#moving the sliders like is this even doing anything?????

[scionshtola]

i feel like i’m committing crimes in the mass effect character creator somehow

[yellowharrington]

wildflower and barley -- joel miller x reader

pairing + fandom: joel miller x reader, the last of us (hbo)

word count: 5k+ oops

warnings/notes: smut smut smut!!! minors DNI, 18+!!! no outbreak!au. age gap (it's implied reader is in her 20s while joel is 45) and mentions of joel being kinda perverted and liking it lol. drinking (both reader and joel, not excessive), use of a dating app like tinder but not specified, unprotected PIV w creampie and oral (m+f receiving), do not fuck your tinder hookups without protection i'm just horny and gross. excessive use of darlin' as a nickname. implied that reader likes men. she/her pronouns used, afab!reader (with mentions of body parts), no use of y/n. if i missed anything lmk!

a/n: heavily inspired by this post by @yesttoheaven about joel's tinder profile!! it has been rotting my brain since i saw it which literally inspired me to write my first fic in the tlou fandom ever so please be gentle with me. i imagined show!joel because i've never played the game so do with that what you will. please reblog and leave comments if u enjoy it <3333

divider by @cafekitsune

summary: after deciding to change your age range on a dating app in hope of a change of scenery, you stumble across joel miller.

No one likes using dating apps.

Swiping left, left, left mindlessly at troves of men holding fish, showing off their trucks, or with deer heads mounted to the walls behind their selfies holding guns.

This was Texas, after all.

Having just moved here, it was a little shocking, to say the least. But you were getting used to the “eligible” bachelors that were your age generally looking and acting the same. When you did end up finding someone of interest, you were usually turned off pretty quickly by whatever shitty pick-up line they had chosen. Or, your personal favourite, “wanna fuck?”

No thanks.

It was an idyllic summer evening, the hot stuffy air of Austin flowing in through your windows. You laid in bed, propped up on the pillows against your headboard and sorting through the faces that adorned your screen. No one particularly interesting, as usual, and every profile was starting to melt together to look the same.

You sighed, looking into your settings, adjusting and increasing different metrics to hopefully change the pool just enough for there to be someone new or interesting. 

Age range: 25-30

Your eyebrow cocked as you looked onto the screen, pulling the slider more to the right experimentally. No one was here to see you, and even though it was slightly embarassing to be interested in older men, you’d be lying if you said it didn’t pique your interest to imagine it. Even just to try, and see, if they ever really did grow up. You imagined it was wishful thinking, but increased the range anyways.

Age range: 35-45

Feeling the need to throw your phone across the room after doing that, you placed it face down under your pillow and slid out of bed. No use in swiping through them now, and you were getting tired of looking. A pint of Ben and Jerry’s and a new episode of your favourite show was waiting for you downstairs.

‧₊˚ ☁️⋅♡𓂃 ࣪ ִֶָ☾

Joel Miller does not use dating apps.

He barely knows how to send a text on his phone, let alone navigate the world of online women. Not to say he didn’t explore the options, so to speak, but they usually were not ones that were single, his age, and in his area. Unless the ads on those sites were real, that is.

“It’s starting to get sad,” Sarah had remarked at breakfast, when they got on the topic, and Joel feigned hurt. Hand over his heart, he dropped his fork onto the plate. “It’s not sad, Jesus. I’m just busy, is all.”

“Busy not gettin’ busy,” Sarah remarked, and Joel’s eyes widened. “Hey now! None of that.”

A blush spread up his cheeks and ears as they continued to eat breakfast in slightly awkward silence, before Joel took his plate to the sink. “Okay, off to school, you. And no more conversations about my dating life. Ever.”

Sarah laughed as she finished off the last of the juice in her glass. “I’m just saying, dad. You can if you want to. Might be nice for you.”

Joel planted a soft kiss to her head before she bounded out the door, rolling his eyes and calling out a ‘love you’ before she closed the door swiftly behind her. Joel stared at his cell phone on the table. Maybe it would be nice.

‧₊˚ ☁️⋅♡𓂃 ࣪ ִֶָ☾

The following evening, you were a little too excited to see the dating app specimens you had acquired. Not sure what to expect, really, and you went in with no expectations. It’s not like they’d magically all be tall, dark, and handsome, but some variety never killed anybody.

Paul, 41

Daddy, but not yours. No libs allowed. 6’ because that matters.

You sighed deeply. Some things never change. 

After swiping through much of what you were used to, a profile managed to catch your eye among the sea of disappointment.

Joel, 45

Just a Southern gentleman trying this out for the first time. Contractor of over 10 years. I love my daughter, BBQ, strong coffee, and sleeping in. 

Now that was the most interesting thing you’d seen in a while.

He didn’t look a day over 40. His eyes creased at the corners when he smiled wide in his photos. He looked tan, a product of the Texas heat and his job, you thought. His features were accompanied by salt-and-pepper facial hair and messy curls that looked soft and pliable. His photos showed off his physique incredibly, tight wash-worn t-shirts pulling over his arms and shoulders, looking big, broad. He was no doubt the most handsome man you’d seen on an app, maybe ever.

When you swiped right before you could think too hard, you were surprised to see the green “Match!” Flash across your screen.

Your fingers ghosted over the keyboard on your phone, thinking of a witty thing to say, probably for too long.

Your phone buzzed as you saw a notification pop up.

Joel has sent you a message.

Hey, darlin’. How are ya?

You felt your face warm at the sweet message, when was the last time someone had called you darlin’? Ever?

Hey cowboy. I’m great, how are you?

He was certainly an eager responder, taking only a few seconds to reply. You found yourself smiling down at your phone screen.

Cowboy… I like that. I’m better now that I’m talking to you.

Oh, Joel, who told you to say that? 😂

No good?

Not bad. 6/10. 

Only 6/10? I’ll work on it. I like to think I’m better in person. 

I would love to find out. 

You found yourself emboldened by how easy the conversation was flowing. Joel was certainly easy to talk to, easier than the other matches you had going for you, and infinitely more handsome.

Oh, would you? Alright. I’d love to take you to dinner sometime. If you don’t mind being seen with an old man such as myself in public. Or meeting a stranger from the internet.

He’s a very handsome stranger. I would love to go to dinner with you. Know any good spots? I’m new around here.

There’s a great barbecue spot in downtown Austin. If you’d prefer something fancier, let me know.

I love bbq. Just tell me where and when, cowboy.

Tomorrow, 7pm ok?

You sent him your phone number in the message. Fuck it.

Sounds great. Text me the address, I’ll be there. :)

Joel’s reply didn’t come. Instead, a text appeared at the top of your screen with an unknown number. 

It’s Joel. This the right number?

Yup. You found me.

Great. Talk tomorrow sweetheart. Looking forward to it. :)

He texted you the address of the restaurant, right before you opened the contact card, saving his name as “cowboy ♡”.

‧₊˚ ☁️⋅♡𓂃 ࣪ ִֶָ☾

Cowboy. Cowboy. Cowboy. It was playing over in his head like a broken fuckin’ record. 

Joel was positively freaking out about this date.

Sarah had managed to secure a sleepover at her friend’s place, so the house would be empty for the night. He had been busying himself with cleaning the entirety of the house, even taking the time to mow the grass before work and vacuum the family room. He can’t remember the last time he vacuumed anywhere.

Would she even make it back here? How does this work? Will she want to sleep over or hang out on the couch or should he be making a dessert for after?

His mind was brought out of it’s craze by Sarah jumping down the stairs. She plopped her bag down on the freshly wiped countertop.

“Careful,” he warned, putting a hand up. “I just cleaned that off.”

“I can tell. It smells like the cleaning aisle threw up in here.”

He smirked before patting her head with his hand, as she aggressively smoothed out her hair. “Dad! Don’t!”

“When do you wanna go to Ellie’s?” He asked, more gaging how long he has left to get ready than actually asking.

“Probably soon. Why? Tryna get rid of me?” she poked her dad in the side, but when she flinched away instead, a large smile spread across her face. He was tense.

“What’s your deal?” Joel hated the way she knew him so well sometimes.

“Nothing.“

“Are you going on a date?”

Silence fell over the kitchen between the two of them, as Joel’s shoulders slumped in defeat. “How did you know?”

“Oh my god, you actually took my advice,” Sarah laughed, watching her dad’s face burn red with embarrassment. “Just don’t do anything weird on communal surfaces, please.”

Joel shook his head at her suggestion, already becoming annoyed with the whole prospect. He was so nervous, about what to wear, how to act, what the expectation was… let alone, what would happen if they made it back to his place at all. 

Although, when he was able to shake his nerves for a second, he was just really fucking excited.

“Wear those dark jeans, and that green shirt you wore to Tommy’s last week. Looks good on you.” Sarah smiled as she put her arms around Joel’s middle, while his worries melted away with her touch. “She’ll love you, I promise.”

‧₊˚ ☁️⋅♡𓂃 ࣪ ִֶָ☾

It had been such a long time since you’d been on a proper date, you were starting to lose your mind at the simple process of deciding what to wear.

Clothes were strewn across every surface of your apartment, shoes matching with jeans that matched with cardigans, tops that matched with belts and jackets.

It’s 87 degrees at 5 o’clock, idiot. You’re not wearing a jacket. Relax.

Exhausted of picking out outfits and making decisions, you collapsed on your couch and took a look at your options. You landed on an easy sundress, putting the rest of your clothes back in their respective drawers, and pulling out all of the products you were expecting to use to get ready.

You scrolled through your phone aimlessly as a notification bubble popped up on the screen.

We still on for tonight darlin’? Or did you change your mind?

No worries if you did. I respect that.

You let out a cackle at the message, thinking about how he must look right now. Was he nervous? Scared? Was he just looking for a controversially young fuck?

You weren’t… completely against that.

Didn’t change my mind, wouldn’t in a million years :)

Meet you there. Can’t wait to see you.

His eagerness to meet up would’ve been a red flag if it were any other run of the mill guy, but something about Joel felt special. There didn’t seem to be any funny business with him; too sincere to try anything other than just a good old fashioned date.

You too, cowboy.

‧₊˚ ☁️⋅♡𓂃 ࣪ ִֶָ☾

When Joel showed up at the restaurant, he clenched a small bouquet of pink peonies in his right hand and checked his watch obsessively. The minutes ticked away, as he kept a high alert for anyone who could be his potential date. He knew what you looked like, of course, but this being his first time doing anything of this sort is making him hyperaware of anything going awry.

When he does lay eyes on you, his whole gaze softens. A pink sundress, hair pristinely styled and a bounce in your step that reminded him of summer. You looked like an angel, the sunset behind you painting the sky tangerine, which reflected off of the shine against your supple skin. So young, beautiful, it was taking his breath away.

“Joel?”

Your voice matched your sweet demeanour, and he was taken out of his waking daydream.

“Hi,” is all he can say, letting his breath out as he relaxed. “Yes, hi, sorry. I’m Joel.”

“Hi,” you laugh back, eyes darting to the flowers in his hand. They matched your dress.

“These are for you,” he gets the hint, extending his arm out, and you can see the veins bulging in his forearm. He looked so much stronger in person, it was making your knees go weak.

“Thank you, wow,” you held them up to your nose to smell the sweet aroma. “I love peonies.”

“Me too,” he smiled, showing off a string of pearly white teeth, that contrasted with the pink of his lips and the even tan of his skin.

“Shall we?” He extended his arm to you for you to grab onto, and you got to feel the warmth of his skin for yourself. Your hand wrapped around his forearm as he opened the door of the restaurant for you, leading you inside and catching a glimpse of the backs of your thighs as you walked in front of him.

‧₊˚ ☁️⋅♡𓂃 ࣪ ִֶָ☾

When you were finally sitting, the conversation flowed easily. He was truly a Southern gentleman, like he had said. It wasn’t normal for you to open up so quickly, but Joel was so easy going and smart, he asked the right questions and knew when to listen. He knew how to listen, a warm gaze and a nod along, asking follow up questions to your answers and easily getting to know you.

You asked about his daughter, his family, his work. He was happy to tell you. 

“So, what’s a man like you doing being single in this city?” You take a sip of the wine in the glass in front of you, burgundy staining your bottom lip. 

He takes a bite of the food in front of him, a napkin pressing to his lips quickly after. “Been busy,” he started to say, honey brown eyes meeting yours for a second. His gaze sent an electrifying pulse down your spine.

“And, well, when Sarah’s mom left there was a ton to do,” he says it nonchalantly, as if that should be something normal to happen. “House, work, school, she keeps my hands full. Hasn’t been a lot of time.” His syrupy drawl is pulling you in, you’re enticed by the way he speaks to you. So easy, warm, soft. You wonder what his hands feel like on your body, lips pressed to your neck, torso pressed against yours.

“Sorry, that’s a lot of information for a first date,” he laughs to cover the awkwardness, and quietly curses himself for going into so much detail about his precarious family situation and basically admitting to you that he hasn’t fucked anything other than his hand in the last 5 or so years.

“No, it’s okay,” you slide your hand across the table, palm up, urging him to slot his hand into it. He takes it, easily, enveloping yours. His fingers find the pulse point on your wrist. You let your eyes drift up to his, drinking in the way his chest fills out the shirt he chose.

“What’s your story?” He asks earnestly, giving your hand a squeeze. “Can’t imagine there isn’t a long line of people outside waiting to take my place, darlin’.”

You blush furiously at the nickname, and let your eyes meet his once again. “You have no idea the… mess that is out there,” the wine is calling your name to take another sip at the mere thought, but you refrain. “Certainly not too many I am interested in.”

“So, is that why you’re on a date with an old man on a beautiful summer night in Austin?”

You could tell Joel, in a twisted way, liked that you were younger than him. It made him feel younger by admission, that you’d want to spend time with him. 

“You’re not that much older,” you laugh, not even believing it yourself as the words left your lips. “And I like to try new things. Don’t you like trying new things, sometimes?”

It was his turn to let his face go red at your insinuation. If only you knew how ‘new’ this really was for him, how much he was pushed out of his comfort zone right now.

You didn’t notice. 

A little more polite small talk and exchanging of stories was all you could take before the tension was becoming too much. After another glass of wine and a shared plate of sky-high chocolate cake for dessert, you were enjoying his company and could tell he was enjoying yours all the same. When you met his gaze again, hands still intertwined, you could tell there was a question on the tip of his tongue.

“Would you want to…“ - a nervous pause, with a halo of lust - “come back to mine for a nightcap? I’ve got an empty house this evening.”

You couldn’t help but smirk, knowing in your heart that Joel must’ve made arrangements for his family not to be home in anticipation. He had to have planned for you, known in his heart you’d say yes.

“I’d love that.”

‧₊˚ ☁️⋅♡𓂃 ࣪ ִֶָ☾

Joel’s home is unmistakably him. It smells like a pine candle that sits near the front door and a faint aroma of laundry detergent. There’s photos everywhere, him and his daughter, his brother’s family. Big windows were letting in the twinkling lights of the city outside, the inky sky making them look brighter against its canvas.

“You have a beautiful home,” you say, although it seems a little formal for the situation. What else do you say to a grown-up in their house?

“Thank you,” he takes a bottle of whiskey from the bar cart and pours two rock glasses, handing you one. He flicks on a lamp, ambient light filling the room and painting his skin amber orange, as he joins your side by his kitchen table.

“I did a lot of the construction myself, the decorations are my daughter.” He points lazily to the trinkets on the shelves and photos on the wall. “I don’t really have a good eye for that type of stuff.” 

You take a sip from the drink and it coats your throat, burning down as you suppress a cough at the taste. You nod along as he explains the design choices he made in the home, and you play along, knowing it’s likely out of anxiety.

“What about upstairs?”

Your eyes are innocent as they meet his, although you understand the implication you’re making whole-heartedly. He puts his glass down on the kitchen table and you follow his lead, his strong hand around your wrist as he leads you up the stairs wordlessly.

“It’s not anything,” - he clears his throat - “special,” he shows you around the second floor, finishing at the door of his bedroom that has been left slightly ajar. 

You step in quietly, leading him inside as you take in the bedroom. Neatly folded clothes, a made bed that looks well loved. Blue sheets and fluffy pillows, big bay windows that let the moonlight in.

“I think it’s nice,” you say simply, letting yourself turn around to meet his broad frame. He looks down at you slightly, eyes meeting yours as your hand drops from his grasp and snakes around his neck. His hands come up the sides of your dress, pulling it up slightly, but landing on your waist.

“Is this okay?” He asks tentatively in the dark of the room, his lips so close to yours already you can practically taste the whiskey on his lips for yourself. You answer him by pressing your tentative lips to his, slotting them together easily.

Joel’s grip on your waist tightens momentarily as he takes you in, pulling you as close as he possibly can. He can smell the perfume on your neck and the wine on your lips from earlier, and it’s making his need for you increase tenfold. 

You pull him into you as you stumble back to let your knees hit his mattress, sitting down and letting your hands come to his belt buckle. Your hands came to undo it as he pulled his t-shirt off to throw onto the floor beside him, bending down to help you pull the dress over your shoulders to meet his t-shirt.

You made quick work of his jeans, pushing them to the ground and looking up at him with a keen glance. You could see the breath making his belly rise and fall, anticipating your touch on him any second.

When your hand wrapped around the base of his cock, his breath hitched and his head rolled back. He was already half-hard only from kissing you, so a few pumps made him easily ready for your mouth.

“You’re so big,” is all you can think to say, head spinning from the sheer size of him right in front of your face. Your mouth watered at the way his hand palmed through your hair, pulling you in closer to him for some relief.

It was intoxicating to him, the way your mouth fit around his cock. Such a beautiful sight to see, your head licking and sucking at his tip, gathering spit there to lubricate him. His knees were going weak as he watched intently, no thought able to cross his mind, other than maybe how long it had been since he’d had anyone to do this with. He was going to have to pace himself if it was all like this.

Your mouth constrained around the length of him, taking him deeper and deeper with every bob of your head. Filthy sounds were filling the room now, of your eager mouth pulling him in as best you could. His hand stayed steady at the back of your head, not pushing, just softly pressed there for support. His other hand found your shoulder, pushing down your bra strap.

“God, darlin’,” was all he could choke out, using his hand to pull you off of him. Your hand lazily stroked him as you looked up at him, spit collecting at the corners of your mouth. “I’m not gonna last long if you keep doin’ that,” his laugh eased some of the tension in the room, as you took your other hand and wiped the spit away.

He leaned down, pressing a fervent kiss to your lips before using his own hands to unclasp your bra and let your breasts free. His lips traveled to the side of your neck, before he was kneeled down between your legs, sucking your nipple into his mouth. He lapped at you, all consuming, as his hand came up to grasp the other breast that wasn’t being serviced. He moaned at the noises you were making, lewd whines into the night air that only encouraged him. 

His lips made their way down your body to your clothed centre, your back against his soft sheets. You looked down at him intently, watching as he pulled your panties down your legs and immediately delved into your pussy with broad strokes of his tongue.

Your body jerked upwards at the contact, hand fisting the sheet beside you as he lapped at you, like a man starved. His expert tongue found your clit easily, sucking and licking at you for what felt like hours. You thought about his heavy cock between his legs, begging to be touched, hard as ever as he licked at you desperately.

“Joel,” you whined out, feeling your hand reach down to grab at his curls and push him deeper into you. That only made him moan, one hand lazily fisting his cock as the other came up to dip a finger into you, allowing you to see stars when you screwed your eyes shut.

His fingers were so large, pressed into your core as you fucked yourself on them and his tongue in tandem. He was groaning and grunting, and you hoped his neighbours couldn’t see into the window at the desperate filth that was going on in his bedroom.

“Fuck, Joel, please,” you begged, but he had no mercy, and your orgasm was creeping up on you. He was ready to watch you come undone, pushing a second finger into you and furiously sucking on your clit. His other hand left his own pleasure and wrapped around your breast, pressing and playing with the hard nub there, pinching to provide a little bit of sting to it. It was sending you into another dimension.

“Come for me, sweetheart,” and his voice is gravely and debauched, enough to send you into your first orgasm, chanting his name and pulling on his hair. He was happily licking at you, fingers still pressing in and out as to not mess up the rhythm, as you rode out your orgasm against his face. 

When you started to come down, he finally detached himself from you before standing up between your legs and pressing his broad palms to your thighs. He stayed there for a moment, cock still hard and heavy between his legs as you gazed up at him, out of breath from his work.

“You’re really good at that,” was all you could think to say, head clouded with arousal. You moved up on the bed a little, opening your legs and pressing your knees apart to show your pussy to him again.

“Please fuck me, Joel,” you breathe out, letting your hand find your own clit to rub it teasingly for him. It was still so sensitive, but the way he was looking down at you, eyes dark and stormy with need, you could almost come again just from that.

He put a knee down on the bed and crawled on top of you, his lips finding yours once again as your hands found his face. You held him there, savouring the kiss as his tongue crashed against yours, all warmth and spit and the taste of you. His hand found your breast and continued to play with your nipples, softly, coaxing more moans into his mouth from yours.

He leaned back and slipped his cock inside of you, filling you up immediately and making you gasp. He groaned into the side of your neck, tonguing the side of your ear and kissing you feverishly as he pumped in and out of you.

Your legs wrapped around his waist, pulling him impossibly close, your moans filling the room as he rocked in and out of you. He kissed your jaw and chest, before reaching down between your bodies and pressing his thick finger to your clit again, using the wetness there to draw circles around your sensitive nub.

“So pretty,” he smiles into your neck, your hand on the back of his, playing with the now-sweaty strands of hair on the nape. “So pretty for me, taking my cock,” the dirty talking is welcome as he continues to bring you closer to a second orgasm, your breath hitching once again.

“Come inside of me,” you say it like a whisper, a secret in the stillness of the room, and Joel is unsure he even heard you correctly.

“Are you sure?” He says it not accusingly, but in a way that conveys he feels like he just won the lottery.

“Yes, please, fill me up.”

You can see the way his eyes darken more, shifting so he’s on his knees and using your body to fuck himself on his thick cock. His hand continued to play with your clit, bringing you so close to your orgasm that tears pricked at the corners of your eyes. His cheeks were getting hot as he thrusted in and out furiously, and you could almost see the stress melt off of his face as he came close to his own undoing.

The white-hot feeling washes over you once again, eyes shutting before you’re back on your elbows and watching intently. Your whole body feels like it’s on fire as his thrusts become sloppy, your name pouring out of his lips like a prayer. You’re clenching around him and letting him ride out his high alongside you, slowing after his hot cum coats your walls and leaves you full of him.

He collapses on top of you, cock softening inside as you both catch your breath together. Your chests are sticky with sweat as you breathe, taking in the smell of him, and the feel of his warmth on your body.

He pulls himself from you and flops beside you, still taking a moment to admire you. You look over at him, a lazy smile on your face as your hand reaches out to caress the skin of his chest. He takes the time to run his fingertips up your arms and back as you lay there in silence together, just soaking in the moment in a post-sex glow.

“I guess I should get going,” you say after a few beats, sitting up to grab your dress off the floor. You cringe at the thought of throwing your underwear on and leaving, this being just another random hookup for you that never lead to anything. Joel was sweet.

A confused look spreads across his features and his brows knit together, before sitting up next to you at the edge of the bed.

“I mean, I don’t know how these things usually go,” he laughs, as his hand finds your lower back. “But you don’t gotta run outta here like a scared animal or somethin’.”

You look up at him again, unsure of what to do next. In your, albeit limited, experience with dating app hookups, you were expected to leave pretty much right after.

“Oh, um,” you look around the room at the soft worn-in sheets and the TV across from Joel’s bed. You take a look at him again, your eyes meeting his to match his gaze, where you can tell he’s mentally begging that you’ll stay the night.

“I mean, if you don’t mind, I’d be happy to stay.” Joel smiled lopsidedly and let his hand rub soothing circles at your lower back. 

“I’ll make it worth your while,” he laughs, stepping over to go into the bathroom and warm up a cloth for the mess spilling out from between your legs. “I wouldn’t mind wakin’ up and doing all that again tomorrow.”

You laugh and lay back onto his bed as he presses the warm cloth to your pussy, his lips once again finding yours to pull you in for a sweet kiss. 

You nod, sliding between the comfortable sheets as Joel runs downstairs to grab your abandoned drinks as well as a couple of bottles of ice cold water. He slips into the sheets next to you, not bothering to throw on any pajamas (not that you were complaining), and settling in beside you. After a few gulps of water, you nestled into his chest and let your hand find his tummy, resting on it as you listened to the even pattern of his breath.

“We should do this again. Like, after tomorrow morning.” you say quietly as you’re drifting in and out of sleep. His fingertips continues to slide across your arm and give you goosebumps as you snuggled closer into him, hearing a laugh exhale out of his nose and feeling a kiss press to the top of your head. 

In his sleepy, deep southern drawl, he replies. “Don’t have to ask me twice, darlin’.”

[hellenhighwater]

Do you just do a ton of, like, scouring buy/sell groups, online marketplaces (ebay? craigslist? FB marketplace?), and online or in-person antique shops?

I'm in the process of buying a house and know I have, like, no furnishings for when/if I manage to pull that off. I really love the idea of reusing older furniture (both for sustainability reasons and because anything "new" in my budget would be, like, prefab stuff that's usually more on the minimalism-side aesthetic-wise), but outside of what's listed above, I'm not even sure to how to start! (Also totally fine if you prefer to keep how you find stuff secret, thanks for reading either way. :) )

Yeah it's like 90% just Facebook marketplace. I have luck at thrift stores for decor items but not furniture, and antique stores are mostly not in the budget. Just start trawling Facebook!

And let people know that you're moving and are looking for furniture. They might not have your style, but if it's free it'll give you something to use while you look for the right thing.

Edit: it's also worth investing in moving gear. Ratchet straps, work gloves, furniture sliders, dollies, scooters, moving blankets, a shoulder dolly, etc. If you're disassembling furniture, always bring a zip lock bag to put screws and stuff in so you don't lose them.

Oh yard sales! Also good. They just don't happen in the winter where I am.

[love-quinn]

— REPAYMENTS

summary — carmen accidentally loses his chance with you after you all-but ask him out. luckily for him, you're sitting two tables away from the kitchen he runs.

warnings — swearing, smoking, i think that's it?

pairing — carmen berzatto x fem!reader

pronouns — she/her, reader is explicitly mentioned to be a girl

word count — 2.2k

note — i am still finding my footing writing for carmen so this has just been trial and error, i hope you enjoy this!!! thank you for 100 followers, i appreciate it so much omg <333

It's fairly well-agreed upon that family and business should never be mixed. Whoever said that had probably never met Natalie Berzatto. His sister infuriates him, but if Carmen is being honest that’s usually because she’s just there. She doesn’t pick fights, but she will call him out on his bullshit, even if he doesn’t appreciate it in the moment. Out of all of his relatives to be closely working with, Sugar was probably his best option.

No, it was far more likely that the coiner of that phrase did meet Richie.

Carmen loved Richie deep down. He would do a lot for Richie, and he’s seen firsthand that Richie would do a lot for him. But it’s really hard to remember that when Carmen’s having to leave the kitchen to go and talk to a table because something’s gone wrong.

“‘I’ll handle it,’” he mocks Richie under his breath. “‘Calm the fuck down, Carmen, I’m Richie and I’ll handle it even though I’m fucking incompetent.’” He abandons his station to go out into the dining room, already feeling a headache brewing behind his eyes. “Handle it, my ass.”

It’s a fairly simple problem to sort out, just an old man who was bound to complain about something wanting to talk to the owner about it. Carmen smiles and nods and apologizes and makes a note to comp that part of the meal and go chain smoke about it later. 

It’s not the interaction that causes Carmen’s chest to constrict, it’s what he sees on the way in. 

Usually, Carmen is safely in the back. He stays in his section, he spends each night being hyper aware of everything that goes on in the kitchen, and he doesn’t have to worry about anything outside of the kitchen (it took a second for that last part to be true, but he does trust Richie and Natalie enough to handle things out in the dining room. 

But of course he happens to be out in the dining room on the same night that you’re there.

He almost didn’t recognise you, the room isn’t very well-lit and he only met you once. It was about two weeks ago, but he’s thought about it quite a lot since. It had been two in the morning and he didn’t even remember what he’d needed but he’d ended up at the 24-hour convenience store down the street from his place. 

The fluorescent lights had been flickering and you had been standing right in front of the refrigerator he needed. You had been browsing the fucking chips or something and Carmen was too busy controlling the tapping of his foot so you wouldn’t hear it.

“Sorry, am I in your way?”

His head snapped up, eyes locking with yours. “Yeah.”

You tried not to frown at his bluntness, just raising your eyebrows and moving out of the way. Carmen yanked open the fridge door, rubbing his face to stop his eyes from drooping closed. He’d just left the restaurant and just wanted milk before he went home. His hand dropped and he opened his eyes to look for the milk only to find the slider-shelf thing that contained his usual stuff was completely empty. “Fuck.”

You were a few feet away, still making your way down the aisle, but you glanced at him out of the corner of your eye. The last bottle of yellow-capped milk is currently sitting in the basket dangling from your elbow. You finished up and decided to just make your way to the front, cutting your losses about getting more snacks.

You’re not usually up at 2am, but one of your friends was stopping by in the city for a few days and the two of you had gotten home from a late movie still wanting to spend time together so you’d ducked down to the store for some more snacks. 

You had put a few of your items on the counter for the store clerk to scan by the time he got to the front, and you pretend not to notice him. The clerk looked so exhausted you didn’t even try to make small talk, just flashing him a soft smile while he put your stuff in a plastic bag. While you were paying, the clerk turned his head to the guy behind you to see what he wanted. 

It was the guy from the fridge and he mumbled something about cigarettes. The clerk handed you back your card and your receipt before turning back to the cabinet for the cigarettes.

Carmen didn’t even care they didn’t have the usual type he liked, he just needed a smoke soon or his chest would cave in. He slapped the bills on the counter, grabbed the pack and was out the door before you had turned around. 

He smoked almost directly outside the door to the store, and you had to walk past him to get back to your building. Usually, when guys were dicks out in public to you, you’d ignore it and you’d move on. But this guy looked so defeated that you almost felt bad for him. 

He was sitting on the sidewalk, head buried between his knees. You tried not to make it obvious that you were looking at him but he looked so sad that you felt a begrudging amount of empathy for him. You dug the bottle of milk out of your bag and put it on the sidewalk next to him.

Carmen’s head shot up at the sound, looking back and forth between you and the bottle. “What?”

“You look like you need it more than I do.” If you were being honest, it did make you feel a little smug that he was slightly rude to you earlier and now you were being nice to him, but it was mostly out of concern.

Carmen’s mouth was dry, and he swiped his tongue over his bottom lip, hauling himself to his feet with the bottle in hand. “No, you don’t have to do that. Take your milk.”

“I don’t even want it,” you said. “Seriously, dude.”

Carmen looked down at the bottle of milk in his hand. “Now I feel bad for being an ass.”

You nodded. “You should.”

Carmen gave a tired laugh and you finally noticed how bright his blue eyes were, even in the dark street. “I’m usually not. An asshole, I mean. Well, no, actually. I… am making this worse.”

You watched him, amused, and Carmen felt his throat constrict at the sound of your laugh. “Way to sell yourself. You’re really making a meal out of this, aren’t you?”

“It’s what I do best,” he said absentmindedly. “I’m, uh, Carmen.” He tried to shake your hand but with the cigarette in one and the milk in the other, he couldn’t find a way to do it. Then he had the thought that nobody shakes hands anymore, and felt stupid for the whole thing. 

You weren’t in the habit of giving your name to strangers, especially not men you met outside the convenience store at two in the morning. “Just Carmen?”

Carmen hadn’t expected that to be your response, and he blacked out for a half second where he forgot his own last name, “Berzatto.” 

“Carmen Berzatto.” You nodded, knowing to give the name to your friend later, just for safety. You told him your own name, not bothering to shake his hand. 

You dug around in your purse quickly, grabbing your receipt and hoping you had a pen. You didn’t but you did find an old eyeliner in the bottom that would work. Carmen had taken a stance of leaning against the wall, smoking his cigarette and trying not to fall asleep standing up. If he was honest, he assumed you’d walk away after that, so he was surprised when he felt you press a piece of paper into his hand. “Your receipt. For the milk” Your smile was sweet and he didn’t even process that you’d scrawled your phone number on the back until you’d walked away.

That had been two weeks ago, and he hadn’t seen you since.

He bursts back through the kitchen. You’re sitting at table nine with two other women, and his number one priority is finding Richie. Or Natalie, someone who works out in the dining room and can do what he needs them to. 

Richie, as if he heard Carmen’s mental plea, is right behind him. “I need two more mushroom risotto for table fifteen and for table nine-”

“Cousin,” Carmen interrupts. “The, uh, table nine. They’re not gonna pay.”

Richie took that the wrong way, leaning down to talk right in Carmen’s ear conspiratorially. “They’re dashers? You want me to take ‘em down? I’ll go out there and fuck them up, you give me two seconds and twenty dollars and I’ll-”

“Richie!” Carmen shoved him. “No, they’re…” He’s been so pissed off with Richie lately, more so than usual. He’d gone back to the restaurant the day after meeting you, dumping his jacket in his office, receipt on the desk with every intention to at least text you during his break.

And then Richie had spit his gum into the receipt and thrown it out. 

“Listen. One of the girls, she’s… They’re just eating for free, okay?” Carmen lets himself sound desperate, maybe that will stop Richie from making fun of him.

Richie looks down at him, eyebrows raised. “You… alright, yeah. Good. Don’t make your girl pay. Good. Does she know you run this place?” 

Carmen shakes his head. “No, I kinda messed things up with her. I need everything to go good tonight, okay? Can you do that for me?”

Richie saluted. “You got it, cousin. Food’ll be good she’ll forget what a massive prick you are.”

That’s probably the best he’s gonna get, so he takes it. Then, he gets to work. He gets your order from Richie and the kitchen makes it in record time. Then, when it’s done, Carmen makes sure he’s the one to run the food.

You didn’t know what you’d been expecting when your friends had invited you out to a new restaurant, but it hadn’t been to see the guy you’d met at a convenience store in the middle of the night to be presenting you with your meal.

You’d liked Carmen, but it had been a while and you only met him for a few minutes. Once the sting of rejection had worn off, you’d almost forgotten about the encounter. He puts your dinner in front of you and practically bows. “Carmen,” you muse, mostly just taken aback. “I didn’t know you worked here.”

“I’m the owner,” he says, trying to ignore the way your friends are looking at him. “I saw you and I… I’m not really good at this shit, but I, uh. I meant to call you.” He sounds earnest, and he looks somewhat embarrassed by the amount of eyes on him. “I wanted to, I just lost your number and I didn’t know how else to talk to you but I wanted to call you.”

You watch Carmen as he speaks and the longer you’re silent, the worse he feels about it. He can’t read the expression on your face and he’s really regretting insisting that he walked your meals, he should’ve just sent Richie. But he also knew that it would seem more genuine if he did it in person. 

“So far you’re oh-for-two in terms of not looking like an asshole,” your tone is light and a bright smile is worming its way onto your face. Your lipgloss shines under the light and Carmen can’t stop looking at it. 

Carmen swallows, wiping his hands as inconspicuously on his pants. “Would it make it better if I told you that I already got your meals comped?”

“I mean,” you say, tilting your head up at him. “Yeah, that’ll do it, yeah.”

“I owe it to you,” he points out. “For the milk. Let me just go grab your receipt, enjoy your meals.” He flashes an awkward smile over at the two women you’re with, not noticing the way you’re looking up at him.

He walks away and your eyes follow him back into the kitchen. You had just assumed he didn’t really like you, so the idea that maybe he liked you so much he was willing to give you complimentary meals slightly overwhelmed you. Your friends swarm you the second he’s gone and you relay your very limited history with Carmen.

You almost forgot what it feels like to be in the earliest stages of romance. Slightly awkward flirting, fleeting glances, the butterflies in your stomach when you realize that the other person likes you just as much as you like them.

You don’t know much about Carmen aside from the fact that he’s apparently an insomniac who owns and runs a restaurant, has really pretty eyes and likes you. That was the part that got you. He likes you enough to come out and talk to you.

In fact, he likes you so much that once he goes back in the kitchen he dodges Richie’s attempts at a high five, and prints out your now-free bill. He likes you so much that he digs through his desk for the only working pen to scribble something on the bottom where the tip number would usually be. And, something that makes you positively giddy, he likes you so much that when he hands you the check with his number printed towards the bottom.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Gig apps trap reverse centaurs in Skinner boxes

Enshittification is the process by which digital platforms devour themselves: first they dangle goodies in front of end users. Once users are locked in, the goodies are taken away and dangled before business customers who supply goods to the users. Once those business customers are stuck on the platform, the goodies are clawed away and showered on the platform’s shareholders:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/21/potemkin-ai/#hey-guys

If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/12/algorithmic-wage-discrimination/#fishers-of-men

Enshittification isn’t just another way of saying “fraud” or “price gouging” or “wage theft.” Enshittification is intrinsically digital, because moving all those goodies around requires the flexibility that only comes with a digital businesses. Jeff Bezos, grocer, can’t rapidly change the price of eggs at Whole Foods without an army of kids with pricing guns on roller-skates. Jeff Bezos, grocer, can change the price of eggs on Amazon Fresh just by twiddling a knob on the service’s back-end.

Twiddling is the key to enshittification: rapidly adjusting prices, conditions and offers. As with any shell game, the quickness of the hand deceives the eye. Tech monopolists aren’t smarter than the Gilded Age sociopaths who monopolized rail or coal — they use the same tricks as those monsters of history, but they do them faster and with computers:

https://doctorow.medium.com/twiddler-1b5c9690cce6

If Rockefeller wanted to crush a freight company, he couldn’t just click a mouse and lay down a pipeline that ran on the same route, and then click another mouse to make it go away when he was done. When Bezos wants to bankrupt Diapers.com — a company that refused to sell itself to Amazon — he just moved a slider so that diapers on Amazon were being sold below cost. Amazon lost $100m over three months, diapers.com went bankrupt, and every investor learned that competing with Amazon was a losing bet:

https://slate.com/technology/2013/10/amazon-book-how-jeff-bezos-went-thermonuclear-on-diapers-com.html

That’s the power of twiddling — but twiddling cuts both ways. The same flexibility that digital businesses enjoy is hypothetically available to workers and users. The airlines pioneered twiddling ticket prices, and that naturally gave rise to countertwiddling, in the form of comparison shopping sites that scraped the airlines’ sites to predict when tickets would be cheapest:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/27/knob-jockeys/#bros-be-twiddlin

The airlines — like all abusive businesses — refused to tolerate this. They were allowed to touch their knobs as much as they wanted — indeed, they couldn’t stop touching those knobs — but when we tried to twiddle back, that was “felony contempt of business model,” and the airlines sued:

https://www.cnbc.com/2014/12/30/airline-sues-man-for-founding-a-cheap-flights-website.html

And sued:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/06/business/southwest-airlines-lawsuit-prices.html

Platforms don’t just hate it when end-users twiddle back — if anything they are even more aggressive when their business-users dare to twiddle. Take Para, an app that Doordash drivers used to get a peek at the wages offered for jobs before they accepted them — something that Doordash hid from its workers. Doordash ruthlessly attacked Para, saying that by letting drivers know how much they’d earn before they did the work, Para was violating the law:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/08/tech-rights-are-workers-rights-doordash-edition

Which law? Well, take your pick. The modern meaning of “IP” is “any law that lets me use the law to control my competitors, competition or customers.” Platforms use a mix of anticircumvention law, patent, copyright, contract, cybersecurity and other legal systems to weave together a thicket of rules that allow them to shut down rivals for their Felony Contempt of Business Model:

https://locusmag.com/2020/09/cory-doctorow-ip/

Enshittification relies on unlimited twiddling (by platforms), and a general prohibition on countertwiddling (by platform users). Enshittification is a form of fishing, in which bait is dangled before different groups of users and then nimbly withdrawn when they lunge for it. Twiddling puts the suppleness into the enshittifier’s fishing-rod, and a ban on countertwiddling weighs down platform users so they’re always a bit too slow to catch the bait.

Nowhere do we see twiddling’s impact more than in the “gig economy,” where workers are misclassified as independent contractors and put to work for an app that scripts their every move to the finest degree. When an app is your boss, you work for an employer who docks your pay for violating rules that you aren’t allowed to know — and where your attempts to learn those rules are constantly frustrated by the endless back-end twiddling that changes the rules faster than you can learn them.

As with every question of technology, the issue isn’t twiddling per se — it’s who does the twiddling and who gets twiddled. A worker armed with digital tools can play gig work employers off each other and force them to bid up the price of their labor; they can form co-ops with other workers that auto-refuse jobs that don’t pay enough, and use digital tools to organize to shift power from bosses to workers:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/02/not-what-it-does/#who-it-does-it-to

Take “reverse centaurs.” In AI research, a “centaur” is a human assisted by a machine that does more than either could do on their own. For example, a chess master and a chess program can play a better game together than either could play separately. A reverse centaur is a machine assisted by a human, where the machine is in charge and the human is a meat-puppet.

Think of Amazon warehouse workers wearing haptic location-aware wristbands that buzz at them continuously dictating where their hands must be; or Amazon drivers whose eye-movements are continuously tracked in order to penalize drivers who look in the “wrong” direction:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/02/17/reverse-centaur/#reverse-centaur

The difference between a centaur and a reverse centaur is the difference between a machine that makes your life better and a machine that makes your life worse so that your boss gets richer. Reverse centaurism is the 21st Century’s answer to Taylorism, the pseudoscience that saw white-coated “experts” subject workers to humiliating choreography down to the smallest movement of your fingertip:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/08/21/great-taylors-ghost/#solidarity-or-bust

While reverse centaurism was born in warehouses and other company-owned facilities, gig work let it make the leap into workers’ homes and cars. The 21st century has seen a return to the cottage industry — a form of production that once saw workers labor far from their bosses and thus beyond their control — but shriven of the autonomy and dignity that working from home once afforded:

https://doctorow.medium.com/gig-work-is-the-opposite-of-steampunk-463e2730ef0d

The rise and rise of bossware — which allows for remote surveillance of workers in their homes and cars — has turned “work from home” into “live at work.” Reverse centaurs can now be chickenized — a term from labor economics that describes how poultry farmers, who sell their birds to one of three vast poultry processors who have divided up the country like the Pope dividing up the “New World,” are uniquely exploited:

https://onezero.medium.com/revenge-of-the-chickenized-reverse-centaurs-b2e8d5cda826

A chickenized reverse centaur has it rough: they must pay for the machines they use to make money for their bosses, they must obey the orders of the app that controls their work, and they are denied any of the protections that a traditional worker might enjoy, even as they are prohibited from deploying digital self-help measures that let them twiddle back to bargain for a better wage.

All of this sets the stage for a phenomenon called algorithmic wage discrimination, in which two workers doing the same job under the same conditions will see radically different payouts for that work. These payouts are continuously tweaked in the background by an algorithm that tries to predict the minimum sum a worker will accept to remain available without payment, to ensure sufficient workers to pick up jobs as they arise.

This phenomenon — and proposed policy and labor solutions to it — is expertly analyzed in “On Algorithmic Wage Discrimination,” a superb paper by UC Law San Franciscos Veena Dubal:

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4331080

Dubal uses empirical data and enthnographic accounts from Uber drivers and other gig workers to explain how endless, self-directed twiddling allows gig companies pay workers less and pay themselves more. As @brianmerchant@mastodon.social explains in his LA Times article on Dubal’s research, the goal of the payment algorithm is to guess how often a given driver needs to receive fair compensation in order to keep them driving when the payments are unfair:

https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/story/2023-04-11/algorithmic-wage-discrimination

The algorithm combines nonconsensual dossiers compiled on individual drivers with population-scale data to seek an equilibrium between keeping drivers waiting, unpaid, for a job; and how much a driver needs to be paid for an individual job, in order to keep that driver from clocking out and doing something else. @ Here’s how that works. Sergio Avedian, a writer for The Rideshare Guy, ran an experiment with two brothers who both drove for Uber; one drove a Tesla and drove intermittently, the other brother rented a hybrid sedan and drove frequently. Sitting side-by-side with the brothers, Avedian showed how the brother with the Tesla was offered more for every trip:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UADTiL3S67I

Uber wants to lure intermittent drivers into becoming frequent drivers. Uber doesn’t pay for an oversupply of drivers, because it only pays drivers when they have a passenger in the car. Having drivers on call — but idle — is a way for Uber to shift the cost of maintaining a capacity cushion to its workers.

What’s more, what Uber charges customers is not based on how much it pays its workers. As Uber’s head of product explained: Uber uses “machine-learning techniques to estimate how much groups of customers are willing to shell out for a ride. Uber calculates riders’ propensity for paying a higher price for a particular route at a certain time of day. For instance, someone traveling from a wealthy neighborhood to another tony spot might be asked to pay more than another person heading to a poorer part of town, even if demand, traffic and distance are the same.”

https://qz.com/990131/uber-is-practicing-price-discrimination-economists-say-that-might-not-be-a-bad-thing/

Uber has historically described its business a pure supply-and-demand matching system, where a rush of demand for rides triggers surge pricing, which lures out drivers, which takes care of the demand. That’s not how it works today, and it’s unclear if it ever worked that way. Today, a driver who consults the rider version of the Uber app before accepting a job — to compare how much the rider is paying to how much they stand to earn — is booted off the app and denied further journeys.

Surging, instead, has become just another way to twiddle drivers. One of Dubal’s subjects, Derrick, describes how Uber uses fake surges to lure drivers to airports: “You go to the airport, once the lot get kind of full, then the surge go away.” Other drivers describe how they use groupchats to call out fake surges: “I’m in the Marina. It’s dead. Fake surge.”

That’s pure twiddling. Twiddling turns gamification into gamblification, where your labor buys you a spin on a roulette wheel in a rigged casino. As a driver called Melissa, who had doubled down on her availability to earn a $100 bonus awarded for clocking a certain number of rides, told Dubal, “When you get close to the bonus, the rides start trickling in more slowly…. And it makes sense. It’s really the type of shit that they can do when it’s okay to have a surplus labor force that is just sitting there that they don’t have to pay for.”

Wherever you find reverse-centaurs, you get this kind of gamblification, where the rules are twiddled continuously to make sure that the house always wins. As a contract driver Amazon reverse centaur told Lauren Gurley for Motherboard, “Amazon uses these cameras allegedly to make sure they have a safer driving workforce, but they’re actually using them not to pay delivery companies”:

https://www.vice.com/en/article/88npjv/amazons-ai-cameras-are-punishing-drivers-for-mistakes-they-didnt-make

Algorithmic wage discrimination is the robot overlord of our nightmares: its job is to relentlessly quest for vulnerabilities and exploit them. Drivers divide themselves into “ants” (drivers who take every job) and “pickers” (drivers who cherry-pick high-paying jobs). The algorithm’s job is ensuring that pickers get the plum assignments, not the ants, in the hopes of converting those pickers to app-dependent ants.

In my work on enshittification, I call this the “giant teddy bear” gambit. At every county fair, you’ll always spot some poor jerk carrying around a giant teddy-bear they “won” on the midway. But they didn’t win it — not by getting three balls in the peach-basket. Rather, the carny running the rigged game either chose not to operate the “scissor” that kicks balls out of the basket. Or, if the game is “honest” (that is, merely impossible to win, rather than gimmicked), the operator will make a too-good-to-refuse offer: “Get one ball in and I’ll give you this keychain. Win two keychains and I’ll let you trade them for this giant teddy bear.”

Carnies aren’t in the business of giving away giant teddy bears — rather, the gambit is an investment. Giving a mark a giant teddy bear to carry around the midway all day acts as a convincer, luring other marks to try to land three balls in the basket and win their own teddy bear.

In the same way, platforms like Uber distribute giant teddy bears to pickers, as a way of keeping the ants scurrying from job to job, and as a way of convincing the pickers to give up whatever work allows them to discriminate among Uber’s offers and hold out for the plum deals, whereupon then can be transmogrified into ants themselves.

Dubal describes the experience of Adil, a Syrian refugee who drives for Uber in the Bay Area. His colleagues are pickers, and showed him screenshots of how much they earned. Determined to get a share of that money, Adil became a model ant, driving two hours to San Francisco, driving three days straight, napping in his car, spending only one day per week with his family. The algorithm noticed that Adil needed the work, so it paid him less.

Adil responded the way the system predicted he would, by driving even more: “My friends they make it, so I keep going, maybe I can figure it out. It’s unsecure, and I don’t know how people they do it. I don’t know how I am doing it, but I have to. I mean, I don’t find another option. In a minute, if I find something else, oh man, I will be out immediately. I am a very patient person, that’s why I can continue.”

Another driver, Diego, told Dubal about how the winners of the giant teddy bears fell into the trap of thinking that they were “good at the app”: “Any time there’s some big shot getting high pay outs, they always shame everyone else and say you don’t know how to use the app. I think there’s secret PR campaigns going on that gives targeted payouts to select workers, and they just think it’s all them.”

That’s the power of twiddling: by hoarding all the flexibility offered by digital tools, the management at platforms can become centaurs, able to string along thousands of workers, while the workers are reverse-centaurs, puppeteered by the apps.

As the example of Adil shows, the algorithm doesn’t need to be very sophisticated in order to figure out which workers it can underpay. The system automates the kind of racial and gender discrimination that is formally illegal, but which is masked by the smokescreen of digitization. An employer who systematically paid women less than men, or Black people less than white people, would be liable to criminal and civil sanctions. But if an algorithm simply notices that people who have fewer job prospects drive more and will thus accept lower wages, that’s just “optimization,” not racism or sexism.

This is the key to understanding the AI hype bubble: when ghouls from multinational banks predict 13 trillion dollar markets for “AI,” what they mean is that digital tools will speed up the twiddling and other wage-suppression techniques to transfer $13T in value from workers and consumers to shareholders.

The American business lobby is relentlessly focused on the goal of reducing wages. That’s the force behind “free trade,” “right to work,” and other codewords for “paying workers less,” including “gig work.” Tech workers long saw themselves as above this fray, immune to labor exploitation because they worked for a noble profession that took care of its own.

But the epidemic of mass tech-worker layoffs, following on the heels of massive stock buybacks, has demonstrated that tech bosses are just like any other boss: willing to pay as little as they can get away with, and no more. Tech bosses are so comfortable with their market dominance and the lock-in of their customers that they are happy to turn out hundreds of thousands of skilled workers, convinced that the twiddling systems they’ve built are the kinds of self-licking ice-cream cones that are so simple even a manager can use them — no morlocks required.

The tech worker layoffs are best understood as an all-out war on tech worker morale, because that morale is the source of tech workers’ confidence and thus their demands for a larger share of the value generated by their labor. The current tech layoff template is very different from previous tech layoffs: today’s layoffs are taking place over a period of months, long after they are announced, and laid off tech worker is likely to be offered a months of paid post-layoff work, rather than severance. This means that tech workplaces are now haunted by the walking dead, workers who have been laid off but need to come into the office for months, even as the threat of layoffs looms over the heads of the workers who remain. As an old friend, recently laid off from Microsoft after decades of service, wrote to me, this is “a new arrow in the quiver of bringing tech workers to heel and ensuring that we’re properly thankful for the jobs we have (had?).”

Dubal is interested in more than analysis, she’s interested in action. She looks at the tactics already deployed by gig workers, who have not taken all this abuse lying down. Workers in the UK and EU organized through Worker Info Exchange and the App Drivers and Couriers Union have used the GDPR (the EU’s privacy law) to demand “algorithmic transparency,” as well as access to their data. In California, drivers hope to use similar provisions in the CCPA (a state privacy law) to do the same.

These efforts have borne fruit. When Cornell economists, led by Louis Hyman, published research (paid for by Uber) claiming that Uber drivers earned an average of $23/hour, it was data from these efforts that revealed the true average Uber driver’s wage was $9.74. Subsequent research in California found that Uber drivers’ wage fell to $6.22/hour after the passage of Prop 22, a worker misclassification law that gig companies spent $225m to pass, only to have the law struck down because of a careless drafting error:

https://www.latimes.com/california/newsletter/2021-08-23/proposition-22-lyft-uber-decision-essential-california

But Dubal is skeptical that data-coops and transparency will achieve transformative change and build real worker power. Knowing how the algorithm works is useful, but it doesn’t mean you can do anything about it, not least because the platform owners can keep touching their knobs, twiddling the payout schedule on their rigged slot-machines.

Data co-ops start from the proposition that “data extraction is an inevitable form of labor for which workers should be remunerated.” It makes on-the-job surveillance acceptable, provided that workers are compensated for the spying. But co-ops aren’t unions, and they don’t have the power to bargain for a fair price for that data, and coops themselves lack the vast resources — “to store, clean, and understand” — data.

Co-ops are also badly situated to understand the true value of the data that is extracted from their members: “Workers cannot know whether the data collected will, at the population level, violate the civil rights of others or amplifies their own social oppression.”

Instead, Dubal wants an outright, nonwaivable prohibition on algorithmic wage discrimination. Just make it illegal. If firms cannot use gambling mechanisms to control worker behavior through variable pay systems, they will have to find ways to maintain flexible workforces while paying their workforce predictable wages under an employment model. If a firm cannot manage wages through digitally-determined variable pay systems, then the firm is less likely to employ algorithmic management.”

In other words, rather than using market mechanisms too constrain platform twiddling, Dubal just wants to make certain kinds of twiddling illegal. This is a growing trend in legal scholarship. For example, the economist Ramsi Woodcock has proposed a ban on surge pricing as a per se violation of Section 1 of the Sherman Act:

https://ilr.law.uiowa.edu/print/volume-105-issue-4/the-efficient-queue-and-the-case-against-dynamic-pricing

Similarly, Dubal proposes that algorithmic wage discrimination violates another antitrust law: the Robinson-Patman Act, which “bans sellers from charging competing buyers different prices for the same commodity. Robinson-Patman enforcement was effectively halted under Reagan, kicking off a host of pathologies, like the rise of Walmart:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/27/walmarts-jackals/#cheater-sizes

I really liked Dubal’s legal reasoning and argument, and to it I would add a call to reinvigorate countertwiddling: reforming laws that get in the way of workers who want to reverse-engineer, spoof, and control the apps that currently control them. Adversarial interoperability (AKA competitive compatibility or comcom) is key tool for building worker power in an era of digital Taylorism:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/10/adversarial-interoperability

To see how that works, look to other jursidictions where workers have leapfrogged their European and American cousins, such as Indonesia, where gig workers and toolsmiths collaborate to make a whole suite of “tuyul apps,” which let them override the apps that gig companies expect them to use.

https://pluralistic.net/2021/07/08/tuyul-apps/#gojek

For example, ride-hailing companies won’t assign a train-station pickup to a driver unless they’re circling the station — which is incredibly dangerous during the congested moments after a train arrives. A tuyul app lets a driver park nearby and then spoof their phone’s GPS fix to the ridehailing company so that they appear to be right out front of the station.

In an ideal world, those workers would have a union, and be able to dictate the app’s functionality to their bosses. But workers shouldn’t have to wait for an ideal world: they don’t just need jam tomorrow — they need jam today. Tuyul apps, and apps like Para, which allow workers to extract more money under better working conditions, are a prelude to unionization and employer regulation, not a substitute for it.

Employers will not give workers one iota more power than they have to. Just look at the asymmetry between the regulation of union employees versus union busters. Under US law, employees of a union need to account for every single hour they work, every mile they drive, every location they visit, in public filings. Meanwhile, the union-busting industry — far larger and richer than unions — operate under a cloak of total secrecy, Workers aren’t even told which union busters their employers have hired — let alone get an accounting of how those union busters spend money, or how many of them are working undercover, pretending to be workers in order to sabotage the union.

Twiddling will only get an employer so far. Twiddling — like all “AI” — is based on analyzing the past to predict the future. The heuristics an algorithm creates to lure workers into their cars can’t account for rapid changes in the wider world, which is why companies who relied on “AI” scheduling apps (for example, to prevent their employees from logging enough hours to be entitled to benefits) were caught flatfooted by the Great Resignation.

Workers suddenly found themselves with bargaining power thanks to the departure of millions of workers — a mix of early retirees and workers who were killed or permanently disabled by covid — and they used that shortage to demand a larger share of the fruits of their labor. The outraged howls of the capital class at this development were telling: these companies are operated by the kinds of “capitalists” that MLK once identified, who want “socialism for the rich and rugged individualism for the poor.”

https://twitter.com/KaseyKlimes/status/821836823022354432/

There's only 5 days left in the Kickstarter campaign for the audiobook of my next novel, a post-cyberpunk anti-finance finance thriller about Silicon Valley scams called Red Team Blues. Amazon's Audible refuses to carry my audiobooks because they're DRM free, but crowdfunding makes them possible.

Image: Stephen Drake (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Analog_Test_Array_modular_synth_by_sduck409.jpg

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en

 — 

Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

 — 

Louis (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Chestnut_horse_head,_all_excited.jpg

CC BY-SA 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/deed.en

[Image ID: A complex mandala of knobs from a modular synth. In the foreground, limned in a blue electric halo, is a man in a hi-viz vest with the head of a horse. The horse's eyes have been replaced with the sinister red eyes of HAL9000 from Kubrick's '2001: A Space Odyssey.'"]

[azeterna]

tutorial: making slider-compatible earrings

this uses quite a new feature, the BlendID vertex colour layer, and as far as i know there's no complete tutorial or explanation of how it works out there, so this could probably still be improved. i still use old Blender, but feel free to translate this to other versions.

in simple terms it's a new vertex colour layer that gives each vertex of the head a unique colour, and you can use it on your CC mesh to attach it to a specific head vertex. for small detailed meshes like earrings it does this better than uv_1, which makes them go spiky.

to start, the earrings should be placed on the s4s rig's ear, even though it's way smaller than the smallest preset in-game. if you have several piercings close together, separate them (P) into different meshes because it makes transferring the colours so much easier.

there are some limits to this, each CC vertex can only be attached to one head vertex, so you can't do chains or anything that would need you to blend between two verts. the industrial does work because it's just two clusters of verts with nothing in the middle, and for this tutorial i'll treat it as two separate earrings. finally, don't expect it to perfectly preserve the placement - evenly spaced piercings will end up uneven, and on extreme occult ear presets the earrings will probably still come away from the ear.

selecting the source polys

check that the head mesh (head for mframe, head_2 for fframe) has a BlendID vertex colour layer. if it doesn't, re-export the CC from S4S or import it into a freshly exported blend file.

enable editing the head.

for each piercing, select a poly that contains the vertex you want to attach it to. for me it works best using the outside of the ear. it takes a lot of trial and error to find the best one, so don't expect it to be perfect first time. (you need to do this for both ears, you can't just mirror the mesh after you're done because the colours are different)

duplicate (Shift+D, Esc) and separate (P) the polys into a new mesh.

switch to editing the new separated mesh.

move the source vertex for each earring as close to the middle of it as possible. the whole of each earring should be closer to that vertex than any other, this is why we separated the ones that were close together at the beginning.

move the other vertices well out of the way.

transferring data from the head

if your CC mesh doesn't have a uv_1 map and a BlendID layer, create them and name them.

transfer the BlendID layer from the separated head polys to the CC mesh. use Nearest Corner Of Nearest Face, not Nearest Face Interpolated like you normally would for uv_1 maps.

do the same for the uv_1 map. (this might not be necessary, but it won't hurt.)

in edit mode, select and assign the whole mesh to the head group and delete any other groups. (side note: if you do this for face piercings you'll still need to transfer weights from the face as normal. i'd transfer them from the separated head polys using nearest vertex, so each piercing has uniform weights. you might need to do separate versions for both frames too.)

in vertex paint mode and wireframe view, check that each earring has a uniform red colour. in classic EA style some of them are impossible to tell apart, so use the colour picker (S) to check.

switch to the Col layer and paint the whole mesh (Shift+K) with #007F00.

bet you wish this was over

if you separated the CC into multiple meshes, do the whole thing again on the other mesh.

select all your CC meshes on object mode and join them together again (Ctrl+J).

hide the polys you separated from the head.

the mesh should be ready to import into S4S now! sometimes in my testing it was being weird though, and i had to import it several times or delete the BlendID layer then undo and reimport it. i'll try to update the tutorial if i figure out why.

trying it in game, you can see which parts still need tweaking, the higher stud is especially bad because it isn't that close to any of the head vertices. you can either try a different source vertex for them, or try moving them around. if you're designing an earring set from scratch, it might be easier to choose placements that are close to a vertex on the ears.

[misseviehyde]

CONFISCATED - Part 1

"AGGGGHHHHHH! I FUCKING HATE YOU, I WISH YOU'D DIE!"

Lawrence winced as the screams of his hysterical teenage daughter rang in his ears and she slammed the door to her bedroom so hard, the house shook and plaster fell down.

Bella was volatile at the best of times, but by confiscating her phone - the most important thing in her life, her Father had really just set her off.

He could hear sobbing and crashing in her room and knew she was trashing it. He knew from experience that Bella would try anything to get her phone back... threatening him, threatening to hurt herself... begging, screaming, pleading, lying... it was kind of sad. She might even try to contact her Mom, but even though he and Beth had separated, they still parented together and it would do little good.

'Since when did teenagers get so addicted to social media?' he thought. He'd noticed his daughters addiction to her phone had been getting worse and then when another parent had contacted him to say Bella was bullying her daughter he had decided to act.

He'd been pretty disappointed to see the mean messages calling the other girl a fat loser. He knew Bella was a popular girl and obsessed with her looks, but he hadn't realised she was so mean. It seemed everyone was afraid of Bella and she liked it.

Lawrence had decided that he needed to get his daughter back on track. She would be moving out soon and he didn't want his legacy to be a spoiled toxic bitch who thought she could treat other people like dirt. Bella seemed to think the only thing that mattered in life was money and status.

"I better go through here and see what else she's been up to..." he mused.

Scrolling through the phone, Lawrence was a little embarrassed to see the clothes and outfits his daughter had bookmarked as things to buy. They were all skimpy and expensive... he wasn't sure he approved. There were also pictures of boys in her phone and he didn't want to think about his horny daughters crushes on other men.

As he scrolled through, his eye was suddenly caught by an app he had never heard of. Brat App.

Opening the app, Lawrence saw it was some sort of social media app. It seemed you scored points for posting selfies and completing tasks and then you could spend those points buying outfits and upgrades.

Bella had obviously been playing it a lot. She had accumulated a lot of points. Perhaps she'd been saving up?

Intrigued Lawrence opened the avatar menu.

CREATE NEW AVATAR?

He clicked the button and a 3D doll appeared. It was female - you could only have a female representation it seemed. The name Loren had been randomly generated. He went with it.

Clicking on the doll, Lawrence saw you could spend points to buy different features. He began to play.

Hair: blonde. Body-type: Princess. Makeup: Pink

Each selection changed the avatar making it more attractive and feminine looking. Lawrence found it strangely addictive. Strangely pleasing to shape and mould the avatar, to watch it getting prettier and prettier.

Make her bitchy. Make her mean.

He wasn't sure where the intrusive thought came from but it felt good. Yes... why not make the avatar look hot and mean. A bully... even worse than his daughter.

Yessss. Make her super popular... make her an IT girl.

He selected the toxic femininity personality trait and pushed the natural leader button. Loren was going to be an Alpha girl.

More... make her meaner. Make her a total nightmare. Make her completely evil.

The intrusive thoughts felt really good and Lawrence saw that there were other options besides physical. He began to play with those. He cranked the popularity slider to maximum. He selected Head Cheerleader. He selected the slider for wealth and pushed it as high as it would go.

Make sure she knows how to fuck. She has to be the best at everything. Make her a fucking dirty slut...

Lawrence didn't feel embarassed as he entered the sexuality tab. It seemed so natural now to adjust Loren and make her nastier.

Sexual Orientation: Likes boys but will make out with girls. Sexually confident - switch. Likes to be fucked by Alpha's, but peg and dominate beta boys.

He noticed he'd nearly spent all of his daughters points. She'd really been saving, but he'd had enough points that he could pretty much max out all of Loren's stats.

The avatar was now of a mean, bullying, rich brat. She was the Head Cheerleader and a completely cruel delinquent who got whatever she wanted. She oozed toxic femininity, was an avatar of lust and desire and clearly had no morals. Loren was the most evil bitch it was possible to be.

COMPLETE AVATAR AND TRANSFORM?

Lawrence stared at the big button flashing at the bottom of the app. What did that mean? His thumb hesitated over it. Something wasn't right here.

Push it loser. Push it and see.

Lawrence felt like something was influencing him. Something external... yet also something within himself. Something hungry and dark and desperate to be free. Something that had seen its chance and was going to take it.

He pushed the button...

Lawrence screamed in pleasure as pink lightning blasted out of the phone and engulfed him. Bones cracked and skin tightened as with a howl of orgasmic pleasure he began to transform.

Long blonde hair cascaded from his scalp and makeup simmered across his features as his drab clothing became hot and sexy. Breasts grew and his dick shrunk away and his ass inflated out.

Loren was becoming a reality.

Pussy lips opened as body hair receded and a hot blonde teenage slut rolled her pretty eyes in ecstasy. Nails shot out, thick makeup covered her face and the new bitch giggled in glee. This felt amazing.

"Ohhhhh fuckkkkk yesssss," she hissed as her transformation completed.

Loren blinked. She looked down at the phone in her hand. What... a.... rush.

She smirked and standing up walked to the mirror to admire her perfect body.

She was eighteen... she was popular and she was horny.

This was going to be a lot of fun...

The end?

[adore-laur]

Hey! Saw your post abt asking for more dadrry and I love sending these to you so here goes: Harry’s been noticing that his wife is a bit down lately. It’s not because of anything in particular she still loves all of them but she’s just a bit bored at home with him back at work after a short parental leave to take care of the baby and their oldest daughter at school now. So one day he concocts a plan with their oldest kid and takes her with him to the pet store to pick up something to keep his wife company

——

It was Harry's last day of parental leave, and he noticed you were apprehensive about it. He had been at home for twelve weeks, savoring time with his three girls. Now, he was leaving the little bubble of bliss and heading back to work.

He empathized with you, knowing the daily parenting routine would weigh heavily on your shoulders. A part of him didn't want to leave you. It wasn't that he didn't trust you—he simply dreaded missing milestones, cuddles, and the mere pleasure of watching you as a mother.

Harry was out and about running errands with his eldest daughter to enjoy some quality time together before tomorrow arrived. He stocked up on groceries so you wouldn't have to worry about it for a while. He had also already decided to freeze several home-cooked meals to make it easier on you, as well as occasionally bring dinner home from work if he had the opportunity. Next on the list was buying more diapers and baby powder.

You had told him the days would be long and boring without him home as the main entertainer for the girls. Last night, before he had fallen asleep, he brainstormed ways that you could pass the time while he was working. You obviously had the kids to take care of, but there would be moments, like during nap time, when you'd be sitting in the house with nothing to do.

It was easier with the first kid since all you did was nurse and soothe cries. Now, you needed a distraction for both the kids and you.

"Daddy, can we go see the animals?"

Harry was buckling his daughter in her car seat when she asked the question. Her little finger pointed next to the grocery store they were just at, where a pet store resided. He'd never ventured in there before simply because he had to reason to. Now, he had a daughter who loved every animal that roamed the earth and held a curiosity toward any signs of them.

He sighed and unbuckled her. There was no chance he'd have said no, even if he did want to soak up family time in the comfort of his home. But his baby girl got what she wanted, at least when it was a reasonable request.

Steady rainfall dotted his clothes and frizzed his hair as he speed-walked toward the automatic doors with his daughter on his hip. It was Sunday, so there was a slow stream of people driving around and walking past the line of stores and boutiques.

Inside the pet store, an unknown smell greeted him, as well as two green parakeets perched in a large, luxurious birdcage. His daughter gasped with a wondrous smile, listening to them chatter and squawk noisily. Further past the several species of birds placed near the storefront window were glass terrariums with bearded dragons, nonvenomous snakes, and slider turtles. They all moved leisurely and held zero interest in visitors.

In the back, a dark section dimly lit by blue aquarium lights showcased rows upon rows of glass tanks filled with freshwater fish galore. Some of Harry's cherished childhood memories involved lingering near the fish section at pet stores, feeling like he was in a secret underwater world that no human could enter.

"All right, lovebug," Harry said. "I have a question. Should we get Mommy a fish to take care of?"

"Yes!"

"Let's pick one out. I'll even let you get one if you want."

"Really?"

He jostled her playfully. "Of course. We'll put it in your room and help you feed it."

She rested her head on his shoulder and softly said, "Thank you."

His heart melted a little bit as he kissed her temple and set her down. "Anything for my sweet girl."

They walked hand in hand past the tanks and admired the different species of fish floating in the water—goldfish, cichlids, tetras, and ones he couldn't name.

"I want one of those." She pointed to some nearby shelves, where there were little glass containers with betta fish swimming around in them. Many were vividly multicolored. It seemed like a perfect distraction for your mind. Nothing too high-maintenance or in need of too much attention.

"Yeah?" He stalked over to the shelf. "Which one?"

"Purple," she said decisively.

"And which one for Mama?" he asked.

"You pick."

Harry browsed the options. They were all magnificent to look at, but one in particular grabbed his attention. On the bottom shelf, there was a pearl-white betta fish that looked like a wispy angel. Harry crouched and closely inspected the harmless creature. It was beautiful, with an appearance of quiet elegance. Just like you.

"Definitely this one," he said, picturing it in a bigger tank with aquarium pebbles and plants and maybe a rock cave to sleep in.

Harry waved over a store associate and got the checkout process started. Within ten minutes, he was carefully carrying two glass containers with the new pets and pushing a shopping cart with two separate two-gallon tanks, pellets, and a couple of cheap aquarium decorations.

When they arrived home, Harry walked through the front door and saw you sleeping on the couch. The baby must have been napping as well, which was really the only time you or he could catch up on sleep. He smiled to himself, a lovely ache pulsing in his heart. If it was possible, he'd stay home with you forever and have "parent" be his singular job title. Alas, he was a needed man outside the home. 

His daughter skipped toward you, clearly excited to reveal the surprise. Harry slowly walked over with the fish and crouched next to your sleeping form. Quietly beautiful. 

"Sweetheart," he whispered, softly stroking your cheek with his knuckles. 

You sleepily opened your eyes, squinted at his face, and then hummed happily. "You're home." The way you said it sounded relieved, which made him not want to be released from his sabbatical. If only he could work from home. 

"We got you something," he said, turning to his daughter so she could do the honors. She took the container with the white betta fish and held it out like it was a sacred gift meant to be handled with the utmost care and respect.

"What is... oh my, what is this?" you asked, your expression morphing into amazement. "Where did you get this?"

"We went to the pet store, and Daddy said that me and you could get pet fish."

You quickly noticed the other betta fish that Harry was holding, and your eyebrows drew together. "What's the special occasion?"

Harry tucked the blanket further up your body and said, "Tomorrow is going to be rough, so I thought you could use a distraction when the days are long without me here."

Your jaw dropped a little as you took the container and closely watched the wispy specimen swim in circles. "That's so thoughtful, Harry."

"Thank your daughter," he replied, kissing your head as he stood up. "She convinced me. Thankfully, she picked an easy animal to take care of." He couldn't imagine if he came home with a slithery snake or an obnoxious bird. This was a peaceful pet that didn't really do much of anything. Something you could simply admire and keep satisfied through simple measures.

He never thought getting you a fish would be a part of his lifelong repayment for two precious children, but it was the most spontaneous moments that mattered most.

——

[the-ace-with-spades]

(an unfinished post I found as I scrolled through my drafts on the train to glasgow. putting it out there as i feel... something rn)

Whenever I think of Mav and Ice as Bradley's parents/parental figures, no matter what the scenario is, I always imagine that Ice is the softer one and Mav is the stricter one.

No matter whether the child acquisition happens when Bradley is in elementary school or when he's a teenager, I think Mav would already be more used to parenting Bradley, even if he'd never call it that, simply because I can't imagine him not helping Carole throughout the years. I imagine he's seen Bradley's first tantrums and was the one Carole called whenever Bradley was acting out, or whenever she felt like Bradley needed a 'man's hand' regarding issues with boys at school or was about to hit the big milestones like learning to ride a bike or start school or outgrow the car seat or anything that she felt she would be too emotional about to keep Bradley's confidence up. They'd always come to pick Mav up from deployment and would be at all of Mav's ceremonies and big events and it all worked in both ways --- Mav was a parent and Carole and Bradley were his family. He'd never call himself a dad, not even when Bradley started sometimes calling him that whenever explaining to the other kids that he's 'kinda like his dad' and Carole said it was okay, but he was a parent.

For a while after Bradley moves in with them, Ice is stuck in the fun uncle mode because that's who he was before. Carole called Mav whenever she needed help with parenting issues, and Ice was there when no one was available --- to watch Bradley when Mav and Carole were at PTA, or take him to the beach with Slider when Carole and Mav were at work on a Saturday, or to buy Bradley way too many birthday presents despite their protests. He's not here for discipline or to manage the tantrums or to guide Bradley from a toddler to a kid to a teenager to a young adult --- he's here to spoil him in ways Mav or Carole can't.

Even when Carole falls ill and he takes more responsibilities around Bradley, he's still managing them in the 'fun uncle' mode. He picks up Bradley from school and takes him out to eat junk food or out for ice cream, or takes him to baseball practice and ends up buying him a whole new set of equipment on the way, lets him stay up late and lets him eat too much sugar and then takes him out to the playground despite misbehaving and unfinished homework so Bradley can get rid of the energy.

When Carole passes away, it gets to the point where Mav has to have a talk with him.

When it became clear Carole wasn't going to make it, Mav and Carole sorted out her will, including Bradley's care. Mav had a whole breakdown about it, far away from Bradley's eyes, and when he told Ice he didn't know how he was going to do it all alone, Ice promised he wouldn't have to, that they would do it together.

But Carole passes away and Bradley starts acting out, like most grieving kids, and Ice is still stuck in the 'fun uncle' mode. He doesn't know what to do when Bradley sulks after school, or refuses to go to school in the morning, or refuses to eat what they made for dinner, or when he doesn't want to sleep alone, or 'forgets' to pack his backpack. He just---stands there and observes as Bradley gets chewed up by Mav. Or Bradley gets sent to his room to go and finally do his homework after the third time he comes back with a warning from his teacher and Ice can't get his sad face out of his mind and sneaks into his room and maybe helps him a bit too much with said homework. When Bradley doesn't want to eat the dinner he's cooked, even though he asked him three times what he'd want before he started cooking, he caves in and orders takeouts despite spending nearly two hours in the kitchen.

Mav is tired. He doesn't like being the bad guy all the time, he can't do everything either, and Ice disregarding any sort of discipline or change he tries to implement is not helping at all.

"You can't be the fun uncle anymore," is what Mav tells him. "I need you to be his parent, with me. I can't have you both working against me."

The thing is, Ice's never expected to be a parent. He realized he's gay since he was about fifteen and knew that if he ever married, it'd be a levander marriage, with a wife he'd never touch and probably divorce fast enough that the lack of kids would be understandable. He hasn't been around many kids either, mostly isolated throughout most of his childhood, certainly not enough to see healthy parenting in place. As a kid himself, he was mostly self-sufficient, with his mom dead and his father absent or disapproving most of the time. It's the only thing that got stuck with him when he's around Bradley --- he never wants the kid to feel alone or like he's doing something wrong just because the adults are not appropriative of it. He sees himself in Bradley whenever he looks upset when they tell him what to do or when they punish him for misbehaviour or when he simply doesn't know how to make it better for him. Spoiling Bradley is so much easier than denying him anything or even negotiating a compromise for him.

Mav might have been like Bradley in a lot of ways, but his mom never had a family friend that could take on a parental role for him --- he had to fill the void his dad left in their family from a very young age. When he entered foster care when she passed, he didn't have many options. It was either misbehaving and ruining his life before it started with a suspended sentence or an accident or pulling himself together. In some foster families it was misbehaving and not eating or walking around with a black eye or behaving and staying above the water line until they would relocate him again. He knew what discipline was and he met many many parental figures he could learn from, both bad and good stuff. He's met kids that were older than him and then became them and met kids younger than him. Learned tricks and things that work for certain development stages, learned parenting can't just be soft if he wanted to keep the kid alive and healthy.

So Ice starts to learn, slowly. Saying no is still really hard, but he starts negotiating and asking for things. Starts telling Bradley to do things he doesn't like. Sometimes he helps him do those things, but doesn't do them for him anymore, not from start to finish anyway. He tells Bradley Mav is right and he should listen to him, explains why he's right whenever Bradley talks back when Mav chews him out. He starts getting a grip on the things parents are supposed to be there to make sure that are happening --- homework, food, cleaning Bradley's room, making sure the kid is showering and sleeping, wearing clean clothes, managing tantrums and outbursts in a way that is different than caving in and leaving Bradley to deal with them alone. They become a team again, Ice as Mav's wingman in the whole parenting gig.

Mav starts to breathe again.

Eventually, Bradley grows out of the grieving phase. He's still a teenager, but Ice likes to think they did an alright job sorting him out. He's a sensitive kid, still, and Ice likes to think Bradley knows it's okay, that they love him no matter what. He likes to remind himself that the instances when Bradley makes puppy eyes at them to ask for a new guitar or for extra money for a theater or when he just crawled between them on the couch or the moments when he rumbles on about some asshole from his class freely as he peels potatoes for Ice --- he reminds himself Bradley feels loved enough to not feel like those moments are a burden on them. Reminds himself he's not only alive and healthy, but also happy and they made sure of that.

When Bradley calls Mav dad for the first time and Mav is mortified, Ice finds himself jealous. For the first time in his life, he realizes he wants to be a dad. Then he realizes he wants to be Bradley's dad and he feels equally mortified as Mav. Neither of them was ever supposed to be Bradley's dad.

Ice is still a bit softer. It's not that Mav can't be fun --- he can tease the kid, play around with him, take him on outings and places that Bradley enjoys more than anything. He is the one who takes him flying for the first time and the one that screams at his matches, and the one who teases Bradley relentlessly as he helps him prepare for his first date. But Ice gives in a bit more easily, let's Bradley make the choices a bit more freely as he grows up.

They both hover but in different ways --- Mav is always, always kind of around, trying to protect Bradley from anything he can, especially as the years go on and he realises how much shit teenagers get into. Ice likes to think Bradley is sensible and that even if something happened, he knows he can count on them and would let them help him if need be.

Mav watches like a hawk as if Bradley could ruin his life with one wrong move and tried to predict if it will happen at any given moment. Ice isn't stupid, he knows Bradley is going to fuck up time and again, everyone does. But unlike Mav, he doesn't want him to have a perfect, unproblematic life. He wants him to feel safe and loved enough that no problem would seem too big or irreversible.

[lizzylucky]

Draxum hadn't accounted for the fact that when he gave four hatchling turtles the DNA of a human being in order to give them greater intelligence, he would effectively be making himself a surrogate father to actual children, with wildly different needs.

When he sent his gargoyles to obtain a sample of DNA from Big Mama's prized warrior, the intention was to create his own. They were to be the prototypes for an army of simple creatures with just enough heightened intelligence to learn combat and follow commands, that he might defend Yokai kind with.

Instead, he quickly discovered the integration of human DNA had been a little over successful in allowing his test subjects to learn and think and feel in a civilized manner, going so far as to override some of their natural instincts as turtles that would otherwise allow them to learn to care for themselves. He had to feed them, by hand, with bottles.

Like infants.

They were easily distraught by unfamiliar things, and quickly became dependent on Draxum in every sense of the word. They babbled, they cried, they explored things with their hands, their tails, their mouths.

It was an unplanned adjustment needed to be made, but no matter. If anything, learning to understand the new hybrid emotions of these turtles would allow Draxum greater advantages when they grew enough to safely learn combat. Preferences, likes and dislikes, needs, diet, and so on, all became more complex areas of study.

Even a couple years in, he found himself continually surprised. Brain scans had shown that the turtles were more intelligent, still, than anticipated. They, truly, seemed more human in mind and function than anything else, with only some base instincts and behaviors left to influence their personalities. They retained many reptilian traits, but overall had the bipedal anatomy and function of humans and some Yokai. It had been an infuriating discovery at first, but Draxum had to admit that over time he became fond of it.

Each turtle had developed his own personality. The eldest, for example, had a love of plush toys, and showed a fierce protective instinct over the others. The youngest, Draxum had learned, was contrastedly reckless and excitable, not nearly so reserved or gentle as the first. Additionally, he was, decidedly, to be kept away from any and every writing utensil unless under strict supervision (unfortunately, this was learned a little too late, as was evidenced by the clear markings left in several work benches). Then, of course, were the slider and the softshell, who had the most bizarre relationship. They were constantly fighting with each other, but utterly inseparable, and each showed an incredible and unique curiosity, constantly exploring and watching and studying, with concentration filling their eyes in ways Draxum had never seen in other children so young.

Embarrassingly, it took another couple years before Draxum realized he couldn't simply refer to them by their species' names. It certainly was effective, but they were not the mild, simple creatures he had once expected them to be, and he knew that they never would.

Now, they were vocal, playful, inquisitive... energetic. By the gods, were they energetic. They never stopped moving, never stopped talking, never stopped eating, never stopped wanting or needing.

...This is why Draxum never had children of his own. It took all the time and energy he had to spare, and then some. Although it would be a lie to say he wished they were any other way.

They had so much capacity to learn, and with their emotional propensity could one day come to understand exactly why Draxum was doing this, which he knew would be an edge in their combative styles.

As he introduced them, slowly, to more of the world's culture and knowledge, he felt, in a new way, that their very existences were revolutionary. A perfect, synergistic unity between two entirely different families of genetic material, with numerous enhanced abilities. And they were children. They maintained all the properties of regular children, but had so much more in store! Such grand destinies! They would be, inarguably, the greatest warriors of their time when they were grown. They would be the compassionate, skillful heroes of all Yokai, the first of a new generation of super mutants, and the key to overcoming the evils of the humans who had overtaken the surface and posed such threat to all who lived below.

It was with great reluctance that he allowed himself to accept, however, that not all of mankind was evil. There were many forms of art, beautiful in different ways, there were some rare people filled with kindness, inventions that utilized resources in ways Yokai kind had never thought to. Perhaps he had been a little stubborn in his ways, a bias cementing over time that blinded him to some of the beauty that did yet exist in such a species.

Make no mistake, humans were a threat. Innocent families lived in fear, in hiding, of the governments and ruthless sciences designed to invade, to blaspheme the name of knowledge, with no regard for the safety of this people.

Draxum could live with being an outlaw to the Yokai if his experiments would lead to their salvation. He may be their villain in today's papers, but in history books he would be a hero.

Still, he wished to amend some of his practices. Even if only to his turtles, he would be known for his ability to change and understand. He would be fair, and he would be truthful.

And so it was that he told the turtles the nature of their existence. Perhaps he muted some of the details, to protect their minds until they had more understanding, but he would not lie to them about their DNA. He told them of Lou Jitsu, and their human genetics, and he begrudgingly allowed them access to the culture of the humans. He would let them choose their interests unbiased.

In the process, he came to know of some of the revolutionaries of human history. Though he wasn't particularly inclined to believe there were no evils involved, he was intrigued by the strange moral code that the humans boasted from their different time periods. The turtles, as well, were fascinated by the stories of war heroes and generals, seamstresses and inventors, artists and royalty.

Initially, when it came time to redesignate his turtles, Draxum had been inclined toward the names of those whose legacies persisted in the humans' culture even today- perhaps a president for the slider, a scientist for the softshell, a great general for the snapper, and an artist for the young box turtle. It seemed, somehow, clandestinely right; carefully considered to exemplify each of their personalities.

And although he had begun to get used to the possibility of names like "Monroe" and "Edison", his indecision on the matter seemed to be working against him. He was taking too long, and the boys were growing smarter.

It was a day in August, later that year, that he found his two youngest arguing over a Renaissance book, oddly enough. The elder two took to a game of knocking "secret patterns" on each other's carapaces, which he dismissed before he could allow himself the confusion that came with wondering why a five year old would want to knock on a spiked shell for fun.

After breaking up the fight and confiscating the book (which, as it turned out, the youngest only wanted because it had pictures in it, much to the chagrin of the other, who insisted that reading it was much better than just looking at the pictures), Draxum found himself idly flipping through pages of rustic images and rudimentary ideas, developed by people with strange names.

Maybe he was simply too tired to consider it properly, but, feeling defeated in his endeavor, he chose four names at random and assigned them to the young turtles, deciding it had been long enough.

It took a while to get used to, but soon "Raphael", "Leonardo", "Donatello", and "Michaelangelo" truly fit.

Over time, the boys grew... ravenous. They devoured everything- food, information, technique. They were learning quickly everything Draxum taught them. They practiced with Huginn and Muninn, leapt up, around, over, and through everything in the lab, and took special interest in action-filled films.

And Draxum grew fonder. He wasn't entirely surprised, of course; it's natural to develop some sense of sentimentality when caring for anything this long. Even if they had been the simple minded turtles he expected, he knew this was inevitable, to a degree.

What startled him was the sudden sense of fear that came with watching them train. The alarm that made his heart beat harder when one of them fell from somewhere high or any time they ran simple drills with weapons not blunted and made from wood.

He subtly began to intensify their defensive strategies, taught them where they were most vulnerable so they could protect those spots, insisted on perfecting their abilities to parry, block, and dodge before anything else.

And, over time, he found himself training them less often than before, thinking, "I must preserve their innocence and prolong their childhood experiences". After all, it was an essential part of development, was it not? If it were tarnished too much, they might become unwise or unjust as warriors. And, really, Raphael was only 8 years old, and he was the eldest; they were much too young to be exposed to the harshness of what their combative training was really for.

He told himself that, time and time again. He told them that, making certain they understood that their training was not a game. It wasn't untrue, certainly.

Really, he just wasn't ready. He wasn't ready to admit to what extent he cared about them, because it was too much. It was more than he could ever have been prepared for. It was more than that passion to protect Yokai kind ever was, and if he ever realized that, he might become the compromise to his own purposes, to the very reason these turtles exist this way to begin with, and then what? What was he to tell them, why was he to train them, who did they exist for if not the inhabitants of the Hidden City?

No. He couldn't do that. He simply would not allow it, not when so much was at stake.

And yet...

More and more often he desired simply to watch them. He was growing weary with worry, and with that tight feeling that arose in his chest each time one of his boys so much as frowned.

Raphael loved to carry his brothers on his shoulders. And he prided himself on being the big brother, in every way. He liked repeating instructions Draxum gave to the others, and tended to play caretaker anytime someone was sad, or had a bruised knee. He often played the "bad guy" in their made up games so the younger ones could "win", he was the mediator in big decisions, like what book they should read before bed, and he seemed always ready with an armful of stuffed animals when he wanted to express affection. So strong, incredibly strong, but soft spoken and sweet.

Leonardo adored Raphael. Just as Raphael did Draxum, Leonardo liked to imitate and repeat instructions. He tended to take charge in many of their childish endeavors, and had a propensity for dramatics and heroism, often pretending to rescue his brothers. This seemed to irritate Donatello to no end, unless he was also playing the hero, and often times he was. The two were usually glued to the hip, though Leonardo liked to make a point to tell all his brothers about everything that went on, and would take a movie night with the three of them over a one on one outing with Draxum any day. He was exuberant and joyous, and very driven by the concept of justice.

Donatello, similarly, seemed to care very dearly about maintaining a bond with all three of his brothers, but he was peculiar, often more reserved and enjoying his alone time. That child read and read like he might never get a chance to again, and he absorbed what he read like a sponge. Quite a few times Draxum found him pulling apart whatever he could get his hands on, and though an effort was made, there was no hiding place the boy couldn't discover in his quest for Draxum's tools. In spite of his quizzical, sometimes stoic nature, Donatello was sensitive, and very thoughtful. He would spend hours talking about his books and his ideas- some of which were very clever- and he was expressive in secondary ways- sitting nearer his brothers even without interacting, crafting things out of paper as gifts. Even the little heart-shaped mark on the back of his soft shell seemed a fitting part of him- he wore his heart on his sleeve, so to speak, and didn't even realize it.

And Michaelangelo. There was an innocence and joy and goodness about the smallest turtle that had struck Draxum. Even when he was younger he always wore a smile and liked to see the good side of things. And he idolized his brothers. With him had grown his creative inclinations, filling every colouring book, drawing on every wall, and absolutely plastering the other turtles with stickers. They were a pain to wash off, but Draxum couldn't bring himself to mind it, especially given the elder three always loved their baths. Ironically, it seemed Michealangelo did not, enjoying it only under specific circumstances. Heat, bubble bath, and bath toys had quickly become a necessity. So too did bath crayons, the need to express himself coming through even when bathing. Everything about the ornate box turtle was bright and colourful.

Draxum... loved them. Dearly. Every facet of their personalities and growth. Every unique trait and behavior.

It was terrifying. He couldn't afford to love them. He couldn't afford to see any more goodness in the humanity they showed. He couldn't afford to change his goals right now.

So he continued disregarding the feeling, trying to reason that everything he did for them was to nurture their instincts as warriors, as science experiments, as specimen.

But a pained scream one day, different from any of the ones he heard when they were frightened as infants, when one of them tripped and fell, when a spat led to hitting, sent his heart into his throat and had him racing through doorways with more urgency than he had felt for anything before.

He had demanded an explanation, panic translating to perceived anger, and three of his boys looked up with teary eyes. Three, but Donatello remained curled up on the ground, wailing his little heart out without ever looking up, and it was one of the most heart wrenching, painful sounds Draxum'd ever heard.

Raphael sat not far from the smaller boy, looking over his shoulder seemingly at nothing, at Donatello, then up at Draxum and back again. Both Leonardo and Michaelangelo burst into frantic, panicked explanations, none of their words coherent enough to understand through their tears.

When Raphael stood, exposing red-tipped spikes on his shell and pointing frantically to Donatello's, it didn't take long to figure out well enough what had happened.

It became quickly a very long day. All four turtles were distraught, and though Draxum had more than enough first aid knowledge to address the situation, bile had threatened to rise the very moment he pulled out the suture kit.

The cuts were deep, and jagged. And poor Donatello cried the entire time, even after a numbing agent had been applied.

Draxum had never thought that in depth about Donatello's soft shell. Not like that. He chose a softshell for the experiment because it would provide greater flexibility, greater agility. It gave an advantage that the hard-shelled turtles did not have.

Now, here... The soft carapace, spongy and leathery and bloody...

It was an accident. Of course it was, Draxum never doubted that. He had to assure that none of his boys were in trouble, no one was in trouble, no one had done anything wrong.

But for the first time he had to be honest with himself. For the first time he couldn't deny how much he cared about the turtles. His turtles. His boys.

He wouldn't, either. If this was what it was, if this was something that could happen again because he insisted on making them into warriors, into fighters- if this could happen on purpose, if this could happen worse, if this could happen with malice and hatred in mind...

Draxum wasn't unused to physical affection, by now. All four boys adored hugs, although Donatello was usually more reserved about them. Now, Donatello clung like his life depended on it, sniffling and whimpering, having cried so long he had no more tears. Draxum clung back, idly smoothing over the edges of the bandages, holding the frightened, exhausted turtle to his chest, cradling.

He did so until well after Donatello fell asleep. He couldn't bring himself to put him down. He accompanied the others to bed, assuring them once more that things were alright, and then simply stood in the walkway, holding his boy tightly.

He couldn't do this. He couldn't go through with it. They were children, every bit as innocent and deserving as the Yokai he wished to avenge and protect. He could train them, prepare them to protect themselves, but he could never send them into battle, ask them to put their lives on the line, much less demand it.

How could he?

It took months of processing, of agonizing his way through the healing process with Donatello, of watching the other boys proving their humanity, their curiosity, and their innocence time and time and time again. His mind was constantly at war with itself, his heart constantly in turmoil and distress, worsened by the turtles' confusion at his sudden change in behavior.

What was even worse was that they would.

They would absolutely sacrifice everything they had for his approval, and for what they understood as "right". He could see them, easily, being willing to submit their very lives to a greater cause if he asked it.

But was he "right"? Even if this experiment had gone exactly as planned, was he right for ever considering putting these turtles into the station of a warrior? Even if they had remained turtles in mind, if they never expressed complex emotion, if they could not speak, if they did not have distinct and colourful personalities, would it have been right?

Was what he saw in them now what they would have been at heart, regardless of circumstance?

Or was it the humanity, that he stole from Lou Jitsu?

Perhaps... perhaps it was time to learn. To consider the root of his motivations.

He couldn't do this to them.

How could he?

[alphabetboyluvr]

throttle │ jjk - one

this fic is my baby and has just hit 400k over on wp, so I'm sharing her here too he he

one / two / three / four / five / six / seven / eight / nine / ten / eleven

warnings - jungkook is blonde <3, he's also a bit of an asshole. dangerous driving, alcohol consumption, nothing major, we're setting scenes, building worlds just to ruin them woohoo. mentions of violence, gang dynamics. both the oc and jk swear like sailors.

word count - 17.8k

minors dni // posted to wp late 2021 // series masterlist

The bell above the gas station door always chimes just a little bit louder than is really necessary. 

In fact, the shrill clang of metal is so intrusive, that it feels borderline rude every single time a customer swings the door open. It's only natural for you to ignore it now, affronted by the way it distracts your focus.

It's not like you're ever doing anything important. Just flicking through the day's newspapers or counting stock. 

Although, come to think of it, you're never actually counting stock, either. You leave that job for Jieun, because you know she's a stickler for the rules, and likes feeling accomplished after her shifts are finished.

You're not really sure how much accomplishment can be derived from a part-time job at a GS25 attached to a gas station forecourt, but she seems to enjoy it.

This job really isn't for you - but it's better than following your father into local politics, and nepotism is all you really have going for you, considering you flunked the college entrance exam. An act of rebellion, for the corruption scandal your father had chosen to embroil himself in during your senior year, you had refused to write a single word on the paper. 

You thought it would embarrass him - and it did. Just at your expense.

And so, while it may not be your childhood dream of being a pop star, or a vet, or anything of any significance, ringing up bills at the gas station is how you're able to pay your own bills. It'll do for now.

You ignore the chime of the bell as the door to the service station opens once more. 

It's the start of the year, and the breeze is bitter whenever it rushes in. This time, the wind is accompanied by a guy in his mid-thirties. Dark slacks, burgundy jumper. His off-brand sliders scuff across the floor as he traipses round to the refrigerator, bottle clinking as he picks up a little soju and some beer for his evening. It's not an uncommon occurrence for men his age.

You hypothesise his next move. To the snack section to pick up something for his kids? Maybe straight to the kiosk to pay for his fuel? You check the screen, and notice he's barely added enough gas to cover the minimum charge. 

A scornful mutter of 'priorities' laces your lips, as you see him put back the soju and reach for the whisky instead.

Still, you can't blame him. It's fucking freezing. A little whisky to warm him up will probably be as cost-effective as getting a new boiler that actually works.

It's all just an assumption of course. 

You don't know this man, and you don't have a clue if his boiler works or not - but thinking about the lives of the people you meet for split fractions of time always helps to make your shift go quicker. 

He comes to the counter, pays, and leaves. 

You wonder if he's made up a life for you in his head, too.

Probably not. He probably already has an actual life to distract him from his thoughts. Maybe that's what the whisky is for.

And there you go again; hypothesising. Thinking. Putting your assumptions onto strangers.

The next customer is a girl around your age, wearing a fluffy pink coat and hoops big enough to be worn as bangles. She arrives on foot, pushing the swing door open without much care for excessive force. 

You decide, all rather quickly, that she must work at the gentlemen's club around the corner from the gas station. She's buying a coffee, iced, and nothing else. 

It's when she's at the kiosk that you realise your make-believe life for her is terribly inaccurate. She fumbles with her purse, dropping her staff I.D. card.

She's a nurse. Paediatric nurse, to be specific. The coffee she's picked up isn't for a boost before a shift on the poles, but to keep her going through a night on the wards.

And yet despite how your assumptions are so often so wrong, you still consider yourself to be a good judge of character.

It's a flaw, the way you always seem to think you can read people; think you can look at their demeanour, their clothes, and assume their financial status, what they do after the sun sets, and if they're going home to an empty house or not.

Your thoughts become lore. The gas station you work in is the thick leather cover that protects your make-believe world from outsiders.

When the bell chimes again, you don't look up. 

It's a habit. You don't want to make eye contact. It breaks the illusion that these people are just characters in your head.

Instead, you glance up to the curved mirror in the far corner of the shop. It acts as a second pair of eyes, and is ignored by pretty much all of the customers - except for the teenage girls who like to take selfies in it.

Tall, you assess when you finally find the new customer in the mirror. Broad. 

His posture a little sloped, but all things considered, he carries himself well. He heads for the refrigerators, just like every man above the age of 19 seems to do on a Friday night. There's that clink again, and you guess he's going for soju. He's young, so it seems apt. Whatever's cheapest seems to be the drink of choice for the guys your age, and you can't blame them.

You watch, cautious to not catch his gaze, as he heads to the food fridge. 

Gimbap, you guess. Tuna, not chicken. One roll, not two. 

He pulls out his phone to check a notification, and you notice just how hard his gaze is. There's a ridge between his brows, and a couple silver ballbearings accenting the brow farthest from you. Whatever he's reading on his phone, he doesn't like.

Girlfriend, you guess again. No. An ex. No, no. A FWB turned far-too-clingy. 

He looks like the type to be after something a little casual. 

The tattoos on his hands are nothing special - you've seen hands like his in countless 'sneaky' Instagram stories; a hand on the thigh, holding a bag. Y'know, the ones. The kind of shit girls post with the caption 'private, not secret' - but you both know there's nothing really 'private' about it. The owner of the hands will be blocked within a week or two, once the girl realises he's nothing special, just like his hands.

You hear him mutter beneath his breath. You can't quite make it out, but the way he shakes his head lets you know that it was most likely a curse. He locks his phone, tucks it into the back pocket of his jeans, and carries on looking for something to eat. 

You watch as his gaze lifts and falls.

That's it, you urge silently. Go for the gimbap.

You want to be proven right. 

He's already got a green bottle tucked into the pocket of his black bomber jacket, so you know you've got his choice of drink correct. You're assuming that your guess about his phone is correct, too, so you only need one more right to get a full house.

As he looks across the snacks - gimbap, vacuum-sealed meats, cheese, strawberry sandwiches and enough microwavable food to feed an orphanage - he pushes his hair out of his face. The way it falls back down almost instantly makes you smile. 

He needs a haircut - but you bet that his FWB (turned far-too-clingy lover) loves it, so he keeps it long for her satisfaction. It's bleached; pale as the sticky rice balls he's eyeing up, with dark roots that let you know he's trouble. No boy with hair like that has ever been good news. Especially not the ones who look like him.

Or so you guess look like him. He's wearing a mask. It's black, to match his outfit, cinched at the nose, hooked around ears that are studded up the sides. He must have, what? Five? Six? Little square studs in there. Airport security must be a nightmare.

You smile to yourself as he reaches for gimbap. One roll, not two. Tuna, not chicken. Bingo.

"Pump six," he says as he approaches the counter. You already know. It's been waiting on the screen since he walked in. There's no one else in the forecourt. "And these."

He tosses down the gimbap, and pulls the soju from his pocket, an old receipt coming with it. Kang's Auto Repairs it reads, but he stuffs it back into his pocket before you can read anything else.

"We're cheaper," you note, not really caring for revealing just how incredibly nosey you are. There's a perspex screen between you, which always makes you feel protected - from people, their judgements and whatever other airborne diseases they might be carrying. From the looks of him, the only diseases he'll be carrying are the ones found beneath the sheets. He's too well-built to be suffering from any ailments - but equally, too well built to not to be fucking about. "Cheaper than Kang's, I mean. He'll charge you an arm and a leg for the honour of his service."

"Hmm?" He raises a brow, obviously just wanting to pay for his shit and go. "Thanks, but I like Kang's. Been going there for years."

You hold back a laugh. He's no older than you. 24? 25? Yet he's talking like he's been loyal to that over-priced, under-qualified garage for decades. The neighbourhood is littered with garages, scrap part dealers and gas stations, and yet Kang's is the main competitor for your place. It's not even in this neighbourhood - it's across the river, which is a different district entirely, but the proximity is close enough. Your boss will never miss an opportunity to shit talk Old Man Kang and his 'con-artist' car mechanics. He doesn't think any of them are actually trained.

"Yeah, well," you smile, scanning his items, pretending there's a fault with the barcode on his gimbap just to be a little annoying. "Our guy, Yoongi, he's a specialist with those." You nod out of the window and towards the car by pump six. It's red; a little bit brash, but a classic. "Pony, right? Hyundai? '80?"

"Pony," he nods, tone neutral but eyes a little narrow. Doesn't know why, but he didn't expect you to know - and then he remembers you work at a garage. Of course you know. Got the year wrong, though."It's an '83. A mark two. I'll keep the suggestion in mind," he adds, though you both know he's lying. "How much do I owe you?"

He doesn't really listen as you list off the figure. Just hands you his card, hums when you ask for his signature - sign of a big spender, must be a full tank - and says little else. His phone buzzes on the counter as he stuffs his purchases back into his pockets, and you glance down - again, not caring for the discretion of your nosey tendencies.

KNJ. (1)   New Message.

Sneaky bastard, you think. How rude of him not to have his message previews displayed.

You're not sure if he caught you looking, but he snaps his phone up regardless and shoves it into his back pocket.

"Cheers," he nods, before he sets off into the night. Car unlocked, he slides into the driver's seat and empties his pockets onto the passengers' side. You watch on for a moment, before there's a rattle of his exhaust pipe, engine roaring into action - and like that, he's gone. You assume he's not on his way to his FWB (turned far-too-clingy lover). Wouldn't have bought tuna if he was. Then again, he's a guy. You don't expect him to care about such social cues.

Maybe he's just left hers. His neck did seem a little red, but then again, it's cold. Minus 3. The river you walk across to get to work is frozen over, and has been for about two weeks now. You've got a heat pack stuffed in either pocket of your work jacket. 

Well, Yoongi's work jacket. It's his name stitched into the breast pocket - but it's bigger than yours, so you can fit a few more layers beneath it. If the boss saw you in it, he'd have a bitch fit for 'not following company protocols,' and for not caring about the 'company brand image'. Which is true. You're neither following protocols, nor do you care about the company nor its brand image. 

It's just gone nine on a Friday night, though, and the boss clocked out a few hours ago with a bottle of makgeolli and the day's newspaper under his arm. He's not gonna see. And if he does, what's he gonna do? Fire you? Good luck to him finding anyone else who wants to spend their winter nights freezing half-to-death in this shit hole of a gas station.

By the time midnight hits, you've been yawning for at least an hour. Keeping yourself warm is a laboursome task.

"You're gonna catch a cold," Yoongi acknowledges as he enters the shop through the back entrance. He's still wrapped up in a calf-length puffa jacket, all warm and cosy. He heads out past the kiosks as normal, up to the fridges. Bagged americano and a cup of ice. You know his score - and you're proven right. "Tell me why I agreed to cover your night shift, again?" he says with a slight shiver as he scans through his own items.

Though he's typically out fixing up cars behind the service station, he helps you out at the kiosk too. Normally just when there are staff shortages - which in all fairness, occur more frequently than you'd expect.

"'Cause you love me," you sing, knowing that it's entirely plausible. 

Yoongi - stone-cold, stoic, as emotionally inept as you'd expect a bachelor verging on his 30s to be - could very much be in love with you. It's not like he really speaks to many other women, and he's never given you a reason to believe he's not interested. 

But he does give you his jacket, cuts you slack on the days you feel like shit, and covers the shifts you don't want to work without asking any questions. Sometimes he sneaks you the food that was meant to be tossed in the bin overnight, and other times he makes sure there's a peach tea waiting for you when you clock in.

"It's 'cause I love money," he corrects, as if the extra 30,000 won he'll make from the last three hours of your shift is really an incentive. He's already spent 3,000 on his coffee. "Now scram. Get yourself home. Fucking freezing tonight. Want me to call you a cab?"

That'll be an extra 7,000 to his evenings' expenses. You really don't think he does love the money. At least not enough for it to be a reasonable excuse.

"It's good," you shake your head. "You know I'm not far away."

He nods, not really fighting your choices. It's not like you ever accept his offer anyway. He learned quite a long time ago that if you want something done, you'll do it for yourself.

Y'see, you're not the only one who watches.

Yoongi watches you too, as you tap through on the screen to log yourself out and cash up the till. 

You've only run 260,000 through your till in the last four hours, barely enough to make ends meet for the gas station. No wonder the place hasn't had any upgrades - with the exception of tills and a new fridge every now and again - since the mid-noughties. The signs are rusting, and Yoongi still has to change the fuel prices by hand every morning.

On the rare shifts you work together, you like to make assumptions together. You guess what people are gonna buy, hypothesise where they're going, who they're going with. When you hear bottles clink, you guess which flavour soju they're going for, as if you don't only have 4 flavours stocked. During the summer, you like to guess who's filling up their tanks to go to the coast.

The door chimes as a new customer walks in, and Yoongi knocks his head back. "Go on, out. I'll cash your till up. It's all good."

You ask if he's sure, to which he smiles and tells you to leave again - so you do. Not without thanking him, and fluttering your lashes a little. Maybe it is your fault, just a little, that Yoongi might be a tiny bit in love with you. 

"I owe you the world!" You squeal as you skip out the door. He laughs, but says nothing. He just wants you home and safe as quickly as possible.

Yoongi doesn't mind covering your shifts, not this late at night. He knows this area doesn't have the best reputation, and despite your sharp tongue, he knows that you'd stand absolutely no chance if someone decided that it seemed like a good place to commit a felony or two. 

It's a debate you've had a few times before. You know he's right, but you fight against him regardless. It always makes him smile, and only adds to your theory that he might be a little bit in love with you.

You forget the quiet thrum in your chest as soon as the cold air hits you. Yoongi traded his jacket with you before you left; him now in his work uniform, and you in his thick puffa which reaches down to your ankles. Hands stuffed into his pockets, your shoulders hunch as you walk, a mask covering your face just to keep the heat in. Your scarf is wrapped around you so tightly that you might just suffocate, but it would be worth it, you think. You hate this time of year. So fucking cold, and for what?

The bridge lights are off by the time you reach it, illuminated only by a couple of cars. They're sat up towards the far end, facing you, and you sigh. Every fucking weekend.

It's not always the same cars, but quite often it is - or some variation of the same group, at least. They sit, waiting for traffic to die down and the lights to cut off, before turning the bridge into their own little speedway.

You should have guessed from the sound of that asshole's exhaust earlier that evening that he'd be one of them. 

The fact he goes to Kang's, too. 

It's obvious, when you think about it now. 

Guys his age never fill up their tanks - but he did. Filled it up just to spit it all out again, painting the road in iridescent speckles of gas.

You can see the Pony. It's the car farthest away from you, next to a black SsangYong. 

You can't make out the model of the SsangYong, but it looks fast. It's lowered, windows tinted, exhaust tampered with, just to create an almighty roar - which screams 'I have a tiny cock'. 

At least with the Pony, you can tell that the sound being delivered comes from his engine. Credit where it's due, and all that. He could still very much have a tiny cock, but at least he's better at hiding it.

Crossing your arms over your chest, you hug into yourself to preserve heat. The lights of the cars make you a little self-conscious, aware that you're the only thing in sight that's disturbing their peace. There's ice on the road, but you pay it no notice, knowing that there's no point in worrying about one of the cars swerving off-road as they inevitably shoot past you. 

If it happens, it happens.

The SsangYong is loud. Obnoxiously, so. You can hear pressure being put down and released on the gas pedal, clutch raised. He's teasing you. Warning you. Hurry up. 

Next to it, the Pony hums. He doesn't seem interested in taunting you as if you could fight a two-tonne vehicle as it hurtles towards you. That, or he doesn't want to waste his gas. Lord knows he'll be wasting enough of it tonight as it is.

"Try me, fucker," you mumble under your breath, eyes trained on the black car. You can't make out its driver, nor do you really care. 

It's at this point you notice a guy on the opposite side of the road. 

He flashes the torch of his phone, once, twice. The Pony kicks into gear now, too, revving to rival the SsangYong. You're halfway across the bridge, wishing they could have just waited, like, one more minute. But whatever. Assholes will be assholes.

The torch guy is out of your line of vision by the time you hear tyres screech against the ice-cold road, rubber-burning regardless. The Ssangyong bolts, fumes from the exhaust fogging in the air behind it. You expect the Pony to do the same.

It takes you half a second to realise it's stagnated, and another half to realise that things aren't going to plan for Mr Gimbap.

There's a thud from the back wheels as they lock and release, causing the wheels to spin out. You've seen enough wheel spins now to know one, and as the Pony lurches forward, you know that's exactly what it is - but you also know the road is icy. 

The fun of a wheel spin, or so Yoongi likes to tell you, is that brief moment of lost control. He likes to do it whenever he gives you a lift home, because he finds the way you freak out funny - but he's always in command of his vehicle. He's never done it with you in the car during the winter. He knows better. Doesn't actually want to lose control.

At least, not like the dude in the driver's seat of the Pony currently is. 

The back kicks out, sending him swerving. The front wheels are a fucking mess, his hands twisting the wheel in an attempt to rectify his fuck up. It's fruitless. He's off the clutch, the wheels aren't spinning, but he's already on the ice, and he's hurtling towards you.

You're aware you should run, but like the river, you're stuck. Frozen in place. 

Maybe you should have accepted Yoongi's offer of a taxi. RIP.

There's another biting screech as you're doused in headlights, and you're pretty sure that this is what people mean when they say you see the light before you die. Fucking blinding. No way those lamps are regulation approved.

It's as you're bracing yourself for the inevitable end (and thinking about how embarrassing it's going to be when your family is tasked with clearing out your apartment after your demise - you haven't cleaned for weeks, laundry has been sat in the washer for two days, and there's a pizza box that you don't dare look in sitting next to the bin) that miracle seems to strike.

The Pony hits an uniced patch just in time for the driver to slam on his breaks. Handbrake, by the sound of it, but you're not sure. Not really sure of anything. Your heart is beating in your throat.

Steam is coming from the heat of the tyres, but the air around you is frozen, and so are you. You're not sure if it's from the cold or from the shock. A bit of both probably. You don't shake out of it until the driver's door pops open.

"The fuck are you doing?" He shouts. His mask is off now, not like it had been in the store. Light glimmers off yet more metal stuck in face, this time a ring around his plump bottom lip. His nose, though well proportioned, is blushed. "I could have fucking hit you!"

"Uh, yeah?" You almost laugh, too stunned to compute the fact that he was shouting at you. "Yeah, you could have fucking hit me, you asshole-"

"The fuck are you doing on the bridge? This late? Wearing all fucking black? I know you work around here, so I know you know what this place is used for-"

"Yeah, it's a bridge," you deadpan. It's notorious for racing, but who cares? It's not like you're in the wrong here. He's the one breaking laws. You're just trying to go home. "It's used to cross rivers. So, yanno, people working night shifts can walk home without rowing a fucking boat. Pretty neat actually, invented by the Greeks."

"Don't be smart," he scolds. "You saw us gearing up, you knew what was about to ha-"

"I'm sorry," you really are laughing now. "Are you telling me that I'm in the wrong? You? The asshole who's racing his shitty car on an icy fucking bridge? The asshole who can't control his aforementioned shitty car-"

"Can control it," he snaps. "If I couldn't, you'd be fucking dead."

"Oh, well thank you very much! How kind of you to not kill me as a result of your reckless driving. No, really. I appreciate it so much. How ever can I repay you?"

"You know what?" He calls after you when you begin to walk away. As far as you're concerned, the conversion is done. "Next time, I will just hit you."

"Be my fucking guest!" You shout back, holding your middle finger up to wave goodbye. "Stick to Kang's next time, you pretentious, self-absorbed cunt."

"Gladly."

"Oh, and by the way," you begin to say in a sickly sweet tone, which you just know is going to piss him off. You turn to find him standing, facing the bridge wall, looking at the river that's illuminated only by the headlamps of his car, like two little moons. The real one is hidden by clouds. "You'll have better control if you release the clutch a little slower. Wheelspin like that? Yeah, someone needs to practise their clutch control."

He looks like he wants to say something, but instead, he just flares his nostrils and grates his jaw. He knows you're right. Knows he missed the mark - but he'd been distracted when he noticed you on the bridge. You threw him off his game.

Equally, you know he's a good driver. The way he gained control of his car on the ice was borderline expert. Impressive. You won't go as far to say life-saving, because if it wasn't for his driving in the first place, your life wouldn't have needed any God Damn saving.

You walk backwards for a step or two, just to gloat in the knowledge you've gotten the last word. He glares at you, but stays silent. Victory.

"Oi, Kook. The fuck was that about?" A distant voice yells. The SsangYong driver, you assume.

"Nothin'," he yells back. His eyes are still on you, watching as you hunch a little, folding your arms over your chest. You must be freezing, he thinks. Stupid, too. The area is littered with taxis on Friday nights. Why anyone would choose to walk is beyond him. He casts you one final stare, his chest heaving from the adrenaline, before he turns away from you. "Stupid bitch almost got herself killed. Starting line. Let's go again."

────────────

You don't mention your near-death experience to Yoongi when you see him at work the following Monday. You know he'll just worry, and then he'll really start insisting on ordering cabs for you.

Worse yet, you think he might just order them to arrive when your shift finishes, and then you'll have to take them. No point in making mountains out of molehills.

Customers are always steady on Mondays; people fuelling up for the working week, replenishing stocks wasted on the weekends.

By the time it hits four, school kids are piling in. They're picking up snacks, something to fuel them between mandatory classes and the additional ones they've picked up at hagwons. Poor suckers, you always think.

It's been years since you did the same grind, and you still don't fully understand just why you worked yourself to the bone, only to end up working in a fucking service station. 

It had never been the dream. Still isn't - but it beats being hired on account of nepotism, thanks to a father with an unlawful influence in the city. 

Your family name - which you don't go by, these days - is on the side of buildings, in the list of hospital beneficiaries, even on the local soccer team's fucking shirts. You're cursed with it; no identity of your own. Even when did try to get a job without the backing of your family, people still knew. Your face has been at God knows how many press junkets, playing the role of the Mayor's darling daughter.

All bullshit, of course.

Your father is just as good at saving face as he is at making investments. Turns out there really is nothing money can't buy; support for a mayoral campaign, the silence of a nanny - of whom he started fucking when you were still in middle school - and enough pearls to keep your mother happy after she found out.

Cars, houses, material goods? You'd wanted for nothing as a kid.

Privilege. It's a funny little thing. You had the world, and yet none of it was yours. Not really. And so, as soon as you were of legal age, you were out of the family home, trying to find some concrete meaning for your life.

All you'd found so far was the harrowing knowledge that your father's mayoral tenure had been hell for those without the privileges you'd been raised with, and therefore you'd distanced yourself so far from your family that you weren't even sure they'd recognise you, anymore.

"You good?" Yoongi asks, around about the time the clock hits five. He's by the back entrance, wiping his oil-covered hands on an old rag. "Just finishing up."

"Good," you nod in response to his question. You give him a fond smile to let him know that the perplexed expression he'd caught on your face was nothing to be worried about, and then you ask him his plans for the evening.

There are only a few more hours left on the clock for you. It's a mid-shift, someone else coming in to work the night rotation. You've never liked these shifts - the highest influx of customers, but by far the least interesting interactions.

They come and go so quickly that it's hard to make up a fake life for them, before they're replaced by the next sullen face, wanting to get in and out as quickly as possible.

"Gimmie a call if you need a lift," Yoongi calls over as he gets his jacket to leave. Off comes his work one, tossed over to you, replaced with the black puffa you returned that morning.

"Will do," you nod - and you both know you're lying. Still, he's a gentleman through and through. Wouldn't have felt right if he didn't at least offer. The bell on the entryway door chimes, but you don't look over to see the customer, choosing to smile at your friend instead. "Catch ya later, Yoongs."

"Yeah, you too," he smiles back, zipping up his coat and pulling up his mask. He's walking home, too, but it's still light. It will be dark by the time nine hits, and even though he doesn't know about last Friday night, he still doesn't like the idea of you walking home alone.

You hear the clink of glasses by the fridge, but the view is obscured by an obnoxious advertising standee your boss has insisted you put up inside the store. You tried telling him that the whole point was to draw customers in, not block them from even entering, but he was having none of it. Doesn't trust the kids in the neighbourhood not to nick it.

There's a crunch as the lid of the chest freezer is slid open, a cup of ice rattling as it's pulled from the stack. You only filled it up half an hour ago. 

Annoying. And who the fuck is drinking an iced drink on a day like today? You think, as if Yoongi doesn't reach for an iced americano before each and every shift. You're just as bad. Your peach tea habit is becoming an issue.

You glance to the forecourt to check which pump to ring through - and that's when you see it. 

Sat in bay six, as proud as the paint is bright, is that stupid fucking Pony again. With a small scoff, you pull up the balance - just over 30,000. Half a tank. Already.

Hardly a surprise, with the way he had been ragging it about on Friday evening. Must be a common occurrence.

As he comes into your line of vision, you busy yourself. 

Turning your back to the kiosk, you're arranging cigarettes that don't need to be arranged, purely so that you don't have to look at him. The bottom of his soju bottle clinks against the counter, the ice and a coffee bag following suit. You still don't turn around, instead opting to look through the 'how-to' manual for the lottery machine, just to really reinforce the fact that serving him is the last thing you want to do.

Had you not told him to stick to Kang's?

"Ahem," he coughs.

You pause mid-page turn and look vacantly into the distance for a moment, before facing him with a smile so insincere it's almost comical.

"Sorry, didn't see you there."

He nods, but doesn't say anything further. He's in all black again, this time with a sweater beneath his bomber. Air quality is still bad, thanks to the cold temperatures and lack of rain to clear the skies, so he's wearing a mask again, but it's perched beneath his jaw. His poker face holds up well.

You ring up his total, ignoring the fact he's chosen to go for a peach tea, not coffee like you'd assumed, and ask if he wants a receipt. He declines, and heads on his way, scooping up his soju bottle, leaving the peach tea.

"Oi," you call after him, but he ignores you."Oi."

Still, nothing. He pushes the door open with his knuckles that are wrapped tightly around the neck of his bottle, not paying you any attention. He's just being a dick at this point. You know he can hear you.

"Oi," you shout again, sliding out from behind the kiosk and following him to the door. You don't grab his drink - he can go back and pick it up himself, the asshole. 

"Kook," you shout, remembering the name the SsangYong driver had called him by.

He stops now.

"Oh," he turns, lips pursed, before throwing your words right back at you. "Sorry, didn't see you there."

Neither of you say anything. It's fucking freezing, and you can see your breath as you huddle yourself together. His eyes are soft, expression gentle, to suggest he's only teasing, but you can't work him out.

"You left your drink."

He shakes his head. Holds up his soju. "No, I didn't. That's yours. You like them, right? It's what you were drinking the other day?"

You narrow your eyes, only for him to raise his brows. You aren't the only nosey one, doll.

"Bit weird," you tell him.

Retrospectively, he thinks you're probably right. It had seemed like a good idea at the time. He hadn't intended for it to be so strange - he just isn't great at admitting when he's in the wrong, so a peace offering is a far more tempting solution.

He digs a hand into his pocket, almost as if he's searching for the remains of his dignity, but simply shrugs. "I know I was a bit of a prick."

Acknowledgements of flaws are always welcome by you, but you really don't fancy just forgiving and forgetting. As stupid as it all seems, it was a life or death situation. A peach fucking tea wouldn't have resurrected you or uncrushed your bones.

"Yeah," you nod, biting down on your lip, a little unsure of how to handle the situation. "You were. And not just 'a bit' of a prick. Massive prick, actually."

He repeats your correction, and adds, "You just took me by surprise. I panicked. I'm not usually that..."

"Unreasonable? Arsey? Unable to control your clutch?"

"All of the above," he smiles, and you notice that he has dimples. Asshole. "Look, I won't bother you again. It just wasn't sitting right with me, the way I behaved. My mother would have been rolling in her grave if she heard me speak to a girl like that, especially so late at night. It was a dick move... and so," he inhales, looking at the ground before briefly meeting your eyes again. They're round and wide, almost as if he's incapable of telling lies. "I'm sorry."

There's silence for a moment, and then there's the flash of headlights as a second car rolls into the forecourt. You both turn to check the car, but it's just a standard family saloon. Nothing worth checking out, but it's enough to end the conversation.

"Stick to Kang's," you simply say as he pops open the door to his car. "I appreciate the sentiment, though. Was sweet."

He nods, fully intending on sticking to Kang's. He just needed to do this before he could move on from things. 

Or at least, that's the assumption that you make as he drives away. 

You wait for a little while, ignoring the man clicking the gas nozzle into the side of his car, just watching the now empty road where the small red car had sped off from. You wonder where he's going, but determine he's most likely going to that FWB you've decided he has.

Turning on your heels slowly, you let your body weight fall into the swing door, pushing it open with your shoulder. The bell jingles, like always, and for some reason, it kind of feels like the sound has settled in your stomach. It's all jittery and annoying, and you don't quite understand it. You definitely don't like it, whatever this feeling is.

It's the same feeling that washes over you next Thursday afternoon, when the bell chimes and you glance out the window, only to see a red Hyundai fucking Pony sat in bay six.

He begins to make a habit of it. Neither of you really address it. He just keeps showing up, filling his tank up, and buying whatever tickles his fancy from the snack fridge. It's nearly always gimbap. Occasionally he'll pick up something a little more substantial, and it's always accompanied with soju on Friday nights.

It takes about three weeks for you to be able to distinguish the way in which he opens the shop door. The bell chimes a little slower than normal, his casually cool demeanour preventing him from using too much force to open it. It will always 'ding' for just a bit longer than when other people push open the door. Doesn't matter where you are in the shop, what time it is. You always know when it's him.

It's a Saturday when you hear the unmistakable sound of him again, 4 weeks since that first time.

You can't see him, thanks to the standee that is still obstructing your view, but you can hear the fridges. One, two, bottles of soju. There's another clang. Three? Unusual. It's when he heads to the snack fridge that you realise you're off your game.

He's holding beers - four of them. Making the most of the four for 10,000 deal, you muse. The bottles are green, so you assume Terra, but there are some foreign imports in the fridge, too. You kind of stop guessing at this point, too busy watching. His hair is messy, like aways, and the flannel shirt he's wearing is in need of an iron, but you have to admit - there's a certain charm about him.

Your eyes flick to the door to check that nobody else has entered, and are proven correct - so why does your stomach still feel like that bloody bell chiming?

"Am I good to leave these here?" He asks, drawing your attention back to him. He's already putting the beers down on the counter, so it's not really like you can say no. "Haven't filled up yet, just wanted to check that you had what I was after, first."

"Beers?" You laugh almost immediately. "It's a GS25, dude. Course we have beers."

"Right," he nods, scrunching his nose up a little as he smiles. It was a stupid excuse, and he knew it. Part of you thinks he actually looks a little bashful. It's sweet. Confusing - but sweet, nonetheless. "I'll just go fill up."

"Uh-huh," you nod, when he doesn't leave immediately, almost as if he's waiting for permission. He laughs, and so do you. It's awkward, and you don't know why but you find yourself dropping his gaze. "Just go fill up your car."

"Yeah, yeah," he says. "Fill up. Right."

You move his bottles to the side just in case of another customer, and set about making yourself look busy, but you're a simple being. It's hard to do anything other than wistfully stare when a boy that pretty is stood in your forecourt. 

He pays you no notice as he unscrews his gas cap and positions the nozzle against the opening of his car.

There's a casual nature to his posture, leaning back ever so slightly as he slides the length of the nozzle into his car, displaying just how in tune he is with doing such a menial task. It's second nature at this point.

He watches the nozzle, then lifts his gaze above the car and out towards the road. His eyes are hard, focused almost, that little line forming between his brows again. Almost like he's looking for something.

There's a click as his gas reaches its limit, and he withdraws the nozzle slightly, letting the excess drip into the tank. He knocks it once, twice, against the entrance to be sure that he's emptied it of every last drop, before he slides it out and hooks it back into its holder.

You finally avert your eyes as he screws the cap back into place, your fingers working nimbly to bring up his total on the screen.

There's that ringing feeling again when you notice he's barely reached the minimum spend, yet you could hear the tell-tale sign of a full tank from the forecourt. He hadn't needed gas at all.

He could have just gotten a few bottles of beer from any of the convenience stores in the area - and yet for some reason, he made his excuse to come to you.

The silage of his aftershave lingers by the kiosk, and you remind yourself that he's probably off to see a girl you've made up in your head. The beers are probably to be drunk with her. The flannel shirt is still creased because what's the point in ironing something that will just end up on the floor, anyway?

It's these thoughts that have you acting a little frosty again when he returns. You ring up his total, instruct him to put his card in the machine, as if he doesn't know what he's doing, and then you offer him a receipt.

He's a little confused by the fact you're as cold as the air outside.

Had your interactions not developed past the point of a typical cashier-customer relationship? Maybe he'd read the situation a little wrong.

"Kang's have beer," he finally adds, accepting his receipt, studying it, just to see if it has your name listed under the cashier ID. It does. He takes his time to fold it up, instead of just stuffing it into his back pocket. He's biding time. Making more for himself. "But I'm a bit of a liar," he says, ending his statement with your name. The way he says it, hanging onto the last syllable, taking claim of your identity as his gaze meets your eyes, has that stupid ringing feeling back in your stomach. "I'm not here for beers."

"No?" you ask, almost nonchalant. You're divided by a perspex screen, and you've never been more thankful. It's cutting the tension for you.

"No," he shakes his head. He's about to speak, when the bell of the door goes again - for real, this time. Not just in your stomach. 

He steps aside to let the customer pay for their gas. It's a simple transaction, no added extras like Flannel Boy always has.

He stands awkwardly, toying at the bagged sweets with his ring adorned fingers. You decide that even if your assumptions about him are wrong, there's one that must be right: he knows he's hot.

The way he turns and smirks after the customer leaves, and says, "where were we?", only confirms this.

"You were saying how you weren't here for beer," you remind him, not that he actually needs it.

The perspex screen feels like a thick brick wall. You're simultaneously thankful for and annoyed by it.

"Ah, that's right," he nods. "You were saying how you're going to call in sick tomorrow night and meet me downtown."

"I'm gonna do what now?" You laugh, caught off guard by his boldness. He's smooth, you'll give him that much.

"You're gonna meet me downtown," he says simply, before adding, "Jungangno underground, exit two. The one near CGV. I can draw you a map-"

"Shut up," you laugh, blissfully ignoring the fact he's flirting with you. "I know Jungangno."

"So you'll meet me there?"

"I didn't say that."

He begins to gather up his beers, two in either hand, a smile etched on his cheeks. "So I'll see you tomorrow, at, hmm, say, 8?"

"No," you laugh.

"Yes," he grins back, walking away so that you don't have even more opportunities to reject his advances.

"No, you won't."

You sound so full of conviction when you say it. Determined. Self-assured.

Idiot.

────────────

You tell yourself that you're not going to go.

You told Mr Gimbap that, too, before he left the gas station, not that he was listening.

You tell yourself it again when you're thinking about what you could wear, and then you repeat it like an oath when you're texting Yoongi to see if he can cover your shift.

It's not like you're actually going to go.

You just want to check out your options.

And yet, somehow, you find yourself sitting on a bench outside a shitty burger chain at seven-fifty-six the next evening.

You're dressed casually, in a pair of jeans and a slouchy sweater which is a few sizes too big, but you think it looks cute. It's covered by a thick puffa jacket, regardless - cropped to your hips, unlike Yoongi's mammoth calf-length one.

He told you he'd be happy to cover your shift tonight when you asked, but you still feel a little guilty.

Mainly because when he asked why, you panicked and lied, telling him it was a friend's birthday. 

You then also told yourself that you're definitely going to hell - but it's not like that's news to you. 

It's still freezing, and you're thankful that you changed out of your converse and into a pair of boots before you left your apartment. Your hair is clipped up, make up the same as it normally is, just with a little more mascara than normal. You don't want to make it look like you've actually made an effort - but you definitely have.

You're about a mile and a half from work, but you can feel that bloody door chime in your stomach, again.

Should you walk away, a little? You don't want him to see you waiting.

Appearing too keen is the least of your desires. 

Desperation isn't a good look for anyone. If anything, he should be the one waiting for you. Kind of rude that he isn't, actually. So you get up, and pace around a little, before thinking fuck it. 

You hop on the elevator and head down into Jungangno underground mall, painfully aware of your stomach doing that stupid ringing thing again. Maybe it's vertigo. From, like, the change in altitude, or some shit like that. You're almost able to convince yourself that it's plausible. Almost. 

The shops in the underground mall are a welcome distraction. Ajummas stand in dated clothing stores, offering low-quality clothes for even lower prices. It's crowded, and stuffy, but you're enjoying the distraction. You head for your favourite jewellery place, an emporium filled floor to ceiling with what must be thousands of jewellery pieces, and fumble through the racks of earrings. 

You aren't wearing any, and remember that he - Kook, though you're not entirely sure that's actually his name - wore enough to open up his own jewellery store. You settle on a simple pair, just a couple silver hoops. It's a subtle difference, but one that makes you feel a little more confident. A little more willing to awkwardly say hello, and go on a date (if you can call it that) with a guy you barely know.

Pulling your phone out, you check the time. Seven past eight. Do-able. A little late, but not so late that it's rude. You head up the stairs, and are greeted with almost the exact same scene you had left ten minutes earlier. 

Perhaps he's just running late. It's not embarrassing to be the first one waiting, not now that it's gone past the meeting time, but you can feel that ringing in your stomach begin to grate against your insides. 

It hits eight-fifteen, and you're feeling anxious. Embarrassed. Even if he does show up now, it's obvious that you've been waiting there like a tragic, desperate excuse of a woman. 

Five more minutes, you tell yourself. 

But five turns into ten, and then another fifteen, and then it's nearly nine. 

You pull out your phone and are barely able to type, thanks to how bloody cold it is.

How long until lateness turns into being stood up?

Opinions vary, but everyone on the little online forum you're reading seems to be of agreement that 45 minutes is the cut off point. 45 cold, lonely, mortifying minutes. 

You imagine he's watching you, laughing from the warmth of a cafe, with that friends-with-benefits girl you've convinced yourself is definitely real. 

God, you must look like a twat. You've been sat here for so fucking long. Your hands are numb, arse too, and you know you're gonna wake up with a cold - but none of these compare to your hurt pride. Not by a country mile.

With a sigh, you stand, admitting defeat. Being a jerk, you could get over. But this? Deliberately being cruel? You're proven right, after all. The guy is an asshole.

You hop on the 503 out of the downtown area and back towards home. The ride is lonely, city lights reflecting in your eyes as you gaze out the window and wonder at which point your life became this bleak. You work at a gas station, and got stood up by a guy who drives a fucking Pony. Mortifying.

The ding of the bus as it rolls into its stops reminds you of the chime of the gas station door - so you stay on for a few extra stops past your apartment building. 

You're gentle as you press the red button to let the driver know you'd like to get off, but there's a little more traffic than normal, so he lets you off ahead of schedule. Odd. The roads are never normally blocked, not at this time of night. 

You're only a couple hundred steps away from the bridge, but you notice the red and blue flashing lights across it almost instantly. 

Your heart sinks to your stomach, right into the pit where the chime has been grating your insides apart. Still, you keep on walking. It's only the road that's blocked. Not the path. One foot in front of the next, you keep going, until your pace begins to increase. You can see the police cars now, and where they're parked. 

Fuck the kid you barely know, fuck feeling sorry for yourself. 

All you can think about is Yoongi. 

There are four cars sitting outside your place of work, and you can hear an ambulance blast its sirens away from the gas station in an attempt to get through the crowd. 

You're gonna be sick. You can feel it - or is that just the chime resting too far up in your oesophagus, now? You ignore it though, and begin to run, faster, faster, faster, boots clicking against the pavement as you draw closer to the gas station. Your boss is there, locked in conversation with a police officer, but Yoongi is nowhere to be seen.

A cop notices you approach, grabbing onto you as you attempt to run past the tape and into the store.

"Woah, woah, woah. Calm down, little lady-"

"Where is he?" You panic, not even caring to offended by the officers choice in tone. "Min Yoongi. The guy who was working. Yoongi, where is he?"

"Who are you?" The officer counters, and you want to scream.

"Where is he?!" You struggle against his grip, kicking out, but the officer is firm. He's trained to handle situations like this; girls like you. The little but fierce. The kind of girls Shakespeare wrote about. "Where the fuck is he?"

From across the forecourt, your boss calls over. "She's one of mine. Was meant to be working this shift. Did a last minute switch with Min Yoongi."

The officer nods, understanding the situation, but not easing his grip. "In that case, I'm gonna need you to come with me to the station. Need you to answer some questions."

You stop struggling. "I- What?"

"You're not under arrest. It's voluntary, but we'll have to go to the station," he speaks calmly, straight to the point. You notice that his nose is slightly crooked. You wonder how many people have punched it. Quite a few, probably, considering that you'd quite like to do the same.

"Just go," your boss calls over, not even looking in your direction. Asshole, you seethe internally. City is full of fucking assholes.

"Where the fuck is Yoongi?!" You demand to know, this time shouting towards your boss, who looks like he's in desperate need of a cigarette. He just fucking shrugs.

"C'mon, station," the officer says, deciding that enough is enough. 

You don't know your rights. You can't fight back, not really, and you're starting to tear up, and everything feels like such a fucking mess. You just wanna know that Yoongi is safe, that he's well, that he's okay. If he's not, it's all your fault, and you don't even know how to process that. 

In fact, you don't know how to process any of this. Your cheeks are wet before you're even sitting in the back of the police car. The engine rumbles, and before you know it, you're back downtown, but this time you're at the city's main police office. 

It's hard to comprehend anything. You practically feel like you're dragged from the car and then dumped in the witness interrogation room. Some rookie cop is asking you questions, and you find yourself not wanting to answer a single one of them.

They're stupid fucking questions, for starters. Dumb shit.

Why did you switch your shift? Were you aware of a planned hold up at your place of work? Is that why you swapped? Who were you going on a date with? Why did you lie to Min Yoongi about your activities this evening? How do you not know the name of your date? Says on your file that you legally changed your name six years ago? Why? Anyone know of your family ties to politics? 

Dumb questions reap dumb answers though, so once they realise they're getting nothing of any substance from you, they admit defeat. Tell you they'll be in touch if they need to follow up.

And then, after they've watched you cry for an hour and half over Yoongi, they tell you he's fine. Came in for routine questioning, but was released without charge (obviously) and drove back. 

He's waiting for you in the lobby. 

That temptation to break the officer's nose? Yeah. Intensifies. 

"God, you fucking idiot," Yoongi speaks softly as you come into view, face all red and puffy from tears cried over him. He pulls you into his chest, and you can hear his heart thud, thud, thud, against your head. "Why did you go to work? Shouldda just gone home."

He calls you an idiot again, and you sniffle into his chest. There's a comforting scent to his clothes, a mix of gasoline and cotton, and it makes you feel a little calmer. 

You pull away, and inspect his face. There's a small graze on his cheekbone, which is beginning to bruise, and a little dried blood crusting around his nostrils. Other than that, he seems okay. 

He's silent as your fingers trace the pink flesh of his cheeks, lips resting a little ajar, unsure. Uncertain. He doesn't know what to make of such an outward display of concern - so he simply brushes it off. 

"I'm fine, trouble," he promises, bringing his hands up to clasp your wrists and stop your hands from roaming. Doesn't wanna stop you. Not really. Just knows that he should. "C'mon, let's get you home."

And it's ridiculous, 'cause Yoongi was the one who had been held at knifepoint by three men that evening, the tills forcefully emptied and his life threatened if he didn't tell them where 'the girl' was. 

He doesn't tell you that last part when he tells you what happened, though. Doesn't want to scare you. He's scared enough, himself.

It replays in his head, the way the guy with the knife doubled-down when Yoongi said he had no clue where you were. The clatter of the knife against the counter, the hands that tangled in his hair and slammed his face against the surface... yeah, they weren't memories he'd be forgetting any time soon.

Yoongi has few regrets in life, but taking the perspex screen down at the beginning of his shift to clean it definitely makes the list.

A conversation plays on loop, though, which scares him more than anything else. 

"You said she'd be here. She ain't fuckin' here!" "Well she normally is. You know I've been keeping watch for weeks-" "Not hard enough." "Oh fuck you, you do it next time, prick." 

Doesn't take a genius to work it out - and Yoongi's pretty smart, regardless. For whatever reason, they'd been hoping you'd be on shift.

"Do me a favour?" Yoongi asks as he rolls his car into your neighbourhood. He only lives around the corner from you, but it's too far, he thinks. 

"Mhmm?"

"Kind of feel a bit..." he pauses, but doesn't elaborate. He doesn't need to. You already know. "Don't really wanna be alone."

"Stay at mine," you offer, straight off the bat, not giving it a second thought.

He shakes his head. Makes some excuse about your place being small. Avoids mentioning the fact he's scared that someones keeping tabs on you. 

"I've got a spare room," he adds. "Makes more sense."

You'd be forgiven for thinking this is just another sign that the poor boy is helplessly infatuated with you. He knows he isn't really all that inconspicuous, but he also knows that the pair of you would never work. He just can't seem to help himself.

And so you end up in his bed, while he takes the pull out sofa in his spare room, because he's far too much of a gent to make you sleep on something so crappy. He leaves the heater on in your room, because you're always complaining about the cold, and tells you not to worry when you pout and mention the fact it will hike his heating bill. It's a small price to pay. 

"All the money I've saved when you refuse taxis can go on the heater, instead."

Still, you click it off as soon as you're confident Yoongi won't be back in to check on you.

In the morning, when his hair is all fluffy and cheeks puffy from a crappy sleep, he orders breakfast and double-checks that you're okay to work the shift you're scheduled on for. You remind him that he was the one held at knifepoint. Not you.

You're not surprised to learn that Yoongi thinks two iced americanos and half a bagel each qualifies as 'breakfast', but you appreciate it nonetheless. 

"I can cover, if needs be," he rambles, bagel in one hand, americano in the other, while you watch on with a smile. His cheek has bruised rather spectacularly, and you wonder if it aches as much as your heart does. "Boss gave me a couple days off, but I don't love the idea of you being there alone-"

The guilt of asking him to cover the night before is eating you alive. You don't think you'll ever ask him to cover for you again. Karma will catch up with you, you're sure, but for now, you'll be your own Saturn. 

"I'll be fine," you smile. "Lightning never strikes twice." 

────────────

When Jungkook drives, he drives alone. 

No music, no radio, just him and the open road. He likes to hear the way the tarmac sounds beneath his tyres, and how the engine purrs a little louder when he steps on the gas. It's therapy in a way - though, with the amount that he spends on gas, he's pretty certain that an actual therapist would probably be cheaper.

The roads are empty, morning sun breaking beyond the mountains that line Daegu, as he makes his way past the bridge over the river, and out towards Kang's. There's a boxing studio next door, owned by Old Man Kang himself, a little decrepit and definitely not the kind of place you end up by chance. 

It's the kind of place that's bestowed upon those who need it; the people looking for a home. A family. A cult, some like to joke, though Jungkook thinks they're half right. For him, it's somewhere to hide when the world gets too invasive; a shadow in the spotlight. 

Old Man Kang's boxing club is a shit hole, when Jungkook looks at it objectively. Wires hang from the ceiling, and the walls have needed a paint ever since he'd first stepped foot into the place six years ago. He thinks about doing it sometimes, just showing up early before anyone else arrives, with a can of white emulsion from Daiso and a few brushes. Never does it, though. Would be a thankless job. Old Man Kang probably wouldn't even notice. 

And if he did? He'd probably make Jungkook pay for 'defacing his property.' 

As he pulls his car into the forecourt, parking up by the air compressors, Jungkook sighs. He isn't expecting anyone else to be here so early, but he's having trouble sleeping. Pulling down on his sun visor, he's rough as he slides the mirror cover across to study his face.

He's not looking too bad - lip a little split, but alright, all things considered. Could have been a lot worse. Namjoon has a mean left hook, after all.

His thumb presses down on the buckle of his seatbelt, releasing it as he reaches over for his duffle bag in the footwell of his passenger seat. There's a clink as he does so, half a dozen bottles of soju ready to be transferred into the fridge by the entrance to the locker room. It's a free for all, used by all the members of the boxing club, but no one ever knows who actually stocks it up. It just kind of... replenishes. Like Christmas presents, or coins under pillows in place of lost teeth.

Admittedly, Jungkook never used to know, either. He still doesn't know who stocks up the waters. He knows who stocks the soju, though. Or at least, he's known for the last few weeks, now.

Where else is he gonna put all the bottles he buys from your store? It's not like he ever drinks them. He just needs an excuse to visit so frequently. 

"You're early," a voice says from the back entrance, as Jungkook is shuffling around with the bottles. The fridge light hums, illuminating his face, as he lets his perfectionism take priority when arranging the bottles. He doesn't turn to look, knowing the tone by heart.

"So are you, Minnie."

Minnie by name, mini by nature, Park Jimin is a 5'7 (though he swears blind he's 5'9 with shoes on) force to be reckoned with. He likes to get to the club early, before his shifts at the fishmongers. It gets his blood pumping, ready for a day of hacking away at marine carcases. 

"I'm always early," he teases, as he tosses his bag on an old wicker chair in the corner of the room. 

It's a large space - a disused rice store that was repurposed in the 80's, and taken over by Old Man Kang after the last owner gambled it away during a back alley game of poker. A large square ring is in the middle, red ropes a little tatty, but still usable. There are a few machines dotted around the corners of the room, but most people opt to use the plethora of punching bags hung up by the far wall.

Jungkook smiles softly as he begins to wrap his hands up. He's dressed down in just a black t-shirt and a pair of grey sweats. They're tapered towards his ankles, where they meet his beat-up black high tops. His laces are pulled tight, wrapped around the classic star logo, and tied in hasty bows on the back of his ankles. Double knotted, as always. "Couldn't sleep."

For how much of a liar he is, Jungkook is always honest with Jimin. 

Well. Nearly always.

Jimin heads for the far corner, where a skipping rope is strung up on a rusty nail embedded into the wall. He nods, figuring as much. "Joon isn't happy."

Jungkook rolls his eyes as he stretches out his back. He couldn't give a fuck if Namjoon is happy or not, especially not after-

"You should talk to him."

Squaring up to the coffee-brown punching bag, Jungkook knocks his head to the side. His jaw clenches as he gently presses against the leather to get a feel for the weight. He bounces, left, right, and then throws a punch. The smack of his hand against the weighted bag echoes into the room.

"Or not," Jimin adds, sensing that Jungkook is in no mood to talk to anyone - and definitely not Namjoon.

Unsolicited advice is never received well by Jungkook. If he wants it, he'll ask for it. Jimin knows this.

There's an art to the way his body moves, recoiling a little with every punch thrown until he disciplines himself. Back broad and triangular, calves strong and tense, it's clear to see that Jungkook can defend his own. If he had wanted to fight back against Namjoon, he could have. 

But Jungkook is a man of honour. Integrity. Respect. He'd never fight against Namjoon, no matter how much he disagreed with him - so instead, he takes it out on a punching bag that is so old it may as well be an antique. The echo of his assault against the leather rings in his ears like a warning bell. A siren. A chime. 

It's funny, 'cause a few roads over - just past the bridge and down the lane  - there's a ringing in your ears too. 

For you, it actually is a chime - the one of the gas station door, and it's a scathing reminder of how badly you fucked up by asking Yoongi to cover your shift.

You spend your morning lamenting, hypothesising. You're so busy thinking about the stupid boy who drives that god-awful red car, that you don't even bother making assumptions about other customers.

They're all about him. Where he was, who he was with. Why he did what he did. 

You decide that he grew up in a single-parent household. He's already mentioned his late mother, and suggested that she influenced his need to apologise, so a father figure didn't really seem to fit the profile you have of him. 

He wears so much black because he's scared of having an actual personality. Scared that it makes him vulnerable. Or so you assume. In fact, you decide that 'scared' is the best way to describe him. 

A scaredy-cat. A chicken. A pussy. No balls. 

After all, he was too scared to show up, and didn't even have the bottle to find a way to let you know. Did he have your number? No - but perhaps that was deliberate on his part, too.

Your final assessment of his character comes in the form of his FWB (turned far-too-clingy lover). If she's real, which again, you've decided she is, then you don't think it's her fault that she's developed an unhealthy dependency on him. He seems to be the type to lift others up, only to drag them back down with him.

Enough thoughts about him, though. 

If you're not worthy of his time, then why should he be worthy of yours?

The next few days are spent in a subliminal haze; body moving, mind still. It's Wednesday before you know it.

Jieun is on shift with you, after she complained about not wanting to work alone following the raid. You told her that no one would be stupid enough to rush the place again so soon after the first time, but she's having none of it.

"We don't get paid enough to put our lives at risk," she states whenever the topic of conversation is mentioned. And she's right - you don't.

But as you look at the grainy CCTV footage still-image that's taped up above the counter, you can't help but think they wouldn't have actually killed either you or Jieun. Realistically, they barely left a scratch on Yoongi. Physically, at least. Mentally, he's a little more wounded. 

There had been three of them; two rather tall, the third shorter. About Yoongi's height, you guess. Dressed in all black, it's hard to really distinguish any features or their bodies, let alone their faces, which had been covered in ski masks. Run of the mill robbers. The kind you see in crappy action films. Background characters. Just a way to move the plot along, no real personalities, no actual significance to the lives of the protagonists, other than causing a mild inconvenience.

You don't even realise when you're making assumptions, these days.  You think in hypothesis more often than not.

The thieves had run off on foot and down the back alley behind the shop, which is where the trail to find them ends. The CCTV for the alley has been out for months. The boss didn't deem it a necessary investment - "Well, we'd never been robbed before!" - so it had fallen to the bottom of his priority list. The issue with the back alley is that it leads to an underpass with so many blind spots that it's easy - almost too easy - to slip into nothingness. 

It's when you're staring at them, thinking about the assumptions you could make for your mystery men of misdemeanours, that the door chimes. 

You don't ignore it, anymore. The raid has spooked you. So you look towards it, and are met with the sight a broad back. The shoulders, strong and well-defined, are covered in a brown flannel shirt. It's tucked into a pair of jeans, that cling to the contours of the customer's legs. He's not wearing a coat - just hopped out of his car, where the aircon is keeping him toasty - and you realise you recognise his posture. 

The mop of bleached hair is pretty damn recognisable, too. 

"Jieun," you hiss quietly, drawing her attention from the stock she's counting in front of the kiosk. She glances towards you, eyes startled by your tone. You beckon your head back, and she scurries over to you.

"Can you man the till?"

She looks confused for a second. "Why?"

"Girl issues," you lie, knowing she won't be able to say no. "Just came on my period. Need to, yanno-"

"Go, go, go," she nods, hurrying behind the counter, ushering you away and towards the staff room door. 

As you leave, you glance to the curved mirror in the far corner; the one that only you look in. It's your second pair of eyes - but you find another pair staring back at you. It's brief, and his gaze drops as soon as he sees you focus on him, blonde hair covering his dark eyes from your view. He's looking at the gimbap again, now.  Pretending like he never saw you.

Good, you think. Fuck off. 

It's been three days since he stood you up; three days since you jeopardised one of your best friends lives to see him, only for him to be M.I.A. You don't know the kid, not really. Why waste any more of your time on him?

You stay in the bathroom for upwards of five minutes. Just enough time for him to leave. Jieun must be wondering what you're doing, but you'll just explain it away.

You're quite good at that. Lying. Just little ones, white lies. Porkies. Fibs. Never anything that will harm another person, just things that will protect you instead. 

"Who's the blonde dude?" Jieun asks when you return. You furrow your brows and play dumb. "The one with the brow piercing," she adds, as if you need any clarification. Blonde dudes aren't really the norm around these parts. He sticks out like a sore fucking thumb. "Tattoos."

"Dunno," you say with a smile. It's the same one that laces all of your little lies.

For once, Jieun looks at you, her thick brows hard and poised, as if she knows you're lying. 

And then she nods towards the counter, where a peach tea and a cup of ice sits. "Left this for you."

"Hmm," you purr. "Must think I'm someone I'm not."

Yeah, you think scornfully. Must think I'm an idiot.

It worked as an apology once before - but it's a pattern of behaviour, now. He's a leopard, spots unchanged as he runs away from the consequences of his actions, suffocating you in the dust clouds he leaves behind.

"He's cute," Jieun muses.

"No," you smile. It's the same one. That little one full of lies. "He's not."

────────────

The peach tea sits on the counter by the till for two days. It's tucked behind a box of pocket money candies, which are waiting to be restocked; hidden in such a way so that only you know it's there.

Y'see, you've been making assumptions again - though you wouldn't really call this one an assumption. It's acceptance of a habit that's been proven: he will return.

He always does, it seems. 

And sure enough, that afternoon, two days after you'd last been graced with his presence, he returns.

Jieun spots him first, eyes darting immediately towards yours. You're like a deer in headlights, ready to bolt - but she doesn't let you.

"Gotta go," she squeaks, before mouthing 'girl issues' to you, with a smile she reserves moments like these; her little victories. 

He does his usual rounds, and you're already mentally ringing it up: a bottle of soju, and a tuna gimbap roll. You glance out to the forecourt, towards pump six - but it's empty. Not a single car in sight, let alone his trusty red pony. You're confused. Brows furrowed, nostrils a little flared. Lips pouty. You big baby. 

When he eventually comes to the kiosk, it takes all of your strength not to ask, 'why the fuck are you here?'

And just like all of your assumptions about him, you're wrong. Again. 

No soju, no gimbap. Banana milk and bibimyun ramyeon, instead. A great combination by all accounts, but you're not gonna give him the satisfaction of letting him know you think his choice is elite. 

As far as you're concerned, he can take his banana milk and shove it up his ass.

Frustratingly, he appears to find amusement in your outward expression of annoyance. There seems to be a small grin on his face, cheeks appled beneath his mask, as if he's not aware that it's painfully awkward between the pair of you.  

He has no manners, you decide. No spine. No awareness of social cues, either. A triple whammy. What a catch.

But you believe that silence is a virtue, so you say nothing as you ring up his items. You don't even tell him his total - just nod towards the card machine. He follows your line of sight, watching the machine light up for a moment, before putting his card in the slot. 

While he does so, you reach for the peach tea and add it to his stockpile. 

"You forgot your drink again."

He looks at the pouch of tea, then up towards you. And then he repeats it, several times.

"Ouch," he says, ending his declaration of pain with a small laugh. You've got half a mind to rip the pouch open and pour it all over his shitty flannel shirt. It's blue today, paired with sweats, because apparently that's fashionable? 

Boy looks like he got dressed in the dark, you think scornfully - but really, you're just annoyed with how hot you think he looks. Unreasonably hot. He's the bloody Sahara storming through Daegu's coldest winter. He's melting the river, leaving everyone wet in the process. 

Or maybe not. Maybe just you-

"What's the grin for?" he teases, and you realise that you've been paying too much attention to your thoughts.

"No grin," you snap, face flushed.

"Service with a smile, as always."

"Your transaction is done," you say, this time smiling as if butter wouldn't melt. "You can leave, now."

He holds up his pot of ramyeon and shrugs, before glancing over to the food station, where the hot water and microwaves are waiting for him. "Actually, I think I'm just gonna eat here."

Without even so much as a glance back towards you, the asshole picks up a pair of chopsticks, wrapped in thin paper, and heads towards the food station. You're in a state of disbelief. Entitled prick.

Jieun returns almost as soon as he's left the counter. She still doesn't have a clue about whatever's happened between the pair of you, but she did see you hiding up the peach tea a couple of days ago, so she figured it was something. 

"You gonna take it to him?" she asks, nodding down towards the tea, which he's left at the counter, again.

"No."

"Take him the tea."

"No."

"Take it."

"No.

"Fine," she huffs. "If you don't, I will-"

"Fine!" you whisper, though it's definitely a shout. You might not want anything to do with him, but you also don't want to watch him work his charms on Jieun. For her benefit. Not yours. Definitely not because you don't want to see him flirting with her instead.

Him, with his stupid tattoos, and dumb blonde hair, and annoying smile and-

"Go," she grins. 

"Just... give me a minute."

You watch as he fills up his ramyeon bowl, hot air steaming around the jet of water. It's been a while since you ate, and you're a little jealous. Your break isn't for another few hours yet, though, so smelling his food throughout the store will be torture. Asshole.

He sits down, and Jieun pesters you a little more, but you're trying to wait it out. If a customer comes in, then you can just deal with them instead - but the forecourt is empty, just like it always is at this awkward time of day. After lunch, but before the end of school. This is the real ghost shift of a gas station - after midnight is when it comes alive. 

Admittedly, it was a little too lively the night of the raid. You make a mental note to text Yoongi on your break, just to check-in, and then you glare at Jieun and her shit-eating grin, before heading towards gimbap-less Mr Gimbap. 

Tossing the bag down onto the cheap plastic table, you're indifferent as you speak. "Like I said. This is yours."

"Is it?" he asks, unpierced brow raised. "Doesn't look like mine."

"Well, it is," you say, clearly fed up with him. "And just while we're talking - where's your car?"

His eyes narrow ever so briefly. Almost like he knows you're onto him. For what? No clue. But something.

"Taillights out. Just needs a repair."

You nod. Seems plausible. At least he sticks to the highway code - even if he does break it after the clock strikes twelve every other weekend. 

You're not quite sure what to make of him as he looks at you, eyes only lingering for long enough to let you know that there's something he's not telling you. 

The air quality isn't bad today. There's no need for him to be wearing a mask, but he's hiding. From you? From something else? You can't work him out.

Perhaps it's shame. 

After all, this is a boy who came and apologised to you for being a little bit mean in the heat of the moment. Being deliberately cruel doesn't really seem like his motive, no matter how cold his demeanour is.

And so, instead of just letting your assumptions fester, you voice them.

"You're hiding something." 

You're met with silence. 

"Behind that mask," you clarify, before repeating yourself. "You're hiding something."

He looks at you for a moment, before dropping your gaze, and glancing towards the door. 

Thinking about making a run for it, you lament internally - but he's not. He just doesn't like how sometimes - just sometimes - your assumptions are entirely correct.

He lifts his ringed index finger to his ear, unhooking the thin black elastic that keeps his mask in place, before letting it fall. His skin is clammy beneath it from the heat of his breath, and the chill of the winter breeze outside, but your eyes fall to his bottom lip. 

It's split, the centre crease darker than the soft pink flesh around it. There's a bruise beneath it, still tender and sore. You don't mean to, but you gasp at the sight of it. It's no worse than Yoongi's graze, the placement makes it so much more bothersome.

Uncomfortable with the way you're looking at him - like you feel sorry for him - he hooks his mask back up again. 

"Happy now?" he asks, knowing that you just love to be proven right.

You scoff, a little offended. "Obviously not. What happened?" You take the seat opposite his. "Are you okay?"

"Nothing happened," he lies, avoiding your eyes as he does so. It's funny how you haven't noticed that little trait of his yet. You will. Just not yet. "I'm fine."

"You're quite clearly not fine."

"Quite clearly am," he bickers, before nodding to the food on the table. "Just hungry."

Ouch. You're just trying to make sure he's okay, but if he wants to be hostile again, then fine. No skin off your back. 

You nod, looking away. It's awkward, and when the bell chimes to indicate another customer entering the shop, you find your stomach lurching. 

Still, he toys with the softening noodles in their pot, as if they're the most fascinating things in the world. 

This isn't how he wanted this conversation to go. Hell, he doesn't even know what the outcome should be. He's just feeling uneasy, as if he's making all the wrong choices.

"I heard about the raid."

You nod. It's been on all the local radio stations. Thankfully Yoongi is the only employee being name-checked. You aren't ready to give up your own personal paradise just yet, which is exactly what will happen the second your family gets notice of where you're spending your days.

"Yeah, me too," you deadpan. It's a fault of yours, giving back the same energy you receive, unable to just suck things up and be nice all the time.

Thankfully, he smiles. You kind of expected that he would. He seems to get you, get your humour. It's something you both share, like a little secret. A smile rests on his lips as he glances up towards you, like he's a school kid trying not to giggle in class.

And then you find yourself making assumptions again. You wonder what he would have been like in school, if he would have been just as charming. You bet that he was the kind of kid who could get away with murder in class. All he'd have to do was flash those of eyes of his, and he'd be off the hook.

Sort of like how he does with you. Why else would you be giving him the time of day after he stood you up?

"Oh really?" He entertains your attitude."What did you hear?"

You lean against the table, a little bit provocative, but only 'cause his tone of voice matched it. "Heard that I'm lucky some prick asked me out, even if he did leave me waiting for hours in the dark."

His smile falters a little, but only for a fraction of a second. He likes the flirt; doesn't like the acknowledgement of what he did. "Hours?"

"Nah," you scrunch your nose up, and sit up straight again. You're still smiling, to let him know that you're feeling fine about it, now. "Didn't stick around for that long. What?" You laugh when he raises a brow, and begin to tell white lies. He'll see through them, but you want him to. "You think I don't have other eligible bachelors lining up, trying to take me on dates?"

He shrugs, and you can tell that he's pouting a little behind his mask. "I'm still the one you skived off work for, am I not?"

"That's neither here nor there."

"Yeah, it is," he speaks softly, leaning forward on the table. Closer. "What time do you clock off today? I wanna talk. Properly."

"Are we not talking properly now?" You say, unable to resist being difficult. It takes everything within his power not to roll those pretty eyes of his - but you're grinning, and he finds himself doing the same back. His mouth may be covered by his mask, but you can still tell.

He thinks about his response for a moment. If he's being honest, he wants to make some crude remark; tell you that he wants to get you talking just so he can think of ways to shut you up. You're not at that level yet, though. Coming on strong is unfavoured by him, so he opts for something a little cooler.

"We're talking about talking," he reminds you, picking up the pot up and leaning over to the sink by the food station to drain the excess water. "I wanna talk about... well, anything else."

You purse your lips, folding your arms across your chest. There's part of you that really wants to say no, to tell him to go fuck himself. But there's a teeny tiny part of you that wants to say-

"Nine. I'm off at nine."

"Nine," he nods. "I'll be here."

"Sure you will," you tease.

"I will."

"Yeah, yeah. Course. You're really good at that." You're nodding enthusiastically, a stupid smile on your face, eyes all wide as if you couldn't be more naive. You can tell he's smiling again, and it's like that door chime in your stomach is bloody broken. "Yanno, the whole showing up when you say you will, thing."

"Shut up," he laughs, but it catches in his throat like a low growl. "I'll be here, but not if you keep being a little bitch."

Your teeth cushion themselves on your bottom lip, and you nod. "See you at nine... Kook?" You question, realising that you're yet to actually ask his name.

"Jungkook. But Kook works, too. Just depends on how well acquainted you're planning on getting."

He doesn't give you a chance to reply, simply standing as he pushes the pot of noodles over to you. "Eat up. You look hungry."

Turning on his heel, he heads for the door. 

The bell chimes, and it's like it's harmonising with the feeling in your stomach.

You prod around at the noodles, and sigh, posture defeated. This is not good.

────────────

The rest of your shift trudges on. It's slow, the hands of the clock seemingly frozen - until, suddenly, it's nine.

"You're late," Jungkook greets you, perched on a bollard by the side of the forecourt. He's wearing a coat, now, wrapped up a little warmer than he had been earlier. His sweats have been traded for jeans, but he's still in that big blue flannel shirt. You like it. 

And he's not wrong - cashing up your till took a little longer than normal, thanks to an old note that wouldn't read properly in the sorter. Just another thing your boss refuses to upgrade.

"At least I'm here," you quip back.

"Touché." He holds out his arm, almost as if he expects you to link yours with his. "Shall we?"

You look at his arm, then up towards him. And then you repeat it, letting out a soft laugh, not accepting his arm, instead turning to walk in the direction of home. "C'mon," you call back. "You walking me home or not?"

It's his turn to laugh now as he ups his pace to catch up with you. "Not."

"Not?"

"Not," he repeats, seemingly unable to say anything else - until, of course, he does. "My cars around the corner. Wanna go for a drive?"

"Sorted the taillight?" You ask, curious, figuring that it would have been at Kang's overnight.

Jungkook hums a response, not really saying yes or no, but as you turn the corner and it comes into vision, you can see that his taillights seem fine - not that you can really judge. A car as old as his doesn't come with central locking systems, so it's not like you'll see the lights flash as it-

Oh. Nevermind.

There's a beep, and the car flashes in front of you, mocking those damn assumptions of yours.

"Since when do Pony's have electric locks?" You ask defensively, almost as a reflex for having your assumptions disproven.

"Since I decided to install them," he says, as if it's the simplest job in the world. You've heard Yoongi mutter 'bastard locks' enough times to know otherwise.

"Kang's must make a killing from you," you joke as he nods towards the passenger side, indicating for you to get in.

"Kang's don't make shit from me when it comes to the wires."

You wait for him to pop his door open before you do the same. The interior is leather, all black, and is cold to the touch as you get in. The windscreen begins to fog almost instantly, the minimal heat you're letting off proving just how cold it's been getting lately. 

It's curious, you think. There should be a little heat left in the car from his drive to meet you.

"No?" you question, choosing to ignore the temperature of the car. It's below zero, you rationalise. Of course it cooled quickly.

"No," he shakes his head, turning the key in the ignition.

The car rumbles - purrs - softly. You can tell he's listening to the engine, making sure that it sounds okay before he sets off. Standard old car problems. Running gas through the motor before it warms up only causes issues.

Like his locking system, you notice that the stereo isn't exactly true to the era in which the car was built (even if the lack of insulation is). It's got an aux cord hanging from the headphone jack, which he picks up and places in your lap. "Don't put anything shit on."

He avoids clarifying your question, and it annoys you - so you choose to be direct about it, not plugging your phone in at all. If he doesn't want to listen to shit music, he should be a more specific.

You're stewing, clearly irritated, but you're also casually enamoured, watching him as he carefully observes the dashboard, checking the revs, trying to heat the car up a little.

"Just the electrics? What about everything else?"

He doesn't look your way as he replies. "Just the electrics. Put your seatbelt on."

"Why?"

He's still not looking at you. "'Cause if I crash, you'll go straight through the windshield."

"Not the seatbelt," you reply, though he's got a point. You haven't clicked it into its buckle yet. Nor has he, though. "The electrics."

Still. Not. Looking. At. You.

It's not even like it's an important question. You couldn't give a flying fuck about his shitty car's electrics. You just don't like that he's deliberately avoiding answering something so simple, as if you're asking him how old he was when he lost his virginity.

Eventually, he cracks. It's as he's sliding his seatbelt down, the smooth noise of  fabric scruffing against plastic filling the car. He's bargaining - hopes that if he does his belt up, then you will too. 

Then again, he knows that you're difficult, and that you'll probably use it as a bargaining tool. You won't do it up until he gives you an answer.

"Electrician by trade," he says with a little sigh, before turning to face you finally. "Happy?"

You don't want to say yes - but you are. You're smug in the knowledge that you know just as much about him now as he does you.

"By trade?" You push a little further as your buckle clicks into place.

"By trade," he answers, in that annoying way he so often does, not really giving you an answer, just confirming what you already know. "I'm in between jobs at the moment."

"Ah," you smile, finally putting the aux into your phone. The windows are beginning to clear. "That explains why you're always in the garage at such weird hours."

It doesn't. There's an entirely different explanation for that. Not one that he'll give, though.

He hums a response, not wanting to tell more lies. He knocks the car into first, and lets the handbrake down, easing the car into motion as it rolls gently from the curb and into the road. 

It's at this point you realise you're in the car with a near-stranger, and that it's probably the dumbest thing you've done in a while. You're smarter than this. Been raised better.

Jungkook smiles at your statement, though. "You ever stop making assumptions?"

A laugh falters in the back of your throat. "No," you muse. "I don't think I do."

His palm rests on the gear stick, thigh pressing down against his seat as he dips the clutch. There's a simple joy to be found in watching his movements like this, as if you're getting to see something reserved for very few people. He's smiling as he knocks it into second gear. Smiles a lot around you, actually. 

Perhaps he's just like this all the time. Naturally light natured, despite the dark clothes and even darker eyes.

"Tell me mine," he says as the car moves from the slightly beat up side road, towards the main street that leads up to the bridge. There's a change in pressure beneath the tyres, the new road far smoother, far easier, than the one you'd been on previously. "Your assumptions. I wanna hear them."

"I can't," you reply, as if they're some closely guarded secret. In a way, they are. You've built up this idea of Jungkook; of who he is, who he associates with, what he does in the dark.

If he confirms or denies a single one of these assumptions, then it could all be in tatters.

"Can't? Or don't want to?"

You watch his hands as he flicks on an indicator. There's no one else on the road. Seems redundant. It's interesting, though, how he seems to care about the rules of the road now that you're in the passenger seat.

"Why can't it be both?"

And just like that, you're going round in circles again. Always talking, but never quite saying anything. It's a strange little dance you like to do, one that you don't know the steps to, but seem to get right anyway.

He uses the palm of his hand to turn the wheel, back on the bridge now. It's less icy today, but you find your heart resting in your chest just like it did the first time you were here with him. He glances over to you, but you keep your eyes straight ahead.

"I'm sorry," he says quietly. "About that time. When we were here, yanno?"

You nod. It's a weird thing to think about. You could have died. Came pretty fucking close to it - and yet all that really lingers in your mind from that night is the way he stared you down.

"Mhmm," you press your lips together, and cross your legs.

He doesn't like it. The way your body sort of angles away from his. It's cold. Cruel, almost.

So he lifts his hand from the gear stick and taps your knee. A request, not a demand. He's gentle as he nudges, encouraging your legs to unhook, until they're back in their original position. You just kind of let him. Neither of you say anything, but there's an awareness that he doesn't want you to close off from him.

Your arms move instead, without much thought, crossing over themselves.

"Don't."

The silence is so loud you think the windows might shatter.

"Please," he follows it up, then decides that he needs something to fill the void that you're leaving in the conversation. "Put some music on," he says, before backtracking on his earlier statement. "I don't mind if it's shit."

It earns a small smile from you, an exhale from your nose letting him know that you find humour in his words.

You unlock your phone and head to spotify, confronted with more playlists than you know what to do with, and settle on the one you use when Yoongi lets you control the music in his car. It's pretty inoffensive, you think. Nothing too shit. No noughties classics, at least, though there are a couple from the 80's. If he complains, you'll just remind him of how old his car is.

"So what's the deal?"

The fact you only start talking as he exits the bridge isn't lost on Jungkook.

"No deal," he replies just as casually as you asked.

"Well you aren't taking me home," you muse, glancing over to him. There's a smile on his face. Dimples present. "And I'm hoping that you're not chauffeuring me to a date with the Grim Reaper - so where are we going?"

"We-" He turns to face you, now. Just briefly. Just a glance with a smile that has a chime sounding in your tummy again. "-are heading into town. I don't think the Grim Reaper's gonna be there, but you never know with that dude. Always showing up at the worst of times."

"Mm," you agree with a small laugh. "His social skills are atrocious."

"You give him a run for his money, yanno," Jungkook teases you.

It's reflex, more than anything, that has you swatting at his shoulder. The fabric of his shirt is soft, and there's a waft of his aftershave as you draw your hand back to your lap. Oaky. Mature. Probably more than he seems to be.

"My social skills are fine. You're just shitty company."

"Me?!" He sounds affronted now, but there's a grin plastered all over his pretty little face. "Sorry, little miss clutch control. Forgot you were queen of making casual conversation."

"Uh-huh," you say as you shift in your seat, body angled towards his. The smile on his face grows. There's one on yours too. A pretty fuckin' big one, at that. "That's why they hired me. Could see I'd be great with the customers."

He snorts, crown of his head tipping against the back of his seat. "Oh, yeah?"

You hum an affirmation, and Jungkook looks towards you briefly, chin lifted, eyes narrow, curious of what you'll say next. 

"Well, I seem to have done alright with one of the customers, at least."

His teeth begin to show as he looks towards the road again. "Poor fucker. I'd hate to be him."

And then you're both laughing. 

It's how it remains for the rest of the evening. 

You're laughing when he parks in the furthest corner of the lot, just to make sure no one scrapes his paintwork. You're laughing when he can't figure out the QR code for the automatic parking fee, and you're laughing when he tells you to fuck off for laughing. 

But he's laughing too. 

Laughs when you can't figure out the apron in the dakgalbi place off the side of the main shopping street, and laughs when the middle-aged lady running the shop comes to help you out. Jungkook had refused. He was enjoying the struggle too much.

See, your cheeks go all red when you get flustered. He's never seen that look on you before. You get a similar look once you realise the spice of the galbi is a little hotter than what you're used to, and you get it again after you've had a few shots of soju.

He matches you, shot for shot, but also makes sure to keep filling up your stainless steel water cup. In fact, he fills it more than he fills his own.

Unlike you, and your perceived ability to judge characters, Jungkook actually can read people pretty well. He knows his limits, and he's guessing at yours, but doing a good job doing so.

It's not until Jungkook's paying that you realise just how many bottles the pair of you have gotten through. You're steady on your feet, but you can feel the alcohol in your system, and know that he must be the same.

"How we getting home?" You ask, as the chime of the door rings behind you. Within seconds you're pulling your arms over your chest, trying to preserve heat. You fucking hate January.

"C'mon," he mumbles, looping his arm around your shoulders, rubbing at the side of it quickly to build up some heat. He's all hunched up too, clearly feeling the cold. "Taxi? I can pick my car up in the morning."

It's gone twelve on a week night. You both know there's no way in hell you'll be able to score a taxi, not without a 45 minute wait, at least. The curse of downtown Daegu. Should have just gone to eat in your neighbourhood, but Jungkook felt like he had a point to prove. He wanted to make it up to you. Properly.

You drop Yoongi a text as you load up your taxi app, just checking in, letting him know that you're all good. He replies pretty much instantly, but you're distracted by Jungkook letting you know that his app says no cabs are available.

"Shit," you hiss, bouncing around on the balls of your feet, trying to keep warm.

Jungkook weighs up his options. On the one hand, he knows he needs to get you home. On the other, you're hopping around like a fucking bunny. It's borderline cruel to keep you out in the cold like this. Especially when his place is only a ten minute walk away, in the heart of town, compared to your hour long trek back to the outskirts.

"My place isn't too far."

The suggestion is out of his mouth before he knows any better. He's getting himself in too deep already. All it's taken is a couple weeks of awkward flirting across a gas station kiosk and exactly one (1) shared dakgalbi. Maybe the 6 bottles of soju didn't help.

"You can wait it out in the warm for a taxi, at least," he adds on, before realising that you're both as tipsy as one another. Both hovering a little too close to one another. Both feeling that weird pull, of which he's telling himself to ignore, but he just can't seem to help himself.

He's a simple man, of simple pleasures - and sex is the most simple of them all.

If he wants it, then you probably do, too.

Might do, he corrects himself. Best not to make assumptions about things like these.

"Wait it out," you nod, a little grin resting on your lips. They're a little plumper than normal, partially thanks to the galbi spice, but also thanks to the you've been biting down on them all evening. It's okay, though. Jungkook's lips are just as bad. All plump and pretty and - fuck. You know you're staring but it's kind of hard not to.

He knocks his head to the side and holds out his hand for you to take. "C'mon. I'm this way."

And so you do take it. Fingers neatly linking between his, hooking on and holding close as if it isn't the first time that it's happening. It's been so long since you did this with another person that you're almost not sure you're doing it right. His grip adjusts, and then his other hand reaches behind your shoulders to prop the hood of your jacket over your hair.

"For the wind," he says. 

Definitely not so that the pair of you are a little more incognito. 

It's why he puts his hood up, too... For the wind. 

After all, he's not hiding behind his mask like he was earlier. Not hiding from you. 

But he's hiding from something.

And you should be, too.

────────────

minors dni // posted to wp late 2021 // series masterlist

[tgmsunmontue]

Season to Taste - 27/? WIP

Explicit Hangster - Celebrity Chef Bradley and Naval Aviator Jake Seresin who have a relationship spanning the globe before they realize how tightly bound they are to one another. Heading into this little world.

PROLOGUE/ONE TWO THREE FOUR FIVE SIX SEVEN EIGHT NINE TEN ELEVEN TWELVE THIRTEEN FORTEEN FIFTEEN SIXTEEN SEVENTEEN EIGHTEEN NINETEEN TWENTY TWENTYONE TWENTYTWO TWENTYTHREE TWENTYFOUR TWENTYFIVE TWENTYSIX

CHAPTER TWENTYSEVEN

                “I fatti contano più delle parole,” Leandro says, patting his face and Bradley sighs. It’s not the first time he’s had the sentiment thrown his way, and even when he’s been able to throw them back he hasn’t taken any consolation in them.

                Actions speak louder than words indeed.

…            …            …

                “Lieutenant.”

                “Admiral Kerner sir.”

                “Another care package for you.”

                Jake bites back the quip about him making an excellent delivery man. There’s friendly respectfulness, and then there is over-familiarity.

                “Thank you sir. Much appreciated.”

                “No need to thank me Lieutenant, it is definitely worth it to me to do this for Bradley. Uh. Leo.”

                “You can call him Bradley sir, I do know it’s what his name is. I just know him better as Leo.”

                “Alright then. Thank you, I know him as baby goose as well, but calling him that is likely a sure fire way to either make him angry or sad, so maybe best not to test it.”

                “Baby goose sir?”

                “Hmm. He tell you about his father?”

                “Yeah. Right. His father’s callsign was Goose. I get it.”

                “Mmm. Thought for a long time he’d follow in his father’s footsteps, join the Navy.”

                “Until his godfather pulled his papers from USNA,” Jake supplies, because Leo has told him that Admiral Kerner knows all about it, and he’s not beyond going digging and using the resources available to him. He just never thought he’d be having this kind of conversation about a boyfriend with an Admiral. Beyond bizarre on so many levels.

                “Yes. Idiotic move if you ask me. Would have been nice if Tom had been able to talk some sense into either of them…”

                “Leo’s Uncle Tom,” Jake says, hazarding a wild stab in the dark.

                “Yeah. He told you about him huh?”

                “Uh huh…” Jake says, because yes, Leo has talked about his Uncle Tom. Once. Vaguely. He guesses it makes sense that Admiral Kerner knows whoever this Tom is, if he also knows who Bradley’s godfather is. He wonders if he could just ask.

                “Of course, bunch of stubborn idiots the lot of them. Ice has the patience of a saint to put up with the pair of them. I’d have locked them in a room together years ago until one came out victorious or they actually talked… I’d have given Bradley weapons. Stacked the odds in his favor. Although Ice would have likely done the same for Maverick…”

                Ice.

                Ice is Tom?

                Iceman?

                Tom Kazansky?

                Oh shit.

                Wait.

                Maverick? Maverick Mitchell? Where does he fit into the picture?

                He doesn’t let anything show on his face, years of practice at maintaining a benign poker face, calm and unruffled. Inwardly though he’s wondering just how many fucking admirals Leo calls uncle and has them running errands for him.

                Jesus.

                But Mitchell just jumped to the top of his list of suspects of being Leo’s godfather.

…            …            …

                “Holy shit, you’re here,” Jake says, and Bradley knows in that instant that Slider didn’t spoil the surprise.

                “I sure am. And I have a hotel room. Happy for us to not see anything but the four walls, or we can do some sightseeing,” Bradley offers with a wide grin, cap pulled over his face in an attempt to hide it at least a little as people stream around them. He tugs Jake away from the main press of people and can’t stop grinning. It’s been over four months and while they’ve communicated in some way nearly every day the fact he has Jake in front of him in the flesh makes the time apart just melt away.

                “Hotel. Then maybe sightseeing. You came all this way to see me, I need to make it worth your while…”

                “Just seeing you in person makes it worth my while.”

                “God you’re a sap.”

                “Yeah well, I’ve missed you.”

                Then Jake’s kissing him, his hands on either side of Bradley’s face before they’re sliding around his neck and pulling him close and Bradley lets himself be tugged closer. Jake might get a warning about doing this in uniform, but nothing like he would get if it wasn’t Slider who has approved his extended shore leave. Bradley’s isn’t usually one to use and abuse his connections but for this? Yeah, he’ll do it in a heartbeat every single time.

…            …            …

                Jake doesn’t know where to start when faced with Leo, naked and happy in a bed with him, his whole body seems to be fizzing with sheer joy and Jake has to admit it’s contagious. Even though they’ve not seen each other for months he doesn’t feel any sense of awkwardness between them, or that there has been that much time spent apart. It’s nothing like he feared it might be, some of the horror stories he’s heard from others about deployments ruining relationships. He guesses they’re probably still in the honeymoon phase or something. He kisses up one of Leo’s thighs, lets his fingers trail up the other one, knows he might be making the other man ticklish but he likes nothing more than hearing Leo laugh freely, it’s a beautiful sound and it makes him smug when he knows he’s the cause.

                “Was going to stretch myself open, be ready and waiting for you…”

                Jake groans at the images his brain provides, drops little soft kisses up the length of Leo’s cock, doesn’t bother keeping the grin off his face. “Decided you might want the privilege this time.”

                “Yeah, you’re right… want to get my fingers in you. Jesus Leo.”

                It’d both brand new and familiar when he pushes into the tight hot clench of Leo’s body, mouth falling open to suck in more air before he leans up to kiss him. Leo’s riding him, body rocking and flexing above him, allowing Jake to get his hands everywhere. This position is definitely turning into one of Jake’s favorites. Who is he kidding, they’re all his favorite, they just have different pros and cons. He brushes a hand teasingly over Leo’s cock, smirks at the sharp intake of breath and lets his fingers dig into the flesh of Leo’s hips, hard, holds him still while Jake grinds up and he hopes he leaves the bruises that Leo likes.

…            …            …

                They don’t seem to stop touching one another for more than a few minutes. Ordering room service, curling up and watching movies, talking about a whole range of different things, pressed against each other the whole time. They sleep entwined, the large bed completely superfluous, at least when it comes to sleeping. Clothes don’t even make it out of his bag, the robes in the room and Jake’s body heat more than sufficient depending on what they’re doing. He takes a few pictures of him and Jake grinning at the camera, sends them to Vi and Jake’s sisters, ignores the teasing comments he gets back. He knows they’re all happy for them.

                He’s taking a very firm denial approach that they only have two days, but nothing in his power stops the seconds ticking away and as he watches Jake get dressed back into his uniform he feels an irrational grumpiness about life being unfair that he and Jake both have to return to the real world. Jake has insisted that he wants to say goodbye to Bradley here, in the privacy of the hotel room. Jake’s fastening his belt, his eyes haven’t left Bradley though, taking in the litter of marks left over his skin by Jake’s fingers and mouth and he lets himself run his fingers over them, presses into the ones on his hip and smirks when Jake’s eyes go darker. Then Jake’s stalking toward him, pushing him back and straddling him, hands pressing down on Bradley’s chest.

                “Can I get you to do something for me?”

                “Yeah. Of course. What do you want?” Bradley asks.

                “Next time you know we’re going to see each other, and you know in advance… I want you to not jerk off for a coupe of days. Want you to stretch yourself open until your loose and use lots of lube and then put a plug in…”

                “Fuck Jake…”

                “Yeah, want you ready for me and desperate for it… you like the sound of that darling?”

                “You know I do.”

                “Mmm. Think I’m going to let you know exactly what I’ve been thinking about doing with you when I have more time on my hands.”

                Bradley doesn’t think he whimpers, but he wouldn’t put money on it either.

…            …            …

                Two days isn’t long enough but it is still better than nothing and he’s never had anyone go to this much effort other than his family. He knows Leo is talking to his family like he’s part of it, that they have a group chat which Jake isn’t part of, and he’s fine with it. In fact he likes it, that Leo is so well liked by his family, already so involved and entwined.

                “Wow, you look… well rested,” Phoenix says and Jake smirks, because rested is not the word he’d use, but he’s in too good a mood to say something snarky back. “Thought you had a boyfriend Hangman.”

                Jake raises an eyebrow at the insinuation.

                “I do. And he’s doing very well.”

                “Wait… he was here?”

                “Yep,” Jake says, smirking because now she’s annoyed. At least he thinks so, now she simply looks speculative and Jake frowns. “What?”

                “You really like him, huh?”

                “Trace, I’m pretty sure I more than like him. He’s something special.”

                “Well, he must be if he’s putting up with you!”

                He does pull a face at that, but he feels a little icy tendril of worry that maybe what he’s feeling is too much, too fast. That maybe Leo doesn’t feel the same way. He wishes he could just pick up the phone and call his sisters, but he’s going to have to wait. He sends a message and figures out the time difference to organize a time he can talk.

…            …            …

                “So, not that I don’t like talking to you, but why me?” Sandy asks.

                “I need your advice.”

                “Uh. Okay.”

                Jake knows he’s surprised her, because they’re not the closest, however she is the one who had the longest time with their mom before she started declining. He really wishes he could talk to his mom right now, but Sandy is the next best thing, all his other sisters, especially the ones closer to his age, will potentially just tease him.

                “I think I’m in love. Not just in love… I think I love him. Like… forever kind of love him.”

                “Okay.”

                “What do you mean okay?”

                “Uh… what?”

                “Isn’t it, like, too soon?”

                “You think emotions like love have nice tidy timelines? That it’s just this thing which will happen after a set time? Really?”

                “Uh.”

                “Jake… our parents eyes met across a dance floor and mom said she knew he was the one before they’d even exchanged words. I hated Daniel the first time we met, thought he was a brainless jock. And every single time I held each of my kids for the first time I knew I would die for them. So yeah, okay. If you love him, you love him.”

                “But…”

                “But what?”

                “What if he doesn’t…”

                She’s laughing then, long, loud and gasping breaths of laughter and it sounds like she’s struggling to catch her breath, unable to say anything and it continues for far longer than he thinks warrants. What he said wasn’t even funny. This is worse than being teased. He wonders if he should hang up.

                “Oh my god, I needed that. Thank you.”

                “What?”

                “I needed the laugh. Jake. You don’t need to worry about him not feeling the same. He flew to Japan to spend two days with you.”

                “He said he had work here!”

                “Yeah, work that he more than likely organized to align with your shore leave. Your boy is as stupid for you as you are stupid for him. It’s… it’s really sweet actually.”

                “Uh… thanks?”

                “You’re welcome. We like seeing you happy. Let yourself be happy.”

                “Yeah. Okay.”

                “Okay.”

TWENTYEIGHT

[renrapp]

alright someone asked me a few weeks ago how i colored my gifs to make them colorful like this so i thought would make a simple tutorial on it! it's a relatively simple process and also assumes you know how to make gifs, including basic coloring.

before we get started, it's important to note that scene selection is the most important thing here and could make or break the way you color your gif. i highly recommend scenes/videos with cyan/blue-ish backgrounds (or even gray bgs with cool tones) as they don't interfere with skin tones and therefore will be much easier to color.

now that you've picked your scene, go ahead and make your gif how you normally would, but limiting the coloring to just the basics (aka lighting and color-correcting). here's how mine turned out:

and then the fun part begins! first, we're gonna make a new selective color layer and crank up the blue & cyan layers to make the colors really pop. i find that doing this first before doing anything else makes the colors more vibrant. here's how mine looked like, but you're free to move the sliders whichever way you want as long as you end up with a pretty even cyan or blue base to work with.

after that we can go ahead and add a hue & saturation layer. go into the cyan or blue tabs (or both depending on which colors show up in your gif, in my case mine is predominantly cyan with some blue shadows) and move the hue sliders to whichever color you prefer! you can play around with the saturation and lightness sliders too, but i was already satisfied with how the color turned out.

you can choose to stop here, but if you think it still needs a bit of color correction (especially if you have a subject whose skin tone needs a bit of fixing), go ahead and do that! here's how mine looks after that:

aaaand that's it! easy peasy. here are a couple more examples using the same process across different media:

i hope this made a bit of sense and is helpful, and if you have any questions don't hesitate to ask! 💗

[oleander-nin]

Horrortober Day 9 - Death(Yandere Rise Mikey x Reader)

A/N, not important: DO NOT IGNORE THE CONTENT WARNINGS. Any criticism is welcome, constructive or not. This is supposed to be a gender neutral reader, so if I screwed up somewhere, please tell me.

-Ollie

CW: DEATH, MAJOR CHARACTER DEATH(?), DECOMPOSITION, living with a corpse, Delusions, vomit, kidnapping, blood, bodily fluids, dark themes, yandere themes

Words: 964

Summary: Mikey's so far into his own head he doesn't even notice how far gone you are as well.

Mikey whistles to himself as he draws in his sketchbook, your head in his lap while he does so. It was a lazy Saturday, nothing going on for him, or for you. He decided that morning that he didn’t want to do anything but cuddle and relax, dragging you into his lap and settling down. The hand he wasn’t using to draw rakes slowly through your hair, your closed eyes and paling face making Mikey smile.

You were so much sweeter like this. Complacent with everything he does, no longer fighting, no longer flinching at his touch. Sure, you had grown quiet, but you had also stopped arguing. It was a massive improvement in his eyes.

The candles around his room flickered, the sweet aroma battling the foul stench seeping from the depths. He barely noticed, having grown so used to the smell. It wasn’t bad to him, and he brushed it off whenever his brothers complained when they walked by. It was why he got the candles after all. To quell their complaints and keep you happy. He couldn’t have you living in a rancid room after all. Even if it was mostly your fault either way.

Mikey sets his pencil down and leans over, grabbing the remote to his personal TV Donnie had gifted him for you. He turns it on, switching through the channels with mild disinterest. He glances down at you, his thumb caressing your cheek softly. He could feel your cheek cavity caving in at the small amount of pressure, fluid spilling from your lips. He simply wipes it away and turns back to the screen, ignoring the way your hair falls out in clumps in his hands as he strokes your head.

“What do you want to watch?” He asks, clicking through each channel as it comes on. He appreciates how you weren’t as rigid as the other day, although your skin still felt dry. He knew you hadn’t been getting up to take care of yourself, but it was still disappointing. Maybe he’d give you some lotion to put on later, to add some more life to your touch.

He doesn’t wait for you to answer, clicking on the first cartoon that pops up and leaning over his sketchbook once more. The weight of your head in his lap was comforting, making every wrong in the world right once more. You were his anchor, keeping him still and steady despite the rocking waves. He would be lost without you, and he refused to ever let you go.

The TV drones on in the background while Mikey draws, loosely sketching you and practicing poses with your body. He was restraining himself from adding too much detail to the pieces, trying to capture your essence in as few lines as possible, but feeling guilty for not pulling out all the stops in the drawing of your likeness.

He takes your limp hand and squeezes it, whispering soft words to you while he stares. You gave no opinion to his dilemma, but Mikey still felt bad for not giving you the full works, even if it was just in a drawing. He sighs, deciding to leave those drawings as just sketches, and make a fuller piece of you on the next page.

The page turns, and a knock sounds from the door, startling Mikey. He stares at the door for a moment before carefully moving you off him and slipping off the bed. He opens the door to see Leo, the older slider grimacing. He coughs when the door opens, taking a step back from his room.

“Mikey, Hermano, your room smells like death. Are you okay? Did a rat die in your paints again?”

Mikey frowns, shaking his head. “Not that I know of. And I have candles burning, so that should get rid of the smell soon. But I don’t even notice it unless I’ve been outside for a long while. It’s not that bad.”

Leo sighs, rubbing the bridge of his snout. He didn’t have the heart to tell him just how awful the smell was. He looks at his younger brother, both in concern and love. “Have they woken up yet at least? You said they’ve been sleeping for three days now.”

Mikey pouts, shaking his head. “Nope, still asleep. I shook them this morning and everything.”

Leonardo stares at his younger brother, contemplating what to do. He understood you were Mikey’s, and he wasn’t going to fight the younger on that again. However, having his youngest sibling and his kidnapped partner live in a room that reeked of death, especially while you were apparently out cold, was not the best idea.

“I’ll take a look at them.” Leo mumbles, walking into the room once Mikey steps to the side. Leo covers his nose as he steps into the thick of it, his eyes burning and lungs crying out for mercy. He couldn’t even breathe through his mouth, the air tasting as putrid as it smelled. His eyes land on you, and he freezes. Flies were buzzing around your head, landing on your skin. Pus and other fluids dripped from you, your bloated body being in the middle of Mikey’s bed and staining his sheets and blankets with the muck of decomposition.

Mikey was right in a sense. You hadn’t been waking up. Not like you could anymore, not with what Leo was staring at. Your eyes looked to have been forced shut with tape, your body patchy and drained of color from the lack of life. Mikey looks on at you too, his vision warped to see your sleeping form rather than your corpse. Your dead, rotting corpse.

Leo pukes and runs out of the room, yelling for his brothers with Mikey’s pleas hot on his heels.

[imrllytootiredforthis]

Addicted

Pairing: Felix x reader

Summary: You’re obsessed with him, enchanted by him, too bad he’s taken...

Warnings: fem!reader, dom reader, sub lix, handjob, marking, slight humiliation, slight degradation 

Word count: 5k

A/N: I’ve had this written for like 2 weeks now but felt bad about posting bc i have a whole bunch of requests that i haven’t gotten around to. so if your one of the people that requested, dunno when i’ll get around to it but i will, i have like a million wips rn and i’m trying to get through all of them

It was a bad habit, you knew. 

Smoking.

You’d been a teenager once. Had the professionals talk about it, listened to all the same bullshit warnings; that your lungs would turn shrivelled and black-that cancer would bloom. Seen the pictures of the smoke-free lungs compared to healthy ones.

You knew it would end up killing you. You weren’t stupid. 

But they filled you with warmth, calmed you down, made everything feel a sort of numb as you stood out on the balcony of the apartment.

There was shouting inside, laughter and talking, the others all hanging out, having fun. 

You were supposed to be in there. Your step-sister-Avery had invited you, told you that you needed to make friends and get out more but you didn’t really feel as if you fit in with her type of crowd.

They weren’t actively trying to make you feel that way of course-in fact if anything they were very welcoming, asking you about yourself, trying to get you to contribute to the conversations, you just...

You didn’t know really how you felt, just that you told everyone that you would be right back, and now here you were cigarette hanging loosely from your lips, nicotine filling your lungs.

It was a horrible habit really-one you had thought about breaking dozens of times but never did.

You could stop anytime you wanted, if you wanted to but you didn’t need to yet so there was no point.

The slider door opened behind you.

At least smoking would take your mind off certain things.

“Why’d you leave?” Certain things like this.

Warm arms wrapped around your torso, head falling onto your shoulder into your hair, inhaling the smell of you. You and your slightly floral scent-perfume, maybe? 

Of course along with the pungent stale smell of the smoke. 

A smell that he hated in the beginning-it made his eyes water and his nose screw up in distaste. It was gross and bitter, a foul odour that reminded him of grime and dirty crowded cities.

But now the smell was you. It stained your clothing, lingered in your hair, clung to you like a second skin. It was addicting.

“Not really my scene y’know? Needed a bit of a break.” You sighed, twisting around to look at him. 

His hair had gotten a bit longer but you liked it. A bit shaggy and a bit messy but boyish, cute in a way that made you want to play with it all the time. He had talked about getting a haircut earlier that week but you’d managed to convince him not to. 

After all, the longer it is, the easier it is to pull.

That was your winning point to sway his decision.

“You should go back inside Felix. The others will notice that you’re gone.” 

He cocked his head to the side, hair moving along with the action. “Why? Don’t want me around?” A small pout adorns his lips with the question, bottom lip pushed out in a way that makes your heart do flips in your chest. 

You did.

You really, really did.

You wanted this more than you could even put into words.

Wanted to stay like this for just a bit longer. The feel his arms wrapped around you, his attention focused on you. Wanted for this to be a normal thing that happened, a normal thing that didn’t only happen when he was horny.

But he wasn’t yours.

And that was all just a fantasy.

You knew that.

You knew that too well as he nuzzled his nose into your throat, lips finding purchase against your neck. You took another drag, deeply sighing out, body shuddering as he whined for you to touch him-anywhere.

As he whined about how needy and desperate he was for you-somewhere-anywhere would suffice. As long as it was warm flesh against warm flesh, soft skin against soft skin, you touching him.

A moan slipped out, followed by another as he nipped at your pulse-point. “Please?”

His hands softly pushed your hair back, fingertips grazing your jaw, moving it out of the way for more purchase. “I need you.”

“Felix.” The words were a plead more than a command. A beg for him to stop, for him to make the decision you were too weak to make.

Because it was so hard to turn him down. So hard to tell him no because you wanted this-god-you wanted this so bad. Wanted to make him feel good, wanted to fill every single thought in that pretty little head of his. Wanted every single one of them to be you. 

You. You. You.

Only you.

Even if it wasn’t true, you loved to live in the delusion of it-the fantasy make-believe world where maybe, just maybe he could be yours.

“Please, touch me~”

The cigarette hung loosely from your fingers.

“Felix.”

His breath was hot as his mouth moved lower, down to your collarbone. “You know you want to.” He muttered lowly, kissing up your cleavage. “And I want you to.”

The smell of him, you couldn’t even name what it was but it was utterly intoxicating-so much more than nicotine could ever be.

Some part of you came back and suddenly you were very aware of the voices still talking and laughing inside.

She was right inside.

Finally, with that thought, you were pushing him away. “Felix no, your girlfriend is right inside that door.” You stepped back, far enough that a good three feet of space stayed between you-almost as much as you possibly could on the small porch.

He blanched, trying to step closer before you held out an arm, pushing his chest back. “It’s okay. S-she’s with the others-she won’t come out here-she won’t-”

“No.” The word was concrete but your eyes stayed trained on the ground as it was spoken, avoiding the puppy eyes you knew would be staring back at you if you were to look up.

And if you saw them you knew it would be over for you. You knew that. He knew that.

“Please, I need you so bad.” The words were agonizingly enticing but you’d been around him for long enough to build some level of immunity to his charms. 

“Please,” he took a step closer again, brushing away your arm as your eyes screwed shut. 

You couldn’t see him but you could feel his breath fanning across your face. “You can do anything you want to me. Push me around, punish me. Just fuck me.” He pressed himself against you, showing you just how hard he was for you.

“I’ve been so bad, so, so bad. Need you to just fuck me back into place.” 

Before your brain even comes to terms with his words, his hand was clasping around your wrist-the one with the cigarette in hand. Quickly bringing it up to his shoulder, pulling down his shirt to expose more skin. “Put it out on me.”

You’re sure your mouth is practically hanging open at the thought, lust pooling deep inside of you. “Do it-please!” He shakes your hand, desperation filling his eyes.

It would be easy. So easy to give into his whims. To let yourself fall into the trap of his desires...

"Miss you so much." His voice takes on a certain kind of desperation, lips trembling. "Need-need your touch so bad. Want you to bruise me, mark me, ruin me."

So, so fucking easy. To go along with it.

With a heavy groan you shove him away once more. He whimpers as you drop it onto the ground instead, snubbing it out under your foot. 

“Not right now.” The finality of the tone has him sulking and whining but you ignore him as you pull out your phone at the vibration of a notification.

You sigh at the contact name on the message. The real reason you wouldn’t give into his whims. 

Why you wouldn’t grab him by the throat right now, kiss him until his lips were raw and red, tease him until he came in his pants and make him walk straight back into there with his shame and your ownership stamped on him like a bright neon sign.

Because of her.

Avery: He’s with you rn, right?

You: Yeah

The dots pop up, signalling her typing before they disappear.

You: Why?

Avery: He just didn’t say he was going anywhere and I got worried

You: Worried?

Avery: Ofc! Why wouldn’t I be?

You: Avery.

Avery: Fine. 

Avery: I left with Hyunjin like 5 minutes ago, we’re heading over to his place for a bit

Avery: Can you just tell Lix I was idk, sick or smth-literally anything it doesn’t matter as long as he doesn’t come looking for me lol

You: Okay.

Avery: Yeah, maybe invite him to stay over at urs or smth, I won’t be back at our place til tmrw and u guys are friends so it won’t be weird.

And there it was. Both the reason you rarely ever felt bad and simultaneously felt incredibly guilty about what you had with Felix.

Because while he was out with you, she was out with someone else too, so in a way you guess it kinda nullified it? 

Made you sleep better knowing that you were fucking the brains out of a taken man?

You weren’t very sure to what extent either of them knew about the other’s rendezvous. You were sure he knew that she was cheating on him but doubted he knew it was his friend that it was with at the moment. And if she knew what was going on between you and him well she didn’t say anything and that was a pretty dead giveaway that she had no idea.

Because she was a hypocrite, not above starting a confrontation and spinning it around to make you and him seem like villains and her to be the helpless victim of the story.

Even as she was out with one of Felix’s best friends doing god knew what, knowing how much it would hurt him. But you guess that wasn’t so different than what he was doing to her.

“Hey, you wanna come over to my place? We can watch a movie or something.”

He perked up immediately at that, nodding quickly. “Yeah!” He knew what that was code for. He glanced down at his phone. “Should I go tell Avery I’m leaving?...Nah it’ll be fine, I’ll just text her later.”

“Okay cool, let’s go.”

The fire escape off the balcony landed right into an abandoned alley, perfect so you wouldn’t have awkwardly say goodbye to all of their friends.

You broke into a brisk walk the second you were on the ground, Felix having to almost run to catch up with you after he got off the ladder. “Hey! Wait up!” He shouted.

“Then hurry up, slowpoke!” You retorted over your shoulder, not slowing the pace. 

Your own apartment was pretty close, only maybe a 10 minute walk but it was still cold as shit and you’d given Avery your jacket earlier. You hadn’t really registered the chilliness on the balcony before, have it be the smoke or Felix you didn’t know.

“Hey!” He panted as he caught up.

You rolled your eyes, trying not to smile at the way he linked your arms together, swinging them happily.

He looked happy.

A smile across his face-his eyes still slightly clouded and the bulge in his pants still ever-so present but seeming to be fine ignoring it for now, even if whenever he took a step too long or too short he’d have to suppress a moan.

Your phone buzzed in your pocket again. Probably Avery. 

You ignored it.

Probably another update about her and Hyunjin, a reminder to keep Felix with you. Another reminder of how fucked up this whole situation this was.

“Do you ever feel bad?” You asked suddenly, the words blurted out before you could really think them over.

He let out a surprised noise. “For who-Avery?”

You nodded and he made a small noise of consideration, thinking it over before replying. “Not really, no. Really why should I? She was the one that cheated first.”

It was true, he could remember it all very clearly. They’d only been together for a few months at that point-basically nothing really but very quickly had either of them gotten attached. 

He vividly remembered walking in on her with some other random guy when he came home from working on a group project after school. 

He remembers standing there, frozen in place. Not wanting to watch but being unable to look away. 

Stuck in his body. Feet glued to the floor. Eyes frozen on them. Forced to watch her moan out the guy’s name, for him to smile and leave a kiss on her lips, groaning out about how she was such a pretty little slut for him.

The next thing he knew she was gasping, pushing the dude away, yelling out Felix’s name in alarm. The guy was pulling out of her, eyes wide in shock.

And maybe he didn’t know she was with someone-maybe he was innocent in all this mess. 

But she wasn’t.

And then his feet finally moved and Felix was running out of the room, trying not to cry as he threw himself into the guest room, locking the door and sliding down it, covering his face with his hands in an effort to hold back tears.

He could recall all of the sobbing and pain and apologizing that first time. 

She’d wailed all night long like she was the one that had been the one to walk in on their girlfriend fucking another guy. 

She refused to leave the house even when he yelled for her to pack her shit and leave. 

She stayed, sitting on the other side of the door, banging and crying for him to let her in. For him to let her explain herself, like that would somehow make anything better. 

She promised to not do it again. For two hours she kept that up until finally he cracked and let her in. 

She cradled him in her arms and wiped away his tears, cried with him for a bit and promised and swore and crossed her damn heart, assuring him that she’d never ever do it again. Held him tighter when he gritted his teeth and told her again, to leave. But she refused. She grovelled and pleaded and ‘justified’ her actions for a second chance.

He’d ended up forgiving her of course but, surprise, surprise, only a few weeks later it happened again. The whole process repeated with the guest room and the begging and the promises. 

And it happened again.

And again.

And the time after that. 

Over and over until it got to the point where he was used to it-expected it. No longer did he lock himself in the guest bedroom, all that would happen with that was she’d get bruises all over her hands from banging on the door and complain about it the next day as if it were a routine and nothing more.

And he wouldn’t say he was exactly happy with this arrangement but slowly with each new guy he became practically desensitized to it. 

When he came home from classes and saw her giving a guy a sloppy blowjob on the couch that had been Felix’s before they’d moved in together he simply sighed and rolled his eyes, ignoring the bitter twang in his chest and telling the dude to get out.

When he’d gone to a party with her and realized she’d disappeared only to find her practically dry-humping some random dude in the kitchen he’d just told her he was going home and to not wake him up when she came in.

It hurt, yes but through all of that he stayed with her. Why? He didn’t really know, maybe it was something to do with the fact that she was his first serious relationship and he liked the security of the title. Maybe because he was scared about how she would react, what she would do.

But for whatever reason he always stayed loyal throughout it all.

That was until you came along.

You, sitting in front of him in lecture hall. You who got decently good grades so the teacher’s paired you up with him, asking you to tutor him some days too if you were to have the availability, You who had a step-sister, through your dad’s marriage to her mom who just happened to be his girlfriend.

You.

You, you, you.

Who made him not want to be loyal anymore. Who made him laugh and smile and want to leave his cheating girlfriend once and for all.

And suddenly it was no longer the security of the title that kept him around, her anger or her small scraps of love only given when he begged for it. 

It was you. Who reminded him how it would affect not only them but all of their friends, who reminded him that she was your step-sister and the issues and drama that would come along with breaking it off with her.

But that didn’t stop him from wanting to.

He remembers the first time he came onto you, it was only about two months ago-56 days to be exact-but who was counting?

It was during a tutoring session, he’d been watching you. Observing the way you bit your lip when you concentrated, a slight furrow in your brow. Fixated on the way your tongue would dart out to quickly wet your lips before you spoke. 

Watched and watched until without really making the decision he was leaning in and kissing you and you were kissing him back and finally he understood how little Avery meant to him.

He could almost feel phantom hands on his body, remembering the way your’s had immediately gone to his hair, tugging at the silky strands until he moaned and then you realized what was going on.

You’d pushed him away all too soon, panicked and frazzled, yelling at him about why he’d ever do that. 

Did he know what this meant?

Had he really thought over what this might do?

Did he realize how Avery would feel? 

What this could do to you and to her and to-

And then he was kissing you again-desperate and needy, making you gasp out, grasping your hands by the wrists and placing them around his waist. 

And then your hands were back in his hair, all over his body, taking and giving and feeling and exploring. Then he was under you and any thought about how Avery would feel was the last thing on your mind.

The whole experience was different. Then anything he’d had and anything that you’d had, in a good way.

After that you didn’t want to stop seeing each other and she was starting to question why he was getting tutored so much. 

It started off as just sex and that wasn’t a morally good thing by any chance, but you could rationalize it. 

You told yourself that you could stop anytime you wanted, if you wanted to but you didn’t need to yet so there was no point. And it would be easy, because there were no feelings, not as bad of a betrayal. 

But it quickly turned into more than that. 

To laying in bed afterwards, him curling up in your arms, pressed up close against your chest, fiddling with his hair, and taking in the way he smelt. 

To enjoying each others company and nothing more during these moments-small bursts of time that started as one of you leaving right away, to staying for a few minutes, to staying for a few hours simply talking. About nothing. About everything. About your family and his friends, how your week was and how he wanted to be a professional dancer someday.

To suggesting good restaurants to him and to personally showing him to them. To days that one of you were in the mood and the other wasn’t, so you’d cool down and cuddle instead. To inviting him over for movie nights and making dinner together. To doing things without the idea of getting laid at the end of the night even in either of your heads.

And did he ever? Feel guilty about any of it?

“No.” Felix stated with a certainty in his tone. “If I could go back I’d do it all over again.” You unlocked the door and gestured for him to go in first. “But you never know...”

The keys were placed on the counter, “Never know what?” You questioned distractedly, shoes slipped off along with his. 

“I might feel differently if you keep teasing me,” He rested his head on your shoulder, whispering into your ear. “Maybe I shouldn’t have even come to you...Avery would’ve helped me back at the house you know-”

Before he could blink, his body was pushed back, stumbling until his knees hit the couch and he feel backwards. And then you were on top of him, knees of either side of his hips, lips inches away from his.

A dark look had crept into your eyes, flickering over the length of his body hungrily. He shivered almost violently, he couldn’t help it.

“Wanna repeat that for me, kitten?” Chills broke across his skin at patronizing tone you spoke in and he was once again reminded of how turned on he already was.

His mouth was dry and his body burned in anticipation but he wouldn’t reply-couldn’t.

A dangerous sneer replaced the smirk, malicious intent written all over it and fuck, it left him throbbing and holding back the whimpers climbing up his throat. “C’mon pretty little kitty, you said it so confidently before.” Your hand brushed over his thigh and he whined, a pathetic sound that rolled off his tongue like an angel’s call to your ears.

“Say it.” You demanded, tipping his chin up to look at you.

“Please,” He whispered.

A single brow of yours raised, unimpressed. “That’s not what I asked for.”

He shut his eyes, unable to look at you. “M-maybe if you won’t help me,” His voice wavered, turning to a mumble. “Ma-maybe...Avery w-will.”

Your smile was large but the action didn’t convey to your eyes. Mirthless and dark-in lust or anger he couldn’t tell but could only hope it was both.

That was the only way you’d fuck him the way he needed to be right now.

“Really?” You growled.

His breath hitched. He was very accustomed to this version of you. The version that came out when it was just the two of you. Here and now. When he was needy and you were willing. When he begged you to do anything you wanted to to him and you would grant him that wish.

It got you into this head space where you wanted to remind him who he belonged to-not Avery certainly. It made you want to break him down and build him back up again just to remind him that you could. To make him forget who she was and who he himself was and the only thing left falling from kiss-bitten lips would be your name and begs for more.

He knew Avery was an especially sensitive topic to bring into this moment. To taunt you with her name in the way he’d just done. In a way that undermined your hold and control over him in these moments.

After all, you were nothing if not possessive.

And he fucking loved it.

Because now you were going to show him. Show him how good you could make him feel. Show him how well you knew his body and make sure he knew that plenty could try but no one could make him feel the way you did.

The laugh that came next was cold as your lips travelled down the smooth expanse of his neck. Nipping over his jugular, sucking harshly at his pulse point. “Does she fuck you better than I do sweetpea?” He could do nothing but moan brokenly in reply, arms grasping helplessly around your shoulders.

“Can she make you feel as good as I do?” Your hands dragged over his body in the seconds, touching him so slowly, so tantalizing.

Was this heaven or hell?

“Does she make you scream like I can?” It took a perfectly timed stroke to the words and he felt like he was go crazy with want, losing grip on reality, liquid heat filling his body with need.

He couldn’t even begin to try to figure it out in this moment.

Felix shook his head, frantically trying to find his voice but to no avail. You let out a chuckle. “When was the last time she touched you?”

And this time it seemed like you wanted a legitimate answer, pushing your body up and off of his, hovering over him. Those few inches of space devastated him, leaving his body cold and tingling for your touch again.

Your eyes trained on him, expressive and pushing, prompting him to answer the question. 

“L-last week.” He finally croaked out.

At long last-which was only really a few seconds but felt like an eternity, you were back on top of him, bodies snug against each other. “Only last week?” You pouted. “Lixie, thought I was special, th-”

“-Y-you are!-”

“-Ah ta ta ta,” you clicked your tongue at him like he was a misbehaving dog. “No interrupting me sweet thing.” You scolded, pulling up his shorts to reveal unblemished skin of his thigh, kneading the flesh in your hand before continuing. “Thought I was the only one who got to see you like this.” 

Grip turning harsh, you pried his legs apart, setting between them. “But it seems like you’re just an easy slut, opening your legs for anyone.”

He whined, pulling you closer to him if that was even possible, hiding his pink stained face in your hair, trying his very best to control his body. To keep his hips from jumping up and thrusting up against you like his body was aching to.

“No-she doesn’t make me feel the way you do. She doesn’t-” the words cut off into a moan of pure unfiltered unholiness.

“Doesn’t what? Doesn’t stroke you the way I do?” You taunt, slipping his shorts down to find...huh, no underwear, couldn’t say you were surprised. “Commando princess? And you say you aren’t a whore.”

Dragging the heel of your hand up and down him, slow and sure. “Only a whore for you~” he whispers through pants, breathing becoming erratic and irregular as you pick up the pace, increasing in speed.

You can’t help but laugh at the quip. “Whatever you say princess.”

He mewls, watching your head dip out of his view as your tongue continues your mission along his throat. 

Tasting and teasing but careful to leave the skin unmarked-a certain amount of level-headedness able to still keep control over the horny thoughts beginning to run rampant.

Hand slipping behind his head you softly twine your fingers into the long hair you’d begged him not to cut and suddenly tugged, quick and harsh, giving you more space to work with.

You’re still level-headed.

But Lix has other ideas-rational thoughts replaced by wet dreams, hips chasing your hand for more and fingers threading through your hair. “Mark me-fuck! Bite me-please-bite me, bruise me!”

Something inside you thrums with heat and you gently scrape your teeth down his neck. “Dunno baby, can you really take that?” 

He nods quickly, unable to keep his body from squirming anymore. “And what about Avery? You want her to see you all pretty-covered in bruises from another woman?”

“Yes! Please do it, m’ yours-wanna be yours!”

You freeze but he doesn’t seem to notice, too lost in his haze of pleasure, fucking up into your hand.

He’d never said that before.

You’ve called him yours-your slut, your pretty little thing, your whatever felt right in the moment but never had he said it.

...And the level-headedness was gone.

Your teeth sunk into his skin, leaving him keening, arching, tightening his hold in your hair. “M-more, please, need more!”

Happily, you could oblige to him and his request, carrying on with more teeth, more sucking, more fervor and a primal desperate need-like you needed to prove something-to Avery? To him? To yourself? Who knew.

Certainly not the boy under you who had lost any semblance of composure-not that he’d had very much to begin with.

A strangled sound akin to a sob left him and his legs wrapped around your waist, his eyes slipped shut-wanton cries and hiccupy gasps filling the room. “Please.” Was all he could say, your hand moving faster, matching rhythm with his thrusts.

“Trust me princess. When I’m done with you, you won’t even remember your own name.” The hiss in his ear had his mouth falling open, no sound coming out.

Finally you pulled away just a bit, admiring your work. 

A piece of art that consisted of reddened patches of skin that would soon fade to purple. His cock, pulsing and throbbing his your hand, working up and down his length smoothly due to the copious amounts of arousal leaking from the tip. And lastly, the best part was his cute little fucked-out face.

Stroking his cheekbone lightly with your fingers, a slow smile crept across your face. His mouth hung open, eyes screwed shut, brows furrowed tightly. “And you sure as hell won’t remember Avery’s”

You were addicted to him, yes. 

Just as much as that little deathstick you couldn’t seem to stop smoking. 

But truly, in the end, could something that felt so good be so bad?

[savemeafruitjuice]

Tickletober Day 8- Nuzzles

This is where I give up on finding gifs ����

For the rest of these, I'm going to be just saying what version I'm writing for, so yeah. On that note, this is a ROTTMNT fic! Maybe I'll color-code each version so it's easier to recognize.. 🤔

Lee: Donnie

Ler: F! Leo

TW!: SWEARING! AN ARGUMENT! (It's only referenced. The rest is just comfort and tickes.)

THIS HAS SPOILERS FOR THE RISE MOVIE!!! READ AT YOUR OWN RISK IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN IT! ALSO, THIS IS NOT A SHIP!

(I'm putting this below the cut because of spoilers, but Future Leo is established to be in the present time with the turtles. I will be addressing him as 'Leon' throughout this.)

Loud techno music blared throughout Donnie's lab. He was curled up in his rolly-chair, sulking as the noise calmed him down a little. All of a sudden, he felt the presence of someone else, and turned around at the same time a knock sounded on his door.

"Hey, can I come in?"

Ugh, it was Leo. He knew it before a word even left his dum-dum mouth. "I don't like you. Go away." There was a moment of hesitation, before Leo called out again. "Did I do something? I didn't mess up a project or anything, right?"

Donnie stopped. Was he just playing dumb to get into his lab again? The scientist made his way to the door, opening it a crack. "No, dimwit- oh. It's you.." Donnie opened his door a little more. "Wrong Leo. My mistake."

Leon glanced at the younger's face. He looked tired, and not just normal Donnie-tired. "Don, how ya feelin'?"

The purple-themed turtle shrugged. "Just.. tired. Don't worry about it." The slider clearly didn't believe him, having had decades of experience reading his twin, even if this one was slightly different. "No, I don't mean physically 'how do you feel'. I mean emotionally. You don't seem to be doin' too good."

"Jeez, I don't like how much you know about me.." he muttered, but let the door open the rest of the way, sighing. "Come in, I suppose. You haven't done anything to upset me. Yet.." The elder walked in, glancing reminiscently around at all of the tech.

"Shelldon, turn the music down by fourty-five percent." The room got a bit quieter, and Leon crossed his existing arm over his chest. "I'm assuming you and little-me got into a fight?" Donnie nodded, and went to sit back in his chair, spinning around twice before turning back to the sword-user.

"He was being annoying, and wouldn't stop trying to make me try his nasty food. So.. I may- or may not, have called him a.. disgustingly-paletted ape.. and said his food looks like shit." Leon forced a chuckle down, nodding. "I see.. Was that all?" The softshell shook his head, pulling his legs back onto his chair and resting his chin on them.

"No.. It got bad, and he told me he didn't like me as long as I didn't like fucking pineapple, and now we aren't talking."

The slider's face fell at the last part, and he shifted his weight between his legs. "Oh. I'm sorry.. did you.. need anything?"

Donnie paused, then spoke softly. "A hug would be nice.."

Leon looked a bit surprised, but moved to the younger and squatted down. When Donnie didn't initiate the hug, the blue-themed turtle wrapped his arm around the softshell, and pressed his face into the crook of his neck. Donnie sighed, and moved to rest his head on the elder's shoulder, relaxing his tense posture slightly. "I'm going to pick you up now."

Soon enough, the purple turtle was being held to his sort-of-twin's plastron, the two sitting on the floor. Donnie was facing away from the other, while Leon's arm was holding him by the torso. "For how smart you are, you really don't know a lot."

Donnie's eyebrows lowered into the start of a scowl, and he turned his head to bite back with an insult, but was interrupted. "One of those things being how much I love you." His face faltered, and a more confused face was present on the scientist. "I don't know what you think you mean to me, but there's one thing you can be sure of. It's about three-hundred times more than you'd imagine."

The softshell let out a quiet noise, not quite sure of how to respond. He was never good at reacting to people when they got like this, but what Leon was saying was something he really needed to hear right now.

"It doesn't matter if it's your Leo, or one in the past, or the future, or in another timeline.. You will always be loved, and nothing in existence could ever change that. I guarantee that he didn't mean anything he said."

All of a sudden, his vision went blurry, and tears were filling his eyes. Donnie reached up to wipe at them, sniffling. "I.. don't know-"

"Trust me."

Donnie wiped his eyes again, his brother holding him as he cried. "Leon.. sniff- Thanks.." The slider smiled, squeezing a little harder. "And.. for the record, I- I love you too.. A lot."

He hugged the elder's arm, and Leon pressed his face back to the younger's neck, and was surprised with a giggle. "Hey, Donnie.. What was that?"

The softshell shook his head, kicking his legs out when the back of his neck neck was nuzzled into again, becoming aware of the fact that he was extremely trapped. "Noho! Lehee- ahahah!"

"Mm, I think you need a laugh."

The turtle flailed, trying to crane his neck upwards in an attempt to push Leon's head away, but all it did was give him time to reach forward and move to his throat.

Donnie let out a a high screech, reaching up to grab at the elder's head. The slider only smiled, but eventually flipped the scientist around, laid him on the ground, and sat on his legs. "Aw, I remember when you were this small! So much easier to hold down than my Donnie.."

Donnie didn't seem to register what he was saying, or didn't care, only shaking his head and giggling. "Heheh! Noho! Lehet mehe goho- youou scoundrehel!"

The elder tsked, and resumed his tickling tactic, this time the focus being the younger's belly. As soon as his face made contact, Donnie exploded into louder giggles, bucking and trying to scramble away.

"You're so ticklish, it's not even funny!" The softshell cackled when a bad spot was attacked, hopelessly trying to pry the weight of a full-grown mutant off of his legs. "Well, scratch that. Maybe it is pretty funny.."

The purple-themed turtle whined, covering his face with one hand, as the other pushed at his shoulder. The elder looked up to make sure he was alright, unfamiliar with a Donatello who didn't do everything in his power to try to kill whoever dared tickle him.

When all the other did was laugh and squirm, Leon took it as a chance to up his game, and pressed a huge raspberry right in the center of his plastron. Immediately, both hands came shooting to the elder's head, slapping and hitting frantically as loud laughter filled the room. "BPHK- NAHAHAHAH! LEHEHEHEOHON!"

Having his head attacked without regard to safety was definitely a lot more like his own Donnie, and Leon instinctively went to hold the smaller's wrists in his hand, holding them up in the air. "GYAHAHAH! GIHIHIVE- GIMME MY HAHANDS BAHAHACK!"

Another raspberry was pressed to his plastron, and soon enough the purple turtle's laughter went silent, slowly losing the will to fight as he turned his head to the side. The blue-themed turtle took it as a sign to stop, and he let go of Donnie's arms, then got off his legs, and smiled fondly at the sight of the younger curling up onto his side.

He reached out to rub his shoulder, and laughed when the younger flinched. A couple seconds passed, and Donnie had calmed down enough to roll onto his back, a happier face than before present on his features. "How do you feel now?" The softshell let out a quiet laugh. "More tired."

"Okay, you know that's not what I meant this time!"

-----

Weird idea I guess? Never really saw any lee Donnie with future Leo, soooo yeah. 😱