#it was the only thing on there for like 3 weeks

[tonycries]

TALKIN' BOOODY!

Synopsis. The one thing he won’t survive? Your ovuIation.

Pairings. [SEPARATE] Gojo x Reader, Sukuna x Reader, Choso x Reader, Geto x Reader, Nanami x Reader, Toji x Reader

Content. MDNI, fem! reader, MARATHONS, cervíx kíssing, dúmbification, PÚSSYDRÚNK MEN, bréeding, creampíes, true form Sukuna, dp, talking you through it, jeaIous s (Sukuna), cúmplay, cúmming dry, use of powers, spítting, chokíng, matíng presses, p talking, p sIapping, reader ovuIates, pet names, swéaring.

A/N. Hope you have a lovely week <3

♡ TOJI FUSHIGURO - Love Machine.

Toji Fushiguro never thought he’d meet his match - he never thought he’d end up like this. 

Toned chest panting - heaving - in pathetic huffs and puffs, muscular thighs quivering with every second he folded you like a lawnchair into such a mean standing nelson. It’s all he can do to snarl out mere husked gurgles, “O-ovulation? Hah- five rounds n’ you still think she’s a match against me, doll?”

Lies. And both of you knew it.

The man himself can only watch through hooded eyes when you’re squirming your greedy hips back and forth for more more more- “But Toooji– when m’ovulating I really want a hah...a baby.” 

Oh.

Oh.

And Toji doesn’t know whether it’s your words or the mere sultry sound of your voice that makes his tall, powerful body shiver. 

“So what?” He’s spitting through clenched teeth, you yelp when Toji wastes no time jostling you into such a pliable position against his glissading abs. Big, beefy biceps flexing when he smears your thighs widely agape, “Then m’just gonna give ya a baby, ma.”

But fuck, is Toji cursing back his words the very moment his geysering divot slides past your spongy cervix and probes a deep indent right against the door to your womb. 

Because you feel so unfairly good - so scorching hot n’ melty all around him - that he can’t help but furrow his sweat-slicked brows and pump his hips vulgarly sloppier into yours. Faster. Harder. 

He oh-so-badly wants to cum. Needs to prove it.

But the way his feverish skin breaks out in another sweaty varnish, the way his overused cock twinges with overstimulation leave him wondering if he still can. Parting his mazing length past all the ribbony excess of seed from earlier tonight to milk himself fucking dry if he has to.

“Gonna b-be eating your words.” He’s seething cockily, heftily bloated tip blushing the exact same strawberry-pink shade as his pretty flush right now. “Swear m’gonna make ya- oh god.”

And whatever sentence rambling pussydrunkenly off of Toji’s filthy tongue never sees the light of day - because what he sees makes his throat tighten. 

Dipping down one fat thumb of his to circle the cream-topped peak of your sensitive clit, Toji pries apart your adhesive-like walls until he can take a long, hard look at the way your slippery entrance was swallowing every solid inch of him.

“Look at you.” He’s murmuring out, and your heart stutters at the primal adoration that laces his words. Round, padded fingertips pap! pap! papping! the edge of your throbbing clit until steady globs of cum from just before slip out of your needy entrance. “Got s-so much you’re overspilling n’ you still want more.”

You’re craning your head to look up at him, lashes fluttering following each of his vicious rams. “Can’t help it- I just feel so…”

You don’t have to talk - because your slobbering cunt does all of it for you.

A resounding squelch! ringing into your ears and all across Toji’s cottony mind in an utterly sensual manner. 

“Damn, girl-” you hear from above you. And he wastes no time slathering those bulky digits in a saccharine coating of all your sap, “-n’ I thought hngh- you were needy. Turns out this cute cunt is a fuckin’ diiirty girl.”

But, of course, who was Toji Fushiguro to not give you anything and everything you wanted? You were his girl, after all - and your eyes widen when those very same drippingly wet fingers are pushed between your sodden folds with a waterlogged fwop!

“S’this ‘nough for my ovulating girl?” Toji’s rolling his willowy eyes, hasty streaks of sweat running down the side of his face. “Speak up- ”

“Yes- fuck!” You’re clawing your nails down his firm forearms to rake red, red lines that match his puffed-up veins. Thumping hotly against your skin to the same ba-dump–! as the ones on his girthy shaft, grazing your clingy walls and molding them out generously to his size. “Need you to cum in m-me Toji– need it-”

Fuck- Toji’s knees weaken precariously at your words. Hollowed breaths coming out infinitely more strained, “Where- where do you want me?”

He thinks he’s going fucking insane. 

But of course, you’re showing it all off for him. Of course, you’re letting your index drag from the middle of your tummy to secure right where he was rummaging every nook and cranny of your insides. Just millimeters away from where the rotund bulge of his crownhead was pressing innocent pecks on your womb-

“Here.”

And when Toji cums he’s losing all strength - he’s out of control. “Fine- fine. But you’re takin’ every l-last drop- fuck! Everythin’ because you b-better make me a hngh- daddy all over again, doll.” 

Not even every ounce of superhuman strength from his heavenly restriction could keep him standing upright. Hunching over into your body, you feel like you’re being crushed- you are.

Gasping at the faint pop! of your poor joints once Toji’s letting himself droop languidly down onto his knees on the hardwood floor. Close. 

He’s burning so hot, and you eagerly inhale his sweet, cinnamony cologne. Laddered bumps of his abs meshing and melding into your back, his tightly clamped chin rests on the crook of your neck. 

“Mercy-” He’s muttering through clouded pants against your ear, vision flashing white behind his heavy lids. And the moment your gluey walls grip onto around his sensitive slit he thinks he sees heaven. Toji doesn’t think he’s had an orgasm like this in his entire life. “Mercy.”

You’re tangling up a few fingers to scrape along his scalp, parting Toji’s glossy black bangs - and you swear you hear his throat curdle, frantically biting down a hoarse whimper. 

Bulbous head bludgeoning into your forbidden spots and twitching up angrily, every sopping smack against your deepest depths only leave your mouth watering. 

You grind your hips down with a mewl, thighs aching to meet his strained cadence and draw out those tiny, sweltering hot spatters of milky cum. More. Where- 

But Toji’s eyes snap open- fuck! All it takes is one strong arm to hold your entire weight up easily when he darts down an urgent hand to curl dexterously around his hefty girth. Squeezing, tugging- “Fucking- cumming dry? Fuck-”

It can’t be.

Shit, it can’t be.

But a lazy few grazes of his sensitive cock inside your raw cunt helps him find…nothing. Not even a few wiry wisps of splattered seed. Furiously working his fingers up n’ down up n’ down your teary slit, trying to feel for another fresh lather of cum. For that familiar sloshing mess of buttery white- because Toji has never cum dry. Never. 

He’s swatting your puffed-up clit as if it was your fault all he could muster up was a singular dabbing bead of ivory. 

And as Toji watches that surprised glint in your eyes transform into something darker, something…filthier, he knows he can do nothing else but gulp. Chubby balls perking up with a mocking little twitch-

“M’not making it out a-alive, huh?”

♡ NANAMI KENTO - Ge-ge-genius

“And according to the agenda, we’ll be discuss- fuck-”

It didn’t matter if Nanami was working. It didn’t matter if he had some stupid meeting for tomorrow. 

No- right now the only thing that mattered was that, according to his tracker, his lovely wife was ovulating - and of course, Nanami had to be there as a good husband to…help.

“-discussing the- oh- my love.” You’re sure that you knock over much more than a few important papers when you’re eagerly straddling him at his cool office chair. Looking up at you through blond, curtained lashes, “Still needy, huh?”

The only answer he gets are your greedy hands rovering all over his unbuttoned front. Perking a thumb over one of his bubblegum pink nipples, squeezing ravenously at his toned abs. All the way down until you’re hooking a finger underneath the shirt garter around his muscular thigh to snap!

“Fuck- m’here- m’here, I promise.” He’s massaging all down your perfectly arched spine, planting a slow, lecherous drag of his leaky divot across your spongy cervix. Drawing a goopy line that makes you squirm, “You want some of this, don’t you?”

Nodding and nodding, “Yeah- s-sorry I just need it so hngh- bad right now, Kento.”

“Nothing to apologize for, darling. M’glad to know my girl is ovulating n’ healthy.” Nanami leans back, and you can practically feel the sleazy up and down of his seductive eyes. He’s tilting his head ever-so-slightly, “Why don’tcha use my fucking cock like a good little wife then, hm? Let Kento here get some work done while you haaah- take care of that pretty pussy like a big girl- s’that alright?”

Fuck- you’d take anything you could get at this point. You just needed him.

And Nanami wasn’t serious about looking over some useless documents while you shuffled your hips to milk his every inch. Truly, you were his first priority after all.

But when you gave into his little teases oh-so-easily and looked at him like that- well, how could a man say no?

It’s like you were trying to get him pussydrunk, your sappy folds extra sticky against his toned front. Letting out the cutest of whimpers every time the fleshy mounds of your ass hit his belt buckle with a loud plap! 

Fuck.

Fuck, why did he say that he had work to get done in the first place?

Because now Nanami’s left clutching a crinkled document in one hand, the other soothing down your back as you crane yourself over and give his bumpy Adam’s apple a thorough suck. 

“R-right- the proposal of this project has been m-moved-” He was rereading the same sentence over and over and over. Watching your gyrating motions, alternating between vulgarly deep strokes inside and swivelling grinds to scratch your plump clit against his neat tufts of tawny blond. “...has been moved a-according to the ngh-”

“It- it feels so goood-” Your breath hitches with every cry, every thick drag of his pre-topped mushroom tip plundering your sweetest orifices. Nanami didn’t even have to try with that right-leaning curve of his, every battering bounce had you seeing stars. “-you f-feel so hngh- good, Ken. Wan’ you inside forever.”

Eyes widening a mere sultry fraction, his voice is so breathy. “Fuck.” 

“Focus on your work. You’re smart, baby–” You knew what you were doing - you were always such a minx during ovulation.

“Mhm, not like I’ve got a hngh- distraction.” A very welcome distraction that was currently toying with his haphazard tie, tugging and pulling until Nanami felt lightheaded with just how close he was to you. “A real pretty…” Curving up a thumb to swab up your sappy streaks of slick, it makes your pussy let out the nastiest squelch! “-real loud distraction.”

But, of course, that wasn’t going to stop you.

No. In fact, it’s as if your cadence gets even impossibly sloppier - a hard, fast papping of your hips that makes Nanami’s brows furrow.

“-and the client has r-requested that-” He’s hissing, a snarling smile ever-growing on his hips when your gluey walls cling onto him even tighter the moment he manages to get enough coherent syllables out. “-that we halt-”

A pen that’d been clutched in his hand - when had he even picked that up? - clatters onto the floor when you rake your hands to brush his aching, plump balls. But he barely even hears the commotion over those ringing slurps slurred out of your sloppy cunt.

“F-feeling handsy today, aren’t we?” He was tutting such nonsense at this point, glassy eyes trailing away from that important document in his hands and instead watching the heavenly sight that was you.

You, with your mouth spilling with whines upon whines every time he’s jerking his hips up in a rough ram. Such voluminous piles of buttery pre swashing around your insides forcing Nanami’s words to end up nothing but a ball of lead in his throat.

You’re noting the way his recitation has quieted down, doughy pads of your fingers still massaging where he was most sensitive. Humming, “S’everything alright- hck! Kento?”

And before you can say a word - before you can even blink - those particular meeting notes of his are thrown about halfway across Nanami’s decadent office.

Hands flying to you - everywhere, anywhere. Wrenching off Nanami’s speckled tie to loop them around your wrists and behind your back - tying you. Trapping you as he finishes off a knot.

Such a crazed look smeared all over his face when he’s lacing his now-free hands on top of the sweat-dampened crown of your head and pushing. 

Because you might have been driving him crazy with that depraved, rolling cadence of yours - but when Nanami fucked, he fucked mean. Holding down by your restrained arms to to warm his girthy cock, massaging his ridged veins along your resinous channel with a harsh thrust.

And yet it’s the perfect angle for a direct jackhammer into that magical area of your g-spot. He holds you captive until you’re being bruised with the perfect circular sphere of his inflated tip, until you can only throw your head back and cum.

You’re shuddering, “Cumming- ngh! M’cumming, Ken–” The sparks of white and red behind your shuttered lids are blissful, it’s like you’re crashing right into heaven.

“You got it, you got it-” Nanami’s bouncing his powerful knees to fuck you through your high, dragging his tight, cum-filled balls along the perk of your ass. He’s so large, letting you use him as you pleased. “Your Kento’s here, m’here so hah- gimme a kiss, please?”

Ever the gentleman.

It’s on autopilot when you do - you can’t even control the way your maw falls parted to make it such a slobbery mess. But your husband was far from complaining - “Good- good. Now spit in my mouth.”

“Fuck-” You’re whining, letting loose a viscous mess of spittle that targets Nanami’s pink tastebuds. Back arching when the very moment it meets his tongue makes his leaky divot burst with fat wads of cum. “-s-so full.”

That was an understatement - Nanami’s ribbony streams of seed were filling you up to the brim. He’s holding you still like his own personal toy, letting his staggering volume of cum stream from between your soppy pussylips to ruin his crisp office pants. 

Such round globs of pearly white that only make his smile grow even more feral. Guiding you at a lazy pace up and down up and down his throbbing cock to milk out every ounce.

He lets off a low whistle, “M’missing work tomorrow, huh?”

♡ GETO SUGURU - FRENCH TIPS

“S-Sugu-”

“Settle down, gorgeous.” Geto’s voice is silken-smooth, tinged with something so sexily husky that makes your fatigued thighs clamp even tighter around his pretty wrist. Trembling as he talks you through yet another orgasm tonight, “If you wanna talk out of this cute cunt here then you better let her fucking talk.”

And the only thing meaner than his words was the way that his doughy fingertips were prying apart your folds, circling the very edge of your slick-flooded entrance oh-so-lazily. Teasing. “Isn’t that right, pretty girl?”

Fuck- and he knows expertly how to get your sloppy pussy talking just as much as he was right about now. Pulling slobbery slurp! after slurp! that rings across his ears and makes them burn bright red at the fleshy tips.

Cooing away, and if you tilted your head just right you could catch the way that his tender palm was just gleaming with a syrupy lather of your juices. “Mhmmm– You’re the special girl tonight, s’like you’re in fucking heat. ”

You whine, “No–”

And Geto loved that. 

Loved how cute you were when he was mean. Loved splurging out his vicious digits from your hot core to drag his sloppy pink lips down till he was nudging against his mountainous knuckles. 

Sucking every ounce and sappy wad coating his fingers while staring deeply into your eyes. “‘Course you are. S’like a damn waterpark f’me when yer ovulating. Almost makes me wanna finally give you my cock. Almost.”

Almost.

And right now your melty mind couldn’t even fathom the possibility of not having Geto’s achy cock inside you right now. You needed him.

Desperately, your hips perk upwards to bump the fleshy mounds of your ass against his swollen girth. Glissading your skin across his sweltering hot length, yearning to feel the bumpy nudge of his veins. His plump, rotund crown-

“Tch- being teased turns you right now, huh? Or s’this pussy just filthy?” He’s letting off a chuckle, one palm covering your maw to block your saccharine sweet noises - because just the mere sound of your voice was making him twitch. 

He’s leaning in so dangerously close that you could practically read the filthy, filthy intentions in his hooded eyes. Drinking in the flowery whiff of his shampoo, “If you’re so impatient, maybe I shouldn’t give you my c-”

Geto doesn’t get to finish his sentence. Exactly as he’d expected. 

Exactly as he’d wanted. Oh, he loved it when you’d push him down and take exactly what you wanted, no matter how much he denied.

In only mere split-seconds, you’re flipping your positions over to splay him out like such a slut on the cottony sheets. Ass hitting his sharp hip-bones with a resonating pap! when you easily and pliably sink his curved cockhead past your teary slit. 

Inch by solid inch. Brows furrowing at the sheer stretch, tautly pulling your rubbery entrance to mold around his staggering girth-

“Yeahhhh, easy there. Take it hah- easy, gorgeous.” Geto’s batting is long, dark lashes up at you. And if you peered even closer you swear you could see his crinkled lids slip past a few stimulated tears. “S’a biiig stretch, isn’t it? N’ you don’t wanna hngh- hurt yourself.”

But you weren’t listening - you couldn’t.

You squeeze his tender throat tighter and Geto thinks he could cum.

The only thought running through your fuzzy head being to stutter out such thorough bounces, swallowing his rugged length from the curve of Geto’s inflated, ruby red tip, all the way until your plumped clit was rubbing back and forth against his dark happy trail.

“Fuck- hngh!” You’re moaning when his pulsing veins slip and slide in lightning bolted patterns all across your geysering sweet spots. “Feels so good- need more, Suguru.”

“Then fucking- take- it.” He spits, such a snarling grin smearing all across Geto’s face just in time with the pussydrunken splatters of drool leaking from one corner of his mouth. “Arch that back and take it.” Milking him until he’s lurching onto his elbows, “You’re the one ovulating, girl- use me.”

But you could feel your poor, overworked legs shaking, a pout cutely coating your words. “But-”

“Nuh uh, no complainin’-” You can’t help but flinch when his cushiony fingerpads reach over to give your bulging pussylips a good smack. Tugging right on the fleshy hood of your clit, “Take a few more inches n’ tell me who’s the one hngh- that was talking out of her cunt today, hm?”

“Sugu-” Swat! And apparently another soaking spank is all it takes for you to actually listen. Drooping your hips down further and further, bustling his bloated cock bottomlessly before the answering syllables tumble from your lips. “-fuck! Me- was me.”

“That’s right, good girl.” The thick fat of his thumb massages your treacly slit back and forth, forcing your hips to move in circling little gyrations that drive you wild. “Fuck, keep that rhythm. And who begged me to fuck this p-pretty pussy because it was that time of the month. Again and again and again?”

“Me.”

“Exactly.” He sounds so uncharacteristically smug. Dangerous. Such sexy veins puffing up Geto’s milky neck once he’s planting two feet firmly flat onto the cushy ground and pushing. Abs flexing with every swab of his weepy tip down your deepest depths over and over. “So if yer gonna ride me. Ride me right.”

Geto’s so feral pumping your cervix with branded bruises of his circumference, stuffing you so snugly full that your slick was flooding his bulky base in waves. “Bend your knees s’more- yeah. Yeah, move that hah- damn hand.”

Rudely sifting away your shy hands to cup his handsome face, he’s tilting his head right into your touch. You can feel your heart race when Geto nips your cozy palm, “Hold back my ah- hair, gorgeous. Can’t see her.”

Her being the way your glistening folds flutter when you push his silky locks into a haphazard ponytail and pull. Streaking a warm trail of sweetened juices down his abs when Geto bucks his slender hips to reach for-

“Ah! Fuck-” Your hazy eyes bulge out at the sudden crack of raw bliss, before scrunching pathetically shut once more when Geto’s split, plummy head crashes against the bullseye of your g-spot and drills down into it. “Sugu- I think I’m-”

And he knew it before you did. Could already feel the extra clingy smush of your walls, could see the way you’re letting your head tumble emptily backwards and cumming.

How cute.

Geto flies up one ravenous set of fingers to your heatedly pulsing clit and swats, one after the other. Two. Three. Counting them with each peak of pleasure he fucks you mercilessly through. 

Still letting his ears burn with the waterlogged thwack! thwack! thwack! of the spanks, you swear you could hear his breath hitch in awe. “We gotta train your riding, gorgeous. Luckily for you…we have allll night.”

♡ CHOSO KAMO - “M-more…?”

The moment those words are murking out in a puffed-out cloud from Choso’s lips, he thinks he could faint. He thinks he could feel his ears pop when you’re breaking apart from his plump, cerise tip with a wet plap!

“Mhm–” you’re nodding, treacly ribbons of spit and buttery cum still dangling from your lips and the leaky divot right on top of his swollen cock. “Sorry, Cho- this ovulation still has me so…horny.”

You’d just finished making him cum with that pretty mouth of yours, twice with your hands, and once merely from the sound of your sultry voice. And at the way your lips curve into the perfectly stained pout, Choso finds his loose maw dropping.

“No!” He’s hissing out, sounding as pathetically needy as he feels. A viscous puddle of saliva formulates at the back of his tongue and threatens to trickle from right between his kiss-bitten lips, “No no no don’t apologize, I- I mean.”

And fuck- even after so long with you, Choso still feels so fucking shy. Just the memory from today of you confessing that your ovulation was here and that you wanted him to…help make his high cheekbones scorch over with a cute red blush.

Lower lip wobbly precariously as he’s tugging at your sweat-simmered body to pull you from your knees, supporting your entire weight when you scramble onto unsteady legs. 

You’re raising a brow, “Cho? Do you want-”

Only to be cut off when Choso manhandles you around and all but slams you against the cool wall of your headily humid bedroom. One slender hand curled at your throat, softening the blow, the other pawing greedily at the fat of your ass. 

He’s pulling and prying to take a long look at the way your gluey lips were being oh-so-easily stretched by his aching shaft. 

Oh, you were so hot around him, it’s as if you were melting. Lacquering down a syrupy glaze of slick with every throbbing inch being fed inside-

“Don’t- don’t even know if I can cum anymore-” He’s breathing out in a heated whisper against your ear. Ragged and crazed enough that it makes your spine prickle with tiny goosebumps. “Don’t know if- fuck.”

But of course, he’s spying down at that lecherous sight. Words petering out when he cranes his drunken head downwards to leave an open-mouthed trailway of snogs down your back. Murmuring into your skin, “Don’t know if I can- hngh- even c-cum anymore. But for you–” Finishing off his trek at the finish line of your lips, “-anything for you, baby.”

Such a filthy, filthy French kiss. 

He could taste the saliva sugarcoating your mouth, feel the weight of those globules of his cum swirling into his own mouth. So sinful that it made him whine-

“B-baby, are you sure?” You’re managing, mouth faltering into an oh! as he starts up a fast, urgent rut of his hips. But Choso wasn’t ready to let you free that easily - no, no, no. He’s chasing after your lips as if he was addicted, suckling on your battered lower lip, “If you can’t…”

“I can.” He’s gruffing out, and he’ll apologize for cutting you off later. Right now, the only thing that Choso can do is roughly latch onto your hips and give you steady pound after pound. Countless. “I will- promise. All the way ‘ntil your ngh- ovulation finishes if I hafta, baby–”

Well and fully intent on keeping his promise.

His milky hips smack and strike eagerly against your own until the mounds of muscle underneath Choso’s soaked happy trail was all a stinging red. So much so that you see stars.

And shit- then you’re gazing at him over your shoulder and he thinks he could reach his high just from seeing your pretty face. “M’gonna milk you till you’re heh- dry, baby.”

Choso didn’t care that the tender curve of his fattened balls ached with overuse, didn’t care that those words and a simply snug cling of your dewy walls around him would be enough to make his strawberry orifice leak with copious volumes of cum.

Swamping your spongy cervix, he’s making such an utter mess by slamming! one palm down onto the wall fitting snugly inside you until he was thoroughly bottomed out. 

You’re gasping when you feel the warm plap! plap! plap! of something hitting the curvaceous edge of your shoulder. Only to tilt your head upwards and find your dear boyfriend crying.

Such pearly tears beading out from the edge of his chestnut eyes, and Choso’s clammy flush only grows ever-darker at the intensity of your stare. Fat, cylindrical shaft twitching upwards and hitting your sweetest spots with a dull thud! you shiver when he spurts out exactly three rivulets of sappy seed. 

Only three. 

“O-oh god–” He sucks in a deeply shuddering inhale, watery eyes fluttering as his hefty breeder balls squeeze and make him cum dry. “-s’this okay? S’this- ngh- enough? M’sorry I-”

“Awww, don’t apologize, Cho.” you’re humming, heat coiling at your tummy with just how bloated and full you felt right about now. Choso was always more than generous with the heaping torrentials of seed, swabbing a few delicate speckles with every thrust of his. “You did great- ngh- did so well.”

“Really?” He’s tightening his fingers around your throat to shut you up, to choke you lightheaded - because oh. There was his second weakest point - your praise. Only second to simply you in general. “Really? Y-you shouldn’t say that, baby- s’gonna ngh- make me…”

He doesn’t have to say a word.

He can’t.

Not when Choso was leaning back to eye your geysering hole, gulping at the sweltering hot beads of cum that trickle from between your pretty lips. Wispy little goblets that he can’t help but thumb over with a huff. 

“U-uh, baby.” Shit, there was something dark in that tone of his. Something…greedy. From the corner of your eye, you’re catching the pinkish flash of Choso’s tongue glide slooowly along his kiss-bitten lips while he still stares down lovingly at your pussy. After all- didn’t you say you’d milk him dry? He wasn’t quite dry just yet, no matter what the sensitive sting of his balls said. “On second thought- don’t you…don’t you want more?”

And he swears that only makes you wetter, you’re leaning upwards to kiss away one salty tear of his, “Thought you’d never ask.”

Oh. 

Choso’s going to marry you.

♡ RYOMEN SUKUNA - Dickmatize

“Kuna- Kuna—” You were babbling away stupidly after only a few bruising strikes of Sukuna’s restless hips, halfway through crashing into the royal headboard if it wasn’t for one of his clawed hands latching firmly onto the crown of your scalp. 

“K-K-Kuna-” He’s mocking with a roll of his eyes, perking up two of his enguling hands to angle your hips even deeper. And the grin he’s plastering all over his handsome features is so sleazy, “S’there anything else ya can say, woman?”

Your lips wobble with a few strained whines, “Harder.”

“Harder? Keh- harder?” Sukuna spits out, letting your woozy lips drag across his in a lazy slip n’ slide - just about all that you could manage with how spellbound you were right now. “‘Course ya want fucking harder when you can’t even ah- handle- this-”

But it’s not as if Sukuna was doing any better.

Fuck was he glad that your dewy gaze was way too cross-eyed with every one of his vulgar strikes. 

Because Sukuna’s monstrously towering body was shivering, hooded eyes growing heavier every time the spherical ends of both cockheads skated into your snug channel. 

You were taking him so well, and that was making his cursed second mouth salivate.

And when he tilted his head mere inches his closer and sucked in a deep whiff-

“Shiiiit- I can even hah- smell the ovulation on ya, woman.” And Sukuna didn’t mind it one bit, in fact, he was taking in such heaving lungfuls of that specially candied air. Elongated canines gleaming in the dim lighting, “And it’s fucking delicious.”

He could always smell those special few days of the month when you got just a bit sweeter, even more gorgeous than usual, just a bit…needier.

The problem was that everyone else seemed to notice too. 

And he had half the mind to think that your ovulation was affecting him, as well. Because Sukuna felt feverish, head falling backwards when his proud lengths pry apart your gluey walls as if he was opening up his very own gift.

He just felt so dumb on your pretty pussy.

Your saturated folds lacquer with a freshly new wave of slick once Sukuna lets his maw fall slack with a growl. Sharp teeth nipping right down your throbbing pulse, easy to sink in. To mark. 

“P-Please–” You’re squealing when he’s letting off numerous thwacks! of his curvaceous balls against the weepy end of your slit, hard enough that it almost bruises. “Need you r-right here.”

And shit- Ryomen Sukuna may be the notorious king of curses, but he was nothing against you. Nothing against just how evil you were with your pretty hands trembling up the cylindrical bulge he was pounding into you.

“Want me to fill up th-this pretty pussy till everyone can see, huh?” Sukuna’s rumbling out, so close now that you could feel the rasping vibrato of his bulging pecs glissading down your front. “Till even that new fuck- coworker of yours realizes?”

His husky words out of place enough to make your droopy lids blink repeatedly, “Wha- who?”

That bastard giving you fucking goo-goo eyes and clinging onto you, that’s what. But Sukuna can’t utter that - he can’t even bring himself to do anything other than grit his sharp jaw, “Talkin’ about another man while m’all inside you, huh?”

Ah, the way your mouth falls into a shocked oh! is just adorable. 

Cockdrunken tongue struggling to get the coherent syllables out to defend yourself against his little tease. And if you were in any better state of mind you’d have sworn that only made him harder.

Stacked lengths barrelling into you once. Twice. And yet, pulling out on the third - watching your brows furrow when he takes his leisurely time fighting back the clingy embrace of your glutinous walls as he pulls out inch by fucking inch.

“Maybe you should have him fuck you insead.” Sukuna arches a regal brow, curling a stray hand around his bulky bases to leave a syrupy swot! right on your glossed folds. But, of course, with him it was always double the spank making your toes curl. Heavy. And hot. 

It makes your head spin, full of cottony thoughts of just him. “D-don’ want anyone else- ngh- Kuna- Just need you in me right now.”

“S’that sooo?” He’s drawling out, two palms smearing your jittery legs and spreading them widely agape. All the way until your inner thighs burned with both the stretch and the spurting streaks of pre he left. “Don’t know if I believe this slutty pussy, brat. Maybe s’jus’ the ovulation talkin’.”

He was being so mean.

But what was even meaner was the way Sukuna’s roguish second tongue lolls out to splat! right down on your treacly cunt. So, so comparably large - he was easily drawing wet little patterns all over your gooey core. 

Over n’ over.

“M’not- s’not–” You’re choking out, mouth needily parched. Rovering your hands dexterously over to cup his aching cocks - but you could barely even squeeze your digits into a close around them both. “S’not just the ovulation, Kuna-”

“Then say it.” He snickers, having way too much fun with just how needy you are. “Spell it out f’me.”

Hips bucking impatiently, “S-spell what-” But that’s when you realize- oh, that’s when you’re registering that those lewd little patterns being made out onto your pussy weren’t just patterns. 

No, you’re wrenching your eyes open just a bit wider to take in the sappy trail of sweet, sweet juices glazing Sukuna’s wet muscle. Lugging ounces of it allll over his tongue as he makes such a mess of you down below.

With the help of two fat digits smushing your cheeks together he’s prying your head to look right down. Just at the right angle to watch the dizzying motions of his tongue spelling out-

“A? Wait no-” Gasping as he plants another papping spank on your puffed-up folds, “-R? A-and is that- Y?”

You already knew what the next shape was going to be - you didn’t even have to watch the very edge of his roughened tastebuds draw a slow, circular kiss. 

Way off in the fuzzy distance you think you can hear Sukuna chuckle, cooing at your cute mewls. “O-o? Does it spell out- haaah- Ryo?”

Yeah, he was in love.

“Damn right.” Sukuna bites back a moan, when he sinks back in mercilessly. Feeding your starving cunt with a few scorching inches of both swollen cocks - and then all at once. “You’re mine, lil’ human.” And one slam turns into two. Four. Eight- until Sukuna was fucking you like he couldn’t stop. 

You were mumbling out stupidly, floods of murky saliva spilling in heaps from your mouth. “All yours?”

He’s spitting twice - once from each mouth. Wadding one mess past your ajar lips, and then another to slip down the hill of your clit.

“All mine.” He grins, oversized tongue slithering past your syruped folds to poke its way into your already-overstuffed hole. Taking in a deeeep breath of your honeyed pheromones, “And m’gonna fuck ya till that pretty lil’ head remembers.”

♡ GOJO SATORU - F.E.V.E.R.

Oh- Gojo’s head nuzzles dopily into the treasured crook of your neck, lips parted to heave out a scorching little pant of sweetheart—!

And at this point his sing-songy baritone is broken several octaves higher, held together at the seams with only a drunkenly crooked grin that you know doesn’t bode well for you. 

Because once again you’re left wondering whether it’s really you that’s ovulating or your dear, feverishly deprived husband right here.

Fingers twitching on the splintered mahogany headboard above, he jostles his hips to give your bruised and battered cervix a stinging little swab. Strawberry divot so red and angry, that just the slightest push leaves him slathering your insides with creamy pre in long, lazy ribbons. 

Just to remind you how achingly hard he still was. 

Even after hours and hours of you milking him dry, he was vibrating with the powerful buzz of reverse cursed energy that kept him oh-so-swollen.

“S-s’that ‘enough?” Gojo trembles out, shudders wracking down his spine. And you can’t help but ogle that unintentionally sexy flex of his washboard abs massaging onto your front. The way you could count each n’ every tight ridge. “S’that all my- hck! ovulatin’ girl can handle?”

Your chest lugs in desperate pants of air at the way each throbbing inch of his probes into your steaming orifices one by one. Languidly, as if Gojo had all the time in the world. “Y-yes…”

And oh, you really didn’t expect the strongest to fall for that one- did you?

All it takes is a few sloppy seconds for him to reel his head back and giggle, wild. Sapphire eyes gazing down at the inflationary little bulge he was fucking into you. 

Practically purring, practically heart-eyed. “Really? Well, that’s reeeeal interestin’, sweetheart, because-” Gojo’s dipping the thick, rounded pads of his digits to splay out over your tummy. Hard. And you swear you glimpse the way his half-lidded eyes crinkle with electric bolts of cursed energy, “-I can see that this pretty pussy is still in need of a hah- gooood fucking.”

You squeal when those very same fingers take a much filthier approach, tracing cute little patterns down, down, down to the sensitive nub of your clit. Before twirling over your plump hood and pinching. Making your leaky hole lacquer itself even wetter, “You’re still ovulating, needy girl.”

“Th-then—” you hiss back, the sole sound of your voice making his fat, ruddied tip twitch. He was so sensitive, so…filthy.

Feeling the soft curve of his free hand latch onto your waist, pinning down your squirming hips until you couldn’t jostle them even a singular inch more. To feel him more, ever-messing up your insides. “-then stop teasing me and-”

Ah, this was his favorite part.

Right when you had your brows furrowed needily that way, right when your lolling mouth was half-opened into the shape of a few snappy insults-

That’s the exact split-second he’s arching his prespired back into the perfect curve, hitting the spongy target of your g-spot dead on. 

“Still want more- h-heh–” Pearly white canines snarl back at the slippery slide of his dumbfoundingly long girth down your sweetest spots, rounded globes of his cum-filled sack swatting against the ends of your soppy slit with a resounding thwack! He lets off such a whine, “My girl wants- no, is begging for…more.”

Fuck, he sounded so ruined. Voice as brittle as you felt. 

You watch as his prominent Adam’s apple bobs with a husky ah! ah! ah! after every bounce back from the heated depths of your pretty pussy - he couldn’t bear to part even for those repeated split-seconds. Ruby red cockhead leaving stringy little wetspots that have you seeing stars.

“Yes-” you’re gurgling out, and Gojo’s only snapping his hips with vulgar strokes even faster to dredge out those pretty noises from you. “Yes yes- yes! Need it even harder, Satoru.”

Somewhere off in the distance you’re hearing a sharp crack! and only hours and hours later do you realize that it’s your poor bedframe. 

In the back of Gojo’s mind he couldn’t help but think that you’d be next.

“Harder- wait- harder? Ohhh, fuck- she wants more-” He’s seething out, planting a tempo of pounds after pounds that make sparks of heat sprint down your spine. It felt like you were being split into two - it felt like he was mazing apart your adhesive walls with such expertise that he must’ve been unfairly using his Six Eyes. “D’you realize that when you ask th-the strongest for hah- more, I might just break ya, sweetheart?”

Your dewy pussy folds twitch at those very words, enough to get him melting over into you. Hunching his sculptured body heatedly against yours, it has him considering proposing right then and there- “Wan’ you to, Toru–”

Fuck “considering.” 

Gojo’s feeling his maw flood with a syrupy wave of saliva, spilling out in trickling rivers on either side of his coral pink lips when he’s choking out, “Marry me- marry me.” 

His reverse cursed technique wasn’t even workin anymore - power rolling off of him in pressurized waves. He couldn’t control it.

Feeling his eyes go crazily wide, he could already feel them watering when Six Eyes kick into overdrive but still doesn’t look away from where your needy entrance was sucking his every fat inch. He wouldn’t. He can’t.

Entranced. 

Can’t do anything else, didn’t even register the wadded mess of sweltering cum coating your insides in a sloppy second skin. 

You’re squealing as more and more strikes planted onto your drooling cunt leave you rendered stupid. Gojo’s eager fingertips keeping your saturated lips held captive with an ever-tightening squeeze.

Your thighs jitter helplessly at the swashing cobwebs of seed that fill you to the brim and more. Seeping from your flooded entrance slobbering in a sloppy ring around Gojo’s hefty base, one that lecherously matches the drenched white happy trail scratching up and down against your puffy clit. 

“Baby, w-we-” So full it’s like you can barely even speak. Gulping in deep lungfuls of his expensive cologne when he’s stuffing into your personal space and nastily swirling his bloated cock around n’ around your rubbery walls, till you’re soaked with his cum in every nook and cranny. “-we’re already married.”

“O-oh.” He’s sucking in a sharp inhale, eyes flickering with axioms of power once he scoops up generous helpings of ivory seed topping his shaft, popping it into your mouth with a wet plop! 

And then - only then - is he finally looking away from your bawling cunt.

You’re not sure whether his simpering, feral smile is because of the realization or because he’s finally noticing that he’d cum. Only…the next few words spilling from Gojo’s mouth make you realize that it’s neither- “Can see that we’re gonna have a daughter soon, Mrs. Gojo.”

“...”

A/N. Can y’all tell I’m nearing ovulation hm…

Plagiarism not authorized.

[hanniebaeee]

Clueless: Baby Bang

Bang Chan x fem!reader

Warnings: Reader is pregnant (just that, nothing deep)

Genre: established relationship, flufffff

Summary: You've been distant lately, and Chan can't understand why. Because this is very unusual for the two of you as you two are on each other all the time. And Chan panics as you guys are getting married in a few months, and this sudden change is unraveling him.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

Chan paced the living room, a deep frown etched into his forehead. You hadn’t touched him in days. Weeks, actually. That alone was already a catastrophe, considering the fact that you two were basically like bunnies.

But now? Nothing. You were dodging his touches like he was contagious. He reached for your hand? Oh, look, you suddenly needed both hands to text someone. He tried for a kiss? Whoops, you conveniently yawned. Bedtime? You were already asleep. 

And that diamond ring glittering on your ring finger? It made him wonder if you were regretting saying yes to him already.

He’d spent way too many nights staring at the ceiling, feeling like the universe was punishing him for something he didn't even know he did.

Chan sighed and opened the group chat. This was bad. He needed to vent.

Chan: She’s avoiding me.

A rapid barrage of notifications followed, and Chan barely had time to process one before another arrived. 

Minho: Y/N? The one who’s practically glued to your lap 24/7?

Hyunjin: LMAO. Not possible. I won't believe it.

Seungmin: You obviously did something.

Chan: NO, I DIDN’T DO ANYTHING!

Chan: She’s been acting weird for WEEKS. 2 weeks to be exact. No kisses. No hugs. No… anything.

Jisung: No sex? BRO. Are you okay?

Felix: What if she’s planning something? Like a surprise? Maybe a wedding thing?

---

Chan paused. That was… not unreasonable. But no. You’d never kept secrets from him before. Like you've given him enough surprises before so he knew this was different.

---

Minho: OR. She’s finally come to her senses about you seducing her into saying yes? 

Chan: Minho. I will come to your house and end you.

Jeongin: But seriously, hyung. Did you say something? Do something? Forget an important date? You’re kind of a workaholic.

---

That hit a little too close to home. Chan frowned, scrolling back through his mental timeline of your relationship.

---

Chan: I didn’t forget anything. I swear. We were fine until a couple weeks ago, and now she’s avoiding me like the plague.

Changbin: Well. There’s only one logical explanation.

Changbin: She’s been abducted by aliens and replaced with a clone.

Jisung: YES. I second this. The real Y/N would NEVER do this. 

Felix: Omg guys! 

Chan: GUYS.

Hyunjin: Okay. What if she’s mad because you’re not initiating? She’s waiting for you to grovel.

Seungmin: That makes no sense. If she’s mad, why not just say so?

Hyunjin: IDK, some people like drama.

Jeongin: That’s your toxic trait, Hyung.

Hyunjin: IS NOT!

---

Chan groaned, dropping his phone onto the couch. He missed you. Like, really missed you. Sure, he wanted to rip your clothes off 90% of the time, but he also missed the simple things - your cuddles, your soft laugh, the way you’d always need him by your side when you're stressed. 

The cold shoulders and polite smiles were killing him.

---

Minho: Just confront her, idiot. Corner her in the kitchen and ask her what’s wrong.

Chan: You think I haven’t tried that?! Every time I ask, she changes the subject.

Jisung: Okay, hear me out. Seduction.

Chan: What?

Jisung: Set the mood. Candles. Sexy music. Flex those ridiculous arms. She won’t stand a chance.

Felix: Worth a try. 

---

That night, Chan put the "seduction plan" into action. He dimmed the lights, skipped the candles, and put on a romantic playlist. He even went full drama, lounging on the couch with his shirt conveniently unbuttoned.

When you walked in, your eyebrows shot up as you asked, “What's up?”

Chan said nothing, just held held his hand out.  You froze, guilt flashing across your face, and Chan knew he had you. You placed your hand on his and let him pull you close.

“Baby, what’s going on? You’ve been avoiding me, and it’s driving me crazy. Did I do something wrong?” His voice cracked, and that set you off.

Your eyes filled with tears, and in an instant you were in his lap, clinging to him like your life depended on it.

“I’m sorry, Channie! I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“Then why -”

“Shhh,” Chan fell silent as you pressed a finger to his lips. “Just know that I love you, Channie.”

Chan was suspicious. Because, well, you’d shut him up in the best way possible, last night - all he remembered was his shirt coming off and yeah.

You’d seduced him. Thoroughly. And while his brain had short-circuited at that time, he was now absolutely certain that you’d dodged his questions on purpose.

At least he can't complain about you not touching him anymore, right?

---

Chan: It didn't work.

Minho: WHAT didn't?

Chan: She kinda caught me off guard. And avoided my questions.

Jisung: I thought we agreed on YOU seducing her and you got seduced??

Felix: Soooo… you still don’t know what’s going on?

Chan: NO. She’s hiding something, I know it.

Hyunjin: Maybe you’re overthinking. Or, maybe she’s secretly a spy.

Changbin: She’s NOT a spy, Hyunjin. That’s ridiculous.

Hyunjin: And alien clones aren’t?

Minho: Why are we even helping you? You let her seduce you and then just… forgot your goal.

---

Chan groaned, flopping onto his back. It wasn’t his fault! He was weak when it came to you. All it took was a look, or a whisper of his name and his brain turned to mush.

Still, Minho had a point.

---

Chan: Okay, fine. What do I do now?

Felix: She’s probably just stressed? Weddings are a big deal. She might just need time to sort her thoughts.

That gave Chan pause. Weddings were stressful. Maybe that was it?

Hyunjin: My bet’s still on spy.

---

Meanwhile, you were in the bathroom, staring at the little plastic stick in your hand for the hundredth time now. You’d known for two weeks, but the reality hadn’t gotten any less terrifying.

You were pregnant. Pregnant. With Chan’s baby.

The thought sent your heart racing. You loved him more than anything, but… you’d never talked about kids. What if he wasn’t ready? What if he panics when you bring it up? 

There were only a few months until the wedding. You didn’t want to dump this on him now and risk throwing him into a spiral.

---

That night, Chan decided to take Minho’s advice (for once). No more distractions. He was getting answers tonight.

When you walked into the living room and his eyes locked onto yours - you froze. He looked so handsome, and a little…worn out? You felt so guilty for doing this. 

“Come sit,” he said, patting the couch beside him.

You hesitated, but complied, heart pounding.

“Baby, we need to talk,” Chan said, his voice soft but firm.

You swallowed hard as you murmured, “About what?”

“You’ve been acting weird for weeks. And you obviously don't trust me enough to talk it out. I’m worried. What's going on? Is it the wedding?” He was giving you that puppy eyed look, and your heart shattered.

“No, Channie, it's not like that...”

“Then what is it? Please, just tell me.”

You opened your mouth, ready to spill everything - but then you panicked. The words caught in your throat, and instead, you leaned in, pressing your lips to his.

Here he was - caught off guard (again) but quickly melting into the kiss. You climbed into his lap, your hands tangling in his hair, and within seconds, all thoughts of questioning were gone.

---

Chan: SHE DID IT AGAIN.

Minho: You’re hopeless.

Seungmin: At this rate, she could rob a bank and get away with it.

Felix: Honestly, I’m impressed.

---

Chan sighed, glaring at the group chat before throwing his phone across the bed. Whatever you were hiding, it was big. And he was determined to find out, one way or another.

Little did he know, in the bathroom, you were rehearsing how to tell him the truth: that in just a few months, he wasn’t just going to be your husband.

He was going to be a dad.

Chan was officially losing it. His imagination had gone to some very dark places (thanks to Changbin’s clone theory and Hyunjin’s spy nonsense), but now he just felt defeated. What was so big and terrifying, that you felt like you couldn’t share it with him?

Chan: I give up. She’s unbreakable.

Jisung: Hey don't lose hope.

Minho: Pathetic.

Jeongin: Just sit her down and don’t let her leave until she talks.

Chan: I’VE TRIED THAT.

Chan was ready to lock himself and you in a room till you cracked, but unfortunately he was already cracking under the stress. And then a lightbulb went off in his head. There was just one person in the world who might be able to get through to you.

Felix.

---

Felix was, to put it lightly, concerned when Chan cornered him in his kitchen.

“Lix, you have to help me,” Chan said, his eyes wild and desperate.

“Help you how?” Felix asked cautiously.

“Can you please try to talk to her?” Chan literally begs. “She loves you, Lix. Maybe she’ll tell you if you ask?”

Felix hesitated, torn between loyalty to Chan, who was literally his brother and his friendship with you. But ultimately, his desire to help won anyway.

“Okay,” he said with a sigh. “I’ll talk to her.”

---

Later that afternoon, you opened the door to find Felix standing on your porch, holding a box of cookies and his sunniest smile. 

“Lixie?” you asked, surprised. “So good to see you!”

“Just wanted to check on you, love,” he said, coming forward to hug you.

You stepped aside to let him in, and the two of you settled on the couch.

“I baked these for you,” he said, watching your reaction closely as you opened the box and munched on a cookie immediately. “You’ve been looking a little stressed lately.”

You stopped mid-chew, guilt gnawing at you.

“I’m fine, Lix. Just… wedding stuff, you know?” you said, carefully avoiding his eyes.

“Is it really just the wedding?” Felix tilted his head, unconvinced.

You froze, your hands tightening around the box.

“You know you can talk to me, right? Whatever it is, I won’t judge.” Felix said, reaching out and placing a gentle hand over yours.

Your eyes welled up with tears, and as you put the box aside gently. Felix scooted closer as he saw the tears fall, and before you knew it, the truth came spilling out.

“I’m pregnant, Felix,” you whispered. “And I don’t know how to tell Chan. We’ve never talked about kids, and I don’t even know if he wants them. And now the wedding’s so close, and I’m scared I’ll ruin everything. I already got my wedding dress and I don't think I'll fit into it anymore because by that time-”

Felix’s eyes went wide, and for a moment, he looked like he might burst into tears himself. But then he let out a strangled laugh.

“You’re… you’re pregnant?”

You nodded, sniffled and managed a soft, “Yeah.”

Felix threw his arms around you, nearly knocking you over. 

“Oh my God, Y/N! I’m so happy for you! And for Chan! You’re gonna have the cutest baby in the world!” he gushed, his eyes sparkling with happy tears. 

You couldn’t help but laugh through your own tears. 

“You don't think this is a disaster?” you asked softly, wiping your tears away. 

“Disaster?” Felix pulled back, shaking his head. “Of course not. This is amazing! But you have to tell Chan. He’s going insane trying to figure out what’s wrong.”

“I know,” you said softly. “I just… I’m scared.”

Felix gave you a reassuring smile and said, “Chan loves you more than anything. Trust me, he’s gonna be over the moon. And I'll always be here for you. Seriously, sweetheart, this is the best news ever.”

---

Hyunjin: Well? Did she tell you?

Jisung: SPILL, FELIX.

Chan: Felix? Please. I’m dying here.

Felix hesitated, his fingers hovering over the keyboard. He couldn’t betray your trust, but he also couldn’t leave Chan hanging.

Felix: She’s okay. She’s just… working through something.

Minho: And you’re being suspiciously vague.

Seungmin: Should've known that sending her best friend to investigate wasn't your strongest idea… obviously he's gonna take her side! 

Felix: I promised I wouldn’t say anything. But it’s nothing bad, I swear.

Chan: Seriously?? Nothing bad? Then why is she avoiding me?

Felix: Just… be patient with her, okay? She’ll tell you when she’s ready. I promise it's all ok. Trust me. 

Chan frowned at the message, his heart twisting.

You had spent the whole night rehearsing what to say to Chan, your stomach churning with nerves. Morning came far too quickly, and as you watched him shuffle into the kitchen with his hair messy and his sleepy face, you nearly chickened out.

But Felix’s words echoed in your head. He’s gonna be over the moon.

“Channie,” you said softly, placing your mug of tea aside and taking a step towards him. 

He looked up from the coffee maker, his sleepy eyes brightening instantly. You were trying to talk to him, and somehow that was enough. Anything was better than you avoiding him. 

“Morning, baby.”

You smiled nervously, gesturing to the table. “Can we talk?”

His brow furrowed, worry flashing across his face as he nodded and sat down opposite you.

“Is everything okay?”

You took a deep breath, your hands trembling slightly as you said, “You know how I’ve been… weird lately?”

Chan nodded, his gaze fixed on you with a mix of concern and curiosity.

“Well,” you continued, “there’s a reason for that. And I’ve been scared to tell you because it’s big. Like, really big.”

“Baby, whatever it is, you can tell me. I promise, I’ll handle it.” Chan said, reaching across the table and taking your hand in his.

Your eyes filled with tears as you finally said it.

“I’m pregnant.”

Chan froze. Completely. His mouth hung open, his grip on your hand tightening slightly as his brain processed your words.

“You’re… pregnant?” he whispered, his voice barely audible.

You nodded, tears spilling over.

“Yeah. I found out a couple of weeks ago, and I didn’t know how to tell you. I didn’t know if you’d be okay with it, or if it was too much with the wedding coming up -”

Chan cut you off by pulling you into his arms, burying his face in your neck. His body shook as he let out a half-laugh, half-sob, and you realized he was crying.

“Channie, are you okay?” you asked nervously, your own voice shaking as you stroked his hair.

“Okay?” he choked out, pulling back to look at you with tear-streaked cheeks and the biggest grin you’d ever seen. “Baby, I’m better than okay. I’m… I’m gonna be a dad?”

You nodded, your heart swelling at the pure joy on his face.

Chan laughed, his tears flowing freely now.

“Holy crap. I don’t know what to say?! We’re having a baby. A baby!”

Before you could say anything else, Chan was  peppering your face with kisses, squeezing you in the tightest hug ever.

“I love you so much. Baby, you’re…I can’t believe you’ve been carrying this on your own.” he said, cupping your cheeks with his hands. 

“I didn’t want to stress you out,” you admitted, clinging to him as he pulled you onto his lap. “And…I've never been more scared about anything my entire life? I mean, I adore you, and I know I want this with you, our baby already means the world to me…but not knowing if you would want that too? It's been killing me, we've never even joked about this before, Channie… “

“You could’ve told me sooner, baby,” he said softly, kissing the tip of your nose. “I thought we were clear about this, with you, I'm ready for anything! But I get it. And I love you even more for worrying about me. But baby, we’re in this together. Always.”

---

Chan: GUYS. I HAVE NEWS. HUGE NEWS 🤩

Jisung: Finally!! 

Hyunjin: I told you she's a spy!! No one ever listens to me!! 

Minho: He’s too happy for that, you idiot.

Chan: WE’RE HAVING A BABY.

Jeongin: Excuse me, WHAT?

Changbin: STOP. Really?! 

Seungmin: Wow, plot twist

Felix: Oh thank godddddd😭😭😭😭

Felix: I was dying here

Chan: SHE TOLD ME THIS MORNING. I’M GONNA BE A DAD. WE’RE GONNA BE PARENTS. OMG.

---

It felt like everytime he said it, it felt a little more real.

---

Jisung: Congratulations, bro. Wow. 

Hyunjin: I AM CRYING. I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU’RE REPRODUCING.

Chan: 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

Chan: MY BABYGIRL AND I ARE HAVING A BABY😭💖

Minho: Jokes aside, this is such great news!! Congrats. Now go take care of your pregnant fiancée instead of spamming us.

Chan: I think I'm gonna faint

Changbin: Congrats, bro. But also… HOW DID YOU NOT NOTICE SHE WAS GOING THROUGH SOMETHING?

Chan: I NOTICED! I just didn't think she was, you know

Jisung: Avoiding you because she was growing your spawn, apparently.

Hyunjin: “Spawn” makes it sound like a little gremlin. Oh my Gawd 🤣

Felix: STOP. My baby’s gonna be so adorable I’ll CRY 😭

Minho: Okay, Felix, you’re suspiciously calm about this. Did you already know?

Felix: 👀

Hyunjin: YOU KNEW.

Chris: WHAT?? FELIX, YOU KNEW BEFORE ME?!

Felix: SHE TOLD ME FIRST, OKAY? SHE WAS NERVOUS, AND I PROMISED I WOULDN’T SAY ANYTHING.

Jisung: Wow. Betrayal.

Chan: SO YOU JUST LET ME SUFFER FOR WEEKS??

Felix: Yes. And? I'd do it again for her.

Changbin: LMAO savage.

Jeongin: Shame on you for trusting him when everyone knows he works for her

Chan: Thanks for being on her side, Lix

Felix: Anytime 💖

Hyunjin: Omg, imagine Baby Bang. Tiny curls, tiny dimples 😍

Chan: STOP I’M ALREADY CRYING AGAIN 😭

Jeongin: I've never been this excited for a baby really. You'd let us babysit won't you? 

Changbin: Oh yeah. Group uncle duty.

Hyunjin: We're gonna be dancing before we can even walk Baby Bang 🤝

Felix: For sure!

Chan: THANK YOU GUYS FOR BEING EXCITED FOR US!

Jisung: Save your tears for the wedding, Daddy Bang.

Jeongin: When do we throw a baby shower? Felix?

Felix: Already planning it.

Hyunjin: This baby’s gonna be so loved.

Chan: THANK YOU, GUYS. I LOVE YOU ALL 😭

---

Chan added Y/N to the group chat.

Chan: SURPRISE, BABY! WELCOME TO THE CHAOS.

Jisung: AHHH THE QUEEN IS HERE!

Hyunjin: ALL HAIL THE BABY-MAKER 👑

Minho: Congrats on creating life and also tolerating Chan for this long.

Felix: YAYYYYYY YOU’RE HERE! 😭 We’ve been dying to have you here!!!

Jeongin: Thank you for gifting us Baby Bang. We promise to only slightly corrupt them.

Changbin: We’re all crying. I’m crying. Hyung is crying. Everyone’s crying.

Y/N:😂

Y/N: Oh my God, you guys.

Minho: This is us being tame.

Hyunjin: Soooo, what does it feel like, hm? Asking for research purposes, of course

Chan: Oh yeah, totally not gonna run off and impregnate someone 🙄

Hyunjin: What's it to you Christopher? You can do it, but I can't?! 

Chan: Oh please

Minho: I told her to get a collar for this damn puppy and look who's here yapping

Y/N: Leave him alone guys!

Hyunjin: I respect you, Y/N. I respect you. So I'm gonna shut up (Mr Know, let's do this face to face huh)

Minho: Gladly.

Felix: Honestly, Y/N, we’re just honored to be part of this. 

Y/N: Thanks guys, this means a lot to us. 

Changbin: And we’re going to spoil them rotten.

Jeongin: Rotten is an understatement.

Y/N: 🤭🤭🤭

Minho: You won't even know what hit you for the next 18 years. Or 30.

Chan: GUYS. Stop scaring her. Baby, they’re joking.

Felix: We’re not.

Hyunjin: Nope.

Jisung: Absolutely not.

Y/N: I'm all in for that hehe

Chan: I love you guys

Jisung: Chan’s in his feels again.

Felix: We have a wedding and baby shower to plan! 

Hyunjin: OMG. A pregnant bride. You’re gonna be so GLOWY.

Y/N: Thank you for being this excited for us. I love you guys 😭💖

Felix: We love you too!! 🥺💖

Divider: @saradika-graphics

Tags: @moonchild9350 @velvetmoonlght @eastjonowhere @pixie-felix @sailor--sun @chancloud8

[mytherapyisreading14]

Drunk Confessions

Summary: You got drunk during a night out with your best friend and accidentally send your Professor a photo of you in lingerie. Now you try to avoid him, which is not really working.

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Female Reader

Category: Smut (18+ MDNI)

Warnings: alcohol consumption, dirty talk, dom!spencer, semi-public sex, hair pulling, thigh riding, spanking, fingering, praise kink, multiple orgasms, oral sex (kinda, he comes in her mouth)

Word Count: 4,6k

Author’s Note: My last posts got so many likes, I didn’t expect that at all, thank you sm!! <3

Your alarm goes off - 8:30am. You groan. Your head is pounding and the sun shining into your room is just way too bright. Your stomach turns and you close your eyes to escape the wave of nausea. You slowly sit up and search for your phone on the nightstand. It feels like your head is going to explode. You reach out and unlock the screen, turning your alarm off.

It's way too early. And you drunk way too much last night. It was a chaotic but nice yesterday, a night full of laughter, way too much alcohol and karaoke. Your best friend celebrated her birthday and you promised to go to your favorite bar with her. You have to smile when you think back to the night and start checking your messages. You see that she already texted you this morning to find out how you are doing.

How are you?

I have the worst headache after last night

It was fun though, wanna go again tonight?

Just kidding, I feel like I need a week to recover from this

You can’t help but laugh and answer her quickly. You are about to put your phone away to finally get ready when a new chat catches your eye. You freeze in shock. It’s your Professors name. The one you’ve been crushing on since you saw him for the very first time.

Back when you found out that you were getting a new professor, you didn't expect much, a lecture like any other with someone who was only concerned with reciting his material. But then he entered. He came through the door and for a moment it seemed as if time stood still. The room, which had just been immersed in the murmur of conversation, suddenly became silent.

He was tall - taller than you expected and his presence filled the room in a way that you couldn't put into words. He wore a simple but elegant suit that somehow effortlessly fit him perfectly. His hair was a little longer, curly and fell slightly over his forehead. And then he looked up. His big, brown eyes met yours and in a split second everything became clear to you. You immediately knew you wanted, needed, this man.

Now you stare at the chat in complete horror. He recently gave you his number for a project. That's how this whole texting thing could even happen. Your heart is pounding in your chest. Obviously you can't remember texting him. You were so drunk yesterday that you can't even remember how you got home.

You open the chat - and your heart stops for a moment. It wasn't just a message that you sent him. It was a photo. Of you, in lingerie. It’s one of your favorite sets, you got it a couple of weeks ago. "I wore this for you today, Professor. Do you like it?” You wrote in addition to the photo.

Oh God. Oh God. Oh God. You just stare at the screen, the picture of you that you should never, ever, ever have sent. And the worst part: He read it. But didn't reply. Confusion and panic spreads through you. You jump out of bed, your feet barely finding purchase on the floor, and your heart keeps racing. You try to think clearly, but your thoughts are a complete mess.

You reach for your phone again and frantically tap on the chat with your best friend, but you pause and call her instead. "Hello?" Her voice still sounds sleepy and hungover. “Oh my God, I need your help!" you gasp and immediately start telling her everything.

The line is silent, then you hear a short laugh. "Wait a minute... what? You did that?" You close your eyes and search for the right words. But before you can say anything, it hits you like a blow. You also have a lecture with him today.

"I’m not coming today," you tell her. “You can't just cancel!" she says immediately, and you hear her getting herself settled in her bed. Her voice sounds determined, but also worried. "You know how it is, our seminar today. We can't miss it. We said that celebrating wouldn't stop us," she says. "Celebrating isn't what would stop me either. Seeing him definitely is," you say and lean back with a groan.

You close your eyes and sink even deeper into the pillows. Your stomach clenches when you think about it. She’s right, You really have to go today. But the text, the picture that you sent him - what if he wants to talk to you about it? Or worse, he reports the whole thing?

"I can't just sit in front of him today and pretend that everything is normal. I sent him a picture of me in lingerie... I can't face him. It's just... it's just too much!" There is silence on the other end of the line for a moment. She still hasn't said anything, and you know she's thinking. Then you hear her take a deep breath.

“Okay, the thing with the picture, that's really... a little crazy. But hey, you can skip the lecture. Just disappear after the seminar and then hide in your apartment. Or you can go and hope that when you run into him, he'll do completely different things after you seeing this photo. I bet you looked hot, was it the new set you recently bought?” she asks and you can hear her grin even though you're on the phone.

Obviously she knows about your crush on your professor. You couldn’t stop talking about him after your first lecture and she took every opportunity to tease you about it. You look at your phone as if it were the only thing that could help you think clearly. Of course she's right. You have to go to your seminar. And you can really skip his lecture. Still, the idea that he might be thinking about it makes your heart beat faster and not just in excitement.

“You're right, I... okay, I'll come," You say after a short pause, but the thought of maybe running into him still makes you nervous. “You'll see, it won't be as bad as you think. You'll get through the seminar, it's only an hour. And then we'll be out and we can take our time for everything else. And you'll just avoid your favorite professor today," she continues to teases.

“Today? More like forever," you mutter and finally get up, even though the thought of getting out of bed still paralyzes you. “See you soon then. I'll shower and get dressed now, then I'll come. Let’s meet outside the building, okay?" you ask. "Sure!" she calls out happily. "See you soon and don’t forget to wear another fancy set for your professor today. Just in case you run into him,” she jokes.

After you hang up you put the phone on the pillow and stand there for a moment, your legs heavy, your head still about to explode. But then you take a deep breath. It'll be fine, you just have get through the seminar. With a sigh, you go into the bathroom and take painkillers first. Then you start getting ready.

You turn on the water and let it run hot. A short time later, you go into the shower. The hot steam envelops you and slowly your body feels a little alive again. The nausea subsides and the hangover becomes more bearable. After the shower, you get dressed in peace - black skirt, a comfy sweater and your favorite sneakers. You quickly walk through the apartment again to make sure you packed everything and when you leave the house, you somehow feel less like a wreck.

-

The smell of freshly served pasta is still in your nose as you say goodbye. You got lunch together after your seminar and it was nice to get a little break and talk about everything that happened. Now you are ready to leave but you still have to go to the library to get a book that you need for your upcoming assignment first.

“I still have to go to the library," you tell her, pulling your bag over your shoulder. “Are you coming with me?” you ask her. “I’m sorry, I have to pick up my sister now. But be careful, you don’t want to run into your favorite professor, or do you?” she teases again. “I’m not going to run into him. I’ll hurry up and leave immediately. I’ll call you later. See you tomorrow," you say and give her a quick wave before you set off.

-

The campus is full of students rushing through the halls, carrying their books around or sitting in groups and discussing. You slip into the library and head straight to the section where the book you need is. Unfortunately it’s at the top of the shelf and you realize that you probably won't be able to reach it. You jump up a few times, but the distance between you and the book just seems too big. You sigh. If only you were a little taller.

As you attempt the jump for the third time, you suddenly feel a presence building behind you. One that seems familiar. Your heart beats faster and a nervous tremor takes hold of you. You turn around and stare straight into Professor Reid's eyes. He is standing just inches away from you and you can hear the soft sound of his breathing.

The look he gives you is almost piercing - warm, but somehow also searching. He leans forward slightly without saying a word and effortlessly grabs the book with one hand. You avoid his gaze as he hands it to you. “Thank you," you murmur, trying to hide the slight nervous tremor in your voice. He nods and stands still for a moment.

"You weren't at my lecture today." You stare at the book in your hands and feel your stomach clench. This is not good. “I..." you take a deep breath. "I haven't been feeling so good. My head..." He waits, his eyes still fixed on you, and you get the feeling that he wants to hear more. You feel his gaze on you and when you finally raise your eyes to look into his eyes, there is a silent understanding, and for a moment you wonder if there’s more. “Sick, or...?" he asks calmly. You hesitate and bite your lip.

"I went out partying with my best friend yesterday, it was her birthday… we drank a little bit too much and... well, I'm not feeling so good today. That’s why I skipped." His expression remains neutral, but something in his gaze changes. You can hardly believe it, but it's almost as if he's interested. He frowns slightly. "I understand," he then says. "But it's not ideal to miss class, especially when important topics are involved."

You nod. “I know, Professor. I won’t happen again.” You just want to get out of this situation, and as you try to take a step back he stops you. "No, wait. I need to talk to you." You pause and turn back to him. "About what? I don’t really have the time -" you begin, pretending you don't have any idea what he wants to talk about, when he cuts you off.

"Doesn’t matter, it’s important. We'll sort it out in my office." His gaze is intense as he steps towards you. The thought of him asking you to come to his office makes your heart beat faster. The idea of ​​being alone in a room with him is tempting. "Okay," you say quietly, unable to prevent a nervous tingling from spreading in your chest. You follow him, even though your legs feel like they're made of jelly.

He leads the way, his steps calm and determined, and you can barely keep your eyes from lingering on his back. As soon as you reach the door to his office, he opens it and lets you enter first. You step in, your heart now beating loudly in your ears. The moment he closes the door behind you, you realize that it is more than just a conversation about the seminar.

The look he is giving you now is not the look of a professor. It is the look of a man who wants more than just academic discussions at this moment. And the thought that you’re alone with him in this room inevitably leaves you nervous and intrigued at the same time.

As the door closes behind you, you’re left breathless for a moment. His office is quiet, almost too quiet, compared to the crowded hallways outside. The room is sparsely decorated, except for the desk covered with stacks of paper and a few personal items. He is still standing at the table, his arms loosely folded in front of his chest and looks at you.

"Sit down," he says calmly, pointing to the chair on the opposite of the desk. You hesitate, then finally sit down, your heart pounding in your chest. The nervous energy inside you grows as you try to organize your thoughts. Before he can say anything else, you can’t hold it back any longer. The words come out of you hastily, almost in a rush, and you feel your body tense.

"The picture, it was a mistake! I didn't mean to... It wasn't meant for you. I was drunk, and it was stupid of me, really. I'm sorry." You look at the table, avoiding his gaze. But as you say the last words, you immediately notice how the atmosphere in the room changes. He remains silent for a moment, but then his body language shifts slightly - his gaze becomes more intense, the tension between you almost tangible.

"Hmm," he says after a pause, his voice deep and calm, "so the picture wasn't meant for me?" You flinch when you hear his question. What exactly does he want to hear? What does he want to know from you? You try to stay calm and answer hesitantly.

"It... it's none of your business." His expression hardens instantly. "It is," he says, and his voice sounds sharper, more determined now. "Because you sent it to me." Your heart beats faster as he continues. "I don't think it was an accident, even if you were drunk. You wanted to send it to me. And you did."

A cold shiver runs down your spine. You open your mouth, trying to say something, but you can't find a way to defend yourself. Instead, you just stay still, looking at your hands, which are resting nervously on your lap.

He laughs quietly, a mocking, almost challenging laugh. "So you're really sure it was an accident, huh?" He slowly leans forward, rests his hands on the table and looks straight into your eyes. The look in his eyes has changed, and something in his expression shows you that he is the one in control.

"Do you really think I haven't noticed how you look at me in class? How you keep watching my hands? How you press your thighs together when I approach you?" His words hit you and you freeze for a moment. Your cheeks burn hot, you feel your heart pounding uncontrollably, but you keep quiet. Everything inside you screams to defend yourself, but you stay silent because you know he’s right.

"I noticed from the beginning, angel," he continues, and a shiver runs down your spine. You can’t believe he just called you that. It turns you on immensely. "I know you didn't just do it because of the party and the alcohol. You also sent it to me because you wanted to." He leans further forward, his presence overwhelming, and you can't help but feel small even as you try to assert yourself.

You open your mouth to say something, but the words stick in your throat. What could you say? That he's wrong? That would be a lie. “You sent it to me," he repeats, his voice now almost like a command. "Because you wanted to show me. And I don't think it was an accident. You were drunk, yes, but you wanted me to see you like this."

Your body is paralyzed. It feels like the room has suddenly become smaller. You can hardly breathe. His words and his look have completely captured you in that moment. “I... uh," you begin, but the thought that he is in control, that he sees you like this at this moment, leaves you speechless and you’re unable form a proper sentence.

He remains silent, only his eyes continue to focus on you. "You have to understand that you can't just play with me like that." His gaze becomes more intense, and for a moment it seems as if he wants to say more but then he slowly stands up, walks around the table and stops right in front of you.

"I'll show you something," he says in a calm but unmistakable voice. "And you will understand why it wasn't just an accident." Your heart beats faster. His hand reaches for your chin, lifting it up and tracing his thumb over your bottom lip. Your breath hitches and you lean closer, craving his touch. “Get up and lock the door for me,” he says and pulls his hand away slowly.

You do as your told immediately and when you turn around, he is sitting on his chair with his legs spread. He looks so hot and you desperately clench your thighs together to relief the pressure between your legs. “Good girl. Come here,” he says and pats his thigh. You shiver in excitement and when he notices a grin spreads across his face.

You go over to him and when you stand in front of him, he pulls you down into his lap. He leans forward to whisper into your ear “That’s what you wanted, right? To be my good girl. That’s why you send me that picture. You wanted to end up here,” he says and places his hands on your hips. You press yourself closer against him and inhale his scent, he smells like cinnamon, peppermint and aftershave, it’s addictive.

However, you get interrupt by his hand reaching into your hair to pull your head back. You gasp in surprise and he leans closer to you, looking deep into your eyes again. “I asked you a question. I expect an answer,” he says and you can feel yourself getting even wetter. “Yes, that’s true. I - I always wanted that,” you manage to say and he releases your hair, satisfied with your response.

Then he leans forward and you finally feel his lips against yours. It’s even better than you always imagined and you start to grind against his leg, desperate to release the friction between your legs. But Spencer quickly stops you. “Did I allow you to move?” he asks and you shake your head.

He sighs in disappointment but before he can say anything you quickly answer him. “No, you didn’t,” you say and his grip on your hips looses a little. “That’s right. I didn’t. And you’re not allowed to move until I tell you to. You’re going to listen to me and do exactly what your told, do you understand?” he asks. “I understand.”

“See, it’s not that hard. You listen to me, you behave and you’ll get your reward. Now, do you want to ride my thigh?” he asks, his hand slowly sliding behind your back to your ass, squeezing it. “Yes, please. Can I?” you ask and he leans forward to kiss you again, his tongue exploring your mouth. When he pulls back you can see his eyes sparkling with lust. “So polite, I like that. Yes, you can,” he says and you finally go back to moving against his thigh.

It feels good, so good and when Spencer starts to slide one hand under your shirt to grab your breasts you press closer against him. You can feel that you soaked your underwear trough and wearing only a skirt, you can already see a small wet stain on his pants. His gaze follows yours and he chuckles. “Someone’s needy,” he says and you nod, leaning against his chest, grinding down more against him.

“Spen - Spencer, I’m going to come,” you whimper but he pulls you back by your hair again. “It’s Sir for you, angel,” he says and you correct yourself immediately. “Please Sir, can I come on your thigh now?” you breath out and he grabs your hips again, stopping you.

“No, not yet,” he simply says and you whine when he stands up and you lose contact. “But I thought - “ you start but he doesn’t let you finish. He turns you around and pushes you down onto his desk. “Doesn’t matter what you thought. I decided I’m not letting you come yet,” he says and flips over your skirt to expose your underwear to him.

“I see, another pair then the ones you wore yesterday. I’ve got to admit, I prefer the other ones, but you look pretty anyway, angel,” he says, sliding his hands over your thighs and your ass. “Last night when you send me that picture, I couldn’t stop thinking about you,” he admits and you can feel your whole body reacting to his words.

A wave of confidence flashes through you. “Did I keep you up last night, Sir? Did you have to stroke your cock while you looked at my picture? Thinking about all the ways you want to fuck me?” you ask him and turn your head slightly back to look at him with a smirk on your face. His eyes darken and he tightens his grip.

“Oh you have no idea, angel. I’m going to show you exactly what I was thinking about last night,” And suddenly you feel a harsh smack on your ass. He just spanked you. And you liked it. Your breath hitches and you bit down on your lip to keep quiet. You don’t want anyone to find out what’s going on in here.

His hand strokes the spot he just hit before going further down to pull at your panties. He takes them off and stuffs them into his pocket. You are convinced you’re not going to get them back. Then you feel his long, slender fingers sliding between your legs before he presses onto your clit. You gasp in surprise and try to press against him but his grip on your hips is firm, holding you still.

Then he pushes two fingers inside you. “So fucking wet.” His eyes wander over your body down to your legs hungrily, appreciating every curve and every spot. “I’ve never seen such a pretty pussy. And it’s all mine now. You’re all mine now,” he says. The way his fingers move and the way he stares at you intensely feels just way too good.

When his thumb goes back to your clit, rubbing it in slow circles, you can feel how your orgasm builds up inside of you and you can no longer hold back your moans. “Spencer - Sir, feels so good. Please,… I need more,” You clench around his fingers and he quickly puts a hand over your mouth to keep you quiet. “Shh, be quiet, angel. As much as I would love to hear all these lovely sounds you make, I don’t want to get interrupted. Not now, when I finally have you, after all this time.”

His fingers curl inside you and keep hitting your g -spot. You clench around them, he notices and chuckles. “Can I - please,” you stutter. “Yes angel,” he says, already knowing what you’re asking for and you come around his fingers. You never had such an intense orgasm from foreplay before, but you don’t mind. It’s even better than you always imagined.

He wants to give you a moment to recover but you want more. You somehow manage to turn around, even though your legs feel like they are going to give in any second and push yourself up on his desk. He looks surprised and opens his mouth to say something but you interrupt him by pulling him closer by his tie.

You wrap your hands around his neck and rank your fingers through his soft, brown hair before kissing him. You moan into his mouth and he groans, sending a shiver down your spine. “Thank you, Sir. That was amazing,” you say with a smirk on your face when you pull back. “Now is the time to lose your pants and relax, I want to return the favor.”

“As much as I want to see you down on your knees with your pretty lips wrapped around my cock, we don’t have much time left. Office hour starts in less than 30 minutes. And I need to fuck you. So drop it and spread your legs for me. Now,” he demands and you obliged, sitting further back on his desk with your legs spread.

He takes a step back and starts to unzip his dress pants. When he takes out his cock your eyes widen. He is even bigger than you expected. “Are you on the pill?” he asks while he starts to pump his cock. “I am,” you say. “Good. I want to fuck your pussy and then, since you suggested sucking me off, come inside your mouth. I want you to taste me. You don’t swallow until I say so. Do you understand?” he asks, sliding his cock through your folds to tease you. “Yes Sir, I understand,” you whimper and he wastes no time and pushes inside you.

His first thrust already make your eyes roll back and you feel like you’re going to die from the intense pleasure. Your legs wrap around his waits and your hands are on his back, pressing him even more against your body. Everytime a whimper or a moan escapes your mouth his thrust become deeper, rougher and faster. You can feel him throb inside you and he keeps hitting your g- spot over and over again.

One of his hand is sneaking through your breast, squeezing it and toying with your nipple. You graze his back with your fingernails and make sure to leave marks on him. Your mind goes blank and you lose yourself in the pleasure completely. After a few more thrust you can feel the orgasm building up inside of you. “Close,” you breath out and he nods. “Me too. You can come on my cock now.”

You let go and your orgasm is even more intense than you expected. You moan his name so loud that he quickly covers your mouth with his hand again. He picks up his speed and a few thrusts later he pulls out of you to shove his cock into your mouth. You can feel his cum inside your mouth and taste him, just like he told you to. He watches you closely the whole time while he recovers from his own orgasm.

“Now swallow,” he says and you do. Then he pulls you forward with both of his hands to kiss you. The kiss is different this time, more gentle and caring, not just full of lust. When he pulls back you both smile. “I guess sending you this picture was not bad at all. And I was so worried.” He laughs. “I’m glad you send it, angel. Now I finally have you all to myself. It's a shame I couldn't take more time for you right now. There's a lot more I'd like to do with you,” he says with a mischievous smile on his face. “Why don’t you show me after your office hours, Sir?” you say with a smirk on your face. “Make sure to be here on time, angel.”

[lightseoul]

a/n. might turn this one into a drabble series if people like it. alternatively, i have a one-shot idea that shares similar themes with whatever this is. dedicated to my psych degree that i may never finish. (0.4k)

navigation. (you are here), part 2

bakugou doesn’t notice you at first.

in his defense, looking for girls wasn’t exactly part of his itinerary whenever he visited his therapist’s building. and if it was?

well, doing that in a mental health institution wouldn’t exactly be his first pick.

not that he is looking for someone.

rising speedily through the ranks as a pro-hero came with more and more tasks and responsibilities by the day, and as much as he wanted to downplay the weight of such endeavors, he’d be lying if he said the exhaustion wasn’t getting to him.

he’s barely making enough time to make room for his weekly therapist appointments. how can he possibly squeeze in dating into his already jam-packed schedule?

in fact, that was the point he was trying to make to his psychologist a few minutes ago who, in turn, countered his theory by broaching the plausibility of it being an avoidant technique to mask his inexperience, when time ran out and the session had to be put to a close. as always, she tied the session neatly with her spiel about them picking up where they left off next week, and then the pro-hero was already up and exiting her office.

“fucking plausibility,” he mutters to himself just as the door closes behind him, hefting the duffel bag that he carried all the way from his agency higher on his shoulders.

and really, he was about to turn to the right so he could take a piss before driving home when the door beside the restroom creaks open. now, he’s never seen any other client in his few years of face-to-face consultations, which was weird but not entirely inconceivable. so he finds it pretty excusable when he finds himself pausing, craning to hear the soft mutters emanating from the inside—not that eavesdropping on someone else’s psych appointment is fun—then immediately straightening up when a body emerges from the crack.

his first instinct is to instantly dash towards the comfort room like he wasn’t just standing there like a nosy idiot, but instead, he finds himself frozen when his eyes dart up and meet yours.

what did that proverb say again? all pretty girls are mentally ill?

he can only watch—immobile—as your eyes widen in recognition because, of course, you’d recognize him. not that he’s being fucking cocky; in fact, he’d much rather you did not identify him—fresh out of therapy, no less—but he’s aware that his reputation, unfortunately, precedes him. his reputation of being this aggressive, no-nonsense, brash pro-hero.

which is why he doesn’t fucking understand why he does the next thing.

he lifts his hand and blurts—

“hi.”

˖⁺‧₊ as always, reblogs, replies, and tags are appreciated <3 feel free to drop an ask, too—i'd love to chat with you. have a nice day!

tagging. @bunnysaursushii @yawnzzzzzzzz @cholios @kashee-h @iluv-ace @lotuslovers @elarakive @sugurusmoon @napbatata @k0z3me @h0ngh0ngh0ng @honeyoru @yoongiwithglasses @hellokitty-doll @lilsebnem @tetsuukuroo @crangrapel0ver @syrhra

[kavehscanvas]

Chat I'm gonna ramble

I have multiple hyperfixations that every once in a while I think "oh I'm getting normal about this now I think" and suddenly I'm BLASTED with the knowledge that I'm, in fact, not normal about it AT ALL

So this is a list of things I'm normal about until I'm not normal about, for fun

I spend like from a week to a month being EXACTLY the image above, to the point where even >I< get tired of hearing me talk about something

Danganronpa, unfortunately. Resurfaces at least once a year, and so far it's happened 3 times around my birthday. I don't think I can break the curse and I've stopped trying

Steven Universe, but specifically ALL the Ruby and Sapphire appearances. I can binge ONLY the episodes where they appear and sometimes the ones leading up to it for the full impact. That's why my Kavetham Rupphire crossover exists.

Genshin Impact hasn't gone anywhere since I got into it, I never had the chance to think I was normal about it. But every once in a while I might think I'm normal about Enkanomiya, The Chasm, Perilous Trail or Guizhong and I get SLAPPED by my own insanities

HSR but specifically the Xianzhou Luofu continuances from 2.4 and 2.5. I am ABNORMAL about the Yaoqing Trio, I am ABNORMAL about Lingsha, I am ABNORMAL about the transition from Dan Feng to Dan Heng in the shackling prison

Ordem Paranormal as a whole. Since Natal Macabro released I haven't been able to let go of it. I can't do anything without thinking "what if I inserted the NM cast into this". I binged the ending of Desconjuração this week. I watched two whole episodes in one day, and MIND YOU. THE EPISODES ARE 4 HOURS LONG.

Like two months ago I got beamed with Akame Ga Kill thoughts. Chat. It was so much worse than all the other times. I lost track of how many times I watched this anime since 2017. This time I only intended to watch a couple of the episodes, yk "the fun ones" (where my faves die) and ended up watching THE ENTIRE ANIME. In two days. I did not come out of it with my sanity intact. And this time I absorbed even more plot points that I had missed the other days and I was even more analytical of the characters and chat. Chat I don't think I can recover from this one. The Run thoughts come back to me every time I open my gallery. Ohhhhhh vaguely androgynous blonde man with good intentions but questionable actions who is the normalest person in his group and has angel imagery despite having a LOW ASS V NECK that shows a considerable amount of his chest save meeeee. Save me small pink girl with a gun double her size and trauma that turns into motivation. Save me lady who killed a guy with her bare fists with no power back up while she was dying from several gun wounds and also bit into a guy's blade with her teeth and it was literally so attractive I physically had to stop and gush over it because I'm attracted to beautiful and strong women.

This was not my intention but I think that last point is a very good example. I am, in fact, not normal about it. I literally thought a few hours ago "huh maybe I should delete some of these AGK skins, I don't use them a lot" past me I have news and I think you won't like them ...

[dwaekkicidal]

cw» fem!reader, kitty hybrid reader x puppy hybrid!channie, mentions of p in v, manhandling, there’s a few more but nothing too crazy/out of the blue

cw» not really proofread, but this is for that one anon who asked for kitty reader a few months ago <3 sorry it took so long

DO NOT republish or translate+post my work!

pup!channie who was very against his owner adopting another hybrid, let a lone a cat of all species. but it's not like he has much of a say in it- it's supposed to be his new "friend" so he's not alone while his owner is at work all day!

pup!channie who scares you shitless before you two even meet. your new owner warned you and told you all kinds of scary things about the dog you'll be living with from now on

but queue faces of surprise, from all 3 of you, when chan's face burns red and his tail starts wagging aggressively the second he sees you

pup!channie who gets addicted to your scent from day 1. he just loooves the way you smell. that and your endearingly cute demeanor only leads to him quickly growing a little crush on you~

pup!channie who surprises you and your owner when he opens his space to you right off the bat- with little to no aggressiveness coming from the boy.

pup!channie who welcomes you with open arms, even going far enough to allow you to lay (and sleep with him) in his bed. your owner was scared at first but quickly grew to trust chan enough that he didn't bother getting you your own bed- simply allowing you to sleep with chan

pup!channie who stares daggers into every person, human or hybrid, who even glances your way. your pretty head is never worried about anything enough to notice the stares, but chan has eyes of a hawk when it comes to you.

pup!channie who scents you unbeknownst to you. sneakily scenting you and your clothes to the point where it's just a natural smell to you- you don't question where it comes from anymore now that you're conditioned to live in the smell- but the smell follows you everywhere enough to scare other hybrids away

pup!channie who is SO easily jealous and refuses to let anybody near you. your owner has to muzzle HIM when you go to the doctor because the mere thought of strangers being so close to you, maybe even touching you makes him seethe.

^ and this is even worse when your owner brings their friends around. the onslaught of questions like "ohh how did you get that mutt to tolerate your new, pretty kitty" was already enough to piss him off, but when the friends try to touch you, he sees red. he actually loses all sense of rationality and will bite the person if they don't back away within his first growl.

and all of this is innocent at first! until its not.

it loses all innocence when mating season comes around, and you both discover your owner wasn't responsible enough to account for the clash of hormones. they thought about the possibility of you getting pregnant and put you on birth control "just in case", but they didn't take into account that the hormones would still be there in full force.

and that leads to what happened at the beginning of the week. your owner is out on a business trip that just so happens to be 2 weeks long, and channie has begun to feel the first signs of his heat. but it wasn't until he came home from a short grocery outing, and smelt your scent for the first time in hours, that he realized his heat was hitting him.

it wasn't until he was standing the doorway of your shared room, groceries long forgotten on the kitchen floor, that he felt the heat start coursing through his veins.

it wasn't until he had your face shoved into the sheet, balls deep in your cunt, that the emotions started to hit him.

"C-Channie! Slow down, p-please-" He shushes you and thrusts harder, his balls slapping against your clit each time he bottoms out. "Pretty kitty- MY pretty kitty."

"Chan~" Your whines only made him growl and push into you harder. He was using both hands to hold you down, one in your hair and the other on your shoulder, but he trailed the lower of the two down to your ass after some time.

His hand comes down on your ass suddenly, making you yelp out of surprise. The yelp turns into a moan when his hand wraps around the base of your tail and tugs.

"A-Ah!?" He doesn't release it. Instead, he tightens his hold on your tail and continues to lightly tug on it as leverage to pull you back onto his cock. Your hand that's not tangled in the sheets goes behind to push his hand away and Chan growls again, releasing your hair to dig his hands into your wrist and hold it above your head in order to get you to stop resisting him.

"You're gonna take it, right baby? Gonna let me fuck you full of my pups?" You attempt to push yourself up with your free hand, only to fall back down when his canines dig into the side of your neck. "Answer my fucking question before I lose my patience, kitty."

"Yes! I'll take it all. Anything for you, Channie…” You could feel the smirk break out against your neck, and it seems like your promise was enough to scratch an itch in his stupid dog brain.

now, days into his heat, you feel your own heat starting up- no doubt thanks to the restless hound that was adamant about rearranging your insides and trying to get you pregnant.

the two of you had barely left the room by the mid point of the next week. your owner had to call in a friend to bring you guys food every night- at first they weren't really aware of what was going on thanks to the vague texts chan sent (in the middle of you riding him, might i add), but boy could his friend smell the sex from the front door.

and channie had absolutely no plan to stop fucking you, even as your owner's friend poked their head in to check on you two for your owner. he simply gave them the nastiest side eye and tightened his grip around your neck, seemingly fucking into you even harder as he held eye contact and growled at the person to leave.

and then once they did leave, he continued fucking you as if the world was ending and the two of your would never see each other again.

“Attagirl, baby. Take this knot and Channie’ll breed your pains away.”

Taglist (red=can’t be tagged):

@valkyriexo @lunearta @jabmastersupriseee @rylea08

@yaorzu-blog @amararosesblog @jiminssluttyminx @clemissleepy

@miss-daisy04 @kittyxnoa @dwaekkiiracha @honeyybbuubblleess

@mariteez @fun-fanfics @honeyybbuubblleess @kittycatkrissa

@nicora04 @chuuyaobsessed @moonlightndaydreams @velvetmoonlght

@aeri-skzver

[peachycocaine]

some ideas for you (if you want them) <3

brothers bff!thanos who has been secretly fucking you for years and is always threatening to tell on you two to your brother whenever you’re being a brat but you always beg him not to because you don’t want your little secret to end (and then of course you have to *thank him* for not telling)

or!

reader and thanos have an only fans and they keep getting recognized for it (whether that be in the games or just in public) and people always say gross stuff to you and it makes you sad :( (this could end up being smut or angst or fluff or any combo tbh)

or!

you’re broke and the only place you can afford to rent is a room in some dude named thanos’s house… the first few months are chill but he keeps stealing your undies (he’s not at all slick about it) and whenever he asks you to come watch shows with him in the living room he sticks his hand down your pants (never actually *doing* anything but just to show you that he can)… then finally you realize you’re not gonna be able to pay rent this month and he just smiles because there are other forms of payment :) (this one could be headcannons or an actual story)

Okay cuz why did these actually eat hello?? Thank u sm noonie i've been yearning for ideas!! i'll try to do all of these, no promises though might end up procrastinating :/

Sealed deal

Pairings: pervy landlord!thanos x fem!reader

Tw: p in v, unprotected sex (rmbr to wrap it before you tap it), dry humping, mentions of drug usage, language

You had been financially struggling for a long time, you didn't have a place of your own to stay at. Though your friend let you live with her for 2 weeks, she eventually told you she couldn't let you live with her any longer. And you understood that, you were living with her free of charge and she had to cover for your expenses. She had to buy twice the amount of food and the electricity and water bills would come in double the cost due to you living with her. She was also struggling and so she had to do what she had to do. You did have a job, which paid minimum wage. Seeing your condition your friend suggested that you could live with one of her friend's, but you'd have to pay monthly rent of course. At first you weren't very fond of the idea since her said friend was a male but it was the only one thing you could afford right now. You turned up her offer and moved in with her friend.

His appearance was questionable but you had no other choice than to adjust. he wasn't really living lavish but his financial status was above average, he made his money off of his meaningless raps. At first living with him was easy, he didn't really bother you since he was always too busy doing drugs or trying to come up with new rap lyrics or he'd just be outside with his friends. But after 2 or 3 months, you noticed that alot of your panties went missing. At first you shook it off thinking they got lost, but too many of them had gone missing. And ofcourse the culprit was the man that lived with you. He gave 0 fucks about hiding it too, you could walk into his bedroom and you'd find your panties laying on his bed. You just took them back without confronting him about it, trying to ignore the fact that the man you lived with and will be living with for a good while was a pervert.

As time went on, interactions between you two became more frequent. He'd ask you to join him on the couch at times, though you'd always hesitate before you went because everytime you did he'd sneak touches to your thighs or brush his arm against your tit and call it an accident. He'd shove his hands down your pants, letting it rest against your clothed pussy as he watched your shift uncomfortably, at times he'd press his palm harder against your core. You didn't really say anything, well, more like you couldn't because you knew if you protested against him he could kick you right out. You tolerated his panty stealing habit until you found one of your panties covered in some slimey substance. You instantly dropped it when you realized that slimey gooey substance was his cum. You wanted to get out of here as soon as possible but you knew you couldn't.

You spent half the money you earned from working your ass off on clothes and other necessities, forgetting to save some for rent. You realized you were short on rent money and panic set it. Maybe you could ask thanos to give you one more month and pay off your rent after you earn more, but you knew thanos wasn't that generous or sympathetic. Later that evening he approached you and you just stood there hoping he'd forgot about the rent. "Hey, y'know its time to pay up right? Come on" he sticks his hand out, expecting you to hand him money. You chew your lower lip before gathering up the courage to speak. "U-uhm right so.. im short on money right now but could you please just give me one more month? I promise i'll pay full by next month" you heart was thumping in your chest, waiting for his response. He just looked at you and gave you a smile. His expression was unreadable, you couldn't really tell if his smile meant a yes or no. He stepped closer to you, towering over you as he leaned in "it doesn't work that way senõrita, now does it?" His breath fanned over your ear before he stepped back. You started fiddling with your fingers, growing more and more anxious about what you could do.

"I don't have the money on me, i really cant do anything about that, you have to understand, please." You pleaded hoping he'd show some mercy and let it slide this time. He rubbed his chin acting like he was thinking "hmm.. you could do one thing though.." his tone suggestive. "A-and what could that be..?" You saw right through his intentions, you knew what kind of man he was. He scanned your body up and down, practically eye-fucking you. Your body tensed at the way he looked at you. "Come on, don't act all innocent doll. Y'know what im talking about." He smirked at you and you just bit your lip. You knew exactly what he meant, he wanted you to pay with your body and you knew he had you cornered. You bunched up your shirt in your fists and just simply nodded, giving him a greenlight to do whatever he wanted to you. He was quick to jump at you, you fell back and landed on the couch as he eagerly started kissing you, almost devouring you whole. You just laid there, letting it happen as he caged you in. His hands were roaming around your body eagerly, exploring your skin like theres no tomorrow. He roughly squeezed your breast as his mouth never left yours, you moaned into his mouth making him shove his tongue deeper down your throat. He pulled away from you, panting as a string of saliva connected your mouths. You looked anywhere but at him, not wanting to see his face as he took advantage of you. He cupped your cheek and made you look at him, his thumb tracing your bottom lip as he started grinding his bulge against your clothed sex.

"Do you feel that? Feel how hard you make me?" His voice was raspy and breathy as he rubbed his groin against your crotch. You tried supressing your moans by biting your lip, trying not to give him the enjoyment of this situation. He rolled his hips and you could feel his hard throbbing cock through his sweats and of course he wasn't wearing boxers. His movements came to a halt and he started pulling his sweats down. "Undress." It was a command not a question. You did as you were told and took off your clothes while he did the same.

You two were skin to skin now, his naked form on top of yours. He looked down at you, admiring every inch of your bare body. "Fuck i can't believe you've been hiding this gorgeous body of yours from me since months." He chuckled as he spread your thighs apart further and positioned himself between you. He ran his cock up and down your slit before tapping the head on your clit a few times, earning a moan from you. Your moan gave him a head start as he began pushing his tip in, resulting in you biting your fist. He was bigger than you thought and the stretch made you want to scream. You let out a pained whimper as he began slowly pushing each inch into your tight pussy, splitting you apart on his cock with each inch. He let out a groan as he bottomed down, he was kind enough to give you time to adjust before he began rocking his hips gently. You covered your mouth with your hand trying to stop the moans that were forcefully pulled out of your throat. You hated the fact that it felt so fucking good, his fat head grazing your G spot with each thrust. He cooed and peeled your hand away from your mouth "c'mon dont hide those moans from me now, i needa hear how good i make you feel" he said as he dipped his head down, planting rough kisses to your neck. He started thrusting his hips into you faster, his dick slammed in and out of you. Your hands instantly flew to his hair, tugging on it as he bit down on your neck. He marked your neck before licking the bite mark "look at you taking dick like a good girl" his breathing heavy as he pulled away from your neck to admire your face.

The way your lips parted and tears pricked your eyes made his cock throb inside you. He pulled all the way out till only his head was in before ramming his dick back into you, aggressively fucking his cock into you as he watched your tits bounce with each of his thrusts. The sight before him made him almost lose control and cum right then. He eagerly stuck his hand between the both of you and started messily rubbing your clit. He was eager to make you cum, he wanted you to cover his dick in your cum. Your back arched as your nails dug into his back as he began rubbing your clit. Feeling tension build up in your stomach, you felt yourself getting closer with each of his thrusts. He felt your walls spasm around his cock, noticing that you were about to cum "gonna make a mess all over my cock princess? Go ahead, cum on my fucking dick like the little whore you are" he lifted up one of your legs to get a better angle, his dick pounding into you deeper now. After a few thrusts, you came undone on his cock. Your body fell limp beneath him as he kept snapping his hips into yours. His hips stuttered as he came closer to release. With one swift thrust, he burried himself deep inside you. Painting your insides white with his cum.

He collapsed on top of you, both of you trying to catch your breaths. He pulled out his now soft dick, watching in awe as his cum gushed out of your used cunt. "Payment succesful"

[mandalhoerian]

Fish in a Birdcage ৎ୭

ৎ୭ ⸻ rafayel has quite the storm raging in his mind during his artistic expedition to aridum. which, the root of his crisis he was trying to wean himself off of wasn't supposed to tag along to make him spiral further. funny thing is, you just think he's sick. he is. just infected by something far worse than you can imagine: crippling dependency.

ৎ୭ ⸻ SO MUCH BUILD-UP, momentary sickfic, anxious attachment issues, rafayel being hot and cold with the reader, angst, exhibitionism for like 0.01 seconds bc of bond shenanigans, switch4switch and constantly changing dynamics that comes with it, handjob, slight obedience kink, impromptu bondage play with rafayel's neck piece praise kink, obedience kink blink and you miss it, p in v, CLOTHED SEX ITS SO HOT 2 ME, unprotected sex, multiple rounds.

ৎ୭ ⸻ hello lads fandom, FIRST WORK HERE (it sucked my soul out i've been working on this for like tHREE weeks)!!! this is my adaptation of rafayel's nightly rendezvous card intertidal zone. a lot of it is based on my reading and understanding of the card, i'm so sorry for releasing this when caleb just released but, i hope you enjoy, much love <3 ( lil tag: @comatosebunny09 )

ৎ୭ ⸻ 26K, read on ao3

In retrospect, finding out Aridum was a city in the middle of a desert should have made you stop and think more about how the climate would actually affect Rafayel before diving straight into travel plans.

You know, a Lemurian.

Who, logically, wouldn’t fare well in the dry heat.

Rafayel flicking off your genuine concern like it was a bug on the surface tension of his fish tank was the first red flag you should have paid more attention to. In your defense, since he’d been there before and was confident enough to initiate banter, it was easy to give in and trust he knew what he was doing as he batted his lashes at you with those pretty dual-colored, sparkly wide eyes that left you starstruck in the face and said, “As long as I’m with you, I’ll be fine.”

Well. He was with you now and he wasn’t fine.

Because for once in his life, Rafayel didn’t have enough energy to run laps around you. Just a few minutes outside the hotel, lingering near the grand fountain square framed by towering palm trees that offered scant shade, and he began to deflate pitifully like a garish balloon leaking its vigor into the sweltering air. His usual dynamism, the kind that pulled attention to him as effortlessly as a river carved its path, had dimmed to a sluggish ebb, so much so you found yourself glancing over your shoulder every ten seconds, vigilance heightened by the unsettling absence of his ever-present current. The languid pace like he was moving through molasses made him look like an entirely different person than the one tugging you through the airport with even the luggage excitedly rolling behind him.

And it had been just a single day since you’d set foot in Aridum.

That wasn’t to say the trip had been a disaster or he was in terrible shape — you two were still on day one. Back in Linkon, he was, on paper, enthusiastic about pointing out local landmarks for you to go together like he knew the city personally, but he had quickly lost that energy when it actually came to the execution. You chalked it up to him not being able to get any sleep the previous night because of a mix of jetlag and the discomfort of a new bed, but regardless, it was still concerning to watch him only interested in stopping by street stands where he could buy himself cold water bottles and stand in a shaded corner in order to drink them slowly under shelter, while also dragging you with him, so there wouldn't be even a split-second distance between you two.

You were thankful you didn't have many plans in mind. Rafayel always packed enough enthusiasm for the both of you, but now, as you watched with wide-eyed worry how his spark had suddenly wilted, the drastic shift in his personality left him finding everything he suggested doing utterly unnecessary for the day. On top of that, after only managing to sit still for five minutes or so, it'd become obvious to see that the environment of this city, complete with a sun beating down hot enough to cook you alive, had taken a toll on Rafayel's temperament far more drastically than expected — rendering his eagerness completely sour.

But still, you wanted to cheer him up, you did. It broke your heart seeing someone who brought so much life into every room shrivel down to such a defeated shell. Maybe that's why you couldn't help yourself when you caught him pouting at something on the phone screen as if it'd done him a great offense.

So, you began teasing. “Rafayel, we haven’t even been out for thirty minutes, you're sweating already?"

“No, I’m not.”

“Yes, you are,” you countered, only to squint at his face more closely. “Wait. You’re not?”

He threw his arms out like he was expecting a grander reaction. “Do you know what that means?”

“That you’re a human raisin in the making?”

He groaned, a sound that was more theatrical than pained, but you still caught the edge of frustration in it. “It means I’m seconds away from crumbling into sand. You’ll have to gather me up and carry me home in a jar.”

You started walking towards one of the fountains near some empty seats where shade was available, while he dragged himself behind you like a zombie. "Let's sit you down before you begin to form cracks."

The fountain’s spray misted faintly in the air, enough to make the stone bench beneath feel less like a skillet. Rafayel took extra care positioning himself on one of the seats before collapsing backward, draping one arm over his flushed face.

He took the bottle of yet another ice cold water you fished out from your bag without protest, but his free hand found your wrist and lingered there — light at first, then tighter, like he needed to anchor himself. The unexpected heat radiating from his skin sent a little jolt up your arm. You were about to comment on it, but then he tipped the bottle back and drank, and you swore you could feel the tension in his throat as if it was your own.

When he finished, he let out a breath — not a sigh, just an exhale that sounded heavy, deliberate, sprawling beside you, one leg stretched out, the other bouncing restlessly as he tilted his head back and squinted at the cloudless sky.

“I think I’m dying,” he announced, as if that wasn’t thr fourth time he’d said it today.

After your attention was made aware that he indeed wasn’t sweating by the dry hairline of his, though, the mood to banter had dissipated like a mirage. You began fussing. Was it normal that he didn’t sweat? If a normal person was like this, they needed to be taken to the hospital. However, Rafayel had done nothing but up the ante in complaining, that had to indicate nothing was seriously wrong, right? He’d know his body the best. Right?

“I told you to put on sunscreen this morning. Did you?”

He scoffed, “I don’t need it,” — and you heard the imaginary Lemurian in his tone rolling his eyes at your human expectations.

“Not with that attitude,” you shut him down, already skimming through your bag at an increasingly faster pace. “Now, keep still.”

Finding what you were looking for, you uncapped the bottle, reaching out with one hand to tilt Rafayel’s head left and right to gauge where to start. His skin under the pads of your fingertips felt almost brittle and paper-thin — unnatural on Rafayel, making you unconsciously rub like it was a stain you could get rid of. Without meaning to, you frowned, and he made a soft, lukewarm grumble, nudging your leg with his foot, reminding you what you were doing. Which was fussing over a grown man who should have been responsible from the start and able to take care of himself.

“Show me your forehead,” you said, wanting to get it out the way first.

He obediently carded his bangs back, silent, half-hooded eyes flicking everywhere on your face going ignored as you rubbed sunscreen in and felt what alarmingly was similar to a fever. It was a relief to hear him humming at the feeling, you hoped it would help as you quickly moved to spread the white lotion over his cheeks and smeared a stripe right across the bridge of his nose as he fixed his hair, squinting at your ministrations.

Though, somehow, he looked contented enough that you had to stop him from nuzzling into your hand. “Rafayel, I’m working here.”

All you got was a breathy, “Mmm,” as if he was speaking through the pleasant haze of sleep.

How contradictory of him, as always. For someone constantly grumbling about the unbearable heat, he leaned into every touch with a docility that defied reason — and worse, he initiated them, either molding against you like water taking the shape of the container it was poured into, or his fingers ghosting over your skin as though drawn by instinct. You couldn’t make sense of it. The mere thought of physical contact when the air was this heavy and oppressive made your skin crawl, but he seemed to revel in it. No, thrived on it.

It wasn’t just the way he didn’t flinch — he leaned in harder, his breaths hitching faintly, brow furrowed like he was wrestling with a need he barely understood. You’d swear the heat radiating from your skin would only make it worse, yet he tilted his face into your touch as though your thumbs brushing his cheekbones offered a balm, a strange, cooling relief.

Maybe, he perceived your skin to be indeed cooler than his.

It had to be something unique to his Lemurian physiology. His reactions didn’t make sense otherwise. What human would ever enjoy the sensation of warmth pressed against warmth in such sweltering conditions? And yet here he was, biting back what suspiciously sounded like a placid sigh, while you struggled to reconcile the peculiar contradiction.

“C’mon, don’t let me do all the work,” you muttered, quieter than you intended, the heat and the moment distracting you entirely.

You must have sounded a tad bit worried, because Rafayel didn’t react with his usual playful defiance or the melodramatic sulking he resorted to when things didn’t go his way. Instead, he fell silent, sinking more fully against your side as though he belonged there, and successfully narrowed the angle you were working with. His head tilted slightly, guiding your hand to the sharp line of his jaw with an unspoken invitation, eyelashes fluttering as he blinked, the haze of his voice turning soft and almost vulnerable. You couldn’t even see his face properly from looking at the top of the purple mop of hair blocking you.

"Do my neck too?"

Before you could decide, his hand encircled your wrist. Not tightly — not forcefully — but with a loose, guiding pressure that was maddeningly deliberate. He led your lotion-slicked hand to curve around his throat, the smooth, simmering heat of his skin pressing against your palm.

You hesitated, the instinct to pull away warring with the strange tension settling between you both, but his thumb found the delicate underside of your wrist and began tracing slow, thoughtful patterns that seemed designed to leave you paralyzed. You knew damn well how tenderly and skillfully he handled paintbrushes, and it was evident by the practiced precision of each touch that he was using the same sensibility on you, whether he was fully aware of it or not, which sent a warm burst of blood rising to your cheeks.

Seeming restless, Rafayel sat up straight and finally allowed you a clear view of him. His head tipped further back, exposing more of his neck to your hand, eyes darkened into to a shade of purple that seemed otherworldly in the harsh light of day. They glittered like faceted amethysts film-burned blue around the edges, soaking in every sunlit fleck of your features with a focus that made your chest tighten, like you were being studied with the assessment of the artist Rafayel before another’s painting, his focus unbroken save for the low hum he let slip, soft and unguarded.

You swallowed hard, aware of how exposed you were. The bustling world of Aridum hadn’t stopped turning just because the two of you had stumbled into whatever this was. A bead of sweat rolled down the back of your neck, but it wasn’t just the desert heat making you feel like you were suffocating.

This shouldn’t have been happening. Not here, not now.

Your breath shuddered as you finally regained enough sense to break the silence. "Do it yourself," you murmured, voice uneven as you pressed the bottle of sunscreen into his chest. You looked away, clumsily rubbing your hands on your arms to mask the way they trembled, pretending to rid yourself of excess lotion while wishing desperately to erase the heat radiating off your skin.

Rafayel sighed, a low sound of reluctant acceptance, as he pulled himself upright. His fingers glided over his neck, spreading the sunscreen where you hadn’t, his movements smooth and unaffected as he worked the lotion over his collarbones and along the nape of his neck. The sight was annoyingly graceful, as though he wasn’t feeling the same unbearable tension you were. If you’d have thought of bringing a small electric fan along today, it would have been inches from your face already.

"Maybe we should’ve gone out at night," you said abruptly, grasping for any lifeline to shift the moment’s focus. Your gaze darted to him as he worked, your cheeks burning hotter than the sunlight that baked the streets. "Now I feel bad."

"What for?"

"Making you come along. This must not be very inspiring.”

Rafayel let out an honest-to-goodness laugh. It rolled from his throat so easily and naturally that it seemed even he wasn’t aware of it until the sound tapered off into a quiet chuckle. Shaking his head, he leaned toward you until his temple rested lightly on your shoulder, his gaze unfocused as he stared absently at the fountain ahead. "I’m not giving up time with you just because the sun here wants me dead."

He completely bypassed the part about inspiration, but the sincerity in his words hit you like a splash of cool water on overheated skin. Your shoulders relaxed as you melted into a sigh, letting your head fall atop his, but the sticky warmth made the closeness unbearable almost instantly.

You promptly peeled yourself away with an, "Ugh.” He had already filled his making-you-feel-hot quota for the day, in every sense of the word.

Rafayel straightened just enough to meet your gaze, "That’s how you answer my heroic declaration?" he asked dryly, one brow arched in faux offense.

He didn’t budge, though, even though the heat seemed to bother him more than it did you. The stubborn set of his jaw spoke volumes, and it took a gentle nudge of your elbow to get him to finally sit upright. Even then, he let out a dramatic whine from deep in his chest as if being forced to separate was a personal betrayal.

"You’re lucky I’m rewarding it with mercy," you shot back, brushing a hand through your hair to vent your own rising frustration with the heat. "Come on, let’s head back. I need to get my fishie in the water before he dries up completely."

"But you wanted to see—"

"There’ll be plenty of opportunities in the future," you interrupted with a wave of your hand. "If anything, this was a good lesson about choosing the time we go out more carefully."

To your relief, Rafayel didn’t push back. He rose to his feet with you, though his sluggish movements and the slight downward pull of his lips suggested reluctance. As much as his leaning on you had been irritating in the heat, the sight of his faint frown made your chest tighten, and without thinking, you looped your arm through his and pulled him closer, even though the contact made your already overheated skin feel unbearable. His shoulders straightened slightly at the gesture, but the small crease between his brows didn’t disappear.

"I hear it’s seafood night at the hotel restaurant," you offered, attempting to lift his mood. He was obviously bummed out, but his stubbornness refused to show why outright. It was cute to a degree — childish almost, so endearing you couldn't find it in yourself to grow impatient with him. But you hated seeing him down. "If we head back now, we might snag a rooftop table.”

"Snag? Puh-lease. Worst case scenario, one glimpse of me and I could get us prime seating any time, anywhere," Rafayel scoffed. Still, the corner of his lip twitched upward as if tempted to smile, and you found yourself mirroring the reaction immediately. “And that whole thing would still be less bothersome than you assuming I haven’t secured us a reservation already.”

Later that evening, after dinner on the rooftop, the mix-up with the room service attendant delivering Rafayel’s envelope to your room turned out to be a convenient excuse to check on him. It had been hours since you insisted he take time to rest, and while he promised to settle in and let you know how he felt after freshening up, you hadn’t heard from him since.

You were greeted by the humidity hitting you in the face like a solid wall of rain when the door got opened though, instead of your boyfriend. Thick as fog like it had its own gravity.

Rafayel stood in the doorway, his hair dripping and clinging to his flushed skin in lazy dark purple rivulets, robe loose, the soft fabric blotched dark with water where droplets had slid from his neck and shoulders.

The room behind him radiated a different kind of heat — not the oppressive dryness of the desert, but the heavy, steamy warmth of someone trying to crawl their way back to comfort in the only way they knew how.

He looked better, at least.

The brittle edge that had been clinging to him seemed softened, as if he’d soaked away some of the tension in the beath he’d clearly stepped out of upon you knocking on his door.

Still, the sight of him — damp like a wet cat instead of a fish in his natural environment, robe-clad, the faint sheen of exhaustion still lingering in the way he leaned against the door frame left an odd twist in your chest.

He didn't look any worse for wear than he had earlier in the day when he’d claimed he wanted to spend the rest of his night marinating in ice cold water, and while seeing him not suffering was a relief, you clearly weren't expecting for him to actually mean what he said, even though the water obviously wasn’t ice cold.

The envelope, as it turned out, held a ticket to the memorial hall and an invitation to an art salon gathering hosted by one of his friends. Neither looked to be sparking any interest in Rafayel, however, despite him having come here for as much stimulation as possible for his inspiration.

You understood. It just wasn’t possible when he wasn’t feeling well.

The room itself was telling the entire story, in fact, chaotic in its stillness against the beauty of the floor-to ceiling windows framing the desert skyline in soft, shimmering lights of the city crowned by the full moon hanging proudly above. Papers were scattered across the floor in uneven piles, some curling slightly at the edges where they’d caught the artificial moisture in the air, blank and untouched, and some haphazardly sketched in a way you couldn't even begin to guess what they would become later. A few uncapped pens sat nearby, ink untouched, next to a can of soda that had long since gone warm. It wasn’t hard to guess what he’d been doing — or trying to do — in the hours since you’d left him.

So, you told him to stop forcing himself. Come enjoy the scenery with you.

It was your first instinct, but the words didn’t feel enough. You weren’t an artist, you didn’t know what would be good for the block he was going through. Even though your concern was genuine, you were clumsy at best at consolation.

But, he did lower himself onto the floor beside you anyway, his hands brushing against the scattered papers as he sat and leaned back on his palms. Like this, it was easy to imagine him search for his vision to come to him among the mess as he was attempting to draw, and end up with his gaze drifting out the window instead.

And then, as if he were a tide and the moonlight was pulling him inexorably to shore, he began to open up. Pushed by your mention of watching the view together, he spoke of sceneries. Of what traveling to discover secret corners of nature meant to him before everything changed — before he started creating. About how he used to just look at the world and feel it. Admire it. He didn’t need to do anything with it back then. A sunset was just a sunset, the sea was simply the sea, and neither asked anything of him but to exist alongside them.

Once he began to create, however...

Those discoveries done from a place of pure enjoyment became material, their beauty and pain turned into fuel. The act of looking became an act of taking. Of extracting. He started to see the world not as it was, but as something that could be stripped bare and transformed. A beautiful, bleeding wound. Every sunrise painted became a slice taken from the sun. Every ocean wave he put down on canvas was a handful of ocean lost. He couldn't experience sceneries for themselves anymore without having to to capture and translate them into a demand.

He didn’t look at you while he spoke, but the portrait of his honesty could be interpreted by even the most art-blind.

It was then that he dropped the bomb on you: “If one day, I become someone who only takes from you… If I were like that, would you leave me?”

That question dropped into the space between you like a stone in still water, sending ripples through everything you thought you understood about this moment.

But Rafayel was watching you in a way that made your pulse trip over itself, dissecting every flicker of your expression, like you were sitting in the middle of a high-stakes exam you hadn’t studied for. His fingers splayed on the ground besides yours were mere inches away, but even in that minimal distance, you sensed him drawing further back — a subconscious, reflexive reaction to fear, as if he needed to protect himself by retreating into some remote part of his mind, distant and closed off from the rest of him.

"Oh you silly fishie..." was your immediate response despite the whiplash he'd inflicted upon you, fondness rolling off your tongue easily, folding over itself into a dull ache for the struggle he was going through. "I won't leave you."

Your hand slid towards him, pinky finger crossing over until it brushed against his — gently, giving him ample chance to pull away before you covered his entire hand with your palm.

He was feverish again, despite all attempts made to soothe him, and the urge to smooth the pads of your fingers over his flushed skin, mapping each ridge and freckle that dotted his knuckles, surged forward within you. And you gave in, trying to make up for what you knew words would never be able to express, as you lightly rubbed lines onto the back of his hand.

It seemed to melt something in him, and he eased into your touch. It was an involuntary response to you reaching out for him — he tilted into you like he always did. It only lasted a second or two, however, before you felt him falter; like he noticed the instinctual motion midway, then consciously pushed down the reaction by gripping his thighs in an effort to sit back and avoid leaning in. Your heart dropped a little, confused, and you stole a peek at his face through the corner of your lashes to try to guess what he was thinking about.

What you saw only amplified how wrong everything felt. His features, which normally softened whenever you reached out for him, tightened, pensive. He frowned, holding back — hesitant about something, unreadable except for a subtle unease creeping in around the edges.

Even before he broke the silence, you had the awful premonition that his next words weren't going to be what you hoped to hear.

"Are you sure?" he asked, measured and quiet, and you knew you were right. This was trouble.

You squeezed his hand lightly despite wanting to do the very opposite, reassuringly, "Do you really think I’d stay even a second longer with someone I know is bad for me?"

He remained unresponsive.

“Rafayel?”

You made it about yourself, idiot, you realized.

Instead of acknowledging him and his cue for more reassurance and affirmation, you'd shifted the attention from him to trust in your decision making. You hadn't meant to, you hadn't done it deliberately — but...

Gosh, you were absolutely terrible at this.

So much so that Rafayel being the more emotionally in-tune of the two of you even in his vulnerable state was setting a humiliating new standard for how low you could go.

It was pathetic, really, how utterly you failed to pick up on what should have been an obvious cue. There wasn’t a shred of doubt in your mind that he’d taken your clumsy words as a glaring sign you found his struggles trivial, insignificant compared to your own convenience. All you’d managed to do was shove him deeper into the spiral of insecurities he was already battling.

This was supposed to help him clear his head. All it had achieved so far was adding onto his concerns.

Despite your determination to pour everything you had into assuaging the gnarled knot of his self-doubt, you were woefully unqualified for the task. Unmoored, you floundered blindly through half-finished thoughts, grasping for ways to communicate your feelings — gracelessly, imprecisely — all in hopes of soothing whatever ugly thoughts tangled around your boyfriend's brain like weeds choking the life from fertile soil.

Your stammering words stuck to the roof of your mouth like taffy, thick, unwilling to yield, and suddenly useless, coming out slow as you spoke. “What I mean by that is… My life has been consumed by you. In the best way possible. You made it ito a beautiful, chaotic mess bursting with life. I couldn’t possibly leave you.”

And he heard it — you felt it in the faint shuddering breath he drew as a silent response.

His thumb swiped over your pinky in absent response, stroking soothingly over the thin bones as he stared at your joined hands. His shoulders hadn't relaxed even marginally, but there was still an immeasurable kindness in the gesture.

“Besides, you’re not someone who takes. That’s not true at all. You’re just…”

He looked up then, turning his head to you, a doe-eyed, half-dazed blink breaking past the glassy stare he'd fixed on the empty space in front of him. His hand twitched underneath yours, flexing as he made a questioning noise, wordlessly urging you to elaborate as he invited comfort from your explanation. The way he tilted his head, the corners of his furrowed brows slightly angled upwards — the effect was childlike, innocent almost.

Receptive.

Breaking through your hesitation to touch him lest he shrink away again, you lifted both hands to cradle his cheeks gently, smoothing your thumbs across the high sweep of his cheekbones until his eyelids slid shut.

A soft sigh fell from his parted lips, his body pliant in your grasp as he melted under your fingertips, as if the gesture were more potent than any reassurance you might offer. The climbing tension within your ribcage dissolved with a single exhalation at the sight — helplessly endeared by his sheer willingless to submit to your awkward, inexpressive attempt at consoling. Subtle adoration burned quietly beneath each featherlight caress you placed along the slope of his nose or the soft patches underneath his eyes.

"You're just feeling a little anxious," you continued carefully, brushing a stray piece of damp hair away from his temple. It stuck stubbornly, refusing to let itself be tucked behind his ear before you tried again, gentler this time, hoping to soothe any lingering reservations you hadn't managed to wash away. “That’s probably why you’re overthinking things.”

In the brief silence that followed, anxiety bubbled low in your stomach once more, especially when he seemed to be focusing somewhere on your neck and ignoring looking you in the eye directly. It came as yet another whiplash and a sinking feeling simultaneously when he covered one of your hands with his, tilting his chin to plant a kiss into the centre of your palm as if making up for the withdrawal from earlier.

"What, were you playing tricks on me?" you murmured.

Shaking his head, "A token of my gratitude," he clarified. A gentle huff of laughter slipped past his lips, so faintly that you would've missed it had you not been staring at him with rapt attention in your bewilderment. "For you. Who accepted someone like me."

You frowned, eyebrows immediately drawing close. “Rafayel—”

He leaned in all of a sudden, one of his arms slid behind your back, while the other stretched across in front of you, caging you in with an unnerving ease. Both his hands rested flat against the floor now, framing you on either side like a living barricade. Your own left arm shot down to slap a palm down so you wouldn't topple over on your side. The droplets falling from his damp hair onto your neck was a sharp, sudden cold in comparison to the alarming heat radiating from his body, making you jolt in place as he loomed close enough for his breath to fan across your face.

"You're burning up again," you said weakly, trying and failing spectacularly to disguise your nervousness with indignance as his lips brushed softly against the apple of your cheek before ghosting lower, pausing just beneath your ear, testing for a reaction.

Meanwhile, him taking your hand that was balled up in a fist on the ground to slowly bring it towards his mouth left you frozen and dizzy from the contradictory sensations prickling under your skin.

Rafayel hummed against your wrist in response, dropping light kisses along the ridge of bone connecting your thumb to the rest of your fingers in the interim. It was impossible to ignore how every one of his touches ignited something different within you — the sensation of him painting the length of each finger with tender brushes of his lips and heated exhales sent pulses of liquid warmth flowing through your bloodstream.

The abrupt shift had left you uncertain about many things, chief among which being whether your previous efforts actually sank in at all or not.

Apparently they had.

The combined assault was distracting, but even amidst the whirlwind of thoughts vying for attention, you struggled to fully comprehend just how drastically the moment had veered off course — how your own worry-stricken attempt at appeasing him ended here instead, with your pulse hammering in your ears as he pressed even closer, draping his arm around your waist to turn you sideways until you were nearly sitting on his lap, faces inches apart.

A glimpse hope of maintaining control over the situation arrived in the form of a can toppling over during his handling of you, clattering on the hardwood flooring and startling you enough to snap free of the strange trance Rafayel had ensnared you in during his momentary lapse in focus.

Being so close gave you a good look at the change in him that manifested suddenly; his features visibly hardened as he turned his head at the disturbance, seemingly irritated to have been interrupted midway — a dark glint shone through his lashes before shifting over to you, misty, hazy, indescribable in its raw complexity.

His bathrobe hung loose, the neckline slouched further down one shoulder from having moved so much earlier, displaying more skin than was appropriate, and you weren’t sure if you were imagining the faintest hint of familiar coloration mottling his chest.

Which was dry.

Not only had his skin absorbed all the moisture that clung to it like a sponge after stepping out of the bathroom, there was no hint of perspiration whatsoever — not a bead of sweat lining the ridges of his collarbone or dampening the strands of hair stuck to his forehead.

As if responding to your inner thoughts, he lamented, "As you said, I'm anxious... Well, more like... Restless," before leaning in further to bury his face in the crook of your shoulder. "Ever since I arrived here, I feel..."

His arms encircled your waist, pulling you flush against the expanse of his chest and filling your nose with the scent of bodywash. It was no less than holding a solid block of heat capable of radiating more than enough warmth to replace an actual human furnace. The sheer amount of radiated temperature seemed ridiculous in such conditions, but the way he tried the loosen the already disheveled robe covering his other shoulder despite coiling around you, which had to be the source of the biggest discomfort concerning heat, was even more ridiculous. Shouldn’t he have let go of you before complaining?

"The air feels like it's burning, like there's not enough moisture anywhere. My heart's racing and I feel so miserable," he admitted quietly, muffled in the material of your shirt.

Yeah, you were taking him to a hospital.

This wasn't normal by any means, especially since you were now a hundred percent sure Rafayel couldn't sweat in order to regulate his internal body heat.

How could you let this go on for so long? He had been suffering these symptoms for a whole day now, hiding it all under layers of petulant frustration and overdramatic complaining to escape having to ask for help.

He was always like this. So secretive and reserved about his struggles underneath all the goofiness, especially those directly related to him being a Lemurian.

You put a hand on his burning chest and pushed yourself away to put some distance between the two of you and this moment, ignoring his quiet gasp and the way he clutched your waist. "I'm taking you to a—”

Suddenly, the world spun off its axis, a dizzying blur of motion that ended with your back colliding against the floorboards.

The impact sent a ripple through the room — drawing pens clattering and rolling away, half-sketched papers crumpling beneath you, while others scattered into the air like startled birds, carried by the gust of displaced air.

As you blinked up, trying to shake the daze from your mind, the world sharpened into focus.

The light cascaded over Rafayel like liquid mercury, accentuating every sharp edge and soft curve of his form. His bare legs straddled your hips, knees pressed firmly into the ground on either side of you, pinning you in place with an effortless authority. His hands had found yours in the chaos, and now your wrists were restrained above your head, his long fingers encircling them with a grip that was firm yet somehow shaky.

The bathrobe he wore hung precariously, one shoulder already exposed to the moonlight’s caress while the other threatened to follow suit, the fabric dipping low to reveal a tantalizing V that stretched from his clavicle down to his navel. Tendrils of lilac hair curled lightly downwards with gravity, catching the light from outside, glittering like morning dew against a canvas of violet satin and plopping down onto your face, each impact making you blink. And his face, suffused with a flush so intense that it seemed to glow under the pale lighting, as if all the blood in his body had rushed to stain his fair skin with an undeniable rosy bloom.

The cool floorboards beneath your skin were contrasting harshly with the heat of his touch, and the helpless position left your pulse racing in a way you couldn’t entirely blame on adrenaline.

Rafayel lowered himself until his nose brushed lightly against yours, his breaths shallow and uneven, eyes caught halfway between hazy drowsiness and burning intensity — a vivid shade of sunless plum made darker not by the shadows cast across his features, but a deeply buried and masterfully concealed emotion on the verge of making itself known to you.

To call it desire wouldn't do it justice.

It was something far stronger than fleeting arousal or casual infatuation — you hadn’t been looked at this way before. Weren’t even sure if a man could look at someone like this. There was nothing superficial or mundane about this particular weight. It sought to consume you. To burn you alive, leaving you to crumble into ashes like incense offered up to a deity. And the worst part? You had no idea what exactly you were being consumed by, or why.

All of this, because you had merely wanted to—

“No. I’m not going anywhere,” he hissed as if sensing your plan, breath dragging along the edge of your ear. "I'm just... restless.”

But—

“In every sense of the word.”

Oh?

Your mind reeled, dizzy from the intoxicating cocktail flooding your senses — from his breaths washing over the side of your neck, to the overwhelming sensation of Rafayel on the verge of draping over you like a living brand, hot and firm, trapping you in place.

"Especially when you're by my side," he purred.

Oh.

He pulled back to stare you down, heavy-lidded and glinting like knives honed razor sharp, yet somehow tender in his approach. If anything, it served only to accentuate the danger of whatever it was simmering below the surface. This was different than his Ebb Day state, but similar enough in its intent to be instantly recognizable — especially since it bore all the marks of the manic rush he fell victim to when succumbing to the lure of his instincts.

It was something primal in you that scattered your thought process into oblivion and made you look away instinctively, averting your attention toward the window off to your left — but the sparkling view of night time in Aridum was soon curtained by a flash of Rafayel's hand as he cupped the side of your face in one smooth motion.

The slight roughness of the pad of his thumb brushed along your cheekbone until his fingers sank into your hair, fanned along the outer edge of your ear, and turned you back to face him. The gesture felt proprietary, like he wanted to make certain he'd captured every last scrap of your undivided attention, like it physically hurt to allow even the smallest opportunity for you to withdraw and escape his grasp.

“Rafayel,” you forced your common sense to come out of its hiding place. “I don’t think—”

"But even so, I can't let you go. I don't want to," he breathed against your lips, punctuating his command with an achingly slow drag of his nose tracing yours. The contact made something molten unfurl in your belly, warm and sticky-slick and pooling in the hollow space below your navel, curling its tendrils through your veins like sweet, syrupy nectar. "What should I do?"

It would be easier than breathing to surrender and give him whatever he was asking for, but... but...

It felt wrong when he was so distressingly hot to the touch, not to mention you couldn't shake off the feeling he was doing his best to distract you from your worry by acting more brazenly suggestive than you'd ever seen him be before.

"You should rest, I don't think you'll enjoy getting worked up in your current condition—"

Your efforts were derailed with the subtle scrape of chapped lips running up the slope of your neck and a bite into the fleshy part below your ear as punishment for daring to answer his plea with platitude.

A shudder shook your frame, nerves firing off confused messages in quick succession throughout your brain, half demanding the sudden pressure recede and half urging more from the tingling heat. Your hand flew to grip his bare shoulder, fingers digging in until the tight bunch of muscle strained beneath his fevered skin — not enough to stop his ministrations, but enough to serve as a weak deterrent.

"Such lovely lips, spinning such pretty excuses," Rafayel huffed, drawing back and sweeping his thumb across your chin with gentle disapproval. "When we both know you don't want me to let you go either."

The words trailed off into something softer, tender, almost wistful, and were followed by the pad of his finger slipping past your parted lips, stroking along the underside of your tongue before drawing back and skimming across the wet patch he'd left glistening upon your bottom lip. As if magnetized, his smoldering stare followed, entranced by the minute trembling of your mouth, darting occasionally upward to capture your own hooded eyes at the sudden boldness of his gesture. He licked his own lips slowly as if thirsty, mirroring the same lazy stroke he'd used against your mouth, allowing you to take your fill of the sight.

No.

Before you could fall into his enticing trap again, your palm pressed firmly against Rafayel's chest until he eased back obediently, giving you space to rise, every single sensation previously pink at the edges quickly melting into clarity about taking care of him properly.

"This isn't the right time," you insisted breathlessly once you managed to catch your breath and speak, steadfast with the strain of iron will alone — pushing forward when your mind threatened to wander where his moistened lips had been just seconds before.

The mood was quickly dispelling, much to Rafayel's clear irritation, judging by the petulant slouch of his shoulders. You emphasized your point by putting your hands on his forehead, cheeks, neck, every patch of skin you could reach, the clear intent of medical examination being communicated silently until he relented with a dramatic sigh, turning his face upwards to expose more of his throat as if giving permission.

"It's fine," he groused reluctantly, although his grumbling somewhat relenting in volume under your gentle inspection. "I'm not dying."

"That's the opposite of what you said earlier today. Are you sure you don't want—"

His hands closed firmly around your wrists, tugging you off gently before you could finish speaking. "It's really not that bad.”

You’d be more convinced if he'd just told you about how miserable he was feeling.

"Is it a Lemurian condition?" You frowned up at him, taking note of how carefully he cradled your hands in his palms, stroking the insides of your wrists. "If it's making you feel awful, shouldn't we see someone about it?"

Rafayel tilted his head at you with a peculiar sort of fondness written across his features. It was difficult to identify what precisely made his smile curve upward into something distinctly knowing, yet warm — something infinitely affectionate yet impossible to quantify.

"Already doing that," he answered cryptically, tilting forward until he met your forehead with his own, nuzzling into the creased spot directly between your brows, eyelashes fluttering shut.

Ugh, this man.

"Do you know for a fact if you'll be okay?" you asked as delicately as possible without sounding too overbearing. That would definitely push Rafayel closer to defensive territory again and have him brush off any attempt at assistance, or even conversation, so you needed to walk the tightrope of concern while still keeping it mild enough for him not to clam up. "This trip still has a few more days left. What if you don't get better?"

The corner of his mouth twitched faintly with a ghost of a smile, perhaps pleased by your attentiveness —— "I enjoy this kind of concern."

—— which was starting to irritate you a little. "Well, I don't. Seeing you suffer and not doing anything isn't enjoyable."

He had the audacity to grin at that, broad enough to crinkle the corners of his eyes as he ducked his head coyly before turning it sharply to brush the tip of his nose against the shell of your ear and murmuring, "Not enjoying seeing me suffering does imply some enjoyment in seeing me otherwise."

"Rafayel!" You snapped finally, jerking out of his embrace with exasperated incredulity, only to meet an unrepentant smile waiting for you beyond your escape. He wasn't deterred whatsoever, which was a little unnerving.

Or rather, the rapid shift to your own pent-up restlessness was about to become in the next two days.

The limbo between then and the memorial hall day unfolded in a whirlwind of contradictions, each more puzzling than the last — starting from the abrupt ending to your interlude in front of the window, where he suddenly pulled back without any warning at all, leaving you cold and stunned with the excuse that he wanted to go to sleep, subsequently kicking you out of his hotel room as if possessed by a demonic force capable of inducing selective amnesia.

Like he wasn’t asking to fold you in half like a laptop mere moments ago.

The result was you forcing mandatory house rest until the day of the memorial hall visit came, settling awkwardly between coddling and hovering — a weird blend of fussing over his health like a mother hen and trying desperately not to make him feel infantilized as a result of said fussing.

All of that only ended with him either clinging close or deliberately distancing himself in confusing waves that seemed to occur at random intervals with little rhyme or reason.

It was simultaneously bewildering and heartbreaking. You had no idea how to react when he gave you zero insight into his thoughts and behaviors unless coaxed open, and even then, his answers were cryptic.

(So much for enjoying your concern.)

Really, this was your fault.

Maybe you shouldn't have pushed. But you worried.

Especially when he was dismissive like that despite being openly going through something other than a fever and a creative block, made worse by his inability to leave the hotel due to the hostile environment. Both of which you could do nothing to help with.

He would sit at the edge of the bed, his sketchbook propped open but untouched, pencil hovering above the page as though waiting for some divine spark that refused to come. At times, he’d stand by the window, reminding you of a cat sitting by its food dish for its owner to fill it with dinner, paw swiping irritatingly at its empty confines. Then, just as abruptly, he’d abandon his spot to sprawl across your lap instead while you were busy with paperwork online, one arm draped loosely over his stomach as he stared blankly at the ceiling in defeat, and demanding you play with his hair.

Then, some time later, it was back to deciding being near you was unbearable, pulling away entirely whenever you reached out for reassurance, no matter how casual or friendly your intentions, retreating back into his personal bubble to focus on attempting to get something on paper mindlessly, pages fluttering with restless action, crumpling here and there under the rough treatment before being smoothed out hastily.

The cycle continued nonstop. Restlessness, fatigue, clinginess, building you up while you didn't let it show because time and place, solitude, then back again — you never knew what Rafayel's whimsies were going to bring, and the uncertainty of it wore you thin, fraying your already wan nerves.

The humidifier was a desperate, last-ditch effort, the kind born out of sheer frustration and the kind of exhaustion that makes rationality optional.

You’d bought it from a small local shop at the crack of dawn, spurred on by the memory of walking into Rafayel’s suite only hours before, where he’d bullied the hotel staff into delivering two oversized sacks of ice — each roughly the size of a small child — and ordered them to be dumped unceremoniously into his bathtub.

At 3 AM. In the dead of night.

By the time you returned and set it up, the machine had barely begun spitting out its first gentle stream of cool mist before Rafayel sat down beside it, legs folded beneath him like a solemn monk meditating in front of some sacred relic. His quiet intensity as he stared at the thing made you wonder if he was grateful, resentful, or some combination of both — because with Rafayel, it was never as simple as one emotion at a time.

Still, the day turned out to be noticeably easier on him, and for the first time in what felt like forever, you allowed yourself to believe that maybe, just maybe, the worst had passed.

He still looked like death warmed over, often pink on the face and worn, but at least he wasn’t on the brink of staging another late-night ice-bag heist.

He even tolerated your awkward attempts to distract him, accepting your offerings of snacks, endless glasses of ice water, iced tea, whatever cold beverages you could scrounge up, and a marathon of that one TV show the two of you had been meaning to watch together.

And, of course, there was the doting.

So much doting.

Which was rare for you.

You were not, by any stretch of the imagination, the kind of person who showered people with attention. You weren’t the mom friend. You didn’t hover. But something about Rafayel in this state, rightfully whiny, subdued, far too fragile for your liking, made you want to roll him over in bubble wrap and shove him in your pocket to keep him safe from everything.

In some ways, you were more anxious than he was.

The helplessness swung at you like you were a tree and it was an axe, the inability to snap your fingers and fix him, to just make it better was torture. Worrying felt inevitable, but useless. And the not knowing what to do with yourself in between bouts of fretting? That was worse. Still, he wasn’t showing any signs of further deterioration, which felt like a victory you didn’t want to jinx.

You were so relieved you briefly considered leaving all your savings to the shop clerk who’d sold you the overpriced humidifier. She had probably thought you’d lost your mind, judging by the way you thanked her like she’d just handed you a ticket to salvation, practically singing her praises as she rang up your purchase. And honestly, if you could go back in time, you would’ve thanked her even more profusely.

Because it worked. Rafayel was better — well, better-ish. Better enough that you decided it was safe to move forward with the plan to visit the memorial hall.

Which, eventually, became a visit to the ocean.

An ocean.

In the middle of a desert.

The sheer impossibility of it left you breathless, like you were standing at the edge of a fever dream made real. The water stretched out endlessly, shimmering beneath the brutal sun, and you couldn’t stop marveling at the sheer absurdity of it — a body of water so vast, so alive, nestled in a place it had no right to be. It felt like a miracle.

It was a miracle.

And just when you thought the desert couldn’t surprise you further, the skies proved you wrong soon enough later, crowning the experience with snowfall at the end of the trip. Snow, delicate and silent, drifting from the sky like a benediction.

You couldn’t help but marvel at it all — at how the world had managed to gift you two impossibilities in the span of a single day. It felt like the desert itself was defying logic, bending over backward to offer something beautiful, something extraordinary, as though it wanted to prove it wasn’t all hardship and sunburnt misery.

But Rafayel stood by the edge of the ocean with a look that made your chest ache — a look that spoke not of wonder, but of mourning. To you, it was a miracle, but to him, it was a tragedy: a dying ocean trapped in a place it could no longer thrive, its very existence a reminder of something slipping away. An everlasting eulogy engraved into reality.

He didn’t look away from the canvas of pain he had set up and started painting for himself until you voiced all of what you thought out loud for him to see.

And this time, you truly felt like you had broken through — like you’d reached him in a way that mattered.

It was there, in that rare, fragile moment, that Rafayel dove straight through your hesitation, sidestepping the awkward pauses you were fumbling with, and pulled you into an embrace before you even had the courage to ask if you could. It was as though he had heard the unspoken thought aloud, plucking it out of the air with startling precision.

And then he’d confessed — softly, almost too softly — that at the time, he had wanted to come here before, with the most important person in his life.

Those words lodged themselves in your chest, a bittersweet ache blooming alongside the unmistakable joy bubbling up within you. You hugged him back as tightly as you could, pouring all the gratitude you didn’t know how to put into words into that one simple gesture. Gratitude for trusting you enough to share that. Gratitude for showing you yet another new side of himself, something unguarded and rare. A treat, indeed, one you hadn’t expected but cherished all the same.

Relief flooded through you, so potent it felt like a physical weight lifting from your shoulders. You hadn’t even realized how tense you’d been until that moment. Your body relaxed, and with that relaxation came fatigue, the kind that crept up on you and left no room for resistance. Before you knew it, you had fallen asleep during the entire way back, lulled into a rare sense of peace you hadn’t felt in days.

And yet.

Like clockwork, he withdrew the instant you arrived back at the hotel.

Rafayel never thought he’d truly understand what it meant to drown.

As a creature of the sea, he wasn't meant to in the first place.

Not until you.

The realization had hit him like a storm breaking over still waters — not all at once, but in slow, rumbling waves that built. He didn’t even feel himself breaking; it was more like a slow erosion, the kind that wears stone into sand. Quiet, but irreversible. Your optimism. Your touches. Your encouragement. Inching in and in and in one step at a time.

(It was snowing in the desert.)

He had been holding himself together in the driver's seat, hands knotted around the steering wheel and knuckles bloodless with how tightly he gripped. Every inch of him vibrated with anxiety, away from where you lay fast asleep beside him, breathing shallow and uneven like he was afraid of exhaling too loudly. But there you were, oblivious, asleep, your head leaning softly against the window as if his world hadn’t collapsed in on itself.

(It was snowing in the desert.)

It wasn’t the desert heat that was killing him, though it might as well have been. (Everything about this place grated against him — the air, the dry scrape of his skin, the silence of the fading ocean that was too vast to be comforting. Too big. Too empty. Fading. Fading. A warning from cities away that this land was no place for a creature like him.) He wasn’t meant for this — for the cracked earth and the relentless sun and the suffocating absence of water. His body ached for moisture, for the cool, familiar embrace of the sea, but it ached even more for you. (He didn’t even realize how long he had been watching you from the corner of his peripheral vision — how long he had been unraveling, thread by thread.)

You’d tilted his world off its axis, turned everything he thought he knew into something unrecognizable. Once, pain had been his anchor. It was always there—constant, unyielding, something he could hold on to when nothing else made sense. It had driven him, fueled him, given him purpose when nothing else could. He had sought it out like a man dying of thirst seeks a mirage, and it had never failed him. Pain was constant. Pain was reliable. Pain was everything. Inside. Outside. It was all he had ever known, and it had kept him alive — fed the anger that gnashed his insides with teeth and claws, soothed the beast that prowled just under his skin, tempered the instinct that drove him relentlessly onward. Toward destruction. Towards home.

He had used it as a shield, as armor, as the whip he wielded against those who dared to clip the tails of his people. A weapon. A tool. A brush.

And then there was you (who he'd willingly sought out, angry and grieving and resentful and hurt.)

You, who didn’t fit into his carefully crafted world of suffering and art and revenge. You, who had made him forget (as easily as you forgot him) what it felt like to hurt, to ache, to yearn for something greater than himself. To hate. To see others bleed while his fingers flew across canvas after canvas, leaving only beauty in their wake — only soaring wings, only gleaming scales, only flowing water, only living fire, only reaching skies, only rushing wind, only rising floods...

Only you.

(It was snowing in the desert.)

Except now, he did yearn. He yearned in a way that was foreign and unbearable, in a way that felt like drowning — not in water, but in light, in warmth, in the overwhelming weight of wanting something too much. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair that he wanted you this much — needed you this much — when he didn’t even know who he was without all the hurt and hatred inside. It wasn’t fair that he felt something hot and ugly churning under his skin whenever you smiled up at him in admiration, filling his stomach with lead until he thought he might collapse beneath its heaviness. It wasn't fair that there were times when he thought it might actually be better not to have met you again at all.

(That thought filled him with dread so immense it threatened to crush the breath from his lungs; the possibility of having spent his entire life stumbling aimlessly through darkness towards a destination he was no longer sure even existed — )

He watched you sleep, the rhythm of your breathing steady and unbothered.

His gaze lingered on your hands, resting loosely in your lap, fingers twitching faintly as if even in sleep, you were reaching for something. (Reaching for him?) He wanted to take them in his own, to press them to his lips, to hold on so tightly he’d never have to let go. But he couldn’t. (He wouldn’t.)

Because the moment he did, he knew he’d lose whatever fragile standing he had left.

(“Isn’t it a surprise that there’s an ocean in the desert?”)

His thoughts spiraled, looping back on themselves in a tangle of contradictions that refused to resolve; questions without answers, fears without resolutions. What had he become, to need you like this? To depend on you like this? To depend on you so completely that even the idea of your absence felt like the loss of something vital — something essential — an emptiness he wasn't prepared to face.

(What must you think of him? Did you even know what you did to him? What would you think of him?)

He had told himself he could manage it, that he could stay close enough to feel your warmth but far enough not to burn. But that was a lie, wasn’t it? He was already burning. He had been burning since the moment he met you. An addictive pain — the kind that made him ache for more even as it seared him from the inside out.

And before he knew it, the car was parked beside the hotel entrance around the far corner of the garden, and Rafayel didn’t remember driving there at all.

He blinked, confused for a moment as to how exactly he had managed to pilot the vehicle, when you stirred quietly in the passenger seat, drawing his attention like a moth to flame.

You groaned softly, eyelids fluttering, but remained firmly locked within slumber's grip as he unbuckled your seatbelt for you, as gently as if he were handling fine china. Your head leaned sideways against the headrest and faced him, slack and soft with sleep. His fingers twitched around the plastic buckle, curling into a fist until he thought they might cramp under the strain.

He leaned forward, forehead coming to contact with the cool leather surface of the steering wheel, squeezing his eyes shut tight enough to blot out your presence entirely.

There was too much to process — too many feelings, thoughts, sensations threatening to overwhelm him if he looked directly at them, instead swirling through his head like debris caught in a vortex, invisible yet disorienting nonetheless.

But they all blipped out of existence the moment he turned his head around, following the impulse to look.

(“Isn’t it a surprise that there’s an ocean in the desert?”)

The urge struck Rafayel with all the force of a lightning bolt — bright, sudden, unavoidable — and suddenly the knuckles of his fingers were sliding across your cheek, feather-light in gentle arcs along the arch of your cheek, savoring every inch of satin flesh as it shifted beneath his caress.

The sensation of touch buzzed pleasantly underneath his skin previously starved, reveling in the sweetness of contact after so many days of withdrawal.

The artificial light coming from outside bathed your sleeping form in a glow that cascaded like a gentle waterfall, chiaroscuro shadows casting angles upon your features, emphasizing every line and curve, and for a long time, all he could do was stare. He could feel your breath against the tips of his nails, warm puffs of moist exhales against his calloused flesh, and found himself fixating on the gentle undulation of your chest as you breathed — unconsciously, mindlessly unaware of what such a simple act did to him.

The memory of your voice echoed in his mind, soft and certain, cutting through the chaos like a beam of light.

"Isn’t it a surprise that there’s an ocean in the desert?"

You had a way of reframing everything, of taking the pieces of his broken world and rearranging them into something that almost looked like hope. (He hated it. He loved it. He hated that he loved it.) It wasn’t fair. None of it was fair.

You hadn’t asked to become such an integral part of his existence — so intrinsic and fundamental and irreplaceable. Yet somehow, here you were. Here he was. The absence of water, the grief of it. The grief of what it meant to lose something so essential, so intrinsic, that one didn’t know how to live without it. And that grief had found a new home in you. You, who had become his ocean, his escape, the source of every ache in his chest and joy in his heart.

(Isn't it a surprise that there's an ocean in the desert? Isn't it a surprise you're the muse calling to him and not the muffled, fading cries of the dying ocean in pain, not the skeletal remains of an era he'd never get back?)

He gazed, and gazed, and gazed, drinking you in like a thirsty man lost in a sea of golden sands, watching the subtle play of lights over the curves of your face — the delicate angle of your chin, the arch of your nose, the graceful slope of your neck as it curved into collarbone and shoulder — memorizing every detail he could, without the pressure of having to wrench himself back before he drowned in your wake, without the need to pretend to your face he was anything less than desperate to be with you all day, every day, in every way possible. And that the sound of your voice in his ears was enough to get the paintbrush running across paper from the sheer momentum of his imagination.

But he couldn't keep going like this.

Somehow, somewhen, between the start of your journey and now, this thing had begun shifting irrevocably past his ability to contain it any longer. Had grown exponentially until it seemed to dwarf his capacity to handle it. All it would take was being away from you for a mere few hours to bring him to a level of misery that was honestly embarrassing.

And you had no idea.

No idea that orbiting around him in these past few days like a second moon had only served to exacerbate the foul joy of watching you fawn over him.

It made him sick to his stomach to admit it, but soaking in the knowledge (in his soul, through the bond) that you cared so deeply for him went straight to his head like some drug he hadn't realized he needed.

It felt so despairingly good that he would wrap himself around you like a vine climbing towards sunlight if he could for the rest of his days, absorbing your rays of affection like photosynthesis... or a parasite.

(Was he being punished by the sea that this love was eclipsing his fury and vengeance? Or rewarded that he held both equally in his grasp despite how terribly wrong it felt at times? Regardless, his inspiration was the punchline, once only capable of singing into the canvas elegies of lament and sorrow, now composed ballads and odes that poured out effortlessly.)

You would hate him if you ever found out just how perversely his emotions swung in every direction; so high one moment that the ecstasy of relief nearly shattered his reserve of control, and so low the next that he feared he'd choke to death from the guilt that clawed up the back of his throat like a strangled animal's cry for mercy.

This entire ordeal had flipped the script completely — instead of keeping you at arm's length as he normally did (regarding… everything), Rafayel now clung onto you desperately like Tantalus to a branch of fruit he’d finally gotten a grasp of, and what if he was exposed? The question rose like bile in his mouth whenever he began slipping.

“I won't leave you.”

Liar, his grudge wanted to answer.

It remembered. It never forgot. It told him you'd flee and never look back if he let a sliver of this dependency that bound him tighter to you with each passing day slip out from his fingertips — if he allowed you even the tiniest insight into the strange workings of his head and his heart.

Because you didn’t understand. You couldn’t. You had no idea what you were talking about when you told him you wouldn’t leave. How could you, when you didn’t know the depths of what you were promising to stay for? You didn’t know the true nature of Lemurian love, its ferocity, its weight, its cost. The all-consuming, all-encompassing reality of it — how they loved as if it was the only thing tethering them to existence itself. How they lived for it, how they died for it. How he had been dying for it.

If you saw it — if you saw him — you would run. He knew you would. Because if he laid bare just how much he depended on you, how much of his breath, his will, his very being hinged on you, you’d be overwhelmed. You’d leave.

Why else would he be tearing himself apart like this? Miserably trying to wean himself off you, forcing himself to let go only to grasp harder each time he felt you’d finally come to hate him and slip away?

He didn't know how long he sat there in silence.

Just a bit longer, he would keep watching you with these feelings out in the open. Just a little bit longer. He couldn’t bear to wake you up.

By the time you stirred, groggy and disoriented but blissfully unsuspecting, it felt as though several eternities had passed in the span of minutes, and he had to struggle with all the strength of a raging current to force himself back into this skin of his that felt too tight and suffocating around him.

But, still resting his temple against the steering wheel with an arm slung on top of it and another hanging lazily at his side, feigning ease, nothing betrayed his inner turmoil.

He watched quietly as you slowly regained your bearings, resisting the temptation to reach out and brush aside that one piece of hair out of place on your head, letting you find the words first.

(So adorable. So endearing.)

(It was not only snowing in his desert. There was also an ocean in there.)

"Rafayel..?"

"Yeah?"

"How long was I asleep?" You blinked at him blearily, one hand lifting to rub the lingering tiredness from your eyelids as you peer into the darkness of night beyond his silhouette. "Why didn't you wake me up?"

Everything he'd been thinking about vaporized and left behind nothing but softness, so tender it scared him; it seeped into the spaces in his heart left vacant and curled inside them, filling every corner, until it made the next smile he offered you come free of burden. "You were sleeping so well, cutie. I didn't want to disturb you."

The unconscious put of your lips and the way that strand of hair bounced around when you slid down your seat a little had him leaning in before he knew what he was doing, smoothing the unruly thing, fingertips betraying him by skating across the outer edge of your ear while he watched you tilt your cheek instinctively.

His body warmed immediately, gravitating towards you in a half-hug that kept you cradled close to the side of his frame as he nuzzled into your hair above your temple with a hum, dipping his nose deeper into the crown of your head near where your neck curved gracefully upwards before inhaling deep — greedy, thirsty, like he’d die if he couldn’t seep up all the scent of you.

Your breathing hitched a bit, and that’s what halted him right at the corner of your mouth with a sharp exhale — he couldn’t be doing this, he was just thinking about how he needed to pull back and —

Art salon.

Yeah, the art salon gathering.

He was supposed to be on his way to there like yesterday.

If only his body didn’t move like a most willing pupped tethered by strings to yours and refused to walk away whenever he tried.

“…Rafayel?”

It suddenly hotter in this car like a tide pool at noon. So stiflingly hot he was breathing fire even with the snowy weather outside. So unbearable the deepest V-cut known to mankind that had his whole chest out for the world to ogle did nothing to help.

He could… He could skip.

Yeah, he needed this. It had been literal days of non-stop withdrawal and a push-and-pull of his frustration that you wouldn’t touch him (because oh noo, he was sick — which, he wasn’t!) and stubbornness to not let you touch him. He’d gotten to a point that he was drunk off your scent alone and he couldn’t keep doing this forever, and why should he? Why did it matter about this event at all? Who cared — who cared about some stupid gathering? He wasn’t functioning anyways until he—

Stop. He had to stop. He was already so late.

He imagined catching himself by the scruff of his neck and yanking himself back to the driver's seat, within safe borders. Far away from your mesmerizing lips and wandering eyes and cute squirming in your seat under the thin cover of innocence.

And pulling away and practically fusing with the car door was exactly what he did.

He needed to prove to himself, just this once, that he could function without the constant reassurance of your presence — that he wasn’t helplessly anchored to you, no matter how much the pull of your moon whispered otherwise.

He had to dilute himself. This — and his inspiration problem, involving you or not, was his to figure out. And he had to figure it out if he wanted you to stay by his side.

"...Do you wanna go back to your room first?" he heard himself ask you quietly.

"You're not coming with me?" The tiny furrow of worry between your brows spoke volumes about your confusion, and despite wanting to reach out and smooth it away, to wipe every ounce of uncertainty from your face with a tender kiss, Rafayel clenched his fingers around the door handle of the vehicle until they cramped, his heart aching strangely inside his chest as you stared quizzically at him.

He brought out the invitation that came with the memorial hall ticket, waving it a little with little to no enthusiasm, "I still have to attend my friend's art salon thing."

The way your shoulders deflated and face dropped at the mention made him waver in — not enough to follow through with ditching the whole thing, but certainly making his resolve weak enough to crack like glass under pressure. "But you don't look well. You need to rest."

How could someone manage to resist getting spoiled like this, he thought miserably as he closed his eyes while you continued fussing, peering worriedly up into his face with the cutest scrunch to your forehead, palms searching along his cheeks heat before trailing down the length of his arms, and he wanted nothing more than to give in to that impulse of being coddled to bits by your hands alone.

He was a weak man.

You nearly lifted off the passenger seat and fell into his lap the way he embraced you, his arms coiling around you like kelp around a rock, holding fast as though you might slip away with the wind. His face buried into the crook of your neck, breath warm and uneven against your skin, his grip snug yet teetering on the edge of too much — like he didn’t trust himself to let go. There was a desperation in the way his hands trembled slightly, his fingers pressing into your sides, not hard enough to hurt but enough to leave the faintest impression of how badly he needed this. When your pained whine broke through, it was like snapping a thread, he instantly loosened his hold, guilt washing over his features as he pulled back just enough to make room for you to breathe. But he stayed close, his forehead dipping to rest against your shoulder as a heavy sigh rumbled deep from his chest, raw and apologetic. You leaned heavily into him, your fingers threading into his hair in a gesture that should have comforted him, but instead left him drowning deeper in the tangled sea of his emotions.

"See? You're burning up again," you mumbled as your cool lips grazed his temple in a comforting kiss. He was no better than a child. He knew it. And he hated how much he basked in your coddling, reveled in the unspoken message behind your words: Don't hide it. Tell me when you hurt. I care. "Maybe we can go together? Will you feel okay if I'm there?"

He would. He would feel more than okay, because that's what made him function.

But he couldn't keep being like this.

"Do you wanna turn me into a sea creature beached on the sand after the ocean recedes," he whispered, mostly kidding except not really, hiding in the dip of your neck just below your ear, hand tracing absent shapes into the small of your back above your tailbone. "Unable to breathe on my own, waiting helplessly for your tide's return?"

Your fingers stroking through his hair slowed, then stilled entirely at the edge of his nape. You pulled back only far enough to meet his lowered stare, confusion dancing within your own, bright and clear and genuine. You had no inkling of what was going on with him, and he didn’t want you to find out either. He would be fine. He was going to handle it.

"Don't you trust me?" Rafayel said. "How about we make a promise? I promise... I'll be okay without you tonight."

It hurt to lie to you so directly, but seeing your doubt dissolve to appease him helped soothe that sting considerably. (Even if it felt a little too convenient to rely on such flimsy methods.) You nodded, seeming convinced in spite of yourself, and his stance firmed — strengthened with your faith and affirmation alike, like he'd just taken a double shot of espresso. He would be okay. He wasn't going to keep imposing his feelings upon you even if a part of him desperately yearned to, no matter how difficult the prospect seemed.

(Say no, a small part of him whispered traitorously, selfishly, insistently. Ask me to stay. You know I can't say no to you, he wanted to plead. Needed to be affirmed once more, reassured that he was welcome to indulge, to remain, to lean into the comfort you offered freely.)

"Okay..." you echoed uncertainly, but gave him another soft smile — tentative yet warm, gentle encouragement. He watched quietly as your expressions shifted in quick succession, cycling through shades of hesitation and worry before settling on resignation. You nodded again, firmer this time, seemingly steeling yourself against whatever doubts you harbored. He wanted to kiss it all away.

But instead, he gently pushed you back, sinking further into his seat, looking out the view beyond the windshield to gather his wits against the force that was your presence beside him.

"You can head back," he repeated, not turning to meet your searching stare. "I can handle it."

The art salon had an air of cultivated elegance, grandiosity reflecting into soaring ceilings and walls adorned with curated artworks, with conversations floating in fragmented pieces, the occasional laughter punctuating the steady hum of "cultured" discourse — all the while Rafayel stood at the periphery, his posture consciously maintained with the kind of deliberate nonchalance that masked a profound discomfort, one hand buried in his pant pockets and the other holding a flute glass of champagne, ghosting the suffocating room with an expression of aloof disdain, attention drifting from painting to painting without ever settling. Humans circled him like murmuring specters, their faces a study in muted curiosity and empty civility. He loathed their presence. (Yet, here he was.)

The room's overwhelming sensory overload grated against his composure — cloying mingling of varnish and wine, sharply polished sheen of curated lighting, artifice of smiles that never reached their eyes...

He should leave. (No, he had to stay.)

The dichotomy was a pendulum swinging between contempt and an unspoken compulsion to endure. He’d insisted he didn’t need you here, insisted on proving — to himself as much as to you — that he could function without your constant presence. But the more he replayed his own words in his mind, the more it was obvious the joke was on him.

He rolled his eyes as an overly enthusiastic laugh erupted nearby, a sound sharp enough to pinprick through his already thinning out patience. His hand twitched in his pocket, the movement a reflexive manifestation of his barely-contained frustration.

(Focus.)

The art, exquisite as it was, did little to distract him as the chatter blurred into a meaningless drone, the edges of the room constricting him under the weight of pretense.

And then. The tug.

At first, it was delicate — an unsuspecting tremor sifting through his awareness, like the faintest ripple across an otherwise still surface that he thought he was imagining and hoping this was you. But it swelled rapidly, a deluge of sensations sweeping him off his feet towards your pull with a force that left his breath stuttering and the floor wavering beneath, erupting into vivid, agonizing clarity.

His lips tingled, a ghostly imprint of a kiss not yet given.

Heat bloomed under his skin, first at the base of his throat, spreading like a slow, insidious current. The faintest pressure, then, at his collarbone, radiating outward, like silk dragging over sensitive skin, a tingling warmth that prickled and spread, until it seemed to rewrite the very contours of his form, leaving him trembling with phantom caresses that lingered far too long to ignore.

He could feel the press of your palms against his chest, the drag of your nails over the planes of his stomach, each sensation so precise it made his breath catch, and the ache in his hands mirrored the way you gripped at yourself. Every brush of your hand — every hurried, seeking stroke — burned through him like smoldering embers, and he swore he could hear the faintest hitch of your breath, feel the tremor in your thighs.

A siren song of need that echoed his own, calling him under, drowning him in you.

Come to me, come to me, stay with me.

His breath hitched with the oxygen turning into lava-hot needle prickling in his lungs, his legs going limp as noodles and giving way. He collapsed into the nearest chair with a jarring lack of control, the motion abrupt, almost violent.

One hand clamped onto the edge of the table as he hastily discarded the champagne glass to cover where the bond was glowing, fingers digging into the wood as if it were the only thing keeping him from being swept away.

A single candle at the table’s center responded instead of Rafayel, its once languid, uninterested flame quivering violently, and then erupting into an erratic flare, a burst of light so sharp and sudden it cut through the room like a gasp. The activity drew murmurs from those nearby, heads turning, eyes widening as the flame seemed to writhe with a life of its own as wax spilled over the edges of its holder, dripping down in frantic rivulets, glistening like molten gold beneath the trembling glow.

"Hey, Rafayel, man, you good?"

A hand on his shoulder made him flinch violently and slap it away, the contact snapping him partway out of his spiraling thoughts. "Don't."

He was already rising, the chair scraping noisily against the floor as he pushed himself upright with a force that bordered on frenetic. The friend stood as well, confusion clear, but Rafayel didn’t wait to explain — with a curt shake of his head, he turned on his heel and strode toward the exit, leaving the other man standing there with his hand half-raised, a bewildered, "Hey, where are you going, come back!" hanging unanswered in the air.

The murmurs of those left behind — curious stares, the faint scrape of chairs and clothes ruffling — faded into irrelevance, they barely even registered. The bond burned like a tether, yanking him back to you, and he had neither the strength nor the desire to disobey.

By the time he reached the cool air of the night outside, he was seething. He had heard you loud and clear.

You merciless, cruel, horrible witch of a woman, punishing him with your sweet truth in an act so loving yet selfish, selfless yet entirely possessive, driving him completely to his wit's end until the only remaining thought was yours — to worship you wholly, thoroughly, obsessively, as deeply as he wanted.

He was in love.

You were in Rafayel’s room.

Because for his sanity to be tested like you intended it would be, of course you had to be in there of all places.

He was able to crash in the way he wanted like a dam bursting without knocking holding him back. In fact, he didn’t even bother calling out at all.

And honestly, he wasn’t even lucid enough for coherent thoughts such as those the moment his vision tunneled on your frame in the middle of his space, your back turned to him, an unaware and unintentional siren in a fluffy white robe loosely tied at your hips.

His robe.

Rafayel was moving before he registered the full picture — prowling the distance between you within seconds, hand snatching up yours and spinning you around. Just being this close and touching you uninhibited got the synapses firing faster than bullets in his head. He pushed forward into your space with no preamble, crowding you against the floor-to-ceiling window. He spared another two or three precious seconds taking in your startled expression with vindication (“Rafayel, what are you doing here?” before putting a stop to all the unnecessary talking with a kiss.

How could he expected himself to stay away from this?

One knee pushed between your thighs, a subtle but undeniable acknowledgment of what he’d felt, and you faltered, clutching the sides of his shirt so abruptly the lily decorations peppered through out clinked. A quiet noise escaped past your lips, muffled by his own and intensifying the building pressure simmering in his gut as he played with the collar of your robe — his robe — and drank greedily from you.

He felt a push at his chest.

The separation between you that couldn’t be more than a tight space to breathe each other’s air brought the world rushing back into focus — Aridum’s quiet, serene snowfall materialized behind your head like a mockery of their frenzied tangle of limbs, the ambient sounds of the city bustling in the distance dampened.

Your eyes searched his, glazed and hazy with steadily-building arousal, yet waiting nonetheless for an answer, shiny lips parted in wordless wonder.

Rafayel could say nothing. The words were there, soda fizz under the surface threatening to erupt into something incomprehensible at best if he opened his mouth.

His palm engulfed your cheek and drew you right back in, continuing the kiss with more urgency to prevent you from tumbling out from his grasp again — let the action speak for him.

The need that thrummed deep beneath rendered him mute, save for strained sighs and grunts of effort louder than the rustle of fabric and the thuds of feet shuffling around on the floor as he plundered your mouth, tongue chasing yours. It tasted like toothpaste and chapstick, like fresh mint leaves, like nurturing warmth cooling his into something calmer.

Rafayel’s hand left your face and slid down your back to seize your waist, dragging you closer, flushing your hips against his firmer and pushing his thigh more brashly. Not even a second later, his other hand bracing your wrist against the window pulled your arm into him to spin you around like in a dance, switching positions without breaking away.

And you bit him.

He recoiled with an “Ah,” that was more surprised than pained, drawing away just enough to swipe his thumb over the curve of his bottom lip where your teeth had punctured him.

“Why are you here?”

Something rotten and vicious was about to bare his fangs at you through a smile he barely stopped from telling on himself by holding back, ‘You called,’ from slipping.

The other, more acceptable answer came in a quick and effortless sweep of your legs off the floor, draping them over either side of his waist, one palm supporting you underneath like the cradle of a hammock as he pivoted towards the bed. “This is my room,” he said — low, simple, keeping eye contact to witness your frustration. “You’re the one who walked in here.”

He saw in the curl of your mouth that you would’ve continued arguing semantics if not for Rafayel bending to deposit you gently atop the bed for you to settle safely beneath him. The mattress creaked under his shifting as he eased further and started descending to resume getting lost in your kisses until a finger landed upon his lips.

“What I meant was,” you started, and Rafayel exhaled against your touch and nuzzled into it like an obedient pet coming to heel with a lowered tail before his master. “Shouldn’t you be at that art salon?”

He stared, blood about to keel over the boiling point.

His beloved was pouting. So adorable that he wanted to bite down.

You’d been so patient with him, hadn’t you? The little divot between your brows called out to Rafayel, begging to be kissed.

“I regret going in the first place,” he said, getting closer to breathe those words directly against the curve of your ear, savoring its delicate shell and the heat emanating from it against his lower lip — basking in the short tremble he could pull out of you that told him all he needed to know. “Stay here with me—”

His arm dipped around your waist and tugged you insistently closer, shakily eager, while your hands scrambled at his biceps, the side of your neck stretching upward to meet his halfway and melting further into him like candle wax molding against Rafayel and pooling liquid sweetness inside him like a basin filled.

Ring — ring — ring — ring — ring — ring — ring!

What the hell? Now?

A surge of irrational anger flared inside Rafayel, sharp and sudden, as if the hotel room phone had personally wronged him so bone-deep that his ancestors themselves had been insulted by its shrill, untimely ring. He clicked his tongue sharply against the roof of his mouth, a frustrated noise brimming with disdain as he reached out with the intention of silencing the nuisance immediately.

But before his hand could reach the red button, your fingers curled gently around his wrist, halting him mid-motion. The touch was soft, warm, and unassuming, yet it cut through his irritation more effectively than words ever could. His breath hitched as he glanced down at your hand, stilling under the quiet weight of what you were going to say next.

“Wait,” your dulcet murmur came. “What if it’s something important?”

More than this?

The irritation got you a side eye for that — but he quickly caught onto where this was heading from the way you gave him a pointed, sultry glance under your lashes and the faintest devilish curl at the corners at your lips. The grip around his wrist turned into your fingers interlacing with his as you guided him to accept the call, holding his gaze so intensely throughout that the beginning of the reception’s announcement went unheard in his ears.

“The guest of this room is unable to answer. Please leave a message."

Rafayel hadn’t even found a chance to breathe, let alone process what was even happening when you pushed him off and knocked him flat onto his back, straddling his hips with surprising speed which elicited an involuntary jolt from him.

He froze, breath caught somewhere between his lungs and the thick, burning, moistureless air that was overheating him. A thousand words tumbled in a rush into his mouth at once, all died under his breath in a sigh as his senses swam and short-circuited in response to your boldness, the sheer power radiating off your figure captivating him. For a single, stretched heartbeat, all he could do was look up — look at you.

The light from the ceiling framed your form in a way that bordered on divine, spilling past the loose strands of hair that fell around your face and catching on the curves of your silhouette like a lover's caress. Shadows slithered around you, dipping into the soft folds and valleys of the bathrobe that clung to you in all the places his gaze couldn’t help but follow.

And then the vision struck, slicing through his mind like a blade dragged cleanly through water.

No, you brought it to him, conjuring it as surely as though you had whispered it directly into his mind.

The blues wouldn’t just be blues — shadowy cobalt would bleed into the depths below, heavy and still, fading into fractured glacier blue as the water grew lighter near the surface, where the sun struggled to break through. The greens would soften into glassy jade, shimmering faintly, caught in the shifting light as if the water itself pulsed with life. Shadows would stretch in drenched charcoal, not oppressive but endless, framing the brightness above almost like curtains opening.

And there, close to the surface, you would hover like the sun underwater, light spilling from you in ripples and shards. Your form would glow with submerged gold, warm and radiant, a halo of sunlit pearl surrounding you where the sunlight hit the water and scattered around your silhouette. You wouldn’t simply stand still — you would drift, your movements impossibly fluid, arms outstretched in a gesture that could be comfort or inevitability, a quiet invitation to a homecoming. Shadows would gather around your curves in bruised honey, soft and subtle, fading into the glow that surrounded you, the kind of light that looked almost too warm to belong in the cold ocean.

The person who the painting was drawn from the perspective of would see you not as a person, but as something greater. His arms would float above him, slack and surrendered, the only movement from his fingers angled upwards, glowing faintly with washed ash gold, the last vestiges of warmth clinging to his skin, while the rest of his form darkened in the embrace of storm-drift gray. Faraway air bubbles would be glacier silver-blue catching the warm light as they ascended toward the unreachable surface, reflections flickering like distant stars against the background of salt-shadow teal.

This was a homecoming.

The bursting of colors landing on his imaginary canvas came to a head when the branding heat of your mouth found his ear, screeching into stuttered motion and scattering like seagulls afterwards. His head lolled sideways under the zapping pressure, inviting more of the world-halting caress that left him all limp.

Then it was gone — only a cool tingling remained where yout moist breaths once ghosted him —

"Hey bro, why'dya leave? Get back here—"

Shocked as if he had short time memory about it being a voice message, he squirmed for a beat, eyes flitting in panic between the call display and you with the mortification of every single drop of blood in his body rushing southwards.

His friend’s voice fractured into static buzzing under the pounding of his ears when you bowed forward once more, towards the red mark on top of his mark that was practically vibrating under his skin, trailing kisses across its glow. Every skin contact point with you burned even with the layers of clothing in-between, melting into an acute throb as you reached the base of his throat and dipped into the hollow between his collarbones — fingers dancing along the strip of his neckpiece before delving underneath, dragging down and delicately, deliciously tugging.

That was all it took for Rafayel to flip your positing and roll you beneath his body, propping himself up with one forarm and holding your wrist to just — stop you for a minute, expression tight as he asked, “Are you sure?”

Your intentions were crystal clear, but it was necessary to check in before continuing any further even though he needed this like air right now, and the prospect of hearing it straight from your lips that he was wanted —

Looking somewhere off to the side, you replied, “Otherwise you’ll actually go back,” thoughtfully, but there was something resentful in there, the statement almost bitter sounding in its delivery.

The overjoyed press of his lips to hide the smile he just knew would annoy you betrayed what he was thinking on the spot.

“So cute,” breached containment however, full of affection as he moved aside your hair behind your ear tenderly, fore and middle fingers taking your love’s sensitive edge between them and caressing, causing you to turn your face further away from him. “You must have missed me quite a lot.”

That sentence was accompanied by the press of his knee into the junction between your inner thighs, innocent enough unless you factored in that one certain revelation of earlier that entirely changed the context in intent. Especially when your pupils dilated visibly before him as you choked out a tiny gasp of surprise, revealing your guilt in glaring clarity.

“What, not pleased you got caught?”

A wicked impulse seized him — one daring him to keep playing this card to unlock so many possibilities as to how he could have you tonight.

He could have you show him what you’d done while he watched until you begged to be touched — on your back with legs wide open for his viewing pleasure, or hovering right above his face in 4K Ultra HD quality that he could just lay down and enjoy and perhaps contribute with his breath if he felt generous enough. You were having fun all on your own, yeah? He just wanted in on it. Not knowing wasn’t a sin, but not learning was.

If you didn’t think you were ready to bear the consequences of this decision of yours, you should have rethought before choosing the room he frequented, shouldn’t have turned him into a fish out of water in public by calling out to him like that, should have known better that Rafayel could be the vilest when he was provoked.

“Or, are you?”

His words were a double-edged knife. Pick the surface-level meaning and you ended up with him teasing you about missing him quite literally, nothing more, nothing less. Take him for what lay beneath, however...

Unfortunately, or, fortunately, you were one slippery fish.

"Why should I be ashamed?" The confidence that dripped from your reply rang genuine. You were so unbothered by his instigation that he realized this was going to be harder than expected, perhaps more rewarding as well. A delightful prospect. "Do you wish I wouldn't miss you?"

Oh, your pride, your grudge was truly an impressive sight —

gleaming razor-sharp even under scrutiny, glittering steel reflecting his image in fragments, and yet tempered by enough warmth to invite him closer instead of warding him off.

"Not at all." His heart sang. "But it couldn't compare to how much I missed you."

"And you still left," came a mumble, sounding more dejected than anything, carrying the weight of his deeds for the past two days.

It was that easy to change his mood.

Rafayel cooed instinctively, rubbing soothing circles into the skin above your knuckles as he pressed a string of quick kisses into the curve of your wrist — lips brushing tender apologies along its path until he reached the palm of your hand cupping his face, where he lingered to feel you stroke delicately over his lower lashes.

"I'm here now," was his gentle promise, one spoken nuzzled against the backs of your fingers. "I'm not going anywhere."

"What are you going to say to your friend? You didn't even pick up his call," you admonished softly, drawing his attention towards where the voicemail was still being displayed on the hologram screen hovering from the nightstand, accepting a prompt about how to proceed.

Rafayel made a show of leaning back to sit back on his heels, staring down at you as he slipped his fingers underneath the tightly-belted thick, sash-like band to pop the clasp to the side apart, the metal closure disengaging with a small clack as the ends slid free and exposed the zipper underneath.

He drank in your every reaction — every detail of you sprawled out before him: your robe coming undone ever so gradually, tantalizing glimpses of skin peeking between its parted folds, a little bit of collarbone here, the curve of your breast there, teasingly hinting at the shape of a nipple underneath the white fabric, then another flash of thigh, an exposed inch of inner leg from your feet shifting restlessly alongside his shins.

He pulled the whole belt free in one smooth yank — the sudden momentum making it snap with a harsh crack. It curled like a ribbon in his palm as he surveyed you, gauging your reaction; watching your widened stare catch onto cloth held loosely in his fist as he flung it haphazardly to the side.

Then, he started tugging at your ankle to raise it higher — dragging his knuckles along your heel, the sole of your foot, caressing into the arch of your instep, traveling along the softness of your calf all the way down to your knee, a single fingertip trailing underneath, slinking gradually but surely toward the inner side, tracing hypnotic spirals into the silky flesh that made your breathing hitch unevenly.

The ends of your robe were riding further up past your thigh along with the slow march, your naked skin revealed in gradual increments the higher his palm slid — revealing more and more until his hand stopped at the underside of your thigh, entirely disappeared from view because of the bunched up cloth, and pulled your leg up gently to drape it over the curve of waist.

Falling right back in on instinct, he leaned down, propped above your splayed form on his forearm beside your shoulder and bent to drag his nose upwards along the line of your cheekbone, saying, "I'm busy."

Your answering snicker was endearing and familiar, drawing forth a swell of warmth inside him like the sun rising over a tranquil ocean's horizon. "Still trying to run away?"

“Just returning to the original plan.”

There would be no running away now — not anymore, not ever, at least not from you and what you made him feel. He'd tried; failed, obviously, as evident in his return here, where the answer awaited him with open arms.

"Who says I'm going to agree? I still haven't forgiven you.”

Rafayel adored that one pout of yours, the one that curved at its edges like the swoop of a bird's wing, delicate and lovingly rounded in its downturned shape. It drew his mouth upward to meet its match, slotting perfectly against its twin seamlessly in the union of a kiss, lingering as if they belonged together like puzzle pieces. You melted sweetly under the fondness contained within the gesture, sighing quietly in surrender; every angle of his mouth was drawn to yours inexorably, it was gravity pulling falling stars back to their courses.

"Not yet," he amended dutifully once he could manage words again, and felt your smile widen before sealing his mouth over it. "Let me."

"If you beg," you shot right back, the curve of your mouth pronounced against his chin, smug satisfaction dripped from every word and its delivery as you pulled away again just enough to meet his half-hooded stare evenly — daring him to refuse you. "Properly."

You kissed the little groan that was about to spill past his lips, but it wasn’t enough to satisfy him. Neither was it intended to.

"How would you like me to repent?" He dragged the question into an offer, a honey trap ripe for plundering. "On my knees? On my back?"

He let his arousal to show on his fact at those mental images, conjured by practiced ease, crafted to seduce. The soft puff of your exhale danced across his chin, sending his nerves tingling. A sign he was on the right track? Or did it merely betray surprise at whatyou had in mind? Either possibility stirred his blood.

"You know what someone in your position shouldn’t do?" you whispered, low and hushed, conspiratorial yet laced with a dangerous authority that quickened his pulse. His brows rose involuntarily, the shift in your tone sending anticipation skittering down his spine. Your lashes swept low, casting faint shadows on your cheeks as your pointed stare locked onto him, sharp enough to pierce. "Ask me what to do when you’re supposed to be coming up with ideas on your own. That’s weaponized incompetence."

His head snapped back so fast that something audibly clicked in his neck.

Mouth wide open.

"Weaponized in—" The sensual, submissive haze he’d been wrapped in evaporated like morning dew under the brutal heat of the desert sun, vanishing so quickly it left him sputtering. The words faltered on his tongue as insult overtook every carefully cultivated mood, his composure fracturing into clumsy indignation. Propped up on his elbows above you, his face twisted into a comically muddied mix of offense and disbelief, his tone taking on an incredulous sharpness as he glared down at you.

"Say that again and I’ll spit bubbles at you!" he snapped, his threat hanging in the air like a gauntlet thrown by a petulant prince.

"Pffft!"

The insolent brat you were being in that moment, daring to laugh straight in his face, was both impossibly cute and maddeningly infuriating. He stared down at you, eyes narrowing with mock offense, the knowledge that your laughter was entirely at his expense gnawing at his frayed patience. He was torn between kissing you senseless or flipping you over and finding some other way to wipe that smug, adorable smirk off your face.

"What do you mean weaponized incompetence?" Rafayel shot back, the words almost trembling with disbelief. "You think I can't please you properly without you guiding me through it step-by-step? Is that what you're saying?!" His irritation swelled, a balloon of indignation puffing up and threatening to burst as he fought, tooth and nail, to keep the whine rising in his throat from escaping. "I like you telling me what to do because I enjoy indulging in your desires! Not because I’m incapable of being creative in bed!"

A frustrated huff crowned his ranting, "Stop laughing!" he barked, though his rising pitch only seemed to add fuel to your uncontrollable amusement.

You shook your head firmly, slapping your hands over your face to muffle the sounds of your laughter, but it was no use. Your entire body curled inward instinctively, knees drawing up as you rolled to your side, burying yourself deeper into the cocoon of your mirth. It only made it worse for his pride — your stifled giggles shaking through you like tremors, every failed attempt to contain yourself sending them bubbling up again.

Rafayel let out a growl of frustration, throwing his body off yours with an exaggerated thud, landing face-first into the pillow beside you in utter defeat. The mattress jolted slightly from the force, but the muffled yell he buried into the pillow caused a chain reaction that only made your laughter harder to suppress. The giggles came fast and bright, and he swore they sounded far too gratifying for his current temperament, his scowl deepening with every shake of your shoulders and every wheezing gasp for air that he felt in the bed, he didn’t even need to look.

The fact that you were utterly immune to his wrath, impervious to every “Stop,” he threw your way, made it all the more maddening. How was he supposed to maintain the upper hand, to reestablish even a shred of dignity, when he couldn’t even intimidate you?

"I'm sorry," you gasped finally, though the apology was weakened by the cracks of laughter still slipping through. You managed to sit upright, though it took visible effort, your hands brushing away tears from the corners of your crinkled, joy-stricken eyes. A few lingering giggles escaped as you cleared your throat, attempting to sound sincere but failing miserably. "I didn’t think you’d have such strong feelings about this topic."

Rafayel lifted his head from the pillow, his hair disheveled, his glare shooting daggers your way, though the deep flush blooming across his cheeks betrayed his struggle to keep his composure. He opened his mouth to retort, to say something, but instead all that escaped was a muffled, irritated groan as he flopped back down into the pillow.

“Rafayel.”

He rolled onto his back with dramatic flair, hands folded primly over his stomach and ankles crossed, the picture of theatrical innocence. The pout he wore, however, was pure spite, lips pushed forward just enough to make his point. “If you think I’m sooo weaponizing my incompetence, maybe I should actually start doing that. Let you handle everything yourself. Clearly, you’ve got it all figured out.”

“Rafayel…”

“No, no, go ahead,” he cut in, stubbornly resolute, almost belligerent in its exaggerated persistence. “I’m useless, right? I don’t know what I’m doing. Teach me. I won’t even lay a single finger on you.” He puffed his cheeks, a childish act of defiance paired with the way he turned his head away, sulking with the finesse of spoiled royalty.

The exaggerated display drew a sigh from you, long and exasperated, but tinged with a quiet amusement that he didn’t miss. He wasn’t fooling you — not for a second—but he relished the moment all the same.

“Well,” you began, feigning hesitation, with false reluctance. “Since you’re already laid out, I guess…” You trailed off as you shifted to straddle him, slow enough to test the limits of his so-called resolution, the soft white robe you wore parting ever so slightly as you moved, revealing tantalizing glimpses of skin before your knees closed firmly around his hips, framing him like twin prison bars.

His eyes darkened as he watched you, taking in the sight hungrily, every detail sinking into him like a drug he couldn’t resist. His hands betrayed him almost immediately, fingertips skimming the hem of the robe where it hung loosely, their touch feather-light as they ghosted over the tops of your thighs. It was instinctive, reflexive — completely unrepentant.

“I thought you weren’t touching me,” you teased with a playful lilt that interrupted the heat thickening the air between you like an unwanted knock on the door.

His hum was deliberately innocent, his head tilting as though to feign ignorance. But the dark gleam in his eyes and the smirk curling at the corners of his lips told a different story entirely. “I really like this robe,” he murmured with a calculated drawl. “What, I can’t touch my own clothes now?”

The claim was absurd — blatantly so — but it made you pause, his fingers grazing the fabric in question as though testing its texture, when in reality, it was clear he was savoring the warmth of your skin beneath it.

(Truthfully, it was also you who looked lovely draped in what was his — but that went without saying.)

Your mouth opened, the gleam of a retort on the tip of your tongue, but the words dissolved into nothingness as his hands shifted, palms hot against your sides, skirting along your ribs in an intentional, testing motion. He knew the heat of his touch stole the breath from your lungs, burning through the fabric like a spark setting fire to paper.

“You go on,” he said, infuriatingly smug as he leaned back into the pillows, his hands never straying far from your sides. “Help yourself. Take as long as you need. I’ll just… be appreciating this fabric in the meantime.”

His fingers traced the lines of your ribs, the motion slow, languid, before sliding downward to hover just above the curve of your stomach. They lingered there, resting near the knot of the belt holding your robe together. The edge of his thumb dipped just slightly beneath the fabric, brushing over its folded loops, a movement so subtle it was barely there, as though he wanted to test how much he could push you. He toyed with the fabric, rolling it between his fingers like he was unraveling a puzzle.

The pause in his pent-up desire — the break that had proven to be a blessing — was wearing thin. The front he was putting on, all casual indifference and smug bravado, was crumbling, betrayed by the way his gaze kept flickering back to you, and, of course, the growing press of his impatience beneath you, hard and neglected, made it abundantly clear that he was more than ready to pick up where you’d last left off.

You broke first.

With nary a warning, your hand shot out, snatching the ends of the thin, ribbon-like scarf draped loosely around his neck. You wound the fabric around your fist once, twice, tightening it just enough to make your intentions clear…

Then you yanked.

The pull wasn’t violent — no, it was far too calculated for that. Enough pressure to catch him off guard, to tip him forward slightly, but not enough to hurt. It was a demand, plain and simple, one he found himself surrendering to before he even had the chance to consider resistance. His wide-eyed surprise melted almost instantly like cotton candy in water into something darker, something sharper, as his lips curled into a grin that spoke volumes about just how much he was enjoying this game.

"First, you ask to beg for my forgiveness," you continued, pulling him a little closer, and his chest tightened as though the leash around his neck extended all the way to his lungs.

Your gaze pinned him down like a blade, your lips curving into something that wasn’t quite a smirk, wasn’t quite a smile — something far more addictive.

"And then," you murmured, sweet but laced with unmistakable bite, "you start ordering me around like a brat."

A jolt of concentrated heat shot through him, not from embarrassment but from the sharp edge of thrill that ran through his veins. He let the tension in his body slacken just slightly, a calculated move that allowed him to lift from the bed a little, meeting your challenge with his own. The faint tug of the scarf against his neck only heightened the electric energy between you, and he found himself biting back a grin.

“Well," he said at last, letting his weight sink into the bed with a noncommittal shrug, the barest shift of his shoulders enough to convey his defiance. "I’m just playing my part." He tilted his head just enough to make the scarf strain, wanted to see what you’d do with the provocation. “The sleazy husband.”

“You want a reward for that?”

“Acknowledgment of how committed to the role I am would be nice.”

“Oh yes, the most infuriating actor—”

“Aaand you goofed it—”

“—impossibly—”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah—”

“—handsome," you went on, and his smirk faltered ever so slightly. “Disarmingly clever, annoyingly witty," you added, the sharp edge softening with each word, though the grip you kept on the scarf didn’t loosen. If anything, you pulled him closer, closing the space between you inch by inch. "—and worst of all," you finished, dropping into something softer, something so intimate, "Completely, devastatingly, undeniably competent."

“Well, aren’t you good at apologizing…” he said into himself, embarrassingly beet-red at having fallen for your trick.

“I’m still waiting for yours, you know,” you pointed out distractedly, playing with the crystal flame lilies scattered on his wine berry shirt, tracing the petals of a bloom while seemingly entranced, following the silvery droplets dangling in a chain. “But I’ll be graceful this time and keep going with mine...”

Before he had a chance to blink or register the motion — your free palm slipped underneath the thin fabric covering his heart, caressing right alongside the pulsing red mark — and squeezed with a vengeance (such a fierce boob grab!), applying enough pressure that the pads of your fingers sunk into flesh, then widened the buttonless V-cut of his shirt by yanking, no, downright ripping it open by the lapels with both hands, and Rafayel damn near felt like a virgin at how scandalous that single action was that he almost covered himself up.

But then again, he could hardly claim innocence right now, could he? He was practically a champagne bottle about to pop down there. Just from that. Who was he, the main female character getting her corset ripped in a bodice-ripper novel?

“Ohmyg—hi? What happened to hello? How are y—”

“Shut up or no head.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Kisses were rained along his collarbone, the length of his neck, and nipping gently at the spot behind his ear that got the hairs on his nape rise to attention. It would’ve been funny what a child’s play it was to tease him until his ears matched the scarlet blossoms on his shirt, except nothing about this particular situation bore humor — least of all, his response to it.

Which was practically none at all. Because he simply lay there, stiff as a plank from how turned on he was, and you worked him diligently as if he was an instrument and you were the virtuoso.

It was also because he was zeroed in on the cleavage peeking out from the gap in your robe as you made your way further downwards, tongue flickering along the dips and bumps of his upper abdomen — surely able to feel more than hear each inhale and exhale getting closer to moaning territory the longer you kept teasing. He even caught a nip slip here and there, getting impossibly harder in response, culminating in him twitching and tightening beneath you whenever you — purposefully! — brushed against his erection.

“Rafayel,” you sighed dreamily, and he moaned for real this time at how his name fell softly past your parted lips, pouring into a pleased hum against his navel where a trail of wetness gleamed — followed by fingertips curling gently around the hem of his pants’ band. “You’re so quiet. Not leaving it up to chance, huh?”

And the only response he gave was an impatient roll of his hips toward your head, granting you permission — eager acquiescence, even — while a loud, unabashed gasp slipped into his lungs as your hands found the zipper of his pants. With a practiced tug, you freed it from its track, and his pants slid low on his hips, just enough to reveal the waistband of his underwear. Your fingers followed immediately, hooking under both fabric barriers to ease them down until they rested tautly just below his hips. The motion tugged on his shirt as well, once secured by the overlap tucked into his waistband, and with nothing anchoring it anymore, the luxurious fabric parted effortlessly, exposing the sculpted expanse of his chest and abs in one sweeping reveal. His stiffening length, freed from its confines, ached visibly — leaping subtly toward contact, as though craving the touch it had been denied for far too long.

"See? You're being so good... why do you keep wanting to provoke me?" came your lilting reproach, spoken against the soft skin of his pelvis, lips fluttering teasingly across its planes in playful grazes of their silky plush. "

“Permission to talk?”

A sharp, in-drawn breath escaped him the moment a single finger traced along the underside of his shaft, lingering over a wildly pulsing vein — evidence of the frenetic race of his heart currently pumping pure liquid lightning straight through his veins — but he recovered quickly, allowing it to dissolve into an exhale long and drawn-out instead.

“Go ahead, handsome.”

His hips lurched instinctively in search of something tangible, of a sensation besides the torturous tickle of warm breaths dancing lightly along his arousal, "Give me my reward, then. I've waited so long for this, it's been torture."

“Doesn’t sound like you minded the wait. You left me, didn’t you?”

Ah, yes. The grudge. You were becoming like Rafayel the longer you stayed by his side.

"You know I hate waiting. Let alone like this," he said, all whiny and punctuated with a shudder — one that was met with an accompanying jolt that surged straight from the base of his erection when your lips brushed teasingly alongside it. "I didn't think you'd be this cruel..."

"Are you really asking?"

"Can you give it to me instead of wasting time talking?" came his blunt retort, brows drawn together in an impatient furrow that radiated ‘I’m being wronged,’ energy.

"Not wasting time at all, just wanted to spend more time with you. Feels nice, right? You deserve this,” you murmured comfortingly against the swell of his abs rising and falling with each heavy breath — and oh, he almost melted into a puddle at that, visibly deflating with his chest cavity just filling up all warm and fuzzy with love.

It did feel nice but — just — just — fuck — he needed to be touched or he actually was going to disintegrate into sea foam. Not joking.

A brief kiss landed on on the left side of his Apollo belt in consolation before a drag of your tongue along its path followed, transitioning into you breathing more warmth directly into his base, then placing a loving peck to his tip — eyes twinking at the tremble that surged through him. “I really love seeing you so reactive. Does it feel that good? Just breathing on you like this?”

His hips pushed upward in tiny nudges, bumping insistently against your cheek, practically begging to be held properly inside your mouth. "It doesn't feel good at all — just, come on, hurry... I keep my lube in the top drawer on the left... It's edible, you know..."

Thankfully, you didn't smirk at him. Didn't stop to tease him about his eagerness, either, wordlessly going about reaching over to rummage for a bottle in his nightstand — an act that forced you to draw away from his straining member completely, your warmth vanishing suddenly in one agonizing instant, causing him to nearly whine from the loss.

You popped open the lid to squirt some lubrication into your palm and recapped it while staring down at him with a curious gleam. "You had something like this with you the whole time—"

Your words got cut off upon him grabbing your dripping hand and directing it straight where his impatience stood angry at the delay, shuddering out a moan at how incredibly silky the glide was.

"Finally... yesss," he hissed, thrusting upwards to feel more friction — the delicious slickness spreading across your enclosed grip driving him absolutely wild. "Ahh—kkhfff... Keep going, you have to keep going, don't let go... Please. Please?”

Something in your face twisted weirdly at his breathy begging, making his heart flip at the unflinching lust in your widened gaze trained firmly onto his jerking hips.

He had your fist trapped around his swollen cock, urging you into pumping it once you settled into a steady rhythm stroking its turgid crown, twisting and curling into each new swipe upwards along his pulsing flesh; encouraging you by squeezing tighter every few strokes until you took over completely. Then, he threw his arm over his forehead haphazardly, basking in the blissful waves flowing through his veins at long last, watching you watch yourself pleasure him through fluttering lashes, breathing hard through half-parted lips.

"That's it," he sighed huskily, rocking his body into the hand rubbing and grinding against his dick's ridge with expert motions; thumb circling its glistening head and caressing alongside its slit where precome beaded out generously, smoothing over the entirety of its surface and working into the underside, swirling tantalizingly over the bulging vein there until all his thoughts melted into a haze of pure sensation, mind wiped clean of everything except the singular, simple fact that he desperately needed to come. "Like that — nnhhh, yes! That feels amazing — feels perfect — love those sweet little fingers... So close already, I can't, I can't—"

At his muttered groans, your pace stuttered noticeably before resuming its previous speed, which wasn't fast enough according to the stretching throb inside his core, his blood rushing loudly through his ears like boiling rapids. "No, faster..." he urged you, rutting into your palm even harder in a frantic effort to increase the pressure and bring him to the precipice quicker. "I can't hold on much longer — need more, I need more. Tighter. Tighter."

The corners of his vision pulsed white and Rafayel whimpered as he jumped inside your curled fist when the unexpected sensation of having your forefinger slide through his sticky fluids gathered at its tip, swirling clockwise before ascending back up in an unhurried stroke that carried a slippery coating alongside it to smooth out the glide to put pressure right into the slit — a sensation that lingered for seconds afterward with ghostly echoes, drawing a sudden choked gasp from his lips at how intensely good that single touch felt.

“Thaaaaat’s it, yeah, I love that, you have such a beautiful voice.” Your free palm swept up alongside his ribs to rub gently against their curve as though to soothe the ragged sounds ripping past his throat; traveling upward to cradle his head against yours where your cheek brushed alongside his temple, holding him still with tender care and easing some of the tremble wracking through him. "Can you feel how much I'm enjoying us being together like this — how badly I've missed you? Please let me hear those pretty sounds, I wanna hear them loud and clear. Will you be generous for me and share it all?"

His reply died in his throat in favor of a low keening sound — something raw and broken — when you squeezed tighter.

The way your nails dug ever so delicately into the sides of his cock, applying pressure just shy of pain was truly exquisite torture, making his head swim and rise up from the bed so he could crush his lips against yours, biting hungrily into your plush mouth and delving deep into its depths until oxygen became nothing but an afterthought. Every neuron of him burned alive in chain reaction as your tongue wound and slid alongside his, curling along the underside before retreating for him to suckle on your lower lip eagerly until it swelled red.

"Mmnghhfuck! Hhhaaa—keep—" Words spilled past his slackened lips like ribbons unfurling, senseless as he struggled to convey how excruciating it was to contain his euphoria within, desperate for any sort of outlet to relieve the pressure rising inside him rapidly —

— and then broke off suddenly on a low moan when he caught a flash of your unoccupied hand that was just cradling his neck having found its way between your thighs, the view out of sight because of the robe —

Then, Rafayel saw the pearly gates.

His orgasm slammed straight into him, so unexpected and yet wholly expected all the same that he gasped around it like he was in a headlock, utterly disoriented by the sudden assault on his senses, soaring impossibly higher with each jerk of his hips into your fingers' grasp and shooting thick white streaks across his stomach; leaving behind faint smears wherever it hit its mark — warm, sticky ropes landing atop his defined abs and even reaching as far as his sternum.

He knew something was wrong when it didn't stop.

Far from it, really: each pulsing contraction seemed to force more of its fluid past his cock's narrow slit, painting your pumping digits liberally with his release — even staining the lapels of your robe in messy spots. It lasted so long that Rafayel started seeing stars sparkling around the edges of his blurring vision; making everything appear fuzzy like static. "Nggh—too much—ah! Aaa—hhh! Nnhhfff... Khhffffcking hell... Can't believe—still going—"

"Don't hold back now, just ride it out, nothing wrong with it," you murmured fervently, brushing some hair back from his sweat-soaked temple and — then — kisses, so many kisses. "I know you wanted this so badly, it's okay... You deserve this. Let go for me, yeah? Can't you let go for me? All this stress will go away. Isn't that nice?"

What came out instead was an embarrassingly high moan, hoarse with overuse, entirely at odds with the self-assuredness he'd wanted to project with each thrust of his hips, spurred onwards by instinct alone in a mad dash for euphoria.

Just how pent-up was he?

He couldn't recall the last time he'd felt pleasure this acute, sharp as shrapnel beneath the layers of desire, making him so out of it that he wasn't even aware of the embarrassing mess he made like he’d just wet himself being cleaned up with a tissue by you.

And it still wasn't nearly enough.

He surged forward, wound his arm around your waist and tossed you to the side gently so your back lay flush against the sheets before following suit in a tangle of limbs that ended with you under him — where he belonged: cradled between your thighs, seated fully inside their heated clasp as he hovered above you — one elbow propped beside your shoulder while the other wandered aimlessly downwards and undid the trusty knot holding your robe together in one go.

"Rafa—"

“Sorry, I'm sorry, I can't, I'm so thirsty," he said, as he raised the lube-and-come-sodden hand of yours up to his mouth to lap at the trails trickling over your wrist; sucking on your fingertips in apology — no trace of shame coloring his cheeks as he did, far too focused on the task of cleaning them thoroughly to be distracted by something as trivial as embarrassment. He didn’t even taste himself. Just the blueberry.

So engrossed in it that he didn’t even notice you burning holes with your gaze at his lips sealing around your thumb while he ran his tongue underneath it in short, quick flicks until it was glistening once more, except this time with spit instead of lubricant.

All the while, he traced the clean strip of skin revealed by the parted folds of your robe with a searing hand, starting from the valley of your cleavage between your breasts all the way down the slight convex curve of your torso leading towards the V that marked the point where your thighs began, drawing delicate circles into your navel, slipping downward inch by tantalizing inch in search for hidden oasis.

Taking notice of how wrecked you looked through the curtains of your fingers splayed over his eyes and forehead, Rafayel rewarded you an equally debauched looked as his lips curled into a smirk against your palm.

A loud, viscous pop of your wetness echoed in the room when his fingers tenderly made contact — positively dripping for him. Your mouth flew open upon feeling him draw his forefinger's pad gently against your entrance, lingering teasingly at the seams in an excruciating crawl, tracing lightly around it as you pulsed hungrily against his fingertip.

"So thirsty," he mumbled absentmindedly to himself — mouth watering.

Rafayel pushed open your legs by the backs of your thighs to allow his head better access. If he was on a normal day, he would plant feverish kisses on the insides of your quaking knees and thighs and mark you everywhere, made it more sensual, more teasing, but he was borderline parched — not to mention more impatient than a driver stuck behind a cyclist in a one -lane road.

You yelped at his mouth diving between your legs in reckless abandon. His tongue lapped up your slick in deep, obscene flicks, then plunged inside into the warm haven awaiting him inside, devouring your sweet nectar in loud slurps, uncaring of how sloppy and unrestrained he was currently acting; far too hungry to concern himself over anything save for indulging greedily in your flavor.

"Rafayel, shit, that feels—oh my god..." He had to push your hips down by splaying his hand along the plane of your stomach as you arched helplessly, otherwise you would have simply lifted right off from his greed ravaging you without mercy or restraint. "That's so—you're so—fuck! What—what’s gotten into you? Ahh...!"

Any hope of responding to that died the second your hand tangled itself tightly into his hair and tugged to bring him impossibly closer against you, his head blanking. It felt so good when your heel planted itself onto his shoulder blade and pressed insistently there in a silent plea for more, sending ripples of heat fanning out across his nerve endings in their wake.

Without hesitation, he latched his lips around the swollen bud peaking proudly from beneath a layer of velveteen flesh and flicked upwards, suckling hard before closing around it fully — then rolled his tongue in circles around its rim with the intent to render your world spinning madly with each passing stroke. The fingers locked around your trembling thighs kneaded deeply into their skin, coaxing the delicious, involuntary spasms coursing throughout you until the only thing you knew was the blissful torment his hot mouth wrought.

"You're so delectable on my tongue, did you know? The prettiest moans come pouring out from your lovely lips when I'm between your legs like this," he said, the sentences pieced together like beads on a pearl necklace fragment by fragment between licks and sucks, sounding just short of reverence. "Your taste drives me wild, I swear it's addictive... Am I making it up to you yet? Please say yes. Tell me it's working."

"Yesyesyesyesss—" A sharp inhale cut off anything else you tried to babble further as Rafayel rewarded you with another generous helping of his enthusiasm by diving back in and running his tongue in earnest up through your center. "You feel amazing, you — feel — so — g-good—"

"—don't think that's enough, though. Didn't you call me incompetent earlier?"

"What," you choked out angrily when a puff of warm breaths skated dangerously close to where you were most sensitive. "Oh my god—"

"I hold grudges, cutie. You taught me that," he said in a sing-song reply, lighthearted in tone, nearly drowned out by the thready groans bleeding through.

"I apologized already — what more do you want? Stop teasing, Rafayel!"

A pregnant pause followed as he stared up at you from between your legs, and saw your eyes widen with realization at just what you'd requested.

"As you wish," he relented, a dark edge to his mischievous grin when he rose back up and braced his knees against the mattress better, pulling your hips tight into the cradle of his thighs until one of your legs was thrown over his shoulder. "Have it your way — and don't forget you asked for this."

The slow sink inside your wet heat was traitorously misleading: a gentle, sweet meeting at first that masked what was brewing underneath.

A dragged out whine fanned his flames as you threw your head back. “You asshole—”

"I could have made you come once, twice..." he said, in a smooth purr that dripped sinfully past his lips.

Your mouth fell open on a silent gasp; the first wave of pleasure rolling through you upon being filled suddenly in one deep plunge. Your torso twisted to allow you to hide your face into the curve of his forearm draped next to your shoulder.

"You know I love taking my time with you," he continued, pausing to bury his face into your hair to breathe you in deeply, adjusting your leg to fall from his shoulder straight onto his hip. You took advantage of Rafayel getting close, grabbing onto his back so quickly that you missed the first time and yanked his shirt down to bunch halfway down his midsection and get stuck at his elbows. "And you just had to take that from me. I don't know which one of us is greedier... "

An apology was voiced, muffled by the crook of his elbow, almost incoherent by your gasps.

He cupped your chin and made you look at him. “Are you comfortable? Not hurting you, am I?”

Your throat clicked audibly. Then you shook your head rapidly in answer to both inquiries: yes — no — everything was okay — and Rafayel breathed a quiet sigh of relief.

And then, out of nowhere your fingers started moving around the expanse of his upper back, and before he could question the non-sexual way it came across when he was literally inside you, you said, "You're sweating."

"Yeah...?" Confusion muddled his hazy mind clouded with dull pleasure begging for him to start moving again, but you looked at him with wide, eager expectation dancing behind your expectant eyes — as if you couldn't quite believe what you'd seen.

"No — your temperature. It's still high but you're sweating now," you told him excitedly. "Rafayel — that's huge! This means your body is cooling itself down!"

He huffed.

"Of course it is, I've got the hottest woman in the world under me," he said with a roll of his hips, earning an enthusiastic moan from you in the process. Your arms snaked themselves around the back of his neck tighter until both forearms crossed at their crease, palms moving upwards in an intoxicating drag through the back of his skull. "You the cure to all of this..."

His forehead dropped unceremoniously yours where it stayed, and he sucked in an uneven, shaky groan that tapered into something resembling a whine as he started rutting steadily against you, driving into that spot where you liked it the best with growing desperation with the occasional staccato grunt at the fluttering squeeze and murmured encouragement.

At some point, his mouth wandered towards your pulse, scraped his teeth against it gingerly before latching on it in an open-mouthed kiss that was hard enough to bruise.

You tilted your chin skywards with a sigh to give him better access and tangled your fingers encouragingly deeper into his hair, and something inside him sparked awake in response, a fiery need demanding him to paint every inch of your skin violet, rose and mauve so that it may glow evermore brightly for everyone to see —

"Way too beautiful for your own good... Driving me crazy... Every single day... Couldn't keep my hands off you the moment I got in here..." he hissed furiously as though he were possessed, snapping his hips harder upon finding the angle he desired, searching relentlessly for something within you both to satisfy the frenzied race to the peak taking control of him completely; searing kisses littering everywhere he could reach along the underside of your chin and neck whilst spewing senseless litanies into your skin in between them. "Can't believe I could have this forever... Right? Say I can have this forever. It'll drive me insane if you don't, I swear—"

"Forever," you echoed hoarsely, your nails digging tightly into his scalp as his pace increased once more. "Y-you can have me forever—anytime, wherever—"

Your assurances came with a startled cry of ecstasy as he sank his teeth into the juncture connecting your shoulder and collarbone in a bite that bordered on a savage instinct to ensure he was there, he'd been there, and would always be there. "You're not leaving, are you? Aren't gonna leave me anytime soon, right?

Every syllable was marked with a measured grind into you as if determined to force every word inside your head by burying it deep in your core — imprint it permanently into your brain; until the only thing filling your thoughts was him and him alone. "Not letting you — I'm not letting you. I can’t let you go, it’s too late — too late. Say it. Say it.”

"As — many times as I ne-ed to," you panted underneath him, arching upwards so beautifully for him as his grip loosened marginally to let you find that perfect angle that caused your back to bow like a perfectly tuned instrument in his hands; singing nothing but divine music. "'S not changing, ever. Won't change... Agh!"

His hips bucked in answer to your nails sinking deep into the skin of his shoulders as though clawing for dear life. "Yeah? Yeah? Promise—?"

All you could do was sob into his mouth hungrily swallowing yours — a mess of moans falling endlessly past your lips swallowed whole, accompanied with plaps and slaps of wet thrusting. There'd never be a time when he wasn't craving the taste of your flesh burning scorching white hot against his own, craving more and more until everything blurred into a haze of delirium.

"Tell me... Tell me—hah, tell me, princess. Let me hear it..." His chest rumbled deep within where yours rubbed deliciously against his bare flesh with each fervent roll of his body. Even then, it wasn't nearly enough; couldn't possibly be, not with how ravenously thirsty he was for anything and everything having to do with you: your sounds, your expressions, those intoxicating stares filled with nothing but need for him and only him. Not while his stomach twisted itself in knots tight enough to tie sails and yet remained impossibly empty at the same time, yearning for the sweet relief of gratification flowing freely and quenching his deepest thirst. "Wanna hear you, gotta hear you say it—"

"I'm right here, m'here, not going anywhere, not leaving... I'myours, just don't let go, don't let go of me—"

He heard it as though you were underwater; faint, muffled underneath the thick fog clouding his senses, so indistinct yet simultaneously loud enough to drown out anything else within reach.

Every coherent thought vanished from his mind, melting into thin ribbons streaming across an ocean of red flames, then bursting forth anew into embers scattering throughout his vision in a dizzying display, igniting behind his eyelids with blinding light every time he blinked them closed. When he opened them, new constellations blossomed instantaneously; bright orange ones with maroon tinges shining bright among the black canvas.

"M'not gonna—! Can't let go—couldn't even if I tried. They wouldn't even be able to pry you away from my cold, dead hands."

More vivid blotches appeared before him at random intervals, painting his desert landscape in abstract patterns shifting so erratically they threatened to form fractals at any moment, jagged shapes overlapping and warping themselves until they resembled colorful stains splattered across walls in chaotic messes; or perhaps simply the shadows of clouds skirting the edges of his sight drifting past without a care — all blending together and merging seamlessly as though water droplets bleeding into fine lines until none could tell where one ended and the others began.

"Gonna be... gonna be stuck with me for life," Rafayel said, sounding entirely half out of his mind with the way he was babbling endearments (something about a bride) in-between little laps that trailed upwards along your quivering sternum toward your heaving chest; kissing you so fervently as though possessed, driven wholly by base instincts demanding he give in to whatever compulsion overtook him. "Always been mine. Always. Always—can't ever leave, yeah? I won't forgive you—won't forgive you this time—"

"Rafayel, I'm gonna come, please..." you whispered hoarsely against the crown of his head nestled between your breasts, your hands grasping onto his shoulders helplessly in an attempt at anchoring yourself. "I can't keep going, I'll fall apart. Please, don’t stop, don’t stop—"

One of his fingers slid down to repeatedly flick through your swollen folds, teasing and circling around your clit while his tongue swirled around a nipple; pulling and sucking hungrily with fervent desire, giving a pointed twist once he'd latched on.

"Come for me, then, do it, c'mon, cream all around me, let me have it, let me have this — you can do it, I’ll help you along.” His lower body lifted suddenly, pulling back until only his cockhead remained caught inside; followed by a quiet pop indicating his lips breaking contact from where they were buried in your chest. "I need you so bad I can hardly stand it anymore... Wanna feel you — feel all of you — need all of you..."

All it took was one sudden shift after a steady build-up of rhythm of shallow, quick thrusts: the smallest rotation of his pelvis and thrust straightwards, hips knocking against yours in a violent shove of flesh meeting slick flesh for you to fly apart spectacularly when he buried himself into that specific area right below your cervix.

With a shuddering breath that dissolved instantly into a shrill cry tearing through your throat, your thighs locked tight around his waist — holding him prisoner while your nails sank fiercely into his scratched back as your entire body trembled uncontrollably through the aftermath.

“Yeah, there you go, cutie.” A comforting, grounding caress landed on your forehead, tracing the arc of its curve towards the back of your ear; then repeating itself multiple times in slow, unhurried strokes — to remind you he wasn't going anywhere, anytime soon. “There you are, that was beautiful. You got me seeing stars.”

"It's... It's snowing outside... In the desert," you said faintly, eyelids slow in their blinking, and Rafayel thought how utterly gorgeous you looked, all worn down and exhausted and so drunk in your post-orgasmic euphoria to talk nonsensically about what was happening outside.

"Yeah," he agreed, equally hushed as he peppered a trail of soft kisses across the bridge of your nose. You closed your teary lashes instinctively against the ticklish sensation. "It's so soft... and beautiful..."

You were the snow in his desert. Though, too blissed out to pick up on what he was implying.

Too busy stiffening up when you felt his cock jump inside you.

"You... you're still hard?"

“I didn’t come in the first place, whoops. Busy being too competent, I guess,” he said breezily, tilting his hips so that he pressed deep inside, directly into the tender spot inside you where pleasure flared to life unbidden.

"Let me... Let me rest, fuck, give me a minute..." Your hands scrambled for purchase against his scarred back; anchoring yourself by clawing surface level trenches down along its expanse and dragging red tracks as he continued his grinding in torturously slow and shallow rolls. "Need — I need to catch my breath, you're gonna make me pass out, shit, hold on — !"

Rafayel had you for three more times after that.

The first was the short prologue to what was coming, picked up from where he’d left off in the same position — head buried in your neck, making you tightly embrace him like he’d fly off the earth if he wasn’t held. No sooner did his hips start bucking roughly against yours before he spent himself inside in long pulses that coated you inside in heated spurts, sending sparks rippling out into your limbs from where you clenched weakly around him through your own release that hadn’t yet run its full course.

The prettiest sounds in the whole entire world spilled from him as he pulled out with a schlick, dripping his neglect-thickened seed onto the sheets, and you were naive as to think this was it. You both had indulged yourselves enough for the night, fucked through the absence-abstaining makes the heart fonder phenomenon, it had been fantastic to witness him get so serious. Surely now would be a good time to cool off and step into the bath together now that you’d been able to make him sweat and the sex-heavy humidity clinging thickly to your body was getting more comfortable the more you became aware of it. The room was absolutely boiling, stuffier than a sauna like he’d projected all the heat trapped inside his body everywhere. Perhaps opening up a window wouldn’t hurt…

“That was one,” he said then, staring down at his flushed erection straining proudly between his legs like a compass needle pointed north — the faint strand of semen connecting his tip and stomach swaying and snapping apart. “This isn’t anywhere near enough.”

To your shock, Rafayel got off the bed, hauled you in by your legs until your bottom half was dangling from the bed, and folded you completely in half with no warning. Your legs were pushed against your chest and were hooked over his shoulders, and the speed of with which all of it happened punched out a wheeze from you.

"Can I? Are you okay?" he asked urgently, patting your thigh rapidly twice, pausing — then adding another firm slap there before you nodded hurriedly in confirmation rather than a verbal response, because fuck, his weight holding you down felt absolutely incredible like this.

Your ankles started bobbing in sync with his hip thrusts as he drove deep inside your heat, the sink easy, smooth and soft and the mess you both made between your legs pouring out and splattering everywhere as he kept mumbling, “I can’t stop, I’m sorry, I can’t stop, can’t stop—”

This round lasted longer, though it was the worst frenzy you’d seen Rafayel in. Nothing was slow about it, he was mercilessly pistoning himself into you and unpredictably switching between shallow and deep that had your clit being scraped against and A-spot drilled into. You couldn’t even keep your eyes open from how intense pleasure was kneading you violently like a dough. If it wasn’t for his mouth gluing itself onto yours, the entire floor and the poor downstairs guests probably would have heard what was happening with how loud his moaning became — because he was downright voluntarily overstimulating himself.

With one particularly desperate sob, Rafayel finally buried himself to the hilt within you — throbbing — in harsh jets of liquid fire with jerking, abrupt twitches of his hips, milking himself into your body as he found yet another release that was as intense and concentrated as the previous. You cried brokenly, shuddering as that final thrust abused your clit over the edge of orgasm number two, involuntarily flinching and trying to get away when he pushed all the accumulated, positively flowing stringy mess right back into your puffy cunt with a strange, entranced look on his face. You had to slap his hand away and kick his weight off you, powerless and exhausted and fully feeling like your vagina was gaping and would never close back up.

A soft kiss on your cheek brought you back to earth.

“Still alive?” he croaked, gently maneuvering you higher up the bed and laying you back comfortably. You had to avoid the giant, wet and shining spot that had to be dripping down on the floor at the edge of the bed, face burning as Rafayel’s sweat-drenched forehead leaned against yours. “I’m not going easy on you… I have to say I’m impressed how good you’re taking it.”

You realized, once more with feeling, that he was rock-hard against your hip despite having already come three separate times — two of which had filled you to the point of pouring out of you — and had no sign of calming down any time soon.

He was beyond insatiable.

Though the third and final time was far sweeter, the pace much slower and drawn out as though he’d suddenly regained some sense and clarity. By that time, you were growing deliriously tired, the earlier carnal fucking accommodated itself to you by morphing into tender lovemaking. Rafayel had you on your side, comfortably able to hug pillows and anchor yourself, while straddling your thigh and hooking your other calf over his waist and held it there firmly, out from your space to let you breathe with his back straight. Just looking down at you with obvious, sensual longing to lean down for kisses the entire time and looking so fucked out had been enough to rekindle your desire.

He was driving himself languidly into you, either eyes closed and head thrown back, or focused dead-on at the spot between where he was slipping in and out of you — watching your cunt eagerly swallow his white-coated cock and attempt to suck him right back in each time he pulled out until only his tip remained buried. Over and over.

And eventually, his shaky breaths and sweet sighs started turning into fast-paced, restrained moans. You saw him hanging on the precipice of wanting to go fast again, the tension his body pulled taut like a bowstring about to snap.

At one point, your robe and his shirt had found themselves slingshotted into the far, opposite corners of the room at some point but he still had his pants and was positively drenched in sweat like he’d just taken a bath and shining under the dim lighting.

"Drained all of my stamina, I'm empty, completely dry... I’m gonna need an IV drip. I can’t believe it. This is crazy, you know... I could die happy like this... But I wanna come. I wan—nnah come inside you so bad again, wanna fill you up—make you full with me—"

He went completely motionless and stayed burrowed in you when your palms cupped his face gently, forcing him to look down at you with his shiny eyes. "You've got to calm down first."

“I don’t think I can,” he murmured, panting, “I really can’t. You feel so—”

Your thumbs stroked the outer corners of his eyes with aching tenderness. “We’ll stop and try to calm you down a bit continuing then, okay? Try for me. No need to rush when we have time to ourselves. No one’s going anywhere.”

He stumbled and nearly fell to his elbows on top of you. “Tell me to,” he said, in a begging voice. “You can just tell me to calm down. Anything you want, anything. You know I’ll listen.”

All these months of living with the revelation about the bond and it still came as a shock to you, but you figured if it was for his own good...

So you ordered him: "Calm down and relax, Rafayel. Everything’s fine, you’re okay."

And god, did he listen well.

You were shocked, as you always were each time, to see just how willingly compliant he was. Seeing his body literally change its chemistry to conform itself to your desires and let go of all tension was unbelievable. You immediately felt bad that you’d forced it on him somehow like some admitted, invasive tranquilizer, because you could have made him relax naturally, with your own labor, a glass of water and massage, maybe, gradually work him through it—

“There’s nothing to worry about. Don’t think about it too much. Just focus on me, yeah?” A quiet command that lacked any real intent to order accompanied an equally soft kiss planted softly against the corner of your mouth, and all thoughts went flying out of the window when you saw how mellowly at peace he was, gazing dreamily at you without the slightest care in the world.

After that, everything became a blur once again. But a pleasant one. Slow, like molasses trickling lazily throughout your bloodstream at room temperature — soothing all aches into pleasure-flavored coziness at being joined, no rampant race towards a climax involved. There was no concept of time whatsoever: just the two of you together.

After your pillow talk about what he believed inspired him — what he wanted would, you internally filled in the blanks — and how he was running out of reserves exclusively saved up for the purposes of his art, you had to make it clear to him that there would be no pain involved in your relationship.

You didn’t know if he expected to be hurt by you in the future or implied he had no problem with that happening, but you couldn’t even tolerate him saying those things for the sake of love, or whatever it was. Him being intimately familiar and nonchalant with the concept bothered you down to the bones.

Not only were you trying to work around the huge rock he’d just dropped on top of your heart with the revelation that Aridum had to represent pure suffering to him as a Lemurian, you were also slightly upset he’d wanted to subject himself to it because he was lost more beautiful things in life had made their way into his life to inspire him as well. His paintings, all of them, had taken a new context and an additional layer of tragedy with that revelation, despite the fact that he’d basically said you made him draw from a different fountain and clogged up the other one.

It was a bittersweet happiness to hear Rafayel wanting to explore brighter, happier sides of life together when the sketch he showed you he was working on while you were sleeping depicted a man drowning in the sea and a figure beckoning him from above, close to the surface. Something still very painful.

“That’s one bleak drawing.”

“Depends on what you see.”

“I see a dying man hallucinating. Maybe that’s someone close to him and his brain is comforting him with a vision. I don’t know.”

“Interesting take. Maybe it’s not just a man at all. Maybe it’s a reunion. It looks peaceful, doesn’t it?”

Now you looked again, it did look peaceful. Just like Rafayel was right now, next to you on the bed with his forehead almost touching yours.

"I'd like to think he isn't drowning, then."

Rafayel just smiled.

[conkreetmonkey]

Fun story: My last job was at a restaurant. They hired me among many other workers all at once. This is because the kitchen had recently burnt down, thankfully after hours and without hurting anyone, so they had to temporarily close and rebuild; can't very well run a restaurant with no kitchen, after all. Presumably they'd laid everyone off and were completely restocking their labour pool in like a week. My first day was wonderful. People were patient about training me, the manager was sweet and made sure everyone was staying hydrated, and she even personally brought me a glass of water while I was on my break. Like any person would have, I took this as a good sign. Then, over the next few months, things began to devolve. There's like 5 stories in there about the extortion, ER visits, second-degree burns, and explosive stress diarrhea, but basically that once sweet manager slowly became a demon, and my once fun and kind coworkers began doing things like threatening to harm my work bestie unless I performed unsafe work that was guaranteed to burn me due to inadequate PPE, or yelling obscenities at me for asking perfectly reasonable questions. It went from heaven to hell over the span of a single damp, mild autumn. So, as you can guess, I came to resent the place. But there's another element to it:

in my time working there, I would come to learn that the fire that destroyed the place was entirely preventable; there was a known gas leak in one of the deep fryers, and management knew, but refused to shell out the $15 to patch the line (just like they refused to give us PPE, or generally fix anything ever). Quite a long time after they found out and after many staff reports of this gas leak, one night, it somehow finally ignited, and a $15 expense suddenly turned into tens of thousands of dollars. One night, while I was manning the fryers, I noticed one of them was producing bubbles of opaque white smoke from under the oil. My coworkers assured me it was "normal" and "just some food stuck under there." I've worked many a deep fryer, and had been working those particular ones for months, and never seen such a thing before. It was pretty easy for me to put two and two together on that one. The lifers weren't having it and insisted I ignore it and get back to work. A few weeks later, I quit on the spot after getting cussed out over asking if anybody had put an order in the oven yet. My work bestie was fired shortly afterwards, for what she claims was written down as "disobeying orders." She was very allergic to the fryer oil we used, it made her break out in painful, swollen hives, but the lifers kept insisting on making her clean the fryers, so it was probably that, I imagine. Who knows, though? There came a point where it was never enough, no amount of speed or cleanliness or quality. We were always understaffed, and now they'd fired one of their best workers. I met another one of the coworkers I'd bonded with working elsewhere. It was retail, under a notorious asshole boss, but at least it wasn't there. Her arms were covered in deep burn scars the day she'd walked in, so I imagine she's used to it. I hope she'd okay. I should probably try to check in on her, actually. I never asked if she left or was fired. I know they never patched the leak. They didn't the first time. Of course they didn't learn their lesson, the whole place was just a number in the bloated investment portfolio of some silver spoon fatcat from Toronto, he didn't give a fuck. None of us ever even met him, or learned his name. Fully hands off. We'd pull like $15,000 or even $20,000 some nights, but all made minimum wage, and were always one call-in away from total collapse. They kept cutting hours. They would send people home in the middle of dinner rushes because "we're spending too much money on labour." Schedules became mere suggestions. We were never given end times to begin with. 11 or 12 hour shifts weren't uncommon on my end, but sometimes I'd only get 3. It was a coin flip every night. My point is, the place was managed, on all levels, by people who'd drown if it rained. Thinking about how perfect the place could have been still makes my heart rate increase. It filled a niche with absolutely no local competition. Our profit margins were absurd. And yet the dullards filling the office chairs didn't understand that you need cooks to produce food, and the place began creaking under their weight. I left before something gave. I suppose me leaving was something giving though, in a way. I worked my ass off for that place. I made them thousands, IN PROFIT, every night. I feel like maybe that triggered the exodus that followed, idk. Don't want to aggrandize myself too much. As far as I know, the second burning hasn't happened yet. But it will. It's all but guaranteed to. I hope that, just like last time, nobody's there when it happens. But I also hope that, unlike the first time, this time the entire place completely, unsalvageably burns down to ash, reduced to a concrete foundation. I hope there's nothing left to rebuild. I hope the cycle finally ends. I pretty much never got to take my legally mandated break again after that first shift, btw. Should have seen it as a sign, but it was just one shift right? They needed me, they said. They needed me.

[themultifanshipper]

It was a lot of fun, being persued by by two Formula 1 drivers. 

But they would soon be getting tired of the chase. They weren't going to let you stay ahead of them for much longer. 

Warnings: smut, finally bottom franco, technically a threesome but not really, restraints (belt), edging, shower sex, anal (mxm), face fucking, tension?

Anon originally had an idea with journalist reader but I went in another direction :3

The tension between you and Max had been brewing since your rookie year. 

You'd instantly taken a liking to each other and hung out all the time whenever you had breaks. 

You'd been on his yacht, he'd been to your family's vineyard for some wine tasting. You were good friends, and you knew each other exceedingly well. 

And of course it wasn't rare for the two of you to find yourselves battling for positions on track, and even came together a couple of times over the years. 

That lead to some pretty heated arguments, you even took a swing at him once. You were both hot-headed competitors, it was inevitable. 

Nothing ever happened between you though, you'd always kept a sensible distance to your coworkers. 

But you couldn't help being a tease. 

You'd put sexy bikini pictures of yourself on holiday in your private story, which only Max had access to. 

He figured it out pretty quickly when no one else seemed to know what the hell he was talking about when he asked them about it. 

And then Franco arrived. 

But he never pushed. If this was a game you wanted to play, he could wait it out, no problem. If you got desperate enough you would come crawling to him, he was sure of it. 

Franco was the biggest flirt you'd ever seen. Surpassing the likes of Daniel and Carlos as the smoothest talker on the grid. 

 He was slightly closer to you in age, so you gravitated towards each other naturally. 

You went on holiday with him a couple of times, and you went clubbing a lot. 

So pretty soon the rumours shifted from you and Max, to you and Franco. 

And there were pictures circulating. You and Max had had your fair share of paparazzi nuisances, but with Franco it was on another level. 

It was impossible to see each other without photos coming out the next day. 

Some were photoshopped, like the ones of you and him on your yacht, kissing.  

Or at least that's what your PR team told the public. 

You hadn't slept with him of course, but 4 glasses of wine is 4 glasses of wine. 

That's 3 too many if you want to keep a clear head. And day drinking in the sun is a dangerous game when you're alone with a horny man on a yacht. 

But you politely rejected his advances, insisting that your relationship was supposed to be professional. 

Max saw the photos. Of course he did. And he knew they weren't fake, so the next time he saw you he confronted you. 

Much to the chagrin of both of your bodies’ needs. 

“So how's it going with Colapinto?” he asked, faking nonchalance while you waved to the fans at the drivers parade. 

“Nothing's going on, don't be jealous” you plastered a fake smile on your face for the cameras. 

“I'm not jealous” he snapped. 

“Sure you aren't, Max. Anyway I keep my love life, and sex life, separate from my career, you know that”  

He scoffed, turning away from you to talk to whoever was on his other side.  

During the next week you decided to spice things up a little. 

The race weekend went by without a hitch, and Max didn't bring it up again. 

You sent Max a dirty picture. 

Nothing too bad, just you in some lingerie and a see through robe that hid absolutely nothing.  

You followed it up with “shit, that wasn't for you sorry” 

If that didn't get Max riled up nothing would. 

But to your disappointment, he didn't reply. 

That night you got yourself off to Franco's answering texts instead. You sent the same picture with the same caption, and waited for him to take the bait. 

The next weekend Max cornered you in the paddock on media day. 

He’d played the game at least, sending you a delicious picture in return, in the name of fairness. 

He dragged you to a quiet corner and caged you in against the wall. 

“What the fuck are you playing at?” he hissed, pressing you against the wall. 

“What the fuck Max! What are you even talking abou-” 

“I'm not fucking stupid, I know that picture was for me” 

You sighed. 

“No it wasn't, Max” 

“Who was it for, then?” 

“Wouldn't you like to know” you smirked, which just made him angrier. 

“Yes, I would actually”  

You pushed him off roughly and he stumbled backwards, taken off guard by your sudden aggressiveness. 

“None of your fucking business. And if you want to fuck me, this really isn't the right way to go about it” 

The next day, lord knows how, Franco managed to sneak into your driver’s room. 

You sauntered off, leaving Max to fume in silence at your audacity. 

“I enjoyed that picture very much, you know” he mumbled as he approached you from behind. 

He quickly plastered himself to your back, hands on your hips while he felt you up. 

“I'm sure you did. But it was an accident” your voice shook as his hands wandered. 

He chuckled. “I am not convinced of that”  

He placed kisses along the side of your neck, trailing upwards towards your lips as he turned your head to look at him. 

“Any chance I can see more?” 

His lidded eyes bore into yours and you sighed, pushing him away half-heartedly.  

“No Franco. I can't go around sleeping with my coworkers. It's not professional” 

He smirked. “Not professional? Tell me, who was that picture for?” 

You hesitated a second too long. 

“You don't know him.” 

He bit his lip mockingly, he knew you were lying. “Okay. I guess will just go then”  

Max won the race. He was back on his A-game and you’d spent the second part of the race squabbling with Franco and Alex over 10th place for the last point. 

And he did, he slipped out without anyone noticing him, leaving you to contemplate your next move. 

You got it, at the expense of Franco's front wing. 

“That was a dirty move” he groaned into your neck. 

You'd found yourselves back in the same position, him grinding against your ass, this time in the club while the bass made your bodies thrum with excitement. 

“If you want to get my attention, crashing into me isn't the right way to go about it” 

You shivered, both at his tone and at the fact that you'd said almost exactly that to Max three days prior. 

“Why would I want your attention?” you murmured back, enjoying the feeling of his hands caressing your body. 

“Darling, we both know you want to fuck me” 

You turned around in his hold, giving him the most seductive eyes you could muster. 

“No I don't” 

He groaned and threw his head back in frustration. 

“Don't do this to me. We both want it, stop playing around and let me show you how good I can make you feel…” 

You smiled and leaned in. 

“But where's the fun in that?” 

You removed his hands from you body and slinked back into the crowd. 

What you didn't know is that Max was in the DJ booth with Lando, and with his vantage point he could see everything. 

Running away, once again. 

He saw you slip away through the crowd and over to the bar. 

His blood boiled and he decided to take action. 

But he didn't make his way to you. He went to see Franco instead. 

“Mate I need to talk to you” 

“Ok, mate” Franco was confused, but followed him towards the bathrooms anyway, where it was slightly quieter. 

“Did she send you a picture of herself last week?” Max was going straight to point. 

Franco hesitated. “Who?” 

Max rolled his eyes at the younger man “You know who, don't play stupid” 

The sudden thought that you might be in a relationship with Max flashed through Franco’s mind. 

What if he'd read the situation all wrong? What if Max had found out about the flirting and was actually about to beat him up? 

“No?” he answered, but it sounded unconvincing even to his own ears. 

Max looked unimpressed. 

“Give me your phone” 

Franco complied immediately.  

Max proceeded to scroll through his messages, and clicked on the conversation with you. 

The picture of Franco appeared on his screen first, and he looked up at the man incredulously. 

“You sent one back? It was obviously bait. Are you stupid?” 

“I know it's all a game to her” he snatched his phone back “but playing it got me a very nice picture of her so who cares?” 

“I'm not playing the game and I got the same fucking photo” 

Franco frowned at his phone, and had to admit, he had him there. Maybe he had been stupid. 

“Well… you keep not playing, and I will keep playing, and we will see who get her to break first?” he suggested. 

“No” Max snapped. “I am sick of not playing”  

He glanced at Franco's screen, where the photo of you was still visible. 

They completely ignored you for two whole weeks. 

“She has been teasing us for too long. Now it's time she learned her lesson”… 

They avoided you at the weekend, and they never returned any of your calls and messages. 

You even tried sending them more pictures, but they both left you on read. 

You were bored. 

You knew something was up when you spotted the two of them deep in conversation in front of the Redbull garage. They were plotting. 

Max was pretty much your best friend on the grid, and you missed messing around with Franco. 

So on Saturday night, you sent them both a text you knew they wouldn't be able to ignore. 

Well Max might, but Franco would definitely crack. 

To Franco, you sent “If you come and fuck me now, I won't tell Max” 

And to Max, “If you come fuck me now, I won't tell Franco” 

You sent them both your room number, and waited. They both saw the texts immediately. 

Max had too much self control, so you doubted whether he would be desperate enough to show. 

You waited barely 20 minutes before Franco was at your door. 

But Franco…  

He was so easy. 

You had him on the bed, laying under you while you made your way down his body, picking off his clothing bit by bit. 

“I knew you wouldn't be able to resist me”  

His pupils were blown wide and a slight blush was creeping up his neck. 

“The offer was too good to pass up” he groaned as you rubbed yourself over the bulge rapidly growing in his boxers. 

You leaned down and pressed your lips to his, and he took the opportunity to wrap his arms around you and roll you over. 

“Your teasing has been driving me crazy” he panted, hovering over you while he made quick work of your clothes. 

“Why do you think I was doing it” you muttered with a smile, and his tongue poked the inside of his cheek as he realised how much you'd been enjoying teasing him. 

“To make me lose it and come fuck the shit out of you?” he asked, exasperated. 

“That's the plan” you bit your lip, looking up at him with a smile. 

“Perra” he groaned, sitting up. “Turn over” 

You raised an eyebrow at him, doing as he said. 

His hands were palming your ass while he admired the view, when a sharp knock at the door broke the tense silence. 

Your jaw dropped as you looked back at Franco who was wearing a similar look of shock on his face. 

Neither of you knew quite what to do, and the knock sounded again, louder this time. 

You jumped to your feet, grabbing a robe on the way and opened the door. 

Max stood there, fists clenched. 

“Max…” 

“Is Franco in there?” 

You were taken aback by his question. 

“And bear in mind, the answer is going to determine how this evening goes for you” 

You raised your eyebrows in surprise, but was saved answering by Franco appearing next to you. 

“I am here… sorry” 

He looked slightly afraid, and it was understandable, because the grin that spread over Max's face was evil enough to scare even you. 

“I had a feeling you would be here” he stepped inside, crowding against you as he slammed the door behind him. “Option number two, then”… 

You didn't know what option number one was, but number two involved you having your hands tied to the headboard, while Max had his cock shoved down Franco's throat. 

Which is not something you ever thought you would see. 

But there Franco was, drooling around Max’s girth with red cheeks and tears in his eyes. 

You knew he was enjoying it though, because he was still wearing his boxers and the wet patch at the front was getting steadily larger. 

“Look at you” Max cooed “are you crying because you got caught betraying me just to get your dick wet?” 

Franco whined, hips bucking at Max's tone. 

“Or are you crying because you’re enjoying this a bit too much?” 

Franco closed his eyes, more tears falling as he breathed deeply through his nose. 

“You were fucking made for this. You've obviously had practice, slut ” 

Franco whimpered pathetically and you throbbed at the sound. 

You were fully naked, spread out for Max to admire. 

“And you” he snapped at you. “You have been teasing me for years, making me wait, while posting pictures of yourself for my eyes only. Then this little bitch arrives and you let him touch you? Absolutely not” 

He pulled out of Franco's mouth and manhandled him onto his hands and knees, facing you while Max dragged his boxers down his legs. 

Franco's eyes widened as he looked at you, glancing between your thighs at where you were glistening in the soft light. 

“You've been playing games with me since you joined the grid. And you would just let Franco have you after a couple of months? Over my dead fucking body” 

He pushed Franco down onto the bed, making his arms buckle and his back arch obscenely, and the younger man gasped. 

“So I'm going to fuck Franco, and you are going to watch.” 

God knows where the bottle of lube came from, but you were grateful for it, on Franco's behalf. 

The way Franco reacted when the first finger went it made you gasp softly. 

His eyes fluttered closed and he arched his back even more, pushing back against Max as he let out a porn worthy whimper. 

You were getting so turned on, you went to close your thighs but Max tutted. 

“Franco, hold her legs open” 

He obeyed, shuffled forwards and curled his hands around your knees to hold you in place. 

Unfortunately, that brought his face closer to your soaked folds and you could feel his cool breath down there. 

You whimpered and he groaned, leaning his head against one of your knees as he looked at your slick lips with a pained look on his face. 

“Don't you dare touch, Franco” Max growled “You need to learn patience” 

He was on three fingers already, and he was entranced by the way Franco's hole swallowed them greedily. 

He made quick work of lubing himself up and pushing into the younger man, who mewled at the stretch. 

“Jesus, you are tight.” He gritted his teeth as he pushed in to the hilt. “squeezing around me so good, maybe I should give up on her and just keep you as my plaything, hmm?” 

He gave an experimental thrust and Franco whined low in his throat as he looked up at you through lidded eyes. 

He looked so fucked out it was almost pathetic. 

But to be honest, you probably looked even worse. 

You squirmed against the bed, unable to get any sort of friction or stimulation as you were forced to watch Max rail Franco into the mattress. 

“You're fucking dripping” Max commented, finally glancing at where you could indeed feel the sheets under you becoming damp. 

He wrapped an arm around Franco's middle, shuffling him forwards until he was only an inch away from your soaked folds. 

“You want a taste Franco?” 

The younger man nodded as best he could with Max’s grip his hair. 

Max just chuckled and pushed Franco's face forward, allowing him to eat you out hastily. 

The sudden intense stimulation made you writhe under him, cursing as he sucked on your clit while his tongue delved into your wetness. 

“Fuck! Oh my god-“ you whined, hips trying to buck but Franco's hold on your thighs was too strong as he devoured you. 

As your moans increased in pitch, Max could tell you were getting closer and just as you were about to fall over the precipice, he pulled Franco's head back roughly. 

You cried out at the loss, and Max just chuckled, slamming his hips into Franco even harder. 

“Max please” you whined, and Max cooed in mock simpathy. 

He pushed Franco against you once again, revelling in the way he tightened around his cock at being manhandled like this. 

He angled his hips so that his cock pushed against Franco's prostate, and the vibrations of the resounding moan against your cunt got you right to the edge once again. 

But again, when Max saw your thighs start to tremble, he pulled on Franco's hair to separate him from you. 

Tears clung to your lashes as you were robbed of yet another orgasm, and Franco let out a loud moan. 

“I'm gonna come, Max!” he cried, and Max just picked up the pace of his hips. 

“Then come, I'm not stopping you” 

Once Franco had come down from his mind-numbing orgasm, Max pulled out of him carefully and rolled him over, making sure to avoid the puddle of cum now in the middle of the bed. 

Franco's eyes rolled back and his upper body slumped against the mattress as Max continued to pound into him while you watched helplessly. 

“You can go now, I will take it from here” he muttered as he handed Franco his clothes. 

You looked at Max. 

He looked at you on his way out, sending you a kiss before the door slammed shut behind him. 

He was making his way around the bed to come and untie you from the headboard. 

You weren't quite sure what to say to him as you stretched your arms. 

He walked into to the bathroom and turned the shower on, then poked his head around the doorway. 

“Come and join me”  

You got off the bed hesitantly. 

Was that it? Were you going to take a shower and then he’d leave? Or stay with you and talk? 

You weren't sure which option you hated more. 

You got to the bathroom and he was already under the water, cleaning himself without a care in the world. 

You approached him, putting an hand on his shoulder. 

“Max? Are you angry with me?” 

He huffed out a laugh. 

“No, why would I be angry?” 

He kept washing himself, and you had no idea what to answer. 

He had every right to be pissed after all. 

He looked at your confused face and chuckled. 

“No, I am not angry with you” 

You nodded, and he moved over a bit and pulled you under the spray. 

He pulled you against his chest and looked down at you. 

“I'm not angry, but I am sick of your games” 

You gulped. 

You could feel him against your hip, he was still hard. 

“You didn't come” you muttered, and he smiled. 

“Neither did you” 

Your heart was beating fast as you stared at him. 

“Are you planning to?” 

He nodded. 

“Oh yes. But you have a choice to make. Either I fuck you now, and we both come.” 

His hand came to cup your jaw as his thumb stroked your cheek. 

“Or, I leave right now, and you’ll never get to know how good you could've had it these past two years.” 

Your jaw dropped, and your cunt throbbed at the idea of finally getting to fuck Max. 

“Well?” his other hand trailed downwards to ghost over your folds, dipping in ever so slightly, to confirm that you were still soaked. “What will it be?” 

You gasped, head leaning back against the tiles of the shower wall. 

“Fuck me, please” 

He grinned. “That's what I was hoping for” 

He wasted no time turning you around and pushing into you roughly, your wetness easing the slide as he bottomed out on the first thrust. 

You both groaned, and he snapped his hips, determined to hear that noise again. 

He made you come twice like that, pressed against the shower wall as he took the frustration of the past two years out on you. 

He did indeed make you regret not giving in to him sooner. 

Later, in bed, you cuddled together after having changed the sheets. 

“So tell me Max. If tying me up and fucking Franco in front of me was option number two… what was option number one if Franco hadn't been here?” 

He chuckled, pulling you tighter against him. 

“If you had been alone, I would have tied you to the bed and left you there alone" 

You gasped. 

“and Franco?” 

“I would have fucked him anyway, to congratulate him for not giving in to you” 

You went silent. Thank god for Franco’s weak will. 

“Can I fuck him?" you asked "I really want to"

Max nuzzled into your neck and nipped at your skin. 

“Of course. As long as I can keep fucking you, I don’t really care” 

You hummed and turned your head, looking into his deep blue eyes.  

“Sounds good to me” 

He smiled, giving you a quick kiss before laying his head back on the pillow. 

“Me too” 

You giggled sleepily.  

Just like you planned. 

You had your best friend back, and two men were at your beck and call.  

[queeniewithabeanie]

The Little Stalker

Dpxdc Prompt #21

Timothy Jackson Drake is amazing at being really good at things he can't let anyone else know about.

Exhibit A: Tim is very sneaky, or at least sneaky enough that Batman and Robin don't notice him stalking following them around at night.

Exhibit B: Tim is a great photographer! He's most likely gotten more clear photos of the Dynamic Duo in the past week than everyone else since they started operating.

Exhibit C: Tim is an awesome detective. He's figured out Batman and Robin's identities, which he's pretty sure no one else has done.

All and all Tim is great at sneaking, photography, and detective work! Except—it seems—when any of it has to do with Phantom, the vigilante of Crime Alley.

Tim: follows Jason and Bruce around every night for a week, with neither even looking into his direction Also Tim: steps one foot into Crime Alley and is picked up by the hood of his sweater by Danny and corralled by him outside of Gotham City's crime central

Tim: takes flawless photos of Jason and Bruce, having dedicated so much time to doing so that they probably would be mistaken as professional Also Tim: anytime he gets close enough to Danny to even take a photo they come out so blurry it looks like tv static

Tim: figured out Bruce, Dick, and Jason's identities from a fact he learned when he was like 3 years old Also Tim: doesn't even have a vague idea that Phantom, protector of Crime Alley, and Danny, his babysitter are even tangentially related

Meanwhile Danny's just trying to look out for the guys that Batman and Robin's help for some reason doesn't extend to. Now if only the kid that he babysits for a little extra cash would stop trying, and failing, stalking him.

[kooggukk]

𖦹 ׂ 𓈒 BEYOND THE JOB // JJK

daddy jungkook (literally)

; babysitting the cutest angel on earth is the perfect job. (except when her father is fucking hot and wants all of you)

+ comment if u wnna be added to the taglist

— 1/??

“seriously though, you have to fuckin’ quit that job already.”

Sasha, who happens to be your best friend ever since you started working at the local elementary school, just lectured you again. she was already teaching there when you arrived, you spent your lunch breaks with her and even be each other’s substitute sometimes.

surprisingly, she quit a few months after that. you stayed close though. at first, she was dying to know the drama happening among the teaching staff, but as shit kept going down which included you and the principal, all you ever hear from her is that you need to quit.

it wasn’t a huge surprise to her when you first told her your boss, aka the school’s principal, asked you out. it was weird, but everyone knew he was.. a little desperate. he had asked most of the female teachers out, some who agreed could only say bad things about the experience.

you declined his offer politely, explaining that you don’t want your personal life to mix with your job. it was awkward after that, but turns out he seems to be the dumbest person on earth. he asked you out two weeks after that, again.

still to this day, he keeps asking you out over and over and you keep rejecting him over and over again. sure, he got a lil’ crush on you, sweet, right? fuck no. he’s a pervert, doesn’t know what personal space is.

“but i need the money. i don’t know where else i could get such good salary.” you told her, for the nth time.

“be a stripper,” Sasha casually said, sipping on her diet coke while your eyes widened.

“don’t say nonsense, dafuq..” you both shared a giggle, but you definitely won’t put that job idea on the bottom of your list. maybe in the middle, or top 5. if you really can’t find a good place, then gotta be top 3.

“you could be one until you save enough money, then look for a less crazy one.”

“there’s never enough money, sasha.” you sighed, fuck inflation. when you grew up and finished studying, you realized the hardest part of being an adult was money. it’s crazy how difficult it is to make a living.

“if you don’t give in your quitting notice tomorrow, i’m gonna do it for you instead.” she narrowed her eyes at you.

“i don’t want to make a decision too quick. not until i know i can find another job.”

“quit.”

“no.”

“quit.”

“no.”

“quit.”

…

“okay.”

she squealed in her chair, gaining some attention on the two of you.

“if you dare to lie to me right now, i’m gonna make you eat your own shit.”

you kicked her under the table, sending her a glare. “behave, bitch.”

┈ ⪩⪨   ┈

“oh, __! what brings you here today?” your boss, sehun immediately stood up from his chair, ready to greet you with a hug.

panicking, you reached your hand out with a paper, catching his attention. “this is..?”

“my resignation notice, sir.”

“your what?”

he took the paper from your grip, examining it carefully. his eyebrows fell together, eyes scanning every single word.

he backed up, resting on the edge of his table. he looked at the paper again, rereading the first sentence.

‘Kindly accept this letter as my formal resignation…’

“are you sure, __?” he asked, putting the paper on his table. he crossed his arms, frustration written on his face.

you fixed your hair, giving him a firm nod. “yeah, i’ve been thinking of it for a while now.”

“i’m glad i could be a part of this amazing team, but i just feel like,” you struggled to find the words, obviously you didn’t want to tell in his face.

‘aye bruh, stop bein’ a pervert and you might stop losing your workers’

“look, teaching isn’t my thing. and i feel horrible to find that out so late.”

“well, if your passion for teaching ever comes back, you’re more than welcomed here.”

“thank you,” you smiled, because even though he’s the most annoying person you’ve ever met, your co-workers have always been kind to you.

the children also love you, and you’re extremely thankful for all the support and love you got from everyone.

during the usual lunch break, you co-workers heard the news too. they all wished you the best with a hug, some getting emotional too.

officially, this was your last week working at the school.

when you got home, sasha sent you a link to an advertisement.

‘looking for a nanny’

you laughed, dialing her contact. didn’t take her long to answer, obviously. she’s always on her damn phone, even when working.

“you can’t be serious. a nanny?” you laughed, finding the idea of you with a kid ridiculous.

“have you seen the description? girl, they pay damn well!” she said, followed by her exhaling.

“didn’t you say you’re gonna stop smoking?”

“i stopped. for three hours.”

you shook your head, putting her on speaker as you clicked the advertisement.

“170.000₩?” you blurted out loud, “a day?!” sasha hummed on the other side of the call.

“told ya’..”

“that’s.. nice. woah, yeah, nice.” you mumbled as you continued to read the requirements and some important details about the job.

“give it a try.” sasha said, but your eyes caught a sentence.

“they want someone with experience, as expected.” you let out a long sigh and fell back on your bed.

“you got the experience.”

“me? sasha, i never looked after a kid-“

“you work with kids. first and second graders. and they all fuckin’ love you.”

“that’s different.” you groaned.

“it’s not. a kid is a kid. 3 year olds are just as damn annoying as 7 year olds. prove me wrong..”

you laughed, she was right. they can be a huge pain in the ass, but they have the purest soul.

“true.”

“give it a try, __.” she said again, calling you by your name. oh she’s serious serious.

“yeah, i might call tomorrow then.”

“might? no, you will.” she corrected you and you rolled your eyes.

“sure.”

you called them the next day after considering it for half a day, being the typical embarrassment, you called at the wrong time.

the man was in a hurry, so you both just quickly agree on a time to meet in person. that happened to be the day after.

you looked at the address one more time after you got off the bus, realizing it was more of a wealthy neighborhood. you only had to walk about 5 minutes until you got there, hesitantly but you pressed the bell.

a tall, young man opened the door. his skin is smooth and fair, almost perfect. his hair dark, slightly wavy which was styled in a mullet cut, longer at the back.

his choice in clothes seemed to be rich, a white ribbed polo shirt with short sleeves, causing your eyes to drop to his sleeve tattoo in a second. he paired it with black tailored trousers.

“hey, you must be __?” he asked with uncertainty and you came back to life, smiling to him.

“yeah, i am.”

“great, come in.”

he stepped aside and you walked in, taking off your shoes and jacket.

the house was oddly barely decorated, not a single picture or painting on the walls, very few plants, which you’re sure are fake plants also. the house wasn’t really colorful, most of the furnitures are bright. like beige and cream white.

“would you like a drink? water, tea, soda? maybe coffee?” he suggested as he walked in front of you, leading you to the living room.

“no, thank you.” you politely refused, feeling a little.. off in such a nice home. not something you’re used to.

you sat down on the couch, carefully not to mess the neatly placed pillows behind. god you looked so uncomfortable and awkward.

“i’d like to introduce myself again, in person this time.” he spoke as he sat down on the armchair, next to the couch.

“i’m jeon jungkook, 27. i’m a dentist in the center of seoul. i’m the father of a sweet angel, nabi. she turns 5 in a few weeks, we could say she’s in her, erm,” he struggled to find an appropriate word.

“crazy phase?” you asked with a smile.

“yeah, something like that. she’s been loud lately, that’s all.” he chuckled, resting his arms on his knees.

you nodded and held your small bag tightly, “i’d like to introduce myself better too, then.”

“i’m __, 24 and i currently work at an elementary school. i handed in my resignation letter and this is my last week as a teacher, so i’m searching for a new job currently.”

you paused, hesitant what else to say.

“elementary school? so, you work with kids?”

“yes, first and second grade.”

after a few minutes of getting to know each other more, a little girl, most likely his daughter, walked down the stairs with her sleepy appearance.

“oh!” she stopped the moment she saw you, the tiredness leaving her eyes.

“nabi, c’mere.” jungkook held out his hand, “this is __. what do you say?” he asked her, holding her tiny hands.

“hello.” she greeted you and you smiled, her shyness is adorable.

“hi.”

“__ is here because she would like to look after you.” he said and she looked up to him so fast, you thought her neck would snap.

“daddy, are you leeving me?” she gasped and jungkook chuckled at her words, shaking his head.

“no, but when i’m at work, someone needs to be here and take care of you. how about __, does she seem nice? hm?”

the little girl shrugged, hugging her father’s arm. he sent her back to the bedroom, saying he would be there soon too.

“well, she’s a little shy at first but, i think she’s gonna open up fast.” he smiled and stood up, your eyes widening a bit and you stood up too.

“does that mean, i got the job?”

“see you next monday?” he asked and you almost started jumping, but you held back. instead, you gave him a huge smile and nodded.

“monday then.”

[thiswasachoice]

All true and delightful, but you should really report your cash tips. Not because it's the right thing to do or it's the law or any of that jazz. But because you will absolutely get fucked over on your social security payments later in life (or earlier if you become/are disabled) if you do not.

Social security works by taking the top 35 years of your employment and using that, with some arcane graphs, to calculate how much you will receive when you hit 67. If you don't have any reportable income for a year, say because you took all of your payments in cash and didn't report it on your taxes, you get a zero. If more than 25 of those years are 0s, i.e. if you have reported less than 10 years of income, YOU WILL NOT GET ANY SOCIAL SECURITY. Period. None. Not even if you contributed enormous amounts in the other 9.5 years. It will all be gone and you will not be eligible for any social security payments, even if you become disabled or would be eligible for survivor's benefits. (Yes these rules have exceptions and details based on ages and categories, but this is a general rule.)

But Jack, you might say, I have basically no money! I can't afford to pay taxes on what I do earn!

How do you know my name, and why are you in my house, I will reply.

But in all seriousness, if you have basically no money, you are exactly the person who should be reporting it! If you have very low income:

1. You will likely pay low or no taxes and may be eligible to receive payments instead, which you can only get by filing. If you are in the bottom 20% of earners, on average social security taxes will cost 8.3% of your income but tax credits will return 9.3%, leaving you ahead now and in 35 years years, just by filing.

2. Social security has a minimum benefit amount based on years in the workforce. If you retired today after 35 years of paying 5$ a year in social security taxes, congratulations you're now entitled to $1,066.50 per month! That's the best investment you could ever make!

3. You can report and pay taxes on your own income, even if your employer doesn't report or you do freelance or other non-employee work.

4. If you have an employer who does give you a W-2 and they try to get you to take your tips under the table or take a portion of your pay on the side they are trying to fuck you out of your social security. Why? Because the employer pays the same amount into your social security as you do and if they don't report your actual salary, they don't get taxed on the full amount and you don't get their payments credited.

People don't know these things because they aren't taught them. When I was a kid, I made $7 an hour working as a secretary in a church office for four hours a week. My parents made sure I reported every penny of it and paid taxes. The same thing happened for every summer job and student worker position when I was in college. As a result of that, at the age of 24 I had fulfilled my 10 year social security requirement and if I became disabled or couldn't find a job, I would still be vested in the program. If I get hit by a bus, my wife will collect a survivor's benefit. It probably cost 300$ over the course of ten years. I thought it was stupid at the time, I wanted the extra money, I thought taxes were bullshit when I made so little, but that was the best thing they could have done for me. The system is set up in such a way that it benefits those who understand it. I didn't, but I was lucky enough to be in the care of those who did.

There are people who tax evasion benefits. Those people aren't working part time jobs, waitressing, caddying, or doing housework though. They are evading tax bills larger than your yearly salary. And one of the ways they do it is to convince you to do it, so they don't have to pay their fair share of your benefits. And you know what all of those folks have in common, even as they dodge taxes across jurisdictions and try to convince you to take cash under the table? They all pay their fucking social security taxes.

STOP assigning pre-modern characters the trait “would commit tax fraud” without understanding how hard tax fraud was back in the days when a tax collector would physically come to your estate and assess your sitch. Do you have any idea how easy kids these days have it? You can just claim a few fake deductions or lie on a form and be a tax criminal. Your ancestors and fantasy faves had to work for those pennies.

Look at this house. This house has no mortar so it can be collapsed or moved to avoid taxation. That’s the sort of innovation I need to be seeing before you can call anyone in a feudal society a tax fraudster. They need to be hiding warehouses of goods, shoving grandpa in the basement to dodge the censusman, starting small regional wars, fleeing their villages in a constant semi-nomadic race against the forces of government, registering twins as a single child, or putting their life on the line to sell blackmarket bread. Come back when you have some tax fraud I can respect, not just a guy who looks kind of sleazy and sometimes does paperwork.

[lightseoul]

a/n. pleasantly surprised at how quickly i wrote this bit, it practically wrote itself. glad the first part was interesting for a lot of you—i love writing about psych/therapy stuff (despite my complex relationship with 'em), and ofc bkg <3 i honestly don't know where i'm going with this, but it's been fun so far. (0.8k)

navigation. part 1, (you are here)

thankfully—and to the relief of whatever dignity he had left—that interaction was short-lived.

well, it’s mostly because after you blinked at him for what felt like a torturous eternity and said a shaky hello back, he gave you a curt nod as if he wasn’t the one who just initiated the exchange and bolted it out of there without a single glance back.

that bit haunted him for the next few days, reappearing in his consciousness whenever the topic of therapy or anything remotely close to it was broached. he even snapped at kirishima when the redhead asked how his latest session went during one of their evening patrols together. it was a kneejerk reaction, an entirely out-of-proportion, aggressive response that shocked even him, which says a lot.

he should go ahead and text the guy an apology.

eventually, though, that unfortunate powwow slowly faded into the background of his exceptionally busy mind as the days went on. things got so hectic in the agency that he had to postpone his appointment for the week, which—quite frankly—is an upside to this chaos, because he sure wasn’t pumped about discussing his love life, or the lack thereof, with the jarringly knowing middle-aged lady. being able to definitively avoid you and buy you more time to forget about his stupid social blunder is merely the cherry on top.

okay, maybe the incident didn’t actually slip his mind after all.

“…bakugou-san? are you still with me?”

dazed, bakugou squeezes his eyes shut before fluttering them open, and what greets him is the very same lady against the backdrop of her increasingly familiar office, only this time she’s looking more concerned than perceptive.

right. he’s supposed to be in the middle of a session right now.

“yeah, sorry,” he mumbles, shaking his head in an attempt to rid himself of irrelevant thoughts and focus on the matters at hand. therapy is expensive, after all. “i’m here.”

that doesn’t seem to placate the woman who instead prods, much to his chagrin. “you seem out of it today. is there something in your mind that you want us to talk about?”

for a second, he debates caving and just telling her the dumb shit that happened two weeks ago, but then backtracks when it dawns on him how ridiculous everything is. what is he, a prepubescent boy? he died and survived a major war, for fuck’s sake. why is he so hung up on seeming awkward for once in his life?

even hearing it in his head is embarrassing enough.

that settles it, then. his lips are and will remain sealed.

but then his gaze refocuses on his therapist, and the sheer ‘unconditional positive regard’ or whatever the crap is called that she’s radiating becomes so palpable that it just spills out of him.

“i fucked up.”

that makes the lady frown—which, if he thinks about it, is understandable, because he rarely opens up about his failures, let alone this blatantly—although she manages to quickly school her expression into a more neutral one. “can i ask you to expound on it?”

at that, bakugou sighs, because it’s either he just tells the laughable truth or actually cite one of his actual mistakes—which he’s not feeling right now, by the way. or he can expertly maneuver the conversation to another topic, but something tells him there’s no getting out of the current subject. maybe today, there is, but it’ll surely loom over their next sessions indefinitely until either of them revisits it.

he should know. it’s happened to him too many times, he’s lost count.

with this realization, he can only sigh again.

“it’s stupid,” he preempts.

“i’d like to hear it regardless,” comes her classic, supportive response.

and so he does it. talk, that is. it starts off a bit rough—he didn’t know how to even begin without flushing like an idiot, but he managed to get the brief anecdote going. he still ended up blushing anyway—the warmth in his cheeks was undeniable—and if she noticed, she gratefully didn’t point it out. by the time he’s finished with the trivial tale, he’s mildly out of breath, having said everything in one continuous burst.

“i told you,” he spits when she doesn’t say anything for a beat. “it’s stupid.”

“i’d normally ask you to reconsider the adjectives you use for yourself and your experiences, but i think you’ve heard enough of that.”

he snorts. damn straight.

the woman then shoots him a smile, and he has to tamp down the reflex to bristle at an impending attempt to placate him. fortunately, it doesn’t come.

what does, instead, is a question.

one that catches him completely off guard.

“did you find her attractive?”

the fuck, is his first, immediate thought.

but then his normally trusty and acute brain seemingly comes to life and promptly supplies a second one that leaves him frozen and utterly dumbfounded.

yes.

˖⁺‧₊ as always, reblogs, replies, and tags are appreciated <3 feel free to drop an ask, too—i'd love to chat with you. have a nice day!

tagging. @bunnysaursushii @yawnzzzzzzzz @cholios @kashee-h @iluv-ace @lotuslovers @elarakive @sugurusmoon @napbatata @k0z3me @h0ngh0ngh0ng @honeyoru @yoongiwithglasses @hellokitty-doll @lilsebnem @tetsuukuroo @crangrapel0ver @syrhra | @kalulakunundrum @cheezemanz @gold24fish @lunaryasha

[veggiesxxx]

When they get jealous (HCs)

Rafayel (1/4)

- He's not afraid to show you how affected he is by it

- he absolutely will complain and believes you're abandoning him

- a dehydrated fish, 'drying out'

- when you get irritated by the pouty whining he'll apologise

- will subtly bring up your past together as a silent plea to not leave him

- he exaggerates what happened that made him jealous for sympathy points

- doesn't mean whatever he says about you going to leave him— would rather paint an ugly picture and sign it than have you more than 3 feet away from him.

- take care of him pls (he says with watery eyes ☹️)

Sylus (2/4)

- Jealous? No, not him.

- Definitely not him.

- acts like he was just concerned about his kitten's safety, thats why he's brooding around with Mephisto on his shoulder

- when in reality he's afraid you're gonna leave him.

- will not let go of your hand after the incident for at least a week

- insists you wear the brooch he gave you every day after that— wear it in your hair if you have to— even if it doesn't match

- wants it to be the first thing you tell people about when you meet them

- in his head, it goes: "hi. look at this thing my lover gave me. Yeah, *blocks them*"

Zayne (3/4)

- it's him. he's jealous.

- you can't accept gifts from guys. that's a no no.

- if you do happen to accept something while he's not there, trust me, he'll find out

- he will mail the gift back to the sender with a polite restraining order

- if you get upset with him for it, he will just smile at you and pet your head. He's already prepared for it. He took an off-day to spend time with you. He knows his little hunter is smart enough to realise he sent the gift back.

- he doesnt mind listening to you scold and berate him, only occasionally giving you some intelligent-ass remark or response that forces you to pause

- his remark will make you get more pissed at him and scold him more indignantly

- to be honest, he does it on purpose. He just likes to hear your voice.

Xavier (4/4)

- sulk. sulk. sulk. that's all that's on his mind

- he's clueless on how else to respond. you surely can't expect him to actually be upfront about his feelings, right? it's much easier to just wait for his adorable star to comfort him.

- and it makes him feel better when he knows you can tell when he's upset— and you don't tell him how obvious he is either

- he thinks he hides it well, actually. And he'll regard you as a really good significant other because you know what he's feeling

- he has a low tolerance for jealousy, so after a few times of this in succession, sprinkling him with affection isn't enough to stop his sulking

- will take his anger out on anything other than you

- wishes he could punch the other man/men in the face

- why do people need to be spared if they're as dangerous as wanderers?

- dangerous as in going to steal his beloved's heart, of course. in his opinion, thats worse than a wanderer.

-ˋ��✄┈┈┈┈

(Click on their names to link to respective POV oneshot)

[bettys-redwinesupernova]

WAITING AIN’T EASY

drew starkey x fem!reader

SUMMARY: after 6 gruelling months of long distance with drew, y/n decides to surprise him on set. listen to ‘waiting ain’t easy’ — Evan Honer!!

based on this ask !! i really hope you enjoy my lovely :) amazing ask as always !! i made a little twist on it though, and added some angsty goodness to make it more emotional <3

WARNINGS: angst to fluff, fighting, crying, mentions of breaking up, long distance relationship, like one (?) curse word, brief mention of cheating rumours (made by the media) and i think that’s it? (lmk if i missed anything !!)

WORD COUNT: 1.8k

THIRD PERSON +

Y/N stared out at the crashing waves outside her beachfront rental in Australia, the sun dipping low in a painted sky of reds and golds. Normally, she would've snapped a picture to send Drew, knowing how much he loved sunsets. But tonight, her phone sat abandoned on the kitchen counter, vibrating occasionally with notifications she couldn't bring herself to check.

It had been nearly six months since she'd left for Australia to film her new movie, a dream opportunity that she'd accepted with boundless enthusiasm. Drew had been so supportive at first, kissing her forehead and promising her they'd figure it out. "Eight months will fly by," he'd said. "We'll make it work." And for a while, they had.

The first few months had been manageable—late-night FaceTime calls, text messages scattered throughout the day, photos exchanged to make each other smile. But as the weeks turned into months, the strain started to show. The time difference, their conflicting schedules, and the exhaustion from their respective work had turned their once-effortless connection into something fragmented and brittle.

And then there were the rumors.

The first article had popped up about a month ago, with pictures of Y/N and her co-star, Paul Mescal, leaving a restaurant. They'd been with a group of castmates, but the tabloids didn't care about context. The angle made it look intimate, as if the two of them had been alone. Headlines screamed: "New Flame on Set?" and "Trouble in Paradise for Drew Starkey and Y/N?"

Drew hadn't believed the rumors—not really. He knew how tabloids worked. But the seed of doubt had been planted. Their conversations became laced with tension. "Why didn't you tell me you were going out?" Drew had asked one night, his voice tight.

"I didn't think I had to give you a play-by-play of my day," she'd snapped, the exhaustion from a grueling shoot making her sharper than she intended.

"I'm not asking for a play-by-play, Y/N. I just want to know what's going on in your life. Is that too much to ask?"

The fight spiraled from there, unresolved, and left a bitter taste that lingered.

Tonight, their most recent argument had pushed them to a breaking point.

She answered the phone after his third call, her voice strained. "Hey."

"Hey," Drew replied, the weight of unspoken words heavy in the silence that followed.

"I'm sorry I didn't call earlier," she began, trying to preempt his frustration. "I got caught up on set, and—"

"Y/N, you always get caught up on set," Drew interrupted, his tone clipped. "I'm starting to feel like I'm not a priority anymore."

Her heart sank. "That's not fair."

"Isn't it? Because it feels like I'm the only one trying here."

"Trying?" she repeated, her voice rising. "Drew, do you know how hard this has been for me too? I miss you every single day, but I can't just drop everything to cater to your insecurities."

"Insecurities?" he echoed, incredulous. "You're calling me insecure because I want to spend more than five minutes talking to my girlfriend? Because I'm tired of feeling like I'm the last thing on your mind?"

"Don't do this," she pleaded, her voice breaking. "Don't twist this into something it's not."

"Then tell me what it is, Y/N," he shot back. "Because right now, it feels like we're falling apart."

Her throat tightened. "Maybe we are," she whispered, the words slipping out before she could stop them.

The silence that followed was deafening.

Drew exhaled shakily on the other end of the line. "Do you really believe that?"

"I don't know what I believe anymore," she admitted, tears streaming down her face. "This... this isn't what I thought it would be. I didn't think it would hurt this much."

"You think I don't hurt too?" His voice cracked, raw with emotion. "You think I don't lie awake every night wishing you were here? That I don't feel like I'm losing my mind wondering if this is worth it anymore?"

Her chest tightened painfully, but she couldn't find the words to soothe him. To soothe herself. The weight of their love—their pain—pressed down on her like a crushing wave.

"I can't do this right now," she said finally, her voice barely above a whisper.

"Yeah," Drew said bitterly, "of course you can't."

And then the line went dead.

Y/N stared at the screen, her hand trembling as the call ended. She wanted to call him back, to take it all back, but the words hung in the air between them, too heavy to ignore.

Halfway across the world in Charleston, Drew sat in his apartment, his phone clutched in his hand. He stared at the empty screen, the echo of their fight replaying in his mind. The silence in the room was deafening, the loneliness suffocating.

They were both alone, yet they'd never felt further apart.

—

Drew sat on set, legs stretched out as he leaned back in his chair, absentmindedly scrolling through his phone. The day had been slow, and while he loved working on Outer Banks, his mind wasn't fully there. It hadn't been for weeks. The weight of his argument with Y/N lingered, the harsh words and silence that followed gnawing at him.

He sighed, locking his phone and tossing it onto the nearby table. The OBX cast was scattered around the set, some chatting, others grabbing snacks. Madelyn, Madison and Carlacia were huddled together near the craft services table, giggling about something. Their sudden burst of laughter caught Drew's attention.

"What's so funny?" he called out, raising an eyebrow.

"Nothing!" Madison replied quickly, a little too quickly. She nudged Carlacia, who bit her lip to stifle another laugh.

Suspicious, Drew tilted his head but didn't press further. He wasn't in the mood for their antics today. As much as he loved his friends, all he really wanted was Y/N. Six months apart felt like an eternity, and knowing they still had two more months to go made the ache in his chest worse.

What he didn't know was that Y/N was only minutes away.

Y/N stepped off the plane, her heart pounding as she adjusted her bag on her shoulder. She had managed to keep the wrap of her film a secret from Drew, wanting to surprise him in the best way possible. It hadn't been easy; she'd had to bite her tongue during their rare phone calls and carefully avoid social media posts that might tip him off.

Madelyn, Madison and Carlacia had been the first people she told about her plan, and they had been more than happy to help. When she landed, they were waiting for her, practically vibrating with excitement.

"You ready to blow his mind?" Madelyn asked, grinning as she pulled Y/N into a hug.

"I've never been more ready," Y/N said, her nerves and excitement warring within her.

Carlacia held up her phone, ready to document everything. "Okay, we've got this all planned. He's sitting in the main lounge area. You just walk in, and we'll follow behind you."

Y/N nodded, exhaling shakily. "Let's do this."

Back on set, Drew was oblivious. The girls had disappeared somewhere, but he didn't think much of it. They were always running off to do their own thing. He leaned forward, rubbing his hands over his face as exhaustion crept in.

The sound of footsteps approaching barely registered until he heard a familiar voice, soft and hesitant.

"Hey, Starkey."

Drew's head whipped around so fast that his chair tipped backward, clattering to the floor. He stumbled to his feet, his heart racing as his eyes locked on her.

"Y/N?" His voice cracked, disbelief written all over his face.

Before she could say another word, Drew launched himself toward her, nearly tripping over his fallen chair in his haste. He reached her in seconds, his arms wrapping tightly around her as he lifted her off the ground.

"Y/N," he choked out, his voice breaking as he buried his face in her shoulder.

She clung to him just as tightly, her arms wrapped around his neck as tears spilled down her cheeks. "Hi, baby," she whispered, her voice shaking.

Drew pulled back just enough to look at her, his face streaked with tears. "You're here? How are you here? I thought—"

"My shoot wrapped early," she interrupted, laughing through her tears. "I wanted to surprise you."

Drew didn't hesitate. He leaned in, capturing her lips in a kiss so full of love and longing that it made Y/N's knees weak. Around them, the cast erupted in exaggerated groans and laughter.

"Get a room!" Rudy teased, shielding his eyes dramatically.

"Y'all are gonna make me cry," Carlacia joked, still filming the entire moment.

When Drew finally pulled away, his forehead rested against Y/N's, his tears falling freely now. "God, I missed you," he whispered, his voice thick with emotion. "I missed you so fucking much."

"I missed you too," Y/N said, her hands cupping his face as she brushed away his tears. "I'm so sorry, Drew. For everything. For the fight, for the silence. I hated it. I hated being apart from you."

"Me too," Drew admitted, his voice cracking again. "I was so scared, Y/N. Scared I was losing you."

"Never," she said firmly. "I was scared too, but I never stopped loving you. Not for a second."

Drew let out a shaky laugh, his arms tightening around her as if he were afraid she might disappear. "Waiting ain't easy," he said softly, his eyes searching hers, "but it's worth it for you. Always."

Y/N felt fresh tears well up as she kissed him again, pouring every ounce of love and reassurance she had into it. When they finally broke apart, the cast was clapping and cheering, much to Drew's embarrassment.

"Alright, alright, show's over," Drew said, his cheeks flushed as he waved them off. But he couldn't stop smiling, and his hand never left Y/N's.

Carlacia walked up, showing them the video she had taken. "You two are gonna want this later. It's a tearjerker."

Drew chuckled, pulling Y/N closer. "Thanks, Laci."

As the cast gave them some space, Drew turned to Y/N, his eyes still glistening. "You're really here," he said again, as if he couldn't quite believe it.

"I'm here," she confirmed, her smile soft. "And I'm not going anywhere."

Drew's expression softened, his love for her radiating in his gaze. "Good. Because I don't ever want to do this without you again."

They spent the rest of the day glued to each other, catching up, apologising, and soaking in every second of finally being together again.

For the first time in six months, everything felt right.

(divider by @kodaswrld !!)

betty’s notes ౨ৎ ⋆｡˚

this was such an adorable one to write :’) i love writing hurt/comfort, it’s just my absolute fave genre of ff !! i really hope you enjoy this @xoxosblogsblog <3