#more than he acknowledged me in the first two months when we SHARED A CLASS

[silvercaptain24]

Ugh.

[angeliicheartt]

🐬 "ᴘᴜʟʟ ʜɪᴍ ꜰᴏʀ ᴀ ᴄʜᴀᴛ!" — send a dialogue prompt and a character and i'll write a blurb!

I'M BACKKK<3 okok hear me out, what if, "you were supposed to be the one" with ur man shinsou hihi 🫶🏻

"ᴏᴜʀ ꜱᴘᴏᴛ."

includes: hitoshi shinso

fem!reader

a/n: ermie reader and toshi are third years in this.. hope u like >:) lowk giving toshi and aizawa the same trauma

you walked side by side with hitoshi, your hands wrapped around his tense arm. the setting sun making the walk’s atmosphere romantic if it weren’t for your nerves brewing a storm of anxiety in the pit of your stomach. 

the two of you were assisting with a semi-big case through your work studies with edgeshot. you were both briefed on the dangers of the mission and were told you could opt out, but the heroes had asked for the two of you to help. the two of you had decided to take on the case, due to the two of you only being a few months away from graduating. and after graduation you would be doing cases like these all the time, so why not get some experience when you can?

your face lit up as you realized where hitoshi was leading the two of you. the both of you approached the park bench where you first spoke to him. it was a small park near UA, only a few blocks to walk.

you were walking to school when you saw hitoshi feeding a stray cat, the cat content with sitting in his lap as it munched. you recognized him from when he fought midoriya at the sports festival, and you’d heard aizawa was training him to be able to transfer into class A.

from the moment you sat down next to him, hitoshi wouldn’t stop thinking of you, often getting himself tangled in his capture scarf during his training, much to aizawa’s dissatisfaction. you began to regularly leave early for school in hopes of finding him at the park, and more often than not you did. 

when the dorms were enforced, you continued to wake up early, going for the short walk to the park to find hitoshi, in his casual clothes, feeding the stray the two of you decided to name “sugar” due to her white coat.

and then hitoshi was admitted into class A for second year and the two of you became closer. you were the first classmate he called his friend, and unknown to you, he acknowledged you as his friend long before.

and sometime between second year’s start and now the two of you had entered a relationship, working alongside each other both in training and at your shared work study.

you sat with hitoshi on the sacred park bench, the tension leaving your body as you take in the familiar scene. the rosy hues of the transitioning sky blanketing the world in a pink hue. 

“we haven’t been here in a while, i thought it could calm our nerves for tomorrow,” hitoshi says as you interlink your hand with his, his lavender eyes peering down at you. 

“well you thought right, i’m much calmer than i was before,” you state, your lips quirking up into a grin and hitoshi returns it with his shy smile. “c’mon toshi.. I can’t still be flustering you like this,”

“you very much can, actually.” he mutters as his head dips to your shoulder, hiding his flushed face in your skin. you laughed at his actions, his heart stuttering at the sound. 

“when are you gonna admit you’re in love with me, hm? only plausible explanation for this shyness to still be around,” you tease, laughing as he scoffs into the skin of your neck. 

“when the time is right, i will.” he murmurs, his free hand moving to play with the ends of your hair as he leans his cheek against your shoulder. 

“well you’ve gotta do it here, this is our spot.” you say, this exact spot was where you’d really met hitoshi, where he’d asked you to be his girlfriend. it was your spot.

panic filled hitoshi as your mangled body laid only a few feet in front of that same park bench. the mission had gone wrong. hitoshi tried to piece together the pieces of knowledge he could muster from his cloudy head. the villain you guys were trying to take down had struck you midair, launching you all the way to your park. 

you gasped for breath as the gash across your torso seeped blood. your right arm was twisted at an unnatural angle, the sight unnerving. your left hand shakily moved to your stomach, feeling the warm substance spilling from the wound. you winced as it grazed over the injury. 

you let your head drop, but before it could hit the ground hitoshi’s hand was cradling it. he pulled you to him, holding you in his own shaking arms. your hazy eyes could just make out his messy, violet hair and his pinched brows.

“toshi..” you gasped, your chest heaving as you fought for breath. his eyes darted from your gushing wound to your eyes, one of his hands moving to cup your cheek.

“yeah, yeah, im here,” he whispers, his lips curving into an uneasy smile. “what do you need?”

“just..” you’re cut off by a cough, one where you can taste the metallic taste of blood in the back of your throat. “just.. you,” you whisper. you feel your eyes drooping, and your vision gets hazier, but you force them open, for hitoshi.

“i alerted UA, they're gonna come get you, okay? and you’ll be fine..” he whispers, his eyes glossing over. he knows you two are a good ten minutes away from the school by foot, and you were already seriously injured before you were knocked across the sky.

“hitoshi..” you murmur, your left hand moves from your blood-soaked uniform to cup hitoshi’s against your cheek. the dark red substance stains his hand. “you’ll..” a wheeze. “be okay.. right?”

hitoshi’s eyebrows furrow, his hold you growing tighter. “yes, i’ll be fine, y/n, and so will you, okay? just hang on,” his voice falters, his tone growing more and more panicked. 

you inhaled sharply, your breaths becoming more and more ragged. your lungs burned, your insides screamed at the pain echoing through your torso. they weren’t going to get here in time.

“toshi..” you murmur, your hand moving from his to cup his cheek, his face now stained in your blood as a tear drops down his cheek. “i’ve.. gotta go, okay?”

“no.. no no you can’t, you can’t. you were supposed to be the one..” you feel his chest rise and fall against your side, your own chest struggling to do so. 

“i love you..” you whispered, your lips quivering in a blissful smile as the pain finally dissipated. hitoshi tugged you closer to him, his body almost enveloping yours. “i love you, y/n.” he whispers into your hair, his tears falling freely as he feels your body stop. he feels the life leave you.

after a few minutes he hears the heroes from UA rushing toward him, aizawa at the head of the pack before they all stop a few feet away.

“she’s gone, mr. aizawa..”

ᴛᴀɢʟɪꜱᴛ: @satelitis @whenanafallsinlove @kozumesphone @tikitsune

[professorsnape394]

Day 3: Haunted Hijinks

Pairing: Severus Snape x OC

Rating: 🥰

Prompt: Haunt

Summary: Peeves has it out for the new Professor and only Severus Snape can help.

A/N: So I had initially intended for his to be a shorter story but it ended up being even bigger than my last. I apologise if there maybe isn't quite enough Snape for you, but good news is there will be a part 2!

Warnings: ghosts?

Word Count: 2518

Credits to Gif Creator

Week 1

The haunting started just as I had anticipated. Doors slamming, objects randomly disappearing and reappearing in different places, drawers sporadically flinging themselves open and emptying their entire contents onto the floor.

I wasn’t scared. I knew it was coming.

When I first joined the school Minerva was over the moon to have her favourite student joining the faculty. I received an overwhelmingly warm welcome by everyone… everyone, except two.

The first was to be expected. Severus Snape was never a man for comradery. Despite the fact we had both attended Hogwarts at the same time as teens, my presence here didn’t seem to faze him in the slightest. While I had been admittedly disappointed by his cold reception, I wasn’t surprised by it. Snape rarely acknowledged me, even when we had shared classes together. I wouldn’t be surprised to find out he didn’t even know I existed.

The second, less then pleasant reception, came from a poltergeist.

As confirmed by Minerva, Peeves had a habit of making every new professor’s life at Hogwarts a living hell. Everyone had experienced the same treatment, all except one.

The torment was to last one month exactly, worsening as the weeks went on. This was his way of initiating you into the faculty apparently. The silver lining of it all though, was after the month was done, no professor would be pestered by the poltergeist thereafter.

The first week passed without issue. Yes, it was annoying to go to pick up your hairbrush only to have it vanish from plain sight. And constantly tidying up the contents of my desk was becoming a bit of a nuisance but nothing I couldn’t handle for the next few weeks.

Week 2

“Peeves!” I groaned, jumping from my chair, as my whole desk hit the floor. “I’m trying to work.”

The room echoed with deep belly laughter, an apparition of the ghost appearing as he zoomed from one side of the room to the other.

Books flew from their spot on the bookcase, smashing into the opposite wall before fluttering to the floor. One after the other the shelves emptied themselves, leaving only the bare bones of the old oak bookcase.

While trying to right my upturned desk, a loud creaking caught my attention.

“No!” I screamed, watching the shelves come crashing to the floor with a loud thud.

This had been the way of the week. Standing by, watching the poltergeist wreak havoc on my chambers, powerless to stop his antics. Within the short space of a week Peeves had turned my life upside down. Every day I awoke to each room in my quarters being completely trashed by the ghost. My clothes were piled high, the empty drawers dumped beside them, class assignments and student essays lay scattered across the floor, he had even taken to raiding my bathroom cupboards, squeezing out the contents of every bottle he came across, smearing it over the floor, walls and mirrors.

Despite my efforts to clean up after him, I soon realised it was a futile task. No matter how quickly I cleaned up one mess, Peeves had already created three more. It was halfway through the week when I realised it would be easier to live with the mess for the next two and a half weeks. Paying my dues turned out to be a lot messier than I had anticipated.

Week 3

The penultimate week took a different toll than the others. I saw Peeves a lot more than he had previously allowed; choosing to take to his physical form and follow me around the castle grounds.

He whispered nonsense in my ear, spoke over me while I taught, interrupted my conversations with my colleagues and worst of all he sang. Day and night, Peeves belted out a badly pitched tune, throwing in the occasional made-up limerick to just to taunt me.

Last night was a particularly difficult night. Somehow Peeves had gathered every radio, gramophone and record player from around the school and scattered them throughout my bedroom. Dozens of different melodies blasted through the speakers, all while Peeves sung along to songs that he never even knew the words to.

My three-day migraine turning into four, I was surviving purely off of caffeine and sheer will power at this point. I hadn’t had a minute of sleep since the week began, and I wasn’t sure I could cope with it any longer.

“Not long now, my dear.” McGonagall encouraged, gently patting my arm reassuringly.

Struggling to keep my eyes open, I took another large swig of my morning coffee. “How did you put up with it, Minerva. I don’t think I can last much longer; it’s beginning to affect my teaching.”

“I’m afraid it’s just one of those things we have all had to endure, my dear.”

“Not everybody.” I huffed, turning my narrowed gaze to the potions master at the far end of the table. “How did he get away with it? Why doesn’t Peeves make his life hell.”

“That would have to be a question you ask Severus.”

“Pft.” I grunted. “He’d never tell me. He hasn’t even spoke to me since I started here.”

“Have you spoken to him?”

“No but…” I didn’t have any excuse.

“Then maybe now is your chance. Severus had never been one to make the first step, but I know he’d appreciate it if you paid him a visit.”

“Do you think he even remembers me? I mean it’s been years since we were in school and even then we didn’t exactly run in the same circles.”

“I’m positive he’ll remember you, Y/N, maybe more than you’d expect.”

“What’s that supposed to mea- “

Before I had a chance to finish my sentence, my mug of coffee flew from my grasp, levitating in the air tauntingly, before finally tipping its entire contents onto my lap.

I jumped from the table with a gasp, thanking Merlin the beverage had time to cool before I was scolded.

My cheeks flushed red with embarrassment. Not only was my dress and robes stained dark with coffee but the entire school had been privy to my torment.

I immediately ran from the Great Hall, hoping to escape any further public teasing from the spectre.

By the time the school day had come to an end my head was pounding from the lack of sleep, Peeves had interrupted all six of my classes today, and I had heard students whispering about the coffee fiasco on more than one occasion.

This was my breaking point.

Putting aside my shame and anxiety, I stormed down to the Dungeons to find out how Snape escaped the poltergeist’s awful induction. I was willing to beg on my knees if that is what it took.

“Y/N?” Snape breathed, seemingly shocked at the sight of me on his doorstep.

“I need your help Severus. Please.”

“Come in.” He granted, clearing his throat as he returned to the room.

I took a seat by the fire, waiting for him to join me. Instead, the potions professor paced around the room, never quite settling on one spot.

“It’s nice to see you again.” I called over my shoulder to him, hoping to break the ice.

“Is it?” He stumbled. “I mean; yes, it is.”

“It’s been a long time; I don’t even think I remember the last time we saw each other.”

“Graduation.” He said without hesitating. “I saw you afterwards in the Hog’s Head with Potter and Black.”

“Oh yeah. I forgot about that.” I chuckled nervously, wondering how he possibly remembered that when I couldn’t.

“I remember Sirius got so drunk that night, he ended up sleeping at mine and-

“What do you want, Y/N.” Severus snapped, his entire demeanour changing as he made his way to stand in front of me.

“I need your help.” I repeated.

“With the Poltergeist I presume.”

I nodded simply in response, suddenly understanding why the students found him so intimidating.

He had changed a lot since school. He was no longer the scrawny little teenager whose clothes never quite fit. He was a man now, tall and built out. His clothes fit him perfectly, they even showcased the outline of a bicep on either arm. His voice was like velvet, deep and rich, and it hit my ear in exactly the right way. His face, while no longer youthful, suited the aged lines etched into his forehead. His eyes had always been my favourite though; dark as the night sky and just as mysterious. I never could bare the intensity of his gaze and experiencing it now made me feel just like that awkward 14-year-old again.

“Peeves is not one to be stopped. With exception of Dumbledore and the Bloody Baron he listens to nobody. A deal was struct with a previous headmaster to allow the spectre to have his fun for one month, after which he is not to intervene with the professors to ensure the sanctity of the school and the students education.”

“But he never tormented you.” I whispered, hoping to gain some more insight.

“I cannot help you.” Snape’s eyes saddened.

“Why not? Is it because we were never friends in school? I tried to talk to you Severus, I did, but you just never seemed interested, I- ”

“I cannot help you, Y/N, because I did nothing to deter the ghost.” I opened my mouth to object, but Snape never gave me a chance to speak. “Peeves never haunted me because he never wanted to. It is my understanding that before the castle was built, these dungeons were the grounds in which Peeves was brutally murdered, more specifically, this very room. The ghost refuses to enter my chambers at all. I cannot help you, Y/N, because the only place in this whole castle where you can escape the phantom is here.”

My shoulders drooped at the revelation.

“Oh.”

“I’m sorry.” He looked like he really meant.

“Don’t be, it’s not your fault.” I puffed, trying not to sound as disappointed as I was. “I guess I’ll just have to suck it up like everyone else, I guess.”

Realising Snape probably didn’t want me to stick around for some unnecessary small talk, I immediately tried to make myself scarce. However, while heading out the door I was forced to stop in my tracks.

“Y/N.” Severus called after me.

God, I loved the way he said my name.

“If you ever need a break from him. To do your marking or even just to read for a bit, you can come here. There door is always open.”

“Thank you, Severus. I really appreciate that.” Though it wasn’t likely I’d ever take him up on the offer. Being in such close quarters with a man like him was bound to set me nerves on edge.

Week 4

With 7 days to go until my living hell was no more, I was sure I could power through the fourth and final week.

Oh, how wrong I was.

Day one came in full force. I awoke to the deafening sound of fireworks; fizzing and sparkling at the end of my bed. My heart pounded in my chest; the combination of insomnia, my high caffeine intake and now this, heart palpitations had become a regular occurrence for me.

Nevertheless, I promised myself to power through the day, trudging out of bed to start my classes. I waded through piles of my belongings; the floor hadn’t been visible for a fortnight now and I was almost starting to get used to it. As I made my way to the bathroom, I flicked my wand turning off each blaring radio as I went, hoping it would earn me a moments peace before I was thrust into the chaos of Hogwarts.

True disaster stuck, however, as I approached the hall leading to the bathroom. A sharp shiver shot through up my spine as something squelched underneath my bare feet. I closed my eyes, praying it wasn’t what I thought had happened.

My favourite sweater lay sodden in the middle of the hall, amidst a pair of drenched leggings and a stack of soggy assignments. The hall had been completely flood, the source of course being; the bathroom.

“Please please please.” I repeated to myself as I gripped the door handle tight.

Giving me no time at all to mentally prepare myself for the inevitable state of the bathroom, Peeves appeared on the other side of the door, yanking it open forcefully, taking me with it. I was instantly flung into the deep end, finding myself standing in the middle of a domestic rain shower. The shower, the sink AND the toilet all had water spurting out of them, drowning the room until I was in an ankle-deep puddle. Even the bath was overflowing, given that Peeves had deliberately put the stopper in it before choosing to burst the pipes.

I let out a long and frustrated scream.

“This has gone too far, Peeves!”

A far away laugh echoed through the chambers, he clearly got his desired reaction out of me.

While tempted to succumb to the ghosts’ antics; ready to ball myself on the floor and cry it out. I remembered I did have one other option.

No longer possessing a sense of shame I trudged my way through the castle halls wearing only my saturated silk pyjama set and a pair of waterlogged fluffy bunny slippers. My hair clung to the side of my face in strands of tangled curls, the wet ends dripping onto the floor behind me as I walked.

“Please don’t say no to this.” Were the first words out my mouth when Snape opened his door to me.

“Alright.” He answered without question.

“Can I stay with you.”

“Okay.”

“It’ll just be for the week and I can sleep on the couch, or even on the floor but at least I’ll sleep. And I’ll have to use your shower too, as you can probably tell my bathroom is currently incapacitated. I’ll stay out of your way as much as possible, and I’ll literally owe you the biggest- Wait, what did you just say?”

“I said okay, Y/N.” It was clear the potions master was struggling not to roll his eyes at me forcing him to repeat himself.

“…But why?”

“I’m not quite as unaccommodating as people seem to assume. I’ve witnessed how much you have struggled these past three weeks. And I know, if you’ve shown up here begging for my help, it must be bad. So okay, you can stay for the week. But be warned, there will be some ground rules.”

“Oh My God, Severus I could kiss you right now. Thank you, thank you, thank you!”

If he were anyone else, I’d have definitely thrown myself at them, crushing their torso to show my sheer gratitude. With Severus though, I knew he was not one for physical forms of affection, and given that I was soaked to the bone I realised it wouldn’t be wise to subject my saviour to my same fate.

“We’ll discuss my stipulations after dinner this evening. Now you best hurry up and take a shower if you want to make it in time for your first lesson of the day.”

As I sprinted to his bathroom, I could have sworn I spotted a small smirk tugging at the corner of Snape’s lips.

He really wasn’t as grouchy as he let on.

[cosmicdream222]

https://www.tumblr.com/cosmicdream222/754632926605541376/have-you-manifest-shift-or-anything-with-psych-k?source=share

How did you manifest with EFT tapping?

This is gonna be long haha but I’ll summarize how it works on a general level first combining science and loa, cuz EFT is actually scientifically proven to help with a lot of things like mental health and rewiring the brain after trauma.

The sciencey part: basically when we experience adverse experiences, traumas, stresses, or any kind of intense emotion, we often don’t process or release them, and they hang out stuck in our nervous systems. Then when we encounter regular stressors, our nervous systems are triggered by those trapped emotions, and reactivate the old experiences. That often triggers us into feeling more anxious or stressed than we need to be, and we end up in a continuous state of fight or flight.

The loa part: we are unlimited beings and can manifest anything we want! However, our subconscious takes direction from our conscious mind, or the human ego, or the part that is reacting to all these emotions and triggers trapped in our nervous systems. The ego is not our enemy and just wants to keep us safe, but unfortunately it is just reacting to outdated information and keeping us in limited patterns. If we keep reacting to the old experiences, we will keep repeating the same old patterns of anxiety, fear, and limiting ourselves.

In a nutshell: Tapping clears out the emotional residue in our nervous systems so the conscious mind can stop reacting to all the triggers that are keeping us stuck in old patterns. When you release the old patterns, then you can accept your new affirmations and beliefs more easily.

So personally, I had found out about tapping around 2017 maybe, and basically just used it the textbook way to deal with day to day stresses. It wasn’t until around the end of 2022 when I joined Gala Darling’s tapping class that I found out you could do intense tapping sessions and change things that seemed “unrealistic”. I didn’t know about the law/shifting at that point, but Gala shared some of her personal experiences where she used intense tapping sessions to get rid of allergies, phobias, even an ED she had struggled with for years. She said how she would go in the bathroom, look in the mirror and just tap everywhere while venting and don’t stop until you feel a significant release. She said she ended up getting violently ill, but her ED was cured forever after that.

So at that time I was super stressed and anxious about a guy situation. We had been friends for a while and I felt like there was “more” but I didn’t know how he felt. I wanted to talk with him about it, but I had built it up a narrative in my head for months and was afraid to talk about my feelings. In the past, it was really hard for me to acknowledge and express my feelings in general.

So I decided to do an intense tapping session like Gala recommended. I now call it a “tapping induced meltdown” 😂 I ended up tapping for at least a half hour, hysterical crying at an epic meltdown level. But after that, I felt so much peace around the situation. I honestly had a lifetime of anxious-avoidant attachment that was keeping me repeating unhealthy relationship patterns, and I feel like a significant part of that was cleared out in that moment.

Within two days, he ended up initiating a conversation about our feelings and we were able to discuss everything in the open for the first time. And since then I have been able to express myself so much easier, and really haven’t had any anxiety over guys or relationships anymore.

Typically now I just use it throughout the day with a mental diet - when I find myself thinking things I don’t want or repeating negative stories, I immediately flip the thought, and start tapping on one point while affirming the positive. Even just a few seconds of tapping helps neutralize the BS faster than just affirming alone for me.

[draculasfavoritewife]

Happier Now

Summary: Alone time on a summer afternoon is a rare thing, and anniversaries are a time for remembering and realization.

Pairing: Emma Frost x Scott Summers

Warnings: More fluff than I usually write (this one is pretty nostalgic and sweet). Lots of innuendos and Emma's flirting -- which really deserves its own warning lol.

Me from two years ago has no excuses. This is purely self-indulgent sweetness because I love soft Emma/Scott moments and this dialogue was absolutely burning a hole in my brain. Sorry not sorry.

Classes finished for the day, Emma Frost takes a minute to herself, leaning against her desk at the front of the classroom and allowing herself to decompress in the quiet. The kids at the Institute test her patience at every turn and drive her absolutely mad sometimes. But she’s never wanted to be anything except a teacher, and the madness is far outweighed by the satisfaction of seeing them grow up in front of her day by day. 

She would never say it aloud, but she would do absolutely ANYTHING for these kids. 

So deep is she in her moment of reverie that she doesn’t know he’s snuck up behind her until he’s kissing her cheek, and she actually jumps. “Scott! Where did you come from?” 

He chuckles, amused that he caught her daydreaming. “Someone’s a million miles away. Or have you just spent so much time with me that my psychic signature is boring to you now?” 

She turns halfway to return his kiss, her fingertips caressing his jaw. “Yours is the only mind I haven’t grown bored of, Darling.” 

“Flattery generally gets people nowhere with me, but for you, I’ll make the exception.” He grins and hands her a single white rose. He’s learning her tastes, and she feels an odd surge of happiness that he remembers so much about her without constantly having to ask what pleases her anymore. 

Emma doesn’t go in for huge, extravagant flower arrangements unless she’s organizing a social event. Minimal elegance goes a long way in her book. 

Scott’s next words leave her at a momentary loss. “Happy anniversary, Em.” 

Which anniversary is it?

They’ve already acknowledged the four-year anniversary of their first date. And she hasn’t quite shared his room for three years. 

So she cheats, takes a glimpse into his thoughts, realizes — has it really been FIVE years since she arrived to teach here? 

“That makes me feel old,” she remarks. 

She knows him well enough to tell he’s rolling his eyes at her behind his opaque glasses. “Let’s not be gloomy, shall we? This is the day we first officially met, five years ago, Em. It’s cause for a…less negative outlook, don’t you think?” 

I didn’t know it at the time, but your arrival was the start of the happiest years of my life…. 

Emma pulls out the thread of what he doesn’t say and smiles. “Aw, you’re such a shameless romantic, Scott.” 

That flusters him for a second, and she could almost swear she sees his face flush. “I didn’t say anything,” he defends himself, though he sounds unsure of that fact. 

“You didn’t have to. Your thoughts are very loud sometimes.” She smirks at him and points to the drink carrier in his right hand. “Please tell me one of those coffees is for me.” 

“No, you’ve rubbed off on me too much. I bought two just so I could rub it in your face that I didn’t get you any.” He hands over one of the cups. 

“How I adore it when you get sarcastic, Lover. I always knew you were just pretending to be such a boy scout.” She takes a sip of the hot drink, noting with uncharacteristic softness that he remembered her current favorite — white chocolate hazelnut latte with almond milk, two shots of espresso, and whipped cream. He’s too good for her. She comes up with ridiculously complicated combinations every other month to see if it throws him off, and yet he cares so much and his memory is so unfairly perfect that he caters to her whims and she can’t even complain about a mistaken order. “Thank you.” 

“My pleasure.” He tastes his own — strong and black, she knows from the smell of it. Hasn’t changed his own preference since long before she came into his life. She’d never drink black coffee, much as the others might think she’s suited for such a bitter drink. She loves that about him, though. It rounds out his masculine and no-nonsense personality, and she can’t deny that she likes to taste the hint of it lingering in his mouth after he drinks it. 

“What does the rest of your day look like?” she asks, pressing her body up to his. He shifts automatically to avoid spilling his drink on her immaculate white jacket. 

“I cleared my schedule. Wanted to spend the evening with you.” Scott glances out the window. “The weather’s nice, and the pool is empty. I don’t know about you, but that sounds like providence to me.” 

“I have a new bikini and no other excuse to wear it. You’re good at formulating plans even when we’re off duty.” She pulls away from him and starts down the hallway. 

“Am I watching your transformation, or are you holding out on me until we get there?” 

Emma flashes him a naughty grin over her shoulder. “I’m holding out on you this time, Lover Boy. After all, if you always get the privilege of seeing me in a state of undress, what power do I have to hold over you anymore?” 

He leans against the wall with a disappointed sigh. “You’re cruel, Emma.” 

“Darling, I wrote the definition of the word.” She sashays off, fiercely delighted that she can feel the heat of his gaze fixed on her swinging hips. 

If only the others knew what dirty thoughts sometimes cross their straight-laced leader’s mind. 

He was right, the weather is perfect for this.

She watches him swim laps as she lounges in a deck chair, admiring his toned muscles and relishing the reality that she can check him out as obviously as she likes. He’s hers now, so she doesn’t have to pretend to disguise the fact that she undresses him with her eyes whenever they’re in a room together. 

Emma has always had a deep appreciation for beauty, and the male form in motion is no exception. Scott Summers moves with an efficient grace no matter what he does. With his ample physical strength, he could be explosive, unfettered, but she finds it much more interesting that he restrains himself, not a motion wasted, every execution clean and sharp. 

Then he’s suddenly still, leaning over the side of the pool. “Somehow when I pictured this, I thought you were going to swim with me,” he complains. 

She leans further back, crossing her arms beneath her head. “What’s the point of a bathing suit as small as mine unless it’s for a good tan? You didn’t actually think this was made for swimming, did you?” 

“You’re not tanning,” he points out, with an infuriating grin. 

It’s true. She’s protected from the late afternoon sunlight by a meticulously placed umbrella, as well as a wide-brimmed hat and a pair of sunglasses that probably cost no less than five hundred dollars. The sun has never been too friendly to Emma’s creamy porcelain complexion. 

She scowls down at Scott, whose more bronze tones always manage to tan gorgeously. 

He pulls himself out of the water. “Come on, I’ll put sunscreen on you if you’ll get in the water with me.” 

“Don’t get me all wet,” she tosses at him, handing him the bottle of lotion. 

“Don’t tempt me.” 

Removing her hat, she pulls her hair up and slides forward so he can sit behind her on the lounge and start working on her back. She relaxes into the familiar touch of his hands as he massages the sunscreen into her skin, firm but gentle, just the way she likes it. Can she really be faulted for demanding he give her back rubs so often?

The man is the god of back rubs. 

“Has it really been five years?” she murmurs. 

“The time has sure flown by.” His thumbs are higher than they need to be, working the knots out of her neck, and she sighs with relief as the tightness of the day finally releases. “I still remember,” he stifles a slight laugh, “how shocked I was when the Professor introduced you to me.” 

“Whatever do you mean?” 

“Well, the way he talked about you, ‘former headmistress of the Massachusetts Academy’, I thought you were…much older, for one thing.” 

And much less sexy, is what he doesn’t say aloud. 

He catches her knowing smile and this time, she’s CERTAIN he reddens slightly. “And then you walked in, and all the puzzle pieces finally fell together. I definitely wasn’t expecting the Professor to hire the White Queen on the faculty, that’s for sure.” 

“How did you feel about that?” She’s not usually one for fond reminiscence, but the way he’s talking has her feeling strangely sentimental. 

“Confused. I think I was equal parts outraged and still trying to be welcoming. Not to mention your wardrobe is very provocative, which wasn’t helpful to my composure.” 

Emma laughs softly at his honesty. “I knew you were secretly more affected than you let on.” 

His hands move lower, and she arches her back against the delicious pressure, letting his knuckles knead into her tired muscles. “I wonder sometimes what your first impression of me was.” 

“You’re so bad at hinting.” She falls quiet for a moment, considering. “I remember seeing you there, in your tight black t-shirt and those dark-wash jeans, and I think the first coherent thought I ever devoted to you was, ‘Hmm…this Scott Summers has a nice butt’.” 

“You didn’t.” He can’t seem to make up his mind whether to be flattered, embarrassed, or downright horrified. 

“No, you called my bluff. I was much more taken by your massive —” 

“EMMA!” 

“— Thighs, Sweetheart. I was going to say thighs.” 

“Somehow I don't believe you.” 

“Pectorals?” she tries, turning to run her fingers across the muscles in question and seeing his jaw twitch at the suggestive contact. “Biceps? Or maybe it was your glorious hair — I’ve always thought you had the softest hair, even when you had it cut so short.” 

He raises one eyebrow, lips stern. He says nothing, but she can tell he knows it’s a load of bull.

She looks away again. 

“Truthfully, I noticed your mental imprint before I ever saw you. It stood out among the legions of others. Your thoughts were focused, intense, raw, even. I felt how you held yourself to crushing standards, kept up a façade, and in the midst of so many sharp and chilly thoughts directed at me, yours were like flames. The only taste of heat I could find.” 

She knows he’s staring at her, that she’s surprised him with so human a confession. 

“I held onto that as I walked past rows of judgmental eyes, wanting to meet whoever was such a brilliant flash of light in the midst of an admittedly dark time in my life. I think you felt the brush of my consciousness against yours, because that’s when you turned, and we made eye contact. At first I didn’t think it could possibly be you, since you were so well-groomed, so aloof. But then I saw that same intensity reflected on your face, just for a moment, and I….” 

She trails off, suddenly feeling like she’s peeled back one too many layers, and all of her childhood conditioning kicks in. Don’t ever open up, it makes you seem weak. 

He stops his work with the sunscreen, resting his chin on her shoulder as his arms encircle her, pulling her back against his body. “And then what happened?” he asks, barely above a whisper, and his lips are smiling into her neck, and she’s reminded all over again that Scott already knows her weaknesses, and he would never even dream of taking advantage of them. 

She’s not delicate, even if she looks it, and she’ll crush anyone who calls her so. But Scott keeps all of her weak moments and her softness cradled somewhere deep inside him, where he’ll never allow any harm to come of them. And she is hit all over again with his sweetness, and his caring, and she finds now that she does want him to know exactly what she thought of him that day, five years ago. 

“…And so I thought, ‘Maybe I’m not alone. Maybe there’s someone here who understands what I’ve been through, and I won’t be completely on my own in the world anymore’.” She lets out the breath she’s been holding, amazed at the lightness in her chest now that she’s said it.

“And THEN I started thinking about your butt.” 

He’s laughing as he kisses her collarbone. “Thank you,” he tells her sincerely, as he moves on to slather sunscreen down her legs. “That means a lot.” 

She can tell that it really does, and it makes her happy, to know that. 

“Do you want me to help you with your front?” he asks, nodding at the sheer amount of skin her risqué top leaves exposed. 

“I think I had better handle that area myself, if you want me to ever actually end up in the water with you,” she retorts.

His self-control may be better than most, but even his isn’t THAT good. 

“Suit yourself.” He shrugs. 

“I will, thank you. You can, however, aid me in un-suiting myself later, if you so wish.” 

When they finally complete their task and he at last coaxes her into the water, she remembers what he was thinking earlier.

You were right, Scott. I’ve never been happier since I met you. 

[ratstarxx]

alright so idk i just wanted to share an anecdote and my journey as an aroace person.

So this story starts the beginning of my freshman year. my second day really because it was just us on the first. now this needs prefaced by saying, i don’t have a lot of friends. it’s not some sad horrific thing - i mean id like a couple more friends but i’m not keen on a giant group. so at this point i have one solid friend, and i make it through the day like scouting out who’s nice and who i could get along with. my last class of the day is acting and i’ve already seen these people once or twice helping out with drama and i quickly get the understanding that they’re chill and id get along with them. the acting class is in the auditorium and we’re told to sit stage right in like two sections. i just pick a seat way off to the (stage) right, around people but not directly next to anyone. over the next week or so i start settling in and end up joining the big group twords the middle. i sit next to these two friends who i think are pretty cool and they seem to like me.

and the year progresses. i don’t become besties with one or the other but i make friends in general. i’m not sure if i could like become best friends with one of them because they had a really tight bond. like hallmark movie best friends. like the small part that isn’t ineffable about this relationship will be explained later on. but i am making other friends (i’m just gonna go with initials bc these ppl follow me on tumblr) and i become really good friends with w. we have some common interests but generally we just vibe yk.

now i’m gonna skip ahead a couple months to the school class play. all of us are involved in this - the previously mentioned acting friends (m and p) are both actors along with me and w is on stage crew. so one day w and i are mopping the stage or something just talking. i can’t remember exactly how it went but w has a boyfriend and he talks about him sometimes. but w really only refers to them as “my boyfriend” so i’m just going with it and pretending i know who it is. anyway at some point while we’re talking i must’ve said something like “who is your boyfriend btw” and they’re like ohhh l. and i just feel so dumb. they’re always together and interacting and i’m just like how did i not realize. i think about it for like a full day realizing how many things have gone over my head and how oblivious i am. fast forward a week or two to opening night. i’m kinda nervous because this is my first play-and also my first performance but i only had one line and i knew i could nail my characters. i have one bit in scene 3 then i change and im not needed til scene 7 so i mostly sit around and if it wasn’t crowded i sat in the fem dressing room. it’s about intermission time and we’re kinda sitting in a semi circle doing makeup as a bunch of queer (not girl) afabs. we’re talking about past relationships and stuff and coming out when p is talking and they say something along the lines of ‘and my dad was like you seem to be besttt frienddsss with m’. everyone understands and acknowledges it. then i realize. i’m like wtf. and i go ‘you’re with m??’ just lost and they confirm. this was like 10x more obvious than w and l. i have no clue how i didn’t see it. but 3 months in i realized that there relationship was romantic.

i don’t know why i care but i do. i wanted that friendship. i wanted a relationship like that. i thought i could have that if i found the right person. and in a single phrase i realized that i can’t. i know i can’t be in love. i accepted that long ago. but i struggle to accept this. maybe i didn’t believe in true love or whatever before i met them. but the way that they look at each others like they’re all they need. like it’ll be okay as long as they’re together. like i can see the hearts in their eyes. the way that they talk. the way they’re always laughing with each other. they way that they just effortlessly get each other. i don’t want to date them. i mean i’m aroace and lesbian at that. but i am so incredibly jealous. it’s like i see them together and it feels like a dagger in my chest. then i want a dagger in my chest. the jealousy consumes me.

at the beginning of that year i thought i had come to terms with myself. i’m not sure if i have. but i haven’t seen anyone talk about feeling this way, and if you’re like this, you’re not alone. we’re gonna make it through. it doesn’t matter how many friends you have or how relatable they are right now. you’re gonna find your person. and i hope someday i can find a plutonic m to my p

i really struggle with friends. i currently have 2 solid friends that i talk to most days. i know that i’m not either of their number ones. i’m aware that i put in eighty percent of the effort into our relationships. at least with one of them. but i know that people do care for me. and that i may never be able to fall in love, but i still get to be loved. and i still get to love. i just have so many more people to share my love with. i love you.

[little-miss-moonshine]

i think i thought i saw you try

the night before last, exactly one month after you left, you called me, absolutely wasted. I've seen you through most things, but I've never seen you so gone. you called me, happy, angry, euphoric, and miserable in equal measure. you've never been like this.

you were kind, sweet, gentle, like you always are, but you were also mean and cruel. you told me how insecure and clingy I was, you told me about your illicit affairs in detail, you talked about the pros and cons of me. you didn't even acknowledge when I broke down crying. maybe you didn't notice, or maybe you didn't care. you broke my heart like a toothpick once again, just like you always do. I kept thinking, this is not like him, but that's not true. you may have never said cruel things, but you've done cruel things. why shouldn't I consider this on brand for you? as much as I'd like to have an answer, I don't.

the next day, you called me, terrified because you didn't remember what you'd said. I thought about not telling you, but how could I not? it was breaking me. you always get more truthful when you're drunk. you sometimes say things in the wrong way, but there are things I couldn't have misinterpreted. you apologized again and again, but all I could do was cry.

the words formed in my throat before I could stop myself. I asked if you wanted me to tell you what I thought. I finally told you about the man I saw being torn in two. the man who'd be distant in the daylight, but hold me like he never wanted to let go at night. the man who said I love you first, a month and a half before I did, unconsciously reaching for me. I told you to think about who I am to you. now here I am, silence on both of our ends, absently opening your contact throughout the day to tell you something, and closing it wistfully when I regain my senses.

this whole situation reminded me of rem's song, losing my religion. it is one of my favorite songs of all time, and it's very reminiscent of my relationship with you. it's on the playlist I made for us, the one you've never listened to. it's not about the vibes on that playlist, it's about the words. you can see how I feel about you in every lyric associated with that playlist, if you'd ever deign to listen.

want me to break these lyrics down? you always like it when I tell you things. if you don't, nod absently as I tell you, as you usually do if I'm saying something you don't want to hear. I do hope you'll hear me this time, though.

Oh, life is bigger It's bigger than you and you are not me The lengths that I will go to The distance in your eyes Oh no, I've said too much I set it up

that's how I felt that one day we submitted the last assignment from our one shared class. the girl at the bus stop played in my mind as you told me that you didn't know what love was, but that you're happy when I'm happy, that you always want me to be safe, and that you worry for me when you can't protect me yourself. I still told you how I felt, how I knew I loved you, and how much it was killing me to have you just a little.

That's me in the corner That's me in the spotlight Losing my religion Trying to keep up with you And I don't know if I can do it Oh no, I've said too much I haven't said enough

that was me, being the best girlfriend I could be, being as kind, caring, and understanding as I was capable of being. it was also me, giving you that same care and love, even when we were nothing and everything at the same time. for so long, I swallowed my affection, telling you what I thought you wanted to hear. after everything, it was the opposite. I couldn't stop telling you how I felt, but god, sometimes I think you never heard me.

I thought that I heard you laughing I thought that I heard you sing I think I thought I saw you try

this was me witnessing your dichotomy. the man who showed me his care as much as he could, but who hid away in the arms of others, just to avoid confronting me. you think saying something cruel to me is something you'll never forgive yourself for. have you forgiven yourself for doing cruel things to me? did it ever weigh on you at night? what's the difference, jaan?

Every whisper, of every waking hour I'm choosing my confessions Trying to keep an eye on you Like a hurt, lost and blinded fool, fool Oh no, I've said too much I set it up

I was always careful about what to say. not because I was terrified of you would react, but because I didn't know what you'd make of it. tiptoeing around each other. it's just my curse that you made my happy. you made my life really worth living for the first time in many years, and you didn't even try. what does that say about me? that I'm a hurt, lost and blinded fool, reaching for you, praying you'd at least love me in silence, in perpetuity, if not for real.

Consider this Consider this the hint of the century Consider this the slip That brought me to my knees, failed What if all these fantasies come Flailing around Now I've said too much

now you're considering it. there was a slip, and now you know. now you know what you've been doing subconsciously. whether you choose to acknowledge it, to understand it, to accept it, it's your choice. you also need to acknowledge another important thing. you've put me through hell, but you've also made me happy. genuinely happy, much happier than I was when you met me. did you know that despite everything, I sometimes imagine scenarios where you come to me, apologizing, and telling me you wanted to be with me, somehow? at the same time, I've also imagined the reverse: you washing your hands of me, or me deciding we're too complicated. now that one of these scenarios is going to come to pass, I'm suddenly terrified. isn't that sad, jaan?

But that was just a dream Try, cry, fly, try That was just a dream Just a dream Just a dream, dream

sometimes I have to tell you something twice before you believe me, so I'll say it again. you made my life worth living for the first time in years. you supported me, cared for me, protected me, and always made me happy. but then you'd hurt me, and I'd wonder which of you was the dream, and which one the reality. you exist in two forms in my mind, and I wonder which one will emerge victorious.

now, jaan, the ball is in your court. depending on what you choose to do, next on my discography is one of four choices:

this love (sweetie's version)

kahani suno 3.0

dear jaan (sooshi's version)

create flames in the rain

our playlist is in your hands.

[kasienda]

Adrino Fic Recs - Part 2!!!

I’ve been promising this for months, and I’ve been struggling to finish any of my fics, but I figured this was something I could definitely finish! And share with you all. 

Here’s is Part 1 if you missed it the first time. I was in search of romantic Adrino when curating this list, but a few of the ones that made the list might be a bit ambiguous and could be interpreted either way.

Here we go again in no particular order:

(Actually, I lied, the multi-chapters all ended up at the end):

1) In which Adrien braids his boyfriend’s hair by @ck2k18​. The title says it all. This is a little tiny one-shot, and it packs an emotional punch of pure sweetness. And I can’t say more than that. It’s just perfect. You should read it!

2) Blindsided by Leisey. Nino has figured out Adrien’s identity, so despite his own feelings, he’s determined to set Adrien up with Ladybug, but Adrien isn’t cooperating. I positively adore the narrative voice the author has written for Nino in this one. It’s just delightful and fun and hilarious all in one. Longer one-shot.

3) Corrupt you on the dance floor/take you home by Reiaji Nino doesn’t fit in Adrien’s crazy life. But somehow he’s still in it, and he’s not letting go. This is the same person who wrote “whose woods these are (I think I know)” so you know they just have a way with metaphors and imagery and making your feel things, and this one-shot is no exception to that.

4) Would you Rather? By SiderealSandman The class is having discussions on who they would rather kiss. Ladybug or Chat Noir. Nino and Adrien are both super embarrassed. This is just mostly miracuclass shenanigans in an au where Nino is Ladybug. One-shot.

5) Emotional Support Turtle by Distraught_by_your_Love Nino figures Adrien out and then helps him run away from home. This one alternates between narrative scenes and text fic, and I love it. This writer really did capture Nino’s voice in both dialogue and text. Platonic longer one-shot.

6) Chit-Chat by MuseofWriting Chat Noir keeps visiting Nino to hang out, and Nino has no idea why, but he doesn’t want it to stop. Again, more platonic, but it hints at something more developing. One-shot.

7) Your Secret is Safe by WoodenSuitcase When Ladybug lets it slip that she told her identity to Alya who is her best friend, Chat comes to the conclusion that Ladybug is Nino. This setup is borderline crack and requires a bit of suspension of disbelief, but the concluding conversation about pronouns is just so wholesome and made me cry the first time I read it. One-shot.

8) How We Began by Heart With A Vacancy Adrien tells the story of how he and Nino began to their child. Beyond precious. Established relationship. Short one-shot.

9) I can think of something better by @ladynoirist Chat has a tendency to come visit Nino after Nino’s had some rough days. Nino starts to notice some patterns. They’re kinda dating in this one, but it’s never actually acknowledged. Super cute! One-shot.

10) Antihero Adrien WIP Two: Carapace Edition by LoganLight (@chronicallylatetotheparty​) Look! I can read this one over and over again, and it makes me feel things. This writer is kinda my idol for fight scenes with emotional subtext that just makes everything feel raw. (The Adrigami part one of this is also amazing). Little tiny one-shot. But it’s intense.

11) Off the Mark by @buggachat Nino vents to Adrien about Chat being weird, so Adrien keeps changing Chat’s behavior to make Nino happy, which just makes Nino feel even more weird. Both hilarious and sad. Ultimately cathartic. Platonic longer one-shot.

12) Out of Your Orbit also by @buggachat Buggachat apparently is in the habit of dropping multi-chapter fics all at once out of friggin nowhere (in addition to almost daily comics). This particular fic is amazing!! The characterizations are perfect. There is longing/pining, core four shenanigans with so much hilarity, but also feelings, and definitely lots of romance. Features Alyanette throughout the fic, but this story is ultimately about Adrino. I’ve already reread this one like three times. No powers au. Multi-chapter.

13) Best Friends and Boyfriends by Kasienda More shameless self promotion, and I feel less awkward this time because there’s so few multi-chapter stories with this pairing. But basically, in this incredibly self indulgent fic, Chat and Carapace are dating pre-reveal while Adrien and Nino are talking to each other about their boyfriends. Also features background Alyanette. Mostly fluff with a little bit of disagreement thrown in for depth. I find the make up (and make out) scene and reveal in this one to be SO SATISFYING. This is my comfort fic. I reread it when I’m sick. Hope you enjoy it!

And that’s part two of my recs! Hope you enjoy them!

[prettyboykatsuki]

am i warm enough for you?

➳ tags ;; soulmate au, strangers to lovers, fluff and angst but mostly fluff, some-what canon compliant, bakugo katsuki is bad at feelings, lots of Feelings™, you guys are adults but the end of the fic but the fic is sfw, alcohol, drunk confessions

➳ wc ;; 5.6k..

➳ plot summary ;; you see your soulmate in dreams - sometimes in bits and pieces and other times in full. bakugo is less than inclined to admit he even has a soulmate - and you learn how to cope with it, one day at a time.

bakugo learns that this soulmate shit is no joke. that has to be why he keeps falling for you so helplessly.

➳ a/n ;; i wasn’t even gonna comeback this early but it felt so wrong not to post on my bfs birthday so alas </3 for anyone who cares to know this is @elysianseraph but with my new url. nice to see u all <3

this was originally posted on 4/20 but im reposting cause it didn’t show up in the tags dskjds

It’s hazy.

A cloud of smoke settles over your body, permeating your lung. It smells like sugar, like burning, like smoke and a little like leather. You can feel your toes curl and your hands moving but your body is separate from you in a way you can’t describe. It’s a pleasant kind of warmth that spreads, creeping up from behind your neck till it’s soft and cradling your skull. It’s soft like the touch of a mother, like wool over your ears.

It’s a pleasant feeling, that’s all. Almost cozy but there’s a fading sense of distress that chills in your lungs as you encompass it. Your hands are too small to reach forward, and truthfully the sensation is so powerful that you’re afraid to reach out. You’re 6 years old, so all you know is how it makes you feel. You can’t remember many details, but you feel pleasant. Something about it is soft, but there’s a sharp edge right at the end that has your lungs gasping for air.

It’s a flash of colors. Red. Orange. Pale Yellow. Grey. Black. Forest Green. Red. Red. Orange. Red.

And then it fades into a feeling again. A blurry feeling. You feel conflict, then concern, then inadequacy in heavy waves almost like it’s drowning you. It’s the first time you’ve experienced such a pain, so your wailing and wiping tears away with chubby fingers and saying a name you don’t know and can’t remember.

Ka. You know the sound, Ka. But you don’t know of anything more. It repeats rhythmically in your mind like a knock on the door, rapping with urgency - but it doesn’t do anything to jog your memory. Someone is trying to be let in but you don’t know how to answer them, and you’re still crying. The distress, the inadequacy shakes you and all you feel is frustration in short simple bursts.

Your first encounter with your soulmate is written this way in your memory. A sense of urgency laced with frustration - but they’re not towards you. It’s him, his feelings - you can feel them even deeper then he can. They pierce you in a way that makes it hard to breathe, no matter how you try to escape them it’s an overwhelming feeling of helplessness. The only way to escape the feelings of a dream is either to control them, or to face them and swim through the fog.

Soulmates have an urgency to them, in general. His is different, you can tell as much. Your first soulmate dream leaves the heaviest impression and each one thereafter is like pieces of a puzzle.

Sometimes you simply share random dreams, like a split screen in a video game - the two of you witness different parts of the same dreamverse. Other times, and honestly - most times, you’re experiencing their emotions or feelings. You experience their core memories, their life, in flashes and bits and pieces.

It’s not enough to know them or who they are, it’s like know everything about them except the things that matter

Sometimes you meet too. Just barely.

MEETING 1:

The room is white. When you blink, colors flash in order - red, pale yellow, orange, forest green and you know. You blink a few more times, stretching your hands out in front of yourself. Curling your hands into fist then into stretched palms, you lean forward and stretch. You wriggle your toes - notice you're wearing shoes. Clothes from your closet. Strange.

You take a look around the room but there isn't much to see. There’s a wall in front of you with a glass divider and a mirrored empty room. The room across from yours has spiky decor littered against the walls. An orange dresser, plastic grenades and play guns. You know who it is without a second warning - and a foggy part in the back of your head tells you that it’s him, again but with more force. You don’t see anything in your room, but you figure he might. All of it is confusing to you.

Before you can blink, there’s a loud thud coming from the other side of the glass. It’s a silhouette, the outline of a face - but nothing clear. Dream logic dictates you can’t know a face you’ve never seen, yet somehow you know his outline. Spiky, he’s spiky everywhere.

“Hello?,” you call out, overly tentative. The figure pauses, seems to take in whatever they must be seeing. You’re not sure what response you’re expecting, really. There’s no expectations at all.

“...Who the fuck are you?,” says a pitchy, male voice. He sounds like he’s your same age, a highschool boy. His throat is rough, yet not overly deep. It’s almost scratchy.

“Uhm,”

You’re not sure how to reply. You can see him through the glass, but not really. Still, you take note of his shadows like they’re going to tell you anything more. You shove your hands in your pockets, messing around with something inside.

“Uh.. your soulmate, I think,” you reply.

Scratching the back of your neck as an awkward silence settles, you take a few minutes to try and figure what more to say.

“We met when we were kids once too,” you explain awkwardly. He must know, has too - this soulmate thing is a two way thing, but his silence is deafening. You just want to feel this space. Is it always this awkward?

“Red. Orange. Pale Yellow. Forest Green,” you repeat, like a mantra. You hear him take in a sharp breath, and freeze. For some reason, you’d like to avoid upsetting him. He doesn’t seem like he’s taking to the information too well.

“I don’t have time for this damn bullshit… whatever quirk you’ve got to mimic this - cut it the fuck out,”

Hostile.

You pause, not sure how to feel. Half of you is offended, the other half is confused - had you done something to upset him? You can feel how he feels - but you don’t understand it. You sit with your mouth agape, like a fish out of water. Unsure of how to proceed, you scoff a little.

“Woah.. this isn’t a quirk thing. We’re.. soulmates? That’s already a thing,”

More silence. You’ve.. he doesn’t seem upset, but you can tell he’s not all that keen to the idea. It’s a bare minimum improvement that you find yourself valuing, without your consent. He breathes again, throat even more hoarse than before. His voice is angry but it doesn’t fit his responses, his feelings - so you don’t pay attention to his madness. Something is off.

“... I’m not supposed to have a soulmate. No fucking way I have a soulmate,” he grits. You step back, stumbling. You didn’t have any expectations.. but this wasn’t what you had been expecting at all. You feel uneasy, sick. It must be a shared feeling if the way he leans against a wall counts for anything.

A beat of silence passes before you open your mouth to speak.

“... I have no idea what I’m supposed to say to that,” you admit. He scoffs.

“Nothing you damn extra. Leave me the fuck alone,”

You don’t reply, too stunned. This was your soulmate? This.. asshole? Not that you were a peach entirely either, but this was supposedly the person that the universe had decided for you?

You shake your head. Maybe you’re just being rash? He could be a nice guy behind all the chaos. You try your best to hold onto that, that this was literally someone chosen for you before you gave up all hope. You sigh, cracking your neck.

“You can say whatever you want but.. we’re here, you know? It’s more productive to just go with it.. isn’t it?,”

“Go fuck yourself,”

“After meeting you, I’m not exactly over the fucking moon about it either. It is what is,”

“You’re not my fucking.. soulmate or whatever the fuck. Leave me alone,”

Your heart both aches with anger and sadness. You don’t know what to do. What does this shit-head know about you, anyway? You know he’s been through some shit, same as you - what makes him so entitled? You swallow the lump in your throat. It hurts. It pierces. Stupid soulmate bonds.

“Yeah? Alright. Fuck you too,”

You see him pace around for a longer before he disappears in a cloud of smoke. You didn’t even catch his name, and you’re not sure you wanted too. It must be morning, but at least you're away from him. It feels lonely, but it must just be you.

Your eyes flutter open but your heart is heavy with regret. You don’t know who it belongs to, but you’ve got class in an hour and not enough time to think about it. If he doesn’t want to meet you that’s fine.

It’s fine. Not like you wanted to meet your soulmate anyway.

__

You don’t have another meeting with your soulmate for months. Lately your dreams have little if anything to do with him or where he is, how he’s been. You have some of those split screen ones, where you know he’s there but neither of you acknowledge each other, even in spirit, like how you did before. When you wake up feeling angsty, you don’t know how to distinguish the feeling but you don’t try.

You wonder idly if he can feel your apathy, if he cares enough too. Maybe he also mistakes it for his own? It seems likely.

It’s a weekday where you’re getting ready for remedial classes at your school. First year advanced courses were no joke, and you find yourself regretting your choice to participate in them.

Still you get dressed anyway, put your uniform on and brush your teeth - wash your face with your eyes half open and look presentable. No one's home in the morning, the house is empty of any life but you. Food becomes a last minute priority, so you make an egg sandwich with cheese and eat it on the way to the train station.

You stare down at your feet as you step outside, music drowning out the noise of your surroundings aptly. The walk to the station is long and the ride is longer, but the streets are packed edge to edge. Musutafu is busy this time of year - the U.A. Sports Festival is taking place today and everything seems to reflect that. You barely manage to squeeze past all the strangers on the subway - clearly on their way to see it.

When you get to school, you're greeted by a mostly empty classroom with a teacher. These classes were straightforward as always, do the work you need to correct, have it approved and leave. It repeats until your finished with all the assignments and you get to be done. You give a respectful nod to your teacher before grabbing your work from your bag.

It goes on and on - occasionally, you hear an excited gasp and quiet chatter from classmates. It’s about the festival, the happenings - but you’re too caught up in completing your work that day and trying to get the fuck out of their as soon as possible.

Shit like that didn’t matter to you, anyways. It’s just a festival.

You leave around the same time the festival seems to have ended, the streets flooded with people - you miss the first station and wander towards an electronics store a block away from your highschool.

It’s the winners on TV. A guy with split hair - Shouto Todoroki, Endeavors son. A guy with a bird head, and a blonde with red eyes - muzzled to the pole.

When you see them, your heart stops. You can feel anger, an unfamiliar rage and humiliation building in your chest. It feels the word has stopped as you watch from afar, through screens. Your soulmate seems upset about something, but you wouldn’t know what.

And that blonde on TV, you wonder if you know him from somewhere.

MEETING 2:

Red.Orange. Pale Yellow. Grey. Black. Forest Green. Red. Red.

You feel him before you even know what’s happening - and it catches you completely off-guard. You haven’t had a proper soulmate dream in two years. Smoke clouds your lungs, the taste of sugar burning your tongue as you cough yourself into awareness. This time, you’re not in a room but it’s a campground. In the middle of the space is a bonfire, burning warmly. This one feels more vivid, more real.

But you know it’s not, your body feel unusually light and your hands can’t hold anything for too long. You know it’s a dream, but you sit in the chair anyway. It feels like you're floating. You feel oddly warm. Dread builds in the pit of your stomach. Even though it’s been so long since you’ve spoken to your soulmate - you can’t forget the terrible first encounter. It sticks to the roof of your mouth - a bitter memory that fills you with unexplainable, irrational resentment.

But it’s not like you hadn’t been seeing him, to an extent. You’ve seen all his memories in bits and pieces - all of them tragic and painful. This time, you see people but they come in the form of small scraps. Spiky Red. Electricity. Tape. Pink with Horns. Music. Green. So much green and red - like Christmas, you’ve called it. You’ve seen disappearances, fear, anguish - so much anguish.

In the weeks after All Might’s fall, you were in so much pain - you couldn’t stop crying for days. It’s been enough time to know what feelings were yours and which were his - and these ones felt so much like him. It went on for nearly a year - you’d almost got accustomed to it. If tears showed up to blot the ink of your lecture notes, you didn’t think twice about it. You tried to keep yourself calm, steady - in hopes you could lend your soothing to him. Even if he hated your guts, you could barely believe so much sadness could exist in one person. You didn’t know what happened but whatever it was - it must’ve been terrible. At the very least, you felt sympathy.

Sympathy was enough to get by for a long time. A neutral, level-headed sympathy that helped soothe some of your own hurt.

All that said, you were hardly expecting to see him again - especially not this soon. You don’t remember the last time you thought about him in anything other than passing - actively. It’s one thing to know what's happening - you’ve felt him passively everyday for damn near two years.

But it’s another thing to see him in front of you, force yourself to acknowledge him as your soulmate even if he insists on not doing the same.

You squirm in your chair, noticing that you’re wearing PJ’s instead of clothes. Just a hoodie and sweats, none of which fit you quite right. You pull your sleeves over your hands, fiddling with the stray strand of thread loose.

“What the fuck is this shit?,”

Your stomach drops. Unsure of what to say, you opt to say nothing at all. Just let him be, sit quietly in your dreams and mind your business. Maybe he’ll wake up soon and it’ll all be over.

You can’t see him from the corner of your vision but you can hear him shuffle. The way he touches things, noticing how they make noise but don’t feel quite right in his hands. How it feels real but doesn’t, how it is real and isn’t. Surely, he’s noticed you by now. The lingering silence makes you squirm.

“...It’s you,”

You flinch, lifting your head up slightly to meet his gaze. His expression is unreadable, but it’s different from before. In a fleeting moment, something occurs to you.

You can see him. What he looks like. Blonde with red eyes, and a sharp chin and thin waist. You know it must mean you’ve seen him before - perhaps you’d even seen each other, but for your life you can’t remember where you’ve seen his face. It’s right there, on the edge of your mind, but you’re stumped.

“Hello?,”

“Oh,” your reply comes short, strained. Your eyes flutter as you press your lips into a flat line. “Uh, hi,”

The blonde sits in the chair, slumping down. His eyes go towards the flickering flames without another word and you decide it’s best not to engage. It stays like that for a while, a beat of silence - not awkward but not comfortable, passing by without another thought. It all feels real, present - not like normal dreams. This must be the special kind of soulmate thing you find yourself feeling resentful towards.

His eyes are heavy. Relief is overwhelming him, with an iron grip and he’s worried you can feel it. If you can, you don’t say a word.

“I didn’t think I’d see you again,”  he admits.

The words sound tender passing through his mouth, unmistakably so - but you don’t get your hopes up. Instead, you give him a placating laugh, leaning forward towards the fire and mirroring him.

“I didn’t think so either,”

When it falls silent, it feels comfortable. It’s not like either of you have anything to say to each other right now, with no manual on how this was supposed to go. If he even wanted to go there.

“I can.. see you,” you start. He squints.

“You couldn’t before?,”

This takes you by surprise. You shake your head.

“No..Could you? See me, I mean?,”

Bakugo feels heat rise to his skin. Oh. Huh.

“Yeah,” he replies, a sharp inhale leaving his lungs “I can see you,”

There’s something tense in the air. It’s a strange sensation - to know the deepest and most intimate parts of someone without even knowing their name proper, or where they went to school, or what they normally eat for breakfast. All that connects you are these mutual feelings, shared grief that holds you two to the title of soulmates. This odd bond.

“..d’ya still think I’m a quirk wielding villain?,” you laugh, or try too - you’re doing your best to cut the tension. He can feel your hurt all the way from your sit, so deep in his gut - it’s been haunting him for years. How many nights of sleep he’s lost knowing there are soft and helpless tears coming from these suppressed feelings. He doesn’t know how to say sorry, so he sighs and rubs the back of his neck. He’s changed a lot in two years - but not enough to be good at this.

“No, I don’t,”

“Oh,”

He smiles, just a little. It’s gentle, casts shadow on his face from the light of the fire. It’s warm, everything feels warm and better and invigorating. When you look at him and his uneasy expression - you know he feels it too.

“By the way, uhm - what’s your name? Ka.. something? Right?,”

His eyes shoot up in surprise. He nods a little.

“Katsuki Bakugo,” he replies, expectantly. You seem surprised that he wants to know yours.

“Y/N Y/L/N,” comes your reply.

“Nice to meet you,” says him, Bakugo - your soulmate.

“Nice to meet you too,”

__

Getting to know Bakugo is unusually easy. You get the feeling it wouldn’t be, in the case that you were anything but soulmates - but Bakugo has never known being this intimate with someone other than you. Despite himself, how much he hates himself - you never seem too. Even though you feel and see all the ugliest parts of him - have since he was small enough to still be innocent, you always treat him the same.

Your conversations are short, and shallow. Regardless, he’s not used to talking so much about himself. But you’re always curious, so much so Bakugo doesn’t have the heart to see your countless questions go unanswered.

You keep a little notebook of all of your encounters. You remember them by heart but write them down too, just in case you miss something. You ask about his friends - Spiky Red and Soft Green, referring to them that way even after you’ve known their names. You ask about his work - the life of a dangerous hero, and if he ever gets nervous flying through the air.

Admittedly, he’s mean to you. He teases you so frequently, he’s lost count of all the times you’ve huffed and puffed at his sarcastic remarks. Still, you never turn away from him. You stand with your foot down and your arms crossed over your chest - insistent on making him feel flustered too. And it works, somehow - because you know all too much about Bakugou and always gets him right where he’s most conscious about. You don’t have to tease him about his feelings since you know them like the palms of your hand.

But these shallow conversations always mean a little more to him that he knows how to verbalize, and half the time he doesn’t need to do that at all. You’ve learned the masterful of working around him quietly, making all the parts of that feel too big to love - something small and fragile. Somehow, you’ve made being with him, even as friends - feel like less of an impossible feat but a dream.

Katsuki Bakugo has been in love with you since he was 6 years old. There must be some feelings we cannot share with our soulmates, because he has no idea if you feel it or not. He just knows he does, somewhere deep in the cavern of his heart, he loves you.

You never cross the barrier of romance with him, though. A paralyzing fear seems to settle in your bones when you breach too close to love and intimacy - and Bakugo understands those feelings, even if he doesn’t know exactly why they’re there. It’s not something you’ve decided to tell him yet, but he feels it in the same way he feels your loneliness. You may be kind but you’re more guarded than he is, and not fearless but reckless.

But he still finds himself aching to love and be loved by you, no matter how much he hates it. The yearning still manages to swallow him, even late into the night.

MEETING 3:

It’s been a while since your last meeting with Bakugo but not long. You were 21 now, but your dream visits were frequent. When you weren't speaking or seeing him through dreams - you were watching him on TV. You’d been yet to meet with him in real life but to you, that was okay. Seeing him like this had been more than enough.

Today was different. Normally, that bonfire was always a back-drop to these little encounters but it was a field today - a filed with rolling hills and hundreds of flowers and tall grass that made you feel itchy. The sun was permanently stuck right before it set but it was so warm everywhere. When you get there, there’s a blanket on the top of one of the hills. You sit on it cautiously and watch the wind pass. Everything is tinged orange, and red - you know he’s there with you before he appears.

When he does, he seems different. You glance over at him as he stumbles towards you in a stupor, and when he does finally sit - you get a whiff of alcohol coming from his neck and mouth. It’s strong enough to make a little dizzy. Blinking owlishly, he sits crisscross besides you, staring a little at the surroundings.

“..the fuck?,” he slurs. You can’t help but break out into a laugh. He nearly falls over, body swaying so you bring his head down to your shoulder wordlessly, a furious heat running all over your skin. Even though you can’t feel him, the gesture makes you feel something in your belly.

“Why’re you so drunk?,”

“Birthday,” he mumbles. Your eyes widen in surprise. Bakugo is seemingly unfazed, eyes drooping with tiredness. He’s completely inebriated.

You feel yourself grow tender. You’d have to wake up and remember the days date. Despite all the times you’ve met, you had no clue about his birthday or how he celebrated. You feel your heart ache at the idea you’ve spent the latter half of it together, in your own way.

“Happy Birthday, Bakugo.”

“Bakugo this, Bakugo that,” he growls, a little incoherent “We’re supposed to be fucking soulmates and you still call me by that.. damn name.”

He hiccups a little as you sit there stunned. You blink.

“.. You think of us as soulmates?,”

“Are you some kind of moron?,”

You scowl, flicking his forehead with your thumb and forefinger. He makes a noise of indignance.

“Well, how would I know? When we first met, you didn’t seem enthused about it,”

Bakugo sighs tiredly.

“I was 15 and an asshole - clearly I don’t fuckin’ feel that anymore,”

You seem surprised again.

“..You don’t?,”

Instead of swearing at you, he closes his eyes and gets closer to you. The liquor runs through his system like liquid courage and he nods a little.

“Not at all,”

“What do you..”

“What do you think I mean?,” he barks a laugh. You feel your pulse under your skin, drumming against your chest like a hammer. You can’t even breathe.

You’ve had feelings for Bakugo from the second proper meeting you’d had with him. It was clear as a day that he was your soulmate for good reason, that inexplicable draw that kept your heart from ever belonging to anyone else. You tried to - tried to go on dates and see other opportunities through but he was always so one of a kind.

Yet, you’d given up all hope that it would mean anything to harbor these feelings, convinced that Bakugo simply wasn’t interested in you In doing any of this. You didn’t want to force him into something he didn’t want - so you kept your distance with hope that he’d still be in your life. It was enough, or you’d wanted it to be.

It’d be a lie to say that you hadn’t started thinking about it more and more as the days pass. What it would be like to see him, touch him and love him and be with him for real - these passive daydreams gone vivid. If he could see your dreams, he must know about them. But you didn’t know how to approach it - how to approach love at all.

That’s the thing with soulmates. You’re told that you’ll just have the answers, destiny will do the hard work but that’s far from true. Because even now, with Bakugo leaning  on your shoulder with this confession lingering in the air - you don’t know what to do.

“Stop being so nervous,” he mumbles. You stumble a little over yourself.

“Sorry,”

He chuckles.

“You really need me to say it, huh?,” he sighs. He picks himself. If he’s drunk and reckless, then fuck it - he’s gonna take it all the way. He drops his head onto your lap with a tired sigh.

“I think you’re my soulmate, you fuckin’ idiot,” he admits.

And it’s hard to say, because feelings don’t come easy for Bakugo Katsuki - but it’s the least he can do. All Bakugo Katsuki has ever known is to be lonely. It’s a loneliness that he’d forced on himself. Bottling up all the anger and sadness and swallowing it. It’s long since sunk it’s claws into him. That overwhelming, all consuming ugly feeling that lingers underneath that superiority complex.

That no one would ever, could ever love the ugliness that lingers in him. That no one who knew him for what he truly is, could care for him. Deku was the first of many disbeliefs and not much had changed.

Except for when it did. Except for when he met you - in a dream, and you were real and beautiful even at 15. That the universe hadn’t been playing some sick joke on him when he kept seeing you in his dreams, so soothing to his teenage loneliness. You were real and that was so fucking scary.

But you loved him anyway. Looked out for him when he was at his lowest - the soothing beat of your heart  in the days after All Mights end . When he cried himself into sleep and dreamed of you. God, how he dreamed of you. Not especially romantic dreams, but dreams of how you made breakfast. How you watched cartoons on Sunday and read manga in your classes instead of the assigned work. How you fell asleep on the train station and always ate icecream after big tests. How you were especially mundane and how he got to be apart of that everyday routine.

After all, you see dreams of each other, but Bakugo has no clue what your dreams of him look like. His have always looked like you though.

When he was worthless and empty and unable to give you anything meaningful, to apologize or put his pride away - you had loved him anyway. Felt for him with clumsy hands and held on, not letting go. Even when he was begging for you to leave him alone, in fear of this all being nothing more than a cruel dream - you held on tightly to him. With your silly notebook questions and dumb names.

Bakugo Katsuki has never known what it means to love someone who isn’t you. Even if you found someone else and there was someone better than you for him, he would grit his teeth and bear it. He wonders if he’ll ever believe he deserves you. He wants to believe you’re his soulmate - to believe you wont ever leave. To believe that he did something right enough that the universe could give him someone like you.

And he wishes he could say all this, but he can’t - he just closes his eyes and hopes you can feel it.

“You’re so mean,”

“Isn’t that why you like me?,” he grins.

And you can feel his sincerity. He should feels yours too.

“I love you, actually,”

He gasps, a sharp breath that stabs his lungs. He feels sober from the confession.

His voice is gravelly when he speaks.

“Yeah, shit - me too,”

__

Your heart beats rapidly in your chest. The address is correct, it has to be with the way this place looks. Only a hero could live here, with the floors that lead up to skies. He lives on 3rd floor, so you swallow your fear. You give yourself a thumbs up in the glass window pane of the building before entering through the doors.

When you get there, a box sits. You press the button next to his place, bouncing on the balls of your feet until you answer.

“Hello?,”

His voice feels different in real life. You  cough.

“Uh, hi,” you greet awkwardly “I’m here,”

“Oh,” he says. You hear something buzz and then him again. “Come on up,”

And you do. The elevator ride feels like it stretches mild, classic piano echoing against the empty walls. You feel yourself feel sick but you’re not sure it’s from the movement. All you can do is fidget and wait.

When the doors open, you peak your head out into the hallway. He’s the first one on the left, just as promised. You can see a welcome mat - forest green, and something in you knows that it’s the right one.

You step up and knock, three times precisely. Your heart is all the way in your ears and everything in you is filled with unease and excitement.

When the door swings open, the world stops. You gape like a fish out of water in disbelief. He’s tall and big like he promised he’d be, but you’re unprepared. His chin is scruffy, eyes full of sleep. Strong chest and arms that seem to crowd your vision, you don’t know what do.

His expression is full to the brim with feelings you’ve never seen. He steps aside with his head ducked down.

“Come in,”

“Ah.. right,”

You take your shoes off and place them in the slippers meant for you - they fit you just right, and it can’t be a coincidence. Your heart swells up a little as you take your coat off, hanging it on the rack. You can feel his eyes as they linger on your silhouette.

“So -,”

Before you can get a word out, you feel strong arms wrapped around your waist. His scruff brushes against the skin of your neck as he holds you tightly too him. The warmth of his breath lingers on your neck - and he hiccups, a sob stored in his rib cages let out with a howl. The tears blur your vision too. You can feel his drip onto your shoulder as you snivel into his neck. Your legs feel weak, but he holds you up at the door - the only thing keeping you standing.

You cling around him tightly, your nails digging into the meat of his shoulders. It’s him, your soulmate, Katsuki Bakugo. He’s real and holding you - and he smells like leather and sugar and a fireplace. He’s warm and strong and overwhelming and your crying into his shoulder with so much feeling you don’t know what to do. You hit him weakly, unsure of what do with yourself and he laughs.

“Damn you, shitty woman - makin’ me fucking cry,” but his voice is strained. It’s like something connected, how you feel each other so intimately in that moment. Not only because you’re soulmates, but because you love each other so deeply. Your heart feels heavy.

When you pull away, you manage to give him a warbly smile.

Your hands cradle his face - so handsome and wonderful. You lean forward, emboldened, and peck him. He melts into your touch like he’d been waiting for this moment his whole life. It makes you grin.

Maybe you don’t realize that he had.

He’d been waiting for you all this time.

[teklarn]

hi, this is my first ever ask so I'm not sure I'm doing this correctly, if that's the case I'm sorry; I don't know how tumblr works just yet >:')

would it be possible for you to write something about bakugo, pining incredibly hard for fem!reader and initially hating how strongly he feels about her? because they're not even friends, they only exchange few words occasionally and she doesn't even glance at his way whereas he slowly finds himself unable to divert his eyes from her during classes? shes always with damn deku and his friends and doesn't even seem interested in him at all but his heart can't ignore the way she looks at him proudly whenever they spar together, the way she sends him small confident smiles as they fight each other with all they have; so he thinks that maybe, maybe he might have a chance. basically bakugo liking reader so much he's completely lost in self-hatred because he always thought feelings were for weak romantics and not great people like him, but everytime he sees reader doing some badass things (again, like sparring with him and basically matching his skills etc...) he's reminded of how badly he likes reader? but when he finally accepts he's fallen for reader, after ignoring and trying to forget about how she makes him feel, he masters up the courage to confess? and it's a very clumsy confession because he's awkward and has no idea how to deal with those feelings? and he tries so hard to make reader realise he's never been more serious than now? and reader is startled and speechless before rejecting him? and at that point he's just completely humiliated, so he nods and walks away.

it might be a little dramatic but I've always been into unrequited love and one-sided pining. thank you, its okay if you don't want to write about this, i'll understand <33

𝓫𝓻𝓾𝓽𝓪𝓵 - 𝓴. 𝓫𝓪𝓴𝓾𝓰𝓸𝓾

character(s): katsuki bakugou x fem!reader (my hero academia) 

reblogs are greatly appreciated! 

a/n: AHHHHH this is so cute <33 honestly this is super exciting for me and this ask made me so happy, lovey. i’m fairly new to tumblr, i’m usually just a reader but i wanted to migrate here from wattpad so this made me so happy. here u are my love <33 i hope this lives up to what u wanted !! :)) a bit lengthy, but i had a lot of fun writing it !!! 

summary: bakugou finds he’s rejecting his feelings for you in fear of becoming weak, however he just can’t seem to ignore you. 

genre: fluffy, fluffier than the clouds istg, however the clouds are sprinking a little teeny weeny droplet of angst. 

warnings: cursing (bakugou, duhh), one-sided pining (on bakugou’s part) second hand embarrassment (on bakugou’s part bc we can all agree he’s a complete idiot when it comes to trying to get someone’s attention), just bakugou being a jackass, i gave the reader a quirk 

word count: 3,859 

(pls excuse any typos or mistakes, i edited to the best of my ability but i miss some things sometimes !) 

- - - 

part 2 is here my loves <3

brutal. it was utterly ruthless. he couldn’t focus, couldn’t think right. his hands were already exceptionally sweaty, but gosh when he saw your damn face, he was ready to explode. literally. 

what the hell was it about you? was it your stupid smile? or the way you just seemed to carry every battle on your back? was it all the undeniably sweet things you do for others ‘just because’? 

it made him angry that he thought about you, but gosh he couldn’t wait to see you every day. 

just like any other day, bakugou found himself staring at the large door to the classroom, awaiting the moment you would bounce into his day, skirt shifting around your legs, bag slung loosely around your shoulders. 

his leg was bouncing eagerly. 

bakugou didn’t know when the feelings came. his cheeks just started flaring up all of a sudden and one day you just looked...different. you hadn’t done anything different to yourself. it was just him. not that he would ever admit that, to you or anybody else. 

you were insufferable. you were stupid and obnoxious and so...so damn... 

“y/n! come look at this!” 

you’d come walking into class just as expected, and as soon as you did, that stupid nerd had called you over. 

it didn’t help that deku sat right behind him, either. the two of you had recently gotten closer. bakugou noticed it last month when he yelled at the two of you to shut up about all might and get to work. he’d turned around to find you leaning over deku, hands resting on his shoulders while you peered at his phone. 

“sorry, bakugou,” you’d said, barely acknowledging him. you had waved him off like an annoying fly. is that all you were to him? some nuisance that got in the way of your oh-so-entertaining conversations with deku? 

all he heard nearly every day was your chipper voice talking to deku. always, “oh my gosh, midoriya, did you see the fight edgeshot was in last night?” or “midoriya! i have something to add to our quirk analysis book!” 

that was the one that took the cake. you two dorks shared a notebook, occasionally passed between one another, and filled it with junk about quirks and pro heroes. but no matter how much he tried to tune you out, no matter how he tried to zone off and think about something else, you were always there. it made him want to vomit how much he thought about you. 

you were doing an adorable shuffle over to midoriya’s desk and leaned over the table as you usually did while he angled his phone your way. “did you see this hero report?” 

deku let you slip the phone out of his grasp to get a better look. 

“no,” you breathed. “was this just recent?” 

“yeah,” deku said, taking the phone back. “last night.” 

“holy—” 

“can you guys shut up over there?” bakugou said, his voice quaking. 

“sorry, kacchan.” deku scrolled through the article. 

dammit, bakugou thought. “i wasn’t talking to you, nerd. i was talking to shitface over here.” he jerked his head towards you. his eyes flared in anger when he saw you were looking down at your phone, now focused in on the article yourself. “i was talking to you, asshat!” 

your eyes flicked up to his. you looked around for a moment before slowly pointing to yourself as if to say, “me?” 

his face scrunched. “yeah, you. you’re so damn loud.” gosh, he hated how his voice was cracking, how he could feel his ears and cheeks lighting up in a swollen, cherry red. his stomach flipped. 

she’s looking at you, gosh i’m sweating. i’m going to throw up. she’s so gorgeous. what the hell? they’re ugly as shit, i don’t think anything of them. 

his eyes bore into yours. 

“did you...need something?” 

your voice broke his trance. 

“kacchan, are you okay? you dozed off there for a second. you look like you’re burning up.” 

bakugou looked to deku who was currently stretching out of his seat, arm extended. he pressed the back of his hand to bakugou’s forehead. “you’re really warm, kacchan. should we call recovery girl?” 

it took him a moment to realize what was happening. his vision got blurry every time he was with you. bakugou smacked deku’s hand away. “i’m fine!” his voice lifted at the end, cracking. “i’m not sick. don’t you think i’d take better care of myself?” 

“i don’t doubt you take good care of yourself, kacchan, but everyone gets sick once in a while. there’s nothing wrong with that.” 

“i never get sick!” besides, if i got sick, i wouldn’t want you to be the one taking care of me. 

he was still pissed. he was always in a bad mood, however, more so right now because you’d gone straight back to your phone and that stupid hero article that was supposedly so damn interesting. 

soon enough, the bell rang, and you were seated at your desk. it was jirou’s old spot, however, after much convincing, you two had switched spots so you could be closer to deku. just a few months of getting close to the idiot and you two are suddenly best friends. jirou hadn’t minded one tiny bit, claiming she needed a break from how loud that section of the room was. 

late as always, aizawa came trudging into your room. thankfully, his entire body wasn’t obscured by a yellow sleeping bag that smelled of something unwashed and coffee and gasoline. (for some reason, aizawa’s clothes always smelled of it.) 

“lucky for you,” he began while shuffling papers on his desk, “all of you are doing training for these first periods.”

the class cheered in perfect unison, followed by their individual chatter. you had erupted with glee along with them, and bakugou was sure he felt his heart clench and then explode. just a tiny bit. but he shoved the feeling down just as quickly as it had come up. 

“go out to the field and wait for further instructions. don’t make a sound in the halls otherwise, i’ll expel all of you.” 

this shut everyone up in almost a second, the sound draining out just as water does. the first years trailed out into the hall, single-file mimicking the positions baby ducklings would take when following their mother. 

bakugou found himself walking faster when he saw you take up your spot in the line, hoping to land his spot right behind you. 

unfortunately, this idiot who considered himself bakugou’s friend tugged him back. “bakugou!” a familiar voice rasped. 

“shitty hair, let go of me.” 

“hey man, chill out. wanna partner up if we’re doing training in pairs?” 

bakugou glanced at the line, the spot that should have been reserved for him now taken up by sato. 

bakugou tugged his sleeve from kirishima’s hand. “whatever,” he snapped. 

“sounds good!” kirishima flashed him a toothy grin and a thumbs-up. the bubbly feeling in bakugou’s chest died down as he stood behind sato, the overwhelming scent of sugar filling his nose, various candies that would go straight to your arteries. 

“you smell like ass, damn,” bakugou remarked, squeezing his nostrils together. 

luckily, sato was tall enough to not hear the insult, as he towered over bakugou by just another head. the line began moving like a sloppy train down to the change rooms. 

bakugou scoffed as he listened to your giggle. he should be making you laugh. 

- 

“you’ll be given partners randomly from this box.” aizawa held up a familiar red box. “inside are all your names. i’ll select one, then that person will come up and pick another name from the box. that will be your assigned partner for today. as soon as you have your assigned partner, i want you guys to get straight to work.” 

denki raised a hand, speaking before being called on. “sensei, why are we getting random partners? we’re always allowed to choose.” 

“in the real world, you’re going to come across different villains every day. you’ll never improve your skills or your quirks if you keep fighting the same person.” 

denki sighed, slumping back. 

dammit, bakugou thought, gritting his teeth together. there wasn’t any way he wanted to be partners with you. it’s obvious he’d win the fight in the first few seconds. 

yes! exactly right! bakugou internally grinned. his fluctuating feelings had finally soothed themselves. you were just another extra, and he had no room for you in his head. 

aizawa took a moment to fiddle with the slips of paper inside the box. soon enough, he pulled out a name. “todoroki.” 

todoroki walked up, digging his hand into the box when aizawa held it out for him. he pulled out a name, delicately unraveling the slip. “uraraka, you’re my partner.” he deadpanned. 

the brunette grinned. “great!” 

the two found their own spot on the field, and the class’s attention was once again diverted to their grouchy teacher as he pulled out another name. 

“bakugou.” 

bakugou strutted up without a worry in his mind. he pulled a name to find... 

“y/n,” he said, voice a low growl. instead of the annoying fluttering in his chest, his eyes met yours, and they were filled with a different, new ferocity. he crumpled the paper in one hand, letting it twirl to the ground. 

you looked at him, unsmiling. your eyes gave away nothing, and to bakugou’s knowledge, all you saw in him was another opponent. 

it took him a moment to realize you had both locked eyes for about a minute. perhaps the two of you would have stayed as you were if aizawa hadn’t snapped at the two of you to get moving as yaomomo’s name was called. 

bakugou was on his way to the back of the field, you followed close behind. while there was plenty of room still, he chose a secluded area. while it was still open enough to view everything going on so nobody got hurt, it was often nobody chose to train here. for whatever reason, you weren’t sure. 

“wait up, bakugou,” you said. after a bit, you caught up to him. 

“if you can’t keep up, then...” then what? he looked at you from the side of his eye. “then don’t keep up...” gosh, here came the embarrassing, disgusting feeling of redness in his cheeks. 

you laughed. “what?” 

“shut up.” 

“you’re an idiot, bakugou.” 

“i said shut the hell up!”

“what, so you can call me shitface in front of the entire class but you get all pissed when i call you an idiot?” 

so you had heard him! 

he tongued his cheek, curling his hands around an invisible ball, explosions sparking in the centers of his palms. “don’t expect me to hold back, dumbass.” 

“i wouldn’t dream of it.” 

gosh he loved that about you. 

bakugou caught his thought in the air. 

ahem...gosh he hated that about you. 

you both charged in at the same time. his cry was louder than yours, but you struck first. 

he admired your quirk. while he’d overhead you explaining all the drawbacks it had, it was strong, and you were strong because you knew how to control it. 

purple arrows flew from your arms, going in your desired directions. if you lost focus for one moment, they’d vanish and weaken. if you focused too hard or long, you’d be plagued by a splitting headache. 

he’d spent too much time obsessing over your strengths and weaknesses.  

your arrows were weightless, however they were solid objects capable of carrying any mass, any thing, and worked as extensions of your body. 

the violet arrow had shot out at him, twisting around his right gauntlet and crushing inwards. it’d snaked around him without him noticing, slithering along his back. 

bakugou struggled to get the air-light arrow off his wrist, but it was no use. he glared back, only to see your focused, furrowed brows. he’d expected to see your cocky ass smiling. it was nice to see you weren’t. 

that was one thing that had also caught his eye. you never underestimate your opponent, but you never underestimate yourself, either. 

you conjured a larger arrow. it snaked around your right arm as you hurled bakugou into the air, releasing your grasp on him. you shot your other arrow into the air, and it raced into the sky. 

it swerved. bakugou’s eyes went wide as the tip of the arrow came down on his chest. if they weren’t intangible things, he would have been bleeding out. 

another drawback: the arrows, while they could solidify, they couldn’t do any actual damage. you had to use your surroundings to inflict harm on your opponent. 

he coughed out as the arrow shot him into the ground. he hadn’t even touched you, and here he was, vulnerable and so...so... 

you stood over him, hands on your hips. 

vulnerable and so lost in that adorable, winning smile. 

“get away from me, idiot,” he grunted and turned onto his side, his back crying out in pain. 

“i think i won this fight, bakugou,” you chirped, rocking on your heels. 

“don’t get arrogant, shithead. you won’t be winning against me anymore.” 

you grinned, arrows shooting out behind your back. 

- 

the dorms were exceptionally quiet. you were typing away in the common room, bakugou on the couch reading. everyone was off doing something else. it was the weekend, luckily. he’d expected you to go bounding out with everyone else, however you’d stayed back, claiming you had some homework to catch up on. 

bakugou being classic bakugou had stayed back. he was excited to have the dorm to himself, but your dumbass was stuck here with him. couldn’t you have done your typing in your room? 

you were so aggressive on that poor keyboard. 

“oi, quiet down with your shit typing.” 

you barely grunted in response. 

“don’t ignore me.” 

“i heard you, mom.” 

“the hell did you call me?” 

no response. only your aggressive typing is a bit less aggressive. 

“i can still hear it,” bakugou remarked, eyes fixed on your back. 

“‘kay,” you said. your typing slowed a tad, and your pressure on the keys lessened. 

it was quiet now. bakugou should go back to his book. he shouldn’t still be looking for a reason to talk to you. 

the pages crinkled in his fingers. he bit his tongue, keeping his snarky comments in. 

“you’re a fucking idiot, you know that? doing your damn homework. it’s due tomorrow.” 

you turned, pursing your lips. “and how would you know what i’m working on? are you stalking me?” 

“i- what? no. you’re such an idiot, of course i’m not—” 

“i’m messing with you,” you breathed, face un-moving. 

“o-oh,” bakugou stuttered out. he blinked awkwardly. 

“gosh, what’s gotten your panties in a twist?” 

“you’re annoying.” 

“you’re a jackass.” you returned to your work. bakugou settled with reading in his room. reading consisted of jumping onto his bed just as the stereotypical high school girl would in an eighties movie. he buried his face in his pillow, face burning bright red. he cursed you for making him feel this way, and hated himself even more for how much he enjoyed it. 

- 

the next day came swiftly. you’d left early to go train with midoriya. there were many improvements needed to be made, but you weren’t doing too bad.

you propelled yourself forwards with an arrow, and your green-haired friend shot back, lightning flickering around his body. 

landing back on the ground, you panted and swiped the sweat from your brow. from the corner of your eye, you could make out both kirishima and bakugou coming to the training grounds. 

bakugou stopped in his tracks, frowning at the sight of you. 

it was evident he hated you a bit more than everyone else. he was always making his annoying comments, he was always snubbing you. you saw no reason to talk to him, so you didn’t. either way, even if you tried, he would still get angry for no reason. 

it’d taken you quite some time to get used to his obnoxious attitude. tuning him out had been the best course of action, in your opinion. 

the way you and midoriya had bonded was through bakugou, in a way. the first day of school, bakugou had snapped at you for tripping over your laces and nearly crashing into him. later that day, midoriya had stepped up and apologized for his old friend’s actions. 

you two had never been too close until now. the recent incidents going on with the league of villains had snagged your attention, and it seemed you were the only person who didn’t mind listening to him ramble on about heroes. 

you were just as passionate and just as dorky, but midoriya could talk your ear off. you never minded, and he always took the hint when you didn’t want to listen. 

you brought your leg up, twirling in the air with ease and watched your heel collide with midoriya’s face. he grunted, stumbling back. 

you were about to charge in again when a hand landed on your shoulder, big and rough. you turned to see bakugou standing behind you, a scowl on his face. 

“fight me again,” he demanded. 

“excuse me?” 

“don’t act like you didn’t hear me.” 

“i’m in the middle of fighting midoriya right now.” 

“so?”

“so if you think that i’m just going to ditch my friend because you want to fight, i won’t.” 

“you’re being stubborn.” 

“i’m being reasonable. back off.” 

“y/n?” midoriya rubbed his jaw—right where you had struck him. “what’s going on?” he jogged up to you and bakugou. 

“he wants to fight me in the middle of our fight. it’s nothing serious. don’t worry about it, midoriya. let’s just ignore him.” 

bakugou made a sound someone would only make if they were choking. “the hell did you just say?” 

“we’re ignoring you!” you waved him off and placed your hand on midoriya’s shoulder, wandering away. 

-

it was new to him, not getting what he wanted. and what he wanted right now was to be around you. again, it wasn’t like he would ever admit that to himself. 

“dude? you good? i thought you went off to fight y/n. i was so ready to cheer you on, dude,” kirishima’s chipper voice piped in. “she’s not fighting with you? why not?” 

“the dumbass was just probably scared of getting her ass beat by me.” 

“dude...that sounds really weird.” 

“whatever, shitty hair. let’s go.” 

- 

the clock ticked. his ears were on fire. again. 

gosh, it was happening again. it was all you. his face scrunched up, his voice would surely crack if someone were to ask him what was wrong. 

bakugou was once again stuffing his face in his pillow, hiding his expression from no one. why did you have to go train with that shitty nerd? why were you always around deku? deku, of all people. what did he have? why was he so great? 

bakugou was a man of many insecurities, but losing to deku? that was possibly his biggest fear. 

perhaps he wasn’t the nicest, or the most soft person out there. bakugou could admit that, at least. but he was smarter than deku. he was stronger and he was better and people liked him more. right? 

what was so...amazing about deku? 

it was often bakugou would find himself obsessing over little, insignificant things such as these. 

you were what he was thinking of most of the time. just yesterday, he’d gotten a test returned. he was expecting an eighty at the lowest, but more so expecting a high ninety. it’d come back exactly sixty percent. 

sixty. percent.

bakugou vividly remembered staring at your face. he also remembered not being able to focus because of it. his grades were dropping because of you. 

you were the only person to be able to do this to him. 

his heart grew quiet, but the pounding of his didn’t cease. he lifted his head. 

“alright, fine,” he said aloud. “you win, y/n. you win.” 

he settled with getting over his feelings the way he’d read them in his collection of romance manga. 

bakugou left his room and knocked on your door. (he was banging on it, but it was his nice way of knocking.) 

you answered, looking around awkwardly. “yes?” 

his hands shook. how was this supposed to go? sure, he’d seen it in romance movies and read it in books but it was always easy to tell whether the guy would get the girl or not. 

in this instance, bakugou was clueless. for once in his life, he was clueless. you stood, tapping your foot with a hand on your hip, waiting expectantly for him to tell you why he was here. 

“um.” he scratched behind his neck. “you uh- i uh...i’m sorry i called you a, um...a shitface.” 

“okay? is that it?” 

what? come on! it was already unlike him to apologize. what else did you want from him? 

“did you...i’ve been thinking, maybe? maybe we could..train together as...friends?”  

“...what?” 

gosh dammit, as friends? 

“whatever, um...the uh...” oh gosh, what did the boys do in all the books he’d read? right! bakugou stretched out his arm, resting his forearm on the door, leaning to the side. 

although he didn’t, really, because like the clumsy jackass he was, bakugou missed completely and nearly toppled to the floor. 

this earned a snicker from you. 

his stomach flipped and churned, and bakugou found himself unable to reach your eyes. “uh, would you maybe..? okay, um. do you want to go on a date with me? you absolute fucking dumbass.” 

your eyes flew wide. “...what?” 

“no, that’s not what i— i mean i didn’t mean the last part. um, i meant the first part. the first two parts. the part where i was asking you if you wanted to go on a date with me and then before that when i said maybe because it’s still a maybe until you say yes. or...or no because that’s an option too.” 

he swallowed. 

you resisted the urge to mock him, just a little bit. “um, bakugou, listen.” 

he leaned closer. “yes?” 

“it’s going to be a no. i’m sorry, but i’m just not interested in you like that.” 

it took him a moment to register everything. his shoulders sagged. gosh that was brutal. 

“oh, alright.” 

“yeah, uh, sorry about that.” you offered him a weak smile, still a bit shocked yourself. he did his best to return it, and when you closed the door, his face was ready to explode. 

it was so damn difficult to deal with these feelings, but maybe it was better this way. knowing where you stood on your end, he knew he wouldn’t miss out on anything. 

perhaps it was alright to admire from afar. things could happen in the future, right? 

right now, he’d just wait. for a long, long time. bakugou pressed a hand to his chest, feeling his erratic heartbeat. maybe it was alright to not have you right now. perhaps he could better himself for you. just for you. 

[velvetcloxds]

MUTUAL ATTRACTION| S.B.

Pairing: Sirius Black x Plus Size Fem!Reader

Word count: 2800 words.

Warnings: Bullying, negative body image, negative comments about body, mentions overweight/plus size reader being bullied, degrading nickname for reader

Summary: Reader doesn't believe that Sirius Black truly likes her, thinking that his interest in her is part of some joke to embarrass her for being a plus sized girl. Sirius finds out why she feels this way and attempts to convince her otherwise.

A/N: This is completely self-indulgent, so feel free to scroll past it if it's not for you. Mxx.

“Shove off, Sirius,” Y/n mumbles, the words meeting the ears of a rather confused Sirius Black as he treads out of the classroom behind her. He scoffs lightly as he falls into step next to her.

“Why are you always so mean to me, love?” He muses with a light tone, lightly brushing her shoulder with his own. “Truly, if you continue on like this, I may just think that you don’t like me and give up,” He notes, earning a side glare from her as the pair slip past some first years rushing towards the class they just exited.

“How close are we to that happening?” She questions quickly, pausing briefly at a pileup by the stairs. “Just a general timeframe for the sake of my sanity?”

“I think I could hold out a bit longer,” He confirms, and she shakes her head with a soft sigh.

“You’re that committed to this ploy?” She asks him softly, the crowd starting to move again as a professor guides students into the right directions.

“What ploy?” Sirius asks, brow raised as he stares down at the girl.

“This ploy,” Y/n explains, gripping her books in her one arm as she gestures between her and Sirius. “Convincing me that the great Hogwarts player has somehow decided to court me,” She further explains, rolling her eyes at the boy who holds a confused stare. “I’ve been at this school for six years, Sirius. I’ve outlived all of the pranks, all of the bullying and all of the weight jokes, even this one specifically. And though, to be honest, you’ve held up much longer than the other bastards at this school, it still won’t work.”

“There seems to be a rather large miscommunication happening here, love,” Sirius defends, just barely catching a glance of Y/n’s glare before she starts walking away. ‘I’m not trying to prank you, Y/n. There is no ploy,” He announces as he starts following her. She scoffs. “I like you, is that honestly so hard to believe?” He questions carefully, a hand delicately gripping her elbow to keep her from stepping into her next class. She extends a shy glance at the gentle gesture before carefully pulling away.

“Yes,” She notes plainly, not even sparing Sirius the briefest look before disappearing into the steady stream of students heading to potions.

Sirius lingered for a mere moment before walking to the Gryffindor common room in a haze, shutting the door behind him in a rush as he waited to be acknowledged by James and Remus, currently studying for their DADA quiz.

“She doesn’t like me,” Sirius announces as he falls onto his bed, his friends looking up from their work as he does.

“Who?” James questions, shoving his textbook to the side at the newfound excuse from studying.

“Y/n,” Sirius clarifies and lifts his head to look at his dark-haired friend. “I don’t get it, I’ve been a complete gentleman,” He notes and both James and Remus scoff playfully, locking eyes to share a knowing look. “What was that?” He asks, lifting himself to lean back against his headboard. “What was that look?”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Remus answers, also sliding his textbook close, folding his arms over his chest.

“I think what Remus means to say, is that you are the furthest thing from a gentleman poor Y/n will find,” James offers with a sly smirk and Remus looks down to hide a small smirk tugging at his lips as well.

“I’m offended,” Sirius muses with furrowed brows. “Utterly scarred by your insinuation,” He adds with mock hurt and shakes his head when the boys laugh in reply. “Besides, it’s not my adventures with the girls that worries her, I think it’s my adventures with you bunch that’s making her question me.”

“I don’t blame her.” Remus says as he refocuses his attention on his books. “We aren’t exactly the posterchildren for antibullying.”

“Why does that matter?” James asks before Sirius could and Remus sighs, lifting his gaze once again to explain.

“You’ve been practically stalking this girl for a month now and you’re telling me you haven’t noticed how she steers clear of Lucius Malfoy and his friends,” Remus shakes his head. “He has been bothering her for years.”

“That bastard,” Sirius mumbles and drags a hand through his hair. “Why?”

“Well take your pick, she’s a Hufflepuff and a muggleborn and as of lately, he’s been enjoying pointing out that she’s a plus size girl in a sea of smaller girls.” Remus explains which earns a slow nod from James who is now realizing how obvious Y/n’s misfortune has been.

“Wait, you’ve noticed this too?” Sirius asks with a pointed glare at James. “Why haven’t anyone said something to me?”

“Hey, it’s not our fault you’re this oblivious.” James points out and Remus nods slightly.

“Well, bloody hell, I don’t blame her either,” Sirius sighs softly, sinking back onto the bed again. “She probably thinks that I’m just another asshole taking a turn to make her life horrible.”

“Well, do you really like her?” Remus asks to which Sirius nods quickly, hair falling around his head as he moves against the bed. “Then prove her wrong.”

With Remus’ words echoing in his head, Sirius makes his way to the class he left Y/n at, a slight skip in his step due to his newfound knowledge and his plan to not only prove his intentions are pure, but to put an end to her struggle.

“Watch out,” A voice whispers behind him and he pauses, looking back to see his friends stumbling after him.

“What are you doing?” Sirius questions, pulling a hand through his hair as the boys still in front of him.

“Helping,” James explains, patting the raven-haired boy on his shoulder as Remus joins him in leading Sirius on his mission.

Y/n was unaware of the three boys heading towards her current classroom, she was however very much aware of the blonde boy that was in the same class with her at the very moment. Lucius whispered something to the boy at his side, his eyes never leaving hers as a soft laugh echoed from the group surrounding him. He musters a sly smirk as he moves to wave at her slowly. Y/n looks down at her textbook, hand shaking slightly as she adds another ingredient into her cauldron, stepping back just in case an unexpected reaction follows.

“Are you okay?” Lily Evans asks from her side. Y/n tilts her head when she hears the sincere question coming from a girl that may as well be a stranger. She nods slowly.

“I’m fine,” She replies too quickly, Lily stepping closer towards her just as another fit of laughter echoes from Lucius’ side of the classroom, a slight frown tilts into Lily’s lips as she watches the scene unfold, Y/n seeming to grow more anxious as Professor Slughorn announces the end of the class.

“Do you want me to walk out with you?” She asks, settling a hand on Y/n’s shoulder causing her to tense under her touch. Y/n frowns, closing her textbook as she turns to Lily.

“I’m fine,” Y/n repeats her earlier statement, managing a small smile before walking to the door and out of the class in a hurry, her books tightly pressed against her chest as she hears a group of determined footsteps following her, not even noticing the curious gaze of Sirius Black as she passes him in a rush. She pauses for a mere second to consider her route before turning the corner that leads her to the Hufflepuff common room, knowing that even if Lucius does catch up with her, he won’t be able to follow her inside.

“Y/n…” Lucius muses, his mocking tone slicing at her nerves as the hall around her starts to clear, her pace picking up as her heart beats in her throat.

“Where are you going, Piggy.” Another voice chimes in, laughs filling the air as a result of the comment. Y/n tightens her grip on her books and takes in a shaky breath, considering hiding in a cupboard or classroom, trying her luck in finding the room of requirements, but a sharp hand pulling her back empties her head of plans and thoughts, panic shivering though her body as her books drop to the ground in a loud thud.

“He asked you a question,” Lucius notes as he breathes into her neck, pulling her hands behind her back to keep her from running. “Answer him,” Lucius demands, not needing to raise his voice, the closeness of his body against hers fulfilling his flare for fear.

“To the common room,” Y/n admits, voice controlled as she looks at the ground, slightly struggling against his hold.

“Trying to skip out on our daily meetings?” One of his friends ask and Lucius smiles against her ear.

“Pity,” Is all he says as he loosens his grip, throwing her to the ground next to her books where she shuffles back towards the wall, desperately looking around for an escape, the boys making sure to surround her in a way that she couldn’t identify a single one. Lucius removes his wand from his robe, smiling as he points it directly as her, eyes dark as he considers which spell to begin with.

“Step away from her,” A voice commands and Y/n’s eyes shoot up, meeting the beautiful pair of brown ones first before she carefully rakes her gaze over the other two boys standing next to him, wands in their hands. “Now!” Sirius adds coldly the sharp shout filling the entire atmosphere. Y/n flinches at the guttural laugh dripping from Lucius lips. He looks from the girl on the floor to the boys in front of him and grins.

“How sweet,” He notes, bending down slowly where he reaches forward and settles a strong hold on Y/n’s chin, forcing her to keep still as his fingers pinch into her skin. “Defending her honour,” He laughs again. “You’re a few years too late, Black.”

“I know,” Sirius admits, voice forced as he tries to control himself. “But you’re done,” He steps forwards, paying no mind to Lucius’ friends turning to point their wands at him instead. “You’re done hurting her and scaring her, you’re done trying to dim that light,” He pauses briefly as he stills but inches from Lucius’ face, his eyes meeting with Y/n’s for a second as he shakes his head at the soft tears that roll down her cheeks before looking at Lucius. “I will not leave her side, not for a second.”

“But if he does, she’ll have us,” Remus declares from behind him and James nods in agreement. “And Lily and Peter and Marlene and every other person that we know will have her back.” He adds and steps closer to Y/n as well, James moving with him as they shove past Lucius’ friends and still next to Sirius.

“Get her,” James instructs, and Lucius moves aside, grinning still as he mockingly lifts his hands in surrender, his friends doing the same. Sirius wastes no time as he moves towards her, hands carefully latching onto her shoulders as he gently guides her to her feet, removing one hand to gather her books. Y/n avoids the boy’s gaze, numbly wiping at her cheeks to remove evidence of briefly cascading tears as she stumbles slightly.

“Go,” Sirius demands calmly, hands sliding down to the small of Y/n’s back as he faces Lucius, his cold tone earning a surprised reaction from everyone. “And spread the word too, Y/n is under the protection of the marauders, if you cross her, you cross us,” He notes simply, Lucius’ friends nodding quickly before collecting themselves and scurrying away. Only Lucius pauses as he extends another sly smile towards the girl in question.

“Very well,” He comments lightly and shrugs. “I’ll see you around, little Piggy,” He offers with a wink before walking away, Y/n’s hands nimbly grabbing hold of Sirius’ arm to keep him from going after him.

“Are you okay?” Remus questions when he meets the girl’s gaze, she nods slowly in reply.

“You guys didn’t have to do that,” She notes, reluctantly stepping away from Sirius and taking her books from his hold. She shakes her head. “I appreciate it, I truly do. But all you’ve done is shift his attention and tactics to you,” She explains and the boys nod, small smiles tugging at their lips as they look at Sirius who hasn’t removes his gaze from her for even a second.

“We know,” James confirms and shrugs. “But you’re important to him, which makes you important to us,” The dark-haired boy states plainly before tapping Remus’ shoulder, silently inviting him to leave.

“Thank you,” Y/n almost whispers, loud enough for the boys to hear though as they leave her and Sirius with kind smiles and gentle shrugs.

“I didn’t know,” Sirius informs her not missing a beat. “I’m an idiot for not noticing, but I swear I didn’t know.”

“I know,” She sighs, shyly looking down to her feet as his gaze intensifies on her face. “I also know that you’re not like Lucius Malfoy, despite your questionable activities with those friends of yours.”

“I wish I could’ve put a stop to it sooner,”

“It wasn’t your place to do so,” She notes and then shakes her head when she realizes how forward it sounded. “I meant that I could’ve done it myself. I know the spells and to be honest if that didn’t work, I could have just sat on the boy,” She jokes lightly, expecting Sirius to smile only to be met with a rather misplaced frown.

“You thought you deserved it?” He asks after a lingering second and she nods. “It that why you refuse to believe that I truly like you?” She nods again, slower this time, eyes back on the floor as an embarrassed tint of rose meets her cheeks.

“I don’t like myself very much, Sirius Black and I’d be damned if I tried to pretend that anyone could like any part of me when I can’t even do so myself,” She moves her hands to fiddle with the corners of her books. “There’s a lot not to like, is all, and I mean that literally,” She gestures to her body. “There’s a lot,” Sirius scoffs, tilting his heads as he looks down at the girl in front of him, quite unused to this level of honestly.

“You are a phenomenal girl, Y/n,” He notes honestly and moves a hand to her arm, fingers sliding down over her robe to intertwine with hers. “I can’t possibly explain to you what I see when I look at you, but you clearly need some enlightenment," He smiles softly. "I see the dimple on your right cheek when you laugh at Dumbledore’s comments, I see those worn-out band shirts that you wear when you’re studying in the library after everyone has left, I see that little twinkle in your eyes when someone asks you for help with their work, I see how excited you get when they have croissants at breakfast and I see how fragile you look when you’re staring up at the candles in the dining hall alone. I see you, more than you see yourself maybe, but I have yet to see a single thing that hasn’t made me completely and utterly mad about you, Y/n.” Sirius' voice is almost a whisper, his adoring tone causing a bashful smile to sink into the girl’s lips as he waits for her eyes to meet his.

“You like me,” She notes softly, more to herself than to him as she looks down to where his thumb is moving rhythmically across her hand, the movement causing shivers to tickle through her body.

“I like you,” Sirius clarifies, other hand lifting to the crook of her neck, delicately shifting the hair away from his fingers to caress her skin, keeping her in place so she doesn’t look away again. “And I’ll like you enough for the both of us for now, but I will not let another day pass without reminding you just how relentlessly extraordinary I find your very existence,” She smiles, nodding almost mindlessly as she steps forward, not quite ready to kiss the boy just yet, but yearning for the softest touch as leans into him, her books against his chest as his hands remain where there are, only shifting to be sure she’s comfortable against him. She smiles into his shirt, allowing the sweet sensation to consume her when he places a delicate kiss to the top of her head.

“I like you too, Sirius Black,” She announces carefully, tugging numbly on the hand that is folded around hers. “I like you too.”

Hi there, more of my work can be found on Wattpad under @mjoubertt. Mxx.

Masterlist 

[tsukishumai]

pairing: Bokuto Kotaro x gn!reader

summary: whoever said being adult was fun obviously never had bills to pay. so when Akaashi offers up a way to earn cash fast, you jump at the opportunity. except, you never thought you’d find yourself modeling in your underwear... least of all with Bokuto Kotaro

wc; 3k+

tags; fluff, humor, college au, mentions of very slight nudity

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 　　 *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

If anyone else other than Akaashi offered you this position, you would probably punch them right in the face.

Maybe he considers this payback for all the times he’s had to listen to you whine about your problems during your shared shifts at the cafe, or maybe this truly was his own sadistic way of attempting to provide support.

“Okay, so I know a way you can make easy money,” he started, and already those words should have sent alarm bells ringing in your head, but this was Akaashi. You’ve only really known him for a short time, but already you knew he wouldn’t lead you astray.

But really, the electronic shop five blocks from campus told you it would cost 55000 yen to repair your laptop monitor, so you weren’t exactly in a position to be picky. 

You had also been complaining to him for the past forty minutes -- about the broken laptop, the leaking faucet in your apartment, the textbook that cost you more than your groceries for the past month, the two hours of sleep you got last night, and your paychecks that were all but depleted once the bills were paid. He remained tightlipped throughout your whole tirade, so you suppose the least you could do was hear him out. 

“You’re not trying to sell my kidneys, right…” You mumble sarcastically, but you tilt your head to him anyway to show you were listening.

“No, sadly, it’s not quite the season for kidneys yet,” Akaashi delivers in a flat tone, “So you’re just going to have to deal with modeling.”

“Modeling?” Your reaction was harsh and loud, and you flinched away from the piercing glares of cafe regulars trying to study in peace. 

Akaashi smirks as he wipes down the steamer before replying, “Don’t worry, it’s not the kind of modeling you’re thinking.”

Your mouth dropped, and you raised an eyebrow as you crossed your arms, scoffing at Akaashi incredulously. 

“Are you trying to send me to a nudie shoot?!” you whisper in almost-mock offense, but now a part of you was a little worried that your favorite coworker was a secret pervert.

To your utter relief, Akaashi just laughs. “God, no. Well, I guess, kind of?”

At this point, your head was beginning to spin. “What do you mean kind of? Just spit it out already, Akaashi.”

Akaashi finally finishes cleaning off the coffee machine just as you finished replenishing the pastry displays, and in an unusual lull in customers, he’s able to lean against the bar and give you his undivided attention.

“My art professor pays the models for her figure drawing class a pretty decent amount of money, I think,” Akaashi tells you, and your eyes begin to sparkle. “She mentioned a couple of slots being open.”

“Really?” your interest was immediately piqued, “How much money?”

Akaashi shrugs. “Enough to strike at least one problem off your list, probably.”

That was all you needed to hear. Akaashi had given you his professor’s contact information, and you sent her an email the second you had clocked out of your shift. 

Professor Nobuta was a kind woman who emailed you back with such haste, you could feel her desperation matching yours. She was candid during the entirety of your exchange, saying that her usual model had dropped out last minute and there was a spot in her class tomorrow that she needed to fill as soon as possible. Lucky for both of you, you were actually available, and details were exchanged swiftly. 

As you read over the requirements, your eyes roved over two words in a section of the email that made your eyes bulge out of your head. 

Semi Nude. 

You blinked once. Then twice. 

You had already formulated a kind rejection in your mind, ready to type your response when another section caught your eye. You inwardly groaned, dropping your head into your hands. 

She was offering you almost as much as two shifts at the cafe. 

That, alone, was enough to convince you, but the look of relief on Professor Nobuta’s face when you walked through the doors of her classroom was confirmation you made the right decision.

The seats around the classroom were nearly all filled, some students preparing their materials across their desks, and others sitting back and scrolling through their phones. The whirring of the A/C had filled the room with white noise, and you take notice of the two empty stools in the middle of the room.

“Thank you so much for signing up, L/N-san,” Professor Nobuta bowed profusely, and she gestured to a table for you to leave your things. “We’re still waiting on the other model, so take your time, and have a seat on the stool when you’re ready.”

You nodded in acknowledgement, and Professor Nobuta makes her way back to her desk. You briefly wonder if she was going to point you in the direction of a changing room, but realized the redundancy when everyone in the room was meant to stare at your half naked body anyway. 

You begrudgingly peeled off your clothes, folding them neatly before placing them in a pile on the table. Your footsteps made hardly any noise as you walked across the room, desperately trying hard to act nonchalant. 

Just as you took a seat in one of the empty stools, you heard someone pull the door open and loudly clamber inside.

“Ahh, welcome back, Bokuto-san!”

Your eyes widened at the name the professer had just yelled across the room. You brace yourself as you quickly whip your head around, and standing by the door sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck was Bokuto Kotaro. 

Student Athlete, Volleyball Star, Most Wanted Bachelor Bokuto Kotaro smiled brightly as he skipped to the table your items were placed, apologizing profusely for being late. All eyes followed him like moths, and Bokuto was the bright flame. Everyone knew him, and you often saw him walking across the quad, always greeting at least twenty people on the way. 

You could hardly hear what Professor Nobuta was saying to him, and you were now unabashedly staring as Bokuto began to strip out of his clothes. 

Bokuto was built like a marble statue -- hard lines that traveled across his chest and traced his abs must have been painstakingly carved with the utmost care by a masterful artist, and every movement he made created new shapes along his muscled body. You found yourself instantly wishing you had even an ounce of artistic talent, because it was no doubt that Bokuto was every figure artists’ dream. 

All at once, your vision was filled with gold and a sweet smile, and too late did you realize you had just been caught staring. Bokuto’s eyes don’t leave yours as he stands up straight, and struts over to you in nothing but a pair of nude briefs. 

“Alright, everyone, your timed session is about to begin,” Professor Nobuta’s voice had startled you nearly out of your seat, and you turn your head back to face the class, cringing inwardly when you noticed some were smirking at you, “Feel free to request poses from the models, as this will be a graded assignment. We only have an hour and a half, so make the most out of your time.”

You feel your body stiffen as Bokuto takes the empty seat next to you, staying silent when you feel his eyes staring at you. You might have been able to ignore this in another setting, but at the moment, about fifty students were watching him watching you -- eyes flitting up the stage down to their sketchbook as they try to decide where to begin. 

Envy coursed through you as the room began to fill with the sounds of graphite scratching against paper, wishing you could switch positions with literally anybody else in the room. You tried to relax your body against the stool, awkwardly attempting to find a natural position for your arms when you were interrupted by a throat clearing. 

Your head turns to the side, heat rushing to your face when you see Bokuto smiling at you.

“Hi,” he greets, his voice a direct contrast against the silent concentration filling the room, “I’m Bokuto!”

His knees were bent as he settled his feet on the first ring of the stool. He rests an elbow on his thigh so he can place his chin on the palm of his hand, giving you an expectant look as he waits for your response. You try to avoid the way his chest seemed to bulge even more in this position, but the furious sound of sketching says you weren’t the only one to notice.

“Bokuto Kotaro,” you say his name back, and he pulls his lips back into an even wider smile, “I know.”

You bite your lip when a student from the back requested for you to cross your legs, resting your hand against your thighs. You’re not sure if you’re supposed to be talking, but Professor Nobuta didn't seem to be paying either of you any mind. 

He hadn’t said anything to you after that, but the grin remained on his lips as requests begin coming in from students across the class.

They were all fairly simple -- please position your hand like so, could you extend your leg this way, or turn your head that way. The first twenty minutes had been spent doing individual tasks and repositioning, and soon you felt yourself relaxing into your role. Your previous jitters had all but dissolved, and you figured if the rest of the session were to go on like this, then you’d be golden. 

Your eyes shift over to Bokuto, who was leaning back with such easy grace, balancing himself with his foot against the footrest. The way his body created such naturally eloquent lines made it seem as if he was born to be a sculpture, to be admired and gazed at, to invoke inspiration and creation. You weren’t sure anyone in this room was even looking at you anymore, with Bokuto acting as if he was the lighthouse in a storm, beckoning all of you to come home. 

He turns his head a second too quickly, winking when his eyes meet yours, and for the second time in less than an hour, you realize you’ve just been caught checking him out. 

Your dignity was slipping through your fingers like sand, and you clear your throat before turning your attention to a poster on the wall.

From the corner of your eye, you see Professor Nobuta stand from her desk and making her way to a student in the corner. The two whisper among each other, and you watched as the professor consults with other students before nodding her head and turning to the both of you. 

“I received a sort of direction from a few students,” she began, beckoning for the both of you to stand, “They were hoping you could do some more intimate poses.” 

You balked, nearly choking on the air in our lungs. “I-intimate?”

Professor Nobuto nodded her head enthusiastically, and you exchanged a look with Bokuto. 

“Whatever you’re comfortable with — an embrace, hand holding, hands on each other’s face — get creative with it!” 

And with that, the professor sits back down on her desk and begins flipping through her phone, and the two of you are left to brace the expectant looks of the art students staring up at you. 

“This your first time?” Bokuto asks you gently, a sort of sympathetic look on his face as his eyes study your stiff posture. 

“Yeah,” you admit, and he coaxes you towards him with an outstretched hand. You hesitantly place your fingers in his palm, and for a moment, he just stood there. It took a minute for the sounds of rapid sketching to register in your brain, and you realize he’s allowing the class to take note of this pose. 

He’s standing directly across from you now, and you can feel his gaze burning trails across your body as he regards you from head to toe. You feel like an ant burning under the beam of a microscope, and you nearly burst into flames when he chuckles. 

“Nice peach,” Bokuto comments, and you nearly recoil back in surprise. The last thing you had expected from Bokuto was a comment like that, but then you notice his eyes flick back down to your underwear. 

The professor’s email hadn’t included too many rules or requirements. She only included the most important details, such as time, place, pay, dress code, and such. Stated in the dress code, you were allowed to wear undergarments of any neutral color. Today, you had chosen a simple pair of black underwear and figured it was the safest choice.

You hadn’t, however, noticed the large cartoon peach that had gracefully adorned the back of it, complete with a cartoon face that winked sparkles. Now that you were forced to stand, and the entire class got a good view for themselves. 

“Thanks,” you deadpan through gritted teeth, “It’s pretty juicy if you asked me.” 

Bokuto fails miserably to hide a smirk, but his eyes sparkled with amusement as he looked down at you. 

A few minutes (or eternity) later, his hand closes around yours, pulling it up to place against his cheek. He pulls you in by the other wrist, wrapping your arm around his waist as he cups the side of your neck. His other arm wraps almost completely around your middle, and he pulls you flush against his chest. 

His body was hard against yours, and you had no doubts he could feel your heart’s hundreds of beats per second. He tilts his head to the side ever so slightly, and you hope he doesn’t notice the sheen of sweat beginning to collect on your upper lip. 

A fire was bound to be started with how quickly everyone around began to move their pencils, and you heart races when Bokuto absentmindedly draws circles on your skin with his thumb. 

He holds you in this embrace for much longer than you anticipated, and the butterflies in your stomach were making you nauseous. His eyes are trained on your face now, the intensity of his stare making you want to shrink back, but you hold your place and return his gaze. 

His eyes narrow and squint, eyebrows wiggling as his face scrunches up in thought. 

“Do I know you?” Bokuto asks, and it was in this moment where you felt your stomach flip flop into the abyss. It was the one question you had hoped he wouldn’t think to ask you. 

Because you did know Bokuto Kotaro, but not in the way everyone else on campus knew him. 

You remember clearly the slow, dreary Wednesday morning when Akaashi Keiji asks you the same thing. 

“Uh, yeah? Of course, you know me, we’re coworkers,” you replied sarcastically, and Akaashi insists it was more than that. 

“You’re hiding something from me,” he simply states, and you inwardly thanked the customer that had walked and interrupted that moment.

But you should have known that Akaashi was not one to let things go, and after being berated the entire shift about how secrets don’t keep friends, you finally confessed.

You were a student at Fukurodani. 

Akaashi didn’t believe you. There was no way, how was that possible? He would have recognized you. But you were the year above him, and had actively avoided school sports. Because as much as you would have liked to watch your school’s Nationally Ranked Volleyball Club play and compete with super hot athletes from across the country, there was one glaring reason why you couldn’t. 

You had confessed to Bokuto Kotaro in your first year. 

And you were soundly, and absolutely rejected. 

He had every right to, of course. You were just his classmate, you didn’t even know each other that well, and he needed to focus all his attention on volleyball. It made sense.You know that now.

But to your young heart, it was world ending, soul crushing even, and it took you two years to get over your ridiculous one-sided crush. 

Now here you were, standing in front of a group of people in nothing but your underwear, with Bokuto staring at you like a fly caught in a trap.

“No, I don’t think so,” you respond, and Bokuto scoffs. 

“You’re a bad liar,” he whispers, and you find yourself grinning. 

“How would you know?” You whisper back, “You just met me.” 

“No, I definitely know you —“ 

“Alright, everyone,” Professor Nobuto announces with a smack on her desk, “That about does it for today’s session. Give some thanks to your models!”

You jump back from Bokuto as the class offers a light round of applause. The two of you bow back, and you rush over to the table as the professor approaches Bokuto. 

You leave the two of them to chat as you hurriedly put your clothes back on, hoisting your bag up on your shoulder, and nearly falling over putting your shoes on.

“Thank you for today,” Professor Nobuto sneaks up from behind, a smile on her face as she hands you a blank white envelope, “I hope I see your name on the sign up sheet again.”

You offer her a grin as you accept the envelope. “Thank you for the opportunity!”

And with that, you rush out of the stuffy room and make a bee line towards the door. 

“Hey, Peaches!” Bokuto’s voice makes you freeze from across the room, and you turn around to see him adorned only his pants. “You never told me your name?” 

With a smirk, you put your hand on the handle, walking out the door as you yelled over your shoulder. 

“I thought you said you knew me!”

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 　　 *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

“That was a trap, wasn’t it,” you accuse Akaashi as soon as you see him again, walking into your shift at the café just as he was about to clock out. 

His smile was almost evil, punching out as he gathers his jacket. 

“Whatever could you possibly mean, dear coworker,” he replies, and you smack him on the shoulder. 

“You had to have known Bokuto was doing that,” you seethe, glaring at Akaashi, “And you knew about… about… you’re dangerous, Akaashi Keiji.” 

He laughs, waving you off, “You said you needed help, so I offered help.”

“Oh, you conniving little —“ 

“Akaashi, you ready?” A familiar voice cuts you, making your head twist towards the door. 

A set of white and black streaked hair, a devilish grin, bright twinkling eyes — your nightmare in human form walking in. 

His eyes widen as they meet yours from across the room, and he waves a hand in the air as if you could have possibly missed the six foot three volleyball player barely fitting through the door frame.

“Hey, Peaches!” He greets cheerfully, walking and leaning against the counter, “Fancy running into you here.”

“Peaches?” Akaashi asks, and your eyes shoot him a nasty glare. 

“I work here,” you reply, and Bokuto’s eyes widen. 

“Akaashi, why wouldn’t you tell me you have such a cutie for a coworker?!” He demands of his best friend, who simply rolls his eyes and heads out the door. 

“Let’s go, Bokuto-san!”

“Akaashi! Hey, wait,” Bokuto runs one step to the door but stops and turns back, “If I come back tomorrow, you gonna tell me your name then?” 

You laugh. “I don’t work tomorrow.” 

“I’ll ask Akaashi for your schedule then!” He screams as he runs out the door. 

The smile on your face stayed on for the rest of your shift. 

[neko-rogers]

All I Ever Need

Peter warned you about the dangers of online dating.

words: 4,007

tags: dark!peter parker, strong and explicit non-consensual elements, manipulation, implications of sex-pollen or drugging, lowkey breeding kink

a/n: please forgive me! i’m still new to writing dark!versed fics <3 but this was a request and i couldn’t resist (: if you liked this then you are free to help me out and improve my writing by leaving feedback or suggesting prompts that i could write about

     It was emotionally crushing.

     The moment you decided to create a Tinder account led you to all sorts of feelings. 

     As someone who had been busy with your final year of college, you never thought of engaging much in the relationships territory. With all these, you could only focus on finally graduating and obtaining a stable job. The idea that you were providing for yourself, without having to depend on a significant other, was fulfilling.

     It did not help further considering that most of your group of friends were just as hardworking as you. Peter Parker was one the closest and much more than just a good influence. Truly too good to be true.

     Nonetheless, you finally tried out those infamous dating applications you have been hearing. Despite warnings from your friends about how dangerous it can be, you were confident that you were smart enough to handle it.

     “You're still hung up on that app?” Peter interrupts alongside.

     The professor dismissed the class moments ago, and at least half of the people already exited the room. As always, Peter waited for you before heading for next subject.

     Admittedly, you were a bit caught up with your phone. Swiping left and right sounded boring, but for some reason you found it amusing how convenient it can be – the interaction and messages was a bonus. “So what if I am?”

     You lock your phone before Peter got to snoop further. Both your reflections could be seen amongst the black screen as you placed it on top of your other textbooks to be carried.

     “Any interaction online is dangerous,” he explains. “I thought you out of all people should know that, Y/N.”

     You roll your eyes at his remark. “You’re only a year older than me yet you sound like my dad. You know I’m already twenty-two, right?”

     “I’d hate to be the one to say I told you so when your world comes crashing down,” he consoles. 

     “Oh thats bullshit, Parker.” You could almost laugh at his sense of ridicule. “Like you said, I’m smart. I’m sure I’ll be able to handle online dating. Have faith in me, yeah?” 

     “Yeah, whatever. It’s fine.” Peter nods, still beside as you walked along the hallway. “It’s not like you’re already going on a date with one of them, right.” His assumption comes off as a statement rather than a question.

     However, you stay quiet seeming as it was best to leave it unanswered.

     “Oh no, please don’t tell me you’re seeing someone already.” Peter looks back when you decided to stay a meter behind him to save you from the guilt.

     “It’s just a second date, it won’t harm me,” you defended. “Plus, he goes to the community college nearby.”      “What?! You two are already on your second date before you told me, or anyone of your friends?” You could understand where his temper was coming from, but in the end, it was none of their business.

     “I know, but I just thought it wasn’t a big deal. Besides this is about me and Jacob.”

     Fortunately enough, you and Peter have the same subject which was BioChemistry. This time, he followed you behind while you avoided his gaze. He waited until you took a seat along the second to the last row, and then taking his seat next to you.

     You look straight, facing the chalkboard displayed at the farther side of the room. Though you could not see Peter entirely, you could see his glowering look by the corner of your eye. “So his name his Jacob, huh, tell me more about him.”

     This was the reason why you could not update him, or any of your friends. You knew this would happen. They begin getting so nosy around your life before they even realize it.

     Surely, you did love your friends, much more the boy sitting next to you. They have been with you since freshman year, and you were more than grateful for one another’s support.

     “Peter, I don’t think that whatever I tell you would concern you,” you state clearly to avoid a dragging conversation. 

     “But we care about you, I care about you, Y/N.” He pouts, “The moment he tries to hurt you, you’ll run back to us and cry about it. I just want to skip seeing that part knowing I can’t see you heartbroken.”

     You furrow your eyebrows. His statement comes off as a bit acquisitive, but you knew that it was just his concern caught up in the moment. “That’s the problem. We all need to eventually fail or feel pain. It’s normal, especially for young adults like us, Peter!”

     There was a lot of things you wanted to say now. He trigged you somehow and now you’re at the edge of becoming a rambling mess. The worst part of it was that you were scared that you might say something that you would not be able to take back. 

     “Okay then I’ll–”

     “No look, I apologize for raising my voice.” You sighed to calm yourself down and compose your thoughts better. “You know I adore you so much, Peter. And I appreciate you looking out for me. But this can’t be forever, I’ll eventually have to learn how to deal with these kinds of stuff.”

     You got through barely half of your day yet you could already feel the emotional turn of having an argument with one of your best friends. 

     And eventually, your professor entered the room. Barely giving the two of you a moment to continue the heated conversation just seconds ago. The displeased look on Peter’s face remained as he looked in front, acknowledging that both of you took lectures seriously. He wanted to pick up this argument at another setting. 

｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ☆ ｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ

     "Congrats to your first ever anniversary!” Your friends applaud just as Jacob was seated next to you.

     “We’re so proud of you.”

     “You two look so happy together!”

     “Both of you look amazing, practically perfect for each other.”

     “Can’t believe it’s already been a year.”

     A year has passed, your group of friends remained even so with Peter. In addition, they learned to accept your boyfriend despite their doubts on online dating sites and applications.

     Just as they learned to trust your decisions more, you also learned way more about your significant other. Though despite your differences in fields, you learned to love him more than you thought you could.

     All of you have freshly graduated from college. Most of your friends did not have much planned so far; however, as your friendship with Peter remained, he grew to understand your feelings more and handled it sensitively.

     After your argument during your early days of dating Jacob, he eventually apologized for his behavior too. Though that was not the only time your friendship with him was put to a test. After the succeeding months, Peter still gave feint warnings and acted a bit overprotective when you tried telling him how you wanted to take your relationship to another level and get more serious.

     Nonetheless, you did not let any of your peers affect your view upon your relationship. Seeing that you were now at your first anniversary, you were happy that you followed what your heart and gut believed in.

     “To be honest we didn’t expect our Y/N to be getting into a relationship before we graduate, let alone celebrating her first anniversary!” Liz joked. “But in the end, just know that we love you and we’re here for you.”

     You smiled, looking at your friends who seemed to share the same feeling. After graduation, everything feels too good. It feels as if your life was falling into place.

     Not only have you gotten into a relationship with a kind guy. You also attained high ranks among the other students in your program, which led to companies offering you internships right off the bat. Rather than you worrying about where you’re heading to after college, you got the privilege to pick what you wanted to do.

     Surprisingly, you got an offer from the Stark Industries to become an internship on being their analytical chemist. It was the most tempting offer you got. Who would not accept an opportunity like that, right?

     When you learned that Peter also got an offer, you were more than happy for him. You knew he was one of the smartest persons in class and he deserved it just as you did.

     Both your contracts agreed that the internship starts a month from now which was just perfect, considering that you also have a few things to do prior to it.

     “Well, this girl also has a lot planned ahead,” you announce while catching the attention of your friends that were circled around you. “Me and Jacob were talking about moving in probably in his apartment by the end of the month.”

     Your intention was not to brag. Everyone could see how genuinely excited you were with such a big event. You were just so happy that despite what every one thought your relationship would end, you accepted whether the outcome would be good or bad. 

     Your friends cheered at you for taking a big step into your relationship. Looking back, you were so scared to accept the second date, but little by little you could not notice how much progress has been done.

     “I am so thankful for you guys.” You smiled and nodded at them before looking to your side where Jacob happily watched you interact with your friends. You slung your arm over his chest and planted a kiss directly at his lips.

     “We’re always here for you, Y/N,” Peter added along with a smile.

*

     Unbeknownst to you, just as your friends had left the celebration, you had big news yet to hear.

     As you drape your purse over one shoulder, your boyfriend assisted you out. He held one side of the door for you and walked after you. He held onto the side of your waist until both of you reached his car.

     Like the gentleman he is, he went over to the passenger side to open the car door for you before doing the same for himself at the driver’s side.

     When both of you were finally inside the car, Jacob had not started the car immediately. He paused with fingers gripping around the edges of the steering wheel.

     His sigh was just as evident, hearing it echo around the car which left chills across your skin as you looked at him. “You seem bothered. What’s wrong?”

     He avoided to look at you just as both of your hands reach for one of his. He lets you toy with his fingers yet his gaze still directs straight at the gas pedal. You lean further to catch a glimpse of him, moving one hand to cup his cheek. “Hey, what’s bugging you, babe? I’m here to listen.”

     “I’m sorry,” he starts off. The puzzled look on your face apparent as to what he’s trying to apologize for.

     “What do you mean?”

     “I just don’t think you deserve to stay with someone like me.”

     His self-loathing was not settling your confusion in any way at all. “I still don’t get it.” You did have an assumption in mind, but you chose not to jump into it as it might flare up on what’s happening now.

     “I think we need to break up,” Jacob swiftly drops.

     Slowly, you pull back and rest your back against the window. You bring a hand up to brush the little fringes in front of your face. You were trying to comprehend everything that’s happening. “I don’t understand. Why so sudden?”

     “Don’t get the wrong idea, Y/N–”

     “Then what should I get?” Your voice starts to crack as you hold back the tears. “I don’t understand anything at all! You seemed so happy a couple of hours ago.”

     “That’s why I’m apologizing,” he softly explains. “You don’t deserve me, I’ve been so horrible to you–”

     “You have been so nice to me. I don’t know where you’re getting all of this, at all!” Eventually, tears could not help but form around the corners of your eyes.

     Jacob sighs, finally looking at you. “You deserve so much more than this, I’m so sorry, Y/N.”

     Finally, the tears began to spill. You covered both your eyes with your palms, trying to both hide and wipe them away. “Y-you can’t just break up with me after celebrating our first anniversary.”

     “I’m sorry–”      “Stop saying that,” you sniffed. You did not know what annoyed you more, hearing him apologize like a broken record or hearing him imply the ‘its not you, it’s me and you deserve more’ bullshit. “You’re too cruel.”

     “I’ll drive you to your house,” he offers. The look on his face seemed very guilty. You did not know what was behind these sudden turn of events, but either way you were heartbroken for how

     “No,” you stated. “Uhm, I have a friend who lives nearby. You can drop me off there.”

     “Okay.”

｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ☆ ｡･:*:･ﾟ★,｡･:*:･ﾟ

     “That’s pretty much my night in a nutshell,” you sighed as Peter entered his room with a blanket and some clothes in hand.

     Your legs were cross-seated over his bed as your hid your face with your hands. Peter frowned as he walked over to the edge of his bed where you were positioned. “I just don’t understand why he dumped me all of a sudden, might I add, dumped me on our first anniversary!”

     You felt a hand over your back, rubbing slow and comforting strokes as you continued to cry. “Just as I thought I was getting to know him better.”

     It was emotionally crushing.

     “I’m so sorry, Y/N.”

     “Well.” You look up at him despite knowing your nose eyes eyelids became swollen, “You can finally tell me that you told me so.”

     “That doesn’t matter right now.” His hands move to the ends of your hair, toying with the strands before turning half of his body aside. He reaches for a mug that situated on top of his nightstand, “Here. I brought you a cup of tea.”

     “Thanks, but I’m not really thirsty–”

     “Drink,” he calmly says. “You need to get hydrated after crying.”

     You could not argue with that. You’ve definitely lost a lot of water in your body after hours of just crying, without drinking anything. “You know me so well.” you told him and added, “I should’ve just listened to you when you warned me about strangers online.”

     “I guess I owe you an apology.”

     Peter chuckled at your statement and watched you as your lips slowly sipped at the heated tea he had just prepared. “No need to be sorry about anything now, I’m just glad you’re safe. He didn’t hurt you, did he?”

     “Don’t worry he didn’t physically touch me,” you assure as he nods.

     The adorable boy in front of you slyly looked down as he called for your name. “Y/N? Can I ask you a question?”

     “Of course, Peter.” 

     “Why’d you choose to stop by my place amongst our other friends.” 

     You finally finish the entire drink he had prepared. Before you could answer him, you extended your arm in order to set the fragile mug back on top of his bed side drawer.

     “Well for one, I still know where your place was, and it was closest from the restaurant,” you answered. “And conveniently enough, you were the first person I could think of after Jacob hurt my feelings.”

     “I could vividly remember your warnings just as I realized he was breaking up with me already. I didn’t know whether to feel sad or ashamed. What I do know was that you knew me too well, even before I became fully aware of it.”

     He smiled at your answer, and you gave the same look at him. “Well I’m glad you thought of me.” His hands reach over to yours and places them on top, feeling the warmth of his body over yours. “I would never want to hurt you, nor let you feel the pain Jacob gave you.”

     “You’re too sweet.” You smile.

     Your hands rubbed circles around your eyes first. Then you tried to lean in front, opening your arms wide signaling for a hug. Peter did not hesitate to hug you back, enveloping his arms while both of you rest your chins on top of each other’s shoulders.

     From this angle, you could strongly scent his cologne. However, that was not the only thing you could observe.

     As each second passes, you were not sure if you were the only one who could notice how hot the room was getting. Either that or that your skin was starting to burn up. “Peter?”

     “Don’t you think it’s getting hot–”

     As you were just about to react, you felt a pair of lips against yours. Peter had pulled back, and even when you could have realized it, he was pinning you down as your back presses against his bed.

     And as much as this was entirely contradicting your morals, you did not feel an ounce of guilt as one of your best friends continued to leave kisses down your neck. You were not entirely sure why your mind was doubting this, but your body was suddenly, badly craving for touch – and Peter was conveniently doing you the favor.

     “Don’t I think it’s getting what?” Peter sits up and teases just as he pulls his shirt over his shoulders.

     “Nothing,” you groan. “But I don’t think this is a good idea–”

     He shushes you, “Relax. Let me take care of you, yeah?

     His hands gently released heir grip around your wrists. He was confident enough that you wouldn’t fight back after finishing the drink he exclusively brewed for you.

     Your state of mind was perfectly right where he expected it to be. Just conscious enough to feel him against you, but incapable of thinking rationally. 

     He just hated how smart you were when it came to his friends and school; however, just as he expects, you were not as quick-witted when it came to relationships. 

     And hiring Jacob was definitely one of his greatest achievements so far. He lost a part of his savings along the way, but nothing could ever become as valuable as you. Now that you were in his room, let alone under his touch, he had the upper hand.

     Peter was not letting you go that easy afterwards.

     For now, he continues to leave kisses under your jaw while your hands lazily combs through the locks of his hair. He proudly hums against your skin after leaving gentle nibbles that started to leave evident love marks.

     One of his hands creep under your shirt, reaching to unhook your bra. As he successfully does, he moves to adjust your shirt over your breasts. He gets a good view of them even without having to pull it over your head, smirking to himself as this has been a fantasy he has been dreading for.

     “Fuck you’re even more beautiful than I imagined,” he murmurs. With one hand, he gently squeezes around one of your breasts just as he descends at your body.

     “Peter,” your moan comes from above his head just as he was ready to spread your legs.

     “Yeah, babe?”

     “C-condom,” you mumbled with eyelids partially open.

     He chuckled as a response, “Don’t worry. I’ll take care of it.”

     Peter tried to test the waters first to make sure he was completely in control of this situation. He drags the tip of his fingers across your stomach, further narrowing the path down as it reached at the entrance of your cunt. 

     He could instantly sense how wet you have become throughout his teasing. Both his middle and ring finger grew damper as he inserted them inch by inch, slowly seeing them reappear. 

     The warmth radiating around your walls excites him more, assuming how good you would be while his cock was wrapped around it. He instinctively curls his fingers out of excitement, forgetting that he was trying to handle you gently.

     You react by tightening around it, along with a whine. 

     “Sorry, babe.”

     Moreover, he continues it up until he felt his erection grow harden than before. He made sure he was completely hard before finally dropping both your pants down, attending to yours first until you were completely naked – excluding the shirt he did not haul over your head.

     Next was his turn. He undid his shorts and threw them away ever so quickly. Then rushed to welcome himself between the space of your legs. “You ready for me, babe?” He did not leave a choice despite asking that either way. You remained helpless under him.

     “Hmm,” was your only response.

     Peter did not hesitate as he glides into you. He groans at your heat, grasping that you feel better now compared to when he was using his fingers. “Oh shit,” he groans while speeding up the pace of his thrusts, “you feel so good.”

     “That’s it, holy fuck.” He was surprised at how responsive your body was still. Despite drugging you to the extent of being mentally incapable, your body was contracting all over him as if it was enjoying itself. 

     He continued to praise your body even if you could not understand what he was saying. The entire event revolved around him fucking you and leaving sweet remarks as if he was your boyfriend – and not, at all, a friend who laced your drink and made you believe you were somewhere safe.

     Though Peter did say he was going to care for you. Ironically, it was obvious that all he can think about now is chasing his orgasm and nutting inside you. After all, it was one of his dark and twisted fantasies – to have full control over you, at least.

     There were few moans coming from you, but the happy noises being created by Peter overpowers. With all of this, sexual, tension he finally got to release, it was expected that he was going to cum sooner.

     “Fuck,” and other swears came from him. “Didn’t expect to cum so soon.”

     As he did not care about your take on this, he also did not give a fuck when he was planning to cum inside you. Since he purposely avoided to wear any kind of protection, let alone learn if you were in any kind of birth control, anyone in their right mind would know what could happen the morning after.

     Willfully, he made sure to go deeper inside you until he could feel the tip of his cock twitch as a sign that he was going to cum. “Gonna fill you up with my cum, yeah,” he grunts as if you were going to reply. “And you’re gonna take it like the good girl you are.”

     Even so, when Peter finally felt his release, he took a good look at you beneath. You seemed hot and bothered, but not as him. Your chest was heaving all the while he could feel the speed of the beating of his heart.

     When he steadily pulls out, the awaited moment of his deep, dark fantasies finally arise. He could clearly see his own cum beautifully spilling out of your cunt like a cream pie. He could almost feel himself get turned on just at the sigh of it, but he considered that round two’s with you would be saved for next time.

     “Peter?”      “Hmm?”

     “I still feel hot,” you purr. 

     Peter extends his arm to gently place the back of his hand over your forehead, feeling how feverish your body still was. There were few hints of sweat streaming from your forehead. “Let me take care of you, I’ll just run you a bath, okay?”

     You childishly smile and agree with him, “O-okay.” He pulls back to be able to properly stand and proceeds to head to his shower with a huge smile from his face.

     You were his.

[thephysicsgraduate]

The extreme fatigue, brain fog, and tachycardia I’ve been experiencing for the past 5-7 months are NOT just because grad school is stressful. I found out I have POTS (Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome) this past week. I have been struggling tremendously this semester, especially when I don’t have many breaks, and I have to circulate classrooms while I TA. It wasn’t until I had to miss class because my resting heart rate was just “randomly” around 150-160 bpm that I realized I should go to the doctor. I tried medication to help lower my heart rate, but the side effects weren’t great so I’m going to have to go back and maybe try something else.

This puts a lot of my semester into perspective, and I feel so guilty for all of the negative self-talk I battered onto myself. I knew I should be able to accomplish the simple tasks I was struggling with, and I didn’t understand why I was so bad at all of these things. Now I’m not saying this explains EVERYTHING, there is still material that I didn’t fully master before exams, but this is a significant thing to discover. It’s hard for me to feel motivated and capable of overcoming it right now, and I don’t fully understand how to cope with the symptoms. I’m so afraid they will never go away. If anyone who stumbles on this has POTS and would like to share any advice or tricks for handling it, I would appreciate that a lot!

Besides this crazy discovery, I went to my research advisor’s house on Friday for a small dinner party with everyone in our research group. I had a lovely time, and he cooked a delicious meal for us. He also had fabulous wine and shared so much interesting information about wines in general. Probably a result of the years he spent in Paris as a postdoc before becoming a professor at my university. It was also lovely to get to know the postdoc and two 3rd year students in the group.

The group is tiny compared to others, and my advisor is relatively young. I believe he has only been at the school for 3 or 4 years now, and the other two grad students in the group are the first students he is advising. I was a little wary of this at first, but I spent a lot of time observing and getting to know the group's energy. I’m so glad I chose this group, and so far, it has been an encouraging experience. During the group meeting this week, I asked a question during another grad student’s presentation, and it was something that they hadn’t thought of before. It could be a possible contribution for interpreting the results. That made me feel happy because usually, I ask lots of introductory-level questions, and it was nice to feel like I could contribute to the discussion a little.

I also attended a grad student game night/happy hour, and one of the other students in the research group came up to make sure I got the invitation to dinner and asked if I was officially joining the group. He shared that a while back, he had a bad depressive episode, and during that time, our advisor was supportive and understanding. Hearing that makes me feel even better, and I appreciate that he was willing to share that with me. My undergrad research advisor was not supportive of my mental health at all, and we had conflicts on more than one occasion when I tried to set boundaries because of poor mental health. She repeatedly overstepped those boundaries after acknowledging that she “understood.”

I can’t wait until this summer to start doing research full-time! Then I don’t have to worry about classes. I have so many hoops to jump through before then, and I hope I’m able to make it through this year.

[inevitably-johnlocked]

((my account is @mymiddlenameslove tumblr is still being weird lol)) do you have any fics where john and sherlock hold hands for the first time? i just love the build up/panic that leads to some good fluff thank you (*´∇｀*)

Hi Lovely!!!

Bah, sorry about Tumblr being dumb!!!!

What a fun fic req!! I know for SURE I’ve missed a lot, so these are either fics I remember have hand-holding, are tagged with it, or I’ve just re-read and found it in there :D Hope you Enjoy!!

HAND HOLDING / for COMFORT

The Four Incidents by TheGirlWithRedHair22 (K+, 1,064 w., 1 Ch. || S1 Compliant, Hurt/Comfort, Romance, John Whump, Accident, John POV, Hand Holding, Worried Sherlock, Sherlock’s Self Esteem) – The first time John was present when someone insulted Sherlock, he brushed it off as a strange coincidence.

Peacock by ClassyGirlsWearPearls (T, 1,189 w., 1 Ch. || Romance, Cranky Sherlock, Soft John, Hand Holding, Soft Sherlock) – A study in Sherlock and John.

Here to Stay by MockJayPhoenix12 (K, 1,574 w., 1 Ch. || Post Reunion, Friendship, Hurt/Comfort, Headache, Bed Sharing, Care Taker Sherlock, Hand Holding, Fluff) – On Sherlock's first day home, John wakes with a migraine.

Random Numbers by songlin (T, 1,671 w., 1 Ch. || Ace Sherlock / Straight John, Cuddling / Snuggling, Massage, Hand Holding, Bed Sharing, Fluff, Post-TRF, Slice of Life) – A collection of moments in the relationship of asexual!Sherlock and straight!John.

Giveaway Fic #9 - Angsty Sick Fic/Sherlock is Sick by ConsultingPurplePants (T, 1,734 w., 1 Ch. || Sick Fic, Hypothermia) – The next time he awakens is even more chaotic. Two doctors are shouting at each other in the corner, and John is holding his hand so tightly Sherlock is worried he’ll break it. Part 9 of 1000 Tumblr Followers Giveaway Fics

Once is Enough by Jominerva (T, 3,030 w., 1 Ch. || Love Confessions, Domestic Fluff, Whump) – Just as the earth rises to meet the sun at every mountain crest, John reaches out for Sherlock and takes his hand in his own."Tell me it won't end like this," he says, blue eyes holding grey while he laces their fingers together. Sherlock lets out a shaky laugh and shakes his head. "I wish I could."

holding steady by darcylindbergh (E, 12,724 w., 4 Ch. || Post S4, Love Confessions, First Kiss, Growing Old, Gone Fishing, Mood without Plot, Soft Sherlock, Caring Sherlock, POV John Third Person, Anxious Sherlock, First Kiss / Time, Touching, Feeling Old, Sherlock Worship, Crying Sherlock, Cuddles, Comforting, Introspection, Retirement, Hand Holding, Forehead Kisses, Caring John, Bed Sharing, Emotional Love Making) – Sitting on a thick wool blanket at the end of a rickety dock side-by-side, legs dangling over the edge, a styrofoam container of wet, dark dirt between them, they’re fishing. John knows what this is about. This is about finally figuring it out.

A Gossamer Dream by CarmillaCarmine (E, 15,985 w., 4 Ch. || Writer/Teacher AU || First Meetings, Friends to Lovers, Writer John / Teacher Sherlock, Fluff, London, Holding Hands, Online Friendship / Romance, Phone Sex, Anal Sex, Happy Ending, Alternating POV, Scottish John, Online Relationship, Internalized Homophobia, Hand Holding, Forehead Touching, First Kiss/Time, Texting/Sexting, Rimming, Toplock, Sherlock Speaks French) – Sherlock had never realised one could care so much about someone they'd never met in person. Now he is about to meet the friend with whom he's been chatting online for months and his anticipation is reaching a crescendo.

How To Unfold a Heart by elwinglyre (E, 25,477 w., 7 Ch. || Post S4 Fix It, BAMF John, Mentioned Eurus, POV First Person Sherlock, Case Fic, Fluff, Slow Burn Topping from the Bottom, 3 Yr Old Rosie, Introspection, Sexual Fantasies, John Worship, Ogling, Hand Holding, Kidnapping, Domesticity, Sherlock Whump, First Kiss/Time, Doctor John, Caring John, Soft Sherlock, Sensuality, Touching, Crying, Love Confessions, Anxious Sherlock, Rimming, Toplock, Fingering, Bossy Bottom John) – To Sherlock’s dismay, John’s return to Baker Street with Rosie is only temporary. Sherlock’s daily visits to Regent Park with John and Rosie illuminate his lost childhood memories and missed opportunities. But with each trip to the park, Sherlock also feels a growing sense of hope. That is until the past horrors return unexpectedly in a cryptic note folded in the shape of a heart. To decipher the message, Sherlock must uncover the nature of the hearts around him, including his own.

Insanity in the Middle by DotyTakeThisDown (E, 28,010 w., 8 Ch. || Equestrian Sports AU || Alternate First Meeting, POV John, Pining John, Bottomlock, Clueless Sherlock, First Kiss/Time, Passionate Kisses, Hand Holding, Caught Making Out, Bed Sharing, Spooning, Blow Job) – John is a world-class eventing rider with a gold medal and several four-star wins to his credit, but he's never won at Rolex. Sherlock is an up-and-coming rider taking the sport by storm.

Lucifer's Gardens by ampersand_ch (E, 32,679 w., 12 Ch. || GERMAN VERSION || Romance, Friendship, Friends to Lovers, Murder, Poison / Drugging, Mystery, John Undercover, Academic Club, Therapy, Rituals, Jungian Archetypes, Doctors & Physicians, Grief/Mourning, Esotericism, Hospitals, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Love Confessions, John Falls In Love With Another Man, Jealous Sherlock, Crying, Doctor John, Hand Holding, First Kiss/Time, Mysticism, Hugging, Touching) – John goes undercover for an investigation as a favour to Lestrade in a village in Suffolk. The events surrounding the case awaken deep-seated fears in Sherlock. While John begins to come to a realisation of what he needs in Lucifer's Gardens, Sherlock tries to find a way to reach John – in more ways than one.

A Promise Made to Be Broken by PlantsAreNeat (E, 37,018 w., 7 Ch. || Fake Relationship, Pining, Slow Burn, RST, Eventual Relationship, POV Sherlock) – A young John makes an ‘if we’re still single at 40, we’ll get together’ pledge to a woman who ends up all wrong for him. She keeps reminding him of the promise, and won’t let go of it. John asks Sherlock to pose as his boyfriend at a family wedding, so as to dash her hopes permanently. Sherlock, who has at last acknowledged his feelings for John, reluctantly agrees despite knowing how painful it will be to ‘have’ John, but not keep him.

A Love with No Name Series by aceofhearts61 (G to M, 49,955 w. across 20 stories || Asexual Sherlock / Straight John, Est. Rel, Queerplatonic Relationship, Romance, Cuddling, Fluff, Platonic Romance, Domestics, Rape/Non-Con) – In which Asexual!Sherlock and Straight!John are platonically in love life partners.

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse by SilentAuror (E, 50,635 w., 1 Ch. || Post-S4/S4 Divergence, Case Fic, For a Case / Reverse Fake-Relationship, Conferences, Marriage Equality, Travelling / New York, Pride, Homophobia, Bottomlock, Marriage Proposal, John POV, Sexuality, Love Confessions, Emotional Love Making, Public Hand Jobs, Blow Jobs, Passionate Kissing, Needy/Clingy Sherlock, Virgin Sherlock, Touching / Hand Holding, Bed Sharing, Little Spoon Sherlock, Intense Orgasms) – John and Sherlock go to New York to attend a conference run by the National Defence of Traditional Marriage Coalition in order to investigate the potential bombing of the annual Manhattan Pride parade. As the conference unfolds, John finds himself repulsed by the toxic ideology being presented, which becomes relevent to his own unacknowledged issues and his friendship with Sherlock...

Repairing the Broken Things by BakerTumblings (M, 75,252 w., 15 Ch. || S4 Compliant, Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Medical Trauma, Hospitals, Big Brother Mycroft, Misunderstandings, Realizations, Severe Accident, John Whump, Pneumonia, Medical Procedures, Bed Sharing, First Time, Healing, Happy Ending) – "I'm calling today to notify you that there's been an accident."

Not Broken, Just Bent by Schmiezi (E, 87,585 w., 43 Ch. || Pining, Love Confessions, Rape/Sexual Assault, Torture, Hurt/Comfort, Heavy Angst, Villain!Mary, Suicidal Ideations, Main Character Death, Sherlock First Person POV, Parentlock, Sherlock’s Mind Palace, Grief/Mourning, Emotional Love Making, Possessiveness, Depression, PTSD, Kidnapping, Virgin Sherlock, Eventual Happy Ending) – "For a second, I allow myself to remember teaching John how to waltz. There is a special room in my mind palace for it. A big one, with a proper parquet dance floor. For a second, I go there. I remember holding him, closer than the World Dance Council asks for, excusing it with the fact that we are training for a wedding, not for a competition. For a second, I feel his hand on mine again, smell his sweat, hear the song we used. For a second, I allow myself to love him deeply. For a second, only a second, that love reflects on my face." Fix-it for S3, starting at the end of TSoT. Evil Mary.

Northwest Passage by Kryptaria (E, 95,157 w., 27 Ch. || PODFIC AVAILABLE || Canadian AU ||  BAMF!John, Canadian John, PTSD, Anal / Oral Sex, Rimming, Emotional Hurt / Comfort, Drug Rehab, Falling in Love, Pining Sherlock, Love Confessions, Sherlock’s Violin, Panic Attacks, Switching, Anxious / Protective Sherlock, Hugs for Comfort, Suicide Mentions, Healing Each Other) – Seven years ago, Captain John Watson of the Canadian Forces Medical Service withdrew from society, seeking a simple, isolated life in the distant northern wilderness of Canada. Though he survives from one day to the next, he doesn't truly live until someone from his dark past calls in a favor and turns his world upside-down with the introduction of Sherlock Holmes." Part 1 of Tales from the Northwest

The Lost Special: Family Matters (As Do Relationships) by ShirleyCarlton  (M, 144,688 w., 40 Ch. || S4 Fix It Fic / Meta Fic, Unreliable Narrator, John’s Mind Bungalow, Friends to Lovers, Happy Ending, Demisexual Sherlock, Holmes Family, John Whump, Gay Mycroft, Misunderstandings, Drug Addiction, Parenting, TFP is a Nightmare, Virgin Sherlock, Slow Burn, Minor Character Death, Switchlock, John’s Past, Sherlock’s Past, Eurus, Love Confessions) – Sherrinford is not really the name of some high security prison. That was just a figment of John’s frantic coma dream. And Eurus is not actually Sherlock’s sister. That’s just something random she said to John before shooting him. Sherlock and John were never actually estranged. That was just their act to cover up what really happened to Mary – or Rosamund Moran, as her real name has turned out to be. Sherlock does have a secret sibling, though, and his name is Sherrinford. After finally eliminating Moran – though in a rather dramatically different way than they had envisioned – and exposing the truth about Eurus, John encourages Sherlock to delve into his past and to find out whether the reasons to keep Sherrinford away from Sherlock were the right ones, and to discover what really happened in 1981. Along the way, Sherlock and John gradually, finally, stop keeping each other at a distance, and eventually become a proper family of their own.

Against the Rest of the World by SilentAuror (E, 151,714 w., 20 Ch. || PODFIC AVAILABLE || Post-TRF, Hiatus Fic, POV First Person Sherlock, Present Tense, First Kiss/Time, Big Brother Mycroft, Escaping from Capture, Soft Sherlock, Toplock, Insecurity, Infidelity, Travelling, Introspection, Pining Sherlock, Depression, Fantasies, Yearning for the Past, PTSD Sherlock, Suicidal Ideation) – Sherlock has been away from London for nine hundred and twelve days and counting, and has no idea what sort of reception to expect when he finally returns.

Unkissed Series by 221b_hound (T to E, 184,100 w. across 45 works || Established Relationship, Ace Sherlock) – Sherlock returned from the dead a year ago. John returned to Baker Street six months ago. They've been in a couple since then. or at least, not NOT a couple. For two smart men, they sure can be dumb. Luckily, an art thief tries to drown Sherlock, Sherlock has a fever dream and things are about to change.

[wildsyde]

*Pairing: Mark x black female reader

*Genre/Content Warnings: College AU, One night stand, drinking game, exhibitionism, friends with benefits, smut without plot

*Word count: 4,018

*Prompts: N/A

*Author’s Note: Mark and the reader are fully sober! Also this is my third Y/N fic so I hope y’all enjoy! Italics indicate inner thoughts. Let’s get to the good stuff!

Living in off campus housing comes with perks; one of which is currently underway right now. A small-ish get together is taking place at your house and you were fine for the first half hour, but now that the get together is dragging on, you find yourself moving away from the gathering to hide out in the kitchen.

Just for a few minutes, you tell yourself. However, as you hear the laughter becoming more raucous, the ”few minutes” stretch into fifteen and your roommate is now staggering into the kitchen with an alcohol soaked grin plastered on her face that you know spells disaster for you.

“Not interested,” you say before she even has a chance to try and rope you into whatever half baked game they’re playing

“Why are you so boring Y/N?!” She whines as she stumbles forward, throwing her arms around your neck. “You always say no without giving me a chance to try and convince you.”

You roll your eyes as you steady her on her feet. “Last time I said yes, we wound up drunk between classes and nearly being placed on academic probation because someone,” you stress, “cannot hold their liquor.”

“I resent that accusation,” she mumbles, “but, hear me out right quick.”

Resigned to whatever fate is about to throw your way, you sigh softly, “It’s never ‘right quick’ but go ahead.”

“Bet! Okay, so like, you remember Jaehyun, right?”

You shift underneath the weight of her arms, gently placing her against the counter and taking a step back to lean against the one adjacent to her. “Mhm. The one you’ve been going on about for the past two months. Your ‘not’ boyfriend.”

“Yeah, him. Anyways, he’s here and we’re trying to—“

You hold your hand up, interrupting what you know will be an explicit description of something you are definitely not interested in hearing. “Spare me the details of your love life. I already hear way more than I’d like.”

She laughs, nodding her head absently, and continues, “Well, he brought a friend and I gotta say, if my hands, mouth, and—“

“—If I say I’ll make nice with his friend will you stop sharing too much information about your man who is not your man?”

“First of all, fuck you,” she laughs. “And second of all, yes.”

You huff a loud sigh that’s just on the other side of exaggerated before agreeing. “Fine. But, I’m not sleeping with him.”

She rolls her eyes and purses her lips together before muttering, “Okay.” A bit more loudly, she states, “We’re in the middle of a drinking game. He seems pretty disinterested and has been asking when they’re leaving so just—,” she stops talking and gestures towards you, “—do what you do Y/N.”

Your eyebrow quirks as you question, “And what is it I do?”

“Fuck if I know!” She happily quips as she grabs your wrist and drags you back to the living room.

Several people are still there, a couple from the frat that Jaehyun and, you’re assuming his friend, belong to. Empty beer bottles and red solo cups are strewn across the living room floor. Some of the guests are already halfway to passed out on the sofas while the rest are seated in a semi circle on the floor. You nod in Jaehyun’s general direction and upon your acknowledgment he gives your roommate a knowing glance before turning his face to smile up at you.

“Y/N, meet Mark. Mark, meet Y/N.”

Usually, whenever your roommate draws you into something that results in you having to babysit her latest conquests friends, you humor them. However, Mark is just your type and from the way she’s throwing her elbow into your side, your roommate is fully aware of that.

“See! I told you!” She hisses. To which you turn your head and snap,

“You didn’t tell me shit.” Turning back to Jaehyun and Mark you muster up a shy smile. “Nice to meet you, Mark.”

His eyes light up as he sees you, the dark irises doing a quick once over as he takes in your shapely frame. “Nice to meet you too, Y/N.”

Jaehyun, obviously taking a page from your roommates book, hisses the same thing to Mark, “See! I told you!”

“You told him, what exactly?” Your roommate asks as she settles on the floor next to her “not man”.

Jaehyun just smiles as he throws an arm over her shoulder, pulling her in to his side as he kisses her forehead. “Nothing. Should we start the game again or just have Y/N join?”

“She can join. I’m already hella tipsy and if we start over again…” she trails off to whisper in Jaehyun’s ear, resulting in his cheeks turning a bright shade of red before he nods vigorously as he rushes out,

“Yeah. Just join in. The game is ‘Never have I ever’. You know how to play, right Y/N?”

You stop the sarcastic quip and eye roll you feel coming on, but Mark is quick to speak for you with an equally (if not more) stinging amount of sarcasm.

“Since when did never have I ever become a strategic game, Jae? Do we need to pause to put our heads together to figure out how to take down the competition?”

You snort, a little too loudly for your first time meeting someone, but he stares up at you with a broad grin and you barely hear him whisper, “cute” before Jaehyun launches into a quick explanation.

“Take a drink if you HAVE done the thing.”

Your roommate cuts in, “That’s why I’m tipsy.”

“Because you’re an easy lay?” You ask sweetly.

“Who says this game is sexual?” She pouts.

You and Mark share a look before you both burst out laughing.

“Too easy,” he chuckles as he shakes his head.

“Kinda like her!”

“Hey! I’m right here?!”

“We know,” Mark cheerfully replies.

You can’t help but giggle as you settle in the semi circle. You sit next to him, close enough for your knees to brush if you move.

Not me feeling scandalous over knees touching. How long has it been since I’ve been la—

Your thoughts are interrupted as Mark asks, “Can I get you a drink? We have cheap beer, cheap vodka, and…” he trails off, squinting a bit as he takes stock of the alcohol, “even cheaper beer.”

“Hmm,” you hum softly as you feign contemplation. “I’ll take a cheap beer.”

“Lucky for you, that’s on tap.” He winks as he hands you a can.

You open your mouth to respond, but your roommate’s loud voice cuts off whatever response you could have had. “If this is flirting, this is just sad.”

Known for being slightly petty, and already irritated with her, you start the game with a bang. “Never have I ever fucked two guys, on separate occasions, in the same night.” Your smile is small (and petty… did you mention petty?) as she frowns and takes a drink.

“That’s how you want to do me? Say less, Y/N. Never have I ever had sex at church.”

Jaehyun loudly gasps and you can feel the slow turn of Mark’s head as he stares at you. However, because it’s you, you ignore them to take a drink.

“We aren’t just going to breeze past that are we?” Jungwoo asks as he sits up on his knees. “There’s a juicy story there and I, for one, would like to hear it.”

Your roommate answers, “A lady doesn’t suck dick in the confessional and tell. Right Y/N?”

You cut your eyes in her direction, already ready to fire off the perfect follow up question but Jaehyun cuts in.

“Never have I ever had a one night stand in a club restroom.”

“You suck, man,” Mark mumbles as he takes a drink. Now it’s your turn to stare at him, your interest piqued. “I can explain,” he starts, but he stops as you raise your can of beer to your lips and take a swallow. His eyebrows climb up his forehead as he watches your throat bob. “Oh?”

“Mmm,” you hum softly. “Who’s next?”

Jungwoo’s hand flies in the air. “Me! I’ll go. Never have I ever fucked someone in this room.” It’s an easy out and the people groan as they sip from their cups—everyone but you and Mark.

“Nice,” he whispers.

Johnny pulls himself away from the girl he’s with to slur out, “Never have I ever wanted to fuck while people are watching.”

You groan inwardly as you take another swallow from your drink, but notice Mark doing the same and now it’s your turn to whisper, “Nice.”

The game goes on in a similar fashion with each person purposely trying to get their friend out, until your roommate loudly exclaims, “If I drink anymore I will pass out and I refuse to pass out before he fucks me at least twice. We’re done.”

Jaehyun nods in agreement as she stands, following suit and yelling out over his shoulder, “You’re on your own. Have fun!”

The game dies down as those that can drive leave, citing an early class tomorrow. The others that can’t are suspended in that murky space of too tipsy and half asleep so that pretty much leaves you and Mark alone and questionably sober.

You pierce the awkward silence by putting your foot in your mouth. “You seem so vanilla.”

“And since when is that a bad thing?” Mark fires back immediately.

Heat creeps into your face as you try to find a suitable, and less humiliating response, but…you can’t. “It’s not, you just don’t seem like the type to—,”

“—Get mediocre head in a club bathroom?”

“Ye—mediocre?!” You cover your mouth as you laugh, apologizing in between snorts.

“Or the type to have an exhibition kink?”

“You definitely don’t seem the type to have that.”

“Neither do you, Y/N, but looks can be deceiving.”

Maybe it’s the beer or the fact that Mark is devastatingly handsome and has somehow gradually gotten comfortable enough that his hand has been on your knee the entirety of your side conversation, but you find yourself leaning into his coquettish behavior and asking,

“What do I look like?” And when he answers, you choke, on absolutely nothing, your stomach tightening as his fingers flex around your knee.

“You look like the type of person I’d love to watch fall apart on my fingers,” he casually responds.

“Holy—what?” You manage to squeak out.

He hums softly as he leans in to whisper, “Shh. Do you want to wake up the others?”

You did not, but your incredulity keeps you from lowering your voice further. “You can’t just say something like that.”

“Would you rather I show you, instead Y/N?”

God yes.

You stare blankly at him for a few seconds, watching as his confidence begins to slip. Before it’s gone entirely you heatedly whisper, “Yes. But not here.”

“Now who’s vanilla?” He retorts.

“Oh fuck you,” you jokingly fire back.

“I’ve been trying to get you to for the past ten minutes…”

“Well then stop talking so much and kis—,” his free hand coming up to grip the nape of your neck and pull you in for a kiss, cuts you off, leaving your body flooding with heat as he parts your lips with the tip of his tongue. His other hand moves from your knee to your upper thigh, squeezing with enough pressure to have you whimper softly. He smiles against your mouth, fully enjoying the way you’re responding to him. His hand seeks out the heat between your legs, fingers dancing over the denim covering your crotch. Your thighs snap closed around his hand and he breaks the kiss, pulling away with a facetious smirk.

“Scared you’ll be too loud and we’ll get caught?”

Yes.

“No. I just…I’ve never done this with other people in the room.”

Mark pulls back, his head tilted to the side as he studies you. “We can stop, if you’d like.”

“No!” You loudly rush out. His muted laughter causes your cheeks to redden as you try to save face. “I mean,” you whisper, “just don’t be so loud.”

He arches an eyebrow as he looks over at you. “Do you have something else in mind I can do with my mouth?”

To quell the growing arousal you’re experiencing, you attempt sarcasm. “Are you always this eager to sleep with strangers?” His honesty only serves to make your stomach dip and cause you to swallow thickly.

“Only when the ‘stranger’ in question looks like you, Y/N.”

After that, you cannot possibly try to rationalize not giving Mark a chance. He’s fine as fuck, hilarious, sarcastic, and currently looking at you as if he wants to savor every bit of your body.

You start to unzip your jeans, shimmying them down your full hips. “If we get caught—,”

“—Don’t be noisy—,”

“—You say shit like you want to watch me fall apart on your fingers and then follow it up with, ’don’t be noisy’?”

“I mean, if you want an audience, Johnny admitted he’s into voyeurism,” Mark replies softly, biting his bottom lip as he watches you stand to pull off your jeans.

“Shh,” you hush him, that being the only response you have in your mind as you notice the tent beginning to form in his pants. He makes no move to hide it as his eyes trail up your thick thighs to zero in on the black lace covering your pussy. You hook your thumbs in the waistband of your panties and he stops you.

“In the off chance someone does wake up, how can we possibly explain your nudity from the waist down? Panties stay on.”

“How is that the hottest thing you’ve said all night?” You groan softly, but you comply, lowering your body to your hands and knees as you crawl over to him.

“Wait, wait,” he hisses. “Do that again.”

“Crawl?”

“Mhm, but slower.” He pulls his bottom lip between his teeth as you oblige, standing up again and stepping back to allow more space for you to slowly crawl towards him.

You can’t help but suck in a sharp breath as he palms his dick over his jeans as he watches you with rapt attention. Your body responds to his siren call, your pussy already wet and nipples hard and sensitive without him barely having touched you. You briefly experience the fleeting thought of, this one is dangerous, but all mental faculties shut down the minute he unzips his jeans to pull his length free. “Oh.”

He reaches out for you, pulling you forward to close the gap, his lips capturing yours in a kiss that absconds with your breath. He pulls you into his lap, situating your legs around his hips, and without being prompted, you’re moving your panties to the side.

“I said I wanted to watch you fall apart on my fingers first,” he laughs softly, the sound dipping into a mixture of a startled gasp and low moan as you wrap your hand around the base of his dick.

“And I was game before you showed me something much better,” your breath hitches in your chest as you lift your hips, guiding the head of his dick between your slick lips to lightly brush against your sensitive clit. His moan is low as you tease your entrance with his head, your hand coming up to grip his shoulder as you slowly lower yourself onto his length.

That first twinge of pain with the stretch of him filling you is enough to have you both gasping for breath and you don’t stop, lowering yourself completely onto his dick until your hips are flush and you’re both panting.

His fingers flex around your hip, squeezing as he slowly pulls your hips forward as he canters his up, swearing softly as your walls reflexively tighten around him. The rush of doing this, of having him deep inside of you while others are merely a few inches away, has your senses heightened and every time he rolls his hips or pulls you forward to grind against him, strangled gasps and moans tumble end over end from your lips.

Mark controls your movements, thanks to the firm grip he now has on your ass cheeks. His thrusts are shallow as he pulls you forward and the motion of his hips, coupled with the friction of your panties against your clit has you digging your nails into his arms as you fight to gain control of an impending orgasm.

“Wait, wait,” you heatedly whisper and luckily for you, he listens, his brows meeting in the middle as a small frown creases his face.

His arousal has dropped his voice nearly an octave and the close proximity has you feeling the rumble in his chest as he asks, a little too loudly, “Are you okay?”

Your lips part to answer “yes”, but as you do, Johnny stirs in his sleep, mumbling something nonsensical. Your heart drops to your stomach as your pulse quickens. However, Mark groans, low and loud and you clap your hand over his mouth as his eyes roll shut.

“Are you crazy?!” You hiss through your clenched jaw. “He almost woke up!” He doesn’t answer you, not at first at least. His grip tightens on your ass and his thrusts become more forceful, bouncing you in his lap as he locks eyes with you, his eyes heavily hooded and pupils blown wide. Your mouth falls open and your back arches, your hips seemingly moving of their own volition as you attempt to match his pace. He pulls you flush against his body and moves your hand to whisper in your ear,

“I felt you tighten around me when you thought he woke up. You’re dripping wet right now. Do you want to get caught?” All the while, he keeps up a steady pace, his hips faltering slightly as your breath hitches in your lungs. “I would love to hear you, Y/N. I bet you sound so pretty when you cum. Fuck.”

You reach over to cover his mouth again, knowing how his words are affecting you. You can barely maintain control—the tightly coiled tension in your lower abdomen is rapidly unspooling as your body temperature rises—and somehow you’re aware of the fact that he knows this. He grabs your wrist, preventing you from covering his mouth and instead, he intertwines your fingers, the pressure increasing as his rhythm becomes choppy. Your eyes flutter shut and now you’re squeezing his hand just as tightly as you pull your bottom lip between your teeth, biting down hard as the thin wire snaps, sending a rush of wetness from between your legs and a strangled, muted cry filling the quiet space. Your walls contract around him, milking his dick through your orgasm.

“Movemovemove,” he rushes out as he lifts your hips, pulling you completely up from his lap. Mark barely has enough time to lift his shirt out of the way before he’s painting his stomach in sticky ropes of white, panting loudly as he releases. “Oh my god,” he exhales softly.

You settle next to him, your breathing uneven as your chest rises and falls with each ragged inhale and exhale. “Shh, Shh.” You weakly gesture to the sleeping guests before you succumb to the post sex bliss. You fall onto your back, your body trembling from the small aftershocks of a powerful orgasm.

The quiet is comfortable and neither of you want to disturb it, but you know it’s only a matter of time before someone wakes up, and the thrill of being caught is only a thrill when Mark is inside of you. Silently, you pull yourself up on your feet and reach out for him. He looks up at you, slightly perplexed but when you mouth “bathroom”, he nods. On shaky legs, you guide him to the restroom and just as you turn your back to go back to the living room for your pants, his hand closes around your arm and he’s tugging you in for a chaste kiss.

Mark whispers, “I’ll be gone when Jaehyun is done.”

“You know they’re both knocked out and neither of them will wake up any time before noon, right?” You stare up at him, an eyebrow quirked as you lean against the door jamb.

He drags a hand through his hair as he sighs heavily. “I guess I can call a cab?”

“Or, or…” you trail off, blushing profusely as you lower your eyes to the floor. “You can just…stay the night?”

“But Johnny and Jungwoo are asleep on the—oh.”

“Oh.” You chance a glance at him through your lashes and can’t fight the small smile that blossoms on your lips as you see his eyes light up.

“Cool. Yeah. That’s fine. Let me just—,” Mark gestures behind him and you nod.

“Yeah, I have to go grab my pants. Gotta hide the evidence,” you chuckle. You turn your back to him again to leave, but he stops you.

“Hey, Y/N?”

You slowly turn around. “Mhm?”

His smile is beautiful, dimples fully on display as he replies, “Thanks.”

___________________________________

“Alright y’all!” Your roommate bellows. “You know the rules! If you’ve done the thing, you drink!”

It’s been about a month since…well, the incident…and you and Mark have been quietly hooking up every chance you get. However, this information has stayed between just you both and when you’re around your friends, you keep a healthy amount of distance between the two of you. Even now, as you’re seated in the semi circle, drink in hand, he’s close enough to reach out and touch, but far enough away to where you’d have to lean in to do so. You both do your best to keep conversation friendly and touching minimal, seeing as how the facade is that you both only met that one night and haven’t met subsequently. Why you’re hiding your situationship, who knows?

But it’s something that you both agreed upon.

For the greater good.

Which is really just so Jaehyun and your roommate don’t make things weird.

Jaehyun goes first, his voice interrupting your thoughts as a small chuckle precedes his statement, “Never have I ever hooked up at a small party.”

You drink, suspicions not raised as you watch everyone else take a drink.

Jungwoo smiles, a facetious thing that lights his face up and makes his eyes sparkle. “Never have I ever had sex while people watched.”

Your eyes narrow imperceptibly and Mark coughs lightly, but neither of you drink.

“Mmm I guess some of us are lying,” Johnny quips.

You cut your eyes at him, your eyebrow arching as you say slowly, “Okay…” and when he, Jungwoo, Jaehyun, and your roommate all share the same shit eating grin, you know…

“Never have I ever,” Johnny starts, with a smile on his face, “Had sex in this living room while Jungwoo and I were trying to sleep on the couch.”

Your eyes open wide as your mouth falls open and you try to cover, spluttering loudly as you attempt to find the words to deny this attack. Mark, on the other hand, is as red as the cup he’s drinking from. “You couldn’t lie?!” You stare over at him, incredulous.

Your roommate interrupts a brewing argument to state, “Never have I ever hooked up with someone in this room for a month and hid it.”

“I swear to god if you lift that cup I’m smacking it out of your hand Mark Lee,” you whisper loudly at him.

He turns to face you, a cheeky smile on his face as he slowly drinks. True to your word, you knock the cup out of his hand, which sends everyone into a fit of laughter.

“I hate this game,” you pout, but as Mark throws an arm over your shoulder to pull you into his side, you don’t fight the smile that belies your statement.

Never Have I Ever