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harryforvogue · 3 months ago

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inspired by this request (thank you @ftdtkatie and welcome back queen). harry and mia post wedding reception. smut but it's not really detailed innit. 2.7k words. more harry and mia here

***

When Harry finally untangles himself from her, Mia steps into the hotel room, twirling the key around her finger. “Wow,” she murmurs, reaching for the light switch. “This is … wow.”

Harry’s back to nuzzling against her neck, arms around her again. “Only the best for you.”

Mia suppresses her shudder, tossing the keys onto the entrance table. She lets Harry turn her around and press her against the door, his mouth on hers before she can squint up at him.

“Wife,” he says again, softly, against her mouth. “My wife.”

Her fingers grip his shirt. The blazer is long gone, sleeves rolled up to his elbows to show his strong arms, tattoos, and watch. The soft overhead light above accentuates the shine of the ring on her finger. She wiggles her fingers and Harry laughs softly, covering her left hand with his own.

“Are you happy, Mia?” he whispers, using his other hand to pull her chin up. “Was everything perfect today?”

Mia leans her head back on the door and stares up at him. The glow of the candles to the right of him illuminates half of his handsome face. He’s smiling down at her, dimples on either side of his cheek, breathing softly. His lips are slightly swollen from all the kisses they’ve exchanged today.

“I have never been happier,” Mia says so quietly that it’s nearly inaudible. “And you?”

Harry ducks his head down and kisses her fully, holding her head against the door. “You’ve no idea, Mia,” he whispers. “I don’t think you’ll ever know.”

She breaks her hand out of his and loops her arms around his shoulder. Harry’s eyes shine when he pulls back from the kiss, cheeks a gentle pink. He leans down and picks her up from under her knees, cradling her against his torso. Mia laughs and holds onto him tighter. Harry walks them further into the room, giving her a tour of the place with careless motions. “That’s the dining. The bathrooms. The bar. The fridge.”

Then he stops at the bed, carefully toeing off his shoes and climbing into it on his knees. He swings her carefully and then lays her in the middle of the bed.

Mia stretches cat-like, back sinking into the mattress. “Oh, that’s so nice.”

Harry smiles, sitting down, leaning on his outstretched palm. His eyes twinkle with amusement, watching her stretch her arms out above her head. “Isn’t it? My back’s been hurting something fierce too.”

She shakes her ankles out, catching Harry’s attention. “Try walking around in these.”

“You’re right.” He catches one of her ankles and starts to undo the buckle. “Torture devices.”

“Now you’re understanding.”

Harry drops the shoe and works on the other one. He massages her heel gently, forcing a groan of relief out of Mia who stares up at the ceiling. When Harry’s hand starts trailing upwards and under her dress, she grins and raises her head, pushing up onto her ankles. “What are you doing?”

Harry bends down to kiss her calves and knees, warm hands holding her as if she’ll break. “Sit up, baby. Let’s get your hair down.”

Mia does so, with help from Harry tugging on her hands, and then he sits behind her with his own tie undone and shirt halfway unbuttoned. For the reception, she kept her hair braided and up, so it’s unsurprising that by the time Harry’s done unleashing her hair, there are at least 25 pins sitting in her lap. His nimble fingers run through her hair to get rid of any hairspray, the soft hidden strands from within her bun falling in loose waves around her face. Harry holds her chin as he kisses her again. “So pretty,” he murmurs, lips sliding down to her neck. “Wanna get out of the dress?”

“Mhmm.”

He undoes the zipper and pats her thigh to get her to stand. The dress falls to her feet. Harry leans back on his palms again, biting the inside of his cheek to hide his smile. “You are so pretty, Mia.”

It’s stupid how Mia suddenly feels nervous. She’s not supposed to feel this way – she’s had sex with Harry likely a thousand times now. But there’s something about the way she stands before him in the – very meticulously picked out, thank you very much – bra and underwear set, his eyes drinking her in, though his smile really only widens when he sees the emotion in her eyes.

With his hand outstretched, he beckons her forward. As if a puppet on a string, she shuffles back to him, sitting in his lap.

He kisses her again and again, sighing and licking into her mouth with a surprising amount of gentleness that makes Mia’s throat close.

“Are you tired? Sleepy? Hungry?”

Mia kisses him back, gripping the back of his neck. “I’ve got other things on my mind.”

He hums, drawing back to look at her face. “I’ll order food now so it’s ready by the time we’re done.”

Her fingers walk down his collarbones, lips pursed. “Done with what?” she says innocently, because even though she’s nervous, that won’t stop her from being annoying. “What do you think we’re about to do, mister?””

Harry kisses her once more. “You know damn well what we’re going to do.” Then he leans over and grabs the phone, balancing her into his lap as he does. “What do you think you’ll be in the mood for?”

Mia rests her head on his shoulder, pressing her hips against his. He takes a shuddering breath that makes her smile. “A burger.”

“Fries?”

“Nah.”

“Anything else? Dessert?”

“No cake, please. I’ve had too much today.”

“Alright, baby.”

She listens to him dial and wait for the desk to answer. His voice rumbles under her ear. He finishes his list of late night dining food with “...and if you could, a bowl of strawberries for dessert. Thanks.”

Mia lifts her head to grin at him when he puts the phone down. “So romantic.”

“Should have made them chocolate covered,” Harry says with a frown.

She kisses him, throwing all her might into it, which effectively catches Harry off guard. Instead of catching her, he falls onto his back, his hair in his face as she swings a leg over his waist and straddles him. The undone tie comes off first, flying behind her, and Harry’s laughing as she works on the rest of his buttons.

“What do we have – T-minus twenty minutes?”

“Thirty, likely.”

“Enough time, I’d say.”

Harry reaches up and squishes her cheeks together. “Oh yeah?” he mimics. “What do you think we’re about to do, huh?”

Mia tries to bat his hands away but he only squishes harder. She crosses her arms over her barely dressed torso and says, “You’re being horny. I’m being practical. Don’t you know that a lack of consummation is grounds for annulment?”

Harry throws his head back and snorts. “There’s absolutely no way you just said consummation.”

“It’s a real thing.”

“I’m pretty sure we’ve consummated our relationship to keep us afloat for a good decade.”

“Oh, so you’re saying you want an annulment?”

Harry bites on his inner cheek. “It’s a bit early for divorce jokes, no?”

“Annulment, not divorce.”

“Whatever.” He raises his head and smiles up at her. “Mia.”

“Yeah?”

“Why are you shaking?” His hands come up around her, yanking her down with him so she lays flat on his chest. He rubs her arms, but the shivering doesn’t stop. “Baby.”

“Is it stupid that I’m actually, you know, nervous-excited?”

“Excited, I understand. Being nervous, though, is interesting.”

“You’re not nervous?”

“To..to have sex?” Harry asks, slightly bewildered. “Not really.”

Mia rolls her eyes. “I don’t think it’s the sex that's making me nervous. I don’t know what it is. Just all the excitement and all of today, maybe. I think I’m having a sugar crash. Yeah, that’s what this feels like. But I also don’t want the day to end because I’m having so much fun. It’s surreal, but I’m also in the moment. It’s weird. I don’t know.”

She knows she’s rambling a bit, but it’s hard to stop once she’s started and Harry’s looking at her with just a fond smile, she’s not sure if he’s actually listening or just admiring her face.

“I know it’s a lot to process,” Harry says once he’s done staring at her. “Honestly, my love, if you just wanna crash for the night, we can do that. Like I said, we’ve consummated enough times–”

“I’m really starting to dislike the way you say that word–”

“--so we can just get our clothes off and go to sleep.”

Mia frowns deeply. “No way I’m sleeping without banging you within an inch of your life, Harry.”

“Romantic.” He sits up and brings her along. “Mia.” He waits for her to look at him. “You’re in charge tonight. Whatever you want goes.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

A look of determination slots onto her face. “Alright.”

The kiss is gentle, but there’s an underlying urgency in it. The way she presses her hips to his again suggests she’s done with the chatter, and when his large hands grab her waist and pull on her, she softly sighs into his mouth.

Harry – to be plain – has been hard since the moment Mia looked at him at the reception half an hour ago and said it’s time to leave. He’d been waiting for her signal, and now they’re here, Mia sprawled on top of him, thighs around his waist, and her mouth hot on his. Her hands push off his shirt, tossing it aside just as Harry’s fingers twist off the clasp of her bra.

She shivers as the straps fall from her shoulders, and Harry leans in to pepper kisses to her chest. She holds him close, cradling his head, and throwing her own head back with a satisfied hum. His lips find the column of her throat next, the back of her ear, her temple, her nose. He twists them over so that he lays on top of her, and she gives in to his heady kisses.

His hands slide down her sides, fingers catching onto the band of her underwear, and he pulls away to look at her. It’s always been what he does, Mia thinks, as his eyes search for visible agreement. She nods at him, raising her hips to help him. His dimples return and the last of her garment is tossed away.

“Not fair,” Mia murmurs, dragging her nails down his abs. He tightens the muscles to prevent being tickless. “Take yours off too.”

Harry works on his belt while Mia watches with heavy eyes. Once his trousers are gone, he fits himself between her legs and sighs at the contact of their skin.

She loves the weight of him on top of her, just shy of crushing her lungs. His soft skin against hers, simply absorbing heat.

“Nothing else,” Mia says, getting comfortable under him. “We can do the other stuff later. Just want you inside of me right now.”

Harry smiles. “You know me too well.”

“I can tell by that evil look that you’re about to use your mouth, but I mean it,” Mia giggles, and he kisses her neck as his hands slowly part her legs. His fingers slide through, gently pressing one finger at her entrance. He pushes in and listens to her whimper before adding another. And when she whimpers again, he kisses her so he can swallow the noises and savor them.

“Harry, ah please just – yeah. Just… yes. Yes.”

He lines himself up and carefully begins to enter her. It’s always this way, no matter if they’ve previously decided to be rough. He watches her face contort with pleasure, her mangled whine blending in with his deep groan. The feel of her walls invites him, warm and comforting.

“I love you,” Harry murmurs against her mouth, arms braced beside her head. Her eyes flicker up at him, a beginning of a flush blossoming on her face. “You are everything. Do you understand? Everything.”

His thrusts are shallow at first, but once he hears her throaty moan, he pulls her closer to him and presses deeper. She makes the prettiest sounds as he quickens his pace, eyes never leaving hers.

“Wife,” he marvels, causing Mia to whine and throw her arms around him. Her sharp nails dig into his shoulders. “I love you. I love you.”

All of Mia’s nervousness, or whatever you would call it, melts away. Instead, she looks up at her husband in awe. Only the two of them know how far they’ve come. Nobody else but Mia sees the way Harry’s eyes take her in, how his heart beats to the syllables of her name, how his hands cup her face as if she’s the most precious thing he’s ever laid eyes on.

And in his most vulnerable moment too. Nobody sees Harry the way he is now, spread out and bare in front of her, broken down to the point where she can see every molecule of him. His fears, his fierce way of loving, his stubbornness, his protectiveness.

It’s all hers.

She holds him closer, emotion in her throat causing her to moan lowly, nails still pressing into his skin.

It doesn’t take long for either of them to announce their impending orgasm, but Harry goes first, and then, with the help of his thumb against her clit, she follows, hot pleasure running down her spine like electricity. He’s holding her in his arms when she’s coming down from that high, mumbles soft words against her hair.

“I love you,” Mia whispers, and that doesn’t even begin to cover it.

Harry’s lips twist into a smile and he runs his palms over her eyes. “I love you.”

“I’m crying?”

“A little, my love.”

His own eyes are looking misty again.

“Sorry. Don’t know why I’d be crying right now.”

He shakes his head. “Don’t apologize.” He starts sliding down her body, and she only realizes what he’s doing when his head is between her legs and his tongue is darting out to give her a gentle lick.

Mia hisses, yanking on his hair. “Give me a bloody minute, would you?”

He rests his head on her thigh and waits exactly one minute before he returns to his spot and licks into her.

Despite the lack of rest, Mia’s riding out another orgasm on his tongue within minutes, the tears in her eyes now from oversensitivity. She’s pushing him away frantically, trembling when he emerges while wiping the corners of his mouth, grinning. His hair is a mess, curtains around his brows, and his eyes filled with delight.

He’s so fucking handsome.

“You just can’t help yourself,” Mia says, barely able to manage a whisper.

“You taste so good, I really can’t.”

Before he returns to lay next to her, he finds his white shirt and helps her into it. She’s shivering again, still from excitement it seems, and when he finds his place beside her, she immediately snuggles into him. Mia takes exaggerated inhales to breathe in his scent, and Harry simply cards his clean fingers through her hair.

It’s nearing two in the morning now, but unlike before, Mia’s wide awake. Harry’s eyes are closed, she sees when she glances at him, but he doesn't seem to be asleep. She presses even closer to him, throwing the blanket over his lower half to keep him from getting cold.

When the food arrives, it’s Mia that wraps her robe around herself and takes it in while Harry yawns and struggles to sit up. They go for the strawberries first, both of them sitting in white robes on the edge of the bed, shoulders brushing against one another. He pours her some champagne and blinks at her when she tells him she’s barely had a sip of water today.

And when Harry wipes the strawberry residue from Mia’s mouth and drags her in for a deep kiss, Mia’s heart just about explodes with happiness. Harry smiles into the kiss and holds her tighter.

She leans into his strong frame, breathing him in again.

Everything is good.

#harry and mia #harry styles fic #harry styles smut #harry styles writing #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles x oc #harry styles fluff

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exaltedfuzz · 3 months ago

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Wrote something...

Bonus sketch:

#art #my art #ace attorney #exaltedfuzz #artists on tumblr #digital art #lana skye #artist #ace attorney fanart #mia fey #writing #fanfiction #fanfic #lanamia

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threewaywithdelusion · 1 year ago

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You Me Her

Since AO3 is down and I'm sure people are losing their minds looking for fics (I am people), I'm posting some of my fics over here. If you look in the tag "Mia writes fanfic" you can see all the fic I've posted on tumblr. If you prefer to read on AO3 now that it’s back up, you can find this fic here

Robin was the first person to notice something was wrong with Steve Harrington.

By the end of the day, everyone had noticed. People were whispering up and down the halls, wondering what had happened to Steve since yesterday to make him act so drastically different. He hadn’t flirted with a single girl all day. He’d told Tommy Hagan to “knock it off” when Tommy had started tormenting a freshman. He’d treated his friends weirdly – avoiding Jason Carver, a sophomore on the basketball team who he’d been training, losing patience with Carol Perkins’s snappish remarks, freezing up when some cheerleaders talked to him.

Robin heard all of this second-hand. King Steve was so notorious that even the band kids were gossiping about his personality transplant. Multiple people came up to Robin to share some tidbit of gossip that they insisted proved that Steve had been body-snatched.

But Robin didn’t need rumors to know that Steve Harrington was different. She’d known since first period, when he’d walked into Ms. Click’s class on time and without a bagel. Steve had barely glanced at Tammy, even as she’d looked at him from under her lashes, beautiful and enticing. Instead, Steve had, for the first time in his entire life, looked at Robin.

And he’d smiled at her. Not a polite acknowledgement of her existence – which still would have been more than Robin had ever gotten from him – but a huge, friendly smile. The kind that would have had most girls falling at his feet.

Robin glanced behind her to see if Steve was smiling at someone else, but unless Steve was smiling like that at Fred Benson – even more unlikely – he was definitely directing that expression at her.

Robin spun back to Steve, unsure what her face was communicating. Confusion, maybe, or wide-eyed shock.

Steve didn’t look offended or surprised by her reaction, just gave her a dorky little wave and sat down.

Robin stared at the back of his head, still trying to process what had just happened. Tammy turned to Robin, scanning her up and down. Robin knew she was just trying to figure out what about Robin had caught King Steve’s interest, but her scrutiny made Robin feel all hot anyway. It was Tammy, looking at Robin intently. With purpose. Taking in Robin’s stupid perm and her smudgy makeup and her layers of jewelry.

Robin blushed.

Tammy turned back around.

Ms. Click began talking, but Robin didn’t hear a single word for the rest of class, lost in thought. She alternated between loud mental screaming about the fact that Tammy had looked at her and staring at Steve Harrington’s famous hair and wondering what the hell had inspired him to notice her existence.

Robin was packing in a daze at the end of class when Steve gave her another smile before leaving. Robin accidentally met Tammy’s eyes, which were just as confused as Robin felt.

Tammy bit her lip, which was pink and soft-looking. “Robin? Did you talk to Steve over the weekend?”

Oh my god. Tammy was talking to her. It wasn’t like Tammy never talked to her, but every single time it made Robin lose her mind and babble like a freak.

Robin just shook her head instead of risking opening her mouth.

“Oh,” Tammy said, looking disappointed. “But you like him?”

“No,” Robin said honestly. “I don’t even know him.”

“But you like him,” Tammy said, and this time it wasn’t a question. “I saw you blushing after he smiled at you.”

“I guess so,” Robin said. What else was she supposed to say? She couldn’t tell Tammy that she didn’t give a damn if Steve Harrington looked at her and that the blush had been all for Tammy. That would send Tammy running the other way.

“You don’t have to be embarrassed,” Tammy said. “A lot of girls like Steve.”

She didn’t mention that she was one of those girls, but she didn’t need to. Robin knew.

Maybe it would be okay to pretend to like Steve. It would give her and Tammy something in common and it would help her hide in plain sight. Steve was the perfect fake crush for a lesbian, pretty and athletic enough to be an acceptable crush, but unattainable enough that she would never have to act on it. Robin had never faked a crush on him before because of the principle of the thing, but now that she’d accidentally already done it, she might as well keep up the pretense.

“Today must have been a fluke,” Robin told Tammy, trying to sound both reassuring and lovelorn. She didn’t want Tammy to see her as a threat. She wanted her to see her as a friend. “I don’t think Steve even knows my name.”

***

But Steve kept smiling at her for the rest of the week and on Thursday, Tammy asked Robin if she wanted to hang out after school.

“Really?” Robin asked. Then, “I mean, yeah, sure. Sounds fun.”

So Robin went to Tammy’s house with the rest of Tammy’s friends. Apparently they did this every Thursday — Friday and Saturday were date nights, which made Thursday the perfect girls’ night.

They went up to Tammy’s room, which was like peeking into her mind. The other girls paid no attention to the room, probably having seen it a million times. They settled on the floor, spreading bowls of chips and chocolates around and pulling out magazines and nail polish. But Robin couldn’t help but try to take in every detail of the room. The walls were pink and the curtains and bedspread a gauzy white, giving everything a bit of a princess feel. But there were posters on the wall, and not the kind Robin had expected. There weren’t handsome movie stars — these were girls with guitars.

“Who’s that?” Robin asked, pointing at a poster of a girl with long straight hair, standing over a microphone and holding a guitar.

Tammy twisted to see who Robin was pointing to. “That’s Emmylou Harris. She’s incredible. She was one of the first women to really make it big in country music.”

“So you want to be like her?” Robin asked.

Tammy blushed a little, playing with the end of her long blonde curls. “I mean, I don’t know if I’m as good as Emmylou Harris. But that’s the dream.”

“You’re really good,” Robin said sincerely. “I heard you singing Kiss On My List before class the other day and it was-“ captivating. life-changing. beautiful. “Really good,” Robin finished lamely.

“Thank you,” Tammy said, looking touched.

One of Tammy’s friends — Olivia? — rolled her eyes. “Tam, we didn’t invite Robin here to talk about your singing. We want to hear about Steve Harrington!”

The two other girls — Karen and Melissa — giggled and nodded their agreement.

“What did you do to get his attention?” Olivia asked Robin.

Robin tried not to obviously deflate. She wanted to talk to Tammy about her passions, see the way Tammy lit up when she smiled. She didn’t want to gossip about stupid boys, especially not Steve Harrington.

But that was why they’d invited her over. Her fake crush on Steve was her in with these girls, with Tammy, and she had to make them believe her if she wanted to be invited to spend more time with him.

“I don’t know,” Robin said honestly. “I’ve sat behind him all year and I didn’t think he knew I existed. And then all of a sudden on Monday — bam! — he’s acting like he knows me.”

Melissa hummed, passing around bottles of nail polish. “Maybe it’s your hair? Did you perm it recently? Cause Heather Holloway says Steve has a thing for girls with curly hair.”

Tammy frowned at her own hair and shook her head. “Robin’s hair has been like that all year.”

Tammy had watched Robin closely enough to notice what she did with her hair? Robin bit down on a smile, grabbing blue nail polish from Melissa.

“Did you go to the party last weekend?” Karen asked.

Robin shook her head. She’s actually spend last weekend reading a book, listening to her language tapes, and playing board games with her parents. Nothing that could be remotely considered cool.

“Did you look particularly pretty on Monday?” Olivia asked.

Robin shrugged. “I think I just looked how I always do.”

Tammy put on a Kris Kristofferson record then sat down beside Robin again. “I guess we’ll just have to watch what he does in class. Collect more information.”

“I guess so,” Robin said, hoping Steve forgot her existence soon for her own sake. She didn’t know what she would do if he actually asked her out.

But maybe if he kept giving her attention she could keep this new friendship with Tammy, at least for a little while.

Robin sighed, loud and long.

“Don’t worry,” Tammy said, “We’ll figure it out.”

“And you don’t… mind?” Robin asked. “I know you like him too. I don’t want to break girl code or something.”

Robin had never worried about breaking girl code before, for obvious reasons, but she’d seen girls fall out over liking the same guy.

Olivia snorted. “Please. Girl code doesn’t count when it comes to Steve Harrington. He’s slept with half the school.”

“Yeah, everyone knows he’s just a good time,” Karen added. “He doesn’t actually date girls for real.”

“I went out with him for two weeks in middle school,” Melissa said. “We made it to second base and then he dumped me for Erica Tanner.”

“You’re in good company here,” Olivia promised.

Tammy still hadn’t spoken. Tammy was focused on painting her nails bright pink, a color Robin would never choose for herself but that perfectly matched with Tammy’s pink cheeks and pink lips, which she was biting.

Because Tammy cared, Robin realized. Steve might be the school slut, and he might never date a girl seriously, but Tammy liked him for real.

Melissa, Olivia, and Karen were now arguing over whether Melissa’s two-week fling with Steve Harrington counted as a relationship. They seemed sufficiently distracted, so Robin dropped her voice low and leaned into Tammy’s space.

“Do you mind?” she asked Tammy. “Because I can back off.”

“No,” Tammy said, smile pretty and entirely a lie. “It’s okay. I don’t mind.”

Robin didn’t know what to do with that. Was Tammy trying to save face by not admitting she had a real crush on Steve Harrington? Was this her way of testing if Robin was worthy friend-material? How was Steve fucking Harrington Robin’s key to getting to know Tammy and also the one who was mostly likely to ruin this new friendship?

“Okay,” Robin said, staring at her nails so she wouldn’t have to figure out what facial expression was appropriate. She cleared her throat. “So you were telling me about Emmylou Harris?”

***

Steve Harrington came up to Robin at her locker on Friday, when she was getting the books she needed to take home for the weekend.

“Hey,” he said, like it wasn’t supremely weird that he was approaching Robin Buckley, band geek and wallflower and no one who ever should have caught his eye.

“Hi?” Robin answered.

Steve ran his fingers through his hair. “Do you want to go to the diner with me? We could get milkshakes.”

Robin stared at him. Was this a joke? A prank? Had one of his friends dared him to ask out the weird band kid?

“What?” Robin asked.

Steve rubbed the back of his neck. He looked nervous, which was crazy. He was Steve Harrington and she was just Robin Buckley.

“I can drive us,” Steve said. “And I’ll pay.”

“I’m not going on a date with you,” Robin said. It was a gut reaction, but a second later Robin couldn’t help but wonder if she should have said yes. What was she going to tell Tammy about why she’d turned down her supposed crush?

But why was Steve Harrington even asking her out in the first place?

Steve didn’t look offended at her rejection, but he did hurry to say, “I know. I didn’t mean as a date.”

Robin looked down the hall. A group of cheerleaders at one end was watching them, giggling and tittering. Had the cheerleaders put him up to this? Girls could be vicious, but trying to embarrass a girl by having a boy ask her out seemed like a more guy type of prank somehow.

“You want to hang out with me just as friends,” Robin said skeptically.

“Yeah,” Steve said.

Robin rolled her eyes. “Right. Thanks, but no thanks.”

“I mean it,” Steve said. “I want to be friends.”

He was lying. Robin didn’t know why, but he was lying. Maybe he thought that if she hung out with him as “friends” she would eventually change her mind and agree to date him.

“Why?” Robin demanded. “Why would you want to be friends with me?”

Steve opened his mouth, then paused. He thought for a few seconds before he said, “You seem cool.”

Robin snorted. “I’m the furthest thing from cool.”

“No, I know,” Steve said. “I mean you seem… interesting. Nice. Fun.”

“You don’t even know me,” Robin said. “We’ve never spoken, and now all of a sudden you’re interested in me? I don’t buy it.”

“It’s true,” Steve said. He jumped as a hand landed on his arm and then Carol Perkins was there, staring Robin down with disdain in her eyes.

“What are you doing?” Carol asked.

“I was asking Robin to milkshakes,” Steve said.

Carol gave Robin an up-and-down and it didn’t feel good like when Tammy had done it. Carol wasn’t admiring her. She was looking at Robin like gum stuck to the bottom of her shoe.

“Are you that bored of going out with pretty girls?” Carol asked, voice all fake-interested like it was a real question.

Steve scowled, shaking Carol’s hand off his arm. “Robin’s pretty.”

Carol rolled her eyes. “She’s not terrible, I guess, under that bad perm, but she dresses like a dyke. If you want to rebel and date a freak or a charity case, you can do better.”

Robin flinched violently when Carol said the word dyke. She fought to keep her expression straight even as her heart raced and her lungs constricted.

Did Carol Perkins know? Or had she blindly thrown out an insult, hoping it would hurt?

“Don’t call her that,” Steve snapped, his face dark and furious. He looked frightening enough that Robin skittered back half a step.

Carol didn’t look scared of Steve, but her mouth did drop open in shock.

That was fair. Robin was shocked too.

Was Steve defending her?

Maybe this was what it meant to be a girl Steve Harrington liked. Maybe he didn’t like Carol calling Robin a dyke because that was an offense to his own masculinity. That was the only thing that made sense. Robin had heard Steve throw around gay slurs just last week, so it couldn’t be the word itself that he had a problem with.

“Seriously, Steve?” Carol asked, haughty and judgmental. “You can’t actually like her.”

“Robin is great,” Steve insisted.

Carol rolled her eyes. “Whatever. I’ll remind you of this when you come to your senses.”

With that, Carol spun on her heels – red hair smacking Steve in the face – and walked away.

Steve’s posture loosened, like he had also perceived Carol as a threat.

“I’m sorry,” he told Robin, looking sincere and apologetic.

Robin hated him.

“Stay the fuck away from me” Robin told Steve.

She slammed her locker and walked away, clutching her books to her chest to hide her shaking hands. She kept her head up as she walked by the cheerleaders, who laughed loudly as she passed.

***

Steve kept smiling at her whenever he walked into Click’s class, but he didn’t try to ask her out again.

He looked a bit like a kicked puppy every time she glared back at him, but Robin didn’t care.

“What are you doing?” Tammy asked one day after class. “He’s going to give up on you if you keep glaring at him like that.”

“He asked me out as a joke,” Robin told Tammy.

Tammy frowned. “Are you sure it was a joke? I don’t think he would do that.”

“I’m sure,” Robin said darkly, thinking of Carol hovering and the cheerleaders watching. Did Steve believe what Carol had said? Was that the joke: to put Robin in a position where she had to either go on a date with a man she didn’t like or else turn him down and confirm she was a lesbian? What kind of girl said no to a date with Steve Harrington?

Tammy bit her lip. She had on bright pink lipstick today. It would have looked tacky on anyone else, but it made Tammy look like a pop star. Robin wondered if the lipstick was flavored. She wished she could kiss Tammy and find out.

“You don’t mind if I flirt with him, right?” Tammy asked, echoing Robin’s words at her house last week. So far, Robin hadn’t been invited to girls’ night again.

Yes, Robin thought. Yes, I mind. I mind so much, but not for the reason that you think.

“Not at all,” Robin said. “It’s like you said, girl code doesn’t apply to Steve Harrington. Go for it.”

So Tammy kept trying to get Steve’s attention. He was nice to her. He never outright ignored her when she talked to him, but he never talked to her for longer than politeness required. He would always turn away, missing the way Tammy’s face fell.

And he kept fucking smiling at Robin. Picking up her books when she dropped them. Apologizing to her when he got bagel crumbs on the floor, even though she’d never mentioned how much it annoyed her. Turning to catch her eye when someone said something funny, like he thought she was someone he could share inside jokes with.

Slowly, Tammy stopped smiling at Robin. She started flicking annoyed glances in Robin’s direction whenever Steve gave Robin attention. Started snapping at Robin whenever Robin tried to sympathize with her about how much of a douchebag Steve Harrington was. Started avoiding Robin unless Robin directly started conversation with her.

Steve Harrington was ruining everything.

***

“What are you doing?” Robin demanded. She’d chased Steve after Ms. Click’s class, following him to the little alley out by the gym. She was going to be late for math, but she didn’t care. She needed to talk to him before he ruined everything.

Steve frowned as he lit up a cigarette. “What do you mean?”

“In Click’s class,” Robin said. “Tammy is practically throwing herself at you but you never even look her way. And I don’t talk to you at all, but you keep trying to talk to me.”

A flash of something crossed Steve’s face, but Robin didn’t know him well enough to read his expressions and it was gone in a heartbeat anyway.

“You don’t want me to talk to you?” Steve asked.

“Yes!” Robin said. “No. I don’t know. Why won’t you flirt with Tammy?”

Steve’s face scrunched up. It was a face Robin had seen before when they were taking tests in class – it meant Steve had no idea what was going on. “You’re upset because I’m not flirting with Tammy Thompson?”

“I don’t get it!” Robin said. “She’s really nice and she’s a good singer and she’s really pretty. Objectively. I mean, she seems like the Steve Harrington type.”

“Right,” Steve said, his lips twitching like she had said something funny.

“So I don’t get it,” Robin said. “She’s right there, and I don’t even try, but you keep looking. What’s so special about me?”

“Oh,” Steve said, like he had just realized something. “She’s jealous of you.”

Robin shuffled but didn’t say anything. Of course Tammy was jealous. Steve sat next to her every day, did he really not see it?

“And you don’t like that,” Steve continued, like he was figuring something out. Unfortunately, he was figuring out entirely the wrong thing. Robin wasn’t here to talk to Steve about her friendship with Tammy, she was here to find out why Steve didn’t like Tammy and why he seemed to like her.

“It’s not about me,” Robin said.

“Right,” Steve said, inhaling his stupid carcinogens. “Okay.”

“Okay?” Robin asked. She was pretty sure she was smarter than Steve Harrington, so she didn’t know why she was the one feeling lost in this conversation.

Steve stubbed out his cigarette against the wall. “I’ll fix it.”

The late bell rang. Robin wanted to ask Steve what he’d understood from this conversation, but she really did need to go to math class. Arriving late wasn’t a good way to fly under the radar.

“Okay,” she told Steve, not quite sure what she was agreeing to.

He gave her another one of those big smiles as she left the alleyway. It made something churn in her gut.

She wanted to be the kind of girl who got excited when Steve Harrington smiled at her like that. She wanted Tammy Thompson to smile at her like that. She wanted to fall in love with someone who loved her back, and she wanted to not get chased out of town by an angry mob with pitchforks for it.

***

The next time Robin walked into Ms. Click’s class, Steve was flirting with Tammy.

Robin had to stop in the middle of the aisle, feeling like she’d just been punched in the gut.

Tammy was leaning into Steve’s space, twirling her blonde curls around one finger. Steve was smiling at her, arm stretched over the back of her chair, listening attentively as she spoke.

Robin forced herself to walk mechanically to her desk. She took her notebook and pencil case out of her backpack and very carefully arranged everything on her desk, doing anything she could to prolong looking up. She didn’t want to watch this.

After what felt like the longest few minutes of Robin’s life, Ms. Click began talking. Robin risked looking up and saw that Steve had pulled his arm back and Tammy was sitting in her own seat again.

She couldn't stop seeing them wrapped up in each other.

At the end of class, Steve walked out quickly, the way he always did. Robin wondered if he always went to smoke behind the gym and that was why he ran away so fast.

Tammy whirled to Robin, squealing, her face lit up in a beautiful smile.

“Robin! Did you see that!”

Tammy hadn’t started a conversation with Robin in two weeks. Robin managed a real smile in the face of Tammy’s happiness.

“I did,” she said.

“I think he likes me,” Tammy said, almost shy, playing with the bracelets on her wrist.

“Yeah,” Robin said, ignoring the sinking feeling in her gut. “I think so too.”

***

The rumors at band practice told Robin that Steve was still flirting with other girls. He seemed particularly interested in Nancy Wheeler, who was a priss and a nerd but who was pretty and definitely his type. He seemed to be slowly wearing her down.

It made Robin furious. So Steve Harrington had a crush on Nancy Wheeler, fine, that made sense. But if he really liked her, and the rumors said he was absolutely head-over-heels, then what was he doing playing with Tammy and Robin? What the fuck was he up to?

***

A week later, Steve didn’t run out of Click’s class at the first sound of the bell. Instead he turned to Tammy and Robin and said, “I’m having a party at my house tonight. You’re both invited.”

“I’ll think about it,” Tammy said, smiling like this was a game. It was. They all knew Tammy would be going to see Steve and she was just trying to play it cool.

“Cool,” Steve said. He met Tammy’s eyes, then Robin's. “I’ll see you there.”

Tammy waited until he walked away, then did a little shimmy of excitement. It was kind of lame, but also hopelessly endearing. Robin liked when Tammy didn’t try to act cool around her.

“You’re going?” Robin asked dully.

“Of course I’m going!” Tammy said. “This is going to be so much fun! You’re coming, right?”

“Yeah,” Robin said, her mouth running before her brain could catch up with it. Tammy wanted her there. What else could she do? “I’ll be there.”

***

Robin got her dad to drop her off at the party. She was willing to bet she was the only teenager being dropped off by their dad, but her parents weren’t the type to be upset about her going out and they trusted her to drink responsibly. Plus, Robin couldn’t drive, so she didn’t know how else she was supposed to get there.

By the time she arrived, the party was already in full swing. Music came from inside the house and a few people spilled out into the yard.

Robin headed inside, dodging around a few couples making out against the hallway walls. Tammy was probably here already, right? Robin passed through the kitchen, filling a red solo cup with a tiny amount of vodka and a lot of coke. Jason Carver was there, flirting with Chrissy Cunningham, who was blushing at the attention.

Robin slipped into the living room and that was where she found Tammy. She was standing against a wall, surrounded by Olivia, Melissa, and Karen. Tammy was holding a red solo cup and staring out at the other end of the living room.

Robin followed her gave to Steve, who was talking to… Eddie Munson? Robin watched with her jaw slack until Steve came away with a grin and a joint between his fingers.

That made sense, actually. Of course the only reason Steve Harrington would ever speak to Eddie Munson would be to buy drugs.

Robin went up to Tammy, hovering at the edge of the group as she said “hi.”

“Hey,” Tammy said, giving her a distracted smile.

“I like your dress,” Robin said. She wanted to say that Tammy looked good, but that wasn’t a safe compliment.

“Thanks,” Tammy said. “I got it in Indy.”

“It’s cute,” Robin said. It was — pink and ruffled at the edges and unlike anything anyone else was wearing. Something that screamed Tammy Thompson.

The music went quiet for a moment, and Robin spun around, trying to figure out why. Carol Perkins was standing by the speakers.

“Let’s play a game!” she said, blowing a bubble with her gum like the picture of teenage insouciance. “Truth or dare.”

She sat on the ground, Tommy Hagan and Steve Harrington sitting beside her. A few more jocks joined — Jason and Andy from the basketball team, Chrissy and Fiona from the cheerleading squad. Heather Holloway and Patrick and Brenda.

“We have to join!” Tammy said. She grabbed Robin’s hand and dragged her over to the circle.

Robin complied in a daze. Tammy was holding her hand. Tammy’s hand was soft and warm and not sweaty at all and Robin could die happy, Tammy’s hand in hers.

Tammy released her as soon as they got to the circle and Robin felt suddenly bereft, taking a seat mechanically beside her. Melissa, Karen, and Olivia sat on Tammy’s other side.

Steve Harrington was looking in her direction, eyebrows up, and Robin scowled at him. Steve smiled, hands up like he was saying don’t shoot, and Carol noticed and shot Robin a glare.

“Tommy,” Steve said. “Truth or dare?”

“Dare,” Tommy said.

Steve grinned. “I dare you to let Carol take a body shot off you.”

Tommy scrunched up his face. “Don’t you mean I should take a shot off her?”

Steve blinked, absolutely nothing behind his eyes. “What do you mean?”

So Tommy lay down and balanced a shot glass on his stomach, so low it was practically on his hips, and Carol grabbed it with her mouth, tipping her head back to drink. Robin didn’t like Carol at all, but she had to admit there was something attractive about it, about the long line of Carol’s throat as she drank the shot and the dainty, self-satisfied way she wiped her mouth afterward.

From there, they kept going around the circle.

Heather Holloway gave Andy a lap dance. Fiona admitted to having done mushrooms. Jason Carver was dared to kiss the prettiest girl in the circle, which made him turn to Chrissy Cunningham and say “A good girl like you deserves better than some drunken kiss during truth or dare. What do you say I take you out to dinner tomorrow and then give you a kiss on your front porch at the end of the night?”

Chrissy’s smile was disarmingly wide. “Yeah,” she said, nodding. “That sounds nice.”

“It’s a date,” Jason said. A few of the boys hollered and whooped, patting Jason on the back and shaking him a little. Jason looked bashful, hiding a smile behind a sip of his drink.

“Finally!” Carol Perkins said. She turned to Chrissy. “He’s been pining over you since last year and it took him this long to work up the guts to ask you out.”

Jason screeched at Carol, who ignored him and winked at a pleased-looking Chrissy. Robin was hit with the sudden realization that Carol Perkins could be nice, when she wanted to be.

Melissa got dared to swap clothes with Patrick, Karen revealed she’d shoplifted a pair of earrings once, and Olivia admitted to having made out with a boy in the school janitor’s closet.

Then it was Tammy’s turn.

“Truth or dare?”

“Dare,” Tammy said, something brave in her eyes.

A few of the girls conferred together — Carol and Heather and Fiona — before turning to Tammy with smiles on their faces. “We dare you to shotgun with Steve.”

Tammy’s eyes went wide. Robin didn’t think Tammy was the type to smoke weed, but Tammy pressed a confident smile onto her face. Maybe she didn’t want to back down from a dare. Maybe she just wanted a chance to press her mouth against Steve Harrington’s.

Steve looked at her from all the way across the circle — if he, Tommy, and Carol were the North Pole, Tammy and Robin were the South, the antipodal point — and raised the joint questioningly.

“Okay,” Tammy said.

Steve took a drag off the joint and crawled across the circle. Tammy met him in the middle and he was gentle as he used one hand to tip her chin up, pressing his lips against hers and exhaling. Robin could only really see the back of Tammy’s head, but she was hit by a burning jealousy at the way Steve so casually touched her.

It felt like it had been years since Tammy had held her hand.

Tammy sat back beside Robin, a pleased little smile on her face.

“Band kid,” Carol said, smiling meanly. “Truth or dare.”

Robin shuffled uncomfortably. So far all the dares had involved some kind of sexual display with the opposite sex and Robin did not want to kiss a boy or give him a lap dance. But she also had a lot of secrets she didn’t really feel like sharing.

She should pick truth, right? Worst come to worst, she could just lie. It’s not like any of these people would ever know — none of them really knew her.

“Truth,” Robin said.

Chrissy started to say something, but Carol spoke over her. “Who was your first kiss?”

Robin’s cheeks flamed. Carol was doing this on purpose.

“I haven’t had my first kiss yet,” Robin said, trying to sound casual. It wasn’t that unusual, at least in the circles she ran with.

But Carol reacted with extreme shock, her eyes going wide, her mouth dropping open. “Ever? That’s so sad!”

“Not really,” Robin said. Everyone was staring at her. She’d spent months trying to fly under the radar, and now they were all watching her and it was just as terrible as she’d thought it would be.

Carol kept going. “But why haven’t you kissed anyone? Aren’t there any boys you like?”

It would have been fine if Carol hadn’t paused a little, put more emphasis on the word boys. But Carol knew what she was doing, insinuating exactly what she had when she’d stood with Steve by Robin’s locker.

Everyone in the circle was staring at Robin. Jason Carver looked disgusted. Tammy pulled back a bit from Robin’s side.

Robin felt like she was going to throw up.

Then Steve Harrington scoffed. All eyes moved to him, to see what the King was going to say. Steve was relaxed, weight back on one hand, legs kicked out in front of him. “Not everyone is a slut, Carol.”

The like you went unspoken, but Robin saw it land. Carol’s face scrunched up with real hurt for a second, like she wasn’t sure why Steve was attacking her.

Tommy, sitting between them, gave Steve a what the fuck look as he pulled Carol into his side.

Steve either didn’t see any of this or pretended not to. He turned to Patrick, sitting next to Robin on the opposite side as Tammy, and said “truth or dare?”

Robin relaxed. It was over, right? They weren’t looking at her anymore?

She glanced around the circle and it seemed like everyone had moved on. A sneaky glance at Tammy showed that she wasn’t sitting as close to Robin as before, but she also wasn’t looking particularly repulsed. Maybe she had just forgotten to move back again.

Robin didn’t really believe it.

She tried to calm her racing heart as the next few people went. But when it was Steve Harrington’s turn, she couldn’t help but tune in.

“Steve,” Tommy Hagan said. “Truth or dare?”

“Dare,” Steve said, like every teenage jock ever.

Carol leaned over and whispered in Tommy’s ear and Tommy grinned. “I dare you to kiss Robin Buckley.”

Robin’s blood turned to ice. Once again, all heads in the circle swiveled to her.

Robin didn’t want to kiss Steve Harrington. She had been saving her first kiss because she wanted it to be special. She could have pretended to like a boy, to kiss a boy, to date a boy. But she had wanted to save all her firsts for a girl — to have them be real and meaningful instead of a stupid farce.

She didn’t have a choice though. Not after what Carol had implied earlier. If Robin didn’t kiss Steve, she would practically be confirming that she was a lesbian.

Robin looked to Carol, who was smirking at her.

“Yeah,” Robin said shakily. “Okay.”

Steve was watching her intently, something indecipherable in his eyes. He got to his feet and crossed the circle, kneeling down in front of her.

Robin didn’t think she’d ever been this close to a boy. He smelled like hairspray and beer, and his eyes were brown and serious as she watched her.

He gave her the same friendly smile he’d been giving her all semester, then leaned in to whisper in her ear. His breath was uncomfortably hot on her skin as he said, “trust me.”

Then he pulled back and squared his shoulders, cocky and unapologetic about it. He smirked around the circle, a boy proud to be showing off that he was kissing a pretty girl.

Robin was going to throw up. Her heart was pounding and she was going to have to kiss a boy and Steve had been playing games with her all semester.

Robin closed her eyes, preparing for the kiss and also trying to hide the hot tears she could feel building up.

She jumped a bit when Steve’s hands landed on her face. He wasn’t holding her jaw delicately like he’d done to Tammy. Both of Steve’s giant palms where splayed across her cheeks, one of them half caught in her hair, dragging it in front of her face. Great. Her first kiss was going to taste like hair and that wasn’t even going to be the worst part of it.

Robin kept her eyes screwed shut as Steve’s skin pressed against her lips and his nose bumped hers and — those weren’t Steve’s lips.

Steve was close, yes, so close they were sharing the same air. So close that it probably looked like they were kissing.

But this was a stage kiss. Steve’s thumb was over Robin’s mouth, his lips pressed to one side and hers to the other.

Robin opened her eyes in shock. She couldn’t really see Steve — he was too close not to be blurry — but his eyes were pressed closed, brown eyelashes fanned over his cheeks. As if this were a real kiss.

Where had basketball-playing, prom king Steve Harrington even learned what a stage kiss was? This couldn’t be standard practice for the popular kids — they played these games as an excuse to kiss each other, not to fake it.

And more importantly, why was he doing this? Was he that opposed to kissing her? Or had he somehow noticed her reluctance and decided to protect her while allowing both of them to save face?

Steve used his hands to tilt Robin’s head and she followed without resistance. He pressed closer, moving her back, and they still weren’t kissing but it probably looked like they were making out. Like he was into this. Like she was.

Robin closed her eyes. She could figure out the mystery that was Steve Harrington later. Right now, she had to help Steve sell this.

She raised her hands to Steve’s shoulders, pulling him closer, hoping he wouldn’t misinterpret her sudden ardor as a request for a real kiss.

He let out a little moan, his nose brushing hers as he tipped his head, and she smiled against his thumb. Holy shit. They were totally faking it and everyone was going to think she was a good enough kisser to make Steve Harrington moan.

After a long moment, Steve pulled back, simultaneously slipping his thumb to the side so it wouldn’t be over her mouth.

He stayed in her space a second longer, eyes locked with Robin’s. He seemed pleased with himself, or maybe with her shocked expression.

He licked his lips and Robin copied him automatically. Her lips tasted like beer and smoke but it was from Steve’s hand, not his lips, and that made all the difference.

Someone wolf-whistled.

Steve backed away, returning to his seat next to Tommy Hagan. Robin was speechless as the room returned to focus.

Carol looked pissed. Tommy was elbowing Steve, leaning in to tease him.

“Damn, Harrington,” said some basketball jock Robin didn’t know. “I didn’t know you were into band nerds.”

“That was a hell of a first kiss,” another one said.

Steve smiled, cocky and pleased and bashful all at once. He was a better actor than Robin had ever given him credit for.

Tammy nudged Robin, and that’s when Robin realized she was still staring at Steve, dumb with awe.

As everyone turned to Tommy Hagan, Tammy leaned in and whispered, “it looks like you really enjoyed that kiss.”

She was trying to smile, trying to gently tease like a friend would, but Robin could see the heartbreak in her expression. Robin wished she could tell Tammy that it had all been for show and that she hadn’t actually kissed Steve, but Tammy had pulled away at the accusation that Robin was a lesbian and only been okay touching her again after that performance of a kiss.

This wasn’t a world where Robin got to have both Steve and Tammy.

“Yeah,” Robin said, surprised to find she was telling the truth. She was glad she’d been dared to kiss Steve and not any other boy here. There were apparently layers to Steve Harrington, who she’d thought was nothing more than a pretty, empty-headed, girl-obsessed jock.

She kind of wanted to know more about him.

She glanced across the circle. Steve was watching Tommy try to do a handstand, until Tommy overbalanced and fell into Steve’s lap, making him yelp. Steve laughed as he leaned over Tommy, asking if he was okay, and Tommy’s eyes lit up in a way Robin recognized. The way she had probably lit up when Tammy had taken her hand.

In that moment, Robin felt like she understood something about all of them.

Carol’s frozen smile as she watched her boyfriend beam at Steve. The way Tommy pretended to fumble a bit climbing off Steve’s lap, if only to stay there a second longer. And Steve’s sharp eyes, catching Tommy’s adoration and Carol’s pain.

“You’re too high, man,” Steve said, waving his joint in a big circle. Giving Tommy cover in case anyone else had noticed what Robin had.

“Way too high,” Carol agreed, snatching the joint from Steve’s fingers. She took a long drag, then blew the smoke out, passed the joint back to Steve, and curled into Tommy’s side.

Tommy and Carol looked like the picture of a happy couple and Robin realized it was another type of performance. Had Carol known before she started dating Tommy? Or had she fallen in love with him first, only realizing he liked Steve when it was too late to stop her heart from being broken?

Robin didn’t want to feel sympathy for Carol Perkins, who had tried so hard to ruin Robin’s night. But she pitied her a little, watching her playact at being happy and realizing that they were all doing it. All these stupid popular kids were just pretending to be shiny, happy people and the rest of the school was buying it, standing too far away to see the imperfections that would have been obvious up close.

Steve met Robin’s eyes across the circle, bringing the joint to his lips. His eyes were perfectly clear, pupils small, not like someone who had been smoking at all. Another slight of hand, like the stage kiss.

“I think he likes you back,” Tammy said.

Robin looked at Tammy, who was faking a smile just like the rest of the popular kids. Why hadn’t Robin seen it before? Tammy was brave and Tammy was kind, but she hid those parts of herself, trying to seem just as cookie-cutter perfect as the rest of the people in this circle.

Robin didn’t want cookie-cutter perfect. She wanted real.

She still didn’t want to break Tammy’s heart, so she said something she didn’t really believe about Steve. Not anymore.

“Maybe,” Robin said. “But like you said, he’s just a good time. He’ll be over me in two weeks.”

***

On Monday, Robin found Steve at his locker after school.

His eyes went wide as she came up to him and he smiled at her. “Hey.”

“Hey,” Robin said. She kicked the toes of her converse together. She’d spent all of yesterday doodling on them while watching tv. Maybe it was stupid, given how close Carol had come to outing her, but Robin was feeling a little bulletproof. She’d written I may not go down in history, but I’ll go down on your sister in pen on the whites of her shoes.

Steve looked down at her feet and smiled. “Nice artwork.”

Robin froze, even though there was no way Steve could read her shoes while standing up. “Thanks,” she said stiffly. “I thought they could use some, uh, personality?”

“I like them better this way,” Steve said.

Robin cleared her throat. “Do you, uh, wanna get milkshakes? You’re paying, of course.”

Steve’s eyes lit up. “Yeah,” he said quickly. “I’ll buy you however many milkshakes you want.”

Robin rolled her eyes. “Do girls really fall for this desperate act?”

“I’m much cooler around girls I’m interested in,” Steve said. Robin believed him this time. He’d put his thumb over her mouth and then swaggered like he’d kissed her and she trusted him in a way she hadn’t before.

She was dying to know why he’d done it.

“So it’s just your friends that you bribe into liking you,” Robin teased.

“Yeah,” Steve said, shameless. “Usually more with free rides and arcade money, but I’ve used ice cream before.”

“You’re so weird,” Robin blurted out. Then she froze. It was practically social suicide to call Steve Harrington weird.

But Steve didn’t get mad. He just laughed and said “you have no idea.”

“Yo, Harrington,” called a basketball player walking down the hall. “Hurry up, you’ll be late for practice.”

“I’m not going today!” Steve called back. “I’m sick.” He gave a very unconvincing cough.

The basketball player rolled his eyes. “Lovesick, maybe.”

Steve scowled playfully. “Fuck off, man.”

“I’ll tell Coach you’re too pussy-whipped to play,” the basketball player said.

“Don’t you dare!” Steve called. Robin expected him to sound more offended at being called pussy-whipped. No teenage boy wanted to be told he would do anything a girl told him to do, even in exchange for sex. And Steve was definitely not getting sex. But the insult rolled off Steve like water off a duck’s back. “Tell him I have the flu.”

“Sure, sure, whatever.” The boy rolled his eyes as he disappeared around the corner.

Steve closed his locker. “Ready to go?”

“You’re not going to basketball?”

“No,” Steve said. “We’re getting milkshakes. I’m not giving up a chance to make Robin Buckley my best friend.”

“Aren’t you, like, first chair?” Robin said. She watched a lot of basketball games by virtue of being in band, she knew it was called starting line. But she enjoyed seeing Steve’s face scrunch up at her words.

Steve groaned. “God, that is annoying. Remind me to stop calling Dustin’s campaigns his nerd practices.”

“Who’s Dustin and what are campaigns?”

“A kid I babysit, and a Dungeons and Dragons game.”

Robin blinked. “Dungeons and Dragons? That Hellfire game?”

“Yeah,” Steve said. “He’s not in high school yet, so he doesn’t play with Eddie as his DM, but I’m sure he’ll join in a few years.”

DM? Was that some Hellfire term?

Apparently the new Steve Harrington knew the terms to nerd games. He stage-kissed lesbians at parties and thought it was worth skipping basketball practice for a chance to be Robin’s friend.

“Who are you?” Robin asked. “And what have you done with Steve?”

“I’m a time traveller from the future,” Steve said.

Robin laughed. What a nerd. “No, really.”

Steve started walking backwards down the hallway, keys swinging around his fingers. “I’ll tell you over milkshakes.”

He held a hand out to her, beckoning, a hopeful smile on his face, and it didn’t feel like a joke anymore. Robin had no clue why, but Steve Harrington really wanted to be her friend.

Robin peeled herself off the lockers and took Steve’s hand, their fingers twining together, letting him pull her outside.

#stranger things #stranger things fanfiction #ao3 #because ao3 is down #robin buckley #Steve harrington #carol perkins #stobin #platonic stobin #time travel fanfiction #mia writes fanfic

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trashydez · 4 days ago

Text

like a phoenix. (2.7k words)

what if phoenix- instead of being virtually indestructible, actually wasnt? what if he was actually incredibly prone to death, but he just… never stayed dead?

(trigger warning for a multitude of causes of deaths!! some in detail and some not. other tw’s include implied suicide attempts, implied child neglect, derealisation and thinking one is already dead. be warned! take care of yourself!)

at 9, he wakes in his bed after having a high fever and his mom ships him off to school hours after it began. he finds it odd, because last he’d checked his temperature (that morning, when he told his mom he felt like he was going to die and his mom had left to go run errands, barely sparing him a glance), his temperature had been at 107 degrees farenheit. that was definitely high, but after he slipped into unconsciousness, writhing and restless and in a lot of pain, he woke up to his mother checking his temperature and saying he was fine to head off to school. he didnt feel fine, but his temperature had gone down significantly enough that his mother felt like he had no excuse not to go. hes glad he went to school though, even as he shivered, sneezed and sniffled, because there he found a friend in a boy with a funny bowtie and a heart made of gold.

he crunches and chokes on glass shards and poison but doesnt die. the doctors dont find anything wrong with him, aside from feeling a bit ill, so he goes back into the courtroom and dollie is convicted of murder. hes happy his roommate is away for some theatre troupe thing, because the sickness eventually catches up to him and he throws up shards of glass, acid and blood. it cuts into his throat and burns his eyes and he swears, he swears he dies right then and there, freezing and shaking and everything hurts. but when he wakes up hours later, the sun having set and the only light source in his dingy dormroom the moon outside, hes amazed to not feel sick anymore. but the puddle of sludge is drying beside his face and he considers himself lucky, or maybe unlucky, because unlike dahlia’s other victims, he actually lives to tell the tale.

phoenix arrives early to the office, having been in the public library nearby reading a book on reincarnation. he enters the office and promptly has his skull caved into his brain. he does not see his assailant, but when he wakes, theres an oddly dressed girl crying, crouched over his boss’ cold body. he doesn’t think about the drying blood in the back of his head, or how cold mia’s body is (and why he can even tell, considering the fact he has not touched her corpse) or the chapter in the book he’d been reading that talked about quantum immortality— all he thinks of is proving maya fey’s innocence.

as it turns out, being constantly anxious and terrified of mortal peril actually has its perks. maybe the fact he’s a lawyer whose only ever dealt with homicide cases definitely wasn’t benefiting his mental wellbeing either. in any case, its that fear of literally everything and constant feeling of impending doom that makes his body react before his mind does. taser! danger! maya! so, he gets tasered. and it fucking HURTS, but he feels more relieved than frightened as the searing pain shoots through him, because he’d been able to push maya away before von karma got to them both. wasnt a symptom of death by electrocution an overwhelming feeling of helplessness and imminent death? maybe he was going crazy. when he comes back though, its to his head in the lap of a crying spirit medium, so maybe a psychotic break isnt too bad if it means everyone else gets to escape with no damage to their own psyche.

its only after she stops screaming in terror- oh my god, nicks a zombie!! kyahh!!!- and nearly beating him with her bulky magatama necklace, that she tells him what she saw. (“like, there was a sudden bright light and then i realised it was coming from you! but when i tried to touch your glowing skin,” she says it like its the most absurd thing she’d ever seen, which really said something considering the fact she was from a family of people who could channelthe dead “it was HOT! like, japanifornia summer hot! blazing! i was only able to check your pulse after you cooled down a bit…”). maybe its this that makes him less alarmed by the way his skin glowed in the dark of his trashed bedroom, after drinking himself to death following a certain phone call from a terribly sad, newly bossless detective. he doesnt think he can bear the taste alcohol ever again, after that.

maybe the number of times he’s died of blunt force trauma to the head should be a cause for concern, even more so when he wakes up without any of his memories. he’s terrified, and doesnt even knows who he is, until he does, and is able to prove maggey byrde innocent. fun times! he should probably watch out to make sure his next death wasn’t to the head, lest he be as mentally impaired as a number of people liked to say he was… (and he should probably also be concerned by the fact he was already thinking of the next time he’d die, but ah well, blame it on the concussion).

as it turns out, getting whipped to death was not on his list of ways he thought he’d die next, but life liked to mess with him like that, it seemed. still, dragging his delirious self to the bathroom of his office to try and save the infected wounds from killing him wasn’t all that fun, and he’s immediately reminded of his first death, slow and painful, alone and scared of what came next. he feels bad for feeling relieved when maya shows up and screams upon seeing the state he and the bathroom (that’d he’d accidentally trashed when his legs gave out after he opened the door, a number of bottles fallen to the floor beside him) were in. he stops her from calling the police- there was no point, he didn’t have much time left. but when she asks what she could do, he goes quiet. (…just… stay here? i dont- he coughs up a distinctly red shade of spit. maya makes a noise between a choked cry and a whatthefuckwhatthefuckwhatthefuck. but phoenix was shivering worse now, and hugs himself tigher. i dont want to die alone.) so she stays with him, on the cold bathroom floor, as his labored breathing eventually slows. when he awakens, he finds maya asleep leaning against him, and promises to get her burgers as a thank you.

who knew death by a monkey throwing a giant bronze bust of max galactica at you could happen? at this point, he’s almost glad he was basically immortal, because there was no way in hell he’d allow his autopsy report to say ‘cause of death: monkey manslaughter’! edgeworth would laugh himself to tears if he saw! not that he could see. or cry, because he was dead. and not coming back. damn.

so edgeworth isnt dead! yippee? he thought it was his thing to get reanimated after death, not edgeworths. when he saw him, standing in the middle of the police department, alive and breathing and very much not dead, he nearly started laughing. he must’ve finally gone insane! curse the amount of times he’d died of brain related injuries, not that he knew how many of them there were at this point. he might actually have laughed a bit, because pearls was looking at him like he was losing it (he was) but he couldnt really bring himself to care as he had more pressing issues at hand, like saving his best friend from a crazy serial killer holding her hostage, and punching his other best friend in the face for faking his own death (because really, dying was his thing! not edgeworths!). and if he pulls edgeworth into a hug immediately after, throwing caution in the wind (you only live once, right?), the warmth- a normal, human temperature, unlike his burning hot when he came back from death- is enough to stabilise his harried mind for just a moment, before he has to return to his guilty client and his hopeless situation.

by some crazy turn of events, he actually doesnt die from having boiling hot coffee thrown at his face. it burns, and maya screams when she sees the boils on his face after that first trial with godot, but after throwing a wet towel over his face and putting him in timeout on the sofa for 12-hours, the burns go away as if they were never there. he fell asleep at some point, and after alot of back and forth debate, they eventually came to the conclusion that 1. his body heat rising to burning levels when he dies must have caused his body has to grow immune to heat and 2. since sleep was like a ‘temporary death’, a ‘temporary wound’ would just heal like it did when he died of normal wounds, right? he didn’t want to dwell on it too much, because maya was looking at him like she wanted to test that theory for real, so he quickly changes topics before things got out of hand.

so their theory on the immunity to heat thing was correct! …almost. larry had tried to stop him, but it was fire and he was basically immune to heat, right? nope! his skin burned and boiled but he didn’t die as he tried to run across the burning bridge. even so, nothing hurt more than falling through one of the burnt planks and slamming onto the surface of the freezing cold rushing stream below. luckily the death was near immediate, but unfortunately he came to while in the water still, so he swallowed a sizeable amount of water before paramedics arrived. he hears the doctors find his survival miraculous, despite the scorching hot fever he was now under. he blacks out again, and comes to in the hospital, feeling absolutely terrible.

the horribleness feels familiar though, and when edgeworth walks in, he realises what it must be, when the man presses the back of his hand to his temple and quickly pulls his hand away as if burned. (oh. he thinks, tearing up despite himself. it must be the fever. i’m going to die like this again.) his internal monologue must’ve been external though, because edgeworth balks (‘again?!’). but phoenix was crying in hiccups and sobs, feeling terrible and like he was nine years old again, wishing his mother were there to nurse him back to health like she’d never done before. he faintly hears edgeworth sitting down on his bed and reaches out, gripping the mans waist like it was a lifeline. in a sense, it was. “don’t go.” he whispers, gripping the man tighter like he’d disappear into thin air (again). “please, please don’t go.” in his delirium, he nearly wails in despair when he feels edgeworth move, but he was only moving to readjust himself so he’s lying next to him, their bodies so close that it must burn, but the only sign edgeworth shows that he’s in pain is a wince and the crease of his brow. he allows himself to be cried on, curling a protective arm over phoenix’s burning body. “i- i dont know what’s going on, wright, but i’m not, i’m not going anywhere, okay?” he seems to be attempting exasperation, but it comes out terrified and concerned, but phoenix is fading quickly, so it might just be his waning mind making up things that don’t exist. “i am terrified. your body is life threateningly hot and— wright? wright!”

he comes to with nurses surrounding him, and a distressed edgeworth swearing on his life that that man was dead, his body was seizing and on fire and- and his heart stopped beating! but phoenix couldn’t dwell on it, because the mention of fire immediately brought him back to why he was in the hospital at all. and plus, it gave him the chance to use his best friends sensitive treatment of him afterwards to convince him to play defense attorney, so that was nice. still, he feels like he dies when he finds out dahlia had actually been iris and that godot was actually his dead mentors apparently not dead boyfriend. oh, and he was also a murderer. he also feels like he dies when dahlia- actual, serial killer and dead by execution dahlia, was exorcised from maya’s body. but that had more to do with his soul leaving his body in terror rather than actually dying, so that was a nice change of pace… probably.

later, he’d had to have a conversation with edgeworth to give him an explanation on just what the hell he’d witnessed in that hospital room. although, apparently his re-aliving symptoms must’ve started becoming more dramatic, because miles describes it as his whole body glowing as bright as the sun, and then his eyes opening for a moment to reveal nothing but white, glowing eyeballs with no irises. phoenix has to convince him to still board his flight the day after, that he was okay… probably. maybe not safe, but definitely okay. (still, edgeworth stays the night at his, and they hold eachother close, basking in the shared warmth of two alive bodies in heat equilibrium, listening to eachothers breathing and rhythmic heartbeats, no signs of impending mortality in sight, save for, what did the french call it? la petite morte? most of all, phoenix basks in the promise miles makes to him. “i’m not going anywhere,” he repeats, over and over like he was trying to convince himself as much as he was phoenix. “i’m not going anywhere, i promise.”)

and when he loses his badge, he thinks he really does die, permanent and definitively. he feels far away from his body when the forger is called to the witness stand. feels like a ghost when the council walks out the room and past him, making no eye contact and answering the unanswered question on the tip of his tongue. feels his life crumble to pieces when a blonde man with a pleasent, almost saintly smile gives him the most maddeningly sympathetic look and tells him he is sorry for his loss, as if there really was someone dead. only, the only one dead must’ve been him, because there was no one else there who had just lost their life. he couldn’t even hear himself as he laughed, which turned into sobs, as he excused himself and fleed to his bicycle. not one pedestrian bats an eye at the state he is in, so he must really be a ghost, cycling past speeding cars and large trucks and buses as if it couldn’t kill him, because he wasn’t there, he was already dead. when he reaches his office, freezing and quiet and dreadfully void of any human life, he passes by the window his boss had died at and sees his reflection, unkempt and red faced and badgeless. he wants to scream, but he couldn’t because no one would hear a ghost scream, so instead he just sits down in the spot his mentor had lost her life in, and mourns.

when two weeks later a warm, incredible alive life falls into his hands in the shape of a little girl with a too big tophat and a joy for being alive that he’d lost years ago, well, maybe he is glad that he couldn’t die for real, if only to be able to wake up to that beaming grin as his little girl tries to pull her daddy out of bed because she’d made breakfast, and it only smells burnt because of the magic something she’d added as a special ingredient. he eats it, char and all, because he can’t taste the burnt-ness of it anyway, but he could taste the love and care put into it, and that was more than enough to take his mind away readying himself for his next death. instead, he thinks of his daughter’s next performance at the wonder bar, and their next trip to kurain, and miles’ next visit. for once, he thinks of living.

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miaqc1 · 2 days ago

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Mini Transducer for the Little Alien [Pikmin, The Girl From Tomorrow]

Read on Ao3

Read on SquidgeWorld

Or read it here.

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When Captain Olimar finds himself on planet Earth in the year 3000, its inhabitants welcome him with joy. Not only do they invent a breathing mask for him, so Olimar can wear casual clothes while keeping his life support, but they teach him how to use a Transducer. A mini Transducer created just for him.

The Transducer is a kind of headband worn over the forehead, like a tiara. It has a teardrop-shaped black plate in the middle. On this plate is a round transparent crystal.

The Transducer focuses the power of the mind, enabling his/her user to levitate objects, heal wounds and interact with futuristic devices.

At first, Olimar has difficulty using his Transducer, even with the help of Alana and several children.

"He doesn't concentrate hard enough." A little boy told him.

"You have to concentrate!" A little girl told him.

"The Transducer is a tool for projecting your mental energy." Alana, a 14-year-old teenager and healer in training, had explained to him. "You have to feel that energy before you concentrate. It's a psychic state to achieve."

Despite this, Olimar isn't the type to give up. After days and days of practice, he manages to put himself in the right psychic state to project his mental energy. When he manages to levitate an apple, Olimar can't contain his joy. He jumps, runs and screams like a child discovering his presents at Christmas.

His behavior upset some people from the year 3000 as they have been used to controlling their emotions from an early age. Alana is an exception but she won't say why she has learned to respect expressing joy, sadness or anger. Thus Alana talks to those who have been offended by Olimar's behavior. That solves the problem.

When Captain Olimar returns to Hocotate with his mini Transducer, he can't wait to show it off and tell all about what he's discovered on this planet. Yet he's sure he's already known a planet called Earth. Could there be more than one? Hm.

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crazyoffher · 1 year ago

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COLLAPSE IN THE KEY OF FIREWORKS.

lorraine day x fem!reader

summary: growing up in rural texas circa 1979 wouldn't have been so hard if you didn't have an attraction to your best friend.

warnings: eventual smut. - mentions of homophobia, canine injury, religion / religious rebellion, paragraph mention of suicide (in a joking manner), umm that's it i think.

word amount: 4100+

a/n: not really sure how i feel about this. sorry for the long wait </3

You loved her, and you wanted to express it more than anything in the world, even if it meant being condemned to the sins your father warned you of.

You wanted her, and the feeling was more than likewise, but you just couldn’t have her.

The realization did not take you forever to realize—your feelings for her, anyway. You knew that you wanted to drown in her gaze, love, smile, and soul the day you laid eyes on her in the back of that stone-cold silver pickup truck. It was a present given to your brother, the eldest, from your father the day he had completed his required service as a missionary, and the first thing that hick-of-a-man did was throw you over his shoulder and hurl you in the back bed.

You were twelve then, lonely as can be during the summertime, before that adorable girl with a voice sweeter than anything you ever tasted crashing down into your life, quite literally.

“Holy shit!” The truck stopped abruptly, and you had to hoist yourself to the far edge of the railings to prevent yourself from flying. You cursed under your breath the words your father would smack you day and night for if said out loud, shaking your head while jumping out of the back to see your brother fast out of the driver's seat, crouching down in the front of the truck.

“The heck did you do, Aziel? Burrow over a rock, ‘cause you know Daddy will kill you if you’ve already scratched this masterpiece.”

“Not no rock, no, but a dog. Cute one at that; I’m so sorry for this.” He spoke solemnly, and you found his frame hunched over as you cornered the truck's front, petting the head of a dog that

whined in pain. “Come on, little miss. I’ll take him to the hospital for ‘ya, just join this devil’s spawn in the bed,” he pointed to you, though your eyes were glued to the dog, “and we’ll be there in no time, alright?”

“Okay,” and it was that saccharine tone that caught your ears, head perked up to lock your gaze on a girl, quite the small one for the age that matched yours, with cute little freckles spread out across her cheeks and her eyebrows furrowed. Concern laced her voice, and her face too, for the dog that you assumed to be her pet, and you felt bad for the girl that made your heart flutter instantly at just the sight of her.

She wore shorts that rode just to the edge of her knees and a tight white top tucked inward. Your father would have dealt you well for even thinking of such an unwomanlike outfit, contrasting her choice of clothing to your pink skirt and fitted light-blue long-sleeve, your denim jacket hanging over you loosely that you clung to when the winds picked up. The girl was beauty in a jar, if that even made any sense, and you knew from the start that you wanted nobody else but her.

“Here, hold off for just one second,” you warned the girl with a tight expression, being sent a nod as your hands clung to the metal of the bed’s railings, hoisting yourself up greatly to get yourself over and into the open space. You turned the knob and let the bed’s opening fly down, lending a hand to the girl with an injured dog cradled in her arms, to which she joined you on the bed with the utmost struggle.

“I’m sorry about him, by the way." The girl’s head perked up at your voice, a bit gruff from a sickness that seemed to loom over you. “My brother. He hasn’t always been the brightest, and I’ve been juggling in my mind for the past ten minutes or so about why my Daddy decided to gift him a darn truck.”

A small smile etched her face at your words, her hand mindlessly petting the dog cradled in her arms, and a sort of glint in her eyes that you seemed to pass over. God damn, did you still hate yourself to this day for how awkward you grew to be in that moment, failing to make direct eye contact with the girl who wanted nothing but her small ‘ol doggie to be well.

Your eyes subtly lingered over her shirt, stopping abruptly at the crimson-colored stains that donned the fabric with hatred. The girl was more than aware of the stains—she could feel her shirt melting into her—but she could have cared less at that moment when her canine, whom she loved more than herself, was itching and writhing in pain.

“Here,” you got up from your spot against the metal railings, kneeling in the middle of the bed, to the girl’s confusion. “Getting stains on that shirt, yeah? Wrap this over ‘em,” and in front of her, resting in your hands, was the denim jacket that you always wore, stolen from your brother the day he left town, and with no intentions of returning it upon his arrival.

A small “thank you” left those chewed-up lips of hers, bitten and torn from her stressful mind that hoped for her dog to be alright, and you know you’d be getting on Aziel after the situation had died down and the girl was long gone. Long gone, you hoped she wouldn’t be, because you hadn’t seen a face as pretty as hers in your short lifetime, and you didn’t want to imagine how long it would be until you saw it again.

Sooner or later on that breezy day, you found yourself perched on a chair in the waiting room of an animal hospital, feet swinging to the soft guitarra tunes mixed with solid tapping noises from beside you. The girl had her finger curled, her nail hitting the wooden armrest of the chair and scratching it ever so lightly, seemingly in need of taking her mind somewhere else.

Aziel was elsewhere, outside in a small payphone box that would trigger anyone’s claustrophobia, the dirty black-wired phone clinging to his ear while his head was drawn back; you could only assume he was growing tired of your father's voice through the transmitter, berating him for his reckless actions. You almost felt bad for him.

“What if he’s dead?”

That sweet, worried voice tore you away from your brother's frame, turning to face the new-found girl whose eyes bore into your face, tears brimming at the edges of her eyes just at the thought of it, and your heart sank.

“That’s no way to think, uh..."

“Lorraine.” She answered simply, eyes never tearing from yours, and you grew mildly uncomfortable at the continuous staring. You didn’t hate it—no, of course not—but you weren’t accustomed to having a pretty girl stare at you like that.

“Well, Lorraine,” you managed to turn your head away from her, resting them back on your brother’s frame, his posture slumping as time went on. “I love him to death—my brother, I mean—but oh,” your eyebrows raised, and your breath hitched when you felt a cool, soft palm brushing over yours on the wooden armrest, knowing the girl was only ever looking for comfort.

You finished your sentence with a new-found shake in your voice. “I’ll kill that son of a bitch.”

Before Lorraine could reply, the door where the veterinarian had previously taken her dog opened, and you surprised yourself at how quickly you rose from your seat. Lorraine gave you a look before standing up as well, sighing in the utmost relief when her eyes laid on her dog wrapped in a blanket, his chest heaving up and down to signal that he was alive.

"Oh, thank God!” Your head twisted to see Aziel at the front entrance, and his head hung in relief at the living animal. “I was going to bury myself in deprivation if that cute ‘ol thing died.”

“There would have been no need for you to bury yourself because I would have gotten to your Bible-praising ass before you could even shed a tear.” You barked, and Lorraine paused a second of her relief to react, a small smile etching her face at your words of protection.

“You better watch that mouth, sissy, because Dad would rip you a new one if he were to find out.” He threatened though you waved him off; he was all talk, managing to tick off every nerve that held patience within you whenever he pleased, and you still held shock in the back of your mind whenever you’d admit you couldn’t live without him and his childish attitude.

“He’s going to need care. He has two ankle fractures and stitches on his back that you ought to watch out for to make sure he doesn’t bite at them.” Lorraine and Aziel were the only two to listen to the veterinarian, while your mind took you elsewhere; the sun had gone down by then, as it had been over two hours since the truck-dog massacre, and you were sure Lorraine’s parents were concerned about her whereabouts.

“We should probably get her home now, yeah?” You had proposed after the veterinarian had retreated and the small dog rested in Lorraine’s arms, earning a nod from Aziel, who seemed to collect in his mind that Lorraine had a family that she needed to return to, pulling keys from his pocket and ushering the two of you out.

You settled in the backseats of the truck, finding it dangerous enough to ride in the bed, while Aziel got cozy in his driver seat. “Where do you live, girl?”

“The east.” Both you and Aziel turned your heads at her answer, seeing as the two of you resided in the North—hell, you picked her and her dog up in the North—before Aziel questioned her. “Ya positive? What were you doing out here in the North?”

“We were heading to a relative’s house, and my Daddy needed some gas; his truck stopped in the middle of a dirt road because the thing was empty, and he told me to go up to a gas station that was about five minutes out to ask for a gallon. Told me to take Atticus here too,” she said, bending her head down to kiss her dog on the forehead. “They ain’t give it to me, and I was on my way back when..."

Aziel visibly cringed at the remembrance, and he gave Lorraine one last look of sorrow before turning in his seat, cranking on the engine, and setting off east. “So, what? Your parents are worried sick now that you’ve been gone for hours, yeah?”

“Guess so. Daddy’s always been protective of me, calling me his little girl and telling me to always stick by him, but he needed to watch the truck, and I guess he figured Atticus would be enough protection.” Your eyes trailed to the dog in her arms, and you tried to understand how her father could think a dog that small could protect her. “God, he’s never going to let me out of his eyesight ever again.”

“I wouldn’t either if I were him.” Aziel’s grip on the wheel was harsh, his eyes searching the road every second to keep watch of anything. “His little girl ain’t come back; I’d think you were kidnapped.”

The rest of the ride was silent after that, disregarding Lorraine’s soft coos to her drowsy pup when he eventually woke, and you could see Aziel’s hands shake when the truck grew closer to the home address Lorraine had previously given. “Your fault.”

Your voice rang when you pushed yourself up to whisper in his ear, his hand finding your chest to push you back in your seat and away from him. Soon enough, the truck came to a stop outside of a house—a ranch, to your surprise—with a man in a cowboy hat and tucked flannel top sitting on the porch, clearly in distress, while a woman sat right beside him.

Before Lorraine could open the truck door, you put a hand on her shoulder to stop her, and she turned to you with curiosity in her eyes. “Do you think—uh?" Your voice caught in your throat, searching for the right words, while Lorraine had a small smile tug at her lips. “Uh, what’s your house number? The phone number, I mean, to the house. You know, how every house has a phone number because there’s a house phone in every-”

Her voice cut you off, and you could only thank the night sky for covering your reddened cheeks. “82-97, 500.” She gave you a sweet smile before turning the door handle, letting herself out while continuing, “First three numbers are the state code!” and shutting the door, soon embracing her worried father's arms.

When you returned home, you were instructed to sleep in your room while Aziel was forced into the living room, and the numbers recited from Lorraine repeated in your head as you trudged up the stairs, ignoring the shouts of your father toward your missionary brother.

“5…2…9—no! 8…2…9,” you scratched the numbers on a blank piece of paper in ink, "7, 500."

You were lost in your thoughts, trying to accumulate the state code numbers from far in your mind to let the sound of footsteps become known to you, and before you knew it, your mother was standing in front of you with her hands settled on her hips. “I thought I told you to go to sleep, (Y/N)! Stop whatever it is that you’re writing, read off your nightly verse, and go to sleep!”

That day was one you could never forget. It was the day you met your best friend, your teenage-long crush, and also the day you got to ride in a truck bed for the first time. Lorraine’s father, to his continuing demise that you refuse to call him anything other than Mr. Day, was more than reluctant to let Lorraine out of the house after the incident, but your natural charm didn’t take long for him to put trust in you—that you’d take care of his little girl—and soon enough, you were forcing Aziel to drive you down east every weekend to go hang out with the girl that clouded your every thought.

Your feelings toward her never mattered anyway, right? She certainly never felt the same toward you, or so you thought. You knew that the trajectory of two girls together would never be accepted in the eyes of your parents, in the eyes of your church, and in the eyes of the man whose verses you read in a book every night and whose practices forced and consumed your everyday life.

Soon enough, it started to concern your parents as to why you hadn’t found a lover at the growing age of seventeen, having overheard a conversation between them one night about the possibility of lining up suitors, shocking you to the very core. So when the next boy came around, annoying you more than life itself at your school locker before popping the question, “Can I take you on a date?” You could only swallow your pride with a choked-out, "Yes,” leaving your lips before scurrying away.

That relationship didn’t last long—maybe three months—before you had enough of his continuous attempts to shaft his hand into your pants. You ended your relationship with him after a dull day at the state fair, and he could only accept reality after being knocked out by Lorraine after attempting to assault you in a bathroom stall.

The day after, you sealed in place your love for the girl. How could you say anything to her, though? Express your feelings and get something out of her besides rejection—a scenario that you deem impossible. The internal battle kept you up at night, and deciding not to fight it any longer, you forced Aziel to drive you up to Lorraine’s ranchhouse on a cool Friday night.

You probably should have just stayed home, because that would have temporarily avoided the heartbreak words that left her mouth after you had settled in her room. They were not ones of rejection.

“I have a boyfriend!”

“What?” The words came out of a nervous impulse, your face falling to sadness. That went unnoticed by Lorraine, whose face had lit up in excitement at finally being able to tell you. “Yes! His name is RJ, and he’s in my film studies class. He’s so sweet, charming, and so nice, (Y/N)!”

If only Mr. Day had shotgun bullets pre-equipped in the barrels, you would have taken yourself down to the garage, where the weapon lay, and shot yourself without another word. You felt sick, and you felt sicker when that fateful day came around the next week when you had to meet the boy she raved about.

Boy, did that only make you question your self-dignity? He looked to be eighteen going on thirty-five, and you bathed in anger at the way Lorraine looked up at him with such admiration glistening in her dark-brown eyes. You yearned for that look.

Then, alas, the day you waited for came eight months later.

You had accompanied Lorraine and RJ with your “boyfriend”, Danny, who in reality was just playing along to the toy game of you and him being either’s significant others, benefiting you for hiding your true identity and for Danny’s mother to get off his back about never having a woman by his side.

You had a limp in your leg, trying your utmost hardest to recover from the death trap that was the spinning teacups, berating yourself for trusting Danny to not send the two of you spinning like a couple of toy fidgets. In the end, his actions were limited to himself, and to keep himself upright as his head spun as quickly as he did, he tightened his hold on your shoulder.

The sky was fading to darkness, reminding you of the upcoming end of your day, but you couldn’t think about that when you heard the deafening cries of a girl sounding in your range, a cry that you knew all too well.

“You hear that?” Danny plugged a finger in his ear, fidgeting around the canal with the assumption that his mind was getting the best of him. “Get your finger outta your ear, will ya?” You put a hand to his forearm, yanking the limb to the side with a slouchy cry from the darning boy. “You made me scratch my ear!”

You only hushed him with the sound growing louder as if it were heading toward the two of you. It took a one-eighty to find the source of the problem, coming face to face with a crying Lorraine headed in your pathway at a directionally fast pace, no intention of stopping set in her quick feet as salty tears dribbled down her cheeks.

You held the girl without question when she crashed into you, burying her face in your chest with a mighty clutch to Danny’s—secretly yours—leather jacket, and your heart broke at the sight of her in such a distraught state. Why was she crying? Where was RJ? Was he the cause of her crestfallen shadow?

But you couldn’t pester her with questions; no, that would be irresponsible of you and rid you of all the mannerisms you were forced to learn growing up. You turned to Danny with a solemn look on your face; he was already looking back at you with a sense of confusion laced in his furrowed eyebrows, and you wordlessly cocked your head to the side to give him a signal of your temporary departure.

He shook his head, headed in the other direction with a slight pat on Lorraine’s shoulder, and you drove the other girl in the silenced direction of haystacks originally laid out to be used as sitting stations. However, nobody at the fair seemed to pay any mind to the location. Her crying never let down, sobbing in her hands while you rubbed her back in comfort.

It was only when she finally came down from her teary state that you carried the question, “What happened?” When she looked at you, your reassuring smile fell, analyzing her furrowed eyebrows and narrowed, red eyes, which made you wonder if she was agitated at your question. Should you not have asked?

Her staring never faltered; it looked as if she were analyzing you—your face, to be precise—and your breathing grew heavier as your mind grew less shallow at the impending thoughts that infiltrated your mind. “Raine, I’m dearly sorry if I said somethin’ wrong. I’m just worri-”

“Shut it.” Her voice came out in a whisper, and like a trained dog to its commander, your lips were sealed. Lorraine’s tone was cracked, weary, and dried out from all the crying she had endured not moments before, but now she had formed into a new human. If it weren’t for her reddened eyes, stuffy nose, and pinkish ears, you wouldn’t have had a clue she was in a former tainted state, and there before you, her pupils scanned you all over. Like… if you were someone she hadn’t recognized for years beyond that point, as if you were a whole new person to her.

You had no idea what thoughts circled in her mind at that moment, and if you did, you might have burst.

“I’m not crying because of RJ.”

“Then why are you-”

“I said shut it.” Your lips sealed once more, obedient to Lorraine’s words in the same way you had always been. It was never like you had anything better to say, anyway.

“I broke up with him, but that’s not why I was crying. I was scared of the truth ‘cause it’s nothing but wrong in other eyes, and I’ve always wanted to perfect myself in the eyes of myself and others. Now, I can’t.” You could see from your peripherals that her hands were shaky, fiddling with one another, and her mind was a swarm of second questioning. She couldn’t go back by then, though.

“I don’t think I ever liked RJ entirely. I feel bad about it all ‘cause I think I was just using him to cover up my truth.” Lorraine’s eyes had flickered off of yours for a moment, eyeing her fidgety hands before looking back toward you with a different glint in her eyes. You had never been more confused in life than then, and you wanted nothing more than to question her for miles ahead.

“I think this entire time, I’ve loved someone else.” To your oblivious mind, you couldn’t pick up the secretism behind her words or that glint in her eyes, and your heart broke at the idea of Lorraine finding attraction to another man, another person that wasn’t you.

“What’s his name?”

The corner twitches of Lorraine’s lips vanished, and the gleam that once filled her eyes left to form confusion before realization. “God damn it, (Y/N)!” She pushed herself back with a huff, and it was then that you recognized how close she had been toward you.

“What?”

Lorraine gave another large breath, filled to the brim with annoyance. “What? What? I had this entire thing planned out since last month, just for you to not understand it!”

“Understand what? Raine, you’re really confusin’ me he-” But you couldn’t finish your sentence when something was blocking your lips from moving—more noticeably, someone—and you didn’t move. You didn’t kiss her back, no, but it wasn’t because you didn’t want to. You dreamt of this moment every night, and you didn’t fucking move.

The three second reign it took for Lorraine to register that you had frozen in place rushed her out of her tranced state, the ecstasy coursing through her to finally feel your lips on hers. Her former relaxation and calmness at the ability to finally let her feelings out turned to fright. Did she just ruin a friendship with someone she labeled her lifeline because of her stupid, homosexual thoughts that she figured you would reciprocate?

“(Y/N), uhm, I-” But she couldn’t finish her sentence either, because, like you, there was someone blocking her lips from moving. That fright, the one that her body turned to, disappeared just as quickly as it settled in, and she sighed in relief as she wrapped her arms around your shoulder to bring you in closer. That feeling she felt in her stomach was something she had never felt kissing RJ or any other boy, and man, did it feel fucking amazing.

“Just- just one thing, Raine.” Your voice came in a hushed whisper, moving forward to rest your forehead against the girl you claimed to be your whole word. “Yeah?”

“We ain’t gonna tell nobody about this, ‘cause you know we can’t.”

That was the truth, one that broke both of your hearts. “I know.”

☟

taglist: @grandpatrolnut @annalestern @rhythm-catsandwine @yara124 @daryldixonsw1fe @alexkolax @red1culous @xxxtwilightaxelxxx @n0vabug @idkwimdtbh @yolehiho @likefirenrain @ctrlamira @lovelyy-moonlight @dunohilly @jjsmaybank20 @xzennypennyx @mfd-101

(all tagged are from the list that are originally tagged in jenna content. if you don’t want to be tagged in lorraine cont. please let me know!)

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im-yn-suckers · 16 days ago

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me when riki serves bf core

battery level; █ 10% or when youre so tired that even riki knows how to handle it

you were especially tired today. you dont know why. you woke up today, exhausted, you got ready for school, exhausted and came home from school, exhausted. riki knew that your classes can sometimes be a lot to handle. hes also an expert in how you act, others think he may be more on the clueless side of things when it comes to ur feelings but its quite the opposite.

'hi pretty' 'hi ki' a simple interaction was all it took for riki to notice you were down. its been hours and all youve done was start on your paper, if you call an intro paragraph starting.

once you finally finish your paper (after locking in) you go up to your shared bedroom and see riki playing video games, having done his own work a while ago. he knew you needed some space, so he left you to do your work. you walk to him and stand behind his chair, putting your hands on his shoulders. you dont say anything, knowing you could embarrass him while 'playing with the homies'. he looks up,

'hi pretty, you feeling better?' he shuts off the pc, leaving his friends mad. he spins his chair around to face you. you nod in response, he stands up and hugs you tightly before leading you to the bed, he lays down and pulls you down with him and although you guys talked maybe three times today, all the hugs made up for it

a/n: uhm academic comback this year?? i have such good grades guys i might tweak out. IM SO SORRY TO THOSE HWO ACTUALLY WAIT FOR ME TO POST, I SAID ID POST AND I HAVENT IN LIKE A MONTH, ive been so drained and feel really pressured rn so ive been taking for time for ms!

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hb-writes · 2 months ago

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Doting

Summary: When Mia's sudden stomach pain turns out to be appendicitis, the Cullen family's doting nature comes out. Takes place pre-Twilight/ Bella, but not by much (it's the same school year).

Characters: All of the Cullens are present, but focus is mainly on Carlisle Cullen, Esme Cullen, Edward Cullen & Mia Cullen (OC)

Content Warnings: medical stuff - ER visit, appendicitis, appendectomy, surgery recovery

Twilight (Mia Cullen) Masterlist

It was usually Carlisle and Edward who monitored the majority of Mia’s medical needs. It was Carlisle and Edward who did the assessing and diagnosing, determining the need for a visit to her pediatrician or the emergency room. Determining what could and should be cared for by them at home, knowing that she received a fair bit more at-home care than most children did because most kids didn’t have a father and brother with medical degrees. Most kids didn’t have so many people paying such close attention. Most people didn't have so many people close who cared and had the ability to see in one way or another what was going...

Most people didn't have a Carlisle or an Edward, with their medical degrees and their decades of experience and knowledge.

Most people didn't have an Alice who had visions of the future or a Jasper who could sense moods.

But even so, it had been Esme and her mother’s intuition—her thorough knowledge of her youngest child—who figured out something was wrong with their Mia.

Mia had been quiet when she came home from school, slightly withdrawn as she went through the motions of saying goodbye to her siblings before they left for their hunting trip. No one questioned it. Mia understood why she could go, but she was always a bit disappointed when the others left her behind.

She first mentioned the stomach ache after they left, declining dinner and informing Esme that her stomach had been off all day. Mia figured it had just been nerves about the science test that was worth 40% of her grade this quarter, and when the test had passed but the unease in her stomach didn’t dissipate, Mia assumed she had caught a bug. It seemed likely—it was flu season after all.

But the flu didn’t feel like this. It could be awful, sure, but the persistent pain Mia had felt…she knew it was something more. And it was something she couldn’t hide or explain away. She was in enough pain that she didn’t even care to hide it from her mother. Mia was in enough pain that she didn’t fight when Esme announced that they needed to go to the hospital.

Mia only braced herself against the pain as her mother situated her in the front seat of the car, too engrossed in her discomfort, too desperate for relief to even be bothered about where they were going.

It was Carlisle’s new resident, a bright-eyed young woman who grew up and attended college and medical school on the other side of the country, moving to Forks 6 months ago for her training, who greeted them and examined Mia while Carlisle was busy treating a farmer who had the misfortune of having his arm stuck in a piece of farm equipment.

It was the resident who endured Mia’s screams as she gently pressed her fingers to Mia’s stomach. It was the resident who had studied the sonogram images of Mia’s abdomen. It was the resident who explained to Esme and Mia the diagnosis and the prognosis and the next steps. It was the resident who prescribed some pain killers while they waited.

Mia was resting by the time Carlisle was able to get away, curled into the fetal position with her head in Esme’s lap, both of them huddled in the hospital bed.

Carlisle kissed his wife and stroked a cool thumb across his daughter’s flushed cheek before pulling the chart from the end of the bed. He had already been briefed, but he liked to see the blood work for himself. Liked to see her vitals. Liked to be sure for himself even though he trusted his resident’s assessment.

As soon as the appendicitis was diagnosed, they started the medications—antibiotics to fight the infection and pain killers to help keep her comfortable.

Carlisle knew his daughter would be fine. They had caught it before the appendix ruptured. She would have a quick surgery and head home. She would recover and have little to show for the whole ordeal aside from a memory and a small scar that would fade to nothing over time.

“She’ll be okay,” Carlisle said, unsure if the assurance was more for himself or for his wife. “Flanders is a terrific surgeon.”

Esme nodded at her husband before looking back to their daughter, smoothing back the sweaty hair on Mia’s forehead. Esme had been so grateful when Mia fell asleep, so grateful for the speed with which the IV-administered pain medication had swarmed her daughter’s system, swiftly easing Mia’s torment. But there was a fear that still refused to budge, a worry that had settled itself in Esme’s heart and every fiber of her being.

Carlisle pulled her to his side and kissed his wife’s forehead, careful that the movement didn’t disturb their sleeping child. Carlisle knew the words wouldn’t be enough to soothe Esme.

The words…The knowledge that she would be fine…That an appendectomy was standard…easy…None of that had soothed him either.

The only thing that would offer any relief was seeing their child on the other side of this.

—

The surgery was laparoscopic. Minimally invasive. No complications. She was discharged home on the same day from the recovery room with discharge notes and a prescription for pain medication.

Mia was asleep on the couch, settled between Esme and Carlisle when the front door burst open, Edward emerging with a wild look in his eye. It was a full minute before Alice caught up.

“She’s—”

“I saw—” Alice began, the words caught in her throat as the vision she’d seen flashed in her memory again. Edward swallowed as it washed over his mind as well.

“She’s fine,” Carlisle said, his gaze drifting towards the front door as Rose, Jasper, and Emmett came into the room. “Our Mia had appendicitis, but your mother spotted it in time and she’s healing.”

Carlisle’s words and the sight of their sister sleeping peacefully brought some relief—Carlisle could see the slight change in each of his children as they integrated the information, taking in his assurances.

Even so, he extricated himself from the sofa and crossed the room to pull her discharge papers from his bag. He wordlessly passed them to his son for review before glancing back at Mia.

Jasper stood a ways back, but the others had taken up the space Carlisle had vacated, crowding around Mia as she continued to sleep.

She would be fine. More than fine. While she recovered, she would be cared for and doted on almost too well. She would receive far better care than any hospital could offer.

Carlisle had taken a few days off from the hospital to be with her, but he knew it wasn’t truly warranted. Mia had more than enough volunteers ready to help nursing her back to health.

“She should be up and moving soon,” Edward murmured as he looked over the papers. “Even if she doesn’t want to be.”

Carlisle nodded.

“She did a little walking at the hospital before they released her.”

“How did she do?”

Carlisle answered through a glance and a small smirk that told Edward his sister had been full of complaints through every step she took.

“Your sister is a terrible patient.”

“And they’ll do nothing but enable her,” Edward said, nodding toward the others.

“A little doting won’t hurt her,” Carlisle mused, knowing that he planned to dote a little himself. He glanced at Edward. “You were able to go hunting?”

“Barely,” Edward answered, his gaze moving to Jasper who was still at the edge of the room and keeping a distance. “The others should head back out.”

“And you?” Carlisle asked.

“I’ll be fine,” Edward answered. “I’ll stay.”

Carlisle snorted softly. “Go hunt, son.” Carlisle took back the discharge papers.

“I should—”

“Your sister is safe,” Carlisle interrupted. “And she'll be asleep for a few hours still. And your mother and I are here with her. Take your siblings back out to hunt.”

Edward looked torn, his dark eyes settled on his sleeping sister. Carlisle’s gaze remained on his son as he watched his sister.

You can have a turn doting on her after you’ve fed.

Edward glanced at Carlisle. He hadn’t said it aloud, but Edward heard it all the same.

The nourishment will help you better navigate the recovery.

Carlisle hadn’t said it or even thought it, but Edward knew that what Carlisle truly meant was that feeding would give him a little more patience. Feeding would help Edward navigate his sister’s complaining about getting off the couch and completing her exercises and following the discharge instructions with the least amount of bickering. Feeding would lower the odds of Carlisle and Esme having to play referee.

What Edward didn’t realize was that Carlisle also meant that before Edward could care for his sister, he needed to care for himself.

What Edward didn’t realize was that Mia wasn’t the only Cullen Carlisle was doting on.

Carlisle placed a hand on Edward’s shoulder, squeezing once before he crossed the room and began the process of ushering his other children from the room, communicating the plan to resume their hunting trip to the others while giving Edward the opportunity to approach Mia and Esme on his own.

Esme gave a gentle smile as Edward approached, sitting on the edge of the coffee table in front of them. Edward took the hand Esme offered.

“She’ll be fine,” Esme said. “They all said the recovery should be simple.”

Edward raised an eyebrow. Esme chuckled, a bit of light entering her eyes for the first time since this ordeal started.

“Well, it should be simple when it comes to the medical piece, at least,” she amended.

Edward snorted, barely a sound emitted as he did it, but Mia’s eyes fluttered open anyway, locking on him immediately.

“Edward?”

Some tension Edward hadn’t realized he was holding shifted at hearing her voice. Esme released his hand. “How are you feeling?”

“Like I got my appendix out,” Mia mumbled, the hint of a smile on her lips though it disappeared as she shifted position, her face suddenly scrunched up as she winced at a lash of pain.

“Careful,” Edward said, his hands instinctively shooting forward to steady her.

“I’m fine,” she hissed, though she was far from it, a small bead of sweat forming at her hairline and a bit of foggy exhaustion creeping in after just a few minutes awake, after just a few seconds of misguided movement.

Edward gave his mother a knowing look and Esme schooled her features, but Mia had somehow caught it, even distracted as she was with her pain.

“It’s not funny. I just had surgery and—”

“You’re awake,” Carlisle said gently and as if it was the best news in the world. He offered a smile to Mia as he approached, his sudden presence easily putting an end to a rant he knew would only rile her up.

“Edward, the others are waiting for you,” he said, squeezing Edward’s shoulder.

Edward nodded. “I’ll be back soon,” he offered to Mia and Esme before standing and moving slowly towards the front door.

“How are you feeling, sweetheart?” Carlisle asked as he took Edward’s place on the coffee table.

Edward slowed his steps as he waited to hear Mia’s answer, hoping she’d give their father a more honest and complete answer than she had given him. There was none of the sarcasm Edward had received—none of the bite in her voice either—as his sister answered Carlisle’s question with a question, her voice small and timid.

“Can I have some ice cream?”

Edward stopped by the front door. His instinct was to return to the livingroom and answer. To interject and relay the instructions he’d just read in the discharge summary—she was restricted to clear liquids only for 24 hours post- surgery—but Carlisle answered before he could get the words out.

“How about a popsicle?” he offered instead, just as well-versed in his daughter's discharge papers as the son who still lingered by the front door.

Edward didn’t hear his sister’s answer, but he heard Carlisle stand and cross the room, a doting sentiment sent his way as Carlisle walked toward the kitchen.

Go ahead, son. She’ll be fine.

Twilight (Mia Cullen) Masterlist

#twilight fanfiction #the twilight saga #twilight #carlisle cullen #carlisle cullen fanfic #esme cullen #edward cullen #the cullens #cullen!sister #mia cullen #we intertwined #appendicitis #appendectomy

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crabrat · 3 months ago

Text

COMING SOON TO A THEATER NEAR YOU!

the inspo for the fic:

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senualothbrok · 30 days ago

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Research

“All your preferences. All your secret places. What pleases you. How to drive you mad with toe-curling, soul-shattering ecstasy.” Your entire body tingles from the hard twitch against your thigh. “I've barely scratched the surface.”

Summary: Gale and Mia do some very vigorous research.

Set after Chapter 7 of The Difference, in which Gale discovers the existence of Gale smut. (The Difference is a reverse isekai fic in which Gale portals into modern day England and learns that in this universe, he is a fictional character in a video game, with a significant fandom.)

AO3 link

Word count: 1.5k

Disclaimers: NSFW. 18+. Smut. Mutual masturbation. Gale-coded dirty talk.

A/N: The piece of smut Gale and Mia refer to is Words. Totally meta and self-indulgent, I know, but I couldn't resist doing the smut within smut / smutsception thing 🤣

Bon appetit, Galemancers 🫶

*****

As you step into the bedroom, you are momentarily winded by the sight of him. He is a vision against the headboard, naked and tousled, brow wrinkled in intense focus. The bedsheets crumple haphazardly around his lap, offering a tantalising glimpse of his happy trail. He looks up from the phone in his hand, his eyes blazing as they fall on you.

Your flesh still steams from your shower. Water beads and trails down your neck as you wring at your dripping hair. His gaze snags on the towel wrapped around you, flashing with hunger, unabated despite your earlier exertions. There is a flush on his cheeks, mirroring the heat that flares inside you whenever he is near.

You catch your breath. “What are you reading?”

His lips curl in a sideways smile. When he starts reading from the screen, his voice is low and silken. From the arch of his brow, you are certain he knows the effect it has on you.

“You lean up on your elbows, and it is then that you see Gale, jerking with the movements of his own pleasure as he laps and sucks at the centre of your fire.”

You laugh a little. You are not entirely surprised. Gale has been nothing but enthusiastic since you revealed the plethora of online smut centred on him. He has been especially enthusiastic about your demonstrations, insisting that you repeat several of them. You have not refused.

“That’s a good one.”

He bobs his head. “One of your favourite pieces.”

“You've been taking notes.”

“Of course.” His eyes dance. “Copious notes. Reams of them.”

When he climbs off the bed and strides towards you, you linger on the hard planes of his muscles, his broad shoulders framing his narrow waist. You savour the thick trails of down peppering his bronzed skin, the sharp cut of his hip bones guiding your gaze steadily southward. His desire is a proud curve, alert and ready. His arms snake around your hips as his tongue flicks at the damp nook of your neck. You tremble at his touch.

“Aren't you tired?”

He nibbles at your earlobe. “Most certainly not. I've had a rest.”

“Clearly not if you were reading that.”

He tuts, his open mouth trailing down your cheekbone, lingering at the corner of your lips.

“Research, my love.”

You turn, half-lidded, sucking his bottom lip into your mouth. When you release it, he inhales roughly.

“You've done some pretty vigorous research already.”

He unwraps your towel like a gift. When he tosses it across the room, the flick of his wrist is an invitation. You weave your arms around his neck, aching for his heat on you, around you, inside you. His fingers drift down your spine, drawing tender, teasing circles around the dimples of your back.

“The work of a scholar is never done. The quest for knowledge never ends.”

You gasp as he suddenly clasps the cheeks of your ass. His grip is firm. Determined.

You press against him, burying your face in his mussed hair. It is intoxicating, the headiness of his sweat, the sour sweetness of your passion. When you trace the shell of his ear with your tongue, he quivers.

“You have some pretty robust evidence.”

Your teeth graze his earlobe. His breath judders, his beard a maddening rasp against your skin.

“One should never be complacent where knowledge is concerned.”

One of his thumbs nestles into the cleft of your ass. You buckle into him, your thighs clenching against the wet flame that burns through your every nerve.

“I pride myself on being meticulous.” A stray finger circles the peak of your nipple, the soft underside of your breast. “My attention to detail is unparalleled.”

The look in his eyes is ravenous. You whimper at the pulse of his cock against your core, the stark demand of him. He lurches backwards, pulling you onto the bed with an urgency that winds you. Your mouths meet in a desperate frenzy, an eager exploration of tongues, a flurry of moans. When you draw back, you are both panting, aflame.

You stop for a moment to take him in. Splayed out beneath you, locks tangled, chest heaving, a single bead glimmers and falls from the tip of his cock onto his chiselled abdomen. A work of art.

“Taking in the details?”

It takes all of your self control not to eat him raw. You bend down, swiping your tongue over the pearl in his slit. He spasms, groaning. You look up at him open mouthed, turning his nectar around on your tongue, savouring his taste. His eyes are dark, blown wide with pure, unbridled need.

You reach for his hand. Slowly, painstakingly, you take each of his fingers in your mouth. Your tongue glides up and down each length, lapping and sucking, coating each finger thoroughly and meticulously in your spit. You smile as you whine, as he flinches and hardens. Strings of saliva thread between his moist fingers and your gleaming chin when you come apart.

“I’m not sure we've explored this avenue yet.”

You press his slickened hand onto his cock. His eyes widen before he grimaces at the tightening of your fingers around his. His cock surges against the pressure, bursting for relief. Realisation dawns on Gale’s face as you remove your hand, pushing away gently to settle back on the bed. To watch.

That huff. That sideways smile that drives you wild.

“That was the moment, I suppose.”

You raise an eyebrow. He nods towards your phone, discarded beneath the sheets.

“The climax of that piece you love. Quite literally.”

You chuckle softly. “Only you could turn literary analysis into foreplay.”

He widens his thighs, shifting his position. You bite your lip at the lean bulge of his thighs, the curves of his strong calves. When his grasp glides to the base of his shaft, the practised elegance of it tears through you.

“The brain is the seat of arousal, as you well know.”

He begins to pump, each stroke slow and deliberate. His tongue flickers over his lips as he watches your face, following every detail, missing nothing. You are entranced by the reddening throb of his length, the thick veins trailing down his girth. Glazed in your spit, his cock pulses under his lithe and slender fingers. You cannot resist.

“What if I told you…”

You sit back, spreading your legs. You tease your fingers between the path of your breasts, pausing at the damp down just above your mound. When you part your swollen folds to expose your wetness, the moan that sputters from him is like a spell.

“...That I get off from thinking about you like this?”

His hand stops for an instant. You let out a little whimper, disapproving, pleading. His gaze is voracious as you angle your pelvis, pressing downwards into the sheets. You begin to grind, rubbing your throbbing clit against the mattress, unravelling at the growing ache. When he thrusts into his hand, you muffle a cry.

“Does that turn you on? Knowing how wet I am?”

You cannot hear his reply. He resumes his rhythm, slapping up and down his stiffness with increasing fury. The sheets rustle and the bedframe heaves as you lurch to his frenetic beat. A trickle of sweat rolls down his chin, pooling at his nipple. His free hand clutches at yours, insistent, imploring. He looks at you, features clenched with the pain of desire. You have rendered Gale speechless. You have never felt so aroused.

“Show me.”

You dip your head towards his cock. Drips of delight trail down his blanched knuckles, down the taut veins on his wrist. You spasm, your fire building with each pump and grind.

“Show me how much you want me.”

The whine that erupts from him echoes your own. He struggles to hold your gaze as his eyes roll back, abs rippling and back bowing as he pounds up and down his shaft with growing abandon. You writhe as you watch him draw nearer and nearer to the brink.

“Mia,” he moans. “Gods… Mia…”

You clutch at your thighs, your breasts, your nipples, your touch becoming his fingers digging into your skin.

“Show me, Gale,” you breathe. “Come for me.”

He grunts and gasps, teeth gritted with urgency. You roll into the burning friction of the sheets as his hips snap frantically into his clenched fingers. You are raw with the frenzy in his engorged frame, wild and bursting with need. When he cries out, streams of release spill from the pulsing perfection of him, spraying onto his chest, trickling into the deep grooves of his abdomen. The hairs beneath his navel shine. He twitches and keens, and you can barely breathe as you surge forward to take his spent tip in your mouth, still rigid against your tongue. He shudders violently, letting out a sound you are certain is reserved for you alone.

You have no time to respond. He springs up with sudden force, pinning you back against the bed. Panting, blazing, he grabs your fingers and plunges them onto your slick, aching clit. You throw your head back with a groan.

“Now,” he rasps as he draws back, settling against the headboard, “it’s your turn to show me.”

*****

And just in case you need a visual... 🫠

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