#its not a sweater or food drive. its just a small act of thoughtfulness.

[jvzebel-x]

🦋

[bathic]

⌜JWY/FR⌟

Sure, having a demon for a housemate was unconventional but at least he knows how to cook.

↳Warnings: Pegging, anal fingering, hair pulling, coming in underwear.

By the time you stepped out, what was left of the evening sun had disappeared in favor of winter stars. New years was steadily approaching, and nothing you found pertaining to better your person seemed to stick enough to become a workable resolution. You rather liked yourself as you were. Weight, height, personality, attitude. Maybe your style needed a bit of upkeep, but you couldn’t find it in yourself to ditch the wardrobe you’ve collected over the years— even if some of the articles of clothing had worn thin and were one thread pull away from laying in a tattered heap on your closet floor.

Perhaps that was something you could work on. Giving up the old and less reliable and welcoming the new and sustainable.

The thought was one you could definitely apply to other things, one being the creature of disproportionate havoc waiting for you at your apartment. Knowing that he would be in a sour mood, one that he was in before you left for the evening to attend a company organized dinner party to celebrate the promotion of a beloved office favorite. You were happy for her, with her last big move on-up the corporate ladder been about a decade ago. She deserved it for sticking it out in that hellhole. You wouldn’t have done the same, leaving around the halfway mark for something worthwhile that’ll be more than just shoulder pats and passing approvals.

Damn did the bitterness soak in like the snow in the cracks of the sidewalk.

Seonghwa, your cubicle neighbor had given you a knowing look when the announcement was made regarding a newly crowned promotion. And when it ended up being a name that wasn’t yours or his, he’d simply rolled his eyes behind the black frame of his specs and turned back to his computer. Even he didn’t feel the need to waste the energy on something that’ll probably rear its head when he’s well into his age— that’s even if he sticks around that long. Essentially both of you had the same means of ditching the place at some point if the lack of proper acknowledgement is ever gifted. Kind of like a pact between the both of you. That at least kept you from acting rash until then.

The commute back to your apartment was a short one, a single bus drive that lasted a mere twenty minutes that you could have honestly walked but it was freezing outside and the long coat you wore over the red-wine suit didn’t really insulate the warmth of your body very well. That and the heels. Why’d you even bother wearing them in the high time of winter was beyond even your own comprehension.

But at least the lobby of the complex was warm, lightly decorated for new year's but nothing over the top.

The elevator ride up was uneventful, stuffy as it is being in a confined box. The smell of bleach faint in the still air.

You resided on the third floor, 308 with a burgundy door. Standing in front of it made the weight of the evening fall right off your shoulders. The need to soak until you were a proper prune made your hands work quickly to unlock the door, the key ring rattling in your haste to get inside.

Greeting you, was the smell of food. Something savory and well-made and the unfortunate side effect of that was your nonexistent hunger and the demon currently standing in the kitchen entrance, dressed in black sweater (your black sweater to be exact) with a frilly apron tied around his waist. His hair was pinned back, fiery red strands poking up here and there in an endearing mess. Small nubby horns in fawn to darker brown ombré sat within the crimson bird nest.

“Hey.” The casualness in your tone made him bristle, spade-tipped tail batting from side to side.

“That’s it? Hey?” Wooyoung looked like he swallowed a lemon, glaring at you beneath furrowed brows.

You shrugged off your coat, dropping it onto the coat hanger by the door. “Is that my sweater?”

He scoffs, arms crossing petulantly across his chest. “It is, I’m also wearing a pair of your panties underneath it. Would you like to know whose socks these are as well? I’m sure if you look you could probably guess correctly.”

You were sure it was all rhetorical, but that didn’t stop you from taking a glance downward, past his bare legs to his feet. Fuzzy socks gifted to you in a care package from Seonghwa welcomed your eyes. Violet with little golden stars embroidered between the woolly fabric. Wooyoung wiggled his toes and that adverted your attention back up to his sour expression.

“Do you like them? They’re pretty nice. Think I’ll drop a hint for another pair next year.”

“I don’t give two flapping shits about the socks. Where were you? I made dinner nearly two hours ago and ate most of it in an emotional fit. Because of you— I’ll be struggling to fit into my favorite pair of jeans and all you have to offer me when you waltz in here is a lousy hey and some mediocre small talk?” Surely if it was possible, Wooyoung would be steaming out the ears but instead his foot tapped restlessly against the ground and his tail swished erratically behind him.

“I told you not to worry about making some big feast because I was to be in attendance for a company dinner party and therefore wouldn’t be here to eat any of it.” You rolled your eyes at his childish behavior. For a demon who could very well do an insurmountable amount of damage to a person, he acted far below the stereotype glorified in modern movies and old folk tales.

If anything, he was more comparable to a miffed kitten. All hiss and hardly any claws.

“Oh, so it’s my fault then? I didn’t think you were serious about ditching me for the evening to hang around a bunch of circle jerking half-wits. Was the company worthwhile? Bet the food was shit and flavorless and the conversations could bore a junkie to sleep.”

“I didn’t say it was, but to answer your follow up question— it was about as eventful as watching paint dry. But at least Seonghwa managed to make it less mind-numbing.” You kicked off your heels, leaving them scattered and a problem for tomorrow morning.

At the mention of your coworker's name, one that the demon knew far too well, made his feathers ruffle more and surely, he would have looked like brooding hen if he was a bird. If Wooyoung was one thing, debatable by his standards, jealousy was it. The demon had a horrid case of proprietorial behavior, clinging onto you every second he could and burning hot daggers when anyone so much as spared you a passing word or glance. You were, in hindsight, like his favorite toy. And he didn’t take kindly to others trying to play with it— you.

That extended to your coworker. Someone harmless and less than interested in you in a romantic setting.

“Oh yeah? Did you give him a hand under the table? Let him have a bit of dessert before the main course? I bet you snuck off with him to the bathroom and played with his ass.” The words practically dripped like venom from his lips, thick and full of corrosion that would surely eat away at your skin like acid.

You scoffed this time, “Seriously, Wooyoung? Do you even hear what is coming out of your mouth, the nonsensical bullshit? How fucking sick in the head are you to even entertain the thought that I would be having my hands anywhere near my coworker let alone in his ass? Or vice versa. The only person’s ass I play with is yours and last I checked that hasn’t changed.” You were in his space in a couple of swift steps, having a couple inches on him meant that you had the ability to tower over him, which worked in your favor when he had to crane his head back to look up at you.

The movement of his adams apple bobbing caught your eye for a millisecond, a nervous twitch of sorts that he did when cornered.

Wooyoung opened his mouth to retort something, but it never made it into fruition when your own hand curved beneath his jaw, fingers digging into his cheeks causing his lips to bulge outward. “I’ve tolerated the jealousy act for a while now, even found it endearing from time to time but what I won’t condone is the insinuation that I would even think to stray away from you for another’s attention. Even if Seonghwa happens to be one of the most gorgeous men I’ve ever seen— at the end of the day, I come home to one person and one person only. And it isn’t him.”

It wasn’t one thing that served as a catalyst but rather several instances all at once— the promotion, the boring dinner party, the wasted homemade meal, the salacious way that Wooyoung talked to you, the mentioning of your coworker, the jealousy clinging to his posture, the glaring, the sweater, the apron, the socks, the overlooked admission regarding your underwear being worn. All of it seemed to accumulate together until the bomb between you two exploded in a flurry of hands, lips, tongues and teeth.

Wooyoung had his teeth latched onto the skin of your bottom lip, tongue swiping back and forth and nudging roughly against the fronts of your teeth. Instead of parting your jaw so he could slide into your mouth, you kept it clenched just to get him riled up at being denied. He was a brat after all, and when does misbehavior ever deserve a reward?

“Open your mouth.” He huffed, warm breath fanning across the round of your chin as your bottom lip flung back into place, released from its captivity between the demons' teeth.

“You don’t get to make demands after acting like a prick.” You shoved him against the outer wall of the kitchen, immediately crowding him once again. The position wasn’t anything new, in fact you could definitely recall the last time you had him trapped against this exact spot on this very wall just earlier this week. He wanted to play, as he put it, but you were in the middle of an online seminar regarding new tactics that would better improve work time and productivity and therefore could not divert your attention for his whims. His whims that just so happened to be the need to be ruined into an utterly sloppy mess of a creature— snot, tears, rosy cheeks, sweat, cum. Initially you could ignore him quite easily, but that nonplussed attitude would only spur him on till he was taking drastic measures. Which just so happened to be him, completely naked and standing across from you at the small dining room table, cock hard and laying on the tabletop, impishly smiling at you while he dragged his length back and forth causing the table to shake and stutter. Long story short, you had to suddenly make a quick exit with the excuse that your cat was covering your living room in explosive diarrhea before snatching the demon up, herding him against the wall and shoving several fingers up his ass and several more into his mouth.

Wooyoung had gotten his way then. What he wanted— your attention, your touch, the itch in his loins to be satisfied. And despite it all, you’d give it all to him no matter what tricks he pulled. You could say you were pretty smitten with your demonic housemate.

The ties holding the apron around his waist were swiftly tugged apart, the knot loosened prior to everything taking place, most likely due to comfort either after finishing cooking or from waiting. You could feel bad, feel just a smidgen of guilt if you hadn’t already told him about the dinner party several days ago. The fabric dropped at his feet, of which he kicked away quickly.

“Kiss me… please?” Wooyoung looked up at you through fluttering lashes, lips pulled into a pout.

Knowing he wasn’t going to be getting anything if he chose to be selfish (which is always), adding that little sugary word at the end paired with the coy little tilt of his head made it so easy for you to give in. But you wouldn’t be nice about it. You practically shoved his head into the wall with the force of your lips on his, roughly widening his mouth with your own so you could dart your tongue in and drag it along every surface. Wooyoung’s muffled whines were like a steady buzz at the back of your head, they felt good, sounded good. You loved to hear them just as much as you liked to see them fall from his kiss-swollen lips.

You parted just a breath away to squat down for a moment, hands riding up the backs of his thighs. “Jump.”

He didn’t need to be told twice, jumping up using the leverage of his grip around your shoulders. Your hands fell just beneath his ass, feeling the slightest bit of soft fabric against your fingertips. Wooyoung immediately latched back onto your lips, kissing you in a fevered haze as you carried him down the short hallway leading to your room, his room and the bathroom you both shared. Oddly enough, despite the demon taking residency in your bed more often than not, he still required his own room to sleep in from time to time (usually when he is upset with you but not in a way that gets him horny). Or when he chooses to partake in his gaming addiction that becomes a several weeklong binge. When that occurs, you wisely stay far from his door. Last time you neared it to check on him, the smell that wafted from the crack nearly sent you to your knees. It was… a peculiar smell, sweet and potent and you never really got around to asking where the hell it came from. Not that he would enlighten you, finding it embarrassing when you would bring it up.

Your bed was left as it had been this morning— askew with your comforter kicked towards the bottom and pillows crooked and laying in disarray. Throwing Wooyoung down in the fray made the entire thing come together, gave it purpose, made it make sense. Because he was a messy little imp, insufferable at worst and down bad at best. Or maybe that was you. Perhaps you’ve been with him for so long that you’ve started getting each other mixed up.

He looked up at you in a halo of fiery red hair, black sweater raised completely up his torso and bearing the sight of your aforementioned panties to you front and center. They were plum in color, nothing overtly sexy, just a simple pair of panties with a logo printed across the band. And yet seeing him sporting a chubby beneath the cotton fabric, perfectly outlined by the tight stretch of cloth made it undeniably sexy.

“I’m still mad at you. Picking those miserable losers over me. Could have had a nice warm meal and then me for dessert but instead you decided to entertain your stupid coworker over unseasoned slop.” Wooyoung was up on his elbows, tail batting against the sheets like a dark colored whip.

“It was a company dinner party, meaning I was there for the company, by the company. Not for Seonghwa.” Your fingers worked the buttons on your dress shirt with ease despite the demon lurching forward to take over. You batted at his finicky hands, and as an afterthought added, “And the food was good. A bit pricey but it was on the company’s tab. Definitely wouldn’t mind going back, with you of course.”

Wooyoung paused, fingers having deserted from your button-up to curve around the waistband of your slacks. His eyes bounced between yours, caught off guard by your simple remark. Maybe it was the implication behind the last statement, that you would be willing to be seen in such an upscale setting with him, a bratty demon with jealousy issues and an obsessive need to cling to you like second skin. It wasn’t like you both never went out with each other, but it was definitely limited to places that were more inclined to tolerate Wooyoung’s brashness. But to have you suggest that you would gladly have him accompany you to some snuck-up restaurant that he’s only ever seen on movies— it was like you had just told him the big three words.

True, you both are housemates that have fallen into a sexually charged dynamic mixed with smattering of domesticity. But you weren’t together in a sense of a relationship.

“You… You can’t just say things like that and not expect me to want to eat your soul right out of your pussy.”

The laugh that bubbled out of your chest was loud and unexpected but so was his retort, making you stop entirely from your progress on unbuttoning your shirt to throw your head back. Wooyoung pouted, watching you tremble beneath your fit of giggles while he sat there, hard as a fucking rock and in dire need of you to make a mess out of him.

“I should honestly be saying that to you— not the soul and pussy part but, damn, you shouldn’t be saying things like that to me. I’ll be liable to just leave you to suffer while I go take a shower and get ready for bed.” You dropped a hand from your shirt to jab the demon square in his forehead, the force of it being enough to send him on his back.

“You wouldn’t—“

The zipper on your slacks was drawn down in a quick tug, button at the waist already popped open from Wooyoung’s fussing. “You know I would.” And he did, actually. You were quite the meany when it came to denying him his pleasures, even going as far as to leave him edged after hours of massaging his prostate to go catch a seven o’clock showing of a new film. That of course made him hole himself up in his room, doing who knows what, with the additional ignoring of your person for several weeks.

And while you had a great amount of patience, the same could not be said about him. Cue a late-night visitor standing in the doorway of your room, tail twisted up into his fists and a sheepish smile displaying several pearly whites. You didn’t even second guess yourself when lifting up the covers in front of you, shifting to the center of the bed when the demon bounded over, and face planted into your pillow.

He watched your slacks drop out of view to the floor where you stood at the foot of the bed. Your suit jacket swiftly joining it but your button-up stayed on, just halfway undone and displaying the connective band of your bra between the cups. Wooyoung shifted a bit, hands rubbing up and down his torso, taking the fabric of your black sweater with each movement.

“Did I tell you how good you look in that sweater?”

“No, but it isn’t too late to let me know.”

You laughed, light-hearted at his fishing for praise despite being rather miffed just moments ago. “How about I show you instead, hm?”

Giving your hand an indicating roll, a gesture he recognized a little too well and saw quite often. The demon was on his stomach in a mere second, knees bending beneath his body to lift his backside up in the air. You ran an appreciative hand along one of his covered cheeks, the cotton soft under your palm. Wooyoung watched you like a hawk from over his shoulder, tail wrapping like a vine around your forearm.

“Haven’t I waited long enough?” He was pouting, eyes narrowed.

“I guess so. Although I could make you wait for the rest of the night. Have you go to bed in your room with blue balls while I retire early. Got a big meeting tomorrow morning, can’t be sleep-deprived for it just because you want to play around.” You were only teasing, and he knew that but a part of him definitely didn’t like the suggestion if going by the wiggling of his hips and his head dropping to the bed, an obnoxious whine reverberating around the room.

You moved from the foot of the bed to the bedside dresser, pulling open the bottom most drawer and grabbing the black silicone strap and lube bottle. Your movements were tracked by a very pleased demon, seeing that you wouldn’t be making him suffer tonight despite your threat after all.

Settling back at your previous spot, you grabbed ahold of Wooyoung’s ankles after dropping the strap and lube on the rumpled-up comforter and gave him a harsh yank towards the end of the bed. He yelped, front side dragging along the sheets. His sock clad feet dipped down to touch the floor just on the outside of yours. With the drag across the mattress meant the sweater was pulled up his back, fully displaying the demon's ass in your borrowed panties in all its glory. The color was nice in contrast to his tanned complexion, little moles here and there across the expanse of his back like an undocumented constellation. You dipped your fingers beneath the ban and his warm skin, tugging them down over the curve of his ass but leaving them to stay just beneath his cheeks.

Wooyoung arches his back, the shift making every muscle from the waist up bulge and release. “Hurry up. I don’t want you to stare at me all night, I want you to fuck me.”

Rolling your eyes, you grabbed the lube from the side, tapping the lid against one of his butt cheeks before popping it open with your thumb and squeezing out a good amount to slick your fingers with. “I don’t think you’re in the position to be making any kind of demands.”

If he was going to say something, you wouldn’t know, not when one of your fingers eased past his rim and into his ass. The only thing he does is let out a small sigh. You can see him slump a bit, relaxing his upper half better on the bed. If he could purr, surely, he would. You give the digit a wiggle, bending and straightening it out in a ‘come hither’ gesture before sliding it about halfway out and pushing it forward. Wooyoung mumbled something into the sheets, hands lying flat besides his head.

The next finger joined the first, middle and index, both coated in a good layer of lubricant before disappearing past his rim. You had a firm grip using your other hand on one of his cheeks, giving the fat of it a good squeeze and rub while your fingers worked to stretch him. Wooyoung moaned, mouthing at a mound in the sheets. Slowly, you spread your two fingers, feeling the way his rim held tight around them. The scissoring effect meant the tips of your fingers jabbed into the slimy canal, lightly scratching much to the demon's pleasure.

His crooning paired with the way his tail suddenly wrapped back around your forearm after falling limp when the first finger was inserted seemed more telling than any dirty confirmation he could have given.

“Good?”

“Fuck yes, might cum if you keep scratching at my insides like that.”

You hummed, continuing to spread your fingers, using the pad of your thumb to swipe along the wrinkled skin around his rim. “Think you’re ready?”

Wooyoung hummed, head lifting off of the bed to look at you from over his shoulder. You could see the moment he decided to dredge up the earlier conversation, crossing over his face like a veil.

“Bet your coworker wished he was in my position right now. Getting fucked in the ass until he can’t see straight. Or maybe he already has? Was it between the appetizers or the entree that you snuck off to ravish him in the bathroom?” His nose scrunched at every word, eyes blazing and the misplaced jealousy seemed to cover him like a weighted blanket.

You had enough of his nonsense.

The strap-on left at the side was dragged up your legs and tightened within a blink of an eye, lube slopped hazardously on your hand which worked along the black silicone without a single word. You could only glare, matching the heated daggers thrown your way with equally icy ones.

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you were a rabid dog with how much you foam at the mouth.” You bent forward to latch onto the scruff of his neck, holding his head down while grabbing at the slippery false cock in your other hand. You nudged it forward, letting the blunt head catch on his rim, the lack of entry making him squirm beneath your grip.

Sliding in wasn’t difficult for you, popping the tip in with a shallow thrust forward. Wooyoung groaned, hands tugging at the sheets beside his head. “More, fuck, give me more.”

“Yeah, yeah, alright.”

The collision of your hips against his ass nearly sent him flying towards the headboard. The demon was at the mercy of no one but you, having removed your hand from his nape to hold his hips firmly with both hands. It gave you better leverage to roll your hips forward, starting off slow and sharp, letting the silicone cock bump and grind against his insides. Wooyoung moaned so prettily, head leaning back, horns barely visible beneath the messy mop of red hair.

“You know what? I think I might just have to ask Seonghwa out. Bet he’d love to be wined and dined.” You casually commented, rubbing your thumbs harshly against the skin of his ass.

Wooyoung hiccupped, a jumbled mess of a broken groan and some kind of verbal retaliation lost to the way your pace picked up. Going from slow and sharp juts to quick and fully sheathed thrusts. You looked down at his rim, watching it spread around the black strap, sucking it in and tightening to keep it from slipping out. The sight was downright erotic, even more so paired with the growing volume of litanies falling out of Wooyoung.

“He’s really handsome, nice slender body, looks good in a vest, smells nice— I bet he’d look so beautiful begging for my fingers up his ass. Should have asked him at the dinner party.” One hand left his hip to bury itself in the hair between his horns, giving the locks a firm yank that had the demons head craning backwards.

He was trapped in a tight corner, the leverage you had on his scalp made his body stiffen up which assisted your hips into pounding at him wildly. He swore he could feel that stupid silicone cock in his throat, but that was probably just his heartbeat straining against the taut bend of his neck. Seeing straight wasn’t a possibility, despite the only thing he could focus on was the ceiling but even then, it was starting to haze over.

“He’d be the complete opposite of you— sweet, kind, thoughtful. Not a foul-mouthed brat that picks fights over the littlest things. He wouldn’t be jealous or clingy. Just the sweetest thing.” Your words struck a bit of a chord, the frustration in your tone seeming to make Wooyoung’s stomach bubble in both raw anxiety and the overwhelming arousal.

He didn’t like the mention of your coworker at all while you fucked him, even if he had used him to egg you on. That, to him, was different, however. That momentary break between your fingers being in him and the strap coming on was simply a breather to stir up his earlier hashing. To rile you up into railing him into the bed. To have your way with him and to pay attention to him, pleasure him. But now all he could think about between the push and pull of the silicone cock, your hand still buried in his hair and the moans falling from his mouth growing exponentially louder is you doing this exact thing (albeit a lot gentler) with your coworker.

It made his chest burn and an uncomfortable sensation build within his stomach.

Yet he couldn’t say anything, couldn’t tell you to stop blabbering about the man you worked with and focus just on him. No, instead all he could make out verbally was, “Yes— yes— yes— yes—!”

Wooyoung could feel the drool running down his chin in thick trails, feel how his eyes were burning from the tears built up. He was so utterly fucked that he had raised up onto his toes, one hand reaching back blindly while the other fisted tightly into the sheets.

You removed your other hand from his hip, keeping the one in his hair firm, to let him latch onto your forearm.

“Going to cum in my underwear? Make a mess out of them? Probably going to have to throw them away after this.”

Your underwear was still tucked under his ass; however, the front never did make it down over his aching cock, the poor thing trapped uncomfortably in the fabric. But that added a bit of something to all of this. The thought of soiling your panties that he borrowed without asking had his thighs clenching, toes curling from inside the fuzzy socks (borrowed as well and ironically gifted by the aforementioned coworker) and rim clenching hard around the strap-on. Wooyoung wasn’t even aware that he was coming, body so locked tight and hyper focused on the continuous way your hips pummeled into his.

He jerked, his muscles spasming as his cock released ropes after ropes of nearly scalding cum against his skin and the bush around his cock.

You slowed to a stop, taking in the way he was trembling, the sight of his stretched rim fluttering around the black silicone buried in his ass. His cheeks clenching and unclenching, thighs shaking against your own. Spade-tipped tail curling in on itself. You were sure if you cranked his head back just a bit more, you’d be able to see the white of his eyes staring back and nothing more, drool and tears and splotchy patches of blush across his face and down his throat. Your hand in his hair retracted, a few strands stuck to the slight perspiration of your palm.

Easing the strap out seemed to release the tension from the demon, once it was free of his body, he slumped down against the sheets and comforter in a sweaty pile of flesh. You removed the harness from your waist, grabbing the deserted bottle of lube and putting both of them on the surface of the bedside dresser. Cleaning it can wait. What your sole focus on was the demon who hadn’t moved a single inch since he plopped down.

“I hope you didn’t die. That would really suck for my survival, kind of rely on your home cook meals.”

The joke was met with silence.

You sat yourself in front of his head, reaching down to sort through the mess your hand had made when you heard the softest sniffle. Immediately, you felt your stomach plummet. It wasn’t like rough sec wasn’t a common occurrence between you two, in fact it was an essential when the both of you engaged in sexual activity with each other. And while you could definitely vouch that this instance was tame compared to a lot of things Wooyoung demands you do to him, it didn’t settle the sudden anxiety that you had hurt him. Quickly, you wrapped your hands into his armpits and dragged him up into your lap. The demon was definitely a hot mess in face. Snot running down from his nose and pooling along his upper lip, drool tracks semi-dried on his chin and tears freely flowing over his cheeks.

“Shit, what’s wrong? Did I hurt you? Wooyoung, baby, are you okay?” The frantic lilt in your voice and the way your hands soothed along his shoulders and neck and down his sides made him lurch forward, arms tapping tightly around your neck.

“Please say something, I’m about to shit myself if you don’t.”

True to the immature nature of the demon, he couldn’t help the laugh that bubbled up in a watery mess against your shoulder.

“I’m not— not hurt or anything. Far from it, I actually feel pleasantly split open. Fuck… that was good, you fuck me so good.” He pulled away, swiping at his nose with the back of his hand.

“Then what’s wrong? I know what your ‘fucked good’ tears look like, and this is definitely not them.” Your concerned expression and soft caresses along his back from beneath the sweater that now fell back down to cover his torso made the reasoning for his pitiful behavior seem absolutely stupid.

“I just… what you started saying got into my head and then I couldn’t separate it from the truth and you just trying to rile me up and I know you weren’t being serious but the thought of you seeking out someone else, someone who’ll be less of a headache and more gentle and kind and thoughtful just made me feel worthless. Like you could have anyone, but I’ve become a barrier that won’t allow you to pass, and I know my tendency to get jealous and clingy is an issue, but I only do that because…” Wooyoung finds himself faltering, not sure of his words.

But you give him a moment to decide on whether he did want to continue or not.

“You, well, you’re all I have. Without you then I don’t know where I’d go or what kind of life I would be living. Sure, returning back to hell is always an option but I’ve grown attached to earthly things… even if having a three separate forks at dinner is completely stupid. And…” He paused, looking up at you through tear-soaked lashes, a bashful expression overtaking his face. “I can’t say I haven’t, you know, grown attached to you as well. Just a little bit, though. Your head is already big enough, don’t want to inflate it some more.”

You smile, huffing in amusement before planting a wet kiss to his cheek. Something he doesn’t mind one bit.

“I just want you to know that I wouldn’t pursue anything with Seonghwa. Yes, he is my coworker and does act as a friend when I’m needing one, and I would be blind to not acknowledge that he is very easy on the eyes—“ The deadpan Wooyoung gives you only serves to make you laugh fully, cradling him tighter in your lap. “But that’s all he will ever be. I’m not interested in him beyond that. I actually prefer it that way.”

“How come?”

“Because I’m sure he couldn’t withstand all the hot and rough sex that we have nearly every day. Poor thing will probably never be able to sit normally again.”

Wooyoung gave a good-hearted cackle, high in pitch and practically making your ears buzz from the volume but you loved the sound. And the wide boxy smile that accompanied it.

“Not to be a demanding brat but… kiss?”

“I don’t know, that sounds like quite the request. Not sure if I can fit that into my schedule for the night.”

In one cheeky swoop, you planted your lips onto his. He hummed contentedly, fingers curling against the fabric of your button-up along your shoulders. The kiss was soft, paced in a gentle way and filled with mutual care.

Couldn’t say it was love, but perhaps something akin to it.

[deadpuppetboi]

Goretober Day 9: Snow

Anthony gets scared.

Sure, what he's going through is terrifying.

He is not only confronted with a thing beyond his comprehension, but he is also confronted with individuals who are either on his side, not on his side, or on neither side.

He has anxious instances in which his heart beats like a drum against his chest and his mind tries to find a way out.

Anthony was initially on his own.

He went across an infinite wilderness in search of pages.

He wandered through abandoned homes and buildings, collecting various stuff in order to continue on.

He even stayed up all night without food, water, or a roof over his head, just to see what would happen.

His dedication exceeded everyone's expectations, including his own. part of him expected him to give up right away, while the other part kept pushing him to discover answers. Answers that Anthony had no idea would require so much time and effort to obtain.

The responses could be modest, substantial, or none at all. But that didn't matter; what was important was how far he'd come. And so far, Anthony has gone too far, to the point where returning 'home' is impossible.

Anything that resembled ‘home' was thought to be a hallucination, a deception to divert him from the road.

And while on this walk, the child brushed his way through the forest's scratchy twigs. His ears were ringing with a familiar white noise, his skin was ravaged with small cuts, and his vision was obscured by tears that cascaded down his cheeks like a waterfall.

He had no idea why he was acting this way.

He forgot, again.

It was a problem he'd had since he began his adventure.

Forgetting.

He'd forgotten where he was, what he was doing, and even why he was doing it in the first place.

Anthony had to accept that the amount of stress he was subjecting himself to was driving him insane.

With this one issue, he wanted to give himself some time to consider, but he couldn't. He didn't deserve that time to contemplate, not with the cold eroding him with each passing second. The only thing keeping the child warm was his sweater and a heavy but long jacket that his uncle had given him a long time ago.

'You'll grow into it,' he joked, taking another stroke from his bottle.

He pondered how he, like everyone else, had processed his 'disappearance'...

Anthony expelled a soft burst of air from his mouth while rubbing his palms together to create friction.

He needed a place to stay, or at the very least a roof over his head to keep warm for the night.

The sun had already gone down, leaving just the dull lighting of the sunset crisscrossing the treelines.

Anthony could see his own shadow ahead of him, crisscrossing the treelines as well. The shadow vanished as soon as the boy observed it.

The outcome was, without a doubt, the sun being obscured by clouds. And in response, Anthony tightened his grip on the jacket around him, the cold nearly painful. He'll have to start a fire soon and try to warm himself up to avoid getting frostbite again.

Anthony came to a halt, removed his backpack, set it down, opened the zipper, and rummaged through its contents.

His hands shook from the cold, and the sensation of the goods inside was lost on him because the tips of his fingers were entirely numb.

Anthony disregarded it, preferring to obtain what he needed before the cold set in.

Anthony coughed into his arm as he rummaged through his backpack for a pair of gloves.

He slipped them on, and a tingling sensation passed through his hands before going back in to fetch his beanie. The cold hadn't been as awful as it had been, at least not in the last several days.

As he put on his beanie, Anthony formed the theory that he had been moved to another location. Hopefully not another time, it was as perplexing as it was complicated.

Anthony breathed once more into his palms as he closed his backpack.

He made a move to put it back on before hearing it: Singing.

Or chanting...

The child paused, his hands gripping the backpack straps, his head slowly turning toward the direction of the chanting. He exhaled slowly, and a faint image of his breath appeared before rapidly fading away.

Anthony was aware of this chanting, a language spoken in tongues that he didn't comprehend yet understood completely.

Anthony felt a sense of serenity wash over him for a split second, just a split second. It was almost as though he was engulfed by the warmth and familiarity he felt before all of this.

But then his body was struck with a sudden fatigue, a sharp contrast to the safety he felt before, and he nearly tripped on his two feet.

Anthony blinked, a wave of dizziness overtook him, and he shook his head to clear his mind. When he was clear, the child looked around him and realized how long he had walked. Looking back, Anthony realized he was off route, his backpack out of sight.

The chanting had become almost deafening, and the child tried to ignore it until he noticed a form pass through his line of sight. Turning over revealed another, although this time it was closer. The child inhaled anxiously, his gaze darting from one tree to the next as he traced the footsteps he'd made in the snow before.

They weren't as prominent as Anthony had hoped, but he followed them nevertheless.

Anthony continued to walk, one foot in front of the other, head straight ahead, his ears and eyes alert.

Small flakes of white descended from the sky, coating the boy as he ran to follow in his father's footsteps. Worry ran through his head as the snow began to fall, concealing his footsteps. Puffs of breath escaped his mouth as he rushed onward, witnessing other black shapes appear and fade among the trees.

He tried not to make a commotion, not to show his anxiousness, not to show that he was aware that they were around.

But Anthony wasn't very adept at putting on a show.

The sound of snow crunching behind him was overheard, and the young child instantly began to run. As he was doing so, he heard voices all around him, some shouting out to him and others telling each other to get him.

The air was thick with ice, and the snow slapped his numb face as he ran away from the shrouded people. He needed to find his rucksack and get out of there; perhaps there was a passage he had overlooked that would have saved him from this situation. But as long as he wasn't found, he'd be fine hiding and waiting till the coast was clear.

A broad hand swiped from the upper right corner of Anthony's vision, and he dodged out of the way barely in time to avoid being caught. Anthony hurried past a future clad in dark robes and wearing a white mask. He made a rapid pivot to avoid a few other figures running towards him, some tripping or halting altogether.

He was slowing down, the cold distracting his thoughts as his legs turned to jelly from the strain he was putting on himself. With how far he had run from where he had last run before feeling a huge force hit him in the back, he was certain he was getting away. He stumbled forward, falling on his feet as a large figure overtook him, causing his face to land on the icy earth below.

Before he could think, the child was roughly grabbed by his shoulders and flipped over. A dark-robed figure held him down, both hands wrapped around his neck, as he hit his back against the ice below.

“Ach-”

"How could it be you," the figure screamed as his grip tightened around his neck, "How could He entrust you with the knowledge of what is unseen?! How?!"

Anthony only glanced at the masked man, his gaze drawn to the eyes hidden beneath the white mask. They appeared angry, filled with hatred that no normal person could feel. Even as the youngster strained to speak, his weak hands gripping the broad ones tighter, causing him to choke.

"You are only a child! A sacrifice offered as a gift for Him to shred and twist as He pleased! You have no business showing your face around here! You're a jerk!"

Anthony started hitting the man's arms, dark spots developing in his vision as he struggled to take a single breath. He hit, kicked, and scratched as hard as he could, but it wasn't enough to stop the man and his cold-hearted rage.

Anthony could see a man nearby, standing and watching from the background, from the distant corners of his blurry vision. It was too far away for the youngster to discern, his eyesight blurred as he felt his life begin to slide away from him. Bits of who he was were melting away, falling apart like a tower of blocks, and there was nothing he could do about it.

Anthony let himself give in, taking one rapid breath in before a violent force threw him off balance.

The boy's grasp on his throat was released, and he finally got a full breath, coughing quickly as tears sprang from his eyes. As his vision cleared, he turned over, gripping his painful throat. Two characters clashed in his hazy vision, one of whom appeared to be familiar to the small child.

Anthony shivered as he noticed a familiar coat of crimson fly from one of the figures.

One figure stood above the shrouded man, carrying a hunter's knife in one hand and pinning the man down with the other. Their hold on the knife was firm, and with a rapid stroke, they sank into the man's torso before hastily twisting to the side and being taken out. The man yelled out in pain, moving his limbs to attempt to block the creature above them from stabbing them more.

In, twist, and out.

In, twist, and out.

In, twist, and out.

Over and over again.

With each stroke of the knife, blood flowed out and landed on the white snow below. As blood spilled from the masked man's wounds, his shouting came to a halt, his mouth coated in blood, his body quivering nervously as he began to fall. Even as he collapsed, the person above him continued to strike frantically, as if the man below them was the source of all their problems.

Anthony slowed his breathing, moving back to scrutinize the body in front of him, his eyes focusing on the smallest characteristics.

Their outfits were all black: a sweatshirt, sweatpants, and thick boots. It was all covered in recognizable symbols, a circle with a giant 'x' above it, a symbol Anthony knew to be associated with a figure he both studied and feared. He flinched as the figure turned to face him, wearing a mask similar to the rest of their suit.

But Anthony discovered something else attached to the figure's back.

Anthony stood up and grabbed up his glasses, ignoring the body that lay between them. He kissed his chapped lips, stroking his achy neck while keeping his gaze fixed on them.

"My backpack," he coughed weakly, "you have my backpack."

He reached his hand over.

“Could you—uh—give it to me?”

The figure dropped the bloodied man while heavily breathing. They gripped their bleeding knife closely before cleaning it and storing it. They said nothing but simply removed the backpack and handed it to the small boy. Anthony quickly grabbed his backpack and put it on, taking a few steps back to maintain a safe distance.

The figure only stared at him, saying nothing and doing nothing to harm the youngster like they'd done to the man below them. Anthony took a step back, keeping an eye on the figure before they rolled over. He came to a halt in the middle of his run, turning back to face the person, as though debating whether or not to speak.

“Uh—thank you!”

They didn't have to answer since Anthony turned over and fled, leaving the figure alone with the corpse.

[jimlingss]

Happy Holidays! Can you write a Jimin hybrid Au? I love you and your fics!

Every day, we stray closer to being a furry.

↳ Floof’s Tail

3k || 80% Fluff, 20% Angst || Park Jimin || Hybrid!AU

You’re beaming with excitement.

The first time you saw her through the glass window, you thought she was just a visitor. You were so happy when she wanted to play with you and only you. And you were even more ecstatic when she came a second time days later. You spent time together for hours on end, just like many of the other humans that came around to keep you and the other hybrids company.

But unlike them, she adopted you.

You still can’t believe you now have a home, something to call yours, and an owner that you love so much.

Soyeon stops in the hall and her hand lifts to pet you, gesture affectionate and eyes loving. You lean into her touch, and she smiles before withdrawing away much to your disappointment. 

“This is it, Y/N.”

Her arms motion theatrically to the door, and then she pulls out her keys with a grin. “This is my home and it’s going to be your home from now on too.”

Your tail is practically wagging and you look at the gray door, loving what’s inside already without needing to see it. You don’t remember much of the street name or the apartment building, but you know that it’s the seventh floor, that it seems super nice from the outside, and they’ll probably be big windows looking out at the city. Not to mention from the drive here, there’s also a park close by! 

You can’t wait.

The door opens.

Soyeon brings in your small bag along with the other stuff she bought for you at the store, and then she turns around to beckon you to come in, smiling softly. “There’s someone I’d like you to meet, Y/N.”

This is a dream. It’s all you’ve ever wanted and wished for. An owner. A home. A place to call your own. But you should’ve known, nothing is what it seems.

The moment you step inside, you’re hit with a thick scent. It slams into you, choking your lungs and overwhelming your senses. Warm and earthy, like vanilla and the trees at the park after a rainy day in Spring. You don’t know why you didn’t notice before. It always lingered on Soyeon, a scent underneath her laundry fabric softener and sweet perfume. Maybe you had unconsciously ignored it because you wanted so desperately to be hers.

But of course, someone as perfect as Soyeon would have another dog.

Before you can dart out the door, she calls for him. “Jimin!”

He comes barreling out of the hall with a big smile and his tail wagging.

Only, he stops short a meter away with his eyes pin-pointed on you. His grin instantly falls, ears drooping. His brows furrow as if to ask ‘what the hell is this’. 

Soyeon smiles. “Y/N, this is Jimin.”

Jimin is a dog hybrid just like you. You can tell by the triangle ears on the top of his head that’s a slightly darker shade than the blonde hair that falls over his forehead. His face is round, cheeks full and his lips are pouty. But his brown eyes are mean. They’re half-lidded and glaring at you.

“Jimin, this is our new puppy, Y/N.”

“Leave!” he suddenly barks at you, growling at the back of his throat. You yelp, ears pressed flat on your head and you jump to cower behind Soyeon who’s bigger and taller than you are.

“Jimin,” Soyeon scolds in a low tone.

But he isn’t dissuaded and steps closer to you with one large stride.

Your back hits the door, fear making your eyes grow round. He’s much larger than you are and his scent is thicker too. Jimin’s nose twitches, but before he can get to you, Soyeon blocks his way.

More sternly than before she commands, “Jimin, stop.”

Soyeon takes your hand, turns around and shushes you. “It’s okay, it’s okay, don’t worry,” she coos and then shifts to the other hybrid. “Stay right there, Jimin.”

He glares as Soyeon leads you away, down the hall into a room. But he doesn’t move.

“This is my room and the place that’ll be yours too.” She shuts the door and realizes your distressed expression. “Everything will be okay,” Soyeon tries to reassure and comes to brush a hand through your hair. Then she looks over to the small bag she had dragged with her and lights up. “Oh, here’s your kitty cat.”

It’s a tattered stuffed toy you’ve had since you were born in the shelter, but the moment she passes it to you, you hug it and find comfort. Your heart begins to slow back to its normal pace and Soyeon smiles, seeing that you’ve eased.

“Get yourself settled, okay? I’ll be a second. I just have to talk to Jimin.”

“Okay.”

Her room is large with plenty of space. There’s a massive bed bigger than you’ve ever seen and a TV opposite of it. By the other wall, there’s a bookshelf, vanity, and desk with a computer. There’s a walk-in closet, dresser and another door to a bathroom too. It’s everything anyone could ever need in one room.

You marvel at your surroundings before staring out the enormous glass window.

But your ears perk. Outside the room, there’s muffled voices.

You shuffle your feet over the door and you pick up what’s being said.

“—your friend and heat partner.”

“I don’t need a friend or a heat partner!”

“Jimin. This….this isn’t the way to act.” 

There’s a long sigh and you hear steps coming down the hall. You step back and Soyeon opens the door before shutting it. She looks at you with your eyes on the ground, tail drooping and your ears pressed to your head again.

“It’s okay,” she suddenly says in a higher-pitched voice. You head lifts to her and she smiles, petting you softly behind the ear. “Jimin’s really sweet and kind, I promise. You just have to get used to each other.”

You nod. 

Soyeon asks, “Do you want snacks?”

Your eyes widen and your head bobs more enthusiastically. 

...

Soyeon does a good job of distracting you. She pets you, plays with you, shows you her room and the connected bathroom. The TV has you especially captured for a while, but you’re broken out of your trance when you hear knocking on the door. Followed by scratching. 

And then there’s Jimin’s whine.

Soyeon looks at you and says. “I’ll be right back.”

She slips away and you’re left by yourself again.

Deep down, you know you shouldn’t get too comfortable. This isn’t your home.

…

“Yes. I tried to introduce them, but it isn’t going as well as I thought it would.”

Soyeon’s voice is quiet, barely above a murmur. Yet it’s enough to stir you from your sleep and your eyes flutter a few times before you see her outline standing in the corner. She’s facing the wall with her phone pressed to her ear. You don’t know what time it is but it’s still dark outside.

“My other dog, he’s a guard dog, but he’s more possessive than I thought—….okay…..okay. Oh, alright. Yeah.”

She stops talking and you shut your eyes again, pretending you didn’t hear.

When Soyeon turns around, she doesn’t see the tears pricking at the corner of your eyes.

The sheets, the pillow, the blanket, it all smells like Jimin. Even if you’re stowed away in this room for the rest of your life and kept separate, the walls have already been plunged with his scent.

...

You don’t realize you’ve drifted back to sleep until you wake up with the sunshine on your face.

And your heart feels full when you see Soyeon right there with you. You’ve never been taken care of so closely by someone before, never been solely doted on, never had someone call you in such a soft voice and look at you that lovingly. And she chose you. But you don’t let yourself become too happy. Not when there was someone else on the other end of the apartment.

Still, you very much like it when Soyeon smiles and sweetly chimes, “Rise and shine.”

You rub your eyes, voice still sleepy, “Morning.” 

As you sit up from your spot on the bed, your nose twitches. Your pupils instantly dart to a wool sweater draped at the back of the desk chair. It smells strong. Stronger than the rest of the room. 

Soyeon follows your line of sight. “Oh. I thought you looked cold in that dress. I ordered you new clothes, but they’ll arrive later tonight. Do you want to wear that for the time being?”

“M-Maybe later.”

She nods. “Are you hungry?”

You nod enthusiastically and the corner of her lips quirk. 

As she leaves to get you food, you stare at the sweater. It looks softer than the blankets and much warmer too. Before you can think twice, you approach slowly, feet cold on the floorboards.

You hesitantly sink your hand into the plush fabric of the sweater. 

It doesn’t bite you. No one yells.

You pick it up and bring it to your nose, inhaling deeply. It actually smells….good. Comforting.

Soyeon grins when she returns with a tray of food, noticing the sweater slipped on top of your dress.

Halfway through your meal, she looks at your stuffed cat and boops its black nose. “Hey, Y/N. Would you mind if Jimin took a look at this? I think he’d really like it.”

You shift uncomfortably. “I don’t know.”

“I have other toys for you, like the sheep.” She plops down the white stuffie next to you that looks like a huge cotton ball. You picked it out yourself, but still… “I’ll only borrow this one for a few hours.”

It takes a second, then you’re nodding. “Okay then.”

Soyeon’s hand lifts to gently ruffle your hair. “Thank you.”

…

After breakfast, you watch TV as Soyeon cleans up and probably attends to Jimin on the other side of the wall. But no later is she returning to play with you. The two of you end up reading a story as you cuddle up to her. She shows you how to play a game on her laptop too. But then all of it is interrupted when the phone rings.

Your ears perk and you flinch from the loud sound.

Soyeon picks it up and stands in the corner of the room. “Hello?” There’s silence and then she’s sighing. “What do you mean, Taehyung? I put the file on your desk before I left.” A long pause has you worried. “It should be somewhere in our email correspondence. Figure it out.”

“No. I can’t come in! I’m on personal leave for the next two weeks, remember?” Her voice moves up a pitch and you wince. Soyeon’s clearly upset and you hate it. “Ugh. I hate you. I swear to god, Kim.”

She hangs up.

“Is something wrong?” you ask.

“I have to go into work, but I’ll be back in an hour.” She’s frantically rushing around, entering her closet and emerging with a blouse, pants and a coat. Still, she finds the time to come over to you and she presses a kiss on top of your forehead. “I’ll be quick, I promise.”

“It’s okay. I can wait.” You muster a smile, trying to make her feel better. After all, she’s done her best to comfort you. Now you want to do the same to her.

“It’ll just take a jiffy. Be back before you know it.” Soyeon steps towards the door. “Don’t leave the room, okay, Y/N?”

You nod.

Soyeon leaves a few moments later. You hear footsteps in the hall, muffled voices and then the larger door shutting. Instantly, you become drowned in silence without the television or the laptop or Soyeon’s comforting voice and soothing hands petting you. You’re abandoned.

On the other side of the wall is someone who hates you and wishes you were gone.

The truth that’s been blaring in your head becomes noisier than ever: this isn’t your home.

Maybe what she said was just an excuse. Maybe the phone call was an act and maybe Soyeon hates you too. Maybe you’re more problematic than she expected, and she’ll return you to the shelter tomorrow or even today. You wouldn’t blame her if she did. Soyeon probably wanted someone to get along with Jimin and you’re too much of a handful for her.

You don’t realize you’re crying until it’s gotten so loud that it’s deafening to your own ears. But you can’t help the wails choking out of your sobbing chest or the tears streaming down your face. You lay curled up in the bed, ears pressed to your head as you clutch your toy to your chest.

Through your clouded vision, you don’t notice the bedroom door opening. Not until you hear—

“You know she’s not leaving forever, right?”

Instantly, you jolt and scramble back on the bed. Until your back hits the headboard, pillows bent underneath you. 

Jimin looks at you, eyeing the way you’re wearing his sweater, and he swallows hard. “She’s supposed to leave five to six hours a day. Sometimes more, sometimes less. But she always comes back.”

You whimper and he frowns. 

“Stop making those noises.”

“I can’t help it,” you hiccup and rub your eyes. “W-Will she make me go back?”

“What?”

“The shelter. Will she leave me if we don’t get along?”

Jimin shifts his weight from one foot to another, expression almost uncomfortable. But he says, “Soyeon’s not that kind of owner.”

You hiccup and snivel, unable to make the lump in your throat go away. “I...I just want a home.”

You almost start to cry again, but then Jimin extends his arm. You see him holding your kitty cat. “I think this is yours,” he says and you nod, teary-eyed. He points to your body. “That’s my sweater. You’re not supposed to touch it.”

You look down, not sure if you should take it off. But you’re too scared to move.

At once, the concern vanishes. Jimin takes a step towards you and your spine and ears straighten on reflex. Then he takes another. You whimper and his brows furrow again. “Stop it. I won’t bite you.”

He places the kitty cat on the edge of the bed and in a moment where your courage has swelled, you lurch forward to grab it. Immediately, you withdraw and hold it to your chest.

You frown when you realize how much it smells like him.

You’re too busy paying attention to your toy to see the bed dip. To see Jimin crawling closer to you. Not until he’s facing you, practically nose to nose. Your back hits the headboard once more and your breath hitches. But instead of being barked at or bitten, Jimin leans in. You feel a tickle as his nose sniffs at your neck.

You release your breath, unable to hold it any longer and when you inhale, you smell him.

Jimin’s scent is warm and earthy, like vanilla and trees at the park after a rainy day in Spring. When you’re not scared, it actually smells really nice. Even if you don’t want to admit it.

Jimin sniffs at your neck incessantly with his nose and then at your hair. You whine, slumping downwards, and he practically hovers over you, caging your frame in with his arms, smelling down your body. 

The tip of his nose travels from the valley of your breasts down your tummy. He pauses at the apex of your thighs, right where your underwear is and you shut your legs together.

You’re vulnerable beneath him and you’re not sure clutching the two toys to your chest will do much good in protecting you if he decides to attack. But when Jimin’s done, he looks at you and simply says, “You smell like flowers.”

“Is that bad?”

He pauses. “No. But I like it when things smell like me.”

You gasp when he suddenly leans in, brushing his cheek against yours, nuzzling into you. It tickles and you can’t help but giggle. Jimin’s ears perk at the bubbly sound and his tail starts to wag. The toys roll off your chest, and they’re left beside you when you let go. You wiggle and shift away from him, yet he pounces after you with a smile on his face.

You laugh, managing to dodge his arms and slip off the bed.

But Jimin’s much too fast and swift for your liking. He corners you by the closet with an enormous grin on his face, half-moon eyes lit up in mischief. Before you can dart to the left, he snatches your waist and follows after you as you collapse on the soft carpet. 

Jimin brushes his cheek against yours, the weight of his body pressed to yours with a knee placed between your parted thighs. You’re never going to completely smell like him, not when you have your own scent, so you’re not sure why he’s trying so hard. But you don’t mind.

You take the chance to smell him too, nose twitching at his neck. A hum leaves the back of your throat as you allow yourself to become immersed in the comforting scent.

...

 When Soyeon comes home an hour later, she’s surprised that Jimin isn’t already waiting at the door or doesn’t come barreling out to greet her. It’s much too quiet. She doesn’t have a good feeling.

Blood drains from her face when she walks down the hall and she sees the bedroom door wide open. The woman rushes inside, nearly tripping her feet, mouth falling open.

Yet the words die in her throat and a smile lifts onto her features when she sees Jimin cuddling you. The pair of you are fast asleep.

[august-bleeds-red]

Texas Heat

Alpha!Tommy x omega!Reader (AFAB). When you find yourself trapped within the Hewitt family’s web of murder, violence and pain, the last thing you expect to do is fall in love.

Part One / Part Two / Part Three

~

The Texas sun beats mercilessly down on the back of your neck, the air thick and slow as dark molasses. You tied your sweater around your waist, but even that was too much for your sweating skin, so now it just hangs limply from your fingers.

 You manage to hitch a lift from a family of three on a cross-state road trip – the parents were both betas, the little girl in the back unpresented. You tell them you’re heading back to college from visiting your family, that your car packed up some three miles back. You also tell them you’re a beta. Two truths and a lie.

 They pull into a small gas station in Travis County called Cele Community Centre to fill up, while you step inside the sore to ask to use the phone. A middle-aged woman with cats-eye spectacles stands behind the counter, a couple of leather-clad bikers sitting at a table littered with beer bottles.

 The phone’s busted, but when you explain about your car, she offers a different option. Her brother’s got a tow truck – he could go pick up your car and bring it back for repair. It’s too good an offer to refuse, so you wave goodbye to the beta family and take a seat in the diner. The woman – Luda May Hewitt, she introduces herself – gives you a soda on the house and asks you about yourself. You tell her about your parents, your brother in the army, your little sister about to graduate high school. By the time her brother arrives – a unkempt, bespectacled man she calls Monty – you feel as though you’ve been talking to a matronly aunt for the past hour. She’s kind, with good old-fashioned Southern values, and so when she asks if you’d like to join them for supper, you accept. Monty says your car needs a new valve or something, which he has back at the homestead, so you hop in the cab of his truck next to Luda May.

 The Hewitt family home is a large farmhouse, with sprawling fields surrounding and a dilapidated garage. Monty parks up in the front yard and disappears, presumably to find the missing piece for your car. You shoulder your bag and follow Luda May inside the house. It’s not particularly clean, but your mother raised you to be polite, so you accept some sweet tea and some homemade biscuits.

 Shortly, another man appears in the kitchen – this one younger and more well-presented than Monty - who introduces himself as Sheriff Hoyt. A rough, brutish scent of alpha pheromones follows him through the door, but you know by instinct its not from him.

 “Tommy,” he says, glancing over his shoulder at a hulking figure beyond the doorway. “Come say hello to our guest.”

 The person who steps into the room has to be the largest man you’ve never seen. Not only is he tall – at least six and a half feet – but he’s also broad; wide shoulders, muscular arms, and a chest like a barrel. Despite the suppressants you’ve been careful to keep concealed in your bag, your glands tingle pleasantly as his scent washes over you. Your nose recognises earth, leather and sweat, but your finer-tuned olfactory senses catch hints of sandalwood, charcoal, and the unmistakable metallic tang of blood. You contribute this to the butcher’s apron he’s wearing tied around his thick waist – the dark brown stains a clear indication of animal slaughter. While this doesn’t exactly strike you as comforting, you can’t deny his scent is . . . appealing.

 You focus on his face for just a moment, not wanting to stare. His dark hair is long and wavy, most of his face concealed beneath a crude leather mask, revealing only his eyes, forehead and a small glimpse of chapped lips. The space where his nose would be beneath the mask is strangely flat, leading you to suspect some kind of physical deformity. His shadowed eyes catch yours and you look away in embarrassment.

 “This here’s Thomas, my boy,” Luda May says. “Tommy, meet Y/N.”

 “Hey,” you rise to your feet and hold out a hand. Even at your full height, you barely come up to his chest. “Nice to meet you, Thomas.”

 He doesn’t speak or move to shake your hand, but his right-hand fingers flex at his side, so you can tell he wants to. Moreover, you can smell it on him. The pheromones he’s giving off betray his interest, and your face flushes at the thought that such an impressive alpha’s attention is directed at you. Eventually, you lower your hand and return to your seat, taking a sip of tea to hide your awkwardness.

 “So,” Hoyt says, sitting down opposite you and placing his hat on the table. “Y/N, what are you?”

 You know what he’s trying to say, even if the question comes across as a little rude.

 “I’m a beta, sir,” you say.

 “Seems the whole dang state’s beta these days,” he says, leaning back and accepting a glass of tea from Luda May. “Tommy’s pretty much the only alpha ‘round these parts, and as for omegas, forget it.”

 Praying that your suppressants are doing their job, you nod along with his words and try not to focus on Thomas, who’s still standing like a full-door draft excluder in the corridor. You wonder if his senses are strong enough to tell that you’re lying. Surely if they were, he’d say something, wouldn’t he? Such a big strong alpha like him, wouldn’t be able to help himself.

 Big strong alpha . . .

 The thought makes you shiver slightly, and you notice Thomas shift where he stands. Covering your neck as casually as you can with one hand, you pretend to be intently interested in what Hoyt is saying. As he’s illustrating the hardships of being the county’s only sheriff, Monty appears, wiping his hands on a dirty rag.

 “Well, hope you didn’t have nowhere to be anytime soon, ‘cause that tin can sure ain’t going without a new carburetor.”

 Your heart sinks – the car was a gift from your parents when you got into UT, and you’d taken good care of it since. How had it sustained so much damage without you realising?

 “D’you know where I can get a new one?”

 He blows his cheeks out. “Nowhere ‘round here. Next town, maybe; ‘bout twenty miles north.”

 You mentally count the small handful of notes folded in your wallet – your mom had given you $50 to get back to college, enough for fuel and food along the way, plus extra to stay in a motel. Certainly not enough for such a hefty repair.

 “Course,” Hoyt says, a strange smile playing at the corner of his lips, “Uncle Monty’d be more’n happy to drive through for one tomorrow, wouldn’t ya, Monty?”

 Monty nods slowly. “Be my pleasure.”

 A strange tension has fallen over the small room, setting the hairs on the back of your neck a-prickle. Hoyt’s eyes are burning into you with a fierce intensity, almost . . . hunger, Monty bearing a smile, too leery to be comforting. You’re wondering if you’ve made a mistake in coming here, when Thomas moves from the shadows, his scent passing over you. Your shoulders drop a little, his presence proving an inexplicable reassurance to you. You know it’s your hormones talking; with such an alpha nearby, you’re safe. It takes a nudge from the logical side of your brain to remind you that biology is not fact, and you could be very, very far from safe with these people.

 You clear your throat, mouth suddenly dry.

 “Well, that’s awful kind of you. Is there, um . . . a motel or something I could stay at tonight?”

 “Motel?” Luda May laughs. “Don’t be so silly, honey – you’ll stay here.”

 You turn to look at her, her warm, motherly gaze refilling some of the certainly draining from you. Maybe you’re just being paranoid. After all, you’re a young woman – an omega, no less – so it’s no wonder that Hoyt and Monty might act strangely around you, whether they realise it or not. As for Thomas, well . . .

 “I don’t want to be a bother, ma’am.”

 “Oh hush, you’re no bother at all, and call me Luda.” She takes an old apron from a hook on the wall and nods towards the door. “Tommy’ll show you to the spare room and then you can help me start dinner.”

 Thomas looks as surprised by the idea of being alone with you as you are, his gargantuan posture stiffening. His eyes flit from Luda May to you, unsure of what to do.  

 “Go on, boy, m’sure she don’t bite,” Hoyt chuckles.

 But does he? Your mind races as you lift your bag and follow Thomas from the kitchen. His heavy footsteps make the floorboards shake as he ascends the stairs, decidedly not looking anywhere in your direction. The room he takes you to is small, barely more than a box room, with a narrow cot bed, a chest of drawers, and a dirty sink built into the wall. The white ceramic has been long since hidden beneath a layer of brown grime, and the light from the window is filtered through what looks like years of dirt.

 You turn your head to thank Thomas, but the words die on your tongue when you see how close he is. His chest is heaving, and you suspect he’s . . . smelling you. Shit. You remember the mace your mom forced you to take with you, stowed safely away at the bottom of your pack. There’s no way you could get to it before he could grab you. He’s so big – his hands could easily encompass your entire head – you’re sure he could do irreparable damage without breaking so much as a sweat. His eyes – how had you not noticed how blue they are? – are fixed on you, all trace of shyness gone. You raise a hand – to do what, you’ve no idea – and stifle a shriek when he takes hold of your arm with surprising agility. Your blood stills as he lifts your wrist to his face, the air whistling through his nostrils beneath the mask as he breathes in your scent. He must know – there’s no way he can’t. He must either be the strongest alpha you’ve ever encountered, or on the brink of his rut, to detect your omega scent through your suppressants. Or both.

 Part of you wants to run, to scream for help, but you can’t; your legs won’t move.

 “Please . . .” you whisper, though you’re not entirely sure what you’re pleading for. Your eyes meet for one long, electrifying moment.

 “Tommy, get down here! We got trespassers!”

 Thomas drops your hand like it’s scalding hot, disappearing from the room and down the stairs after Hoyt’s harsh commands. You stand rooted to the spot, your heart beating a brand against your ribcage, and the bed creaks ominously beneath you as you drop down onto it. Fishing in your bag, you pull out the thin blister pack of pills, swallowing one dry. You have enough to get you safely back to Austin – you’ll just have to hope your stay here is a short one.

~

Comments are greatly appreciated because I’m a needy little trashbag.

[peterrparrkerr]

Moodboard for the series (don't judge me I usually do gifs, this was something new. Also, I could not get the collar to look right)

So I meant to upload this yesterday but I lost control of it and then got busy, so here's a little over 3k for you!

Also, tagging @snowstark because this is our baby. Ao3 version here!

Idk what to tag this. Dark themes, spanking, forced to choose a punishment, uuuh, not sure what else. Enjoy!

*-*

Bucky knows when Peter is going to have a hard time adjusting to Tony being gone. It had been close to a year since Bucky started working for Tony, and he's gotten familiar with all of Peter's little quirks.

And he knows the slight pout Peter sports as he waits beside Bucky for Tony to come to the door, means Peter's going to be a slight handful.

But Bucky can handle the teenager. He's been in charge of Peter's safety for long enough. Aside from Tony, Bucky knows how to get Peter to do as he's told.

Tony comes down the stairs, suit tailored and travel bag in hand. "What a sight," he grins. "My pets waiting for me."

Bucky clenches his jaw at that, but he doesnt say anything. Peter though, steps up to the Superior nuzzling into Tony's chest.

"Don't go," Peter whined. Bucky watched with a familiar jealous rock in his gut, but he stays still.

"I'll be back in five days," Tony sighed, kissing the top of Peter's curly hair.

Peter's in a pair of soft blue jean shorts and a faded Yankees sweater, the bottom cut off to show off his midriff.

Tony pushes Peter back a little and smiles fondly down at him, fingers fixing the collar around his puppy's neck, little bell tinkling.

"You be good," Tony orders, leaning down to kiss Peter's pouty lips.

Peter sulks as Tony steps away, towards the door and closer to Bucky.

"I'll be back late," Tony hums, patting Bucky on the cheek. "I'll see you both when I get back."

And with that, Tony's gone. Bucky rubs at his cheek with a slight scowl. Its a new thing, Tony touching him. And Bucky doesn't like it.

Peter spins on his heels the moment the door is shut and storms off, making Bucky sigh explosively before making his way after him.

Alpine slows him down by weaving between his legs, meowing needily.

"Damn cat, go away," he snaps, nearly kicking the thing before remembering she's Peter's.

The door to Peter and Tony's bedroom slams and Bucky sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose.

So it's going to be like this then. Bucky decides to let Peter wallow on his own. Sooner or later his emotions would get the best of him and he'd come out for comfort. Bucky wouldn't force him to before then.

Its the same song and dance. Peter cries when Tony's gone, he doesn't eat much, and just kind of sulks around the house.

If he were a real puppy, Bucky could just imagine him crying at the door with his tail tucked between his legs, looking extra pathetic.

It was during these days when Tony wasn't around that Peter got a little less obedient.

Most incidents Bucky kept to himself. Little scenes of Peter acting out of his emotions. Tony didn't need to be informed of everything.

The bigger incidences though was definitely taken to Tony. They hadn't had an incident in a while -not since Peter ran out and Bucky got shot.

Peter had been terrified after that, refused to leave the tower even with Buck and Tony there with him.

Tony had punished him good and hard for that -it still makes Bucky's stomach roll at the thought of Tony hitting Peter. Bucky still remembers how small he looked when Tony had guided him back into the penthouse.

His eyes all red, tear tracks down blushed cheeks. He had been trembling slightly. It had made Bucky sick to his stomach.

But Peter hadnt done it again. When Tony left, Peter stayed put.

"Peter, time to eat," Bucky called after knocking on the bedroom door. Peter had been locked in there for most of the two days so far Tony's been gone.

He sulks under his covers, and when he does come out, its with a pout. Something Bucky is used to.

"M'not hungry," comes Peter's petulant response through the door.

"Yes you are, pup," Bucky sighed. "Come on, out with you before I come in there."

"Said I wasn't hungry," Peter spoke, voice raising a little. Bucky cocks an eyebrow, then tries the handle of the door. Its locked.

"Peter, open this door."

"No," Peter said.

"You open this door or I'll kick it down," Bucky threatened. Peter's never locked his door before.

"Do it!" Peter snapped. "Then Tony'll be mad at you and send you to the basement!"

"Oh for fuck's sake," Bucky muttered under his breath.

"F.R.I.D.A.Y, override the lock for Peter's door," he says, looking up at the ceiling.

"I am sorry, but the lock is manual, it will have to be unlocked by Peter, Mr. Barnes."

Bucky growls, clenching his teeth.

"Open the door, Peter," he tries again.

"No."

"C'mon, pup, open up," Bucky sighed. He really didn't want to break down the door. What has gotten into Peter? He's never like this.

"Nuh-uh," Peter said. "Leave me alone."

"You know I can't do that, Pete," Bucky huffed.

"I don't need a babysitter," Peter called out. "I can take care of myself. Tony doesn't need you anymore."

"You've got five seconds and then I'm breaking the door down," Bucky said, pinching the bridge of his nose.

Peter says nothing. Bucky begins to count. He thinks Peter will crack when he reaches two, but the boy doesn't make a sound.

"Alright, last chance."

Nothing.

Bucky tries the handle once more before stepping back. He lowers his shoulder, ready to drive it into the wood before slamming into the door.

The frame splinters and the door slams into the wall with a deafening crack.

Peter jumps from his spot on the bed, eyes wide and mouth gaping in shock.

"What is going on with you, Peter?" Bucky demands, a little fed up with his behavior. "You've never acted like this before."

Peter's shock falls away to anger, eyebrows furrowing and arms crossing.

"Get out."

"No, you need to tell me why you're acting like a brat," Bucky demanded, crossing his own arms.

"M'not a brat," Peter snipped, little bell sounding as Peter turned his head away from Bucky, glaring at the wall.

"No? 'Cause you seem pretty bratty to me," Bucky challenged.

That gets Peter standing from the bed. "I'm not!"

"I'm not going to fight with a fucking child," Bucky muttered to himself. "Go into the dining room and eat your lunch."

Peter sets his jaw. Its cute. Little thing trying to be tough.

"I said I'm not hungry."

"Well, Tony wants you to eat," Bucky tries. Usually talking about what Tony wants would get Peter to do as he's told. But it doesn't work today.

So Bucky grabs Peter by the upper arm and pulls him out of the room. Peter grunts, digging his heels in, but he's small and doesn't have much muscle.

"Eat," Bucky demands, gesturing to the food he sits Peter down in front of.

Peter glares up at him, though its not as effective as he thinks with his pastel blue tshirt and matching collar.

"I hate you," Peter bites out.

"Good for you, now eat your God damn lunch before I force feed you."

To say the next three days is difficult is an understatement. Bucky has no idea why Peter's acting out the way he is, but he's had enough.

On the fourth day, Bucky actually swatted him! Peter looked up at him with wide eyes, mouth clicking shut. Bucky instantly felt sick, but he forced himself to stand his ground even as hurt and anger filtered through Peter's features.

"You hit me," Peter said. It made Bucky feel even worse, but he didnt back down.

"You're being bad," Bucky said. More anger filtered in, and Peter reached forward to try and shove him.

Bucky caught him by the wrists and Peter yelled loudly, beginning to flail.

"Peter, stop it!" Bucky snapped, pulling the pup in close and pinning him against his chest. He doesn't have room to thrash now.

"I hate you! I hate you!" Peter yelled. Bucky can hear the beginnings of tears in his voice. "I don't want you here! I want- I want Tony!"

Bucky holds Peter as he chokes on his tears, forcing Bucky to carry his weight when Peter stops holding himself up.

Bucky let's him cry it out, walking him to his bedroom. The door still wasn't fixed -Bucky didn't have time, what with Peter acting out.

He deposited Peter onto the bed. "You can come out when you're done being a brat," Bucky said shortly. Peter just fell to his side, wrapping his arms around a pillow and drawing up his legs.

Bucky walked out and flopped onto the couch, leaning his head back and staring up at the ceiling.

Maybe Tony would know what Peter's problem was. Just because he's never acted like this since Bucky moved in doesn't mean its never happened before.

Bucky's never been more glad when Tony arrives the next morning. He's exhausted. Tony -the perceptive bastard- notices right away when Bucky greets him at the elevator.

"What happened," Tony demanded. Bucky let out a sigh, shoulders slumping just a bit. He didnt like feeling like a whiner, and explaining to Tony what the past five days have been like definitely makes him feel it.

"I don't know whats gotten into him," he finishes with. He just wants to sleep for a couple days. He's never felt more like a babysitter than he does now.

"Oh, I do," Tony huffed. Bucky raised an eyebrow inquisitively. "He's jealous."

That throws Bucky for a loop. "Jealous? Of what?" He can't help but demand incredulously.

Tony smiles knowingly and lifts his hand, brushing his fingers over Bucky's jaw, pinching his chin and giving a little shake.

"Of you, pet," Tony hums, looking amused. "He's used to getting my full attention. I think he's feeling a bit misplaced."

Bucky lifts his head, pulling his chin free from Tony's grasp and taking a small step back.

"He's got no reason to be jealous of me," Bucky grunted.

"No?" Tony asked. "Lets go see our puppy then, hmm?"

Bucky frowns as Tony walks past him into the penthouse. Our puppy?

He quickly spins on his heels and follows after Tony. Theres a disapproved hum when Tony notices the door leaning against the door.

"Tony!"

Peter scrambles from the bed, rushing over to Tony and crashing into his chest. Bucky keeps his distance, hands clasped behind his back.

"I missed you."

"I'm sure," Tony hummed. "Bucky told me about your behavior while I was gone."

Bucky winces in sympathy at the tone Tony uses with Peter. The pup steps back from him, brows furrowing.

"I-"

"I don't want any excuses," Tony interrupted. Bucky watched as Peter's demeanor shifted. He knew he was in trouble, he could see it in the way Peter's shoulders slumped.

"Go wait for me in your room," Tony continued. "And when we're gone, we're going to have a talk."

"But, Tony‐" Peter began. Tony grabs him by the arm and yanks him towards the elevator that leads to the basement.

"Go," he snaps, features twisting into a look of anger. Bucky holds his ground, but he wants to rush back out of Tony's line of fire.

Peter shrinks at the tone. He doesn't try again, just makes his way to the elevator, like a dog scurrying out of trouble with his tail between his legs.

"Are you really going to punish him?" Bucky asked, following Tony towards the elevator Peter had just disappeared through. "If he's just acting out of jealousy-"

"His acting out got me a broken door and a puppy with an attitude problem," Tony said. "I brought you here to take care of him while I'm away. His behavior hindered that and that won't do."

Bucky follows Tony into the elevator. He doesn't say anything, just stands beside Tony, watching the floors pass in glowing numbers above the doors.

When they reach the basement floor, the doors open and Tony steps out, already heading for the door that leads to Peter's room.

"Come on, pet," Tony calls over his shoulder. Bucky's legs work without him, taking him out of the elevator and into the main room.

"I'm not a pet," Bucky grunted. Tony glances over his shoulder, smirking. His blue eyes shining with amusement.

"I beg to differ," Tony hummed, before reaching a hand out and clasping Bucky by the back of the neck.

Bucky allows the Superior to pull him closer as they make their way to the door.

Buck decides not to argue the issue. Better to keep on Tony's good side.

Tony opens the door, and Bucky's eyes widen at the sight of Peter on the bed, naked. Hes on his elbows and knees, pert little ass up in the air.

He's hidden his face in his arms, and doesn't realize Bucky is here with Tony.

"He does paint a pretty picture, doesn't he?" Tony murmurs lowly, arm still wrapped around Bucky's shoulders, nosing at Bucky's jaw.

"I can leave," Bucky says lowly, glancing from Peter to Tony.

"No, I want you here," Tony decides, shutting the door. Bucky chews on his inner cheek, staying close to the door as Tony walks over to the wall of -Bucky feels his stomach drop. He doesn't know if he can watch this.

"M'sorry," Peter whines, turning his head to see Tony at the wall.

"I know you are," Tony said, looking over the items hanging on the wall. Bucky's never seen so many switches and floggers before.

"But that doesn't change the fact that you were a bad puppy."

Peter's breath hitches and he hides his face again. Bucky watches Tony pick out a flat leather paddle from the wall. One of the less intimidating items hanging on the wall.

"How many hits do you think he deserves?" Tony says, catching both Peter and Bucky off guard. Peter's head turns, wide eyes locking onto him before he seems to shrink, hiding his face away again, but not leaving the position Tony most likely trained him to be in.

It takes Bucky a moment to realize Tony was talking to him, and he blinks, looking over at the Superior. "What?"

"You had to deal with his poor behavior for five days, so you decide his punishment," Tony said.

Bucky looks wide eyed at Peter, pale and naked except for the baby blue collar around his neck. He shakes his head.

"Come on, pet," Tony goads. "What does he deserve?"

Bucky hears Peter whimper at that and he feels his skin crawl. He shakes his head again, feeling sick. "I can't."

Tony's mouth drops in a frown, looking disappointed. Bucky doesn't care. He can't.

"Fine," he hums. "Then fifty hits."

Peter lifts his head, breath hitching and tears streaming down his cheeks.

"Ten for each day."

Bucky feels his throat closing up.

"N-no," Peter sobbed. "No, please, Tony!"

Tony looks at Bucky, challenging glint in his Extremis blue eyes. "Bucky doesn't want to choose, so I'm chosing for him, puppy."

Peter turns to look at Bucky, pleasing with a trembling breath.

Bucky digs his nails into his palms. He looks from Peter to Tony, then back to Peter.

If Bucky chooses a lower number, Tony may not agree to it. But Bucky doesn't want Peter being hit -especially in front of him.

"Twenty," he manages to say, unsticking his throat. His voice is tense, body rigid and hands clasped behind him. Outwardly, he looks calm and collected, but inside he wants to do nothing but run out of the basement.

Tony doesn't say anything for a moment, and Bucky's sure its just as long for Peter as it is for him.

"Alright, twenty it is," Tony agrees. Bucky feels the muscles in his shoulders unwind a little at that.

"Count them out, pup."

Its the worst few minutes of Bucky's life. He served tours over seas. He's killed people with his bear hands and lost an arm, and he'd go through all of that ten times if it meant he didn't have to be in the same room as Tony and Peter right now.

Each smack has Bucky's pulse spiking, each sobbed out count down like agony. Its a punishment all its own to be forced to stand by while Peter cries, the loud smack of leather on skin filling the room.

The worst thing is Bucky is the reason he's got twenty spanks in the first place. Sure, its less than fifty, but he's still the one who offered a number.

Bucky doesn't even care anymore about Peter's behavior. He just wants Tony to stop.

Peter's ass is just as red as his face, and his breath hitches on cries, but the boy doesn't move. Bucky has no doubt if he had, the punishment would be far worse.

"Twen-twen'y," Peter finally gasps out wetly, dropping onto the bed.

Bucky restrains himself from rushing over there and scooping the boy up. His nails dig painfully into his palms.

He watches Tony do it instead. Watches as Tony's hand turns soft, scooping Peter up and settling him onto his lap, careful of his poor bottom.

Tony smooths Peter's curls from his forehead, muttering lowly against Peter's cheek as the boy cries, arms lifting to wrap around Tony's shoulders.

Tony glances up at Bucky and nods. "Come here, pet."

Bucky's too concerned with Peter to argue the pet name. He makes his way over to the bed in three long strides and sits down beside Tony and Peter.

Peter peeks out from Tony's neck, eye red rimmed. His breath hitches.

"M'sorry, Bucky," he cries, voice reedy and wobbling with tears.

"Thats alright, Pete," Bucky said softly.

Peter tucks himself back into Tony's neck, allowing the Superior to smooth his hands up and down Peter's bare back.

"Go with with Bucky, pup," Tony says a moment later, once Peter's tears have tapered off a little. Bucky's eyes widen at that, but he can't do much else, because Peter's crawling out of Tony's lap and settling into his own.

Bucky doesn't know what to do. He's wearing cargo pants, and he can't help but worry they're too rough for Peter.

And then he's stuck on the fact that he's got a very naked Peter in his lap. The boy leans into Bucky's chest, head resting on his shoulder.

Bucky settles a hand on Peter's lower back -as low as he dares- and rubs circles into his skin.

"I think its time we had a little talk," Tony said, looking first at Peter, then at Bucky.

[memes-in-a-half-shell]

Business AU - Working Late, Part 4

Part 1 || Part 2 || Part 3

Flirt mode  A C T I V A T E D 👏

As everyone else in the room was getting ready to depart for the day - chatting here and there and gathering their belongings - Vee was mostly occupied by her handbag, making sure everything was there before she would leave the place. She did not hear when someone approached her, but she next felt the poke of an object to her right shoulder.

“I didn’t want to make you feel bad earlier,” started Donatello’s voice. “But I truly do think we’re connected somehow now.”

She looked at him, first noticing that he had been poking her with a cardboard file folder, and then she took a good look at his clothes. Purple. AT LEAST not the same shade. He was wearing a fitting v-neck sweater of a dark purple color, with a white shirt  and a black tie underneath, his looks completed with dark charcoal pants and black shoes.

“... You’ve got to be kidding me,” started Vee with a stifled laugh. “Why are we like this?”

“I’m not superstitious, but maybe it’s destiny. We were meant to work together,” he winked. “Great minds think alike!”

Vee couldn’t hide her smile, next prompting him to get on the move for their dinner. She first expected them to walk out of the building and head to a subway station, but she was surprised to see the turtle head towards the indoor parking lot of the building.

“Wait, you want us to go by car?” she asked, her heels clacking rapidly on the tiled floor as she caught up to him.

“Why not? It’ll be quieter that way! I don’t feel like dealing with crowds in the subway anyway.”

She had to give him that, at least. A car would smell better than a subway train... As they made their way through the lot, she noticed Donnie getting out keys, the woman commenting:

“Huh, I thought you’d have a chauffeur or something like that.”

“Why, because I’m rich?” asked the mutant, amused. “I like driving, so I don’t see why I would leave all that fun to someone else.”

He pressed a button on a small remote attached to a key, which prompted a black SUV nearby to flash its light.

Vee was most certainly impressed by his taste, first observing the vehicle until she noticed the other opening the passenger door for her.

“The lady may take her seat.”

As she took place, her eyes scanned the interior.

The major difference she could notice from any other cars was how the driver seat was rearranged a bit further back, allowing space for the mutant’s shell most probably. As Donnie took place next, Vee couldn’t help her question:

“Is this car completely custom made?”

The other smirked: “If it was, it’d be way cooler. ... Nah for this I only had a Genesis GV80 model slightly modified to accomodate my form. I like the look of it and I don’t need something too extravagant to go around on the streets.”

“ ‘Don’t need something too extravagant’,” quoted the woman. “You do realize that you have an expensive car?”

“Remind me to show you my brother Mikey’s cars,” added Donnie, then starting the car’s ignition. “Then we can talk back about what’s expensive.”

As soon as the vehicle was brought to life, music was heard, being none other than Dio’s “Better In The Dark” track. The turtle rapidly fumbled to turn it down, his eyes widening.

“Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry for that,” he said once silence was back.

“... Are you kidding? You shouldn’t apologize for listening to Dio!” reassured Vee. “That guy frickin’ rocks!”

The terrapin smirked: “Ah, a woman of good taste! You keep on getting better and better.”

Vee couldn’t help her smile in return, the pair then finally getting on the move.

***

Donnie had to park his SUV on a quiet street, the duo next walking towards their destination; New York’s Little Italy. The evening was already laying its shadows in the sky, but the streets were bright and colorful, the warmth in the air of the incoming summer days an absolute delight. A light conversation was held as they were walking, until Vee was abruptly stopped by almost falling due to one of her heels stumbling into a small crack in the sidewalk. She was first surprised by how fast Donnie had been to catching her, a small laugh escaping her. To feel his touch around her, his strength, all she could hear was her heart drumming in her ears. They continued their path, Vee’s arm hooked to Donatello’s. It simply felt like a dream at that point...

They finally arrived to the place; a small rustic looking restaurant that had been hiding from the bigger crowd’s broad sight. There were few patrons inside, the ambiance calm and somehow giving a “feels like home” kind of vibe. Donnie seemed to know the place well, only quickly waving to the staff and already going for a table. It was a nice little corner with a table large enough so they could lay down their paperwork. Being a complete gentleman, the mutant was quick to draw a chair for Vee to sit on, waiting until she was seated properly before settling down across the table. A waiter was already at their disposition, Donnie already asking for a bottle of white wine, interjecting some Italian words in the bunch and ending with a “grazie mille”, to Vee’s surprise.

“You speak Italian?” she asked as the waiter was walking away.

“Non molti, ma un po' sì (Not a lot, but a little bit yes),” he answered. “Still learning, but I’m getting there.”

“Do you know any other languages?”

“I’ve tried to start learning Japanese alongside my brother Leonardo, but I’m not as proficient as him so far. I’ve also started French.”

Vee couldn’t help herself: “Donc, si je parle dans ma langue maternelle, tu devrais comprendre? (So, if I speak in my native tongue, you should understand?)”

Donnie froze for a moment, soon ruminating the words and showing a smile.

“Un peu (a bit),” he said. “But I feel like I need to practice a little more.” He did not skip a beat when adding: “I don’t know why, but I think a French Canadian’s accent sounds way more interesting than metropolitan French. There’s a certain flair to it, I can’t really explain...”

Vee was most certainly amused: “Try going into any rural parts of Québec, then you’ll feel like you’re speaking to aliens or something. Our French is unique, sometimes butchered, but it is nice indeed.” She did a small shrug. “I could help you practice, if you want.”

Their wine arrived, their glasses filled and the bottle left at their table. Donnie took his glass, pensively rolling the drink in his hand.

“You keep on giving, miss Vee, and I’ll soon feel cheap. First you’re helping me for the Lowline, now you’re proposing to help me with my French. ... My oh my, mademoiselle, I’ll have a debt to repay once again.”

“Let’s start by actually getting something for dinner,” added the woman, lifting the menu to her face in order to hide her blush. “It’ll give me time to think about if I need your help with something. What’s good in here?”

It was so hard to act casual...

“Their pastas are the best, but I’ll have to say that their tiramisu is to die for - I’m definitely grabbing one of those at the end.”

As the evening went along, Vee was finally starting to feel more at ease. The food was delicious, the wine delectable, and the company absolutely charming. They took some time to review the folder Donnie had brought along, talking about the project’s restrictions and demands. It was simple enough thus far, some ideas already boiling in the woman’s mind. Maybe the wine was kicking in, but she didn’t even flinch when her hand brushed the turtle’s over some papers. Her body language was screaming interest, lightly hunched over the table, actively listening to him and her smile tender. She couldn’t quite explain this attraction she felt. All she knew was that Donnie had this aura surrounding him; a welcoming and calm presence that made her feel safe and relaxed. His humor was subtle and his additions to a conversation well-placed. He was a man of many words and of a vast knowledge, although gladly giving the spotlight to any soul speaking, always listening with great interest. Vee could only admit that she wanted to learn more about him.

***

The dinner over, the pair headed back to the SUV, Donnie at least insisting that he could drop Vee to her place. How could she say no to a sweet smile such as his, anyway? The address handed, the ride went on smoothly in a comfortable silence, the woman glancing at the many lights outside - not even noticing that the terrapin would sometimes glance her way and feel this lovesick knot in his chest...

As he parked nearby her apartment building, he did not hesitate to get out as well, at least considering it good etiquette to escort her to the entrance.

“I hope I didn’t make it harder for you by cramming all that information in your face?” he said as they were talking, arms hooked again.

Vee shook her head, amused: “Absolutely not. It has given me ideas, in fact.”

“Good, good.”

As they stopped by the main door, they paused, their hooked arms transitioning into a longing, yet subtle touch of their hands. Vee finally moved her hand away, her blush faint as she removed a small strand of hair from her face.

“... This was nice, thank you,” she said. “Not the habitual work meetup I’m used to, but this was good for a change.”

Donnie quickly cleared his throat, retrieving his thoughts.

“Of course! It was quite pleasant, indeed. ... It’s not often that I get such enjoyable company.”

“You’re sweet, thank you.”

There it was, that silence as they both crossed gaze. That moment of unspeakable words and uncertain actions... The mutant sweetly smiled, breaking that moment.

“I’ll see you tomorrow at work. ... Goodnight, Vee.”

“Goodnight, Donnie.” She felt like she could breathe again...

Yet, as she saw the other walk away, she added:

“Donnie!”

He turned back.

“I think I know how you can repay me for the French lessons,” she continued. “... How about another evening together? Not work related this time.”

Joy lightened up the turtle’s features, definitely agreeing: “Absolutely!”

And just like that, the night felt even better.

((Part 5))

[fafulous]

Take Me Home (4/5)

Andy Barber x Reader (Post!Defending Jacob)

Summary: After the unfortunate events of the trial and after, a depressed Andy Barber decides to call it quits and start a mundane life far away from Newton. He decides it is best to have a fresh start away from prying eyes and alone, but he never thought his caring neighbor (and her son) would change all of that.

Chapter Warnings: MAJOR D.J. SPOILERS (BOOK Ending), Reminiscing the Loss of a loved one.

Andy soon came to realise that walking out on you was never ever really a solution. In reality he knew with his current state, without you he was doomed.

He needed you because he has no one. He needed you because it was his chance at something new; something no one would understand.

He needs you because in between all those shenanigans in these few months, he was falling hard for you.

But he did what he had to that day because he just wanted some space. In his head it seemed to be fine, but alas it hurt like a bitch.

On the other hand, Nikolai had no idea what was going on. It only took him minutes to fall in love with his new room. The lights, the colour of the room made him so jubilant, later on only to see you a bit unhappy. You were able to deflect from your son’s questions, but how on earth were you going to tell him that Andy won’t be meeting him anymore.

It hurt. So hard. All you needed was one conversation with him to settle things away but he wanted his space and so you half heartedly respected it.

Nikolai on the other hand was hitting a real low seeing you unhappy the whole day sporting stuffy red eyes. Like any other kid, Nikolai jumped to the conclusion that their mother is crying because she got a boo-boo or lost her favourite toy.

But that little brain of his pieced it slowly once he realised Andy never visited them for any of the dinner nights.

“Mommy pwese don’t cwy” his nimble fingers wiping your fat tears rolling down your cheek.

“I know peaches. I’m trying so hard to get Andy back okay. I’m sorry for crying around you like this baby.”

“B-but Wandi pwomised he neva gonna hurt you mommi…”

“Oh Niko,” you wiped the cookie crumbs around his tiny lips, “Your little brain won’t get it. It’s okay.”

“No. Not owkay. Wandi hurt you. Wandi bad. I don’t wike Wandi cahr now.”

You couldn’t help but surpass a giggle. “Niko. Andy is never bad. Never. He is just feeling sad and lonely. We just need to tell him we have him and love him okay?”

Love? Too soon. Maybe it’s more than like but it was too late to change it for your son and for yourself. You always saw how Niko’s eyes sparkled whenever Andy was around; he was soon accepting him to be a member of the household.

“Owkay,” he dug his head to your neck, “I wike Wandi and his cahr.”

–

The following week were hard for you and him. From sharing couches to kisses, now the only thing you both shared were small talks.

Yes. Small Talk. Or texts rather.

Andy told you he finally found a therapist to speak to and slowly expressed his wish to still visit Nikolai till you both figured out what was happening between you two.

Why did this have to get so complicated?

You on the other hand replied he was free to do so because to be real, the little kid missed him too. So, the next day he asked you for permission if he could take Nikolai on a car drive.

You had no idea what would go on in his head at times. From seeing Andy’s perspective, he was denied of the choice of telling you his story. It was his fucked-up childhood, his story that he wanted to tell you. Not a pity tatter-tale gossip story that was to be heard from your characterless, ex-husband.

Andy later in the evening sent a message that he was ready, and you saw the man your heart so longed for.

His eyes were back to being sunken, those blue irises not having the guts to meet yours. His hair was ruffled like he just woke up from a nap. Looking at him made you realise how much your hands were twitching to just hug him. You were reminded of the first night you spent at his house; that blue sweater he gave you while you two made out on his couch for the first time was now worn by him.

You walked towards him as you held Nikolai’s convertible baby seat to be fixed in his car and he was kind enough to open the door for you.

Andy on the other hand knew he had to- no, wanted to strike a conversation with you; but didn’t know what to say.

Hey long time huh?

Y/N. Hey, how are you?

Hey listen…

Nope nothing came out of his mouth while you fixed the seat.

He took in your appearance too; that ray of sunshine that beamed from your smile was non-existent; replaced with a forlorn look that he hated to see on you. The past few days were definitely much harsher on you than it was for him. Andy knew he couldn’t get any more foolish. He had to get back to what you two had before.

He needed it.

“Have we gone back to square one? Because of what? My ex-husband?”

Andy came out of his tiny reverie and focussed back on you. He didn’t pay attention, but he did realise you said something bitter that meant to sting him.

“Honey listen-”

“Oh, don’t you honey me Andy. How could you? How could you be so- so-“ you tried so hard to not break into a stream of tears.

How could you be so hateful to yourself Andy? Did you not trust me?

“How could you just desert me like that? D-did you think I was going to throw away my second chance at life for something you father did? Did you want to throw away your second chance at life because of your father who has no role in our lives right now?”

He sighed dejectedly, disappointed with himself. Hearing your voice break wrecked him, “I know Y/N. I was an asshole that day, leaving you without an explanation.” He found himself taking steps towards you and cupping your cheek, tilting his forehead onto yours, “I am so sorry hon- Y/N. I am sorry.”

You bit your lip and looked up at him, his eyes still closed; now content that he and you could just touch each other after a very long time.

Any other situation, you wouldn’t let a man walkover you so easily after fucking up. But this was Andy. The man who made you believe in second chances. You gave him a first chance already, and now it was again your turn to give him one more.

“You weren’t an asshole Andy,” you held on to his hands, “Its just, I don’t know…”

“I know you know exactly what you want to say Y/N. Just say it.”

You could hear Nikolai running around his circles with his unicorn plush doll behind you, “I was angry when you left, but at the same time I tried to understand your point of view, your emotions and your feelings about this whole situation. But I think or- or I know that I didn’t deserve to be ghosted like that Andy, because I liked you for you, not what your father did, especially when we had something so good going on.”

He removed his hand from your cheeks and looked down like a disappointed child. He knew he was at fault and so he didn’t say anything; head hung in shame looking at the little, carefree boy that he loved so dearly.

“It’s only had if you want it to be,”

“What do you mean?”

You saw a glint of that eagerness that Andy always had with you before, “I told that we had something good going on? It’s only had if you want it to be…“

Andy took some time to find his words. Again. It was the second time he fucked up so bad and here you were, taking him back even after he exploded like a mine. Was this woman for real?

“Of course, I want this honey. I always want us. You’re always so good to me.”

He reached out to graze your cheeks, but he was blocked by your squealing son.

“Cahr Wandi! Can we gooo?”

You were surprised that you weren’t interrupted by your son sooner, but nevertheless your son’s new founded patience was found to be a blessing in disguise.

The cutest sight unfurled before you as Andy made grabby hands at your son, only for the latter to be scooped into Andy’s arms like a cocoon.

“Come on Y/N, join us wont you? For a drive?”

You shook your head, “I think I’ll pass.”

“Y/N. I want to really make it up to you. Like real time. Please come with us?”

“I know Andy, but who will make dinner if I come along with you boys?”

Andy slowly grinned at your implications. He never ceased to be impressed by your gracious generosity and the small acts of kindness.

“I’m not mad, not as much as I was before I promise,” you dared to but tiptoed to place a kiss on his cheek, “We can talk over dinner today.” You saw how his cheek sported a cherry red tint, slowly creeping up till his ear. A teenager in a old man’s body.

“Peaches,” you turned to your son right now jumped into Andy’s arms, nuzzling his face in that soft sweater, “Be good and behave okay peaches? Don’t trouble Wandi- I mean Andy for anything on the way okay?”

Everything drowned inside a chorus of laughter when Andy realised how you had called his name. Niko had no idea what the humour was for but joined the chorus when he found his two most favourite people in the world giggling.

Were you forgoing all that pent-up sadness that this man gave you this week? Yes. Yes you were.

And you would soon realise that it was the best decision you made.

Hours passed by and the boys came back home. Nikolai was gleefully pulling onto Andy’s beard and curiously asking him when he was going to get a ‘bweard’ like him and heard both the boys animatedly inhaling; the smell of aromatic food that stirring their tummies.

“MOMMY IS MAKING PAWSTAHH!”

Andy was so confused. You always made the best Italian food for your child.

“Let’s just say after that episode we had with Chad, I was cooking boring greens and ordering takeout for the little one and me. I lost the will to cook. Thought I’ll revive the poor kid’s taste buds.”

It was always these small gestures that pulled you towards Andy; like this one. He tugged you by your shoulders and placed a soft kiss on your forehead and then cupped your cheeks so lovingly.

“Sorry Momma bear.”

“Shhh. It’s okay grumpy cat,” you winked.

Dinner on the other hand did go relatively smooth than you expected it to. Andy explained himself, his feelings and what he felt that day when he left you and tried his level best to process your emotional state that day.

The baked pasta was licked clean by your two boys and you while Andy also spoke about his past few days with his therapist, who seemed to help him more than he possibly could ever think of. Over a glass of wine, Andy held your hand promising you that he wouldn’t do any more foolish stunts that ended up hurting all of us in the process.

But as you and Andy were doing and drying the dishes, you felt that he was holding back something.

“You’re doing that thing.”

“What thing.”

“That thing you used to do when I used to pick movies that you don’t like.”

His grin could make your whole body mushy and soft like a teenager having their first crush “So? Is that my fault honey?” he feigned hurt, glad that he could now call you back with his favourite sweet name.

“Nah,” you playfully tapped his shoulder. “You give me that look so prominently so that I understand that you want something from me, or you want me to do something for you.”

Andy looked so lost and you knew something was biting his thoughts because he enjoyed doing domestic chores with you; his favourite being you washing the dishes and him drying them out and keeping them inside the cupboards. He didn’t reply until the last wine glass was kept inside the cabinet

“It’s just-” hesitated Andy. You waited patiently for him to find his words.

“It’s about Jacob.”

“Oh.”

For a startling few seconds, you held your breath; thinking about Andy’s son was something wrecked your thoughts and heart every single time.

“My therapist says that I haven’t, you know, fully processed Jacob’s death. Like I’m holding on to something. But parents don’t, right? They can’t move on from their child’s death right? It’s practically impossible.”

You weren’t sure what to say but you nodded, gripping on to his arm and gesturing to sit with you to the couch where little Niko dozed off with two of his stuffed dolls clenched in his hand.

“But she did say one statement that made sense to me, I don’t know. It made sense about how we can’t forget our children who are no longer with us but we can learn to accept the fact that they are no longer with us.”

Oh bub, how much have you been through? “Do you agree with this Andy?” You asked him to keep yourself strong during this conversation for him, and you did.

“Of course, yeah. Maybe. But the thing is I think I haven’t accepted it honey.”

You took both of his hands and squeezed reassuringly, “I have no idea what you are going through bub but I’m glad you are talking to me about this. Take your time; its going to be hard, but I’m right here okay? Whatever you need, I’ll do within my best ability.”

He hummed, but still hesitant.

“Andy its okay, tell me. Talk to me bub.”

He squeezed your palms even more tightly, turning towards you completely. “C-can I ask you a favour? I mean you can say no, I will understand.”

I’m ready to give you all the happiness in the world to you bubba. “Anything for you Andy? Tell me now.”

He didn’t meet your gaze, but instead shifting his focus to trace your knuckles, “My therapist told me to visit Jacob’s grave whenever I was ready, to mourn him, to accept he is no longer with me and you know…talk to him I guess. To process my emotions. And um…Oh god I am a bubbling mess Y/N.”

“Hey its okay baby take your time. There is no pressure.”

“I can’t do this alone honey…I need you there with me. Can you come with me to the graveyard?”

How could you ever say no to this solemn situation?

“Of course, honey. Absolutely anything you need.”

And what seemed like after ages, Andy Barber enveloped you into his signature bear hug. Both of you left a huge sigh of breath, relief washing over that both of you were slowly getting back on track.

Until you heard a rugged whimpers from the little boy beside Andy.

You didn’t want to tell Andy about this, but Nikolai’s nightmares were back and the little boy was finding it difficult to sleep at night. The new nursery still did not work for him, so he ended up sleeping on top of your chest; your heartbeat probably soothing him to sleep.

But Andy the experienced father he was, quickly scooped him into his arms and started cradling him, rocking him side by side with his arms protecting him, humming a familiar soft tune that seemed to calm you in the process too. You saw how Niko’s head was cushioned between Andy’s pecs and muscles, slowly relaxing and nuzzling into his touch.

Niko’s scrunched up face was now back to a peaceful baby lost in slumber. 

Andy met your gaze and blinked at you with a smile and it conveyed so much than you think.

We got this baby. We all gonna get through this.

–

The decision to take Nikolai along with you and Andy was refuted by the latter saying that a young boy like him shouldn’t be visiting such desolate place.

“Children are the embodiment of new birth, new life. And graveyards, quite opposite.”

But you knew secretly he also didn’t was your son to see him in such a vulnerable position. You were grateful for the fact that the rough patch between you and Andy was solved; for the little boy saw Andy as his new father figure with Chad gone away with a new girlfriend.

Talking about Chad, he did not make efforts to meet his son; and you didn’t bother contacting him. Better off without him you wondered.

The drive to Jacob’s grave was a couple of hours away and ride in itself was a quiet one. Andy and you were informally dressed in dull colours, hearts dull too. You knew it was a big step for Andy and you were going to support him till he thinks he is over it. Car windows were rolled down, the fresh air making efforts to refresh you both.

You could also see Andy’s urge to interlink his hands with you while your drove and you did; Gripping onto his palm or occasionally rubbing his shoulders or thighs throughout the ride would help him calm down and relax his creased forehead.

When you both got down from the car it was so hard to read Andy’s thoughts. He came over to you and interlinked your palms and made way to the place where his son was buried.

Jacob’s grave was flowerless when arrived. Andy soon fixed that after leaving a wreath of Jacob’s most favourite flowers, daisies.

A graveyard, a place of death, sprouting trees filled with life here and there. The irony of life.

You didn’t know the boy but the aura of the graveyard, the impersonal feeling towards the dead even though you have no idea who they were beneath the stones made you heart sink. It then came to your senses.

The boy was just fourteen.

Both of you sat down near his grave, not caring about the grass and mud staining your clothes. He finally took away his palms from yours.

Andy spoke some kind words, rekindling memories of his son’s favourite pastime, his favourite stories and one of his embarrassing yet kind-hearted moments. He sought an apology on behalf of his mother, trying to make Jacob understand that his mother loved him so much, that it unfortunately ended tragically.

Another thought popped into your head, how couples these days separate over trivial matters, over materialistic matters, and infidelity. But Andy? He separated because his wife- No no. You didn’t want to complete that thought.

But after a while passed and you decided give Andy some needed space. He was probably going to be anxious, but it was for the best.

“Andy, you feel a bit better?” you whispered.

“You can say probably.”

Here we go. “I’m going to leave you two alone okay?”

“What? Honey. If I can’t-”

“You can Andy. He is your son, remember that. So, don’t hold back. I know you wanted me to be here with you and I did and I’m so proud of you, bubba,” you stroked his hair. “But unintentionally you may be holding back on expressing because I’m here and that’s normal.”

Why are you so good to me?

“I’m just going to be near the parking lot okay? I’m not going anywhere,” you reassured him with a peck on his cheek and made your way back.

You shed your tears while you sat inside his car, thinking about the little boy. It was difficult thinking of losing a loved one that you gave birth to. He was too young. Too fucking young.

Oh, this cruel world, how you hated it so immensely right now.

Half hour passed by and you saw Andy making his way towards the car. It was so strange to think of this, but he didn’t look red eye rimmed like you; he looked the same with much more solemnity. He didn’t cry and that slightly bothered you. Maybe you had to accept the fact that different people process emotions differently.

He got into the car and took in your red eyes. He knew you had cried. Seeing you like that made his pull your lips onto his for just a chaste kiss, the first time you two felt each other’s lips after an eon. All he breathed into your lips was that we are going to be okay and drove back home with no word exchanged. For the upcoming hours, the fresh air offered you comfort, drying out those spilt tears along with the lingering touch of his palms; interlinked like their souls.

After coming back, you took advantage of Andy’s silence and maneuvered him to your home. He seated himself on the couch pulling out his phone and wallet from his pants and placed it on the coffee table.; trying to steal a quick nap while you picked up Nikolai from your neighbour Mr. Arthur.

Andy sleeping gave you an immense sense of peace, but for the little boy in your hands; not so much.

“WANDI!!!!”

He groggily woke up thanks to Nikolai running towards him, lying on his chest like he does with you. “Hey buddy.”

“You home yaay!” Probably meant that he was excited to see the man in house like the usual dinner nights. Nikolai calling him and telling he was home pricked him and at the same time felt so right. As cliché as it sounds, he always has heard this quote where Home is never a place with four walls to cover your head; home is where the heart is.

His heart was with you and Nikolai.

After eating Andy, and you began to do your dish washing routine, this time he washing the dishes. He was slow, but that was alright, you had all the time in the world.

Niko on the other hand was singing all the rhymes he learnt from daycare in different pitches, earning a chuckle from the both of you here and there. He was also carelessly playing with Andy’s phone and wallet, both of you seeing that the little boy had dropped all the contents of the wallet on to the floor. Once they were done Andy picked up the falling things patiently without chiding the little one like any other adult would. 

He picked up his Dollar bills, receipts and then a forgotten thin strip of a photo roll.

It was him and Jacob.

The roll had four pictures of him and his son posing for the silliest pictures, the first three with their tongues sticking out in the goofiest angle possible. The last one however was so pure; Andy giving a  forehead kiss to Jacob because he was so proud of his son, remembering he had bagged the highest grade in English that term in school.

Minutes pass and he didn’t notice his waterworks brimming. A blink and they would fall down.

And they did, when he heard Nikolai nudging him by the thigh. “Why you cwyin Wandi?”

That startled you enough to stop whatever it was you were doing and went to see what was happening.

Oh bubba.

You sat near Andy, touching his thigh for comfort while your son got closer to the photo that was in Andy’s slightly quaking hands.

“Who that Wandi?”

“Th-thats my son buddy. His name was Jacob.”

“Can he play with me Wandi?”

Everything just pricked. The boy’s innocent questions and Andy’s realisation of his emotions. This was too much to bear.

“No buddy he can’t-“

A hand around his shoulder, it was you. When he looked up his eyes were blurry from the tears that were falling. He was so upset he didn’t even realise you were next to him. It was you. Only you.

It was then you realised it finally that it hit Andrew that his son was dead.

“You don’t have to answer that Andy. He’s just a kid. It’s okay.”

The little one feeling that he had said something wrong hugged his arms with his little arms. “I’m sowwy Wandi. Don’t cwy.”

“I’m not buddy, I-I’m not.” He reassured the kid, and falsely assuring himself too.

“Wandi, I’m feelin sleepy…” “Yeah, let’s get you to bed buddy,” he cooed with his quivering voice.

“Andy I’ll take him-” But he refused to and took the child. You took a few minutes to pull yourself together after witnessing Andy so vulnerable. Even in these moments, he took care of your son. When you reached the nursery, Andy was whispering a lullaby to a dozed off Niko for a good ten minutes. He even spoke to the little boy, telling him that the measly Audi car painting he did in the room was going to protect him and his nightmares; and the boy believed because Andy said so.

Few minutes later and Andy didn’t refuse to hold back.

“I held Jacob like Nikolai, put him to sleep like Nikolai. My sweet precious baby,  my innocent child Jacob. He didn’t do anything and he is away from me Y/N. Far far away-”

Andy let out a loud whimpering cry, the sound swallowed when he buried his head into your neck and your tears began streaming, him sobbing uncontrollably the next minute.

Andy and your tears began streaming; you pulled yourself together soon but Andy? He was weeping uncontrollably. You only could take him in your arms and offer him comfort. No words could heal his wounds instantly. He buried his face into your neck, his safe place, which made you remember the initial days with Andy when he lent a shoulder when you cried. Now it was your turn.

You whispered in ears how it was best not to do this near Niko and maneuvered Andy to your room. He held onto your arms as you took him to your room. You urged Andy to talk to you if the visit to the grave was still bothering him. He sought recluse in your safe place again, lying down on the bed, head tucked in your neck.

“Andy you can tell me anything. I promise it won’t affect whatever is between us.”

It was too twisted, he was distraught. He ranted about Laurie and how she unravelled into killing her own son. He slipped some details of how Laurie always kept bringing up past incidents of his son to prove that Jacob was the possible killer. He kept blaming himself that he was too weary with Laurie and that he should’ve seen her actions. Your whole body pricked; he was crying as he said all this.

You couldn’t imagine Nikolai and yourself in that situation. It brought tears to you eyes but wiped them off before he could see it. You let him talk as much as he wanted to, calming and soothing Andy in the process, running your fingers through his hair gently. You comforted him as much as you could and kept reminding yourself that this was the first time he came to his senses and realised he was crying out for his dead son; and so you were patient.

“My own wife murdered him Y/N. My Jacob. If I had been more attentive”

“Shhhhh Andy,” you cooed into his ear “Your circumstances were horrible. Don’t blame yourself bubba, none of this was your fault okay? Jacob’s death was out of your hands, it was an unfortunate accident Andy.“

Andy could stay all day in your embrace, his head on your gentle shoulders while your soft hair caresses made him doze off to sleep.

But his head felt like it was going to explode and he couldn’t let you see that.

“I’m going back home honey. I think I need to be alone tonight. I- I am not abandoning you okay, I promise, I’ll be okay tomorrow.”

“Andy are you sure? Stay with me, I don’t want to leave you alone.”

“I- I think I need to be alone for sometime you know? Please don’t be upset.”

“I’m never ever upset okay? As long as you are sure bubba; whatever you think is best for you okay? This house is always open to you.”

Kisses on the cheek were exchanged before he left your home. But you stayed awake, in the hopes he’ll be back because deep down you knew, he needed you.

You would give him space, and why not?

He was your home.

–

Andy soon realised he couldn’t. Staying alone was the worst decision he made.

Yes he did get the desired space he absolutely needed for like an hour and he did try to cease his crying, but his heart, oh his heart was pounding like nobody’s business. Anxious. Alone. Not cared for.

The walls of his room closed around him, his breathing becoming rugged, the laughter of his dead son echoing in his head. But he remembered he was cared for. By you. He had only you now.

He wanted, needed your soothing embraces, your kind words, your optimism, your affection. Everything.

He just wanted you now.

He had to forget.  It was a bit past midnight, but it was you. His reliable rock; soon to become the love of his life. He had to forget what he was going though and in a moment of desperation, he texted you. His thought was confirmed, you would always be there for him.

—

Last and Final Part 5 on its way :)

[leossmoonn]

chemistry part thirteen

part twelve | part fourteen | masterlist

zuko x fem!reader

avatar: the last airbender

includes - you, zuko, suki, katara, toph, sokka, and aang

special appearances by - iroh, azula, and appa

warnings - mild language , makeout scene

you put your phone in your purse, getting up to go to the bathroom. you washed your hands and looked at your makeup and outfit for the 100th time.

your makeup was pretty minimal. well, it looked minimal. you did a very natural look with winged eyeliner and a red lip. since it was cold and zuko had told you to dress warm, you had wrapped up in warm, but cute clothes.

you had put on solid black jeans, a black belt, a red turtleneck sweater, a red scarf, and a coat. you had paired the outfit with black, one-inch heeled boots and curled hair. you were wearing a gold necklace that katara had given you a long time ago, and the charm bracelet that zuko had given you yesterday.

you hoped he liked your outfit. you’d never been on a real date before that didn’t consist of friends being with you. you were nervous, to say the least.

a knock sounded at the door, making your heart race and palms sweat.

“time to shine,” you muttered to yourself as you walked to the door.

you swung the door open, smiling once you met zuko’s smiling face. you took a look over his own outfit.

he was wearing jeans, a dark-blue sweater, a black coat, and black boots. you noticed silver rings on every other finger on his hands, and a silver chain around his neck. they made him ten times more attractive. his hair was fluffy and looked soft, going down past his eyes, covering up most of his scar.

“you look beautiful,” were the first words he spoke to you.

a light blush arised on the tip of your ears and cheekbones. you put your head down, smiling shyly. “thank you. you look really handsome.”

zuko smiled brightly at you, thinking how cute you were when you got shy. “thank you. are you ready to go?” he asked, holding out his hand for you to take.

you looked up at him, a big smile sitting in your red lip. “yep,” you said and took his hand.

goosebumps ran up your arm at the skin contact. you felt all warm and tingly. a feeling you only felt when you were with him.

you closed the door, locking it and heading out to his car. you got in the passenger’s seat, sighing happily as you and zuko made eye contact once again. you couldn’t help but get lost in his ember eyes, they were so pretty.

“so, where are you going?” you asked.

“um, somewhere not warm,” zuko answered, starting the car.

“hm, gonna keep it a secret from me? this isn’t a good way to start a relationship,” you joked.

zuko chuckled, “i think you’ll like it.”

“me, too,” you smiled.

as he drove, you two talked about the rest of your plans for christmas break. you were planning on heading back up to see your parents for the rest of the break, and he was planning on having a new year’s party with his family. he had invited you, to which you had happily accepted.

“you sure it won’t interfere with your family plans?” zuko asked.

“nope. i usually come back here a day before new year’s eve because the girls and i also plan a party,” you reassured him.

“ah, i see. well, good. are you girls still planning a party?” zuko asked.

“hm, probably not. and if they do, they’ll just have to have to without me because i’ll be at a much cooler party,” you chuckled.

“yes, you will,” zuko smiled.

you hummed, your hand making its way to his subconsciously. his hand was on the gear shift, per usual. you set your hand on his, liking the warmth that he provided.

zuko smiled at your gesture, happy that you two have grown close and were comfortable enough with each other to do those types of things. he loved feeling your skin on his. whether it was with hand-holding, cuddling, or kissing - which you two hadn’t done yet, but he had thought about it many times.

he drove for another 10 minutes, finally arriving at the date place.

“you brought me to a dark parking lot?” you chuckled.

zuko sighed, “yeah, i know i look sketchy right now, but i promise you’re safe.”

you smiled, “i know, don’t worry. i feel most safe with you, anyways.”

those words made zuko’s heart flutter. every guy liked hearing that they made a girl feel safe, especially when it was a girl who the guy had been crushing on hard for almost 3 months, which was you for him.

“i’m glad,” zuko said and got out of the car. you followed in his suit, seeing him go to the trunk of his car. he pulled out a small picnic basket.

“a picnic in december?” you asked.

zuko shrugged sheepishly, “aang said this was a cute idea. plus, we aren’t staying here.”

“alright. well, lead the way,” you smiled.

he nodded and slid his hand into yours, intertwining your fingers. you walked close to him, puting your head on his shoulder. you were grateful he radiated heat, otherwise you would be freezing.

you two stopped in front of a bunch of trees. zuko turned to you.

“close your eyes for me, okay?” he asked.

you nodded shutting your eyes tight. zuko put his arms around you, your body stiffening from his touch, but almost immediately relaxing. zuko walked you forward slowly. you were nervous, but extremely excited. you couldn’t wait for what zuko had planned.

“alright, open your eyes,” zuko said softly.

you opened your eyes slowly, the cold air hitting them immediately. your jaw fell as you saw a beautiful scene in front of you.

zuko had taken you to a light show. it was in a part of the city where they would put up all types of christmas lights in the shape of a tree, abominable snowman, snow, stars, snowmen, children ice skating, etc. you remembered your parents would take you here when you were a little girl and drive around so you could see the lights. it was one of the most fondest memories you had of your childhood, and now, you were spending it with the greatest guy on earth.

“do you like it?” zuko asked.

you looked at him, smiling. “i love it. how did you know about this place?”

“aang told me you loved this place as a kid, and that you hadn’t been to it in a while. i thought it would be nice to take you here for our first date,” zuko said.

“i love it, thank you. this is such a cute date idea. you are perfect,” you said.

“thank you. let’s sit at the gazebo,” zuko said, pointing to the building across from you. you nodded excitedly, taking his hand in yours and running to it.

once you got to the gazebo, zuko set out the picnic blanket that he folded into the basket. he got the food he prepared, too. he had made noodles, egg tarts, jasmine tea, moon cakes, and roasted turtleduck.

“hm, smells so good. you made all this?” you asked, sitting down.

“yep,” zuko smiled proudly.

“wow, he’s romantic and cooks. what more can a girl want?” you teased

“i know,” zuko chuckled. “my mom and grandpa taught me how to cook.”

“that’s really cool. i can’t cook for shit. i swear, i always end up burning everything,” you laughed, cutting yourself a peice of the duck.

“i can teach you,” zuko suggested.

your mind immediately went to a cute, very romantic date where he would teach you two how to cook, then after when you got to desert, you two would go back into your bedroom.

“that sounds very fun,” you smiled.

“i think so, too,” zuko smiled, taking a sip of tea.

you two talked while eating. after you finished, zuko and you had decded to lay down and admire the lights.

you had cuddled into zuko’s side, his arm around you, holding you close. your head was on his chest, tucked under his chin. your legs were intertwined with his, too. you sighed contently, you couldn’t remember a time where you had felt this happy.

zuko looked down at you with a love-filled look. he pulled you to him impossibly closer. he couldn’t believe you were with him in this moment. after mai, he wasn’t sure he would really like or trust anyone else. but you made it easy. you were kind, funny, so sweet and smart. you didn’t try to act tough like mai, and you definitely were not afraid of showing your feelings. you also had good intentions. you were the perfect girl for him.

“thank you for taking me out tonight. i’ve had lots of fun,” you said, sitting up and looking into his eyes.

“me, too. i’ve been wanting to ask you out for a while,” zuko said.

“well, i’m glad it happened when it did,” you smiled.

“me, too,” zuko said.

you looked at his face, not being able to stop yourself from staring down at his lips. he noticed this and put his hand up to your cheek, running his thumb slowly along your skin. his rings felt cold, but good against your face. his eyes traveled down to your lips as well, going back up to your eyes for permission. you looked back up to his eyes, leaning forward.

you weren’t sure what was happening. well, you did, but your heart was racing a mile a minute. the way his thumb was rubbing against your skin had your stomach knot up. the fact that there was barely any space between you and him made your mind a little foggy, and made you figet with your thighs.

“i’ve never kissed anyone before,” you said breathlessly.

“just go with your instinct,” zuko said, his other hand finding your waist, squeezing reassuringly.

you nodded, leaning in more. before you knew it, you two were kissing. you two took it slow, savoring the feeling. his lips were soft and very good at kissing. the way they moved with your’s, the fact that his lips fit perfectly with your’s, put butterflies in your stomach. you couldn’t think of another perfect moment.

for someone who hadn’t kissed anyone before, zuko thought you were amazing. your lips moved with his expertly, making him imagine fireworks shooting off in his brain. his hand on your waist pulled you impossibly closer, wanting to feel you right against him. you took the hint and swung your leg around his waist, climbing on top of him without breaking the kiss. your hands wrapped themsleves in his hair, pulling slightly.

zuko ran his tongue on your bottom lip. you opened your mouth almost immediately, taking in a shallow breath of air. your tongues clashed, you quietly moaning in response. zuko’s grip on your waist got tighter as you two fought for dominance while kissing.

it wasn’t too long before you had to pull away for hair. once you two did, big smiles rested on your faces. zuko admired the way you looked in the dim light. you hair was slightly messy from laying down and running your fingers through it. your cheeks were flushed and lips wet and a little swollen from kissing him. your lipstick was also smudged slightly.

“that was um... amazing,” you panted.

zuko took a deep breath, his going up to your hands. he intertwined each of your fingers together.

“wanna do it again?” he asked.

you giggled and leaned down, “definitely.”

————

note - hope you guys read and enjoy this as new parts are added! if you wanna be on the taglist, message me and/or reply to this post :))

taglist - @sorrythatspussynal @theblueslytherin @charlenasaxen @akiris @the-paintedlady @thatarthistorynerd @freckled-and-daydreaming @fi-chanwrites

[novelconcepts]

fic: learning a lot (about being alive)

So much of the story is the same. Dani. The kids. The lake. So much of the story is exactly the same--only, this time, there is no gardener working at Bly Manor.

The young woman is tired. Exhausted, if she’s truly honest with herself. She feels as though there must be an endpoint to running, a marker down the road that says a person has gone as far as they are able. Rest now, she imagines that marker saying in a cheerily-bold script. Fall down now. Let go. 

She isn’t there yet, she’s pretty sure. Not quite. She doesn’t know how much a person can be expected to carry, or for how long, but at least...at least she has a little left in the tank, yet. Enough to get her affairs in order, if nothing else. Enough to try a little longer to find solid ground. 

***

It was a matter of escaping home, to start with. A matter of escaping old ghosts and older expectations, and that Dani Clayton found all too quickly how easily ghosts can follow a person across miles and miles of world was...unfortunate. It had been naive, maybe, to think she’d leave Eddie behind with the simple act of crossing an ocean. One of those you never know before you try things.

Try, she did. Succeed, she did not. Not at first.

Still, there were bright spots. Travel hadn’t been a large part of her life back home; Edmund was a homebody, her mother always had opinions to offer when Dani mentioned family trips, and there were the kids at school to consider. Reliability had been her middle name, if not by choice, at least by necessity. She’d been twenty-five, twenty-six, twenty-seven years old, and all she’d seen of the world was small-town Iowa. 

And then, unexpectedly: the thread of courage that had pushed her to break things off with Eddie.

And then, even worse: the screech of tires, the scream tearing from her own throat, the awful gurgling sounds Eddie had made as he lay spread-eagled on the blacktop. 

And then, the worst thing of all: glasses, gleaming bright with no sign of Eddie’s laughing eyes behind them, flashing at her from every mirrored surface in the room.

It had been too much. Too much for anyone to bear, Dani was sure. Who could blame her, for running away? Who could blame her, for needing a little space?

Her mother, for one. Eddie’s mother, for another. Even so, she had gone. Packed three bags, bought a guidebook to Europe, jumped a plane for the first time in her life. Bravest thing she’d ever done--or stupidest--and it had been a week before she’d stopped waking up trembling with adrenaline. 

She had some money--enough to get by on cheap hostels and simple foods--but she’d kept her eyes on the listings in every paper all the same. One in particular seemed to burn a little brighter within the newsprint. A charming manor in the countryside. Two children. Live-in au pair required. 

A good, solid job. Money in her pocket, and a path forward through a world that maybe wouldn’t demand Danielle of her any longer. She’d stretched for it, closed her fist tight around the opportunity. 

Those kids had been wonderful. Strange, at times, but what children freshly mourning their parents aren’t strange? The other adults at Bly Manor, too, had been charming and kind--Owen, with his bad puns and his delicious dishes, and Hannah, who had taken Dani by the arm with motherly affection almost before Dani had even introduced herself. They were good people. For a few weeks, she’d felt more at home than she had ever been with people who had known her since childhood. 

Still, there had been shadows cast over the summer. Miles, aggressive without provocation. Flora, sleepwalking. Owen, unexpectedly losing his mother. Hannah, growing more and more distant. 

And, finally, the night everything comes apart. A lake. A spectral form with a too-solid grip around Dani’s throat. A child, screaming in terror. A phrase, falling from her lips before Dani can even process the words. 

Dani says them like a spell. Dani says like them a promise. Dani says them, and blinks, and Flora is in her arms, squeezing so tight around her bruised neck, she thinks she might pass out. 

She almost tips over in cold, dirty lake water, but someone is splashing toward them. Henry. Henry Wingrave, still dressed for the office, bug-eyed and grasping for his niece with panicky hands. Dani gives her over gladly, feeling as though all the strength has been wrung out of her body. 

None of this makes sense. A summer spent at this house, making a warm little hole in the world for her to crawl into, only to culminate in this? In Owen shouting for Hannah, in Miles shaking all over, in Flora weeping and Henry trying to look as though he isn't about to start doing the same?

She can’t handle it. Suddenly can’t stay here. There’s...something happening beneath her skin, something cold and sharp and terribly foreign, and no one is looking at her. No one is seeing the way her hands convulse as she forces them into fists. 

She hears herself say, “I have to...have to go...” and knows no one is listening. Owen’s gone, sprinting off toward the chapel. Henry and the kids are a mess of hugging, shaking, crying bodies. 

A quick stop in the house, a quick stop upstairs to shuck off sodden sweater and mud-encrusted pants, and then she’s climbing through Henry’s still-open car door. Backing down the endless drive. Leaving the manor and all its eccentric shadows in her wake. 

***

Dani Clayton can’t breathe. Can’t think. Can’t drive, either, not really, but she’s made it this far. A few miles down the road, to a little village where most everyone is likely to already be asleep. 

There’s a pub next door to an inn, and she thinks, Nobody will care if I stay the night. Just one night. 

She has no idea what comes after. Is sort of afraid to think about it much. Tonight hasn’t made a lot of sense--her brain is still buzzing with it’s you, it’s me, it’s us, with Flora’s screams and her own gargling panic as an impossible hand tightened around her throat--and maybe that’s fine, for now. Maybe one night of not making sense is an acceptable loss. She’ll just walk into this little pub in this little village that doesn’t know her name, and maybe she’ll feel better after a drink. Or two. 

Or seven.

She’s not much for hard liquor, and her tolerance ought to be negligible, but there’s just something about this night that has unbound her. Alcohol is doing very little to take the edge off this gut-wrenching feeling that she isn’t...right. Isn’t quite who she was two hours ago. Isn’t...alone.

No, she thinks with firm certainty, no, that’s the crazy talking. The crazy I thought I fixed after Owen’s mother’s funeral, but maybe not, maybe it’s still...

She tips back her glass, polishing off a scotch she’d never have thought to order yesterday. Her face contorts; it hurts to swallow, even without the burn. She should probably give up, probably head next door and book a room to sleep this off.

“All right there?”

Her eyes snap to the owner of the voice, which is both thickly accented and alluringly curious. A woman--small, brown hair mussed, eyes watching Dani like she sort of expects Dani to start trouble right here in the smallest pub in England--is leaning against a neighboring table. Dani lets her empty glass drop with a thud against oak scored with initials and curse words. 

“Fine,” she answers shortly. The woman’s brows raise. 

“Only,” she says in a voice much more level than Dani’s own, “you don’t look fine. Look a bit like you’ve had the worst night of your life, in fact.”

Why should she care? Dani wonders. She licks her lips. “That,” she says, “would be an understatement.”

She’s too aware that she doesn’t belong in a place like this--smoke hazing the air, men laughing too loudly near the bar--and that a woman like the one watching her through guarded eyes does. Too aware that her pastel sweater and scrunchie probably label her as an outlier even faster than her American accent.

This woman, on the other hand, has the look of someone who spends most nights in pubs like this one. Her face is pretty--very pretty, Dani realizes with the belated interest of one just opening her eyes--but there’s something of a shield around her smile. Her clothes are clean, but not particularly fashion-forward: a pair of jeans, a ratty t-shirt, thin suspenders. She doesn’t look like anyone who has ever wasted a breath on Dani Clayton. 

But she’s raising her glass in a small salute. Dani raises her empty one right back, glancing at it with mild distaste. 

“Another?” the woman asks, still in that attention-grabbing, almost familiar tone. Dani starts to shake her head--she doesn’t accept drinks from strangers, as a rule, particularly strange women who look at her in ways that make her stomach clench--and changes her mind at the last second. Another. Sure. What harm could it possibly do?

***

Jamie’s back strikes the wall of the women’s bathroom with such force, she almost bites her own lip. Might have done, in fact, if not for the other woman’s lips in the way. 

She didn’t get a name, and figures that’s probably for the best. Bad enough she’s going down this road at all on a first glance--Bly isn’t big, and word travels impossibly fast. Jamie’s spent years keeping her head down, avoiding just these such entanglements. 

But the woman has incredible eyes--one bright blue, one a shocking brown--and accepted a free drink with the air of one who desperately needs a good time under her belt. When Jamie slid seamlessly from her own table to the stranger’s, the woman only smiled. When Jamie let her hand rest lightly on the pocked wood, fingertips grazing the woman’s wrist, she’d taken her lower lip between even teeth in a manner Jamie will probably think about for the rest of her life. 

Bathroom, then. Locked door. Bad choice, but one Jamie’s comfortable enough with so long as this woman is kissing her. 

She’s a damn fine kisser, and seems to have no qualms about showing Jamie as much. Her hands are fleeting, desperate, grabbing anywhere she can reach--Jamie’s collar is the current target, gripped so tight, it’s a wonder the thin material doesn’t tear--and she’s kissing Jamie like this is the most natural thing in the world. Like Jamie’s hand sifting through her ponytail, grabbing hold and tugging to urge her closer, is more welcome than that drink had been. Like Jamie, lips parting to accept a seeking tongue, is more welcome than--

Just a girl, Jamie reminds herself. Just a girl without a name, even. American. Probably won’t see her again, so might as well just enjoy what I get now. 

And what she’s getting is good, certainly. The woman has pressed a thigh between her legs, is riding against her with a panting ferocity that makes Jamie woozy. Her mouth slides from the woman’s kiss, searching for more skin to taste, her nose bumping against gold hoop earring as she licks a spot just below the woman’s jaw. A soft groan is her reward, and she grins against the woman’s skin, grazing with gentle teeth as she dips lower--

“Jesus,” she breathes, leaning back. Her fingers brush the woman’s neck below the collar of her sweater. “Hey, are you--”

“Fine,” the woman says, dragging Jamie’s bottom lip between her teeth and biting down hard enough for Jamie to hiss. 

“These,” she says, pulling slickly away again, “look like bruises--”

The woman is staring at her with a hard expression she can’t quite deconstruct. There’s something feverish about the way she looks at Jamie, something hunted and more than a little disconcerting. 

“I’m fine,” she says again, stiffly. “Do you want...?”

She almost sounds nervous, and Jamie realizes the opportunity for a pleasant evening is rapidly diminishing. Push now, push too hard, and this woman is going to turn on her heel and march out of this bathroom. Maybe out of Bly altogether. 

“If you do,” she answers, like this is nothing more than two bodies searching for something to hang on to. She leans back in, half-expecting the woman to shrink away, the moment already in its grave. Instead, she finds herself making an incredibly undignified noise as the woman slides her tongue into her mouth and a hand up the front of her shirt in the same motion. 

It feels both teenage and foolish, arching into a strange woman’s hand in a pub bathroom. Fascinatingly unwise, letting this woman scramble excited fingers against the seam of her jeans. Truly, just idiotic, sinking to her knees and pulling the woman’s trousers down just enough to seek out hot, wet skin with her tongue. 

Any other place, any other time, any other woman, and Jamie would know better. 

It’s just once, she reminds herself, groaning as the woman bucks into her mouth, slick and desperate, her hands tangled hard enough in Jamie’s hair to hurt. One stupid night with one stupidly attractive American. Life’s short. It’ll never come up again. 

***

Dani is pretty sure her head was removed last night and screwed back on the wrong way. 

She wakes in a heap in an unfamiliar bed, still in last night’s clothes. Her hair is a bedraggled mess around her face, her brain slamming itself repeatedly against her skull like a tiny, terribly angry man trapped in a very small room. Her mouth feels like she forgot to close it all night, her lips feel swollen, and her calves feel...weirdly sore. Like she’d spent the night clenching every muscle in her legs. Like she...

Oh, she thinks, quite unable to convince herself to open her eyes. Right. Like she’d spent the evening with a strange woman in a pub bathroom. A strange woman who had...with her mouth...and a wellspring of eager talent...

“Shit,” Dani says in a very small voice. 

If she doesn’t open her eyes, she thinks, there can be no proving she made choices last night the old Dani Clayton would never make. No proving how many scotches she’d downed. Certainly no proof of the woman whose thrusting tongue had caused Dani to...

She cracks one eye open, relieved when she finds herself in an empty and incredibly boring room that can only belong to some kind of motel. The inn, she realizes, sitting up with a wince. She’d made it to the inn, with its twin bed and its single lamp and its sad little flower print on the far wall.

By the looks of things, she made it to the inn alone. 

That makes it better and worse at the same time, somehow.

She’s far too tired and far too hungover--far too something else, too, something that has not at all diminished with the rising of the sun, and she will not look at it, will not think about it, will not--to care how she looks. Staggering downstairs, hair scraped back from her forehead, clothes rumpled, she gives the innkeeper her best approximation of a smile.

“Excuse me, do you serve--”

“Breakfast next door,” the man says dully, jabbing a pen toward the exit. Dani’s mouth twitches, an old anger pressing itself against her ribs. If there's one thing she can’t tolerate on a hangover and an empty stomach, it’s a man speaking to her like she’s not even there.

Forget it, she thinks with some effort. One perk, she supposes, of having dragged herself in at who-the-hell-knew what hour last night is the lack of packing up to do this morning. No bags. No sign she was ever even up there. She’ll just go next door, get a cup of coffee and maybe a little toast, and...

Ah. I stole Henry’s car last night. She heaves a sigh. 

“No breakfast after all?” the man adds as she stands in the doorway, peering out in search of wherever she parked a much-too-expensive vehicle without Henry’s consent. She considers flipping him the bird. Decides no version of Dani Clayton is quite that crass. 

Even one who spent last night riding some strange woman’s--

“No,” she says primly. “No, I should be getting back.”

***

Henry, to her extreme relief, has not even noticed her absence. Things have been a bit hectic, she gathers. The children are all right--as all right as they can be, anyway; they’re still in bed when she sneaks into the house--but they’re the only ones. Henry, seated at the kitchen table with a mug of cold tea between his palms, looks bruised around the eyes. 

“Long night,” he says, though Dani hasn’t asked. “Are you...?”

“Fine,” she says, as bright and cheerful as she can muster with her skull throbbing. “Where’s Hannah?”

Henry looks at her like she’s just buried a kitchen knife between his ribs. Her mouth goes dry. 

Hannah was not, as it turns out, in the chapel last night. Hannah was not anywhere at all. Not the part of her that counts.

“I can’t explain it,” Henry says in a low, urgently exhausted voice. “If I hadn’t...if it had been any other way, I’d have said I hallucinated the whole thing.”

It’s impossible, and yet, Dani can’t discount the story. Something about this house and its grounds, its atmosphere (its lake, she thinks and pinches a torn bit of cuticle to distract from the word), has her believing in things she’d have said were children’s fairytales a year ago. Ghosts aren’t real; anyone with any amount of sanity knows it. And yet...

You. Me. Us. She shudders. 

They’d gone out to the old well first thing, Henry tells her. He and Owen, walking in silence, both knowing what they’d find and knowing just as well that it was an unacceptable discovery. 

“I offered to go along,” he says hollowly. “When the authorities arrived. He wouldn’t hear it. Must have been an accident, they said, a terrible fall...”

How, Dani wonders, does a woman like Hannah Grose fall into a well?

As if that’s really the question. As if the true question isn't how does a woman like Hannah Gross fall into a well, and just continue about her life for the next few weeks without pause?

Ghosts aren’t real. Can’t be, in a sane reality. And yet, the coroners told Henry there were signs of decomposition going back many days. Hannah, who had been talking and laughing at this table just yesterday night, had been down there alone for so long. 

Can’t stay, Dani thinks with sudden venom. Can’t stay here anymore. Isn’t home anymore. 

It’s the same thought she had in that little blue house across the pond, staring at things that had been Edmund’s--had been, for better or worse, theirs--and understanding some changes are permanent. Some places, once haunted by certain kinds of grief, cannot remain your own. 

As if reading her mind, Henry pushes back from the table. “I’d like very much to thank you for your services this summer, Miss Clayton. I truly don’t know what the children--what any of us--would have done without you.”

She tries to smile. The bones of her face ache. Everything about her is a single rabid pulse of pain, except maybe the smallest corner of her mind, the smallest corner of memory where she is back in a dirty pub bathroom, watching a woman sink to her knees, feeling her eyes roll back as that woman touches--

“It was my pleasure,” she says, and isn’t lying, exactly. She’d do it again, she thinks. All of it. The job. The little family she found so unexpectedly. Rescuing Flora from something she can’t, even now, process. She’d do it all again if asked, and do it exactly the same. 

It hurts no less, for that. 

***

“You’re sure?” Henry asks yet again. He’s out of the car, holding her bags out, his face that of a worried father. Dani thinks he’ll make a good one to those kids, in his own way. “You could stay a little longer. I’d never ask you to--”

“I know,” she reassures him, slinging the backpack over her shoulder. “But honestly, it’s better this way. The kids don’t need me hanging around, and I...”

Can feel her, she doesn’t say. Can feel her moving around, way down where I can’t even catch a glimpse of how or why. If I stay there, if I let it, that house will call to her like a magnet again. Like gravity.

“It’s time for a new adventure,” she says instead, smiling. He believes this smile, she knows. Anyone would. She’s gotten so good at faking it. 

He hugs her once, quickly. It is appropriately awkward, and she even laughs a little. Flora, hanging out of the backseat window almost far enough to fall, looks miserable. 

“You’re really leaving?”

“I am.” Bent at the waist, Dani looks the girl in the eye. Flora’s face is uncharacteristically solemn. “But I promise I’ll write. Call, too, if your uncle gives me the number.”

“Where are you going?” Flora presses. Behind her, Miles lays a clumsy hand of reproach on her shoulder. Dani favors him with a small, comprehending smile. Miles has gone through things none of them can fathom, things he may never be able to talk about. She aches for the too-adult cast about his eyes. 

“I don’t exactly know yet,” Dani tells them both. “Like I said, it’s an adventure. Might end up anywhere.”

“But happy,” Flora says uncertainly. “Right?”

“I’m sure,” Dani says, dropping a final kiss to the top of her head, “it will be perfectly splendid.”

She keeps the smile on her face as Henry ushers Flora back through the window and into her seatbelt, as they pull away from the curb and down the curve of Bly’s main intersection. When they turn the corner, disappearing from view, she lets the expression drop with a sigh. 

A week. A week since the lake, since finding Hannah’s body, since the impossible set up shop in her head. A week of Henry learning to parent in a slapdash rush, of Owen’s face more serious than she’d ever seen it, of yet another funeral. Hannah’s had been a quiet affair, properly spiritual as she’d have liked, and Dani had spent the entire thing trying not to think about the last funeral she’d attended. 

And now, a week later, she’s here. Standing in front of Bly’s one and only little pub once more. It’s barely afternoon; she figures this is as good a place as any to sit for a few hours with a beer and her thoughts, until she figures out what comes next. 

Nothing comes next, she finds herself thinking. You’re carrying a time bomb. You can’t understand it, can’t get rid of it, and there’s no one left to hold your hand as you wait for it to go off. 

Defeatist thinking. Stupid, hopeless, miserable thinking. She’s tired, but she isn’t out of the game just yet. 

Make a plan, she tells herself, slipping through the pub’s front entrance and taking a seat at the bar. Get a drink, make a plan. There’s always a next step. 

Except, this time, she doesn’t know if she believes it. Not really. Not knowing things she isn’t comfortable knowing. Ghosts exist, and ghosts can hurt--not just your grasp on the world, not just your sanity, but you. They can throttle. They can manipulate. They can steal the life out from under you, if only you invite them in.

Not that she can say any of this aloud, not ever, not to anyone. 

Get a drink. Make a plan. Something that doesn’t involve Mom, or Iowa, or Danielle. 

She drops the backpack between her knees, slides the other bags under her seat where she can keep an eye on them. She’s sure she looks exhausted in a hooded sweatshirt, a denim jacket, the skin around her eyes nearly purple with sleepless nights. Pub at noon on a Thursday--maybe no one will notice. 

Not that there’s anyone she’s trying to impress.

“Just a beer,” she says when a shape appears in her periphery. “Please.”

“Sandwich as well?”

Her head comes up so fast, something in her neck cramps. The bartender, back to her, is filling a tall glass. Cloth over one shoulder. Brown hair a messy tangle of curls. 

“It’s--it’s you.”

The woman meets her gaze with a smirk Dani is simply not equipped at noon on a Thursday to cope with. 

“Last I checked,” she says calmly, setting the full glass in front of Dani and wiping her hands on the cloth. “Ought to be, too, seeing as how this is my pub.”

***

Oh, this is rich. This is rich, and this is wonderful, and this is fucking bad.

Jamie, who has been watching this woman loiter outside the pub for the better part of ten minutes, has had exactly this long to come to terms with her own misfortune. Ten minutes, to recognize the world is a shallow, cruel prankster. Ten minutes, to recognize this does nothing at all to stop a woman she’s been dreaming of for a week from walking back through her door. 

I know what you look like when you come, she thinks with a recklessness she truly thought she’s outgrown. And now I'm meant to serve you ale like we’re complete fuckin’ strangers. 

For all her nerves, watching the woman hug an older man, lean into a car to speak to some very small children, Jamie thinks she’s still the better off of their twosome. After all, she gets to decide how she’s going to stand--off the side of the bar, furthest from the door, buying time--and when she’s going to make her entrance. This woman?

Well, judging by her wide Bambi eyes, this woman could have done with a little preparation herself. 

“White or rye?” Jamie asks when the woman continues to gape at her. “Or we can get you a fish and chips plate, if it suits you.”

“I don’t understand,” the woman says. Her hand is clenched around her glass like she’s dimly considering tossing it like a grenade and bolting for the door. Jamie hopes she’ll restrain that impulse. Glass would be a bitch to clear up during the impending lunch rush.

“Well,” Jamie says, leaning her elbows against the bar in a show of carelessness. “When you order the fish and chips, see, they come wrapped in a little newsprint. And the grease makes for--”

“I know,” the woman snaps, “what fish and chips are. I just. I...” She lowers her voice, looking around like anyone’s in the mood to eavesdrop. “Do you...remember me?”

For a split second, Jamie is back in the bathroom, biting at soft thighs, loving the way this woman leaves scratches down the back of her neck. 

“Yes,” she says placidly. “I remember.”

“Okay,” the woman says, leaning towards her so far, she almost topples off her stool. “Okay, listen, I don’t--I mean--I didn’t--”

“Mean to do it,” Jamie suggests wryly. She’s heard this song more times than she can count. “Tripped and fell onto my lips, did you?”

“No,” the woman hisses. “I just--don’t normally do that.”

“Women,” Jamie says. It’s sort of nice, how empty the place is. Gives her plenty of time to sarcastically shift away from caring about how this woman is gazing at her. 

“No--I mean, I haven’t. Before. But I’ve wanted--doesn’t matter.” She’s practically playing jump rope with her own tongue, this poor beautiful woman. Jamie takes pity on her. 

“You mean you don’t normally stride into a small-town pub, put away more booze than the meanest local miner, and drag a stranger back to, ah. Improve your evening?”

“Yes.” The woman slumps against the bar, relief shining like starlight in her mismatched eyes. “Yes, exactly.”

“Was an accident, then,” Jamie says with studied calm. The woman shakes her head. Looks like it hurts, frankly, she’s putting so much behind it. 

“Not an accident. Just. Was a really strange night.”

And this, Jamie thinks, is a very strange conversation. The most she’s ever talked to a woman after sex, in fact. Stranger still, she feels like it was always going to happen, eventually. Like this woman was always bound to stroll back through her door. 

“Well,” she says, giving the bar a decisive rap with her knuckles. “I can be an adult about this, if you can. Agree to behave as though I haven’t, ah--”

The woman raises a single finger in warning, her face flushed. “Don’t.”

Jamie laughs. “Right. Anyway.” She extends a hand, takes the one the woman is jabbing in her direction. “Jamie. Bartender, terminally afflicted by the poor decision to settle in Bly.”

“Dani,” the woman says, squeezing her hand with surprising strength. “Teacher. Au pair. Unemployed.”

“All of the above, or one at a time?” Jamie grins. Dani releases her hand, touches her forehead lightly as if warding off a headache. 

“Honestly, I’m not even sure it matters.”

Strange woman, Jamie thinks. “You’re heading out of town, then? Only, I saw your taxi service come and go...”

If she says yes, that’s all this business taken care of before Jamie can bring herself to think on it too hard. It’d be best, she thinks. Best to let this too-beautiful woman swan right back out of her life, let her become little more than a jarringly-electric memory sneaking up on Jamie at odd moments. Jamie’s got a nice little life here in Bly--boring, but simple. She really doesn’t need anything upending that for her. 

“I don’t know,” Dani sighs. “I don’t exactly have a job anymore. Or a place to stay.”

“But?” Jamie turns her attention toward cleaning glasses, if only to keep from staring at this woman. She looks like it’s been days since last she slept, but there’s something about her eyes Jamie can’t seem to stop glancing at. 

“You’ll laugh.”

“I won’t,” Jamie says. Dani’s mouth twists, a crooked little grin that doesn’t sit quite right on her face. 

“Won’t believe me, then.”

Jamie says nothing. Some people don’t take kindly to being told to trust. Some people need more to put their faith behind. She can’t begrudge it of this woman, or anyone. 

“It doesn’t matter,” Dani says, pausing to take a hearty sip from her glass. Her neck looks better, Jamie notes--the finger-shaped bruises have faded to near invisibility. Not that she’s thinking about Dani’s neck. Not that she’s remembering the way Dani sighed and clutched at her back as she kissed--

“I just don’t want to go back,” Dani says, oblivious. Jamie nearly fumbles the glass in her hand, sets it carefully down on the rack. 

“To your old job?”

“Home.” A surprising amount of venom fits into that single syllable, rolling off of Dani’s tongue. Jamie can certainly understand that. 

“So, don’t.” She turns her back, barely able to believe what’s about to come out of her own mouth. It’s foolish. It’s foolish and dumb and silly, and still: “Stay here.”

Dani’s mouth makes a rather funny sound, falling open. Jamie keeps her eyes on the bar mirror, watching surreptitiously for signs of revulsion in the other woman’s face. 

“Could use a waitress,” she goes on, as if this is the most normal conversation in the world. “Just for a few weeks, mind. Through the fall, maybe. Boss man’ll be back by then.”

“Boss?” Dani repeats. Jamie flashes her a quick grin over her shoulder. 

“I don’t actually own the place. What on earth would I do, ownin’ a goddamned pub in Bly?”

***

She doesn’t mean to say yes. It’s complicated, saying yes to Jamie. Knowing what happened between them, and knowing it happened on a night she can’t explain, is bad enough. Knowing all of that and taking a job working alongside the woman every evening?

It’s a bad idea, and, somehow, that’s the only reason she does it.

She can’t explain it, the recklessness living inside her chest. Doesn’t like the feel of it, curled up against her good sense as though it will, at any moment, open its jaws and consume her best judgement. All she knows is there is something waiting for her to trip up. Something waiting for her to give up. Something that may take her at any time, no matter how she feels about it. 

Without something to hang on to--without something to close her fists around, something to focus all of her attention on--she’s going to give in to it. Sooner than she’d like. 

She doesn’t want to go. 

So, she stays in Bly, of all the places to start an adventure. Small, quiet, boring Bly. With...Jamie.

Not with Jamie, she thinks briskly. Not with Jamie-with Jamie. Just. Alongside Jamie. As a co-worker. A normal, casual, my-tongue-has-not-been-in-her-mouth relationship.

She’s been telling herself this for three days. Three days spent learning the ins and outs of the pub, learning how to navigate the unfriendly, untrusting stares of Bly locals as Jamie hovers just off her periphery. It has been...an experience, to say the least. 

“You’re doing great,” Jamie says at the end of the third night. They’ve just ushered the last of the patrons out into the brisk moonlight, and Jamie is in the process of moving chairs on top of each table Dani wipes down. They’re a good team, Dani thinks, a better team than a week of knowing one another has any right to produce. 

“I spilled a drink in a man’s lap,” she says, to distract from this not-entirely-unwelcome thought. Jamie leans conspiratorially close, shoulder brushing Dani’s as she drops her voice to a whisper.

“You only spilled it ‘cuz he bumped you trying to get a look at your ass. Served him right, I’d say.”

Heat climbs her neck, taking root in her cheeks. She hadn’t noticed. “Really?”

Jamie shrugs. “Does that to every girl who walks through that door. Not our most pleasant customer, to be sure, but he orders enough to keep our doors open, so...”

She makes conversation so easily, Jamie. Like Dani’s been here for years, bustling awkwardly between close-set tables, making small talk around drink orders. She makes conversation so easily, and Dani finds herself responding in kind. Nights here, at the pub, wearing a black apron and a smile that gets a little less plastic every time Jamie leans close and whispers a barb about some customer or another, leave her feeling the most stable she’s been in days.

“How’re they treating you next door?” Jamie asks, sliding her half of the tips across the bar. Dani pockets the money without really thinking about it. 

“Good. It’s quiet. I’m...not used to it, yet.”

She doesn’t say the rest--that she misses those kids, misses the way Owen and Hannah would peck at one another like no one could tell how deep their love ran. That she misses small feet tearing up and down a huge staircase. That she misses having someone who needs her waiting just around the corner. 

Can’t say the other part, either. The part where the room is quiet, and the walls seem not to exhale like they did at the manor, and everything is perfectly still...except for the little spot at the back of her head. That spot where she senses something waiting. Something she doesn’t understand, something that is so unbearably silent...and so incredibly furious. 

“Hey--Poppins. Still with me?” Jamie’s hand touches hers lightly, a bare flourish of fingertips across her knuckles. Dani jumps. 

“Poppins?” she repeats, smiling despite herself. Jamie shrugs.

“Said you were a nanny, didn’t you? For those, ah, rich beasties up the way.”

She had said as much, yes--last night, when Jamie asked what brought her out to England in the first place. “You’re as American as they fucking come,” Jamie had said with a grin that made Dani’s stomach feel like it was falling. “What on earth could have led you to Bly?”

Don’t, a tiny part of her had warned. Don’t tell her. There’s so much story, and so much of it is truly crazy. But Jamie had been leaning her hip against the bar, watching her with gentle interest, and Dani hadn’t been able to resist giving some of that story anyway. The simplest version: had to get away from home, wanted to do good in the world, best skills are with kids. Took the job because it was everything she’d thought she’d needed.

“And?” Jamie pressed gently, when Dani had faltered there. “Was it? Everything you needed?”

You. Me. Us. She’d closed her eyes, felt the world swim around her for one excruciating second. When she’d opened them again, Jamie’s hand was on her elbow, steadying.

“I don’t know,” she says now, as she did then. Jamie’s mouth quirks a little to the side, like she wants to smile solely as a reassurance. 

“Long night.”

It was--every night since the lake has been longer than Dani knows what to do with--and she’s not sure she can stand the idea of spending it alone in her room. The inn is warm, well-lit, and makes her feel like a tinderbox seconds from going up. Restless energy, is all--she’d felt it at the manor, too, that pent-up need to leap from her bed and roam the halls each night--but for some reason, it scares her.

Jamie is watching her still, and Dani is struck with the wild notion that she could ask for Jamie’s company. Could ask not to be left alone tonight. Jamie would probably say yes to anything she asks for, and they’d have a good time together. It would be a campfire in the woods, maybe, just a little light to break up the shadows, but it would be better than nothing.

Not fair, she tells herself. Not fair to her. Not with whatever it is I’m carrying now. 

“Thank you,” she says aloud, touching Jamie’s hand quickly, her thumb swiping across Jamie’s skin in a manner so brisk, it might as well not have happened at all. “You probably want to get to bed.”

Something she can’t--won’t--look at too closely in Jamie’s eyes. Something that makes her whole body clench with a need she isn’t capable of dealing with just now.

“Yeah,” Jamie says softly. “G’night, Poppins.”

***

Dani is better at this than she thinks, Jamie sees right away. Not just the serving gig, either; doesn’t take a mastermind, to take drink orders and drop off plates of bad chips to drunk townies. She’s good at the real heart of the job, the reason people like the citizens of Bly flock to the village’s one and only pub. 

She catches sight of her doing this very thing, probably without even realizing, on a Friday night. The room is packed with bodies, sweaty and laughing and half-gone on half-priced ale, and Jamie’s been looking for her for ten minutes. When she locates her at last, Dani is standing in the very back of the pub, hands on her hips, smiling at the oldest woman in the world. 

Jamie moves just near enough to pick up the gist. The woman, a fixture of Bly in her late eighties, still making her weekly venture to the pub, is regaling Dani with what very well might be her life story. And Dani, rather than looking impatient, rather than letting her eyes slide away in search of something else to do, has her head tipped to the side. Her posture is easy, the first time Jamie’s seen it as such, her focus absolute. 

Just listening. Just listening to this ancient woman like there’s nothing going on around her. 

“That was something,” Jamie says in her ear when Dani finally extricates herself from the one-sided conversation and makes her way back. 

“What was?”

Jamie inclines her head toward the old woman. Dani looks embarrassed. 

“I know, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to ignore the other tables, I--”

“Easy,” Jamie says, neatly stepping in the way of Dani’s breakneck sprint toward a panic attack. “You aren't in any trouble, I just can’t recall the last time I saw someone chat her up.”

She watches Dani relax, charmed by the way Dani smiles almost sheepishly.

“She said she’s been here her whole life. Can you imagine that? Staying in one place for almost ninety years?”

“Can’t imagine being anywhere for ninety years,” Jamie says without thinking. Dani’s brows go up, a comedic little arch that pulls at her heart. She hastens to add, “Only mean it’s been...a life. Not always lived with the best of intentions.”

Dani looks interested, and for a terrifying moment, Jamie thinks not only is she going to push, but that Jamie is actually going to tell her. Everything. Home life, foster care, prison term. Everything that stacks up behind her walls to remind her of why she built them in the first place. 

But Dani, thank fuck, only says, “We all have our baggage, right?” There’s something sad about the way she says it, the way she smiles with what Jamie is coming to think of as a half-light. There’s something going on behind a smile like that, and Jamie knows it isn’t safe to even wonder. Isn’t simple, to even consider caring. 

But you do, something whispers. Don’t you? Even knowing she’ll be gone in a couple of weeks, you do. 

“It’s funny,” Jamie says, a quick-change that doesn’t quite cover the heat she feels has cropped up between them. “That she’d come talk your ear off. She’s not much for words most nights. Thought she’d have gotten her fill at old Mrs. Sharma’s funeral last month.”

There goes Dani’s face again, forming that expression of pure surprise. “Wait. She knew Owen’s mother?”

“Who didn’t?” Owen Sharma, Bly’s kindest, least eligible bachelor. If Jamie had a dollar for every beautiful woman who made moon eyes over the man, she’d be up at least the price of a nice meal. 

Shame about his mother, really. Margaret had been at least as kind as her son, prone to slipping Jamie a wink and a chuckle while Owen blatantly missed all flirtation sent his way. It had hurt, seeing her grip on her own mind slip away. Had hurt worse, knowing Owen was up at that big old house only because it was the nearest he could get to Margaret’s deterioration. 

“Good woman,” Jamie says gruffly. “Kind woman. Hated seeing her go, but if I’m honest, maybe it’s easier on Owen this way.”

“He didn’t seem to think it was easier,” Dani says, but there’s a bit of hesitation in her voice. Like she knows what Jamie was trying to say, and maybe she doesn’t like it, but can’t entirely discount the idea, either. 

“Hang on,” Jamie says, jumping back a few steps. “If you know Owen--”

“Worked with him,” Dani agrees. “At the house. He was our cook.”

Of fucking course. How could I have missed this. “If you know Owen,” Jamie repeats, feeling very certain and very warm all of a sudden, “then you were at the funeral, too.”

The funeral. A surprisingly sunny affair, where the weather was concerned, and utterly miserable in every other way. Jamie, in honor of a woman who once made her feel more welcome in this tiny village than just about everyone her own age, had dressed carefully. Her only black dress. A fine jacket. Neat silver earrings. No one to impress but ghosts.

And she’d felt...incomplete, somehow, standing over the grave. Incomplete and terribly small, as Owen tried to make sense of his mother’s death under the cold stares of fifty strangers. This, they seemed to say with their eyes alone, this is the boy who thought he could get out. Thought he could escape. But Bly calls everyone home, in the end, doesn’t it, Owen?

She’d hated seeing him up there, tears leaking down an uncharacteristically solemn face. Hated the way their eyes followed him as he bowed his head over Margaret’s grave. Owen’s a bit of a prat, a little disconnected, totally unaware of the grip he has on the women of Bly, but he deserved so much better than this. So much better than judging eyes and whispers. 

But, then, who was Jamie to fight his battles for him? This man who might have been a friend, in another life, who is really little more than an occasional customer. She’d shaken her head, tapping a cigarette out of a crumpled pack, and set off a ways for a break from it all. 

And there, behind a tree, had been a woman. 

Jamie hadn’t seen her face. Had, in fact, stood intentionally back a few steps to give the woman a spot of privacy, because the sounds she was making did not invite onlookers. She seemed to have her hands over her mouth, dragging in great hitching sobs that made it sound as though all the air had gone out of the world. 

“All right?” Jamie had asked. Such a stupid, silly thing to say. But the woman had frozen. 

“Yeah.” Voice choked with obvious tears she was just as obviously trying to hide. Jamie had settled the cigarette between her teeth, flicked a lighter, cupped her hands around the infant ember. 

“Funerals,” she’d said, a bit stupidly. No idea why, even. No one in Bly needs her to play nice with their panic attacks. “Truly the worst.”

“Yeah,” the woman agreed, breathless. Jamie could just make out a layer of black dress, cut higher and less conservatively than the village prefers for its more somber events. A bit of black dress, a swatch of blonde hair. Not much else. 

Not my business to look, she’d thought, taking a long drag. Shifted her weight from one boot to the other. Hesitated. 

“S’all right,” she’d said at last. Voice smoke-roughened and more than a little embarrassed by her own forwardness. “I cry three, four times a day, even when there’s no fresh body in the ground.”

“Mmhmm,” the woman replied in a tight voice. Jamie sighed. 

“Only, no one would judge. Or,” she added, thinking of those pinched faces following Owen’s every broken step, “no one who hasn’t earned a punch on the nose for the trouble.”

To her surprise, the woman laughed. Not a big laugh. Just a snort, really, swallowed again just as quickly. Jamie, raising the cigarette back to her lips, fought down a grin. 

“You owe ‘em nothing,” she’d said, with a finality she didn't quite understand. Then, when the woman didn’t answer, a second time: “You owe ‘em nothing.”

Now, with the world of patron and alcohol abuzz around her, she peers into Dani’s face. “You,” she says quietly. “It was you.”

***

What are the odds? That the woman who had talked her down from a small mental breakdown at the funeral had been Jamie. That the woman who had, in fact, sparked something Dani couldn’t explain even to herself had been Jamie. That the woman who, in saying those four tiny words--you owe ‘em nothing--had lit the match she’d used to burn Eddie’s ghost out of her had been Jamie.

“Look a little pale,” Jamie observes. Her hand is loose around Dani’s upper arm, and Dani realizes she is swaying in place. Her heart is a jackrabbit, her head spinning. 

How? How could I not have noticed?

She’d thought Jamie had sounded familiar, hadn’t she? Right at the start, with Jamie raising her glass in a flirtatious little salute. She’d thought that voice rang a bell, and chalked it up to alcohol, to the pounding in her head, to the adrenaline high. 

“Have you ever,” she hears herself say dizzily, “met someone and felt right away you should have known them all along?”

It is an insane thing to say. Jamie ought to bolt for the door, words like that. Instead, brow creased with concern, she leads Dani behind the bar and sets her down on a stool. 

“Stay here a minute,” she commands. Dani drops her head into her hands. 

That night, after the funeral. Hadn’t she been thinking of this woman’s words when she’d taken a bottle of wine and Eddie’s glasses out to the fire? Hadn’t those words been vibrating between her teeth as she’d stared him down, this shadow of the man she’d once loved in all the wrong ways, for the last time?

I owe you nothing anymore, Eddie. I’m sorry. I’m sorry you’re gone, and I’m sorry I was the--I’m sorry you felt you had to run from the truth. But I can’t live like this. Not anymore. 

Drunk words. Sober reality. She’d woken the next morning feeling for the first time in almost a year like each inhalation actually inflated her lungs. 

“Here.” Jamie, reappearing like a magic trick at her side with a glass of ice water and a damp rag. “You’re off the rest of the night, Poppins. Can’t have you fainting on me.”

“Don’t want to go,” Dani begins blearily. Jamie presses the glass into her hands. 

“Not kicking you out,” she promises. “Just. Stay posted up here a while, yeah? I’ll be back.”

It’s an oath she keeps faithfully for the next several hours, performing a perfect balancing act between serving drinks and checking in with Dani. She ought to be embarrassed, Dani thinks, watching Jamie smile and fill glasses and glance back at her every so often to make sure she’s still where Jamie left her. This ought to be mortifying. 

Why isn’t it mortifying?

She watches Jamie, the natural way she glides from joke to joke, order to order, all steady hand and quick smile, and it’s like...like watching a movie you haven’t seen since you were a kid. A movie you used to put on in the background when you were sick, or sad, or lonely. She feels certain that she still knows all the words, the music cues, the parts where she always had to close her eyes against tears she didn’t yet understand. 

In a month of truly strange events, a month littered with ghosts and terrible heavy silences, this is the strangest yet. Looking at Jamie just in time to catch a wink that makes her hands slip against the glass. Looking at Jamie and thinking, I owe her nothing--and that’s the way it ought to be. 

“Feeling better?” Jamie asks when the doors are locked and there is only wood and glass listening in. Dani nods, clutching the now-empty glass and trying to find an expression for her face that will betray none of what she’s been thinking. 

“I’m sorry. It’s been a strange...” She shakes her head. There are words you can only say so many times before they begin to crumble on your tongue. “It doesn’t matter.”

“Seems as though it does,” Jamie says. She hoists herself up onto the bar, legs swinging, looking very young all of a sudden. Dani smiles. 

“It’s a long story.”

“Got time,” Jamie replies, and though it’s two in the morning, and Dani’s body is heavy with exhaustion, she can’t help leaning a bit closer. With Jamie seated this way, she’s a little taller than Dani for the first time, her eyes searching Dani’s face for clues as to...what? How she came to Bly, really? How she came to this pub, really?

How she came to carry whatever it is she can feel watching her every move, matching her step for step, really?

“You’ll think...” She swallows hard. Closes her eyes. Waits for Jamie to say I won’t, or try me anyway, or think what? Jamie doesn’t. Jamie remains quiet, and when she chances another glance, the expression on Jamie’s face almost undoes the small amount of calm she’s been collecting over the last few hours. She’s never seen anyone just...look at her like this. Like they really do have all the time in the world. 

“You’ll think I’m crazy,” she finishes at last, smiling such a hard smile, it feels as though it might snap right off her face. Jamie leans forward, elbows resting on the knees of her overalls. 

“I think you are,” she says, “one of the sanest people ever to walk through this shitty little town.”

And then, without quite knowing why, Dani is talking. About all of it. Dani is spilling things she can’t explain, can’t quantify: about Eddie, about deciding no longer to allow him ownership of her life even in death; about Hannah and the well, the way the woman had been so lovely and so strong and so not there at all, in the end; about the children and their unexpected passengers, about how Rebecca Jessel had tried to the last to rescue Flora from a fate Dani can’t imagine, even now. 

And she tells her about the Lady. 

She tells her about the specter with its hand like a claw, who had picked her up like a squirming sack of flour and dragged her through that house. About how Flora had saved her life in the way only a child can think to try. About how she’d saved Flora in return, even if she can’t explain it. 

Jamie listens. To all of it. Eyes serious, mouth drawn in a gentle frown. She’s nodding, Dani realizes. Nodding, and watching Dani’s eyes the whole time. 

“See?” Dani says at last, and realizes she’s crying. The silent tracks of tears are warm on her cheeks, skidding off her chin and into her lap. She’s crying, and she’s breathing through it, and somewhere deep inside, she thinks she hears the crash of waves. “Crazy. Think I’m crazy. Think I’m going--”

Jamie, so gracefully, she almost doesn’t see the change, pushes off the bar and crouches beside the stool. Her hands find Dani’s, a gentle grip that makes the world stop swaying for a moment. 

“Think you are,” she says in the most determined voice Dani has ever heard, “surprisingly sane. All things considered. And I want you to know, you don’t have to--”

Dani’s got her by the shoulders. Dani’s dragging her upright, surging right off her seat, pressing her back against the bar. Dani, who understands on a level that is conscious and legitimate and wise that this is her co-worker now, and finds she does not particularly care, kisses her with such desperation, she nearly moans into Jamie’s mouth. 

Jamie should push her off. Jamie should be gentle and solid and certain in her dismissal. This is a bad idea. This is a bad--

“I have a flat,” Jamie breathes against her lips. Dani realizes Jamie’s hands are in her hair, Jamie’s mouth is flushed pink, Jamie is looking at her eyes. “I have a flat upstairs.”

***

“I want you to know,” Dani pants against her neck, “I’m not doing this because I’m--”

She hesitates, apparently not quite invested enough in what they’re doing on Jamie’s couch to use the word haunted. Jamie catches one hand, brings it to her lips, kisses each finger slowly. Taking her time, letting her tongue drift from index to middle to ring, watching Dani’s eyelids flicker. 

“Want you to know,” Jamie replies, when she feels certain the welling panic in Dani’s eyes has been effectively banished once more, “you don’t have to explain. And you don’t have to do this, either. If you don’t want to.”

Dani, sitting in her lap, shifting her weight so her torso presses against Jamie’s, gives her a truly hilarious look. “Does this feel like I don’t want to?”

Jamie grins. There’s just something about being in this situation that is funnier than she knows what to do with--Dani, having just told her the kind of life story better suited to a horror film, in her flat, on her couch, kissing her neck. It feels like the wrong genre, somehow. Like the wires of the world have been crossed, and Jamie would give anything to leave them this way. 

Fact is, she hasn’t liked the way anything feels the way she likes this. Hasn’t liked the presence of anyone in her world--her town, her pub, her home--like she likes Dani. 

Known her five minutes, the intelligent, ever-shrinking part of her brain protests, even as she lets Dani coax her head back on the arm of the couch, even as she lets Dani suck gently at the skin just below her ear. 

Kinda knew it after one, she thinks, hands flexing on the back of Dani’s sweater. 

This isn’t like before, she recognizes. Last time, there was a hunger in Dani bordering on feral, like she was running so hard from something Jamie didn’t even know existed that only Jamie’s body had stopped her running right off the edge. Tonight, Dani looks at her and Jamie is confident--confident in a way she’s never been with anyone in her life--Dani is actually seeing her. Actually choosing her. 

“You said,” she hears herself say, even as she’s gripping Dani’s waist. Dani has moved to straddle one thigh now, is rocking slowly back and forth, making soft whimpering noises into every kiss she leaves on Jamie’s skin. “You said there are people you meet...”

Dani groans, and Jamie pulls at her hips faster, harder, liking the way Dani is panting against her shoulder. “You feel you should have known all along,” she finishes, turning her head to kiss Jamie’s lips. “Yeah. Yeah.”

“Me too,” Jamie says, her own body straining to get closer. There are way too many clothes between them, she has decided, but it’s up to Dani to take them further. Up to Dani to decide what she’s okay with. After everything she just told Jamie downstairs, it’s the least Jamie can offer by way of comfort. 

When Dani pushes up enough to take Jamie with her, shoving the straps of her overalls down and dragging her t-shirt over her head, she figures she made the right call. 

“You too,” Dani says, looking at her--at her; Jamie feels quite certain this is what it feels like to jump and find yourself flying--as though she never again wants to look at anything else. Jamie nods, pressing their foreheads together, trying to catch her breath even as Dani is sliding curious hands down her chest. 

“Minute I met you. Minute I saw you. So, who’s crazy now?”

Dani laughs, and it’s the sweetest sound Jamie’s ever heard. This is different, she understands, so different from a quick fuck in a bathroom. This is going somewhere, even if neither of them have a map. 

She brings Dani to bed, wanting on some level deeper than decision to do this properly. It feels right, to guide Dani back onto clean sheets and cheap pillows, to help Dani out of her clothes in small, measured movements. It feels, she thinks with the clearest head in the world, like Dani was always supposed to be here. That no matter how the story unfolds, no matter how many roads it takes to get them here, this is the endpoint. Dani, gazing up at her, hair messy, smile angling against Jamie’s mouth. Dani, arching under her hand, saying her name in a sharp, heady way Jamie suddenly can’t do without. Dani, who says she’s crazy, who doesn’t say she’s haunted, clenching tight around Jamie like she was always supposed to be here. 

“Please,” Dani sighs, “Jamie.” And Jamie thinks, Whatever it is, yes. Whatever you need, yes. 

Five minutes, that nearly-banished whisper repeats. 

Knew after one, she thinks again, curling two fingers and watching Dani spiral. 

***

Jamie sleeps like she’s never been afraid of anything hiding in the dark. Lips parted, arms tossed without care, she sleeps more deeply than Dani would have guessed. Even when Dani rises, carefully removing the hand she had kept tucked around Jamie’s middle all night, Jamie barely stirs. 

I haven’t slept like that in years, Dani thinks with a rush of fondness. C’ept maybe last night. 

She wants to blame it on the sex, on Jamie working her over once, twice, three times before she’d even been able to reciprocate. Wants to say only good sex can knock a person out, banish nightmares that have been so present for so long, they’re really more like old friends. 

Wasn’t that, though, she thinks, pulling Jamie’s discarded t-shirt on and perching on Jamie’s side of the mattress. Was something else. 

There is a catharsis, maybe, in telling your story to someone who is really listening. A release not found anywhere else. She hadn’t meant to tell Jamie everything--had certainly not expected Jamie to, if not understand, accept it without a word of discouragement. If Dani had been listening to that story, with all its hidden bumps and screams, would she have been able to nod and kiss the storyteller without so much as a chuckle?

Maybe it depends on the storyteller. Or maybe it’s just Jamie. Jamie, who has seen her naked in two very different ways, and has yet to flinch from either. Jamie, who even now is sleepily rolling onto her back, groping along the pillow where Dani ought to be. 

“Dani?”

Her heart lurches, squeezes, the sound of her name as the first thing out of Jamie’s mouth bringing tears to her eyes.

“Here,” she croaks, and Jamie--eyes still shut against the burgeoning sunlight through thin curtains--stretches until her fingers find Dani’s wrist. Her face relaxes, her smile soft. 

“Thought I’d scared you off,” she says, a joke that isn’t a joke at all. Dani bends over her, kissing her cheek. She can still taste Jamie, can still feel the way Jamie gripped the sheets in both hands as she let Dani explore uncharted territory for what had felt like hours. 

“Not going anywhere,” she hears herself say, and though the terrible silence in her head seems to tighten, she feels as though it is true, somehow. For how long, she can’t say. But there is a confidence in the sentiment all the same, an assured little edge to it like a promise. 

“Good,” Jamie mumbles, curling toward her until her face presses against Dani’s hip. The kiss she leaves is clumsy, but Dani feels the heat of it go straight to her core all the same. 

How can I know I want that kiss every day for as long as I’m here? How can I possibly know that?

“You’re worrying,” Jamie says, nuzzling against her skin, eyes still shut. Dani smiles, sifts gentle fingers through tousled curls.

“How can you tell?”

“I am,” Jamie says in a voice like one tumbling back into sleep, “a genius.”

“You are,” Dani laughs, “still asleep.”

“Nope.” To prove her point, Jamie cracks open one eye. “See? Perfectly present, Poppins.”

Dani is, for the first time in a long time, perfectly present herself. It scares her a little--not as much as the beast scares her, not as much as the weight of exhaustion fitting itself around her shoulders and pressing down scares her, but all the same. This is fear, of a kind. And excitement, of another. 

And hope, maybe. Just a little scrap of it, lining the bottom. 

“I should go,” she says, and Jamie opens the other eye, groaning. 

“You should stay,” she suggests, sitting up and pressing close to punctuate the idea. As small as she is in sleep, she feels like she could take up the whole room, now. Dani licks her lips. 

“We open--”

“When I unlock that door,” Jamie finishes for her, something sly and delicious about the way she’s looking Dani over. “S’that my shirt?”

Dani shrugs, liking the way Jamie’s eyes make her feel like she needn’t have bothered with covering up at all. Jamie cups her cheek, kisses her with all the slow careful energy of a woman revving up for something glorious that might take all day. 

“You’re not...I mean...you remember what I said last night?” Dani doesn’t really want to be saying it, doesn’t really want to drag focus away from the way her entire body goes shock-bright when Jamie’s tongue slips into her mouth. Even as the words are coming out of her, her hands are sliding up Jamie’s body, familiarizing themselves once more with sleep-warm skin. 

“The part about feeling crazy?” Jamie breaks just enough to speak, still within kissing distance. Dani steels herself. 

“The part where I don’t understand what’s happening to me. But it is happening, Jamie. Whatever it is.”

Jamie, holding the back of her head, peers into her eyes. Dani holds her breath, waiting for the flinch, waiting for Jamie--no longer sex-addled--to find some sign of the beast behind her gaze. 

“I only see you,” Jamie says, as if reading her mind. She smiles, almost self-conscious. “I only see you, and I’d...like to keep seeing you. If you’ll stay.”

She should say no. Should say it’s unprofessional at best, utterly unwise on a deeper level at worst. Should say Jamie’s better off without her, everyone’s better off without her, who knows how much time she even has before the thing she’s carrying like a disease comes to call--Jamie, you can’t take this on. It isn’t fair. 

Don’t think fairness much comes into it, a voice very like Hannah’s echoes. She squeezes her eyes shut. 

“Hey.” Jamie isn’t trying to kiss her now, is holding one hand anchored to her ribs like she believes it’s the only thing keeping Dani from floating away. “Poppins. I’m not asking for your hand in marriage, all right? Just...I like you. Like you quite a lot, as it turns out. I’d like to see where...where this goes.”

She’s waiting, Dani realizes, for Dani to laugh at her. To say absolutely not. To say there is no chance in hell. How many women have said as much to Jamie before? How many women have shot her down for less?

I’d like to find out, she thinks with surprise. I’d like to find out everything about her. 

“I can’t make promises,” she says. “I don’t know how much--”

“But you have now,” Jamie says, somehow managing to interrupt without stealing the words from Dani’s mouth. “Yeah? You have right now. In this bed, with me. Wearing my shirt better than I ever have,” she adds, plucking at the hem until Dani can’t fight a smile. 

“Yeah, but--”

“So,” Jamie says, shifting gently until Dani is laying beside her, hip sinking into the mattress, eyes barely a breath from Jamie’s. “I promise today. Here. In this bed, with you...probably not wearing my shirt much longer, if I’m honest.”

Dani laughs. She’s moving toward Jamie without meaning to, their legs tangling. Jamie kisses her once, very softly.

“And I promise you this afternoon, if the morning goes all right. And this evening, if you aren’t screaming up the road by then. Tomorrow, we re-evaluate the whole thing. Decide how we feel then.”

Dani is nodding. Can’t seem to stop nodding.

“Each day,” Jamie says, punctuating every word with a long kiss Dani has no desire to see end, “on its own merit, Poppins. One at a time. If they stack up, they stack up.”

Dani, unable to resist, pulls her close. One at a time, she thinks. I can do that.

***

The young woman is tired. Exhausted, if she’s truly honest with herself. She feels as though there must be an endpoint to running, a marker down the road that says a person has gone as far as they are able. Rest now, she imagines that marker saying in a cheerily-bold script. Fall down now. Let go.

She isn’t there yet, she’s certain. As certain as she gets these days, anyway.  She doesn’t know how much a person can be expected to carry, or for how long, but at least there is Jamie. Jamie, who grins at her as they bustle around the pub like clockwork, who takes her to the stockroom under guise of replenishing the peanuts and has her muffling sighs against an open kiss, who looks at the calendar at month’s end and says, “Y’know, Poppins, boss man’ll be back next week. Thinking I could use a break from Bly. What d’you say?”

One day at a time, she thinks, but the idea of a road trip with Jamie is too much, too wonderful, to say no. It’s only an idea until it happens, she reminds herself. Only an idea until they’re in the car, Jamie’s hand covering hers, Jamie pressing down the gas pedal like the whole world is theirs to claim. 

She’s tired. Been tired a terribly long time, if she’s honest with herself. And maybe that’s just the way it goes, for anyone, even those too lucky for ghosts. Maybe the trick really is just finding someone to be tired around, someone who is willing to hold your hand, learn your secrets, kiss away your monsters. 

She might not be okay forever. Might not even be okay much longer. But Jamie’s making happy murmurs about Vermont and wanting to start a garden, and there’s a light in her eyes that makes Dani feel more alive than she has in months. 

A little longer, then. If the days stack up, so be it. It’s enough, just to try a little longer to find solid ground.

[stellar-imagines]

HEADCANONS REQUEST: ❝studious but rebellious.❞

[ Fandom: Boku no Hero Academia ] [ Characters: Bakugou Katsuki, Todoroki Shouto, Kirishima Eijirou ]

「Headcanons of Bakugou, Todoroki and Kirishima who's studious, mild-mannered, and the typical perfect student but is secretly rebellious, tomboyish, fierce and fiery.」

BAKUGOU KATSUKI

♤ This guy probably thinks that you're a shitty��model student. You were the typical student who's gentle, encouraging, helpful and kind to everyone. Anyone would find it easy to talk to you given how bubbly and mild-mannered you were on a daily basis. You always arrived at school on time, dressed properly, did your homework, actively participate in class and performed well during hero training. Now we all know that Bakugou has a superiority complex and he was a bit pissed that you were so good at everything. He sees you as a rival but he has never actually said it to your face.

♤ He would compete with you without you knowing at all. For instance, after midterms when Aizawa handed back your papers, Bakugou is already looking through all his papers, satisfied with how he had performed. He would then proceed to approach you and demand you show him your scores. Gets cocky if he actually surpasses you and angry when he failed to beat you. Because of this small exchange you have with one another, you became friends. 

♤ Gets along with you better than anyone expected. You were normally studious and looked like the type of student who would be sophisticated and disciplined, someone like Iida or Yaoyorozu. He probably thought that you would be a person who prefers studying, reading books, and all that. Bakugou was kind of surprised that you were actually pretty tomboyish. He knew this from hearing you talk about your hobbies and the things you loved to do. 

♤ He wasn't sure what kind of acts were considered rebellious. Bakugou had this certain image of you as the person who would never break rules or bother other people and act like a responsible person even outside of school. You would sneak out of your room and make a midnight snack. When you're at the movie theater, you would sneak in some snacks inside your bag. 

♤ Though, you weren't the kind of rebel who's a troublemaker ― someone who doesn't like to follow instructions and causes inconvenient disruptions. You're not really everyone's typical girl who loved dressing up and pretty clothes. You were more on the tomboyish side, preferring pants over skirts and t-shirts over blouses. Make-up? You think it's better spent on food! Bakugou thinks you're absolutely right.

♤ Bakugou has no certain preference when it comes to girls. But he definitely likes someone who's too prudent and someone who would want to live their life in their own ways even though their acts are considered rebellious. It's a bonus that you're fierce because you can put him in his place if he gets out of hand. But when it comes to sparring, he won't lose. Lowkey thinks that it's hot when you show your rebellious, fierce, and fiery side. He would rather die than admit that to you.

TODOROKI SHOUTO

☆ Todoroki is not a competitive person like Bakugou and he's the type to not really care whether you're actually really smart or not. You both like to share notes with one another and study together. He really likes having you around during study sessions. Sometimes studying alone can get a bit boring. However, even with you around, it's not like you're both going to talk anyway. But you both were comfortable with the silence and can genuinely enjoy each other's presence without having to talk.

☆ He does think that you're the epitome of a model student. A student who is on the top of class due to your outstanding grades, possessing and overall charismatic feel, kind-hearted, and excels in everything you do. Despite your popularity, you're also humble, never boasting your grades, and never looked down on people. Todoroki finds himself admiring you for this. You didn't look like the type who would be reckless and tomboyish so he just assumed that you were what everyone sees you as.

☆ This boy is initially surprised that you were actually quite rebellious at times. When you both started dating and hanging out a bit more, he learned a lot of different sides that you don't normally show to everyone. Even though it was surprising, it's not like he didn't like you any less. He feels like a very special person as he's probably the very few people that knew how you actually are. Before you both even started dating, you got along very well and went out on a few dates. 

☆ Behind closed doors, you were completely different. But not different to the point that would make Todoroki question himself if you're actually the same person. You reveal to him that you might be very diligent when it comes to studying but you really hate doing housework and sometimes argue with your mother over it. At home, you would play games, watch anime, and read manga. 

☆ You're not competitive when it comes to school but you were certainly competitive when it came to games. Todoroki was a bit overwhelmed by your sudden change but he kind of likes that you're comfortable enough to let loose in front of him. Instead of dressing up like girly girls, you always wore sweaters and pants around him. If you were to ask him for one of his hoodies, he would give it to you without asking anything.

☆ Todoroki loves you so much that when you break a few rules a couple of times, he wouldn't even say anything much. You're not rebellious to the point you commit weird acts. Studious and mild-mannered but at the same time, fiery, tomboyish, and rebellious ― he thinks its an interesting combo and that you're unique.

KIRISHIMA EIJIROU

♡ You're his lifesaver. He can't say that he's smart but just like a majority of students in the world, he struggles with a few problems related to studies. Kirishima would always ask you questions and even plead that you tutor him before tests and help him with homework. You were the perfect teenage girl in his eyes. A model student who's good at everything you do, be it studies or even sports.

♡ Super proud of having you as his girlfriend. You're smart, pretty, kind, and reliable. A student that a lot of people looked up to, not only because of their outstanding grades but also because they act humble despite their popularity and smarts. Kirishima's not dating you because you're smart or anything, he's not that type of person. He enjoys spending time studying with you because you somehow make it fun and much more enjoyable.

♡ Kirishima is a bit surprised to know that your hobbies are different from a normal girl's, you preferred playing games over shopping like normal girls. You'd spend most of your money on games instead of makeup and pretty clothes that girls prefer. When going out, he wouldn't have to think about what girls normally liked and could invite you to things that he also enjoys. But of course, he would ask you where you wanted to go beforehand.

♡ Similarly to most, Kirishima didn't expect you to be the rebellious type but he isn't complaining or anything. He's actually pretty happy about it. Since you're very studious and mild-mannered at school, he expected you to be the type of person to stick to the rules. You have confessed the little rebellious acts you've done before, like sneaking out from your house to go to a friend's party.

♡ Sometimes, you'd drag him into your antics, doing weird things in public. He knows how rebellious teens act but you weren't like those people. Driving over the speed limit, shoplifting, smoking and drinking alcohol, even blowing off homework in favor of using social media, and skipping school. Kirishima trusts you and knows that you wouldn't do anything too extreme. And if you happen to do something that might potentially harm you, he's there to stop you.

♡ Best boy to play games with but not only that, he's just super fun to hang out with. No matter what kind of things you like, he's the type of person who's very flexible and willing to get to know a person more despite having different hobbies and interests. Kirishima is very interested in learning different things and supportive so your somewhat contrasting personality doesn't really bother him.

Total: 1390 words Published: 11.09.2020

Thank you for requesting! ｡٩(ˊᗜˋ)و*｡ Honestly, this is basically me in a nutshell but I'm not that rebellious. Sorry but we don't write for Denki. Hope you liked it! ― author Lou

Thank you for requesting it! Surprised that there were a number of similar requests. But we hope you enjoyed this! ― author Natsuki

Requests areopen! Matchups are closed!

Please do not mind the grammar mistakes and typos.

[toorusbaby]

second choice, pt. 3

summary: being in love with hajime iwaizumi is like riding a rollercoaster of emotions. it’s thrilling as it is exciting, but you feel a little lightheaded... because he doesn’t know how you feel. the worst part? he thinks you’re in love with his best friend.

warnings: just pure fluff, oikawa cockblocks, slow burn, slight angst if you squint real hard

word count: 2,406

part four here

“Behold,” you walked ahead of Iwaizumi before turning to face the boy, excitedly throwing your hands in the air in a cheesy manner. “The Osaki Food Festival!” You stood beneath the festival’s welcome banner, the aroma of the different kinds of food making your stomach growl in anticipation. The sound was relatively quiet, but Hajime had taken notice and chuckled when you placed a hand over your stomach with a nervous chuckle. 

“You know, I really hope you didn’t eat breakfast yet, Y/N.” 

“What? Why?”

Your eyebrow raised in confusion but Iwaizumi swiftly pulled out his wallet and flashed a toothy grin at you that made your heart do somersaults. 

“Because you and I are eating everything this place has to offer. Or that we can afford, at least.” 

What a dork, you thought. You smirked and pulled out your own wallet, bumping it against Iwaizumi’s. “Only if we get takoyaki first.” 

༺♥༻

It was safe to say that the food festival was crowded despite the chilly weather. Hours felt like minutes to you and Iwaizumi, especially since the boy was keen on keeping his promise of trying all of the different foods with you. Before you knew it, it was already five o’clock in the early evening. In the midst of trying foods, both tasty and savory, time had flown by in a flash. You and Iwaizumi were having the time of your lives stuffing your faces while enjoying good conversation.  

You were feeling bright and cheerful, the evident result of having a satisfied stomach. It was also notable to mention that strolling around with Iwaizumi, your crush, for hours was a contributing factor to the permanent smile on your face. Initially, you were worried that your nerves would ruin the day and drive the wing spiker away from you. However, you were proven wrong almost immediately when you realized that laughter and smiles came naturally from the both of you. 

Unbeknownst to you, Iwaizumi felt the same way. Seeing you reveal a side to him that you didn’t often display excited the ace. He couldn’t ask for more, especially since it was just the two of you.  

You glanced up at Iwaizumi, who was now eagerly nibbling on his karaage in between words, his nose a bit red from the cold. His other hand was busy holding a small bag filled with different desserts that he bought for his mother back home. 

‘If I bring something back for her, she won’t complain about me being gone all day,’ Iwaizumi had slyly smirked at you when he made the purchase earlier that afternoon. You found the action extremely endearing; it was obvious from the way you smiled up at the spiker who didn’t fail to notice. For a second, Iwaizumi thought your gaze was a look of adoration, but he figured he was delusional for thinking so. In his mind, there was simply no way that you’d ever think of him romantically.

Currently, the two of you were strolling past the very last of the festival’s aisles. You were chewing on your last piece of dango, snickering as you listened to the green eyed boy complain about Kindaichi’s choice of body spray. 

“I mean, I get wanting to smell good after practice. But who even uses Axe anymore? It smells like ass and the last time I checked, he isn’t a student at Kitagawa anymore,” Iwaizumi chuckled and finished the last of his karaage. 

Before you could defend Kindaichi’s honor (as best as you could, really; who uses Axe?), a small ice cream vendor at the very corner had caught your eye, halting your footsteps. Despite your cold cheeks, nearly numb fingers, and the icy breeze, the idea of strawberry ice cream was enticing. 

Iwaizumi on the other hand, proceeded to walk without noticing you pause, continuing with his story. 

“Kyotani nearly strangled Kindaichi to death for overspraying a few weeks ago. Honestly, I don’t think Oikawa could’ve convinced me to stop him though— Y/N?”

The ace paused and turned back to face you, but your eyes were focused on the vendor instead. Quickly connecting the dots, Iwaizumi exhaled and grinned, placing a hand behind his neck to stare at you. 

“Y/N, it’s freezing... ice cream in this weather?” 

“Well, it’s not exactly snowing, Haji...”

“But I don’t want you getting sick, dummy. When it’s warmer, we can get some.”

“But... fine.” Placing emphasis on your ‘fine’, you pouted and trudged over to the spiky haired boy who was waiting up ahead for you. Truthfully, you were just exaggerating. You were fine without the ice cream; you didn’t want Iwaizumi to worry about you getting sick. Even though the thought of him worrying about your health made you feel giddy inside, you forced yourself to remember that it was a moral thing for someone to fuss over. 

“You sound just like a little kid.”

“Shut up, Iwa-chan.”

The sight of your pouty rosy lips and flushed cheeks as you continued to walk beside him was burned into Iwaizumi’s memory. He watched as you used your sleeves as sweater paws to warm your bare hands, in awe when your usual grin returned to your face when you gazed at the colorful lanterns and streamers on other vendors. The image was burned into his memory and would probably remain there for the rest of his life, seeing as Iwaizumi’s cheeks burned brightly at how adorable you were acting. 

She’s not even trying, he pursed his lips and exhaled through his nose. Even though you were now smiling, Iwaizumi felt uneasy and guilty being the reason why you were pouting in the first place. 

“Iwa,” Without thinking, you gently tugged the material of his sweater to grab his attention, the action startling the boy. “There’s actually another place I want to visit if that’s okay. It’s a short walk, not too far from here. Think we can go?” 

Iwaizumi quickly glanced at the spot your fingers had touched before clearing his throat. “Yeah, of course. I’m down.” he nodded. The sight of the ice cream vendor that was now behind you caught Iwaizumi’s eye. He knew what he had to do next. Even though he was afraid you’d catch a cold, making you smile was the volleyball player’s top priority. 

It’s like spoiling a child, he bit the inside of his cheek to refrain from chuckling.

“Y/N, we should probably use the restroom before we head out. I’ll meet you back here?” 

“Oh, that’s a good idea. See you in a bit then.”

As soon as Iwaizumi saw you make your way to the women’s restroom, he made a beeline to the ice cream vendor that had customers, much to his surprise. The green eyed boy knew your favorite flavor was strawberry, making sure to order a vanilla cone for himself as well. He knew you’d feel guilty about eating ice cream he bought for you all alone. Plus, Iwaizumi figured he could self-indulge just for today, even more than he had already. He wasn’t the type to ever say no to festival food.

When you finished your business, you made your way back to the spot Iwaizumi had told you to meet him, only to find it empty. 

There’s probably a line or something, you figured.

Your assumption was shot down the moment your eyes landed on the tall figure walking towards you. It was as if you were experiencing tunnel vision, the way the handsome boy stood out among the busy crowd. In both hands, a grinning Hajime Iwaizumi was holding a vanilla cone along with a strawberry one you knew was just for you; the large size of the treats made your eyes sparkle. His bag of desserts for his mother dangled on his forearm and you swore that it was the cutest thing you had ever witnessed. 

“Haji, are you for real? You didn’t have to!” A bright smile crept its way onto your face and you made your way to meet him halfway. 

The boy shrugged his shoulders and gave a teasing smirk. “Damn, that sucks. I guess I’ll just give this to someone else then.” Iwaizumi chuckled when you rolled your eyes at his sarcasm. “You’re so annoying… but thank you, dummy.” You grinned. Your fingers barely brushed against one another when he handed you your large cone but it was enough to make your heart race.

Before either of you could have a taste, you gently bumped your strawberry ice cream against Iwaizumi’s vanilla cone, a “boop” leaving your lips. Iwaizumi blinked in confusion and quickly glanced at the part of his cone that had strawberry mixed with the vanilla. He looked at you. “What was that for?” he questioned before licking the combined area. 

Despite the increasingly cold weather, you felt as if your veins caught fire. 

“They kissed, silly,” you responded, choosing to avoid eye contact. 

I cannot believe I just said that. What the fuck. 

With flushed cheeks, you tasted your ice cream to calm your nerves. “Come on, I’ll lead the way to the next spot. I think you’ll like it.” 

Your previous words rendered Iwaizumi speechless. They kissed? Our ice cream cones kissed? Iwaizumi could feel his ears burning up; he was certain that his face was beet red at your simple words. Being too deep in his thoughts, the volleyball player didn’t notice you walk ahead of him, exiting the festival. It wasn’t like the spiker to get so flustered over something like two ice cream cones ‘kissing’, but Iwaizumi couldn’t help the blush that crept up his neck and to the rest of his face. 

Note to self: get ice cream for Y/N again next time. 

The boy smiled to himself but your voice calling out to him to hurry up broke him out of his trance. 

༺♥༻

“Iwa, you have to bend your knees!” You laughed, your arm trembling from being held midair too long. You and Iwaizumi found yourselves snickering beside a fountain at the park you ended up taking him to, the two of you attempting to stop your laughter in order to smile for a selfie to send to Oikawa. It was your idea, of course. It was Iwaizumi who couldn’t say no to you. 

With half finished ice cream cones in both of your hands, the ace chuckled at the sight of the two of you on your phone screen. It had taken a minute for you guys to find a proper angle, one where you could snap a picture that didn’t cut Iwaizumi’s head off due to his taller height. However, the spiky haired boy stood behind you to your left, flashing a toothy grin as he held up his half-eaten ice cream cone. 

Due to his bending, you could feel Iwaizumi’s body warmth radiating onto you, his head hovering above yours. You definitely weren’t going to complain. Melting ice cream cones in both hands, you smiled brightly before taking the picture, sending the photo alone to Oikawa. 

“And... sent!” you exclaimed, putting your phone into your purse. “Oikawa is gonna be so jealous,” you grinned. Iwaizumi glanced at you while licking his dripping cone and handed you a napkin in the process. 

“Oh… Do you want him to be jealous?” The ace questioned. It was hard to keep the bitterness out of his tone, but Iwaizumi managed to succeed.

 Your eyes widened in realization at your own words and you shook your head. “No, not at all. It’s not like that. I just meant of us getting ice cream without him, of course,” you awkwardly chuckled after your explanation. You could see Iwaizumi’s shoulders relax and you let out a breath you didn’t know you were holding. 

Nice job, Y/N, you’re an idiot, you grumbled inside your head. If you could slap yourself, you most definitely would.  

Thankfully, Iwaizumi didn’t seem to notice your nervousness. However, he seemed to be in his own thoughts. 

The park you had taken Iwaizumi to was more of an area for biking, jogging, or walking, perfect for picnics. It was fairly large, small hills scattered throughout the grassy area. Although the nearly vacant park was beautiful, your favorite area was a bit further in the center. As the two of you continued to follow the paved pathway, with you leading him, Iwaizumi was the first to break the comfortable silence after finishing the last of his cone. 

“Speaking of Oikawa,” he started, gaze fixated on the ground. “Why didn’t you invite him instead?” 

Your eyebrows furrowed in confusion and you stared up at the boy beside you. A small pang of embarrassment flared through your chest. You took a second to think about the spiker’s question. Did Iwaizumi not want to go with you in the first place? You could’ve swore he was having a good time... or at least you thought so. Taking one last bite of your cone, you opened your mouth to reply. 

However, you never got the chance to since a flustered Iwaizumi immediately intervened. “Oh shit, I didn’t mean it like that. Sorry, I worded that weirdly,” he panicked, his hand gently clasping your shoulder to have you face him. “I’m actually really glad you invited only me today, so please don’t misunderstand,” Iwaizumi’s footsteps came to a halt, his eyes trailing to your shoulder where his hand rested. 

“Sorry about that.” He mumbled, instantly moving his hand off of you. Iwaizumi absolutely feared the idea of ever insulting you; he’d never forgive himself if he upset you. It probably didn’t help that he placed a hand on you without permission, but you didn’t mind at all.

Waves of relief washed over you once you heard Iwaizumi’s short explanation. Thank god. With a reassuring smile, you waved your hand in a dismissive gesture. 

“Oh, that’s okay Iwa. Don’t worry about it, I get what you mean.” Rubbing your bare hands together to create heat, the two of you continued to walk with you leading the way. “And seriously, you don’t have to apologize for touching me. I won’t break or anything, I promise.” You smiled at him. 

Iwaizumi’s question however, still lingered in your mind. It was an innocent question and there was no harm in answering truthfully. You figured this was a good opportunity to drop subtle hints about your feelings towards the ace before confessing entirely, whenever you felt the time was right. 

“But to answer your question,” Iwaizumi’s eyes flashed to meet yours. You kept your eyes on the path ahead of you and brought your clasped hands to your lips to blow heat into them. 

“I really just wanted to spend time with you.”

[confusednarcissistwrites]

Scope It Out (D.M.)

(lol sorry for the photo quality)

Another request for the darling @thestarsaregivenonceonly​ that I took over to lighten her work load a bit 💛 I decided on Danny Middleton as I love the aesthetic of Hot Summer Nights and really couldn’t resist. I hope you enjoy, anon!

(cursing, slow burn, friends to lovers, fluff to rot ur teeth)

You strolled up the driveway, quickly spotting Danny polishing the headlights of his car. Smirking, you hopped up onto the hood to get his attention.

“Dannyyyyyy,” you sang, posing for him. “Do I look like a good fake girlfriend?”

“Y/N, Jesus, you scared the shit out of me,” he gasped, jumping up to his feet. He wiped his hands with the rag he’d been holding, his eyes scanning over you with a smirk. “You look great.”

You felt your cheeks heat up, much to your chagrin. You wore a high waisted, denim skirt with a striped sweater tucked in and yellow socks bunched above your red, hightop converse. You felt good.

“It will definitely get McKayla’s attention having you on my arm.”

You turned away a bit, trying to hide the way your face fell. You cleared your throat, quickly slapping on a smile. “Thanks! I thought so.” You slipped off of the car, hopping into the passenger side while he grabbed his coat and wallet and climbed in next to you. You briefly wondered how anyone could possibly not see him as attractive as you watched him fix his hair in the rear view mirror.

“What?” he asked, feeling your eyes on him.

You turned away, rolling your eyes. “Nothing. Just if you keep playing with your hair you’re gonna look like Travolta.”

“Shut up.” He started the car and sped out of the driveway, making you laugh loudly. You turned up the radio and sang along obnoxiously, your hair whipping in the wind. Danny joined in and you really didn’t think anything got much better than that moment.

When you arrived at the fairgrounds, the sky was just beginning to change colors with the sunset. He’d wanted to get there early to “scope it out,” in his words. You’d told him he was ridiculous, but decided you didn’t mind if it meant you got to go on more rides. He parked the car and turned it off, exhaling a heavy breath. “Show time,” he grinned, slipping out of the car and grabbing his stuff from the backseat. He circled around the car and helped you out. “Oh, hey. You should wear this,” he said, holding his bomber jacket up for you to slip into. Butterflies fluttered in your stomach as you did as he asked. He then offered you his hand, wiggling his eyebrows. “M’lady?” You laughed softly, intertwining your fingers with his. You couldn’t help but think how well they fit together. It was quickly dawning on you that all of this was going to be more difficult than you’d originally thought.

Leading the way through the gates, Danny bought you both thick stacks of tickets for games and rides. He’d insisted on paying for everything since you were doing him this favor. Some favor. You walked hand-in-hand through the groups of little kids and teenagers getting their fill of carnival food and squealing with glee. You smiled, feeling the summertime spirit fill you up. You could almost let yourself forget why you were there.

“Now, I don’t think she’ll be here till later, so do you want to get something to eat first?”

“Sure,” you responded, allowing him to lead you over to all the vendor stands. You guys made small talk while splurging on all the greasy food your stomachs could handle. Talking to Danny had always been easy. However, you were grateful to see him drifting further away from the mopey kid he had been when he first moved to Cape Cod. Despite his baggage, he was finding his place here, and you were grateful to have been one of the first people he’d had to help him make the transition.

“Ready to go do some rides?” you asked, biting your lip excitedly.

He groaned loudly, holding his stomach. “Now that you conned me into eating all that shit? Are you serious?” he laughed. “Let’s do some games first.”

You pouted, but agreed. You got up to throw away the garbage and he followed after you, wrapping his arm around your waist and pulling you against his side. “You look good in my jacket, girlfriend,” he teased. You punched him in the shoulder, making him laugh. You laughed too, shaking your head at him.

The sun had almost set and the sky was stunning, especially with all the carnival lights twinkling against it. You suddenly felt Danny’s arm tighten around you. “Shit, there she is.”

You looked up, quickly looking away when you spotted the blonde already looking right at you. Danny sped up a bit, walking you up to a ring toss game. “Laugh at something I just told you,” he whispered in your ear. You played along, letting your head fall back as you giggled. You quickly realized that McKayla and her friends had gotten in line a few people behind you and Danny, making your heart rate speed up. You’d never spoken to her, but her reputation well preceded her. Danny grabbed a ring, turning to flex for you. You resisted the urge to mock him, letting out more girlish giggles.

“Just throw it, babe,” you laughed, the pet name feeling foreign on your tongue. He smiled and tossed it, making it the first try.

You threw yours too, but missed by a long shot. You both got three turns, all filled with unnecessary touching and flirting that made your cheeks glow. He’d won a teddy bear that he promptly placed in your arms, planting a sweet kiss to your cheek. You couldn’t help the soft gasp that escaped you. He tugged you away from the front of the line, though you felt more like you were floating along behind him.

“That was perfect! I don't think she looked away once!” he enthused once you were both out of earshot.

You felt a sick feeling settle in your stomach, but quickly nodded and smiled. “She looked pretty mad,” you said, though you hadn’t really looked.

“Seriously? Oh my god,” he chuckled. “I haven’t felt this excited about someone in so long, Y/N. She drives me crazy.”

Ouch.

You cleared your throat, looking away a bit. “Gross,” you replied flatly, giving in a bit of a look.

He just laughed, nudging you with his elbow. “Let’s go see if we can find some more lines to stand in near her.”

Your chest ached. You wanted to yell and scream at him and tell him how stupid he was being. You didn’t know McKayla, but you knew no one could feel the way that you did about Danny. Even so, you forced a smile and allowed him to pull you around the carnival by your hand.

After searching for about 15 minutes, you spotted one of your favorite rides. “Danny, pleeaassee. I love the Gravitron; it’s been my favorite since I was little! Can we go, please, please, please?” you pleaded, sticking your bottom lip out at him.

He looked around for a moment before replying. “Yeah, I guess we can real quick.”

“Yesssss!” It was your turn to pull him through the crowd to the line climbing into the UFO-shaped ride. It was hot inside the enclosed ride and music was playing loudly, just like it was every year. You and Danny found two spots next to each other and leaned back, waiting for the ride to start.

“If I puke on your shoes, it’s your own fault,” he warned, turning his head to look at you. The dim lighting accentuated his freckled cheeks and warm eyes in a way that made your breath catch. Before you could respond, the doors were closed and the ride began to spin. You couldn’t stop grinning as dizziness turned into the delightful press of centrifugal force pushing you up the wall. You squealed as Danny grabbed your arm in panic as his own seat hit the top. With a bit of effort, you were able to turn your head to look at him and catch the expression on his face before you burst into laughter. His cheek was smushed against the seat and his eyes were squeezed closed as he fought to keep his dinner down.

“Watch this!” you called over the music. He squinted his eyes open just barely to watch as you flipped yourself sideways, your legs draped over his center.

“You’re fucking crazy!” he laughed, seeming to be getting slowly used to the feeling. You flipped yourself back upright, feeling your head spin from the movement.

“You try!” You watched as he tried to outstretch his arm, but was quickly overcome by the force, his arm falling across your chest with his open palm cupping your boob. His eyes turned to saucers and he quickly pulled away. Laughter bubbled up from your stomach as you began to belly laugh at his awkwardness.

“Shit, I’m sorry,” he laughed nervously, squeezing his eyes shut in embarrassment. You could see his blushed cheeks even through your watering eyes.

“It’s okay,” you giggled. “Guess it’s a good thing I’m your girlfriend tonight.”

You both stumbled out of the ride, Danny looking a bit green around the gills. It was dark now and the light show of carnie lights was in full effect, the ferris wheel acting as its feature. You couldn’t help but stop and take it all in. However, your thoughts were quickly interrupted.

“Hey, you feeling okay?” Danny asked softly, his hand resting on your shoulder. You smiled, nodding. “Okay, cool. I was thinking we could hop on the ferris wheel next so I can try and see where she went.”

How many times would you forget that that was the only reason he was here with you? You weren’t sure how much more you could take. “Yeah, lets go.”

His head was on a swivel the whole way, making you feel terribly alone despite his cold fingers tangled with yours.

Once you made it through the line, you climbed in across from each other in the small car, your knees bumping. You made your ascent slowly as they loaded the other passengers. For the first time that night, the silence between you felt heavy. You pulled his jacket a bit tighter around yourself, looking at him even though you knew he was looking everywhere but at you.

“God, I can’t see her anywhere now. Can you?” he asked, his brow furrow as he squinted at the ground.

“Danny, what the hell are you even looking for?” You even were a bit surprised at your sudden snap. But the words were already out of your mouth, hanging in the air between you.

He looked up at you, confusion written on his face. “Y/N, what do you mean? You know who I’m looking for.”

“I said what. Like, you’re at the top of the Ferris wheel with the most beautiful view of Cape Cod that you only get once a year, and you are busy looking at the ground for some blonde.”

“Some blonde? Where is all this coming from? Did you not come here to help me get her attention?”

Frustration ran through you as your voice rose. “For god’s sake! Can you really not see what’s right in front of you? Are you that unaware?” you cried incredulously.

“Yes, I see the fair. The lights are beautiful but-“

You cut him off, fisting his shirt and smashing your lips against his. He tensed initially, shocked by your brash action. However, suddenly all your words clicked into place in his head. His hand found the side of your face, kissing you back tenderly.

Fireworks.

It was more than you had ever imagined. His chapped lips gently pulled away from yours, his eyes fretting over your face.”Y-you meant you. Didn’t you?” he stuttered.

You let out a breathless laugh, leaning into his hand that was still pressed against your cheek. “Yes, you idiot.”

He leaned in slowly, awkward now in a way that made your heart flutter. You met him in the middle, kissing him again as you sat at the top of the ferris wheel; it felt too perfect to be real. Your hands let go of his shirt and slipped behind his neck to toy with the curls on his nape as you kissed him for all you were worth.

When you finally pulled apart, he was smiling like a fool, his cheeks pinker than you’d ever seen. “When d-did you..? How-“

“Not right away, but somewhere in the middle. Well before McKayla, but definitely confirmed once you started talking about her all the time.” It felt good to finally tell him all these things after so long.

“You were jealous,” he smirked, that signature smirk.

You pushed your palm to his face, pushing him away playfully. “Danny Middleton, so help me god-“

“I want you to be my girlfriend.” You stopped what you were doing, meeting his gaze. He was looking at you with a look you hadn’t seen before. He looked down, suddenly shy. “I-I mean will you- will you be my girlfriend?”

“I’ll think about it.”

[simp-for-spencer-reid]

Sugar with a Side of Coffee Ch. 7- Raining in My Apartment

Chapter 7: Raining in My Apartment

Series Masterlist :)

Spencer awoke the next morning still sitting up on his couch, one of his blankets draped over his lap. He stared at the ceiling, piecing together the night before. His face turned red as he remembered inviting Cate over. He was sure he blew it. Who invites a girl over and then falls asleep? He really hoped he hadn’t screwed up. He finally peeled his head off the back of the couch, catching sight of his glasses and a sticky note on his coffee table. He put his glasses on his face, and picked up the note, like it would turn to dust if he wasn’t careful. 

Spencer, 

Thanks for having me over! :) 

Sleep tight, 

Cate :)

He placed the note back and looked around his apartment. His alarm wasn’t due to go off for another five minutes according to his watch. Speaking of which, he patted his pockets for his phone, coming up empty. It wasn’t on the coffee table or the side table. Sliding his hands in between the cushions, he finally found his phone. A notification of a new voice message from Cate was lighting up the screen. As he played it, he felt the corners of his mouth turn into a smile. 

His alarm pulled him from his thoughts and he had to get up and get ready for work. He made a mental note to send her a message back later that day. Sleeping on the couch made him feel sweaty, so he needed a shower before catching the bus to work. 

Cate had rushed into The Empty Mug for her shift. The late night had made her snooze her alarm one too many times. Shrimp was no help, curled up in the bend of her knees contently before yawning and stretching as Cate flew out of bed. Cate had expected to see a voice message from Spencer, but the only text she had was from Marta. It was a gif of Snooki from Jersey Shore, saying something along the lines of “Get it, Girl!”. 

“About time!” Marta said to Cate sternly. “If Sweater Vest is going to make you late to work, I might have to disapprove of him.” Marta was flying behind the counter, making a few orders at once. 

“I know, it won’t happen again” Cate mumbled to Marta, her mouth holding a clip while Cate pulled her hair back into a half up half down style.

“Good, now when you get back, we have matters to discuss!” Marta had to cut their conversation short, not only because she was serving, but because Cate had to get out onto the cart. 

As Cate’s shift was ending, her phone was ringing in her pocket. She had no customers in sight, so she pulled it out of her pocket. Spencer’s contact was displayed on the screen.

“Hey,” Cate said, wiping the counter. “What’s up?”

“Hi, I, um, I’m sorry I fell asleep last night.” Spencer stuttered nervously. “I didn’t mean to, I was just so exhausted from the case-” Spencer rambled until Cate cut him off.

“It’s totally fine! I know your job is tough.” Cate smiled. She could almost hear Spencer smile on the other end of the line.

“Did, did you like the movie?” He asked nervously. 

“Yeah I did!” Cate wiped the counter of the cart. “But next time, I’m picking the movie.” She said with a smile. She imagined the two of them in her apartment, binging all of the Harry Potter films, snuggled on the couch with enough junk food to feed a small army. 

“Deal!” Spencer said eagerly. He wanted to make up for falling asleep, and he wanted to be conscious for their next hang out. Mostly, he was glad that Cate was so understanding about him being so relaxed he slipped into the best sleep he’d gotten in a while.

Despite The Empty Mug providing coffee for the BAU in their building, Spencer still stopped by in the mornings when he had the chance. Cate was able to keep it short and sweet, having his coffee ready and sometimes a baked item made from the night before. They kept their conversations short, so as to keep the cart’s line moving. Besides, they enjoyed their voice messages. It was like the staple to their friendship. 

On the days that Spencer didn’t show, Cate would ask him about it.  He would explain he was away on a case in another state. Cate was fascinated by the idea of a private jet for the agents. She loved flying, and loved looking out the windows on planes, unfortunately she didn’t fly often. She envied that Spencer had seen so many states and got to travel for work, but was brought back to reality when she thought of the horrific things he’d face on the job.

This particular morning, was a day where Spencer was off on a case. He didn’t tell her about the case, sometimes he didn’t even tell her what state they were in. He liked to keep her as distanced from the job as possible. Sometimes, the news channel or other customers who gossiped about the news would give away where they might be. 

“Have you heard about the missing women they found hidden in the basement in Arkansas?” an older, light haired woman asked Cate while she was fixing up her coffee.

“I haven’t heard.” Cate handed her the disposable cup. The woman lingered for a bit longer.

“The youngest one escaped, and then they arrested the guy at his job, acting like everything was normal!” she told Cate. Cate gave her a smile and looked at the next customer. The woman thankfully took the hint and left the cart, going about the rest of her day. When Spencer didn’t visit, it seemed like her shift took forever. She wasn’t sure when he’d get off his case, but he would usually send her a quick voice message when they landed safe.

Cate tried to keep Spencer out of her head as she finished her shift. She didn’t like imagining what graphic things he’d seen. She did however, like to imagine him in all his unique-ness. A nice patterned button-up, a cardigan or a sweater vest, his messy brown hair. It always seemed to be in his face, Cate wanted to reach out and tuck it behind his ear sometimes when he spoke, but didn’t want to overstep. She liked where they were as friends. She wouldn’t mind being more, she did want that. But, she liked having him as a friend. She enjoyed his presence in her life. 

Before she knew it, her shift was over. She would’ve stopped to talk with Marta, but Marta had a line of customers waiting to be tended to. Knowing she could call Marta later, Cate opted to head home to relax and get housework done. She walked home, enjoying the nice breeze and warm air. 

Upon entering her apartment, Cate was taking off her shoes when she heard the sound of water droplets. She paused, trying to find where it was coming from. She prayed that Shrimp hadn’t managed to turn the faucet on again. He had racked up quite the water bill one month. Cate walked quietly around her kitchen, looking for the source when the sink was dry. 

Cate gave an exasperated scoff when she had walked into her living room and saw her ceiling dripping. A large rust colored wet spot grew on the white ceiling. She leapt into action when she saw it had made its way onto her bookshelf. Her recipe books were safe, the laminated pages kept her family recipes waterproof. Her favorite books, however, were sopping wet. She grabbed all seven of her Harry Potter books off the shelf, bringing them to her counter for safe keeping. 

Her next mission was to find Shrimp, who despised water. Per usual, he was loafed under Cate’s bed, wide eyed. She shook a treat bag to coax him out. He stayed put. Frowning, Cate called down to maintenance to see what happened. After receiving some bad news, she called Marta to see if she could stay the night. Cate looked miserably at her favorite books on the counter. She called the only person she knew who might be able to fix this.

Spencer was still at the office, having just landed. He tidied up his desk and sorted through his messenger bag.  He was talking with Emily and JJ when his phone rang loudly. He barely got the chance to greet Cate when he heard her voice.

“I need help because you know a lot about books and you’re smart and my books are in really bad shape because my apartment is raining, I really need your help.” Cate managed in one breath. He tried very hard to not correct her about how it was impossible that her apartment would be raining.

“I’m sorry could you repeat that a little slower?” Spencer walked away, trying to find a quieter place to listen to her more carefully. 

“M-my favorite books got wet because my apartment ceiling is leaking and I need your help because I know you take good care of your books.” Cate was trying to not sound desperate, but she didn’t succeed.

“Of course,” Spencer gathered his messenger bag, sweater, and go bag. He gave Emily and JJ a wave as he made his way out. He was glad he had decided to drive to work today; he didn’t have to wait for a bus. “I’ll pick you up.” he said as he started his car. “I’ll call you when I’m out front.” he hung up and drove as fast, yet law-abiding, as he could to her apartment. He had already memorized where her building was in the image of Quantico that he could envision perfectly in his mind.

He pulled up at the front of her building and Cate was already waiting for him. She had a bag of books over one arm, a backpack on her back, and a cat carrier. He had never seen her look so sad. These books must be special, he thought to himself. She spotted Spencer’s car and started walking towards him. He got out of the car to open her door and take her backpack and books and put them in the backseat. 

“I’m sorry I know I didn’t mention Shrimp, but I couldn’t leave him. Maintenance said the people upstairs somehow burst a pipe and now I can’t be there for a week while they do construction, ugh!” Cate rubbed her face with her hands. “I cannot believe this happened.” Spencer wasn’t sure what to say to make her feel better. He could list off the limited construction knowledge he had, but it didn’t seem right. “I’m sorry, I’m not insinuating that I’m moving in. I’m living with Marta for a bit. Can you tell me about books?” Cate looked over to him, and began sticking her fingers in Shrimp’s carrier. 

“I keep my books at 68 degrees, which is the ideal temperature to store them to keep them in good condition. I control the climate in my apartment to ensure that my books stay in the best environment.” He continued to talk through the silence the whole way to his apartment. Cate followed him silently. He grabbed her backpack and book bag while Cate carried Shrimp. Spencer let Cate in first, closing the door behind them. He placed her backpack on the couch while he brought the other book bag into his study, where his bookshelf was. Cate put Shrimp’s carrier down on the living room.

“I brought a hair dryer too.” Cate told Spencer as she pulled her wet Harry Potter books out. “I know you might not be able to do anything, but I figured if anyone could try it would be you.” Cate looked at Spencer and he would do just about anything for her hopeful face. He tried not to linger his stare on her tear streaked cheeks. 

He picked up the first book. He knew deep down that they were probably unsalvageable but he would try anything. They both did not speak as she carefully removed the dust covers off of them and laid them out on Spencer’s desk. He took the hair dryer and began blowing the pages. 

“These were some of the first books I ever read on my own.” Cate confessed. She watched Spencer peel the pages apart with his long fingers. “These are my first copies that I actually read the series on for the first time.” Spencer saw her gaze on the books. 

“It’s like they’re old friends.” He told her. “I get it.” She gave him a weak smile.

“Yeah.” She saw how concentrated Spencer was and she felt like there might be hope for her books. Spencer straightened up, looking back at Cate. “Thank you for helping me.” Cate told him. He put the dryer down and faced her, his hand propping him up against the desk. 

“Anytime. I know that books can carry a lot of sentimental value.” He watched as her eyes flickered to his hands. 

“It means a lot.” Cate placed a hand on top of his. Spencer felt his heart swell. She left the room to check on Shrimp in the living room. He tried to calm himself down before he went after her, so she wouldn’t see his blush.

Cate had opened Shrimp’s crate, reaching inside to pet him. His carrier was on the couch, Cate was kneeling in front of it, and Spencer had just walked through the doorway. 

“So,” Spencer started as he knelt beside her. “Why’d you name him Shrimp?” Cate smiled, thinking back to when her cat was a kitten.

“He was so small when I first got him. Like a little orange shrimp.” Cate pulled her hand out of the crate, and Spencer reached in to pet Shrimp himself.

“Did you know that the biggest shrimp species can get up to eight inches? A kitten is a pretty accurate sizing comparison.”

Cate and Spencer spent the rest of the afternoon trying to save her books. Spencer did not want to admit that the series had been one of the few that he hadn’t picked up. After some time, Cate had asked if Spencer could drive her to Marta’s so she could let Shrimp roam around. When he returned to his apartment, he carefully picked up the first book and began to run his finger down the pages as he read the whole series in just under two hours.

[starring-movies]

Killing Eve: Episode Analysis

*SPOILERS*

Season 1, Episode 5 - I Have a Thing about Bathrooms

The episode picks straight up from the end of S1E4, when Villanelle is chasing and shooting at Frank. Eve stops the car to confront Villanelle, who is visibly shocked that Eve had the courage to confront her (especially since Villanelle had a gun), and because this is the first time they’re seeing each other in person since meeting in the hospital toilets.

When Eve gets out of the car, she puts one hand up to show Villanelle that she isn’t going to hurt her, and she puts her other hand on her heart, as if to show her care and concern. Almost as if trying to test to see if Eve is genuine that she cares for her, Villanelle puts the gun to her head, and Eve’s immediate “no!” confirms this to her. (Or this is just more emotional manipulation like we get later in the kitchen scene)

When Frank is being shown around his safe house, he is shown where the bedroom is and told “this is where the magic happens”. Unfortunately for Frank this is foreshadowing to him getting killed by Villanelle in the bedroom.

While Frank is telling Carolyn and Eve about The Twelve, he says that their aim is destabilisation and when Eve asks “to what end”, Frank simply says “chaos”. This is referenced back to in S3E7, when Hélène tells Villanelle that she loves her because she is an “agent of chaos”.

In the scene when Eve is at the bus stop, the first thing she does is take out her hair, so we can assume that Villanelle is on her mind. Eve sees a crack in the glass of the bus stop and presses it with her finger, it doesn’t break and so she proceeds to smash the glass with her elbow.

The glass with the crack represents Eve. The crack symbolises something that has always been within Eve, her darkness and impulse and desire around killing. Eve manages to keep it together though (shown with the glass, when she presses the crack with her finger but it doesn’t break yet), she often feels the pressure from herself and of her darkness pushing to overcome her, but she won’t let it break her or become too unmanageable. She also represses the existence of the crack (the darkness), but it’s something that Villanelle saw in Eve from the beginning; it’s what she thought made Eve “special” [S2E8] and why she was so upset when Eve rejects both the darkness and her (just like Villanelle’s mother did). The pressure on the crack in the glass is also being put on by Eve herself, again reminding us why Villanelle was so upset with Eve, telling her “it’s what you wanted”; and Villanelle is right, it is what Eve wanted deep down but she’s in denial and won’t accept it and so blames Villanelle, its not until S3E8 that she’s willing to accept her darkness.

However, now Villanelle has come into Eve’s life and she’s aware that Villanelle will be the elbow to the crack in her glass. As they discuss on the bridge in S3E8, Eve can feel the control of her “monster” slipping away from her as Villanelle’s monster encourages her’s.

Eve goes on to take her suitcase, with all the things that Villanelle packed in it, back to her house and has another look at what was put in it. Eve can see that all the clothes and the shoes are her exact size, which is one of the things that drives her to put the dress and shoes on - here is someone who sees Eve, knows her so well and has paid such attention to detail to her from the brief times she’s seen her, that she gets clothes that she knows suit Eve and fit her perfectly. Considering Niko got her a scarf she doesn’t even like, and doesn’t seem to know her style well at all, to have someone pick clothes and shoes that are so perfect for her seems to be incredibly attractive to Eve.

Eve again takes hair hair out when putting on the dress, shoes and perfume from Villanelle. When we see her put on everything that Villanelle gave her and take out her hair, and when she looks at her reflection in the mirror, she is completely an image of exactly how Villanelle wanted to see her. Eve looking at herself in the mirror also shows how she wants to see herself in the way that Villanelle wants to see her.

Unloved’s, ‘(Sigh)’, which plays during this scene of Eve trying on the dress also reflects how Eve is feeling in this moment. The lyrics are:

“There’s something about

The way you are

That makes me (sigh)”

The lyrics reflect Eve’s mixed emotions about Villanelle and her confusion in dealing with them. The word “something”, as well as the *sigh* (the feeling can’t even be expressed with words - only a longing sigh), shows how there’s just this mysterious thing that Eve can’t put her finger on that’s dragging her closer to Villanelle. She feels this unrelenting attraction to an assassin, and not just a assassin, but one that killed her close friend and co-worker - Villanelle is someone she should hate with no question, yet she can’t.

We then get the long awaited proper first meeting between Eve and Villanelle, the kitchen scene.

The entire scene is a power play between the two women as they assess the situation, and each other, after spending the whole season so far obsessing about each other from a distance.

It obviously begins with Villanelle, who has surprised Eve in her safe space, in the position of power. She tells Eve she wants to have dinner with her and to change out of the wet dress, saying “I won’t look”, but then proceeds to look anyway and helping her out of the dress, adds “you have a nice body”. From this we can see that Villanelle makes it clear to Eve from the beginning that she’s attracted to her; but Eve is the one who won’t take it further, until the kiss in S3E3 which is one of the reasons why Villanelle is so shocked - Eve initiated the intimacy this time.

When Eve asks Villanelle why she’s come to her house, she tells Eve “I need someone to help me. I don’t want to do this anymore. I know what I am. I know I’m not normal... I don’t feel things that... I don’t want to hurt people”. What Villanelle says is an attempt to manipulate Eve, but Eve sees straight through the act saying it’s “bullshit”, which surprises Villanelle. However, given the events of Season 3, there is some truth to what Villanelle is telling Eve, as everything she said becomes true for her later on. In the exact same words as she used in this scene, in S3E6 Villanelle tells Dasha “I don’t want to do this anymore”, but the second time she says it she says it entirely sincerely.

Eve also tells Villanelle “I know something happened to you”, which contrasts with the tea dance scene in S3E8, where Eve instead asks Villanelle “what happened?”. Eve goes from being entitled to Villanelle and having a certainty in what she thinks she knows about her, to understanding and being considerate of her feelings much more. When they meet at the tea dance in S3E8, Eve is listening to what Villanelle is saying to her and can see she’s upset and so asks her a question, giving her the opportunity to share what’s bothering her if she wants to, rather than trying to make a statement about what she thinks she knows happened to her.

Villanelle does the same thing with Eve in this kitchen scene, as she does with Hélène in S3E7. She replies to Eve’s request to tell her more by first saying “okay”, but then diverting and saying “can we get one thing clear before we go on with this? Is that a sweater attached to a shirt?”. Similarly when Hélène asks Villanelle “has something happened recently?”, Villanelle first says “I did something bad to my mother”, but then in the same way as with Eve, only follows up by saying “I took a shit in her shoe when I was three”.

In the tea dance scene in S3E8, before they were interrupted by the man encouraging them to get up and dance, we can also see that Villanelle looked like she was about to answer Eve’s question, illustrating how much Eve and Villanelle’s relationship has developed emotionally, especially for Villanelle who doesn’t open up to anyone. She becomes more willing to discuss her feelings with Eve than the emotional guardedness we get in this scene, as both women are just trying to gauge the other.

When Villanelle smells Eve, she asks her “are you wearing it?”, which again shows us how she reuses things she’s heard or observed, as it’s exactly what Sebastian asked Villanelle in S1E2.

Eve also makes a comment to Villanelle telling her “I am going to find the thing you care about, and I am going to kill it”. Hopefully this isn’t foreshadowing for the coming seasons, that Eve is the thing that Villanelle cares about and so ends up being killed.

Another small but impactful moment is Villanelle telling Eve “I will eat anything”. Continuing with Killing Eve’s aim of subverting audience expectation and going against gender stereotypes, Villanelle is an attractive woman but also an enthusiastic eater. She eats a lot in the show and more importantly when she does eat, she isn’t just eating a salad. Usually in film and television woman aren’t shown eating, or if they are, they’re eating some sort of salad or a tiny unsubstantial meal to maintain the idea that they’re dainty and trying to keep slim and attractive. So to have a female lead character who is so strong and attractive, heartily eating all this food and enjoying it, shows the audience that a woman can indulge in her food and doesn’t have to be depicted eating one lettuce leaf to have these qualities.

A funny little detail - Carolyn tells Eve her dog is called Martin, that means her dog’s full name is Martin Martens.

When Villanelle goes to kill Frank, she tells him that she’d prefer to kill him in the bathroom rather than the bedroom, saying “I have a thing for bathrooms, actually”. Villanelle has a thing for bathrooms because she has just come from Eve’s house (where they fought in the bathroom), and the bathroom of the hospital is where her and Eve first met.

Villanelle also warns Frank, telling him “don’t get me excited”, when he tries to fight her off with a chair. This is confirmation that Villanelle can get excited, making her kills more violent, like when she killed the hospital room of people after she met Eve in the toilets.

You can read my previous Killing Eve posts here:-

First Introduction to Villanelle

First Introduction to Eve

S1, E1 - Nice Face

S1, E2 - I’ll Deal With Him Later

S1, E3 - Don’t I Know You?

S1, E4 - Sorry Baby

S1, E6 - Take Me To The Hole!

S1, E7 - I Don’t Want to Be Free

S1, E8 - God, I’m Tired

S2, E1 - Do You Know How to Dispose of a Body?

S2, E2 - Nice and Neat

S2, E3 - The Hungry Caterpillar

S2, E4 - Desperate Times

S2, E5 - Smell Ya Later

S2, E6 - I Hope You Like Missionary!

S2, E7 - Wide Awake

S2, E8 - You’re Mine

S3, E1 - Slowly Slowly Catchy Monkey

S3, E2 - Management Sucks

S3, E3 - Meetings Have Biscuits

S3, E4 - Still Got It

S3, E5 - Are You From Pinner? [Part 1]

S3, E5 - Are You From Pinner? [Part 2]

S3, E6 - End of Game

S3, E7 - Beautiful Monster

S3, E8 - Are You Leading or Am I? [Part 1]

————————————————————————————————————————

[hopelessromanticspoonie]

Congrats on 750 and thanks so much for doing this! Can I please request “4. I need to know that you can trust me. Please.” for Tom? Angst to fluff with maybe a dash of smut at the end? I could see either Tom or the OFC say this under different circumstances, but I would leave that choice up to you! Thanks again and also thank you for creating such a wonderful blog:)

Thank you so much for sending this request! I will admit that this is incredibly long at 3.4k words and it 100% got away from me to take on a life of its own. As it stands, I couldn’t make any smut work in it, but I do hope that you enjoy it nonetheless!

Thank you to @vodka-and-some-sass who gave me some very helpful insight on this fic! It wouldn’t be what it is without you!

Warning: language!

Five Stars

“Ben, I can’t. I’m sorry, but I’m swamped working on the cues for-”

“Too busy to pop into our Ugly Sweater party? Nonsense! You must come. It has been ages since we’ve seen you.”

You made a noncommittal grunt, scouring the thoroughly marked script in front of you, ignoring the pixelated face giving you a very stern glare from the screen beside it.

“It starts at eight. Sophie will be so pleased to know you’re coming.”

The screen went blank after his unceremonious goodbye. You rolled your eyes before pulling the pencil from behind your ear to make another note. Ben was a force of nature, had been since you’d met him starting out in theatre, and it was easier just to go along with whatever he wanted whenever he got an idea into his head. Maybe a few hours of fun might do your exhausted mind a bit of good. Clear the clutter and whatnot. What could it hurt?

~

What was the line between a sweater being so ugly it was awesome and just being embarrassingly terrible?

You were sure you had crossed that line with the getup you were wearing, but there wasn’t time to change as you had already knocked on the door to the Cumberbatch house. You were swept inside from the soft snowfall into a pair of long, lanky arms and crushed against an almost skeletal body.

“It’s been so long! Come on, Sophie can open the wine you’ve brought, and then I need to introduce you to some new friends.”

You followed along without getting much of a word in edge-wise, nursing a glass of red wine thrust into your hand by Sophie before you made the rounds at Ben’s side. Names and faces went in one ear and out the other. Hands were shaken, cheeks of old friends were kissed, and small talk was made. The cheery Christmas music in the background and the slight buzz of alcohol in your system helped to loosen you up, and soon you were sitting on the arm of a couch, contentedly people watching when Ben confidently strode up to you, ushering along someone behind him.

“You look positively bored out of your skull, and I have just the solution. I’d like you to meet Tom,” he said with a grin and a flourish, stepping out of the way to present ‘Tom’.

“Tom Hiddleston,” he said, the familiar face sheepish as he held out a hand for you to shake. “Ben has regaled me with great tales of your running around together years and years ago.”

His hand was warm when you took it, smooth and firm and completely enveloping yours with the length of his thin fingers. “I’m sure they’re highly edited versions of what truly happened, all spun to put him in a more attractive light.”

“On the contrary,” he smiled, running his hand through the auburn locks curling behind his ears before shoving his hand into the pocket of his dark jeans, “they were tailored to do so for yourself. Perhaps you can tell enlighten me with your perspective?”

And that was how you spent the evening chatting with Tom Hiddleston. You had known that he and Ben were close friends, he’d been mentioned in passing before, but it was one thing to hear about ‘Tom flying to the States to work on a film’ and another to have the full force of Tom Hiddleston and his breathtaking rapt attention clothed in a gaudy Christmas sweater directed at you from close range. It was secretly thrilling to hold the focus of someone so beautiful, to watch his eyes sparkle and mouth pull back into a grin at your jokes and anecdotes. His hands spun tales in the space between you, as expressive and vibrant as his many impassioned tangents. You couldn’t deny the twist of butterflies in your stomach when his hand settled onto the middle of your back and his head craned down to better hear your point over a sudden burst of laughter from the other party guests.

But the night couldn’t last forever, and the glass of spiked eggnog Ben had slipped into your hand was in cahoots with the late hour to make you drowsy. Your poor attempt at stifling a yawn behind your hand did not go unnoticed by the keen blue eyes that hadn’t left you since you’d been introduced what felt like an eternity ago.

“Perhaps we should call it a night,” Tom offered, standing up and stretching languidly. It was pure force of will that kept your eyes from lingering on the peek of pale skin at his hip revealed by the gaudy red bottom of his sweater riding up from the innocent movement.

You slipped your phone out of your pocket, nodding in agreement. “You’re probably right. I’ve been working myself to the bone. I’ll just call an Uber and then make the rounds.”

His hand closed over your phone, pushing it gently down to your side. “I was about to leave. Allow me to give you a ride, in payment for monopolizing so much of your time?”

How could you say no to such an earnest face? With his brows lifted into a hopeful smile, you were hooked. “Let me say goodbye?”

You left Tom to wind your way through the mingling crowd, the music and murmuring having leveled off to more intimate levels as the evening wore on. It was easy to find Ben stationed in the kitchen, packing away the leftover finger foods.

“Heading out?” he asked when you handed him a cheese platter, glancing around you before turning to the open refrigerator once more. “Sophie wanted to say goodnight before she went up to bed, but she couldn’t find you.”

Their home wasn’t that big, but you let it slide with an exaggerated roll of your eyes. You carefully put your empty glass into the overloaded sink. “Yeah. It’s getting late, and Tom offered to give me a lift back to mine.”

“Oh, Tom?” The interest on his overly expressive face was impossible to miss. “Hit it off, did you?”

You swatted at his chest before pulling him into a quick hug. “Oh hush, you. You’re about as subtle as a slap to the face. He’s nice. Come say goodbye, you meddling fool.”

He acted overly offended, hands clutching his chest as he led you back toward the front door where Tom was waiting, already buttoned into his black pea coat. “Meddle? Me? Never!”

Tom’s answering chuckle was filled with warmth as he pulled your coat from your hands, helping you into it without any fuss. “I haven’t the faintest idea what you’re talking about, but I’m inclined to side with the lady. You are far too meddlesome for your own good, Ben.”

“Would it be considered meddling to inform you both that you’re stationed underneath the mistletoe?” Ben asked, a devious smile on his face as he pointed above your heads.

Sure enough, he had cheekily planted that festive decoration right above the front door. Heat flooded your cheeks when you dropped your gaze down to Tom and shoved your hands into your coat pockets awkwardly. “That bastard.”

He shifted just a breath closer to you, so the masculine scented warmth of his body fought against the chill seeping through the front door at your side. “It is tradition. May I?”

When you quickly nodded your silent reply, his hand came up to cradle your cheek facing the room, permitting you a bit of privacy. As soon as your lashes fluttered against your cheeks did he kiss you, a quick, almost chaste brush of his lips, leaving you with just the barest taste of the chocolate he sampled earlier. It wasn’t enough.

You ignored the inferno set inside of you at the simple action and opened your eyes, startled to see Tom still so close to you. His breath fanned across your face, sweet and quick, and his thumb stroked your cheek softly before he released you from the captivating spell of his blown light-blue eyes.

“Right,” he cleared his throat, adjusting the collar of his jacket up around his neck, shooting Ben one last glance. “Thank you for inviting us to the party this evening. I’ll get in touch soon.”

You waved your goodbye before following him outside, mind trying to wrap around being included in Tom’s farewell to your mutual friend. It was surely nothing, as was the way that his hand lighted on your lower back to assist you into the car. You were exhausted. That had to explain why you were so tongue-tied and nervous for the entire drive back to your home.

“That’s me,” you gestured to the side of the road, sitting up straighter in the soft leather seat.

He pulled to a slow and careful stop on the curb. The tense silence that filled the small space threatened to choke you, but you couldn’t make yourself reach for the door. Doing so would be a definite cap on the evening. The spell would be broken and you would go back to the mundanity of daily life without the captivated ear of a handsome gentleman.

Tom broke your sorrowful train of thought, unbuckling his seatbelt. “Allow me to walk you to the door.”

In the spare seconds that you had to compose yourself, all you managed to do was thoroughly inspect a smudge on his rear-view mirror. Cold rushed into the haven of his car when he opened the door, drawing you out by the guidance of his gentle hand. He followed you to the door, towering above you and ducking his shoulders against the frigid breeze that ruffled your hair.

“Thanks for the ride.” You fidgeted with the keys in your hands, worrying the worn metal. “It was much more pleasant than an Uber ride, that’s for sure.” So smooth.

“Will you give me five stars?”

The joke gave you enough confidence to lift your face to his. You startled slightly at how close he was, the fog from your breath swirling together to mix with the scattered snowfall. The tenderness in his gaze made your heart race in your chest. Your tongue darted out to wet your lips against the wind, and the darkness that flooded his pale blue eyes made your breath catch in your throat. Snowflakes caught on his light lashes and tinted his now rosy cheeks. You heard yourself ask, “What have you done to earn them?”

Uncertainty flashed across his face for the briefest of moments before determination ticked in his temple. He stilled the clink of your keys with his hand over yours, using the contact to shift that much closer to you. Hope and the desire that clenched in your stomach bid you to tilt your pouted mouth up to him in offering. He accepted, giving you a warm, gentle kiss that warmed you from the top of your head to the tips of your curled toes. The sensitive skin around your mouth tickled from the rasp of his short beard, wholly masculine and surprisingly soft.

“Goodnight, darling. I’ll call you in the morning.”

He stayed on your doorstep until you fumbled the keys into the lock with trembling fingers. The last thing visible through the slowly tightening crack in the closing door was his kind smile crinkling around his eyes, bright and full of promise just for you.

If he called the next morning, which would be impossible because you had forgotten to give him your number like a pining idiot, you wouldn’t have been able to tell. You woke to your phone blaring out your ringtone nonstop. It had vibrated itself right off of the bedside table onto the floor so you had to practically fall out of bed to silence it. As soon as you did, another call came through from an unknown number, followed by several texts and emails in quick succession.

“What the?” Rubbing the sleep out of your eyes, you leaned back against the side of your bed, opening your texts because you were definitely not alert enough to speak to a living person yet.

’ARE YOU DATING TOM HIDDLESTON?!?!’

‘Was that you in the papers with Tom Hiddleston?’

Practically every person under the sun that you had ever come in contact with had sent you a message or called you, flooding your phone with notifications you were instantly too overwhelmed to handle.

You grabbed a change of clothes, answering the phone on the next ring and shoving it into your ear, not even caring who had called as you gathered your things for a shower.

“Are you alright?”

Ben. “What in the ever-loving fuck is going on?”

“I sent you a picture taken by the paparazzi yesterday. It’s all over the gossip magazines and websites. I haven’t been able to get a hold of Tom. I assume he’s been tied up with Luke all morning. Are you alright?”

You didn’t answer him, tossing your clothes onto the bathroom sink so you could flip through your overload of messages to find what Ben was talking about. There, on the front of some tawdry magazine, was a slightly grainy picture of you and Tom from the previous evening. There was no mistaking it. There you were, locking lips with the internet’s perpetually single boyfriend.

Shit. You placed the phone on top of your clothes, hitting the speakerphone so you could turn on the water for the shower. “Nothing happened, Ben.”

“I know that, you know that, and Tom knows that. But the world doesn’t, and several hundred-thousand opinions hold more weight than the truth in this instance.”

Hitting your head repeatedly against the tiled bathroom wall was suddenly far more appealing than the current conversation. “I can’t deal with this right now. I’m going to take a shower. Thanks for checking in, Ben.”

Hair damp and decked out in your softest lounge clothes, you had foolishly expected that the situation would somehow magically improve. But it only seemed to worsen upon leaving the sanctuary of your bedroom. When you peeked out from behind your curtains to see what all the shouting that you heard was about, dozens of men with cameras bigger than your face were visible across the street. They perked up at the movement and their huge black lenses all turned in your direction.

You were trapped. Grumbling, you turned on your heel to retreat to your room when loud knocks pounded straight into your skull, making you practically jump out of your skin with shock.

“Who is it?” you called, pressing your ear against the front door. Who would brave the field of paparazzi to visit you?

“It’s me! Please, let me in,” Tom called.

You hurried over and ushered him in before closing the door against the blinding flashes shot in your direction, blinking the spots from your eyes.

He held his hands out in front of him, palms up. “I apologize for showing up without an invitation, but I didn’t have your number, and I was concerned.”

You crossed your arms over your chest to hide the trembling in your limbs at the sudden spotlight thrust upon you, shrugging your shoulders in what wasn’t exactly a convincing act of nonchalance. Desperate to hide from his earnest, ever-observant stare, you went into the kitchen and set the kettle on the burner. “It’s fine, I’m fine. It’s whatever.”

His heavy footsteps matched the roaring pulse in your ears as his long legs quickly closed the distance between you. He carefully took your hand in between both of his, turning you to face him. “You aren’t fine.”

“No, I’m damn well not fine,” you huffed, pinching your nose with your free hand. You dropped your chin onto your chest, closing your eyes as you fought the anxiety gripping your lungs like a vice. “I woke up this morning to my phone blowing up because of a stolen picture with you. I’m sure half of the internet hates me because they think we’re this serious thing now, and any illusion of privacy that I had is dwindling by the second as they try to figure out who the heck I am to either crucify me or congratulate me. It’s just…”

He released your arm to curl his fingers underneath your jaw, lifting your gaze from the burgundy cable-knit jumper covering his chest. The genuine concern that creased his brow and tugged on the corners of his mouth would be your undoing if you allowed yourself the weakness. “It is quite the ordeal, and you didn’t ask for this aspect of our relationship.”

“There isn’t any relationship at all! It was only a kiss. Well, two, but still. It would be one thing if there was,” you paused, allowing yourself the luxury of fully savoring his electrifying touch before pulling your face out of his featherlight hold, “but there isn’t.”

His hand scrubbed over the whiskers muddying his razor sharp jawline before falling to ghost over the curve of your hip. “If there was, what?”

You didn’t know what you were saying, what you had just said and alluded to. Your thoughts were a blur and you couldn’t discern whether you wanted to hide from him or into him. Quickly replaying what you had blurted out in your distracted state, you sighed heavily, the weight of what could not be dragged down your shoulders. What would it hurt to say what had been lingering on your mind all morning? “If there was something between us, maybe all the scrutiny would be worth it. If we were together, and I didn’t have to face them alone. If there was a reason behind terrifying men shouting awful things at me outside of my home. As it is, I’m a prisoner in my home for no damned good reason.”

He took a step away from you, arms crossing over his chest. “A consolation prize, then?”

You wanted to slam your fists onto the countertop, scream and tear your hair out at the confusion and frustration of it all. Instead, your hands flailed uselessly in between you. “No! No, not that.”

“Then what?” he asked, silken voice as tight and guarded as the rest of him. Steely blue eyes held you captive as he demanded an explanation.

What did it hurt to admit your fledgling feelings at this point? “Being with you, it wouldn’t be some consolation prize. You aren’t a-a prize to be won, Tom. I like you, okay? It was fun to talk with you last night, and you sure are one heck of a kisser. Five stars, for sure. I just…” you waved your arms at the throng of paparazzi you could faintly hear gathered outside. “That’s a lot to take on, especially for someone I hardly know.”

His arms fell to his sides and he took a small step toward you. “If it weren’t for the fame, for the fans and the celebrity and the madness of it all, would you hesitate?”

“Not for a second,” you answered instantly. The answer came from deep within you with no thought.

“Well, then…” His hands came up on either side of your face, cupping your jaw. He moved with absolute care, slow and steady with plenty of time for you to stop him at any point. First his forehead rested lightly against you, then his nose nudged along your cheek, and finally his mouth slanted over yours in a kiss so full of passion and intensity that your knees buckled. He held you upright between his body and the counter behind you, hands splayed over your sides and fingertips molded to the soft flesh of your waist.

He tucked your head beneath his chin, nuzzling his cheek into your damp hair. “Give us a chance? Give this a chance.”

You dug your fingertips into the worn wool of his jumper, inhaling the dark and soothing scent of his cologne from your nose pressed into his chest. “Tom…”

“I will handle this, I promise,” he assured you, reaching up to cup the back of your neck, holding you to him. “I need to know you can trust me. Please.”

The tension slowly left your shoulders at the caress of his hand down your spine. You melted into him. “Ben is going to be insufferable when he hears,” you said, doing your best to keep the happiness from your voice, but you were no award-winning actor.

“Let him,” he growled, hooking his thumbs underneath your chin, tilting your face up to him so he could further prove to you with his pillowy-soft lips and coffee-laced tongue exactly why trusting him would be worth all the sorrow and strife waiting just outside your door.

~~~

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