought you’d feel more urgent, but your movements are leisurely as you bring your hands to his hoodie and begin to pull at the buttons holding it together. As the fabric begins to sag off his arms, he starts kissing at your neck, and you tilt your head to the side to accommodate him.

Once his shirt has fallen to the ground, you then work to release his cock from the confines of his pants, pushing at the thankfully loose waistband until it springs out against his naked stomach. You jerk him slowly and leisurely but it causes him to groan into your mouth just the same, and soon he’s moving to unbutton your own t-shirt until you’re both naked from the waist up.

“Leehan,” you whimper, as he cups your tits with both hands, “Bed.”

“Which one? I take it your roommate’s is empty?” he replies jokingly, and when you stare at him scathingly, he chuckles. “I’m kidding. Don’t look at me like that or I’ll come in my pants.”

You have no chance to scold Leehan for his teasing any further before he’s picking you up off the ground, your legs wrapping around his waist and hands around his neck as he walks habitually to your bedroom. He’s still on top of you even as you feel yourself being lowered onto your bed, mouth on yours in a sloppy kiss while his hands rush to get your pants off. He sits up to kick his own off, and now the two of you are left completely naked.

This would usually be the point where the two of you would become like animals and rush to fuck as soon as possible. But while standing above your body, you watch as Leehan just stares at your still figure on the bed, taking in every detail with his penetrative, admiring eyes.

“I find you so beautiful,” he softly confesses, caressing the skin on your hip before looking up to meet your shy gaze. “Do you know that?”

It’s unclear whether he’s asking if you know that you’re beautiful, or if you know that he finds you beautiful. Either way, it’s in a moment of sincere honesty that you reply, “Only sometimes.”

Because there are days when you look in the mirror or put on your clothes on your way to campus and feel like your body is less of a home, but a prison that you’re forever doomed to occupy.

And with the emotional rollercoaster that is having sex with Leehan only for him to completely ignore you afterward, you’ve naturally found yourself wondering if the only alluring thing about you is that you’ll let him fuck you with no questions asked. That in a school full of beautiful girls with actual self-esteem, he’s settled for you so long as you continue to provide him with pussy.

Leehan furrows his eyebrows at your response, and with a corrective tone of voice replies, “ Always .” In movements that are slow and gentle, he leans down to lay a chaste kiss on your forehead. Another on the top of your cheek. Another on your ear. And then on every single part of your face that you’d normally consider insignificant. And then slowly down your rising and falling torso.

“Everything about you. I couldn’t pick a favorite thing because I love every single part of you,” he confesses in a whisper-like tone against your skin. Finally reaching your pussy, he places one last gentle kiss at the top of your mound, something about the gesture making your pussy clench, espeically as he says, “You’re my favorite girl.”

To be affirmed by Leehan in this way is something that causes both your heart to swell and your body to pulse with arousal. But it’s also with a surge of sadness that you wish these words didn’t affect you so monumentally.

A part of you wants him to stop making remarks of this sort to you during sex because you can never be sure that he truly means them.

But if that’s the case, then why do they feel and sound so genuine?

It’s with shaky resoluteness in your voice that you sit up to look at Leehan, replying, “Then show me.”

And, as if spurred on by the challenge, you can see Leehan’s expression changing even with half of his face obscured by your pussy. “How?” he asks, leaning in to lick teasingly against your clit. “Like this?”

When he doesn’t wait for your answer and continues sucking and licking against your clit, you throw your head back as you enjoy the physical manifestations of Leehan’s attraction to you.

If there is any time when you feel most desired and liked by him, it’s when he’s in between your legs, devouring you whole like a man starved.

He uses his mouth not to tell you sweet-nothings, but to give you some of the best pleasure of your life. And it’s in gestures like these where you can wordlessly understand his devotion to you.

It’s in your desperation to reach your peak that you begin to buck your hips into his mouth, wanting more of him, but he stops it with both hands that snake up your body and press down on your boobs. He tweaks at your nipples in a way that makes your back arch, but in a gesture that surprises you, he also just rests his hand over your chest, right where your heart is. You wonder if he can feel the fluctuations of your pulse, how it speeds up when his tongue does. Dreamily, the thought of him being so in sync with you that he can feel the intimate beatings of your inner organ sends you into a spiral of heightened satisfaction.

“Leehan, I’m gonna come.”

Even with your eyes closed, you can almost hear the smirk in his voice as he says, “My favorite four words in the world. Go ahead, baby. I’ve got you.”

Somehow, you think your body needed that permission, because it’s only moments later that your orgasm takes over your body.

Your eyelids are covered with dancing spirals, your spine bends as you arch up into the air, and your body vibrates with a feeling so pleasurable it’s like an addiction, something you’d endure the greatest emotional lows to receive on a regular basis.

As you still, Leehan gets up to sit on his knees, looking over at your bedside dresser. “Still have the condoms where I left them?”

“Top drawer,” you confirm.

“Good girl,” he praises with a smile, reaching over you to rummage through the drawer and coming out of it with a silver packet between his fingers.

It’s just as he’s finished putting it on and is about to slide in that you raise a hand to stop him, saying, “Leehan wait. I wanna ride you.”

His eyebrows raise at this, but he nonetheless maneuvers so that he’s in a criss-cross position, saying with a grin, “Woah. I feel lucky. You never get on top. Make me do all the work.”

“Shut up,” you grumble, making your way over to him and holding onto his shoulders as you hover over his hardened cock. But before you can take him, he roughly grabs your chin, squeezing your face in his hold in a way that forces your eyes on his.

“Make me,” he asserts, staring at you so intensely that it makes your stomach swoop. Reaching between your bodies, you grab hold of his pulsing erection and line it up with your hole, sinking down on him and loving the way it makes both of your mouths instantly open on impact.

It feels like you’re being split open in the most pleasurable way as you sit down fully on Leehan’s cock and allow the satisfcation of being filled by him to consume you. Driven by the pursuit of your own pleasure, you bounce, swivel, and thrust yourself against him. And when Leehan throws his head back, beautiful neck on display as he growls, “You’re so tight, Y/N,” you’re motivated to go even harder.

Sex with Leehan has never felt more intimate than it does now, when you’re above him and able to catch every small distortion in his gorgeous expression as he gets taken away by the gratification of this sex. Mantaining eye contact with him is nothing new to you now, but even so, you find yourself feeling like his eyes are admiring your soul more than they are your body or face as you bounce up and down for his viewing pleasure.

With your arms wrapped around his neck, you’re skin to skin, heart to heart, and in a way you almost feel like the closeness grants you the telepathic ability to know what he’s feeling and thinking. If there were to be a physical manifestation of the word yearning , it would be this exact moment between the two of you.

Your expression melts into a smirk as you continue to ride him, and you feel almost motivated to giggle as the pleasure you’re experiencing makes you feel deliriously satisfied and happy. Leehan, with his hands leisurely rested at his sides, scans your face as if trying to memorize every detail, saying, “You make the prettiest expressions when my dick is inside of you. I truly can’t – nphhh – get enough.”

It’s as you begin to set a pace that has the tip of his cock kissing your g-spot with every bounce that you yearn for him to touch you, to light your skin on fire with the warmth of his touch. Anywhere. Everywhere. “Leehan, touch me .”

And it’s because he’s come to know your body so well, know exactly what makes you tick and what places to touch that have you crying in pleasure, he brings his hand to your clit and starts rubbing incoherent shapes into your swelling bud. Your body feels like it’s on fire, so much so that you begin to lose strength in your trembling thighs, something Leehan picks up on as he says almost desperately, “Faster, Y/N. Take it.”

You have to fight through the strain in your legs and the building tension in your stomach in order to begin bouncing on Leehan so hard it’s as if your life depends on it. And though it feels like it’s taking all of the energy in your body, you do it because you want to make him feel good.

You do it because you want him to continue thinking of you as his favorite girl, even though that statement in itself implies the existence of other girls.

Even though it feels like every morsel of your self-esteem is shattered in the process, you do it because his attention means so much to you that it blurs everything else.

“ Fuck , I’m gonna come,” you cry out as the pleasure becomes too much, as it begins to feels like everything else in your vision is obscured except for Leehan.

“Open your mouth,” you hear him say, and although your sex-crazed mind can barely comprehend why he’s asking you that, you comply anyways and feel your arousal growing stronger when, to your surpise, he tips your head back with a hand on your jaw and spits into your mouth.

The gesture is dirty and lewd and yet a moan rips out of you just the same, and the closer that your orgasm inches, the less you feel like you’re in control of your body or your reactions. Every thought and will in your brain has been diluted so that your only objective is to reach your peak.

“You like that, pretty?” he asks teasingly, his own orgasm approaching in a way that causes his voice to come out strained and tight. “Let me see what a dirty girl you are. Come all over my cock.”

Whimpers of his name leave your mouth in broken succession, the robustness of your orgasm milking you until your body quite literally collapses against his. And it’s after giving everything that your body could give, your legs trembling and your body screaming out in exhaustion, that Leehan takes over by thrusting wildly up into you. In search of his own climax, you can only whimper weakly into the skin of his neck and allow him to manhandle your limp body up and down his cock.

“I know, I know,” he coos apolgetically in your ear, fucking up into you hard and firmly. “I”m close. Gonna come inside your pretty little pussy.”

With a last thrust so impactful that it resonates throughout your entire body, Leehan releases into his condom, twisting his hips inside of you before pulling out with a groan. You collapse onto the bed together, and even though you can barely feel anything in the bottom half of your body, even though you have the foreboding inclination that it’ll be hard to walk later, you still can’t help the foolish smile that appears automatically on your face. There is no greater high than basking in your post-orgasm haze.

The stillness of the moments you share after sex is something you cling onto every time, wishing that the universe would mercifully turn those seconds of blissful and intimate silence between the two of you into minutes. But like the distant sound of thunder that lets you know that it’s going to rain, you feel the bed dip with the weight of Leehan sitting up, knowing that it’s only a matter of time before he sees himself out.

“You made a mess,” you hear him say as he picks at the fabric of your sheets where, sure enough, the white sheets have been soiled grey. The comment gives you slight butterflies, and as you manage a weak smile, about to reply with something snarky, he says, “Want me to stay behind? Do your laundry?”

If only for a few seconds, you allow yourself to consider the possibility that he’s being serious. That for the first time since you met him, he’s actually going to stay behind and take care of you instead of leaving you wet and limp and naked and sad. You hate how good those few seconds of belief feel. That just the idea of how doing something as simple as your laundry could make you feel so fulfilled and wanted.

At first you’re not sure what to think when he leans down to gently caress the hair on top of your head. But then, with an almost pitying expression on his face, he replies, “I’m just joking. If I hang around for too long, how would you miss me?”

There have been lots of times when Leehan has shown his lack of regard for you in his actions, but never in his words.

So to hear him plainly confirm to you that this is all a game to him, that it’s always been his intention to leave you strung out and wanting more, that he knows the emotional impact his absence causes, hits you like a slap in the face.

He doesn’t have to hide how little he cares about you because he knows that no matter how he treats you, you’ll always come back.

Haven’t you proven that exact notion to him time and time again?

“See you later, Y/N,” he says as he’s leaving your bedroom, a statement that he can make with confidence because you’ve shown him time and time again that he can walk all over you and still be guaranteed access to your body, mind and soul.

And as the reality of the situation that you’ve found yourself in hits you all at once, it’s at the sound of your front door closing that you begin to cry on impact.

Tears that feel endless begin to pour out onto your cheeks until you’re open-mouthed sobbing, and because you’ve spent so long holding these emotions back, they wreck your body until you have no energy left and devolve into soundless heaves.

You fall asleep like this, so emotionally wrecked and confused that you forgot about the three essays you were supposed to submit.

You’re on the verge of tears as you enter your advisor’s office, sitting down across from the older woman whose passive expression tells you everything you need to know about the sort of news she’s about to deliver to you. But it’s with surprising clarity that you react to her saying, “Y/N, you’ve failed almost every single one of your classes this term.”

You stare blankly at her, processing the emotions that come over you at this news. It’s suprsing to say that the immediate feeling that comes over you is relief, but you owe it to the fact that you’ve been struggling this entire semester, plagued with anxiety as to whether or not you’d fail. And so, to have it finally confirmed after months of stressing about it feels similarly to being in the eye of a storm.

After struggling for so long, you’re at a vantage point where it feels more comforting to be able to say that all that’s left is for you to fight your way out of the storm entirely.

“Typically, when students have such large and sudden drops in performance like this, it’s because of some significant life event,” she explains, tilting her head as she looks at you pitifully. “Given that you’re a transfer student, I’m wondering if the transition from your old school to this one had an impact on your performance. Are you finding the academic rigor here harder?”

“No, maam,” you say, shaking your head. Academically, this school has been everything you had been hoping for and more since deciding to transfer. You couldn’t have expected to meet someone who so greatly turned your life around within a matter of months.

Not sure how to explain the unique set of circumstances leading up to this moment, you vaguely answer, “I’ve just…transparently had a lot going on this semester in my personal life. So I haven’t been as great at prioritizing my classes.”

Humming in understanding, your advisor moves to face her computer. “Well, I’m afraid the next steps are to put you on academic probation for the rest of this semester. Are you aware of what that all entails?”

You shake your head no. Your advisor goes on to explain it to you. “You’ll need to maintain at least a 2.5 grade point average moving forward. Additionally, you’ll be given a tutor – another student who you’ll be mandated to meet with at least once a week to get your grades up.”

There a few telltale clicking sounds from her computer before she’s speaking up again to say, “It looks like the only available tutor for this semester is a student named Han Taesan. Do you know him?”

Admittedly only familiar with the few people who Jaehyun’s introduced you to, you shake your head no. You then have to try and push off the dread that builds inside of you at the thought of having to meet with a stranger once a week for the next two or so months until the semester ends.

You perk up as you watch your advisor’s eyebrows lift in surprise at something on her computer “It looks like he actually has office hours open right now until three. So, after this, I recommend you go see him and introduce yourself. It’s important that you get started right away so that you can begin correcting this situation. The last thing we’d want is for your financial aid to be affected, which – I should mention – will happen if you fail your classes again, Y/N.”

It’s at this warning that the reality of the situation finally hits you.

As stupid as it now sounds, all of the times when you allowed Leehan to take up so much of your time in lieu of submitting your assignments were aided by a blind faith on your part that everything would work out in the end.

But it’s in grave realization that you see how much you were gambling with your future by making such poor decisions.

And with that feeling of shame and embarrassment weighing down on you so heavily, you leave your advisor's office a few short moments later, heading to the library to meet Taesan.

As you’re leaving, you feel your phone buzzing in your pocket and unlock it to read a text that could not be more ill timed:

>leehan: what are you doing?

There couldn’t be any worse moment now than to receive such a message, after you’ve just been told that you could potentially lose your scholarship over your mindless decision making in regards to this man. And for perhaps the first time since you’ve met Leehan, you decide to let go of this manic-pixie-dream-girl image you’ve created for yourself, typing out a message that relays the completely honesty of your current situation.

>you: leehan, i failed my midterms. They’re putting me on academic probation and i might lose my scholarship. I don’t know that i’ll have much time for our “arrangement” anymore.

You stuff your phone back in your pocket right after sending it, caring little to know what Leehan will say in response.

It’s in realization that you finally decide that making Leehan’s every thought, feeling and desire a priority in your life is a luxury you can no longer afford.

Arriving at the library a few minutes later, you wa;lw inside and observe how empty the place is. You suppose it makes sense given that most students have left for their fall break by now, not beholden to stay behind because of failing grades like you are. There’s a boy sitting by himself at one of the many tables in the library, a laptop and a few books surrounding him. You decide he’s the most likely to be the person you’re looking for and go up to approach him.

“Excuse me, are you Han Taesan?”

The boy, whose hair is uniquely marked by a streak of blonde in the back of it, looks up at you and nods.

“I’m not sure if you got the notification,” you say, pulling at your fingernails nervously. “But I’ve been assigned a tutor and you’re it. My advisor told me to meet with you today.”

Understanding finally dawning on the boy’s face, he puts down the screen of his laptop so he can fully pay attention to you and your presence. “Okay. What’s your name?”

“Y/N.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Y/N,” he says, and even though everything from his voice and manners should have you inclined to feel less nervous, there’s something about his facial features that have you feeling intimidated.

He’s quite good looking, but in a way that makes him seem unapproachable.

“If you’ve been assigned to meet with me, that means you’re on academic probation, correct?”

Something about hearing those words, the assignment of your name next to the phrase academic probation , feels like a knife to the stomach. Still, the only thing you can do is nod grimly, and without intending it, you launch defensively into an explanation. “It’s not something I’m in the habit of, if that’s what you’re wondering. This is my first time, truly, and it’s just because I had a lot going on this semester.”

You expect Taesan to appear annoyed with you, just as you are with yourself when you hear those words leave your mouth. But you’re surprised when instead, he smiles. And when he does, it’s like the intimidating persona you built of him in your head immediately shatters and in place of it, you’re introduced to someone that seems really sweet.

“Listen, I know you’re probably feeling like a total failure right now. I know cause I’ve been there. But you don’t have to explain yourself to me, Y/N. The last thing I want to do is make you feel judged for something that so many students go through,” he explains, shrugging his shoulders to further communicate how little of an issue this is for him.

“Most of the time, the people I tutor don’t even need me. They’re not dumb, they just were going through something that made them deprioritize their classes. We’ve all been there before. I’m just here to be an accountability partner and help you manage the stress.”

Fighting against all the parts of you that have been feeling shame in response to today’s development, you allow Taesan’s reassurance to wash over you like a cold drink on a swelteringly hot day.

“You’re…really nice, Taesan,” you reply, thinking of no better way to express your gratitude. “I really needed to hear that.”

“No problem. If you’re free, we can go somewhere else and begin working on those late assignments. I don’t really like staying at the library because we’ll be forced to whisper like this the whole time.”

It’s only at his observation that you become conscious of the fact that you have been indeed whispering this entire time, and it is in fact, very burdensome. “Yeah, you’re totally right. Are you cool with coming to my dorm? I live on campus, in Commons.”

Grabbing his things, he gets up to follow you, and it’s at that moment that you realize just how tall Taesan is. “Sure. Let’s do it.”

Just as you’re about to leave with Taesan, you feel your phone buzzing in your pocket once more. And because you completely forgot about your earlier exchange with Leehan, you don’t even consider that the message could be from him until a picture that you’re immediately swiping out of lights up your phone screen.

>leehan: he misses you :((((( [img_6785]

The image in question is a dick pic, a full frontal image with Leehan’s smartly masked face just barely peeking out at the top as he angles his phone downward.

You go from surprised to disgusted as you remember what the picture is in response to – a candid expression of anxiety about your academic probabtion – and suddenly, you couldn’t be more sure of the negative impact that Leehan has had on your life.

More sure that if you never heard from him after today, it would be the universe's greatest gift.

“Are you okay?” asks Taesan from beside you, and it’s with great gratitude that you observe his reaction is not that of someone who accidentally saw a dick pic on someone elses phone. Steeling yourself from the shock of the unexpected message, you hum an affirmative sounding noise in reply, and with that, you exit the library.

You walk together to your dorm that’s only 5 minutes away from the library, and as you walk, you discuss a variety of things. How and why Taesan became a tutor, the circumstances which led to you transferring from your old school, and observations on how empty campus seems to be right now. Taesan, a music major, became a tutor once he learned he could get paid for what he already liked to do, which was teach people. The more you talk to him, the more assured you feel about this arraignment and your situation at large.

More importantly, Taesan has the ability to do something you thought no man or object could be capable of – he takes your mind off of Leehan, and moreover the picture you just received from him.

Arriving at your front door, you can feel Taesan’s eyes on you as he says, “When I started my day today, I would’ve never guessed it would lead me to a girl’s dorm room.” You giggle at the genuinely funny joke, and now, you’re looking up at Taesan as if you’re fully seeing him for the first time.

In just a short amount of time, you’re learned that Taesan is handsome, smart, nice, and funny.

Perhaps something other than good grades could come of this time you’re about to spend together.

In the time that you spend looking at Taesan, still smiling in the aftermath of his joke as you let him into your dorm room, you don’t notice the fact that Leehan is waiting for you down the hallway, armed once more with a bouquet of flowers.

After last time, he figured surprise visits would be his thing now, especially since he knew your roommate wouldn’t be there to stop him.

He wasn’t expecting, though, that there would be someone else who would act as a barrier between the two of you.

Someone who causes unexplainable anger and resentment to blossom unusually in his chest.

It’s in a blur of confusion – both at himself for reacting this way and at you for being with someone other than him – that Leehan turns around and rushes for the building’s exit before either of you can see him.

part 4 can be found HERE

taglist: @lailols @papichulomacy @0310s @softiwoon @gardenforwon @cherrytaesan @mryuyux @saintriots @lonelylandofan @cyber-tiny @keyywrld @isabellah29 @amarecerasus @cadidupped

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#leehan #boynextdoor #leehan smut #boynextdoor smut #leehan x reader #leehan fluff #leehan angst #boynextdoor fics #hornychristianprincess #donghyun boynextdoor #boy next door smut #donghyun smut #donghyun boy next door smut #kpop smut #kpop angst #kpop fluff #i literally blinked and suddenlly i was at 15k words lol

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chuluoyi · 1 year

Text

heartbreak hotel

- gojo satoru x reader

so you're going on a three-day-two-night getaway trip with the one and only Gojo Satoru. the catch? you two have just broken up.

genre/warnings: crack, jealousy, a dose of pettiness, hurt/comfort, fluff, zero angst i promise, suguru being a good buddy to his boyfriend best friend

notes: inspired by a very real life story :))) anyways, it takes place in an au where suguru never left and all is well with our little meow meow catoru the wonderful colored manga panel by the talented @redbluenight! this was so much fun to write (that it turned into a whopping 3k+ word, so sorry) and i even made a playlist while on it ;)

general masterlist

"He's intolerable!"

There were many things that led to the end of your relationship with Gojo Satoru, but if asked one word to sum it, then that was it.

When you started this thing with him, obviously you had never planned on how it would end―who started a relationship with that sort of mindset anyway? But if you could choose, you definitely wouldn't want it to end with dramatic shouting match that left you in tears.

Anyways, some things were just not meant to be. You refused to spend your whole life crying over that smug bastard, and so you moved on.

However, if there's one thing you've learned about plans, it is that whenever you already make a foolproof one, the world always has some funny way to mess it up.

Like this time.

"I... I remembered saving for months," you stammered dumbly, staring blankly at Shoko in front of you. The realization felt like a spiritual ascent. "I paid for that damn plane ticket and hotel with my whole saving. I can't just throw them away."

How could you possibly forget about this? This graduation trip that had been planned between your group of Satoru, Suguru, Shoko and yourself for months now. It was meant to be a getaway, a celebration of your most significant achievement after four years of barely getting by on exorcising curses and not dying in the process. This was supposed to be the ultimate milestone celebration in your life.

"Then don't," Shoko replied simply, twisting the cigarette in her mouth. "I'm still going though. No way I'm wasting that money."

"But!" you vehemently hissed. "He will be there. It means I have to see him for three days straight!"

Your cringeworthy breakup happened just barely a week ago. You had sworn in front of Gojo Satoru that you didn't want to see his face again, and yet in less than a week from now, you and him would literally share the same space―again?

"Can't I get a refund?"

"This late? Nah, it's like yay or nay at this point."

You slumped in frustration. Were the gods making you swallow your own words now? You were left with no other choice. Your frugality and tendency to get broke often compelled you to make the decision.

You were going on this trip whether he was there or not.

Meanwhile, on his end, the said smug bastard was brooding, groaning and pacing over the same predicament. Satoru had two options and had weighed them all, and somehow he still arrived at the more seemingly no-good decision.

"I'm going, duh!"

"You are?" Suguru asked with a hint of surprise in his voice. "Well, might be the first time I've seen someone agree to go on an overnight trip with his ex..."

"Hmph. I just don't like squandering money."

Suguru snorted, unimpressed. “Satoru, you have an entire fortune. The airfare is just an amount you'd donate to charity. Besides, you have wasted more than that.”

“Well, I want to enjoy my youth too! I’m going—who cares if she’ll be there!”

He was still miffed, recalling the day your argument spiraling out of control. How could you say those hurtful things to him?

“You never take things seriously—heck, I’m not even sure if you’re ever taking me seriously at all! Satoru, you’re always acting all high and mighty, but you’re just a selfish little twat!”

No way. The last time, he was left in the dust, not being able to say anything in his defense. So now, he would use this chance to be the one who had the last laugh. He was going, because he was 70% sure that you wouldn’t let your hard-earned money go to waste.

And he was right when two days later, he found you at the airport with a bitter scoff upon seeing him.

“Hey, sweetheart,” he moistened his lower lip in that obnoxious way. “Missed me?”

You walked past him, tone lacing with disdain. “Get lost, Gojo.”

He couldn’t help the prickling sensation in his chest when you dismissed him just like that. And the use of his last name—whereas you used to call him with all sort of available pet names? Now that was just low.

“Nah, you can’t get away from me that easily, Y/N,” Satoru sniggered. “You’re going to see me for the next three days, so suck it up and enjoy the sight,” and then the idiot proceeded to pump his fist in the air. “Wooo! Kyushu, here I go!”

Suguru and Shoko merely observed your icy interactions in silence, occasionally exchanging glances from time to time.

ITINERARY ::: DAY 1 — BEACH DAY @ SEASIDE HOTEL

After the three-hour flight, the four of you arrived at Karatsu, one of the main highlights in your trip—or back then, one you and Satoru handpicked yourselves.

You swore you still had your heart frozen for him, so you didn’t know what stirred it when you saw him giggling and doubling over in carefree delight, surrounded by those beach girls in skimpy bikinis.

“Hey, handsome~ is this even okay?” one of the girls in pink thong scooted closer to him, asking him with this cheap seductive grin. “Won’t your girlfriend be mad?”

At that moment, you could’ve sworn Satoru threw you a glance from the corner of his eye before replying with a triumphant bark. “What girlfriend? I’m wholly and happily single!”

The hell?

A rush of squeals grated your nerves as they swarmed your ex-boyfriend, prompting you to stalk away in irritation.

Absolutely not. You wouldn’t let this fine establishment be your heartbreak hotel any longer.

Gojo Satoru knew fully that he was petty. He let you see that on purpose just to rile you up, because frankly, he still felt like he didn’t deserve your messy breakup at all.

But when you were no longer in his eyesight, suddenly the urge to entertain these strangers dissipated, and what remained was this hollow sensation in his chest. You not paying him attention somehow made him crave it all the more.

He recalled how you pointed out that playing in the clear waters would be your ideal graduation gift. He specifically recommended this place himself and you had agreed. He remembered planning all of this, dragging Suguru and Shoko too just to make it merrier. To keep that cute smile on your face.

You were supposed to fool around with him in the clear waters of Matsubara Beach, splashing and pulling him underwater.

And yet in reality, he was toying with these questionable women and in your eyes, he was nothing but an irritable twat.

He didn’t see you again until evening, during dinner time. And the sight before him made him want to pull Suguru to the side and trap him inside his unlimited void.

"Really?" Your clear voice rang in his ears, every bit the same as when you would energetically question him with those doe eyes of yours, as you peered at Suguru. "We should go together tomorrow then!"

His eyes twitched.

What has his life come to? Reduced into seeing his ex-girlfriend possibly going on a date with his best friend?

He almost hoped that you'd stage up your pettiness level. It was worse because unlike him, you didn't make this up just to gauge his reaction.

That night, in their shared hotel room, he ignored Suguru completely, as well as silently waiting for him to divulge where he and you were going tomorrow.

"Hey Satoru—"

"Shut up, I'm trying to sleep."

It was obviously a wrong move, because Suguru apparently caught the hint and stayed quiet as a mouse throughout the night.

ITINERARY ::: DAY 2 — HOT SPRING @ KUMAMOTO

Or at least, last he remembered, that was the agenda.

Until he saw that only Shoko who was there, idling around at the hot spring area.

"Where are the others? Why is it only you here?"

She shrugged. "Geto said he's going to try the local specialties. Dunno where. As for me, I'm going to enjoy this onsen to the fullest."

Shoko noticed his irritated scowl, and a sly grin crept across her face.

"Heh, jealous much now, Gojo?"

Meanwhile, you and Suguru went to various dessert shops in town as per his invitation. Perhaps he took pity on you because you really seemed not to be having any fun at all after you stormed off from the beach area yesterday.

"Mmm! This is tasty!" you remarked, munching away the three-colored dango happily. You were so engrossed in eating today that you no longer had any room to think about anything else, which was a good thing.

Suguru smiled. "I'm glad you're enjoying yourself now." However, he appeared to have something on his mind, prompting you to hum and tilt your head in curiosity.

"No, it's just... so it's really over between you and Satoru?"

You let out a snort. "Yeah. Totally. He's an ass."

"He really is miserable, you know..."

"Nah, he doesn't look like it."

Your friend sighed. "Honestly, what was the argument even about? Both of you usually didn't take it this far."

You didn't want to go back to that topic, really. But Suguru was always the one with cooler head, and after his kindness today, maybe you could spare him a detail or two.

"It's a lot of little things that have piled up, you know," you mumbled. "It's probably just how he is, and I know. But I finally reached my boiling point. Why can't he try to see things from my perspective? Everything that's important to me doesn't seem to matter to him, and relationships need two people, not just one who resigns and the other who does anything he pleases."

And until now, you doubted if Satoru even realized what he did wrong. That was what hurt you the most. Like you were so small in his eyes, like he could toy with you and get away with it.

As you expected, Suguru would understand your point. "So that's how you feel... Yeah, I think I get it."

You thought he would end it at that, but then he went on. "I'm not defending him, Y/N. I think some time away from you would do him good, but later, maybe you can talk this to him? See if he will understand?"

"I already did, so many times." You narrowed your eyes at him. "Not to offend you, but it awfully seems like you're defending him, Suguru, despite you saying otherwise."

"I'm saying this because sometimes we can forget that Satoru is different," he explained sympathetically, and to be honest, you were surprised by his statement. "He is born exalted. He has a hard time comprehending things that come to us naturally. I just think it's a pity if... you can actually fix this, but just because bad communication, you lose the chance to."

Have you properly communicated this to him? Now that you thought about it, most of the times you would just get mad and point at the little things he missed, but never actually told him how it made you feel.

Your mind was still muddled with the fact Suguru had shed light on even after you got back to ryokan where you were staying for the night. The two of you were in for a surprise though as apparently there was a festival happening there.

Everything seemed to spark with glitters. The bamboo lanterns, lights, the gentle breeze. It created an undeniably romantic ambiance, to be honest.

You didn't know when Suguru slipped away, but suddenly, you found yourself alone amidst the visitors and dim lights.

And you found yourself to be immensely lonely.

Satoru spotted you in all your solitary glory amidst the sea of people in this godforsaken place.

No, actually it was a pretty great inn and attraction, but this trip had been horrible so far, and so he just felt everything was bad.

But at that moment, bitterness no longer clouded his mind, because you were so beautiful, bathed in the glow of the lights that Shoko had forcibly dragged him to see. If it were up to him, he'd spend the last night sleeping his heartbreak away, but now that he was here, he was thankful to see the dazzling sight of you that reminded him once again just what made him hopelessly in love with you.

And why he didn't get his sorry ass back into your good graces faster.

He retraced everything had brought both of you to this point. Your last fight was about what again? Him not telling you any news when he would be back from a mission?

No matter how he thought about it, it was a trivial matter. So what made you mad? He kept thinking, and then he imagined switching places with you. What if you didn't text him at all for three days straight? How would he feel? Oh, he would be despondent, of course.

Now he was starting to understand. He had done that so many times he could no longer keep count. Granted, you would be angry.

Satoru suddenly know how to rectify this. He can make things right. He would be damned if he didn't. He just had to pull you aside, and he was going to when he lost sight you in the crowd.

Okay, now he was frantic, as the longer he didn't see you, the more his opportunity to make amends slipped away. He moved through the crowd, pushing people in the process, earning ire and questionable glares and yet he cared none for it.

He nearly cursed at how his phone kept vibrating incessantly inside his pocket. Begrudgingly, he took it out and almost gasped.

You are calling him.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

It was so incredibly stupid. You just went to pee for a bit and then somehow got yourself locked in the toilet. It might have been fine, but then the lights unexpectedly went out, scaring the shit out of you.

How could such a upscale inn experience a sudden power outage and have doors that wouldn't budge? It was worse when no matter how many times you punched the switch or banged the door, it refused to turn on or open.

You were trapped. Honestly, it took everything you had not to cry.

And so you did the next best thing aside from forcing your way out. You called your friends. First, Shoko, and then Suguru, but both of them somehow didn't pick up the call even after you had called them three times each.

That left you with one possible person left. In your frenzied mind, it didn't even register in your mind what you were doing as the line connected and the last person you'd call on the other side answered.

"Satoru," you shakily breathed out, almost crying—or were you already? You didn't know as you focused on his sharp intake of breath, most likely surprised at how rattled you sound.

"Y/N? What? What is it?"

"I—" you wheezed, hating how helpless you sounded, yet still forced the words out. "I'm locked, it's dark—and it's just so—help! Help me please! I tried getting Shoko but she didn't—"

"Okay, sweetheart, calm down. Calm down, okay?" Satoru's voice brought you some comfort and it helped to reduce your tears, missing how he slipped up by calling you with his usual pet name for you. "Tell me. Where are you?"

"The women's restroom… I think it’s in the east wing."

"I'm coming, okay? Don't panic. I'll be there. Just stay on the line."

You heard his ragged breaths as he muttered several "coming through!" and "excuse me!" from where he was. It made your heart lurch. Despite the spiteful breakup, he rushed to your aid as soon as he realized you were in some kind of trouble.

Was this okay, to let your relationship end just like that?

"I'm outside." And then you heard his voice, much to your relief. "Y/N? Are you there?"

"Yes!" you shouted over the steel door.

You then heard how he rummaged to get the door open, and faintly hear him cursing it. "It won't open."

You wanted to sob, but then Satoru told you with an absolute tone, sounding so sure and demanding that compelled you to comply. "Get away from the door. As far as possible. Take cover."

Oh God, was he going to do what you thought he might do?

...he did. The next thing you knew, the door—and much more than that—was destroyed, and a rush of cursed energy was everywhere. After the blast subsided, you instinctively made a run for it, and you didn't know how, but you ended up stumbling into him.

Satoru caught you in his firm embrace.

"It's okay. You're okay," he cooed, whispering in your ear gently, urging your shivering body to calm down. "You're safe now, Y/N... I'm here. You're safe."

There was always something about your trembling form that made him want to tear down everything and anything in his path just to make you feel secure. And there was always this sense of rightness whenever you snuggled in his arms. Both desires clashed in a contrasting need and want and Satoru could do nothing but keep you close to him, torn between the two.

He kept his hand on your spine, and you clung on him, burying your face in his broad, sturdy chest.

Nevermind the fact that you technically broke up with him. Nevermind that ever since this botched trip started, it was the first occasion in which the two of you held a proper conversation without spewing bravado or sarcasm.

Afterwards, he led you away from the site, and he figured it would be best to go somewhere quieter rather than the festival, and so here you were, at the deserted lounge.

You had calmed down for the most part, and slowly you felt heat in your cheeks. In hindsight, you could've tried using cursed energy to blast the door too, why didn't you think of that earlier?

And yet, unaware of your internal musings, Satoru's thoughts were occupied with another matter entirely, and blame it on his insensitivity—he chose this moment to drop it without hesitation.

"I want you back," he declared, void of any hesitation. "I'll be better, I promise. Those things you hate—tell me, and I'll make sure not to repeat them again."

He wasn't the sharpest when it came to picking up on your feelings, but Satoru vowed that if it bothered you that much, then he would do his best to avoid doing it.

But you... you were still trying your best to grasp the situation. Amidst the plot twist you just experienced tonight, his blatant proclamation was the last thing you expected so you only managed a "What?"

He held your gaze, eerily serious. “I don’t want to break up. It’s hell. We can—I can still fix this.”

He looked sincere, unlike the usual empty promises he’d give you after you went off on him. And suddenly, you understood.

“…really?”

“Yeah. Just give me another chance. I’ll prove it to you,” Satoru said, visibly impatient now. “I won’t give you up. This literally is the fight of my life right now.”

You couldn’t help but chuckle, despite yourself. If there was anything that you had learned tonight, it was that apparently you and him were still salvageable.

“And how will you prove it?”

“Just so you wait and see, sweets. I’m gonna relight your feelings!”

It was beyond corny that he took a line from your favorite song. And both of you burst into a laughter at the sheer silliness of it.

You sighed, but this time of relief, in stark contrast to your earlier sighs that afternoon. You were giddy as a smile perched on your lips. “Fine. Let’s give this another shot.”

Satoru felt the tension in his shoulder melt with your answer. A genuine, wide smile emerged from the bottom of his heart and lit up his face.

“Now, this whole trip has been kind of terrible so far, don’t you think?” He made a brief pouty face for a moment before reverting to his mischievous grin His remarkable expressiveness—reminiscent of a child's, in your opinion—never ceased to fascinate you. “I have a pretty good idea where we should go next.”

You furrowed your brow in confusion. “What do you mean? Tomorrow’s our last day.”

“No freaking way!” he exclaimed, whipping out his phone to launch the travel agency app. “We are going to redo our graduation trip. This time just the two of us!”

There were many things that led to the end of your relationship with your dork of a boyfriend, but as you reflected on it, you realized that there were also many reasons for you to stay together, especially when he reached for your hand and held it firmly in his grasp.

You were unable to contain your excitement and bubbling with melodious giggles that he adored so much as he whisked you away from Kumamoto in favor of the last bullet train to Kyoto, where your long-awaited true vacation would begin.

Epilogue

“I told you this was a horrible idea. I fucking told you.”

"Can you blame me? Dude was about to throttle me in my sleep."

"Geto," Shoko scowled, her disbelief at his simple answer evident as she gestured wildly with both hands towards the wrecked lavatory, emphasizing her point. "Look—now that he had gone and done it, we're the ones footing the bill for the destruction of property!"

Gojo had blasted the washroom with a freaking Red. And the innkeeper promptly held both Shoko and Suguru responsible since their roommates were captured on CCTV and had vanished without a trace.

Suguru rubbed his neck sheepishly. "I genuinely thought it was a good idea. I didn't expect Satoru to go overboard though," then he threw her a stink eye. "And hey, you were complicit in this too!"

Shoko mumbled a string of curses as she pulled out her phone, snapping some pictures of the undeniable evidence of Gojo’s doing, and then made a call. Suguru frowned.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm reporting him to the headquarters!"

3K notes · View notes

forteafy · 1 year

Text

A House, A Home | CL16 & CS55

Summary: A loveless marriage usually comes after years, not before. You've always loved him, his best friend has always loved you.

Word Count: 10.1k

Warnings: Hard Angst, Cheating, Mentions of Sex, Death.

Note: This piece has two heavy inspirations. The first is @lxclerc's amazing pieces 'Moth to a Flame' and 'Call out my Name.' They are both incredible pieces and I highly suggest you give them a read. The second is from a TikTok Account called 'ForPercival,' they are currently doing a social media AU which I cannot recommend enough.

PART 1: A House, A Home | PART 2: Where Do We Go? | PART 3: 'You Think, You Know'

Charles Leclerc is a husband.

At least, he was your husband on paper. One year ago, a hidden agreement had been put in place between Scuderia Ferrari and the Leclerc Household; their son, the ‘Il Predestinato,’ of the team, (albeit one whom had had the most terrible season,) could continue to drive for the team, so long as he married the daughter of one of their longest-running investors.

That so happened to be you.

You had been against the entire idea since the first day. After being introduced to Ferrari’s driver, you had instantly felt the divide between the two of you. You’d reluctantly shaken his hand and since then, had been thrown through a mixture of fake dates, a fake engagement and the fakest wedding that could possibly be imagined. The ceremony hadn’t even ended with a kiss, per tradition.

It didn’t take long for your walls to crack; living with Charles, seeing him at his highest and lowest points, his most vulnerable behind the four walls of your home had caused your heart to soften. Forget being forced into this marriage, you’d grown to care, to adore the man who’d once burdened you with his presence. You dreamed of the day he would return your affection; how long would it take for you to realise you lived in denial? In your late-night fantasies, lying alone in one of the guest rooms you’d sought refuge in on moving into this house, you’d dreamt of lying in his arms, lazy morning breakfast, slow kisses when he would come back to you. To your home.

A home, however, is where you feel safe, warm, protected. You lived in a house with Charles. The man who would barely glance your way and after three months of your marriage, started coming home, smelling of rich perfume and lipstick marks littering his jawline.

The first anniversary of your marriage should have been special, even if he despised you in every known form to man. You’d woken up in your room, slipped on the silk robe which had been lying on the empty bedside and slipped out of the bedroom. In your heart of hearts, you knew there would be no significance of today; no flowers, no card, not even a simple text from your husband to signify the date in question. The only text you had received that morning, was a stern reminder from your father, that you were due to attend the Monza Grand Prix in less than one week.

A soft sigh emitted itself from your lips; it was a routine you knew all too well. Every few races, the more significant ones; Monaco, Silverstone, Spa-Francorchamps, Monza, you’d play the doting wife; cheering for your husband whilst dressed in soft summer dresses, a forged grin if he managed to battle his way into the points. On those rare days when he would obtain a podium position, he’d greet you on the barriers with a soft kiss. It was all fake; a routine which had been performed so many times. Yet, each time his lips met yours, you could dream he meant something behind the affection.

The train of thought had played through your mind for so long that you were unaware of the tears pooling on your lower lash line. So, what if Charles wasn’t at home for your anniversary? It was your thought for feeling any kind of emotion towards him in the first place. It was a business deal, after all. Did your husband enjoytreating you like this? His disappearance on that morning was a cold reminder that he felt nothing towards you. No sentiment, no adoration.

Despite the tears which had bade your eyes that morning, until the mid-afternoon, you had a productive day. Of course, leaving the house was out of the question; what would the media say if devoted wife of Ferrari’s driver was seen without him, on their wedding anniversary of all days?

Instead, you’d played soft music whilst re-organising your wardrobe, something you’d put off for a while now. Cooking a meal whilst lazily treading around the kitchen, experimenting with the spices that Yuki had gifted to you on your previous visit to a Grand Prix. The meal itself was too big to eat alone. Instead, you boxed up the remainders of what was left in the tray, carefully placing it in the fridge, knowing Charles wouldn’t actually eat it.

Your evening had been…less productive. You’d found solace in a glass of red wine, lounging on the sofa of the main living area; usually, you kept as far away from that zone as possible. Charles would spend his evenings in the couch, eyes flickering between the television and his phone, no doubt sending longing messages to his mistress whilst his wife was in the home.

The third glass had just about been drained. You were adamant upon gaining a fourth, no longer caring of any commitments you had the next day. Instead, you sat up abruptly from the sofa, hearing the gentle click from the front door.

He had come back to the house.

His green eyes barely took a second to meet yours, slipping off his shoes and placing them into the rack situated by the front door. A rustle of his jacket signified his option to stay. You saw him carry the garment over his arm as he trudged into the living area, set to lie in front of the television for some personal relaxation.

With his entry to the room, you suddenly remembered your position. You’d hastily stood up from the couch, collecting the half-finished bottle from the low table, holding the glass to your chest to draw the attention away from your beverage.

Charles said nothing; he’d unlatched the top two buttons from his dress shirt; faint purple marks nestled on the lower joint of his neck; a clear mark that his mistress had previously made, a sinful reminder of his adultery.

“I left you some dinner in the fridge.” You mumbled, voice barely picking up over the sound of the television. “There’s some clean loungewear on the end of your bed, too.” You finish your sentence. Your husband doesn’t even attempt to tell you he’s acknowledged your words, eyes transfixed on whatever news was currently playing on the television.

“Happy Anniversary.” You mumble, feet leading you back to the kitchen, the bottle of wine against your chest now seemingly the only attention you’d ever get.

Charles Leclerc is an actor.

The entire drive to the track had been bade in complete silence; not even the radio had been switched on to drown out the undeniable tension in the car. You had originally tried to make light conversation with the man; he couldn’t even be bothered to make a sound in response to any of your questions.

You couldn’t handle the harsh tone he had snapped at you with the previous time you had been in the car; instead, you watched the rolling hills and glistening sun of Monza. It was always one of the highlights of the year. If not for the racing, you would have come here in your own time, to bask in the sun and to enjoy the secluded section of Italy as an individual.

The incredible views soon began to fade out, instead replaced by expensive cars and adoring fans, leaning over the barriers in an attempt to see their favourite drivers; there was an uproar as your husband drove past the crowds; he was clearly the home favourite, as any member of the Ferrari crew would be in this location. Silently, you slipped on the sunglasses which had been resting in the pouch of your bag, knowing the paparazzi would be blistering your eyesight sooner rather than later.

Charles effortlessly parked his car in the allocated spot. Silently, he switches off the engine, removing the keys and shoving them into his jean pocket. The man doesn’t so much as register your presence as he opens his door, leaving you to venture out of the car yourself. You’d carefully adjusted the flowing fabric of your dress; the patterned fabric flowing gently around your calves.

You looked beautiful. You just wished your husband would care enough to tell you.

Instead, his priority is the cameras leaning over the barriers. He doesn’t even look in your direction, instead firmly grasping your hand in his own; an act the two of you had performed for the crowd oh-so-many times. He waves towards the crowds; neither of you miss the adoring sounds, the coos for many of the fan’s favourite ‘couple.’ To so many, his affection seemed to clear to you, and yours did to him.

Charles didn’t hold your hand with any adoration. His grasp was harsh, palms roughly mashed together, no intent to keep your grip safe against his own. You were certain that if you were to let go, he wouldn’t think to remedy the situation. Your theory is proven when you gently let go, instead keeping in step, just behind his figure; Charles’ hand seems as if it’s gone into idle mode. His eyes, however, stayed alert, vigilant. Silently, the two of you pass through the paddock security, pausing every few moments for Charles to sign a cap, take a photograph with a fan.

It isn’t until you reach the outskirts of the Ferrari Building that you see her. Soft hair around her shoulders, clothing exquisite, her eyes flickering to your husband, offering him a sympathising smile.

He may have been a devoted husband towards the press, to Ferrari, even to the majority of his team. However, the moment that the cameras were turned off, microphones pushed away, he was sneaking to his mistress, one he had shamelessly invited to so many Grand Prix’s over the past nine months. She was what he wanted; a fun and fancy-free lady, rather than the wife whom stood by his side. There’s a glance between the two of them, as if a whole conversation is had in that moment.

You stay silent as you follow Charles into the Ferrari Building. Instantly, you’re overwhelmed by the welcomes that your husband obtains; so many of them pass onto you. Upon the questions of how married life is treating him, he smiles, fakes a laugh as he pulls you into his side, one hand firmly resting upon your waist.

“Married life is perfect.” He insists, pressing a kiss to the side of your head, one which you falsely giggle about, ignoring the butterflies which were nestling in the pit of your stomach. “It’s even better when she’s standing right here, beside me.”

The entirety of the room buys the staged scene, all except for two people. The first, obviously, is your father. He’s always there, watching that the driver is performing well. He knows of his affair, but in his mind, as long as the affair is kept out of the light, and his marriage was still official, their deal continued. Besides, he would speak to you both sooner rather than later upon extending the family; that would seal both of your fates towards one another. Nobody liked a husband whom left a wife and child.

The second was Carlos Sainz; the second driver for Scuderia Ferrari.

The Spaniard was all too aware of the affair between Charles and his mistress; after qualifying from Baku, Carlos had found his teammate behind the garage, his hands with a firm grip on her waist, their kisses entirely formed of tounge and teeth. The man had furiously ripped Charles from the woman, bellowing in his face about the wife he had, whilst this woman warmed his bed. A deep blush had formed over both of their cheeks, Charles explaining that you were aware of his actions.

Carlos didn’t want to believe it; he’d frantically messaged you that evening, to which you had answered his question, confirming you knew of the affair. That evening, you had revealed everything to him, watching his eyes get glossier as the cruel details were flickered in front of his eyes. It pained him; he’d cared for you since the moment you’d first stepped foot into the paddock alongside your father. His heart shattered upon finding out that you had been betroved to Charles, that he had missed his chance, all that time ago.

He waits; waits until later in the day to approach you. By this point, you had made yourself comfortable in Charles’ driver room. Of course, your husband isn’t actually there. After a brief encounter with most of the members on his team, he’d excused himself. Carlos knew that he had snuck away from the crowds adorned in red to see his mistress, likely stealing kisses and rough fumbles between one another. Whilst that was happening, you, were sat in his drivers’ room, skirts spread across the soft lounger, eyes engrossed in a book which had been enclosed in your bag alongside your sunglasses.

You were the epitome of beauty in Carlos’ eyes. He could have stood at the ajar door to the room, watching you as you engrossed yourself in the story. Instead, he offers a light cough, drawing your attention from the book in your lap. He’s engrossed by your eyes, how the light reflected off them, the glow they offered. Your smile, how you presented your real smile to him so naturally, not the one you forged next to your husband on every single encounter.

“Good morning, Carlos!” You greet him with a bright tone, standing up from your position on the couch. You offer him a hug, feeling his warm arms wrap around your waist, his breath against your face when he kisses your cheek gently. ‘In another life,’ you always tell yourself. One where you were happy, free to marry a man who would return your affection.

“Good morning, Mariposa.” The nickname rolls of his tongue; one he had presented ever since you had once showed up in the paddock, the most beautiful butterfly-imprinted dress flowing in the soft breeze of that Monaco weekend. “You’re hiding out in here today, yes?” He teases. You offer him a small shrug, eyes not able to meet those sweet brown ones of the man stood in front of you.

“Charles is…busy.” You finish the sentence abruptly. Carlos knows not to question further; the two of you have a mutual understanding as to where he would be at this point during the day; wrapped up in the arms of another woman. “He’s probably on his track walk…maybe. I’m just…keeping occupied.” You motion towards the window, looking onto the first straight of the track. “Plus…it looks windy out there.”

“Well…” Carlos invites himself into the room now, looking down at your attire, seeing that your feet were enclosed with the brilliant white trainers you’d left home in that morning. The man shrugs off his own windbreaker, holding it in his arm. “If I give you my jacket, would you like to come on my track walk?” He offers, holding out the garment to you.

You knew you would probably live to regret that moment. However, if you stayed resting in Charles’ driver room much longer, reading the same line of your book whilst your thoughts trailed away to how he would be with his mistress, you would go crazy.

“I’d love to.” You finally respond, slipping your arms through the large sleeves of Carlos’ jacket. Offering you a pat on the shoulder, he motions towards the exit of the driver’s room, determined to keep you on his side whilst walking across the track loved by fans far and wide. He hopes that everybody misses the longing gazes and soft smile on his face every time you make a comment, or your hands brush a little too closely.

Charles Leclerc is a neck kisser.

It’s not as if you would know this. The only kisses you ever had were those for show. Cold, meaningless interactions between somebody who attempted to show unconditional love and one who could dream of being anywhere else in that moment.

You’d carefully unlatched the front door of the house, your wireless earbuds resting comfortably in your ears, unable to hear any other sound apart from the music playing. Slipping off your shoes, hanging up your jacket; your only intention for the afternoon was to go through some of the notes you had made regarding education courses in the area; sitting at home day after day was truly aggravating. You couldn’t pick up yet another hobby. Maybe some form of learning would interest you.

But first, you needed a drink to cool yourself off from the sun. You’d remembered the smoothie packs you made earlier in the week; one of those and going through your notes seemed a perfect plan for the current moment.

The second you rounded the corner into the open-plan kitchen, you wished that you could have taken the scenic route home.

His mistress was sat up on the kitchen island, back straight, legs wrapped around the waist of your husband, her hands grasping at the soft curls atop of his head. Charles’ hands slid across her back, soft grunts coming from his lips, his mouth leaving open-mouthed kisses along her slender neck. She was loving it, at least, that’s what you could judge from the noises leaving her mouth.

Before either of them could clock your arrival, both too wrapped-up in their embrace, you’d stepped out of the kitchen, hand over your mouth to silence the sobs which were threatening to escape. In a moment, you’re out of the hallway, letting your feet carry you up the carpeted stairs.

The only intention now embedded in your mind was to drink so much you would forget the scene unfolding in front of your eyes.

Charles Leclerc is a slow replier.

The smell of tequila and sweat is strong in the cramped hallway of the club. It was insane to believe that less than three hours ago, you had been cocooned in your king-size duvet, lips slightly parted as you strung a meaningless thread of text messages to one another; you didn’t truly care how one of your friends felt in that moment, the heartbreak shattering in your chest was stronger than any other emotion you could begin to comprehend.

No, your sole reason for texting was to leave this god-forsaken house. You kept telling yourself not to care. Charles’ eyes were all you could think about as you picked out your shortest, slinkiest dress; one which enhanced every curve and dip in the most elegant way. Charles’ dimples were all you could think about when your attention was drawn to outlining your lips with a deep red gloss. Charles’ lips were all you could think about, your foot sliding into the black heeled shoe, your feet finding no solace in being propped up within six inches of their life.

Your friend had messaged you the location of the designated club. How anybody could enjoy one of those places sober was beyond your comprehension. Instead, you had taken the route of every other supposed being in that club; one shot of a suspicious-looking liquid had turned into sixteen – his number, you couldn’t help remembering. That was the reason you had found yourself stood motionlessly in the hallway, trying to navigate yourself back to the bar. At least seventeen wouldn’t have been tied to any other emotion.

The plan, however, was short-lived when you hear a familiar voice call your name. Turning too quickly in your ridiculous heels, you’re met with the figures of Kelly Piquet and Max Verstappen, hands linked together, clearly nowhere near as intoxicated as you were in that moment.

Kelly moves first; you had always enjoyed her presence, spending time with her around the Paddock when you were bade to attend. Penelope was one of the sweetest three-year-olds you had ever come across, always greeting you with a toothy grin and a story of her and ‘Maxie’s’ escapades. When her mother encloses you in a hug, you can feel the tears fall, your drunken façade falling immediately. The woman simply cups your hand in her face, delicately wiping the tears from your lash line, making sure to remove any heavy clumps of mascara. She asks you where Charles is, where your husband is. You can’t make any sound which you believe is cohesive, something about him being back at the house.

Max by now, has his own arm resting around your shoulder. You were Charles’ wife, after all. He knew Charles would do the same for Kelly if she was ever to be found in this state. Something strange stabs at his chest; maybe he was too protective, but he would have never of let Kelly get into this state, at least, not on her own. The driver carefully fumbles in his back pocket, unlocking his own device and filing through his contacts to phone Charles.

The phone goes straight to voicemail, not even a dialling tone. Max tries a second time, a third time. Instead, he leaves messages. How on gods earth did Charles feel relaxed, knowing his wife would be out, probably on some form of alcohol, and not think to check that she would be safe returning home? If only he knew.

The duo moves to a second plan. You needed some fresh air before they could attempt to get you into a car and take you home; standing in the corridor of a nightclub was not an ideal situation, instead moving you to the exit. Your eyes widen, looking up to Max and Kelly as if you had shrunk right down to Penelope’s age, as if they would be the saviours to get you home. By the way Max was holding you by his side and Kelly stroking your hair behind your ears, you may as well been their daughter.

Conversations are had; neither of them is sober enough to drive you home, nor do they think it’s wise to try and sneak you into their hotel room when they had already issues when checking in a little too late. Their prayers are answered when a group of men wander past, one of them stopping to smack Max, his fellow driver on the back. His dark eyes, ones you know so well, widen when he sees your figure, looking so fragile in the light of the early hours in the city.

“Mariposa.” He murmurs, running a hand across your cheek, wanting nothing more than to hold your frame against his chest. Your soft eyes meet his own dark ones, glossed in concern for how on earth you could do this to yourself. The man murmurs something to Max and Kelly, ensuring them that he’d been the sober friend out of his group; promising he would get you home himself. The duo has no reason to not trust him, both of them leaving a gentle kiss on your cheek before retiring to their own hotel.

As the couple walk away from the club, you can only feel the warmth of Carlos’ hand, still resting on your face. When he at last turns his attention back to you, he simply wraps a strong arm around your waist, supporting you to stand in those awful, heeled shoes. At the pace you’re walking back towards his car, you would get there just after the sunrise. Instead, he scroops you into his grasp.

The affection, the physical contact is all too much for you. It had been so, so long since anybody had held you, cared for you like this. Your clouded mind, now overwhelmed by warmth and alcohol allowed you to lean your head into Carlos’ sturdy chest. If you were sober, you’d be able to feel the way his heart raced when feeling you rest against him.

“Why do you do this to yourself, Mariposa?” He murmurs, settling you into the passenger seat of his car. He can’t help but remove his own jacket, wrapping the soft fabric around your arms, letting you nuzzle into the scent of his fabric softener and aftershave. Once settling himself into the driving seat, he begins the route back to the house, one hand gently resting atop of your leg, some form of comfort for the world in your mind which seemed to be caving in.

“I’d never do this to you.” He whispers, turning into the driveway that he had become accustomed to since the marriage.

Across the city, Max Verstappen is sound asleep. His phone, plugged in on the dressing table across the room buzzes once, notifying a text from his racing rival.

03:21: Charles Leclerc

Hey, sorry, was busy with something. Is everything good?

Charles Leclerc is a traveller.

You hadn’t expected anything to awaken you after the way your body had reacted to the previous night. A natural awakening, however, would have been a lot nicer than hearing the clicking sound of wheels against flooring. Whatever, whoever was outside of your room most certainly had a death wish to awaken you that morning.

It felt as if pins had been pressed into every square inch of your head, the task of even sitting up and forcing yourself towards the door of your bedroom, still dressed in your slinky garment and…somebody’s jacket? The night for you had truly ended as soon as you had that ninth shot of tequila; you thought you could remember Max and Kelly in the same location at some point, maybe that was your mind playing tricks on you, longing for people who enjoyed your company.

You were pulled back to the present when the figure of your husband appears at your doorway. He’s dressed already; loose hoodie and tracksuit bottoms cover his frame; his hand is clasping tightly onto a suitcase. There wasn’t a Grand Prix this weekend, you were certain. He would have left days ago for that. There was-

“I’m going to stay with…” He pauses, clearly trying to think of the correct way to word the fact he would be staying with his Mistress until further notice. Even in your state, you understand, simply raising your hand to stop him from speaking. You didn’t want to hear her name, you didn’t want to know that he would be spending the next nights wrapped in her arms, because for once…you didn’t care.

They say alcohol causes dangerous mistakes, but in this moment, your hangover seemed to be your best friend. Every single time, you would think later, Charles would come back from seeing her, would leave to spend an evening by her side or sneak away during your paddock appearances…and you would be focused, your sole attention being on when he would return. Now? Your sole focus was on throwing up the remains of alcohol in your stomach, placing on a facemask and ordering some kind of comfort food to your home.

You didn’t care about him, not right now. Your actions relay this, simply offering him a nod before speaking, your voice surprisingly clear for how much your throat was weeping for a drink.

“Okay.” You pause. There’s nothing left to say after that. What does he want you to do? Wish him a happy time? Charles looks equally taken aback, usually expecting some kind of warm drabble on how he needed to stay safe. In that moment, he can’t help but…want it.

“I’ll be back on Wednesday to pack for Singapore.” He pauses this time, taking in your appearance, your face so…gentle, soothing. “You’re coming, yes?” He remembers a conversation had many a time; his wife should be there to support him as much as possible, even if he wasn’t a fan of the sly ways he would have to leave her in front of his team members.

He isn’t expecting a shrug of the shoulders, bringing a hand up to rest on the door, clearly ready to close it at any given moment.

“I’m not sure.” You offer him, sighing as you begin to close the door yourself. “My father said that race isn’t a priority.” That was the last sentence you offered him before closing the door. You obviously do not see it, but on the other side of the wall, Charles stands in confusion for a full twenty seconds before snapping back to his reality, his clutch on the suitcase a little tighter as he begins his decent down the stairs, wondering where on earth he had seen that jacket you were wearing before?

Your own priorities that morning was in full swing; you had placed your phone on charge, messages beginning to thread through as you stepped into the shower, the cool water savouring your skin. A fluffy robe is tied around your waist, brushing your hair around your back whilst your attention focused on rehydrating your skin, brushing your teeth and cleaning the dirt from underneath your eyes.

The silence is strong when you walk back into your bedroom. In that moment, you opt for some music whilst changing into some comfortable loungewear, easy to roam around the house in and let your hair dry naturally. Sitting at the end of the bed, you’re able to check notifications, seeing Kelly had sent you a photo of Penelope that morning, smiling for her favourite aunt. You see your most recent text had come through from none other than Charles’ teammate, following one which had been sent early that morning.

03:45: Carlos Sainz

Sweet dreams, Mariposa. Let me know if you need anything please.

11:51: Carlos Sainz

Just seen on Twitter Charles is at the airport, he’s not off to see her, is he?

His message brings so many emotions to you, and also answers the question of who’s jacket you had been wearing that morning. Your heart can’t help but soften, knowing already that Charles is on his way to see...her. You think back to your mindset from earlier, how it was the last thing you wanted to care about. Why on earth would you care about them, when you could be focusing on ordering your favourite food and calling your nail technician to come to the house? That would make you feel better, better than he ever had.

You first drop a message to Carlos in response, wanting to let him know you had woken up from potential alcohol poisoning.

12:25: You

Yeah, he is. Didn’t seem so happy that I couldn’t care less. Thank you for the jacket last night, I hope you had a good evening.

12:28: Carlos Sainz

All the better for seeing you. Hoping the hangover isn’t too bad today.

The messages spring backwards and forwards between the two of you for the afternoon; you’re smiling whilst you go through your favourite meal, the taste of it filling your mouth in the best way possible. There’s still a smile on your face when your nail technician arrives, painting some delicate designs into your fingers and toes, subtly asking who on earth has you smiling that much.

It isn’t until that evening; you’re sat in front of the television, a series you had watched one-too many times playing, your eyes glued to the storyline as if it would change again. The notification on your phone instantly drew your attention away from the screen, looking down to see a text on your screen.

21:03: Carlos Sainz

Why don’t you come and stay in Madrid for a few days? I’m sure we could both do with the company.

Charles Leclerc is a stalker.

Well, maybe stalker was too strong of a word. However, his intentions were identical, having watched your latest Instagram story three- no, four times. Since leaving the home several days earlier, his mind could not stop thinking about the fact you truly could not care less about where he was going. This wasn’t you, was it?

He’d arrived at her house, being temporarily distracted by luring himself into her bedroom, an afternoon of escapades and touches until she had rolled onto her side, telling him she was going to shower, and he would be more than welcome to join her. Instead, he pulled out his phone, seeing if you had done your usual; texting him to check that he had arrived safely, asking when he could be coming back to the house.

There’s no messages, no notifications. Huffing to himself, Charles instead pulls up your Instagram, seeing that you had posted a new story that evening, a suitcase in hand, an emoji of an aircraft and a Spanish flag. You were off somewhere, and hadn’t told him? No, no. You always told him where you were going, you always-

“Are you not joining me, then?” Charles’ mistress’ voice suddenly draws him out of his trance, a towel wrapped around her body, hair around her shoulders. It was nowhere near as soft and as gentle as yours was, he realised in that moment. He eventually nods, pulling himself from his phone and following her into the en-suite.

He’s so…distant for the remainder of his visit. When the two of them go to a secluded spot for lunch, when they go for a drive in a car they had hired for the afternoon. When she’s lazily pressing kisses along his neck, trying to grind into his crotch, desperate for his attention. When she finally falls asleep, Charles pulls out his phone, looking through any of the photos you had posted from that day. The soft sands of the beach, a hugestrawberry ice-cream cone, a mirrored selfie of yourself in the most beautiful sundress, hair curled and clearly ready for an evening in the Spanish sun.

The routine continues, he sees your adventures, day after day. You’re touring small markets, trying local delicacies. One day, you’re simply lounging by a pool for the afternoon, a fat paperback resting on your stomach, clearly engrossed by the story which was resting on your stomach. Each time he sees a post, he can’t help but be drawn to how he wants to know how you’re doing. Maybe that’s why he drops you a text message, trying to gain some sort of traction from how you were doing.

23:54: Charles Leclerc

Are you home? I’ve got a flight tomorrow afternoon.

You don’t respond; now, your phone is at the bottom of your bag, resting on the inside cabin of Carlos’ boat. For your final day in Madrid, he had insisted on taking you for a boat ride. You’d shyly mentioned earlier in that week that Charles had never taken you on his own boat, despite the fact that you were indeed married.

The sun began to set over the rolling waves of the ocean; the boat is gently rocking, the sounds of water lapping over one another was music to your ears. You were sat at the edge of the now stilled boat, contemplating dipping your toes into the water. Your attention is so drawn to the scenery that you don’t hear him step away from the wheel, crouching next to you.

“You could just go in.” He teases, “rather than staring at the water. You know how to swim.” The taunt causes you to roll your eyes, simply looking to the Spaniard on your right-hand side.

“What? And have you speed off without me?” You retaliate, using your shoulder to nudge his body. Carlos clicks his lips together, mumbling something incoherent, before he’s suddenly scooped you up into your arms; despite your sounds of protests, he simply holds you against his chest tighter. His dark eyes flicker between yours and the ocean water below the two of you. Before you can say anything, his feet have made their own choice, jumping off the edge of the boat, both of you tumbling into the sea. Your briefly submerged entirely, before your head pops out of the waves, blindly reaching around until two strong arms encircle your waist.

Both you and Carlos laugh for a moment, in pure awe that you just did that. He moves first, one of his hands releasing from your waist, tucking a strand of wet hair behind your ear. There’s a silence between the two of you, where the only sound emitting from your surroundings is the gentle waves of the sea. In that moment, Carlos Sainz wants nothing more than to lean forward, pressing his lips to your own. They look so…soft. He craves to give them the attention they had been longing for so long. But…you’re married. And even if your marriage is loveless, to a point where your husband is openly in an affair, he would never do that to you. Instead, he settles for resting one hand on your cheek, gently kissing the top of your forehead, murmuring some Spanish wording you would never remember.

If you did understand it, however, you would have known that he said there and then that he would always be devoted to you.

Charles Leclerc is a loud shouter.

His voice seemed to travel for miles, you were almost certain the entirety of the secluded neighbourhood could hear him at this current moment. The man had returned home from his secluded stay with his mistress to an empty house; at that point, you were still in the depths of Madrid, packing up your own suitcase, wishing Carlos luck on the Singapore Grand Prix. You had intended to return to the house after Charles had left himself; the heartbreak of seeing him littered in love-bites, his eyes transfixed to his phone from her messages was too much for you.

However, if you had been at the house when he had arrived home, you would have seen his neck clear, phone shoved into his back pocket as he called out your name, wondering if you had returned home yourself. Charles notices your trainers haven’t been left on the shoe rack; there’s no music to signify your afternoon relaxation. A light knock to the door of your room signifies there’s nobody home. The house feels empty.

Maybe, Charles Leclerc was beginning to understand how you felt.

His first instinct is to message you. Surely, you would have seen his text from his previous message by now; what would it hurt to check in once more. The man feels against his rough jean pocket for the device, swiping away from the multiple notifications from his mistress, instead scrolling to your contact’s name, seeing you hadn’t been active in almost twelve hours. You hadn’t even opened his message.

His thumb hovers above the keyboard, not entirely sure what to say in this situation. Instead, he opts to call your number instead; you had always picked up to him; whenever he needed you to stay away from the house, or to remind you to be ready to leave at a certain time. The phone rings once. Twice. Three times. On the fourth ring, your voicemail comes through the speaker, signifying him that you were too busy to pick up the telephone.

Charles didn’t grow concerned during the evening; he grew angry. You were his wife. You were supposed to be at the house to greet him, to welcome him with open arms, ask about his day. Even if…even if he had chosen to ignore your welcoming’s and kind heart for over a year. The man found a distraction in going through the information that Scuderia Ferrari had sent him for his journey tomorrow, making sure his passport was in the correct place. He hadn’t needed to pack; you had made sure to do that for him before your own departure, making sure his comfortable clothes were packed and sunglasses safely secured in the pouches of the case.

It was late, late for you when the door finally opened, signalling the arrival of a second being. Charles immediately sits up from his slouched position on the couch, stepping up from the sofa, almost ready to give you a piece of his mind. Upon reaching the hallway, he sees you, slipping off your trainers, leaving the suitcase next to the front door. Even underneath your jumper, he can see your skin is glowing from the Mediterranean sun, yet your eyes are watering, tears leaking from your lower lash line.

“Where on earth have you been?” He snaps, not actually wanting to hear an answer. You open your mouth to respond, but the man cuts you off before you can speak. “I am your husband. You’re supposed to wait for me!” His temper is getting the better of him, green eyes flickering with anger.

At this point, you’re exhausted, overwhelmed from the news you had received on your drive home, and for this man to question your loyalties to your marriage? You can’t help the scoff which falls from your lips, the emotions building a little too much.

“You’re my husband?” You mock in confusion. “Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t realise my husband was around at long last, not wrapped in the arms of another woman!” Your temper flares, pushing your hair behind your shoulders, grasping the suitcase to take upstairs and repack.

“You didn’t pick up your phone once.” Charles retaliates. Oh, the cheek of-

“Like when you pick up your phone when I call?” The tears are beginning to flow freely now, wanting nothing more than to get upstairs and completely ignore what has been happening. “You don’t Charles. You’ve done nothing to show that you’re my husband in the past twelve months!” You can’t help yourself now. Instead of seeking the new suitcase, you simply turn around on the step of the front door, slipping your trainers back onto your feet.

“Where are you going?” His voice is now laced in concern; you couldn’t leave yet, surely? You’d only just returned; you wouldn’t be safe to drive in this condition. Why on earth did he care now? His question is answered, but not in the way he desired.

“Like you would care.” It’s the last thing you say before the door to the house is slammed shut.

Charles Leclerc is an investigator.

When arriving in the Ferrari Garage of Singapore, there’s already an eerie feeling through the air; there are no smiles, sympathising looks thrown towards the back end of the garage. The driver isn’t stupid, he knows something must be wrong. He’s unsure of who to ask; who would know what is going on?

His original plan was to ask Xavi, maybe during their morning briefing, until he is told that his flight has been delayed and wouldn’t be there until the late afternoon. Eventually, he spots his racing partner, nestled in the corner of the garage, his eyes flickering across his own phone screen, rapidly typing a message to somebody he would rather not admit to.

“Hey.” He speaks softly, not wanting to startle the man. Silently, Carlos looks up from his device, offering his teammate a small nod, not wanting to prolapse the eye contact for too long. Charles can sense he knows what has happened, eyes narrowing in confusion. “Why is everybody so…quiet?”

The look on Carlos’ face signifies he’s said something wrong. His eyes darken, shaking his head in disappointment rather than fury. It correlates to the kind of look his father would give him during a long talk, when he had broken something and not admitted to it. The Spaniard isn’t sure he should even tell his teammate what had happened. Instead, he changes his phone application to the Emails App, handing the device over to Charles. His eyes flicker across the screen, taking in the information.

Ferrari’s biggest benefactor, your father, would not be attending the race weekend after the untimely death of his wife. Your mother. It suddenly correlates; how the night before, you had seemed inconsolable, despite the fact you had obviously had an incredible vacation. You’d tried to simply walk away, to let yourself grieve without bothering him. Instead, you had found comfort in Carlos as he had driven you to the airport, whispering sweet words of comfort, promising that everything was going to be okay.

Charles feels his blood run cold, he feels sick. The look on the man stood in front of him tells him enough; he had made the biggest mistake of his life. Murmuring an excuse, he leaves the garage, stepping to the secluded back area, the realisation that he is everything his mother never wanted him to be, hitting hard. He still had the ability to run to her, to ask for her advice. You didn’t have that anymore. You didn’t have anybody, least of all your husband.

The first thing he does in that moment, is pull out his phone, scrolling to the contact of his mistress.

10:09: Charles Leclerc

We need to talk.

Charles Leclerc is a phone call away.

The past day had been filled of tears, clinging to your father, to your younger siblings, to your elder cousins. How on earth your mother had left this world early was beyond you. It wasn’t fair. Nothing was fair. Your mother was the one whom had been your rock for the past miserable year of your marriage. If not for her, you were almost certain that you would have thrown your silvery key to the house down a drain so long ago.

Without her guidance, without her tutoring, you felt like bird trying to fly individually for the first time; surrounded by fears and almost certain you’d fall into compromising position.

You hadn’t rested. Not since you had arrived at the bleak family home. As customed, every curtain was drawn close, doors to each room sealed, no natural light emitting to the large house, making every shadow and crook of the building seem more terrifying. Eventually, your father had retired to his own bedroom, your younger siblings tucked into their beds, butterfly kisses pressed against their foreheads, a silent promise you were only down the hall if they so desired you.

The bedroom you had grown up in remained almost identical to the one you had painted in your mind; pale pink wallpaper, a luxury bed lined with a rosebud-patterned quilt set. The vanity you had last used to get ready on your wedding day remained pristine, the perfumes and scents which had been your favourite still sitting atop of your shelf. And the photographs. A polaroid of your two closest friends from your childhood; one of your sisters on her christening day, the entire family dressed so elegantly; Charles is in that photograph, off to the side alongside his brothers; you had no idea there and then that boy with the ocean eyes would become your estranged husband.

You could have continued going down memory lane, if not from the buzzing which was coming from your bed. The phone you had carelessly thrown atop of the blankets when first entering the room had finally got some service, a thread of text messages and missed phone calls beginning to filter through. Silently, you take a seat on the edge of your bed, eyes flickering across each message. Some are from members of the Ferrari team, others from family members you hadn’t heard from in what felt like centuries.

There’s one. One from the man whom you had spent the previous week with. The one who had consoled you whilst travelling to the family home. Your husband’s teammate.

23:05: Carlos Sainz

Mariposa, please let me know how you are doing. I’m so worried about you. Let me know if you need anything at all.

23:31: You

Thank you, C. I should be heading home tomorrow, with a bit of luck I’ll be able to swing by and say hello.

You hadn’t expected anything else that evening. You were settled, ready to focus on yourself for the remainder of the evening; in your eyes, there was a high likelihood that your siblings would be burrowing into your blankets later. Once dressed in nightwear, the makeup that had stained your cheeks removed, you noticed the soft glow of your phone screen. Another message had just been received, and in your wildest dreams, you could not have imagined whom it was from.

00:24: Charles Leclerc

I heard about your mother this afternoon; I am truly so, so sorry for your loss. Please let me know if there is anything I can do. I mean it.

Your eyes had barely had time to view the message which had just been received, before your phone screen changes, taking the message away from your sight. The message thread is replaced by a photograph of your husband, his name lighting up on you phone screen. You don’t even think; instead, your thumb swipes across the screen, pressing the green button and holding the device to your ear.

“Charles.” You speak one word, hearing your husband visibly relax on the other end of the line. You realise it’s the first time you’ve said anything coherent in hours; the tone of your voices echoes around the room. Did you always sound that sad when you spoke to him?

“Hey.” He isn’t too sure what he wants to say; the lack of conversation between the two of you means he isn’t aware if there are any boundaries, anything you wouldn’t discuss with him. No, he just wanted to speak to you, to check in. In reality, he had realised how lonely the house was as an individual. His mistress was gone from his contacts, not inviting her around to fill the void had made him realise how you had felt for oh-so-long.

“How…” He pauses, not sure on how to finish his question. He doesn’t need to, because despite the lack of understanding of one another, you know he’s trying, trying to make you feel better.

“I’m…yeah.” You can’t find the correct words to say; ‘sad’ is an understatement, ‘fine’ is a rude response. Neither of you can find the words, but in that moment, you crave somebody who isn’t mourning the loss of your mother as heavily as you are.

“We have some new neighbours.” He’s trying to find anything to create some conversation. It’s almost as if he knows the quiet of the room is making you feel uncomfortable. “They left us an invitation to join them for a tennis session- not that I’m any good.” He laughs to himself, remembering the previous time he’d attended a tennis game alongside his fellow drivers; he’d had to step out after a few minutes, completely terrified he would end up breaking his hand.

He doesn’t hear anything from the other side of the line but continues to talk. “Are you…” He catches himself for a moment. “Are you coming back soon?” His voice turns into barely a whisper, as if saying the wrong thing will cause you to hang up immediately. He doesn’t hear anything for a moment, taking a gentle sigh and awaiting your response.

“Yeah.” You pause. Are you doing this? Are you having a conversation with your husband? “I’m going to fly home tomorrow afternoon. I think my father wants space.” Your sentence closes, looking around your room. The silence is deathly; in that moment, you don’t care about everything that’s happened. All you want is for somebody to hold you in their arms and tell you it would be okay.

“I’ll come and get you.” Charles has spoken before his mouth has had time to catch his brain. Your eyebrows quirk in confusion. The only time your estranged husband ever drove you himself was on your endless journeys to races; you would sit silently, curled away from his figure, eyes transfixed as the world passed by around you. The man not only offering but wanting to pick you up from the airport was a new-found curiosity.

“It’s okay.” You don’t let him continue. If previous standings have taught you anything, it’s that behind those mesmerising eyes cannot be trusted. You knew the secrets that lied beyond the ocean settled in his eye. “I wouldn’t want to interrupt you.” Part of your heart is craving to bring up his mistress; how she would probably be warming his bed in the current moment, walking around the house which you ached to find comfort in.

“You wouldn’t.” Charles is quick to respond; in his heart of heart, he knows getting you to trust him again would be a monumental task. He’d do anything to prove he would be the husband who would look after you. Who would love you unconditionally; the husband you deserved.

“I’ll let you know when I’ve landed, okay?” It’s your final compromise. The woman whom you had been twelve months ago would love nothing more than to run into Charles’ arms; whether he cared for you the way you did; you would always desire his attention and affection. You’d had to learn through the months that some of life’s biggest temptations had to remain untouched.

Charles Leclerc is your husband.

Landing back in the country was almost eerie; despite being away for only a miniscule amount of time, you felt changed; changed by the loss of your closest companion, changed by the fact your husband had been the one to call you, and not to throw some crazy request down the telephone line.

Arrivals, as always, were completely smothered; couples reuniting, children screaming at the sudden change of scenery. After obtaining your own bag, your eyes flicker through the never-ending crowds, desperate to find some recognition.

Standing apart from the crowd, looking effortlessly rugged in his athletic shorts and hoodie, hair pushed underneath a snapback. His eyes are trained on you, as if he had sensed your presence into the room in less than a moment. The breath catches in the back of your dried throat, a pair of eyes that you trusted undoubtedly. Stumbling, your feet carry you over to the arms of your favourite Spaniard, your head instantly finding solace in the joint between his shoulder and neck, the cologne you were used to from his attendances around the paddock creating a cloud of comfort.

Carlos’ hands effortlessly lock around your torso, pulling you tighter into his chest, one palm rubbing up and down your back. It was the first time, the first time in a long time that anybody had offered you this sort of affection. Mindlessly, the soft tears begin to pool at the bottom of your lash line. Soft snuffles emitting from your lips cause the man to hush you gently, pulling your face away from his body, cradling your head between his larger hands.

He mumbles something quietly, something about taking you back to the house. If it was him, the man would bundle you into his car and drive to his own home. He’d nestle you under his bedroom blankets, dress you in one of his hoodies. Instead, his rough palm finds your soft fingers, intertwining your hands together. Carlos takes your suitcase in his free hand, guiding you to his car parked outside of the airport.

Not much is said during the shortening journey back to the house; the tears glossing your eyes reflect the streetlights, transfixed on the roads which you had left for a few short days. The tears will continue to fall; her loss had taken a part of you that you would you never thought would return. The man to your right, eyes focused on the road can sense your heartbreak. He doesn’t wait to push you; he had spoken to you shortly after the news had originally broken, in that conversation, you had barely been able to say ten words before your voice cracked. Instead, Carlos rests a warm hand on your leg, a silent promise that he will be there no matter what.

The journey feels too short; eventually the driveway to the house rolls into sight, Carlos slowing down the car. When it comes to a halt, he steps out immediately, obtaining your suitcase from the rear of the car, placing it down on the wheels. By this point, you’d wiggled from the seat, ready to wheel your case into the house. However, before you can move, his arms engulf you once more, clinging so tightly, your feet began to lift from the floor. You had clung back just as tight, pressing a kiss to his stubbled cheek; a silent ‘Thank you,’ for everything.

The embrace ended, Carlos awaiting until the door had unlocked, nodding when he saw you safely enter the house. The building is practically silent; no television sounds, no gentle music, not even the whirr of Charles’ simulator in his downstairs office. Ears pricked, you could hear the jets of a shower from upstairs, the assumption that he must have been in the shower. Paranoia threads your mind, she wouldn’t be showering alongside, would she?

You don’t let your mind wander; instead, you focus on lugging the suitcase along the staircase, silently glad you had gotten further with it since your trip to Madrid. Beelining towards your room, the suitcase rolls behind you, resting it in the corner of the room, a silent promise you’d wash everything tomorrow. However, a delicate bouquet of soft, pink and fresh flowers decorated the vanity of the room; you knew you hadn’t bought flowers since Madrid, and these…They looked as if they’d been placed mere minutes ago.

Overthinking had always been dangerous; instead, you keep yourself busy, wiggling your skincare bag from the suitcase, padding into your bathroom with that and a fresh set of long pyjamas; the late-night breeze had begun to tickle your skin since removing yourself from Carlos’ warm arms. The relish indulges your body, shampoo trickling through your hair, body wash bubbles tickling your body. You’d stepped out a few moments later, changing into the soft clothing, sitting in front of the mirror, brushing your hair out as carefully as you could have.

Silently, your feet carry you from the en-suite towards the main bedroom. Standing at the head of the doorway, is none other than your husband, hair own hair damp from his shower, dressed in soft tracksuit bottoms and a tight tee-shirt. He’d seen your suitcase nestling in the corner of your bedroom, your phone had rumpled the blankets of your bed. Charles had been the one to hear the shower this time, deciding to wait, just to see your soft eyes.

They’re bloodshot; you look so…frail. The years of heartbreak littered across your face. Charles’ heart practically breaks; before you can say a word, he’s across the room, arms pulling around your torso, pulling your head under his chest. Your instinct tells you to fight it, why on earth would you accept some form of affection from a husband who had openly destined you for so long?

And yet, you subcome to his affection, hesitantly holding your own arms to his chest. His scent, his warmth.You felt as if you were dreaming, eyes wet from the overwhelming care, feeling gentle kisses press to the top of your head.

You don’t remember when Charles scooped you to his chest, tucking you into your fresh blankets before nestling in behind you himself. You remind yourself; this is a one-off. You’re almost certain that by tomorrow, he’ll be back in the arms of his mistress, your moment tonight will be an absent moment to your husband. You’ll take it; if it’s one night in his arms, feeling his breath against the back of your neck, tip of his nose pressing into your back, one hand pressed against your stomach in comfort, you’ll take it.

Some point during the night, your phone buzzes, the sound barely audible on the blankets of your bed. You groan slightly, the bubble of yourself and Charles giving you a true form of sanctuary, a true form of home. Curiosity in the night takes the better of you, lifting the dying device to your eyes, slightly blinded by the glow of the screen.

Despite being wrapped in the arms of your husband; you can feel your blood turn cold when you read the one sentence which had been left for you to find.

01:46: Carlos Sainz

I’m in love with you.

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faebaex · 1 year

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Accidentally Courting an Eel Ⅱ

author note: part 2 part 2!! You guys seemed to really love this and that makes me so happy! I’ll admit, I really, really enjoyed writing part 2, and that’s probably why it turned out longer than the first part x-x less cameos this time, but lots of Jade and this time its Azul being the only voice of reason. Hope you enjoy!!

characters: Floyd Leech x F!Reader

“Ne… Do you think Y/N likes me?”

The VIP room was quiet apart from the scratching of Azul’s pen and the soft clinking of teacups as Jade prepared a pot of black tea. Floyd laid back on one of the plush VIP room couches, his legs hanging over the arm as he dangled his earring in front of his face, gazing at it as it swayed gently. Azul’s pen didn’t stop, continuing to scrawl across the documents in front of him, whilst a ghost of a smile played on Jade’s lips as he brewed the tea leaves to perfection.

“You two had a fight not even a week ago, why would you think she likes you?” Azul queried, a small frown marring his features, but he did not take his eyes off the documents he was labouring over. Floyd’s hand closed around his earring, and he rolled over, his chin resting against the couch arm as he looked over at Azul, a pout beginning to form on his lips.

“But she bit me.” Floyd pointed out and Azul raised an eyebrow, finally looking up from his documents. “But she isn’t a merfolk, Floyd. She wouldn’t have any idea what that might mean.” Azul countered, sighing at the ridiculousness of this conversation. Floyd’s face fell, his lips turning downward slightly at the corner at Azul’s words. Jade noticed this, elegantly making his way over to Azul’s desk and setting a teacup down with a flourish. “But she still bit him. Such actions carry connotations, bold ones at that. Of course Floyd would feel a certain… Way.” Jade stated, folding his hands in front of him as he stood beside Azul’s desk. Azul’s pen dropped onto the desk with a clatter, and he looked up at Jade incredulously, “are you serious?!”

“And she so kindly repaired Floyd’s earring, without us having to persuade her to do so or claim fair compensation. She looked so pleased with herself too. And I need not remind you just how important gifting jewellery is to merfolk?” Jade smiled serenely, ever happy to be stirring the pot whilst Azul shot him a dirty look.

Floyd’s legs kicked restlessly behind him, his face blank for a few moments before a wide grin spread across his face, sharp teeth glinting as he jumped up off of the couch, a short wild laugh leaving his lips before he dashed out of the VIP room with a spring in his step. Azul sighed as the VIP room door slammed shut, convinced that he was going to have to replace it one of these days due to Floyd’s recklessness, and Jade let out a muffled chuckle that he hid behind his hand.

“Why did you do that?” Azul huffed, picking up his pen and getting back to work, the sound of pen on paper once again filling the room.

“Whatever do you mean?” Jade responded innocently, his composed smile never budging despite the sly glint in his eyes.

“If it ends in tears, I don’t want to hear a peep about it. And this better not disturb business at the Lounge, otherwise you will be the one picking up the overtime.” Azul warned, and Jade’s smile lifted, his teeth starting to peek through.

“Of course. I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

Life had mostly gone back to normal after your fight with Floyd.

You were finally free of what seemed like the never-ending punishment from Crewel. As expected, Floyd was nowhere to be seen during your three-day stint in the botanical garden, tending to the regrowth of the ingredients that had gotten caught in the crossfire of your and Floyd’s dispute. It wasn’t as bad as you thought it would be, with you mostly watering the plants, your biggest obstacle having to move housewarden Kingscholar from his napping spot so you could water the plants there (nothing a discreet threat with the watering hose couldn’t fix).

You had also finally submitted your potionology assignment, your partner generously distilling another vial of ginger root so that you could brew the energy boosting potion and not suffer any more of Crewel’s wrath for submitting a late assignment. Considering how insistent that your lab partner was about replacing the ginger root, you can only imagine it was a result of him seeing you taking on Floyd Leech without even batting an eyelid.

Either way, things had all sorted themselves out and your day-to-day school life fell back into place like normal. Well, apart from one difference. Floyd Leech.

He was bothering you. Every day. Without. Fail.

At first, he began randomly attacking you. But there was none of the vicious aggression that usually accompanied a fight, it was more like… Excitable and rough play fighting. And he bites too, incessantly, your arms and hands often littered in his very distinct teeth marks. He’d pop out of nowhere and some days, it was just about all you could do to fend him off, being how you were trying to lay low in order to keep your head, lest housewarden Riddle finally get sick of you and cut you down to size. Floyd seemed to delight in when he managed to make you jump, or when you smacked him with your textbooks in an attempt to ward him away. To make things more odd, after you’d got into a small altercation with another student, Floyd had sought you out that same afternoon. You don’t even know how he had even heard about the incident, having not been a physical one which was diffused rather quickly. With a surprisingly pouty expression, he’d gripped you by the shoulders, not budging an inch even as you tried your best to detach him.

“Ne, don’t go bitin’ other guys, okay?”

Floyd’s random offensives lasted every day for about a week before he began to change tact.

Soon, you’d notice things going missing. Not anything important, but enough to be small, irritating inconveniences. For example, you’d reach into your stationery case for a pencil to find it missing, only to find it tucked behind Floyd’s ear casually as he strolled down the corridor. On one particularly troublesome occasion, Floyd brazenly slipped his hand into your pocket and took your phone, pouting on discovery that it was locked via face ID and yet still managing to somehow line up your phone screen perfectly to get it to unlock. He cackled as he held it out of reach, not reacting no matter how much you stomped on his shoes and tugged at his arms. You were one step away from climbing him like the bean pole he resembles when he finally gave it back, grinning like a Cheshire cat. You didn’t find out until later when a message from a “Moryay!” popped up with the most ridiculous meme and string of emojis did you realise that Floyd had added his number to your phone and made you follow him on all his social media accounts.

After that, you changed your phone lock to passcode only.

But perhaps the most bizarre moment that came out of Floyd’s sudden obsession with you was the nickname he had dubbed you.

“P-pea?!” You spluttered, looking at Floyd with a mix of shock and disbelief.

Floyd gave you his typical toothy grin, leaning forward with his hands in his pockets. “Yeah, pea puffer,” Floyd drawled, looking absolutely delighted with himself, “Y’know, pea puffers are real tiny. They look all cute and unassuming, but they are real aggressive and fight other fish all the time, just like you.” You gaped at this comparison, and that only seemed to please him more, remarking how you really looked like a fish now.

“I’d rather you went back to calling me guppy. Please.” You complained, a hand resting on your hip as you looked upon Floyd, unimpressed.

“No way, pea puffer. You’re much more special than the rest of these lil guppies.”

It had been weeks, but Floyd was still seeking you out non-stop. Your friends, whilst sympathetic, had begun to avoid you by proxy, trying not to get caught in the crossfire. You were at a loss about why he was so obsessed with you lately, or about what you could do to get him off your back.

“Well, that’s just Floyd Leech,” your friend responded with a shrug as you vented to her on your walk between classes, “if someone interests him, he’ll be all over them. But as soon as he finds them boring, he drops them as quick as he picked them up. That’s just how he is. Although I’ve never seen him bite people like that before.” Your friend commented, eyes briefly glancing down at your bare wrist. You grumbled and quickly rolled down your blazer sleeves, concealing the unique pinprick bite marks. Your friend shrugged again, as if that was the be all and end all of the situation. “What? So I’m just supposed to wait until he finds someone else on campus interesting enough for him to bother?” You huffed in exasperation, and your friend shot you a sympathetic side eye. “Well, I think the best thing you can do if lay low for a little while. Well…” A small smile curved your friends lips up, “as low as you can manage, I guess.” You shot her a half-hearted glare and she laughed, “the point is, if Floyd doesn’t see you for a while, maybe he’ll move on and start terrorising someone else.” The two of you entered the history of magic classroom and took your seats, and there was nothing like an incredibly slow, boring history class to ponder what your friend said and what you should do next, and if it was even possible for you to lay low enough to avoid Floyd for that long.

Having carefully formulated your plan under professor Trein’s nose, you sprung Operation Avoid The Leech into action. In the mornings, you would hurry to your classes, keeping your head down and under the cover of the bustling student body. At lunch, you’d rush to the cafeteria, pick up whatever sandwich was closest you could grab and then you’d dash out of there, eating your lunch in a discreet spot. After afternoon classes, you went straight back to your dorm with no detours, holing yourself up in your room. You managed to tell your club president a convincing enough excuse as to why you would not be attending club activities for the foreseeable future, internally thanking your scrappy reputation for making whatever punishment your club president thought you had gotten yourself into now so much more believable.

Your new routine had some unexpected benefits, with housewarden Riddle often praising your new behaviour, believing that you had turned over a new leaf and you were starting out on your journey to become one of Heartslabyul’s model students. But there was a very specific downside to your new no frills routine.

You were so, so bored.

The irony wasn’t lost on you that whilst you were waiting for Floyd to get bored of you, you were the one who was hopelessly bored, moping around in your room most of the time. There was only so far studying could take you, and looking through your social media only made you feel worse, seeing all of your friend’s stories and posts of how they were spending their precious freedom just making you feel more miserable. You huffed a huge sigh as you threw yourself down on your bed, hugging one of your pillows as you stared aimlessly at the ceiling. Hopefully, just a few more weeks to go…

Floyd huffed a sigh, slumped across the Mostro Lounge bar, head in his arms as he stared aimlessly gleaming, polished surface of the counter. Jade stood behind the bar, diligently polished glasses as he stared at his twin with a knowing smile. Service at the Mostro Lounge had ended an hour ago, with Azul holing himself up in the VIP room to pour over the day’s sales figures, giving Floyd the perfect opportunity to mope.

“Is something the matter, Floyd? You’re rather sullen today.” Jade commented, knowing full well what the problem was but decided to prod his brother regardless, curious as to what reaction it would elicit. Floyd remained silent, his finger tracing mindless shapes against the countertop. The lounge was silent apart from the occasional clink as Jade set back a perfectly polished glass and began work on the next. Finally, Floyd spoke up.

“Pea puffer is avoiding me…” Floyd mumbled, not raising his eyes up from the counter. Jade’s head tilted slightly in interest, yet he still didn’t stop polishing the glass in his hand. “Pea puffer?” Jade questioned, his curiosity even further piqued, “You mean the small, combative— Ahh.” An amused smile lifted up Jade’s lips at this new piece of information. So Floyd had upgraded you from the sea of guppies to a personal nickname, quite the honour.

“What makes you believe Y/N is avoiding you?” Jade asked, placing the glass he was polishing on the counter and folding his hands neatly on the counter, focusing his full attention on Floyd now. Slowly, Floyd sat up from the counter, resting his chin on his fist as he continued to sulk. “I haven’t seen her in weeks. She’s never in the cafeteria at lunch, I even went to her club but she wasn’t there either. The club prez said she told him she couldn’t attend for a while…”

“I see...” Jade hummed as he mulled this information over, “have you been to the Heartslabyul dorm to check on her?” Floyd’s pout turned into a frown, his mood starting to turn. “Goldfishie banned me from stepping foot in Heartslabyul after the last time.” Jade’s lips turned upwards as he remembered the last time, but he soon turned his mind back to the problem at hand. “I see. This is quite the mystery.”

Floyd didn’t respond, instead staring dejectedly at the glass in front of him. “… I thought she liked me,” Floyd finally broke the silence, “she was the one who started courting me… She bit me, and she fixed my earring!” Frustration began to seep into Floyd’s voice, his eyes narrowing on the glass, “y’know, she was even opening her mouth a lot recently, real wide. Sure, she sometimes covered it with her hand, but…” Floyd’s voice trailed off and he fell back into gazing dejectedly at the glass, until a slender hand reached out and plucked it from the table, back to being polished in Jade’s careful hands.

“Hmm… Perhaps it is time that you let Y/N know that you are courting her back?” Jade mused, and Floyd huffed, his hand falling down onto the counter with a dull thud. “I have! I bit her back! I leave ‘em all up her arms, so she knows how into her I am. And I take her stuff and wear it, so all the other guppies know, y’know?” Floyd reasoned, and Jade nodded slowly, the glass clinking as he slides it back into its place, beautifully gleaming. “I know, but I fear Azul may have been right. Perhaps she does not know.” Jade countered, and Floyd looked up at his twin then, waiting for him to continue. “It seems that land dwellers have more… Fragile courting customs than us merfolk do. It may help to be more direct.” Jade concluded, carefully watching his twin to gauge his reaction to this idea. Floyd stared blankly at Jade, and Jade knew his twin enough to know a dark cloud was starting to form over Floyd’s mood again. On cue, Floyd slumped against the counter again, a whine of annoyance slipping past his lips. “Human customs are annoying,” Floyd continued to whine, burying his face into his arm, “how am I supposed to tell her if she keeps avoiding me?”

Jade looked down at his brother, finding himself a little amused by his uncharacteristically lovesick behaviour. In all the years they had been together, he had never seen Floyd act this way over someone before. How curious. “It’s quite simple, Floyd. You simply need to lure her out.” A cunning smile spread across Jade’s lips, and Floyd perked up slightly, once again turning his attention back to his brother. “I have a plan…” Jade affirmed, leaning forwards and beginning to conspire with his dispirited twin…

It had been two weeks since you had begun Operation Avoid The Leech and to put it bluntly, it was the most boring two weeks of your life. But things were finally starting to look up. Your friends had begun to report to you that Floyd seemed to have calmed down a lot this past week, no longer constantly peppering them with questions about your whereabouts or attempting to hunt you down during breaks or after class. And yesterday, to add the final cherry on top, you received news that a random Scarabia student had caught Floyd’s interest, and he had apparently been chasing them around instead. You were still feeling a little cautious, wondering if you should leave it a few more days before deciding it was safe enough to venture out again. You were on the fence about what to do, but then a friend sent you a message, asking if you wanted to go to a trendy new café that had opened in town. With her assurance that she hadn’t seen Floyd at all that day, and it was very doubtful that you’d run into him in town. Persuaded that everything was fine, and you were finally off the hook, you eagerly agreed to meet her by the clocktower after class.

Classes flew by, and before you knew it you were waiting at the clocktower for your friend to arrive. Your mood was sky high and it was a beautiful day, you couldn’t think of a better day to go into town and celebrate your new freedom. You leaned against one of the pillars, scrolling aimlessly through your social media as you waited for your friend to show. You found yourself getting distracted, doom scrolling through videos on Magicam, and when you finally noticed the time, it was ten minutes after your friend was supposed to meet you. You frowned down at your phone, seeing no messages to say that she was running late. You looked up from your phone, confusion etched on your face as you looked around the courtyard that enclosed the clocktower, wondering if she had somehow missed you. In fact, you were about to message her to check that everything was alright, when you saw a flash of teal walking down the path towards main street. You felt a surge of dread when the figure turned to lock eyes with you and offer his signature insincere smile.

Jade Leech.

Suddenly it all clicked into place.

“Oh fuck.” You muttered to yourself, and you swear you could see Jade’s sharp teeth poking out from under his lips. At that moment, your phone pinged in your hand and a message from your friend popped up, and your feeling of dread only intensified as you read the pop-up notification.

‘I’m so sorry’ was what your friend had sent to you, but you hardly had a chance to dwell on it when you heard the familiar laugh that sent a chill down your spine. Without a second thought, you bolted.

You could hear Floyd Leech’s maniacal laughter behind you as ran around the clocktower, ducking for cover as you internally spat every curse word you knew, trying to figure out what your next move would be. Floyd’s laughter died down into silence, but you weren’t stupid enough to believe that he’d left, pressing yourself against the clocktower and peeking around the corner. The coast seemed to be clear, but now you had to weigh up whether you could outrun Floyd. The outlook was looking dismal. A small body of water cut off one side, but you wondered if you could maybe duck through the trees near Sam’s shop and make a run for the hall of mirrors. The hall of mirrors wasn’t that far from the clocktower, but that all relied on Floyd not chasing after you. You peaked around the corner again, still not seeing Floyd, and you were about to make a break for it when, out of the corner of your eye, you saw a shadow loom over you. Before you could react, Floyd slammed his hand down just above your head, surprising you enough for you to let out a yelp of surprise as he boxed you in against the clocktower with a wide toothed smile and an excited glow in his eyes.

“Found you.”

Floyd leaned his arm against the clocktower, leaning over you as he continued to grin down at you, looking incredibly proud of himself. You looked up at him in disbelief, not much room for you to move with your back pressed against the clocktower and Floyd looming in front of you, effectively crowding you in between his arms. It was rare that you found yourself speechless, your mind spinning as you tried to figure out exactly what you could do in this situation, if at all anything. So instead of overthinking it, you did what you do best.

You attacked.

“Floyd Leech! What did you do to my friend?!” You hissed at him, puncturing every word with a swing of your bag into his stomach. Floyd grunted as the first swing hit him, but then he laughed, letting you hit him a couple of times before he grabbed your bag mid swing, stopping your assault. “I didn’t do anything to your little friend, pea puffer.” Floyd drawled, looking amused when you shot him an indignant look back at him.

“Then why isn’t she here? Are you bullying my friends?” You retorted, trying to tug your bag out of his grip so you could whack him again, but his hand didn’t even budge, like his grip was made of iron. Annoying. Instead, he decided to yank your bag himself, catching you by surprise and making you tumble into his chest. “I ain’t bullyin’ your friends, little pea puffer,” Floyd whispered into your ear, “ain’t it obvious? Your friend sold you out.”

You let out a disgruntled sound as you pushed Floyd, taking a step back and glaring at him. Floyd retained your bag, looping it over his shoulder with a cheeky grin. “Ya see, your friend owed Azul a favour, an’ me and Jade decided we could help her out… If she helped us out.” His tongue poked out of his mouth as he grinned down at you, “you’re too trustin’, pea puffer, it’s cute.” You folded your arms over your chest, glaring at him. You were about to open your mouth to retaliate, but before you could, Floyd suddenly lunged forward and lifted you into his arms, marching off with you without a word, if you didn’t count his trademark giggle.

“Floyd! Put me down!” You shouted, pushing at his shoulders, your legs flailing in protest. Floyd didn’t respond as he walked around the clocktower, and you twisted, trying to get out of his grip. “Stop squirming, pea puffer. You’ll make me drop you.” Floyd complained, even if his grip around your waist didn’t budge an inch as he held you. “Alley-oop!” Floyd cried joyfully as he launched his long leg out, kicking open the door leading into the clocktower with a deafening slam. “Floyd! The clocktower is off limits, are you trying to get us another detention?” You snapped, your eyes wide with alarm. “Relax, pea puffer. What they don’t know won’t hurt them.” Floyd drawled casually, and you huffed. “Easy for you to say, you didn’t even turn up to our last detention!”

Floyd turned his head and grinned at you, and you had to lean back, not realising how close together your faces were. “Then I’ll come to the next one. Now hold on tight!” Floyd grinned, all sharp teeth and mischief, and you barely had a chance to process his words and why you’d need to hold on before he started dashing up the clocktower stairs. You were unable to fight the undignified squeak that ripped past your lips as you clung onto Floyd like your life depended on it, his laughter echoing off of the high walls of the clocktower as he bounded up the stairs. You thought it would never end, but finally a room opened up and Floyd ducked into it, finally setting you back on your feet. “Ta-da~!” Floyd announced, swinging his arms out. The room was small, small enough that Floyd couldn’t even stand at his full height, lest he bump his head on the low ceiling. The true centrepiece of the room was the curved window that looked out onto main street, and you could see all the way to the sports field. A ledge sat below the window, and Floyd took no time to make himself comfortable on it, waving you over.

“Isn’t it cool, pea puffer? I like to come here sometimes, when I just wanna chill without anyone harshin’ my vibe.” Floyd grinned, setting your bag on the ledge and to your surprise, he opened it up and started rifling through it. “Hey!” You scolded, rushing over to stop him as he began to rifle up through your stationery case. “Ne, don’t you have anything fun I can have?” Floyd asked as he pulled one of your pens out, not seeming at all phased when you slapped at his hands, trying to get him out of your things. “If you want something fun, get your own!” You huffed, pulling your stationery case and bag out of his hand and shoving it behind you, out of his reach. You tried to reach for the pen, but he held it out of your reach, his previous sunny expression falling into a pout. “That’s not the point, pea puffer. It has to be something of yours.” Floyd complained and you raised an eyebrow at him, completely lost as to his reasoning behind this.

Floyd’s expression went blank as he stared at you, and if felt like the two of you were locked in a staring contest for hours before he finally decided to speak again. “Ne, you just don’t get it, do you pea puffer?” Floyd asked, his eyebrows drawing down slightly as he continued to stare at you. You suddenly felt like you were under a microscope, shifting uncomfortably on the ledge. “What’s there to get?” You remarked, although you had the odd feeling that you should tread carefully, considering how uncharacteristically serious his face looked, “aren’t you just messing with me because you’re bored?”

Floyd pulled a face at your words. “Jade was right. You really don’t know.” Floyd huffed, before leaning forward and grabbing hold of your wrist, rolling your blazer sleeve up to your elbow with unexpected gentleness, revealing your bare arm. The bite marks Floyd had made had mostly faded by now, and he pulled another face, unhappy with this but pushing on with the conversation anyway. “You bit me, so I bit you.” Floyd stated, looking at your face and seeming to study it for your reaction. You’d be lying if you said you weren’t baffled. “Yeah… So?” You responded, and Floyd’s brow downturned just a little bit more at that.

“And you fixed my earring.”

“Yes…?”

You could see Floyd’s teeth clench together, an annoyed breath huffing out of his nose as he dropped your wrist, raising that hand to grip at his shoulder. He stared at you, brow furrowed and you were truly at a loss for what you had done wrong. You could only stare back at him, eyebrows raised as you waited for him to divulge what exactly you didn’t get.

“Those are all merfolk mating customs.” Floyd finally said flatly, and you felt yourself freeze.

“… Excuse me?” You managed to squeak out, not even feeling embarrassed about how your voice sounded as you stared at Floyd in disbelief. Floyd continued to study your expression; his lips pressed together in a firm line.

“Listen up, pea puffer. You bit me in the potions lab, and that made me think you liked me. Merfolk bite each other when they’re interested, y’know? And when I was mullin’ it over, you came runnin’ after me, holdin’ out my earring that you’d fixed with that pretty smile on your face. You were very persistent in letting me know you were interested.” Floyd explained, looking at you pointedly.

“Wait, wait, wait!” You spluttered, “what does giving your earring back prove? And I bit you when we were fighting!” Floyd just shook his head, letting his hand drop into his lap. “Giving jewellery is like, the top merfolk courting custom,” Floyd said with a shrug, “fixin’ someone’s broken jewellery is just as close. It doesn’t matter how it happened. Plus, merfolk fight all the time. Especially when they like each other, its just natural.”

You stared open mouthed at Floyd as you processed his words. Floyd thought you had a crush on him, because you bit him and fixed his earring?! You were stunned silent, feeling your cheeks heat up slightly at the implication. If Floyd noticed, he didn’t mention it, continuing with his explanation.

“So that’s why I started bitin’ you back. It shows that I like you back and it lets all those guppies know it too,” Floyd’s gaze fell back to your arm again, and now it really made sense why he had pulled a face earlier when he saw his bite marks all but gone, “it’s also why I started borrowin’ your things and keepin’ them on me, so that all the guppies would see that I’m unavailable.” Floyd finished, looking at you expectantly. You simply stared back at him, rendered speechless by Floyd Leech for the umpteenth time that day. Floyd began to frown again at your bewildered expression, and he leaned towards you as he spoke next.

“D’ya get it, pea puffer? I like you.”

Floyd’s rather straightforward, unabashed confession is what snapped you out of daze, and you felt your cheeks grow hot, a red hue painting them. You’d look at home with the roses in the Heartslabyul gardens. You fumbled for some words, your lips moving but nothing coming out as you found yourself awkwardly flustered. A smile started to curve up Floyd’s lips as he saw just how flustered you were becoming, and he leaned closer still, his nose almost close enough to touch yours.

“Ne, pea puffer, d’ya like me back?”

If your cheeks could have grown any redder, they would have. At this point, someone might as well have dug a hole in the Heartslabyul gardens and planted you there, your face putting the roses to shame. “Y-you haven’t even taken me on a date!” You stuttered out, cringing at your own weak defence, only for Floyd to lean back and gesture at the room you were both in.

“Whad’dya mean? We’re on a date right now.” Floyd shot back nonchalantly, and you almost choked on your own tongue.

“This was entrapment! Some would even dare to call it kidnapping!” You retorted, finally starting to shake the daze that his explanation and confession had put you in, “usually, when you like someone, you ask them out on a date.”

Floyd’s grin became toothy, and that’s when you knew you’d really put your foot in it. “D’ya want me to ask you on a date, pea puffer?” There was a shine in his eyes, and he seemed excited about the idea, but also sincere. You felt your cheeks heat up again and you looked away, suddenly finding the spelldrive players on the sports field very interesting. “T-that’s not what I said.”

Regardless of your complete obliviousness to merfolk mating customs and what you had apparently started, Floyd seemed very satisfied with the outcome of the conversation. He scooted closer to you, his knee brushing against yours as he leaned in very close, his lips hovering above yours for a painfully long moment before he decided to detour and press a surprisingly soft kiss to your forehead, his wild toothy grin as he pulled away a complete contradiction to this gentle gesture. “Buckle up, pea puffer, ‘cause now I’m courting you. Aha~!”

Just what had you gotten yourself into?!

Taglist:

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#twst #twisted wonderland #floyd leech x reader #twst floyd #floyd leech #twisted wonderland x reader #twst x reader #floyd leech x y/n

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