#its MY au and I can pull dynamics from whatever I want

[vaugely10]

the clockers! wandering scammers traders, currently taking residence on a planet with a local bakery...

[just-my-latest-hyperfixation]

Another celebration ficlet request! The original ask for this one seems to have gotten deleted, and it was sent on anon, so I can't even tag the person who sent it in. 😫

I hope you still see this and enjoy, nonnie! 💖

Heaven's in the backseat

Rated: E

Words: 1,000

Tags: Mafia AU; Hitman Eddie Munson; Mob boss Dick Harrington; Mentions of Stommy; Knife play; Dubious consent; Obsessive behavior; Violent thoughts; Car sex; Eddie has anger management issues and Steve is a little slut

Notes: Previous part | Part 1

Eddie has just lit his first cigarette of the night when one of the waiters informs him that Mr. Harrington wants him outside. As he grinds the cigarette under his boot, he imagines doing the same thing to Dick’s stupid head. 

Working for a mob boss is so goddamn exhausting. 

A week where Eddie doesn't come close to kicking the proverbial bucket is a good week - especially now that Dick has been taking him along as a bodyguard more and more often. He’s not complaining about that, though. Occupational hazard. 

No, what’s really annoying is the damn black tie affairs. As if squeezing into a fucking suit wasn't enough, the social dynamics of the underworld are mind-numbingly complicated. All of the big mob families are either related or out to kill each other - more often than not both at the same time. It makes events such as this an interesting affair, to say the least. All night long, Eddie has been hovering at the edge of the room while the boss ate and drank and shook hands with other important farts. Always vigilant, always ready to pull his knife from its holster under his suit jacket. And now he can’t even step out for ten minutes to have a fucking smoke? 

The car is parked in the driveway when he arrives. Next to it are the boss himself and a swaying figure with disheveled chestnut hair wearing a rumpled suit. 

Eddie’s blood bubbles and his steps speed up.

“-fucking disgrace,” Harrington says just as he flies down the stairway leading to the car. “You’ll do anything for attention, won’t you?” 

Eddie doesn’t catch the slurred reply, but it must’ve been the wrong one, because Harrington slaps the boy across the face before wrestling him into the backseat. Eddie’s hand is already on the knife when the asshole turns. For a heartbeat, he revels in the temptation of lodging the blade right in the middle of that ugly face, but he reigns himself in. Too much security, too many witnesses. 

“My son is drunk,” Harrington says. “Drive him home.” 

Before Eddie has a chance to reply, he has stalked past him and back into the venue.

*

“What the hell took you so long?” 

Eddie casts a look into the rearview mirror to see the venue disappearing behind them and Steve straightening up in his seat. His voice is still slightly slurred, his eyes a bit unfocused - but he's nowhere near as drunk as he appeared seconds ago. Eddie's mouth tugs into a grin. 

“What, I don't get a thank you for driving you? Where are your manners, little nymph?” 

“Why should I thank you for doing your literal job?” Steve’s mirror image scoffs at him. His bottom lip is pink and a little puffy where his father slapped him. “And don't call me that.” 

“I'm a bodyguard, not a chauffeur,” Eddie says. “There's a difference, y’know?” 

“You're a dog,” Steve drawls. “You do whatever my dad tells you to.” 

Eddie’s hands tighten around the steering wheel. Steve’s mouth curls at the edges, but his eyes stay bored. 

“How about you?” Eddie asks, once he has blinked the crimson shadows from his vision. “What did you do to incur his wrath? Must’ve been pretty bad, if you feigned being so wasted he’d send you home like some misbehaving child.” 

“None of your business, is it?” Steve snaps. Then, after a second or two, the aloof facade slips back on and he shrugs. “He caught me in the bathroom with Hagan.” 

Something slithers low in Eddie’s gut, dangerous and deadly like a coil of venomous snakes. 

“What? That ugly, freckled fuckface? C’mon, you can do better than that.” 

Steve laughs, a sound like the edge of a knife - bright and pretty and sharp-edged. “Why do you care? You don’t own me. What is it to you if Tommy fucking Hagan shoves his cock up my-” 

He doesn’t get any further than that. Eddie pulls over to the side of the road and slams on the brakes. One fluid motion later, he has scaled the middle console and has Steve pinned on the backseat, wrists trapped over his head in a one-handed vice grip. 

“Oh, honey,” he murmurs, voice low and lethal. “But this is where you’re wrong, see? You are mine. And one of these days, I’m gonna make sure everyone knows it.” 

Those pretty eyes go wide as he slides the knife from its holster. The blade gleams, catching what little light there is in the dark car. With one flick of his wrist, he slices away the top button of Steve’s expensive shirt, revealing the long, graceful line of that neck. Steve exhales a shaky breath and his throat bops with it. 

“One of these days,” Eddie murmurs, trailing the tip of the blade over tan skin, leaving just the thinnest of red lines. “I’m gonna kill everyone who ever looked at you or touched you wrong and claim you as mine. Stuff you so full of my cock you forget about everyone else, until the only word you remember is my name. Carve my initials into that pretty skin of yours so nobody ever forgets who you belong to.” 

Steve looks up at him, eyes bright and hazy, and a little whimper falls from his perfect lips. He writhes deliciously in Eddie’s hold, and for a moment, Eddie thinks he’s scared, that he’s gonna plead for mercy. 

But then he slots his leg between Steve’s thighs to hold him in place and he feels it. He looks down at the boy in awed surprise and can’t help the grin that creeps over his face.

When Steve speaks, his voice is hoarse and breathy, but not from fear. 

“Do it, then,” he challenges, rolling his hips and grinding his hard cock against Eddie’s thigh. His lips strain to meet Eddie’s, breath warm and wet against his skin.  “Make me yours.” 

Eddie has never been so happy to obey in his life. 

Part 5

More celebration ficlets

[welcomingdisaster]

Rec List: Favorite Fics of the Year!

hey hey hey! here are my favorite fics that I read this year. This is not an all-encompassing list, and I know I am missing some fics I read and loved. I always appreciate more fics recs. That said, here are some things that really stuck with me this year!

before the black gate by TheChasm ( @thelordofgifs)

Lôminzil would mark her, if she could: leave the indentations of her fingers on Abraphêl’s hips and thighs and kiss-bruises on her neck, carve her name into Abraphêl’s flawless skin so that all who set eyes upon her might know to whom she belongs.

Lôminzil does not much like her job as one of Tar-Míriel's attendants, but there are consolations. Her secret work spying on the Queen for Ar-Pharazôn, for one: and Abraphêl, too.

This list in in particular order, but I am putting this one first because I believe it is CRIMINALLY underrated. The odds are stacked against it as a femslash, original character, Numenor centric fic but listen it is SO good. The tragedy and inevitability is SO peak Silmarillion to me. The character work is delicate and intense at once. It is both soft and violent at the same time. It makes me feral. It makes me cry. Please read it.

Also, because I feel weird recc'ing ghosti without including any M&M fics (which are all excellent!) - her little one shot, crowns and other trinkets, somehow stuck with me a lot. It's quiet and understated and just catches something about the characters to me.

A Common Chord by sallysavestheday ( @sallysavestheday)

I loved him first, Maglor liked to tell himself. Fingon and Maglor and Maedhros, loving.

Just so obsessed with this dynamic. Sally's language is as always so creative and vivid and good to read; the characters in this are so vivid and breathing. This fic is warm and cold at once. Please read it.

Silence Stretched as a Shadow Between the Trees by Melesta ( @melestasflight)

This is what Maedhros wanted all along, this is why he selfishly stole Fingon from his duties and brought him here at the edges of Beleriand. Because here, there are no houses or banners, no wars to fight, no rules of propriety. They are not the eldest sons of great fathers, nor lords of mighty kingdoms. To the forest and its cycle, they are no more worthy than the mayflies that emerge and die within a single turning of the Sun.

A late entry, published a few days ago; but I've already read it twice, so I think it has to count. I'm always a sucker for art writing and location writing, and this has both in droves. Just really beautiful writing and great character work; this is kind of cheating as a compliment to Melesta, but what a wonderful wonderful Fingon. Aurgh. Love the osanwë work in this as well.

I was also going to include Red by the same author, but I think I actually read it last year. Go read it anyways.

Oh everybody waits so long by polutropos ( @polutrope)

In the summer of 2017, Fingon is called to the scene of hit-and-run while on duty. He's shocked to discover the victim is Maedhros, his ex-boyfriend he hasn't spoken to in two years. Over the next six months, they stumble and fumble their way back to each other.

I am jealous of this fic's ability to render the Silmarillion believably in a totally different world. It takes a lot of writing chops and a lot of brain juice to do an AU this different, and boy do you pull it off. This is emotional, intense, and quite often funny. I think about it a lot.

The ficlet collection in this universe is also so so fun!

On the same note - Hearken Still Unsated by the same author.

“For how many years have we two listened for the echoes of the Music of Creation in the oceans and lakes and rivers? And yet we will never be sated. Like the water in which they say it lives, the Song does not rest but ever moves and changes. It may pool in a great lake for an age and then pour down into the Sea in another. It fills whatever spaces it can and flows by whatever paths most easily open before it.”

When the Noldor return to Middle-earth to make war on Morgoth, only rumours reach Menegroth of their reasons for coming, but Doriath's minstrel experiences their loss and longing through his connection to Music and the gift of his Queen. Years later, he is sent to the Feast of Reuniting and meets the Elf whose grief he felt. A story about the Eldar returning home, their connection to the land and to each other, and their relationship to Music and fate, love and free will. 

Not a fic from 2024, but I did read it in 2024. One of the most lovingly-crafted, carefully made fics I've read. No word is out of place. Foundational to the ship. Check it out.

arrangement of flute and harp by jouissant ( @jouissants)

“What sort of man leaves his lover abed with his brother? Fingon, hast thou ever heard of such a thing?”

Incredibly tasty character dynamics in a lot of ways. The writing is delicious and vivid and extremely witty at the same time. I love the character voices in this most of all - so sharp and well-defined, fitting for the ebb and flow of the fic. The way the characters are intertwined and tangled up together is so striking. And the smut was really hot, which goes without saying for the author.

Mockingbird by littlewhitemouse @littlewhitemouseagain

One of his captains had asked him, “Maglor, do you not sleep beside with your brother when visiting him?” and Maglor had replied, “I do, as it makes it easier for me to sleep,” and his captain had said, “Which is good, because you do not usually sleep,” and Maglor had said, “I do not.” But his captain had then asked, “but doesn’t Prince Fingon also bed with him, on account of their completely secret and frankly astounding incestuous affair that no one knows about (and I certainly don’t myself)?” and Maglor had replied, “Yes, and that makes it harder to sleep.” On account of that being a full and complete explanation, Maglor’s captain had said, “Ah,” and that was the end of that conversation.

This caught me from the absolutely-hilarious description and kept me for each word. You can probably tell this is a very funny fic, but it is also an extremely thoughtful and earnest fic, an incredible Maglor character exploration, and a gorgeous rendering of the world and customs and clothing and jewelry and AHHH. Love this fic. Frequent re-read.

In Memory to Dwell by EilinelsGhost ( @eilinelsghost)

"I was healed, they told me. As ready as a soul could be." Bitterness laced through Finrod's words and he drew the robe close about him once more. "In what way is this readiness? Is there no longer healing in Námo’s halls?"

Immediately after his reembodiment, Finrod shuts himself within his chambers and allows none but his mother to come near. When Eärwen is called away, Finarfin must navigate his grief at this new separation and both father and son wrangle together with the toll the First Age has left upon them.

Really thoughtful and carefully crafted examination of elven culture, disability, reembodiment. The author is extremely precise with her language and her characterization; the little details in the text really make this fic very striking and real. I loved how this balanced the family dynamic (and Finarfin's longing for his son as a child again) against the adult separation. Bittersweet in the best way.

And a lot of philosophy, which is suitable for Finrod, ha.

Finrod/Sauron One Thousand Nights Esque AU by am_fae @meadowlarkx

In which Finrod does not die at Tol-in-Gaurhoth, but begins an extended game of wills as Sauron's captive. Mairon is intrigued by the mysterious Elf singer. That's all there is to it.

Cheating by posting the whole series but GAUGH this is just so good. I was chomping at the bit to learn how Lark was going to wrap this one up and it SO delivered. This is tender, brutal, and so crisp. It left me wanting so many contradictory things for the characters (escape. love him. escape. stay) and dug at the core of goodness and corruption in such an interesting way. As always I am blown away by Lark's dialogue and POV writing. Just really great stuff.

And that is all, for now! I unfortunately read less fic than I wanted to this year, so I know I missed out on some gems. I'm thinking of putting together a quick list of some favorite short fics and drabbles, if I can find them (I have lost more than I thought) - keep an eye out for that! And always feel free to add on to this post with your own recs. :)

[mytragedyperson]

So I'm once again having BSD x death note thoughts. I don't know what it is about these two shows that makes me want them but I do.

So new (or new to me) crossover fic idea. I probably won't ever write this myself, so if you want to write it, please do feel free to do so and either tag me or send a link in comments or reblogs. Or if you've seen a fic like this, comment it.

So, basically, my idea is, during the two years Dazai is keeping a low profile. He's left the mafia but isn't yet with the ADA. He pulls some strings and gets enrolled as the same school as Light Yagami. Him and Light kind of become academic rivals as they're the only ones in that class who really pose a challenge to each other. Light secretly hate Dazai. Dazai is mostly indifferent but also curious about how smart he is.

Dazai picks up the Death Note instead of Light. He uses it to take out people who pose a threat to him or Chuuya. Except Fyodor. Dazai's problem is he'll let smart monsters live so he has a challenge. So like in the show people notice. Dazai isn't bothered about being discrete because he knows they won't be able to catch him unless he wants them to.

Enter L, who, like in the show, decides he wants to catch Kira. He does the same test as in Death Note. And Dazai basically springs the trap on purpose because he's heard about L and wants to test him. L still thinks Light is Kira at first and starts testing him. Meanwhile, Chuuya learns about this and knows its Dazai. He pops in regularly throughout the fic when he's not doing port mafia stuff.

Eventually it's Light that suggests Dazai as a potential suspect, and L decides there's a % chance that it is Dazai, so now they need evidence.

Also, Misa still comes. She also thinks it's Light initially, she still falls in love with Light. Light treats her with the same indifference as he does when he forgets he's Kira and just doesn't really entertain it. Since he's not Kira it's less Light vs L and more Light and L vs Dazai, and this is, in my head a Lawlight AU. I don't really know about other ships, I imagine Soukouku. Obviously you don't have to do this if you're writing it, you can decide the ships.

So, after a while of back and forth and L and Light actually getting close enough to catch him, Dazai decides they might be useful whenever the Book starts causing trouble, so basically let's them catch him by letting them find the Death Note.

I can't decide what kind of dynamic Dazai and Ryuk would have, I just know it would be different than with Light.

So, after they find out Dazai is Kira, they ho to arrest him, but Dazai basically tells them they can't because he's one of the only people that can stop an angry god of Calamity from destroying this world. Yes he means Chuuya, no he doesn't tell them that. Instead he tells them about the book situation and, in this AU, Dazai doesn't know where the book is, he doesn't have it, and that's what he sets L and Light to do, find the book and keep it safe. He even agrees to stop using the Death Note since by this point he's tired of it.

Also he refuses to use the Death Note for Fyodor because he wants to stop and kill him on his own. He joins the ADA, and brings L and Light with him because I need them interacting with Ranpo. BSD happens with L and Light involved. At some point they find out the god of calamity is sealed inside Chuuya and think Dazai lied but he actually wasn't, because if they had killed Dazai, Chuuya would've snapped and the world probably would've ended. Not that Chuuya has told Dazai that. Somehow, Dazai, L and Light win. They also all become friends because they're all super smart, morally grey, manipulative and willing to do whatever they have to do to accomplish what they set out to accomplish.

You can decide how involved Watari, Misa and the whammy's kids are involved. I could see Watari kinda being disappointed over not knowing about Ranpo when he was younger. I feel like he could have an interesting relationship or dynamic with Fukuzawa and Mori, especially since he's very clearly noticed Dazai being suicidal and, well, Dazai. If he finds out Mori partially raised him, I feel like he'd have shit to say. You could also get some interesting L and Whammys kids backstory in this fic.

I don't know, I just feel like, while these animes are fairly different, the idea of the characters interacting is really interesting.

[demonictumble]

fic rec list (1/??? )

this is a fic recommendation list for whomever wants a good read. All of these are on AO3. I have not provided links, so just search them up!

If you do end up reading any of these, or really any fic in general, remember to leave the author comments!! They deserve them, esp because they do this for free and they deserve to know how beautiful their writing is and how appreciated they are.

My PSA: COMMENT ON FICS AND DONT TAKE AUTHORS FOR GRANTED

DC..

IMPORTANT NOTE I am not a religious fan where I only like a fic when it adheres to canon characterization or texts. I can enjoy fics even when they completely throw off what's actually canon and that's okay for me, but it might not be for you. So just keep this in mind and the back button exists for a reason if you don't like something.

Buy Back the Secrets by Sundiscus (incomplete)

Tim Drake and Kon El centered!! OH MY GODS. I could rave on and on about this fic all day but I'll have to keep it brief. I've reread at LEAST 5 times. It's brilliant. The writing, the plot, the characterizations!! They are incredible. If I had to use a phrase to describe it, it would be "identity shenanigans and timkon" but that simplifies the absolute masterpiece that it is SO MUCH

Executive Assistant to the Batman by heartslogos (complete)

Tim is basically Bruce Wayne's assistant and is desperately trying to avoid letting them know that he knows. This is complete crack, but it is hilarious. The writing is so funny and It's what I need after a bad day or anything tbh. It may not be completely true to characters or whatever, but it makes up for it a thousand times over in spirit and the laughs it's produced from me.

anything (not the title because literally ANYTHING) by IzzyMRDB

I can rave about them all day because the dc/batfam fics I have seen them right are all so delicious and I devoured them far too fast and momggg its just so good. and I love their writing style <3

Reverse Robin AU by yellow_cabellero (complete)

I CANNOT DO THIS SERIES JUSTICE WITH MY WORDS. IT is a must read for me. The writer writes spectacularly and the characterization, even though its a reverse robin, feels on point, especially considering the circumstances (Im a huge believer in circumstances shape a person's personality, which is what I think occurs beautifully in all of these fics). They're just so GOOD.

Also this author has a STEPH FIC that is stunning. 10/10. Steph is a character that doesn't get the appreciation she deserves, so this fic was especially more touching for me. It was terrific seeing her girl bossing in the 90s (IT ALSO FELT SO PERIOD ACCURATE CAN WE TALK ABOUT THAT). Not to mention, the author shows off character flaws in a believable manner and nobody is a Mary Sue and it's just EVERYUTHING IS JUST *chefs kiss* by them.

The Fishbowl by LordLuxury (complete)

This is Dick Grayson centered. THEY HAVE MADE A MASTERPIECE. I genuinely mean it. Dick is constantly trying to pull the family together, he is trying to be the glue as everything tries to go the opposite. LET THIS MAN HAVE HIS FAMILY. This had me in shambles. Bad Dad Bruce hurt me, but it was just so realistic. That's what gets me. The whole dynamics portrayed in The Fishbowl are so goddamn realistic and it feels so real. Everyone is flawed in their own way and its just... PLEASE READ IT I BEG OF YOU.

Love and Bruises by Acin_Grayson and Hoebiwan (complete)

Despite what the title may suggest, this is actually funny! Jason thinks Batman is abusing Bruce. And I just remember dying of laughter as I read this. Terrific! Would read and Will read again

Marvel (I am a movies fan so most if not all fics I recommend from here on out will be probably based on movies!)

Tennessee Outreach for Spider-Man and Friends by ciaconna

GREAT FIC. Harley (potato gun kid in one of the iron man movies for those who don't remember) gets an internship with Tony stark for college application reasons and its to help Spiderman. Peter Parker and Harley whateverhislastname is such a funny duo and they made the fic spectacular. Terrific writing omg.

Peter and the Jailbirds by beautifullights

I THINK THIS FIC HURT ME. I don't really remember much bc its been a year and a half, but I think my emotions remember because I feel mildly sad when I think about it. Peter is on the raft and bonds with the ex-avengers also on the raft. The premise of a teenager possibly spending the rest of his life in prison is terrible, but I swear this fic has funny moments and the conversations that occur are to die for because the WRITING. WHEW.

O Brother, Where Art Thou? by theskeptileptic

Tony survives and it's set after No Way Home. Where I'm pretty sure the only people dead are May and Pepper. Morgan saves the day by remembering her big brother (Im a sucker for big brother Peter arc). Peter is kind of a mini Tony in this one I think, which is such an interesting take. And it's such a coming home story and its just so beautiful.

Cross Overs:

Even Heroes Have the Right To Dream by Bounemr (complete)

mlb/dc crossover!! where marinate and Jon are retired superhero and go to college together! Great writing and plot with a good ending. Fluffy for the most part as far I as I can remember (it's been a year since I've read it so you know it's good if I can still remember)

Hired Hands by neighborhood_yogurt (incomplete)

Percy Jackson/ DC crossover!! It's been a while since I've read this one too but It's stuck with me. It's hilarious and I need to reread it but Percy is accidentally on Penguin's payroll because he's just a dumb blonde at heart, but it's okay we all love him. And Shenanigans occur. I don't remember exactly what happens so reminder to read this again for myself as well!

(IDK if any of these authors have tumblrs, if they do, someone please tag them and I will forever be in your debt)

[autisticlancemcclain]

fic rec friday 54

hello and welcome to fic rec friday! where, on friday, i rec five of my favourite fics.

all i want for christmas by tusslee

“Listen,” Lance squeezes Keith’s fingers in his hands, “I’m as bad at this as you probably are and this is going to be really cheesy, but that’s the way I was raised and I know I act like an idiot around pretty girls, but I’m an even bigger idiot around you. Go ahead and try to guess why that is. No, actually don't do that."

this one is gonna be an xmas special!! even though im writing this before halloween lol. anyways. this was so cute!! lance being all stressed about what he should get keith bc he's all in love w him any everything. so real.

2. You're Here (Where You Should Be) by @blue-wanderer

"And if you’re worried about the cameras just take care of them.” “Take care—! Take care of them? With what, Keith?” “I don’t know?” Keith asks, busily testing his foothold in the gate and generally ignoring the rising storm cloud of ire behind him. “With a gun?” “A gun? This isn’t some sort of black ops storming an enemy base thing! This is a Christmas tree thing!” “I don’t see a difference? You’re the sharpshooter. Shoot out the cameras.” “Let me just pull a gun out of my ass, Keith!” “OK, problem solved,” Keith agrees, taking another step up the gate. “Nothing is solved you dumb country space redneck!”

Or Keith and Lance may be disasters at decorating, but Christmas still manages to work its magic on them.

i bookmarked this like a year ago and let me tell you all i needed to hear was dumb country space redneck and i was hooked 😭😭 and it lived up to the name fr. hate the canon ending? want lance to not be a farmer while still acknowledging his struggles with homesickness? want some whipped keith and meddlesome kosmo? want some cheesy xmas feels? click ahead!

3. make my wish come true by angelbolt

“A world where one has to fight for custody of one’s boyfriend is a godless one,” Lance muttered, slumping so he was leaning against Hunk. Shiro exchanged some final words with Kolivan before the screen blipped out. Ah yes, the ideal Christmas Eve: long boring talks and war meetings. Wonderful. ❆❅❆ keith comes home for christmas.

fun game idea: take a shot every time you see a klance xmas fic with a mariah carey lyric. lol. ANYWAYS yall know me and established relationship + early season dynamics!! i am obsessed!! and this fic delivers!! grumpy lance pov who just wants the rest of the world to fuck off for a couple days so he can have his bf around. he's such a voice of the people

4. i'll be home for christmas by @thespacenico

A severe bout of winter weather threatens to stop Shiro from making it home for his first Christmas with Keith. Shiro is ready to do whatever it takes to keep his promise.

okay this one is from darcy's i've got you brother, which i am obsessed with and have cried over several times, and which just recently updated! this fic is so cute and a adashi with young keith always fucking gets to me, man. they're just so. shiro being so desperately determined to keep his promise to young keith who has had so many promises broken that he doesnt even expect shiro to try. but is happy that he does. sobbing.

5. the greatest gift of all by dumpsterdiva

Keith’s mouth hung open for a few seconds before he stammered, “D-do you really mean that?” Lance looked a bit sheepish as he said, “I… It’s crazy, right? I mean, it’s way too soon. You know I was kidding.” Keith straightened up. “Well, I’m not. Marry me.” “What?!” “You heard me, you coward. Marry me.” “That’s the worst proposal ever!” “Worse than you threatening me with marriage so I would stop talking about how amazing you are?”

YOU GUYS KNOW HOW I FEEL ABOUT PROPOSAL FICS. i feel ksjbskdbqjdbqwlwd about them. okay. and throw in a christmas setting??? and banter?? and a MODERN AU?? i am doing my best, people. this fic had me shoving a pillow into my face and screaming.

that’s it for today!! happy holidays! merry christmas!! i’ll see y’all back next friday for the next fic rec post!!!

[cloudlessly-light]

But you make my heart race (Prosecutor Hotch/secretary Emily AU one-shot)

A/N: This is set in the middle of Emily working as Hotch’s secretary since I wanted to keep the prosecutor/secretary thing going, I hope you like this little one-shot!

Title: But you make my heart race  Summary: Emily wanted to push his buttons, if only just a little. It worked.

One shot from my AU Chills on a summer day but can be read on its own. Word Count: 3,1k Rating:  Explicit Warnings: Smut, dirty talk, power dynamics, spanking, rough sex

She’s been working as Aaron’s secretary for almost two months now, been sleeping with him for more than half that time. And she’s been having the best time of her life. Sure while they’re at work he can be demanding, pushing her for more, to be better, but she takes it in stride because she knows that he’s working twice as hard.  

She wasn’t sure what they were, or where things would lead, but what she did know was that she didn’t want to stop whatever they were doing. It was something she hadn’t ever experienced before, how easy it was, how fun, how thrilling it could be.  

It was carnal, exciting, the type of desire she’d only ever read about before. And then there he was, showing her the most unexpected realms of pleasure.  

As she’s getting dressed that morning she smiles to herself, he had spent the previous night teasing her until she was ready to beg him for any type of release, and when he had left she had planned her revenge. Aaron might be in charge most of the time, but that didn’t mean that she couldn’t fight him a little for it sometimes.   

He had spent the previous evening in her apartment but hadn’t spent the night because he had court the next day and wanted a few more hours to prepare. She doesn’t fault him for that, he’s a fantastic lawyer. But it was a case they both knew he would win, so she was allowed to have a little fun with him. Or at least that’s what she thought.  

With that thought in mind, she capped her lipstick and grabbed her purse. It was going to be a good day.  

*    

“I’m off, I’ll be back late so I’ll probably see you tomorrow.” He says, stoic as ever with his briefcase in hand, his Rolex glimmering just under the cuff of his suit.    

“Okay Mr. Hotchner.” She smirks, always enjoying their little charade at work. As she looked at him there was something suggestive lurking in her dark orbs and he raises an eyebrow at her. “Want me to pick up dinner for you before I leave for the night?”    

“Not necessary, I’ll pick something up on the way.” He gives her a questioning look, the teasing smile still on her face makes him take a moment. She was planning something, he knew it, he knew that look.  

“See you tomorrow then.” She winks at him and he feels the familiar pull in his gut as she spreads her legs just enough for him to catch a glimpse of her smooth thighs, the hint if a hickey showing. But he’s late so he can’t drag her into his office like he wants to. Instead he nods, grips the handle of his briefcase a little harder and walks towards the elevators, still feeling Emily’s heated gaze on him. 

But as he gets closer to the courthouse he forgets about everything except the case. A case he knew he’d win. In court he was feared, superior to most. It made him feel powerful only adding to the slight arrogance that Emily would tease him about.  

He’s watching the testimony, listens as the frail man on the stand tries to defend himself from what he’s accused off, and memorize what he knows is far from the truth. He can tell that the defending lawyer is starting to close up and he gets ready to stand up for his own line of questioning.  

And then his phone buzzes on the table, Emily’s name flashing on the screen with an incoming text. He knew she wouldn’t reach out while he was in court unless it was important, she never had before, so curiosity gets the better of him and he opens the message. 

When he does he has to do a double take, a low grunt escaping him that thankfully no one seems to hear. 

It was picture of Emily, dressed in the tiniest underwear set he’d ever seen, posing on her knees in front of her bed, legs wide apart and one hand inside her panties.  

Good luck today, Mr. Hotchner. 

The large hickey he’d sucked into her thigh was fresh, meaning that she had taken that picture after he had left the previous night. And he was furious. 

Then another picture came through, this one with Emily in the same panties, minus the bra, bending over, her plump ass arched up.  

Aaron clears his throat, arousal stirring in his belly at the sight, eyes trained on the picture. 

“Mr. Hotchner?”  

He looks up at the sound of his name, and finds the judge looking at him with annoyance. 

“Do you have any questions for our defendant? Or do you have something more important to attend to?” The judge asks, her blue eyes intent as she stares him down, 

“Sorry.” He mutters, his phone landing on the desk with a dull sound and he stands up. For a moment he’s unsure what do say, his mouth dry as the pictures of Emily play on a loop in his mind.

“You- uhm.” He stops mid-sentence and clears his throat, he’s off his game and that’s never happened in court before. He takes a moment, centers himself and then looks back at the defendant who’s looking at him curiously. “You say you were alone at home at the time of the assault.”

“Yes.” The man says, voice steady and Aaron narrows his eyes.

“That’s not completely true is it?” The second the man swallows harder, Aaron knows he has him and he smiles to himself.

By the time he sits back at his table he knows he’s proven that the man in front of him is guilty and he feels confident. He looks at his phone and there’s three more messages from Emily, all more and more risqué, the last picture of her completely naked as she poses on the bed. He feels the dull ache of arousal settle between his legs, his cock stirring at the sight. He knows she’s doing this to rile him up, knows that he shouldn’t fall for it so easily, but he does, anger at her for trying to throw him off his game and arousal mixing.

He couldn’t wait to get out of there.

*

When he comes back it’s late but he knew she would be there, waiting for him. As he suspected the office was empty, almost eerie quiet as he walked through the space towards his office. As he got closer he could hear the familiar clicking of the keys on the keyboard and when he turned the corner Emily sat there, eyes on the screen but a smug smirk on her lips.  

“Good evening, Mr. Hotchner. How was court?” She met his hard stare and her smirk turned into a grin. If it weren’t for the security cameras he would have grabbed her right then and there.    

“My office.” He muttered, voice thick with pent up frustration. When she didn’t move a muscle he leaned over her desk, effectively towering over her. “Now. I won’t ask you again.” 

Emily waited another second, debating with herself if she should listen or not, but she knew that she would only make things harder for herself if she didn’t so she slowly stood up. When she started to walk the short distance to his office she could feel him behind her and her breathing was already coming out a little faster.  

Aaron closed the door with a soft click, but the second the door was shut all pretense of calm disappeared and he grabbed the back of her neck. When she hissed in surprise and pain, it was his turn to smirk and he bent her over the large desk.  

“So you think it’s fun to tease me huh?” He growled against the back of her ear and Emily shook her head the best she could. “Use your goddamn words.” His grip tightened and she whimpered.  

“No.” It came breathy, her voice trembling slightly from excitement and fear.    

“Don’t lie.” He stood up straight, the hand not pinning her to the desk moving over her body, down to the curve of her ass until he reached the hem of her skirt. When he pulled it up enough to expose her underwear he snickered. “So wet already.” His finger gently traced over her damp silk and Emily moaned softly. “You’ve waited for this all day, haven’t you?”    

“Aaron- oh!” She’s cut off by the hard spank that lands on one butt cheek.  

“Let’s try this again.” He says, his voice suddenly much calmer, restraint she’d always wonder how he possessed making her shiver in excitement. “You think it’s fun to tease me?”    

It’s a moment of silence before she nodded.  

“Yes.”  

Slap!    

“You wanted to distract me while I was in court?”  

“Y-yes.” She braces herself for the third slap that made a cracking sound as his palm connected with her skin.  

Slap!    

“You’re that desperate?” He had to stop himself from palming his erection, the reddening skin and slight whine that came from Emily each time he spanked her made him throb inside his pants. This time she didn’t answer, and he spanked her three times in rapid succession, making her squirm.    

“Fuck!” She gasped but made no move to try and get away. She could feel her slick coating her thighs, felt maddening arousal each time his hand came down.  

“Answer me.” He rubbed over her red skin as he spoke this time, enjoying the warmth that radiated off her.  

“Yes.” She whispered and when he spanked her she pressed her thighs together in a vain attempt to try and get some friction against her clit.    

“Yes, what?” He kept his grip around the back of her neck as he undid his belt and then pushed his pants and boxers down his legs. The tip of him was already slick with precum, shaft thick and hard and he slowly stroked himself.  

“Yes, I’m that desperate.” Her cheeks burned with humiliation, sweat was gathering at her temples and when she heard the low groan behind her she immediately knew what he was doing.    

“Pathetic aren’t you.” He spat the word at her and he saw her clench her thighs again in response. He knew how much she got off on being degraded like this, knew that every second he made her wait only made her more excited. Slowly he pulled her underwear down to the middle of her thighs, just enough to see the way her pussy was glistening.    

“Yes, Mr. Hotchner.” She whined, her hands desperately grabbing onto the edge of the desk to keep herself from moving.  

“Are you sorry for acting like such a slut?”    

Slap, slap, slap, slapslapslap!  

She cried out as he continued to spank her without pause and she had to shift her weight from one foot to the other to keep still.  

“Yes! Yes I’m sorry.” She cried out, tears of pleasurable pain starting to make their way down her cheeks. When his hand didn’t come down again she relaxed, his hand now gentle as he rubbed her lower back and gently comforted her.    

He waited for her to calm down, or to show any sign that she wanted to stop but she only gave a quick nod and he knew she wanted to continue. He moved behind her and pressed his front to her back, speaking right against her ear as he pushed her harder onto the desk.  

“You think you’re sorry now?” He whispered menacingly. “Just you wait, Emily.”    

Before she had the chance to reply, he was pushing inside of her with one rough stroke. He didn’t give her time to adjust to the size of him. He moved to grip both her hips, keeping her still as he set a pace that was bordering on too fast.    

She grunted at the sudden stretch, her hands that had been gripping the edge now fumbling against the smooth wood to try and brace herself. The front of her hips would be bruised from how the edge of the desk dug into her skin, matching marks would be left by his hands, and she loved it, loved every second of it.  

“Oh God.” She gasped as he groaned behind her, clearly using her body to get rid of the pent up frustration from the last few hours.

“There’s nothing I could do to you that you wouldn’t enjoy, is there?” He bit the back of her neck and she whined. “So desperate to please me.”

Emily could barely form a single thought, let alone string a sentence together. She felt him everywhere, her sole focus was his breathing against her ear and the feeling of him inside of her. She arched her back, hips moving back to meet his harsh thrusts. He had been right, she had been waiting for this all day, had felt the familiar thrumming of arousal since this morning.

The desk rattled underneath her every time he pushes forward, pain and pleasure mixing together and she sucked in desperate breaths of air.

“Aaron,” She whimpered, eyes rolling back as he rutted his front against her back, making sure to press against the heated skin of her ass. “so good.”

“You’re dripping onto the floor.” He taunted her and she felt another flush creep up her cheeks “Filthy thing, my perfect, filthy girl.”

Before she had the chance to say another word, Aaron straightened behind her, and she turned her head to look at him. He looked powerful, even with a wrinkled suit and sweat gathered on his forehead, his eyes looked close to wild, jaw clenched as he swallowed hard at the sight of her.

“Please.” She whispered, trying to get him to move as he continued to stand still, simply watching her. He smirked, the smugness radiating off him as he stepped further away from her, slipping out of her and she groaned.

“On your back.” He muttered as he rid himself of his suit jacket, watching her as she turned and laid back against his desk and kicking away her panties that were around her thighs. “Unbutton your shirt.” He did the same as she hurriedly got her shirt off, her fingers trembling slightly

When she laid back, her skirt around her waist and bra still on, Aaron stepped back between her legs. He slapped his cock against her clit, making her jump. The wet sound was bordering on obscene and he snickered and did it again. Then again and again.

“Beg for it.” His dark eyes flashed with something predatory at the way Emily’s skin blushed a darker shade of pink. “Beg me for my cock. Show me you know I’m the one in charge.”

It’s a beat of silence, Emily biting down on her bottom lip as she watches him as he starts to jerk his cock.

“I can easily come like this, leave you here unsatisfied and desperate, messy with my cum. That wouldn’t be a problem for me.” His eyebrow arches and he fists his cock harder.

She whines, something low and breathy as she wordlessly shakes her head. She couldn’t imagine not getting the release she had longed for all day, her body screaming at her from unreleased tension.

Her mouth opened and closed, the words somehow not forming, some of her defiance clearly still present. He noticed, his mouth pursing for a moment and then, so fast she didn’t have time to react, his palm slapped between her legs, hitting her clit with a sharp smack.

“Fuck!” She hissed, legs trying to close automatically but his hips were in the way. She looked at him, eyes wide in surprise and he only raised an eyebrow at her.

“Beg.” He said again, his shaft moving along her clit, taking away the sting of his slap.

“P-please.” She whispered but she knew it wasn’t enough. “Please fuck me.” She said louder.

“That wasn’t so hard, was it.” He cooed, his hand gentle as he caressed her cheek and then pushed his thumb between her parted lips. He sighed happily when she immediately sucked, her tongue pressing against the pad of his thumb. With his eyes on hers, he pushed back inside of her, filling her completely and she moaned. “Are you begging for my cock or for me to make you come?”

“All of it.” She gasped around his digit. “I’m begging for all of it.”

“That’s right.” He grinned, a low hum of satisfaction falling from his lips as he started to thrust. “Because you belong to me, don’t you?”

“Yes, Mr. Hotchner.” It was enough for her to please him, his thumb slipping from between her lips to her clit where he rubbed quickly, making her cry out.

He keeps her pinned with one strong hand pressing against her hip, groaning and grunting between pants as he picks up the pace of his hips. It’s hard, almost furious, the way he fucks her until she’s gripping the desk and her back is arching.

“Come on, let me feel you soak me.” He encourages her, his voice graveled and strained, his own pleasure building by every second.

She comes with a high pitched moan, her eyes rolling back and body trembling and Aaron groans against her chest. Her mind is still reeling, her ears still ringing when his hips starts to jerk, a telltale sign that he was getting close. Through blurry pleasure she grasps his neck and tugs his hair enough for him to look at her.

“Let go, so I can feel it all the way home.”

The mental image of Emily dripping of his cum on the walk home set something off in him. He growled, the sound raw and deep as he claimed her lips in a desperate kiss. His hips stayed pressed against her, his orgasm intense as his knees buckles at the forceful pleasure that rips through him and with that the last of his pent up tension leaves him.

She hums and rakes her nails through his hair, helping him come down from his high, her own thighs still twitching around his hips.

“I knew you’d like those pictures.” She teased and he chuckled breathlessly, giving them both another moment before he stood back up.

“I should have known you were up to no good after last night.” He smiles and pulls her up, placing a quick kiss to the back of her hand before pulling her into his arms and pressing a kiss to her lips. “You’re such a brat when you want to be.”

“And you love it, Mr. Hotchner.”

She was right, he really did.

[beannary]

Hi! Thank you for blessing us all with tlp :) it’s such a cool au and I like it a lot!! I have many thoughts about it so I’ll start writing them now:

With Donnie being raised by Big Mama, the change in dynamics with literally everyone is interesting to think about, so of course my brain has latched onto the concept of how Donnie’s dynamic with his own brain (his neurodiversity/autism) effects his relationships with himself and his family. 

(beannary note: putting everything under the cut so this doesn’t get too long)

Comparing Donnie’s relationship with his own neurodiversity in tlp to canon makes me so emotional you have no idea…..in canon he’s never had a need to mask, living in the sewers with a family who accepts him for who he is, so he has difficulties doing so when needed; we’ve seen him in situations where he is unable to mask/act “socially appropriate” (the mystic library episode comes to mind - he can’t control the volume of his voice when he gets excited. Also every single time he is put in a situation where he has to lie but he is comically bad at it. Also the many many instances in which he is shown being unable to ‘read the room’). But in tlp he seems to be masking a lot, either when he’s interacting with Big Mama’s guests or with Big Mama herself (your Masking is Hard comic comes to mind instantly - how Donnie has a hyperspecific role to play as Big Mama’s Son and the pressure to not only be sociable, but be sociable in a way that meets his mother’s expectations. Its a lot to handle, acting a way that doesn’t come naturally to you and no matter how many times you go through the motions you feel as if it doesn’t get any easier and you dont know why). Tlp Donnie can mask far more convincingly than canon Donnie, but only because he’s had to mask frequently throughout his life. It seems to me like he’s been taught at a young age that he needs to stop acting so “weird” (for example, stimming in obvious ways), because that kind of behavior loses its cuteness fast with Big Mama & most of the company she associates with. I imagine lots of his behaviors are discouraged as he grows up because they’re “not cute anymore” and he’s “not a little kid anymore” and he “needs to learn some manners/self-control” even though everything “weird” Donnie does feels like so natural to him, even as he gets older. Although I do think Donnie has instinctively coped with this by making his stims more subtle (this is where I get to be self-indulgent and imagine his stims - humming, tapping his feet, fiddling with any object he can get his hands on, blasting EDM in his headphones etc), and he only pulls out the big guns (aka big stims) when he’s in his own room with the door closed (or when he’s locked himself in a bathroom stall and physically cannot hold himself back anymore). 

Unfortunately for Donnie I also figure that this amount of masking makes him more susceptible to meltdowns. In canon Donnie has so much freedom and control over his own life that the only time I can remember him being even mildly close to Meltdown Territory is during the Todd Scouts episode when his tech was taken away. And even then, he immediately knows how to cope with the change by Creating with whatever tools he is able to find, his brothers just accepting his absence as he goes MIA to build the things he needs to make himself feel better (like the wooden battle shell). But in tlp au does he even know how to cope in healthy ways? Does he get to go MIA for long periods of time so he can pull himself together and prevent a meltdown from happening? Oouuggghh I just want him to be happy :( poor guy feels as if he has no control over his life to the point he develops an eating disorder, he absolutely has no idea what a healthy coping skill is. I’m torn in between concepts for how he processes his neurological differences - either he goes the “autism? don’t be ridiculous, everyone feels this way” route or the “I am astronomically Different from anyone else I know. surely this is just due to my superior intellect and not a developmental disability of any sorts”. Either way this dude is not connecting any dots nor processing any emotions in a healthy way. (Now that I think about it, while Donnie lives with Big Mama, his unique and different skillset are probably what he clings onto to feel needed and useful to his mother, so the latter makes sense for him during that time. But the former makes sense when the concept of Different scares him, when it’s not just intellect and fixations and tunnel vision but sensory issues and social awkwardness and repetitve movements, things that very clearly separate him from his family and make him less of the Perfect Son he is expected to be.) 

Another thing I’d like to ramble about is Donnie, his autism, and his relationship with his brothers and his dad….you mentioned in an ask that he doesn’t know he’s autistic but that may change when he starts living with the Hamatos. This made me think about how Donnie’s brothers react to his autistic traits in canon versus in tlp (assuming that no one knows that Donnie is autistic; they just know that his brain works Differently than the rest of theirs). In canon, Donnie has lived with his brothers for his entire life. His brothers know his habits, his preferences, his sensitivities, his moods, etc. He may be Different than the rest of them, but not so much that they think about it for more than 5 minutes. Donnie is their brother - any “weird” behavior is not too different from how how he usually acts. Donnie may be weird but they all are in their own ways and it’s not a big deal to them. His brothers are used to accommodating his needs and dealing with his moods. However, in tlp, Raph, Mikey, and Leo don’t know him very well yet. They’ve never lived with him before and when they do accept Donnie into their home as an Official Brother (a development I’m very excited for), they also can’t help but immediately recognize the stuff that makes him Different from the rest of them (if they’re the ones that recognize that it could be autism, than it’s Differences in a way that’s Familiar, if that makes sense). Differences that aren’t just unhealthy habits and mindsets from his previous shitty living situation. Obviously they can be accommodating but it would understandably take longer to adjust simply because they’re not used to Donnie’s specific quirks. They don’t know right away what makes him uncomfortable, or what textures he prefers, or why he moves and talks and acts the way he does. It’s a learning experience for everyone. 

As for Donnie and Splinter….they make me so emotional!!!! Your art of the two of them is so so good and captures that emotion. When Donnie lives with the Hamatos, everything changes. Anyone would have difficulties adjusting to this huge change, but I imagine for Donnie it’s a lot harder. How do you cope with leaving your mother, your only family member you’ve known your entire life? And now suddenly he has to stop being His Mother’s Son and become His Father’s Son, another role he has to create and adjust to (he doesn’t realize yet that his father doesn’t need Donnie to try to be someone he’s not - he loves Donnie unconditionally, just the way he is ;-;) because having a role to play is familiar to him, the only familiar thing he can cling onto during these huge changes in his life. Unfortunately though it just makes everything more exhausting, not only coping with the move into a literal sewer but trying to act like a perfect son for Splinter. Donnie doesn’t know yet that he doesn’t have to mask in front of a parent or meet impossible expectations to “earn” parental love and approval. Meanwhile Splinter sees how Donnie acts with his brothers (much more casual because Donnie doesn’t feel as if he has to “impress” his brothers the way he has to with a parental figure) versus how Donnie acts with him and thinks he’s doing something wrong, that he’s the one giving off an impression to his new son that he has to suppress his stims or say the “right” things or do stuff that makes him uncomfortable because he thinks it’ll make his parent happy…..but I have faith that this pressure eases with time, that they get more comfortable around each other the longer they live together. Eventually Donnie won’t be hesitant or embarrassed to take off the mask in front of his father. Maybe one day he’ll get rid of the mask around his family entirely!! Either way I’m excited to see tlp Donnie’s journey :) thanks for sharing your au with us!

HI THIS IS BEANNARY SPEAKING NOW wow this was so much and im sooooo glad that you are enjoying this au! And for real its so flattering that you like?? wrote all this about my silly au this has actually been the only thing that I could think about since you asked if you could send this in and yeah it’s just really nice to see that people like my comic and this little separated au that i dreamed up

One of the big differences between canon donnie and tlp donnie is tlp donnie’s ability to mask really well. When he was a kid, a lot of his stims were cute and adorable so Big Mama didn’t like encourage them? but let him you know stim freely since she thought it was cute, but as he got older and he kept on stimming in obvious ways she started really hounding him to stop. I do really like the idea of donnie starting to stim in more subtle ways, and im definitely going to try to incorporate that in some of the comics! He still needs to stim, because you know of the autism, and so he does tap his feet and play with whatever little object he can get in his hands when he’s in public. His room is his one safe space where he can really be himself, since its the one spot where he’s not being watched by anyone (his safe space isn’t his lab because what he does in his lab is highly controlled by Big Mama so while he does like being in there and getting to do his science, he’s still pretty on edge since he never knows if his mom is watching him or not). Donnie really loves spending time in his room, though he doesn’t really get a whole lot of time there by himself since Big Mama has filled his schedule with as many extra curriculars as possible so she can show him off all the time). But speaking of his room it sure would be bad if something happened to it! Sure would be bad if it was destroyed in some way thereby destroying his one safe space! Haha! ;)

And no! Donnie does not know how to cope in healthy ways! He is very good at figuring out when he is about to have a meltdown and at figuring out a way to subtly get out of a situation so he can go recuperate somewhere in private, but even then, he can never spend a whole lot of time to himself because if he ever disappeared for an abnormally long amount of time, it would draw attention to himself and more specifically to these meltdowns that he’s having and he really wants those to stay off of Big Mama’s radar since if she knows about them then that’s one more thing for her to criticize and then it’ll be even harder for him to deal with them with his mom now being aware of them. And yeah he does know about autism but he’s still like no it simply could not be me but in that way where he’s like 99% sure he’s autistic but is just refusing to acknowledge it so he can keep on pretending to be ‘normal’. if that makes sense alksdjfh

Living with the Hamatos is going to be very hectic and scary for Donnie just because of how different their home is from his current home. In tlp, Raph also is autistic im pretty sure idk I might change that as the comic progresses but at this point that is what im going with but just havent had a whole lot of time to develop, but that’s part of the reason why the hamatos are so accepting of Donnie, its because they’re already used to living with a sibling who is autistic so all of this is second nature to them, it’s just normal and that really throws donnie for a loop because he’s so used to walking on all these eggshells making sure to act as allistic as possible 24/7 only to be suddenly dumped into an environment where its completely normal and accepted for him to just be himself. And sure it’ll be a learning curve for the hamatos because like obviously not all autistic people are the same but it’ll also be a learning curve for donnie since he’ll finally be able to relax and figure out who he is without having to hide himself all the time. 

Donnie and splinter’s relationship is what im really the most excited to write about. I really want Donnie’s experience leaving Big Mama to mirror Splinter’s experience. And I really don’t want to spoil too much but Donnie is really not gonna like Splinter much at first, and it’s gonna take a while for Donnie to warm up to his dad, but also Splinter is going to be the most understanding of what Donnie is going through because well, Splinter also left an abusive relationship with Big Mama. I dont really want to say much more about their relationship because I dont want to spoil the good angst I have planned but I’m really excited to explore their relationship more!!!!

Also just for the record I have not like proofread any of this so there may be typos or maybe i said something dumb so just lmk and ill fix it aklsdjhf Im not autistic (or am I! I havent been to therapy in a while and I would not be surprised to find out that I am autistic or that I have adhd or something else) so lmk if i said something stupid or phrased something in a dumb way and I cannot emphasize how fast I will fix it 

Ok bye now!!! this was fun!!! and thank you for sending this in!!! Idk it just really warms my heart that someone out there is thinking about this silly au this much, makes it feel like all the work ive put into making this comic is worth it :)

[rarepair-haven]

I think a cool shipname for the Fellmare ship would be: Redmoon!

That's because, well...Nightmare is related to the moon, and Fell is related to the color red, so...I think you get the idea-

Well, I think their dynamic would be...interesting.

They both really suffered enough, especially in a place where monsters keep killing each other.

And Nightmare has suffered several times from the residents of the village where he lived.

And unlike Fell, he managed to get himself out of this problem, and now he can do whatever he wants.

I really don't imagine the two of them being morally right in this relationship. I imagine more Nightmare and Fell sharing the shit in life, and Fell ending up having the ✨bastarlization arc✨ (not that he isn't a bastard already, but anyway-).

Anyway, I imagine Nightmare wanting more minions for himself, because he needed more allies, right?

So why not find an ally in an au corrupted by evil and monsters are already bad in themselves?

I feel like Nightmare would pull that polite bastard on Fell, and he'd try to convince him to join the Bad Guys.

Fell would find the name stupid, but he would enter, as he no longer had hope in that world, so much so that even his own brother became corrupted.

And well, they would maybe geek out a little about books and space, since Fell is still a Sans, so he would like astronomy, Fell would tease Nightmare with puns and knock knock jokes, they would both end up with some ass, they would have conversations like:

Fell: I feel like dying now

Nightmare: Same

And well, they would basically be depressive idiots evil bastards in love.

Fell would certainly have his strange habits, like drinking mustard and other condiments.

And Nightmare, since he's a "gentleman", would find that strange and disgusting.

And in the end, Nightmare would fill up on hot dogs and other junk that had already passed its expiration date with Fell 👍

They are both old, what can we do?

It’s my firm belief that the bad sans gang took one look at fell, held him up simba style, and made him their mascot. Hes edgy he’s loud he’s violently funny, he’s the perfect specimen to put in a room with an egotistical 500 year old and place bets on if it’s gonna end in a kiss or a pile of dust

[growling]

kokolight (vivia x yuma ) annnnd kokohell

kokolight:

Don’t Ship I

1. Why don’t you ship it?

Vivia is such a nothing character to me there is nothing that would make me in any way interested in whatever it is he has to say. I hope a lammergeier drops a turtle on him. Also I usually do not care for the agency I am so sorry Yomi brain makes me violent

2. What would have made you like it?

if Vivia tried to kill him more times and more violently. or if he showed any amount of interest in Yuma before chapter 4. or if Vivia wasn't Vivia but was instead replaced by director of the peacekeepers Yomi Hellsmile from Master Detective Archives: Rain Code

3. Despite not shipping it, do you have anything positive to say about it?

ummmmmmm uhhhhh well its not atrocious. it doesn't make me mad or anything i guess the height difference is poggers as always. i appreciate the murder

kokohell:

Ship It

1. What made you ship it?

mashing the main boy and the (secondary) antagonist together the old sacred fandom tradition. aside from that i do not rember :( also vibes.

2. What are your favorite things about the ship?

auuughhhh uhhh where do i start. you'll have to ask me in a hyperspecific way if you want any coherent answer... guess the height difference is poggers as always. yuma could just walk up into his cape pull it over himself and just hide there . and the fact that yuma is just makoto with a few less extra steps. would yomi just start noticing little things that make him always get reminded of makoto for some reason, or is he just near completely oblivious and if/when he finds out that yuma is his original would he go through all five stages of grief aka denial, denial, denial, denial and acceptance. also i BEG all of the raincoders to just think a little while longer about homunculus x human relationships. like... how does yomi handle the whole *gestures* thingy. or does he not handle it. the dynamic is also real funny and glorious and i (or we... whatever.....) think i popped off with this one. yomi deserves a pathetic tiny fragile purse dog he can pick up like a hamburger and carry everywhere to show off to people like "check out my little pogchamp isnt he so mouse shaped" and yuma deserves an extremely aggressive large guard dog that meows sometimes because good lord that scrawny thing needs at least some semblance of protection at all times. and i said semblance because yomi gets punched once and falls over on the ground scream crying he will not save him in a dire situation. its moreso the intimidation factor you know the illusion of safety. he won't actually be safe with him alone they need a goon entourage. also i made up an entire kokohell au once where yuma instead becomes a peacekeeper and steals seth's job i guess thats also a thing

3. Is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship?

are there. any popular opinions on kokohell. its just me, three other guys on tumbler, and one other japanese guy from pixiv/twitter that draws them with more raw skill than leonardo da vinci. yuma tops

[softprettything]

late bloomer, ch 7

AO3 | Previous | Next

Fandom: OHSHC

Pairing: Kyoya/Reader

Tags: 18+, A/B/O Dynamics, College AU, Fake Dating, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Slice of Life, Eventual Smut

Summary: Nobody ever said falling in love with your best friend would be easy.

Taglist (new!): @silverhetdanes @lampalooza

late bloomer, ch 7

“There’s my girl,” Kaoru crows as soon as he spots you. At a look from Hikaru, he amends, “Our girl,” and pulls you into a hug. Low in your ear, he says, “Not Haruhi’s, but…”

You push away. “If you’re going to be a dick, I’ll just head home.”

“Noooo,” he whines.

“Ignore him, (Y/N).” Hikaru pops around your other shoulder. “He was three shots in before he even reached the pregame.”

“Yeah, which means she has some catching up to do!” Kaoru offers the red solo cup currently in his hand, full of whatever godawful concoction the Thetas have thrown together this time.

You shake your head, and he pouts at you. “You know my rule.”

“Never drink the jungle juice,” the three of you say in tandem.

Kaoru rolls his eyes, but takes the cup back, at least, knocking back most of its contents in one gulp. You can’t help but wince. Kaoru’s always had the strongest capacity for liquor of anyone you know, which makes you incredibly concerned for his health past graduation. “Spoken like someone who’s never really lived,” he says.

“Spoken like someone who wants to have a working liver when I’m thirty.”

“There’s some canned drinks in the kitchen, I think.” Hikaru says. “Want us to show you?”

“Nah, you can stay here. I’ll be right back.”

You push through the dark and sweaty room and are relieved to make it to the kitchen, which isn’t quite empty but is at least marginally less crowded. You pop open a watermelon seltzer and try to breathe.

“You sure that’s a good idea?”

You almost jump at the sound of his voice. “What are you doing here?”

“I could ask you the same thing,” Kyoya says. He’s leaning against the counter, looking relatively casual in a sweater and slacks. Not exactly frat-party attire, but at least it’s a departure from the suit. “You know overconsumption of alcohol can lead to fainting.”

You roll your eyes, and take a sip of your drink for good measure. A few sips. If Kyoya Ootori is going to try and engage you in some section-asshole-pedantry in the middle of a Theta party, you’d like to be as drunk as humanly possible. “I appreciate the concern, but I doubt one White Claw every three months is going to make me blackout.”

“You don’t drink a lot, then.”

“Are you surprised?”

“Maybe.” If it was anyone else, you would think he was teasing you. But he sounds so serious. Everything he says sounds so serious, and its seriously starting to get on your nerves.

“What, you had me pegged as an alcoholic?”

“Never mind.” He moves to take a sip of own drink, and you raise a brow, looking from the (mostly full) cup to his face. “Vodka and Sprite,” he says by way of explanation. You can tell by the wince on his face after he sips that he’s telling the truth. “Terrible.”

You can’t help but laugh. “What were you expecting, scotch? Or apple juice?”

“Right now I’d take either,” he says. “Gladly. It’d be leagues better than this.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“Vodka and Sprite?”

“What you’re doing here,” you correct him. “I’ve never seen someone who looks like they’ve been to less parties in my life.”

“Unlike you, a true connoisseur,” he says, eyeing your can. “How you can make it through one of these with nothing but a White Claw every three months is beyond me.”

“Oh. No, I was dragged here by some friends. I’m not really a party person, either.” You angle your head in the direction of the living room/dance floor. “I wish I was. I mean, they’re good if I’m in the mood, which usually involves being drunk off more than a seltzer.”

“How do you feel about shots?”

“What happened to overconsumption of alcohol can lead to fainting? ” He shrugs. You blink up at him. “I’m not opposed.”

He reaches over your shoulder, and you flinch before realizing that he’s just trying to get at the drinks on the kitchen island. Only at fancy-ass Ouran would the Greek life kids be able to afford a house like this, you can’t help but think. You step aside to allow him better access, and take the opportunity to get a better look at him. He’s not bad-looking. He doesn’t have the type of vitality that Tamaki has, nor is he intimidatingly buff; but he’s tall, and well-dressed, and his shoulders press against the fabric of his shirt in a way that implies a bit of lean muscle. His face looks as though it should be committed to paint (knowing the type of wealth he comes from, it probably has, several times); the smooth, pale-velvet skin; the slim, curved nose, arriving at an offensively delicate point at the end; the dark eyes; the bow-drawn lips; and all of this framed by a defined jaw and well-shaped cheekbones and that strikingly dark hair.

If only he weren’t such an ass.

“Tequila alright?”

You clear your throat, looking away before he can catch you staring at him. “They have salt and lime?”

“They must.”

“Then yeah. Yeah, that’s great.”

He hands you an empty cup and goes about cutting a few lime slices. You take the opportunity to pour your own shot, and wait for him to finish. Ass or not, you have to admit that this particular interaction is going well. Even if it started out with him questioning your drinking choices. “To becoming party people,” he says once you’re set up with the salt and the lime.

“To becoming party people.” You touch your cup to his, lick the back of your hand, down the shot, and find your eyes meeting his as you suck on the slice of lime. For some reason, it brings a smile to your face. You certainly didn’t expect at any point tonight to find yourself in a frat kitchen, taking tequila shots with Kyoya Ootori, of all people. “Does this mean we’re not enemies anymore?”

Now he raises a brow. “Were we ever?”

You snort. “I mean. We didn’t exactly get off on the best foot in class.”

“I hardly think a difference in opinion makes us enemies. It made for interesting conversation, at the least.”

“Oh, no.”

“What?”

You point at him. “You’re one of those devil’s advocate guys. Is that it?”

A little crease appears between his eyebrows. “What?”

“You just like to argue for fun? You get off on it? Is that how you think normal people communicate, just pointlessly debating all the time?”

“We were having a discussion. In a discussion seminar. What’s pointless about that?”

You roll your eyes. “Can we take another shot? Whatever looks like it’ll taste the worst.” You know by now that if you want to get really fucked up, you have to go for the cheap stuff.

Once that shot’s been downed, you clear your throat. “Okay. I just…you really didn’t feel like there was any bad blood between us? I mean, okay, what about the hospital the other day?”

He pauses. “What about it?”

“We…well. I sort of jumped down your throat.” You take a breath, then a sip of your seltzer, then another breath. “So I guess that was my fault. Sorry about that.”

“Forgiven. Though, for what it’s worth, I wasn’t holding it against you.”

“Nice of you.”

“You didn’t seem to be having a great day.”

“Well. Mondays, you know?” You tip your head back, enjoying the buzz that is rapidly taking hold. “Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays…Saturdays. Sundays. Hard to pick a least favorite.”

“Sounds miserable.”

You shake your head. “I’m exaggerating. It’s not actually that bad. But the first week of the semester is always the hardest.”

“And the second week. And the third, the fourth, the fifth.” When you focus your unsteady gaze on him, you’re delighted to realize there’s something like a glint in his eye. He really is teasing you. “And so on, and so on.”

“Sounds miserable,” you parrot back at him, and he almost cracks a smile. “Well. At least Tamaki and Haruhi—”

“Kyoya? What are you doing hiding out—oh.” Olivia stops in the kitchen doorway, and takes in the sight of the two of you. “Hi.”

“Hi.” You respond to her closed-mouth smile with an uneasy one of your own. Olivia seems nice enough, from your little exposure to her, but sorority omegas always make you nervous.

“I thought you were grabbing us drinks,” she says to Kyoya, winding an arm through his. If you weren’t already tipsy-on-the-way-to-shitfaced, you’d swear you see him tense slightly. “But I see you found Little Miss Joan-of-Arc here.”

Your smile freezes on your face as she turns back to you. “(Y/N),” you offer.

“Yeah, I know. Crusading against the big bad alpha-omega industrial complex, or whatever it is, right?”

She laughs. You join in, if only because you don’t know how the fuck else to respond, and those two back-to-back shots were definitely a bad idea. Kyoya doesn’t laugh. She notices.

“What? I’m just joking. It’s funny. (Y/N) doesn’t care, right (Y/N)?”

“Yeah.”

“See?” She cocks her head. “Y’know, it’s so crazy, I feel like I know everyone at Ouran. But I, like, didn’t have any idea of who you were until Monday. Are you a transfer?”

“No, I actually went here for undergrad before—”

“It’s just that I’ve never seen you, like, out. At any benefits or anything.”

And there it is.

There’s no denying—Ouran is a nice school. A private university, an elite and expensive private university, where scholarship students are few and far in between. And the elite tend to flock together. So it’s no wonder that Olivia (Freidmonte, a Google search after that first class revealed, and a literal fucking diamond heiress) would know all of the other rich kids (aka ninety percent of the student body) from benefits and balls and whatever else rich people did to pass the time.

Olivia’s not stupid. She’s probably put two and two together and figured out that you’re just too poor for her to have taken notice of before. But it seems, from the way she’s clinging to Kyoya with a grip that would put an anaconda to shame, that she’s probably just annoyed that a lowly beta on a scholarship would have the audacity to talk to her boyfriend. Drunk or not, you know when you’re not wanted in a room.

You clear your throat. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to…I just…I have to meet some friends out there. Sorry.” The room is starting to spin around you—in a drunk way, not a fainting way, you’re pretty sure—as you make your way out of the kitchen. “See you in class,” you mumble. Neither one of them responds.

Being in the louder, crowded room almost immediately makes you want to throw up, so you push through to the nearest door, which leads to the backyard. It’s not far enough into the season to be cold; a leftover summer evening, a gift in these early September days.

You stumble down the creaky wooden stairs and collapse with your back against the house, and absentmindedly take another sip of your White Claw, before realizing with a groan how that’s definitely not going to make you any less drunk.

Oh, well. You’re too thirsty to really care.

“Having that good of a night, hm?”

Not Kyoya this time; someone you don’t recognize. Or rather, someone you do, but not by name. “Oh. Hi…”

“Reese.”

“(Y/N).” They offer a very ring-heavy hand, which you shake. If you were more sober, you’d try to get a better look. Heavy jewelry bothers you to wear, but you always like seeing it on other people. And the sight of one particular ring rings some bell in your memory as to where you know Reese from. “Oh. You run the beta frat, right?”

If you were drunk, you wouldn’t have said that at all; especially not that bluntly. You’d spent years dodging Epsilon Phi’s recruitment efforts. They seemed nice enough, but you couldn’t justify carving out the time or the money (or the interest) to take part in Greek life. But it seemed like a nice space, as far as frats went. Friendly. Full of people (of all presentations) who didn’t think that betas ought to fade into the background.

One only had to look at Reese to demonstrate that. They were probably the best-looking person you’d seen in your life, right up there with Tamaki Suoh; they even had similar tanned skin and beaming eyes, though their hair was bright copper and closer-cropped than Tamaki’s. Wearing a bright, tastefully low-cut purple shirt and high-waisted jeans, with the aforementioned jewelry (in addition to the rings, you blearily clocked several necklaces, bracelets, and at least one cartilage piercing). “We don’t really call ourselves that, but yeah.”

“Sorry. Sorry, I don’t know what’s wrong with me tonight.” To your horror, you’re getting a little choked up. Something about the slog of the week; the reality of Haruhi going on a date with a guy who is, by all appearances, perfect; Olivia; Kyoya; those two-and-a-half drinks—it’s too much.

“Hey! It’s not a big deal, really. You’re fine.” They peer at you with what you dimly register as concern. “Are you okay? Do you need some water?”

“M’fine.”

“Yeah. Water. C’mon, the kitchen’s this way.”

“No, no, no,” you say, clinging to some vague idea that Kyoya and Olivia might still be there. After some coaxing, you do allow them to get you to the (blissfully empty) kitchen, find you an unopened bottle of water, and get you to divulge the names of the friends you came here with.

They disappear, but you only have all of thirty seconds to feel abandoned before they return with the twins, who fuss over you and determine immediately that you should probably go home. Even though it’s, like, ten in the evening.

This part of the night is the fuzziest, even as you’re living through it. Stumbling down empty streets. Crashing through your front door. Crouching in front of the toilet with one twin holding your hair back. Being tucked into bed on your side. The door; Haruhi’s voice; the door again, and quiet. Someone leaving pills and water and a big blue bottle on your nightstand. Sleep, curling around you.

And then, while you dream: flashes of warmth and witty remarks and dark, dark eyes.

[alfgifu]

Fic analysis 39. Rough handling

Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/51809101/chapters/130984120

Word count: 7,416

Chapters: 3

First posted: 24th November 2023

Last chapter up: 26th November 2023

Summary: 

Handling would certainly be needed this evening. I could feel the slight tug on the rope at my wrist as I pulled Kip along. His easy ability to keep pace with me made this less than satisfying as an outlet for my – frustration, call it frustration. (Better not to invoke fear, or fury, or any of the wilder emotions that shook and swirled beneath the parts of myself I deemed appropriate for you to acknowledge.) He had endangered himself. Deliberately. (I had no words to express my outraged panic on his behalf.)

Kip knew he was in trouble, of course.

How and why this came about

This was another fic that started as a chat, turned into a livefic for a few friends, and then sprouted out into a doc and AO3 publication of its own.

In this case the line of thought was around the way that Kip would be able to get involved in politics in his position as the emperor’s concubine, and the difference his role would make to the ways he could exercise influence. Accepting a risk to his life, as he does in canon, would be far more visible to his Radiancy and most definitely forbidden.

The other thought that went into this fic was that his Radiancy would struggle to distinguish between his own ‘unacceptable’ desires (for sensation, for multiple partners, to be absorbed into a crowd and no longer set apart, to not be in charge) and Kip’s (Kip would be largely uninterested in sex if it were not now his core competency and most valued asset). His Radiancy is also unable to draw boundaries between real and play punishment. Having slid so far across his own moral event horizon he is, as the tags of another fic say, bad at boundaries.

What worked and what didn’t

One recurring theme of evil!household is that Kip is, for the emperor, an exception to all his usual rules. On some level he sees Kip as an extension of himself and - in most of the fics, through most of the AU - nobody calls him on it. I’m pleased with the quiet moment in this fic where his Radiancy is careful to listen to and respect Ludvic’s preferences at the same time as he is ignoring and overriding Kip’s, which really crystallises the concept.

I’m also pleased with the depiction of sex, with the way the narration loses focus as Kip is losing focus, and with the continuing stark contrast in perspectives between Kip and his Radiancy and those around them.

What I learned from writing it

This fic (and evil!household in general) definitely improved my ability to write erotica. Mostly in a depraved direction, but when I came back to softer sex scenes in future works I think you can see the improvement there too.

I was also getting better at tagging and naming fics, and really enjoying working through the crunchy emotional and moral dynamics that the scenarios threw up, as well as their impact on those involved. Cognitive dissonance fascinates me and so do bad choices and messed-up power dynamics - we all encounter these things and engage in them in our own lives, and this sort of story lets me as an author push that into an extreme that reveals so much about human nature.

One thing I didn’t think much about at the time but have realised through this exercise is how rapidly I dropped all the early e!household fics. A chapter a day between 18th and 26th November 2023 to get this far - I had a backlog, because I hadn’t wanted to post any of them while still uploading Cross your heart. At the time I didn’t think much of it… I had been posting something almost every day for months, and just kept going with whatever was next in the queue. But on reflection it was hardly fair, in contrast to the level of care I took around floating CYH, that I just pinged out this whole raft of content in a separate dubcon-to-noncon AU immediately following that without at least taking a slight break.

Now that I’m writing less and looking over the range of things I have written and posted, I feel like I’m seeing more of the dynamics around how posting impacts on the way people see and interact with the fic. None of this is terrible, but it does make me want to be more intentional about what I’m doing going forward.

[mochiwrites]

which dynamic do you think scarian is in the Fairy tale vers? me personally? im thinkin a bit like jerza but also not? mmmaybe gajevy (its impossible to pin their dynamic into any ship obvi but this is just a lil fun thing lol)

OHMYGOD YOU’VE JUST BECOME THE BEST PERSON EVER TO ME

ohmygod okay okay okay. I’m apologizing SO hard in advance for how nerdy I’m about to get.

jerza and gajevy are 100% valid answers!!! I can see scarian’s dynamic in both those pairs and I 🥺

if we take scarian at their CORE dynamic, ignoring the angst (we’ll get to that >:3) and with the two of them at their rawest form as characters, my answer is nalu.

and no it’s not just because they’re my favorite fairy tail ship I promise — well, maybe it does play a small part :3

let’s look at natsu and lucy first here, and then apply scarian.

SO. natsu and lucy. very much the dynamic of “a follows b around and tries to stop b from doing something Stupid” but there’s more! natsu and lucy hold a lot of respect for one another, as well as trust. there’s this bond between them that goes a lot farther than any kind of label. it’s the way they know one another like the back of their hand, and their communication doesn’t even need to be verbal for the other to pick up on the message.

natsu can read lucy like an open book. lucy can Mostly read natsu like an open book.

lucy is the One person who can pull natsu back before he goes too far. and natsu encourages lucy when she’s close to giving up.

and their banter???? the way lucy tries to keep natsu from doing something dumb but somehow gets roped into whatever he’s going to do anyways?

lucy is very much natsu’s home, as evident by the number of times he’s snuck into her apartment. and lucy is Not quiet about her complaints about natsu. but at the end of the day, they have each other’s backs and I’m going to stop before I go Any Further or else I’m going to derail this ENTIRE thing.

ahem. right. so. Scarian.

already you kinda start to see the similarities between the two pairs, yeah? grian tries to stop scar from doing stupid thing, somehow gets roped into it anyways. and he very much complains the entire time, even as he helps.

scarian trust each other a lot. and you can see that in third life and double life. I know people seem to get on scarian about their “lack of communication” but in actuality their communication in double life was just fine. they’ve done this rodeo before. they know how to trust and communicate with one another without needing to do it verbally.

they know how to trust each other.

they hold each other as equals, they joke and banter and grian knows how to read scar very well. scar can… sort of read grian? but grian is a very complex character to begin with.

also scar just…. fits as natsu so well? dorky, lovable himbo who likes to burn things. also early ft!natsu with his chest out. gestures to scitties. enough said

and grian Mostly fits in that role as lucy. he’s the one pulling scar back (or at least trying to), complaining whenever scar tries to do something dumb but still helping him anyways.

scar and grian have a mutual trust and respect for one another, much like natsu and lucy do.

and I mean. C’mon. grian killing scar in third life? natsu seeing future lucy die? OR OR OR natsu and happy disappearing for like a year without telling lucy in person because he wanted to become stronger? grian pushing scar away after third life without telling him why because he didn’t want to hurt scar again?

also !!!!! grian and scar are ALWAYS attached at the hip, much like natsu and lucy.

I think out of all the fairy tail ships, scarian most closely fits nalu, nerd rant over LMAO

god one of these days I’m going to write such a self indulgent hermitcraft fairy tail au

[acaciapines]

SONG 19 FOR THE OWL HOUSE DAEMON AU LETS GO

YAY WHOOO HIIIIII <3

19. No Hell – Cloud Cult

she thinks she might be a little bit on fire.

hunter’s on her shoulder like he so often is these days, no matter how many times it means mom double-takes when she sees them, thinking mari but getting hunter instead, and luz isn’t so sure who she is in the weird smashing-together that is her-mari-hunter-flapjack but she’s sort of starting to not care about that so much anymore. whatever happens she’s her, and if that her-ness includes hunter and flapjack, then that’s alright. she wants them there.

“they aren’t going to like this,” hunter says. his wings are tucked close to him, his red dull in the darkness. behind luz flapjack follows loyally, and she can feel their worry, or maybe mari’s, the bat clinging to flapjack’s frame, but what else do they have to do?

they go together. whatever else.

“yeah, well.” luz reaches up a hand to bury in hunter’s feathers, feel the pulsing of whatever palismen—daemons?—have instead of a heart. “it’s gonna save them all. i think they’ll forgive us.”

for a moment hunter’s quiet as luz pulls her door shut behind her. flapjack lifts their head, sniffs at the air. nothing, they twitch, and mari curls her wing-claws deeper into their fur.

“do you think we get out of this?” hunter’s voice is near-whisper. “as—as ourselves.”

“we’ll get out as someone,” luz says. “guess we’ll figure it out on the other side.”

Discussion

okay firstly YOU FOUND MY MOST FAVORITE LUZ&HUNTER SONG EVER!!!!!! sorry everyone go listen to this song right now it RULES okay it is the most song of all time. if any of you remember my postcanon hunterfic but then a bigger heart grew back this is the song the title is from!!

anyways to Talk.

its so so funny that everyone keeps sending in early numbers lkdfgdf a lot of the more recent stuff is 100+ so revisiting these old ones is really interesting, since like, i literally JUST finished writing thanks to them where a lot of these luz&hunter dynamics come from.

like, this is....so off from what i ended up writing! its so WEIRD that originally mari was coming along for the ride bc her and luz's relationship certainly uh. aint doing so hot right now dfkjgdfg. and wow just. like this is actually fascinating to me. bc its somehow so close to what ended up being canon and also so so far off.

also you might notice i say hunter has 'red feathers' which is SO FUNNY bc this is back when i thought his main non-witch form would be a cardinal! and its not! its a SPECIAL cardinal from the demon realm! a palistrom cardinal <3 ALSO THEY/THEM FLAPJACK......look i do a Lot with flapjack in regards to name/pronouns as time goes on. originally flapjack was gonna change up pronouns as early as like, eclipse lake? yeah that didnt happen drkjgfg.

i stand by the last bit tho. that's always been the core of what i wanted to do with these guys--they'll get out as someone. only time will tell who that is.

anyways go listen to no hell its one of my favorite songs of all <3

[thepandalion]

While everyone is looking at homestuck stuff today might as well get a shoutout for my currently unnamed music au featuring pitch vriskezi

(under the cut this time is only au stuff! Noone is gonna ask so might as well get the rant out now)

It’s basically a meteorstuck kinda au? Except I decided to say fuck it all the trolls are alive (mostly because I have a few songs in my playlist that are very much feferi<>sollox vibe and I kinda need them alive to be able to sing yknow)

So uh. Trolls are kinda bug-like. And they communicate with words, yes, but also with dancing, like bees? A lot of body language, especially when it comes to your quadrants; leaning on your moirail’s shoulder, grabbing your kismesis’ wrist to stop them from turning away from you... and also just actual dancing and stuff. So, trolls dance. But then Dave and Rose get on the meteor and teach them about how humans communicate. With music.

Cuz like, in the au, humans can get on the same wavelength as other humans via song. Singing is a way a human shows how they feel or think about anything at any given moment. You gotta learn the lyrics (unlike my other music au, which is also a magic au where the lyrics are chosen for you by fate gods aka me specifically and you dont gotta know the lyrics before singing) but like its sorta a bonding thing? and humans are social creatures so they gotta sing every once in a while or they get sadge

so the kids teach the trolls how to sing and thats all really fun and cool and whatever. meanwhile I’ve fallen prey to karkezi flushed propaganda via fanfiction so now Im sitting in the “what if dave and terezi moirails” because they’re my favorite beta kid&troll and the dynamic they have in canon makes my insides fluffy in the way a good moirallegiance gotta get outta you yknow.

Anyways timeskip to after they win Im very much ignoring how by that point both sessions were lost and I decided both of the groups win and like the humans make a new earth ig and like they still have their godtier stuff (at this point Im just picking and choosing what I want based on random music from my 600 songs playlist being put on shuffle). and uh. Well dave becomes a film person (I wanted to say director but also he writes the movies so also scriptwriter and just. he makes movies). And decides to make actual homestuck’s plot into a 12 movies and ongoing film franchise that is basically as well known as like. star wars or whatever. but bigger bc I never actually watched star wars so I only know about it the basic stuff a person who once dated someone who watched all the star wars movies enough times to quote them offhandedly would.

anyways dave is stuck with the part where the trolls get actually introduced to the audience in non-text form and is like “can I convince a bunch of actors to dye themselves grey and put candycorn looking horns on their heads without anyone thinking Ive lost it” when actual trolls (all 12 beta trolls+a bunch of friendsim trolls I thought would be fun to put in+unnamed background trolls for the confusion of wtf is sgrub) land a ship in the middle of area 51 and immediately get cornered by human guards patrolling the area in case aliens ever crashed there.

Anyways is now a good time to mention rose grew up to become the person who runs area 51 because she is and apparently at some point during the 3 years on the meteor she pulled like feferi and karkat aside to go “yo so when we win the games if yall wanna stop by earth 2.0 Imma go run our alien communication center so just ask the people there for rose lalonde yea” and uhh. they do. the other trolls in the background are Confusion over who tf this rose lalonde person is. the human guards are confused abt how tf the aliens know the full name of their leader bc usually the aliens just go “we want to speak to ur manager” or whatever so one of them takes their walkie talkie and talks to her and rose is like “oh hey they made it btw is one of them wearing green and looks like a vampire tell her I love her” to which kanaya fckn melts ig. soft gfs.

and uhh. well at this point except rose all the other beta kids can kinda teleport? Jade is still part-dog, john is wimdy, dave stops time and powerwalks over then unpauses time... rose just calls her limo like “dude I gotta get to this specific part of the desert plz” and by then dave is having a passionate debate with the guards about how trolls are actually awesome and the guard is like “they havent sang anything to make me think theyre intelligent species” or whatever and then the 12 main trolls do like. choreographed dancing with rainbow colors and stuff to various feel-good songs in my playlist. And then dave starts live streaming with scifi tech he alchemized during the game that he kept around like “yo ik theres rumors abt the trolls showing up for the next movie can we all give it up to my moirail and the rest of these lovely folk” to which the internet immediately implodes bc imagine fckn. idk. big time movie producer just starting a livestream in which he casually talks to a bunch of aliens while his half-dog bestie is floating the in background.

yeah and then the protagonist of friendsim sees that happening and goes to talk to the friendsim trolls who are there and thats fun and idk

dave is really good at assigning trolls random songs they should like. my playlist is almost entirely clown cult music its all violence and bright colors and yelling into the void and starting a revolution over the fact you suck at video games.

also the alpha kids are there. because dirk strider is my favorite homestuck character I want to dunk him in my tea like he’s a sad animal biscuit. he also gets a song where he and hal are being passive aggressive and sad about prince of heart stuff ig

[neoneun-au]

what the fuck

i was going to read one of the other (more recent) fics youve posted but when i went to your masterlist i remembered that i had never actually read this one. whether timing or whatever, i know i had started it a few times but i was just so distracted that i never got very far, though i knew one day would be the right time to sink into it. guess that was today

literally from the first paragraph i felt so so immersed in it. the setting, the narrative, the tone--everything was painted with such a fine, delicate brush. it just completely enveloped me and i was so so hooked immediately

i already knew youre a good writer. obviously. that was never in question. but there was something so transcendant about this one in particular. the allusions to fruit and food metaphors throughout, never too much but just enough to really pad the writing with such beauty and dynamism. it was just such a treat. such a complete joy to read.

it was so potent too, emotionally. i could feel it in the pit of my stomach the entire time. heart on edge, just waiting for a pin to drop. for the tension to let off. it walked such a fine balance of introspection and external forces and the whole time i just felt like i was on the edge of a cliff, wind whipping past, staring out over the horizon and just waiting for...something. waiting to jump, to fall, to be pushed, to see a ship come over a crest of a wave. it was just so deliciously paced and poignantly felt. im at a loss for words (obviously not literally since i keep typing but you know lol)

i was so immersed i didnt get much of a chance to clip out specific passages but there were a few that really stood out while reading enough to pull me out of my trance

this passage is everything. its the perfect example of how expertly crafted this entire thing was written as well. the choice of words, the sentence structure. it all comes together so well to convey the depth hiding in this humble farmer!au. it made me want to cry. very intensely. because havent we all felt this at some point. this yearning. this deep maw of need. greed for more.

then this line made me want to kill myself ! (in a good metaphorical way lol) these two back to back just. my god.

the readers imposter syndrome and their self sabotaging that always always ripples out to affect the lives of those that simply love them. so felt. so seen. so beautifully portrayed by you, dear writer.

"without your fingerprints all over him"

wow.

your writing is so lush. its so evocative. i have a hard time grasping for words that might convey how i felt about this and i continually come up short but im just in awe of how beautiful this story is. and to think i got to read it for free on tumblr dot com and it was written by such a dear, lovely, otherwise incredibly busy person lol

ill close my thoughts here by saying that ive read a lot of books in the last little while. a few classics. some that really resonated while i was reading them but that sort of drifted off as time went on and i wasnt present in their narratives anymore. i loved them. but i love this more. i can feel this slotting into my brain and lingering there at the edges. it makes me want to write.

TO GROW LOVE (AND EAT IT TO THE CORE)

pairing: mingyu x gn!reader wc: 8.1k summary: your whole life, you've only wanted one thing. then you meet mingyu. suddenly you want too much, and you wish the summer never ended. notes: farmer!au, established relationship, angst/hurt/a little comfort

this is a birthday fic for my one and only cat @wuahae ! yes this is about half a year late but what can i say. all good things come with time. thank you for being so kind, funny, and thoughtful (and patient)! not a day goes by where i’m not thankful for our friendship :)

and a million thanks to hana @wqnwoos and jackie @97-liners for helping me with edits. literally you guys are insane writers and i will never stop looking up to you.

i. strawberries (the summer we were young)

When a strawberry is ripe, the seeds push out from the heart of the fruit, as if it's bursting from the inside out.

This is one of the few and only things you've learned by living in Seogwipo, where strawberry season comes like a supernova. The May sun, full and heavy, peels into summer, and the roadside farms open their doors, trying to catch stray vacationers from Jeju City on the other side of the island.

That being said, there are approximately two things to do here. One of them is farm. The other is pretend like you have a life, which is your childhood friend Yizhuo's favorite thing to do when she's back from university on summer break.

Today, this involved convincing her ritzy, too-good Seoul friends that they're missing out on this side of Jeju. (Missing out on what? You're not sure. Perhaps the chipped paint of the mural walls, or the endless flat-topped stretches of seagrass. Yizhuo isn't fooling anyone, but you've always liked stretching your legs out in the bed of her pick-up, even on the long drive to nowhere.)

Unsurprisingly, her friends quickly came to the same conclusion. Just one look at your local strawberry patch, with none of the glamour of the bloated tourist traps in the city, and they decided they'd rather spend the afternoon at the beach.

It was then, between the fragaria blooms, when you met Mingyu. He asked for your name, and the rest was history. Yizhuo and co. scattered like the grasping hands of an overripe dandelion and you learned that he was, one, the newly-graduated son of a pair of local farmers, and two, very, very attractive. Almost too much so, especially for a place like this.

Now he holds up a berry, a bright red murder between his fingers, and tells you to try it.

"You must be delusional if you think i'm taking food from a stranger," you laugh, perched on the fence bordering the field. It sprawls before you, melon stripes on the sunbaked ground.

"No, my name is Mingyu," he replies. "No idea who delusional is." His smile, all bright lip and snaggletooth, tears into the scarlet belly of a newly picked strawberry.

"We all know what happened to Persephone."

"Well, if the underworld was a strawberry patch, I wouldn't mind being stuck there for all of eternity."

"What're you picking all these for, anyway?" you ask, watching Mingyu struggle with his too-big straw hat between the vines. His woven basket bleeds over with little berries.

"Jam. I make it on the very first day of every summer."

"Why?"

"You ask a lot of questions for someone who trespassed on my farm. You're cute, but I won't let you off easy."

He laughs at how you balk, clearly red-handed. You're not sure how to tell him you don't think you were supposed to be here either. You don't do things like sit in the back of trucks, trespass, or talk to pretty farmer boys who take a fancy to you, but it's the summer before you graduate and you're not even sure how long you'll have to continue making bad decisions.

"Are you gonna take my first-born now?" you joke instead. The daylight runs down the rim of Mingyu's hat, trickles down his brow, and you wish you could pour the image of him into a jar and keep it forever.

"No, but I will invite you in for some fresh jam on toast. I baked a loaf this morning." and when you say nothing, he continues. "The strawberries are only good once a year. It's the best you'll ever have. Promise."

It's a whine and a half, and somehow you convince yourself this will be the last bad decision you'll make. You've been here long enough to know that good things don't come twice in Seogwipo, and he is unlikely to be an exception.

Yizhuo blows up your phone, you tie the gingham apron around Mingyu's tiny waist, and the basket turns to blood in the saucepan.

Mingyu is right. Love comes to you in that kitchen, high and red like the sun, and the jam never tastes as good as it does that summer.

ii. watermelon (hollowed out, like a magic trick)

"A good watermelon sounds like a heartbeat."

You watch Mingyu heave the fruit, small and striped, out of his grocery bag. It joins the array of egg sandwiches and banana milks you picked up from the store together earlier. (There should have been chocolate Pepero too, but you split the box on the walk).

You're on a picnic, sprawled out on the outcropping overlooking the water. The path up is basically right behind your house, but you had never cared to visit. It had always been the local makeout spot, a schlocky teen crawl for those with nothing better to do, and yet, with Mingyu stretched out beside you, it seems newer. More exciting.

You're still just friends, or at least that's what you told Yizhuo. But ever since you sat on Mingyu's kitchen counter and ate from his jam-covered spatula, you don't think you've gone a week without seeing him. It's been almost two months, which seems so long and yet not long enough—he makes it easy to be greedy.

"See?" He thumps the watermelon with the heel of his palm. "Try it."

You already went through this entire charade at the grocery store, right in front of all the local aunties, but you indulge him. There's little point to triple checking if it's still ripe, but you think he just likes hitting it.

"It sounds good," you say. "But how are we even gonna eat it? We don't have a knife."

"Watch this." Mingyu procures a coin from his pocket. "You didn't learn this in elementary school? I feel like everyone was doing it."

"Here?" you ask, incredulous.

"Yeah, here. I grew up here too, you know."

He holds the edge of the coin to the skin and slams his palm into it once more, so that it lodges itself into the rind, and begins dragging it around the fruit. You start to wonder if he bought the watermelon just to show you a party trick—not that you mind, though. The strain of his biceps peeks through his rolled up white tee, and you remember why he was able to stop you with just one look back when you first met.

"No way." The watermelon is so ripe, it bleeds around the incision. "I feel like I know everyone here. And I definitely would have remembered you."

"I was probably, like, two grades above you," he replies. "And my parents shipped me off to live with my cousins after elementary school. They said I should get out of Seogwipo and experience the real world."

"Good call. There's nothing here." You watch Mingyu spin the melon over to cut through the other side. The coin catches the sunlight, and it looks like gold. "I wish I left for university. The one here is so small."

"Really?" He pauses to show you his handiwork. The two melon halves roll over on their backs, their cut edge cruel and jagged. "Cool, huh?"

"Impressive," you say. "Honestly. I really didn't think that would work."

"I didn't either when I first saw someone do it. But I’ll try anything once," he replies, ripping open the packaging of the plastic spoon from the bag. "I can't believe you don't like it here."

"You do?"

"Yeah. A lot." He shoves the spoon in his mouth, and you watch the watermelon juice pool around his lips. "I missed home. The trees and the tall grass and the ocean. All the fruits. Everything. I learned to ride a bike, right down there by the water."

"Hm." He passes you the spoon. You don't want to hog it, so you carve out a piece bigger than you need. "Are you gonna work at the farm?"

"Maybe. Haven't decided yet," he says. "I think I want to be here, though. Maybe do something with food, but I want to be home."

"That's funny, because I think I’ve always wanted to live a different life. Or at least one somewhere else."

"You want to go to law school, right?"

"Yeah." Mingyu is right. The watermelon is all sugar, and you would almost feel guilty for eating it if it wasn't technically good for you. "I’ve always wanted to be a lawyer. It's something about the people watching, I think."

"That’s really cool," Mingyu says, mouth full but no less sincere. It's then that you notice your shoulders are almost touching, and your heart crawls back up to your mouth. "You know what you want. I admire that."

He makes it sound like a compliment, but you're sure it's a curse.

You think of your parents. There's a permanent wrinkle ironed into their foreheads, the paper crease of expectations and high standards. It's not that they didn't care, but their kind of care was a humbled sort, made heavy by a hard life. It didn't help that your big sister Seohyun went straight from Yonsei to work a big tech job in San Francisco and never once looked back.

But you can't blame any of them—wanting has always been a hereditary failing. Sometimes Yizhuo will catch you frowning at nothing, and then you remember that life isn't a performance and every day ends at the same time no matter how hard you work. But you don't know how to tell her that the only thing you can do sometimes is want, because otherwise you wouldn't really have much at all.

It seems like the exact opposite of how Mingyu lives—everything about him seems to pass like the seasons. Maybe that's why you can't seem to get enough of each other.

"Thank you. Really." You dig the spoon into your half of the melon. There isn't much left. "You're way too nice to me."

"It’s not hard to be," he laughs. "Maybe you're just too hard on yourself."

You're losing track of the distance between the two of you. You can almost feel the heat playing off his skin.

"Maybe."

It's then, under the veil of summer, where you meet Mingyu's gaze and, finally, things seem close to simple.

All you know are his eyes, heavy with sun, and then the slow, slow move of his lips against yours. He tastes like August, long and sweet, and for once you know what it's like to not only want, but to have, and to have again.

The ocean sings on the horizon, and the watermelon bellies weep.

iii. adzuki beans (or, the blood of a headless taiyaki)

Mingyu eats taiyaki headfirst because he says it hurts less.

"That makes no sense," you tell him, your pinkies linked. You never really liked holding hands, but yours fits so perfectly in Mingyu's and there's some girlish, childlike shine to it when you watch his finger search for yours after just a moment separated.

"What do you mean."

He breaks your gaze to eye a red bean taiyaki, like an unwilling predator sizing up their prey. It's the lamest, most embarrassing iteration of National Geographic you've ever seen, and yet you cannot find any fiber within yourself not deeply in love with the lion.

Fall is a forgiving place for your relationship to settle. You're now a senior at university and he's started his gap year. Gap implies he's in the middle of something, but in true Mingyu fashion, he leaves it up to fate, or chance, or something not nearly as kind (whim).

"Taiyaki isn't alive. And why would you want to pretend it is? Eating gummy bears would become an extinction event."

"It kind of is." He holds out the tail end of the taiyaki, the pastry almost explicitly flayed open, in front of you to eat. "Why does the Haribo bear have a face? Why do the gummy bears live in a gummy forest?"

"Great, so now I can’t even enjoy gummy bears without feeling like a serial killer?"

You dig your pointer into his shoulders, broad from all the time he spends on the farm. To think that his hands, big and weathered, were made to pick berries (and now wrap around your pinky finger) is bruising, if not ridiculously funny.

"It's a crime of passion. Gummy passion. Prosecute that."

He kisses your cheek and your heart almost squeezes into two.

The terrible thing about being with Mingyu is how seemingly endless his affection is. Now he's feeding you in public and buying the two of you matching socks (cat and dog, to be exact), although you'll admit it's a little charming, even if the neighbors do gossip.

He's sweet, too sweet, and his kisses stick to the back of your throat.

But you can't be fooled. There's an unsaid violence to the way Mingyu loves. (The meticulous spiral of the peel he carves when you ask for him to cut you an apple. The grind, decisive and cruel, of a knife against a cutting board. A pair of canines against your neck, your jaw.)

Even now, he bites the head off another unwitting taiyaki before stuffing it back in the bag.

"We're still splitsing, right?" he says, with perhaps 1% of his mouth available for speaking and the other 99% murder machine.

Splits, he always says before you share food. You never had the heart to tell him that it's in the same family as mines or sharesies or takebacks—silly childhood relics, ones that no one uses anymore because they don't mean anything.

This time, you don't hear him because you're thinking about the law school fair you went to before Mingyu picked you up. The future is so close, it scares you. A year from now, what ground would you be standing on? Would it smell like this—the peat, the thread-spool fields, the balm of the ocean? Would you still have Mingyu's finger wrapped round yours?

"Have you decided if you're staying at the farm?" you ask.

"Not really." He uses the back of his hand to wipe off his chin. "If my sister decides to take over, I’m actually kinda thinking of going to pastry school instead of getting a masters."

Mingyu had been toying with the idea for some time after you had talked about it on the outlook. It started off as a joke (September; a galette), then a what if (October; green tea mochi), and now it sits at a kinda.

"Kinda?"

The word gathers speed in the pachinko machine of your mind. You never liked being a kinda person. For Mingyu, it seems like a luxury of a word, but for you, it's really just another thing to hide behind. Kinda talented, kinda ambitious, kinda just there. You're always one foot in, one foot out of something better.

"Yeah, kinda. Why?"

"I dunno. What if we both end up leaving?"

"Maybe. You still want to, right?"

You would be lying if you said you didn't—it's what you always wanted. Seogwipo has been a sun-rot, too-small crutch for you, but you would also be lying if you said you weren't terrified that you'd eventually come back, limping like some doomed Icarus, unable to truly make it in the real world.

Then you think of the pockmarked farmland beside your home, lacy with the fall harvest. Even now, you can trace the endless blue of the coastline all the way there, cut through all the maybes and just let the sound of the ocean fold you into sleep like you were a child again. You wonder if Seohyun, all the way on the other side of the world, ever misses it.

"I’m not sure," you say, because, as much as you don't like it, it's the only answer you have.

"It's ok. You'll figure it out. You always do." He squeezes your cheeks together between his thumb and index, laughing at how they pillow out underneath his fingers. "Screw pastry school. I could come with you. Who else would keep you fed?"

Mingyu's complete and unfounded belief in you makes you feel something close to betrayal. How could he say any of that? With what proof? Only someone like Mingyu would be able to hold the wrinkled fruit of your unremarkable life between his palms and see something better than that. Maybe it's because he grew up on a farm. Either that, or he already cares for you too much, too painfully.

Secrets are easy to keep when they look like yours. At least here, in the pit of your stomach, you can keep count, take attendance of them, all your tittering, small anxieties. Some days it feels like your ribs are pressing out, but it's better than cutting everything loose to spill out over what little you do have control over.

You can handle a little pressure. You have to.

What concerns you is the hand Mingyu's got across your chest. With one look, he just might gut you. A twist of the heart-knife, and all those carefully wound insides carved out in an instant—maybe he'd pity you, but worse than that, he'd likely be disappointed.

For you, expectation has always stood taller than shame, and the idea that he sees something past you makes you want to run away.

"I could be a house husband," he says as easily as ever. "You'll be off saving the world, arguing with whoever, and I'll be there to run you a bath afterwards."

"Let's not get too ahead of ourselves," you reply, binding up the strange, hollow feeling in your stomach with a laugh.

There's a scared little girl hiding inside you, and whether Mingyu sees her or not hurts the same. A spade is a spade. You can only pretend so long.

You look at the taiyaki floating in their wax paper bag, blinded and wrought open by the same grin that now peels you down, and you're not hungry anymore.

iv. winter pears (rotten, outside your parents' house)

Mingyu's family loves Christmas.

You think it's because of the pear trees they have in the front yard. They stand bravely before the house, all emerald ash and wisdom in the December freeze. Run your palms over the knobs and it's like you can see into a sleepy visage of simpler days past. (Below its heart, carved: 1982, the year the farm was bought. Along the tangle of the roots: gyu waz here, in an unsure, childish scrawl.)  

Winter comes to the countryside crawling on its hands and knees. On days it doesn't snow, there's a mist, boggy and clingy. You've come to realize the cold is more of a threat than a promise, and so the pear trees still bear fruit; the silvery branches hang heavy, faithful.

The first day of December, Mingyu's parents had tasked the two of you with decorating the farmhouse, a duty you took very seriously. You wrapped Mingyu up in string lights and watched him blink in and out like your own personal firefly.

It wasn't until you watched the rafters, the barn doors, the joyous vault of the ceiling all glow, like a spectacular firework, that you finally started to understand why Mingyu was so into the holidays.

It was in the yellow blush of the string lights that you had your first pear from the tree, which Mingyu insisted was a holiday tradition. We make poached pears, he said, mid-bite. You simmer the pear in syrup until it gets so soft, you can cut into it with a fork. Just like butter.

That same night, he kissed you, mouth hot and trembling and tasting of honey, and pressed you against the bark so hard, you could feel the grit of its veins against your skin.

You think December became your favorite month, and pears your favorite fruit.

So much so, that for the entire month, you try to put away your worries about law school applications to celebrate with Mingyu and his family.

You learn his mom makes the best hot chocolate (a cinnamon stick and a dogged devotion to the whisk), and that Mingyu has no clue on God's green earth how to ice skate. (He careens right into your chest the first time. You spend the next hour with him attached to you like a backpack—he manages to find the most impractical ways to do anything, which you somehow admire the most). On Sundays, Yizhuo ditches her Seoul friends and instead accompanies you to the mall two towns over, where she watches you compare different ties and watches and collagen creams as you decide on gifts for his family. (Lilac is so last year, she'd say, stirring the straw of a watered-down milk tea.)

It's not until the weekend before Christmas when you realize just how serious things have gotten. Your feet understand the meander of the dirt path to the farmhouse, your bones the scent of the yellow-skinned apple, the faded wildflowers. Your palms crave the plush of the rug they have in front of the fireplace. Hell, you can't even eat soondubu without thinking of the kind Mingyu's dad makes, with extra anchovies and green onion.

You don't think about what this means. There are ten days left in December and love poured from a full cup never seems to run out.

"Please let me carry some of those," Mingyu wheedles. "Oh my god. I'm like the worst boyfriend in the world."

"No, you are not." you make your way up to his doorstep, taking care to one-two step over the stray roots of one of the pear trees. It's second nature to you by now. "The moment I hand you a box, you are gonna start trying to figure out what it is."

He harumphs and plucks the big one off the top anyway, the one he knows you can't reach. "I didn't even know you were getting us gifts. You didn't have to."

"It's the least I could do. Who shows up to a holiday dinner emptyhanded?" You stop at the front door. "And stop shaking it," you laugh, using the tip of your boot to nudge his shin.

"Okay. Okay," he says, saccharine, adoring, before grabbing the doorknob. "Ready? Are you nervous? You shouldn't be nervous, right? It's not fancy or anything, if you were worried about that."

And that's the thing that wedges itself between your ribs. Mingyu and his whole family are like this. They love and worry and love again; it presses deep into you, fills you, and overflows.

So here you are, standing in your nicest dress and balancing a stack of gifts you hope will amount to something, never enough but something, to repay the people who you feel have loved you more than you deserve. It's all you really have. You do your best, and yet you know when that door opens, it'll all be washed away in a high-tide flurry of hugs and laughter and the familiar press of Bobpul's wet nose against your leg. They're just those kinds of people—they would be just as happy if you didn't bring anything at all, and somehow that makes you feel even more guilty.

"No, no," you wave him off. "I’m fine. Excited."

When Mingyu opens the door, everything goes just as you expected. His sister takes your coat, your gifts are whisked away to the tree (Aji has already figured out which one is his), and his parents descend upon you in a choking swell of warmth and charity.

We baked some fresh bread for your parents (—Thank you so much, but you really shouldn't have.). You look so beautiful in that color (—No, no, you flatter me too much.). Mingyu better be taking good care of you (—He is. He really, really is.).

The kitchen is gauzy with cinnamon, anise. They must be making their famous poached pears, which Mingyu remarks on, just like clockwork.

Dinner passes the same way. It bubbles over with affection, and you feel swallowed by an impossible yearning. This—a full table and a hand to hold underneath it—did you deserve this? And could you keep it?

For an instant, you picture yourself, years later, at this same seat. Mingyu would be fussing over the rice cakes, his apron still gingham because it reminds him of the day you two met. His parents, grayer but no less happy, bickering over the shade of tinsel on the tree. And the dogs, coiled at your feet like they are now. The vision laps at your bones like you're a raft in a storm.

You're pulled back into the moment when Mingyu squeezes your hand, grounding and insistent. "Mom asked how school was going. I told her I think you're basically the smartest person I know, and I’m pretty sure you're getting into whatever law school you want."

Mingyu's parents laugh, and they cut through their pears.

"Oh, sorry," you say. "Um."

Clink. Knife meets flesh, meets porcelain. Your cheeks are hot. You wanted to talk about anything other than yourself tonight. Clink.

"The top programs are a reach, but it'd be nice." clink. "I just want to get in somewhere."

"They’re all so far away," Mingyu's mom remarks. "So grown up. Any school will be lucky to have you. You'll get into all of them."

Clink.

"Or maybe you can stay here." You watch the prongs of Mingyu's father's fork disappear into the pear. "Keep us old folk company."

"No, no, I think Mingyu should take notes and get off his lazy ass," his sister says, teasing. "Going back to the city will be good for him."

"So you can, what, burn down the kitchen again?" Mingyu grumbles, and the whole table seems to boil over with laughter.

"We’re kidding," his mom tells you. "No matter where you go, I’m sure you'll do great. We can even throw you a party at the end of the year. For graduating."

Clink. Clink.

There's a horrible uneasiness writhing around in your stomach. It's pear and syrup and clove and a blackness, an anxious, selfish one that sucks up all the generosity of the evening and turns it into shame.

Mingyu's mom is talking about throwing you a graduation party, something you didn't even think to do for yourself, and here you are, thinking about the shaking moment you open your rejection letters and the lonely path you'll draw on your way back home.

It's ok. They missed out, Mingyu would say, pouring you a consolation drink, and then it would be over. You'd go home and sit on your bed and the trifold piece of paper would go round and round your head like it was in a washing machine.

Your heart, an inventory of tasks and goals and tally marks. Things you've taken and things you've owed. It's a soft, boneless excuse. Be grateful. Give them that, at least.

Clink.

Dessert ends before you can tell his family not to get their hopes up. Mingyu's mom sends you off with your loaf of bread and a kiss on the cheek, and the moment is gone.

"Gyu," you call out on the steps in front of the house.

There are words at the seam of your lips. You want to tell him you're sorry for worrying so much. For making the whole dinner about you and then very possibly having nothing to show for it when it matters. For the heaviness in your chest. Your cowardice. But none of it comes out.

Instead you watch Mingyu pull at the leaves of a pear tree, watching the frost-filigree they get at the end of the season. He looks over his shoulder and smiles at you, as if he's on the hazy cover of a magazine. His eyes bend so wonderfully at the corners when he looks at you, and it breaks your heart.

"You had fun, right?" he asks. "My parents like you a lot, you know. I think they really do."

But that's the problem, you want to say. You all do, and I have no idea why.

Some of the pears are beginning to rot now. You watch one drop off the vine, and it caves to the pavement like it was made of nothing at all.

v. wild barley (grows like weeds)

In March, you play house.

Your parents leave on a two week trip to see relatives, and Mingyu takes it upon himself to make sure you survive.

It's a kind, blinding charade.

(7 am, breakfast. You usually don't even eat breakfast, but you wake up to doenjang and a smile, one that presses itself to yours until you're wearing it on the long walk to school.)

(4 pm, the stretch between lunch and dinner. You're muddling through another useless club meeting when Mingyu sends you a picture of him in your mom's apron, making kimchi. Kiss the chef, he texts you. You promise to, over and over and over.)

It's good until it isn't.

That isn't to say that it's Mingyu's fault. In fact, it's never really Mingyu's fault, and that's the worst thing about your relationship. Sometimes you wish he was worse just so there was someone else to blame.

(1 am, a fridge-cold glass of water and a hand on the column of your spine. Can't sleep? He asks. Just had a weird dream, you say.

It's a lie. You're a liar.

You miss your parents and the first wave of acceptance letters comes out in two days. You're not like him. Sleep has never been a cure for the exhaustion you're feeling, and you have no way of telling him that however warm the bed is won't fix that.)

It's on a Thursday afternoon when you open your mailbox and see the tiny, thin envelope that you've been expecting for the past week. You don't need to open it to know what it says, and yet you do it anyway.

The sun is white, a ghost in the spring sky. The ocean bleeds into the overcast, the curly barley stands tall around your feet, and you let the worst letter you've gotten in your life fall upon your shoulders, word by terrible word.

Then you close it, pinching the seam shut, and draw up your brave face. Nothing left to do but be brave. You're convinced you've used up all the sadness in your relationship—spend in pennies and the well still runs dry. Mingyu will cup your cheek and call you darling, pouring into your emptying basin, holey and broken.

You see him now through the kitchen window, Venus in his clamshell of a kitchen. Galbijjim day, he had said this morning. Now, he waves at you, glittery with recognition.

Your throat feels like crumpled paper.

Mingyu smiles at you, hazy through the glass. Your cheeks hurt and your mouth is paper mache, but you smile back anyway.

///

The letters come one after another.

You know what the envelopes hold and yet you keep opening them. The little folder you keep stashed in your bottom drawer gets fatter every passing day because you can't help but revisit your misery, almost as if you need to remind yourself it exists.

Mingyu is none the wiser. Today he decides he'll put off pastry school for one more year. "It doesn't feel like the right time," he says, rolling a log of burdock kimbap up. "You know what I mean?"

No, you don't. You never really do.

You do know, however, that it would feel really fucking bad that, come the end of the year, to have nothing. All your friends would be going somewhere—even Yizhuo opened her acceptance to an MFA program in Shanghai yesterday—and you would be here, still, feet firmly planted in the muddy Jeju dirt like they always had been.

"Hey, don't look so disappointed." he jokes. "Don't tell me you're already trying to get rid of me."

You're not, you really aren't. But part of you wonders if it's just a race to the bottom. If you got rid of him before he decided he wanted to get rid of you, maybe it would hurt a lot less. One less letter for the folder.

"Never. But imagine if you picked up a French accent at pastry school. Then I’d consider it. Maybe."

You watch his knife rock back and forth on the cutting board as he cuts the kimbap.

"Some for you. And more for me," he says, in what you can only describe as someone attempting to speak French when they've never heard it before. "Unless you want more, mon cherie."

He brings the plates to the table, his grin nothing short of dizzying.

"I’m irresistible, huh? Still wanna leave me now?"

"You're gonna have to try a little harder than that, I think."

The words roll off your tongue, easily, traitorously.

You watch the kimbap disappear off of Mingyu's plate.

Going, going, gone.

///

Seogwipo is always dark at night, only kept alive by the glow of the moonlit sea.

You can't sleep. Again. And so you sit out on the steps in front of your house, letting the twilight wrap around you like a blanket.

You got your last letter back earlier today. You held your breath and tore it open like you would a birthday card with money in it.

Waitlisted.

It was surely better than a rejection, but some naive, child-eyed part of you thought that if you had just closed your eyes and hoped hard enough, things would work out the way you had planned. Tragically, it wasn't enough this time. You wanted and wanted and you thought maybe that would mean you'd come close to deserving it.

Your parents called today. After managing to sideline the issue of basically the rest of your entire life, they had finally cut through your sad little charade. No good news yet, huh?

No, but—

It was always like that with you. No, but it's not as bad as you think. No, but give me a chance. No, but I’m trying. I've been trying.

You wish things didn't come out of you so complicated. That you could be like Seohyun, who could go through school with her eyes closed and still graduate at the top of her class. Instead, you parade around your little failures, trying to convince people it all could mean something only if they squinted. See? It isn't so bad.

You think you're past the point of crying about it. Your stomach hurts, you're cold, and most of all, you just want to go back to bed. Plus, although Mingyu sleeps like a log, you think he's developed a sixth sense for whenever you get up too early.

Time to be brave, you've been telling yourself, although you don't know who you're pretending for anymore.

So you nudge the front door open—it's so old, it wails if you come at it with any more force—and, to your surprise, see the light above the kitchen sink turned on.

It's not very bright, but it's enough to make out Mingyu's broad silhouette, back turned to you as he makes a cup of tea. He's humming one of his made-up songs.

"Mingyu?"

"There you are," he says, turning around. "Just came out to check on you. And make you some tea."

The kettle whizzes. Your gut twists.

You still haven't said anything to Mingyu. To manage your own disappointment was one thing—you don't think you could handle another person's. And yet when he stands there, Pororo mug between his huge hands, you feel as if you are holding a knife, big and guilty and bloody.

"I-I'm fine, Gyu. Honest." you watch his expression flicker, unreadable in the persimmon lamplight. "Sorry you had to come out. It's chilly out here."

"You know, you can tell me what's going on. I won't judge."

No, no, no. This is the last conversation you wanted to have, with the last person you wanted to have it with.

You feel feverish. You think your hands are shaking.

"Mingyu, I swear—"

"Whatever it is, we can fix it. I know we can."

That almost makes you want to laugh if you didn't want to cry so bad. Of fucking course he would say that. Mingyu, who treats life like it's the watermelon trick he showed you on the outlook, wants to put a bandaid on this whole thing, as if that could come close to fixing it.

He'd tell you to curl up on the couch with a bad movie while he orders takeout. Kiss you on the top of the head. It's ok, baby. Just another bad day for the person who has the worst luck in the world. Another lump of problems for him to try and make better. If he isn't sick of you now, he sure would be soon enough.

"It’s okay," you say, steeling your voice. "It really isn't a big deal. Let's just go back to sleep."

You try to walk away, but the hardness in Mingyu's eyes roots you down to the tile.

"Stop doing that."

"Doing what?"

"Pushing me away," he swallows. "Like you always do. I know something's going on."

"I’m not, i just—"

"You just what? You can't help it?"

"No, I—"

"Because you like to know that you can? That you can say whatever and then watch me come back?" A fragmented, heavy silence thrums between you. He's looking at you like he's daring you to say something, anything. His gaze is black. "What am I good for if you can't tell me anything?"

There's that familiar, stinging pressure behind your eyes. You think you're crying, but you're not sure. Maybe you've been crying this whole time.

"Fine," you bite. Your blood feels like hot metal. "You really wanna know? I didn't get into law school. There. Happy now?"

Mingyu looks stung.

"W-why didn't you tell me?"

Because I thought you would stop loving me. I thought you would have finally had enough.

"Because it's not all about you, Mingyu."

The words, selfish and damning, burn your tongue. Mingyu is right. This is what you always do. You fuck up and then make everyone else hurt for it.

"I'm sorry," Mingyu says. His voice doesn't sound like his. Instead, the words seem to hang in the air, trembling and holding their breath, waiting for an apology you can't give yet. "I shouldn't have—"

"It's ok." You swallow hard, and it hurts. "Let's just go back to bed."

It's getting colder and colder. You think there's a little hole in your sock, right above the cat's whiskers.

Mingyu doesn't reach for you as he passes to get to the hallway. Maybe he doesn't know how to anymore.

The Pororo cup is left abandoned on the counter. You walk over and read the label on the tea bag—barley, because you have class tomorrow morning.

You pick it up, let the ceramic buzz between your hands with whatever warmth it has left, and hold it to your lips.

It's cold now, but all you can think to do is drink it. Erase all the evidence that tonight ever happened, and maybe it'll be nothing more than a bad dream in the morning.

There's honey at the bottom of the cup. It sears the back of your throat, but you drink until there's nothing left.

vi. the peach blossoms (without fail, bloom every August. I miss you.)

You broke up the next day.

Even now, you remember what happened. You had woken up early that morning to make your own breakfast because you couldn't allow Mingyu to give you any more of himself. Your hands could only hold, shatter, so much.

"Mingyu, I think we should...." You looked at the zigzags of jam on your toast, angry and uneven. "I think we should stop seeing each other. For now," you had added, as if that made anything better at all.

Somehow that seemed more merciful at the time. Really, you think it just showed your cowardice. If you were going to break his heart, you might as well have gone all the way the first time.

Maybe it was a good thing that Mingyu saw right through you. He always did.

"So that's it, huh? You're just gonna give up on us?"

"No, I just...need some time."

"How long?" he asked. "Be honest with me. Because you know I’ll wait."

"I don't know." You couldn't meet his gaze. His eyes reached and reached over that kitchen table and you denied him even that.

"Don't you always know?" he asked, pitifully, desperately. "Don't you want this to work?"

And you did. In fact, you don't think you had ever wanted anything more, and it was that that scared you. You had already lost law school—you couldn't let the only other thing in your life let you go. So you pulled the trigger first.

"We should just end things. I'm sorry. I can't give you what you need."

He packed his bag within the hour, and you think everything, from then on, froze inside you. You didn't move from your seat until your parents came home from the airport later that day and asked why there were two plates of toast still on the table.

You think you knew, someplace, inevitably, this would happen. You, who only knew hunger, had reached deep inside Mingyu and rooted out a love you didn't think you were worthy of having. And yet you still ate from the vine, bite after guilty bite, until you couldn't take any more. The only time he asked you for anything at all, you couldn't give it to him—such was the irony of your relationship.

Maybe you were doomed the moment the first strawberry hit your tongue, just like you had said, all that time ago.

About a month later, you got another letter in the mail. Chungnam National University Law School, it read. This one was fat, in one of those brown envelopes lined with bubble wrap. Somehow, miraculously, that position on the waitlist had turned into an acceptance. You held the package to your chest and cried, loud and with abandon, as if taking a deep breath after almost drowning.

Ironically, the first person you wanted to tell was Mingyu. But the good news you needed to save your relationship came too little, too late. Perhaps that meant it had no legs to stand on in the first place, but that didn't stop you from missing it. Instead, you told Yizhuo, and she drove you to Jeju City and treated you to dinner. "You should just call him," she had said. "Hey, don't look at me like that. He'd probably pick up on the first ring."

The city is swathed in August's crimson summer—peach season. The narrow streets are lined with peach trees, the fruits glowing like fat drops of sunlight. All you do these days is plan for your eventual move to Daejeon and the start of a life that seems newer and shinier than your own. But surrounded by the cicada song, the velvet treeline, the rain-soaked asphalt, somehow you think you're going to miss Seogwipo more than you think.

(Fickle, fickle heart. You always needed things to be taken away to really be able to appreciate them. Somehow, all that wanting had boiled down to something more satisfying, more filling.)

You wonder how Mingyu is. Now that you think about it, he seems just as much a part of Seogwipo as the farm he lives on. It was only last summer when you had first met him in the field, set on fire by the strawberry harvest. You think about him now, peddling around that ridiculous wicker basket to make jam. Maybe talking to another pretty girl, someone as naive, cruel as you had been.

Not long ago, you considered calling him to apologize, but that'd just be another thing to be selfish about. A little time and some warm weather, and I’m calling to finally wash my hands of you. That's what it would sound like, no matter what you said. Still, it didn't stop you from thinking of him, every flower, every season.

"You know, I always wanted to grow peach trees. But I think we've always been a pear kind of family."

Mingyu. If a voice could cut through air, it'd be his.

You whip around, half-believing you're hearing things. Certainly that would be easier, but you're learning that there are some things you can't run from.

And like a picture, Mingyu stands tall, golden, framed by the peach blossoms. Not a thing about him has changed. Not even the way he looks at you.

"Mingyu," you breathe. Unfortunately, none of the times you replayed your last conversation with him help you come up with something to say, because in none of them did you anticipate him coming back. "W-what are you doing here?"

"I live here, silly."

"No way," you reply, scrambling. "Crazy, because I live here too."

You both laugh nervously, a silly, bubbly thing, but you feel like you're going to throw up. It's only now that you realize you're kind of on the walk to his place. Seogwipo has never had places to hide.

"I...um." You try and disentangle the guilt from the nostalgia from the scent of the peaches and the warmth on his face. They all look the same. You missed him. "I got into law school. In Daejeon."

"I heard," he says. "Not surprised at all. I always knew you would."

"Thank you. I mean it." The cicadas buzz around you, as if they know they have an important silence to fill. "You're staying in town, right?"

"Actually, I decided to apply to culinary school. It finally felt right, you know? I'm leaving at the end of the summer, but it's just in Jeju City. I couldn't leave the island."

"Thank goodness. I don't know if you could tell, but I kind of always hoped you would. I don't think I’ve ever eaten better food." Your voice wobbles, but it gets there. "You'll do amazing."

Then time stretches and forces you to recognize, reckon with, the moment you're in. You wonder if he feels the same way you do—bruised, overripe. If there's still a space in his heart for you.

Deep breath. Life only gives you so many chances.

"Mingyu, I’m sorry. I'm sorry I couldn't make us work. You deserved better." Saying it feels like peeling the skin of your heart back. There's still a palpable distance between the two of you—you think that had always been there—but it feels more comfortable in a way it never did before.

"Don’t apologize," he says, easily, as he always does. Everything seems to flow off him like water, and you think that's the part of him you loved the most because it was the one thing you couldn't touch. "We loved each other. I think that much was true."

A jasmine breeze curls through the trees, sending the blossoms fluttering around you like ink in water. The very first time you met Mingyu, you thought the image of him, haloed with the sunset, was the one you wanted to keep forever. And yet, somehow, you don't think you'll ever forget the way he looks right now.

"Will you ever come back to Seogwipo?" you ask.

"I was gonna ask you the same thing—you were always the one who wanted to get out of here." He grins, ear to ear. "Of course I'm coming back. There's nowhere I'd rather be."

"Yeah. I think I know what you mean."

The sea, the clay dirt, Mingyu. Even yourself, clumsy and care-worn. You think, somewhere along the line, you forgot how to love. But you're learning—one step at a time.

"Friends," you say. "Let's be friends. If you'll let me."

"Thought you would never ask. Gladly. Always." The space between you seizes, like it's holding in a breath. Maybe one day, you'll think of closing it once more, but you like where you stand now. You can admire him better from a distance, without your fingerprints all over him. He stuffs his hands in his pockets, something he does before he gets ready to leave. But before he does—"I'll see you soon, okay? You better come back. Promise me."

For the first time, you see the honesty in his eyes and you really, truly believe him.

"Promise."

The Seogwipo sun is high and red in the sky when you wave Mingyu goodbye. It feels like you're coming to an end of a long summer, but you're not afraid. You watch the wind dance through the peach blossoms, their branches never searching, never wanting, and you finally feel as if you've arrived home.