#it's about meeting someone you love again for the first time

[luveline]

Missing hotchner reader❤️❤️

hotch and spencer have to work together to look after you when things get really hard. fem, 3.3k

cw cptsd episodes and descrips of abuse

Adoption isn’t as permanent as people might think —they can give you back anytime they want. So when the oldest Hotchner started hitting you, it wasn’t that different to a previous placement, nobody was watching over you, and you were so afraid of losing your new brother that you didn’t say a word. 

You knew, reasonably, that if Aaron was to find out about how his father (your father) had been treating you, he’d report it to your caseworker or the police or somebody and you would be removed from the Hotchner household. And Aaron was the first person you’d ever met to care about you, really care, maybe even love, so you hid it all away and you told him that things were fine. You do it for years.  

You move out, you go to college. Aaron moves you into a nice apartment a few streets away from his own, and for a while, life is good. You meet his coworker, Spencer, and you get along. Spencer takes you on dates to cinemas and patisseries and he buys you cuddly plushies with hearts sewn into their hands at Valentine’s. By all accounts, things should be good. 

You can’t breathe, is the problem. Somebody has their hand raised to hit you again and you can’t do anything about it, you just have to take it, because you’re useless, because you deserve it, because you’re a drain on everything and everyone and you aren’t worth the trouble, you deserve the hit. You’re so sorry.

“I know,” someone murmurs quietly, a sensation on your shoulder. You wait for it to close around the back of your neck. “I know. It’s alright.” 

“I’m sorry,” you say, barely, a breath of sound. 

“You don’t have to be sorry, you didn’t do anything wrong.” 

But you did, you did, he was in a bad mood to begin with and you hit his glass of scotch right off the table, smashed glass and wasted drink and a bad mood made worse. He should’ve hit you by now. He’s waiting for you to sit up. He doesn’t like to hit the back of your head, but he will if you cower long enough.

“Honey,” the voice says, right by your ear, “I’m not going to hit you, do you hear me? I am never, ever going to hit you.” 

“I’m really sorry.” 

“I don’t care that you knocked the glass over. I don’t care at all.” 

“I’m sorry.” 

“Can you look at me? I promise,” —he emphasises until his voice burns— “I am not going to hit you.” 

Aaron sounds upset enough to force your gaze. You look at him through your lashes, ready to shut your eyes if this is a trick, but he has his hands flat in front of you and he’s completely still. 

“Sweetheart,” he says, so unlike himself, “I wouldn’t hit you over a glass. I wouldn’t hit you if you did it on purpose. I wouldn’t hit you if you smashed every piece of glassware in this apartment for fun.” 

He’s hit you for less. 

“Sweetheart,” he says again, waiting for a reaction you can’t give, “do you want me to go away?” 

It’s a good question. Do you want him to leave? Immediately, everything inside of you says No. He’s gonna hit you just like the last time you smashed his drink, out of the blue, ‘cos didn’t mean to doesn’t matter. But you don’t want Aaron to go. He’s the only person who’s ever loved you properly. 

“It’s okay, just hit me,” you say, staring at him, pleading with him not to even as you ask for it, “it’s my fault.” 

“Not gonna hit you,” he says, reaching for you now, even when you flinch, he holds you by the arms and he stares at you hard. 

“It’s okay,” you say. 

“It’s not okay. It won’t fix anything.” 

“I deserve it.” 

“No, you don’t.” Aaron rubs your arms in tandem, shaking his head, a trace of panic in his eyes you’d missed until now. 

It’s Aaron. Aaron’s never hit you. 

“You never deserve to have someone put their hands on you,” he says, practically murmurs, “I’m sorry I let that happen.”

“I lied to you.” 

“I know. I know you did, honey.” He shakes his head gently. “It’s not your fault.” 

“I hit the glass over,” you say, And he hit me so hard I couldn’t hear right for hours. You still remember the way it shocked you, because you’d started to expect it but you were still surprised he’d bother with such a hard hit, that he could get that angry about it.

“I thought it was just me,” he murmurs, sorry, clutching at you like he needs you to listen. “I never should’ve left you in that house, but I thought it was just me. It was only ever… me.” 

You already know —you’ve had this conversation before. He’s apologised already. 

He cups your cheek. “I’m sorry.” 

“You’re not angry with me?” 

“No. I’m never angry with you.” 

You come to yourself in fits. You’re kneeling on the floor not far from the table, the mess of glass, half still intact and cupping a few sips of scotch. Aaron’s kneeling right next to you, still in his suit, hasn’t been home long, you were waiting for him. You used your key because you didn’t want to be home alone. Today’s been a bad day. You’ve felt stringy and strange for hours and you knew seeing Aaron would set it right. That Aaron would make you feel better through force of will. 

And then you’d knocked his drink off the table and both of you had startled, and he’d said, “Wait, don’t, you’ll hurt yourself,” but all your brain heard was You. 

You. What could be said to mean more than that? 

“You’re not gonna hit me,” you whisper. 

“Never.” 

“Can you help me up?” you ask, half apart from yourself. Your head is back, but your legs won’t cooperate. 

“Where do you want to go? The kitchen?” he asks, leaning so you can wrap your arms behind his head. He lifts you up with some effort on his part, adjusting you, and leading you together to the kitchen to sit you at the island bar. “Sit tight. I’ll clean the glass, okay? It won’t take long.” 

You don’t want him to go, but you don’t wanna say no. 

Time away from him is good, in a way. It makes you remember who you actually are outside of the bad memory. It hammers home that this is Aaron’s apartment, your big brother, your number one supporter. There’s a picture of you and Jack right there on the fridge stuck by an alphabet magnet. Aaron’s never hit you before and it’s not going to change now, because he is nothing like his dad. 

He’s never really seen you act like this, though, and you aren’t excited for what he has to say next. He has a penchant for seeing you at your worst and building you back up again. It shouldn’t be his problem, but it is. 

He brushes the glass into a dustpan and unloads it into a bag, which he trashes. You watch him wet a paper towel and wipe it across the floor for the shavings. 

When he’s drying his hands on a towel, you summon the courage to apologise. “Aaron, I’m… I’m sorry. Sorry.” 

He closes his eyes. He doesn’t look much like the other Hotchner’s. He’s dark-haired like his mother, and he smiles with all kindness. You never saw anything so soft at home, not unless he was there to visit. It’s a wonder he ever bothered getting to know you, already living his life very much outside of the household, and shouldn’t he have moved on? If it were you, if there were another kid in the house right now, could you go back? Knowing how you were treated? 

“I love you,” he says. “You know that?” 

“Yeah.” 

“Do you think you could understand why I don’t want you to say sorry, or be sorry, because of that?” 

You smile weakly. “Yeah.” 

“Yeah? Because if Jack were in here today, and he had hit that drink over, you couldn’t have hit him. Could you?” 

“Of course not.” 

He’s mildly guilty for the example, you can tell, but it cements the sentiment in your mind and he can see that. “When you love someone, you don’t hit them. We just can’t do it.” 

“I just… just– you– I got all mixed up in my head.” 

“I know.” 

“Thought you were him,” you say tightly, quietly. 

“I know. Is that the first time you’ve had something like that happen? Like you weren’t sure where you were?” 

Your face crumples of its own accord, heat clogging your nose and throat and lining the backs of your eyes. “No… but it hasn’t been that many times…”

“The bad panic attack at work a few weeks ago, was that like this?” 

“No, that was just that I couldn’t breathe right. I– I had one with Spencer.”

Aaron frowns, but he speaks kindly, “When was that?” 

“A couple of days ago…” You stare at your hands.

“We don’t have to talk about it. But I need to make sure you’re okay.” 

“He told me to tell you, but it– I thought he’d break up with me, after, but he hasn’t, so I’ve just been waiting.” 

“Honey, I don’t think this is the sort of thing that could make Spencer break up with you. He cares too much.” 

“You don’t understand, I– I begged him not to touch me, Aaron. I really scared him.” 

With Spencer, it was late. You asked him to stay the night on a limb, and you’d forgotten he was there sleeping beside you, met him in a dark hallway, where he asked what you were doing out of bed. It’s late. You shouldn’t be up. 

His hand had settled just behind your neck. He won’t touch you there anymore. 

“If there’s something you want to tell me–”

“I want it to go away,” you say. 

“It’s not going to be that easy.” He takes a big, deep breath. “You could’ve told me this was happening,” he promises. 

“I didn’t want you to know that I– lied so much. Sometimes I can’t believe I let him do it.” 

Your tone, quiet and calm and a juxtaposition to the ache in your chest, couldn’t hurt him worse. You're familiar with the pain on Aaron’s face, how it makes him do this sorry smile, how he tries hard not to give it away. “If anyone let him hurt you, it was me.” 

“What?” 

“I knew he was unkind to you. I knew he shouted. I didn’t try hard enough to get you away.” 

“Aaron–”

“If you’re going to blame someone, it has to be me.” 

It’s ridiculous. If you hadn’t had Aaron, you would’ve been completely miserable to the marrow of your bones. He’s the last person on earth you’d blame for the way you’re feeling now, so when a tear wells in your eyes, when it hits your cheek in a splash, you let him tut and wrap his arms behind you. 

“It’s my fault,” you insist, hiding your face in his shoulder. 

“No.” 

“It’s my fault, I hit the glass–”

“No, no, it’s not your fault.” 

“I’m really s–sorry.” 

“It’s gonna be okay, honey. Just breathe. Just take a deep breath for me. I promise you I’m not mad about the glass.” 

“Maybe you should be.” 

He holds your forehead to his chin, clutching you to him, reassuring and a little too tight. “I’m not mad at you.” 

You can’t make yourself believe him. 

—

Spencer isn’t expecting to get waylaid by Hotch at Rossi’s dinner party. He can’t think of what he did wrong. You’re happy with him, clingy lately, which he loves, and as smart and sweet as ever, and work is great. Spencer’s a good agent and a better profiler. 

Hotch looks so serious that he follows him in silence, squeezing his coke neck like a lifeline. 

“I want Y/N to be assessed for PTSD, and I need to know that you’re going to support her,” he says simply. 

Spencer searches the backyard for you. You’re laying down in the grass with Jack, Henry, and Penelope. It’s getting late, barely any sunshine left, but nobody’s wanted to ruin the fun and call it a night yet. You don’t fuss as Jack throws himself sideways across your chest. 

“Did something happen?” Spencer asks. 

“She had an… event. She told me about a similar incident with you the other night. That she panicked and got confused about who you were.” 

Spencer nods. “Yeah, I– yeah. I caught her by surprise.” 

“That’s the only time it’s happened?” 

“Yeah. She’s told me a little about it.” 

“About the episode?” 

“Everything. And it’s obvious?” He enthuses it with apology, worried he’ll offend Hotch if he says something too blatant, but desperate to be honest. “Most of the time she’s this– she’s amazing, she’s like this light, and then sometimes it’s like she thinks I don’t like her? Like I don’t want to be near her, or like she thinks I’m gonna hurt her.” 

Hotch lets his eyebrows rise a little. “Yeah.” 

“She cried so much that I didn’t know what to do.” 

“I wouldn’t worry about that part, she already told me you made her feel better,” Hotch says quietly. Neither of them mention what they know, how you’d begged Spencer to stay after the episode, how sorry you’d been, how desperate Spencer was to calm you down. “But if you can’t do it in the long run, you need to know now. I can’t start this with her and have you duck out halfway through. I know,” —Hotch gives him a fond smile, half-knocking the wind from him— “that you care about her, and I know it’s not my place to come to you on her behalf, but I’m going to do it anyhow, and you know why I am.” 

“What do you mean?” he says, though he knows. 

“I’m saying I think she’s going to get worse before she gets better. She’s not well right now.” 

“I know she isn’t.” 

“I trust you, Spencer. I care about you, too. But she’s going to be my priority, and if you can’t be there for her then it has to be done now... I’m worried she’s going to get really low.” 

“I’m not going anywhere,” he says genuinely. Spencer’s not defensive, only urgent. “Hotch, I more than care about her.” 

Hotch nods. “Okay. Good, because I need your help. You have to vet these doctors for me, I have a preliminary list. I’ll send it to you.” 

“Wait, have you talked to her about this?” 

“I said we’d talk to a doctor. I promised I’d talk to you about it. She’s… I don’t know, she’s scared.” 

Spencer straightens up. You have nothing to be scared of with him, not his reaction, not his lack of support. He wishes Hotch had had more faith in him, but none of this is about him. Someone hurt you, and now you have to put yourself back together again. 

The kids have disappeared. Penelope’s climbing onto her feet and offering you a hand, but you stay laying down in the grass. 

“I really care about her,” Spencer says. 

Hotch clasps his shoulder. “Are you going, or am I?” 

“I’ll take this one, please.” 

“Sure.” 

Spencer trudges around the side of the yard, past the bench and the tables and the string lights on the patio to where you’re laying in the bluegrass, eyes nearly closed. “Is this seat taken?” he asks, nudging your hip with his shoe lightly. 

“No, sir.” 

Spencer sits down in the grass. He finds your wrist to hold. 

“You okay?” 

“Did Aaron talk to you about the doctor?” 

“Yeah, he did. You want to go?” 

“What do you think?” 

Spencer rubs your pulse. “I think it’s good. If you were having headaches, we’d go to the doctor.” 

“Headaches that make me not know who you are.” 

“Especially that kind.” 

You turn a bit and give him an amused smile. “Sorry I was too scared to say more about it.” 

“You don’t have anything to be sorry for.” Spencer brings a cautious hand to your cheek. He sees the flicker of hurt it brings —you don’t like that he’s careful how, but how can he not be, remembering the way he’d touched your neck and the wound it seemed to inflict in the dark— but he tries to caress it away. “I’m with you,” he says, “I care about you. I want to take care of you, as much or as little as you might need that from me.” 

Your eyes fall closed. “It might be nice.” 

“What would?” 

“To be taken care of by you.” 

“I’ll try my best.” 

You cover his hand with your own. JJ laughs across the yard, and Jack and Henry shout battle cries. Hotch says, “Jack! Not so rough, buddy!” and makes you laugh. 

“Did he intimidate you?” you ask. 

“No more than usual. He said I have to decide if I can do this with you.” 

You squirm and attempt to sit. If Spencer weren’t nervous about touching you, he’d force you back down. “He shouldn’t have.”

“No, he should. But I already decided.” Spencer finds your fingers, lacing them with his. “It wasn’t really a decision, actually. I want to do this with you, but only if that’s okay with you.” 

You nod slowly. “I already said it’d be nice if you took care of me,” you whisper, letting your face dip downward. 

He chances a kiss pressed to your temple. 

You laugh under your breath. “I know you didn’t sign up for this.” 

“Did you?” he asks, giving your back a rub like a wave. 

“It’s different. I knew what was happening to me.” 

“Angel, you didn’t have a choice,” he says, so quiet he’s surprised when you hear it. “I know you’re… What?” he asks, perturbed when you shake your head. 

“You and Aaron…” 

You never finish. Spencer can’t make you. He holds your shoulder until the tension under his hand unfurls, relaxing his touch when you decide to lay down in the grass again, quietly asking him to lay with you. 

“Be ready for Jack to use you like a trampoline,” you warn, taking his hand. 

He has a feeling Hotch will keep Jack away for a while. 

Spencer traces the back of your hand with his thumb, over and over. He’s sorry he didn’t know you five years ago, sorry you were alone, sorry someone put their hands on you. He’s sorry you learned to anticipate physical abuse in the wake of mistakes. He’s sorry he can’t take it away from you, ‘cos from the second you took his hand at that park a street from his apartment he’s been a goner, all you had to do was jump up on the lip of the fountain and trust him not to let you fall. He remembers how that felt, the zinging sparks travelling from the palm of your hand into his, the romanticism of two arms stretched apart and your slow circle. And when you fell in, you didn’t blame him, you just laughed and scrambled back out, squealing excitedly about your wet shoes. 

It’ll get better, he thinks. Even if it gets worse first. You’ll feel better soon. 

He turns his cheek into the grass and beckons you forward for a kunik kiss, nose pressed to yours, wanting to kiss you like he would if you were at home together, and knowing this is enough too. 

“You okay?” he asks. 

“It’s getting cold.” 

Spencer agrees, but neither of you attempt to move. 

[goldfades]

never felt so alone───paige bueckers

free palestine carrd 🇵🇸 decolonize palestine site 🇵🇸 how you can help palestine | FREE PALESTINE!

⟢ ┈ 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭 | 6.7k

⟢ ┈ 𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲 | requested by @wanderlusturous -> Paige x reader too 🤍 like maybe some teammate fics | i hope you enjoy, babe!

⟢ ┈ 𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬 | angst to fluff, ACL injury stuff, paige being a cutie patootie, not sure if theres anything else but it has a happy ending!

The first time you let yourself cry about it—really cry, not just a few silent tears swallowed in the dark—you were alone in the training room, knee wrapped in ice, watching your team warm up on the screen mounted in the corner. The sound was off, but you didn’t need it. You could hear it anyway. The sneaker squeaks, the ball hitting the floor, the echoes of laughter and easy, thoughtless movement. It was the sound of a world that had moved on without you.

And you hated that it hurt this much.

It had been almost a year. A year since your body betrayed you in front of thousands. Since your whole life had changed in a single wrong step, your knee buckling beneath you in a way it was never supposed to. A year since you lay on the court, gripping your leg with hands that shook, blinking up at the overhead lights while everything around you blurred into background noise. A year since you had to sit in that tiny, sterile room with a doctor who didn’t bother to soften the news: ACL tear. Surgery. Recovery. Long, slow, brutal.

And just like that, everything you had been working toward, everything you had been so sure was yours—the draft, the number one pick, the future you had mapped out for yourself since you first picked up a ball—was gone.

You tried to be okay about it. You told everyone you were okay about it.

But you weren’t.

Because now, every time you walked into that gym, it wasn’t the same. You weren’t the same. You felt it in the way people looked at you, in the way their eyes darted to your knee before meeting your face. In the way their encouragement sounded more like pity, their reassurances empty, weightless.

“You’ll be back,” they’d say, and maybe they believed it. Maybe they didn’t. It didn’t matter. Because you knew the truth. You weren’t the same player. You weren’t the same person.

And you had never felt more alone.

But if there was anyone who understood, it was Paige.

She never said much about it, but she didn’t have to. She had been through it too. She knew what it was like to go from untouchable to sidelined, to watch the game you loved move forward without you, to wonder if you’d ever be the same again.

And lately, she was the only person you could stand to be around.

You had been staring at your phone for so long that the screen dimmed, and for a moment, you just let it. You let the notification blur into the background, just another soft glow in the otherwise empty space of your mind. But the words were already burned into your vision. You could still see them, could still hear them.

ESPN: The new projected #1 pick in the 2025 WNBA Draft has been updated.

You hadn’t even opened the article. You didn’t need to. The bets had been completely off for you for a while now. They had kept your name there at first, had held onto you like a favorite whose odds just kept slipping, but eventually, reality set in. You were old news now. Another cautionary tale. A talent with a question mark hanging over her head.

And now, someone else was in your place.

You stared at the screen, willing yourself to feel something other than this heavy, creeping numbness. You should be angry. Should be heartbroken. Should be something.

But you just felt… gone. Like the piece of you that used to care had been hollowed out somewhere along the way.

A year ago, you had been untouchable. A sure thing. The future. The kind of player people built franchises around. And now? Now, there was a chance there was no draft for you at all.

Because the truth was, you weren’t healing fast enough. You had tried. God, you had tried. You had pushed your body past the point of exhaustion, past the pain, past the doubt. You had done every stretch, every exercise, followed every rehab plan like it was a religion. But the clock was still ticking. And if you didn’t get back soon, if you didn’t prove that you were still the player they had once fought over, then what?

Then no one would draft you.

Then it would all be over before it even began.

Your fingers tightened around your phone, stomach twisting into knots, the weight of it pressing against your chest, against your throat, until you felt like you might choke on it.

And then, suddenly, it was gone.

You blinked, hands grasping at empty air as Paige plucked the phone from your grip, her movements casual but firm, like she had seen this moment coming before you even did.

She didn’t say anything at first. Just held your phone in one hand, looking down at you with those sharp, knowing eyes, the ones that had always seen through you too easily.

“It’s nothing,” you muttered, shifting on the bench, trying to sound bored, like your world hadn’t just cracked open a little more. Like you weren’t barely holding it together.

Paige didn’t buy it. Of course she didn’t.

She turned your phone over in her palm, thoughtful, before slipping it into the pocket of her hoodie. “You don’t need to look at that.”

The damage was already done.

Your chest still felt tight, your stomach still sick, your mind still racing down the same dark paths it had been on since the moment you read that notification. Paige could take your phone away, but she couldn’t erase the words from your head, couldn’t make you unsee them, couldn’t stop the way your pulse was pounding in your ears, reminding you over and over of what you had lost.

Paige must have seen something shift in your face because she exhaled, long and slow, before sitting down beside you.

“You’re still in this,” she said after a moment, her voice quieter now, edged with something softer.

You laughed, but it didn’t sound like you. “Am I?”

She didn’t answer right away, just studied you like she was trying to figure out how far gone you really were, how much of you was still left.

And for the first time in a long time, you weren’t sure of the answer.

The locker room was dead silent. Everyone could feel the tension thick in the air, suffocating, pressing against their chests. No one wanted to look at you. No one wanted to be caught in the crossfire.

You sat there, jaw clenched so tight it ached, hands curled into fists on your knees, staring at the floor like if you looked anywhere else, the whole thing would snap you in half.

"You think this is easy for me?" Geno’s voice cut through the silence, sharp, impatient. "You think I enjoy calling you out like this? I don’t. But this attitude you’ve had? It’s not helping you. It’s not helping the team."

You felt your throat tighten, but you swallowed it down. You always swallowed it down.

Geno sighed, dragging a hand over his face before leveling you with that look, the one you’d seen him give so many players before. The one that usually meant tough love, a push in the right direction. The one that used to light a fire in you.

"You know what I’ve told you before," he continued, voice calmer now but still firm. "Half the battle is in the mentality. You can sit here and feel sorry for yourself, or you can prove to everyone that you’re still the player they think you are. It’s your choice."

That was it.

That was the moment you broke.

The moment you couldn’t keep it all bottled up anymore.

Because it wasn’t just about your mentality. It wasn’t just about your attitude. It was about how everything had been taken from you in one second, how you had clawed your way through recovery, how you had done everything right and it still wasn’t enough. It was about the way people talked about you now, like you were a what-could-have-been instead of a what-still-could-be. It was about the fact that you didn’t even know who you were anymore without basketball, and no one seemed to understand that.

Your voice shook when you spoke, but the words spilled out anyway, raw and desperate and unfiltered.

"Do you think I don’t know that? Do you think I don’t replay that moment every single night, over and over again in my head, trying to figure out how I got here?" You laughed, but it wasn’t funny. It was bitter, broken. "Do you think I don’t want to be out there? That I don’t want to be the player I was?"

Your eyes were burning now, but you refused to let the tears fall here. Not in front of him. Not in front of them.

"I’ve done everything I was supposed to do," you whispered, voice hoarse, barely holding it together. "And it’s still not enough."

No one said anything.

Not Geno. Not the team.

No one.

So you left.

You grabbed your stuff, shoved past the stunned silence, and walked out before anyone could stop you.

Paige was the only one who followed.

She didn’t call your name. Didn’t try to talk to you. Didn’t try to tell you it was okay, because she knew it wasn’t.

She caught up to you outside the gym, her footsteps quiet but steady, and the moment you turned to look at her, everything you had been holding in—the anger, the grief, the exhaustion—crashed into you all at once.

And without a single word, Paige wrapped her arms around you.

She hugged you tight, like she was holding you together, like she could feel the way you were unraveling, thread by thread. And for the first time in a long time, you let yourself cry. Really cry. Not just a few tears wiped away before anyone could see, but the kind of tears that shook your whole body, that made it hard to breathe, that carried everything you had been too afraid to say.

Paige didn’t let go.

Not when your shoulders trembled. Not when you gripped the back of her hoodie like a lifeline. Not when your sobs turned into ragged, uneven breaths.

And that night, she didn’t leave your side.

She didn’t say much. She didn’t need to.

She just stayed, close enough that you could hear her breathing, close enough that, for the first time in a long time, you didn’t feel completely alone.

Paige had always seen you as untouchable. As unstoppable.

Seeing you like this? Broken, vulnerable, hurting in a way that even she couldn’t fix?

That broke her, too.

You had always been the one. The kind of player people whispered about before you even stepped onto the court. The kind of talent that didn’t just demand attention but held it, bent the game around you like gravity. Paige had seen it from the first time she played with you, the way you moved, the way you thought the game three steps ahead of everyone else. You were special. And everybody knew it.

That was why, when it happened, it felt like the world had cracked open.

She remembered it too clearly. The sharp sound of your body hitting the floor, the way you clutched your knee, the way your face twisted in pain. She had never seen you like that before. Never seen you down and not bounce right back up.

At first, she thought—hoped—it was just something minor. A bad landing. A scare. You’d get up, you’d shake it off, and everything would go back to normal.

But you didn’t get up.

And when they helped you off the court, when she saw the way you wouldn’t even try to put weight on it, her stomach dropped.

Because she knew.

She knew before the MRI, before the press release, before the hushed conversations about recovery timelines and worst-case scenarios. She knew the second she saw your face.

And that night, when she found you sitting in the locker room long after everyone else had left, staring down at your knee like it wasn’t even yours anymore, she realized something else.

You weren’t just scared of being hurt. You were scared of what came next.

Paige understood that fear. She had lived it. She knew what it was like to sit on the sidelines and feel like the game was leaving you behind, like the thing that made you you was slipping further and further out of reach. She knew how isolating it was, how no amount of support or encouragement could touch the parts of you that ached the most.

But this was you. And in her mind, you had never been touchable, had never been stoppable. The idea of you being anything less than that—it wasn’t something she could wrap her head around.

So she had told herself, You’ll come back. You have to come back.

But months passed, and she watched the way you changed. The way your fire dimmed. The way you started retreating into yourself, isolating, pulling away from the team, from her.

The way your name slowly started disappearing from draft talks.

The way you looked at yourself like you weren’t sure you belonged here anymore.

And now, sitting beside you, holding you as you finally let yourself fall apart, she felt helpless.

Because this wasn’t a game she could win for you.

She could fight for you on the court. She could hit big shots, make big plays, try to keep the team moving forward. But she couldn’t fix this. She couldn’t make your knee heal faster. She couldn’t take away the doubt, the fear, the loss of everything you thought was certain.

She hated that.

She hated that all she could do was hold you, that all she could offer was her presence, her warmth, the steady rhythm of her breathing against yours.

But if this was all she could do, she would do it.

Because you weren’t alone.

And as long as she was here, as long as she had anything to give, she would make sure you never felt like you were.

--

It started with an alarm.

A shrill, relentless alarm at 5:30 AM. The kind that made you want to throw your phone across the room.

At first, you thought you had set it by accident. But then you heard the knocking.

No. Not knocking. Pounding.

You groaned, pulling your blanket over your head, willing whoever it was to just disappear.

No such luck.

"Get up," Paige’s voice rang through the door, clear, firm, unmovable.

You shut your eyes tighter. "Go away."

The door opened.

You peeked out from under the blanket just in time to see Paige standing in your doorway, arms crossed, dressed in workout gear like she had been up for hours.

You glared. "Do you not believe in knocking?"

"I knocked," she said, unimpressed. "Then you ignored me. Now get up."

You scoffed, rolling onto your side. "Not happening."

You should have known she wouldn’t just accept that.

Paige walked over, grabbed the edge of your blanket, and ripped it off you in one swift motion. Cold air hit your skin, and you practically yelped, curling into yourself.

"Jesus, Bueckers—"

"You can cuss me out later," she said. "Right now, we’re going to the gym."

You stared at her like she had lost her mind. "Paige, it’s five in the morning."

"Yeah, and you’ve got work to do," she shot back, unfazed. "Season starts in a few months. You wanna be ready or not?"

You hesitated.

Of course you wanted to be ready. Of course you wanted to get back to where you were before, to prove that you weren’t just some washed-up has-been before you even got the chance to be a someone.

But that want—that need—was buried under months of frustration, self-doubt, exhaustion. You had pushed yourself so hard for so long, and it still felt like you were running in place.

And now, here she was, asking you to choose again.

Paige must have seen the hesitation in your face, because her expression softened. She sat down on the edge of your bed, nudging your knee lightly.

"I know you’re tired," she said, quieter now, more serious. "I know this hasn’t been fair. But you’re too good to let this stop you. You know that."

You swallowed, looking away.

She sighed, leaning forward, elbows resting on her knees. "You’re not doing this alone," she continued. "I’m gonna be here every step of the way. If you have to push yourself, then I’ll push you. If you fall, I’ll catch you. But I’m not letting you give up on this. I won’t."

Something in your chest tightened.

Because she meant it. You could hear it in her voice, in the unwavering steadiness of it.

Paige had always believed in you. Even when you stopped believing in yourself.

And maybe—just maybe—that was enough to get you out of bed.

You exhaled through your nose, rubbing a hand down your face before finally, finally sitting up.

"Fine," you muttered. "But if I pass out halfway through, it’s on you."

Paige grinned, already victorious. "You’ll live."

And with that, she tossed you your sneakers, stood up, and waited—because she already knew you were going to follow.

The next couple of months were hell.

But not the kind of hell you had been drowning in for the past year. Not the slow-burning, isolating, empty kind of hell where every day bled into the next, where the weight of your own expectations crushed you before you even got out of bed.

No, this was different.

This was the kind of hell that left your muscles aching in the best way, your lungs burning as you pushed through another sprint, your hands gripping your knees as you bent over, gasping for breath, feeling alive again. The kind of hell that reminded you why you had ever loved this game in the first place.

And it was all because of Paige.

She didn’t go easy on you. If anything, she was worse than the trainers. She forced you out of bed before sunrise, dragged you through drills that made you want to collapse, and refused to let you quit.

"You’re too slow," she’d say, breathless, as you tried to keep up with her full-speed cuts. "Use your damn left hand," she’d scold when your layup was just a little too stiff. "Again." That was her favorite. No matter how many times you told her you were done, she’d look at you with that infuriating smirk and make you do it again.

And somehow… somehow, you needed it.

For the first time in forever, you felt like a player again. Like you were clawing your way back to the person you used to be. And with every day that passed, with every extra rep, every bead of sweat rolling down your spine, every time you beat Paige in a shooting drill and got to see the way she rolled her eyes, shoving your shoulder with a muttered, "Whatever, lucky shot,"—you started to believe, just a little, that maybe you still had a chance.

It was exhausting. It was painful. It was the hardest thing you had ever done.

And you had never felt more alive.

But then there was the other problem.

Because somewhere along the way, between the early morning workouts and the late-night film sessions, between the inside jokes and the way she always, always knew exactly what to say to get you out of your own head—something shifted.

You caught yourself watching her too long. Not just as a player, not just as the Paige Bueckers that the world knew. But as her. As the person who had seen you at your absolute lowest and refused to let you stay there.

As the person who had held you when you broke. Who had stayed up with you on the nights where the doubt crept in too deep, the one who knew, before you even said a word, exactly what you needed.

And it scared you.

Because Paige Bueckers wasn’t just some random person. She was your teammate. Your best friend. The person who had dedicated months of her life to making sure you didn’t give up on yourself.

And you couldn’t risk losing that.

So you ignored it. You ignored the way your heart picked up when she brushed against you. The way her hand lingered on your back whenever she guided you off the court. The way she looked at you sometimes, like she was trying to figure something out.

You ignored everything.

Because preseason was coming. And you weren’t where you needed to be yet.

You had made progress—real progress. You were moving better, sharper, stronger than you had in months. But you weren’t there yet. Not fully healed. Not fully you.

But baby steps, right?

You weren’t giving up. Not anymore. And maybe—just maybe—you weren’t as alone as you thought you were.

--

The gym was nearly empty when Paige found you.

Late night, lights dimmed, the faint echo of bouncing balls from the other side of the facility. You had just finished your last set of shooting drills, your knee wrapped tight, sweat dripping down your back, exhaustion clinging to your limbs. It was another long day of almost being back, almost being who you were before.

But almost wasn’t good enough. Not yet.

You heard the door open but didn’t look up. You knew who it was. Paige had a presence, an energy that filled the space before she even said anything.

"You really gotta stop sneaking in extra workouts," she called, footsteps slow as she crossed the court. "What if I tell Geno? He’ll make you sit out of practice for real this time."

You rolled your eyes, bending down to grab your water bottle. "You won’t tell Geno, because that would make you a snitch."

She scoffed. "I think it makes me a responsible teammate."

"You dragged me out of bed at five in the morning for conditioning all summer, but now you wanna be responsible?" You shot her a look. "Little hypocritical, don’t you think?"

Paige grinned, coming to a stop a few feet from you, spinning a ball lazily in her hands. "That’s different."

"How?"

"Because I was supervising. You out here by yourself?" She made a tsk sound, shaking her head dramatically. "Reckless. Careless. Dangerous, even."

You huffed a laugh, shaking your head. "Whatever."

Paige took a step closer, that knowing look in her eyes. "You know you don’t have to do this alone, right?"

Your grip tightened around your water bottle. It wasn’t the first time she had said something like that. And every time, it hit the same.

"I know," you muttered.

She studied you for a second, then nodded, spinning the ball again before flipping it toward you. You caught it out of reflex.

"One-on-one," she said casually, stretching her arms overhead. "First to five."

You narrowed your eyes. "You just had practice."

"So?" She smirked. "I still won’t go easy on you."

That shouldn’t have made your stomach flip, but it did.

You licked your lips, tossing the ball between your hands. "I won’t go easy on you, Bueckers."

Her smirk deepened. "Good."

And just like that, the banter faded into the familiar rhythm of competition—the kind where words weren’t needed, where the only thing that mattered was movement, instincts, the game itself.

But even as you tried to focus, as you tried to lock in, you couldn’t ignore the way Paige’s eyes lingered a little too long. The way her hands brushed against your waist when she reached for a steal. The way she grinned every time you scored, even though she hated losing.

The way the tension between you two had started feeling different.

And you weren’t sure what scared you more—losing the game, or what would happen if you stopped ignoring it.

--

The sun was starting to set as you and Paige walked back from physical therapy, the sky streaked with warm oranges and purples, the air crisp against your skin. Your knee was sore, but in the way it always was after PT—stiff, a little swollen, but manageable. You were used to it by now. What you weren’t used to was the fact that you didn’t hate these sessions anymore.

Not since Paige started showing up.

At first, you thought she was just being nice—checking in on you, keeping you accountable, making sure you weren’t wallowing in self-pity (even though you totally had been). But then, she started coming every time. She sat in the waiting room during your sessions, tapping her foot impatiently like she was the one getting worked on. She cracked dumb jokes when you winced through exercises, flipped through old magazines and read the worst horoscopes out loud just to make you laugh.

She was like your own personal emotional support dog. If emotional support dogs talked a lot.

And the thing was? She made you feel less bad about all of it.

The injury, the rehab, the endless cycle of progress and setbacks. It didn’t feel so heavy when she was there.

Now, as you walked side by side, your duffel slung over one shoulder, Paige stuffed her hands into the front pocket of her hoodie, gaze flicking toward you before settling on the sidewalk.

"You know, I’ve been here before," she said after a beat, her voice quieter than usual.

You frowned. "What do you mean?"

"This place," she nodded back toward the therapy clinic, her expression unreadable. "I came here after I tore my ACL. Same time, same days. Same routine."

You blinked. You knew about her injury, obviously—everyone did. But she had never really talked about it. Not like this.

"That was before I got here," she continued, exhaling, her breath visible in the cool evening air. "Before I really got back. And it sucked. So bad." She huffed a laugh, but it wasn’t really funny. "I don’t think people get how… alone it makes you feel. Everyone’s moving forward, the season keeps going, and you’re just stuck in the same place. Trying to convince yourself you’re still the player you were before."

Your stomach twisted at how familiar that sounded.

Paige kicked a loose pebble down the sidewalk. "I didn’t really have anyone who—like, I mean, I had people who cared, but no one who really got it. Not like this. I wanted someone to be there for me the way I’ve been here for you."

You stopped walking. Paige took a few more steps before realizing and turned to face you, her brows furrowing slightly.

"You never told me that," you said, voice softer than you meant it to be.

She shrugged, a little sheepish. "It wasn’t something I talked about much. Didn’t think it mattered."

"It does matter," you insisted.

Paige held your gaze for a second, something flickering behind her eyes. Then, she took a step closer.

"You know what else matters?" she asked, tilting her head slightly. "The fact that you were the only person who actually pushed me to get my ass back on the court."

You blinked. "What?"

She smiled, but it wasn’t teasing. It was real.

"You don’t remember?" She shook her head, laughing to herself. "I do. You were a freshman, and you wouldn’t shut up about how I needed to get back out there. You kept saying I was too good to waste it, that I had to stop feeling sorry for myself. It pissed me off so bad."

Your eyes widened. You… vaguely remembered that. You remembered standing outside the locker room, Paige still moving stiffly, not fully cleared yet, and you had said something—something blunt, something stubborn, something about how she was going to regret it for the rest of her life if she didn’t push through.

"You were annoying as hell," Paige added, smirking. "But you were right. I don’t know if I ever told you that."

You were still trying to wrap your head around it. You had no idea you’d made that much of an impact on her. That you had been the one to push her the way she had been pushing you now.

For a moment, you didn’t know what to say.

Then, finally, you huffed, shaking your head. "So… what you’re saying is, this is revenge?"

Paige snorted. "One hundred percent."

You both laughed, but beneath it, something else settled in your chest. Something warm.

She had been there before. She understood.

And maybe, just maybe, that meant you could come out on the other side of this too.

--

The doctor barely got the words out before Paige exploded.

"Let’s goooo!" she shouted, jumping up so fast her chair screeched against the floor. She clapped you on the back—hard, like she forgot her own strength—before pulling you into the tightest hug you’d ever been in.

You were still processing it. Cleared. Cleared. After nearly a year of waiting, of doubting, of pushing yourself until you couldn’t breathe, you were finally back.

You let out a breathless laugh, gripping the back of Paige’s hoodie as she squeezed you tighter. "You realize I’m the one who just got cleared, right? Why are you more excited than me?"

Paige pulled back just enough to look at you, eyes bright, that signature smirk tugging at her lips. "Because I knew this would happen," she said like it was obvious. "I told you. You’re too good not to come back. It was only a matter of time."

You swallowed hard, suddenly feeling warmer than you should’ve in an air-conditioned office. There was something about the way she was looking at you—like she had been waiting for this moment just as much as you had. Maybe more.

The doctor cleared his throat, clearly trying not to laugh. "Are you two done celebrating in my office, or do I need to step out and give you a minute?"

You and Paige both whipped around like guilty kids, muttering quick apologies, but the grin never left her face.

And it didn’t leave the rest of the day, either.

She refused to let you go home without celebrating. Took you straight to your favorite restaurant, ordered way too much food, and every time you even thought about checking your phone, she smacked your hand away.

"Tonight is not for film. Or texts. Or stressing," she said between bites of fries. "It’s for you. And me. And this delicious meal I just paid for."

"You literally stole my card to pay," you pointed out.

"Yeah, but I swiped it," she said smugly, sipping her drink. "Which means I paid. Which means you should be grateful."

You rolled your eyes, but your stomach flipped, and you weren’t entirely sure it was from the food.

Because here she was again. Paige Bueckers, making you feel like the most important person in the room.

And that feeling hadn’t gone away.

The first practice back, you were expecting a normal warm welcome. Some pats on the back, maybe a few sarcastic finallys thrown your way.

What you were not expecting was to walk into the locker room and see balloons tied to your chair, a giant cake sitting on the bench, and the entire team yelling, "She’s baaaaaaack!" the second you stepped inside.

You stopped in your tracks, wide-eyed. "What the—"

"Surprise!" Paige called, stepping forward with an exaggerated bow. "Courtesy of your personal hype woman."

You looked at her, then at the cake—white frosting, piped-on basketballs, and the words WELCOME BACK, SUPERSTAR in bright blue icing. You could tell she definitely decorated it herself, because one of the basketballs was slightly misshapen, and the lettering was just a little off-center.

Your chest felt tight, but in a good way. A way you didn’t quite know how to explain.

"You did this?" you asked, already knowing the answer.

Paige shrugged, but her grin was unmistakable. "Figured you deserved it."

The warmth in your chest spread.

"Alright, get over here and eat before I do it for you," she added, shoving a plastic fork into your hand.

The rest of the team dove into the cake, laughter filling the room as people threw icing at each other, teasing you about how they were gonna light your ass up in scrimmages.

And through it all, you kept sneaking glances at Paige.

Because this was the part that was messing with your head.

The way she always knew what you needed before you even said it. The way she was so damn proud of you, like this wasn’t just your win, but hers too. The way she looked at you sometimes, like you were the only person in the world that mattered.

And suddenly, you couldn’t keep pretending that your feelings for her were just friendly.

Because they weren’t. Not even close.

--

The second the buzzer sounded, the roar of the crowd barely had time to register before Paige was on you.

You didn’t even have time to celebrate properly, barely had time to process the fact that you had just played in your first official game back, before she grabbed you—hands firm on your waist, tugging you straight into her.

"You killed it," she practically breathed against your ear, voice thick with something deeper than excitement, something that sent a full-body chill down your spine.

You barely had time to respond before she pulled you closer, her arms locking around your back, holding you like she was afraid to let go. Her heart was pounding against yours, fast and erratic, and you swore she was holding on for longer than a normal post-game hug.

Not that you were complaining.

Your hands hesitated for only a second before finding their way to her back, gripping onto the fabric of her jersey, still warm from the game.

"You act like we just won a championship," you teased, but your voice came out softer than you meant it to.

She pulled back just enough to look at you, her hands sliding down to rest on your hips. "We won your first game back," she corrected, like that was the real victory.

And the way she was looking at you—the way her eyes were scanning your face like she wanted to memorize it, the way her fingers were still gripping onto you like she wasn’t ready to let go—made your stomach flip so hard you almost felt dizzy.

It was so obvious.

So obvious in the way she refused to move more than a step away from you during the entire post-game celebration, always lingering close, her hand brushing against yours, her shoulder bumping into you.

So obvious in the way she reached for you again when the cameras swarmed, her arm slung around your shoulders like it belonged there.

So obvious in the way she beamed every time she looked at you, like she was the proudest person in the damn world.

And it should have been overwhelming, should have felt like too much.

But it didn’t.

Because if you were being honest, you didn’t want her to let go either.

--

The ice cream shop was packed, buzzing with late-night energy—fans still wearing jerseys, kids on sugar highs, groups of students laughing loudly in the corner. The air smelled like waffle cones and melted chocolate, and the whole team was crammed into two booths, talking over each other, hyped from the win.

And through all of it, Paige wouldn’t leave your side.

She had slid into the seat next to you the second you got there, pressing close enough that her knee knocked against yours under the table. And she stayed there, so damn close, even when there was plenty of room to move.

Not that you minded.

She was warm, practically radiating heat against your side. Every time she laughed—really laughed, head tilting back just slightly—her shoulder bumped into yours. Every time she reached for her cup, her fingers brushed against your arm like she forgot how much space she was taking up.

Or maybe she just didn’t care.

"Alright, we’re making a bathroom run," one of your teammates announced, and the rest of them quickly followed, leaving you and Paige alone at the table.

The shop was still loud around you, but suddenly, everything between you two felt quiet.

You tapped your spoon absently against your cup, not looking at her. "You planning on sticking to me like glue all night?"

Paige scoffed, leaning back like she was just now realizing how close she was. But she didn’t move. "Psh. Please. If anything, you’ve been following me."

You raised a brow, finally meeting her gaze. "Oh yeah? That what you’re telling yourself?"

She smirked, like she had been waiting for this exact opening. "Well, you do like me, so."

Your spoon paused midair.

Your brain short-circuited.

She had said it so casually, like it wasn’t the biggest bomb she could have possibly dropped. Like it wasn’t the exact thing you had been trying not to admit to yourself for months.

You opened your mouth, then closed it. Blinked. "I—what?"

Paige just grinned, stirring her ice cream like she didn’t just say that. "Relax, it’s not that deep," she teased, but there was something lighter in her voice, something testing.

You swallowed. "So you’re just out here saying stuff?"

She shrugged, still grinning, but you could see the shift—the way she kept glancing at you, like she was trying to gauge your reaction. Like she was actually nervous.

You inhaled slowly. "Paige."

She finally stopped stirring her ice cream, finally let the teasing drop just a little.

"Okay," she said, quieter now, tapping her spoon against her cup. "Maybe it is a little deep."

The air between you shifted.

You could still hear the noise of the shop, the hum of conversations, the occasional burst of laughter from across the room. But none of it mattered. Not when Paige was sitting this close, looking at you like that.

Like she had been waiting.

Like she wasn’t scared of saying it anymore.

Your chest felt tight. "Oh."

Paige let out a soft laugh, shaking her head. "Oh? That’s all you got?"

You swallowed again, your heart beating way too fast. "I mean—what do you want me to say?"

"I don’t know," she murmured, voice almost playful but not quite. "Maybe that you like me too?"

Your mouth felt dry.

Because you did.

Of course you did.

It had been obvious for so long, in the way your heart jumped every time she touched you, in the way you gravitated toward her like it was second nature. In the way she made the worst year of your life bearable just by being there.

So, really, what was stopping you?

You let out a breath, then shook your head, smirking just slightly. "You are so full of yourself."

Paige rolled her eyes but leaned in just a little closer. "Am I wrong, though?"

You huffed, pressing your lips together—trying to hold onto the last shred of self-control you had, but it was so hard when she was right there, when she was looking at you like she already knew she was right.

And then—

She reached out, fingers curling around your wrist, lightly, like she was giving you an out.

She didn’t need to.

You didn’t think. You just moved.

And before you could second-guess it, before you could talk yourself out of it—

You kissed her.

It was soft at first, tentative, like neither of you could believe it was actually happening. Like months of unspoken tension had suddenly snapped all at once.

But then Paige exhaled against your lips, like she had been holding it in for so long, and you felt her smile into the kiss before she kissed you again, deeper this time, her fingers tightening around your wrist, pulling you in.

You felt weightless.

Like everything—the injury, the doubt, the fear—had led to this.

And, for the first time in forever, you weren’t thinking about the past.

You weren’t thinking about the future.

You were just here, with Paige, and nothing had ever felt more right.

[save-the-villainous-cat]

The villain couldn’t help but stare at the hero.

They’d gotten thinner, the villain realized.

“Listen...” The villain brushed the hero’s chin with their fingers until they took it altogether. Slowly, they leaned forward, but the weary eyes didn't meet them. “Just let me help. Just let me say the words, let me do the evil monologue and join me.”

The hero brushed the villain’s wrist with their fingers.

“You’re fully aware that I cannot do that.”

“Come on.” The hero shot them a sharp look and for a second, the villain considered retreating. With a groan, the hero leaned against the wall. Ultimately, they sat down, clearly too tired to stand up. “This is eating you. This stupid job, this stupid costume. When was the last week all your bones were intact?”

“It’s not that simple,” the hero argued. They frowned and even that looked like it was draining. The villain tried to, but they didn't understand. They feared they would never be able to fully grasp what the hero was aiming for, nor why they were so adamant.

“It is that simple. Your obsession with justice is ludicrous," the villain said. "You know the law doesn't function as a guide for moral decisions."

"I can't just watch and let people die, can I?" the hero answered. Their fingertips against the villain's wrist were cold and very slowly, it dawned on the villain that they were shaking.

At first, the villain didn't say anything. They simply kneeled to be on the same eye level as their counterpart. Then, they took the hero's face into their hands.

"You also can't blame yourself every time someone dies." The villain leaned in, nearly instinctively, and lowered their voice. "Please, just come back to me."

Their lips brushed the hero's cheek and they closed their eyes, taking their time to concentrate on the proximity and calm down their racing heart. They didn't want to think about the past, they didn't want to think about the endless fights and the many tears. It was all gone now - right now, in this moment, resentment didn't linger.

All that remained was affection.

"Please," the villain begged again. By now, they were hugging their hero, holding them closer than ever before, taking in deep breaths and burying their face in the hero's shoulder. They could feel the hero's hand move; snaking up their back and eventually finding a place in the villain's hair.

It was unbelievably painful to hold the hero like this. It was unbelievably cruel as well. All the things they had thrown at each other before, all the insults and the schemes, all those plans and conflicts...still being able to hold so much love for a person felt specifically dreadful to the villain.

But then again, the hero wasn't simply a person. Once, they had been everything.

"Please come back to me," the villain begged again. "This is killing you. This job, it..."

They felt the tears.

God, they felt the tears. After months of pushing their feelings away and replacing them with rage. After months of suppressing their emotions, they could feel how heavy their heart truly was.

They pulled away, blinking tears out of their eyes, and stared at the hero who had already let their tears roll down their face. The villain brushed them away.

"It is so exhausting," the hero whispered. Their voice was shaking.

"I know."

"And it hurts so much."

"I know, darling."

"But I can't quit, I can't- I mean, there is so much pressure and so many people are counting on me and if I fall, I mean...I'm not a person anymore, I'm a symbol of hope and inspiration and if I...I can't, I just can't-" The hero took in a trembling breath and the villain hugged them again, softer this time.

"Take a break, please. I can't stand this anymore." The villain pressed a kiss to the hero's cheek and slowly, let their fingers intertwine. "I can kidnap you if that makes it easier."

"Yes," the hero said. "For a few days, okay? Just a few days."

Given the hero's physical state, a few days turned into two weeks.

[kiwriteswords]

oh oh i have a fluff v day request! maybe reader is jacks teacher and they have a class valentine’s day party, when hotch picks him up after school, jack is trying to set them up by planting one of those silly cartoon cards in either of their pockets 🤭

Matchmaker, Matchmaker, Make Me a Match [Aaron Hotchner x Teacher!Reader]

Ki2k Masterlist||MainMasterlist (not updated, sorry!)|| Ao3||Word Count: 1k|| AN: Happy Valentine's Day! Thank you for this request, lovely! I had so much fun writing it--I never usually write Jack-related fics, but when I do, I wonder why I don't more often because they're so sweet! ||Requests are still open for Ki2k!!

Tags/Warnings: female reader, Valentine’s Day, non-bau!Reader, teacher!reader, Jack's teacher!Reader, Jack Hotchner is present (for those who do not like kid fics, lol), sadly had to use Y/N Y/L/N :P--sorrry!!!

Summary: Jack comes home beaming about his pretty teacher to Hotch everyday, so when Valentine's comes around, he finds the perfect reason to get the two of them together.

Jack's little feet pounded on the pavement as he bounded towards the car where Hotch was waiting, his face lit up with the day's excitements. Throwing open the car door, he barely waited for the buckle to click before he started.

"Dad! Did I tell you what Miss. Y/L/N did today? She showed us how to make volcanoes with baking soda and vinegar! It was awesome!"

Hotch smiled, driving off as he listened. "Sounds like you had fun. Miss. Y/L/N seems very creative."

"She is!" Jack's voice was earnest, eyes wide. "And she's really pretty, too. She wears these nice dresses, and her hair is always perfect."

Hotch raised an eyebrow, a small chuckle escaping him. "Is that so?"

"Yeah! And she's super smart. She knows everything about science and books and... um, maybe you should ask her about the Civil War? You like that stuff, right?" Jack's attempt at casualness was comically transparent.

"I do," Hotch replied, his interest piqued both by the mention of history and the subtle undertone of matchmaking in his son's voice. "Sounds like you think she'd be good company."

Jack nodded vigorously. "She'd be the best! You always say you want someone smart and kind. And she's the best teacher ever. Everyone thinks so."

As they pulled into their driveway, Hotch ruffled Jack's hair, considering the little seeds his son was planting. "Maybe I'll have to meet Miss. Y/L/N at the next parent-teacher conference."

"Yeah! And maybe you can ask her about her favorite book or something," Jack added, hopeful.

Hotch laughed softly, the corners of his eyes crinkling with amusement at his son's not-so-subtle matchmaking. "Maybe I will, buddy."

Jack grinned, satisfied, his mission for the day accomplished.

The next time Jack came bursting into the car after school, his backpack swinging wildly as he clambered into the passenger seat.

"Dad!" He held up a piece of folded paper, waving it excitedly. "Miss. Y/L/N gave you a note!"

Hotch glanced over as he pulled away from the school parking lot, one hand steady on the wheel. "Oh? What’s it about?"

Jack grinned like he was holding the world's greatest secret. "I think she likes you."

Hotch blinked. "What?"

Jack wiggled in his seat, practically vibrating with excitement. "She sent you a note! Teachers don’t just send notes unless it’s important. And I heard my friend Olivia say that when someone writes you a note, it’s because they like you."

Suppressing a laugh, Hotch reached for the paper at a red light, unfolding it with careful fingers. His eyes skimmed over the words--just a standard, typed letter about an upcoming parent-teacher night and some classroom updates.

"Jack," he said, amusement coloring his voice, "this is just a general note. Every parent got one."

Jack frowned, his enthusiasm faltering for the first time. "Oh." He thought for a second, then brightened again. "But maybe she really wanted you to see it!"

Hotch sighed, shaking his head with a small smile. "I’m sure Miss. Y/L/N is a wonderful teacher, but she’s just doing her job. It’s not a secret message, buddy."

Jack crossed his arms, unconvinced. "I don’t know…she does walk me to pick-up.” 

"Because she walks all the students to parent pick-up," Hotch countered. 

Jack sat in contemplative silence for a few moments before mumbling, "Still think you’d be a good couple."

Hotch chuckled. "Noted."

The school hallways were quieter than usual, the loud bustle of daytime replaced by a hushed, anticipatory energy as parents trickled in for the evening's parent-teacher conferences. Hotch adjusted his tie as he approached your classroom, Jack's enthusiastic endorsements echoing in his mind.

He paused at the doorway, spotting you as you animatedly discussed a student's progress with a couple before him. Even from a distance, your passion was palpable, your gestures animated and your smile bright. When it was finally his turn, you looked up, recognition and warmth lighting up your features.

"Mr. Hotchner, it's great to finally meet you," you greeted, extending a hand. "Jack speaks so highly of you."

"The feeling is mutual," Hotch replied, taking your hand. "He hasn’t stopped talking about you since school started."

As you both sat down, the conversation flowed effortlessly. You shared insights about Jack's strengths and areas for improvement, your words thoughtful and encouraging. Hotch was struck not only by your understanding of his son but also by your genuine care for all your students.

"I strive to create an environment where they can all feel supported and challenged," you explained, your eyes lighting up with a fervor that resonated deeply with Hotch. It was clear teaching was not just a job for you but a calling.

The conversation shifted from academic achievements to personal interests, and Hotch found himself discussing topics he rarely explored with strangers. Your interest in classical literature and your hobbies sparked a shared enthusiasm. Hotch was pleasantly surprised by how much he enjoyed talking about his own rare escapes.

which he seldom shared due to his demanding job.

As the meeting concluded, Hotch stood up, feeling an unexpected reluctance to end the conversation. "Thank you for everything you’re doing for Jack," he said sincerely. "And not just for him--for all the kids."

"It’s truly my pleasure," you replied with a smile. "They make it easy."

There was a brief pause, a moment of shared understanding, and an unspoken acknowledgment of a connection neither expected.

"If you ever need help with any class activities or if you organize any field trips," Hotch added on impulse, "I’d be happy to contribute."

Your smile widened, pleased and surprised. "I'll definitely take you up on that."

As Hotch walked away, he couldn’t shake the warmth that filled his chest. Jack might have had childlike motives for wanting him to meet you, but Hotch couldn’t deny the genuine interest he felt--a spark ignited, perhaps, by the passion and beauty you exuded, both inside and out.

The door clicked shut behind Hotch, and the familiar sound of home was a welcome relief after the draining hours of a difficult case. As he shrugged off his coat, the sight that greeted him was anything but the quiet he had expected. 

Jack was in the midst of chaos, surrounded by a whirlwind of craft supplies--glue sticks, construction paper, crayons--all spread out like a tornado had swept through their living room.

Jack had just begun staying home for short periods of time by himself--something Hotch didn’t take lightly, but this was not a sight that he ever expected to see. 

"Jack, what's going on?" Hotch aske, his tone a mixture of amusement and concern as he stepped carefully over a stray roll of tape.

"Dad!" Jack looked up, his expression frantic but determined. "I need to make the perfect Valentine's card, but nothing looks right!"

Hotch knelt down, picking up a half-finished card that was more glue than paper. "Isn’t tomorrow just the school Valentine's party? What about the box of cartoon Valentines we bought last week?"

Jack shook his head vigorously, sending his hair into disarray. "Those are for my classmates! This one has to be special--it’s for Miss. Y/L/N. I want it to be perfect because I want her to come over for dinner and have a romance like in the movies. Like the Disney ones!" His eyes shone with the earnestness only a child could muster. "And you have the right hair to be like Prince Charming!"

Hotch couldn’t help but laugh softly, touched by his son's intentions yet aware of the need to tread carefully. "Jack, it’s very sweet that you want to do this for Miss. Y/L/N, but inviting her over for dinner and trying to set up a romance--that’s something she and I would have to talk about. It's not on you to worry about."

"But Dad, I just want you to be happy, and Miss. Y/L/N could make you smile," Jack protested, his lower lip trembling just a bit.

Sitting down beside his son, Hotch put an arm around him, pulling him close. "I know, buddy, and that means a lot to me. It’s okay to make her a card, but we should keep it about thanking her for being a great teacher, okay? As for dinner, how about we invite her over as a thank you from both of us, just to enjoy a meal, not as a date? We can see where things go from there."

Jack seemed to consider this for a moment before nodding, a small smile creeping back onto his face. "Can we still make it the best card ever?"

"Absolutely," Hotch agreed, his heart lightening at his son’s quick recovery. "Let’s see what we can create with less glue this time."

Together, they spent the evening crafting a more modest but heartfelt Valentine's card, Hotch guiding Jack’s enthusiastic efforts. As they worked, Hotch couldn’t help but think about your reaction, the warmth of your smile in his mind giving him more hope than he wanted to admit. 

Maybe Jack’s little plan wasn’t so far-fetched after all, just premature. As they set the finished card aside to dry, Hotch found himself looking forward to handing it over, curious and slightly hopeful about where a simple dinner invitation might lead.

Valentine's Day had brought its usual flurry of excitement, and amidst it, Hotch received an email that made him pause. It was from you, thanking him for the generous card and his contributions to the classroom Valentine's Day party. Reading between the lines, Hotch assumed it was also a nod to the dinner invitation Jack had ambitiously included. Buttoning his coat, he headed to the school, curious and admittedly a bit nervous about the meeting.

As he entered the classroom, the scene was vibrant with kids laughing and trading candies and cards. Jack spotted him immediately and with a grin wide enough to split his face, dashed over and grabbed his hand, tugging him through the clusters of giggling children.

"There’s my dad!" Jack announced proudly, pulling Hotch towards you.

You laughed as Jack nearly yanked Hotch off his feet. "Easy there, Jack, don’t break your dad’s arm off!"

Jack paused, gave Hotch a comically exaggerated wink, and said, "I’ll leave the romance to you two--it is Valentine’s Day, after all!"

You chuckled, shaking your head at Jack's antics. "Hotch, you’ve raised quite the little charmer."

Hotch, a bit flushed but smiling, replied, "I’m not sure where he gets that from. I’m currently at a loss for words.

"That’s alright," you said with a gentle smile. "I don’t mind coming up with the words, as long as that dinner is still on the table."

"It definitely is," Hotch assured you, his tone warm and more confident.

From the corner of his eye, Hotch saw Jack giving a not-so-subtle thumbs up before darting off to join his friends, leaving Hotch and you to chat amidst the joyful chaos of the classroom party.

As the children continued their celebrations around you, the two of you discussed logistics for the dinner, the conversation easy and flowing naturally. It was clear that what started as a child’s innocent matchmaking might just turn into something truly special, much to Jack's delight--and perhaps to his credit.

[wcnderlnds]

the heart wants what it wants | choi su-bong (thanos)

・❥・ summary: he hates himself but you kinda, sorta love him. ・❥・word count: 1.3k ・❥・warnings: usual squid game stuff, swearing. ・❥・ authors note: as if i was gonna leave my boy thanos out of valentines fics. here's something a lil fluffy while still (hopefully) in character for him.

“What’re you sitting there looking like someone just pissed in your cereal for? And don’t try and tell me it’s because of that last game or whatever because I know that’s bullshit.”

Thanos’ voice pierced through your ears as he sat down beside you on the steel stairs between the bunks. His arms rested on his knees, hands dangling between his open legs as he looked at you expectantly. That was Thanos down to a tee – he needed to know everything immediately, patience wasn’t his strong suit. It frustrated him when he didn’t get answers. You had known this man for far too long to know the signs. The way he was clenching his jaw, his fingers tapping against his leg. 

“...I don’t want to tell you because you’ll laugh at me,” you mumbled, head resting on your arms that were crossed over your pulled up knees.

“Come on, spit it out,” he waved his hand, dismissing your worries. “I probably will laugh but since when did that shit bother you?”

He was right. You never cared before so why now? Well, you knew why. Being trapped in this place with him had resurfaced something you had thought you’d got rid of a long time ago. When you had first met Su-bong, you had the world’s biggest crush on him but he had turned you down, telling you that you should just be friends so… that’s what you were. Now, eight years on and that all consuming crush was back. You were trapped in a life or death game with him, he’d been protecting you and making sure that no harm fell on you. His hand grabbed yours at any opportunity like he just had to be touching you to make sure you were still here. You had never seen so much panic in his eyes than the moment you had almost fell in Red Light, Green Light. Luckily, he had managed to grab your arm to stop you from meeting your end. Su-bong wasn’t someone that wore his heart on his sleeve but when he cared, he cared. That was one thing you were certain of; he cared about you. There were ways he showed it without saying it. Like now, he had come to sit with you, asking you what was going on even if it was in his own annoying way. He had to act like he didn’t care otherwise it would consume him, his anxiety would sky rocket. That was why he was popping those colourful little pills. They may make him act insane but inside they calmed him, made him think clearer so he could protect you.

“Fine,” you sighed. “...it’s Valentine’s Day and I’m just sad I’m stuck in here and not enjoying some chocolate covered strawberries fed to me by some super hot person. Happy now?”

Thanos couldn’t help but bark out a laugh, nudging you with his shoulder. “That’s why you’re feeling sorry for yourself?” He narrowed his eyes, examining you before he decided you weren’t telling him the full truth. A quick shuffle and he was sitting right beside you, his leg touching yours. His arm wrapped around your shoulder, pulling you into his side. It was unusually soft for him but he had these moments with you sometimes. The only person who wouldn’t judge him was you, that was something he knew for certain. “You ain’t tellin’ me the whole story so I’m gonna need you to get that pretty mouth of yours talking more before I go get Nam-su to come glare at you with those beady little eyes of his.”

“You know his name is Nam-gyu, right?” You rested your head on his shoulder, nervously wringing your hands together. Thanos noticed almost immediately, placing a hand on them to stop you. “Remember when we first met? When… uh, when I had a crush on you and your turned me down?”

“Yeah, how could I forget?”

“Well, I might be feeling that way again.”

At those words, he froze up. His body tense, panic flashing across his eyes. Yeah, you shouldn’t have said anything. He would only close himself off now and that was the last thing you needed right now. He had been your whole support system here. The silence between you was almost deafening until he finally spoke. “...you shouldn’t.”

You couldn’t help but roll your eyes. “Wish it was that easy, Su-bong.”

“You wanna know why I turned you down all those years ago?” He had pulled away from you slightly, both his hands now resting on your shoulders as he made you look at him. “Because you fuckin’ deserve better than me. I’m a mess. I’ve always been a mess. I’m no good, especially not for you. Someone like you? You deserve the fuckin’ world and I can’t give you that. I wish I could but I can’t. You need someone who can treat you like the princess you are but, baby, that man ain’t me.”

If it wasn’t anyone else, they wouldn’t have caught the waver in his voice, the way he was looking at you as if pleading for you to listen to him. He meant every word he said but you didn’t. You knew he often got lost in his self loathing thoughts, thinking that he was scum of the Earth but he wasn’t. He was just a lost boy, someone had never had someone care about him like you.

“I don’t care, Su-bong. My heart knows what it wants and it wants you. It isn’t going to stop. It’s been eight years and it’s always felt this way. You are everything to me, you always have been. I wish you could see in yourself what I see in you,” your hand cupped his cheek, the gesture so soft he almost nuzzled into your palm but refrained. “Sure, you’re not perfect but neither am I. I’ll respect whatever you want but… just know that my heart belongs to you.”

His eyebrows scrunched together as if he was in deep thought, one of his hands playing with the chain of the necklace that hung around his neck. His cross; the one that contained his drugs. It looked like he was in an internal conflict with himself before, finally, he pulled the necklace over his head and onto you. You felt your heart pounding as his fingers skimmed across your chest, making sure the cross laid properly. “You’re a damn pain in my ass, you know that? But… I’ve been into you the day we met, just thought you deserved more than I can give you. So, this is my promise to you to show you that I trust you, that maybe I’ll try and be the person you deserve some day. Ain’t never let anyone wear this other than me, by the way.”

The gesture meant more to you than you could even put into words, your heart hammering against your chest as he tapped the cross. You smiled up at him, hand resting over his. “The highest honour, huh?” You couldn’t help but tease to at least ease some of the tension. “It means a lot… and Su-bong? I believe in you.”

You heard the small, breathy laugh that came from his lips as he looked at the ground trying to hide it. That meant more to him than you would know. Finally, he looked back up at you, his arm back around your shoulder to pull you back into his side. “We get out of this shithole and I’ll feed you all the damn chocolate strawberries you want.”

“I’ll hold you to that.”

As you rested your head on his shoulder, his thumb rubbing gentle circles on yours, you knew that once you got out of here things were definitely going to change but it gave you something to look forward to. His promise the one thing that would get you through these deathly games.

taglist (ask to be added!): @ldydeath @justsisse @djarindroid @angelofbooksworld @taivantaylor @sherlocke3d @basquiat-top @urmomsg1rlfreind @belladonna-303 @seunghyunwifey @infinetlyforgotten

[cherriegyuu]

whispers of desire | c.sc | part one

pairing: incubus seungcheol x f!reader  genre: smut, angst, fluff - minors do not interact word count: 7.3k summary: when you cut a deal with the demon king, the man who shows up to help is nothing like you imagined warnings: mentions of god, demons and religion, infertility, infidelity, knives, breeding kink, masturbation, creampie, dirty talking ish, begging, multiple orgarms, unprotected sex, piv, forced orgasm. jeonghan (idk, he deserves a warning too)

a/n: and finally after i don't even know how many months, i finished part one. i really want to thank @ssinboo who not only helped me brainstorm this, but who motivated me into picking it up again. @joonsytip and @nothoughtsjustfic who read it over and promised me that it was good. thank you so much to all three of you, this one would have never left my wips if not for you. i truly hope you enjoy this and if you do please leave comment, i would love to know you thoughts about it! it's 17 minutes past midnight, but i'm going to count this as a valentine's day special

You looked once again at the waiting room—the light gray walls, the black furniture, the small splashes of color here and there. It was mostly modern and imponent but dark. You felt out of place in your bright yellow sweater and almost white pants. You looked like an egg, but when you realized what you had done, it was too late. You were already in the Uber, getting the most incredulous look from the driver. 

The watch on your wrist seemed to mock you. You arrived too early for your appointment, too nervous to stay any longer in your apartment, too queasy to go to the nearby cafe and waste some time. 

You had been sitting on that extremely comfortable couch for 10 minutes, the pretty receptionist giving you suspicious looks followed by insincere smiles. You were so close to just getting up and walking out the door.

It had been a stupid idea. A desperate attempt at one last resort to reaching your dream. The one thing you wanted in life since you were sixteen. But it was, indeed, stupid. How was it possible that a man without a last name, who obviously wasn’t a doctor, could help you get pregnant? Even if he happened to have a magic dick, which you doubted, there was still no chance of you getting pregnant. The problem wasn’t on the sperm donor, it was in you. 

For years, you tried getting pregnant. During the first year you and your husband, now ex-husband, tried in the most natural way: fucked every chance you got, at the most random places, tracking your cycles every month. You knew that for some people getting pregnant took a little more time, so at first, you didn’t think much of it. You managed to convince yourself that the reason why you weren’t getting pregnant was because you had just gotten off birth control and sometimes — most times — the hormones messed up a little too much with the body.

After a year, something felt strange, and little red signs started to go off in your head. It wasn’t natural to take that long, at least according to everyone you knew, so you set a meeting with the doctor and did all the tests in the book. When the results came back and showed that you were infertile it was like the world came crashing down.

In life, many of your plans failed and many of your dreams were taken from you, however being a mother was one that you always carried with you. It was a dream that was yours, truly yours and you didn’t need anyone to make it happen for you. Of course, you couldn’t make a baby on your own, but in the end, it was always your choice. If you didn’t have a husband, you could go to a sperm bank and just choose someone.

Along with your dream, your marriage was also one that didn’t last long. After the initial shock of not being able to have a baby slowly started to pass and the fog that clouded your mind started to lift, you started to think of other ways you could become a mother.  Adoption seemed like a natural path. Your husband, however, didn’t agree with the idea, which led to many fights and eventually a divorce.

The idea of adoption didn't leave you, so you sought out ways to adopt on your own. While the adoption process in itself was excruciatingly difficult as a married person, by yourself was nearly impossible. You went to many people and asked for advice on how to proceed, how to present yourself, what to say and do in front of the social workers. All of them said the same thing “the chances of you getting approved for adoption are very low”.

Every day that went by, with each breath you took, you felt as if the dream of being a mother escaped you, like sand slipping through your fingers.

One day, like many others, you were searching for ways to adopt as a single parent when you came across a forum post talking about an unnamed man who could get anyone to do anything, even things that seemed impossible. You had snorted at the post and almost closed the tap when the word pregnancy seemed to flash in front of your eyes, like a moth drawn to a flame. After you saw it, there was no way you could have closed the tab and moved on to something different. 

You read post after post, comment, after comment, about all of these women who had gotten pregnant after losing all hope. All of them mentioned the same name, Jeonghan. There was no last name. On the very last post was a phone number.

There wasn't enough time to question yourself or your actions, the next thing you knew you had the phone pressed to your ear, setting up a meeting for later that day.

The fact that you were able to set an appointment on such short notice should have made alarms ring in your head. But the alarms only went off while you sat in the waiting room. 

You suddenly stood up and walked to the pretty secretary who was hiding behind the computer.

“Sorry, hi” you waited until she looked at you, and the same polite smile greeted you “Something came up, I need to leave… I'm really sorry”

As the words left your lips the door on the other side of the waiting room opened. A man with a kind smile and hair long enough to cover his forehead greeted you. Despite his smile being inviting, his eyes told an entirely different story. 

“Please, come in”

The little alarms inside your mind suddenly turned silent and the need to flee turned into the desire to follow him inside that office. 

You turned to look at the receptionist, who in return offered you an encouraging nod and smile.

“Sorry to keep you waiting, I had some files that needed attention”

The man, who you could assume was Jeonghan, pulled a chair for you to sit on. He only let go of the chair once you were seated.

“It's okay”

His office was very similar in style to the waiting room, except for the leather chair and the industrial-looking desk. There was no computer, no bookshelf, no degree attached to the wall, just some creepy paintings that looked maybe a little too dark and tenebrous to an office. His desk was also empty of any files, phones, and pens. It was hard to believe that he was going over some files when there was nothing to look at.

“How can I help you today?”

For a second his eyes turned dark, entirely black, before going back to the dark brown color. Eyes of a snake, the words flashed in front of you. Your hold on the straps of your purse tightened until your knuckles turned to white.

It was a mistake going there.

It took an enormous amount of strength to push your body into a standing position.

“I'm sorry, I can't stay” you managed to force the words out, doing your best to smile and sound apologetic “Something came up”

Jeonghan leaned forward, his chin resting on his hand.

“Now, we know that's a lie” there was humor in his voice “You came here for a baby, so do us both a favor and sit down”

It was like your will to leave the room was suppressed by a hand pushing you down back on the chair. That same hand seemed to be holding you in place.

“See? That wasn't so hard”

The back of your neck started to grow cold, your hands sweaty. Your heartbeat with the force of a horse. His eyes turned into snake eyes once again. You felt your entire body grow cold. This time he flashed his eyes for a little more than a second.

“If you promise to be good, I'll stop holding you down” he raised his eyebrows at you, his tone almost bored now “Okay?”

It was a strange sight, a man who was around your age — or at least you thought so –, with soft features to have such eyes. Strange didn't even start to describe it, terrifying was a more precise word, and yet, you weren't scared. 

Perhaps you were at first, after all your initial reaction had been to escape, but while sitting there looking at him you were just curious.

“If you can stop with the eyes,” you used your index and middle finger to point at your own eyes “sure, we'll talk”

Jeonghan pouted but complied. In a millisecond the snake eyes were gone at the same time the pressure on your shoulders subsided. 

“You don't know how to have fun, do you?”

You didn’t bother to answer, you knew that no matter what you said those words wouldn’t make any difference to him and you were sure that your definition of fun was entirely different from his.

“So, a child. That's what you want, your deepest desire?” Jeonghan raised a hand to stop you from talking as if he changed his mind “Of course it is, you don’t have to say it”

It was the way he said it that made a shiver run through your spine. You shouldn’t have gone there. You should have asked someone else to go with you, though who could have been that person was unknown to you.

“Did you bait me into coming here?”

“Well, yeah” he laughed “I'm sure you saved that forum but if you go back there won't be much to see. Let's be realistic here and say that what you want, can be done”

You rolled your eyes and sighed. It wasn't a reaction to what he had said, it was to what you had believed. 

“You were so pathetically desperate that it was so easy getting to you” Jeonghan taunted you “Just one word, one post on a random website was enough to get you here and so fast too! Was it a couple of hours ago?”

Biting your bottom lip was the only possible way to keep your mouth shut, to keep the very much not polite fuck you in the silence of your mind. You tried to get up again, not really willing to sit there and be mocked, but as soon as you made the slightest movement you felt that hand again on your shoulder holding you down, this time much more forceful than the previous one.

“You said that we were going to talk, so, let’s talk”

“I want to go,” you said between your teeth “now”

Jeonghan tilted his head to the side, his snake eyes making an appearance again.

“Silly girl, you should have listed to your grandma when she warned you about what your wishes could bring” a sickening smile made its way to his face, paired with his eyes made your stomach drop all the way down to your toes “Now you can only leave when I saw so”

A sudden memory crossed your mind, one from your childhood. Of you sitting in your grandma’s lap when you couldn’t be older than seven. She said don’t wish for impossible things, you never know who or what could be listening. Your grandma was catholic, always with her rosary in her hand, or wrapper around her wrist or on her neck.

It became painfully obvious who Jeonghan was. From the snake eyes, the smile, how graceful he looked.

“Shit” the curse was almost silent.

He smiled once again, his eyes back to normal. It was all the confirmation you needed from him.

Nights had become a lonely part of the day, not that they were eventful before the divorce but at least you weren't always by yourself. 

Somehow you had allowed yourself to become one of those people who are only friends with their husband's friends so when the divorce happened it was obvious that most Of them — in this case, all of them — stayed with your ex-husband. You also hadn't really helped the situation when you closed yourself off. It had become too much, finding out that you were infertile, a possible affair from your husband, and the inevitable divorce. It was only natural for you to isolate yourself.

It seemed though that not many people seemed to understand it. Your so-called friends, who you cried with when the results came back, seemed to think that crying over was ridiculous, that one week was more than enough to move on from the entire thing, it's not like you don't have a life outside of this dream. 

And while all of that was true, it was much easier saying it than doing it. You felt as if you were spiraling down with nothing to hold onto, without anyone by your side. 

So, nights by yourself, with a bottle of wine and some takeout had become your new normal.

You were in the kitchen when you heard a faint knock on the door. Since visitors were few and you weren't expecting anyone, you assumed that it was on your neighbor. Someone probably knocking with a little more strength than necessary. It wasn't unusual. Your neighbor had loud and often drunk friends you had gotten used to their shenanigans during the three years you lived there.

All you did was keep doing the dishes, swaying your body from side to side with the music you had been playing in the background as you tried your best to forget that entire week and how you had willingly walked into a pile of shit but had no idea of how to get out of it.

The sound of the door opening made you close the faucet. A look at the clock above the door told you that there was no way for your neighbors to be back yet, not when you had heard them leave less than an hour before. You didn’t know why you thought that it could have been them. There was no doubt that the opened door was in your apartment.

You took a knife from the holder, wrapping your hand tightly around the handle. Your hand was still wet from doing the dishes so you held onto the knife as strongly as you could, until your knuckles turned white.

The one good thing about old apartments is that there were certain places that cracked and you knew exactly where those were, so you also knew how to avoid them. Whoever was in your apartment didn’t.

A small part of your brain hoped that it was your ex-husband. If it was, the worst thing that would happen was for you to look like an idiot in front of him, for the millionth time since you met him. Looking stupid was much much better than having to deal with an intruder or a murderer.

You took one last breath before pushing your bedroom door fully open.

“Don’t you dare throw that knife at me”

A man in a purple suit stood in the center of your room. His hair was bright red, pushed back. He looked like he had come out of one of those comic books your brother read as a child. He had your wedding album in his hand. He went through the pages, a pout in his lips and he scanned all the pictures, assessing what he was seeing.

“It’s not polite to hold a knife at your guest,” he said matter of factly.

“Who the fuck are you?” your grip on the handle tightened as if such a thing was even possible to begin with.

He turned the photo album to you, showing you a picture of yourself alone, smiling after throwing the bouquet at your wedding. It was a spontaneous picture, a true smile. That woman in the picture was an entirely different person. Looking at her it was hard to believe that you had been her at some point in time.

“You looked happier here” he pointed out, turning the album back to himself, still pouting “I don’t think she’d hold a knife at a guest”

“Who are you?” you demanded again, your voice louder, desperate.

The man rolled his eyes at you, finally closing the book and throwing it on your bed.

“Think about it, we both know you’re smart” he lightly raised his eyebrows at you “A little over a week ago you had a weird… dream? That’s what you made yourself think, wasn’t it?”

For a moment it was hard to pull air inside your lungs.

You thought that you had gone crazy. You clearly remembered getting out of the apartment, of going downtown in an Uber, of the waiting room, of talking to Jeonghan. But you didn’t remember walking out of the building or how you got home. You just… somehow found yourself back in your bed, in your pajamas in the middle of the night. The clock marked 3:33 AM.

“That was Jeonghan’s fault so I won’t hold it over your head too much. He likes to play tricks like that”

He sat on your bed, arms stretched back, thighs parted. A cocky smile on his lips and you could swear that your legs melted a little when you noticed that he had nothing under the suit jacket.

“Who are you?” you asked again, this time your voice wasn’t as loud or as demanding.

The man raised his eyebrows again and you could swear that it did something to you, tickling a place you didn’t know it needed to be tickled. He moved his chin lightly as if pointing to the knife. You sighed and put the knife down, holding it closer to your body. But that wasn't enough for the man, he pointed at the dresser. You rolled your eyes but did as asked. You didn't dare to get closer to him though. You simply crossed your arms over your chest and leaned against it. 

"I'm Seungcheol," the man said, only when he was sure that there was no chance of you stabbing him "Choi Seungcheol"

"I didn't know demons had last names"

His pout was still in place, as he seemed to be thinking of what to say next.

"We're civil enough, though me coming in without your permission might not be the best proof of character" he was quick to add when you opened your mouth to object. 

It didn't matter how much you tried, nothing came to mind when you thought about your conversation with Jeonghan. All of it was a big blank. You remembered getting there, him scaring you, the realization of who he was but nothing after that.

“The word you’re looking for is demon king,” he said. 

His eyes seemed to assess you, each and every movement you made. Seungcheol’s eyes never left you, not even for a second. When you moved to the chair on the opposite side of the room he followed you, adjusting his own body he would be seated directly in front of you. 

If your memory served you right, which at that point you had no idea, Jeonghan seemed to know what you were thinking. You were inclined to think that he couldn’t actually read your thoughts because according to Seungcheol, again if you could take his words for anything, demons too were civil and would just be way too invasive, but he was awfully good at knowing exactly what you were thinking. But then again, Jeonghan seemed to know way too much in the first meeting. Were the files he was looking at something like your life’s history? Where you were born, about your parents, your first boyfriend, your college crush, your husband, and everything that happened after?

You did your best not to focus too much on the demon king thing. If you did, your mind would take you somewhere else entirely and you weren’t sure if you could go there at that moment. Actually, you were sure you shouldn’t, especially because if you did the man in front of you, or a demon, would probably laugh. And being laughed at wasn’t something you were ready for at the moment.

“Okay,” you said slowly, exhaling all the air in your lungs all at once “Jeonghan is the demon king”

Seungcheol nodded, a small smile on his lips as he was proud of a child who had just given a correct answer. 

“That makes you…?”

“An incubus”

You closed your eyes for a second, folding your legs in front of you. Incubus… the demon who would sleep with women in their sleep and get them pregnant, and these women birthed demon-like children. 

Fantastic.

“So, magic dick,” you said, half not believing what you were saying, on how easily it seemed for you to understand it all “Great” 

That seemed to pull out an honest laugh out of Seungcheol, to the point a dimple made its way into his cheek. You couldn't help but smile along with him. 

“Something along those lines, yes”

He stood up, his eyes no longer filled with laughter and amusement. They had turned darker, hungry even. At that very second you felt like a prey under his eyes. You bit your bottom lip and he got closer to you, his eyes focused on your lips as he moved deliberately slowly to get to you. It seemed that your room was much, much, bigger than it actually was, almost like there was an entire runaway between him and you. 

You stood up as well, though that was probably a bad idea, considering how wobbly your legs felt. 

Seungcheol smiled, not in the cute and almost condescending way of before, but in a way that was much darker and held so many promises at the same time. He took your hand, pulled you towards the center of the room, walking backward.

“So, this is it? No flirting, no nice words, no dinner. Just straight-up sex” 

You hoped that your tone was light, teasing. Though there was nothing light about the way you were feeling. The few inches of your skin that were under his touch felt like were on fire. 

It had been a long time since you were with anyone, your husband was the last one a year and a half before. That wasn't to say that you hadn't found any sort of pleasure, but it had always been by yourself.

You couldn't help but wonder if part of the heat on your skin came from the lack of contact or if it was because of him. Something told you that it was a mix of both. 

“Well, you had dinner before I even got here and I thought you holding a knife was flirting”

Seungcheol circled you. The hand that held Yours suddenly pressed on your stomach, holding you against his firm chest. He pressed his nose to the crook of your neck. Giving him more access to your skin felt almost natural.

You felt his lips on the back of your neck. It started as a chaste kiss, followed by the burn of his teeth sinking into your skin and then soothed by his tongue flat over the space he had just bitten. 

“Are you a vampire?” you hoped your voice sounded steady but even to your ears it was breathy, close to a moan. The thing… the man… had barely touched you and you were ready to just melt under him. 

Seungcheol’s chest vibrated against your back and he leaned into your neck once again, now biting the other side. 

“Never met one of those, but if you want, I can become one for the night”

It suddenly crossed your mind “would he do anything I ask?” but you didn’t have it in you to ask. More than that, you didn’t know what to ask. You wanted too much but at the same time, you weren't sure where to begin. 

Slowly, Seungcheol ran his hand down your body. You felt your core tighten at the proximity, wetness slowly damping your panties. You were in a haze, one you didn’t want to come out of. 

“Tell me what you want. Whatever you want, however, you want it. It’s all yours”

It was like he had somehow heard your thoughts. Was that also part of his abilities? Magic dick and mind reading? Seemed like good powers to have. 

He nuzzled your neck again, this time placing kisses all over your skin as he slid down the strap of your shirt and continued his discovery of your skin. But your shoulder was not the place you wanted to feel him the most, it was not the spot that was craving for attention. 

Seungcheol ran his nose over your shoulder, the curve of your neck, up to your ear. 

“Ah, not so sweet and innocent after all” the hot breath over your skin made your entire body flame up. 

Finally, he lowered his hand, going under the elastic band of your shorts. He roughly rubbed his palm over your covered clit as his other hand went up to your breast, tugging at the hard nipple.

“You’re this wet and we barely even started?” he nibbled on your ear “You were all brave with that knife but all you can think about now is my magic dick filling you over and over and over again. Right, sweetheart?”

He pushed your panties to the side, his finger finally rubbing over your sensitive clit. A whimper left your lips as he was exactly where you needed, but it was far from enough. 

“Oh, I’m going to have so much fun with you”

He circulated your slit with two fingers. Once, twice, three times. 

“Please” you whispered. 

You felt his smile at the same time he pushed his fingers into you, your arousal more than enough to suck him in. You sucked in a moan as he picked up speed with his fingers, then another when his palm pressed over your clit adding another layer of pleasure. 

“Make that pretty noise for me again, sweetheart,” he asked, his voice low, though commanding “Let me hear you”

You tried your best to stay quiet, to not make any sound, and let the only sound in the room be the almost obnoxious noise of his fingers slipping in and out of you. But when Seungcheol found that one spot, that tiny piece of skin that made your mind almost go blank it was impossible to be silent. 

The sound coming out of you was pathetic, each new moan getting louder as you felt your abdomen cramp. The louder you got, the faster he moved his fingers. He didn’t stop pumping his fingers, didn’t stop pressing his palm on your clit, until the tide finally broke loose. 

You tried to shut your legs, suddenly the stimulation was too much at once, but Seungcheol was willing to let that happen. He kicked your feet apart, using his own knees to keep yours proudly open. 

Your orgasm hit you harder than ever before, your body convulsing in his grip, shaking as each new wave of pleasure hit you, somehow stronger than before. Seungcheol held you together until your body calmed down. A moan that could have been easily mistaken for a sob, came out of your lips, a light tremor in your legs, though you were certain that it was no longer visible. 

Seungcheol slowly guided your body towards the bed, both of his hands on your hips, steadying you. He sat you down on the bed and took a couple of steps back. He didn’t say anything as he opened the button on his suit and pulled it off his shoulder, tossing it aside on the chair to his left. 

He was teasing you, that much was obvious. Under normal circumstances you’d have looked away but as he unbuttoned his pants you couldn’t force yourself to look away. Your mind was in a trance by him, he had your undivided attention and he loved it. 

His movements were deliberately slow, a cocky grin making its way to his face as he noticed your eyes following the movements of his hands. 

The only piece of clothing covering Seungcheol was his underwear, though it did very little to disguise his erection. Your mouth watered at the sight, a nagging feeling on the back of your mind telling you to get down on your knees in front of him and take all of him into your mouth - or at least as much as it could fit anyway. 

Seungcheol laughed as he finally pushed the last piece of cotton off. You bit your lip to stop yourself from moaning at the sight of him on full display. Every inch of his devilish body, in full glory, was mesmerizing. You felt you pussy clench around nothing as Seungcheol started to pump his dick. 

“We’ll have enough time to play later tonight,” he moved closer to you, standing in between your legs, his cock was close to you face that you simply inch forward and have him like you wanted, he had different ideas though “but right now I want to know what it feels like to be buried deep inside that sweet, sweet, pussy”

You reached down to the hem of your shirt, pulling it over your head. It was only when you reached for the elastic band of your shorts that you felt the embarrassment creeping up every inch of your body. 

“Come on, sweetheart, don’t hide yourself from me”

He lightly pushed you onto the bed, his knee pressing against your center and he scooped you up on the bed. He grabbed you by the hips and flipped you so that your face was pressed into the mattress. 

He pushed your shorts down, though not boring to take them off all the way down. Seungcheol straddled your legs and he teased your pussy with the tip of his cock. Running it over the slick entrance but never fully pushing it inside. 

You tried to change the position in a way to force him to just sink in but he was having none of that. He gripped your head by your hair, pulling it back until your ass up in the air, your back arched in a way that should be painful but somehow all it did was heighten your pleasure. 

“Beg” he whispered against your ear, his voice deliciously low.

“What?” you breathed out as he continued to tease you, your body moving along with his, a new whimper escaping every time he almost pushed inside. 

“I’m not going to make it that easy for you” he laughed “You wanna be fucked? I’ll fuck in ways you can’t even imagine. But you’re going to have to beg”

In any other situation, in any other moment of your life, you’d have felt embarrassed by his demand, to some extent would even have felt angry towards it. But right in that second, with the promise of what was to come, saying a few words sounded like a fair price to pray. 

“Please, please, Seungcheol” you begged, voice dripping with need and honey as you moved your hips wanting nothing more than to just be filled “just fuck me, fill me up. All of me is yours…” for the night.

He didn’t let you finish, pushing his cock into your throbbing pussy. There was no time to adjust. Seungcheol drove his dick into you again and again, each thrust harder than the previous one. He pulled your arms back, holding them against his chest with his own. 

Each sound that left your mouth was increasingly louder but you didn’t care in the slightest. Seungcheol’s grunts behind you, the slapping of his skin against yours every time he drove into you was intoxicating.

“Oh my god” you chanted over and over again

“No, no, not god” he laughed, biting the soft skin of your shoulder “He can't help you now”

He snaked a hand around your waist directly to your clit, massaging it in slow circles, in high contrast to his dick. The pressure was just perfect, his pace never faulting. 

An orgasm hit you yet again, without notice, this time not as hard as the first one, but still enough to have you shaking to the core. Seungcheol held you even tighter, his pace relentless as he searched for his own high. 

You felt his warm cum splurged into you, too much of it. 

Your body felt limp on the bed, all energy drained out of you, not a single drop left. You turned, looking at the ceiling, trying to steady your breathing, waiting for the tremors to pass when you felt Seungcheol his hand over your thigh. 

He pushed your shorts and panties all the way down, tossing them on the floor with a mute sound. He spread your legs and smiled proudly, seemingly happy with his work. It only lasted a second though, as a frown took over his features. 

“You’re wasting it, sweetheart” he tsked “We can’t have that, now can we?”

You felt his hand on your sensitive cunt and tried to flinch away but he didn't bulge. His finger grazed over your clit before he pushed them into you. You held his wrist, trying to push his hand away. 

“No, it’s too much” you shook your head, pleading “Please, I can’t, please”

He laughed at your words, pinning the hand that held his wrist over your head. Seungcheol kissed your breast, taking the nipple into his mouth, sucking hard, and blowing on it a second later, all while he pumped his fingers in your pussy, pushing back inside all the cum that had dripped out. 

“You can” you bit your lower lip and tugged at it “and, most importantly, we both know you want it”

You could only shake your head as the pleasure became too much, almost unbearable. Almost. You felt yet another orgasm build up again, like your entire body was throbbing, closing itself tightly before it finally broke free.

Seungcheol swallowed your scream, kissing your lips, neck, and shoulders as your body spasmed. Your quiet whimpers were the only sound in the room. He only pulled his fingers out of you when you calmed down completely.

“That’s it” he kissed your cheek, letting go of your hands and using them to hold his head so he could look down at you “See, I told you you could it”

Out of the possible outcomes of the previous night waking up to a mop of red hair on the other side of the bed wasn’t one of them. You were certain that when you woke up you’d realize that the night had been a dream — the most real one you had ever had in your life but that was beside the point. 

Just for good measure, you pressed your index finger to the shoulder of the man. Warm and soft skin was under your finger.

Okay, not a dream then.

You turned on your back, facing the ceiling of your bedroom. The night played vividly in your mind. The way Seungcheol pressed the first kiss to the back of your neck and how that alone was enough to make you go crazy under his touch. Not only that, how you were so willing to completely let yourself go to him, how every time he whispered in your ear, chills ran down your entire body and you could feel him everywhere.

You couldn’t help but wonder if all of your emotions had been heightened because he was…. him. A demon. Or if you were just so touch-starved that the smallest caress was enough to drive you over the edge.

Most of all, you couldn’t look past all how you had been so incredibly reckless. A random man who looked like he had gotten out of some comic book suddenly showed up in your room — mind you without using the door — and you somehow, for whatever reason, thought that it was a good idea to have sex with him. And then, as if all of that wasn’t enough, you still fell asleep by his side like it was the most normal thing in the world like he was someone you could trust entirely.

You covered your eyes with your arm, a groan leaving your lips.

There was still the whole “deal with the demon king” part that you were yet to think about.

It seemed unfair that you couldn’t remember what you agreed on. You should have the chance to prepare for whatever was to come, didn’t you? The demon king, or Jeonghan, you weren’t sure how you should address him, was well… unfair.

“Are you usually this loud so early in the morning?”

Your entire body jumped on the bed and a scream died in your throat. For a couple of minutes, you had been so lost in your mind that you forgot that Seungcheol was by your side at all.

His voice in the early morning, just after waking up, was almost made out of honey, velvety, tingling in your ears. By your side, Seungcheol had turned to you, his eyes barely open, his full lips pulled almost in a pout, a few strands of hair covering his face. You had to grip the sheets closer to your body just so you could suppress the desire to move them aside.

Your eyes moved slightly down, to his half-exposed chest. Another flash of the night before crossed your mind, of him over you, the way the chain around his neck hung just over your nose, how you used it to pull him to you again.

“You look cute when you blush,” he said with a lazy smile on his lips. You felt your cheeks warm but didn’t think it was enough to cause any visible change. 

Seungcheol folded his arm, holding his head up. The sleepy smile he gave you was the most delicious thing you had ever seen, it was enough to take your breath away all over again. You were happy that you were still in bed, otherwise there was a chance that your legs might have given in under you.

“I didn’t think you’d stay” was all you said as you swung your feet out of the bed, looking for the pajamas that were lost somewhere on the floor.

It was on the other side of the room, how it had ended up there was beyond you. You gripped the sheet closer around your body but you were only able to move one step away from the bed before you felt it being pulled back.

“You know, I already saw everything there’s under those sheets” you didn’t turn to him but you could hear the smile in his voice “In fact, I did a lot more than just look at it”

You took a deep breath and closed your eyes. You were certain that if you forced the sheets out of his grip, Seungcheol would have let go of it but if he did such a thing then he would be the one exposed, and while you were sure that he had no problem with the idea, everything you screamed that if you saw him naked again there was no way that you would just have a redo of the night before.

Letting go of the sheets, you walked to the other side of the room, opening the dresser drawer and pulling out a clean pair of panties and bra.

“I’m going to shower and by the time I finish it I want you gone”

Seungcheol’s laughter still echoed through the apartment when you closed the bathroom door.

You had managed to keep yourself busy enough during the weekend that you had almost forgotten about Friday night. The keyword being almost. Usually, you would have come up with an excuse to not help your sister during the weekend. She was a wedding planner, a very good one at that — she had been the one to plan your wedding — and highly sought out so it was easier to find her working than being at home.

The reason why you always declined was that weddings, while they could be wildly different from one another, there were things that were the same, didn’t who was at the isle. Two people were promising each other eternal love.

When you saw those people, standing in front of each other, eyes filled with love and hope, you couldn’t help but think about Joshua. How you had once been in that exact spot, saying similar words, how you had been happy with him for so many years until all of it came crashing down on you. The only thing that love left behind were scars that were still all too fresh but hidden enough that no one would ever see them.

Still, working during the weekend with your sister was better than staying at home and thinking about all the stupid decisions you made and how much you’d love to make at least one of them once again. She was also kind enough to let you work on the setup and then later back in the kitchen. Maybe she had some sort of sixth sense that said that you need to get out of your mind. Her call was at the right moment.

Even so, there were moments when you were on your own, in the darkness of your bedroom, when Seungcheol’s perfume somehow still lingered in the air. There was no escape then. It was like a replay of that night played in your head again and again, and everytime it it did there was a new detail that you had somehow forgotten.

It was both a blessing and a curse.

You ran your hand over your face and hair, urging your mind to just stop and let yourself fall asleep. You had a meeting early in the morning and you needed your sleep, just so you could function like a semi-normal human being.

You were in the kitchen when you heard a sound in your bedroom. Your heart skipped a beat, hoping that maybe… just maybe… You shook your head in an attempt to come back to reality. The chance of seeing Seungcheol once again was below zero. You heard the sound again and this time your heart wasn’t the only thing doing a weird flip inside your chest, you also felt chills run down your skin.

The third time the sound came you felt as if you were under a cold shower when it was followed by the sound of laughter in the hallway that belonged to your neighbor. 

It was hard swallowing the expectation that had somehow found its way into you. You weren’t even sure why you were expecting something in the first place. After that night it was clear that there wasn’t going to be a second one. Not that there was any conversation on the matter, it just seemed like the most natural option. 

If things had gone according to plan, and if your mind was worthy of any trust, apparently it did, there was no real reason why you should ever see Seungcheol again. And yet, there you were wishing that he’d just show up again, and for what? 

You set the glass of water down, wishing you could have something strong – God knew that if you wanted to sleep you’d need some help – but not wanting to risk anything. Shutting down the lights in the kitchen and living room.

Before you even opened the door to your room you felt this shift in the air. You pushed it open, hard enough that it smashed against the wall. 

“You must really love your kitchen, the second time I show up here and the second time you're in the kitchen”

You closed your eyes for a second, basking in the sound of his voice, how it made chills erupt in your skin. 

“Second time you don’t use the door”

“I’ll be sure to remember that”

Seungcheol smiled, hands in his pocket. 

“You better”

Before you gave yourself a chance to think about it, you crossed the room in two strides and pulled him to you. Seungcheol smiled against your lips before he finally kissed you. 

if you enjoyed reading, please reblog and leave a comment, it really does mean the world to me and i would love to know your thoughts. thank you! 💕

you can read my other fics here ➝ masterlist

[sweetbuckybarnes]

Spencer's Family

Summary: The team finds out what Spencer did on his sabbatical.

Inspired by a post, I saw about how, in the one episode we're going to see Spencer in, they meet his wife. I took it and ran.

1k words

After finally closing the case, Penelope practically demanded they go see the new place Spencer had bought a few years ago. Once he agreed (begrudgingly), the BAU tech was literally vibrating in her seat.

Spencer had picked out a small-town house on the edge of DC, a train ride away, but the small town had shops, schools, and parks for an all-around American family. 

He unlocked the door, making his way in first, summoning his team in with a nod of his head.

It seemed like a lovely home for a nearly mid-40s man.

However, there was something that caught Penelope's attention. It sounded like there was someone (possibly more than one) in Spencer's living room.

"Spencer," Penelope hisses. "I think there's someone in your house."

Spencer raises an eyebrow and makes his way into the living room without his gun raised. "It's just my wife and stepdaughter," he says over his shoulder.

"Stepdaughter?" Came from Tara and Luke.

"Wife?" Whereas this came from Penelope, Emily and JJ. 

The last anyone had heard from Spencer about his love life was Maxine, and judging by the voice - this wasn't Maxine.

The group hurried after Spencer, seeing a young girl - possibly around the age of 5, maybe 6 - with her arms wrapped tightly around Spencer's neck. The little girl was an absolute chatterbox. She hadn't stopped talking since the moment he set foot in the living room.

However, the woman they were more interested in was Spencer's wife. Who was sitting on the sofa, giggling at the pair in front of her; a blanket was thrown over her lap, and some sort of embroidery was now abandoned at her side.

"-and then Tony stuck a pencil up his nose!" She giggled.

"Why did he do that?" Spencer asked the little girl, taking a seat on the sofa and pulling her into his lap.

Just as she was going to explain why, she burst into more giggles, Spencer looked over at his wife for a possible explanation. "Apparently Arthur dared Tony to do it."

"Ah! You'd think after the incident with the Magic Marker, they'd know not to dare Tony to do things."

Spencer's wife shrugged her shoulders. "Now you're here, I'm going to take a nap." 

Before Emily could question why his wife was going to take a nap, she got herself out of the little nest she had made for herself. Protruding from her abdomen was a baby bump. A pretty big baby bump.

"Reid, you're going to be a father?!" Luke exclaimed, earning himself a rather harsh glare from the little girl (who now obviously sees Spencer as her dad). "Again..." he trails off, correcting himself under the child's gaze.

"Has she been giving you any hassle?" Spencer asks, ignoring Luke's question (or many of the genius didn't hear him), as his hand rested on the bump, a large smile growing on his face told the team the baby was probably moving. JJ still remembers when she was expecting Henry, and when she got Spencer to feel her bump on time, he mentioned how it felt alien-like.

"Well, she's happy now her daddy's home," his wife comments.

He looks up at her. "Have you given any more thought to going on maternity leave yet?"

The team watches as she rolls her eyes. "As I told you before I left, I'm completely fine; the semester doesn't finish for another 3 weeks."

"Your due date is in 4 weeks, Y/N! I know you feel you have a duty to your students, but I think even they would agree you should be at home."

"They would only agree because they don't want to see me go into labour whilst I'm at school."

"What's labour?" 

Both Spencer and his wife, who they now know is called Y/N, look down at their daughter. The wife looks at her husband. "Can you-"

Spencer leans over and presses a kiss to her temple. "I'll deal with this. You go take a nap."

She sighs happily. "Lifesaver, I don't know what I would do without you."

"And you won't have to," he replies, giving her a kiss. "Go take a nap."

After a spirited conversation with his stepdaughter about childbirth and babies (that was appropriate for a 5-year-old), she happily went back to her colouring book, which was neat and tidy, with every scribble kept firmly within the lines - she was more like Spencer even though they don't share blood.

Penelope plops herself down on an open chair and stares at Spencer like she has seen a ghost. "A wife, a stepdaughter, and a baby on the way?" Spencer nods, reaching over to run his fingers through the little girl's hair (who they now know is called Betty).

"You're excited to have a little sister, aren't you Betty?" Spencer asks, watching her blonde hair bounce around her head.

"I gets to help Mommy and Daddy take care of her!" She replies, the excitement bursting out of her.

Emily looks over at Spencer. "Are you ready?"

Spencer looks away from Betty for all of a second to smile at Emily. "I don't think I've been ready for anything more in my life," he turns to Betty. "Have you come up with any more names for your sister?"

Betty coming up with names for her little sister was a way of her having a part in her little sister's life before she even gets here.

However, this time, Betty only had one. "Willow."

18 days later...

Just as Penelope hung up the phone on Emily, her personal phone pinged in her purse.

There was a notification from Y/N. In a picture from a hospital room, Y/N sat in the bed, cradling a bundle; Spencer sat at her side with Betty in the middle of them, the evidence of tears having rolled down the little girl's face.

Meet Willow Penelope Reid, born 5:37am, 6 pounds 9 oz; mom and baby are well. Oh, and Betty has asked Spencer to adopt her!

Penelope was crying when she called JJ. "Hey, Garcia."

"Y/N had the baby, and my name is the baby's middle name!" Penelope cried, and before JJ could say anything. "And Betty wants Spencer to adopt her!"

JJ smiled softly. "Well, we will have to go visit them once they are out of the hospital and settled in at home."

[nakylvr]

— ALL THE THINGS I NEVER SAID

sophia laforteza x fem!reader

summary જ⁀➴ you've had a crush on sophia for a while now. on the week before valentine's day you write a letter confessing your love to her, but hide it away. until one of your friends finds it and gives it to her on valentine's day without you knowing.

warnings/tags જ⁀➴ fluff, college!au, mild language

wc જ⁀➴ 2,4 k

you were a person with a lot of thoughts. a lot of words left unsaid because they weren't important or you didn't have the confidence to say it out loud. you were quiet, you didn't have a big group of friends, but you had the ones that counted. you weren't exactly seen in classes unless you answered a question and then the moment would pass and you would be forgotten again. but, you didn't mind it a whole lot.

valentines day was one of the most obnoxious days in the year. at school, at least. you thought once high school was over that it would tone down but no, it got worse if anything. you’d have to sit through multiple classes of boyfriends coming in and asking their girlfriends out on dates, you’d have to deal with girls giggling about what their boyfriends did for them for the holiday, shit, you even had to sit through your roommate being serenaded by her girlfriend first thing this morning. you weren't big on the holiday. what was the point if you didn't have someone to celebrate it with?

and as much as you would hate to admit it, you hated missing out.

-ˋˏ✄┈┈┈┈

you didn’t have crushes on a lot of people. a few here and there throughout the years, but none of them went farther than admiring from afar. you never confessed, too afraid of it backfiring and ending in a mess. and it was the same this year.

sophia laforteza, aka the girl so far out of your league that you would rather die than admit your feelings for the girl. you had spoken to her a few times with you being in technical theatre and her being the star of all the musicals and plays alike, and you ended up falling for her. her warm smile, her sweet voice, her beautiful eyes. it was hard not to. especially once you saw just how many people were pining for her.

you walked into the theatre with your binder in your arms filled with all the things you needed to get finished before rehearsal for “romeo and juliet”. could you guess who juliet was? pretty easy. but it still surprised you when you saw sophia sitting on the edge of the stage looking at papers in her hands as the door shut loudly behind you.

sophia’s head perks up upon hearing the door close, and a smile grows on her face at the sight of you. “sorry, i didn't think anyone would be coming in this period,” she says apologetically.

you could feel your heart skip a beat just at the sight of her smile towards you, feeling your anxiety creeping up the closer you approached the stage clutching the binder in your hands like a lifeline. “oh, it's okay!” you assure quickly, shaking your head. “i’m usually in here during free periods when a show is coming up. there's a lot to get situated.”

“i’m sure.” sophia nods, setting the papers down next to her and crossing her leg over the other. “you do a lot of work in tech, don't you?” she asks, tilting her head to the side.

“uh, well, i guess you could say that,” you respond shyly with a short nod. this was the longest you've held a conversation with sophia without one of you being dragged off, and you didn't know what to do. “but, i mean, you do a lot too. i’m sure memorizing all the lines and stuff is hard.”

sophia just shrugs her shoulders lightly. “i guess, but it's nothing technical, literally, like you do. i may be the one on stage, but you're the one who lights me up.” she smiles at you, not a hint of hesitation in her voice as she talks.

“well when you put it that way…” you mumble, glancing down at the ground. your face is heating up the longer you feel her gaze on you, your heart practically beating out of your chest. when you finally meet her eyes again, you quickly look away again. “i uh i need to get some things done before rehearsal today so uhm, yeah,” you manage to say. “you can stay though! or do whatever it was you were doing! i don't mind!” you quickly add, not wanting her to think you were kicking her out.

the giggle that comes from sophia makes your face turn redder than it already was as she smiles at you. “if you don't mind me talking to myself repeating the same lines over and over again, i’ll stay.”

“i don't.” you shake your head, shifting your weight from one foot to the other.

a moment of silence fills the large theatre before you clear your throat and make your way to behind the stage, scurrying off like a scared cat having a showdown with another. once you were behind the stage and sophia was out of your line of sight, you let out a sigh of relief as you set your binder down on the table with a thud. running a hand through your hair, you started to get things ready.

you heard a few people talking about thirty minutes into you doing your work, leaving you confused as you overheard a few things. but, you tried not to think of it too much. that was, until a ginger-haired girl crashed into the back room, literally.

“megan! jesus christ!”

you stare at the scene in front of you, wires in your hands that you were trying to set up for the lighting as sophia rushes in after the ginger.

“holy crap! there's all this shit back here?”

“megan!” sophia grabs megan by her arm, yanking her up off the ground before her eyes land on you. “i’m sorry! my friends wanted to help with my lines. i told them not to come back here.” she shoots a look at megan who puts her palms together.

“i’m sorry! please don't kill me, pretty theatre tech lady!” megan apologizes immediately.

“what?” you let out in surprise, your face turning red.

“it's her words, not mine!” megan continues.

“and we're leaving!” sophia smiles, but her eyes are wide with an emotion you couldn't recognize as she then drags megan back out onto the stage.

what the fuck was that. you stand there frozen for a few minutes trying to process what just happened, hearing the faint voices assumingly yelling from you being able to distinguish a few of the voices. shaking your head, you quickly finish what you were doing before going to your bag.

searching through your bag, your eyes widen when you realize something is missing.

every time you had a crush, you wrote a letter. it was the easiest way to express everything you were feeling rather than mess it up by not knowing what to say at the moment. you poured your heart out into every one you wrote, and it was only a few.

so when the letter you had in your bag is now gone, you obviously were going to freak out.

“shit, shit, shit,” you curse, pulling items out of your bag to see if it was at the bottom or in another part of it only to find it nowhere. “oh my god…” you mumble quietly.

and then, you remembered something. your best friend, danielle, had asked to look in your bag for a spare piece of paper, and you were too busy doing something else that you didn't even notice she never took paper. she probably took the letter.

grabbing your phone you call her, waiting a minute until she picks up.

“yn? what's up?”

“did you take the fucking letter?” you angrily ask quietly.

“what letter?”

“don't even right now!” you try to keep yourself from yelling, knowing that sophia and her friends were still out there. “did you take it?”

“maybe. you needed a push! i’m that push! i’ll give it to her after rehearsal. i know you signed it so it won't be weird.”

“oh my god, danielle, what the fuck?” you sigh dramatically. “this is insane!”

“no, it's me being an amazing friend and getting you a girlfriend!”

“it's not going to work! it never does!” you say, your voice getting louder without noticing.

“because you don't try! trust me, this will work.”

you didn't even respond, just hanging up instead and setting your phone down. letting out a loud sigh, you put your face in your hands.

“i’m doomed.”

-ˋˏ✄┈┈┈┈

rehearsal went well. or, you assumed it did, seeing as no one texted you saying things were going wrong. you couldn't even show up. not when you knew danielle would give sophia your note at the end of the day.

you sat at the bleachers of the field, looking at your phone with your headphones on, not paying attention to anything else around you. you tried to keep your mind off what was probably going to go down tomorrow. word will probably go around, you’ll end up rejected, and you’ll move schools as a result. you knew it was a dumb idea to write the letter in the first place, but to be fair, you were never going to give it to her! it just had to be danielle to take matters into her own hands. for your sake. little did you know just what had happened after the rehearsal, or how the day would finish.

feeling a light tap on your shoulder, you jump, turning your head and sliding your headphones off to see sophia standing there, making your heart drop to your stomach.

“oh, h-hey!” you mentally curse at yourself for stuttering right off the bat.

“you weren't at rehearsal today,” sophia says, sitting down next to you.

“yeah, i got caught up in some stuff,” you lie, looking away from her.

“not because of the letter?” she asks.

your heart is beating so fast you think you're going to pass out in a minute or the next at her question. you don't even know if you're breathing at this point. you can't even think of how to respond.

sophia hesitantly reaches her hand towards yours, gently grabbing ahold of it, causing you to slowly look at her and see the small smile on her face.

“you didn't want danielle to give it to me, did you?”

“no,” you whisper, shaking your head. “i-i didn't want you to have it anyway.”

“why?” her expression turns confused, eyebrows furrowed together.

“because i knew you wouldn't like me too,” you mumble quietly.

“you thought i don't?” sophia asks you, her eyes softening once realizing you were serious.

“i mean, yeah.” your voice gets quieter. “i thought you didn't even know i existed until this play.”

sophia hums and nods her head. “i guess i was pretty bad about it at first. but i saw how much work you put into phantom that i kept trying to get a part even if i didn't really want it. i just wanted to see you, even if i was just awkwardly staring from afar and messing up my lines multiple times,” she admits, letting out a short laugh. “i read your letter, and i thought it was really sweet. you have a way with words, y’know. and i’m glad danielle gave it to me, because it made this whole thing a lot easier. i really like you, yn.”

“what?” you accidentally say. to say you're shocked would be an understatement, because you weren't even believing the words that left sophia’s mouth. “are you serious?” you question.

“yeah,” she answers with a nod.

there's a short silence then, as you try to come up with what to say. you couldn't find any words. thankfully for you, sophia speaks up.

“can i kiss you?”

your eyes widen subtly in surprise, and you ultimately nod your head, not trusting your voice. sophia’s other hand cups your jaw as she slowly leans in before softly pressing her lips against yours. the kiss is slow, almost hesitant with both of you not wanting to push it too much, and when she pulls back, her smile is wide and she giggles at the dazed expression on your face.

“you're so cute,” she says fondly, her thumb wiping off a bit of the lip gloss that transferred from her lips to yours. “are you doing anything tonight?”

“no.” you shake your head.

“then be ready by six, and wear something nice,” she tells you, her smile widening. “i’ll be waiting outside your dorm.”

“how do you know where my dorm is?” you ask, looking at her confused.

“your roommate kazuha is my friend daniela’s girlfriend. i was told how irritated you looked when she and megan showed up this morning," sophia answers.

“oh my god.” you shake your head. “okay well, i’ll make sure to be ready.” you smile at her.

“good, cause i don't want to be waiting outside in the hallway all night.” sophia stands up, still holding onto your hand. “you don't mind if i keep the letter, do you?”

“huh?” you look up at her. “uh, no. why would you want to keep it, though?” you ask.

“like i said, it was really sweet. i want to remember it,” she answers like it was nothing. “promise you’ll meet me at six?”

“yeah, i promise.” you nod, trying to ignore her answer to your question. “as long as you don't kidnap me.”

“you think that low of me?” sophia gasps dramatically, acting hurt. “all i’m doing is taking you to a nice dinner, nothing more! unless you want to–”

“okay!” you cut her off, laughing. “i’ll be ready, i swear.”

“you better.” sophia leans down, kissing your cheek. “i’m really glad today turned out this way.”

“me too,” you respond quietly.

“i’ll see you later, pretty.” sophia smiles, pecking your lips before walking away.

watching her walk away, you let out a breath you didn't know you were holding, missing the warmth from her lips on yours and her hand holding yours. your phone buzzes in your pocket, and when you take it out you shake your head. “loser,” you mumble under your breath reading what danielle sent you.

you hated to admit it, but you were happy with how things went today, even if it wasn't how you originally planned it to be. it went better than you expected, and you were thankful for that. even if it was because your best friend stole your letter and gave it out. but you would never say that out loud.

[scoutofmymind]

Momma I request a prompt inspired by a song of your choosing (: I L Y

Couldn’t Make It Any Harder — { Luigi x Reader }

Content: mental health issues, mentions of past trauma, TorturedArtist!Reader, Empath!Luigi, Luigi says “go birds” after flipping off a woman, confused feelings, situationship, reader is just Very Confused in general, angst, eventual romance.

Wc: 5,107

I couldn't make it

Any harder to love me

Oh, one day, believe me

You’ll want someone who makes it easy

This has been floating around in my asks for awhile, and I wasn’t feeling practically inspired by any songs lately until Sabrina released Couldn’t Make It Any Harder and I couldn’t stop thinking about writing it.

This work was done quickly between my other ongoing Luigi projects, so I apologize for any inconsistencies or skipped backstory (you know I’m a backstory bitch) but I simply needed to get this out of my system, and remembered that an anon had asked me to write something based off of a song quite awhile ago!

Also, how could I leave you hanging on Valentine’s Day? Even if I’m posting this at 2 AM….

It's 8:30 AM at your usual coffee spot — that tiny café two blocks from Luigi's apartment where the barista always draws terrible attempts at latte art, and you’re still wearing yesterday's mascara, not because you've been crying, but because you spent the night in your studio, channeling your frustration into a new piece that's all sharp edges and bold strokes.

"I mean, we had a great time!" You're gesturing with your coffee cup, nearly spilling it. "We went to that new gallery opening, and he actually understood my rant about contemporary minimalism. Then dinner, drinks, great conversation — and now? Radio silence. Three days of nothing."

Luigi, sitting across from you, is trying not to smile at how animated you are, his laptop open beside him — he's probably got a Slack channel blowing up with messages from his dev team, but he rushed to meet you for this emergency coffee session, anyway.

The startup's dress code might be casual, but he always manages to look put-together in that effortless way that makes other tech bros look like they're not trying hard enough.

"Maybe I'm just-“ you pause, stirring your coffee aggressively, "too much, you know? Too loud, too passionate, too-"

"Stop," Luigi cuts in, closing his laptop and fixing his gaze on you again, "You're not too anything. You're exactly enough. So don’t even go there with me.” He massages his temples, “Too early for it.”

"I know that," you say firmly, because you do. "That's the thing — I like who I am. I like that I can talk about art for hours. I like that I get excited about things. I like that I feel everything so intensely. I'm not going to make myself smaller just because some guy can't handle it."

"Then don't," Luigi says, and there's something in his voice that makes you look up from the foam disappearing from your cappuccino. "The right person won't want you to."

"Exactly! And you know what? If Jake can't handle a woman who knows what she wants and isn't afraid to say it-“ you trail off, reaching for your sketchbook. You start absent-mindedly drawing on a corner of the page.

“Ugh,” Luigi’s face screws in mock disgust, “His name was Jake?”

Putting down your pen, you lean back in your chair with a frustrated sigh. "But then again, if I'm so great, why does this keep happening? Three first dates in two months, Lu. Three. And they all end the same way."

"You mean with guys who can't handle someone who actually has opinions?" Luigi takes a sip of his coffee, his fingers tapping absently on his closed laptop. A notification buzzes on his phone — probably his team wondering where he is — but he doesn't even glance at it.

"No, see, that's just it," you lean forward, your hands moving expressively as you talk. "They love it at first. They think it's so fascinating and refreshing that I'm 'not like other girls', or whatever." You roll your eyes at the phrase, hating the taste of the words in your mouth. "But then it's like they realize I'm actually serious. That I'm not just putting on some manic pixie dream girl act for their entertainment."

Luigi's mouth quirks up at one corner. "Heaven forbid you be a real person with actual thoughts and feelings."

"Right? And I know — I know I'm not too much," you say, but your voice wavers slightly. You start fidgeting with your rings, a habit Luigi's seen a thousand times when you're wrestling with something in your head. "But sometimes I wonder if-"

"If what?"

"If maybe I should just- you know.. tone it down? Just a little? Just at first?" The words sound wrong coming out of your mouth, and you can see from Luigi's expression that he knows it, too. "No, you're right, forget I said that. That's stupid."

"It is stupid," he agrees, but gently. His eyes catch yours across the table again, his gaze steady and genuine. "Remember that installation you did last month? The one about authenticity?"

"Yeah?"

"What did you tell that bag of bones professor who said it was 'overwhelmingly honest'?"

A smile starts to spread across your face. "I told him that was the whole damn point."

"Exactly." Luigi checks his watch and starts gathering his things — he's definitely late now. "So maybe the problem isn't that you're too overwhelming,” he pats the top of your head, slinging his bag over his shoulder, “maybe they're just underwhelming."

•

You're standing in front of your last piece, forcing a smile that feels like it's splitting your face in half, as another guest explains to you what your own art means.

Behind you, you can hear snippets of conversations that make your skin crawl.

It's a bit... aggressive, isn't it?

Not quite gallery standard... these nepo kids..

Experimental, but perhaps too experimental..

Your hands are shaking, so you clasp them behind your back. You've been doing this grim waltz for two hours — nodding, smiling, explaining yourself over and over to people who look through you rather than at you, and the gallery owner keeps shooting you these looks, these little disappointed glances that make you feel about two inches tall.

You catch Luigi's eye across the room.

He's been watching, you realize, while pretending to be deeply invested in a conversation with some tech entrepreneur who probably thinks art is a good investment opportunity, and he tilts his head slightly — a question.

You shake yours — you’re not okay.

"The brushstrokes here," the current patron is saying, pointing at your most vulnerable piece, "they're rather — well, chaotic. Unorganized. Muddy. It’s strange to see. Was that intentional?"

Something inside you splinters.

"Excuse me," you manage, your voice surprisingly steady for how the room is tunneling, how your fingers begin to tingle, how your lungs have lost the ability to draw in a full breath. "I need some air."

You make it through the gallery, past the whispers and the stares, past the owner who starts to say something about maintaining appearances, past the front desk and around the corner to the back alley.

Then your legs give out.

You're gasping, trying to remember how breathing works, your back against the cold brick wall. The dress — that stupid yellow dress that Luigi said was his favorite — feels too tight. Everything feels too tight.

You tear at your collar, needing air, needing space, needing- "Hey." Luigi's voice, close but not too close. "I'm here."

"I can't-" you choke out. "I can't breathe, I can't-"

"Yes, you can." He moves slowly into your space, hands hovering but not touching. "Look at me. Just look at me. I’m right here. It’s all good.”

You shake your head violently, sliding down the wall. "They're right. They're all right. I'm not- this- This isn't-" Each word feels like it's being ripped from your throat, bloody and raw and dishonest and horrific. They aren’t right. You know they aren’t.

"Bullshit." The sharpness in his voice makes you look up. He's crouched in front of you now, his tie completely undone, his eyes fierce. "They're not right. They're not even close to right. They're looking at fireworks and complaining about the noise. Old fuckin’ bunch’a assholes.”

A sob catches in your throat, half laugh, half cry. "That's a terrible metaphor."

"Made you look at me, though." His voice softens, his hands resting on your clammy shoulders. "Breathe with me, okay? Just breathe."

You try to match his exaggerated breathing, your hands still shaking. "I put everything into this show," you whisper after your second deep breath. "Everything."

"I know."

"And they just- they- they just-“

"I know." He shifts, sitting beside you against the wall, careful to leave space, but still your shoulders bump together. "But. Want to know what I think?"

You turn your head to look at him, makeup probably ruined, dress definitely stained from the alley ground, but you’ve already abandoned ship, you’ve waved your white flag — there’s no use in pretending you haven’t crumbled in a New York alleyway now. "What?"

"I think they're terrified of you."

That startles a real laugh out of you, “What?"

"You heard me." He's looking straight ahead, but there's something fierce in his profile. "You walked in there with your soul on full display, unapologetic and raw and real, and they don't know what to do with that. People like that, they're comfortable with art they can hang in their dining rooms and forget about.” You watch him blink, gathering the words, “Your shit doesn't let them forget. It makes them feel things they don't want to feel."

You nudge him gently, a laugh flaring your nostrils. "That's a lot better than the fireworks metaphor."

Now he does look at you, a small smile playing at his lips, his cheeks blushed crimson from the wine he’d gulped down just to make himself a bit more sociable. "Yeah, well, I've had three glasses of their overpriced wine. I'm feeling poetic."

Another laugh bubbles up, watery but real. You let your head fall against his shoulder, just for a moment. "I don't want to go back in there."

"So we won’t." He doesn't move, letting you lean on him, his head leaning atop yours. "Let's go get real drinks instead. You can tell me all the things you wanted to say to that guy who tried to explain color theory to you."

"God, he was the worst." You straighten up slowly, wiping at your eyes. "Did you see his socks?"

"I was trying not to."

•

You're standing at the open bar, counting the minutes until it's socially acceptable to leave, when Madison — a college friend you haven't seen in years, who always seemed to help herself to open bars beyond her means — sways over.

Her champagne sloshes dangerously close to your dress, but for some reason, you don’t step back.

"Oh my god, it really is you!" Her voice carries just a bit too loud, and you can feel a few heads turning in your direction. "I almost didn't recognize you without, you know-“ she gestures vaguely at all of you, that sick smile still on her blush pink lips. "All the paint and shit all over you.”

You take a long sip of your drink, hoping it would wash away the rising tide of anxiety in your core. "Good to see you too, Mads.”

"So,” She leans in conspiratorially, her breath smelling of booze and mid-tier champagne. “I heard about your gallery show last month. The one at The Maxwell? God, that must have been-“ She trails off, eyes wide with what looks like concern but feels like something else entirely.

Your hand tightens around your glass. "Must have been what?" Your lips tighten into a line, “It was an- an honor to have the opportunity.”

Words your father had always said to you growing up echo in the far depths of your mind; Honor and Integrity.

There’s a humility in it, in accepting such a nightmare as privilege.

"Well, I mean — I saw that article that was going around Instagram. About how you just up and left? In the middle of opening night?" She takes another sip of champagne, watching you over the rim with her big, stupid brown eyes. "Is that true? That you didn't even come back to collect your pieces? God, that's crazy!"

The word crazy hits like a slap, and you can still feel the panic from that night, the walls closing in as people whispered, pointed, discussed your work like it was a car crash they couldn't look away from and did nothing to aid.

"It's not exactly-"

"And after everything with Matt, and then Jason- ugh,” She shakes her head. "I mean, I get it. Using art as therapy. But maybe actual therapy would be — I dunno — you know, beneficial?”

"Madison-"

"I'm just worried about you," she continues, reaching for your arm and her fingers feel like serpents, coiling around your skin, suffocating you. "We all are. First the whole thing with your poor father — god, remember how he used to say you were just too-"

"Don't." Your voice comes out sharper than intended, your brows furrowed at her like she’d backhanded you. “Don’t you fucking say another word.”

Madison almost gasps, clutching her necklace. “See? This is what I mean. All this reactionary stuff. The anger. The intensity. Have you thought about getting help? My therapist says sometimes when we've been through things-"

The garden somehow feels too small, the fairy lights too bright, the music too loud. Across the room, Luigi is trapped in conversation with the bride's uncle, but somehow he must sense something because his eyes find yours, his head tilted at you, his usual question.

Everything okay?

This time, you look away from him.

"I’m going to leave this conversation before-“

"No, wait, listen." Madison's grip on your arm tightens, slithering, sneering, hissing. Fangs, poison. “That show — people were talking about it for weeks. How raw it was. How fucking uncomfortable it made everyone. One of the pieces — the one with all the broken mirrors? Someone said it looked like a cry for help."

You can feel your pulse in your throat. "It wasn't a fucking-“

"And then you just disappeared! Like, who does that, girl? Just leaves their own show? The curator had to pack up your pieces himself. That's what the article said. Is that true?" She may as well have a microphone beneath your trembling lips, taking on the role of some cheap reporter for a local shittalking magazine.

Of course she read the article.

Everyone read the article.

The one that called your work a disturbing glimpse into a clearly troubled mind. The one that suggested your artistic breakdown was inevitable given your history of emotional instability.

It was laughable, truly, and anyone that knew you well enough had known so much to be so very far from the truth.

"I had my reasons," you manage, but your voice sounds distant even to yourself. “I had reason for leaving the way I did.”

"Obviously you did. That's what I'm saying. Maybe if you got some help, you know, dealt with all this and found ways to properly cope-“ She waves her hand vaguely again, like swatting away a pesky fly. "Then maybe you could make art that's more you know.. accessible. Enjoyable. Less-“

"Less me?" The words come out before you can stop them. “Bullshit. You wouldn’t know, Madison. You haven’t seen a single one of my shows, haven’t shown yourself at any of my gallery openings-“ your cheeks burn red hot, your glass of wine discarded and your hands balled into fists. “You’re lucky I don’t fucking pop that smirk right off your-“

"That's not what I-"

“It is exactly what you fucking-“

“No, it’s not! Look at yourself!”

"Hey!” Luigi's voice cuts through the rising panic. He's suddenly there, solid and real. "Sorry to interrupt, but we have that thing that we have to get to-“ he loops his arm around yours, and he swears he can feel the heat radiating off of you, hot and quivering like a volcano deciding if it’s time to erupt just yet or not.

Madison blinks at him, her nostrils flared at the sudden interruption. It seems as though this is exactly the reaction she wanted, and was pissed the show had called curtains so quickly. "What thing?"

"That very important thing," Luigi says firmly, already guiding you away. "Great catching up. Green is not your color. Go Birds.” As he turns you both, he raises his middle finger behind your back — not because you needed defending, but because that's who Luigi is; all sharp edges and fierce loyalty, a guard dog with his teeth bared in your honor, though, you catch the gesture in a reflection, and something warm unfurls in your chest.

Not because you needed saving, but because he'd always take your side, no matter the circumstances. He didn’t need to know why you were barking at this girl he’d never met before — he already knew you had good reason to do it.

You make it to the venue's back garden before your legs give out, and the fairy lights blur through tears you refuse to let fall. "Did you— fuck,” Your voice shakes as you reach to wipe away the tears before they even get the chance to glide down your cheeks. "Did you actually hear what she was saying or just see it?”

"Caught the greatest hits." His jaw is tight, his hand resting on your lower back as he hunches forward, clearly concerned but approaching all of it carefully.

You can’t help but wonder then how many times you’ll find yourselves like this — Luigi rescuing you from yet another mishap, and that alone could become a new reason to feel sorry for yourself.

And him.

"The article." You wrap your arms around yourself. "She read the fucking article."

Ironically, you had originally taken the article well.

Too well, in fact.

You'd invited them all over — Luigi, Anna, Theo — for what you called A Reading of My Professional Obituary. You'd spent all day in the kitchen, channeling your grandmother's stress-cooking legacy; bouillabaisse simmering for hours, Tarte Tatin caramelizing to golden perfection.

The good wine came out, the kind you'd been saving for a real occasion.

Perched in your chair like it was a throne, wine glass dangling from your fingers, you'd performed dramatic readings of the choicest quotes. "Sources close to the artist describe a history of emotional instability," you'd intoned, affecting a pompous art critic voice that had Luigi choking on his wine. "An unsettling collection that seemed less like art and more like a cry for help.”

The evening devolved into a tipsy game of "Guess the Snitch" — everyone taking turns suggesting increasingly ridiculous candidates for the mysterious source. "It was Gabby, in the gallery, with the emotional manipulation!" Theo had declared, wielding his bouillabaisse spoon like a gavel.

But Luigi had watched you through it all — the way your hand shook slightly when pouring wine, how your laugh got a little too loud to be genuine, and how you'd spent three hours making a perfect French dessert like your life depended on proving you weren't falling apart.

"We all did." Luigi reminds you, his voice gentle but firm. "Christ, we turned it into dinner theater. Remember how Anna did that dramatic interpretation of ' the unsettling collection'?" His hand finds your knee, squeezing. "And it was shit. Not only was it shit — it was cowardly. Didn't even have the spine to name you."

You tilt your head back, using the stars as gravity's help against the tears threatening to spill. The fairy lights from the wedding garden blur into little halos. "I know, but — these people, Lu." Your voice catches, and you hate how it betrays you. "They believe it. They're all walking around thinking I'm some unhinged artist who needs to be sedated and locked away from sharp objects." A laugh escapes, but it's wet and hollow. "God, I wish I'd understood what that article would do. I wish-"

But there's no point in wishing.

The damage was done with surgical precision.

They hadn't needed to use your name — everyone knew exactly whose exhibition had opened at Maxwell Gallery on August fifteenth.

Yours.

•

The hotel room feels smaller with each passing hour.

You've mastered a careful choreography — sliding past each other in the narrow spaces, maintaining precise distances on the king bed as you both pretend to watch some mindless cooking show. But sometimes, despite your best efforts, you slip. His hand brushes yours as you both reach for the room service menu, your feet touch under the shared blanket; each accidental contact sends you recoiling like a startled cat, though you used to fall asleep during movie nights without a second thought.

When your knee accidentally bumps his as you shift position, you jerk away so violently you nearly fall off the bed.

"Okay." Luigi mutes the TV, turning to face you. "We need to talk about this."

"About what?" But you know exactly what, can feel heat creeping up your neck and it makes you want to run.

"About how we used to share my twin bed during college when you crashed at my place, but now you act like my skin is fucking toxic." His voice is gentle, but there's an undercurrent of hurt that makes your core ache. "Remember that road trip to Detroit? You slept on my chest the whole way back because the car heater was broken.“ he looks desperate, grasping at the last straws of you. “I feel like we hardly look each other in the eyes now.”

You stare hard at the geometric pattern on the duvet, picking at a loose thread. "Things were different then."

"Were they?" He shifts closer, and you fight the urge to move away. "Or are you just scared they weren't?"

You get up abruptly, needing to put physical space between you and that question, the Chicago night spreading out beyond the window, a constellation of lights blurring through unshed tears; each one feels like a witness to this moment, to your cowardice.

"You know what changed," you say finally, arms crossed tight against your chest like armor. "After Maxwell, after the article, after everything became public consumption — I can't be that person anymore.”

"Why not?" His voice is closer now — he's moved to the edge of the bed, but he doesn't approach further. Giving you space while refusing to let you run.

Very classic Luigi.

A laugh escapes you, bitter and dry. "Because now everyone's watching. Waiting for the next shoe to drop. And you-“ You turn just enough to catch his reflection in the window, superimposed over the city lights. "You're too important to me, Lu.”

"So you'd rather just — what? Keep pretending?" There's frustration in his voice now, raw and real. "We both know that's not sustainable. Not when we used to-“ He trails off, and you recall the many countless nights on his cramped couch, your head on his chest, his heartbeat your lullaby to the most restful sleep you’d ever known.

"Maybe not," you admit quietly. "But it's safer than the alternative."

"Safer for who?"

The question almost knocks you off your feet.

Because he's right — this careful distance isn't protecting him. It's protecting you. From vulnerability. From the possibility of loss. From the terrifying reality that despite everything, despite all your jagged edges and dark corners, he's still here.

Still looking at you like you're something precious instead of precarious.

The silence stretches between you, heavy with all the things you're afraid to say, all the ways you're afraid to need him, and even more terrified of the way he needs you.

Eventually, you turn from the window, facing him. "It can't be simple. I won't let it be." Your voice catches. "I push and I pull and I keep everyone at arm's length until they prove me right by leaving."

Luigi stands slowly, like he's approaching a wild animal. "You've been trying so hard to make it impossible," he says softly. "Creating distance, convincing yourself I'll give up." He takes another step closer. "But loving you has always been the easiest thing I've ever done."

"Don't." The word comes out choked, your hand pressing against his chest in hopes that he’ll back away. "Don't say that when you know how complicated — how- how difficult-"

"Difficult?" He's close enough now that you can see the flecks of gold in his eyes, stood firm but not inching any closer. "You want to talk about difficult? Try watching you date other people. Try sitting across from you at coffee shops for years and watching you cry over them. Try fucking loving you quietly through every gallery opening, every crisis,“ his brows furrow, his nostrils flare, “you don’t get to tell me what loving you is like.”

Your breath catches as he reaches for you.

"You think you're pushing me away?" His voice is barely above a whisper, his hands finally cradling your face, tears dampening your cheeks that blaze with warmth. "I've been yours since that first night you fell asleep on my shoulder during finals week. Everything since then — it's just been waiting."

You clench your jaw, your heart a wild thing against your ribs. This tightrope you and Luigi have been walking for years — this delicate balance of almost-but-not-quite, of maybe-someday-but-not-now — has finally frayed beneath your feet. All those careful steps, those perfectly maintained distances, those nights of pretending your skin didn't burn where he almost touched you.

They’ve led you here, to this hotel room in Chicago, where the fantasy of staying safely suspended between friendship and something more has finally given way to gravity.

And what, you wonder, has Luigi seen in you to make him want to dive deeper into your chaos?

He's already witnessed the 3 AM phone calls when your mind won't quiet, the obsessive cleaning episodes that leave your hands raw and your apartment sterile. He's held you through the tears that come without warning, weathered the anger that burns hot and fast like summer lightning.

You're no manic pixie dream girl — you're the real thing, messy and unpredictable, with a heart that bleeds all over everything it touches.

He's either a storm chaser or a fool, you think.

Some hopeless beast tamer who hasn't realized that some creatures aren't meant to be gentled, that some storms leave nothing but wreckage in their wake.

But that's the thing — to Luigi, you've never been a storm to weather or a beast to tame. He doesn't look at you like you're broken machinery in need of repair, doesn't treat your edges like something to be smoothed away.

Instead, he's spent years matching your pace, stepping back when you needed space, stepping forward when you needed anchor. And now, finally, the weight of all that careful patience has brought him here — raw and honest in this dim hotel room, asking you to either meet him in this space between what you are and what you could be, or lay him to rest.

"Touch me," he says, the words falling soft but heavy in the space between you. His eyes hold yours, steady and sure, "Or let me go.”

The city lights paint his silhouette in gold and shadow, and you realize you've never seen him look so vulnerable, so stripped of the careful composure he always maintains. Your Luigi laid bare — not the patient friend, not the steady shoulder, but a man who's finally reached the end of his endurance.

"What if we break?" The question slips from your lips, small and honest, carrying all the weight of your fears that kept you at such a distance all these years — shattering to pieces, left broken by the man you’d loved the most.

Luigi's eyes soften, and something like a smile — sad and sweet and knowing — tugs at the corner of his lips. "Then we break," he says simply, his thumbs swiping away the tears that slide down your cheeks. "But I'd rather that than spend the rest of my life whole and wondering."

His hands haven’t moved. Patient, steady Luigi, who has never pushed but never fully retreated, either. Who has somehow found this perfect middle ground between staying and going, between asking and waiting.

And maybe that's what finally does it — the realization that he's offering you both beginning and end in the same breath. That he's standing here saying yes to all of it; the possibility of breaking, of shattering, of ending up with nothing but deadly carnage between you.

That he knows exactly what he's asking for, and he's asking anyway.

Your hand moves before you can think yourself out of it again, crossing the space between you like a prayer finally answered. When you cup his face, the scrape of stubble against your palm is both foreign and achingly familiar — like a song you used to know by heart, now half-remembered.

His eyes flutter closed at your touch, and you feel the slight tremor in his jaw, the way he leans into your hand like he's been starving for it.

His breath catches, shaky and soft, and when he speaks, his voice is rough with emotion. "There you are," he whispers against your palm, like he's greeting someone long lost, like you've finally come home after years away. "There you are."

His lips brush your palm once more before he lifts his gaze to yours, eyes dark with something between hope and heartache. "Tell me to pull away," he whispers, voice rough. "Tell me this isn't what you want, and I'll go. I'll understand."

But his body betrays him — the slight tremor still present in his jaw under your touch, the way he's still leaning into your hand like he can't help himself. He's offering you an exit, even now. Steady, selfless Luigi, always making sure you have a way out, even when it's killing him to do so.

And that's what breaks you finally — not his touch or his words, but this endless capacity of his to put your needs first.

To stand here offering everything he has left and the chance to walk away from it.

His hand finds your waist, fingers pressing into soft flesh with just enough pressure to make your breath hitch. That small sound seems to undo something in him — his control fractures, and suddenly he's pulling you down to him with a urgency that matches your own, your hands bracing against his chest, feeling the thundering of his heart beneath your palms.

"I've thought about this," he confesses roughly, eyes locked on yours with an intensity that makes heat pool low in your stomach, his thumb tracing a burning path along your hip bone. "Having you like this.”

You can feel the tension coiled in him, the way he's still holding back despite everything. Even now, he's giving you the chance to set the pace, to decide how far this goes. But you're done with hesitation, done with the careful distance you've maintained for so long.

You lean down, letting your lips brush against his ear. "Show me," you whisper, and feel him shudder beneath you. "Show me how you wanted me."

He moves with a swiftness that steals your breath, flipping your positions in one fluid motion. Now he's the one hovering above you, his forearm braced beside your head, other hand still at your waist.

The weight of him, the heat of him so close — it makes your head spin.

"Like this," he breathes, pressing his forehead to yours. "Just like this." He holds you like you’ll run from him — just like he’s watched you run from everything before that doesn’t run from you first.

Your hands find their way to his shoulders, feeling the tension there, the way he's trembling slightly despite his strength. "I'm here," you whisper back, one hand sliding up to cup his cheek. "I'm not going anywhere."

[heliosunny]

I GOT A GENIUS IDEA about Dazai x reader!! It's inspired by my favourite novel, OUABH!

So Dazai is a forgotten prince, he's wandering around the world and is cursed. He's just waiting for someone to genuinely love him enough to break that very curse, but the curse is cruel; the moment someone loves him and confess their love for him, they will loses their memories about him!! But even though the reader forgets him, he's determined to make reader fall for him every single time.

Could you write that? I genuinely enjoy your writing!! Keep it up!

- 🐢🐢

THE 101ST TIME

The sun bled into the horizon, streaking the sky with dying embers. The world smelled of rain—fresh, clean, like something on the verge of change. You were walking along the river, the evening air cool against your skin, when you noticed him.

A lone figure leaning against the railing of a bridge.

At first, you thought nothing of him. Just another passerby lost in thought, watching the ripples dance across the water.

Then he turned.

And for a fleeting moment, something in his eyes—grief-stricken—made your breath catch.

It wasn’t the way he looked at you.

It was the way he looked at you like he had already lost you.

You hesitated. Some part of you whispered that you should leave, that speaking to him would change something. But your feet betrayed you, your curiosity outweighing reason.

And so, the 101st story began.

“You’re staring” he mused, tilting his head as a slow smile curved his lips. It was the kind of smile that felt practiced—like someone who had spent years learning how to hide behind it.

“I—” You faltered, shifting awkwardly. “Sorry. You just… look familiar.”

Something in his posture changed, his grip on the railing tightening just slightly.

And then, his smile softened. “Do I?”

You nodded, brows knitting together. “Have we met before?”

Dazai exhaled a quiet laugh. “You could say that.”

There was something off about him. He spoke like he knew you, like he was waiting for you to realize something that your mind couldn’t quite grasp. It sent a strange, hollow ache through your chest.

“Do you… live around here?” you asked carefully.

“No,” he answered. “But I always come back.”

He was watching you too closely now, his gaze searching, waiting. For what, you didn’t know.

This isn’t the first time.

You swallowed. “Well, it’s nice to meet you… again, I guess.”

He didn’t respond right away. Instead, he reached into his coat pocket, pulling out a single, delicate object.

A silver locket.

Its surface was scratched and weathered, as if it had been carried for years. Carefully, he held it out to you.

“This belongs to you.”

The moment your eyes landed on it, your chest constricted—like an invisible thread had pulled tight around your ribs.

You didn’t know why.

You had never seen this locket before.

…Had you?

Your hands trembled as you reached for it, fingers brushing against the cool metal.

A sharp, searing pain split through your skull. The world tilted, your vision warping. For a moment—just a single heartbeat—your mind was flooded with something else.

Rain. A dark alley. A promise whispered against your lips.

"Say it again."

"I love you."

And then—

Emptiness.

Your knees buckled.

You gasped, inhaling sharply as your mind reeled, your heart pounding like a war drum against your ribs. Your fingers twitched around the locket, the image of the memory—if that’s what it was—slipping through your grasp like water.

Gone.

You blinked.

The world was normal again. The street, the river, the man in front of you.

…Who?

You glanced down at your hand. A silver locket rested in your palm, its surface gleaming under the dim glow of the streetlights.

Something cold curled around your spine.

Why were you holding this?

Where had it come from?

You looked up, confused. “I—”

But the moment your eyes met his, the words died in your throat.

Because the man in front of you—whoever he was—Was smiling.

Soft. Pained. Resigned.

Like someone watching a tragedy unfold for the hundredth time.

The silence stretched between you.

Your fingers curled around the locket, gripping it tight. “Who are you?”

Dazai exhaled a quiet laugh, but it wasn’t amused. It was empty.

“I was hoping you’d remember” he murmured.

He stepped onto the railing of the bridge.

Your breath caught. “Hey—!”

The streetlights flickered, the river below swallowing the last of the sunset’s glow. Wind ruffled his coat as he balanced effortlessly, staring down at the water as if it were calling him home.

Like he had done this before.

Your pulse pounded in your ears. “Get down.”

Dazai hummed, tilting his head. “Why?”

“Because you’ll—”

Your words caught in your throat.

Because, suddenly, you knew—

He wanted this.

He wasn’t looking down at the water in fear. There was no hesitation, no uncertainty in his stance.

A sharp pang of fear shot through you.

You didn’t know this man.

And yet, the thought of watching him fall, of watching him disappear beneath the surface—

It terrified you.

The instinct came before the logic. Before the hesitation. Before you could think.

Dazai took a step forward—

And you lunged after him.

Air rushed past you, cold and biting, tearing at your skin. The distant sound of the city blurred, replaced by the deafening roar of the wind.

And in front of you—just inches away—

Dazai

His eyes widened, not in fear, but in shock.

Like he hadn’t expected you to jump.

Like you had shattered something he thought was inevitable.

In a blink, his arms were around you. The air crushed between you as his grip tightened, pulling you against his chest, twisting midair.

The river swallowed you both whole.

The cold was instant. A shockwave of ice against your skin, stealing the breath from your lungs. Darkness wrapped around you, water pressing against your chest, your ears, muffling the world.

Panic clawed at your ribs. Your limbs kicked instinctively, fighting against the weight of the river pulling you under. The surface was too far. Your chest burned, screaming for air—

A hand found yours.

And then—he was pulling you up.

You broke the surface with a gasp, coughing, choking, dragging in deep, desperate breaths. Rain pelted against your skin, the city lights above distorted through waterlogged lashes.

And beside you—Dazai.

He was still holding you. His chest rising and falling with heavy breaths, soaked hair clinging to his forehead. His grip was tight—too tight—his fingers digging into your wrist as if he were afraid that you would sink instead.

A shuddering breath left him.

And then he laughed.

“You jumped.”

You coughed, still struggling to keep yourself afloat. “You idiot—! What the hell were you thinking?”

Dazai’s gaze flickered, searching your face with something unreadable. “You always jump.

Water lapped against your chin, your body trembling from the cold. “What?”

His expression shifted—just barely.

Like he had said something he shouldn’t have.

Like he had forgotten this was your first time.

(Your first time. His 101st.)

“…Nothing.”

“What do you mean, I always jump?”

“You don’t remember”

“Remember what?”

“…Me.”

The cold suddenly felt unbearable.

You didn’t know why.

Didn’t know how.

But you knew.

Somewhere, in a place just out of reach,

You had met him before.

You took him in.

You didn’t think much about it at first, just that he had nowhere to go, that he was soaked to the bone, trembling from the cold. That his lips were tinged blue, and his hands were too light when they clutched yours, as if he wouldn’t mind slipping away.

You told yourself it was temporary.

But days passed.

And Dazai stayed.

The first few nights, he barely spoke.

You gave him dry clothes, wrapped him in a blanket, and forced him to drink something warm. He let you, silent and compliant, but there was something distant in his gaze—like a man sitting at the bottom of the ocean, watching the world through glass.

You were in the kitchen when it happened.

It had been a rare moment of peace—you’d just finished making tea, the scent of jasmine filling the air, when a feeling struck you.

You ran.

And when you found him, Dazai sat on the floor, his back against the wall, sleeves rolled up. A blade pressed against his skin, a thin, delicate line of red blooming just beneath it.

When he looked up at you, his eyes were soft.

Like he was caught.

Like he already knew what would happen next.

“…Ah,” he murmured, tilting his head. “You found me.”

You didn’t even realize you were moving until your fingers closed around his wrist, yanking the blade away with more force than necessary.

“What the hell are you doing?” Your voice was shaking.

“You’re shaking.”

You hadn’t noticed.

Your hands, gripping his wrist, were trembling.

“Dazai,” you choked out. “Why—”

“Because it doesn’t matter,” he said simply.

“It matters to me!”

The words came out louder than you intended, echoing off the walls, bouncing back at you. The silence that followed was thick.

His lips parted slightly, as if he wanted to say something—

But then, instead, he laughed.

Not the soft, empty chuckle from before.

A real, genuine laugh.

“…That’s new” he murmured, his gaze locked onto you.

Slowly, carefully, you reached down and picked up the blade. Then, without a word, you walked to the other side of the room and threw it—hard—into the trash.

Dazai hummed. “So dramatic.”

“I’m serious” you said, turning back to him.

His gaze softened, but there was something sad in it.

“I know,” he said quietly.

You swallowed, trying to steady yourself. Then, in a voice barely above a whisper:

“…Promise me you won’t do that again.”

Dazai didn’t respond immediately.

“…I can’t.”

“Dazai.”

“I’ll just have to make sure you never look away” he mused, almost to himself.

If that’s what it meant to keep him here, to keep him alive—

Then you’d never look away again.

The Next Few Weeks

You started watching him more closely.

If you left the room for too long, he’d wander.

If you got too quiet, he’d get this look in his eyes—like he was slipping away, somewhere far, far away.

You had to anchor him.

So you talked to him more. Touched him more.

Small things—your fingers brushing his when you handed him tea, fixing his scarf before he went outside, pressing the back of your hand against his forehead when he looked tired.

And every time, his eyes would linger.

His body would go still.

Like he was memorizing the feeling.

Like he was afraid to forget.

But it wasn’t enough.

Because sometimes—when you turned around too fast, when you left him alone for just a second too long

You’d find him staring at his wrists.

Or at the balcony.

Or at the bottle of pills he had found in the bathroom cabinet.

And you realized—

It wasn’t enough to care for him.

You had to make sure he wanted to stay.

---

The first time you suggested it, Dazai just blinked at you.

“You want to do what?”

You crossed your arms. “Clean you up.”

His eyes flickered with amusement. “I think I’m rather charming like this, don’t you?”

You stared at him.

His hair was a mess, curling wildly in every direction, dried unevenly from the last time he bothered washing it. The bandages on his arms were sloppily wrapped, loose at the edges like he didn’t care if they unraveled. His shirt was wrinkled beyond repair, his coat barely hanging onto his frame.

If it weren’t for the sharp structure of his face, the deep warmth of his brown eyes, and the natural elegance he carried even in self-destruction, he would’ve looked completely pitiful.

You sighed, rubbing your temples. “Dazai.”

He tilted his head, smiling as if you were the one being ridiculous.

“Why?” he mused, resting his chin on his hand. “Are you trying to make me beautiful, my dear?”

You raised an eyebrow. “You already are.”

That caught him off guard.

“You’re too kind.”

You rolled your eyes. “I just don’t want to live with a stray cat who refuses to groom himself.”

Dazai gasped, pressing a hand to his chest. “How cruel.”

“Sit down.” You grabbed a comb. “I’m fixing your hair.”

Dazai sighed dramatically but obeyed, flopping onto the couch like he was preparing to be pampered.

At first, he fidgeted.

When you ran the comb through his hair, his shoulders tensed—like he wasn’t used to being touched like this, like he thought you were going to hurt him.

You were gentle.

Slowly, the knots disappeared, the wild curls softened into something silky, smooth.

When you ran your fingers through it, testing the strands—Dazai stopped breathing.

“…You’re being careful” he murmured.

You hummed. “Of course.”

He didn’t reply.

But you saw the way his fingers curled against his palm.

Like he didn’t know how to handle this.

Like he wasn’t used to someone taking care of him just because they wanted to.

You wrapped his bandages properly.

Instead of the haphazard way he did it himself—messy, careless, like it didn’t matter—you took your time. Pressed the gauze gently against his skin, smoothed the fabric down with steady hands.

And when you were done, his fingers brushed over your work.

“…Neat,” he murmured.

You smirked. “See? You could look good all the time if you tried.”

Dazai chuckled. “Ah, but where’s the fun in that?”

You flicked his forehead. “Shut up and change into something clean.”

When you finished, you dragged him to the mirror.

Dazai blinked.

For the first time in who knew how long.

“…Ah,” he mused, tilting his head. “I almost look like a prince.”

Something ached in your chest.

You swallowed. “You are one.”

Dazai stilled.

Your reflection met his in the glass, and for a moment—just a moment—he looked like he wanted to say something.

But then, instead, he turned to you.

“…You really are dangerous” he murmured.

You frowned. “What?”

His hand lifted—fingertips brushing against your cheek.

“…You always make me want to stay.”

---

The night air was crisp, carrying the scent of blooming jasmine. Streetlights flickered in golden pools along the cobblestone path, the world around you quiet except for the faint sound of footsteps—yours and Dazai’s.

It wasn’t your first time going out together.

Somewhere along the way, your relationship had shifted from caretaker and reckless wanderer to something softer. Something closer.

Dazai had stopped flinching when you touched him. He had stopped looking for ways to disappear every time you turned your back. He still carried his darkness—still held the weight of a forgotten prince who had wandered for far too long—but he stayed. For you.

And tonight, for the first time, you had dragged him out for a proper date.

“Ah, how romantic” Dazai mused, glancing at you with a playful glint in his eyes. “A moonlit walk with my beloved.”

You rolled your eyes. “You’re the one who insisted .”

“Only because it would be tragic if something happened to you,” he said, placing a hand on his chest dramatically. “What kind of gentleman would I be if I let my dear forgetful darling wander alone?”

The word forgetful sent a familiar pang through your chest.

He was always thinking about it.

No matter how happy he seemed, no matter how much closer you had grown—Dazai never forgot the curse. And tonight…It would finally break.

You felt the weight of it pressing against your ribs, the moment drawing closer with every step.

This was the 101st time.

The last time.

If the curse worked like it always had, by the end of tonight, you wouldn’t remember him.

Dazai had told himself he was prepared.

That if it happened again, he would simply make you fall for him once more.

Like he always did.

Like he always would.

But tonight, something in his eyes was haunted.

Like he wasn’t sure he could handle it this time.

Like he was afraid this was the last time he’d ever get to hold your hand like this, walk beside you like this, hear you say his name like this—

And you—you let him believe it.

Because when the moment came—when the words finally left your lips—

I love you, Dazai.

You saw it happen—the flicker of realization, the way his breath caught in his throat, the way his fingers curled into fists at his sides.

And then—

The fear.

The horror that seeped into his gaze, the silent, desperate panic as he waited for you to forget.

The second stretched, agonizing.

Dazai’s voice was barely above a whisper.

“…Say my name again.”

You blinked. “…Dazai?”

His entire body trembled.

His fingers twitched—like he wanted to grab you, to shake you, to make sure this was real.

“You still—” He swallowed. “You still remember?”

You tilted your head, feigning confusion. “Who are you again?”

Something broke in his expression.

Dazai stumbled back a step, like you had struck him, like the weight of losing you again had finally crushed him for good.

For the first time, he looked truly lost.

“…Ah,” he murmured.

His voice was too soft.

Too empty.

“Of course.”

He smiled, but it was a dead, hollow thing.

“I suppose even after a hundred times, I never learned how to say goodbye properly.”

His hands curled into fists.

He took another step back, as if preparing to leave.

And that’s when you dropped the act.

You grabbed his wrist, pulling him back before he could disappear.

“I’m kidding, you idiot.”

His breath hitched, his entire body going still beneath your grip.

And then, slowly, he turned to you.

You smiled.

“I remember everything, Dazai.”

The silence was deafening.

He just stared.

Then—his lips parted.

A sound escaped him, somewhere between a gasp and a laugh.

“—hah.”

A choked, shaking breath.

Then another.

And then, suddenly, his arms were around you—tight, desperate, real.

He was trembling.

Burying his face in your shoulder, clutching you like he was afraid you’d vanish.

“You—” His voice cracked. “You remember.”

His entire body pressed against yours, warm and solid and alive.

And for the first time in so, so long—

He wasn’t alone.

You exhaled, wrapping your arms around him just as tight.

“I remember, Dazai.”

And this time, I won’t forget.

[pastlivesxpastlie]

Get Below Me vol 3 🖤

you and everyone’s baby boy, simp!roommate!Vessel spend some quality time on his bed after making out in the living room. and whatever you have saved to your phone DEFINITELY has his attention

simp!roommate!Vessel x virgin!fem!reader

Head’s up: consent checks, watching porn together, teasing, reader finally asks for what she wants, someone else finally strokes vessel’s cock other than himself

A/N: what will be finished first this weekend? The actual smut chapter or my sourdough?

🎀taglist: @lifemod17 @glitterghost @inv3ga @adenobabe @jeriiicho @milk--bones @myaudiocommentary @horsebiologist @intake-of-breath @fruitsandcheese @0hg00dgirl @goosepond69 @friendly-neighborhood-ghoul @lynzeequitlollygagging @thatxxjiyong-ssi @cloudy-soul @daddysaidbringthethunder @evisnotok @cheomain @chaosandchaos @sage-m-sepia @dreamer-lost-in-wonderland

You sat between Vessel’s legs on his bed, your hand shaking softly as you unlock your phone. His wide hands stroked your tummy as he placed little kisses behind your ear. “It’s ok to be shy.”

“I know…” you sigh. “But I’ve never…shown anyone what I’m into.”

Vessel chuckles softly, his breath tickling your neck. “And like I said, love, we can just talk…”

You start scrolling and breathing a little heavier. Obviously you’re turned on from making out with Ves but now you’re showing him your secret little “Fun Time” folder and it’s having a Pavlovian effect on you. “If I try to talk about it, I’ll start giggling again.”

But Vessel doesn’t respond, at least verbally. His cock throbbed against your lower back. You had already begun mindlessly scrolling through your folder, not realizing his eyes were glued to the screen. “That’s what you want, sweetheart,” he asks as you hover for a moment over a clip showing a girl getting bent over and playfully spanked by…whoever this guy was. But Ves did notice the man was quite tall and slender, not too dissimilar from him. Even in the next clip, which was just the close up of a guy fingering his very receptive, squirmy plaything, Vessel noticed how wide the man’s hands were. Spidery. Like his. “What excited you first…boys with big hands or just ones that look like me? Hmm?” He’s so turned on just knowing you get off to these videos but the idea that you could have saved them because the guys look like HIM…he could cum just from grinding against your lower back right now.

“Uhm,” you lay your head back on his shoulder, “hard to say I guess but…I can say for certain you’re my type. Definitely my type.”

“Hmm. Interesting…” he whispers as his breath catches. The next clip shows a girl with a body like yours getting folded in half and eaten out. The man in this one isn’t quite enough like Vessel for his liking before he remembers he has the real thing tucked up against him ready to eat out of his hand. “Such a shy little thing. I’ve been here the whole time,” he coos and tickles your sides. You toss your phone down and start giggling again. Giggling so hard your lungs feel like they’re on fire.

“Ves, that’s not fair!”

He finally stops and holds you close against him like a teddy bear. You both breathe heavily between small laughs. Vessel’s hand gently brushes your cheek, encouraging you to look back at him. When you do, your lips meet in soft little kisses. He leaves you breathless ever…single…time. “Y’have to remember, darling. You’re in control. It’s your night. Tell me what you want and I’ll do it in a heartbeat.” Vessel breathes heavily against your lips and moans softly. “And…if it’s too much or you don’t want something stop me. Please…”

“Can I suck you off?”

Vessel’s face heats up. “You up for that…?”

You’re already on your knees by the bed, gazing up at him. “I’m a visual learner,” you chuckle. You’re trying to be carefree and sexy but you’re so nervous. You want to do good for him…to make him happy. Make him cum the way you’ve imagined you could.

Ves sits on the edge of the bed in front of you and undoes his pants. “That’s so naughty, babe. You like watching your little videos, huh? Imagining that’s us?” He tsks and chuckles softly as he watches your mouth drop open and your eyes soften a little. “What’s the matter,” he teases. He drags his hand up the underside of his cock, letting your eyes trail from his heavy balls up to where his fingers now delicately rub at his leaking head.

“I’ve never…” you steel your nerves and come closer. You gingerly put out your hand touch Vessel’s cock. The warmth and weight of it in your fist causes a thick heat to spread from your pussy up to your stomach. This was so totally different from feeling him up over his pants. “This…this is so fucking cool.” As your hand moves up you take in Vessel’s reaction.

“Oh…sweetheart…” he bites his lip and grins as you stroke him. “You have no idea what you’re doing to me.”

You’re so lost in this new experience that you just want to experiment and see what you can do. Vessel is like a new, perfect toy.

[alexusonfire]

She Blossoms in the Night

Patti!Fosca x Fem!Reader

Happy Valentines Day everyone, have a little sweet treat 🖤 Requested by @kittenpielove , mostly fluff, with a HINT of angst if you squint

She’d captured my attention from the moment I first saw her.

A pale, fragile thing, with dark hair that hung in long strands down her back. Her walk was hunched and hobbled, like the pain in her joints was almost too much for her to bear. Clothed in layers, despite the lingering summer heat, her swaying skirts could be heard down the long halls, warning of her impending arrival. Older than I, perhaps exaggerated by illness, with such sullen eyes they drew instant pity. 

I’d heard of the Colonel’s sickly cousin from my brother’s letters; “a ghost” is how he described her. Gaunt and haunting, her wails of pain were often heard long into the night. The men avoided her as best they could, on constant alert for the sway and howls; they’d even go so far as to completely ignore her at dinner, hooting and hollering around her as she sat in her own melancholy. 

Upon finally meeting Senora Fosca, I could not fathom what he’d been writing about; in all my years, I’d never found someone quite so alluring.

Our first real exchange was in the greenhouse, which I would later learn Fosca tended to herself. I’d only meant to take a short walk, something to clear my thoughts lest I be left tossing and turning. As I ambled between rows of gardenias and petunias, their scent wafting pleasantly in the air, her sudden presence in the doorway startled me. Loud as she could be in her throes, silence came just as easily to her. 

A ghost, wicked and cursed, the men would have whispered, the way she was half-hidden by shadow.

Yet I’d never seen her so beautiful.

“I did not mean to frighten you.”

I asked her to sit with me, mostly for my own selfish reasons. I could not stop admiring the way the moonlight reflected those dark strands of hair, once so dull and bland now seeming vibrant. Her skin shone, eyes sparkled; she so often hid from the sun, its rays flushing her unpleasantly, but here, in the cool glow of the moon, she flourished. I wanted to keep her here forever, if only so that I might look upon her wistful beauty as often as I pleased.

Our conversation flowed easily, lengthening well into the night. She remained firmly rooted in reality, her reality, refusing to spin pretty tales of love and fantasy. I encouraged her to speak of the small pleasantries she had, such as her piano that she often played, or the novels that lined the walls of the quarters. When she finally bestowed me with a small smile, it felt as though the sun had finally burst through the clouds on a cold, rainy day. I knew, from that very briefest of moments, that she’d captured something within me.

__

I began to ask after her, to her cousin and the Doctor, sometimes even being so bold as to knock on her door when the light barely clung to the corners of her shadowy bedroom. I longed to see her lit by the moon time and time again, so deeply it was like an ache welling in my chest. Much to my initial surprise, she never objected to my visiting, and soon began to ask after me as well. We now spent our days together, reading, gardening, or she teaching me the notes of her piano. Sometimes we would speak, other times simply be near one another. Her cousin was so pleased to see that Fosca had finally found a friend, and the doctor attributed the color she had gained in her hollow cheeks to our closeness.

As time went on, I became more and more infatuated. I took it upon myself to care for her when the doctor could not, even going so far as to share her bed when her mental state did not allow my departure. We clung to each other, more than would normally be found appropriate, but as the men were busy with their own tasks and truthfully, they were simply glad to have Fosca out of their hair, no one said a word against it.

I couldn't be more pleased with their lack of attention. I adored having her all to myself, my sweet, sad little mourning dove. Her cold hand in mine brought me a sense of belonging I hadn’t experienced in years, and one evening as we lay curled into one another, she told me much the same.

We snuck away to the ruined castle for our first kiss. Ever conscious of her declined physical state, I waited for a day she seemed brighter, lighter, more sure of herself on her feet. When the light fell and darkness rose, I gathered her and an oil lamp up, then headed down the rocky path. She held tightly to me, her boned fingers digging into the cotton of my sleeve. Her gentle voice guided me through the winding vines and crumbled stone, leading us to the overgrown courtyard gardens. She’d spoken of this place often, with such reverence. Her entire body filled with it now, her spine straightening and shoulders relaxing. When her lips tipped upwards, I could bear it no longer. I pulled her flush to me, we sharing a small moment of longing between us before her mouth melded to mine. We fit perfectly together, as though we were always meant to be connected in this way. With the moon as our witness, we claimed each other for our own, swearing our love and our lives to one another for as long as hers would allow.

–-

Ten years we shared, filled with more love and joy than either of us had ever hoped for. Though the true extent of our affections remained behind closed doors and hidden corners, we often found peace in the greenhouse while the world slept. Even when her legs weakened to needing a cane, she held my arm for support as I sat her amongst the flowers, she curling into me as we wiled away the hours discussing life and our menial day-to-day.

I lay those same flowers on her grave, as she requested of me, and took care in their upkeep every week. I would sit with her in the evenings, that block of marble shining as she did under the moon, and tell her of my life without her, how I missed her, and couldn’t wait to see her again.

My ghost. My mourning dove. My Moonflower.

My sweet Fosca.

[floraisunwell]

Invisible string | s.r

who: spencer reid x fem!reader

category: fluff (??)

summary: you've always loved reading at your spot in the park, getting lost in books and daydreams. what you didn't realize was that someone had been noticing you all along

lyric prompt: “green was the color of the grass where I used to read at Centennial Park, I used to think I would meet somebody there/ time, curious time, gave me no compass, gave me no signs. Were there clues I didn’t see? and isn’t it just so pretty to think, all along there was some invisible string tying you to me?” Invisible string, t.s

word count: 1.1k

a/n: my entry to @mggslover 1k event, congratulations once again darling

t.w: none

divider by @esote-rika

The park had always been your favorite place in the whole city—a patch of green and calm right in the middle of the metropolis' restless buzz. Exactly what you needed after a long day. Alone, but surrounded by people; that weird in-between your introverted personality had always loved.

Beneath your favorite tree, you'd lay out a towel, open a book, and let yourself slip away. Between the pages, you'd been a poet, a painter, an elderly woman reminiscing on her youth—someone's lover, even.

And sometimes, in the spaces between sentences, you'd let yourself dream. You'd imagine meeting someone, falling stupidly, hopelessly in love—just like in your favorite romances.

You knew it was silly, highly unlikely, but the thought alone was enough to make you smile. Enough to fill you with a quiet kind of hope.

And then, as if crafted by destiny, you did meet someone.

☆

Near-Miss #1: The Coffee Shop

The first time Spencer saw you, it wasn’t at the park. It was at a coffee shop, long before he ever noticed you beneath that tree. He hadn’t even been paying attention at first, too busy watching the barista prepare his drink. But then he saw you—leaning against the counter, absently tracing circles on its surface while periodically checking your watch. Something so ordinary, so insignificant, yet he couldn’t look away. He thought about getting closer, maybe striking up a conversation. But by the time he worked up the nerve, you were already walking out the door.

☆

Lucas was a lovely guy. You met on a rainy day—"Mind if I help?" he had said, noticing how you were struggling to juggle your things and an umbrella at the same time. He ended up with your number, and soon, the tree that used to be your spot became your shared spot.

☆

Near-Miss #2: the train ride

A familiar giggle caught Spencer’s attention. He looked up and saw you.

Curled up by the window, book in hand—as always. He watched as you absentmindedly twirled your hair, scribbled something in the margins of your book, let out the occasional quiet laugh. It was just like all the other times he’d seen you, and yet, he was still mesmerized.

The thought of approaching you crossed his mind. Maybe he could finally say something, maybe this time—

The train jolted to a stop. You stood, tucked your book under your arm, and stepped off the train before he could find the words.

☆

Picnics, reading sessions, coffee breaks, cloud-watching—beautiful moments. But now it was Valentine’s, and you were alone at your spot. Turns out Lucas wasn't the one after all.

For the first time, you sat under the tree alone, thinking about all the little moments that, maybe, had been clues.

The way he never understood your love for books. The fact that he never got your bakery order right—"It’s too complex, and you know that, babe." You’d chuckle, brush it off, but it unsettled you.

You knew it was dramatic. Of course, he wouldn’t be like the men in your books. He was good enough. But something was missing.

A sickly kind of romance filled the air—people of all ages showing their love for each other. You were sure you’d witnessed a failed proposal a few minutes ago. Amid all this love (and some heartbreak), you felt invisible.

But maybe you weren’t.

☆

Near-Miss #3: the collision (and almost first conversation)

Spencer had walked past you countless times. A hundred, maybe more. But one time, he almost spoke to you.

You were heading in opposite directions. You looked hurried, eyes glued to your book even as you walked. He was distracted too, skimming a page of his own. And for a moment, just a split second, you almost collided.

At the last second, both of you stepped aside. Hushed apologies, barely more than whispers, before you kept walking.

He took a few more steps before his brain finally caught up and registered who you were. He stopped in his tracks, only to turn around just in time to see you disappear into the crowd.

He cursed himself for losing another opportunity.

☆

Spencer loved the park, too.

He came to play chess, to read, to watch people—not in a creepy way, just something he enjoyed. You had always been one of his favorites to watch.

He loved how you’d giggle at a line in your book and then glance around to see if anyone had noticed. How you’d twirl your hair when you were deep in thought. How you looked so utterly lost in your stories, as if the world around you didn’t exist.

☆

But now, it was Valentine’s, and the young man who usually accompanied you was nowhere to be seen.

His chance.

"Can I sit here?" His voice startled you. You looked up to see a tall, slender man watching you.

"Uh... sure," you replied, still a little confused.

"Why are you alone?" Fuck. That probably sounded weird.

You huffed a small laugh. "Well, not anymore." He smiled at that, a little softer now.

"I'm Spencer, by the way."

"Nice to meet you, Spencer. I guess now you're my partner for the day."

"I guess," he echoed, his smile was so wide it could seem fake

☆

After a few moments of comfortable silence, Spencer looked at your book and said "You were reading a book by the same author on the train a few months ago"

"Was I really?" you blinked

"You were," he affirmed "I was in the seat across from you. We sat across each other many times in fact"

"I guess we were bound to meet sometime then" you mused meeting his gaze

"Yeah," he mumbled with a smile"Something like that"

thank you for reading!

[saebyeokbliss]

JUST MEET ME AT THE APT.— K. SAE-BYEOK

CHAPTER NINE

synopsis: managing a rising rock band is already chaotic enough, but when you're stuck touring with four reckless musicians, things get even messier. between late-night facetime calls, teasing that feels a little too knowing, and a certain guitarist who might just be your biggest problem, keeping things professional is getting harder by the second. but hey, no one said the music industry was easy.

warnings: mutual pining, intense eye contact, teasing that borders on flirting (or maybe it is flirting), friends who refuse to mind their business, secondhand embarrassment, slow burn that burns, emotional whiplash, online scandals

playlist: spotify

It started with a tweet.

A blurry, low-quality video posted by some fan who had managed to sneak backstage. The caption was cryptic but damning:

"WTF did Jisoo do to make Kang Sae-Byeok this mad???"

And underneath it—

A video of Sae-Byeok pinning Jisoo against the wall.

The audio was grainy, muffled by the distance and the hum of post-show chaos, but some words were crystal-clear.

"I don’t want to see you near her or the girls ever again."

"You don’t get to come in here and make her feel like nothing."

The internet exploded.

At first, there was confusion. Speculation. Wild theories about why HOT DIVISION’s lead guitarist was this close to throwing hands with an influencer-turned-socialite like Jisoo.

Then came the sides.

Some people immediately took Sae-Byeok’s, praising her for standing up for whoever she was talking about. Others rushed to defend Jisoo, twisting the narrative into something uglier—something about how aggressive Sae-Byeok had looked, how scary her temper seemed, how it was��unprofessional for an artist of her status to act like that.

And then, of course, the worst theory took hold.

That it was about you.

Screenshots of old photos resurfaced—pictures of you with the band, of you standing next to Sae-Byeok at award shows, of you in the background of HOT DIVISION’s biggest moments. Someone even found a picture from that night, showing you leaving the backstage area just moments before the video took place.

And suddenly, you weren’t just the band’s manager anymore.

You were the reason for the fight.

The narrative twisted: Sae-Byeok was in love with you. Jisoo had done something to you. You were caught in the middle of some messy, behind-the-scenes drama that no one was supposed to know about.

It spiraled fast.

By the next morning, articles were being written. Think pieces dissecting Sae-Byeok’s reputation, questioning her professionalism, debating whether or not HOT DIVISION’s label would make a statement.

And through it all—

You stayed quiet.

Because you knew exactly how this worked.

Scandals like this didn’t just pass. They grew until someone stopped them.

And that someone had to be you.

You found Jisoo before anyone else did.

She had been avoiding the internet, dodging calls, probably waiting for it all to blow over before she made her next move. But you weren’t going to give her that luxury.

You cornered her in the back of a café, where she had been sipping an overpriced latte like her name wasn’t being dragged online.

She barely had time to react before you sat down across from her, fixing her with a look that made it clear you weren’t here to play games.

"Fix it," you said, voice steady.

Jisoo blinked. "Excuse me?"

You leaned forward. "You fix it. You clear it up. You tell everyone exactly what the fuck happened before this gets worse."

She scoffed, setting her cup down. "I don’t owe anyone anything."

Your patience snapped. "Are you serious? You owe Sae-Byeok everything right now. Because you’re sitting here, drinking your stupid fucking latte, while she’s getting torn apart for something that wasn’t even her fault."

Jisoo frowned, finally looking uncomfortable. "I didn’t mean for any of this to happen."

"But it did," you said sharply. "And I’m not letting you be the coward who lets her take the fall for it."

A beat of silence.

Jisoo looked away, jaw tightening. "I didn’t think she actually cared that much."

You exhaled through your nose, forcing yourself to stay calm. "That’s the problem. You never thought about what you were doing. You never thought about how it made me feel—how it made her feel."

She swallowed. "I just… I didn’t think I was doing anything wrong."

You shook your head. "Exactly."

Jisoo sighed, rubbing a hand down her face. "So what do you want me to do?"

"Tell the fucking truth," you said. "Make a statement. A video. A post. I don’t care. Just fix it."

She hesitated.

Then, finally, she pulled out her phone.

And for the first time since this entire mess started—

She actually did something right.

Jisoo’s video went up within the hour.

It wasn’t perfect. It wasn’t some grand, emotional apology.

But it was enough.

She admitted that she had been careless, that she hadn’t realized how much she was excluding you, that she had walked into HOT DIVISION’s space without thinking about how it might have made you feel.

And most importantly—

She cleared Sae-Byeok’s name.

She explained that the argument wasn’t about anything romantic, that there was no secret drama or jealousy, that Sae-Byeok had only been angry because she had stood up for you.

The backlash didn’t disappear overnight. But it shifted.

Now, instead of attacking Sae-Byeok, people were applauding her.

And you— You finally let yourself breathe. But the damage had already been done.

And you weren’t sure if things could ever go back to the way they were before.

Dinner was quieter than usual.

Not because there was tension—no, after everything that had happened, the tension had finally cracked, leaving something raw and unspoken between all of you.

The girls had chosen a small restaurant, tucked away from prying eyes and the chaos of the internet, somewhere they could just be without worrying about cameras or fans or another scandal brewing.

And tonight, for the first time in a long time, they weren’t just HOT DIVISION.

They were just friends trying to make things right.

Ji-Yeong was the first to break the silence, setting her chopsticks down. "Alright, let’s just say it."

Se-Mi exhaled. "Yeah, we fucked up."

No-Eul nodded. "Big time."

Sae-Byeok, sitting across from you, was unusually quiet, arms crossed, her gaze flickering between you and the others.

Ji-Yeong leaned forward. "Look, we got caught up in our own shit, and we didn’t notice how much we were leaving you out. That’s on us. Completely on us."

Se-Mi sighed. "We should’ve realized sooner. We should’ve—" She hesitated, then met your eyes. "We should’ve been better friends to you."

You swallowed, feeling the weight of their words, the sincerity behind them.

And then No-Eul, ever direct, said, "We’re sorry."

Your chest tightened, but this time, it wasn’t from pain.

It was relief.

You let out a small, shaky breath, nodding. "Thank you."

Ji-Yeong gave you a hesitant smile. "Does this mean you forgive us?"

You huffed a quiet laugh. "I mean… yeah. But you guys owe me. Big time."

Se-Mi grinned. "Obviously. We’ll buy you so much coffee to make up for it."

No-Eul smirked. "Or we could just kick Jisoo’s ass next time we see her."

That made you laugh—really laugh, for the first time in days.

And just like that, things started to feel okay again.

After dinner, you stepped outside for some air.

The night was cool, the city lights flickering in the distance, and for the first time in what felt like forever, you actually felt lighter.

But you weren’t alone for long.

No-Eul appeared beside you, hands in her jacket pockets, her usual calm, unreadable expression on her face.

"You doing okay?" she asked, her voice softer than usual.

You hesitated, then nodded. "Yeah. Better than before."

No-Eul tilted her head, studying you in that way she always did—like she could see right through you. "You sure?"

You sighed, leaning against the railing. "I mean… I still feel kinda stupid for letting it get to me so much."

No-Eul frowned. "Why?"

You shrugged. "Because it’s not like they meant to hurt me. And I knew that. But it still—" You exhaled. "It still sucked."

No-Eul was quiet for a moment, then said, "You don’t have to justify feeling hurt."

You glanced at her, surprised.

She met your gaze, something unreadable in her eyes. "You deserved better from us. And you were right to be upset."

The way she said it—so steady, so certain—made warmth bloom in your chest.

You smiled, small but genuine. "Thanks, No-Eul."

She nodded, her gaze lingering on you.

And for a moment—just a moment—something shifted.

The space between you felt smaller.

The air heavier.

Her eyes flickered to your lips, just for a second, and you felt your breath catch.

Was she—?

Were you—?

Before anything could happen, a voice cut through the air.

"Time to go," Sae-Byeok’s voice rang out, firm but unreadable.

You both jolted slightly, stepping back as if the moment had never happened.

When you turned to look at her, Sae-Byeok’s face was blank, but her eyes—her eyes—were sharp, flickering between you and No-Eul with something you couldn’t quite place.

You cleared your throat. "Right. Yeah. Let’s go."

No-Eul didn’t say anything—just shoved her hands back into her pockets and followed after you.

And as you walked ahead, you could feel Sae-Byeok’s gaze lingering on you.

Like she had seen everything.

Like she was thinking about something.

But she didn’t say a word.

Not yet.

taglist: @everly-summers-solace @knfthxv @madebysae @knfthxv @katieschry1 @imlackingsleep @lyzem @stellssxo @wiltingconquest @peelover25@monroesturnns @laurenkens @yenyu1s @idontliketoread2137 @bitchybananaflower @lyuuw

[honeysorwell]

all of it (all of you) 

Pairing: Melissa Schemmenti x hairdresser!fem Reader

Synopsis of the story + Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9, Chapter 10

Link on AO3

Chapter 2

Tag list: @janeyseymour @italianaidiota @chloeelou02x (and if you want to be tagged too just let me know.)

Warning: there is a line for people who want to kiss Mel's burn hand, and I'm the first in it.

Words: 5,7k

The comments and compliments I received for this work caught me completely unprepared. Guys, thank you all very much for embracing my work with such affection.

Enjoy!

Fifteen people in the last twenty days.

Fifteen people have complimented Melissa's hair in the last twenty days.

In theory, everything was done the same as usual, but by someone else's hands. However, the universe decided to make the redhead feel even more guilty about everything that happened on her last visit to the salon.

First, it was Barb. The older woman touched Melissa's red hair tenderly in the teacher's breakroom, without any apprehension or concern about the second-grade teacher's reaction, and complimented the way it was colored, saying it looked brighter than before.

But it quickly escalated into something more significant.

Ava asked if she did anything differently, and the principal did so while telling a flattering joke asking where her Roger Rabbit was, which even made Barbara laugh softly. Next, it was Janine and Jacob who also complimented her hair, with a shy Gregory by their side who just nodded.

Then more and more parents of students joined the complementary wave of affection towards her. And then Melissa was hearing compliments from Abbott’s new stocker and vending machine operator, a handsome man with hair that was too long for her taste named Julian who now shares the heavy workload of the truck with Gary (causing the bald man with the mustache to blush before he softly agrees with his new co-worker).

Then there are a few random teenagers, grocery store clerks, who stop her to tell her she looks hot, quickly finishing the sentence with a “respectfully” before Melissa even has time to respond to them.

Normally Melissa would love all of this attention, and in another scenario, the compliments would have encouraged her to go out after work on some random Friday night looking for someone brave enough to try something more than a compliment. But this time the Italian woman felt her heart clench and her mind race a thousand miles an hour as she thought about the hairdresser who did that job every time someone complimented her.

So she actively swallows her pride and visits the Riverfront Roots Salon once again. Melissa would truly rather die than apologize or admit she was wrong. She memorized this from her family and she carries this learning throughout her life, but even someone like the redhead needs to admit that nothing can be applied in life without at least one exception.

That's why Melissa makes this visit to the salon on a Tuesday, after the school day is over since the darkness of the night could allow a little more privacy between her and Y/N.

As she parks her car in front of Riverfront Roots, the redhead convinces herself that it doesn't hurt to make sure that only the minimum number of people witness this display of vulnerability coming from a Schimmenti as she watches what seems to be the last customers of the night saying goodbye to the receptionist before leaving.

What will she say?

She has no idea.

But everything goes down the drain when the redhead's idea goes wrong. So when she returns home at night, unable to even talk to the hairdresser to replace the image of discomfort written on Y/N's face from her memory with an apology, Melissa decides to call her confidant and arrange to meet her the following weekend, using the next few days to gather courage and ask for advice from the one who never failed to give her the best of them whenever the teacher needed it.

“Oh, Melissa. How are you, dear? Don't get me wrong, cuz I figured I'd get your call, just not exactly as an invitation for coffee...”, Andrea's voice rings out as Melissa enters her favorite coffee shop, sounding happier than the last time the teacher saw her, and the redhead imagines that this is the result of the free time resting that the Italian woman must now have in abundance thanks to her retirement.

“What? Can't I invite my friend for coffee and ask her how her days are going without the sound of the hairdryer making her deaf?”, her voice sounds playful above all, which makes the answer she receives from Andrea come along with a laugh.

“Of course you can, silly girl!”

And so they talk for several hours, drinking coffee after coffee and hardly caring about how electric their bodies will be after ingesting so much caffeine while sharing pieces of their current lives. At first, it is strange to look at the woman in front of them and not see their own face next to that one, sharing a reflection in the mirror, but it is fine and the two women quickly get used to the new arrangement.

“Of course, you knew I would miss you,” Melissa says with a laugh, chewing gently on one of the best butter cookies she has ever eaten after taking another sip of her particularly hot coffee.

“Oh, I knew that. But, that’s not exactly what turned on the light bulb in my head,” the older woman says with an air of wisdom that only someone who has ever lived in the world enough to know too much can have, and after taking another sip of her coffee, she continued, “You see... Y/N called me a few weeks ago asking for permission to pass on the mix recipe I developed for you to another hairdresser... So, even though she didn't give me any details, I figured something had... happened.”

Melissa felt that the blood under the skin of her face was truly burning with shame.

The redhead thought about swallowing the coffee in her cup in one go, hoping it would burn her tongue with how hot the liquid was, and thus be able to escape from answering what Andrea clearly wanted to know.

She knew she was cornered and had been caught, with no intelligent way to escape. Shame and guilt mixed together, creating a bitter taste in the teacher's mouth even with the memory of the cookie so fresh on her tongue.

But, Melissa's usual response to these situations, loud and ready for a fight, doesn't happen here. Not with Andrea. Never with Andrea.

“What a big mouth... Jezz...”, is how the teacher responds, mumbling as she looks away from her friend in front of her.

“Something tells me yours is too.”

“I just... I was angry, okay?”, for the first time the redhead is honest even in the midst of murmurs, “And she’s different, and she kept talking so I... I freaked out and said what I shouldn’t have.”

Andrea remains silent, just observing the discomfort of the one in front of her with affection and understanding, and it’s this look that makes Melissa continue to speak.

“I know I crossed the line... But she did too!”, the words come out of the teacher’s mouth accusingly before she shares the whole story with Andrea, who smiles and shows surprise at every bit of her student’s encounter with Melissa shared with her, especially with the scissors.

“And what do you want to do now? I even know other hairdressers, but–”

“No! I just... I don't know exactly how I should apologize... Don't get me wrong, I don't want to apologize, but I really know I need to.”, honesty and vulnerability continue their journey between Melissa's mind and tongue as she speaks, “I stopped by her salon but they didn't even let me see her, they just gave me a paper with how many grams of each dye I need for my whole head and sent me away. But since you told me she was your pupil... Well...I thought that maybe...”

“Oh... I see.”, Andrea's voice has the most suggestive tone Melissa has heard in years, and thanks to the look the older woman gives her, full of knowledge, the redhead's cheeks blush.

“Please Andrea, it's not like that.”, the sentence escapes her lips just as her neck also begins to blush, with a speed that would be justified if Melissa were being tortured, trying to prove her innocence of a crime that the teacher definitely did not commit. But maybe she thought about it.

Or if she had enjoyed many generous sips of her coffee, even though she knew how hot it was.

“I didn’t say anything, dear. I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Andrea can sense Melissa’s embarrassment, so she diverts her attention to the bigger picture, even though her knowing smile never leaves her lips, “Look… You know you’re a good cook, and you’ve gotten your fair share of favors that way. Maybe it’s worth trying your luck.”

After that, the subject goes back to where it was before, and the teacher actually tries to focus on Andrea saying that she’ll be spending next summer in Europe, but Melissa’s mind starts working in a completely different way. She silently goes over (in her memory) the most beloved dishes from the cookbook she inherited from her grandmother while listening to Andrea talk about how it would be a pleasure to have Melissa over if she decides to run away from her family for the upcoming holidays. And when they pay the bill for the coffee, Melissa knows what to do.

“And Melissa… Cut off an inch when you get the chance, my dear. It's getting a little.. uneven.”, this is the end of Andrea's farewell to the redhead after a tight hug and a sweet kiss on the forehead, but the words are said in a maternal tone, of genuine care for the teacher that makes Melissa, even without thinking, respond to the older woman with just an affirmative nod and a loving smile.

And, as she doesn't want to think about what happened when someone else suggested the same thing, at least not now, Melissa goes home with only that feeling in her chest.

When the moon took over the sky that night, Melissa was lying under the covers of her bed, staring at the ceiling of her room and completely giving up on falling asleep, while her mind went over and over her conversation with Andrea. The older woman was right, as always.

She could cook something for Y/N.

Cooking has always been her passion since she was little, and that was one of the things that made the redhead and her grandmother even closer. The fact that Melissa was very good at it only helped her cause of being her grandmother's favorite.

Most of the time the redhead cooks as a thank you, rather than an apology, but the change is small. And so, the fact that the idea of ​​cooking to apologize has not left Melissa's mind honestly shocked her.

Most of her guys are just people from all over Philadelphia who work in different places and when they hear about how good her food is, they actively choose to seek her out, willingly offering services (sometimes illicit) that the redhead might be interested in in the long run in order to have the opportunity to taste her seasoning, thus forming an alliance.

It's impossible not to take advantage of this after a few years.

Finding out and memorizing what her most skillful guys' favorite dishes are. Doubling or even tripling the size of recipes that were previously made for only ten people, making her thanks become something shared with more and more potential “guys” (thus increasing the number of guys offering their services to her) so often that the redhead has forgotten how to cook for just two people in the last twenty years.

Cooking is a gift that, unlike her job as a teacher, the redhead didn't have to choose. It was flowing through her veins.

Melissa knows that this is one of the simplest ways to get what she wants. And maybe that's what made her block this possibility until now.

There was a voice inside her head, not the part inflated by her ego for always getting what she wants thanks to how good her food is and how everyone who knows about her talent wants to appreciate it, but the insecure and confused one that whispers in a soft voice that Melissa wants to manipulate Y/N.

And for the first time in a while, she’s not bragging about doing it. In fact, she doesn’t want to do it.

For some reason that Melissa still doesn’t know but keeps scratching her insides, she wants to earn Y/N’s apology, not demand it with her food.

And it doesn’t help that it’s been a long time since Melissa apologized to anyone.

Knowing that she won’t be able to sleep anytime soon and taking advantage of the fact that tomorrow will be Sunday, the second and third-grade teacher gets out of bed and goes to the kitchen, wondering what she should cook.

It’s already the middle of the night, and she has a lot of grading to do for her students’ tests tomorrow, but Melissa knows she won’t be able to concentrate if she doesn’t do that first.

Wrapped in a dark blue robe and hoping that Jacob won’t come to check why she is up so late at night, the teacher carefully opens the refrigerator and checks the ingredients she has and the ones she bought the last time she went to the farmer’s market.

Orange juice... Half a bottle of wine... Milk... Eggs... Fresh mascarpone?

When her eyes focus on the sweet cream-colored cheese, a train of thoughts runs through her head. Melissa knows less than little about her new hairdresser – which is her fault, really – but who doesn't like a sweet treat after a long day of work?

The redhead has dark chocolate in the pantry. Coffee is always a must in a teacher's house. And her cousin gave her a cocoa powder so rich and velvety last Christmas that it could melt in her fingers.

So tiramisu it is.

It was a simple yet sophisticated dessert, full of layers of flavors and textures that the redhead hoped would be enough to convey the care and effort she had put into the dessert. And that would certainly be worth more than a few words, right?

When Melissa goes back to bed, she knows that this is a good idea, and, bathed in this certainty, the redhead can finally see herself falling asleep as she climbs back to bed.

"Perfect," is the word Melissa whispers softly to herself, as she finally gets the thing that was preventing her from sleeping off her chest.

The next morning, the redhead took a quick shower and went downstairs, deciding to organize everything she would need to grade her little eagles' work on the dining room table before taking a deep breath and heading to the kitchen.

She hadn't made homemade Savoiardi in years, always using the ones from the Italian bakery that sold her favorite cannolis. But today was different. Today, cooking would make her put her feelings in order, perhaps even directing her mind to a light that would clear her ideas for what the teacher should say when giving the dessert to Y/N the next morning.

The redhead begins to separate the ingredients she will need to bake the cookies quickly, already deciding that it would be smart to have the necessary ingredients on the kitchen counter even before she finishes making her coffee. Anticipating the company she will have when she hears the sound of lazy footsteps coming from the stairs, Melissa fills one more cup than she would if she were alone with the dark liquid and begins to grab her frying pan to put it in the stove and prepare what she's going to eat.

"Good morning Mel-Mel!", Jacob sounds as he enters the kitchen, hoarse and sleepy, leaning softly against the kitchen counter and observing the ingredients that are displayed there.

"Morning Jacob. There's coffee ready.", Melissa answers softly, pointing to the coffee cup next to hers, still full and steaming, waiting for the younger teacher.

"Thank you.", the smile Jacob gives her is initially full of gratitude, but quickly turns to curiosity when he continues, "Oh... what are you cooking?"

The teacher isn't sure what exactly this question refers to, but considering how curiously he was looking at her ingredients just a minute ago, Melissa gives Jacob two simple answers.

"Eggs, and then baking."

"That's cool. Let me finish this, you already made me coffee.", Jacob says as he gently takes the spoon from the redhead's hand, then grabs four eggs from the fridge and takes her place in front of the stove.

After he moved in with Melissa and this new and sweet idea of ​​friendship was born between the two teachers, what had previously been just a few cooking lessons here and there turned into an intensive course. But the younger teacher loved every second of it. Jacob learned so much about everyday food living with the redhead and even managed to succeed at it, making moments like that more and more natural in the Italian woman's kitchen.

Taking advantage of the softness of her replacement in front of the stove, the redhead begins to gently check if everything she needs to bake is there until Jacob's voice sounds again.

"Did you know that astronauts can bake bread in some space stations?", the man says the words with childish excitement, but still with his eyes attentive to the eggs he is stirring gently on the stove, exactly as the redhead instructed him weeks ago, "Wouldn't it be nice to eat warm bread while you watch the earth from afar?"

"First, I'm not baking bread. But yes, it does sound good to them, kid.” Melissa’s response is simple and sweet, not irritated like she usually would be when she hears silly things like that at work.

They ate breakfast in comfortable silence. Melissa knew Jacob was going on a date that Sunday, so from the moment she woke up to the moment she heard Jacob singing in the upstairs shower before he began to get properly dressed for the lunch he would share with Avi, the paramedic at the local Philadelphia fire station, everything was going according to the plan the teacher had until she started baking.

Melissa tried to focus on the methodical rhythm of her task. Crack the egg, pour the white into a jar, pour the yolks into the mixer bowl, and repeat. But her mind insisted on going back to what she had done a few weeks ago. The words she had said to Y/N were sharp and thoughtless, but what weighed on her like a stone in her stomach was the change in the hairdresser’s expression. "She may have already forgotten...", Melissa muttered to herself, trying to calm her mind. But she knew it wasn't true.

She knew Janine didn't mean to say that she was a bad teacher when Courtney was transferred to her class, not really. It was just the younger teacher's ego and naivety, both screaming and destroying Janine's judgment for having been actively chosen.

But Melissa also couldn't deny that her mouth turned bitter the moment she heard her colleague's words, even if they were whispered.

She would never say it out loud, not even to Barb, but that first night, after hearing that unexpected insult, the younger teacher's words remained too vivid in the redhead's mind when the lights in her room went out and she had to go to sleep.

Maybe I'm not a bad teacher. Maybe you are.

She really didn't deserve that.

The memory flashed through Melissa's brain so quickly that the teacher even lost her rhythm as she added more ingredients to her mixture, but she recovered enough to start beating the egg whites. However, the continuous noise of the mixer only made her remember how much she had thought about it, lying in her bed watching the sun rise through her window when she woke up before her alarm clock.

A bad teacher.

Sighing, Melissa thinks about how much it took for her to understand what was going on in the mind of the younger teacher back then, and then turns off the mixer and begins to mix its contents with the few that were missing.

As she spread the molds she would need on top of her table and, with the experience and speed of a chef, the redhead put the freshly mixed dough she had in her hands in a pastry bag and continued without even blinking as she remembered that little clash in Abbott.

When Janine got upset about being described as an inexperienced teacher in the teachers break room, the redhead hadn't even blink, and that was why she started teasing the younger woman.

Because, to the redhead, it was obvious that she was a more experienced teacher.

If Melissa, a teacher with over twenty years of experience, wasn't more experienced than a teacher with only three, then Melissa was doing something very wrong not only with her life but also with the lives of the children she taught. The fact that the two woman had different times to prepare and perfect themselves to where they were now, both in the same place (teaching Abbott Elementary as second-grade teachers at the same time), had nothing to do with Janine's qualities as a teacher.

Eventually, she managed to explain this to the younger teacher.

"Thank God.", was the muttered thought that Melissa let slip between her lips as she put her Savoiardi in the oven after sprinkling them with her mixture of sugar and cornstarch, automatically starting the timer.

Melissa forgave Janine because she knew she didn't mean it with all her heart. The younger teacher was foolish but not cruel. She couldn't be cruel even if she tried.

Melissa knew. But Melissa knew this because she knew Janine.

The problem was that... Y/N didn't know Melissa.

So what the hell was she going to do if the hairdresser didn't accept her apology?

And so it was over. Her mind was just taking away the possibility of a peaceful morning for Melissa. Because not even her grandmother's collection of favorite Italian songs would be fair competition for what was starting to form in the redhead's mind.

The redhead isn't someone who has a problem with someone she barely knows not liking her. Melissa sometimes even triumphs over this idea of ​​being disliked by people close to her, so someone she doesn't know should simply mean nothing.

When Uncle Archie says she's his least favorite in the family, it doesn't mean anything. It's an honor, really, and the words of her mother's brother would never keep her awake at night. And he is family.

Now among people she knows, Schimmenti loves the idea of ​​being seen as unreachable, distant and unsociable. But there is something about that hairdresser...

With a huff, Melissa simply grabbed a cloth within her reach and began to clean the counter of her sink, ignoring the insistent sound of the timer that finally went off, still lost in all these thoughts.

Maybe it's because the hairdresser really didn't deserve those words... Maybe it's because the poor woman was just doing her job... Maybe it's because the hairdresser is connected to Andrea... Or maybe...

When the smell of sugar began to intensify, Melissa finally realized that the time had passed. With a start, the redhead opened the oven, letting out a wave of heat so intense that it made her eyes water. The teacher hurriedly pulled one of the baking sheets out of the oven, her bare fingers touching the hot metal before she realized her mistake.

"FUCK!" she groaned loudly, backing away quickly, knocking the tray onto the counter. One of the cookies fell to the floor with a dry, crunchy sound, while her instinct forced her to hold her hand against her chest, her eyes watering.

The burning heat pinked up her palm like an immediate punishment, and defeated Melissa finally turned on the kitchen faucet, placing her red hand there.

"MELISSA??" Jacob's shrill voice sounded faster than she imagined. And more desperate too.

For a moment, the older teacher stood there, staring at the cookie on the floor and feeling the buzzing in her throbbing skin as she felt the flow of water. The pain was real, but it served only as a reflection of something greater: guilt.

“I’M FINE, JACOB!” the redhead yells back at her roommate, even though she knows that from the sounds she hears upstairs, he must be desperately putting on the first piece of clothing he can find and then coming to check on her.

By the time he appears in the kitchen, as out of breath as Janine had been running around in her early years as a teacher, the pain has already subsided. But the younger teacher doesn’t care about that, or the fact that Melissa honestly tells him that she used to get burned all the time when she was younger and that heat tolerance is in every Italian woman’s blood, as he gently rubs some burn ointment from his personal first aid kit onto her burned fingertips.

After repeating what she imagines to be a thousand times that she is fine and perfectly capable of being alone, Jacob finally leaves her alone and goes on his date, giving Melissa the space she needs to sit at the kitchen table. She doesn't want to sound insane, but the savoiardi, perfectly shaped but with some slightly over-brown, seemed to judge her silently.

With a fork and using her non-dominant hand, Melissa tried to transfer all the cookies she baked to a covered container as soon as they cooled and went to her living room.

Finishing the corrections of her students' tests with her non-dominant hand takes longer than she imagines, taking up most of her morning and afternoon. But at least she is back in the kitchen when Jacob returns from his meeting, with flushed cheeks, swollen lips, a sweet smile and lost eyes as he asks her if her fingers still hurt.

She softly denies it, with a smile on her face and thankful for Jacob's concern written in his eyes. He understands even the words she doesn't say, and she is also thankful for that as she grates some of the dark chocolate she will need to finish her recipe the next day and puts it in a covered container.

On Monday morning, Melissa gets up ready early.

If asked, she would say that she set her alarm to wake her an hour and a half earlier, but the reality is that her nerves did the job without the help of technology.

Calmly, Melissa took the mascarpone from her refrigerator and began to make the cream that would bring the entire recipe to life. She beats the egg whites with the egg yolk, and uses the mixer to first mix the sugar, then the mascarpone and finally the carefully beaten egg whites.

When everything was ready, the redhead took a deep breath and, next to the precious dish she had chosen, arranged on her counter the Savoiardi cookies made the day before, the grated chocolate, the mascarpone cream and began to assemble the dessert. She dipped the cookies in a little room temperature coffee, one by one, taking care to make sure they were just the right amount of wet so that she could arrange them on the bottom of that precious glass dish, creating an even base and trying to ignore how much she wished the hairdresser could see the care she put into it.

When Jacob finally came downstairs, she was already spreading the fourth layer of the mascarpone cream, smoothing it with a spatula to ensure that each part of the dessert was perfect. When she finished, the redhead noticed that it was exactly ten minutes before the time she and the younger teacher left the house every day, so the redhead took her time sprinkling cocoa powder on top delicately, as if she were drawing an invisible message to Y/N.

Forgive me. I'm sorry.

Melissa wasn't sure.

But what she knows for sure is that Jacob is practically melting with curiosity in his passenger seat as he holds the dessert in his lap.

The Italian woman wanted to rest the tray on her back seat, as she always does when she needs to take something important to school. But he asks so genuinely to carry it that Melissa doesn't have the heart to tell him to take the bus that day. Especially after his ointment worked wonders by almost completely healing the burn on her hand.

At least not inside the car, since she takes the tray from the younger teacher's hand and is the one responsible for putting it in the refrigerator in the teacher's break room.

"Oh. This is a...”, Janine's voice is uncertain as she inspects the tray that prevents her from storing her sandwich on the common refrigerator shelf, already stretching her fingers to get a better look at what it was.

“It's mine. Do you have a problem with it?”, Melissa says rudely just so that there are no additional questions, but, as usual, Janine doesn't get the hint.

“That's beautiful. But can I—”, Janine starts again only to be interrupted.

“It's not yours. So don't touch it.”

After that, a heavy silence takes over the break room for a few moments.

“She spent the whole day yesterday making it... and she even got burned and then she was putting it together this morning.”, the youngest man in the room mumbles to his friend, not as quietly as he imagines he did since everyone in the room hears Jacob's words even with the news on the television.

“Did she give you a piece?” Janine mumbles back to Jacob, now curious. He shakes his head at the younger woman, purposely leaving out the fact that Melissa left a fair amount of the cream she used for that tiramisu in a small bowl, next to some of the homemade cookies just for him this morning. And that’s why Jacob gets a slap on the arm from the redhead along with an irritated look as he passes her on his way to the coffee maker to refill the dark liquid in his cup. Finally, intrigued by the younger man’s groan of pain, Barbara looks at the refrigerator that Janine still has open, trying unsuccessfully to put her lunch inside, and sees the reason for everyone’s commotion. A big tiramisu. But she also sees something that no one else does.

Something that cannot be questioned is that, out of everyone there, Barbara knows Melissa like no one else and is able to figure her out without even trying. And, with a small look at the glass dish in question, she had already figured her friend out.

That was one of a set of five glass dishes that Barbara Howard had heard about and only seen from a distance. Before her third year of marriage, the redhead's ex-mother-in-law, who was battling lung cancer although she still refused to give up smoking, distributed her most precious possessions to her family. And among them was that set that had been desired by all the women in Joe's family for many years.

As expected, four of the dishes were divided among Mary Alice's four daughters, but, surprising the redhead in a way she never imagined possible, Melissa was given the last one of the set, much to the despair of Joe's older brother's wife. Melissa's ex-husband's mother told the teacher that her talent for cooking would give a better destination for the last piece, unlike the idiotic fight that the sisters would probably start over the unequal number of the set.

Even after the divorce, the heartwarming gift was never claimed by Joe.

So Barbara knew that the tiramisu in question, taking up a huge space in the refrigerator of the teachers' break room on the first floor of Abbott Elementary, was not like any other.

"Girlfriend?" Barbara says softly to get the redhead's attention, speaking again only when Melissa's green eyes are looking directly into her dark ones, "Don't get involved in anything dangerous, please."

"I won't..." Melissa's voice no longer has the bite it had when she spoke to the other teachers, "I swear! It's just... an apology."

"For Joe?", the first-grade teacher knows she might be pushing, but she can't help but ask.

"No!", it's almost a scream, the redhead's tone of voice sounds scared and indignant, but it calms the teacher next to her.

And that, for now, is enough.

At the end of the day, with the tiramisu neatly packed and in her passenger seat, Melissa got into her car and drove to the salon where Y/N worked. The teacher's heart was beating fast as she parked and walked to the entrance, holding the dessert tightly even though her hands were sweaty. As she entered, the sound of scissors and the buzz of conversation seemed to fade in her mind. Her eyes searched for Y/N, who was distracted by a client and she didn't know if that was a good thing or a bad thing.

The last time she tried to talk to the hairdresser, Melissa gave her name right at the entrance and the receptionist automatically started searching through her notes for the note addressed to her, but now the redhead knew better.

"My name is not important. Just say that someone really wants to talk to her."

"Y/N!" the receptionist shouts the hairdresser's name loudly, using her vocal cords without any remorse, "There's a redhead who wants to talk to you."

“Is she hot?”, the sound of Y/N’s voice rings out from a distance to Melissa amidst a laugh, at the same time that her rhythmic footsteps echo on the floor of the salon, as if the hairdresser wasn’t exactly running, but in a kind of hurry and curiosity to know what was waiting for her at the reception.

When the Brazilian woman turns the glass corridor and finally appears in front of the redhead, with a soft smile on her face, Melissa can’t help but think that Y/N is even more beautiful than the first time she saw her.

But that smile doesn’t last long because, the moment the hairdresser’s eyes meet Melissa’s green ones, Y/N’s soft face turns into a frown as she asks harshly:

“Oh. You. What do you want?”

[signanothername]

Okay so, in another ask someone was talking about how nightmare could shapeshift

What if nightmare would shapeshift in to color to fuck with killer? Like imagine the angst possibilities

Funny enough, I actually shared an unfinished comic before regarding that

Killer will absolutely notice anything off, even when Nightmare does it the first time, Color’s smile is a lil sharper than it usually is, Color doesn’t walk like that, Color doesn’t talk like this either, the way Color picks his words is wrong, the way Color looks at him is different

But he’ll probably ignore the blaring alarms in his head just because he’d think it’s it’s mind making shit up like it always does, but once Nightmare reveals himself Killer starts taking these alarms more seriously

Except.. what can he really do? All he can do is endure the abuse until he finally learns and adapts, until he understands how Nightmare’s shapshifting happens, which will take a bit of time

Tho I think there are definitely certain stuff that Killer will absolutely know it’s Nightmare if Nightmare did them, like say Nightmare wants to fuck with Killer’s emotional state, and he gets a bit too excited and says “I hate you” in Color’s voice and looks? Killer will immediately know this is not Color, Color would never dare utter these words to him, because god knows he tried to push Color away to make Color say that to him and leave, it never worked

Color will say “I love you” sometimes just to be stubborn, Color is persistent like that, Color is honest like that, Color is patient, kind, brave, like that

But the fucked up part is, Nightmare also learns and adapts, he goes from not understanding how to act like Color to perfectly mimicking him down to changing his tone depending on different situations or how his colors change based on his emotions

Of course, it’ll absolutely fuck with Killer, Killer’s dissociative state and his inability to tell what’s real and not is just going to get worse, he’d meet the actual Color and sometimes gets paranoid, looking for signs, is this really color or is it Nightmare fucking with him again

Or what it’ll be like if Killer’s soul got a bit unstable, or went back to stage 1, how Nightmare can turn to Color to mock him, asking him if he needs a hug, he knows this is not Color, he knows this is not real, and yet, he embraces Nightmare, just to pretend a little, pretend this is actually Color, and he hears those cruel words in Color’s voice and he knows it’s not really Color saying all that to him, yet it still hurts, Nightmare already put the knife in, and he enjoys twisting it

Needless to say, it’ll have long lasting damage on Killer’s mental and emotional state