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sidekick-hero · 11 months ago

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I didn’t know that it could be easy

When the wonderful @sentient-trash sent me this beautiful steddie art I knew I needed to write something for it. So why not fix the heartbreak I caused with this ficlet here? Thank you again, Simon, I love your art so much 💜💜

"It has to be perfect, Wayne. Do you hear me? Perfect."

Eddie knows he's overthinking this, obsessing over things that probably won't matter in the end, like the color of the tablecloth or whether the scented candles smell like cinnamon or vanilla. It's just...this is Steve and he needs this to be perfect because Steve deserves nothing less. Eddie almost screwed up this thing between them once, and he's been terrified of doing it again ever since.

It's a miracle and a half that they've made it this far. Their third Christmas as a couple, living together in their cozy apartment with their cat Garfield and their dog Bowie. That they made it to the point where Eddie has a ring hidden between his Dnd dice set, waiting to be placed on Steve's hand if he wants it.

God, what if he doesn't want it?

Because four years ago, Eddie had foolishly pined for Steve. Worst of all, he’d done so after pushing the other man away himself after a drunken night together early in their friendship slash roommateship. At the time, he'd thought his feelings had been one-sided, telling himself he'd done it so he wouldn't lose Steve completely. Eddie had never been the kind of guy you would choose to be with after a quick tumble in the sheets, so why would someone as sweet and funny and gorgeous as Steve?

As he discusses his plans for the evening with his uncle, so goddamn determined to make it the perfect Christmas for his boyfriend, he thinks back to their fight that had almost ended it all. Steve had been with someone else after Eddie had made it clear that their night together had been a drunken mistake and that he wanted them to be friends. Eddie had been dying inside, even as he tried to be happy for Steve. Things had come to a head when Eddie had come home and found Steve and his boyfriend Sam making out on the couch. He had reacted badly and Steve had followed Eddie to his room and confronted him about his behavior.

God, he can still see Steve's face, the tears forming in Steve's eyes as he told Eddie that he couldn't do it anymore, watching Eddie disappear before his eyes. Telling him that he fucking missed him. Steve's boyfriend had interrupted their fight before anything else could be said, and Eddie had left their apartment to wander aimlessly through the night.

"Don't forget the pecan pie, it's his favorite. And the banana ice cream. Yeah, I know I hate banana everything, but it's his guilty pleasure. I made some toffee and caramel beans to put in it and some chocolate topping and whipped cream to go with it, so - I don't know why you’re laughing at me, but I don't have time for this, he'll be back from walking Bowie any minute and I still have to put the presents under the tree. Just. Will you help me make this the best Christmas he'll ever remember? Please?"

He's an anxious mess, and he knows his uncle can tell, because instead of teasing him further, he just confirms in a warm and gruff voice that he will help Eddie make this the best Christmas for his boy. They end the call and Eddie rushes into their shared office and recreation room. It is actually Steve's old room from when they were roommates instead of boyfriends. Nowadays it's used as a guest room when one of their friends or his uncle sleeps over, and as a storage room for all the stuff they don't want lying around the apartment taking up space.

It's also where they keep the Christmas presents.

Eddie carefully carries them over to their Christmas tree and places them underneath it. All except one, which he puts in his pocket. Playing with the simple gold band in his pocket, Eddie couldn't help but think back to that night over three years ago.

He had snuck into their dark apartment, assuming that Steve was staying at Sam's to avoid Eddie. He had decided to tell Steve the truth about his feelings during his long walk, rehearsing what he would say, playing out a hundred different scenarios. Still, he hadn't been prepared to find Steve lying on Eddie's bed, apparently asleep while waiting for him, with Eddie's favorite hoodie clutched to his chest.

The sight had hit him hard, making his breath catch in his lungs and his heart stutter in his chest. He had just stood there for what seemed like hours, watching Steve's sleeping form on his bed. Steve had looked worried, even in his sleep, a slight crease between his eyebrows and the hand holding his sweater had been clenched into a tight fist. His whole body was hunched up as tight as it could be, his knees pressed against his chest as if protecting himself from the cold and empty room. That was what finally made Eddie move.

He went back into the living room and grabbed the afghan off the couch before making his way over to Steve. But as he placed the blanket over the sleeping form, Steve had stirred.

"Eddie?" He had mumbled, his voice slurred with sleep.

Unable to help himself, Eddie had knelt by his side and started to stroke his hair. "Yeah, it's me. Go back to sleep, Stevie. We'll talk in the morning, 'kay?"

But when he had tried to get up, he had been stopped by Steve's hand on his arm, his eyes searching Eddie's with surprising clarity. "Stay. Please."

Maybe it was the late hour or the emotional exhaustion. Maybe it was because Eddie had no fight left in him to deny himself or Steve what they both obviously wanted. Maybe it was just the way Steve had looked at him, the memory of the tears in those eyes still clear in Eddie's mind. Whatever it was, Eddie had just slipped out of his jeans before crawling onto the bed right behind Steve, pushing the sheets out from under them to pull them over their heads. With their bodies pressed together and Steve in his arms, they had both fallen asleep.

The next morning they'd woken up late, still tangled under Eddie's blanket. Everything had been warm and hazy, perfect really. When he felt Eddie stir behind him, Steve had rolled over in his arms and they had just looked at each other for a long moment before Eddie had broken the silence between them.

"I'm sorry, Steve. I don't even know where to begin to tell you how sorry I am."

Steve had just taken his hand, his thumb caressing the back of it in small circles, and it had given Eddie the courage to go on.

He told Steve all the things he had been too afraid to say before.

They had talked for a long time. Steve telling him how much he had wanted Eddie that night, drunk or sober, that he had liked him for a while and had hoped they would get together afterwards. But then Eddie had called it a mistake and asked Steve to be friends. So he'd tried, but he'd never gotten over Eddie. Sam had known that Steve was nursing a broken heart when they got together, and after seeing how Eddie had reacted to their relationship and how it had gutted Steve to see Eddie pull away, he had put two and two together. He wished Steve good luck, but said he couldn't wait for Steve to get over someone who clearly wanted him back.

"I fucked up bad, huh?" Eddie had asked with a pained smile, looking at their intertwined hands between them. He couldn't believe that Steve was still here, holding him close and lifting their joined hands to his lips to plant a soft kiss on the back of Eddie's.

"Kind of. But I think we can fix this."

"And how do you suggest we do that, oh wise one?" Eddie had asked, hope blossoming in his chest at the warmth of Steve's smile.

Pulling Eddie impossibly close, Steve whispered against his lips, "Would you just kiss me, you idiot?"

Eddie had never been happier to be called an idiot, as it led to them exchanging soft kisses that soon became more heated, tongues sliding against each other to take each other's moans right out of their mouths.

When they finally stumbled into their kitchen, it was late noon, but that didn't stop them from making breakfast together before spending the day lounging on their couch, exchanging kisses and soft whispers of how happy they were to finally be here.

That day, Eddie had vowed to work hard to never let something so precious slip through his fingers again.

Since then, they'd adopted a grumpy orange-and-white cat with one eye and a mutt, moved Steve's stuff into Eddie's room ("Because that's where we finally got our shit together, Eds"), and Wayne had all but adopted Steve into the Munson family. Robin, Steve's best friend, had taken a little longer to warm up to Eddie because she had a front row seat to Steve's heartbreak thanks to Eddie being an idiot. But she had come around, as had Steve's little brother Dustin, who was away at college, a fact Steve didn't take too well. So Eddie had invited Dustin and his mother, as well as Robin, without telling Steve, hoping it would be the perfect surprise for him.

As if his thoughts had summoned them, the doorbell rang, alerting Eddie to the arrival of his guests. Opening the door with a flourish, he found Dustin and his mother standing there, along with two large suitcases.

"The Hendersons! Welcome to our humble abode, please come in." Eddie greets them cheerfully before leading them into the warm and cozy apartment.

He gets them settled in their guest room and is about to make them both some hot cocoa when the doorbell rings again, this time revealing Robin and his uncle, who happen to have arrived at the same time. They also gather in the kitchen, with Wayne taking over the cocoa duties. They all shove more presents into his arms, which he dutifully places under the tree as well. And in a wider circle around it, because holy shit, that's a lot of presents.

The only thing missing is Steve, who takes their dog for long walks whenever he has the time and hasn't been back yet.

Wayne is in the middle of telling a rather embarrassing story from Eddie's childhood, which the man himself tries to stop, but to no avail, when he is saved by the sound of a key turning in the lock of their front door. Eddie mimes for everyone to be quiet as he makes his way to the door as quickly as possible.

"Stevie, light of my life, you're back!" Eddie calls out in excitement as soon as the door opens to reveal his boyfriend and their dog.

Steve, on his knees letting Bowie off the leash, looks up at Eddie with suspicion. "What have you done now?"

"I'm wounded, Steven. Wounded! Why do you accuse me of some unknown crime before you even give me a kiss?"

Steve grabs Eddie by the collar of his Christmas sweater and pulls him in for a kiss, smiling so hard it can hardly be called that. "Because you get extra loud and dramatic when you're trying to hide something. So what have you been doing?"

"A special Christmas surprise, honey." Mrs. Henderson speaks up, making Steve whip his head around to face her.

"Claudia?" And then his eyes land on the other guests gathered in their kitchen. "Dustin? Robin? What...why? How? I thought you had to spend Christmas with your parents, Robs?"

"That was all Eddie. He arranged for all of us to come here and spend the evening with you. I have to leave later to drive over to my parents, but not for another four hours or so."

After hearing Robin's words, Steve slowly turns back to Eddie, and this time the tears in his eyes are from happiness, not heartbreak.

"Eddie," is all he says before he slams into him, his arms wrapped tightly around his shoulders and his face nestled in his favorite spot just above Eddie's collarbone. "I love you." Steve whispers, his voice choked with emotion.

"I love you too, Stevie," Eddie whispers back, right into Steve's ear, the words meant just for him.

After that, they all gather around the improvised dining table Wayne had set up. It is a simple construction with another table the same height as their kitchen table, so they could push them together and decorate them with a large tablecloth to make it look like one. They eat the roast Steve had prepared, everyone praising his cooking skills, making him blush and his eyes glow with pride.

For dessert they have pecan pie, much to Steve's delight. "Eddie insisted it had to be pecan," Wayne reveals, earning Eddie a wet kiss on the cheek from Steve.

"You're spoiling me, Eds."

"It's not spoiling when you deserve it. Besides, the pie is for everyone, it just happens to be your favorite." Eddie deflects, suddenly self-conscious. Maybe he'd overdone it, just a little, in his quest for the perfect night. But what is it they say? In for a penny and all that. "I might have something just for you, though."

Before Steve has a chance to say anything to that, Eddie is already up from the table to get the ice cream from the kitchen. By the time he comes out with it, everyone has stuffed themselves with the pie, leaving none for Eddie. Putting the ice cream in front of Steve, he complains loudly about it. "That's how you thank me, I see. Scoundrels, all of you."

A plate with a large slice of pie is placed in front of him. "I saved you a slice, baby."

Eddie presses both hands to his heart and pretends to melt. "Aw, you do love me."

Instead of answering, Steve just kisses him before looking down at the bowl in front of him. "What's that?"

"Banana ice cream with toffee and caramel beans, topped with whipped cream and chocolate sauce."

Steve plunges the spoon into the creation and takes a big bite, letting out a moan that's downright pornographic. "Oh God, please marry me."

Across from them, Wayne nearly chokes on his coffee at Steve's words, and Eddie gives him a warning glare. Wayne is the only one in on Eddie's plan, which Eddie begins to regret. But he needed someone to organize some things, especially the custom-made rings.

After dinner, everyone gathers around the tree, including Garfield and Bowie. Garfield is sitting on Claudia's lap, having taken an instant liking to her, while Bowie is sleeping at Wayne's feet. As usual when their little family gets together, the gift exchange is a cheerful and chaotic affair. Eddie gets new guitar strings from Robin, a new set of custom-made Dnd dice from Dustin and Claudia, and Garfield slippers from Wayne, as well as a can of motor oil with the promise to change Eddie's oil together next weekend. Steve's gift, however, was the most treasured: two tickets to a Metallica concert right here in Chicago.

Throughout the night, Wayne had been taking pictures of everything, claiming that they would be glad to have some memories later on. So when all of the presents have been handed out, he leads Steve and Eddie over to the tree for a picture.

"We need Garfield and Bowie here, too, if it's a family photo," Steve exclaims, his cheeks rosy from equal parts eggnog and joy. "Come here, Bowie. Good boy." Bowie, who is just as much of a sucker for Steve as Eddie is, promptly follows. Eddie knows that Garfield would not be so easily persuaded, so he walks over to Claudia, plucks him from her lap, and places him at Steve's feet.

What Steve doesn't know is that this is all part of Eddie's plan. The two pose in front of the tree with Bowie between them and Garfield weaving between Steve's legs. Just as Wayne's about to take the picture, Eddie turns to Steve and, seemingly outta nowhere, grabs a Santa's hat and puts it on Steve's head. "There you go, now you look all dressed up for the occasion."

"How...where did you hide that?"

"Pulled it out of my ass. You better check to see if I have any more Christmas stuff stashed there later, big boy."

Eddie can't know it yet, but he hopes Wayne captured the exact moment Steve's face scrunched up in surprised laughter. But even if he hadn't, Eddie hadn't been able to tear his eyes away from it anyway, as he memorized every single detail of that very moment.

As his laughter subsides, Steve opens his eyes again to look over at Eddie, only to find him kneeling with his hand outstretched and something small on his palm. A simple golden ring.

"Oh my God."

More than one gasp of surprise could be heard from those around, but the only person whose reaction matters to Eddie is Steve. Who looks at Eddie with big, shining eyes and an open mouth, completely taken by surprise.

"Steve, I have rehearsed this a million times and I still do not have the words to tell you what you mean to me. What our life together means to me. I love you so much it scares me, because surely people aren't supposed to feel that much, but I do. And I want to be scared every single day for the rest of my life because it means I get to love you. I get to cherish you and laugh with you and take care of our furry kids together, and Steve, sweetheart, I want to marry you and promise you forever. And I can't wait for nothing to change, because the life we have is already perfect. And if that didn't make any sense to you, I'm really sorry. The most important thing is that I love you. So, Steve Harrington, will you do me the honor of becoming my husband?"

Steve has tears streaming down his cheeks, but he’s smiling. In fact, he’s smiling so big it has to hurt, and when he kisses him, all Eddie can taste is happiness and love. After that, Steve peppers his whole face with kisses, each one pressing another "Yes" into his skin.

Their love story might not have begun like a perfect fairy tale, and Eddie had no idea if it would end like one. But the middle? It was pretty damn perfect, if you asked him.

#steddie #steddie fluff #steddie fanfiction #steve harrington #eddie munson #steve x eddie #my writing #for the record: here it already is the 25th so this entry is for the 25th day prompt of steddiemas

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trulybetty · 1 month ago

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october | 02 x apple scent

pairing: frankie x reader word count: 1,001 warnings: apples, meet-cutes, benny miller & as always unbeta'd summary: you and Frankie meet for the first time. ao3: linked

{ x. series masterlist }

author note: prompts are not in chronological order, the story is told throughout the life span of the relationship. once all are posted, I'll post a list of the prompts in chronological order.

02 x Apple Scent.

The smell of sticky toffee blended seamlessly with the scent of freshly picked apples, not too out of place given that it was an apple festival you’d been dragged to by Jess after work after being given little to no choice in the decision.

“You’ve got to try the apple pie! It’s to die for!” she’d exclaimed dragging you along the cobbled street. Lanterns hung overhead, casting a warm glow that matched the colours of the falling leaves. You tucked your hands deeper into your coat pockets, the crisp autumn air nipped at your cheeks.

“Remind me again why I’m here?” you asked, sidestepping a couple trying to share a caramel apple.

She shot you a sly grin, “Because you love me and want to offer moral support.”

“Translation: you need a wing woman in case things go south.”

“Details, details,” she laughed nudging you playfully with her elbow, “Besides, Benny’s bringing a friend. Maybe he’s cute!” she exclaimed, the excitement on her face as the realization of the possible meet-cute this could be evident all on her face.

You rolled your eyes but couldn’t suppress a small smile as she practically bounced beside you now, “You owe me!”

As you approached the source of the baked apple scent that had lulled you through the crowds. The pie stand, its booth in the shape of a glossy red apple, and its sweet aroma now only intensified its efforts in making your mouth water. Jess purchased two slices, handing one to you, “See? Worth it already,” she said taking a bite.

You took a tentative taste, letting out a groan as the warm apple filling melted on your tongue, “Okay, I’ll admit it, this is amazing.”

“With that kind of endorsement, I might have to try a slice for myself,” came a voice from behind Jess. You looked up from your paper plate to see Jess enveloped in a hug by a tall, blonde man with a charming grin, “I’m Benny,” he said settling Jess back on her feet, his blue eyes twinkling as he reached out his hand to you.

You shook his hand, amused by his enthusiasm as you told him your name, “Nice to finally meet you.”

“This here,” he said, gesturing to the man stepping up beside him, “is my buddy, Frankie. Frankie say hi!”

Frankie offered a small smile, his dark eyes warm beneath the worn baseball cap he wore. “Hey.”

“Hi,” you replied, suddenly feeling a little self-conscious and not entirely sure why.

Jess and Benny quickly fell into animated conversation, leaving you and Frankie following behind.

“So, enjoying the festival?” you asked in an attempt to break the silence.

“Not too bad for a festival themed solely on apples,” he laughed softly, the sound causing a flutter in your chest. “It’s my first time here.”

“Same,” you admitted, “Jess insisted that I had to experience it.”

He gave you a smile, “Benny can be persuasive too.”

An awkward pause settled between you.

“So,” you cleared your throat, “what do you do?” you ventured, sure Jess had mentioned something about Benny's work but struggling to remember exactly what it was.

He hesitated. “Military.”

“Really? What branch?”

“Army,” he said simply.

You nodded, “What do you do in the Army?” you asked, trying to prolong the conversation in the hope of staving off further awkwardness of the situation you both found yourselves in.

“Nothing too exciting,” he shrugged. “Just logistics.”

Before you could ask more, Benny turned around having overheard your conversation. “Don't let him fool you! There's not a plane or automobile this man here cannot operate.”

Frankie shot him a look. “Benny…”

“What? It's true!” Benny grinned mischievously.

You raised an eyebrow, intrigued. “So you're a pilot?”

Frankie rubbed the back of his neck, clearly uncomfortable. “I fly sometimes.”

“He's being modest,” Benny continued. “Best pilot in the unit. Saved our asses more times than I can count.”

Frankie sighed but couldn't hide a small smile. “Benny likes to exaggerate too.”

“Well, I think it’s pretty impressive regardless,” you said genuinely.

“Thanks,” he replied, meeting your gaze briefly before looking away.

The rest of the evening passed in easy conversation between the four of you, and soon enough, you found yourself mentally thanking Jess for this unexpected outing. Benny’s laugh was infectious and had a knack for leading the conversation. Most of which concerned outings involving Frankie and the rest of their unit. Despite some of Frankie’s attempts to downplay his part in some of these antics you could tell he enjoyed it—or was at least tolerating it with good humour.

The evening ended with Benny insisting on walking both of you back to your car having picked up Jess on your way out from work. Once you reached your car parked under one of the scattered blossoms lining the street, it was time for goodbyes. Benny enveloped Jess in a warm hug first, whispering something that made her giggle into his ear.

The drive home was filled with Jess’ excitement about Benny and the date the two of them had already planned. Her eyes sparkled with enthusiasm as she turned in her seat to look at you, “You two looked so cute together!” she gushed, “Did you give Frankie your number?”

You opened your mouth to respond then realised as you turned onto Jess’ street that you hadn’t. Neither had Frankie given you his. Disappointment awash Jess was sympathetic but optimistic as she spoke to you through the passenger window after you’d dropped her off, “Who knows, it’s obvious you two hit it off.”

You were in the office two days later, your eyes glossed over from dry corporate documents needing your stamp of approval when your phone buzzed with a message from an unknown number. Curiosity piqued, and thankful for the distraction, you unlocked your phone to read:

‘Hope this is okay, but I asked Benny to get me your number.’

Followed by a second message soon after.

‘It’s Frankie by the way.’

#frankie morales #frankie morales fanfiction #frankie morales fanfic #frankie morales x you #frankie morales x reader #frankie morales x f!reader #francisco catfish morales #triple frontier fanfic #triple frontier #pedro pascal character fanfic #pedro pascal character fanfiction #pedro pascal characters

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bpbomegaverse · 26 days ago

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Omegaverse Master Scent List

Scent description can be a big part of omegaverse. This is a master list of Alpha, Beta and Omega scents I've compiled. I will add to them when new things pop up for me.

Note: Just because I've put a scent in a certain category, doesn't mean you can't use it for one of the other second genders. 🫶 I kind of like that alpha a little more savoury, musky and deep. And omega are more sweet, fresh and light. But that's just my interpretation.

I'm starting with Alpha. I'll update the other two a little later.

Alpha - α

Gardenia

Orange Blossom

Lavender

Black orchid

Violet

Bluebell

Rosewood

Elderflower

Ink

Sparklers

Black Tea

Green tea

Resin

Saffron

Leather

Bark

Pine tree

Burnt wood

Coal/charcoal

Oak Barrel Whiskey

Cedar

Agar wood

Tobacco

Oudh

Driftwood

Oakmoss

Amber (labdanum)

White wood

Rosewood

Musk

Sherry oak

Match (blown out)

Rye Whiskey

Mahogany

Cegar

Wood sage

Almond

Walnut

Tar

Rubber

Moss

Iron

Bronze

Gold

Rust

Ash

Graphite

Vinyl

Smoked meats

Coriander

Basil

Cinnamon

Nutmeg

Paprika (smoked)

Aniseed

Black cherry

Clove

Allspice

Fenugreek

Ginger

Black pepper

Roasted Garlic

Blood orange

Grapefruit

Blackberry

Bergamont

Lemon

Blood Plum

New car smell

Hay

Pesto

Balsamic Vinegar

Sauteed brown onions

Fruit cake

Eucalyptus

Teatree

Wet Dog

Blood

Soap

Fish oil

Marijuana

Lemongrass

Thunderstorms/Petrichor

Smoke

Mud

Wet forest floor

Limestone

Cobolt

Ore

Cactus

Molten rock

Shampoo

Wet cement

Cork

Bush fire

Egyptian dukkah

Jamaican Jerk

Recado rojo

Cajun spice

Chinese five spice

Baharat

Brown sugar

Toffee

Molasses

Apple pie

Tequila

Dark chocolate

Bacon

Dark roast coffee

Petrol

Gunpowder

Gravy

Cola

Burnt caramel

Bone marrow

Syrah/Shiraz

Cabernet Sauvignon

Port

Toasted bread

Buttered Popcorn

Dry dog food

Sulphur

Mustard

Ginger Beer

Meatballs

Olives

Chipotle

Teriyaki

Peri-Peri

Sesame

Jalapeño

#omegaverse #alpha beta omega #a/b/o verse #omegaverse headcanons #alpha scent #pheromones #scent list

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kurov1864 · 5 months ago

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Scents of Babyls teachers + Opera (pt.3)

March: Faint whiff of blood, leather and smoke, earthy undertones, cumin and cloves. He would definitely have that metallic tang to his scent, from both his metal tools and... blood. Leather and smoke to sorta hint at that darker enthusiasm for the torture arts, since those are commonly associated with violence. The earthy notes is to reflect his (mostly) grounding and comforting aspect of his personality, with the spices emphasizing it more so. I contemplated putting in more flowery/lighter scents but in all honesty despite being easygoing and kind, I feel like his overall personality just doesn't fit it. He's more laid-back in the rational and grounded way, sorta like a big brother that cares for you and will (gently) call you out when you're pulling shit, rather than the happy cheerful laid-back kinda way yk? Ah but can't forget some caramel and butterscotch candy for his top notes, just to really show his sweeter side.

Ifrit: charred wood, coconut lotion, cigarette smoke and gunpowder. Similar to March, I decided to go for a more grounded scent but foregoed the more comforting aspects. Charred wood and cigarette smoke is pretty self-explanatory, he is a fire demon that loves to smoke after all, and it'll add a rustic and intense quality to his scent. The gunpowder would help to reflect his more competitive side because while he is mostly nonchalant and collected, whenever he gets excited his more brash and boastful traits would come out. Definitely would have some earthy and smoky undertones + metallic accents to have the more grounding yet fleeting aspect? I'm not sure how to describe it but I wanted to go for a sort of reliable warmth which can look flimsy and unpredictable at times but would always be there, just like his flames. It may flicker and almost die out sometimes, but it would always stay lighted up no matter what. The coconut lotion is just there, just because.

Murmur: Freshly baked bread, spicy cologne, sweet citrus and toffee. To me Murmur... leans to the warmer side. He has this sort of friendly and non-judgemental sorta vibe to him, like you can tell him your deepest insecurities and he would never judge or use it against you, just being more mindful of his behaviour and words around you. So of course to me this translates to those homey warm and slightly sweet foods like bread and toffee. Some sweet citrus notes like oranges and mandarin can also add some energy to his scent, to represent his easygoing and familiar attitude. Some spicy cologne just because I think he would, and finally some light woody undertones like sandalwood or cedar for a more grounding and comforting vibe.

Ipos: Pine trees, leather, cayenne pepper, warm amber. Couldn't find a good summary of his personality on the wiki so this would be directly from my viewpoint. Ipos seems like a pretty chill kinda guy, calm and level-headed, as well as knowledgable and experienced. So for these traits, I picked out pine trees, for it's fresh, cold and kinda tingly sharp scent, and leather for the experience. Despite this we also know that he has his own witty sense of humor and mischief, and that's represented by a subtle citrus - probably lemon - to add a touch of lively energy and zest to it. But I also wanted to show off his warmer side, so I also included some cayenne pepper and warm amber. And last but not least, some soft musk and earthy notes to just add some depth to him.

Opera: Sheet softener, cilantro and parsley, soft spices, amber. Sheet softener is a given, since they literally do all the laundry in the mansion. I would think that this also helps depict the way that they try to comfort those they treasure, literally wrapping them up in their blanket, cuddling them and feeding them until they feel better. Wanted to include some mild spice as well, to reflect their sassy and sarcastic attitude. Might have a dash of ginger and cinnamon as well, for their more playful and witty side. And for their base notes, of course we'll go for some soft musk to show their reserved and kuudere personality, as well as the inherent mystery in their character.

#kurovwrites #headcanons #welcome to demon school iruma kun #wtdsik #mairimashita iruma kun #marbas march #ifrit djinn eito #Murmur Tsumuru #Ipos Ichou #opera #m!ik opera

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deceptive-daydreams · 1 year ago

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The Under-Ground (18+ ONLY)

Chapter Six - The Yellow Car

Ch. 1 | Ch. 2 | Ch. 3 | Ch. 4 | Ch. 5 | Ch. 6 | Ch. 7 |

Modern!Barista!Eddie AU - "You made me hate myself and you were okay with that."

Enemies to Lovers, Modern!Barista!Eddie AU, Eddie x Fem Reader

9.6K Words

Warnings - Eddie is an asshole, eventual smut, mentions of drugs and drinking, drug dealing, allusions to mental illness, I don't think there's anything else but please let me know if I missed anything

Author's Note: I have nothing to say other than pls lmk what you think cause I put my full pussy into this one like im so scared to post this

Masterlist

Prev | Next

The Harrington House, December of Junior Year

“Well done, Munson. Looks like you’ve won yourself a hundred bucks.”

What?

Oh.

It felt like blood filled your ears, everything becoming muffled the second the words were spoken. The breath had been stolen from your lungs and you wanted to choke. Hands numb, fingers tingling uncomfortably, and mouth drying up, you were obligated to process the unthinkable. The unthinkable in your eyes at least. A hot face seared with fresh humiliation was always the worst side effect.

A hundred bucks.

The guy with an arm wrapped around Eddie wore a letterman jacket. He looked like every other one of them. Sandy blond hair, blue eyes, and a menacing smirk stuck to his stupid face. You’d seen him before, hell he was probably one of the boys to stand on the sidelines when the others made unsolicited comments at you. Nathan? You couldn’t remember his name and honestly, had no interest.

Then there was Eddie. He was a stranger now. You didn’t need any context, his face said it all. His lips were parted as if trying to grasp words, any words as he attempted to shrug the jock off of his shoulder. Those big brown eyes you one minute saw so much promise in were now distant and pleading. How could he do this to you?

A hundred dollar bill was slapped to his chest and…he grabbed it. Clutched it in his greedy hand.

The world was becoming one large swirling blob as hot tears brimmed in your eyes, your entire body shaking and your nerves on fire–not in the romantic way they were before. And that wasn’t all. There was a cherry on top, of course there was because it wouldn’t be your life if things didn’t progressively become worse and worse with each passing second. Several more jocks emerged from the pool table that once garnered their attention, each of them exhibiting a concerning amount of enthusiasm at your expense. If you were asked, you couldn’t recall anything they were shouting as they mimicked a dog’s bark after.

Paralyzing.

Mortifyingly paralyzing—all you wanted to do was run, you didn’t know where but you wanted to leave this awful place. And yet you found yourself glued to the very same bean bag that moments before held a girl that was so entranced and intoxicated—not on alcohol but on him. She was nearly a ghost now, a shell of a person with barely any breath left in her, a corpse in the making. El c

All you could hear was hot blood pumping through your veins at a concerningly rapid rate, everything else was tuned out and your sole focus was how Eddie changed from the charming bad boy that only showed that certain softness for you into every other guy you’d encountered. Shallow. Selfish. Scary. Everything you knew him as, he no longer embodied. The Eddie you knew was now also a shell.

You know when a person just feels like home? They’re safe. Warm. Familiar scents. Their presence is like a hug, a welcoming embrace. Eddie was like home in the sense that his eyes offered an affectionate glow and he was always sugary sweet–not just regular sugar though–brown sugar. A bit gritty with undertones of candied molasses, caramel and toffee lingering on the tongue if anyone ever cared to unveil those parts of him…which you did.

And he threw it all back in your face. He didn’t need to say anything. He was no longer the feeling of home, not since he just essentially threw you out on the doorstep and shut the lights off, feeding you to the wolves. Your name fell from his lips desperately, his hand flying out to grasp at your knee, a hundred dollar bill still crushed in his other hand so tight he might just rip it and ruin his fortune. But you were too fast, flinching away while boys congratulated him, praised him as tears rolled silently down your cheeks. And before you could endure anymore your legs were carrying you up the wooden stairs, shoes thumping on each step as you attempted to maintain balance through teary eyes.

You were an object.

–

Present Day

“Shit.”

The quiet but noticeable curse came from the front of the shop, your head only tilting toward the noise not out of curiosity but out of instinct. Whatever Eddie was bent out of shape over this time was none of your concern. The atmosphere had shifted since the cup debacle, it almost felt awkward but you were more disoriented than anything.

It wasn’t fair.

You were spiraling in the whirlpool that was Eddie’s recent behavior and yet he seemed unaffected. Yes, he was acting far more civilly than he had in years but he still had this spark to him that no one could seem to put out. You weren’t even sure if you wanted to–no you knew you didn’t–that wasn’t your intention, ever. The spark was never the issue, it was the fact that the spark would grow into flames. Unforgiving, destructive, scolding flames only headed in your direction, everyone else safe from the path of annihilation that was guided by his venomous words.

It wasn’t exactly ideal, your declared enemy since junior year suddenly holding back on firing like he was out of ammo. It would be enough to send anyone into insanity because he would never run out of ammo, he would always have something to say that would hit a nerve just right but tonight…tonight he seemed to be aiming toward himself. Small self-deprecating jokes of ‘Munson, were you born fucking yesterday?’ said to no one in particular as a healthy glob of whip cream slid off of the small mountain he was creating and onto the sticky floor.

So when he muttered a curse toward the front of the shop as you silently dismissed yourself to the breakroom to catch up on some assignments in the absence of any customers due to the storm outside, you didn’t pay any mind.

“Oh, shit, shit, shit!”

Not even a blink of an eye was offered as you scrolled through the files on your laptop, tracking pad greasy from the endless stress eating when you happened to attend a study group every now and then. The breakroom table shook as your knee bounced against the leg. Whatever the issue was, he could figure it out. Hell, how does cleaning the window warrant that much of a reaction? How badly could he fuck up cleaning a window? You didn’t even care, the thought was gone as soon as it came. He wasn’t going to earn a reaction, not when he was pulling whatever stunt he was pulling at the moment.

“Fuck my life–Roadkill, I think we got a big problem.”

Your eyes may as well have rolled into another dimension. If he thought he could just start calling you that, reality would have to slap him in the face. No, this was not going to be entertained.

“I think you’re gonna wanna–shit! There was a brief silence and some shuffling before he yelled back again. “You’re gonna have to get your ass out here and tell me what the fuck to do. This is just–god dammit! This is not in my job description.”

There was no helping the grin that pulled at your lips, no matter how hard you tried to hold it back.

“No? Nothing?” It sounded as if he was talking to himself more so than you which only elicited a quiet chuckle that you knew wouldn't be heard all the way from the back. “Okay, well then you can explain to Ronnie–god fuck! Where are the fucking rags–or just anything absorbent?!” His voice got closer and you knew he was rummaging through the several cabinets lining the coffee bar, your suspicion only confirmed when the slam of each small door would echo through the shop.

“I think you got it handled.” You finally chime in, a smirk displayed on your face, eyes glued to the screen in front of you as you typed.

“Got it handled my ass.” It was mumbled under his breath but you still caught it as his steps seemed to get closer only to appear in the doorway of the break room, bangs sticking straight up in disarray and a torn up rag clutched in his hand tightly, a hand braced against the doorway as he leaned against it, cocking a brow at you which you only caught as you glanced up at him against your better judgment. “Is that what you’re gonna tell Ronnie when he shows up tomorrow and everything is completely under water? ‘Oh, Eddie had it handled’. Yeah that’s gonna go just fine, then we’re both gonna get fired–”

“What–wait–what are you talking–”

“It’s flooding!” An urgent point of his finger toward the front had your eyes widening.

Not another second was wasted as you flew out of your seat, pushing past Eddie and receiving a grunt in response as you slammed a little too hard into his chest on the way out. And sure enough, water was trickling in from underneath the two french doors, inching further and further into the shop.

“Shit.”

“That’s what I said! You didn’t listen!”

Eddie shoved the tattered and useless rag into his back pocket before reaching for a throw blanket that had been previously carefully placed on the couch near the bookshelves. He had no fear as he stepped into the water that didn’t quite reach the top of his boots yet. The blanket was wedged in the crack underneath the door as much as it could go to keep the water at bay. But it would only hold for so long.

“I-I’m gonna call Ronnie.” You decide, Eddie nodding as he further kicked the fabric underneath the door.

It would’ve been a decent plan had the storm not affected the cell towers. You attempted to get through but the call wouldn’t go through and panic only grew in your features. In denial, you even tried a few more times, hoping, just hoping that maybe the call would carry through but to no avail, the call dropped every time.

“Okay, it should hold for a few minutes but after that we’re fucked.” Eddie was only causing more anxiety in his statement.

“Oh god. I can’t get any signal.” You would have winced at the way you whined if you weren’t internally crumbling.

“I think we just need to get the fuck outta here.”

“Do you see outside?! We won’t even be able to see two feet in front of us and the water is rising!” A clammy hand dragged down your cheek in despair, your breath uneven. Why could you never catch a break?

“I’m gonna check the back, see if we can go that way. You just…watch the door and yell if it starts flooding again.”

All you could do was nod as he raced toward the back. Water was slowly spilling into the shop little by little and just when you thought things were as bad as they could get, the lights began flickering and you knew the power was done for. It was only a matter of when it would go out. So you did what you could, shoving the blanket even further under the crack to create a barrier, becoming desperate enough to even untie your apron knowing the canvas material would provide more assistance as you tucked it beneath the door. As you squat to push the material further, your foot slips and suddenly your knees are engulfed in the puddle of water that had formed. You hissed at the impact of the hard floor but brushed it off the moment you realized you created a wall between the water and the shop that was sturdy enough and didn’t seem like it would falter anytime soon. Knock on wood cause god forbid if the night spirals into an even bigger shit show, you wouldn’t be able to handle it.

“So, there’s no way we’re getting out through the back.”

God, you just kept jinxing yourself.

With doe eyes, you looked up at Eddie like a pathetic excuse of a human. Your pants were becoming drenched every second you sat there, the fabric absorbing a small amount of the large puddle you resided in. Tears pooled once again and you swore you wouldn’t cry in front of him again but it seemed inevitable at this point. It was like your new thing. And before you could jinx yourself any further, the lights flickered especially bright before blacking out completely. It was nearly pitch black except for the saving grace of the streetlights outside that must have been on some kind of backup generator.

“C’mon.” Eddie’s hands were on you, pulling you up by your arms but you shoved him away, tears spilling despite your best efforts.

“Don’t.”

“Don’t do this now. C’mon.” His voice was soft but firm as he continued his attempt at pulling you out of the water.

“Stop it!” Your hand came down, splashing the water harshly in the heat of the moment. You could be equated to a child having a tantrum and you hated that he’d probably hold this over you.

“Let’s go.” He wasn’t giving up but he wasn’t making fun of you either. It only added to your outburst, everything was all so confusing, your whole life felt like it had been shaken around in a to-go container and opened only to reveal the leftovers splattered–a mess you can’t undo. An unappetizing meal that no one would go near.

“Quit doing that! You’re acting like you care!”

“Get up.”

“Stop playing mind games with me, Eddie.” Snot was dripping from your nose but you couldn’t find it in you to care.

“Get up.” The tone was stern as he held a ringed hand out to you which you only stared at in anguish. “Get up. If you don’t get up, I’m picking you up.” You continued to glare up at him through wet eyelashes and salty tears.

“Get fucked.” You spat bitterly.

Large brown eyes stared up at the ceiling momentarily as if he was pondering before he knelt down to your eye level. Even in the darkness you could still see that spark in his eyes, pupils blown in mischief. “I’ll give you one more chance. Let me help you up or I’m gonna make you get up.”

Oh.

For some reason you found yourself even more stubborn in your pitiful puddle of tears and rain water.

“Get. Fucked.”

Before you could even exhale a breath you didn’t even know you were holding, you were thrown over Eddie’s shoulder and for the life of you, you couldn’t ignore the spice lingering in his cologne and the detergent wafting into your nose from his shirt. You didn’t even realize you were gripping said shirt in between your fingers until he began to set you on the plush leather couch, his shirt raising before you released the cotton at the realization.

“I mean it, go away.” You weakly wiped at your cheeks as he knelt in front of you, looking up at your puffy face as he toyed with his rings.

“I will. But first I need to make sure you won’t have a heart attack.”

“I’m fine.”

You weren’t.

With a short nod and a sigh, he stands up. And what did it mean if you suddenly felt devoid of warmth?

–

9:00 PM.

It was 9:00 PM, an hour and a half later and the phone lines were still dead, the rain was coming down harder than you’d ever seen, and the shop remained engulfed in darkness. The power wasn’t going to come back anytime soon. Though your shift was over, there was no way you were leaving without being washed away or drowning.

At least there was a comfortable couch and a supply of food at your disposal. Even then, fear was consuming you and you just couldn’t help it.

What if the flooding gets so bad and we have nowhere to go so we’re forced to drown?

What if I die and I was never able to make amends with Steve?

What about Robin?

What about Will?

What about Dustin? Lucas? Max? El? Mike? Jonathan? Nancy? Joyce? Everyone?

My found family.

What if they all forget about me?

What if they don’t care?

The thoughts were becoming unbearable, devastatingly unbearable and your brain may as well have imploded from the impending doom you were subjecting yourself to. Again, you were crying. But this time Eddie wasn’t watching, he was occupied atop the counter, back to you, his apron discarded next to him as he swung his feet back and forth. In his hand was a straw wrapper, folded neatly over and over until it was as small as he was able to get it before unraveling it and repeating the process. All you could do was bury your head in your hands because your final thought of unavoidable despair was: What if I wanted to see more of this Eddie?

But that wasn’t possible and it never could be. Because he was an arrogant and short tempered man with no regard for you. Right? You hadn’t engaged with him this much since high school, every other time in between didn’t allow for the two of you to interact for more than ten minutes at a time. Then you wouldn’t see each other for months until plans collided and someone had accidentally invited you both. Now he was everywhere. All the time. It’s almost like that one thing people say where if you think about a yellow car, you’ll see a yellow car everywhere you go without fail.

There was no excusing the damage he had caused all those years ago and if you’re honest, you were still repairing it. But there was nagging in the back of your brain, a faint feeling that was familiar and that’s why it was scary. Because the last time this feeling lurked on the outskirts of your thoughts, you got hurt. A kind of hurt that you don’t just recover from and move on, forgive and forget. The kind of hurt that makes you ache so deep when you’re face to face with the source. And what were you supposed to do when that source created both a tremendous ache, painfully and longingly? Left you hating his guts but wanting more all in the same breath?

No, you were supposed to despise him. He made you hate yourself and he was okay with that. That’s what you needed to remember. He was not seventeen years old and stealing your heart, he was seventeen years old and shattering it to pieces. And yet, he was the yellow car of your life. Were you his?

–

The Harrington House, December of Junior Year

The stairs.

The stairs became your least favorite place in the world at that moment. A sob escaped your lungs uncontrollably and though you did your best to muffle the sound with your hands, you still caught a few stares from some girls passing you on their way down. You couldn’t imagine how crazy you looked with tears rolling down your face as you wobbled up the steps, only managing to make it to the landing before you had to take a minute to collect yourself. The basement was suffocating, if you had to breathe in anymore of its toxic fumes you felt you might just pass out. But you just couldn’t bring yourself to trek up the last few steps, your body was refusing to carry you any further.

With a hand braced against the wall, you attempted to regulate your breathing and tame your oncoming sobs only to fail as you stood there in utter mortification. The woops and the yells of the boys downstairs continued only spurring on your anxiety which kept you a hostage on the landing.

“Oh, Munson’s gonna go hit that!”

“He’s going for the gold!”

You couldn’t find it in you to be surprised anymore.

“Fuck off!”

A series of offended yet amused ‘oh’s sounded throughout the room and after that, the thump of some heavy boots against the bottom of the wooden stairs. Knowing very well who those steps belonged to, you ignored them and set your priorities on getting up the remainder of the stairs. A task that seemed near impossible in your current state as a trembling foot placed itself on the next step up only to hesitate and fall back onto the landing as you bit your lip and tried to suck back as many tears as you could.

“Fuck.” You whispered, reprimanding yourself as hot, fat tears continued to spill down your face, your hands doing their best to wipe them away only to be defeated as more trailed down.

A murmur of your name just behind you had your shoulders tensing and your eyes squeezing shut. Eddie’s voice sounded distraught, for what reason you weren’t sure. He won his stupid bet and he wasn’t the one being exploited.

“Please, let me–”

“I-I’m leaving. Just–just leave me alone.”

Eddie wanted to throw himself down the stairs but he knew that would even provide enough pain to measure up to what he’d inflicted on you. He fucked up. Your shaking frame and wet sniffles made him want to drop to his knees and beg for your forgiveness. But he also knew that would never be enough, the look in your eyes as you realized the density of the situation was something he would never be able to get out of his mind. The absolute terror flashing across your face would haunt him forever and when you evacuated the basement like your life depended on it with complete panic etched into your features he accepted that he ruined everything.

“C-can we talk? Please. Please.” You’d never heard him sound so small and you hated that there was an ounce of you that felt for him when he was the villain here. You didn’t need to see his face to know that those stupid puppy dog eyes were looking up at you, begging for you to turn around. You could just feel it.

“No.”

“Let me explain.”

The nerve. As if you were too brainless to understand.

“You don’t need to.”

Finally, you faced him. Looking over your shoulder all you saw was betrayal disguised as a beautiful boy that you vowed to never go near again. Of course you were right about his stupid puppy dog eyes because they were looking up at you from a few steps down, glassy and pleading, his mouth opening and closing as if to respond but no words were good enough. He knew that.

“Leave me alone, Eddie. I mean it.” You gritted, finding the courage to embark up the rest of the stairs. You had no intention of entertaining a conversation with someone who never had your best interest in mind, especially a conversation where he would beg for sympathy and understanding. As you emerged from the basement, the hall became foggy. More tears. Shocker. The music grew louder as you shoved through groups of people, not one of them paying any mind in their intoxicated state. You saw the light at the end of the tunnel when Nancy and Steve were in clear view, talking and swaying to the music. Nancy. You just needed to get to Nancy. Except a barrier of all black and leather was suddenly in your way. And those goddamn near black eyes that you now loathed despite how enthralling they were.

“I didn’t accept the money.” He stood in your way and it only made you boil.

“Oh, that makes things so much better! Do you want a medal?”

You were turning sour and he had never witnessed this side of you before. You were always the sweet and reserved girl from school. He had to come to terms with the fact that he was the one to turn things upside down and spoil the budding relationship you shared. But he only knew how to twist the knife deeper and deeper so if his tone came out meaner than he intended, he wasn’t able to reverse it and he was fully aware of that. After all, sabotage was what he did best even if he was internally screaming at himself to stop.

“A medal? I don’t want a fucking medal. I want to talk!”

“Talk about what?! Talk about how you’re a liar? I watched you take the money. You used me.”

Your finger prodded at his sternum rather hard but he didn’t budge.

“No, no I didn’t.”

Lies. Everything was made up of lies. He was a liar.

“I have to get out of here.” Your fingers swiped under your eyes, gathering any makeup that had built up in your turmoil, a defeated breath escaping you as you moved toward Nancy who was watching with concern. But he stubbornly blocked your way once again.

“I know I made a stupid mistake but I wasn’t talking to you just to get a hundred bucks–”

“Eddie, I don’t wanna hear it. Just leave me alone.”

It was over. The damage was done and you planned to never look his way again. All you needed was to cry into Nancy and hear Steve’s comforting words. Though he was right about Eddie, you knew he wouldn’t celebrate seeing as you got hurt as a result of going against his warnings. It was never something he’d wish upon you but you were being reckless and it was proving his point.

“I have liked you ever since last year. Tonight I made a dumb decision, I know that.”

There was regret in his eyes but it was too late for any kind of redemption. He made his bed and he had to lay in it.

“Do you?” You whisper.

His gaze went softer and an anxious hand ran through his curls, tugging at them a bit too harshly. All he could hear in his brain was ‘fix this fix this fix this’ but how could he fix this?

“I-I never thought about the money. They said they thought I could never get you to talk to me and I knew I could because we already had been talking but I–I also started doubting–”

“Do. Not. Make this about you. Do not try to make me feel sorry for you.” You turned cold right before his eyes. It was something he never would have expected from you but he knows that if anyone could cause it, it would be him. Of course it would be him. He never deserved love in the first place so it was fitting that the moment he received anything close to it, he did what he did best and destroyed it.

“I’m not. I got in my head and did something I’m not proud of. But I need you to know that I never talked to you just to make a few extra bucks.”

He was trying, fuck he was trying. But it wasn’t good enough and below the surface he had already accepted that but there was a naive little boy inside of him that yearned for love and always cried ‘why’ whenever he managed to ruin everything. The only answer he could come up with was ‘because I’m me’.

“I liked you. Do you know how it felt to have it all thrown in my face like that? And have everyone laughing and watching me? Like I’m some kind of zoo animal? All because some boy used my crush to his advantage?”

I liked you.

Crush.

You were red in the face and all he could think about was the flutter in his stomach as his brain hung onto those words.

“It’s not like that and you know it. I have talked to you since last year. Before tonight. I have liked you this whole time.”

Admitting it was hard, he’d never done that before but he was clawing his way back to the old dynamic you two had. What he failed to realize in his teenage mind was that there was no going back. It was a lost cause. He couldn’t just say sorry and everything would be fine again.

“No you haven’t. No, no one who likes someone would ever treat them like this. Steve was right, you are a lowlife.” You’d never seen red like this before but the more bullshit he was spewing, the closer to the edge you got.

“What the fuck did you just say?”

“A lowlife Eddie. You’re a lowlife. What? Did I offend you? I’m sorry I thought that's what this was. I thought we had no respect for each other, right?”

He thought he was doing the right thing, so why were you rejecting everything he said? He was admitting to his wrong doings and being honest so didn’t that warrant a peaceful resolution? That’s what he initially thought but he was quickly learning that there were layers upon layers to this argument, that to truly understand and to truly earn your respect he needed to fully dissect the situation. He had no idea how to.

“I’m trying to tell you what happened! I’m trying to lay it all out and tell you I fucked up–”

“Why don’t you go back to selling drugs to your little jock friends? I guess trailer trash and white trash really go hand in hand. You guys are perfect for each other.”

Oh.

It was a low blow and you weren’t proud. All you wanted to do in that moment was hurt him like he hurt you. He was speechless and you guessed that maybe that was the reaction you wanted. To stun him. Show him you weren’t just a fragile girl he could play with for his own benefit.

“You know I was so stupid for thinking you were different from them. You’re a monster just like them. I don’t know why I ever thought you were the exception.”

“Is that what you think?” His voice turned eerily quiet. The party surrounding you may as well have not existed with how tense things had become.

“Yeah. I think I should have just listened to Steve and stayed far away from you. What was I thinking liking someone who’s good for nothing other than a few pills and some shitty weed?”

Rage took the wheel but you didn’t care and you’d even vouch that he deserved it. And he’d agree with you but sometimes words dig up old wounds and the sting only fueled the flames behind his eyes.

“Fine. Run to King Steve like you always do. I bet you’re fucking him just to keep him around.”

He should’ve just spat in your face instead, it would’ve had the same effect as his words.

“Excuse me?”

“What do I know though? I’m just some shitty trailer trash drug dealer.”

He offers a shrug but in the most unfriendly way. Your words were eating away at him like acid and he was trying his best to appear unaffected. Had you not been so full of resentment you may have caught him cracking.

“You’re such an asshole.”

A shove to his chest lets him know that he’s done his job. That he’s wrecked the only good thing he had going for him. Just as he regrettably promised himself so many times. So why not finish it off with a painful pinch of distaste?

“At least I don’t have to beg to keep my friends around.”

“At least I don’t have to mooch off of the jocks and use a stupid bet for some extra cash.”

“I didn’t take the fucking money.” His jaw clenched, teeth gritting as he scowled at you.

“That doesn’t matter! Are you fucking blind?! I don’t give a shit that you gave the money back. It’s the fact that you accepted the bet in the first place and then when it blew up in your face you turned into a coward!”

That sounds about right.

You hit every point on the mark.

But he wasn’t going to stand here and convince you that he was actually a good guy when he knew he wasn’t.

Nancy’s soothing voice broke the barriers of the heavy conversation fumigating the hallway before anything else could be said.

“C’mon, let’s go upstairs.”

The way Nancy glared at him as she guided you out of the hall made his stomach churn. And the way Steve shot daggers at him only further proved that he was everything everyone said he was. He confirmed Steve’s premonitions and he’d forever detest himself for it.

That night you’d passed by the kitchen as the party died down, all you wanted was water before returning upstairs to cry and get drunk on cheap wine with Nancy. What you got was Eddie Munson making out with Chrissy Cunningham in the middle of the kitchen. And when he caught your broken eyes, he knew he was the vessel for everything you hated.

–

Present Day

The crying wouldn’t cease as you remained curled up on the couch, knees to your chest and head in your hands. The last 48 hours had been eventful enough that you would require a week to sleep it off. The amount of crying only tacked on the time you would need to recover. Outside, the storm continued raging and the wind combined with the harsh rain against the windows raised your anxieties. Every other second you’d glance at the door anticipating the water breaking through the barrier you created and feared that soon enough the place would be flooded and you had no way out.

From what you could hear, there was some rummaging around behind the counter but that was the least of your concerns right now. Whatever Eddie was messing around with this time wasn’t important and truthfully, you were just concentrating on keeping your sobs under control. If one slipped out every so often, Eddie didn’t pay any mind or say anything which you were grateful for.

Until you felt a presence in front of you which you refused to acknowledge, further burying your face in your hands and cowering into your knees. You pretended he wasn’t there.

“Here.”

His voice was soft and velvety. You were able to conclude that he was sitting on the coffee table in front of you as you peeked for a split second from between your fingers. What he was offering you, you weren’t able to determine from the quick glance. You responded with a shake of your head, hoping he’d just go back to mindlessly tinkering with things around the shop or fidgeting with straw wrappers.

“You’re gonna make yourself sick.”

Like he’d give a shit.

“C’mon, you gotta breathe.”

At this you give in, allowing him the smallest view of your eyes from just above your knees, wet lashes blinking up at him in the most beautiful way though he wishes he could take away all the sadness you were radiating. Gentle. He has to be gentle. And if you happened to snap at him he had to control himself. Breathe.

“Here.” He repeats, holding out a to-go cup, just like the one from earlier.

Again you shake your head. And he has to be fine with that. He is fine with that. Your poor body was trembling and he was carefully selecting his next words so he wouldn’t feed whatever was causing this episode. Cup neglected next to him on the coffee table, his palms rest on the tops of his thighs as he stares at the floor contemplating. A flash of light and a rumbling of thunder, louder than you could ever imagine has you flinching, face wincing almost as if in pain and he isn’t sure what his next move is. When you glance back over at the door in fear he knows he has to divert your attention. He isn’t sure how long you’ll both be stuck in here and if you’re freaking out the entire time it won’t help either of you.

“Hey. The door is fine.” He didn’t know that for sure but it seemed to be holding up and no more water was seeping into the shop so he was confident enough.

“Yeah.” You whisper, lip being pulled in between your teeth nervously, nearly drawing blood.

“I promise–”

A deafening crack of thunder just about swallowed the town and on instinct, you lunged forward to grip Eddie’s bicep tightly. Your nails were digging into his skin but he didn’t mind. His initial reaction was to pull you into his arms but he decided against it. Instead he gripped your forearms, gentle enough that if you were to pull away his hands would fall off of you with ease. If this was the closest he’d get to ever holding you, he’d take it.

“It’s okay. Everything’s okay.” He soothed, his voice dripping with honey like never before. “You’re gonna be okay.”

You seemed to realize how out of character you were as you let go of his arm, hands in the air as if surrendering but if you only knew he didn’t want you to.

“Sorry.” You murmur, eyes wide.

His gaze never left you and yours never left his. You were too close to him yet you couldn’t move back. Somehow you still allowed his hands to hold your forearms and without thinking his thumb caressed the skin ever so slightly, a whisper of a touch.

“Nothin’ to be sorry for.” That boyish smile graced his lips and for the first time in a while, you were appreciating it with stars in your eyes.

Another clap of thunder and a blinding light streaked across the sky and once again, you were clinging onto him but this time as he held your forearms, you held his. You almost fit like pieces of a puzzle.

“Sorry. Sorry.” You apologized twice more and he wasn’t sure why. If anything he should be spending the rest of his life apologizing to you. That’s what Wayne would tell him if he knew the density of the situation between you.

“Stop saying sorry.”

“I-I’m…sorry?” You laughed. A breathy but genuine laugh. His heart felt like it was going to rip itself out of his chest as he laughed with you. Yeah. He wanted to spend forever laughing with you. So he would savor this moment if it was all he could get.

You released his forearms and finally moved back to your original position on the couch. Your warmth was missing from his skin and he ached even just having been allowed that one simple pleasure for a minute or so.

“Drink this, it’ll probably make you feel better.” For one last time, he offered you a token of his peace, a declaration that even if you still didn’t take it, he would still honor it and respect your decision.

The streetlights illuminated your face in a way that he wanted to remember for eternity. If you were his, he’d trace his finger down the slope of your nose. But you weren’t and you’d never be. It was his fault and throughout all the grief he had given you, he somehow learned to fall even harder. That was never the intention. Truth be told, he didn’t know what the intention was. Maybe subconsciously he was pushing you further and further away since he fully accepted he’d never have you. A dumb concept, he knows but that’s how his brain was wired.

“Hot chocolate?” You ask, head tilted in the most adorable way, brow raised at him in suspicion.

“What else would it be?”

“Poison.” You joke but he doesn’t quite find it funny. He should. What changed?

“No. No, not poison.” It’s mumbled as he stands, beginning to make his way back toward the counter. He’s stopped when your hand reaches out to grab his elbow, another clap of thunder accompanying the action which only causes your nails to dig into his skin again, a welcoming sensation.

“Why aren’t you laughing?” You frown. He didn’t mean to cause it but he finds ways to disappoint time after time.

“I-uh, I don’t know.” Liar.

“Well, you can’t leave me here.” Was this your way of saying you needed him? Why would you ever need him? He was the bane of your existence and you had no problem showing it until now. Now you were being almost…sweet? No, not quite although he couldn’t deny that you were sweet all the way around–even when you were telling him off. Even when you were telling him how much you hated him. You were being friendly. Towards him.

Towards him?

He didn’t deserve that.

But who was he to say no to you?

“Okay.” He whispers, seating himself on the opposite end of the couch, a few feet in between you for modesty.

It turned silent. Only the golf ball sized rain drops pounding against the windows and the occasional rumble of thunder filling the gap. You still hadn’t taken a sip of your drink and he figured you’d never accept his semblance of a peace offering. And he was slowly learning to be okay with it. Wasn’t quite okay with it yet but he would be. He hopes.

And then you sipped it, letting the chocolatey goodness coat your throat and soothe your nerves. You’d never know how big of a deal it was to him. As you looked at him across the couch, his mouth was hung open and the ghost of a grin lingered.

“It really is poisonous isn’t it?” You ask.

“No.” He answers, jaw tightening. “Why do you keep insisting that I’m going to poison you?”

Another crash of thunder alerts you, causing you to jump involuntarily which only made the hot chocolate slosh over the side of the cup and singe the skin of your wrist. A series of curses sputtered off of your tongue and instantly Eddie had grabbed a handful of napkins, offering them to you which you accepted right away, blotting the liquid and watching the skin turn red.

“I-I don’t think you’re going to poison me. It’s a joke.”

“Really?”

“Yes. Why does that bother you so much?”

A sigh falls from his lips, hand running through his lengthy curls. He didn’t exactly know how to formulate the answer into words but he would try.

“I just–I don’t–I’m not like that.”

“Like what? A murderer? Eddie, I know that. I’m just messing around. We hate each other so it just seems fitting.”

His eyes grow two sizes bigger and ten times softer at your statement. His mouth runs without him even thinking but he doesn’t regret it.

“I don’t hate you.”

It takes a moment for you to respond. You’re not as surprised as you should be but you weren’t expecting it either.

“You–you don’t?” Your eyes dart from the beverage back to him as if working out an equation.

“No.”

“Then–then why–what do you call what we’ve been doing this whole time?”

It was a genuine question. If he didn’t hate you then why was he constantly belittling you? Arguing with you? If not in the name of hatred, then what was it all for?

“I couldn’t tell you. I’ve been trying to understand that myself.”

His gaze faltered briefly, insecurely. You’d never seen him with his guard down like this. He did still have those stupid puppy dog eyes, he always had them. But they looked especially sad tonight. Not that you were giving in. What exactly would you be giving in to? Nothing.

“Hold on. You’re the one who started all this. Am I just expected to tell you I don’t hate you? Eddie, you did some seriously messed up shit–”

“I know. I know. Every time I see you I think about it.” It came out strained, as if it physically pained him but what right did he have acting wounded when he was the one who inflicted pain in the first place? You were both aware that he didn’t have that right.

“And to this day you’re still doing some seriously messed up shit like the thing with Steve? If you don’t hate me then what the fuck was that?”

Steve. It wasn’t clear if your bond was completely severed or hanging by a thread. But Eddie played a part in that too and that was more pain and harm done by his hand.

“I don’t know, okay? I keep sabotaging myself, it’s kinda the only thing I’m good at. That’s not an excuse. I’m just trying to make sense of it as much as you are. All I know is that I don’t hate you. And I fully expect you to hate my fucking guts.”

The only person he’d been sabotaging was you. That’s how you saw it. Your life had been on a downward spiral more so when he began showing his face recently. And here he was declaring that he was sabotaging himself and that nothing made sense to him either. You couldn’t buy it. He was the cause of it all, meanwhile he wasn’t even sure of himself what the goal was.

“Eddie. You made me hate myself and you were okay with that.” Tears threatened to resurface but you were able to suck them back. It was a noticeable gesture but at least you weren’t crying again. And his eyes only seemed to grow softer, more bambi like rather than black holes that left you uncertain.

“I was never okay with it.” Before he continued, his mouth seemed to hesitate as he thought about what he said next. The words get stuck on his tongue, he needs to say them but he’s struggling. He shouldn’t be struggling because you deserve to hear what’s lingering in the back of his throat. It’s just that he’s never been good at feelings and has never claimed to be. Fucking this up would mean three steps backwards after he was brave enough to take that first step. He thought of Wayne and the talk they had the previous night, hoping to find some kind of courage because ‘sorry’ was all he was trying to say but how he said it mattered the most. “But I never made any effort to fix it or stop being an asshole and I’m sorry.”

The air was still. Your face displayed no emotion and it was proving difficult to determine how you took to his apology. So he rambled on.

“And the thing with Steve.” Oh boy. “It was nothing. We were messing around not that that makes it any better but honestly we were just looking to get off. Steve came to me cause there were no other dudes in town and he didn’t wanna drive all the way to Indy to find someone. That’s it.”

That’s it?

“That makes me feel so much better.” Sarcasm was laced in your bitter response, your eyes rolling, feeling as heavy as bowling balls before they focused on the babbling idiot on the other side of the couch again.

“Hey, I just said ‘not that it makes it any better’, didn’t I?” It didn’t come off as mean like usual. It came off as more…humorous. But not at your expense. There was no undertone of insult, not with the way the corner of his mouth raised in the most authentically Eddie way. The way you remember from high school. It was the little upturn of his mouth that he really only ever offered you and you were embarrassed to admit to yourself that you noticed. But god, you hadn’t realized how much you missed that cute small dimpled smile until he just flashed it at you. Only for you.

“So Steve is still a huge jackass?” Maybe it was you being delusional from lack of sleep paired with the psychotic events you were being put through but you returned the same humor. Your own tiny upturn of your lips displayed. Only for him. Even if he did take your heart and stomp on it right in front of you years ago.

“That’s up to you. I’m not getting involved.”

His brows raised as he threw his hands up. He’d caused enough chaos to last a lifetime.

“And you’re still a huge jackass?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I am.” Eddie was so sure of his answer and though you were pleased with his reply, something felt achey.

“Are you throwing a pity party?” You tried to divert from the sting you felt, he didn’t warrant any sympathy after all and you were well out of it.

“No. I just really need to grow up.” There was a desperate plea in there somewhere. Not necessarily directed toward you but you detected it nonetheless.

“And it took fucking Steve for that to happen?”

An unexpected decorative pillow was thrown your way, landing in your lap and you couldn’t stifle your laugh. He was in the same boat, cheeks hurting from how wide his grin was and when you tossed the pillow back at his head, he felt his heart in his throat. It thumped uncharacteristically hard, he could feel it in his bones.

“Shut up. It wasn’t fucking, remember? But yeah, I guess King Steve actually did me a favor in a way.”

“By favor do you mean…getting you off–”

“No, god no!” The pillow was again flung into your lap, not too hard, just right as it elicited another giggle from you. “I mean if that didn’t happen then things wouldn’t have happened the way they did. I wouldn’t have gone and bothered my poor uncle late at night and he wouldn't have given me a stern talking to that I honestly needed.”

“Well, whatever he told you it must have worked. You’ve been a lot less jackass-ish today. It’s kinda weirding me out.”

Another pillow to his chest let him know that he was doing okay. He was still the scum of the earth but he was doing okay. The grunt he let out only made you snicker at him from underneath your hand.

“Listen, I’m not always a jackass but when I am good fucking riddance. And I happen to only get that way with you and Steve.”

“Why?”

“I guess–I guess it’s like–well with Steve he was always in the crowd that hated us at school. You know, the nerdy kids, all into DND. Always acted like he was better. Especially since he had money.” Eddie paused, finding himself choked up as he debated his next statement.

You couldn’t deny how pretty he looked in the glow of the orange toned street lights outside. His side profile was something straight out of a renaissance painting, just as you’d observed before. Your finger could delicately trail down the bridge of his nose perfectly. You imagined.

“And with you–I-I fucked up.” He completed his thought.

A moment passed as you sucked in a breath.

“Yeah.”

“Yeah. I was a stupid ass teenager who liked a girl so much he got cocky and ruined everything.”

Liked a girl so much.

Those aren’t the words you should be focusing on yet they’re the only ones that seem to stand out. Were you feeding into misogyny if you kept only hanging onto the parts where he said he liked you? You were so mixed up in so many emotions and it was hard to distinguish what you were supposed to be feeling in the moment.

“You know, I never actually listened to what happened that night. At least from your perspective. I don’t know if I wanna know but we’ve got time to kill so…” Your own form of an olive branch. One that maybe he didn’t deserve but you’d extended it anyway. You were feeling generous and if you really needed to, you could cut that branch.

“I uh–okay.” He began nervously, twisting his rings in his routine habit. “The gist of it is that some jock bet that I couldn’t get you to talk to me and smile.”

You hummed in response, displeased.

“He said something about a hundred dollars but to be honest I didn’t pay a lot of attention.”

“Sure.” You scoff.

“Please just—he—he just started going off about how I wouldn’t be able to do it. And I knew I would because we had been talking for a while. So I figured, why the fuck not? I have reason to talk to this girl I’ve liked for so long who I know will talk to me and laugh at my jokes and I get to make an ass out of this brainless jock. Except, uh that didn’t really happen and I ended up as the ass.”

Disappointment was evident in the way his brows knit together and how his eyes glued themselves to the ground.

“Yeah, you did.”

“And then uh–and then I didn’t stop there as you know. You were there. I said some mean shit.”

He paused to take a deep, thoughtful breath. Eyes fluttering shut before reopening to meet yours again.

“I still say mean shit. But I-uh I wanna work on it.”

“I can respect that.”

“You don’t have to.” Before you can respond he tacks on one more detail that you were curious to see if he’d even address. If he was man enough to bring up. “Oh and uh—the—the whole making out with Chrissy thing. That was a dick move. I did it to spite you. Which was kinda evil. So, I’m sorry for that too.”

“I just need you to know that you really hurt me that night. I don’t care how young we were. It’s haunted me to this day.”

You can’t seem to meet his eyes as you say it, fingers toying with a loose thread on your jeans. His reply is more mature than you’d think to hear from him which only made your head snap up at his admission.

“I’ve hurt you several nights. And I hate that I knew I hurt you and kept hurting you. And I’m sorry. That probably doesn’t mean much coming from me but I am.”

He’d never sounded so sincere in the time you knew him, big brown homely eyes staring at you profoundly. But there was still a lot to unpack and you couldn’t just drop that baggage and forget about it.

“I can’t accept your apology. Not right now anyway. I don’t think you as a man will ever understand the fear and humiliation I felt that night. Every boy in that room cheered you on. I was an item to you all. I was like some prize. I felt like a piece of meat.”

It was true, you’d felt like a display and ever since then, relationships were something you strayed from, unable to trust another human in that way that you’re supposed to when love blossoms.

His posture straightens up and he scoots a centimeter over but never crosses the unestablished boundary that was your side of the couch, doesn’t even come close to it.

“You’re right. I’ll never understand. I never meant to make you feel like a prize or a piece of meat but I did and I can’t imagine how much that traumatized you.”

“It really did. I’ve been scared of liking anyone ever since.” You hadn’t realized you were so okay with being open about it until the words hit the air.

“Fuck, I’m so sorry.” He winced as if he was physically in pain, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“I know I can’t really undo everything but um—if you give me like–a week tops I’ll find another job that will let me work nights–”

“Eddie, I think you’re too late.”

“What? No, no I swear I can probably–”

“Eddie.” Your voice was so gentle, something he wasn’t deserving of, something he wasn’t expecting. “I think we’re on the best terms we’ve ever been on since before the incident. Don’t you think the best time to quit would’ve been when we were at each other’s throats? You’re a little late.”

“I mean–”

“Listen, I’m not forgiving you. But I’m not gonna make you quit your job either. I almost quit and the stress of it probably took years off of my life. We’ve both got bills to pay so there’s no use in wasting time on another job hunt.”

Eddie’s head was shaking in disbelief that even with all the shit he put you through, you were still being the kindest person to him. Maybe that’s what made him fall for you the first time. Maybe it’s what was making him fall all over again.

“I don’t get it. You should be punching me in the face.”

“I think you’re forgetting, I said some pretty horrid things to you too. I guess you’re not the only offender here. You’re the biggest offender. But not the only.” Yet again, you were proving to be a much better person than he ever was. He’d admit to himself that what you said to him back then stung, it stung bad. But he wouldn’t admit that to you. “So I’m sorry. For calling you all those names. And saying Steve was right about you being a lowlife. You’re not trailer trash.”

Tears pricked at his eyes for a sliver of a second but he blinked them away before you could make any note of it. He sniffled, playing it off as his normal body language.

“Honestly, you don’t owe me an apology because I am those things. So I don’t accept your apology. Because you were just telling the truth.”

“You’re not those things. You know what you are though?” You grin, glancing down to the paper cup in your hands.

“What?”

Rotating the cup to display his messy handwriting back to him, he cracks a smile.

“Roadkill.”

~end~

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tags - @mmunson86 @haylaansmi @batkin028 @obscureenigmatic @micheledawn1975 @dreamerjj @hideoutside @hellfirefiend @emilyslutface @rustboxstarr @3rd-conchord @eddiessteady @lightcommastix @kittydeadbones @shadows-echoes @str4ngerthingsslut

#eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson fluff #eddie munson fic #eddie x reader #eddie munson smut #eddie munson x fem reader #eddie munson x female reader #eddie munson imagine #eddie munson x y/n #eddie munson au #eddie munson x you #eddie munson blurb #stranger things au #the under-ground

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spaceratprodigy · 11 months ago

Text

OCs as Obscure References

Thank you for the tags @darkfire1177 @bokatan @hibernationsuit 💖💕

👇❤💜 Faith, Iris, Maril, AND Poppy 💙��👇

Name:

Captain Faith Hawthorne

Animal:

Rat / Bunny / Sprat

Colors:

❤🖤💛

Month:

August

Songs:

Pressure – Billy Joel

Chop Suey! – System of a Down

Autoclave – The Mountain Goats

Angel with a Shotgun – The Cab

I Think We're Alone Now (Cover) – Billie Joe Armstrong

In Your Eyes – Peter Gabriel

God Only Knows – The Beach Boys

The Longest Time – Billy Joel

Number:

Plants:

Peony / Spider Lily

Smells:

vanilla and sweet bakery smells, old books and paper smells, a nice cologne, the smell of the forest when she would go hiking on Earth, gasoline (x)

Gemstone:

Villiaumite / Peridot

Time of Day:

Sunrise / Middle of the Night

Season:

Spring / Autumn

Places:

Fallbrook, Devil's Peak Station, Botanical Lab, Edgewater, Grand Colonial Hotel Penthouse Suite, Purpleberry Orchards

Food:

Empanadas, Rice, Sofrito, Sweets and Pastries, Cheese, Potatoes

Drinks:

Water, Tea, Orange Juice, Milk, Rum

Element:

Fire

Astrological Sign:

Leo

Seasonings:

Adobo, Sazón

Sky:

Full of Stars

Weather:

Warm Spring Day

Weapons:

The Vermin II

Hunting Rifle Hyper

Phin's Phorce (sentimental)

Social Media:

Tumblr

Makeup Product:

Black Nail Polish

Candy:

Dark Chocolate

Method of Long Distance Travel:

Spaceship (via The Unreliable)

Art Style:

Art Nouveau / Baroque

Fear:

loneliness, alcoholism, addiction, abuse, not being good enough, the drastic consequences of failing or not making the "right" choice, how many people she's hurt, never being safe, never being happy, whether or not she's capable of love or being loved back, never finding comfort, her numbness and anger consuming her

Mythological Creature:

Phoenix

Piece of Stationary:

An old, worn, well loved paper. The edges have started turning brown, on it is written all sorts of calculations and schematics that probably only make sense to her, some doodles in the margins where she was lost in thought.

Three Emojis:

⭐🐀📚

Celestial Body:

Cone Nebula / Carina Nebula / Eye of God

Name:

Miss Iris

Animal:

Deer / Bear / Radstag / Yao Guai

Colors:

💜💙🖤❤

Month:

December

Songs:

Invisible Touch – Genesis

Everybody Wants You – Billy Squier

Black Sheep – Metric

I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For – U2

I Want You to Want Me – Cheap Trick

Babe – Styx

All Night Forever – TWRP

Number:

Plants:

Iris / Forget Me Not / Hyacinth / Lily of the Valley

Smells:

gentle floral scents, wood and sawdust, the smells of spices and nice hearty soups cooking, petrichor (x)

Gemstone:

Rhodolite Garnet / Scorodite

Time of Day:

Sunset

Season:

Winter

Places:

Red Rocket Truck Stop, Sanctuary, Valentine Detective Agency, The Third Rail, Diamond City Radio, Atom Cats Garage

Food:

Soups, Fruits, Veggies, Breads, Breakfast Foods

Drinks:

Coffee, Milkshake, Fruit Juice, Whiskey

Element:

Earth / Water

Astrological Sign:

Sagittarius

Seasonings:

Garlic Powder, Onion Powder, Rosemary, Parsley, Coriander

Sky:

Warm Sunset Colors

Weather:

Chilly Jacket Weather

Weapons:

Agamemnon the Fuck Upper (10mm pistol)

Amadeus (rifle)

Le Boom Stick Terribles (combat shotgun)

Social Media:

Makeup Product:

Dark Eyeshadow

Candy:

Chocolate with Caramel / Toffee

Method of Long Distance Travel:

Walking

Art Style:

Rococo / Art Deco / Impressionism

Fear:

losing everything and everyone she loves all over again, not being good enough, not being able to help or save people, causing harm or pain to others, being a burden, never being loved, never being wanted, never being able to free herself, never being able to rebuild a new life with people to love and be loved back by, failing her son, becoming a mother again, failing as a mother again

Mythological Creature:

Siren / Fairy

Piece of Stationary:

A love letter handled with the utmost care. She poured her heart into her elegantly written words. The precision is not lost on you, she wants it known you were worth the time. She signs her name with a lipstick kiss that makes your heart flutter. The parchment smells slightly like her gentle perfume.

Three Emojis:

💋💐🎭

Celestial Body:

Fireworks Galaxy / Pandora's Cluster

Name:

Maril Highwind

Animal:

Crow

Colors:

🖤💙💚💛

Month:

March

Songs:

Shipmeisters' Shanty – Yoko Shimomura

Traverse Town – Yoko Shimomura

The Afternoon Streets – Yoko Shimomura

A Twinkle in the Sky – Yoko Shimomura

Asteroid Attack – Yoko Shimomura

Number:

Plants:

Hydrangea / Morning Glory / Sunflower

Smells:

oil, grime, workshop smells, ink, parchment, wood, paint, dusty old books, the smell of food cooking in the Twilight Town Bistro (x)

Gemstone:

Azurite / Malachite

Time of Day:

Early Afternoon

Season:

Summer

Places:

Traverse Town, Hollow Bastion, The Grid, 100 Acre Wood, Twilight Town

Food:

Sea Salt Ice Cream, Sugary Skies Ice Cream, Royalberry Ice Cream, Carrot Potage, Beef Sauté, Tarte aux Fruits

Drinks:

Lemonade, Limeade, Orange Juice, Apple Cider, Hot Chocolate

Element:

Lightning / Air

Astrological Sign:

Aries

Seasonings:

Basil, Oregano, Cumin

Sky:

Clear Blue

Weather:

Perfect Summer Day

Weapons:

Custom Twin Shooters / Rifle

Social Media:

Instagram

Makeup Product:

Sparkly Cosmetic Stars

Candy:

Sour Gummy Worms / Cotton Candy

Method of Long Distance Travel:

Gummi Ship

Art Style:

Futurism / Neon Art

Fear:

abandonment, something bad happing to her family and friends, not being able to protect the people she cares about, the darkness, her world disappearing while she's away

Mythological Creature:

Wyvern / Harpy

Piece of Stationary:

A stack of worn, rolled up scrolls. The dustier ones are filled with spells and runes you're not quite sure how to read. The ones that smell of inks and paints are beautiful illustrations of various gummi ship designs. The newest scrolls are countless blueprints, they are quite fascinating! Many are for building gummi ships, some are for custom weapons and defense systems.

Three Emojis:

✨🛸🤖

Celestial Body:

Cosmos Redshift 7 / Saturn

Name:

Poppy

Animal:

Snake / Deathclaw

Colors:

❤🖤

Month:

May

Songs:

Foreign Object – The Mountain Goats

Choked Out – The Mountain Goats

Raining Blood – Slayer

Light Up the Night – The Protomen

I Am... All Of Me – Crush 40

Want You Gone – Jonathan Coulton

Number:

Plants:

Poppy / Bleeding Heart

Smells:

Blood, Filth, Campfire, Mildew, Foul Stench of Death

Gemstone:

Cuprite / Amber

Time of Day:

Evening

Season:

Summer / Autumn

Places:

Nuka-World, Grandchester Mystery Mansion, Pickman Gallery, The Combat Zone, Goodneighbor

Food:

Candies, Jerky, Noodles

Drinks:

Nuka-Cherry, Smoothie, Slushie

Element:

Fire

Astrological Sign:

Gemini

Seasonings:

Paprika, Cinnamon, Crushed Red Pepper

Sky:

Dark and Cloudy

Weather:

Stormy and Slightly Windy

Weapons:

Disciples Blade (from Nisha)

Pickman's Blade

Chain-Wrapped Aluminum Baseball Bat

Triple-Hooked Meat Hook

Social Media:

Twitter

Makeup Product:

Red Lipstick

Candy:

Cherry Flavored Candies

Method of Long Distance Travel:

Walking / Train

Art Style:

Expressionism / Surrealism

Fear:

weakness, not being able to defend herself, being captured or imprisoned in any way, loss of autonomy in any way

Mythological Creature:

Hellhound

Piece of Stationary:

An old, torn, crumpled up piece of paper. It's covered in dirt, or maybe that's soot. Did someone try to burn this? The handwriting is sloppy, but the words tell a story. Perhaps a diary entry. It's hard to read, but it's heartbreaking, desperate. This is something someone had to tell, to get it out of their system. It looks as if they tried to destroy it when they were done but swiftly changed their mind. Maybe, in the end, they hoped someone would find it, someone would know their story, maybe even find comfort in it that they're not alone if they've been forced to endure the same pain.

Three Emojis:

🗡💀🍒

Celestial Body:

Sun / Engraved Hourglass Nebula

–

open tag to anyone who wants to jump in!

#uh oh besties I felt like doing all of the girlies #also bc I wanted to show off the updated banners I did for them #faith and iris coded lmao #captain of the unreliable #sole survivor #maril highwind #poppy

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randonauticrap · 1 year ago

Text

The Future of Memory Lane

Pairing ~ Jin Grandet x Reader

Word Count ~ 2.1k

Author's Note ~ Well, with a request like "Wool coat/blanket over shivering shoulders", plus my favorite man in the world, of course I got carried away! Thank you so much for this request, @kissmetwicekissmedeadly !!! I hope you enjoy me just basically gushing about Jin in fic form for 8 minutes. hehe

Warnings ~ Mentions/insinuations of smexy times, but none actually written

And happy official First Day of Fall for everyone in North America! IT'S FINALLY HERE!

The night air was cool, laced with a brisk wind and crunchy leaves that followed its urging. The festival lights were bright and welcoming, a warm invitation to sample the vivacious life that bubbled in the town square, and you and Jin took that invitation with open arms. You sat on a bench in the midst of a bustling evening, filled with laughter and the smoky scents of the dishes made with autumn harvest. Children participated in a pumpkin carving contest not too far away and you watched as mothers and fathers helped their young ones use the sharp knives to bring to life the spooky designs that could only come from a child’s mind. Yours and Jin’s pumpkins sat beside you on the ground, waiting for their turn to be carved once you returned to the palace.

“Hope ya didn’t miss me too much.” your lover’s voice came from your right and you turned to face him, an eager smile already on your lips.

“I always miss you too much.” you giggled as he sat down and handed you a basket with all sorts of food inside. The smell was intoxicating and you nearly neglected the use of your fork just to dig in faster. But upon remembering all you had to carry, you thought better of getting your hands sticky and picked up your utensil. “Thanks for the food, Jin.” you plopped your head against his shoulder and he chuckled, pulling you closer to his side.

“Sure, sweetheart. I couldn’t let the most beautiful woman here go hungry.”

You nuzzled his warm body and let out a laugh, your cheeks reddening in a giddy blush as you chased away the chill in the safest place you’ve ever known: right in this man’s arms. The two of you munched on your food and watched the people smiling around you, oblivious to the prince and his lover in their wake, and that’s just the way you and Jin liked it. Blending in allowed you to enjoy dates like a regular couple, without the peering, judging eyes that befell royalty every day in the palace.

The wind began to pick up as you and Jin discarded your empty baskets and walked around the stalls, all lit up with little twinkling lights and candles. You came across one of your favorite jewelry merchants and started looking through the pieces he had brought this time. The gems were all delicately wrapped with beautiful iron detailing, and each was a representation of something to do with the autumn season. As per tradition, you and Jin each picked out a piece for the other, paid the merchant after thanking him, and made your way further up the cobblestone street.

"Here we go." Jin declared as you reached your favorite coffee shop. Your smile widened and you wrapped your arms even tighter around Jin's bicep, excited about what you knew was coming next.

The little bell clinked as Jin opened the door for you and the wave of coffee bean scent hit you. Your eyes fell closed and you breathed in the cozy, familiar scent of memories from many years of shared joy. Strong arms wrapped around you from behind and you giggled, the musky scent of your lover only adding to the bliss. "Know what you want, sweetheart?" He murmured in your ear and you nodded, letting him propel you to the counter, his warm hands never leaving your sides.

You ordered your favorite: pumpkin flavored coffee and a piece of toffee cake, always made freshly at the beginning of each day once the weather turned cold. Jin ordered his favorite: caramel flavored coffee with pumpkin syrup, and a piece of honey chocolate cake, and you both made your way to the seats outside in the cool night air, your favorite booth left open in anticipation of your visit. You slid in next to the stone wall and gazed out at the lights from the festival, sighing happily when Jin scooted in next to you and provided you with his warmth.

"Ready?" He leaned down and pressed the gentlest of kisses against your lips and you hummed against him, pulling him closer.

"Mhm," you murmured, tugging him back down for another kiss before turning away to grab your bag from the jewelry merchant. Jin did the same, and when you turned back around, he was holding a little terracotta ring box in his hand.

"Sweetheart, I never thought I'd get to have a love like this… but ya proved me wrong. You showed me that love isn't a curse, and it doesn't have to end the way my parents' did," he paused, coughing to hide his emotions, and you wrapped your arms around his waist, tucking your head under his chin. All the love, pain, grief, joy, and comfort that this man had given you the last three years came rushing back to you in an instant a the thought of what you assumed he was about to say, and you fought to hold the tears back before he could finish. You nodded silently and he continued.

"I… I want to make you happy, for the rest of your life. I want to be the man that lives up to all your fairytale dreams. I may not be able to do that, but I wanna try. I wanna be yours forever and I want you to be mine too. Will- will you marry me?"

The moment the words left his lips, you let out a sobbing laugh and smiled up at him, tears beginning to streak your face. The look of momentary panic on his face had you cupping his cheeks and kissing him with all your might. "Jin of course I will. Of course I'll marry you!" You cried, and threw your arms around his neck. His entire body slumped with relief and he returned your embrace, crushing you to him and nearly taking your breath away.

Swept away in a tidal wave of emotion, neither of you noticed the little crowd of townspeople that had gathered to watch the excitement, until they began to clap and celebrate your joy. "Oh!" You gasped in surprise and you both finally broke apart in a daze, and glanced around at everyone clapping for you.

Jin smiled at them, then down at you, the love in his eyes set newly ablaze as he stared down at his fiancée; the only woman who had ever successfully broken through his salacious exterior to see the man within. You were smiling and giggling, thanking the townspeople, but all Jin saw was you. All Jin would ever see again was you, and he was completely fine with that.

The rest of your coffee shop date passed in hushed giggles and loving touches, and before long, the festival crowd was dying down and it was getting late. "Well, ready to go home, future Mrs. Grandet?" Jin beamed down at you as he stood from the booth and held his hand out. For the thousandth time that evening, a joyful laugh bubbled out from between your lips.

"I am, my darling future husband." You responded in kind, taking his hand and letting him pull you up.

"Then we shall take our leave." He continued the silly posh accent as he wrapped your hand around his arm and led you back through the coffee shop and out into the night. You were always safe with Jin, his big, tall frame too intimidating to be pounced upon, so walking the streets with him, even in the evenings, never worried you the way it used to. It was a comfortable walk; a walk you had watched lovers take all your life; a walk you never thought you'd experience for yourself. That is, until 3 years ago. Then you finally understood how every moment was so precious, and every step meant something when you were with the right person.

You were as close to Jin as you could possibly get, but it still didn't feel like enough. Would you ever get close enough? You pondered the thought lazily as the two of you walked back toward your carriage on the other side of town, when…

plop!

plop plop!

"Oh man," Jin said above you. "We're about to get real wet. And not the fun kind. Hold on, sweetheart." And in a single second, you'd been lifted into your prince's arms, and not a moment too soon. The sky opened up and the rain began to pelt you both. It was a cold autumn rain that put a chill in your bones upon contact, and you squealed, clutching Jin's shoulders tightly as he ran. The carriage had still been pretty far, but Jin's long legs carried you there in half the time your own could have, however not before allowing the rain to completely soak the both of you. You clambered into the carriage with Jin right on your heels. He gave some hurried instructions to the driver before pulling the door closed and pulling you close to him.

The carriage arrived at the palace after several wet, shivering moments, and a butler came out to greet you both with a large umbrella in hand. Thankful for the cover, you both hurried along beside him into the palace and once inside, Jin tugged you towards his room.

"Thank you for carrying me. I never would have been able to run that fast." You laughed as you toweled off your wet hair in Jin's bedroom. You tossed the towel to him next and he mimicked your actions before stripping his shirt from his soaked body and toweling it too.

"Course, sweetheart. I'm sorry your prince couldn't keep you from getting wet." He smiled sheepishly.

"Oh, it's fine." You giggled. "Rain is just water. We basically just took a shower outside."

"Have you forgotten what we do in the shower?" He cocked his eyebrow at you, unimpressed, and you blushed, images of exactly what you and Jin normally do in the shower dancing through your mind.

"Oh absolutely not." You laughed, wiggling your eyebrows at him.

"Good, I wouldn't want to find out that my beautiful fiancée could forget our time together." He grinned, the mirth once again in his eyes.

Fiancée.

The word hit you then like a freight train and you paused all movement, staring at Jin as if taking him in for the very first time again. You were pledged to be married to this insanely handsome man before you. It was almost too wild to believe. But as his eyes met yours again, it seemed so obvious. Of course it was him, no one else could ever compare.

Jin hadn't noticed your revelation, and instead was busying himself with pulling several thick blankets from his closet. You only noticed that he had lit up the fireplace when he came to drape one of the blankets around your still shivering shoulders and lead you to his sofa. He sat down first, then pulled you into his lap, cradling you against his bare torso. Your fingers automatically began to trace the lines and dips in his skin, a habit you had formed early in your relationship and never intended to drop.

"Oh hey!" You exclaimed suddenly. "I got so excited about your proposal that I forgot to give you what I got you from the jewelry stall!" You hopped up and rummaged through the pocket of your discarded jacket and pulled out the little bag and brought it back to Jin. You sat back down in his lap and pulled a pendant out of the bag. It was two deep blue sapphires encased in iron hearts and woven together in a beautiful design. "For your jacket lapel." You added as he brought his hand up to cup the tiny piece of art.

"It's incredible." He murmured, staring at it with a certain reverence you only get to see from him when you're alone. "Thank you baby." He muttered, pulling you close and pressing his lips to yours several times before letting you settle back into his arms under the blanket.

"You know this blanket is going to be so soaked, right?" You said after several moments of silence, leaning your head against Jin's shoulder.

"Yeah, that's why I got two out. We're gonna warm up right here first, and then we're gonna take a nice, hot shower, dry off, and we're coming right back to this spot. This is a special night, ya know. I wanna make it last as long as possible."

You giggled and cupped his cheek with your palm before allowing your fingers to explore the nape of his neck and his damp hair. You pulled him down to kiss you and his grip on you tightened. You pulled back just enough to whisper against his lips, "I love you, Jin Grandet."

"I love you too, sweetheart; my amazing future wife. Happy anniversary."

🎃

Tags for the Lovelies: @rhodolitesroseforclavis @aquagirl1978 @ikehoe @queengiuliettafirstlady @maries-gallery @nightghoul381 @itsjudesfault @xbalayage

#ikemen prince #ikepri #ikemen series #jin grandet #ikepri jin #jin grandet fluff #ikepri jin fluff #otome #otome games #autumn fluff #autumn ikepri #ikepri fluff #ikemen prince fluff

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malibudarby87 · 1 year ago

Text

How To Bury Your Love - short story

#Content Warning for spooky stuff and mild body horror#

I recognise Xander the way I would a wax figure. An uncanny approximation of my friend standing in my kitchen, familiar in ways both unnerving and kindly. He is Canadian by catabolism now. His long British vowels drowned in maple; the sharp gravel of his bass notes softened to a pine-fire purr. Even the mass of him, his imposing granite shape, square shouldered and reaching the height of the doorframe, is softened at the edges. Smooth and autumnal, with an un-English gentility.

He is back for the winter, he tells me, and leans in for a hug. His body is a thick, rustic object, made for labour, but his eyes show the softness that kept him indoors; molasses brown with a ring of cinder toffee, cracked and dispersed into the surrounding syrup. Raised eyebrows and the flash of a canine in his smile as he pulls me into him. Skin prickles at the warm-stone kiss on my cheek, campfire and salt on his collar as I breathe him in, and something else. A dryness like mould on bread that catches in the back of my throat.

I raise my arms and hold him firmly, unsure for the first time in my life of his solidity. I press the flesh of my cheek into the buttons of his coat and my fingers find warmth beneath the green corduroy and I know, inflexibly that he is here in my kitchen, holding me. The evidence of his hands, large and square like paws on my neck and lower back, and the soft purr of his comforting coo that vibrates in my hair, is unshakable against the equally inflexible truth that Xander Hollinsworth – my best friend and great unrequited love of my life – had died a week prior.

I step back from the hug and begin to ask him how he got in, appearing as he did seemingly from nowhere in the doorway of my galley kitchen as I absentmindedly finished making two cups of tea instead of one. As if some part of me expected this strange company. An odd behaviour made odder by the knowledge that I don’t get much company – undead or otherwise – anymore.

He waits for me to finish, one eyebrow cocked in anticipation, but the words stick in my throat and instead I turn my gaze to the counter. I stare at it for a while before quietly handing him the prophetic second mug of sweet, milky tea.

‘Cheers, darling,’he says, and my chest blossoms.

In the past, my friends in the know had scolded me for letting him call me that. Tutted their tongues and shaken their heads when I explained how it made me feel like a wildflower shrapnel bomb had exploded in my gut whenever he called me darling, or sweetheart, or handsome.

‘He’s leading you on. And what’s worse, you’re encouraging it,’ they would say, exhausted by the repetitive, futile explanation, like the tired owner of a dog that won’t stop pissing on the rug. ‘It’s not healthy. He’s never gonna fuck you, Ben.’

I would agree with them, only in part to keep them quiet but also firm in the knowledge that they were right. Then later, in the proximity of him and his all-encompassing solidity, all such pretences would be shed, and I would go out of my way to be dutiful and attentive enough to illicit those words.

When he announced his permanent departure to Canada, more than four years ago now, there were some among my friends who couldn’t contain their glee at being proven right. He was never going to fuck me, and now he’d be too far away for me to keep pretending like he would. This, for reasons I could never quite explain, would not be the case. My imagination, despite my own protestations, knew no obstacle it couldn’t overcome, and I pined and hoped harder in his absence than I ever did in his presence.

Weeks turned to months and years, and I still held out a childish hope that he would one day return and sweep me off my feet and we would fall madly in love somewhere with green mountains and caramel doughnuts; the scent of sandalwood and acoustic guitar following wherever we went. This was not – as I was reminded for a time until my friend’s patience depleted – a healthy way of being for a thirty-three-year-old man.

There is a significant part of me, standing in the kitchen, watching my dead but not dead friend sip his tea in awkward silence, that feels a grim smugness at being proven right.

Conversation is stilted as I ask awkwardly how his journey was and he laughs dryly. I join in the laugh after a few moments of quiet shock, shaking my head as I try to rationalize the situation. Xander is dead. He is also in my kitchen, swirling the dregs of his tea in a Starbucks Pumkin mug, and shooting me glances with those molasses eyes of his. Both things are true. I decide that to examine things much further is a waste of sanity, and lead him to the living room to sit on the sofa.

The silence here is gentler. A warm, familiar thing that was always easy to come by between us. We could sit for hours in each other’s company, never saying a word. I would sometimes, as I did now, count the freckles on his neck, imagining constellations in the flecks of brown, and he would, as he did now, pull my legs onto his lap and make cat-like biscuits on my calves in a feeble half-massage.

As I chart high-sailed ships and bears swiping at salmon and juggling jesters, I notice the skin between the freckles is paler than I remember, with a shimmer of oyster shell like spoiling ham. I hear the tendons of his fingers, mashing into the flesh of my calves, crack, and grind like stones in sausage casing. I choose to ignore these things, for now.

I don’t remember how we met. We seemed just there, in the periphery of each other’s lives. Planets in the same system. Friends of friends of friends. Over the years the Venn diagrams swelled and contracted, twisting in a spirograph pattern until we became our own little circle in the middle of the page.

I do remember, however, the moment I fell in love with him. It came long before our planets fully collided; long before we were the one person the other would call in a crisis. I suppose there was a perversity in me allowing us to grow so close in friendship, knowing what I did.

It was the week before my Birthday, not one of the big ones, and I had been a sulking child for the better part of a month. I hate Birthdays, specifically my own, and had been oscillating wildly between not wanting to bring it up for fear of anyone making a big deal of it, and wanting to tell everyone so I could demand they didn’t.

I’d just finished work, an evening shift at a massive arts and crafts store. I walked to the bus stop in a grim silence, rubbing at the knots in my shoulders, and didn’t even notice him until we were separated by a mere few feet. He stood by the bus stop bench, just under the shelter. The structure was dwarfed by him. His height, his breadth. The measure of him made everything around him look so small. But it wasn’t just his size. It was something else. A weight of being. The world was smaller for him being in it.

He held a golden balloon decorated with white smiley faces in one hand, his other behind his back. A dopey grin spread across his bearded face, flash of white in the dull glow of the streetlights, and I couldn’t help but smile in response.

He started singing Happy Birthday. Loudly. Voice like coffee grounds and whiskey. I cringed, eyes rolling. I turned on my heel and started to walk in the other direction. He rushed to follow, feet dancing on the pavement, balloon bouncing against his wrist as he continued his song. Hot breath on my cold ear. I started laughing, calling him a dickhead and swatting at the balloon when it flew too close to my face.

‘What are you doing?’ I asked, slowing to a stop as he circled me. He didn’t answer until he’d finished the song, ending with a bow and a flourish, revealing a gift-wrapped rectangle in his free hand.

‘Happy Birthday, Ben.’

‘It’s not my bloody Birthday, Xander,’ I said, taking the present and the balloon offered to me. I felt foolish, stood on the pavement of an industrial estate, clutching childish party favours.

‘I know,’ he said, pulling a menthol from a half-crushed packet and lighting up. ‘But, I’ve heard you don’t like to celebrate your Birthday.’

‘I really don’t,’ I said, breathing in the smoke as it drifted towards me.

‘Well, that’s a problem for me. Because I always have to make a big deal about my friend’s Birthdays. It’s a sickness. I’m a sick man, Ben.’ He paced the narrow pavement back and forth in front of me, gesturing like Columbo giving his final thoughts. ‘So, if we celebrate it today, when it’s not your Birthday, I get to fulfil this admittedly selfish, irrepressible need I have, and you can’t be mad about it.’

‘Oh, I can’t?’ I asked, with as much impunity as I could muster through a smile.

‘No,’ he said, shaking his head grimly. ‘It would be completely unreasonable of you. And rude. And possibly homophobic? I’m not sure, but just come with me for one drink, which I will buy, and we won’t have to speak about your day-of-birth again. For exactly one calendar year.’

I laughed, tapping the present against my thigh, and weighing up his disturbed logic.

‘One drink,’ he pleaded, eyes catching jewels of amber from the streetlamps. ‘And you have to be very pleased with the present or I’ll cry. It’s a copy of Frankenstein. One of the posh ones. The book is posh, not the monster. Or the Doctor. Scientist? Creator.’

That was the moment. Him stumbling over his words in the middle of nowhere, in the dusk of an unremarkable day in April, pleading for me to celebrate my existence solely for his benefit.

He asks me how I’ve been since we last spoke. It’s been a little over a fortnight since our last call. A week before I heard the news. He’d said ‘Love you, buddy. See you soon.’

I look around the room, at the collection of coffee and tea mugs, two dozen strong; the Pot Noodles with forks still embedded in the crusted remains; torn scraps of brown envelopes, notes and numbers scribbled, languidly. Pen strokes dragging across the paper. Details for his funeral in Canada that I couldn’t afford to attend. An appointment date for free grief counselling.

‘Stupid question, I guess,’ he says, and I’ve missed his smile so much. I’d thought about it often the past week. Imagining it in my mind. Picturing the way his mouth pulls up unevenly, higher on the left side. One rogue canine sliding out from his under his upper lip. I’d gotten it almost perfectly in my memory, though his lips are darker at the corners than I remember. An aubergine purple, almost fading to black.

‘You need to look after yourself better,’ he says, drumming an arrhythmic beat on my shins. If he knows he’s dead, he hasn’t yet mentioned it. ‘Honestly, I go away for a few years, and you really let yourself go. Hideous.’

It takes me a moment to realise he’s joking. His voice is flatter than I remember, the edges round and indistinct.

I wonder why I’m not scared. Shocked, yes, but searching my body I find no trace of fear. Even the shock is a dull emotion, tempered by the nearness of him. The weight of his forearms resting on me. The sound of his breathing. I’m crying. Not a hysterical thing. Tears, thick and heavy roll down my cheeks and collect in the scruff of two-week stubble.

I pull myself closer to him across the couch. My hands moving under his jacket to grab at him hungrily. Xander yields and shrugs himself free from the extra layer. He shushes me gently, stroking my neck and thumbing at the dampness in the corners of my eyes, but does nothing to stop my grasping.

‘Hey, it’s okay,’ he whispers.

I push my face into his chest, breathing him in. Fire and ash. Wood and leather. Dry mould.

‘Xander?’ I start. Unsure of where I’ll end. ‘Why? Why are you here?’

He holds me for a long time in silence. My salt tears dampening his chest hair and the ribbing of his shirt. Eventually, he answers.

‘I owed you that much, I think.’

He doesn’t elaborate, and he doesn’t need to. We both know what he means, in some way. ‘You don’t owe me shit, dickhead.’

Fingers firmly on my chin, he raises my head. Our eyes search for each other’s in the dim light. His dart rapidly, as if struggling to focus on mine. Carousels of brown and gold, flickering like tracking on a VHS. The edges are cloudy, like cigarette smoke.

I remember the last time we were this close, in this way. The electric anticipation of possibility that went unfulfilled.

‘Can I?’ he asks, barely more than a whisper. I should say no, or at least think further. But before I can find protestations, something slick and warm in my bones moves, and I shakily nod my response.

His lips touch mine and I crack open. A tectonic shift of plates under pressure, finally yielding after years of friction. I am split in two. In this moment we are both of us dead men. I know this like I know anything. How to breathe. The sound of thunder. Universal knowledge that lives in the blood.

I am certain that beyond this kiss, the man I was, who waited and craved, will be no more, and the man who knows a hunger sated will continue. This dead man doesn’t know which is more cursed.

Xander’s mouth tastes like curdling milk.

I was always terrible at flirting. I came out too young and learned too quickly to fear the violence of threatened masculinity, and so I never felt comfortable around men.

Well, most men.

Xander had an ease to him. An assurance in the way he carried himself. I’d watch him flirt and seduce, casually slipping from relaxed, friendly conversation to something more primal without a hint of fear.

I wasn’t even jealous, most of the time, but fascinated by an aptitude that seemed impossible to me.

I remember seeing him strike out only once, though I’m sure there must have been other times. It was less a miscalculation through incompetence and more the effects of mixing Tequila and Prosecco.

It was New Years Eve 2015, and we’d spent the night hopping around house parties in Nottingham before finding ourselves outside some tiny black-box gay club down by the canal. The entry price was more than either of us had left to spend, and Xander instead had the bright idea of seducing one of the door staff; a stout, burly bald guy with ginger stubble.

Xander dwarfed him, practically having to lean at the waist to speak into his ear over the din of whistles, fireworks, and general homosexual commotion.

I kept my distance, steadying myself on a safety railing, swapping between swigs of water and drags from one of Xander’s Superking menthols. I expected I’d soon be watching them make out by the river. I was wrong.

I didn’t hear what was said, but I saw the shove. This guy with the stubble, not much more than five feet tall caught Xander off balance. He tumbled onto the cobbles, rocking like a see-saw on his head before crumpling into immobility. It was a strangely morbid spectacle, but oddly impressive. Like watching a tower block fall while a lone resident waved from a balcony. It wasn’t a fight. One push and it was done.

I stood frozen, as if unable to process what I’d just seen. By the time I’d summoned the courage to walk over and help, Xander had somehow already charmed the guy into apologising.

Throwing out some apologies of my own, I promised to get Xander home and waved off the forming crowd. His weight on my shoulders as I walked him down the street was a beautiful burden. My cross and my cause in one drunken package, slurring nonsense into the cold air.

Later, we sat together further down the canal. Shoulder to shoulder with a greasy slice of pizza between us, feet dangling through the safety rails over the still water.

‘Don’t think either of us is getting lucky tonight,’ he said, wiping blood from his hairline with a balled up pizza napkin. I ignored his commentary and took the napkin, and gently tried to clean up the blood that he’d missed.

He smiled at me, glassy eyed.

‘One of these days,’ he began. I could tell what was coming. Something that always happened when he was drunk, and horny with no one to shag.

‘Don’t say it,’ I said, wanting him very much to say it.

‘No, shut up,’ he said, grabbing my wrist and looking me dead in the eyes as though delivering some important speech. ‘Ben. Ben, one of these days, I am going to ruin our friendship so hard.’

‘Shut up, you’re drunk!’ I laughed, pulling away.

‘So hard! I’m gonna-‘ his voice dropped to a pantomime whisper. ‘I’m gonna do things. To you. Weird shit. Like, crazy animal shit. We’ll never speak again, and you’ll hate me, but it’ll be so good.’

‘You’re an idiot, Xan,’ I said, pulling him to his feet and he wrapped me into a hug.

‘One day, handsome,’ his voice, hot and wet in my ear. Thick and sour with alcohol. ‘One day.’

We don’t mention the kiss. We settle back into our comfortable silence, his hand stroking my head as I curl into a ball in his lap. The motion of his hand feels stunted. Mechanical. His fingertips are cold

‘Now what?’ I finally ask. The tears have stopped now. I can still taste him on my lips. Sweet and sour.

‘No idea, handsome,’ he says with a soft chuckle. He makes a strange sound that might be a yawn. I hear something snap as he does.

For the first time since his return, I’m scared. A cold, weightless fear that lives at the base of my spine and swims in circles.

I wait for the night to turn black. Then a little longer. Finally, I suggest getting some rest and reluctantly climb off of him. As he stands his bones and flesh crinkle and crack beneath his clothes. A cruel percussion that makes me wince. He cracks his knuckles and one of his fingers splinters like a cinnamon stick. Neither of us mention it, but he gives an apologetic smile and strokes my face with his remaining solid hand. I don’t even flinch at the cold.

‘Lead the way,’ he says, and I take him by the hand, across the hall into my room.

I haven’t slept in my bed in two days, curling on the sofa instead; sleeping with a mindless drone of YouTube playlists of our favourite bands for white noise. I’d forgotten the state I’d left it in.

Xander walks around me, beelining for the bed and the pathetic shrine I’d been sleeping in since his first death. Pictures of the two of us; the copy of Frankenstein, the gold leaf embossing almost entirely worn away; the wrapping paper it came in, unfolded and refolded a thousand times; postcards, letters, Birthday cards, and gift tags. A littering of desperation.

He smiles as he brushes his fingers across them one by one. I wonder what this must be like for him. His expression gives away nothing. He looks tired.

We clear the bed and undress. His feet and hands are blue now, pearlescent and shiny, with thick grey veins visible up to his knees and elbows. When he’s done he helps me peel of my last layers. Somehow still delicate with hands of stone.

We lay down and pull up the blankets. I curl instinctively into him, my feet finding place behind his knees and my hands snaking beneath his shoulders. It feels natural. A slotting of bodies that makes a strange sense, and I imagine a world in which we did this every day.

The cruelty of it pulls me back into the present moment.

As if sensing my mistake, he pulls me closer. Stone-lipped kisses on my forehead. I stroke his back and a piece of him falls away.

The fear snakes its way up my back and I know I’m not ready for what’s to come. I wish that pieces of myself would crumble. I wish that we could turn to dust together.

‘I’m so sorry,’ he says. His voice sounds distant, and hollow. Bouncing off the insides of him.

‘Don’t apologise. Don’t you dare fucking apologise.’ I whisper into his chest, stock still so as to not break him further.

His breaths grow quick and rough. A rumble of quiet thunder that feels like a lullaby.

‘Don’t apologise,’ I’d said to him, staring at the nauseating shapes on the carpet of the cinema lobby. Xander had just told me his latest trip to Canada would be permanent. He’d taken me to a Halloween horror night at the Odeon to soften the blow, and it ended with me crying into the dregs of a bucket of popcorn, skeleton facepaint smeared into a lopsided rorschach.

He hadn’t been able to look me in the eye since he told me. He was standing by the window. He never sat when he was nervous.

The sounds of the busy lobby buzzed around me. They droned, distant and muffled, as if underwater, and for a moment I imagined I was drowning.

‘Say something, handsome,’ he said. He was keeping his distance. I wanted to ask him to come hold me, but I was afraid he’d think me weak. I was afraid he’d think I was manipulating him to stay.

God how part of me wanted to manipulate him to stay.

A bigger part of me knew I couldn’t, and that hurt somehow more than the knowledge that he’d be gone.

‘I’m happy for you,’ I said. And it was true enough. ‘I’m gonna fucking miss you, Xan. Really fucking miss you. But I am happy for you.’

I forced a smile. He was crying. I stood and it felt like the world was off its axis. I stumbled and he grabbed me. He held me. The solidity of him righted the globe. Soon that would be gone.

‘It won’t be forever,’ he said. ‘I’ll come back.’

I open my eyes and he is still. The world expands.

I must have fallen asleep, and for a moment I fear that I’d imagined it all. But he’s still here, in my bed. Pieces of him. Solid, but broken. His hands still hold me, unattached to his wrists. Cold stone fingers gripping me tight enough to bruise.

I whisper his name in the darkness, knowing there will be no response from his fractured face. His mouth and nose have rolled off the pillow. One eye, set solidly in place in a petrified lid stares at me sightlessly. No molasses. No cinder toffee. The sweetness of him a memory.

I leave him there in my bed for too long. Resting next to him each night, stroking at the remains of him until he turns to smooth edged stones that glitter like snow and smell of fire and mould.

When the spring comes, I sweep up the jewels of the man that I love, and bury him in a ring of stone. I water the soil until wildflowers grow.

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