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blessedbucky · 5 months ago

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we tried the world, good god, it wasn't for us! (part 3)

pairing: autistic!satoru x suguru x autistic!reader

word count: ........14k? oops?

summary: a glimpse at your first year in tokyo jujutsu high

tags: autistic!reader, autistic!satoru, bisexual!reader, bisexual!suguru, ableism, internalized ableism, mentioned child abuse, light bullying, satoru has some identity issues, actually EVERYONE has identity issues here, jealous and protective boys, JJK typical violence

beautiful people who asked to be tagged 💕: @ichikanu, @iceheartsice, @anders-is-being-a-simp-again

author note: um.....so....this was meant to be all three of the high school years in one chapter........but i lost control of the plot. and here we are...FOURTEEN THOUSAND WORDS LATER...and THIS WAS ONLY THE FIRST YEAR of them in high school? help me.

translation note: jiheishō is the japanese term for autism

chapter links: ONE, TWO, AO3

[YEAR ONE.]

Graduation comes.

Finally.

In the months since you and Suguru were offered scholarships with Jujutsu High, word slowly spread around the school. Suguru and you have to sit on the roof for lunches to escape your growing popularity. You have no idea why these people have started to crawl out of the woodworks, but Suguru said he kind of expected it. It’s not only you two that want out of the village and you two are going to live the life that everyone else dreams of. They think they can worm their way into your lives now and leech off any future success or have an in inside Tokyo.

Still, you can’t believe how many addresses and phone numbers you’re given. There are a few that you keep, people from the art club that you joined who have always been cordial enough to you. You felt a little obligated because they pitched in to buy you a relatively nice art supply kit to continue your craft in Tokyo. The rest of the contact information is tossed in the trash, some right in front of their faces out of spite.

Meanwhile, Suguru is almost suspended.

No one can prove that Nakayama Izuru was attacked by Suguru, though. It’s not possible for a human to leave the claw marks on Nakayama’s arms. You can only imagine that saccharine smile that Suguru was wearing when he told the school staff that he saw a tanuki attack Nakayama. The only crime he committed was not getting help sooner and, for that, he apologized. Nakayama himself even admitted that he didn’t see anything or that Suguru didn’t put hands on him, but he knows Suguru was responsible somehow.

You, obviously, know better.

“Idiot,” you hiss when you and Suguru are at your usual afterschool hangout spot by the river. “That wasn’t very heroic of you. It could’ve costed you your scholarship if word got back to Tokyo.”

Suguru rolls his eyes. “It wasn’t even that bad. A cat could’ve done more damage than I did.”

You sigh. “I know we’ve always teased people with your collection, but we’ve never drawn blood. You don’t like him, never have, but I didn’t think it was that bad.” You throw a rock, trying to get it to skip across the water, but it just gives a sad plop and sinks. “What happened?”

“Remember when you and Endo got in that fight a few months ago?” You nod slowly. “It was something like that.” He’s not looking at you, but his rage still lingers. He’s usually good at skipping rocks, but not today. “Which means you can’t judge me because if you knew how to fight, you definitely would’ve. Don’t even try to pretend you wouldn’t.”

“Yeah, but I suck at keeping my mouth shut and can’t control my emotions for shit. I know I’m gonna struggle when we start high school because of that.” This isn’t a scolding. You’re just really worried because, “You’re good at letting that stuff roll off you.”

Suguru’s frown deepens. “Not about you.” If it wasn’t so quiet here, you’d have missed him whisper, “Never about you.”

“People have made fun of me before.”

“It’s different.” He presses a thumb against his forehead. “Can we drop this?”

“Well, I kinda want to know what he said. I told you what Endo said, didn’t I?”

“I’d rather not.”

“Suguru,” you sing. “I’ll keep asking. Don’t I have a right to know?”

“I was trying to be polite.” His eye is twitching irritably. “He said that he never noticed until now how nice your tits are. The nicest in our class.” You burst out in a fit of laughter. A vein throbs at his temple. Maybe this is why he didn’t want to say anything. “It’s not funny, Squid. It was disgusting. He tried to act buddy-buddy with me while I was waiting for you to get done with art club. He wanted to know if you were still a virgin or not.”

You shake your head, wiping a stray tear from your eye. “Nakayama thinks because his father owns the biggest farm that he’s worth something. Not even Endo would date him and she’s the most popular girl in school.” You crouch down to rummage for some skipping stones. “Hey, if we’re still virgins by the end of high school, want to take each other’s virginities?”

It’s like all the fight rushes out of him, the way Suguru sighs and how his shoulders slump in defeat. “You shouldn’t say things like that.” His neck, the tips of his ears, his entire face…it’s all so red. It’s rare to find, but there are some things that go too far. You open your mouth to apologize, but he interrupts. “You promise?”

“I promise.” You give one of the stones you find a few tosses, making sure it’s light enough. “I kind of always thought it would be you, anyway. Now that we’re leaving the village, you’ll get super popular at this new school, so I doubt you’ll be single by the time we graduate, but this is on the off chance that you are.” He tilts his head back, staring up at the skies. That’s his existential crisis face. “I’m sorry. Was that too far?”

“I always thought it would be you, too,” he admits quietly. “I guess…you’re making it sound so transactional.”

Right. Girls say that the first time is supposed to be special. “I can try to make it special for you, if it happens. I don’t really understand what special means, but I’ll try.”

Suguru shakes himself out of his thoughts. “I’ll make it special, don’t worry.”

“Don’t think about it too much. You’ll definitely get a boyfriend or girlfriend.”

“It could be the other way around, y’know.”

You scoff. “Where we’re going…seeing the spirits is normal. So, everyone there will be normal. That’s when my weirdness is really going to shine. You’re used to it. Do you think someone is willingly going to deal with my stupid habits and quirks? How do I even explain to another person that even seeing cotton balls makes my teeth hurt?” You shake your head. “I’m already high enough maintenance for you and you’re my best friend. It’d be worse for a boyfriend or girlfriend, wouldn’t it?”

Suguru says your name. You look over at him and he’s sad. “You’re not high maintenance.”

“You’re my best friend. You’re obligated to say that.”

“No, I’m not. You know I’m honest with you. Would you like an example of my honesty? Here’s one—you’re so blind that, sometimes, it amazes me.”

You throw a rock at the vicinity of his feet. He moves to dodge it. “Rude.”

***

Non-sorcerer students are required to move on campus two weeks before school starts. There will be some informal classes on the most basic of jujutsu basics to give you somewhat a foundation. In yours and Suguru’s cases, Yaga lies to both your parents and has someone come pick you and your things up three weeks before school starts.

At the nearest relatively big city, Yaga makes the driver stop. He practically shoves food down your throats, lecturing the entire time about the importance of eating to make up for the massive amounts of energy that you’ll be burning by using cursed energy and fighting spirits.

Then, he forces you both to choose cell phones.

You and Suguru, obviously from very humble means, protest. None of them are cheap. Yaga shuts you down and declares this as yet another requirement. Essentially, you’ll always be on-call, especially as you become a more seasoned sorcerer. You need a way to communicate with others and be communicated with in return. Yaga mutters something under his breath before he heads outside to take a smoke break with the driver.

“He’ll probably yell at us if we go for the cheapest thing,” Suguru mutters as he looks around the store.

“Something in the middle, then,” you agree.

In your defense, you do get something that’s not the most expensive. There wasn’t any mention about the design or color. It called to you, okay? You could take or leave the color, but the almost metallic shine of it. It’s so sleek and smooth. The number keys are nearly flat and it’s satisfying to run your fingers over the slight bump of them.

Yaga doesn’t even bat an eye when you hand over the hot pink flip phone. He simply takes what you’ve chosen, takes Suguru’s chunky option, and goes to the counter to pay for them and set up your new numbers. You and Suguru stand there, almost with bated breath.

It’s hard to believe that the school is investing so much money into you both already. Yaga didn’t even mention this coming out of your monthly stipend. A stipend, by the way, that you and Suguru weren’t aware of until you were on the road. You’d asked if you needed to tell your parents because that seemed like a pretty important thing for Yaga to forget. Yaga had shrugged and, casual as anything, said, “it’s your money now. Tell whoever you want about it.”

And, as easy as it was then for him, it is now because Yaga hands you your phones back, numbers on some paperwork, and that’s it. He walks out of the store and gets in the car. You and Suguru share a look of disbelief before you scramble to follow after him and climb in the back of the car.

It’s still a drive to a train station that will take you the rest of the way to Tokyo. The driver turns the music up. You and Suguru immediately duck your heads down, heads knocking together, voices hushed as you marvel over your new phones. You can’t stop rubbing your thumb over the smooth surface. Suguru isn’t the type to get distracted by something like texture, so he’s already clicking through it to add your phone number.

“Add me,” he demands. “What? Were you blinded by that gaudy color?”

“Like you have room to talk,” you shoot right back at him. “That’s got a MP3 built into it.”

“Are you the only one here that can be an enjoyer of the arts?”

“You could’ve kept using the radio.” You’re already a little sad. It’s a favorite pastime—you and Suguru, sprawled out on the floor, listening to the radio. Maybe you can save up for one. “Whatever. You better share the headphones whenever you figure out how to put music on that thing.”

“You better use your phone as a SOS if we’re ever lost.”

The only response to that is your harrumph and grabbing your backpack off the floor. Suguru goes back to his phone as you pull out your pencil and sketchbook. It’s a bumpy road. You already have a sketch of Hong, but maybe you’ll just do another rough one to fill the time. You flip through the pages upon pages of new and old cursed spirits that Suguru now holds, trying to find an open spot. There’s not much room left. Mother hates to buy you sketchbooks, seeing it as indulging your abnormality.

“You’re a talented artist,” Yaga commends. You pull the sketchbook against your chest instinctively. Yaga doesn’t acknowledge the action. Just asks, “Are those the cursed spirits that you’ve seen?” You lower the sketchbook back down in your lap, nodding shyly. “May I?”

You usually hide your sketchbook away from the eyes of others because classmates and adults were easily disturbed by what they thought were figments of your imagination. It’s going to take time to get over this surrealism that comes from everyone seeing the things you can and treating it as if it’s normal. So, you hesitantly hold out your sketchbook for him to take. You’re nervous as you watch him flip through the pages.

“These notes…you study them?” Yaga correctly assumes.

“Yes.”

“How?”

“Um…they can’t see me unless I want them to,” you explain slowly. “I can make them calm, too.”

“How have you been destroying them?”

“We don’t,” Suguru answers on your behalf. “I eat them.”

Yaga’s eyes widen. “You…eat them?”

“Maybe a better way to say it is that I absorb them,” Suguru corrects. “After that, I can summon them whenever I want.”

Yaga tries to hide it, but he seems…shaken. He glances back down at your sketchbook, quickly thumbing through the pages. “Is this all that you’ve taken down together? Is this how many you’ve swallowed, Geto?”

Suguru takes the sketchbook back from Yaga. Suguru is a lot more familiar with your sketches, but he skims through the pages once again. “I think this is about right,” he finally answers Yaga. “There might be more in my arsenal. Sometimes, we find spirits on our own or she doesn’t want to sketch whatever we find.”

“Right.” Yaga is nodding to himself. “We’ll explore your individual techniques more when the term starts.”

***

You’re allowed a few days to unpack and acquaint yourselves with campus before you’re taken to be fitted for your new school uniforms.

“Whatever I want?”

The tailor nods. “It’s important that you be comfortable and be in clothes that are easy for you to move in. It goes without saying that you’re a representation of the school, so you can’t be indecent, but that is your only condition,” she explains. “I’ll check-in with you after your first assignment to make sure your uniform doesn’t need any further adjustments. Also, the uniform expenses aren’t deducted from your stipend. This is on the school’s budget.”

The second that the tailor shows you the standard uniform, you turn your nose up at it. You rub the fabric between your fingers, examining it critically. The fabric, you think you could deal with, but if you can throw out the blazer then you’ll immediately jump on that chance. You’ve always preferred baggy clothes, so you shop a size or two too large. Your mother never complained because that meant your clothes lasted longer. So, you think about your wardrobe. Think about what your go-to clothes are when you’re not in a stiff school uniform.

After giving it some thought while your measurements are taken, you decide on a skirt, thin tights, and a hooded sweatshirt.

It’s an outfit that you can justify. The skirt will allow for freer movement. Tights, if they’re thin enough fabric, don’t really bother you because they’re like a second skin. The sweatshirt won’t have the same restrictive sleeves that the blazer does. Lastly, if you’re overwhelmed after assignments then you can hide under your hood.

The tailor accepts the design and tells you that she’ll call when the uniform is ready.

You’re thankful that Suguru is so tall because you’d have panicked otherwise if you stepped outside the tailor shop and couldn’t see him in front of a shop across the street. Your brows raise when you see that it’s a small tattoo shop. Outside the door, there’s a binder on a stand that must have their services and examples from their portfolio. Suguru isn’t looking at the tattoos. No, he seems to be carefully considering the section with ear piercings.

And, honestly, you’re not surprised.

“That school trip to Osorezan really left an impression on you, huh?”

It’d been the first year of middle school that your class went on a trip to Osorezan, believed to be the entrance to the afterlife. It was a religious, historical, and scientific field trip all wrapped into one since the Bodaiji temple is inside the caldera of an active volcano. The high amounts of sulfur gave the waters varying shades of blue. The land was gray and barren. But there was also a hot spring. Statues were littered around the area to represent the souls of the dead.

Just going off the limited knowledge that Yaga gave you, it makes sense that there were so many cursed spirits there. It’s a place of reverence, sure, but people probably go there out of desperation, too. On some level, it might be feared—whether because of the lore or the volcano near it.

It was an overnight trip. You and Suguru hadn’t slept a fucking wink. It was amazing. You’d adored it because of the nature and science. Suguru fell in love with the history and spirituality.

“Shut up.” The tips of his ears are red. “The tailor said there’s no dress code. Yaga said the only rule is to not bring too much attention to the school.” He rubs at his ear lobe. “It looks really cool, doesn’t it?”

“I think you’re being a stereotypical smalltown kid that’s going wild in the big city,” you deadpan.

“Well, I’m doing it. If it bothers you so much then stay out here,” he says primly.

You’ve started to flip through the pages of piercings. “No, no.” There’s one thing that caught your eye. You touch the picture of a tongue piercing. “Just think it’s a little funny that as soon as your feet stepped down in Tokyo, you went running.” Do your eyes glaze over when you think about running the little metal ball of a piercing across your teeth? Maybe. “I want this one.”

“Eh? I’m just getting gauges. You’re getting way wilder than me. You understand that, right?” Suguru is grinning as he grabs your wrist. “Let’s go.”

***

A week later, your tongue has healed enough that you finally learn to talk around it. Just as you suspected, the urge to roll it between your teeth is hard to pin down while you let it fully heal. It’ll be another three to five weeks. Yaga never said a word about it when you both showed up to a classroom the next day. All he did was throw some textbooks at you both and got to lecturing.

You guess you need to start thinking of him as sensei.

Suguru talks about you being a huge nerd, but he’s the one that’s in the school library, trying to dive deeper into…everything that you’ve learned, basically. Despite the fact that you’ll be spending the next three years gaining more knowledge about the jujutsu world. He’s always been like that—impatient when he’s eager. Well…maybe he picked that up from you.

Anyway, you left him behind to enjoy the weather and view. If you’re not with Suguru, you’re enjoying the view. The campus is nestled on a mountain outside Tokyo. It’s got the kind of scenery that inspires a person. This is the first time, probably ever, that you draw things that are not cursed spirits. That’s what you’re doing now. You have an urge to draw the contrast of the bright red torii gate against the lush, green foliage.

You almost lose your art supplies to gravity when someone rushes in front of you. Not that you’d say anything, but you can send them a shitty look. You’re a little more forgiving when you see their vision is blocked by a big box. Another person follows with another equally big box follows after that person. You blink and look in the direction of where they’re coming from.

A group has made their way to the top of the staircase that leads up to the school.

They are…very bright.

Almost everyone in the small group has blinding white hair and blue eyes. Not only that, but they are also dressed in traditional clothes that you know are expensive. The colors are vibrant. Just from here, you can tell just one of those kimonos probably costs more than your childhood house. Every woman in the group has a gold kanzashi in their hair with a dangling charm in the form of a…is that a dragonfly?

Off to the side of this group, though, is a boy your age. Same white hair and blue eyes, yes, but he’s dressed so casually that it’s almost obscene next to the rest of his people. Just a white shirt, pair of basketball shorts, and some sneakers. Thismust be one of your two classmates. Yaga said there would be another boy and girl enrolling. And…he must be moving on campus early. You wonder why. Clearly, those people are his family and they’re loaded. Why on earth would he want to leave home early?

The classmate stops and turns to stare at you dead-on. Don’t come over here, don’t come over here, don’t come over here, you silently plead. You weren’t prepared to deal with other people yet. It’s still a new place and new information is constantly getting thrown at you and you just don’t have the mental energy to deal with strangers.

Fate is not on your side, though, and your classmate closes the distance between you and him.

You’re wary when he’s right in front of you. If you weren’t desensitized by Suguru, this guy’s height would definitely intimidate you a lot more. You’re still nervous which could be because he’s really close to you physically. Your body tenses, instinctively preparing for unwanted touch.

“Show me around.”

“Huh?”

“Show me around,” he repeats.

Okay. You’re not sure what you expected. Normally, people give a little context when you question what they say. “I’m new, too. Our sensei is here, though. His name is Yaga.” You tilt your head slightly. “I can go grab him instead.”

“I asked you. You’re one of those shy types, right? Probably not good with talking to hot guys? I figure you won’t talk while we walk around the place.” He says all that…so casually. “I’ve had that hag back there in my ear all day. I got a headache. If you wanna keep talking, though, I’ll just go find someone else.”

“The only other person here will tell you to fuck off if you go around making demands like this,” you state bluntly. Actually, you wouldn’t be surprised if he ended up punching this guy in the nose. “Look, I come off as rude, too, but you should maybe think a little longer before you speak.” Oh, no. You sounded like Suguru just now.

The guy squints at you. “Who the hell are you? Where you from? Do you not know who I am?”

Oh. Yaga warned you and Suguru about this in a roundabout way. The jujutsu world is super traditional. There are these three clans that have been around for hundreds and hundreds of years, so they’re really respected. They’re competitive with each other and try to pump out more talented sorcerers. They tend to turn their nose up at people like you and Suguru who have no hint of sorcery in your family or ancestry.

You give him your name, the prefecture you came from, and then answer with a curt, “No, I don’t know who you are. Should I?”

He clicks his tongue and rolls his eyes. “So…you’re a hick. That’s what your deal is?” Hmm, well, he’s technically not wrong about that. “Whatever. I’m Gojo Satoru. You can ask the Yaga guy about how important I am later. Can we go now?”

You could not follow Gojo when he walks past you, but his…family or whatever is taking up the space that you were going to use for your art. Also, you can sympathize with needing an excuse to get away from a large group of people, especially when you’re overwhelmed. Not saying that Gojo is, but he did mention a headache.

So, you and Gojo take a stroll.

It’s quiet, aside from the sounds of nature and your footfalls. Out of the corner of your eye, you can see his head turn in your direction. What? Is he shocked that you respected his wish to be quiet? You don’t want to force a conversation.

After maybe half an hour of walking, you declare, “I think we’re far away enough that you don’t need me anymore.” You point at the bench in front of a pond that you purposely led yourselves to. “So, I’m going to do what I was going to do.” You give a polite half-hearted bow. “It was nice to meet you. I look forward to working with you in the future.”

Suguru texts as soon as you sit down, asking where you went off to. You’re terrible with directions, so you send him a shot of the pond and the building closest to it. You don’t mention Gojo. You’ll tell him about it later. Your fingers glide over the hard cover of the new sketchbook and the fresh, crisp, blank page that you turn to. You treat this sketchbook carefully because it’s the nicest you’ve ever seen.

Yaga said that it was very important to nurture your curiosity in understanding cursed spirits, so it was a more than worthy investment to get you sketchbooks. The more knowledge that you gain about the jujutsu world, the deeper your understanding of them goes, and that can be helpful to the jujutsu world. No one has ever had an ability like yours that he knows of, Yaga had told you privately. Knowledge of cursed spirits is only gained in the heat of battle or the aftermath of death. Your pacification abilities allow the study of cursed spirits without the bloodshed.

In that meeting, you’d tried to make Yaga see some sense. You’re some nobody from nowhere with a weird fixation on drawing the cursed spirits. He has all these big aspirations for you, but you highly doubt that you can live up to them. It wasn’t even about the sketchbook at that point. Suguru’s technique is the one that will change the world.

With you and Suguru, I think your techniques have skewed your worldviews. Suguru has shown me some of his higher-grade spirits. Exorcising those would be bloody work for anyone else. Your technique is more suited for a supportive role, yes, but don’t dismiss your power. It’s a trickle-down effect—you’ll save the lives of fellow sorcerers who will go on to exorcise spirits that saves the lives of current and future non-sorcerers.

You’d definitely cried after that conversation with Yaga. No one has ever wanted to…foster your interest like this. Setting aside how disturbed they were by the content that you drew, they saw no use in it. It was fine as a child, but in the past year or so, they had outright started to scold you for not putting the pencil down. You were the daughter of farmers and would never be famous for your art, so you needed to invest in better skills. Even your art teacher wanted to censor you and told you that any drawings needed to be school-appropriate.

More dedicated than ever, you’ve been almost obsessive with drawing.

“Oi.”

You’ve literally only drawn the rough shape of the pond. You try not to sigh or let your irritation at being interrupted show on your face when you tilt your head up. “Yes?”

“What if I did want a tour?”

It was obvious from the get-go that Gojo is a blunt person, so you don’t lie out of politeness. “I still get lost, so I’m the wrong person to ask. Like I said before, go ask Sensei.” You drop your attention to your lap and start sketching again. “Besides, I’m not good at talking to people.”

“It’s not like we have to chat. Just tell me the buildings.”

“Didn’t you say you have a headache?”

“Yeah, but I always have a headache.” That’s…alarming. You look back up at him, concerned. He shrugs and says, “Six Eyes,” as if you have any idea what that is supposed to mean. “Ugh. Right. Small town girl or whatever.” Then, he tries to dismiss it all with, “It’s a Gojo clan thing. I have special eyes that make my technique better, but the cost is migraines.”

Oh. It’s like Suguru’s technique, then. In the sense that there’s a massive blowback. Suguru has told you about the taste of curses and how disgusting doesn’t even come close to describing how awful it is. He tries to pretend that the taste is the only bad thing about it, but there’s a reason why he would wait until night to eat them where he could lay down immediately after. He’s even admitted that he would eat them to make his body forget about its hunger.

You’re sympathetic to the sensitivity. There are days when an overcast is still too bright. You bought a pair of sunglasses while you were out with Suguru, but…you can always get more. You have a whole monthly stipend now. Also, you got your uniform and you’re wearing it, so you can use the hood if the light is too much.

“Here.” You pull the sunglasses from where they’re perched on the top of your head. They’re a simple pair with thin silver frame and blue, circular lenses. Gojo looks between you and the sunglasses that you have held out. You hesitate. “What? Are they too girly or something?”

“Uh…no. I…” He looks genuinely perplexed. “You don’t know who I am. Why are you giving me these?”

“My senses are stupidly delicate, too. I know what having a bad day feels like. I don’t need these today, so you can have them. I can go buy new ones if I need them.” Oh! You remember something important and inform him, “I’ve worn them inside and Yaga doesn’t care, so you’re good on that front.”

Gojo takes the sunglasses from you but doesn’t put them on yet. “Inside?”

Oops. “Sorry. I forgot that people are weird about sunglasses inside.” You tap your pencil against the sketchbook, trying to figure out how to say what you want to. “I don’t really understand what the issue there is. Sunglasses are designed to help when it’s too bright. Inside can be as bright as outside, so I’m just using them for their intended purpose. That’s how I see it.” Oops again. You started rambling. “I’ll take them back if you don’t want them. You didn’t seem like the type to care about the opinions of others, is all.”

“No, I want them.” He yanks them away when you try to take them back. “I—”

“Hey!”

Suguru’s normally soft voice raising like that makes you yelp and jump in your seat. You whip your head around to see him storming toward you, fists and jaw clenched. You’re alarmed to see him so visibly angry. You scramble to stand up and meet him in the middle. “Suguru?”

“Aren’t you too old to be picking on people?” Suguru asks with narrowed eyes. He’s looking over your head, at Gojo. “Give those back to her.”

Oh! Now, you understand. To someone else, it would look like Gojo stole your sunglasses and is trying to keep them away to be a bully.

“Suguru, no. It’s okay—”

“Heh!” Gojo’s cocky laugh makes you angle your body so you can look between them both. He smirks smugly and makes a show of putting on your sunglasses. “Who are you? Mommy?” Gojo shoves his hands in his pockets, feigning nonchalance. “I didn’t steal them, so calm down, mama bear.” Gojo points at Suguru while asking you, “This the guy that’s gonna tell me to fuck off if I don’t find some manners?”

“I’m certainty thinking about it right now,” Suguru sneers. His anger simmers back down and he goes back to his polite yet cool indifference. He ignores Gojo’s obvious baiting and moves his attention to you. “Is that true? Did you give those to him?” You nod. Suguru frowns. “You just bought those.”

“I was trying to be nice to our new classmate.” Suguru’s brow twitches in irritation—probably over the knowledge that this is one of your two classmates. Gojo has not made a good first impression, to say the least. “It’s no big deal. I can buy some new ones when we go to the konbini.”

“Eh? I want to go!” Gojo whines.

Suguru forces a polite smile. “You should stay here. I’m sure that Sensei will have some things to go over with you.”

“I don’t know how to get back. Sketch here was showing me around.”

“Sketch?” Suguru and you repeat, in unison.

“Yeah! Sketch!” Gojo motions towards your sketchbook that you left on the bench. “Because you’re an artsy girl.”

“You should know someone longer than an hour before you go giving them nicknames,” Suguru lectures.

Gojo cocks his head to the side, genuinely confused. “Should you?”

“Yes. Otherwise, it’s just being presumptuous.”

“Ask the lady, then.” Gojo hunches over, prowling toward you with a mischievous grin, getting very close to your face with his. “You don’t mind it, do you…” He lifts his head, purposely baiting Suguru when he adds, “…Sketch?”

Now, you may not be the best at social cues or reading the room, but even you know that whatever you say is going to be the wrong thing. Do you actually care about the nickname thing? No. Also, is Suguru forgetting that he literally gave you the Squid nickname only after a week? Sure, you were both six and he forgot your name, but the point stands.

“I think I’m in the middle of a dick measuring contest,” you muse aloud. Suguru sighs in exasperation while Gojo gives a delighted laugh. “I’m going to walk away now.”

“Yes. We should go,” Suguru agrees through gritted teeth.

As you and Suguru are walking away, after you’ve gathered all your things up, Gojo loudly asks, “Aren’t you gonna introduce yourself?”

Suguru understands, on some level, that it would be beneficial to get along with your peers since there’s only going to be four of you in the whole class. That’s why you’ve indulged Gojo’s…neediness? Entitlement? Whatever it is. And Suguru won’t be as nice as you—which is ironic because he’s usually the polite one—but he does turn around and introduce himself with a curt, “I’m Geto Suguru.”

“Gojo Satoru,” Gojo shoots back cockily. “Aren’t you going to tell me how much you look forward to working with me?”

“No.” Ah. Suguru’s patience has reached its end. “We’re leaving now.”

***

It’s not until about a week later, one week before the term starts, that you actually see Gojo on campus. This isn’t to say that you’re not painfully aware of what Gojo has been up to. Because what his purpose in life seems to be right now is to dig his way under Suguru’s skin. While in separate rooms, they still share communal spaces—kitchen, showers, laundry. Suguru tries to stay in his room, but they’re bound to run into each other, and when they do…

Well, you learn that there are alarms imbued in the protective barrier around campus that blare when a cursed spirit is detected within. Spirits from Suguru’s collection are no exception. That unexpected noise had you in a panic. Suguru and Gojo had an extremely long lecture and were forced to clean the already pristine classrooms as punishment.

You’re making your rounds on the track. Sensei recommended it since you’re not nearly as in shape as Suguru. He was trusted to work in the fields back home way more than you were. The most that you were trusted to do was wash picked crops. You weren’t even allowed to pick out the bad crops because you took too long. You’re a perfectionist and kept questioning if you should let a crop slip through or not.

Gojo plops down on the stone staircase that leads down to the track and field. You feel like you should ignore him out of loyalty to Suguru, but you can’t do that here. You have to try and get along with your classmates. You leave the lectures to Sensei and hope that Suguru’s temper will cool down with time. Also…Gojo is waving a second popsicle in the air to get your attention and it’s really tempting. Too tempting.

You wordlessly take the popsicle and examine the flavor. It’s red bean. You’re instantly wary. “Did you get the same?” Gojo flashes the reddish tinted popsicle in answer. He shoves it back in his mouth before you can get a good look. Fine. You’ll just ask outright. “Does it have pieces of red beans in it?”

Gojo scowls. You think you’ve offended him for asking too many questions about his gift, but it turns out that he’s actually upset about something else entirely. “No! Ew! What am I? A heathen?” His nose scrunches up in disgust. “Dude, that’s so gross. Who like chunks in their ice cream? The whole point is for it to be creamy and smooth!”

You almost sigh in relief. “I think sprinkles are okay, but…yeah. Everything else is too much.”

“Ugh, no. Sprinkles are too chalky. They leave this…eh…it’s like a film kind of feeling on my teeth. I hate it. I have to scoop it off any desserts which pisses me off more because I love whipped cream and I’m losing it to fucking sprinkles.”

You nod sagely. “A waste of good food.”

“Thank you! You get it!” Gojo sighs dramatically. “You’re so much cooler than your boyfriend, Sketch!”

“Because I agreed with you about dessert preferences? Also, Suguru isn’t my boyfriend. He’s my best friend. We’ve lived in the same village all our lives. There was no one else like us. People that could see cursed spirits, I mean.”

Gojo is still wearing the sunglasses that you gave him. You can’t tell that he’s looking you over until he allows them to slip down the bridge of his nose. “Really? He acts like a possessive boyfriend, though.”

You rub the back of your neck. “We’re protective of each other because of…other private stuff.” You know not to put Suguru’s relationship with his parents on blast. “Oh, and he says he’s not, but I think he’s protective because of my diagnosis.”

“Diagnosis?”

“Jiheishō,” you answer casually between licks of your popsicle. “I was always weird as a baby and a toddler. Then, I talked about seeing things, and that pushed my parents over the edge. They took me to a doctor, and I got diagnosed.”

“Huh. What’s that like?”

“I don’t know. It’s who I am. How do you explain being?” You pause. “I would say that you could ask Suguru since he’s on the outside looking in, but…you’re being an annoying dick to him.”

Gojo cackles. “But he makes it so easy!”

“I’m not one to assume because it’s hard to know what people think or I don’t understand them the right way, but…have you ever tried to make friends before? If I didn’t already know that you have to go to a school, I’d ask if you’ve even been around other people your age. This isn’t how you get along with your peers.”

He scoffs. “Why do I need to get along with my peers? Why do I need friends?”

“Because it’s lonely and miserable without them?”

“Ha! You ever stop to think that it’s lonely and miserable with them?” There’s a bitter twist to his mouth. He nudges the sunglasses back up the bridge of his nose, hiding his eyes away. “I mean, you said it, didn’t you? It’s such a chore to figure out how other people work and what they’re thinking. Normies are too…normal. Clan kids are only sucking up because my clan is the most powerful. It’s stupid and complicated. Why bother?”

Oh. That’s…sad…and also way too relatable. Your expression softens. “Those aren’t friends, though. You know that, right? I guess my opinion might not count because I only have one friend, but…he’s made my life better. I like to think that I’ve made his better, too.” He sticks his tongue out in disgust. You shrug. “It’s true. He’s been the only person that listens to me when I can’t shut up about art styles or cursed spirits because I’m really interested in those. I can be me around him.”

“You’re probably not as annoying as you think you are,” he dismisses. “Now, I’m annoying. I can’t shut up about Digimon.”

“You’re probably not as annoying as you think you are,” you repeat mockingly. He flips you off and you smirk in response. “Do you want to talk about it with me? I’ll listen. It sounds like you’ve been around shitty people that don’t want to hear about things that make you happy.”

Gojo is actually…hesitant. That makes you even sadder. You know this all too well. “I yap a lot. Seriously.”

You make yourself laugh past the hurt you feel out of sympathy for him. “I’ve got my sketchbook with me. I’ll show you what real yapping is.”

It’s the right thing for you to say. Putting a competitive spin on it makes it easier for Gojo to be open, it seems. “Oh, you are so on, Sketch.” He rises to his feet with a renewed excitement. “You should come help me finish unpacking! I have a lot of Digimon stuff, so it’ll be easier to explain everyone with that!”

“Eh? Are girls allowed—”

Gojo doesn’t hear you. He snatches you by the wrist and you stumble to keep up with him. You’re halfway to the boys’ dorm before he finally listens when you tell him that he left your sketchbook behind. You watch him sprint back toward the track, still trying to figure out how the hell you ended up here.

Suguru loves to read, but not manga. There was only one television in your house that your parents always had control of, so they never let you watch anime. Obviously, you know that Digimon is a manga and anime. It’s big like Pokémon. You know there are little creatures, but that’s about the extent of it.

Gojo changes that.

It’s a little confusing, sure, but you like hearing people talk about the things they like. Maybe it’s because you’re so used yourself to the rejection of being shut down because you’re boring people by talking about the same thing or overwhelming them with talking too much or liking weird things. You don’t want other people to feel like that. It was obvious from Gojo’s demeanor that it’s something he’s experienced, too.

As you look at all the figurines and manga and plushies, you wonder if his family threw money at this thing he likes and left him alone with it all. You don’t think he would be so cynical about other people if he had support from his family. Would you be okay if you parents paid for the most expensive art supplies in the world and left you to it? You prefer to be alone, but…isn’t this special interest more special when you can share it with someone?

“Squid?”

You and Gojo are both in the middle of his room, on the floor, and currently have your faces shoved against his little plushies that are shaped like the first evolution of the original Digimon set. It’s so soft and squishy. Gojo is really proud of finding them and you can’t blame him. It’s cool that he’s not afraid to have cute things like this like a lot of guys are.

“Oh. Hey, Suguru.” You look over your shoulder at him, a little nervous. Before he can grill you about being alone with his unofficial rival, you quickly explain, “I’m getting informed about Digimon.” You spin around on your ass, shoving the plushy out. “Come feel this. It’s so soft.”

Suguru scowls. “No.”

“No is right!” Gojo loudly agrees. “He’s not allowed to the nice stuff!”

“Girls aren’t allowed in our dorm,” Suguru says more to Gojo than you.

“It’s fine until dark. I already asked Yaga.”

Suddenly, there’s a tension in Suguru’s shoulders. His jaw clenches and his eyes narrow at Gojo. “Why do you know that?”

“Shouldn’t you be happy about this news?” Gojo shoots back, a clear deflection. “You can hang out with her now.”

Suguru presses a thumb to the center of his forehead. He holds that position, trying to calm himself down. When he does, he moves his attention back to you. “He didn’t pressure you to come in here, did he?”

Before Gojo can open his mouth, you swing the plushy back to hit him. The way he sputters and Suguru’s proud smirk is a sign that you hit him right in the face. “I can make decisions on my own,” you tell Suguru which wipes that little smirk right off his face. “We’re doing a show and tell…kind of. You should bring your headphones and let us listen to your music!”

“I didn’t consent to this!” Gojo complains.

This going back and forth is a little annoying, so you angle your body to face them both. To Gojo, you say, “Okay, that’s your call. This is your stuff, after all.” To Suguru, you ask, “Um…I’ll meet you in an hour? We can listen to your music then. Does that sound good?”

Gojo groans. The excitement to share outweighs his need to annoy Suguru because he concedes with an exasperated, “Fine! He can come hang out!”

“Fine,” Suguru agrees with the same amount of annoyance.

But, hey, a win is a win.

***

The last of your class moves in a few days before the semester starts. It’s early in the morning when she does, so the noise in the hallway startles you awake, and you go stumbling out of your room without a second thought to how you’re dressed. Your door opening catches your roommate’s attention and she’s looking in your direction when you walk in her line of sight.

Both of you stare wordlessly at one another. There’s a beauty mark under the corner of her eye that catches your attention before anything else. Her brunette hair is cut short, barely past her chin, and her bangs are swept to the side. You’re watched by curious, brown eyes. At first glance, you think she’s got a cigarette in her mouth, but it doesn’t have the filter on the end. It might be one of those chalky candy sticks.

“Oh! You’re so pretty!” You blurt the words out before your sleep-addled brain can catch them. Heat crawls up the back of your neck and the tips of your ears. “Sorry!”

She laughs good-naturedly. “What? Should I be offended by a pretty girl giving me compliments?” And how…do you react to that? No one has ever called you pretty before. She unintentionally throws you a bone by moving the conversation somewhere else with her name. “I’m Ieiri Shoko. Nice to meet you.”

You give her your name, bow, and the same polite, “Nice to meet you, too. I look forward to working with you.”

“We’re living together now. You don’t need to be all formal.” It’s a force of habit. You learned quickly as a child that the world revolves around politeness and manners. “Sorry for waking you.”

“That’s okay.” You hesitate. “Do you need help?”

“Please. My parents bailed. I’m lucky they even had the time to drop me off. Not sure how they even had the time to pop me out with how busy they are at the hospital.”

You’re rolling up your sleeves as you walk over to her door. “They’re…doctors?”

“Surgeons, yeah,” she answers casually. “Makes sense that I ended up with the technique that I did, even if no sorcerer in our family has ever had it. We’ve always been big on healing, or so my parents have told me.”

“What’s your technique?”

“Reverse Cursed Technique, but I can use it on myself and others. It’s rare to extend it to other people.” Your blank expression has her chuckling. “You’re from a non-sorcerer family, huh?”

Your face is back to being hot again. “Sorry. Sensei…um…I don’t think he went over that yet.”

“I’m not sure that he will. It’s advanced. Even among the best, strongest sorcerers, it’s a rare skill. Baby sorcerers only know about it because it’s a thing to aspire to, y’know?”

Whoa. “What is it? You must be really powerful, right?”

Ieiri laughs. “No way. Reverse Cursed Technique alone is healing yourself. Like I said, I can take it further and heal others. Oh, and I have this…ability to find disturbances in the mind and body.” Then, she puts her ability in practice. “I know you got your tongue pierced.”

Your fingers fly up to touch your lips. “And you think that’s not powerful?”

“Flatterer.” Between all your back and forth with her, you’ve both gotten all the boxes inside her room. She flops down on the bare mattress. “What’s your technique?”

“Nothing as cool or useful as yours, I think.” You rock back and forth on your feet nervously. “They don’t see me unless I want them to. Also, I can pacify them. Nothing more than that. I only make them calm.”

“Guess we’ll both be saving lives.” There it is again. Someone can see more purpose in your technique than you can. Your brain just can’t compute with that. You’ll just…stand there and pacify spirits. It seems like so little to save actual lives. “Are our other classmates here yet? Have you met them?”

“Yes. One of them is my best friend, actually. His name is Geto Suguru. We came from the same village and he’s from a non-sorcerer family, too. Please be patient with both of us. And our other classmate is Gojo Satoru—” Ieiri groans loudly. You smile meekly. “I guess you know that his family is important?”

“If you have even a hint of sorcery in your family, you know about the big three clans, so, yeah, I know. My parents have never been active sorcerers, but they’re in the know of the community. No one has been able to shut up about the Gojo heir since he was born. I think my parents said it’s been…hundreds of years since someone was born with the Six Eyes?”

You nod. “Right. He said something about that. They’re special.”

“That’s an understatement.” There’s a lull in the conversation and, in the silence, you hear a familiar noise. It didn’t come from you. Ieiri laughs, no hint of shame at her stomach outing her. “I guess since I woke you up that you haven’t had breakfast. Want to grab something to eat? My parents didn’t give me time to eat.”

Your brows furrow. “They’re doctors. Shouldn’t they be more worried about your nutrition?”

Ieiri just starts laughing.

***

The school term starts.

Suguru and Gojo still aren’t getting along well. It almost seems worse because when actual schoolwork starts, they’re essentially tied on their marks. In regard to their techniques, while Gojo has more cursed energy, Suguru has more refined control. Suguru also takes to martial arts extremely well and Gojo, who you’re sure has been touched even less than you have, is almost always overcome when they spar. Gojo is faster than Suguru and is learning to use that to an advantage.

As for you and Ieiri, you hope that she likes her as much as you like her. It’s…easy to be around her. You admit that you had a lot of issues with her deadpan sense of humor, but she seemed to catch on quickly and now will usually tell you if she’s joking or being sarcastic. There are also some hiccups with food because you two share cooking duty, but she starts learning what textures you hate and which you love.

In your studies, you do okay, but you’re last in the class. If Ieiri wasn’t so lazy, she’d give the guys a run for their money. You are a lot more in shape than her despite your larger size and you lay her out flat in sparring. Yaga declared that you and she would be mostly non-combatant sorcerers due to the nature of your techniques, but he insisted that you and she learn martial arts for self-defense. Actually, you’re more in shape than Gojo even. Suguru is leagues ahead of you, obviously, because he’s so much more coordinated and stronger.

About a month in, you’re given your first assignment.

And by you what you actually mean is yourself and Gojo.

In the last few years, the number of cursed spirits has been steadily increasing. There are two separate incidents with relatively low-level curses and all the higher-grade sorcerers are occupied with higher-level curses, so you and your classmates are split up in teams of two.

Suguru was not happy about the pairings, but Yaga said that you and Suguru know how to work well together already. Then, kind of bitchily, Yaga explained that if Suguru and Gojo got along better then Yaga would’ve simply had them handle both batches themselves. Later, you try to reassure Suguru by reminding him that there’s going to be a more seasoned sorcerer with you—the newly graduated Kusakabe Atsuya. You don’t think it made him feel better.

Kusakabe will meet you there. On the way to meet him, you ask Gojo, “Should we…come up with a plan?”

“Why?”

You fiddle with the metal aglet on the ends of your hooded sweatshirt’s drawstrings. “I would feel better if we did.”

“We don’t even know the layout of this place,” he points out.

“Right,” you mumble. You’d forgotten about that, honestly. “You’re right.” You slip the aglet in your mouth and chew on it nervously.

Gojo huffs. “You stop it. I blow it up. Simple as that.”

“Can I draw it first?”

“Hah?”

You squirm uncomfortably. Hesitantly, you show him your old sketchbook. You kept it in case you come across a similar cursed spirit and need to compare notes. You’ve also got your new, blank sketchbook to start a new, more official record. “I like to study them,” you explain timidly. “It’s…kinda like my Digimon…I guess…”

Gojo takes the sketchbook from you, casually flipping through the pages. “Why cursed spirits, though?”

“Why’d you pick Digimon instead of some other anime?” You shrug nervously. “It’s hard to explain. At first, I thought some of them looked really cool. I made myself get better at art so that I could draw them, in case they were exorcised somehow. Then, I wanted to know how they got those shapes. It became about their behavior next. I’ve always loved mythology and animals, too, so maybe that influenced the interest a little.”

“Hmph. Alright. I’ll try to hold off on blowing it up.” Before he turns his head away, you notice a pinkness on his cheeks. “You can talk about them with me, if you want. Like…how I talk about Digimon and stuff.”

You duck your head, face hot. “Thank you.”

The assignment doesn’t take long at all. It may take more time for you to sketch the spirits than it does for Gojo to blow them away. There were a lot of them. They all took the same form which was vaguely pufferfish shaped. You know that the weaker, tinier spirits tend to group up, and these were no different.

Their behavior around Gojo was the odd thing, though. Unless the spirit is a higher grade, spirits never reacted to Suguru when you were around. It’s not like that with Gojo. He’d held back to let you sketch, but when he stepped toward you, the group started to shift restlessly in their places. Then, when he got too close, they shot their spines out. If Gojo hadn’t dashed forward and tackled you to the ground, covering you with his Infinity-lined body, you would be a porcupine.

“It was fascinating!”

Suguru looks faint as you recount your assignment to him over dinner. You made sure to pick up something light for him since eating curses fucks with his stomach. You got him some onigiri for the morning when he’ll be ravenous, making sure to mark them as yours before you tuck them in the communal fridge. Hopefully, it’ll succeed in tricking Gojo because you have no doubt that he’d eat them to antagonize Suguru.

“I wonder what it is about Gojo that freaked them out like that,” you mutter to yourself. “You’re as strong as him. Do you think you have some sort of calming effect on them because of your technique? Or what if they can sense the spirits inside you and it confuses them?”

“No more thinking tonight, Squid,” Suguru declares and closes your sketchbook. “We have three years to figure out both our techniques.”

“Fine.”

“Well, now you just sound like Gojo with that bratty attitude.”

“It’s not bratty! It’s called being a nerd.”

Suguru gives a shake of the head as he laughs. “You can be a nerd and a brat at the same time.” You watch him start to clean up the empty food containers. His face is doing something…weird. You can’t pinpoint this particular emotion. “Squid…are you up for touch today?”

“Yeah. Why?”

“Can I hold you?” Suguru, uncharacteristically vulnerable, goes on to admit, “I was worried about you today.”

“If anyone was worried, it was me. You didn’t have me there to calm the spirits down.” You two ate while sitting in the floor, so you hold your arms out to him like the brat that he accused you of being. “C’mon. I never get Suguru hugs anymore. I really miss them.”

He smiles, a little shy. “Brat.”

“No. I’m Squid, remember? You never let me forget.”

For some reason, your brain replaced hold with hug. You’re fully expecting him to help you up and give you something quick, but he doesn’t do that. He drops in behind you, wrapping an arm around your waist to pull you back between his open legs. You squeak at the manhandling and your heart starts to beat faster. When your back is against his broad chest, he slips both his arms around your middle, and leans his chin on the top of your head with a happy sigh.

“Oh,” you whisper unthinkingly.

Suguru mistakes your tension with overstimulation. “Is this okay still?”

“Yes.”

Why are you so nervous? You’re not being bombarded by stimuli, so it can’t be because of that. Actually…it feels really good to be in his arms. He’s always so warm. You feel as if his arms are all-encompassing. It makes you feel safe. It makes you feel loved. And Suguru should be feeling that way, too, so you need to push away this weirdness inside you. You twist around in his arms, putting yours around his waist, shoving your face against his hard chest.

“Squid hugs are the best hugs,” Suguru whispers.

***

“Do you know how to help with a broken nose?”

You’re in the library when Sensei appears in the doorway and asks that almost ominous question. Slowly, you put the book back on the shelf, eyeing Sensei warily. He simply looks back at you, exhaustion seeping from every pore. The resignation you see in him is familiar, too. The pieces quickly add up. The air around Sensei paired with the cryptic text that came from Suguru with only a simple apology…

Oh, no.

“I can plug up the nosebleed and make an ice pack,” you answer with an equally tired sigh.

Sensei nods and gives a curt thanks. Before you and he go your separate ways, you sheepishly ask if you can talk to Suguru before he does, but Sensei shuts that idea down immediately. You’re then held up by being given a quick yet scathing lecture about needing to let Suguru face the consequences of his own actions and to stop coddling him. You bow profusely in apology as he’s leaving the room.

Ieiri is away on a research trip of sorts. Being taught the human body and putting her technique into use. Thankfully, she said she’ll be back today, but not until later tonight. Gojo is stuck with your shabby patchwork until then. So, you grab a first-aid kit, fill up an ice pack, and meet him in the classroom that Sensei told you he’d be waiting in.

Gojo has an arm against his face, likely trying to stop the bleeding since it’s stained. You wordlessly get to work. Unfortunately, you have experience with nosebleeds and broken nose. Noses? Can a nose be broken twice? Suguru’s nose still sits crooked from his father’s rage.

“Pinch,” you order softly after you take Gojo’s hand and move his fingers to the bridge of his nose. You reach for his face, pausing as he flinches when you get close. You give him a moment to prepare before you guide him to tilt his head back with gentle hands along his jawline. Blood is smeared all across his lower face and still dripping down from his nostrils. You cringe at the sight. Suguru got him good. “This might hurt,” you warn before you pack his nose with gauze.

“No lecture?” Gojo’s voice is high and nasally.

“You don’t think you’ll be getting one from Sensei?” You grab a damp, warm cloth and start wiping away the blood. “Besides, whatever you did, you got a broken nose for it. What else do I need to say?”

“Might prefer the broken nose over your disappointment,” he says with a pout.

“I’m not disappointed.” You pause. “I don’t think I am, anyway.”

Gojo leans his head back even further, sighing dramatically. “Your BFF is scary when he’s angry.”

“Suguru does this thing where he’ll hold all his emotions close. They sit there, building up pressure, and then one day, he’ll just explode. So, yeah, that’s a little scary. Not so much for me, though. I only worry.” He pouts more. “What’s that face for?”

“No worry for me?”

Your hands hesitate. “Maybe kind of?” Should you say what you want to? Eh. Gojo rarely cares. Why should you? “I’d love it if you two could get along, so I worry that this might keep that from happening forever, but…you probably pushed him. I could be wrong, but you probably deserved this.”

Gojo throws his clean arm over his eyes. “Yeah…I did…” Oh? That’s certainly a change of heart. “No one has ever touched me like that before…” There’s a redness on his cheeks now that doesn’t come from the blood stains. Is he embarrassed that he lost or something? “Why aren’t you and Suguru scared of me?” He tries to lean his head back down, but you keep him in place with a hand gripping his chin. “See? See! Not even my family touches me so casually!”

“What? Is your family actually scared of you?”

“Yeah. Always have been, even if they pretend not to be. They treat me like a god to hide it, but I learned. Everyone is scared of me. Maids apologized for touching me by accident when I was a kid and needed help getting dressed.” Your incredulousness must make him self-conscious because he shrugs. “C’mon, you’ve been around long enough now to pick up on this, Sketch. I’m the jujutsu world’s weapon.”

Normally, you’re immune to being shocked by Gojo’s directness. Not this time. “It’s stupid if you believe that.” Ugh. You’re so pissed off right now. You want to punch someone. That was his mother on the first day that he came to campus, right? Can she come back? Does she have Infinity? “You’re bleeding and breathing right now, aren’t you? Weapons don’t do that. Gods don’t get migraines because of their special eyes. You’re a human. You’re Gojo Satoru.”

“But who is Gojo Satoru if he’s not those things?”

“A sugar-addicted brat who pushes when he shouldn’t,” you intone. He giggles, taking it as the joke it’s supposed to be. “Aren’t you too young to be having an identity crisis? I can’t tell you who you are. I’m not even sure I know who I am. Don’t they say you’re supposed to figure that out in high school or something?”

“Dunno,” he mumbles.

The blood is cleaned from his face. You reach for the icepack but falter. You don’t feel like you’ve said anything helpful. If anything, you feel like you’ve put him in a bad spot. So, you try to reassure him. “It’s okay to take time to figure out who you are, Gojo—”

“Satoru.”

“Huh?”

“Call me Satoru…please…”

“Ah.” You can understand why he wants to be so informal. If he wants to distance himself from his stupid family, you’re more than happy to oblige. “Okay.” He yelps when you press the icepack against his nose. “Let’s all try to get along from now on, okay…Satoru.”

Later, you have Suguru’s big hand in yours while you carefully dab antiseptic on the cuts all over them. You know that this isn’t solely from punching Satoru in the nose, but you don’t press Suguru about it. He hasn’t spoken since you knocked on the door to his dorm room and you’re okay with that. You’ve been through this routine before. It’s what you two do. You patch each other up, being a silent and steady presence until whoever is upset wants to talk.

When you’ve cleaned all his cuts, you try to clean up all the pieces of paper from the band-aids, but Suguru stops you. He slips his fingers through yours and your entwined hands hover in the air between you two. You watch as he intensely studies your hands, so you do the same. When did his hands get so much bigger than yours? How do your hands feel to him, you wonder, because his are so rough. You like the difference, though.

“I’m sorry,” Suguru finally apologizes. “I broke the sunglasses you gave him.”

You huff in amusement. That’s what he’s worried about? “It’s okay.”

“They were your first purchase in Tokyo.”

Ah, you sometimes kind of hate how well he knows you. You do tend to assign some importance to seemingly unimportant trinkets. “I think I’m more attached to the piercings that we got together. I’ll probably keep this somewhere when I finally have to get a new barbell.” You stick out your tongue, as if he’s forgotten the piercing.

“I would’ve given you that first set of earrings if that was the case,” Suguru grumbles. Shoko had used you and Suguru as guinea pigs for her technique and healed your piercings, so Suguru quickly started the process of stretching his ears. As he said, he’d thrown away that first set of earrings.

“I know it’s weird to ask that sort of thing.”

“It’s you, Squid. Nothing is weird anymore.”

“Hmm, sounds like a challenge. I need to find something to disturb you.”

“Please don’t.”

“I’ll be nice for now because you had a bad day.”

“Bad day doesn’t even begin to cover it.” There’s a tired slump in his shoulders now. “He was playing around too much. Instead of exorcising the curse or letting me absorb it, he kept taunting it. The spirit threw me out a window trying to get to him, so I got pissed. I absorbed it and punched him in the face.” He pauses before lowly confessing, “I punched him a second time when I saw the sunglasses broke because I thought they were special to you. I was upset at myself for losing my temper and mad at him for not being careful with them even though it was my fault.”

You hum. “Is that guilt, Suguru?”

“Guilt for the sunglasses.”

“Right.” Again, you’re not pushing, but you doubt he doesn’t feel bad in some way. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be as melancholic as he is right now. “I’m going to let you sit on this, but…I think Satoru actually feels bad, so he might apologize. I didn’t tell him to, by the way. Just like I’m not telling you to forgive him. But I thought you should know.”

Suguru’s brow twitches. “You’re on first name basis with him now?”

“Yeah.”

“Ugh. He’s just doing it to piss me off.”

You’re the one to feel a flash of irritation now. “Doing what exactly? Being my friend? Are you saying that he can’t actually want to be my friend without some ulterior motive?”

Then, he rolls his eyes. Rolls his eyes! “Squid, you’re just reaching now. You know that’s not what I’m saying—”

“What are you saying, then? Has he said something bad that I don’t know about?”

The corners of his eyes are tight. Through gritted teeth, he answers, “No.”

“Okay. So, what’s the problem?”

“I just don’t trust him around you, okay?”

“You just said that he hasn’t done anything shady other than wanting to be my friend.” You yank your hands away from his, baring your teeth. “Am I not allowed to have those? Are you going to say that you don’t trust Shoko around me either?”

Then, he has the audacity to look hurt. “No! That’s not what I’m saying at all! You’re allowed to have friends!”

“Okay! Satoru and Shoko are my friends, too!” Are you overreacting? Tears prick at the corners of your eyes which makes you feel even more stupid. Why are you about to cry? Stupid, stupid, stupid brain. “I’m going back to my room. I’ve got blood under my nails and I fucking hate it.”

“Squid, I’m sorry—”

“Save it, Suguru.”

When you’re woken up by tapping against your window at one in the morning, you seriously debate shoving a pillow over your head and ignoring him. There’s a part of you that wants to let him stew in his guilt. You can’t keep forgiving him as soon as he comes running.

This seems like an insignificant thing to stay mad over, though…

After you take a deep breath, you roll out of bed, walk over to your window, and open it up for him to climb through.

Suguru genuinely does look miserable. More than punching Satoru or breaking your sunglasses made him. When he apologizes, you accept it. And when he shyly asks if he can sleepover, you let him. It’s been years since you guys have shared a bed, but your parents aren’t around to send him home.

Suguru said your hugs are the best hugs, but you have to disagree. You know you’ll wake up in the morning, skin slick with sweat, because he’s a furnace, but you’ve missed this. It’s always been so easy to let Suguru touch you. It got to the point where even the touch of your parents would make you wince, but not his. He asks, but you always say yes. You’re never overwhelmed by the way his big body curls around yours.

“I’m sorry,” Suguru apologizes one last time before you both fall asleep. “I’m scared to lose you,” he slurs sleepily.

“Never,” you mumble right back. “You’ll never lose me.”

***

Five months into the term, it’s time for the annual Goodwill Event.

This year wasn’t the best for Tokyo recruitment, so it’s only your class in the entire school. It’s not the same for Kyoto. They only have one person in their third year, Iori Utahime, but the rest of the years have more students. Normally, first years aren’t allowed to compete, and Tokyo would simply forfeit this year, but because of Suguru and Satoru’s strength, an exception is made.

Kyoto brings a total of eight students—three girls, five boys. Two judges come with them, too—their principal, Gakuganji, and a Grade 1 sorcerer, Mei-Mei.

It’s been about two months after the big Suguru-Satoru Blowout. As you predicted, they apologized to each other not long after the incident. Dare you say, they might be more than simple acquaintances now. Dare you say, they might actually be sort of friends. They’ve really bonded over being assholes, actually. They’re still stupidly competitive and bicker, but it’s no longer malicious. They can exist in the same space as you and there’s no more awkwardness. You spend time with them together and it’s so much fun.

The Goodwill Event reminds you of that deep-rooted fear of Suguru’s, though. A fear that you had before you left the village, you remember suddenly. It finally happens. Suguru is adored. Fawned over. Truly seen for the first time in your lives. The same is done to Satoru, too, but you banked on that happening. And, technically, it makes sense. Guys want their power and girls just want them period.

It was stupid to pretend that your school exists in a bubble. In the back of your mind, you’ve known that you’d eventually have to meet other sorcerers and that not everyone will like you. You’ve prepared yourself for that, haven’t you? It shouldn’t bother you that the Kyoto students barely even acknowledge your existence when you’re in the same space as Suguru and Satoru. You get it, right? They’re admirable. Shoko is awed at for her technique, too, and that’s great! It’s wonderful!

Just four days, you remind yourself as you’re sitting under a tree by yourself and shoving food in your mouth. Four days, and then the Kyoto students will be gone. It’s okay, you chant to yourself. No one noticed you leave, but you wanted some air, anyway. And, hey, you even made a friend! Sure, Shoko had to introduce you to her and break the ice between you two, but Iori has a sharp tongue and awesome sense of humor. A senpai to truly look up to. If you can get along with one new person then you can get along with the rest.

“Yo! Sketch!”

You pause right before you take a bite of your tamagoyaki. “Satoru?” Fruit sando and melon soda in hand, he easily flops down next to you at the base of the tree. “What are you doing here?”

“It’s exhausting dealing with all those brown nosers.” He takes an aggressive chunk out of his sandwich. “Ugh. I can’t believe we’re gonna have to share a dorm with these assholes for four days. I don’t need a bunch of strangers in my business.” His lip curls in disgust. “Suguru lecture you about playing nice?”

“Yes.” You take a grumpy bite out of your tamagoyaki. “I’m trying not to stress about it, but they were already talking about breakfast, and I can’t imagine the mess they’ll make.” It’s a struggle not to snap your chopsticks from the death grip that you’ve got on them. “Suguru says that I need to learn how to handle my routine being interrupted better.”

Satoru huffs. “Easy for him to say.”

Well, it makes you feel a lot better to know that someone else understands your pain. “All we can do is our best.”

“Or we can make their lives hell.”

You duck your head, trying to hide your smile. “It wouldn’t kill you to play nice with others, Satoru.”

“Naw, I think it actually would.”

“You’re nice to me.”

“Sketch is different.” Heat explodes in your cheeks. You outright turn your head away, not giving him the satisfaction of seeing how much he flustered you with that. Since he doesn’t tease you, he didn’t see. “We should stay in a hotel. We could do one of those capsule hotels, y’know?”

“And have my knees and elbows bumping against the sides? No way.” You stick your tongue out in disgust. After the third bump of a limb, you know it would drive you insane. Besides, “Would you even fit in one of those?” Ah. Wait. Were you supposed to take that seriously? “Were you joking?”

You look back over at him and he’s scratching the bridge of his nose. “Not really.”

“Ha. Okay, so, a couple of things—I think we’re too young to book a room, and a girl and boy in the same room? Scandalous.”

He gives an exaggerated sigh. “Fine.”

Sympathetic to his plight, you reach over to pat his knee. “Hang in there.”

These days, it’s a little easier for you to pick up on the kind of mood Satoru is in. It’s the second day now, early in the morning, and you’re dragged by Shoko to the designated gathering spot of Tokyo and Kyoto students. Just by the way that Satoru lashes out at people, purposely baiting them with taunts and cruel bluntness, you can tell that he’s in as bad a mood as you are. And you can’t blame him.

The other two girls on the Kyoto side are Ota Juri and Takata Tenka. They cleaned up after themselves, but they moved everything around in the kitchen and didn’t put it back in the original spot, so you got pissed off trying to find where something went. You could live with that, but they’re also…invasive. After they went looking for Suguru and Satoru yesterday and found the boys with you, their attitude toward you quickly changed. They think they’re slick, subtly probing about your friendship with Suguru and Satoru. They try to act familiar now, getting touchy, thinking that’ll warm you up to them faster.

To say that you’re on a wire’s edge today would be an understatement. You don’t know which one suggested it, but you want to deck whichever one of these girls suggested shopping as a way to build comradery between the sister schools and the people you may be working with in the future. They just want to experience the Tokyo scene like they probably couldn’t get permission to ride a train here on any other day.

At the mall, Ota and Takata take the lead. They have very domineering personalities, so their classmates allow the girls to drag them along. You try to sneak away, sometimes with Shoko and Iori behind you, but Ota and Takata hunt you down—probably trying to show off how caring they are to Suguru and Satoru or something. Eventually, you stop trying. You shut up and linger at the back of the group.

You try to do that, anyway.

Shoko, as equally over this trip, drags you into the beauty store because if she’s going down, you’re going with her.

“Aren’t you going to get anything?” Ota questions as you’re just passively glancing over products. You almost miss the question because you’re teetering on the edge of overstimulation. Why do beauty stores have to use so much fluorescent lighting? You forgot your fucking sunglasses.

“I’m not big into makeup. I don’t like how it feels on my face.”

Ota laughs obnoxiously. “You’re just using the wrong product, silly.”

You force a smile. “My mom already tested a bunch out with me. I just really don’t like any of it.”

Takata has been eavesdropping. She takes up Ota’s side, smiling as predatory as Ota is now. “Was it the foundation? I know the liquid can be heavy. Have you tried powder?” You lose control of your temper a little and roll your eyes. Don’t these girls know how to take no for an answer? “Don’t be like that,” Takata scolds. “Look, you could stand to use some makeup. We’re trying to help you.”

“Help how?”

If Satoru hadn’t spoken up ahead of time, you’d probably tip over when he practically drapes himself on your shoulder.

Ota and Takata perk up at his presence. You can almost see the hearts in their eyes. “Satoru!” Takata chirps.

“Oi, oi, oi, you’re getting awfully familiar there. Who gave you first name privilege, huh?”

Her syrupy sweet smiles falter. “Oh, I’m sorry. I thought—”

“Don’t hurt yourself. Steam might start spewing from your ears. It’s obvious you don’t have a lot going on up there.”

Takata deflates at the insult. “Sa—Gojo—” her gaze flickers to you. Pleading for you to intervene. When she gets nothing from you, she scrambles. “I’m sorry if we offended you somehow—”

“Not me you should be apologizing to.” Your eyes widen. Is he doing this for you? “Y’know, Sketch, it’s good that someone has some sense around here. Make sure you don’t get attached to these idiots, okay? They’ll be so busy thinking about makeup that they’ll up as bloody smears on the wall pretty soon.”

You frown as you look up at him. “What if I do want makeup?”

He brightens. “Can I buy you something?”

Try to make the favoritism less obvious, you think with a twitch of the brow. “Find an art store and we’ll talk.”

“Eh? I already did,” he says as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world that he would go scouting for art supply stores. “Can we leave now? I’m bored,” he whines. You hope you’re not gawking when you nod. “Awesome! Let’s go! I found a shop that sells sweets, too!”

Suguru is hovering at the entrance of the store, brows furrowed in concern, but he steps out of the way for you and Satoru, who is practically dragging you out with a grip on your wrist. Suguru isn’t allowed confusion or shock because Satoru is snatching his hand on the way out.

“Satoru, you’re going to rip my arm off,” Suguru complains when the other students are out of sight.

Satoru stops dead in his tracks, so sudden that you and Suguru almost crash into him. He looks over his shoulder at you both. The angle you’re in allows you to see the wideness of his eyes. He still hasn’t let go of your wrist. Actually, his grip tightens, which makes Suguru get huffier.

“Satoru,” he calls out exasperatedly.

Oh.

You’re not sure if Suguru has realized it himself, but he’s using Satoru’s given name now. No wonder Satoru is stunned. It’s so odd. What changed between this morning and now? Because Suguru was definitely referring to him as his surname earlier. You won’t ask because Suguru might clam up and this peace may shatter.

“Oh. Uh. Sorry,” Satoru mutters as he finally releases his hold on you and Suguru.

On the fourth and final day of the Goodwill Event, something…weird happens during your individual match.

Tokyo easily won the team battle. The individual battles are where Kyoto can even the odds. The thing is that Satoru and Suguru are going to win their individual match. As much as you adore her, you expected that Shoko would lose hers, and she did. You couldn’t hear what was happening, but you think that she flirted with Iori more than fight, but Iori didn’t allow herself to get too flustered, and took the win.

You think that Kyoto expects you to lose your match because plans were already made about the tiebreaker. There would be a random draw for one last individual match to decide which school wins the day. There was no word on what would be done to break the tie if each school has their own point.

So, your win is an upset.

If you’re honest with yourself, you didn’t think that you’d win, either. It didn’t look good. It was your luck that you were pitted against the biggest guy on Kyoto’s side. Not as tall as Suguru and Satoru, sure, but the guy is built like a literal tank. During the team battle, if Suguru hadn’t summoned a cursed spirit in time to cushion the blow, this guy would’ve knocked him out with a single punch.

You didn’t stand a chance at winning, you’d told yourself as you were running through the forest, but after the whole mall fiasco, you wanted to try to last long enough to not be the laughingstock of this year.

As soon as the siren sounded, you went running. Your opponent supplemented his lack of technique with shikigami use, so you had time while he channeled energy into an intermediary to summon his shikigami. You’re trying to think of a plan on the fly, not sure what to do since your technique is useless against people.

This would be easier if there weren’t still so many fucking cursed spirits left in the forest. You’re pacifying them, obviously, but you still have to duck around them. Ugh, why can’t you control them like Suguru can? No, at this point…

I wish you would just die, please. Bloody and painfully would be preferred.

And, as soon as you have that thought, the big curse that you were dashing past moves. Your body freezes on instinct. The spirit shouldn’t be moving around you. Your technique is still active. At the most, this curse is Grade 3. It raises a clawed hand, and you throw your arms up, ready to protect yourself from a whole new problem.

There’s a sickening crunch and the curse screeches in pain. Purple blood splatters across the front of you. When you drop your arms, confused as to what attacked the spirit and saved you, you watch the gruesome scene of the curse slowly ripping limbs away from its body. It still has that dead-eyed look that spirits get when you’ve pacified them, but it moves with an urgency to tear itself apart.

Once the curse has only one arm left, it proceeds to push its arm through its own chest, grabbing its heart. That heart is thrown at your feet. Then, as its final act, it slowly twists its head around until it’s the opposite way, pulls its head off, and the curse finally crumbles to pieces.

What the fuck happened?

From your left, there’s more of those crunches and high-pitched screeching. A curse in the shape of a centipede is trying to crawl toward you between picking legs off with its pincers. At your feet, the curse keeps gnawing at itself, screeching in pain every now and then, until it, too, finally dies and crumbles.

If you didn’t hear the loud roar of your opponent’s shikigami, you’d still be standing there in shock. Your mind runs faster than your legs. That’s not normal behavior. Self-preservation is ingrained into a curse…unless it’s forced like with Suguru. You asked them to die. Moreso, you wanted it to be bloody and painful. The curses listened.

You purposely seek out another spirit now. Die, you mentally scream at the first spirit you see. Unlike with the others, this one doesn’t take time to mutilate itself. It tears its head clean off and that’s it. Blood splatters across your shoes briefly before it fades away with the cursed spirit.

A plan slowly takes shape.

Didn’t you and Shoko stumble across a pack of fly heads yesterday? You’d split up because you knew Kyoto would try to follow Satoru’s presence and get to the winning Grade 2 before you. The fly heads weren’t a bother and the bell had rung sounding your win, anyway.

Where were those? By the river, right? Yes!

You’re getting tired from running and burning cursed energy. You’re pretty sure that you only have one shot at this because you’ll either pass out from exhaustion or get your ass beat by a shikigami. So, yeah, you need to make this count.

The fly heads haven’t moved far.

Kyoto Guy and his shikigami aren’t far behind you.

Just as they’re running out of the tree line, you look at the pacified fly heads. Protect me, you plead them, but that’s too much to ask. It was a test. The fly heads don’t move, but you’re forced to when the shikigami lunges. That thing is sporting some nasty fangs that catch on your arm as you narrowly dodge it.

You play this game of cat and mouse, luring the shikigami away from the sorcerer. All you need is for Kyoto Guy to get close enough to the fly heads. He’s an asshole, laughing cruelly as he watches you scramble away from his shikigami, getting bloodier as you get sloppier from fatigue. Iori was gossiping with you and Shoko, and this guy has a crush on Takata. You figure he’s not happy about Satoru’s cruelty which was a result of him defending you.

Explode! You plead the fly heads when Kyoto Guy steps in their range. Explode, explode, explode!

They do.

The shikigami immediately drops the fight with you, thinking the fly heads are the more immediate threat. Like little paint bombs, the fly heads splatter their blood across Kyoto Guy when they force themselves to combust. There are so many of them that he’s continually being splattered.

While he’s blinded by the blood of cursed spirits, you pour cursed energy into your fist. Sprinting past the shikigami that’s snapping at fly heads, you give this asshole a ferocious kick to the balls to get him to hunch over.

You slam your fist square in the center of his face. There’s so much force in the punch that he goes flying back, landing in the shallow river with such a painful sounding thud, and he doesn’t get up. You’d think you killed him if it wasn’t for the subtle rise and fall of his chest.

The alarm sounds.

Tokyo wins.

Later, you’re walking out of the infirmary behind Shoko who proudly announces, “She gave him a concussion!”

Sensei gives you all a lecture on good sportsmanship after Satoru, Suguru, and Shoko break out into applause and cheers.

#my fic #jjk fanfic #jjk #jujutsu kaisen #gojo x reader #geto x reader #satosugu x reader #jjk gojo #jjk geto #autistic gojo #autistic reader

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bumblebeehug · 2 months ago

Text

Some of their own

Summary: Babysitting and a bit of reflection of a past encounter is just the kick Natsu needs to get started on thinking about his future. Notes: At the end. Nalu Week 2023 day 7. Prompt: New Adventures. Ao3

***

For being a mom of three kids, Levy was weirdly calm. Lucy realised that as she spent time with her friend: she was rusty at the beginning, sure, she had two newborns to take care of and she was completely new to everything, but she had a very involved, very loving father to the children, and also what many people didn’t always consider to incorporate – a community that helped her whenever she asked. This community included, but was not limited to, the guild.

Currently, she and Lucy sat and enjoyed their lunch together, as Gajeel and Natsu sat one table away. Gajeel was caring for his and Levy’s latest addition to the family, Akane, while Natsu kept Kanetatsu and Kanae entertained. Though they would never admit it, and would absolutely hate to hear it – Natsu and Gajeel worked well as a team. Gajeel had all the actual parenting down, he did well with the fostering and the diapers and feeding, while Natsu had a natural talent when it came to entertaining. His skills shouldn’t be underestimated: to actually engage with the kids and play in a way that keeps the games enjoyable was surprisingly hard. Natsu, however, was a natural. He knew exactly what ideas were perfect for their preferences, Kanetatsu preferring more wilderness games (he was going through an obsession with ancient reptiles) and Kanae loved Natsu’s story-driven games. She preferred to play pretend, that she was on a mission like the ones her mom and dad went on. And of course, Natsu would be the star of the show by narrating it.

Lucy liked watching him with children. Natsu was otherwise the type of guy you’d want to keep away – having a pyromaniac with no sense of safety around a couple of toddlers wasn’t ideal, but his entire demeanour shifted around kids. She had known this for quite some time. Back when they first met she only got to see a sliver of Natsu’s persona around kids, and that was through Romeo. Still, sliver or not, she definitely saw it. A brotherly connection based on safety and trust, not wavering a second as Natsu went to save his dad from the Vulcans. And after the seven years on Tenrou Island, she got to see it again – Natsu creating an environment where Asuka could both play and learn. It wasn’t the ideal day for them to babysit, considering the fact that bandits attacked them, but not only did Natsu put Asuka’s safety first, but he also engaged her to act and help in the ways she could. Though in Lucy’s opinion the danger in that situation was way too close for comfort.

“... And I was thinking we could go check it out tomorrow after lunch?” Lucy’s attention was brought back to Levy, the scene of Natsu and Gajeel and the kids fading back into the background.

“Sorry, check out what?”

Levy smiled knowingly.

“Something other than Natsu for once.” She winked at her. “The new bookstore that opened on the square. I checked their inventory, and they’re gonna sell your book there, so I thought you’d like to say hi to the owners.”

“Oh yeah absolutely! Meet me at 1 by the fountain?” Lucy finished her drink with a sweeping motion. Levy nodded approvingly and then tilted her head.

“Hey, Lucy… Wouldn’t it be nice if you had one?”

Lucy blinked in confusion.

“A bookstore?”

“No,” Levy laughed, “a kid. It’s a lot less diapers than you think – take it from me, I had two at once.”

Lucy felt her cheeks warm up.

“Well I think I’d need someone to have it with, before I start thinking about diapers.” She let out an airy laugh. But she knew that Levy meant with Natsu. And judging by the shifting eyes Lucy could see in her periphery, Natsu was paying attention to their conversation.

“Don’t you think it’s time to start thinking about it though? We always said our kids would be as close as we are, but I’m not sure how many more I can produce before we run out of money here.” Levy giggled, but Lucy knew she was serious. It wasn’t easy being the single friend in a friend group – even harder being a single friend in a mom group.

“Well, I guess I’ll have to adopt if I’m not knocked up within a year,” Lucy joked, now being more or less desperate to steer the conversation away from the topic of babies. She did, however, pay attention to Natsu’s face. Though she only saw it in profile, she knew he had been listening. There was something in his eyes, perhaps the way they didn’t really seem focused on the task ahead of him, that revealed the many thoughts running through his head.

Their current relationship was messy. Too intimate to be friends, too friendly to be lovers. But Lucy knew she wasn’t the only one thinking about them. The last couple of years, Natsu had been more present, more grounded in their conversations. Like he was soaking up everything Lucy said or did, and savoured that information like treasure. Lucy had noticed it, but she knew that not many else had. Levy included. Because in public and at the guild, they were completely normal. Talked about missions, kept their routines, went on team missions with Erza, Wendy and Gray whenever they got the chance (which wasn’t as often nowadays – Gray’s fault, since he rarely went anywhere without Juvia). But behind closed doors they allowed themselves some secret moments. Movie nights cuddling, hugs from behind while the other’s cooking, Natsu fiddling with Lucy’s left hand’s fingers while she was reading (the right hand had to be free so she could turn pages). There were lots of moments like those, but none that could be pinned down and refused in a “I only do that with guys I’m in a relationship with!”-manner.

Her thoughts were soon interrupted by the cries from Levy’s youngest. As they stirred around, Levy rushing to Gajeel and Akane, Natsu picking up both toddlers on each hip to get them away from knocking over bottles and wet wipes and other miscellaneous items, Lucy found herself drawn to Natsu. She could blame it on wanting to unload him from one of the kids, but they both knew he could manage carrying them both. Lucy should have brought her and Levy’s empty dishes to Mira, to minimise the risk of anything falling down on the floor, but instead she grabbed a handful of toys from the bag Gajeel had packed, and started giving them to Kanetatsu and Kanae, letting them choose from the soft, colourful figurines.

“You want that one?” Lucy asked Kanae, not expecting an answer from her. Kanetatsu had already picked his toy – a boar-like stuffed animal. “How about we go to the library and play? I’ll bring the toys and uncle Natsu will take you downstairs, okay?”

Natsu grinned broadly and started moving towards the stairs, roughhousing them a little to keep their interest. Levy sent Lucy a thankful smile before she went back to focus on the poopy diaper. Lucy took it as approval of the impromptu babysitting and grabbed the bag and a couple of water bottles before hurrying after Natsu and the kids – even if Levy said kids weren’t as stressful as they seemed, Lucy had yet to take her word for it.

In the library, Natsu managed to get both kids to stay on the carpet. Lucy swore she had heard something about the floor being lava, but the kids seemed too calm for that to be true. She quickly sorted out the toys from the actual useful items in the nursery bag and poured them out on the carpet.

“Aunty, play kingdom!” Kanae blubbered and started clearing out a space for the characters to live. Natsu and Kanetatsu swiftly gathered round, eyeing the toys they wanted to use.

“Alright, I’ll be the princess-knight then.” She grabbed the figure of a princess with a big poofy dress. They didn’t actually have a toy that looked like a knight, so this one sufficed once she held a small, toy sword against the plush princess-hand. “Do we want to start from the beginning or pick up where we left it last time?”

When the twins were just 2 years old, Lucy had created a make believe game with medieval themes – knights, princesses, dragons, kings and queens, evil trolls under bridges etc. Ever since, Kanae swore that it was the best game ever, though Lucy knew she preferred watching Natsu’s hot pepper eating contests. Natsu wasn’t actually bothered by the chilies, but he was good at acting out different stages of spice levels. When eating the hottest one he liked setting his tongue on fire, to demonstrate how terrible it was to eat it.

That, however, was beside the point. Even if it wasn’t the absolute best game, the kids still loved it. Natsu did as well, but for other reasons. He was captivated by Lucy’s story telling. All characters in the game were so different – some reminded him of guild mates, some of her spirits, others were more like people they had met briefly on missions. It was like she knew everything about everyone she met, inside out. Their dreams, their past, their reasonings behind certain behaviours. Her ability to read people was beyond great, and that reflected in her books and games. All stories she told, big and small, were taken seriously by her.

“From the beginning!” The little girl almost shouted out her answer, but her brother was quick to protest.

“No, from the part when the dragon eats the troll!”

Lucy held in a sigh. The twins played well together when they were on the same page, but as soon as their opinions didn’t align, their heads would butt together in disagreement. Their fights would often get both loud and violent – it wasn’t hard to figure out which parent had given them that temperament.

Before the twins began their screaming contest, and before Lucy had the opportunity to defuse the situation, Natsu had grabbed the princess-doll in his left hand and the troll in his right and started shouting.

“RAAAH, your fight is pointless, the troll has already taken the princess-knight hostage! Aunt Lucy, what’s gonna happen?” He flailed his arms around to somehow demonstrate the motion of the troll stealing the queen. Lucy sent a quick glance towards Kanae to make sure she wasn’t upset over Natsu picking Kanetatsu’s storyline – with no tears in sight she put on her best storytelling voice and got to work.

“Oh no!” Lucy exclaimed in a light voice. “The troll has taken me and the amazing ninja-wizards are nowhere to be seen!” She was relieved to see the twins scramble together their characters so they could join in – they had accepted the game.

“The two ninja-wizards hurried across the continent as they heard the queen’s cries,” Lucy read in a deeper voice. “They ran through forests, rode over deserts on camels, climbed mountains and jumped over rivers that were over 20 feet wide! And with their amazing speed, they arrived in only fifteen minutes!”

***

Levy waited a moment before making a noise. She had finally gotten Akane back to sleep after cradling her for the last hour. Gajeel was currently on watch, keeping the pram moving, which gave Levy an opportunity to check in on the twins and her two friends watching them.

As she observed her best friend and her pink haired situationship, her heart ached a little. She wanted Lucy to be the happiest version of herself – she wanted all good fortune to reach her, for all her dreams and desires to come true. And she wanted her to experience that one true love. For years, Levy and Lucy had read romance novels that described all kinds of relationships. Enemies to lovers, soulmates, friends to lovers, and all beyond and between. If Levy allowed herself to brag, she would say she won the jackpot. She had found her true love, she had experienced the full story. But in a way, that wasn’t enough for her. Levy took all her relationships seriously, both her familial, romantic and her platonic ones. If a friend of hers was hurting, then so would she. Now, that didn’t mean she thought Lucy was hurting from her relationship with Natsu – the opposite, actually. She was certain that Natsu made Lucy the happiest version of herself, which was only strengthening her resolve to get the pair together soon.

If you asked anyone else about Natsu’s and Lucy’s relationship, they would claim that they were staying out of their business. Levy, however, knew that those people were kidding themselves. Everyone waited for the day they would get together, when Lucy and Natsu finally would release the guild from the tension that had been built up from the constant expectations that lay heavy in the air. It hadn’t passed anyone’s attention that they loved each other. It hadn’t passed anyone on the entire continent – the two of them were meant to be.

Still, somehow their mutual feelings went past each other’s heads. The line between what was friendly and what meant something more had been so blurred that Levy wasn’t even sure if they could tell the distinction. For all she knew, they could have gone all the way, still thinking the other one didn’t love them back. Of course, if they had done that Lucy would have told her. Everything Natsu did eventually went past Levy – unless Lucy promised to keep a secret, she would tell her everything.

***

“Hey there babysitters.” Levy’s voice startled Lucy, who had been caught up trying to storytell herself out of a corner that Natsu had pushed her into. (Being surrounded by wild boars and having no armour, plus the two wizard-ninja-characters being locked up in a cell. Plus, Natsu’s dragon character had surrounded the princess-knight with a wildfire. Surely she could manage to get out of this situation without pulling the saved-by-the-dragon-card…)

“Hey Levy,” Natsu answered, himself not as startled since he had both smelled and heard her standing by the door watching them. “Ya’ got the baby to calm down?”

“Yeah, thanks for your help. Kanetatsu, Kanae, say thank you to aunty for playing with you, it’s time to go home.” Levy crouched down with a smile, catching the kids who charged right at her as soon as she finished her sentence.

“Thanks,” they mumbled in chorus. Levy sent a smile towards Lucy who handed her the bag that contained the toys they had played with.

“Don’t forget, bookstore tomorrow after lunch.”

“I won’t, I’m looking forward to it. Be safe on your way home!” Lucy waved goodbye to her blue haired friend. When she was out of sight, Lucy turned to Natsu, who had been standing right behind her during the parting.

“So, what’s for dinner?” A big grin was plastered on his face as he looked down on her. Their height difference wasn’t very big, but when they stood this close she almost felt like he was towering over her.

“We just had lunch and you’re already thinking about dinner?” Lucy asked, baffled, as she still felt stuffed from her meal.

“Ya’ gotta look forward to life’s pleasures,” Natsu argued. Lucy just scoffed.

“Well I suppose you can pick out dinner tonight, we have to buy groceries anyways. Someone’s been eating all the leftovers I’ve been saving.”

“I don’t get that leftover stuff. How can there be food left from one night of cooking?” Natsu put his arms behind his head. They had started heading home and were just leaving the building, Lucy taking the lead.

“Normally people don’t eat four portions in one go, that’s how.” She looked back at him, slowing her pace so she could walk beside him. “Though I guess I should thank you. I don’t exactly love reheated stuff.”

“Hah,” Natsu laughed curtly, “I know ya’ don’t! That’s why I ate it for ya’!”

“Oh, as if! Don’t act like you did me a favour!” She playfully hit his arm.

The sky was just shifting from blue to orange, making the sun give off a golden shine. Natsu looked good in gold. He looked good in all colours, but Lucy found him especially beautiful, lit up by the sun as if he was one of its rays. His skin had a healthy glow, his brown complexion mingling perfectly with the sunshine. Adding his gorgeous, sculpted profile to the mixture was almost too much for Lucy. Her knees wobbled a little, and she made herself look away before she truly melted.

***

After stopping by the store, the two of them were on their way to Lucy’s apartment. She almost made a mental note of how much money she put out for the food, but reminded herself that Natsu had been the one to pay this time. It was only fair, according to him, but Lucy felt bad either way. Even if he owed her this much, she still wanted to pay for the things in her own fridge. This once, though, she swallowed her pride and let him pay. It was nice to be cared for as well – he was even currently carrying the bags for her.

Natsu loved how independent Lucy was, he really did. However, sometimes he wanted her to be a bit more selfish. Ask for more. She was always the first to offer her seat on a full train, the first to give up her comfort for someone else’s. Even today, Natsu had to argue for five minutes before being allowed to carry both of the bags. He ended up spurting out claims to “need it for passive training” even though he knew it sounded stupid – Lucy couldn’t give up without a fight. Though he reminded himself that that too was a trait he was fond of. Her spirit was unwavering, and that could be quite helpful on missions.

That woman was truly remarkable, he caught himself thinking. He would have blushed, but thankfully it wasn’t as visible on his tanned skin. Besides, as a fire wielding mage, being bothered by having a hot face would have been quite silly. But the truth remained – he was completely smitten by his friend. Always catching himself in a longing gaze, following her movements and being at her beck and call if anything were to happen. It was as if his senses had tuned in with her existence. If she smelled differently, or if her smell faded, Natsu was the first to know. If she was shivering, he felt himself drawn to her like a magnet, like he had to fulfil his job of warming her up. If she made a sound, Natsu tuned out all other sounds. He didn’t even do this consciously – it was just part of life.

He recalled the day they had. He woke up with Lucy in his arms, ate breakfast with her, washed up in her bathroom and went to the guild with her. He spent the entire day in her vicinity, hanging out with the mates she hung out with, eating beside her, having a midday nap with his head in her lap, and then the babysitting. How he loved to hear her voice, no matter the things she was saying – the chirpy, singing tune that felt as natural to his ears as the sound of birdsong. Calming even, with a soothing effect on his mind. The fact that the voice was telling elaborate stories of ninja-heroes with magic powers and villains that could create volcanic eruptions out of nowhere was only a small detail – the content of her words barely mattered as long as he could hear her speak.

After getting released from babysitting duties, the two of them had continued to spend the day together. The trip to the grocery store wasn’t exactly exciting on its own – there was uncooked food and bright ceiling lights, none of them things that Natsu spent his day longing for. However, within this unappealing territory, a secret hid. The actual content of the store never became any more appealing, but walking along the aisles with Lucy was like entering a different world. A world where the two of them could stay together like this always, doing small, mundane tasks and still feeling fulfilled. In this world Lucy would ask about toothpaste preference, what type of coffee he wanted to have in the morning, despite her not drinking coffee, and she’d tell him off for only picking snacks that fit his own tastes. But he wouldn’t mind a little scolding, because at the end of the day, it was the fact that they were shopping together that made things special. She was making small changes in her kitchen so he could feel at home – that’s the world he never wanted to leave.

Currently, Lucy was patting down her pockets in search of her apartment key. He could see them in the back pocket of her shorts, but he didn’t bother mentioning it, since she would find them soon enough. He did, however, take this opportunity to tease her a little.

“Ya’ sure ya’ wanna stand out here and let the milk sour?” He grinned when he saw her whip her head around, her face clad with a scowl.

“I literally have the key in my hand, could you be any less patient?” Natsu could just make out that she rolled her eyes as she turned back around and unlocked the door. He was first to enter, still snickering from the teasing.

“You start chopping the vegetables, I need a shower.” Lucy shivered as she thought of the abundance of toddler-drool that must have been clinging to her body the past hours. Natsu confirmed her commando with a nod and started putting the food they wouldn’t cook with in the fridge.

By now he knew her kitchen by heart. That too was one of those things he felt fond of. To be allowed in her space, trusted with her items – not everyone had the privilege. Her team could be allowed in as guests, granted permission to make themselves at home, but it didn’t really compare with what Natsu could do in her home. He had his own coffee cup, his assigned seat at the kitchen table and in her couch, his toothbrush was allowed in the same cup as hers in the bathroom, and hygiene products had their own little designated places in her cabinet over the sink. He had a drawer in her dresser, snacks in her kitchen, a place to put his sandals as he entered her hallway. He even liked to think that she saved some space on the left side of her bed for him to cuddle up against her at night, even if she pretended to dislike it.

But it wasn’t just her apartment that he had the privilege to share with her. Not just the physical, practical stuff. She always seemed to fit Natsu into her life, whether it regarded an empty chair beside her at the guild, or an open lap for his head to rest on the train. She opened up all conversations she had, for Natsu to join. He couldn’t see her purposefully ignoring or shutting him out if he tried – but now that he was thinking about it, he also realised that it went both ways. Time spent apart from her was time spent in vain. He couldn’t enjoy himself without her by his side.

***

“Do ya’ ever wonder how Nasha’s doin’?” Lucy looked up at Natsu who had broken the silent atmosphear, her fork stuck in the air between her plate and her face.

“Edo-Lucy’s kid?” She asked, confused as to why he’d ask her this out of nowhere.

“Yeah.”

Lucy tried to understand what he was asking for, but his facial expression was vague, not serving her any clues.

“Well…” she began, putting down her fork to think. “I suppose I sometimes think of her, but I’m sure she’s fine. Lucy and Natsu are really good parents, after all.” She couldn’t help but blush when she used their names in that context. She didn’t consider herself to be naive anymore – she could handle talking about their Edolas counterparts and their lifestyles as parents without stuttering and stumbling over her words. That didn’t mean she didn’t still feel a bit affected by the implications. She and Natsu rarely spoke about relationships and intimacy with each other, so naturally her face would get hotter if he brought up a subject like this.

“Guess you’re right,” Natsu said, still seeming lost in thought.

“What brought it on? Have you been thinking about the quest recently?”

It took a minute for him to answer.

“No, it’s more like… I’ve sorta been thinkin’ of my future?” Lucy nodded a little – it was clear to her that he had been thinking hard about it. Normally he seemed so content to just live in the moment, taking life one day at a time, but she knew it wasn’t as simple as that, not even for him. He too had goals beyond just having a good next meal. “Ya’ know, ever since I reunited with Igneel I’ve tried to keep my promise, to keep looking into the future.”

He was looking down at his plate as he spoke. Any time Igneel became the topic of the conversation, he became very aware of the fact that he would never see him again. He knew Lucy could see how talking about him troubled him, and he’d rather not look straight into her eyes as he did. It would definitely open the dams and clog up his throat – right now he wanted to keep his train of thought.

“I guess I’ve just been thinking about what I’m missing.” He frowned, realising that’s not exactly what he meant. “The Edo-versions of us seemed so happy when we met them. And Gajeel and Levy have been weirdly happy ever since they had kids. So I guess I’ve been a bit envious.”

Lucy smiled. She knew how he felt, she really did. Having a big, loving family had been a lifelong dream, so seeing people achieve exactly that before she even had her first kiss riddled her with jealousy at times.

“But do you really think a baby would fill that space?” She asked. Natsu scratched his head. He had already thought about that, analysed their families to really pin-point the differences. The result? Natsu had everything that Levy and Gajeel and Edo-Lucy and Edo-Natsu had, except for kids. He had a home, he had friends, he had a loving guild, and he shared an amazing bond with someone he’d consider his life partner. There really was nothing else.

“It’s the only part that’s missing,” he ended up answering.

“Don’t you want a girlfriend first?” A wife, she wanted to add, but silenced herself.

“Why would I need one? I have you.”

Lucy blushed a little but tried to laugh him off.

“Natsu, you realise that I can’t get pregnant out of thin air, right?” She glanced up at him through her bangs. Was he pouting?

“I know how babymaking works,” he said to her, shifting in his seat. He knew he had started the conversation, but it was taking an awkward direction. Lucy looked like she finally understood what he was hinting at, her mouth dropping slightly agape.

“I... N-natsu! Are you suggesting we…?” She couldn’t finish her sentence before he abruptly interrupted her.

“I want a child.”

Lucy shrieked. Was this man hearing himself?

“I’m ready,” he continued.

“Well, I’m not! Hold on a second Natsu, have you really thought this through?” She crossed her arms over her chest.

“What’s with you? It’s not like we gotta make one right this second.”

“No kidding!”

The blush on Lucy’s face was spreading down her neck. She hurried to take a few deep breaths before Natsu sputtered out more nonsense.

“Look, it’s not that I would hate having a family with you,” she began, deliberately avoiding the dark eyes that were drilling through her. “It’s the part where you and I would make a family, that would be weird. I need romantic love to be involved in that process.”

Natsu observed her as she squirmed in her chair. Was she really this dense?

“Naturally there’d be love involved. What do you take me for?” He deadpanned.

“No, Natsu, I could only do that stuff with my boyfriend, you know that.”

Of course he knew that. He had been listening to her go on about her ideal boyfriend for years, he knew that hypothetical man inside and out.

“Couldn’t that be me though?”

Lucy frantically searched his face for any sign that he was pulling her leg. This had to be a joke – no way was this discussion happening over her dinner table on a normal Thursday.

“Are you asking me out…?” She felt herself blush harder as she voiced the thought.

“I s’pose I am,” he grinned at their odd predicament.

“Does that mean that you love me?” Lucy’s eyes were big as saucers.

“Of course I do.”

“Romantically, I mean. Not like a friend or team mate.” She cringed at her words, but she couldn’t afford mistaking him – her lifespan would actually be reduced to nothing if that were the case.

“Geez, Luigi, just what type of man am I in your mind? He seems awful.” Natsu muttered the last part, really hoping she’d counter it. Lucy, however, was still trying to register what he was doing. The man she loved was asking her out in the most Natsu-way ever, and she was just sitting there with her plate in front of her half full, feeling her jaw drop into her lap. “Of course I love you,” he clarified.

“No way.”

Natsu cringed.

“Is that your answer?”

Lucy flew up from her seat, her chair falling backwards with her momentum.

“What?! No! I mean, argh!” She grabbed her hair in frustration. “I love you too!”

Natsu’s eyes lit up.

“Really?” He grinned, standing up too to get a better look at her. She was sporting a wild blush, but her facial expression was stuck in a frustrated grimace. “You sure? You look constipated.”

Lucy would have reprimanded him if he didn’t have a point. Here she was, in the middle of her happiest moment alive, and her mouth was pressed together into a squiggly line. With a deep breath she softened her face and smiled.

“I’m sure. I really do love you.”

Natsu couldn’t hold himself away any longer. With his mouth twisted into a big smile, he closed the distance between them with a kiss. For a split second he found himself thinking that kissing wasn’t anything special, but that thought fled his brain the second Lucy kissed him back. Plush, soft lips, making movements so small they seemed more like adjustments. He loved it.

When they finally broke apart, Natsu had to ask.

“So what’s that stance on babymaking?”

Lucy giggled against his lips before mumbling her answer.

“Let’s take it one step at a time, stallion.”

_____________________________________

Notes: please pat me on the back for finishing this... it wasn't easy, especially considering the fact that i haven't felt very passionate for this prompt. but i did it! for some reason it was really hard to portray natsu? getting that perfect mixture of goofy and serious is harder than rocket science, please don't hate me if he was ooc. at least they kissed, lol

oh! and here's my crazy long motivation to gajevy babynames: Boy twin - Kanetatsu, has these kanjis 金龍 where 金 means gold, but is also used as a general term for metals. It also covers money, coins, golden colour, just to name a few. 龍 means dragon, an imaginary animal, an outstanding person, a hero. Thought that was fitting with Gajeel as a dad, but also Levy who I imagine came up with all names. Girl twin - Kanae, written with these kanjis 金恵, the first kanji being the same as Kanetatsu’s, whereas the second kanji, this one 恵, means grace, caring and compassion. Most people probably know this, but parents in Japan often use names that will sort of manifest the life for their kids, so I imagine Levy would put extra effort into these things, as it’s a symbol of what the parents are expecting from their kid as well. And then the newborn, I named her Akane with these kanjis 亜金 because I thought Gajeel would like to use the same kanji for all the kids, bc I can imagine he’d want to create a little Redfox-clan lol, and 亜 means companions, which I like as a nod towards the guild, but also to make her be part of her siblings, despite not being a twin.

(wow, what a ramble...) anyways, hope you enjoyed and i'll see y'all the next fic <3 happy october! xoxo

#bumblebeehug writes #fairy tail #lucy heartfilia #nalu #natsu dragneel #fairy tail nalu #gajeel redfox #levy mcgarden #fanfic #fanfiction #nalu fanfic #nalu fanfiction #fairy tail fanfic #fairy tail fanfiction #fluff #nalu week 2023 #new adventures

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lainiespicewrites · 1 year ago

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Coach Sy part 4 "The Date"

Here it is folks! Sy and Alayna's big first date and other things ;) Enjoy let me know what you think! No I promise I'm not stopping here!!

Warnings: cursing, alcohol consumption, Smut! (p in v) , creampie, Dom Sy

Reblogs and comments are always welcome! all mistakes are mine! it's late and I definitely did not proof read because I was on a roll and excited about posting it! I'm sorry in advance for any grammatical errors

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was another busy week. We were headed into the second week of October and that meant midterms were right around the corner. And so was fall break. Half of my students were anxious and stressed, they had test anxiety and were worried where this would put them on the class ranking. The others, I couldn’t get them to focus. They had one foot out the door ready for the long weekend, Ready for pumpkin patches and fall leaves. Surely plotting their next instagram post or tik tok or whatever it was they were doing now.

I actually didn’t see much of Sy during the week, the boys were up against another difficult team this friday so he spent most of his lunches watching tape for practice. We kept things professional when we did run into each other though. It helped that I wasn’t sure how far he wanted to take it after what he’d said saturday. He wanted to be a gentleman. I guess that meant he wasn’t going to kiss me again either until he took me out on a date. I could handle that. But it didn’t mean it wasn’t torture. Logan may be kind and sweet and the perfect gentleman. But he’s also a big fucking tease. And he was doing it on purpose!

I ran into him on Wednesday afternoon in the hallway. I was on my way back in from picking up lunch. He was on his way back to his classroom. He immediately smiled when he saw me

“Well there’s a sight for sore eyes, late lunch darlin?” He asked, leaning against the wall in the hallway. I blushed.

“Hey handsome, yeah, busy afternoon just got the chance to go pick something up.” I responded. Then added “I’ve missed are lunch dates, I haven’t seen much of you this week,” I bit my lip softly waiting for him respond.

“Yeah, me too, I’d much rather be having you for lunch,” He winked. “But I don’t think that’d be very work appropriate.” He smirked. I felt my face heat up and my eyes went wide.

“Sy!” I scolded trying so hard to hide my laugh. He cupped the my jaw and brushed his thumb over my cheek.

“Saturday’s only a few days away Darlin’, I waited over a year for you. Just a few more days and you can see as much of me as you want,” He drawled out chuckling softly.

My face went completely flush and my heart rate sped up. This had to be what a heart attack felt like. God this man knew what he was doing. My skin felt like it was burning and simultaneously I was puddle on the floor for him.

“You talk big game for a man that won’t even kiss me,” I teased, finally finding my voice again. I watched him as his eyes flickered behind me and he quickly turned to see if we were alone.

“I can’t baby, you’re like a drug or something. If I get started with you again I’m not gonna be able to stop. And this aint the right place for that sugar.” He smiled softly. He let his hand fall back to his side. We were in the middle of the hallway surely we couldn’t stand like this forever and not get caught. And he was right. Faculty dating isn’t against the rules. But at the rate we were going we would be fired if we took a step closer to each other right now.

“I do that much for you?” I asked, unable to hide smile.

“You do more than that sugar, you’ll see soon enough. I gotta head back to my classroom and get some work done. I’ll see you at the game Friday! You go eat darlin, don’t need you passin out on us,” he gave me one last soft smile before we parted ways and I headed back to my office.

On thursday night I went to dinner with the girls. And gave them all the details they’d been waiting for.

“Girl I would have melted! He did not!” Skyler gasped. I laughed and hid my blush behind a sip of wine.

“And in the middle of the school hallway, you guys are like teenagers,” Hayley shook her head, but smiled. “You better be back by curfew saturday night,” she smirked. I took another bite of the cake we were sharing for dessert and smiled skyler shook her head.

“I don’t think he plans on taking her back to her house unless he’s staying the night,” She joked.

“My god you guys can we get through one dinner without discussing my love life,”

“No, it was non-existent until he came along and we are fully invested. This is better than TV!” Skyler laughed. “Seriously though, I hope you have so much fun saturday night, you haven’t been out on a date in… well a really long time! You deserve this!”

“He does know you’re like horrible at bowling though right? Like when we used to go in high school your best game was like a 72, you might as well as just dropped it right in the gutter!” Hayley laughed.

“I tried to tell him! I chuckled. “If anything there will be a lot of laughter. And it’ll be an excuse for him to put his hands on me again.” I wiggled my eyebrows. Hayley rolled her eyes and skyler almost choked on her drink laughing. I love my friends so much!

Friday felt like it dragged on forever. Sy was busy all day again so I’d only heard from him in his usual “Good morning” text. We were busy in the office starting sign-ups for the first senior college campus field trip, and I skipped lunch so I was starving by the time I packed up my office at the end of the school day. Just as I was about to lock up my office there was a knock on my door.

I looked up and saw a few of the boys on the football team standing outside of my office.

“Derek, Matt, Tyler, Can I help you boys?” I smiled.

“We just wanted to thank you for being at our game last week Ms. P, You’re the best!” Derek spoke first. He was such a sweet kid. He was a shoein for a football scholarship at one of the big universities.

“Yeah and we heard you were gonna be there tonight too! That’s awesome, Coach says you’re our good luck charm and I think he’s right. No one’s got as much spirit as you!” Tyler laughed.

“You boys are just trying to butter me up to write your college recommendation letters,” I chuckled. “That’s so sweet of you to say, thank you! I can’t wait to watch you guys play tonight!”

“You rock Ms. Plummer! Oh and uh,” Matt smirked and stepped out from behind the other two boys I hadn’t noticed he was holding a bouquet of flowers. “Coach sent us to deliver these,” He said extending the vase out to me.

“Thank you Matt,” I smiled taking them from him and setting them on my desk. “You guys better get home Coach will have your head if you don’t take care of yourselves before the game!” They all smiled

“We’ll see you tonight Ms. P!” Derek called as they left the office. Shook my head and smiled to my self as picked up the flowers and finally closed up my office.

Once I got home from work I set the flowers on the counter and noticed there was a little card attached. I pulled off the little envelope and took out the card.

“Flowers for our gorgeous good luck charm. It’s gonna be a great game! Can’t wait to see you tonight Sugar ;)” I could feel my cheeks heating up and I smiled to myself. He was too much sometimes. But I loved it. I ate a quick dinner, changed into some jeans and put on Sy’s hoodie I still had from last weekend. I’m sure he wouldn’t mind. I sprayed on a little perfume that he had complimented a while ago. And then headed out the door to get to the game a little early.

I don’t know why I was trying to impress him. I already had him. But I really enjoyed having his attention. And I missed it so much this week while he was busy. The spot next to his truck was open so I parked next to him. It was starting to feel natural. I liked it. It felt like we belonged together. I shook my head. I was getting ahead of myself.

When I headed toward the field I found him immediately. He was standing on the sidelines talking with the other coaches while the boys were warming up. I walked along the fence that ran along the outside of the track and stood leaned against it waiting for him to see me. One of the other coaches saw me first and smirked. He sent me a little wink before he nudged Sy and nodded in my direction. Sy raised his eyebrow and turned to see what Nick was looking at. I smiled and and waved shyly. “I’ll be back, Nick get the boys started on the next defensive drill, I want ‘em good and focused tonight!” He said barely looking back to catch his assistant coaches response before he strode over to the fence giving me a toothy grin.

“Hello beautiful,” He smiled as he leaned his hip against the fence.

“Hey handsome, looks like the boys are in good shape for the game tonight!” I said. He looked out at the field and watched them for a minute and nodded.

“Yeah, we’re lookin’ even better now that our good luck charm is here. The boys couldn’t wait to give you your flowers.” He chuckled, turning back to face me.

“Yeah? I’m sure THEY couldn’t,” I smirked. “Thank you they were beautiful, and the card was sweet Sy, you didn’t need to do that.”

“Gentlemen always, sends flowers on the first date,” He teased.

“Yeah but it’s not until tomorrow,” I joked.

“Okay, so maybe I felt bad that i’ve been a little busy this week, just wanted you to know that I’m eager to see you again. I’m always thinking about ya,” he smiled

“Sy,” i blushed

“It’s true, I’m always thinking about your pretty little smile. And those lips.” He paused “The way you taste. And those tits,” He smirked wiggling is eyebrows.

“Oh my god,” I blushed and folded my arms against the fence hiding my face. “You are ridiculous!” I mumbled against my sleeve. He chuckled.

“Is that my sweatshirt?” He asked raising an eyebrow. I lifted my head to meet his gaze biting my lip softly.

“It might be.” I said shyly.

“So you’ve been thinking about me too,” He smirked.

“It’s kinda hard not too,” I admitted. He smiled and holding my gaze for a moment before looking back at the field, then behind me at the bleachers.

“It’s probably not appropriate for us to show PDA around the students like this huh?” He said sadly, “I wanna kiss you so bad,”

“Well, it is technically after work hours, and theres no harm in a good luck kiss.” I smiled batting my eyelashes playfully.

“I like the way you think Darlin,” He smirked cupping my jaw tilting my face up and pressing his lips to mine softly. We stayed like that for a few seconds breathing each other in. It’d been a long week. Finally we pulled away when one of the players whistled from the sidelines. Sy chuckled and shook his head.

“Good luch coach.”

They didn’t need it, the boys played amazing. The predictions would be that this would be a close scoring game, but our team shut them out. The final score was 54 to 10. They had 4 straight consecutive wins this season. They were undefeated so far and if they won again next week it would be the first time in 15 years we’d headed into an undefeated season. Sy was really soaking it up after the game.

“Well look at you Cowboy.” I smiled waiting against my car as he walked out to his truck after everyone had cleared out. “You’re famous around here now.”

“Nah, the boys deserve all the credit, they’re the ones putting in the work.” He said humbly.

“I saw you celebrating you out there, You love this!” I grinned, looking up at him as he stopped right in front of me. “You’re a damn good coach, they wouldn’t be this good without you,” I put my hand on his chest and the other on his shoulder pulling him closer.

“With a beauty like you cheering us on we’re unstoppable baby,” He said softly grabbing my belt loops and pulling me against him kissing me roughly. I let him bit my lip and slip his hands down to squeeze my ass before I pulled away and pushed him back softly with my hand on his chest.

“Slow down Tiger, you haven’t taken me out yet remember?” I smirked. He groaned dropping his head to my shoulder breaking heavily against my neck. “Whats got you all riled up captain?

“You showing up in my hoodie, kissing me like that, acting all shy, you’re such a tease baby,” he growled.

“Me? And your little stunt in the hallway this week wasn’t teasing? I couldn’t focus for the rest of the day! And I couldn’t kiss you then!” I pouted. He smirked.

“Yeah I guess that wasn’t fair was it?” He brushed my hair back away from my face and placed a gentle kiss on my forehead. “Okay, we better get out of here before I try and take you home with me again,”

“One more day Logan, you did this to yourself!” I winked. “It’ll be worth it.” He chuckled.

“I’ll pick you up around 7:30 for dinner, the bowling thing starts at 9 is that okay?” He asked.

I nodded “That sounds perfect Sy! I’ll see you then,” I said walking around to the drivers side of my car and opening the door.

“Get home safe, Text me when you get home.” He said as he got in his truck.

“I will!”

The next day I was so anxious. Logan and I had been out together before but this was different. I could barely eat I was so nervous. I sat around trying to get some housework done, but I couldn’t even nervous clean. So I sat down and tried to get some reading done, but then there was a spicy scene in the book I was reading and, well my mind wandered to Sy and I was nervous all over again. Finally 6 o’clock rolled around and I let myself start to get ready. I pulled on a pair of tight jeans I hoped he’d like. Not that it would matter. By the end of the night I knew they’d be off. I put on a dark green v neck. I’ve noticed he seems to like that color. We would eventually have to switch to bowling shoes so I just put on a pair of converse and paced while I tried to figure out what to do with my hair and how much make up I should do. Then I panicked again because, Should I pack a bag?

It’s very likely I’ll end up at his place again. Unless he doesn’t want me to stay over. I don’t want to assume. Maybe I should text him. No because I didn’t want him to know I was thinking about what we’d be doing later. But I was. And I’m sure he was. This was Ridiculous. I picked up my phone and sent a quick text.

“Do gentlemens let their ladyfriends sleepover on the first date?” I sent. That sounds so stupid, He’s gonna think your stupid. He’s literally gonna call you and cancel the whole thing. My phone buzzed and I jumped a little lost in thought and anxiety.

“When they’re lucky enough to have a date as sexy as you they do ;)” He replied. Okay so maybe I’m not stupid.

“Would it be unladylike and presumptuous for me to be prepared for said occasion?” I texted back. Instead of texting my phone rang. I answered him quickly

“Hello?” I giggled.

“Hey Darlin’ I was just getting ready to come pick you up and I was thinking, Do you wanna stay at my place tonight?” I could hear the smirk in his voice.

“Sy,” I chuckled “You didn’t have to.” he shushed me.

“Listen baby, you don’t have to if you don’t want to, but the way we’ve been going at it this week, I figured I may as well formally ask.” He was holding back laughter.

“I’d be honored to stay with you tonight, I’ll pack a back,” I teased. He chuckled

“Good girl, I’ll see you in 20 baby,” we hung up and bit my lip shaking my head to myself. He was so damn cute! I finished getting ready and threw a few overnight essentials in a bag. Just as I was double checking everything there was a knock on my door. I grabbed my purse and bag and opened the door to see Sy with another bouquet of flowers and a big grin.

“Hey gorgeous! You ready?” He smiled. I nodded.

“Yeah! Those for me?” I blushed.

“Told ya, Gentleman always brings flowers on the first date.” He smirked proud of himself. They were a beautiful bouquet of yellow roses.

“Your momma raised a good man!” I smiled. “They’re beautiful, I’ll go put these in some water and we can go!” After I found a vase and set them on the counter next to last nights flowers we left for dinner. He took me to a local burger joint. It reminded me of one of the restaurants in Grease. He’d genuinely put thought into this! We ate dinner and even shared a milkshake.

“You’re such a dork!” I laughed when he leaned across the table to take a sip.

“You like it or you wouldn’t keep me around,” He joked.

“Yeah I guess you’re right.” He laughed and his eyes flickered to my lips.

“Hold still sugar, you got a little something,” He took his thumb and swiped the ice cream off my bottom lip and then brought it to his lips sucking it off. I swallowed hard and bit my lip “Got it,” He winked.

“Mmhmm, you did,” I stuttered.

After he paid for dinner he drove us to the bowling alley and we got set up on a lane for the night. We also got a little wrist band for the bar. “I”m gonna go get a beer sugar you want anything?” He asked.

“I’ll take a wine cooler, whatever they got!” I smiled. I set up our screen putting our names on the board and started our first game. I felt him wrap his arm around my waist and he pulled me close pressing a kiss to my neck.

“You ready?” he asked handing me my drink? I nodded biting my lip and trying to control my breathing. I didn’t want him to know how easy it was for him to make me lose my mind. He chuckled and kissed my cheek letting go of me and picked up his ball.

Sy was up first and I watched as he stepped up to the lane. He drew his arm back and let the ball come forward dropping it perfectly in the middle He hit all but two pins in the far left. Of course he was good at this. “Damn Sy, I didn’t realize you were a professional at every sport.” I joked. He chuckled.

“A couple buddies and I used to play on a league in high school. It’s been a while.” He picked up his ball again when it came back through and stepped up to the line again and it spiraled down and curved perfectly knocking down the last pins. “Guess I still got it!” He smirked. I rolled my eyes and took a sip of my drink. I grabbed my ball and stepped up to the line. Well, I’ve made myself look stupid before and he’s still here so, here’s to embarrassing myself! I threw the ball and it dropped hard immediately rolling toward the right gutter. I sighed heavy and dropped my head in shame. I could hear Logan trying not to laugh.

“Shut up,” I said when I turned around waiting for my ball.

“That was a good try,” He snickered.

“I’ll get the next one!” I said confidently. I did not. This one rolled more to the left skated along the edge and knocked down two pins. I winced but laughed at myself when I turned around.

“You hit em that time!” I laughed.

“We can’t all be perfect like you Sy!” I joked. He shook his head his chest shaking with laughter.

“I can help you if you want,” He smiled sweetly. I wasn’t going to give into him that easily. Not yet.

“No! I can do it,” I said stubbornly. He just laughed. We went on like that for a while. The next turn He bowled a strike. I knocked down 4. He picked up another spare. I got 6. He got another strike. I threw another gutterball. When it was my turn again I downed the rest of my drink and stood up grabbing the ball. I walked up to the line and stood their for a second. I stared at the pins and the turned back towards Sy and pouted.

“Okay I give up, help,” He smiled standing up from the table and walked up behind me.

“Come here baby, Stand a little more to the right of center.” He moved us over and grabbed my hip so I was completely pressed against him. He slowly ran his hand down my arm gently grabbing my wrist. Guiding it back to show me how to throw the ball. He was saying something but I honestly couldn’t hear the instructions he was giving over my heartbeat pounding in my ears. “Just like that and let it go okay.” he smiled. I nodded and he guidded me again helping me throw the ball. This time I knocked down all but one. “Thats my girl!” He said spinning me around and kissing me passionately. I wrapped my arms around his shoulders kissing him back. He pulled away quickly and smiled. “I knew you could do it.” We finished the first game and of course Sy had Won. He got me another drink and he switched to water so he could drive us home. The second drink was starting to hit and I kept calling him over to help me and teasing him by pressing my ass against him everytime he was behind me. At the end of the last game he was behind me helping me throw again. I was definitely a little buzzed.

I pressed my ass against him grinding against him to whatever song was playing on the old jukebox. But he was done with my teasing. He growled in my ear squeezing my hip tight. And after I let go of the ball he turned me around crashing his lips to mine. I smirked when we pulled away. “What do you think you’re doing darlin, hmm?” he smirked.

“Just having fun Sy,” I ran my hand down his chest and his stomach. He grabbed my wrist stoppinig me before I could get any further. I pouted. “Buzzkill,” He shook his head.

“You’re in for it when we get home darlin, don’t say I didn’t warn ya,” we left the bowling alley and got back in the truck. I was so excited for him to get us home.

“Such a naughtly little girl teasing me in public like that. You like misbehaving don’t you,” He growled when we were on the main road back home. His hand had been on my thigh the whole drive. His fingertips softly massaging the inside.

“I think you like it when I do,” I teased. I reached over and ran my had across his lap and smirked when I felt the bulge in his jeans. I playfully squeezed him and he cursed under his breath.

“What am I gonna do with you.” He groaned. He pulled into his drive way and threw it into park. He jumped out and ran to my side of the truck. I had just enough time to unbuckle my seatbelt before he pulled me out and threw me over his shoulder.

“Sy!” I laughed. He smacked my ass.

“You asked for this sugar!” He carried me into the house and took me straight to his bedroom. He dropped me on the bed and flipped me over onto my stomach. I squealed playfully as he pulled down my jeans and panties tossing them to the side. “You wanna be a brat and misbehave. You’re gonna learn baby.” He brought his hand down with a loud smack on my ass. “Bad girls get punished.” I could feel myself dripping already. God it was like he was straight out of a romance novel. But he was real. This was happening. He gave a hard slap to the other cheek and I whimpered. He rubbed over it soothing it gently. “You like this don’t you, when I take control?” I moaned inresponse.

“Words sugar,” He smacked my ass again and I yellped not ready for it.

“Yes Sir!” I choked out.

“That’s my good girl, now stay just like that, Ive been dying to bend you over all week.” I heard him unzip his jeans and then felt him press the head of his cock against my folds. He didn’t give me time to adjust this time. He just slammed into me.

“Fuck Sy!” I moaned as he started a relentless pace. He tangled his fingers in my hair as he fucked me from behind pulling me up against his chest.

“I love when your like this, when you’re so needy for me. You’ve been aching for my cock all week. And You’d do anything to get it.” I blushed. Fuck he was right. I moaned as he thrusted harder.

“Say it,” he growled in my ear.

“Mm fuck I need your cock Logan,” I moaned. I heard him groan and felt his fingers pressing against my clit as he reached around to help me reach my climax.

“I know baby, and you needed me to make you cum didn’t you, I’m gonna let you cum baby all you have to do is ask.” It felt so fucking good. He was so intense. His words his motions. The things he was doing to me was too much.

“Please Sy,” I begged.

“Please what baby?” He smirked as his thrusts became sloppy. I groaned feeling it build up inside me.

“Please let me cum!” I moaned. He Pushed me back down so my face was against the mattress and grabbed my hips thrusting into me.

“Let go baby, I gotcha, I’m right here baby, cum for me. “ his name tumbled from my lips as my walls clenched around him and I reached my climax. He wasn’t far behind. A few more thrusts and he was cumming inside me. Growling in my ear telling me how good I was.

“Fuck,” He breathed pulling out and laying on the bed next to me. He pulled me on top of him, combing his fingers through my hair. “Well, I’d say that went well,” He smirked. I shook my head trying to catch my breath.

“You’re an idiot.” I laughed.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

That's it Please let me know what you think! There's more to come and let me know if you want to be added to the tag list :)

@summersong69 @carrie80reads @identity2212 @caramariehurst @redheadrouge @warriormirkwood @kingliam2019 @gummydummy19 @deandoesthingstome

#fanfic writing #henry cavill #henry cavill smut #august walker #august walker fanfiction #captain syverson #captain syverson smut #captain syverson x ofc #fanfiction #henry cavil x reader

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muniesstuff · 1 year ago

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I really want to see fanart, fanfic, post, I'll take anything, about the fall out between spider gang and miles. I'm talking the universe said "fuck you" to both sides and made shit go sideways and fast.

Miguel said Miles dad had to die? Universe took both of his parents.

Miles still has Ganke? Universe takes him too

Miles has already seen two people die in front of him? Universe add four more and make it back to back, that little girl his dad died for, yeah she gotta go too.

Peter said Miles is a tough kid? Universe said to break him when they barely win and have him go right into shock.

Miguel said cannon events (his predictions) will stabilize the multiverse? The spot almost wipes 1610 out and nearly takes miles with it.

Peter and Gwen were only trying to do the right thing? Miles has lost everyone close to him and can never get them back.

Gwen wants to go back to the way things were? Too bad Miles can never give her that kind of trust again. He definitely can't love her in that potential romantic way again because she hurt him.

Peter wants to help the kid through this tough time? To come to an understanding? Miles understands, and he gets why Mayday comes first. But Peter hurt him too, so there are going to be a long heart to heart and a lot of tears. Their relationship has to start from scratch and slowly heal from there.

Miguel didn't think things would turn out like this? He thought Miles was the cause that he couldn't even clock the spot? He had to carry back a catatonic Miles back to hq to rush him to medical because the shock very nearly finished what the spot started.

Miguel wants to apologize? Wants Miles to get better? Miles is terrified of him, not because of his looks, but because of his actions. But they are both each other's triggers, so the first two month (out of the hospital) or so, they send each other into outburst and panic attacks. Miles is triggered by the chase. Miguel is triggered by feeling reminded of Gabriel by Miles eyes, smile, and some similarities in personality. They get there eventually, and I feel like they'll get there before peter and Miles get there. Mostly because Miguel and Miles didn't know each other like that.

Friends want to visit Miles while he's recovering? Nope, they set him off into a panic or aggressive outburst. The only person that can go in or near miles is Hobbie. At some point Pav and Mayday worm their way in. Nearing the end of his hospital stay Porker, peni, and noir also work their way in. But Hobbie becomes important to Miles very quickly as a point of trust. His main support system are Hobbie and Pav.

My point is that I want to see "your actions have consequences" and not only with Miguel. Yeah , he played a big part, but let's be honest, it all felt like a huge mental breakdown. But Peter? He was Miles's mentor, and he looked up to him. And Gwen knew Miles longer than peter did and Miles was obviously crushing on her. So, she had to hurt the most out of the two.

I just want some juice angst for everyone.

#miles morales angst #across the spiderverse #spiderdads #peter x miguel #mayday parker #peter b parker x miguel o'hara #gwen stacy #spider angst #margo kess #pavitr prabhakar #hobie brown #peter b parker #miguelohara

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salaimoi · 8 months ago

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ᯓᡣ𐭩 ‘like an angel’ by artemas is responsible for this. re-upload bc I was too sleepy to realize how horrible & unfinished this was when i first uploaded it

Most men would call you distasteful words during sex, but not Choso. The two of you had only fucked a handful of times thus far, but when you did, he would remain in utter silence as he admired you.

And to you, his untainted purity was a refreshing sight to behold among this blemished world – so you didn't mind his lack of words.

Choso was fairly new to the dating scene, but he heard buzz from the other jjk men that you're supposed to talk to your partner during sex. He didn't completely comprehend the notion, since he believed your physique communicated with his gaze in a way no words ever could.

Alas, he decided to give it a try, blurting out the first line that crossed his mind during that moment.

“You fuck like an angel,” he praises mid session while his hands latched onto your hips as you maneuvered yourself on top of him. Even the way he held you with a mellow grip mirrored his temper, aiding your efforts by guiding your body and gently pressing you back down against his pelvis every time you felt as if your knees were going to give out.

You were too out of it to comprehend a single syllable, so you babble an incoherent “uh huh,” not giving what he said much thought.

But Choso meant every word; to him, you were divinity fully realized. He was almost 100% certain you would give him a heart attack, but he would die for his angel. Perhaps he welcomed death as long as it meant immortalizing the breathtaking scene before him.

And as if his first comment wasn't enough, he went on to cement the notion of just how dearly he admired you.

“From my rotting body, flowers shall grow, each one being only for you – and you alone,” he gazed up at you with a tooth-rotting, beaming expression before going on, “and I'd be honored to be the favored flower that adorns the enchanting garden your body is.”

While his composed demeanor didn’t change, the color of his cheeks told a completely distinct narrative.

Your eyes widen, causing your movements to come to a complete halt as the sudden unexpected, but heartfelt, words finally process in your mind.

One of your hands moves towards Choso’s cheek, a tenderness that directly translates to your voice as you reply, “I love you sweetie, but I’m gonna have to teach you how to properly dirty talk.”

“But isn’t that how other people do it?” He raised an eyebrow, completely unaware that the definition he gave to the concept of sex talk was flawed.

He assumed other couples used this time to praise their partners, since they were handing over a very vulnerable part of them. And he was right to an extent, but other couples did not spew beautiful poems like he did — but you had no heart to tell him that.

So instead of shattering his wholesome beliefs with reality, you nodded, leaning forward to press a warm kiss on your boyfriend’s forehead.

“Yeah, that’s how some of them do it.”

The reassurance was met with his arms wrapping around your waist, his face burying itself in between your bare chest. It was almost enough to forget the vulgar deed you were engaging in a few seconds ago.

#⊱ ۫ ׅ ✧ ᴄʜᴏꜱᴏᴄᴀᴛ ɪꜱ ᴏɴʟɪɴᴇ .ᐟ #first choso fic I’ve ever written lol #he’s so bbg tho how could I NOT write at least once for him #choso my beloved #choso kamo #choso x reader #choso smut #choso fluff #choso x you #jjk choso #jujutsu kaisen choso

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lemotmo · 2 months ago

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Heyya!!Let me start by saying i am pretty sure buddie's happening this season butt..

Eddie's obvious chrush on ana.It was on his face.

Eddie's intimate scene with marisol.like him kissing her hands showed he liked her.

What I'm trying to say that we can explain these scene's didn't hold that much depth with theories right but the GA doesn't pay that much attention to minute details of eddie's queer coding.

And I will not speak about eddie being in love with shannon or not because we don't know about that.Eddie's pov/memory of his and Shannon's relationship is messed up.What we were shown on screen when she was alive doesn't clarify anything about his feelings when they were together before chris.He loved her that's for sure but in what form is...unknown,if i may.

So coming back to main point,The GA definitely hasn't given that much thought to eddie's sexuality,probabaly assume he is straight.My question is how do you think the writers will make the GA aware of his queer coding and all the umm..inner function-lol-that we as hardcore fans have studied intrinsically.😅

PS: Sorry to anyone who headcanons eddie as bisexual but I don't think so.

Interesting question Nonny. Thanks!

The thing is...

The GA thought Buck was as straight as a ruler as well before he came out in season 7. He had had a long string of girlfriends. More than Eddie even. So, it wouldn't be the first time the GA would have to adapt to exploring a formerly unknown facet of a character.

Eddie has always been queer-coded, since day one. In my personal opinion even more than Buck ever was and most of the GA seemed to adapt just fine to him kissing a guy, so I'm quite certain it won't be as big an issue as some people seem to think it might be, if it is properly introduced.

I do have to disagree on Ana and Marisol. Eddie never really seemed completely comfortable with either of them. He got a panic attack because Ana was referred to as Chris' mother. He obviously didn't care too much about Marisol either if he didn't even give her a second thought when he met Kim.

He also admitted to Buck that he didn't want to go home because Marisol would want to have sex with him. I mean, she was a good-looking woman and he was avoiding having sex with her over something that happened in her past? That's a red flag right there. The whole moving in/moving out thing? Big red flag! The man didn't really want her in his space, but he felt that he had to take that step because that's what was expected of him. That's not a sign of a loving relationship.

And what about his comment about 'feeling like he has to perform on dates with women'? Or his date with that lovely lady where he sat with her all night long, making plans on how to lie to their families. She was great. That would have been a perfect time for Eddie to fall for someone, but once again he just didn't seem to be very interested.

He seems to be capable of building great friendships with women, but the moment it goes beyond that, things start short-circuiting his brain.

Remember his break up with Ana? He literally said that he thought he would start to fall for her over time, but it never happened for him.

When Carla told him to follow his own heart, he looked over at Ana and you could see he wasn't really in it. He never was.

As for Shannon... He met her at a very young age and befriended her. I'm sure he felt a lot of emotions for her and he definitely crushed on her. But when she got pregnant reality set in and they had to get married. So there was never a chance to explore his own emotions beyond what he and Shannon had. He had no way to compare if this was what he was supposed to feel for someone when you're in love.

So yeah, he did love Shannon deeply. I'm absolutely certain of that. But I'm not so sure if it was a true romantic love. He definitely convinced himself that it was. But was it really?

In conclusion: In my humble opinion Eddie has always had problems connecting to women. He has never really fallen in love with one. Not the way he was supposed to anyway.

I do think they'll gradually build up his story as to not drop the GA right into another coming-out without any other context to it. Two seasons in a row might be too much of a good thing.

They might reach back to all the above scenes I mentioned in flashbacks. And they might ad extra scenes as well. Scenes from when he was a child perhaps? Growing up in Texas and having to be 'the man' of the house at an early age? How did that affect him during his puberty?

Gradually the GA will get a new view on Eddie and his complicated history with women. Eventually, after a few extra episodes I think, they will also get a new view on his very complicated emotions for his best friend Buck.

#eddie diaz meta #eddie diaz #buddie #eddie diaz speculation #season 8 speculation #911 speculation #911 abc #nonnies galore

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jnginlov · 1 year ago

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to love you

when you ask him to be your fake fling he’s not prepared for the way it will make his unaddressed feelings for you grow

⇀ pairing wooyoung x gn!reader (references to yunho x gn!reader)

⇀ genre fluff, angst, fake dating au, unspecified nonidol au, f2l, one sided pining

⇀ style one shot

⇀ word count 10.4k

⇀ warnings jealousy, talks of hooking up, talks of vomit, crying, yelling at reader, yelling at wooyoung, just like a lot of general yelling, something that could be interpreted as a panic attack (no specific descriptions), allusions to violence (in a non-serious sense), cursing, food, alcohol consumption (assumed all characters are of age), parties, multiple kisses, pet names (love, babe), skinship (head on a shoulder, holding hands, holding faces), let me know if i missed anything

you and wooyoung certainly weren’t best friends but that’s not to say you two were enemies either. you’d met each other through a friend of a friend just over a year ago and even though you both felt an instant connection, it was nothing that had either of you suddenly intertwining your lives. wooyoung would consider you a casual friend and if he asked he’s about 89% sure you would say the same, 1% of the other 11 was reserved for what his best friend yeosang liked to call his “simp brain” that wanted to imagine you’d call him something along the lines of a crush, but disregarding the tiny baby so minor and minuscule romantic interest wooyoung had in you, you both were casual friends, “i’m already in the neighborhood, do you want to grab coffee” friends, “i was supposed to have a date but they bailed and i’m already dressed up, do you want to get drinks” friends. you both were certainly not “can you be my fake boyfriend?” friends.

“i’m sorry, what?” wooyoung is lucky he swallowed the last sip of his coffee or it would likely be all over his open laptop.

“you know that guy yunho?” you supply, quite unhelpfully in wooyoung’s opinion.

and yeah of course he knows yunho, he’s yeosang’s roommate, and the guy you haven’t been able to shut up about for the past month. “what does he have to do with anything?” he asks, trying to keep any of the jealousy he felt bubbling in his stomach at the mention of yunho’s name from showing on his face.

you roll your eyes like the answer is obvious as you reply, “well i was talking with mingi the other day,” mingi being the friend you had met wooyoung through in the first place, “and he said i should try making yunho jealous, because he’s pretty sure yunho is actually interested in me but just, like, needs that push.”

wooyoung nods slowly as he continues to listen to you rant, trying to understand where in your mind you think taking mingi’s advice, especially when it came to your love life, would be a good idea. wooyoung loved mingi but the man hadn’t had a date in more than six months and he’s not even sure when the last time his roommate had any romantic interest in anyone was.

“-and so i figured the best way to make someone jealous is basically seem interested in someone else,” you conclude as the man sat across from you tunes back in, trying to look like he’d been listening the whole time instead of wondering how he’d found himself in this situation. he was definitely going to have to talk to mingi once he got back home.

“and you thought i was the best choice for that?” wooyoung raises a brow as you sip your drink.

you nod quickly as you swallow. “well i’m pretty sure he knows hongjoong and seonghwa are dating, jongho is very clearly not my type, i’m not close enough with san, and i doubt he would believe yeo and i were a thing considering they live together,” you explain, listing off all the men in your close circle of friends, except for him, yunho, and mingi, and for a second he considers trying to twist mingi’s intentions by suggesting that maybe the tall blonde is the one who likes you and is looking for an excuse to get close to you but he can still recall the look of sadness on the gentle giant’s face the last time wooyoung threw him under the bus. the look of determination on your face makes it seem like you’d been thinking about this for more than a day, hell maybe even more than a week, but wooyoung can’t tell if your resolve should be alarming in any way because he’s much too worried about the prospect of what pretending to be in a relationship with you might do to his heart.

in a last ditch effort he asks, “isn’t this what, like, tinder is for?” and the way you sigh cues him in to know that you’ve definitely considered that avenue already.

“i don’t want to lead on some poor guy for my own gain like that.”

of course you don’t, you’re too nice, and if you knew that wooyoung would agree in a heartbeat, if it weren’t for his microscopic eensy-weensy romantic interest in you, he’s sure you wouldn’t be asking him for the exact same reason, but wooyoung has been set to keep his feelings to himself since he realized they existed at all and so he can only blame himself for the current situation. well maybe he can blame mingi too but, again, that’s a conversation for later.

wooyoung sighs. “i need to know your plan before i’ll agree to anything,” he says but he knows he’ll end up saying yes no matter what when he sees the way your face immediately lights up at the prospect of your plan working successfully.

“okay,” you place your hands against the table excitedly, causing both of your drinks to wobble slightly, “i was thinking it could be more of a casual thing instead of a full blown relationship so that it would be more believable when we break it off.” you explain and wooyoung can feel that he’s not going to get any work done today, closing his laptop in defeat as he rests his chin on top of his hand, his elbow now placed on the table.

after you’d explained the details of your idea, and your fake situationship, you and wooyoung both left the cafe with a plan for the next couple weeks, leading up to a big party yunho and yeosang were hosting in which you’d explain to yunho that your thing with wooyoung was over and you’d get together and it would all work out.

he had to give it to you, wooyoung had doubted how much rational thought you’d actually put into your idea when you first asked but after hearing you out he was almost convinced himself that it might work. secretly wooyoung was hoping for the romcom ending in which you would realize he was the one that was interested in you, but that was just a itty-bitty thought in the back of his mind, totally not a thought swirling around his head and making his heart thump his entire journey home after you’d parted ways.

“hey, how was your day?” mingi is quick to greet his roommate with a large smile as wooyoung takes off his shoes in the entryway.

“hm yeah it was fine,” wooyoung starts with sarcasm dripping from his voice, “except for the part where you convinced my friend to ask me for a fake relationship!” his words had progressively gotten louder as he approached the taller man, now looking like a kicked puppy and cowering on the couch.

“what’s going on?” seonghwa, who had been trying to pay attention to the television is now alerted to the conflict between his friends when mingi almost sat right on him.

“mingi convinced (y/n) that they just need to make yunho jealous in order to get him to make a move,” wooyoung plops down next to seonghwa, arms crossed in front of his chest and pout set on his face.

“and that’s your problem because,” seonghwa trials off, gesturing for wooyoung to supply the rest of the sentence before placing a comforting hand on mingi’s arm.

“because,” wooyoung sighs, taking a deep breath before he finishes his sentence, “they asked me to be their fake situationship.”

mingi pops up off the couch suddenly at wooyoung’s statement, looking just as surprised as wooyoung is sure he was in the cafe with you less than an hour earlier.

“i did NOT suggest they fake date one of our friends,” mingi explains, scrambling through the living room in search of, well, wooyoung’s not sure. “my suggestion was to just get a little comfy with someone at a party or something,” he explains, pulling the pillow off from where he’d been sat and sighing in relief as he takes his phone into his hands, fingers flying across the screen in a panic.

“i don’t see the issue,” seonghwa interjects, “it’s not like you’re actually dating and it’s not even like you’re fake dating if you’re not calling it official,” the oldest of the group shrugs, opening one of the boxes of pizza on the coffee table and pulling out a slice for himself. “plus it’s not like you’re interested in them or anything.”

mingi freezes at this, his behavior a complete 180 from only a few seconds ago as his gaze slowly drifts up from his phone to wooyoung who has stiffened next to seonghwa. the two youngest both let out audibly pained chuckles and seonghwa drops his plate dramatically back down onto the table.

“don’t tell me.”

wooyoung clears his throat loudly. “so i may have, like, the tiniest most insignificant crush on them,” he practically whispers, face feeling slightly warmer at the prospect of the situation he’s in, and certainly not his feelings for you.

seonghwa narrows his eyes at the youngest, a question on the tip of his tongue before mingi decides to supply the answer anyway.

“you’ve been in love with them for months, we all know.”

“i am not in love with them,” wooyoung shouts back, anger reignited as he focused back on the true root of the issue, mingi and his bright ideas. “yes i might think they’re attractive, and yes i would like to date them for real, and maybe, just maybe, i do get a little jealous when they talk about yunho, but that doesn’t mean i like them that much.”

wooyoung feels the energy fizzling out and his words get weaker as he observed the looks on his roommates’ faces. mingi seems almost smug, like he’s been proven right, while seonghwa wears an amused grin, eyebrows raised slightly in satisfaction.

“you’re sure about that?”

the next week, as he’s laying sprawled out on his best friend’s bed, yeosang busy putting away his freshly cleaned laundry, he sighs for what feels like the millionth time and the dark haired man at the closet has had enough.

“either say something or stop sighing,” yeosang grunts, placing the last hanging item in the closet. as he moves to sit at his desk, wooyoung flips onto his stomach quickly, causing the bed to creek and him to bounce slightly.

“i just don’t get it,” wooyoung says and yeosang resists the urge to groan. this is the same conversation the two had been having since wooyoung found out about your interest in yeosang’s roommate.

woo complains that he doesn’t understand why you think yunho is so great and then yeo has to bring his friend back to reality by reminding him that yunho is actually a pretty great guy and that woo is the one who could change his own fate, if he just had the balls to admit he was interested in you. but of course wooyoung always manages to weasel out of the truth, claiming that he doesn’t like you that much, or that you don’t like him, which yeo thinks is shit considering the amount of times you started ditching him for his own best friend but he’s not a snitch.

it’s yeosang’s turn to sigh. “i’m not doing this again,” he mutters. “yunho is not a bad guy, in fact he’s a great guy, all of his previous relationships ended amicably, he’s not unattractive according to the people that have asked me to give him their number, and as far as i know he and (y/n) actually have quite a bit in common.” yeosang turns to wooyoung quickly, finding the younger man with a small pout gracing his features.

as wooyoung opens his mouth to possibly argue against one of the points his friend had raised, both men hear the familiar sound of the front door opening and yunho’s usual greeting rings through the apartment. both boys suddenly feel like they’ve been caught, wooyoung’s eyes going wide for a moment as yeosang turns back to busy himself with the unfolded clothes on his desk.

“hey,” yunho says, poking his head through yeosang’s open door a few moments later. “they were out of those macarons you like at the cafe so i got you a maple cinnamon roll instead, y/n suggested it.”

at the mention of your name wooyoung perks up, trying not to seem too eager at the mere thought of you.

“sorry woo, i didn’t know you were over until after i’d ordered or i would have gotten you something,” yunho apologizes and wooyoung hates that he can tell it’s sincere.

wooyoung thinks it would be a lot easier to hate his best friend’s roommate if he was not actually such a nice guy. but he just can’t hate him, he might dislike him a bit for being such a great guy and being the one to hold your attention, but honestly feeling anything but amicable toward the man just makes him feel guilty. it’s not yunho’s fault you find him attractive and it’s certainly not yunho’s fault that wooyoung can’t just admit his feelings.

“you ran into y/n?” yeosang asks, honestly not trying too hard to hide the glance he throws wooyoung’s direction.

yunho nods as he moves to fully lean against yeosang’s doorframe. “they said they were stopping by the cafe before they were supposed to meet a friend.”

yeosang and wooyoung both nod in response, wooyoung’s a little more engaged while yeosang keeps looking between his two best friends.

“they actually asked if you were over,” yunho continues, gesturing to wooyoung with a quick tick of his chin.

the younger man’s expression quickly shifts to confusion before he’s remembering your idea he’d been telling yeosang about only half an hour before. he tries to tone down the shock of hearing you ask about him as he asks, “really?”

“yeah,” yunho chuckles slightly. “they said you weren’t answering any of their texts and that only happens when you’re with yeosang.”

before yunho is even done with his explanation wooyoung is digging through the slightly askew comforter he’d unceremoniously dropped himself and his phone onto once he’d arrived an hour ago. he’s not sure if you just made up the statement to prove to yunho that you two were close, as you truly didn’t text each other much outside of making plans, but no matter if you were just trying to provoke yunho you had spoken the truth. just about every time you texted wooyoung he would drop everything to respond. mingi would call it being “down bad”, and maybe wooyoung was learning to accept that fact about himself.

as wooyoung scrolled through the texts you’d sent him, a little update about how you think the plan is working and a picture of a cute dog that you said looked a little like him, which totally didn’t make him blush, he hears yunho clear his throat.

“are you two,” yunho pauses as wooyoung glances up at him, finding the conversation to feel a bit stiff and uncomfortable. “are you two like a thing?” yunho finally asks, finding the setup of yeosang’s room to be more interesting as his friend watches a blush creep onto the tips of his ears.

it’s wooyoung’s turn to find the decor around him interesting as he replies, trying to remember everything you’d talked about, “i wouldn’t call it a thing.” wooyoung shrugs trying to seem cool as he feels his heart beat creeping up into his throat.

he hadn’t anticipated it being this hard. the man hadn’t even lied about anything yet and he could still feel the guilt settling into the back of his throat, flavoring his words with a bitterness that held a strange mix of satisfaction, for getting to even pretend to know you in a more intimate way than his current competition, and regret, for agreeing to be apart of a plan that might cause one of his friends any distress.

“they’ve just been talking about you a lot,” yunho adds and if wooyoung had a little less self control he’d probably have fallen right off yeosang’s bed. he’s too focused on the thought of you purposely mentioning him in conversation to others to think about how yunho would know, the older man probably having seen you more times than wooyoung had in the past week.

“i think they’re in what you might call a situationship,” yeosang supplies when wooyoung doesn’t respond, shrugging as if he has no interest in the information he’d just shared.

wooyoung bites his tongue as he takes a deep breath, mentally preparing to tell the biggest lie he’s probably told in his whole life, just as you’d agreed to. “you remember that party their friend, whatever-her-name-was, had a few weeks ago?”

yunho nods gently, now able to look at wooyoung again after having determined that the conversation maybe wasn’t that uncomfortable.

“well we kinda,” wooyoung pauses, knowing it’s his last chance to back out before everything changes, and so he pushes forward with a sigh, “we hooked up that night and we’ve gotten together a few times since then.”

for wooyoung, it felt weird to say, the statement now just sitting in the air as he sees yunho trying to digest the information. he thought it might make him feel some way but instead he just feels empty, knowing that it’s entirely untrue. sure you’d left that party together, a fact that you had remembered and wanted to use in order to make your little fib realistic, but you’d both simply had enough of partying that night and gone for food at the convenience store on the corner before he walked you home. as far as wooyoung was aware, and he was pretty sure you didn’t go anywhere after he left your doorstep, you’d both gone to bed alone that night. and yet wooyoung didn’t feel like he could let himself daydream even the thought of you both actually doing anything then, the idea much too dangerous for the way he’d slowly started accepting what all his friends had been telling him about his affections recently. and even though he might be able to admit that he does have a crush on you, he certainly wasn’t expecting to hear the question falling from yunho’s lips.

“do you love them?”

wooyoung could feel his stomach jump right into his throat, his heart plummeting at the same time and causing nausea to replace the guilt he’d been wadding in just moments earlier.

“uh i think love is maybe a strong term,” he tries to chuckle lightly but he can hear the awkwardness permeating the laugh. “but i do like them.”

it’s the first time he’s admitted it without a caveat, and just like with the lie before, he feels the emptiness returning except instead of sitting deep into his stomach it fills his entire chest cavity, only stirring the nausea and making him feel like he’d much rather sink into the covers of his best friend’s bed than continue this conversation. he’s just not sure how much more he can say before he might actually vomit.

yunho nods slowly, a thoughtful look on his face, before he says, “i think you two would be good together.”

wooyoung is much too focused on staying grounded and not revealing the sickness that he feels to analyze whether yunho is telling the truth, a slight burn building in his chest of what he can only assume is bile, and at this point he’s not sure he wants to know what yunho thinks anymore. why did he agree to this?

“well, that roll is on the counter whenever you want it yeo,” yunho continues, oblivious to the turmoil brewing in wooyoung’s mind and body. “see you later woo.”

with that the man is gone, disappearing into his bedroom down the hall.

yeosang turns to his best friend quickly, ready to supposedly recap the conversation but stops in his tracks when he sees the look of pain on wooyoung’s face.

“how am i gonna make it through this?”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

the next week or so is filled with moments similar to this, where he has to look at yunho and lie straight to his face, straight to his own heart. and although yeosang assured that it would have to get easier at some point, wooyoung can feel he’s reaching his own breaking point.

throughout the process, as you execute your plan, you actually try to spend more time with wooyoung, starting with simple little outings that weren’t too different from things you might do usually. at some point these outings morphed into full fledged dates, and every time wooyoung felt himself sinking into the idea that he might be able to just enjoy this for what it was, you were quick to mention the plan and pop the bubble that wooyoung had found solace in. although he feels something unfamiliar burning lightly in his chest he can’t even fathom to be mad at you, too unbelievably happy in those moments where he could forget that you were faking it all.

“i’m not sure this is good for you anymore,” seonghwa had said one day after wooyoung had come home from a day out with you, plopping himself down onto the couch with an exhausted heart from the emotional roller coaster you were unknowingly taking him on.

wooyoung only let out a grunt, the sound muffled by the cushion his face was squished against, and seonghwa sighed in response.

“you’re tearing yourself apart for them,” seonghwa tried to reason, his quest of stopping this little escapade you’d set yourself on as futile as always.

wooyoung was sure he was delirious at this point, fatigue settled deep into his body from the way he felt he was chasing every moment with you, and so the next words that slipped off his tongue were completely unvetted by his mind and entirely from the heart.

“how else would i be able to love them?”

if seonghwa is surprised by the statement he doesn’t show it, his face neutral as wooyoung turns to look at him, the older man now crouched next to where wooyoung lies. he’s not sure what reaction he expected, and he knows that he asked an unanswerable question, but somehow wooyoung’s not surprised when seonghwa reaches out to run a gentle hand up and down the younger’s back.

the next words wooyoung speaks come out watery as he feels tears pricking at the back of his eyes and that unfamiliar burn returns to his chest, “they’ll always love someone else.”

as much as seonghwa wants to argue, to point out that you shouldn’t think in forevers and absolutes, right now he knows that his friend just needs comfort. so he moves to pull wooyoung so that he’s sitting, seonghwa moving into the space he’s created on the couch and taking his younger friend into his arms, letting him sob gently against his shoulder.

as if he couldn’t feel bad enough about this entire situation, wooyoung wakes the next morning to a text from you. normally he might feel a bit giddy to hear from you but the message is nothing like any of the ones you’d recently started sending, casual conversations about your days and cute pictures of things that reminded you of him. it was cold, with a finite energy and wooyoung could feel it like a punch to the chest.

y/n: let’s break it off

wooyoung can barely perceive himself moving to message you back, feeling like he’s gone into autopilot. he’s tried to be prepared for this but with the way he’s allowed himself to feel with you for the past few weeks it’s almost as devastating as knowing that he’s been making himself comfortable inside of a lie. as he turns over to try to return to sleep he feels that same something unfamiliar burn in his chest.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

“you should go anyway,” yeosang says, looking down at wooyoung from his place on the couch.

wooyoung has taken to wallowing in self pity on the floor of his living room, mingi having forcefully pulled him out of the pitiful nest he had created of his bed a few hours ago upon seonghwa’s request.

“and see yunho all over them, no thank you,” wooyoung pouts.

the two of them had been talking about the party at yeosang’s, and by extension yunho’s, place since yeosang had arrived just over an hour ago. the party was supposed to be the final phase of the plan, when you would confront yunho, with the help of the alcohol that would surely be in your system, and wooyoung was obviously less than enthusiastic to see you complete the last stage of the plan. his best friend had been arguing that he could reasonably avoid you the entire night and be able to have fun anyway, but wooyoung wasn’t in the mood to have fun in the first place.

“if you just stay by the beer pong table the whole night i’m sure you’ll be able to avoid them,” mingi supplies helpfully, to which wooyoung whines in response.

“and have a perfect view of the rest of the room, where everyone else will be having the time of their lives, yeah great, very cool,” wooyoung spits sarcastically, limbs flailing about around him as he tries to push away the mental images of all of his friends getting to have a great night while he tries to keep from silently crying into his cup in a corner.

“so you’re just never going to go to another party?” seonghwa asks, stepping over his roommate as he goes about tidying the living room, setting things that had migrated amongst the room back where they belong.

wooyoung stops at this, turning over quickly so he can toss seonghwa, who spares no glance to him, a questioning look. “what do you mean?”

seonghwa just shrugs, dusting an empty shelf before he reorganizes the knick-knacks that would sit on it. “well, if you’re avoiding this party because you don’t want to see them together, then you’re going to have to avoid every party where you know they’ll be, which will likely be every party you’re invited to,” seonghwa explains, enunciating slowly as though wooyoung is only a child.

“and if you’re just avoiding anything they’ll be at together are you going to stop coming to group hangouts, or anything either one of them is at in fear that the other person will show up,” seonghwa continues, oblivious to the way wooyoung seems to be melting into the floor as he realizes how crazy his logic from earlier sounds now that the eldest is breaking it down like this. “so are you just going to stop being friends with both of them?”

wooyoung lets out something akin to a growl as he flops once more onto his back, his legs kicking in the air as he knows that he’s been cornered. “i get it,” he whines, hands smacking gently against his face in defeat.

“if you just rip the bandaid off now it’ll be so much easier,” yeosang adds, “you won’t have built it up more than you have already.”

“i hate when you’re all right.”

so, with the caveat that he can hang onto one of his roommates the whole night for emotional support, wooyoung finally agrees to attend the party.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

“have you been avoiding me?”

wooyoung knew it was a bad idea to come to this cafe, the same one he had made that stupid agreement with you at, the one where you might be found more often than not, your favorite cafe. and if any of his friends were here with him they might just call him an absolute idiot, yeosang might even call it masochistic, to think that he could avoid you in the one spot you were sure to be.

“avoiding you?” wooyoung hears himself speak before he is even able to process what he should say, his nerves too frazzled by your proximity, standing closer than he thinks you ever have before. it certainly doesn’t help that with the warmer weather lately you’ve taken to start cycling your summer clothes into your wardrobe, your outfit today including one of your favorite tank tops, showing off the soft skin of your collarbone and shoulders. wooyoung has to use all of his self control to not reach out and brush his fingertips against you, tracing shapes into your skin and feeling you shudder beneath his gentle touches.

he’s snapped suddenly out of the trance he had been sinking into when you speak again, “you haven’t been answering any of my messages.”

at this wooyoung moves his gaze to your face and although he can see the teasing smile that graces your lips he can still spot a bit of disappointment swimming in your eyes.

“i’m sorry,” he replies, sounding much too genuine for the way you had seemed to be trying to hide your true disappointment in the playfulness of your usual cadence you adopted around him, and he feels the familiar pool of guilt start to fill the void that he’d been keeping in the pit of his stomach since you’d broken things off.

as you stand before him, forcing him into your personal space and looking at him expectantly, he thinks back to his decision to turn off notifications from your number, one that all of his friends had already torn him to shreds for. at the time he had reasoned that it was to protect himself from the repeated heartbreak he would suffer every time he might interact with you. unfortunately, in making this decision he hadn’t thought about what his seemingly sudden disappearance from your life might do to you, he hadn’t considered that he might be hurting you, and the guilt only grows.

you seem to be slightly taken back by his apology, likely not expecting him to reply in earnest, taking a moment to collect yourself before you state, “so you admit it, you were avoiding me,” although it comes out as more of a question, your head tilting gently as you seem to be inspecting the man before you, and wooyoung hates that he feels so exposed.

you aren’t even aware of the way you hold wooyoung’s heart in your hands but the longer you stand dissecting his expression the more he feels like your grip on it is too tight. he can’t tell whether you want him to answer honestly, or if you even care if he does, his mind is far too clouded by the scent of your shampoo along with the hurt he can see you trying to hide behind the confusion in your eyes, and he feels the familiar prickle of tears forming in his own.

he watches as your own features turn to concern, but before either of you can move to speak again, you’re both thrust out of the moment as someone behind you asks, “are you two going to move? you’re holding up the line.”

and suddenly wooyoung feels like the entire world can see him, pathetically crying over a person stood directly in front of him, and he needs to get out.

he’s not sure how he manages to make it out of the cafe with his vision as watery as it is, tears now fully rolling down his cheeks, but he assumes muscle memory simply kicked in as he finds himself briskly walking in the direction of his apartment.

“wooyoung!” he hears you call behind him and for a moment he considers stopping but then he feels that familiar burn in his chest, the same one he felt when you’d broken things off, and in a moment of clarity, as his feet carry him further from the agreement you’d both made, he realizes what it is, anger. although he’s never felt anger like this before, anger that roots itself into that guilt he’d been building for the entire time you’d pretended to be something. so it’s not an anger he can quickly pick apart and resolve, no, it’s an anger that feels like it feeds off of everything he’s been through for the past month. he’s angry at himself, for being so stubborn for so long, at his friends, for pushing for him to reanalyze his feelings, at the situation, for being so complicated, at yunho, for being the one you want, at the plan, for making everything worse, and most importantly at you.

his feet suddenly come to a halt, and you must have been closer behind than he thought because just a moment later he feels you running right into his back, not having expected him to actually stop.

“what do you want from me?” he spits, whipping around and causing you to jump in surprise.

“wooyoung,“ you begin softly, feeling his gaze sharp and strong, “what’s wrong?”

“you want to know what’s wrong?” he laughs, the sound void of any real humor. “you’re what’s wrong.”

you try not to react, knowing that he probably doesn’t mean what he’s saying, but he can see the way your hands, that had been hesitantly reaching toward him, suddenly drop to your sides.

“you and your goddamn plan,” he starts. “why couldn’t you have just fucking talked to yunho yourself instead of dragging me along for your own fun? you’re so goddamn selfish it doesn’t even cross your mind that other people might get hurt by the shit you think up. but it doesn’t matter to you does it? no one else’s feelings and emotions really matter as long as you can get what you want in the end. how long are you gonna string along yunho before you have to tell him you’re a liar and break his heart too? how many other guys are you going to hurt and then manipulate into feeling guilty for protecting themselves from you, huh?”

by the end of his rant he’s shouting, surely attracting attention from anyone else just trying to go about their lives that might happen to pass you both on the sidewalk, but wooyoung couldn’t care less, each word cooling the burn in his chest and laced with the anger that he can no longer stand to house inside of himself.

“wooyoung, please-“ you try to start, but he must miss the watery way you speak and how your own tears now threaten to join his on the sidewalk as he interrupts you.

“i wish i could just stop loving you,” and with his final peace spoken he turns and begins, once again, the trek home, an inexplicable exhaustion weighing down his steps.

he barely even registers that you don’t follow.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

“JUNG WOOYOUNG WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU?”

when he had returned home to an empty apartment, he felt like it was the only good thing that had happened to him in the last month, but then, as he sat in silence, calming his nerves and slowing his racing heart, his actions from the last half hour began to sink into his conscious. he knew his friends would find out what he had done sooner or later, but he certainly didn’t expect to find four of them bursting through his front door in a fury only minutes after he’d arrived.

hongjoong, always the voice of reason, had been the one to shout and announce their presence, his boyfriend, and wooyoung’s roommate, in tow. both men were visibly upset, although reasonably so, and if mingi didn’t have a gentle hold on seonghwa’s wrist wooyoung is sure the eldest would have tackled him to the ground by now.

“i knew you were an idiot but man,” yeosang says, bringing up the rear.

“so,” wooyoung tries, looking anywhere but his friends, “how was lunch?”

hongjoong takes a breath, likely trying to calm himself as he replies, “great, we even ran into a friend,” sarcasm heavy on each syllable.

“oh really?” wooyoung asks just above a whisper.

“yeah,” hongjoong nods harshly with an angry smile, “we would’ve invited them to join us had they not been FUCKING SOBBING,” he ends shouting.

“ah,” wooyoung tries, wishing the couch might just swallow him whole. “so you ran into y/n i’m guessing.” wooyoung lets out an awkward cough, releasing a humorless chuckle as he finally glanced back up at his friends.

“i’m going to ask this again,” hongjoong starts once more, taking several large breaths with his eyes closed to presumably calm himself. “what is wrong with you?”

“what did you do?” mingi takes a turn to speak up, releasing his hold on seonghwa who moves to run a soothing hand along his boyfriend’s back.

wooyoung can’t find the energy to recount the details of your entire encounter, and he also doesn’t feel like being berated for every little misstep he’d taken throughout your interaction, so he resolves to try summarizing the last half hour for the four men that are giving him some of the most expectant looks he’s probably ever seen. “we-uh,” he starts, as eloquently as usual, “we ran into each other and i may have cried and then i may have gotten angry and then i may have, uhm, madethemcry.” his last three words come out as one as he tries to get them out as quickly as possible, hating the way they taste rolling off his tongue.

and now, as the four men that had been listening so closely are thrown into a flurry once more by his statement, he begins to digest his own statement. he made you cry, and he’s sure if the room wasn’t filled with the voices of four of his friends arguing, the crack he feels in his heart would echo against the walls around him.

“i also told them i loved them,” wooyoung says again, barely above a whisper and yeosang is quick to shush the other three.

“you what?”

“i told them i loved them,” he repeats before quickly clarifying, “well it was more like i told them i wished i didn’t.”

and that set them all off again, each of his friends shouting over each other, and wooyoung just sunk into himself, the image of your tear stained cheeks at the front and center of his mind.

after what wooyoung might consider a pretty reasonable 15 minutes of being reminded how he has fucked up in pretty much every way possible, mingi was the first to calm down, always the one to move through his emotions quickly, and yeosang was soon to follow. seonghwa was the next to cool off, half way through a shouted sentence remembering the moment just a week ago in which he’d comforted wooyoung on the same couch he stood in front of now. hongjoong didn’t get the chance to simmer down, seonghwa pushing him to go home before he could pop a blood vessel.

“what are you thinking about?” yeosang asks, sitting himself next to wooyoung on the couch.

“how stupid i am,” wooyoung sighs, staring up at the ceiling.

yeosang sighs, placing a tentative but comforting hand on wooyoung’s bicep. “you’re not stupid,” yeosang says, “you’re just in love.”

wooyoung lolls his head to the side, getting a good view of his friend to see if he was joking, but all he found was sincerity, and a little pity, in the gentle smile on yeosang’s face.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

saturday

y/n: let’s break it off

woo: sure

sunday

y/n: hey, i just told yunho

y/n: just figured you should know

tuesday

y/n: can we talk?

wednesday

y/n: everything okay?

today

y/n: i really need to tell you something

that night wooyoung opens your chat and feels even worse about everything that happened today, but before he can tumble into a cycle of self pity once again, he feels his phone vibrate in his hand.

y/n: are you still going to the party tomorrow?

wooyoung practically tosses his phone in the air with the way he jumps up in surprise, fingers flying across the keyboard to respond. he types out and deletes his message at least five times before he hits send, debating if he should take this moment to apologize in fear that he won’t ever get the chance again. in the end he decides to just answer your question, straight and simple, not wanting to fuck up anything else.

woo: yeah

and in the minute he waits for a response he feels like his nerves are on fire, mentally berating himself for his answer. he should have apologized, or said something else, anything else. you probably wanted him to do more, address what happened earlier in the day, but of course he couldn’t even do that right. so wooyoung starts that spiral again, sinking into the depths of his own mind, until he feels his phone vibrate.

y/n: cool

y/n: i’ll see you there

wooyoung can barely sleep that night, either replaying his mistakes from the day or rehearsing the apology he had to give you at the party.

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yeosang had managed to rope wooyoung into helping with the set up at his and yunho’s apartment for the party, claiming it would help him to get his mind off of things, but as wooyoung knocks on his best friends door, he can feel the anxiety creeping up as he tries to think of a plan for if yunho were to open the door instead of yeosang. wooyoung is so lost in his nerves he doesn’t realize that yeosang has answered until the older man speaks.

“why are you shaking?” yeosang asks, confusion clear on his face as he opens the door wider for the quaking man in question to enter.

“uh, yunho,” is all wooyoung says, as he inspects the state of the apartment.

streamers and other miscellaneous decorations are thrown about the entrance area and living room, the beer pong table already set up in the corner farthest away from the hall to yeosang and yunho’s bedrooms, giving it the best view of the open concept living room and kitchen, and wooyoung tosses around the idea of mingi’s suggestion. he would certainly be able to see when you arrive so he can catch you before you lose yourself in the party tonight.

“oh, he and mingi went to pick up the stuff for drinks,” yeosang shrugs, “i thought mingi would have told you.”

wooyoung just shakes his head before yeosang starts instructing him on what he needs to do, placing the younger in charge of setting up the kitchen while yeosang gets everything hung up in the entrance and living areas.

for the first half hour, wooyoung does have to admit that he is more focused on decorating and organizing the snacks, making sure to leave room for drinks, than the apology he has perfected that had been swirling through his mind all day. he busies himself with which color balloon should be where and whether he should put the salty and sweet together or mix them up a bit so one side doesn’t get more crowded than the other, of which he decides to mix them together, instead of how he should open the conversation he’s dreading. of course as he finally starts managing to sink himself into his task all the way he hears a throat clear behind him.

expecting it to be yeosang who has some little complaint about the way wooyoung hung the streamers or how he should at least put the cookies all together he just says, “i don’t want to hear it.”

instead of one of yeosang’s usual quips wooyoung is surprised to hear a much deeper voice, laced with confusion. “what?”

wooyoung is quick to whip around, ending up face to face with, a slightly amused but mostly puzzled looking, yunho who has a bottle of tequila in one hand and some sort of mixer in the other, a few bags scattered on the floor near his feet.

“sorry,” wooyoung is quick to move, gesturing to the empty space on the counter. “thought you were yeosang,” wooyoung explains, stepping as far out of yunho’s way as he can.

yunho just chuckles lightly, as he sets the two bottles down, turning to wooyoung, “i figured.”

to wooyoung’s surprise yunho doesn’t move to unpack any more of the bags, instead leaning up against the counter and crossing his arms over his chest.

“he went out to grab another cord for the speakers,” yunho explains, “we always manage to loose one.”

wooyoung just nods slowly, his gaze flickering between the decorations still left to be used and the bags that still need to be unpacked, and just as wooyoung is about to move back to do one of those tasks, yunho speaks up again.

“y/n told me,” he says and wooyoung freezes completely, feeling his heart plummet into his feet. he prepares himself for any of the rage that yunho might be about to throw his way, even trying to mentally steel himself for the way yunho will surely laugh at him for telling you that he loved you. how could his love compare to that which is reciprocated by someone you actually wanted.

“i still mean what i said,” yunho continues and wooyoung dares to glance at his friend. “i think you two would be good together.”

now it’s wooyoung’s turn to be puzzled. for a moment he wonders if yunho is sick at all because he certainly wouldn’t tell another guy, especially one that made his crush cry, that they would be good together but with the way yunho doesn’t react to wooyoung’s confusion wooyoung fears that maybe the sleep deprivation has finally caught up to him.

“i know that it was supposed to be all pretend but i don’t think you were lying when i asked you if you loved them,” yunho continues and wooyoung shakes his head like it will clear out his thoughts. “you’re a pretty open book.”

wooyoung decides he might as well bite the bullet and asks, “what did they tell you?”

“that it was fake,” yunho replies easily, “the situationship.”

wooyoung wishes that his answer cleared anything up but instead it only leaves him feeling more lost. does yunho like you? does he know about yesterday? do you still like yunho? wasn’t the end of the plan the party? that had to mean that you ended the plan early, did it not work out?

“i hope it works out for you,” yunho concludes, leaving wooyoung to stand mindlessly in the middle of the kitchen as the older man goes about setting up the drinks.

“thanks,” is all wooyoung can say in response and suddenly the party can’t start soon enough.

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when it’s half an hour past go time and you still haven’t arrived, he’s tempted to text you but he decides against it when he realizes he’s not sure what he would even say. mingi had been reassuring him that it was fine, turning to say so every time he would score in the game of beer pong he and a friend of a friend were playing, he thinks she introduced herself as yuri or yeji or something that started with a y but it’s hard for him to remember when his mind has been stuck on you for the last hour now.

“i told you they were pregaming at san’s so you know it’s gonna take them forever,” mingi says before downing the cup in his hand, the girl across the table high-fiving her friend excitedly. “plus i’m pretty sure they were going to wait for jongho to get off work and swing by his place to grab him.”

wooyoung just nods quickly, feeling more uncomfortable by the second. he had decided to forgo drinking until you arrived, wanting to be sober when he talked to you but the longer he waited the more he was regretting that decision, the soda he’d been nursing for the last half hour going flat as it swished around his cup.

before he can start to overthink it, he leans in next to mingi’s ear, not wanting to yell over the music. “i’m gonna grab a drink,” he says, not waiting for his friend’s response before he’s pushing through the crowd of people dancing, making his way to the kitchen.

“they here yet?” yeosang asks as soon as he spots wooyoung entering the kitchen, simultaneously handing an obviously tipsy seonghwa another drink.

“no,” wooyoung responds quickly, tossing the liquid in his cup into the sink before reaching for one of the bottles of soju on the counter.

seonghwa lets out a high pitched giggle, not hiding that it’s at wooyoung’s expense as the younger whips his head to stare daggers at his senior. “don’t you have a hongjoong to be hanging off of?” wooyoung spits and the phrase receives the reaction he’d intended, seonghwa quick to let out a squeaky “joongie!” before making his way back into the clump of bodies wooyoung had just emerged from.

as he watches his oldest friend disappear into the crowd, yeosang following suit, wooyoung catches mingi’s gaze, eyes wide as he ticks his chin in the direction of the front door, and he knows what it means immediately.

you’re here.

he can see the top of your head slowly moving into the center of the crowd, presumably being pulled by none other than choi san, who wooyoung can see is already flushed when the crowd moves and he can catch glimpses of you both dancing together, a bright smile displayed on your face as you laugh at san. he wants to go to you but he feels like his feet are suddenly too heavy, unable to do anything but watch from a distance.

“just the man i was looking for,” jongho says, clapping wooyoung on the back harshly, and successfully pulling him out of the trance you’d put him in.

“why?” wooyoung whines before he turns to jongho, seeing the smile that only his younger friend could lace with a scary sort of anger and wooyoung’s blood runs cold.

“y/n was just telling me about the interesting conversation you two had yesterday,” jongho says, his hand moving from wooyoung’s back up to his shoulder and squeezing harshly. wooyoung resists the urge to yell and instead tries to push the younger’s hand away, ducking under his arm to try and escape.

“i’m going to apologize,” wooyoung is quick to explain, now facing jongho head on in hopes to stop any more of his friend’s attacks.

jongho just drops his smile, muttering a quick, “i hope so,” before he moves past wooyoung and toward the drinks.

once wooyoung is sure he’s no longer in danger of being on the wrong side of jongho’s anger he quickly turns back to the crowd, scanning quickly for you or san. he spots san easy enough, having moved his dancing from the floor up onto the couch that had been pushed up against one of the walls. unfortunately you’re no longer with him and so wooyoung continues his search once more, although it’s starting to prove difficult as he realizes that more people must have arrived during his quick exchange with jongho, the living room packed almost wall to wall.

“who are we looking for?”

wooyoung almost jumps three feet in the air as your voice registers so clearly, your mouth centimeters away from his ear so that you can speak without straining over the music. he places a hand firmly against his chest as he tries to calm his racing heart but when he turns to you he knows the attempt is futile.

“can we talk?” wooyoung eventually manages out between staggered breaths, yelling over the music instead of opting to get closer to you, fearing that he might overstep some sort of boundary if he were to be inside of your personal space.

you only nod in response before you grab his wrist, and wooyoung barely registers where you’re pulling him off to as he focuses on the way your fingertips press into his skin. only once you’ve closed the door behind you two, successfully muffling the music and voices enough to converse without shouting, do you release his arm and he recognizes the room as his best friend’s.

you make no effort to move away from wooyoung once you’ve succeeded in locking the door behind him, ignoring the many extra feet of space that you could place between you both, and wooyoung isn’t sure if he’s overthinking but he would like to assume it’s a good sign.

“i was looking for you,” wooyoung answers your question from earlier, feeling like his mouth is much too dry before he remembers he’s been holding a cup in his hand since you’d arrived and takes the smallest swig of the liquid inside. he notices you aren’t holding a drink and debates about offering a sip of his own to you before ultimately deciding to just set it down on yeosang’s desk, leaning awkwardly to the side in order to reach.

“why?” you ask and wooyoung loses his balance for a moment, falling into you slowly before his feet find better support. if he hadn’t felt hot enough with embarrassment just from starting to fall in front of you, he’s now overheating when he realizes you’d placed a hand on his chest to keep him from completely falling onto you, your palm feeling as though it might burn a hole through his shirt.

he clears his throat nervously as you retract your hand and he misses the searing heat of your skin almost immediately, itching to just grab your wrist and place your hand back. but he doesn’t, because he respects you too much. he loves you too much.

“to apologize,” he finally admits, feeling the heat you’d gifted him moving up from his chest to his cheeks. “i-“ he tries to breath, to remember the apology he’d been practicing in his mind, but it’s so much harder when you’re actually in front of him. your eyes, just as they had in the cafe before his outburst, make him feel exposed, sensitive. “i’m sorry for getting mad at you, i shouldn’t have said what i did,” he’s able to continue, trying hard to return your gaze so that you may be able to spot the sincerity in this apology just as you had his last. “i didn’t mean those things. i was,” he pauses, knowing this is the point in which he could still turn around, pretend that he wasn’t upset for the reasons he was, and so he pushes through anyway. “i was angry at myself and you were just who i could take it out on. you didn’t deserve that, i’m sorry.”

he searches your face for any change, desperate to see your usual expression replace the frown you sported and smooth out the current crease between your brows, and when your face doesn’t change he’s once again tempted to reach out to you. he wants to just take your face into his hands, to gently message the tension from your temples and to place a gentle peck to the tip of your nose in hopes that he might get to see your smile up close once more before you might just vanish from his life forever.

but instead he keeps his hands firmly at his sides and says, “i wish i could take it all back.”

“all of it?” you ask quickly, your voice practically overlapping his own, and your expression does shift but wooyoung can’t make out the difference.

neither of you speak then for what feels like an hour, your eyes determinedly set on his while you let wooyoung’s gaze flit along your face, trying to find his answer amongst your features, before he closes his eyes with a wobbly sigh.

“i don’t want to stop loving you,” he says, eyes still closed, “but i have to.”

he can feel his chest caving in, the emptiness he’d started calling home consuming him from the inside out as he finally says what he’d been teetering on the edge of admitting for the last month.

“who told you that?” you question and if wooyoung could bare to open his eyes and actually look at you instead of finding cowardly safety behind his eyelids he is sure you would be wearing the same look of frustration he’s seen directed at him so many times before. although now he knows that it doesn’t carry the same playfulness that usually makes him so endeared, the sparkle in your eye that encourages him to bring out that same look more and more.

wooyoung lets out a humorless chuckle, shoulders dropping heavily as he becomes hyper aware of the way he’s been tensing his entire body. “no one,” he says before scrunching up his face in hopes that it will quiet the urge for him to open his eyes and see your face once more. “everyone.”

he hears you let out a huff before you comment, almost indignantly, “well i didn’t get a say.”

wooyoung can’t recall a time he’s opened his eyes faster, tenderness quickly replacing the shock he’d felt when he sees you once more, your gaze now firmly set on the cup wooyoung had placed on yeosang’s desk and arms crossed over your chest, a pout on your lips. he feels the corners of his own lips ticking up in a fond smile.

“so,” he begins to ask, a hint of playfulness coloring his tone as he feels hope build inside of him, “what do you think i should do?”

he’s not sure if you were expecting his eyes to still be closed but as you bring your gaze back to wooyoung’s face he feels like he can easily spot a hint of nervousness beneath your determined expression. you both find yourself in silence once more, this time he’s the one to hold firm, your gaze now traveling along his skin.

“i love you.”

he’s sure if he was any farther from you that he wouldn’t have been able to hear it, the words flowing along an exhale.

“what was that?” he asks, unable to contain the smile that overtakes his features, and he half expects for you to take it back playfully, to mess around with him, but then he watches as a determined smirk creeps onto your face.

“i said,” you start, leaning impossibly closer and placing your hand onto the same spot on his chest as you had earlier. “i love you.”

your lips are on his in an instant, almost imperceptible, the gentlest brush of skin, but wooyoung can feel it.

“i love you too,” he whispers against your lips before one of his hands moves to the back of your neck, the other wrapping around your wrist as he pulls you back into him.

of all the times he’d imagined kissing you, it was nothing like he expected, your lips remaining gentle against his no matter how passionate he became, and wooyoung knew instantly that he was already addicted. he was so utterly consumed by you, and he wouldn’t have it any other way.

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“your drink, my love,” wooyoung says, placing a cup down on the table as he takes the seat next to you, his own coffee in his hands, while he places a gentle kiss against your temple.

“gross,” yeosang comments, watching you both from across the table before taking another bite of his macaron.

“yeah,” hongjoong agrees from his seat on your other side. “i didn’t realize that you two getting together meant we would have to watch you both all over each other all the damn time,” he complains as his boyfriend rolls his eyes on the other side of the table.

wooyoung ignores his older friends in favor of grabbing one of the legs of your chair, pulling you toward him so that he can more easily rest his head against your shoulder. he smirks against your skin as he feels a shudder run down your spine when he turns his head to press his lips into the crook of your neck.

you and wooyoung are gathered with a few of your friends in the same cafe that set everything into motion, your favorite place, enjoying your first quiet afternoon as an official couple.

“come on, i think they’re cute,” mingi says, looking between yeosang and hongjoong, who both exchange disgusted looks.

you chuckle, the sound light and airy, making wooyoung’s heart float as he feels the vibrations through his own chest.

“thank you mingi,” you say with a hint of finality, ready for the attention to be away from you two.

you’re thankful that the conversation drifts into a new direction, yeosang mentioning something about the latest star wars movie and sending seonghwa into a spiral about his thoughts and opinions.

“thank you,” wooyoung whispers, lifting his head from your shoulder before resting it on his hand, his elbow propped on the table in front of you.

you send him a confused look, tilting your head gently, but with the way he stares at you, overwhelmed with devotion, you can’t keep a tender smile from gracing your features. “for what?”

“forgiving me,” he elaborates, taking your hand in his.

for a minute you simply bask in the genuine warmth of the moment, watching the way his gaze shifts to your hand as he starts to play with your fingers gently. you’re tempted to bring his own hand up to your lips and let the whole situation stay genuine, but you just can’t keep from teasing.

“who says i forgave you?”

wooyoung is quick to look back up at your face, eyes wide with worry as he lifts his head from his hand, now using both of his hands to hold one of yours. you watch the worry melt away as a pout takes over his features, seeing the playful smirk on your own.

you can hear the whine building in his throat before he even opens his mouth, your gentle giggles matching his volume. “babe,” he groans, dropping his shoulders as he pulls your hand against his chest.

once you’ve calmed down enough from your giggle fit, you reach the hand he’s not holding up to hold his face, watching with adoration as he turns his head to press his lips into your palm before he leans fully into your touch.

as you both sit, just savoring the moment, wooyoung can’t help but reflect on how you both ended up here. so, as he falls deeper into his romantic haze, he can’t help but let you know, “i love to love you.”

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note so hi, i’m alive. this was just something i wrote for fun recently and now i guess i write for ateez. anyway, hope you enjoyed

let me know what you think?

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