#my entire life now is just absence
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sometimes you get put on antipsychotics because you're fixated on someone you've known like a couple months that you're experiencing intense symptoms around when in reality you're going through the greatest loss of your life but you're not thinking about that at all 🙏🙏
#incoherents#i was so normal in 2020. actually 20/21yo me would like this album the most but folklore was definitely better for processing this shit#than ttpd#so not complaining folklore was the first time i actually started letting myself feel that loss AT ALL. i still block it out every second#oh also the new bright eyes album i sometimes let myself feel it LMAO#to be CLEAR while they both tried to claim it was bpd and mania in retrospect i think it was just the mixture of ptsd and my ocd#getting to a paranoid level#miss the intensity of it though#my entire life now is just absence
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new tortured soul dropped
#im back in my gothic horror and 19th ct novel era and its terminal#anyway i made a new guy... hes a murdered musician but he came back ✌️ (wrong)#and now hes out to end an entire bloodline#sketch#original character#artists on tumblr#illustration#frankenstein#body horror#my art#ghouldraws#long time no poast.... sorry for my absence i havent really felt like doing much digital art lol#ngl though i have been thinking of opening a comm slot since its been a really long time afdhdjfk#like 2 years#anyway i don't have a name for this freak but what good is a name without a life to live it with anyway <3 its over for him#makes a playlist for him and its all just musical adaptations of the novels that inspired him#im great at thissss#i like sketching in b/w :] maybe i will do more
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rolls around on the floor........ so anyway, i failed my attempt to fix my sleep schedule... now i'm just gonna try waking up a bit earlier every day until i feel at least somewhat like a human being ashjfgds
#went to take the zzzquil last night.... then had the thought 'oh i should make sure this doesn't have interactions with any of my meds'#turns out there is a (rare) interaction so i backed out :x#still managed to sleep a little earlier!! and wake up a little earlier!!!#.......but i'm really bad at forcing myself to get up with an alarm so it wasn't nearly as early as i wanted#and then my brain was really smelly about doing anything... so i did my laundry went for a walk and played my dumb hyperfixation games#(i am still playing my hyperfixation games it is actually a fucking problem at this point)#but yeah!! i just!!!! idfk#i'm gonna stop saying i'm gonna do anything on a certain day bc that just adds pressure to my weenie brain and makes me wanna do it less#gonna just see how i feel and do things as i feel like/as i have motivation and/or energy#it's v hard to work urself back into a structured schedule when u've lived a very unstructured life for like a decade...........#(i did this to myself)#(but i blame my autistic burnout for being the thing that's fucked me up over and over for 2 entire decades akjsfhds)#(.........i'm drunk. ignore me i just. feel bad for the absence/lack of dm replies so i wanted to make a note idk idk jklashfds)#(now i'm just crying over all ur sweet tags on my promo 🥺🥺)#━━ ˟ ⊰ ✰ ooc ⋮ don't @ me.
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well🙂
#*visibly trying not to burst into tears* hey guys whats up#surprise surprise another absence bc my life can’t stop getting WORSE evry day it seems haha!#so. now who’s gonna tell me how u deal w the loss of ur fave person n the one person u were 100% certain truly loved u no matter what#who also inspired u to be an artist in the first place n who's been there for u ur ENTIRE life#like idk how to start dealing w it lmao. one min ill be basically okay n then the next ill feel like smthing just tore a chunk out of me#looked outside just a sec ago n thought “oh so she'll never see my progress in art. oh ill never get to make another painting for her”#n yk part of me just wants to pretend like none of it happened honestly#like “hey that was a fucked up dream oh well let me call [x] n tell them I love them”#n I dont fucking KNOW how to deal w this grief n idk whats normal n what isnt#no I havent cried rlly but almost every day I feel like I cant breathe n tht my chest is collapsing in on itself#no I cant talk abt it but i can’t draw like I used to n thinking abt my last art project makes me wanna throw up#< considering it was going to be a present for her tht she'll never get to see. Haha so funny right guys#fuck I need to get so entirely drunk over this now RELAPSING TIME BABY!!#anyways. will try to be normal tm n talk to ppl again instead of isolating as a way to cope n sorry to ppl who have msg'd me Ill be back
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this is also why i stopped using my tracked tag for a while tbh
#and i might do it again bc its just#a reminder that no one rly cares abt what i do / who i am etc#which might sound over dramatic idk how else to describe it tho its just hollow#it feels very much like a Chore and a Task and if i dont reblog things fast enough from my tag#people get very angry and/or upset with me even tho theres just#so much content and i have 0 time so everything gets queued no matter what#like this whole experience feels like a chore lmao#and it never ever used to#but now theres so much animosity if i dont behave / interact with things Properly#or whatever the make believe rules are idk#this dash can just be so negative like have we all truly descended into madness during this hiatus#bc like i get it ive been up and down and all around too but ive never been straight up MEAN to anyone in this community#and i never want to either so this entire situation thats been bubbling for months just feels like shit#bc what the fuck changed and how do we get back to where we were#i never ever ever ever felt this way before like idk the middle of last year#but ever since like last fall its just been idk. Bad#once again im sorry if ive ever done anything to upset anyone but my silence / absence doesnt mean i dont care#ive just been Incredibly busy due to some real life changes that are out of my control#i might not have energy to answer everything but i do Read everything and it does make me smile#and i save messages that are kind in my heart so i can be reminded of the root of what this blog is supposed to be#a space for something im very passionate about and previously had nowhere else to express said passion#so like idk if we all like the same things why does this weird feeling of competition linger over us lmao#why do all ccs have to fight???? each other???? when we all love and do the same things????#i have nothing against anyone personally but what i Do take issue with is the way that ive been doing this since 2021 and im fully just#ignored and shoved aside by so many people for reasons i fully dont know or understand#so yeah idk this is a novel i just woke up from a spontaneous nap bc im so exhausted i can only stay awake for 3 hours at a time#but yeah anyways idk !#be nice its so easy !#tbd
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Girl are you okay? Cause you've been looking through the "My lesbian experience with loneliness" tag again
Well the short answer is no :D
#the long answer is I saw one post of someone going 'well now that I'm 28 too maybe I'll try doing the same thing the protag does here''#and nearly cried because 28 is such a ridiculously long time away except not really except it's SO#fucking long and so close to what I was gaslit into believing I would ever have that I'd be lucky to make it to my thirties for no reason#and I never wanted anything different and just wanted to live and had panic attacks when reading but I'd still believe it was inevitable#and now I am suddenly having to come to terms with so much I want from life that I had resigned myself to never having because I couldn't#but how am I meant to do that? it's just hanging over my head now and it feels so stupid and I feel so out of place everywhere#it feels like I'm too bad at being a person to be loved and too angry to even admit I want to be#and too regretful to seek it because I'm scared of trampling over people's boundaries like people have done to me#and like I did too before I grew up and thought my way through having some empathy#why do only boys show any interest in me.... why is every friend I make entirely outside the range of people who could possibly reciprocate#why is it so easy for me to brush crushes aside aren't people supposed to suffer for this stuff#does that prove it's not a romantic crush and it's just that I want to be held and wanted#it feels so wrong to want this after fighting so much just to have fulfilling platonic relationships what's wrong with me#that I still want something else what more could I want this life is so ideal as far as 12 yo me is concerned#...when did my brain start viewing any and all kinds of want or ambition as doomed efforts for me?#I have such a headache all of a sudden#I think... the way I value self preservation has gotten all the way around into being harmful maybe#at least a little#everyone I know is nowhere near the amount of control freak as I am and they just go do things they want to do#have I seen them hurt over the consequences multiple times yes. but . I'm tired of hurting over absence#''did you know wishing you had more extreme and easily verifiable trauma is in itself proof of having undergone trauma'' well yeah but like#fuck why couldn't I be traumatized by anything else that wasn't literally the profession supposed to help you with all the trauma#delete later#like for real I want to delete it rn but I also don't
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I suffered a severe brain injury about 3 years ago and from the bottom of my heart, I empathize with you! It's hard and I still get frustrated with my brain, but it does get better. I may not be 100% where I was at before the injury, but the beauty of the human brain is that it's always changing and it was never meant to stay at the level it once was anyways. You and your brain are beautiful and resilient and I believe in you!
im so sorry that happened to you too ❤️
I remember hearing accounts of what TBIs were like before the accident but I never truly had the appreciation for just how terrifying and lonely it is being inside a mind and body that feels so unfamiliar.
thank you so much for reaching out, I know I need to internalize that thought. Brains are never meant to stay the same and change, whether organic or forced from an accident, is a natural part of life. I just don’t like feeling so much like a stranger.
#i was talking to my bf about memory issues last night#and i was talking about how scary it is to not know what you’ve lost until it’s absence is made known#how much about myself have i forgotten?#what parts of me are gone forever?#I don’t know because I don’t remember#im sorry#this has just been one of my number one fears my entire life#and now its happened#and im scared#but thank you so much for this#this was really kind ❤️#sulley answers#wearyrabbit
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Sorting through some stuff and came across this one again. It’s going to be six years in July but I guess it never really stops hurting.
#longer even if you count the years where we were already strangers to her#she recognised me the longest because i practically spent my entire childhood with her#my mother always found excuses to dip out#but my grandmother was always there#she just had this presence#and it's even more palpable in her absence#because there's just this huge void for all of us where she used to be#and like. i was recently asked at work by someone who was a complete stranger to me if i was related to her#and it was just so nice to have a stranger remember her so fondly#she was kind and did her best to care about everyone even though life did its best to beat her down#and sometimes i wish i could just sit down with her in front of the tv again#hold her hands and tell her about my life and accomplishments#and how all the dreams she supported me in and wanted to come true for me#are now fulfilled#and thank her for always believing in me#for listening#for tolerating and encouraging all my rambles about birds#anyway.#i love you grandma#and now i should probably get back to the boxes#personal
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#thinking about how i was in portland yelling at you in a bar bathroom about how much you hurt me#thinking about how i stayed up till 4am when i was in California to talk about how much we missed each other while you worked night shift#thinking about how i used to message you on lunch breaks and on my walks home and wake up early to your good mornings#thinking about how you were such a huge part of my life for so long. and then you just weren't.#thinking about how your absence from my life became so much larger than your presence was#it's been years of the on and offs and even though I'm so much better now i can't leave you entirely in the past#i still want to cry sometimes thinking about you.#you treated me like i was disposal the last time we talked and I've never been angrier at you.#but here i am still thinking about you wondering if you still think about me#personal#🍑#lol all too well just came on shuffle bc of course it did
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tap out. pt ii.
warnings. mentions of death, emotional distress, grief and loss, pregnancy.
a few years later, another tap-out ceremony arrives, but this time, the air feels different—heavier, somber. simon’s been gone for over a year, his deployment unexpectedly extended due to an incident overseas. you’d been told he couldn’t come home for a while, but that didn’t make the waiting any easier.
today, you stand among families who aren’t just here to tap out their loved ones but to say goodbye to those who didn’t make it home. tears stream down faces as loved ones gather around caskets, grieving the soldiers they’d lost. the sight fills you with a mix of dread and relief, knowing simon is still out there, waiting.
simon stands in formation, rigid as always, but he has a sense for you. before you even appear in his line of sight, he knows you’re near. but imagine his surprise when he catches a glimpse of you in his peripheral vision, a small bundle wrapped securely in your arms.
his heart hammers in his chest, quickening as he realizes what this means. his breath catches, his eyes fixed on you as you approach. you look up at him, your eyes sparkling, a knowing smile on your face as you watch the subtle changes in his expression—the slight twitch of his eyebrows, the way his breathing picks up as it dawns on him.
both of you had been trying for a baby before he left, and now, standing before him, you hold that precious life in your arms. it had been a struggle going through pregnancy without him, feeling his absence during every kick and every sleepless night. but seeing him now, looking more than ready to meet your child, all the pain fades away, replaced by a joy so profound it fills every inch of you.
‘daddy’s home,’ you whisper softly, tilting the blanket so simon can see her tiny face, fast asleep, a perfect mirror of him in miniature. she’s got his nose, his quiet strength already etched into her tiny features.
with tears in your eyes, you reach up, your hand finding his cheek, tapping him out in the gentlest of touches.
the moment your hand connects, simon moves, breaking formation as he pulls both of you into his arms, holding you close as if he’ll never let go. his voice is thick with emotion, barely a whisper as he murmurs, ‘my loves.’
you knew your husband had a reputation in the military—a man as cold and unyielding as steel, a fortress no one could break. but as he held you and your newborn in his arms, that carefully built facade cracked, revealing a vulnerable side of him that only you ever saw. the tough soldier was gone, replaced by a man whose heart lay entirely with his family.
‘do you want to hold her?’ you ask softly, watching his eyes light up with a blend of surprise and joy.
‘her?’ he whispers, voice catching on the single word, as if it’s almost too much for him to believe.
you nod, smiling through a haze of happy tears. ‘her.’
with slow, reverent movements, you pass your daughter to him, watching as she looks impossibly tiny cradled in his strong arms. simon looks down at her with a mixture of wonder and fierce protectiveness, as though he’s already memorizing every detail of her face.
as if sensing her father’s gaze, the baby yawns, a soft little sound that makes simon’s eyes shine with awe. you catch the faintest smile pulling at his lips, a rare, tender expression that he reserves only for moments like this.
he leans down, pressing his lips gently to her forehead. ‘never gonna let anything happen to you,’ he murmurs, voice thick with love and quiet promise.
while simon was lost in his quiet moment with your daughter, a loud shout cut through the air, breaking the peaceful silence.
‘is that our baby i see?!’
simon’s head snapped up, his expression immediately shifting to something harder. he turned to see soap grinning widely, practically bouncing with excitement. with a sigh, simon reached over and smacked the back of soap’s head, though his movements were careful not to jostle the sleeping baby in his arms.
‘there’s people grieving, you idiot,’ simon muttered, but soap only snickered, completely unfazed.
‘and what do you mean, ‘our’? she’s y/n’s and mine. you’re not part of this relationship, mate,’ simon added, his tone dripping with mock irritation.
but soap, undeterred, just ignored him and held out his hands, wiggling his fingers in a display of exaggerated excitement. ‘oh, come on! let me hold our child!’
simon groaned, looking down at you with a glance that seemed to ask, ‘do i really have to put up with this?’ but he couldn’t hide the tiniest hint of a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth as soap’s enthusiasm filled the air around you.
reluctantly, and with another sigh, simon finally leaned over, carefully passing your daughter to soap, though not without a low, ‘if you don’t keep her calm, you’re not holding her again.’
soap just grinned, taking her into his arms as if he’d won the lottery, cradling her gently and cooing softly.
soon after, the rest of task force 141 gathered around, drawn by the excitement, each member eager to catch a glimpse of the new addition to the family.
you and simon stood to the side, watching with cautious eyes as they took turns holding her, each one adopting a careful gentleness you wouldn’t have expected from hardened soldiers.
price held her with a proud grin, murmuring something about ‘training her to be the next captain,’ while gaz made her giggle softly with his gentle cooing. even the usually reserved roach softened as he held her, a rare smile tugging at his lips.
you glanced up at simon, watching his face as he stood beside you, arms crossed in a show of casual indifference.
but you knew him too well. beneath the mask of stoicism, there was something warmer, a subtle softness in his gaze as he watched his team, his family, sharing this moment with him. this gruff, unbreakable soldier, who had once thought he’d lost everything, had found a new family among them, one that shared in his joys and sorrows alike.
reaching over, you took his hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. he didn’t say anything, just gave your hand a quick squeeze in return, a quiet acknowledgment. but you could see it in his eyes, that gratitude for a family he never expected to find—a family that had now become part of yours.
#cod x reader#simon ghost riley#call of duty#simon riley#simon riley blurbs#simon riley headcanons#simon riley x reader#task force 141#simon ghost riley blurbs#simon ghost riley x reader#simon riley x you#john price#kyle gaz garrick#gary roach sanderson#cod ghost
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Fish in a Birdcage ৎ୭
ৎ୭ ⸻ rafayel has quite the storm raging in his mind during his artistic expedition to aridum. which, the root of his crisis he was trying to wean himself off of wasn't supposed to tag along to make him spiral further. funny thing is, you just think he's sick. he is. just infected by something far worse than you can imagine: crippling dependency.
ৎ୭ ⸻ SO MUCH BUILD-UP, momentary sickfic, anxious attachment issues, rafayel being hot and cold with the reader, angst, exhibitionism for like 0.01 seconds bc of bond shenanigans, switch4switch and constantly changing dynamics that comes with it, handjob, slight obedience kink, impromptu bondage play with rafayel's neck piece praise kink, obedience kink blink and you miss it, p in v, CLOTHED SEX ITS SO HOT 2 ME, unprotected sex, multiple rounds.
ৎ୭ ⸻ hello lads fandom, FIRST WORK HERE (it sucked my soul out i've been working on this for like tHREE weeks)!!! this is my adaptation of rafayel's nightly rendezvous card intertidal zone. a lot of it is based on my reading and understanding of the card, i'm so sorry for releasing this when caleb just released but, i hope you enjoy, much love <3 ( lil tag: @comatosebunny09 )
ৎ୭ ⸻ 26K, read on ao3
In retrospect, finding out Aridum was a city in the middle of a desert should have made you stop and think more about how the climate would actually affect Rafayel before diving straight into travel plans.
You know, a Lemurian.
Who, logically, wouldn’t fare well in the dry heat.
Rafayel flicking off your genuine concern like it was a bug on the surface tension of his fish tank was the first red flag you should have paid more attention to. In your defense, since he’d been there before and was confident enough to initiate banter, it was easy to give in and trust he knew what he was doing as he batted his lashes at you with those pretty dual-colored, sparkly wide eyes that left you starstruck in the face and said, “As long as I’m with you, I’ll be fine.”
Well. He was with you now and he wasn’t fine.
Because for once in his life, Rafayel didn’t have enough energy to run laps around you. Just a few minutes outside the hotel, lingering near the grand fountain square framed by towering palm trees that offered scant shade, and he began to deflate pitifully like a garish balloon leaking its vigor into the sweltering air. His usual dynamism, the kind that pulled attention to him as effortlessly as a river carved its path, had dimmed to a sluggish ebb, so much so you found yourself glancing over your shoulder every ten seconds, vigilance heightened by the unsettling absence of his ever-present current. The languid pace like he was moving through molasses made him look like an entirely different person than the one tugging you through the airport with even the luggage excitedly rolling behind him.
And it had been just a single day since you’d set foot in Aridum.
That wasn’t to say the trip had been a disaster or he was in terrible shape — you two were still on day one. Back in Linkon, he was, on paper, enthusiastic about pointing out local landmarks for you to go together like he knew the city personally, but he had quickly lost that energy when it actually came to the execution. You chalked it up to him not being able to get any sleep the previous night because of a mix of jetlag and the discomfort of a new bed, but regardless, it was still concerning to watch him only interested in stopping by street stands where he could buy himself cold water bottles and stand in a shaded corner in order to drink them slowly under shelter, while also dragging you with him, so there wouldn't be even a split-second distance between you two.
You were thankful you didn't have many plans in mind. Rafayel always packed enough enthusiasm for the both of you, but now, as you watched with wide-eyed worry how his spark had suddenly wilted, the drastic shift in his personality left him finding everything he suggested doing utterly unnecessary for the day. On top of that, after only managing to sit still for five minutes or so, it'd become obvious to see that the environment of this city, complete with a sun beating down hot enough to cook you alive, had taken a toll on Rafayel's temperament far more drastically than expected — rendering his eagerness completely sour.
But still, you wanted to cheer him up, you did. It broke your heart seeing someone who brought so much life into every room shrivel down to such a defeated shell. Maybe that's why you couldn't help yourself when you caught him pouting at something on the phone screen as if it'd done him a great offense.
So, you began teasing. “Rafayel, we haven’t even been out for thirty minutes, you're sweating already?"
“No, I’m not.”
“Yes, you are,” you countered, only to squint at his face more closely. “Wait. You’re not?”
He threw his arms out like he was expecting a grander reaction. “Do you know what that means?”
“That you’re a human raisin in the making?”
He groaned, a sound that was more theatrical than pained, but you still caught the edge of frustration in it. “It means I’m seconds away from crumbling into sand. You’ll have to gather me up and carry me home in a jar.”
You started walking towards one of the fountains near some empty seats where shade was available, while he dragged himself behind you like a zombie. "Let's sit you down before you begin to form cracks."
The fountain’s spray misted faintly in the air, enough to make the stone bench beneath feel less like a skillet. Rafayel took extra care positioning himself on one of the seats before collapsing backward, draping one arm over his flushed face.
He took the bottle of yet another ice cold water you fished out from your bag without protest, but his free hand found your wrist and lingered there — light at first, then tighter, like he needed to anchor himself. The unexpected heat radiating from his skin sent a little jolt up your arm. You were about to comment on it, but then he tipped the bottle back and drank, and you swore you could feel the tension in his throat as if it was your own.
When he finished, he let out a breath — not a sigh, just an exhale that sounded heavy, deliberate, sprawling beside you, one leg stretched out, the other bouncing restlessly as he tilted his head back and squinted at the cloudless sky.
“I think I’m dying,” he announced, as if that wasn’t thr fourth time he’d said it today.
After your attention was made aware that he indeed wasn’t sweating by the dry hairline of his, though, the mood to banter had dissipated like a mirage. You began fussing. Was it normal that he didn’t sweat? If a normal person was like this, they needed to be taken to the hospital. However, Rafayel had done nothing but up the ante in complaining, that had to indicate nothing was seriously wrong, right? He’d know his body the best. Right?
“I told you to put on sunscreen this morning. Did you?”
He scoffed, “I don’t need it,” — and you heard the imaginary Lemurian in his tone rolling his eyes at your human expectations.
“Not with that attitude,” you shut him down, already skimming through your bag at an increasingly faster pace. “Now, keep still.”
Finding what you were looking for, you uncapped the bottle, reaching out with one hand to tilt Rafayel’s head left and right to gauge where to start. His skin under the pads of your fingertips felt almost brittle and paper-thin — unnatural on Rafayel, making you unconsciously rub like it was a stain you could get rid of. Without meaning to, you frowned, and he made a soft, lukewarm grumble, nudging your leg with his foot, reminding you what you were doing. Which was fussing over a grown man who should have been responsible from the start and able to take care of himself.
“Show me your forehead,” you said, wanting to get it out the way first.
He obediently carded his bangs back, silent, half-hooded eyes flicking everywhere on your face going ignored as you rubbed sunscreen in and felt what alarmingly was similar to a fever. It was a relief to hear him humming at the feeling, you hoped it would help as you quickly moved to spread the white lotion over his cheeks and smeared a stripe right across the bridge of his nose as he fixed his hair, squinting at your ministrations.
Though, somehow, he looked contented enough that you had to stop him from nuzzling into your hand. “Rafayel, I’m working here.”
All you got was a breathy, “Mmm,” as if he was speaking through the pleasant haze of sleep.
How contradictory of him, as always. For someone constantly grumbling about the unbearable heat, he leaned into every touch with a docility that defied reason — and worse, he initiated them, either molding against you like water taking the shape of the container it was poured into, or his fingers ghosting over your skin as though drawn by instinct. You couldn’t make sense of it. The mere thought of physical contact when the air was this heavy and oppressive made your skin crawl, but he seemed to revel in it. No, thrived on it.
It wasn’t just the way he didn’t flinch — he leaned in harder, his breaths hitching faintly, brow furrowed like he was wrestling with a need he barely understood. You’d swear the heat radiating from your skin would only make it worse, yet he tilted his face into your touch as though your thumbs brushing his cheekbones offered a balm, a strange, cooling relief.
Maybe, he perceived your skin to be indeed cooler than his.
It had to be something unique to his Lemurian physiology. His reactions didn’t make sense otherwise. What human would ever enjoy the sensation of warmth pressed against warmth in such sweltering conditions? And yet here he was, biting back what suspiciously sounded like a placid sigh, while you struggled to reconcile the peculiar contradiction.
“C’mon, don’t let me do all the work,” you muttered, quieter than you intended, the heat and the moment distracting you entirely.
You must have sounded a tad bit worried, because Rafayel didn’t react with his usual playful defiance or the melodramatic sulking he resorted to when things didn’t go his way. Instead, he fell silent, sinking more fully against your side as though he belonged there, and successfully narrowed the angle you were working with. His head tilted slightly, guiding your hand to the sharp line of his jaw with an unspoken invitation, eyelashes fluttering as he blinked, the haze of his voice turning soft and almost vulnerable. You couldn’t even see his face properly from looking at the top of the purple mop of hair blocking you.
"Do my neck too?"
Before you could decide, his hand encircled your wrist. Not tightly — not forcefully — but with a loose, guiding pressure that was maddeningly deliberate. He led your lotion-slicked hand to curve around his throat, the smooth, simmering heat of his skin pressing against your palm.
You hesitated, the instinct to pull away warring with the strange tension settling between you both, but his thumb found the delicate underside of your wrist and began tracing slow, thoughtful patterns that seemed designed to leave you paralyzed. You knew damn well how tenderly and skillfully he handled paintbrushes, and it was evident by the practiced precision of each touch that he was using the same sensibility on you, whether he was fully aware of it or not, which sent a warm burst of blood rising to your cheeks.
Seeming restless, Rafayel sat up straight and finally allowed you a clear view of him. His head tipped further back, exposing more of his neck to your hand, eyes darkened into to a shade of purple that seemed otherworldly in the harsh light of day. They glittered like faceted amethysts film-burned blue around the edges, soaking in every sunlit fleck of your features with a focus that made your chest tighten, like you were being studied with the assessment of the artist Rafayel before another’s painting, his focus unbroken save for the low hum he let slip, soft and unguarded.
You swallowed hard, aware of how exposed you were. The bustling world of Aridum hadn’t stopped turning just because the two of you had stumbled into whatever this was. A bead of sweat rolled down the back of your neck, but it wasn’t just the desert heat making you feel like you were suffocating.
This shouldn’t have been happening. Not here, not now.
Your breath shuddered as you finally regained enough sense to break the silence. "Do it yourself," you murmured, voice uneven as you pressed the bottle of sunscreen into his chest. You looked away, clumsily rubbing your hands on your arms to mask the way they trembled, pretending to rid yourself of excess lotion while wishing desperately to erase the heat radiating off your skin.
Rafayel sighed, a low sound of reluctant acceptance, as he pulled himself upright. His fingers glided over his neck, spreading the sunscreen where you hadn’t, his movements smooth and unaffected as he worked the lotion over his collarbones and along the nape of his neck. The sight was annoyingly graceful, as though he wasn’t feeling the same unbearable tension you were. If you’d have thought of bringing a small electric fan along today, it would have been inches from your face already.
"Maybe we should’ve gone out at night," you said abruptly, grasping for any lifeline to shift the moment’s focus. Your gaze darted to him as he worked, your cheeks burning hotter than the sunlight that baked the streets. "Now I feel bad."
"What for?"
"Making you come along. This must not be very inspiring.”
Rafayel let out an honest-to-goodness laugh. It rolled from his throat so easily and naturally that it seemed even he wasn’t aware of it until the sound tapered off into a quiet chuckle. Shaking his head, he leaned toward you until his temple rested lightly on your shoulder, his gaze unfocused as he stared absently at the fountain ahead. "I’m not giving up time with you just because the sun here wants me dead."
He completely bypassed the part about inspiration, but the sincerity in his words hit you like a splash of cool water on overheated skin. Your shoulders relaxed as you melted into a sigh, letting your head fall atop his, but the sticky warmth made the closeness unbearable almost instantly.
You promptly peeled yourself away with an, "Ugh.” He had already filled his making-you-feel-hot quota for the day, in every sense of the word.
Rafayel straightened just enough to meet your gaze, "That’s how you answer my heroic declaration?" he asked dryly, one brow arched in faux offense.
He didn’t budge, though, even though the heat seemed to bother him more than it did you. The stubborn set of his jaw spoke volumes, and it took a gentle nudge of your elbow to get him to finally sit upright. Even then, he let out a dramatic whine from deep in his chest as if being forced to separate was a personal betrayal.
"You’re lucky I’m rewarding it with mercy," you shot back, brushing a hand through your hair to vent your own rising frustration with the heat. "Come on, let’s head back. I need to get my fishie in the water before he dries up completely."
"But you wanted to see—"
"There’ll be plenty of opportunities in the future," you interrupted with a wave of your hand. "If anything, this was a good lesson about choosing the time we go out more carefully."
To your relief, Rafayel didn’t push back. He rose to his feet with you, though his sluggish movements and the slight downward pull of his lips suggested reluctance. As much as his leaning on you had been irritating in the heat, the sight of his faint frown made your chest tighten, and without thinking, you looped your arm through his and pulled him closer, even though the contact made your already overheated skin feel unbearable. His shoulders straightened slightly at the gesture, but the small crease between his brows didn’t disappear.
"I hear it’s seafood night at the hotel restaurant," you offered, attempting to lift his mood. He was obviously bummed out, but his stubbornness refused to show why outright. It was cute to a degree — childish almost, so endearing you couldn't find it in yourself to grow impatient with him. But you hated seeing him down. "If we head back now, we might snag a rooftop table.”
"Snag? Puh-lease. Worst case scenario, one glimpse of me and I could get us prime seating any time, anywhere," Rafayel scoffed. Still, the corner of his lip twitched upward as if tempted to smile, and you found yourself mirroring the reaction immediately. “And that whole thing would still be less bothersome than you assuming I haven’t secured us a reservation already.”
Later that evening, after dinner on the rooftop, the mix-up with the room service attendant delivering Rafayel’s envelope to your room turned out to be a convenient excuse to check on him. It had been hours since you insisted he take time to rest, and while he promised to settle in and let you know how he felt after freshening up, you hadn’t heard from him since.
You were greeted by the humidity hitting you in the face like a solid wall of rain when the door got opened though, instead of your boyfriend. Thick as fog like it had its own gravity.
Rafayel stood in the doorway, his hair dripping and clinging to his flushed skin in lazy dark purple rivulets, robe loose, the soft fabric blotched dark with water where droplets had slid from his neck and shoulders.
The room behind him radiated a different kind of heat — not the oppressive dryness of the desert, but the heavy, steamy warmth of someone trying to crawl their way back to comfort in the only way they knew how.
He looked better, at least.
The brittle edge that had been clinging to him seemed softened, as if he’d soaked away some of the tension in the beath he’d clearly stepped out of upon you knocking on his door.
Still, the sight of him — damp like a wet cat instead of a fish in his natural environment, robe-clad, the faint sheen of exhaustion still lingering in the way he leaned against the door frame left an odd twist in your chest.
He didn't look any worse for wear than he had earlier in the day when he’d claimed he wanted to spend the rest of his night marinating in ice cold water, and while seeing him not suffering was a relief, you clearly weren't expecting for him to actually mean what he said, even though the water obviously wasn’t ice cold.
The envelope, as it turned out, held a ticket to the memorial hall and an invitation to an art salon gathering hosted by one of his friends. Neither looked to be sparking any interest in Rafayel, however, despite him having come here for as much stimulation as possible for his inspiration.
You understood. It just wasn’t possible when he wasn’t feeling well.
The room itself was telling the entire story, in fact, chaotic in its stillness against the beauty of the floor-to ceiling windows framing the desert skyline in soft, shimmering lights of the city crowned by the full moon hanging proudly above. Papers were scattered across the floor in uneven piles, some curling slightly at the edges where they’d caught the artificial moisture in the air, blank and untouched, and some haphazardly sketched in a way you couldn't even begin to guess what they would become later. A few uncapped pens sat nearby, ink untouched, next to a can of soda that had long since gone warm. It wasn’t hard to guess what he’d been doing — or trying to do — in the hours since you’d left him.
So, you told him to stop forcing himself. Come enjoy the scenery with you.
It was your first instinct, but the words didn’t feel enough. You weren’t an artist, you didn’t know what would be good for the block he was going through. Even though your concern was genuine, you were clumsy at best at consolation.
But, he did lower himself onto the floor beside you anyway, his hands brushing against the scattered papers as he sat and leaned back on his palms. Like this, it was easy to imagine him search for his vision to come to him among the mess as he was attempting to draw, and end up with his gaze drifting out the window instead.
And then, as if he were a tide and the moonlight was pulling him inexorably to shore, he began to open up. Pushed by your mention of watching the view together, he spoke of sceneries. Of what traveling to discover secret corners of nature meant to him before everything changed — before he started creating. About how he used to just look at the world and feel it. Admire it. He didn’t need to do anything with it back then. A sunset was just a sunset, the sea was simply the sea, and neither asked anything of him but to exist alongside them.
Once he began to create, however...
Those discoveries done from a place of pure enjoyment became material, their beauty and pain turned into fuel. The act of looking became an act of taking. Of extracting. He started to see the world not as it was, but as something that could be stripped bare and transformed. A beautiful, bleeding wound. Every sunrise painted became a slice taken from the sun. Every ocean wave he put down on canvas was a handful of ocean lost. He couldn't experience sceneries for themselves anymore without having to to capture and translate them into a demand.
He didn’t look at you while he spoke, but the portrait of his honesty could be interpreted by even the most art-blind.
It was then that he dropped the bomb on you: “If one day, I become someone who only takes from you… If I were like that, would you leave me?”
That question dropped into the space between you like a stone in still water, sending ripples through everything you thought you understood about this moment.
But Rafayel was watching you in a way that made your pulse trip over itself, dissecting every flicker of your expression, like you were sitting in the middle of a high-stakes exam you hadn’t studied for. His fingers splayed on the ground besides yours were mere inches away, but even in that minimal distance, you sensed him drawing further back — a subconscious, reflexive reaction to fear, as if he needed to protect himself by retreating into some remote part of his mind, distant and closed off from the rest of him.
"Oh you silly fishie..." was your immediate response despite the whiplash he'd inflicted upon you, fondness rolling off your tongue easily, folding over itself into a dull ache for the struggle he was going through. "I won't leave you."
Your hand slid towards him, pinky finger crossing over until it brushed against his — gently, giving him ample chance to pull away before you covered his entire hand with your palm.
He was feverish again, despite all attempts made to soothe him, and the urge to smooth the pads of your fingers over his flushed skin, mapping each ridge and freckle that dotted his knuckles, surged forward within you. And you gave in, trying to make up for what you knew words would never be able to express, as you lightly rubbed lines onto the back of his hand.
It seemed to melt something in him, and he eased into your touch. It was an involuntary response to you reaching out for him — he tilted into you like he always did. It only lasted a second or two, however, before you felt him falter; like he noticed the instinctual motion midway, then consciously pushed down the reaction by gripping his thighs in an effort to sit back and avoid leaning in. Your heart dropped a little, confused, and you stole a peek at his face through the corner of your lashes to try to guess what he was thinking about.
What you saw only amplified how wrong everything felt. His features, which normally softened whenever you reached out for him, tightened, pensive. He frowned, holding back — hesitant about something, unreadable except for a subtle unease creeping in around the edges.
Even before he broke the silence, you had the awful premonition that his next words weren't going to be what you hoped to hear.
"Are you sure?" he asked, measured and quiet, and you knew you were right. This was trouble.
You squeezed his hand lightly despite wanting to do the very opposite, reassuringly, "Do you really think I’d stay even a second longer with someone I know is bad for me?"
He remained unresponsive.
“Rafayel?”
You made it about yourself, idiot, you realized.
Instead of acknowledging him and his cue for more reassurance and affirmation, you'd shifted the attention from him to trust in your decision making. You hadn't meant to, you hadn't done it deliberately — but...
Gosh, you were absolutely terrible at this.
So much so that Rafayel being the more emotionally in-tune of the two of you even in his vulnerable state was setting a humiliating new standard for how low you could go.
It was pathetic, really, how utterly you failed to pick up on what should have been an obvious cue. There wasn’t a shred of doubt in your mind that he’d taken your clumsy words as a glaring sign you found his struggles trivial, insignificant compared to your own convenience. All you’d managed to do was shove him deeper into the spiral of insecurities he was already battling.
This was supposed to help him clear his head. All it had achieved so far was adding onto his concerns.
Despite your determination to pour everything you had into assuaging the gnarled knot of his self-doubt, you were woefully unqualified for the task. Unmoored, you floundered blindly through half-finished thoughts, grasping for ways to communicate your feelings — gracelessly, imprecisely — all in hopes of soothing whatever ugly thoughts tangled around your boyfriend's brain like weeds choking the life from fertile soil.
Your stammering words stuck to the roof of your mouth like taffy, thick, unwilling to yield, and suddenly useless, coming out slow as you spoke. “What I mean by that is… My life has been consumed by you. In the best way possible. You made it ito a beautiful, chaotic mess bursting with life. I couldn’t possibly leave you.”
And he heard it — you felt it in the faint shuddering breath he drew as a silent response.
His thumb swiped over your pinky in absent response, stroking soothingly over the thin bones as he stared at your joined hands. His shoulders hadn't relaxed even marginally, but there was still an immeasurable kindness in the gesture.
“Besides, you’re not someone who takes. That’s not true at all. You’re just…”
He looked up then, turning his head to you, a doe-eyed, half-dazed blink breaking past the glassy stare he'd fixed on the empty space in front of him. His hand twitched underneath yours, flexing as he made a questioning noise, wordlessly urging you to elaborate as he invited comfort from your explanation. The way he tilted his head, the corners of his furrowed brows slightly angled upwards — the effect was childlike, innocent almost.
Receptive.
Breaking through your hesitation to touch him lest he shrink away again, you lifted both hands to cradle his cheeks gently, smoothing your thumbs across the high sweep of his cheekbones until his eyelids slid shut.
A soft sigh fell from his parted lips, his body pliant in your grasp as he melted under your fingertips, as if the gesture were more potent than any reassurance you might offer. The climbing tension within your ribcage dissolved with a single exhalation at the sight — helplessly endeared by his sheer willingless to submit to your awkward, inexpressive attempt at consoling. Subtle adoration burned quietly beneath each featherlight caress you placed along the slope of his nose or the soft patches underneath his eyes.
"You're just feeling a little anxious," you continued carefully, brushing a stray piece of damp hair away from his temple. It stuck stubbornly, refusing to let itself be tucked behind his ear before you tried again, gentler this time, hoping to soothe any lingering reservations you hadn't managed to wash away. “That’s probably why you’re overthinking things.”
In the brief silence that followed, anxiety bubbled low in your stomach once more, especially when he seemed to be focusing somewhere on your neck and ignoring looking you in the eye directly. It came as yet another whiplash and a sinking feeling simultaneously when he covered one of your hands with his, tilting his chin to plant a kiss into the centre of your palm as if making up for the withdrawal from earlier.
"What, were you playing tricks on me?" you murmured.
Shaking his head, "A token of my gratitude," he clarified. A gentle huff of laughter slipped past his lips, so faintly that you would've missed it had you not been staring at him with rapt attention in your bewilderment. "For you. Who accepted someone like me."
You frowned, eyebrows immediately drawing close. “Rafayel—”
He leaned in all of a sudden, one of his arms slid behind your back, while the other stretched across in front of you, caging you in with an unnerving ease. Both his hands rested flat against the floor now, framing you on either side like a living barricade. Your own left arm shot down to slap a palm down so you wouldn't topple over on your side. The droplets falling from his damp hair onto your neck was a sharp, sudden cold in comparison to the alarming heat radiating from his body, making you jolt in place as he loomed close enough for his breath to fan across your face.
"You're burning up again," you said weakly, trying and failing spectacularly to disguise your nervousness with indignance as his lips brushed softly against the apple of your cheek before ghosting lower, pausing just beneath your ear, testing for a reaction.
Meanwhile, him taking your hand that was balled up in a fist on the ground to slowly bring it towards his mouth left you frozen and dizzy from the contradictory sensations prickling under your skin.
Rafayel hummed against your wrist in response, dropping light kisses along the ridge of bone connecting your thumb to the rest of your fingers in the interim. It was impossible to ignore how every one of his touches ignited something different within you — the sensation of him painting the length of each finger with tender brushes of his lips and heated exhales sent pulses of liquid warmth flowing through your bloodstream.
The abrupt shift had left you uncertain about many things, chief among which being whether your previous efforts actually sank in at all or not.
Apparently they had.
The combined assault was distracting, but even amidst the whirlwind of thoughts vying for attention, you struggled to fully comprehend just how drastically the moment had veered off course — how your own worry-stricken attempt at appeasing him ended here instead, with your pulse hammering in your ears as he pressed even closer, draping his arm around your waist to turn you sideways until you were nearly sitting on his lap, faces inches apart.
A glimpse hope of maintaining control over the situation arrived in the form of a can toppling over during his handling of you, clattering on the hardwood flooring and startling you enough to snap free of the strange trance Rafayel had ensnared you in during his momentary lapse in focus.
Being so close gave you a good look at the change in him that manifested suddenly; his features visibly hardened as he turned his head at the disturbance, seemingly irritated to have been interrupted midway — a dark glint shone through his lashes before shifting over to you, misty, hazy, indescribable in its raw complexity.
His bathrobe hung loose, the neckline slouched further down one shoulder from having moved so much earlier, displaying more skin than was appropriate, and you weren’t sure if you were imagining the faintest hint of familiar coloration mottling his chest.
Which was dry.
Not only had his skin absorbed all the moisture that clung to it like a sponge after stepping out of the bathroom, there was no hint of perspiration whatsoever — not a bead of sweat lining the ridges of his collarbone or dampening the strands of hair stuck to his forehead.
As if responding to your inner thoughts, he lamented, "As you said, I'm anxious... Well, more like... Restless," before leaning in further to bury his face in the crook of your shoulder. "Ever since I arrived here, I feel..."
His arms encircled your waist, pulling you flush against the expanse of his chest and filling your nose with the scent of bodywash. It was no less than holding a solid block of heat capable of radiating more than enough warmth to replace an actual human furnace. The sheer amount of radiated temperature seemed ridiculous in such conditions, but the way he tried the loosen the already disheveled robe covering his other shoulder despite coiling around you, which had to be the source of the biggest discomfort concerning heat, was even more ridiculous. Shouldn’t he have let go of you before complaining?
"The air feels like it's burning, like there's not enough moisture anywhere. My heart's racing and I feel so miserable," he admitted quietly, muffled in the material of your shirt.
Yeah, you were taking him to a hospital.
This wasn't normal by any means, especially since you were now a hundred percent sure Rafayel couldn't sweat in order to regulate his internal body heat.
How could you let this go on for so long? He had been suffering these symptoms for a whole day now, hiding it all under layers of petulant frustration and overdramatic complaining to escape having to ask for help.
He was always like this. So secretive and reserved about his struggles underneath all the goofiness, especially those directly related to him being a Lemurian.
You put a hand on his burning chest and pushed yourself away to put some distance between the two of you and this moment, ignoring his quiet gasp and the way he clutched your waist. "I'm taking you to a—”
Suddenly, the world spun off its axis, a dizzying blur of motion that ended with your back colliding against the floorboards.
The impact sent a ripple through the room — drawing pens clattering and rolling away, half-sketched papers crumpling beneath you, while others scattered into the air like startled birds, carried by the gust of displaced air.
As you blinked up, trying to shake the daze from your mind, the world sharpened into focus.
The light cascaded over Rafayel like liquid mercury, accentuating every sharp edge and soft curve of his form. His bare legs straddled your hips, knees pressed firmly into the ground on either side of you, pinning you in place with an effortless authority. His hands had found yours in the chaos, and now your wrists were restrained above your head, his long fingers encircling them with a grip that was firm yet somehow shaky.
The bathrobe he wore hung precariously, one shoulder already exposed to the moonlight’s caress while the other threatened to follow suit, the fabric dipping low to reveal a tantalizing V that stretched from his clavicle down to his navel. Tendrils of lilac hair curled lightly downwards with gravity, catching the light from outside, glittering like morning dew against a canvas of violet satin and plopping down onto your face, each impact making you blink. And his face, suffused with a flush so intense that it seemed to glow under the pale lighting, as if all the blood in his body had rushed to stain his fair skin with an undeniable rosy bloom.
The cool floorboards beneath your skin were contrasting harshly with the heat of his touch, and the helpless position left your pulse racing in a way you couldn’t entirely blame on adrenaline.
Rafayel lowered himself until his nose brushed lightly against yours, his breaths shallow and uneven, eyes caught halfway between hazy drowsiness and burning intensity — a vivid shade of sunless plum made darker not by the shadows cast across his features, but a deeply buried and masterfully concealed emotion on the verge of making itself known to you.
To call it desire wouldn't do it justice.
It was something far stronger than fleeting arousal or casual infatuation — you hadn’t been looked at this way before. Weren’t even sure if a man could look at someone like this. There was nothing superficial or mundane about this particular weight. It sought to consume you. To burn you alive, leaving you to crumble into ashes like incense offered up to a deity. And the worst part? You had no idea what exactly you were being consumed by, or why.
All of this, because you had merely wanted to—
“No. I’m not going anywhere,” he hissed as if sensing your plan, breath dragging along the edge of your ear. "I'm just... restless.”
But—
“In every sense of the word.”
Oh?
Your mind reeled, dizzy from the intoxicating cocktail flooding your senses — from his breaths washing over the side of your neck, to the overwhelming sensation of Rafayel on the verge of draping over you like a living brand, hot and firm, trapping you in place.
"Especially when you're by my side," he purred.
Oh.
He pulled back to stare you down, heavy-lidded and glinting like knives honed razor sharp, yet somehow tender in his approach. If anything, it served only to accentuate the danger of whatever it was simmering below the surface. This was different than his Ebb Day state, but similar enough in its intent to be instantly recognizable — especially since it bore all the marks of the manic rush he fell victim to when succumbing to the lure of his instincts.
It was something primal in you that scattered your thought process into oblivion and made you look away instinctively, averting your attention toward the window off to your left — but the sparkling view of night time in Aridum was soon curtained by a flash of Rafayel's hand as he cupped the side of your face in one smooth motion.
The slight roughness of the pad of his thumb brushed along your cheekbone until his fingers sank into your hair, fanned along the outer edge of your ear, and turned you back to face him. The gesture felt proprietary, like he wanted to make certain he'd captured every last scrap of your undivided attention, like it physically hurt to allow even the smallest opportunity for you to withdraw and escape his grasp.
“Rafayel,” you forced your common sense to come out of its hiding place. “I don’t think—”
"But even so, I can't let you go. I don't want to," he breathed against your lips, punctuating his command with an achingly slow drag of his nose tracing yours. The contact made something molten unfurl in your belly, warm and sticky-slick and pooling in the hollow space below your navel, curling its tendrils through your veins like sweet, syrupy nectar. "What should I do?"
It would be easier than breathing to surrender and give him whatever he was asking for, but... but...
It felt wrong when he was so distressingly hot to the touch, not to mention you couldn't shake off the feeling he was doing his best to distract you from your worry by acting more brazenly suggestive than you'd ever seen him be before.
"You should rest, I don't think you'll enjoy getting worked up in your current condition—"
Your efforts were derailed with the subtle scrape of chapped lips running up the slope of your neck and a bite into the fleshy part below your ear as punishment for daring to answer his plea with platitude.
A shudder shook your frame, nerves firing off confused messages in quick succession throughout your brain, half demanding the sudden pressure recede and half urging more from the tingling heat. Your hand flew to grip his bare shoulder, fingers digging in until the tight bunch of muscle strained beneath his fevered skin — not enough to stop his ministrations, but enough to serve as a weak deterrent.
"Such lovely lips, spinning such pretty excuses," Rafayel huffed, drawing back and sweeping his thumb across your chin with gentle disapproval. "When we both know you don't want me to let you go either."
The words trailed off into something softer, tender, almost wistful, and were followed by the pad of his finger slipping past your parted lips, stroking along the underside of your tongue before drawing back and skimming across the wet patch he'd left glistening upon your bottom lip. As if magnetized, his smoldering stare followed, entranced by the minute trembling of your mouth, darting occasionally upward to capture your own hooded eyes at the sudden boldness of his gesture. He licked his own lips slowly as if thirsty, mirroring the same lazy stroke he'd used against your mouth, allowing you to take your fill of the sight.
No.
Before you could fall into his enticing trap again, your palm pressed firmly against Rafayel's chest until he eased back obediently, giving you space to rise, every single sensation previously pink at the edges quickly melting into clarity about taking care of him properly.
"This isn't the right time," you insisted breathlessly once you managed to catch your breath and speak, steadfast with the strain of iron will alone — pushing forward when your mind threatened to wander where his moistened lips had been just seconds before.
The mood was quickly dispelling, much to Rafayel's clear irritation, judging by the petulant slouch of his shoulders. You emphasized your point by putting your hands on his forehead, cheeks, neck, every patch of skin you could reach, the clear intent of medical examination being communicated silently until he relented with a dramatic sigh, turning his face upwards to expose more of his throat as if giving permission.
"It's fine," he groused reluctantly, although his grumbling somewhat relenting in volume under your gentle inspection. "I'm not dying."
"That's the opposite of what you said earlier today. Are you sure you don't want—"
His hands closed firmly around your wrists, tugging you off gently before you could finish speaking. "It's really not that bad.”
You’d be more convinced if he'd just told you about how miserable he was feeling.
"Is it a Lemurian condition?" You frowned up at him, taking note of how carefully he cradled your hands in his palms, stroking the insides of your wrists. "If it's making you feel awful, shouldn't we see someone about it?"
Rafayel tilted his head at you with a peculiar sort of fondness written across his features. It was difficult to identify what precisely made his smile curve upward into something distinctly knowing, yet warm — something infinitely affectionate yet impossible to quantify.
"Already doing that," he answered cryptically, tilting forward until he met your forehead with his own, nuzzling into the creased spot directly between your brows, eyelashes fluttering shut.
Ugh, this man.
"Do you know for a fact if you'll be okay?" you asked as delicately as possible without sounding too overbearing. That would definitely push Rafayel closer to defensive territory again and have him brush off any attempt at assistance, or even conversation, so you needed to walk the tightrope of concern while still keeping it mild enough for him not to clam up. "This trip still has a few more days left. What if you don't get better?"
The corner of his mouth twitched faintly with a ghost of a smile, perhaps pleased by your attentiveness —— "I enjoy this kind of concern."
—— which was starting to irritate you a little. "Well, I don't. Seeing you suffer and not doing anything isn't enjoyable."
He had the audacity to grin at that, broad enough to crinkle the corners of his eyes as he ducked his head coyly before turning it sharply to brush the tip of his nose against the shell of your ear and murmuring, "Not enjoying seeing me suffering does imply some enjoyment in seeing me otherwise."
"Rafayel!" You snapped finally, jerking out of his embrace with exasperated incredulity, only to meet an unrepentant smile waiting for you beyond your escape. He wasn't deterred whatsoever, which was a little unnerving.
Or rather, the rapid shift to your own pent-up restlessness was about to become in the next two days.
The limbo between then and the memorial hall day unfolded in a whirlwind of contradictions, each more puzzling than the last — starting from the abrupt ending to your interlude in front of the window, where he suddenly pulled back without any warning at all, leaving you cold and stunned with the excuse that he wanted to go to sleep, subsequently kicking you out of his hotel room as if possessed by a demonic force capable of inducing selective amnesia.
Like he wasn’t asking to fold you in half like a laptop mere moments ago.
The result was you forcing mandatory house rest until the day of the memorial hall visit came, settling awkwardly between coddling and hovering — a weird blend of fussing over his health like a mother hen and trying desperately not to make him feel infantilized as a result of said fussing.
All of that only ended with him either clinging close or deliberately distancing himself in confusing waves that seemed to occur at random intervals with little rhyme or reason.
It was simultaneously bewildering and heartbreaking. You had no idea how to react when he gave you zero insight into his thoughts and behaviors unless coaxed open, and even then, his answers were cryptic.
(So much for enjoying your concern.)
Really, this was your fault.
Maybe you shouldn't have pushed. But you worried.
Especially when he was dismissive like that despite being openly going through something other than a fever and a creative block, made worse by his inability to leave the hotel due to the hostile environment. Both of which you could do nothing to help with.
He would sit at the edge of the bed, his sketchbook propped open but untouched, pencil hovering above the page as though waiting for some divine spark that refused to come. At times, he’d stand by the window, reminding you of a cat sitting by its food dish for its owner to fill it with dinner, paw swiping irritatingly at its empty confines. Then, just as abruptly, he’d abandon his spot to sprawl across your lap instead while you were busy with paperwork online, one arm draped loosely over his stomach as he stared blankly at the ceiling in defeat, and demanding you play with his hair.
Then, some time later, it was back to deciding being near you was unbearable, pulling away entirely whenever you reached out for reassurance, no matter how casual or friendly your intentions, retreating back into his personal bubble to focus on attempting to get something on paper mindlessly, pages fluttering with restless action, crumpling here and there under the rough treatment before being smoothed out hastily.
The cycle continued nonstop. Restlessness, fatigue, clinginess, building you up while you didn't let it show because time and place, solitude, then back again — you never knew what Rafayel's whimsies were going to bring, and the uncertainty of it wore you thin, fraying your already wan nerves.
The humidifier was a desperate, last-ditch effort, the kind born out of sheer frustration and the kind of exhaustion that makes rationality optional.
You’d bought it from a small local shop at the crack of dawn, spurred on by the memory of walking into Rafayel’s suite only hours before, where he’d bullied the hotel staff into delivering two oversized sacks of ice — each roughly the size of a small child — and ordered them to be dumped unceremoniously into his bathtub.
At 3 AM. In the dead of night.
By the time you returned and set it up, the machine had barely begun spitting out its first gentle stream of cool mist before Rafayel sat down beside it, legs folded beneath him like a solemn monk meditating in front of some sacred relic. His quiet intensity as he stared at the thing made you wonder if he was grateful, resentful, or some combination of both — because with Rafayel, it was never as simple as one emotion at a time.
Still, the day turned out to be noticeably easier on him, and for the first time in what felt like forever, you allowed yourself to believe that maybe, just maybe, the worst had passed.
He still looked like death warmed over, often pink on the face and worn, but at least he wasn’t on the brink of staging another late-night ice-bag heist.
He even tolerated your awkward attempts to distract him, accepting your offerings of snacks, endless glasses of ice water, iced tea, whatever cold beverages you could scrounge up, and a marathon of that one TV show the two of you had been meaning to watch together.
And, of course, there was the doting.
So much doting.
Which was rare for you.
You were not, by any stretch of the imagination, the kind of person who showered people with attention. You weren’t the mom friend. You didn’t hover. But something about Rafayel in this state, rightfully whiny, subdued, far too fragile for your liking, made you want to roll him over in bubble wrap and shove him in your pocket to keep him safe from everything.
In some ways, you were more anxious than he was.
The helplessness swung at you like you were a tree and it was an axe, the inability to snap your fingers and fix him, to just make it better was torture. Worrying felt inevitable, but useless. And the not knowing what to do with yourself in between bouts of fretting? That was worse. Still, he wasn’t showing any signs of further deterioration, which felt like a victory you didn’t want to jinx.
You were so relieved you briefly considered leaving all your savings to the shop clerk who’d sold you the overpriced humidifier. She had probably thought you’d lost your mind, judging by the way you thanked her like she’d just handed you a ticket to salvation, practically singing her praises as she rang up your purchase. And honestly, if you could go back in time, you would’ve thanked her even more profusely.
Because it worked. Rafayel was better — well, better-ish. Better enough that you decided it was safe to move forward with the plan to visit the memorial hall.
Which, eventually, became a visit to the ocean.
An ocean.
In the middle of a desert.
The sheer impossibility of it left you breathless, like you were standing at the edge of a fever dream made real. The water stretched out endlessly, shimmering beneath the brutal sun, and you couldn’t stop marveling at the sheer absurdity of it — a body of water so vast, so alive, nestled in a place it had no right to be. It felt like a miracle.
It was a miracle.
And just when you thought the desert couldn’t surprise you further, the skies proved you wrong soon enough later, crowning the experience with snowfall at the end of the trip. Snow, delicate and silent, drifting from the sky like a benediction.
You couldn’t help but marvel at it all — at how the world had managed to gift you two impossibilities in the span of a single day. It felt like the desert itself was defying logic, bending over backward to offer something beautiful, something extraordinary, as though it wanted to prove it wasn’t all hardship and sunburnt misery.
But Rafayel stood by the edge of the ocean with a look that made your chest ache — a look that spoke not of wonder, but of mourning. To you, it was a miracle, but to him, it was a tragedy: a dying ocean trapped in a place it could no longer thrive, its very existence a reminder of something slipping away. An everlasting eulogy engraved into reality.
He didn’t look away from the canvas of pain he had set up and started painting for himself until you voiced all of what you thought out loud for him to see.
And this time, you truly felt like you had broken through — like you’d reached him in a way that mattered.
It was there, in that rare, fragile moment, that Rafayel dove straight through your hesitation, sidestepping the awkward pauses you were fumbling with, and pulled you into an embrace before you even had the courage to ask if you could. It was as though he had heard the unspoken thought aloud, plucking it out of the air with startling precision.
And then he’d confessed — softly, almost too softly — that at the time, he had wanted to come here before, with the most important person in his life.
Those words lodged themselves in your chest, a bittersweet ache blooming alongside the unmistakable joy bubbling up within you. You hugged him back as tightly as you could, pouring all the gratitude you didn’t know how to put into words into that one simple gesture. Gratitude for trusting you enough to share that. Gratitude for showing you yet another new side of himself, something unguarded and rare. A treat, indeed, one you hadn’t expected but cherished all the same.
Relief flooded through you, so potent it felt like a physical weight lifting from your shoulders. You hadn’t even realized how tense you’d been until that moment. Your body relaxed, and with that relaxation came fatigue, the kind that crept up on you and left no room for resistance. Before you knew it, you had fallen asleep during the entire way back, lulled into a rare sense of peace you hadn’t felt in days.
And yet.
Like clockwork, he withdrew the instant you arrived back at the hotel.
Rafayel never thought he’d truly understand what it meant to drown.
As a creature of the sea, he wasn't meant to in the first place.
Not until you.
The realization had hit him like a storm breaking over still waters — not all at once, but in slow, rumbling waves that built. He didn’t even feel himself breaking; it was more like a slow erosion, the kind that wears stone into sand. Quiet, but irreversible. Your optimism. Your touches. Your encouragement. Inching in and in and in one step at a time.
(It was snowing in the desert.)
He had been holding himself together in the driver's seat, hands knotted around the steering wheel and knuckles bloodless with how tightly he gripped. Every inch of him vibrated with anxiety, away from where you lay fast asleep beside him, breathing shallow and uneven like he was afraid of exhaling too loudly. But there you were, oblivious, asleep, your head leaning softly against the window as if his world hadn’t collapsed in on itself.
(It was snowing in the desert.)
It wasn’t the desert heat that was killing him, though it might as well have been. (Everything about this place grated against him — the air, the dry scrape of his skin, the silence of the fading ocean that was too vast to be comforting. Too big. Too empty. Fading. Fading. A warning from cities away that this land was no place for a creature like him.) He wasn’t meant for this — for the cracked earth and the relentless sun and the suffocating absence of water. His body ached for moisture, for the cool, familiar embrace of the sea, but it ached even more for you. (He didn’t even realize how long he had been watching you from the corner of his peripheral vision — how long he had been unraveling, thread by thread.)
You’d tilted his world off its axis, turned everything he thought he knew into something unrecognizable. Once, pain had been his anchor. It was always there—constant, unyielding, something he could hold on to when nothing else made sense. It had driven him, fueled him, given him purpose when nothing else could. He had sought it out like a man dying of thirst seeks a mirage, and it had never failed him. Pain was constant. Pain was reliable. Pain was everything. Inside. Outside. It was all he had ever known, and it had kept him alive — fed the anger that gnashed his insides with teeth and claws, soothed the beast that prowled just under his skin, tempered the instinct that drove him relentlessly onward. Toward destruction. Towards home.
He had used it as a shield, as armor, as the whip he wielded against those who dared to clip the tails of his people. A weapon. A tool. A brush.
And then there was you (who he'd willingly sought out, angry and grieving and resentful and hurt.)
You, who didn’t fit into his carefully crafted world of suffering and art and revenge. You, who had made him forget (as easily as you forgot him) what it felt like to hurt, to ache, to yearn for something greater than himself. To hate. To see others bleed while his fingers flew across canvas after canvas, leaving only beauty in their wake — only soaring wings, only gleaming scales, only flowing water, only living fire, only reaching skies, only rushing wind, only rising floods...
Only you.
(It was snowing in the desert.)
Except now, he did yearn. He yearned in a way that was foreign and unbearable, in a way that felt like drowning — not in water, but in light, in warmth, in the overwhelming weight of wanting something too much. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair that he wanted you this much — needed you this much — when he didn’t even know who he was without all the hurt and hatred inside. It wasn’t fair that he felt something hot and ugly churning under his skin whenever you smiled up at him in admiration, filling his stomach with lead until he thought he might collapse beneath its heaviness. It wasn't fair that there were times when he thought it might actually be better not to have met you again at all.
(That thought filled him with dread so immense it threatened to crush the breath from his lungs; the possibility of having spent his entire life stumbling aimlessly through darkness towards a destination he was no longer sure even existed — )
He watched you sleep, the rhythm of your breathing steady and unbothered.
His gaze lingered on your hands, resting loosely in your lap, fingers twitching faintly as if even in sleep, you were reaching for something. (Reaching for him?) He wanted to take them in his own, to press them to his lips, to hold on so tightly he’d never have to let go. But he couldn’t. (He wouldn’t.)
Because the moment he did, he knew he’d lose whatever fragile standing he had left.
(“Isn’t it a surprise that there’s an ocean in the desert?”)
His thoughts spiraled, looping back on themselves in a tangle of contradictions that refused to resolve; questions without answers, fears without resolutions. What had he become, to need you like this? To depend on you like this? To depend on you so completely that even the idea of your absence felt like the loss of something vital — something essential — an emptiness he wasn't prepared to face.
(What must you think of him? Did you even know what you did to him? What would you think of him?)
He had told himself he could manage it, that he could stay close enough to feel your warmth but far enough not to burn. But that was a lie, wasn’t it? He was already burning. He had been burning since the moment he met you. An addictive pain — the kind that made him ache for more even as it seared him from the inside out.
And before he knew it, the car was parked beside the hotel entrance around the far corner of the garden, and Rafayel didn’t remember driving there at all.
He blinked, confused for a moment as to how exactly he had managed to pilot the vehicle, when you stirred quietly in the passenger seat, drawing his attention like a moth to flame.
You groaned softly, eyelids fluttering, but remained firmly locked within slumber's grip as he unbuckled your seatbelt for you, as gently as if he were handling fine china. Your head leaned sideways against the headrest and faced him, slack and soft with sleep. His fingers twitched around the plastic buckle, curling into a fist until he thought they might cramp under the strain.
He leaned forward, forehead coming to contact with the cool leather surface of the steering wheel, squeezing his eyes shut tight enough to blot out your presence entirely.
There was too much to process — too many feelings, thoughts, sensations threatening to overwhelm him if he looked directly at them, instead swirling through his head like debris caught in a vortex, invisible yet disorienting nonetheless.
But they all blipped out of existence the moment he turned his head around, following the impulse to look.
(“Isn’t it a surprise that there’s an ocean in the desert?”)
The urge struck Rafayel with all the force of a lightning bolt — bright, sudden, unavoidable — and suddenly the knuckles of his fingers were sliding across your cheek, feather-light in gentle arcs along the arch of your cheek, savoring every inch of satin flesh as it shifted beneath his caress.
The sensation of touch buzzed pleasantly underneath his skin previously starved, reveling in the sweetness of contact after so many days of withdrawal.
The artificial light coming from outside bathed your sleeping form in a glow that cascaded like a gentle waterfall, chiaroscuro shadows casting angles upon your features, emphasizing every line and curve, and for a long time, all he could do was stare. He could feel your breath against the tips of his nails, warm puffs of moist exhales against his calloused flesh, and found himself fixating on the gentle undulation of your chest as you breathed — unconsciously, mindlessly unaware of what such a simple act did to him.
The memory of your voice echoed in his mind, soft and certain, cutting through the chaos like a beam of light.
"Isn’t it a surprise that there’s an ocean in the desert?"
You had a way of reframing everything, of taking the pieces of his broken world and rearranging them into something that almost looked like hope. (He hated it. He loved it. He hated that he loved it.) It wasn’t fair. None of it was fair.
You hadn’t asked to become such an integral part of his existence — so intrinsic and fundamental and irreplaceable. Yet somehow, here you were. Here he was. The absence of water, the grief of it. The grief of what it meant to lose something so essential, so intrinsic, that one didn’t know how to live without it. And that grief had found a new home in you. You, who had become his ocean, his escape, the source of every ache in his chest and joy in his heart.
(Isn't it a surprise that there's an ocean in the desert? Isn't it a surprise you're the muse calling to him and not the muffled, fading cries of the dying ocean in pain, not the skeletal remains of an era he'd never get back?)
He gazed, and gazed, and gazed, drinking you in like a thirsty man lost in a sea of golden sands, watching the subtle play of lights over the curves of your face — the delicate angle of your chin, the arch of your nose, the graceful slope of your neck as it curved into collarbone and shoulder — memorizing every detail he could, without the pressure of having to wrench himself back before he drowned in your wake, without the need to pretend to your face he was anything less than desperate to be with you all day, every day, in every way possible. And that the sound of your voice in his ears was enough to get the paintbrush running across paper from the sheer momentum of his imagination.
But he couldn't keep going like this.
Somehow, somewhen, between the start of your journey and now, this thing had begun shifting irrevocably past his ability to contain it any longer. Had grown exponentially until it seemed to dwarf his capacity to handle it. All it would take was being away from you for a mere few hours to bring him to a level of misery that was honestly embarrassing.
And you had no idea.
No idea that orbiting around him in these past few days like a second moon had only served to exacerbate the foul joy of watching you fawn over him.
It made him sick to his stomach to admit it, but soaking in the knowledge (in his soul, through the bond) that you cared so deeply for him went straight to his head like some drug he hadn't realized he needed.
It felt so despairingly good that he would wrap himself around you like a vine climbing towards sunlight if he could for the rest of his days, absorbing your rays of affection like photosynthesis... or a parasite.
(Was he being punished by the sea that this love was eclipsing his fury and vengeance? Or rewarded that he held both equally in his grasp despite how terribly wrong it felt at times? Regardless, his inspiration was the punchline, once only capable of singing into the canvas elegies of lament and sorrow, now composed ballads and odes that poured out effortlessly.)
You would hate him if you ever found out just how perversely his emotions swung in every direction; so high one moment that the ecstasy of relief nearly shattered his reserve of control, and so low the next that he feared he'd choke to death from the guilt that clawed up the back of his throat like a strangled animal's cry for mercy.
This entire ordeal had flipped the script completely — instead of keeping you at arm's length as he normally did (regarding… everything), Rafayel now clung onto you desperately like Tantalus to a branch of fruit he’d finally gotten a grasp of, and what if he was exposed? The question rose like bile in his mouth whenever he began slipping.
“I won't leave you.”
Liar, his grudge wanted to answer.
It remembered. It never forgot. It told him you'd flee and never look back if he let a sliver of this dependency that bound him tighter to you with each passing day slip out from his fingertips — if he allowed you even the tiniest insight into the strange workings of his head and his heart.
Because you didn’t understand. You couldn’t. You had no idea what you were talking about when you told him you wouldn’t leave. How could you, when you didn’t know the depths of what you were promising to stay for? You didn’t know the true nature of Lemurian love, its ferocity, its weight, its cost. The all-consuming, all-encompassing reality of it — how they loved as if it was the only thing tethering them to existence itself. How they lived for it, how they died for it. How he had been dying for it.
If you saw it — if you saw him — you would run. He knew you would. Because if he laid bare just how much he depended on you, how much of his breath, his will, his very being hinged on you, you’d be overwhelmed. You’d leave.
Why else would he be tearing himself apart like this? Miserably trying to wean himself off you, forcing himself to let go only to grasp harder each time he felt you’d finally come to hate him and slip away?
He didn't know how long he sat there in silence.
Just a bit longer, he would keep watching you with these feelings out in the open. Just a little bit longer. He couldn’t bear to wake you up.
By the time you stirred, groggy and disoriented but blissfully unsuspecting, it felt as though several eternities had passed in the span of minutes, and he had to struggle with all the strength of a raging current to force himself back into this skin of his that felt too tight and suffocating around him.
But, still resting his temple against the steering wheel with an arm slung on top of it and another hanging lazily at his side, feigning ease, nothing betrayed his inner turmoil.
He watched quietly as you slowly regained your bearings, resisting the temptation to reach out and brush aside that one piece of hair out of place on your head, letting you find the words first.
(So adorable. So endearing.)
(It was not only snowing in his desert. There was also an ocean in there.)
"Rafayel..?"
"Yeah?"
"How long was I asleep?" You blinked at him blearily, one hand lifting to rub the lingering tiredness from your eyelids as you peer into the darkness of night beyond his silhouette. "Why didn't you wake me up?"
Everything he'd been thinking about vaporized and left behind nothing but softness, so tender it scared him; it seeped into the spaces in his heart left vacant and curled inside them, filling every corner, until it made the next smile he offered you come free of burden. "You were sleeping so well, cutie. I didn't want to disturb you."
The unconscious put of your lips and the way that strand of hair bounced around when you slid down your seat a little had him leaning in before he knew what he was doing, smoothing the unruly thing, fingertips betraying him by skating across the outer edge of your ear while he watched you tilt your cheek instinctively.
His body warmed immediately, gravitating towards you in a half-hug that kept you cradled close to the side of his frame as he nuzzled into your hair above your temple with a hum, dipping his nose deeper into the crown of your head near where your neck curved gracefully upwards before inhaling deep — greedy, thirsty, like he’d die if he couldn’t seep up all the scent of you.
Your breathing hitched a bit, and that’s what halted him right at the corner of your mouth with a sharp exhale — he couldn’t be doing this, he was just thinking about how he needed to pull back and —
Art salon.
Yeah, the art salon gathering.
He was supposed to be on his way to there like yesterday.
If only his body didn’t move like a most willing pupped tethered by strings to yours and refused to walk away whenever he tried.
“…Rafayel?”
It suddenly hotter in this car like a tide pool at noon. So stiflingly hot he was breathing fire even with the snowy weather outside. So unbearable the deepest V-cut known to mankind that had his whole chest out for the world to ogle did nothing to help.
He could… He could skip.
Yeah, he needed this. It had been literal days of non-stop withdrawal and a push-and-pull of his frustration that you wouldn’t touch him (because oh noo, he was sick — which, he wasn’t!) and stubbornness to not let you touch him. He’d gotten to a point that he was drunk off your scent alone and he couldn’t keep doing this forever, and why should he? Why did it matter about this event at all? Who cared — who cared about some stupid gathering? He wasn’t functioning anyways until he—
Stop. He had to stop. He was already so late.
He imagined catching himself by the scruff of his neck and yanking himself back to the driver's seat, within safe borders. Far away from your mesmerizing lips and wandering eyes and cute squirming in your seat under the thin cover of innocence.
And pulling away and practically fusing with the car door was exactly what he did.
He needed to prove to himself, just this once, that he could function without the constant reassurance of your presence — that he wasn’t helplessly anchored to you, no matter how much the pull of your moon whispered otherwise.
He had to dilute himself. This — and his inspiration problem, involving you or not, was his to figure out. And he had to figure it out if he wanted you to stay by his side.
"...Do you wanna go back to your room first?" he heard himself ask you quietly.
"You're not coming with me?" The tiny furrow of worry between your brows spoke volumes about your confusion, and despite wanting to reach out and smooth it away, to wipe every ounce of uncertainty from your face with a tender kiss, Rafayel clenched his fingers around the door handle of the vehicle until they cramped, his heart aching strangely inside his chest as you stared quizzically at him.
He brought out the invitation that came with the memorial hall ticket, waving it a little with little to no enthusiasm, "I still have to attend my friend's art salon thing."
The way your shoulders deflated and face dropped at the mention made him waver in — not enough to follow through with ditching the whole thing, but certainly making his resolve weak enough to crack like glass under pressure. "But you don't look well. You need to rest."
How could someone manage to resist getting spoiled like this, he thought miserably as he closed his eyes while you continued fussing, peering worriedly up into his face with the cutest scrunch to your forehead, palms searching along his cheeks heat before trailing down the length of his arms, and he wanted nothing more than to give in to that impulse of being coddled to bits by your hands alone.
He was a weak man.
You nearly lifted off the passenger seat and fell into his lap the way he embraced you, his arms coiling around you like kelp around a rock, holding fast as though you might slip away with the wind. His face buried into the crook of your neck, breath warm and uneven against your skin, his grip snug yet teetering on the edge of too much — like he didn’t trust himself to let go. There was a desperation in the way his hands trembled slightly, his fingers pressing into your sides, not hard enough to hurt but enough to leave the faintest impression of how badly he needed this. When your pained whine broke through, it was like snapping a thread, he instantly loosened his hold, guilt washing over his features as he pulled back just enough to make room for you to breathe. But he stayed close, his forehead dipping to rest against your shoulder as a heavy sigh rumbled deep from his chest, raw and apologetic. You leaned heavily into him, your fingers threading into his hair in a gesture that should have comforted him, but instead left him drowning deeper in the tangled sea of his emotions.
"See? You're burning up again," you mumbled as your cool lips grazed his temple in a comforting kiss. He was no better than a child. He knew it. And he hated how much he basked in your coddling, reveled in the unspoken message behind your words: Don't hide it. Tell me when you hurt. I care. "Maybe we can go together? Will you feel okay if I'm there?"
He would. He would feel more than okay, because that's what made him function.
But he couldn't keep being like this.
"Do you wanna turn me into a sea creature beached on the sand after the ocean recedes," he whispered, mostly kidding except not really, hiding in the dip of your neck just below your ear, hand tracing absent shapes into the small of your back above your tailbone. "Unable to breathe on my own, waiting helplessly for your tide's return?"
Your fingers stroking through his hair slowed, then stilled entirely at the edge of his nape. You pulled back only far enough to meet his lowered stare, confusion dancing within your own, bright and clear and genuine. You had no inkling of what was going on with him, and he didn’t want you to find out either. He would be fine. He was going to handle it.
"Don't you trust me?" Rafayel said. "How about we make a promise? I promise... I'll be okay without you tonight."
It hurt to lie to you so directly, but seeing your doubt dissolve to appease him helped soothe that sting considerably. (Even if it felt a little too convenient to rely on such flimsy methods.) You nodded, seeming convinced in spite of yourself, and his stance firmed — strengthened with your faith and affirmation alike, like he'd just taken a double shot of espresso. He would be okay. He wasn't going to keep imposing his feelings upon you even if a part of him desperately yearned to, no matter how difficult the prospect seemed.
(Say no, a small part of him whispered traitorously, selfishly, insistently. Ask me to stay. You know I can't say no to you, he wanted to plead. Needed to be affirmed once more, reassured that he was welcome to indulge, to remain, to lean into the comfort you offered freely.)
"Okay..." you echoed uncertainly, but gave him another soft smile — tentative yet warm, gentle encouragement. He watched quietly as your expressions shifted in quick succession, cycling through shades of hesitation and worry before settling on resignation. You nodded again, firmer this time, seemingly steeling yourself against whatever doubts you harbored. He wanted to kiss it all away.
But instead, he gently pushed you back, sinking further into his seat, looking out the view beyond the windshield to gather his wits against the force that was your presence beside him.
"You can head back," he repeated, not turning to meet your searching stare. "I can handle it."
The art salon had an air of cultivated elegance, grandiosity reflecting into soaring ceilings and walls adorned with curated artworks, with conversations floating in fragmented pieces, the occasional laughter punctuating the steady hum of "cultured" discourse — all the while Rafayel stood at the periphery, his posture consciously maintained with the kind of deliberate nonchalance that masked a profound discomfort, one hand buried in his pant pockets and the other holding a flute glass of champagne, ghosting the suffocating room with an expression of aloof disdain, attention drifting from painting to painting without ever settling. Humans circled him like murmuring specters, their faces a study in muted curiosity and empty civility. He loathed their presence. (Yet, here he was.)
The room's overwhelming sensory overload grated against his composure — cloying mingling of varnish and wine, sharply polished sheen of curated lighting, artifice of smiles that never reached their eyes...
He should leave. (No, he had to stay.)
The dichotomy was a pendulum swinging between contempt and an unspoken compulsion to endure. He’d insisted he didn’t need you here, insisted on proving — to himself as much as to you — that he could function without your constant presence. But the more he replayed his own words in his mind, the more it was obvious the joke was on him.
He rolled his eyes as an overly enthusiastic laugh erupted nearby, a sound sharp enough to pinprick through his already thinning out patience. His hand twitched in his pocket, the movement a reflexive manifestation of his barely-contained frustration.
(Focus.)
The art, exquisite as it was, did little to distract him as the chatter blurred into a meaningless drone, the edges of the room constricting him under the weight of pretense.
And then. The tug.
At first, it was delicate — an unsuspecting tremor sifting through his awareness, like the faintest ripple across an otherwise still surface that he thought he was imagining and hoping this was you. But it swelled rapidly, a deluge of sensations sweeping him off his feet towards your pull with a force that left his breath stuttering and the floor wavering beneath, erupting into vivid, agonizing clarity.
His lips tingled, a ghostly imprint of a kiss not yet given.
Heat bloomed under his skin, first at the base of his throat, spreading like a slow, insidious current. The faintest pressure, then, at his collarbone, radiating outward, like silk dragging over sensitive skin, a tingling warmth that prickled and spread, until it seemed to rewrite the very contours of his form, leaving him trembling with phantom caresses that lingered far too long to ignore.
He could feel the press of your palms against his chest, the drag of your nails over the planes of his stomach, each sensation so precise it made his breath catch, and the ache in his hands mirrored the way you gripped at yourself. Every brush of your hand — every hurried, seeking stroke — burned through him like smoldering embers, and he swore he could hear the faintest hitch of your breath, feel the tremor in your thighs.
A siren song of need that echoed his own, calling him under, drowning him in you.
Come to me, come to me, stay with me.
His breath hitched with the oxygen turning into lava-hot needle prickling in his lungs, his legs going limp as noodles and giving way. He collapsed into the nearest chair with a jarring lack of control, the motion abrupt, almost violent.
One hand clamped onto the edge of the table as he hastily discarded the champagne glass to cover where the bond was glowing, fingers digging into the wood as if it were the only thing keeping him from being swept away.
A single candle at the table’s center responded instead of Rafayel, its once languid, uninterested flame quivering violently, and then erupting into an erratic flare, a burst of light so sharp and sudden it cut through the room like a gasp. The activity drew murmurs from those nearby, heads turning, eyes widening as the flame seemed to writhe with a life of its own as wax spilled over the edges of its holder, dripping down in frantic rivulets, glistening like molten gold beneath the trembling glow.
"Hey, Rafayel, man, you good?"
A hand on his shoulder made him flinch violently and slap it away, the contact snapping him partway out of his spiraling thoughts. "Don't."
He was already rising, the chair scraping noisily against the floor as he pushed himself upright with a force that bordered on frenetic. The friend stood as well, confusion clear, but Rafayel didn’t wait to explain — with a curt shake of his head, he turned on his heel and strode toward the exit, leaving the other man standing there with his hand half-raised, a bewildered, "Hey, where are you going, come back!" hanging unanswered in the air.
The murmurs of those left behind — curious stares, the faint scrape of chairs and clothes ruffling — faded into irrelevance, they barely even registered. The bond burned like a tether, yanking him back to you, and he had neither the strength nor the desire to disobey.
By the time he reached the cool air of the night outside, he was seething. He had heard you loud and clear.
You merciless, cruel, horrible witch of a woman, punishing him with your sweet truth in an act so loving yet selfish, selfless yet entirely possessive, driving him completely to his wit's end until the only remaining thought was yours — to worship you wholly, thoroughly, obsessively, as deeply as he wanted.
He was in love.
You were in Rafayel’s room.
Because for his sanity to be tested like you intended it would be, of course you had to be in there of all places.
He was able to crash in the way he wanted like a dam bursting without knocking holding him back. In fact, he didn’t even bother calling out at all.
And honestly, he wasn’t even lucid enough for coherent thoughts such as those the moment his vision tunneled on your frame in the middle of his space, your back turned to him, an unaware and unintentional siren in a fluffy white robe loosely tied at your hips.
His robe.
Rafayel was moving before he registered the full picture — prowling the distance between you within seconds, hand snatching up yours and spinning you around. Just being this close and touching you uninhibited got the synapses firing faster than bullets in his head. He pushed forward into your space with no preamble, crowding you against the floor-to-ceiling window. He spared another two or three precious seconds taking in your startled expression with vindication (“Rafayel, what are you doing here?” before putting a stop to all the unnecessary talking with a kiss.
How could he expected himself to stay away from this?
One knee pushed between your thighs, a subtle but undeniable acknowledgment of what he’d felt, and you faltered, clutching the sides of his shirt so abruptly the lily decorations peppered through out clinked. A quiet noise escaped past your lips, muffled by his own and intensifying the building pressure simmering in his gut as he played with the collar of your robe — his robe — and drank greedily from you.
He felt a push at his chest.
The separation between you that couldn’t be more than a tight space to breathe each other’s air brought the world rushing back into focus — Aridum’s quiet, serene snowfall materialized behind your head like a mockery of their frenzied tangle of limbs, the ambient sounds of the city bustling in the distance dampened.
Your eyes searched his, glazed and hazy with steadily-building arousal, yet waiting nonetheless for an answer, shiny lips parted in wordless wonder.
Rafayel could say nothing. The words were there, soda fizz under the surface threatening to erupt into something incomprehensible at best if he opened his mouth.
His palm engulfed your cheek and drew you right back in, continuing the kiss with more urgency to prevent you from tumbling out from his grasp again — let the action speak for him.
The need that thrummed deep beneath rendered him mute, save for strained sighs and grunts of effort louder than the rustle of fabric and the thuds of feet shuffling around on the floor as he plundered your mouth, tongue chasing yours. It tasted like toothpaste and chapstick, like fresh mint leaves, like nurturing warmth cooling his into something calmer.
Rafayel’s hand left your face and slid down your back to seize your waist, dragging you closer, flushing your hips against his firmer and pushing his thigh more brashly. Not even a second later, his other hand bracing your wrist against the window pulled your arm into him to spin you around like in a dance, switching positions without breaking away.
And you bit him.
He recoiled with an “Ah,” that was more surprised than pained, drawing away just enough to swipe his thumb over the curve of his bottom lip where your teeth had punctured him.
“Why are you here?”
Something rotten and vicious was about to bare his fangs at you through a smile he barely stopped from telling on himself by holding back, ‘You called,’ from slipping.
The other, more acceptable answer came in a quick and effortless sweep of your legs off the floor, draping them over either side of his waist, one palm supporting you underneath like the cradle of a hammock as he pivoted towards the bed. “This is my room,” he said — low, simple, keeping eye contact to witness your frustration. “You’re the one who walked in here.”
He saw in the curl of your mouth that you would’ve continued arguing semantics if not for Rafayel bending to deposit you gently atop the bed for you to settle safely beneath him. The mattress creaked under his shifting as he eased further and started descending to resume getting lost in your kisses until a finger landed upon his lips.
“What I meant was,” you started, and Rafayel exhaled against your touch and nuzzled into it like an obedient pet coming to heel with a lowered tail before his master. “Shouldn’t you be at that art salon?”
He stared, blood about to keel over the boiling point.
His beloved was pouting. So adorable that he wanted to bite down.
You’d been so patient with him, hadn’t you? The little divot between your brows called out to Rafayel, begging to be kissed.
“I regret going in the first place,” he said, getting closer to breathe those words directly against the curve of your ear, savoring its delicate shell and the heat emanating from it against his lower lip — basking in the short tremble he could pull out of you that told him all he needed to know. “Stay here with me—”
His arm dipped around your waist and tugged you insistently closer, shakily eager, while your hands scrambled at his biceps, the side of your neck stretching upward to meet his halfway and melting further into him like candle wax molding against Rafayel and pooling liquid sweetness inside him like a basin filled.
Ring — ring — ring — ring — ring — ring — ring!
What the hell? Now?
A surge of irrational anger flared inside Rafayel, sharp and sudden, as if the hotel room phone had personally wronged him so bone-deep that his ancestors themselves had been insulted by its shrill, untimely ring. He clicked his tongue sharply against the roof of his mouth, a frustrated noise brimming with disdain as he reached out with the intention of silencing the nuisance immediately.
But before his hand could reach the red button, your fingers curled gently around his wrist, halting him mid-motion. The touch was soft, warm, and unassuming, yet it cut through his irritation more effectively than words ever could. His breath hitched as he glanced down at your hand, stilling under the quiet weight of what you were going to say next.
“Wait,” your dulcet murmur came. “What if it’s something important?”
More than this?
The irritation got you a side eye for that — but he quickly caught onto where this was heading from the way you gave him a pointed, sultry glance under your lashes and the faintest devilish curl at the corners at your lips. The grip around his wrist turned into your fingers interlacing with his as you guided him to accept the call, holding his gaze so intensely throughout that the beginning of the reception’s announcement went unheard in his ears.
“The guest of this room is unable to answer. Please leave a message."
Rafayel hadn’t even found a chance to breathe, let alone process what was even happening when you pushed him off and knocked him flat onto his back, straddling his hips with surprising speed which elicited an involuntary jolt from him.
He froze, breath caught somewhere between his lungs and the thick, burning, moistureless air that was overheating him. A thousand words tumbled in a rush into his mouth at once, all died under his breath in a sigh as his senses swam and short-circuited in response to your boldness, the sheer power radiating off your figure captivating him. For a single, stretched heartbeat, all he could do was look up — look at you.
The light from the ceiling framed your form in a way that bordered on divine, spilling past the loose strands of hair that fell around your face and catching on the curves of your silhouette like a lover's caress. Shadows slithered around you, dipping into the soft folds and valleys of the bathrobe that clung to you in all the places his gaze couldn’t help but follow.
And then the vision struck, slicing through his mind like a blade dragged cleanly through water.
No, you brought it to him, conjuring it as surely as though you had whispered it directly into his mind.
The blues wouldn’t just be blues — shadowy cobalt would bleed into the depths below, heavy and still, fading into fractured glacier blue as the water grew lighter near the surface, where the sun struggled to break through. The greens would soften into glassy jade, shimmering faintly, caught in the shifting light as if the water itself pulsed with life. Shadows would stretch in drenched charcoal, not oppressive but endless, framing the brightness above almost like curtains opening.
And there, close to the surface, you would hover like the sun underwater, light spilling from you in ripples and shards. Your form would glow with submerged gold, warm and radiant, a halo of sunlit pearl surrounding you where the sunlight hit the water and scattered around your silhouette. You wouldn’t simply stand still — you would drift, your movements impossibly fluid, arms outstretched in a gesture that could be comfort or inevitability, a quiet invitation to a homecoming. Shadows would gather around your curves in bruised honey, soft and subtle, fading into the glow that surrounded you, the kind of light that looked almost too warm to belong in the cold ocean.
The person who the painting was drawn from the perspective of would see you not as a person, but as something greater. His arms would float above him, slack and surrendered, the only movement from his fingers angled upwards, glowing faintly with washed ash gold, the last vestiges of warmth clinging to his skin, while the rest of his form darkened in the embrace of storm-drift gray. Faraway air bubbles would be glacier silver-blue catching the warm light as they ascended toward the unreachable surface, reflections flickering like distant stars against the background of salt-shadow teal.
This was a homecoming.
The bursting of colors landing on his imaginary canvas came to a head when the branding heat of your mouth found his ear, screeching into stuttered motion and scattering like seagulls afterwards. His head lolled sideways under the zapping pressure, inviting more of the world-halting caress that left him all limp.
Then it was gone — only a cool tingling remained where yout moist breaths once ghosted him —
"Hey bro, why'dya leave? Get back here—"
Shocked as if he had short time memory about it being a voice message, he squirmed for a beat, eyes flitting in panic between the call display and you with the mortification of every single drop of blood in his body rushing southwards.
His friend’s voice fractured into static buzzing under the pounding of his ears when you bowed forward once more, towards the red mark on top of his mark that was practically vibrating under his skin, trailing kisses across its glow. Every skin contact point with you burned even with the layers of clothing in-between, melting into an acute throb as you reached the base of his throat and dipped into the hollow between his collarbones — fingers dancing along the strip of his neckpiece before delving underneath, dragging down and delicately, deliciously tugging.
That was all it took for Rafayel to flip your positing and roll you beneath his body, propping himself up with one forarm and holding your wrist to just — stop you for a minute, expression tight as he asked, “Are you sure?”
Your intentions were crystal clear, but it was necessary to check in before continuing any further even though he needed this like air right now, and the prospect of hearing it straight from your lips that he was wanted —
Looking somewhere off to the side, you replied, “Otherwise you’ll actually go back,” thoughtfully, but there was something resentful in there, the statement almost bitter sounding in its delivery.
The overjoyed press of his lips to hide the smile he just knew would annoy you betrayed what he was thinking on the spot.
“So cute,” breached containment however, full of affection as he moved aside your hair behind your ear tenderly, fore and middle fingers taking your love’s sensitive edge between them and caressing, causing you to turn your face further away from him. “You must have missed me quite a lot.”
That sentence was accompanied by the press of his knee into the junction between your inner thighs, innocent enough unless you factored in that one certain revelation of earlier that entirely changed the context in intent. Especially when your pupils dilated visibly before him as you choked out a tiny gasp of surprise, revealing your guilt in glaring clarity.
“What, not pleased you got caught?”
A wicked impulse seized him — one daring him to keep playing this card to unlock so many possibilities as to how he could have you tonight.
He could have you show him what you’d done while he watched until you begged to be touched — on your back with legs wide open for his viewing pleasure, or hovering right above his face in 4K Ultra HD quality that he could just lay down and enjoy and perhaps contribute with his breath if he felt generous enough. You were having fun all on your own, yeah? He just wanted in on it. Not knowing wasn’t a sin, but not learning was.
If you didn’t think you were ready to bear the consequences of this decision of yours, you should have rethought before choosing the room he frequented, shouldn’t have turned him into a fish out of water in public by calling out to him like that, should have known better that Rafayel could be the vilest when he was provoked.
“Or, are you?”
His words were a double-edged knife. Pick the surface-level meaning and you ended up with him teasing you about missing him quite literally, nothing more, nothing less. Take him for what lay beneath, however...
Unfortunately, or, fortunately, you were one slippery fish.
"Why should I be ashamed?" The confidence that dripped from your reply rang genuine. You were so unbothered by his instigation that he realized this was going to be harder than expected, perhaps more rewarding as well. A delightful prospect. "Do you wish I wouldn't miss you?"
Oh, your pride, your grudge was truly an impressive sight —
gleaming razor-sharp even under scrutiny, glittering steel reflecting his image in fragments, and yet tempered by enough warmth to invite him closer instead of warding him off.
"Not at all." His heart sang. "But it couldn't compare to how much I missed you."
"And you still left," came a mumble, sounding more dejected than anything, carrying the weight of his deeds for the past two days.
It was that easy to change his mood.
Rafayel cooed instinctively, rubbing soothing circles into the skin above your knuckles as he pressed a string of quick kisses into the curve of your wrist — lips brushing tender apologies along its path until he reached the palm of your hand cupping his face, where he lingered to feel you stroke delicately over his lower lashes.
"I'm here now," was his gentle promise, one spoken nuzzled against the backs of your fingers. "I'm not going anywhere."
"What are you going to say to your friend? You didn't even pick up his call," you admonished softly, drawing his attention towards where the voicemail was still being displayed on the hologram screen hovering from the nightstand, accepting a prompt about how to proceed.
Rafayel made a show of leaning back to sit back on his heels, staring down at you as he slipped his fingers underneath the tightly-belted thick, sash-like band to pop the clasp to the side apart, the metal closure disengaging with a small clack as the ends slid free and exposed the zipper underneath.
He drank in your every reaction — every detail of you sprawled out before him: your robe coming undone ever so gradually, tantalizing glimpses of skin peeking between its parted folds, a little bit of collarbone here, the curve of your breast there, teasingly hinting at the shape of a nipple underneath the white fabric, then another flash of thigh, an exposed inch of inner leg from your feet shifting restlessly alongside his shins.
He pulled the whole belt free in one smooth yank — the sudden momentum making it snap with a harsh crack. It curled like a ribbon in his palm as he surveyed you, gauging your reaction; watching your widened stare catch onto cloth held loosely in his fist as he flung it haphazardly to the side.
Then, he started tugging at your ankle to raise it higher — dragging his knuckles along your heel, the sole of your foot, caressing into the arch of your instep, traveling along the softness of your calf all the way down to your knee, a single fingertip trailing underneath, slinking gradually but surely toward the inner side, tracing hypnotic spirals into the silky flesh that made your breathing hitch unevenly.
The ends of your robe were riding further up past your thigh along with the slow march, your naked skin revealed in gradual increments the higher his palm slid — revealing more and more until his hand stopped at the underside of your thigh, entirely disappeared from view because of the bunched up cloth, and pulled your leg up gently to drape it over the curve of waist.
Falling right back in on instinct, he leaned down, propped above your splayed form on his forearm beside your shoulder and bent to drag his nose upwards along the line of your cheekbone, saying, "I'm busy."
Your answering snicker was endearing and familiar, drawing forth a swell of warmth inside him like the sun rising over a tranquil ocean's horizon. "Still trying to run away?"
“Just returning to the original plan.”
There would be no running away now — not anymore, not ever, at least not from you and what you made him feel. He'd tried; failed, obviously, as evident in his return here, where the answer awaited him with open arms.
"Who says I'm going to agree? I still haven't forgiven you.”
Rafayel adored that one pout of yours, the one that curved at its edges like the swoop of a bird's wing, delicate and lovingly rounded in its downturned shape. It drew his mouth upward to meet its match, slotting perfectly against its twin seamlessly in the union of a kiss, lingering as if they belonged together like puzzle pieces. You melted sweetly under the fondness contained within the gesture, sighing quietly in surrender; every angle of his mouth was drawn to yours inexorably, it was gravity pulling falling stars back to their courses.
"Not yet," he amended dutifully once he could manage words again, and felt your smile widen before sealing his mouth over it. "Let me."
"If you beg," you shot right back, the curve of your mouth pronounced against his chin, smug satisfaction dripped from every word and its delivery as you pulled away again just enough to meet his half-hooded stare evenly — daring him to refuse you. "Properly."
You kissed the little groan that was about to spill past his lips, but it wasn’t enough to satisfy him. Neither was it intended to.
"How would you like me to repent?" He dragged the question into an offer, a honey trap ripe for plundering. "On my knees? On my back?"
He let his arousal to show on his fact at those mental images, conjured by practiced ease, crafted to seduce. The soft puff of your exhale danced across his chin, sending his nerves tingling. A sign he was on the right track? Or did it merely betray surprise at whatyou had in mind? Either possibility stirred his blood.
"You know what someone in your position shouldn’t do?" you whispered, low and hushed, conspiratorial yet laced with a dangerous authority that quickened his pulse. His brows rose involuntarily, the shift in your tone sending anticipation skittering down his spine. Your lashes swept low, casting faint shadows on your cheeks as your pointed stare locked onto him, sharp enough to pierce. "Ask me what to do when you’re supposed to be coming up with ideas on your own. That’s weaponized incompetence."
His head snapped back so fast that something audibly clicked in his neck.
Mouth wide open.
"Weaponized in—" The sensual, submissive haze he’d been wrapped in evaporated like morning dew under the brutal heat of the desert sun, vanishing so quickly it left him sputtering. The words faltered on his tongue as insult overtook every carefully cultivated mood, his composure fracturing into clumsy indignation. Propped up on his elbows above you, his face twisted into a comically muddied mix of offense and disbelief, his tone taking on an incredulous sharpness as he glared down at you.
"Say that again and I’ll spit bubbles at you!" he snapped, his threat hanging in the air like a gauntlet thrown by a petulant prince.
"Pffft!"
The insolent brat you were being in that moment, daring to laugh straight in his face, was both impossibly cute and maddeningly infuriating. He stared down at you, eyes narrowing with mock offense, the knowledge that your laughter was entirely at his expense gnawing at his frayed patience. He was torn between kissing you senseless or flipping you over and finding some other way to wipe that smug, adorable smirk off your face.
"What do you mean weaponized incompetence?" Rafayel shot back, the words almost trembling with disbelief. "You think I can't please you properly without you guiding me through it step-by-step? Is that what you're saying?!" His irritation swelled, a balloon of indignation puffing up and threatening to burst as he fought, tooth and nail, to keep the whine rising in his throat from escaping. "I like you telling me what to do because I enjoy indulging in your desires! Not because I’m incapable of being creative in bed!"
A frustrated huff crowned his ranting, "Stop laughing!" he barked, though his rising pitch only seemed to add fuel to your uncontrollable amusement.
You shook your head firmly, slapping your hands over your face to muffle the sounds of your laughter, but it was no use. Your entire body curled inward instinctively, knees drawing up as you rolled to your side, burying yourself deeper into the cocoon of your mirth. It only made it worse for his pride — your stifled giggles shaking through you like tremors, every failed attempt to contain yourself sending them bubbling up again.
Rafayel let out a growl of frustration, throwing his body off yours with an exaggerated thud, landing face-first into the pillow beside you in utter defeat. The mattress jolted slightly from the force, but the muffled yell he buried into the pillow caused a chain reaction that only made your laughter harder to suppress. The giggles came fast and bright, and he swore they sounded far too gratifying for his current temperament, his scowl deepening with every shake of your shoulders and every wheezing gasp for air that he felt in the bed, he didn’t even need to look.
The fact that you were utterly immune to his wrath, impervious to every “Stop,” he threw your way, made it all the more maddening. How was he supposed to maintain the upper hand, to reestablish even a shred of dignity, when he couldn’t even intimidate you?
"I'm sorry," you gasped finally, though the apology was weakened by the cracks of laughter still slipping through. You managed to sit upright, though it took visible effort, your hands brushing away tears from the corners of your crinkled, joy-stricken eyes. A few lingering giggles escaped as you cleared your throat, attempting to sound sincere but failing miserably. "I didn’t think you’d have such strong feelings about this topic."
Rafayel lifted his head from the pillow, his hair disheveled, his glare shooting daggers your way, though the deep flush blooming across his cheeks betrayed his struggle to keep his composure. He opened his mouth to retort, to say something, but instead all that escaped was a muffled, irritated groan as he flopped back down into the pillow.
“Rafayel.”
He rolled onto his back with dramatic flair, hands folded primly over his stomach and ankles crossed, the picture of theatrical innocence. The pout he wore, however, was pure spite, lips pushed forward just enough to make his point. “If you think I’m sooo weaponizing my incompetence, maybe I should actually start doing that. Let you handle everything yourself. Clearly, you’ve got it all figured out.”
“Rafayel…”
“No, no, go ahead,” he cut in, stubbornly resolute, almost belligerent in its exaggerated persistence. “I’m useless, right? I don’t know what I’m doing. Teach me. I won’t even lay a single finger on you.” He puffed his cheeks, a childish act of defiance paired with the way he turned his head away, sulking with the finesse of spoiled royalty.
The exaggerated display drew a sigh from you, long and exasperated, but tinged with a quiet amusement that he didn’t miss. He wasn’t fooling you — not for a second—but he relished the moment all the same.
“Well,” you began, feigning hesitation, with false reluctance. “Since you’re already laid out, I guess…” You trailed off as you shifted to straddle him, slow enough to test the limits of his so-called resolution, the soft white robe you wore parting ever so slightly as you moved, revealing tantalizing glimpses of skin before your knees closed firmly around his hips, framing him like twin prison bars.
His eyes darkened as he watched you, taking in the sight hungrily, every detail sinking into him like a drug he couldn’t resist. His hands betrayed him almost immediately, fingertips skimming the hem of the robe where it hung loosely, their touch feather-light as they ghosted over the tops of your thighs. It was instinctive, reflexive — completely unrepentant.
“I thought you weren’t touching me,” you teased with a playful lilt that interrupted the heat thickening the air between you like an unwanted knock on the door.
His hum was deliberately innocent, his head tilting as though to feign ignorance. But the dark gleam in his eyes and the smirk curling at the corners of his lips told a different story entirely. “I really like this robe,” he murmured with a calculated drawl. “What, I can’t touch my own clothes now?”
The claim was absurd — blatantly so — but it made you pause, his fingers grazing the fabric in question as though testing its texture, when in reality, it was clear he was savoring the warmth of your skin beneath it.
(Truthfully, it was also you who looked lovely draped in what was his — but that went without saying.)
Your mouth opened, the gleam of a retort on the tip of your tongue, but the words dissolved into nothingness as his hands shifted, palms hot against your sides, skirting along your ribs in an intentional, testing motion. He knew the heat of his touch stole the breath from your lungs, burning through the fabric like a spark setting fire to paper.
“You go on,” he said, infuriatingly smug as he leaned back into the pillows, his hands never straying far from your sides. “Help yourself. Take as long as you need. I’ll just… be appreciating this fabric in the meantime.”
His fingers traced the lines of your ribs, the motion slow, languid, before sliding downward to hover just above the curve of your stomach. They lingered there, resting near the knot of the belt holding your robe together. The edge of his thumb dipped just slightly beneath the fabric, brushing over its folded loops, a movement so subtle it was barely there, as though he wanted to test how much he could push you. He toyed with the fabric, rolling it between his fingers like he was unraveling a puzzle.
The pause in his pent-up desire — the break that had proven to be a blessing — was wearing thin. The front he was putting on, all casual indifference and smug bravado, was crumbling, betrayed by the way his gaze kept flickering back to you, and, of course, the growing press of his impatience beneath you, hard and neglected, made it abundantly clear that he was more than ready to pick up where you’d last left off.
You broke first.
With nary a warning, your hand shot out, snatching the ends of the thin, ribbon-like scarf draped loosely around his neck. You wound the fabric around your fist once, twice, tightening it just enough to make your intentions clear…
Then you yanked.
The pull wasn’t violent — no, it was far too calculated for that. Enough pressure to catch him off guard, to tip him forward slightly, but not enough to hurt. It was a demand, plain and simple, one he found himself surrendering to before he even had the chance to consider resistance. His wide-eyed surprise melted almost instantly like cotton candy in water into something darker, something sharper, as his lips curled into a grin that spoke volumes about just how much he was enjoying this game.
"First, you ask to beg for my forgiveness," you continued, pulling him a little closer, and his chest tightened as though the leash around his neck extended all the way to his lungs.
Your gaze pinned him down like a blade, your lips curving into something that wasn’t quite a smirk, wasn’t quite a smile — something far more addictive.
"And then," you murmured, sweet but laced with unmistakable bite, "you start ordering me around like a brat."
A jolt of concentrated heat shot through him, not from embarrassment but from the sharp edge of thrill that ran through his veins. He let the tension in his body slacken just slightly, a calculated move that allowed him to lift from the bed a little, meeting your challenge with his own. The faint tug of the scarf against his neck only heightened the electric energy between you, and he found himself biting back a grin.
“Well," he said at last, letting his weight sink into the bed with a noncommittal shrug, the barest shift of his shoulders enough to convey his defiance. "I’m just playing my part." He tilted his head just enough to make the scarf strain, wanted to see what you’d do with the provocation. “The sleazy husband.”
“You want a reward for that?”
“Acknowledgment of how committed to the role I am would be nice.”
“Oh yes, the most infuriating actor—”
“Aaand you goofed it—”
“—impossibly—”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah—”
“—handsome," you went on, and his smirk faltered ever so slightly. “Disarmingly clever, annoyingly witty," you added, the sharp edge softening with each word, though the grip you kept on the scarf didn’t loosen. If anything, you pulled him closer, closing the space between you inch by inch. "—and worst of all," you finished, dropping into something softer, something so intimate, "Completely, devastatingly, undeniably competent."
“Well, aren’t you good at apologizing…” he said into himself, embarrassingly beet-red at having fallen for your trick.
“I’m still waiting for yours, you know,” you pointed out distractedly, playing with the crystal flame lilies scattered on his wine berry shirt, tracing the petals of a bloom while seemingly entranced, following the silvery droplets dangling in a chain. “But I’ll be graceful this time and keep going with mine...”
Before he had a chance to blink or register the motion — your free palm slipped underneath the thin fabric covering his heart, caressing right alongside the pulsing red mark — and squeezed with a vengeance (such a fierce boob grab!), applying enough pressure that the pads of your fingers sunk into flesh, then widened the buttonless V-cut of his shirt by yanking, no, downright ripping it open by the lapels with both hands, and Rafayel damn near felt like a virgin at how scandalous that single action was that he almost covered himself up.
But then again, he could hardly claim innocence right now, could he? He was practically a champagne bottle about to pop down there. Just from that. Who was he, the main female character getting her corset ripped in a bodice-ripper novel?
“Ohmyg—hi? What happened to hello? How are y—”
“Shut up or no head.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Kisses were rained along his collarbone, the length of his neck, and nipping gently at the spot behind his ear that got the hairs on his nape rise to attention. It would’ve been funny what a child’s play it was to tease him until his ears matched the scarlet blossoms on his shirt, except nothing about this particular situation bore humor — least of all, his response to it.
Which was practically none at all. Because he simply lay there, stiff as a plank from how turned on he was, and you worked him diligently as if he was an instrument and you were the virtuoso.
It was also because he was zeroed in on the cleavage peeking out from the gap in your robe as you made your way further downwards, tongue flickering along the dips and bumps of his upper abdomen — surely able to feel more than hear each inhale and exhale getting closer to moaning territory the longer you kept teasing. He even caught a nip slip here and there, getting impossibly harder in response, culminating in him twitching and tightening beneath you whenever you — purposefully! — brushed against his erection.
“Rafayel,” you sighed dreamily, and he moaned for real this time at how his name fell softly past your parted lips, pouring into a pleased hum against his navel where a trail of wetness gleamed — followed by fingertips curling gently around the hem of his pants’ band. “You’re so quiet. Not leaving it up to chance, huh?”
And the only response he gave was an impatient roll of his hips toward your head, granting you permission — eager acquiescence, even — while a loud, unabashed gasp slipped into his lungs as your hands found the zipper of his pants. With a practiced tug, you freed it from its track, and his pants slid low on his hips, just enough to reveal the waistband of his underwear. Your fingers followed immediately, hooking under both fabric barriers to ease them down until they rested tautly just below his hips. The motion tugged on his shirt as well, once secured by the overlap tucked into his waistband, and with nothing anchoring it anymore, the luxurious fabric parted effortlessly, exposing the sculpted expanse of his chest and abs in one sweeping reveal. His stiffening length, freed from its confines, ached visibly — leaping subtly toward contact, as though craving the touch it had been denied for far too long.
"See? You're being so good... why do you keep wanting to provoke me?" came your lilting reproach, spoken against the soft skin of his pelvis, lips fluttering teasingly across its planes in playful grazes of their silky plush. "
“Permission to talk?”
A sharp, in-drawn breath escaped him the moment a single finger traced along the underside of his shaft, lingering over a wildly pulsing vein — evidence of the frenetic race of his heart currently pumping pure liquid lightning straight through his veins — but he recovered quickly, allowing it to dissolve into an exhale long and drawn-out instead.
“Go ahead, handsome.”
His hips lurched instinctively in search of something tangible, of a sensation besides the torturous tickle of warm breaths dancing lightly along his arousal, "Give me my reward, then. I've waited so long for this, it's been torture."
“Doesn’t sound like you minded the wait. You left me, didn’t you?”
Ah, yes. The grudge. You were becoming like Rafayel the longer you stayed by his side.
"You know I hate waiting. Let alone like this," he said, all whiny and punctuated with a shudder — one that was met with an accompanying jolt that surged straight from the base of his erection when your lips brushed teasingly alongside it. "I didn't think you'd be this cruel..."
"Are you really asking?"
"Can you give it to me instead of wasting time talking?" came his blunt retort, brows drawn together in an impatient furrow that radiated ‘I’m being wronged,’ energy.
"Not wasting time at all, just wanted to spend more time with you. Feels nice, right? You deserve this,” you murmured comfortingly against the swell of his abs rising and falling with each heavy breath — and oh, he almost melted into a puddle at that, visibly deflating with his chest cavity just filling up all warm and fuzzy with love.
It did feel nice but — just — just — fuck — he needed to be touched or he actually was going to disintegrate into sea foam. Not joking.
A brief kiss landed on on the left side of his Apollo belt in consolation before a drag of your tongue along its path followed, transitioning into you breathing more warmth directly into his base, then placing a loving peck to his tip — eyes twinking at the tremble that surged through him. “I really love seeing you so reactive. Does it feel that good? Just breathing on you like this?”
His hips pushed upward in tiny nudges, bumping insistently against your cheek, practically begging to be held properly inside your mouth. "It doesn't feel good at all — just, come on, hurry... I keep my lube in the top drawer on the left... It's edible, you know..."
Thankfully, you didn't smirk at him. Didn't stop to tease him about his eagerness, either, wordlessly going about reaching over to rummage for a bottle in his nightstand — an act that forced you to draw away from his straining member completely, your warmth vanishing suddenly in one agonizing instant, causing him to nearly whine from the loss.
You popped open the lid to squirt some lubrication into your palm and recapped it while staring down at him with a curious gleam. "You had something like this with you the whole time—"
Your words got cut off upon him grabbing your dripping hand and directing it straight where his impatience stood angry at the delay, shuddering out a moan at how incredibly silky the glide was.
"Finally... yesss," he hissed, thrusting upwards to feel more friction — the delicious slickness spreading across your enclosed grip driving him absolutely wild. "Ahh—kkhfff... Keep going, you have to keep going, don't let go... Please. Please?”
Something in your face twisted weirdly at his breathy begging, making his heart flip at the unflinching lust in your widened gaze trained firmly onto his jerking hips.
He had your fist trapped around his swollen cock, urging you into pumping it once you settled into a steady rhythm stroking its turgid crown, twisting and curling into each new swipe upwards along his pulsing flesh; encouraging you by squeezing tighter every few strokes until you took over completely. Then, he threw his arm over his forehead haphazardly, basking in the blissful waves flowing through his veins at long last, watching you watch yourself pleasure him through fluttering lashes, breathing hard through half-parted lips.
"That's it," he sighed huskily, rocking his body into the hand rubbing and grinding against his dick's ridge with expert motions; thumb circling its glistening head and caressing alongside its slit where precome beaded out generously, smoothing over the entirety of its surface and working into the underside, swirling tantalizingly over the bulging vein there until all his thoughts melted into a haze of pure sensation, mind wiped clean of everything except the singular, simple fact that he desperately needed to come. "Like that — nnhhh, yes! That feels amazing — feels perfect — love those sweet little fingers... So close already, I can't, I can't—"
At his muttered groans, your pace stuttered noticeably before resuming its previous speed, which wasn't fast enough according to the stretching throb inside his core, his blood rushing loudly through his ears like boiling rapids. "No, faster..." he urged you, rutting into your palm even harder in a frantic effort to increase the pressure and bring him to the precipice quicker. "I can't hold on much longer — need more, I need more. Tighter. Tighter."
The corners of his vision pulsed white and Rafayel whimpered as he jumped inside your curled fist when the unexpected sensation of having your forefinger slide through his sticky fluids gathered at its tip, swirling clockwise before ascending back up in an unhurried stroke that carried a slippery coating alongside it to smooth out the glide to put pressure right into the slit — a sensation that lingered for seconds afterward with ghostly echoes, drawing a sudden choked gasp from his lips at how intensely good that single touch felt.
“Thaaaaat’s it, yeah, I love that, you have such a beautiful voice.” Your free palm swept up alongside his ribs to rub gently against their curve as though to soothe the ragged sounds ripping past his throat; traveling upward to cradle his head against yours where your cheek brushed alongside his temple, holding him still with tender care and easing some of the tremble wracking through him. "Can you feel how much I'm enjoying us being together like this — how badly I've missed you? Please let me hear those pretty sounds, I wanna hear them loud and clear. Will you be generous for me and share it all?"
His reply died in his throat in favor of a low keening sound — something raw and broken — when you squeezed tighter.
The way your nails dug ever so delicately into the sides of his cock, applying pressure just shy of pain was truly exquisite torture, making his head swim and rise up from the bed so he could crush his lips against yours, biting hungrily into your plush mouth and delving deep into its depths until oxygen became nothing but an afterthought. Every neuron of him burned alive in chain reaction as your tongue wound and slid alongside his, curling along the underside before retreating for him to suckle on your lower lip eagerly until it swelled red.
"Mmnghhfuck! Hhhaaa—keep—" Words spilled past his slackened lips like ribbons unfurling, senseless as he struggled to convey how excruciating it was to contain his euphoria within, desperate for any sort of outlet to relieve the pressure rising inside him rapidly —
— and then broke off suddenly on a low moan when he caught a flash of your unoccupied hand that was just cradling his neck having found its way between your thighs, the view out of sight because of the robe —
Then, Rafayel saw the pearly gates.
His orgasm slammed straight into him, so unexpected and yet wholly expected all the same that he gasped around it like he was in a headlock, utterly disoriented by the sudden assault on his senses, soaring impossibly higher with each jerk of his hips into your fingers' grasp and shooting thick white streaks across his stomach; leaving behind faint smears wherever it hit its mark — warm, sticky ropes landing atop his defined abs and even reaching as far as his sternum.
He knew something was wrong when it didn't stop.
Far from it, really: each pulsing contraction seemed to force more of its fluid past his cock's narrow slit, painting your pumping digits liberally with his release — even staining the lapels of your robe in messy spots. It lasted so long that Rafayel started seeing stars sparkling around the edges of his blurring vision; making everything appear fuzzy like static. "Nggh—too much—ah! Aaa—hhh! Nnhhfff... Khhffffcking hell... Can't believe—still going—"
"Don't hold back now, just ride it out, nothing wrong with it," you murmured fervently, brushing some hair back from his sweat-soaked temple and — then — kisses, so many kisses. "I know you wanted this so badly, it's okay... You deserve this. Let go for me, yeah? Can't you let go for me? All this stress will go away. Isn't that nice?"
What came out instead was an embarrassingly high moan, hoarse with overuse, entirely at odds with the self-assuredness he'd wanted to project with each thrust of his hips, spurred onwards by instinct alone in a mad dash for euphoria.
Just how pent-up was he?
He couldn't recall the last time he'd felt pleasure this acute, sharp as shrapnel beneath the layers of desire, making him so out of it that he wasn't even aware of the embarrassing mess he made like he’d just wet himself being cleaned up with a tissue by you.
And it still wasn't nearly enough.
He surged forward, wound his arm around your waist and tossed you to the side gently so your back lay flush against the sheets before following suit in a tangle of limbs that ended with you under him — where he belonged: cradled between your thighs, seated fully inside their heated clasp as he hovered above you — one elbow propped beside your shoulder while the other wandered aimlessly downwards and undid the trusty knot holding your robe together in one go.
"Rafa—"
“Sorry, I'm sorry, I can't, I'm so thirsty," he said, as he raised the lube-and-come-sodden hand of yours up to his mouth to lap at the trails trickling over your wrist; sucking on your fingertips in apology — no trace of shame coloring his cheeks as he did, far too focused on the task of cleaning them thoroughly to be distracted by something as trivial as embarrassment. He didn’t even taste himself. Just the blueberry.
So engrossed in it that he didn’t even notice you burning holes with your gaze at his lips sealing around your thumb while he ran his tongue underneath it in short, quick flicks until it was glistening once more, except this time with spit instead of lubricant.
All the while, he traced the clean strip of skin revealed by the parted folds of your robe with a searing hand, starting from the valley of your cleavage between your breasts all the way down the slight convex curve of your torso leading towards the V that marked the point where your thighs began, drawing delicate circles into your navel, slipping downward inch by tantalizing inch in search for hidden oasis.
Taking notice of how wrecked you looked through the curtains of your fingers splayed over his eyes and forehead, Rafayel rewarded you an equally debauched looked as his lips curled into a smirk against your palm.
A loud, viscous pop of your wetness echoed in the room when his fingers tenderly made contact — positively dripping for him. Your mouth flew open upon feeling him draw his forefinger's pad gently against your entrance, lingering teasingly at the seams in an excruciating crawl, tracing lightly around it as you pulsed hungrily against his fingertip.
"So thirsty," he mumbled absentmindedly to himself — mouth watering.
Rafayel pushed open your legs by the backs of your thighs to allow his head better access. If he was on a normal day, he would plant feverish kisses on the insides of your quaking knees and thighs and mark you everywhere, made it more sensual, more teasing, but he was borderline parched — not to mention more impatient than a driver stuck behind a cyclist in a one -lane road.
You yelped at his mouth diving between your legs in reckless abandon. His tongue lapped up your slick in deep, obscene flicks, then plunged inside into the warm haven awaiting him inside, devouring your sweet nectar in loud slurps, uncaring of how sloppy and unrestrained he was currently acting; far too hungry to concern himself over anything save for indulging greedily in your flavor.
"Rafayel, shit, that feels—oh my god..." He had to push your hips down by splaying his hand along the plane of your stomach as you arched helplessly, otherwise you would have simply lifted right off from his greed ravaging you without mercy or restraint. "That's so—you're so—fuck! What—what’s gotten into you? Ahh...!"
Any hope of responding to that died the second your hand tangled itself tightly into his hair and tugged to bring him impossibly closer against you, his head blanking. It felt so good when your heel planted itself onto his shoulder blade and pressed insistently there in a silent plea for more, sending ripples of heat fanning out across his nerve endings in their wake.
Without hesitation, he latched his lips around the swollen bud peaking proudly from beneath a layer of velveteen flesh and flicked upwards, suckling hard before closing around it fully — then rolled his tongue in circles around its rim with the intent to render your world spinning madly with each passing stroke. The fingers locked around your trembling thighs kneaded deeply into their skin, coaxing the delicious, involuntary spasms coursing throughout you until the only thing you knew was the blissful torment his hot mouth wrought.
"You're so delectable on my tongue, did you know? The prettiest moans come pouring out from your lovely lips when I'm between your legs like this," he said, the sentences pieced together like beads on a pearl necklace fragment by fragment between licks and sucks, sounding just short of reverence. "Your taste drives me wild, I swear it's addictive... Am I making it up to you yet? Please say yes. Tell me it's working."
"Yesyesyesyesss—" A sharp inhale cut off anything else you tried to babble further as Rafayel rewarded you with another generous helping of his enthusiasm by diving back in and running his tongue in earnest up through your center. "You feel amazing, you — feel — so — g-good—"
"—don't think that's enough, though. Didn't you call me incompetent earlier?"
"What," you choked out angrily when a puff of warm breaths skated dangerously close to where you were most sensitive. "Oh my god—"
"I hold grudges, cutie. You taught me that," he said in a sing-song reply, lighthearted in tone, nearly drowned out by the thready groans bleeding through.
"I apologized already — what more do you want? Stop teasing, Rafayel!"
A pregnant pause followed as he stared up at you from between your legs, and saw your eyes widen with realization at just what you'd requested.
"As you wish," he relented, a dark edge to his mischievous grin when he rose back up and braced his knees against the mattress better, pulling your hips tight into the cradle of his thighs until one of your legs was thrown over his shoulder. "Have it your way — and don't forget you asked for this."
The slow sink inside your wet heat was traitorously misleading: a gentle, sweet meeting at first that masked what was brewing underneath.
A dragged out whine fanned his flames as you threw your head back. “You asshole—”
"I could have made you come once, twice..." he said, in a smooth purr that dripped sinfully past his lips.
Your mouth fell open on a silent gasp; the first wave of pleasure rolling through you upon being filled suddenly in one deep plunge. Your torso twisted to allow you to hide your face into the curve of his forearm draped next to your shoulder.
"You know I love taking my time with you," he continued, pausing to bury his face into your hair to breathe you in deeply, adjusting your leg to fall from his shoulder straight onto his hip. You took advantage of Rafayel getting close, grabbing onto his back so quickly that you missed the first time and yanked his shirt down to bunch halfway down his midsection and get stuck at his elbows. "And you just had to take that from me. I don't know which one of us is greedier... "
An apology was voiced, muffled by the crook of his elbow, almost incoherent by your gasps.
He cupped your chin and made you look at him. “Are you comfortable? Not hurting you, am I?”
Your throat clicked audibly. Then you shook your head rapidly in answer to both inquiries: yes — no — everything was okay — and Rafayel breathed a quiet sigh of relief.
And then, out of nowhere your fingers started moving around the expanse of his upper back, and before he could question the non-sexual way it came across when he was literally inside you, you said, "You're sweating."
"Yeah...?" Confusion muddled his hazy mind clouded with dull pleasure begging for him to start moving again, but you looked at him with wide, eager expectation dancing behind your expectant eyes — as if you couldn't quite believe what you'd seen.
"No — your temperature. It's still high but you're sweating now," you told him excitedly. "Rafayel — that's huge! This means your body is cooling itself down!"
He huffed.
"Of course it is, I've got the hottest woman in the world under me," he said with a roll of his hips, earning an enthusiastic moan from you in the process. Your arms snaked themselves around the back of his neck tighter until both forearms crossed at their crease, palms moving upwards in an intoxicating drag through the back of his skull. "You the cure to all of this..."
His forehead dropped unceremoniously yours where it stayed, and he sucked in an uneven, shaky groan that tapered into something resembling a whine as he started rutting steadily against you, driving into that spot where you liked it the best with growing desperation with the occasional staccato grunt at the fluttering squeeze and murmured encouragement.
At some point, his mouth wandered towards your pulse, scraped his teeth against it gingerly before latching on it in an open-mouthed kiss that was hard enough to bruise.
You tilted your chin skywards with a sigh to give him better access and tangled your fingers encouragingly deeper into his hair, and something inside him sparked awake in response, a fiery need demanding him to paint every inch of your skin violet, rose and mauve so that it may glow evermore brightly for everyone to see —
"Way too beautiful for your own good... Driving me crazy... Every single day... Couldn't keep my hands off you the moment I got in here..." he hissed furiously as though he were possessed, snapping his hips harder upon finding the angle he desired, searching relentlessly for something within you both to satisfy the frenzied race to the peak taking control of him completely; searing kisses littering everywhere he could reach along the underside of your chin and neck whilst spewing senseless litanies into your skin in between them. "Can't believe I could have this forever... Right? Say I can have this forever. It'll drive me insane if you don't, I swear—"
"Forever," you echoed hoarsely, your nails digging tightly into his scalp as his pace increased once more. "Y-you can have me forever—anytime, wherever—"
Your assurances came with a startled cry of ecstasy as he sank his teeth into the juncture connecting your shoulder and collarbone in a bite that bordered on a savage instinct to ensure he was there, he'd been there, and would always be there. "You're not leaving, are you? Aren't gonna leave me anytime soon, right?
Every syllable was marked with a measured grind into you as if determined to force every word inside your head by burying it deep in your core — imprint it permanently into your brain; until the only thing filling your thoughts was him and him alone. "Not letting you — I'm not letting you. I can’t let you go, it’s too late — too late. Say it. Say it.”
"As — many times as I ne-ed to," you panted underneath him, arching upwards so beautifully for him as his grip loosened marginally to let you find that perfect angle that caused your back to bow like a perfectly tuned instrument in his hands; singing nothing but divine music. "'S not changing, ever. Won't change... Agh!"
His hips bucked in answer to your nails sinking deep into the skin of his shoulders as though clawing for dear life. "Yeah? Yeah? Promise—?"
All you could do was sob into his mouth hungrily swallowing yours — a mess of moans falling endlessly past your lips swallowed whole, accompanied with plaps and slaps of wet thrusting. There'd never be a time when he wasn't craving the taste of your flesh burning scorching white hot against his own, craving more and more until everything blurred into a haze of delirium.
"Tell me... Tell me—hah, tell me, princess. Let me hear it..." His chest rumbled deep within where yours rubbed deliciously against his bare flesh with each fervent roll of his body. Even then, it wasn't nearly enough; couldn't possibly be, not with how ravenously thirsty he was for anything and everything having to do with you: your sounds, your expressions, those intoxicating stares filled with nothing but need for him and only him. Not while his stomach twisted itself in knots tight enough to tie sails and yet remained impossibly empty at the same time, yearning for the sweet relief of gratification flowing freely and quenching his deepest thirst. "Wanna hear you, gotta hear you say it—"
"I'm right here, m'here, not going anywhere, not leaving... I'myours, just don't let go, don't let go of me—"
He heard it as though you were underwater; faint, muffled underneath the thick fog clouding his senses, so indistinct yet simultaneously loud enough to drown out anything else within reach.
Every coherent thought vanished from his mind, melting into thin ribbons streaming across an ocean of red flames, then bursting forth anew into embers scattering throughout his vision in a dizzying display, igniting behind his eyelids with blinding light every time he blinked them closed. When he opened them, new constellations blossomed instantaneously; bright orange ones with maroon tinges shining bright among the black canvas.
"M'not gonna—! Can't let go—couldn't even if I tried. They wouldn't even be able to pry you away from my cold, dead hands."
More vivid blotches appeared before him at random intervals, painting his desert landscape in abstract patterns shifting so erratically they threatened to form fractals at any moment, jagged shapes overlapping and warping themselves until they resembled colorful stains splattered across walls in chaotic messes; or perhaps simply the shadows of clouds skirting the edges of his sight drifting past without a care — all blending together and merging seamlessly as though water droplets bleeding into fine lines until none could tell where one ended and the others began.
"Gonna be... gonna be stuck with me for life," Rafayel said, sounding entirely half out of his mind with the way he was babbling endearments (something about a bride) in-between little laps that trailed upwards along your quivering sternum toward your heaving chest; kissing you so fervently as though possessed, driven wholly by base instincts demanding he give in to whatever compulsion overtook him. "Always been mine. Always. Always—can't ever leave, yeah? I won't forgive you—won't forgive you this time—"
"Rafayel, I'm gonna come, please..." you whispered hoarsely against the crown of his head nestled between your breasts, your hands grasping onto his shoulders helplessly in an attempt at anchoring yourself. "I can't keep going, I'll fall apart. Please, don’t stop, don’t stop—"
One of his fingers slid down to repeatedly flick through your swollen folds, teasing and circling around your clit while his tongue swirled around a nipple; pulling and sucking hungrily with fervent desire, giving a pointed twist once he'd latched on.
"Come for me, then, do it, c'mon, cream all around me, let me have it, let me have this — you can do it, I’ll help you along.” His lower body lifted suddenly, pulling back until only his cockhead remained caught inside; followed by a quiet pop indicating his lips breaking contact from where they were buried in your chest. "I need you so bad I can hardly stand it anymore... Wanna feel you — feel all of you — need all of you..."
All it took was one sudden shift after a steady build-up of rhythm of shallow, quick thrusts: the smallest rotation of his pelvis and thrust straightwards, hips knocking against yours in a violent shove of flesh meeting slick flesh for you to fly apart spectacularly when he buried himself into that specific area right below your cervix.
With a shuddering breath that dissolved instantly into a shrill cry tearing through your throat, your thighs locked tight around his waist — holding him prisoner while your nails sank fiercely into his scratched back as your entire body trembled uncontrollably through the aftermath.
“Yeah, there you go, cutie.” A comforting, grounding caress landed on your forehead, tracing the arc of its curve towards the back of your ear; then repeating itself multiple times in slow, unhurried strokes — to remind you he wasn't going anywhere, anytime soon. “There you are, that was beautiful. You got me seeing stars.”
"It's... It's snowing outside... In the desert," you said faintly, eyelids slow in their blinking, and Rafayel thought how utterly gorgeous you looked, all worn down and exhausted and so drunk in your post-orgasmic euphoria to talk nonsensically about what was happening outside.
"Yeah," he agreed, equally hushed as he peppered a trail of soft kisses across the bridge of your nose. You closed your teary lashes instinctively against the ticklish sensation. "It's so soft... and beautiful..."
You were the snow in his desert. Though, too blissed out to pick up on what he was implying.
Too busy stiffening up when you felt his cock jump inside you.
"You... you're still hard?"
“I didn’t come in the first place, whoops. Busy being too competent, I guess,” he said breezily, tilting his hips so that he pressed deep inside, directly into the tender spot inside you where pleasure flared to life unbidden.
"Let me... Let me rest, fuck, give me a minute..." Your hands scrambled for purchase against his scarred back; anchoring yourself by clawing surface level trenches down along its expanse and dragging red tracks as he continued his grinding in torturously slow and shallow rolls. "Need — I need to catch my breath, you're gonna make me pass out, shit, hold on — !"
Rafayel had you for three more times after that.
The first was the short prologue to what was coming, picked up from where he’d left off in the same position — head buried in your neck, making you tightly embrace him like he’d fly off the earth if he wasn’t held. No sooner did his hips start bucking roughly against yours before he spent himself inside in long pulses that coated you inside in heated spurts, sending sparks rippling out into your limbs from where you clenched weakly around him through your own release that hadn’t yet run its full course.
The prettiest sounds in the whole entire world spilled from him as he pulled out with a schlick, dripping his neglect-thickened seed onto the sheets, and you were naive as to think this was it. You both had indulged yourselves enough for the night, fucked through the absence-abstaining makes the heart fonder phenomenon, it had been fantastic to witness him get so serious. Surely now would be a good time to cool off and step into the bath together now that you’d been able to make him sweat and the sex-heavy humidity clinging thickly to your body was getting more comfortable the more you became aware of it. The room was absolutely boiling, stuffier than a sauna like he’d projected all the heat trapped inside his body everywhere. Perhaps opening up a window wouldn’t hurt…
“That was one,” he said then, staring down at his flushed erection straining proudly between his legs like a compass needle pointed north — the faint strand of semen connecting his tip and stomach swaying and snapping apart. “This isn’t anywhere near enough.”
To your shock, Rafayel got off the bed, hauled you in by your legs until your bottom half was dangling from the bed, and folded you completely in half with no warning. Your legs were pushed against your chest and were hooked over his shoulders, and the speed of with which all of it happened punched out a wheeze from you.
"Can I? Are you okay?" he asked urgently, patting your thigh rapidly twice, pausing — then adding another firm slap there before you nodded hurriedly in confirmation rather than a verbal response, because fuck, his weight holding you down felt absolutely incredible like this.
Your ankles started bobbing in sync with his hip thrusts as he drove deep inside your heat, the sink easy, smooth and soft and the mess you both made between your legs pouring out and splattering everywhere as he kept mumbling, “I can’t stop, I’m sorry, I can’t stop, can’t stop—”
This round lasted longer, though it was the worst frenzy you’d seen Rafayel in. Nothing was slow about it, he was mercilessly pistoning himself into you and unpredictably switching between shallow and deep that had your clit being scraped against and A-spot drilled into. You couldn’t even keep your eyes open from how intense pleasure was kneading you violently like a dough. If it wasn’t for his mouth gluing itself onto yours, the entire floor and the poor downstairs guests probably would have heard what was happening with how loud his moaning became — because he was downright voluntarily overstimulating himself.
With one particularly desperate sob, Rafayel finally buried himself to the hilt within you — throbbing — in harsh jets of liquid fire with jerking, abrupt twitches of his hips, milking himself into your body as he found yet another release that was as intense and concentrated as the previous. You cried brokenly, shuddering as that final thrust abused your clit over the edge of orgasm number two, involuntarily flinching and trying to get away when he pushed all the accumulated, positively flowing stringy mess right back into your puffy cunt with a strange, entranced look on his face. You had to slap his hand away and kick his weight off you, powerless and exhausted and fully feeling like your vagina was gaping and would never close back up.
A soft kiss on your cheek brought you back to earth.
“Still alive?” he croaked, gently maneuvering you higher up the bed and laying you back comfortably. You had to avoid the giant, wet and shining spot that had to be dripping down on the floor at the edge of the bed, face burning as Rafayel’s sweat-drenched forehead leaned against yours. “I’m not going easy on you… I have to say I’m impressed how good you’re taking it.”
You realized, once more with feeling, that he was rock-hard against your hip despite having already come three separate times — two of which had filled you to the point of pouring out of you — and had no sign of calming down any time soon.
He was beyond insatiable.
Though the third and final time was far sweeter, the pace much slower and drawn out as though he’d suddenly regained some sense and clarity. By that time, you were growing deliriously tired, the earlier carnal fucking accommodated itself to you by morphing into tender lovemaking. Rafayel had you on your side, comfortably able to hug pillows and anchor yourself, while straddling your thigh and hooking your other calf over his waist and held it there firmly, out from your space to let you breathe with his back straight. Just looking down at you with obvious, sensual longing to lean down for kisses the entire time and looking so fucked out had been enough to rekindle your desire.
He was driving himself languidly into you, either eyes closed and head thrown back, or focused dead-on at the spot between where he was slipping in and out of you — watching your cunt eagerly swallow his white-coated cock and attempt to suck him right back in each time he pulled out until only his tip remained buried. Over and over.
And eventually, his shaky breaths and sweet sighs started turning into fast-paced, restrained moans. You saw him hanging on the precipice of wanting to go fast again, the tension his body pulled taut like a bowstring about to snap.
At one point, your robe and his shirt had found themselves slingshotted into the far, opposite corners of the room at some point but he still had his pants and was positively drenched in sweat like he’d just taken a bath and shining under the dim lighting.
"Drained all of my stamina, I'm empty, completely dry... I’m gonna need an IV drip. I can’t believe it. This is crazy, you know... I could die happy like this... But I wanna come. I wan—nnah come inside you so bad again, wanna fill you up—make you full with me—"
He went completely motionless and stayed burrowed in you when your palms cupped his face gently, forcing him to look down at you with his shiny eyes. "You've got to calm down first."
“I don’t think I can,” he murmured, panting, “I really can’t. You feel so—”
Your thumbs stroked the outer corners of his eyes with aching tenderness. “We’ll stop and try to calm you down a bit continuing then, okay? Try for me. No need to rush when we have time to ourselves. No one’s going anywhere.”
He stumbled and nearly fell to his elbows on top of you. “Tell me to,” he said, in a begging voice. “You can just tell me to calm down. Anything you want, anything. You know I’ll listen.”
All these months of living with the revelation about the bond and it still came as a shock to you, but you figured if it was for his own good...
So you ordered him: "Calm down and relax, Rafayel. Everything’s fine, you’re okay."
And god, did he listen well.
You were shocked, as you always were each time, to see just how willingly compliant he was. Seeing his body literally change its chemistry to conform itself to your desires and let go of all tension was unbelievable. You immediately felt bad that you’d forced it on him somehow like some admitted, invasive tranquilizer, because you could have made him relax naturally, with your own labor, a glass of water and massage, maybe, gradually work him through it—
“There’s nothing to worry about. Don’t think about it too much. Just focus on me, yeah?” A quiet command that lacked any real intent to order accompanied an equally soft kiss planted softly against the corner of your mouth, and all thoughts went flying out of the window when you saw how mellowly at peace he was, gazing dreamily at you without the slightest care in the world.
After that, everything became a blur once again. But a pleasant one. Slow, like molasses trickling lazily throughout your bloodstream at room temperature — soothing all aches into pleasure-flavored coziness at being joined, no rampant race towards a climax involved. There was no concept of time whatsoever: just the two of you together.
After your pillow talk about what he believed inspired him — what he wanted would, you internally filled in the blanks — and how he was running out of reserves exclusively saved up for the purposes of his art, you had to make it clear to him that there would be no pain involved in your relationship.
You didn’t know if he expected to be hurt by you in the future or implied he had no problem with that happening, but you couldn’t even tolerate him saying those things for the sake of love, or whatever it was. Him being intimately familiar and nonchalant with the concept bothered you down to the bones.
Not only were you trying to work around the huge rock he’d just dropped on top of your heart with the revelation that Aridum had to represent pure suffering to him as a Lemurian, you were also slightly upset he’d wanted to subject himself to it because he was lost more beautiful things in life had made their way into his life to inspire him as well. His paintings, all of them, had taken a new context and an additional layer of tragedy with that revelation, despite the fact that he’d basically said you made him draw from a different fountain and clogged up the other one.
It was a bittersweet happiness to hear Rafayel wanting to explore brighter, happier sides of life together when the sketch he showed you he was working on while you were sleeping depicted a man drowning in the sea and a figure beckoning him from above, close to the surface. Something still very painful.
“That’s one bleak drawing.”
“Depends on what you see.”
“I see a dying man hallucinating. Maybe that’s someone close to him and his brain is comforting him with a vision. I don’t know.”
“Interesting take. Maybe it’s not just a man at all. Maybe it’s a reunion. It looks peaceful, doesn’t it?”
Now you looked again, it did look peaceful. Just like Rafayel was right now, next to you on the bed with his forehead almost touching yours.
"I'd like to think he isn't drowning, then."
Rafayel just smiled.
#love and deepspace#rafayel x reader#rafayel x you#rafayel smut#lads rafayel x reader#lads rafayel x you#l&ds rafayel x reader#lnds rafayel x reader#rafayel#intertidal zone#lads rafayel#l&ds rafayel#lnds rafayel#lads#lnds#l&ds
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i think about this a lot. because the thing is, i don’t think either of them are truly to blame for the seals they broke. dean was tortured into submission and had no idea that there could be such massive consequences to giving in; sam was manipulated and deceived and honestly thought what he was doing would stop the apocalypse, not set it in stone. neither of them willingly chose to break a seal, and neither of them had any way of knowing what they were really doing. they were key pawns in a game they didn’t even realize was being played, not active participants in it. and i don’t think you can really blame someone for falling victim to that.
but if you are going to blame sam for his part in it, you also have to blame dean for his. either both of them are responsible for accidentally breaking the most important seals, or neither of them are.
didn't...didn't dean break the first seal? why is everyone on sam's case for being manipulated into killing lilith (which he thought was a good thing bc hey demon dead) but not on dean's case for torturing souls and LIKING it? protect sam winchester oml
#this plays into a lot of thoughts i have about their roles in the show#the way i see it sam is the protagonist from a plot perspective (at least at first)#but the narrative lives in dean’s head. the show is filtered through the lens of how he sees things#and the way the show just…forgets about dean’s role in breaking a seal once sam does the same#mirror’s dean’s tendency to latch onto other people’s wrongdoings to escape the guilt he feels about his own#if the story is told through dean’s eyes then of course sam is the only one we’re told to blame in the end#because dean himself is trying desperately to not think about what he did#and projecting those feelings onto sam is the only way he really knows how to do that#but just like dean never really believes it — guilt doesn’t go away just because you repress it and he still winds up hating himself#the show also never really believes it and that’s why the absence of blame placed on dean is so glaring if you’re paying attention#it feels wrong because it is wrong. we know that because the show knows that because dean knows that#but dean can’t admit it so the show can’t admit it#and that makes it easy to ignore. easy to not pay attention to. easy to just pay attention to sam instead#ofc i don’t think they did any of that on purpose#but it’s unintentionally a really interesting framing that exists throughout the entire show#not to mention sam being the plot protagonist also makes sense if the narrative lives in dean’s head#because sam is the most important character in dean’s life#and just like being a protagonist often means you pay for the spotlight by going through the most horrors#sam’s role as the most important person to dean often just causes him more pain#so yeah. in my mind sam is the main character of the story but dean is the one telling it#which actually also puts an interesting spin on the ending post-dean death#that sam’s life montage is all weird and blurry because it’s not real at all#it’s what dean imagines — maybe hopes — sam will have after he’s gone#the nice happy future for sam that he has to believe in so he can let go#ANYWAY i’ll shut up now. this show is eating my brain#spn posting
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| after hours c.s. |
chris sturniolo x fem!reader
summary: chris practically begs his best friend to massage his back, but after an awkward discovery, y/n finds it difficult to keep her hands -- and her eyes -- on the job.
warnings: smut; established friendship; oral (m/f receiving); fingering; hand job; squirting; unprotected p in v; dirty talk(!!!!); 18+
notes: whew! long time no see! life has been putting me through the absolute ringer lately! i haven't felt like a real person in months! i still don't tbh! im working on it! but i have absolutely missed writing and tumblr and u all so much! pls forgive my absence on here i literally haven't even been able to open this app since october when my life went south. my semester is over now so i have one major thing off my plate, so im hoping i can be a bit more consistent with writing. I MISSED U ALL SO SO SO SO MUCH and i hope u enjoy this chrissy one shot that i started months ago and just finally finished it today. love u all <33333
“No Chris.” I chuckled, standing up from my couch and walking to my kitchen to put away our leftover dinner. “Please,” I heard him whine behind me, “My back is killing me Y/n.” I turned around, facing my best friend still sitting on the couch where I left him. I laughed at his fake expression of misery, and the hand pressed to his lower back was a nice touch. “Chris, you know I’ve made it a rule not to massage my friends in my free time.” I explained, putting my hands on my hips. He groaned dramatically. “But why? You have all your stuff in the next room!” He began standing up from the couch, being sure to make it seem like a painful struggle.
He was right. I was a licensed massage therapist, and had recently started my own practice from the comfort of my home. I had turned my den into a massage room, fully equipped with a massage table, calming music, and essential oils. But I had made it clear to all of my friends — especially Chris — that I wasn’t going to massage them after-hours. Of course, I would treat them free of charge, but they had to book during normal hours. I was brand new in this career, and I wanted to ensure professionalism right from the start.
“You already know why.” I replied, turning away from him and opening up the fridge to put away my leftovers. As I leaned down into the fridge, I gasped as I suddenly felt a hand press against my lower back. “Just right here.” Chris whispered behind me, circling his thumb along my lower back. “It’ll only take five minutes.” I shuddered at the sound of his voice and the feeling of his touch. Chris had a habit of turning on his sex appeal when he needed something from me, and even though him and I were only friends, it unfortunately worked.
I turned around and closed the fridge, coming face to face with my friend. His eyebrows were knit together in what I could only assume was faux pain, because there was a playful smirk pulling at the corner of his mouth. Sighing, I ran a hand through my hair before pointing at the closed french doors leading to my massage room. “Go in there, take off your shirt and lay on the bed. Call me in when you’re under the sheet.”
A smile consumed his entire face, and before I could change my mind he walked over to the room and shut the door behind him.
Chris’s POV:
As I shut the door of the massage room behind me, I stood for a moment to take in the room. She had never let me in the room before, in fact she made it known that she considered it separate from her home and so she didn’t like going into it when she wasn’t working. I always joked around with her because of that, asking her if it was really a secret torture room, but as I saw it for the first time, I couldn’t help but smile. It was professional, but still had personal touches that made it clear that it was hers.
The lights were dim, enough to see clearly but dark enough that everything had a blurry haze to it. It smelled like that shit she diffuses in her bedroom — I think she told me once that it was lavender or something. I noticed the various candles dotted around the room, and took it upon myself to light a few of them. As I lit the last candle on the small table beside the bed, I noticed an old phone connected to a small speaker. Finding that the phone didn’t have a password, I opened it and hit play on the playlist that showed up first, smiling at the title: music that makes strangers fall into my bed.
I chuckled to myself. Not so professional, sweetheart.
Typical spa music filled the small space, and I couldn’t lie, it did add to the meditative atmosphere of the room. Looking at the massage table in the middle of the room, I remembered what I was actually in there for and felt a wave of excitement hit me. I hadn’t been lying when I told her that my back had been hurting — not exactly, at least — but I had definitely been exaggerating. The truth was, I just really wanted to see what her hands could do. Not wanting to waste any more time, I took of my clothes and climbed onto the table, slipping my lower half under the thin white sheet.
“Y/n!” I shouted, “I’m all set!”
Y/n’s POV:
From my place at the kitchen counter, I heard Chris’s voice and my stomach did a flip. I wasn’t sure why I was so nervous, I had given a few of my other friends massages before, but for some reason I had been dreading the idea of giving one to Chris. Maybe it was because him and I had such a playful relationship, and I was so used to being professional with my clients, I couldn’t quite envision how combining my two personalities would go. Still, I took a deep breath and headed for the room.
Once I opened the door, I noticed the candles were lit and soft music was already playing. Looking at Chris, laying face down on the table, I chuckled. “I see you made yourself comfortable.” I remarked. Heading towards him, I noticed the pile of his clothes on the floor, including his sweats and boxers. “Uh Chris,” I began, stopping at the top of his head, “I said you only had to take off your shirt, remember?” He lifted his head from the table, looking up at me briefly. “I know. It’s just that the pain goes pretty low down my back and I figured it would be easier to just take everything off.” There was a playful look in his eyes. “It’s what I’ve seen them do in the movies.” He added softly, making me chuckle.
“It does make it easier,” I replied, moving so that I was now standing on his right side. “It’s really just about what you’re comfortable with.” As I spoke, I began running my hands down his back, from his shoulders down to his tail bone, to check for any tightness. He remained silent underneath me as I applied pressure on certain areas. “So, you said right here is sore?” I asked, pressing down on the same spot that he had when demonstrating on me. I heard a muffled hiss and watched as he nodded his head. “And the pain kind of shoots down to here.” He added, awkwardly moving his arm behind him and trailing it from where my thumb was down to just below the white sheet.
I hummed in acknowledgment, pumping the bottle of massage oil beside me and rubbing it in my hands. “Okay, I’ll get started. Let me know if the pressure is too much.” I said the same thing that I said to all of my clients robotically, before working against his muscle. It was pretty tight, but definitely not as bad as he was making it seem before on the couch. Like I do with my other clients, I stayed silent to encourage him to relax against my pressure. A few groans of pain fell from his lips as I worked, but he encouraged me to keep going each time I asked if he was okay.
I noticed him shuffle a few times under the sheet. “Are you uncomfortable?” I asked him softly, wondering if maybe the massage table was too hard. “N-no, I’m fine.” Was his reply, and even though there was a slightly panicked edge to his voice, I took his word for it and continued working my hands lower down on his back. I felt my cheeks grow hot as my hands pulled the white sheet lower to gain access to his pain. I had never seen this much of Chris’s body before, and even though I was trying to be professional, I felt like the act was a little too intimate.
I rushed to finish up, and after about fifteen minutes I was satisfied that the knot in his back had improved. “Alright, I think I’m done. Want to flip onto your back for me?” I asked, pulling the sheet up slightly. “W-why?” Chris asked, his tone filled with alarm. “I usually finish every session with a neck massage. Sometimes the neck gets stiff from the way it lays when you’re on your stomach.” I replied. “Oh, uh, it’s okay.” He replied, refusing to move. I rolled my eyes. “What? Not even 30 minutes ago you were begging me for a massage, and now you’re turning it down?” I crossed my arms and moved over to his head, “Come on, turn over. It won’t take long.” I reassured him.
He sighed, and, holding onto the edge of the sheet, slowly turned over. I stifled a gasp, because between his legs, the thin white sheet had tented, and I could clearly see the outline of his erection. I was thrown off, unable to take my eyes away from it, but quickly recovered — clearing my throat and dropping my eyes to his face. His eyes were still closed and his cheeks were flushed; I could tell he was embarrassed. In a normal circumstance, I would think that I would have made a joke about it, and he would have just told me to shut up. But at that moment, there was something so real about his exposure and humiliation, and so I knew that I would just ignore it.
I began massaging his neck, trying to focus on my actions and regain my professionalism. But, I couldn’t stop looking at the white sheet; it being the only thing between his cock and my eyes. I could tell that it was huge, and I watched as it grew harder and harder as I continued working his neck. It went from standing straight up and wobbling in the air as Chris breathed, to being pressed right against his front. The sheet draped around it, perfectly outlining its girth, and I could see a small bead of dampness taint the sheet a translucent shade of white at its tip. My mouth watered and my mind wandered. I felt my own body begin to react to the sight in front of me, and the tension in the room began to grow so heavy that I began to gasp for air.
“I-is the pressure okay?” I asked, doing my very best to keep my voice strong as I worked his neck. I watched his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed nervously before nodding his head. “It’s good, Y/n.” His reply was so simple, but there was something about the gruff undertone, the almost indiscriminate breathlessness as he said my name, that caused my knees to weaken and my throat to turn into a desert. Suddenly, I could no longer hear the soft music playing throughout the room as my blood pumped deafeningly in my ears. I couldn’t pull my eyes away from his bulge for more than a few seconds at a time — it seemed so hard that it had to be painful. My eyes continued to flutter between his flushed face and pulsing member until suddenly, when my eyes returned to his face, his bright blue eyes were wide open and staring right at me.
I felt a new wave of heat crawl up my face at the fact that I had just been caught red-handed staring at the one thing in this room that both of us had been actively ignoring. I opened my mouth to attempt to explain myself, but his words beat me to it. “I’m sorry.” He murmured sheepishly, his face turning the same shade of red that I imagined mine to be as he squeezed his eyes shut. Immediately, I began shaking my head rapidly. Partially as a reassurance to him and partially as an attempt at erasing the last two minutes of my life. “No! Don’t be sorry. It happens all the time.” I rushed out, doing my best to make light of the situation. “No it doesn’t.” He replied flatly, with a hint of disbelief in his voice. I forced a chuckle. “Okay fine, it doesn’t happen all the time. But its not not normal.” I tried again, brushing a soft curl out of his face.
Chris was silent for a moment, his eyes still squeezed shut in either embarrassment or concentration. I had stopped massaging his neck, but my hands were still on his damp skin; my thumbs drawing gentle circles against his rapid pulse. After a moment, an exasperated sigh fell from his lips. “It won’t go away.” He said, his voice laced with genuine disgust. “I’m sorry Y/n, this is creepy.” A forced laugh, then another sigh.
The room fell silent again as I tried to find the right words to fill the space. Words that would reassure him more genuinely than more “it’s okay’s”. Because, from the way my pulse had quickened, and from the way my core had grown so slick from arousal that I could feel it dripping steadily onto my panties, it really was okay. It was more than okay. So, instead of trying to find the words that could possibly portray just how okay it was, I leaned down and pressed my lips to his.
I felt him tense at the first brush of my lips against his, clearly shocked by the sudden close proximity of our mouths; closer than they had ever been before. So, I pulled away for a moment, finding his piercing eyes to search them for whatever thought is running in his mind. They were wild, racing across my face trying to make sense of what just happened. But there was something else there, something erotic that was blurring the line between right and wrong. Between professionalism and spontaneity. Between friends that fuck around and friends that fuck. I could tell that we were both balancing on that same fine line, but when I brought my lips back down to his, and when he opened his mouth to welcome mine with the kind of hunger than can never be satiated, I knew that we both came to the same conclusion.
Our lips moulded together in rhythmic wonder as our tongues explored each other. Immediately, I felt his body relax as his hands reached up and wrapped themselves in my hair. A soft moan of satisfaction fell from his lips as I nibbled on his bottom lip, causing my body to react in a way that was foreign to me. I felt goosebumps raise up across my skin as if his hands were all over it. He pulled his lips from mine and used his grip on my hair to tilt my head to the side, giving his swollen lips access to my neck. He sucked and nibbled against my electric skin just below my ear, and I felt as though I could fall apart and dissolve into a puddle just from that. “L-let me make you feel better.” I managed to moan out through the waves of pleasure I was feeling. My eyes wouldn’t leave the rock hard bulge under the white sheet, just barely out of my reach. Chris groaned against my neck at my words, and I watched as his cock twitched under the sheet as if it heard my words itself and was begging me to help it.
After another moment of Chris devouring my neck, tasting every inch of it as if he couldn’t get enough, his grip on my hair loosened and he allowed me to straighten up. I looked down at his face, now even more flushed than before. His lips had gone bright pink and were so beautifully swollen from their journey against my skin. His chest was rising and falling rapidly and, after a short moment, his eyes fluttered open and landed on me. “You sure you want to do this?” He asked, his voice slightly tentative, and I knew what he meant.
A kiss between friends is one thing. It can be brushed off as a slight moment of weakness, can be something that the two friends can one day laugh about as they look back on their friendship. It can be never spoken of again, can be hidden from their other friends deep in the vault of the minds of the two people that shared it. But anything more than that, any other touching, or licking, or exploring of the other person is not as easily ignorable. In friendships there is deep love and strong understanding of the other person. Once that love and understanding collides with the act of literally merging together, of being as physically close to another that you can be in this lifetime, it’s not so easy to ignore. My mind may not be able to shut out the events that transpire with Chris tonight ever again. We may never be able to chalk it all up to a moment of weakness, or keep it a secret from our mutual friends. We may never have the same friendship we had before I agreed to this massage. But there is no way to know that for sure. What I did know for sure in that moment, with Chris staring up at me with eyes filled with intoxicating desire, with my own body vibrating with lust, was that I wanted this.
So without a word, I walked down his body towards his beckoning cock. I took a moment to just gaze at it, closer to it now than I had been all night. I rested a hand on his thigh hidden beneath the sheet, and watched as his cock once again twitched. I chewed on my bottom lip in an attempt to keep myself from moaning just from the sight, and after a moment let my eyes flutter back up to his face. “I’m sure Chris.” I replied softly, searching his expression. “Are you?” I asked, realizing that he was likely considering the same potential outcome that I had been. He kept my gaze for a brief moment, his eyes focusing on different parts of my face. “I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life.” He replied finally, a cheeky smile growing on his face. I felt my own expression mirror his own, and without wasting another second I began peeling the thin sheet down his waist.
My smile fell the moment his bare cock was finally exposed, and was replaced by what I knew was the expression of desperate hunger. His length was impressively long, and I felt my mouth water at the thought of running my tongue along its veins up to its swollen head. Reaching to my left, I pumped some massage oil into my hand. I brought my cupped hand above his upright cock and let the oil drip between my fingers and coat him. He released a sharp hiss at the feeling of the oil as it trailed down his length towards his base, and I watched as his hips thrust forward desperately from the barely-there contact. A bead of pre-cum suddenly dripped from his slit, and I used my thumb to collect it before finally pumping my hand up and down his shaft. Immediately, a deep moan fell from Chris’s lips as I worked his oiled cock in my hand. I focused on his body language as I adjusted my movements to figure out exactly what he needed to feel good.
When I went slow, I watched his breath grow steady, telling me that I should pick up the pace. When I used a softer touch as I moved along his cock his hands would stay relaxed at his side, but I knew he liked it when I used a bit more pressure along his tip as his hands would tighten into fists against the sheet. But when I used both hands, twisting in opposite directions with the occasional brush against his balls with my pinky, I discovered that was what he liked most of all. A deep grunt followed by a moan fell from his lips, and his right hand flew to my upper thigh; where he gripped so hard I was sure that he would leave a bruise. “Fuck, Y/n.” He breathed out as I continued with these movements.
His hand traveled further and further up my leg until his fingers slipped under my loose-fitting shorts. I continued to stroke him with both hands, even when I felt the tip of his fingers just milimetres from my trembling core. They brushed against the ever-so-soft place between my pelvis and my pussy, and I bit back a moan. Subconsciously, I adjusted myself so that my legs were wider apart; giving him access to touch even more of me. My hands continued to work his cock as his fingers inched closer and closer, before finally, I felt the very tip of just one of his fingers reach my core and dip into its warmth. My knees buckled at the barely-there contact just as he released a muffled moan. “Jesus fuck, Y/n,” My eyes flew to his face and the translucent arousal that I found all across it was almost enough to push me over the edge. “Put that on my face right fucking now.”
His demand was so jarring, his voice so gritty and raw, that I didn’t hesitate before peeling my shorts down my legs, lifting myself onto the massage chair, and straddling his face. Immediately, his hands gripped onto my thighs and pulled them apart; giving his eyes untethered access to my glistening core. “You’re fucking soaked.” His words came out in an almost-whisper, as if he hadn’t actively planned on speaking them aloud. Still, they shot straight to my lust and I leaned forward, resting my head against his chest to allow him to see even more of me.
I gasped as I felt his thumb against my slit, collecting my arousal. I heard a wet sound and then another deep moan. “So good.” He whispered before suddenly his warm mouth was suctioned to my clit. Immediately, I dissolved into a puddle of desire as his tongue swirled and licked against my sensitive bundle of nerves. Moans fell from my lips as my brain turned to mush from the relief of finally having his mouth on me. I began moving my hips against his face, chasing a high that I so desperately needed. Satisfied moans slipped from his mouth into me, and I felt a sharp slap against my ass cheek that added to my intense need.
I had turned into nothing more than a dead weight on top of him, his lethal tongue paralyzing me. But as I opened my mouth to release a guttural moan, I felt my lip brush against the tip of his cock. Without a second thought, I slipped his cock into my mouth and began pumping up and down. Another moan fell from Chris, vibrating against my clit and causing me to moan around his girth. “Fuck.” Chris muttered against me, and I responded by deep throating his cock until my nose pressed against his bare thigh. “Mmmm, Y/n.” Chris breathed, removing his mouth from my clit. I stopped my movements as well, waiting on shaky legs for him to continue.
“If you keep doing that, I’m gonna cum.” He began, gently running his knuckles against my ass cheek. “And I don’t want to do that yet.” He slipped two fingers into my core effortlessly, causing me to immediately begin rocking against them. “Mmm. Thatta girl.” He breathed, presumably watching for a moment as I rode his fingers just inches above his face. “What I want you to do is focus on making a mess all over my face, then after that I want to cum with these tight walls wrapped around me.” His words caused my eyes to roll to the back of my head, and a sharp moan fell from my lips. “Sound good?” He asked, his voice muffled as he reattached his mouth to my throbbing clit. I nodded my head maniacally as he resumed his impressive movements against my nerves. He kept his fingers inside of me, and as I slid my soaked cunt against his face, I cried out at the added sensation of his fingers filling me.
“Fuck C-Chris.” I moaned, my words nearly incomprehensible as I grew closer and closer to my climax. He could tell that I was quickly approaching, and tightened his grip on my ass cheek with his free hand; pressing my cunt so hard against his face I was afraid that he would suffocate. “G-gonna cum!” I warned him just before the tumultuous waves of my orgasm took over. My body began shaking as I came hard against his face. I had never before felt so out of control of my own body, and relished in the feeling as my back arched and a plethora of moans fell from my mouth. I felt a gush as I squirted against Chris’s mouth, and trembled at the guttural moan he released as he began lapping me up.
Once my mind reattached to my body and my orgasm had finishing ripping through me, I rested my head against his stomach as he ran his hands along my tense back and dropped gentle kisses against my sensitive core. He let me lie there on top of him for a few moments, catching my breath and slowing my heart rate, before gently lifting my limp body off of him and sliding off of the massage table. I sat up on the edge of the table, facing his standing figure before me, and my gaze landed on his excruciatingly hard cock. He grabbed my chin and lifted my head up before pressing his wet lips harshly against mine. He tasted like me, and immediately a new wave of arousal filled my core.
As his tongue flicked into my mouth, I reached between our bodies and began stroking his cock. He thrusted into my hand instinctively, and a moan fell from his lips as his hand shot to my core where he drew torturously slow circles against my over-stimulated clit. Caught up in how good we were making the other feel, our kissing slowed and our mouths eventually turned into matching O’s; eyes shut in pure bliss. I dropped my forehead against his bare chest, and watched as our hands worked on the other’s body, slowly working up the nerve to do the one thing we hadn’t yet done with each other.
“You still want to do this?” Chris asked, his voice strained. I jolted slightly at his words, shocked at the fact that he seemed to be reading my mind. A sharp wave of pleasure hit me from his fingers and I moaned softly before looking back up at him. “Mhmm.” I breathed, meaning it. “Do you?” I asked in return as I felt his cock jump in my hand. “So much.” He replied before lowering his head and planting another deep, wet kiss against my mouth. After a moment, he grabbed the hem of my t-shirt and pulled it over my head. He took a moment to admire my bare chest before kissing each of my painfully pebbled nipples. “God, you’re unreal Y/n.” He moaned, running firm hands against my completely naked frame. I arched my back against his touch and shut my eyes blissfully.
He leaned forward and ran his tongue along my collar bone. “You ready?” He asked. I felt his hand replace mine on his shaft, and bit my lip as I felt him line the head up with my soaked core. He used his free hand to hold firmly onto my lower back, and I wrapped my legs around his waist; using the grip to press him against me. “I’m ready.” I replied breathlessly, looking up at him through my eyelashes. Without wasting a second, Chris kept his glazed eyes on mine as he slowly pressed his hips into me. My jaw dropped as his girth stretched my walls out further than I thought possible, and the intoxicating mix of pleasure and pain that can not truly be described with words turned my brain into mush.
Chris hissed as he bottomed out in me, his cock taking up every inch of my cunt. He remained still as he rested his forehead against mine, his breath erratic and hitched. “Fuck.” He finally groaned out, his body more tense than I’d ever seen it. “You okay?” I asked, wrapping my arms around his neck. He nodded. “I’m gonna cum in, like, record speed here Y/n.” He replied, taking deep breaths and keeping his forehead pressed to mine. I couldn’t help but chuckle. “It’s okay Chris,” I replied, running my hands through his hair. “Just give me what you’ve got.”
My last seductive whisper seemed to give him the motivation to power through, because immediately he snapped his hips into me. I released a sharp moan from the depth of his movements, and that was enough to bring him fully back into it. Using the grip he had on my lower back, he plowed into me relentlessly. My eyes were rolled into the back of my head as I felt my walls stretch with each thrust; allowing him to hit my g-spot each time. “Jesus!” I cried out, gripping onto his shoulders in a weak attempt at holding onto my sanity.
“You’re so f-fucking tight.” Chris groaned into my shoulder as he continued to drive his ruthless cock into me. The room filled with the sounds of our bodies smacking against each other, adding to the indescribable arousal I was filled with. Chris’s hands began travelling all across my body, taking his time on my tits as his thumbs drew circles around my hardened nipples. He gave my tits a harsh squeeze before travelling down my stomach, leaving a trail of goosebumps on my skin as he reached my clit and began rubbing it in rhythm with his thrusts. “God, keep going baby.” I moaned, wrapping my legs even tighter around Chris’s waist, “F-feels s-so good!” I cried just as Chris lifted me up off the table and slammed me into the wall. I released a sharp gasp from the shock, but as he continued pounding into me, my pleasure was intensified.
“Fuck, sweetheart,” Chris growled as he nibbled against the skin on my neck. “You always this fucking wet?” His dirty words make my head spin. “N-no. I’m n-not.” I reply honestly, feeling my juices spread all over his front. A wicked smile covers his face. “Just for me then, huh?” His tone was arrogant, but there was an undertone of overwhelming arousal in it that told me he needed it to be true. I nodded my head rapidly. “Y-yes Chris! O-only this wet f-for y-you.” I managed to reply just before my second orgasm swept in and overtook me.
Just as I began riding my high — my nails digging into his skin and my mouth sputtering out profanities — Chris stilled inside of me and released a ragged “Oh fuck!”. I felt his cock pulse inside of me, painting my walls with his warm seed as my orgasm milked him dry. He released soft grunts against my neck as he rode through his own high, and I relished in the feeling of his cum as it dripped from my cunt.
After a while, both of our bodies relaxed and we rested against one another as we caught our breath. I waited for the overwhelming feeling of regret to wash over me, as one would expect it to after fucking your best friend, but it never came. In fact, I was so relaxed in that post-sex liminal space, pressed against the wall with Chris’s softening cock resting in my core, that I almost couldn’t believe that we had never done that before.
I was pulled from that thought by Chris placing a deeply passionate kiss to my lips. There was no lust, no untethered desire attached to it; it was almost as though this kiss was the end of one chapter of our lives and the beginning of a new, more exciting one. Our lips moved in slow motion, as if we had kissed like this a thousand times. With his lips still on mine, Chris slowly helped me down so my feet were on the ground. After another moment of our mouths merged as one, I pulled away and was immediately wrapped in a hug. Chris’s warm body felt so familiar, even more familiar than before, and I closed my eyes and took in the moment, as I knew it was the start of something new.
“Well, I think we have some things we should figure out,” Chris said, and I felt a soft chuckle against my head tucked into his chest. “Because I don’t know about you, but there is no way I can go the rest of my life without doing that again.” It was my turn to laugh, and I pulled myself out of his arms and looked up at his face. “I think I am officially under your spell.” I replied, feigning a smile. “Let’s go sit down and figure this all out.” I grabbed my discarded shirt and threw it over my head before walking towards my living room. “Oh by the way Y/n,” Chris grabbed me by my waist from behind as we walked through the door, “My back feels great now, in case you were curious.” I rolled my eyes with a smile and continued walking. “You have magical hands.” He whispered, and all I could do was laugh and give him a half-hearted shove.
ᵕᵕᵕᵕ୨♡︎୧ᵕᵕᵕᵕ
#sturniolo triplets#sturniolo smut#sturniolo x reader#chris sturniolo#christopher sturniolo#chris sturniolo fanfic#chris sturniolo x reader#chris sturniolo smut#chris sturniolo x you#the sturniolo triplets#sturniolo
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Okay but imagine if Sukuna's fav concubine successfully runs away from court life because she's tired of the bullying and walking around eggshells with Sukuna? (bonus points if he continues to be with other concubines) She ends up working in an orphanage or something ☠️ But do you think Sukuna will look for her or not???? 🤔🤔🤔 (manifesting that it's an angst to comfort 😌😌😌🤞🤞)
“betrayal”
heian era sukuna, just a tad different from the exact request but with the same principle
ryomen sukuna x concubine!reader
Synopsis: sukuna wakes one morning to find that you, his favorite concubine, are nowhere to be found. now, he must make your absence everyone else's problem.
to sum it up: you do not understand your relationship with sukuna, and it burdens you more to endure the abuse you receive from his favoritism than to stay
WC: 5,760
Warning(s): suggestive themessss, destructive treatment of some concubines, violence, twinge of angst
“WHERE IS SHE?!”
Sukuna’s voice is a roaring boom of thunder that can be heard even from the farthest floors of his grand estate, its bass shaking the walls as servants and concubines alike tremble upon hearing it.
The quivering hearts of those nearby are not at all settled when the sharp, alarming symphony of glass shattering and furniture toppling resounds against the wooden floorboards and into the meticulously decorated wallpaper. A line of servants stand directly outside of Sukuna's quarters with sweat beading down their foreheads, serving to provide assistance if or whenever the lord calls for it.
And those who could keep far away, they avoid stepping anywhere near the vicinity of a raging Ryomen Sukuna for fear that the next thing broken will not be an antique lamp but their heads.
Sukuna's order of women, specifically, cower in their chambers, listening carefully to muffled noises so distant from them to catch even a glimpse of what may happen next. Concubines decked in floral kimonos huddle together, staring up at the ceiling with each crumble of debris that showers from overhead as a result of the large king's monstrous frame thudding about.
Uraume stands alone within Sukuna's chambers, having been called there directly, doing their best to keep a professionally calm face despite the subconscious jolt in their shoulders every time one of Sukuna's arms thrusts down into yet another expense that they will have to add to the day's damages when it.
"My lord," the king's right hand begins pensively, sneaking a hand out from its regal place within the cuffs of their kimono as the salmon haired demon resorts to furiously pacing back and forth. The white-haired servant tries their best to keep their balance with each step he takes, which could only be described as the parade of an elephant dancing around mice. "The handmaidens, butlers, and I have searched everywhere for her. There is no trace of her left in the estate."
Another loud crash shoots throughout the room, Uraume wincing yet quickly regaining their composure once Sukuna's crimson eyes snap back to them lividly. Uraume has seen their master in many forms, including anger, but this rage levels that of which they have seen displayed in him before. Sukuna's practically a ticking time bomb, waiting to explode with his arms swinging heavily at his sides, one occasionally switching to swipe over his chin, another propping over his hip temporarily. He's antsy, frighteningly so, and Uraume unfortunately, for the first time, has no clue what to do in this situation.
Mainly because this entire tantrum has been sparked by you, a lowly concubine, who has dared to betray her king's trust and loyalty to sneak off without a word. No one knows how long you have been gone, as it is the early morning, but Sukuna took notice the moment he began his day.
The entire estate is well aware of Sukuna's selective favoritism over you, though no one is exactly sure how it started. You are fairly new as well, having been with them for about half a year when the other concubines and servants have been lingering around for far longer.
When the King of Curses was first led to you, your kneeling stance with your head bowed to your hands and your beautiful purple kimono draping over your figure to the ground, he had little interest in you. Sure, your figure looked appealing on a general basis, and granted the demon had not even allowed himself five seconds to truly look at you, but he is unimpressed until your head raises and your (e/c) eyes meet his on command.
There is something in your gaze that Sukuna decided stands out against the desperate pleas whispering in those of previous concubines. Perhaps a bit of pain... disdain... a sourness that you attempt to mask with the generous warmth of your (s/c) skin and butterfly lashes, rather involuntarily, and Sukuna has to pause as he stares down at you with indifference.
Are you angry? He knows that the concubines in his care are hardly treated nicely by those bringing them to his feet, but boo hoo. You're a woman, and a concubine at that. If you're wallowing over unfair treatment, then you surely have no place in his brothel.
But then, you hold his stare for as long as he examines you. His eyes scatter over your features, taking them in silently with no care for whether you are growing nervous under him. Even if you are, however, he can not tell. Your eyes are so clear as if they have never told a lie, and you are not challenging him but giving him the opportunity to soak you in even longer.
"Stand," he suddenly, gruffly orders, and you do with such poise. You close your eyes politely and push yourself to your feet slowly, opening your eyes once more once you are on your feet.
Hell, you're tiny, much like the rest of the women compared to all of his seven foot glory, yet you do not shrink under his shadow. You stand proud, serene, as though you know you are a rare prize, and Sukuna can do nothing but make a strange noise of unitelligible affirmation under his breath before turning on his heel and leaving the room.
"Send her to my chambers in an hour. I shall see if this lowly woman can appease me."
And by the grace of his name, you do.
He doesn't even have to be inside you for longer than a second to be completely thrown by your warmth, the way your tight cunt responds to him so obediently after he's bullied one of his lengths into your drooling hole, the plush of your ass gripped lethally within his claws and drawing strands of blood as he plows into you inhumanely.
And you take it. You whine, and groan, and cry, but you beg for more and thank him for every monstrous inch he gives you. He does not even mean to go over his normal set time with his concubines of about twenty minutes when he finds he's been fucking you for hours, and your body is still with him.
You've become a babbling, tear-stained, overstimulated mess with your fingers digging into the pillow that your face is smashed in, his second throbbing cock well situated now into your bum as he thrusts relentlessly like some sort of vicious animal. You're aching, trembling and hardly speaking a lick of sense, but Sukuna only pushes you farther, for he just can not get enough.
Consequently, you slowly begin to find yourself in his bed once a week, then twice, then about three or four times... then maybe twice in a day, and hell, why not just drag you along with him as much as he possibly can all seven days of the week?
Sukuna takes an immense liking to you, so much so that he begins to allow you to speak less and less formally with him behind closed doors. He'd ridicule you for being late, and with politeness still soaked in your voice, you'd say something smart like:
"I was not aware that thirty seconds was considered late, my lord."
Sukuna knows then that he's begun to let you get away with too much, yet as he fucks you into next week as punishment, he tells himself internally that he could get used to this.
You are far more than beauty. You are class, grace, and character that the other concubines severely lack, and the next thing you know, Sukuna is ordering you to sit on his thigh upon his throne with him as he listens to citizens or servants speak.
The salmon-haired demon has attempted to entertain other selections of his concubines, simply to conduct an experiment for himself if he can still derive pleasure from the others, but after at least ten rather boring fucks with women who are not you, he concludes that you are the best of them. Of them all.
And you are so humble, taking on his attention. You walk about the halls as though you are no more special than the others, which you are, and it has the girls boiling over the top with jealousy.
The bullying starts rather quickly after your favoritism is known.
You return to your quarters to find your bedding ripped apart, or feel elbows jab into your back as you pass by that is often brushed off as an "accident" with a conniving snicker and a toss of hair, or insults splattered in ink all over the inside of your kimonos that you can not wash out.
You have never brought this to Sukuna's attention, for you felt there was no need, especially since all of you are under his care despite the feuds spreading about. Whenever you need a new kimono or sheets, you go to Uraume, who asks no questions and simply replaces the things damaged. They already know what’s going on, and though they recognize you as a favorite, they do not share anything with Sukuna either on the direct order that he should not be bothered by concubine business unless it has to do with him.
And that is what you are. A concubine, no matter how the lord favors you, how often he tells you with his fangs dipped into your neck and his fingers gripping any limb of your body that it feels as though you are made for him. No matter how delicately he has begun to grip your waist when you approach him, dull eyes glinting with lust and interest as he stares down at you and you up at him. No matter how your heart has begun it’s pitter patter each time he addresses you by your name, something he has not bothered to learn from the others but has sworn to remember by you.
You were still one of hundreds of women here to serve only for Sukuna’s pleasure. You’re a number, and while Sukuna may not see you as such any longer, the other concubines ensure that you remember your place and who you are.
You’re a secure woman, and initially you did not allow the insecurities of others to impact you, but as the cruelty and frequency of the bullying increases, it wears down your tolerance bit by bit. Nudging turns to pinching and shoving, you can no longer eat in their presence without food landing in your hair or down your clothes, and you barely sleep at night for fear that one of them will come to harm in you in your slumber as they have on many occasions prior.
And you’re tired. So very tired. Sukuna himself even begins to notice a shift in you, how dull your eyes look when you meet him and how quiet you have become. He has demanded you tell him what is wrong, which you always reply that you have not gotten enough sleep, which is not necessarily untrue, and Sukuna has no reason not to believe it because he is not aware of the world that transpires amid the concubines when they are not actively serving him.
He is no fool, though. He has an inkling that something is going on, but he holds off on saying anything. He waits, watches.
But unfortunately, he has waited too long when you decide upon yourself that you can not take this torment anymore, that you are no more worthy of Sukuna than then next peasant. That both you and him would be better if you parted, if he no longer had a woman to favor that created such profound rifts within the community.
There is no place for you, a concubine hopelessly in love with your lord, within the estate. Sukuna feeds off of your unspoken and unknowns affections, and it has created nothing but hell for you and everyone else. So you vanish.
And Sukuna is pissed.
“You mean to tell me that she just fucking left in the middle of the night and nobody saw her?” he seethes. “You did not see her?!”
Uraume takes in a deep breath. “Unfortunately not, my lord. I was in the kitchen all night making preparations for today’s courses as usual. I’m sure the other servants were asleep as well.”
“That ungrateful brat,” he addresses you as if cursing you, your name a sweet, sick poison on his tongue. “She’s got some fucking nerve.”
“It is appalling that a concubine would do such a thing as flee your court,” Uraume instantly agrees.
“After everything I’ve given her!” he grows angrier by the second, thinking back to the privilege he bestowed upon you. You dare now to make him look weak? Another fist lands into a vase that smashes it to pieces, the memory too overwhelming to mull over without feeling as though he is going to murder someone. “When I get my hands on that girl…”
“How would you like to proceed? I have men already on the hunt-“
“Send them back.”
“…Pardon, my lord?” Uraume blinks.
“You know I do not enjoy repeating myself, Uraume.”
“I apologize. I will-“
“I want every one of them back in this estate. No one is to come or go, and if they do they shall suffer directly at my hand,” Sukuna snarls. "I will look for her myself."
Uraume bows their head. “Yes, my lord.”
“And what of the concubines?” he grunts.
“What of them?”
“I find it hard to believe that they did not hear (Y/n) take her leave, nor think it a matter not to inform me of immediately.”
Sukuna stops his pacing, standing heavily in the middle of the room as he glares to the side now in thought.
“It would be wise to inform you that when I asked them about her disappearance before coming here, they all behaved as though they were unsure of what was going on,” Uraume speaks with a hint of disdain, and Sukuna’s eyes darken.
Slowly, it pieces together that they have something to do with this.
“All of them in the throne room. Now.”
-
Petrified faces line before Sukuna as he uncharacteristically stands before his throne rather than sits, his personal arm candy nowhere to be found and frankly making him all the more uneased. Uraume, who has rounded up the women, stands to the side as they all kneel in rows on the floor, shivering with fear.
"Someone start talking," Sukuna's voice grumbles out, so menacingly, so deep that it shakes the women's cores. Those who bully you have lost any lick of confidence they found in your wake as they keep their widened eyes to the floor, mouths clamped shut, paralyzed with fear. "Do not play dumb with me. I know you all know exactly what I am referring to."
Silence filters the air, the concubines unsure of how to proceed or what to say.
"Where is she?"
The question ehcoes again, and "she" falls like a boulder crushing to the earth. You are so prized that Sukuna does not even need to address you by your name for everyone to know who he is talking about. It makes their blood boil, to be petrified on behalf of your absence. What makes you so special anyway?
"Your lord has asked you a question," Uraume adds firmly, fueling the tension within the room. "I suggest one of you answers it."
"Must I begin punishing you one by one until you learn to use your mouths and speak when I ask you to?" Sukuna fumes when he is still met with nothing, and this threat finally encourages on concubine to twitch her head slightly then speak.
A brunette girl. One of your abusers.
"We do not know where (Y/n) is, Lord Sukuna," she says with a trembling voice, head still bowed. "We... we woke, and she was gone-"
"And yet no one said a word until I took notice, and Uraume in turn."
She whimpers. "We did not think to-"
"Silence." She stops, for Sukuna can read rather clearly through her facade. He can read the energy of the entire room, in fact. It does not seem that any one of these women cares very much about your whereabouts or what has happened to you, almost as though they wanted you go in the first place. "You," he gestures to a short haired woman, who takes the risk of peeking upward to ensure that Sukuna is addressing her, for somehow she just knew.
She quickly looks back down. "Yes, Lord Sukuna?"
"Tell me why (Y/n) ran away."
She gulps, eyes scattering over the floor as she conjures up a response. "I do not know, my Lord."
The king's eyes slim, one set of burly arms crossed over his chest. His patience, at this point, is non-existent. He needs to know where you are. He needs to find you know, and so help anyone who got in his way.
"Liar," he says.
With the flick of his wrist, a slicing motion resounds through the air followed by a pitched scream of agony. The victim stares down in hair as her hands fly from her wrists within an instant, sprouting blood from her wrists and pooling over the floor. The concubines grow aware of the action, having no choice but to look up upon hearing such a sound and panic at the sight of blood and the woman now stripped of her hands.
"Now, let me make myself perfectly clear," Sukuna announces over the rise of cries throughout the room. Uraume closes their eyes with a deep sigh, watching everything unfold. "The next one of you who dares to lie to my face will lose more than just her hands. Understood?"
Warbled sobs of understanding and nods flutter about the room while short haired woman struggles to sit up, lifting her trembling limbs to her teary eyes with quivering parted lips of shock. It does not take long before she is passing out, and Sukuna rolls his eyes.
"Uraume, get her out of here."
Once the wounded woman is removed from the environment, a pool of blood left in her spot and trailing behind her, the concubines double down into sniveling submission.
"Why did (Y/n) leave?" he repeats.
Suddenly, overlapping voices jump out with their own explanations in desperate attempts to plead their cases. Sukuna's eye twitches as he listens on for only a few seconds before shutting it down.
"I do not recall telling you all to ramble ontop of each other. Speak one at a fucking time. Tch. You should know better than that."
The room dips into instant silence, followed by one meek voice that speaks out. “S-She never said anything about leaving,” she shivers.
"Of course she didn't, that would have defeated the purpose of sneaking away," Sukuna growls. "Clearly, however, something has transpired within this group to encourage her to leave, am I mistaken?"
"Yes, my lord. I'm sure, my lord," she is quick to go along, for she is not one of your bullies and Sukuna can tell by the look on her face and the way she obliviously rambles on. "Perhaps... she felt unwelcome...?"
And oh, there it is. The icing on the cake, the very piece that sets those guilty for your absence into a momentary state of shock and solidifies Sukuna's assumptions.
"Unwelcome?" he cocks a brow, reciting the word slowly. "By who."
The crimson eyed king's eyes do not miss the way the concubine flashes a glance over to the brunette from earlier swiftly, only to look back down and swallow hard.
With a slow tilt of his head, Sukuna follows her brief line of sight with a hum. While he may not know just exactly what has been transpiring between you and some of these women, he knows that he has identified one involved. One who likely pushed you to run off so disrespectfully.
Sukuna does not know what it is about you that has him driven onto the brink of insanity due to your absence. He knows its not just because of sex, because he can find sex anywhere. He's surrounded by women who provide those services. There's something about you specifically though that makes fucking feel less of a habit, a simple release for pleasure and more so a desire, a thrill, a need. A need with you.
It's your company that he has grown so accostumed to, his frequent access to you, and to be stripped of it so suddenly is a crime in itself. You can not deprive the King of Curses of the very thing you were hired to do. You can not just leave and expect him not to scrounge and burn every corner of this earth until he finds you and punishes you for putting him through the trouble of searching for you. You're a brat. A pain, and Sukuna somehow needs you around, so when he looks the brunette woman dead in the eye, he knows he has to kill her.
Sukuna leaves the concubines traumatized when he treks out to look for you on his own, scorching earth, terrorizing villagers, destroying home after home in search for you and somehow you still are not within his grasp.
Citizens retreat scramble about and retreat to safety, trembling in fear as your name rings out through the air like a battle cry, flame flittering into the call as though hell itself is beckoning you. There is no building that Sukuna does not plan to visit, no alleyway unsearched, no creak unexplored, and just when the demon feels he is prepared to slaughter a nation, you hear a distant cry of your name from afar.
A shiver licks its way down your spine and you jump, whipping your head around.
"(Y/n)?" a gentle, present woman's voice calls from behind you. "That is your name, isn't it?"
Your brows draw together and a pit develops in your stomach, eyes to the door of the orphanage you took shelter in miles away from Sukuna's estate. "...Yes," you say slowly, mind distracted.
"Strange. I think I just heard someone calling you from somewhere."
-
You don't know why you follow the voice.
You left for a reason. You'd been gone since the middle of the night, and you had promised not to return, but you follow his voice anyway as though it beckons you. You always knew better than to ignore the King of Curse's when he calls you, and you can't say that you have prepared to outgrow the habit. Not within the mere hours you have been absent.
The real reason you go back, you want to tell yourself, is to prevent Sukuna from disturbing the peace of the shelter you sought in confidence. You know that if you heard him from where you were staying, he would have continued to make his way further and further down until he found you, and you were not fond of the idea of him tormenting innocent women and children for your sake.
And while you expected to be greeted by an irritated Sukuna, you did not expect the scene that greets you when you round a street corner blocks down during your walk.
You halt in your tracks, heat greeting your skin. Your eyes go wide, your face falls, and before you lay a street aglow with the aftermath of what looks like the tosses of flame and fire. Ash flitters into the sky, windows of businesses are broken, and the entirety of the brick street is empty save for debris and dying flames. It looks as though some kind of bomb or explosion went off and those within the vicinity either fled or got caught in the attack.
Your hands go to your mouth as you study the scene in shock, your skin going cold despite the heat.
You are too entrapped with your shock to notice the shadow that envelopes you from behind when it first arrives. Its eerily quiet, save for the crackle of lingering fire ahead, and you go to take a step back in fear when you hit something hard.
You tense completely, pupils shrinking and gaze unfocusing. You recognize the feeling, the smell, the heat. You recognize the sheer unfathomable mass towering over you without having to turn around, the raw surge of evil that potrudes and surrounds you, caging you in normally so enticingly, but this time so terrifyingly.
You swipe your tongue over your lip anxiously, your heartbeat rapidly hammering into your chest. You shouldn't turn around. You shouldn't look up. You know what will happen, but you can't help yourself. You can not fight the urge as you slowly twist your head around and tilt your chin upward to meet the glowing pairs of red eyes that you'd grown to adore searing down at you from so far above.
You breathe heavily, caught in the lock of Sukuna's wild glare. He appears almost feral with anger to you, some sort of sick enraged smirk twisting onto his face that is anything but kind. You don't say a word as the street burns behind you and your hands stick stiffly to your sides.
"Care to explain what the hell you are doing?"
You know that tone of voice so well by now. It is monotone and low, almost inaudible with its bass yet it carries so crisply. It comes of as calm, but the underlying emotion is anything but. He is pissed, if that is not clear enough from his face and stature, and if you were anyone else you think you'd be dead, but Sukuna's values his possessions and his means of true pleasure far too much. He would do something much worse to you than death. He would be sure of it.
"Mm? Can't talk?" he frowns when you don't answer. You flinch when a hand comes to clasp over your cheeks and squish, sharp nails prodding into your skin as Sukuna guides your body to face him completely. Instinctively, you grab his marked wrist out of surprise. His second pair of eyes look down at the motion, the first still blazing on you. "You think you can touch me without permission after what you've done?"
"Sukuna," you whisper, staring straight into his eyes as your hand slips away. The lord always enjoyed that about you, how you stared directly into him instead of avoiding. Even now, your eyes are mesmorizing pools of uncertainty and alarm as you look at him. "What did you do?"
"Don't ask me that foolishness," he sneers. "You left behind my back, and you have lost the privilege of addressing me as anything but my proper title."
You falter slightly. "I... I could not stay."
"You do not have the power to make that decision."
"It's my decision to make. It's my life."
"You serve me. My life," Sukuna states firmly and you grimace, brows angling in discomfort as he reminds you of your place, of why you left. "I have clearly given you too much freedom if you believe this nonsense."
You feel your heart jolt with sadness, your face hardening as he holds you still. You should know your place by now, truly, but you don't appreciate how you are still treated as though you are an object of possession when your life has been turned to hell by those who are jealous of your favoritism. It's unfair, to love without the benefits, to be placed on a pedestal with no regard for the ramifications nor how it may feel for your privileges to be bestowed upon you without any promise of anything more.
It pains you to be in this position so hopelessly, and you wished to flee it but Sukuna of course refuses to allow such a thing to happen.
"What if I don't want to be your concubine anymore?" you say in a hushed voice. Sukuna's eyes flicker with subtle surprise, and for a moment you think you have caught him off guard.
"You are dramatic," he elects to say. "You are not telling me something, and you choose to take it out on me."
"If I'm just a concubine, then there's no need for me to tell you everything I think, is there?" you ask bitterly.
Sukuna's brows tilt downward slightly, and slowly he releases his grip of your face. You inhale sharply when he does, stumbling slightly and blinking harshly. "Is that what this is truly about?"
You clench your jaw. "What?"
"Wishing to be more than a concubine instead of not being one at all?" he proposes, and you feel yourself freeze. "And here I was made to believe it was solely because of the others."
"...W-What do you mean?"
"You never said anything about how the other women treated you."
You stare at him blankly as you let his comment sit for a moment, a far off look catching your eye. "There was nothing to tell."
"That is not true."
"There was nothing to tell you- you don't care about what happens with the concubines."
"You are not just another concubine."
You furrow your brows and part your lips. "I don't understand you. You want my forced subservience to you and you continue to entertain the others, but you don't think I'm like the rest of them?"
"If you believe that the way I treat you is how I treat the others, then you are much stupider than I previously believed."
"And if you cared to think of me as more than them, you would have noticed how the special treatment does more harm to me than good!"
"You can not complain because you chose to suffer in silence. All you had to do was tell me, and you still will not explain what has happened."
"Because I don't want to! I don't want to talk about it! It's humiliating, and I-" you suck in a breath of air. "I can't keep reliving being tortured for your carelessness-"
"I disposed of them."
You pause. "You- what? Disposed of what?"
"Of the women who harmed you. I assume that is what has been happening. They were jealous of you and pushed you out and treated you poorly."
You gape at him, utterly stunned. "You- you don't even know who-"
"Others confessed."
"...And you killed them?"
"They drove you away. It was a fit punishment."
You can no longer find the words, for you had not expected Sukuna to do such a thing for you. You believed his behavior around you to be temporary engagement, a fling. You believed that he would hardly care if you truly lived or died as long as you pleased him, and you certainly did not believe that he would go such lengths for your sake.
You are rattled by the mentions of their deaths, yes, but more so shocked by what Sukuna's disposal of them means for you... that he must truly value you above the others.
Sukuna raises a brow. "Are you truly surprised?"
"...Sukuna, all I've been to you is..." you trail off slowly as his gaze hypnotizes you, and you stutter over an exhale. "What am I doing with you? What am I to you? You have concubines still, and I'm not- I'm just-"
"You think too much." The salmon haired demon wraps a hand around your wrist while another finds your waist to tug you along with him. You trip into motion as you trail beside his heavy strides, watching him baffled.
"Wait, my lord, wait-" you urge, and he shockingly does. He eyes you out of the corners of his eyes and slows to a stop. "I truly don't understand. Why would you do that for me? What do you want me to be?"
Sukuna looks down at you wordlessly, taking in every crease of your face. He had been so angry, and now that he has found you, now that he sees you, now that he has you, his mind is at ease. He knows what humans label this feeling, and he is well assured that he is far beyond the useless ideal, but irritatingly he feels it there when he looks at you. He felt it at the thought of anyone treating you poorly, and he felt it the moment he lay eyes on you.
And you look terribly confused standing with his arm wrapped around you and your glossed lips pressed into a soft frown. The fire still burns behind you from a distance, and there is still something unsaid that Sukuna can tell you are hiding, but perhaps he does not want to know. Perhaps he needs to keep that barrier.
Even so, he wants you to remain his. You belong to him, with him as more. He doesn't know as what yet, but just knows that you are more, and that you should never dare to pull a stunt like the one you just did.
You jerk your head back gently when Sukuna turns into you and ducks down, meeting you as eye to eye as he possibly can from his height. His face hovers over yours and you watch him with a twisted, tormented, longing gaze, and you are so pathetic he craves it.
He presses into you without purpose, catching your lips in his and you jump against him, for he has only ever kissed you in intimate spaces and the feeling in such a setting is so foreign but your skin is tingling and your heart is thumping. Sukuna pushes in hard, keeping a set of lidded eyes open as yours slide closed and you allow him to take you within his harsh, swift kiss.
He pulls away fast, a soft smack of parting lips, and hovers over you afterward so closely. You can feel your face burning as your lashes flutter open and you look back up at him with shiny eyes. Sukuna catches the gaze. He catches what it means, and he sighs.
"We are returning now," he orders gruffly, standing up straight. "We will further discuss your arrangements at the estate, but as of today, you are no longer a concubine."
Your mind is still fuzzy from the kiss, therefore you do not completely comprehend his declaration. "I'm... not?"
"You will be under my direct surveillance at all times. Try to sneak away again, and I will be sure you are unable to walk for weeks. And do not think this will go unpunished."
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SILLY LITTLE BAT
pairings ⸺ Yandere! Platonic! Batfamily x Anti-Hero! Fem!reader.
sinopsis ⸺ In the shadowed halls of Wayne Manor, a girl lost among the darkness seeks the connection she never had. Her mother, a kleptomaniac with a broken heart, vanished, leaving only echoes of empty promises. Surrounded by a family that never sees her, her pain turns into a deafening silence. The void left by her past traps her in a limbo of solitude and sorrow.
One dark night, seeking her own way, she became what she once despised. Now, like the albino bat rejected by its own flock, she flies alone in the twilight. Her pale skin glows in the dark, but her heart still yearns for the warmth of a home she never came to know.
warnings ⸺ Dark Themes, Dead, murdering,Disturbing Content, Unhealthy Obsession, Discrimination, Violence, Blood, LGBT Content, Child Abuse, Kidnapping, Implicit Sexual Content, Mental Illness, Addiction, Suicide, Torture, Corruption, Isolation, Trauma, Phobias, Paranoia, Manipulation
Chapter Guide! Pt 2. Pt 3. Pt4
A/N — English is not my first language—Spanish is—so there might be some grammar or spelling mistakes here and there. This is the first part of a story I’m writing for a friend (Isabel, I love you, you brat), and also an experiment to see what it’s like to write on Tumblr. Please support me! :"((
Nobody is coming to save you
Get up.
Your mother was not a good woman, and that was an undeniable fact, heavy as the shadow that covers Gotham City at nightfall. She was a creature of the underworld, one among the specters that wandered under the yoke of crime, walking among dangerous names like Selina Kyle or Harleen Quinzel, yet always remaining in the background, never reaching their fame or infamy.
She was nothing more than a kleptomaniac and a mythomaniac, doomed to live by cunning and deceit. She took advantage of the men who crossed her path, from the lowest criminals, like The Penguin, to the most powerful man in the city: Bruce Wayne.
You never called him Dad. To you, he was always Bruce, and on the rare occasions you addressed him, you did so with distant formality, "Mr. Wayne." Richard, your adoptive brother, found in him a father figure, while to you, he was just another shadow in the mansion, that huge, cold house you arrived at after your mother’s death.
You remember how, time and again, you tried to warn your mother to stop stealing, to stop lying, that those dark paths would inevitably lead her to Arkham Asylum, surrounded by all the lunatics you feared so much, or even worse: to death. But she always responded with a playful smile, stroking your head with her delicate hands, adorned with stolen jewelry and crude tattoos. "Those are just fantasies of an eight-year-old girl," she would say sweetly, while her ring-laden fingers assured you that you needn’t worry, "I will always come back for you," she promised, "because you are the only thing more valuable than any diamond I’ve ever held."
But the cruel truth was that was the last time you saw her. That night she left, and she never returned. It was then that the last vestiges of innocence faded with her absence. From that moment on, you ceased to be a child.
And that was one of the few things you understood with absolute clarity. There were no more empty promises, no more caresses tinged with lies. All that remained was the silence of a life fading away, like a stolen jewel that never returns to its rightful owner.
The only thing you knew after calling the police when your mother didn’t show up after two days was that they found her corpse in a back alley far from Gotham, showing signs of having been beaten and bruised by some underground gang.
Commissioner Gordon searched the entire house for illicit substances and signs of debts to mobsters, but he only ended up finding documents, stolen jewelry, and letters from your mother that were never sent, and most importantly, DNA evidence implicating that the city’s millionaire was your biological father.
From then on, your life was stained with eternal gray, that muted shade that erased all traces of light or shadow. There was no more white or black, only a silent fog that, day by day, enveloped you and dragged you into a madness that seemed inevitable. Gotham itself seemed more alive than the place you called home, although "home" was never the right word.
You didn’t love any of the Wayne family members. Bruce, your biological father, never listened to you. To him, you were always just another shadow, a ghost in the vast mansion that he prioritized over his other children, his "true" heirs. There was always something more important, something more urgent, and your presence faded among the cold walls and the echo of his hurried footsteps. With each passing day, you became more invisible to him, as if your very existence were a mistake he preferred to ignore.
Richard, the perfect brother, was kind on some occasions. He spoke to you courteously, but when you needed him, when you asked him to attend one of your performances, there was always an excuse, something that kept him away, as if your passion and accomplishments were insignificant details in his heroic life.
Jason, on the other hand, despised you from the start. He saw you as an intruder, a child of gold—but not of that pure and valuable gold, but of a dirty and false one, which he always mocked with disdain. And although you never cared for him, when he died, silent tears rolled down your face. It wasn’t out of love, but out of respect for what he represented, for the brutal reality of his fall.
Tim, in contrast, was the most indifferent. To him, you were a nobody, so irrelevant that you weren’t even worth a glance. Spending time with his friends or being the Robin of the moment mattered more than you did. You lived on his periphery, in a limbo where neither your name nor your face seemed to exist.
Cassandra, Stephanie, Barbara… at least they treated you with politeness, but you knew they didn’t really remember who you were. They saw you, smiled at you out of obligation, but deep down you knew they had no idea of your name, your story, your struggle to be more than a shadow in that world.
The worst of all was Damian, your younger half-brother. When he arrived at the mansion, Alfred introduced him to you with that serene formality he always had, and you, driven by an almost desperate impulse, tried to reach out to him. You wanted to offer him the support and affection of an older sister, that warmth you would have longed for in his situation. But all you received in return was a cold response: a katana piercing your abdomen. I wish I could say it was just a metaphor, but no, that wound was as real as the blade that cut your skin.
You would have liked to think that the pain was symbolic, that Damian had only rejected your affection with harsh words or his usual arrogance. But no, it was much more than that. The only thing you received in exchange for your attempt at fraternal love was a stab, a scar you still carry not only on your body but also in your soul. Because in that brutal gesture, you understood that the blood that united you also separated you, sharper than any weapon. And that was how you tried to connect.
You strived to stand out, to learn, to shine in your own ambitions, wishing that your success would be enough to earn you a place, a bit of affection. But no matter how hard you tried, it was never enough. Your talent crashed against indifference, your achievements faded into the air, as if they had no weight in the lives of others.
The only light, the only beacon in that storm of gray, was Alfred. The only one who smiled at you with genuine tenderness, the only one you truly loved. To you, he was the real father, the one who was always there, expecting nothing in return, offering you a silent but firm love. You did call him father, and his presence was the only thing that kept your sanity, the only thing preventing the gray from consuming you completely.
But even that love, so genuine and deep, was not enough to fill the void that your own family left you. And in that void, you continue to float, trapped between the girl you were and the woman you are trying to be, searching for a place you can truly call home.
Y/n's small room, though modest, had always been her refuge. The walls were adorned with unfinished sketches, trophies from various activities, and some paintings she had completed with dedication, showcasing her passion for both manual and performing arts.
The dawn light filtered softly through the curtains, bathing the space in golden tones, giving it a warmth that contrasted with the coldness of the rest of Wayne Manor.
On the desk, a small cake rested on a plate, simple yet made with love. Beside it, Alfred, with his usual understated elegance, watched Y/n with a mixture of nostalgia and concern. He, the only one who seemed to remember her birthday, offered her a delicate professional drawing set, wrapped in smooth, elegant paper.
"Happy birthday, Miss," Alfred said with a gentle smile, although his eyes reflected a sadness that was hard to conceal. "I know how much you love art, so I thought this would be helpful for your new projects."
Y/n took the gift in her hands with a genuine smile. It had been so hard for her to find moments of joy lately, but Alfred's gesture filled her with a warmth in her chest that she hadn't experienced in a long time. She placed the gift into one of the many brown boxes she had prepared for her upcoming move.
"Thank you, Alfred. It's perfect," she said, examining the set carefully, as if each detail were a reminder of the affection he held for her. "It will help me a lot... although, well," she sighed, as if searching for the right words. "Actually, I wanted to talk to you about that." Alfred raised an eyebrow, attentive, as she continued, glancing at the small space that had been her home within the vast mansion.
"Today... today is not just my birthday. It's the day I leave here." Her voice was firm, yet there was a sense of liberation in it, as if this were a long-awaited step. "I am finally no longer a Wayne. I go back to being a L/n."
Silence filled the room for a moment, heavy and dense. Alfred clasped his hands, striving to maintain his composure.
"Miss, I can't help but feel a certain unease hearing this. Are you sure this is what you want? This house, though empty in many ways, has always been your home..."
"Home?" Y/n looked at him with a mix of sadness and determination. "This house has never been my home, Alfred. Not like it was for Dick, nor even for Bruce. I have always been a stranger here, the daughter of a woman who never fit into this world, the bastard child. My mother taught me to find my own path, to not cling to what doesn’t belong to me... and being here, being called Wayne, has never belonged to me." Alfred sighed softly, turning his gaze toward the window. He knew there was truth in her words, but that didn’t lessen the pain of her leaving. "I know it’s hard to understand," Y/n continued, "but for the first time in a long time, I feel happy, Alfred. I’ve graduated, college is just around the corner, and I want to start anew. I want to find what truly makes me, me... not what others expect of me."
The old butler remained silent for a few moments, nodding slowly. He knew he couldn't retain her, that it was not his place to interfere in the young woman's dreams. But still, he couldn’t help but feel a pang in his heart at the thought of the house being even emptier without her. "I just wish you find what you’re looking for, Miss. And if you ever need a place to return to... this door will always be open for you."
Y/n stepped closer to him, gently hugging him, something she had rarely done. "Thank you, Alfred," she whispered against his shoulder. "You will always be my family, but I need this. I need to discover who I am outside of this last name."
The old butler felt the lump in his throat as he tightened the embrace a little longer before letting her go. He knew that deep down, she was doing the right thing. But that didn’t make it hurt any less to see her leave.
"Alfred, can you call the movers? I’ll be leaving tonight," Y/n said as she closed the last box with trembling hands, her gaze lost in the empty corners of the room she once considered her refuge. The butler, ever serene, nodded with his unwavering calmness.
"Don't worry, Miss, I assure you they will be here on time." His voice was soft, almost an echo of the ancient walls of the mansion, as if he himself were part of that structure that had seen so many comings and goings, so many lives broken and healed in silence.
Alfred turned halfway to leave, but Y/n's voice stopped him, broken yet sweet, like a melody at sunset. "Alfred..."
The man turned slowly, his eyes filled with paternal warmth, though always contained behind a formal gesture. "Yes, Miss?" he replied, with that tranquility that had always brought Y/n peace in her worst moments.
She took a breath, feeling how the words she had kept for so long fought to come out, to break the shell she had built since childhood. "I’ve never told you, but... thank you. Thank you for being the father I never had, for being there when no one else was."
For a moment, the silence in the room was heavier than all the accumulated boxes, deeper than any word. Alfred, who had been a witness to so many confessions and secrets in that house, stood still, his eyes shining with an emotion he rarely showed. "Miss," he murmured, his voice slightly choked, "it was an honor and a privilege to take care of you. If I ever gave you anything close to what you deserved, then my life has had true purpose."
Y/n smiled sadly, nodding slowly. "You did, Alfred. You did. And for that, I will always carry you with me, even if I leave here."
The butler slightly bowed his head in respect, swallowing any emotion that might betray his composure. "Wherever you go, you will always have a home here, Miss."
"I know," she said, though in her heart, she knew she wouldn’t return.
And as Alfred left the room to make the call, Y/n let out a long sigh, as if with it, she were leaving behind a part of herself, a part she could no longer carry with her.
Life in Gotham is like constantly walking on the edge of a razor blade. The city never sleeps, always alert, always dangerous, and for someone with the Wayne surname, the risks multiply. It has been a year since you left the mansion, trying to erase any ties that bound you to that life, desperately wishing the name would fade into the echo of the dirty streets and crumbling buildings. But it's not that easy. The name Wayne remains an indelible mark that the media and the people of Gotham refuse to let fade. The forgotten child, the silent accident of billionaire Bruce Wayne. And although you try to live as if you don’t exist under that shadow, the weight of the legacy haunts you.
You left with little, barely enough money to rent a small apartment in one of the worst corners of the city. You share the space with a friend, a plant-loving girl who has filled every nook of the place with leaves and pots, as if trying to make green defy the constant darkness of Gotham. You get along well with her; her love for nature is almost an antithesis to the chaos of the city, and she has taught you that even in the hardest concrete, something can bloom. She always accompanied you on the coldest, loneliest nights, giving you a warmth that, although ethereal, was very welcome. But still, life is not easy. You barely survive, spending the little you have on cheap food and paying the rent. There are days when the cold seeps through the poorly sealed windows, and you wonder if it was really better to be in the mansion instead of this little trench. However, you prefer this rough freedom to the soulless luxury of Wayne Manor.
Freedom, however, comes at a price. It wasn't enough to distance yourself, to change your life, or even to always carry a knife for defense. Gotham does not forget. People recognize you in the shadows, whisper your name, and approach you, sometimes with curiosity and other times with disdain. You have been beaten more than once. Some just for being a Wayne, others because they think they can extort you, even though they have no idea you can barely get by. The scars on your body bear witness to those beatings, but you refuse to give up. You get up every morning, despite the pain, and continue on your way. You don’t need Batman. You don’t need Bruce. You learned long ago that he wouldn't come to save you.
That night, like so many others, you were heading to the subway for your night shift, with the hood of your coat covering your face, trying to go unnoticed. The sound of the tracks echoed in your ears, a constant reminder of the city's hustle. You had gotten used to walking fast, avoiding eye contact, as if each step was a small battle won against the city. But this time, something was different.
"So it was true, the little Wayne girl is roaming the city... how lovely." The raspy, mocking voice rang out beside you, cutting through the heavy air of the train station. The man speaking wore a suit that, at first glance, seemed elegant, but there was something about his extreme thinness, his skin clinging to his bones and his disheveled hair, that made him look more like a specter of Gotham than a distinguished figure. A ghost from the shadows that had stalked you since you set foot on the streets.
If it weren't for his gaunt appearance and unsettling aura, you might have mistaken him for one of your father's employees. "I'm not a Wayne anymore," you said disdainfully, your voice sharp like the edge of a dagger refusing to be touched. "If you want money, I don’t have any. And Mr. Wayne wouldn’t give a cent for me either."
Your gaze drifted to the station clock. 8 minutes until the train that would take you away from this corner of Gotham, far from the shadows and faces that always seemed to recognize you.
The man let out a dry, raspy laugh that sent chills down your spine. "I don’t want your money, pretty girl," he replied, moving closer, invading your space with the same familiarity that Gotham’s filth slipped into every corner. "You’re worth more than that." You felt his calloused, scarred hand rest on your hip, with a pressure that was neither violent nor friendly. The contact filled you with disgust.
7 minutes.
You clenched your fist, your jaw tight as you struggled to maintain your composure. "I don’t want sex either, idiot," you spat, your words loaded with contained fury. Your hand subtly slid toward your bag, where your knife lay, waiting to be used.
6 minutes.
The man didn’t flinch. In fact, he let out a low, mocking laugh. "And I don’t want that either, little girl," he murmured, his cold, deep blue eyes scrutinizing you as if they could read every dark corner of your soul. "I want something more from you."
5 minutes.
"What do you want then?" you asked, forcing yourself to keep your voice steady, even as the ice of fear began to creep down your spine. Your eyes scrutinized him, searching his gaze for any hint of his true intentions, but all you saw was darkness.
4 minutes.
He let out a long, chilling laugh, tightening his grip on your hip. "Do you know what I want, Y/n?"
3 minutes.
His voice dropped, as if his words were a cursed secret the wind refused to carry away. "I want you."
2 minutes.
The world seemed to stop. You knew there was no time to run. There was no time to pull out the knife or to scream. It was as if the clock itself had conspired against you, reducing those last minutes to mere seconds.
1 minute.
The blow was sharp, a flash of excruciating pain at the back of your head. The cold metal of the station, the hum of the city, everything faded abruptly. The last thought that crossed your mind, before the world vanished into darkness, was that this time, you didn’t expect Batman to save you. It wasn’t a mere thief or a street threat that was taking you.
Gotham, with all its cruelty, always had new ways to remind you that there is no escape.
That night, when the Gotham subway stopped at the station, there was no one to pick up.
The mansion felt emptier than ever, like a deserted and cold labyrinth, where each hallway seemed to stretch into an infinite tunnel, devouring the light.
The silence was overwhelming, an oppression that enveloped every corner, as if even the ancient walls had run out of words. It was so heavy that the few who remained in the mansion couldn’t help but move uncomfortably, trying to fill that void with something, anything.
Bruce Wayne walked through those same hallways with a strange feeling, as if something was missing, though he didn’t know what. An unease, a persistent discomfort that he couldn’t shake off.
He had been like this for months, with that absence haunting his mind, a gap he couldn't identify. And then, suddenly, like a gust of icy wind, the truth struck him.
You.
His daughter.
His little daughter.
How long had it been since he last saw you? When was the last time he heard your laughter, the one that always seemed too sarcastic, too filled with resentment? He stopped abruptly, frowning. Why couldn’t he remember you? He couldn’t bring to mind a clear image of your face, not even how you used to look at him... why? How could he have forgotten you like that?
Damn.
It was as if time had stopped. It had been a year, maybe more, since he had really thought about you. He felt a pang of guilt pierce his chest, a heavy, silent guilt that dragged him into the abyss of his own negligence. Not knowing what else to do, he began to check the rooms, one after another.
Each door he opened was another blow to his conscience. Where was your room? The more he searched, the more confused he felt. The mansion was enormous, but how could he have forgotten where you slept? How was it possible that he didn’t know where you lived in the house where both of you grew up? Had you been here all this time?
Each door he opened was identical to the last, as if all the rooms had fused into one.
None showed a trace of you.
None seemed to have a hint of your presence. Didn’t you decorate your room? He thought frantically, didn’t you even mark it as yours? Panic began to take hold of him. Anxiety wrapped around him like a fist tightening on his chest. Were you still living in the mansion? Or had you left without saying a word, like a shadow fading at dawn? But... no, you hadn’t mentioned anything. You hadn’t said you were leaving. Or had you? And if you had, why didn’t he remember? How could he have ignored you for so long that now he didn’t even know if you were still under the same roof?
“Ah!” he exclaimed in a whisper, unable to contain the dread he felt.
Frustration consumed him from within. He stopped in the middle of the hallway, breathing heavily, and the echo of his voice faded into the empty walls. He tried to remember something, anything about you, about the last time they spoke, about how you were... but everything was blurry, as if his mind was betraying him, hiding you behind an impenetrable fog.
How could he have forgotten so much?
He brought his hands to his head, trying to calm himself, but only felt more confusion, more desperation. The mansion, which had once been his home, now felt like a strange and foreign place.
Had you been the one who made it feel like home? The question echoed in his mind, but he had no answer. Just more questions. More uncertainties. Finally, he let his arms fall, exhausted. He had checked almost all the rooms and had found not a trace of you. Not a clue. Not a sign that you had been there. And at that moment, something dark and painful began to settle in his heart.
Had you ever really been there?
Then something caught his attention as he passed by the cleaning room. In a dusty corner, next to a forgotten bag, something was protruding. Something small, old, and faded. He bent down and pulled it from the dirty clothes. It was a stuffed animal, or what was left of one. The faded black of its suit left no doubt. It was a figure of Batman, but worn down by time, battered to the point of looking forgotten.
Bruce's eyes were fixed on the small piece of fabric hanging from the doll's neck. A tag.
Your name.
Your name, handwritten, in ink that was already fading.
Bruce felt a lump in his throat, a mix of guilt and rage. How could he have forgotten something so important?
He clutched the doll tightly, as if doing so would return a piece of you to him, but instead of comfort, he only felt more emptiness. Where were you? He ran to Alfred, who looked at him with a mix of concern and pity.
"Alfred..." Bruce said, his voice breaking. "Where is she? Where is my daughter?"
The butler, with his always serene face, seemed to age suddenly. A long silence settled between them, as if time was fading away. "Mr. Bruce, I didn’t mean to..." Alfred lowered his gaze. "I didn’t want to burden you with that truth, but... it’s time you know."
Bruce felt a chill run down his spine. Truth? What truth?
"She left almost a year ago. She didn’t say where. She just... she took all her belongings, though they weren’t many, and left. She said she didn’t want to be a burden. That you and the other family members had too many things to worry about."
Bruce took a step back, as if the words had physically struck him. Did she have enough age to leave? A burden? Never, not for a second, did he think that of you, of his little daughter who, even though she wasn’t wanted, he embraced under his wing just like Damian.
You were never a burden.
...or were you?
No, he refused to acknowledge it; he just... he hadn’t spent time with you because Gotham needed him!
But when you needed him, where was Batman?
Where was Bruce Wayne when his only biological daughter needed him?
"Alfred, do you know anything about Y/n?" the hero asked, worry clear on his face.
Alfred didn’t look at him; he only stared into nothingness. "...I haven’t heard anything about her for two months...
And honestly... I'm starting to think...
that she might be lost to us forever..."
A/N — This is definitely apart from being my first official Tumblr post, it is also my first DC post and especially the first from the Lord of the Night xD
Don't hesitate to ask me anything if you want.
Isabel, I dedicate this to you, my love. Eat more to be well, you fucking anorexic, don't suck.
take a bath!
inspiration: @acid-ixx with his Again & Again series, @gotham-daydreams' work, @i-cant-sing's work and @klemen-tine's work, be sure to check them out!
#yan blog#yandere#yandere batfam#yandere batfamily#yandere batman#yandere batboys#yandere bruce wayne#yandere dick grayson#yandere nightwing#yandere jason todd#yandere red hood#yandere tim drake#yandere red robin#yandere damian wayne#yandere robin#yandere platonic#fem reader#x reader#neglected reader#yandere dc#dc universe#dc x reader
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PLAY FAKE | 15
MASTERLIST (Series)
Pairing — Rafe Cameron x Female Reader .ᐟ
Summary — When Rafe needs to secure a girlfriend for his father to see him as a viable candidate for Cameron Development, he enlists the help of a bartender who wants nothing to do with him.
Content — 18+, smut, angst, depictions of jealousy + aggression, emotional turmoil, mild descriptions of violence, and usage of drugs.
Rafe always struggled with noise.
It was always too much or too little. But silence at Tannyhill was something he had grown accustomed to: the steady hum of the air conditioner wavering between seasons, the chirps of cicadas outside his balcony, and the soft waves crashing on his beachfront estate. These noises are familiar to him, setting his routine for the day.
Not Sarah.
It's unfair to say Sarah is an anomaly. He grown up with her his entire life, and her being in the house wasn't an uncommon sound. However, after she ditched the family to go slumming it with the Pogues, there was a lightness in the air from her absence. With Wheezie being off at academy, Rose and Ward often traveling for work, Rafe gotten used to being alone.
Now, the droning silence is met with a muffled pop music blasting from Sarah's bedroom. Given that her room sits adjacent to his, it forces Rafe to hear every screeching lyric, every grating beat, and every obnoxious sound, reminding him of his sister's existence.
Solitude is something he wishes he could return to.
"Can you turn it down over there?" Rafe pounds on the shared wall, but the volume doesn't lower. In fact, if he's imagining it or the anger bubbling beneath the surface is giving him more clarifying senses, it gets louder. With gritted teeth, Rafe shakes off the nuisance and returns to his task.
Her presence agitated him. It's one thing for her to come home and disrupt his routine, it's another when her return jeopardize his future. As much as he likes to pretend it doesn't—and not think about it—he knows it does.
For the longest time, they fought for their father's affection, especially after their mother left. Sarah had always received it, and Rafe had to always fight to stay in the limelight. But it isn't true to say he hates her. There were times where Rafe considered himself closest to Sarah. She was the one who shared his childhood, separated by a measly three-year age gap, and she was the one who remembered their mother. They have sibling spats, but it never pushed to the level it is now.
Now, it's as if they can't seem to stand each other's existence. To Rafe, she's a reminder of all the bitter favoritism their father offered her. To Sarah, Rafe is the [reminder] of someone who can't seem to move on.
Once Rafe packed, he steps out of his bedroom—only to collide with Sarah.
"Watch it, Rafe," she snaps, holding a ceramic bowl in one hand, while collecting her wet hair in the other. Her eyes narrowed with disdain, before she turns her heel and head to the stairwell.
His jaw ticks.
Rafe hates how easy it was for her to come home. To be accepted. When Rafe was kicked out of the house, he had to beg his father to grant his return. And that was just for an addiction. Imagine how much worse it could've been had Rafe skipped off and abandoned his family for a fleeting puppy romance.
It just wasn't fair.
Finally, he snaps. "What are you doing here, Sarah?"
She halts at the top of the stairs, twisting her head at the accusation. Rafe uses this opportunity to approach her. "Why are you back home?"
Ever since she returned, he hadn't had a proper conversation with Sarah. Not that he wanted to. He's been so preoccupied with you and everything going on with Aaron, he hadn't bothered interrogating the origin of his sister's sudden homecoming. Now, it's as if he can't stop.
Sarah twists her delicate features. "Last I'd checked, this was my house too."
"It was your house," Rafe corrects. "Before you abandoned it for that little Pogue boyfriend of yours. What happened? Couldn't cut roughing it?"
She huffs, tightening her jaw and glances away. "Dad said I can move back in,"
"Dad says anything to give his little princess what she wants,"
"What's your deal, Rafe?" She demands, nostrils flaring at his abrupt attack. "Are you that mad I'm coming home?"
She made him sound unreasonable. He wasn't. "Was it home when you ran away to fuck your little boyfriend? Was it home when Dad and Rose tried to contact you, only to receive radio silence? Was it home when you left our little sister?"
"It's as if you give two shits about Wheezie,"
"Of course I give a shit about her," he growls, unable to keep the emotions from his voice, "She's my family. And frankly, she was the only family I had when you left."
At the end of the day, it wasn't just the rivalry that got to him. It was the fact that he was abandoned. It was the fact that he found satisfaction in his placement of their Kildare society, and he had his sisters with him—only for one to skip off and choose to live on the rough side of town. That being with them was easier than being with him.
All he asks is loyalty.
His chest heaves by the end of his sentence, but there's a lightness to his heart. He hadn't realize how much he needed to get that off. He needed to say his piece. Hands bundled into fists by his side, a sudden draw of blood tastes on his tongue.
Silence eclipses their argument, saved for the choking sputters of the air conditioner, before Sarah answers calmly. "John B and I broke up."
"Oh."
"Yeah," Sarah says solemnly, all lost of her previous energy, and she looks down. "Guess that makes you feel better, huh?"
"I didn't say that."
"You might as well have," Sarah declares, as if she could read his heart. "Me failing. Me losing my relationship. Everything in my life going to shit—I bet you're satisfied."
That isn't true. There's not even any resemblance of satisfaction curling in his chest, but a bleeding ache of hurt. Did Sarah really, truly, thinks so lowly of him?
It makes him defensive. "If this was the attitude you had with John B, it's no wonder he dumped you."
Sarah scoffs, "here it is."
"Am I wrong?" Rafe snaps, charged with misplaced hurt. "And now you get to come back like nothing has changed, and sneak your way into the family business as if you had any fucking right to it."
Sarah stares at him, jaw slackens, before realization dawns on her. "Is that what this is about?" She begins. "You're pissed because Dad asked me for help?"
"You never wanted it," he says lowly, but he can't seem to say the other part. That if his dad could pick between them to run his legacy, it would be her. But he is the one who wants it.
"Dad asked me," Sarah emphasizes, trying to get Rafe to understand.
"You could've said no."
"How could I?" She demands. "I have no place—I left for God's sake, and now I'm crawling back with my tail between my legs and Dad asked me to help with one case. How could I say no to that?"
It's so easy for her. Rafe took time, energy and effort to get enough approval from their father to give consultations. Sarah got it as a placement test to prove herself. She's going to ruin it, he thought bitterly, and he knows he should feel sympathy for all the shit she's been through, but all of it dissipates in the waste of his anger.
It's his birthright; he deserves it.
Rafe suddenly says. "You should go."
"Go where, Rafe?" She orders, "and for what? So you can live here with that little girlfriend of yours? It's not like you're going to last anyways."
Rafe is struck by Sarah bringing you into the conversation.
"You don't know what you're talking about,"
"She's a Pogue," Sarah emphasizes mockingly, in the same tone that Rafe used. He hates that too. "Why do you think John B and I broke up?"
"Because he couldn't stand your attitude of yours?"
Sarah scoffs, shoulders unwinding. "No, because he had other things he cared about more than me."
"She's not like that."
"You can't honestly believe that," Sarah says with a demeaning scoff, "They're all like that. It's in their blood. John B wanted something more and he put me behind. She's going to do the same to you."
He doesn't believe that. He refuses to. "Maybe you got the wrong end of the stick."
"Maybe you're blinded by love," she retorts easily, without missing a beat. "Do you honestly believe she had no ulterior motives with you? What did she even see in you in the first place?"
Rafe wanted to argue in your defense that you didn't see him as some cash cow. But he realizes he can't. Because there was an another motive for the beginning of your relationship—your bar. Albeit fake, it's all the same.
He doesn't know if it still stands.
"She's not like that," he repeats, but his voice is weaker in conviction. Sarah merely shrugs.
"Whatever you say," she says, taking a step down the stairwell. "You'll see."
—
After his fight with Sarah—which Rafe isn't even sure he won—he heads over to your bar. He knows he should be able to process his feelings without seeking an emotional clutch, but there's an unbeatable calamity that comes from being in your presence.
Upon entry, the little bell chimes, and you lift your head to greet the customer, only for a wide smile to spread across your face. He steps in to meet you halfway at the counter.
"Hi," you greet softly, reaching out to stroke his shoulder, and all tension in his muscles unwinds.
"Hey," he leans down to kiss your lips, his hand finding the small of your back. "Ready to go?"
You shake your head. "Can't. I have to stay until the last customer leaves."
Rafe glances around the bar. While mostly vacant, it hosts a couple of lingering patrons who are drinking and watching the channel on the television—no sense of urgency behind their necessary leave.
He turns back to you, "You're the boss."
"Yes, and the boss says no," you say with a playful grin.
Rafe's mind is whirling with thoughts. He just wants to have you alone, and contemplating a solution, his mouth lowers to the shell of your ear to ask, "How would you react if I kicked everyone out?"
"Mad?" You offer.
He groans. "Thought so."
You laugh, and the sweet sound grounds him. It's the same laugh as before; the melodic, light, and airy sound, filled with spirit and soul. It's the same sound he heard in your bar that day; now, in the same place, at a different time. He hadn't realized then how much he was going to love it.
"What's wrong?" You question. "Do you want to go home that bad?"
He shakes his head. "It's not that," he murmurs, his hand sliding up your low-cut work shirt, grabbing the hems to pull it down. "I just want to be alone with you."
"You always want to be alone with me,"
"I want you." He declares definitively, so full of totality that it sends a buzz of warmth straight to your heart. You grin, steeping on your tiptoes to give him another kiss.
This time, he savors it—grabbing the back of your neck to hold you in place as he laps over your bottom lip, tasting you on his tongue until it's swollen. When you reluctantly pull away, needing to get back to work, your hand trails down to grab his. "Wanna help me serve?"
"I only know how to be served," he answers.
"Kinky?"
Rafe smirks. "Let's go to the backroom and find out."
You laugh again, pulling him behind the counter. You hand him the first glass and instruct him to behave because he had a tendency to grab your ass, pull you in posessively between serving customers, and surprise you with kisses.
Despite this, Rafe follows your orders. While he pretends not to care, he secretly loves the enthusiasm behind each demand. The sharp wit you show while bossing him around reminds him why he's attracted to you in the first place.
After recruiting Rafe as your second-in-command, the job becomes much easier. You don't know if it's the second set of hands, or because every customer who asks for a refill is met with a piercing glare that silently warns them to leave, but you end up going home earlier than expected.
By the time you arrive at the house, your sisters lift their sleepy gazes off the television, jump off their seats, and come running—tackling you and Rafe into a hug.
He didn't even have the time to set his duffel bag down before Amara nearly knocked him off his feet, clutching his legs like lifelines while she recounted her day at hourly intervals. However, he merely chuckles at the sight, running his hand through the mess of her hair, while giving his utmost attention. He even asked for follow-up questions about her day, which led to a minute-by-minute breakdown.
You watch with tenderness, recognizing Rafe's presence in your home. He has changed the very fabric of your family. Usually, getting your sisters ready for bed takes ages, filled with bemoaned complaints about wanting to stay up past bedtime, but now, they're nearly obedient.
Sitting on the couch, while your sisters are crisscrossed on the floor, you brush your sister's hair and braid them; Rafe does the same. He's steadily detangling Amara's hair, afraid to hurt her sensitive head, while she rattles on about nonsensical things. Despite struggling for the first couple of times with braiding, and reducing them to a magic happenstance that appears out of thin air, Rafe slowly learns the tool of the trade, perfecting it to Amara's liking.
When you finally send them off to bed, you and Rafe return to the couch. Your head leaned against the backseat, releasing a slow sigh, before turning to face Rafe. Both of you made the same move, at the same time, and it caused a smile to light your expression.
"Tired?" He proposes gently.
You shake your head. Truthfully, you are. It's been a long shift, on top of a long week, but being in the presence of your boyfriend melts away all the exhaustion. You just want a few more moments, alone, with him.
Making the bold choice, you climb onto his lap. With your knees on either side of his hips, your arms looped around his neck, and your chin tilted slightly downward to meet his gaze.
Rafe tilts his head slightly to the side, amusement fliting his features. "Hi, pretty girl."
"Hi," you say timidly, heart lunging out of your chest, and desire pools in your stomach. Rafe watches you for a few seconds as your mind fills with choices, but all of them are silenced when you lower yourself to kiss him.
At first, it surprises Rafe. He assumed you didn't have the energy to start anything, after the long hours, but with you deliciously placed on his lap like his own personal meal, he couldn't help the pang of need stirring within. His hands find your waist, drawing you close, while his fingers splayed across your rode-up top, grazing your bra.
Pulling away, just slightly for air, his mouth hovers over yours to ask, "What's this for?"
"I miss you," you mumble a breathy answer, before recapturing his lips. This time, he has no objective. His hands slide under your bra, gliding across your heated skin and raising goosebumps in its wake.
For the next few minutes, it was just a lazy makeout with quiet groans and moans. Your core rocks gently over his lap, coming into contact with his growing erection, until it becomes impossible to ignore. Your lips pull to a teasing smile, and Rafe catches it, "Know how I feel about you now?" He asks hotly against your swollen lips.
"You're so obsessed with me," you declare.
"I am."
You grind against him, finding the right spot that allows your panties to graze his hardened cock underneath his jeans. Rafe groans into your mouth, the low sound sending a shiver down your spine, while timid flutters of pleasure curl in your stomach.
"I need you," you murmur against his lips, kissing down his jaw to the column of his neck. When your hands find the button of his jeans, you lift your innocent gaze to ask, "Can I blow you?"
This fucking girl.
Wordlessly lifting his hips, you remove his pants and briefs until his cock springs free. Half of you want to push your panties to the side and sink on his length, but the other half wants to edge yourself. Sliding to the floor, with your knees scraping the carpet, your hands timidly wrap around his girth.
"Fuck," he groans lowly, tipping his head back when you dribble spit on his tip and rub his cock, the grip of your soft hands feels good, but not enough. "Baby, put your mouth on it."
"Say please," you tease.
"Please," he begs, and satisfaction reverberates through you as a hand drops, and his cock enters your mouth, your tongue lapping over the crown. With the other hand wrapped around the base, pumping him, you slide down his length until he touches the back of your throat.
Rafe lets out a guttural groan.
His hands slide through your hair as he pushes you deeper, and you gag, the vibration sending jolts of pleasure up his spine.
His words come out choked and unsteady as you quicken up the pace; pumping and sucking him off. You hollow your cheeks to produce suction and rub him with your spit until his cock twitches in your mouth.
"Fuck," he moans again, hips lifting off the seat as your free hand presses down his thigh. You go faster, and faster until spurts of hot cum hits the base of your throat and Rafe finishes inside your mouth.
He grabs your arm and hauls you to his lap, greeting you with a well-deserved kiss. When he pulls away, forehead resting against yours, breathing heavily, he whispers, "I wanna be inside of you."
You trailing your thumb down his jaw. "Will you beg for it?"
"Sweetheart," he warns.
"That's not a very nice tone," you tease, pulling away as punishment, but Rafe grips your arm tighter. Quickly standing, Rafe lifts you up and off his lap, your legs wrap around his torso as he carries you off.
Rafe enters your bedroom and locks the newly-fixed door. Everything else moves within a blur—Rafe pulling off the remainder of his clothes before removing yours. Your giggles echo the chambers as you run away from him, only for Rafe to easily snatch you by the waist and throw you onto the bed.
Your back hits the sheets as you land with a thump, and laughter escapes. Rafe's warm body covers yours as his hot mouth attacks you with kisses, nibbling on your bottom lip, pulling the plush between his teeth as a sensual penalty.
His hands slowly descend between your parted thighs, finding your slick core waiting for him.
"You're so wet for me," he murmurs against your swollen lips. "Does sucking me off turn you on?"
You nod eagerly, putting his mouth back on yours before his fingers spread your wet folds. You whimper, clenching around nothing, as he skillfully strokes your pussy, teasing your swollen nub, but not quite satisfying you. "Rafe."
"Yes, baby?"
"Inside," you command, but your voice wavers from the sparks of pleasure he's eliciting.
"Inside," he mocks, "inside where?"
Your core clenches around nothingness. His cockiness mixed with his strokes causes your mind to short-circuit. "Rafe, please," you beg because that's all you seem to be able to say.
"Say it again," he orders, rolling your clit between his thumb and pointer finger. Your hips lift to chase the feeling, only for him to push it down firmly. "Ask me politely."
"Baby," you whimper, capturing the nape of his neck and dragging his mouth back to yours, "please fuck me."
Rafe grins, before removing his hand. The emptiness of his touch leaves much to be desired before you feel the tip of his cock grazing your slick, and he sinks into you, inch by inch.
You gasp at the intrusion before the familiar buzz of pleasure warms your stomach and Rafe begins to rock his hips.
"You feel so fucking perfect," Rafe says through gritted teeth. Stealing your breath away with each thrust, the way his cock presses right against your cervix, the way your walls flutter around him as he quickens his pace. Rafe pushes your legs onto his shoulders and kisses one of your ankles as he fucks you.
"Go faster," you order, nails digging into your sheets. Rafe grins, fastening his thrusts as he watches the way his cock enters and leaves your pussy—over and over again, the way you swallow him whole. Slowly, the build of your release coils inside.
Moans and whimpers leave your lips, each sound becoming more desperate, and incessant, and needy until you're tipped over the edge and come crashing down.
Rafe hasn't come, and plowing into your overstimulation, he fucks you until he releases himself, finishing inside of you.
When Rafe pulls out, he collapses into the space beside you, breathing heavily. In the clarity of post-sex, his mind returns to the one place he wishes it doesn't.
Despite everything, despite being with you, Rafe still has Sarah's words in the back of his mind. He doesn't want to, and he has faith in you, but something about his sister's words is everlasting and terrifying. It has him locked in thought, and it appears on his face, because when you turn your head to look at him, you ask, "What's wrong?"
"Nothing," he answers quickly.
"Rafe..."
"It's fine," he declares. "Nothing important, I swear."
By the look on his face, you know that's not true, but Rafe has always been the type of person who doesn't talk unless they're ready, and you don't want to push further onto the subject.
"Okay," you agree, switching gears. "Then, I have some news."
Rafe tilts his head, especially after hearing the bubbling of excitement contained in your voice. "Yeah?" He asks, turning his body towards you, and pulling you into his arms. "What is it?"
Grinning, you announce, "I got a catering gig."
Your joy is contagious, and he mirrors it with a soft smile. "Really? For who?"
"Sarah."
All of the air in Rafe's lungs goes stale. His shoulders become rigid, and the daze from the sex disappears. Sobriety covers his features, but you're too excited about the announcement to catch the subtle shift.
"What?" Rafe's astonishment is light, almost undetectable, and it works. You don't catch it—neither his tone nor the fall of his expression. Your happiness bleeds into ignorance, and you gloss over the details.
"Yeah. Your dad asked me to cater for her birthday coming up," you explain. "I was contemplating saying no, but the gig pays really well, and since a lot of Kooks attend these parties, I had to agree."
The thing about Camerons' birthday extravaganzas is that they're not an exclusive event; it's a parade. Especially with the return of Ward Cameron's golden child, Rafe isn't surprised that his father pushed for a big celebration. However, dread suddenly fills his veins at the thought that this could mean something more.
Not just the fact that it was Ward soliciting your service, but the fact that Sarah had agreed to it. This has to be some kind of power move; a play for her to demonstrate that she holds more control over Rafe than he wants her to.
You continue to talk about your plans, specifically what drinks you'll be serving and what menu you'll have. But Rafe stopped listening. His mind is elsewhere, his thoughts eluding him, and amid a rambling that he isn't registering, he suddenly interrupts you to say, "Don't take it."
You blink in surprise. Your brows pull together in confusion, and when you finally turn to Rafe, all sense of amusement is gone. "Why?"
He couldn't tell you. He couldn't explain that the reason was because of him. It's selfish, but he needs it. If you take it, it means you're proving her right, and him wrong. It means that if she's right about this thing, she must be right about the others too.
He doesn't want to put you in this position, but he needs to know your loyalty.
"Just don't take it."
Now, you're more confused. You pull away slightly from his grip to evaluate his face, trying to figure out if this is some sort of joke. But Rafe doesn't deliver a gotcha! His expression is stern, and his request is absolute. Is he really asking you to forgo one of the biggest gigs of your life?
"Why?"
He shakes his head. "I'll pay you."
Flabbergasted, you say. "What?"
"I'll pay you double what they're paying you—just don't take it."
Your mouth drops to an unsteady frown. "That's not the point."
He doesn't know how to argue. He wants to be happy for you, but he can't. It's Sarah. It's his sister. He believes this is some ulterior motive to break you two apart. "Just... Just don't take it. Please."
"Why?" You ask again, pressingly, and agitation ticks at his jaw.
"Can't you just listen to me?" He snaps. "Don't take it."
This time, you withdraw. It isn't the aggression that frightens you, you've seen those sides of Rafe before. But this time, it's different. This time, it feels more tormented and frantic. Off.
You don't answer, recognizing this atmosphere as too tense. You don't want to get into a fight, and you don't know what to say that'll satisfy him. "I'm..." You begin, unsure of where the sentence is heading. You glance at the door. "I'm going to take a shower."
You get up from bed and grab some clothes before heading into your ensuite bathroom, locking the door with a soft click. Rafe remains in your room, unmoved. When the sound of water runs, he sighs heavily, glancing around the space, at the door, but nothing helps.
Fear creeps over him like a second skin. Daunting, present, and perpetual. You didn't give him an answer, and honestly, he doesn't know if you will.
But he knows one thing.
Sarah's right.
And if Sarah's right, then that can only lead to one conclusion.
He's going to lose you.
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