#match for his vomit unfortunately

[sadgirlautumn]

My cat threw up all over my bed ☹️

[diettwistup]

HALF OF YOU

PAIRINGS: tashi duncan x f!oc, art donaldson x f!oc, patrick zweig x f!oc

SUMMARY: No matter how bright Tashi Duncan shined, her best friend, Milan Mikaelson, wasn’t far behind. Though seeming second best, Milan would never let that define her career. Holding as much fame as Tashi, Milan encountered Patrick Zweig and Art Donaldson. Would this encounter change the trajectory of her life, and would it completely alter her relationship with Tashi Duncan?

WARNINGS: challengers spoilers, reader is milan mikaelson, sexual situations, language, angst, plot alterations.

WC: 3.9K

NOTES: hey y’all!!! so excited to be posting the first chapter of this story. manifesting my edits are all good LOL. enjoy! 💋

READ BEFORE THIS: INTRO

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTIONS AND EMBARRASSMENTS

US OPEN TOURNAMENT- 2006, 2:00 PM

Sitting down on the hot bleachers, I put my sunglasses on and adjusted the braids in my hair. Sucking on my teeth and brushing my fingers across the hem of my uniform skirt, I let my eyes gaze at the large crowd of people accumulating. 

Damn Tashi, you always know how to make a bang. 

Crossing my arms and softly laughing, I let my mind wander back to my match yesterday. 

I had lost to the girl who would be playing Tashi for the championship. I really don’t know if that was a good or bad thing. On one hand, I lost from a bad call when I was so close to the end. On the other hand, I wouldn’t have to battle my best friend and get absolutely decimated, as she would say. 

As I continued to lose myself in thought, two boys, blonde and brunette, moved through the growing crowd and sat in front of me. 

You’re kidding me. 

Patrick Zweig and Art Donaldson—the “fire and ice” duo—had just won their doubles match, if I’m not mistaken. How could I be when their trophies were sitting right on their laps?

There's still a ton of seats open, and they choose to sit here? 

Rolling my eyes and crossing my arms, I pushed my sunglasses up, waiting for Tashi to come out. 

Staring at the door to the locker rooms, I clicked my tongue in boredom before grabbing the tournament pamphlet to look at everyone’s stats. 

“Don’t you wanna meet Tashi Duncan?” 

My ears perked at this as I put the pamphlet down and narrowed my eyes at the brunette boy. 

Whoever said eavesdropping was a bad thing…

I had to hold in my laughter as they began to talk about Tashi and how she was the entire package. Telling her this later would be the highlight of my week. 

“What about Mikaelson, you know her?” Patrick asked as he slung his arm around his companion. 

I froze at this and tilted my sunglasses down to better see the two of them. 

“Of course I know her. Have you seen her play? She’s fucking hot.” Art added with a smirk as he attempted to whisper, failing miserably. 

My face heated up at this as my eyes narrowed at the boys. 

Do they not realize the person they’re talking about is behind them? 

“Agreed,” Patrick started as he pulled his friend closer. “She’s also got a fat ass.” He laughed as Art chuckled along with him. 

Gag. 

Closing my eyes and pretending I didn’t hear that, I heard cheers and claps from around, signaling that Tashi had come out of the locker room. The chair umpire immediately began to talk about her stats and how she was the best female player in our division. 

I happily clapped as I beamed at my friend, her eyes scanning the crowd and locking with mine, a large smile playing on her features. 

“Fuck, did you see that? Tashi Duncan just smiled at us…” Patrick exclaimed in awe as he pushed Art in the chest. 

“Shit, I missed it.” Art complained before leaning back and adjusting himself in his seat.

I almost had to cover my mouth to hide the vomit that was about to let loose. 

Dumbasses. 

After a few minutes, Tashi’s match began, of course, in her favor. Everything was perfect: her serves, backhand, line receives, counterattacks, and every single step she took. 

I smirked widely as I watched Tashi decimate the bitch who, unfortunately, decimated me. 

Patrick and Art watched Tashi in awe for the first ten minutes of the match while commenting on how amazing a player she was. 

I snorted at this, wondering how long it would take to notice who was sitting behind them.

On the next serve, Tashi’s opponent hit the ball out, but the line umpire declared it as in. 

Standing up immediately, I pointed a finger and yelled at the top of my lungs. 

“What?! Come on, Tash, don’t take that shit!” 

Everyone else agreed with me as the crowd began to roar in protest of the shitty call. 

Lost in the moment, I hadn’t realized that Patrick and Art had turned around and stared at me in horror and awe. 

“Oh,” I started and took off my sunglasses. Did I yell in your ear?” I looked between them before looking back up at Tashi. 

“Fuck, you’re-“ Patrick started in a slightly panicked state before I cut him off. 

“Milan Mikaelson? Yeah, I’m guessing you two know me.” I spoke with sarcasm as I kept my eyes trained on Tashi and her opponent. 

Caught. 

“Shit, I’m real sorry for what I said, I-“ Art started before I placed a hand on his shoulder to stop him, eyes still not leaving the game.

“Don’t sweat it, was too focused on the game to give a damn.” I lied straight through my teeth as I pretended to act nonchalant. 

I could feel both of their eyes staring long and hard at my hand lingering on Art’s shoulder before I took it away to throw my hands in the air and yell as Tashi locked in another point. 

“Come on, Tash!” I yelled and clapped with the roaring crowd, boys still looking back at me. 

Sighing, I crossed my arms and looked back down at them. “Take a picture, it will last longer,” I spoke in annoyance before sitting back down and putting on my sunglasses. 

All I could hear were muffled whispers and attempts to counteract my statement before they turned back around and shared we’re fucked looks. 

Stifling my laughs, I angled my eyes back to the match. 

As Tashi continued to hit the ball effortlessly for the rest of the match, her win came almost naturally. 

Standing up and yelling, I quickly ran down the bleachers, feeling two pairs of eyes following me. I stood against the fence and clapped loudly while Tashi caught my eyes after her victory yell and smiled widely at me. 

I jumped up and down with all the fans cheering with their signs and matching t-shirts. 

Running around the court to thank everyone for coming, Tashi came over to me and grabbed my hands. 

“Tashi! I’m so proud!” I yelled and bounced on my heels, extremely happy with my friend's success. 

“My biggest fan.” She smiled and reached over to hug me before letting go and continuing to thank everyone. 

Smiling proudly at her, I pushed my braids behind my back and took off my sunglasses. Turning around, I looked back at the sea of people cheering for Tashi before my eyes landed on two figures. 

What a mystery those two are…

I smirked proudly at them as their eyes shifted between Tashi walking back to her locker room and myself standing by the fence. 

Patrick leaned over to Art and whispered something as their eyes darted between us. I could only see Patrick's smirk and Art’s growing grin at his friend's words. 

Snorting to myself, I turned around and put my sunglasses back on. 

“Fucking morons…” 

ADIDAS BRAND PARTY - 2006 8:00 PM

“Tashi!” I exclaimed as I weaved through a crowd of familiar and influential faces to ambush my best friend. 

I could see her bright smile miles away as she turned to meet me at the edge of the dancefloor, engulfing her in a hug. 

“Milan, I was wondering if you weren’t coming.” She laughed as she wrapped her arms around me and returned my hug. 

Pulling away, I rolled my eyes and crossed my arms. “Tashi Duncan, my best friend, thought I would miss out on this?!” I questioned as I gestured to the bustling party. "You must be crazy if you think I would miss out on anything that concerned you and your tennis career,” I snapped at her with a knowing smirk.

“I’ll have you know I was late because my mother insisted on making me change ten times.” I rolled my eyes and tilted my head to where our moms were conversing. I stuck my nose up and closed my eyes, annoyed at the memory of how nagging my mother was when getting ready for the party.

Immediately, she raised her hands in defense and raised an eyebrow. “Sorry, Miss Mikaelson, didn’t mean to assume.” She laughed before crossing her arms. 

I watched her expression change slightly as her eyes softened and lips parted. 

“I watched your match yesterday,” she said, lightly treading. “I’m sorry about the loss.” She finished and brought a hand to my shoulder, rubbing it gently with a sad smile.

Flashes of my match fluttered back into my mind as a small pit formed in my stomach. 

I shrugged this off and took up a carefree attitude, whereas my insides were screaming. 

“It was a shitty call, what can I say? That bitch had and has nothing on me.” I smirked and made sure not to falter, but secretly, the loss had internally crushed me.

Tashi laughed, brought her other hand to my shoulder, and bent down to level our eyes. “Don't worry, I decimated her for you. Plus, at Stanford, the both of us will be fucking up bitches right and left.” She shot a cocky smirk at this as I gave her one back in turn. 

Stanford. The next four years of my life with Tashi Duncan would be the ultimate dream. 

Right? 

I extended my pinky to Tashi with a slight wink. “Promise?” I bit my bottom lip and smirked at this familiar gesture between us. 

As long as I can remember, Tashi and I have made over a hundred pinky promises. Our first one involved her letting me borrow her Barbie doll while we played house and my promise to return it. Since then, it’s been a norm between us. 

I felt the confidence radiating from Tashi’s grin as she moved her right hand from my shoulder to interlock our pinkies. 

“Promise.” She repeated and swung our interlocked pinkies back and forth. 

I laughed like a child all over again before quickly raking my eyes across the entire party. As I scanned the crowd, I let go of Tashi’s pinky and leaned in to whisper. 

“Lots of important people here, I see,” I whispered as Tashi’s eyes followed mine.

“And familiar faces too…” She responded in a lower tone, angling her eyes to an older man by the beverages. 

“Shut up!” I gasped before looking back at Tashi. “Is that Mr. Reynolds?!” I asked in shock at seeing our fifth-grade English teacher. 

“Yup,” Tashi responded, standing straight as she crossed her arms. She studied the older man as he scanned the beverages offered. “He was always my favorite,” she quipped, not needing a huge explanation for why he was here. 

At this, I burst out into laughter, as did she. 

“I thought he died years ago.” I clutched my stomach before placing a hand over my mouth and muffling my small laughs. “Wait, that’s not nice. I mean, I thought he passed on peacefully years ago.” I corrected in a serious tone as I watched the older man before glancing at Tashi and bursting into laughter again. 

As I laughed with Tashi, I felt a burning feeling on the back of my head. 

Was someone staring?

Wiping my eyes carefully to avoid messing up my makeup, I slowly turned around and almost froze as I locked eyes with the person, or should I say persons, staring at Tashi and me. 

Oh, hell no. Is that who I think it is?

Quickly, I turned back around and whispered to Tashi in a hurried tone. 

“Tash, is that Patrick Zweig and Art Donaldson?” I looked her in the eye as they narrowed at the mention of the “fire and ice” duo’s presence at the party. 

“Oh yeah, they’ve been staring all night.” She smirked and looked between the two of us. “Frankly, I don’t blame them.” Her smirk grows even wider, mirroring the Cheshire Cat. 

Biting my lip, I remembered my earlier encounter with the two tennis players. I shuddered as I remembered their smirks and remarks about Tashi and me. 

“Tash…” I said warningly, pointing my perfectly manicured finger in her face. “Please tell me you don’t have one of your ideas in mind.” I slightly scolded her, studying her face to see what she was thinking. “Those two are complete and utter idiots.” I continued as I shook my head. 

She wrapped an arm around my shoulder and whispered back as she lowered my finger and sucked on her teeth. “Do you really need to ask this?” She questioned with an air that spoke obviously, are you stupid? 

“And believe me,” She started and moved to fix the straps of my dress. “I know exactly how they are…teenage boys.” She snickered wider at this as I rolled my eyes. 

I huffed loudly before grabbing a piece of my hair to fiddle while I groaned. “But Tash, it’s our summer before we go to college. No boys.” I retorted as the music in the background got a little louder. 

Grabbing my hands, Tashi dragged us to the middle of the dance floor and forced me to dance. “First of all,” She started as she twirled me around, “This was never a pinky promise.” She spoke, wrapped her arms around my neck, and swayed us to the music. 

Fuck, she got me there. 

“Second of all,” She continued before touching my neck to untangle my necklaces while swaying with me. “I know you’re internally drooling over Art Donaldson. He’s exactly your type, and he’s going to Stanford.” She laughed to herself as she worked on my necklaces. 

Fuck x2 can’t deny that. 

I rolled my eyes and turned away, knowing I couldn’t argue either of those statements. 

“You’re crazy…” Was all I could protest. 

Untangling my necklaces, Tashi clapped and smiled brightly at me before putting her hands back on my shoulders. “This is gonna be a great start to the summer.” She grinned like a mad woman as we kept dancing across the floor. 

After dancing, mingling, and trying not to focus on the two hard stares hitting Tashi's and my head for the entire night, I decided to go to the beach. 

“Hey, Tash, I’m going to the beach for a quick breather. If my mom asks, I’ll be down there. Come down if you need anything or if I miss something interesting.” I smile gently at her while I take my heels off.

“Got it. Be safe.” She waved before going to get pictures with her family. 

I smiled at her before walking to navigate the path to go down to the beach, pretending not to notice the two pairs of eyes following me. 

10:00 PM

I wonder how long I had been down here listening to the sweet waves ripple against the hot sand. I almost feel as if the ocean is calling me. 

Imagine the escape of living on a secluded island where nothing mattered. Not school, not tennis, and not the future.

Especially the future. 

Staring at my newly manicured nails, I continued to get lost in my thoughts while the ocean rang in my ears.

Shit, I’m over everything.

I reached a hand up to my mouth and began to bite one of my nails. 

Do I even wanna go to Stanford? 

Practically gnawing at it, I can feel the acrylic wearing off.

Doesn’t matter because I’ll be with Tashi… right?

SNAP

“Fuck…” I muttered to myself as I broke off a nail, leaving a tiny bit of blood seeping from my nail bed. 

Rolling my eyes, I held onto the broken nail and rested my head on my knee as I watched the ocean. 

“We’re not interrupting, are we?” I heard a deep voice ask behind me, making me let out a small yelp and nearly fall off the rock.

Quickly turning around, I was met with two, unfortunately familiar, faces. 

Why now?

Patrick Zweig and Art Donaldson stood before me, shoes in one hand and cigarettes in the other. Frankly, I had no idea which one spoke, and I had no care to know at this rate. I wanted to be alone with my thoughts, and they disturbed that. 

“What the fuck,” I explained as I stood up from the rock and patted my dress down. “Do you know how rude it is to sneak up on someone?” I crossed my arms and narrowed my eyes as I looked between the two boys sheepishly standing before me. 

“Shit, really sorry, didn’t know you were here,” Patrick spoke up as his counterpart dropped his cigarette from his lips upon seeing me study his stature. 

Bullshit. 

“Hm, okay, well, I’ll be going then,” I exclaimed, irritated, as I bent down to grab my heels. “I hope you two have a grand time.” I sarcastically quipped as I went to walk past them and go back up the path to the party. 

“Wait,” Art, almost panicked, stood before me with a lopsided grin as he flicked his cigarette bud beside him and treaded lightly as he motioned to the chairs near the rock I had just occupied. “We’d love it if you joined us, just for a chat.” He had a genuine smile on his face now. 

Are they serious?

Before I could open my mouth, Patrick beat me to it as he walked to sit in one of the chairs Art motioned to. 

“Yeah, just to talk. You're one of the best players in our age bracket, and it would be a real treat to get to know you as an apology for what happened earlier.” Patrick added and smirked so wide I could feel pure smitten radiating off it. 

They are serious.

Both boys were now staring at me, gazes identical in pure amazement, awaiting my response. 

Fuck this. Fuck me. Fuck x3.

Sighing softly and crossing my arms, I dropped my shoes, returned to the rock, and sat down. 

“You get five minutes,” I spoke curtly as I looked between the boys, waiting for one of them to speak up.

Art took this chance to open his mouth, but before he could begin, I held a hand up to stop him.

“Oh, and there’s no need to introduce yourselves. Art Donaldson and Patrick Zweig, the “fire and ice” duo.” I spoke unenthusiastically, keeping my eyes on Art for a little longer before angling my expression to Patrick.

Both boys stared at me with slight smirks as I adjusted my dress and grabbed a piece of hair to play with while they continued. 

“Well, Milan Mikaelson,” 

I inwardly shuddered as he spoke my full name. 

“During your match, I thought that call was fucked.” Patrick spoke up and got right to the point. He laughed as if he remembered it as a fond childhood memory. 

Almost instantly, Art chimed in to add to his friends' thoughts, a bit too eager for my liking. “I mean, that Anna girl could barely serve your entire match, and then that?” He stated as he shook his head, acting like he was scolding my opponent to her face like a coach.

My eyes lit up at this. They knew how to crack me. Bring up my pride and losses, and I’ll talk your ear off for hours. 

“I think the official was blind because that bitch’s ball was totally past the line,” I explained matter-of-factly. “Did you see the way he hesitated before calling it? He probably had it in with her.” I rolled my eyes and crossed my arms in annoyance at the memory of the loss. 

“Still, you were fucking amazing out there. How did you get your backhand to be that powerful?” Art quickly added and leaned forward in his chair as if moving closer to me would allow him to understand my words better. 

I let a slight smile adorn my features as I studied his position. 

Fuck x4.

For the next four minutes, the three of us talked about tennis and our matches throughout the tournament. Though brief, I could quickly tell how these two relied on each other and their sport. It was definitely the glue for their friendship. I could also tell how they hung onto my every word, like a toddler waiting for his mother to let him out of the time-out-chair. 

Checking my watch, I stood up and looked between the boys. 

“Though this was fun, your five minutes is up.” I flashed my watch at them with a subtle smile before bending down to grab my shoes. 

When I bent down, I could hear some rushed scuffles and whispers. Standing back up, I saw that both boys were also standing, very tense, might I add. 

“How can we contact you to do this again?” Patrick asked with a smirk, which I presume was a signature for him.

Raising an eyebrow at him, I crossed my arms and looked between him and his blonde companion. 

“Who said I wanted to do this again?” I asked as Patrick shoved his hands in his pockets with a defeated grin while Art let out a muffled chuckle. 

“Come on, this was fun.” Art added and took a cautious step towards me. “Can we get your number?” He asked as he studied my face with the cheekiest grin he could muster.

I laughed at his question dryly before pointing my finger between the two boys. “We? You think I’m gonna get between this? Hell no.” I replied, walking past them to the stairs and back to the party. 

Immediately, I could feel their eyes staring into the back of my head, and I wondered if they would beg or plead. 

They better not. 

“Come to our hotel,” Patrick yelled, making me whip my head around. “We have beer,” he grinned once he saw my interest somewhat piqued. 

Fuck x5.

“It’s not far from here. We can talk more.” He gestured between the three of us and then pointed up to the party. 

This made me look back to the party, about to question what he meant before Patrick chimed in. 

“We talked to Tashi earlier and told her the same thing. Would be fun getting to know the beautiful golden tennis girl duo.” He chuckled as I watched his eyes flicker from my face to my lips.

This made my face heat up, but I would never reveal that. Teenage boys don’t deserve the satisfaction of knowing they have any sort of effect on me. 

Clicking my tongue, I nodded at this new piece of information. 

Tashi did say she had a plan in place. This could be fun. 

“Maybe,” I replied as my eyes shifted between the boys.

You’re not easy, Milan Mikaleson. Remember that.

“Depends on my mood.” I finished and shot them small smirks before walking back up the stairs, not giving the boys a moment to retort. 

As I walked back to the party, my eyes shut as I felt a headache coming on. 

What the hell did I get myself into?

[thelastofhyde]

you cut your hair, and take some space (2)

pairing. narcos!javier peña x fem!reader

synopsis. an anthology of events that precede and procede the termination of you and your father's best friend's sexual relationship. this is part 2 of 3! (part 1)

warnings. no use of y/n! all spanish text is followed by immediate translation ( please note that i am fluent in castilian spanish, therefore some words/phrases may differ from that of other hispanic countries ), age gap , student!reader, dbf!javi, post-s3!javi, policeofficer!javi bc i said so, break up au, mutual pining, forbidden lovers kind of vibes, reader has a healthy relationship with her parents, violence, nondescript depictions of sa ( not javi ), pedro-ception aka there's a small cameo of another pedro boy, vomiting, mentions of pregnancy, reader is described to have hair and celebrates christmas ( but no mention of the reader's religious beliefs )! smut ( creampie, breeding kink through the roof, domesticity kink?? javi just wants to love and be loved and start a family, dacryphilia, indecent use of a credit card, spanking, dirty talk, prostitution kink?? i feel like i'm making these up at this point, + a hell of a lot more ) this fic is based on bsc by maisie peters except this has a happy ending bc im a sucker for mr. peña :( not all warnings listed here appear in this part, these are warnings for the fic as a whole !

word count. 14.3k

hyde’s input. hey... hey... how y'all doin'?🧍remember when i said part 2 would be posted a few weeks after part 1? yeah, that was a fucking lie. and, remember when i said it would be 2 parts in total? that was also a lie! the universe is praying on my downfall ( i had a fun mental health episode and fell into a black hole for a few months <3 ) unfortunately, i am very much still alive and kicking, so this is me trying to get the ball rolling again when it comes to posting fics. as the fic has surpassed 40k words, meaning it would likely crash the tumblr site for anyone trying to read it + tumblr will not allow me to post it as a whole due to it's paragaph-count limit, i've decided to post it in three parts. the fic will be posted in full on ao3 once all three parts are available on tumblr!

if you see any typos, no you didn't 🫣

“...wouldn’t have to be serious,” he’s speaking, finishing off a sentence you don’t quite catch the start of. “huh?” “this. us. it could be casual, y’know?”

Golden boy, you dropped the ball I am Annie fucking Hall

The year moves too fast.

It’s like you blink, and suddenly it’s Thanksgiving.

Leaves turn brown. Pumpkins are carved only to rot upon front porches. A gathering of friends, young adults getting their first taste at hosting a thanksgiving meal.

You’re put on dessert duty, which culminates in stressful tears and your mother’s hand rubbing soothing circles into your back, reassuring you that it’s okay, everyone burns their first pie.

No one at the party needs to know the pumpkin pie you brought was a product of your mother’s gentle care.

Then there is actual Thanksgiving, which you celebrate, as always, at your aunt's.

The highlight is, and forever has been, the road-trip out of state, your father making it his mission to deafen you and your mother with his horrific singing.

As they drop you back at your apartment, your father has no qualms leaning out the car window and calling after you.

“I expect to see you cheering me on at the Thanksgiving Touchdown event!”

Which brings you here, to said event, sweater sleeves tugged over cold fingers and a wandering pair of eyes who refuse to comply with your wants.

You want to focus on the ongoing football match- Fire Department vs Police.

Your eyes prefer to follow him, striding up the field, his hair soaked in sweat and his t-shirt long removed.

You’ve no valid reason to roll your eyes at the other women who seem to prefer spectating the sport of Javier Peña. You’re no better than them.

Yet, as one of them let’s out a joyous shriek as he takes a pass at the ball, your eyes roll.

"He’s a show-off, that boy.”

At least you have company. An older gentleman, who you caught struggling to pick his wallet up from the floor. He’d smiled as you returned it, and conversation had flowed easily from there.

As the whistle blew, commencing the final match of the local community services’ football league- or, Thanksgiving Touchdown, as your father so aptly named it-, he’d patted the empty seat next to him.

“Hmm?”

He points, and you follow the direction, realising he’s speaking about Javi.

“Him,” he says it with a teasing tone to his voice. It’s like he’s mocking the agent. “Think’s he’s God’s gift, takin’ his top off like that.”

The more you sit with the older gentleman, the more you enjoy his company.

On the field, your dad bellows something at Javi. He replies with a curt salute, and shoots off down the length of it.

He’s fast, agile, stealthy.

A force to be reckoned with, keeping pace with rookies half his age.

The vision of him, gun strapped to his leg and a tact vest on his chest, speeding down streets in the columbian heat conjures in your mind.

You wonder how it felt to know him then, if worry kept his companions awake.

It had certainly kept you awake in recent months, and that was with him safe, in Laredo, cooped up in some bachelor pad.

“Surprised he’s not thrown his top to the crowd of screaming ladies!” The gentleman continues his mocking, and it rouses laughter out of both of you.

A whistle is blown, your eyes return to the field and, though he’s quick to look away, you catch the tail end of Javier’s eyes on you.

Fifteen minutes pass, in which you do your best to not stare at him.

You’ve made worse attempts in the past.

Eventually, the man next to you coaxes you into getting him a lemonade from the food truck.

You oblige, of course, and deny his attempts to hand you cash, insist it’s on you.

He’s kept you smiling on a rather gloomy day.

You tell him you’ll be right back, smile, and realise you don’t know his name.

“Chucho,” he tells you, and waves you off.

You join the queue, keep your head down, ignore the gossiping women three spots ahead of you, claiming to have each shared an encounter with Javi.

You don’t need to know what he’s been up to.

You don’t want to know who he’s been up to it with.

It happens when you’re finally being served.

There’s no longer a queue, just you, smiling as sweetly as possible. The service industry is rough enough, nevermind on holidays.

You order successfully, both Chucho’s lemonade and a hot chocolate for yourself.

The guy working the truck- young enough, a bit too traditionally good-looking, with coiffed hair and a shaven face- he’s talkative.

Friendly.

Too friendly.

Till it crosses the border into flirty.

You’re not interested.

At all.

But it’s flattering, to feel wanted.

Even more so after a something that means nothing yet everything ends out of the blue and you’re left reeling over whether or not some part of you is to blame.

So you let him shoot you his dashing smile, and throw in unnecessary pet-names that just feel forced into every sentence he speaks to you, and write his number on the paper cup of your hot chocolate.

“Here you go, pumpkin,” he winks. The pet-name feels a little too on the nose for the season. Couldn’t he have called you sweetheart instead? “A sweet treat for that sweet smile.”

You wonder if he’s allowed to gift the free donut he slides your way.

Your stomach growls and begs for sugary release before you can fully bring yourself to care.

An awkward thanks. Hands reach up to grab the to-go cups, three fingers curling up the bagged donut. 

He helps you get a grip on the beverages, placing them in your hands.

His touch lingers, more than necessary, fingertips brushing over your knuckles as if trapped in slow-motion.

“So, a pretty girl like you got a boyfriend, or are you gonna let me take you out to-”

Gasps fill the air.

Half the crowd boos.

Your father screams one name, loud and clear, down the pitch.

“Peña, get your head out your fucking ass and pick up the ball!”

Turning on your heal, the scene unfolds.

The ball, abandoned on the ground.

The players, scrambling to grab it before one another.

Javier, frozen in place, face an unreadable maze of emotions, eyes staring right at you.

They follow you all the way back to your seat, even as the game picks up again.

Even as you congratulate your dad on another victory for the police department, now the four-time consecutive champions of the Thanksgiving Touchdown.

Even as you head off to your father’s car.

Even when you’re home, curled under a blanket and watching a televised copy of Annie Hall, you feel his eyes on you.

The look of betrayal on Javier Peña haunts you even once you fall asleep.

If you don’t love me, What was April?

You’ve always been organised.

Everything has it’s place, from the books that line your bedside table to the memories inside your mind.

You compartmentalise.

Tucked deep into the right side of your brain, there’s a box.

It’s contents, memories you’ve yet to process.

Moments you know that, if you wish to move on, you’ll have to relive.

Caution tape holds the lid shut.

Fragile stickers cover every corner.

And, scribbled in bold red marker, April ‘99.

A late night.

You, wide awake, laying on your back and mapping out stars in his ceiling.

Javier fell asleep hours ago and now snores softly against your neck, muscled arm curled around your waist as his legs entangle your own.

The agent is a fiend for cuddling, and so often wraps himself around you like a vine.

You find yourself nestling your hand in his hair, and take note of the sharp breath he intakes.

Go still.

Worry you’ve woken him.

Relax when you feel him snore and press himself even deeper against your naked skin.

He’s tired. Exhausted.

Work was getting to him as of late.

He hadn’t told you that, but he didn’t need to.

You know him. You can read him.

Can tell in the way he moved slower against you.

In the way he let you take the lead, resting back against the couch to watch how your hips wound down on him.

In the way he got even clingier than usual, dragging you into the shower with him just to have you near, holding you from behind as you washed up the plates he’d used to serve you dinner (a trade-off he’d reluctantly agreed to months ago: he cooks, you clean), laying his head on your lap as you curled up to watch some cheesy horror movie- one you’re bound to fall asleep during and he’s counting on it, glancing up till he spots you slumped over and eyes closed, granting him the perfect excuse to carry you to his bed and nestle himself in beside you.

Unlike other nights, you’re trapped awake.

Something feels off, makes you queasy.

There’s something nagging at your mind.

It’s like you’ve forgotten something, misplaced something, and can’t even figure out what it is.

You just know its absence is wrong.

Javi mumbles something, dreaming away, and you feel the subtle press of his lips against your skin.

Fingers curl tightly into the fabric of your (his) shirt.

He can’t get you close enough, it seems.

Playing against his wants, you pull back, slowly, trying to catch a glimpse of his face.

There’s a pinch between his brows, furrowed in worry.

It’s not fair, you think.

Sleep is usually where you see him at his calmest.

It’s a selfish act, born purely from your own desire, but you find yourself pressing a kiss against his forehead.

His grip loosens, though slightly.

It gives you enough time to feel a stir between your thighs, a calling coming from your bladder.

So you do your best to slip out his hold.

It’s a struggle that leaves you topless and feeling a pinch of cruelty, standing over the bed as you watch his hand grabbing at the vacant spot you once occupied, your scent and shirt the only traces you leave behind.

You don’t bother turning on a light, make your way to his bathroom with practiced ease.

Pad your way across the cold linoleum floor, sink down onto the porcelain seat- he’d stopped leaving it up when your overnight visits became more frequent. You hadn’t asked- didn’t need to ask-, he’d simply done it.

Closing the door over, yet not enough for the hinges to squeak and the handle to lock, you pray the wood muffles noise of the flushing toilet.

When it stops, you wait a few seconds, until you’re sure there’s no rustling coming from his bedroom.

Then, you open the tap.

The water is barely a trickle, yet you tell yourself its enough.

Lather your hands in soap, sit them under the constant drip of cold water till you feel the suds wash down the drain.

It’s hard to stop yourself from sneaking a glance at the mirror, just as it’s hard to recognise the version of yourself you see.

Your hair frames your face, though messy.

Your eyes are bloodshot, yet carry less bags.

Your cheeks are rounder, fuller.

You look different.

You feel it too.

Yhen come the thoughts of Javier, and how he sees you.

Has he noticed a change?

Is he the reason for it?

Does he feel different, too?

Your stomach flips.

He’s not said anything. Or done anything, to make you notice a change.

But, then, Maybe it’s been subtle, slow, dragged out long enough it’s not drastic enough for either of you to take note of.

You eye the spare toothbrush he keeps in his bathroom, and try to remember when it became yours.

You don’t remember.

One moment, his toothbrush sat alone. And, the next, you were standing side by side, laughing as you raced to see who could make a foamier mess of the toothpaste.

Corazón, you look like a rabid animal, he’d called you once, laughing through tears as he wiped away the white suds dripping off your chin. You’re lucky that you’re just so cute.

You can recall, even now, how quickly his mouth had found yours that night, with no ulterior motive other than to bask in the minty taste of one another.

The stir in your stomach becomes more intense.

Eyes refocusing, you find yourself in the mirror again.

Only, sweat lines your forehead and your face seems drained of colour.

You make it only two steps back before you’re hurtling across the bathroom floor.

Your knees crash down first, harsh and unforgiving against the tiles.

The first wretch burns, has you coughing over your own gag.

In the dark, it’s hard to see what exactly comes out of you, but you know where it came from.

Your stomach.

Another wave of nausea hits, this one harder, and you’re gripping at the sides of the bowl, spewing into the water below.

A splash meets your cheek, but you’re too out of it to care, wave after wave of nausea leaving you a coughing, gagging, crying mess.

You feel lightheaded, only managing a moment to catch your breath before another wave hits.

It feels like you’re suffocating.

It’s in your throat, in your mouth, in your nose, in your hair.

It feels like it’s never stopping and you’re doomed to spend the rest of your days submitting to the horrors of throwing-

“Shh, shh, it’s okay,” warmth, against your naked back.

It’s a nice warmth, not like the one that has you covered in a cold sweat.

There’s a soothing motion over your skin.

Up, down, up, down.

You try to follow it, match your breathing to the tactile comfort.

“That’s it, baby,” cool air meets your neck, the hairs that stuck to your skin now pulled up and pushed back. “I’m right here, I got you.”

Eventually, all that’s left is the burning of bile at the back of your throat and the dull ache of eyes gone raw with tears.

You’re pulled into a solid mass, naked chest pressed to naked chest as you go slack upon the bathroom floor.

You’re exhausted, and covered in your own sweat, tears and vomit.

Javier doesn’t care, pulling you tighter against him and whispering sweet words you don’t quite pay attention to.

“Woke up and you weren’t there, corazón. Don’t do that again,” even in his attempts to chastise, he’s gentle, brushing the remaining strands of sweat-slicked hair off your face. You must be an awful sight, yet his expressions don’t give way. “You wake up, you wake me up too. ‘Specially if you’re gonna hurl, okay?”

You glance at him, swallow back a lump and deal with the realisation that dawned upon you ten minutes earlier, as you sat hunched over the toilet’s bowl.

“Javi,” he smiles at the way you call his name.

You feel sick all over again at the thought of that changing, everything changing, as you build the courage to speak.

He calls your own name back to you.

“I’m late.”

You await the sharp inhale.

And the unwinding of arms.

You imagine he’ll stand up, pace the floor.

Run his hands through his hair, rant over every thought he has.

Ways to get rid of it, the dangers of your dad finding out.

Then he’ll turn the blame to you.

That’s what men do, right?

He’ll ask why you weren’t safer, why you forgot to take that morning-after pill, why you played so fast-and-loose with your body.

None of it arrives.

He stands, yes, but only to pull you up with him, tired limbs leaning into his strong build as he drags you both under the heat of a warm shower.

You watch the remnants of your own vomit wash down the drain, and question how he can stand there, not disgusted with you.

He dries you off, delicate drags over your skin.

He’s rougher with himself, scarcely drying properly before he’s carrying you back to his bed, a replay of hours earlier as he lays you down, crawls in behind you and tucks you both under the soft comfort of his worn-out sheets.

Only, this time you’re wide awake.

He so easily nestles himself behind you, dragging you back against him and committing himself to the role of big-spoon.

His hands have always felt large, their touch always electrifying, but nothing compares to the feeling of him splaying one across your lower stomach, a subtle press into where part of him could be growing within you.

“Javi,” you whine, fighting off the sleep your overwhelmed body so badly needs. “I’m sorry.”

You say it because you feel obligated, like it’s your place to be apologetic.

After all, the blame is yours, surely.

“No seas boba (Don’t be silly),” there’s a fresh set of tears already sliding down your cheeks by the time he replies. “Don’t need to be sorry, baby.”

“But I-”

“But, nothing,” his tone feels final, one that tells you you’ll get nowhere arguing against him. “You’ve done nothing wrong, corazón.”

You fall asleep, eventually, soothed by his gentle breathing and the repeated motion of his thumb stroking over your belly.

Yhe next time you awake, there’s a crack of sunlight creeping through his blinds.

Javi’s still in bed, only he’s propped up on his elbow and staring down at you.

His smile stretches a little wider when he spots your open eyes.

Lips press against your own, soft and subtle.

A quiet greeting, a wordless goodmorning.

“I gotta go, corazón,” is met with a protest from you, rolling over to curl into his solid chest.

Expecting it, he wraps you up tighter in his arms, presses an array of chaste kisses to your head.

You don’t want him to leave this bed.

Or this apartment.

You don’t want him out, in the real world, where the hours you’ve spent cooped up together become more scandalous than the peaceful nature of them.

“I know, I know. Don’t wanna go either, baby,” you wonder if you spoke your thoughts aloud, or if Javi simply knows you so well.

Eventually, he peels himself away from you.

You watch him dress.

Tell him which tie to wear.

Help him tie it, the comforter pooled around your naked waist as you sit criss-cross-apple-sauce and Javi’s at the side of the bed, legs bent at the knee.

He thanks you with a kiss, then asks you to pass him his cologne.

It’s on the other side of the bed- his side of the bed- and you lean over to grab it.

You don’t bother handing him it, spraying it directly onto your own wrist and dabbing it into the skin of his tanned neck.

He lets you, a gentle smile on his face and eyes that pull you in for a hug, burrowing himself between your naked breasts.

He presses a kiss between them, hums in enjoyment.

“You’re gonna smell like me all day, cariño (darling),” he tells you.

“Good,” you reply.

Another hum, this time of approval, and a squeeze to your hip.

When he pulls back, he looks even more reluctant to leave.

Reality rears it’s ugly head, but he pushes it out your mind with the pressing of his hand against your stomach, the same spot he’d held onto all night.

Leans down, brushes his lips against it.

Your hands instinctually curl in his hair, and you like to think you leave it a little messy, enough to ward off any of the women he works along side, hopeful eyes hoping to get a taste of the handsome, unmarried cop.

“Stay,” he mumbles against your skin, as if you’re the one who’s about to leave. “Don’t go, ok? I’ll call around lunch.”

He keeps his word.

Calls you, a few minutes past two, interrupting whatever daytime TV you were pretending to watch.

Answering leaves you feeling lightheaded, like you're trapped in a daydream.

Listening to him croon down the line while your finger anxiously tangles in the phone’s wire as you stand in his apartment, it feels domestic, like you’re waiting for him to come back home, a place you share together.

The thought has you pressing a hand against your womb.

“How bout you, corazón?” He knows how to make you melt, picturing him smiling at his desk. “Have you ate yet?”

With a grimace, you admit you haven’t.

“You need to eat, baby,” you don’t like the fact he uses that pet-name, not right now. “There’s plenty in the fridge. Could make yourself a sandwich, or some toast. Might even have some of that pasta left over. You know, that one you said you liked? Oh, wait, maybe don’t eat that, don’t think uncooked salmon is good for pregn-”

You don’t want him to say the P word, so you cut him off.

“I’ll probably just have toast.”

He says ok, then you hear him take a bite of whatever his lunch is.

The call goes on a little longer.

It’s mostly him talking.

He tells you a quick story, something about one of the younger guys accidentally stapling his tie to an arrest warrant.

That rouses a laugh out of you, makes you forget all about the massive P word he almost said.

“I’ll be home soon, okay?”

That sounds nice coming from Javi.

Home.

Not his home, just home.

A place he feels his soul at rest.

A place he’d begged you to stay this morning, safe and tucked away.

“Was thinking we could drive out to the clinic, find out for sure if we’re pr-” he cuts himself off this time, like he knows you’re not ready to hear that word. “Then we’ll take things from there, okay? Whatever you decide you wanna do, corazón, you call the shots.”

He keeps his word, again.

Comes home barely three hours later.

He walks through the door and welcomes the way you coil yourself around him, humming in delight as he peppers a few kisses over your face.

“Still smell like me,” he says it with approval, takes a purposeful whiff at you as he pulls you tighter against him.

You still smell his cologne on him too, buried beneath a few layers of sweat and cigarette smoke.

Near clinging to one another, it’s a miracle you two make it out his apartment and down the elevator.

An arm around your waist, he guides you over to his car.

Pulls the door open for you, stops you from bumping your head on the way in.

He practically runs round the car’s hood, jumping into the driver’s seat and thrumming the engine to life with the turn of a key.

“You remember to eat?” He asks as he pulls out onto the street.

You nod, then audibly reply.

Tell him you did in fact eat toast, leave out the part where you spewed your guts again twenty minutes later.

The drive is quiet.

Not uncomfortable, just relaxed, with the radio playing gently and his window rolled down enough to let in some air.

At some point, his hand slides over the console and rests against your thigh.

You welcome it, covering it with your own.

As you watch out the window how he drives past the turning for the local hospital, he must catch your questioning gaze.

“They, uh,” he clears his throat, rings his hand over the steering wheel. A small stain of sweat marks it. “Know your dad pretty well in there. And me. Figure you’d rather he not find out about us like that.”

He’s right.

So you relax back into your seat, accept the fact you’re both driving out of town together.

At some point, the beginning notes of your favourite song play through the stereo.

You instantly perk up, sitting up straighter in your seat and tap your foot a little to the beat.

Javi says nothing, simply peels his hand off you to turn the volume dial up.

Seconds later, he turns his head and throws you a look just asking if he’s done good.

You smile, and thread your fingers between his own.

A soft squeeze before he pulls them up to his lips, eyes back on the road.

The clinic is bright.

And squeaky, each step you take making you a little more nervous than the last.

Javier, by all accounts, is solid as a rock, signing you both in, picking up a few pamphlets, buying you a can of soda, all while you curl up in some plastic chair and just focus on not spewing your guts out.

You only relax once he’s sat beside you, helping you get a sip of the sugary drink and wrapping a protective arm around you.

You don’t mean to but you fall victim to sleep, the past 24 hours getting the best of you.

You come-to likely not much later, but to the sound of a childish giggle.

Cracking one eye open, just slightly, you notice you’re slumped into Javier, head on his shoulder.

There’s a giggling little girl in front of you both, in purple overalls and with two pigtails to hold her curly hair.

One of her hands is on Javi’s knees, using him to keep herself standing.

“First time?” You snap your eyes shut as a stranger’s voice fills the quiet bustle of the clinic.

A confused sound leaves Javier.

“Yeah, could tell from the look on your lady’s face,” the man continues. “Same one my own wife had during our first visit.”

You want to pay attention to Javi’s response, but you’re a bit busy dealing with the fact he’s not correcting the man, telling him you’re not his lady nor his wife.

His thumb soothes over your hip, and you wonder at what rate you’ll melt away into a pile of nothing thanks to his soft touches.

“You hoping for a boy or a girl?”

You tell yourself to try harder, to actually pay attention.

You succeed, catch as Javi replies, “a girl.”

“Yeah?” the stranger seems genuinely invested, it almost makes you want to open your eyes, see him for yourself.

But you don’t want to ruin the moment.

“Wanted a boy, myself,” that same little girl giggles again and you can’t fight the temptation to peek once more, catch as she crawls into her faceless-father’s lap. “Doc told us it was gonna be a boy, too. Then this one came along and, wouldn’t ya know, not a boy.”

“Surprise!” the little girl squeals, and you feel Javi’s shoulder shake under your head.

God, you want to look at him, see if he’s looking at her with the same adoration that’s festering in your heart.

“Yeah, baby, you’re my little Sarah-Surprise,” the man coos and, despite his rough accent, it suits him. Like he was only ever meant to speak with gentle words and a soft heart, all for his precious daughter. “It’ll get easier, on your lady, just so ya know. Less scary, more exciting. ‘Bout to welcome our second one, and I’ve never seen my wife so happy.”

Javi’s still not correcting him.

It makes you nauseous for a whole new reason.

“Mr. Miller?” A voice calls out.

A nurse, you imagine.

A chair squeaks as pressure is taken off it, the stranger standing.

You peak your eye open in time to see him picking his daughter up, her little legs dangling off his hip.

He takes a few steps, till Javi interrupts him.

“What,” he clears his throat, and you wonder if it’s of emotion. “What are you hoping for this time?”

“A girl.”

Eventually, it’s your turn.

You’d pretended to wake up to Javier’s coaxing.

Shuffled into some room, reluctantly separating from Javi.

A smiley nurse handed you a cup, talked you through what you needed to do for your tests.

Took your blood pressure, complimented your earrings, and stepped out the room to give you privacy.

A short while and a reunion with Javi later, you sat in a doctor’s office, both a nervous wreck as you clasped each other’s hand.

“Mrs. peña,” again, Javier does not correct the doctor. And you realise it’s because he filled out the forms, he signed you in. He wrote you down as Peña. “You and your husband are not pregnant.”

What should have followed was a sigh of relief, from both of you.

But all you felt was led drop in your stomach and Javier’s grip tighten on your hand.

“You are, however, displaying symptoms of acute food poisoning, likely salmonella.”

The doctor continues on, detailing a prescription you’re being given.

But it falls on deaf ears, the world around you gone blank as you wrestle with conflicting emotions.

You’re not pregnant.

You should be elated. Jumping, and cheering, and dancing all over the place. Instead, you’re silent, letting yourself be guided back into the car by Javi.

This time, the drive is silent.

Not quiet.

Silent.

You watch him drive past the turning into your street.

He doesn’t explain that he’s taking you back to his place.

Getting you back in his bed, switching off the lights, he curls himself in behind you and splays his hand over your stomach.

Over your empty womb.

For some reason, you find yourself sobbing into your pillow, unaware of the tears from him that stain your neck as he tries to hush you.

“Shh, shh, it’s okay,” the irony of him repeating those very same words last night is not lost on you.

It’s hard to move on, when every month there’s a stabbing pain in your abdomen and a trickle of blood staining your underwear to remind you of April.

And so you keep it locked in it’s box, slapping another caution tape over it’s lid as you groan and roll out your own bed, trudging your way into your bathroom to check if the wetness between your thighs is your monthly visitor.

You played a game But I run the table

You’re avoiding your dad’s calls.

It’s not because he’s done anything to warrant your rejection, but, rather, it’s the forthcoming actions he’ll be guilty of.

See, you know why he’s calling.

Your mom let it slip, over brunch and a few too many glasses of wine.

He’s hosting another poker night.

He wants you there, as always.

Some baseless theory of you being his good luck charm.

Or, at least, that’s what you were until the last poker night he’d hosted, way back in March.

He slips away, phoned by your tipsy mother and obligated to drive three towns over to go pick her up because she misses him.

“Fill in for me, will ya, kiddo?”

It was less a suggestion, more of a pleading, his hands already scraping the seat back and awaiting you to plop yourself down.

He leaves you with his hand, his winnings so-far, and a kiss to the top of your head.

“Watch out for Peña,” he whispered, as if you hadn’t been keeping an eye on the agent all evening, clouded by his own cigarette smoke and sitting looser each sip of his whiskey, no ice. “His poker face is dangerous.”

He turns out to be no threat.

None of the officer’s are, really.

Rounds end and rounds start, and you father’s pile of winnings grow more and more.

It’s an ego boost, taking money from these cocky men who look at you as though surely you have no clue what cards you’re holding.

But, taking from Javi?

That’s something else, entirely.

Each time you win, he gets more agitated.

Flinging down cards, muttering curses, shoving his cash across the table.

All whilst glaring, at you, eyes black with ire.

And intoxication.

And something else.

Something you know all too well on Javier.

Lust.

Nearly an hour’s past since your father left, someone else leaves the table.

Says he needs the toilet, you point him in the direction of it.

You all call for a break, and then you graciously offer a refill on drinks.

It’s what your dad would’ve done, kept them all drinking and lowering their inhibitions, their focus disappearing alongside it.

“I’ll help!” One of the officers exclaims.

He’s on the younger side.

Practically a rookie, it’s only the second poker night he’s attended.

He’s sweet, with his large-framed glasses and his nervous smile.

You both make your way out of the basement- refurbished to be your dad’s man-cave- and head towards the kitchen.

You open the fridge, grab however many bottles of beer you need.

He heads to the liquor cabinet, pulls out a bottle bourbon.

You beat him at grabbing the whiskey, an unvoiced need to be the one who refills Javi’s glass.

Maybe, he’ll offer you a sip.

Conversation flows naturally between you, in spite of him being a near stranger.

He asks about college.

You ask about working with your dad.

You both agree on the fact he’s a pain in the ass.

He tells you about a new bar, downtown.

You tell him where to go to get the best club sandwich.

It’s light, it’s easy, it’s friendly.

You’re enjoying his company.

nNeither of you can tell who causes it, but one of you mispronounces a word and you both wind up in a pile of giggles, falling over yourselves and banging into counters.

His hands grip his sides.

You’re clutching your chest.

Through wheezes, he repeats the phrase that left you both in this state.

You laugh harder, louder, warn him to stop before you lose control of your bladder.

Something thuds in the hallway, your eyes shoot up to the kitchen entry and you swear you see Javi’s retreating figure.

Blink a few times, realise there’s no one there.

You both gather some decorum.

He grabs as many of the beer bottles he can manage, and looks at your empty hands in question.

You tell him to head back without you, that you just need to go to the toilet.

Parting ways, you find the both the downstairs and upstairs bathrooms occupied.

Sigh in frustration, only to remember your parents en suite.

It’s empty, because of course it is. No one would feel comfortable enough invading the privacy of your parents' bedroom.

You do your business, wash your hands, fix yourself in the mirror.

Decide your lipstick needs a little touch-up, your clothes need straightening out.

And, when you’re done and ready to head back down to the poker table, you hear a thud.

Pull open the bathroom door, expect to find your father struggling to put a tipsy, giggly, clumsy version of your mother into bed.

Instead, there is only a brooding look and disapproving grunt.

A firm grip, on your arm, dragging you right back into the bathroom.

The door slams shut, a little harsher than you’d like, the sound of it surely reaching the ears of those regrouping for the next dealing of the cards.

He doesn’t pounce, like he so usually does when he’s wearing that look of frustration.

He’s simmering in it, teetering on the edge of boiling anger as he smooths a hand over his chin, visibly clenching his jaw, swallowing back whatever it is he wants to say to you.

He takes one step forward, and you go one back.

Then two steps, which you also match.

Your hip smacks into the sink’s counter on your fifth step backwards and it’s enough to finally put his hands on you.

He tugs you right into his chest, one hand soothing over where you’d banged your hip.

It’s alarmingly gentle for his stoic features.

When he speaks, you nearly melt into a puddle, the heat of him invading your space, face inching close to your own, enough to have you questioning the sanctity of your parents en suite.

“What’s going on with you, huh?”

“Could ask you the same thing, officer,” you make the fatal mistake of giggling, but you’ll blame it on the fruity cider you’d helped yourself to.

He clearly finds no humour, not even as you fiddle with the top button of his shirt and shoot him your best look of innocence.

“Think you’re real fucking funny, don’t you?” His hand, warm and imposing, grips a hold of your face.

It’s almost painful, but you like it, squirming a little at the blunt stab of his nails and the way he smooshes your cheeks, forcing a pout onto your lips.

You try shake your head, his grip won’t let you.

“Sitting in a room full of men, making yourself the centre of attention,” he huffs a breath out of his nose, and you can’t help but compare him to an angry dragon.

He’s worked up, frustrated, angry.

And it’s hot. A turn-on.

“What’s the matter, Javi? Jealous you’re not the centre of all those men’s attention?” You’re poking the dragon, teasing him, and it’s an act that may leave you burned and scarred.

Or, as you’re hoping, it’ll win you the ride of a lifetime.

He doesn’t even grace you with a verbal response.

No, he scoffs, as though he’s in physical disbelief at the words you’re saying.

Spins you around, pins you to the sink’s counter, tugs your hair till you’re forced to stare at your reflection.

He’s right behind you, seething in anger, fire in his eyes.

His head dips between you neck and shoulder, brushing his lips against your pulse point.

“Not all of us are attention whores like you,” it’s fleeting, and he’ll deny it if you dare mention it, but he smiles.

Just a second, but you feel it, see it even though he tries so hard to turn his face into your neck.

It’s what lets you know he’s playing, teasing, egging you on to push him over the edge.

“I’ve been with real whores, corazón,” he confesses a sin you already know, eaves-dropping one too many times on your dad fishing stories of Colombia out of him. “Fucked them so often they started doing their nails in colours they knew I wanted to see wrapped around my cock.”

Involuntarily, your back arches, brushing your ass against him and providing him the perfect access to wind his hand up between your heaving breasts, all the way up till his fingers curl round the base of your throat.

In the mirror, the image is one of ownership, of Javi seizing your bodily autonomy. A whore and her gentleman caller.

It’s arousing to think about, Javi and his whores.

You wonder what positions he put them in.

How many rounds he lasted with them.

How often he made them cum.

“And not one of them took half the money you’ve taken from me tonight.”

Oh.

So that’s what this is, his pretty ego, bruised at the hands of you?

Poor Mr. Javier Peña, humiliated in front of all his peers round after round, hundred bill after hundred bill.

You almost taunt him for giving into the temptations of the fragile male ego, but you’re stopped in your tracks.

By him, hands squeezing at you a little tighter as he grinds the unmistakable outline of his hardened cock against you.

That single action changes the game, entirely.

Because this isn’t about you stealing his money and his ego.

No, this is something far filthier, that has your panties growing wetter beneath the skirt of your dress.

“I’m worth every dime though, aren’t I, officer?.”

The grip tightens.

He shoves you harder into the counter, so hard a tub of your mother’s moisturiser topples off.

The hard outline of him is still there, ever-present.

“‘S that what you like, huh, taking my money? Wanna be Javi’s personal little whore?”

Every ounce of feminism evaporates within you.

Who could deny such a tentative offer?

Certainly not you, reflection mimicking the way you eagerly nod, teeth biting down on your bottom lip in a failed attempt to hold back a grin.

Javi notices- of course he notices- and takes his victory, hips rocking even deeper into you.

There’s too many layers between you, a feat on which you both agree, yet neither of you do anything about.

You just savour the friction, instead, pushing and pulling one another to the axis of pleasure.

Your panties, soaked.

His jeans, tight.

“What’s it gonna cost me to get you bent over and stuffed full of my cum, corazón?” One hand leaves your body. The mirror snitches on him, exposing how he’s reaching into his back pocket. “This?”

He smacks something down, into the bowl of the sink.

It’s his wallet, and you watch the worn leather of it shine with the residue of water on the linoleum.

The hand at your throat pulses a squeeze, his knee nudges you from behind.

“C’mon, don’t be shy.”

His mouth, right by your ear, lips tickling you with the subtlest of brushes against it.

His hand guides your own, down into the sink, flipping the wallet open and putting it’s belongings on display.

Bills, some placed neatly, others stuffed in forcefully, edges spilling out the pockets. There’s less in there than when he arrived, courtesy of you.

There’s a few miscellaneous cards. A library card, an ID slip you’re sure he uses for something in the sheriff's station, a loyalty card to some record store.

The picture of his mother sits centre stage, radiant smile and loving eyes grabbing the attention of any who dare open it.

He has his mother’s eyes, you notice.

And then you notice something else, peeking out from behind his mother’s picture.

You dive into temptation, dart your nosy fingers over to tug at the object, till you realise it’s another picture.

A picture of Javi, and you.

Taken on a polaroid you found under a box of his belongings, you remember the day clear as ever.

The two of you had messed around, captured your sins on film with the promise of destroying it after. It would be too risky a thing, to allow image evidence of the intimate ways in which you knew each other’s bodies.

Javi’s fingers on your skin, your nipple in his mouth, his cock’s outline bulging within your lower abdomen.

There was no point risking your father ever finding it.

But this picture, this one you do not remember.

Fully dressed, eyes fixed on his television, your head lays in his laps while his fingers card through your hair.

It’s captured from above, as if Javi’s own eyes had made a permanent record of his view.

The sweetness of this living on, of Javi taking something sacred for himself to keep hidden in his wallet distracts you for a moment.

He does good to bring you back into the room.

“Take how much you think you’re worth, corazón,” whispered into your ear, as he rips a few of the notes out his wallet.

They sit in the sink, growing wet.

And you are too, frozen on the spot.

You glance down, count over the different bills.

Five dollars.

Twenty dollars.

Hundred dollars.

With each bill you count, your internal price shooting up within your head, you try picture his reaction.

In the mirror, he’s watching.

Not the sink bowl, no.

You, your face, looking at your expressions in a way that reminds you it’s his job to read people.

You decide to be bold, dig into his wallet and, even though your insides twist in anxious turmoil, hold up your hand to present him with your answer.

Resting neatly, between your fore and middle finger, a shiny credit card.

The gleam in Javi’s eyes just about match it, blackened and blown out with lust.

The card is plucked out your hand.

The hand on your neck leaves, in search of your waist.

The fabric of your dress bunches, wrinkling and creasing as his fabric-straining grip inches it’s hem higher and higher.

You feel sexy like this, face heated and breathing heavy.

It’s an effect he has on you, has had on you, forcing you to look at yourself in new lights, in new angles, admiring every out-of-line trace of you for what you are.

Desirable.

And attractive.

And pretty.

And smart.

And every other word under the sun that Javi whispers into your skin with innocence as his body commits sins within you.

At the bottom of the mirror, you watch as the white cotton of your panties comes into view.

Wet, as you both expected, the thin fabric now turned almost sheer, exposing the delectable view of your cunt hugged cutely by the cotton’s tight seams.

Javi hisses, muttering something to himself.

There’s a strain to his voice, one that would have you worried he’s in pain if it weren’t for the way you’re watching as his face contorts with lust.

His eyes are dark and you study them like he studies his card, contemplating something.

A few seconds pass. 

Tension is puffed out his chest with one exhale, through the nose.

You feel the air tickle your skin.

He nods curtly, to himself, and flickers his gaze back to meet your own in the mirror.

It’s unwavering, even as he brings the black plastic down and smacks it against your mound.

You squeal, he hushes, and you both know he doesn’t mean it at all.

He likes when you gift him noise, a private aria only he has tickets to.

Just as easily as the first time, he snaps the card against you again, a jolt of pleasure shooting straight through your clit.

Just as loudly as the first time, you squeal, a jolt back into his warm, steady, hard embrace.

“What’re you running from, hmm?” His face turns, burrowing itself in the tresses of your hair.

A shallow sniff, and you wonder if he notices the smell of his shampoo on you.

There’s a pressing of lips, against your scalp, and it’s far too gentle of a juxtapose to the imagery of his fingers pulling your panties to the side, exposing your pussy to the bathroom’s cold air and the two pairs of hungry eyes in the mirror.

“You say that this is what you’re worth, and then you don’t want to take it?”

The third spank of the card against your bundle of nerves is harder, louder, echos in the confined space. A moan, minuscule and muffled, slips past tightly shut lips, a look of fear flashing through wide eyes.

Javi’s quick with his reassurance, gentle with his comfort, a hand stroking over your collarbone.

“Don’t worry, no one’s gonna hear you. You just be as loud as you need, hermosa, they’re too busy encouraging that boy-cop to ask you to dinner.”

There’s a tint of jealousy to the way he says boy, and you’re reminded of the image of him in the kitchen doorway.

Smack!

The card strikes down, once more, this time eliciting an open-mouthed gasp. 

He doesn’t let up, repeating the action twice more.

It hurts, in a way that makes your core throb and your toes curl, squirming aimlessly in a grasp he knows you don’t truly want to escape.

But he mocks you, with a hushing noise in your ear and gentle it’s okay, corazón, Javi’s got yous against your neck. His thumb swipes through your folds, coating it in your wetness and dragging itself up to your clit, soaking it in soothing rubs.

His gentle nature lasts mere seconds, his wrist flicking back only to smack the credit card down again. This time, it’s a pattern of three, repeatedly crashing down on your sensitive nerves one after the other.

In the mirror, you watch him observe as he twiddles the card between deft fingers, contemplation on his mind.

The room’s quiet, apart from your shortened breaths and his deep inhales.

You hear a cheer.

From the basement.

It must have been a loud cheer, for you to hear them all the way up here.

And, suddenly, the stakes feel higher than when you were sat at the poker table, counting Javi’s coins with every passing round.

If you can hear them, they could hear you.

This doesn’t seem to cross Javier’s mind, who merely twists your head away from the bathroom door and back to the mirror, to where his hungry eyes await.

All contemplation is gone, he’s decided in what he’s going to do, and so you watch as he takes the card and swipes it through your cunt.

It’s not a pleasurable act, in itself.

In fact, it’s rather uncomfortable, the solid plastic hard on your delicate skin.

It’s the arousal of him doing it that gets you weak in the knees, to have him perform such a mundane act- the swiping of his credit card- in such a crass, dirty, wrong way.

Like he’s paying for you, committing a physical transaction in exchange for your body.

It doesn’t matter that he could have you for free, has had you for free.

He wants to pay, wants to reward you in a way that aligns with the capitalistic world.

“Javi…” You whimper, softly, head lulling back against his shoulder as he swipes the card again.

Your eyes, slowly slipping shut, shoot right back open as you feel the rounded corner of the card prod at your opening, as if trying to notch itself within you.

“Think she could take it, corazón?” Javi bites at your ear, teeth clamping down and pulling at it’s lobe. The card sinks in, not even an inch. You nudge back into, your cry circling the room around you both. “I know, baby, I know. It’d be a wide stretch, but ain’t that all pretty whores like you are good for, hmm?”

It’s automatic, the way you bend to his every whim, head nodding without direct orders from your brain, every part of you, conscious or not, ready and willing to prove you could fit his card inside of you.

For him, you can do it.

“Fitting big things in your little pussies?”

Surprisingly, the hand between your thighs retracts and you watch as he brings the card up to your mouth, glistening with your arousal.

“Open,” the directions are unnecessary, your mouth already dropping open for him in an act of muscle memory.

He hums approvingly, yet his eyes are still fury filled as he slots the card between your lips, lathering your tongue in your own taste. 

“You’ll take anything I give you, won’t you, corazón?”

The statement rings true, both ways: as much as you’ll take anything, he’ll give anything.

You don’t tell him that, though, finding it much easier to rest your palms on the countertop, backing your sopping core into him, enticing him with the wiggle of your hips and whines from your lips to take you already.

“Shh, shh, don’t you worry that pretty head. Javi’s gonna feed this greedy little cunt, ok?”

The unbuckling of a belt.

The unzipping of teeth.

The shucking down of-

Something smashes, in the basement, and it’s enough to have you flinching.

Javi’s touch soothes you, a hand running over the curve of your shoulder as he presses yet another kiss into your neck.

“S’okay, probably just a beer bottle.”

He doesn’t move another inch, not till he sees you nod, melting back into him.

You hear, more than you see, the way he tugs his trousers down, just enough to free his hardened cock from its jean-clad confine. The risky business of a quickie in your parents’ en suite calls for clothing moved aside, and not removed.

Much to your annoyance, his all-encompassing warmth drifts away as he moves back, hands clamping down on your hips. 

He tilts them to the angle he wants, the angle he knows gets him brushing all your sweet-spots.

He tugs the skirt of your dress up, and then readjusts your soiled underwear.

You hear him draw a deep breath and watch his eyes in the mirror, glued to that spot between your legs, entranced.

The drag of his cock over your folds is familiar, the way he smacks the head of it against your clit is welcomed.

He spears you no gentle coaxing, no stretching around his fingers first, coming undone just for him to fill you right back up, this time with his cock.

No, this is a vengeful touch, the kind that’s meant to display his irritation, his fury, for reasons you’ve yet to confirm yet you’re more than willing to accept.

A man like him, so unfairly selfless, taking something in this world for himself, how he wants to and how he likes to.

You’ll be his vice, so long as he grants you his virtues.

Javi fills you with a single thrust, grunting low into your ear as you feel the way the air is physically knocked out both for your lungs.

He’s still, head buried in the crook of your neck as he works on steadying his breathing, giving you time to adjust to the delicious stretch.

You whine out some version of his name, feel yourself pulse around him.

A hand, reaching up to cup your cheek.

A kiss, gentle and longing against your mouth.

He’s making you wait for it, you think, torturing you with an impending paradise.

He’s savouring the feel of you, he thinks, taking advantage of the few moments alone he wins with you.

"Javi,” he barely lets you part from him to speak, chasing a trail of kisses down your jaw. “This isn’t the time to develop patience.”

The snide remark earns you a bite, his teeth nibbling on the sensitive skin of your earlobe. You squeal, try remind yourself to be quiet, only to squeal louder when his hands tickle at your waist.

“I’m a very patient man, corazón.”

You scoff.

“Just not when it comes to you.”

His hips roll back, slowly, but it’s better than nothing, better than when he wasn’t moving at all.

Still, he makes you squirm a little longer, moan his name a little louder.

Only then does his fake resolve snap and he’s fucking into you at a brain melting pace in the blink of an eye.

Javier does his best to keep quiet, at first, biting down on his lip and your neck just to contain all those melodies he usually makes.

You can’t say the same for yourself as, despite your efforts, broken moan after broken moan tumbles out your mouth and into the sink, filling and filling and filling it in sync with how Javi your cunt.

You wonder how long till it all spills over the edge.

“Joder (Fuck),” he groans as you unconsciously squeeze him tighter, pulling him deeper into your walls. serves him right, for the teasing and the torturing. “Tienes el coño más lindo en todo el mundo. (You have the prettiest cunt in the whole world.)”

You feel lightheaded.

Warm, sweaty, covered in the fingerprints of a lover you shouldn’t be with.

The bathroom fills with an array of sounds. The slapping of skin against skin, the broken cries of an agent’s name, the mindless rambling of a man drunk on pleasure.

“So good to me, baby. Always so fucking good to me.”

“Gonna stay here forever, fuck. That sound good to you, corazón, hmm? Full of my cock always?”

“Look at yourself… Pura belleza (Pure beauty).”

He consumes you, mind, body and soul.

There’s no worrying about the happenings around the poker table, no listening out for your father’s car pulling in the driveway, no worrying about your tousled hair or sweating skin.

There’s just Javi.

Beautiful, gorgeous, deserving Javi.

“Please, please, Javi-“ The words all melt together, pleads becoming his name, his name becoming pleads.

You’re not sure what you’re begging for.

It’s okay though, Javi always knows what you need.

“I know, amor (love), I know,” he murmurs into your skin, butterfly kisses so gentle you wonder how they come from the same man that’s pistoning his hips into you like it’s the last chance he’ll ever get. “Let go, c’mon. Show me how much you love this cock, how much you love-”

He’s cut off by his own groan, you cunt fluttering around him as you inch closer and closer to the edge of euphoria.

Hands hurry off your waist, slipping between your thighs. 

It brings a welcomed cushioning, shielding you from repeatedly bumping against the marble of the countertop.

Your legs part further, eagerly, an easy pathway for his yearning fingers to seek out the wonders of the female body as they brush over your clit.

The gentle tactile that he strokes over your bundle of nerves, partnered with the repeated brushing of his cock against that spot that makes you weak in the knees, drool out your mouth, it’s becoming too much.

Eyes glancing in the mirror, you wonder if yours is the same image of the whores who’d warmed his Colombian nights: sweat soaked skin, hooded eyes, messed up hair, wrinkled clothing.

He tilts your hips, a deeper angle to fuck into you that has you perching up onto the tips of your toes, fighting with the chance of losing balance.

He’d catch you, if you fell.

Wrap you up in an embrace that’s more familiar than your own.

“I’m gonna- Fuck! Corazón, need you to cum. Now, please. Please. Need to feel you-”

He’s babbling, losing composure and revealing the side of him you pray he never showed those other women: the side that needs, the side that longs, the side that begs to see you cum before he allows himself to, before he’s able to.

“Javi,” it’s a struggle to speak, but you endure, fighting off your orgasm and holding back tears. There’s something you need from him too. “Cum with me. Wanna be full of you, all of you-”

“¿Sí? (Yeah?)” He pleads back, thrusts already getting a little sloppier, hands a little shakier in the way they touch you. Much like his poker face, you know how to read the face he wears moments before he falls apart. “¿Eso es lo que quiere mi corazón? (Is that what my sweetheart wants?) Want me to cum in you, hm?”

“Yes, oh god yes! So bad, Javi, I want it so bad!”

“Ay, bebesita, no llores. (Aw, baby girl, don't cry.)” He coos, a condescending lilt to his words that has you falling into a bigger mess. “Shh, don’t worry, baby. Gonna fill you right up, so my cum’s dripping down your thighs when that poor kid asks you for your number. Thinks he’s got a shot with you cause he made you laugh, poor boy wouldn’t know how to deal with all the noises I get out of you.”

Javi divulges into a spine-tingling rant of burning hot jealousy, the kind that leaves your cheeks burning and your heart scorching, lit under a flame of your desire for more of him. To have him, equal parts physical and emotional.

You try warn him of the bubble that’s about to burst, the feeling in your loins building and building till it’s seconds way from toppling over. 

“That’s it, baby, squeeze my cock. Lemme feel it,” He urges, heart pounding out his chest against your back, hands tightening their grip on your hips. “Need to feel you cum, ‘s all I want.”

You both crash and burn, together.

You fall first, a chaos of unfinished words, crying out for Javi.

He follows close behind, body pressed against your own like he’s willing you to fuse together, to become to entangled in one another that all possibilities of separation become void.

“Take it, cora-” He’s in your ears, in your head, in your heart. Inside of you, consuming you, as eagerly as he’s willing to be consumed by you, fingerprints on hips and teeth-marks in necks. “Take it, take it, take it.”

Arms envelop you from behind, crossing over your chest to pin you back against him.

He’s nearly stagnant, nothing but the twitch of his cock and the shallow thrusts he fucks you deeper with, filling you with another, another, another pump of his cum.

“So good,” Javi’s voice persists, teeth gritting as he bites back the need to be loud, to be heard, to lay a claim on you so blatant no one could deny hearing it. Your relationship with your father is the only thing that holds him back. “Good to me, baby. Always… Good… Díos. (God.)”

Craning your neck to the side, you manage to pull him in for a kiss.

It’s something he accepts easily, lips parting and melting into a dance against your own.

One of his hands falls over your jaw, twisting your face even closer to him.

The kiss dies slowly, with each of you refusing to truly part, pecks being splattered messily against the other’s mouth.

“Was I,” Javi interrupts you with another kiss, his free hand smoothing up and down your side, his hips still slowly rocking into yours, a delicious sting of overstimulation biting at your core. “Am I worth it?”

He pulls back, tired gaze warm as it takes in your messed features.

With the smile that stretches over his lips, however, one would think you were the prettiest creature in all the world.

He calls your name, calmly, slowly, like he’s trying to memorise the shape of it on his tongue. “You’re worth everything I could give, and more.”

There’s something behind the ways he says it that makes you believe him.

With little will to do so, you peel apart from each other, his hands moving quick to adjust your underwear as his cum starts to leak out onto your folds.

He exits the bathroom first, a final kiss placed on your cheek before your left alone, forced to confront the wrecked version of you that will never see your parent’s en suite in the same light.

Your dad arrives back just in time to see you slipping back down to sit at the poker table, no seat left for him to take but the one between his sweet daughter and his loyal best friend.

If only he knew he was placing you both where you most wanted to be when he suggested Javi give you a ride home, waving you both off through the car window with no idea Javi's cum sat dripping out your cunt, staining the car seat.

Your phone buzzes to life in your hand, slipping you out of your memories.

Your father’s contact name reads clearly on the screen.

Hitting decline one more time, you roll over and try ignore the gathering slick between your thighs.

Damn Javi and all the memories he haunts you with.

Mr, I don’t want a label You made me a little miss unstable (And it)

Days grow colder.

Nights grow longer.

You change your bedsheets, stuff a comforter back inside.

Pick out a tree, synthetic, and lump the box up the countless stairs to your apartment.

Try not to think of how he would’ve insisted on helping, refused to let you carry it.

Even if it culminated in him doubled over in pain, clutching his lower back.

Lights, baubles, action.

The tree’s smaller than you expect, barely reaching your hip, but it’s green, tree-shaped and festive. It’s enough.

Your decorations are minimal, a few inconsequential things you picked out your parents’ stash. There’s a Santa hat, frayed with time. A few cracked baubles, with string so thin you suspect they’ll snap off. A gingerbread man ornament, a glass snow-flake. A crooked star, missing one of its points, tops the tree.

A homemade snowman, one you’d gifted your parents after a busy day in nursery. Neither of them had the heart to tell you you’d made its nose a rather phallic shape.

And then there's the red phone-box, nestled somewhere in the middle, an etching of LONDON brandishing it as a reminder of your trip.

You’d picked it up in a tiny bookstore, right next door to The Distillery Club.

The winter season has never felt so lonesome, tucked away in your grown-up apartment. 

There’s no fireplace to warm your hands, no hot cocoa boiling on the stove. No cheesy hallmark movies to laugh at with your mother, no racing past your father to grab the last slice of dessert.

It’s just you, alone, with only your wandering mind as company.

Sometimes, more often than not, it wanders to him. To if he’s alone.

To if he’s filling his heart as easily as he fills his bed.

To if he’s finally bought a second seat for his dingy balcony.

“Is this some tactic of yours?”

He hums, brows furrowing, lips pouting, smoke dragging into his lungs.

The cigarette sits perched between two fingers of the hand resting on your knee, his other curled around your waist.

“Some what?”

“Tactic,” you repeat. Watch him blow a puff a smoke, taste his ash at the back of your throat. “Only having one chair, so pretty girls have no choice but to sit in your lap.”

He lets his gaze wander away from the streets below and up to you, sitting pretty in his lap. Like a cat, draped over his thighs.

Nothing but his own rumpled, inside-out shirt to cover your skin.

Bare legs, messed hair, smudged lipstick.

Fingerprint bruises littering your hips, bitemarks etched into your collarbone.

“I gave you a choice,” he speaks with a reservation he didn’t have before, when he’d offered you a ride home from the bar. There’s an etching of something that’s diluting his expressions, sinking him deeper and deeper into his own pensive mind. “You were the one who insisted on sitting on me.”

“You weren’t complaining earlier.”

Nails pinch at your thigh, causing a squeal out of you.

A few birds fly off a nearby wire, a head or two turn in the street below.

They don’t see you, or Javi, or the lack of clothing that sits between you.

“Neither were you. In fact, you were a little busy fucking my fac-”

“Stop!” Your sudden modesty feels unearned, yet that does nothing to stop you from placing your hand over his mouth.

He licks at it, you grimace, he licks again.

Then takes another breath of nicotine, as you wipe the remnants of his spit onto his naked thigh.

When he offers the cigarette your way, you hesitate.

Picture your father, disappointed to see you smoke.

The whiff of Javi’s post-sex smell- muted cologne, matted sweat, burnt ash- steals your senses, reminds you you’ve already done enough to disappoint your father, a cigarette can’t do much damage.

So you let him hold it up to your mouth and inhale it’s poison.

You and Javi were never meant to happen.

Sure, the line had already been crossed weeks ago.

But that was supposed to stay in Vermont, tucked between snowy slopes and wooden cabins. Existing in a timeline separate from your reality, where you are your father’s precious daughter and Javi is his trustworthy colleague and friend, that is where it should have stayed.

And it had, for two weeks. Sixteen days, specifically. 

You’d returned to classes, to sharing lunch breaks with your father in his office, to slowly moving more of your things out the family home and into your new apartment.

And Javi, from what you heard, had returned to keeping civilians safe, to sharing a drink or two with your father at the end of the work week, to flirting with every secretary within a mile radius.

Neither of your crossed paths and, when you nearly did, the other made the effort to turn a corner, shut a door, hide behind a wall.

Until tonight.

Until you ditched your mediocre date, some lame excuse of having a last-minute paper due.

Until you’d gone to console yourself over your failing love life, unknowingly sliding into a bar stool right next to the most desired cop in town.

Until he’d turned to you, tilted his head, and asked “d’you wanna get out of here?”

He’d offered to take you home.

The drive was quiet, tense, until his hand drifted over the gearstick and you dragged it down onto your thigh.

He squeezed.

You inched it further up, till the tips of his fingers brushed at the edge of your dress.

He took the invitation, took a turning towards his own place.

Brought you into his apartment, drowned you in his fountain of kisses, begged you to sit upon his face. He’d made you see stars beneath a roofed sky, eyes rolling so far back they threatened to get stuck there.

With barely a moments recovery from a third blinding orgasm, he dragged you down the expanse of his body, sat you down on his cock and refused to help your overstimulated, puddle-brained self ride him, grinning cunningly with his back pressed against the mattress as you struggled through shaky legs.

Eventually, he tired and launched himself, arms tangling behind your back, feet planted flat behind you, hips fucking up into your battered cunt until you both came to a haltering crescendo.

He’d layed you down to rest, cleaned you of any mess, and then wandered out to his balcony, inviting you to join him when the feeling returned to your legs.

Which brings you here, fifteen minutes later.

“...wouldn’t have to be serious,” he’s speaking, finishing off a sentence you don’t quite catch the start of.

“Huh?”

“This. Us. It could be casual, y’know?” Another puff of smoke slips right through his lips. “If that’s what you’re worrying about… your dad, and all that other stuff. I don’t need a label, not if it means I get to have… We could keep it casual, if that’s what you want.”

It takes a few moments for you to fully register his words, and then a few more to formulate a response.

“Is that what you want?”

He shrugs.

Pulls in another breath of his cigarette.

Stubs it out on the arm of the chair.

And says nothing.

You assume it’s a yes.

Because what else could Javier Peña, notorious womaniser, want with you if not a casual, no-strings-attached permit to sleep with you, as many times as he sees fit, without the risk of losing his job or, worse, his best friend?

Silence falls upon you both.

You twist in his lap.

He tightens his hold.

Within a half’s hour, he’s got your hands white knuckling as they grip the metal bannister of his balcony, his own hands busy pulling your hips back to meet each of his desperate thrusts, not even the cool air of the night enough to soothe the flaming desire that burns between you.

Your stomach twists, your mouth dries, your eyes water at the thought of him out on that balcony now.

Somebody else, some new body sat in your spot, upon his lap as they exchange smoke rings and warm mouths.

Broke me big time It’s funny and I’m laughing baby You think i’m alright

The Laredo sheriff’s department is known best for three things: its lack of parking, its swoon-worthy ex-DEA agent, and its office holiday parties.

Each year, it’s the same.

The station, decked out in decorations.

A Christmas wreath, mistletoe hanging from every doorway, egg-nog and mulled wine.

It’s not just Christmas.

It’s menorahs, and ficus trees, and a statues of different gods.

Each piece of culture, tradition, holiday that makes up the people that inhabit the station, day in and day out, behind desks and in cop cars, filing paperwork and fetching coffees, represented in some way, celebrated.

Each member of staff is encouraged to bring their friends, their family.

Their spouse, their mothers.

Anyone, and everyone, is welcome.

Then there’s the gift exchange, a Secret Santa system, optional for each member of staff.

It’s the part you look forward to most.

Crowding your dad the minute he gets home on the first of December, poking and prodding till he lets it spill who he’s got.

Fishing out a pen, some paper.

Drawing up a list, made of details and anecdotes your father remembers of his target.

Dragging your shop-avoidant father down to the mall, for a day of gift hunting and sweet-tooth indulging.

Getting to watch your father’s coworker open their gift, eyes lighting up as you once again knock the ball out the park and gift them something perfectly tailored to them, winning your dad the spot of top gift-giver year after year.

This year, there was none of that.

No list of pros and cons for each gift option.

No trying to crack just what exactly your dad should gift his person.

No waiting with baited breath to watch them open it, heart racing with that little fear of them not liking it, of you failing.

No, the moment that name fell from your father’s mouth, you knew what he needed to get.

Hinted at it, slightly.

Claimed you’d smelt it on a friend, thought it would be a good idea.

Sipping on some wine and picking at the buffet, you watch him pick up his gift.

Hold it up to his ear, shake it.

Look down at the box, confused, then tear into the wrapping paper.

The whole room stops.

Not really, but it feels like it does, as somewhere across the room Javier Peña holds up a bottle of that damn cologne.

And, when his eyes instinctively find yours, it feels like everything else fades away.

Fades to grey.

It’s just him, and you. The only two within the room, holding a secret too heavy on the tongue to ever speak it aloud.

He knows.

Of course he knows.

Knows you’d watched him spray it on his skin, day in, and day out.

Knows you’d worn it on your own, sunk it deep into your pores after intertwining your souls upon wrinkled sheets.

Knows you’d watch its contents decrease over time, time you’d spent with him.

That bottle of cologne reminiscent of a timer on you both, that morning before the hospital trip becoming the last few sprays he got out of it.

Colour returns to the world that surrounds you as your dad steps into view.

He’s hugging Javi, pathetically tipsy and ignorant to the lipstick stain on his cheek, no doubt ingrained to his skin with how hell-bent he is on having your mother kiss him beneath each mistletoe.

They’re exchanging words you don’t hear, slapping one another on the back.

You turn on your heel, insides twisting as nausea overcomes you at the scene.

The next time you see Javi is hours later.

You’re trying to leave, tempted to take the good old Irish exit and just slip out a back door.

But your parents- ne, your father- are so busy show-ponying you around the room, that you fail to take a single step that goes unnoticed.

“There she is!” Your father calls out, somewhere behind you, as you slip your hand into the arm of your coat. This act sparks outrage, a frown birthing onto his face. “Don’t tell me you’re leaving too.”

You say you’re tired.

He boos, loudly, like he’s not the chief of police and a whole grown adult.

Grabs at you, lovingly, trying to pry the coat out of your hands.

The effort is minimum, and you know he’s only messing around.

You can leave, if you want to, even if he’d rather you stay.

“It’s not even midnight and you two buzzkills are leaving!” He wails, all the while he’s reaching around and helping you slip your other arm into the coat.

That’s when Javi’s face comes into view, over the arch of your dad’s shoulder, sporting a smile and a pair of keys dangling off one finger.

You try your best to counter his smile with your own, though your throat feels dry and your cheeks feel tight.

“I can’t believe I’m being betrayed like this by two of my favourite people!” The smile slips before you can catch it, eyes widening at your father’s words.

Words you’d spent months agonising over the thought of hearing. Picturing the circumstances in which he’d find out. Imagining the horrendous fallout, a red slash over Javier’s reputation. Swearing you’d quit it, quit him, and then winding up tangled in his sheets again, head pressed to his chest, eyes closed in the soundest of sleeps.

Javi plays it cool.

Nudges your dad’s shoulder, shakes his head and tells him to “quit the dramatics, viejo (old man).”

“I gotta head out to my pop’s first thing in the morning, he’s wanting me to help him rewire some of the fences.” Comes out as his excuse, one your dad can’t really argue against.

He knows better than anyone that Javi drops everything for his dad.

Well, better than anyone but you.

Your excuse, however, falls a little short, a consequence of the last minute conjuring of the lie.

“I’ve, uh, got an early class. Don’t wanna flunk out in my last year, right?”

Your dad stares at you.

Your mum stares at you.

Javi stares at you.

And that’s how you know you’re screwed.

“Class? I thought you were on winter break.”

Javi takes the momentary distraction to shrug his coat on, over those broad shoulders.

Shoulders that twist with the rest of him, as he makes space for you in the doorway, nodding you over. Here, he’s saying without really speaking, escape with me.

So you do, tiptoeing past your parents as though, the slower and quieter you move, the less they’ll notice your approach to the exit.

“Oh! Yeah, I- Sorry, I meant that I-”

“The library, it’s still open for the graduate students,” Javi swoops in effortlessly, dragging the spotlight off you.

He takes hold of your jacket, too, slipping the zip into place and dragging it up the length of your torso, over your chest, till it rests snuggly at your sternum.

A little too snug, making each new inhale deeper, harder, practically heaving the air into your lungs.

At least that’s the reason you give yourself.

You don’t get to dwell on it too long, fortunately, for your mother lets out a gasp.

She points, eyes a little widened by excitement, at the both of you and nudges at your father.

“Look!” She tells him, and you watch in confusion as he displays her same reaction, eyes wide and mouth agape.

Then comes the laughter, straight out the depths of your dad’s belly and right to your weak heart, a melody that reminds you so much of easy Sundays and curling up next to him on the sofa, watching kids’ shows that seemed to entertain him more than you.

“Oh that’s just,” he takes a laugh break, doubling over slightly, his own finger joined in pointing at you two, beneath the doorway. “Too perfect!”

Before you can inquire on either of your parents bizarre reactions, Javi’s eyes are staring into your own and pointing upwards.

Wrapped with a red bow and barely hanging onto the door frame with a single strip of tape, a mistletoe stares down at you, two white berries like mini eyes.

When you glance at the agent once more, it’s hard to read what he’s thinking.

His shoulders are tense, his lips are pursed, his brows are furrowed. But, his eyes.

His eyes burn you with an unspoken intensity, a look he should never possess in front of your parents.

“Well, what are you waiting for?” You mom, camera in hand, urges you both, a wide grin cast upon her face.

You dad is in no better state, rushing forward to squeeze you both closer, one hand clasped over the back of Javi’s head.

When the once-agent exhales a nerve-striken breath, the warmth of it, of him, hits your neck.

“Dad, c’mon, stop-” you’ve never imagined yourself stuck like this, your mother and father both urging you to kiss a man you spent months tossing and turning in bedsheets with behind their back.

The creatively deviant part of your brain tells you this is how it could be, maybe, in some other life.

Some other life, where Javi’s not a cop, you’re new in town, and you both bump into each other at the grocery store.

Both of you reaching out for the same apple, or box of cereal, or bottle of milk.

Your hands, brushing.

Your eyes, meeting.

He’d charm you, easily as he always has.

Get your number and then, the next day, a date.

One date leading to two, three, four, more dates.

Till you bring him home to meet your parents at last, squeezing his hand tighter when he tries to pry it away as the door opens to your father’s stern face.

It would take a while, you reckon, for your dad to see past the difference in years.

Your mother wouldn’t care, wouldn’t spare a second thought to it, not when she notices how much he makes you laugh and how he can’t keep his eyes off of you in any room you occupy.

This could be your first Christmas together, your parents begging for one sweet photo of you under the mistletoe, before you both head off to spend the rest of the holiday season with Javi’s father.

But it isn’t, and you’re not.

“C’mon, it’s bad luck not to!” Back in the present, in reality, your dad’s found his way over to your mother’s side. “Peña, just kiss the girl on the cheek for Christ sake, I ain’t gonna bite your head off for it this one time!”

His lips brush your cheek like an autumn breeze.

Gentle, a hint of warmth, a tickle from the wisps of his well-groomed moustache.

“Get a bit closer, you’re not fully in frame!”

The flash goes off on your mother’s camera, and the two give a little cheer, and Javi wraps an arm around your back, squeezing you a little closer.

When all is said and done, your mother’s forcing you both to stare at the camera screen, a perfect picture of the most doomed couple to ever grace this Earth.

Such dramatics in your thoughts reminds you of the copious glasses of prosecco you’d downed throughout the night, and of your intentions to get yourself home before you done something stupid.

Like stand under the mistletoe with your former casual lover, the very same man your father calls for golf matches and March Madness debriefs.

Javi offers you a ride home, an idea your father approves of.

“I’m heading that way anyway, gotta pick up a few things before I drive out to the ranch.”

A part of you thinks he’s lying, wanting any excuse for a moment alone with you, but then that’s the kind of delusions you shouldn’t be feeding into.

You and Javi don’t spend time alone anymore.

You and Javi do not exist together anymore.

Maybe you never did.

“It’s okay, I already called a cab.”

You part ways at the door, your father watching you from inside.

Javi calls your name, before you can take more than a few steps.

For a second, he just looks at you.

Then his arms are pulling you in, and he’s got you right against his steady chest, and he’s resting his head atop your own, arms squeezing tightly at your sides.

“Get home safe.”

He walks away before you can tell him to do the same, the door slamming to his car the last thing you hear as you pull out your phone and call a cab.

It takes twenty minutes for it to appear, in which the rain starts and your clothes get soaked, but all that and the fifteen dollar fare are a cheaper price to pay than the torture of letting Javier Peña drive you home.

Crawl up the stairs, unlock the apartment door, drop your clothes onto the floor.

You find sanctuary under the shower, soap suds and boiling water, a dynamic duo that scrub off any remnants of his skin against yours.

Even as you step out, fully cleaned and towel wrapped around yourself, you catch a hint of his cologne, the very same one you’d made sure your dad picked out for him.

And as you pick your coat off the ground, a distant voice that sounds much like your mother scolding you for leaving such a mess, you notice it.

First, just a little extra weight.

Then, scratchy paper as your hand dives into the left pocket.

The wrapping is haphazard, with an uneven bow tied atop it, but that’s not what matters.

You tear away at it, let the paper fall to the floor at your feet.

Then you’re met with a small box, which you tear open too. 

And find it sitting neatly among balls of yarn, the prettiest, most delicate looking glass bauble.

It’s ribbon a deep green, and it’s centre an image of mountain slopes, backed by a green forest and a valley full of wooden lodges.

It shakes in your grasp, and you spy the snowglobe-esque white foam that dances around within it.

In it’s centre, in bold, italic and green, Vermont.

One more glance in the box.

There’s a note, tucked at the bottom.

You fish it out in one breath, hold it up to read what it says.

Corazón, For your tree. I hope there’s still space.

[thatrandomidiot182]

Bird in a Cage

TW. cursing, minor violence, some gore, toxic relationships, reader matches their freak

Pairings. Targtower Duo x Reader (Mainly Aemond). (Possibly implied) Helaena x Reader.

A/N. Happy Halloween, everyone!! Ghostface Targtower won the poll by a landslide! Unfortunately, I got so caught up in writing this that I neglected the runner-up, which happened to be my favorite, so that will also be out soon, hopefully... definitely before Thanksgiving!! 😅

Anways, hope you enjoy reading! If I missed any TW pls let me know, I'm still new to tagging them...

⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘⫘

Shitshitshitshit- "FUCK!"

The loud thud followed by a string of obscenities was almost enough to get you to falter in your gait.

Almost.

The all-consuming fear and anxiety flooding through your veins was enough to keep you running without sparing a second glance back.

Your breath left you in short, hurried pants. Eyes darting back and forth between the ground and hall in front of you in a frantic attempt to keep your footing and avoid any unnecessary obstacles.

Obstacles like the vase next to the bathroom that you've stubbed your toe on one too many times, or the small table placed at the beginning of the stairway downstairs...

Or the sudden cloaked figure that popped his head over the bannister.

"Where do you think you're going pretty bird?"

The short scream that left you was more out of shock than fear, as his leather clad hand shot out to grab yours just as it had reached out to grab the railing.

"Ooh, I quite liked that..."

Your head snapped back towards the lurking figure behind you. The long black robe was a bit snug on his figure, draping down to rest on the top of his stained sneakers. His gloved hands were draped across his chest, stretching the fabric of the robe to the point you could see a glimpse of the color shirt he was wearing beneath.

It appeared to be emerald green, in a shade similar to Aegons favorite-

Oh God Aegon!

The sudden reminder of your best friend, who you had left on your bed during your journey to the kitchen, was enough to make you nauseous.

If the first killer emerged from your room when you had first come up the stairs, then...

It meant that Aegon was dead.

Without a doubt.

He stood no chance if the killer had caught him off guard...

God, you just hoped it was quick.

If anything, it was more likely than not that his throat had been slit...

Just like little Lucerys Velaryon...

Luke had been the first victim connected to these killers and the leaked crime scene photos were quick to circulate your school once it was confirmed.

It was disgustingly inappropriate, and you had nearly vomited all over Aegons lap when he had shown them to you.

You remember the sick grin on his face as he had goaded you into looking. The wicked gleam of satisfaction in his eyes as he had mocked your reluctance.

"C'mon, everyone else has already seen them! You don't wanna be known as the only wimp who didn't look, right?"

His words rang out as clear as day as you recalled the contents of the picture, only this time, you were imagining Aegon himself as the victim.

You wonder what he'd ended up looking like.

Was his head twisted back, eyes forever frozen wide open in fear?

Maybe he never even got a chance to fear his fate, and was instead left slumped over the bed with his signature grin engraved on his face...

Or, maybe the killer had used the extra five minutes you spent preparing the popcorn to beat the poor boy unconscious before-

Your morbid thoughts quickly came to a halt as you heard the footsteps pickup again.

"Well, this was easier than I thought it'd be, I'm honestly a bit disappointed in you, birdie... We put so much effort just to get you all to ourselves, and you don't even put up a fight? That's not very considerate of you..."

You furrowed your brows, in annoyance. Without saying anything in response, you quickly yanked your hand away from the one on the stairs, barreling straight towards the one who had emerged from your room. Thankfully catching him off guard, you burst into the master bedroom, slamming the door shut behind you.

You allowed yourself a small grin of satisfaction at the thud that followed.

"You are such a moron!"

Thankfully, their bickering allowed you enough time to manouver the window open.

Sitting on the windowsill and sparing a quick look behind you let you see that they had already gotten over their squabble and were making their way into the room with you. Unfortunately, it seems like the taller one had caught onto your plan, as he pushed his partner towards you before disappearing into the hallway.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?"

Your jaw clenched as you rushed to squeeze yourself through the opening, barely escaping his gloved hand that had reached out to stop you.

"Fuck you."

With those final words, you pushed yourself out onto the roof of your backyard patio, taking an extra second to pettily slam the window back down onto your pursuers hands.

"SON OF A-"

Ignoring his expletives, you made quick work of carefully crawling your way down the slope of the roofing. As you finally reached your destination, you hesitated.

The last time you did this, you were about ten inches shorter and had someone waiting to catch you.

Now, you were fifty times more scared, still in your pajamas, with no shoes, and two serial killers chasing you down...

But, beggars can't be choosers.

So, with a quick, quiet "Fuck me" you jumped.

The water was always freezing when the sun went down.

When you were little, you used to cry when your parents wouldn't let you go night swimming. You always used to talk back and argue that you weren't a wimp who'd get sick from being a little cold...

Now you're thankful they never did give in to your pleads, as even now, as you pulled your fully grown self out of the depths of the pool, you could sense the sickness developing.

You didn't have time to dwell on your feelings however, as just as you had regained your footing, the grating sound of your back door sliding open rang out.

You didn't even glance back at the figure you knew was there before you booked it towards your side gate, quickly flicking the pathetic excuse for a lock open.

This one was quieter than his counterpart. Taller, too, but not as broad, as was obvious by the flowiness of the cloak he donned.

You hated it.

You hated how easy it was for him to get behind you, as you slammed the gate shut in his face.

You hated that you didn't hear him complain about it like the other one.

Not taking another second to dwell in your thoughts, you made your way off of the property and into the street.

Your feet screamed in protest as the sharp pebbles and rough asphalt dug into your soles, but you kept running.

Your body shivered as the wind blew through your clothes during your sprint, but soon enough, your eyes welled up with tears of relief as they fell upon a welcome sight.

You had made it out.

You escaped.

You survived.

The relief was so overwhelming that you didn't even question the presence of Aemonds car parked at the corner of your street.

You simply ran up to the side of the door, knocking frantically on the passenger window, where you were met with the familiar wide-eyed gaze of Helaena.

Sweet, innocent, dear Helaena, who you had never been more happy to see.

"Helaena! Oh my god- thank god- We need- You know, the killers- The- The murderers they- They, OH! Aegon-Aegon is-"

Your rambling was cut short as Helaena opened the car door, pushing you back slightly as she rushed out to meet you.

"W-What are you doing out here? You're not supposed to..." She trailed off, hands clasped down on your shoulders as she whipped her head around in search of something unknown to you.

"Oh, god if anyone sees us-"

Your brows furrowed as she delved into a quiet ramble, her blunt nails digging into your arms painfully as you process her words.

"Helaena, what the fuck are you talking about? Right now isn't the time for your whole weird chick act, okay! Get your ass in the car we need to go!"

You don't know if she was purposefully ignoring you or not, but her silence was enough to fuel the rage that had been simmering inside you all night.

You didn't mean to lash out on her, but she was an easy target, and if you didn't focus on your anger, you'd completely shut down.

"HELAENA! Are you listening to me!?! We need to get the FUCK out of here, so get in the car!"

She once again ignored you, staring blankly over your shoulder as she limply released her hold on you.

You huffed, "Helaena, get in the car."

When she didn't respond, you resorted to copying her earlier actions, gripping her shoulders, and shaking her back and forth in an attempt to wake her from her sudden stupor.

Now giving up on being quiet and just shouting in her face, "HELAENA GET IN THE GODDAMN CAR-"

You froze as a hand clamped down on your shoulder, "Sorry, little bird, but she won't be doing that."

Gulping, you slowly turned your head towards the man that stood behind you, coming face to face with that stupid goddamn mask.

"Boo."

You screamed, or at least you tried to, but the gloved hand that wasn't on your shoulder quickly snapped up to cover your mouth before you could. The killer, who you recognized as the one who chased you by the pool, wasted no time and immediately spun you around to face him, slamming your back into the car.

"God, you're adorable, you know that..." His grip on you tightened as his hand trailed from your shoulder to your waist. "But, you're also infuriating."

You whimpered as his grip continued to tighten, squirming in his hold as he pressed his body to yours, pinning you against the cool metal of the car behind you.

"I just don't know what to do with you..." He sighed, pelvis up against your own as he shoved a knee between your legs, keeping you trapped and off balance. His hand moved from your waist to your head as he gently ran his fingers along your hair.

"That's it, keep looking at me like that-"

"You got her! Good, I don't know how I was gonna pull off a resurrection..."

Your eyes widened at the voice that had interrupted whatever creepy ass monologue was about to happen. You watched, frozen stiff as the source approached your little group, focus quickly snapping from Helaenas guilty form to the new arrival...

Aegon.

His smirk broke into a laugh as his gaze met your own, body hunching over as he cackled to himself, "Oh man, you should see the look on your face! Not so tough now, are ya?"

As much as you would have liked to deny the truth, even your survival fried brain was coherent enough to piece together the facts in front of you.

It really was impossible to deny...

Even though he had ditched the cloak, his shirt was the exact same shade as the man who chased you in the house, and clenched in his bloodied and bruised fingers was that stupid mask...

Your eyes welled up with tears as you processed, muffled sobs ringing out into the night as he laughed in your face.

"Come now, you're already crying? The best reveal hasn't even happened yet..."

You tearfully glared at Aegon as he walked over to slump his form onto Helaenas.

"Yes, as you should've guessed by now, I'm not the only one involved in this little game, no. Our dear, sweet, innocent little Helaena is in on it as well! Not so innocent now, is she-" he snickered to himself as Helaena avoided your gaze, "But! The final reveal has yet to be made!" He snapped up straight, hands flaunting about as he dramatically made his way towards your figure.

"Yes, our friend here has yet to introduce himself, how rude!" He laughed, hand slowly reaching toward the mask of the man holding you.

"Make your guesses now, folks, it's not a hard guess, really. It's actually quite obvious if you ask me!" He paused, left hand raising to cup his ear as he swiveled his head around, eyes meeting yours as the implication struck...

No. fucking. way.

He smirked as your eyes widened, hand snatching the mask back to reveal flowing silver locks and a face you knew all too well.

"Why, if it isn't the one, the only, Aemond Targaryen! Who didn't see that coming?" Aegons laughter rang through your head as your sobs increased.

You desperately shook your head, fighting the hand against your mouth as you screamed your denial.

There's no way this was happening.

There's no way your best friend just revealed himself and his siblings to you as serial killers.

There's no way that was your boyfriend.

"Are you done now, or should I get you a hat and a horn too?" Aemond spat, glaring at Aegon as his elder brother lifted his hands in surrender.

"Hey now, I'm just trying to lighten the mood a little! You don't really think she'd be down for the next part the way she currently is, do you?"

You ignored their bickering, instead focusing on berating yourself for being so stubborn.

Everyone told you he was bad news, even his own family!

Your parents had talked to you about him before. Saying your relationship was unhealthy, that he was too toxic for you, and staying with him was only gonna end up with you getting hurt.

You ignored them, of course. Too blinded by the rose tinted glasses he had strapped on your head to see all the red flags.

He had complete control over you, molding your personality and hobbies to be solely centered around him and his desires.

He didn't like your friends? Oh well, they weren't that cool anyway, besides, you still had Helaena and Aegon!

He worried about you running around late at night? You never liked going out much, no biggie! Aegon was always down for a movie night at your house!

He hated when you wore that dress you loved so much? It's okay, you were planning on getting rid of it, too. Helaena had mentioned that it was looking a bit tight...

The hold he had on you was alarming. Everyone knew it, you knew it. You just ignored it, perfectly content to live your life peacefully under Aemonds thumb if it meant he'd always and forever look at you like that.

No one had ever looked at you like that before Aemond.

With blown out pupils and rosy cheeks.

Eyebrows always curved in the softest, most reverent look you'd ever seen.

Aemond had always looked at you like you were a work of art. You just never realized what that truly meant.

You never realized how deep his devotion ran, how obsessed he was with you... how obsessed they both were, really.

Until now.

Where you sat shaking, nauseous, and terrified in between the two serial killers who just so happened to be your closest friends.

Your closest friends who were also vicious, merciless, cruel monsters that murdered your other friends just to get you to themselves... and who... who...

Who, you couldn't help but feel flattered by.

You know you shouldn't but, come on...

What girl wouldn't, when the two people they love most turn out to be equally as obsessed with them.

You're just glad you were smarter about it than they were...

[blueberryarchive]

The One Were Jungkook;

more slasher!jk

𝙩𝙝𝙚𝙢𝙚𝙨; slasher, 80s, psychological horror

𝙩𝙬; heavy non-con, somnophilia, horror, violence, blood

(thank you to @hoseokshobagi for helping me with this big mess, I love u, shut up)

NY, 1985

The little ol' Brew House wasn't like the bar you went to with Jimin. It was so small that you could feel the sweat running down your back, the ghost of a hand or a glance behind you with every step. There was a sour smell of old, dried beer on the rustic green furniture and freshly disinfected vomit in the corner where Jungkook motioned for you to sit.

"Sit down, don't move."

You climbed onto the cracked brown leather stool, your bare thighs sticking to it like Velcro. A band was playing Iron Man on the other side and it was so uncoordinated that it matched the people sitting there: middle-aged men in blue-collar jobs, women in black leather skirts and foreign students with little money, underworld poets and their upper class girlfriends living the fantasy of muses sitting one their boyfriend's thighs while they discussed Bob Dylan and Williams Burroughs. A green and brown amalgam of sweaty skin drinking warm beer and watered down whiskey.

You couldn't help but compare both places.

Sweaty Joe's was a bar just two corners from the university, it was bathed in colored lights and posters as old as the owners of the place themselves. Red leather sofas were distributed in the corners and those, for years, have belonged to the Maroon Knights players.

This is where you met Jimin, it was your first week and you and Bobby Joe decided to have a beer, you two were new, smiled candidly at each gentleman who offered you another drink. You had never done that in the small town where you came from.

Jimin was celebrating his first winter tournament, his crimson cheekbones and his elegant smile conquered your heart, he let you sleep in his room in the trailer where he lived with his four brothers. His hands never took yours without first asking you, never looked away. You fell asleep so quickly in that bed while the little snores of the quaterback kept you stable, safe.

At dawn, you couldn't even see his face, you spent a week avoiding the hallways where he frequented until you did what your mother did to apologize to people: you baked some cookies. Unfortunately, he was on a diet but he still accepted them, his younger brother would eat them all with pleasure, you offered him a kiss and he let himself go.

That afternoon you lost your virginity behind his secong-hand orange Pontiac, white cotton panties crumpled and drooled between your teeth as Jimin held your calves. You cried so much that he forgot to moan, but your boyfriend wiped away each tear with his wet tongue and his thumbs until his cum fell thickly onto your skirt and his uniform.

The second time was different. What you don't know is that you cooking for him lit a spark, a simple breeze in a dry forest and you were the summer sun. You were going to be his wife, he promised you, with drooping eyelids and your pelvis on top of a pillow, his hands guiding your ass until they collided with his waist.

“I'm going to make you mine, I'm going to buy you a house and a huge ring. Fuck—you’re going to have to stop me at some point because I’m going to get you pregnant every time you smile at me, love. Doesn't Ms. Park have a ring to it?" He growled grabbing your hair to pull you closer to his sweaty chest.

“What is that pretty head of yours thinking about, huh?” Jungkook snapped his fingers at you, placing a long mug of beer in front of you. The second cigarette of the afternoon dangled between his fingers as he waited for you to take a drink, his eyes darting from your chest to your hair. “I saw you look at the ring on your finger.”

“My boyfriend gave it to me a month ago.” You said fixing the thin silver ring, a promise desperate to be fulfilled.

“How very” The boy laughed, choking on the smoke, you held the beer and took a long drink.

You realized that men when they exist in a cloud of promises and anonymity are more fuckable, because now seeing the metalhead in front of you, you just wanted to hit him.

“I don't understand why you keep yapping when you're not here to hear me speak.”

“I didn't want us to move on to fucking so quickly, but if you can't wait, then we'll make a little something in the alley.” Seeing your face blush he laughed again. “I'm kidding, doll. Don’t be so rigid.”

With a whistle, Jeon effortlessly caught the eye of a man nearby. His muscles were noticeably defined, and he sported a pair of square glasses that added a touch of charm. Dressed in a casual plaid shirt, his hair styled like a military man. Spotting Jeon, his face lit up with recognition, and he quickly closed the distance between you.

“Kim, I thought you weren't coming to the meeting.” Out of the corner of your eye you caught a glimpse of the man's slight tensing as his friend spoke, but without skipping a beat, his hand gently landed on his friend's shoulder.

"What do you mean?"

"You literally said-"

"No, I didn't. Gosh, give me a break."

Hoseok looked in your direction with a hint of distrust, the creases on his face sharpening with each step you took. You walked closer, his eyes traced your body from head to toe, his initial skepticism fading away the moment he reached your side. Your little shorts and Wham! t-shirt hugged your curves tightly, clinging to your tits like a sculpture of marble.

"What's this?" Hoseok pointed at you and moved his fingers up and down.

"Come, I want to introduce you to my friend. We met in…" Jungkook's smile widened as he tilted his hand. “Well, it doesn't matter. What does matter is that you have to make a place for her in the club, wouldn't you gladly have one of the sweetest pieces of meat of the whole faculty on the team, eh?”

Jungkook looked in your direction again, he knew that the way he spoke caused tremendous disgust in you and he enjoyed it. “This is Hoseok, the president of the archery club. Greet him before he hates you for some reason.”

"Shut up." Hoseok's voice cut through the air as he extended his arm to shake yours, his calloused hand brushing against your skin. His sharp eyes studied your hands intently, examining every detail. "You got weird fingers."

"Is that how you give compliments to pretty girls?"

Hoseok let out a sigh, nonchalantly plucking the cigarette from Jungkook's mouth. With a subtle gesture, he motioned for his friend to approach while bringing the cigarette to his own lips.

“If you want to fuck one of the cheerleaders, find another way, I'm not going to put her in the club, dude.” His failed attempt at whispering, which was clearly intentional, didn't escape your ears.

“Do you think I have to fuck one of you to be part of your Disney Heroe theatre team?”

Hoseok's eyebrow arched, while leaning back against the bar stool. With a confident yet subtle sway, he adjusted his posture, his pelvis shifting ever so slightly, but still managing to catch your eye. A mischievous grin formed on one side of his lips, knowing full well of the effect he had on you. “And why the hell are you looking for me if you don't need me, Barbie?"

"I'm here to let you know that I'll be waiting for you in the green area on Monday at 3, expecting you to hand me a bow and arrow," You declared, a sweet smile playing on your lips like a precious jewel shimmering beneath a cloak of innocence as you deftly snatched the cigarette from between his parted lips. "And I hope you show up with a smile that could outshine the sun and a more decent cologne."

Hoseok scoffed with raised eyebrows, clearly unimpressed by your little rebel talk as you took a drag from his stolen cigarette.

"You do realize you'll be the only woman in the group, right? The guys ain't going to like you, they tend to be very…"

"Terrified of women," Jeon chimed in, leaning against your shoulder.

"Exclusive," Hoseok added.

"They'll probably do a jerk-off circle if they see me in a skirt." You quipped, a sly smile playing on your lips.

The three of you looked at the cubicle where the a few memebers sat, all upper class kids who couldn't get into anything in their lives without Mommy opening the door for them first.

“Whatever, you're not even that hot, they'll live.”

You smiled, turning around on your stool to continue drinking your beer. “See you on Monday, four eyes.”

“Bye, Hobi-Bobby.” Jungkook rested his arm on the bar, his eyes positioned on your profile.

“Do you want to fuck now? I love women who know how to silence men, i'm already hard.”

"Why are you so fucking disgusting?"

"You're the one sitting next to me, you can go now." And he waited. You stayed there, speechless and waiting, too.

"Kim?"

"Who?"

“The dickhead called you Kim.”

“I don't know who that is, sweetheart.”

“Mm.” You nodded. You weren't too sure now. “Are you sure you're the one I talked to that night?”

"I promise you." Jungkook dragged his stool closer to your ear, the smell of nicotine and shaving cream was pleasant, manly. "Are those sugar tits as sweet as that voice of yours?"

“What time did I call you?” You ignored his nutty breath.

“Are you questioning me now?”

"Yeah."

His jaw tensed, biting the inside of his cheeks.

“I'm going to give you some advice, doll. If you want things to go well today, don't question me.”

You felt a rush cover your back, the beer felt colder on your fingers and you were more aware of his proximity. You were in his territory, you didn't know anyone there, you were screwed.

“Can you answer me just one thing and that's it?”

Jungkook moved closer and nodded, his pupils stabbing at your lips waiting for you to say something out of line so he would have an excuse to destroy you with.

“Why do people think you are weird?”

His sigh collided with your neck, a smile woven little by little; you could see stars in his eyes when he moved back. The raw desire to show you why.

He leaned close to your ear and whispered slowly, the urge to laugh drowned out by his words. Both his hands hiding his lips like a child. You swallowed as you finished listening, a long drink to finish the remaining beer.

He pulled out a new cigarette before your eyes met his again.

“So, in your room or mine?” He mumbled before lightning the tip.

“I'm- I think I'm going home.”

"Isn't your home in the middle of nowhere in Pennsylvania, you silly little bun'?"

The man in front of you pouted, nodding with a dejected face when he saw you stand up, the large mug of beer hitting your trembling anatomy. You wanted to vomit, to shed your own skin to pieces, to vanish, to crawl along the road back home like a mass of nerves and to sleep in your bed until you forgot what this psychopath had just hummed in your ear in the middle of the crowd.

But what did you expect? Wasn't this what you were looking for?

That's why curiosity ends up being the cruelest animal feeling. It takes you to the cheese on top of the trap, it makes you look at the sun and go blind, it makes you run through the grass until you fall at the bottom of nowhere. Voices like Jungkook's end up taking you to a seedy bar, at the mercy of God if he is even allowed in these parts.

“Come on, I'll take the bike down for you, then.”

You grabbed your backpack and walked in front of Jeon, stares like needles digging into your shorts.

Outside, his arms stretched out to take the bicycle, as light as a feather.

“I would've take you to college but-”

“I think this is where our journey ends, Jungkook.” Your voice was firm, elegant. You knew when to say goodbye.

He remained silent, one last smile as a gift. "If you say so." His hands opened dramatically to show you the road.

You raised your leg until you sat down and accelerated down the street, the sun hiding on the horizon. You didn't know if it was the wind hitting your cheeks and eyes, but you felt the cold stream go down to your neck. You wanted the road to get shorter in front of you and suddenly you were crying like a lost child, the sharp exhale stinging your lungs, you took all the alleys you recognized and the ones you didn't and you looked around at the desolate sides of New York.

Hiding from the sun your skin grew cold and the sobs turned to murmurs praying that you would return alive to the arms of Steph or Bobby Joe.

But oh, how angelic you looked with the halo of Jungkook's car headlights on your back. A honk chilled your blood until you couldn't do anything but grip the handlebars until your knuckles turned white.

“I changed my mind, I'll take you.” His breathing was jagged, he was sweating deeply, swallowing hard to hide the psychosis.

“It won't be long now and my boyfriend is waiting for me.”

“Don't worry, just load the bike and I'll drop you off at his house.”

'No' was not an answer and you knew that, no one ever said no to him. And if they did no woman managed to keep her tongue to say it.

"Roger that. Thank you, Jungkook, you are a gentleman.”

“Of course, get off the bike now.” He muttered as he snatched the iron from your hands and threw it behind his vehicle.

The trip was lethargic, the music faltered in the car with each curve until you reached a neighborhood of white houses and yellowish lights, the crickets chirped in the safe silence of a suburb. You thought about getting out when the car stopped and screaming until your lungs vomited.

But of course, when you arrived the garage door was open, the car slid across the smooth concrete without a sound.

“Do you mind if I look for a few things before I take you home?” His voice sounded so carefree that you almost believed you were going back to your dorm room. You shook your head as he went down to close the garage door, the darkness consuming your hope.

Your heart began to beat blood so fast that your hands began to try to open your door, Jungkook tilted his head at the noise until he saw your reflection in the side mirror.

"Why you do that? God, you’re so stupid.” Jungkook took your hair in his hands and without much effort dragged you out of the vehicle and onto the garage floor. His hand covered your mouth, his calloused and sweaty fingers undoing the button on your Levi's until they stuck to your ankles.

“It's only once, you have to reward me for the beer you had, you know?” His voice burned in your ear along with the beating of your heart, a light hum of your soul trying to get away from your dirty body.

“Mm-” You groaned as you felt the fabric of his jeans mold between your ass. Moving was in vain, fighting a mere fantasy.

“Just a quickie and then I'll drop you off, don't be so rigid.”

Your body was puppeteered to the living room with dim lights, curved and modern furniture that someone paid great attention to match with the upholstery and the carpet that decorated the floor.

And your body was thrown to the edge of the pink couch, the metal underneath the cloth digging into your stomach, your ass in the air as you felt cold hands remove your underwear. Why weren't you moving? Why did you let this happen to you? What was your mom doing right now? You thought of her chubby body moving around her room while organizing her dresses, folding the flowery pieces and tucking in it away in her closet. Peacefully humming gospel songs.

Warm spit fell onto your pussy and you closed your eyes, the last tear creating a shadow on the corrugated carpet as Jungkook slid his cock around the entrance to wet the entire area. The phone rang five, six, ten times next to you. Beep.

Hello, you are calling the sweet home of Bee, Dr. Kim and Taehyung. We are on vacation in Florida, but when we arrive we will take your message. Bye bye!

Who were the animated voices humming on the phone and why was Jungkook's voice there? You looked at the stranger loosening his grip on the sudden crackling laughter coming from the small speaker on the phone.

"Fuck." The now stranger mumbled, holding your neck with his forearm.

"You got the wrong kid, callgirl." And your eyes opened like a full moon, you looked at the closed windows of the room. “Taehyung, you have ten to hide.”

"Shit." Taehyung whimpered behind you pushing your body to the ground, instinctively you grabbed his leg causing his body to fall to the ground next to yours.

If you were going to die today, you wouldn't do it alone.

"Five, six…"

“What the fuck are you doing, you fucking whore?! I will die if he finds me.” His reddened face dragged trying to take your sudden weight and strength off of him. It was useless. Black Sabbath began to play above the house, reverberating, like thousands of wasps between the walls. “I'm sorry, I won't do it again, please. Let me go."

Taehyung's head reached the kitchen when a worn military boot stopped his movements. The muddy sole of the boot collided with Taehyung's head, making it bounce again and again and again against the wood of the kitchen. It was a hollow, wet sound, more forceful with each blow.

You leaned your body back until you collided with the sofa, your nails anchored in the carpet.

"Sorry. I'm sorry, ple-” Taehyung tried to speak until the boot took the last hit and his jaw hung from his mouth like a toy. His eyes looked back with mercy. Run, he shouted to you with his bleeding eyes, run until you die but run. A broomstick passed through his mouth until his body bounced once more. And then...

So still.

Drool was falling from the corners from having your mouth open for so long. Why didn't you run? Is it that the boot you were looking for so long? Was the cruelty of being curious true?

An excessively tall figure passed through the kitchen frame, avoiding Taehyung's lifeless body. Black was the first thing you saw: the dirty jeans, the leather jacket tied around his waist, the Motley Crue tank top pressing against his chest and shoulders. Sweat dripped from his mullet to his tattoos.

His face, soft and covered in red. His oval nose and thin lips, eyes like a dead deer. Metal surrounding the room like the choir of fallen angels.

It was him, it was Jungkook.

“Poor little thing.” He licked his lips as he held your chin so you were looking at him. “Look at you, so afraid of that fucking-” he growled under his breath, getting down to your level.

"Please don't kill me." You cried, the air was thick, like sulfur around him.

“I didn't promise you that in the call, baby. Did you forget already?"

His hands were delicate under your armpits until he lifted you up and took your body to the furniture sitting you on top of his wide thighs. Your body looking at the turned off television, the curved reflection showed the difference in size. You were a doll on top of that beast.

“Put your foot up.” He ordered as he grabbed your knee to help you put on your Levi's with the softness of a creature in feather hands. "Stop crying."

“I can't, I'm too scared, I want to go home.”

"Pity." Jungkook sighed, taking your underwear from his jeans, wet with some chemical. His tattooed fingers took the flimsy cotton to your nose. Bitter at first and then it burned in your lungs. “Don't try to fight it, it'll be worse for you, baby. Atta girl, just let go, inhale.” His voice was serious, unharmed, like an anesthetic just like the clorophorm. There was no harm in closing your eyes if you were in the great hands of a beast, a mammoth.

"I like you girls manageable, stupid." Was the last thing you heard, a smile grazing your neck.

Your body rose without permission, abrupt. The pain was immeasurable.

“Jimin, she's up!” You heard a small voice in the corner of a familiar room, the sheets rough and thick.

The silhouette of Jimin's younger brother ran to the kitchen. The other two brothers approached the door, their blond heads peeking out. Jimin pushed them until he reached you.

“Hyung-”

“Shut the door, JP. I’m sick of you, just eat your fucking breakfast and get out of the house.” Jimin shouted, looking at his brothers out of the corner of his eye.

The slow footsteps receded and Jimin turned his attention to you.

“Love, no, don't cry. I'm here.”

His name fell from your lips desperately as you squeezed his face, consuming every detail so your body knew it was real and wouldn't squirm like a worm.

“Breathe with me, come on.”

You closed your eyes hugging your boyfriend's neck.

“Come on, I've prepared a hot bath for you in the twins' room.” You shook your head frantically without breaking away. “It's just to get the mud off your body, then we'll go back to bed.”

"Mud?"

“Minjun found you outside this morning, do you know where you were last night, who did this to you?”

You grabbed the sheets and uncovered your body, bruises covering your legs and stomach. The dried mud covering the sheets of Jimin's bed. A scream choked in your throat.

“Its okay, I can change the sheets. Don’t worry about that. Let's go champ, up.” Jimin patted your injured thigh so you would chain your legs around his abdomen. With a grunt, Jimin lifted you up and carried you to a makeshift tub of hot water.

The little beds were together on one side of the small room, a metal tub emanating sweet steam covering the walls of the room in a thin web of drops.

“Raise your arms.” Jimin kissed your neck gently, the nausea returning little by little but you just let your body melt in the arms of the only person who mattered. His eyes shone with the concern of a father, he undressed you as quickly as possible so that the bruises didn't have time to hurt. Reaching your shorts, he knelt in front of you and stared at your tired face.

“I shouldn't have gone to the bar last night.” He wavered his speech for a second as he slowly lowered the zipper.

“Shh.” Your hand fell into his messy hair, he was still wearing his pajamas, what time did Jungkook throw you in front of Jimin's trailer?

The silence became strange, different. You didn't understand Jimin's sudden furrowed eyebrows when he took off your Levi's.

“Minnie?”

“Motherf-” Jimin stood up and hit the wall hard. His body turned around until he was looking at the jeans on the floor again. “That's it, I'm calling Yoongi.”

"What? Yoongi, what for? Minnie, don't leave, please."

"Don't move!"

Your boyfriend disappeared from the room before you asked him what was happening. You sighed with a heavy heart as you walked in pain to the mirror on the wall: a wide, slimy stain extended from front to back of your panties, hickies covered your stomach. The pants fell to the floor and you went to the mirror on the wall.

Your trembling finger curved until you felt the hole between your legs, the whitish and salty cum thread stretched from your entrance to your shocked face.

You don't remember Taehyung penetrating you. Was Jungkook such an animal that he came inside while you were passed out? How could he?

Tears gathered in your eyes as you laughed silently, the pain was unbearable around your waist and legs, pussy still numb and you could only remember the patterns on the carpet.

Cruel curiosity.

[captain-hawks]

Dee, I have Thoughts and no one irl to brainrot @ so pls excuse the umpteenth time I am in your notifications this weekend.

Last week I word vomited in your spicy requests about how much TraditionalGarb!Hoshina plagues my thoughts. Well, I went out for dinner and had a few cocktails, and my slightly drunk, pliant mind was churning the entire ride home. [Sober Note: I started this ask right when I got home, and now, having sobered up a bit, holy hell I am sorry for getting lost in the sauce and turning what was supposed to be drunk imagines into something ludicrous. I can't quite bring myself to delete it bc I was clearly so into it, but seriously if this is too long/annoying please just ignore me!]

I'm thinking of a historical period-era AU Hoshina clan. Not too familiar with Japanese history but maybe Edo period, idk about historical accuracy. In my imagines, reader is from a less influential, albeit wealthier clan, has 2 older brothers, and grew up around the Hoshina family from birth. Both their families are preoccupied with the eldest children and their role in continuing the family legacy/business, so their families don't hound them too closely in their childhoods. They're in a rural, countryside part of Japan with plenty of wild grass and flower fields. Soichiro holds all the weight of family expectation so he is more aloof. But Soshiro is allowed more freedom, so when he isn't obsessively training, he is spending time with reader as her closest childhood friend. Meanwhile, reader is trained in all the traditional arts and duties expected of her, but she also has a love for calligraphy (or painting but idk how accurate that is) that she is allowed to cultivate because, again, her parents aren't hounding her too closely. She's fascinated by Soshiro's swordsmanship and makes him show her all the moves he is learning, and in turn, he is enthralled by her knowledge and love of calligraphy and likes to hear her talk about it for hours even if he doesn't quite get it. Because they're in a rural area, they also play outdoors together whenever they can, climbing trees and splashing in the streams, and Soshiro is rough-and-tumble and free around her in ways he can't be at home when he's ceaselessly trying to measure up to and surpass his brother. As they grow older they are naturally forced apart due to expectations of their genders and stations. They still hold onto what they believe is a fondness for their childhood friend, until one day, as the wild wisteria blooms and they see a glimpse of each other after an absence of several months, they both realize that the innocent fondness held in their hearts had taken root long ago and finally bloomed into love.

Unfortunately, in the Edo period, warrior families started to lose their place in this era of newfound peace, and the Hoshinas are forced to worry about their place in this world for the first time. At the same time, reader's clan is struck by tragedy and her 2 older brothers are killed in an accident, leaving a vacuum for the future of the clan. The Hoshina and Reader patriarchs decide on what they believe is a mutually beneficial arrangement: Soichiro and Reader shall join their clans in marriage. Reader's clan benefits from the prestige of the Hoshina name, and the Hoshina clan benefits from the prosperous wealth of her family. As the sole remaining offspring of her clan, she should be honored to be chosen to helm the Hoshina household and bear its heirs.

Ofc Reader is devastated, but she knows that her voice is unimportant and she will forever be doomed to suffer in a life so close to her dreams, but with a cruel twist. She sees Soshiro just once after the engagement announcement, and it is with a too-cheerful mask that he congratulates her on her match, and, in a moment when no one is looking, he slips into her hands a small gift that he had picked up in the capitol on his last trip and had been meaning to give to her: some fine new ink he thought she would love for her calligraphy. He supposes it is an engagement gift now, even if the gift is only really for her.

On the eve of her wedding, she manages to sneak out and find Soshiro. Together, they go to the grassy field of wildflowers by the creek they played in as children. Even though fate is not on their side, it seems the moon has sympathy for them, because it hides behind clouds and conceals their illicit meeting. They're finally able to declare their love for one another in the place where it all began. She tells Soshiro that even though destiny was determined to keep them apart, she wants to know what it is to wholly love and be loved, just once in her life. So under the glow of a thousand fireflies, she undresses Hoshina, gently pulling his kosode apart to reveal his chest. She laughs lightly as she traces his scars-the old and familiar ones from childhood, and the newer ones he has acquired in manhood. She traces the marks she remembers: the dented scar on his shoulder from when he fell out of the cypress tree trying to grab a beetle to impress her when they were five. The patch of slightly uneven skin along his arm from three years later, when he had run after his father's horse in the road and tripped down the hill. The thin, raised slash from when Soichiro had cut him in training at age 11, to teach him a lesson on inferiority. From there, she draws lines to the unfamiliar marks: a puffy patch of new skin from a recent battle wound that has only started to heal, two pigmented gashes where he was gouged in battle last year, a mottled expanse of bruises on his ribs from where he had challenged Soichiro last month, just after the engagement announcement, and had finally shown his brother that his attempted lesson in inferiority had never sunk in.

She says that all these marks tell her a story in the same way a calligrapher's soul is left indelibly in their brushstrokes. She sees a world in his body, and it tells her favorite story. Overwhelmed, Soshiro finally crashes into her and through the flurry of kissing he has her on her back in the grass, slipping her out of her garments. He's mapping his way across her significantly less blemished skin with his lips and tongue, and laments between pants that he will never be able to partake in the story of her body, because she belongs to his brother and he cannot leave his own brushstrokes on the expanse of her skin. Breathless, reader pulls a bottle tucked into her undergarment next to her heart-a vial of the precious ink Soshiro had gifted her. Her wedding is tomorrow-she knows there is no way he can leave any lasting marks on her. But for tonight, she is his and she wants some proof of that, however temporary. So Soshiro dips his finger in the ink and swirls and dips it all over the memories he has buried in his mind: a spot on her neck where a particularly vicious bee had stung her as they chased tadpoles as six-year-olds, a whorl on her shoulder where his ten-year-old head rested as she unrolled endless scrolls to extol the virtues of some long-dead calligrapher, an almost-violent slash just under the swell of her bosom where he had caught her when she had fallen in her attempt to swing his katana at 13.

And as he finally lines up his achingly hard cock and breaches her cunt, as he makes love to her for the first and last time, he grieves for the death of the two stories written here-hers, which will be washed off her body as soon as she returns to her home, and his, which will wither and end without her to trace the patterns and give them the meaning he can never find by himself. [sober note/holy run on sentence batman]

you better believe i'm posting this ask because IT NEEDS TO BE SEEN!!!

MY FRIEND!!!!! i'm on my knees. i'm begging. i'm clawing at the air. i'm frantically waving anything of value that i have in your direction. i implore you to write this because i'm wholly obsessed. a period piece, childhood friends, the arranged marriage, THE YEARNING, THE LOVELY POETRY OF IT ALL EVEN JUST AS A SUMMARIZED VERSION!?!?!?

She says that all these marks tell her a story in the same way a calligrapher's soul is left indelibly in their brushstrokes. She sees a world in his body, and it tells her favorite story.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(don't even get me started on him painting on her????? oh my god i'm so unwell. i need one of those fainting couches. i want to CONSUME THISSSSS)

you're a genius. a brilliant wonderful genius.

[after-witch]

Gutter [Yandere Mahito x Reader]

Title: Gutter [Yandere Mahito x Reader]

Synopsis: Mahito took you a while ago. He’s not human. But it gets harder and harder to remember that. 

Word Count: 3000ish

Notes: yandere, kidnapped reader, noncon sex, mentions of mild physical abuse, degradation

You were so unremarkable that you doubted if even your parents could come up with something unique about you. Much less teachers, much less your (distant) friends. 

You were just… you. 

But there was something special about you, wasn’t there? Something that you never told anyone about, because by the time it happened--puberty, of course, it was always puberty--you were old enough to know that it spelled nothing but trouble.

Unremarkable, nobody-worth-mentioning-you… could see curses. Most people couldn’t, unless they had a talent for sorcery. You didn’t. 

But you were unlucky enough to casually see the awful things usually hidden behind a thick blissful wall. A barrier that kept people from realizing a curse was latched onto their side, their back, their throat.

You did your best to ignore them. Look away. Pretend they weren’t real and go about your business and hope to heaven that none of them would ever try to latch onto you. 

But one day, looking away from them wasn’t enough.

Because you bumped straight into a curse who didn’t look like a curse. And at first, you’d stammered, eyes to the ground, apologizing for being so clumsy to the man who was the unfortunate victim of your inability to pay attention to your surroundings.

“Oh,” the man said, “What’s this?” And it was the oddest thing. His voice sounded almost like a pleased purr. But why--?

The realization was slow, like walking through molasses. 

You’d looked up, starting from his feet, slowly taking in an appearance that looked like it belonged on some Halloween show. A strange outfit. Scars, stitches, and mis-matched eyes.  

A costume, maybe? But even you didn’t entertain that thought for long, because something about him was inherently wrong. It made your gut boil. 

He peered down at you, a soft, growing curiosity on his face. His eyes were different colors. His face was stitched. 

And then he grinned, and you knew what he was, because inside that grin was everything horrible that ever was and ever would be. 

He was a curse. And he was smiling at you.

But it was too late for you to do anything about it.

--

The couch underneath you was stained and patched. But it was better than sitting on the concrete of the sewer, so you were grateful for it. 

That’s what your life had dwindled down to--being grateful for a ratty, old sofa with mysterious (and regrettably, some not-so-mysterious) stains on the cushions.

You pick idly at one of the patches as Mahito comes into view, holding up a DVD case like it was a prized possession. You look up at him, because if you try to pretend he’s not there, he’s going to get annoyed. And if he gets annoyed…

“I got us a new movie!” He says, almost singsong. “It’s supposed to be very popular. I wonder why…” He flips over the case and skims over the back, and it makes your chest hurt. He looks so normal, in moments like these. He shouldn’t. He’s not normal. He’s not even a person, for God’s sake--

All thoughts cease as he inserts the DVD into the player and walks behind you, to what you might call the “kitchen” if you were going to call it anything. In reality it was a table stacked with haphazard boxed foods, a microwave and a small refrigerator intended for drinks. 

This last gadget he’d only dragged down here after the third or fourth bout of all-night vomiting from foods left out at room temperature. And even then, he’d fought your begging with a smile and soothing words. “But I don’t mind when you throw up! I don’t think it’s gross at all. Really, you shouldn’t be so self-conscious.”

The sound of popcorn from behind you doesn’t come as a surprise. Nor is the scraping dread in your stomach that follows as he plops himself down on the couch and throws his arms around your shoulder unfamiliar--only unwelcome.

It’s a comedy. At least he didn’t lie about that. You barely pay attention, but he does. He laughs, his arms wrapped around you, pulling you close now and then. It’s like you’re a couple having a movie night when the roommates are away. 

Only you’re not.

His fingers dig into the bowl of popcorn, and there’s a steady crunch as he eats (even though he doesn’t need to) and watches a comedy (even though he gets amusement from far nastier things on a regular basis) and snuggles against you.

“Not hungry?” 

His sudden voice is so close, his breath unnaturally cool against your cheek. It’s a blissful reminder of his inhumanity, that coolness. 

You shrug. You should eat. At least popcorn won’t give you food poisoning. 

You make no move to grab from the bowl, so he scoops another handful of popcorn into his palm and holds it up to your mouth, like he’s presenting a treat to a horse. 

You slowly open your mouth--what might happen if you don’t?--and he pushes the pieces inside one by one. His long fingers linger on your lips, dragging over them, and you shudder.

--

“I like them both, really, but I want your opinion.” 

Mahito shifts the two lingerie sets up and down, like he’s weighing them on a scale. One is a short black one-piece that is primarily see-through, with attached black garters creating a lascivious effect even on the hanger. The other is all pink frills, frou-frou to the extreme. 

The thought of wearing either makes you want to throw up, and you screw your eyes shut and turn your head away. Maybe if you don’t give him a reaction, he’ll get bored and move on.

You should know better, though. He doesn’t mind prodding at you until you give him a response. Sometimes, you realize you should be grateful for that. He could just kill you, if you stopped being entertaining. Instead he makes sure you’re not fully tuning out, not fully retreating into a blank shell where you can imagine you’re somewhere else.

“Ahh, you’re feeling shy?” He grins and drapes both sets over a chair. You curl your fingers inward until they pinch your palms. “It’s okay. I’m the only one who will see  you in them, you know…”

You dig in harder, until Mahito’s hand is on your chin, and your eyes open out of jerky reflex.

“Was that the wrong thing to say?” He looks genuinely confused, and genuinely curious. He lets go of your chin and slots himself next to you on the bed. “You’ll look good in either set! Or you can wear nothing. You’re prettier than me, did you know that?”

It’s like he’s trying out different things, to see what makes you tick in the right way. Or is he trying to make you feel better? Either option makes your chest tighten for different reasons.

You give him a tired, withering look.

He grins, and pokes your cheek.

“Don’t worry. If you can’t pick, I don’t mind taking the decision off your shoulders!”

--

Sometimes, Mahito fucks you. It’s never quite the same. It makes you feel like one of his experiments, though you’re writhing for quite a different reason than they are as he hums and decides just how large he wants to make himself for this particular session. 

You’ve only come a few times, and it was essentially by accident. Mahito was mostly concerned with his own gratification, with stretching--sometimes literally--the limits to see what he could do. You don’t care, not really, but you can’t say it makes the experience more enjoyable when you’re left sore and unfulfilled. 

Lately, though, he’s added something startling. More startling than when he surprises you with extra hands to shove roughly inside or an impossibly long tongue snaking into your mouth, choking you.

Now, he’s taken to holding you after sex. Not holding you down while you whimper and squirm, but simply… holding you. Quiet and calm. 

And that’s where you are now, snug in his arms, sweat on your brow, as he guides your head to rest on his shoulder and rests his own chin on top of your head. His hands come up to stroke at your cheek, and you’re so tired, so dazed, that you don’t even flinch.

“That is pleasant, isn’t it?” He murmurs. You can’t tell if he’s asking you or talking to himself.

Pleasant…

As if he didn’t force you. As if he didn’t hold you down. As if there weren’t bruises on your wrists, your neck, your soul.

But as he pulls you closer and you find yourself lulled by the idle strokes of his fingers on your skin, the calmness exuding from his body, you can’t help but feel your body relax until it feels heavy and buzzing.

This was pleasant.

If you ignored everything else that came before.

--

Mahito pries open your thighs with only token resistance on your part, since you aren’t keen on the all too familiar bruises from his fingers today.

This is not unusual.

Mahito spreads your legs apart and doesn’t immediately start fucking you with his fingers or cock.

This is a little unusual.

Mahito crawls in between your legs, flat on his stomach, and rests his chin in his hand while he stares intently at your pussy.

This is definitely unusual.

“What are you…” You lean up on  your elbows, curiosity and fear swirling sourly in  your stomach.

He pouts up at you.

“I’ve been selfish, haven’t I? I read a book…” He points to the stack of books piled next to his hammock, as if you know exactly which one he’s talking about. “It says women are often ignored by men when it comes to sex. That some women don’t even get to orgasm!” He sighs, drawing it out. “I have been ignoring you… so awful.”

His gaze returns to between your legs, 

There is a dueling urge to snap your thighs shut or spread them wider. 

Mahito makes the choice for you. He reaches out and gently pulls the lips of your pussy apart.

“This little button for instance… the book said most women need it touched.”

You swallow hard. 

His thumb reaches out and strokes your clit, softly, almost tickling. 

“It’s like a little pearl.” There’s a grin in his voice as he continues to rub. You can’t help it when your hips grind down, wanting more friction than he’s giving. He seems to take the hint and presses harder, and there’s a delightful spark of pressure that runs straight down your gut.

“Mahito,” you gasp.

“I like that,” he whispers. “Say my name like that again. Like you want me. And you do, don’t you?” He grins. “Now that I’m touching this cute pearl…” His words bring tears to your eyes, or maybe it’s his touch–you can’t tell the difference. 

His thumb begins to rub slow circles around your clit, the pressure increasing your pleasure with every touch.

“Mahito.” Your voice is a soft keen. You don’t even mean to obey his order, it’s entirely instinctive. He’s making you feel good and you should say his name.

“The book said that not all women can orgasm without different types of stimulation, too, so..."

He leans his head closer, and you're only barely aware of what he's doing before his tongue licks a long stripe that ends with wiggling his tongue tip around your clit.

“Oh--”

He shifts gears, then, lapping at you slowly yet firmly.

You throw back your head and let out a series of keening grunts. It’s not enough to get off, not yet, not when you went from completely untouched to being lapped at like a bowl of milk, but…

“This is better, huh?” His words are practically spoken into your pussy, and you can feel the way some of your wetness clings to his lips as he speaks. “I still want to have my fun, but you should have fun too, shouldn’t you?” Again, you can’t quite tell if he’s asking you or simply affirming it to himself. 

It doesn’t matter, because all you can really focus on is his tongue, and the way the digit begins to swirl around your clit, applying more pressure.

“Yes,” you breathe out, moaning. Your fingers clench the sheets. “More--like that, like that, please, oh please.” 

Mahito presses a chaste kiss to your swelling clit. “Are all human women so polite when you lick them here? Or just you?” Heat burns your cheeks. But he doesn’t need an answer, and in a moment you feel his tongue on you again, tracing firmer patterns, providing just the right pressure for a warm tension to grow perfectly right. 

Your head turns from side to side--you want it, you don’t, you do--as the tension between your legs builds and builds until it finally snaps and floods your senses with red hot sparks. Your legs kick out helplessly, and your breathy moans are almost bewildered. 

Mahito keeps licking, soft little laps, until your body relaxes and you begin to come down from the high. Gradually your heart rate slows, gradually you realize exactly what happened. 

He waits until you look at him to speak.

“You looked absolutely ridiculous like that, did you know?”

His grinning mouth glistens with your wetness. Heat flushes from your chest to your face at the sight of it--and the way his words make your stomach twist in shame. 

“But don’t worry, I like it. I want to see that face again…”

You don’t have time to do more than whimper as he lowers himself back down between your legs. He licks his lips grotesquely, his tongue stretching until he’s lapped up every bit of you clinging to his mouth, before he returns his tongue to your clit. 

This time, the pleasure is mingled with a vague over-stimulation that makes you let out little keening whimpers every time he presses harder with his tongue. Sweat beads on your forehead and your back stretches as you grind yourself down towards him, wanting more despite how strange it feels. 

It’s so much… but it still feels good, and if anything, you reach your peak faster now that you (and Mahito) have had a taste of it. The second orgasm hits harder, and you gasp with your mouth strained open as your back arches so far you’re worried it might pull out. 

But he’s not done.

He’s not done, because his fingers are back on your clit even before you get time to catch your breath, pinching it firmly enough to make you squeal. 

“Not again,” you groan, half-whining. “I can’t--oh, I can’t, please,  Mahito, Mahito--it’s too much.” 

Mahito hums, and positions himself until he’s looming over you, his fingers still working your clit as your legs kick and your hips try to twitch out of his reach. His other hand--it must be a third one, because his palm goes to rest on your cheek--pins your hip down with ease. There will be bruises later.

Mahito leans down close to your ear. His cool breath almost snaps you to reality, but then his finger is rubbing your clit back and forth, stimulating the bundle of nerves until you swear you see sparks behind your eyes. 

“Try,” he murmurs in your ear, all cold honey and poison. “Try for me, won’t you? Since you’re being so good for me?”

It hurts, but it feels good. It’s too much, but you want more. You feel ashamed, but you don’t care. 

You murmur something soft and pitiful, something like assent, and his eyes widen as he thrusts a finger inside you to aid with the stimulation of your clit. 

You grunt, primal in your pleasure, as he doesn’t let up the stimulation until the painfully good feeling in your clit tightens to the point of release. It’s like someone has pulled a string running from your belly to your clit as taught as possible and let it go--there’s relief and pleasure and discomfort all rolled into one overwhelming experience. Your legs and thighs shake wildly as you clench around his finger, and Mahito’s third hand releases your held hip. He leans back and watches you from head to toe, taking it all in, committing it to memory. 

As you come down from the overstimulated high, you feel his finger pull out just before he leans down and presses a wet, hungry kiss to your mouth. You don’t need to be forced to open your mouth this time, gasping as his tongue--thankfully the normal size--swirls around yours. 

You murmur something into his mouth, unprovoked, not even realizing that it’s coming out until he pulls back and asks you to repeat yourself without his tongue in the way. 

“Thank you,” you repeat. Your voice is soft and meek and God help you, grateful. Sexual experiences with Mahito never felt like this. Especially not twice. Especially not three times, over-stimulation notwithstanding.

Mahito’s thumb trails across your lower lip. He opens his mouth, but whatever he said is retracted as he closes it again. He presses a sloppy smooch to your nose and pulls back, all energy, all excitement.

“Now it’s my turn for fun, okay?” He’s grinning, and the exuberance is almost contagious as you find yourself letting out a short, startled little laugh at his sudden change. 

He glances down at you, and the soft, curious expression he wore when he first met you is there on his face. It’s smoothed over in a moment, replaced with a grin. Replaced with his hands spreading your thighs even wider, and his fingers pushing his trousers down until his erect cock is right in view.

If you were thinking and not caught in a brain fog from your triple orgasms, the physical and mental turmoil that they took, the reappearance of that curious expression might give you pause. Might make you think. Might make you wonder about why he made it, and what he’s thinking, and what it means for you. 

But all you can think about is whether or not Mahito will try to make you come for a fourth (and a fifth? And a--) time while his cock is sheathed inside you. All you can think about is how good his cock might feel this time, with your pussy wet from multiple orgasms and your nerves tingling and stimulated.

There will be bruises, afterward. There are always bruises, with Mahito. Sometimes ones you can’t even see.  This time will be no different, in that respect. 

But this time, the memory of his wrists gripping yours or his mouth biting bruises into your neck will be mingled with the way your back arched and toes curled and the sight of Mahito's face, glistening with your pleasure on his lips.

[strarri]

here is me just rambling about kimetsu gakuen obamitsu :33 1.6k word vomit i did not reread this whatsoever and i might just continue!!

obamitsu in the kimetsu gakuen needs more appreciation… i find obanai and mitsuri’s relationship in the kimetsu gakuen just so cute and its tearing me apart GRHAHHHHH

it’s an alternate universe, so just imagine the two in a relationship without demons without trauma. i still don’t get why obanai still wears a mask even though we’ve seen the snake demon in the diner and he doesn’t seem to know her at all so i’m assuming they kept it for his signature designs sake. i understand it since there are alot of writing holes on all of the characters in the gakuen, since you do take away the demons that make them, well them?? small headcanon that obanai is just allergic to everything that it’s embarrassing

he still has issues with eating food in public and still eats small portions or nothing at all, and the writers just stuck with him being aftaid of women?? (shown in chapter 10 and the extra scene in chapter 30) so they really just kept him as obanai iguro with no trauma. it’s kind of sad that the gakuen author never mentioned a reason why he’s still the same but it is just a highschool au and there’s nothing we can do about it either way. i find it rather unfortunate that iguro barely appears in the gakuen at all

i really do love obanai and mitsuri’s wardrobe in this au though, their outfits look really comfy and even matching their personalities. a part of me doesn’t imagine mitsuri to be the type to wear revealing clothing, not that it’s a problem or anything!!!! but her vibes just remind me of a gal who lives in the fifth floor apartment taking care of 23 cats, i think she’s a cat lady. her outfits in the gakuen consists of pieces like turtlenecks, long skirts, jackets, and maybe hats and i LOVE ITT!!! considering she’s an artist as well so her outfit colors are so cute and sandwich well together

and i just love obanai’s wardrobe is like a basic middle aged teacher and it’s so funny he really is just some basic guy with or without demons…. the kind of guy who has “I 🩷 my GF”(mitsuri bought them matching mugs) or “No. #1 Snake Guy” (mitsuri gave him that as a christmas present) imprinted on his coffee mug. or OR his favorite mug is just a cute cat mug.. that mitsuri gave him….

it’s really obvious but i noticed that obanai and mitsuri are actually dating/ and their relationship is so healthy that it’s like “oh my gosh i saw a kite today” and sends a picture to the other person thinking they’d like how it looked, like they talk to eachother about EVERYTHINGG that goes on in their life, because they wish they were together in that moment!!! i think they just communicate alot and it’s adorable.. but i just noticed this cute detail in the chapter where gyomei was trying to get the cat plushy and mitsuri wanted to take a pic of tengen and him and send it to iguro because it was funnyy and the one where she was talking about her lil sushi manga.

i think their occupations in the gakuen are just really silly in general, i can visualize mitsuri stressing about her college terms and part time job and asks obanai to help her😭being a teacher is arduous work as well though so at times their schedules definitely aren’t well fitting so… i’d like to think that they visited each others places to study??work?? or just be in each others presence to lighten the stress <33

mitsuri is the cliche broke college student, working her ass off to pass her class and to pay for her month’s worth of rent soo, buying things for her own accord is probably a rare occasion for her, and obanai probably funds alot of it😭😭mitsuri isn’t the type to ask for things, so obanai probably volunteers to treat her to things like restaurants, get her nails done, buy some materials for her drawings whenever her money is in the slums, though i know mitsuri can handle herself of course!!

in one of the extra panels in chapter 30, though iguro is afraid of women, and especially eating food infront of others, he still tries his best to not upset the students who don’t deserve of it. he still thought of a solution to help the butterfly triplets with their medicine stall even if he himself couldn’t taste test their medicine and it shows that he still cares for his students, though definitely has a bad side with the lousy ones

mitsuris hobbies are like the silliest thing ever and it’s so fitting for her?? she just draws cute little characters just for the sake of making people smile and giggle and i love her for it. i think she’d go to iguro whenever she was facing writers block trying to make an outline for her manga considering he is a teacher and all??? if it were anyone else, iguro would probably think the idea of food manga was silly, maybe childish(?) but it’s mitsuri he has grown to her silliness!! if mitsuri were to ask iguro for critique or advice he’d probably have to broaden his own imagination because obanai seems like the type who can’t even comprehend the idea of walking food.. he is REALLY closed minded

mitsuri has an image of iguro where he’s like the sweetest, nicest, well adored teacher ever(maybe an overstatement?? im totally convinced) and it’s actually so funny.. like what if she found out iguro tied his students up on a daily basis and throws bottle rockets at them just for being noisy?? and even better what if this image of him still remained in her head after knowing that nevertheless??? she’s so hopelessly inlove its pathetic and it’s KILLING MEEE

i’d like to imagine that mitsuri would just text him while he was in the middle of the class and then he’d just run to get his phone the moment his gf texts him, and then someone like zenitsu goes like “mr. igurooo, how d-“ “shut up!” ???? he needs to cut zenitsu some slack but its way too funny

and and!!! even though they have phones since this au takes place in the modern era, they still send love letters to eachother crow style??? and mitsuri’s letters are designed so cutely it actually hurtsss… they’re genuinely so romantic and no shame in that at all!!!! like fuck texts look at them doing traditional romantic gestures:33

this applies to literally any other universe but i still think it’s cute, i don’t think iguro is written to have any trauma in the gakuen but he deals with ed and probably some stress from being a highschool teacher, yet mitsuri is the one person that melts those cold walls of his and he’s able to show vulnerability towards her :(( he really does his best to show how much he loves her by putting so much thought into his gifts and actions, like hell he needed help from two highschool students just to decide a gift for mitsuri but knowing her she would have love him to be with her all the same.

there is clear sign that mitsuri doesn’t doubt that he loves her at all!! there are still steps and layers in their relationship that are yet to be but mitsuri willingly waits for him nevertheless, and of course iguro waits for her as well.

i’m just so happy that there was nothing like demons and trauma to stop them from expressing their love for eachother, in the second fanbook it is mentioned that mitsuri never confessed to iguro due to the trauma from her previous marriage interview (fuck that guy) and that she has always thought he was just nice to others. which probably proves my statement from before? iguro could shoot her ex and mitsuri would still be head over heels for him?? OR MAYBE MORE????

but yeah again their relationship being official in the gakuen brings me pure bliss😭and the two wouldn’t have to embarrassingly pine for eachother until they reached their death bed. i just find their relationship so cute and intriguing, i’m dead glad it’s canon but i really wish there was more content of them shown in the anime in some way. especially mitsuri, she was barely given two minutes of screentime in the hashira training arc and it hurts me, it’s sad because her breathing style is such an awesome concept but it’ll barely be given screen time going forward. i personally love kimetsu no yaiba and its story, and i appreciate that it actually focuses on the fighting elements, but i really wish that they gave a bit more credit to one of their most significant romantic elements.. (includes hakuji and koyuki & amane and kagaya i love them) some more official art would’ve been nice i’d continue talking about this but it’s derailing from the gakuen topic😭

most of my source is just chapter 10 and some mentions from other chapters but… if you need pictures of my points i can provide. mostly?? i really just need more gakuen chapters specifically obamitsu centric it’s not funny anymore. i’d love to know how they got together and as i’m writing this im beginning to scramble my brain for ideas so i could make a fanfic outline that i’d probably just draft again… if someone were reading this post i encourage you to write an obamitsu gakuen au PLEASE.. maybe a long fic haha… but anything is enough for me really, there are barely any fics i find on ao3 considering most of the ones i find are really just obamitsu as a side ship which kinda makes me sad, i do personally aspire to become better at writing so i could start making stuff for others to enjoy as well but my time is diminishing as i have alot to do.

i think this is enough rambling<33 i’d hope to spread the obamitsu brainrot because i dont want to be the only one stuck here

anyways dropping screenshots but just read the kimetsu gakuen😭💗

Chapter 10 is obamitsu centric but there are bits on other chapters! :3

https://ww7.demonslayermanga.com/chapter/kimetsu-gakuen-chapter-1/

[daflangstlairde-art]

lightning in our fingertips today

Work 1 of DFL's Whumptober 2024

Summary:

Donnie and Leo get hit with a wayward body swap spell. You could say it gives Donnie a new perspective on the matters of his dear twin. When was Leo going to tell them that his Ninpō hurts him?

—

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Raph was, in fact, able to fit through Donnie’s portal, though it was a tight squeeze, him and his bombastic size. Which was beneficial as always, considering today’s foe. 

“Mikey!” Leo yelled in Donnie’s voice, but with his own Leader Voice™, “He's gonna bring down that building, there's people–” 

“ON IT!” Mikey yelled back, which was as much of a relief as it wasn't. He was one of their heavy hitters, yet nimble and dexterous enough to greatly evade the giant robot they were fighting at the moment. 

Oh, yeah, by the way. They’re fighting a big robot, controlled by one boy wannabe-genius Baxter Stockboy. 

(That little twerp was lucky the robot was bulky and colored and didn’t quite resemble the K–)

“I’LL SHOW YOU WHO'S A LITTLE TWERP!” the kid belted through the robot’s intercom, swinging yet another massive fist. He wasn't quite Godzilla sized, thankfully, he was smaller than that Purple Dragons mech; but he was big enough to cause some concerning destruction. Especially with his uncoordinated piloting of the thing, and he had the gall to call himself a kid genius, Donnie could do better in his sleep–!

Ahem.

Raph was matching him swing for swing, taking the brunt of the damage.

What was Donnie doing during all this?

Oh, not much, thanks for asking. Mostly feeling useless. 

Leon’s swords were akin to toothpicks compared to this guy’s sheer size. Metal against metal? Not very useful. And it was becoming horribly evident to Donnie just how much they’ve grown to rely on Leo’s portals during battle—moving them in and out and sideways and up and down at a constant pace based on so, so much trust of his sheer capability to conceptualize and execute it all in mere seconds. 

And yes, sure, Donnie would try. He would eat one of Raph’s post-workout socks before he ever said Leo was smarter than him! 

If it wasn't for the NEAR-LITERAL SHOCKS OF EVERY PORTAL. 

(Yes, he had attempted the thing where Leo hurled his sword and teleported to it. It made him immediately bend over and almost vomit. Woo.) 

And Donnie wouldn't be feeling quite so cripplingly superfluous in this altercation, if he wasn't watching Leo use his own mystic powers unbothered. 

He watched Leo laugh with his voice, whizzing through the air with his hover shell. He watched Leo summon a construct of a large rocket at the end of the bō, spinning in a circle for momentum and slamming it into Stockbot, synchronizing it with Raph’s attack to try and bring the robot down. Leo then immediately flew away, flipping and stumbling through the air to avoid the big hand attempting to snatch him. He readied several constructs of... something... sharp, not any specific object (he was already building his personalized way of using Donnie’s Ninpō–), and sent them off to barrage the control punct of the robot. It had admittedly durable defenses, unfortunately, but if they just managed to crack it open, Donnie could get inside and disable it.

Or he could just portal in, haha! Not.

Donnie swallowed the thorns in his throat. His right shoulder hurt, sending its painful pulses down his arm and between his shoulder blades as well.

It– it was an awful feeling. It was choking and freezing, this inner mockery of useless useless useless. 

What good was he, as the robot punched Raph so hard his projection wavered? What good was he, as Stockbot slapped Leo and sent him hurling through the air? What good was he, as concrete and glass rained down from all the fighting, narrowly avoiding Mikey as he rushed people out with the help of his chains?

(There were more people than they thought, Mikey sure was taking his time–)

What good was he, small and weak? What good was he, with complicated and janky portals? 

What good was he, cocky and arrogant with nothing to show for it? What good was he, lazy and careless? 

What good was he, a leader stationary in the middle of a fight? 

What good was he, letting his BROTHERS get HURT?! 

What good was he alive when they were DY–?! 

“NO YOU STUPID MUTANTS–!”

“MIKEY GET OUT FROM–” 

Donnie was snapped back to reality at the sound of his own voice, and then there was a massive crash as finally, finally the robot was sent toppling over.

...Right into an already compromised building, concrete and glass and supports all shattering and crumbling under his weight. 

“MIKEY!” 

“MIKEY–”

“NO!”

Crumbling right on top of their little brother. 

(And, like, a whole bunch of people, or whatever.)

And Donnie was hurling a sword through the air before he thought twice about it. And to the same melody, only the afterimage of purple flew through his vision, and then everything. Collapsed. 

Donnie braced in place, going into his shell for protection as rocks fell to the ground and shattered. Car horns going off, glass shards raining, dust and pebbles kicking up and expanding outwards and making him hack and cough even hidden inside. 

“MIKEY!” Raph’s yell was loud enough to echo off alongside the cacophony of the scene. The creaking and crashing kept going off, alarms blaring, people yelling, sirens in the distance getting nearer. 

And judging by the sudden oddness of some of the sounds, Donnie immediately knew exactly what his older brother was trying to do. 

“RAPH WAIT NO!” Donnie shot out of Leo’s shell, picking up the one katana still with him, that he'd dropped. He coughed in the middle of all the dust, but the red glow of Raph’s Ninpō was easily visible through it. 

“I’M GETTING ‘EM OUT!” 

“NO!” Donnie insisted, desperate. “RAPH, LISTEN!” 

And Raph paused, hands on the rubble of the collapsed building. 

“Leo used my Ninpō, he probably created a pocket of SPACE for them!” Donnie yelled up at him, “Do NOT move the rest! You may set the structural integrity off and SEND IT ALL CRASHING ON TOP OF THEM!” 

He couldn't quite make out Raph’s expression at this, though the dust was settling. However, so very carefully, his older brother put aside the pieces he was already holding. 

“And YOU!” Donnie snarled at Stockboy, flying away through an emergency parachute and ditching the robot in the still-collapsing remains of the building. Dust was still being unsettled, so he couldn’t even see the kid’s face. “You better DEAL WITH THIS!”

“What do you want me to do?! I CAN’T EVEN GET THE MECH OUT BECAUSE YOU TURTLES BROKE IT!” Stockboy seethed. However, he sounded much less confident than before. Notes of nervousness, perhaps guilt in his voice. Donnie would guess he did NOT mean for all this to get so out of hand. 

“Then what the heck do we do?!” Raph exclaimed, panicky. 

“I– I sent a sword in there!” Donnie informed him, “I can... get them out!” he stated, though he himself was... unsure quite how to do that. Uh. Uh. 

(Useless good for nothing selfish they're dead because of you you're NOTHING–)

He squeezed his eyes shut, trembling beneath the weight of... of... of whatever he was feeling, what was he feeling?! 

Panic, surely. He had to get their brothers out of there. 

Raph dissipated his projection to come up to him and place his hands on his shoulders—Leo’s shoulders, Leo was in there, they were going to die–

“Hey, hey, L– Dee, it's okay,” Raph spoke and Donnie latched onto it. “Breathe, brother,” 

Argh, right, he'd forgotten to do that, what with all the dust. But it was settled now, and Donnie gasped in a proper breath, and then another, and another, coughing a little.

“You've got this!” Raph clapped his back, looking towards the debris. People were coming out to crowd around the massive pile of crumbling concrete, concerned and scared for those trapped inside.

Right, Donnie had to get them out. Right. 

...How in the FLIPPY TIME AND SPACE was he going to get them out?! His body felt too tight, and he felt overwhelmed. There was some tar-like feeling absolutely choking his lungs (hateful inadequacy). It felt like there was a building collapsed on top of him. 

“I, I...” 

“It's okay! You've got this Don! You just gotta focus!” Raph encouraged him. And... and that did help. A smidge. 

Even though Raph’s claim was entirely baseless. 

Even though he was useless he's always been useless all he’ll ever be good for is GETTING THEM KILLED–

Donnie bonked his head with a fist, clenching his jaw. He had to focus. 

Focus on the sword. 

Focus on your brothers. 

Focus on how needed you are. Focus on how much you love them.

Focus on– why couldn't Donnie just focus?! 

Human emergency personnel were arriving to deal with the immediate damages of the situation. The Invasion was a mere month ago, the city still hadn't healed from that; this won't be their priority for long. Save whoever you can, add another wreckage to the tally. 

Donnie needed to get his brothers out. So why couldn't he? 

There was a background screaming in his head. Drowning out everything else with you're useless you've always been useless you're nothing without them you're nothing to compared to them. Selfish and arrogant and lazy and uncoordinated and mean and annoying and unpredictable. Waste of space of air of life, they're so much better off without you. 

You should've went into that building. You should've bit the bullet and endured the wreckage and made yourself worth something for once in your pathetic life. 

(Donnie was on the ground, curled up, hands pressed to the sides of his head. He wanted to vocally beg it all to just shut up shut up SHUT UP–)

You should've made better calls during the fight, you should've moved, you should've done SOMETHING besides STANDING there and being WORTHLESS. 

You were supposed to LEARN. You were supposed to be BETTER and you couldn't even do THAT. You RUINED them, you've ruined them your ENTIRE LIFE and you will never, EVER stop. 

You died once and it didn't even stick. 

Might as well have STAYED DEA– 

—

Donnie had a meltdown in the middle of the wreckage. Donnie almost threw up on the ground while his oldest brother held him, desperately trying to figure out how to help. Donnie felt like screaming. Donnie felt like taking the katana, Leo’s katana, and– 

...

Thankfully, he calmed down faster than the emergency services work. Or... “calmed down” is... too good of a label. Really, something inside him cut into his flesh, and his thoughts gained a metallic sharpness to them. 

Hand clutching onto a singular katana. His right hard, the shoulder of which was hurting for literally no reason. 

But it's fine! It's fine. He is. So fine. 

He was not fine at all but he needed to act. 

He could teleport to the other katana, because he was eighty three percent sure he landed it right next to Mikey, having planned to–

...To what? Teleport into the midst of an actively collapsing building? Insane. Why did he do that?! That made no sense!

But now, it could be buried under nothing but rocks. Not ideal, for sure. 

Portal, then. 

...GAH, except how was he supposed to portal in there when he doesn't know exactly where “there” IS?! 

Donnie let out a long high-pitched sound, teeth clenched, throwing the damn sword to the ground hard enough for it to bounce off. 

“Donnie, Dee, hey, heeeyy, it's okay!” Raph was still trying to calm him down. He was fretting, he was freaking out too. Leo was usually the one to stay calm. Leo wasn't with them right now. 

...Wait. WAIT. 

Donnie whipped his arm up, pressing on the comm, oh he'd completely forgotten their comms! 

“Leo, Mikey, come in,” he demanded with a cold, desperate edge to it. “Leo, Mikey, come in. Come in.”

Raph huddled close, fidgeting and wide-eyed and smelling of concern–

A crackle. Coughing. 

“Donnie!” Mikey exclaimed, and Donnie felt relief douse over him and Raph like a fire extinguisher. “We're okay! ...Well. Sort of. THERE'S A BUNCH OF US! You gotta get us out!!!” 

“Any bright ideas on how to do that, Michael?!” Donnie said through teeth. 

There was a pause. Someone speaking in the background, and if Donnie strained, he could recognize–

“Leo says your– I mean his sword is here!!!” Mikey exclaimed. 

Oh, oh dear chocolate chip muffins, thank you Universe.

“Leo, answer your comm!” Raph exclaimed into his own, voice cracking. Wait, why didn't he think to contact them earlier– 

(He was busy dealing with his useless meltdown–)

“He uh, kinda can't at the mo!” Mikey replied instead. 

“WHAT?!” 

“HE'S OKAY! But he's using Donnie’s Ninpō to hold up the rocks from crushing us!” 

Oh. Oh. 

Oh, that was an excellent idea. Once again Donnie profusely thanked the Universe. They were okay. 

He exhaled, infused with relief.

“Alright, put him on with yours then,” Donnie pointed out.

“Oh. Right.” shuffling, 

“Heeeyyy bros,” Leo’s—or, well, technically Donnie’s—straining voice came through the comm. 

“Leo, how do I–?!” 

“Okay D-boy, listen up,” Leon immediately began, and Donnie listened up. “You don't have much space to get in here, but you can use the sword as an anchor, mkay? I’m sorry bro, I know they’re not all fun, but we're gonna need another portal,” 

“Okay.” Donnie said readily, the clear guidance settling the vibrating animal inside his brain. 

He was prepared. He knew he'd do anything for his family, anytime. It was never a question. 

“You just gotta focus on it. Think of it as, like... uh... hm... the swords are like– like the same, right? So think of them as one object! And that object just exists simultaneously in two places at the same time, like... like that guy Schröder’s cat or whatever–”

“You mean Schrödinger's cat?” Donnie deadpanned. 

“Yes, exactly! Both are equally–” a grunt, background speaking, “–possible at the same time, right? So you just... get one to be the one you focus on instead, which is the current one. And it's just, like– same with taking people with you,”

That... made positively no sense. 

...And yet. It was far, far more logic than to just wing it, to go by the feeling of it. Far more logic and, quite frankly, science than doing it like magic. 

It... occurred to Donnie that Leo has never spoken of how his mystic abilities actually worked. It's always been “Oh, you know how it is, haha,” or “I just fhwip and slash and boom, portal!” or such. 

Donnie would not have guessed in a million years that his twin actually put that much thought into it all. And all so physics-based, too. 

“Dee?” 

“Yeah, yes, I understand,” Donnie stated, and to his shock, he... may have even meant that. “Alright, if we're lucky—see you in a moment, Nardo,” Donnie started getting back to his feet.

“Hey,” Leo’s, or, well, his own voice with Leo’s tone made him pause. 

“Yeah?” 

“You've got this,” 

Said so sincerely. So full of trust and love and faith. Leo’s smile was audible. And Raph put his hand on Donnie’s shoulder and smiled, echoing the same. 

Leo actually knew what the portals are like. Leo had easily used Donnie’s Ninpō. So maybe, he did know what he was talking about when he said that.

Donnie took a deep breath, and picked up the sword for the umpteenth time.

—

It is nauseating, it is painful, and quite frankly, it is draining. Bafflingly draining. But Donnie got into the little pocket that Leo was holding up using abstract constructs of supports, and then Donnie made as big of a portal as he could for all of them to exit through. 

They left the authorities to deal with the remains of today’s failure, and instead headed home. For which Donnie had to muster up yet another unpleasant portal. 

Agh. If he’d just... managed to swallow down his hesitation during the fight, all of this could’ve been prevented! This entire mess! 

Well. At least his brothers were okay. 

“You’re not hurt? Anywhere? You’re sure?” Raph fretted over Mikey, as they all went through the portal to their living room.

“Yes, Raph, I’m sure,” Mikey insisted for the fourth time, getting more irritable about it. “It is literally JUST a sprained wrist, do you see my intestines spilling out from it?!”

“...no,”

“Then I’M FINE!” Mikey threw his hands in exasperation. 

“Leo? What about you?” Donnie directed. Leo was strangely quiet, just grinning in amusement off to the side. 

Was he tired? Or was he staying out of it on purpose in order to not call attention to himself? 

...Or... was he being strangely quiet? Now that Donnie thought about it...

...Huh. Leo was quiet a lot, recently. Not to the point where any of them would notice, but he’s been less annoying than ever. 

Donnie had just attributed it to him becoming a bit more serious after the Invasion. Or perhaps as a natural effect of growing up and maturing from a rowdy teenager—a settling into contentment. 

But now that he was wearing Donnie’s face... well. Like all the other... points of notice, it was only becoming evident now. Donnie would bet their other two brothers hadn’t noticed any change in Leo’s presence whatsoever, either.

“Hm? Oh yeah, I’m all good,” Leo shrugged, easy, idly twirling Donnie’s bō. A neutral smile on his face. 

“Are your hands hurting?” Donnie asked. 

“What?” Leo blinked at him. 

“You know,” Donnie gestured. When his twin’s expression didn’t clear in understanding, he continued, “Because of the Ninpō...? You said it hurts you to use it as well, right?” he pointed out. 

“Oh–” Leo opened his mouth to respond–

“It hurts you to use it?” Raph frowned. “What??? But you were training with it yesterday and today?” 

Donnie’s eyes shot to Leo at the newly revealed information.

...What? 

Leo had practiced using his Ninpō???

That explained how he was so proficient with it during the altercation, but... but he said it hurt him! Did he lie about it??? But why???

Or did he simply... bite the bullet, power through the hurt to train?

But that was–! Leo? Taking initiative to train? When he had a perfectly good reason not to?? What????

“Yeah, I mean,” Leo shrugged, chuckling, stepping away. “It wasn’t that bad, and hey, it paid off, right?” he twirled Donnie’s bō. “Speaking of, dude, Dee, I totally get why you fly so much with this thing, it was awesome, bro you really are epic with this tech stuff–” Leo gestured with a thumb to the battle shell on his back, turning around, and wait what is that– “I’ll go leave it uuuhhhh you said in the lab, right? Should I leave the staff there too–”

Donnie rushed forwards before Leo could slip away and yanked him back by the mask tails. 

“All good, huh?” Donnie repeated Leon’s earlier answer, sharp. “Then what is this?” he flicked the bruise on the back of Leo’s head, making him wince. Well, technically Donnie’s head. Eugh, that won’t be fun to deal with once he's back in his body. 

Leo’s smile turned sheepish. “Huh? What’s what? Do I have something on my head–?” he reached over to feel the spot. 

Oh. Did he really not notice the... frankly big bruise deepening in color as they spoke...? 

Donnie squinted at his twin’s face. Well, his own face currently being worn by his twin, except with Leo’s blue mask. 

Hm. 

Instead of replying, Donnie just began dragging Leo to the kitchen for a bag of frozen peas. Leo-in-his-body felt heavier than him-in-Leo’s-body, and Donnie chose to blame it on the battle shell. And not on the weird nausea that came with having a full meal. 

Leo complained, but it was more jokey than anything, dramaticized. It brought a little more normalcy to this entire situation. But not enough normalcy. Because it still felt off. 

Maybe it’s because of the body switch, Donnie kept excusing to himself. But all these teensy tiny things were shaping up to an ugly picture. A concerning picture. 

Donnie was concerned for his twin. 

But they really were very tiny things, things Donnie most definitely could be overthinking. Seeing signs where there are none. Symptoms caused by much more reasonable reasons

Maybe Leo did simply become more responsible and decided to train. Maybe he found it fun to goof around with Donnie’s Ninpō and just called it training. Maybe he really didn’t feel whatever whacked him on the head hard enough to cause the nasty bruising. Maybe the nausea was Donnie’s own distaste for food heightened by being in a whole different body. Maybe Leo was just as loud and talkative as he was pre-Invasion and it was only Donnie’s perception that was altered by other factors. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

Donnie slapped his hand over the light switch in the kitchen, and Leo winced, squinting. 

Donnie opened the freezer and shoved the bag of frozen veggies into Leo’s hands. With a “Aw you’re being such a sweet pea,” Leo pressed it to the back of his head. 

“Stay here,” Donnie demanded, and then strode out of the room. He needed a penlight. 

“Dee?” Mikey asked as he passed by, a bit concerned. 

“I’m fine, just gotta take care of a certain moron,” Donnie exhaled through his—Leo’s—nose. 

He fetched a pen light from med bay. He returned to the kitchen, where the rest of his brothers had gathered. 

He returned just as Leo was seemingly trying to smoothly exit, actually, but Donnie wasn’t letting that happen. He took Leo by the arm and brought him to sit at the kitchen island, instead. The way Leo went along with it made Donnie doubt whether he’d actually been trying to leave. Maybe he’d just moved out of Raph’s way or something. 

“Eyes open, look over here,” Donnie situated himself in front of Leo. Leo blinked, and turned his eyes towards Donnie. Donnie clicked the penlight on and shone it at Leo’s eyes. 

Immediately, Leo winced and snapped his eyes shut, turning away from the light with a complaint of “Dude, are you trying to blind me–” 

“Leonardo, what date is it?” Donnie clicked the penlight off, crossing his arms. Leo’s arms, technically. 

“Um, I dunno, Thursday,” Leo huffed, rubbing his eyes with a hand. 

Wow. First question and he already got it wrong. Impressive. But, to be fair, it was Leo, it’s not like he was the master of keeping track of time. That would be Donnie. 

“Can you spell your name backwards?”

“Okay, that one is just unfair–”

“Can you stand up and hop on one foot three times?” Donnie stepped back to give him space. 

Instead, Leo just squinted at him. “...Dude, I don’t have a concussion,” he snorted. “I’d know if I did,”

“Uh-huh,” that remained to be seen. But this did remind Donnie of how Leo had performed the very same checks on him just yesterday, right after they got switched up. Donnie ran through Leo’s behavior since then, to check if that’s actually when the concussing occurred. 

If it was, Leo had covered it up excellently. 

“Then you won’t have trouble hopping on one foot three times, hmmmm?” Donnie raised his brow ridges. He hadn’t bothered with asking questions such as “Are you dizzy?” because at this point, he had a well-educated guess exactly what Leo’s answer would be. They needed concrete evidence on this.

Leo huffed a laugh and rolled his eyes. Donnie watched him catch the eyes of their other two brothers with the gesture. The way they were watching. Also waiting for him to simply do it. 

That’s what finally incited Leo to sigh, and push himself up to his feet, eyes squinting again. He put the bag of frozen vegetables on the kitchen island, and stood on one foot. 

Safe to say, he absolutely did have a concussion. 

And he hadn’t mentioned even a word about it. Nay, when Donnie outright asked after his well-being, Leo lied. 

...

The question was, why?

[corneliaavenue-ao3]

End Game: I wanna be your first string

A continuation of end game. This is stan tumblr's pov of Ginny's World Cup Semifinal match.

if you somehow got tagged in this, i am so sorry it was an accident

@quidditch-world-cup-updates posted

The first semi-final match will start in just under an hour with England taking on Bulgaria!

@ginwiz posted

i'm nervous, anyone else nervous?

@ginginweas replied: nervous? why would we be nervous? (i've vomited three times today)

@queezy-4-weasley replied: bulgaria's chasers still suck, so i have some hope

@bitch-witchh posted

fuck bulgaria and fuck viktor krum!

@quid-bitch reblogged @bitch-witchh

I'm trying!

@bitch-witchh reblogged @quid-bitch

don't make me bring out the spray bottle cat meme

@queezy-4-weasley posted

Krum will likely get the snitch over Shah, but Bulgaria's chasers still suck

@ginwiz reblogged @queezy-4-weasly

Shah could catch the snitch!

@ginginweas reblogged @ginwiz

yeah and I could win an order of merlin

@hinny-luv-4-eva posted

Harry just finished the Frey Family case yesterday, so he should be able to make it to the game!

@harpies-hore reblogged @hinny-luv-4-eva

how do you know that?

@hinny-luv-4-eva reblogged @harpies-hore

I listen to the auror scanner

@im-a-keeper posted

I am very excited to see England's chasers: Weasley, Alton, and Killick play against Bulgaria's beaters: Higgs and Ross. A fast, electric offense vs a brutal, widespread defense.

@quidditch-world-cup-updates posted

The England World team has entered the arena. They play Bulgaria in Round 2 of the World Cup.

@queezy-4-weasley posted

AND THERE SHE IS!

@ginginweas posted

GINNY WEASLEY!! THE WOMAN THAT YOU ARE!!!!

@ginwiz posted

THERE IS MY MVP!!!

@quid-bitch posted

do you think Ginny Weasley, Richard Alton, and Ophelia Killick need a fourth?

@bitch-witchh reblogged @quid-bitch

there aren't 4 chasers

@quid-bitch reblogged @bitch-witchh

I wasn't talking about quidditch

@harpies-hore reblogged @quid-bitch

@queezy-4-weasley posted

i've been watching Higgs and Ross, and unfortunately they are on their A game today. I hope Gin, Oph, and Rick can handle them

@puddlemore-111 reblogged @queezy-4-weasley

weirdo, calling them Gin, Oph, and Rick like you actually know them

@queezy-4-weasley reblogged @puddlemore-111

how have i not blocked you yet?

@ginwiz answered

probably not yet since we haven't seen him, but he is going to be there

@ginwiz answered

95% of my blog is Ginny, and the moment i talk about her boyfriend (someone who has been heavily involved in Ginny's life since she was 11), I get this stupid ask. Go take your hate somewhere else.

@quidditch-world-cup-updates posted

Bulgaria World Cup team, lead by team captain, Viktor Krum, has entered the arena.

@ginginweas posted

NOT THE CAMERA PANNING FROM KRUM FLYING IN TO RON BOOING HIM!! THE LORE!!

@queezy-4-weasley reblogged @ginginweas

wait, whats the lore

@ginginweas reblogged @queezy-4-weasley

krum took hermione to the yule ball back during the triwizard tournament was happening. obviously there is no bad blood, but it's just funny to see him boo his fiance's ex

@quid-bitch posted

poor ron, only member of the golden trio to not have been with an international quidditch star

@bitch-witchh reblogged @quid-bitch

that's what he gets for being a Chudley Cannons fan

@drarry-is-real posted

lol so ron is there but harry isn't, even tho @hinny-luv-4-eva knows that he is free. wonder where he is then

@hinny-luv-4-eva reblogged @drarry-is-real

well we know he is not hanging out with a death eater rn

@gin-will-win posted

GUESS WHERE I AM!

@ginginweas replied: NO WAY

@ginwiz replied: OH SHIT HAVE SO MUCH FUN!

@queezy-4-weasley replied: STOP I AM SO JEALOUS

@im-a-keeper posted

looks like the ref team will be the same team from the france game

#hahaha oh fuck

@harpieshore reblogged @im-a-keeper

@gin-will-win posted

HARRY IS HERE!! THEY JUST SHOWED HIM TAKING HIS SEAT NEXT TO RON

@hinny-luv-4-eva posted

HARRY IS THERE!!!

@hinny-luv-4-eva posted

get fucked @drarry-is-real

@bitch-witchh posted

okay but why was he late?

@harpies-hore reblogged @bitch-witchh

what if i told you he was in England's locker room

@bitch-witchh reblogged @harpies-hore

@quidditch-world-cup-updates posted

The semi-final match between England and Bulgaria has officially started with the release of the quaffle!

@gin-will-win posted

they are so fast in person wtf

@queezy-4-weasley posted

that bludger that nearly hit killick came out of NO WHERE

@bitch-witchh posted

merlins beard. why did no one tell me bulgaria was actually good now?

@ginginweas posted

did... the bulgaria chasers actually just score?

@ginginweas reblogged @ginginweas

did... the bulgaria chasers actually just score again?

@harpies-hore posted

@ginginweas posted

ENGLAND!!!! GET YOUR SHIT TOGETHER!!!

@ginwiz posted

you all need to have more faith in ginny lol

@gin-will-win posted

SHE SCORED!

@ginginweas reblogged @gin-will-win

i don't like that you know what is going to happen 5 seconds before i do

@ginginweas reblogged @ginginweas

but omg yay!! she scored!!

@im-a-keeper posted

England only down 10-20 right now is somehow a miracle

@bitch-witchh posted

THANK FUCK!! POINTS!

@gin-will-win posted

I have such a good view of Harry and he is such a nervous fan, omg. he is basically clinging onto the railing

@hinny-luv-4-eva reblogged @gin-will-win

stop, he is so sweet

@drarry-is-real reblogged @hinny-luv-4-eva

do you even like quidditch?

@hinny-luv-4-eva reblogged @drarry-is-real

do you even have morals?

@queezy-4-weasley posted

FUCK DID KRUM ALREADY SPOT THE SNITCH

@ginwiz reblogged @queezy-4-weasley

i think he is feinting

@im-a-keeper posted

Shah should start looking for the snitch himself instead of trailing Krum

@ginginweas posted

killick scored!! assist by ginny!

@harpies-hore posted

@quid-bitch posted

omg they got their shit together

@queezy-4-weasley posted

STEAL FROM GINNY!

@queezy-4-weasley posted

POINTS FOR GINNY!

@ginginweas posted

THEY SHOWED RON AND HARRY CHUGGING THEIR BUTTERBEERS IN CELEBRATION!!

@ginwiz reblogged @ginginweas

Hermione looked so disappointed in them, im crying

@quid-bitch posted

what if i said ron is the hottest weasley

@harpies-hore reblogged @quid-bitch

shut up

@quid-bitch reblogged @harpies-hore

they crucified jesus for being right

@harpies-hore reblogged @quid-bitch

who the fuck is jesus?

@bitch-witchh posted

LOL the bulgaria chaser dropped the quaffle again

@queezy-4-weasley reblogged @bitch-witchh

that's the bulgaria team i remember

@im-a-keeper posted

Alton just scored with an assist from Weasley! All England chasers have now scored! 50-20 in favor for England!

@queezy-4-weasley posted

Bulgaria's beaters are fucking aggressive

@bitch-witchh posted

OH FUCK

@ginginweas posted

GINNY

@ginwiz posted

FUCK FUCK FUCK! GINNY!!!

@Im-a-keeper posted

that was a NASTY hit by Ross. It looks like Ginny was hit in the face and knocked from her broom.

@ginginweas posted

that hit was terrifying

@harpies-hore posted

Oh shit! is she okay?

@gin-will-win posted

guys, there is so much blood

@ginwiz reblogged @gin-will-win

fuck, i hope she is okay

@gin-will-win reblogged @ginwiz

Richard caught her, and she is moving fine. I think it looks worse than it was.

@ginginweas posted

They showed Harry, and he looks so upset.

@bitch-witchh reblogged @ginginweas

Ross better hire some bodyguards because Auror Potter looks like he is planning his murder right now.

@queezy-4-weasley posted

Harry's heart dropped out of his ass watching that. (my heart did too)

@hinny-luv-4-eva posted

Harry looks like he wants to jump down to Ginny to comfort her right now :(

@puddlemore-111 reblogged @hinny-luv-4-eva

if a player getting hit by a bludger makes her whiny boyfriend act like this, she should just quit and stay in the kitchen

@drarry-is-real reblogged @hinny-luv-4-eva

harry is faking sadness right now, he would much rather be with his boyfriend than be at this stupid quidditch game

@ginginweas posted

@hinny-luv-4-eva reblogged @ginginweas

you already know who I voted for

@ginwiz posted

SHE IS OKAY!

@queezy-4-weasley posted

They fixed her nose and she is okay!!

@harpies-hore posted

STOP!! she just looked up at the stands and gave the "I'm okay" sign

@gin-will-win posted

Harry visibly sighed when Ginny waved to him. Hermione was rubbing his back and Ron gave him a reassuring shake

@ginginweas reblogged @gin-will-win

Every day, I become more and more thankful for the golden trio

@quidditch-world-cup-updates posted

After a nasty hit, and a presumed broken nose, chaser, Ginny Weasley, makes her penalty shot increasing England's lead to 70-20.

@harpies-hore posted

like we always say. ginny shooting a penalty shot = free points

@bitch-witchh posted

Bulgaria's chasers have now gotten so desperate that they are stooging

@ginwiz reblogged @bitch-witchh

and the refs have done nothing to stop them

@ginginweas reblogged @ginwiz

I feel like I need to bring back the refs vs voldemort poll

@gin-will-win posted

Ross is out of control today. He just elbowed Shah

@harpies-hore posted

Shah gets hit in the face when he is the one player who a beater cannot touch with their body and yet the refs call nothing

@ginwiz reblogged @harpies-hore

hey @ginginweas, we need the poll now

@ginginweas reblogged @harpies-hore

@im-a-keeper posted

I was really hoping that the ref team would have gotten better since the last match, but unfortunately they have not...

@bitch-witchh posted

lol while everyone was focused on Shah and Ross, Ginny scored again

@ginwiz posted

I fucking love Ginny Weasley

@qin-will-win posted

THE ENTIRE STADIUM IS CHANTING GINNY'S NAME RN (I think harry started IT!!!)

@harpies-hore posted

GINNY! GINNY! GINNY!

@ginginweas posted

okay, someone needs to take Ross's bat

@im-a-keeper posted

Ross hits a quaffle out of the hands of Alton. And of course the refs say play on.

@ginwiz posted

FUCK ROSS

@quid-bitch reblogged @ginwiz

I am not going to do that

@gin-will-win posted

KRUM IS FLYING OVER TO ROSS TO YELL AT HIM!

@harpies-hore posted

krum on his way to go yell at his beater

@quid-bitch posted

Krum can come yell at me next

@bitch-witchh reblogged @quid-bitch

JAIL

@ginginweas posted

WAIT

@gin-will-win posted

NO WAY

@im-a-keeper posted

Is Shah about to????

@queezy-4-weasley posted

DID SHAH JUST????

@quidditch-world-cup-updates

England's Shah catches the snitch while Krum is distracted. England wins 240-20!

@ginginweas posted

WE WIN WE WIN!!!!!!

@queezy-4-weasley posted

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

@bitch-witchh posted

WE ARE GOING TO THE FUCKING FINALLSSSSS!!!!!!!!

@puddlemore-111 posted

A pathetic win for England. How the hell did they make it all the way to the Quidditch World Cup?

@harpies-hore posted

@im-a-keeper posted

I NEVER THOUGHT THIS DAY WOULD COME!!! LET'S GO ENGLAND!!!!!

@hinny-luv-4-eva posted

IM SCREAMING!!!

@ginwiz posted

The entire team jumping on top of Shah, celebrating. What if I cry?

@gin-will-win posted

THIS IS THE BEST DAY EVER!

@bitch-witchh posted

Shah it seems I’ve grown quite fond of you tho there are no sexual urges or desires you come to me as a long lost friend whom I once picked apples with in papa’s orchard

@queezy-4-weasley posted

Ginny, Ophelia, and Richard are dancing around Shah, this is adorable

@gin-will-win posted

GUYS! HARRY IS NOT IN HIS SEAT ANYMORE

@harpies-hore reblogged @gin-will-win

@hinny-luv-4-eva posted

HARRY IS ON THE FIELD!!!

@gin-wiz posted

HARRY????

@gin-will-win posted

GINNY RAN UP TO HIM AND JUST KISSED HIM!!!

@queezy-4-weasley posted

AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH

@harpie-hore posted

HE IS HER BIGGEST SUPPORTER WHICH SUCKS BECAUSE I WANT TO BE HER BIGGEST SUPPORTER!!!!

@hinny-luv-4-eva posted

BAD DAY TO BE A DRARRY STAN!!!!!

@drarry-is-real reblogged @hinny-luv-4-eva

fuck you

@ginwiz posted

I THOUGHT THE GAME AGAINST FRANCE WAS THE BEST WHEN SHE FLEW OVER TO HIM, BUT HIM COMING TO HER?? MEETING HER ON THE FIELD?? GINNY SEEING HIM AND DROPPING HER BROOM AND RUNNING OVER TO HARRY?? HARRY LIFTING HER UP OFF OF HER FEET TO KISS HER????

@harpies-hore posted

i am so single

@ginginweas posted

THEY ARE SO CUTE!

@hinny-luv-4-eva posted

THEY ARE SO IN LOVE!

@quid-bitch posted

THEY ARE SO HOT!

@im-a-keeper posted

What a thrilling game. I will never forget this. (also hinny are so cute)

@ginnyweasley posted

ONE MORE MATCH! ON TO THE QUIDDITCH WORLD CUP!!!

[vanillimouse]

CW: Cannibalism (fantasized), blood, gagging (no vomiting), DARK

Thinking about a reader that struggles with love that’s all-encompassing.

Maybe you’ve been deprived of it and are fascinated by the concept—or the reverse, you’re spoiled rotten, no a foreign concept to you. Either way, you’re greedy. Looking upon human features with a sense of sonder isn’t enough. You need to touch them, crush them, own them. Squeeze the color out of their eyes and suck the melanocytes out of their skin.

A reader who knows that the average 250-pound hog will yield 150,000 calories’ worth of meat. A reader who knows this varies based on the pig. A reader who also knows that, essentially, humans are long pigs, similar enough to swap organs.

It’s natural to you that you’re drawn to men in the military. They’re the biggest, the baddest. The strongest—taking one down would be like a hominid versus a mammoth. The challenge excites you. And everything about them is documented well, from their muscle mass to their blood type. The government’s finest pigs, and you get to pick.

-

SIMON “GHOST” RILEY

Your love for him makes you feel awful.

It’s unfortunate that you met him. He’s lived an animal existence already—knows what it’s like for greedy things to pick and pick. There are scars on his body and nicks in his ears. He pads around like some sad dog. Not aimlessly, but like he believes he should be somewhere worse. Like he’s grateful for the nothing he’s gotten.

You think the universe has a sick sense of humor. You wonder if he lived as a lamb once and was butchered. And then was brought back to be human and butchered again. And again. Mentally, then physically, metal hooks cozy in his ribs. You wonder if you’re just fate for him. Because of this, you remain delicate.

He’s quiet company. So are you. You appreciate it. It lets you mull over him. Your favorite part of him is his eyes, you think. Feline almond made sultry by the paint smeared across his lids. Pretty, two matching voids, both framed by eyelashes more luscious than your own. You like the contrast; golden hairs, black iris. His gaze is sharp. You can tell where he’s looking even if you can’t see his pupils.

That’s a part you’d miss if you decided to devour him: his alertness. It must be hell for him, but it’s a wonder for you. His eyes eternally flick, scan. There’s an intelligence they’d miss if they glazed over. If they unfocused forever.

Your growth is proportionate to his. At first, it’s silent lunches spent together–revelment in and acclimation to a new source of heat nearby. If he grunts, so do you. If he speaks, so do you. You wonder if he’ll tire of you, interpret your mimicry of him as mockery. He doesn’t. If anything, he appreciates the space. You’re inoffensive.

Seeing his petals open only makes you hungrier. He’s quite talkative with those he’s close to. He’s goofy, too–something easy to miss under his deadpan delivery. When he fucks with you, it makes you greedy. Saliva pools under your tongue. He’d be warm, you think. Fit for a stew. Something that steams as high as the tea you both shared in your silence. Hardy, spiced. You pretend to hate his dad jokes.

When you lunge at him, it’s because he let you touch him. That was an unspoken rule for months–you didn’t touch him. He hovered in your space, tantalizingly close, casting a shadow over you, but he was off-limits. Not until he gave you the okay.

It was while you sat beside him on his bed, watching him craft a new mask. Another period of silence. Those were rarer these days, but still happened. You were happy to listen to his breathing, to observe the dexterity of his long, weathered fingers. He had gotten tangibly better at stitching. They were less visible. Straighter; neater. You would joke about it, but you were too comfortable.

You leaned in too close. You could blame it on his weight tugging you in his direction like a gravitational pull. You could also blame it on your peace-softened limbs, bones boiled down to jelly. Either way, your arm brushed his. You could tell it did because he tensed the microsecond before he felt the fabric of your long-sleeve.

You were ready to apologize. Fully prepared for him to kick you out, to ban you from the one place he found safe. You couldn’t conceptualize your punishment. It was a rule you had never broken before, not even by accident.

Your mouth opened and he silenced you. The roundness of your eyes and the way you gathered your body was sorry enough.

“‘S fine.” He muttered, but he stopped sewing. The needle sat frozen between his fingers, eyes fixed on nothing in particular. You cleared your throat.

“Could I, then…?” You were greedy. You were pushing your luck. “Just your shoulder, I mean.”

“Said it’s fine.” He huffed.

Your touch was light, experimental. Like he was a fragile bird that you got to hold. He didn’t tense as much because he expected you. You promised the shoulder, but your hand moved lower. Away from the dip of his collarbone to the expanse of his bicep. It was thick–your fingers, spread as they were, couldn’t wrap around it. You trailed lower, lower, lower still, until it was his wrist you were threatening. His hand had moved away from his lap. It rested on the bed, available to you.

Down a hand, he bundles the needle in the mask and casts it aside. “Pettin’ me like I’m a dog.”

“I thought that’s what you wanted?” Your voice betrays the grin on your face.

You don’t even care to look up. You’re too engrossed in this. He runs hot, infernal against your fingertips. He’s pale enough for you to be able to trace his veins, so you do–trailing blue until you reach the leather of his palms.

“I hear that if you can see an ‘M’ on your palm, it means you’ll get married someday.”

“Yeah? You see one?”

“Yeah. And I feel sorry for the lass.”

He chuckles at that. It’s a low rumble, probably the closest he can get to a giggle. You like it. It makes you feel starved. With two of your own, you lift his limp hand. It’s heavy. Veins roll down his palms like lightning bolts.

You don’t know if you can handle this. His flesh is a temptation to you. He doesn’t understand that you want to score him and roast him over an open flame. You want him to be part of you forever. You think it’s beautiful, what male grasshoppers do to satisfy their mates. The idea of his body fueling your own is euphoric.

The attack is abrupt. You’re staring into the webbing between his fingers, then your teeth are in it. Specifically at his thumb where there’s a bit of extra skin. You clench your jaw as hard as you can muster, and to your surprise, he hisses. He’s human, but he didn’t strike you as one to show pain.

His blood trickles into your mouth. It isn’t much, as you didn’t clamp down on a hotspot. It’s thick and savory and rich to you. You groan and flex your jaw, chewing on him, urging more blood to eke out.

His hand tangles in your hair. It’s the roughest thing he’s ever done to you. The pain in your scalp is excruciating enough to loosen your jaw.

The noise you make when he forces you away from him is inhuman. Like a wounded animal, like a parasite detached from its host. Your eyes are misty. You’ve been caught. You don’t know how to explain that this is what love means to you. There’s no other method for you to cope. You want every piece of him that’s still intact.

“Please, S-”

“Easy, love.” He catches you before his name spills like his blood from your mouth. It’s gathered at the edge of your bottom lip. He didn’t bleed that much; it’s mixed with your spit. You’re drooling.

“I just need-” You grit your teeth, eyes squeezing shut. His wounded hand is moving. It cups and swallows the lower half of your face. His other hand remains in your hair, but it loosens.

This is a messy affair. He’s rubbing blood on you. His thumb, pad already slick with your spit, slides past your lips. He taps his nail against your teeth. The gates open. You allow him to slide his thumb over your tongue slowly. There’s a salty taste to him.

“Shoulda told me this ‘s what you needed.” He grunts. His thumb doesn’t stop moving, not even when your teeth pinch at him. This bite doesn’t seem to affect him. Either his fingers are less sensitive or you simply caught him off guard the last time. You gurgle.

He continues until his thumb hooks and a wave of nausea washes over you. You release his thumb, if not for a moment, and nearly choke on your spit.

“Careful.” He warns. “This better?”

In your valiant battle against vomiting, you push more saliva out of your mouth. It slips like molasses down to your chin. You try to bite again and manage. But when the pressure is too much, his massive thumb hooks again. This time, you do gag.

It’s torture. You can taste him, you can nip him, but you can’t gnaw on him. A tear rolls down your cheek.

“We can do this for as long as you like.” Simon purrs. He’s petting your hair, now, soothing you. You’re like a disobedient puppy to him.

You should be angry, but you honestly feel relieved. He knows how to handle you. He sees your sickness and treats you with the best medicine that he can think of. Your teeth grind—you feel thick skin shifting over bone. His tongue clicks.

He hooks his thumb.

[infoglitch]

i beg of thee... please... more blackguard stuff. am dyin over here...

It appears the sinners have demanded my attention.

Very well, it's time

TO LOCK THE FUCK IN!

Back bone.

Jaune found himself sitting in his dorm gaming with ruby and surprisingly Weiss was with them, watching as the two were playing "street clash revolve" with jaune winning 3 matches as it was a best of six. With ruby winning 4 matches.

Jaune: Oop! Oop! Here it comes ruby!

Ruby: oh you think?! Aight bring it vomit boy!

Jaune proceed to tap a chain of buttons.

Up forward and then B as jaune shouted with enthusiasm.

Jaune: KANE OVERDRIVE!

On the TV screen the letters K. O. plastered the screen as Ruby groaned but also laughed as her and jaune fist bump. With Weiss watching in awe.

Ruby: GG jaune, GG.

Jaune: what you mean GG? We only got two rounds left before one of us wins.

Ruby: unfortunately I gotta get ready.me and yang will be heading to our dad's cabin for our break, and I gotta grab my bags and get ready, me and her will leave in an hour.

Jaune: awe, well I understand

Weiss: you sure you two and your father couldn't reschedule?

Jaune and Ruby had to do a double take as they looked at Weiss who they completely forgot was there.

Weiss:... Look I'm on the edge of my seat and I want to see who wins!

Jaune and Ruby look at eachother.

Jaune: are you sure we aren't sharing a dream?

Ruby: definitely. But regardless sorry Weiss but I gotta go, if don't who knows when me and yang will be able to go again.

Weiss sighed and nodded.

Weiss: very well, I do hope you and Yang enjoy your time back with your father.

Ruby:.. thanks weiss

Ruby walked out as jaune and Weiss sat on the formers bed with Jaune just looking at Weiss.

Jaune: hey um.. real talk, but why have you been so interested in what me and ruby do lately.

Weiss: oh just curiosity, plus I figured it do me some good to get to hang out with my leader and her friend.

Jaune looked at her as he put his controller away and fully turned to her.

Jaune: it's Bleiss isn't it?

Weiss just sat there before groaning.

Weiss: i don't know why but whenever I try to be Alone she constantly pops up and bugs me over and over again, its getting frustrating and since i cant be alone any more-

Jaune: you started hanging out with me and ruby?

Weiss nodded and looked away somewhat ashamed.

Jaune: so I assume you dont actually find what we do to hang out interesting?

Weiss: at first yes but just being around you two, there's this energy you give off that is just.. nice to be around, your like air purifiers... That was a bad analogy I'm sorry.

Jaune just chuckled but waved his hand.

Jaune: I think I understand. But outside of that.. Weiss this is your sister we are talking about. And neither of you have seen eachother for...

Weiss:... 5 years.

Jaune: 5 years, and from what i can tell, she wants to atleast catch up.

Weiss: it's not like I don't know that! Its just- why can't she just be-

Jaune: normal? Weiss your normal is based around fancy balls and gala's. How Bleiss is acting is normal. Shes being herself. Shes being&

Weiss: loud, foul mouthed, and is flirting with basically every man here?

Jaune: yeah that. All I'm gonna say is this, siblings may come from the same family, but they don't always have the same lessons as us... I can't believe I actually used the advice saph gave me.

Weiss chuckled as she just looked at the knight. The two hadn't completely become friends but jaune hoped they were getting there, and so far from he could tell.. they were.

Then footsteps are heard as one Belamere "bleiss" noir givrése. Weiss Schnee's twin sister. Her attire still the same biker aesthetic as ever with her looking around the room, before seeing jaune.

Bleiss: ah you jaune I wanna talk to you for a second.

To both Jaune and Weiss's her tone was less rude and more... polite.

Weiss: where the hell was this?!

Jaune: uh sure just give me a second.

Bleiss: take your time but this is rather important.

Weiss: WHERE THE HELL WAS THIS?!

Jaune adjusted himself as he followed Bleiss outside the room only to be pinned to the wall as he yelped before being hushed by the twin of his snow angel.

Bleiss: I need your help arc, my dear sister and I have obviously not gotten along. So I need you to help me out here since you, Weiss, and that ruby girl, are buddy-buddy now. Got it?

Jaune simply nodded as Bleiss smiled.

Bleiss: good. And If you do well enough who knows.. I may give you a taste of people out of your leag-

Jaune removed her hand from his mouth rather calmly as he spoke.

Jaune: don't even think about it, I'm doing this because Weiss is my friend, and I prefer her not having to deal with any problem that can be solved. I don't care what you give in exchange.

Bleiss:.. that's surprisingly noble. Here I was thinking he was just a loser going for women out of his league.

Jaune: are we done now?

Bleiss: hm? Oh yes, I'll be going now, till then, noble knight~

Jaune raised an eyebrow at the nickname as Bleiss walked away with a smirk.

Bleiss: perhaps this place is nothing like vacoue, and if that's the case this will be lovely~

And that end this installment of the growing story between Bleiss and Jaune.

[theladyofrosewater]

If any of you guys have read my fic "He Never Did" on AO3, then you might be familiar with this idea but I've decided to expand on it with a new au.

(More art at the end by the way)

The first big difference between this AU and canon is that Charlie never died, she never got locked out of her party and William never killed her. Her parents divorced when she was around 10 and her mom took Sammy in the divorce while Henry got Charlie.

Also side note but like standard FNAF content warning because I know a big chunk of my followers dont care about fnaf.

Basic backstory is in 1982 William gets springlocked but survives which sets him on the path of searching for some form of immortality, after this incident he starts acting colder to his family which causes Michael to start acting out and later leads to the prank that goes wrong and kills his younger brother in 1983 with the bite. This leads to the family further falling apart, especially when William starts his experiments which of course leads to Elizabeth's death and the Missing Children's Incident in 1985. Unfortunately, just like how we see in Sister Location the animatronics and the ghosts inside of them are mistreated terribly and without the Puppet being there to calm them down or at least direct the anger towards just adults. They start behaving a lot more dangerously and maiming and evening killing a few people, with the Bite of '87 instead being an incident where several people were killed instead of just a brain injury (don't worry even though he's not featured in this au Jeremy was relatively fine besides the whole frontal lobe thing). Henry is freaking out over all of this while getting most of the blame, while William uses this opportunity to do more experiments. Henry then closes Freddy's for a few years, with the promise it will reopen in a few years once everything has been resolved. William gets pissed and they get into a huge argument afterward Henry kicks him from the company and William opens Circus Baby's Rentals to continue his work. After a few years he gets a breakthrough with remnant but ruins into a huge problem.

In my AU remnant isn't exactly a cure all. It's absolutely TERRIBLE at de-aging someone unless you literally have gallons of the stuff, and even remaining at your current age take a lot in addition to the fact that until you wait for it to disperse into your bloodstream and get absorbed, a person becomes highly flammable and you have to deal with bouts of nausea and vomiting unless you find a good doner match if you consume large amounts. Something important to note is it's similar to blood in my rewrite with a WAY longer regeneration time, like 6-12 months compared to blood's few weeks, but killing someone violently or drawing it out gets you a higher yield

So, William hits a wall in terms of his research that until remembers that he still has (at least in this AU) two kids left alive, Michael and Vanessa. Now right now Vanessa is about 5 and William tested both her and Michael and found that Vanessa would be a terrible match for him but a decent match for any of her siblings, both the live one and the dead ones, so he notes that down but basically ignores her. Not Michael though, he unfortunately could provide a similar enough template to William that any experiments performed on Michael would roughly have the same outcome if performed on William. So, like in canon he convinces Michael to work at Circus Baby's so he can experiment on Michael in secret and if Michael dies, see if he can be brought back. Unfortunately, while William is out of state dealing with investors and some of his other testing grounds, Michael gets scooped and after Ennard leaves him for dead, he wanders around until he finds his way to where Charlie lives because Michael thinks he is well DYING and A. needs someone to know his sister doesn't have anyone to take care of her and B. This is a Marlie AU and if Michael is going to die, he's at least going to tell the girl that he likes how he feels before he kicks the bucket. So, he does and then immediately falls into a coma because he's like super weak and Charlie is freaking out because oh my god what else would you do. She's freaking out on her porch when who shows up but William. What happens next is basically what happens in the fic I wrote. He basically tells Charlie "Hey Michael is basically going to be a suffering mess in constant pain forever unless you help me murder people so we can fix him and if you say no, I may just murder you instead" So Charlie agrees and after about two months, they have hypothetically "fixed" Michael, but he still hasn't woken up yet. William then hands Charlie a case of remnant and tells her to use it on Michael until its gone and then he'll wake up. William then disappears! and yes, he does abandon 5-year-old Vanessa, but don't worry she still has Charlie. So, Charlie does as she's instructed but here comes the issue. Michael never wakes up, no matter how much Charlie waits, in fact he stops even breathing and goes in a rigor mortis like state. Charlie is heartbroken and one night during a thunderstorm she gets a really fucked up idea.

She needs more remnant.

Specifically, she saw and read Williams notes about remnant compatibility and knows that both William and Vanessa have a high compatibility with Michael. Now she's obviously not going to hurt Vanessa, so Charlie goes to the Afton house to try and get answers from William but again he's not there, what Charlie does find is a taunting note and some VERY unsettling records of all the child murder, so Charlie then decides to hunt him down. Obviously, she can't just abandon Vanessa alone with her comatose/possibly dead brother so she heads home to plan. The first thing she does is empty out a freezer in her garage and she sticks Michael in there after giving him another dose of remnant just in case and gathers up all of Vanessa's things and drops her off at Jessica's house, She tells Jessica she has to be gone for a little bit but promises she'll be back as soon as she can and even puts a wad of cash into her best friend's hands as she runs off. Jessica is a little pissed but mostly worried, so she waits exactly a week before she decides to go check on Charlie. Instead of finding Charlie however, she finds an equally confused and concerned Henry because he'd been calling Charlie's house phone and there had been no response. After Jessica tells him how weird Charlie the last time was she saw her, the two decide to enter the house and grow increasingly more concerned as they see that the house is a mess and find more and more concerning notes and papers. Side note Jessica took Vanessa with her because she wasn't going to leave the kid alone. The tour of the house gets worse when they end up in the garage and when Henry is freaking out and little baby Vanessa asks him to be quiet because "Mikey's sleeping right now" and points to the freezer. Que the abject horror of Jessica and Henry as they open the freezer and find what they think is Michael's corpse, which looks like someone has performed surgery on and he's missing an arm which was replaced by a modified endoskeleton hand. Henry and Jessica then rush out of the room, with Jessica dragging Vanessa out with her. They then start freaking out and due to shenanigans Vanessa somehow manages to electrocute Michael because "that's what they do in cartoons." and they start freaking out even MORE when Michael actual wakes up very confused to why he's not dead. Eventually once everyone calms down and talks it out, they realize they need to find Charlie and probably also William.

The main plot of this AU will follow Charlie hunting down William while she frees the spirits she finds along the way. Henry, Jessica and Michael with little Vanessa tagging along have to find Charlie and William to prevent any future possible murders.

If you've made it this far down, Congrats! feel free to send in an ask about the au if you're curious about anything!

[sissylittlefeather]

Let's Forget About the Stars: Chapter 11

A/N: I'm back! Maybe. But I wrote this and I really love it, so I hope you will too. Here's another chapter of our lovely Dovey and Jumbee. We pick up with Gladys in the hospital and Dove sitting on a big secret. Enjoy!

Need to catch up? Masterlist

Warnings: 18+ minors DNI, kissing, cussing, penetrative sex, unprotected sex, creampie, but also pregnancy, morning sickness, illness and death

Word count: ~2.6k

"It'll be okay, Jumbee. Whatever happens, I'm here. It'll be okay."

But she's not sure she believes it either.

******

Elvis sends Dove to Memphis immediately to be with his mama and promises to follow her as soon as he can. In an unfortunate twist of events, her morning sickness begins on the train to Memphis and she's ill the whole time. When she finally arrives and Vernon picks her up at the train station, she's pale and weak and sweaty. He does his best not to notice as he drives her to the hospital to see Gladys. She manages to compose herself enough to make it into her room, but the second Vernon leaves the two women alone, she rushes to the bathroom and vomits.

“You sick, baby?” Gladys calls from her bed. Even ill, she's caring for everyone around her.

“It's nothing catching, Mama. I promise.” She comes out of the bathroom and sits down, pulling a mint from her purse. Gladys looks her up and down and suppresses a smile.

“How far along are you?” Dove’s eyes flick up to meet the older woman’s quickly and she shakes her head.

“I-I-I-no-I’m just… food poisoning…”

“Right. And I've got allergies.” Gladys purses her lips and gives Dove the look.

“Almost 12 weeks.”

“Does Elvis know?” Dove shakes her head and tries not to cry.

“He said he didn't want this yet.”

“Oh, baby, c’mere.” Gladys pats the bed next to her and Dove perches on it gently, letting her take her hand. “He will be happy as a clam. Once he gets over his initial shock, that is.”

“You think so?”

“I know so.” Gladys pats her hand softly and then grins broadly. “I'm gonna have a grandbaby!”

Dove laughs. The older woman’s joy is contagious.

“Yes ma'am, I suppose you are.” The two women spend the next half hour or so discussing plans for a nursery, baby names, and the merits of breastfeeding. When Vernon returns, Gladys puts her finger to her lips and Dove smiles, enjoying their secret.

******

Elvis arrives a couple of days later and immediately meets his family at the hospital. He spends the next day and a half by his mother’s side. That night, she encourages him to take Dove out and then sleep at Graceland. She's hoping that the next time she sees him, he'll know about the baby and they can share in the joy together. But there's something else, too. Something dark and looming and she doesn't want him there for it, just in case.

Everything about the night feels off, though. For some reason, Dove never seems to find the right moment to tell him. She's filled with a kind of nervous energy that doesn't fade no matter what she does. Elvis tries to settle her, completely unaware of anything at all. He kisses her neck gently and tries to slide his hand up under her skirt, but she pulls away.

“Not tonight.”

“Aw Dovey, why not?” He looks at her with his blue eyes pleading.

“It just doesn't feel right. I can't say why.” She sighs, flustered by what she's feeling and he caresses her cheek gently.

“Whatever it is baby, it's okay. I'm here. Let's just get in bed and I'll hold you. Okay?” She nods and they both put on pajamas to settle into the bed. Dove is filled with thoughts about the future and she has a hard time relaxing. Something is wrong, but she can't figure out what it is. Praying it's not the baby, she tries to go to sleep. Elvis is wrapped around her, breathing quietly in her ear and she focuses on matching her inhales and exhales to his. Before too long, she drifts off too.

They're not asleep for very long before the phone rings. Elvis groggily curses and drags himself out of bed, ready to berate whoever is on the line. Dove rolls over and closes her eyes, but she freezes when she hears him.

“Oh God, no.” His knees hit the floor and the phone receiver hangs by the cord as he immediately weeps. Dove is out of bed in a second, pulling Elvis to her chest with one hand and picking up the phone with the other.

“Hello?” She hears someone crying on the other end and her stomach churns.

“Dove?”

“Yeah, Vernon, it's me.” Her blood runs cold when he sobs again.

“She's gone.” That's all he can choke out, but it's all he needs to say for Dove to understand that Gladys is dead. Elvis wails even louder, hearing it again and Dove hangs up the phone without even saying goodbye.

“Oh, Jumbee…”

“I should've been there! I'll never forgive myself for leaving.” He soaks her chest with tears and cries uncontrollably like a child. Dove’s body is wracked with sobs as well, but she tries to focus on Elvis's grief.

“No, Jumbee, there was no way of knowing this would happen.”

“Why did she tell us to leave?! Oh God!” As Elvis clings to her, weeping, she starts to wonder how he will react when he finds out the baby is the reason she wanted them to have a night alone. All of a sudden, she's crying for two reasons as she holds the shaking frame of her shattered husband.

This becomes a familiar position in the days that follow. He spends most of his time crying, either next to Gladys’s casket or, after the service, in Dove’s arms. She does everything she can to be what he needs, but what he needs is his mother and she can't be that.

Elvis is broken and Dove is broken watching him. Her helplessness overwhelms her and she hangs on by a thread. The thread is Elvis's need for someone to stay strong. The only thing that carries her through is the knowledge that he needs her.

People try various things to cheer him up, but Dove doesn't. She simply is for him: a safe place for him to fall apart as often as he needs. And he does, frequently. It takes every ounce of her strength to keep herself together for him.

In what feels to Dove like not nearly enough time, Elvis is called to go back to Fort Hood. She follows him to the house in Killeen, but nothing feels the same without Mama. Somehow, her morning sickness subsides as quickly as it came on and she's fine, albeit a little more tired than usual. She mopes around the house when Elvis is gone, carrying his pain deep in her chest.

And then one particularly bad night, the night before he's set to take the train north to sail to Germany, Elvis is wrapped around Dove crying as she strokes his hair.

“I jus’ don't see the point without Mama. I don't wanna be here no more. It hurts too bad.” Elvis groans into her chest. Dove tries to hide the sob that comes out of her, but she can't. The thought of being without him is too much. And the baby in her belly has her on the edge of a total and complete breakdown. He sits up when he realizes she's damn-near hysterical. “Dovey…”

“No. Ignore me. I'm sorry.” She tries to contain her sobs, but it's like the past few weeks are all hitting her at once and everything she's suppressed is pouring out of her like a broken tap.

“Dove. I'm not going to ignore you. Talk to me.” He reaches up to stroke her cheek from his place between her legs on the bed. If he was paying any attention, he would notice the changes in her body from this position, but Dove is thankful that he hasn't.

“It's fine. I'm fine. I'm sorry.” He sits up and pulls her into his lap and takes her face in both hands.

“Eleanor Morningstar Presley. I'm your husband. Tell me what's going on.” She looks into his eyes and it comes tumbling out of her before she can stop it.

“I'm pregnant.” He blinks a few times and she wants to scream and die and throw up all at once. “I'm s-”

“Don't you dare apologize. Dovey, how long have you known?” He tries to do the math back to the last time they had sex.

“Since July. I'm about 17 weeks.” His eyes widen in shock.

“Seventeen weeks?!” She nods slowly, bracing herself for some kind of negative response from him.

“I know, I'm s-”

“This is amazing.” She freezes with her mouth hanging open.

“A-amazing?” She looks at him as a smile, the first smile she's seen from him in weeks, crawls across his face.

“Yes. Amazing. Dovey, why didn't you tell me?!”

“Well, I was going to and then… Mama…” He darkens a bit.

“Did she know?” Dove nods.

“Yes. She did. That's why she sent us home that night, so I could tell you.” Understanding washes over him.

“Why didn't you?”

“I don't know. It just didn't feel right. I couldn't, knowing she was sick. Are you mad?”

“No. I'm glad she knew.”

“Oh yeah. We talked about all kinds of things, the nursery, names-”

“Names? Dovey…?” He looks at her with his eyes wide and pleading.

“Yeah, Jumbee?”

“Can we name her after Mama?” Elvis whispers. Dove sniffles as the tears fill her eyes.

“Her?” She looks at him lovingly. He nods vehemently.

“She's a girl. I can feel it.” She watches as he lifts her shirt to reveal her small baby bump. “God, how did I not notice?”

“You've been a little… distracted. It's okay.”

“No. You're my wife. This is our family. Mama would want me focused on this.” He puts his hand on her belly gently. “Our baby is in there.”

Dove giggles despite herself.

“Yeah, she is.” He leans forward and kisses her stomach gently and then whispers against her skin.

“Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For giving me a reason to go on. I wouldn't be me without you. And now we have this to look forward to. Mama would be so mad if she thought I wanted to leave you both for her.” Dove breathes a deep sigh, releasing all of the stress and grief she's been holding on to.

“I love you, Jumbee.” He smiles up at her and kisses her belly again.

“I love you too, my Dovey.”

“We'll get through this.”

“Yeah, we will. All three of us.” He rubs his hand over the baby and nuzzles into her neck. “I'm so glad I married you.”

“Me too, Jumbee. Me too.”

******

The next morning, Elvis and Dove wake up early and lay in bed together dreading the time that they'll have to get up for him to leave for Germany. She's nestled into his side like she always is and he has his arms wrapped around her with his lips on her forehead.

“You'll be over there with me in less than two weeks. We've been apart before. We'll be fine.” Elvis sounds like he's reassuring himself more than her as he mumbles against her skin. Dove looks up at him and nods and he leans down to press his lips to each of her cheeks and then her lips. He pulls back a bit, blue eyes sparkling with affection and something else. She knows that look and it surprises her to see it, but she's not going to argue as he leans forward again, this time hungrily capturing her lips in a passionate kiss. It doesn't take long for the kiss to move into more, their tongues dancing wildly as hands slide over skin and up under pajamas.

He rolls over on top of her, sensually pressing his hips into hers as he drops a trail of kisses along her jawline and down her neck. She moans softly as he quickly unbuttons her shirt, but as soon as his hand touches her belly, he stops suddenly.

“Can I- can we- is it gonna hurt the baby?” He asks breathlessly. Dove giggles and kisses him gently.

“It won't hurt her. She's safe.” He nods and looks down at her tiny bump between them.

“That's good because I'm not sure I could stop now even if I wanted to.” He dives back into kissing her deeply, rolling his hips against her and letting his hard cock press into her center. “I need ya, baby. It's been too damn long.”

Dove whimpers as he finishes undressing her and strips off his own pajamas. He lays on his side and pulls her in close to him, throwing her leg over his hip. She sighs as he runs his fingertips over her body, stopping to squeeze her breast and her ass. He teases her entrance with the tip of his dick, slipping it around in her arousal.

“So good and wet for me, baby. You want this cock?” He murmurs against her lips. Dove whimpers and nods.

“God, yes. I need it.”

She moans loudly as he slowly starts to push into her, inch by tantalizing inch, his hand on her hip to steady her.

“Fuck, baby, you're so tight. I love this little pussy.” He groans as he bottoms out, his dick fully buried inside her. Dove’s eyes cross with the sensation of being filled as he slides out and rolls his hips forward to meet hers again.

“It's so good, Jumbee.” He kisses her softly as he picks up a steady rhythm of fucking into her slow and gentle. Maybe it's the pregnancy, or the fact that it's been so long, but when Elvis slips his hand in between them to rub circles on her clit, Dove cums almost immediately, moaning and grasping at his shoulders as her orgasm screams through her veins, lighting her on fire from the inside out.

The feeling of her pussy pulsing and squeezing his cock is almost too much for Elvis to take. He grunts and buries his face in her neck as his hips snap against her over and over again.

“Gonna… oh god, fuck!” He groans into her hair as his hips stutter against hers and he cums deep inside her. His body relaxes and he whispers. “I missed you.”

He lifts his head up and looks into her eyes, cupping her cheek with his hand. She smiles softly and kisses the end of his nose.

“I missed you too.”

******

At the train station, Dove stands on the platform watching as Elvis waves to fans. The Colonel has demanded that she stay back and let him be Elvis Presley. He even has his hand on her arm to keep her next to him. Neither she nor Elvis told him about the baby.

Just before the doors close, Dove yanks her arm away and takes off for the train. When he notices, Elvis's smile switches from the one he gives for pictures into his natural smile and he leans down, grabbing the back of her head and pulling her into a deep kiss. The cameras go wild, but they don't care.

The Colonel curses and Vernon just shakes his head laughing.

“Colonel, you lost. Elvis and Dove are gonna be Elvis and Dove. You might as well embrace it. He'll get rid of you long before he gets rid of her.”

The Colonel shoves his cigar in his mouth and turns around, huffing. He's beaten and he knows it.

As the train pulls away, Elvis is left with the image of Dove on the platform. He watches as she gasps and grabs her stomach, laughing with delight. That's the first time she's felt the baby move. She's lit up with joy and Elvis can't help but smile widely, knowing he'll never forget this picture of her with her eyes bright and her dark hair blowing in the wind. Dove looks down at her baby bump and runs her hand over it.

“Steady, little girl. We'll see daddy soon enough.”

******

Until next time...

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Taglist:

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[theacemagpie]

HELLO PEOPLE OF TUMBLR

Alright mutuals, followers, random people that saw my post (how how did you get here you strange and funny creature?)-

I want to change the look of my blog! And my amazing gf Clo suggested we could do some cute themed couples blog matching thing (ignore the word vomit)

Basically my gf and i want themed blogs that match!

Unfortunately my brain hurts and I cannot think so I will happily consider some ideas!

Please rb or reply to this post to help me with them and maybe I'll make a poll for it too who knows lol

Give us suggestions under this post!

Thank you lovely people! Have a great night/day!

[Tagging some people for fun- no pressure to reply or anything

@four-leafed-queer-gal <- tagging my beloved. Hi love!

@shark-tranny @psychokatrixxxy @ohtobecat @missingnightwingsmullet @goodbye432 @sentientballofpeas @thecrazyalchemist @kermit-is-life @tiny-space-platypus @sir-ghost-the-green @anime-nugg3t @cheezbot @saphi-everything @46-reasonable-hamsters and everyone really

If you wanna be removed from tagged just let me know and sorry if I disturbed you!]

[howlingday]

I’ll just… attach a Shin Godzilla’s tail, Jaune…

JAUNE-ZILLA

"How is he?"

Ren shook his head at Ruby. For the past few weeks, ever since a mysterious stranger snuck upon and attached a strange appendage to Jaune, the paladin leader of Team JNPR had become noticeably more and more ill as of late. The doctors in the infirmary had difficulty determining what was happening to him, originally citing it as some type of unknown infection.

Since then, Jaune had been quarantined within his own room in the medical wing of Beacon Academy. What started as a fever and chills quickly developed into vomiting blood and developing painful lesions across his skin. Not only this, but his body had begun to change as well, developing a form of gigantism matching his adult teeth falling out and being replaced by larger, sharper teeth. What little words he could speak had fallen into mumbles and groans.

The lesions in his skin, which had gone from pale to gray, began to scab over, as if he were suddenly growing scales over his body. This brought confusion as experts all over Remnant were brought in to study this new illness. When one student was asked to look his mind, using his semblance, the student remarked that the only response he could find that remained of Jaune Arc was one word. "Pain."

"Is... Is he going to die?" Ruby asked.

"They're not sure." Pyrrha answered, putting on a brave face for her team. Nora leaned into Ren, not bearing to look at their sister team as their new leader explained. "They say his vital signs are maintaining stability, but..." She swallowed. "They're also saying they don't see any way for Jaune to recover from this."

"He looks pretty bad." Yang commented. "Do you..." She clenched her teeth, hesitating to speak her thoughts.

"Go on." Pyrrha urged.

"Do you... know if anyone is talking about... 'helping' him?" The way Yang put emphasis on the word did little to ease tension. "Y'know?" Concerned her point didn't come across enough, she made a motion similar to putting one's head to pillows.

"I..." Pyrrha sighed. "I wish I could say no." She looked to the doors where their leader had been taken almost a month before. "The doctors are saying that what Jaune has isn't contagious, but... They're also saying that Jaune is in so much pain, anything else would be considered cruel."

"What if-" Sirens blared in the infirmary.

"CODE VIOLET." A voice on the PA system called. "VIOLENT PATIENT IN QUARANTINE."

"JAUNE!" Pyrrha turned to the doors, only to be stopped by Professor Goodwitch. "Professor! Let me!"

"Stay back, students!" The deputy headmistress barked. "Mr. Arc is being subdued and your presence will not-"

"CODE YELLOW." The PA called. "PATIENT HAS ESCAPED QUARANTINE."

"GET DOWN!" A voice called, causing Professor Goodwitch to use her semblance to push the students out of the way. Unfortunately, she was too slow to move herself and was shoved into the wall by a running mass of gray that barreled through the doors. She tried to hold him, but he was too far away and too heavy for her to grasp.

"Jaune!" Pyrrha called, giving chase with Team JNPR. Ruby looked to Professor Goodwitch, who was being helped by the infirmary staff, then looked to her team who nodded. Jaune was in pain, and they were going to help their friend.