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lucid-heart · 9 months ago

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Teeth in Your Throat

Vampire!Lottie Matthews x f!Reader 🔞

🩸Lottie hesitates to feed from you because she's scared of hurting you. But you know she would never, she just needs a little convincing🩸

WC: 1.7k+

masterlist • read on ao3 • request

CW: Blood Drinking, Kinda Subby Top Lottie,

"You can bite," you say. "You need to feed. And I trust you."

Lottie's eyes haven't left yours but the usual dark brown has been replaced with a glowing red. The beautiful vampire hesitates when given the chance to drink your blood. She's always worried she will hurt you.

But you know she wouldn't.

And she is very, very hungry.

"It's okay," Lottie says with a slight tremor. "I'll find Nat, she can get me-"

You grab her hand and tug her closer. Lottie stumbles and bumps into you. Her skin is cold to the touch but will quickly warm once in contact with you for long enough. She nervously looks away, as if looking at you for too long will cause her to lose control.

Maybe that's what you need her to. To give her the push over the edge.

"Lottie. Are you really going to run and find Nat when I'm right here?" You roll your eyes in fake exasperation. "Hmph. Maybe I should go find Shauna."

Lottie's eyes snap to yours and her brows furrow.

"What?" A single word but it's ice cold.

Lottie hides her emotions well, years of being forced to act like the perfect daughter for parents that never cared about her. But you know her too well. Even now as she tries to act casual, it bleeds through her stare. Hot, raging, jealously.

You shrug. "Nothing. Just I know Shauna would appreciate a taste. Since Jackie is away, she hasn't had human blood in a while. And I beat she would be real rough about it-"

Lottie grabs you with pure vampire strength. One moment you're standing face to face in her room, the next your back is against the wall with her body caging you in. She bares her teeth as her fangs snap down, eyes glowing red.

Your heart races in your chest. You should feel fear from being so close to someone so dangerous and the adrenaline rushes through your system. Heat burns in your chest and you let out a shaky exhale.

"Don't," she says. "Don't talk about Shauna."

You raise a hand to her lips. Slowly you press your thumb into her mouth and against the sharp tip of her fang until it draws blood. Then you press deeper into her mouth. Her tongue swirls around your fingertip as she catches the taste of you. Of what you're offering.

She groans and her eyes flutter.

"What are you so afraid of?" you ask. "You need to feed. I think it's hot when you bite me. I think there's an easy solution here."

Lottie lets your thumb slip from her mouth and she stares at you with intense eyes. Ever since you've started dating, you've chased the darker side of her. She worries that you'll be afraid of her. Doesn't she know you love it? You want her.

"Baby, please." You lift your head to expose your throat to her. "I need you."

Something in Lottie snaps and she pounces. Her lips lay waste to your neck as she kisses and nips, sure to leave a splattering of marks the next day. You moan and hold onto her. But she doesn't break skin. Not yet. Not even as she teases her fangs against your pulse point.

"You're such a temptation," she murmurs. "I want to so badly."

"Why don't you?" you gasp breathlessly.

She presses you against the wall and a thigh slots between your legs. You bite back a groan as you press against her, need pulsing through your core. She's hardly even touched you yet.

"Mm." Lottie kisses your jaw. "Adrenaline makes blood taste sweeter."

"Yeah?"

"Yes. Prey that runs, that is afraid. It's why we hunt. Why we chase. It tastes good." A hand dances across your chest over your clothes, a light tease. "But do you want to know what tastes best?"

She finds your wrist and lifts your still bleeding thumb to her mouth. She meets your gaze with hooded eyes as she licks the bead of blood welling on your fingertip.

Your heart thunders in your chest, so loud it might overwhelm you. You know Lottie can hear it. Her vampire hearing allows her to pick up on even the slightest of changes. The corners of her mouth quirk in knowing. She knows exactly what she's doing to you.

"Prey that wants it tastes best."

Wants her.

Needs her.

Needs-

Lottie leans in and claims your lips, the metallic tang of your blood still on her tongue. You taste it in a fleeting moment before it's just her kissing you. Usually Lottie is sweet and kind, a wonderful girlfriend who loves you very much. This side of her is that but also darker and possessive. She kisses you like she wants to devour you. To claim you.

You must have really ticked her off when you mentioned Shauna.

You wrap your arms around her neck and hold her closer. Her frame is slim but you can feel the power she possesses. If she wanted to, she could throw you across the room without blinking. You are weightless to her.

Evidenced by the way she effortlessly hooks a hand under your thigh and lifts you against the wall.

"That's it," you breathe against her mouth. "That's my girl."

Lottie groans and she slams a hand into the wall beside your head.

"You like that? Being called mine?" You tug at the front of her shirt until she gasps. "Do you want me?"

"Yes, yes, so badly." It comes out as half a needy beg and half a hiss. Lottie licks her lips and bares her fangs, twin points shining and full extended.

You want her fangs buried in your neck while her long fingers are buried inside you.

Lottie seems to get the idea as her eyes darken. She shifts her hands to your waist and carries you over to her bed. Down onto the many cushions you go with her on top of you. She can't stop kissing you. She can't get enough of you.

You find the hem of her shirt and tug it over her head. The second she's free, she's back kissing you again. It's hungry, pressing you back against the pillow with even the slightest touch. She's so hot.

"(Y/N)?" she groans.

"Mm?"

You dig your nails into her shoulder blades and she shudders.

"Can I...?" Her eyes sweep down your body.

She doesn't need to ask, you've wanted this since the moment you lay eyes on her. How could you not? Lottie Matthews can command a room with her smile alone. She enchants and entrances, and that's even without her vampire powers. You've wanted her since the beginning.

The vampire thing is just a bonus.

"Please."

Lottie shifts back and lifts your shirt. As she takes it off, she plants kisses up your stomach, your chest, your throat until she reaches your lips once again. Your entire body feels like it's burning alive.

You need her to touch you.

"God, you are so hot," she murmurs. "I could just eat you."

You bite her bottom lip for emphasis and tug it back. "Do it then. I'm here for the taking."

She doesn't need anymore encouraging. Lottie eagerly leans in and kisses you again. But this time, as her lip strays across her your jaw, her intent is clear. Sharp teeth tease at your skin as the hunter finds her mark.

But Lottie doesn't bite just quite yet.

She trails a hand down your stomach into your pants, finding you wet and ready for her. It doesn't take her long to find the perfect angle and then she's sinking into you.

"Fuck, Lottie!"

You arch up into her waiting mouth. She kisses your neck, just below your ear.

"God, (Y/N), I want you bad," she gasps. "You're so-!"

How can she say that as her fingers thrust in and out of you? She quickly finds a strong rhythm, curling deep inside you. Heat spreads through you until you feel like you're aflame. You're burning for her. You won't last long.

Lottie lets out a shaky exhale and her body presses against you.

"Fuck, that's it," you groan. "Just like that! Keep going, Lot, I'm so close!"

"Y-Yeah?"

Your nails find themselves in her back again and she whines, the noise sending a hot flash right through your chest. You scratch down her spine and she moans.

"So close, you're doing so well, Lottie," you gasp.

As if spurred on by your praise, she ducks her head against your skin. Her fangs caress the vulnerable expanse of your shoulder, just waiting for her moment. You know exactly when she will bite you. And you weren't lying when you said you were close.

You cry out her name as you come, drawing blood from how hard you're clutching to her back.

And Lottie sinks her teeth into your neck.

Jackie described to you what it felt like but nothing could have prepared you. No pain, no sting, just hot pleasure spreading through your entire body. Lottie drinks from you and it completely overwhelms you.

Fingers in you, teeth in you.

"L-Lottie! Oh god, Lottie!"

She drinks her fill. You can't quite tell if you're lightheaded from that, from coming, or a messy combination of both. Either way, you never felt anything like that before. Intensely euphoric and addictive.

Lottie paints your throat red with kisses, tongue lightly pressing to the weeping wounds. She groans deep in her throat.

"(Y/N)... that was..."

You know.

You released your hold from her back and flop back against her pillows. Lottie raises her head and her lips are painted blood red. You raise a hand and wipe the drop trying to roll down her chin.

"Good?"

She laughs. "More than good."

You touch your throat and your fingers come away red. Lottie flushes, embarassed at the mess she made. No matter, she will have plenty of time to clean it later. You reach a hand towards her. Lottie meekly accepts your fingers and licks them clean.

"Still hungry?"

"Uh... I... not really-!"

You hook a leg over her hips and turn the two of you. Lottie ends up sprawled beneath you, hair spread out like a dark halo. You smile down at her. Her blush is very cute for someone who is so dangerous.

"Okay. Then I guess it's my turn to feed on you," you smirk.

You have so much exposed, unmarked skin to work with. When the night is over, your claim on Lottie will be painted all over her skin.

Lottie nods. "Yes, (Y/N)... Please."

You smile.

As if you needed asking.

#lottie mathews x reader #lottie matthews #yellowjackets #x reader #lucid writing

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shaunamilfman · 11 months ago

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'tis the damn season

Summary: “You hadn’t seen Nat since the two of you screamed at each other outside Lottie Matthews graduation party, but you can’t deny that you’ve missed her dearly. Long before she was your girlfriend she was your best friend, and when you're given the chance to hang out with her while you're home from college for the holidays you jump at the opportunity no matter how unique the circumstances. When the two of you have to work together to solve a surprising mystery, maybe a few truths about what really went down between you will be revealed along the way.”

December 23rd, 1996

You’ve been home from college for a grand total of 10 days before they’ve started to run together. You’ve been drifting in and out of sleep on the couch for the last few hours, Christmas movies playing quietly in the background. You're just on the edge of sleep when your mom walks up to shake you awake. You groan softly as you bury your head further into the cushion, but get up quick enough to give you a headrush when your mom tells you someone’s calling for you. Thank God, You think. You were dying of boredom. You’ve seen a lot of your high school friends since you’ve been back, but they all remind you of her. You still can’t gather the nerve to call the one you really want to talk to, so you're more than willing to accept the distraction the phone call provides.

You grab the receiver from the table and lean lazily against the wall as you answer. “Hey.”

“Hey,” You hear a familiar voice say.

“Lottie!” You greet happily, twisting the cord aimlessly around your finger as you speak. “Do you want to hang out later? I know we just saw each other the other day b-”

“I think someone's been following me,” Lottie interrupts quickly, sounding noticeably anxious. Your eyes widen slightly in surprise as you immediately straighten up. “Can you come get me? I don't want to be alone.” She asks pleadingly.

“Absolutely,” You promise immediately. “Just let me get changed and I’ll be right there.” You exchange a quick goodbye as Lottie seems obviously distracted as you run to your room to change.

What the fuck is happening? You wonder as you hurry out to your car.

You get a bad feeling as you drive to her house, but you do your best to ignore it as you break almost every traffic law known to man on the drive there. It’s ominously quiet as you pull up, her family home seeming somehow more imposing than usual. You shut the door of your car as you start walking up the driveway, only to be interrupted by a voice calling out your name.

“Y/N?” Nat calls out in disbelief. You whirl around in surprise as you watch her standing at the base of the driveway. You bury your hands in your pockets to hide the way they shake with your nervousness. You weren’t prepared to see her today, not that you thought you ever would be. You exhale shakily as you look her up and down. She looks just as good as always, maybe even better than usual. Your eyes glance down at her nails, noticing their unusually bare state. You barely remember a time when they weren’t painted black, but maybe all things change over time.

She seems annoyed to see you, making you grin slightly at the familiar sight even if it’s never been directed in your direction before. You knew Nat was just as nervous to see you as you were to see her. You think you might know Nat better than you know yourself, or you did at one point. Your smile fades at the thought.

“What are you doing here?” You both ask at once. You laugh softly as you look down, catching the way Nat kicks nervously at the ground. The familiar sight of her boots fills you with confidence as you look back up at her.

“Lottie called me. Said someone was following her?” You say. Nat scoffs, raising a hand to run it messily through her hair.

“Said the same shit to me,” Nat complains. You glance up at Lottie’s house, suddenly getting suspicious. Lottie’s tried more than once to convince the two of you to start speaking again after you broke up, but her pleas always fell on deaf ears. You knew it must be awkward to be stuck in the middle of the two of you, but as much as you felt for Lottie’s predicament you thought manipulating you like this was too fucking far. Nat gives you a wry look as she follows your gaze, rolling her eyes as she turns and starts walking down the street.

“You're not going to make sure?” You ask.

Nat huffs. “It’s obvious what happened, isn’t it? Lottie not minding her own fucking business.”

You stare up at the house a little unsurely. “That doesn’t sound like Lottie.” You say, unable to stifle your concern. You and Nat catch each other's gaze for the first time in months, and you think you might miss her more 10 feet away from her than you ever have before. You suspect Nat feels the same as she quickly breaks your eye contact, looking uncharacteristically shy as she scuffs her boot against the ground.

“Yeah, well people change don’t they.” She accuses pointedly. You scoff, storming back up to your car. You weren’t sure what crawled up Nat’s ass all those months ago, but it's certainly still there.

“Go fuck yourself, Natty.” You jeer, throwing the door of your car open. You climb back in as you forget about whatever Lottie thought she was pulling as you turn your anger at Nat instead. You slam the door shut, resting your head against the steering wheel. You exhale slowly as you try to calm down. Nat’s always been able to get to you like this, even when no one else could. It’s one of the things you loved about her. Love about her, you admit even if only in the privacy of your own head.

You stare at her in the side mirror as she stands in the same place you left her in. She looks strangely guilty, but you know better than to expect an apology from her. Nat almost never apologized to anyone even if she thought she should, prideful to a fault. You used to be the one exception but you won't hold your breath anymore. You sigh quietly as you back out of the driveway around Nat. You roll your window down next to her as she stares expressionlessly at you. “Do you need a ride home?” She pauses for a second as she considers it, but slowly shakes her head. You nod easily, not bothering to fight her against it as you drive down the street.

You don’t look back, no matter how much you want to. You miss the way she watches you all the way down the street; The way she watches you until you finally turn off the street, disappearing from view.

…

September 7th, 1986

Even now you remember how upset you were when your dad up and moved your entire family across the country right before you started the third grade. To New Jersey of all places. You weren’t really sure why moving to New Jersey was a bad thing, but your best friend Kaitlin had told you that her mother said it was. So in your mind, there was no place on Earth worse than New Jersey if even your best friend thought so. Thinking about your best friend only made you angrier knowing you wouldn’t get to see her again.

You were brooding the whole way to your desk, righteously angry in the way only an eight-year-old could be when you caught curious eyes looking up at you. You returned her curious look even as you moodily took your seat. There was something about her that caught your eye even then. You didn’t exchange a single word but you still felt a strange sense of comradery with her. You stormed off during recess to go angrily kick at the tree, deciding that that was a far better use of your time than sitting with someone from stupid New Jersey.

You're too far away to hear it at first, but it catches your attention as the catcalling gets louder. You see a couple kids surrounding your desk mate, obviously making fun of her. You weren’t sure what ‘trailer trash’ meant, but it was obvious by the look on her face that she knew. You weren’t sure even now what caused you to storm over there and grab the ringleader by the back of the shirt and whirl him around. Maybe you were angry and he just happened to be there, or maybe you knew even then how important Nat would be to you. You slammed your little fist into his cheek, sending him sprawling to the ground in surprise.

He starts crying loudly, immediately garnering the attention of your teacher who starts walking over from across the playground. You stare down at your hand in surprise: You’d never been particularly violent before and hadn’t realized it was going to hurt your hand this much. A pale hand reaches out and grabs you, turning your wrist over so she can see your red knuckles. She grins toothily up at you, her grin slightly crooked. “I’m Nat.” She says.

“Y/N.” You say, a little teary-eyed from the pain. You smile back weakly as your teacher drags you away from them and to the office. You don’t get in nearly as much trouble as you should considering it’s your first day, but you certainly wouldn’t complain. You get sent back just in time for lunch, looking around unsurely until you see Nat waving you over. You practically skip over to take your seat next to her. You talk for the rest of lunch and hold hands on the way back to class. From that moment on you were inseparable.

Maybe New Jersey wouldn't be as bad as Kaitlin said.

…

December 24th, 1996.

You stare guiltily down at the phone as you get Lottie’s answering machine for the third time in a row. You were positive that Lottie was just setting you and Nat up, but the longer she went without calling you back the more worried you became. Certainly, it wouldn’t hurt if you just stopped by just in case, right? You set the phone back down on the receiver as you exhale shakily, unable to calm your racing heart. You try to shake it off as you walk out to your car Maybe you were less sure about Lottie being okay than you thought. You would just stop by her house and yell at her a bit, and then you could guilt her into watching your favorite movie and everything would be just fine. Still, your hands shake the entire drive there.

You walk purposely up the drive, pulling your jacket tighter around you in an effort to fight the cold. You knock firmly on Lottie’s door as you shiver on the porch. The longer you go without an answer the more frantic you knock until you're banging your fists against Lottie’s door. “Y/N!” Nat calls out, making you whirl around in surprise. You don’t even want to imagine what you look like right now, how wild and crazed your expression must look, as you quickly walk towards Nat.

“Have you…” You both start, trailing off as you realize Nat hasn’t spoken to Lottie either.

“I’ve been banging on her door for the last five minutes and she hasn’t answered.” You say nervously, glancing back at Lottie’s empty-looking house. You look at Nat in disbelief as she reaches around you to try the door handle, finding it locked. “If only I would have thought of that.” You snark. Nat shrugs, holding her hands up placatingly as she spins around and starts walking around the side of the house.

You reluctantly walk after her, watching curiously as she tries all of the ground-floor windows. You end up back at the front door after fruitlessly trying every window and the backdoor. You sigh as you start looking around for a fake-looking rock or something. You catch Nat giving you a curious look out of the corner of your eye. “Maybe they have one of those hidden keys or whatever?” You suggest, squatting down to look closer at the welcome mat.

“Oh shit, you’re right,” Nat says wryly. “I found it.” You grin widely as you stand back up, backing up so she can unlock the door. Your eyes widen in horror as Nat smashes the glass of the front door with a heavy-looking rock she found on the ground. You stare down at the rock on the floor of Lottie’s living room in disbelief, slowly turning your head to look at Nat. Nat shrugs, looking proud of her little joke, as she carefully reaches through the newly installed hole in the door to unlock it from the inside. The two of you step over broken glass as you trudge your way up the stairs, heart jumping further and further up your throat the longer your presence goes without answer.

You step into Lottie’s room behind Nat, finding it just as empty as the rest of the house. “Maybe she just went out?” Nat suggests, seeming as if she doesn’t believe it herself.

“She always gives her driver Christmas off.” You say anxiously

“Maybe she walked?”

“Without her shoes?” You gesture to Lottie’s favorite pair of shoes lying by the door. “Without her purse?”

Nat nods stiffly as she dumps Lottie’s purse out on the bed, riffling through the contents hoping to find something indicating her location. You exit Lottie’s room and check the rest of her house as quickly as you can, still finding no sign of her. You catch Nat waiting for you outside of the room, staring anxiously at you as you shake your head. The lack of Lottie’s presence combined with the panicked phone call you received the other day paints a disturbing picture. Judging by the look of concern on Nat’s face you can tell she feels the same.

You quickly make your way back downstairs, making a beeline for the phone as you race to call the police. You tell the story to the officer, taking great care to leave the breaking and entering out much to Nat’s quiet amusement. There’s a long moment of silence after you finish and you hear the officer take in a shaky breath as he says, “Are you sure she didn’t just run away? She’s an adult, you know.” You scoff, immediately drawing Nat’s attention as she leans in closer trying to listen in.

“Lottie wouldn’t just run away like that, especially after that phone call she made.” You immediately refute, not even humoring the idea. Nat starts to nod in agreement, wincing halfway through as she realizes he can’t actually see her.

“Look.” He says, voice sounding annoyed. “There’s nothing we can do until she's gone 48 hours, and you're going to have a hell of a time getting someone to come out there on Christmas to look for her.” You’re almost positive he had more to say, but you slam the phone back down on the receiver so hard you're surprised it didn’t crack. You look over at Nat teary-eyed as you try pointlessly to blink away your tears. She instinctively draws you into her arms, wrapping them tightly around you just like she always has. You freeze in her arms, not having the luxury of muscle memory to explain it away. You bury your head in her shoulder anyway, soaking up any comfort offered to you in your moment of need.

Nat tenses up as she becomes aware of her position, but she still holds you tightly until you get yourself calm again. You clear your throat as you pull away from her, wiping the lingering tears away with your hand. Nat shifts her weight from foot to foot as she looks anywhere in the room but directly at you. You can’t help but laugh at the pure awkwardness of the situation, and Nat quickly joins you. When your laughter finally dies off the two of you share a look as you seem to come to a mutual agreement. If they wouldn’t look for Lottie, it seems that you’d have to do it yourselves.

…

December 27th, 1992

You’d rushed your mom into going to pick Nat up the second your extended family fucked back off to their own houses, feeling like you were going through withdrawal from not seeing your best friend for so long. Nat had come running down the street to meet you, equally as excited to see you. She’s been enraptured by your new gameboy and you were all too happy to let her play around with it. Nat lies back on your bed focusing intently as she frantically presses buttons. You sit next to her watching fondly as she gets her ass kicked at Tetris again. “Fuck!” She curses, a moody look on her face as she sets it down on the nightstand. Your face twitches in amusement trying desperately not to laugh, but Nat gives you a dirty look anyway as she crosses her arms over her chest.

You reach over her to grab it off the nightstand, giving her a smug look as you turn it back on. “I’ll show you a master at work.” You tease. Nat scoffs but dutifully looks over your shoulder as you play. Her mood gets more and more sour the longer you play as you blow her score out of the water. She puts her hand on your leg to support her weight as she leans closer to watch the small screen more carefully. You tense slightly as you try to pretend it doesn’t make you nervous that she’s close enough that you can almost feel her breath against you. You weren’t sure when you’d developed a crush on your best friend, but you desperately wished it would stop. The two of you had only gotten closer since high school had started a few months ago and your weird responses to Nat were only getting more noticeable as time went on.

You nearly breathe a sigh of relief as you finally reach the cap of your skill level and lose the game. Nat hums as she leans back away from you, crossing her legs underneath herself as she looks at you. “You’ve had more practice.” She accuses, ever the sore loser. You shrug in acceptance even though you haven’t actually started this game yet, being much more concerned with playing Super Mario Land. What Nat didn’t know certainly wouldn’t hurt you.

“If you say so, Natty.” You grin in anticipation, knowing what’s coming.

“Don’t call me that!” She grumbles immediately as she gives you a weak glare.

“Since when are you too cool to be my Natty?” You tease. Nat flushes slightly, pale cheeks going bright red as she turns away from you. One of your favorite things about Nat was the way she would blush to her ears at the slightest embarrassment, though you figured she probably couldn’t help it.

“Shut up.” She mutters. You concede easily as you start a new game. Nat glances up at sees you’re playing again.

“You’ve had enough practice,” Nat complains, reaching to grab it out of your hand. You move it further out of her reach as you grin playfully at her. You’ve lost interest in the game itself, much more interested in her desire to play it herself. You wiggle it just out of her reach as you taunt her with it. She scoffs and lunges at you so fast that she reaches you before you even realize she’s moved. Nat catches you by surprise as she overshoots and sends the both of you sprawling to the ground.

You groan breathlessly as the fall knocks the air out of your lungs. Nat hisses in pain as she rubs at her knee that she banged against the ground. As you catch your breath your eyes go wide as you realize the position you’ve found yourselves in. Nat lies fully on top of you with her arm still stretched fruitlessly out over your shoulder. You’ve got one hand trapped between the two of you, and the other stretched up still keeping the Gameboy out of her reach. Nat groans as she slowly shifts up to her knees, leaving her straddling you. Your breath gets caught in your throat for a different reason as you look up at her, Gameboy more than forgotten.

Nat’s got a strange look on her face as she looks down at you, her eyes fixating on your lips.

“Hey.” She murmurs shyly, trying to gauge your mood.

“Hey.” You murmur back, slowly raising your now-freed hand to her cheek. She gives you a crooked grin as she leans down to kiss you for the first time, but certainly not the last.

…

December 24th, 1996.

The longer you’ve been driving around town the more you realize just how much of Wiskayok reminds you of Nat. There’s nowhere you’ve looked for Lottie that you don’t associate with memories of Nat, no matter how weak the connection may be. With a town this small it’s hard to escape from anyone no matter how much you want to. During the awful few weeks between when you and Nat broke up and when you left for college, you found yourself almost haunted by the sheer amount of memories you were unable to separate her from. It almost makes you feel a little bad for her, knowing she has to live in them all the time.

As you pull up to the stop sign you can’t help but grin at the site of the old playground. Nat smiles slightly at the sight, turning her head to better get a look at it. It hasn’t aged well, the dilapidated wood and peeling paint not doing it any favors, but that’s not the important part. This mess of rotting wood and rusted swings holds some of your fondest memories, all of them involving Nat. “Do you remember,” You start, but Nat soon interrupts.

“The time when we pushed Jackie down the slide when she wasn’t ready?” She says with a wide grin.

You laugh loudly at the memory, nodding in agreement. “We had to spend the rest of recess running away from Shauna.” You reminisce fondly.

“God, she was fucking fast.” Nat comments.

“She was Princess Jackie’s loyal defender. No one could doubt her prowess.” You add, knowing it would get under Nat’s skin. Nat had always loved pretending to be Princess Lottie’s knight as a kid, always dragging you into it even though you’d rather be on the swings. Lottie and Jackie would sit up on the swings watching the rest of you duke it out for their amusement. Nat and Shauna had often gotten into mock battles as kids that Nat always seemed to lose by herself, no matter how hard she tried. Eventually, she always dragged you into it so she could win, uncaring of the way Shauna and Jackie would accuse her of cheating. Nat wasn’t one to play fairly as a kid, even if she later grew out of it.

Nat scoffs, turning fully in her seat to face you again. You turn your blinker on innocently, watching her fume out of the corner of your eye as you finally let your foot off the break. “Just because she was willing to bite people doesn’t mean she was a better knight than me.” Nat defends with just a hint of a pout. “She was ruthless.”

“Of course. Could you find it in your heart to forgive me Sir Scatorccio?” You tease. Nat grins, chest puffing up in an imitation of pride.

“Don’t doubt me again.” She warns playfully.

You pull into the gas station to fill up your car, finally coming to the bright idea of trying to call any of Lottie’s other friends to see if she was with any of them. You fiddle with your loose chain for a minute, pulling out a handful of quarters as you head to the phone booth. Nat looks slightly impressed at the idea, following you over and leaning against the wall next to you as you begin dialing.

You roll your eyes as Nat's shivers start turning into shaking as she stubbornly crosses her arms against the cold. You shift your shoulder up to keep the phone pressed against your ear as you start rummaging around your pocket for your keys. Your fingers are numb enough that you nearly drop them as you get them out, flailing slightly with your hands as you finally manage to get a grip on them. You hold them out to Nat by your car key and point her toward the backseat. She gives you a confused look as she mouths the word what, careful not to interrupt your conversation.

You cross your arms over your chest as you mimic being cold, and point back at your car. Her eyes widen slightly as she looks over, slowly walking up to the car and looking in the backseat. She gives you an unreadable look as she pulls out her favorite of your jackets and slips it over her shoulders; The jacket you always kept in the backseat for her because she constantly forgot to bring a thicker one. Nat zips it up as she leans against the car with her arms crossed against her chest. She doesn’t say anything, but you know her well enough to know by the small twitch of her lips that she’s a little pleased it’s still there. You turn further into the phone booth to hide a grin of your own, though it slowly falls as Shauna confirms that she and Jackie hadn’t seen Lottie either.

You hang up the phone as you turn to face Nat, slowly shaking your head as you walk over. Nat’s face falls, a slightly stricken look taking its place. You’ve called basically everyone that Lottie knows, and still nothing. Honestly, you were starting to give up hope that you’d be able to find Lottie anytime by yourselves but you weren’t quite ready to admit it yet. “What now?” You ask Nat. She shrugs, pulling the jacket tighter around her. “We could try driving around, I guess?” You prompt, but she just shrugs again.

You scoff as you run your fingers frustratedly through your hair. “Nothing to say, Nat? That seems to be a common problem.” You accuse.

She scoffs as she pushes herself off the car to get in your face. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean, Y/N?” Nat asks gruffly.

You stare her down unafraid: Nat was generally all talk as far as you were concerned. “Just that your inability to communicate hasn’t changed while I was gone.” You knew damn well that you were blowing her little shrug out of proportion, but you’d been holding on to this anger longer than you’d care to admit.

“You seriously want to do this right now?” She asks, throwing her arms out dramatically to gesture around.

“When else are we going to do it, Nat? Why won’t you ever just fucking talk to me?” You spit out frustratedly. The two of you stare each other down for a long moment before Nat seems to deflate. She turns away and storms off to the car, sitting down and slamming the door behind her.

You take a minute to calm down before climbing back in the car yourself. You start the car without even looking at her, knowing you’d only make yourself angry again. “I don’t want to talk about it,” Nat says quietly.

“Sure. Whatever.” You say simply, pulling out of the gas station as you get back to looking for Lottie. You hope you find her soon: both because you’re worried about her, and so you can get away from Nat once and for all. If she wanted to be stubborn she could be stubborn, you were sick and tired of trying to reach out to her only to get shot down. If she wants to be miserable and alone so badly, who are you to stop her? You fume in silence.

…

June 18th, 1996

Your smile is a little strained as you walk up to your girlfriend, a little hesitant about what her mood is going to be like. You weren’t sure what was up with Nat recently, but she’d really been worrying you. Her mood was prone to change on a dime and she was more emotional than you’ve ever seen her. The closer you got to her the more sour her expression looked. Fucking great, You thought wryly. You held her cup out for her and she accepts it without comment, throwing her head back and drinking it in one gulp. Your eyes widen as you slowly sip at your own drink, taking your place leaning against the tree next to her as you watch the rest of the party.

Neither of you had really wanted to come out to the party tonight, but you knew that Lottie’s graduation party was one of the last times you and your friends would all be in the same place at the same time. Normally you’d just assume not wanting to be here is what has her so annoyed, but she had seemed perfectly happy when she was talking to Lottie earlier. You haven’t much liked how insecure Nat was making you feel lately, but you were going to wait until things calmed down a bit to bring it up. There was so much going on with school ending that you haven’t had the chance to bring it up.

You tentatively lean your head against Nat’s shoulder, feeling the way her body tenses underneath you. You sigh quietly as you decide to leave Nat to her own brooding, pushing off the tree as you begin to walk away. She stops you in your tracks with a hand wrapped loosely around your wrist, gently spinning you around.

“We need to talk,” Nat says seriously, an unreadable expression on her face. You glance around the party to make sure no one’s close enough to hear you before you respond.

“You want to do it here?” You ask in disbelief. Nat shrugs, fingertips tapping rhythmlessly against her cup. “Fine, Nat. I don’t like how distant you’ve been lately.” You say firmly, still questioning Nat’s decision to hash this out in the middle of the party. She scoffs derisively.

“I haven’t been distant.” Nat refutes, “You’ve just been so fucking clingy.” Your eyes go wide in shock. Never in your entire life has Nat spoken to you like this.

“What the fuck did you just say to me?” You ask in disbelief, your voice getting louder with each word until you're practically yelling at her. You can tell the parties almost come to a stop around you but you can’t bring yourself to care.

“I said,” Nat continues as her voice rises to meet yours, “That you’ve been all over me recently! You won’t even let me breathe without commenting on it.” As angry as you are you can’t help but glance nervously around the party as the comment gets a little too close to revealing the nature of your relationship. Lottie seems to be corralling everyone into the house and smiles awkwardly when you give her a grateful look.

“Don’t act like I’m being crazy, Nat! You’ve been pulling away from me and you know it!” You accuse pointedly.

“Maybe I’m just getting tired of doing the same old thing all the time!” Nat yells back.

“Oh? Am I boring you now?” You ask mockingly. “Poor Natty and her boring little girlfriend, huh?”

“We’ve been doing the same damn thing since we were kids! You can’t tell me it isn’t getting old!” Nat shoots back.

Your face falls as you stare back at her with an undeniably hurt look on your face. “Getting old?” You ask quietly as if you’d lost all of the fire you’d had a minute ago with just one remark. Nat nods solemnly, looking down at the floor so that she doesn’t have to look you in the eyes.

“I think we should break up.” Nat rushes out as if she’s ripping a bandaid off.

“Break up?” You ask quietly, almost in disbelief.

“We’ve been growing apart,” Nat says simply as if that’s the only reason she needs to break up your four-year relationship. As if that’s the only reason she needs to walk away from your 10-year-old friendship.

“We’re different people. We grow apart all the time Nat, but we always come back together. That’s what we do.” You can barely get it out, so desperate that it verges on a whisper.

“Not this time,” Nat says sadly, shaking her head.

You focus on her chipped black nail polish as you try not to cry. You’d done it for her, you always have ever since you were kids; Nat never had the patience to do it herself, always getting nail polish all over her fingers as she impatiently tried to rush through it. You still remember the first time she’d asked fondly, Nat sheepishly handing you the bottle of dime-store black nail polish you’d picked up for her. It's been a while since she asked you to do it, but you don’t think you were truly aware of just how long it’s been until now. You wonder how long she’s been planning on breaking up with you; Was she thinking about how to let you down easy while you were scheming on how to sneak her into your dorm room? Was she grinning along at your idea of regularly scheduled calls while knowing in the back of her mind that she'd never make them?

You think the worst part is the premeditation of it all. Had she just sprung it on you that would be one thing, but it's clear from her moods and the way she's speaking that she's been practicing this conversation. It stings more than you thought it would, not that you'd ever imagined the two of you breaking up. Nat was your person, she always has been ever since you moved here. You barely remember a time before her, and now you're going to have to live without her?

“Fuck you.” You choke out, turning around and storming off deeper into the party as you try to wipe away your tears. You miss the way Nat’s hand twitches after you as if she's resisting the urge to stop you. You never see the look of regret on Nat’s face that remains long after you disappear from view.

…

December 24th, 1996.

Your bad mood lasts long after the moment passes, still looking around as you drive off to the last place you can think of that Lottie might go to. Misty was the only one who hadn’t answered the phone, and while you're doubtful that Lottie would go there willingly you still hoped that at the very least Misty would be able to help you find her. Misty always seemed to know things that everyone else didn’t, even when you were children.

The two of you drive in a slightly uncomfortable silence broken only by the sound of your blinker as you navigate your way across town. The longer you drive the more you notice the way Nat’s eyes always seem to dart away just as you have to look in her direction. Her gaze is a little unnerving now, even if it never used to be. “What is it?” You ask finally, growing tired of her little game.

“What are you talking about?” Nat deflects immediately, too soon to be anything but suspicious. You sigh, pulling your car off to the side of the road as you decide to confront her.

“You’re staring.” You accuse gently, giving Nat a curious look.

“So what? You look nice.” She admits with a shrug as if it isn’t a big deal. You can’t help but grow a little angry at the admission, your face twisting as a result of your mood. Nat’s eyes widen as she tries to mentally review what she could have done to upset you.

“I look nice?” You ask dangerously. Nat nods unsurely, feeling like she’s walking into a trap. “You like my outfit?” Nat nods again, fingers tapping anxiously against her thighs. “You don’t think it’s too boring?” Nat winces at the reminder, immediately turning to look out the window as she finds herself unable to meet your eyes. You scoff at the uncharacteristic display of cowardice. You aren’t sure what changed with Nat, but you desperately wished she’d get over it. You’d forgive her in a second if she just bothered to ask you for it.

“I don’t think you’re boring,” Nat says, leaning her head against the window as she looks at you.

“Change your mind so soon? It seemed pretty important a few months ago.” You remark bitterly, stuffing your hands in your pockets in an attempt to fight the cold creeping in.

“Well you’re so worldly now, aren’t you?” Nat jokes weakly, “With your college education and your cool new friends.”

You give Nat a weird look. “I’ve been at college for one semester, Nat.”

“Yeah, but I’m sure you’ve got those college girls lined up down the hall right?” Nat says with a strained smile. You shrug listlessly.

“Haven’t really been interested in dating.”

Nat’s fingers clench into a fist as she stares down at her lap. “You haven’t… Haven’t wanted to be with anyone else?”

You sigh. “Not really, Nat. They’re not…” You trail off as you try to search for the right words, but can’t seem to find any that fit. “They’re not what I want.” You say finally.

Nat inhales sharply at the admission, looking strangely angry as she stares up at you. “No one? No one at all?” She asks.

“What are you going on about?” You ask her annoyedly. “It’s not like it’s any of your business, Nat. Not anymore.”

Nat deflates at the comment, hands unclenching as she leans back in her seat. She looks devastated as she stares over at you, seemingly lost in a way that you haven’t seen since her dad died. “It was for nothing, then?” She asks, quiet enough that you don’t think you were supposed to hear her.

“What was?”

“I didn’t want to hold you back,” Nat admits quietly. You stare at her in shock as you contemplate what she’s just said. Out of all the self-sacrificing bullshit she could have pulled, this is what she decided on? You’d be angrier if it didn’t make you so fucking sad at the thought of it; Leave it to Nat to break both of your hearts because she was being self-deprecating again.

“You broke up with me to do me a favor? Is that it?” You demand bitterly.

“You're leaving this fucking town, Y/N. You didn’t need me to drag you down with me.” You roll your eyes at her excuse– because that’s all it was, an excuse. Not even a particularly good one, certainly not the truth.

“Since when do we lie to each other, Nat? You started at the party and can't seem to bring yourself to stop can you?” You accuse.

Nat mirrors your look of anger as she stares you down in return. Nat was always too stubborn for her own good, always getting herself into trouble because of it. The longer you sit in heated silence the more Nat seems to calm down, until finally she sighs as she looks at you defeatedly.

“What was I supposed to offer you?” She asks softly.

You give her a questioning look as you feel like you’re finally making some progress, eyes widening at the sight of tears welling up in the corners of her eyes. She clears her throat pointedly as she wipes at her eyes with the back of her hand in an attempt to erase the evidence of her outburst. “You were going across the state to all those smart girls that you can talk nerd shit to.” She offers weakly, “I was afraid you were leaving me behind.”

“You were afraid I was going to break up with you, so you broke up with me first?” You ask in confusion.

“I didn’t think you’d break up with me.” She admits. “I was worried you’d resent me for it.”

“Why didn’t you just talk to me about it, Natty? Like adults?”

She laughs wetly, giving you a wry grin. “I wasn’t exactly self-aware about it when I did it. Honestly, Lottie was the one who told me about it.” You snicker, running your hand through your hair as you look at her fondly.

“Lottie does seem to have a sixth sense for these kinds of things.” You admit with a small smile. You stare at her for a long moment as you consider it in your head. Nat hurt you pretty bad, but she’s always been bad with her emotions. You don’t think she meant to be as malicious as she was, but the fact of the matter is that it still happened. “I need you to say it.”

She tilts her head in confusion before her eyes widen in realization. “Oh.” She murmurs quietly, sitting up straight as she gives you her full attention. “I was being stupid, and I’m really sorry about it.”

You hum teasingly, tilting your head to the side with a playful grin on your face. “I don’t think I’m feeling it.” You say.

Nat smirks as she holds her hands together in front of her as if she was begging. “Please, oh please could you ever find it in yourself to forgive me?” She pleads, sticking her lip out in an exaggerated pout. She’s playing along because you want her to, but you can see how relieved she looks. You sigh dramatically, never able to resist matching her energy.

“I think I just might.” You say, serious even in your playful tone. Nat nods, ever-present smirk never leaving her face for a second. You watch as her eyes slowly lower to your lips, tilting her head in question.

You lean in close to her so that your lips are just centimeters apart. “We should talk some more, later.” You murmur seriously. She hums in acknowledgment and you finally allow yourself to close the distance, meeting her in a gentle kiss. You’ve missed the way she felt, the way her lips moved against you. You pull back to speak again, but Nat just follows along as she refuses to let you break away from her again. She’s nearly straddling you as she leans over the center console, stretching unsteadily to reach you as you keep backing your head up. You wince as you smack your head against the window, Nat finally pulling away to laugh at your expense. You mock her laugh in a high-pitched voice which only serves to set her off further. You roll your eyes at the sight, but can’t help the warm feelings it brings. Maybe there was such a thing as

Christmas magic, but then again it was still the 24th.

Oh shit. You think. You smack Nat gently on the arm. She rubs at it exaggeratedly as she gives you an offended look.

“Lottie.” You remind her.

“Oh shit,” Nat exclaims, pulling away so she can put her seatbelt back on. “Here’s hoping Quigley has the answer.” She mutters, not sounding excited in the slightest.

…

December 24th, 1996.

You stand with Nat outside of Misty’s door as both of you trade imploring looks back and forth trying to get the other to knock. You’d usually bring out old reliable by now, rock paper scissors, but neither of you was willing to let go of the other’s hand to do it. Nat finally seems to give in, rolling her eyes as she raises her free hand to knock, but the door swings open before her fist can meet the wood to reveal Misty’s wild smile.

“Hi, guys!” Misty greets happily, gasping in excitement as her eyes land on your interlocked hands. She claps her hands together excitedly as she invites you in. “I’m so glad that you’ve gotten back together!”

You and Nat exchange slightly panicked looks as it wasn’t exactly common knowledge. You look wide-eyed at Misty and she seems to catch on to this. “Oh,” Misty says with a touch of awkwardness, pushing her glasses further up her nose. “You notice a lot of things as the equipment manager.” She nods as if that’s a super obvious and normal thing to say as she leads you further into her house. You nod unsurely in agreement, utterly unconvinced but not wanting to further push the issue when you need her help. You like Misty well enough, but she has a troubling habit of knowing things about you that you don’t necessarily want her to. Still, you figure that there’s no one better to go to in a crisis.

“Thanks for inviting us in, Misty. We just wanted to know if you know anything-” You start, but are quickly interrupted by Nat.

“Holy shit!” Nat exclaims, pointing at the couch. You stare dumbfounded at a bound Lottie sitting on the couch. Her hands are tied in front of her with a tie as she sips at a mug of hot chocolate. Lottie raises one of her hands slightly in greeting as she shoots Misty a supremely annoyed look. “What the fuck?” Nat asks.

You let go of Nat’s hands as you try to free Lottie but find yourself unable to untie the knot. You look back at Misty who grins over at you. “Oh.” Misty murmurs, walking over and untying Lottie in one quick movement. You watch the tie slide loosely down Lottie’s arms, still not entirely sure how Misty untied it in the first place. Nat walks over to stand behind you, shooing Misty away. Misty makes an offended noise as she starts protesting but you’ve decided to ignore it as you look down at Lottie.

“Were you in on it?” You ask in concern. Lottie shakes her head, shooting an annoyed glare at a still protesting Misty.

“Do you seriously need to ask that?” Lottie asks, rolling her eyes. “She showed up at my house and the next thing I know I’m tied up in her house.” You eye Misty wearily as Nat still fights off her attempts to talk to either of you.

“Let’s just go home,” Lottie says, slightly pleading as she rubs at her wrists. She doesn’t seem all that worse for wear, more annoyed than anything at the ordeal.

“Shouldn’t we like… Call the cops or something?” You ask unsurely. Lottie raises an eyebrow in question as she looks at you.

“And tell them what? She fed me three meals a day and hasn’t left a mark on me. As far as the cops are concerned we could have been having a sleepover.” Lottie remarks, glancing back over at Misty.

Nat’s looking back and forth between Lottie and Misty with a look of disbelief on her face. “Are we seriously jus-” She starts.

“Yes,” Lottie says, setting her mug on the table and standing up. Misty sitting down on the couch opposite you after she gave up on trying to get past Nat. She looks frustrated as she looks between the three of you as if she doesn’t understand why you could possibly be upset with her.

“I was helping you!” Misty defends. “I brought you back together!” Misty pouts slightly as she looks at you.

You open your mouth to speak, unsure of what you could even say at this moment but Nat beats you to it.

“Thanks, Misty,” Nat says sarcastically, giving her a little wave. The two of you follow Lottie out the door, relieved to finally get out of there.

“Are you like… good?” Nat asks Lottie in concern. “I could still go back in there.”

Lottie sighs as she slumps back against your car. “It was fine, I guess. As far as kidnappings go.” She pauses as if deep in thought. “She just kept playing movie musicals.” She shivers in horror, glancing up at Misty’s house in remembered terror. Nat pats her shoulder sympathetically, also shivering in horror at the thought. You watch the scene in silent disbelief, shaking your head as you unlock the doors to your car.

“What took you guys so long, anyway?” Lottie asks curiously as she buckles her seatbelt. You meet Nat’s eyes in the rearview mirror, both of you looking guilty and slightly panicked. Lottie takes one look at the two of you and gasps in offense.

“You stopped to make out while I was missing?” She scoffs but looks slightly amused anyway as she shakes her head.

The drive to Lottie’s house is mostly spent in silence as she stares contemplatively out the window. You and Nat keep exchanging teasing glances in the rearview mirror and you're almost positive she’s coming home with you later. You pull into Lottie’s driveway to let her out but suddenly remember that you’ve busted her door. “Uh, Lottie.” You start, pointing at the door. “We kind of br-”

“Don’t worry about it,” Lottie mutters, pinching at the bridge of her nose. She turns to look at you looking uncharacteristically small in your passenger seat. “Would you spend the night?” She asks quietly. Your face falls slightly at the question but you immediately acquiesce. You and Nat could always hang out another time, you suppose.

Lottie grins as she opens the car door. “It’s a big house, don’t let me get in your way. Just wait till I’m asleep, yeah? The least you could do for busting my door.” Nat scoffs and immediately starts arguing the necessity of it as you walk up the steps to her front door.

You’ve missed this.

…

December 25th, 1996.

“It’s finally snowing.” You murmur as you turn your head to stare out the window.

“Yeah?” Nat asks quietly against your neck, the feeling of her hot breath making you shiver. She shifts against you to prop herself up on her elbow as she peers out the window over your body. “About time.” She says.

She looks you up and down with a smug grin making you roll your eyes. “Again?” You ask fondly.

She shrugs, incorrigible as always. “It’s been a while.” Nat teases. “Won’t you warm me up?”

“You’d be warmer if you put your clothes back on.” You point out playfully but lean in to kiss her anyway.

#nat scatorccio x reader #natalie scatorccio x reader #yellowjackets x you #yellowjackets x reader

155 notes · View notes

illbisexual · 2 months ago

Text

cuddles with the yellowjackets Warnings: fem!reader, this fic excludes Misty, Mari, Akilah, and Laura Lee Proofread: no

Lottie Matthews

Teddies GALORE on her bed

She collects the little beanie babies and you cant escape them when you go over..

Her room is usually tidy

Bed ALWAYS made before you come over

She has super cute sheets like pink floral ones that she adores

Insane amount of ribbons tied around her bedposts

she likes when your laying on top of her

Sometimes you two just lie side by side

She always has to be touching you or she goes insane

"Let me play with your hair" "no lottie I'm trying to sleep" "okay so why do you hate me.."

Jackie Taylor

Everytime you go over to her house she tries to convince you to let her do your makeup

Which you usually do let her after a few minutes of her constant "please"s

She forces you to sit on her vanity chair and she sits on the desk. Don't ask why she just does

She refuses to let you take the makeup off after she does it

After she does your makeup she drags you into bed

She plays with the drawstring of your hoodie/pants if you're wearing clothes with drawstrings

She has those cute pillows that are heart-shaped on her bed

Little spoon

She likes when you have your arms around her

She matches your breathing like a DORK !!!

Shauna Shipman

Fusses over making sure you're warm enough even though she's like a literal human heater

She liked having her arm around your shoulder and plays with the ends of your hair

She likes when you lean into her side it makes her giggle like an idiot

Halfway through cuddling she'll usually fall asleep and roll over and accidentally smother you

If she doesn't fall asleep she shoves a pillow in your face which prompts a pillow fight

..which she usually wins. Like always

She makes fun of you for "looking sleepy" when she looks like she's about to fall asleep standing up about 50% of the time she's with you

Your voice just makes her tired she doesn't know why

Taissa Turner

Blankets upon blankets stacked on her bed

it doesn't help her room is like an oven

You step one foot into her room and immediately you have to take your jacket off or you'll cook alive 😭

She makes you pick out a CD to play and then makes you put it in the CD player because shes too lazy too

You spend atleast 10 minutes just adjusting to how heavy her covers are

She has her arms wrapped around you constantly

She goes dead silent and just when you think she's fallen asleep she starts giggling and calls you an idiot

you guys sing along quietly to the music playing

Natalie Scatorccio

She usually goes over to your house after school

When you do go to her house she doesnt even give you the chance to properly get through the trailer door before shes dragging you to her room

She puts music on immediately and closes her door

You convince her to paint your guys' nails

She then proceeds to get pissed at you when you mess up your nail polish she just painted

She's over it in the next 5 minutes when your in bed with her

She likes to lie in between your legs and wrap her arms around your waist and she rests her head on your stomach

She sings quietly when you mess with her hair

She plays with her rings and she feels really peaceful with you

Van Palmer

You guys walk home from school together to her house usually

You crash into bed with her the minute you get into her room

You guys fight over the covers for a couple of minutes until you both start laughing and eventually sort them out

she strikes me as the kind of girl to have like.. christmas/Halloween bed sheets on even though its the middle of September

"What? I'm getting in the spirit" "or did you just get forced to change your bed sheets??" "Maybe.."

She makes you braid her hair for her, or just makes you do it general

But you don't kind because you like running your hands through her hair

And pulling on it and watching her offended face as she whips her head around to look at you

She has her arms wrapped around you and you have your arms wrapped around her

#Illbisexual #Yellowjackets #Shauna shipman #Jackie taylor #Lottie Matthews #Natalie Scatorccio #Van palmer #Taissa Turner #Oomfs

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zeezelweazel · 1 year ago

Note

i love love your blog!!! could you write a oneshot of best friend! lottie pining over fem! reader and confessing after she gets jealous when a guy flirts with reader at the party?

Lottie Mathews| I'll be yours, if you'll have me

______________________________________

Thank you so much!

I've read a few fics like this with lottie so I hope this didn't turn out to be too similar to them

______________________________________

"Ok Lottie, I love you but there's no way you're wearing this shity dress that you stole from TJ Max to Jeff's party. The whole damn school is going to be there!"

Lottie groans and puts that dress to the side while pouting. For a rich girl your taste is very shity Matthews, you're lucky you're cute.

"You only talk shit because you look good in everything."

You giggle at your best friend's childish behaviour and take her hand to pull her towards the closest. All of the deliberate fashion advice that you give her doesn't register to Lottie's brain, her head is already full of you and how gorgeous you look in this outfit and how your make up is flawless and how soft your voice sounds and how silky your hair looks and-

"Earth to Lottie? Do you like the blue skirt or the grey one with this top?"

"Um the blue for sure."

You only nod at her and continue looking through her accessories. Lottie is already stumbling with her words and you haven't even gotten to the party yet. She can practically hear Taissa's voice in her head. 'She's literally head over heels for you just confess to her already'.

"Easier said than done." She mumbles quietly as she stares at you trying to envision a pair of silver earrings with the outfit you've assembled and her insides feel warm.

When you arrive at the party, only 30 minutes late, majority of the people are drunk off their asses. You and Lottie move through the crowd keeping eachother in sight so you don't get lost. Now, when it comes to parties the Yellowjackets usually are spread around. Van and Tai are most likely having a make out session in a random room at Jeff's house. Speaking of Jeff, him and Jackie are probably together and where Jackie is Shauna has to be nearby. Nat is with her friends and Misty is probably not even here.

You and Lottie share a look and mutually decide that it's better to just hang with eachother for now. You enter Jeff's house and like you expected there are tons of people there, talking, dancing and drinking. Speaking of drinking...

"Hey Lot, will you go grab us some drinks? I'll try to look if any of the girls are around here."

Lottie just nods and makes her way to the kitchen where the drinks are, leaving you alone in the crowded living room. After you took a good look at all the people and didn't recognise any of the girls you decided to head towards the pool. That's usually were all the popular girls are and by extension the jocks and if the jocks are there Jeff, Jackie and Shauna must be as well. Sure enough, you spot the three of them sitting in the side of the pool. You start to head to them but someone calls your name and you stop in your tracks. It's a guy from the baseball team, his name is something like Martin..?

He cuts your path to your friends by getting in front of you and starts complimenting your outfit.

"You look so good in that... urm whatever it is! Even at school you always dress so nice. It seems like you know what fits you perfectly. You know what would fit me?"

You suppress a sigh as you heavily contemplate on saying no and just walking away but since Lottie isn't even here yet, and this guy has no chance at all you decide to humor him.

"What would?"

He chuckles and moves closer to you bringing his hand on your chin.

"You, of course."

You can't really hold your laugh this time as a giggle slips through. Unfortunately for you the boy took that as approval of his horrible flirting and got closer as he wrapped his arm around you. At this point you were ready to push him off you hear someone shout from behind you.

"Hey get your hands off of her Markus!"

The boy instantly turns around to look at a very pissed off Lottie coming towards you. She doesn't even wait for him to say anything before she tugs you on her side and glares at him.

"Get the fuck out of here. Now."

You can't help but be surprised at her aggression as you keep looking between her and Markus. Lottie rarely got so angry. As Markus leaves embarrassed Lottie is still following him with her eyes. You look at her face, trying to study her expression.

"Um, Lot? What was that?"

She looks at you surprised, as if she just now realized how obvious her jealousy was. She can even see Jackie and Shauna looking at her with a questioning look.

"Nothing, he was just being creepy and I helped."

You fold your arms over your chest and look at her with a 'do not bullshit me Matthews' look.

"You went like full beast mode there Lot. I've only seen you get like that, like, twice."

Lottie can't handle your questions or the looks from her teammates and there are just so many fucking people in this stupid pool area. So without another word Lottie just storms off, leaving as fast as she came in.

You follow after her as you keep calling out her name. You are even more confused now. Why did she get so angry at that boy flirting with you? And why did she get so defensive when you asked her about it?

You eventually manage to catch up with her in what looks like a guest room. She's sitting down on the bed and looks up at you with e defeated expression.

"Well damn Matthews now you really have to tell me what the fuck was that."

Lottie takes a deep breath and closes her eyes. There's no way out of this now, she knows that much, but still she's scared of telling you how she feels. She can't bear the thought of loosing you. You're the most important person in her life. The one who understands everything when it comes to her parents and her schizophrenia and all that comes with that. You're a good person so she knows that you won't be disgusted or anything but just seeing that pitying look on your face as you try to gently reject her would break her heart. Well it's not like you have any other choice.

"I um... I was jealous." She can see how you're even more confused now but thankfully you let her continue. "There's a reason why I never like anyone you date. Even when they're good people. It's because I get jealous. And I get jealous because well, I like you."

Your eyes widen for a moment and then soften as you look at her sweetly.

"Oh Lot, I like you too, you know that right?" Lottie is so surprised but excited to hear you say that, she almost can't believe it. "There's no way I would let any stupid boyfriend, or girlfriend, come between us. We're best friends."

Best friends

Of course, how did Lottie ever think that you'd like her like that? She feels frustration bubbling up in her chest. You didn't even understand what she meant. Well if she's going to confess might as well do it properly, so she can get rejected properly as well.

"I want to be your stupid girlfriend!"

She doesn't even mean to shout but her words shake you anyway. Holy shit Lottie fucking Matthews said she wants to be my girlfriend?! You are too busy with your internal panic to notice Lottie being on the verge of tears. All you see is a blur passing by you and heading for the door.

Oh hell no, you're not running away again.

You manage to grab her wrist before she makes her escape and spin her around so she's facing you. You don't waste a single second as you grab her face and bring her down so your lips meet in what definitely seems to be the best kiss of your damn life.

Lottie immediately gets the memo as she puts her hands on your waste. It's impossible to kiss for much longer because both of you can't stop grinning. When you pull back, you take a moment to just look at your girlfriend.

"I think we need to thank Markus for this."

"Oh fuck no."

____________________________________________________

#wlw #female reader #yellowjackets x reader #yellowjackets imagine #lottie x reader #lottie matthews #lottie matthews x reader

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fizziepopangel · 2 years ago

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Yellowjackets Season 1 Recap & Review

Riddle me this: How would your life have been affected if you had not only survived a plane crash that ended with the deaths of several people, but also ended up stranded in the wilderness through the winter as a result? Yellowjackets is a dramatic tv series centering around just that.

Now, it's important to know that the events of the show switch between the past and present days of the characters we follow. I personally love media that does this because it does show how trauma works in the sense of flashbacks that put you back in the mindset you had in the midst of the original event, as well as how we think about past events that shaped us into our current selves. The then and now perspective of the show offers both understanding and questioning of the now we watch the girls now turned women navigate. While I enjoy that back-and-forth perspective of the show, I'll be reviewing one timeline at a time for the sake of making this easier to read and write. So let's get into a Fizziepop take on season 1 of Yellowjackets.

For anyone who hasn't watched the first season of Yellowjackets, this is your sign to do it as soon as soon as you get the chance

*WARNING: THIS POST MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS IF YOU HAVE NOT WATCHED THE SEASON IN QUESTION, I SUGGEST WATCHING THIS SEASON BEFORE READING.*

The Recap:

It's 1996, the Yellowjackets are a high school soccer team whose girls are going to nationals in Seattle... that is until their plane crash lands in the wilderness. While most of the girls survive this tragedy, most of the adults do not and the singular coach who does becomes an amputee after one of the girls takes charge of the situation.

After mourning the passing of the flight crew, and their friends and coaches, the girls eventually wonder away from the crash site in an attempt to find food and shelter. When the survivors of the crash eventually find an abandoned cabin in the woods, they take it over and begin trying to make the best of their lives given the situation they've found themselves in; their hope of being rescued dwindling as the days pass.

While each character has their own storyline, we only truly focus on those that we'll follow into adulthood, this being said, the characters we follow show not only their true feelings and insecurities, but also the lengths they're willing to go to keep themselves and their hope alive. A great example of this is the character Misty Quigley, the team's not-so-popular equipment manger, purposely breaking the tracker from the plane after the crash in an attempt to keep the survivors stranded because she felt valued when she was able to give her direction in first aide. Misty is portrayed as the odd duck of the group and therefore feels the need to be the center of attention and most trusted, valued member of the group, equating her almost forced popularity with the others genuinely liking her. In contrast, the character Jackie Taylor shows her true colors when she feels her influence and slowly begins to let her sweet, nice to everyone popular girl persona slip. On the other end of the scale, we watch as both Lottie Matthews and Taissa Turner slip into madness; Lottie's seeming to be a form of mental illness that she's no longer medicated for, and Taissa's being one due to trauma.

As the months go by, Lottie begins to take over as a leader under the guise of her believing herself to be more in tune with the earth and it's inhabitants and things greater than us that only she can seem to comprehend. Though this gives a sense of hope and security to a large part of the group as winter approaches and food becomes scarce, not everyone feels so comforted by Lottie's newfound status.

On the other hand, we have a different storyline intermingling with this as the events of the crash from their high school days follow them into adulthood in the form of an unnamed character that seems to be stalking 4 of the survivors. As the stalking continues, the former yellowjackets are forced to reunite and revisit the memories they tried to push down from '96. While the character haven't changed too much, it seems that their friendships dwindled after the getting home, most of them seemingly not having spoken to each other since getting home and getting back into some sense of normality; two of the girls even having families of their own now. But that all seems to be taking a sharp turn as the women are blackmailed, stalked, and forced to do what they feel they need to in order to keep their secrets safe.

The Review:

Getting into the review side of things, I have very few complaints about the series thus far. The characters are well written and don't seem to lose their individuality unless its relevant to their storyline (i.e. Misty feeling the need to be popular, Shauna feeling the need to try to mimic Jackie in ways in order to get out of her shadow, or Jackie trying to do what's expected of her to keep popularity prior to the crash). It was enjoyable seeing the different reactions to the crash both directly after and further down the line, and interesting to see the portrayal of Lottie's deteriorating mental health being portrayed as clairvoyance as some sufferers believe it is. In all honesty, I believe the writers have actually set things up for Lottie's character to have a genuine ability to understand these supernatural things she claims to, but as it is now, it could just as easily be a psychosis she's experiencing due to being without treatment for an extending period of time. Regardless, I believe Lottie's storyline has become one of the most interesting within the first season with Taissa's sleep walking being a close second that I hope continues to be looked into.

As I'm a big horror and gore fan, I was happy to see the wonderful death scenes portrayed so early on, but I wouldn't have been mad if there had been just a little bit more. After the plane crash and amputation of the coach's leg, things remain kind of tame for quite some time, which I believe is kind of a shame and a waste considering the setting of the 1996 scenes and how much the girls endure only to escape fairly ok despite the phycological effects.

Final Thoughts:

In the end, Yellowjackets is actually a good watch for those who enjoy drama that doesn't involve them and mysteries that keep you thinking as the plot thickens with each passing moment. Highly recommended for those who want to watch a series that is ongoing and need something to look forward to at the end of a long week as it is released weekly. I'm sure you'll be dying to see the new episodes the same way I was after finishing season 1.

#fizziepop thoughts #yellowjackets spoilers #yellowjackets #yellowjackets showtime #misty quigley #shaunajackie #taissa #shauna yellowjackets #season 1 #tv show review #yellowjackets recap #jellowjackets review

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doomdays · 10 months ago

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It's instinct, the way Van is so determined to make this stay perfect for @silencedrage. She doesn't even know if that's possible -- it's not like her apartment is all that grand, but it's hers, something to her own name that she once thought was never even possible, and for a long time, that was enough. She didn't have anyone else, no one to impress, no one to welcome home at the end of the night. But now, suddenly it's all on display, so exposing to the person they've become since seeing Lottie last, and she can only hope that this is exactly what Lottie needs after everything she's been through. Because maybe they're not the same kids they were back then, but Van still feels that draw to Lottie, the one that urges her to keep her safe.

❝ No, no, Lottie, please. I insist. Spend more days falling asleep on the couch as it is, it's really no hassle to me. ❞ Some days there's a good enough excuse for that, like falling asleep to a movie she's seen a thousand times by now, but others, it's so hard to get comfortable anywhere that it never really seems to matter. Eyes lock with Lottie's, but they soften as she offers a small nod. ❝ I prefer it. ❞

Their breath catches, and Van looks down at their hands together. Mentally, she works to center herself, remind herself that though Lottie might be a stranger in some ways now, she's still the person that once knew Van in a way most people didn't, and she likes to believe the same was true for Van about Lottie, too. A smile tugs at her lips as she feels a sense of relief, hardly even realizing how desperate she was to feel this again -- even after years of telling herself she wanted nothing to do with the other survivors, like the separation was going to give her any real peace. ❝ Yeah, me too. Should've never gone that long without knowing each other to begin with. That's changing now. ❞ For however long she's got left, at least. Eyes light up at the suggestion, because she never thought she'd get the chance to show Lottie Matthews a movie, especially not now. ❝ Damn, now you're speaking my language. When's the last time you've seen a movie? ❞

She steps into the apartment after @doomdays, eyes roaming over every detail, drinking in every aspect that feels so much like them. Lottie didn't know what to expect when Van had first offered to let her stay with them, mostly because it's the first time anyone's offered such kindness to her in the first place. It sounds weird to say that, but even in her childhood home, Lottie has never felt like her presence is welcome in someone else's space. Over the years, she had created her own space with her compound, a place that was unequivocally hers, and now she had lost even that. But like everything else about Van, even their home seems warm and welcoming, completely different from the cold perfection of the Matthews estate and the curated polish of her cabin. Things aren't all carefully tucked away and unbearably neat, and it's refreshing to be in a space that feels like someone actually lives in it.

The drive back to Ohio had been longer than she expected, the furthest Lottie's been out of state since she returned from Switzerland, and her legs welcome being able to stretch out once more. But the tiredness is also starting to sink into her limbs and she wasn't even the one who drove the entire way back. "Van, you've already invited me into your home, I'm not going to kick you out of your own bed," she replies sternly.

She reaches out to gently take Van's hand between her own. "I know you mean it. You always do, and I've never known you to go back on your word." Even years later, Van is still the one looking after her, protecting her even from Lottie's own delusions. And when they mention getting to know each other all over again, her eyes soften with hopeful excitement. "I would really love that, Van." She wants to hear everything, and in her friend's own words. Even a quick glance around the apartment tells her that there's still parts of the old Van she remembers from years ago, and she's eager to learn all of the details to fill in the gaps. "Maybe... we can watch a movie too?"

#silencedrage #silencedrage: lottie.#thread: v. palmer.#queue.

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melanielocke · 3 years ago

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An experiment with a Fairchild

Alastair goes to the Fairchild's house to visit Charles, but finds only Henry home, who is working on something.

CW for toxic relationship

Taglist: @foxglove-airmid @alastair-esfandiyar-carstairs1 @justanormaldemon @styxdrawings @ipromiseiwillwrite

I don't think this really adds up with the timeline since I'm not sure Henry was actually in London at the time but I don't care. It's somewhere during early Chain of Gold.

Alastair knocked on the door of the house in Grosvenor Square. The consul was currently in Idris and would not be home, and Alastair was fairly certain Matthew was someplace else with his band of bandits or whatever they called themselves nowadays. Charles’ father he wasn’t so sure about, but Alastair imagined he would have gone with her. He sincerely hoped Charles would be home. He’d missed Charles and hoped they could talk about his engagement. Alastair could make him understand, how unhappy it made him. They would work something out, Alastair was sure of it. It would be like Paris again, just the two of them. He could be happy, as long as he had Charles’ love.

The door opened, but it wasn’t Charles standing in the doorway, nor any of the servants. Instead, sitting in a bath chair, was Charles’ father. Henry Branwell, known for inventing the portal, although Alastair didn’t think he got the recognition he deserved. He didn’t know much about Henry beyond that, Charles was far closer to his mother than his father and Alastair didn’t think Charles really understood his father’s work.

‘Good afternoon,’ Henry said. ‘I’m not sure we’ve met? I’m Henry Fairchild.’

Alastair didn’t realize Henry used his wife’s name. He knew Charles’ mother had chosen to give him her last name instead of Henry’s because of her position as consul, which was an unusual decision, but he’d never heard of a husband taking his wife’s name.

Charles often claimed his parents hadn’t married out of love either, that his mother had married his father because she needed the support of a husband to advance her career. Therefore, it was fine he was marrying for political reasons and would never love his wife. But Henry Fairchild must love his wife very much, to have taken her name.

‘I’m Alastair Carstairs,’ Alastair said. ‘I’m here to see Charles, is he home?’

‘Right, you must be Charles’ friend. No, I don’t think he’s at home right now.’

‘Oh that’s too bad,’ Alastair said, attempting to hide the disappointment in his voice. ‘Do you know where he is?’

Perhaps he was at his club, Alastair thought. He’d been there once before with Charles, who’d wanted to introduce him to the club. Alastair had not yet managed to win much approval there, but he was determined to keep trying. Many high standing shadowhunter men were members of the same gentleman’s club Charles went to, and Alastair wanted so badly to fit in there. Even if deep down, he knew he never would, not really. Even with his hair dyed blonde, his skin was still too dark to pass for a white English man. At most they would accept an act he put on. Still, Alastair tried the best he could to be what they wanted and win their approval, especially Charles’.

‘No, I’m not sure. But I expect he’ll be home soon. Why don’t you come in and wait there. I am working on something fascinating.’

Alastair hesitated, but he guessed it couldn’t hurt to come in. If at any point Matthew arrived, he could always make his way out. He didn’t hate Matthew, not really. He thought Matthew was immature, and sometimes Alastair was jealous that it was so easy for Matthew to be himself, but that was all, and Alastair deeply regretted his behavior at school.

However, Alastair thought it was best for all parties involved if he stayed away from Matthew, who was clearly still mad with him. Who could blame him, honestly? Charles knew, of course, about the bad blood between them, but had chosen to believe Matthew had been a brat at school and did not blame Alastair for his behavior. While that was true to some extent, Alastair had been far worse. However, if he was to be accepted, he should not show such weakness, and the best course of action was to stay away. Perhaps coming here was a bad decision.

Henry retreated into his lab, and while Alastair waited with some tea provided by a servant, he felt very awkward. What were his duties here? He would have expected someone inviting him in to stay with him, although a conversation with Charles’ father would have been just as awkward. Where was Charles? Was he coming?

In the end, Alastair did decide to take a look in the lab.

‘Ah, there you are,’ Henry said. ‘You were taking your time with that tea. Do you prefer it colder?’

Truth to be told, Alastair didn’t like the way the English made their tea at all, but he reserved his complaints about the awful food and drinks of this country for when he was having tea with his mother and Risa.

‘It was quite hot,’ was all Alastair said.

‘After some deliberation I’ve decided to give the Phosphor another chance,’ Henry said. ‘It was unfortunately, a failed invention, but I still believe I could make it work.’

‘What is it supposed to be?’ Alastair asked.

Henry fell into a lecture of his work, how he’d wanted to invent a light source five times brighter than witchlights. So far the Phosphor had mostly resulted in fires, and Henry had abandoned the project in favor of the portal. Alastair noticed how passionate Henry seemed when he talked about his interests. He could be passionate too, but Charles said that was not a good thing. It was important that he appeared rational at all times, not clouded by emotion.

‘Nor did I like working with something so highly flammable while Charles and Matthew were small,’ Henry said. ‘It would be too dangerous with small and vulnerable children depending on me. But they’re growing up so fast. Charles will be married soon and move out with his wife.’

Alastair wasn’t so sure what Charles intended to do. He’d assured him the engagement was temporary, that he would not marry miss Bridgestock. But she was under the impression the marriage would take place. Then who was Charles lying to?

‘So now is the right time to give it another try?’ Alastair concluded.

‘Precisely. However, something is not right with my calculations, and I cannot figure it out. Do you have an interest in science yourself, Mr. Carstairs?’

Alastair had once, although not to the extent Henry did. He was good at math, at least, and fascinated by the theory.

‘A little,’ he said. ‘But I’m mainly interested in politics.’

Alastair glanced over the calculations Henry had written down. They were complex, but Alastair was good at math and at least this part of the inventing process he could follow along.

‘There’s a mistake here,’ Alastair said. ‘Maybe that’s why it’s not working.’

Henry moved over to look at the calculations, and Alastair pointed out the errors, working with Henry to fix the errors. Would it work now?

‘Are you sure you’re not interested in becoming a scientist or an inventor?’ Henry asked. ‘You’re quite clever. I think it is limiting, to think of shadowhunters only as warriors. Some are, and that’s fine, but there are more ways to make the world better than just killing demons. The experiments Christopher and I do all serve the purpose of improving life for shadowhunters, yet so few understand.’

Henry sounded resigned, had he accepted the way he was viewed? Alastair found it difficult to imagine. He knew what it was to be mocked, and he never wanted to experience that again. He didn’t think he could bear it, but perhaps Henry was simply stronger than he was.

‘That’s their loss,’ Alastair said. ‘There are many ways to improve the world beyond fighting. I’m not an inventor, but I hope I can improve the Clave by getting into politics someday.’

Alastair wasn’t completely sure it was what he wanted anymore. Even if he did succeed, he knew people would gossip. He could never be the perfect politician shadowhunters expected, not without a wife, and Alastair was determined that no matter how much he pretended to be something he was not, he would never pretend to love someone he could never have such feelings for. He admired Henry, for not caring what people thought of him. He wished he could be like that, be himself, and be appreciated, if not by society then by a smaller group of people who loved him. But Alastair didn’t think that was possible, because no one could love the real him, could they? After pretending for so long, he didn’t even know who the real Alastair was anymore.

‘Ah, like Lottie,’ Henry said. ‘I so admire what she does. I could never make people listen like she does. And Charles wants to be just like her. Truth to be told, he’s a far better assistant to her than I could ever hope to be.’

‘Charles is good at what he does,’ Alastair said.

Alastair hoped some day he would be too. He read all the books Charles recommended, he worked tirelessly on formulating his own ideas. But whenever he presented his ideas to Charles, he was met with laughter. As if his ideas were just a joke to him, as if he were far too young and silly to understand. It made him feel awful. Alastair usually tried to downplay it then, pretend he hadn’t been absolutely serious about these ideas. Because clearly if Charles didn’t take him seriously, his ideas weren’t as good as they’d seemed at first and he needed to do better. He’d convinced his mother that he could help their family’s social standing by succeeding in politics rather than marrying, but how could he if not even Charles thought his ideas were worth anything?

‘I must admit I don’t understand his work nearly as well as you must,’ Henry said. ‘I’m glad he has a friend like you. I have worried about him. Always so focused on work, he doesn’t have many friends and I worry he’s lonely. I think he finds it difficult to make friends. But you and he, you are good friends are you not?’

‘We are,’ Alastair said, suddenly terrified Henry would suspect he and Charles were not quite friends, but lovers instead.

He wasn’t quite sure what Henry meant about Charles not having many friends. Charles attended his club along with many shadowhunter men, and he seemed friendly with many of them. Of course, even then he mainly talked about politics and tried to build alliances to further his career. Alastair wasn’t sure Charles really cared about any of them, perhaps he was the only one Charles had former a true connection with. If anything, it made him feel more special to be the only one trusted and appreciated by him.

‘He’s lucky to have you,’ Henry said.

‘Father, what are you doing here with Alastair?’

Charles was standing in the doorway. He looked weary, and Alastair wanted to go to him, but he didn’t dare, not when Henry Fairchild was still here to witness them. Although strangely, he suspected if there were shadowhunters who did not condemn men like him and Charles, it would be Henry.

‘Ah, there you are, Charles. Your friend has been waiting for you.’

Charles sighed. ‘Please do not bother my friends with your experiments. I am sorry for this, Alastair. I was caught up at the Institute, you know how it is.’

Alastair was a bit shocked by the way Charles spoke to Henry. Compared to his father, Henry seemed kind, if only a bit absent minded. He knew Charles did not understand his father well, but it was quite rude to speak to him in such a manner. His mother certainly wouldn’t tolerate it if he spoke to her like this.

Henry didn’t say anything else, and Alastair left the lab with Charles to go upstairs, to his bedroom. As Alastair understood it, Henry rarely left his lab and there was little danger of him interrupting him.

‘Are you very tired?’ Alastair asked.

‘Just work,’ Charles said. ‘It’s becoming a bit much lately, but that’s alright. This is my chance to show my best qualities, after all. Exhaustion is a small price to pay. And I have you with me now, and that more than makes up for it. I could use some relaxation.’

And Alastair obliged, as he always did. Even if part of him was still upset with Charles, he knew that if he wanted to earn his lover’s affection and loyalty, he would have to be there for him when Charles needed him and give him what he wanted. At least now he could experience what if felt like to be loved, and Alastair knew love was supposed to hurt. It was better than nothing, better than being alone. Still, he wished he could be more like Charles’ father, doing what was right for him and being who he was regardless of what anyone else thought. But Alastair had lost himself a long time ago, the only time when he felt even remotely like himself was when he was in Charles’ arms. And even then, he still did not feel quite right and couldn’t figure out what was missing. He did not know who he was anymore.

#Alastair Carstairs #Henry Branwell #Henry Fairchild #Charles Fairchild #the last hours #fanfiction #fic

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shadowhuntertrash · 4 years ago

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Bad Day

Matthew woke with a start. He was sweating and shaking and all too aware of his quick breaths. Damn. Matthew thought, shaking his head, trying to shake away the nightmare. He had this dream at least three times a week, most of the time around five.

It always started the same, he was at a park with his mother and father. They were having a good day, it was Matthew’s birthday and he had decided he wanted to go outside. They would be sitting there on a bench and then the scene would switch and he’d be at the Shadowmarket with the faerie who sold him the poison.

The faerie would give him an evil look and then the scene would switch again and he would see Charlotte trembling and sweating in her bed. Tessa was next to her and Charlotte was crying. His father would usher him out and tell him about the child Charlotte was bearing.

Then the dream would morph one more time and he would be standing in a room with blood everywhere and Charlotte and Henry sobbing. He would sit there and watch for a minute before Charlotte’s head shot up and she glared at him. “This is your fault! All of this! Look what you’ve done! Get out, leave! I never want to see you again!” Matthew would try to talk to her but before he could say anything she would slap him.

That’s when he woke up.

Matthew sat in his bed shaking and running his hand over his face before glancing at the clock. It was six in the morning. He decided to not go back to sleep and got up to go shower. He stood under the hot watch and tried to keep his eyes open, every time they closed he would be back in the room with his parents sobbing and his mother’s face looking at him with disgust and hate.

Matthew shook his head again and stepped out of the shower grabbing a towel and drying himself off slowly. He always moved slowly after those dreams. It gave him more time to put on his mask. He always wore it, the happy carefree mask that hid his darkest secrets.

Once Matthew was dressed and ready for the day it was eight in the morning. He trudged downstairs and heard voices from the kitchen. “I just don’t know what to do with him Henry.” It was his mother and father. He grimaced and continued walking. “All he does is drink and party. He has to know that he has quite a reputation, mustn't he? I just don’t know what to do.” Matthew froze, were they talking about him?

“Darling, it’ll be okay. He’ll grow up soon. Don’t you remember Will when he was that age? He was just as bad and he has turned out to be a great man. Matthew will grow up, he just hasn’t had to yet.” Matthew felt a pang in his gut. He always knew his mother looked down on him. How could she not? She was the Consul and he was her problematic son. He knew that she thought lowly of him but his father?

That hurt so much more than he ever dreamed. He had always loved his father so much, he would watch over him and help him in any way he could. He was aware that he had a drinking problem and he knew that he had a reputation for partying but surely his father didn’t hate him for that?

“I know he’ll grow up but he needs to do it soon. I can’t be the Consul with a son like him. Everyone already questions having a woman in the position, but a woman who can’t even control her own son? Everyone looks down on me for it Henry. He needs to stop messing around and step up.” Matthew felt the words hit his heart like daggers. He heard his father sigh.

“He will Lottie don’t worry.” Matthew turned on his heel abruptly. After the dream he had he needed to get out. He couldn’t listen to this, not right now.

He had just gotten in the carriage when Charles stepped in and shoving him over. “Where are you going so early Charles?” Matthew said through clenched teeth. He did not want to deal with Charles right now. Charles huffed and looked at him as if he was nothing but dirt.

“I’m going to a meeting as important people do, and what about you? Going to another bloody downworlder party?” Matthew looked away scowling. He wasn’t going to a party, he was going to see James. He knew Charles hated him and thought of him as nothing but it still wasn’t great hearing it from his own mouth.

“Sod off Charles, I’m going to Jamie’s.” Charles wrinkled his nose. “I do wish you had never befriended him. He’s an awful lot of trouble and honestly you don’t need any help in that department.” Matthew froze all he could see was red. He tried to calm himself down but his brother kept going.

“The only thing he’s good at is getting into the shadow world and that’s not even on purpose. He doesn’t have his mother’s warlock powers nor does he have his dad’s bravery. He doesn’t even have his parents' charm. He needs to grow up just as much as you do. But then again the worthless ones always find each other don’t they brother.”

Matthew couldn’t help himself. He punched Charles in the nose. He heard the sickening crunch when it broke which was accompanied by Charles’ groan as his hand shot up to his face. Charles took his hand away from his face and punched Matthew right back. Matthew felt the pain blooming right under his eye and his only regret was that he was going to have a large bruise.

Both boys were fuming and Matthew knew he needed to get out before they did something they would both regret. He stumbled out of the carriage as the driver slowed to see what was going on.

He started walking to the Institute. It was about a thirty minute walk from his house so he knew he would get a chance to calm down. Today was not his day and all he wanted to do was go see his parabatai.

Honestly he would’ve been fine if Charles had just been talking about him but he had never been good at controlling himself when people said bad things about Jamie. Charles seemed to know that and use it every chance he got.

Matthew put a hand to his eye and winced. It hurt like hell and his head was throbbing. He silently cursed Charles and walked faster. It only took him 20 minutes to get to the Institute and when he walked in there were several shadowhunters in the entryway. Matthew was going to ignore them and go find James but he was distracted when he caught his name.

“It’s a shame that he’s a bastard child. His parents were so great but it’s common knowledge that Henry can’t have kids and Charlotte wanted more. I mean Gabriel owed Charlotte a lot from when he was younger and have you seen his hideous wife? He would surely need something more than her.” Matthew balled his hands into fists and tried to slow his breathing.

“Poor kid no one will want him now. I mean he doesn’t even look like his father and they intend for everyone to believe them?” Matthew was shaking when Will opened the door and ushered the other shadowhunters inside.

Will spotted him and smiled warmly. “James is in the-” He cut off abruptly and frowned walking over to Matthew quickly. “Math what happened to your face?” He said tilting Matthew’s face up so he could get a better look at his eye. Matthew just shook his head and gave him a charming smile.

“Nothing to worry about Mr. Herondale just a little bruise.” Will frowns and shakes his head. “Matthew, I know you aren’t going to talk to me but please tell James how you got that. He’s in the library.” Matthew looked down and nodded with a soft smile. “Yes sir.”

Will patted Matthew’s head and walked hesitantly into the room where the rest of the shadowhunters had gathered. Matthew let out his breath and tried to still his trembling form. It didn’t do much so he gave up and walked to the library.

The library was quiet and Matthew headed over to where he knew James would be. When he got there he climbed on the window seat and put his head in James’ lap. James was reading Great Expectations and the only form of acknowledgement he gave Matthew was readjusting so his book was propped up on Matthew’s head.

Matthew sighed and let the quiet overtake him. His thoughts went back to his parents as he went over the day again in his head.

It was his own fault his parents didn’t like him, his own fault that they wanted him to change. He was a drunk who was useless at politics who liked to have fun but they didn’t know the half of it. They didn’t know he was a murder who drank to forget. They didn’t know he slept around because he didn’t think he deserved anything better than a one night stand. He could deal with other people hating him because no one hated him more than himself.

He knew he was a monster. He knew that he had no right to be alive when his sister wasn’t. He wished with all his heart that his sister was here instead of him. If he ever got the chance he would switch their places in a heartbeat.

It was times like this that Matthew wished him and Charles were close because maybe he would tell Charles what happened. He didn’t really think he would even if they were close but at least Charles wouldn’t be so awful to him. Maybe then he would protect Matthew from all the cruel words instead of joining in.

But only good people deserve good things. That’s why his brother hated him. Because he wasn’t a good person. He was a god awful person and he didn’t understand how anyone could like him. He didn’t understand why James chose to agree to be parabatai. Maybe he did it out of pity or maybe he did it because he didn’t want to have lied to his dad.

All of his friends were so good, how could any of them want him around. He didn’t deserve the way they treated him. He never had even before everything happened.

Matthew thought of all the rumors he’d heard, not only about his parentage but about his reputation as well. Many people thought he did it to spite his mother because he didn’t love her. No one knew it was the opposite. No one understood what he did, let alone why he did it. No one cared enough to find out either.

Matthew was so stuck in his head that he didn’t realize when he started crying. He didn’t respond to James’ anxious questioning either. James ran his hands through Matthew’s hair and repeated his name, a little louder each time.

By the sixth time James had said it, growing more anxious each time, Matthew had jolted back to reality. He sat up quickly trying to rid of the tears that were flowing but to no avail. Matthew balled his hands into fists and pushed them into his eyes trying to stem the flow of tears forgetting about his bruised eye.

Matthew gasped and quickly took his hand away. James finally saw his bruised face and gasped as well. “Bloody hell Math, what happened?” He asked frantically kneeling in front of Matthew and holding his hands down with one of his own using his free hand to tilt his chin down so he could see Matthew’s eye.

Matthew let out a slightly hysterical laugh and shook his head. “You know you’re just like your dad.” Matthew mumbled looking away from James who frowned and pulled out his stele. “Matthew look at me.” Matthew turned his head further away. He couldn’t stop his tears and they were flowing faster now.

James sighed and brought his chin back so he could look Matthew in his eyes. “Math, what happened?” Matthew shook his head, tears coming impossibly faster. He didn’t deserve James’ concern. He felt a sob in his throat and closed his eyes tightly. He shouldn’t let James see him like this. This was weak; he shouldn’t let anyone’s words get to him. He deserved them anyway.

James was having none of his silence though and put both his hands on Matthew’s shoulders shaking him gently. “Matthew Fairchild look at me right now.” Matthew opened his eyes hesitantly and saw a fire burning in James’ gold eyes. Golden fire meeting green hills.

“Who did that to you.” Matthew broke then. He didn’t bother holding back his tears as he let his head fall on James’ collarbone. James put his arms around Matthew immediately, frowning. Matthew never cried, and when he did it was uncontrollable like this. James rubbed his back and muttered soothing words in his ear.

“You’re okay, Math. You’re with me in the library. No one else is here, it’s just us. You can talk to me, I’m not going to make you, well I need to know how you got that bruise but I won’t make you talk to me about anything else.” Matthew only sobbed harder at that. James’ frown deepened and he shifted them so he was leaning against the window and Matthew was on his lap straddling him.

Most people would see this as intimate, and it was, but not in the way other people thought it. This was the best way to calm Matthew down, James knew that better than anyone. Matthew was the kind of person who needed to be touched or held when he was upset and James knew that he felt safe when James held him like this.

James could feel his shirt getting wet but he didn’t care. All he cared about was what had upset his parabatai so much. He rubbed soothing circles on Matthew’s back and Matthew took stuttering breaths trying to calm himself. James put Matthew’s hand on his back and took exaggerated breaths feeling encouraged as Matthew tried to match them.

“You’re doing great Math, just breathe.” Matthew nodded against him and a few minutes later he was breathing normally again and the tears had slowed, not stopped, but slowed. James pulled back slightly and rested his forehead against Matthew’s. Matthew’s eyes were still closed but James kept his open trying to read his best friend’s face.

“Math, can you tell me what happened now?” Matthew let out a bitter laugh. “I punched Charles.” He said, his voice thick from the tears. James looked at Matthew and shook his head. “That’s not what I asked.” James said, slightly confused. Matthew shrugged and moved backwards before settling his head against James’s chest again. “He retaliated.”

James felt his eyes widen. “Charles did that?” He questioned bringing Matthew’s face back up to look at his eye again. It was in the middle of turning black. James scowled and glared at the bruise. “I’ll kill him.” Matthew rolled his eyes and hugged James resting his head on James shoulder. James wrapped his arms around Matthew, pulling him impossibly closer.

“Did you not hear what I said? I punched him first. I was asking for it.” James made a noise of exasperation. “Okay then what did he do that made you punch him?” Matthew tensed and James started rubbing circles in his back, staying quiet until Matthew relaxed. “He was just talking crap about stuff he knows nothing about.” Matthew said quietly. James sighed, he knew what that meant.

“You don’t have to protect me from everyone Math. I can protect myself.” Matthew scoffed and shook his head but James could hear the small smile in his voice. “Says the guy who told me he was going to kill my brother.” James rolled his eyes, his own smile playing at his lips. “I’m not the one with a black eye.”

Matthew laughed softly and tucked his arms into James’ chest. Something James knew he did when he got cold. James pushed Matthew off of him slightly and Matthew pulled away with a poorly masked hurt expression. James grabbed his hand and shook his head.

“You’re cold, I’m just getting a blanket and we can move to the couch.” Matthew nods standing up walking to the couch. He let’s James sit down first so he can slot himself between James’ legs. James is on his back half propped up on the arm of the couch and Matthew lays down on his stomach propping his chin up on James’ chest.

James runs his hands through Matthew’s hair again feeling the silky strands. Matthew sighed content for the first time that day. He didn’t understand why James constantly looked after him but he would always appreciate it more than James could ever know. Matthew closes his eyes feeling the calming effect of James running his fingers through Matthew’s hair.

Matthew turned so his cheek was on James’ chest. James’ chest was hard but Matthew had always found it comfortable. He’d always considered James his home, his safe place. So this was typically how they ended up when one of them was upset.

“Hey Math do you feel like talking or do you want to talk about this later? And don’t say later and think we won’t do it because I’ve had enough of giving you space. We need to talk.” James wasn’t looking at him but Matthew felt as if he could see his soul. All his secrets, his heart, his mind.

Matthew shuddered, he wasn’t ready to tell James his secret. He couldn’t bare to lose his best friend, his soul, his parabatai. Not today.

“Jamie, do the rumors ever bother you?” James looked down at me in concern but I don’t meet his eyes. “Math is that what this is about?” Matthew shakes his head slowly and raises up again so his chin is resting on James. Matthew looks everywhere but James’ eyes.

“I just had a long day.” James frowns at him. “Math it’s ten in the morning.” Matthew closes his eyes tightly. “I’m well aware Jamie thank you.” James let out a huff of annoyance. “Okay then tell me about your day.” Matthew starts to shake his head but James groans and cuts him off. “No, you don’t get to deflect or say you don’t want to talk. I’m your parabatai Math, I can tell when something is wrong. Hell I can feel it.”

Matthew lets out an exasperated sigh. “I’m fine. I just didn’t get much sleep last night.” James frowns, “Nightmares again?” Matthew nods slowly. They had shared a room many times and James was well aware of Matthew’s nightmares. Matthew had told him however, that they had stopped when in reality they had only gotten worse.

“Okay, what happened after.” James said Matthew is simultaneously glad and annoyed that James knows him well enough to know that wasn’t the only thing that happened.

“I showered and went to get breakfast but my parents were talking.” James’ eyebrows furrowed in confusion. “About what?” Matthew looked down again his cheeks burning from embarrassment.

“They were talking about me. My reputation as a drunk partier. They were talking about how I need to grow up. My mother said I’m ruining her career and Jamie they’re right. Don’t.” Matthew said when he saw James open his mouth to protest. James gave him a hard look but stopped talking. “They are right because people already give my mom bloody hell for being a woman and then I ruin it for her further. I make a mess of everything my own parents hate me. I mess up everything and I can’t stop.”

James is looking at Matthew with a contemplative expression and stays quiet for a few minutes. Matthew shuffles around a bit, the silence building his anxiety. “Math you don’t really believe that right? You do know that’s not true?” Matthew looked away, frowning and James forced his head back. “Math none of that is true. You have to believe me. None of that is true.”

Matthew shook his head sadly and smiled at James. “Jamie I will never stop loving you for seeing the best in people but your being daft. I know I’m your parabatai but it’s okay to agree with them.” James look as if Matthew had struck him across the face.

“Matthew Fairchild when have I ever led you to believe I thought anything they said was true? Do you believe I should die for being a demon’s grandchild?” James was looking at Matthew furiously and Matthew ducked his head. He was not used to being the target of that look. “James you know I don’t believe that.” James huffed, “Then what in Raziel’s name led you to believe I would?”

Matthew furrowed his eyebrows, James wasn’t listening. “Because James you were born this way it’s not something you can change and you constantly prove yourself worthy. James, I do this to myself. Everything they whisper about me aside from me being a bastard child is true. I am a drunk. I do sleep around. Jamie all of that is true.” James flinched and Matthew let out an exasperated sigh.

“Jamie I’m not trying to upset you.” Matthew makes a move to get up but James tightens his hold around Matthew’s waist. “Where could you possibly be going Matthew.” James said his golden eyes boring into Matthew’s emerald ones. Matthew sighed and collapsed back onto James too tired to fight.

“I’m being a burden so I’m leaving so if you would kindly let me go.” Matthew said, moving to get up again. James frowned and pulled Matthew back to his chest with both arms. “Math please don’t go. We don’t have to talk anymore but please don’t go.” Matthew buried his face in James’ neck in response.

They sat like that for a few minutes before Matthew turned his head, pressing his cheek against James’ chest. “Read to me?” Matthew asked quietly, staring at the fire he just realized was burning. James ran his fingers through Matthew’s hair and grabbed his copy of Great Expectations and started reading aloud from where he left off.

As James read, Matthew found himself nodding off. Right before Matthew lost consciousness he heard James’ gentle voice in his ear as James brushed some hair away that had fallen in his face. “I’ll get you to believe me one day Math I promise. And when you want to talk about why you’re always upset I’ll be here.”

Matthew fell asleep then, and for the first time in seven days, he didn’t have a single nightmare.

#matthew fairchild #matthew and james #james herondale #heronstairs #parabatai #bad day #charlotte fairchild #henry fairchild #charles fairchild #will herondale #rumors #the last hours

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hockeylvr59 · 5 years ago

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Crush || Matthew Tkachuk

Requested: [ ] yes [x] no

Authors Note: So I’m not sure how I feel about this because Matthew’s personality is difficult for me. I know he’s normally sarcastic and confident but I feel like if he’s hiding a crush he’d be a little different. And throw in a kid and that brings out even more softness so I don’t know if this feels like him at all….but let me know what you think. I was watching his NBCSports interview from the all-star game and tried to base his temperament on that but idk how accurate I got.

Warnings: none

Word Count: 2,262

~~~~~~~~

The cool air of the rink was the same. The feeling of his skates cutting through the ice was the same. The sound of sticks on pucks and his teammates chirping was the same. Everything about today’s practice was the same except for one thing...

Practice had started five minutes ago and his favorite team photographer wasn’t in her normal spot on the bench.

Matthew couldn’t recall the last time that y/n had missed a practice. Her presence was such a part of the routine by now that for some reason her absence left him feeling bothered. Standing at the blue line, Matthew tried to pay attention to his coach’s instructions, determined to push past this unsettled feeling. Skating hard toward the net, he buried a puck past Rittich, a flash of movement from the bench catching his eye as he returned to his previous spot. Before he could assure himself that it was her, that everything was back to normal, Gelinas had pulled him aside wanting to chat about his shot and how to improve his game when breakout chances occurred.

By the time Coach had finished with him, the next drill had already started. Taking a moment to figure out what was going on, Matthew settled himself at the back of the line before finally taking the chance to glance over at the bench. His heart settled back into place at the realization that the movement had been just who he was hoping it was. In the same millisecond, his jaw dropped as he realized that while she held her camera in one hand, snapping away like usual, things weren’t exactly normal. No...normally y/n didn’t have a baby resting on her hip.

Lost in thought, Matt didn’t even realize that he was next in line for the drill until Johnny was shoving him from behind. And although Matt attempted to focus and participate in practice, there was one question that wouldn’t leave his mind.

She has a kid?

You see, while Y/N was a staple at Flames practices, Matt had never actually really talked to her before. Of course, he’d occasionally hover over her shoulder to comment on the photos of him she’d taken, but he really didn’t know anything about her personal life. Admittedly, he had made a point to observe a lack of any rings on her left hand but now...seeing her with a baby made him realize that that observation really meant little to nothing at all.

Partway through practice, Matthew had watched TJ Brodie skate over to her during a forward-only drill and he watched as she chatted with him, a smile on her face as she adjusted the kid against her side who appeared to cling tighter to her. From the other side of the rink, Gio watched as his young assistant captain eyed their photographer, his obvious crush ever more apparent. No one had said anything to him about the crush yet, but maybe it was finally time to give him a little shove in the right direction.

A modified scrimmage was set up to conclude the on-ice practice and for a while, Matthew lost himself in the game, forgetting about y/n and the baby on the bench. It wasn’t until the puck deflected oddly off of someone’s stick and he heard a feminine screech of pain that it all came flooding back. Over on the bench, y/n was shaking out her right arm frantically, her fingers clenching into a fist and releasing repeatedly. With play stopped and Ward checking to make sure she was okay, Matthew couldn’t help but listen as she assured his coach that she was fine, that she was more worried about the baby and the camera than taking a bouncing puck to the arm. Still, he noticed the grimace on her face and a rush of anger filled him at the thought of her being hurt. It was a stupid feeling because it was a fluky play and while he cursed himself for it, it was an emotion he was finding hard to control.

By the time he looked over at the bench again, she was gone, clearly not willing to risk another stray puck flying her way when she really wasn’t able to protect herself.

The nagging feeling that he should go check on her followed him into the locker room as Matthew stripped out of his gear. He’d have a few minutes between grabbing a shower and the team film session if he was quick. But as he stood in the shower he told himself that it would be ridiculous and weird if he tracked her down. After all, they weren’t friends and the last thing he needed was for his teammates to give him hell over it.

Still, after throwing on some sweats and a t-shirt, Matt found himself standing in the middle of the hallway, his brain telling him to head to film, while his heart pulled the other way. Caught in a mental debate, he missed Gio walking down the hall from the training room until he was hit in the chest with something thrown by his captain. Catching it, he looked up confused as to why he had an ice pack and a roll of elastic bandage wrap now in his hands.

“She’s down the hall. Go help her wrap the ice pack around her arm.” Gio directed.

“Wait. What?” Matt found slipping from his lips.

“Chuck...she has a kid, not the plague.” Gio declared. “Now go before I have to watch you debate whether you should for a minute longer.”

“I wasn’t…” Matt attempted to defend himself but Gio just walked away shaking his head before Matt could finish his sentence. Sighing to himself, Matt adjusted the items in his grip before turning down the hall where Gio had pointed, finding y/n sitting on the ground just around the corner with her back against the wall, computer propped up on a box and baby sleeping on her chest.

Running his fingers through his hair, Matt sighed before approaching, the sound of his footsteps causing y/n to look in his direction.

“So uh...Gio sent me with an ice pack for your arm.” Matt stated, his voice cracking, driving him completely nuts.

“Thank you.” She whispered back softly, her lips dropping down to press against the baby’s head in an effort to ensure that it didn’t wake up. Now that he was closer Matthew noticed the pink clothes and though it was gender-biased, he took that to mean that this was a little girl. Unmoving for a moment, Matthew just Y/N with her daughter until she reached up for the ice pack.

“Oh uh...can I help you? Gio sent a bandage wrap to keep it in place so you didn’t have to hold it.” Matt found himself rambling, something else that was so unlike his normal behavior. When she nodded, he found himself smiling, dropping into a squat beside her and taking the offered arm. “Did you get hit on the front of the arm...or the side?” He questioned, unable to see any signs of bruising as she wore long sleeves.

“It hit here.” She pointed out, grazing her hand along her daughter’s head as she returned her free hand to the baby’s back. With appropriate direction, it only took a minute or two for Matt to secure the ice pack, and once he was done, he stood back up, his fingers tangling in his hair again.

“Well...you should be all set.” He stated. “And I should head to film.” Shoving his hands into the pockets of his sweats he turned to walk away, only pausing when he heard her melodic voice say his name.

“Thanks Matt.” She murmured and it was sad that those two words alone caused his chest to swell.

As he settled into film he had so many new questions. He had to remind himself that they weren’t any of his business and that his business was to focus on the screen in front of him and not on how gentle she was with her daughter or how wonderful her voice sounded speaking his name. He’d be chirped for weeks if the guys knew where his head was at and he had a reputation to uphold.

___

By the time they finished watching film, Matt was ready to go grab something to eat before hitting the gym for some weights. Detouring back to the locker room for his forgotten phone, Matt had to walk down by where y/n had situated herself in order to get to the player’s lounge. As he passed the side hallway where he’d see her just an hour or so before he once again heard his name, this time being called out with more volume and energy.

Though his stomach was growling, Matt was unable to keep walking and so he stopped and turned down the hallway finding Y/N standing over a now awake child.

“Oh Matt...thank god.” She declared. “Can you do me a massive favor and watch Lottie for a minute while I use the bathroom?” Her words came out in such a rush that by the time his brain processed them she was looking at him expectantly, bouncing on her toes.

“I don’t…” He started and for the second time today, his protests were being cut off.

“Please?? Just make sure she doesn’t go walking away.” Apparently his body language signaled his agreement because immediately she smiled and kneeled down next to the little girl.

“Mommy will be right back. Stay here with Mr. Tkachuk and behave. I’m coming right back after using the bathroom.” Though the little girl whined for a moment she eventually nodded at Y/N and with that the woman who was driving him crazy disappeared down the hall leaving him with her daughter.

If Matt were honest, he didn’t know the first thing about kids and so he stood just watching ‘Lottie’ as she stared back up at him with big brown eyes. Feeling awkward he eventually slid himself to the floor, leaning against the wall, his gaze remaining on the baby as if she would magically vanish if he so much as blinked.

Y/N had been gone far longer than a minute and Matt found himself glancing down the hallway to see if she was on her way back when he felt two tiny hands pressing down on his thigh as the little girl plopped herself down right next to him, a book lying beside her. As she settled herself, she reached for the book before attempting to hand it to him.

“M. Chuck...ook peas.” She requested, those big brown eyes staring into his once more. Gently taking the book from her, Matthew opened it and just stared at the page until it clicked that she wanted him to read to her. It was a children’s book, one which had maybe five words a page and so he complied, telling her about the cat and the rat and the bat and the hat. As he turned each page he couldn’t help but marvel at the look that crossed Lottie’s face and as he finished, he nearly jumped hearing Y/N’s voice above him.

“Tell Mr. Tkachuk thank you Lottie.” With a giggle, the little girl nodded and Matt watched as she brought her fingertips to her chin before moving it away, palm up.

“Tank u” She babbled before pulling herself up and throwing herself at her mom’s legs.

“Yes. Thank you.” Y/N echoed, as Matt set the book down and pulled himself to his feet.

“Was that sign language?” He asked, not even realizing how random of a question that was until it had been asked.

“It was. She started learning sign language as a way to communicate before she could talk.” Y/N explained. “She doesn’t really need it now, but I think she enjoys it because she pairs it with her words still.” Matt merely nodded in response, his hands finding their way back to his pockets once more.

“Seriously thank you for watching her. My bladder was about to burst.” Y/N explained. “She’s been so clingy today because she’s teething again and with hand, foot, and mouth disease going around her daycare I had no choice but to bring her with me today and I did not realize how hard it would be to have a clingy sixteen-month-old attached to my hip as I tried to work.”

“It’s no problem,” Matt assured her, though his brain was now spinning with all of the information she had just thrown at him. She had answered some of his questions, but there were still many more lingering.

As he lifted weights an hour later, Matthew missed the looks his teammates were giving him as he watched Y/N between reps as she flowed easily between taking pictures of the Flames in the gym and capturing snapshots of her daughter who was trapped into a corner with plyo boxes working on a puzzle. No one commented on the smile that appeared on his face as he watched Lottie bounce on her toes as she called out for her mom to show off her finished foam puzzle, but that didn’t mean that they weren’t storing up ammunition to chirp him later.

If things went the way the vets had a feeling they would, there would be plenty of time to do just that in the future.

#matthew tkachuk imagine #matthew tkachuk #nhl imagine #nhl imagines #hockey imagine #hockey imagines #calgary flames #calgary flames imagine #cflames #026

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shaunamilfman · 1 year ago

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Cowboy Like Me

Summary: You've seen a lot of things in the six months you've worked at Tj Maxx. A lot. What you've never seen is the so-called 'Tj bandit' that your boss insists has walked off with hundreds of dollars of merchandise. You've got a vested interest in keeping the bandit free, given that they provide the perfect scapegoat for your own crimes.

You can't say that you've ever spent a lot of time thinking about the elusive Lottie Matthews, but after a chance meeting in the parking lot of a Tj Maxx she just wont leave your mind.

A/N: another long fic im afraid. enjoy!

You yawn silently into your arm, desperately trying to hide the motion. You've been sitting in a meeting with your boss for the last half hour and you honestly can't remember anything past the first five minutes of it. You sneak a glance at the rest of your coworkers and are relieved to find them in a similar state of disarray.

He'd stuck you in yet another meeting about the so-called 'Tj bandit', a name he believed to be absolute artistic genius; A name that the rest of you made fun of behind his back, and sometimes to his face. He never seemed to catch on, or maybe he just didn't care. You certainly didn't.

You held the Tj bandit at a higher level of importance than your coworkers do, but you were readily willing to accept an easy scapegoat for your own crimes. The main benefit that drew you to this job was for the discount: the five finger discount, to be exact.

Sure, you could get a job somewhere else, but most of your paycheck would have ended up being spent here anyways. You weren't particularly concerned with catching the Tj bandit, you were rather grateful for how easy they made it for you to rob the place with basically no repercussions.

You weren't sure why your boss decided that all of these thefts were attributed to one super thief, but he never struck you as a particularly intelligent man. Maybe he had his reasons, maybe he didn't. You didn't get paid enough to care in all honesty.

…

You pull the cart behind you lazily, monotonously pulling items off it to stock on the racks. Once you'd been here long enough stocking things in the right areas became a matter of muscle memory more than anything else. You glance up at the sound of plastic hangers scraping against each other, hoping someone wasn't going to ask you to check in the back.

You look at Lottie Matthews curiously, wondering what she of all people would be doing shopping at a Tj Maxx. She's holding a pretty pink blouse up to the light for inspection and startles nervously when she sees you watching her. You give her your very best customer service smile and she gives you a quick uncomfortable smile in response.

You get back to stocking and finally finish the cart, and with that your four hour shift; Coincidentally, a shift just long enough that your boss wasn't required to give you a lunch break. Go figure. You head back to the break room to grab your stuff and discreetly pop the security tags off your brand new jacket, tossing the tags in the box with the rest of them.

You fold the jacket over your arm as you walk out, all of your coworkers none the wiser. You wave at your boss before stepping out, using the door to hide your smug grin. You hum along quietly to a song that's been stuck in your head, twirling your car keys around your finger.

You look around as you reach your car and watch in awe as the Lottie Matthews, sole heir of the richest family in Wiskayok, untucks her shirt from her skirt to pull out an eight dollar blouse that she's clearly stolen.

You drop your car keys in shock, unable to believe what you've just witnessed. She glances over with a guilty expression, eyes going wide when they land on your Tj Maxx lanyard. You awkwardly wave your fingers in her direction and she takes it as a sign to walk towards you. You practically dive in your car and nearly jump the curve in your haste to get the hell out of there.

What. The. Fuck. You think.

…

You hide your wide eyed look into your locker, desperately trying to seem nonchalant. You finally manage to school your face into something sufficiently neutral as you sneak another glance over your shoulder. Yep, Lottie's still there. Still leaning against her locker and just staring at you from across the hall.

You've caught her doing it a lot lately ever since you caught her stealing from your job. She keeps trying to talk to you the second that you're alone, so you've started following Nat around like she's the second coming of Jesus to avoid her. You wouldn't mind talking to her if you knew why she wanted to talk to you.

Was she going to beg you to keep it to yourself? Was she going to threaten you into silence? Not knowing was the worst part of all of it. Normally you'd just leave a note in her locker to tell her that you really didn't give a shit, but you knew if you took a single step towards her locker she'd be on you just like that.

Prior to the 'incident', as you've been referring to it in your head, you couldn't honestly say whether Lottie Matthews even knew who you were. She's always been one of those really pretty girls who were popular without ever really trying, despite you never really seeing her talk to anyone else. You'd been to a few of her parties, there wasn't really anything else to do in this town on a Saturday night, but you can't say that you've ever really thought of her much before the incident either.

"What are you doing?" You hear an amused sounding voice behind you ask. You jump and curse quietly as you smack your head on your locker.

"God damn it, Natty." You complain, whirling around and rubbing your head painfully with your hand.

"Oh, no." She draws out dramatically. "You really didn't have any brain cells to spare." She holds her hand over her mouth in feigned horror.

"Didn't really have any brain cells to spare." You mimic in a high pitched mocking tone, slamming your locker shut and walking off down the hall. "Bitch," You mutter quietly. Nat laughs as she speeds up to catch up with you. She throws her arm over your shoulder and playfully pulls you against her.

"Don't be like that, Y/N." She says with a grin. You roll your eyes, and sigh loudly. "What's Lottie staring at you for, anyways?" She asks. You laugh softly and turn to face her excitedly.

"Between you and me?" You ask.

She rolls her eyes fondly. "Always." She promises, shifting uncomfortably at the attention.

"Okay." You say, clapping your hands together. "So the other day I saw Lottie at work right?"

"Lottie Matthews shops at Tj Maxx?" Nat interrupts incredulously.

"That's not even the best part," You lean in and murmur in her ear. "I caught her shoplifting on the way out." Nat's eyes widen in shock, her lips forming a crooked grin.

"You caught Lottie Matthews shoplifting?" She asks. You nod wildly. "Have some competition, do we?" You shush her, glancing around to see if anyone is listening.

"Make fun of my shoplifting all you want but we both know who got you that jacket you're wearing." You tease. She shrugs, conceding the point.

"Is that what she's been following you about? Guess she'll get a chance at practice later." She says. Your eyes narrow in confusion and you shoot her a questioning look. Her grin falls and she fidgets a bit, looking uncharacteristically unsure. "Said you'd drive me home, remember?"

"I'll just find ano-" She starts. You place a hand on her arm, interrupting her.

"Just forgot." You promise.

She grins. "Suppose you'll see me later, then. And your new best friend Lottie." She teases as she separates from you to head into her own class. You shake your head exasperatedly as you do the same.

As you watch them practice you can’t help but wonder. If this is the state championship soccer team, what the fuck do the rest of them look like? It was undeniably a shitshow. As Lottie trips over her feet for the third time since practice began Jackie runs up to her on the verge of yelling to help her back up. They have a long and tense conversation as the rest of the girls stand awkwardly around the field. Tai herself looks like she’s on the verge of walking over there and giving Lottie another talking to as well. You and Nat make eye contact as she gives you a confused and exasperated look as she keeps glancing back and forth between you and Lottie. You shrug your shoulders in confusion.

Sure, Lottie had been fucking up in practice all afternoon because she couldn’t take her eyes off of you, but you really weren’t sure how that was your fault. Maybe she’d tripped for the third time right after you had taken your jacket off, but surely it was just a coincidence. You eye her long legs thoughtfully: maybe she’s just clumsy? It was definitely a lot of leg to have to keep track of. They certainly distracted you often enough, why should Lottie be any different. You nod slowly, deciding that must be why. You look back up from your homework as the whistle blows again, signifying that practice has resumed.

You see Jackie Taylor staring at you curiously, eyes narrowed slightly. You wave awkwardly and go searching through your bag for your calculator. You think you might wait for Nat in your car next time, this seems to be more trouble than it’s worth.

…

You’re leaning against your locker a few days later talking to Nat when Jackie approaches you. “Hey,” She says brightly, extending her hand for you to shake. You eye it wearily before slowly extending your own to meet it. “I was just wondering how you knew Lottie? You know, since you kept distracting her at practice?” She says pointedly. You shrug helplessly, tinged with a bit of exasperation. Why is everyone assuming you’re the Lottie whisperer?

"Well, listen here El capitan. Captain my captain," You start.

"I'm not your captain." Jackie interrupts.

"Captain not my captain," You continue to Nats crooked grin and muffled laughter. "I would promise not to, but I really don't know what her deal even is. Scout's honor."

Jackie eyes you suspiciously. "You weren't a girl scout." She concludes. You hold your hands out placatingly and nod in agreement.

"Mm, no. I wanted to go camping but apparently only the boy scouts did cool shit." You acknowledge. "I went to that first meeting though so it definitely counts." Jackie sighs in exasperation and shares a commiserating look with Shauna as if to say 'you see what I'm dealing with?', and the two of them walk off together.

"Oh my god," You loudly whisper to Nat in feigned excitement. "I can't believe that the Jackie Taylor just talked to me! I'm never gonna wash this hand again!" You hear a quick snort of laughter from Jackie's ever present shadow, that quickly gets muffled at the offended look Jackie sends her.

Jackie turns and gives you an assessing look. You grin playfully at her and shoot her a quick wink. She rolls her eyes but you can see the quirk of her lips as she turns back around to talk to Shauna. As you turn back to Nat you can see Lottie Matthews watching you from her locker just out of the corner of your eye.

She's been doing that a lot lately, and it was really starting to make you paranoid. You had no idea how someone so fucking tall could sneak around the school like that. Maybe, You thought. It was easy when no one was looking for you.

You felt an undeniable pang of sadness at the thought and turn fully to her to force eye contact. Her eyes widen slightly at the move and she has an unsure and hesitant look on her face, but still she doesn't back down as she meets you head on. She starts to blush the longer you stare lazily at her, the corner of your lip quirked up in a wry grin.

You nod in acceptance of Lottie's win as Nat finally tugs you away to your car. You watch as Lottie's expression slowly turns smug, her lips forming a smirk as you walk off. Fuck, has she been this hot the whole time? You wonder.

…

You wave unenthusiastically at your boss as you walk out of work, zipping your jacket up higher as a rush of cold air greets you. You rub your hands together for warmth on the walk over to your car. You search through your pockets with numb fingers to find your keys when you hear the sound of someone clearing their throat. You startle at the action, glancing up in panic. Right in front of you is Lottie Matthews leaning against the door of your car. Seems like she finally got tired of you avoiding her then.

"Returning to the scene of the crime, huh?" You joke. Lottie continues to stare at you, looking utterly unimpressed. "Tough crowd." You mutter. This, of all things, is what finally makes her laugh. You grin brightly at her, happy to have finally broken the facade. You hold your keys up pointedly. “Talk if you want,” You promise, “But can it be with the heater?” She hums in agreement and pushes herself off the driver side door and rounds the car to the passenger seat quicker than you’d previously thought possible for her.

You shut the door hard behind you, turning the key and starting the heater as quickly as you can. You can hear the sound of the passenger side handle catching as Lottie sends you a betrayed look. You snicker quietly as you lean over and pop the door for her. “Handles busted.” You explain.

“Oh.” She says softly as she slides into her seat. You watch with amusement as she shifts uncomfortably in the seat trying to find somewhere to put her legs. Nat was typically the one riding in your passenger seat, so it was clearly too far forward for her. She finally gives up and starts feeling under the seat for the lever, quickly pushing the seat back. She looks oddly proud of herself as she finally manages to get comfortable in your car, finally turning to look at you. “Hey,” She says.

“Look. I’m not going to sic the police on you if this is what this is about, Lottie.” You say. “I really don’t get paid enough to care, promise.” She tilts her head to the side in an imitation of confusion.

“The police?” She asks, as if bewildered. Your eyebrows furrow slightly in confusion.

“Y’know? Because of the shoplifting?” You say slowly. She looks over at you, extremely confused.

“What shoplifting?” She asks. You scoff. Is this how she’s going to play it?

“That shirt you stole? The one you stuffed down your shirt?” You ask.

“Oh, no I paid for that.” She says with a giggle. She leans forward and murmurs conspiratorially, “Just didn’t have anywhere else to keep it. You know how it is.” She shrugs, as if it really is that obvious. You watch her in utter disbelief, mind running a mile a minute as you try to figure out her angle. Surely no one could be this stupid? She had to be pretending, you knew that much. On the other hand, you knew that had you not seen the expression on her face when she caught you watching her you would have fallen for her stupid rich girl act hook, line, and sinker.

The longer you stare at her in silence the more unsure she seems to get. She watches you in wide eyed confusion, expression making her seem much younger than she is. She’s really good at it, but you knew her type; In fact, you were her type. You’d learned that playing dumb helps you get away with things so much easier than just flat out lying. It must be easy when you looked like she did. You think, eyes glancing over her again. She had such a natural innocent look, soft wavy hair and big brown eyes.

You’ve never considered Lottie Matthews to be particularly manipulative, but the proof was obvious in the pout that graced her face. You were in awe as you watched a master at work. Lottie was more intelligent than you’d given her credit for, probably more intelligent than most people gave her credit for. You gave her an approving nod. “Sure.” You say, “If that’s what you want.”

She nods slowly, seemingly unsure if this is really a victory or not. “If you're not here for that, then what are you doing here?” You ask.

She grins shyly at you as she nervously fidgets with the ends of her hair. “Needed a ride home.” She lies, “Knew you worked here after the other day.” You scoff but pull your car out of the parking lot regardless to take her home. The two of you talk for the twenty minute drive back, and you find yourself more enamored with her than you’ve ever been with anyone else before. She extracts a promise from you in your driveway to hang out again, and you easily agree. You wonder if she’d set out in that parking lot to get you under her thumb like that, but you remember back to her soccer practice and think you might just have that effect on each other.

…

“You have to say that, Natty.” You accuse, pointing a fry in Nat’s direction. Nat scoffs in offense while Lottie looks on with an amused look on her face.

“What’s that supposed to mean, L/N?” Nat asks expectantly, feigning an angry look. You can’t help but smile. She looks like an angry racoon.

“Just that,” You start, then stare down at your empty hand in realization. You give her a look of disbelief. “Did you seriously just eat my fry?” You ask. She gives you a strange look and shakes her head, making you roll your eyes. She makes a show of looking for the fry before shrugging. The corners of her lips are noticeably twitching. You turn to Lottie to complain when you notice her pinching the fry between two fingers as she eats it.

“Traitor,” You whisper in absolute shock, making her burst out laughing. This seems to finally break Nat’s cool girl facade as well as she laughs so hard she’s tearing up. You fake a betrayed expression as you look back and forth between them, sending Lottie into hysterics. You don’t have to fake your slightly confused look, not quite sure what was funny. She clutches onto your arm as she laughs and you have to stop yourself from tensing in shock. She’d never touched you before but you could totally be cool about it. No big deal, really. Friends touch each other all the time.

You exhale loudly as you turn back to your fries, figuring you’d just let them get it out of their systems. As they start to calm down Lottie reaches down to grab another fry off of your tray, you watch her hand with narrowed eyes but ultimately let her take some. Nat gives you a curious look for a long moment, before reaching forward to grab a fry of her own. You swat her hand away in offense. She scoffs, rolling her eyes as she looks accusingly between the two of you.

“Some bullshit,” She mutters, crossing her arms back over her chest.

“Anyways,” You say, giving her a long look. “You have to say that because you’re my best friend.”

“Oh, come on Y/N. You know I would have told you it was shit if I thought that.” Nat argues. Which, you will admit, is an incredibly good point. Nat had hurt your feelings more than once with her sometimes brutal honesty, but it was a quality that you greatly admired about her all the same.

“She’s right, Y/N. I thought it was really good.” Lottie adds. You nod slowly, deep in thought. You’d been mulling over your college applications for weeks now, continually fine tuning your essay. You were glad to have Lottie to complain about it with, as none of your other friends really showed all that much interest in it. You knew Nat wasn’t all that interested in college and was mostly just waiting to see how Nationals went recruiting wise.

“Think I should send it in, then?” You ask.

“They’d be stupid not to take you.” Nat says teasingly, “Can’t have a nerd school without the nerds.” You sigh, sharing an amused look with Lottie. She squeezes your hand gently as she laces your fingers together. You just try not to blush.

…

You exhale loudly, leaning your hair against the top of the wheel with your fingers tapping anxiously against your thighs. You and Lottie had been hanging out a lot in the last couple weeks, more than you and Nat ever had despite still considering her your best friend. When you brought that up to Nat, unsure if you were upsetting her or not, she just started laughing hysterically till she finally managed to tell you it was “so cool with her” through uncontrollable fits of laughter; You still weren't sure what that was about, to be totally honest. Still, in all that time you hadn't been brave enough to accept Lottie's multiple offers to sleep over at her house. That was, of course, until now.

You check through your bag one more time to make sure you packed everything, knowing full well that it was just an excuse to put it off for a moment longer. Gathering all of your courage you finally get out of the car, throwing your bag over one shoulder haphazardly. You lock the car and look up the drive only to find Lottie Matthews leaning against the doorway staring down at you looking charmed. You give her a lazy wave as you begin the trek up her driveway. You were sure it had probably served as a runway at one point, or at least it should've.

“You sure took a while,” She says playfully with just a hint of a smile at your expense. You shrug in response, she'd caught you red handed on that one. She gently grabs your hand and pulls you upstairs after her. You'd been to Lottie's house a few times before, but you couldn't help from being in awe from the sheer size of it as you followed behind her.

She gestures vaguely to the floor of her room and says, “You can just leave it anywhere.” You hesitate in the doorway as you shift on the balls of your feet awkwardly.

“Oh? Are we both going to be sleeping in your bed?” You ask unsurely.

Lottie turns to face you, tilting her head to the side in an expression of confusion. “Where else would we sleep, Y/N?” She asks innocently, but she can't hide the way her lips twitch slightly at the edges. You sigh. Not this again.

“I'm just surprised you'd give up room in your bed.” You say, giving her a quick glance up and down. “Seems like there's already a shortage of it.” She gasps dramatically in offense as she sits down on the edge of her bed.

“You'd come to my house just to make fun of me?” She asks.

“Why else would I come here?” You ask, dropping your bag haphazardly on the ground. “Oh!” You say suddenly, as if deep in thought. “I remember now. You agreed to watch Texas Chainsaw Massacre with me.”

Lottie forces a smile as she lies through her teeth. “Yep. Looking forward to it.” You snicker at just how unenthusiastic she sounded. You knew she hated horror movies with a burning passion, mostly because she was such a scaredy-cat. Still, she'd agreed to watch it as your price of entry and you were planning to milk it for all it was worth.

It's not everyday that an excuse to have such a pretty girl climbing all over you falls into your lap like that, after all.

Lottie lets out a horrified gasp as she tries to climb even further into your lap. She gave up on watching and buried her head in your neck about 10 minutes ago, but it seems that even the sound effects are getting to her. You chuckle softly as you rub soothing circles into her back. “Don't laugh at me.” She whines, pulling her head away to visibly pout at you.

She’d started the movie full of unearned confidence given that nothing particularly scary happened in the beginning. She’d actually turned to you and said, “I don’t think this is really all that scary, Y/N.” You tried valiantly to muffle your laughter, knowing it would come back to bite her later on.

You're about to respond when the sound of a chainsaw revving fills the air and Lottie makes a squeaking noise as she dives for cover again. This time you can't stop yourself from bursting out laughing, and even Lottie giggles a bit at it. “You're such a wimp.” You accuse teasingly. Lottie makes a sputtering noise but doesn't try to deny it. You look down fondly at the top of Lottie’s head at the sight of her hair getting messier by the moment as she keeps pressing herself further into your shoulder

You finally decide to have mercy on her and reach for the remote to turn it off. She peeks out of your shoulder with a faint blush on her face, trying to appear unaffected. “I was watching that.” She complains, without any actual force. You snicker and gesture vaguely to the cabinet full of VHS tapes.

“Go pick a movie you actually want to watch.” You say. “I’ve had my fun.” Her grin splits her face as she jumps up to the cabinet. You stand up gingerly and go and rewind the tape while she’s sorting through her movies. You smile softly as you can hear the faint sounds of her humming as she does so. After a long moment she turns and holds her movie out proudly. You give it a cursory glance, sure that you already know what it is. You sigh.

“Breakfast club, again?” You ask listlessly. Lottie, of course, picked The Breakfast Club for at least half of all of her movie picks. She gives you a smug look as she hands it over. You have a feeling that she’s chosen it this time in an act of revenge.

“Y/N?” Lottie asks softly. You try not to visibly react to it as you're much too comfortable laying with your head on her shoulder feigning sleep. “Y/N.” She draws out. “I know you’re awake.” You stubbornly keep your breathing even as you try not to react. She laughs softly and blows a stream of air into your face making you crinkle your nose in annoyance.

“Got you!” She says smugly, pulling on your arm a little. You’re still pretending to be asleep so she ends up pulling you a lot further than she meant to, sending you sprawling across her lap. That’s what finally gets you scrambling to your feet. You clear your throat awkwardly and Lottie avoids your eyes as her face burns red.

“Guess we should get to sleep, huh?” You ask. Lottie nods quickly and leads you up to her bathroom. You sit awkwardly on her bed after brushing your teeth, unsure of the logistics of sharing Lottie’s bed. She walks out of the bathroom and rolls her eyes at the sight of you. She lies down gracefully next to you and tugs at your shirt to get you to lie down. You decide just to let her maneuver you as you lay down, not that it would have stopped her anyways. She pulls your back up against her chest and wraps her arm around your waist.

“This okay?” She asks quietly into your ear. You blush at the feeling.

“Yeah.” You stutter out. She makes a contented sound and pulls you closer against her. This is going to be a long night. You think idly as you close your eyes.

…

You’re in the middle of what looks to be a long and draining shift when you see her heading into the changing rooms. You wave at Lottie with a big grin on your face and she waves back. You make sure to fold shirts extra slowly so you can still be there when she’s finished trying on clothes. You're more than ready to abandon the pretense of working when you hear the lock click open, but you can’t help but notice how shifty she seems. You watch her for a long moment, trying to see what seems off when it clicks suddenly: the clothes are gone with not even a hanger to show for them.

Your face falls slightly at the realization and you look around to see if anyone else saw it. The cameras had been busted for months, your boss far too cheap to replace them, so you weren’t all that worried about being caught that way. No, you were far more upset that she wouldn’t be able to stick around. You look back at her to see her sitting there staring at you with a slightly curious look on her face. You get the feeling that she’s testing you, but you’re not sure what for. You nod slowly at her and shrug as you get back to folding shirts. You don’t look back up from them even as you hear slow and hesitant footsteps move past you and out the door.

“Hey,” Lottie says, fidgeting from foot to foot behind you. You hum in acknowledgement, sparing her a quick smile as you don’t take your eyes away from the book in your hand. English started in ten minutes and you still hadn’t finished the reading. She sighs in exasperation and reaches forward to gently pluck the book from your hand. She flips the book over to see the title before smiling at you. “Little last minute, huh?” She asks. You reach your hand out for it but she moves it further away.

“Daisy runs a guy over, it's a metaphor for the American dream. You’ll do fine.” She says. You give her a wry smile.

“Is there something you’d rather talk about, Lottie?” You ask sarcastically.

“About last night,” She starts.

“You mean, when you blatantly stole something right in front of me?” You interrupt.

She makes a shushing sound as she glances around anxiously. You snicker. “Like anyone would believe that Lottie Matthews is stealing from Tj Maxx.” You tease in a loud whisper. “You’d just bat your eyelashes at them anyways.”

She smiles prettily, tilting her head to the side in an expression of confusion. “Are you saying you’re immune?” She asks softly. You shake your head.

“What are you going to do about it, then?” She asks, a little more serious. You shrug.

“Nothing? I guess. I don’t really care, Lottie.” You say. You glance around quickly before admitting, “I stole this jacket too. I’m not one to judge.” Lottie gasps dramatically, leaning back to scrutinize the jacket.

“Didn’t realize I was friends with a criminal.” She says playfully, fingers tugging at the lapels of your jacket. “You’re such a bad influence.”

You scoff. “You were robbing Tj Maxx blind long before me, Ms. Tj Bandit.” You accuse.

She actually laughs at this leaning forward to pull you in a hug. She pulls back a moment later, hands resting on your shoulders. “Tj Bandit?” She asks curiously. You blush slightly.

“Oh, it’s just something that my boss calls you.” You say. Her face lights up.

“I have a criminal alias?” She asks, tapping her fingers on your shoulders excitedly as she bounces slightly on the balls of her feet. Her excitement is contagious and you can’t help but smile in response. You're close enough to Lottie’s face to see the intense way her eyes follow the curve of your lips. She starts to lean forward just as the first bell goes off. You laugh nervously as you finally snatch your book back.

“Don’t let it go to your head.” You warn, trying to break the tension.

“Too late.” She says, pulling you into another quick hug. “I’ll see you at my party later, right?” You just smile in response before heading down the hallway.

…

“Oh, really?” Shauna asks distractedly, head turned to the side to look at Jackie who's being animatedly talked to by Mari in the distance. Talked to being the keyword as she looks bored out of her mind, not that Shauna seems to notice. You and Nat share an amused look as you both try to muffle your laughter. Neither of you have spoken in the last five minutes as you've been waiting to see how long Shauna would keep responding before she realized she was talking to herself.

“That's crazy.” Shauna agrees aimlessly. This is what finally sets you and Nat off in peels of laughter. Shauna jumps slightly in shock as she looks back at the two of you. She fakes a chuckle, not really sure what was funny but this only makes the two of you laugh harder as you lean against each other for balance. She looks between the two of you a little unsurely as she smiles awkwardly.

You're about to reassure her when you feel arms wrap around your stomach from behind. “Hey,” Lottie says quietly in your ear.

She rests her head on your shoulder. “What's so funny?” She asks the group. Shauna herself looks interested in the answer as well.

“Shauna just made the funniest joke.” Nat says, shooting you a smug grin. “Tell her, Shipman.” Shauna's eyes go wide as she sputters slightly trying to think of a joke. With her big brown eyes gone wide in panic she truly looks like a deer in the headlights. Just as she's seemed to settle on something to say she's saved by Jackie calling her over. She shrugs as if inconvenienced but hurries back to Jackie's side to escape the conversation.

Lottie makes a confused noise against your ear. “Was it something I said?” She asks cluelessly. She pouts as you and Nat share a look and shake your heads. She lets go of you to take a few steps back and you turn to face her. “We're gonna play spin the bottle.” She says.

“Spin the bottle?” You ask in disbelief. “What are we, 12?” Lottie shrugs, but doesn't look all that put off about it.

“It was Jackie's idea.” She admits.

“I bet it was.” Nat says wryly. You turn to look over at Jackie to see her fussing over a faintly blushing Shauna as she corrals her over to a group of people gathering around a bottle. You and Nat share another look as you both silently agree to leave, but Lottie grabs you both by the arm.

“Please?” She asks, pouting down at Nat. You watch the way Nat softens and gives in almost immediately. Nat turns to glare at you as you quickly hide your shit-eating grin. You don't even bother to look over at Lottie as you make your way over to the group.

You plop down gracelessly next to Tai who looks just about as happy to be there as you do. You weren't super familiar with Nat's teammates, but she drags you around enough that you know them by name. You watch curiously as she shoots an annoyed look at a pleased looking Van. Ah, you think. She's been dragged here too.

“Okay!” Jackie says excitedly as she claps her hands together. “You know how this works so I'll go first.”

“How big of you Jackie,” Nat says sarcastically. Jackie chooses to ignore the remark as she leans forward to spin the bottle. The bottle finally comes to a stop at Laura Lee. You fight hard to resist the urge to laugh at the visibly disappointed look on her face as she leans forward to press a chaste kiss against a blushing Laura Lee. The urge becomes even stronger at the jealous look on Shauna's face. You cover your mouth with your hand as you look over at Lottie, her eyes alight with mirth.

You watch as the next few people go until it finally gets to you. You reluctantly lean forward to spin it, watching as it slowly comes to a stop in front of Nat. Her eyes go wide as she glances between you and the bottle in disbelief.

“Yes!” You cheer. “Pucker up Scatorccio!” She makes a noise of protest but stays still as you lean forward to kiss her. Her lips part slightly in surprise and you take the opportunity to deepen the kiss to the sound of the cheers in the background. You pull away after a long moment with a smug grin as you look at Nat.

She's blushing to her ears and her eyes are wide with shock. “Nat?” You ask teasingly. She just shakes her head and looks down at the ground. You fall back in your spot on the floor laughing, but stop suddenly when Lottie gets up and storms off. “Lottie?” You call out, but she just waves you off as she keeps walking.

Tai reaches forward for the bottle just as you hurry to your feet and walk after Lottie. Van boos loudly at you but you just flick her off. “Lottie?” You call out again. She doesn't answer but you can hear sniffling coming from the kitchen.

“Lottie.” You say softly as you walk in. She's not actively crying but you can tell from her red eyes that you'd just missed it. “Hey, what's wrong?” You ask. She laughs wetly with a darkly amused grin.

“No guesses?” She asks. You frown.

“Is this about Nat?” You ask.

She just sighs in response. “That's not fair.” You complain in a whine. “We didn't want to play in the first place, remember?”

Lottie softens considerably as she reaches her arms out. You step forward and let her gently fold you in her arms. You rest your head against her chest and breathe in the scent of her perfume. “What’s up with you today?” You ask softly, nestling your head further into her chest. She laughs quietly at herself, rubbing gently at your back with one hand.

“Got jealous.” She admits, steadfastly returning your eye contact as you look up at her.

“Jealous of who?” You ask quietly, more to yourself than anything. You pause. “Jealous of Nat?”

“You say it like it's a ridiculous idea.” She says.

“But she's my best friend. My Nat.” You say simply.

“What am I, then?” Lottie asks, looking uncharacteristically unsure.

“My partner in crime.” You tease, sneaking a quick glance at her sweater. You’d know the winter collection anywhere. Lottie looks a little disappointed but nods stiffly and lets go of you. “Maybe.” You add. “Maybe I want to kiss you sometimes, too. If that's okay with you.” Lottie smiles joyfully in response, and the rapid change in her expression nearly gives you whiplash.

Lottie leans down to kiss you and you step up on your toes to meet her, reaching your arms up to wrap them around the back of her neck. You can still feel Lottie’s grin against your lips as she kisses you, her arms running down your sides to rest against your hips. She pulls you impossibly closer as you deepen the kiss with Lottie meeting you step for step. She backs you up blindly towards the counter, making you hiss in pain as it stabs into your back. With a few murmured apologies against your lips she moves her hands down the back of your thighs and helps lift you up to sit on the counter.

She gently cups your face with one hand as she quickly reconnects your lips again. You use your new position to wrap your legs around her hips, desperate to eliminate the distance between you. She gently strokes her thumb across your face as you break away to try to catch your breath. You intently watch the way her chest rises and falls in heavy breaths, eyes slowly moving up to focus on her swollen lips.

“Hi.” She says shyly with just a hint of a blush on her face.

“Hi.” You say breathlessly as you reach a hand forward to rest on her chin, gently tilting it in the other direction. She lets you direct her curiously, her question being answered as you lean forward to press a gentle kiss against her neck. She makes a whiny noise in anticipation and you grin against her skin as you latch on to her neck after deciding she wasn’t leaving this room without a hickey or two.

“Y/N?” She asks softly later that night, just as you're on the verge of sleep.

“Lot-tie” You murmur sleepily in response.

“I set it up earlier.” She admits quietly, a little nervous of your response. You slowly open your eyes as you give her a confused look. “Spin the bottle,” She clarifies. “I gave Jackie the idea because I wanted to kiss you.”

You don’t say anything in response and just close your eyes again. Lottie watches you in concern until she realizes that you're shaking in silent laughter. “Don’t laugh at me.” She whines, pulling you ever closer. You nestle your way back into her neck, breathing in deeply as you're surrounded by the smell of her shampoo. She sighs happily as you're finally allowed to drift off to sleep.

…

Nat gives you a deeply amused look at school on Monday as you walk in wearing the same outfit you wore to the party on Saturday, but you just wink at her as you fall into step next to Lottie. You’ve spent the entire car ride here trying to convince her to sneak off to a janitor's closet to make out, and you think you’ve almost made a breakthrough. As Lottie laces your pinkies together you can’t help the smug grin that adorns your face as she tugs you to a less occupied part of the school.

#yellowjackets x reader #yellowjackets x you #lottie matthews x reader

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