#ive been reading a lot of fics with these two and i see how the authors have the characters refer to each other in their fics

[gomzdrawfr]

The night was quiet as the Captain stepped out into the open air, fresh out from a mission, the sharp chill of the morning bit at his skin but he hardly noticed due to the exhaustion. The sky was dark, save for the faint halo of the light from the idling helicopter in the distance, painting the floor and wall in hues of turquoise.

There he was, Nikolai.

He leaned casually against the aircraft, a cigarette dangling loosely between his fingers, one foot propped, his broad shoulders relaxed. His jacket was unzipped just enough to reveal a teasing glimpse of his chest and all the hairy goodness beneath.

Even from a distance, Price could see the way Nik’s eyes were fixed on him.

Always waiting. Always there. Always steadfast. Just like he always had been. 

The first few snowflakes drifted slowly from the sky, mixing with the faint fog of Nikolai’s breath curling in the air and the smoke from his cigarette. Nik looked hot—there was no other word for it.

Okay, maybe there were few more words to describe the love of his life, but John couldn’t give a single bollock digging through the dictionary now. Not when Nik was standing there with his arms crossed, black hair slicked back yet slightly tousled. He looked like he belonged on the cover of one of those old male model magazines he’d been caught sneaking glances at in secret.

Something giddy and nearly childish bubbled in John’s chest, like spotting a bright candy from afar, something precious you’ve waited for your entire life. Before he knew it, he began walking. Boots crunched against the concrete beneath each step as his hands moved almost automatically, shrugging his helmet off, letting it fall to the ground with no care as his walk turned into a small jog, then a run. 

His goal was clear: to kiss his hot pilot husband.

By the time he reached Nik, his breath was shallow and his chest was heaving with something that wasn’t exertion, excitement maybe, but he stopped just short, his gaze lifting to meet Nik’s. 

Price paused, just for a second. He always did, right? Even after all this time, after a hundred kisses and then some, Price always had that fleeting moment of hesitation. A combination of gratitude, love and guilt stirred inside his chest. Nik had always waited, even now, through all the years it took John to come around, to gently removing and breaking down his defenses brick by brick, until he’d finally admitted what they both knew was inevitable. 

But tonight, John thought it wasn’t the nerves holding him back.

It was the way Nik was looking at him, staring at him like he was the centre of the universe, with those dark eyes softened and the corner of his eyes crinkled with adoration. The kind of look that had John’s knees buckled, the kind of look that screamed worship, that he was enough, that he was loved for exactly who he was. 

For Nik, he was roaming his eyes around John, observing the way the snowflakes gathered around John’s hair, blending with the white strands already there, the way they aligned and caught in the faint light made it shimmer like constellations, presenting John- his husband, in an otherworldly look. It was as if every star and planet had aligned to bring the John Price here, shaped from stardust gathered from the debris of the abyss and sent John crashing into his heart like a meteor.

If Nikolai too, could see himself as one of the stars in a galaxy of thousands, colliding with John to create the brightest supernova, perhaps then, he could erase the darker thoughts that lingered behind his love.

Nikolai had always thought himself akin to the black hole, pulling everything he loved into himself, consuming it with a selfish, unrelenting hunger. It was, and still is, a daily struggle to fight the unforgiving part of himself that believed he wasn’t worthy of Price. 

Nik leaned down slightly, nudging his nose against John’s, hearing the faint hitch in John’s breath, the reaction that always pulled a smile to his lips. The way Nik moved his nose to John’s cheek was slow and intimate, pressing lightly into the softness of the skin. Even as Nikolai can feel the way John breathed him in, the faint tang of ash and smoke with a mix of engine oil, the smell that reminded John something of warmth, of home, Nikolai still couldn’t quite shake off the pang of guilt. 

Nikolai wanted John wholly, completely, all of him, and that weight of need and want felt almost cruel. To love someone so much that it physically hurt, to want someone to the point of selfishness–it was hauntingly beautiful and unbearable at the same time. 

“Kissing under the first snow of the year,” Nik murmured, the cigarette between his fingers sizzled and forgotten, his voice rough with affection and a hint of the usual tease, batting off the uneasiness of his heart with humor, “like boys in a love story…звезда моя”. John huffed, rolling his eyes as his cheeks burned, a cute shade of red dusting his skin like apples. Nik almost cooed when the snowflake landed on his cheek melted away instantly, the heat of his embarrassment clear as day.

John didn’t bother responding, wanted to kiss Nik stupid as he leaned forward. Yet, as their lips were barely brushing and their eyes closed, the moment dissolved into something softer. Their breaths mingled, warm against their cold skin, and when they finally closed the distance–the kiss was slow and tender, like they were learning how to kiss all over again, and their worries faded away like the snow melting on the ground. 

Nik kissed the same way he loved, completely, boundlessly, consuming, and John allowed himself to be swallowed whole, to be taken completely by the gravity of Nik’s affection.

Because if there was any man that John would start a war for–even a cosmic one at that, it would always be him, and only him, his Nikolai. 

When they finally pulled back, with more snowflakes gathered around their head and their foreheads pressed together. Nik breathed out a quiet chuckle, “you’re blushing, John.”

John groaned, shaking his head, voice low yet filled with fondness. “Cheeky as ever, Nik.”

Merry Christmas Nekros!! I hope you like this lil present I wrote based on the breathtaking art :D special thanks to my friends and @karlachismylife for the help and inspiration :) ho ho ho to the nikprice community too!!

Returning from an op and immediately running to kiss your hot pilot husband under the first snow of the year 🌨️🚁

[ao3-shenanigans]

How do I search on ao3? Ive just been putting in the fandom I want and hitting go but I have to scroll through like dozens of pages before I find something in the theme/ vibe (? Word idk? I hope you know what i mean) I want

Hi! Great question! This will be a longer answer, so I’ll include a cut:

Ao3 uses a Tag Filtering system, wherein authors include tags on their work and readers can use the website to sort and filter through them to show what they may or may not want to read.

These are tags on a work:

But how do we get there? If we start with just a generic fandom search, we’ll find a button at the top of the page labeled “Filter”. This guy will be our best friend, click it.

By clicking “Filter” a sidebar pops up titled “Search and Filter” it has two main sections to it with several subheadings. These two sections: Include and Exclude achieve similar results but function slightly different.

By clicking on the drop downs under each, a list of common tags will pop up and you are presented with the option of Including or Excluding them from your search.

Include:

- by selecting a tag under Include, you are telling ao3 that you only want to see fics with that tag on it, every fic shown for this search will have that tag

- this is good for narrowing down a lot of fics very quickly, especially if you have something specific in mind

Exclude:

- by checking a tag under Exclude, no fan works with that tag will be shown in your search results

- this is good if you want to browse a larger selection of fics but want to avoid something you’re not fond of 

Selected tags in the Warnings dropdown of the Exclude section look like this:

There is a third section of this sidebar called “More Options” which includes sidebars to set preferences for crossovers, fic completion status, word count, and date updated. It functions much the same as Include and Exclude.

Lastly, make sure to click the “Sort and Filter” button at the bottom of the sidebar so that your selections will be put into effect!

Additional note:

This “Sort and Filter” function can be used when looking at an overall fandom page, or a more specific page like one for a ship paring or an alternate universe!

Hoped this helped and happy fic hunting!

[scary-grace]

(secret) santa, baby - part 9 of a shigaraki x f!reader fic

Shigaraki doesn't want to participate in the office's Secret Santa exchange, but when Toga promises to make it easy on him, he gives in. But making it easy for him makes it a lot harder for you -- you're the one who got his list. Office AU, no quirks. A fic in 12 parts. Divider by @ wcnderlnds

part i part ii part iii part iv part v part vi part vii part viii

part ix (snowed in)

When Tomura gets back to his desk, there’s a present waiting for him. Tomura’s Secret Santa doesn’t need REMEDIAL GIFT-WRAPPING, which means he can rule out anyone who was there as a suspect. Tomura peels open the wrapping paper and finds a pair of gloves – and a note. With the gifts, there’s always a note, and the notes have been getting longer. Whoever his Secret Santa is, they have more to say to him than they used to. Tomura’s weird enough that he likes the notes almost as much as he likes the gifts.

Dear Tomura, this one reads. I know I’m off-list again, but I saw these and they reminded me of you. A lot of the things I see remind me of you, but I think you’d be freaked out if I bought you most of them. I kind of want to ask Toga to ask you what you think of what you’ve gotten. If I’ve missed something obvious. Or if you’ve thought of other things you’d like since you made your list.

Tomura’s thought of other things, yeah. The problem is, he’s usually only thought of them after he’s opened a gift from his Secret Santa that has one of those things in it. Whoever his Secret Santa is, they’re good at this. Better than him, even if he knows how to wrap presents now. He keeps reading the note. I’d like to say I got the gloves in advance, but if I’m being honest, they’re extra. I saw the storm in the forecast and I thought about how cold it already gets down in the basement. I can think of better ways to keep your hands warm, but this is probably the most practical. Merry almost Christmas! Yours, your Secret Santa.

The gloves are lightweight when Tomura puts them on, but warm and soft on the inside – and they’re touchscreen gloves, so Tomura won’t have to take them off to use his tablet or his phone. They’re exactly right, just like all the other gifts Tomura’s Secret Santa has gotten him, but even as he folds the note and tucks it away in the same place he’s kept the others, he keeps getting stuck on the idea of other ways to warm his hands.

It’s fucking freezing in the basement, and it’s empty, even though it’s technically still work hours. Did everybody else just bail after the gift-wrapping thing?  If nobody else is here, Tomura’s not sticking around, either. He packs up his stuff and heads upstairs. Maybe he can get home before this storm or whatever it is kicks up in earnest. But when Tomura gets to the lobby, he finds out that he’s missed his window. The sky’s already darkened, and the parking lot is already covered in a layer of snow.

Tomura waited too long. If he hadn’t stuck around to wrap gifts with you – but even as he has the thought, he realizes that he doesn’t regret it even a little bit. It’s worth it, even if it means that he has to trudge through snow to the train station. You take the train home from work, too, don’t you? Tomura knows you had more work to do after the two of you finished the gifts. You told him so. What if you’re still here?

Your part of the office doesn’t have windows. Maybe you haven’t seen what the weather’s like. Tomura turns away from the front doors and heads back into the building to give you a heads-up.

You look surprised to see him, when he gets to your desk – but you aren’t unhappy. “Hey. Did you find, um – what are those?”

“The gloves? Secret Santa gift.” Tomura looks around your desk, trying to see if the gift he left you is anywhere. “Did you open yours?”

“Do you like them?”

“I’m wearing them.” If Tomura didn’t like them, he’d have put them in his desk and forgotten about them. He spots the stapled-shut paper bag he left for you this morning sticking out of your backpack. “Do you not like opening yours in front of people?”

“I was saving it so I’d have something to open tomorrow,” you say. “I heard somebody say that the office might be closed because of the storm.”

The snow. Right. There was a reason Tomura came up here, and it wasn’t just so he could see you again. “It’s already snowing. We should go now if we don’t want the trains to stop running on us.”

You look surprised. “You came to get me?”

“You take the train, too,” Tomura says. He doesn’t get why you’re looking at him like that. “We can walk together.”

“Okay,” you say. You smile at him, and Tomura’s face flushes badly enough that he actually considers covering it with his hands. “I’ll get my stuff.”

The weather looked bad when Tomura was just watching it through the doors, but once the two of you actually get out in it, Tomura realizes that it’s even worse than he thought. It’s the stupid wind. It keeps changing direction, blasting snow and ice crystals into his face no matter which way he looks, and the hood of his coat won’t stay up. His ears are freezing, even though his hair is covering them. It’s not a long walk to the train station, but Tomura knows he’ll have a splitting headache by the time he gets there.

“Here.” You’re wearing a hat and a scarf, and you take off the hat and offer it to Tomura. Tomura tries to say no, but you put it on him anyway, tugging it down over his ears. “I’m not the one who hates the cold.”

You’re right, but something about it strikes Tomura as weird. “How’d you know I hate the cold?”

“Everybody knows that.”

Tomura’s pretty sure everybody doesn’t. If they did, he’d get a lot more ironic let-it-snow shit from his friends around Christmas. There’s only one place you could have heard that, which means that you either know who his Secret Santa is – or it’s you. “Where did you hear that?”

“Sorry?” You’re rewrapping your scarf, pulling it up over your face. “Couldn’t hear you. The wind is really loud.”

The wind is loud and it’s getting worse. Tomura can ask you again once you’re at the train station and out of the weather. “Never mind. Let’s go.”

You and Tomura started out walking side by side. By the time you approach the train station, you’re walking pressed close together, your hand grasping Tomura’s arm, Tomura leaning into you as much as he can without falling over. Part of him feels stupid about it. You’re not fighting your way through a blizzard or something. The rest of him is too happy with it to care. His ears are warm and he’s wearing warm gloves that he got from his Secret Santa who might be you, and you decided you wanted to hold his arm without him doing anything. In spite of the weather, Tomura can’t count this as anything but a win.

The station platform is empty when you get there, and Tomura feels a hit of foreboding even before he sees that every arrival screen is flashing the same message. “Out of service?”

You fumble your phone out of your pocket, almost dropping it. “They just shut down. We missed it by five minutes.”

Fuck. “We can’t stay out here,” Tomura says, and you nod. You don’t have gloves. Your hands are shaking. “We should go back to the office.”

“They have to keep the heat on so the pipes don’t freeze,” you say. “And we can probably get the lights back on even if Maintenance turned them off.”

Tomura’s pretty sure Maintenance left before the two of you did. You were the last ones still in the building. Everybody else left because of the storm, and if Tomura had just left instead of going back to tell you, he’d have been on the last train home – and you’d have been stuck at the office in bad weather, by yourself. Tomura doesn’t like thinking about it. He doesn’t like thinking about it so much that even if he’d known for a fact that going back to get you would have meant he’d be snowed in with you, he’s sure he’d have gone anyway.

He waits for you to put your phone away, then grabs your hands in his gloved ones. “Do you want your hat back?”

“It looks better on you,” you say. There’s nothing on the planet that would look better on Tomura than on you, and Tomura almost says so, except the way you’re looking at him is enough of a distraction that he can’t get the words out in the right order. “Come on. Let’s get back before it gets worse.”

It’s already worse on the way back. There’s more snow on the ground and more ice crystals whipping around in the air, and Tomura’s shivering on every step. You aren’t walking with your hand on his arm anymore. This time you’ve got your arm wrapped around him, even though you’re shorter than he is, holding on tight as the two of you shuffle along. Tomura wants to get inside and out of the wind more than he’s ever wanted anything in his life. And at the same time, he’s dreading the second when you’ll let him go.

<- part viii part x ->

[rowanisawriter]

2024 —my year in writing

last year, i wrote more than i ever have like literally in my whole life. this year i beat my record by about 200k words. i am writing A LOT and it’s all because of you.

yes, you, reading this now. anyone who kudos’d or commented or liked or reblogged anything i wrote, and followed me here and on ao3, and ranted in my dms and added me to servers. you, reading the weird things i write, the things i can only write and only i can write, seeing it and liking it and coming back again and again for more. thank you :)

so here’s my 2024 summary:

words written: 358,963

fics published: 74

my favorite fics:

real world (stardew valley) - a story about parenthood and roads not taken. genuinely the most important story to me, a diary entry as much as fanfic

pilgrimage (bg3) - a story about two people without a past as they work toward an even more uncertain future. i also have no past because of a strange upbringing so this story is kinda personal to me even though it’s about a cleric and a vampire

novel (hades) - a story about looking for adventure and finding love and family instead. i had so much fun writing this and posted weekly without pre-writing which was a challenge but it all worked out

patchwork self (datv) - a story about finding pieces of your brother in yourself. i wrote a lot of structured fic this year and i think this one flowed the easiest and was the most precise in how it delivered the message i was trying to get across, also it’s gen which i never write

my most written pairing: thanzag with 11 stories! not surprising since ive spent most of the year humiliating myself over thanatos

my most used tags: romance, introspection, character study

what i learned: i learned above all to trust myself! this year i wrote and completed three multi chapter fics that i didn’t prewrite and posted week by week until it was done. i’ve never been able to do that before but this year i just did it and didn’t overthink it, and i trusted that i could finish the stories and i did lol i can do anything i think i just have to trust myself a little

what i want to write next year: i would like very much to write something original, i have a loose idea so i just need to sit down and write so my goal is really small and simple, hopefully i don’t let myself down

[atoriv-art]

Heeyyy so sorry if this has been asked before buuuttttt.. What are ur thoughts on the sand siblings?

this made me realize i didnt include their rs in the chart i posted REST ASSURED I LOVE THEM. anyway hehehe :3

a lot of my takes on them are headcanon-based (like even more than the hyugas id say) But i assume thats what people r here for anyway. Sooooo

i really like the suna siblings bc their relationship pre-chunin exams is very, like… dysfunctional, but at the same time stable? temari and kankuro are obviously afraid of their brother, and gaara is deeply unhappy around them, but they've all clearly found a "safe" position to exist in yk?

my read on those positions is that temari actually feels more conflicted about gaara than you would think — she's the oldest and therefore the one most aware of how 'wrong' their family is — but she puts her and kankuro's safety first, therefore she resorts to appeasing gaara and generally staying out of his way. kankuro is more of a show-off and while he is afraid of gaara, it's in a more grounded way, if that makes sense? he taunts him like one might taunt an angry dog, he's afraid of him because of what he can do, vs temari who dreads being around him because she's aware of what gaara carries on his shoulders and Represents

i actually 👉👈 have a suna family-centered fic i've been slowly working on 👉👈 that ive been too shy to mention on main LMAO but since we are on topic here u go [link]. it's yashamaru-focused (my WIFE) but it brushes upon the entire family :3 it'll be slow to update since i've been busy with things but if u don't mind that. i mention it here since i use the extrapolations im mentioning here to write it….

aaaanyway. the kids' relationship with rasa isn't very defined (esp for kankuro and temari) but i interpret their situation as the classic… yk, father lost his soul after the mother died sort of thing. it's a bit cliche but it makes sense LOL while the only kid we know for sure rasa was cruel towards is gaara i don't find it a stretch to expand it towards the other two, even if it wasn't as extreme.

so, with that in mind: my personal interpretation is that temari — in addition to getting the usual heir responsibilities — got put into a caretaker role for kankuro, pushing her towards cynicism and self-preservation above all else (she's also the one most likely to remember their mom, and an early loss like that can push one into hyper-independence), while kankuro was left with a bit less pressure but as a tradeoff grew hungry for acknowledgement, eventually feeding into him becoming a bit of a bully as he gets older. i think he was the one with the most... "normal" relationship with their father, but i wouldn't necessarily say that's a good thing lol

gaara is in a unique position because he was not fully raised by rasa, and his relationship with him is a lot more shallow and extreme as a result. instead gaara ended up being built into who he is almost exclusively through yashamaru's kindness and subsequent betrayal — and this is only accentuated imo by the fact that gaara does not (iirc?) at any point willingly bring up yashamaru. he badmouths his father and blames him for who he is, but the formative moments of gaara's childhood that we see are of him with his uncle. isn't that interesting? to me it reads like that's still a wound so deep he can't even bear to acknowledge it; rasa treats him like a monster so gaara is free to spit poison back at him in return, but gaara did wholeheartedly believe his uncle loved him at a point, and the idea that he did not was so world-shattering that he can't even bring himself to acknowledge his existence

all that being said, gaara as we meet him in the exams treats his siblings like strangers and i can't fully blame him for that; while the compounded traumas of 1. losing their mother and 2. the shift in rasa's disposition, cannot be understated, i think what truly "broke" the siblings' dynamic is the way gaara was likely forced into kankuro and temari's lives after yashamaru died. while they'd certainly met before, there's a world of difference between knowing you have a distant, troubled younger brother vs having that brother violently placed into your home in his most vulnerable state after another familial loss.

(yashamaru's rs with his other niblings is never really touched upon but i do think about it often. he was so close to their mom i doubt they had no relationship at all! but that's. you know. what the fic i mentioned is for.)

it inherently puts the kids into an adversarial position, especially with how rasa doesn't try to argue for gaara's humanity. so gaara, freshly traumatized and distrusting, is met with siblings who are terrified of him and a father who he knows wants him dead. to make things worse, yashamaru (my king.) made sure to crush whatever goodwill gaara still had towards the world before he died, so there's no part of him willing to give anyone the benefit of the doubt. no one has any interest in fixing this situation so this is the dynamic they settle into.

yet! they are still family and there are certainly glimpses of that. one of my favorite moments is temari looking out for gaara for, in our pov, the first time

it's really simple but it always gets an emotion out of me, it's why i think their relationship bothered her the most… one of my biggest gripes with the suna siblings is honestly that we just don't get a lot of them after a point! i would have loved to see them getting closer after gaara takes the first step in closing the distance.

kazekage retrieval arc is easily one of my favorite arcs in naruto it's soooo sweet to see kankuro and temari fighting so so hard for their baby :( i really like the quiet moments where you can tell there's still a lot of guilt over how things were, i wish we got to sit with it a little more because part of the reason i like their bond so much is because of those moments of doubt, you know? i think it's far more powerful for gaara to wonder if he's been fully forgiven, for temari to grapple with the guilt of not having been a good sister to him, than for them to easily slip into a healthy and stable dynamic as a trio.

how do they feel about their father? their mother? how do they feel about their uncle? they are three different people with similar but not identical experiences with all of them, and it makes you wonder how they might navigate unpacking all of that while not jeopardizing their fledgling bond. for example i'm personally a huge fan of gaara coming to view his uncle in an imperfect but ultimately empathetic light, while his siblings see little reason to extend him so much grace.

their personalities in shippuden make a lot of sense to me taking their upbringings into account too; kankuro and temari are predominantly rasa's children, and therefore have rougher edges and are way more averse to earnest displays of affection. gaara meanwhile had yashamaru's influence in his formative years; he knows how to articulate his emotions and acknowledges the importance of sincerity and kindness. i dunno if this was intentional but i think it's a neat detail!

soo much of the suna family follows this pattern of love breeding resentment (rasa's love towards karura breeding resentment against gaara, yashamaru's love towards karura breeding resentment against gaara and rasa, gaara's love towards his uncle being twisted into hatred against the world, the siblings' love for each other being corrupted then saved) it's sooo. chef's kiss. again my only complaint is that we don't see more of them. literally who cares about konoha i want to be in suna forever

[killjoy-prince]

House M.D. but it's when Wilson says House's name

[kindaorangey]

sorry to say but the maker-fledgling/parent-child relationship dynamics make DM so much juicier. and i don't mean that in a kinky way in the slightest i mean it's insane to be adamant about never having a child for 500 years, break that vow on a whim and then be a deadbeat dad for a bit. and also on the more lighthearted and sappy side of things it's really interesting for a dying man in his 70s to be given another shot at life, with eternity ahead of him and the power of an ancient in his veins to inherit over the course of that eternity. idk idk! it's just neat.

[justlightlysedated]

five times eddie rebuffs someone's advances by saying he's straight/gay and one time he doesn't have to

dedicated to @frankchurchillsaysrelax for being my cheerleader, love you 🖤

Read on [AO3]

one.

Eddie didn't want to be at this bar. It had been a couple of weeks after Chris had left with his parents and the last thing that Eddie had wanted to do was go to a bar after work, but Buck had suggested it, and Chimney had jumped on it and Hen had ushered him into her passenger seat, since he'd driven in with Buck that morning.

Fortunately she doesn't use the moment to talk about the fact that they're both missing children, but rants about their last call and how their new Captain was becoming a liability in the field, by not trusting their judgements.

By the time they make it to the bar, Buck is holding down a booth while Chim gets the first round.

While Hen goes to help Chim, Eddie slides into the booth next to Buck, and jostles him with his elbow, interrupting whatever he'd been doing on his phone, which was making him furrow his brow in confusion. 

Buck looks at him, raising his eyebrows pointedly and Eddie just shakes his head, raising one eyebrow in return, which makes Buck shrug and put his phone away just in time for Chimney and Hen to come back.

It's after the fourth round, when Buck has managed to convince Hen to play a game of pool with him, and Chimney has gone to the bathroom, that Eddie is sitting alone at the table, trying not to look through his recent messages and despair at how far down Christopher's messages have gotten in the list.

He's interrupted by someone sitting down across from him. Eddie looks up, mouth open to talk, when he realizes that it's not one of his friends.

The woman looks to be maybe a couple of years younger than him, and several glasses of alcohol more drunk than he is. She's got hazy blue eyes and long brown hair that spills down her shoulders as she leans forward suggestively. 

Eddie feels the dread settle in his chest before she even opens her mouth.

He'd been hoping that maybe she just wanted to rest a little bit before rejoining whoever she was here with, but a brief look around the bar revealed a group of giggling girls who were trying very hard to seem like they weren't looking over at them, one of them was wearing a bride to be sash and a crown.

"Hey," she says, prolonging the vowel. "Just saw you sitting here all by yourself, want some company?"

She grins at him, like she's proud of herself for not slurring any of her words. She's looking at him, like no one ever tells her no, and she thinks charming enough to flirt herself into a yes.

But Eddie's just not interested. Even without the clusterfuck his life has turned into the last couple of months, he wouldn't be interested in whatever she was offering.

"Sorry," he tells her. "But I'm not here alone."

He points towards where Chimney had joined Buck and Hen and is very obviously sabotaging all of Buck's attempts at winning. 

She turns to look over quickly, and shakes her head, "They won't miss you, if you want to spend some time with me."

She reaches out to touch the back of his hand, and Eddie immediately drops his hands to his lap, leaning back in his seat to put as much distance between them as he can without getting up to leave.

She's drunk enough to make a face that he's pretty sure she doesn't mean him to see, and is also visibly rallying herself for another try.

"They won't miss me, since I'm not interested in spending any time with you," Eddie says before she can speak, much more bluntly than he usually would.

She furrows her brow as she frowns at him, tilting her head to the side. "Are you gay?"

Eddie snorts and says sarcastically, "Yes, exactly. Being gay is the only reason a man wouldn't be interested in what you're offering."

She scoffs and immediately gets to her feet. "What a waste," she mutters as she walks away, loud for Eddie to hear it.

Eddie rolls his eyes, and promptly forgets all about the interaction when Buck drops down in the seat she'd just vacated, pouting because he'd lost the game to Hen.

Eddie grins at him, and Buck's starts to protest, "You weren't there. She was totally cheating."

Eddie snorts, laughing, and Buck starts to protest, pointing out all of the ways that Hen totally cheated, that segues into a conversation about the first official pool competition and how pool was known as billiards and is still called that in Europe.

Eddie just leans back, staring at Buck as he speaks, thinking he wouldn't be interested in spending time with anyone else.

two.

This time it's not that Eddie doesn't want to be at the bar. He was the one who had suggested to go and make it a group thing when Buck had sighed that Tommy would be too busy working to check out a new lgbt+ bar that had just opened up. 

Well, actually it is exactly like Eddie doesn't want to be at this bar, but the way that Buck had smiled and looked excited when Eddie had made his suggestion was more than enough of a prize for Eddie to put up with being in a crowded bar when he'd prefer to be locked in his room by himself.

He's at the bar by himself, waiting for the bartender while keeping an eye on everyone. Chimney and Maddie had already gone back home, while Karen and Hen were in the middle of the dance floor finishing dancing to the song while Eddie got their drinks, with Buck who was bouncing from partner to partner, dancing like a white boy with no rhythm at all, and somehow charming every single person who was in his orbit.

Even Eddie can't help the smile on his face as he sees Buck bumping into a group of girls and immediately becoming friends.

"Can I h-elp you?" Eddie hears from behind him, and turns around while the person is speaking, which makes them pause mid word before continuing.

Eddie is still smiling as he replies, "Yes, can I get another round on the Buckley tab?"

The bartender looks too young to actually be manning the bar, but he could possibly just have a baby face. His hair is dyed a purple dark enough to look black when he's not under a direct source of light, and his eyes are too big for his face, open wide as he looks at Eddie like he's never seen another person before.

The bartender blinks a couple of times, before he grins, boyishly charming, "Right away."

He doesn't go for the beers and cocktails they've been drinking, but pours Eddie a shot of a mix that looks bright and green and then leaves it in front of Eddie, winking as he says, "Free of charge."

Eddie is at that point of the night where he won't say no to alcohol, so he grabs the shot and downs it without further thought. It was sweet and sour and tasted overwhelmingly of apple. He must make a face because the bartender laughs as he fixes the drinks for Eddie's table on a tray. There is a pitcher of beer, three pint glasses stacked together, two margaritas and four shots of tequila that weren't a part of the original order.

He pours Eddie another green shot, and one for himself, and Eddie takes it again, without question, knocking their glasses together and throwing it back.

The bartender's eyes are on his throat when he sets his shot down, and Eddie tries hard not to frown.

Eddie moves forward a little to pull the tray closer to himself to take back to their table, when the bartender also leans in so they are much closer than before. 

"I get off in about two hours if you wanna stick around. I promise I can show you a good time." 

He's looking at Eddie from beneath heavy lids, and his lips are quirked in a one sided smirk. He looks confident that he knows what Eddie's answer is going to be, and Eddie would like to know what it is about him specifically that makes people think that he'd be interested in anything they have to offer.

"I'm flattered," Eddie says, because oddly enough he kind of is, but he's not going to look into that too deeply. "But I'm very straight."

The bartender gives him a look, like he doesn't believe what Eddie is saying, looking around the bar obviously like he's questioning why else would Eddie be here.

Eddie doesn't rise to the obvious bait, "I am an ally. Not that it's any of your business."

Eddie grabs the tray and leaves before anything else can be said. He almost bumps into Hen since he wasn't watching where he was going.

She gives him a look, and Eddie rolls his eyes. She sighs and grabs one of the shots from the tray and starts leading the way back to their table where Karen was already sitting, waiting, "Can't take you anywhere."

Eddie just snorts, "It's not like I go asking for the attention."

Hen shakes her head, "Nah, you're just too pretty."

Eddie was about to protest when there was an arm slung across his shoulders, and Buck's loud voice too close to his ear. "The prettiest," he says, agreeing with Hen. "I see the pretty privilege of getting free shots also works in gay bars, good to know."

Eddie rolls his eyes once again, but doesn't say anything, hoping his cheeks aren't as pink as they feel.

three.

Eddie is too busy doing his job to actually notice that his patient is trying to flirt with him, at least until she asks him if he wants her  number.

Eddie blinks at her confused, and then shakes his head, "That's not really appropriate."

She giggles at his response, like she can't help it, "It's not like I'm expecting a call right now."

Eddie shakes his head, "I don't date people I meet on calls."

She pouts at that, "Well, we don't have to date immediately. We can get to know each other first."

"I'm not interested," Eddie tries, moving to put more space between them, looking around for someone else to help, since she's obviously feeling better, if she's trying this hard to get his number.

She tilts her head at him, "Are you ace or something?"

Eddie is confused by what she's asking him, but it makes him think about how the last time a woman hit on him, he'd let her assume he was gay and it had made her go away, "I'm gay."

Her eyes widen a little bit, but she doesn't get upset or anything. She smiles at him, "Well, can I still get your number? My brother is bi and we definitely have the same taste in men."

Eddie feels like he's at an impasse, and isn't quite sure what to do when Buck appears out of nowhere, sliding an arm around Eddie's shoulders as he leans heavily against him.

He says something that Eddie doesn't quite catch since his heart starts pounding and his patient gives him a knowing look.

"Oh, I see," she says, and then winks at Eddie before turning around and leaving. Eddie doesn't stop her, not wanting to prolong the interaction. She had already been outside of the building when they'd gotten there, and had only a small cut on her brow. Eddie had checked for a concussion, and to make sure she hadn't inhaled any smoke.

"What was that about?" Buck asks, letting his arm fall from Eddie's shoulders and turning to face Eddie, a confused look on his face.

"Well, she wasn't taking no for an answer, and put two and two together when you came over."

Buck still looks confused. Eddie raises his eyebrows pointedly, and waits until Buck gets what he means.

"Oh," he says, and again. "Oh! I can go clear up the-"

He turns like he's actually going to seek her out, and Eddie reaches out and stops him before he can get too far.

"No," Eddie says firmly. "It was what I wanted."

Buck furrows his brow again, "You wanted her to think we were together?"

Eddie snorts, "I wanted her to think that I was gay. Since that's what I told her."

Buck is even more confused, "But you're not gay."

Eddie is, of course, going to say, of course not, but the words stay stuck in his throat, and the pause is long enough that Buck's confusion starts turning into a slight alarm.

Bobby's voice sounds out, calling them. Eddie just slaps Buck on the arm and runs towards where Bobby's voice is coming from, knowing that Buck is going to bring this conversation back up when Eddie least expects it.

four.

Eddie isn't technically avoiding anyone. Ever since a priest told him to let himself feel joy, Eddie has been indulging in things he'd otherwise reject. Like the truly expensive Mexican hot chocolate cappuccino that they serve in a giant mug with a design of his choosing on top at the cafe that is fifteen minutes away from the station. He'd woken up super early to be here, and to get a chance to sit and enjoy his coffee before he had to go into work.

He's about halfway done, and is contemplating getting two extra coffees to go, since he knows that Buck loves the French vanilla oat milk latte that they make (and maybe it will cheer him up enough to get rid of the literal thunder cloud hanging above his head since Tommy had broken up with him for at least a little bit), when someone drops down into the seat across from him.

Eddie looks up startled to see a handsome dark haired man with too big brown eyes who looked to be in his early twenties, and is even more shocked when they reach out to grab his hand.

Eddie goes to pull his hand back, when the man speaks up, "Please just, can you pretend to be my date. My crazy ex is right over there and he doesn't really understand boundaries."

Eddie wants to ask him why the hell that's his issue, when he looks over to see who the ex is, and sees a buff man sitting at the other side of the cafe and glowering at their table.

Eddie looks back to the guy sitting at his table and sighs, leaving his hand where it is. "If he's crossing boundaries, then maybe you should consider getting a restraining order?"

The guy gives Eddie a look, like he thinks that Eddie is adorable. "Cops don't take anything seriously unless something physical happens, and this face is much too pretty to be punched."

He grins as he finishes speaking, and Eddie really doesn't have anything to say to refute that actually.

"So you think my face is just ugly enough to be punched?" Eddie asks even though he really didn't mean to.

The guy laughs, and picks up Eddie's hand to cradle it between his two, giving Eddie a knowing look that reminds him of Buck whenever he teases Eddie for having pretty privilege, "Fishing for compliments is not cute."

Eddie can't help but laugh, smiling back as he leans forward a little, "That's not what your face is saying."

The guy leans forward as well, smile turning a bit sly, "Oh yeah? What is my face saying then?"

"It's saying that you think I'm very cute."

The guy laughs again, throwing his head back and shaking his head.

Before anything else can be said, the sound of a chair screeching as it was pushed back. They both turned to see the boundaries pushing ex stalking out of the cafe and down the street.

The guy leaned back in his seat and let out a relieved breath.

"Thank you," he says and smiles, squeezing Eddie's hand and making him aware that they're still holding hands.

Eddie feels his cheeks heating up as he tugs his hand away as gently as he could.

"You're welcome," he replies and grabs his mug to try and finish the rest of his coffee as fast as he can.

"My name is Evan by the way," he says, and Eddie just barely stops himself from choking on his drink, coughing a little as he sets the mug down and grabs his napkin to wipe his mouth.

Evan's smile dims a little bit, but he stays smiling.

"Eddie," Eddie responds, pointing at himself, and setting his hand back down to the table.

"Well, Eddie," he says, leaning forward once again. "How about we turn this into an actual date?"

Eddie coughs again, feeling his cheeks heating up.

"While I've had fun pretending, I'm actually straight," Eddie says, and for some reason, unlike all the other times he's used this excuse, he actually feels a twinge in the pit of his stomach, like he wasn't being entirely truthful.

"Really?" Evan says, sounding a bit incredulous.

"Yeah?" Eddie responds, and this time it sounds like he's lying.

Evan raises both of his eyebrows and then shrugs a little, "Okay, but still, let me pay for your coffee as a thank you."

Eddie feels as though his entire face is red now. He blinks a little, looking down at the coffee that he's almost done with, "I already paid for this one."

Evan laughs, "Then let me buy you another one."

Eddie smiles and nods his head a little, "Fine. You can get me a French vanilla latte with oat milk to go."

Evan knocks his fist against the table, nodding his head. Eddie tries not to stare, but ends up staring anyway as he gets in line, and gets the coffee.

He leaves it on the table, sending Eddie a grin, before he leans down quickly and presses a kiss to Eddie's cheek, "Hopefully, I'll see you around."

And then he's leaving, dropping out of Eddie's life just like how he dropped into it.

Eddie just ducks his head down and finishes the rest of his coffee, feeling like the red in his cheeks is never going to go away.

He ends up giving Buck the coffee once he gets to the station, before he goes to change into his uniform.

By the time he makes it up to the loft, there is a teasing mood in the air. Eddie looks around at everyone, who is staring at him in curiosity (Chimney), amusement (Hen), and frowning (Buck).

"What?" he asks, patting his chest to make sure that he was actually wearing a shirt.

"You want me to save this for you?" Buck asks, and turns the paper cup the coffee was in to show Eddie a phone number along with the message, Just in case you change your mind.

Eddie flushes once again, but refuses to actually answer. He's actually about to invoke their collective wrath by saying the Q word, but before he can the alarm rings out. Eddie breathes out in relief, and turns back around.

five.

All Eddie wants is to decompress with his friends, finish eating his burger and then let Buck drive him home so he could pass out for the next ten hours.

So of course, that's not what happens. It's not the first time that Eddie's been hit on while he's out with everyone. It's not even the hundredth time. It is the first time that they are all there when he says, "I'm gay, and really not interested."

The woman goes fully red with embarrassment, and turns around without another word, stalking back to her seat.

Eddie exhales in relief and is about to take another bite of his burger when he looks up to see that everyone is staring at him.

"What?" he asks, letting his burger go to give them his full attention.

Chimney's eyes are still narrowed, while Hen and Buck share a look.

"You're not gay," Hen says slowly, like she's not sure if she should say it or not.

Eddie shrugs, "I tell guys I'm straight to avoid attention as well."

This time all three of them exchange glances. 

"But you are straight," this time it's Buck who speaks. "Aren't you?"

"Am I?" Eddie says, grinning when Buck's mouth falls open as he stares at Eddie incredulously.

Eddie just grins when Hen snorts and picks up his burger again.

Buck leaves it alone for the entire time that they finish eating, and even for the ride back home, but Eddie knows he's not going to leave it alone. Especially not when it's the second time in the last couple of weeks that Eddie has implied that he's not entirely straight.

So he's not surprised when Buck turns off the ignition and follows behind Eddie as he walks into his house and into the kitchen.

"Eddie," Buck says, but Eddie just pretends that he can't hear him, walking towards the fridge to get out a bottle of water. He downs about half of it before he turns to face Buck.

He still has no idea what to say actually. He's sure I don't actually know, isn't going to fly, not with Buck, who would most definitely know that there was something he did know even if it wasn't whether or not he was gay or straight.

The realization wasn't something that happened overnight. It had been slowly coming over the last couple of years, but mostly the last couple of weeks. Every time that Eddie has had to shoot someone down, or let them down gently, there is this feeling in the pit of his stomach that tells him that the reason he's giving everyone isn't the truth. And prodding at the feeling revealed one thing. 

That he was already in love with someone else. With Buck.

Eddie looks at Buck now, who looks more concerned and worried than anything else, and he knows that he's not alone in his feelings.

He figured that one out as well right after the first realization. He's not entirely sure if Buck is in love with him, but he has the feeling that if he were to push the issue, Buck wouldn't disappoint him.

"What is going on?" Buck asks after a couple of minutes of charged silence between them.

"I don't know," Eddie says almost at the same time.

Buck's confusion grows even more, "Eddie."

"I mean, I don't know the answer to your previous question."

Buck takes a second to realize what Eddie is saying, and the shock spreads across his face.

Eddie takes a step closer, and Buck moves closer as well, like they're two magnets that are getting too close to each other's magnetic pull.

"So you're-?" Buck asks in a hushed voice, leaving it open ended and staring intently like he can get the answer straight from Eddie's brain if he stares long enough.

"I don't know," Eddie says again. "I'm not really interested in figuring that out right now, though."

Buck looks like he doesn't understand what Eddie is trying to say. So Eddie keeps speaking, taking another step forward.

"I know you didn't rest until you figured out your label, and I'm happy that figuring that out made you happy, but for me, that's not what this is about."

"Then what's it about?" Buck asks, taking two steps forward so that they are less than an arm's length away.

Eddie's breathing hitches, and he hopes that Buck doesn't notice.

"I'm just not interested in casual or dating," Eddie says, voice low, not doing a good enough job of keeping the disgust out of his voice from the fond smile that starts spreading across Buck's face. "Not when I'm-"

Eddie stops speaking, the words caught in his throat. He swallows hard, eyes falling away from Buck's face to some point across his shoulder.

"Not when you're what, Eddie?"

Eddie closes his eyes and inhales deeply, letting the breath out slowly. He opens his eyes again, and inhales sharply, losing the small amount of calm he'd gathered when he notices that Buck had moved so that he was in Eddie's line of sight once again.

Looking at Buck's face, feeling the weight of his gaze right in the pit of his stomach, the seriousness in his eyes, knowing without a doubt that this conversation was something that Buck wasn't  taking lightly,  that he'd be safe no matter what he said, made it easy for the words to come out.

"Not when I'm in love with someone else."

Buck's eyes dart all over his face as his brow furrows. There is just a moment, a blink and you'll miss it moment where Eddie thinks Buck looks disappointed. But before it settles it turns into a warm expression, full of empathy.

"Shannon," he says, nodding his head, lIke it makes sense. And Eddie really can't blame him for thinking that, not with what happened just months ago.

Still he laughs a little, shaking his head as he lifts his hands to Buck's shoulders squeezing lightly, making Buck's gaze go wide and shocked.

"No, idiot," Eddie says, feeling so much fondness, and just an overwhelming amount of love. "You."

"M-" Buck starts to say, but Eddie moves even closer, and presses a kiss to Buck's cheeks, causing him to stop speaking as his breathing stutters.

"Eds," Buck breathes out, a question in his trembling tone.

Eddie just nudges his nose into Buck's cheek, and presses another kiss closer to his mouth.

"I'm in love with you," Eddie says, pressing his forehead to Buck's jaw and closing his eyes. "That's what I know."

Buck exhales slowly, shoulders dropping as he lifts his hands and presses his fingers on either side of Eddie's waist.

Eddie breathes out carefully, and tightens his eyes briefly,  before opening them and lifting his head.

Buck is looking at him, with the same look on his face he always has whenever Eddie gives him a compliment or says something that Buck was not expecting, blue eyes wide and clear and shining bright.

It makes Eddie's heart thud hard and painful in his chest, makes him lean in that much closer, eyes drifting from Buck's to his mouth.

"Eddie," Buck says, voice soft and trembling. Eddie just watches him, waiting for Buck to make up his mind one way or another.

Buck moves his hands when Eddie doesn't say anything, sliding them up Eddie's chest, making Eddie's breathing hitch when he presses careful fingers to Eddie's face, tipping his jaw just slightly. Eddie moves into the touch eagerly, pressing even closer, moving one hand to Buck's shoulder and sliding it to cradle the curve of his neck, feeling the thundering heartbeat beneath the palm of his hand.

"Eddie," Buck says again, this time sounding more steady.

Eddie still doesn't say anything.

Buck exhales once again, shaking his head a little as a smile curls the corners of his mouth, just slightly.

"I'm going to kiss you," Buck says, like he needs to be clear as to what is about to happen, even though Eddie's been sure of where this is going from the moment that Buck didn't push him away when Eddie kissed him on the cheek.

"Are you?" Eddie says, smiling.

"Yeah," Buck whispers, voice even lower.

"Then what are you waiting for?" Eddie asks, maybe sounding a bit petulant.

Which makes Buck laugh, a small puff of laughter that Eddie can feel wash across his face.

"I'm trying to build anticipation here, Edmundo."

Eddie wrinkles his nose at the use of his full name, "Well, I've been waiting, for years really, so I think anti-"

Buck kisses him mid sentence, and Eddie's entire mind goes blank, the chaste kiss washing away every single thought he's ever had. It's all replaced with this feeling, warm, slow and sweet, pouring through his entire body.

Eddie pushes closer, wrapping one arm around Buck's shoulder and the other low on his back, pushing into the kiss.

Buck slides his hands across Eddie's jaw and to the back of his neck.

Buck moves back slowly, and Eddie has to fight the urge to pull him back into another kiss.

He opens his eyes, and can't help but smile at the dumbstruck look on Buck's face, lips parted, eyes wide, cheeks rosy red.

"Oh," he breathes out, and Eddie's smile turns into a laugh and he leans forward slightly, pressing their foreheads together, and lets his eyes fall shut.

plus one.

Once again, Eddie is at a bar when he would rather be at home. This time he couldn't even convince Buck just to head straight home after work.

Chris was at a sleepover and they had a rare night to themselves that they could take advantage of, but Maddie had complained that she hadn't seen her brother to just hang out in weeks, and Chimney and Hen had also made comments on how they had secluded themselves for long enough and it was time to get over the honeymoon stage.

So here he was once again, feeling a bit more tired than usual. A feeling that wasn't helped by the three beers he'd already drunk. 

At one point he finds himself lying down on his crossed arms on the table, face turned towards Buck, eyes partly closed.

He feels the table jostle twice as someone or multiple someone's leave. Only humming in acknowledgement when Maddie says bye by ruffling his hair, in a move that she must've learned about from his sisters, when she and Chimney head out.

Eddie only realizes they are alone when Buck leans a little closer, pressing one hand high up on Eddie's thigh to get his attention.

Eddie focuses on his face, cheeks flushed with color like they always get when he's had more than three beers.

Eddie lifts his eyebrows in question.

Buck just smiles at him, as he leans back, hand sliding away from Eddie's thigh, and he lifts one of the empty bottles on the table so that Eddie can see it, shaking it a little.

Eddie lifts his head up, nodding, before propping his elbow on the bar and leaning his chin on his palm to watch as Buck gathers all of the empty bottles to one corner of the table. 

Buck looks to Eddie before he gets up from the table and reaches out to press the tips of his fingers right beneath Eddie's eye. 

"We'll go home after the next round," he says.

Eddie just smiles back and watches him as he leaves, sighing as he goes.

He knows he must look ridiculous with the sappy, love sick grin on his face, but he thinks that it's something that he's allowed, after years of denying himself the pleasure of simply looking at Buck.

Eddie is just planning on staring until Buck comes back. He loves to see the way Buck ducks his head and flutters his eyelashes when he sees that Eddie hasn't stopped looking at him. Eddie is still looking at where Buck is waiting for the bartender to get to him when someone walks into his line of sight.

It was a woman with long brown hair, wearing one of those form fitting dresses in a bright pink color that stopped at her midthigh.

Eddie blinks a little, eyes darting away, and feels someone sitting down at the table. 

He looks to the side to find a man in a sports jacket with shaggy dark hair.

He grins at Eddie, "Mind if I sit here for a bit?"

Before Eddie can respond the woman who'd been walking towards him is sitting down right beside the man. They lean into each other in a way that shows that they are well acquainted, and Eddie feels oddly like he's in the middle of a trap.

"You looked a little lonely," the woman says as she sits down. "We were wondering if you want some company."

Eddie doesn't even have to think about it. "No thanks, I'm fine."

"That you are," the man says and they both move almost like a dance. He leans back and she leans forward.

"We were actually wondering if you'd be interested in coming home with us," she says, reaching out like she's gonna touch Eddie's arm, but Eddie sits up immediately, putting himself out of reach.

"What makes you think that I would be interested in coming home with you?" Eddie asks, feeling both genuinely curious at the answer and a little bit over this whole thing.

They look at each other and then back to Eddie. "You're hot," they both answer at the same time.

Eddie sighs, rolling his eyes. He doesn't know why he was expecting any other answer.

Eddie wants to say that that's not a good enough reason, or maybe tell them that they weren't nearly interesting enough for Eddie to even think about doing a threesome.

Before he can say any of that, two beers are set down sharply on the table, the condensation from the cold glass splattering everywhere.

Eddie looks up, and just sees Buck's face, brow furrowed, mouth in a determined line, for a second before Buck is sitting down in his seat, or well mostly in his seat, while also throwing his leg over Eddie's lap. Eddie barely has time to say anything else, when Buck wraps his fingers into the open collar of his shirt and pulls him into a kiss. 

Eddie makes a muffled sound of surprise but quickly gets with the program, hooking his left arm around Buck's shoulders and pressing the fingers of his right hand to the side of Buck's face, kissing him back.

Buck presses fingers to Eddie's throat, making him gasp and he wastes no time licking into Eddie's mouth and kissing him wet and deep and filthy. The same kind of kiss he gives Eddie right after blowjobs like he's determined to lick his taste out of Eddie's mouth.

It's not a kiss that is entirely acceptable in public. Especially when Eddie drops his right hand to Buck's thigh, itching to tug him right into his lap.

Eddie forgets all about where he is and the audience they all had, world narrowed to Buck and the hot press of his mouth against Eddie's.

After a while, Eddie starts to get dizzy and it's only then when Buck pulls back. Eddie gasps raggedly, blinking his eyes open, not understanding why the kissing has stopped.

Buck laughs, low and short, right against Eddie's mouth and leans in a bit to nudge their noses together.

"I missed you," he says even though they've only been apart for less than ten minutes.

That fact doesn't stop the smile that crosses Eddie's face.

He's expecting to be kissed again, so he's not really pleased when Buck turns and speaks to someone else, dislodging Eddie's arm around his shoulders.

"You're wasting your time. He's not interested and I don't share."

He bares his teeth at them, a move that he'll probably be mortified by when he's sober tomorrow, but Eddie just finds it extremely hot.

He doesn't hear anything else as he cups the back of Buck's neck in his hands and tugs him back into another kiss. 

Eddie muffles whatever other words Buck was going to say with his lips, licking into Buck's open mouth and kissing him just as thoroughly as Buck had earlier.

Buck sinks into the kiss, wrapping his arms around Eddie, fingers digging into Eddie's back as he tugs him in closer. Eddie drags his hands into Buck's hair, tangling his fingers in his hair and digging against his scalp.

Buck moans into his mouth, and Eddie can't think of a good enough reason why it would be a bad idea to push Buck back into his seat and drop to his knees.

That is until the table is jostled, and it digs into Eddie's hip.

Eddie pulls away from Buck glaring at whoever interrupted them, only to see a completely unaffected Hen. Karen was downing one of the beers that Buck had gotten.

"Maybe you should continue this at home?"

Eddie turns back to Buck, who is still looking at him with hooded eyes, bottom lip trapped in between his teeth.

"How about that?" Eddie asks, getting Buck's attention. "Wanna go home?"

Buck swallows hard and nods his head, "Yeah, let's go home."

Eddie grins and leans back in for another kiss before getting to his feet and holding his hand out.

"Let's go."

Buck grabs his hand and gets to his feet, and then rushes them both out of the door. Eddie laughs, but lets Buck drag him wherever he wants to go.

[dbphantom]

maybe i should have gone into practical effects instead of computer science...

[thotfrnk]

jc and lxc, despite having limited interactions within the canon, its still a nice ship, they're quite similar in regards to some of their traumas and betrayals and the idea of two of them healing together post-canon warms my heart so much

[crescentfool]

New Ryomina fic, Lizz!!

THREE WEEKS LATE TO THIS ASK BUT THANK U ANON!! honestly when i got this inbox i was like. tearing up. im like. "oh my god. people still think of me when they see ryomina. thank you so much. that means a lot to me. im so glad people want to share the joy of ryomina with me."

i assume that this is probably about "i alone await you," since the ask came around that time (two people possibly notifying me about this! crazy! this is positive. do not take that the wrong way), and i want to say that i've read it and am going to be insufferable about it for the forseeable future.

and if it is not about that fic than oops. give me clown makeup. i will happily put that on (my true form is that of a clown). i hope to read some more ryominas, it's been awhile since i've sat down to read the tag and. god. did you know? im so normal about them. anyways, thank you anon! 💛💙

[leeechin]

(ꗃ) cat and mouse [nerd sunghoon] ! ⋆ ›  ◟⊹

after sleeping with the cute quiet dork that sat nearby you and your friend during lunch, you find yourself playing silly games with him, due to a miscommunication. [wc: 2.5k]

CONTENT: college au! sunghoon and jay are big losers in this lol. nerd!sunghoon x fem!reader, 2010s era :p | mdni.

WARNINGS: lots of teasing, handjob, sunghoon is pretty switchy but more dom leaning, unprotected sex (big no), bigdick!hoon, fingering, slight degradation, ass slapping, etc.

lee’s note: this is a continuation of my most popular nerd!hoon fic here ! this can be read as a stand-alone!! gaeul from ive is yn’s bff NOT sunghoons dog LOL.

“you should’ve known it was a one time thing..” jay murmurs to sunghoon, who wasn’t focusing on their round of star craft, instead sulking on the couch with his legs crossed. “someone like her wouldn’t do a second time with someone like us— you to be exact.” adding on.

you had the best time of your life, choosing to hook up with the cute quiet dork unexpectedly. it was planned by you, it was just never expected of you for the plan to be executed perfectly. and you weren’t going to let another opportunity slip beneath you.

“she agreed to let me take her on a date though! and it’s only been two days.. maybe she’s busy.” he exasperates in response, opening his phone to see no new messages from you in his inbox.

“orrr maybe she wants you to text her first instead of her..” jay suggests, throwing the control at sunghoon to play the game again, sunghoon shrugs it off, putting his attention back to the next round of star craft.

you were indeed busy.. rambling to gaeul and your other roommates about the other night with sunghoon. raving about how he was ‘so so good.’ completely oblivious that you not texting him, or expecting him to text you.. is causing a minor miscommunication.

now, being back on campus, you were hoping to catch sunghoon at the campus cafeteria, and throw him teasing glances. strutting confidently in your cute denim shorts and low cut tee, you sit yourself across gaeul at the usual table. and looking up, you notice the pause in sunghoon’s movements, pathetically dropping his fork and pretending it was an accident, coughing so fake.

you let out a small giggle, kicking your feet back and forth underneath the table, forgetting that your friend was across you. “helloooooo? earth to y/n?” gaeul waves her hand in your face, causing you to finally blink.

“god, he’s such a loser.” gaeul points out, turning around to see sunghoon, try to not so obviously peek at you from his canned drink, attempting to hide his eyes from staring at you. “a hot loser though.” you correct, going back into a daydream like trance, thinking about the past weekend you spent with him.

flipping your phone open, you shoot a message to sunghoon, you hear the clatter of the metal can he was drinking from, seeing how fast he scrambled to flip open his own phone. was this really the same guy who railed you into the next dimension a couple days ago?

[you]

you know, i could see you staring at me

[hoonie (^з^)-♡]

What? I don’t know what you’re talking about.

[you]

sure sureeeeeeee

you were surely so quick to open your phone

and dropping your little drink that made a loud sound from hitting the floor, okay though! (=´∀｀)

[hoonie (^з^)-♡]

Why haven’t you reached out to me since that night?

Did I do something wrong?

—

sunghoon didn’t beat around the bush. you wanted to apologize over and over, feeling guilt flood your body for not taking the initiative, especially for someone like sunghoon, who mainly kept to himself with one friend.

but something ignited a plan of mischief in your mind, wanting to tease the fuck out of sunghoon until he ruined you completely. the urge to tests the waters until you were in the hands of his mercy. looking up from your phone, you throw sunghoon a small grin, causing him to nearly drop his phone over a pile of rice on his lunch tray.

“just go get him in a room for christ’s sake, stop eye-fucking him infront of me.” gaeul scoffs, gathering all her things together to head to her next lecture, waiting for you to follow pursuit. “go without me gaeul.”, she raises an eyebrow at you, but then sees how your gaze is stuck on sunghoon who seems to be minding his own business now, eating the food on his lunch tray.

“mind if i take a seat here?” you ask sunghoon, making him startle at the sudden sound of your voice, eyes attempting to only focus on your face, rather than the sight of your juicy tits tight against your shirt.

“yeah.” he mutters, returning to finish the last of food on his tray. “why so silent..?” you fake pout, seating yourself across from him, leaning forward slightly.

“whyareyouavoidingme.” sunghoon quickly speaks, you’re unable to catch what he was saying. “hoonie, what?” you giggle, hand reaching under the table to grab at his knee, feeling how it tensed up under your touch.

“not in the cafeteria, please.” sunghoon flinches, trying not to draw attention by avoiding to have a big reaction, feeling your hand squeeze at his sensitive knee, bumping his knee up to remove your hand. you giggle and use both of your hands to straighten up your shirt.

“answer my question, hoon.” you repeat coyly, leaning forward across the table, sunghoon looks around at the people sitting at the surrounding tables, worried they’re catching onto what’s happening between you two.

“can we— talk somewhere else— please.” he stutters, looking down to hide his now flustered face. “hmmmm.. okay.” you contemplate, looking around the direction sunghoon was. “no one’s looking at us, hoon.” adding on with a playful smile painted across your face.

sunghoon opens his mouth to say something, but you interrupted his sentence that hasn’t even started; “oops! didn’t pay attention to the time! i’ll drop by your place at some time soon!”, gathering all of your things as his eyes blink rapidly.. so dorky, and so hot at the same time.

“but what if i happen to be busy..” sunghoon manages to slip out, seeing how you got up and was ready to leave him behind at his lunch table. “i’m sure you won’t be.”

sunghoon was convinced, no he was aware you were playing games with him now. every time you self-invited yourself to his table, right when he’s about to ask you if you want to study together, you leave abruptly. and it doesn’t help with you sending him suggestive messages on his phone while he’s around jay to stir things up.

“what game are you trying to play with me?” sunghoon blurts out, looking down at his hands on his lap, fidgeting nervously as you sat down on the lunch table seat across from him for the fourth day in a row.

“i don’t know what you’re talking about.” you fake acting confused, playing with a strand of your hair in between your fingers. sunghoon sighs in defeat, only knowing you are continuing this silly little game of yours.

“i think you do.” he frowns in response, moving on to eating the bun he had in his hand. “how long are you going to keep going on with this?” sunghoon adds on to his sentence. you sigh in defeat, sitting yourself properly.

“don’t you enjoy taking to me hoon?” you frowned, doe eyes blinking at sunghoon’s as you await an answer.

“i do. but before we can even talk properly, you leave. how long are you going to keep this game of yours up?” sunghoon finishes the last of his bun before crossing his arms together, seeming to be less nervous and shy now.

“i guess i’m done..” you sheepishly replied, trying to read sunghoon’s unreadable expression. “what’s on your mind, hoon?” you ask, noticing the silence that filled between you two for a good 10 seconds.

“you know.. we’re supposed to be studying..” sunghoon comments, seeing how you crawled on his mattress seductively to seat yourself over his lap. “but what’s the fun in only studying hoon?”

“you said you needed help on— fuck.” sunghoon groans, sentence cutting off, throwing his head back with his glasses tilting lopsided, feeling you shift on his lap, back against the headboard of his bed, as your hands clumsily fumble at the zipper of his jeans to pull out his painfully hard cock that has been straining against the tight constraints of his boxers.

“is this what you wanted from me this whole time.?” you speak softly, gathering saliva to slip past your lips, onto the center of your palm, enveloping his base around your hand, gasping when you forgot how big he was when you looked down at your hand jerking his base slowly. you found the sight infront of you to be so pleasing.

seeing sunghoon’s tilted glasses, moving your free hand to put it back in place. “stop playing with me, y/n.” his voice strains, his large hands finding purchase on both sides of your waist. he sits himself up, looking at your irresistible glossy lips that slightly parted as you concentrated on working your hand at his base.

leaning forward to place his lips over yours, you whine against him from the sudden action, hand slipping off his thick cock as your hands run under his shirt, nails trickling at sunghoon’s soft skin causing him to hiss at the contact. you pull away from the kiss to pull his shirt off and over his head, along with him removing yours, throwing the articles of clothing everywhere in his neatly organized room. your lips return to tangling messily along with his, the smacking sounds filling the silence.

your lips trail down his exposed collarbone, leaving soft marks as you attempt to go down lower, feeling him stop you, a soft whine leaving your lips when you feel one of sunghoon’s hand grasp a good handful of your ass.

“this game of yours is ending right now.” sunghoon speaks lowly, gently removing the remaining material of your undergarments, taking in the sight of how your naked body looked so good, even with the dim lighting in his room— the lamp being the only source of light.

“hurry up then hoon..! oh.” you moan at the feeling of his fingers rubbing against your sensitive clit, moving to circle at your dripping entrance, teasing you by only pushing in his fingertips a few times, before plunging two of his thick digits past it. the warmth of your walls clamping down tightly from simply just his fingers.

“you can still barely even take it.” sunghoon chuckles, his free hand brushing his strands of hair back. moving his other hand, flicking his wrist at an angle that had you seeing all sorts of colors, relishing in the feeling of his fingers reaching the spots yours could never reach.

“please hoonie..” you whine, nails digging deep into his shoulders, holding onto him tightly to avoid falling off of his lap with the sensation of his fingers dragging in and out of you rapidly, crumbling apart when you feel the familiar sensation of your orgasm approaching.

despite the advantage you might’ve had in your position of being seated over him, you were powerless, taking in what he gave you, not seeming to mind loosing dominance you once had over him a little bit ago.

“you’re close aren’t you?” sunghoon raises an eyebrow, seeing how you grinded your hips slightly, to take in his digits even further, your eyes looking down to see how well you sucked his fingers in. “mm— yes please hoon i— what the fuck—!” you protest, feeling him pull his fingers out, one of his hands holding you still in place.

you squirm around on his lap, trying to escape his grasp, gasping loudly when you feel his hand smack your ass, the soft flesh jiggling from the touch. “can’t you be more patient for me now?” sunghoon smirks, flipping you onto your back, leaning over the side to reach his drawer for a condom when you grab at his wrist to stop him.

“want you so bad, hoon.” you strain out, face flushed with desire and neediness. you hear sunghoon let out a deep chuckle in response, stroking himself at the sight of your body splayed on his mattress, legs spread.

“you make me wait several days, but you can’t even wait a few minutes.” he scoffs jokingly, pulling one of your legs to wrap around his waist, aligning his tip to your entrance, wasting no more time to slide in easily- due to your wetness that trickled down your thighs.

you hear sunghoon let out a long groan at how your walls once again clamped around him tightly, glasses falling off his face and somewhere beside him on the bed, slowly bottoming out and relishing the feeling of your warm velvety walls. “fuckkk. you feel even better without a condom.” he groans, finding a pace with his thrusts, his cock dragging so perfectly and so deep into you to where you couldn’t even form proper words.

“s’ so good-!” you manage to slip out, palms pressed flat to hold tightly onto sunghoon’s back as you try to keep up with his fast, merciless pace, cock deliciously hitting repeatedly in that one spot in you that sent you spiraling.

“not talking now? had me playing a game like i was a cat and you were the fucking mouse.” sunghoon grunts, eyes meeting yours as you let out a small whimper at his words, clenching around his thick cock, causing him to let out a groan at the feeling, closing his eyes to take in the feeling of not having a condom wrapped around him. deciding to bring your other leg to wrap around his waist, moving to push the back of your thighs to practically fold you in half. you feel him press against the soft bulge of your stomach from how deep he is inside.

your high-pitched moans and mewls of pleasure fill sunghoon’s room when you take what he’s giving you, eyes rolling back as you feel yourself reaching your orgasm, arms wrapping sunghoon’s neck as he leans forward to kiss you, his lips muffling your loud moans.

“inside please.” you whisper, moving your legs to wrap around sunghoon’s waist again, watching how his thick eyebrows furrow in concentration when he twitches inside you, hips moving sloppily as he’s not too far from you— eventually stilling his movements to fill you up with his creamy white essence, seeing how you shut your eyes tightly as your chest heaves heavily, letting yourself go, whining when you feel him slip out.

“you’re nasty.” you giggle, seeing sunghoon return with a warm towel to help swipe up the mess on you. “you indulged into it, you’re not any different from me, y/n.” he laughs in response, throwing the towel into his hamper, laying himself down beside you as he pulls his boxers back on. you’re wearing one of his t-shirts, blanket pulled over as you’re ready to doze off.

“so when are you going to take me out on that date you suggested the last time i was here?” you smile, eyes half lidded as you melt into the embrace of his bigger frame.

“whenever you stop playing those silly little games.”

the both of you releasing a fit of laughter, feeling yourself slowly drift off to sleep, thinking about the next time you’re gonna have this with sunghoon.

hai i wrote this for @00kittenz and @pshbites ily both sm, i’m so glad we are friends bcuz of this silly little app. 💓💓

tag: @aewon

[genyawritesshizz]

Promotion - Sentinel Prime X Reader

Spending your days endlessly mining energon you yearned to one day be promoted. To finally free yourself from the frame aching work of the mines. Yet when you catch the optics of the Sentinel Prime, that promotion may come at a terrible cost, maybe you should have read the fine print.

Tbh it’s very little plot mostly just smut.

18+ ONLY

IVE NEVER WRITTEN FOR TRANSFORMERS NOR HAVE I READ MUCH FIC OF IT BUT I TRIED TO GET THE TERMS RIGHT BUT YA KNOW, ITS A LOT.

Possible part 2, we’ll see how this does.

WARNING: Dubious consent, emotional manipulation, Power Imbalance, (TBH Sentinel is a walking red flag), Sexual Coercion, Size kink, SMUT, Cybertronian reader,

This is essentially just robot porn I'm sorry to all my anime followers :(

The first time Sentinel Prime had set his optics on you he knew, much to his initial disgust, he wanted you. 

A miner. 

Of all the femme’s at his disposal the one that at last managed to catch his gaze was a cogless, bottom level, miner. 

“That thing?” With a snarled lip and multiple sets of trailing skeptical eyes, Airachnid's own revulsion was evident. Far down below the balcony on which they stood, walking the bustling city streets you at last returned to his hungry gaze. 

“Unfortunately so.”

Primus, what an honor it was to be within the presence of Cybertrons protector, the bot who single handedly protected all Cybertronians from the Quintessons; Sentinel Prime. 

After being approached by Arachnid and ordered to follow her you had initially feared you had broken an unknown protocol, resulting in a demotion. Yet much to your shock within the gold columned building you had been led to he was there.

The look of pure admiration within your optics as you stared up to him in awe coupled with the now quiet whir of your internal fans as your spark raced within his mere presence fed his already raging primal desire.

Such blind naivety.

"Walk with me. I’d like to discuss something important." His tone was warm but carried a weight of authority. One you could not help but blindly follow. 

The two of you stroll through the empty corridors, arachnid standing guard just outside of its entrance.

“Tell me, have you always felt bound to the mines? Or have you ever imagined something greater for yourself?" You shift, pace faltering a smidge, taken aback by his directness. You're proud of your work as a miner but can’t deny that you’ve thought about rising above this level.

"The mines are… Well, they’re home. I have my friends down there. But I’ve always wanted to do more…to make a real difference for Cybertron." 

Sentinel nods, his optics narrowing slightly. Searing blue scanned from the top of your dull paint chipped helm to your transfixed gaze, (noting how you subconsciously averted it away from him when noticing his search), down to your chin.

A smirk tugged at the corners of his lips, signaling his satisfaction in finding whatever he had hunted for. 

Vulnerability suited you well.

"I could see that. You carry yourself with a strength that is rare, even among the most seasoned warriors." 

His confident stride deviates him closer to you and he lowers his voice just a touch. 

"Cybertron needs warriors with your spirit. And not just in the mines. In places where real change can be forged." 

His words spark something in you. Your gaze sharpened, instantly locking with his, the once thick humility gives way to a flicker of pride. 

‘Is he going to promote me?’ You hopefully thought. You had been working your frame down to the wire for the last few rotations in hopes of this.

Sentinel picks up the change in demeanor immediately. Before continuing his sweet talk, he comes to a complete stop and turns towards you.

His frame is significantly larger than yours, as to be expected when comparing a cogless to a Prime.

Though, the way he truly towered over you left you feeling far weaker than usual as he had to bend down significantly to reach optic level with you.

"Too often, talents like yours go overlooked down there. Others might not see it, but I do. Imagine if you were to rise up, to stand among those who shape Cybertron’s future. Those who ensure our planet’s place as the greatest in the galaxy." With each passing word he had leaned closer, faceplate now mere centimeters from yours.

Your spark fluttered. 

His venting flowed deliciously warm against your intake.

Proximity feedback signals fired on high and energon lines pumped furiously fast. 

Yet despite your system's shock at his actions, you could not look nor move away.

“You really think… I could be that?”

A set of servos planted themself around your lower chassis, their span long enough to completely wrap around you. 

Your servers struggled to process exactly what was happening, focusing solely on the swirling lights of blue that threatened to swallow you whole.

“I know you can.”

The digits ensnaring your waist tightened, pulling you flush against his wide frame. 

His helm delved lower, denta lightly nipping at the sensitive wires between the spaces of your minimal plating. 

The second you beeped in surprise then melted into his embrace, helm craning to the side allowing him further access, he knew once again. 

You were not going anywhere. 

But then again, why would you want to?

When your protector was so kind enough to show you, a nobody, such special affection. 

Never had you anticipated that you would ever find yourself within a Primes personal suite yet here you were. Sprawled out atop a luxurious berth, hidden away from the rest of Iacon city, with desires you had never even thought to dream of coming true.

Your gracious leader's frame was reduced to a hunched, yet still ever imposing, form as he kneels between your legs. Your modesty paneling had long since been retracted, revealing your array to his hungry gaze, and allowing you to relish in all the new sensations your Prime was bestowing upon you.

No, in all your cycles you had never found the desire to fragbond with someone. Yet now as Sentinel Prime’s silver glossa ravenously glides through the throbbing mesh of your valve and mouthpiece occasionally latching onto your external node you cannot believe your hesitancy for such pleasures. 

To think you had gone for so long without.

Not to worry, never again shall you ever have to suffer such a fate.

It is extremely out of character for Sentinel to give his partner's pleasure this way or in any way/to care about it. 

Normally he wastes no time in pleasuring others, he was a busy man after all. Instead focusing solely on his own release within others bodies then disposing of them.

But something about having you pinned beneath one of his arms, the other easily reaching over your head to hold your wrists down, the way you cried out for him, your Prime, and to be completely at his mercy…It has his spike twitching beneath his own paneling.

Savagely he feasts upon your now swollen valve, thick glossa entering your spasming opening, nose buried atop your external node.

“M-my, oh Primus! - My Prime I-” You were completely unfamiliar with the feeling boiling inside you, it felt as though a coil was winding. Each intrusion of his glossa only pulled it tighter.

“That’s right, say my name.” A smug smirk tugged itself into the corners of his faceplate before he delved back where you so desperately wanted him. 

You looked and sounded both pathetic and desperate.

He loved it.

“Sentinel!”

Overloading into the mouth of said mech was absolutely euphoric.

Though despite your high, he was left utterly displeased to hear you leave off the Prime in your cry.

He had earned that title.

It was his name.

You would learn the error of your mistake soon.

He did not ask permission to continue. 

Standing up from his crouched position, the grip that once held you down now flipped you onto your chest plate and dragged you towards the edge of his berth, allowing your legs to dangle off the edge.

Even on the tips your pedes you would still not touch the golden floor beneath.

Positioning your aft up into an arch he at last retracted his paneling, allowing his spike to spring free. 

Central processor still short circuiting under the throws of overloading, you did not even notice the shift in position.

Once your intake had returned to normal your mind followed suit, catching up to the reality of what was happening.

Yet it was too late to protest as something sickeningly thick prodded at your valve's still quivering entrance.

It felt like far too much.

Trying to squirm away from it you're met with a dark chuckle and thick digits atop your shoulder, easily pulling you back down into position.

“Where do you think you're going? We're just getting started sweetspark”

The moment the head of his spike entered, you felt an immediate sense of dread wash over and a cold shiver through your struts. 

“Too big...” Your vocalizer had barely returned, causing the whine to sound utterly pitiful, drowned in static and served only to feed Sentinel's ego.

“Hm? What's that?” Leaning over your form, faceplate centimeters away from your audio receptors, steam rolled with his words; fogging over the heaving metal of your shoulder plates.

“Frag…You-You’re too big.”

“Oh, do you want me to stop?” His tone was high in pitch and laced with manipulation. “You wouldn’t want to disappoint your Prime now would you?” 

A strangled whimper and a shake of your head ‘no’ gave little confirmation to his taunt in ‘permitting’ him to keep going, not that he cared whichever direction your response led. 

Even if you wanted to stop, you had no power to break away from him.

A deep, dominating, chuckle bubbled within his chest plate. “I thought not. You’re serving me, a great honor really.”

It felt like being pried open, the way his spike speared into your clamping valve was utterly painful. 

Despite your cries you attempted to stay still as the gold winged Prime behind you continued to push further. 

Each half centimeter only served to strengthen the burn.

Halfway in you had closed your optics, denta plates gritted tightly shut. 

“Take it all, I know you can.”

The same four words that once filled you with hope now filled you with burning heat.

You will take what he is so graciously giving you. 

Finally, after what felt like eternity, his entire spike was successfully sheathed inside. 

Though this was just the beginning.

“So tight,” Your body was clamped around the intruder in a vise grip. Desperately begging for it to be removed. “So small.”

His pace was brutally fast. The servos on your shoulder and hip kept you from escaping or sliding too far away from his attack. 

Surprisingly, after a few klicks, the tight inner calipers of your valve slowly loosened. His spike, now slathered in a combination of fluids, began sliding without much resistance. 

At last, a few surges of pleasure coursed through your system. 

Soon both of you were grunting, occasionally moaning. Though your sounds far outnumbered his. 

Your servos clenched into the smooth bedding atop his berth, surely tearing the fabric though in this moment neither of you cared. However it was something he would be sure to punish you for later. 

“You're mine, little miner.” His hips pistoned faster, slamming against your aft, surely to leave you sore. “All Mine.”

In response all you could do was hold on tighter, moaning louder with each intense slam.

“I’ll. never. let. you. go.” Each word sent another wicked surge into your swollen valve.

Blind sighted by the throes of pleasure bordering on overstimulation his words simply did not translate in your faltering audio receptors.

Though he meant every bit of it.

Helm falling back and a loud moan echoing throughout the gold-plated room, his overload blazed hot through his system. Filling your already stuffed valve to the brim with his transfluid.

Fans whirling on high, neither of you moved from your conjoined position for a few klicks.

After he's regained his senses fully, he removes himself from your valve, being sure to marvel at his work of completely ruining your once virgin body with a devilish smirk. Admiring the way his bright blue transfluid seeped from your still clenching valve.

Though this will be far from the last time he sees you like this.

With wobbling arms, you attempted to rise, though as you began to lift yourself up a large servos pushed you back down.

"We're not done."

True to his word, you had earned a promotion.

Fitted with only the finest armor paneling and a fresh coat of paint you had earned yourself the pristine position of his pet.  

A position you held with utmost dignity, after all you were serving your Prime.

[cloudcountry]

ok so obviously leona fic, did we ever expect anything else, recently ive been thinking a lot about childhood friends aus with leona so how about that as a trope. THANKS POOKIE THIS EVENT KICK STARTED A MASSIVE LEONA RAMBLING FOR ME SO EVEN IF I DIDNT WIN THIS WOULDA BEEN AWESOME <33

2ND PRIZE WINNER, LOSER

— CHILDHOOD FRIENDS WITH LEONA KINGSCHOLAR (1117 words)

please note that the expressions of love in his this fic are platonic, but can be read as romantic pining if you wish!

Leona’s ears twitch as your footsteps echo down the halls, coming right up to his door before stopping. His tail starts swishing, almost absentmindedly, but the happiness he feels about you visiting is not absentminded in the slightest.

“Leona!” you whisper yell, cracking the door open as sneakily as your clumsy hands can, “Psst, Leona!”

He smirks, blatantly ignoring you. He hopes the swishing of his tail seems lazy, not happy. Overjoyed, even. Leona knows you won’t mind when you find him out—you’ve always been just weird enough to find him fun to be around and his attitude charming. He wishes more of the palace staff were like you.

“I know you can hear me, goofball!” you whisper louder, sliding into his room through the open door, shutting it softly behind you.

“Huh?” Leona drawls, turning around in his chair, “I thought that was a fly. You sure do a lot of buzzing for a herbivore.”

You purse your lips and pout at him, looking more amused than livid. Your acting always sucked, but he doesn’t tell you that in fear of you swatting at him and whacking his tail again.

It’s sensitive.

“The kitchen is empty. We could totally go in there and grab snacks.” you say, and the pout melts off your face like butter on a saucepan, “You’ve been studying all day, you haven’t had any time for me!”

Leona huffs, tail gently smacking against your cheek. You yowl dramatically and rub your cheek like he punched you, glaring at him with the smallest of smiles on your lips. You’ve always been that blunt with him, saying exactly what's on your mind even though you get scolded for it again and again. You’re the only one in this wretched place who doesn’t bow to him every time you see him, or hold your tongue every time you have an idea. You speak freely, happily, and Leona is thankful to have been with you since the two of you were in diapers.

Even if the gap between you would never be bridged.

After all, a person of your position should not talk that way to royalty, even though he’ll never be anything but a prince.

You drag him out of his thoughts and consequently, out of his room, glancing around the halls to check and see if anyone is there. Leona rolls his eyes but the action holds no malice, not when you grab his hand and yank him down the hallway, giggling quietly as if you’re about to steal cookies from the cookie jar.

Which, considering your destination, may just be your scheme.

Leona doesn’t get soft often, he doesn't get that heart-thumping loving feeling, but when he looks at you, that changes. He loves you, he knows that much. You’re his only friend in this suffocating palace, where he shoulders the burden of being the second born with every step he takes. But with you, his best friend, his only friend, he starts to feel like he’s plain old Leona.

Nothing more, nothing less.

It’s so easy to sneak around with you, even if you are a bit clumsier than he is. And sure, maybe it’s because he purposefully trips you on his tail (only for you to whisper that you thought his tail was too sensitive for that with mock anger in your tone) but that’s nothing you can prove.

Over the course of your childhood, there are plenty more of those moments. You and Leona both grow, even though sometimes you wish you could stay kids forever. It isn’t easy watching him mold to fit his role, watching the usual easygoing smirk he has on his face morph into a constant snarl and frown.

You think you’re the only one in the palace who sees him as Leona anymore.

It isn’t long before he receives an offer to go to a school called Night Raven, which he considers with careful attentiveness. You hesitantly watch from afar, not wanting him to leave you behind but also knowing deep down he’d be so much happier if he did.

Soon enough (too soon), you’re helping him pack his suitcases.

You hug him goodbye, face buried in his clothes, squeezing him tight. He promises to call you every night in a voice only you can hear, gruff and reassuring.

Of course, he has to add a jab about you looking like a puppy without its owner so he doesn’t seem too soft. You just blink back tears and agree with a choked up laugh. His expression goes soft once more, and you take it in like you’ll never see him again.

Once he boards, you watch his carriage until it disappears and there’s no one left watching beside you.

Leona keeps his promise and calls every night, telling you about the upperclassmen and how he got sorted into Savanaclaw, to no one’s surprise. You speculate which dorm you’d be put in if you were to go to Leona’s school, and he tells you “soft hearted herbivores like you would end up in Octavinelle or something like that.”

He sounds like he’s having fun. You’re glad.

There’s a small part of you that toys with the idea of going to NRC yourself—training  your magic to the point of being one of those exceptional mages the Head Mage seeks out. It’s not like you’ll never see Leona, he’s taken the necessary measures to ensure that you can visit campus whenever you please (oh, how he spoils you so) but it’s different. Things aren’t the same anymore and you know they never will be.

(That doesn’t stop you from training in secret. Leona always put everything he had into himself, so why wouldn’t you do the same?)

You don’t bat an eye when the carriage arrives again, standing stationary outside the palace. If anything, you figure it’s Leona coming back for some sort of official business, or at least that’s what you thought before the palace staff starts to whisper your name.

Your luggage, much like Leona’s exactly one year ago, is crammed into the entryway of the palace before you know it.

You’re in a daze the whole trip, painfully aware that you’re sixteen now, going to Night Raven College, you’re growing up more and more and there’s nothing you can do to stop it.

But there’s also excitement, laced with a fair share of anxiety.

You’re going to see Leona again.

And this time, you two will be equals.

It’s the most difficult thing, composing yourself before you’re sorted by the mirror. It’s even more difficult keeping your head straight and not whirling around the room, looking for a pair of green eyes and a lazy, flicking tail. It’s even more difficult not to acknowledge the thrill that jolts through you when your name is called, knowing that Leona heard it, wherever he is in the room.

“Soft hearted herbivores like you would end up in Octavinelle.”

You hope, wherever you end up, you can be close to him like always.

-> leona's napping buddies . . . @vivigoesinsane @dove-da-birb

[killjoy-prince]

House M.D. but it's when House says Wilson's name

[sohnric]

a brief inquiry into online relationships – k. sunwoo

pairing: kim sunwoo x fem! reader

genre: enemies to lovers au, internet best friends au. friends to lovers au. gamer! sunwoo and gamer! reader. fluff, comedy. sunwoo has a big fat crush and is a bitchless loser but is also simultaneously being very annoying and mean sometimes:(

wc: 20k

warnings: swearing, sexual innuendos/jokes/flirting, the reader is referred to with she/her pronouns and called a girl! i call league players virgins :/ (and im right). certain parts are really chat heavy (but what do you expect from an internet best friend au am i right). the reader is said to have dyed hair! I wrote this with a friend in mind yall just get to read it 😔

there's only one person kim sunwoo treasures the most in the whole world, and that person is his internet best friend. there's also only one person kim sunwoo hates with a burning passion, and that person is you. well, imagine his surprise when he finds out... they are the same person.

playlist: fruit roll ups - waterparks / royalty - enhypen

I wrote and dedicate this fic to @csenke 🩷 happy birthday best friend, I hope you like your little present. I dont like being sappy in public, but do know that I love u the absolute most.

a/n: a HUGE thank you to @from-izzy for beta reading and helping me out with this fic so much, listening to me ramble and cry and hyping me up izzy, it means a LOT. thank you @sanaxo-o for beta reading a bit as well. 🫶🏻 ive wanred to write this fic for literally years so im glad it is finally out hihi.

The first time Kim Sunwoo has ever been accused of having a crush on a girl he hasn’t even met in real life yet was on October 11th, 2023. It was a few months after meeting the said girl online through a Minecraft server and talking to her during the night over a Discord call, not being able to fall asleep after and coming to class looking like a zombie from the deprivation of relaxation. After he said the story to his friend Changmin, he got laughed at and teased– all because he said he didn’t want to hang up on his online best friend yet, and she was so full of energy, and Sunwoo wanted to know what she had to say because she was so adorable gushing over how much she loved Paw Patrol as a kid and how she got some magnets for her fridge from her local grocery store and put Skye right in the middle, where she keeps her shopping list. 

Of course, Sunwoo refused this accusation. He does not have a crush on his online best friend– the girl he hasn’t even met in real life yet. He doesn’t like her, because let’s be real, he doesn’t even know what she looks like. Navigating the boundaries of an online friendship was already hard as it was for the boy– was he oversharing? Was he being too much, too annoying at times? – so asking for the girl’s socials outside of Discord or begging for a simple selfie in the chat is far away from the things he’s comfortable saying out loud to her. 

And Sunwoo can’t be into her– because he doesn’t even know her that well. He doesn’t even know where she lives or if the name she’s given him online is her legal name. What he does know, though, is that she’s the same age as him, she’s funny and pretty fucking cool, she has obscure interests like the Spiderman movies or collecting albums of her favorite kpop artists, and her voice is nice over the speakers of his laptop when the two of them call and play Minecraft together in the late hours of the night.

That’s not enough to develop a crush on someone, right?

Right…?

The first time Kim Sunwoo starts to question his own feelings for his friend is also, coincidentally, October 11th 2023. See, he might say that he’s not as dull as one would think after looking at him, but after the conversation he had with his best friend in the morning, something started to click. (Mainly because he just couldn’t stop feeling the blush creeping onto his cheeks, bashfulness filling his composure. Why is it so hard to deny the obvious?)

In the late hours of the night, Sunwoo logs onto the Minecraft server and walks around the world he’s created. He is on a mission of cheering his online friend up– she said something about an exam going terribly wrong in his Discord DM’s just a few hours ago, and although he tried his best to cheer the girl up over messages, he thinks he has to go an extra mile to remind her that life is not as rude and that she’s loved even when she feel like a disappointment. (Just the sentiment of the wording in his head is suggesting that he’s trying to stay oblivious to his own feelings– there is no doubt he is failing, though.)

He checks the people online in the server, noticing she’s not there yet– as he expected, since the girl usually logs on only a few minutes before midnight– which assures him that there is still time to execute his little plan. With a pep to his step, Sunwoo’s character moves through the terribly half-assed house he’s built (that his friend teases him for) and opens  one of the chests in his underground storage area. After taking everything he prepared earlier– for whatever reason, he’s not sure (or just trying to deny the obvious, once again)– he skips outside of the wooden building and runs towards the portal he built leading to her house last week. 

Once she saw the portal outside of her house, she asked him about it. To the question of why he wants easy access to her house at all times, he replied that it’s so he can rob her when she least expects it. Her and him both know she’s not the one keen on mining, so there’s not really much to steal in the first place, but to Sunwoo’s surprise (and relief), his friend dropped the topic quickly, moving on to the next one.

After the vision of his character finally clears and he is left standing right outside of her house– which is a stunning piece of architecture, by the way– he looks around for a bit to find the best place for his little offering.

He settles on the place by the front door of her house and gets to executing his little surprise. Opening the inventory of his character, Sunwoo takes out a bone meal and uses it on the grass blocks next to the door, making all sorts of flowers grow next to her humble abode. When he’s satisfied with the colored petals blooming in their digital world, the boy gets out the pink wool and digs into the remaining dirt blocks on the ground, replacing them with the rosy cubes and shaping them into a small, but telling heart. 

He stands back and admires his work for a bit, laughing at the ridiculous actions he caught himself doing. Sometimes he gains self-awareness in the weirdest of situations, and this is surely one of them– he prays his friend doesn’t log on in this exact moment. He would have no other choice but to jump out of his window and kill himself, he thinks.

Still, he follows up with his initial idea and places a chest next to the heart, filled with emerald and diamonds that he gathered over the last week. He worked hard on them and she kept whining that she still didn't have any– and although he’d like to keep them, he figures he can just get more the next time he’s alone in here, mining. 

A cherry on top is placed next to all of this– a wooden sign that he types “What if we put our Minecraft beds next to each other? xx” on, against all his thoughts telling him otherwise. 

This might be a terrible, terrible idea, he thinks. But the thought of making his best friend smile fuels the boy. Taking one last look at his masterpiece, he snickers. Yeah, Sunwoo. Maybe there really is no getting out of those allegations. Maybe he won’t tell about what he did to Changmin– and he’s lucky the boy doesn’t play Minecraft and has no way of finding out by playing on the same server as the two of you.

Sunwoo logs out of the game, sitting back in his chair. After scrolling through his Instagram for a bit, he hears the familiar sound of an incoming Discord call waking him up from the doom, making him breathlessly accept and wait for the girl’s voice to come out of his headphones, making him feel excited and on the tips of his toes.

“Ya, Steve, was it you who made that cute altar in front of my house?” she asks, making his heart skip a beat.

“Depends,” he hums, “did you like it?”

Every Tuesday afternoon, 6 o’clock sharp, Kim Sunwoo takes the role of the head of the Video Gaming club at his university. It’s quite an easy job, he’d say– since all his responsibilities lay in meeting up with the members of the club in an internet café once a week, playing a video game of their liking– and he also appreciates the fact that he has something to put onto his CV. The extra points towards graduation are also good, and so in reality, he has nothing to complain about– he likes video games and he also likes socializing.

There is just one thing he hates about the Video Gaming club, and that is the fact that Y/N Y/L/N, his best friend’s ex-girlfriend, managed to somehow infiltrate herself into the circle.

Now, you and Ji Changmin dated in the early stages of high school. The two of you met in Science class, and although Changmin wasn’t the smartest when it came to Chemistry, he still managed to make himself your designated helper in all experiments, just to make himself close to you. That slowly worked and the two of you started dating– for 2 months, that is– before you realized Sunwoo’s poor best friend wasn’t who you were looking for and you broke up with him, starting a new relationship with Park Sunghoon, the handsome ice skater from the private school downtown just 2 weeks later.

Changmin cried for three days straight and then one more day after he found out he was replaced, and since then, Kim Sunwoo has decided that he hates your guts– because no one makes his best friend sad. 

Every Tuesday afternoon, 6 o’clock sharp, you waltz into the internet café with your friend Aeri clinging to your side, both of you laughing about whatever you found amusing that day. The sound of your laughter is insufferable to Sunwoo’s ears and the sight of your dyed hair makes his stomach churn with acid– everything about you angers the boy, makes him all alert of your presence. For some reason, he can’t control his anger around you– everything you do infuriates him, makes him wish you were anywhere but in the same room as him.

Can’t you read the room? Do you not realize you’re not welcome here? This is Sunwoo’s territory, and for some reason, he thinks you should respect it. You haven’t spoken to each other in over 4 years, but that doesn’t mean he forgot about everything. Maybe you just keep showing up because you know he hates your guts– you do it out of spite.

Kim Sunwoo won’t have that, though. If there’s something about him that he makes perfectly known in the Video Gaming club, it’s that he is awfully competitive– and for once, he tries to use this quality of his for something good: getting you out of the club.

Because he might be the head of the club, sure, but that still doesn’t give him the permission to kick you out of it for no apparent reason. 

He figures making your life a living hell for the entire hour or two you’re in his presence every week would surely be sufficient enough. Surely, one day, you must have enough.

“There’s someone behind you, dude, watch out–” Intak calls from next to Sunwoo, helping his teammate out. 

Today’s game of choice is CS:GO– too bad for you, Kim Sunwoo is exceptional at shooting games.

He watches his screen and moves his mouse swiftly, shooting the opponent– he thinks it might’ve been Jaehyun or Chan– before they even have a chance at spotting him. His team– Terrorists– are winning by a mile, coincidentally having the best of the best in the group. He’s playing a perfect 5v5 game alongside Intak, Haechan, Yeji and…. and you. 

“Do you even have your screen on, Y/N?” he grunts from behind his computer, glaring at the screen. He notices you not really killing any opponents, and even though he understands that not everyone is going to be the best at every video game that gets played over the course of semester, he’s making sure to trash talk you each and every time you’re even an inch away from perfect.

“Fuck off, I’m trying.”

“Doesn’t seem like it,” he snickers, pointing his gaze towards you only for a split second to watch you roll your eyes at his comment. An annoyed sigh escapes  your throat, making the boy’s veins reek with satisfaction.

“We’re winning anyway, so I don’t get why you’re so pressed about it,” you grunt, tucking your hair behind your ear as you play, momentarily taking your hand off the mouse.

Sunwoo notices your character in his point of view on the monitor– the nickname ‘ceo.Y/N’ shining proudly over the default skin of the terrorist figurine– when a bright, spiteful idea sparks up in his brain. The boy realizes he left the friendly fire option on when assembling the game room, and with that, he’s set on his decision.

You don’t deserve anything nice in Kim Sunwoo’s eyes– which is why he shoots you in the head the first moment he sees you, laughing to himself.

“Yeah, no thanks to you,” he comments as he watches your character drop to the ground.

“What the fuck?! Yo, why did you do that?” you gasp, snapping your head around to point your daggers of eyes onto the boy, frustration dripping off your face. It does nothing to ruin the mood of the satisfied boy, only making him shrug and offer you his brightest smirk.

“You weren’t contributing anything to the game anyway,” he shrugs, “might as well sit this one out, Y/L/N.”

Yes. This one surely will teach you a lesson.

When Kim Sunwoo reaches his room after his shower– at 1 in the morning sharp and feeling too awake for the late hour, since all the hot water ran out due to his roommate’s greediness (curse Eric Sohn’s long ass showers)– he notices a notification shining on his phone in bright light, making him reach for his phone with curiosity. He doesn’t have many friends that would reach out to him at the late hours of the evening, since he talks to most of them during the day anyway, and so even subconsciously, as he reaches for his phone, he expects to see his online best friend’s username pop up in the notification bar.

And he was right– clicking on the Discord notification waiting for him at the top of the screen, he already feels his heart skipping a beat, his insides flowing with immediate warmth despite the cold shower he took just a few minutes ago.

Further shaking out the water out of his hair before plopping onto his bed and reading through the girl’s messages, the boy finds himself smiling at her profile picture. It’s a close up of her Minecraft character standing in front of the little display he put out for her– and he can’t help but feel like this is some sort of a soft launch. Of what, he doesn’t really know– since the two of them are far from dating– but that’s okay. It satisfies him enough. Nobody even really knows it’s him who she’s showing off, but to him, it holds the weight of the whole entire world.

sunpoodle [0:22] – a missed voice call sunpoodle [0:35] – a missed voice call sunpoodle [0:36] – so u dont like me anymore sunpoodle [0:38] – i see how it is sunpoodle [0:48] – everything ok tho? sunpoodle [0:54] – a missed voice call

Squinting at the screen, Sunwoo starts to type out his reply to his friend. Before he has the chance to click send, though, his phone lights up with the incoming voice call from her, leaving him to accept it almost immediately. He hears her voice coming out of his speaker after a few seconds of silence, having his ears perk up and heart beat a little faster.

“Damn, took you long enough,” she hums, making the poor boy chuckle. “I thought you were either dead or ignoring me.”

“I wasn’t,” he replies before settling deeper into his bed, going as far as putting a blanket over him to provide himself the most comfort, “I would never ignore you,” he lets himself speak out, a full body cringe taking over him the second he realizes just how far gone and infatuated he must sound with his friend.

“Oh, okay,” she says, “I was getting kinda worried, though.”

“Worried?”

“Yeah, we didn’t speak at all the whole day,” she replies. And she’s right– Sunwoo was too busy the whole day to text her or check in with her throughout the day. He was working on his assignments with Changmin and Juyeon in the library, and then he had to listen to Eric talk about his crush on the new girl from the café he works at. Before he knew it, it was late in the night and all he wanted to do was shower and go to sleep– his plan was thrown into the bin the moment he got back into his room, though. 

He might have not put his online friend as his priority during the day but if it comes to sacrificing sleep for her, he won’t even think twice.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” he mumbles, although something inside of him cheers at the fact that she cares about him enough to want his presence every day.“I was just busy with assignments and socializing.”

“You do that?”

“Strange, isn’t it?” he chuckles, poking fun at himself. There’s no doubt of him being an extrovert, but for the sake of hearing the girl laugh through his speaker– his insides squeezing on themselves with violent tenderness at the sound (what a contradiction)– he is content with simply ignoring the fact.

“What’s up, though?” he asks. “You usually don’t call and I have to pressure you into picking up in some way.”

“That’s not true.”

“Kind of is, when you think about it–”

“I just like to be persuaded,” she hums, making the boy chuckle. 

“Noted,” he says– and it might’ve been just a figure of speech, really, but there is a secret folder inside of his brain that he calls the girl-he-likes-folder, where he keeps all the information and random facts he learns about his friend safely, until he has a chance to use them. “But really, what is it? You seem uneasy,” he notes, making the girl laugh softly on the other end of the line.

There is some shuffling on the other side before he finally hears her voice again. Sunwoo furrows his brows at the ruckus, but he doesn’t mention it– maybe she’s just moving around the room, doing her own things as she talks to him on the phone. It makes his brain wander, though– imagining her cleaning her room, putting things away. Stacking some old papers or throwing stuff into the trash can. The image of his friend is always hazy in his mind– he was never really the most imaginative when it came to stuff he doesn’t know– but he still feels attracted to the girl in ways he can’t explain without sounding absolutely crazy to an outsider’s ear. He has no clear idea of her features– he doesn’t know how long her hair is, what her figure looks like, or what color her eyes are, but he still knows that to him, she’s absolutely beautiful and no reality he could see would break this image he has of her.

The fact that she’s calling him while going on with her life, as if he is an active, real part of it, makes him smile to himself. Every time the girl acknowledges her friendship with him, he feels like he’s on Cloud 9– he doesn’t really know why he needs that validation, though.

“This might sound stupid, but I just wanted to hear your voice,” she says nonchalantly through the speakers of his phone, and with that, Sunwoo is a goner. He feels the world stop turning for a while, his breath hitching in his throat. Something about the girl’s words makes his head spin and thoughts run laps around the walls of his skull– is it just him, or does that sentence sound strangely intimate?

“Why?” he asks on autopilot– because the annoying voice inside of him needs answers. 

“Hm? Oh, I dunno,” she quickly utters out before she makes a sharp turn in the conversation, completely disregarding her previous statement, “did I tell you about that party I’m invited to this weekend?” she asks instead, making the boy shake his head in disbelief and throw his face into his pillow to stop himself from screaming.

“No,” he sighs, “but tell me now.”

“Okay, so–”

The rest of their conversation is drowned out by his thoughts. Don’t get him wrong, he is actively listening to what she has to say– how she doesn’t know what to wear and she’s not sure if she wants to match with her best friend– but he is also subconsciously focused on the fact that the way she talks in her low tone, keeping her voice down to not wake up her roommate next door. It makes the atmosphere that much more sincere and intimate. He finds himself admiring his friend’s excitement and joy, the energy she has when she talks about how her day went and how she can’t stay keeping up with one topic for long– getting lost in the track somewhere along the way, making Sunwoo remind her what she was even talking about in the first place. Everything about the girl is mesmerizing to the boy, and before he has a chance to notice, he’s falling asleep to her rambling on the phone, eyelids heavy in comfort and sleepiness. 

“Are you still there?” she asks, receiving only a soft hum from the boy on the other side. “Am I boring you?”

“No,” he half-whispers, “I’m just comfortable. Keep talking,” he says, hugging his pillow to his chest and putting the phone next to his head. He hears a soft scoff on the other side of the line, a kind, sweet voice lullying him further into dreamland.

“Okay, keep using me as your bed time story, then,” she jokes, a tint of faux offense in her tone, “I’ll disconnect the call when you stop giving me fakely interested hums after every other sentence.”

And with that, Kim Sunwoo falls asleep to his online best friend talking his ear off on a Discord call. How could she ever think that wanting to hear his voice was stupid? He understands– he thinks that perhaps, he’d choose listening to her even over hearing his favorite song.

The idea of teaching you a lesson with his competitive nature is quickly thrown into the bin when the next week comes as the game his friends choose for the afternoon is one that he is not fond of. Why does he not like this game, you may ask? Well, simply put– he is absolutely terrible at it. 

The love for League of Legends is a telling sign of someone’s virginity, though, so Sunwoo thinks he can take pride in the fact that he is not a bitchless loser by playing it in his free time. (Don’t mention the fact that he is a Discord user and currently does not have a girlfriend. He will ignore it for the sake of his reputation.)

“I’ll go bottom,” Intak says as he chooses his champion in the lobby, making Sunwoo huff. He’s not really good at playing the mage, he’s terribly, terribly bad at going jungle, and tanks and fighters are equally as easy for him to play as learning the Pi number by heart (very difficult). Soon enough though, he finds that the rest of the roles are quickly divided in his team, and that leaves him nothing else to do than to just humbly take the responsibility of the middle lane, equipping the only champion he’s played before– Fizz.

With him locking in his character, the image on his monitor morphs into the loading screen, letting him once again scan the names that belong to his team. Having 10 members in the club is easy enough to divide into two teams by 5, which he is thankful for, but the teams are almost always randomly selected– which makes him angry only at times where he gets the obviously weaker players. 

This time around, surrounded by Intak and Yangyang teaming up on the bottom, Soobin taking over the jungle and Yeji resigning on the top lane, Sunwoo is satisfied to see he at least doesn’t share a team with you this time around– because that means he can do everything in his power to make your life a living hell while playing the game.

“Try not to die in the first few seconds, Sunwoo,” Soobin snickers as the game starts and the boy aimlessly moves towards the middle of the map, moving his character with the mouse. Sunwoo only salutes at the taller boy, making him giggle.

“I’ll try not to, boss!”

Sunwoo’s quest in this game is to protect the tower and farm as much as he can– so that destroying the opponent’s tower is easier and opens up the shortest way to the enemy. After seeing how his character moves in the game– don’t make fun of him but after so much time since he last played the game, he’s forgotten– he puts his head into his hands and mourns, noticing that he foolishly chose an assassin. It’s not that they’re bad per se, it’s just that Kim Sunwoo is much better at League of Legends when he has some distance from the opponent. Which, when he wants to attack, is not a feature Fizz awards him with. 

Much to his surprise though, the middle lane seems to be empty. There is no one from the opposite team walking up to him and trying to start combat, and that puts him at ease. Maybe he can do his job right– for at least a few minutes before the tower is damaged enough that the enemy realizes they need to protect it. 

And so clueless Sunwoo enters the circle under the tower, attacking it with the red minions by his side, veins flowing with satisfaction that hey– maybe he will be successful with something in this game. He surely doesn’t need the validation of his team, but look– all he needs is to not embarrass himself in the process of playing this game. His pride is precious to him. 

The talk around the internet café slowly drowns out around him, providing him only a background noise. He doesn’t need to listen to his team’s strategy– he knows he isn’t really included in it, as the weakest link. Hyperfocusing on the game, he almost jumps when two characters suddenly appear from the bushes– not skilled enough, Sunwoo didn’t think to check them when he arrived in the middle of the map– attacking him.

The nicknames aerichandesu and ceo.y/n shine proudly above the characters of Annie and Vi, both of the females cornering him and making him scowl at the screen. You don’t do much damage to him, he notices, but there is something about the way Aeri plays that tells him that he is royally fucked in this game.

Only a few seconds of combat pass before the banner saying First blood appears on the top of the screen, embarrassing him and making the rest of the team laugh at his death. He finally acknowledges that he was tricked, and as the seconds pass of him waiting to be revived, his eyes meet yours from across the room– and oh how he wishes to wipe that smirk off your face.

“As expected,” Soobin chirps from Sunwoo’s right, making the poor boy sigh and cross his arms defensively at his chest.

“They teamed up on me!”

“That’s the point, sweetheart,” Yeji hums from the corner of the room, “you’d know that if you knew how to play.”

“Oh, shut up, you losers…” he grunts as his character revives, making him hurriedly move towards his designated place again, noticing his team’s tower slowly falling apart due to leaving you in there unwatched. 

Once he appears back under his tower, he watches you retract from your place. Sunwoo takes this as his opportunity to show you that one on one, you’re not going to win against him– and so he chimes forward after you, using Fizz’s trident to deal you magic damage over the next couple of seconds. The clicking of his mouse onto your character resonates through the crowded café and the banners showing his teammate’s successful kills do nothing to help him focus on the task at hand– but your health bar is slowly dropping, and that satisfies the male.

“Not so strong without Aeri now, are you?” he teases, watching as you aimlessly start to run away from him, no longer focusing on killing his character.

He doesn’t get a verbal reply from you, but one thing is certain– the poor male forgot to keep a check of his own health bar, and while chasing after you with greediness, wanting to be the one to get you down, he foolishly gets shot down by the enemy minion following him. The kill is still written off to you though, and when his screen freezes with the death announcement, he watches you cheer– eyes glimmering and a victorious smile spreading across your cheeks– before you high-five with your best friend to your right.

Turns out that maybe you don’t need Aeri to carry you in League of Legends. At least not when it’s Kim Sunwoo you’re playing against– and that puts him at a big of a disadvantage.

Is this how you feel every time he conspires against you? Because if so, he has to applaud you– you have an awfully big patience. He can handle it for one Tuesday out of the semester, but if he was in your place, he’d be running away from the room the moment he dies in the game again, all because of you.

Running around, out of breath and heaving for oxygen, Kim Sunwoo starts to contemplate if all of this was even a good idea. He should’ve known the whole thing was bound to be a failure when the first mishaps started happening, but against his best assumptions, he decided to go on with it and try to figure things out. 

The first thing wrong with this whole entire thing is that it wasn’t even his idea in the first place. Hyunjae suggested that the whole friend group goes to play laser tag at the end of the week, to wind off a little before finals. And Sunwoo agreed– because that sounds like a lot of fun, doesn’t it?– and expected to just read out the details of it in the groupchat. He thought turning up to the place would be the only thing he had to do, but oh how he was wrong. 

Lee Hyunjae decided he didn’t really feel like going to laser tag on the single day where all of them were free– which meant that they either cancel the whole thing or go without him. And since Eric Sohn was all too excited for the idea, Sunwoo decided he won’t disappoint his dear roommate– in fears of getting sabotaged or killed in his sleep if he declines– leading into making Kim Sunwoo being in charge of the whole thing because as the only Aries of the group, he takes his leadership seriously when he has to.

And so he sucked it up and called the laser tag place, asking for a reservation for 5. Another failure hit him in the face when he was announced that they can only let them play if they have a group of ten people, and before he had the chance to let the rational part of his brain take over and cancel the plans, he was left agreeing and saying he will find 5 more people to come with them. 

Sunwoo figured that Eric, as the born extrovert, will have no problem finding 5 more people for the laser tag game. He was wrong, though, when his friend announced that all of his friends magically have some plans for that exact Friday– he thought that there’s a party that somehow, only the loser friend group he is partaking in wasn’t attending, for some reason– and Eric could only think of one person that would come, which left Sunwoo with solving the issue of finding 4 more people to come to play laser tag with him.

So he brought out the big guns– the Video Gaming club group chat. 

sunwhooo [9:31]: hello friends i need 4 people to join us for laser tag tomorrow sunwhooo [9:31]: anyone down meet us there at 5pm

And with that, he considered the task done. Too over with the whole thing and too tired of being the only one with common sense in his friend group, he didn’t check who agreed to his invitation. He figured that someone will either show up, or they will shamefully go home. Which option it’s gonna be is the problem of the day after– in this moment, he needed sleep.

He appeared in front of the laser tag arena on Friday, 4:45 sharp, waiting for his group to arrive. He felt like one of those tour guides in the middle of big cities– all he was missing was a flag in his hand, or an umbrella– either or– waving around and calling out for his friends. Five minutes after him, Changmin and Juyeon arrived, tailed by Eric and a boy that’s introduced to him as Jake Sim– who is, just by the way, a carbon copy of Sunwoo’s dear roommate both with energy and some of their small mannerisms. 

Five minutes before they were supposed to enter the arena and get the safety tutorial on how to play, 2 members of his club came up, smiling widely ear to ear. If Sunwoo had to guess who would say yes to his invitation the fastest, Myung Jaehyun and Lee Donghyuck would be first in line– and he was right. 

“Where’s the rest of you?” he asked after greeting the boys, and right in this moment, after hearing their reply, was when he knew he should’ve canceled the plans the moment Lee Hyunjae turned down his own offer.

“Y/N and Aeri’s bus was late, but they’re on their way now!” Jaehyun said, smiling ear to ear. “Y/N texted you in the groupchat, but I don’t think you saw it.”

“Pretty sure I have her number blocked,” he grunted under his breath, sighing to himself. Was it too late to leave now…?

“What?”

“Nothing.”

And that’s how he ends up in this mess. You and your best friend arrive 2 minutes late, but you’re still let in– much to Sunwoo’s dismay. Everyone seems to be excited– almost too excited– when they choose to play the game in the complete darkness, and before Sunwoo has a chance to protest, he is thrown into the laser tag game, nothing but a laser gun in his hand and a vest with the sensoring clutching to his chest.

He can’t see anything, he’s constantly bumping into the obstacles, the arena is too big for his own liking– because he doesn’t really know where he is and can’t see anyone else, making him feel strangely alone and kind of afraid– and it’s so hot inside that sweat is slowly dripping down his forehead, making him irritated.

Once in a while, he hears a scream from somewhere inside of the arena when two players meet. He contemplates just sitting on the ground and waiting for the game to pass– not really that mad about being the last one in the ranking– but the last remains of his pride are telling him to keep going, to keep trying.

He’s good at shooting games! What is he doing?

Taking a deep breath in and out, he makes a run for it– hoping he won’t be met with the wall and break his neck in the process (now that would really take the crown for the worst thing that could happen in relation to the laser tag), before he’s met with the sound of footsteps in his ears, making him painfully alert of his surroundings.

Turning his head around, trying to see where the sound is coming from and who he has to protect himself from– or shoot and get some points in, that is– he feels his body meeting full speed with another person, a yelp coming out of their throat right before the sound of clothes rustling and body mass hitting the floor resonates through the place.

“Fuck,” he curses under his breath, dropping the gun, “are you okay?” he asks, genuine concern lacing his tone. 

“Watch where you’re going, for fuck’s sake!” he hears your voice call out of him… and the last remains of genuine concern leave his body at that, irritation swimming to the shore.

“How the fuck am I supposed to watch where I’m going when you fuckers chose to play in complete darkness?!” He yells over the music– that is, just for the record, an atrocious EDM remake mix of early 00s songs– and lets his eyes adjust to the darkness for some more, watching the outline of your figure on the ground slowly appear in his retina.

Acting on auto-pilot, though, the boy reaches out an arm towards you, trying to help you to your feet. The view of your face is hazy in his eyes but he can still make out the scowled expression you offer him before you take his hand and let him drag you to a standing position.

“So much sympathy in one man, wow,” you grunt, shaking your head at him once you’re standing tall in front of him. “Wouldn’t hurt to apologize, you know–”

“This clearly wasn’t my fault–”

He starts, but stops himself mid-sentence when he sees you point the laser gun towards him, shooting. The interaction is short– it goes by almost too fast for him to register it– and before he has a chance to let the sensor cool down and aim towards your chest as well, you’re running away from him, full speed skillfully through the maze. 

“Hey!” he yells out, but is much slower at following you. Is he doing something wrong? Why is everyone suddenly so good at navigating the space?

And while Kim Sunwoo is competitive– there was an agreement that the last place pays for everyone’s meal after– sometimes, his spirit is overshadowed by his emotions. Frustrated, irritated and a little mad, although he pays much effort into shooting at his opponents and gathering up all the points he lost while he was aimlessly walking through the place like a blind man, he just can’t seem to catch up and crawl out of the last place.

Standing outside of the room and looking at the scoreboard after, having the rest of the team pat his shoulder and thank for the meal, his eyes land on you as you’re the last one to leave the arena aside from him.

“Looks like being good at CS:GO isn’t enough to be good at shooter games in real life, huh?” you tease, pouting at the scoreboard in mock sympathy. “Thank you for the meal, Sunwoo. I’d like a large fry and a cheeseburger, by the way. Make it extra cheese.”

Maybe he should’ve canceled the laser tag the first moment he wanted to. 

You know what? Maybe he should cancel the Video Gaming club altogether, while he’s at it.

Sitting around the study room in the library, accompanied by Eric and Changmin arguing about something and enveloped in a gray, fuzzy hoodie, Kim Sunwoo lets himself roll his eyes at the aimless quarreling and puts the hood of his sweater up, leaning back on the uncomfortable chair. After a couple of minutes spent listening to the fight– that’s about the assignment at hand, just for your information– Sunwoo feels himself zoning out of the room before he’s brought back to reality by the buzzing of his phone on the table with the incoming notification.

At this point of the uneventful afternoon, he would’ve replied back to anyone within a few minutes– anything to pass time, he figures– but when his eyes zone in on the name on his screen, he is left clicking at the Discord bar quicker than the speed of light.

sunpoodle [6:44]: can u call rn? notsteve [6:45]: no notsteve [6:45]: im at the library rn notsteve [6:45]: why

“You can’t just completely ignore that point of the essay, because it’s going to look like we didn’t do enough research,” Changmin argues his point in the background, the loud voice of Sunwoo’s roommate almost startling him as he tries to prove otherwise.

“We can’t just include every. single. point. in it, though, or else it’s gonna become a wholeass bible at this point.”

“Better to exceed the word count than to hand in an unfinished essay–”

sunpoodle [6:48]: oh so u hate me notsteve [6:48]: pretty sure this is emotional manipulation

“What do you think, Sunwoo?” Eric speaks up, turning his head towards the last boy of the three– the only one that hasn’t spoken up about the matter yet. It’s true that he didn’t really do much work on the actual essay yet– only some very, very brief research last night– but that didn’t mean he suddenly felt like doing much more. 

“Hm? Me?” 

sunpoodle [6:49]: dont care sunpoodle [6:50]: youre probably with some other bitches

“Yeah,” Changmin chimes in, “say your part. It’s three of us here, so the majority will go. What do you think?”

“Oh, I don’t really care…” Sunwoo hums without much thinking, eyes glued to his phone screen.

notsteve [6:51]: ??? sunpoodle [6:52]: anyways i just wanted to show you my child sunpoodle [6:52]: but you’re clearly not interested so

“Are you even listening?” Eric asks.

Sunwoo hums in response, automatized. Did the words really register in his brain? You can bet they didn’t.

“Are you texting that online girl again?” Changmin scoffs, Sunwoo’s ears perking up just a little bit at the mention of his friend.

“Yeah.”

notsteve [6:53]: a child??? notsteve [6:53]: is this another sylvanian families toy  sunpoodle [6:54]: no:(( notsteve [6:54]: what is it then notsteve [6:54]: because we both know youre not responsible enough to have a child

“Still can’t believe you developed a crush on a girl you don’t even know,” Eric sighs from next to him, the previous topic of their conversation long gone when it means he can make fun of his roommate for being absolutely, totally infatuated with a girl in his phone screen.

“How can you even know she’s real?” Changmin jokes. “For all you know, that could be a 50 year old white male trying to get nudes out of you,” he adds, making the shortest boy snort at the comment.

“I don’t have a crush on her,” is all that leaves Sunwoo’s mouth, although his tone is not very argumentative– just mindlessly spoken out, most of his attention still glued to his messenger app.

sunpoodle [6:55]: are you underestimating me?? sunpoodle [6:55]: im offended sunpoodle [6:56]: might just block u. and here i was considering sending u a pic of my dog…

“Sure you don’t,” Eric sighs, “because you’re totally not smiling like an idiot right now.”

“Shut the fuck up…” Sunwoo breathes out, rolling his eyes. The smile on his face freezes and drops at the unnecessary comment, but his cheeks grow a soft pink hue to them, only further proving his friends’ point.

notsteve [6:56]: A DOG????”,?” notsteve [6:56]: show it to me notsteve [6:56]: show it to me rachel!!!!

“When are you going to ask her for a picture or something?” Changmin pries, kicking his friend to his shin under the table.

“When she asks first,” he shrugs, “I don’t wanna sound like a creep.”

“I bet you already do,” Eric jokes, making his roommate glare at him. 

“Besides, we call often,” Sunwoo shrugs, “I know she’s not a 50 year old man. And so far, I’m content with this. It’s not like it would be going anywhere in the first place.”

“You don’t know that,” Changmin says, and something about that sentence makes Sunwoo momentarily glance away from his phone screen, furrowing his brows at the male.

“Yeah,” Eric chimes in, “you don’t even know where she lives. For all you know, she could be just down the street and you two could be going on embarrassing lan party dates together, or something.”

“Or– and get this–” Sunwoo ironically argues, “she could live on the other side of the country. Which, logically speaking, is much more likely.”

“You never know until you don’t ask,” Changmin shrugs, “I mean, it doesn't hurt to know.”

Shuffling his feet under the table, Sunwoo thinks to himself. There is a reason why he never really asked his online best friend any personal questions– and that is because he was simply afraid. Afraid of what he might find out.

No matter the distance, it’s scary for Sunwoo to know about his friend’s whereabouts. Because if she lives far, it means the chances of ever meeting her are unlikely. If she lives close, the chances rise– but he’s also completely terrified of the chance to meet her because, to put it blankly, he is petrified of the image his online friend would have of him when she meets him in real life.

Hiding behind the cloak of the internet is much easier for the boy. His friend doesn’t know what he looks like, what his mannerisms are in real life. And it’s not like he is faking his personality online– because truth be told, he’s acting the same way in his Minecraft server then he would in any real life situation– it’s just that he is strangely insecure of if he’d still be liked in the same way, had his friend met up with him in real life. He’s nervous of awkward silence. He’s stressed out about the fact that maybe he won’t click as well with the girl he met online. It’s all strange and new to him, and that’s why he never really dares to ask.

“I don’t know,” he shrugs, “it’s all just kind of weird.”

At this point, he doesn’t know if he fears meeting up with his friend online, or never seeing her with his own two eyes more. 

sunpoodle [6:57]: doggo sunpoodle [6:58] – sends one picture sunpoodle [7:02]: wow youre ignoring me again sunpoodle [7:05]: why do i even try at this point… sunpoodle [7:08]: teaching my dog to bite u if he ever meets u irl notsteve [7:09]: how are u gonna do that notsteve [7:10]: BUT OMG THATS SUCH A CUTE DOG notsteve [7:10]: BEST BOY sunpoodle [7:11]: i have my ways… sunpoodle [7:11]: but he says thank u so i guess we will let it go for now

Sunwoo chuckles at your reply, making the rest of the boys in the room look at each other with knowing eyes, shaking their head in disbelief. It’s not that they’re disapproving of their friend’s little (big) crush on the girl he met online– they’re supportive of whatever makes their dear bundle of sunshine happy– they just fear that this whole thing… might not end the best for the young gamer.

notsteve [7:12]: u like me too much to make your dog bite me notsteve [7:12]: admit it sunpoodle [7:13]: im resuming with my lecture!! sunpoodle [7:13]: he is small and fat but he is strong. do be afraid notsteve [7:14]: all that for not paying attention to you for 5 minutes? notsteve [7:14]: your actions speak for themselves, honey <33

“Right…” Eric awkwardly clears his throat, calling the attention of the enamoured boy, “shall we dwell deeper into your online relationship, or do you want to help us with the group essay for a change?” He asks while kicking the boy into his shin lightly, to make sure he has his full attention.

“Essay please,” he replies, nodding to himself. There is no way he is going into details of the embarrassing crush he has on the girl living in his phone.

sunpoodle [7:15]: what can i say life isnt fun without my jasper :// notsteve [7:15]: try not to die as i work on this assignment sunpoodle [7:16]: dont lie u dont do those notsteve [7:16]: unfortunately i do:(( notsteve [7:16] – sends one picture

Sunwoo points his camera so only a part of his laptop is shown with the study room in the background– making sure neither his friends or him are in the picture– before sending it to his friend. It’s not like she needs proof– Sunwoo knows that despite the playful teasing, she understands his need to put in some work into his education– he just feels like slowly testing the waters with sharing more and more of his real life with his online best friend.

“Okay, so let’s get back to what we were talking about before,” Changmin says, “I was thinking we should at least briefly talk about the points that are against what we’re trying to argue here, but Eric says it would completely disregard like, half of our work, so…”

sunpoodle [7:17]: wait is that at SNU notsteve [7:18]: yea notsteve [7:18]: how’d you know sunpoodle [7:18]: oh my god ?? sunpoodle [7:18]: i study there too

You know what? Forget the assignment– it’s due in a week. It can wait 7 more days.

“Guys, uh…” Sunwoo hums, hands shaking and his heart doing somersaults in his chest, “I’d actually like to go back to the topic of my online friend for a sec…”

Although Kim Sunwoo feels like the world stopped turning– or shifted in its axis, either or– since he learned about the fact that his internet best friend goes to the same university as him, and therefore, could be just about anyone he sees in the halls on a day to day basis, much to his dismay, it did not. The world didn’t stop turning and nothing really changed, all events happening around him as if he wasn’t just gifted with the life changing information: and that meant that besides the exam week fastly approaching him, he still had to host the Video Gaming club the Tuesday after.

He still has to turn up to the internet café and take the attendance sheet with him, even though the groupchat announced to him that they’re all going to study for the incoming exams instead. Because the rules are rules– as the head of the club, Kim Sunwoo has to host the meetings every week, or else the rights for the club will be revoked and all the privileges that come with having one will be taken away from him before he even has a chance to blink.

It’s already bad that he will be the only one on the attendance sheet– if he doesn’t decide to fake some signatures, that is– but now, he is alone and bored, and as it turns out, playing games alone isn’t as fun as playing them with someone else. The competitive nature in him yearns for multiplayer games, it longs for the social contact he so effortlessly has with someone when playing a video game with them. He thinks he built a decent group out of the other video game lovers at this university, and he didn’t even realize it up until now– when he’s sitting alone in the internet café, in the far back on one of the couches. 

At least he has the chance to test out the new Playstation console they installed here.

Legs spread wide on the small couch, having the whole place for himself, Sunwoo turns on the Test Drive Unlimited game, clicking through the settings. He is not a big fan of racing games in general, but he figures it’s the only game that he can play alone and still have at least some fun, and so after picking out a fancy car to drive around the world, he focuses on racing and fulfilling the side-quests the best he can.

Until a figure squeezes itself right next to him, startling him. “Oh, Jesus!”

“It’s Y/N, actually,” you snicker, making the boy’s mood drop at least two notches, eyebrows furrowing at your sudden arrival. What are you even doing here? He thought no one was available this week?

“You came?” he asks, and despite the sincerity of the question, the tone sounds kind of spiteful.

“Yeah,” you shrug, “am I not allowed here? I thought the club is on every Tuesday?” 

“It is,” he agrees, a hint of annoyance in his voice, “I just didn’t expect you to come.”

“Didn’t expect, or didn’t want?”

“Both,” he grunts, before he turns his head towards the screen again, ignoring your presence completely. The noises coming out of the console provide you two with some background music, but it’s still not enough to diffuse the tense atmosphere. Sunwoo hates every second of you by his side– your thighs touching in the small space due to his dominant manspreading– even the sound of you breathing making him immensely annoyed.

“What’s your problem with me anyway?” you suddenly speak up, breaking the silence. Something about the way you ask the question puts a dagger through Sunwoo’s heart, for some reason, but he doesn’t dare to drop his tough facade.

“I don’t like you, that’s all,” he shrugs nonchalantly, chewing on the inside of his cheek as he focuses back onto the game, trying hard to not fail at his sidequest. Everything but focus on the difficult conversation beginning to take place right in this moment, right? 

And why do you even care? It’s not like the two of you are friends– anything close to that, even.

“Why?” you scoff, shaking your head in disbelief. “I mean, I don’t get it. I did nothing wrong, and you seem to be getting on fine with the rest of the girls, so I don’t think that’s the problem here,” you lightly laugh, trying to take some weight off the situation.

Sunwoo’s jaw hardens. He doesn’t want to have this conversation right now. 

“At first I thought it was just harmless teasing, something you do for fun or attention, but then I realized you were being serious about it, so I really… I really just wanna know what’s the deal behind all of this,” you grunt, swinging your arms in the air at the last word, putting more emphasis on the end of the sentence. You’re starting to get frustrated, and that’s slowly ticking off Sunwoo’s patience.

“Oh, you don’t know?” he scoffs, turning his head to you. “Then you’re even worse than I thought.”

“What are you even talking about?” you yelp out, the eyes of others in the internet café turning towards you with furrowed brows, annoyed glares pointed at your little commotion due to being disturbed while playing their favorite games.

“You’re my friend’s ex, that’s why,” he mutters, before scoffing at you and pointing his eyes back to the TV screen. 

There is a moment of silence following his confession. He’s not sure what is the reasoning behind it– if you’re rocking your head, trying to remember what he’s talking about, or if you’re just shocked that he is so loyal to his friend. Maybe you’re in disbelief. Maybe you feel ashamed. Truth be told, Sunwoo doesn’t really care.

“Ji Changmin?” you ask, suddenly sounding surprised. “This is about Ji Changmin?” 

Sunwoo hates the way you sound almost… amused? 

“You can’t be serious. That happened over 4 years ago! There’s no way either of you is still hung up about that,” you say, shaking your head at him in disbelief.

The boy snickers, talking to you, but not really offering you any eye contact as he continues on with his game. “Maybe you didn’t think it was serious, but I surely won’t like someone who did my friends wrong.”

“Sunwoo, we were kids.”

“Does that mean it didn’t count?” he scoffs.

“Yeah, basically,” you bluntly agree, a bitter laugh escaping your throat. “Ask Changmin. I’m sure he barely even remembers–”

“Well, I remember him crying over you for two weeks straight, so maybe stop bragging into spaces where you’re not welcome,” he snaps, finally looking at you.

He chose a bad moment to have eye contact with you, though. The second the words leave his mouth, hurt flashes by your face, your expression instantly dropping. Your orbs get a little sadder and there’s a wrinkle between your eyebrows that makes Sunwoo’s stomach drop, guilt washing over him in waves strong like tsunami. Realistically, he shouldn’t care about hurting your feelings– by his logic, you must have even deserved it– but there is something in him that wants to physically crawl out of his skin and give himself a big, fierceful slap across his face for the words he just said.

Because who is he to tell you you’re unwanted in the club? The other people there like you. Everyone gets on with you just fine– it’s not Sunwoo’s right to ban you from the space he created, just because he has personal vendetta against you.

You’re not even doing anything wrong… Maybe he did fuck up.

“O-okay–”

“No, wait,” he hurriedly says, reaching out an arm towards you instinctively so he can stop you if you wanted to leave. “I didn’t mean it like that. It’s just… I care about my friends a lot, that’s all. It’s… nothing personal,” he explains, humming to himself.

Except he’s lying, and you both know that. Everything about this was nothing but personal– the targeted jokes, the mean comments, the rude energy he has towards you any time you show up. Everything about his behavior and his annoyance whenever you are around is personal, because it involves you, and only you. 

There’s no way he can save himself now, though. The words are already said and out there, and even though he regrets them, there is no way Kim Sunwoo is apologizing.

A cloak of silence falls over the two of you again but this time, it’s slowly eating Sunwoo alive. It’s biting on his arms and crawling on his insides, carving out every harsh word he’s said to you into skin, making it unbearable for the boy to continue just aimlessly sitting next to you. He has to do something.

“Do you want me to leave?” you ask in a soft, quiet voice– a tone slightly familiar to him. It makes his ears perk up and his stomach squeeze on itself. It’s a weird, visceral reaction, but he won’t really allow himself to put much importance into it.

Instead, he sighs and turns to you with the controller in hand, offering you a soft, guilty smile. “No,” he shakes his head, “you can pick your own car and play for a while as I order us some snacks, if you wanna. I’m also pretty sure there’s Smash bros on it, in case you wanna play with me when I get back.”

The air is tense and awkward, and Sunwoo curses himself from the way events unraveled. He feels like he is betraying his best friend, in a way, but the guilt he carries in him is too big to not try to dissolve. 

You take the controller from him and nod, chewing on the inside of your cheek. He thinks this might be the beginning of truce– not a friendship, just tolerance– between the two of you, but he is soon taken out of his delusions when he sees you clicking off the game and opening Smash bros instead. 

In that moment, he knows he is going to get his ass kicked, and he knows it’s going to be personal.

The remote control in his hands feels like a weapon after he managed to finally stick the strip of LED lights all around the ceiling– and with how things have been going (the previous ones not working and them falling down every few seconds this time around), it might as well turn into one if it turns out he failed at installing his newest room decor again. He will use it against himself, he thinks– there is not much will to live left in him after the whole day, leaving him weak and exhausted.

Praying a little before trying for one last time, Sunwoo clicks on the red button of the remote control in his palm, squeezing his eyes shut– and after wishing on all 11:11s and all eyelashes, it seems– the LED lights finally turn on and illuminate his room with a dark red glow that he quickly turns towards a more muted purple, because it’s easier on his eyes and he kind of doesn’t want his room to look like literal hell upon walking in.

The boy’s heart leaps in his chest. It finally worked– he is every gamer girl’s dream! (And to stay true to the statement, he reaches towards his phone, clicking on the Discord app, approaching the one he dreams about.)

notsteve [10:45]: ive got these really sick lights if u wanna come over ;;) notsteve [10:45]: they tried to scam me twice but omg look notsteve [10:46] – sends 1 video notsteve [10:46]: they can change colors hihihii

Ever since the moment Kim Sunwoo learned that his dear online best friend loves to be persuaded– her words, not his– alongside with the new knowledge of the fact that they both walk across the same halls and visit the same lecture rooms, the dynamic he had with the girl shifted just the tiniest bit.

First of all, they call more often. Not only during the late hours of the night, but also during the day– whenever either of them feels like chatting for a while. There is also an increased volume of voice memos and random pictures of their surroundings, which didn’t use to happen before. And believe me, Sunwoo doesn’t want to honk his horn too much, but he swears the amount of casual flirting increased at least twice the size– from his side anyway. But he promises his friend is reciprocating! Hell, she even starts it sometimes! You have to believe him.

sunpoodle [10:47]: and here i thought you died notsteve [10:48]: almost notsteve [10:48]: i couldnt get it up :((  sunpoodle [10:48]: i didn’t know that was a problem ://

Sunwoo snorts at that, heat rising to his cheeks at the comment. 

notsteve [10:49]: god i hate u notsteve [10:50]: no that’s not a problem for me sweetie notsteve [10:50]: i can show you if u come over cough

The moment he sends the last message, he regrets it. Every day he spends talking with his friend, the boundaries and lines get pushed and pushed, and he can’t seem to know why. Is it the prospect of maybe meeting her one day? The idea of somehow sweeping the girl off her feet and getting to know her beyond the level that the online space gives him– in a more deep, personal way?

Why does the idea of getting to see her with his own eyes, the idea of touching her, make the poor boy so flustered and excited? It’s not like either one of them actually initiated any real meeting in the first place– all of it was just half-jokes and invitations. He wonders when the day comes when he will be able to just nod and say yes to any of it– he wonders when she will feel comfortable enough to actually set a time and place, ordering to meet him there. He would drop anything– cancel any plans– just to run and meet her. 

sunpoodle [10:53]: i could get convinced sunpoodle [10:53]: to see the lights irl i mean sunpoodle [10:54]: nothing else…..cough sunpoodle [10:54]: youll have to clean first tho 

After the replies flood in, Sunwoo immediately relaxes. The girl doesn’t seem uncomfortable– quite the opposite, actually– and so he takes it as a sign to continue the playful nature of things, subtly pushing the idea of a meet-up more and more. For some reason, Sunwoo feels like it should happen soon– although no time is running out, he feels pressure somewhere in the bottom of his stomach and quiet buzzing in his fingertips any time the thought of his friend crosses his mind– and he knows it will only go away if he finally meets the girl. (Or it might even get worse– either way, he desperately needs to find out.)

notsteve [10:56]: my room is super clean!! notsteve [10:56]: and my bed is comfy sunpoodle [10:57]: proof or im just gonna assume youre lying

The boy tussles in his bed, his hair getting messy in his sheets. The music playing in the background only further pushes the intimate atmosphere, and so after receiving your message, he doesn’t waste much time in opening his camera and putting effort into the angle of the picture he’s going to send you.

He makes sure not much of his face is shown. His phone screen mirrors mostly the white fabric of his pillow– that is now tinder purple with the LED lighting– but in the right corner, the majority of his tousled hair is shown. It looks soft against the sheets and he makes no real effort in tidying it, since he thinks it adds to the aesthetics of the picture. A glimpse of his face appears in the picture as well– only his left eye, though. It looks sleepy, hooded, and after squinting at the screen for a few seconds, Sunwoo decides to hit send. 

The line is once again pushed a bit farther, making him wonder if his friend will follow in his footsteps and send a similar photo back. It’s secretive enough, yet also daring enough to make the other side wonder and fantasize– what does the rest of his face look like? Did she see him around? Does she recognise his face? 

…does she find the glimpse attractive? (God, Sunwoo, get a fucking grip!)

notsteve [11:02] – sends one picture sunpoodle [11:03]: i feel like a victorian man seeing an ankle for the first time

The reaction makes Sunwoo’s heart pick up at pace, a dumb smile running to his cheeks. If anyone saw him right now, he’d get bullied and picked on until the rest of his life– it’s hard to hide the feelings he tries to keep under control, though. It’s already difficult enough to deal with them on his own– he bets bottling it all up and pretending they don’t exist would even result in making it all that much harder.

notsteve [11:04]: WDYMMMMM notsteve [11:04]: be serious for once sunpoodle [11:04]: oh i AM serious sunpoodle [11:04]: i mean that bed sure does seem comfy o:))

Sunwoo feels like he is going to faint soon. Hell, he feels like the world is suddenly turning faster and it’s hard to keep up.

notsteve [11:05]: i heard its even comfier when you cuddle i mean what who said that sunpoodle [11:06]: im open to trying that out for myself

There are pools forming in Sunwoo’s palms during the course of the conversation, but they only deepen when he realizes that maybe he has to be the one to make the first step and initiate something actually real. Something that isn’t just mysteriously looking selfies in the chat or silly conversations about cuddling and meeting up that could turn into reality, but aren’t, and for what reason is making him absolutely insane.

And so he picks up all of his remaining courage and starts crafting the message inside of his head. How does he bring it up? How does he make it sound real? Like he’s being serious– that he wants to meet her and will turn crazy if it doesn’t happen soon? 

The semester ends in a few days and lord knows if his friend lives anywhere near the campus. Knowing that he wasted his only chance and opportunity would absolutely destroy him, no matter if it’s Christmas or not. 

Before he has a chance to send the carefully crafted message, though, the tone of a new message in his phone makes his attention perk up, reading out the words she’s sent to him via Discord and making his heart drop to the deepest pits of his stomach.

sunpoodle [11:10]: in all seriousness tho we should hang out sometime sunpoodle [11:10]: since we live on the same campus and all lmao sunpoodle [11:10]: (im trying to be so normal about this)

Well, that’s sudden. And unexpected. The boy feels himself grinning, resulting in biting down on his bottom lip to keep himself from screaming out. It’s finally happening– and he wasn’t the one having to write it down first. It’s not only him that seriously wants to meet up, and that has him metaphorically bouncing against the wall of his newly decorated room.

notsteve [11:10]: oh my god its happening notsteve [11:11]: everyone stay calm sunpoodle [11:12]: LMAO bE SERIOUS FOR ONE SEC sunpoodle [11:12]: would love to meet outside of ur bedroom first tho  notsteve [11:13]: omg ofc that was just a jokey joke notsteve [11:13]: just tell me when and where n ill be there notsteve [11:14]: im free literally whenever except from when im not and even then ill make sure i cancel any other thing sooo sunpoodle [11:15]: what about after exams? sunpoodle [11:15]: im busy on tuesday but i can do any other day sunpoodle [11:16]: they opened a new café close to the campus if u wanna see?:)

Sunwoo feels on Cloud 9. It’s finally happening and it’s so close– in just a week. More than 7 days, sure, but it’s still close enough– much closer than never, as he once presumed. Tussling a little in his bed, he makes sure his mouth is covered with his pillow before he lets out the scream he’s been holding for the last few minutes. 

If Eric hears him, Sunwoo is gonna try to convince him that he just stubbed his toe. Nothing else.

The boy is painfully aware of the fact that he’s acting like a teenager in love for the first time– kicking his feet, giggling, thinking of his crush before falling asleep– but frankly speaking, he doesn’t really care. In just over 7 days, he can prove Ji Changmin and everyone wrong: he doesn’t have a crush on someone he hasn’t met before. Because in just over 7 days, he will meet the presumed love of his life and look at her with his own two eyes for the first time.

That day somehow feels more important than his own birthday. Maybe he should get the date tattooed… He’ll think about it.

When he finally takes his face out of the soft pillow, he notices his room went dark. When he reaches for the remote that belongs to the newly installed LED lights, he finds it not working. In any other circumstances, he’d consider either drowning himself in his bathtub or jumping out of his window– since he and Eric live on the 6th floor, it would be high enough to cause the damage needed– but right at this moment, he feels like nothing could ever break his mood again.

notsteve [11:20]: about the lights tho…

Sunwoo doesn’t really know how he grew to love video games. If he really thinks about it, perhaps he could say it was just how boys always turn out– fascinated with anything electric that had a cord attached to it (he once managed to make the power go out for the whole street when soldering his old pair of headphones that stopped working in one ear), but there was also something so fun about gaming that managed to make the boy stick to it– and that thing was how easy it was to make friends during it.

When he was little and his dad bought him his first game boy for Christmas, he not only managed to boost in front of everyone at school during recess by playing with it, but he also managed to lend the device to everyone who stared at it with even the tiniest bit of desire in their eyes for too long. Sunwoo knew not everyone was as fortunate as him, and playing it was so fun– he thought no one should go without trying the game boy at least once. The other kids at the playground kept going back to him to play with his toy and the friendships eventually blossomed to the point that the people around him stayed even beyond the video games– and that’s how Sunwoo met his first ever friend, Ji Changmin. 

Sunwoo always liked having a group of people around him. He enjoyed when his friends from high school would come over to his house and play with the Playstation console he begged for his birthday. He didn’t mind anyone borrowing his phone during class and trying to solve the most difficult level of Geo Dash (since he’s the one that got the farthest in the game), because it meant he got to talk to the desperate gamers during break and have someone to run to the convenience store to buy snacks with afterwards.

He loved going to internet cafés, because even though the initial friendship he had with Eric Sohn and Lee Juyeon came around because they asked him to play Valorant after finding the poor boy alone, waddling into the place completely lonely during his first week of university, the bond got deeper and he can’t imagine his life without the two men in it anymore.

Sure, video games are fun. He likes to play shooting games because he enjoys winning. The competitive nature in him thrives during video games– he loves to tease his opponent, he loves to show that he’s the best. Yeah, Kim Sunwoo enjoys spending his time in the virtual world, escaping the mundane reality. But if he really dwelled deeper on it, he doesn’t think playing Minecraft would be as enjoyable if he didn’t talk to his online friend on the server every day, or if him and his friends didn’t go out and eat dinner together after a round of Overwatch in the late hours of the day.

Which is why he created the Video Gaming club in the first place. To connect people– to play games with the ones who need a buddy in their life. It made him smile to see people that met because of his club hanging out together even outside of it– he felt like he was doing something good. Sunwoo prided himself in the fact that he was the one to connect people together through his hobby, that he could share precious moments and make precious bonds in his circle through gaming. 

Maybe that’s why the last meeting of the club for this semester made him so emotional. Truth be told, he didn’t think the Video Gaming club would make it big– hell, he thought not many people would care to show up each time. As a pat on his back of some sort, Sunwoo decides that the last game of the winter semester should be his favourite.

“Can’t believe you got us playing Minecraft of all games, what are we, 11?” Chan mutters from next to the club leader, making the boy snicker.

“Just say you’re embarrassed about the nickname you chose when you were 11.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Okay, mega_dino, I’ll believe you,” Sunwoo hums and nods, hearing his friends giggle as the younger one takes a hold of his gaming mouse.

Squinting his eyes at his screen, the club leader makes sure everything is set before the game starts. He already moved all of his important items from his main house into an underground hiding place of which coordinates he’d written down before getting to the internet café– knowing that his friends would want to sabotage him as soon as he lets them play on the server he carefully created. He knows letting them play on a different one would be much easier, but he kind of prefers to have the upper hand of owning a couple of diamond swords already, and he’s also too lazy to set up a new one. (And he would have to pay for it– which he isn’t really a fan of. Money is tight when you have to buy new LED lights off Temu every other week.)

“Are we starting already? I miss Minecraft,” Intak whines from the other side of the table, a glass of coke sitting in his hand.

“Why are you saying it like it’s a children’s game?” Sunwoo shakes his head at the comments. Ever since he announced the game of choice for the week, all he’s gotten were either complaints or dreamy sighs about how nostalgic it’s gonna be. Is Minecraft not cool anymore? Should he get a new hobby?

“Kinda is,” Yeji laughs, making the boy roll his eyes at her.

“You’re just mad you’re missing out on all the fun,” he argues, “heal your inner child a little. Make that pretty house you’ve always wanted!”

“I fuck with Minecraft,” an innocent voice lands into his ears from the opposite of him– a voice he would often curse out and cringe at just because of it’s sheer existence in his proximity, but now tolerates in favor of keeping peace in the room. The comment still startles him, though– he didn’t expect anyone to agree with his point. Not if it’s you, anyway.

“Can’t believe you two finally agree on something,” Aeri sighs from your side, the girl always glued to your hip. “You do realise you’re having an advantage if you’re letting us play on your server, though?”

“It’s not like we’re playing extreme survival tournament, come on guys–”

“You aren’t,” you shrug, “don’t really know about the rest of us,” you comment, meeting his eyes with a smug look, a teasing grin slowly slipping its way onto your lips.

“I’m banning anyone who tries to kill me today from the club,” Sunwoo suddenly announces, making everyone sigh at the dramaticness of his theatrical words. “Forever.”

“You can’t ban anyone over a game–” Haechan chimes in, but is cut off by his peer instantly.

“I will call it harassment and bullying,” Sunwoo shrugs, “try to argue with that.”

“You’re just begging to get targeted at this point,” Aeri mumbles, shaking her head at him. She’s right– but Sunwoo is also kind of confident in his defence abilities. 

Unless he gets ganged up on, of course.

Which could happen– truth be told, he’s had it coming.

“Less talking and more gaming, please,” Yangyang calls from the corner, “I wanna steal Sunwoo’s diamonds now. Turn the shit on.”

And although Sunwoo doesn’t really like the implication of his friend’s words, he doesn’t argue. Mainly because 15 minutes have already passed and the club is only supposed to go on for an hour– which leaves the 10 of them only 45 minutes left to mine and do something meaningful. The owner of the server also moved the spawn point the farthest away from his house– in hopes of them not finding it and putting TNT all over the premises. (If they manage to craft some in the limited time space, that is. He doubts it, but truth be told, he can never be too sure.)

“Okay, I sent the IP of the server into the groupchat, so just type it in and press the Play button on the left and it should take you instantly here,” Sunwoo exclaims as he clicks on his server and connects to it, walking around the spawn point with his character for a bit, waiting for the rest of his group to arrive.

Pressing the TAB key, he keeps checking the usernames of the people jumping in. Once mega_dino turns up, he lets out an amused chuckle– there’s nothing that tops the nicknames you made when you were 11. Sunwoo’s email address scares him to this day, but he is too lazy to make a new one, since all of his subscriptions and social media are tied to it– it does make sending official emails to his university coordinators that much embarrassing, though.

Some nicknames are recognisable– such as yejiiiji or haechanahceah, but some are less decipherable, leaving him guessing who could be the one joining the game. He doesn’t ask about them, though, thinking that figuring it out as he plays will be more fun– when one nickname he recognises all too well suddenly shows up on the list of players, making his heart jump in surprise.

What is his friend doing on the server at this time of the day? She doesn’t usually play in the early hours of the afternoon– leaving her sessions to evening or late night. That’s when she calls Sunwoo and asks him to help her with mining (or begging for his diamonds, which he sometimes rejects, but complies with on the days he is the most weak to her cuteness). 

He considers pulling up his phone and texting her on Discord to notify the poor girl about the influx of new players on the server. She must be confused– maybe even scared, who knows– to see so many new people playing at the same time. The server Sunwoo created was a bit small, hosting only a few of his friends and a couple of people he met online, so a big amount of players would surely make it seem like someone hacked him, right?

“Is everyone in?” he asks instead, hearing everyone let out excited hums and nods.

He furrows his brows. The server says 10 people are currently connected to it, but if his calculations are correct, the number should be 11– everyone from his club and his online best friend, sunpoodle.

He does a double take on the list, shaking his head. He counts the people in his head over and over again, a little frustrated. Why is everyone saying they’re in? It’s clearly not adding up.

Looking up from his computer, he eyes the rest of his friends in the café. Everyone is playing soundly and happily, it seems, paying him no mind as they get accustomed with the new world and warm back up to the controls of the game they haven’t played in ages. 

Everyone but one person. Everyone but you.

Instead, you’re left staring at him with stern eyes. The look you offer him is sharp, maybe a little hurt– and at the moment, he doesn’t know why. Confusion is the only feeling jumping around the walls of his brain, making an unpleasant crease appear in between his eyebrows. Gears slowly turning, he tries to figure it all out.

You’re not playing. You’re not paying attention to the game. It’s like you know it all– like you’re so familiar with it, as if playing it daily. As if you know the server he made. As if you have your house in it, decorated with a cute offering in front of the door, a portal to his own home residing in the front yard.

It happens quickly– the realisation. He finally makes the connection. It dawns on him why you look so surprised. Why you look so shocked, so disturbed. 

Because if you’re the only unmoving one on the map right now and his online friend is not the one to play on Tuesday afternoons, there is only one explanation. 

“Oh my fucking god,” leaves his lips, albeit a little involuntarily. His voice is hoarse and harsh when he says the words, a final nail in the coffin for you as you stand up, the sound of the wheels of the chair churning against the floor, making everyone’s eyes snap to you.

You don’t turn off the game before you storm out of the room, giving him a clear view of your back, the character with the adorable skin you’ve picked out staring back at him blankly in the game. For a second, he doesn’t follow you– letting himself process. Everyone turns to Aeri for answers, as she’s the closest with you, but they get nothing as the girl just shrugs, equally confused, before she runs out of the room to find her best friend.

Sunwoos' ears start ringing. He feels like throwing up. 

This can’t be…

There’s nothing more in this world that Kim Sunwoo enjoys more than playing Minecraft. He enjoys mining with music playing in his headphones. He loves crafting and making his house look perfect– just like little him always wanted it when he watched all those videos on youtube growing up. He likes to prank his friend Juyeon by putting random dirt blocks all over his house, or stealing all of Younghoon’s sugar cane when he’s offline, too lazy to grow some himself. He likes to teleport to his friend’s house and leave little surprises at the door, only to hear her call him a few seconds later, her cheerful, yet soft voice repeating in his ears even after he turns off the game and goes to his bed, letting her stories lull him to sleep. 

There’s nothing more in this world that Kim Sunwoo enjoys more than playing Minecraft with his online best friend– the two of them ganging up on the dragon or entering the Nether together to find some glowstone for her house, because she wants it to look aesthetically pleasing. There’s nothing more he enjoys than helping her with little tasks and fighting off creepers away from her property, making sure they don’t blow out all the hard work she’s been putting in.

There’s nothing more in the world that he enjoys more than talking with his online friend during the mundane hours of the day, her messages making him hide his giggles in the back rows of his lecture halls. Nothing he enjoys more than her laugh, her jokes, her voice, her online presence. It calms him and sets him on fire all at once, and he doesn’t think he’s ever cared for anyone this deeply. 

How has he never noticed that the person he hates the most is also the same person that he’s pretty sure he’s in love with? How has he never noticed it was you all the time?

And really, there’s nothing in the world Kim Sunwoo enjoys more than playing Minecraft with you. This time around, though, no progress in the world is made and your voice is not talking his ear off in the background. He shuts off the computer and leaves the place, not giving anyone an ounce of explanation.

You don’t text him in the evening like you always do. There’s no night call to help him sleep better.

He doesn’t turn the LED lights on in his room either, contemplating his life in complete darkness.

Nobody’s seen or heard of Kim Sunwoo in just a little under a week. Actually, that is an over-exaggeration– he went to take his exams, and he also went grocery shopping when he went out of ramen and his signature comfort food: red tasty KitKat bars– but other than that, it’s like the boy has disappeared from the face of earth.

There is no Video Gaming club, since it’s officially break time now– for only 2 weeks, but still– and he is declining every single invitation to hang out coming from his friends. He’s simply not in the mood to go anywhere or do anything, and so he spends his days locked away in his room.

Nothing is able to cut off his stream of thought. He’s not listening to music, so the occasional sounds of his roommate moving somewhere in the shared apartment are the only background noise to his loud inner voice. The elevator music usually playing in his head is replaced by a screaming match, and although he wishes it would stop, he can’t really control it– until the sound of his door opening makes him jolt away from the nightmare he’s living in.

Usually, he just tells Eric to fuck off and leave his room– since he is not in the headspace right now to spare anyone kindness, it seems– but when the disgusted face of Ji Changmin enters the place, Sunwoo knows there is no escaping this interrogation.

“Man, it stinks in here,” the boy grunts, moving through the obstacle course Sunwoo’s room has turned into in the few days he hasn’t bothered to put away his dirty laundry. 

“Go away,” Sunwoo says. It’s a weak attempt– he already knows he lost this battle.

“Yeah, no,” Changmin shakes his head before moving to the window, opening it. “Eric orders a wellness check on you, so I’m not leaving until I figure out what’s wrong. I was told you left the club early the last time?”

Sunwoo doesn’t offer him a response. All Changmin can do is guess in this situation, and trust me, although they’re best friends, sadly, they still haven’t developed telepathy– and so the conversation is a little tougher than the squirrel-like boy would prefer.

“Did something happen?”

Sunwoo recognises it’s already dark outside, the sound of cicadas landing into his ears through the open window. He doesn’t know how long he’s been glued to his mattress, but it makes him feel a little foolish. Not more than his previous actions, though– that surely takes the crown.

“I have a crush on Y/N,” Sunwoo speaks into the existence, startling the boy.

It’s weird for the boy to call you by your name in regards to his feelings. While he was so sure of his growing adoration for you when he spoke to you online, unaware of your real identity, it’s much harder to admit it to himself when the person he spent countless nights dreaming about finally turns into reality, and it’s not the form he expected. It’s confusing. It’s overwhelming– it leaves him thinking. Why did it have to be you?

“What?” Changmin asks, genuine shock and surprise coating his tone. “I thought you hated Y/N.”

The words sting like a slap to his face. He hated you. How could he ever be so reckless with his words to you? How could he be so mean? You must hate him now.

“Didn’t you have a crush on that online girl? What– I’m confused, man…” Changmin trails off, finally sitting at Sunwoo’s bed, the weight of his body making the mattress shift under the lazy man’s figure. 

“She’s the same person,” Sunwoo explains, the weight of his words making heaviness fall over the whole room, coating it with deep silence.

Changmin must think he’s foolish. He must think he is being crazy– hell, he must judge him for liking someone who once broke his heart, even though he was unaware it was the same person that made him feel so loved just by talking to him online. 

He cares about what you think more, though. Do you never wanna see him again? Do you hate him? He would hate himself, if he was you. 

Does he hate you? Does he want to see you again? Is your friendship over?

Did he lose you?

He hasn’t spoken to you in what feels like forever. Sunwoo’s throat closes on itself, making a real, visceral emotion run through his whole body and hit right in his chest, close to his heart. The corners of his eyes burn and he feels like running out of the room straight onto an ongoing traffic– he is unsettled. He feels terrible.

“Dude, are you crying?” Changmin asks with a shiteating grin on his face, pointing towards the younger one’s face. 

“No!” Sunwoo bluntly replies, voice hoarse and scratchy, harshly wiping off the tear that managed to roll down his cheek– almost slapping himself in the process. 

Changmin laughs. He laughs. Like it’s funny. Like it’s unserious and nothing is going on, like there is nothing to be worried about, and Kim Sunwoo is just being his overdramatic self, as always. Changmin laughs as if liking someone who once broke your friend’s heart is silly and not a big deal. As if not recognising someone you like online in real life is a normal experience, and not completely embarrassing– as if being mean to the same person you claim to adore is fine, and nothing to hate yourself over.

Sunwoo is conflicted. Talk about cognitive dissonance.

“Why are you laughing? It’s not funny,” Sunwoo pouts, the familiar wrinkle appearing in the middle of his eyebrows again, making his friend roll his eyes at the boy’s distress.

Changmin sighs. “It kinda is, if you think about it,” he shrugs, “you claim to hate Y/N, but turns out you’ve been in love with her all along…”

“You’re really not helping.”

“Well, what do you want me to do?” Changmin snickers. “I think this makes it easier for you. I know you were nervous about meeting her in real life, so this kind of takes off the pressure, since you already know each other.”

Sunwoo looks at his friend like he’s crazy. Does he not get the full weight of the situation? Does he not realise how serious this all is?

“What are you even talking about? Do you not hate me?” Sunwoo asks.

“Me?” Changmin asks, his head turning to the side like a confused puppy’s. “I don’t think I’m the person you need to worry about– although I’m sure you worry plenty– why would I hate you for liking Y/N?”

“Because she is your ex-girlfriend?” Sunwoo mumbles, twisting in his bed to have a better look at his friend. 

He is met with a few seconds of silence. He is starting to think his whole life is a joke and he is in some sort of a weird knock-off of the Truman show. How can you and Changmin both have the same reaction to his undying loyalty? He is being taken for granted, that’s for sure.

“You utter buffoon, that was ages ago! I honestly forget we even dated sometimes, it was so short-lived,” Changmin laughs before he rests his back against the wall of Sunwoo’s room, getting more comfortable in his new position. He knows the conversation isn’t over yet– there is more on the boy’s mind than the past relationship.

“Oh,” Sunwoo hums. 

“Yeah, oh,” Changmin laughs. “I honestly thought there was more to your hate towards Y/N, but I never really asked because I thought it was some gamer stuff or something that I couldn’t give two shits about. If I had known it was all because of my relationship from high school, I would’ve set the record straight a long time ago.”

“Well, maybe you should’ve.”

Sunwoo feels defeated. Like a deflated balloon. The weight on his shoulders stays the same despite the newfound information– because truth be told, this was never the problem in the first place.

And he is aware of that. Changmin is as well– he knows his best friend a little too much.

“But that’s not all there is to it, is it?” Changmin hums, poking the boy’s side with his long finger, burying it into his hoodie-covered flesh.

Sunwoo’s averted gaze and the chewing on the inside of his cheek is enough of an answer. “What is it?”

“It’s just… I don’t know how to feel about Y/N anymore,” Sunwoo confesses, snickering to himself. “Like, online, she was this perfect angel, like– don’t laugh at me now, you know I’m fucking sensitive– she was just… she was everything, you know?”

Changmin hums. “And in real life?”

“In real life, we were never really close and I hated her. How can I like someone I so strongly dislike in real life? It’s stupid…”

“You only hated what she did to me when we were teenagers, Sunwoo. You made yourself loathe something that wasn’t even there,” Changmin says, smiling sympathetically at the boy. “Do you think she is suddenly a different person to the one you got to know online just because she made a few mistakes when we were young?”

“I dunno…”

“I think you do know, you’re just scared to admit it to yourself, because you know you were a dick to her,” his best friend bluntly announces, watching Sunwoo wince at the words. Truth hurts– but it’s what he needs to hear. Because Changmin’s right, and Sunwoo is too tired of keeping all of these doubts hidden.

“Changmin, I can’t like her–”

“Why?” the boy cuts him off. “Because you said so? You were so big on saying how much you loved her for who she is, without knowing her in real life and knowing what she looked like. And sure, I made fun of you for it countless times before– but don’t you think you know her well enough by now? And don’t try to tell me you don’t know her just because you met online, because you know you’d be a fucking hypocrite.”

“But it’s Y/N.”

“Does that make any difference?”

Sunwoo moves from the inside of his cheek to bite at the dry skin of his lower lip. After tugging at the chapped mess, he feels iron on his tongue from tearing off a piece of his skin, eyes still pressed sternly into the ceiling. 

Does it make any difference? Does Sunwoo like you less now that he knows who you are? It was never about the looks for him– and god knows he barely even knew you in real life. Saying he wasn’t interested anymore would make him a hypocrite. 

Every time he thinks of the night talks you two shared and the secrets you’d tell him, trusting him with anything and everything, his heart still stummers in his chest and his stomach does that weird thing everyone in the romantic movies his roommate Eric watches talks about– but now, the girl has a face and a voice, and Sunwoo can’t say he hates it. He can’t say he hates you.

“I guess it doesn’t,” Sunwoo whispers, saying the obvious.

He still wants you. Just the way you are. Sure, he was shocked– anyone would be– but the feelings he has for you are still the same; it’s just the hate that slowly left his body, disappearing like the puddles of rain on the pavement on a sunny day. 

He can’t hate someone so important to him. How foolish of him to once think you were the bane of his existence.

“So why don’t you two just talk it out?” Changmin asks, pointing out the obvious.

Sunwoo plays with the skin around his cuticles for a while, nervously picking at the loose skin and making himself bleed once again, the nerves getting the worst out of him. “I think I’m a little scared.”

“So I was right. You’re scared she will push you away because you were a dick to her all those times before,” Changmin once again states the obvious.

“Basically,” Sunwoo says, his insecurities slowly slipping through his mouth and out to the wild, hanging in the air. “As much as my feelings didn’t change, I think hers might have. And that’s… that’s scary.”

In Sunwoo’s eyes, what you and he had together was special. He never wanted to lose you to something like this– over spite, a foolish lack of judgement. The thought of never talking to you again is making his insides crash on themselves, guilt slowly, but surely eating him alive. The best thing that’s ever happened to him might be royally fucked over, and there is no one else he can blame but himself.

“Well, you don’t know that. And although I know you might be too scared to find out, you two both need to have a talk. Don’t you think you owe each other that much?”

Changmin’s right. He almost always is– he doesn’t know why Sunwoo ever thought the older one needed protecting. Like a pouty child, Kim Sunwoo is comforted by his best friend’s words, maybe even a little scolded and enlightened by the dimpled boy. The appreciation in his heart almost outgrows the worry, but there is still a you-shaped hole in his chest that he feels the need to fill– only if you allow him to.

He didn’t expect for it to end up being you, but he doesn’t hate the idea. 

He’s not opposed to it. He welcomes it, because 

It’s still the same you. In whatever form, in whatever shape– he knows your soul, and he fears nothing will ever take away and move the feelings he treasures for you to another place, to some other.

They’re reserved for you only. (Also, he always thought your cunning smile was nice to look at. He just tried to suppress the idea of it deep, deep within his mind.)

“We were supposed to meet tomorrow,” Sunwoo hums, “I’ll see if she… still wants to come.”

Changmin smiles. “I knew you were smarter than this.” 

The backhanded compliment would rile him up on most occasions– this time, though, he knows it’s deserved.

One would say Kim Sunwoo didn’t think much before going up to the new café that opened downtown the week after exams, just like you two scheduled. Why?

First of all, he didn’t really check in with you to see if the offer is still up and if you want to meet him after all of this. Second of all, he turned up almost 35 minutes too early, since he was so nervous pacing around his flat that he physically couldn’t stay in the closed space anymore, and third of all, he’s fairly certain he put two different socks on when he was dressing himself, and after further inspection by the front door of the coffee place, pulling his jeans up to take a look, he finds out his suspicions were correct.

The thing is, though, against popular belief, Kim Sunwoo thought almost a little too much before going to the scheduled hangout. He thought about it the whole night before– and the whole previous week, if he’s being honest. He thought about it so much it consumed his every waking thought, leaving him all over the place, distracted and distressed. On most occasions, Eric had to ask a question five times before he was heard by his dear roommate, and if he wanted a real answer out of him, he had to gentle parent him through the conversation.

Sunwoo thought about it so much up to the point that you were all that was in his head. You and your last conversations on Discord which he spent the whole week rereading, you and your house in Minecraft that was left untouched since the last time you two played together (he checked). You and your laugh and the gentle, soft voice you only used with him on your calls– the voice that lulled him to sleep and make him feel butterflies in his stomach, unrecognisable to the hardened tone you used with him whenever you met up in real life when the conflicts he used to stir got the best out of you.

You and your cunning smile. You and your piercing, playful gaze. You and your hair that always kept falling into your face when you were crouched over the keyboard. It’s almost laughable how much he managed to pay attention to you in real life before knowing you were the same person he spent months adoring over the internet– the universe really works in strange ways sometimes.

So really, Kim Sunwoo has thought a lot about you and you two meeting before actually leaving the house; which could also very well be the reason why he didn’t text you to see if you still want to see him in the first place– in fear of being declined, in fear of being rejected by the only person he so deeply craves the validation from.

If you don’t show up, he will just go home and pretend none of this ever happened.

(Or at least he hopes he can.)

The more time he spends standing in front of the coffee shop, though, the more his hope of ever seeing you again gets smaller and smaller. Minutes are slowly passing him by like last summer, and he swears he’s never felt the passing of time more than right in this moment. He feels like he is gaining 5 years every 5 minutes that he’s standing in the middle of the pavement– the clock striking well past 20 minutes of when you were supposed to meet.

He will give it 10 more minutes, he thinks. 20, at most. Maybe he can wait an hour. Maybe you got stuck in the traffic. Maybe you got confused with the time…

Or maybe you’re just not coming, and he has to accept that.

Kicking the rocks under his feet while also trying to get out of the way of people walking past, he puts his hands deep into his pockets. He would rather die than to embarrass himself in front of you by texting you, and so he figures that if he just waits a few more minutes, God will surely give him a sign of when to stop holding back his tears and go back home…

“You look like a kicked puppy,” a voice– teasing, yet also a bit cautious– falls into his ears, making him perk up and look behind his shoulder. God must really love him today, he thinks.

No words escape his mouth for the time being. His brain goes short circuit a little at the sight of you– and in that moment he fully realises that he didn’t actually expect you to come, and that makes him feel even worse about himself. Relief washes over him like a wave of tsunami, the surprised look adorning Sunwoo’s face disappearing in seconds as he tries to manage his racing heartbeat.

“You came,” slips out from between his lips, making the boy immensely embarrassed with his choice of words. 

“I did,” you nod, pressing your lips tightly against each other, an awkward half-smile doing nothing to calm down Sunwoo’s nerves. “I figured you either come and we figure this out, or you don’t and I get something to treat myself to chase down the disappointment.”

You’d be disappointed if he didn’t come. Just the sentiment makes Sunwoo’s heart do backflips in his ribcage– how could he ever think he hated you? 

“Kind of same, actually,” he replies, nodding.

An awkward silence falls over you two like a weighted blanket, making Sunwoo’s stomach churn in discomfort. This is not how he imagined your first meeting to be– but then again, it’s not like he is meeting his online best friend (if he can even call you that anymore) for the first time. He tries to find the memory of your first meeting somewhere in the depths of his mind, but much to his dismay, he is left unsuccessful. He never really deemed it that important before– curse him and his reckless teenage mind.

“Uhm,” you hum, scratching the back of your neck, “I was… the bus was late, by the way. I didn’t purposefully let you wait to like, get back at you or something,” you suddenly explain, your lips stretching into a sympathetic smile.

The explanation doesn’t matter to him anymore. He doesn’t care if you came 20 minutes late and if you took the bus or if you built a portal in the back rooms of the very café you’re supposed to enter in a few minutes– all that matters is that you came and that you’re here, right in front of Sunwoo’s eyes, and you’re not pulling out a machete or an axe on him as a revenge for all the times he acted wrongly towards you in the past.

“Oh, no worries,” he hums almost immediately, “you’re here now, and that’s all that matters,” he nods. 

After another shared, prolonged look between the two of you– one in which he scans you up and down, as if actually seeing you for the first time (and noticing the switch in your usual attire: you exchanged your cargo pants for a skirt, something more fancy, yet telling), a look in which he gets all red in his cheeks, wondering if you noticed the way he did his hair differently today, just to appeal to you– he clears his throat and takes a step towards the café, opening the door for you like the gentleman he tries to be today. “Let’s go in, then!”

You follow his lead, entering the small, yet cozy place. The cold weather outside makes a good contrast with the heating of the café, and when Sunwoo takes a look at the board above the counter, he finds a seasonal menu welcoming him in with a big bear hug. Hot chocolate is just what he needs after all of this, and he won’t deny himself the pleasure of one now.

“Hot choccy?” you ask, smiling softly at the silent figure standing next to you. Sunwoo is caught off-guard with your suggestion and the gentle curve of your lips just the same, warmth spreading to the inside of his heart at the realisation that you know him so well. It’s her. It’s really her, he gasps in disbelief.

“Want one as well?” he asks after nodding, watching you shrug. He takes that as a yes, and since he thinks he did a lot of damage over the course of your friendship, he takes the lead and pays for your drink to try and make up for it– which you don’t fight him over, and he doesn’t find it in him to care. Actually, he thinks he kind of appreciates it. 

After taking a seat in one of the booths in the corner– the cream sofa hugs him in just well, and Sunwoo thinks he might just give this place a 5 star review on Yelp, depending on the way this date- I mean… friendly gathering goes– he is met with another excruciating, suffocating silence. He never really had much trouble talking to you before– surely not online, but also not whenever you were around in real life settings as well, since he always found a way to tease you and make fun of you, giving you most of his undivided attention– but this time around, he thinks keeping up a conversation with you might just be the hardest thing he’s ever had to experience. 

You make him nervous. You make him doubtful. If he wondered about how you’d perceive him after meeting him before knowing you two were acquainted already, he is wondering even more now– do you hate him? Do you wish he wasn’t the one sitting opposite of you right now? Do you want to leave and never talk to him again?

Is he good enough? Does he live up to the expectations– if you even had any?

All previous hatred towards you disappears as fast as a click of your finger, and Kim Sunwoo is left breathless at the fact that you’re right there, in front of him– his online best friend. He thinks he might have still liked you even if you turned out to be a mass murderer. He thinks he might have still liked you even if you were a 50 year old male in a disguise. He thinks the bond you two have built over the internet is much stronger than any mean comments he threw your way before– and the only thing left is to hope you feel the same.

Opening his mouth to speak, he thinks it’s time to have that conversation.

“Listen, I–”

“Were you disappointed that it was me?” you cut him off suddenly, fast as lightning– as if to hurry to get the question out before you chicken out of it.

Sunwoo is left staring at you open-mouthed, shocked. There was not a single minute of his existence where he’d feel disappointed with your identity. The thought never even crossed his brain once, and suddenly, he feels stupid. 

He left you hanging for a whole week– all because he thought you’d hate him. He left you wondering in silence, doubting yourself and thinking you’re not who he would’ve liked– all because of his own insecurities. Why has he not thought of your side of things as well?

“No,” he simply states, watching your face morph into a more relaxed one, eyes softening. “Not at all, no,” he shakes his head.

“I just– it’s…”

“I’m sorry if I ever made you feel that way,” Sunwoo utters out. You press your lips together, listening. “Was I surprised? Mhm. Shocked? Yeah, of course I was… but no, I was never disappointed that it turned out to be you. Not for a single moment.”

“I thought you hated me,” you note, chuckling. The words sting on Sunwoo’s skin, but he figures he’s not the one to be hurt right now– and so he sucks it up and hums.

“I was being petty,” he agrees. “And childish. Nothing to be so passionate about as I was,” he admits, forcefully laughing at his own actions. “Nothing to throw away everything we… nothing to throw away the friendship that means so much to me.”

The sincerity of his own words scares him. There is a quiet desperation in him that wants to prove to you that he’s not as bad as he presented himself to be. There is a need in him to fix everything he ruined, to show you that he’s the same Sunwoo you know from the internet, and that all of this is worth it. 

“And I’m sorry, just… just by the way.”

Sunwoo never thought he’d be left apologizing to you– but here he is. Maybe this whole thing taught him something– maybe you taught him something. 

“Ah,” you shrug. “It’s okay. I mean, it was kind of fun watching you be so pressed about nothing, but I’m glad it’s resolved now,” you laugh.

You laugh, and the atmosphere immediately clears. Sunwoo feels like he can breathe lighter, like the cold isn’t so overbearing outside, like he hadn’t just spent the last week locked in his room, contemplating the point of living at all. He didn’t think it would be this easy… 

Something inside of him truly believed he lost you for good. 

“I mean, you were the one that ran out of the internet café without an explanation–”

“You cursed me out!” you argue, kicking his shin lightly under the table.

The boy fakes offense, pointing his finger at you. “That wasn’t directed at you! Just the situation in general.”

“That includes me,” you add.

“Sure, but still– I was just surprised. I really didn’t expect my online best friend to be sitting in the same room as me every week, that’s for sure,” he says, watching as your eyes light up at the title, a cute smile overtaking your features.

“I also didn’t expect you to ghost me for a full week after,” you add, shrugging. “You’re usually so desperate for attention,” you hum, making the boy’s cheeks heat up like a furnace, eyes averting your gaze at all costs. Now, this surely wasn’t on the list of things he wanted to discuss with you today.

Clearing his throat, he makes eye contact with his mug instead, desperately trying to shift the topic of the conversation. “Drink it, it’s getting cold…”

“Sure… Whatever you say, Steve,” you tease. When he looks up at you from under his eyelashes, there’s the same cunning smile on your face that he watched all those times when you won against him at League of Legends– the same smile that used to always drive him crazy, but he now recognises that he translated the implications of his insanity all wrong (because he thinks that maybe somewhere deep inside of his romantic, rotten soul, he might have known all along)– and he wonders if this was the smile you always wore when you made fun of him for falling asleep on the call with you again, the boy using your soft, sleepy voice as a lullaby. 

Sunwoo almost chokes on his drink, pointing an accusing finger at you. “Speaking of,” he starts, “the kids miss you. Go and feed them, miss,” he says, watching you roll your eyes at him. The dogs you co-parent with him in Minecraft  have been sitting near your front door ever since you last logged out, and even though coming to your house felt like an emotional torture in the time you were gone, Sunwoo always managed to feed them like he would with a real animal.

Call him childish, for all he cares. 

“Okay, damn,” you say, rolling your eyes at him. “You only say that because you want me to finally move our beds together, don’t you?” you tease him, referencing the little offering he made for you months ago– the one that’s still secure outside of your house despite many of its renovations.

Sunwoo almost chokes on his drink again. You grin at him– a sight that makes his insides feel like they were threaded with gold. He swears hot chocolate has never felt so sweet before. 

If he wasn’t sure of it before, he’s fairly certain now– you can fall for someone over the internet. And yes, the crush translates to its full form after meeting them in person.

“I mean, I wouldn’t be opposed to it…” he mumbles, not really quick enough to come up with a good comeback now that he’s face to face with you, making you giggle cutely at his sudden shyness. This is not how you know Kim Sunwoo– the sheepish composure is so far of the boy you met online, but also the one that ridiculed you during a casual game of CS:GO weeks ago.

“I’ll decide if it’s worth it after you show me the lights you’ve been talking my ear off about,” you say– and he thinks he won. Because this is an invitation to his room– an invitation for further hangouts. If you keep flirting with him like this, Sunwoo thinks he might just combust.

There is only one problem, though.

“About the lights…”

BONUS // A YEAR LATER

If you would’ve told Kim Sunwoo that he will end up in a long distance relationship only a bit more than a year ago, he would’ve believed you. See, he’s a stranger to denial– he is quite good at accepting his own feelings for what they were, inwardly, at least– and so he was fairly certain he was in love with his online best friend even before he had a chance to meet her. Somewhere along the line, given the fact that his feelings would be reciprocated, he imagined going further with the establishment, no matter how far or close in distance you were from each other.

Turns out, life is funny in many ways and his online best friend, the proclaimed love of his life, lived just around the corner with her roommate Aeri. She still doesn’t like him that much, but Sunwoo puts effort into visiting his girlfriend at her place often, in hopes that her best friend finally warms up to him a little– he thinks it’s almost like approaching a stray cat. The Sylvanian families shrine the two girls hold in their living room is also fascinating to him– he didn’t think someone with a stern look like Aeri’s could stare at something so adorable and small so lovingly.

“Sunwoo, once again, we are not in a long distance relationship,” you say over the speakers of his sister’s laptop that he borrowed just so he could call with you, making him mourn into the poor-quality microphone. 

“We are! You’re so far away right now, how can you justify it not being a long distance relationship?” 

“We literally saw each other a week ago,” you deadpan, “and we will see each other again after we come back to uni, you moron.”

See, Sunwoo’s definition of a long distance relationship is a bit warped. As long as you’re not in the same town as him, he considers you too far away– and in any other circumstance, you would find it cute (bless his heart), but when you’re trying to enjoy your break with your family that you haven’t seen in a while, it’s becoming just the tiniest bit overbearing.

“That’s too long.”

“You’re being a baby,” you grunt, making your boyfriend pout at the other side of the call, seen by his web camera. You were against turning your own on, but were forced to nonetheless– Sunwoo’s ‘I need to see your face or else I’ll die’ was too convincing not to. You know he won’t, but at the same time, the poor boy could turn a little manic at times– you had to make sure he will survive until your next meeting.

“God, a man can’t even miss his long distance girlfriend in peace–”

“I am not your long distance girlfriend. We’re literally only like 4 hours away from each other right now, that’s not even–”

“If you think about it,” Sunwoo cuts you off, making you sigh. “It’s like we’re back to square one. Y’know, before we started dating.”

“Not really…?” you try to argue with him, planning to point out the fact that back then, you used to call on Discord and not Whatsapp, with no camera on and using fake names, but the boy cuts you off fast, knowing that you’re right and he just can’t let you have the point.

“I miss your kisses, that’s all.”

Still hung up on the previous comment, you sigh. “We weren’t even kissing back then, Sunwoo.”

The boy stares at you for a second, blinking, before he breaks out into a huge grin. “Well, maybe not you. Me, however, I was kissing the screen everytime your character showed up–”

“I’m going to end the call,” you warn him. Why are you even dating him? He has a bitchless loser energy– maybe you should let him live up to it.

“No no no– okay, I’ll be normal.”

“I find that hard to believe,” you sigh.

If you would’ve told Kim Sunwoo that he will end up in a long distance relationship only a bit more than a year ago, he would’ve believed you. After seeing the little heart shaped altar in front of your house in Minecraft every time he plays– your beds now stuck together, making him sense that he finally made it– he truly wouldn’t find this accusation hard to believe.

Truth be told, though, he’s much happier with having a normal relationship with you.

One where he gets to hold you, one where he gets to kiss you. One where you finally come over and he gets to impress you with the LED strip he finally got off a proper electronic place instead of a cheap online store, investing money into the device he gets to use behind the locked doors of his room for atmospheric purposes whenever you two–

Anyways. 

Maybe Changmin was right and he was always being just too overly-dramatic. He was also right when he accused Sunwoo of having a huge crush on you online, after all. 

Still, Sunwoo wouldn’t change it for anything. Despite the history you share, he actually thinks you’re pretty fucking cute.

And real. And his. 

And thankfully, not a thousand miles away. (Although it may feel like it right now.)