#might just stop spending hours writing longer fics because all my hard work just goes unnoticed | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

biletdoux · 4 years ago

Text

stages of love | j.jh

Pairing | jung jaehyun (nct) + female!reader Rating | M Genre + Tropes | college!au, romance (angst, fluff, smut) Warnings | explicit language, alcohol consumption, instant love?, sexual content (drunk sex, receiving and giving oral, penetration, cow girl position, nipple play), greyzone fidelity Length | 15k+

Summary | A playlist for the trials and tribulations of a beating heart

(Or; your relationship with Jung Jaehyun in ten songs.)

Note: ahhhhhhh!!!! we finally did it boisssss. this fic has been a long time coming and honestly im sick and tired of jaehyun. i’ve spent too long thinking about him for this fic smh. this is also my first time writing smut so we’ll see how that goes lmao. anyway this was a long labor of love so please let me know what you thought of it !!! <333

1. Peach by IU

smitten at first sight.

“How can I explain this feeling?”

“Alright, I think that sums up about everything we need to cover for today’s lecture. Remember, most of this will be on your final exam. Any questions before you’re all dismissed?”

Your professor looks up from the board, scans the room and all he sees are most of the students waiting with bated breath, itching to leave the class, and half of those students having already packed their belongings in anticipation. He held them back an extra twenty five minutes today, which is notably longer than previous lectures in which he delayed dismissal.

“Okay, you’re free to go. Chapters nineteen and twenty are due the next time we meet.”

You breathe out a sigh of relief, ready to head out with the rest of the class. You like Professor Jang and find that he makes history somewhat digestible, but he has a tendency to lose track of time, which is inconvenient, but more so today since you have agreed to meet up with Yeri. You glance at your phone to see text notifications and curse to yourself. You’re already ten minutes late and Yeri is many things and impatient is one of them.

You’re one of the first out of the small lecture hall and you shoot her a quick reply before making your way to the oncampus cafe. Through quickened strides and shortcuts engrained from cross-campus treks from class to class, you arrive in record time. You’re slightly out of breath and impressed by your speed, but you stop, frozen in your tracks when you see Yeri’s displeased face. You find her situated in a small, but cozy corner next to the windows, already unpacked with notebooks and papers strewn on the desk ready to review for exams. It's one of the best study spots in the cafe and you immediately know your best friend had to come extra early to nab such a sought after table.

“About time,” she scowls, “what took you so long?”

You shoot her an apologetic look, “aww, Yeri,” you pout your lips a little too dramatically, “I’m sorry. I just came from history and you know how Professor Jang is.”

Yeri looks at your jutted lips in disgust, but then her face softens in consideration. “Hm, I do know Jang.” She scrunches up her nose remembering her time in his class last semester. “That old man can talk for days on end and he never lets anyone leave class early. I guess I’ll let you go this time.”

You beam at her knowing she’s no longer angry for your tardiness. “Great, drinks are on me today. It’s the least I can do for being late.” Yeri forgives as easily and as quickly as she loses her temper. You learned this after a few weeks of being her roommate.

Yeri says nothing in silent agreement and you place your stuff down across the table next to the chair she reserves for you. You pull out your wallet and weave through the packed cafe to head to the order counter. The line is long and you patiently review the menu. Your roommate has consistent tastes and always orders a vanilla frappuccino regardless of which cafe she goes to, but you base your decision on your mood. You mull over your choices and by the time you reach the barista taking your order, you decide you’re in an ‘iced Americano’ kind of mood today. You have exams on top of exams you need to review for and a stronger caffeine kick is much needed.

After paying, you head back to the table with two drinks in tow. Yeri takes her drink and after you both take a few sips and catch up for the day, you dive straight to work. The two of you decide to review for statistics.

Between re-summarizing chapters and answering review questions, you muse to yourself about how your college experience thus far hasn't been that much different from your high school life. You didn’t necessarily hate high school, per say, but it was safe to say you didn’t enjoy it. Your heart was in the arts, specifically music, and you had found studying the core subjects to be boring and tedious. You remember being ecstatic to have been accepted and enrolled in a performing arts college, foolishly thinking your days of solving differential equations and memorizing chemical formulas were over. You specifically remember daydreaming of your hours being filled with keyboard practice and composition notes and only such things. Somehow the reality of mandatory general education courses slipped your mind when you constructed such fantasies.

Despite frivolous and preconceived notions of college, you have already survived a semester and you are nearly through your second.

“Hey, do you remember when this stats assignment is due?” Yeri’s inquiring voice snaps you out of your brief reverie and you search your cluttered brain for a date.

“Uh, I think it’s due, like, a few days before the final, but I’d have to double check.”

Yeri nods. “Alright, well let’s take a small break. We have some time till then, we don’t have to finish all of it today.”

You happily agree and set down your pen. Yeri takes a sip of her frappuccino and you lean over the table to get closer to her. “Anyway, did you hear about what happened with Jiwon and Youngjae from the entertainment management department?”

Her eyes glisten with wicked interest. “No. Do tell.”

Break time is always synonymous with gossip hour between you and Yeri.

You spend the next fifteen minutes dishing what you know and Yeri offers her own input whenever she feels fit.

“And they think they’re being discreet, but the whole dorm knows they’ve been sneaking around, but guess wha─” Before you can finish your sentence, you are cut off by a loud and energetic voice calling out Yeri’s name.

The two of you look up to see a slim and boyish brunet waving to Yeri and excitedly making his way to your table. He looks vaguely familiar, but you can’t quite place your finger on it, so you let it go.

He smiles happily at Yeri and greets her. “Hey Yeri, how’s it going?” He notices you there and gives you a polite wave, which you return in the same manner.

Yeri replies back breezily, but with her full attention. “Good. Did you need anything, Mark?”

He flushes just the slightest bit, but it doesn’t escape your eyes. “Erm, nothing I just wanted to remind you that we’re meeting for the music theory project tomorrow at four. I would’ve texted, but I forgot to get your number in class, and I saw you here and thought it was a good opportunity to tell you.”

Yeri’s eyes widen, “ah right! I completely forgot about it. It’s a good thing you found me here today, huh? Here, I’ll give you my number.”

She reaches her hand out her hand expectantly, and Mark is confused before scrambling to pull out his phone. You can tell Mark looks flustered while Yeri is calmly putting in her contact information. After finishing, she hands his phone back, “okay, all set. Just shoot me a text so I have your number as well. Thanks for reminding me today or I probably would’ve forgotten and not have shown up or something.”

Mark smiles again, this time a little more sure than before. “All good. I’ll see you tomorrow, Yeri.”

They wave goodbye and you watch Mark scamper from the cafe. Your eyes follow him, but Yeri is already focused on you again, paying Mark’s retreating form no mind.

“So…” you start.

“So?” She returns.

“He’s cute.”

“Yeah, maybe,” she shrugged. “I barely know him though. We have music theory together, but this is the first time we’ve talked all semester and we’re only talking because we got paired up for a project.”

Yeri seems apathetic and you study her closely. You notice she’s acting a little too stiffly carefree to be truly indifferent to the situation. You can’t help, but to tease her a bit. “Well, make the most out of this project then.”

Yeri gives you a hard look and you decide to let it go despite finding your best friend’s situation to be amusing.

“Anyway, keep telling me about Jiwon and Youngjae. You never finished.” Yeri changes the topic, knowing that you might decide to pester her again if she doesn’t.

“As I was saying,” you started up again. A figure outside catches your attention and you peer outside through the window past Yeri’s shoulders. You realize it’s Mark and you watch with interest as he gestures excitedly, pointing to something in his hand, you assume his phone, to some of his friends. From there your eyes wander absentmindedly from one person to the next, and it’s when you see him.

The reaction is almost instantaneous.

“Like you were saying?” Yeri urges, but her words fall on deaf ears, for all your attention is captured by the boy next to Mark with heart-shaped lips.

When you see said boy laugh, you notice he has moon for eyes and you unconsciously suck in a sharp breath. You must have been staring too intently without noticing because he turns his head in your direction and you two hold direct eye contact. Like a deer caught in headlights, you freeze and lose all rational thought. Your head is completely blank. You have never seen someone so beautiful and your mind does not know how to process any sensory information at the moment.

Someone calls the boy away and the entire group of friends leave. It’s only then do you find yourself releasing a breath you didn’t know you had been holding onto so tightly. Your heart is pounding and you feel as though blood is rushing through your ears.

“Hello?” Yeri sounds annoyed, but you struggle to find the words to answer her.

You feel a sudden heat rush to color your cheeks a vibrant red and a feeling surges through you that leaves you out of breath and weak at the knees. A steady warmth washes over you quietly and you feel it deep within yourself and you can’t help but let out a small laugh.

How silly, you muse. Not to be dramatic, but you think you’re in love.

2. Shadow by f(x)

adoration from afar.

“I’m really really into you.”

The next few weeks are packed to the brim with assignments and papers, but despite this, you still find time for your personal research into the boy who was with Mark that day.

Being the obvious first and easiest option, you beg Yeri to ask Mark directly about his friend, but she immediately shoots you down.

“No. Absolutely not. At least not anytime soon anyway,” she huffs. “I’ve barely held two full conversations with him, like hell the next is gonna be about his friend just cause my best friend started thirsting over him after one glance. I mean come on, girl.” She shakes her head at you.

Yeri’s right and you apologize to her for being thoughtless of her situation. She doesn’t say it, but she seems really hopeful about the music theory project and what might bloom from it. You would not want to impede on such possibilities of happiness for your friend, so you let that option go, but Yeri promises to help in other ways and she does.

Somehow between caffeine fueled cram sessions and sleep deprivation, you, with Yeri’s help manage to find out more about the boy. You casually ask around in your contemporary writing and production department and she offers help by searching her vocal performance department.

You find out his name is Jung Jaehyun and he’s a third year in the musical theatre department and that he’s a member of the local chapter of the performing arts fraternity on campus. You also discover his Instagram handle and you find yourself skimming through his page throughout the day more often than you’re willing to admit to any living soul.

You occasionally see him around campus since you first saw him at the cafe and each time, you can feel your heart hammer in your chest and you become so flustered to the point of your sympathetic nervous system activating. Unfortunately for you, your body unconsciously chooses flight each and every time at the sight of Jaehyun because you can always feel your knees go weak and your body lurch away to escape in any direction that isn’t Jaehyun’s. You kind of hate yourself each time you do, but you can’t help it. He’s just so pretty that it’s intimidating!

You try to think positive after the bouts of shame you experience after each escapade.

Well there’s no way to embarrass yourself in front of him if you run away before having the chance to, right?

Even thinking about it now in the comfort of your bed, you can’t shake your self-consciousness and bury your face in a large pillow resting on your knees. Your cheeks are burning and you don’t know what to do.

“Hey, why don’t you just talk to him, instead of moping all day and stalking his profile like a creep.” Yeri’s crisp words cut through your musings and you glance up to see her entering your shared room in the dorms.

“Shut up. It’s not like I have a benevolent match-making professor who happens to pair me up with my crush for an end-of-semester project.” You retort back before sighing dramatically, “I literally have no excuse to talk to him. We’re not in the same year or major. We don’t even have mutual friends. Unless, y’know, you and Mark hit it off, who knows.”

Yeri sits down next to you on your small twin bed, resting her head on your shoulder while letting out an equally dramatic sigh, “yeah, well, Mark’s so dense, all the divine intervention in the world isn’t going to help me.”

You let out snort, “what’s up with you two anyway?”

“Y’know, I could’ve sworn he was into me and I had a chance with him, but every time we meet up we literally only work on the project and nothing else. Every time I sort of tried to do something I get shot down. Like I told him I was kind of chilly today in the library, and he looks all thoughtful for a moment but all he ends up saying is ‘yeah, all the buildings on campus are always cold, huh? Good thing I always bring a jacket with me. You should bring one too next time, I don’t want you getting cold.’ And then he just turns back to the project like nothing. Can you believe him?” Yeri complains and you swear her annoyance is palpable. “And every time I text him to hangout, he thinks it’s to work on the project. I honestly can’t tell if he’s really that stupid or if he’s just not into me.”

You laugh at her unfortunate, but undeniable state of love affairs.

“Really? That bad? I remember him being all blushy when he asked for your number,” you recall. “And you should’ve seen how he looked when he showed off he got your number. Well that’s what it looked like anyway, I could be wrong.”

“Well, at least I’ll get a good grade though. Mark is nothing if not diligent and hard-working, with him being a double major and all.” Yeri sounds resigned however, she sighs again, this time more frustrated and you hear the determination in her voice. “Alright, after finals, for sure we’re gonna hit the clubs. We need to let loose, have some fun.”

You agree with her to appease her short temper, but deep down you feel disappointed. You feel sorry for your friend, having genuinely wanted Mark and her to work out, but a small and selfish part of you felt sorry for having no bridge to Jaehyun at all if it didn’t work out between Yeri and Mark. Looks like you were stranded now and you’d have to find a way to Jaehyun one way or another, but your line of help ends here.

Shaking away such negative thoughts, you think to yourself how soju bombs and dance floors don’t so bad after such an intense exam period after all. It will definitely take your mind off of things for sure.

And even though you say this to yourself, you know your mind will still be plagued with Jung Jaehyun no matter how much you try.

3. What Is Love by EXO-K

careful contemplation.

“I can’t explain what I feel.”

“Mark, tell me you did not.” The disbelief in Johnny’s voice made the situation all the more hilarious and even Jaehyun, who’s the calmer of the two, couldn’t suppress the guffaw from escaping his lips.

The tips of Mark’s ears flush a light pink and he tries to deliver a convincing argument, but all that comes out is a meek stammer, further driving Johnny up the wall.

When Mark came up to his and Johnny’s room asking for advice, Jaehyun had an idea of where it was going to lead, considering Mark’s clueless disposition and inexperienced track record, but Jaehyun had no idea it was going to be this bad.

Mark, having developed a crush on a fellow vocal performance major in his music theory class, came to Johnny, his frat big, to spill his guts and ask for advice constantly. Being Johnny’s roommate, meant Jaehyun was also privy to all the details of Mark’s love life and he had no problem giving advice to the amusing first year student, which Mark appreciated because going to Johnny meant a clowning session before he could get any useful nuggets of information.

When Mark’s music theory professor randomly assigned the two for the end of semester project, Mark was one part excited and two parts nervous, resulting in a frazzled mess. He has been going up to the second room on the right of the second floor of the frat house almost every other day to ask for advice since then.

Johnny was thrilled when he initially heard of the project, already envisioning his little’s love prospects, stating something along the lines of “my little’s gonna get laid!”

However, now looking at Johnny rubbing his temples in exasperation, Jaehyun can tell that his roommate’s initial enthusiasm has dissipated.

Mark’s daily roadblock today consisted of his crush giving him the cold shoulder and being much more snappy than before in the project meet up earlier. Mark recalls Yeri’s anger toward him and racks his brain for an answer. Even Johnny and Jaehyun are stumped at the sudden behavior, assuming that things were going smoothly from Mark’s previous reports filled with clumsy, but endearing and ultimately positive signs. It’s only when Mark offhandedly mentions her so-called ‘strange’ comment about the temperature, does it become clear why Yeri’s attitude suddenly shifted so drastically.

“I mean, I don’t know what I did wrong.” Mark’s second attempt to defend himself has Johnny flaring his nostrils in indignation and Jaehyun has to turn away in an attempt to stifle his laughter.

“Dude, she’s so into you. Or, at least she was, I don’t know about it anymore.” Johnny starts after calming down. “She left herself wide open for you to take a clear shot and you effectively said to her face, ‘thanks but no thanks’ and then walked away. No wonder she’s pissed, I’d be pissed too.”

“Well, what was I supposed to do then?” Mark counters.

“Mark,” Johnny begins, his tone dry and coarse, “you’re killing me.”

Jaehyun deems this the perfect time to step in, the laughter about done coursing through his system at this point. He clears his throat before offering his input, “It’s not too, too bad. Johnny’s just being dramatic. If she likes you enough, she’ll probably forgive you if you play your cards right from here on out.”

Mark perks up, his attention solely on Jaehyun.

Jaehyun hums absentmindedly to himself, gathering and organizing his thoughts to properly explain exactly where and how Mark went wrong and what to do moving forward. When Jaehyun opens his mouth to speak, Mark is glued on to every word and Jaehyun can see the gears in his brain whirring at high speeds.

By the time Jaehyun is done, Johnny has calmed down and Mark nods his head fervently in understanding.

“Ah, that makes so much sense now! I got it now.”

Despite his assurances, both Johnny and Jaehyun know Mark will be back soon.

“Alright little, listen up,” Johnny starts. “Here’s the game plan from here on out.”

Johnny goes off on a sermon, determined to help his little ‘get some’ as Johnny so delicately puts it. Jaehyun can see it’s not the most tasteful of word choice for Mark to hear, but the youngest says nothing.

Lounging lazily in the bean bag on his side of the room, Jaehyun knocks his head back and thinks of a few weeks back when he accompanied Mark and some other frat members to the rec center for some basketball. Jaehyun remembers Mark was bemoaning the fact he forgot to ask for some girl’s number and it was as if a higher entity heard the boy’s laments and felt especially gracious, because right as they were passing the cafe, Mark stopped in his tracks and suddenly ran off into the busy building.

The group of frat boys watched him excitedly weave his way through the crowd of bodies and occupied tables to reach a table with two girls. When they saw the girl putting her number into Mark’s phone, Johnny elbowed Jaehyun, and like a proud parent Johnny exaggeratedly acknowledged his little. “They grow up so fast, don’t they, Jaehyun.” Johnny even wiped an imaginary tear from his eye to really send the message home.

It was only a few moments later and Mark came bounding out of the cafe, eager to show everyone how lucky it was that he happened to see her. “I mean what are the odds, right?” the said boy exclaimed so happily, his cheer so infectious, Jaehyun couldn’t help himself from letting out a laugh of his own.

Jaehyun turned to give Mark an encouraging pat on the back and it’s when he notices a pair of eyes on him. He turns fully to come in the direct line of sight of a girl whose eyes, Jaehyun imagined to have been very warm, had they not been burning holes into him. Her intense gaze slightly unnerved him, but not to the point of pulling away. He found himself entranced and the only thing that broke the quick spell was Johnny’s voice, calling him to move it along.

Jaehyun recalls easily breaking eye contact and giving little thought to the strange girl with fire for eyes, but as the days passed, Jaehyun couldn’t shake the thought of her from his mind.

Even now in the comfort of his room and with Johnny and Mark not even a foot away, carefully planning Mark’s love endeavors, all Jaehyun’s mind can really focus on is the thought of you.

Jaehyun is sure he’s only looked at you for less than a minute, but somehow he’s able to clearly trace out the image of you that day, like a perfect snapshot.

“Yo Jaehyun,” Johnny calls. “You good? You’ve been spacing out, bro.”

“Yeah, I’m good.” Jaehyun answers offhandedly, before contemplating to himself. Was he good? Jaehyun wouldn’t necessarily say he’s bad in any way, but it isn’t normal for him to have the thought of a girl remain so clearly engraved in his mind for so long, and even less common for it to actually be a girl he doesn’t even know nonetheless. It’s not a pressing issue, but it does bother him. He weighs over the next steps in his mind.

“Alright, just making sure.”

With one last thought, Jaehyun concludes to himself that it’s time to tackle his concern at hand head-on.

“Actually,” he starts, “Mark, do you remember the girl next to Yeri the day you asked for her number?”

Mark quirks his head in thought and Jaehyun can see Johnny raise his eyebrows in sudden interest.

“Uh kinda,” Mark answers. “I think she’s a CWP major. I’m pretty sure we shared an arranging class last semester, but like, I don’t know her personally or anything; it was a large lecture. To be honest, I don’t even think she recognized me at all, judging from her reaction that day. Why, what’s up?”

Jaehyun nods, absorbing the information, giving Johnny ample time to fire away.

“Yeah Jaehyun,” Jaehyun can visualize the glint in Johnny’s eyes just from hearing his mischievous tone. “What is up? I haven’t seen you ask about a girl in a hot minute. Thought you suddenly went abstinent without telling me or something.”

Jaehyun isn’t quite sure how to reply. Without a doubt you were cute to Jaehyun and he wouldn’t be opposed for things to happen between the two of you, but he doesn’t even know you! Well, not that it’s been a problem for Jaehyun in the past, but your lingering presence bothers him in ways he cannot communicate. Why is that the thought of you won’t leave him and why does it bother him so much?

Jaehyun decides to be straightforward, as straightforward as his muddled brain allows him to be. “She’s cute. I wanna get to know her.”

“Okay, Jaehyun.” Johnny whoops obnoxiously. “I see you.”

Mark is surprised and suddenly Johnny is all fired up again. Abruptly, Johnny shoots up and the determination that burns in his eyes is admirable.

“I’ve got it!” He declares proudly.

Jaehyun and Mark are quiet, waiting patiently for him to continue. They say nothing, knowing there is not a thing that can reach him when Johnny gets like this.

“We’re throwing a party and you bet your ass your two girls are gonna be there.”

4. Heaven by Ailee

walking on Cloud 9.

“When I hear your voice, it feels like I’m dreaming.”

You look up at the two-story house before you and wonder how you got here. Actually, you don’t wonder at all because you know exactly how you ended up at the steps of the local performing arts fraternity at your college, but you sigh regardless, as if someone had weaseled you into being here. Your nerves gnaw at you and you feel your stomach doing all types of aerobic tricks, the feeling reminiscent of the sensation before the roller coaster drops.

Yeri grabs your hand and pulls you excitedly to the front door. You can feel the thrum of music emanating from the building.

You recall how Yeri almost jumped you to tell the good news.

Finals flew by without any major hitches, ignoring sleepless nights and caffeine crashes. You don’t know how you’ll do, but you’re satisfied with your exam performances. You were in the clear and were just waiting for Yeri to present her joint music theory project before the both of you could finally let loose as a celebration to end the school year.

You waited for her outside of the classroom building as promised, playing with your phone to past time until you were suddenly engulfed by a delighted pair of arms. Yeri hugged you tight; she was in high spirits, seemingly from acing her presentation and you hugged her back in congratulations. She pulled at you closer and whispered in your ears, “just say yes.”

You were confused, but looked up to see Mark headed toward the two you. Yeri released you, leaving one arm still slung casually over your shoulder.

“Hey guys. My frat’s throwing a party tonight to celebrate finishing exams. I was wondering if, uh, you guys wanted to come? I mean you don’t have to, it’s totally optional.”

You didn’t say anything at first and Yeri interjected, “Of course!” She smiled at you innocently despite harshly pinching you to respond, her action hidden from Mark’s sight. “We’d love to, right?”

“Uh,” you answered distractedly. “Y-yeah, sure.”

“Great.” Mark beamed. “Party starts at eight. I gotta go help set up, so I’ll see ya there!”

And with that, he left as soon as he arrived and you looked at Yeri questioningly for answers. “I thought we were hitting downtown tonight. What happened to club hopping?”

Yeri smiled devilishly, “change of plans. I’ll tell you more about it later. The most important thing is finding the perfect outfit for you tonight, cause Jaehyun’s gonna be there.”

And so, here you find yourself dressed in high-waisted shorts and a cute top that took an embarrassingly long time to decide on. You are greeted by the fraternity president at the door of the house, Taeyong you think his name is, and he gives you two a quick verbal tour of the place, really emphasizing where to get drinks. Yeri thanks him for the both of you and you enter the crowded house. You think at least half of the performing art majors must’ve been here judging by the sheer volume of packed bodies.

You remember Yeri explaining how she and Mark may have been making a breakthrough and this party was imperative for its success. You were completely okay attending for that reason alone, because after all, what kind of person sends her best friend to a frat party alone? However, your resolve to go was set in stone after she explained that the frat that was throwing the party just happened to be the same frat Jaehyun was a member of.

“And y’know, seeing as how you’ve been obsessing over him the past few weeks, it’s the perfect opportunity.”

You frown remembering her words and make your way to the kitchen with Yeri in tow. Various beverages, alcoholic and non-alcoholic, crowd the table and you recognize the guy standing nearby idly chatting with others. It’s Jaemin, an acting major in your history lecture with whom you frequently exchange notes with when either one of you decides to flake for the day. You vaguely recall him mentioning his fraternity association, but didn’t realize it happened to be this one. He sees the two of you approaching the drink table and he smiles widely.

“Oh hey, what’s up?” Jaemin greets casually. “Didn’t expect to see you here. How’d you think you did in the history final?”

You groan. “I don’t even want to talk about it. What’s important is that we’re finished and I won’t ever have to think about the WWII timeline for, hopefully, forever.”

“Amen,” Jaemin laughs. “I’ll drink to that.” He raises up his red solo cup to cheers, before realizing both you and Yeri had nothing to drink.

“Oh shit, I’m a pretty bad host, huh? First thing I should've done was get you two something to drink.” He chides himself, but his tone is playful. “What can I get for you, ladies?”

Before you can think about what you want, Yeri cuts you off, her tone matching Jaemin’s. “How about some shots to start off and we’ll forgive the lack of hospitality.”

Jaemin laughs again. “Alright, I like it.” His hands are adept at weaving around the table and finding the paper shot cups and the vodka. “Svedka’s okay, right?”

“We’re not picky.” You and Yeri agree. You take the shot in one gulp and the unpleasant burning in your throat makes you wince.

“Can I get you two anything else?”

“Yeah,” you say. “I think another shot and then a mixed drink. Anything’s fine, but preferably on the stronger side.” You look over at Yeri and she nods in agreement.

“Coming right up.” Jaemin agrees easily.

He pours the two of you another shot and you think he must be a generous guy because the shot is overflowing. You and Yeri cheer once more while Jaemin gets to work mixing a cherry bourbon with some Coke. He tops off the drinks with some ice before handing it over to the both of you. “Here they are. Enjoy, ladies.”

You thank him and take a sip before excusing yourself to make your way around the party. The drink is sweet and the smoky aftertaste of the bourbon gives it a pleasant edge. You and Yeri are attached to the hip as you drift from one part to another around the party, making easy going small talk along the way. You are sufficiently buzzed by this point and feel much lighter as though the party was somehow two degrees removed from your senses. You look over to check on Yeri and she’s noticeably drunker than you are, giggling about the simplest of things and slurring her words just the slightest bit. You make a mental note to ease the drinking, wanting to be sober enough to look after her in case anything were to arise.

The two of you are at the base of the stairs when you hear Mark’s voice calling Yeri’s name. You turn your attention upward to see him ambling down the stairs with excited fervor. His cheeks are flushed, more so than usual around Yeri, and you can tell it’s due to alcohol because Mark is holding her hands and you know he can never be so bold without the help of liquid courage.

“Yo Mark, slow down there.” A voice calls out and you look up again and you feel your breath caught in your throat.

There in front of your eyes is Jung Jaehyun in the flesh. He looks heavenly dressed in simple jeans and a white tee. You unconsciously swallow the lump in your throat and your heart beat gallops a mile a minute in your chest. Your mouth goes dry and you mindlessly gulp down swigs of your drink. You know Yeri would’ve sniggered at your current state had she not been so tipsy and completely preoccupied with Mark.

Jaehyun catches up to Mark and when he reaches the base of the stairs, he notices the two of you.

“Oh Jaehyun, lemme introduce you guys.”

As promised, Mark introduces everyone quickly and Jaehyun shoots a smile that seems to be aimed at you. “Nice to meet everyone.”

“Cool, now that everyone knows each other,” Mark starts. “Yeri, can I show you something?”

“Uh, y-yeah.”

You give Yeri a hard look and she takes your hand to squeeze it in reassurance. She looks at you pleadingly and there’s a confidence in her eyes that you can’t argue with. You relent and let her go.

Mark takes her by the hand and leads her up the stairs while you watch, slightly worried.

Jaehyun seems to have sensed your apprehension because the words that leave his mouth snaps you out of your perturbed state. “Don’t worry. Mark’s a good kid, you have nothing to worry about. You have my word on it.”

And suddenly the situation dawns on you. The boy of your recent all-consuming infatuation stands here before you, and it’s just the two of you alone. Any social skills you have, leave you and you’re unsure of what to do.

Jaehyun notices the awkward tension in the air and works quickly to dispel it. “Your drink’s looking low. Can I get you something else?”

You look down to your drink to see that he was right. Only a few sips remain. You didn’t realize you had drank so much at the sight of Jaehyun.

“Um, some water would be good. I don’t want to be too hungover tomorrow.” You answer shyly. You also need to be sober enough to look after Yeri, but you decide to leave that out.

Jaehyun chuckles, “sure thing. Here, come with me. I’ll get you some water.”

Jaehyun leads you to the kitchen with ease, seamlessly weaving through the crowds of people. Every group of people he passes greets him loudly to be heard of the pounding bass of the music. You are not surprised to see how popular he is.

Once in the kitchen, he grabs you a bottle of water and a beer for himself from the fridge and you thank him. The cold water is refreshing, but it does little to cool your nerves. The awkward tension is high and still ever present. You feel as though you’re drowning in it and you also feel like running away from here despite this being what you’ve wanted for more than anything for weeks on end.

“So,” Jaehyun starts, clearing his throat. “Mark told me you’re a CWP major?”

“Uh, y-yeah, actually.” You hate how you’re so flustered around him. “How’d he know? Did Yeri tell him or something?”

“He said you guys shared an arranging class last semester.” Jaehyun recalls.

“Wait, really? I had no idea.” You start going off on how you could’ve missed such a thing and Jaehyun smiles. You’re much more comfortable when a rhythm has been established and the words flow out of you easily. You’re not as relaxed as where Jaehyun wants you to be, but he thinks it’s a good start.

You continue with small talk from there, much less uptight than before and you feel glad. Jaehyun is as radiant in person as he is in your imagination. You find him to be very kind and your heart flutters even more. Jaehyun mentions he’s a musical theatre major and you do your best to act surprised despite it being one of the only things you know about him prior to this moment.

Before he gets a chance to tell you more about himself, a tall boy with long limbs calls out to Jaehyun that it’s his turn to join the next game of beer pong. Jaehyun looks reluctant to leave and you don’t want him to leave either, but you’d hate to hold him back from prior engagements.

“Would you,” Jaehyun licks his lips in consideration, “like to play with me? I don’t have a partner.”

You nod your head and readily agree, eager to spend more time with him.

You’ve only played beer pong a handful of times and being around Jaehyun makes you nervous, so you miss the first few shots. You feel embarrassed, but Jaehyun is patient and assures you that it’s no problem at all. His little words of encouragement mixed with the beer you drink helps melt your tension, and halfway through the game, you’re whooping and hollering with everyone watching the game.

You high-five Jaehyun without a second thought after nailing a perfect shot and Jaehyun smiles even wider. The two of you are leading when Taeyong comes in to kick everyone out.

“Sorry guys, party’s over.”

Groans of complaints could be heard throughout the crowd, but Taeyong’s words are firm and he ushers everyone to leave. He has a few other frat members behind him helping out. He reaches the beer pong table and pulls Jaehyun aside. After a few exchanged words, Jaehyun nods in agreement and ends the game completely, apologizing to his opponents.

You’re confused, so you carefully ask Jaehyun what’s going on. He sees you and his gaze softens, he quietly explains, “apparently, the campus police have received multiple noise complaints and since the fraternity already has a strike, Taeyong doesn’t really want to risk another. “

“Ah, I see.” You nod. You’re saddened by the turn of events, having finally eased into a relative comfort around Jaehyun and you yearn for more. “Well, I better go look for Yeri then.”

This is a goodbye and you’re unsure of what else to say to him, your disappointment mixes with alcohol making you feel even more miserable. You want to ask for more, but can’t find the words to reach him. Luckily, Jaehyun does it for you.

“Are you free sometime this week?” He asks. “I feel like we didn’t get a chance to really talk and I’d like to.”

Your heart hammers and the blood rushes in your ears, but you still find yourself uttering a mousy agreement.

“Great,” his smile is dazzling and you feel dizzy. “It’s a date then.”

5. 24 Hours by Sunmi

rushed minutes.

“Time goes by so quickly.”

“Hey,” a distant voice calls out and Jaehyun looks up from his phone to see your approaching figure. Your cheeks are rosy from the summer sun and stray pieces of your hair escape from your loosely styled updo. Jaehyun takes all of you in with careful appreciation.

“Hey yourself.” Jaehyun chuckles, slipping his phone casually in his pocket and standing up straighter to greet you properly.

Jaehyun sees the red of your face flush brighter, the soft color bleeding across your cheeks and onto your nose. Cute, he thinks. He watches as you tighten your grip on your clutch, knuckles white with nervous tension, in an attempt to gather your composure and calm your nerves. You clear your throat, “I didn’t know you’d be here so soon. You should’ve texted me.”

“It’s all good, I finished early.” Jaehyun notices you no longer stutter around him like the first night you two met. He’s glad the days and nights of sober texting after exchanging numbers at the party did wonders to make you feel comfortable around him. He’s not too worried about your current ‘first-date’ anxiety, knowing it’ll be dispelled soon enough. “Shall we?” He moves to open the door and the cool rush of air from the cafe greets the two of you.

The cafe is quaint and cozy, tucked away in a small corner of intersecting back streets and crowded buildings. Jaehyun discovered the little spot not too long ago and something, Jaehyun assumes his instincts, compelled him to take you to it for the first official date. It just felt right.

The two of you walk to the order counter and you take it all in. You can hear the quiet chatter of the cafe occupants mixed with the rattle of espresso machines being put to work. Your eyes scan over the decorations and several potted succulents hanging from the ceiling. It’s incredibly homey and you feel at ease.

“Hiya, I can help the two of you whenever you guys are ready.” The barista is cheerful to a fault and Jaehyun watches you shoot her a grateful smile before your eyes move to the menu to decide on what to get.

Jaehyun knows what he wants, so he waits patiently for you to decide, but seeing your eyebrows scrunch together in indecision, Jaehyun chuckles to himself. “I hear the iced lattes here are really good, particularly the caramel latte,” he offers.

You perk up in surprise, but you recover quickly, “okay, that sounds good then. I was between that and the iced cocoa.”

“No problem, I’ll order then. Today’s on me.” Jaehyun says.

Jaehyun walks up to the barista and quickly places the order. He reaches for his wallet after the barista recites the order, but he falters slightly when he sees your gaze glued to the cake display, particularly the crepe cake.

“Can I get a slice of the chocolate crepe cake over there too?”

“Of course! Here’s your new total,” she turns the touch screen display over to Jaehyun and he readily inserts his card to pay. When finished, Jaehyun turns back the screen and after a few taps from the barista, a receipt is printed and she hands him a buzzer.

“Your order will be out shortly.” She informs him.

Jaehyun smiles and says a small ‘thank you’ in return before turning his attention to you. You look up to meet his eyes and you smile, “can we sit over there by the window?”

You head to the little corner table first with Jaehyun steadily in tow. You sit at the chair that leaves your back to the window and Jaehyun is mesmerized by how the afternoon sunlight refracts through your silhouette. You’re glowing and Jaehyun swallows thickly.

“So,” he starts. “What have you been up to?”

“Celebrating finishing my first year of college in one piece.” You laugh lightly. “I got by with passable grades, but other than that Yeri and I just finished moving into our new dorms. We’re no longer freshmen, so first year dorms are off limits. I’m gonna miss the convenient location.” You jokingly mope.

Jaehyun laughs easily with you and before he gets a chance to reply, the buzzer goes off so he excuses himself to go pick up the order.

A different barista places down a tray with your two drinks and a small slice of cheesecake with two dessert forks resting on some napkins. “Enjoy your order!”

Jaehyun smiles in thanks and picks up the tray to bring it back to the table. He can’t wait to see the look on your face when you see the mille crepe cake and true to his expectations, your eyes light up at the sight of dessert.

“Surprise.” He says. “I saw you looking at it earlier.”

Jaehyun watches as you immediately grab a small fork and try a piece of the cake with unrestricted child-like excitement. Your eyes light up at the taste of the delicate layers of fresh whipped cream and thin crepes and the smile you shoot in his direction has Jaehyun’s heart beating a little faster than he’s willing to admit.

“Thank you!” You look up at him. “It’s so good, you should definitely try a bite too.”

“Yeah? I’ll try some then.” Jaehyun sits down and leans even closer to you over the table, his mouth open and expectant and his eyes staring straight into yours.

You try your best to bite back the scarlet fighting to stain your cheeks as you cinch off a small section of the cake with your fork. Your hand falters just the slightest bit when delivering the small confection to his awaiting mouth, but you push through and feed him despite the embarrassment you feel.

Jaehyun chews slowly and deliberately, taking his time to lick the stray whipped cream from the corner of his mouth. You lose the game of chicken, breaking eye contact first.

“Yeah,” he agrees. “It’s good. We should definitely come back.”

You let out a little awkward cough, desperate to ward off your cloud of emotions. “Uhm, yeah sure.”

Jaehyun has always thought you were cute, but he thinks you’re especially cute today.

“Anyway,” you start. You want to change the topic because you don’t think you can survive this tension without your brain frying. “I feel like I’ve just seen you around recently. I should’ve run into you a long time ago since the performing arts college is so small.”

“Oh,” Jaehyun is a little taken aback. “I used to be over at the East Campus. I was a business and administration major for two years before I switched over to musical theatre.”

“Wait really?” Your surprise erases any tension you felt earlier. “I had no idea.”

“Yeah,” he laughs. “It doesn’t really come up in conversation.”

“Why’d you switch over? If you don’t mind me asking.”

Jaehyun contemplates his reply for a second as takes a sip of his coffee. “Well, when I entered college, I didn’t really know what I wanted, so I just followed whatever my parents wanted me to do. I actually knew I liked musical theatre for the longest time, but it took time for me to build up the courage to switch. My parents weren’t happy with it at first and we fought for the longest time, but I think they’ve warmed up to it enough by now. I’ve never really talked about this though, I just tell people I transferred from a different college and the conversation just ends there I guess, but it’s really no big deal.”

“Thank you for telling me this, Jaehyun.” Your voice is sincere and Jaehyun believes you.

“What about you, hm?” Jaehyun returns. “Why CWP?”

“I don’t really have one point that changed my life and helped me find my calling or whatever,” you ponder with a tilt of the head and the taste of cream dissolving in your mouth. “But ever since I was little, I always knew I was gonna end up doing something in music. I was never good at singing though, so vocal performance was out the door and I wasn’t that interested in classical instruments either, so that helped me narrow stuff down. Actually, what really helped me decide was during orientation, my group leader was a contemporary writing and production major and she told me all about it and I’ve been sold ever since. I really like it though, and have no intention of switching.”

“That’s good. Sometimes I wish I switched earlier.” Jaehyun muses. “I feel so behind sometimes. Most people in my class have already been in at least one musical and an internship, except for me. I think about it a lot, but I try not to let it get me so down.”

“You shouldn’t feel that way!” You try your best to cheer him up, and Jaehyun appreciates it a lot more than he thought he would. “Everyone has their own pace, that’s what college is all about! Nothing is ever wasted time. You can think of your time as a business admin major as a way to help you make up your mind on your true passion. You told me you’ve always liked musical theatre, but I’ve bet without the time in business, you would’ve never known you liked it enough to pursue a career out of it.”

Jaehyun laughs at your earnesty. He thinks you’re a touch naive, but your words make him feel light. “You’re right. I can say for sure I wasn’t happy as a business major.”

“See? Nothing is ever wasted time if you can discover your true happiness out of it.”

The two of you exchange easy chatter after that and between small bites of cake and sips of coffee, Jaehyun thinks you’ve become prettier and prettier.

“What was it like?” You ask absentmindedly.

“Hm? What was ‘what’ like?”

“Being a business and administration major.”

Jaehyun has to think about it. He recalls constantly dressing up for group presentations and boring lectures, but his mind wanders to his activities outside the classroom. He remembers the constant partying and the blur of faces that helped him keep his bed warm. He remembers brief flings and relationships cut short. He doesn’t want to think about those things when he’s next to you. “Uhm. It was okay, nothing special, but that reminds me–”

“Yeah?”

“Are you free next weekend?”

“I should be. Why, what’s up?”

“Great,” Jaehyun smiles while taking the last sip of his coffee. “I’m having a housewarming party at my new apartment. You should definitely be there.”

The day of the long awaited housewarming party rolls up sooner than expected between settling into your new dorm with Yeri and the occasional small ‘get-togethers’ with Jaehyun. They’re actually dates if you're being honest, but you don’t want to put a title on anything in case he wasn’t on the same page as you. Being with Jaehyun made you giddy in more ways than one, but that means the anxiety that pools at the base of your stomach grows larger each day when the relationship between the two of you goes unnamed. You feel greedy when you desperately grasp at the shred of time you share with him, always unwillingly to let go.

“Are you ready?” Yeri’s voice breaks you out of your small reverie. Her hand is poised, ready to knock on the black door of Jaehyun’s apartment, waiting for you to gather your composure. Yeri is dressed to the nines in a cute skirt with a top to match. She wants to look good for her new boyfriend and you teased her endlessly for it when the two of you were getting ready.

“Mark’s one lucky guy.”

“Shut up. Worry about yourself.”

“All I do is love you, yet you’re so mean to me.”

Regardless of her harsh words toward you, she helped you toss your closet inside and out for the perfect outfit to woo Jaehyun, even if it meant showing up late to the party.

The two of you leave your dorm twenty minutes later than you intended and it also didn’t help that Jaehyun’s apartment was difficult to find, tucked away in a small building between towering skyscrapers, but now is finally the moment of truth.

“Yeah, I’m ready as I’ll ever be,” you mutter as you watch Yeri knock on the door.

It takes a minute before the door creaks open and Jaehyun’s head pops out. His smile is radiant and you’re absolutely ensnared by the way his fringe falls over his forehead.

“Hey, glad you two could make it.” Jaehyun opens the door wider to allow you and Yeri to enter. He greets Yeri with polite warmth while he wraps an arm over your shoulders. When Yeri heads in the apartment first with her back against the two of you, Jaehyun steals a quick peck to your temple and whispers, “you look pretty tonight.”

His touch is fleeting and he pulls back quickly, as if you imagined the whole thing, but his cheeky smile tells you that it really did happen. Your heart hammers and you force yourself to focus on the steady thrum of mellow R&B that reverberates throughout his apartment to calm yourself. You take his apartment in steady strides with your full attention. It’s sleek and modern with a few pops of his personality here and there in the form of trinkets decoration choices.

“Hey!” Johnny calls over from the couch. He has a beer in hand, but he’s far from tipsy. Flanked on one side is Doyoung with another beer to match and on the other is Sicheng. Seulgi, the girl, who you assume is Sicheng’s significant other, by the way his arm is casually wrapped around her waist, is also there and she nods at you in greeting. You've come to know about all of them after hanging out with Jaehyun so much. “Did you guys get lost or something?”

“Yeah,” Yeri replies as she moves to sit next to Mark who’s on the adjacent loveseat and resting a drink on the coffee table. “Something like that.”

She places a sweet kiss to the corner of Mark’s mouth in greeting and you swear you can hear him crooning at the attention.

“Doesn’t matter, Johnny. The important thing is that they’re here now.” Jaehyun interjects. “Do you guys want anything to drink?”

“That’d be nice.” You hum.

Yeri laughs in agreement, “yeah, the two of us could never say no to a drink.”

“Alright, I’m on it.” Jaehyun calls while moving to the kitchen. “Any preferences?”

“No,” you say. “Surprise us.”

Jaehyun works to mix drinks and you take a seat on the floor next to the coffee table to observe the party. Perched on the shelf of a slender bookcase in the corner of his living room is a bluetooth speaker playing music, the rhythm quiet and bass steady as everyone chatters away once introductions are made on the sofas. You remember him offhandedly mentioning that he doesn’t want any noise complaints on his first week in the new place and it makes sense. Jaehyun’s housewarming party is a quiet affair that is far different from the wild party at the frat house in which you met him, but you think this vibe fits Jaehyun more.

Jaehyun returns shortly with two drinks in tow for you and Yeri and sits himself snugly next to you on the floor. He picks his idle beer from the coffee table and once Johnny realizes that everyone in the proximity has a drink in hand, he raises his voice and beer in a toast. “It sucks that Taeyong couldn’t make it tonight, but here’s to having fun without him. We’re gonna get twice as fucked up to make up for his absence, cheers!”

Everyone lets out a chuckle, but obliges to humor him anyway and joins to connect their drink to his in cheers.

You pull your cup back and take a big gulp of the drink. It’s sweet and carbonated, but the sting of alcohol at your throat leaves you wincing just the slightest bit.

A few pleasantries are exchanged here and there, but it’s only then does Doyoung pull out a deck of cards with a devilish glint in his eyes that deceive his looks.

“Ring of fire, anyone?”

After who knows how many rounds of ring of fire (and maybe a few other drinking games here and there) with too many drink refills for you to remember, you somehow find yourself splayed on the couch and leaning over Yeri’s shoulder in support. Seulgi is on the other side of you leaning on you for support, the same way you’re doing to Yeri, but you don’t mind it one bit. The three of you have grown surprisingly close with one another throughout the night.

Your mind is lucid enough to still be conscious and completely aware of where you are and what you’re doing, but the alcohol in your system eats away at the details in your memory.

You vaguely recall ridiculous punishments that involved Johnny twerking on the dining room table and Mark taking a shot of Jack Daniels mixed with ketchup, and you can’t help but snicker to yourself.

“I think we should get going now.” Sicheng is the first to speak as he moves to help Seulgi up. “It’s getting late.”

Doyoung looks a little groggy, but when he checks the time, he perks up immediately, “oh shit, you’re right. I need to get going too, I’ve got something in the morning.”

With that everyone shuffles to clean the remnants of the party with as much grace as they can muster while intoxicated, which wasn’t much, but in twenty minutes, Jaehyun is already walking half the party to the door in goodbye. Only you, Mark, and Yeri are left.

“Hey Yeri,” Mark calls softly to Yeri as he brushes a strand of hair from her face. “Are you ready to go too?”

Yeri is still sprawled on the couch with you, but mumbles a small response. “Yeah, I should be. Give me a second.”

She turns over to you and nudges you just the slightest bit. “I’m gonna go back to Mark’s tonight, are you gonna be okay?”

“Yeah,” you assure her. “I’ll be fine, just go have fun.”

“She’s free to rest here until she’s ready to leave, don’t worry. I’ll call a cab for her when the time comes.” Jaehyun pipes up.

Yeri gives you a look, but you squeeze her hand one last time to give her some peace of mind. “I’m a big girl, Yeri. I’ll be okay, promise. I’ll walk you to the door, Mark’s waiting.”

You give Yeri a tight hug in goodbye and you find your way back to the couch. The fact that you’re all alone in Jaehyun’s apartment doesn’t hit because of the remnants of alcohol in your system melts away your nerves.

You’re pleasantly buzzed, lost in your own thoughts when Jaehyun comes up to you with a glass of water in hand. “Here, so you don’t feel as bad tomorrow morning.”

You accept it gratefully and take in big gulps, the water refreshing, but your skin feels hot.

Jaehyun takes a seat next to you and the proximity makes your head spin. You turn to look at him, and he flashes you a smile.

“Have I told you how beautiful you look tonight?”

“You might’ve mentioned something.” You tease. “But I don’t mind hearing it again.”

“Well,” he hums. You’re not sure, but you think the distance between the two of you is decreasing. “You really do look stunning tonight.”

You flush at his words, but you look straight into his eyes. “You don’t look too bad yourself.”

“Yeah? I try to impress.” Jaehyun’s eyes are hooded and your throat goes dry. “Can I kiss you?”

You say nothing at first, his words not registering into your muddled brain, but when you feel his breath ghost over your lips, you don’t hesitate to close the gap between you.

His lips are slightly chapped and you can taste the vodka on his breath, but to you it’s perfect. Jaehyun’s perfect.

Jaehyun kisses you with reserved passion and practiced expertise. His tongue sets the rhythm against yours and his roaming hands have you feeling as if you’ve been set ablaze. He pulls back just the tiniest bit and the intense longing for his touch that hits you is indescribable.

You pull him back in your arms and your lips reconnect in a desperate fervor. Jaehyun adjusts his arms around you and the next you know, you’re in his embrace and he’s carrying you to his bedroom. He places you down gently, his bed is plush and comforter soft.

Jaehyun’s touch is gentle as he gathers your face in his hands. He kisses you again and you wrap your arm around his neck to pull him closer. He pulls back and looks at you earnestly. “I don’t want to do anything you’re not comfortable with. We don’t have to do anything tonight.”

Everything’s moving so fast and you’re dizzy, but you don’t want whatever this is to stop. You want to be as close to Jaehyun as possible.

“No,” your voice is hoarse. “Don’t stop. I want you, Jaehyun.”

He kisses you again, this time unrestrained. His tongue is hot, but you can only savor it for a minute before he starts trailing kisses down your neck and tugging at your shirt. You let out a breathy moan in response to how his touches make you feel.

Jaehyun reaches at your shorts and makes quick work at unbuttoning them. You help him remove the article of clothing and his slender fingers dart inside your panties. You’re slick to the touch and Jaehyun must be made of magic because you think you’re seeing stars. You unravel before him embarrassingly quick, but he kisses you at the base of your clavicle in sweet reassurance.

Your chest is heaving, but you want more. You grab at Jaehyun’s shirt, urging him to take it off. The expanse of his abdomen is a sight to behold, but Jaehyun is cruel and doesn’t give you the time to take it in. He’s on top of you again, lips crashing onto yours once more. He reaches behind you to unclasp your bra and while he’s pre-occupied, you unbuckle his belt and steal a moment in his boxers. He feels thick and hot in your hands as you run your finger over the tip to feel a drop of pre-cum. He buckles just the slightest bit and it emboldens you.

Jaehyun helps himself out of his jeans and you push him onto the bed wanting to be on top this time. He’s straining against his boxers and you want to help relieve the tension. When you pull off his boxers you can feel his inaudible groan. You stroke his length gingerly and look up to see him with hooded eyes look right back at you.

This excites you so you take him in your mouth in a moment of unfiltered courage. Your tongue starts at the base before tracing your way up to his sensitive head. You tease him accordingly to his quiet grunts and groans and when you feel like he’s had enough, you take all of him in until his tip is hitting the back of your throat. You gag a bit, but push through.

“Fuck,” Jaehyun stutters out between stacatoed breaths. “Babe, you’re so good.”

You hum in pleasure at his praise and he grabs your hair. This goes on for a few more minutes before he reaches down to stop you. “Not that I don’t love this,” the look in your eyes nearly has him faltering his words, “but I don’t want to cum just yet.”

You relent with a slick pop and Jaehyun shifts over to rummage for a condom in his nightstand. You settle back down in his pillows. Jaehyun gives you a soft kiss on the lips before he enters you.

“Tell me when it’s okay to move,” he whispers and you place a small kiss at the base of his neck.

He starts off slow to let you acclimate to his size, but neither of you are very patient, so he ends up pounding into you a lot sooner than he anticipated and you find yourself getting caught up in the pleasure.

It feels like you’re dreaming, but if this was a dream, you never want to wake up.

6. Hush by Miss A

shh, no talking, just us.

“I can’t think straight.”

You and Jaehyun don’t become official until a few weeks later.

He asks you one day when you’re naked and out of breath. You’ve gone one too many rounds with him and a thin layer of sweat coats your body as you lay on his heaving chest. You absentmindedly draw shapes on his skin and he gives you a chaste kiss to your temple.

“We should date.” He hums. “I think I’d make a good boyfriend.”

“Yeah?” You raise your eyebrow in teasing.

“Yeah,” he ascertains. “Give me a chance and I’ll show you.”

“Hmm,” you pretend to think it over as if this wasn’t you’ve been hoping for since the first moment you laid eyes on him. “Okay. Let’s give it a try, boyfriend.”

Jaehyun laughs and you feel the world fall into its right place. “Alright, girlfriend.”

And the rest is history as they say.

Jaehyun isn’t your first, but you experience many firsts with him. You’re not exactly inexperienced, but he really opens your eyes.

“Fuck,” he groans into your neck. His hands grip at your hips to help guide you along, but you’re fully in charge. “You’re doing so good, babe. Just like that.”

You didn’t see yourself as someone who liked to take charge during sex, but after that one time Jaehyun asked you to top, you’ve never looked back since.

You roll hips into him and at a pace you know drives Jaehyun wild and you pull him into a sloppy kiss. It’s all tongue and no grace, but you love it the same regardless. You capture his bottom lips between your teeth playfully before pushing him flat on his back until he’s firm against his plush mattress. You place a hand on his chest and the other on his thigh to balance yourself and Jaehyun immediately knows you’re close.

A hand rests on your hip to steady you while the other snakes over to play with your clit to further stimulate you toward your climax. Jaehyun knows what you like and his timing is impeccable, so before you know it, both of you are reaching your highs together. You collapse on his chest and you allow yourself to stay in his warmth long enough to have your breaths synchronize before you extricate yourself from him to head to his bathroom.

When you come back out, he’s disposed of the used condom and opens your arm wide for a hug, which you gladly indulge in.

Time stops when you’re in his arms.

On the surface, it looks like Jaehyun likes to mix it up. He seems like an elusive guy with varied tastes, but the more time you spend with him, you realize he likes the control of seeing you unravel before him.

He likes the intimacy of missionary.

The close proximity to your body has him looking into your eyes and leaving you feeling the most vulnerable of ways. He has full access to your neck, which he lovingly claims as his own and you chide him the next day when you see scattered purple blooms. Jaehyun changes his pace on a whim and you fall to his mercy. When he takes you fast and hard, you see stars, but when thrusts in you with languid leisure, he has you begging for more.

He likes the intensity of taking from behind.

When you’re on your knees with your ass in the air, he takes it as a guarantee to fuck you senseless. Your muffled moans makes his dick twitch and you swear you can feel him fuck into you even faster. Jaehyun always makes sure to wrap his arms around you to finger your clit until you go into sensory overload and he doesn’t stop pounding into you until there are tears in your eyes. He kisses each one away before taking your lips in his and you can taste the salt water on his tongue.

He likes the dominance from eating you out.

He laps at your core like a starved man and makes good use of his adept fingers until your head is spinning. Jaehyun makes it a habit to eat you out until you’re satisfied before he gets his turn. When your thighs are on either side of his head and your hands tangled in his hair, he swears he can stay there forever.

Above all, Jaehyun just likes you. He likes being with you and he definitely likes fucking you and you wouldn’t have it any other way.

“Mmmh,” you breathe out.

Your back is flush against Jaehyun’s back as you rock your hips back and forth on his dick. You grind your ass back even harder when he pinches your nipple between his fingers.

He kisses your shoulder blade from behind and bucks his hip upward to meet you in the middle.

The afternoon sunlight is streaming in from the gaps of his blinds and you want to take it nice and slow today. The television in front of you is playing a movie, but you’re too enraptured by the feeling of him filling you to the brim to pay it any mind.

“I love it when you’re on top, babe.” he hums as he plays with your clit.

You let out another breathy groan before you can find the composure to bite back at him. “What happened to no sex today, hmm? I thought we were just going to have innocent quality time together and watch a movie.”

Jaehyun must’ve not liked your sass, so he bucks up harder. He’s telling you to pick up the pace and you oblige. Before you know, you’re practically bouncing on his dick and you can feel your impending high about to crash down on you. He can sense it too and maintains his tempo. When you cum, Jaehyun rides on the tail of your climax in pursuit of his own. He cums shortly after with stuttering hips and a bite on your shoulder. He gathers you in his arms and runs his tongue soothingly over where he bit you and the various love bites that he’s littered on the expanse of your skin.

“Just being with you is quality time in itself.” He says. “Besides, class is starting soon, so I won’t get to see you as much.”

7. Disturbance by BoA

a ripple on the surface.

“I didn’t know at first.”

“So I do have a roommate after all,” Yeri’s voice calls out and you turn over to see her standing by the doorway. You roll your eyes at her, but quickly turn back to gather your things.

She lets out a chuckle, but you don’t miss the sour edge to her tone. “I thought I got a single dorm since it’s so empty all the time.”

“You say that, Yeri,” you retort. “But I know you’re over at Mark’s constantly so I don’t wanna hear it from you.”

“Yeah, but I make time to come back here and I always let you know when I’m going out. I feel like I’ve only seen you maybe once or twice the past few months. I feel like the only reason I see you these days is ‘cause of classes.”

“You’re just exaggerating, don’t be so dramatic. Come on, let’s go. I don’t want to be late.”

She looks displeased, but nothing leaves her lips as the two of you head out for the day.

It’s late.

When night falls, shadows come out to play and your college campus is riddled with them. The school auditorium is situated in the far corner of the campus and the lamp lights of the main walkways do little, but you pay it little mind. Jaehyun should be getting out soon.

It takes another ten minutes to see him emerge from the double doors and you perk up immediately at the sight of him. He looks a little shocked to see you, but greets you with a warm hug and small peck regardless.

“Hey,” his voice is small, almost reserved. “What are you doing here? I thought I told you I was finishing late tonight.”

“Oh, you did, but I still wanted to see you.” You explain, eyes bright and tone undeterred.

“Not that I don’t appreciate it,” he licks his lip. “But it’s really late and I still have more stuff I need to work on. I’ll see you some other time, okay?”

“Oh, okay.”

“Yeah, I’m sorry, babe. Next time.”

“Oh hey,” you smile, but Yeri’s fury is palpable and cuts through you.

“Don’t ‘oh hey’ me.” She spits out. “Where have you been? Why didn’t you answer your phone?”

Sheepish, you reply, “oh sorry. I forgot to fully charge it before leaving and Jaehyun and I have different phones, so I couldn’t charge it at his place.”

“You were at Jaehyun’s?” Yeri is glaring at you at this point and you feel a bit peeved.

“Yeah. What of it?”

Yeri’s been getting angry at you recently, losing her temper at the drop of a hat, and you can’t seem to pinpoint why. You’re getting tired of being her punching bag.

“We made plans to go shop for Seulgi’s gift today. You promised you’d be there, don’t you remember?”

“Oh shit.” It completely slips from your mind and you open your mouth to apologize, but Yeri cuts you off before you get the chance.

“Forget it. I don’t want to hear it. It doesn’t matter anymore.”

Yeri turns to leave before you can say anything back.

8. Symptoms by SHINee

something’s wrong.

“The worse it gets, the more exhausted I get.”

Jaehyun feels off.

He can’t pinpoint exactly what he is that he’s feeling, but he thinks it’s reminiscent of his world being tilted by six degrees. It’s not immediately jarring and takes little time for his eyes to register, but he’ll occasionally bump his toe, signalling that this isn’t right. Things aren’t where they’re supposed to be. His head spins just the slightest bit and he feels woozy, but he doesn’t know why.

Jaehyun just feels off.

Jaehyun checks the bulletin board of his school auditorium almost religiously.

Each time before and after class, he’ll swing by and peruse the flyers that hang from haphazardly stuck on pins. He ignores the tutoring offers and the part time jobs scams, his main focus is almost always on the center of the board where they post the upcoming musical theatre production and eventually, the cast list.

This semester, the chosen production is La La Land and Jaehyun has been dead set on landing the role of Sebastian Wilder. He stays back extra late each day to practice the script and to work on his singing and annunciation.

On the day of the audition, he’s sure he’s nailed it and thinks to himself the world must be ending if he weren’t to get the leading role.

When he leaves the auditorium in a rush, excitement flows through his veins and he drinks in the night air as a toast of victory. He’s tipsy on his excitement and wants to laugh out loud, but in the corner of his vision, he sees you. Your eyes light up the sight up, outshining the moon and the stars, but your visage does not elicit the reaction he thinks it should. He expects his heart to swell and burst, but somehow he feels heavy.

He pulls you in for a hug and a quick kiss to quell his weighted heart, but he thinks he’s starting to sink so he calls you off for the night. He’ll see you next time.

Yeah, next time will be better.

You’re snuggled up close and personal on Jaehyun’s chest. Jaehyun notices you fill every nook and cranny of his being perfectly to a tee, and yet that feeling. It’s there again.

Jaehyun feels off.

You laugh at something one of the characters say and you cuddle harder into him. He feels heavy again and it makes his throat itch, so he swoops down and captures your lips.

It’s hard and fast to scrub away at his uneasiness and before he knows it, his clothes are missing, but so are yours. The foreplay is brief and almost impersonal, but he doesn’t care. He just needs to be inside you.

When Jaehyun has you begging and writhing, he feels like the world is where it should be. No longer is he living at a slight angle when he’s buried to the hilt inside your warmth, so when he sees you, he does what he can to get you out of your pants.

Today is no different from any other.

After a satisfying session you roll on his chest. Your kiss is soft and sweet despite the sweat that covers both of your bodies. He hums quietly as he taps melodies on along your exposed spine.

“Jaehyun?”

“Yeah?”

“I think I love you.”

Ah. Jaehyun thinks he’s getting it now, why he’s feeling off.

Jaehyun thinks he’s being suffocated.

To the surprise of no one, and especially not to him, Jaehyun gets the leading role of Sebastian Wilder in La La Land. He was a shoe-in for it anyway and he made sure to put in the work to get it.

His leading lady is someone by the name of Park Sooyoung, but at the first rehearsal she introduces herself as Joy.

“It’s nice to meet you.” She offers her hand out in a friendly greeting. “Here’s to a successful show together, Jaehyun.”

Her smile is blinding and he thinks Joy is a fitting name. He grasps her outstretched hand, grip firm and sure.

“Yeah,” he smiles back. “Here’s to a good show together.”

Rehearsals span over blurred minutes and long hours.

Jaehyun sees less and less of you and spends more and more time with her.

During a quick water break, he scans his phone briefly to see a text notification from you. He takes another swig of water and returns to the rehearsal.

It’s okay, he can always text you back later.

9. Before U Go - TVXQ!

letting go.

“I will leave now.”

“Come on!” You tug both Mark and Yeri along excitedly. “I want to get good seats.”

Yeri rolls her eyes, but obliges anyway, pulling Mark along. It’s opening night for Jaehyun’s big musical and you wanted to be there no matter what to support him. Johnny, Doyoung, Taeyong, Sicheng, and Seulgi are already inside waiting and you’re not sure if they were able to save the three of you a spot.

After a long chat with Yeri, you apologized profusely to her. You did get blinded by your relationship with him and prioritized him over everything, forgetting your friends and other responsibilities in the process. Yeri forgave you easily and helped keep you in line when you went to head over heels for Jaehyun.

However, after patching things up with Yeri, you begin to notice a shift in your relationship with Jaehyun’s. You’re not quite sure how to describe it, but it almost feels like a distance almost.

You chalk it up to his busy rehearsal schedule and choose not to dwell on the topic, in fears of your wandering imagination. It should be fine. After his musical is over, he’ll be less busy and things will fall back into place.

Right?

“Over here!” Seulgi waves over excitedly.

The auditorium is starting to fill up and you want to get comfortable before the show starts.

Everyone greets each other in hushed tones and soon enough, the show starts.

Right. Everything will be fine.

Jaehyun does amazing.

Your eyes are trained on him the whole time and his singing has goosebumps pricking your skin. You can see the passion pour through him every time he’s on stage and you couldn’t be more proud.

A nagging feeling at the pit of your stomach points out the undeniable chemistry between him and his co-star, but you push it deep down and suppress it.

They’re actors, and they’re good at what they do.

Yeah. They’re just acting. Yeah. Acting.

When the curtains close, you’re the first to shoot out of your seat, eager to meet him backstage. You weave through the endless crowd of people, murmuring your ‘sorry’s’ and ‘excuse me’s’ as you pass by. You reach the base of the backstage and shoot a message to let him know you’re waiting. You hum to yourself when you happen to overhear a conversation playing out.

“You did so good, Jae.”

“No, you definitely carried the show.”

You turn up and you see them. Her eyes are almost soft and loving as she pulls your boyfriend in for a hug. They linger in the embrace longer than necessary and you clear your throat to catch his attention.

He jolts just the slightest bit when he sees you and immediately lets her go.

“Everyone’s waiting,” you say quietly.

“Okay,” he nods. “Let me go get my stuff in the back.”

Jaehyun leaves the two of you alone and you wait for him to get back.

When you leave, he waves goodbye to her and she smiles back.

Jaehyun’s celebration party is rowdy, but it’s to be expected when Johnny is the one hosting.

He books a table at the local club and even orders bottle service. The eight of you work your way through two whole bottles of tequila and are already on your third. Jaehyun is downing the shots at a quicker pace than usual and you’re a bit concerned, but you’re unable to say anything because when you try, he whisks himself away to the dance floor and strikes up a conversation with someone else.

You’re perturbed, but you say nothing. This is his celebration night and he can choose to enjoy it how he wishes.

By the end of the night, Jaehyun is noticeably drunk and you haul him outside to get a breath of fresh air in hopes of sobering up. He’s heavy, but you make it out the side door. You prop him up on your side as you lean on the grimy brick walls.

Months have passed and the weather is chilly.

Jaehyun’s body sways and he murmurs something in your ear. You don’t catch it the first time, the overwhelming smell of tequila overtaking your senses.

“What was that?”

He grumbles beneath his breath, steps staggering once more. He tries again, this time his words are crisp and clear and they cut into you in more ways than one.

“I think we should end it.”

For someone so drunk, he sounds so sober.

You’re at a loss for words. A part of you knew this was coming from his lack of enthusiasm around you and his decreased texts. Even the cold night air couldn’t keep your heartbreak at bay. You say nothing, but you understand the both of you knew it was a silent agreement.

You breathe out wisps of chilled air as Jaehyun’s inebriated body stays slumped over on your side.

You volunteer to take Jaehyun home.

You tuck him gently in bed making sure to prop him on his side in case he vomits during the night. You pour a glass of water and place an ibuprofen on his nightstand drawer for him in the morning.

You kiss him on the forehead one last time. You hope it conveys all of the things brewing in your heart at the moment, but you know it doesn’t.

Later, you leave his apartment with all of your belongings that you ever left there with the stars as your witness.

You never return to his place again.

10. Coffee Shop by B.A.P

what could’ve been.

“So without knowing, like a habit, I came here.”

Jaehyun wakes up to an empty bed.

Morning sunlight streams through his blinds and burns at his skin as a sign to get ready for the day. He blinks the drowsiness from his system and stretches his weary joints before heading to the bathroom to get ready for the day.

On his rare day offs, he allows his body to go on auto-pilot. He completely shuts his brain off and allows it to do whatever it chooses.

Today, it takes him back to the cafe.

His body knows where it’s going before it registers in his mind.

The barista manning the order counter is different, but the decorations are the same, still the same succulents hanging from the ceilings. He mulls over the menu and goes up to order.

“Can I get an iced caramel latte?” Jaehyun doesn’t have much of a sweet tooth, but he’s feeling nostalgic today.

“Of course! Here’s your total.”

He pays with a swipe of his card and the barista goes to work making his drink. He waits around by the counter and soon enough, his drink is ready. That particular table is empty, so he grabs a chair to sit. His first sip is overly saccharine, but he appreciates how the flavor mellows out by the end of it.

It’s been nearly a year since that night.

Jaehyun remembers waking up to a splitting headache and a dry mouth. He thought nothing of the prepared setup as he gulps the ibuprofen and the glass of water in one go. Nothing seemed amiss really until a few days later.

No one mentioned your name around him and he caught Seulgi giving him a look every now and then. Mark didn’t say much either, but Jaehyun felt him drifting away.

He thought he’d feel a lot more, but he didn’t. One day you were a part of his life and then the next day you weren’t. It really was that simple.

He kept in contact with Joy even after La La Land was over and maybe they were something more, but it didn’t last longer than a few weeks.

It didn’t feel right when he was with her. Again, something felt off, but a different kind of off.

Joy was the one to end things with him, but he didn’t mind too much.

He filled his days with study and practice and it wasn’t until he landed a job at his local theatre company that he realized.

It was you. It was always you and perhaps it still is you.

Maybe you were different. Maybe you were the one, but Jaehyun didn’t try.

He recalls feeling smothered. You were always there at the beginning, but he took that for granted.

There are a lot of things he regrets, but above all, he regrets not talking with you. He regrets not trying to work on it. He regrets being a coward and running away at the first signs of true emotions.

You weren’t perfect, but neither was he, but he should’ve stayed so the both of you could work it out together. Jaehyun always did take too long to find the courage to pursue what he wanted.

With a final sip, he finishes the drink and moves to throw it away. Then, he sees you. Here, in the flesh, in almost a year.

Your hair is longer, but your cheeks are still as rosy as ever. You walk up to order and Jaehyun thinks it’s a sign. He moves to greet you, but the doors open again and in walk Yeri and Seulgi. He watches you greet them warmly with wide open arms.

You always did give the best hugs.

Jaehyun watches the three of you chatter away and he feels acutely out of place in the little cafe. You look happy and he should move on.

He throws his finished cup in the trash can and moves to exit through the side door, but he moves too slowly.

“Jaehyun, is that you?” You call out. He looks into your steady gaze and almost feels shy.

“Yeah,” he’s quiet. “It’s been awhile.”

“It has,” you agree. “You look well.”

The smile you give him has him believing in second chances and maybe he’ll get it right this time.

Note: i am so sorry that the second part is a hot mess express smh… there were a lot of things i planned and intended that didn’t happen, but i’ll just take this as a learning experience and write and better story next time. thanks for taking the time to read this !! <3

masterlist.

#nctcreations #cznnet #neowritingsnet #jaehyun scenario #jaehyun fanfic #jaehyun smut #jaehyun angst #jaehyun fluff #nct scenario #nct fanfic #nct smut #nct angst #nct fluff

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beakami · 3 years ago

Text

You've Done So Much (Lucian x F!reader)

Hello everybody! This one-shot comes as a request from the wonderful @fandoms-are-my-friends-1321 . It has been really fun to write and I just love Lucian so much. I have another Lucian Fic comming but it's longer and will come in chapters sooo it will take a while.

"fandoms-are-my-friends-1321 ha preguntado:

Okay so I think I have an idea for a request. May I request a Lucian x Reader where the reader gets off from work and is exhausted, so he provides some cuddles and makes them laugh? I love Lucian on so many levels, and he deserves more content. Feel free to take as much time as you need, and I hope the wedding planning goes well 💕

Summary: Fluff:You've been working too hard this last week to help Lucian, but it's getting the best from you, specially as you have barely seen him. But he makes sure to take care of you to repay your hard work.

SFW (If you want a NSFW version of this, just say so in the comments)

Warnings: None really. Some mention of anxiety and a couple of curse words, but it's mostly fluff.

Hope you enjoy this, and as always requests are open. Love you all❣

>>When you stopped to think about it, your life was completely different from the one you had just one year ago. It might still look the same to someone outside your “new world”, still the same normal boring standard life. Work, eat, sleep, repeat. But they could not be further from the truth. If one year ago your life wasn’t as simple (you had your problems and your hobbies, and a past to deal with), since you met /him/ it all became quite insignificant in comparison. The afternoons of reading, sewing, or going out to look for interesting new corners of the city, turned into expeditions to find vampire hide-outs or simply information that could prove useful.

>>You didn’t miss having more free time, you weren’t forced to help them but did it happily, especially after learning about how they came into existence, how they were treated as animals, as slaves. Of course, spending even a little time with a certain Lycan was also more than enough reason for you. The problem was that the key word was “little”. It wasn’t like that when you first met, you instantly clicked, and he seemed to get time to see you at the most extrage times, but he got it. He would sneak into your house at 2 in the morning through the window (his climbing skills making much more sense when he told you what he was) just so he could sleep a couple of hours holding you before leaving again; or maybe just pop up at your job to have lunch with you (or just look at you while you ate lunch). And even if you knew that lately everything seemed to be more hectic and dangerous, having him with barely any time to take care of himself, you still felt his absence.

>>Yet you did your best to ease his bourden. After work you would go to their base and make sure no one created too much chaos while their Alfa wasn’t there; you went on missions to scout and get intel; and in general took so much upon yourself that you started to be the one who barely slept or ate anything. You thought it wasn’t obvious but were proved wrong when your boss made you take a couple of days off, claiming he didn’t want you getting sick. Yes, it had been a rough week, and yes, you had only slept like five hours in total, but you were fine. You were...you were feeling like shit. And not just because you were tired as hell, but because you missed him, you missed him so much you started to let your mind run wild as it sometimes did. Maybe you weren’t doing enough, or you were doing it wrong, maybe if you tried a little harder he would be resting, he would be with you.

>>The thought ate at your head, and instead of going home and sleeping like you should have, you went to the Lycans’ den. You could help some more, you could make sure Lucian slept that night. Or so you thought, because when you got to their hide-out, he wasn’t there and no one knew where he was or when he would come back. At that moment you didn’t know if you were more tired or frustrated, if you felt more hunger or sadness. So after grunting as if you were also a wolf, you got inside his tent, containing the urge to kick something. He was busy, he had his plan to fulfill, he...you just hoped he was safe.

>>So with a deep sigh you sat down at the edge of the bed, you felt like shit, tired, stressed and just a big ball of uselessness. You were in such a state that you didn’t notice the silent tears streaming down your cheeks, nor the Lycan that stood in front of you, a worried look on his face when he saw his favourite person crying.

-Has anyone hurt you?

>>His deep voice resonated inside your chest and got you out of your reverie, making you raise your head to look up at him. It was at his frown that you noticed you were crying, feeling your cheeks wet with tears, and made quick work of drying them with the back of your hand, clearing your throat before answering.

-No one, no one has harmed me. I…

>>There you were, not helping but giving him more reasons to worry. But you knew it made no sense lying to him. He would know right away and in any case it would do neither of you any good, so you sighed again, locking your teary eyes, dark circles under them, with his gorgeous ones.

-I...I am not helping enough, and yet I can’t help you more, I am so, so tired...and I miss you. I...I was just feeling like shit, Lucian.

>>The Lycan relaxed his shoulders a little, he didn’t want you to be sad, but he’d rather deal with cheering you up than having to beat the shit out of one of his boys. He smiled softly, that sweet and charming half smile of his that made your knees weak, and shook his head, stretching one arm to caress your head.

-Who told you you are not helping enough? You do more than any of these boys and you don’t even have to. I don’t know what I would do without your help.

-/I/ said it…

>>At least his caresses made you relax your stance a little, his warm touch always made miracles with your nerves.

-You barely have time to sleep or eat. I haven’t seen you for more than five minutes in a week…

-Oh, so my lovely pup is worried about me and misses me? That’s what this was all about?

>>He smirked, and he knew what that did to you, especially when paired with how he leaned closer to you, towering over your sitting form.

-You should know that I intend to spend the whole night with you, and that I can only do that because a certain someone has been doing an amazing job the whole week. So I am going to carry you to your apartment and take good care of my lovely pup for being so good. How does that sound?

>>You swear you would have purred if you weren’t still processing what he had just said.

-Really? Aren’t you busy? A-and you should rest…

>>He put one finger over your lips and without a second word lifted you in his arms, making his way out of the tent with you held bridal style, much to your embarrassment. But you weren’t really going to complain, you had missed him so damn much that you closed your eyes and focussed on his warmth, relaxing all your muscles as if he was a hot bath; and on his smell of leather, and grass and...you swore if the image of the moon had a smell, that would be how Lucian smelled. So before you were aware of it he was already opening the window to your living room. You tried to get down from his arms but his hold tightened around your waist. Your e/c eyes raised to his with a confused look.

-You have been so worried about me, working so hard, that I feel like tonight /I/ should take care of /you/. So let’s go get a bath running for you, my queen.

-Q-Queen? What has gotten into you tonight, Lucian?

-I feel like I have been neglecting you while you were only worrying for me, and I don’t want you thinking I don’t care about you. It...things have just been quite...chaotic, and I wanted to put it all at ease as soon as possible so you...all of us would be safe.

>>You felt your heart melt at his words. He might look a little rugish, not be very vocal at times (mainly when deep in thought) but he knew when he had to express himself, he knew sometimes when you delayed things too long they could be taken away from you before your very eyes. So you answered as best you could, resting one hand on his stubbled cheek and raising yourself a little inside his arms to give him a long kiss filled with all the love you’ve been keeping every minute you’ve been away. He tasted sweet and bitter, like blood and coffee and something that was just...him. That taste always put you at ease and at the same time turned your insides warm, but tonight you were too tired for the latter and just focussed on the fuzzy feeling inside your chest.

-You know I would never doubt you, Lucian.

-But you doubt yourself.

>>He was so right that you just didn’t know how to answer, opening your mouth and then closing it again, which made him chuckle and suddenly nothing else mattered, because those chuckles and laughs of his made your heart flutter, they were gifts that you treasured deeply.

-So, as I was saying, you have done so much this past week that I think you deserve a reward, my lovely mate.

>>What could you do but blush and look up at him with adoration? He reminded you why you were helping them. How could anyone call someone a monster and say they didn’t deserve to live just because they were a Lycan? Lucian isn’t a monster, he is the kindest, most loving person you’ve ever met. So you let him carry you to the bathroom, his lycan strength making it possible for him not to drop you while preparing the bath, holding your not so small frame to his body with one arm. Soon the bath was filled with hot water, too hot for some, but Lucian knew how you liked it, almost burning. When he first found out the temperature you felt was comforting in water, almost scalding, he wondered if you could be a Lycan even if he had never smelt it in you, even if he had never met a female Lycan. Whatever the reason you liked it like that, it made sharing baths with you all the more appealing.

>>Then, and as if it was something incredibly hard, he sat you gently on the edge of the tub and helped you undress in spite of your complaints that you could do it yourself. The lycan removed your boots and socks, then moved to your shirt, jeans and finally bra and panties. He had to take a deep breath and close his eyes for a couple of seconds to remind himself what he was doing and why he couldn’t just devour you that night. You needed rest, you needed care, and even if it felt like forever since he could last lay with you, you were worth the wait, you deserved to be pampered and loved. So he focussed on that thought and not on your flushed cheeks, or on the body he adored so much. Instead he added some salts and bubbles to the tub, letting them dissolve while he removed his clothes too.

>>It was your turn to look at him, running your eyes over every inch of his body, every scar, every muscle, every mark and thing that made his body Lucian’s body. And you just loved it, loved that path of hair that disappeared under his pants. But that article of clothing was discarded as well, and you had to swallow to not make any improper sounds. You were too tired for that, but you missed being intimate with him in that way so much that you felt your cheeks burn.

>>When he finally got in the bath with you, your back resting against his chest, your muscles relaxing, a soft sigh leaving your lips as you closed your eyes and inhaled the sweet scent of flowers and orange, his mind wandered to how he never could do such things with Sonja. He always tried not to go down that path, not because the love he felt for you was any less than the one he had felt for her, but because it reminded him that he could lose you too. That the love he had to wait centuries to find could be taken away from him even more easily. So his arm locked around your waist, his thumb drawing soft circles over your hip bone. You moved your head to the side, turning it a little so you could look him in the eyes.

-Is everything ok, my love?

>>You were still concerned for him, you knew sometimes the past hunted him, and even if he tried to save you from that sadness you always insisted that couples were there to share those things. You weren’t sure when you started to be that, a couple, but when he first referred to you as his mate, you knew you didn’t want to be with anyone else.

>>He took his time to look into your eyes, pondering how to phrase it to share with you but not make it overly sad, he didn’t want to dampen the mood, he just wanted to enjoy a night with you, to make you feel loved and appreciated, because God be his witness he didn’t know how in the world he got so lucky as to have you fall for him, a monster seeking revenge on another monster. You smiled softly and raised a now wet hand to caress the line of his jaw, waiting patiently for an answer.

-I was thinking of how lucky I am to have you, to be able to enjoy these moments with you.

>>You knew, you knew he meant more, that he was afraid these moments were to end soon, that he was to lose you. But you just nod and turned your head to kiss where you could reach, first his chin, then his clavicle.

-I feel really lucky too, my lord.

>>At that nickname he chuckled and the water moved a little with how his chest and in turn, your body, trembled at the action. His laughter was definitely your favourite sound. A little more at ease he resumed what he intended to do that night, comfort you. So with you still resting on his chest, he took a sponge and started to wash you as carefully as possible, letting you relax. He cleaned from your calf up, he would leave the rest of the legs for later when he could reach, and once he was sure your skin was perfectly taken care of, he moved to wash your hair.

>>His fingers started massaging your scalp, softly rubbing at your skin, making you purr at the sensation much to his content. After a couple of minutes he decided to switch to his nails every few seconds to mix in some light scratching so you would feel even better. And you had to fight hard not to fall asleep, because it felt too good,but you wanted to enjoy his company. He made sure to clean thoroughly and also added a few more extra scratches before rinsing and conditioning it. He let the product rest in your hair while he peppered your shoulder with soft kisses, making you giggle as you felt his stubble against your sensitive skin, and then proceeded to wash it away. When you were properly clean you just enjoyed each other’s company while the water was still warm.

>>He was so calm, so content just taking care of you. And you found it not only adorable, but also kind of funny. Not the fact itself, but the idea of the Alfa, the first Lycan capable of turning back to his human form, a man feared by the Elders, being a sweet puppy washing his girlfriend’s hair. But this is what he fought for, for the freedom of his kind, for the freedom to love whoever you wished, because that is what started the war, the racism of an Elder. His obsession for the “pure” bloodline causing him to even kill his own daughter and grandchild.

-I love you so much.

>>You murmured, too relaxed to raise your voice, but you knew he had heard you when he pressed his lips to the top of your head. You could feel his lips kiss you and then stay there with a soft smile, telling you he loved you too. It was so peaceful that you stayed there until the water was starting to get cold. Your first small shiver made him get out of the bathtub, fetching a big towel and helping you out to wrap it around you and started to dry your body.

-You won’t even let me dry? You really are spoiling me tonight.

-I am not finished yet.

>>He intended to make you both eat something, and then stay with you the whole night, first talking and then sleeping, keeping you safe. He knew you suffered from insomnia sometimes, and felt really proud when you had told him he made you feel so calm and safe, chasing all the anxiety away, that you could always sleep soundly when in his arms. So he did just that, dried you, took you in his arms to your room and helped you into your pajamas (which in summer consisted of some shorts and an oversized t-shirt), and then moved you again to the kitchen. He didn’t even intend on letting you walk tonight, so he placed you on the counter so you could see him cook. The whole evening was feeling heavenly, not only or mainly because of his pampering, but because you could spend time with him, talking and laughing.

-I’ve missed you so much.

>>You say out of nowhere, just looking at him cook, and caressing the nape of his neck when he moved close enough. He smiled in your direction, how could he be so ravishing, so handsome? You sighed happily, very sleepy, but you needed food and he did too. So you did your best effort to stay awake, talking about your job to have some light conversation but be able to vent a little at the same time. It wasn’t long until you were both sitting together, eating the eggs and sausages he had prepared. You would alternate between a bite at the food and a kiss on Lucian’s shoulder just to see him smile even if just a little bit, and he would rest a hand on your thigh all the while.

>>Dinner; a cup of tea by the window, just looking at the city lights while whispering sweet nothings into each other’s ears; then to bed, cuddling and kissing his lips softly, feeling sleepier by the second. You didn’t want to fall asleep, you wanted to make as much of your time with Lucian as possible, but you needed to, and he did too.

-Will...will you be here when I wake up?

>>You muttered, your voice small and almost begging. You felt a little stupid, a little needy, but you really didn’t care when being with him made you so happy and lately these were such rare moments.

-I will try, but...If I have to leave, I promise I will try and come back tomorrow night. There is some more…”taking care of” that I need to do to you once you are less tired.

>>You giggled again, this time like a fucking teenager and you loved that he made you feel that way. His comforting evening had worked perfectly, all your anxiety, tension, and frustration were gone, and as you closed your eyes, your cheek pressed against his chest you sighed happily.

-I love you so much. I am so lucky to have you, Lucian.

-I am the lucky one, my love. Now rest, I will stay with you as long as I can.

-Only if you sleep too, my lord needs his rest.

-How can I deny you when you tell me like that? Sweet dreams y/n.

>>You chuckled softly, already half asleep, and left a soft peck on his chest before finally letting yourself go into Morpheus’ realm. You were quickly deep in slumber, but the evening had left you with the determination to keep helping the Lycans, to keep trying to ease the burden Lucian had upon his shoulders, because, who would take care of you, comfort you, like he did? Only your wolfie.

If anyone wants to be tagged on future fics, just tell me and I will! Hope you enjoyed it, my lovelies.

#Lucian #Underworld #rise of the lycans #fic #Lucian x reader #x reader #request #fic request #comfort #fluff

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watermelonlovershigh · 3 years ago

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Day in the Life of a Single Dad with a 2 Yr Old

This was requested by this anon.

AN: let me know if you guys like fluff fics & i'll try to write them as frequent as my smut & sicfics. also couldn't come up with a better title so... yeah the title is a lil iffy.

Things to help you understand this story better:

(Harry is a single parent/Harry is 25/Harry is a healthy eater/Loves his daughter so much)

Harry is peacefully sleeping in his bed alone. Covers to his chin, curled up on his side. That is until his beautiful two year old daughter comes barging in there to wake her daddy up. He shouldn't be asleep she thinks. It's too late. In reality its only 7 am on a Saturday, but to an early riser like her, he should be awake and playing with her. Or making her breakfast.

Her little feet pad over to her daddy's side of the bed. She can barley reach him due to the height of his bed, but manages to stretch her little arms up and taps on Harrys face. "Daddy, wake up." she speaks in her little British accent. Harry slowly opens his eyes and immediately squeezes them shut because of the sunlight coming from the window blinding him. "Daddy!!" his daughter says a little louder.

If his daughter was any older, Harry might tell her to wait a few minutes or go back to bed because it's too early, but he knows she's only 2. So he forces his eyes open again and reaches down to hook his hands in her tiny arm pits to lift her on the bed. "Why are you awake so early babe." he asks in a gravely voice, while placing her on his bare chest.

"I hungry." her tiny voice replies.

"Mhmm what would you like?" Harry mumbles sleepily.

"Sweets." she says innocently.

"I don't think so love. We don't eat sweets for breakfast. It will give you a tummy ache. What about a healthy fruit salad. We have some Watermelon and Strawberries in the fridge." he replies to his daughter who's straddling his chest.

"NO, I WANT SWEETS! I WANT SWEETS!" she yells back with angry tears threatening to escape.

"D/n, we do not yell!" her father speaks firmly. "We can't have sweets but we can have something other than a fruit salad if you want. Lets go down and see what we have." With a tight grip on his upset daughter, Harry gets out of bed and makes his way down the spiral staircase and into the kitchen.

This wasn't something new to him. Ever since his daughter turned 2 in August, she's been acting up a lot more than previously. You could say it was the terrible twos everyone talks about. Harry tries his hardest to teach her the proper ways to behave but it's been proven to be a lot more difficult than anticipated. Especially hard when he's busy all the time and isn't with her 24/7 like stay-at-home mums are or stay-at-home dads were. He's a musician. Not a so called musician that gets excited to book a Friday night at the local pub. No, Harry is a international pop star.

When he ended up getting a one-night stand pregnant, he told them they could do what they wanted as far keeping the baby or not. Harry has always been one to agree that its a women's choice. But his one-night stand wanted to have the baby. Honestly, you'd think Harry would get angry that she decided to keep it, but he wasn't. Maybe it wasn't the ideal situation to have a baby from a one-night stand that he had on tour, but he being the loving Harry everyone seems to know and love, of course tried to look at it as a positive thing. But when his daughter was born, his one-night stand got her minute of fame by saying she had Harry Styles baby and left. Abandoned her own blood. Harry had to get full custody of his daughter and ever since then she's been living with her daddy.

It was really hard the first few months of her life. A baby needs their mothers comfort and warmth and she had none of that. She never got the opportunity to breast feed or feel the love of her mother, and Harry feels sick just thinking about it. So Harry put his career on hold for a few months to take care of his daughter and show her that someone cares for her. He never wanted her to feel unloved. It was his biggest fear. That's why every day since the day she was born, he tells her how much he loves her. Shows her how much he loves her.

He did all her nightly feedings with warmed up formula in bottles. He changed her diapers at all hours of the day. He gave her baths every day to make sure she smelled nice and clean. And when she turned 1 years old and was getting more active, he took her to the studio with him and let her play her toys.

Just because Harry is a single parent doesn't mean he doesn't have help or support. He has a lot of help when it comes to taking care of his daughter. His sister Gemma babysits all the time for him when he's got something very important to do at the studio where he'd prefer if his daughter wasn't there. Harry's mum watches his daughter frequently when he has a interview he needs to attend. Even some of Harry's friends watch or take care of her when needed. Especially some of his ex bandmates that have kids of their own now. Harry's daughter has playdates with Bear, Liam's son about once a month. They're about the same age and their dads are friends so it works out great. His daughter has even played with Freddie, Louis's son. Not as much because Freddie lives in America but when he comes to England to spend time with his father they hang out. Freddie and Harry's daughter are quite similar. They were both created due to a one-night stand. The only difference is Freddie's mum wanted him. Didn't abandon him. So he has a relationship with both parents. Needless to say, besides all the things a mother can give to their child, his daughter has a good life. People love her, and once again that's all Harry could ask for. People and himself to love his daughter.

After fighting with his daughter about what to eat for breakfast, she finally settles for some Strawberry pancakes as long as they have chocolate syrup on top. Harry gives in and allows a little chocolate for her to have with breakfast. She sits in her high chair munching on the pancakes while Harry cleans the mess from cooking. Like washing the pan and wiping the stove off. When he's finished cleaning, he notices his daughter has stopped eating and is just making a mess with her food at this point.

Walking up to her high chair, Harry bends down and lifts her sticky body up and says, "Alright, time to give you a bath little one."

"No bath daddy! Me no want a bath!" she yells and attempts to kick her fathers legs but Harry grabs ahold of them in his big hand and stops her movements which makes her small body more angry. She screams very loud in his ear and pounds her baby fist in his shoulders, expressing her anger. Harry really wants to get upset. But what he's read in parenting books is that if you ignore their behavior and act like you don't see their tantrums, it will make it better and they'll give up on trying so hard to show their anger. Because most toddlers have tantrums to try and get attention from their parent(s). By ignoring it, you're not feeding into it.

"I'm sorry but you have chocolate all over you love. Need to get you clean because I need to take you to the studio for a few hours with me today. How does that sound?" trying to make bath time and going to the studio sound fun.

After fighting with Darcy to get in the bath, Harry finally got her in the tub. He struggled to wash her curly hair due to the fact she wouldn't sit still, even after he gave her a rubber ducky to play with. Once he's washed her hair and chocolate covered body, Harry picks her up and wraps her in a big fluffy towel, then takes her to her room to get changed. He manages to get a pull up on her, (still trying to potty train), and puts a lovely red track suit on her with some Gucci shoes. Then he carries her in front of the bathroom mirror to brush her hair.

"Be good for daddy and let me brush your hair." Harry tells his daughter in a gentle manner.

As soon as he passes the brush in her hair, his daughter screams, "Owww, it hurts daddy!"

10 minutes later, Harry has brushed her locks and put her hair into some cute pigtails. With his 2 year old crying in the process. He's pretty good at doing hair because he used to have longer hair himself. Then he picks her up off the counter and places her on the ground, walking her to his bedroom.

"Can you lay in my bed while I get ready? I'll put on your favorite show." he questions calmly.

"Peppa Pig, Peppa Pig, Peppa Pig!" is daughter chants.

"Alright, alright." He picks up his baby girl and sets her in the middle of his bed. Then he grabs the remote to turn his wall mounted tv on. He scrolls on Netflix and finds Peppa Pig to keep her occupied. Then goes to his bathroom to get dressed and ready to head to the studio.

When he exits his bathroom fully dressed and ready to leave, he finds a sleeping toddler on his bed, snuggled into his pillow. Her perfectly outlined lips slightly parted. Harry can't help but smile. He loves his baby girl with his entirety and seeing her peaceful like this makes him so happy. He turns the tv off and carefully picks her up into his arms and heads down the stairs to his car in the garage. But not before stopping by her room to pick up her mini backpack that holds extra pullups and a sippy cup full of juice, with some of her toys as well. Her tiny face is stuffed into her daddy's neck and Harry can feel light puffs of air hitting his skin. He puts his daughter in her car seat and buckles her up properly. Then gets in himself to drive to the studio.

About 5 minutes away from the studio, Darcy wakes up from her late morning nap and whines out, "Me wanna go home and play with you!"

"I'm sorry but I have to work for a little bit. I'll play with you when we get home later. How does that sound Hmm?" She was not satisfied with her fathers answer and starts wailing. Hot salty tears run down her little cheeks and she makes exaggerated sounds to emphasize her crying. She kicks at the seat in front of her and balls her fist up as if she's going to hit something but unfortunately to her, she can't reach a single thing due to her seat belt. Once again, Harry just ignores her cries of anger and turns the radio on loud to block it out.

By the time they arrive at the studio, Harry's daughter has calmed down. She's still upset but at least she isn't crying and that's progress in Harry's eyes. He parks his car in a secluded area to hide from potential paparazzi and unbuckles her. Then shields her face form potential cameras and make their way into the music studio. Harry has to record some audio for his newest album so that's why he needed to come in today. They enter the studio where the rest of his solo band is. He prefers to record the instruments live instead of manufactured drums and guitars.

At some point when he was getting ready in his home bathroom, Harry had called his assistant and told her he needed to bring his daughter in to the studio with him so she could watch her while he's busy. She agreed but being Harry Styles assistant, it wasn't really an option. Not that Harry would force her but she's an assistant for a reason. To do jobs Harry assigns her. In this case babysit his toddler while he records a song. He doesn't have anyone else today and unfortunately can't leave her at home with a mummy like many other fathers can. He's just happy his job allows his daughter to be somewhat a part of it. Not in the spotlight because he keeps his daughters identity a secret from the public for her protection, but as far as her going to the studio with him or when she gets older, she can come on tour with him.

Harry's assistant takes his toddler and her mini backpack full of her essentials. They hang out in the open area, out of the way from his band and he himself so he can get what he needs to get done so they can wrap everything up for the album. Harry's daughter actually loves his assistant. They have grown quite close over the 2 years of her life. But because she's going through her terrible twos, the toddler didn't want to behave for anyone today.

About an hour into Harry's work, he's interrupted with a frantic assistant that has a screaming toddler in her arms. "I'm sorry Harry but she's been crying for about 30 minutes and I've done everything I know to do to get her to calm down." Harry isn't upset his assistant came to him for help with his baby. That's not the type of guy he is.

Harry takes off his headphones and walks over to them. He picks his little girl up into his tattooed arms and questions, "Love, why are you upset for? If you keep crying, you'll end up with a tummy ache."

She just hugs around her fathers neck with her little arms and says, "Want you daddy." Those words almost breaks his heart. Harry doesn't know where this sudden want for him has came from.

"You can have me all you want when I'm finished working, alright. I'll be done shortly." He struggles to pass her back over to his assistant, but finally manages. "Maybe she's hungry. I'll give you a few pounds to take her through drive thru at McDonalds. Would you like McDonalds d/n?" She just nods her pigtailed head. He would suggest for them to go inside, but the public knows what his assistant looks like so they'd know that was his daughter. The daughter that has her identity secret for now. His assistant takes the toddler to the McDonalds drive thru and orders her some chicken nuggets. Even through Harrys pescatarian, he still allows his daughter to eat meats. Then Harry goes back to work in the studio.

Around 2 in the afternoon, Harry and the two year old make it back home. The rest of the evening was a little hectic with a few tantrums here and there. Harry cooked them a nice meal for dinner at about 6 and played dolls with her in the short period of time she wasn't upset. Then comes the dreaded bedtime.

Harry changes her into some pjs and helps her brush her teeth. Then when he went to put her in bed, she started crying for the 100th time today. "Me sleep with you daddy." she cries out. There's a part of him that wants to say yes and cave in, but the parent part of him is saying no. She needs to learn to be a big girl. Harry really doesn't understand why she wants to sleep with him all the sudden. She normally has no problem sleeping by herself.

"No baby. You need to be a big girl and sleep in your bed sweetheart. I'm right next door if you need me though okay." His daughter clings to his body and cries fat tears. Harry decides to stay in her room until she falls asleep. So that's what he does. When she subsumes to sleep, he lays her down in her bed and pulls the covers up over her frail body. Then exits her room quietly.

Harry changes into some comfier clothes himself and goes down stairs to get himself a glass of wine. Then he sits on the sofa and turns a series on to watch before bed. Times like now is when he wishes he had a wife. He'd even take a girlfriend. Just someone to hold him late at night and cuddle with him. Even have some type of intimacy. Ever since he found out about his daughter, Harrys game of sleeping around stopped. He didn't want to keep sleeping with random girls when he was becoming a dad. He was raised better than that. So needless to say he was lonely. In every way possible. Mentally, and physically.

Whilst in the middle of the show he's watching, Harry is brought back to reality when he hears a blood-curdling scream from up the stairs. He rushes to set his wine down on the coffee table and runs to his daughters room. When he walks in there, his heart sinks. The toddler is crying so hard she's gasping for air. It's a different cry that he's seen through-out the day. Unlike her terrible twos tantrums, this cry sounds like she's scared. Harry runs to her and picks her up. "Hey what's wrong my love? Tell daddy what's wrong." he asks of his child, soothing her to his chest.

As her tears slow down in the comfort of her daddy's arms, she mumbles, "You left me." Once again Harrys confused because she never acts like this.

Harry walks out her bedroom and goes to sit with her on the sofa downstairs. Then he turns her around on his lap to look at her face more clearly. "Baby, you need to tell daddy why you got scared or why you want me all the sudden."

The little 2 year old takes a deep breath and speaks in her little accent, "On Peppa Pig, they...they said kids like me are supposed to have a mummy AND a daddy. They said daddies can't love their babies like mummy's can. Me was scared you don't love me anymore." Her voice cracked saying the last bit with fresh tears running down her face and Harry has glossy eyes looking down at his distressed but beautiful mini twin. That's right. They look almost exactly alike. He thanks God every day for that because he doesn't want to look at his daughter and be reminded of a one-night stand that's a piece of shit of a mother.

"Look at me d/n. I love you so so so much. I will NEVER stop loving you." at this point he has to take a deep breath so compose his emotions, "And not all kids have mummies. There are a lot of kids who just have a daddy or some just have a mummy. But it doesn't mean I love you any less. Okay?! Don't listen to what they said in Peppa Pig. They were wrong." Finishing his speech, Harry pulls her tiny body forward and hugs her to his warm chest. He has silent tears running down his face. Both hands spread over her boney back. He thinks tonight is appropriate enough to allow her to sleep with him. She needs comfort. "Would you still like to sleep with me?" he asks in a whisper.

"Pleaseee." she responds while crying. Harry stands form the couch, turning the television off and abandoning his barley touched wine glass, and goes to his bedroom. The turns the overhead light off and walks over to the bed. Peeling the covers back, Harry and his daughter, whose on his chest, slide under the warm blankets together. Now she has just about stopped crying. Just little whimpers leaving her body, along with a few hiccups. Harry reaches over to turn the lamp off, leaving the room completely dark. He shushes his baby until her eyes slowly close and she falls asleep with her face burred in his neck and arms around his neck. Her short legs lay limp over his stomach.

Harry has a difficult time falling asleep that night. He feels sorry for his baby girl because he worries that movies and shows with two parents will make her sad and left out because she doesn't have a mummy. He just prays she will see all she'll ever need is her daddy to protect her and love her for the rest of eternity.

MASTERLIST & My Favorite Harry Styles Fics MASTERLIST

#fluff #harrystyles #harrystylesoneshot #dad!harry #dad harry #dadharry #dadharrystyles #harry #styles #singleparent #harrystylessingleparent #comfort #terribletwos #ddm #daddydaughtermoments

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spnfanficpond · 4 years ago

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Pond Diving - Queen-of-deans-booty

Welcome to today’s Pond Diving Spotlight! We hope that you enjoy this little insight to our members and perhaps even find some useful tips for your own writing. Happy reading!

Want to volunteer, send us an ask! We’re looking forward to learning more about all of you! Not sure what PD is, you can learn more here.

“Don’t Be Koi About It” - All About You

Name: Jordan

Age: 23

Location: Arizona, USA

URL: @queen-of-deans-booty

Why did you choose your URL: Honestly, Dean is the first person I liked on SPN and his ass is so tight and I believe all women are queens so that’s why.

What inspired you to become a writer: I remember reading a book in middle school about vampires, and it’s the first book I remember reading that made me feel all sorts of emotions that books never used to do for me before then. It amazed me to feel these things from a book, and I realized that I wanted to do that for other people someday, thus, is why I became a writer.

How long have you been writing: Gosh, since 8th grade. Might have been a little bit before that, but I remember in 8th grade writing a full book at 20k words, which if I might say, is impressive for a thirteen-year-old.

What do you do when you are not writing i.e. Job/Hobbies etc? I actually am a security guard at a chemical plant. There is some down time to this job, and I try to spend it writing. I even gush to my boss about the stories I write and where I post, and he is all for supporting me about it. When I am not working or writing, then I am either watching Criminal Minds, Manifest, and movies while in my room. With this COVID thing going on right now, I barely leave my house as it is xD

How long have you been in the SPN Fandom? Since season 11 was on TV. It was actually after season 11 had ended and before season 12 had started, so in that four-month span, I managed to watch 11 seasons.

Are you in any other fandoms and do you write for them? Yes! I am in the Marvel and Criminal Minds fandom! I used to be in The Vampire Diaries fandom, but I lost my passion for it so I knew my writing was suffering, so I stopped it. I am doing series rewrites for all three of my fandoms along with one-shots and drabbles!

Do you do any writing outside of fanfiction? If so, tell us about it? Yes, I try to. I took a NaNoWriMo class in college that made me write my first real book, so that is exciting. I also took fiction classes that made me write poems and short stories. I do want to get into writing more original fiction, but right now, I am focusing more on fanfiction.

Favorite published author: I love Riley Sager, B.A. Paris, James Patterson, Ruth Ware, and there are specific books I adore, but they aren’t from the authors I mentioned. I tend to like books rather than authors.

Have you ever read a book that made an impact on your life? Which one and why?: Vampire Kisses by Ellen Schreiber. That's the book that I mentioned about inspiring me to write, and I dedicate my love for writing to her.

Favorite genre of fanfic (smut, angst, fluff, crack, rpf, etc): I really enjoy reading fluff, but I enjoy writing angst because I feel I can have a lot more emotions and feels when I write angst.

Favorite piece of your own writing: My SPN series rewrite. I am currently planning season 7, and I am in the process of releasing season 6. I have gotten so many good reviews of it, and that fuels my passion for it.

Most underrated fic you have written: I can’t think of any at the top of my head. I tend not to look back on my own writing too much. I’ll have an overwhelming need to rewrite it and fix it up, and I don’t need that right now xD

Story of yours that you’d most like to see turned into a movie/tv show: Is it bad to say my series rewrite? It’s already a show, but I’d like to see my version of the show. If I can’t pick that, then my original fiction novel that I wrote that has over 70k words. That would be pretty cool.

Favorite Tumblr Writer(s): @impala-dreamer, @torn-and-frayed, @crispychrissy, @kittenofdoomage, @acreativelydifferentlove, @saxxxology, and there are others, but those are some of the people that come to mind.

Favorite fic from another writer: Can I mention a few? Rock, Paper, Scissors by @impala-dreamer, The Curious Incident of Episode 14x09 by @luci-in-trenchcoats, On the Road by @notnaturalanahi, Cherry Surprise by @crispychrissy, A Change of Scenery by @cass-trash, and On the Case Files (Criminal Minds fandom) by @hotchnerfuckmeup.

Favorite character to write: For Supernatural, it’ll have to be Dean Winchester. For Marvel, it’ll have to be either Loki or Bucky. For Criminal Minds, it’ll have to be Spencer Reid

Favorite Pairing to write: I only write reader-inserts so the characters don’t really matter as long as it’s x reader.

Least favorite character to write (and why): For Supernatural, it’s Crowley. I don’t know why, but I can never seem to get him right. He’s more sadistic and hardcore sometimes and I just can’t get that right.

Do you have anyone you consider a mentor? I don’t really have anyone right now. It used to be my teachers/professors, but I graduated and I don’t see them anymore.

Do you have any aspirations involving your writing? I want to be a published author. That’s all I want. I want to see my books on the shelves, and I’d also love to be a fiction editor! I can’t do anything right now because of COVID, but hopefully one day!

How many work-in-progress stories do you have: More than I can count right now. Like seriously, I probably have over 100. I have a bunch of bingo cards that I have ideas for, but I have so many that they all just pile on. There will come a time when I get through all of them, but I don’t know when.

What are you currently working on? Right now? Some requests and my spn series rewrite.

“Pond Diving” - All About The Writing

What/who has had the biggest influence on your writing? Like I mentioned above, it’s Ellen Schreiber. She is the one person that made me want to become a writer. Also, all my followers on all of my blogs. They are the truest influencers because they are what gives me passion for my writing.

Best writing advice you've been given: Write as if you’re the only audience. I’ve learned that if you don’t like what you’re writing about, then your audience will certainly see it. You can’t please everyone, so please yourself. There will always be someone who loves your writing for what it is, so don’t go changing it to please others.

Biggest obstacle you’ve faced in your writing: Trying to pace myself. I’ve heard of people spending two or three days (or even longer) on a fic. It’s either all or nothing with me. I either spend two or three hours on a fic and complete it right there and then, or I don’t write it at all. Pacing is an issue for me, and I am always trying to spend longer on a fic. I guess I just type really fast, I don’t know.

What aspects of writing do you find difficult when you write fanfiction? I find that trying to keep the character as canon as possible is most difficult. While it’s not always super hard, it does have its moments. All fanfiction are AUs, so it’s okay to change the characters to make them your own. While I don’t think one should make them the complete opposite if they are wanting to stay within canon, I do believe it’s okay to change a few things around.

Is there anything you want to write but are afraid to (and why): I want to write ships. Now that I think about it, I’m not quite sure why I don’t write them. Maybe it’s time that I start.

What inspires/motivates you to write: Feedback!!! Reader’s don’t always see it, but every piece of feedback I get makes me want to write. I do better knowing there are actual people out there that are looking forward to what I write. I do better knowing that real people are reading them and judging it. I do my best knowing that there is an audience. If I don’t get feedback, then that motivation just goes away.

How do you deal with self doubt: I’m not so sure I always do. There is always a voice in the back of my mind telling me that my stories are complete and utter shit, and I shouldn’t bother writing anything. It’s why I take a step back from writing so often. When I first started my blog, I came out with fics every single day. I was always writing new stories. Now, I may get a story out per week. Maybe two per week. I know when it’s time to take a break for a few days because it gives that voice time to calm down. My best advice for someone dealing with self doubt is to just take a break. Separate yourself from the thing that your mind is telling you that you suck at. Take care of you before jumping back into it. Trust me, it helps.

How do you deal with writer's block: Kind of the same thing as I mentioned above. I have suffered from writer’s block a lot more than in my earlier years. Sometimes, I just don’t have the motivation or the passion to write, and I just get so mad at myself for not doing it. One of the things that help me is writing down my ideas. Yeah, I get ideas that float in my head about stories I’d like to write, but actually writing them down makes them concrete. Then, I am able to make notes and side notes and notes of my notes about what I’d like to happen, and before I know it, I’m writing it.

Do you plan/outline your story before you start: ALWAYS! Always, always, always plan your writing, especially if you’re doing a series. It’s good to know what is going on in your story. You don’t always have to follow it to the exact detail (you’re allowed to make changes as you go), but having a plan makes it easier to get through your story. You’re able to look back at it and remind yourself why you're writing that exact scene or if something needs to be added or taken away from it. If you have a plan, then you’re less likely to lose that passion since you know what’s going to happen. You’re able to see the finish line well before you start.

Do you have any weird writing habits: This may be weird, but I like to listen to Got U On by Darci feat. Nessly, Highest in the Room by Travis Scott, some music by Juice WRLD, and other loud rap songs. Don’t ask me why, but I find the music soothing when I write. Those rap songs sound the same to me, and their voices just drown out so I’m just listening to the music. There are other kinds of music I listen to like piano instrumentals and rain/thunder sounds, but it’s really any song I can tune out.

Have you ever received hateful comments on your fic and how do you deal with it? I don’t want to sound arrogant or snobby, but I can honestly say I’ve never received one hateful comment on anything I’ve written (knock on wood xD). I’ve only received good things about my stories, and I think it has something to do with how much good energy I am putting into the world. I believe in karma, and I tend to be nice to everyone regardless of who they are, and I think it comes back to the kind of comments I receive. However, I always think about what I’d do or say if I’ve ever gotten a hate comment. I wouldn’t encourage them to send more hate, but I wouldn’t apologize either. I write the stories I write because it makes me happy. If they don’t like it, they can go somewhere else. Though, I know those hate comments can get to some people, and here is what I have to say about that: remind yourself of when you actually wrote the fic. If you were truly happy about it, then it shouldn’t matter what that person says. You love it, and that’s all that matters.

Conversely: what’s been some of your favorite feedback on your fanfic? I have to pick a favorite? XD I have an album in my phone of screenshots I took of my favorite comments left by my followers. I’ve been compared to John Green, there have been comments that thank me for giving them an escape from their realities, people have told me they want to write just like me someday, people have told me that my work has made them smile and get chills, that my stories are the highlight of their week, and a bunch of other stuff. I am just shocked that there are people out there who think this. It means so much to me, and I get tears when I read them because this is literally my dream. I can’t thank my followers enough for the comments they leave, and this is exactly why it’s so important to leave feedback.

If you could give one piece of advice to a new and/or struggling writer, what would it be? Write for you. I can’t stress this enough. I’ve mentioned it before, and I’m going to mention it again. If you’re not happy, it will show through your writing. Your audience will see it based on how you word things and your flow of ideas. On another note, please brush up on your grammar. I can’t tell you how many times I read such an interesting summary, and noticed the story was full of grammatical mistakes. It made me not want to read it anymore. I’m sure it was a great story, but I didn’t want to put myself through that just to read it.

#pond diving #spnfanficpond

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kinetic-elaboration · 3 years ago

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100 Days of Writing: Day Sixty-Three

I decided to catch up on The 100 Days of Writing and then I... accidentally wrote a large number of words. In my defense, this is like 2 weeks’ worth of questions. Also I skipped the ones I didn’t have anything to say about so actually this could be worse.

(I’m not even kidding, this is really long. I talk about writing rituals, tools for plotting, my thoughts on opening with dialogue and why I don’t like it, my favorite topics, the weather, and what length of fic I like to write.)

I’m tagging, and apologizing to, @the-wip-project and fellow participants @she-who-the-river-could-not-hold, @thelittlefanpire, @hopskipaway, @easilydistractedbyfanfic, @dylanobrienisbatman, and @fontainebleau22.

Day 49: How do you get yourself in the mood to write? Do you have a ritual?

Every time I tell myself I’m going to get back into doing these questions, I see this one in my bookmarks and go nope! and turn around. It’s not a hard question; I’ve just been having trouble consistently getting into the mood to write, so I feel like any answer I try to give to it will be, in some sense, a lie. Like do I ever get “in the mood” to write? Really?? Also, I feel like I’m relying too much on ‘ritual,’ building up ‘the perfect writing situation’ in my head, which at the end of the day is less important than just saying ‘I’m going to do this now’ and then doing it.

I do have some things I always do when I sit down to a writing session. I write on my couch. Almost always (unless I’m on an event deadline where I just have to write in bits and pieces whenever possible), I write in sprints—I use write or die to keep me actually typing and not staring into space. I write in order, and I often write a whole scene at a time. So before I start I need to have at least a couple solid opening sentences in mind, plus some kind of idea about what happens/needs to happen in the scene. In order to get in the right headspace, I usually spend some time just thinking before I actually get to writing. I reread my outline or notes, and skim whatever I might have already written on the project. Sometimes I look at images that help me get in the right mood. Sometimes I just imagine or daydream for a bit. The difficulty, especially recently, is in making sure I do this just enough and not too much, because then I get too caught up in my head and I can no longer translate what I’m seeing into words.

In a broader sense, I also have a building up to writing ritual—again, I think this is part of my problem, that I don’t know how to balance this build up with actual writing. In the hours/days before writing something, I turn it over in my head a lot. I practice different versions of those critical opening sentences. I play it out like a fantasy just to see if there’s a possible flow, even if the final version is different. Basically, I try to turn it into something that just needs to be written, that just needs to get out. But again—this can lead to overthinking and frustration.

The best way I can describe writing for me is that, when it goes well, I find a rhythm, or enter into a zone, where I can describe the images in my head in a way that’s both accurate and pleasant to read. But entering that zone or finding that rhythm is like jumping into a game of jump rope. If you don’t do it right, you’re just going to trip over your feet and get tangled in the rope. But if you do it correctly, it’s fun and exhilarating and you can keep jumping for a long time. Sometimes it takes me some false starts to jump in. And recently I’ve been having days where I just can’t at all, where I tangle the rope up so much I can’t unknot it. Those are the days I just have the same sentences repeating over and over in my head, sounding wrong, and I can’t do anything about it. On the other hand, I write in much longer sprints than I did a couple years ago. I used to only write partial scenes, maybe a few hundred words. Now I can write whole scenes without stopping, and on a few occasions, I’ve written multiple scenes or even whole stories without stopping. So in other words, when it works, it really works. But it doesn’t always, and there’s not a lot of in between.

Day 50 What fic/story made you?

Um… honestly I’ve been writing, in general and fic specifically, for such a long time that I didn’t have a ‘maybe I can do this’ moment. I mean one problem I’ve never had is thinking I can’t do this. I had positive reinforcement for my school and academic writing, and for a long time my fictional stories were just for me, and I knew what I liked. Even just thinking about my fic writing… I’ve been posting fic online since 2006, and I’ve been in multiple fandoms. I don’t really have much connection to a lot of those early stories anymore. They feel like they were written by someone else, a little. I’ve also moved on from most of the fandoms I wrote for in my early fic days so I don’t feel like I can really judge them anymore.

That said… there is kinda an obvious answer for my Star Trek fic lol. I also have favorite stories, and stories that stick out even years after I wrote them, in all (or at least most) of the fandoms I’ve been in. But I’m not sure if that’s the same.

Also, I had two teachers who were really encouraging of me and who I still think about often. One was my seventh grade English teacher, who had us do a lot of writing exercises of various types, both large and small, including keeping writing journals we wrote in every day at the start of class. He once told my mom that I wrote well, not for a seventh grader, but in general, and to be honest I still think of that with some regularity and take a lot of pride and comfort in it. The other was my creative writing professor in college. I don’t think I did my best work for that class, but she was very encouraging and seemed to like what I did. At the end of the semester, as I was preparing my portfolio, she told me that if I didn’t want to do much editing, I didn’t have to, because my unedited work would stand on its own. Again, especially considering all the problems that I saw with my writing for that class even then, I really took that comment to heart. When I’m feeling very self-critical, I remind myself that even my raw scribblings have, perhaps, something to them, and it helps ease the excessive and unwarranted pressure I put on myself. These aren’t really stories about specific writing pieces that ‘made’ me but I do think they speak to that ‘maybe I can do this’ feeling.

Day 51: Do you use tools for plotting and what are they?

So, generally, no. Sometimes I’ll look at various writing/plotting/organizational tools as a method of distraction, but my actual process is very simple. I use plain old notebooks and pens, and word documents on my computer, to plan all my fics, from the one-shots to the multi-chapters. I start by writing down general thoughts and brainstorming, then I build a scene list and/or outline, and then, if necessary, I separate the scenes lists into chapters. Sometimes I break down the scenes even more, if I have additional ideas I don’t wan to forget or if I know I need to hit certain points in a specific scene. The process varies a little bit from project to project, but that’s basically all I do.

I did use Evernote to plan the (still unwritten….) Ark AU. I don’t know if that was the best program choice or if something else exists that would have more precisely met my needs. But that’s what I used and that’s how it is. It’s a little annoying that every time I open it, it’s been updated, and the interface looks totally different and I have to relearn where everything is. But the tagging system has worked decently to allow me to see the big picture of this complex, multi-strand, multi-character, multi-ship disaster epic of a story. I struggled to plot it for a long time because I didn’t know how to balance all of the different parts. In Evernote, I made one ‘note’ for each character, and one for each scene (in addition to miscellaneous notes about sub plots, relationships, questions, etc.). Then I tagged each of them, including tagging the scenes by chapter. So now I can look at a list of all the characters, or all the scenes, or all of the scenes in chapter 8, or whatever, but I can also look at just one particular note at a time, and not be distracted by anything else. That said, I do also have one note that is just a total scene list for the whole fic, which is pretty reminiscent of my usual outlining process.

So… somehow this helped me plot (tentatively) the whole thing, but as I’ve written almost none of it—I finished outlining this in February 2020 so in my defense… I think you can see why it stalled—I’m not yet sure if it was a successful experiment in a ‘plotting tool.’

Day 60: How do you start your chapters? Do you start with dialogue? Why or why not?

While I am definitely against prescriptive “writing rues” generally, as my own personal rule, I try not to start with dialogue unless I have a very good reason.

To be quite honest, I think it’s lazy. I do think that dialogue openings can be used well, if the writer acknowledges that they are intensely stylistic and, from a reader’s perspective, quite difficult. Even within fanfiction, where a line of dialogue (especially if accompanied by a dialogue tag or swiftly followed by a reference to the speaker) gives a lot more information to the reader than in original fiction, opening with dialogue still shoves the reader directly into the deep end of the scene, with very little to orient her. WHERE is the speaker? WHO is being addressed in the dialogue? WHAT is the context of the conversation? Who ELSE might be present in the scene?

There are reasons you might want to throw the reader in the aforementioned deep-end. Maybe it’s an in media res situation and you want to emphasize the overwhelming nature of the action—starting a scene with “Get down!” for example. Or maybe the overall mood is one of disorientation or floating or uncertainty, and you want to create the same effect in the reader.

But I think if you’re starting a scene with dialogue because that’s the first thing that comes to mind for you—the person who conveniently already has the setting, character list, and even future plot already in mind—and it’s just simplest and easiest to start that way, you’re doing a disservice to the reader.

For example, I actually am planning to start the next chapter of the Sleeping Beauty AU with dialogue. My POV character is in a room with multiple other characters, and she’s examining something meaningful to her and not fully listening to the conversation around her. So I want the dialogue to float around in the background, to feel unmoored, and to stand in contrast to the very precise, detailed thoughts and memories that she’s experiencing, which are grounded in physical sensations like touch.

I haven’t quite gotten it to work yet, though, in part because opening with dialogue and doing it well is, in my opinion, quite hard. The difficulty lies in alleviating the challenges the reader is experiencing and making the text fluid and easy to picture. You need to get all of that scene-setting information—the who, what, when, where, and why—in very quickly, but without being jarring. In this scene in particular, I have multiple characters, all in a comparatively unusual location, and I need to establish where they are, who exactly is there, how they’ve come to meet my POV character (which happens ‘off screen’ between the end of Ch5 and the beginning of Ch6), all on top of the character’s thoughts and feelings.

I know all of this very well. To picture the scene in my own head takes only a moment. I just think about it and I see all seven of the characters, where they’re sitting, how they’re positioned, what their facial expressions are, and I also know roughly what each of them is thinking and feeling. To describe all of this in words would take several sentences. Do I put all those sentences on the front end? Do I weave them in among other description and dialogue? Is all of it even necessary—maybe we don’t need to know who’s sitting in what order on the couch, for example.

I’ve gone over a couple of different ways to do this in my head, and I’m sure it is possible, but I’m struggling to get it all down in a coherent way. (Admittedly, I’ve only made one solid attempt. As I was describing above, I’m probably going to jump in with several false starts, and then it will suddenly click.)

My initial attempt to set up the scene relied heavily on dialogue, but when I read it over, what sounded snappy and interesting in my head just fell completely flat—because it lacked context and thus, any meaning. I think the gulf between how dialogue openings feel to the writer and how they feel to the reader is large. To the writer, they feel easy and natural. To the reader, they can feel forced and, contrary to the writer’s intention, serve as an additional reminder that this is a constructed narrative rather than an immersive experience—the opposite of natural. In other words, as I said, they’re a highly stylized form of writing.

To illustrate, this was my first try at the Chapter 6 intro:

"I still can't believe it," a lightly awed voice says from somewhere behind Clarke. "The Princess of Alpha Station really used to live in our quarters.”

She pictures Miller, sunk into the couch cushions, slowly shaking his head, the expression on his face equal parts satisfied and amused.

"Really? That's what you think is the oddest part of all this?"

"Yeah, Bry, I do. Would you prefer I gloat? About being right this whole time? Who says she's just a legend now?"

My current idea is to still start with dialogue, but to move back into a significant amount of description pretty immediately afterward, and only then add more dialogue. Even this is a little hazy, since I haven’t thought much about this fic in a while. But I do think it’s quite clear this won’t work.

As for how I DO start chapters/scenes/stories… I like to start with a strong image that sets the scene and mood of the story, and hopefully leaves the reader wanting to know more. Here are some examples of story openings I’ve written recently, which I like a lot:

When Bellamy is angered, deafening bouts of thunder shake the heavens.

The cawing of the crows—high, sharp, angry shots of sound. The buzzing of the telephone wires.

Marcus Kane's body shows up again in June, skeletal and rotting, six months after his disappearance at the turn of the year.

The sky has turned a bruised yellow, like the inside of a plum, by the time Bellamy starts seeing the robots in the fields.

At noon on the third-to-last day before Christmas, Murphy leaves the cafe, with a single peppermint mocha and a small paper bag, and heads right, walking parallel to the ocean.

The last one doesn’t seem as interesting but consider: you get the who, what, when, and where, the mystery of the paper bag and where he might be going, and also the immediate understanding that this is probably going to be a Fluffy Beach Christmas story—which is correct, that’s exactly what it is.

I’m not saying that I’m always creative or unique. I often start stories off with descriptions of the weather. And I have committed the ~~cardinal sin~~ of starting with a character waking up, heaven forbid. I don’t have any hard and fast rules for myself other than that I try to avoid dialogue, or at least, be careful about its use (another example: I use dialogue to start off Mad Women—but it reads like narration, until it’s rudely interrupted, a sort of in-joke/reference/twist). I try to match the mood of the story and, as I said, include something that will create a question for the reader, some version of why, that the rest of the story will answer.

Day 61: Do you describe the weather? Try changing a scene you wrote by adding weather effects.

After writing a book for the last question, here’s an easy one! Yes, I describe the weather. A lot. Often. In detail.

(Though if we’re talking about the Sleeping Beauty AU as my “current wip,” I actually don’t do much weather describing there, because 4 of the 6 chapters take place in a location with no weather.)

Day 62: What is your favorite thing to write about?

Honestly I like to write about people being dramatic about their emotions. That’s what I’ve discovered while writing my surprisingly self-indulgent Troped fic: I want to describe people acting as if Everything was the Most Ever. It’s fun. Part of this is getting into the usual romantic tropes—longing, pining, exaggerated touches and glances and the like—but why stop at romance when you also have stuff like The Weather and Random Feelings to contemplate?

I also like setting scenes that I find soothing, which is part of why I like Seasonal Stories.

Day 63: Are you more of a drabble/flash or a longfic/novel kind of writer?

I’m in the middle. I mostly write one-shots, and I’ve noticed that a lot of them fall in the 4-6k range. Long one-shots can get all the way to 10-12k but I feel like most of those are, semi-objectively speaking, too long, and would probably have been stronger if they were pruned down to 6k, or, better yet, never made it past 6k in the first place.

I have written some multi-chapters, or, uh, started multi-chapters, but I’m VERY bad at it. The only thing that makes me slightly less bad is being stubborn. Hence the existence of a WIP that I’ve had going for over 10 years now and refuse to call abandoned. Hence this year’s extended angst about the Sleeping Beauty AU, which is only 6 chapters but has taken me literally years to write. I don’t honestly know if I’ve ever finished a multi-chapter WIP, like, properly speaking. I’ve done some short multi-chapters that I wrote as if they were one-shots and then split up for ease of reading or, I dunno, just because. I wrote a Big Bang once, but it’s not very good. Nor very long, if I remember correctly. Generally speaking I probably shouldn’t be allowed to write novels lol—I have a lot of them in my ‘I should write this one day’ idea list—but as it so happens, no one can stop me, so here we are. I definitely have wild fantasies of writing multi-chapters with ease but I’m just a very slow writer and my ideas can’t keep up with my actual-writing. Thus one shots are much easier than multi-chaps, and one-shots on a deadline are much easier than ‘I’ll finish this whenever’ one-shots. One-shots written for events or exchanges also tend to be shorter (and, imo, better) because of the deadlines they’re written on, and are thus more likely to hit that sweet 4-6k spot than stories where I’m allowed to ramble at will.

All that said, I ALSO write a good number of drabbles/writing exercises. I used to write them more often than I do now, but still over the last five years I’ve produced 110,000+ words in free-standing scenes so like… that’s also a thing I guess.

#100 days of writing #my 100 days of writing #100daysofwriting

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dystovian · 4 years ago

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The Last of Us: How to Disappear Completely

Chapter 2: Watchful Eyes

Summary: Within the past year you’ve done nothing but travel, survive, and live with two kids. Two kids who seemed to be fairing quite well in the apocalypse, and two kids who also seemed to be growing on you, and fast. But what happens when you and Sawyer leave the house to Ryan’s watch for a day?

Pairing: Joel/Reader, Joel x Reader (Future)

Warning(s): Language, Death, Anxiety, Grief

A/N: tried to make this chapter a little bit longer, but felt like i got a little too long so i feel like i might have rushed the ending 🥴 either way, i’m gonna try to update every couple days, but if i don’t i’m likely writing multiple chapters at once, either way..thanks for reading!

Tags: @hrk-fic-recs

2 0 1 9.

Kentucky.

It’s been a little over a year, and your luck has proven to be on your side. These two kids stuck to you like glue, protecting you while you did the same in return. Giving you shelter, food, and more. And yet, they rarely asked for anything, nothing but your watchful eye. It was easier than you thought, watching over a couple kids. Especially ones so capable, so strong. Yet...

So goddamned stubborn.

As you sat across them at the dusty dining room table you’ve had dinner at so many times, arms crossed over your chest, slouched into the chair as low as possible, and the thickest most outrageous urge to lean over and slam their heads into the wood. Ryan stood to the side, arms crossed just like yours, and a rifle leaning against the wall just beside her.

Sawyer, on the other hand, looked rightfully and royally pissed the fuck off. Sitting just across the table, hands entwined upon their lap. They had every right to be as stubborn as a boulder, every right to make the calls around here. But you’ve been pulling your weight too, and you can’t sit around and just let a couple kids make every damn decision.

“I’m going. Okay? It’s quieter if it’s just one person, anyways.” Your head leaned towards the other shoulder as you rolled your eyes.

“Exactly. Which is why I’m the only one who should go!” Sawyer snapped, a hand coming down upon the table with a sharp clap.

“Hey hey hey, hold on. I thought you said I was coming too?!” Ryan said, moving from her place against the wall to stand beside her sibling, betrayed at the change of plans which were originally meant to include her.

“I changed my mind. You’re not going, and like [Y/N] said....it’s quieter with just one person. I’m quicker on my feet too, and you know it.” Sawyer whisper-yelled, standing to appear taller and more authoritative against their sister.

“Quick doesn’t mean quiet, dumbass!”

“Just effing kill me...” You muttered, hands sliding down your face, their arguing continuing, as you slouched even further into the dining room chair.

This was meant to be a quick touch and go. You run into the building, grab what you need, and return home with a smile on your face. But, of course, you were meant to leave over two hours ago now, and your patience was running thin. These two kids insisted on doing it while you stayed behind and kept watch.

At this point, you were about to give up, just let Sawyer go and stay behind and keep watch with Ryan. But it appears the two siblings came to an agreement while you had tuned them out, and you would be going with Sawyer, and Ryan would have to stay back.

“That’s so not fair, man...” Ryan huffed, grabbing her rifle and stomping off into the living room. Sawyer turned to you, rolled their eyes, and stomped off to gather their things. God, were you like this when you were younger too? You should have apologized to your dad for being so...so annoying.

By the time you had left, Ryan seemed to have gotten over it. Opting to be proud of being so trusted to watch the place. You smiled, pulled the girl into a side hug, and left with a small feeling of hope pulling at your heart, and something sinister lurking within the pits of your belly.

But things went well, perfectly fine, in fact! You barely came across any Infected, nor any signs of other survivors. Though, you now had to spend the night at some nearby house due to the setting sun, you didn’t even care. You had what you needed, and you wouldn’t be going home empty handed. Sawyer was happy, as well. Being able to go home with just about anything was a plus, especially if it meant their sister wouldn’t starve to death.

“Get some rest. I can keep watch. We’ll leave the second the sun comes up, okay?” You pat the teenagers shoulder, your lips pressed together in an encouraging smile. The kid deserved some rest, all they seemed to do was work, hunt, scavenge. Anything to keep your bellies full, and your minds at ease.

The night was quiet, simple, although the snap of a twig alerted you to the presence of an Infected, it didn’t seem to notice you and it continued on its way. Going on your way that following morning, you couldn’t help but struggle to understand the weight in your stomach. The urge to stop and run all at the same time.

“Hey. You doing okay?” Sawyer stopped mid walk, turned to you, and rubbed your shoulder blade. Something they haven’t done before. They’re growing onto the idea that you’ll be with them a while, and you enjoyed the way that pit disappeared and was replaced with a warmth. You felt...easy. Happy, despite the loss of your sister. The loss that still pulled so heavy on your aching soul.

The moment is interrupted by another pat to your back, and you quickly nod, reassuring your friend that everything is just fine. Thinking, that’s all. Their hand slips from your back and they re-enter the pace they had before. You fall in place next to them, that strange feeling returning, yet you don’t address it. Not even to yourself.

When you return, you begin to understand. The house you grew to love had become quiet. Not even a clanking of the makeshift alarm system, which is literally a bunch of cans on a string. That feeling you had seems to have coated the early morning air as well, and Sawyer feels it too. You’re both stuck on the sidewalk, staring, waiting.

You waited for what felt like forever. What you were waiting for, you didn’t know. Perhaps for Ryan to come out with a grin, or for some infected to round the corner. And yet...nothing came. Not a grunt, not a chuckle, not even the ringing of the wind chime across the street. The both of you were stuck. Weighing the options, do you call out to the younger sibling, or do you go searching inside? You decided on the latter, and Sawyer reluctantly followed.

Entering the house, you felt like something had wrapped you around the chest and squeezed, giving you a warning, a threat of what’s to come. You sweep the first floor, and find nothing. You turn the corner and stare up the steps. That feeling, it comes again, but this time it stops you, and you can’t seem to force yourself up those stairs.

Sawyer, with their courageous efforts, shoulders past you and goes silently up the carpeted flight of steps. Not a creak within the wood underneath, nor a thump follows their wake. You follow, despite something telling you, no, screaming at you to run. Find somewhere safe, and don’t come out.

You get the answer to that feeling within seconds. Because the moment you reach that top step, the atmosphere shifts. It’s still quiet, but the silence is so loud. You know something is wrong, so terribly wrong. And you don’t want Sawyer to be the one to find what could have happened.

As Sawyer checks the first room on the left, you check the one at the end of the hall. And, unfortunately, you see it first, the ruined body of the girl you felt like a sister to, the girl that grew on you so quickly. A gasp leaves you, and Sawyer comes running, you panic and turn, hands coming to their face to block their eyes.

“Don’t look! No!” You heart rate was so frantic, frantic to keep the teen from seeing what had become of the young girl just in the room behind you. You turn them around, arms wrapping around their waist, wrestling their urge to see.

“Let me the fuck go! Now!” They were shouting, you didn’t even bother shushing them. Now that you had man-handled them to the ground, it was harder to keep your grip but you powered through. It didn’t work, though, Sawyer had slipped from your grasp and by the time you had rolled over, you saw them fall to their knees at the bedroom door.

You crawled up behind them again, arms coming to wrap them into some strange and uncomfortable hug. Letting them come apart in your hands, let their heart turn to ash due to the sight of their mangled sister. The cries were piercing, and your head felt like it was splitting. Sawyer’s fists slammed into the carpeted floor, and the cries grew louder and louder.

This time, you shushed them, and dragged them as far away from the door as possible, shutting it behind you. They didn’t fight, didn’t push you back. Just went limp, and sobbed into your chest. Your back leaned against the door that hid a scene straight out of some nightmare, and your front was covered by a grieving sibling.

—

The following morning, after Sawyer had finally fallen to sleep, and you confirmed the absence of Infected, you entered the room again. It felt wrong, almost forbidden, but you couldn’t leave her there. You gathered her up, placed her on the bed and covered her with a nearby blanket. This was hard, extremely. You couldn’t imagine what she had to have gone through to end up like this, and with the way she seemed to be missing so much of her it must have been Infected.

You sat on that bed and whimpered, your fingers rubbing your eyes to quell the headache reaching your skull. To quell the tears that spilled into your lap and the new ache that settled within the confines of your heart.

#the last of us #tlou #tlou x reader #the last of us x reader #joel x reader #joel miller x reader

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all1e23 · 5 years ago

Text

Astrophile [Pt.16]

Chapter: Double Star

Summary: Pizza and Cuddles.

Warnings: Fluff.

A/N: So sorry this has taken so long to get out, but here it is! Only one more chapter to go. I can’t believe it’s nearly over!

***My fics are not to be saved or posted on any other sites without my written permission. Reblogs are welcomed! Thanks!**

Pizza was Y/n’s pick for dinner. Mostly because it was rather late by the time they made their way towards a place that served food, thankfully they live in New York though and can get pizza nearly any time of the day or night. Within reason, there was an unfortunate incident when Steve and Bucky were in college, and it turns out six in the morning is pretty hard to find a pizza place that will deliver. Tonight though Bucky wouldn’t have cared what they ate or what they did, she could have offered to make macaroni and cheese back at her apartment and, not the good kind either – the old school blue box with the powdered cheese and, he would have taken those stairs two at a time if it meant he got to spend a few hours alone with Y/n.

All he’s wanted for weeks now is to have her to himself for just a little while. Selfish? Might be, but Bucky doesn’t spend a lot of time being selfish these days. The last time he did anything remotely selfish he ended up with a late-night phone call from a panicked one night stand letting him know he was about to be a dad and, hey, that time it all worked okay – scratch that, it worked out better than okay. It was amazing. Ori is the best part of his life, and maybe she came from a self-indulgent moment, but she is one of the few good things in his life.

He can add one more thing to that list now that he has Y/n.

Y/n spent a lot of time talking over dinner. Who knew extra cheese makes her so chatty? Not that she didn’t open up to him on any other night they’ve spent together, but something about this conversation is different. She tells him about growing up with her grandparents, which kids always thought was so cool because who doesn’t like going to their grandparents, right? It’s all candy and hugs, and dollars slipped into tiny hands with the whispered promise not to tell mommy and daddy.

Of course, Y/n loves her grandparents, but it wasn’t always easy when she was little. They were older grandparents because her parents had her later in their lives so they couldn’t go on field trips or participate in field day. There wasn’t a lot of money to hire extra help for the bookstore so often only one of them could make it to dance recitals or talent shows. That made Bucky briefly wonder if Ori ever feels the same on those long nights when she’s sleeping at Nat’s because he can’t be home with her. He’s spent countless nights lying awake worrying that she’s spent more time with Nat than with him and, one day when she’s all grown up she’s going to resent him for that.

Y/n being Y/n picks up on it right away, quickly squashing the thought with a firm reassurance, Don’t even think about it, James Barnes. You give that little girl your whole self. I’ve never seen a more devoted father. It’s not the same.

At the time, Bucky had rolled his eyes and leaned forward to wipe a bit of sauce off her nose before urging her to go on. Which she does but not before ducking her head to hide that little shy smile of hers. She goes on to tell him about college and taking over the store when her grandparents could no longer run it. She reveals how her parents left to attend a conference and never came back – the calendar, the ink, and the childhood heartbreak.

All of it.

By the time they arrive back at her place, she’s told Bucky about the pencil on her calendar and how she’s still hesitant to write anything down in permanent ink. He caught a quick glimpse at the faded marks where their date should have been written on their ascent up the back stairs that lead directly into her apartment from the back office. Bucky knows nearly every secret her heart has to tell, so he figures sharing a few of his wouldn’t hurt. After all, she’s the reason his heart is beating faster, the cause behind those butterflies in his stomach and her smile… well, nothing sparkles quite the way she does when she’s smiling at him.

And when they are together like this, the whole world makes sense. Everything snaps into place as if it’s always meant to be the three of them.

“And she just left?“

Bucky nods and leans back against the arm of the couch so he can see Y/n as he continues, "Yeah, she grabbed her skinny jeans and took off."

"I hate that for Ori and you,” she tucks her legs under her and leans her head on the back of the couch facing Bucky, and says with disbelief, “It’s hard to believe she didn’t want to know Ori. She’s the best kid, Bucky. She’s bright and funny and so kind and generous. You did such a good job raising her, and she adores you. You should see the way she lights up when you’re around.”

He offers her a shy smirk and drops his eyes to the woven red thread of the couch because it’s too much to hear those words and see the spark in her eye as she says them. He’s only human. He can only take her beauty in small doses.

"Thank you. That means a lot. I had a lot of help, though. I’m not sure she would be so amazing if it weren’t for all the help I’ve had over the years. Especially Nat.”

"Yes, she would. She’s half you after all. Where do you think all that good came from?”

Bucky looks up and shakes his head, but he couldn’t stop the grin. She scoots closer to him and nods towards the television.

“Pick a movie, Buck. You know I’m right.”

They are navigating something wholly new, and somehow it didn’t feel new at all. Having Y/n tucked against his side as a movie plays in the background and feeling her fingers tracing the lines of tattoo suggests this isn’t the first time he has held her like this, but the thudding in his chest is there to remind him how fresh her touch is. Her fingers pause on the main star of his tattoo, and she looks up at him raising her brows. Bucky reveals the reason behind ink on his arm without her having to ask. He tells her it was a bad night a few months after Ori was born. Steve got hurt pretty badly, and they weren’t able to save a little girl who lived on the top floor of a three-story brownstone.

He tells her how he couldn’t explain what happened, but Bucky knew at that moment he needed to have a piece of his little girl with him when he was running into buildings most people were running out of and, she had said, “So, you put your heart on your sleeve for all to see.” If it was even possible she gained another piece of his heart right then – that’s assuming she doesn’t already have all of it.

“You would make a very handsome chimney sweep,” Y/n observes as they watch Jack dance across the small television in her living room. Bucky had whined until they put on Mary Poppins Returns, claiming he really didn’t like that she missed movie night and things wouldn’t be right until she watched it.

Bucky dramatically clutches his chest and gasps, “Are you just hanging out with me for my looks?”

She giggles and buries her nose in his neck, admitting against the soft skin below his jaw, “You do have very pretty eyes, but no. You like me for me. That’s why I like being with you.”

He doesn’t say anything. Bucky can’t because there is an extremely high chance he’s going to say something stupid. He simply grips her legs that are resting on his lap, pulling them securely against him and she can feel a soft kiss landing on the crown of her head. The world calms enough to let her know she’s the one that’s spinning and everything outside her window quiets, waiting for them to admit what everyone around them already knows. Y/n’s head falls to his shoulder, and she looks up to meet his admittedly pretty eyes, but the words she wants to say die on her tongue and the stars sigh in frustration.

They had time to talk about it about another night. There is something she needs to know now, though.

“Hey, for Halloween–”

“Nope.”

“Come on! How cute would it be?!”

“It’s not gonna happen, Beck. No matter how far you stick out that lip.”

“What if I cry?”

“Christ– Dammit…Please don’t.”

She breaks down into a burst of laughter thanks to the look of panic mixed with genuine pain on his face. Bucky playfully narrows her eyes and grips her hips, curling his fingers into just enough to give her a hint to what’s about to happen. She doesn’t have time to protest or beg him not to, his fingers are squeezing her sides until she’s breathless with laughter and somehow amid all the tickling, she ends up on his lap with her head resting against his chest. Her chest is still heaving as she attempts to steady her breathing and debates climbing off his lap to claim her former place beside him, but Bucky rests his chin on top of her head and wraps his hand around her calf – his silent plea for her to stay and keep his heart in one piece.

So she stays.

Her attention turns back to the movie after tangling her fingers into the soft fabric of his dark blue Henley and burrowing herself as close to his warmth as she can get. This is the first time in nearly a week she let herself relax, and her body is taking full advantage allowing her to give in to how truly exhausted she is, skimming the surface of sleep while surrounded by that earthy, slightly citrus scent that can only belong to Bucky.

“Come on sleepyhead,” Bucky whispers against her ear as the credits begin to roll on the screen. He is already lifting her into his arms and carrying her towards her bedroom by the time her sleep riddled brain thought up a comeback, and it’s a fairly weak retort that she manages to mumble into his chest, “I am not sleepy."

Bucky chuckles, "Sure, you’re ready to run a marathon.”

He lays her on top of her heavy red and orange comforter and pulls the plush white blanket at the end of her bed over her, whispering into the darkened room, “ Get some sleep and I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Bucky slowly pulls back letting go of her hand as he retreats from the queen size bed. Something about the whole moment makes him think of putting Ori to sleep, and it has him grinning. Y/n’s eyes flutter open for only a second, and she grabs his hand to keep him from leaving her alone.

“Don’t go. Stay. Cuddles.”

Even through her sleepy haze, she can tell he’s hesitant, she cracks an eye and sticks out her bottom lip, pleading with a sleepy voice, “Please? I’ll cry if I have to.”

Good grief, between Ori and Y/n he’s completely screwed.

“Okay, okay. I’ll stay,” Bucky says instantly.

He toes his boots off in record time and parks himself next to her on the bed, running his fingers through her hair. He can tell she’s still floating around the edges of sleep despite the proud smirk on her face from getting her way. It’s not that he doesn’t want to slip under those cotton sheets and spend the night wrapped around her, he does. He wants to wake up to find her legs tangled with his and her whole body draped over him, but he also wants her to feel safe when she’s with him.

Always.

“I’ll stay till you fall asleep, but then I’m moving to the couch. I am not sure you’re in the right headspace to consent to cuddles.” She smiles at that as she leans her head against his thigh and takes a deep breath of his scent before letting herself drift off.

The early afternoon sunlight comes too soon. They were up till nearly four in the morning and waking up before noon feels like a punishment no one deserves, but maybe Y/n can convince Bucky to sleep in a bit longer. She rolls to her left side and throws her arm out, hoping to connect with a warm body for cuddles; all she finds is a cold empty space, and she jolts up.

Did he leave after he carried her to bed?

Y/n tosses the blankets off her and slowly wanders into the living room looking for her phone in hopes he at least left her a message, but as she approaches the couch she sees Bucky– He’s crammed his massive body onto her tiny couch and used the small crochet blanket she keeps on the back of said couch to cover him; it doesn’t come close to enveloping him and all those holes didn’t help to keep the cold air out. She decides to let him sleep. Muffins were put in the oven and coffee was brewing, they stayed up late, and he deserves a morning without rush or worry. Breakfast is nearly done and she's in the middle of debating if she should wake him now or let the muffins cool first when a hoarse voice calls from the couch, “Are you making me breakfast babydoll?”

The spinning is back.

“Maybe,” She calls back as she makes her way towards the couch with two cups of coffee, “Or maybe I’m just making myself breakfast.”

Bucky drapes her blanket back over the arm of the couch and sits back down, making room for her to join him. He pictured her apartment a few hundred times, and this is close to what he thought it would look like. The couch was big and red, sitting right in the middle of the room, two green armchairs sit under the far window and the old twenty-four inch tv they watched the previous night is sitting on a lime green chest that he is sure her grandparents bought brand new.

The black trunk she uses for a coffee has Y/n written all over it, with well worn leather straps and the curio cabinet on the far wall across from the chairs has hand painted flowers on the doors. It felt warm and full of light and all Y/n. Everything had a place he noticed. There isn’t a mess. Not like his place where the mess never seems to end and after getting to know Y/n’s heart the last few months he understands why she likes the mess so much. Y/n sits down next to him and the again cushions sinks, Bucky raises a brow and shakes his head in disbelief.

“Nah, you wouldn’t do that. You wouldn’t want me to cry now, would ya?”

“No, I think it would break my heart to see you cry,” Y/n glares at his playful wink and passes him the mug full of coffee she made for him – Black with two sugars. Just the way he likes. She takes a sip from her own mug and smirks as she asks, “Did you say consent to cuddles last night?”

“What?” Bucky clears his throat and holds the ‘i need space’ mug in front of his face, hoping to block the red he knows is rapidly spreading over his face, he says, “No, I didn’t say that. I don’t– I don’t recall that.”

She giggles, and it makes Bucky grin. He loves that sound almost as much as he loves– likes her. His head is telling him it’s too soon for big feelings like those. If only he can get his heart and head to agree.

“I have to work tonight,“ Bucky mentions, letting it linger in the air and lifting his left arm for Y/n to curl into his side like she’s been hinting at with every little scoot closer. She’s awake. She can consent to cuddles now and he’s hardly able to keep his hand off her. She looks up from his side where she snuggled up to and asks, “When do you need to leave to get Ori?”

“Uh, here soon, actually. I like to spend time with Ori before I go in if it’s possible. Do you want to come with me to pick her up? I have to bring her to Nat’s for the night, but I thought maybe we could pick her up and get an early dinner together before my shift.”

Her entire face lights up, and so does Bucky’s soul.

“You don’t mind me coming with you? I don’t want to take up your day with her. I know you guys have your alone time and it’s hard to come by.”

“Ori will be excited to see you. She’s had me all week. I think she’s missed our hangouts and I wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t want you to come,” He assures her with a kiss to the side of her head and a gentle squeeze to her hip.

“Yeah, okay. I’ll go with you after muffins, deal?”

“Deal. Oh, and you can plan on being at movie night on Wednesday because it feels wrong without you.”

“Hold on a second,” Y/n says as she practically jumps off her couch and runs over to the wall calendar that hangs on the wall in her kitchen. She grabs the nearest pen and scribbles on next Wednesday, “Movie night with Bucky and Ori.”

Tony was right. It’s not so scary when Bucky is the one holding her hand.

-------

When Bucky told Y/n, Ori would be excited to see them all together he was not kidding in the least. She screamed so loud Bucky’s pretty sure the neighbors are going to call the police to do a welfare check. Sam spent their entire twenty-minute visit grinning like a maniac because Bucky held Y/n’s hand the full 1,200 seconds they stood in their doorway– he fully intends to make Sam pay for every single comment the second he falls asleep tonight. After lunch, Ori asked Bucky if she could spend the night with Y/n instead of Natasha. If it were anyone else he would have told her she needed to stay with Aunt Nattie, but it’s Y/n – it’s their Beck.

Ori would be just fine with her.

They swing by the house and grab Ori’s things so the girls could have a sleepover in the bookstore because who wants to sleep in a comfy bed when you can spend the night in a sleeping bag on the hard floor in the middle of the bookstore? Y/n and Ori Facetime him before bed, making sure he got a picture of their tent with the twinkle lights from Ori’s birthday party, and first thing in the morning they are calling with a cheerful good morning shout. By the time Bucky hangs up he’s grinning like an idiot and he can’t help but wonder if this is what it would be like if it were the three of them all the time.

He would be okay with that.

Sam collapses next to Bucky on that old orange and brown couch, glancing at Clint and Steve before nudging Bucky’s boot with his own, “So, she asked you to be her date to Tony’s wedding? That’s a year from now. I am pretty sure that means she doesn’t plan on dating anyone besides you. Not to mention you spent the night at her place.”

Of course, the three jerks Bucky has chosen as his best friends have not quit him about Y/n for the last sixteen hours. That is all thanks to Sam informing the entire station Y/n was there when he picked up Ori. He really needs new friends – friends that mind their own business.

“I slept on her couch,” Bucky retorts with an eye roll and, Sam is quick with a recovery, “Yeah, but she wanted to snuggle. Why can’t you just admit you love her? She’s perfect. I am failing to see the problem.”

There’s that big, monumental four-letter word again – love. Why can’t they take things one day at a time? Why does he have to jump in headfirst and possibly ruin everything they have right now? The last time he asked her out, she cancelled for crying out loud! Bucky doesn’t want to push too fast and maybe, lose her for good this time.

“I wouldn’t say we are at love just yet and it’s a big step, Sam. It’s not like Zoey or Claire–”

“God, I did not like her,” Sam groans. “She couldn’t even say Ori’s name right.”

“I don’t think she had much interest in peanut,” Clint pipes in after Sam.

“She’s not some woman I met at a bar that I’m bringing home for the night,” Bucky continues ignoring Sam and Clint’s commentary on his past relationships – well, hookups. No one can call those relationships. “Ori knows her and spends more time with Y/n than I do some weeks. She’s already spun into our lives and Ori’s heart. If things end badly or we don’t fit like everyone keeps insisting… what’s going to happen when Ori gets hurt?

“You mean when you get hurt? Because that’s what we are talking about here, right?”

Bucky meets Sam’s eyes and then looks up at Steve standing behind them. They are all wearing the same expression, the one that says they had him all figured out and maybe they do. Perhaps he is scared, but that doesn’t mean he’s wrong either. “Look, I’m doing this my way. I need to be sure before It’s too late to take it all back.”

“I hate to tell you pal, but it’s already too late and I think you know that, Buck,” Steve is quick to point out and Sam takes this chance to jump in, “Look, take her out this weekend, and we will watch Ori. You’ve got forty-eight hours off so do whatever you do that makes chicks believe you actually have game and win her over. No more dancing around each other. Just tell her how you feel very clearly. In the plainest words possible because I’m telling you the two of you–”

“Sam,” Steve sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. “This isn’t helping.”

“I’m just saying, they need it spelled out for them like they are in a Kindergarten class.”

“What if she doesn’t like me like that?” Bucky grumbles halting Sam and Steve’s bickering. Sam runs a hand down his face in frustration and shakes his head, answering before Steve or Clint could, “Christ, you are dumb. Why would she want to cuddle your ugly ass if she didn’t like you?”

Bucky has a snappy comment on the tip of his tongue, but there’s no time for snark or a shove off the back of the couch. The board is lighting up, they’ve got a call and Bucky has no time for payback. He jumps up and points at Sam, “Wait till we get back. I’ll show you who’s ugly. I’m damn adorable, and everyone knows it.”

“Enough,” Steve orders. It’s strange how easily Steve fades away, and he slips right into Captain mode. Steve recites the address back to the team and Bucky goes still, repeating the address in his head several times.

“Let’s get moving. Buck?” Steve murmurs, coming to a stop in front of the dazed man, “You all right? We’ve got to get going. If this is about what Sam said I need you to let it go till we handle this–”

“No, that’s not– That’s not the right address. That’s- that’s the store. Y/n’s bookstore.”

“Shit.”

“Steve. Ori is with Y/n today. They are at the bookstore together.”

And, Bucky’s entire world went up in flames in a matter of seconds.

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#bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes x you #bucky barnes x y/n #Bucky x reader #bucky x you #bucky x y/n #SINGLE DAD AU #single dad bucky #fireman!Bucky #Firefighter AU #alternate universe #james buchanan barnes #james bucky barnes

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feverwritingandtextposts · 5 years ago

Note

Your Rengoku fic was soo soooooo good?! I was blushing and smiling so much!! Is it okay to request Sanemi being nervous to ask reader on a date too in modern AU? He asks Kanae for advice and reader misunderstood his intentions and thought she never had a chance with him. He does eventually ask the home economics teacher after some encouragement from Kanae 🤭 cute, slightly angsty miscommunication! Sanemi is too cute hehe. If not I understand, thank you!

I loved your request lmao! I was caught up for a few days wondering what would be the best way to write it. I hope you like it! Tell me if you do, also still tell me if you don’t LOL.

If you like my work, please support me on ko-fi!

This was also posted on AO3 here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21781480

————————————————————————————

Miscommunication

Not for the first time, you were thankful of how large Himejima was.

He blocked out everything, the light, the doorway, Shinazugawa’s glare…

Peering cautiously past Himejima’s bulk, you met the sharp eyes of the Math teacher. You flickered your gaze back to the table immediately, trying to desperately act as if you never noticed him staring.

In your defence, you never thought he’d get this angry over it. You only ate one of his strawberry daifuku, and that was only because he’d been complaining about having to eat them at all! A generous student’s mother had given him an entire bag full of them; you didn’t think he’d miss one.

Slowly, you lean back in your chair slinking fully into Himejima’s shadow and out of Shinazugawa’s line of sight. You had to stretch out your hands awkwardly to mark papers at this angle, but its worth it to stop feeling that burning glare on your skin.

From over the other side of the room, you could hear Shinazugawa’s chair scrape as he moved, and all of a sudden, you felt that piercing gaze on you again.

Did he re-position himself… Just to glare at you?

You were so fucked.

—

“You should try a peace offering,” came Tomioka’s mild suggestion. At your silence, he tries again. “It worked for me,” he says, half shrugging.

You remember a specific instance where Tomioka had tried this very method to stop Shinazugawa’s angry tirade during a particularly tense teacher’s meeting (hereby referred to by traumatised witnesses as ‘The Incident’). The two of them had ended up in an all out brawl, the bear shaped cupcake Tomioka had offered ending up half squished under his sneakers, with the other half smeared all over Shinazugawa’s tight tailored trousers.

Probably sensing what you were thinking of, Tomioka opened his mouth again, perhaps to defend his suggestion before he was smoothly cut off by Kanae.

“He’s got a point!” she says, clapping her hands together in excitement. “After all, the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach! You should make him something.”

You frown at her.

She goes on, pointedly ignoring your deep frown of disapproval. “How about ohagi? I’m sure you know how to make some, you’re the Home Economics teacher after all.”

You frown even harder. “Kanae-san, he’ll kill me.”

She smiles, and there’s something mysterious that twinkles behind her eyes that scares you. “He won’t if it tastes nice.”

—

Perhaps for better or worse, you take up their suggestions. You don’t have any better ideas anyway.

You spent a lonely afternoon working on your sweets in the empty Home Economics classroom, crafting your ohagi. You’d never admit it, but you took Kanae’s words seriously. If you were sure of anything, it was your cooking skills. You could’ve been a chef if you weren’t so intent on teaching rowdy children the finer art of home cooked cuisine.

If Shinazugawa didn’t like your ohagi your heart might never survive the insult.

At Kanae’s encouragement the next day, you began your long walk to find Shinazugawa, with all the heavy countenance of a soldier off to war.

You find him brisk walking through the third year’s corridor, probably on his way back to the staff room for lunch. He looked as hard to approach as ever, face set in stony contemplation, arm raised to prop his file up on his shoulder, biceps bulging through his tight shirt.

Hesitantly, you call after him, the nicely wrapped bag of ohagi clutched tightly in your clammy hands. To your surprise, he stops immediately, head swinging to you so fast he might have gotten whiplash.

“What?” he asks, eyes wide and intense, burning right through you. Uncomfortable by the full force of his attention, you felt the heat rise to your cheeks, and you break eye contact. Lowering your gaze, you are instead greeted by a full view of his scarred pectorals, courtesy of the ever open shirt. You raise your gaze back to his face immediately, not wanting to be caught staring.

“Um,” you begin, holding out the packet of food, feeling for all intents and purposes like a blushing schoolgirl talking to her crush. Thank god all of the students had already left for the cafeteria. “This is for you.”

He takes it, eyes widening as he examines the treats through the see-through plastic packaging. He’s unusually quiet. “Sorry for eating your daifuku,"you grind out, and his eyes snap back to you.

His face twists, eyebrow cocked. "You ate my daifuku?” he asks, confusion laced in his voice.

“You didn’t realise?” you ask, incredulous.

Shinazugawa scowls in response. “Why would I care if you ate it? You can have the entire bag if you want.”

“Then, why are you angry with me?"

At that, Shinazugawa splutters, and you watch as his cheeks tinge with colour.

"I’m not mad at you,” he snaps, eyebrows furrowed angrily at you.

Pursing your lips, you decide to let that one go. Shinazugawa continues to glare at you for a moment longer, before blurting out a harsh “whatever,” and stalking off.

You stand in the empty hallway, dumbfounded. He didn’t even thank you for the food! But then again, he did say he wasn’t angry at you so… You’ll still consider this a win.

Shinazugawa doesn’t speak another word to you for the rest of the day, but the heated glares stop as well so you won’t complain.

—

The next morning has you breathing easier. No longer did you feel Shinazugawa’s fevered gaze trained on your back. No longer did you risk catching his eye in a crowd, far too intense for a mere glance. No longer did he force himself into the seat in front of you at lunch and glare at you instead of eating his food.

It was actually feeling far too peaceful for you. Like a fire doused with water, the sudden change in Shinazugawa’s attitude left you feeling surprisingly dour.

You barely even see him anymore, a startling change from when he seemed to be everywhere you looked. If you didn’t know better, yo’d think he was avoiding you.

The thought made you a little bit sad.

You didn’t mean to create a rift with him. You just wanted to be friends! Maybe. Even you didn’t know what you wanted. You wanted to get along with your colleague, you wanted it to be more than just long looks from the other side of the room, more than just wordless glares. You wanted to know just what his problem with you was.

The more you thought about it, the angrier you got.

Stupid Shinazugawa, with his stupid hair, and his stupid handsome face, and perfect abs and-

Whatever. It’s not like you cared anyway.

That’s exactly what you tell a very bored Tomioka at lunch that day, as he chews dismally through a mouthful of rice.

“Hm,” is all he says to your ranting, and continues shoveling rice into his face. Rengoku also ignores your griping, likely not even hearing you over his own exclamations of “Delicious!” as he steadily makes his way through his fifth bowl of ramen. You guys were the only ones at the teacher’s table with Uzui holed up in the infirmary nursing burnt fingers from his latest explosion attempt, Himejima spending the lunch hour counseling (reprimanding) some of the problem kids, and the rest scattered somewhere or another.

You wished that Kanae were here to vent to. No sooner did you think that did the lady herself walk into the cafeteria, deep in conversation with a pensive looking Shinazugawa. Walking towards the table, Kanae catches your eye and sends a quick smile your way, never once stopping whatever it was she was telling the Math teacher. You hear Shinazugawa click his tongue in annoyance at her as they drew close. Spotting you and Tomioka, he gives the latter a particularly withering glare, and glances away quickly when you meet his eye. Not breaking stride, he stalks past the teacher’s table, to sit in-between a surprised Genya and an absolutely horror struck Zenitsu.

Inwardly, you offer the boy your condolences.

Kanae gives you a knowing smile as she takes her seat beside you, leisurely unpacking her homemade bento.

“So how did it go?” she asks finally, offering you a piece of her tamagoyaki.

“Terrible,” you reply grumpily, accepting the egg and immediately shoving it in your mouth. “He hates me even more now.”

Kanae hums thoughtfully in reply. “I don’t think he hates you.”

You deadpan her a look. “He hasn’t said a word to me all day. He won’t even look at me.” At that Kanae snickers, trying and failing to hide her smile behind her chopsticks. You raise an eyebrow at her questioningly.

“You seem surprisingly upset at that! After all that you’ve complained about being looked at too much before,” she says in-between bouts of tinkling laughter.

You can’t help the immediate flush at her words. “I wasn’t being looked at! I was being glared at!”

“Uh huh,” she agrees teasingly, pretty pink eyes alight with amusement. Feeling the heat creep up your neck at the implication, you turn away from her with a huff.

Your reaction just served to amuse her more, and she pats your back consolingly. After her laughter dies down, she speaks again, voice gentle. “If you want him to speak to you, why don’t you try talking to him first?”

You fight the childish need to pout. “No way. He can hate me if he wants, I don’t care.”

Behind your back, Kanae and Tomioka share a tired look.

Your dismal mood carried on throughout the day, even inciting the concern of some of your more perceptive students (mainly Tanjiro). You sigh as you set your stack of collected homework on your desk, drained from your own whirlwind of emotions the last few days. You’ll tackle it tomorrow.

You’re so wrapped up in yourself that it takes you a while to notice that you’re the last person left in the staff room. With a single glance to the dark skies outside, you rummage through your bag and desk for your umbrella.

You can’t find it, probably having left it to dry out on your balcony the night before. Silently ruing your own forgetfulness, you resolved to just make a dash for it with your windbreaker as a makeshift cover. Luckily it was late enough that most if not all of the students were already home and wouldn’t bear witness to their teacher fighting the rain.

Pulling open the door, you step out and knock promptly into something hard in the darkened hallway. Before you can draw back with a shriek, the something speaks. “You’re still here?” the voice asks, and you peer through the dim lighting to see Shinazugawa staring down at you.

“Yeah I had some.. Stuff to do,” you mumble, taking a step back from him. “Why are you still here?”

Shinazugawa’s eyes, no less intense than before, searches you for a second before he glances away again. “Its raining. Do you have an umbrella?” he says finally, choosing apparently, to completely gloss over your question.

You shake your head in response, wondering why he was suddenly talking to you. He cocked his head sharply, a universal sign for follow me. Turning, he ambles down the hallway calling out a casual, “you can share mine,” as he goes.

Your pride begged you to protest, but the larger, traitorous part of you willed yourself to go along with it, following him down the dim empty hallways to the school entrance. You say nothing on your way down, the strange awkward tension of the situation settling into your bones and keeping you from looking at him. Ever so often you feel his burning gaze settle on you, but he glances away just as quickly.

As it turns out, Shinazugawa’s umbrella wasn’t that big. It wasn’t tiny, but it certainly wasn’t big enough for the two of you to share without one of you getting wet. The man himself shoots you a pointed look and you take it as a hint not to mention that.

Pressed against his arm, you tried desperately not to think about how your fingertips brushed against his as you two walked, squeezed awkwardly under the umbrella.

The sun would have barely gone down at this time, but it was so dark out it might as well have been night. It was also ridiculously cold out, a fact that you only realised now that you had a warm body tucked against you. As the rain came down heavier, you felt a shiver rack through you, and you involuntarily press yourself into the warmth of Shinazugawa’s arm.

You feel him stiffen, and realising that, you try to move away, getting your shoulder immediately soaked through with rain. Shinazugawa clicks his tongue in annoyance, wrapping his arm around you and drawing you in close. “You’re gonna get wet, idiot,” he muttered, but there was no heat behind his words. Instead, all the world’s heat seemed to be concentrated in his arm, wrapped tightly around you, comfortably warm.

Your face was burning. Utterly gobsmacked by the situation, you couldn’t bring yourself to say a word, hell, you couldn’t even look at him right now. The rain was thankfully loud enough to drown out the beating of your own heart as you two made your way down to the station, half cuddled into his side. You were pretty sure his arm was getting wet from how it was shielding you from the rain, but Shinazugawa didn’t say a word, so you didn’t either.

The station was as busy as ever, filled with bedraggled people running for their trains. Shinazugawa dropped his arm from you the minute you two were under the station’s shelter. Wordlessly, he began folding the umbrella. Somehow you felt that if you spoke now, it would break the strange tension that has followed you two since leaving the school. And for some reason, you didn’t want that to happen. So you stand, watching as he folds his umbrella, slowly, and he stands, feeling your eyes on him, close enough for him to smell the shampoo off your hair.

Shinazugawa breaks the silence first.

“Wanna get something to eat?” he asks, tossing his bag over his shoulder and giving you a great view of his rolling biceps.

“What?” you reply, intelligently.

“Eat. Let’s go eat,” he says, beckoning you to follow him as he makes his way over to one of the small hole in the wall eateries that line the inside of the station. Not wanting to turn down this rare show of friendliness, and even less wanting to part from him, you follow along.

The two of you squeeze into the tiny plastic benches of a damp smelling Mcdonalds. Seated in front of you, the chairs were close enough that your knees bumped against Shinazugawa’s, but that wasn’t what you were focused on. Shinazugawa was smiling.

He looked like he was trying to hide it too, propping his elbow up on the backrest and resting his hand oh so causally against his mouth. You never thought he’d like Mcdonalds this much.

“What do you wanna get?” Shinazugawa asked, “I’m buying.”

“Uhh,” you scan the menu quickly, before telling him your order. You were more than a little flustered with the sudden 180 in your relationship with this man. He went from angry, to ignoring you, to walking with you in the rain, to now treating you to food? He felt like a hurricane and you can’t catch up.

Distantly, you thought about what Kanae said about “talking”.

Shinazugawa sets down the tray of greasy fries and burgers with a clack, startling you out of your reverie. He motions for you to take one, still looking far too pleased about being stuffed into a plastic seat with damp clothes and a tray full of fried food. He’s got a lovely, pleasant smile on, and its a jarring difference from his usual irritable glowers and sinister smirks. It makes him look gentle.

You help yourself to the food, and spurred on by Shinazugawa’s content expression, you decided to bite the bullet. “So, why did you come back to the staff room?”

The effect is instantaneous. Shinazugawa chokes on his burger, nearly upsetting his soda as he tries to wash it down. You stare, unsure weather to laugh or be genuinely concerned. His face is red now, and you’re not sure if its because of the choking, or whatever possibly embarrassing thing he’s about to say.

“I came back because Kochou told me you were probably still around,” he muttered, eyebrows furrowing as if daring you to contest what he says.

Confused, you point at yourself. “Me? Why me?”

“Because you don’t have an umbrella, idiot.”

“How did you know I didn’t have an umbrella?”

“Because it always sticks out at the end of your tiny ass bag, and I didn’t see it there toda-” Shinazugawa cuts himself off, eyes widening in the realisation that he had maybe said too much.

“Wow, you’re really perceptive Shinazugawa-san,” you say, somewhat awestruck. Shingazugawa flushes an even darker red, the colour of his burning cheeks vibrant against his pale hair. You can’t help but smile at the display. “Thank you,” you say honestly, “you’re a really nice person. I can’t imagine anyone else coming all the way back to the office just to help their colleague.”

Shinazugawa gawks at you, the embarrassment on his face shifting to something nearing incredulity. “You-” he begins, voice halting as if he’s trying to reign in his emotions. “You’re such a fucking idiot.”

You draw back, offended. And just when you thought you guys were finally getting along. “Excuse me?”

“Yeah, you’re an idiot,” Shinazugawa says, his voice growing louder with agitation with every word. “You think I’d go all the way back there for just anybody? You think I’m just trying to be nice?”

You leant back as far as you could in the tiny seat, very confused about Shinazugawa’s mounting anger, and very uncomfortable about the stares the two of you were getting. “Uh… Weren’t you…?”

“No!” he snarls, slapping a hand to his forehead.

“Oh. Uh, then why-”

“I LIKE YOU, YOU IDIOT,” Shinazugawa snaps, slamming his hand down on the table, with a resounding smack.

Ok now, everyone was staring.

Oh my god.

Shinazugawa hides his face in his hand, either from embarrassment, exasperation, or a mixture of both. Hesitantly, you reach towards him to pat his arm for comfort. He grabs your hand, lightning fast, before you could touch him, and the sudden warmth of his touch makes you jump. “You thought I hated you? Why? What the fuck did I do wrong? Kanae was all like ’maybe you’re being too intense’ so I tried to stop looking at you so much, but then you looked sad anyway so fuck Kanae’s advice and-” You reach out and set a hand over his mouth, effectively stopping him to the disappointed murmurs from the gossip hungry Mcdonalds customers, cuing in onto your drama.

In any case, you didn’t think your heart could take any more of these sudden revelations. You were sure your face was just as red as his, or even more so. “I’m sorry,” you whisper, voice wavering. “I totally didn’t realise. Guess I really am an idiot huh?”

Shinazugawa’s eyes widened. Peeling your hand gently away from his mouth, he shook his head ferociously. “No, you’re not. Don’t- You’re not an idiot. You’re just too fucking dense about this kind of stuff.” His grip on your hand tightened to a comforting squeeze. “But I like that about you anyway.”

“Wha- you do?”

“Yeah. I like a lot of things about you.”

“Really?”

“You’re a really fucking good cook too.”

You blush even harder at that, unable to stop the smug smile on your face. You knew no one could resist your ohagi! Shinazugawa gives an endeared, lopsided smile at your expression.

“Make that for me again sometime.”

“Oh, sure!” you say, smiling back at him. To your surprise, he rolls his eyes.

“Don’t make them if you, ya know, don’t wanna or something,” he says softly, and you catch what he means for once.

“Hey! I don’t make ohagi for just anybody you know!”

—

Shinazugawa continues to hold your hand as the two of you leave the Mcdonalds, and you let him, the two of you blushing and smiling like misbehaving teenagers.

Behind you, someone wolf whistles at the two of you, and someone else cheers, probably having sat through the entire of the two of your very vocal confession scene.

At that Sanemi whips around, teeth bared and ready to fight whichever poor soul it was. Urgently, you tug on his hand, hoping to prevent a McMassacre. Surprisingly, he allows you to lead him out obediently, but he still keeps turning back to shoot the other customers death glares as he goes.

You sigh to yourself, unable to stop the amused smile creeping up on your face. Just what did you get yourself into?

#sanemi x reader #kny imagines #kny #Kimetsu no Yaiba #shinaguzawa sanemi #sanemi #kochou kanae #i headcanon that sanemi gets as red as genya does when he's embarassed #no one can convince me otherwise

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libsterslobsters · 4 years ago

Text

Since I've Been Loving You...

Part four of The Song Remains the Same series

Summary: The Reader hadn't had many friends in her lifetime before a chance encounter in Romania brought Bucky Barnes into her life. That's all he is. Just a friend... that she may be slowly falling for. As for Bucky, dating may have changed since the 1940s, but he's pretty sure that's what he and the Reader have been doing for the past four months, and he assumes she's on the same page.. When a night in results in deep fears revealed, both parties involved learn more about themselves and each other than they bargained for.

Pairings: Bucky Barnes x fem! enhanced! Reader

(Reader can see little bits of the future and understands every language)

Warnings: language, mild angst, slow burn (See fic "Communication Breakdown" on my page for resolution), mentions of minor character death, fluff, misunderstandings

Author's note: In this ficlet series, I've referenced the one time Bucky and the reader caught a mouse in her apartment multiple times, so I figured I'd better go ahead and write it 😉. As always, the reader is unnamed, but since these characters live in my head rent free, I call her Violet Aimes.

*************************************************

The radio is on full blast as she dances around her apartment, rearranging a cabinet here, brushing away a cobweb there. Despite the fact that the season is months away, she’s set about the task of Spring Cleaning… in the middle of Autumn.

Since she lives on her own, she rarely has the motivation to clean her apartment. She keeps it functional and hygienic, but other than that, she usually doesn’t do much. That is, until recently, when the most extraordinary thing has happened: she’s made a friend.

As a child, a huge premium is put on your ability to make people’s aquaintances. Every time you go anywhere knew, you’re asked, “Did you make any friends today?” As an adult, friends are seen as nice, but not a priority. That is, unless they can help you get ahead. Since she rarely lets anyone get close to her (it’s too damn dangerous when you see the future, not to mention speak every language automatically, and because of that, the U.S. government would very much like to get it’s hands on you), her list of friends in adulthood has remained quite short. But, it turns out what they say is true: it’s not the quantity that counts, but the quality, and Bucky Barnes is indeed a quality friend to have. He’s kind, he’s loyal, brave, and- she shakes her head- attractive, yes. He’d make someone someday a fine partner. Not her, of course. If there was ever a chance that something like that could happen between them, experience has shown her that once someone learns her secret, they immediately decide it’s best to keep their distance romantically. What was the phrase she heard a while back? Don’t stick your dick in crazy? Well, she can’t blame anyone for thinking that way, dick sticking or not, because while she’ s not crazy, her life definitely is.

Pushing all of those thoughts to the side, she grabs her broom and begins to sweep her kitchen. It’s a small space. In fact, she can only walk three paces in either direction. Still, by the time she’s finished, she has a respectable pile of trash at her feet waiting for the dustpan. Only three more rooms to go in… she glances down at her phone… forty-five minutes. Yikes. Well, if she’s going to spend the afternoon cleaning, she needs an appropriate album to listen to.

Thank goodness for streaming services, because although she has a hefty CD collection (it’s no longer the ‘cool’ way to enjoy music, but what can she say, a girl’s gotta have hobbies), if she started looking through it, she’d be here all day, trying to make a damn decision. So, instead she searches for the first thing that comes to mind: Amy Grant, Heart In Motion. It’s cheesy, but it’s bright and poppy. A perfect combination for getting her though the arduous task of cleaning. So, duster in hand, she slips her earbuds in and, once again, gets to the task at hand.

___________________________________________________________________________________

Bucky’s a few minutes early, so he’s not expecting the door to be open, or even for her to be home. In hindsight, he should’ve texted and asked if it was okay, him showing up before the agreed time, but he didn’t think of it, and now that he’s in her building, well… he’ll just hang around in the hallway until it’s closer to five o’clock.

Not for the first time in the past three months, he thinks to himself that he has absolutely no idea what the protocal is for dating these days. He’s read multiple articles (Reddit is a wellspring of information that he wasn’t necessarily looking for, but there it was) and watched several Youtube videos, but one person seems to contradict another. Wait twenty-four hours after a date to call, no don’t do that, it makes her nervous, but if you call before then, you’ll scare her off with your desperation. Let her determine who makes the first move, but don’t be afraid to take control. Go with casual dates, but make them special. All in all, he can’t help thinking this was much simpler seventy years ago when there were basically three choices on what you’d do on any given night: the movie theater, a diner, or dancing. Maybe a combination of the three, and if you were lucky, possibly parking afterwards. Now… good grief. The best he can figure is to just go with his gut. In essence, get to know her, enjoy their time together. Other than that… well, he’s still figuring it out. So far, things are going slowly, and he’s okay with that. It’s really nice, actually. No pressure for either of them.

He’s still emmersed in his thoughts when he steps out of the elevator and onto the sixth floor. It’s always vaguely noisy. The walls are thin ( the building was constructed before the collapse of the Soviet Union, which he only recently learned about), and there’s several couples cohabiting on this floor who… well, frankly, he’s surprised the ones next door to her haven’t killed each other yet. However, as he gets nearer to the door, one sound grabs his attention. That of someone singing. Singing loudly, and completely off-key. He’s heard some tone-deaf people before, but wow. This is bad.

He’s just outside her door when realization dawns on him. The singer (who is either blissfully unaware of how bad they sound, or simply does not care) is her. He stifles a laugh. The voice is so comically mismatched with the girl he’s come to have quite the crush on. But hey, at least she’s having fun, if the sheer enthusiasm is anything to judge from. In fact, he kind of hates to break up the impromptu concert (although the neighbors might thank him), but he should let her know he’s here.

Thirty seconds after he shoots a quick text in her direction, there’s still no reply, and the singing hasn’t stopped. She’s just moved on to a new song. Phone’s on silent, then. Alright knocking. Just as he raises his hand to do so, his phone dings. “Come on up! It’s open!” Clearly she didn’t take, “I’m here” to mean “I’m right here, ten feet away from where you’re more than likely standing.” Alright then, since he has permission…

He can see straight through the kitchen and living room into her bedroom from the front door, so he usually averts his eyes (everyone deserves some privacy, after all), but today, before he can manage that feat, he catches sight of… is she dancing? It’s not a fox trot, that’s for sure… and is that a feather duster? None of that matters, because, still oblivious that he’s done exactly what she suggested and let himself in, she starts belting out the next verse.

“Classic case of boy meets girl, moving in the same direction.” Oh, now he can see. Her headphones are in. That explains it. “You’re not asking for the world; I’m not asking for perfection.” What’s the best way to go about alerting a person that involved in what they’re doing to your presence without making them jump out of their skin?

“Just a love that’s well designed for passing the test of time-” Knocking is always a classic. Maybe, since he’s closer this time, she’ll hear him. “I’m here to tell you, I’m here to stay. Every hour, every day.” Here it goes.

The good part is, his knocking does get her attention. The bad news-

“Holy fucking-” She jumps, startled, and if her earphones weren’t in, her phone would fall to the floor. “Dammit, Barnes!”

He tries hard, but he’s not entirely certain he’s convincingly covered his laugh with a cough.

“Laugh it up, fuzzball.” She’s trying to seem annoyed, but her own smile gives her away.

“Star Wars, right?”

“Good to know your memory still works. Didn’t your mother ever tell you not to sneak up on people?”

“You told me to let myself in.” Her forehead wrinkles.

“Yeah, but that was when I thought “here” meant “down the street, so you don’t have to stop singing for another two minutes.” She pushes a few escaped hairs back from her forehead. “Are your ears okay? I usually save the live music for when no one else is around.”

He chuckles. “Somehow, I think I’ll make a full recovery.”

“Thank goodness.” Stowing the feather duster, she pushes past him out of the door. “I hope my fine vocal performance haven’t put you completely off, because tonight’s selection is a musical.” Huh. It’s been a while since he watched one of those. Well, apart from whichever Disney flick they’ve caught up on recently (they never watch anything too intense; he still hasn’t figured out if it’s out of concern for his well being or because that’s what she prefers, and he hasn’t worked up the nerve to ask).

He must stay silent for too long, because, cheeks slightly flushed, she explains-

“Don’t knock it just yet. This one’s a classic. Plus, it takes place sometime you’re already familiar with, so you can tell me if there’s any historical inaccuracies.”

“Wait-” He crosses his arms. “-is that an old man joke? Because if it is, I’m gonna have to start on how I woke up only to find out music has been completely ruined by the kids these days.” That’s it. Her smile is back, embarassment erased.

“We’re just gonna have to agree to disagree on that one.” Settling into place on the couch, she boots up her laptop. “Now sit down and watch Singin’ in the Rain with me. It’s the least you could do after taking five years off my life by sneaking around.”

He snickers and with a nod, sits next to her.

___________________________________________________________________________________

“Here’s a historical inaccuracy for you.” She was sort of joking about that part, but it seems like he’s taken it to heart and is good-naturedly pointing out everything Hollywood got wrong about the 1920s. “Hemlines were NOT that short back then. At least, not where I was from.”

“What?” She pretends to be shocked (although truthfully, she is a little). “Don’t tell me the roaring twenties weren’t as wild as The Great Gatsby would have us believe!”

His forehead wrinkles. “I think I read that one. Didn’t think much of it.”

“Don’t tell anyone, but neither did I.” She was bored to death and hated pretty much every single character, but that’s not what’s most important right now. “How long were the dresses back then if they weren’t Debby Reynolds short?”

He seems to think about it a moment, then- “Around here, if I’m remembering right.” His hand brushes just above her knee. “That’s about as wild as it got in our part of Brooklyn, and even that was just the flappers. Of course, my Ma had them all the way down to her ankles until I was grown.” They’ve never spoken about their parents before. She appreciates the trust he’s putting in her, bringing up the distant past. Still, she hesitates before returning the gesture.

“My Mom and I didn’t have a great relationship. She was a little-” She makes a vague motion. “-not all there. She told me that my Dad came from outer space, if you can believe that.” Now that she thinks about it, that’s probably not the weirdest thing she’s ever heard, even if she doubts it’s true. “Anyway, she died when I was sixteen.”

“I’m sorry.” His hand closes over hers, and she forgets how to breath. “Do you have any other family?”

“No.” She shakes her head, attempting to laugh it off. “Just me.”

They’re silent for a few minutes, and she’s about to make a joke to lighten the mood, when-

“I had a sister. Rebecca.” He sighs. “She’s dead now. Looked it up. I thought about looking up her kids, but it’s probably better if I didn’t.”

In a sudden moment of boldness, she gives his hand a squeeze. “Maybe one day, when things aren’t as complicated.”

“Yeah.” He nods. “Maybe one day.”

___________________________________________________________________________________

Despite his opinions of what music has become since he was young (and the fact that this movie really is full of historical innacuracies, but then again, he was under the age of ten when all of this was happening, so his view of the world might’ve been on the narrow side), Bucky can’t help but enjoy it. The male lead has a serious set of pipes. It kind of reminds him of Frank Sinatra. Plus, it’s bright and light and funny. Most of all, it makes her smile.

Around the halfway point, they hit pause to make some popcorn (“Not like the movie theaters, because I’m cheap, but we can doctor it.” ; he didn’t have the heart to tell her it’s been so long since the last time he had popcorn, she probably could’ve offered him packing peanuts to munch on and he wouldn’t have been able to tell the difference), but now they’re back on the couch, the bowl resting somewhere between them. He’s not sure when or how it happened exactly, but at some point, they both migrated so far towards the middle of the sofa that now she’s leaning against him, pressed against his shoulder, and his arm is draped over the back of the couch. It’s nice. If only he could work up the nerve to kiss her.

They’re both laughing just a little too loudly over the scene where the voiceover goes out of sync with the picture part of the movie when a flurry of motion catches his eye. He turns his head to get a better look, and it’s just in time to see a mouse run directly over both of their feet.

“What the-” Her eyes go wide as she sees the creature and registers what it is.

“I think you might have a roommate.”

In a flash, she’s pulled her legs onto the couch, knocking the bowl of popcorn onto the floor. “Oh god! Please tell me that wasn’t what I thought it was.”

“It wasn’t. Unless you thought it was a mouse.” She shudders.

“Bucky, I really don’t like mice.” Considering he found one in his pipes a few months ago, he’s not the biggest fan either.

“I’m not too fond of them myself.”

“No.” She shakes her head. “No, I mean, I really don’t like them. As in, I’m irrationally afraid of them.” Wait-

“You’re afraid of-” She nods, and he feels bad for it, but he has to stifle a laugh. “Doll, you realize they’re a lot smaller than you are.” He immediately regrets the pet name, but she doesn’t react.

“So are atoms. Split one and you’ve got an atomic bomb.” She’s got a point, but still…

“They won’t hurt you. Most of them are pretty shy-”

“The one I woke up to eating my hair when I was a kid wasn’t.” Well, now it makes more since.

“Maybe we can find some traps tomorrow-”

“No. I need it out of my apartment. Tonight.” Tonight… just to refresh his memory, he glances out the window. Uh-huh. Just as he thought. It’s pitch black, and he doubts it’s gotten any warmer since his arrival two hours ago. “I’ll catch it somehow. I just can’t sleep knowing it’s there.”

He starts to tell her that she’ll have better luck winning the lottery without a ticket than catching that rodent, but as he peers down at her face, he sees that she’s gone a shade paler and her eyes are wide. She really is terrified of this… mouse. Alright. Decision made.

“Okay.” Careful to avoid grinding the popcorn into the truly ugly shag carpetting covering the living room, he stands. “Can you tell me where to find a broom? Maybe a spare rag if you have it?”

“Broom’s behind the door. Wash rags are under the sink.” He’s already bent over, searching for the objects in quesiton when she asks, “What are you planning to do?” That assumes he has a plan rather than just a random guess.

“Go poking around. Check behind the fridge, in the cabinets. They like to hide out where they won’t be seen.”

“You don’t have to-” She stops short as he straightens, dish rag in hand. “-but if you do, I owe you big time.”

“Tell me the next time you have a vision of me forgetting to take the clothes out of the washer and put them in the dryer, and we’ll call it even.”

Despite his best efforts, the kitchen and bathroom lend no results. He’s really hoping to avoid poking around her bedroom (that still seems a little too personal, especially since mice like to hide in places like underwear drawers), so that leaves….

It’s completely thoughtless, him pulling the couch out from the wall while she’s still sitting there. It doesn’t strike him as odd until she says,

“You could’ve asked me to get up, you know.”

“No need.” Looks like they’re in luck. “There’s your roommate.” Wrong thing to say, because she shoots off the couch like it’s on fire and, without her feet so much as touching the ground, jumps on top of the coffee table.

“Shit! It was under there the entire time?”

“Looks that way. There’s a hole in the wall, so-” He raises the broom, but before he can bring it down-

“No! Don’t kill it!” What the- He glances at the woman still standing on the coffee table. “It has as much right to live as we do. Just wanted to get out of the cold.” Okay, but-

“What do you want to do with it then?”

She grimaces.

“Just… can you get rid of it?” Can he… oh boy. But, he’s not about to say no. That is until he realizes-

“I could if it were still here.”

“You’ve gotta be shitting me.” He couldn’t have put it better himself. “Okay, um.” She frowns, then with a sigh, squeezes her eyes shut.

“What are you-”

“Sometimes I can see something if I’m not paying attention to anything else.” A few seconds pass, and then she cringes. “Ew! Okay, bottom cabinet, right hand side in the kitchen. I’m gonna have to rewash all of those dishes.” Good enough.

Now that his mission is to catch and carry instead of kill the furry fiend, he moves more quietly, grabbing the now-empty popcorn bowl from the floor as an afterthought. He really hopes that this vision isn’t too far in the future, because although it’s preferable to the way he’s spent a lot of his time in the past seventy years, he’d rather not crouch by a cabinet for the rest of the night. He’ll do it, but if there’s another option…. Pulling open the door as slowly as he can, he catches sight of it. Hope she wasn’t too attached to that box of cornflakes, because Mickey here has helped himself. If he can just get his hand in… the mouse registers that he’s got company and starts to dart out of the way, but this time, Bucky’s prepared for it and catches it between the towel and the bowl.

“Got him!” She cheers from her place on the table, but still takes a step back when he comes nearer.

“Thank god!”

“Never been called that before.” She rolls her eyes, but chuckles.

“Thank you, Buck. Now can we get him the fuck out of here?”

“Sure, but where exactly?” He’s not opposed to letting Mickey Mouse loose in the hallway so he can go bug the neighbors, but then Mr. Mouse might make his way back here, and this seems like the kind of adventure you only have once.

“Um-” She starts to climb down, but hesitates. “Are you sure you’ve got him?”

“I’m sure.” It physically hurts him not to laugh.

“Then out in the courtyard, do you think?” She jumps from the coffee table and picks up her coat, pulling it on.

“That’ll work.” He starts towards the door.

“Don’t you want your coat? I can drape it over your shoulders?”

“Nah, I’ll be alright.” He’s about to mention she doesn’t have to come with him, but before he can, she’s by his side, one arm hesitantly wrapped around his back.

“I’ll stay close then. Can’t have you freezing to death on a mission of mercy.”

As luck would have it, everyone else is already tucked away this time of night, so they have the elevator and the dingy lobby all to themselves. Still walking side by side, she pushes open the door and they step through.

“Just set him down, or-”

“No. Let’s go to the bushes. Give him some quick and easy cover so he won’t be too cold.” Shaking his head, he makes his way towards the shrubbery. Him and his human coat.

“This seem like a good place for a mouse house?” Chuckling, she nods. “Alright then, little man. You’re officially being evicted.” As soon as he releases the mouse, she jumps back with a yelp, still grasping his arm.

“Sorry!” It’s a lost cause. He can’t hold it back. At long last he lets out the laugh he was holding back.

“I’m sorry, Doll-” Why does it feel so natural to call her that? He’ll think about it later, but right now he needs to do damage control. Even when he was coming up, it was rude to laugh at a person.

But, if she’s offended, it doesn’t show, and instead she beams at him.

“Is that the stupidest thing you’ve ever done or what?” It’s one of the strangest, but he’s been known to do stupid things, especially if it’s someone he… oh. Oh. Well, that’s not one he was ever expecting to say again. But it’s true. Somehow, although it’s under the most unlikely of circumstances, he has come to love this woman. More than that, he’s pretty sure he’s starting to fall-

“I’ll take the stunned silence as a yes.” It’s a joke and it snaps him out of his revelry. He loves her, but now’s not the time to say it. For now-

“No, Doll.” Taking her hand, he begins to walk back towards the building. “Not even close.”

#marvel #captain america #the winter soldier #bucky barnes x ofc #bucky barnes #bucky barns x y/n #bucky x reader #fanfiction #bucky fanfic #fluff

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pumpkinpaix · 5 years ago

Text

Hello! and PSA

*waves* hi everyone! so uh, I’ve kind of had a bit of a surge in followers recently, and I thought I would make a bit of a PSA/intro post with a bit more targeted info than my about page.

anyways, I’m cyan! statistically speaking, you are probably here for one of the following reasons:

my fic

my meta

my gifs

my translation

all of the above

this is pretty much an mdzs blog on main these days, but I also rb a lot of other misc things because I have never been good at keeping my interests separate. it’s also my personal blog, so expect some of that? i am very all or nothing ahaha. my opinions change very quickly as I process new information, so like, something I said last week or yesterday might be different now! I’ve seen several people going through some of my older posts, and I’m just like oh dear, I said a lot of things six months ago that I no longer vibe with. /o\ please keep that in mind as you go diving in my blog!

i don’t have a BYF or DNI policy, but I reserve the right to block anyone for any reason because this is a personal blog first and foremost, and I do need to be better about setting my boundaries and curating my own online space! on that same token, you are free to follow, unfollow, block, whatever, even if we’re mutuals. <3

you’re free to come talk to me in my inbox or dms, but please be aware that there’s a very high chance I will never get back to you /o\ it isn’t personal!! I am just very mentally ill and have many difficulties with keeping up social interactions or talking to people.

in the interest of trying to be more open about myself, my brain, and what that means for me in an online/fandom space, I’m gonna do a boatload of mental health talk under the cut (or, if you’re looking at this on my blog proper or somewhere where the cut doesn’t display, it starts right after this paragraph), including mentions of self-harm/thoughts of specific self-harm etc, just so you are warned! I’ve been thinking recently that it’s good to try and take steps towards being more open about my issues, both for my own sake and others’. It’s long, because one of the fun things about my mental illness is that I am hyperverbal ahahaha (if that... wasn’t already obvious orz)

so if you’ve read pfmmpd, you can kind of get a sense of what I’m working with. a lot of how i wrote lwj was drawn directly from shit happening in my own brain, but like? dial that up from the specific issues that lwj had in that fic and apply it unilaterally across the board to almost anything you can think of.

I hesitate to describe my OCD as debilitating, but only because my specific cocktail of compulsions and anxieties and triggers push me to be hyperachieving and hyperfunctional. I consider myself pretty fortunate (?) in that regard. on paper, you could never tell how absolutely batshit my internal landscape is! which is very good for me practically in that I can hold down a job, keep scholarships, graduate with honors, have good prospects for my future, hold onto relationships (usually yikes) etc. but the fact of the matter is, I’m like. oh boy.

to give you a peek, here’s a non-exhaustive list of things that have triggered me to varying degrees of severity within the last like, week or so:

my dog

a chinese folk song

my mother reading a chinese haiku to me written by a young gay man

a chinese reader of my fic lovingly and gently giving me a history lesson on china and on mdzs while praising me

stepping on a piece of snow that didn’t collapse in the precise way i expected it to

writing meta

reading meta

ruminating on my triggers (honestly, I played myself)

seeing a twitter thread going around tumblr with decent information but the OP is someone who was exceedingly cruel to a good friend of mine

visiting my grandmother’s grave

deciding to visit my grandmother’s grave

discussing the concept of cuddling my partner whom i love and have been with for four years

self-harming (truly the height of irony, being triggered into self-harm and then getting triggered by the result of the self-harm hahahahahaha)

dropping off a package

trying to explain queer-coding to my parents

talking about stressors in my life related to covid19

having a very pleasant conversation with a person i admire

editing my translation

the fact that the “close” button on my accessibility sidebar on the translation website is the wrong color

choosing between eating all the shiitake mushrooms in my soup and purposefully giving myself a bad reaction or throwing one out and wasting food

thinking about playing a fun game with my partner and a mutual friend

my mom asking me to take a photo of some tea for her

my mom asking my opinion on a photo she was photoshopping

animal crossing

writing this fucking post HAHAHAHA

like!! it goes on!! endlessly! obviously, these triggers are not simply “bad” things. the chinese folk song and the haiku were both really beautiful and i love them! but I did spend a good amount of time curled up on my floor in the dark sobbing as i played the song on repeat. the haiku was one of the last straws that ended up with me screaming and crying and hurting myself. the snow??? like wtf the snow thing. I stepped on the snow and it felt wrong and my brain just started screaming SMASH YOUR KNEECAP. ???? (I didn’t, for the record, and I would never.) I love my partner very much! I love my friends very much, and my mother, and my grandmother etc. my triggers are infinite, unpredictable, and bizarre.

I’m saying all of this because I want to be clear that MDZS/CQL fandom specifically triggers me on a daily basis, sometimes very very badly. this is just a fact! it is no one’s fault! I have decided it is worth it for me to stay anyways. it is impossible for me to request people tag for certain things because I myself have no idea what my triggers are until I encounter them. It’s like a fun mystery boss encounter! sometimes it’s low level and i’m well-equipped to handle it. other times it’s a one-hit KO. We just don’t know! there are lots of very cool content creators in this fandom that I can’t follow because it would make my dash that much more high stakes. the original source canon material triggers me! all the events leading up to Lotus Cove massacre? I was shaking at work for three hours after consuming it for the first time.

Meta specifically is something I know a lot of people like me for, but it’s 100% the most triggering activity I participate in for this fandom. like, that suibian meta post I wrote that’s currently going around? Probably took me four or five hours of concentrated effort to write because I was compulsively panicking and rewriting and editing and panicking more and qualifying and editing and qualifying some more and then debating whether I should post it or not and then fighting with myself about my wording and then immediately regretting it and then every time someone commented on it (regardless of positive or negative!) my anxiety spiked. I started a reply to a response on that post and had to stop after a few minutes because I was already starting to trigger myself over it.

this is actually a pretty good outcome when it comes to meta! I recognized that I was hurting myself before I got any further, and I only spent like, five hours on it! it was good exposure therapy for me! the bad outcome is. well. bad, as you might imagine lmao.

I like writing meta. I like talking to people about it too! I like participating in fandom, I like writing, I like translating, I like all of these things. they’re just also really hard for me! there’s a couple meta requests sitting in my inbox right now that I want to get to, but it might take me like. a long time because of. you know! *gestures* Everything takes me a long time. that first chapter of the translation took me literally five months from beginning the project to posting a final edited version. It’s just over 1k words. D8

I try really hard to be chill and kind in public and I largely think I succeed on the kind part (I hope!). If you thought I had even an ounce of chill before this, perhaps I have disabused of that notion entirely now lmao. I’m not saying this for pity, but like? just so we all know what we’re dealing with here. I don’t want anyone to get hurt when I don’t engage with them or feel snubbed if I never reply to them. and also like, hey, if someone relates it’s like hooray, high fave, solidarity! we’re not alone in this world! or maybe this will help someone understand OCD a little better! I don’t know. I hope this post is a positive thing. BUT! I’ve spent three hours on it already, and i’m definitely starting to compulsively spiral, so instead of going back and editing it over and over, I’m just going to post it. thank you everyone for your understanding! I hope you enjoy your time on my blog! (*´▽`*)

#/#//#///#////#/////#personal #psa #cyan gets too deep in the weeds #HA HA HA.#can't believe i'm using that tag on a personal post except like. of course i am #hello everyone are you ready for some cyan dlc?#well you're getting it #im anxious about this thing because i'm anxious about everything but!#we are doing exposure therapy this year!!#even if the world is burning down around us i can still try to confront my problems!!!#about

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toast-the-unknowing · 5 years ago

Note

11, 14, 18, because I'm greedy :P!

I DID YOURS LAST BECAUSE YOU’RE SO GREEDY. Or because I knew 18 was going to take a while, one of those two.

11. If you could only write angst, fluff, or smut for the rest of your life, which would it be?

I often have a little angst in my fluff, or a little fluff/humor/comfort in my angst, and either some angst or some fluff in my smut, so it's not even just a question of "you don't get to write the others" it's that "you don't get to write hybrids," that's the part that makes this question tricky. I suppose of the three genres, the one that I most often write in its purest form is fluff, because that lends itself to comedy better than the other two, and I like writing comedy. So I’d have to say fluff. But I wouldn’t like saying fluff.

14. If you were stuck on a desert island with only two characters, which would you pick?

Blue for being practical and hard-working and Henry for company/morale boost.

A part of this consideration was picking two characters that get along well with each other, because oof, the last thing you need on a desert island is drama.

18. What is a line/scene you’re really proud of? Give us the DVD commentary for that scene.

I worked really fucking hard on it all will fall, fall right into place and I am really fucking proud of the whole thing, but I think my favorite scene might be the one where Ronan talks to Adam’s mom. So that’s the one you’re getting. I am putting it behind a cut and I am sooooooooo sorry if the cut doesn’t work for people, because it’s long.

Adam's dad is seeing a doctor the next morning; Adam says he might visit in the afternoon, depending on how that goes. His voice is totally flat.

The main reason we don’t get actual dialogue of Adam talking here is just practical, to avoid needing a mini-scene of that conversation, but I do like that it has the effect of distancing us from Adam, stripping some of his agency away from him. So much of this fic is about Adam being disconnected from what’s going on inside his own head, that I like this moment where we take away his voice.

Ronan hopes the nurses will tell Adam that Robert isn't up to visitors, that he got rushed to the ER, that he's dead, so he doesn't leave the hospital after Adam disappears inside of it. He ditches the car in the parking lot and slinks back to main entrance, prepared to pace back and forth for a minute or an hour or the rest of the day.

The hospital visits are set up for a progression where Ronan stays at the hospital longer each time, as the situation wears him down more and more. He’s less and less willing to let Adam out of his sight, but he has to, since that’s one of the very few things Adam actually asks him for.

Except he comes to a dead halt ten feet away from the entrance, because while he was parking, Adam's mom arrived.

Relatively early in working on this fic I had the thought of “oh, FUCK, Ronan’s going to have to talk to Adam’s mom at some point, isn’t he?” It was one of the moments that I was the most interested in writing, so there was a lot of excitement attached to it once the horror cleared up, but my first impression was also correct. I suspected this scene would be an absolute bitch to write and it absolutely was. I worked on this fic a lot while riding my commuter bus and I cannot tell you how many afternoons I spent working on this scene, only to come away with one or two new sentences to show for the entire hour.

He hasn't seen her since that night in LA. She'd caught a flight back the morning after her dinner with Adam, so they hadn't all had to travel together, thank fuck. He doesn't know what he would have done stuck on an airplane with her. He doesn't know what he's going to do now.

The moment of Adam’s mom ambushing him in front of his friends was one of the very first things I knew would happen in this fic; the moment of Adam meeting her for dinner came a bit later, I forget when exactly. It was only MUCH later that I put together that this timeline makes no sense from her point of view. She ambushes him on a Monday; he calls her on either Thursday or Friday. That means she paid for three nights in a hotel or motel, without knowing if Adam was going to get in touch with her (and with more reason to assume he wouldn’t than that he would). I don’t think it’s hard to believe that she would fly out to LA in the first place, once Adam refused to take her calls; it’d be the only way to get in touch with him, and she’d know that the shock of seeing her, and the guilt she could lay on him about how she had to fly all this way because he wouldn’t just talk to her on the phone like a son is supposed to, would be effective manipulation. But it’s hard to buy she’d spend the money staying in LA, and spend the time away from Henrietta when Robert’s condition is so serious.

But I really LIKED the idea of Adam meeting her for dinner, and the scene after dinner is such an essential part of the story – and I don’t think it would have been as effective after just a phone call, although I suppose he’d have been pretty wrecked after a phone call, too. So I had to make a call on whether a character would do this thing that doesn’t make any practical sense, or change it and risk weakening the story.

Sometimes you have to take something out of a story that you really love, but I generally hold that that’s if the element in question is causing problems within the story itself; e.g. if a joke is really funny but is ruining the tension or the mood of a scene. My own writing philosophy is that good scene work is more important that rigidly holding true to details of reality, but a different writer might have made a different call.

So here is an answer to the question of “when did Adam’s mom go back to Virginia,” whether it’s the right answer or not. And, of course, the answer to “why did she go back on a different day than Adam and Ronan did” is “I didn’t want to ruin this scene by having Ronan spend any time with her before now.”

She spots him at the same moment he spots her. She doesn't have the decency to look away or try to hide. There's something eating at her and she's making up her mind about how nasty she's going to be when she lets it out. Ronan hates that he knows that; Adam twists the corner of his mouth the same way.

I like the idea of Ronan – and, by implication, Adam – noticing the ways that Adam looks like his parents. I also liked having the gesture that reminds Ronan of Adam be a negative one. It ties in with the bit later, of Ronan being aware of Adam’s flaws.

"You just going to stand there all day?" is what she goes with.

"What," Ronan spits, "you think I want to talk to you?"

"You could leave," she suggests. "Better for your eyes than gawking."

"Don't pretend you care. You didn't know I existed a week ago."

"Wouldn't've pictured he'd have someone like you," she agrees, breezy in a way that turns his stomach inside out.

Probably Adam’s mom didn’t know he was bi until a couple night’s before this, when he took her out to dinner – I don’t imagine he would have told her before then, and I imagine there was some awkward “so how has the last decade+ since we stopped abusing you been” conversation during that dinner. Which raises the question of how she and/or Robert feel about Adam being in a relationship with a man, but honestly, I didn’t want to muddy the waters by bringing homophobia into the story. I wanted to deal with the abuse, that was the part that was interesting to me emotionally, which is more or less the approach that canon takes, too. So for “someone like you” I really meant it to be more about “someone with a giant tattoo and a foul mouth” but I suppose it could also be read as “someone with a dick.” In either case she’s intending to be very dismissive of Ronan.

"You don't know anything about him."

"But you know me, is that it? I can see you judging me. You don't know anything."

"I know what you two did to him."

"Is that how he tells it?" she asks, like she isn't interested in an answer. "He makes it sound like any of us had it easy? Three people in that little trailer, never any space, any quiet, never enough of anything. Robert'd work all day and come home and there's the kid getting in the way again, making trouble, telling lies...anyone could lose their temper. I did my best to keep Adam out of the way, but I'm just one woman. He never did learn to listen to someone who knows better."

There’s for sure one time in canon where Robert accuses Adam of lying to him (when he finds Adam’s pay stubs, the night of the concussion) and I feel like there are others, but I may be misremembering. In any case I find it an interesting accusation – because it probably is true at least sometimes, Adam would have to lie to his parents in some situations. But there are probably others where he isn’t lying, and that’s an interesting bit of psychology to me, this idea that his parents might think of him as a fundamentally dishonest person -- because they HAVE to think of him that way, because they cannot reconcile “Adam tells the truth” with “we are decent human beings.”

Beyond that: this paragraph got reworked about ten thousand times, and usually that means that I’m never really happy with the result (because maybe one of the 9,999 other ways was slightly better, because maybe 10,001st time was the charm) but this? I’m pretty happy with this paragraph. It’s awful in exactly the way I wanted this scene to be awful.

"Yeah, I'm sure it would have been really convenient for you if he'd just made himself stop existing," Ronan spits. "It would have been pretty great for him if that shitbag had gone to jail."

"Right," she says. "He goes off the jail. Makes a dollar a day. Gets out with a record and now no one'll hire him. Now there's no money coming in, all on account of a couple of bruises, that would've been better for Adam?"

The reason this scene was so hard to write, which was also the whole reason I WANTED to write this scene at all, was that it meant getting into her head and explaining what the abuse looked like, to her. What story does she tell herself about her husband hitting her son? How could she allow it to happen, for years? How does she live with herself? I wanted to get her point of view across, not to justify it, but just to make her an actual person. I didn’t want her to be a cartoon-moustache-twirling villain.

(I suppose I could have had a version of her that had realized what they’d done to Adam was wrong, but that’s so far out of line with the rest of the tone and plot of this story that it literally only occurred to me now, months after I finished the story and months more since I started it. That’s not interesting to me.)

She absolutely believes what she’s saying here: a couple of bruises are better than starvation. On its face, that’s a reasonable sentence! But oh, how convenient it is that she plays down the extent of the abuse; how convenient it is to pretend that those were the only two options; how convenient that Adam doesn’t get to express a preference between those choices.

"Having nothing would have been better for Adam than having you."

She shakes her head, unfazed. "That right there tells me you've never had nothing."

I think it’s reasonable to assume that she grew up poor, which makes this another of those uncomfortable parallel moments between Adam and his mom. Ronan has absolutely heard Adam point it out to him before, when he unintentionally shows off his privilege.

"If you were such a great fucking mom you could've taken him and left."

She doesn't answer right away. Ronan doesn't want to give her any space to feel comfortable in, to come up with these lies, but he can't force any more words out. His whole mind is one blaring siren, lights and sound, emergency emergency emergency.

There’s a bit of advice I’ve gotten in improv, that if you don’t know what else to do in a scene, you can just say how you, the actual improviser, feel in the moment: “I’m confused,” “I don’t understand,” “why are we doing this again?” Endow your character with those feelings.

I didn’t want to give Ronan another line of dialogue here, but I didn’t know what he’d be thinking or why he’d let Adam’s mom just take her sweet time coming up with horrible things to say to him, so I just went with “Ronan doesn’t know what to say and he doesn’t like this and he can’t even make thoughts happen.”

"You think you're gonna marry my boy?"

"Yes." He never figured he'd say that with so much hate. He never figured she'd be the first person to ask.

The whole “are you going to marry my son” bit of the conversation was something I knew was going to be in this scene basically since the moment I realized this scene was going to exist, but this exactly line about Adam’s mom being the first person to ask was one that just happened during writing. It was a complete surprise and I love it so much.

"You think he's perfect?"

Ronan clenches his jaw. Adam is a stubborn control freak with a temper and intimacy issues a mile wide. Ronan knows that, and he doesn't care; he doesn't need Adam to be perfect.

Adam and Ronan recognizing each other’s flaws is one of my absolute favorite things about the ship.

But he's not going to say that to her. Adam is a god compared to her. She should be walking door to door proselytizing for him. She should be proud of him.

When you’re listing things, you generally want to get stronger as you go through the list; if you’re e.g. writing a joke, you want the funniest item on the list to be the last one (unless the joke is that you’ve messed up the list; Leslie Knope’s “I gotta stop ending on that boring thing” is a good example). This one plays out the other way. The list of things gets more reasonable as it goes along, to emphasize how tragic it is that Adam’s mom cannot do this one very reasonable thing.

"You know what marriage is?" she asks. "It's picking a man and saying, I choose this one, even though he's not perfect. If you can't stay with him when he makes a mistake then you don't marry him."

Another moment where Adam’s mom puts words together in a way that is completely true and rational and yet also a horrifying nightmare sentence when you put it in context!

Everything stops.

He can't speak. He can't move. Every living part of him is blasted away by a scalding wave of outrage. His vision blurs out and Adam's mom fades out of existence -- and then it slams back into place, everything too sharp against his eyes, and she's still there.

He wants her to stop talking. He wants to strangle her so she has to stop talking. He wants to drag her through the streets while people throw things and scream her sins at her. He wants her to admit that she did something wrong. He understands, in a sudden, terrible way, why Adam doesn't expect his father to apologize, and he's shaking with all of the things he's not doing.

Oh my lord these paragraphs. THESE PARAGRAPH. I mean this whole scene was painstakingly forged one word at a time, like I was making chain mail or some shit, but THESE PARAGRAPHS probably took a week’s worth of afternoon commutes all on their own. The thing he’s reacting to is so horrifying, but at the same time, they’re just words; from the outside this just looks like a conversation, this looks like nothing. So I suppose some of the difficulty was in walking this line between too strong of a reaction and not strong enough of a reaction.

Also, just, is there a word for that medieval punishment kind of thing, where they drag you through the streets and yell at you and throw things at you? Is there? That sentence alone I changed every single word of so many times, fuck.

I do quite like that moment of Ronan better understanding Adam, though. That is, of course, the actual plot and character significance of this scene; getting inside of Adam’s mom’s head was an interesting puzzle for me, as a writer, to play with, but what actually matters is that Ronan comes away from this conversation really KNOWING something that before he could only know in an academic way, if that.

"You had to make a choice." His voice is harsh in his own ears, but she just looks bored with him. "And you picked the wrong one."

This bit of dialogue is another one that was written relatively early, compared to the rest of the scene, so I’m not sure why it took me so long to figure out that “you pick a man and stick with him” “well you picked the wrong one” sounds like Ronan is saying that Adam’s mom picked the wrong man to marry out of all of the potential men she could have married. It is SUPPOSED to mean, “you had to pick between your husband or your son, and you fucked up,” but I couldn’t really find a way of rephrasing it that made that clearer and that still flowed in the conversation. I consoled myself that readers would probably understand it, anyway. I had to trust you guys on this one.

#moi #not a fic #long post #comicsohwhyohwhy

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flipmeforward · 5 years ago

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fic: I’d marry you with paper rings (Nando/Quinn, NC-17)

Man, I don’t even know. I’m maybe writing a fic that’s forced slow burn, and I needed to write something light and easy. Mel’s Cricket Series has brought me so much joy and happiness during this weird and crappy spring, and when I read this post, I was like, yes, let’s write my obligatory crossdressing fic that i apparently write for every ship i ever write for, and this thing just ... happened.

@poindextears, thank you for letting me take your characters and have my wicked way with them. Also, I’m sorry.

Here’s this thing on ao3.

Nando would be lying if he said he wasn’t a little bit worried about the way Quinn has been behaving today. He’s not sure anyone else has picked up on it, but then again, no one else spends as much time as close to Quinn as Nando does. He doesn’t really know how to explain it, but if he had to, he thinks he’d describe Quinn as skittish today. He hasn’t shied away from Nando’s touch, really, but he has tensed up slightly every time Nando’s hand has reached below, like, shoulder level. It’s weird, Nando doesn’t like it.

Something about the check in at the hotel is taking longer than usual. Everyone else has already been sent off to their rooms, but Quinn is still talking with the guy behind the desk. He has to stand on his toes to properly reach up and it probably shouldn’t be as adorable as it is, but it’s not like Nando makes the rules. His boyfriend is adorable, that’s just the way it is. And, finally, his boyfriend is done being Team Manager. Nando sincerely hopes everyone will behave tonight, so he can have Quinn as his Boyfriend until they wake up tomorrow. He grabs their bags and starts heading along the corridor everyone else had gone into, but Quinn’s voice stops him.

“Sebastián. This way.” Nando turns around, and Quinn is standing by another corridor, reaching out a hand. Nando is confused, but where Quinn goes, he follows, so he walks over and takes his hand.

“Where are we going?” he asks as they head down the corridor towards an elevator.

“To our room, of course,” Quinn says, then starts humming a song Nando doesn’t recognize. Nando sighs, but he doesn’t ask any more questions. He’s learned a lot during his almost-four years at Samwell, and one of those things is when it’s just completely useless to try to get Quinn to talk when he doesn’t want to.

They take the elevator to the fourth floor, then Quinn leads them through corridors and around corners. There is no way Nando will be able to find his way out of here alone. He squeezes Quinn’s hand. Good thing he won’t have to.

Finally, Quinn stops in front of a door at the end of a hallway and taps the keycard against the lock. The door beeps, lets them in, and Nando barely has time to drop their bags on the floor before Quinn is on him, kissing him like they’ve been apart for weeks. Nando responds in kind, but he barely has time to put his hands on Quinn’s waist before Quinn pulls away.

“I’m going to take a shower,” he says. Nando looks at him, surprised. He doesn’t bother pointing out that it’s pretty useless to take a shower before they have sex, because Quinn knows that as well as he does. But, if Quinn is taking a shower now, that might mean he’s not up for sex, but that’s also weird, because between the two of them, Nando is usually the one who begs off. Not that it happens often (because hello), but when it does, it’s usually Nando.

That doesn’t mean he won’t respect Quinn’s wishes, though, of course he won’t try to talk Quinn into having sex with him. “Okay,” he says, and if he wasn’t already pressed against the door, he would take a step back. Instead, he shoves his hands into his pockets. Quinn reaches up to press a kiss to his jaw, then grabs his bag and locks himself in the bathroom. Nando stands by the door for a few seconds, confused by what just happened, before he grabs his own bag and moves further into the room.

There’s a double bed, which is standard for the two of them nowadays (Nando loves that he’s dating the team manager), a desk, a tv. Standard room. He drops his bag and starts to pull off his clothes, preparing for bed. It’s quick work, then he grabs the tv remote from the desk and lies down on the bed. He kicks the bedspread down and then starts to channel surf, with the sound of Quinn’s shower in the background.

A few minutes later, he hears Quinn coming out of the bathroom. Nando moves to grab his toiletry bag, his attention mostly on the tv, but he flicks one glance at Quinn and freezes.

“Uhm,” Nando says, then swallows. Quinn, his outrageously hot boyfriend, the love of his life, is standing in front of him wearing nothing but a sweatshirt. Nando’s sweatshirt. It’s a navy blue soft-washed thing that Nando barely recognizes, he hasn’t used it in a long while, which means Quinn probably dug through his closet to get it. Nando doesn’t mind, especially when this is the result. The sweatshirt is too big on Quinn, it reaches halfway down his thighs and the arms have been folded up to show his hands. At the neck, the opening is wide and shows Quinn’s collar bone. His hair is ruffled in the way he only allows it to be immediately after a shower, and Nando is going to explode with how much he loves Quinn. Also, he’s going to have to jerk off in the bathroom, because Quinn looking like this does things to Nando.

He takes a breath to steady himself and then stands up. His erection is showing and he knows it, but at least he no longer feels guilty at being turned on by the sight of his boyfriend looking like a wet dream.

“Get back on the bed,” Quinn says in a no bullshit voice. Nando is used to it by now.

“Baby, I just need to—”

“Sebastián. Get back. On the bed,” Quinn repeats, much sharper, and Nando’s dick twitches. He gets back on the bed.

“Are we gonna have sex?” he asks, because he needs to know. Quinn kneels on the bed and stares at him.

“Of course we’re going to have sex,” he says. “Did you think we weren’t?”

Nando shrugs. “I mean ...” he waves a hand towards the bathroom. Quinn rolls his eyes and crawls towards him.

“You’re an idiot,” he says, but the tone of his voice makes it sound like I love you.

Nando settles back on the bed and drags Quinn towards him, onto his lap. “I’m your idiot, though,” he says, wrapping his arms around Quinn’s waist and pressing his face into the curve of Quinn’s neck. He smells like soap, and his skin is still slightly damp from the shower, and Nando loves him so much. “I love you,” he says, because he needs to. He doesn’t need to see Quinn’s face to know he’s smiling.

“I love you, too,” Quinn says, and then he grinds down on Nando’s lap, reminding him that while his boyfriend is the sweetest man he’s ever met, he’s also a sexual deviant who’s going to break Nando one of these days, honestly. “Not having sex,” Quinn continues under his breath as he settles into a much-too slow rhythm. “As if. I even flirted with the reception staff to get us a room without anyone next door.”

“Baby,” Nando groans, equal parts impressed and jealous. Given the chance, Quinn is loud during sex, and between the Haus and Quinn’s dorm, there aren’t many chances. They didn’t even realize just how much being loud was a thing until this past summer, when they’d spent hours in Nando’s childhood bed, both sisters and Mama out of the house. Nando’s dick twitches just at the thought of Quinn not having to hold back anything tonight. If he’d had any lingering tiredness in him after the game, it’s fully and thoroughly gone by now.

He slides his hands from Quinn’s waist, down under the sweatshirt to grab his ass, but stops when his fingers don’t meet the soft cotton or bare skin he’s expecting. He lifts the hem of the shirt to get a look and holy fucking fuck Nando is going to die, and when his Mama finds out the cause of death she’s going to revive him only to kill him again, but it will be worth it.

Quinn, his beautiful, sexy, adorable Quinn, is sitting on his lap, draped in Nando’s sweater, and lace panties. They’re a dark, rich purple, contrasting beautifully to Quinn’s winter pale skin, and Nando doesn’t know what to do. He wants to look at Quinn forever but he also wants to put his hands and his mouth all over him and worship him. Also fuck him.

“Is this—okay?” Quinn asks, suddenly unsure when Nando is having a minor breakdown. It makes Nando pull himself together, a little bit, enough to realize that there is no way he can let Quinn be even the tiniest bit unsure if Nando likes this or not. He moves his hands up to cup Quinn’s face and kisses him, trying to put everything into it. They usually discuss it at least twice before they bring anything new into bed, but Quinn hasn’t said a word about this, so Nando gets why he’s worried, but Nando also has absolutely no complaints whatsoever. And it’s not like it’s a completely new thing, Nando hasn’t exactly been discreet when they prep for Rhodey’s shows, but they still haven’t discussed it, not in this context. So yeah, Nando gets why Quinn might be worried, so he really, really tries to convey with his kiss how much he absolutely doesn’t mind, how much he loves it, how turned on he is just by the short glimpse he caught. Which—Nando should do something about that. He needs to see.

“Wha—Sebastián!” Quinn yelps as Nando grabs him at the waist again and flips him over, onto his back. He straddles Quinn’s thighs and pushes the sweatshirt halfway up his stomach, and then he just—looks. It’s maybe the best thing Nando has seen in his entire life. Quinn is hard, and some part of Nando will probably never get over the fact that he brings out this reaction in Quinn.

Nando drags a hand down Quinn’s stomach, lets his fingers ghost feather light over Quinn’s cock, over the lace.

“Say something,” Quinn says finally, and Nando realizes that he hasn’t, in fact, said anything for several minutes.

“Oh my god,” he breathes, stroking his palm over Quinn’s cock, feeling it twitch against him. “Quinn, baby, you—you’re the hottest fucking thing I’ve ever seen,” Nando says, and Quinn blushes. “I love you so much,” he says, again, because he has to. He rubs harder against Quinn, and Quinn responds by arching up against his hand and letting his head fall back, exposing his neck. Nando leans forward and presses a kiss against the flushed skin, then opens his mouth and sucks a mark there. It’s winter, Quinn wears scarfs all the time anyway. Quinn moans, and Nando can’t help but preen a little. He is the cause of that moan.

Nando’s own dick is rock hard in his boxers, and he groans when his hips jerk down on their own accord, making him grind against Quinn’s thigh.

“What do you want, baby?” he asks, because seriously, Nando wants everything right now, he can’t decide, Quinn’s going to have to call the shots here. Quinn’s hands clench where he’s gripping Nando’s sides, and he draws in a sharp breath.

“You—your mouth, please,” Quinn says, almost whines.

“Yeah?” Nando works his way up Quinn’s neck with kisses, then finally reaches his mouth and kisses him properly. “You want me to suck you off?”

“Yes, fuck,” Quinn breathes out against Nando’s mouth, and okay, if Quinn’s already cursing, this won’t take long.

Well. It won’t take long the first time.

Nando kisses Quinn for another couple of seconds before he tears himself away and crawls down the bed again. Quinn is still wearing the sweatshirt, and Nando is in no hurry to take it off him, he loves seeing Quinn in his clothes.

He also loves seeing Quinn in lace panties, which was not something Nando expected to learn about himself, but he’s not sorry at all about that revelation. Quinn’s cock is straining against the purple lace, and it must be a boy model, because there seems to be more room for that than what Nando would’ve expected. He wonders if Quinn bought them the last time he was in Boston, or if he ordered them online, if he has more, and which colors, and—God, Nando is about to die.

He knows they will talk about this, later, so for now, he just bends down and presses a soft kiss to the tip of Quinn’s cock. Quinn draws a sharp breath, and when Nando glances to the side, he sees that his hands are gripping the sheets. Nando would absolutely love to drag this out for hours, but he’s too turned on, Quinn is too turned on, they actually need to sleep at some point, so in what should be considered an act of mercy, Nando pulls the front of the panties down enough to get Quinn’s cock out, then takes half of it in his mouth in one go.

“Fuck,” Quinn shouts, as if it’s been punched out of him. This is why they take advantage of hotel rooms.

Nando smiles, sinks further down, takes more of him in his mouth. After three years, he likes to consider himself an expert on sucking (Quinn’s) cock, and he really, really likes doing it. He loves the feeling of Quinn’s cock in his mouth, loves that he can render Quinn into this whimpering mess with just his mouth, loves that he can glance up and watch his reaction, loves when Quinn sometimes tangles his fingers in Nando’s curls and presses him down, never forcefully, but enough that Nando gets the hint. He even likes the taste, which wasn’t something he expected, but sure does make things a lot easier.

He likes it even more when Quinn is not fresh from the shower, like when they meet up after Quinn has had an intensive dance rehearsal. He hasn’t dared to say that out loud yet, though.

When Nando pulls off to breathe, Quinn whines. It’s such a difference from his normal, composed self, and Nando feels privileged that he gets to see it, gets to draw it out of him. He has to reach down and stroke himself a couple of times, just to take the worst of the edge off, and for the briefest of moments, he’s tempted to just kneel and jerk off until he comes all over Quinn. It passes when he takes Quinn’s cock back in his mouth. He swallows around him, takes more of him, and Quinn groans.

“Fuck, you’re so good at this,” Quinn pants, and Nando smiles around him. He slides his hands down Quinn’s thighs, grabs him behind the knees and pulls his legs up to rest on Nando’s shoulders. It gives him better access to grab Quinn’s ass, to run his palms over the lace there, and Quinn moans, jerks his hips up to fuck into Nando’s mouth.

It takes just another few seconds of enthusiastic sucking from Nando before Quinn’s hand settles on his neck, a sure sign that he’s close. Nando sucks harder, runs his tongue up the length, squeezes Quinn’s ass again, and that’s enough. Quinn grabs his neck harder, a warning, and Nando has no plans to pull off but appreciates it anyway, swallows easily as Quinn comes in his mouth, all while Quinn keeps up a steady stream of fuck and oh god.

He pulls off when Quinn tugs at the curls at the back of his neck and looks up to grin at him. He presses a kiss to the inside of Quinn’s thigh before he crawls up again, hovering over Quinn, covering him, as he bends down to kiss him.

Quinn kisses him back lazily, licks into his mouth, licks the taste of himself out of Nando’s mouth, and it probably shouldn’t be as hot as it is.

They stay like that for a while, but despite Nando’s fairly rigorous training routine, he still can’t hold himself up on his arms like this for long. He swings one leg over Quinn so he can kneel beside him, kisses Quinn one more time, then gets off the bed to grab the lube.

During their first spring together, when they started getting intimate, they’d gone to the student health center for STI testing. They’d both been clean, not that Nando hadn’t expected anything else, but his Mama didn’t raise no fool. They still use condoms sometimes, because cleanup is easier, but after some experimenting, they’d found they both enjoy the sloppy, filthy part of it. So Nando grabs the lube, no condom, and gets back on the bed.

“Flip over,” he says and takes off his underwear, Quinn doesn’t obey, instead he kneels on the bed and brings his arms up around Nando’s neck and angles his face up to kiss him. Nando wraps his arms around him and drags him closer, settles one hand on his ass and cups Quinn’s head with the other.

Quinn’s crotch rubs against Nando’s thigh, and his dick is still hanging out. It looks a tiny bit silly, but feels incredibly sexy, and Nando is so, so glad that multiple orgasms come easy for his boyfriend. It allows for situations like these, where he can suck him off and then fuck him, and it’s—amazing.

Nando moves his hand a little, puts his fingers against the crack of Quinn’s ass, presses gently against the lace, and—He draws a sharp breath and looks down at Quinn.

“Baby,” he says, unsure, and Quinn’s shy smile is answer enough. Nando is going to die. “Did you—Have you—All day?” Nando asks, incapable of complete sentences. Quinn nods. Him shying away from Nando’s touches all day suddenly makes sense. Nando quickly thinks through what they’ve been doing today and groans, then presses harder against the base of the plug that Quinn has had in his ass all fucking day. Through breakfast, the bus ride, the game, everything.

“How are you even real?” Nando asks and moves his hands so they’re inside the panties instead. He doesn’t allow Quinn to answer, kisses him instead, grabs the base of the plug and twists it.

Nando is ... well equipped. Quinn loves it, so it’s not an issue or anything, but it does require some preparation. Butt plugs aren’t a new thing for them, and Quinn has worn them for a longer period before, but during those times, they’ve both been in on it, and it’s been low-stakes situations like just hanging around campus or maybe during a home game. He’s never had one in for this long, in secret, while just going around his business.

“Sebastián,” Quinn moans, getting impatient. “Please, just—”

“Okay, baby,” Nando murmurs, pressing another kiss to his lips before looking over Quinn’s shoulder, down his back, to where his hands are straining against the lace, pressed against Quinn’s ass. “God,” Nando breathes. He pulls down the waistband of the panties, settling it just below the curve of Quinn’s ass. When Quinn makes a motion as if to pull them off, Nando grips his ass harder. “No,” he says. “Leave them on.”

Quinn gives him a dirty smile, as if he isn’t the one wearing lingerie. Nando smacks his ass, once, and Quinn gasps and goes absolutely still. They rarely do that, because Nando isn’t really a fan, but Quinn loves it. Nando takes advantage of Quinn’s stillness to reach for the lube, then sucks another mark on his neck as he gives him another smack.

“Fuck,” Quinn moans, pressing against him, trying to get impossibly closer. “Baby, please.”

Nando presses soothing kisses against the mark he just made, simultaneously uncapping the lube and coating the fingers on one hand. With the other, he gently drags the plug out of Quinn’s ass. Quinn moans, and Nando kisses him, swallows the sound, even though he doesn’t really have to, here, in this room. He presses two fingers in, easily thanks to the plug, and god, Nando hopes he never gets used to this, never takes this for granted.

He adds another finger, and it’s only thanks to the fact that he’s so much bigger than Quinn that this position is even possible. He can’t actually fuck him in this position, though. Nando pushes Quinn away, gently, but can’t decide which way he wants him. Quinn on his back means he can keep the panties on, but Nando sort of wants to see his face.

Quinn, as always, seems to read the dilemma on his face. “I can wear them again,” he says, gently, as if that statement doesn’t break Nando’s brain. At least it helps him make up his mind.

“On your back,” he says, and Quinn grins at him as he obeys. He finally gets to take his underwear off, throws them carelessly onto the floor, spreads his legs.

Nando grabs the bottle of lube and moves to kneel between Quinn’s legs, again. It’s definitely one of his favorite places in the world. He lubes his dick, quickly, adds more lube to his fingers to press into Quinn with a couple of fast pumps. Lining up his cock with Quinn’s hole, he meets Quinn’s gaze, raises an eyebrow in silent question and gets a nod in return. Nando starts to push in, slowly. This part is always the hardest (hah), because there’s no getting around that Nando is big and Quinn is small and no matter how many times they do this, it’s not like his ass will stretch. Not that Nando would want it to, because this feels so good, but it wouldn’t exactly hurt if they could do it a little bit faster sometimes.

A minute later, Nando is fully inside of Quinn, and leans down to kiss him. He pauses there, waits patiently until Quinn moves his hips a little, fucking himself onto Nando’s cock. That’s when Nando moves back to kneeling between his legs, carefully pulling out almost all the way before pushing in again.

Quinn is still wearing the fucking sweatshirt, and if Nando’s brain wasn’t already broken, it would definitely break at the sight of him like this, with his head thrown back, throat exposed, one hand around his cock and the other clenched in the sheets until Nando reaches for it and tangles their fingers together. It’s such a soft gesture, feels at odds with what they’re currently doing, but it also feels right.

Little by little, Nando increases his pace, until he has to let go of Quinn’s hand and grab his hips to keep them steady. Quinn has his legs wrapped around Nando’s waist, his heels digging into Nando’s ass, and it’s—perfect. It’s perfect, perfect, perfect, Nando is so happy, lucky, turned on, in love, he’s going to explode.

He slips during a thrust, just a little, but enough to change the angle, and Quinn’s responding moan is obscenely loud.

“Fuck, oh my god, honey, god, keep—there, please,” he moans, begs, and Nando does his best to keep fucking him from the slightly different angle. He’s close, he has been close since Quinn got out of the bathroom dressed like that, and it’s not going to take a lot more for him to—

“Quinn, baby, I’m—,” he stutters, past being able to make sense, but Quinn gets it, of course he gets it. He clenches around Nando’s cock, jerks himself faster, brings his other hand down to stroke his balls. His fingertips brush against Nando’s dick and it’s like his fingers are made of electricity, the tiny touch sparks something deep inside of Nando and he just, it feels like he just combusts from within.

Nando is pretty sure his brain leaves him for a moment, because when he comes back to himself, he’s laying on top of Quinn, his face pressed against Quinn’s neck, his cock still inside him, and his breaths coming in heaving gasps. “Fucking hell,” he pants, and feels more than hears Quinn’s responding weak chuckle. He feels Quinn’s heavy breaths, feels his come sticking to his stomach and seeping into the sweater, feels the satisfaction that settles on both of them.

Quinn drags his hands out from between them and settles them on Nando’s back instead, and Nando doesn’t care that they’re sticky, he needs a shower anyway. Quinn does, too.

“I love you,” Nando says, turning his head to kiss Quinn, slow and indulgent, before he kneels up again to pull out.

“I, ah, I love you, too,” Quinn replies, grimacing a little.

“Sorry,” Nando whispers, but Quinn just smiles back at him. It’s par for the course, and it’s worth it.

Nando lies down beside Quinn and wraps an arm around him, pulling him close. “Thank you,” he says, pressing a kiss to Quinn’s mouth, then another.

“For what?”

Nando shrugs. “For getting us this room. For being awesome. For ...” He trails off, glances quickly towards where Quinn threw the panties earlier, and Quinn grins, understanding.

“I take it you like them?” he says, aiming for innocence and failing completely.

“I love them. I love you,” Nando says, and he doesn’t even know how many times he’s said it tonight, but it can’t be too many because there’s no such thing. He grabs Quinn and rearranges them until Quinn is laying on top of him. Nando strokes his back through the sweater, slowly moves his hand further down until he’s cupping Quinn’s ass. He presses his fingers gently against Quinn’s hole, sticky with lube and Nando’s come, and can’t help but smile when Quinn hisses.

“Sebastián. I’m too tired,” he says, and Nando kisses the part of him closest to his mouth, which happens to be the top of Quinn’s ear.

“I know,” he says. He isn’t aiming for a third round, he just can never help himself with this, dreams of a day when he gets to just lay Quinn out on a bed and see how many orgasms he can give him, what Quinn will sound like at the end, how he will look, and okay, Nando needs to stop right now before he does want a third round. “I can’t wait until we get to do this every day,” he says, a smile on his face like there always is when he thinks about them living together.

“Every day?” Quinn replies, and Nando hears his smirk. “Sounds optimistic.”

“Oh shut up,” Nando says, pressing two fingers inside of Quinn just to spite him. “You know it will happen, at least in the beginning.”

“True,” Quinn concedes, obviously torn between tearing himself away from Nando’s teasing and just giving into it. Nando makes the decision for him, because they do really have to sleep. He drags his fingers out, wipes them on the sweater and then gently pushes Quinn off of him.

“I need to shower,” he says, stepping down onto the floor and holding out a hand to Quinn. “Wanna join?”

“Why yes, Mr Hernandez,” Quinn says, taking his hand. “I’d love to.”

Nando loves him so fucking much.

#poindextears #omgcp fic #you gotta read up on the crickets #quindo #i don't know how to tag this thing #fmf fic

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sunnytumbies · 5 years ago

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I'm somewhat confident that Amy's stress baking enables one or more of the other characters to then Stress Eat the baking, which could lead to Tummy Fic (tell me if I'm right and also you don't have anon asks turned on. c; might get more asks if you hit that switch!)

Whoops! Anons, you are now free to enter–sorry bout that!

So, funny story: Tiny, you are right–you are so right, in fact, that I decided to write a lil fill for this! I had like 500 words written and then accidentally closed the tab :’), and for whatever reason my response was even more determined writing to finish it. Long story short, it’s now a /4391 word monster/ that I’m not even all that proud of, but I’m posting it anyway! It’s gonna be confusing & maybe a headache for me later because this is happening later in the story than the first “major story event” fic I’ll be posting but...here we are.

Content warning: this fic involves dysphoria, mentions of menstruation, self-loathing, and binge eating as a response to stress. Please be mindful should you choose to read!

___________________________________________________________

Amy hums lightly to herself, dusting the last of the madeleines with powdered sugar, breathing in the comforting aromas, honey and lemon mingling with cinnamon and apple, almond and vanilla, chocolate and bread. She can’t pretend that this was a good decision, can’t act like she would not have possibly benefit more from a day of studying than a day of baking, but the knots in her chest have finally started to loosen, and it’s hard to take that as anything but a win. She plates the madeleines and slides them into the last remaining patch of free space on the L-shaped countertop, clutching the notebook that belonged to her mother close to her chest.

It’s not that Amy only ever bakes French desserts. She adores the challenge of baklava with its stubborn phyllo dough, loves the thrill and the spectacle of a good Baked Alaska; it’s just that sometimes, she needs to hear her mother’s voice in the only way she knows how–baking the way Maman taught her, dutifully reading the advice scrawled in the margins of her recipe notebook in eccentric cursive, cleaning as she cooks (”Mieux vaut prévenir que guérir, Amelie,” she’ll find herself muttering at times in a poor imitation of her mother. It translates to “It is better to prevent than to heal,” which she thinks is sort of intense as far as wisdom about cleanliness goes, but then, she’s never forgotten it). Professors will likely always butcher her last name, flattening the syllables into something harsh and ugly; classmates will continue to express their envy at the ease with which they assume she sails through her foreign language requirement, oblivious to the unique heartache of struggling to write in a language that flows from her lips with more ease than English sometimes; but no one can take this from her, her mother’s recipes in her mother’s own words, the familiar tastes and smells of home.

It started with the croissants, shaping the dough she’d prepped earlier this week in preparation to make pains au chocolat--she can’t stop her lips from quirking up in a small, proud smile, now, looking at how perfectly they rose, how flaky the croissants are, how tantalizingly the smell of chocolate and freshly-baked bread is wafting off of them, how they glisten with brushed-on butter. But when her eyes glanced over the mostly-full bottle of fruity olive oil in the pantry, how could she resist whipping up a lemon curd tart, with its buttery almond crust and rich lemon custard filling? And it would have simply been silly to waste the lemon zest she had leftover from the tart--not when she could make the madeleines, tiny delicious cakes sweetened with honey and brown sugar, the tang of the lemon zest cutting through the sweetness in the most delicious way, complimented by the dusting of powdered sugar. Then, she thought, that was an awful lot of citrus--she simply had to offset it with a quick apple mille-feuille, the autumnal scent of roasted apples, maple syrup, and apple brandy making her wistful for October. But wait--no mille-feuille was complete without the bourbon whipped cream on top, and shouldn’t poor lactose intolerant Cal have plenty of options too? Besides, a simple spiced bread wouldn’t take too long, and the mixture of star anise, ginger, and cinnamon, sweetened with honey and rife with dried apricots and plums, would be sure to make a delicious sweet toast for breakfast.

Even still, it wasn’t truly over until she noticed that several cartons of eggs--which she, for obvious reasons, tended to buy in bulk--were set to expire soon, and it would certainly be foolish to waste so much money--really, she hardly had a choice! She made chocolate macarons with orange ganache, a cherry buttermilk clafoutis; she made kouign-amann, with its buttery dough and sugary crust, and, in a desperate bid to eat through the eggs, another batch of macarons, this time with raspberry-rose buttercream. Struck with a flash of inspiration, she used the egg yolks she’d set aside while whipping the whites into stiff peaks fit for a meringue to make toasted-flour sablé, a sort of moist little sugar cookie, and while she was at it threw in a batch of snickerdoodles--cookies were easy to both make and get rid of in bulk, and besides, they were Cal’s favorite. Lastly, she decided to tackle a chocolate pound cake--quatre-quarts au chocolat de juliette, her mother’s handwriting rebuked her, along with an all-caps reminder to bake it in a bain-marie, PAS au four!!!!!. It made Amy laugh a little, but she couldn’t deny that the water-bath made for a much richer, much more moist final product than the oven.

She feels a brief rush of shame, looking over it all--it’s truly an improbable amount of baking she’s done, here--but her heart is full, her back aching in a satisfying, productive way. If nothing else, she’s made the house smell like home and has ensured that anyone who enters can leave full and satisfied. Finally, she removes her apron and checks her watch--perfect. She has about half an hour to get to work for her 8pm-midnight shift, a fairly non-intensive desk position at one of the campus libraries, and she’ll more likely than not have enough free time to look over her chemistry notes. As for the baked goods, she opts to leave them out, but takes a few moments to write out sticky notes (“dairy free! Come right in, Cal!”; “full of dairy! Cals beware!”), and smiles gently as she thinks of Cal coming home to a warm kitchen and plenty to eat. “That boy is too damn skinny,” she mumbles to herself fondly, and flicks off the kitchen light, leaving the one above the oven on to bathe the kitchen in a warm, welcoming glow.

Cal is not having a good day.

He shivers as another gust of wind blows what feels like through him, making his teeth chatter as he attempts to sink even lower into his hoodie. The slumping motion does not agree with his cramping lower belly, and he groans, straightening back up with an arm looped around his stomach.

Any day at this time of month for him is a difficult one. He knows for a fact that he “passes,” but he still feels uncomfortably seen, feels like he has to hide himself from view as much as possible. It certainly doesn’t help that his skin hurts, that his belly bloats and his bound chest becomes sore, that despite the fact that he no longer bleeds, he gets all the associated symptoms, yeah, thanks for that, genetics. Even so, Cal isn’t new to this, exactly, and he can deal with the cramping, can even handle the accompanying dysphoria like a champ, but today has been extraordinarily awful. He couldn’t sleep last night, feeling in turns too hot and too cold, and barely made it to his bio class this morning; all the coffee machines were down in the dining hall, meaning his eyes were burning with exhaustion by the time he was halfway through bio, let alone his other two classes of the day; perhaps most damning at all, the paper he’s been counting on being due next week is actually due this week, causing him to spend an extra few hours in the library after class, barely awake, forcing himself to get something, anything onto the page; and, the cherry on top of it all, he missed the last bus home, hence tramping home now in the dark and the rain. More than one car has splashed him as it’s passed, and his jeans are practically soaked through.

He’s cold, he’s exhausted, he barely even made a dent in the paper, and his fucking stomach hurts, the cramps now joined by an anxious knot; as much as he wants to take comfort from the fact that he can see the apartment complex getting steadily closer, he also knows that he’s going to be home alone, and something about that just does not sit well with him at the moment that Cal doesn’t want to analyze, thank you very much.

He shivers his way up the stairs leading to the apartment, down the exceedingly long corridor, through the front door, and is almost immediately assailed by both a rush of welcome warmth and a rush of smells so delicious and overpowering that he knows immediately that today was a stress-baking day for Amy. Something drains out of Cal then, equal parts tension and restraint, the anxious buzzing of his thoughts thrown off by the sheer number of baked goods spread across the counter top. He lets his backpack fall to the floor with a thud. His stomach rumbles--he ate today, but not well--and he sort of knows he’s doomed when he catches the scent of chocolate, as well as when his eyes land on a plate of snickerdoodles (which very much does not make a lump rise in his throat, okay, it’s whatever, it doesn’t matter, Amy made his favorite cookie for him in the middle of her own stress-fueled baking marathon, it’s whatever). Amy will be home soon. Quincy, too, at some point. He’ll be fine. He just needs to do what he can until then, and there’s no shortage of snacks to keep him busy while he waits.

Shocking no one less than him, Cal has many, many regrets, and at least half of them are baked goods he has put into his body over the last hour. He whimpers a little, oh-so-gently palming his belly, which has distressingly little give even when he ventures to apply a little more pressure with his fingertips. He doesn’t think he’s ever felt this bloated, heavy with food and swollen with almond milk, and he’d be lying if he said he’s not fighting tears, beyond ashamed to be in this state: slumped sitting on the floor, back supported by the side of the counter, shirt riding up to expose the pink flesh of his belly. He has to swallow thickly a few times, imagining the sugary sludge that’s surely squelching through his insides right now, trying to force back a dangerous burp that squeezes out anyway and leaves the taste of honey and cinnamon in the back of his mouth. He tried to be good, and that’s maybe what sucks the most. He started with a few snickerdoodles, ostensibly the only dessert on the counter that had been made for him, unable to hold back a little groan of pleasure at the taste, buttery and comforting and complemented perfectly by the crunch of cinnamon and sugar. He had four before pouring himself a tall glass of almond milk, chasing a few more cookies with it before deciding to investigate the irresistible scent of chocolate wafting from the plate of croissants. The chocolate might be a bit much for his lactose intolerance, he decided, and opted for two thick slices of the spiced bread instead, toasted and slathered with ghee. He swore they tasted like fall, like tramping through leaves and Halloween costumes when he was young. Something about filling his stomach after being so hungry and uncomfortable all day, recklessly, indulgently, eased the tightness of his chest, until he could scarcely even feel the chill from his still-damp jeans.

He had already begun to feel rather full, but his interest was still piqued by the croissants, and he hadn’t even tried the little sugary-looking roll things, or the macaroons, or the cake--Cal squeezes his eyes shut, now, swallowing hard, struggling to even think about how much he’s eaten, but unable to completely erase the contrast from his mind between the overflowing countertop when he first arrived and the countertop now, an alarmingly high number of the cluttered plates more empty than not. All that really matters, he guesses, is that at some point filling his tummy began to hurt more than help, and he kept doing it anyway, and now his cramps have merely been replaced with sickly twinges and upset burbles.

He tries to take a deep breath, which hitches as an ominous gurgle bubbles from the top to the bottom of his packed belly, and the tears he’s been clamping down on start to roll down his cheeks. He can’t do this, not alone, at least, and Amy’s shift still has 3 hours to go--they must have just barely missed each other. Part of him knows that he will probably feel worlds better if he simply allows himself to throw up, but he can’t handle that, not right now. He cradles his aching stomach for a moment, one trembling hand cupped under his lower belly, bloated and hot, and one resting on the hard little bloat of his tummy, even that feather-light touch ushering up a series of strained burps. After another moment of feeling his stomach contents swirl and slosh uncomfortably inside him, the nausea and misery outweigh his pride, and he hesitantly lets go of his aching stomach, swiping at his tears and pulling out his phone.

I...fucked up, he texts her, and sends it before he can think twice about it. She replies almost instantly, one of his favorite things about Amy: ?????????????And a moment later, while he’s still figuring out where to begin: everything okay, honey?

The fragile control Cal has over his emotions abruptly slips at that, and he lets out a choked sob, swallowing hard when the motion upsets his tummy further. It hurts so fucking much, but Amy, Amy who bakes his favorites even in the middle of her own mini-crisis, Amy who takes the time to write adorable little sticky notes oriented around Cal’s dietary restrictions, Amy who calls everyone in the world honey because she cares about everyone in the goddamn world, Amy the literal human ball of sunshine--just, fucking Amy, okay?

Yeah. I mean. I’m safe, but I’m not okay. I… Cal doubles over as a cramp twists deep in his belly, panting a little. Maybe it would be easier to just let himself be sick. You baked...a lot. I had a bad day.

:((((( did u see my notes???? what’s going on??????

Cal has to blink hard against the tears at that, a new layer of guilt joining the anxiety and the shame of all he’s eaten. Stress-baking or not, this all had to have taken Amy a few hours, and he’d eaten right through a fair amount of almost everything.

I’m sorry. I did see your notes. It’s not lactose, I just ate a /lot/ and I feel sick and I don’t know what to do

A moment later, his phone buzzes with a call. It’s Amy, of course.

“H-hey,” he manages, sniffing, and then hiccups just before a deep burp gurgles up from his churning belly, clamping a hand over his mouth for a moment as his gorge rises with it.

“Cal, honey,” Amy says, sounding so fucking sad for him. It’s not like she’s never seen the fallout of his stress-binging before. “How much did you eat?”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Cal says hoarsely, his throat burning from stubbornly swallowing back stomach acid. “I’m just nauseous and sick and--and—” He falters, feeling like a child. “And I just really had a bad day, like a really bad day, Amy, and I know your day wasn’t so good either or you wouldn’t be stress-baking but I just, I’m so fucking tired, and my paper is due and—” He gags, suddenly, and has to take a moment to collect himself, hyper-aware of Amy’s concerned silence on the other end of the line-- “and I can’t do this alone,” he finally manages, voice cracking, and it is only the knowledge that openly weeping would send him over the edge right now that keeps him from dissolving into exhausted tears.

“I’m so sorry, Cal. I wish I could be there,” Amy murmurs soothingly, and it’s almost, almost like she’s there. “If I could leave work I’d do it in a heartbeat, but I’m going to call Quincy for you, okay?”

Cal’s heart squeezes at that, half-anxiety, half-hope, and maybe something else, too, a deep sense of being known--Amy knows that Cal knows that she can’t leave work. Amy knows that there’s only one other person that he’d want. Amy knows that he can’t--because of anxiety, because of what he sees as a low stakes problem relative to Quincy’s very high-stakes life, because, because, because--reach out to him himself when he’s like this. “Okay,” he whispers, and hope she hears the gratitude in it.

“Of course,” she says, so warmly that it makes Cal’s heart ache a little. “Hang in there, okay? Try to stay calm for me. I’ll let you know when he’s coming.”

“Love you,” he mumbles, and lets his phone clatter to the floor as soon as he hears the beep that means she’s hung up, clutching at his belly, feeling his stomach lurch and rumble. He’s so fucking full. He’s such a fucking idiot.

Some time later, Quincy comes for him.

Cal startles when the door creaks open, then whimpers a little at the resulting complaints of his stomach. There’s just so much pressure, his stomach tight and hot as though nothing is moving at all, though with all that he feels burbling against his palm, that can’t possibly be true. Quincy looks a little frantic in the doorway before his eyes come to rest on Cal, still curled up pitifully on the floor, both hands pressed gently against his bloated stomach.

“Oh—” Quincy breathes, shutting the door behind him, crossing the space between them in an instant and crouching in front of Cal. “God, Cal, Amy scared me half to death. Are you alright?”

“I’m—” Cal has to stop and breathe, composing himself as a wave of nausea crashes over him, his stomach squelching unpleasantly. All at once, he realizes that he’s no longer alone, that perhaps even if he should keep suppressing everything, he no longer wants to, and he no longer cares if he’s sick, he just wants to feel better, wants to be in his bed, wants to be warm and comfortable and safe--all at once, he’s doubling over his own lap, sobbing his heart out, barely even registering the flicker of amusement he’d ordinarily feel at Quincy’s eyes going comically round behind his glasses. His stomach aches, pain ringing throughout his abdomen at the movement, and before he can process much more than that a warm palm folds itself over his distended stomach, firmly enough to quiet the cramping there, but lightly enough to keep from exacerbating the nausea.

“Cal,” Quincy says, in that low, soothing voice of his, “I am so sorry that you’re hurting, and I’m going to make that go away, but to get you feeling better, I have to get you off the floor. I can’t imagine that you are ready to move just now?”

“No,” Cal breathes, his usual shyness dominated by hours of physical discomfort. “Please, just—” Tears dribble down his cheeks, his lack of sleep and general exhaustion beginning to catch up with him.

Quincy seems to hear him anyway. “Okay, hey, heyheyhey, okay, that is perfectly fine. I’m here, alright? I’m here to help you feel better.”

Ever so gently, Quincy eases himself behind Cal, so that his back is supported by Quincy’s chest rather than the hard base of the kitchen counter. Equally gently, his arms wind around Cal’s waist, both hands coming to rest on his abused stomach. He applies pressure to the bloated space between Cal’s navel and his ribs, rubbing in broad, gentle strokes, almost immediately ushering up a deep belch that has Cal going slack with the smallest but most welcome measure of relief. Quincy is so damn warm, and his rough palm is heaven where it rests on his lower belly, supporting the bloat from below to take the strain off of his overfull stomach. His other hand moves from that space in the middle of his abdomen to his stomach, the noticeable overfull bulge where the organ ought to be, rubbing in gentle circles. The pressure is almost too much and Cal shifts to tell him so, succeeding only in ushering up several more rumbling belches, one right after the other, left gasping with the relief of it. He is still painfully aware of how full he is, packed utterly to the brim with food, but the release of trapped air is so needed and so lovely.

Quincy holds him like this for a while, coaxing up the occasional belch, paying extra attention to the twinges that make Cal groan with nausea. Cal finds his eyes watering again, this time with sheer gratitude for his dearest friends, for their kindness, for the quiet lack of judgement Quincy exhibits as he rubs his aching tummy. Eventually, Cal feels like he might be able to move without throwing up, and Quincy supports his weight with an arm around his waist as they make their way to Cal’s bedroom.

“I’ll be right back,” Quincy says after depositing Cal on the bed gently. “Amy said you’d want a hoodie and some shorts. How did she do?”

Cal smiles a little sadly, having trouble finding his voice, and Quincy barely misses a beat, busying himself retrieving one of Cal’s biggest hoodies and a soft pair of pajama shorts. “Either way, let’s give it a try. You should probably take your binder off--all that squeezing can’t be helping, and no wonder you’re shivering in those wet jeans!” He ducks into Cal’s bathroom for a moment, filling up the cup next to the sink with cold water from the tap, and offers it to Cal, making sure his shaking hands don’t cause a spill before he lets go. “Try to take some sips of that, okay? Trust me. We need to break up all that sugar.”

Cal can’t argue with that, nodding, and waits until Quincy lets the door swing mostly-shut behind him, taking the deepest breath he can manage. His stomach twinges as he bends over to put the water on his nightstand and lifts his arms to pull off his shirt. wriggling out of his binder, and he pants for a moment as the sudden release of pressure on his stomach causes the nausea to flare before it thankfully passes again. He puts on the hoodie, immediately comforted by the billowing fabric, and wriggles out of his jeans and into the pajama shorts as quickly as he can manage, forcing himself to take a measured sip of water. His stomach tightens around it, and he swallows hard.

“Hey,” Quincy says softly, knocking twice on the slightly-ajar door before pushing it completely open with his elbow. His hands are occupied with a tv tray, carrying a heating pad and a steaming mug of tea. “Don’t force it. You’re still very full.”

“Y-yeah,” Cal manages, finding his voice. “Tummy really hurts.”

“I know,” Quincy murmurs apologetically, offering Cal the heating pad. Cal practically melts when the heat makes contact with his sore belly, instantly beginning to soothe his cramping muscles, even working its magic on the fullness, just a little. “I’m sorry you’re hurting, Cal. I know you’re very full, but when you can, you should try to drink some water and this tea. It’s peppermint, so it should help with the nausea.”

Flicking off the overheard light in lieu of Cal’s carefully-hung string lights, Quincy leaves the mug of tea on the bedside table closest to Cal, spreading the quilt at the foot of the bed over him, and Cal instinctively lets his head drop onto Quincy’s shoulder when he climbs onto the bed beside him.

Cal nearly weeps again when Quincy reaches for his bloated tummy without being asked, resuming a soothing pattern, rubbing wide, sweeping circles over his abdomen, applying pressure to the bloated place beneath his ribs, to his tense sides, to the hard knot of his stomach. Each instance of carefully-applied pressure coaxes up a series of rumbling belches that Cal didn’t realize he was holding in, eventually freeing up enough room for him to sip at the tea.

“Amy will be home soon,” Quincy says after several moments. “How are you feeling?”

“Like an idiot who stuffed my face with sweets all afternoon,” Cal mumbles, still wrestling with guilt, and Quincy frowns as his belly emits an audible squelch, smoothing a hand over it in slow arcs. Cal drinks a bit more deeply at the tea, unable to withhold a sigh of relief as it begins to fill the burbly places in his tummy, blissfully soothing the ache.

“You aren’t an idiot, Cal,” Quincy says sincerely. “Amy says this sometimes happens when you get overwhelmed. You’re overwhelmed.”

Something about the sincerity in his voice makes something big and terrifying shift in Cal’s chest, and he abruptly puts down the mug of tea in favor of hiding his face in Quincy’s chest, narrow frame wracked with tired sobs. He dimly registers that at least his stomach doesn’t react poorly to the movement. “I am,” he manages eventually, as Quincy gently shushes him, stroking his belly as though to keep it calm. “I am so exhausted, Quince.”

“So rest,” Quincy says simply, “at least for now. And when Amy gets here, we’ll talk about what we’re going to do next. Okay?”

Cal sniffs, nodding, still hiding his face, and Quincy lets him, simply bringing his arms around him, smoothing his hands over Cal’s back. Against all odds, particularly the still-overpowering sense of fullness, Cal feels his eyelids drooping. All of a sudden, everything has caught up with him, and he can barely form a coherent thought. It has been a day, his belly is now more warm than upset, and Quincy is a very, very comfortable pillow.

“I’m gonna take that as a yes,” Quincy says, and Cal feels the rumble of his chest as he gives a low chuckle, too far gone at this point to respond. He’s going to have a lot to explain when he wakes up, but for now…

For now, Cal lays with his head on Quincy’s shoulder, arms looped around his neck, and Quincy pulls the quilt up around them. “I’ve got you,” Quincy murmurs, and the next thing Cal knows is blessed sleep.

#tiny-tum #perhaps it's for the better since i s2g that entire 500 words was the first sequence describing what amy baked but #i think they were like. better words!#i digress this is what we've got #Amy #Cal #Quincy #stuffing #stress eating #stress baking #belly rubs #dysphoria #side fic #answered #i think the reason im so unhappy with this is that i want quincy to be somewhat mysterious until the major fics are released but also i just #cant imagine anyone being super invested until they know more about these ppl #which is fair #but...yeah! hope ppl enjoy!#why am i so anxious about this

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