#my favorite thing is when i lose my train of thought mid sentence i call it a joe biden buffer

[junghelioseok]

clandestine. | 05

↳ forbidden fruit tastes the sweetest.

◇ jungkook x reader ◇ smut | fluff | brother’s best friend!au ◇ 7.6k [5/6]

notes: second to last installment of a fic that didn’t need to be as long as it is!!! really this entire thing can be summed up with last chapter’s warning, which was “reader is dumb and jungkook is slutty.” i stand by it, okay!!! 🤷🏻‍♀️

warnings: dumb banter, a couple brief smutty bits, oral (f receiving), listen to slow dancing in the dark by joji during the soft smut scene in the middle if u want 

⇢ 01 | 02 | 03 | 04 | 05 | 06 

“No. No. God, no. Has your music taste always been this bad, or is this a recent development?”

“You will excuse yourself,” you retort sharply, wagging a finger at your brother. “Mr. Brightside is a classic and I will not hear this slander. Please feel free to permanently vacate the premises if you disagree.”

Jimin rolls his eyes from where he’s slouched on the couch beside you, one hand submerged in a bag of chips and his bare feet kicked up on the coffee table. “You’re so dramatic.”

“I’m dramatic? Really? You wanna go there, Chim?” You raise your hand and begin ticking off on your fingers. “I’m not the one who threw a fit over a piece of cilantro in my taco. I’m not the one who refused to bathe when Mom couldn’t find the right bubble bath.”

“Oh my god, I was eight,” Jimin snorts. “Both times. And cilantro tastes like soap.”

You raise a third finger. “What about the time you hid all the Monopoly money because you kept losing? Or when yo—”

A knock on the door cuts you off mid-sentence, and you nudge Jimin’s shin with your big toe. “Go get the door,” you order, and you aren’t sure if he’s just tired of hearing your voice, but he stands up without complaint and wanders into the entryway to receive your unexpected guest.

“Hey,” you hear him say. “What’s up?”

“Hey,” a very familiar voice replies. “I need some help.”

It’s Jungkook. Of course it’s Jungkook. You haven’t seen him since he dropped you off and kissed you senseless in your driveway, but you’d have to be delusional to think that you could avoid him for the next week and a half before you leave to return to Seoul. And yet, you allowed yourself to indulge in your delusions for two full days, before he tears them apart with ten simple, innocent words.

“So, I think I might have done the laundry wrong.”

Jimin laughs out loud, covering his mouth with his hand. “That’s all you, Noona,” he says, glancing over his shoulder at you, and you don’t even have wherewithal to lecture him about the sexism of his remark because Jungkook is smirking like he’s just won the lottery and you’re his grand prize.

“Noona?” he begins, his voice syrupy sweet and thick with intent. “Can you come help me?”

You glance down at your pajamas—gray sweatpants and a pink Pusheen t-shirt that’s a couple sizes too big. It’s beyond obvious that you have no plans for the day, and therefore no excuse not to help. Heaving a resigned sigh, you clamber to your feet and roll your eyes when Jimin immediately flops down across the newly abandoned couch and lets out an exaggerated sigh. “Have fun,” he calls lazily as you walk out, and you do your best to ignore the wicked grin that flashes across Jungkook’s face.

“Oh, I’m sure we’ll find a way to make it fun,” he says as he lets you pass by him to exit the house. “See you later, Jimin.”

As soon as the front door slams shut, you round on him with a glare. “Are you serious, Jungkook?” you hiss. “He’s totally going to catch on to… to whatever it is we’re doing.”

“You’re being paranoid,” Jungkook chides, clicking his tongue. He hops over the low bushes that divide your property, and waits patiently as you skirt around them. You follow him into his house—down the hallway and into a little side room that houses the washing machine and dryer—and as soon as the door swings shut, he’s grabbing you by the hips and pulling you close.

“This—this isn’t how you do laundry,” you stammer weakly, winded by his sudden proximity and the dark promise in his eyes. “What the hell are you doing?”

Jungkook chuckles, the sound rumbling through his chest. “I may have lied a little bit. Would you have come if I hadn’t?”

You don’t answer, because you know he’s right. If you had your way, you would have avoided him until it was time for you to leave again. But Jungkook just doesn’t seem to be willing to let that happen, as he tightens his grip on your hips and tugs until you’re flush against him.

“See, the truth of the matter is, I’m actually good at laundry.” He smirks and tilts his head, dark bangs flopping across his forehead. “I’m good at other things, too. Why don’t you let me show you?”

Attraction blooms in your belly, hot as molten lava, and it takes the last ounce of your wavering restraint to say what you say next. “We can’t take too long,” you whisper, letting him hoist you up onto the dryer and jab the start button. The machine rumbles to life beneath you, and you nearly lose your train of thought when the vibrations go straight to your clit. “Jimin!” you gasp. “Jimin—he’ll kill you if he finds out. He’ll fillet your dick with a dull knife and serve it over rice.”

Jungkook raises an eyebrow. “Why are you talking about your brother? Is this your idea of dirty talk, princess? Because I gotta tell you—it’s not doing it for me.”

“Jungkook!” you chide, and he grins and moves to tug off your shirt.

“That’s much better.”

///

In the days that follow your laundry room tryst with Jungkook, sneaking around becomes routine. Both of your parents work—as do his—so avoiding them is easy. Jimin, however, is a different story. The dance classes he teaches are irregular, and the schedule shifts often enough that you’ve come dangerously close to getting caught on more than one occasion.

And it certainly doesn’t help when Jungkook has taken to texting you at all hours of the day, even when you’re eating a sandwich on the couch with Jimin half-sprawled across your lap in his effort to invade your personal space as much as possible.

[12:35pm] Jungkook: hey i just thought of something

[12:35pm] Jungkook: you know how i call you princess?

You nearly throw your phone across the room. Cautiously, you glance at your brother, who is glued to the television and doesn’t seem to notice anything amiss.

[12:36pm] You: yeah…

His response is instantaneous.

[12:36pm] Jungkook: well i’ve got a throne for you to sit on

You almost sigh out loud. Please don’t, you write back, and you practically hear Jungkook’s cackle in your head as the ellipses that indicate he’s typing pop up at the bottom of your screen.

[12:37pm] Jungkook: it’s my dick ;)

[12:37pm] Jungkook: get it?

I fucking hate you, you tell him, thumbs flying across the keyboard.

[12:38pm] Jungkook: and i love fucking you

[12:38pm] Jungkook: princess ;)

///

After nearly a week cooped up at your parents’ house, you’re getting restless. Without a car, you’re confined to the suburban neighborhood you grew up in, and the revelation that you’re bored somehow spills out to Jungkook during one of the many heated makeout sessions you’ve started having in the backseat of his sedan.

“Do you want to go somewhere?” he’d asked, tilting his head curiously, mussed hair falling across his eyes. “I can drive you, if you want.”

And that’s how you find yourself wandering around downtown Busan on a beautiful Tuesday afternoon. Jungkook drops you off at the curb after cumming down your throat, and now that he’s dashed off to work the lunch shift at the restaurant, you’re free to explore all of your old haunts. The shopping center that you and your friends used to frequent is right around the corner, so that’s where you decide to start. After all, you’re still in need of some professional attire, and as much as you love your mom, you’d rather avoid the unflattering dresses and itchy pantyhose she would be sure to seek out.

As soon as you step through the glass revolving doors, you find yourself in a familiar air-conditioned paradise of shops and restaurants. Stopping at your favorite coffee spot, you treat yourself to an iced mocha before heading to the first store.

Two hours and three full bags later, you decide to head to the food court for a quick snack. You’d promised Jungkook that you’d meet him at the restaurant once you were finished, but a glance at your phone tells you that you have more than enough time to stop by Kim’s Kitchen. Mrs. Kim makes the best cookies in the entire city, as far as you’re concerned, and you decide to order a dozen to take home and share with your family.

You’re lowering yourself into a seat at one of the many tables scattered around the tree-lined atrium when you spot a familiar head of strawberry blonde hair. The owner spots you a split second later, and you return her smile as she immediately swerves and heads your way. “{Name}, hey!”

“Hey, Chaeyoung,” you greet, gesturing for her to take the chair on the other side of the table. “What are you doing here?”

“Same thing as you, from the looks of it.” She grins and hefts her shopping bag. “I swear I’ve been to every shoe store and still haven’t found what I’m looking for, but somehow I’ve bought this much crap anyway. What about you? What are you on the hunt for?”

“Professional attire,” you say with a grimace. “Why are pants so hard to find? I swear, they’re all either too long or too short, and never fit properly in the waist and thighs.”

Chaeyoung pulls a face. “Ew, I know. Pantsuits are a nightmare unless you have a tailor. And who has money for that?”

You laugh, nodding in agreement. “So what are you up to now? Mrs. Kim has cookies fresh out of the oven, if you’re interested. Cinnamon rolls too, I think.”

“Ooh, that’s tough,” she says thoughtfully, tapping her chin. “Would it be bad if I got both?”

“Not even a little bit,” you assure, reaching into your box and pulling out a cookie. “But here, I’ll make it easier for you. Hope you like chocolate chip.”

Chaeyoung gratefully accepts the cookie you hand over. “Who doesn’t love chocolate chip?” she asks, taking a bite.

“Criminals and heathens,” you reply, snagging a cookie for yourself. “Among others.”

She tilts her head. “Doesn’t Jimin hate chocolate chip?”

“My point exactly.”

Chaeyoung giggles, hiding it behind a manicured hand, and you laugh right along with her. Together, you decide to grab some smoothies, and when you sit back down, the conversation turns to your trip up to the lake house. “Next time, we’ll have to do a girl’s trip,” Chaeyoung says, propping her chin in her palm. “Feels like it’s been ages since we’ve done one. You must’ve been exhausted with all those boys around.”

Unwillingly, your thoughts turn to Jungkook. “It wasn’t that bad,” you say slowly. “It was actually nice, being able to spend some time with them.”

“Who ended up going, anyway? Your brother, obviously. Taehyung? Yugyeom?”

You nod, raising a hand and ticking them off on your fingers. “Jimin, yeah. Taehyung, Yugyeom, Taemin, Minho. And Jungkook.”

If Chaeyoung notices the way you pause before saying the last name, she doesn’t comment on it. Her expression grows pensive, and you can practically see the gears turning in her head as she considers her next sentence. “You must be seeing a lot of him,” she says at last. “Jungkook, I mean.”

You take a massive sip of your smoothie and wonder if you’re imagining the lingering taste of him on your tongue. “Yeah, a bit,” you manage, your voice surprisingly steady. “He games with Jimin a lot.” After a pause, you decide to tell her the truth. “He dropped me off today, actually. Jimin’s working this summer, and I’ve been stuck at home, so he offered to take me downtown on his way to work.”

Chaeyoung hums thoughtfully. “He’s working at a restaurant or something, right?”

“Just a few streets away, yeah.”

Slowly, she nods. “We went out, you know.” Her voice is distant. “Just for a few weeks. He ended it after… well, after we slept together.”

There’s a pause, as Chaeyoung lets you digest this information, and a part of you wants to spill everything to her right then and there. Jisoo told me, you want to say, as acidic guilt begins to bubble up in your belly, every memory of the moments you’ve since shared with Jungkook rising unpleasantly in your throat. I’m sorry. I’m so,so sorry. You say it over and over again in your head, but the apology gets stuck in your throat when you try to voice it aloud.

Chaeyoung takes a sip of her smoothie and leans back in her chair with a sigh, oblivious to your internal struggle. “Maybe I should have seen it coming,” she says, gnawing on the end of the straw. “Everything changed our senior year, you know? It was like a switch had flipped—he started dating around, relationships that never lasted more than a week… I really should have known better when he asked me out. But I guess I thought I was different. We were already friends, after all. But whenever we were together, just the two of us, he was always… distant. Like he was somewhere else, mentally.”

Her words trail off, leaving only silence that you don’t know how to break. Chaeyoung sips at her smoothie again, before huffing out a laugh and waving a manicured hand in your direction. “God, sorry! I can’t believe I just started monologuing, ew. Jungkook this, Jungkook that—god. I’m not even mad at him anymore, you know? I just want him to figure his shit out.” Her eyes flit up to you briefly, before skittering back down to where a cookie crumb has landed on the tabletop. “It’s funny, though. Seeing him at Taehyung’s graduation party was probably the happiest I’ve seen him in a long time. He almost seemed like himself again.”

You can’t help it—the singular word bubbles up before you can stop it. “Really?”

Chaeyoung nods, her gaze flickering up to meet yours again. “Really. And honestly? I think it was because of you.”

Your heart does a series of backflips in your chest, thudding against the slats of your ribs. You try to respond, try to find the words, but they stick in your dry throat and your smoothie is practically gone at this point. Chaeyoung shrugs, unfazed by your silence, and you watch as she swirls her straw around in the remainder of her own drink. “I don’t know—maybe I’m imagining things. But it always seemed like he had a bit of a thing for you. Didn’t he used to follow you around the playground?”

The memory draws a startled laugh from your lips. “Sure, yeah. But that was in elementary school.”

Chaeyoung shrugs, smiling around her straw. “Still. We never really forget our first crush, do we?”

///

You head over to the restaurant after bidding Chaeyoung goodbye, her words weighing heavy on your mind and your heart. Through the tall glass windows, you can just barely make out Jungkook—looking sharp in a black collared shirt and matching slacks as he greets a table of diners. His smile is warm and his stance is confident, and you’re reminded of just how much he’s grown from that gangly kid you knew back in grade school when you catch the edge of flirtation lingering in his gaze.

The boy who used to follow you around the playground is gone. There’s no doubt in your mind about that. And so, you take a deep breath and walk into the restaurant, doing your best to smile at the host who greets you and asks whether you’d like to sit at a table or the bar.

“Hey, you made it!”

Jungkook strides over with a grin, taking the menu off the host’s hands and leading you over to an empty seat at the bar. “It’s full service, so you can order food here, too,” he explains. “You hungry? Thirsty?”

You glance down at the menu he places on the counter, scanning the lines of text. “Not really, but it smells really good so I might get something to go. And this carbonara sounds really good, actually.”

“It is,” Jungkook confirms. “I’ll go put the order in. You want some water or anything to drink?”

“Water’s good,” you tell him, and he nods before trotting off to do his job. You watch him disappear to the back of the restaurant before reappearing with a tray of glasses, and follow his meandering path through the tables as he disperses drinks and checks on the guests. Somehow, his shoulders manage to look even broader in his black shirt, and you can’t ignore the way they taper into a narrow waist that’s only emphasized by the belt threaded through the loops of his dark slacks.

He’s stopping at the table you first saw him at now, leaning in close when one of the women seated there asks him a question about something on the menu. His smile oozes easy charm, and you can’t help the feeling that flares in your chest when she reaches for the menu and purposely lets her fingertips graze his hand. Frowning, you tear your gaze away and focus on the wood grain of the bar counter. Your eyes zero in on a smattering of water droplets near your left arm, and you’re just about to run a fingertip through them when a voice sounds to your right.

“Can I get you something to drink?”

Surprised, you look up and find yourself face-to-face with a man who appears to be in his early thirties. Dark hair is brushed away from his forehead, a stray lock falling into his eyes, and you find yourself momentarily at a loss for words when your brain registers just how handsome he is.

“I—uh. I think Jungkook is going to grab me some water,” you finally manage, wanting nothing more than to melt into the ground when you hear the stammer in your voice.

“Ah, you know Jungkook?” The man laughs—a sound that is distinctly reminiscent of a squeaky windshield wiper. “He’s been pretty busy today, so why don’t I grab you that water instead?”

You nod, watching as he fills up a glass from the nozzle below the bar, accepting it when he hands it over. “Thanks.”

“Name’s Seokjin,” the man replies with an easy grin. “What’s yours?”

You return his smile and tell him your name. “Seokjin—Jungkook’s mentioned you a few times, I think. This is your place then, isn’t it?”

Seokjin beams. “Yep! Opened just a few months ago, after we finally sorted out the rat infestation and the asbestos problem in the rafters, and—” He pauses at the dumbfounded look on your face, and several beats pass before another peal of squeaky laughter escapes him. “I’m kidding. One-hundred percent. I promise the whole place is up to snuff.”

“So, I see you’ve met Seokjin.” Jungkook materializes at your side with a glass of water, which he takes a sip out of upon realizing that you already have a drink. “Is he making jokes about the health code again?”

“I would never,” Seokjin sniffs, and you laugh, finding yourself completely at ease for the first time since you entered the restaurant.

Jungkook rolls his eyes good-naturedly and turns his attention back to you. “Your carbonara should be out in a few,” he says, jabbing a thumb in the direction of the kitchen. “Are you sure you don’t want anything else?”

“Positive,” you assure him. “I’m full of chocolate chip cookies, anyway. Here, you want one? They’re still a little warm.”

Jungkook eyes the box you pull out of your bag hungrily. “Hell yes. I can smell them from here.” Laughing, you push the box toward him and watch as he pulls a cookie out and takes an enormous bite. “Thanks,” he says in between chews, his cheeks puffy. You can’t help but smile when he takes a sip of water to wash it all down, his eyes growing round.

Turning to Seokjin, you offer him a cookie as well, which he declines with a graceful wave. “I should be feeding you, not the other way around,” he remarks. “You got the carbonara, right? I’ll go see if it’s ready.”

With one last glance at the patrons sitting at the bar, Seokjin departs with a promise to be back in five minutes. Jungkook finishes off his cookie, and you’re considering offering him another when a familiar chirpy voice sounds from your left.

“Wow, it smells amazing in here! What do you think—should we sit at the bar?”

You whirl in the direction of the voice, your eyes immediately landing on a group of three girls standing near the entrance. Two of them you don’t recognize, but the third you’ve seen before. Mina, you’re pretty sure her name was, and you’d recognize her anywhere. The last time you’d seen her was at the restaurant on the night of Jimin’s and Jungkook’s graduation, and your face heats at the memory of everything else that transpired that night.

“Welcome!” Jungkook draws you out of your thoughts, and you turn to see that he’s wearing a bright, welcoming smile. “Were you looking to sit at the bar, or at a table? It looks like there are a few empty spots at the end of the bar, if you ladies would prefer that. Otherwise, I can take you to a table.”

Mina’s face lights up in recognition, and you’re forced to hide your scowl in your water glass. “Hey, we’ve met before, haven’t we?”

“You work at that place a few blocks down, right?” Jungkook jabs a thumb in the general direction of the street. “I’ve seen you around.”

She giggles and tucks a strand of dark hair behind her ear. “That’s right, yeah! I remember you now. Graduation, right? You were my best table of the night.”

Jungkook chuckles. “I bet you tell everyone that.”

“Not a chance,” Mina answers, looking him up and down before a coy smile curves her lips again. “I only say what I mean.”

“Honesty is the best policy,” Jungkook says agreeably. Then he turns to you, distractedly fiddling with his apron as he speaks. “Jin should probably be back with your food soon. Are you okay to sit here by yourself for a bit?”

You can only nod, still staring down into your water glass. “Yeah, sure. Go on, then.”

He smiles and gestures for Mina and the girls to follow after him, and you’re positive you don’t imagine the triumphant look that flashes across Mina’s face before she departs. Frowning, you grab a cookie from your box and break a piece off, grateful for the distraction. Seokjin drops off your carbonara a minute later, and you find yourself suddenly ravenous as you dig into the steaming bowl of spaghetti.

Jungkook returns to your side about five minutes later, raking a hand through his hair as he replaces his notebook back in his apron pocket. “Man, I’m beat,” he remarks. “Thank god Mina and her friends didn’t order anything complicated. My brain would’ve exploded.”

“Thank god for that,” you echo dully. Unwillingly, your gaze drifts over to where Mina is now sitting, chatting happily with her friends. “It’s weird, isn’t it? Seeing Mina here, of all places. I mean, what is she even doing here?”

“I don’t know how to tell you this, but most people go out and have fun on their days off,” Jungkook responds dryly, a grin breaking across his face when you roll your eyes at him. “Or wait… could it be that you’re jealous?”

You scowl. “Don’t be stupid.”

Jungkook just laughs, tilting your chin up with two fingers so he can look you in the eye. “It’s okay,” he says, his thumb brushing softly along the corner of your lips. “You’re cute when you’re jealous, princess.”

You don’t know how to respond to that, and thankfully you don’t have to. Seokjin returns with a takeout container for you to put your leftovers in, shrugging off your gratitude when you offer it.

“I’m discounting your food, too,” he says, leaving zero room for argument. “Any friend of Jeon’s is a friend of mine.”

Jungkook’s shift ends half an hour later. He turns on his roadtrip playlist on the drive home, and you are more than happy to let the music wash over you, eliminating any need for conversation and drowning out your thoughts.

“See you later, princess,” he says once he’s pulled into your driveway, following your every move as you climb out of the passenger seat.

It sounds like a promise coming from his lips, and you can only nod. “See you.”

///

You’re in the middle of buttering a piece of toast for breakfast the next morning when there’s a knock on the front door. Perturbed, you walk over to answer it, wondering if perhaps Jimin has forgotten his keys again, but when you peer through the peephole it isn’t Jimin who stares back at you.

“Jungkook—” you begin, swinging open the door, but he cuts you off before you can finish, taking your face in his hands and pressing his mouth to yours.

“Hey,” he whispers once he’s had his fill, pulling back just enough to mumble the greeting against your lips. “They’re all gone for the day, right?”

“Yes,” you confirm, still reeling from the suddenness of his appearance and the subsequent kiss. “But how did you—?”

“Jimin told me,” Jungkook answers shortly, before pulling you close and kissing you again. This time, you let yourself get lost in the feeling of his mouth against yours, following his lead as he ushers you back upstairs and breaking the kiss only once in the process. He lays you down onto your bed, the mattress dipping under your combined weight, and you sigh when he moves down to nip at your neck.

“No marks, Jungkook,” you remind him breathily. “You can’t leave marks.”

A low whine escapes him. “Can’t you wear a scarf?”

“It’s the middle of summer!” you huff in amusement, smacking his arm when he whines again and stubbornly sucks at the soft spot where your neck meets your shoulder.

Jungkook’s breath is hot against your skin. His fingers find the elastic waistband of your sweatpants, tugging them off your hips and down your legs, and you kick them off as soon as they’ve reached your ankles. Hungrily, his gaze traverses the newly revealed skin, and you shiver when he gently trails his fingertips up your calves and all the way to the sensitive flesh of your inner thigh. “Jungkook,” you sigh. “I haven’t shaved in days.”

“Ask me if I care,” he replies hoarsely, leaning down to press the flat of his tongue against the growing damp spot seeping through the cotton of your underwear. It’s far from your sexiest pair—you’d categorize them as granny panties, in all honesty—but Jungkook doesn’t seem the least bit fazed as he hooks them aside and licks a broad stripe all the way up to your clit. “Want you,” he groans, and the vibrations from his voice send a volt of tingling electricity straight up your spine. “Want you in every way I can have you.”

You don’t respond. You don’t have to, because Jungkook is diving in with the enthusiasm of a man starved, tossing your underwear aside carelessly before banding his arms around your legs to hold you open. His face disappears between your thighs until only the top of his hair is visible, the dark strands mussed. Lips parting in a moan, your fingers find their way to his head, tangling at his roots, and Jungkook parts from your cunt briefly to groan his approval. Then he’s eating you out again—alternating between broad licks and teasing flicks to your clit before his tongue delves into your entrance, inhaling deeply as if he just can’t get enough.

The sun rises higher into the sky, beaming through your window and illuminating Jungkook’s head and shoulders in warm, hazy gold. You chant his name as you reach your high, spurred on by his teasing tongue and whispered words of encouragement, and the grin he wears when he straightens back up is near blinding. Slowly, he peels off his shirt and shucks off his jeans until he’s completely bare before you, the sun painting him in warm strokes of color. Deliberately, he crawls up your body, hiking up the hem of your shirt as he does. He plants kisses into your newly bared skin, and when he reaches your lips he settles there as if that’s where he’s meant to be.

Jungkook kisses you slowly. He kisses you deliberately—sensually—and you melt into his gentle touch, relishing in the feel of his bare body pressed so intimately against yours. You don’t miss the way his cock hardens against your thigh, but Jungkook seems to be in no hurry to do anything about it. Instead, he cups your cheeks and licks into your mouth, and you’re all too willing to part beneath him like a flower in bloom.

The rest of the afternoon passes like this—hot kisses and slow fucking, the two of you meshing until you’re no longer sure where you end and he begins. You keep an eye on the time, though, and by the time your parents and Jimin return home, you and Jungkook are showered and dry, sitting on the living room floor embroiled in a Mario Kart tournament.

“No fair! You played without me?” Jimin whines, plopping down between you and trying to wrest the controller away from Jungkook. “C’mon, let me have a turn. You’ve been at it all day!”

Jungkook’s gaze flickers up past Jimin’s shoulder to meet yours, his lips twitching in barely suppressed mirth. “Yeah. We sure were.”

///

“God, I’m going to be sore for the next month.”

“Don’t be such a drama queen,” your brother snorts, squeezing your cheek between his thumb and index finger like you’re a small child. His three o’clock dance class has just wrapped up, and people are slowly filtering out of the studio. A few of the younger women glance back toward where you’re standing with Jimin, and you have no doubt they’re vying for one last look at your brother in his tight-fitting joggers and loose tank that keeps drooping off one shoulder. Rolling your eyes, you suppress the urge to loudly bring up the time he walked into a sliding glass door and nearly chipped his tooth. Instead, you pinch his cheek back, and laugh when he pouts.

“Ow, hey! What happened to giving me all your love and support?”

“Please, Mom made me come to your class,” you retort, batting his invasive hand away. “I think she just wanted me out of the house.”

Jimin laughs. “Can’t blame her. You’re a goddamn freeloader.”

“Seriously? Because in that case, I’m dying to hear what that makes you.”

Thoroughly nonplussed, Jimin pinches your other cheek before dancing away on light feet. “I’m an angel. Now go away, so I can get ready for my next class!”

Rolling your eyes again, you heft your bag over your shoulder and turn on your heel. “Fine, fine. Good luck, and all that. See you at dinner.”

Jimin doesn’t respond, and when you peer over your shoulder at him, he’s already sprawled on the floor and reaching for his toes in the unmistakable first step of his warm-up routine. He waves when he sees you watching, and you stick your tongue out at him playfully before exiting the studio and heading for the door. You’ve borrowed your dad’s car for the day, and hum cheerily as you climb into the driver’s seat.

You spend the rest of the afternoon running errands—stopping by both the post office and the bank before heading for the grocery store to pick up some ingredients for dinner. By the time you get back home, Jimin has finished teaching at the studio as well, and you fix him with a stare as you plop two full bags of groceries in front of him on the kitchen counter.

“Care to help me carry the rest in?”

“Not really,” he replies, but he stands up and follows you outside to the car nonetheless.

Once all the groceries are inside and unpacked, you begin prepping for dinner. Jimin, to his credit, offers his help without you even having to ask, and with his assistance you finish cooking in record time. Your parents join you in the dining room, and together you enjoy the meal over the evening news.

You retire to your room after dinner, cracking open your laptop to go over the details of your internship for the umpteenth time. You’ve read the emails and the attached documents so many times you practically have them memorized, but the anxiety gnawing at your belly refuses to be quelled. You’re returning to Seoul in less than a week, and your empty suitcase sits in the corner of your childhood bedroom like a taunt. You wonder, briefly, if you should start packing.

“Nah, it can wait,” you decide, muttering the words to your nonexistent audience. Standing up, you stretch lazily before exiting your room and heading down the hall to the bathroom that you and Jimin share, muffling a yawn behind your hand.

You’ve just finished brushing your teeth when your phone vibrates against the bathroom counter, a notification lighting up your screen. Spitting into the sink and rinsing off your toothbrush, you towel off your face before picking up your phone, blinking owlishly at the text.

[11:08pm] Jungkook: can you come over?

By itself, it’s not an unusual request. At this late an hour, though, you can’t help the unease that rises up in your belly. And as if sensing your apprehension, your phone vibrates again.

[11:09pm] Jungkook: my parents are out

[11:09pm] Jungkook: please? i could use some company

There’s an edge of desperation in his last message—something you haven’t seen in him since you returned home. It reminds you a bit of the Jungkook you used to know—the scrawny, gangly one with a nose too big for his face and an all-encompassing fear of the opposite sex. Give me ten minutes, you tell him.

Okay, Jungkook writes back. See you soon.

The next few minutes are a blur. You slather on some moisturizer and consider changing out of your pajamas and putting on a bra, but dismiss the thought immediately. Jungkook has seen you in far less, and you’re staunchly opposed to putting a bra back on after a certain hour of the night. Besides, he’s sure to dispose of your clothes at some point, so there’s little point in changing. With that thought in mind, you tiptoe out into the hall, past your parents’ bedroom and Jimin’s closed door. You carefully edge around the creakiest floorboards and hop over the two steps in the staircase that always groan when subjected to additional weight. Gingerly, you edge open the front door, just enough to slip out into the night.

The trek across the yard doesn’t take long, and Jungkook swings the door open before you even get a chance to knock. “Hey,” he says, and you can’t help but smile at the familiar round glasses perched on his nose. He’s in his pajamas as well—a blue and white checkered set that’s about two sizes too big—and when he ushers you inside, you catch a whiff of his floral laundry detergent.

“Hey,” you say. “What’s going on? Are you okay?”

“Long day,” he sighs, raking a hand through his already tousled hair and mussing it further. “Come on in. You want anything to drink?”

You shake your head, stepping into the entryway and watching as he closes and locks the door again. Jungkook nods and shuffles to the kitchen, where he pours himself a glass of water from the faucet and downs half of it in one swig. His throat bobs as he swallows, his head tilted back to expose the long line of his neck, and you step a little closer as he turns to refill the glass.

“On second thought, maybe I’ll have some water too.”

“Mm. Okay.” Jungkook turns and fetches a second glass, filling it to the brim before handing it over. Then he takes your free hand and leads you upstairs, taking a left turn into his bedroom and nudging the door closed with his foot.

“So…” you begin slowly, putting your water down on the nightstand and reaching for the hem of your shirt. “We need to be quick. My mom’s a light sleeper, and I’m pretty sure I heard Jimin playing games in his room when I walked by.”

Jungkook chuckles and lays his hands over yours, stilling your attempt to take off your shirt. “When did you turn into such a horndog, Noona? Maybe I just want to hang out.”

You blink. “Did you just want to hang out?”

Jungkook plops onto his bed and grabs you by the waist, tugging you down and into his lap. “I mean, yeah—I thought that was obvious. Figured we could watch a movie or something.” Grabbing the tv remote, he switches on the television hanging on the opposite wall. “Any suggestions?”

You hesitate. You’ve been in Jungkook’s bedroom just once since you’ve come back, and the memory of the way he’d bent you over the desk in the corner sends a pulse of heat to your cheeks. Tearing your gaze away from the piece of wooden furniture, you instead focus on the television screen, watching as he navigates over to the Netflix menu.

“We can go old school too, if you want,” he remarks as he scrolls through the list of new arrivals. “I have a DVD player.”

That draws a laugh from your lips. “When was the last time you purchased a DVD? Last I checked, you only had Kung Fu Panda, Iron Man, and two copies of Titanic for some reason that you still won’t tell me.”

Jungkook laughs, his chest rumbling against your back. “Call it human error,” he says, looping his arms comfortably around your waist and propping his chin on your shoulder. “How do you feel about going super old school? I can get the VHS player out of the basement and pop in one of the Pokémon movies.”

“I’m sure we won’t have to resort to that,” you assure him, grinning. “Here, why don’t we just watch Iron Man? Three’s your favorite, right?”

“Three is everyone’s favorite,” he says, scrolling over to the appropriate menu and clicking play. “It’s the best one, hands-down.”

“Won’t argue with you there.”

The movie starts, and you shift off Jungkook’s lap to switch off the lights. Darkness overtakes the room as the screen lights up with the opening credits, and when you return to the bed, Jungkook has sprawled comfortably against the pillows lining the headboard. His eyes remain glued to the screen even as he reaches for you, and you hesitate for only a second before joining him, laying down beside him and letting his arm find its way around your shoulders. The scent of floral laundry detergent fills your nostrils, and you subtly nestle a bit closer, resting your head on his chest.

This isn’t the first time Jungkook has seen this movie. You know this for a fact, yet that doesn’t change how raptly he watches the screen, the action sequences reflected perfectly in his glasses. He’s practically vibrating with excitement by the time of the final showdown, mouthing along to the lines, and you hide your smile in the blue-and-white squares of his pajama shirt as the music swells.

It’s well past midnight by the time the credits roll. Jungkook seems perfectly content to lie on his bed with his arm around you, and when you make to get up, his grip slides down to your waist to hold you in place. “You gotta watch the credits all the way through,” he says, blinking at you with bleary eyes now that the adrenaline from the final showdown has worn off. “There’s a post-credits scene, remember?”

You shake your head, but let him pull you back down onto the mattress regardless. “I’m sure you already know what it is. Why don’t you just tell me?”

“What’s the fun in that?” he asks with a grin.

The end credits continue—an endless stream of names scrolling down the screen. Your eyes begin to droop, the words blurring together, and it’s only when the music stops and the final scene begins that you jolt awake. Jungkook is faring no better than you are, suppressing a yawn behind his hand as he watches the last bit of the film through half-lidded eyes. Then the screen goes dark, and silence descends over the room once more. You glance at the alarm clock on his nightstand and see that it’s nearly two in the morning. A look back at Jungkook reveals that both his eyes have fallen shut, and you slowly begin wriggling free from his embrace in order to head home.

You’ve barely moved an inch when Jungkook’s arm tightens around your waist. “Stay,” he mumbles sleepily, one eye cracking open.

You should say no. You should head home to the safety of your own bed. But there’s something about Jungkook—something soft and fond in his tired gaze and something vulnerable in the way he’s holding you so tightly against his pajama-clad body with his hair in complete disarray and his round glasses askew. Heaving a sigh, you reach up to take them off his face, placing them neatly on his nightstand.

“Okay,” you whisper. “I’ll stay.”

Jungkook smiles sleepily and shuts his eyes. “G’night, then, Noona.”

“Night, Jungkookie.”

Within seconds, his breathing evens out, and you know he’s off in dreamland. Twisting in his grasp, you tug your phone out of your pocket and set a quick alarm for six o’clock. Neither of your parents wake up until seven at the earliest, and Jimin would sleep until three in the afternoon if he could get away with it, so you’re certain that you’ll have plenty of time to sneak back into the house. Besides, Jungkook’s bed is comfortable, and his chest is practically a furnace against your back. You aren’t sure you could work up the energy to leave even if you tried.

So instead, you settle back into his embrace and let sleep whisk you away.

///

There are birds chirping outside the window when you open your eyes the next morning, blinking blearily against the sun shining through the curtains. The blanket is tangled around your legs and there’s an arm looped around your waist, and you sit bolt upright when realization dawns. Jungkook groans and mumbles something unintelligible, but you don’t pay him any mind as you twist out of his grasp, clutching for your phone on the nightstand.

7:03am.

Shit.

Throwing your legs over the side of the bed, you rise to your feet and shove your phone into the pocket of your pajama pants. Jungkook makes a sound that vaguely resembles your name, and you spare him a glance as you fumble for your shoes. He’s flat on his back, blinking hair out of his eyes as he fights to stay awake. “Hey,” he manages, his voice raspy.

“I gotta go,” you whisper urgently, successfully putting your shoes on the right feet and wrenching the door of his bedroom open. And then you turn and dash out, leaving a very sleepy, very disheveled Jungkook blinking after you.

Your house, when you carefully crack open the front door and poke your head inside, is quiet. Much to your relief, you don’t hear any of the telltale signs that your family is awake and downstairs yet—no drip of the coffee maker and no sizzle of bacon or eggs. From upstairs, however, you can distantly hear the sound of the shower, so you dart inside and toe off your shoes, padding into the kitchen to start the coffee maker. You check the alarm you’d set the night prior as you scoop coffee grounds into the filter, and curse under your breath when you realize you’d somehow managed to select six PM instead of AM.

You’re seated in the living room with a mug of fresh coffee when Jimin shuffles in with damp hair and a sleepy frown. “You’re up early,” you remark.

“I have a morning class to teach,” he replies, yawning widely as he grabs a fresh mug. “What’s your excuse?”

You shrug. “Couldn’t sleep.”

“Fair enough.”

Suppressing another yawn, your brother turns his attention to the refrigerator, rooting around for the milk. And you return yours to the window, where you can see the side of the Jeon’s house, and Jungkook’s bedroom window on the second floor. There are no signs of life from within, and you wonder if he’d gone back to sleep after your departure. Considering how tired he’d looked last night, you wouldn’t be surprised if he had.

Chaeyoung’s voice echoes in your mind then, soft and wistful. It always seemed like he had a bit of a thing for you. Happiest I’ve seen him in a long time. And honestly? I think it was because of you. We never really forget our first crush, do we?

And then Jisoo’s words rise up in your brain, just a bit louder. He’s a heartbreaker. He never, ever stays until the morning.

So why, then, did you wake up in his arms today?

[aiweirdness]

How to begin a novel

Last year for National Novel Writing Month I trained a neural net called torch-rnn on 10,096 unique ways to begin a novel. It came up with some intriguing possibilities, my personal favorite being “I am forced to write to my neighbors about the beast.” But many of its sentences used made-up words, or had such weird grammar that they were difficult to read, or meandered too erratically. (“The first day of the world was born in the year 1985, in an old side of the world, and the air of the old sky of lemon and waves and berries.”) The neural net was struggling to write more than a few words at a time.

This year, I decided to revisit this dataset with a larger, more-powerful neural net called GPT-2. Unlike most of the neural nets that came earlier, GPT-2 can write entire essays with readable sentences that stay mostly on topic (even if it has a tendency to lose its train of thought or get very weird). I trained the largest size that was easily fine-tunable via GPT-2-simple, the 355M size of GPT-2. Would a more-powerful neural net produce better first lines?

One of the parameters I can tweak when I’m getting a trained neural net to generate text is temperature - this controls whether the neural net chooses the most likely next bit of text as it writes, or whether it’s permitted to use its less-likely predictions. At a default of 0.7, a relatively conservative temperature, the neural net’s first lines not only make grammatical sense, but they even have the rhythm of a novel’s first line. This is DRAMATICALLY better than torch-rnn did.

I am, or was.

At the mid-day meal the sun began to set and the quiet dragged on.

There was once a man who lived for a very long time; perhaps three thousand years, or perhaps a thousand million years, maybe a trillion or so, depending on how the scientists look at it.

He had the heart of a lion, and the fangs of a man-eater.

"I am Eilie, and I am here to kill the world."

The old woman was sitting on a rock near the sea, smoking a pipe.

I have just been informed, that the debate over the question 'is it right or wrong to have immortal souls' has been finally brought to a conclusion.

When I was a boy, I was fond of the story of the pirate god.

He had a strange name, and he was a very big boy indeed.

The purple-haired woman came to the clearing in the plain, and without looking up from her book, said, "It's too late to be thinking about baby names."

The village of Pembrokeshire, in the county of Mersey, lies on a wide, happy plain, which, in a few years, was to become known as the "Land of the Endless Mountains."

I don’t think the neural net plagiarized any of these? They are so good that I’m suspicious. But others of the neural net’s lines are even weirder, yet in an effective way that opens with an intriguing premise.

The moon had gone out.

I was playing with my dog, Mark the brown Labrador, and I had forgotten that I was also playing with a dead man.

The black stone was aching from the rain.

The short, dirty, and dirty-looking ship that weighed three tons and was three feet in diameter landed on a desolate and green plain.

How many times have I had the misfortune to die?

The first black dog in the park had been captured alive.

Behold the Sky Rabbits!

In the belly of the great beast that was the bovine Aurore there lived, upon the right hand of the throne, the Empress Penelope; and she had, as it were, a heart of gold.

The moon stood on its own two feet.

The reeking maw of the blood-drunk ship, the enemy's flagship, was silent and empty.

The first day I met my future self, I was aboard the old dirigible that lay in wait for me on the far side of the moon.

The child of two cats, and a tiger, a clown, a horse, a bird, a ship, and a dragon, stood on either side of the threshold of the Gatehouse, watching the throng of travelers who came in from all around the world, before he had any idea what was going on.

I think it’s probably doing this accidentally, stringing likely words and phrases together without understanding what any of them really mean. It’s not that it’s good at science fiction or magical realism; it’s that it’s trying and failing to predict what would have fit in with the usual human-written stuff. Some of the neural net’s first lines really betray its lack of the understanding of the laws of physics. It really likes to describe the weather, but it doesn’t really understand how weather works. Or other things, really.

The moon was low in the sky, as though it had been shipped in from the farthest reaches of the solar system.

The first star I saw was a blue one, which became a scarlet one, and then a gold one, and green, and finally a yellow one, which for some years afterwards seemed to be an ebony one, or even a bubbling mass.

The sun rose slowly, like a mighty black cat, and then sank into a state of deep sleep.

The sea of stars was filled with the serenity of a million little birds.

The great blue field was all white, swept away by the blue-gold breeze that blew from the south.

The sky was cold and dark, and the cold wind, if it had not been for the clouds, would have lashed the children to the roof of the house.

The morning sun was shining brightly, but the sky was grey and the clouds aching.

The night that he finally made up his mind to kill the dog, the man was walking home from the store with his wife and child in the back seat.

Arthur the lion had been pretty much extinct for some time, until the time when he was petted by Abernathy the old woman, and her son, Mr. Popp.

One of the disadvantages of having a neural net that can string together a grammatical sentence is that its sentences now can begin to be terrible in a more-human sense, rather than merely incomprehensible. It ventures into the realm of the awful simile, or the mindnumbingly repetitive, and it makes a decent stab at the 19th century style of bombastic wordiness. I selected the examples above for uncomprehending brilliance but the utter tediousness below is more the norm.

The whites of my eyes shimmered, as if my mind were dancing.

I once went to a party where the dress code was as strict as a chicken coop with no leggings and no boots.

A black cloud drifted by, a mottled mass of hydrogen, a black cloud of hydrogen, with the definite characteristic of being black.

I say I am at sea, because I am standing upon the ocean, and look out across the barren, vast throng of the sea.

It is, of course, a trifling matter in the ordinary course of things, if a certain writer were to write a novel, which is a book of stories, which is a book of characters, wherein every detail of the story is stated, together with a brief description of the theme which it concerns.

There was a boy with blue eyes, with sandy hair and blue eyes that looked at all times like he had been pushed through a million compartments.

The Sun, with its rolling shaft of bright light, the brilliant blue of the distant golden sun, and the red glow of its waning corona, was shining.

The man who was not Jack the Ripper had been promoted four times in the last two years.

Felix the Paw was sitting at the table of his favorite restaurant, the "Bordeaux" in the town of Bordeaux, when his father, Cincinnata, came in to say good-by to the restaurant.

It, sir, gives me the greatest pleasure to hear that the Court be not too long in passing away: but that I may have leisure to prepare a new work for the publication of my friend and colleague, the renowned Epistemology, which is now finished; and in which I shall endeavour to show, that this very point is of the highest importance in the subject of the philosophy which I am about to treat of.

It was a rainy, drizzling day in the summer of 1869 and the people of New York, who had become accustomed to the warm, kissable air of the city, were having another bad one.

Repetitiveness is also common, especially at this conservative temperature setting. Once the neural net gets itself into a repetitive state, it doesn’t seem to rescue itself - it’s a problem that people have noticed in several versions of this algorithm. (It doesn’t help that I forgot to scrub the “title” that someone submitted to the dataset that consists of the word “sand” repeated 2,000 times)

The sky was blue and the stars were blue and the sun was blue and the water was blue and the clouds were blue and the blue sky was like a piece of glass.

At the end of the world, where the tides burst upon the drowned, there exists a land of dragons, of dragons, which is the land of the dragons.

It's the end of the world, it's the end of the world, it's the end of the world, it's the end of the world, it's the end of the world, you're dead.

There was once a land of sand, and sand, sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand sand

Increasing the temperature of the sampling would help the repetitiveness problem, in theory, letting the neural net venture into more interesting territory. But at a temperature of 1.0 the text tends to venture out of everyday surrealism and into wordy yet distractible incomprehensibility.

The praying mules on the top of the hills sounded the final klaxon, lifting their spiked front hoofs as they crept the last few feet of desert landscape past the crest of the enormous swathe of prehistoric sand.

In the glen of the Loch is a ladder that winds way up through a passage to a ledge with soft, moss-laden environmental standards.

Someone whipped a dead squash gibbet across the room, like some formidable war lord unleashing a heavy hunk of silver at home.

One blue eyed child stood up and cried out: "Douay, saurines, my Uncle – Fanny Pemble the loader!"

Jud - an elderly despot, or queen in emopheles, was sitting across the table from the king, looking very thoughtfully into the perplexions of the proceedings.

Oh, you're a coward little fool, as if you couldn't bear to leer at a Prunker or white-clad bodyguard quickly emerging from a shady, storm-damaged area of the city.

Hanging presently in his little bell-bottomed chamber on the landing-house, early in the morning, the iron traveler sat on a broad-blonde sandbricksannel blanket outside the gate of a vast and ancient island.

Long, glowing tongues trailed from your mouth as you listened to what was being said across this kingdom of ours, but growing a little more somber since the week that caused us to proclaim general war.

The night I first met Winnie the Pooh, I had sat in the Tasting-House and heard the Chef unpack the last of the poison upon his quiet dinnertable.

There is, of course, no perfect setting at which the neural net churns out sensible yet non-repetitive first lines. There are just varying shades of general awfulness, interspersed with accidental brilliance.

No matter how much you’re struggling with your novel, at least you can take comfort in the fact that AI is struggling even more.

I generated all the neural net sentences above using a generic “It” as the prompt that the neural net had to build on (it would usually go on to generate another 20-30 sentences at a time). But although the sentences are independent in my training data, GPT-2 is used to large blocks of text that go together. The result is if I prompt it instead with, say, a line from Harry Potter fanfic, the neural net will tend to stick with that vein for a while. I've included a few examples as bonus content for subscribers.

Update: I now have a few thousand unfiltered examples of neural net-generated first lines at the GitHub repository where I have the original crowdsourced dataset. Themes include: Harry Potter, Victorian, My Little Pony, and Ancient Gods.

My book on AI is out, and, you can now get it any of these several ways! Amazon - Barnes & Noble - Indiebound - Tattered Cover - Powell’s

[aggressive-positivity-network]

Your demo in a relationship headcanons were simply aaaaaaahhhh!*chef kiss* could we maybe have some for everyone's favorite aussie stringbean?

I absolutely love Sniper...he’s one of those characters I can just fall back on. I also just like Australian accents, especially when he speaks in a low, intimidating voice. Gets me every time. Makes me either blush or happy stim whenever I hear it.

First Date:

You find Sniper on a dating app after a particularly bad break-up.

His profile picture is of him shirtless, holding a huge gun next to him. However, instead of looking sexily into the camera, he’s looking off camera with a bewildered look on his face.

His bio says, “My friends put me up to this. Don’t expect too much. If you go on one date with me maybe they’ll shut up. Who bloody knows?”

You get curious, and you decide to start a chat with him.

“Your friends put you up to this huh? 😏”

“yeah. what of it?”

“What, are you some lonely wolf type or what?”

“you could say that.”

He was texting back almost immediately. Even if he wasn’t a lovey-dovey person, he was certainly interested.

“How would you like to get those friends off your back?”

“i’m free wednesday.”

You make plans, which, despite only seeing this as a one-night stand, you gradually get more and more excited for.

You meet Sniper at a nicer restaurant, wearing a new black dress that you hadn’t worn yet.

When you finally see him at the lobby, you realize that the picture didn’t do him justice, even thought he now had a beige suit on.

His lankiness showed a bit more, but his arms were very strong despite his frame. He was wearing sunglasses, which added an air of cool refinement.

At first you thought he was British because of his texts, but when he spoke, you knew right away he was Australian. You are far from disappointed.

You are still waiting for your table when all of a sudden, Sniper takes out a huge knife. Before you can react, he quickly slices something out of your vision and then brings it before your eyes. You had forgotten to take the tag off your dress.

“I’m flattered. I didn’t think you’d get all shinied up for me.”

You breathe out shakily and rub your neck. Sniper’s eyes furrow.

“I didn’ nick ya, did I?”

“N-no...just s-scared me...”

You thought maybe you had met up with a psycho, and all your suspicions were not put to rest yet, but the close encounter seemed to awaken something in you.

The date continues as normal. Both of you are pretty awkward at first, especially since the knife incident. But before the main meal is brought to your table, you’ve started up a conversation.

Sniper told you he was in the military, but his base is very lax with dress code and schedule.

You start telling him about your job as a graphic designer when all of a sudden a scream interrupts you mid-sentence.

There’s a guy holding a gun about eight tables from you, pointing it at the many patrons. He doesn’t seem drunk, but just enraged.

“WHAT’S A GUY GOTTA DO TO GET SOME DAMN FRIES?!”

The manager tries to talk to him, but ends up getting shot, most likely dead.

The yelling continues for about fifteen minutes. You are very uncomfortable, not to mention terrified, but Sniper seems oddly nonchalant.

Suddenly, Sniper yells, “OI! THEY’RE BRINGIN’ OUT YOUR FRIES! RIGHT THERE, MATE!”

The guy follows Sniper’s finger, and all of a sudden there’s a gunshot. But it wasn’t from the madman’s gun...it was from Sniper’s.

The guy falls over on top of the bleeding manager, writhing in agony.

Before you can even process what’s happening, Sniper grabs you by the arm and drags you out of the restaurant.

“Dishes it out but can’t take it, eh luv? C’mon, we’ll go to my place. It’s real nice.”

You get into his van, which smells like a mixture of old leather, beef jerky, and...something else. However, your terror quickly trumps your logic.

“First Time”:

Despite your fiasco of a first date, you still decide to stay at Sniper’s until it’s all blown over.

His apartment is covered wall to wall with guns, memorabilia, and sticky notes, usually with names and dates written on them.

On the far wall was a cork board filled to the brim with pictures, yarn, and Xs made in thick red Sharpie.

“If I woulda known it would go this far, I woulda tidied up the place. Sorry about that, luv.”

You brush it off, and you both sit on an old leather couch with bits of stuffing sticking out of it.

You take this as a cue to get around to what this whole date had been about: some sweet, sweet rebound. It seems awkward now that you had gone through so much - besides, you hadn’t expected to connect with Sniper the way you have...

But you still manage to spit it out.

“Er...yeah. That’s what people usually do, right? Yeah? I dunno. I’ve been off the playin’ field awhile.”

Sniper puts his hands around your neck and let’s you begin to kiss him. But it was clear after a while he wasn’t into it, so you pull away and ask if he wanted to wait another time.

“Aw, no, shiela. Look at me, lyin’ ‘ere like a dead fish...I just...I’ll try ‘arder, luv, I promise.”

You pull away completely. This had trauma written all over it, and you weren’t about to force someone into it...you were better than your ex.

“Did I do somethin’ wrong?”

You asked him what was wrong, and why he was being so passive about what was happening to him. Why didn’t he say anything? Do anything?

Sniper sighed, pulling his hat way down in front of his face.

“I like girls, don’t get me wrong. It isn’t that. But I never felt...that way about ‘em. Or anybody else, honestly. I tried it once in college...I just ended up feelin’ sick. Tried it with another girl, then another, then another. I even tried with my guy roommate. But I always ended up feelin’ like I was gonna puke. Sometimes I did. It just never felt right. It wasn’t magical, it was bloody disgusting.”

“But every girl I’ve ever been with expected it, and to keep ‘em, I ‘ad to do what they wanted. Sometimes I’d just lie there, tryin’ not to vomit, trying to at least move a little, act like I was into it. They said they’d change my mind, that this time would be different. At the end of the day, it never was, and I lost ‘em. And now I’m gonna lose you too, ‘n I’m gonna halfta tell the guys...they’ll never let this go...”

Back At The Base... :

Spy called the entire team into the security room to watch the entire date go down. He had placed a bug on Sniper’s suit while helping him adjust it, and now everyone was here to watch the show.

Everybody cheered when the guy was shot, though Spy made a mental note to call Miss Pauling in the morning.

The whole team, Scout especially, was excited to see some action when Sniper brought you to his apartment. Well, everyone except Medic. He stood their with his eyebrows creased. He knew exactly what was going to happen.

“Aw, c’mon Snipes, what’s the hold up?! She is so inta you!”

There wasn’t any sound, so no one exactly knew why Sniper paused for so long.

Finally, you two came back together again, but after about thirty minutes of just kissing, the other mercs got bored really fast.

Scout was especially disappointed.

“Man, this was whole thing was a bust!”

Spy shrugged. “Not quite a waste of time. Look at her. She’s smitten. I never thought I would say this, but gentlemen - we have found Sniper a suitable suitor!”

Medic, eyes wide, kept his Sniper’s medical history too himself - not for HIPAA, but for the drama of it all. He wanted to see how this would play out.

Love At First Shot:

On a casual date at his place, Sniper catches you admiring one of his weapons.

“That’s one’s a beaut, ain’ it? That’s one ‘a my oldest guns. She’s outta service, the old girl, but she don’t look a shot over thirty.”

He picks it up and cocks it, nodding approvingly.

“Got this offa real bloody fruit seller. The muzzle ‘ad stains all over it, rust in some places...the bloke obviously had no idea how to take care of it.”

You suddenly feel a pang in your chest.

“Oi, luv, not a fan ‘a guns?”

“No...I...it just made me remember something.”

Sniper puts down his weapon, sits on the sofa, and pats his leg.

“‘Ere. Tell me about it.”

You hesitate for a moment before shyly sitting on his knee. You’re on the smaller side, but you were still afraid you might hurt him.

“Aw, it’s alright. Put your full weight on. These babies can ‘old an Aussie an’ an AK-47.”

You giggle, letting yourself get a little more comfortable.

“Now, luv...what’s on your mind? What’s that pretty lil’ head a’ yours thinkin’?”

You sigh.

“My boyfriend...or, my ex-boyfriend...we broke up for a reason. Or, well, I dumped him. We had been dating for almost three years, and I didn’t see it coming.”

“Crazy train crashed inta the station, huh?”

“He almost did. He...he had hit me before. I just didn’t say anything because I didn’t want him to get in trouble. But one night...it got really, really bad. He wasn’t even drunk. He was still in his work uniform. I stayed with a friend, and I told him it was over with a text - I was just so scared he’d find me. He knew my friends. He knew my address. And so I just wanted to find someone to protect me. It was more than just rebound...I just didn’t want to be alone. I wanted one person in my life he didn’t know so they could protect me.”

You could feel tears welling up in your eyes, but you bit them back. You didn’t feel like sobbing in front of your new boyfriend. Sniper, though, started laying down, taking you with him.

Your head was now under his chin, and you were laying all along his body. The sudden show of affection caught you off guard. You started to cry, burying your face in his chest.

Sniper wrapped his arms around you, supporting your entire weight easily.

Neither of you spoke for a good fifteen minutes, except for Sniper saying an occasional, “Aw, sweetheart...”

Finally, you calmed down, feeling safe in your boyfriend’s embrace.

“Y’know, luv...”

Sniper hesitated.

“I...could teach ya how to shoot. If it’ll make ya feel safe.”

You sniffle and look up.

“I know ya probably want some big, strong man to protect ya, an’ I will. God, if anybody even touches a bloody ‘air on your ‘ead, I’ll kill ‘em. But I wan’ you to go to the movies, or the store, or just ‘ave a nice walk an’ not be lookin’ over your shoulder. I wan’ ya to enjoy your life, luv.”

“I...I can’t shoot a gun...”

“Why not?”

“I can’t...aim or shoot...I don’t think I’ve even held a gun before...”

“Well, we can fix that! ‘Ere...”

Sniper leans over and picks up his old gun again, laying it in your hands. It’s a bit heavier than you expected.

You run your hands over the muzzle and barrel, not even daring to touch the trigger.

Sniper puts his hands over yours and guides them over the gun, giving you more confidence about handling the weapon.

“A gun is like...like a dog. You train it right, an’ you train yourself, you’ll be fine. You’re no kid, so you know ‘ow dangerous these can be. But fear doesn’t shoot the bullet. Fear doesn’ aim for ya.”

Every time you went to his apartment, he would do this. Sometimes you two would be talking, and he would nonchalantly hand you the gun, which, after a while, you took without thought.

Now it was time to take you to the range.

He gave you that old gun to use as practice, but promised a newer, more compact gun when you had gotten the hang of shooting.

Hands on your shoulders, hands over yours, he taught you how to target a person’s more sensitive areas.

Over the next few months, you grew better and better at hitting your mark. You weren’t perfect, but you could definitely defend yourself.

One night, Sniper went to go get you both Chinese food, and you were hanging out at your apartment.

You heard a knock on your window. You ignore it, thinking a bird had flown into it by accident. However, as the knocking grew louder and more insistent, you lift your head, startled.

It was your ex-boyfriend.

He was in a suit, but his face wasn’t nearly as neat. His eyes were red and wide, and his hair was messy.

He had walked up the fire escape to your balcony, and was leaning against the rail, relaxed.

You stayed inside, but you knew that the door was unlocked - he could come in any time he wanted. And he knew this.

He spoke, and you could hear him through the glass.

“Still single. Just like I thought.”

You opened your mouth to speak, but he cut you off.

“I came back because I was worried. It’s been so long since I’ve seen you...I thought maybe something had happened. You were so depressed when you left. I couldn’t help but think that maybe...well, that doesn’t matter. What matters is that you’re here, and I am more than willing to be with you again. I think we both have cooled off, right? We’ve had some time apart, and now we’ve realized we’re madly in love with each other and can’t be apart for another minute...”

“I have a new boyfriend!”

You blurted it out so suddenly you even surprised yourself. But your ex was unmoved.

“Oh, right. Sure. How much are you paying him, this boyfriend of yours? Do you have to pay extra for sex, or do you have a pity discount?”

“He...he’ll come back...and...”

You looked beside you. Your gun was laying on the floor beside you. Sniper had just taken you to the range, and you hadn’t had enough time to put it away.

You remembered what he said...

“I wan’ ya to enjoy your life, luv.”

You put your hand around the gun, grasping it tightly.

You swallow.

“Come back and what?” your ex jeered. “What’s your new boyfriend going to do? Beat me up?”

You are still trying to make your decision when you hear the glass door open.

“Look at me when I’m talking to you, angel. I want to see your beautiful face.”

You whip around, the gun in your hand. Your ex immediately recoils, his hands flinging up.

“Woah woah woah...!”

“Please. Leave.”

Your voice is hoarse, but you try to sound as firm as possible.

“Even if I didn’t have a boyfriend, I would never get back with you. Ever. You...you made me feel so helpless, scared, alone...I can’t feel that way forever. I don’t want you to get hurt, but I want you to leave and never come back. Please. Just leave me alone.”

Your ex smirks, albeit shakily. “You can’t shoot that. You’ve never touched a gun in your life.”

“My boyfriend wanted me to be safe. He wanted me to be happy. He wanted me to be able to deal with creeps like you.”

You get up, gun still in hand, and your ex backs away.

“He did more than you ever did.”

“What, so you’re just going to shoot me? End up on the six o’clock news?”

“No. I won’t. I don’t want to hurt you. I just want you to leave. For good.”

“I bet that thing isn’t even loaded.”

You show him a half-full magazine and point to the fire escape.

“Like you know how to -!”

You quickly turn to a picture of a seaside landscape, shakily aim, and manage to shoot it, shattering the frame to pieces.

“Get. Out.”

Your ex practically runs out, yelling that he was calling the police.

Sniper comes back a few minutes later, and when he asks you what the hell happened, you start telling him between trembling breaths what had occurred.

Sniper turned bright red and tipped his hat down.

“That bloody wanker...fruit sellin’...”

He starts to walk towards the fire escape, but you stop him.

“I scared him off, please don’t...he said he was going to call the police...”

Sniper took a few deep breaths, calming down.

“We’ve got th’ best lawyers in the country. I’d like to see ‘im try.”

The police was never called - you think it was probably a pride thing, since you had overpowered him so easily - but you weren’t sure you had seen the last of him.

But with your own experience and Sniper’s, you had some piece of mind.

However, you were soon going to find out that Sniper had more power on his side than you thought...

*****************

Long time, no headcanon! Well, good headcanons, anyway. I rushed my last post, so I tried to go all out with this one. I might write a second part when headcanons are open again, but I think I prefer leaving some things up to the imagination, hm?

Anyway, more headcanons on the way! Same bat time, same bat channel! The next one is about siblings, though I may post shorter headcanons before that, since it’s such a fun idea to write.

[tristala]

To Distant Lands...

It has been quite a journey.

I have been a fan of Adventure Time for over ten years. But it wasn’t a great start.

Foolish 12 year old me disliked it at first glance just because I wasn’t used to the art style and didn’t take it seriously. I ignored it for almost a year. Then on one faithful day in my tutor’s house, I watched the newly aired episode Mystery Train with her kids.

I was... charmed by it. 

This new kind humor spoke to me and I... actually wanted to see more of it. Of course at first I was in denial for a bit but I got over that quickly. So from then on whenever I see it play on Cartoon Network I wouldn’t skip it anymore. I began to look forward to more episodes until I noticed that this series had an overarching plot.

The episodes that I thought were one-shot had purpose. Not all of them are great but they were satisfying for the most part. Like pieces of a puzzle being slowly formed over the years. When I got used to going online I started watch every single episode until I got to the latest. I would wait every week for a new one to drop.

Not everything was all sunshine and rainbows however. Around the mid seasons I thought that the plot was dragging, that the writing became pretentious in some episodes. I began to lose my love for it after 3 years by that point. So I just became a casual viewer.

It took 2 years for me to get back on going crazy over Adventure Time again and by then I was already 18 years old. But I was never ashamed by loving cartoons and my peers were also obsessed with this show so I had no problem getting back on track.

I know that they use storyboards to tell their stories and that writing was secondary. It’s a very risky way of creating a show. But for some reason it kind of works with a show Adventure Time. 

A world were the unpredictable happens, a world were your own imagination is the limit. 

The songs were always such a treat. They may sound simple but that’s what makes them so memorable and heartfelt. They capture the moments where the situations are laid out. The way they were made sounded on the spot and incorporated what the characters felt at the time has a touch of realism.

I will forever be astounded with the way they incorporated Jake’s powers. The ways the spells, the jokes and the characters work and being alive. The Land of Ooo has infinite possibilities. I love all of that jazz.

But what I love most about this show were the characters and their relationships. 

Sure they’re zany but the situations they find themselves in still felt real no matter how ridiculous they got. There were moments when everything suddenly just made sense and I just began to feel for them.

Marceline was a character that I felt infatuated with the first episode I saw her in. It was when she was ‘helping’ Finn ‘woo’ PB into going to movies with him. I was like “Who’s this vampire chick and why is she so fun?” 

Yeah I liked her, but I never thought that I would fall in love with the immortal known as The Vampire Queen.

Marceline is just a tragically beautifully written character. And the show has done something I never thought they would do: Address how being an immortal affected her and other people.  

This silly looking cartoon has tackled topics regarding existential crisis and put with a lot of thought on it and I live for that. What Marceline felt when she lost the people she loved over the years, how messed up her whole situation was. She didn’t know what to do and instead dedicated her life in killing vampires because she wanted to protect the memory of only one person she had left who couldn’t even be with her. It was so heartbreaking. 

Never had my younger self thought that Marcy would have relationship with Simon. When I saw the still image of them when I was about to watch Remember You I was psyched. Many scenarios were flowing in my head before I clicked the play button. I thought I was ready but I was so wrong. That episode was the first episode that made me cry watching this series. Afterwards I always looked forward to Simon and Marcy interactions. 

I felt the utter hopelessness when Simon was declining onwards to becoming the Ice King we’ve always seen but never really known. 

But even in his maniacal state, there was a semblance of the Simon who loved his Betty and Marcy with all his heart. It could be called hopeful but it could also be cruel. And that is the beauty of this tragedy.

Immortality will mess anyone up and they all cope it with different ways.

Princess Bonnibel Bubblegum is another immortal but had different priorities. She already had a goal set in mind and went through with it with almost no hesitation. She committed numerous acts with questionable morals in mind. She pushed everyone away and just focused on her kingdom. In her own way, she was winging it. 

Her way of thinking clashed with Marceline and it was all the wrong timing for them. Her closest friend’s care for strangers was already almost nonexistent and she herself was too stressed. 

In the process of finding their purpose and having the weight of responsibilities on their shoulders and just living, these two have lost themselves and are just so tired and broken.

This is one of the main reasons why I ship Bubbline. They are so different yet they understand each other in an unspeakable level. The lost moralities they had were slowly gained when they found each other. And it wasn’t even immediate. There were so many ups and downs with their relationship and it took them centuries to figure it out. Even in the present they’re still figuring it out but now they are healing and that’s what matters.

And let’s not forget the titular characters.

Finn and Jake’s brotherly bond is one of my most favorite things in all of the fictional media I have consumed. Because going through reincarnation together and being with each other for all eternity is literally the definition of their love not knowing any bounds.

Together Again was the perfect send off for Adventure Time. And while they’re brotherhood isn’t flawless like Jake not always being the best role model but he’s always there for his brother and Finn would do anything for the people he loves. They have went through so many things together, good and bad.

Their bond is unbreakable.

Finn’s breakdowns in losing his best friend was so painful to watch and I cannot help myself but cry for what these brothers have lost. I know people have to let go but maybe we don’t have to “let go” let go, you know? So imagine my surprise and delight when Jake decided to join his brother and said these very words:

“Because it’s great being alive with you.”

That sentence broke my soul into a million pieces and restored it at the same time. I just bursted into tears the second I heard that. It was so simple yet one of the most touching lines I have ever heard in my life.

This show had so much heart that it’s overflowing. The bonds that these characters have for each other. It has brought me so much tears of sadness and joy. It broadened my imagination for the unknown. The creativity of this series is absolutely outstanding.

I was the same age as Finn when the show started so you could say I grew up with him and the show. I wasn’t young enough for it to be a part of my childhood but it was there for me till I reached adulthood. And I think that it’s much better that way. It did help me grow up and let me see that there are a lot of things that while everything stays, they still change. 

Adventure Time’s had a lot of messages strewn over its seasons and always had a melancholic vibe to it. 

That’s life... and that’s okay.

It may get ugly and terrifying but Adventure Time has told me to just live. 

Sing, dance, cry and laugh. Something simple as hanging out with family and friends has so much meaning in the grand scheme of things. Life goes on and things will seem to be familiar yet foreign at the same time. Linger on nostalgia, but also appreciate what’s happening in the present and look forward to what will happen in the future.

I am so grateful to have been on this wonderful adventure.

Like what they always said: 

The fun never ends.

[flipomatic]

Range of Emotion: Chapter 4 - Love

Author Note: Volume 8 spoilers continue. This is non canon.

First Chapter Previous Chapter

___________________________________________________

A green fluid was dripping slowly from Penny’s chest, leaving bright splatters of neon along the ground. Ruby’s clothes were covered in it, making her even easier to track for the virus that had taken control.

They were outside, near the crater where Penny had crash landed before. Ruby stood more than ten feet away from Penny, with Crescent Rose drawn. She held it in a defensive stance, eyes wide with concern.

Weiss and Blake were nearby, with their weapons drawn as well. Ruby signaled for them to stay back, so they watched and waited.

The virus that had occupied Penny’s body wasn’t concerned with the other two. It only had attention for two things: the relic and Ruby. It had first just tried to leave the building to go to the relic, kicking its rocket boots into gear to fly through, until it spotted Ruby.

A new directive flashed; to kill the girl in the red hood. Cinder would hate it if someone else did the job before she could. Penny wasn’t sure why she had that thought, but she opposed it on every level.

Then the virus, controlling Penny’s body, attacked.

Now, as Penny wrestled to try and take back control, it whipped her blades towards Ruby. The teen dodged, using her weapon to deflect the attack. She had already taken a few hits, but still had plenty of aura remaining. At least, Penny hoped she did. She couldn’t run the scan to check, no matter how desperately she wanted too.

Even though Penny couldn’t feel her body, couldn’t feel the tightening in her chest that came with the emotion, she was afraid.

“Snap out of it Penny!” Ruby called out to her, her voice rough with emotion. “I know you’re in there!” She ducked under another attack, barely avoiding being hit.

The virus that controlled Penny didn’t respond to her. It seemed to lack the desire or even the consciousness to communicate. Instead, it brought the swords back to charge up a laser blast, aimed directly at Ruby.

Again Ruby dodged, maintaining her defensive stance.

“I won’t fight you.” The frown on Ruby’s face was more pronounced than Penny had seen before. A hint of tears glimmered in the corners of her eyes.

The virus fired the laser again, this time without having to charge it first. It struck Ruby in the chest, sending her stumbling back towards the crater.

No, this couldn’t be happening. Penny searched the virus again to look for a weakness, to try to find a way to stop it.

Penny wanted to tell Ruby to fight back, that it would be fine and she could be repaired. She was already losing the fluids that flowed through her veins, a little more damage would be fine. Especially if it kept Ruby safe.

Unfortunately, she still couldn’t find a way to take control. The virus had hijacked everything with these new instructions, keeping her locked onto those paths. Penny tried to run a code that would bring just one of her arms back, but it was rebuffed instantly.

She had no idea where this virus came from or how it had even gotten into her system. Perhaps when she jacked into the Atlas base? If so, it had taken a while to activate.

Penny could only watch as her body fired again, blasting Crescent Rose from Ruby’s hands and sending her tumbling down into the crater. As she fell, her aura flickered out. No, no no, this couldn’t be happening.

Penny’s body stepped forward to follow, but had to reconsider when it detected motion behind her.

Weiss, Penny always knew Weiss was her second favorite friend, no longer seemed content with watching her leader be attacked. She lunged towards Penny at high speed, a glyph in the air behind her. The virus, being cued by Penny’s motion sensors, dodged easily before bringing the bringing the blades around to push Weiss through.

Weiss regained her footing quickly, spinning to again face her opponent. She had her sword pointed towards Penny, but her eyes, directed at the crater and her fallen leader, showed where her attention really was. Blake had run over to the crater while Weiss lunged in, keeping a wide distance between herself and Penny.

The virus calculated the next angle of attack, not concerned about fighting both of them if it meant having an easier time achieving its other goals. The bleeding was a problem, but the program said Penny’s body could take them. That was the last thing Penny wanted.

After another moment, barely a second, Weiss leapt back into action. She lunged forward with an attack from below, which was easily deflected. The attack was weaker than usual, weaker than when Penny had trained with the team.

At the crater, Blake was leaning in to help pull Ruby up. The red hooded girl emerged slowly, but once she reached level ground she seemed able to stand on her own.

“Don’t hurt her.” Ruby said quietly, looking down at one closed fist. She left Crescent Rose on the ground.

Weiss sighed, but otherwise didn’t move. “Then what do you suggest?” While they talked, Penny tried another attack on the virus. She had to figure out how it got in, so that she could stop it. She ran a code to try and find the source, to see where it was coming from.

“I can reach her.” Ruby’s voice was stronger now, as her eyes came up to meet Penny’s. “I know it.”

Now Weiss took a step back, sword still raised. “One more chance.” She emphasized the first word.

Blake took up a spot on the opposite side of Penny, likely prepared to attack from multiple angles if needed.

The virus wasn’t worried about this. Penny didn’t think it was even capable of that kind of emotion. It just recalculated, and then raised its ring of swords once again.

Ruby didn’t move, didn’t pick up her weapon. She raised her right hand, the one that was closed, and slowly opened in it.

In her palm was a familiar object, one Penny always kept on her. It was the hair clip, which had been attached to her pocket. Ruby must’ve found it in the crater, where it fell out of Penny’s pocket as she crashed into the ground.

It still looked to be intact, which was the one and only positive for the day.

“You had this.” Ruby held up the hair clip to scrutinize it. “Since you stopped wearing it, I thought you didn’t like it.” She mused, closing her hand again around the clip. Penny wanted to say that the opposite was true, that she didn’t want it to get damaged.

The virus, not one for conversation, moved abruptly to strike. It swung the blades forward, in a spinning motion. Ruby tried to duck the blow, but it had figured out how she moved. It adjusted the trajectory to hit her in the side, again knocking her to the ground.

Penny’s body then stepped closer, grasping one of its swords to perhaps strike a final blow.

On the inside, Penny was frantically searching for a way to stop it. She was getting closer; she could feel it. She hoped Ruby would defend herself with the clip, that she would use it as a knife. It was her last line of defense.

Ruby sat up and coughed once; she still had the clip grasped tight in her hand. “I never told you what the flower means.” Her voice had weakened, but still carried her innate strength. She looked up at Penny’s body, now standing over her. “Red carnations represent affection.” Ruby’s lip raised in a small smile, as if everything was not going wrong. “And love.”

Affection and love? Penny wasn’t fully in control of her ears so she wasn’t sure if she heard that right. Ruby loved her? Penny was familiar with the concept of love, she loved her father, but she hadn’t checked it against anyone else.

What did it feel like, to be in love? Penny didn’t know that either, and she didn’t think this was the right moment to contemplate it.

In fact, she was quite short on time. The virus was raising its arm to prepare another blow, and off to the side Weiss was charging up a summon.

Luckily, due to her persistent searching, Penny finally found what she was looking for. One of her blades, the one she had lost at the Atlas base to the Ace-Ops, was emitting the virus.

The quickest way to disable it would be to disconnect from all of her blades. While booted, she could do this temporarily by resetting their program, but it would only last a minute. It would have to do for now, until she could think of a longer term solution.

Penny entered the code to reset them immediately, hoping with every wire in her body that she wasn’t too late.

As the swords reset, the ones hovering behind her dropped to the ground. As they did, Penny was finally able to move again. She opened her hand and let the last sword fall.

“Penny?” Ruby leapt onto her feet, silver eyes gleaming. “Is it really you?” Her voice broke mid question.

“I only have a minute.” Penny jumped right to what needed to be done. “It’s controlling me through the swords, we have to disable them permanently.” Think, think, how could that be done? Wait, the detach switch, that was it. “There’s a button under my bow, on the control panel. If you press it the blades will deactivate until I reattach them.” This was a safety measure after what happened with Pyrrha, though it wasn’t actually that practical. Ruby would need a long thin object to be able to activate it.

“How do I do that?” Ruby leaned forward to look on the back of Penny’s neck, squinting.

“Use the…” Penny’s voice stopped mid-sentence, as the virus started to come back and retake control. Her blades once again rose from the ground. “I…” She fought it, but again it was no use. It quickly lunged forward to try and punch Ruby, who skittered away with a shriek of surprise.

Immediately, a summoned soldier was upon her. It swung at Penny’s body to push it back, to make some distance between it and Ruby.

Blake came next, swinging around to draw the attention of the virus.

Even though the virus thought it could beat them, as Penny knew her friends were way stronger than any calculation could give them credit for.

Between the two of them, as Ruby retrieved her weapon and called for them to not hurt Penny, they were able to freeze her blades and contain her. The virus still lacked emotion, as it strived to get free to continue its goals.

Ruby approached, with the hair clip in hand. She had flipped it open to a knife, and she stood behind Penny to try and find the button she mentioned.

“This looks complicated.” Blake commented as Ruby opened the panel on Penny’s bow.

“I got it.” Ruby sounded confident, and Penny was rooting for her. She hummed quietly as she examined the interface, finally spotting the gap that contained the button. It was kept inside of a crevice, so it couldn’t be pressed by accident. “Found it.”

Though Penny couldn’t see what Ruby was doing, there was only one tool she could be using to do it. The hair clip that was also a knife was the only thing on hand that would fit.

A moment later, and it seemed like they had been successful. The blades stopped struggling to leave the ice, and Penny was able once again to feel her own limbs. The strings connecting her body to the blades disconnected, coiling into the weapons. She turned her head to look around, taking in the mess in the courtyard.

The rope from Blake’s weapon, which had been wrapped around her, loosened. Once her hands were free, Penny lifted them to look at them. They were stained green with her own blood.

Ruby stepped around her, grasping Penny’s hands with her free one. “Are you… you?” She asked, glimmering silver eyes locked on Penny’s.

“I think so.” Penny ran a system diagnostic, which made note of the steady loss of blood and inability to connect to her blades. It asked if she wanted to re-establish the connection, which Penny promptly denied.

In front of her, Ruby folded the knife back into a hair clip. She reached forward, placing it in Penny’s hands. “There, back where it belongs.”

Penny carefully clipped it back into her pocket where it would be safe, remembering what Ruby had said about it before. Love, such a foreign emotion.

Now, as Ruby collapsed to her knees and Penny wrapped her arms around her to ease her fall, perhaps she had time to consider it.

All of this time, all of these weeks, she had been fighting and struggling with her emotions. She’d felt so many different things, so much stronger than she ever had before. She’d wrestled with her decisions, with following her desires down the suboptimal path.

The relief she felt now, as Ruby was in her arms and unharmed, was also familiar.

Was love the word she was looking for all along?

Penny thought it might’ve been.

Ruby lifted her arms around Penny, holding her tightly. Penny brought one hand up to brush Ruby’s bangs, which had fallen into her face in the conflict, to the side.

“Don’t leave me again.” Ruby muttered, her cheeks tinging pink. She lifted one hand to place gently against Penny’s.

Penny didn’t have a heart, but if she did she was sure it would be racing.

“I won’t.”

[samthemarvelfan]

Goodbyes: Chapter Eight

Summary: Ella Monroe is the Avengers newest recruit, handpicked by Steve Rogers himself. Indebted to him for reasons unknown, Cap pairs her up with Bucky Barnes. He is tasked with training her to relearn and hone the skills that have long since rusted. Bucky is cold and distant, and Ella can’t seem to break through the wall he’s built up for decades. He sees something in her though, and it scares him to death. Has the fate of these two strangers been sealed? …or will they always be longing…

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x OFC, feat Steve Rogers, Sam Wilson, Wanda Maximoff, Natasha Romanoff, Tony Stark

Warnings: ANGST, Bucky is a dick, mutual pining, self sabotage, slow burn, alcohol, flirting, swearing. I think that’s it!  Def not following a specific MCU canon or timeline.

A/N: I legit can’t believe the love from you all! Gosh my lil heart might burst! Please stick with me after this chapter and please don’t hate me! Patience is a virtue after all. Thank you for every comment, like, message and reblog. Love you endlessly. <3

Taglist: @iheartsebastianstan @jjlizz @stuckysbabe @sk493494 @lefoutoir @nickangel13 @marvelismysafezone @lilulo-12 @warmvanillafeels @heartofagamotto @ravenesque @pinknerdpanda (strikethrough means the tag didn’t work! I’m sorry!)  (strikethrough means the tag didn’t work! I’m sorry! Tags are OPEN!)

Three fucking weeks.

At this point, you were almost positive you were losing your mind.

Everyone was still in Romania, and you hadn’t had any actual contact with the team. Sam occasionally gave you the smallest of updates, usual in the form of a message that said “we’re alive.”

Gotta love that detail.

Wanda had checked on you too, making sure you were eating, as you had a tendency to forget to when you were stressed.

What drove you mad more than anything was that you hadn’t heard from Bucky. Was it really all in your head? The two of you connecting finally, and then he just vanished without a word?

Sure, maybe you were being irrational and needy. He was working; risking his life for the greater good after all. That doesn’t make it hurt any less, though.

“Miss Monroe, you’re receiving a call.” FRIDAY’s voice announced.

You jumped off the couch and ran to comm beacon in the middle of the table.

“Hello?” You ask, hopeful.

“Hey, Punchline! Miss me?” Sam’s humorous tone asked.

You couldn’t even speak, the only sound escaping your lips was an almost sob of relief.

You hear Steve chuckle in the background. “I’ll take that as a yes, meet us on the roof in 5?”

“You bet.” You reply quickly.

You pull your gray, half-zip hoodie over your head as you jog to the elevator. “Flight deck.” You announce as you enter.

The doors close and you hear and feel the rumble of the Quinjet docking. “Finally.” You whisper to yourself.

You get to the roof and see the bay doors opening as the ramp drops. Steve is the first one out, followed swiftly by Sam.

“You guys look the shit.” You jest, running at Steve with open arms.

He wraps you in the tightest hug, “Missed you too, Ella.” He laughs.

“How ‘bout me?” Sam asks. You turn to him with a smile, and he embraced you too.

“Is everyone alright? Did you...did you guys...is it done?” You couldn’t really formulate a thought, your mind still wondering how the hell they survived.

Steve nodded. “Every ounce of data we could extract, we did. That base wasn’t even close to inactive. In fact, it was the hub for HYDRA’s new order.”

Your mouth dropped, “What?”

Sam spoke, “Don’t worry, there’s a debriefing tomorrow, we’ll let you know everything we know.”

Your eyes glance behind Steve and Sam. You see Wanda and Vision exit the plane, relieved that they’re okay. You were chewing on your bottom lip, feeling the impatience take hold of you.

Where the hell is he? You thought.

“Hey Ella, listen—“ Sam said, but you tuned him out, hearing more footsteps on the ramp.

There he was, Bucky, safe and—what?

He was holding someone. A woman. Carrying her like a parent does their child after they’ve fallen asleep in the car.

She was stunning. Milky skin with gorgeous red locks. You knew who this was without a doubt, recalling her photo from the file you’d read months ago. Natasha, the Black Widow.

She was smiling. He was smiling. A real, genuine, happy look graced his face as he walked towards you all.

“Barnes, you can put me down now.” She laughed.

He shook his head, “Not a chance, Kitten. Can’t have you runnin’ off on me again can we?”

She pushed some hair out of his face, “I’m not going anywhere this time. I found what I was looking for, and I don’t intend on letting it go.” She smirked her perfect lips at him, causing him to blush.

Bucky places her gently on her feet before looking at you. His eyes looked panicked as he took in the expression on your face.

“You must be Ella! Nice to meet you, I’m Nat. Steve’s told me so much about you.” She smiled, pulling you in for a hug.

Why didn’t Bucky tell you about me? You think begrudgingly.

A smile graced your face nonetheless as you return the hug. “Its an honor, you’re a legend.” You say in an attempt to control your tone. It was true, too. Natasha Romanoff was infamous in your line of work.

“Don’t boost her ego, Kid.” Tony says walking by you.

You smiled politely, eager to escape to your room. “Well you guys must be exhausted, I’ll let you—“

“Hell no. I need a drink and I need one now.” Sam said as he walked towards the door leading back inside.

“You think you get to drink alone, Wilson? I don’t believe that’s how this relationship works.” Tony said as he completed his retinal scan by the keypad.

“We’re gonna have a ‘hey look at that, none of us died’ dinner tonight. Pizza, beer, booze, music. 8 o’clock in the lounge.” Tony said disappearing inside.

You turned around to see Bucky whispering in Natasha’s ear, both laughing like giddy fucking schoolgirls.

Are they...does he...is she... you’re brain tried to think, but it couldn’t seem to complete a thought.

You wanted to punch him in that smug face of his. He didn’t even have the balls to say goodbye to you when he left, and now that he’s back he has the audacity to not say two words to you?

“I’m always down for pizza, how ‘bout you Ella?” Steve asked, swinging an arm around your shoulder and leading you back inside.

Bucky eyed Steve with a curious look, but you couldn’t help smiling at your friend, “Is that even a question, Steve? Pizza is a main food group in my opinion, you know that.”

He and Nat were swiftly on you heels. “You sure about that Els? You look exhausted, have you been sleeping?” Bucky asks from behind you.

You stop suddenly and turn on your heel. Is he serious? The first thing he says to you is basically ‘you look like shit’ and ‘please don’t come to this party’.

“Now that you mention it, Sergeant, I haven’t been sleeping. I was worried about my friends. Wondering when and if I’d see them again, I’d hate to leave thing left unsaid,”

You grab Steve’s and Sam’s hand in each of yours and lift them, “But it looks like everyone I care about made it back on one piece.”

You turn back around and head into the elevator with everyone.

You stood in your room, fuming.

Is this really who you’ve become? This pathetic teenager pining after someone who will never be hers?

It sure seems that way.

Your stomach churns at the image of he and Nat...together.

An excessive groan leaves your lips as you flop on the bed, ready to let yourself wallow.

Your plans, however, are interrupted by a knock on your door. “What?!” You scream.

The door opens slowly, “I thought you’d have missed me?” Wanda says.

You shoot up, and smile like an idiot. “Of course I missed you, Wan. I’m so glad you’re back!” You embrace her.

The two of you had become quite close recently, and it was so nice to have a girl friend around again.

“Then why do I get the feeling I interrupted a wallowing session, hm?” She said slyly.

You raise an eyebrow at her, “Wan...” You scold.

“I know, I know—stay outta your head. But Ella, your thoughts are so loud I can barely hear my own!” She laughed.

You sigh and sit on the edge of your bed, Wanda joining you.

“I’m just mad. I’m mad at myself for acting like a love struck teenager, I’m mad at him for yoyo-ing me all the damn time. I’m just...”

“In love.” She finished your sentence.

You laugh aloud, “Wan, you have to know someone to love them. That big oaf of a man is too damn stubborn to let anyone in! Besides, I don’t think it’s me he wants.”

“What’s that suppose to mean?” She asked.

You stand heading to your closet, looking through clothes to wear for tonight.

“Nothing. Forget I mentioned it.”

Wanda’s footsteps followed you, “I know you say Bucky’s stubborn, but so are you, Ella.” She smiled softly, her nimble fingers landing on a black velvet dress.

“This one.” She says. The long sleeved, deep v dress was your absolute favorite, and also very fancy.

“Isn’t that a bit much?” You ask.

She raised her eyebrows at you. “Uh, have you met Tony? He says ‘pizza and beer’ but he means a gala... with less people.”

“Fine, but I swear to God if you don’t dress up too then I’m coming back here and putting on pajamas.” You hold your pinky out to her.

She hooks it with a smile, “Deal.”

8 o’clock comes far too fast in your opinion.

You’d spent the last two hours in your bathroom doing your makeup and hair, and you look damn good.

The dress rested a bit below mid-thigh, and fit you perfectly. You make a mental not to thank Wanda later for forcing you into it.

“Breathe, Ella.” You say to yourself as the elevator carries you to the lounge floor.

Your black heels click through the corridor, the sound softening as your ears fill with classic rock from the end of the hall.

You slowly push the wooden door open, and spot everyone mingling. Maria Hill was there, as was Rhodey, and another man you’d never met before.

“Oh shoot! I didn’t know we had a supermodel living with us!” Sam shouts.

You laugh, “Oh shut up, you’ve clearly already been drinking.”

He shook his head, “So what? I still got eyes, don’t I?”

“You look beautiful.” Steve says cutting Sam off, placing a kiss on your cheek.

You blush, “Thank you, Steve. You boys clean up pretty nice too. I don’t think we’ve ever seen each other like this.”

Steve shakes his head, “Not exactly the suit I’m most comfortable in.” He took a sip of what you assume is scotch. “What are you drinkin’, sweetheart?” He asks.

“Honestly? Anything with vodka. Then I’ll have a shot or two.” You say, taking a seat at the high top table next to him.

“Coming right up, Sam why don’t you come with me fore you dig a deeper hole for yourself?”

You hear Sam grumbling as Steve drags him away, and you suddenly feel yourself being watched.

You scan the room, and spot him almost instantly. He’s standing with Nat, her back to you, leaning on the bar.

Bucky’s eyes, though glassy from the booze no doubt, had never been more focused.

His gaze roamed your body from your feet to your face. He licked his lips slowly, before capturing his bottom one in his teeth.

Shaking your head, you look away from him. “Don’t even think about it, buddy.” You mutter to yourself. You glance at him quickly one final time and see Nat waving her hand in front of his face.

Bucky’s trance seems to get broken and he falls back into conversation with her with ease.

“Moscow Mule? I think that’s what the bartender called it.” Steve says approaching you.

A light bulb suddenly goes off in your head.

“Steve? Can I ask for a favor?” You say, squeezing the lime into your drink

He nods, “Anything, what’s on your mind?”

You let out a large breath. “Okay, please don’t think I’m immature but I’ve been thoroughly pissed at your best pal over there,” you gesture with a nod of your head.

“and I’d really like to get him back for all the shit he’s put me through.”

Steve sips his drink again, as Sam places 3 shot of Jameson on the table. “What did you have in mind?”

Bucky’s breathing stopped the moment he saw her. He didn’t think she could get anymore beautiful.

Turns out he was incredibly, outstandingly wrong.

He felt his heat racing and his blood pumping, drowning out whatever Nat was telling him about her plans for the evening.

Ella’s eyes were everything to him. They bared her soul and showed him her heart at the same time. He’d never been able to see a future for himself, until she fell into his life.

He worried about her constantly. Not being able to see her or talk to her or hear her voice for nearly 3 weeks drove him crazy. Then seeing her in the state she was in, so obviously sleep deprived and stressed. He hated himself for making her worry so much, and it was clear she wasn’t too happy with him when he got back this morning.

“Hello, Earth to Barnes? Did you hear me?” Nat said, waving her hand.

Bucky shook his head, “No sorry, what was that?”

Nat smiled slyly. “Mhm, your girls got you in a tizzy, that’s for sure.” She said, sipping her martini.

Bucky smiled shyly. “She’s not my girl, no matter how much I wish she was.”

Nat slapped his lapel, “So what the fuck are you doing fuck standing here with me?!”

“Ow! Okay, okay! Christ, shouldn’t you be fucking Banner in a utility closet or something?” He laughed stepping away from her.

“All in good time, Barnes. Now go get your girl.” She said spinning away from him.

Bucky’s eyes traveled to where she was standing, but she wasn’t there. Sam was in her spot, downing a shot Bucky was sure he’d regret in the morning.

He maneuvered around the groups of people, searching for her. The soft rock music playing poignantly through the speakers, he sees a few couples dancing.

He scoots around them and spots Steve.

Good for him. He thought happily to himself.

When Steve sways around with his partner, he sees its not a random guest he’s dancing with. Steve is dancing with a beautiful girl, a woman, Bucky’s girl.

Bucky wants to throw up and kick his ass all at once.

But then he sees Ella.

She’s smiling, and comfortable. She’s happy as she rests her head on Steve’s chest, and sways to the rhythm of the song.

The alcohol in his system doesn’t make these feelings any easier to handle. His vibranium fist clenching and unclenching.

A whirring sound get both Steve and your attention. That’s when you see Bucky standing about 10 feet away from the two of you as he watches dance.

“Hey Buck, wh—“

“Shut the fuck up, Steve.” Bucky slurs.

Your eyes widen at the words he says to his friend. Bucky is visibly shaking, and obviously drunk—probably more so than you, and that’s saying something since Sam kept the shots coming.

“Bucky, stop.” You say before your mind can stop you.

He lets out a sarcastic laugh, “Not fucking him, huh?” He spat in anger as he pushed by you, leaving the lounge all together.

Steve looked to the door, then to you. Your eyes brimming with tears as you swallowed a sob.

He looks at you with a sad smile, and nods his head toward the door. “Go get him.”

Chapter Nine: Seen

[snowflake-of-destruction]

This isn’t something I normally participate in, but, since I didn’t write much in June and shared hardly anything(something I plan to change in July if I can), I thought I should give some proof of (creative) life if anyone wants it.

Under the cut, a series of tiny excerpts, most more than six sentences, of different Kingdom Hearts pieces to be rescued from the limbo of “half finished chunk of something in a google doc.” Some of them belong to WIPs and some are from various other things started and then interrupted or....we’ll say set to a back burner.

All excerpts headed by a bolded header in the style of 

Title of Piece This Belongs To (Brief description of what kind of fic that is in between parenthesis)

Advantage Rule (Isalea Modern AU. First Chapter Up On AO3. More Info There.)

"You lost or are you the new caulk?" The speaker didn't fit the typical profile of a tech professional, especially one that worked behind the scenes with the coders. Mid-fifties judging by the lines on his face with thinning blond hair so light you could hardly tell where some parts had gone silver combed to stick up as a compensation for where it threatened to recede and leather skin that said he'd worked outside in some decade past, paired with a southern accent that seemed stronger than it was with the effect added by the toothpick precariously balanced in the corner of his mouth. He'd rejected business attire in favor of cargo pants and a dark blue flight jacket that looked like they'd been bought in the last century, and the look in his eye was so fierce without prompting that Axel had to wonder if he was a failsafe for the air conditioning breaking down.

"Am I the what?"

"Caulk." The toothpick switched sides of the man's mouth with a roll of his bottom lip. "Fixing the leaks? The cybersecurity specialist? Axel Lea?" His impatience mounted by the moment. Working on the fourth floor would certainly be interesting.

"Yes, sir. That would be me." Axel tried to smooth the way with deference and the easy smile that rarely steered him wrong. "Does that make you...?"

"Cid Highwind. I'll be showing you the ropes. Now that you've seen fit to grace us with your presence." Cid continued to stare him down and Axel wasn't sure if he was supposed to apologize or bare his teeth and smack his chest like a gorilla to challenge the alpha.

Without False Hope ( First Chapter Up On AO3. More Info There. Akuroku KH/FFX crossover)

Axel was waiting for them, or  it seemed that way at least and Roxas didn’t think himself vain for thinking so, when Roxas spotted the lanky redhead not jogging himself but leaning against a pole until he saw the Crusaders approaching and then falling in next to Roxas just behind Xion as she bellowed, "Young Crusaders gather 'round,"  the beginning of a call and response chant that the rest of them would answer with a promise to knock enemies back and stand their ground or an alternate about beating Sin beneath the ground if they were feeling

Axel finished the line a beat before the Crusaders would have, substituting his own words. "...Eager for Sin to put you in the ground." Roxas's heart, which had soared for a moment when Axel had come up beside him and dared to hope that Axel's first words would be a version of sorry or an invitation out somewhere without other people, took a sharp plummet to his toes then returned to his chest angry at being mocked.

Assorted grumbles and shouts showed many others felt the same way, but Xion seemed to take it in stride, sing-songing her own improvised lines that continued the cadence of the original chant without missing a beat, "Young civilian come to heckle and stare. What would you do if a fiend attacked and we weren't there?"

Axel near stumbled but recovered and let out a short bark that might have been a laugh he wasn't sure he was allowed without inviting training Crusaders to make him pay for it, afterward rumbling in an impressed tone, "You, I like,."

"You should. " Xion shot back and her casual tone alone was enough that everyone else in the formation knew Axel was an acceptable stranger even if he was rude, and that they should ignore the intrusion. "I'm not sure I like you back. Roxas has been mooning and it makes him impossible."

Guardian Force (Akuroku. Axel and Roxas in the next life, living as NPCs in the world of/during the story of FFVIII. Part of my eventual plan to show Axel and Roxas living out every Final Fantasy game. Unpublished/First chapter never completed because I decided on Without False Hope/a FFX crossover instead)

"You often talk to yourself?" an insolent lazy drawl came from somewhere to Axel's left and he turned, eyes narrowing to see a boy in a rumpled Balamb cadet uniform lying across the second highest step, book in hand, vibrant blue eyes, ice eyes like he'd junctioned Shiva right to his vision, trained on him over the spine.

"To my Guardian Force," Axel explained, though that seemed worse. Over six foot of height and lean muscle and the SeeD uniform Axel wore at least enough parts of for it to be vaguely recognizable that he belonged to the elite unit, all usually worked together enough that there was usually no reason to be embarrassed by anything he let slip out.  Nobody would laugh even if Axel welcomed it.

"Thought you didn't like using Guardian Forces," the lounging student's voice was just as nonchalant as it was before, but his gaze was sharp, interested, and he spoke as if he knew Axel.

"Have we met?" Axel knocked the sole of his left boot against the side of his right as if scraping mud off the bottom. It wasn't odd for him to shift constantly even when mostly still, unless he was specifically called to stand at attention. There was an air of discomfort about the present action though, when taken with how jade eyes known for constant analysis on and off the battlefield, seemed attracted to the handrail of the steps rather than searching the face of the boy that had just spoken to him with familiarity.  Axel's normally iron stomach soured immediately at the idea they had met and he'd forgotten, to the point he couldn't even bring himself to try and jog his recollection. All he could do was force out his least favorite question next to 'when did that happen?'

Lollipop (Soriku and Akuroku. College AU/Modern AU. Unpublished. Sora and Roxas in an acapella group because that was the only way I could work out how to get them to sing and do choreo for songs that get stuck in Shaky’s head, which was the Goal of the Day one day before I got distracted)

When Sora said he had a new idea for a piece for the CrescenDudes' next performance, Roxas had been more than happy to volunteer to work on the arrangement with him. Sora was great for ideas, large picture and little flourishes that made a song a show, and he was, hands down, who you wanted doing choreography, even if he tended to get carried away and not realize there weren't many others with the dance and movement background he had in their group, but he wasn't suited for the musical side of sculpting a piece. He'd sing what he was given and he'd stay on pitch doing it, but he had no idea to weave songs together to form a mashup that sounded natural and created the right feeling in a crowd,  and he'd forget to accommodate  for everyone's voices or go the opposite direction and try to highlight everyone and have twenty solos. So it was up to Roxas to take his vision from neat idea to reality, and he jumped at the chance. He'd do anything at this point to distract Sora from dragging him into wedding planning for a few days when that should be Riku’s job as the other groom.  

Hourglass (Unpublished. Self-indulgent BBS Era--at least for this excerpt-- story about KH Squall/Leon and Seifer growing up in Radiant Garden and explaining how they got to be on separate planets and separate ages by the time KH1 rolls around. May be competed and posted to AO3 or just used as a base/record of headcanon for sprinkling backstory references in other pieces.)

Seifer challenged Lea and Isa to break back into the castle and come back with proof this time. He would have just called Lea a liar, but that would lead to Lea trying to fight him, which would lead to Isa trying to fight him, which would lead to Squall getting in the way, thinking Seifer couldn't handle a two on one fight with some chicken wusses. Then Squall would still try to sneak into the castle himself to see Ellone anyway--and she wasn’t in the castle in the first place...probably. Seifer would have to drag Squall’s ass out of there, and, if they got caught by the Royal Guard, then they’d be the next rumored prisoners in the basement.  It was safer to make it be Lea and Isa's challenge.

Lea took the bait. Isa, surprisingly, added they were planning a return trip anyway. Squall shot Seifer a questioning look, which he ignored in favor of taunting Lea and sealing the deal, "I can't wait to see you two hobble in tomorrow after getting your asses beat by the Guard. Try not to hit your thick skulls on the flagstones when you get thrown out."

Drowning (Unfinished/unpublished. Placeholder name. Sorikai. Supposed to be for the Sorikai Summer Event. Prompt: Drowning. Long one shot about eight times one of the Destiny Trio has nearly drowned and then been saved by the others)

Their first prototype of a raft had fallen apart underneath them in open water, the ties that lashed the planks together having not been as securely tied as they could have been--the book on sailor's knots Sora had provided was a lot more obtuse than it had seemed at first, descriptions dense and picture demonstrations too sparse. Kairi and Sora each fared well, each grabbing onto a floating plank to drift a minute and orient themselves after being plunged into the water. Riku was less successful, being fixated on saving as many of the supplies Kairi and Sora had gathered (coconuts, mushrooms, and bottles of water mostly, though there had been a tackle box that Riku's father would kill him for losing if he had to go back and face him, and that was what Riku was primarily focused on) and exhausting his breath on too many dives in a row without recovery in between until he was lightheaded from not taking in enough air in his hasty gulps when he broke the surface and increasingly imprecise in where he chose to come out of the water until he hit his head on the bottom of the plank he was loading the recovered supplies onto and went down without resurfacing.

No Set Recipe (Unfinished/unpublished.  Sorikai. Supposed to be for the Sorikai Summer Event. Prompt: Ice Cream. Kidfic. Sora’s mom is left with the job of explaining polyamory while making homemade ice cream with a group of five and six year olds.)

It was all Selphie's fault to start with, though if she was going to be ascribed the blame for the hurt feelings, she would have to be given credit for all that happened after, which Riku and Sora both agreed she did not deserve, even if Kairi was more magnanimous, so it became habit just to talk of the ice cream and the impact it had on their future. Still, the most accurate account begins with: one day when they were all young-- too young to even be allowed to swim in the water surrounding play island without an adult in the surf with them, if that gives perspective--Selphie, to everyone's surprise, scored the winning goal in the game of land-blitzball the group of them were playing in order to decide what game they would really spend the day playing, and chose, to absolutely nobody's surprise, house.

Everyone accepted their fate and divided into family units with minimal grumbling, phrasing which means that Wakka threw the blitzball into the sea and lost it forever when Jecht--the parent chaperone on play island that day who was five minutes away from falling asleep on the sand and typically didn't care what they did, unlike most parents who at least had restrictions about not hitting each other in the head with wooden swords or throwing sand, and was the favorite of the children for that attitude of freedom to make mistakes being a better teacher than rules--refused to go into the water after it.

Selphie, however, found a problem with Sora, Riku, and Kairi's family. Specifically, she didn't like that the family was Riku, Kairi, and Sora all together parenting a yellow coconut Kairi was trying to rock to sleep while Riku built him a bed out of sand and palm fronds and Sora cooked dinner for the household--a savoury stew of sticks, sand, and mushroom. She stood with pursed lips and hands on hips, and declared that their proud coconut son, Rekka, couldn't have all three of them for parents because that wasn't how things worked.

"Why not?" Sora asked with all the curiosity and innocence of a child.

Riku tried a more practical, solution based approach with, "Can we change the rules?"

Kairi was more direct and firm, her, "It does if I say so," leaving very little room to argue.

[sad-goomy]

confessions

Day 4 of Postwickshipping Week

Read on Ao3

Victor is tired.

Partly because he just got back from an expedition to Mt. Coronet and his body has yet to adjust to the shifting time zones.

Also partly because Sonia’s sick today, leaving him and Hop to actually run the lab, and it’s required a lot more running around on errands than he expected.

But mostly because he’s had to watch his twin and his best friend moon over each other for years now, and it’s all culminated into the nearly half-hour long rant that Hop has been going on as they care for the lab’s garden, going on and on about how he doesn’t want to make things weird, but Gloria’s so great, and he thinks he’s been dropping hints but he’s not sure if they’ve been clear, and, and, and...

And Victor is tired.

He sets down his watering can, letting out an exasperated sigh that cuts Hop off mid-sentence before turning to him and grabbing his shoulders, forcing him to stay quiet and look at him as he signs.

Tell her.

Hop blinks, fumbling with the clipboard and pencil in his hands as he looks off to the right, at the spliced berry tree that he’s supposed to be taking notes on. His voice is small, the shyness such a stark contrast to his usual self that Victor drops his shoulders, slightly more sympathetic as Hop mumbles, “But what if she doesn’t feel the same?”

Honestly, it’s a wonder Victor’s put up with this for so long. His face falls into a deadpan. She does.

“Are you sure?”

If looks could kill, Hop would be buried six feet under the spliced berry tree.

Instead, he swallows hard, gripping his clipboard tighter as Victor finally lightens up on the death glare. With a deep breath, Hop runs a hand through his hair, the pen in his hand very nearly getting snagged on a tangle. “How though?”

The garden grows quiet for a moment as the two think, Victor tilting his head before shaking it, quickly signing, Gloria’s a bit dense. Be straightforward and just tell her.

He’s right, of course; as much as the two love her, they also know that the Champion’s always a bit slow on the uptake when it comes to things like romance. Besides, it’s better to keep things clear, to avoid the awkward confusion of a messy confession that’ll only drag things out.

But Hop feels his hands grow clammy at just the idea of saying the words straight to her face, and he loses his appetite at the thought that there’s still a chance she can reject him. As he turns back to his observations, Victor picking up the watering can once more, he decides it can’t hurt to get a second opinion on what to do.

...

Marnie agreed to meet up with him a few days later, in between her gym challenges. They’d sat on the stage, her listening as he rambled on about his dilemma, because as embarrassed as he might be, Marnie’s always been a good listener.

She nodded her head sagely before taking a sip from her water bottle. “I’m no good with this stuff,” she sighed, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, “But you could send her a song. Something romantic. Tell her she should listen and it made you think of her.”

It’s certainly less nerve-wracking than saying it to her face, but now Hop finds himself lying on his bed, agonizing over the exact phrasing. Eventually, he decides on the second version of the text that he concocted, adds in an emoji, and shoots off the text along with a link to the song (something from a new favorite band of his and a bit on the nose with lyrics about falling for the girl next door).

From: Hopscotch [20:13] heard this and thought of you :) lmk what you think

He then tosses his phone onto the opposite side of the bed, burying his face in his hands to keep from calling her and taking it back, playing it all off as a joke.

A few minutes later, his phone buzzes, and his stomach turns as he slowly picks it up, checking her response with his heart hammering in his chest.

From: Glowstick [20:18] Wow, that was really good! I’ll have to check out more of their stuff :D

From: Glowstick [20:19] You always know the coolest music

Hop stares at his screen in silence for the longest three minutes of his life, and then he lets his phone fall on his face as he groans with the realization that she didn't catch any of the romantic intention and he’ll have to try something else.

...

Bede was absolutely smug, and it took every ounce of self-control within Hop to not start a fight immediately. After all, the Ballonlea gym leader took time out of his day to meet with him at the lab, even if he immediately launched into how silly he thought this entire thing was.

With a far too haughty look on his face, Bede rolled his eyes and told him, “Get her a gift, something undeniably romantic – flowers maybe, although jewelry would be better. You both have bad taste, I’m sure she’ll like whatever you pick out.”

Mild insults aside, it wasn’t terrible advice, and so Hop finds himself in the Wyndon Stadium locker room, sitting on a bench and waiting for Gloria to finish up her training session. He slides a long box out of the inside pocket of his jacket, fidgeting with it in his hands. He chose a simple golden locket, something small that he can easily picture her wearing, but heart-shaped because...that’s romantic, right? Friends don’t usually get each other heart-shaped jewelry – there's no way this could be ambiguous.

Footsteps draw his eyes to the entrance, his foot bouncing as quickly as his heart beats while he waits. A moment later, Gloria appears, spotting him with a warm smile as she greets, “Fancy seeing you here! You should’ve texted me; I’d wrap up training a little earlier.”

“Just wanted to surprise you.” He stands, fumbling with the box as he turns and watches her walk past him and open her locker. His hands are getting sweaty, and if he fusses any more with the ribbon on the box he’ll ruin the delicate wrapping, so the second she has her jacket and bag on, closing her locker, he holds out the necklace box. She blinks, raising a brow at him as he quickly stammers, “I uh, got you something.”

Her smile is back, if a tad confused as she adjusts her grip on her bag. “What for?”

“Just...because.”

“You’re real sweet,” she says, sending his heart soaring only for it to plummet a moment later when she gently pushes his hand holding the box back towards his chest, adding sheepishly, “But I don’t have anything for you.”

Hop shakes his head. “That’s fine, really.”

“I know, I know, but...” She fidgets with the sleeves of her jacket, cheeks taking on a shade of pink that has him nearly distracted from his mission with how adorable it is. When she glances back up at him, she gives him a wink. “Well, I just feel bad. Save it for my birthday?”

He could scream. She’s never been good with gifts, and he knows that, so he doesn’t know why he expected anything else from her. Gloria gets too shy about being doted on, is always so quick to deflect it.

With a defeated smile, he slides the box back into his pocket, because if he says anything else, tries to get her to open it at this point, then he’ll have to actually tell her how he feels and that is just about the last thing he wants to do now.

The air between them is slightly awkward, so she clears her throat, looping her arm around his as she asks, “Since you came all the way here, wanna grab a bite? My treat.”

He very nearly tells her that now she’s the one who’s giving him something, that he wants to spoil her like she always finds a way to spoil him, but she’s giving him that one crooked little smile that has him simply smiling back, nodding as they walk out of the locker room.

There’s always next time.

...

Leon was no help.

Sonia was a little more help.

They were his last resort, because sure enough, when he approached the two in the living room while they were cuddled up on the couch and asked for advice, he had to suffer half an eternity of teasing, only for Leon to then have the nerve to shamelessly declare, “Oh, I didn’t confess to Sonia.”

She snuggled closer into his side, smirking at Hop’s absolutely disgruntled expression as she explained, “Lee was even worse than Gloria. I basically had to kiss him for him to realize.” Hop paled at that, calculations running through his mind as she tilted her head, slightly confused. “But haven’t you tried just telling her?”

He’d quickly excused himself after that, not giving them the satisfaction of seeing the brilliant blush on his cheeks as he escaped back to his room.

A blush that’s now making a comeback as he sits next to Gloria on a mossy fence on Route 1, Sonia’s words reverberating in his head.

Stealing a glance at her out of the corner of his eye proves to be a mistake, as he flushes three shades deeper at the sight of her smiling peacefully out at the fields, her bare legs swinging in the warm breeze that ruffles her dress.

Of course, Hop has thought about kissing her before, in a situation not unlike this one. But there’s a huge hurdle from thinking to doing, one he can’t quite push himself to make, no matter how long the silence stretches.

“I’m glad we still get to see each other so often.” She looks up at him, tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ear before smiling wide, and he swears his heart stops for a moment. “I was nervous we’d both be too busy, and I didn’t know what I was gonna do without my best mate.”

Well, he can’t not kiss her after that.

Still, he hesitates, looking down at her with wide eyes as she turns her attention back to the hills. Before he can overthink it, he leans down, his lips brushing against her warm cheek for a fraction of a second, and then he’s pulling as far back as possible, bracing himself for the worst.

She blinks, lips parted as she catches his eye, and he thinks, mercifully, that she finally understands.

And then Gloria’s leaning over and pulling him into a half hug as she coos, “Lucky to have such a cute best friend.”

Which is...is that a rejection? Hop looks down at her, his own arm wrapping around her shoulder to return the hug even as the gears in his head work overtime to make sense of what’s just happened. It could be a soft “no,” but she’s smiling up at him without a hint of discomfort or surprise. A sense of dread creeps over him as he realizes that she took it platonically, and he doesn’t have the heart to tell her otherwise.

“Yeah, me too,” he mumbles instead.

It’s true, but it’s not the whole truth, and so Hop plasters on a smile and fights the urge to tell her that she’s his very best friend and so much more to him.

...

Victor is so tired.

Hop relays every failed confession to him when they’re at work, and because Victor is a good friend he listens, and he laments along with him, and he keeps himself from pulling out “I told you so.” Instead, he exercises the patience of a saint, and that’s wearing him out quickly when he realizes that at this rate it’ll be another ten years before this mess takes care of itself.

And if he has to put up with this for even just another week, he’s going to pass out from exhaustion.

He’s in the back of the lab with Hop, going through slides of Wishing Stars, when the front door opens. Sonia’s voice chirps from the kitchen, “Hey Gloria!”

Victor looks up from his microscope to see Hop next to him, body frozen and eyes wide with fear as Gloria’s voice carries through the air. “Hi Sonia – is Hop here?”

“In the back with Vic.”

“Is it okay if I borrow him for a second?”

Hop looks around, sheer panic written on his face, and his eyes settle on the broom closet. Acting on pure instinct, he begins walking towards it, only for Victor cut him off and grab him by the arm, ignoring his weak protests as he drags the other assistant towards the front.

Sonia and Gloria glance over at them, their conversation grinding to a halt at the sight of Victor frowning as he drags a reluctant Hop behind him.

“Is now a bad time?” Gloria asks, question ending in a giggle as Hop breaks free of Victor’s grasp. Sonia raises a brow at the two before shaking her head, turning back to her tea and datasheets at the kitchen table. The Champion shifts her weight, looking between the pair of assistants as she adds, “Victor said you had something to tell me.”

Every ounce of color drains out of Hop’s face as he lifts his hands, glancing around and desperate to avoid her eyes. “Oh, n-no, not–”

Forget if looks could kill.

The glare that Victor gives him wouldn’t even leave a body to identify.

Hop swallows hard, turning back to Gloria with a nervous smile. “Can we talk outside?”

She nods, a worried wrinkle forming between her brows as they walk out the front door. He leans against one of the front windows of the lab, thankful that the street is relatively empty. Gloria stands next to him, arms behind her back as she looks up at him, patient and confused.

Hop meets her eyes for a second, and it’s too much, so he looks back down at his feet as he scratches the back of his neck.

“Is everything okay?” Her voice isn’t quite worried, but it’s not as playful as it once was, which sends him into another panic because the last thing he ever wants to do is worry her.

“Yeah, it’s not...well, I guess it’s important, but it’s not anything serious. Er, maybe it is? I’m not...”

His voice peters off into a weak mumble, and his hands slowly stop gesticulating to instead hang strangely in front of his chest. He very nearly cuts his losses then and there, deciding he’d rather just go back inside and pretend this never happened than embarrass himself further, but Gloria has a sparkle in her eyes as she laughs behind her hand, guiltily amused at his strange display.

The corner of his lips quirks up, and he shoves his hands into his pockets as the sound of her giggles helps untie the knot of anxiety in his chest. “Should probably just spit it out, shouldn’t I?”

“Probably,” she says with a faux-sage nod, the remnants of her laughter forming a lopsided smile.

But looking at her while thinking of what he’s about to say makes his stomach turn, so he shuts his eyes, taking a deep breath as his brows knit together in concentration.

“I like you.”

He’s not sure what he expects, but it’s not the silence that follows. Hop cracks open one eye, only to find that Gloria’s looking at him, clearly confused as she chuckles, “Well yeah, I should hope so.”

His shoulders drop as that all too familiar sensation of missing the mark comes over him. It would be an easy out to take, to spin this all as some elaborate show of friendship, but Hop has come too far to go back now (and he gets the feeling Victor might really murder him at this point).

“No, like,” he falters, struggling to walk the line of not being brave enough to say too much versus being too frustrated to say too little, “As more than a friend.”

“Right, we’re best friends.”

She’s so earnest that it only adds to his frustration, and Hop is torn between laughing and crying as he huffs and plows on. “Have you ever thought about us being more than that?”

Her brows furrow. “I’m not sure what that means.”

“Y’know, best friends but...”

“But?”

“More affectionate.”

“Oh, like when you kissed me on the cheek.”

“Not platonic.”

“I’m just not sure what you’re–”

“Arceus’ sake, Glo, I’m in love with you!”

It’s absurdly quiet in Wedgehurst, making Gloria’s silence all the louder. Hop stares down at her, red-faced and shaking, watching as her face unwinds from confusion and falls slack in surprise. Her eyes are wide with realization as a blush slowly crawls across her cheeks and to the tips of her ears.

She blinks once, twice, and then whispers a breathless, “Oh.”

He nods, and his tongue is too big for his mouth suddenly but he still manages to mumble, “Yeah.”

Her blush goes from carnation to firetruck as she holds his gaze, and then her face breaks into a wide smile that has a swarm of Butterfree flutter in his throat. “Oh.”

“Yeah.” He’s mirroring her smile now, and she’s laughing again as she tucks her hair behind her ears, giddy and nervous and finally understanding. The last of the nerves leaves him as he reaches for her hands, slowly intertwining their fingers, searching her face for the slightest sign of hesitation but only finding excitement. “Fair to say you feel the same?”

All she can manage is a nod, biting her lip as she looks up at him.

“Ace.” His eyes are slightly unfocused, glazed over in something hazy and sugary as he unabashedly stares at her lips, too lost in the freedom of finally having it all out there to be self-conscious anymore. “Can I kiss you now?”

With another nod from her, he leans down, brushing his lips against hers until she pulls him further down, deepening it with a smile as he wraps his arms around her like he’s wanted to for as long as he can remember.

...

Sonia takes another sip, feeling just a little creepy that she’s watching one of her assistants and the Champion make out, but then they decided to go and have a romantic moment right in front of her lab’s window. She turns, looking to the chair across from her as she chuckles, “Oi Victor, what did you...”

But the boy is passed out, head resting on his arms as he takes a nap on the table. Sonia gives his sleeping form a sympathetic smile before taking another sip of tea.

“Guess he was tired.”

[expresstheobsession]

5 + 1

5 times Shoto almost kisses you and the 1 time he actually does. 

This is for @infinity2639 for winning my contest. If you guys want to see more contests where I’ll do more custom one shot type content let me know. I hope you enjoy it just as much as I did writing it. 

I didn’t have time to proof read so if you notice mistakes let me know and I can fix it. xx

Word count: 1593 | Warnings: Fluff?? 

The first time Todoroki almost passed the line of friendship was unexpected in the way that he didn’t realize just how cute you were after waking up. 

It was innocent enough, the way your glasses sat crooked on your face after a nap during your free period of the day. He just wanted to fix them, but instead ended up pushing your short hair aside so he could better adjust the frames. 

At least that’s what he told himself, but deep down he knew that he wanted to brush his fingertips through your hair just a little bit. 

“You should take these off if you’re going to sleep during school.” He joked, avoiding eye contact as he fixed them quickly. The way you blushed sent his heart into a small stutters. He knew it wasn’t normal to react this way around a friend, but he tried to play it off.

“Thanks, Shoto.” You whispered, glancing up at him when he pulled his hand away. When his eyes finally met yours the thought rushed through his mind, fleeting almost. 

“Kiss them”, it seemed to whisper. 

Shoto pulled away though, unable to comprehend this new discovery of his feelings for you. He blamed it mostly on getting caught up in the moment of brushing your hair back, but your cute sleepy expression may have had some part in it, even if Shoto was unwilling to admit it.

--

The second time was definitely his fault and not your own, unless you placed blame on the messy way you eat your ice cream. 

The two of you sat quietly on a bench outside the sweets shops, both digging into your favorite flavor as the crowded sidewalk flowed with unaware citizens. He couldn’t help glancing at your attempt to eat the ice cream before it completely melted in the fading summer heat. 

His chuckle was low, the amusement clear in the small smirk that appeared on his lips. “Ash, you’re going to get a brain freeze.” 

You ignored him, taking an extra big part of the delicious treat and then giving him a smug look before your nose scrunched up in instant regret. 

“I told you so.” He gloated, leaning in close and using his finger to gently wipe a missed spot hiding in the corner of your mouth. 

The action was without thought, but when Shoto realized just how close he was, his actions froze. He could hear your breathing increase along with his own and unconsciously started to lean in until your lips were just moments from touching. 

The cool wetness that seeped into his shirt caused him to break from the trance and jerk away. Looking down at his shirt he realized your melted ice cream was now smeared all over his shirt. 

Your laugh was instant, loud and giddy at the sight of Todoroki’s now ruined shirt. 

--

The third time was to be expected with the romantic setting the two of you had placed yourselves in. 

Todoroki followed behind as you tugged him toward the open field, following just the faintest glow of your body as your quirk helped light the way through the dark. It didn’t stop you from tripping occasionally on the tall grass, but Todoroki was always quick to steady you before continuing down the hill to your favorite spot. 

“Hurry or we will miss it!” You called, letting go of Todoroki’s hand in your attempt to lay out the blanket you brought along. 

It was close to midnight, but luckily neither had school the next day. Even if there was school though, Todoroki doubted you would miss such a big meteor shower. With your quirk came the fascination of any light source and since realizing this fact, Todoroki was sure to keep up to date with all meteor showers. 

He loved to watch the wonder glow on your face as your body faded from light to dark so that you wouldn’t miss the brightness of such a beautiful sight. Laying side by side, he couldn’t keep his eyes away on the shower, too focused on you and how the light played off your face. 

When you turned to look at him, your smile faltered as the little voice in his head once again whispered to kiss them. He knew now that he wanted nothing more than to press his lips to yours, but when he went to lean in like before an extra bright meteor shot by, catching your attention and making Shoto lose his chance once again. 

--

The fourth didn’t happen until it was good and cold, the ground icing over just a bit which caused a slippery walk home for anyone that didn’t drive or ride the train. It was common for Todoroki to walk you home after school and this day wasn’t any different.

He had seen the patch of ice before you did, trying desperately to catch you before you fell. The attempt backfired, causing you to instead trip into him. His back hit the concrete hard, knocking the air out of him for a moment. 

When he finally glanced back to you, your eyes were big with surprise and a blush now covering your cheeks. The pink was a regular thing now, but Shoto couldn’t help being so mesmerized. 

“Are you okay?” He asked, squeezing your hips lightly since you were currently sprawled out on top of him. 

“This is the first big frost of winter, Sho, and I’m already falling for you.” You whispered the joke, smiling lightly down at him. 

Shoto scoffed, “More like I dragged you down with me.” 

The words had meaning behind them since Shoto was currently crushing hard and their compromising situation wasn’t helping his urge to lean up and kiss you. 

“Shoto?” You whispered, leaning down slowly. “Can I-” 

Your words were instantly interrupted by two friends jogging up to ask if the two of you were okay. Todoroki didn’t miss the disappointment swimming in your eyes as you were lifted off his chest.

--

The fifth time was the most shocking, at least to Shoto. 

“It’s an American tradition,” Denki commented, holding up the small bundle in awe. “One of these babies are gonna get me kissed.” 

Todoroki rolled his eyes, “Just because you’re holding up a plant doesn’t mean they will kiss you.” 

Denki shook his head, pointing vehemently at the doorway to the classroom. “I’m gonna hang it up and wait around for someone cute to walk through. You get caught, you pucker up. End of story.” 

Throughout the day, Todoroki had forgotten about the pesky plant, but that didn’t stop him from entering the classroom with you later that afternoon. 

“Wait!” Ochako yelled, but the damage was done. Todoroki and you both stood in the doorway, unaware of the plant dangling just inches above his head. “I was trying to stop you. Kaminari is on a rampage.” 

Denki popped up at that moment, smiling mischievously at the two of you. “Pucker up.”

You glanced briefly at the mistletoe, your cheeks now flushed in Todoroki’s favorite shade of pink. “A mistletoe?” 

Todoroki perked up at the recognition in your voice. He placed a hand on your arm, gently squeezing. “You don’t have to. Denki is just being.. Himself.” Denki made a scoffing noise, but didn’t comment. 

You didn’t answer, instead reaching up on your tiptoes and planting a brief kiss on Todoroki’s cheek. Without another word you turned to rush off to your desk in embarrassment. 

--

Shoto knocked gently on your dorm door, shuffling nervously from foot to foot. It wasn’t often that asked him to come to your room as soon as possible. If he was being honest with himself, he wouldn’t be surprised if you wanted to confront him about his obvious crush on you. When you opened the door though all thought of that vanished. 

You stood clad in your favorite lazy pajamas, a board game held tightly in your palms. “I bought a new game.” 

Shoto’s eyes grew as you pulled him quickly into your room and shut the door. He didn’t even get a good look at the game before the two of you were sat across from each other on the floor. 

When you opened the box, he grimaced. “Scrabble? Since when do you like word games?” 

You shrugged, laying out the board and placing the tiles in the correct spot while Shoto collected his own. Without much debate, the two of them began the first game. 

There were jokes thrown back and forth between the two as the game got more complicated and Shoto’s competitive side reared its head. “Wait, that’s two words.” 

Your cheeks flushed with the realization that Todoroki didn’t really understand where you were going with this, just seeing the two words kiss me as a cheat on their part. 

“Sho, are you serious?” You leaned over the board, gesturing once again to the two words you so desperately wanted him to understand. 

“Yes, you can’t use two-” He paused mid sentence as he finally reached the conclusion that you wanted him to act out those two little words. “Ash.”

You leaned even closer, taking this opportunity to be more confident than you usually would, but damn it you were tired of waiting for Shoto to actually kiss you. The two of you had been playing almost for months now, if he was going to kiss you now was the time. 

“Kiss me.” 

Those words echoed in the room, but Shoto didn’t ponder them as his lips finally met yours in a sweet, much anticipated, first kiss.

[hookedontaronfics]

Honky Dancer series - Chapter 1

NEW SERIES ALERT

Chapter title: Auditions Rating: M Pairing: Taron x OC Warnings: None at this time A/N: I was inspired to write a series based on the perspective of a Rocketman dancer. I hope you enjoy following a London-based dancer from her first audition run-in with Taron to maybe so much more - but don’t forget a healthy dose of drama along the way! More mature themes will develop, so be warned! Enjoy! x

“And first position … second … third … and fourth … now fifth. Good, and again.” I swept my arms gracefully through the positions my muscles knew by memory and my mind knew by heart. I’d learned the basic positions when I was no older than the girls I now taught, in their adorable pink tutus and bright shiny faces. “Keep going, that’s right,” I encouraged, walking between the barres and making adjustments while the 5-year-olds moved through each ballet position to the music I had queued.

I kept a watchful eye on these aspiring young dancers, hoping to instill in them the love of dance I had grown up with my entire life. Even when I offered corrections, I tried to do so in an encouraging manner. I’d had my share of critical teachers and even a few who thought I wouldn’t get that far. But I’d never let it bring me down and only used the negativity to push harder for what I wanted. Until, that is, a nearly career-ending injury four years ago that had kept me off the stage and behind studio doors instead. I’d made the transition to teaching on the advice of a dance counselor, and I knew I would never look back.

I ended class with some easy stretching and accepted the cute hugs and calls of “Thank you, Miss Juliette!” as my class filed out to their waiting mothers [and two fathers, bless their hearts.] Once the last girl had left I quickly packed my bag as Madison pushed her way in through the door.

“Oh my god, are you excited?” she asked me as I traded out my slippers for sneaks and pulled on a pair of comfy sweatpants and a hoodie over my leotard.

“I’m so nervous I could puke, but I won’t get an opportunity like this again. And I feel like I’m finally ready,” I grinned, making sure I had everything I needed in my bag for the audition I was already running late for. “Thank you for subbing my next class, I appreciate it, Mads,” I grinned, giving her a hug.

“It’s no sweat, now go!” she laughed, fairly pushing me out the door. “And break a leg!” she giggled as I groaned inwardly.

I rushed out of the dance school and hurried along Balderton Street to Oxford, heading toward the Bond Street tube station and taking the train across town to the Paramount studios on Chiswick. I snacked on a protein bar to keep my energy up while we rumbled over the tracks, doing a few stretches to keep my muscles loose as I wouldn’t have much time to warm up again when I got there. If anyone was staring at me, I ignored it, but I’m sure the tube riders had seen far worse than a few grand plies.

Once I arrived at the studio I hurried through the check-in process as quickly as possible. I was issued my number and told which group and studio to join before I rushed off to the bathroom to change. I’d chosen a sparkly magenta pink leotard I’d used for a performance piece years ago for this audition - I was trying out for the dance ensemble cast for Rocketman, the Elton John biopic, so even if it was a bit over-the-top I felt it was appropriate. 

I pulled on tights and a black ruffled short skirt over that and strapped on my character shoes. I let my strawberry blonde hair down out of its tightly woven bun and dashed on a bit of thick eyeliner before affixing my number with safety pins. I put on bright pink lipstick and grinned at myself in the mirror. I certainly looked the part, I thought, stashing everything else in my bag and going to find my group.

I dropped my dance bag against the wall with everyone else’s stuff and found an open spot on the floor, sitting in a deep split and doing a few stretches while everyone else either chatted excitedly or went through their own personal warmups. The buzz in the room instantly cut out as a trim stately man strode in; I instantly recognized him as the choreographer we’d be working with. Waves of excitement and nerves washed through me in equal measure as we all stood and lined up without being instructed to. Several other people came in and took seats along the wall; I presumed they were likely producers and crew of some variety.

I tried to secure myself a spot in the middle front; even if I wasn’t feeling the most confident, I could certainly fake my way into it. This was my first professional audition since I’d made company - and later principal - for London Ballet Company. All of my dance dreams had shattered after the injury that meant I couldn’t do pointe work any more, but I’d thrown myself into classes in other styles as a sort of rehab process and in an effort to diversify my skill set, and found I loved jazz and Broadway the most.

So here I was, giving my all through the brief warmup, across-the-floor exercises, and combinations, hoping to catch the choreographers’ eye. I knew I was one dancer in a field of hundreds, some coming from other countries just for this chance. But I also knew how badly I wanted a spot in the ensemble, to be a part of such a spectacle. 

My favorite combination involved a bit of a complicated leap into a fan kick; I could see other dancers struggling to get elevated but I felt so completely in my own element, soaring across the floor and losing myself to the music, which unfortunately wasn’t actually from Elton’s catalogue. We were split into smaller groups to perform the series of steps for the choreographer; at the end of it, I added my own little flourish, dropping into a very Fosse-style pose with curved shoulders and tilted hips. The choreographer brushed past me as he circled our group, muttering “very good” so only I could hear. I couldn’t help but smile, but kept my eyes low.

We were given a twenty-minute break after everyone had a chance to perform, and the choreographers from each room of dancers would be making first cuts before we would all be shuffled together and given a full routine to learn and perform on an actual stage. I dearly hoped I’d be making it through the cut, but sometimes not getting a part had nothing to do with how good a dancer you were. Directors sometimes wanted a specific “look,” and I had no idea if this would hold true for Rocketman or not.

The hallways were far too noisy for me so I stepped nimbly over dancers sprawled on the floor as I traveled away from the studio rooms, trying to find somewhere quiet to listen to my music and try to find a bit of peace. I filled my water bottle at a drinking fountain before turning a corner and leaving all the other dancers behind. I probably should have just plopped myself here, but curiosity got the better of me, so I followed down this hallway too, my character shoe footsteps echoing in the quiet even as I tried to walk softly. I plugged my headphones in and was just about to hit play on my Spotify playlist when I heard a couple of voices coming from a cracked doorway. The room had a bank of sweeping windows and I couldn’t help peering in; some day I would learn to tame my incessant curiosity, but today was not that day.

Three men stood inside, involved in what looked like a serious discussion. I couldn’t really make out much of what they were saying, their voices just low murmurs, but I thought I might have recognized one of them. Just then they all turned to head toward the door, and I ducked away from the window, hoping I hadn’t been seen. As I slowly tried to sneak away, the door swung open rather suddenly and flew straight into me, sending me sprawling onto my hands and knees, my phone skidding across the floor.

“Oh my god, I’m so sorry!” the handsome young man I recognized said, instantly offering his hand to help me up and looking embarrassed. I took it, noticing how soft his skin was but how strong he felt as he helped bring me back to my feet.

“It’s alright,” I said with a laugh, brushing off my knees and hands and retrieving my phone from the floor. “Nothing hurt but my pride,” I said as he looked me up and down, taking in my obvious dance garb.

“Here for the auditions, then?” he smiled warmly at me, as the other two men carried on their conversation.

“Um, yes, though I’m hoping I’ve danced with more grace than I just displayed,” I grinned good-naturedly. “Though I should get back to that now.”

“Well I wish you best of luck, Number Two-Nine-Four,” he read off my assigned number with a smirk.

“It’s Juliette,” I supplied with a laugh.

“Juliette then, you may call me Taron,” he replied, smiling so widely his dimples showed through.

“Holy shit, you’re Elton!” I gasped, covering my mouth with my hands and making the other two men halt their conversation mid-sentence as they gawked at me.

“That’s up for debate but yes, I’ll be attempting to play him,” Taron grinned at my shock. I knew now how I’d recognized him, from the Kingsman films. But standing here in front of him was an entirely different thing. He was totally unassuming, just dressed in jeans, a black sweatshirt and a ball cap with “twenty-two” scrawled across it.

“I’m sure you’ll be wonderful at it,” I laughed lightly, trying to not feel shy in front of him, but for his part he did everything to try and make me feel at ease.

“I suppose if I was shit Elton wouldn’t have chosen me,” Taron just chuckled.

“No, I don’t think so. Well, it’s very nice to bump into you but I really must get back,” I said softly.

“Wouldn’t want you to be late, love,” he said with a wink. “We’re heading to the stage now,” he added, making my insides feel rather funny all of a sudden. “Maybe I’ll see you there.”

“Maybe,” I agreed a bit faintly, hurrying back down the hall the way I’d come, my heart pounding and unaware that Taron’s gaze lingered on my willowy frame. The hallways were already deserted and I worried I was late, but I slipped back into the studio room just in time, as we were all called to line up again. 

The choreographer was holding a notepad and after thanking everyone for coming out and giving our hardest work, told us only five numbers from our room were advancing to the stage routine. I closed my eyes at that; five out of a room of 35. There’s no way I’m getting through this cut, I thought. I was confident in my abilities but there was so much talent it was practically dripping from the walls.

“If your number is called, please come join me up here,” our choreographer said, and rattled off the first number, 162. A spry male dancer who had all the marks of “ballet” written in his physique left our ranks and joined the choreographer at the front, fairly beaming to be one of the chosen. Next up was 052, a fiery redhead with a pretty face; 291 [so close], a black muscular male with a sweet expression; and 112, a tow-headed boy who looked barely out of secondary school.

I closed my eyes and held my breath as the last number was read, even if I had no chance. “294!” the choreographer called, and no one moved a muscle. Someone next to me tapped me on the shoulder, my eyes still screwed shut tightly.

“Hey, I think that’s you!” a girl whispered as the choreographer called my number again.

“Oh,” I laughed in disbelief, walking to the front in stunned silence as the choreographer clapped for us and everyone else joined in. After more thanking of all the auditioners, the people who hadn’t made it were dismissed, and after much chatter and shuffling of bags, it was just us five left. We’d all been told on the audition notice to bring black pants and a white button-down shirt we could dance in and tap shoes, though the particular style they had left up to us, and we were now instructed to change into those clothes and join all the other dancers in another studio room in ten minutes. I decided to leave my leotard on under my shirt, only doing up three buttons so it could still flash through. I switched my character shoes out for actual taps and then dashed off a squealing text to Madison that I had made it through the first round of cuts.

<Oh my god, that’s so exciting! So what happens next?> she texted back immediately.

<Next up is learning a full 2-minute tap routine in 30 minutes and performing it on the stage as a group. I’m exceedingly nervous about this. Tap has never been my strongest suit.>

<But you’ve been taking hours and hours of classes! I’m sure you’ll do great> she sent back with about ten winky-face emojis. I had to laugh at that.

<Gotta go, I’ll let you know if I make it through to solos.> I stashed my phone in my bag again and made it to the large studio room in time, lost in a sea of other black-and-white clad dancers, all of us trying to individualize in some way, with bright lipsticks or colored socks or patterned scarves tied round our heads. We were all handed cheaply made top hats and shown where to stand. The dancers from each room seemed to band together, so I was in line with the other four from my room, trying to give them encouraging smiles.

“We’ve got this,” I said under my breath to the tow-headed boy next to me, who looked incredibly nervous though he was probably one of the best talents in the room, even so young. He nodded at me and smiled kindly in appreciation, so I gave him a goofy thumbs up before the choreographers addressed our room. 

There were about 60 of us, and I strained to hear what was being said over the coughs and rustles as dancers adjusted their clothes. Still, I got the gist of it and then we were hard at work, learning pieces of the routine, repeating each small snippet over and over and then quickly breezing through the next. It felt like a blur, but I did what I knew to do best in these situations; I linked each piece of choreo to an image in my brain to keep the sequence in order, building on it as we moved through the 2 minutes of routine the way a child might play a game of memory.

We were all sweaty and out of breath when our thirty minutes were up, and soon we were herded to the stage to perform the piece all on our own, as the choreographers and producers and maybe even the director for all I knew sat in the audience. Oh, and Taron, I reminded myself, trying not to let that make me suddenly nervous. The last thing I needed to do was forget the choreography. We stood on the stage under lights, staring out into the darkened auditorium. If I squinted hard enough I could make out the shapes of people in the seats but had no idea who they were. I wondered if Taron was out there looking for me, and the thought of it made me smile.

The strains of music began and soon we were lost in the whirlwind of the dance, performing the piece like we’d been rehearsing for months. It was nice to feel like I could rely on the dancers around me as much as they could rely on me. Sure, we were all competing against each other for those coveted spots, but we were also performers at heart. And so, for those two minutes, we leaped and we spun and we tapped and we shone.

When the music was over we all stood around on the stage together, whispering and waiting as the shadows in the audience deliberated our fates. I didn’t think I had missed a step, and I looked forward to giving my solo, a piece I had worked hard on and that had made Mads cry when I performed it for her. Still, twenty people wouldn’t be making it through this round and that made me even more anxious than I already was.

After about ten minutes someone called for order, and we quieted down immediately. Numbers were called quickly, dancers cheered or groaned, and I was thankfully called up somewhere in the middle of the pack this time. My relief was probably evident. We were given about twenty minutes to prepare whatever we needed to; I chose that time to eat another protein bar and chill out to some music. I had a simple costume for this piece, wanting my dancing to be center stage. I kept the black pants but exchanged the leotard and shirt for a black dance bra and black vest. I slicked back my hair into a sleek ponytail and pulled a hat low over my eyes. I wiped off the pink lipstick and left my lips neutral, but painted my eyelids black. It was a dramatic effect and exactly what I was going for.

We had to pick numbers and of course I chose the last slot, so I had a lot of time to wait around. We all were told we could sit in the auditorium seats if we wished to watch each other at this point, and I sat with my new-found “friends” from my original group, all of who had made it through the tap round. There was Pietre, the soft-spoken young boy; Dennis, the athletic black dancer; Leah the precocious redhead; and Markus, the handsome ex-principal. Markus was quite funny, and I enjoyed sitting next to him as we watched other dancers perform.

Slowly, our ranks got smaller and smaller as each dancer went onstage to perform and was subsequently dismissed. We wouldn’t be told if we had gotten the job until the next day, so this was our last real shot to make an impression. I wished Pietre, Dennis, Leah and Markus all good luck, and their solos were all amazing. It was going to be a tall order for the choreographers to make their decisions, whittling us down to just 30 core dancers.

And then it was my turn. There was no one else left to watch except the people judging me. But as I made my way up the stage stairs, I noticed someone standing in the wings, and realized it was Taron, waving at me and giving me a thumbs up. Had he really stuck around this long to watch me? I was a little dumbstruck at that and ended up stumbling over my own name when I was asked to introduce myself, even though they had my audition sheet in front of them. Get a grip, I chastised myself, stealing another glance at the wings. Despite the low light I could see Taron’s eyes glittering at me and I could feel his eyes following me as I took my place on the stage. I took a few slow breaths to still my mind, needing to go to that place where I was beyond my thoughts, where it was nothing but light and color and music.

I’d chosen Annie Lennox’s “Cold,” a song that was dreamy and ethereal and yet somehow heavy. Lines like “Dying is easy/It's living that scares me to death” and “But the more I want you the less I get/Ain't that just the way things are” hit me in the chest and had stayed with me ever since I heard the song, but when “Catch me and let me dive under/For I want to swim in the pools of your eyes” the image of Taron flashed through my mind, and the words gained a new meaning as I couldn’t let go of the way he looked at me.

When the song ended and I had struck my final pose, the auditorium was dead silent; I could have heard a pin drop aside from my own heart beating. I stood back up and took a small bow, turning to leave because I didn’t think anyone was going to say anything before suddenly someone in the auditorium was clapping, the sound hollow in that giant space. I glanced over at the wing, but Taron wasn’t standing there anymore and for some reason that made me feel empty.

“Thank you for your time, that was lovely. We’ll phone you tomorrow,” one of the faceless shapes from the auditorium told me. I gave them my most winning smile and then was dismissed. I was sweaty, sore and exhausted by the time I gathered my bag up, changing once again into sweats and ready to just head home and tuck into a bowl of homemade Thai peanut chicken curry. I’d done my best and the rest was up to someone else. I had my hand on the exit door when someone called my name. I turned to see Taron jogging toward me, a bit out of breath.

“You were brilliant. They all said it in there, you should have heard them after you left,” he grinned. “You left us all absolutely speechless.”

“I, uhm, thank you,” I replied awkwardly, trying to wrap my mind around what he was telling me.

“You’re absolutely a shoe-in, no question, but you didn’t hear it from me,” he said, winking at me for the second time that day. I let out a nervous laugh at that. “I look forward to working with you, Juliette,” he added, and I couldn’t help my legs feeling a little weak at the way he said my name. I was glad I was still holding onto the door handle to steady myself. On second thought, this might be a major problem, I thought, but he was an actor and I was just a dancer and I didn’t think we’d be spending that much time on set together. Besides that, Taron was on a whole other level from me, so I figured he was only being kind.

“Me too,” I finally managed to reply. He bid me have a good night and then disappeared off down the hall, to do what I didn’t know but he seemed intensely focused on every aspect of this project. He had certainly left an impression on me though, and I could feel my cheeks were flushed.

I finally made my way to the tube station, taking it across the city to my flat and letting myself in gratefully, instantly greeted by my fluffy 2-year-old golden retriever Troy. “Hey boy, mommy’s home,” I grinned, ruffling his fur happily. Madison had stopped in earlier to check on him and let him out, and I was forever grateful to her. Mads had been my biggest cheerleader and supporter since I started working at DanceWorks, and I had never met a sweeter, kinder soul.

<Finally home. We’ll know results tomorrow. Everything seemed to go really well for me> I texted her as I tossed my sweaty dance clothes in the wash.

<Think you’ve got the job?> she asked back.

<Not sure, these things are never certain even if you feel good about it but I did my best and something tells me I impressed the choreographers> I wrote back. Or rather someone, I thought, a small smile drawing across my face.

I set about making dinner, feeling half-starved now, and did my best to relax in front of the television, catching up with my favorite shows. I took Troy on a quick walk around the neighborhood in the late evening before finally taking a long soak in the freestanding bathing tub I’d invested good money in. There was nothing better after a long day of dance then letting my muscles unwind with lavender Epsom salts.

Tired and fully worn out, I stretched out in my bed, ready to catch some shut-eye but of course every time I closed my eyes I could see Taron’s handsome face floating in the dark. I wasn’t about to delude myself into thinking I had half a chance with Taron. From all accounts he was just an absolutely caring and sympathetic man and his co-workers always spoke so highly of working with him. But I could definitely say there was now more than one reason why I wanted the chance to dance on Rocketman. 

Keep reading: Chapter 2 HERE

[thatonefromyourdreams]

Butterfly (Steve Rogers x reader)

This is my own way of dealing with grief... my great granny Tonita passed a year ago today and I’ve been having dark days ever since. I just wish Steve could hold me for a minute. But yeah, it ain’t happening.

Warnings: angst, mentions of death of a loved one, Steve Rogers not existing...

“Granny, mama and mommy want me to go to my English class, but I don’t want to” I cried holding her hand

“No, no. If my little butterfly wants to stay home, she gets to, now go... we’re making a dress today” she smiled looking down at me

“Y/N” Natasha made you return to reality

“Yes, Nat?” I answered back

“Are you okay?” She asked with a frown

“I am” you smiled trying to hide the pain in your chest “trust me”

But you weren’t. In fact, ever since your mother called you on Monday morning at 7:12 to tell you that your great grandma had passed away in her sleep, you hadn’t been okay.

How could you? Your great grandma was one of your favorite people in the world. She was the reason you decided to pursue your dreams. She made you feel useful and worthy.

And you were unable to go to her funeral, not because of your job, but because going there meant seeing her in that cold coffin and realizing it was true, that she was dead.

“Doll?” Steve’s voice brought you back once again

“Yes?” You asked trying to sound calm

“You’ve been off lately” he says trying to get you to speak

“I just need a drink” you say standing from the couch, it was not even 11 AM and you already took your third glass of whiskey

“Come on Y/N” Steve spoke “you’ve been drinking a lot lately”

“Mind your own business” you snap taking the bottle and walking to your room.

5 days, that’s how long you’ve being trying to deal with the loss... your family called telling you they would get together for the ninth day after her death, but you couldn’t go, you just couldn’t.

“That dress looks so beautiful on you!” Granny said reaching for your hand, she had made that gorgeous dress for the valentine’s day dance you were going to. Your crush had asked you and it had made you the happiest.

“He’s not coming,” You sobbed drying your tears with the back of your hand “He said it was a joke and that he could never be with a girl like me because I am disgusting!”

Your granny laid down next to you and held you until you stopped crying.

“Are you feeling better?” She asked looking at you, you simply nodded “Okay, you’ve cried enough for that stupid boy who didn’t deserve a single tear, but you were hurt. Now listen to me. You can cry, you can feel hurt, but you´re not allowed to let it ruin you, you understand?” She asked, you nodded.

“People are going to hurt you a lot, they are humans and make mistakes, other ones just do it because they are dumb, and their brains are just plain stupid. Be the bigger person and don’t suffer for them but forgive the ones that deserve it.” You held her tight

“I love you granny,” You whispered, “thank you.”

“And I love you my beautiful butterfly,” She said kissing your hair.

A soft knock broke your train of thought

“Come in,” you said looking expectantly at the door

Steve entered your room.

“Your granny died,” He said lowly “5 days ago… why didn’t you tell me?”

You looked at him, fresh tears coming out again. A heart wrenching sob tore you in half.

Steve ran to your side on the bed and engulfed you in a bone crushing hug.

“Please,” you sobbed “Hold me, I feel like I’m falling apart.”

He crushed you in his arms trying to keep you together. Fearing you might break if he let you go.

You don’t know how long you stayed in his arms but it made you feel safe as if nothing could ever hurt you.

“Want to talk about it?” He asked carefully

“How did you find out?” You asked not daring to look into his eyes

“Wanda,” he answered

You nodded and buried your face in his chest feeling the urge to cry again. Carefully he laid down in bed with you by his side and moved so he was cradling you against his chest

“Is just that...” You sobbed harder “She... she’s gone” You tried to say

He caressed your hair

“I don’t know want to believe she’s gone,” You cried “I don’t know how to live in a world without her!”

He waited for you to vent to him

“I feel so guilty, I should have been there with here. She died and I wasn’t around to say goodbye and now she’s gone thinking that I don’t care but I do because she was my favorite person in the entire world and if I go home for the ninth day of praying it’s all going to become a reality and I don’t want to believe I have to live and defend a world she’s not in.” By this time you were shaking so hard Steve thought you were going to faint.

“I’m so sorry doll,” He whispered and kissed your head “Losing someone you love is never easy”.

If someone in this world understood about loss, that was Steve Rogers. He knew what it felt like to lose a loved one. First he lost his mom, then Bucky, though he got him back later, it was still loss and Peggy, losing Peggy was the worst pain he had to endure. The time they lost, the life he deserved and never got to live. He understood your pain.

“Do you think I should go to the ninth day ceremony?” You asked looking up, searching for his eyes. He looked down and met you halfway, his blue eyes were glossy and all you could think what good have you done to the world to deserve being in Steve Rogers’ arms.

You shook your head, trying desperately to get rid of the thought of him, you were in pain, damn it! You were mourning, it wasn’t okay to think about him like this.

“I think you should take the chance to say goodbye to her.” He cupped your cheek and caressed your skin with his thumb.

“I am not strong enough for that,” You tried to say but your voice broke mid sentence

“I can come with you,” He offered and you felt as if the air was finally flowing inside your lungs

“Thank you,” And with that you closed your eyes and fell asleep peacefully, feeling a little better.

----

It was so cliche that the day was this gloomy.

The sky was dark even thought it was barely two o'clock.

You walked inside the small church inside the cemetery of your hometown, your mom was there, at the entrance, greeting people with a soft smile. She saw you and immediately her eyes turned sad, tears falling freely down her face.

“Mommy,” You whispered before engulfing her in a big hug.

“I’m so sorry,” She said knowing what your granny meant to you

You sobbed against her shoulder feeling so small, like a little kid, so lost. Steve’s strong hand remained on your shoulder and you held his hand for dear life.

“Captain Rogers,”Your mom said respectfully when she let go off you.

“Mrs, Y/L/N.” He greeted “Please, call me Steve.” She nodded and guided you both inside the church. Your grandmother was seating on the first row. She looked so broken, your heart clenched at the sight of her red, puffy eyes.

“Mama,” You said softly. She turned around and smiled at you before hugging you and crying her heart out.

“I’m so sorry,” She sobbed. She had lost her mother and she was saying sorry to you. That explained so much what granny meant to you.

“I am the one that should be sorry Mama,” You said letting go off her “I wasn’t here with her until the end.”

“You were,” Your grandma smiled “She kept repeating your name everyday until she no longer could speak, and even after that she would hold your picture between her arms until she fell asleep. For her you were always here.”

The world started spinning and you felt like fainting, Steve’s strong arms took you right before you lost control of your body. It was all too much, your legs gave out and he had to carry you to one of the benches. He held you while you cried. You should have being there, with her, taking care of her. She died without seeing you one last time and that was killing you.

More people started arriving to the church, and the priest started his sermon. Talking about life and death and everything that was promised after it. When he asked if someone wanted to say something your feet took you to the altar as if you were in auto pilot.

Steve smiled at you comfortingly.

“If I had to say every good thing granny did I would stay here speaking for hours.” You started “She was simply amazing. She taught me so much, how to sew a dress, how to cook, how to read, how to recover from a broken heart, how to not die from a hangover,” A soft laugh spreaded through the crow

“She taught me how to follow my dreams and how to be my best version.” You sighed “She taught me so much, but she forgot to teach me how to live in a world without her.” A sob broke from your chest.

You had to take a whole minute to recover.

“She was my teacher, my best friend, my rock and now, my angel.” A sad smile adorned your face “Granny,” You turned to the picture adorned with flowers “I’m sorry I couldn’t be with you to say my last I love you, I’m sorry I left. But I need you to know that I love you and that you will forever be the prettiest reason I had to live, and that I will alway be your little butterfly. Say hello to grandpy up there.”

The silence in the small church was overwhelming, people were sobbing really hard, your mom was wrapped around your dad’s body crying really hard and your grandma was holding your grandfather's hand so tight, trying not to cry.

You walked out the church, taking the small steps to your granny’s grave and kneeled in front of it.

“I made it granny, like I told you before. I became a superhero, I saved the world a lot of times. But you were always the real hero of this world. Do you remember when you used to talk about the heroes of your time? I’ve met them, him. And he is exactly like you said. I’ll see you in my dreams.” You kissed the palm of your hand and placed on the tombstone.

“That was beautiful,” Steve spoke behind you. “She must be so proud of you.”

“I guess,” You sighed

“I am.” He came closer to you and wrapped his arms around your body “Please, don’t shut me out when you’re feeling sad.” He whispered

You nodded.

“I am afraid of loving something death can take away from me,” You said looking anywhere but his eyes “It took away my granny.”

“Hey,” He cooed, you looked up “I’m not going anywhere anytime soon.”

“Promise?” You felt silly asking that

“Promise,” He said before kissing your lips

And even after she was gone, granny kept smiling at you. She was truly a blessing. You knew that wherever she was… there was a smile in her face that’s what you loved to think.

Dedicated to my granny Tonita, 1923-2018.

I will always be your butterfly. I love you.

[kvhottie]

A love that’s like glowing tinder in a slow-building fire. It isn’t until Yuki and Nico become roommates that they realize that the signs were always there.

Rating: Explicit |Pairing: NicoYuki |Tags: Post-Canon, Living Together, Feelings Realization, Light smut

[Ao3]

________________ 

“Do you want to live together?”

Nico rushed through the question, not even offering Yuki a greeting when he picked up the phone. It made Yuki pause, mind loading for a brief second.   The thought of them living together wasn’t displeasing. Over the last year they’d grown apart because Yuki had been working hard in his yearlong internship at the Legal Research and Training Institute and Nico was determined to actually graduate this time around. But they had shared drinks and dinner every few months in an attempt to keep their friendship as strong as their busy schedules would allow them.   Nico was the closest he’s ever had to a true friend. Plus, Yuki was already looking for an apartment since he was done with his internship, and in turn his stay at the Institute’s dormitory. The timing was perfect.   “Sure, let’s do it,” he nonchalantly replied, and the deal was sealed.

The first few weeks of living together were rocky—Yuki was particular, detailed-oriented, and pristine. Nico was, well, “clean enough” as he would call it. But with some practice Nico learned to pay a bit more attention to where he put grocery items in the fridge and to properly clean the bathroom sink when he finished shaving. And Yuki practiced not popping a blood vessel over every misaligned mug and the occasional sweater Nico left hanging over the back of the couch. It was all a work in progress.   By the sixth month mark they were synchronized and living surprisingly well together. They took turns making dinner (though they scarified their stomachs more than a few times to get to this point of basic culinary skill) and shared each other’s company for early breakfast or very late dinner. With Yuki working as a rookie lawyer in the acclaimed TMI Associates Law Firm and Nico having landed a software development job with Panasonic, they both spent most of their time during the weekday at work. But the little bits of free time they had, like on the weekend and the few blessings of vacation, they spent it together doing a varied mix of activities. Running was one of the activities they did together most often. Though usually initiated by Nico, Yuki easily went along with his suggestion to do a leisurely Saturday and Sunday morning run. Neither had completely lost the fire for running they had gained (or rekindled in Nico’s case) under Haiji’s influence. It had died down to just a small, warm blaze present in their hearts, but it was there nonetheless—sparking a tiny, breathy smile during every run.   They also passed their time sitting at their dinner table, chatting about work or anything interesting they’d heard from the news, and twisting those weird metal dolls Nico started making after he quit smoking. Yuki no longer made any profit from selling them online, but he started an Instagram account for them out of respect for the huge collection Nico had accumulated. The account had a loyal fifty-seven followers and was steadily rising.   Apart from that, they each had their own pastimes. Nico’s were focused around being indoors with his laptop or TV, and Yuki’s consisted of going to the club or a concert. There was a brief period during the first few months of them living together that Yuki spent every other night giving Nico a sampling of his favorite electronica music. He even dragged Nico along with him to the club once—only for Nico to last a total of forty-five minutes before bailing. After that experience Nico drew the line at listening to Yuki’s music at home whenever he wanted to share it, but absolutely no clubs.   And so Yuki continued attending the club alone, as he had always done. But there were nights that he’d return with someone else, mostly women, and a sprinkling of men. Since graduating university he had been introduced to an array of experiences, a majority of them pleasant, and had quickly learned that as long as he found the person attractive, he had no preference as to whom he was sleeping with. There was just one rule: he wanted no attachments and therefore would only sleep with a person once. He had no time or patience to deal with other people’s emotions. He barely had time to put up with his own.   “The guy you brought yesterday was a jerk,” Nico commented offhandedly while they ate breakfast.   Nico was generally indifferent to Yuki bringing strangers to the apartment. And it was only fair. They were splitting the rent equally and it was in Yuki’s right to do whatever he wanted in his own room. But still, Nico had never even once complained, neither about the frequency nor the mixed gender of his partners.   Yet…recently, there was an expression that overcame Nico’s face every time Yuki brought someone home that Yuki couldn’t put his finger on. It was one he had never seen before, and had since burned into his mind. Some nights he’d even purposefully meet eyes with Nico when coming in the door with yet another stranger—just to see if he could catch a glimpse of that expression again.   The look on Nico’s face at the moment was awfully similar.   “Really?” Yuki replied in between bites of his sausage. “Did he say something rude to you?”   Nico sighed and set his empty coffee mug down. “He bragged and babbled a bit too many details about you.”   “That piece of shit…” Yuki muttered under his breath, only to shrug a moment after. “Well, I’m not surprised.”   “The majority of people you sleep with are jerks.” Nico set his chopsticks down and met Yuki’s eyes. “Shouldn’t you be more wary of who you bring over?”   Yuki narrowed his eyes and sucked his teeth, straightening his back. “I’m just fucking them, Nico. And I only see them once. I could care less about their personalities.” He picked up his mug to finish his coffee and took a few sips before continuing. “Anyway, it’s none of your business who I sleep with.”   Nico blinked a few times and nodded, eyes and lips curving downward. “Okay, then.” Without another word he got up from their low table, washed his dishes, and headed back to his room to dress for work.   Yuki stared down at his plate, half of his brain cells calling himself an asshole and the other half reassuring him that he hadn’t been that harsh. Nico normally took Yuki’s sass and threw it right back at him, but for some reason that didn’t happen this time. It’s not as if he was psychic and could predict when his sass was going to affect Nico or not. So it wasn’t his fault.   But regardless of Yuki’s thoughts on the matter, for a week or so after that morning, Nico started mildly avoiding him. He’d still say good morning and respond when Yuki addressed him, but he all of a sudden was rushing out the door in the mornings without having breakfast, falling sleep before Yuki got home, or getting home after Yuki fell asleep. Yuki was fuming—the mere fact that Nico thought he wasn’t being blatantly obvious made his eye twitch. Since he first met Nico, Yuki had the uncanny ability to always tell when something was off with him, and he could never leave it alone. But he was stubborn, and confronting Nico on this matter would be like losing out in some sort of way. So he just let it continue, irritation simmering under his skin. ________________ 

The waitress brought Yuki and his coworker, Fumi, their second round of drinks. Yuki reached over for his whiskey highball, lips cracking into a smile as Fumi continued his rambling story.   “And then the chief practically ate him alive. He was so livid that a senior lawyer would do such a stupid mistake,“ Fumi exclaimed, sitting back on his chair with a satisfied smile. “You’re working on the Tamaki case with the chief, right? He must be a hard-ass about everything.”   “He’s not that bad. I actually enjoy how fastidious he is.”   Fumi scoffed, “It’s because you’re just as anal. Did you know that the meticulous way you organize your pens has gained notoriety and people pass by your desk just to see it?”   “I just like things to be neat.” Yuki shrugged, swirling the ice in his drink. “My life would be easier if more people around me functioned at this level but—“   Yuki’s stopped mid-sentence, eyes darting to his phone that had just buzzed and lit up with a message. He didn’t even have to unlock the phone to read the entirety of the text.   From Nico:   Do you think we should stop living together?   But he unlocked his phone anyhow, wondering if there was more to the text—an explanation of some sort. There was nothing. So Yuki read the text message over a few more times, getting increasingly more upset and self-deprecating with each pass. Of course, it was only a matter of time until Nico got tired of him. He had been nothing but an understanding friend and roommate, and was just worried for him; yet Yuki chewed up his kindness and spit it back out with not even one apology to spare. He didn’t blame Nico. Even he’d get tired of himself.   “Hey, Yuki!”   Yuki looked up from his phone to Fumi fervently waving his hand at his face. “Oh. Yeah, sorry. I was just reading a text.”   “You okay? You got all serious and then zoned out. I’ve been calling you for like a good minute.”   “Well, if all of a sudden wanting to get smashed constitutes as fine,” Yuki waved down the waitressed, “then I am excellent.”   It took about three more rounds.   By the time the waitress hesitantly returned with the 6th round Yuki had demanded, the room was spinning. He had promised Fumi that this one for sure would be the last, but Fumi forced the drink out of his hand and chugged it, just so that it wouldn’t touch Yuki’s babbling lips.   “Give me your phone,” he ordered, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “There’s no way you’re getting home alone in this state.”   “No. I’ll be fine if I rest a bit,” Yuki slurred as he set his head on the table. “Just give me fifteen minutes…”   The next time his eyes creaked open, he was being carried on a firm, wide back. It smelled of shampoo, strong coffee, and home.   “Nico?” Yuki croaked, face lifting just enough off of Nico’s shoulder to catch a glimpse of his tussled hair.   Nico gave a small chuckle that Yuki could feel against his chest. “We’re almost to the apartment, drunkard. You sound terrible.”   “Sorry I’m useless.” Yuki murmured, burying his face into Nico’s neck.   “You’re the farthest from that. I actually wish you’d be useless more often, maybe that way you’d rely on me a bit more.”   “You’ve never mentioned that before.”   “…There’s a lot I don’t tell you.”     Yuki slid off Nico’s back the instant they were inside their apartment. He tripped climbing up from the entryway but Nico caught him before he planted face first. He insisted he was fine walking on his own and clumsily made his way to their kitchen to get himself a glass of water. Having forgotten where they stored the cups in his drunkenness, he opened each cabinet in search for one.   “It’s your fault I’m drunk, you know,” he sputtered, pointing accusingly at the approaching Nico.   ”How is it my fault?”   Yuki finally found the right cabinet and grabbed a glass cup, stumbling over to the sink. “Your stupid text!” he yelled. “You sent me that stupid text and I was so angry that I got drunk. So it’s you’re fault.” He tried opening the sink faucet but was turning the nob the wrong way.   Nico reached for the faucet nob to turn it on for him, “Here, let me—“   “No.” Yuki said sternly, shoving Nico’s hand away. He set his cup aside and gripped the edge of the sink. “I don’t need your help. So you’re free to move out whenever you want. I know that I’m horrible to live with and I’m always being rude to you. You should have told me much earlier that you’d gotten tired of me.”   Nico took Yuki’s arm and swung him around, trapping him against the sink. He turned on the faucet and filled the glass cup halfway. Yuki watched him, eyes following his right hand until it was gently pushing the cup into Yuki’s left one. He held on to it, resting that hand on the sink ledge from fear of letting it fall in his clumsiness.   “As if I could get tired of you,” he sighed, face a few centimeters from Yuki’s.   Yuki slowly lifted his gaze to meet Nico’s. It was in this close distance that he could see how knitted his eyebrows were, and how much exhaustion and pain hid in his eyes. “Then what are you unhappy about? Out with it, you coward,” spat Yuki, voice a weird mix of agitated and desperate.   Nico laughed through his nose, lips twisting up into a dumfounded grin. He leaned even closer until his mouth was by Yuki’s ear and their bodies were completely flush. “You’re lucky I’m a coward or I’d trouble you right about now.”   The heat held between them made it hard for Yuki to swallow. He stood completely still, hair rising on end and heart pounding in his chest.   “See?” Nico stepped back and turned around, waving a goodbye. “I’m heading to bed. You better hydrate yourself before you wake up with a killer hangover.” And he shuffled into his room.   Yuki’s hand went a bit slack but he was now sobered up enough that he was able to catch the cup before it fell. Sure, there was water all over the floor, but that was better than broken glass. And it gave him something to focus his still-hazy thoughts on instead of what just happened with Nico.   What had just happened? What was that, exactly?   Yuki recalled Nico’s hot breath on his ear and the feeling of his stubble grazing his cheek. He shook his head, hand pushing the paper towel across the wet floor with more force. Nico was just a good friend. He’d never thought of him like this before, and he wasn’t planning on starting now—regardless of what the knots in his stomach were telling him.   The next few weeks went by in a confused daze.   As the Tamaki case ramped up, Yuki was working long hours on little sleep and too many cups of coffee. Yet, even with so much going on at work, his thoughts would still drift to Nico. Maybe it was because they were barely seeing each other lately, but every time they did get a chance to sit down for breakfast or dinner, Yuki couldn’t sit still. He was ultra-aware of every little thing Nico did. From the way he took his time savoring his food before he swallowed to his new habit of rubbing his stubble when thinking—Yuki’s mind archived it all.   “Are you guys close to finishing the defense for the case that’s been keeping you so busy?” Nico asked, passing Yuki a just-washed plate to dry.   Yuki’s eyes quickly flickered from Nico’s gaze to the plate he was drying. “Uh, yeah. We’ll be wrapping it up this week so my schedule should return back to normal for a while.”   “That’s good. We haven’t been seeing much of each other lately…if I didn't know better I would have thought you were avoiding me.”   “As if, “ Yuki choked out a scoff and set the plate to the side. Nico passed him a fork and their fingers grazed in the exchange, sending a shiver up Yuki’s arm. He dropped the fork—feeling utterly like a deer stuck in headlights. “Uh.”   Nico chuckled and bent down to pick up the fork, placing it back in Yuki’s hand. “No need to be so jumpy. I haven’t even confessed yet,” he said tenderly.   “Confessed…yet?” Yuki repeated, eyes increasingly getting wider as the words registered in his brain. “Wait, what?”   Nico turned off the faucet, lips curled up into a smirk. “I said I haven’t even confessed yet. Did the faucet make it hard to hear me?”   “I heard you loud and clear. I just don’t get what you’d need to confess,” Yuki stammered.   Nico dried his hands with the towel hanging a few inches below their sink and turned his body completely toward Yuki. “I know you know what I mean. There’s no point in trying to act stupid when we both know you’re a genius.”   “Yeah, I am, but that’s not the point!” Yuki slapped the fork onto the counter. “Since when? Why?”   Nico shrugged, scratching the back of his neck. “If I think about it…it started really slowly, probably some time during your 4th year at Kansei.”   “You’re lying.”   “There’s no way I’d lie about something like this,” Nico grumbled. “Part of the reason I asked to live with you was because I was becoming aware of these feelings.   Yuki folded his arms across his chest and looked down and to the side, voice growing quiet. “But it’s pointless.”   Nico’s eyebrows furrowed and he took a step forward. “You may not think much of my feelings, but to me they aren’t pointless,” he growled.   “That's—” Yuki hesitantly looked up, “That’s not what I meant. It’s just I don’t do feelings or relationships. You know that.”   “Yeah, you’ve been saying that since we first met but here we are.” Nico sighed, “You’re just scared. You don’t want to have a deep relationship because you’re scared of getting hurt. Yet, you call me the coward?”   “I don't want to ruin this,” Yuki argued, eyes now narrow and steady on Nico. “We have a very good friendship, one of the best I’ve ever had. I don’t see why that has to change.”   “We can have both. You just need to have some faith, Yuki…”   “Why? What’s so good about falling in love, anyway?!” Yuki barked, hands balling up into fists by his side.   Nico laughed through his nose, not teasingly or out of real humor, but instead with some traces of defeat. He leaned back against the counter and stared straight forward at their fridge on the other side of the kitchen. “You asked me the same thing about running once. You’re asking questions whose answers you already know.”   “That it makes you feel ‘clean’? I kind of understood that with running, but what—“   “That it makes me forget all my burdens.” Nico turned to Yuki with an expression full of sincerity—eyebrows knitted, eyes glossy, and lips slightly downturned. “That you make me forget absolutely everything until my thoughts are only of you, that pretty face, and the sound of your voice leaking through your room walls when someone’s making you feel good.”   Yuki’s mouth opened and closed like a fish until he found his voice. “Forget that last part, idiot!”   Nico’s lips broke into a wicked grin. “Never.”

________________ 

Nico was persistent in his flirtation: compliments whispered in the morning, sweet nothings said with a smug smile the middle of breakfast, and a burning stare during dinner. The last time Yuki had seen him this determined to succeed was when they were training for Hakone. No matter how much Yuki complained and defiantly ignored attempt after attempt, Nico refused to back down.

  It was embarrassing. And it made it hard for Yuki to breathe.   So, to get some clarity, Yuki did exactly what he scoffed at Nico that he wouldn’t do—he ran away. It was only for one night! He’d stay at his mother’s house on Friday and go back home sometime Saturday. It had been a while since he saw his mom and adorable little sister, so it’s not like he was visiting just to get some space from Nico.

After dinner, Yuki sat at the end of their living room couch with his little sitter on his lap. Despite having missed her first few years, she quickly grew attached to him and happily latched on whenever he visited. She was precious and sweet. It made him feel guilty for being such a bad brother up till now, but he vowed to make it up by spoiling her for the rest of his days. “You look like something’s on your mind,” his mother said as she sat down next to him with a cup of tea. Yuki sighed and wrapped his arms around his sister’s torso, hugging her closer as if she were a teddy bear. She giggled and continued to play with the doll in her hands. “I need your advice on something.” His mother fought back a smile and scooted closer to him. “Is it love troubles? I’m all ears.” “If, hypothetically, a person I’ve always thought as a friend wanted to have a romantic relationship with me and is chasing me, how do I make them stop?” His mother hummed in understanding, taking a sip of her tea before answering. “And you’re sure you can’t return their feelings?” “Uh, I mean…let’s say no.” “Then in that case, it’s pretty harsh but if it really bothers you, cut off all connection to that person.” “Wait.” Yuki turned his head to face his mother. “But they’re a friend. I still want to be friends with them.” “You can’t have it both ways, Yukihiko,” she said with a sigh. “It’d be stringing them along. If their affection really bothers you that much, then you have to properly reject them and put some space between you two.” “Oh.” He rested his chin on top of his sister’s head solemnly. His mom lightly laughed. “No need to sound so sad. If what I just said sounds harsh to you and makes you feel lonely, then maybe you don't dislike their attention as much as you’re acting like you do.” She reached over and petted his head. “You’ve always been bad at being honest with yourself and others.” He didn’t reply. After all, she was right. Yuki dragged his feet when it was time to leave his mother’s house Saturday evening. He didn’t want to see Nico…yet he did. But as he was pacing back and forth near the door of his mother’s apartment contemplating what to do next, his mother made the choice for him. She gathered his things, shoved them in his hands, and gently pushed him outside with words of encouragement. Yuki sulkily waved her and his sister goodbye and made his way home. To Nico: I’m on my way back From Nico: Good. I’m almost finished making dinner but I made too much To Nico: Too used to making for two people? From Nico: Yeah. So you have to promise to eat the extra amount I make forever. Yuki re-read that text a few times, but decided not to answer, locking his phone and setting it on his lap. Yet after two minutes of bouncing his leg and failing to distract his mind from thinking about it, he unlocked his phone and replied. To Nico: Lol, are you proposing to me? Your cooking is not good enough to do that yet From Nico: Don't worry. I’ll get better ^^ Yuki groaned, receiving weird stares from the train passengers around him, and rested his head against the subway car wall behind him. What was he doing flirting with Nico? He was supposed to be rejecting and putting space between them like his mother had said. Why was it so hard for him to just do that? When he entered their apartment Nico greeted him with a cheery “welcome back” and the table set with one of Yuki’s favorite dinners: hamburger steak. They ate peacefully, and aside from the random times their eyes met and the tension between them spiked, dinner generally went on without a hitch. After they finished eating and washed the dishes, they settled back down at their low table with a few cold beers and turned on the TV to a game show program they both enjoyed. Yuki cracked open the can and sipped on his beer, sometimes sneakily stealing a glance at Nico. If felt like they were tiptoeing around the elephant in the room. Yuki couldn’t sit still. “Did you go to your mom’s house yesterday because you’re running away from me?” Nico cut to the chase. Yuki choked on a bit of his beer, coughing. “As if. I just wanted to see how my cute little sister was doing.” “Okay.” Nico knocked back what was left of his can. “I mean if you were, I wouldn’t blame you. I’ve been a bit much lately.” “Oh, it’s good you’re self aware,” Yuki snickered, setting down his can on the table. He slowly turned it in his hand. “…I asked my mom for advice on our situation.” Nico laughed through his nose and popped open a new can. “I didn’t know it was worrying you that much. What did she say?” Yuki put the can up to his lips and mumbled, “She said if it really bothered me so much I should properly reject you and put some space between us.” “And will you?” Nico questioned, leaning a bit closer from across the table. Yuki gulped down the rest of his can and shook his head, eyes flickering over to Nico’s unrelenting gaze. “No…I don’t want to.” “Then, let’s have a contest,” Nico replied, mouth rounding up at the corners. He crawled over to Yuki’s side of the table and plopped down right in front of him. “If you can sit there without flinching while I kiss you, then you win. I’ll stop chasing you and this relationship will go back to being whatever you want it to be. But if you do flinch, you have to give me a chance.” “O-Okay, it’s not like a little kiss will make me flinch,” Yuki exclaimed with a puffed chest. He set his empty can down and closed his eyes. “Bring it on!” Nico chuckled briefly and then grew very quiet. Yuki could feel his breath ghosting on his lips and a big warm hand smoothing over his cheek. His heart pounded loudly in his ears in anticipating and he wanted to take a deep breath to let out all the tension building up in his chest, but he sat hesitantly still. Nico’s lips were surprisingly soft for a guy who seemed to never care to use lip balm, and they moved slowly against Yuki’s. It felt…right. Nico’s tongue teased Yuki’s lips and Yuki parted them, meeting Nico’s hot tongue with his own. Nico slid his hand to Yuki’s right ear, softly running his fingers from the top to the bottom and caressing the pieced, earring-less lobe between his fingers. Yuki melted into the touch, a shudder running down his spine and he pushed Nico away, face flushed with realization. “You said kiss, touching is not fair,” he hissed. Nico arched his eyebrow and maintained his close distance to Yuki. “I never said I wasn’t going to touch you…and you complain, but you don't actually dislike it.” “Shut up,” Yuki muttered, covering his mouth with the back of his hand. “It’s a shame you rarely put on your earring anymore. Your ear looks lonely.” Yuki quickly covered his right ear, eyebrows furrowed. “Stop looking at me like that.” “Like what?” Nico teased, feigning innocence. “…like you want to eat me.” “If I ask nicely, would you let me?” Nico pulled Yuki’s hand away from his mouth and intertwined their fingers. “After all, I won our bet.” “That hardly counts,” Yuki sneered, pushing his glasses back up with his free hand. He bit his bottom lip as if wanting to stop himself from speaking but not being able to help it. “I’ll give you this chance. If we have good chemistry, then we’ll talk about what comes after.” “Well, I better impress you then,” Nico said cheerfully as he got up and pulled Yuki up along with him. They walked hand in hand to Nico’s room. If it weren’t for Nico’s strong grip on his hand, Yuki would have contemplated running away. But he couldn’t afford spending even a second on that thought because once the room door shut behind them and Nico’s dark, desire-filled eyes absorbed him in their gaze, he was sure he wanted this. Maybe he’d had wanted this for a lot longer than he could admit. Nico took Yuki’s mouth with a rekindled fervor, rough hands cupping his chin and digging fingers into hips as he walked him backward to his bed. They kissed with as much curiosity as there was desperation—fingers tugging at pants and shirts and bated pauses to share hazy gazes. They lowered themselves onto the bed as they flung off their underwear, leaving themselves completely naked in the dim glow of the moonlight trickling in from Nico’s window. Yuki lay on his back, elbows propping him up to fully take in the sight that was the naked Nico towering over him. His tan, muscular body he never took any pride in despite how easily it carried Yuki and how good he looked without clothes. His handsome face, strong jawline, and those eyes, usually so calm and laidback, that were now sharp with wanting and solely focused on Yuki. It all made Yuki tremble with excitement. “Are you just going to kneel there and stare at me for the next hour?” Nico laughed through his nose and slotted himself between Yuki’s legs, bending down to kiss Yuki’s nape and whisper against his jawline. “I just wanted to take in the view. You look really good.” “You look pretty hot yourself,” Yuki replied, hands now measuredly running down Nico’s stomach with a destination in mind. Nico grabbed Yuki’s hand and pinned it above his head, “No you don’t. Knowing you, I bet you’re used to getting your way, aren’t you?” “More or less,” Yuki replied with a smug grin. “Well, not today,” Nico murmured as he sucked hard on the skin right below Yuki’s ear, rough hands smoothing down across Yuki’s chest. He gently pushed him down so he was off his elbows and fully lying on the bed. “I’m going to spoil you so painstakingly slowly you’re going to begging me by the end.” “Oh, as if I’d beg so easily,” Yuki retorted. Though he tried to sound confident, his breath was already a bit labored and he trembled eagerly against Nico’s touch. He wasn’t making a great case for himself. And, unfortunately for Yuki, Nico wasn’t joking when he said slowly, very hard stress on the painstakingly. Though his hands ventured lower, flicking and petting as they traveled, his lips were on a mission to touch every inch of Yuki’s body. They trailed kisses across his shoulder, nipping and sucking his collarbones, and moving down his chest. He gave tender care to Yuki’s nipples, taking each bud into his mouth and rolling them between his fingers repeatedly. He was so agonizingly kind and loving in his touching. It made Yuki ache both in heart and body. Nico trailed kisses and little bites down Yuki’s stomach and to the dip of his inner thigh. He stayed there for a moment, tongue tracing the curve of it, and sucking bright red spots into the tender skin. Nico would kiss closer to where Yuki wanted his attention, only to switch to his other thigh. Yuki’s body quivered from the teasing, legs spreading but at the same time wanting to wrap him closer. “Fucking sadist,” Yuki growled, his voice giving out into a gasp when Nico bit into his inner thigh with particular vigor. “Just a bit. I’m surprised at how much I enjoy seeing you writhing because of me.” Nico came up to give Yuki a chaste kiss on the lips and to reach over into the first drawer of his nightstand, pulling out a small bottle of lube. “Now for even more fun.” Delivering on his promise, Nico played with Yuki until he couldn’t control his trembling. Every inch of his skin had felt Nico’s searing lips and hands, and had been played with mercilessly. Speckled with red hickies from head to toe, head knocked back against the pillow with small groans and whimpers leaking out of his mouth, Yuki rocked against the long fingers that worked into him. They felt so good, filling him up and rubbing the places he loved, but he desperately wanted more. “Nico, fuck,” he moaned, teeth sinking into his bottom lip to preserve some of his pride. He had already lost one time tonight; he didn’t want to lose a second. “All you have to do is say please,” Nico encouraged, his breathing low and heavy. Yuki could tell that he was also on the edge. Yuki opened his eyes, now clouded over with bliss, and met Nico’s gaze as best he could through his fogged up glasses. “Nico, I want to come,” he managed, making it sound like a command through sheer will power. Nico hummed and pulled his fingers out. He grabbed Yuki’s hips and scooted him closer, barely pressing even an inch into him. “That’s not begging.” “Ah,” Yuki gasped, legs wrapping around Nico to bring him in closer. He grabbed onto Nico’s bicep and pulled him down, hands moving to dig fingers into his back. “I swear I’ll murder you in your sleep…Akihiro,” he panted against Nico’s ear. “Yeah,” Nico grunted, hips pushing deep into Yuki in one motion. “That’s definitely worth dying over.” Their pace was hard and quick once Nico started. Yet even while losing themselves completely to the pleasure, Nico still made sure to kiss Yuki’s temple and whisper words he surely knew Yuki would not dare repeat. Somewhere in the daze, Yuki heard him, and like his words had so many times before, they moved something in him. And he hid his burning face further into the crook of Nico’s neck and buried his hand into Nico’s hair until and long after they had climaxed.

The next morning when Yuki’s eyes groggily peeled open, he was still in Nico’s bed. At one point Nico had cleaned them off and taken off his glasses—not that Yuki could remember anything that happened after he’d come down from the sex high.   “Good morning,” Nico whispered and carefully placed Yuki’s glasses on him. He was propped up on an elbow, laying on his side and looking down at Yuki with the eyes of a completely satisfied man.   “You’re dangerous,” Yuki grumbled as he sat up, voice completely ragged. “You totally mess up my rhythm and do whatever you want with me, but don’t even feel a shred of guilt the next day.”   “But we did have chemistry,” Nico pointed out, lips curled up in that irritatingly wicked smile of his. “How was I?”   Yuki shot him a glare and shuffled to the edge of the bed, his back to Nico. “You were great.”   “Does that mean that you’re willing to try going out with me?” Nico’s voice was devoid of all humor—soft, and sincere.   “...” Yuki got up to grab his black briefs from the corner of the room and pulled them on. He turned his body toward Nico, eyes hesitantly coming up to meet his. “I’m not sure…yet. But I’ve been giving it some serious thought.”   “I’ll wait, then. Until you’re sure, “ Nico said cheerfully.   “You’ll wait? But it could take months.”   “It’ll happen.” Nico stated confidently. “If there is one thing Haiji’s persistence with Hakone taught me about you is that no matter how stubborn you are, if I am even more stubborn, you’ll come around.”   Yuki dramatically opened his mouth in shock and picked up the pillow closest to him, throwing it at Nico with all his strength. He then marched out of the out of the room yelling, “You owe me a luxurious breakfast. And a massage for my aching back.”   Nico slipped out of bed and softly chuckled to himself as he followed behind him.  

[daehwifi]

HELPESS . | KANG DANIEL

- admin xion

genre: fluff/angst/soulmate au member: kang daniel word count: 2, 736  requested: nope side notes: my throat hurts // i have a lot of background information on this so like hahahahhaha sorry if this gets boring or becomes a school lesson for you :/ // i feel like this is really messy so i’m really sorry i scrapped so many ideas to this so many times 

prompt: “i hope you know— i’m actually helpless when it comes to falling in love with you,”   — kang daniel 

the infamous daniel was known for two things

1) being a heartthrob

2) losing his patience easily

soulmates, in this case, worked along the lines of wanting to be beside them all the time and being able to hear all their thoughts whenever they think of you (or mention your name) 

only a few certain people had this ‘case’, while others would have your typical crush and could possibly lead to a relationship 

daniel was one of them that had the soulmate case 

and you were aware of this [and teased him about it a lot] 

as for you, you didn’t have the case and was stuck with the typical crush 

daniel flailed his body into his bed and stared at the ceiling

“i wonder if daniel got home by now— he promised to call me when he did” he heard your voice echo in his head and in response, he chuckled softly and smiled 

lazily, he got his phone and called you almost in an instant 

“miss me already?” he teased with a smirk on his face 

“no, what makes you think that?” you muttered in response 

“oh nothing” daniel hummed, being able to see through your lie 

“’oh nothing’ my ass, i bet you have some harry potter powers your hiding from me,” you scoffed 

“if i had powers like harry potter, i would use legiliment on you and possibly give you amortentia” 

legilment: mind reading/being able to move through many layers of thoughts to find a certain feeling on someone [in which is a complete bluff since he can already do that because you're his soulmate]

amortentia: a powerful love potion  

“god daniel, if people who aren’t fucking harry potter geeks heard that, they’d be so confused,” 

you were daniel’s best friend for a reason

only you would get his jokes where he’d imply such knowledge in certain areas in which would make you roll your eyes 

“but i probably don’t need harry potter powers for that because i know you love me already,” though your conversation was through a phone, you could tell he had a huge smirk across his face 

and daniel knew you’d roll your eyes in response 

“i’m going to hang up now because i’m up to here with your cheesy shit,” you ‘stressed’ 

“awh, too bad i can’t see the invisible line you’re drawing” he teased 

just as you hit the ‘hang up’ button, daniel chuckled to himself 

“shit i’m lonely now” he heard your voice inside his head 

“i wonder what he’s up to now though” your voice almost sound a bit bitter to him 

all these thoughts flew through your head quickly without you even catching what you were thinking 

but for daniel, he treasured them so much

sometimes he’d lay back in his bed with his hands behind his head and close his eyes, hearing all your cheesy thoughts about him

“and she call’s me cheesy” he’ll mumble to himself

daniel laid there with his arms spread out across his bed 

he couldn’t help but smile and placed his hand over his heart 

“shit i need to steal daniel’s shirt again” daniel couldn’t help but sigh

throughout the whole entire school day, you’d continuously compliment his shirt and tug at the hems of it 

your school had an event today, so that’s why there was no uniform 

a smirk appeared at the side of daniel’s face when the image of you wearing his shirt popped into his head 

“aH I FEEL LIKE A GODDAMN KID” he yelled 

he flipped onto his stomach and shoved his face into a pillow 

you’ve stolen his shirts before 

in which you claimed it was for scientific purposes 

then, when you two would meet up outside of school, you’d be wearing it

“is that my shirt?”

“pfft maybe,” 

“i’ll give it back to yo-”

“don’t- keep it, you look cute in it” 

his heart would race even more when he’d see your cheeks flushed pink 

whenever you were nervous, you’d begin playing with your fingers and it was such a small detail to you that daniel loves a lot 

daniel felt like you were some kind of drug that triggers his serotonin and dopamine 

[indirect definitions/these words have more meaning behind them than what i’m stating]

serotonin: a compound in the body for happiness & satisfaction 

dopamine: a compound in the body for love & passion 

the painful part about having the soulmate case was that you’d only hear their thoughts about you

this could lead to a trap, thinking that they're interested in you

keep in mind, daniel can hear everything you think about him, thus including all the negative thoughts

and it’s not that you’d talk shit about him or anything

but you’d get mad at yourself if daniel gave you're a blunt response or overthink things 

daniel would then grow frustrated at himself for responding like the way he did and just— want to hug you and tell you he’s sorry even if he did nothing wrong 

he had small patience, in which was something you adapted too 

a lot of girls found how attractive he was when he was mad, in which made him even madder because he felt like no one took him seriously besides you 

and although you were on that train of seeing how attractive he was, you had to admit, pissed!daniel is quite scary 

he’d clenched his teeth, making his jawline more noticeable and grip onto whatever he’s holding a bit more tightly 

his sentences would include more scoffs or sound blunter 

“ah crap, why does daniel always have such nice shirts? why can’t i buy shirts like that? do i need to start shopping in the men’s section?”

daniel actually burst a soft laugh and closed his eyes, listening to your thought train pass by him 

“DANIEL” he heard coming outside his window 

slowly, daniel approached his window and opened it

he saw you down below (wearing one of his shirts) and how you had your glasses on

in reality, you have terrible eyesight 

whenever your contacts would fall out and you wouldn’t be able to find them, daniel would help you throughout the rest of the school day, assisting you with such things 

but then again, daniel enjoyed the sight of you in your glasses (mainly because he thinks your cute in them) 

“yes romeo?” he teased 

“shut up daliet and give me the shirt you wore today!” you yelled in return

“what makes you think i’ll give it to you my dear romeo?” daniel put on the princess accent in which made you roll your eyes 

although your eyes seemed bitter, the corners of your lips rose and an airy chuckle escape from your lips

“i am your one true love! that’s why!” you replied 

daniel’s small smile faded away

his face almost turned into a pout before nodding

“alright, come through the front door,” he spoke 

as you were approaching the front porch, the words you said echoed through daniel’s head 

you are his one true love, despite how cliche that sounds

he opened the front door and had the shirt in his hand 

“this is like the 5th shirt you’re borrowing from me,” he implied, raising an eyebrow mischievously 

“people are going to start mistaking your my girlfriend or something,” he joked, almost hopefully 

“your shirts are just nice okay?” you provoked, snatching it out of his hand

“i can see that,” he teased, lightly grabbing the collar of the shirt that belongs to him

“plus... girls borrowing guys shirts look... nice,” you mumbled, almost flustered 

daniel messed up the front of your hair and a faint “nice” escaped his lips

you looked at his sheepish smile 

there was a soft look in his eyes when he glared you up and down 

“how can someone look so lazy but look so cute in my clothes?” he muttered

“I’M NOT LAZY YOU LEGIT LIVE RIGHT BESIDE ME WHY SHOULD I WEAR PROPER-” 

daniel slammed his front door shut, leaving you standing there both bitter and flustered 

“AND I’M NOT CUTE” you yelled through the shut door 

daniel smiled warmly and softly laughed, heading back into his room 

of course, another ‘perk’ that comes with being soulmates is missing them a lot and wanting to be beside them

it was only 2 minutes since the whole daliet x [insert your name + romeo] situation happened but he felt a little bit lonely 

soon enough, he distracted himself with sleep and dozed off

[time skip to the next day woosh]

“daniel...” he heard your voice echo through his head almost seductively

his cheeks flushed pink from the sudden sound

he grabbed the nearest pillow and hugged it like a child, gawking his eyes at the blank space on his wall 

“can daniel come over and make me instant noodles?” you debated in your head, tapping your fingers against your phone 

you questioned if you should ask him or not 

“WHY DID YOU FUCKING SAY MY NAME LIKE THAT IF YOU’RE GONNA ASK ME TO MAKE INSTANT NOODLES?!” daniel blurts out loud, sitting up from his bed 

he scratched the back of his head a bit to harshly as the notification on his phone filled his ears 

as expecting, it was you asking him to make him instant noodles

“no” he texted back

as your eyes read the screen, you felt like he was being a bit blunt 

“are you pissed?

is it because i stole your shirt?” you texted

“no i just-” daniel stopped himself from declining to come over

“nvm, i’ll be there in 5″ he replied 

“yayy!” 

daniel threw on a pair of ripped jeans, a hoodie and a hat before kicking on his favorite pair of shoes, then leaving out the door 

mid way of his (short) journey to your house, he began to question why he got all dressed up 

you live next door 

it didn’t matter at all in the end  

almost instantly, right after daniel rung the doorbell, you opened it

his vision was filled with the sight of you wearing that same shirt he let you ‘borrow’ yesterday, hair tied up in a messy bun, you had your specs on, nike shorts,  and you were brushing your teeth 

and did he find the sight to be so beautiful

he loved it even more because that’s how you looked like naturally

“why are you brushing your teeth if we’re gonna eat?” he asked, raising an eyebrow 

“because i didn’t brush it this morning” he made out from your muffled sentence due to the toothpaste 

daniel allowed himself in when you went to the washroom to rinse and wash your face 

[by the way this was at like 10pm on the weekend] 

[and yes he took off his shoes and his hat gotta have the asian household respect] 

he stood outside your washroom, leaning against the wall and waited until you were done washing up

once you exited, you almost bumped into the him for the matter of fact

“god you have your glasses on too and you’re still blind,” he teased 

“aHEM SORRY but love is blind,” you implied, aggressively winking 

“oKAY LET’S MAKE INSTANT NOODLES BEFORE I LEAVE THE HOUSE SCREAMING AT HOW BAD THAT WAS,” daniel blurted 

“PFFT YOU LOVED IT ADMIT IT” you blurted back

you placed your hands on the back of daniel’s shoulder, shoving him into the kitchen 

“you’re wearing that shirt i gave you,” daniel mumbled 

“yeah, i always wear your shirts at home,” you replied

“am i like your boyfriend or something?” 

“don’t you have a soulmate or something?” you provoked 

“how’d you know i have a soulmate?” 

“sometimes you’d just stare off into space and it looks like you’re hearing someone’s thoughts,” 

you seemed to notice that daniel does do that

but what you didn’t notice was that daniel was hearing all of your thoughts about him staring off into space 

he chuckled a bit and nodded 

daniel placed the pot onto the stove and turned on the gas, causing the flame to rise 

you placed the two packs of instant noodles beside him along with a pair of chopsticks and bowls 

“don’t avoid my question,” he retorted 

“you just avoided mine though!” you exclaim

you got out a pot from the cabinet and gave it to daniel so he could fill it up with water while you got out instant noodle packs 

“fine then, yes y/n— i have a soulmate,” daniel admitted 

you stood there, a bit in shocked

that was only a guess, but he really does have a soulmate 

but for some reason, your first reaction was “daniel’s soulmate’s not me, is it?”

it hurt daniel even more because he heard you think that 

but he continued to hide the truth of how you, were his soulmate

“now answer my question,” he inquired 

you rose an eyebrow 

the air felt a bit different

or that could just be because your heart was racing for a reason you were unsure of 

“do you see me as your boyfriend?” he rose an eyebrow and folded his arms

his attention was fully on this conversation but little did he notice that the water was beginning to boil rapidly behind him

“DANIEL THE WATER” you blurted and turned the gas stove down

you ripped down the instant noodle package and placed inside the hard noodles into the pot for them to cook 

since the water was already boiling, it didn’t take long for the noodles to detach from one another and flow 

you broke them apart even more with your chopsticks, assisting it to cook 

once the noodles soften, you placed inside the powder and mixed it around 

now that was left was to left the noodles soften on low heat to how the both of you like it 

you found yourself placing the chopsticks down and just staring at the pot, to avoid eye contact with daniel 

you weren’t sure yourself if you saw daniel as your boyfriend 

it’s quite an absurd and straightforward question to ask 

“why do you ask that question?” you muttered 

daniel was standing at the side of you, leaning against the counter with his arms folded 

he seemed hesitant to answer, in which grew a heavy feeling inside you

“i hope you know— i’m actually helpless when it comes to falling in love with you,” he announced 

you glanced at daniel, but he pushed you to the side and turned the stove to low heat before pouring it into a bowl 

“what do you mean by that?” you queried 

he filled up the pot with water once again and turned the stove back onto high, preparing to make the second bowl of instant noodles 

afterwards, he turned around and looked at you in the eye 

“you’re my soulmate y/n, you’ve been my soulmate since the first day i met you when you complimented my t-shirt you ended up stealing in the end,” he implied 

“every time i get home, all i’ll hear is your thoughts about me which makes me fall in love with you more. it’s like i have the magical circlet that wukong had; i’ll feel double the pain that you’ll feel and i’ll miss you constantly for christ sakes,” 

“magical circlet that wukong had”: in the chinese fictional myth/story titled ‘journey to the west’, sun wukong traded buddha to serve tang sangzang in exchange for his freedom. a magical circlet was then tricked to be placed on wukong that could never be taken off. when tang sangzang chants a sutra, the circlet will tighten, causing an unbearable headache. 

“are you saying that i’m like a tang sangzang to you?” you asked softly

“what else? tang sangzang had so much power, all you can simply do is wear one of my t-shirts and i’d feel my heart racing. and i have this constant feeling of wanting to protect you, so of course. you’re my soulmate y/n,” he spoke 

“tang sangzang had so much power”: tang sangzang safety was unstable due to the rumor that if one eats her flesh, they will have great power, so throughout their journey, wukong protects her from all the bandits, supernatural beings and demons, till the very end 

“so i’m actually helpless because i can never grow to hate you or be mad at you— the most i can say is, 

i love you,” 

[ladytitanium]

(I have ADHD, inattentive variety, professionally diagnosed at 18, I am not medicated but have been briefly in the past. Disclaimer that my experiences are not universal and everyone experiences different symptom sets to some extent or another.)  Things to remember: 

People with ADHD generally know how to mask their symptoms to some extent as a byproduct of being made to Function Normally (tm) in a neurotypical-run world. Your character is not always going to be super fidgety or chatty and will likely be able to focus on even boring tasks for periods of time. However! This requires Energy and Concerted Effort and will have effects once the character is able to relax after the Normal Functioning (tm) is no longer necessary. 

For example, when I’m at work, I’m able to present (most days) very much as if I don’t have trouble task switching and I can keep my hands still and stay on conversational topics when interacting with customers. When I’m off the clock, though, I’m liable to experience things like brain fog, sensory seeking (my favorite thing to do when I get home is change into soft clothes and wrap up in a big blanket), trouble stringing words together as coherently... losing my train of thought, like I did just now. Anyway.

People tend to mask less around people they’re comfortable with. Your character with ADHD will act more like they have ADHD when hanging out with their friends than they will when talking to their boss/teacher/parent, basically. 

Things to avoid: 

No “ooh a squirrel! haha” jokes. Yes, we get lost mid-sentence or mid-thought. No, we’re usually not happy about having that shit picked at in ways that could be found on Hot Topic t-shirts from 2010. 

When we can focus, we focus really well. We’re usually incredibly passionate about our interests. We can get lost in things like books, writing projects, crafts, complex equations, etc. to the point where someone can call our name right in front of us and we have trouble tearing our attention away from the thing we’re doing. There’s a habit among neurotypical writers to ignore the hyperfocus/efficiency/creativity aspects of ADHD and just focus on character being silly little scatterbrained hyperactive jokers. Please include the good stuff, too. 

I can answer more specific questions if you have them, anon, as I am also a writer and I love character development and behavior in particular. 

Hello! Do you have any tips for writing a character with ADHD? Anything I should super avoid?

I ... I really don't know, as I don't... really know how neurotypical people function enough to pinpoint exactly how it differs from the ADHD experience. @__@;; Can anyone else help out this anon?

[taeminuet]

Heartbeat (20/?)

Title: Heartbeat Fandom: SHINee Pairings: Jongtae; Minkey; OnKai Chapter Wordcount: 3k Overall Rating: R (Some chapters will be NC-17; these will be marked.) Chapter Warnings: mental illness, mentions of past abuse, misuse of therapy methods, triggering, Summary: In which not every problem needs to be fixed and not every person needs to be saved; sometimes you just need support.

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1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 7.5 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19

Chapter 20: Taemin

“Did I wake you up?”

Jongin sounds half-awake at best, his mouth not opening fully on his words, and the sound of rustling blankets clear as he shifts around. There’s a faint sound of something else in the background, and Taemin struggles not to tear up at the sound of Jjanggu yapping on the other end. He’s struck with a sense of homesickness so strong it actually aches for a moment, and he closes his eyes, takes a few deep breaths, and tries to remember that it’s better this way, safer this way.

“Minnie,” Jongin sighs and oh, there’s that pang again, except that he can remember Jongin’s voice confirming some of his worst nightmares -- Your dad tried to call me. -- like Jongin hasn’t been such a constant presence in his life that Taemin’s dad having any access to Jongin at all isn’t reason enough to be petrified.

“Hey,” Taemin says weakly.

“What’s wrong?” Jongin asks, before Taemin can even get anything else out. “Are you okay? How are you doing?”

“I’m fine,” Taemin says, and he can’t help but feel simultaneously bad about and pleased by the clear worry in Jongin’s voice. “Really, I’m… I’m okay.”

And that was true, Taemin thought, letting his thoughts wander back to Jonghyun.

“That’s good,” Jongin says. “I was just worried after… you know…”

And Taemin does, but he doesn’t really want to talk about it. Not right now. “Jongin, I’m okay, I promise. I’m not even calling about me. I’m… well…”

He pauses for a moment, trying to think of the best way to phrase this. Jongin is sweet, but he’s so hyperfocused that anything else escaped his attention so easily. That feels mean to say though, like he doesn’t care enough about Onew to pay attention to him. It’s probably relatively true, but still, not the best thing to point out to anyone involved.

On the other end of the line, he hears Jongin shift a little and ask, “Tae?”

Taemin doesn’t know how long that pause had been but clearly more than enough to concern Jongin, which was sad. Jongin was more than use to Taemin losing his train of thought mid-sentence. It came with the territory of sleep deprivation, honestly.

“Sorry,” Taemin says. “Yeah. Just… did you talk to Onew yesterday at all? After I went to my room?”

There’s silence for a moment. “Shit. Yeah, I did. I told him I’d be right back and then I just bailed. I was so worried about you that I completely forgot. Is something the matter?”

“He’s… sensitive,” Taemin says tactfully, worrying his lip. That’s an understatement, from what he’s seen, from what Jinki hinted. “He feels like he did something wrong or let you down or… well, I’m sure I don’t have to explain all the psychology stuff to you.”

“Shit,” Jongin says again. “I didn’t think--”

“Don’t freak out, okay? You’re fine. Just… can you come see me again today? Maybe talk to him a little; apologize and let him know he didn’t do anything wrong?”

“Yeah, yeah, of course. I was planning on coming anyways, seeing how you were after… But I’ll talk to Onew too. Tell him I’m sorry and I’ll be there as soon as I can, okay?”

“Okay,” Taemin says, letting himself smile softly. “Thanks, Jongin.”

“Of course, Tae,” Jongin says, and there’s another rustle of noise and then a soft click. Taemin hangs up the phone, smiling awkwardly at the lady at the front desk. Having someone watching him call out is uncomfortable to say the least, but it’s nice to know that nobody can call him that easily -- Your dad tried to call me.

Taemin shudders and hurries back to the cafeteria. Jonghyun is sitting again, talking lazily with Key, and there’s an open seat beside him, between him and Onew. Taemin takes it gratefully, immediately tugging his plate of food towards him. He’s so hungry, god. Normally he doesn’t get this hungry, but he also normally can place how many hours ago his last meal was.

“He’ll be here later,” Taemin says, stuffing food into his mouth. “After group, probably. Don’t worry too much. He said he’s looking forward to seeing you again.”

And that’s a lie, but for the nervous, hopeful smile that blooms across Onew’s face, it’s worth it.

“I can’t believe you’re fussing over him,” Jonghyun says, a little grumpily. “Seriously, you’re way out of his league, Onew.”

Onew squeaks. “That’s not-- I don’t--” he stutters, cheeks pink.

Key snorts. “Jonghyun seriously? Are you jealous?”

“No?” Jonghyun says. “I just think he’s-- listen, you haven’t even met the guy? What are you hopping to his defense for?”

“I just asked a question,” Key says mildly, a laugh in his voice. “Besides, if anyone here is going to get visitors, might as well be Taemin.”

“Might as well?” Taemin asks, frowning. “What does that--?”

“Me and Onew are on the no-fly list on visitors, mostly. And Minho’s parents show up… well…”

Key stalls, looking over at Minho, who takes a deep breath and then says, “There’s not a point if I won’t remember them visiting, right?”

Key’s mouth twists unhappily. “Something like that. Still a dick move, though. And Jonghyun…”

Jonghyun scowls at him. “Yeah, yeah. We all know how I feel about visitors day.”

And Taemin doesn’t, but it’s not hard to figure out from the look on Jonghyun’s face. He doesn’t want to push either, not after what they’d talked about, but he touches Jonghyun’s arm gently and raises an eyebrow, hoping for Jonghyun to tell.

After a moment, Jonghyun sighs. “My visitors list sucks dick and I’m not allowed to change it,” Jonghyun says. “Apparently it’s ‘inappropriate’ for me to ban my sister from coming to visit even though she’s the whole reason I’m stuck in this fuckin’ place.”

Taemin frowns slightly, confused by the new information, but Jonghyun just shakes his head and Taemin gets the memo. Enough for now. Jonghyun is trying, but he can only try so hard. Instead, Taemin rewards him with a hand on his thigh, squeezing lightly beneath the table. He doesn’t even try to pretend that he can’t feel the way Jonghyun’s legs fall a little open for him, so easy, but he doesn’t take it any further either, just leaves it there while they eat.

It’s almost comfortable here. Taemin almost feels like this could become a new normal. But then Onew mumbles something about it being time for group, and Taemin remembers exactly where he is.

Jonghyun sighs. “I don’t think we should talk about this,” he says. “Onew was right, and I really don’t want to have to deal with getting a talking to about appropriate vs. inappropriate relationships. You guys too…”

Key doesn’t look happy, but he also looks at Minho, reaching over to take his hand. “He’s not wrong,” he says to Minho, touching him gently. “But it’s up to you.”

“I don’t…” Minho takes a second, frowning, mulling things over. “It seems childish to say I don’t want to hide this,” he says finally. “I don’t, but I don’t want to make things more difficult on you, either.”

Key exhales audibly, leaning in closer to Minho, as close as he can without moving his chair. And maybe Taemin hears wrong, or maybe he doesn’t, but either way it feels strangely private to hear the yearning in Key’s voice when he murmurs something that sounds a lot like, “You’re too good for me, Minho.”

Taemin swallows. “Yeah,” he says to Jonghyun in an effort to tune out Minho’s response. “Yeah, I don’t think it’s a good idea just yet. Especially after yesterday’s group. That wasn’t the best time I’ve ever had.”

“What, you don’t love being stuck in a circle and forced to overshare?” Jonghyun says, batting his eyes in faux-innocence. “It’s my favorite time of the year.”

Taemin’s brows furrow for a moment as he tries to work out if that was a bad Christmas pun or not, especially considering that Christmas is still months away, but it’s Minho who stands up first, moving to clear his and Key’s plates.

“We can try to cover for each other, if we need to?” he says, more of a question than anything.

Jonghyun snorts. “Yeah, I mean… honestly, just look confused and insist you don’t know anything and that’s you covered. The rest of us, well… we’ll figure something out. Can’t be that bad.”

Taemin hopes he’s right as they all clear their plates before making their way back down the hall. Onew doesn’t look like he can handle too much more stress right now, shuffling after them with a far-off look, his fingers wound into his sweater and his lower lip trapped between his teeth. He looks almost fragile somehow as they all take their seats, Onew smiling weakly at all of them.

Jonghyun pats his shoulder comfortingly as he passes. “We’re all gonna be fine. Don’t worry. After a couple of years, we’re all pretty good at talking circles. And Tae’s too stubborn to give up any information.”

Taemin lets out a startled laugh. Not that that’s not true, but the familiarity of it makes him feel a little warm, and he reaches out, squeezing Jonghyun’s hand once before the door opens and he lets it fall.

They’re barely even all settled before the doctor is bustling in, a look of barely-restrained frustration on his face. Probably because of them. Taemin remembers exactly how well this last attempt went.

“Good morning,” the doctor says, clipped but expectant, like he expects them all to chorus ‘good morning, Dr. Kwon’ like some sort of demented kindergarten classroom. There’s a resounding silence from most of them, only Onew mumbling something so soft it might as well not be words.

“Well, it looks like there are a few thing we need to discuss today,” Dr. Kwon says, and Taemin stiffens, just a little, but the doctor immediately turns to Minho. “Welcome back, Minho. We should discuss your feelings about waking up last night. I understand that must have been disorienting for you after your injury yesterday.”

Key winces openly. “I didn’t--”

And Taemin hadn’t heard about this yet, but Minho only nods slowly. “Key explained what happened,” he says. “The nurse too, but Key was the only one there when I fell.”

The doctor jots something down, the grit of pen against a clipboard making Taemin’s nerves jangle. “And were you open to believing Kibum? Not a slight against your honesty,” he adds, glancing at Key. “Just a gauge on Minho. I understand that it must be strange trusting someone you’ve never met.”

“We have met,” Minho says, frowning. “Just because I don’t remember, doesn’t mean…”

“But you don’t know him,” the doctor points out. “Wasn’t it difficult to believe someone who’s practically a stranger to you?”

“He’s not a stranger,” Minho mumbles a bit defensively, but his voice is shaky, and he looks at Key for help, eyes a little wild. “I mean... he’s never hurt me before…?”

The doctor hums, jotting down another note, but he doesn’t say anything, clearly waiting for more. Minho doesn’t look equipped to give it.

Across the circle, Onew shifts uncomfortably. “No, he hasn’t.”

The doctor looks over, raising an eyebrow. “Onew? Did you have something to add?”

“Just… no, he hasn’t.” Onew looks petrified somehow, pinned under the sudden attention. “You’re not really… confirming, but… Key hasn’t-- he wouldn’t, not to Minho. Or anyone.”

“Onew, I understand that you’ve been here long enough to know both Kibum and Minho, but I don’t think speculation--”

“Onew’s right, I haven’t,” Key says. “I don’t like you implying that I would. Or that I’d lie to Minho about it.”

“That’s not the discussion we’re having,” the doctor says, his voice not quite as calm anymore. “We’re discussing Minho’s feelings, not dealing in presumptions.”

“It’s not a presumption,” Onew says, and then flinches. “He... Key told the truth, and you’re talking to Minho like…”

Onew trails off, cringing a little, and Taemin is tempted to reach over and comfort him, but then he catches sight of the doctor’s face, cold and firm and calculating.

“Finish your statement, Onew,” he says. “I’d like to hear what you think I’m trying to do.”

Onew shudders bodily. “N-no, I just, I meant--”

“No?” the doctor asks, and Onew shakes his head miserably, eyes a little wild with something like terror. The doctor frowns. “Speak up.”

“Leave him alone, jesus,” Jonghyun says, scowling. “Can’t you see he’s just trying to help?”

“If Onew has something to say, we’re all here to listen. But interrupting another patient isn’t acceptable behavior,” the doctor says, and Taemin wants to deck him because it wasn’t like they weren’t all yelling over each other yesterday, and now he’s being a dick to Onew for daring to correct him? Not even correct, just try and negate some of his fucking with Minho. “Onew, you should know the rules of this group better, and are expected to follow them, do you understand?”

“I-I,” Onew chokes out, looking around in a panic, his fingers twisting roughly into his shirt. “I just w-wanted… I just--”

“Onew, you’re fine. You’re okay. No one’s mad at you,” Key says, all in a rush, and Taemin understands what’s happening then in the way Onew looks right now, stricken and upset and utterly breakable.

And there’s something edges, something purposeful about the way the doctor lifts his pen to the clipboard, poised to take notes, as he murmurs, “I, for one, am extremely disappointed that you aren’t following the rules.”

Taemin’s temper flare, a bolt of rage going through him, because Onew lets out a tiny, broken, whimper and then… nothing. He looks blank, almost empty, like there’s nothing there, and it’s just for a second, just a split-second of utter silence, and then his entire body changes, shoulders taking on a line of tension and hands balling to fists in front of him as his legs part a little, settling into a different position, almost hostile.

Jonghyun snarls. “What the fuck?”

“Leave it, Jonghyun,” Jinki says, voice hard and angry. “He’s just trying to get a rise out of me. Trying to figure out how to trigger us, isn’t that right? I’m not giving him the satisfaction. It’s just going to upset Onew.”

“The satisfaction?” Jonghyun snaps. “This asshole--”

“Stop, Jonghyun,” Jinki snaps. “I don’t have the time or patience to deal with you right now, so sit the fuck down and quit being pissed off.”

“No,” Taemin says, jaw tight. “No, Jonghyun’s right. That’s fucked up. He knew that would fuck with Onew. He knew.”

The doctor frowns. “I was merely making a statement--”

“You were merely being a fucking dick,” Taemin says. “You came in here today to play with Minho’s head, and you couldn’t get that, so you figured you’d mess with Onew’s? Jinki’s? Whatever. That’s fucked up!”

“Taemin,” Jinki starts, but Taemin is shaking with fury, trying to wrap his head around this.

“What are you going to do next, dope me up until I do nothing but sleep? Bring my father here so he can beat me into unconsciousness like he used to and pat yourself on the back because ‘at least he’s sleeping! Job well done!?’” His voice cracks pathetically, but he can’t bring himself to care. “Well congrats, and a hearty fuck you. You figured out Onew’s sick. Good fucking job!”

“Taemin, Tae, baby,” Jonghyun murmurs, trying to soothe him and probably horribly blowing their cover but fuck it. Taemin is pissed.

And the doctor doesn’t make it any better, his voice never leaving its cool monotone. “We were already aware that Onew was sick yes. But knowing what causes his alternate personality to appear is important information that is vital--”

Jinki laughs, cutting the doctor off mid-stride. “You could just as easily have asked for. Onew doesn't know. He's no help. But I know. And Jonghyunnie knows because he asked. But that would have been too easy. It's much more fun to poke and prod and use all those techniques they told you about in school for uncooperative patients. You’re so excited to know what's wrong that you don't care if you're making it worse.”

“That’s not--”

“Don’t lie to me!” Jinki says, voice suddenly ice-cold, almost cutting. “Don’t act like you’re just trying to help when all you’ve ever thought about since you were a kid was poking around in people’s brains and trying to figure out what made them tick. You’re not fooling anyone, doctor, and I promise you, if you ever fuck with Minho or Taemin, or anyone else here, if you ever even think about touching Onew again, I will personally make sure that you are intimately acquainted with what it feels like to have someone rooting around in your skull.”

Taemin’s chest feels tight, and his throat feels dry, and he can’t-- this isn’t the Jinki he met before. This can’t be. Even as he speaks up for Taemin, Taemin feels a burst of fear, uncontainable, and he grabs for Jonghyun’s hand, letting Jonghyun pull him in. “You’re okay,” Jonghyun says. “You’re safe. We’re safe.”

Taemin shudders. “I want to go,” he says. “I want to go.”

And Jonghyun nods weakly, letting himself be pulled as Taemin tugs him away from the group, running, just like he always has.