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stevieschrodinger · 1 day ago

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Part One FortyFour

Eddie’s standing in the doorway, waiting for Steve when he pulls into the driveway. Steve climbs out, grabbing his lunch box. Eddie insisted on packing it for him today, which Steve really appreciated. He had been only a tiny bit nervous when he opened it, but to be honest it was pretty normal, even if salad tomatoes, grapes and blueberries don’t instinctively go together, nothing was chopped too small, so Steve just picked out the tomatoes and ate those first. The goldfish were just loose though, so it was lucky Steve had the box flat when he opened it, and it only felt a little bit like a booby trap.

Steve deliberately keeps his face expressionless as he walks up to the house, Eddie looking on nervously. He frowns, “you okay Stevie? Was it okay?”

“I got it,” Steve says, doing his best to sound really sad.

“You...oh that’s okay Stevie- wait. Oh!” Steve grins, Eddie does a little jump before grabbing him up in a big hug, “you got it! You’re a kindergarten teacher!”

“Assistant,” Steve reminds him, nuzzling into Eddie’s hair, Eddie doing a little wriggly dance of excitement against Steve, “I get to call in Family Video on Monday and tell them I won’t be back, which is just...it feels really good. And now I’ll be home evenings and weekends and...it just feels a lot better, you know?”

Eddie grins at him, “so proud of you Stevie. We will get to have more time together. And I like this,” Eddie tugs on Steve’s new tie gently, making Steve snort a laugh.

“How are you?” Steve leans back more so he can rest a hand low on Eddie’s tummy.

Eddie shrugs, “good but...kind of nervous about later.”

“Yeah...but we need to know though, right?”

“Right,” Eddie nods, determined.

Steve hasn’t seen his catchers mitt since he was about thirteen, but he wonders vaguely if it’s still in the garage. He dismisses the idea pretty quickly, certain that Eddie would be deeply offended.

Steve and Eddie sit on the couch, staring into space. Trying to...absorb.

Owens had measured Eddie’s egg last time, and again this time, to confirm it was growing.

And it is. The smaller eggs that Owens thought were either failures or not fertilized at all had already disappeared, so he’s no longer concerned about any weird infections. He thinks that Eddie may have just passed them, or they might have just...gotten reabsorbed, which Steve just, chose to ignore, rather than getting freaked out by it.

“This is...a lot, right?” Eddie asks quietly.

“Uhm. Yeah. Yeah it kind of is.”

Eddie’s fingers creep over the couch cushion, Steve tangles their fingers together when they make contact.

“Stevie?”

“Yeah?”

“What do you...do? With a baby?”

Steve snorts a laugh. He looks over at Eddie, and Eddie’s bemused face just causes him to break down into, slightly, hysterical laughter.

“Joyce will help,” Eddie says, once Steve finally stops laughing.

“Yeah, pretty sure she will,” Steve confirms.

“I...can’t believe it’s in there...now. Right now.”

“I...yeah. I think this is going to take a minute to sink in.”

“I’m going to teach them to read. And play guitar.”

Steve sighs, letting himself flop over, lying with his head on Eddie’s lap, Eddie’s fingers immediately finding their way into Steve’s hair, blunted nails scratching softly, “you’re going to be a great dad.”

“And you,” Eddie says immediately. He tilts his head, “Stevie are you...happy about it?”

“Yeah, yeah of course. I...just didn’t think we’d have kids you know and that would be fine too but...yeah. I’m happy about it. Completely happy, I just...it needs to sink in. You?”

“Happy, but...little scared.”

“Do you want to tell people? Or...wait? Maybe we should wait until Owens checks it out again? If it’s still growing in a few weeks time then...it’ll be more sure, right?”

“You think something could still go wrong?”

Eddie’s frowning, so Steve reaches up, smoothing the crease of Eddie’s eyebrows with his thumb, “baby...I mean, normal human pregnancies go wrong sometimes, right? And we’re two different species so I just think...maybe wait, just a minute?”

“I want to tell Chrissy.”

“Yeah...I know. I feel the same, I want to tell Robin. Even if it doesn’t work out, I’d like to tell her.”

“We should Stevie, I think it’s going to be fine.”

“Okay. Okay.” Steve climbs up off the couch, “I should tell them I got the job anyway, I’ll call Robs, invite them over.”

Eddie is staring down into the sink, “Stevie?”

“Just leave it. Please. I know I’m doing it okay, and I don’t know why, but it just feels important so. Please. For me.” Also Steve doesn’t want to talk about how he’s acting like a weirdo about this and it’s making him more than a little self conscious.

Eddie seems to accept that, “would you be happy with a bucket?”

“A bucket?”

“Yeah? Like, we could fill it with water, and then we’re not always wasting sinks full of water every time.”

Steve, for a brief second, thinks Eddie’s mocking him. But then he knows it’s Eddie and Eddie just...isn’t like that. “Yeah I mean...I don’t think it matters what it’s in, I just need it to be there.”

Eddie nods, “you were right about the beer. I am having a baby,” Eddie suddenly breaks into a big grin, “baby!” he whispers, full of excitement.

Steve gets it, every time the thought crosses his mind he’s filled with emotion. It keeps hitting him, again and again, and the feeling doesn’t seem to wearing off any time soon. “I know, come here.”

Steve holds Eddie close, relaxing into each others arms, “but you were right about the beer so...you must have known, somehow, right?”

That thought had been niggling at Steve, vaguely. He feels it in the dreams, he knows he does. He just doesn’t have any explanation for it. The dream is exactly the same, every time, every night. Like Steve is...in a room of soft light. It’s not really much to go off of, not really, but still.

“So does this mean you’re not going to argue about the milk either?”

“Two glasses a day, final offer.”

Steve snorts a laugh into Eddie’s hair, “I’ll take it.”

They just stand there, in the middle of the kitchen, holding each other close. Steve sets the occasional kiss against Eddie’s neck or cheek, and they don’t part until the doorbell rings.

Steve sets out a bowl of salad. It’s kind of cheat dinner, just frozen pizza, but still. You can’t invite people to dinner and then not have any dinner. Even if the dinner was an excuse.

“So,” Steve sits, “we have news.”

The girls stop bickering, “what?” Robin asks.

“Is it serious,” Chrissy is frowning, looking between the both of them. “Oh my god did Owens finally come up with something? Eddie, are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Eddie grins, “but Stevie has a new job!”

Robin gasps, hitting Steve with a kitchen towel, “Judas!”

“Robin!” Chrissy smacks her arm.

“I mean. I’m happy for you, obviously. But you could have waited until I went to college. Now I’ll have to fight off Keith,” she shudders.

“I’m sure you’ll cope.”

“It’s the kindergarten thing, isn’t it?” Chrissy clarifies.

“Yeah. Yeah I’ve been and done some hours there already and...I really like it. The kids are fun but...sticky. Like, really sticky, a lot of the time.”

“I’ll be all alone,” Robin bemoans.

“You’ll be fine, stop it.” Chrissy looks from Robin back to Steve, “congratulations Steve. We are really happy for you.”

Robin gestures vaguely, her mouthful of pizza, “obviously happy for you dingus.”

“Thank you,” Steve says primly.

“And the other thing?” Eddie asks quietly, feeling for Steve’s hand under the table. Steve just nods, squeezing Eddie’s hand. Eddie takes a deep breath, looking back at the girls, “I’m pregnant.”

Robin coughs, spraying her plate and the surrounding table with pizza crumbs, Chrissy just...stares at them. Looking back and forth.

The silence lasts long enough that Eddie finally asks, “is it okay?”

“They’re just...a little shocked, baby. Give them a minute.”

“Oh my god,” Chrissy breathes, “I thought you were joking. You’re not are you?”

“No,” Steve says evenly, “not even a little bit. And we’re not telling anyone else yet, we just needed you guys to know first. Eddie’s going to get checked out again in a couple of weeks and then...if it’s okay, we will tell everyone else.”

“Holy fuck,” Robin gestures wildly between the two of them, “how did this happen? I mean...how did this happen?”

Chrissy is already up though, coming around the table, pulling Eddie out of his seat into a massive hug, “congratulations honey. Wait,” she pulls back, holding Eddie by the shoulders, studying him, “this is congratulations, right? You’re happy?”

“Yeah,” Eddie grins, but Steve can see his eyes are wet, “yeah, congratulations.”

“Good!” And Chrissy immediately pulls him back in, no hesitation from her.

“I feel too young to be an aunt. Steve, I’m not ready for this kind of responsibility!”

Steve just shakes his head, trying to resist kicking Robin under the table.

Once the news has, kind of, sunk in, they move to the living room, abandoning the remnants of dinner on the table. Steve can deal with it later, or tomorrow, he just really doesn’t have the energy to think about it right now.

“So,” Chrissy’s laid on her back, staring at the ceiling, “how..?”

Steve looks at Eddie and shrugs, “I’m...a little different to normal guys.”

“Like how different-” Robin starts.

“I’m not telling you what’s in Eddie’s pants,” Steve cuts her off immediately.

“But-”

Chrissy smacks her with a pillow, “we will respect their privacy.”

“You are no fun. No fun at all.”

“I am curious though,” Chrissy starts slowly, “I mean...why has this happened now? Like I know you guys have been boinking for a while. Like, very regularly-”

“Chrissy,” Eddie hisses, “you said girl talk is sacred!”

Chrissy does manage to get out, “sorry,” but it is broken by her laughter.

“She does have a point baby. And I mean...if it happened once, it could...happen again?” Steve’s thrilled to be having a baby with Eddie, even if there’s still a part of him that...wants to wait. Needs to know that it’s for certain.

Eddie nods, “no condoms for a long time.” He blinks then, pulling a leg up so he can turn fully on the couch to face Steve, “my birthday,” Eddie’s eyes widen, “my birthday wish!”

Steve immediately and almost instinctively knows Eddie is right. He feels it in his bones; that one time they did something different, and they haven’t done it again since, Steve can’t help it, he speaks without thinking, “oh I’m so sorry I knocked you up in a bathroom.”

“I’m so sorry we had to hear it,” Robin splutters when Chrissy hits her with the pillow again.

“So if,” Chrissy points at Eddie, “and stay with me here, Eddie is like, fifty percent Steve, genetically-”

“Owens said it’s more like forty,” Eddie tells her, “he compared my blood now to Steve’s blood and what he got before I changed.”

“Right, right,” Chrissy nods, “but still, if the baby is like, half Steve and half Eddie, does that make it like, seventy five percent Steve?”

Robin gasps, “how dare you suggest my niece is inbred.”

“I-” Chrissy starts, then stops again, “I mean that wasn’t what I was suggesting-”

“Nephew,” Steve tells her confidently, “it’s a boy.”

“I...are you saying that because you want a boy or..?”

“No,” Steve frowns. Thinking. He...he’s sure. He knows it like he knows Eddie should drink milk and not beer. He knows it like he knows there’s clean water in the kitchen sink. “No...I think I know it’s a boy.” Steve thinks about his dreams, the bubbly feeling he gets when he’s there, how everything is so soft and gentle and just...nice. “Yeah.” Steve looks to Eddie, “I think I know it is.”

“From the dreams?” Eddie asks quietly.

“I think so, yeah. Yeah it is.”

Eddie just nods, shrugging, before he turns to Chrissy with a big grin on his face, “we’re having a boy!”

“Robin is also a nice name for a boy-so fucking help me Chrissy!” It devolves into a fight, Robin trying to wrestle Chrissy’s pillow weapon away from her.

Steve and Eddie just watch.

Steve sighs, Eddie’s head on his lap. School hours are kind of nice. Since the florist closes up around three ish, and Steve’s work hours are now eight until four, it means they get every evening together.

Unfortunately today, he came home to find Eddie throwing up in the downstairs bathroom.

“Feeling better?”

“Yeah, loads. I think I’ll be okay to go to practice.”

That’s what Steve was afraid of, but he takes a deep breath and mentally squares his shoulders. The guys at practice definitely don’t exactly like Steve, but he figures that’s huge progress on the open hostility he was facing in the beginning.

“I have the stuff for snicker doodle.”

“I know,” Eddie grins up at him.

“Oh you little,” Steve pulls Eddie more onto his lap, going for kisses and a sneaky tickle.

“Stop!” Eddie laughs, “no no no!”

Steve has hung around for the last couple of practices, cheering on the band and doing his best to keep his expression blank through the physical pain caused by incredibly loud feedback at about ten feet away.

He’s vaguely aware that, in the eyes of the band at least, that makes him the clingy groupie.

He doesn’t think he cares.

But tonight he’s doing his own thing, so he drops off Eddie and the cookies, and heads off to the rec center.

Robin lets him in, and he follows her along the hall, calling, “hi Mr and Mrs Buckley!” into the lounge on his way past. There’s a vague response, followed by Mr. Buckley shouting something about the bedroom door staying open.

Robin looks over her shoulder to roll her eyes at him, “Chrissy doesn’t have that rule,” she waggles her eyebrows.

Steve snorts a laugh, “I wonder why.”

“So how did it go?” She asks, bouncing on the bed.

“Yep, they get together to practice and mess around once a week in the evenings, and then there’s a pick up game at the weekend for whoever shows up basically. Sounds really relaxed, but the guys who were there seemed cool so,” Steve shrugs, “I’m looking forward to it, going to go this weekend.”

“Awesome,” she nudges him, “oh! I got you something!”

She bounces off the bed. Steve watches as she pulls some stuff out of the top of her closet. And then pulls over her desk chair and climbs up, moving more stuff around. He is further bemused when she goes out of the room, coming back with a butter knife. Steve watches her, top half pretty much in the closet, there are brief sounds of a struggle.

“Errr...you okay?”

“Yup!” She turns on the chair, throwing something wrapped up in a paper bag to Steve, Steve catches it, watching as Robin undoes whatever she just did, and puts everything back. Steve pulls a copy of ‘What to Expect When You’re Expecting,’ and snorts a laugh. “Thank you, what’s with the…” he gestures vaguely.

“Could you imagine if my parents found that?”

“Yeah. Yeah actually, totally fair point.”

They’re lying sideways across Robins bed, talking quietly, their legs hanging off the edge.

“So, thought of any names?”

Steve snorts, “no, not yet. We’ve not talked about it. I think we’re both...kind of waiting for the next check up, you know? Just...to be sure.”

“That’s fair. I’m sure it’ll be fine. God I cannot wait to see the look on Hoppers face when you tell him. Promise me I will be there. I need this.”

Steve laughs, “yeah, Eddie enjoyed the pot luck so much he wants to do one at our place and invite everyone. Maybe we can do one of those cheesy reveals, I don’t know. Eddie loves that kind of stuff.”

“Yeah.” They’re quiet for a minute, “how are you feeling about it though, I mean, it’s a big deal? Like...this is going to change your whole life.”

“Yeah, I know...but I mean...me and Eddie have come through some stuff, and I know he’s excited about it. I...we’re going to be fine. And I always wanted kids so...I mean it’s really unexpected obviously. I just…” Steve takes a big breath, “I really want this…”

Robins hand creeps into his, giving it a squeeze, “I’m really happy for you…but why did that sound like it had a but.”

“I don’t-” Steve runs his hands through his hair, frustrated with himself, “it doesn’t, not really. I’m really happy, I swear, I just...there’s this one thing. And it’s...completely irrational.”

“Ah yes, because you’re always so rational. Come on, tell auntie Robin.”

Steve snorts a laugh, warmed by Robin’s commitment to the auntie thing. He stops for a second, gathering his thoughts. His mostly, so far, vague and nebulous thoughts about the whole thing. It’s only a little niggle really, but still. “I don’t have a logical answer for it, I just really feel like...if I’m having a kid, I should be married to the person I’m...doing it with, you know? That’s all it is though, it’s just...this stupid feeling that I...should.”

Robin nods, “I...follow you Steve. And first of all, your feelings aren’t stupid,” Robin even lifts herself up on her elbow so she can glare down at Steve as she tells him that. Steve lifts his hands in defeat before she flops back down and continues. “I mean, if you’ve kind of had that plan for a long time, and I guess a lot of people just...sort of assume their life will go that way, you know? It’s not unreasonable to kind of...rest your dreams on that kind of path, even if it’s just an assumption and not like, you know, an actual plan.”

“Yeah. Yeah. I mean...this isn't Eddie’s problem though. It’s my problem, and I can’t make it Eddie’s problem. I don’t...the last thing I want is to upset him, you know? Especially now.”

“I know but...I don’t think you need to keep how you're feeling from him Steve, you two are such a team, you know? I think he’d be understanding.”

“Yeah I get that but...but doesn’t matter, does it? I can’t change it, it won’t happen, so why trouble him with it? It’s just a...feeling I have.”

“If he was worried about something, even if neither of you could do anything about it, wouldn't you want him to share his burden with you?”

“Oh shut the fuck up, stop being so...reasonable. And it’s not like that anyway, it’s Eddie...you know, it’s kind of, my job to look after him. He hasn’t even been human for that long, not really.” As soon as the words are out of Steve’s mouth, he knows he’s kind of, at least a little bit wrong. He’s had this conversation with Jon not that long ago. Eddie doesn’t need him in the same way he did a year ago, or even six months ago. He still thinks this way out of force of habit, he’s pretty sure.

Robin shrugs, “if you think. I don’t think it’s up to you to choose though. Besides, Eddie is smart, he can tell when something is bothering you. Ohhhhh...do you think his freaky mind powers are giving him an advantage? What if he can see your big white wedding dreams?”

“I...well shit. I mean, we haven't actually proven he has freaky mind powers at all. Owens was so excited by my blood sample we hadn't seen him for a while, and now he’s more concerned with, you know, the baby.”

“Huh.”

“Yeah.”

Steve ponders what Robin said while he drives to pick Eddie up from band practice. He thinks about it when he’s making dinner. Stews on it watching a movie with Eddie. When he fills the bathroom sink with clean water, he’s aware of it. He stares at it for a second, deliberately leaving it. Eddie doesn’t ever question the water when he climbs into bed. Maybe the bucket is a good idea.

Steve lies in bed, staring at the ceiling, still thinking about.

Eddie snuffles across Steve’s shoulder until he settles against Steve, “something wrong?”

“Nah,” Steve says reflexively, trailing his hand down Eddie’s back.

“Stevie. You said we have to tell each other the big things. All the things.”

“Right,” Steve scrubs at his face, “yeah, I did say that. And...kind of, but nothing bad, okay?”

“Okay. Tell Eddidie.”

Steve snorts a laugh, “bringing out the big guns huh?”

Eddie nods, his curls tickling against Steve’s cheek.

“Well...I...we’re having a baby. That’s a thing that...you know, is happening, and I’m so happy, I guess. That it’s me and you and...you know, hopefully the baby in you is fine and all that works out, right?”

“Right?”

“Yeah okay but...and it’s not bad, I promise. I just always thought that when I get to be a dad I...I’d be married to the person I was being a dad with, you know?”

Eddie’s quiet for a second, and then Steve feels him shrug, “so we should get married then?”

“Eds we can’t-”

“No, no, I mean just...have people over. It’s just words right, in front of people? We can still do that, right?”

“I...I mean, it wouldn’t be legal.”

“Does that part...is that the part that matters to you? The legal part?”

Steve thinks for a second, “no, actually, I think that’s the part I don’t give a shit about.”

“Okay,” Steve feels it when Eddie shrugs again, “so lets get married then.

“We will have a fall wedding.”

“Steve snorts a laugh, you repeating dumb shit off the TV again baby?”

“No,” Eddie immediately denies it, “I like the trees then.”

“Uh hu, but isn't the idea to have the wedding before the baby? Owens said he had no idea how long your gestation might be.”

Eddies nose wrinkles, “don’t use that word. I’m pregnant.”

Steve sighs, waving a hand, “no you're right, come here baby I’m sorry. He also said gravid and that’s way way worse.” Eddie climbs into Steve’s lap, letting Steve cup the subtle curve of his stomach, “how is he doing?”

Eddie shrugs, “everything feels the same.”

“Maybe he’s in a food coma, you did just eat like twenty chickens worth of legs and wings.”

Eddie rolls his eyes, snuggling close, “Owens says its fine if I’m craving protein,”

“Uh hu,” just do me a favor and include a vegetable-” Steve’s interrupted by the phone ringing

Eddie slumps off him onto the couch, “if its Max or El tell them I love them and they’re perfect.”

Steve gets up, “and if it’s anyone else?”

“They probably smell?” Eddie hazards, “not Joyce though!” Eddie calls after him.

“Hello,” Steve answers, still chuckling.

“Steven, glad I caught you.”

“Mom?” Steve feels vaguely blind sided. They haven't spoken for...months. Quite a few months, and even then their vague interactions have centered on utility bills and couriers coming to pick up his mothers jewellery.

“Steven, I know we haven’t been to Hawkins for a while now, so we’ve decided there’s no point in maintaining the house any longer.”

“Oh,” Steve says, thinking, well, don’t sugar coat it or anything.

“Obviously you have a room at the place in Detroit, the realtor will be in early next week to take photographs, so make sure the place is acceptable. Oh, and I’ll let you know the date for the movers so you can pack your things, okay?”

Steve feels vaguely sick, like the world just got pulled out from under him a little, “I-right. Okay, yeah, but I’m not...Mom I’m not leaving Hawkins, my whole life is here.”

“What, your career?” She laughs, more condescending than cruel. Like Steve is still a silly little boy.

“I...well. My job, my friends...I’m just. Not leaving.”

“Well…” Steve can practically hear here thinking it through as she course corrects, “you are an adult now, but you understand that will mean you need to get your own place? You’ll need to pay your own way with the utilities?”

“I...I know. Yeah, I- I’ll figure something out.”

His mother sighs softly, “it’s a girl isn’t it?”

Steve’s at a loss. His parents knowing the truth is...not a conversation he could ever have, but...this frames it in a way his mother can understand, “yeah.”

“You love her?”

“I...yeah. Yeah I do.”

“And she loves you?” His Mom sounds soft now, like he remembers her being when he was small. She’s a romantic, deep down. His dad might have slowly sapped the life from that part of her but...it’s always been there.

“Yeah...probably more than I could ever explain.”

There’s a moment of silence on the phone. Kind of heavy but...Steve feels lighter for it, “are you going to look after her?”

It’s...a bit of a strange question. The phrasing feels a little off, but Steve speaks this language. This soft secret thing his mom has had to hide away for so long she’s probably forgotten it exists herself, ‘are you going to be better than your father?’ she’s asking him, ‘will your priorities be different?’ she begs, ‘don’t let her end up like me.’

“We’re engaged,” Steve doesn’t know what pulls it out of him, in this moment, the phone cradled close to his cheek, his eyes water, ‘yes,’ he wants to tell her, and ‘I’m nothing like him’. He presses his free hand to the other cheek. It feels a little dreamlike, like he’s a little boy again and his mother is cradling his face, “there’s going to be a baby,” he admits, whisper soft.

“Oh,” his mother answers, and her voice sounds suspiciously wet, and oh so soft, before she clears her throat, Steve hears her pulling herself together, “your father won’t miss a few thousand dollars,” she laughs, actually laughs, real and conspiratorial, something briefly flaring to life that they haven’t shared for a long time, she sounds alive and rebellious, she sounds like a million memories from when Steve was little, “I’ll see what I can do, okay?”

“Yeah...yeah, thanks Mom. Really.”

“Our little secret,” she whispers to him, and it sounds like the forever kind of goodbye.

Steve stands for what feels like a long time, listening to the dial tone. The whole conversation couldn’t have been more than a couple of minutes. “Stevie? You okay?” Eddie disturbs him from his reverie.

“I yeah,” Steve swallows, emotion thick in his throat, “...look are you sure you want to get married in the garden?”

“Yeah,” Eddie nods, “it has to be here. With the pear trees, and the pool.”

Steve takes a deep breath, “how does next weekend sound?”

They lie in bed that night, curled around each other, “we really need to tell everyone else.”

Eddie nods, “if everyone comes around for a pot luck, we can tell them it’s to celebrate your new job. Then we can tell them about the baby and invite them to the wedding at the same time.”

“Baby...I don’t feel like I say this enough but...you’re the best. You’re just the best and I love you.”

“I know.”

Steve laughs, “you just...you just always make everything okay. You just...no matter what happens you just take it in your stride and you’re just...amazing.”

Eddie shifts, resting half on top of Steve, leaning in for soft, gentle kisses, “you’re the best too.”

They kiss for a while, soft and slow. Gentle. Loving. Eddie’s nails scratching at Steve’s chest through his shirt, and Steve’s hands slip up the back of Eddie’s loose sleep shirt, tracing his spine. It slows as they snuggle up, “I guess we actually need to plan a wedding.”

“Joyce bakes the best pies.”

“So you don’t want a wedding cake?”

Steve feels Eddie shrug, “we can, as long as there’s pies.”

“Yes, then. I’d like a cake. I’d like a picture of us cutting it together. I’m sure we can ask Joyce to make pies though. And...do you want to like, walk down the aisle together or-”

Eddie snorts, “no, obviously Joyce will walk me. You do the man part.”

“Right yeah, obviously, yeah,” Steve agrees, like how dare he even suggest anything else, but it still makes him smile into the darkness, “I vote El and Max do that flower girl thing?”

“Yeah. God idea. Chrissy is my head bridesmaid. She already said so ages and ages ago, when I first started at the flower store.”

“Well it’s only fair I get Robs as best woman then. Who’s going to like, marry us?”

They lie in the darkness for a few seconds, and then they both speak at the same time, “Hopper.”

#eddie munson #steve harrington #stranger things #steddie #ficlet #ao3 author #upside down creature eddie #Fish Guy Eddie #creature eddie munson #robin buckly #chrissy cunningham #eddie and chrissy #fish guy #platonic stobin #mpreg

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moni-logues · 2 days ago

Text

Pairing: Changbin x reader (afab, she/her)

Genre: Friends-to-lovers, fake dating

Summary: Your temper got the better of you and you lied to your sister. Rather than coming clean, you get your best friend playing pretend, too.

Word count: 21k

Content: discussion of sex toys, protected piv, fingering, multiple orgasms, ambiguous sexuality (both changbin and reader), reader lifts, changbin can and does pick her up,

A/N: re-read this fic for the first time in a long time and honestly this might actually be one of my favourite fics I've written? i liked it when i wrote it and i still like it now which is frankly a miracle in and of itself so here we are. originally beta'd by @minisugakoobies and very very minorly edited (the first half anyway lol ive run out of time) since then

A Simple Favour

“I need to ask you a favour.”

“Yeah, ok, sure.”

“No, no, I need you to hear what it is first.”

“Ok...”

You sat down next to Changbin on the sofa and it was only then that he started looking as if he was paying attention.

“I need you to be my boyfriend.”

Changbin was out of his seat before the word had come to an end.

“What?!”

“Not really!” you cried, immediately standing up again, hands raised, trying to placate him. “I just need you to pretend to be!”

“What?!”

You groaned loudly and tipped your head back to shout at the ceiling. Then you motioned for him to please return to his seat so you could explain.

“I... may... have... toldmysisterthatwe’retogether.”

He was on his feet again, roaring.

“WHAT?!”

“It’s not my fault, ok?! You know how annoying she is!!!! She won’t stop going on about how we act like a couple and how we’d be good together and why don’t we just get together and don’t I see and no one else wants to go out with me anyway, what, do I think I could do better and I just fucking snapped!” You gripped him hard on the arms and stared, wide-eyed and grimacing at him. “I couldn’t take it anymore,” you told him through gritted teeth. “I snapped. I told her we were already dating but trying to keep it quiet until we knew if it was going anywhere.”

Changbin did exactly as you had not a minute before: looked skyward and groaned all too loudly at the ceiling of your apartment.

“So you mean to say that your sister now thinks we’re a couple?”

“Yeah... and I mean, Chan, too, obviously. He was there.”

Changbin closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

“You mean my best friend Chan?”

“Hey! I’m your best friend!”

“Not anymore!”

He took a few steps away from you and shook his head, shook out his arms, rolled his shoulders. You did not know if you would be able to convince him to go along with your charade. It wouldn’t have to be forever, not even for long; you just had to find a way to back out of it that left both your names untarnished. Couldn't be that hard, right?

“Please, Binnie,” you began, tone softer now, sweeter, pleading just a little. “I know, I suck. But my sister sucks more and I really just want to get her off my back for a bit and I promise I will sort it out. I promise I’ll let us break-up quickly and you’ll come out smelling of roses! But please, please back me up on this.”

He turned around, looking at you seriously.

“What exactly is involved?”

“Well, y’know, if Chan asks about it or something, just... go along with the lie. You don’t have to do anything really.”

“Except for the lying and deceit and stuff.”

“Yeah.”

There was a pause in which Changbin stood, staring out of the window, hands on his hips, deliberating. Then he turned sharply to look at you.

“I have a date tonight. Can we start tomorrow?”

You inhaled sharply through your teeth, eyes shut tight.

“Nope!”

You winked an eye open to see how he’d react. There was outrage on his face.

“What do you mean ‘no’?!”

“You can’t go on a date with someone else if we’re together!! What if someone sees you?”

He shouted again at the ceiling.

“I was going to get laid tonight!”

“Sorry!”

You cowered, made yourself as small as possible, watching him as he nevertheless unlocked his phone and fired off a quick cancellation text.

“I’m going to make you pay for this, you know,” he told you as he typed.

“I know. I deserve it.”

“Fine,” he said with a sigh. “I’ll do it.” Then he flopped back onto the sofa and patted the seat next to him. “But to be absolutely clear, I am not going to your stupid family lunches.”

“Actually...”

You were at your stupid family lunch. You had been going to Sunday lunch with your family for what felt like forever. At first, you and your sister schlepped way too far outside the city to your parents’ house, but now your sister hosted. Your sister and her husband, who just so happened to be best friends with your best friend. Why did the world have to be so small?

This time, your boyfriend was here, too. Sorry, your ‘boyfriend.’ It had taken a thousand favours owed and promises of future gifts made, but Changbin finally agreed to come, and you had agreed the rules for this deception:

You and Changbin had been dating for a ‘few weeks’ (since you got drunk at the river and decided to say ‘fuck it why not?’ to the whole thing).

You made the first move.

When in public together, you would always be prepared to act like a couple, should you run into anyone you knew.

Changbin would lead and you would ‘yes, and’ him, no questions asked.

Absolutely no dating other people, just in case.

It was your job to find a way to end it that made both of you look good – or at the very least, made Changbin look good.

No one—and that meant no one—else could know that it wasn’t real.

Just as you were walking up to your sister’s front door, Changbin added another: you would give him servings of everything first – including seconds and thirds, even if they came from your own plate. He knew your mum and sister cooked well and he was going to enjoy at least some part of this afternoon. You felt you had no choice but to agree.

“Hello,” you called as you entered your sister’s house, without enthusiasm.

You had been dreading this since the second the words had left your mouth the previous week. You could have just not lied; you didn’t have to have said that you and Changbin were dating; you could have controlled your temper even a little and not have got yourself in this predicament. You could even have swallowed your pride and embarrassment and told your sister it was a lie, that you had said it to try to shut her up. It wasn’t like it was the first time you’d told her how annoying she was.

But you hadn’t. You had lied and now you were sticking to the lie and Changbin was fully involved (if not invested) and you were about to spend an afternoon pretending to like him.

You liked him fine, as a friend–you liked him a lot, even, as a friend–but he wasn’t That Guy to you. He’d never elicited so much as a single butterfly in your stomach. Not a flitter of a wing or twitch of an antenna. He was just Binnie. And you knew he felt the very same about you.

“Finally,” your sister said by way of a greeting as she came down the stairs. “You’re late-”

“No, we aren’t,” you snapped back, fully prepared to argue further but the look on your sister’s face took you by surprise.

She was surprised.

“Oh, Changbin! I didn’t know you were coming.”

There was a sly smile on her lips as if there was a joke you weren’t in on, but you didn’t have capacity to be annoyed by that; you were waiting with bated breath to see what Changbin would do.

“Hi, Hanbyeol,” he said, as polite and charming as he might ever have been. “Miki said she told you I was coming. I hope it’s alright I’m here.”

“Of course it is! The more the merrier, right?”

She winked at you as she walked past into the kitchen, and you rolled your eyes.

“Absolutely!” Changbin responded, following her, grabbing your hand and tugging you along, too.

This was going to be a very long afternoon.

The very longest afternoon of your life. When Changbin had made you promise to ‘yes, and’ him, you had thought he meant go along with his concocted story of your first date or something.

You hadn’t expected... whatever the hell it was he was doing.

The first time he called you ‘baby,’ you literally, physically flinched and had to try very hard not to scowl. The second time, the only thing that might have given you away was the flare of your nostrils. The third time, you dragged him off away from everyone to hiss viciously at him.

“What the fuck are you doing?”

“What?” he asked, with as much innocence on his face as he could muster.

“Calling me fucking ‘baby?’ Why? Why would you do that?”

“Aren’t you my baby?”

“For fuck’s sake, Changbin! NO, you know I am not! What are you doing?”

“You said I could play this however I liked and you also said I wouldn’t have to do anything but here I am, in your sister’s house, performing my perfect little tush off to keep your lie intact! So suck it up, baby: this is how Changbinnie dates!”

You rolled your eyes and swore under your breath once more.

“So you mean to say that you’re going to make this as painfully cringe-worthy as possible and embarrass us both?”

“Both? I’m not embarrassed!”

He didn’t wait for your comeback to that one and strode back into the kitchen, leaving you quietly seething but not yet regretting sticking to your lie. You could cope with an afternoon of this.

Which is what you thought until you actually sat down to eat and Changbin made you stick to your word and serve him first. It was almost impossible to do it with a smile on your face – you were sure you resembled some kind of grotesque, with a rictus grin and clenched teeth – but you did your best. You really tried to be sweet to him, to pretend to care that he got the best cuts and biggest pieces of meat, that you were happy for him to take the last dumpling from your plate.

You were sweating from the effort of it. You had never wanted to leave your sister’s house more. You felt suffocated. Hot. Uncomfortable. Embarrassed. Your parents were there; they also had to think it was real and you hadn’t considered the implications of him meeting the parents until it was too late. Suddenly, this felt serious.

You had thought it would be easy pretending that you and Changbin were together because... well, you did spend a lot of your time together as it was. You were close. You were so close that it was what got you into this mess in the first place! If you already acted enough like a couple for your sister (who barely ever saw past her own nose) to see it, then the job was already done – you had thought.

You had underestimated Changbin. Of course you had. His mischief, his love of performance, his inability to not do something that he knew would stitch you up in some manner. They all combined into what was sure to become your absolute worst nightmare and there was no one to blame but yourself.

You were just going to have to find a way out of it and quick.

* * *

“Changbin! How nice to see you again!” Hanbyeol crowed the next week when you dragged him along for a second time.

“Of course! The food last week was so good, Hanbyeol, I had to come.”

She actually blushed.

“Please, Changbin, call me Hani.”

You rolled your eyes; she was too easily flattered and Changbin was a little shit.

You hadn’t planned to make him come again. You would have preferred that he didn’t. But... Well, your sister just knew how to press your buttons. She had expressed her surprise at your apparently real relationship with Changbin, even uttering the words ‘I didn’t really believe you.’ She had then proceeded to lecture you on how to behave in a relationship and warn you of all your ‘usual tricks’ that apparently kept romantic partners away. You had been so thoroughly goaded that you had hung up on her and immediately dialled Changbin, telling him, in no uncertain terms, that he was ‘coming next week even if I have to kill you and drag you there.’

He had put up a fight, but the food really had been that good (your sister had many flaws, but cooking was not one of them) and he let his arm be twisted in far less time than before.

He behaved in much the same way as he had but you were prepared for it. You had braced yourself. You even managed a real smile at Changbin at the dinner table, despite the fact that he, once again, ate the last dumpling from your plate. He didn’t up his game or do anything more to try to embarrass you – perhaps he hadn’t expected your quick adjustment; he had overestimated your temper – but you were glad for this. You had to admit (for a microsecond only) that he might actually be a good boyfriend.

Neither of you had had any serious relationships in the time you’d been friends. When you met, your relationship was in the middle of a breakdown, and your ex had moved out before you and Changbin had become firm friends. Changbin had dated, a lot, but none of them seemed to stick. Sometimes, he was sad about it; he would show up at your door with ice cream and his favourite blanket (yes, really) and you would coax the story out of him, trying not to press too hard on his bruised pride, his wounded heart. Sometimes, he chucked them before it got that far.

You’d actually not really spoken about relationships all that much. You assumed Changbin didn’t want anything serious because he never had it. You assumed that he assumed you wanted to be single because you (mostly) were. You shared horror stories from occasional bad dates and Changbin sometimes made you pick out his outfits, but you didn’t talk about them. You didn’t talk about your fantasies and dreams, your ideal partners, ideal relationships; you didn’t talk about how much you really did want to have one. You weren’t single because you didn’t want a relationship; you were single because you didn’t know where to find one.

You had burnt out on the apps in double-quick time and weren’t really sure where else to go. You would never take up your sister’s offer to set you up, which might honestly have been cutting your nose off to spite your face because you did like Chan and she was happily married to him, but there was simply no way you would ever have been able to live with her smug self-satisfaction if she had been the one to introduce you to a life partner. And that left you with very few other options.

* * *

Having a fake boyfriend—who was your best friend at that—turned out to be quite a lot of fun. You did all the same things you usually did, plus handholding when in public and tolerating whatever cutesy baby-talk Changbin threw at you during your family lunches. That was easy.

Your friends were outraged when you told them. Not because they opposed the union but because you hadn’t told them before. They went back through your friendship with a fine-toothed comb, pointing out signs and hints that they had known ‘all along’ that you were into each other.

There were no signs. There were no hints. Because you weren’t into each other. But you let them have their fun because it helped sell the lie you were trying to peddle.

* * *

“Sister,” your sister began, on the phone to you almost two weeks after your second lunch.

“What, sister?” you replied, already unamused.

It wasn’t that you didn’t like Hani. She just... rubbed you the wrong way. A lot.

“You and Changbin should come on a double date with us.”

“What?”

“A double date. Me and Channie; you and Changbin.”

“Ugh.”

You didn’t have a much more articulate response than that. Really? Why? Why did she always have to suggest these things? Why did she need to be so nosy? So many of the thoughts that stuck in your brain when it came to your sister began with the word: why.

“Why?” you asked, already trying to think of excuses not to go.

“What do you mean why? It’d be perfect! Channie and Changbin are friends; you and I are sisters; we all already know each other! You’re always such a spoilsport!”

“But Binn- Changbin and I have already been for lunch twice; that’s basically the same.”

You had stopped referring to him as Binnie since you had started ‘dating’ him. You had deliberately not thought about why that was.

“It’s not the same at all! Lunch is casual and boring! Our parents are there! We should go on a real date, have some fun!”

“Maybe your relationship needs a fun injection but mine doesn’t.”

You could see her rolling her eyes, hear the stomp of her foot on the floor.

“Kim Mikyong,” your sister said and needed to say no more. When she full-named you, you knew it meant she wasn’t taking no for an answer, and you had given up fighting her on it because she showed surprising restraint in using it.

You sighed.

“When do you want to go?”

“Ah! Perfect! I’ll ask Channie and get him and Changbin to set it up! It’s going to be so much fun!”

She hung up without bothering to say goodbye and you looked at the phone in displeasure. You didn’t even know if Changbin would agree to it. It had taken so much coaxing to get him to lunch.

And this was going to be so much worse.

But you’d been wrong before.

Changbin lived two floors above you and, shortly before half-six, he was knocking at your door to pick you up for your date—your double date.

You opened the door and surprise swallowed your greeting. He looked good. He looked like he’d put effort in. You remembered the outfit from one of the times he’d asked your advice; he’d worn this outfit on a date before. Your first instinct was to be peeved that he was recycling an outfit for your date. Then you remembered that you were only pretending to be together. And then you thought, actually, that maybe it was sweet he had put together a Date Outfit for the occasion.

You’d put on a dress and everything, too.

“You look nice,” he said, still standing in your doorway.

“Thank you,” you replied sincerely. “So do you.”

It was quiet in the lift as you descended, and you jumped a little when Changbin took your hand as you left the building. He looked at you, quizzical.

“Sorry, just forgot what we were doing for a second.”

“Hey, I’m happy not to hold your hand, but this was your rule.”

“Yeah, yeah, it’s fine; it’s good. I mean, we should. It’s safer. We should. I just- I just forgot; surprised me.”

You squeezed his hand in yours, because it was there to squeeze, and you realised you felt nervous. Your sister had been right: this was different. Lunch was casual. This wasn’t. You tried to remember how your sister had previously acted on double dates, but she hadn’t been able to get you on one since you were with your ex and that was a long time ago now.

You wondered how Changbin would act. He had been so keen to play the game and embarrass you up until now; would tonight be the same? He seemed normal so far, but he didn’t have his audience yet. And everyone was still sober.

Your sister cooed and stretched across the table to you and Changbin, grabbing your hand and his forearm and giving a squeeze.

“Oh, I’m just so happy!” she exclaimed, and you could tell by the way she scrunched her nose as she smiled that she was in one drink too deep. “I want you two to be so happy! Aren’t they happy, Channie?”

He grinned at his wife and nodded before turning towards you.

“Are you happy?”

You shrugged which was very clearly the wrong answer.

“Mikyong!” Hani hit the table with her palm.

You shrugged again.

“What?! What do you want us to say? I’m not going to fucking rhapsodise about it at the dinner table!”

That was a mistake. You’d have seen it coming one bottle of soju ago and you wouldn’t have set foot in that trap.

“Then I will!” Changbin said, tossing back his drink, punctuating the end of his sentence with the thunk of the glass on the table.

You groaned, inwardly and then out loud. Changbin turned to look at you, a sweet, shit-eating grin on his face.

“I feel honestly amazed,” he began, his eyes widening in what you knew he hoped your sister would take for some kind of wonder or awe. “It seems so weird that we didn’t see it before.” He took your hand, and you clenched your teeth so hard your jaw hurt. “It feels so natural to be together, y’know? I’m more than happy! I’m comfortable and content; being with your best friend is the greatest thing in the world.”

Hani cooed for so long, you worried she’d run out of breath. She held a hand to her heart, and you almost thought you saw tears in her eyes. She could give Changbin a run for her money in the dramatics department. You didn’t see Chan’s reaction because he hid his face taking a drink. Changbin had promised, as part of the rules, not to tell anyone else and you trusted him, but Chan would be the person he’d tell. Which worried you. Because you could fool your sister; your sister was a fool. Chan wasn’t.

You kicked Changbin as you got up from the table and made sure you walked behind your sister and brother-in-law so you could punch him in the arm for good measure.

“What the fuck was that?” you hissed, face hot with alcohol and anger.

“What was what?”

“That disgusting little speech you gave! ‘Oh, it feels so natural! I’m so content!’. Are you fucking kidding me?”

Changbin chuckled and nuzzled his nose into yours.

“Oh, baby, don’t you feel the same? You’re going to break my heart!”

“Shut the fuck up! How am I supposed to break us up when you say shit like that?”

He shrugged.

“I believe that is your problem. Besides which, you promised I’d come out smelling of roses so I can say as much saccharine, embarrassing crap as I like and you can just ditch me like the cruel and heartless being you are. Problem solved.”

“And you want everyone to pity you for having your soft heart broken by me? Because that’s what’ll happen! They’ll ooh and ah and ‘poor Binnie’ you for weeks. And how are we supposed to continue being friends if you’re that heartbroken?”

You knew by his silence that he was annoyed to not have a quick retort.

“See? You’re trying to embarrass me and make me squirm and yeah, it fucking works, but you’re also prolonging this! You’re making it harder than it has to be!”

“Oh, whatever!”

The four of you stood on the subway, going in the same direction for at least part of the way home. Hani and Chan only had eyes for each other; your sister claimed they were ‘still newlyweds!’ but you didn’t think that, after over a year of marriage, she had any right to do so. You were glad that they were busy being moony-eyed at each other; it meant you and Changbin could relax a little, finally out from underneath the scrutiny of the pair. You weren’t holding hands, but you leant a little against his solid body, letting him support you as the train twisted and jostled you.

You wouldn’t have cared—wouldn't even have been looking—a few drinks ago but you couldn’t tear your eyes away from the two of them. Envy grew like mould in your heart. You were happy for your sister, of course you were, but you wanted that. You wanted it for yourself. You wanted someone to look at you the way Chan was looking at Hani right now. You wanted marriage. You wanted that happily ever after shit that you knew didn’t really exist, at least not like in all the stories. But you wanted someone to believe it. Wanted someone to promise it to you even if it was beyond their power to enforce.

It made you bristle, made you annoyed. At anyone. Everyone. Hani. Chan. Changbin. Yourself. You’d made this bed. It wasn’t as if you had been dating anyway, but now you had removed that as an option; you couldn’t even try to find what your sister had and it was all your own fucking fault. You watched as Hani took hold of the lapel of Chan’s jacket and lifted onto her tiptoes to press a giggly kiss to his mouth; you didn’t manage to hold back the scoff, didn’t manage not to roll your eyes.

Your sister rolled hers in return and tutted.

“What, Miki? I can’t kiss my husband?”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“Your face says it all. Kiss your own boyfriend, why don’t you? And stop looking at mine.”

“He’s not your boyfriend.”

“No, he’s my husband and you’ll never get one if you keep going around on dates with a face like that.”

“Hey,” Changbin says, smiling beneficently, “I like her sour, ugly face.”

You punched him hard on his left pec and he ‘oof’ed quietly but it didn’t stop him smiling.

“Yeah?” Hanbyeol challenged. “That’s a face you want to kiss, huh? Really? Don’t believe you.”

Changbin reflected her challenge in his eyes as he looked down at you.

“Maybe I don’t want to kiss him,” you spat, glaring at your sister, ignoring Changbin’s offer.

“Oh, Mikyong, you are a bitter old maid. Let your boyfriend kiss you if he wants!”

Did he want?

Your heart was beating faster than you’d have liked. Your mouth went dry when you finally turned to Changbin to acquiesce. This hadn’t been part of the deal. Did he really want to do this? You didn’t. This was weird. It would be weird! How could you pull this off? It was your first kiss! Changbin was about to kiss you for the first time! His face was leaning down! He was really going to do it! How could you let him get this close? How can you pull away without ruining everything? What should you-!

His lips were soft and the kiss was gentle. Lasted no more than a second. It took longer for you to come around from it, your mouth pouting and open, looking at Changbin as if you were lost and he would show you where to go. He lifted one side of his mouth in a lopsided grin and winked.

That broke the spell.

“Happy now?" you asked your sister, your ‘ugly, bitter old maid’ face back on-screen.

She rolled her eyes, good-naturedly.

“Whatever, Miki. You are so easy to tease.”

She said it all looking dreamily at her husband and it made your stomach drop. She only had eyes for him. He only had eyes for her. You were desperately trying not to look at your ‘boyfriend.’ You didn’t know where he was looking.

You got off the train a few stops later, leaving Chan and Hani on it. You were itching to be by yourself. You had to process what had happened. Changbin had kissed you. Kissed you. Sure, he was goaded into it; he did it because your sister told him to. But he still did it. You didn’t know how you felt about it. After just ten minutes, you were starting to believe it hadn’t even happened, that you had somehow imagined it. Because you and Changbin didn’t kiss. Even though you were pretending to be together. You didn’t kiss. That didn’t happen.

Changbin walked you to your door when you reached your floor and you turned in the doorway, looking at him as sour as you’d ever been.

“Going to try to kiss me goodnight?” you asked, jeering and hating yourself for it.

Changbin looked at you, a little hurt, a little annoyed, a little fucking tired of your prickly temper.

“No,” was his simple reply.

You didn't say anything back, but he didn’t leave, so you each stood in silence, one either side of your doorway. You knew he wanted to say something as mean-spirited as you had; you knew he was better than that so he wouldn’t.

He turned his body slightly away, as if to leave, and then looked at you, mostly just sad, you thought.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have kissed you. We haven’t talked about that; we haven’t agreed anything on that. I just thought you’d want to show your sister. Prove it or something. So I’m really sorry. I’ll see you later.”

He was walking away and you could taste something bitter in your mouth: your own temper, your impatience with people, your totally unfair expectations of people that were better than you but liked you anyway.

Steeling yourself and clenching your fists, you followed after him.

“Changbin,” you called softly, prompting him to turn around.

You took his hand in both of yours.

“I’m sorry, too. Sorry I’m such a bitch. The kiss was fine. Thank you. It was good. Probably necessary; I don’t know. Thanks. I guess. Sorry.”

Changbin just laughed and pulled you into a rib-squeezing hug.

“You are so fucking stupid.”

He was very, very right.

* * *

Changbin knocked at your door and entered your apartment with far less cheer than he might normally. You hadn’t spoken about the kiss since it happened and there had been no repeats of it. Things had fallen back into your new normal ‘friends who are pretending to be more than friends’ sham.

“What’s wrong with you?”

He sat on your sofa and looked up at you, still serious.

“Remember how you asked me for a favour?”

You asked him for lots of favours but you immediately knew which he was referring to.

“Yes.”

“Remember how you said it’d be over quickly?”

“... Yes.”

You did not like the direction this was heading in, but he was owed, you knew that, so you determined to meet your fate with grace.

“Remember how the very night you asked I had a date?”

“Yes.”

“Remember how long ago that was?”

“... A month?”

He hummed and nodded.

“I was going to have sex that night, but I didn’t get to. Why?”

“Because I made you cancel so you could fake-date me.”

“Exactly. Know what that means?”

You couldn’t see where he was heading because- well, you could see, but you didn’t really know what the favour was going to be. You weren’t sure you wanted to find out.

“Uh, I don’t know.”

“It means it’s been well over a month since I last had sex. Because of you.”

“I’m sorry?”

He chuckled and his face brightened.

“I don’t want you to be sorry, babe-”

You had long stopped flinching at the terms of endearment as they leaked into your non-fake-dating time, too. If Changbin had noticed, he didn’t let on, but you were aware every time he called you anything other than your name.

“-I’m just saying. Aren’t you bothered? It’s not like you’ve been getting any either.”

You shrugged.

“No. I guess I’m not that bothered? I don’t know; I’ve been longer without. A month isn’t exactly that long. And it’s not like there aren’t ways to entertain myself.”

“Don’t you get bored of that though?”

You laughed.

“Did you really come here for masturbation tips?”

The tightened curl of his lips and aversion of his eyes told you he was embarrassed and he was never embarrassed.

“No,” he answered pointedly. “I actually came to suggest that we have sex.”

“What?!”

The shock brought you out of your chair. He could not be serious.

“What?” he returned. “We’re already fake-dating! Why not make a bit of it real? It doesn’t have to mean anything. Except both of us getting some... release. Relief. Call it stress relief! From the stresses of pretending to be dating. It’ll make the pretence easier, too, since it doesn’t seem like you are going to actually break us up anytime so-”

“I am! I am! I’m working on it...”

You couldn’t help the whine that crept into your tone. You were working on it. Or at least, you had been. It was too difficult. How could you find a way for your relationship to end and for you to remain friends at the end of it? And with each day that passed, it got harder, because your ‘relationship’ had gone on longer and everyone was expecting it was getting more and more serious – especially as it was built on the foundation of your very solid, very real friendship.

“Ok and while you work on it, we could be having sex.”

“Changbin...”

He regarded you carefully and you looked back, hoping you looked as pathetic as you felt.

“You don’t have to say yes. I won’t take it personally. I just... I honestly just really want to get laid and you are the only person I’m allowed to have sex with at the moment. So you’ve really stitched me up here.”

You sank down next to him on the sofa and laid your head on his shoulder.

“I am sorry. I really didn’t mean for it to go on this long. I didn’t mean to stitch you up. It’s kind of got out of hand- I actually didn’t mean to create this mess at all. My sister sometimes just brings out the worst in me.”

“Yeah,” Changbin replied, patting your knee. “Family can do that.”

There was a brief lull and then Changbin slapped his own thighs and stood.

“Well, if you don’t want to have sex, I’m out of here.”

“I didn’t say that!”

He raised an eyebrow at you, and you were furious that your cheeks had the audacity to warm. You were a grown woman; he was a grown man. You should at least be able to talk about sex. You did talk about it! You had discussed it!

But it was different when it was this – the two of you having it. Together. There was a line there. And he may have made some good points (you weren’t getting any; as long as you were pretending to date each other, you couldn’t sleep with anyone else; it would make the pretence easier), but suggesting it didn’t have to mean anything? Surely it meant something. It had to mean something! Friends didn’t just fuck their friends. That never worked. It always made things weird.

Weirder than they already were? Wasn’t it already weird that you pretended to be together whenever you saw any of your friends, any of your family? Wasn’t it already weird that Changbin was so used to calling you ‘babe’ and ‘baby’ and god knew what else that he said even when you were alone? Wasn’t it already weird that you didn’t hesitate anymore, that the words ‘I have a boyfriend’ fell from your lips without your even having to try? Wasn’t it already weird that you were... getting used to this? Enjoying it even?

“I didn’t say I didn’t want to. I also didn’t say I did. I don’t know. Don’t you feel like it would be weird?”

He shrugged.

“Maybe. Kind of too horny to care.”

“Seo Changbin!”

“What?! I'm being honest!”

“I’ll think about it, ok?”

“Sure. No pressure. I mean it.”

“I know.”

You did know. You would trust him with your life, and he was the softest little goober you’d ever met. That he might pressure you was not your concern at all.

You were true to your word: you thought about it. On and off over the next couple of days you thought about it. How much further over the line was it, really? You held hands. You had already kissed, a little. Ok, once. Was sex really such a leap? It would lend a lot of credence to this stupid lie you were both living. And you would get to have sex.

But it would be with Changbin. What if he was bad at it? What if you discovered you were bad? What if his dick was weird? What if he liked stuff you hated? Or vice versa? You didn’t know if you believed that sex could be Just Sex, but, even if it could, that didn’t mean it wasn’t complicated. There were factors. A lot of them.

A week and a half later, you thought you were experiencing déjà vu when Changbin entered your apartment again, asking for a favour.

“Sex again?” you asked as you shut the door behind him.

“Not exactly. It’s more embarrassing.”

You did not attempt to hide your glee.

“I love it; please ask immediately.”

“Last time I asked about sex, you implied that you didn’t get bored getting yourself off. I’m asking, how? ‘Cause I’m looking at my hand like it’s my fucking enemy at this point.”

You laughed.

“Do not laugh!” he shouted. “I’m in actual need. I’m in agony. Please. Tell me how to make it more interesting for myself.”

“I mean... Firstly, we have different parts, so my experience is not directly applicable to you. Secondly, how can you be that bored? Have you seriously never gone this long without sex in your adult life?”

He shrugged but you recognised the look on his face: the one where he tried to hide a smug, gloating, little grin.

“Are you seriously telling me you haven’t gone more than two months without sex?”

“I haven’t had to!”

“Oh my god.”

You were in half a mind not to help, feeling like it might somehow expose you as undesirable, because you had been more than two months without; two months was currently very much in your rear-view mirror at that point.

“Well,” you began, leading him into your bedroom, “for a start, if you’re only using your hand, then you are in for a treat. An entire world awaits you.”

You knelt down next to your bedside cabinet and gathered all your toys, laying them out on the bed with a flourish. Changbin looked a little overawed.

“That’s a lot of stuff.”

“Yeah and you know you have to use them all at once?”

For a second, he believed you and his eyes grew as wide as you had ever seen them before he scowled at you.

“Shut the fuck up. I came to you for help. You owe me.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, I’m just teasing. Now, like I said, a lot of these won’t be applicable to you, or might be but I cannot vouch for any kind of pleasure or satisfaction because most were designed for vulvas and vaginas and not penises.”

“I love it when you talk dirty to me.”

“Oh, now who’s teasing?! You want help or not?!”

“I do! Sorry! Fine, carry on.”

“Ok, well, this,” you held up a rather unwieldy, slightly inelegant thrusting toy, “is my favourite. It does not look sexy but it sure as shit feels it. The problem with the others-” you gave a sweep of your hand over a few other insertables on the bed- “is that I have short arms and sometimes I just can’t get the angle I need and keep a firm grip on them, right? Which is why this one is so good.”

You stopped yourself just as you were about to- to what? Demonstrate? You put it back down on the bed in a hurry.

“Ok, well, I don’t need anything like that.”

“No?”

“I top.”

“Right. Ok.”

You lifted another, much smaller toy.

“That looks like something you’d use to clean your face.”

“I cannot recommend it for that. If you want to get someone to squirt though, she’s your man.”

Changbin looked surprised.

“Ever made anyone squirt?” you asked, not sure if he would answer.

He shook his head.

“No, me neither... Except myself. With this. I’m not saying it’s guaranteed but she knows how to get the job done, y’know?”

“Huh.”

He took it from you, examining it as if he could learn its secrets from looks alone.

“It’s a suction toy,” you clarified. “Works on the clit. Sucks. Hard. Not entirely sure what you might get out of it, but y’know, if you want to give it a try...”

You laughed, feeling a little heat on your cheeks. It was both exceptionally weird and very not weird to be talking to Changbin like this.

“Isn’t that weird?” he asked, looking at the toy in his hand like it was a live grenade. “To use your sex toys?”

You shrugged.

“They’re clean if that’s what you mean.”

“Wasn’t suggesting they aren’t. It’s just... Isn’t that kind of intimate?”

You hadn’t thought about it before, but he had a point. And the more you thought about it, the more intimate it seemed. These toys, all of them, had been used on you, had brought you to climax over and over again in the time you’d owned them. They knew your secrets; you were exposing your secrets to Changbin by even showing them to him. If he used them, too? A shiver like ice water slipped down your spine.

But he was the one who had previously suggested you have sex. This was less intimate than that, right?

You shrugged.

“It’s just a thing, really,” you replied, even though it wasn’t at all what you thought. You moved the conversation on quickly. “I guess you’re not interested in butt plugs if you don-”

“I didn’t say that.”

You looked at his face but he was looking at the spread on your bed, his eyes roving across the row of plugs on the right.

“Ever used one?” you ventured, a little tentatively, not sure if it would constitute a slight to suggest he had or hadn’t.

He shook his head and you noticed the tips of his ears redden.

“I probably don’t need to tell you to go careful,” you began, taking a few of the options away, the ones that were too big, a little too intimidating for a first-timer. “But you should go careful. Start small, start smooth. And never, ever insert anything without a ba-”

“Yeah, I know!”

His ears were redder now. He still had your suction toy in his hand and you could see how tightly his fist was clenched around it. It confused you because Changbin couldn’t possibly be that embarrassed. Could he?

Silence fell and you weren’t sure what to say. Should you tell him which one to pick? Did you have to advise him how to use it? How could you do that when you had no idea the sort of things he liked? You wiggled your toes in your socks and tipped up lightly onto them before bringing your heels back down.

“Ok,” you began slowly when it was clear he wasn’t going to speak. You picked up a little purple plug, soft silicone, bubbles of increasing size. You handed it to him and shrugged. “Give something like that a try. See how you like it.”

Changbin didn’t look at you. He looked at the plug. He put the suction toy back down on the bed and continued to look at the small, beaded rod in his hand.

“Uh,” you continued. “Ever used a cock ring?”

He let out a comically enraged cry and stalked from your bedroom.

“Bye!” he called, not looking back as he pulled open your front door and let it slam shut behind him.

“Hey!” you shouted after him, catching his arm as it swung back to his side.

He stopped and turned.

“You know the internet exists, right? Wouldn’t that have been less embarrassing than coming here and asking me?”

He scowled, let out another anguished shout and stalked off.

You laughed because you had to laugh, because he could have just used the internet—it would have been quicker, easier, less embarrassing, and probably more helpful. But he didn’t. He came to you and asked for your secrets. You didn’t know what that meant.

There were nerves fluttering in your stomach that made you feel awkward and self-conscious. It felt like a line had been crossed somewhere. Not a bad line? But a line nonetheless.

You returned to your bedroom and surveyed your collection left on your bed and wondered if you might take a few for a spin yourself. You decided not to. Changbin was in your head and if there was one person in the world you did not want to be thinking about, it was him.

* * *

You tried not to think about it anymore. Sex. Changbin. Any thoughts that involved either sex or Changbin. Nothing that strayed into that territory. It was a hornet’s nest, you’d decided. Nothing good could come from opening that can of worms. He could use each and every single one of your toys if he wanted but not your body. No. No. Nope.

But you were having trouble focusing your mind. You were ovulating and this month in particular was being a real fucker. Your body was punishing you for being single. It was sick and tired of preparing a baby house and having you not put a baby in it. It was doing its damnedest this month to make it happen.

You were out of your mind horny.

You were beginning to sympathise with Changbin. You were, unfortunately and no matter how much you tried not to, thinking about his offer. His request. You were thinking about doing him, and yourself, that favour he’d asked.

It couldn’t be that bad, could it? It could be good. He’d made some fair points and you were curious now, you had to admit. You’d not, before this whole fake-dating thing, given much thought to how Changbin fucked, but your curiosity had been piqued. You hadn’t had your butt plug returned and you could only assume that meant he was enjoying it, though he hadn’t confirmed either way. You wondered if you could entice him to spice things up a little more. You wondered what he did. What he sounded like. What he-

“Fuck!”

You slammed your hands down on your desk and took a deep breath. You were not supposed to be thinking about this. You were supposed to be—you moved your mouse to wake your monitor—creating yet another tedious spreadsheet.

You: you working rn?

Bin: no. gym

You: later?

Bin: come over after work

‘Oh good’, you thought to yourself sourly, ‘that gives me four more hours of this. I’ve got to stew on this for four fucking hours before I can even broach the topic.’

The thought made you sick. You didn’t examine why. You worked for five more minutes, messaged your manager to say you weren’t feeling well and logged off.

Then you left your apartment and went down to the gym.

* * *

You were having a great day. A fantastic day, in fact. That was what you were telling yourself. Because you were about to hit a new deadlift PR and that made it fantastic, as long as you ignored everything else going on in your life. Which was exactly what you were doing.

You were looking down at the bar on the floor, heavily loaded, and you were talking to it nicely. You were a team: you, the bar, the weights on either end of it. You were a team, and you were going to do this thing together.

You took a deep breath, taking no notice of the guy a few metres away who was watching you. You didn’t care about him. You never cared about men in the gym because the gym was yours and no two-bit, ’roided-out gym bro was ever going to put you off your stride. Certainly not today. Let him watch. You’d show him.

You adjusted your feet and shook out your hands before placing them on the bar. You favoured a mixed grip. You got into position, took a breath in, braced your core, and lifted.

It flew.

This was not a weightlifting gym, or anything close to that; it was the gym in your apartment building that came ‘free’ with your exorbitant rent, so you had to carefully lower the weights back to the floor. Then you allowed yourself a loud, crowing whoop and a double fist-pump.

You stood straight, victorious, not even trying to hide the grin on your face and, when you tuned back into the world, the man who had been watching you was clapping. You whipped around to face him, assuming the worst, assuming he was patronising you or mocking you, but he grinned brightly at you.

“PR?” he asked.

You nodded dumbly.

“Nice one. Congrats. You made it look easy.”

He smiled and nodded once at you and then turned back to his own workout: a push day, it looked like, as he sat down on an inclined bench and lifted two enormous dumbbells to his shoulders.

Huh.

That was nice. You didn’t have many nice interactions with men at the gym. Men like him anyway. He was big, hulking, probably bulking given the softness of his skin on his arms, the tight fit of his T-shirt. You’d noticed him before, once or twice; he must live in the building to be using the gym but there were hundreds of people living here so that didn’t help much. He lifted heavy and kept to himself. That was really all you knew.

It distracted you somewhat from your victory, this guy. This nice guy who might actually have been normal. You turned back to the bar and tried to get back in the zone, remember just what you were doing. But that had been it. You were going to PR the fuck out of this lift and then stretch yourself into oblivion.

It was only when you were moving to the free area, walking past him, that you realised you hadn’t responded when he congratulated you.

“Thanks, by the way,” you said as you passed, timing it carefully so you wouldn’t take him by surprise with 20 kilos above his head.

He smiled again.

“You’re welcome. You’re not trying for more?”

He nodded to the rack, where you’d put everything away. You shook your head.

“Quitting while I’m ahead.”

“Well, you really did make it look easy. I reckon you’ve got more in you.”

He meant with regards to deadlifting. He meant he thought you could probably take another two kilos, maybe even five, but it was exactly the sort of thing you needed to hear at that moment and a lump formed in your throat. It took you off-guard and you felt your cheeks heat. You just nodded and moved quickly to the floor where you put yourself in child’s pose to hide your face.

You focused on counting your breaths and moving slowly between stretches. You didn’t look his way again when you left. You returned home, sat heavily on your sofa and cried.

That had been your first interaction with Changbin. For a while it was your only interaction. Your workouts didn’t overlap and you didn’t see him in the corridors.

Then you walked into the gym on a grey, cold November morning, barely awake and not looking forward to exercise. There were a few others there already: a much older man walking slowly on the treadmill, a very bendy woman working through some yoga on the mats, and that guy. The one from your deadlift PR.

You were pleased to see him, though you couldn’t have said why. He had, technically, made you cry. Even though it wasn’t anything at all to do with him and everything to do with your relationship falling apart around you and your self-worth being at rock bottom and your absolute desperate need for a win, even a tiny win, anything.

Still, it was nice to see him again.

You took to a treadmill to try to shake off your sleep and then moved slowly through an upper body workout. Everyone always said they hated leg day but you? You hated arms; you hated chest; you hated back and shoulders; you hated pushing and pulling. What you wouldn’t have given for squats that frosty morning.

You had just placed your dumbbell onto the floor with an unforgiving thud, setting your timer for a 30-second rest when he approached you.

“I’m really sorry to interrupt,” he began, and he did sound it, “do you have just a minute to spot me?”

You couldn’t answer immediately. You? He wanted you to spot him? He could probably bench you; how on earth would you be any good to him?

“Me?” you asked. “Are you... sure?”

He just looked towards the old man on the treadmill (yoga woman was already finished and out of the gym) and shrugged. You giggled and stood.

“I’ll do my best.”

“Thank you!”

You followed him to the squat rack and tried to do your quickest maths to calculate the weight he was attempting. You grimaced internally; that would break your fucking back. But you didn’t want to make him feel nervous or to knock any of his confidence, so you pretended you were confident, too, offering up your arms as he lodged himself beneath the bar. You kept your hands hovering as he stepped back, as he lowered, as he pushed up.... It was shaky and slow and you were genuinely worried for a second that you would have to really do something, but he made it. He took two steps forward, dumped the bar on the rack and let out a cry that was far too loud for the hour.

You laughed.

“PR?”

He grinned.

“You know it.”

“I wish I could say you made it look easy but...”

He laughed, properly laughed, and shook his head.

“Why are you trying to ruin this moment for me?”

You laughed in return and introduced yourself.

“I’m Miki.”

“Changbin,” he offered in return, holding his hand out for you to shake.

And that had been that. Somehow, though you didn’t quite know how, your workouts began to coincide more and more; you began to chat between sets; he continued to ask you to spot him despite knowing that you could do no such thing. Then one day you asked him to hang out outside the gym.

Now you couldn’t shake him. Even if you’d wanted to. Which you didn’t. Never had.

* * *

You could literally feel yourself salivate as you watched him lift and you could not believe yourself to be such a basic, animal being. Humans were supposed to be above all that ‘in heat’ stuff, but apparently you weren’t. You were watching him deadlift—leg day, beautiful leg day—watching him hinge, watching the tension on his face, the pump in his quads.... You had officially crossed the line into creepy, but you couldn’t help it.

You were hot. Literally, physically too warm.

“Binnie!” you shouted, striding across the room to him. It had slipped out, the first time in two months you’d referred to him as something other than ‘Changbin’. You didn’t even notice.

He looked at you, confused.

“What are you doing here?”

“Couldn’t wait until tonight. I need to talk to you.”

“Is everything ok?”

You shrugged, as if this was casual. As if you were about to say something normal to him.

“Everything’s fine, but...” You scanned the room to make sure it was empty. “Look, I’m here to take you up on your offer.”

The confusion did not leave his face.

“Offer?”

You shrugged again.

“Favour, request, whatever. I want to have sex.”

His mouth dropped open and he blinked twice before his brows furrowed again.

“What?”

“You heard! I want to have sex!” You whispered it, hissed it even, despite the empty room. It was embarrassing to be asking.

“Ok,” Changbin shrugged.

You had been expecting a fight, you now realised. You had thought he would protest a little – not necessarily against the sex itself but the fact that he had already asked and you’d turned him down. You thought his ego might make him string it out a little, make you work for it.

“Ok, so are you finished here?”

“Now?!”

There was the surprise you were after.

“Yes, now!”

“I’m- I’m at the gym!”

“So finish.”

“Well, I...”

“I’ll wait if you really haven’t finished your workout.”

Taken aback by the turn of events, Changbin looked a little dazed and nodded.

“I only have a couple of sets left,” he said and you nodded.

“Cool, I’ll wait for you upstairs. My place?”

He shrugged, looking as if he had no idea what the right answer was.

But it had to be your place. It had to be on your ground, not for a home advantage but... something like that. Somewhere you felt in control. Somewhere you felt comfortable. Somewhere you knew exactly what your bed was like and where the condoms were.

You decided to take the stairs, initially, because you had energy to burn. Then you realised that tiring yourself before the sex was an even stupider idea than the sex itself, so you opened the door at the top of the next flight of stairs and used the lift.

Bin: gonna shower. Be there in 15?

You: no come now.

Bin: ???

You: what?

Bin: I'm sweaty

You: so?

When he didn’t reply again, you assumed he was ignoring you and showering anyway, but then you heard the beep of your keypad and the door opened.

“Can I just ask,” he began, no greeting, “before we do this... What the fuck has got into you?”

“What?”

“You were not exactly up for it when I asked about it and now you’re skipping work to fuck me? You’re not even letting me shower?”

Your face heated with embarrassment, but the mere fact that you were asking for this gave the game away anyway, so was there really any shame in it?

“I’m ovulating,” you stated, as if that would explain it.

It would, to you. Possibly to anyone else who menstruated. Changbin looked at you wild-eyed.

“Uh...”

You saw his hands just barely raise at his sides, his right foot stepping backwards as if he were trying to surreptitiously retreat.

“I’m not trying to get pregnant, you moron! I’m ovulating and that means I am out of my fucking mind with- with wanting to get laid! I am desperate.”

“Well, you sure know how to make a man feel desired.”

“Oh, shut up. You know the situation we’re in and you said as much to me last time: there is no one else we can fuck right now, but if I don’t fuck someone, I’m going to lose my mind.”

“What happened to your arsenal of toys?”

“Not the same and you know it. I just need to be fucked right now. I am desperate! Don’t make me say it again!”

You couldn’t help the impatience and frustration in your tone and you knew it wasn’t sexy, wasn’t encouraging, but there was nothing you could do about it. You were beyond help of any kind other than his cock stuffed inside you. It just happened to make you a little less nice.

“Don’t shout at me! It’s no wonder you’re single if this is how you proposition men!”

“This is not how I proposition men! You propositioned me first! I’m just taking you up on it!”

“Well I’m not going to do it if you’re going to look that fucking angry the whole time!”

“I’m not angry; I’m frustrated!”

“Potayto, po-fucking-tah-to!”

“Are we doing this or not?!”

Changbin didn’t answer immediately and you swore to yourself that, if he said no, you would be fine with it. You would not explode and die right there on the floor of your living room. And you would not hate him forever.

He jabbed a finger at you.

“We’re doing this but you have to not be a total cunt to me the whole time.”

You decided not to hesitate. You didn’t have the patience for taking it slow anyway but one of you had to be decisive; it would be awkward if there was hesitation and stumbling and embarrassment. He had just confirmed his agreement. He had said you were doing it. So you had to do it. Do the damn thing. You grabbed the front of his T-shirt and pulled him towards you, crashing your lips into his.

It was nothing like the first kiss. That was gentle and short and chaste and this was everything but. Before you’d snaked your tongue into his mouth, he had hoisted you in the air. You wrapped your legs around his waist, and he carried you to the sofa and laid you down. He moaned when you sucked at his tongue and you moaned back, your hands already pulling his shirt up his chest.

His skin was damp and sticky with sweat, salty when you put your mouth on it. You didn’t care. You liked the soft animal of his body, liked its power, liked the way it was firm under your hands, unyielding. Liked the way he could so easily have his way with you if he wanted; it’s not like you were weak yourself but Changbin was stronger and you knew you couldn’t take him in a fight. You wanted that. You wanted all that used against you right now. Not to fight but to fuck. You wanted him to fuck you so hard, you couldn’t stand. You could already feel the intense ache in your core as it radiated heat. You needed to be touched. So badly. Now that it was actually happening, you couldn’t believe you had let yourself go so long without it.

“Binnie,” you panted, clutching the waistband of your trousers, shuffling them down, trying to discard them. “Binnie, touch me, please.”

He responded with a nip to the delicate skin of your neck and a hand sliding down your stomach.

“Fucking hell,” he breathed when his fingers found your wet slit. “You weren’t kidding.”

“What?”

“You are desperate.”

“Shut the fuck up, Changbin,” you spat, with perhaps too much bite.

His fingers withdrew and he leant up on his hands, looking down at you with his brows raised.

“You can’t ask me to touch you and then speak to me like that when I do.”

You rolled your eyes and gave him a simpering smile.

“Aw, does Binnie not like it when I’m not nice to him? Oh, poor Binnie,” you cooed in a baby voice. “Does Binnie like praise, huh? Want me to praise you?”

His face hardened but he didn’t tell you it was over, that if you were going to behave like that, he’d change his mind. He didn’t say anything and you knew it was because you were right but he didn’t want to tell you. That was one benefit of sleeping with someone you knew so well: you could read him. You didn’t need him to confirm.

But you also weren’t great at being nice. Praise was not a thing that came naturally to you. And he had said you weren’t allowed to be a total cunt to him. That was fair. You rolled your eyes.

“Fine, I’ll be nice,” you huffed. “Promise.”

It was Changbin who rolled his eyes then and looked as if he didn’t believe you but didn’t care either way. He lowered himself down and brought his lips to yours.

His kiss swallowed the loud sound you made when his fingers found their way south and made their entrance. It had been too long since someone else had got you off. Way too long. You knew it from the way your walls were already spasming, your muscles tightening, your breath catching.

“Harder,” you gasped when he let your mouth go. “Harder, faster, please.”

There was a minute pause in which he registered your instruction and then he complied, but it wasn’t enough.

“Seriously,” you continued. “You don’t have to be nice to me. I want more.”

His eyes met yours and when he raised his brows this time, your stomach swooped; it was dark and promising and there was something in his eyes that said he was going to give you everything you wanted.

He slid another finger inside you and drew back so he could focus his other hand on your swollen clit.

You couldn’t speak. You whimpered and keened and nodded; you clutched at Changbin’s arm and the sofa cushion; you arched your back and drew your feet in. You came with a loud cry and your body flopped backwards, your chest heaving as you got your breath back, your body shaking just a little.

“Thanks,” you panted.

Changbin laughed.

“You’re welcome.”

You pulled him closer, slipping a hand around the back of his neck to bring your face to his, to kiss him, hard, deep, indulgent.

“Where do you keep condoms?” he broke away to ask and your mind was still dazed enough that it took you a second. You shook your head, tried to clear it, and pointed into your bathroom. Changbin moved off you and you stumbled as you got to your feet. He was rising as if to go himself, but you waved him off, sat him back down.

The few steps between him and the bathroom gave you a second to catch your breath, to anticipate what was about to happen with a buzzing kind of glee wailing in your head (and elsewhere). You felt greedy. Insatiable. You wanted to take an entire box of condoms out there and use them all. You wanted to break yourself on him, break him, until there was nothing left of you but dust.

You took one foil packet from the box and returned to Changbin who was still standing next to the sofa, waiting for you. His black shorts hid the damp spots of pre-cum but couldn’t hide the tent of his erection. You felt your mouth water at the thought of it. An icy streak of doubt passed through you when you realised you’d never seen it before. Never had cause to give it any thought at all. What if it was disappointing?

Then Changbin dropped his shorts and his boxers, and you let out a breath you hadn’t realised you were holding.

“Thank god,” you muttered under your breath, not intending for him to hear, but he cocked his head at you.

“For what?”

You snorted.

“Thank god you have a nice dick.”

He laughed and you could almost see his pride swell in the way he tucked his shoulders back and raised his head a little, the ever so slightly bashful grin that nevertheless carried a certain smugness. You had never known how he did that: vulnerability and arrogance at the same time. But then again, he was a Leo.

You wasted no more time. You pushed him back onto the sofa, tore open the condom packet, and rolled it down his length. You held his cock as you positioned yourself over him, making yourself sink slowly. Making yourself take him inch by inch not all at once, because you would never get this first time again and you wanted to savour it. You wanted to remember exactly how he felt, his girth stretching you in a way that bordered on but didn’t cause pain.

When he was fully sheathed, you sat your full weight on him and took his face in your hands. You kissed him, sloppy and wet and full of tongue, then slowly began to roll your hips. He groaned, squeezed at your glutes, tipped his head back and sighed.

“Fuck, you feel amazing.”

You nodded, but he had his eyes closed, and you remembered just exactly who it was you were dealing with.

“You, too,” you replied. You tucked your face into his neck and keened as you adjusted your angle. You didn’t really talk much, usually. Weren’t sure what to say. Knew you had to say something. You kissed his neck to buy some time, sucking a bruise into his soft skin, tasting the salty tang of his sweat. “Fuck, Binnie,” you whispered. “So good.”

Lame. But you didn’t have the headspace to dwell on it because it was so good. He fit you just right; you were tight and wet and hot and your legs trembled every time the head of his cock squeezed past your g-spot.

“I’m gonna flip you,” he grunted, having noticed it, feeling the clench in your walls with each pass.

Then without another second’s delay, he did, and you were on your back and he was drilling into you with hard, precise thrusts of his hips. You let your head tip back and your mouth hang open, just as he had only moments earlier.

“More,” you murmured as you lost yourself to it. To him. To the pleasure of it all, the pressure building, coiling like a spring. This was exactly what you had wanted. Needed. The relief of it was breath-taking and that was before the orgasm hit you.

Then it slammed into you like a train on a track and you cried out. Your eyes squeezed shut and your muscles tensed hard and your cunt clenched tight around Changbin’s thick length. He grunted, he gasped, he cried out, too, spilling into the condom and letting the tension in his body go, just enough to relax, but not so much to crush you.

When you opened your eyes, stars danced in front of them, the ceiling of your apartment temporarily transformed into a night-sky kaleidoscope. You brushed the hair from Changbin’s face.

“Relax, Bin, you can’t crush me.”

He snorted lightly and let himself put his weight onto you.

Maybe he could crush you. But you could take it. For a moment at least.

“Thank you,” he said, his breath coming in heavy gasps, his stomach pushing against yours with each inhale.

You laughed breathily, your lungs buried under his weight, trapped.

“You’re welcome.”

He lifted his head and the look on his face was hesitant, possibly even a little shy, but you knew what he wanted because you wanted it too. You drew his face to yours and kissed him, soft and sweet, then a little less, then a little deeper, with a little more urgency, your tongue dancing with his, his teeth biting down on your lips, little moans escaping the both of you.

It lasted longer than you had intended. So long that you wanted to go again, that you’d recovered enough to want him some more, to want seconds and even thirds. The box of condoms in your bathroom cabinet sprung into your mind and your heart quickened.

“Hey,” you said quietly, holding his face back from yours so you could look in his eyes. “Do you want to do that again?”

It took a second for your words to register and he didn’t reply except to bring his lips to yours once more. He twisted his body so he could rest on his forearms above you, then he put his weight onto his left side, his right hand trailing down your body as he kissed you.

“Ok, now I really have to shower,” Changbin said, standing from the sofa with a long, tired groan.

“You can shower here if you want,” you said, twisting around to watch him get dressed.

He smiled but shook his head.

“No way. I’ve never known a single person who takes less care of their skin than you do. Your soap would strip me like paint thinner.”

You snorted and rolled your eyes.

“Whatever. My skin is just naturally soft.”

Changbin chuckled.

“You keep telling yourself that, babe.”

You rose, too, as he reached the door and, without realising it was happening, he turned with his hand on the doorknob and you kissed goodbye. It wasn’t until the door was shutting after him that you realised it had happened. Was that weird?

You didn’t have the energy for it. You showered quickly and flopped onto your sofa for an ill-advised, late-afternoon, post-coital nap.

* * *

The next morning, you woke late and rushed through your morning workout, your morning shower, your breakfast, and hurried out of the door to the office. You made yourself a coffee, logged into everything, and then sat staring blankly at your inbox.

You had sex with Changbin. Twice. You hadn’t given it enough thought yesterday—not after and certainly not before. But that was crossing a line, right? Sex changed things. You had put him off the first time because you thought it would make things weird, that it would be weird.

But it hadn’t been. It wasn’t awkward or embarrassing. It was good. So good you’d asked for it again. So good that you could still feel it in your body as you twisted vacantly from side to side on your chair. It had been good for him, too, right? He had been vocal (that much you had expected) but was that acting?

He had been a very convincing fake boyfriend so far. Maybe it had just been a continuation of the act.

Except it had been his idea. In the first place, anyway.

You could feel yourself getting tangled up in knots, so you had a stern word with yourself and set up blocks on your phone so that you might be able to focus better.

The frustrating thing about it was that you couldn’t talk to anyone. You couldn’t go to any of your friends and say ‘oh my god, I slept with Changbin’ because, as far as they were concerned, you’d been sleeping together for weeks—months!—now. It couldn’t be new, couldn’t be news.

You stopped at the shop on the way home for a bottle of wine, then you took it two floors beyond your apartment and let yourself in.

Changbin was on his sofa, shaking a protein drink in a plastic bottle. He looked surprised to see you.

“Look,” you began immediately, plonking the bottle onto the coffee table and retrieving two glasses from his kitchen cupboard. You placed these on the table and poured a generous glug of wine into each. “I have to talk to you and you are just going to have to go with it because I cannot talk to anyone else about this, alright?”

“Ok.”

You took a deep breath and blew it out sharply.

“I slept with Changbin.”

His eyes narrowed and he looked from side to side and back to you.

“Uh... You know I’m Changbin, right? That’s me.”

“Yes, I know!” you shouted, flinging your hands up, sloshing wine over the rim and onto your trousers. It was white at least. “But I can’t tell anyone else, can I? Because then they would know we haven’t been sleeping together! So you are the only person I can talk to! Just go with it.” Then, to let him know you actually really needed this, you added, “please.”

“Ok.”

“I slept with Changbin,” you repeated.

“Right,” he started, and you could tell he still wasn’t quite sure which response was the right one. “Uh, how was it?”

“Honestly, really fucking good.”

He grinned, his proud ego shining through, and you slapped him hard on the arm.

“Shut up!” you hissed, even though he hadn’t said anything. “I’m saying it was good.”

“And that’s... bad?”

“No! ... I don’t know! I don’t know anything! Isn’t it weird? Why did we do it? Why wasn’t it weird?! Aren’t you confused?!”

Changbin looked away for a moment and thought it over.

“I’m not confused.”

“You aren’t?”

He shrugged.

“Should I be?”

“It doesn’t affect you at all that we slept together?”

“Does it affect you? Affect you how?”

“I don’t know!” you wailed.

“It’s like I said before, we’re pretending to be dating so we can’t sleep with anyone else. It’s, what did I call it? Stress relief.”

“You also said you were too horny to care if it was weird, but now we’ve had sex, so the... the pressure is gone, right? As in... We’ve had relief... Does that change things?”

He shrugged again and it lit a match of frustration within you.

“Changbin! For fuck’s sake, stop shrugging! Stop being so unbothered by this!”

“Why do you want me to be bothered?! It sounds like you want it to be weird, to come between us, or ruin our friendship or something!-”

“-Of course I don’t!”

“Then why are you here insisting things have to change?”

“I don’t know!”

A loud thumping from the apartment next door broke the tension and you both slumped back on the sofa. You would have to stop shouting if you were going to continue this conversation because Changbin had lived here long enough for you to know that that was a polite warning call from his neighbour.

“If it’s made you feel uncomfortable, we don’t have to do it again,” Changbin said, his voice softer now, quieter.

“I’m not uncomfortable. I could never be uncomfortable with you. It just... I don’t know. Maybe I’m overthinking it. You’re right. It was just sex. And we’re just friends.”

“Right.”

“Ok.”

You drained your wine glass and re-filled it, putting your feet up on the table as Changbin switched on the TV. He took a minute selecting something to watch (opting for a youtube video on the best mechanics of the Romanian deadlift which was not as boring as it sounds) and, once it was playing, he picked up his wine glass and asked, without looking at you.

“But where does that leave us, exactly? Re: sex. Is it off the table?”

You took a minute to think about it. You didn’t want to say no. Because you knew what it was like now. You knew what you’d be missing. And, if he was right, then it wouldn’t change anything between you. You could have it all. But saying yes still felt like saying something. And you weren’t sure exactly what.

“It’s not off the table,” you answered quietly, your glass perched on your lips so you could take a drink as soon as the sentence ended. You took a gulp larger than you’d intended and tried not to choke.

“Ok, then.”

* * *

It was so not off the table. It was so on the table that it almost became a permanent fixture. It seemed silly not to. You couldn’t sleep with anyone else while you were pretending to date each other and the seal was well and truly broken. It didn’t feel as though you had anything to lose, not since it became clear that it didn’t change things between you.

If anything, it made things better.

It was as if a barrier that you hadn’t known existed between you had dissolved. Pretending to be his girlfriend was so much easier now. You’d always felt awkward about the physicality of it: having to hold his hand, make sure you were near him, the occasional jeering pressure to kiss in front of people as if you had something to prove to them. It was easy now because you’d touched far more than just his hands, kissed him in ways that would be indecent viewed by an audience.

“You guys seem good,” Chaeyong commented lightly from across the table.

You raised your eyebrows in surprise.

“Uh, we do?”

“When did we seem bad?” Changbin asked at the same time.

“Honestly, no one had any hope of the two of you making it,” Seungmin added. “You were always so weird with each other. We thought you might have broken up but didn’t want to tell people or something.”

You and Changbin exchanged a quick glance and you tried not to make it obvious when you gulped and found the inside of your lip between your teeth.

“You mean you think we were pretending to date?” Changbin asked, thoroughly convincing in his bemused scorn.

“Fuck knows! But something was going on, for sure.”

“But you seem normal now.” Chaeyoung smiled sweetly and she looked innocent but, truthfully, she had been your biggest concern: nothing got past her and you were worried that she was still unconvinced.

“Gee, thanks.”

Thank god for Changbin, who was unflappable in the face of his own deceptions.

“We’re saying we’re happy for you, idiots,” Seungmin offered with a withering glare before turning to his other side, where apparently the conversation was of greater interest.

You turned to Changbin with a slyly triumphant smile on your face, which he returned exactly. You didn’t stop yourself leaning forward to kiss him and he didn’t stop you either.

* * *

For the first few weeks of your ‘relationship’, you had genuinely spent time and effort trying to think of a way for the two of you to end it. None seemed satisfactory. You weren’t really an experienced liar (not to this extent) and they all seemed transparent, lame, obviously made-up. It was as if you had never experienced any sort of relationship before because you just couldn’t think of a reasonable way for you and Changbin to stop dating.

Frustrated by your lack of progress on the topic, you thought of it less and less often. Then you and Changbin started sleeping together and you stopped thinking about it altogether. This situation was working out quite nicely for the both of you. All the fun parts of a relationship with none of the drawbacks.

You were enjoying it so much, you were annoyed you hadn’t thought of it before. And it seemed like the feeling was mutual. Changbin hadn’t raised the topic of your break-up; he still called your pet names and kissed you in public.

You had been sure, when you first suggested it, that it would be a disaster. But your desperation to get one over on your sister had been just enough to override that worry. Now, you were certain it was the best idea you’d ever had, and you were very nearly grateful to Hani for forcing it.

“Hey,” Changbin said softly, catching your hand and dragging you away from the group.

It was summer and the river park was busy. You had amassed a greater group of people than you’d expected – word going around to friends of friends of friends – and your absence from it would not be noticed quickly.

Not that anyone would care if they did notice. You were a couple now; you were allowed to disappear by yourselves.

“Have you met Sakura?” he asked.

“Uh, yeah, Felix’s friend, right?”

He nodded.

“Yeah, I mean, we met today. I don’t know her. Why?”

“She asked me out.”

“What?! Doesn’t she know you have a girlfriend?”

It shouldn’t have bothered you. Because you weren’t his girlfriend, not really. You didn’t have any real claim to him. In fact, this should probably have happened before now, you told yourself. Changbin was a catch; he was hot and fun and kind and, frankly, anyone would be fucking lucky to have him.

But you had him. As far as anyone knew anyway. Hadn’t you literally been introduced to Sakura as his girlfriend earlier that day? Where the fuck did she get off asking out your boyfriend?

“I guess she forgot? I don’t know.”

Changbin shrugged again and you felt your hackles raise.

“Well, why are you bringing it up to me? Obviously you said no.”

“I said no.”

“So why bother telling me? Are you saying you want to go out with her?”

“I was just checking whether or not I’d ever be allowed to go out with anyone again. Y’know, if you were ever going to end this thing like you promised you would months ago?”

You started. He hadn’t brought that up for ages. You hadn’t thought about it. You felt strongly that you should not admit to not having thought about it.

“Of course, I’m going to end it,” you hissed. “Want me to do it right now so you can go over and tell Sakura you’ve changed your mind?”

“Don’t overreact, Miki. This was always going to end. You specifically promised me that it would, in fact.”

“And it will! I actually thought we were both ok with things as they were, since we’re both getting something from it, but fine. I’ll have your break-up ready for you tomorrow.”

You didn’t wait for a response. You stalked off, too angry to notice that you were leaving your phone and your bag and everything else in the park. Too angry to turn back when you did notice. You walked, with heavy, angry footsteps, for a mile or two in the direction of your apartment which was still several miles away. Then you stopped and stood and didn’t know what to do. Your heart was still pounding, your breath coming heavily because you did not commit yourself to cardio in the way you did to lifting, and you were still shaky with anger.

You could not turn back. The horror of the embarrassment you would feel having to return after storming off was too strong. But you couldn’t walk all the way home. You weren’t even sure exactly which way to go, having never done the journey fully on foot before. You were stranded. You knew your only option was the river. But you decided you would rather die than go back there. You would rather sleep on the street than show your face.

You continued to stand there, waiting for your anger to fade, to be replaced by worry and, yes, embarrassment. You tried to guess what time everyone would start leaving. It was still light (such was the curse of the summer months) so it was entirely possible that some would stay late into the evening, the night even. You couldn’t stand out on the street for that long.

“Hey.”

You whipped around at the sound of his voice. He was five feet away.

“What do you want?”

You could see him biting his tongue, being the bigger person.

“Thought you might need this,” Changbin said, holding out your bag.

“Whatever,” you replied, neither turning away nor reaching out for it.

“Well, if you don’t want it...”

He went to turn, to walk back the way he had come, but you snatched your bag from his hand. Before he could react, you put your feet to asphalt, as quickly as you could without running.

“You’re fucking welcome!” he shouted after you.

You were seething again, your stomach roiling, your blood boiling, sweat pricking in your hair. You walked to the nearest subway station in a kind of red haze, barely aware of your surroundings, cognisant only of your own body and its rage.

He didn’t call you the next day.

Or the next day.

Or the one after that.

You wondered if that was it. If that would do it. Break you up. Was it already over? The thought pained you, but you were still angry with him. He had pulled you aside to tell you that another woman was interested in him; he had suggested he was interested in her. But he was supposed to be yours.

He wasn’t yours. You repeated it to yourself, knowing that it should help, that it should make it not hurt, that it should make you not angry with him, that it was the truth. But it didn’t work. You couldn’t make it go away.

He didn’t call you for a full week and you were scowling at lunch with your sister and her husband, your parents, too. Chan asked if he could speak with you. It shook you from your sour stupor and you followed him without hesitation.

“So what’s up with you and Changbin?” he asked, casually, as if he weren’t kicking a hornet’s nest.

“Nothing,” came your sullen reply.

“Ok... So what’s up with you and Changbin?”

You scowled some more and kept your mouth shut.

“There’s obviously something going on between the two of you, and he won’t tell me what it is so I’m asking you. It sucks to see you two like this. You know how happy Hani and I were about you two getting together....”

If you hadn’t been so self-indulgent with your week-long bad mood, you might have sensed his tone, caught the micro-expressions on his face that were giving you an opening. But you had been self-indulgent, so you missed them all.

“If he won’t tell you, I don’t see why I should.”

“You don’t have to tell me anything, but I thought I would ask you myself before I tell your sister.”

He had your full attention now.

“What do you mean, tell my sister?”

“I mean tell her that I’m worried that something has happened between the two of you. You’re fighting or not speaking or somethin-”

“How do you know that?”

“Because I know both of you? Changbin has been out of sorts all week and you have barely touched your food, barely uttered a word except to be as horrible to your sister as you’ve ever been.”

Chan never told you off. He never told anyone off. You felt chastened and shamed but that only fuelled your anger.

“Fine, I’ll go.”

“That’s not what I said.”

“I’m clearly not wanted here if I’m so horrible to your precious, little wife-” You saw the way his jaw clenched and you knew that he would kick you out himself if you said much more; it felt good, pushing that button. Made you feel like you had a little bit of control, a little bit of power. “As if I ever gave a shit about her anyway. I only come to these stupid lunches because my parents make me. I hate coming. I hate Hani. I hate you. And I fucking hate Changbin!”

Chan said nothing. He looked at you with dark, furious eyes and took hold of your elbow. He escorted you carefully to the front door, waited while you put on your shoes, handed you your things, and shut the door firmly behind you.

You wished you could scream. You immediately ordered a taxi and waited impatiently until you got home. Then you picked up your pillow, pressed it to your face and let rip. You raged until your head hurt and then you fell asleep on your sofa, waking in the small hours of the morning with a sore neck. You climbed into your bed and tossed and turned. You did not sleep. You refused to get up.

When the sun was high in the sky and streaming into your apartment, there came a knock on the door. You thought for five seconds about ignoring it because you weren’t expecting and didn’t want to see anyone. Then you got up to answer it anyway.

“So apparently you hate me,” he said in greeting.

Changbin stood at your door. He didn’t let himself in. He knocked. He waited for you to open it.

Then he said that, and you bit back before you could stop yourself.

“Isn’t the feeling mutual?”

Changbin sighed. Rolled his eyes.

“Ok, let me know when you’ll stop being a cunt and maybe I’ll try again.”

He walked away and you let him.

* * *

You kept waiting for him to come again. He didn’t. You waited for him to call or text. He didn’t. As time went on, you had assumed you would care less, get over it, stop being bothered by it. You didn’t.

It had started to hurt. It began as a needling kind of pain, sharp but small. Then it began to grow and now you woke with a hole in your chest and bitterness in your heart.

You thought about him all the time. What he must be telling people. You had refused to talk to anyone about it, refused to go out, shut yourself up in your poky apartment waiting for it all to go away.

It didn’t.

There was a knock on your door and you jumped, because it had to be Changbin. Who else could get into the building?

Your body physically withered at the sight of your sister.

“How did you get in here?” you asked.

“I know your building code, Miki. I know your door code, too, but I didn’t want to just barge in.”

“Why not? You love barging in. You love poking your nose in where it’s not welcome.”

Hani did not reply. She sat on your coffee table and gestured for you to take a seat opposite her on your sofa.

“What do you want?”

“I came to see if you wanted to talk about it.”

“Talk about what?”

Hani closed her eyes briefly and you knew she was rolling them beneath her lids. She was too polite to just do it outwardly, even though it was obvious how she felt.

“You and Changbin haven’t been speaking much, huh?”

“Fuck off, Hani.”

“I know he misses you.”

“You don’t know anything.”

“I’m married to his best friend, M-”

“I’m his best friend!”

“Ok, ok, I’m married to one of his very close friends. Chan says he’s miserable and I know you are, too.”

“You don’t know anything.”

“I don’t know much, I’ll admit that, but that’s because you don’t tell me anything. Have you ever considered that I’d be less ‘fucking annoying’ if you ever let me in? If you ever volunteered information about yourself and your life? I don’t like being the person you think I am. I know you think I’m hen-pecking you, I’m a nag, I’m just like Mum and all the much less kind things you’ve said. But I’m not. You just think I am because you take every question as an attack; you think every inquiry is an interrogation.

“You are the spikiest person I’ve ever met and the reason I was pushing the boyfriend thing with you is because you’ve got worse since you and M-”

“Don’t say his name-”

“... Since the break-up. You were spiky before but now you’re mean and you’re bitter and miserable. And I know you want to be happy, so I pushed it. And then you got with Changbin and I was so happy. You were so happy. Now you’re going to ruin it all by being your-”

“That’s why I think you’re a cunt,” you interrupted. “I’m going to ruin my relationship by being myself? Thanks a fucking bunch.”

“I was going to say you’re going to ruin it by being your worst self. Your scared self. Your angry, short-tempered self that lashes out at people. You have a soft centre, Miki, but you also have a moat full of spikes and a portcullis. You have thorns and a dragon guarding you.

“But I saw the way you looked at Changbin and I haven’t seen you look like that for a long time. Even towards the end of your last relationship, you’d lost it. But you had it back. And I don’t want you to throw it away.”

You didn’t reply because you didn’t have anything to say. You couldn’t argue with the truth, but you weren’t going to tell her she was right. You couldn’t take it.

You’d spent your whole life feeling like the fuck up, the first pancake, compared to Hanbyeol and her ability to get everything right. She had one boyfriend before she went to university and they were sweet and innocent and didn’t even sleep together. Then she met Chan on her first day at university and they’d been together ever since. She graduated with a perfect degree and got a good job on a good career path and has been walking it ever since.

You slept with your first boyfriend at the age of 15 and he promptly dumped you. You spent four years on an art degree that went fucking nowhere and did nothing for you. You’d had jobs and quit jobs and been fired from jobs; you’d dated and had partners and dumped them and been dumped by them. Nothing stuck.

“You don’t know anything,” you mumbled sullenly back, your fire extinguished.

“I would if you told me.” But she wasn’t chastising, wasn’t telling you off. She was just saying it, softly, gently now.

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“That’s ok. You don’t have to talk about it with me if you don’t want. But you should talk to Changbin. He really does miss you. And I really don’t want you to miss out on what you had with him because you’re afraid or being stubborn. Sometimes you have to meet people halfway, Miki; it’s not fair to make him come to you every time.”

She stood and left your apartment without another word. Your bottom lip wobbled.

Was it too late?

You didn’t know where to start. How to start. What to do. Who to turn to. The only person you could talk about this with was Changbin because he was the only person who knew the truth. It wasn’t even a matter of your pride anymore; it would have felt like a betrayal to reveal the secret to anyone else. But you couldn’t just go to him, half-cocked, with nothing in your head but a jumble of half-formed sentences and no idea what you really wanted.

You let another week go by.

The gym felt stuffy. You were sure the aircon wasn’t working properly because it should not have been that warm in there, even if it was over 30 degrees outside. You were dripping with sweat and looking around, praying for chalk so you could dry your hands properly. You had given up on the barbell because you didn’t think you’d be able to grip it with such wet hands. You were miserable and grumpy, and the workout sucked.

Then Changbin walked in.

You felt sick. Your first instinct was to hide, but there was nowhere to hide and he’d already seen you. Your eyes caught and he slowed to a stop, just looking at you. You had to make the first move. You knew you had to.

You stood from the bench and walked towards him, crossing your heart and hoping to die that he wouldn’t walk away.

“Hi,” you said, your voice small.

“Hi,” he returned.

You could barely look him in the eye. You hadn’t prepared for this.

“It’s pretty unbearable in here, right now. I think the aircon is broken,” you offered, cursing yourself all the while.

Changbin seemed surprised and he nodded with a small ‘oh’.

“I think I’ll be fine,” he said. “I wasn’t planning to be long anyway.”

“Right. Yeah. Ok.”

It was tugging at your heart, this need to say something, this inability to do so.

Changbin waited only a few more seconds and then he pointed beyond you and began to move away.

“Wait!”

He stopped.

“I... can we talk? Sometime. Not now. Later. I don’t know. I- I... We should talk.”

You kept your eyes trained on the ground and could feel his gaze on you. He answered slowly.

“Yeah, ok. Text me or something.”

You nodded and scarpered, workout unfinished, but you reached the lift and breathed a sigh of relief. Had that been so bad? You’d survived. You were still in one piece. And he’d agreed to talk to you.

Part of you wanted to go back and tell him, actually, it has to be now. You wanted to get it over with. Another part of you wanted it to never happen. You still didn’t know what you would say to him.

You stood, nervously, outside his apartment, waiting for your courage to build to a sufficient level for you to knock on his door. It was taking its sweet time. You weren’t sure if it would ever get there. Your palms were sweaty, the backs of your knees, too. You realised the last time you were this nervous to speak to someone was the day your last relationship ended and you stood outside your shared apartment, waiting for the courage to go in and end it. Have it ended for you. Not by you. You had certainly never been this nervous with Changbin: not the first time you went to your sister’s pretending to be together, not the first time you had sex. You had always felt comfortable with him.

Now you didn’t. And that was on you.

You closed your eyes, gritted your teeth, and knocked. The door opened almost instantly.

“Oh. Hi. That was quick.”

“I know; you’ve been out there for ages. I’ve been standing here waiting for you to knock.”

“Oh.”

Your face flamed so hot, it made your eyes sting. Changbin stood back and gestured you into his apartment. You waited for him to sit on the sofa and then you took your place on the floor, just off to the side. Somehow, you didn’t feel like you could sit equally next to him. You had apologies to make, grovelling to do.

Changbin waited.

“I’m sorry,” you offered first. The easiest thing to say because it covered all manner of your sins.

“What for?”

Less easy.

“Everything,” you choked. “For making you pretend to be my boyfriend, for not breaking us up, for my short temper and impatience, for overreacting to the Sakura thing, for not speaking to you. All of it, really.”

You heard him take a deep breath but didn’t dare look at him. The silence felt stiff. You couldn’t say anything more even if you’d wanted to. You needed to know what his response was first.

He sighed.

“They’re not the things I want you to be sorry for... I suppose I should apologise, too.”

“What for?”

You were struggling with the silence. If there was one word that could never describe you or Changbin, it was ‘quiet.’ You would have needed more hands to be able to count on fingers the number of noise complaints he’d received from his neighbours. It was never like this between the two of you. It was never awkward like this.

“I don’t want to say it,” he said eventually. “I feel like shit and I don’t want to say it because I’ll feel even more like shit.”

“I don’t want you to feel like shit.”

“That’s how you’ve been treating me.”

Tears pricked in your eyes and you did your best to swallow the anger that was rising with them. Your temper was the reason you were in this mess; it could not get you out of it. But Changbin continued before you could find a word to say.

“I got it wrong, obviously. I thought it was going somewhere. Not at first, obviously. But something had changed and I thought, ok, maybe something is happening now. Maybe this... Maybe this could be real. Then it went on longer and longer and I realised how stupid I was to think that. Because you didn’t want anything more. That was clear. That was really clear and I should have seen it long before I did.”

He sighed heavily and fell back against the sofa cushions. You risked a peek and saw him contemplate the ceiling.

“I made the Sakura thing up.”

“What?”

“I made it up. Of course she didn’t ask me out! She had been introduced to us together. You were introduced as my girlfriend; why would she have then tried something? I just had to see how you’d react. I wanted to... test, I suppose, how you felt.”

You took your time speaking because you could feel your rage simmering in your gut. You were trying so hard not to be angry, not to react. But he’d lied to you. Manipulated you. This was his fault and all this time you thought it was yours? Why would he do that?

“Are you going to fucking say anything, Miki?”

‘Yes,’ you thought, ‘just as soon as I can stop seeing red.’

“I don’t understand.”

The words were sharp in your throat, painfully clawing their way out. You could feel Changbin’s patience ebbing away, too, and the whole situation was as if you were dancing on a tightrope. You had thought it would be easy to straighten out: an apology, some reluctant forgiveness, a few jokes and things would be back to normal. Guess not.

“It made me feel used.”

His confession was small. Small and quiet so you knew it was real, that he wasn’t after a reaction or a fight. He was just telling you the truth.

“Used?”

“I was up for it, at first. I agreed, I didn’t have to but I did. I signed up for it. I know that. Pretending to be your boyfriend was fun to start with. Making you squirm. Though, to be honest, it wasn’t fun that you were so... disgusted by the idea of us being together. The way you flinched every time I touched you or looked nauseated half the time at the thought of us so much as kissing. That wasn’t exactly a balm to my ego. But I could take it. And you got used to it, I thought. Got less disgusted.

“Then we started having sex and things changed. You changed. And I didn’t really know what it meant but I know you well enough that I knew not to push too hard. I guess I thought, at some point, you would come out and say it. But you didn’t. At all. Things carried on exactly as they were and I realised that’s what you wanted. You didn’t want me for anything more. You wanted to have sex and pretend we were together but you didn’t want to be together. You didn’t want me. You just wanted me to keep up your pretence to get one over on your sister; you wanted the convenience of, I don’t even know what. It was like you liked the idea of being with me but not the reality of it. And I got sick of it, ok?

“That’s what made me feel like shit. That’s what made me feel used. And I know you; I knew you were never going to talk to me about it. So I made up the Sakura thing. I wanted a reaction from you. I wanted to see if you gave a shit at all.”

You wanted him to continue, to say things so that you didn’t have to. Because you did give a shit. You were incensed that Sakura dared to ask him out. You were angry with him because you felt like he wanted to go out with her. You felt betrayed by it. Abandoned. Rejected. Surely that had been obvious by your reaction. Surely you didn’t have to say that now?

Though you still weren’t sure what it meant. Hearing Changbin spell it all out like that: his hurt, the word ‘disgusted’, his hope, your inability to communicate being thrown in your face when you had hoped it was a secret. You didn’t want him to see you like that: inept and selfish and inconsiderate. Used. You had used him. Your first instinct had been to kick back at that, deny it vociferously, scream at Changbin and call him every name under the sun, storm out.

But you weren’t doing that anymore. You weren’t going to let your temper ruin this. Again.

Or you were trying.

“Obviously I give a shit,” you said sullenly, a little sulkily despite your best efforts.

“I don’t know.”

“How can you say that you don’t know? Don’t you know me?”

“Yeah, I know you but I’m really beginning to see the limits of my knowledge. I can’t know everything, Miki. I can’t read your mind. Sometimes you have to say things. Sometimes you have to say things even if the other person already knows them! Things need to be said. They need to be heard.”

“What things?”

“I don’t believe you don’t know what I’m talking about.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” You could hear your voice rising but couldn’t stop it.

“Yes, you do!” His was rising, too. “You know exactly what I’m saying and you know what I want you to say but you won’t say it and that’s the fucking problem, isn’t it?”

You opened your mouth to argue back but he got in first.

“Or you really, actually don’t know what I’m talking about and that, in itself, is a problem. Either way, you need to figure it out.”

His tone was final. Conclusive. Dismissive. But you had only just got started so you weren’t going to leave just yet.

“Why do I have to figure it out?”

“Because it’s your problem!”

“No, it’s not! You’re the one who lied about Sakura! You made this mess!”

Changbin got to his feet.

“I made this mess? This entire thing was your idea! I have followed your lead the entire time and you have led me down a fucking merry path! Do you kn-”

“I’ve been leading?! You’re the one who suggested we have sex!”

“You’re the one who took me up on it! And I’d never have suggested it if we weren’t trapped in a situation of your making!”

“You didn’t have to go along with it!”

“You asked me to! You’re my friend! Friends do each other favours! Of course I was going to say yes!”

“I didn’t force you to!”

“Friendship forced me, you idiot! But I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that you don’t understand that.”

“What the fuck does that mean?”

You were interrupted by a knock at the door. Changbin answered and it was building security, here to offer up yet another warning regarding the noise. Changbin apologised, promised to keep it down and returned to the sofa.

“Ball’s in your court,” he told you. “It’s up to you.”

“What’s up to me?”

You made the mistake of looking up at him and his glare could have turned you to stone.

“Don’t act stupid, Miki. You figure it out.”

You wanted to argue. You wanted to have this out right here, right now. Arguing cleared the air. You had been getting somewhere before his pathetic, meddling neighbours had gone and complained about the noise. Maybe you should have made him come to you; your neighbours had never complained, never even made a peep. Maybe you should have gone somewhere open – the park, the river, somewhere you could shout at each other amongst all the noise of the city.

You didn’t want to leave.

“Will you just go?” he asked, impatience ringing clear as a bell through his tone.

You bit the inside of your lip to stop yourself saying no. Then you let it go.

“No. I’m not leaving.”

“I don’t have anything more to say to you.”

“Well maybe I have things to say to you!”

“Do you?”

Yes. No. Maybe. They were there somewhere, the words you wanted to say, the words he wanted to hear. You knew they were there, germinating somewhere deep and dark and bloody. You weren’t ready for them to sprout, to grow, to bloom .

“Miki, I don’t want to ask you again. Please leave.”

When you remained sitting on the floor, he sighed and turned the TV on; he watched and didn’t look your way. He kept watching and didn’t glance down even once.

You knew you weren’t going to say anything but leaving felt like defeat. It felt like walking away. It was walking away. You didn’t want to walk away from Changbin.

You had no choice but to.

* * *

“Can I talk to you?” Chan asked, the following Sunday.

You didn’t get the sense this time that you were in trouble, but you knew you would deserve it if you were.

“I wanted to apologise,” he began and you started.

“You want to apologise to me?”

“Yes. I should have known better than to ask you so directly about you and Changbin. I just didn’t know how to tiptoe around it and, to be honest, I was kind of worried about Changbin; I was thinking of him, not you. So I’m sorry for pushing it.”

No wonder Hani fell in love with him.

“You don’t have to apologise to me, Chan. I should be apologising to you. I was rude; you were just being nice. I appreciate it, actually, that you came to me yourself before siccing my sister on me. I didn’t mean what I said.”

“I know you didn’t.”

“Did you tell Hani I said it?”

He chuckled.

“No, of course not.”

“Good.” You paused. “Thank you. And I’m sorry.”

“It’s ok. Air cleared. We’re all good. But... can I ask now about you and Changbin? He said you talked.”

“Then you probably know everything already.”

His eyebrow quirked and you weren’t too angry to miss it this time.

“What?” you asked.

“I don’t think I know everything.”

“Enough.” You shrugged. “He says the ball’s in my court, but I don’t know what to do with it.”

“Don’t you?”

You could feel your conversation with Changbin started to repeat itself.

No, you did not know what to do with the ball and you were getting pretty tired of holding it. It was Changbin. Your Binnie. Not your Binnie. Just Binnie. He was your friend, your best friend. He was your fake boyfriend because your sister had bugged you just one too many times about it. He was your friend-with-benefits because you couldn’t both keep the lie going and sleep with anyone else. He was...

He had said he felt used. You hadn’t felt like you were using him. Or maybe you thought you were using each other, in which case it was fine. You were both benefiting, weren’t you? You got all the perks of a relationship with none of the obligations. It was ideal. It was really the perfect situation. You had thought.

Changbin obviously didn’t feel the same. You kept running it through your head, the things he had said:

“I thought it was going somewhere.”

“Something was happening.”

“Maybe this could be real.”

It wasn’t real. That was the whole point. It wasn’t supposed to be real.

But your anger when Changbin lied about Sakura was real. The sense of betrayal you felt. The abandonment.

Your comfort with him was real. The ease you felt in his company. The joy and contentment in just lounging around together, with no pressure to be anything other than who and what you were.

Your pleasure was real, once you started sleeping together. The literally toe-curling, hair-raising, blood-curdling ecstasy he ripped out of you. Gave to you. The soft sweetness of his kisses and the unyielding strength of his body; his smooth, golden skin, and curly, black hair. The noises you’d never heard him make before that you could now conjure up whenever you liked, that echoed in your dreams. All of that was real. It was more than real; it was animal. It was pure. It was mindless and easy and natural.

Natural, too, it became when you kissed outside of the bedroom. When you leant into him and he pulled you close with his arm around your shoulder. When he held your hand. When he placed a protective hand on your back on the subway, in a bar queue, just letting you know he was there. He was there for you.

He was right that you’d felt awkward at first. That you hated the pet names and the embarrassment that came with them. You hated him for being mischievous and jeopardising the whole operation by testing your non-existent acting skills. You weren’t sure when that feeling stopped. You were sure it was before you slept together but then you remembered the watershed that occurred afterwards.

An invisible wall between you had disappeared; a veil had been lifted. It was as if all your interactions with Changbin before that moment had been happening behind a barrier. You were holding hands through the holes of a fence, one of you on either side of it. You were clinging to each other from far away.

Then suddenly, you weren’t. You were on the same side of the fence. You were not just close but united. Joined. One.

It hurt your heart to think about it. It hurt so much. It hurt like a break-up. It hurt like heartbreak.

So you knew the answers. The answer. But you didn’t want to.

You looked up at Chan, the inside of your lip torn to shreds. You shrugged.

“I don’t know what to do,” you said, and it came out tight and choked, tears you hadn’t realised were there stinging in your eyes.

Chan pulled you into his arms for a hug and, on any other day, you’d have shoved him off, but it came as a relief. You leant into him and wrapped your arms around his waist.

“You’re a good brother,” you said quietly, trying not to sniffle. “I’m glad Hani married you.”

“Thanks, Miki. That really means a lot to me, you know.”

He rubbed your back and you felt like the world’s most pathetic loser, and sickeningly grateful for Chan at that moment.

“You and Bin can work it out, I promise.”

You could only hope that was true.

* * *

You sat with the answer for longer than you should have. You should have taken it to Changbin as soon as you knew the truth. You even knew what was stopping you, but that knowledge wasn’t helping you get past it.

You lay on your sofa, rotting, hoping to decay to the point that your decomposing body could leak into the cushions and you could become one with it. You stared at your ceiling. You were putting it off. You didn’t want to do it, but doing anything else felt like defeat, felt like shirking your responsibility, felt like running away. So you just lay and stared and waited for something to make you move.

The longer you left it, the harder it would be. The longer you left it, the less likely it was that Changbin would respond how you wanted him to. Because you were leaving him hanging. Stringing him along—you had been stringing him along, however unwittingly, for weeks now. That wasn’t fair and he had every right to be angry, to dislike you, to not want anything more. To have changed his mind.

God, you hoped he hadn’t changed his mind.

You could scarcely believe that it had been three weeks now that you’d not been speaking. Three weeks with just one argument between you. No wonder it felt like a break-up. Your relationship might technically have been fake, but you had dug deep enough to realise that your feelings weren’t.

You cringed to yourself. You hated that. You hated thinking about your feelings. You hated that they existed. You hated that they hurt so much, all the time. You hated how much you missed him, how scared you were to lose him.

That was enough, you’d decided. It hit you over the head, your oldest friend: impatience. You had had enough of this, you said to yourself. Rip the fucking plaster off and, if you bled all over the floor, so be it. At least maybe you’d bleed to death.

You took the stairs to Changbin’s floor and hammered on his door. No answer. You let yourself in, using his door code.

“Binnie?”

The apartment was empty.

Not wanting to lose any momentum, not wanting either to give him any notice, to initiate any contact that might psych you out or knock you off-course, you decided to head to the gym. It was as likely a place for him to be as any.

You were right. He was on the floor, stretching, when you entered. That was good; that meant he had finished. Also good: the gym was empty but for the two of you.

You strode over and sat next to him. You placed your hand on his arm. You knew what you had to tell him but hadn’t quite picked the words. They were never your strong suit. He turned to look at you, his face an open question, and shuffled into a more comfortable position.

The words didn’t come but the impulse did. You leant forward and kissed him. Tentative, hesitant, light. The second seemed to stretch forever; you were desperate for it to end and dying for it not to. Your heart was pounding so hard, you could hear it in your ears. Your body was flushing warm, running hot and you could feel the heat from him, too, though you knew that wasn’t anything to do with you.

The second finally ended and you pulled back, but only barely, just enough to see his eyes, usually so intense but, at this moment, open, sparkling, asking.

You kissed him again. You hadn’t meant to; it happened without your say so. This time, he responded. You felt his lips move against yours, his head turn so they slotted together, so he could run his tongue over your bottom lip. You moved your hands into his hair, damp with sweat, curling at the edges of his face.

“Binnie,” you whispered, when his lips left yours a second time.

“Miki,” he returned.

“I want to tell you-”

He interrupted you with his mouth on yours again. You made a noise of protest, but it was weak and you didn’t follow through because it had hit you, how much you missed this. How much you wanted it. How much you had liked it at the time and not allowed yourself to notice.

You had to be closer to him. You shuffled on your knees and sat yourself in his lap; he pulled you to his body until his sweat soaked through your shirt. Your mouth journeyed across his face, to his jaw, walking a trail down his neck, kissing wet drops of sweat from his skin.

“Miki...”

“Binnie...”

Your mouth reversed its travels and you sucked his bottom lip between yours, sank your teeth into it gently and then not so gently. The groan he made, deep in his chest, lit you up on the inside, burning hot now, your own sweat starting to prickle on your skin.

Before you lost your mind completely to the heat and the haze, you pulled back. You pressed your forehead against his and took a second to get your breath back, breath you hadn’t noticed he had taken.

“I need to tell you,” you repeated. “I have to tell you things.”

You felt him nod against you.

“Ok, you can tell me.”

“I’m sorry.”

It wasn’t the thing you wanted to start with. You wished you could have said it all without having to apologise. But you’d done things that you were sorry for and he had to know.

“I’m sorry I’m so stupid and I’m sorry I used you and I’m sorry I don’t know how to be honest with you and I’m sorry I don’t know how to feel things and I’m sorry I shouted at you and was a dick to you and said I hated you. I’m sorry I did all this stupid shit. I’m sorry I didn’t notice. I'm sorry I didn’t realise. I’m sorry I didn’t speak to you. I’m sorry for all of it.”

His lips were back before you had even closed your mouth. You pushed against his chest with your hands.

“Stop kissing me! I have to say stuff!”

“I know, but I have stuff to say, too, and I want to say it like this,” he replied, pausing between each clause to press his mouth against yours, staying so close that you could feel his lips move as he spoke.

“You said I had to go first,” you reminded him. “Let me go first.”

He huffed but leant back a little and you did the same, the air between you clearing just enough for you to remember how nervous you were, how terrified, even though he’d just been kissing you, even though you sat in his lap with his arms around you.

“It started out not being real,” you began. “It really wasn’t real and I intended for it to never be real because I just wanted Hani to leave me alone and I was going to end it. I swear. I was racking my brain trying to come up with a good solution. Especially because you were being so annoying! I thought you wanted it to fail because you were winding me up so much. And you were right, I fucking flinched and I hated it; it made me so uncomfortable because it was so weird to have you doing that. We didn’t do that!

“Then you kissed me on the subway and it was... nice. And then horrible because it shouldn’t have been nice! And then we had sex and it was... more than nice. And I... I didn’t want to break us up anymore because I liked how it was. I kept saying to myself that we had all of the perks of a real relationship with none of the drawbacks but what I really meant, though I didn’t know it, was that I had all the security of a relationship with none of the risk.

“I didn’t want to risk it. Having feelings. Going there. With you, especially. Not because—not because I d—... Not... It was you, Binnie. You were my best friend. I trust you with everything. You know all of my stupid secrets; you’ve seen me throw up on the street; you gave me food poisoning so bad I literally shit myself in your doorway; it’s you--”

“Can I make a recommendation?”

“What?”

“Maybe don’t talk about shitting yourself while you’re trying to confess your undying love for me?”

You slapped him hard on the arm.

“Shut the fuck up! I’m being fucking vulnerable here, you prick!”

He laughed and you let him kiss you, just a little, just long enough for the flash of your annoyance to fade.

“My point is,” you continued, pushing back against him, “that if you didn’t want me, who the fuck would? You are the person who could... You’re the person who could hurt me the most. Out of anyone. Out of everyone. If I didn’t have you, if you said no, if I fucked things up, who would I have? I didn’t want to lose you.”

“So you kept me at arm’s length and pushed me away and didn’t speak to me for weeks.”

“I know, I’m sorry.”

Shame flamed on your cheeks. It swallowed your voice, made your throat tight and your eyes sting. You dropped your gaze, focusing on your hand around his bicep, your ragged thumbnail that you had chewed to bits. You watched it raise and lower as Changbin shrugged.

“It’s ok. I did it, too. I could have brought it up. But I didn’t. Because, honestly, I knew it would go badly and I thought it would be easier to fight than talk about it. I thought you would find it easier if I pushed you to be angry rather than pushing you to be... open. I thought if you really felt anything, it would come out in an argument. That wasn’t fair of-”

“No, that is pretty much right on the money. You’re right. It’s so much easier to be angry with you than... than this.”

“Are you still angry?”

You shook your head. You were as far from angry as you’d ever been.

“Are you still angry with me?” you countered, swallowing hard.

“No.”

A sigh of relief.

“Tell me, then,” he whispered, his lips moving against yours in anticipation of a kiss.

“Tell you what?”

“What you want.”

And it came out easily.

“You.”

#changbin x reader #skz x reader #changbin fanfic #skz fanfic #changbin smut #skz smut #stray kids fanfic

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nakedbibi333 · 3 days ago

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The Art of Returning: Coming Back to the Law

Well, it sure has been a while! The thing about me and this blog is that it's more of an archive for you guys (and myself as well) and I just log in when I feel like there is something new or relevant I want to share.

Anyway! Today I felt the urge to make a post about the idea of "falling off." I mostly want to address these kinds of questions/predicaments: "What do I do when I stop practicing the law?" and "What do I do when I stop believing in the law?"

It's happened more times than I'd care to admit in these past two years since I stopped posting regularly. I find that I'll have a lot of success and then I get comfortable there and stop being responsible with my routine. Then, by losing my routine, I slowly allow my senses and the outer world to dictate my state, and then you know how that goes...

Either way, it doesn't exactly matter how it happens, it only matters that we can get back on it and return to the place where we were before.

It's crazy how much reacting to (and living primarily in) the physical world affects your mental state. In my experience, it gets more and more negative if you're not aware of it, and soon enough, you become a pessimist, and you're constantly manifesting unlucky and negative aspects into your life. The great thing about this, though, is that you can change it. You are never stuck in a state. Whether the state is negative or positive, it is not immovable or unchangeable. Whatever you are experiencing, hearing, or seeing in your physical world is just a reflection of your state. So, since you have lost your belief in the law, you'll start to see more people criticizing and belittling people who do believe in the law. Maybe you will see more "failure" stories, and you may see more negativity in general surrounding the law. This does not mean that those things are true. They are simply what your self is reflecting onto your outer reality based on your self-concept. It may feel difficult to leave this state, but it's as simple as deciding you believe in the law again. You can just as easily return to that state of faith, trust, and power you had occupied before you stopped practicing. And I know this because I have done it myself. You will always have another excuse, another reason, and another fear that will keep you in this limited state. Just let go and return to that feeling.

For some people, I'm sure it's just as easy as intending to return to your desired state. That isn't my own personal experience, though. It can take some convincing. I approach this by re-learning everything I knew before. I need to first place myself in a calm mindful state (which is easier than immediately placing myself in a state of full, confident belief in the law) and start to consume my favorite content. I read Neville Goddard's Lectures and books, listen to Edward Art's YouTube channel, and read his main series, and then I begin to test the law. This is the best way to build belief in the law. Just test it with things that don't matter. Most people like to manifest seeing a specific color insect, getting free food, or finding a dollar on the street, but I approach testing differently before I do that. Instead of saying that I want to see a green car and then waiting to see it in my life, I just start to notice my surroundings. I'll begin to see that the thing I dreamed about the night before ended up happening, that something I was thinking about was brought up in conversation without my initiation, or that something I wanted to do is now planned by someone in my life. These things, which are not deliberately manifested by me, increase my belief in the law because I recognized that I did not even have to try to make things happen for my imagination to show me the truth in the law of assumption. Only then will I start deliberately manifesting because I feel much more confident that it will happen.

With this process, I have been able to go from a negative, unlucky, unfaithful person, to a fulfilled, lucky, and positive person within days (or sometimes hours depending on my own willingness to change). Just know that even the best of us struggle to stay on top of this way of life all the time. Remember there is very little effort in this process. It's really a letting go of your old self and allowing yourself to be open and receptive to the law again.

Hope you guys are doing well! See you again soon ♡

#manifestation #neville goddard #law of assumption #loa #edward art #states #nakedbibi333 posts

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all-with-angel · 1 day ago

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𝐓𝐖𝐎 𝐌𝐎𝐍𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐒 𝐈𝐍 𝐀 𝐂𝐀𝐆𝐄, 𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐘 𝐌𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓 𝐊𝐈𝐒𝐒! •°. *࿐

Summary: As an infamous half-curse assassin, you never thought you'd find companionship, much less in the equally infamous pink-haired 'King of Curses' ...

Pairings: HeianEra!Sukuna Ryomen x male!powerful!reader

Content. Mentions of child abuse, gore, murder, blood, angst, fluff, crack, fucked up found family, uraume mention hell yeah, gn!reader

A.N. Reader is an assassin and is a bit unhinged as well, but I adore it!! They're somewhat spider-based, with their own extra pairs of arms and eyes +a defense based CT.

W.C. 3.7k

MINOR AND AGELESS BLOGS DNI. Masterlist

The village was silent. Too silent. Not the eerie hush of a place where people slept, nor the somber quiet of a mourning home, but the absolute absence of life. The kind of silence that only follows death.

You knew before you stepped past the crumbling torii gate that your pay had been stolen from you.

The air smelled of blood. Thick, metallic, and cloying, it clung to your skin as you stepped through the ruins of what was once a grand estate. Red lanterns hung askew, their paper bodies torn and stained, still flickering with dying light. The cobblestone courtyard was slick with fresh carnage, and the walls, once pristine, were now painted in crimson streaks. Corpses lay where they had fallen—guards, servants, and the nobles who had once ruled this place.

Your employer, a pitiful man with too much wealth and not enough sense, lay among them. His eyes, frozen in horror, reflected the flickering torch light from the shattered lanterns around him. His throat had been torn out, the wound jagged and messy, as if done in passing, without care.

You clicked your tongue.

No payment, then.

Annoyance flickered through you, but it was distant, dulled. All that effort. Days of tracking. Weeks of maneuvering through the shadows, making kills in silence, setting the stage for a perfect strike—gone. The man you were meant to collect your pay from, dead.

You had lived too long in the shadows to expect fairness. You killed for money, nothing more, and you had learned long ago that the world owed you nothing.

Born of human and curse, you had been despised from the moment you took your first breath. Your mother had made a mistake, and you had been the consequence—a child too human to be a true curse, too monstrous to be accepted by men. They had feared you, hated you, tried to kill you before you were even strong enough to fight back. But you survived.

You always survived.

Your extra limbs had been a curse in your youth, proof of your inhumanity, but they became your greatest weapon as you grew. Strength, speed, precision—six hands worked better than two. And when you learned to hide them, to pull them close and pass as something almost normal, the world became your hunting ground.

Assassination had been the obvious choice. No morals, no allegiances, only the cold certainty of coin. You did not care who died, only that they did.

But now, your target was already dead, and yet you gain nothing. And there was only one man who could be responsible.

A shadow moved within the ruined estate. Slow, unhurried footsteps, the deliberate kind that spoke of confidence, of amusement. Someone who had never once feared death, because they had never needed to.

You turned your head slightly, just enough to acknowledge his presence without giving the satisfaction of immediate attention.

Sukuna Ryoumen.

A demon. A calamity in human form. His legend reached your ears long before this day—stories of the King of Curses who razed villages for sport, who devoured men whole, who fought gods and won. You’d always found such tales exaggerated. No one could be that monstrous. No one could be that untouchable.

But seeing him now, standing amid the ruin of his own making, you had to admit the stories had barely done him justice.

He was taller than any man you had ever seen, broad and thick with muscle, with skin inked in cursed markings that coiled around his arms, chest, and throat. Four arms—an anomaly, an abomination, yet he carried them as if they were his birthright. The left side of his face was something not meant for mortal eyes, warped and grinning with unnatural delight. Blood dripped from his claws, pooling at his feet as if the earth itself bled for him.

He turned, sensing you. And when his four burning eyes met yours, something twisted in your chest. A deep, primal instinct screamed at you to run. But fear was not something you entertained.

Instead, you sighed. Loudly. Dramatically.

“Well, there goes my payment,” you muttered. “What a waste of time.”

His crimson eyes found yours, and you felt it immediately—the weight of his attention, the way his gaze lingered, as if trying to place you.

"Another rat," he murmured, voice low, edged with amusement. "I thought I was done with you vermin tonight."

You smiled. Not a kind smile. Not a warm one. A slow, knowing curl of the lips, the sort that had sent men to their graves in fits of paranoia, wondering if they had just met their end before your blade ever touched them.

"If you were," you said, "I wouldn't be here."

A flicker of something crossed his face—amusement, curiosity, something sharper underneath. Interesting.

Most people quaked at the mere mention of his name. They fell to their knees, begged, pleaded, cried. The ones with a sliver of backbone tried to fight and died screaming for it. But you? You were calm. Unshaken. Unimpressed.

He took a step forward, tilting his head slightly. His presence was suffocating, heavy in the air like a storm waiting to break. "And who might you be, boy?"

You glanced down at the bodies strewn around you, at your employer's lifeless face, the blood soaking into the dirt. "Someone who was supposed to get paid tonight."

A chuckle. Low, rumbling. "Ah. And now you won’t."

You shrugged. "No."

"And what do you plan to do about it?"

You met his gaze and held it. "Haven’t decided yet."

The truth was, you had decided. From the moment you saw the carnage, from the moment you realized who had caused it, you knew there was only one path forward. Sukuna had wasted your time. Had stolen your prize. It wasn’t about money anymore—it was about principle. Sort of, not really.

You did not let things go unanswered. And neither did he, you imagined.

The silence stretched between you, thick with unspoken words, unreadable thoughts. And then, slowly, ever so slowly, Sukuna grinned.

"You’re not afraid of me," he said. It wasn’t a question.

You exhaled, long and slow. "Should I be?"

His grin widened, sharp and wicked. "Yes."

For the first time in a long, long while, something stirred in your chest. Not fear. Not anger. Something that made your fingers twitch with anticipation.

Your heart beat steady, unfazed. You took a step forward, just enough to challenge, just enough to provoke. His grin didn’t falter. If anything, he looked pleased.

"You’ve killed my employer," you said. "So now, I suppose I’ll have to settle for a different prize instead."

Sukuna's laughter rang through the night, rich and full, the sound of a man who had not been entertained like this in centuries.

"And what would that be?" he grinned, blood coating his teeth before he licked it off.

“Your head.”

The first strike was fast. Not fast enough to be unexpected, but fast. A blade aimed for his throat, smooth and silent. Sukuna leaned back just enough for it to miss, feeling the edge of it whisper against his skin. No hesitation, no wasted movement. This wasn’t some arrogant fool swinging wildly—this was a trained killer, someone who knew how to strike to end a fight, not prolong it.

Sukuna’s grin widened. Good.

His own arm shot forward, one of four, grabbing at your wrist. He expected resistance, a twist to break free, maybe a counter—what he didn’t expect was for the stranger to step into his grip, moving with him instead of against him, using the momentum to spin a dagger toward his ribs.

Clever. Sukuna barely avoided the stab, using a second hand to shove him back. He was enjoying this. A rarity.

Sukuna grinned, clearly enjoying himself. “You’re quick.”

You smirked. “You’re slow.”

That wiped the grin off his face—a scowl replacing it. Then, he lunged.

His elbow slammed toward your ribs, but you twisted, feeling the heat of his skin just barely graze yours before you ducked low, shifting your weight to avoid the claws swiping at your throat. You countered with a kick, aiming for his knee, but he caught your ankle mid-strike, twisting your leg to throw you off balance.

You didn’t fight it. You let him pull you off your feet—because as he did, his grip loosened, and that was all you needed. You bent at the last second, twisting unnaturally in the air, and slammed your palm against the side of his head as you used the momentum to break free. Sukuna staggered back half a step. Just half a step.

But you saw it. His eyes gleamed in the dim light, his sharp grin curling wider. “Not bad.”

“I know,” you said easily. And then he hit you.

The pain of the stab hit your entire body like a death knell, making you hiss in pain. You felt the bones beneath your skin break, felt the heat of torn flesh, but it didn’t matter. Because it put you exactly where you wanted to be. You grinned, lips parting just enough to whisper, “Got you.”

It wasn’t the first time you’d been struck in this fight, and it wouldn’t be the last.

His hand shot into your ribs, raw power ripping through your flesh and organs like paper. But instead of pulling away—like anyone with common sense would—you leaned forward.

Sukuna’s eyes widened, the briefest flicker of surprise.

You dropped your blade before using your first pair of hands to grab Sukuna’s arm and pulling it into you, until his hand went through you, blood coated his hand as it emerged from your back. Right before your extra limbs surged from their hiding place, bursting forth in a blur of motion. The additional arms wrapped around him, slamming into his flesh with the precision of a predator finally sinking its claws into its prey.

You felt flesh tear beneath your fingers, watched as his blood splattered against the ground. It was like two rabid dogs, two survivors, ripping each other apart by their necks. A perfect pair, no?

He snarled, not in pain, but in exhilaration. You could see it—the raw thrill in his expression, the unhinged excitement of someone who had finally found a fight worth having. But you didn’t let up.

You pressed forward, extra limbs moving in perfect harmony with your own, a seamless blend of attack and defense. You were faster now, stronger, your movements unhindered by the usual limitations of human anatomy.

Sukuna adapted quickly. He fought like a beast, like a demon given flesh, and yet there was intelligence in his strikes, a predator’s cunning in the way he shifted.

Blow after blow, you clashed. The estate around you had long since faded from thought. There was only this moment, this fight, this exhilarating, intoxicating rush of battle.

Until finally—

His attacks met your defenses, his strikes clashed against yours, and for the first time in what felt like an eternity, you reached an impasse.

Neither of you could land a fatal blow.

The taste of blood lingered in the air, thick and heady, as Sukuna rolled his shoulders. His wounds were already knitting back together, flesh stitching itself back into place with unnatural ease. It had been a long time since he’d bled like this—longer still since anyone had managed to hold their ground against him.

And yet, despite the thrill of the fight, his amusement had started to wane.

He clicked his tongue, shaking off the blood from his fingers before turning on his heel, stepping over the ruined bodies that littered the ground. The estate was nothing but a corpse-strewn ruin now, silent save for the crackling of fires still burning in the distance.

"Annoying," he muttered under his breath, not bothering to glance back at you.

You hadn't died, which was already irritating enough. But beyond that, you had the nerve to grin at him, to tease him mid-fight like this was all some kind of game. The sheer audacity. He exhaled sharply, already deciding it wasn’t worth his time anymore.

"I'll kill you next time," he called over his shoulder, his tone almost lazy, as if this was a mere promise rather than a threat.

And then he walked away. That should have been the end of it. It wasn't. Because not even a few steps later, he heard something that made his brow twitch.

Footsteps. Light, almost soundless. But they were there. Following him.

He stopped.

The footsteps stopped.

He resumed.

The footsteps resumed.

Sukuna’s jaw tightened.

Slowly, deliberately, he turned his head just enough to catch sight of you out of the corner of his crimson eyes. There you were, walking at a perfectly casual pace, the first pair of arms behind your head as the other two pairs were tucked into your yukata, as if you hadn’t just been fighting him to the death minutes ago.

Annoying. That was what you were.

Not impressive. Not worthy. Just a nuisance who had managed to worm his way past his usual boredom, wriggling there like a splinter he couldn’t quite dig out. Yeah, that was it. Definitely. (not)

He stared. You smiled. Multiple pairs of eyes blinking right back at each other.

His fingers twitched. Then, without a word, he swung a fist toward your face.

You tilted your head—not even hurriedly, just a small, effortless shift—and his strike missed by the barest margin, passing through empty air. Your smile grew impossibly wider, eyes crinkling.

His eyes twitched.

He tried again. A quick, sharp jab toward your ribs. Blocked. You blinked as an almost imperceptible shield ebbed around you, reacting to Sukuna’s punch.

"You done?" you finally asked, tilting your head at him.

Sukuna hated how unbothered you looked. He hated how naive you looked, he hated how much you two were alike.

His teeth ground together. His irritation swelled. So he struck again. And again. Each attack was dodged or softened before it could land, and through it all, you didn’t stop smiling.

"Quit dodging, bastard."

"Then stop trying to hit me."

Sukuna let out a low growl, his patience officially gone. His hands blurred in rapid succession—right hook, left jab, a strike from his lower set of arms, followed by a quick kick—each one aimed to throw you off, to catch you when you least expected it.

And yet, every single strike either missed or failed to deal any real damage.

You grinned. "This is fun."

"It is NOT." Sukuna bit out. This was ridiculous.

He had carved through entire armies, crushed the strongest warriors, slaughtered men like they were insects beneath his heel. And yet, here he was, brawling with you in the middle of a dirt road like some petty street fight—and losing, if only in terms of patience.

At this point, he wasn’t sure if he wanted to kill you or just throw you into a river and see if you floated. He stopped abruptly, his shoulders rising and falling with controlled breaths. "Fine."

You tilted your head. "Fine?"

He exhaled sharply, rubbing a hand down his face. "Do whatever the hell you want. Just—stop talking." Your grin widened.

Sukuna grumbled something incomprehensible under his breath and resumed walking, pretending you weren’t there. But he knew you were.

And somehow, despite everything—despite the irritation bubbling beneath his skin, despite the exhaustion creeping at the edges of his mind—he found himself almost entertained. Almost.

The wind was sharp tonight, cutting through the trees like a whisper of ghosts. It carried the scent of blood and frost, mingling in the crisp Heian air, yet despite the eerie quiet of the frozen village behind them, the warmth of the crackling fire in front of them made the night feel almost… peaceful. Almost.

A child, barely more than a wisp of a thing, pale as the frost that still clung stubbornly to their clothes. Silent, observant, and eerily composed for someone their age, considering the way Sukuna and you had found them—crouching in the center of an entire village turned to ice, their expression as blank as the frozen corpses surrounding them.

Most children would have screamed. Ran. Cried for their parents. But not this one, not as if they had any more parents to run to.

No, they had simply blinked up at the two of you, completely unaffected by your presence—the two most dangerous men in the Heian era standing before them, drenched in the remnants of battle, destruction lingering in the air around you like a storm.

Sukuna, ever the skeptic, had initially deemed them useful only for their abilities. "Would keep the meat from spoiling," he had muttered with a smirk, clearly pleased with the idea of a walking icebox. But you? You had seen it immediately—the spark of something familiar in Uraume’s gaze, the way they looked at you both like… like you weren’t monsters. This kid was just like you and Sukuna.

And somehow, against all logic, against the natural order of things, the two of you had kept it. Uraume, it told you its name.

A ‘demon’. A half-curse. And a child who had slaughtered an entire village without meaning to. Sounds like a start to a very, very bad joke.

Somehow, it was… oddly domestic.

At first, Uraume had been quiet, following orders with a cold efficiency that reminded you of yourself when you were younger. It wasn’t surprising—survival demanded obedience. They had likely learned that early on.

But, as time passed, something shifted.

They clung to you when Sukuna got too loud, hiding behind your back when he roared in frustration at something trivial. They sat beside you at night, close enough to steal warmth, but never quite touching. They watched the two of you bicker with the quiet amusement of a child who understood far more than they let on.

And then, one evening, they called you “Father.”

You had choked on your food.

The Heian Era was a golden age—for the strong. For those who could carve their existence into the bones of the weak, who could leave a trail of ruin in their wake and call it a legacy.

And for you, for Sukuna, for your little Uraume—it was nothing short of a playground.

The village burned behind you, flames licking at the sky, thick black smoke curling like a dying beast’s final breath. The air was heavy with the stench of charred flesh, metallic with the scent of fresh blood. Corpses littered the ground, torn apart, their bodies split open in jagged, grotesque displays of what had once been human. Some still twitched, struggling to hold on to the last vestiges of life. A mistake.

You stepped over a writhing man, his guts spilling from the gaping wound in his stomach, his trembling fingers trying in vain to push them back in. The look in his eyes—desperation, horror, confusion—was intoxicating. He hadn’t even seen the strike that felled him. He hadn’t even realized he was already dead.

"Pathetic," Sukuna scoffed, his voice thick with amusement as he leaned on a collapsing pillar, watching the dying man like one might watch an ant struggling underfoot. "You’d think after hearing the screams, they’d run. But no. They stay, they pray, they beg." He rolled his eyes, red gleaming in the firelight. "Like insects waiting to be crushed."

Uraume crouched beside the man, tilting their head as they observed the way he trembled, the way blood bubbled from his lips. "He’s still alive," they noted, voice devoid of sympathy.

You met Sukuna’s gaze, a slow, knowing smile tugging at your lips.

Uraume didn’t hesitate.

"Then fix that."

The ice formed instantly, blooming from their fingertips like a creeping frost, delicate and beautiful in the way it spread across the man's skin. He gasped, choked, his body convulsing as the ice crawled over his throat, sealing his lips shut, freezing the blood in his veins. Within seconds, he was motionless—an intricate, crystalline statue, forever locked in the throes of his last, pitiful moment.

"Good," You hummed, patting Uraume’s head with the same affection one might give a favored pet. "Quick. Efficient. You’re learning!"

Uraume beamed, a glint of pride flickering in their cold eyes.

And then the slaughter continued.

You moved like a specter, slipping through the shadows, striking where the light could not reach. They never saw you coming. You were the whisper of death against their ear, the last thing they felt before their world went dark. Blood spattered across your skin, warm and slick, soaking into your clothes.

Sukuna was chaos incarnate, tearing through bodies with the same ease one might rip through parchment. Limbs flew, heads rolled, entrails spilled like ribbons unfurling from a torn gift. He laughed, gods, he laughed, the sound of it low and rich, a song of bloodlust and madness.

And Uraume—oh, they were the perfect student.

"Not like that," you chastised like a mother, stepping behind them as they struggled to drive their icy blade into a flailing woman’s throat. "You’re hesitating. Don’t. Hesitation makes you weak."

Uraume nodded, adjusting their grip. You guided their hand with a firm but gentle claw, twisting the blade at just the right angle before pressing down. The woman gurgled, her body seizing before falling limp, her blood spilling in thick waves over the dirt.

"There, much better, no?" You beamed, wiping a stray droplet of blood from Uraume’s cheek with your thumb.

Sukuna watched, arms folded, a smirk playing at his lips. "Sweet," he mocked, voice dripping with amusement. "Teaching them so gently. You’d make such a kind parent."

You shot him a look over your shoulder, sharp and knowing.

The dance of death continued, bodies falling like leaves in a storm. You killed when Sukuna told you to, and Uraume followed suit, obedient and precise. But Sukuna too—he killed for you. If an enemy managed to get too close, if a blade even dared to graze your skin, they were erased. Their screams barely had time to leave their lips before they were torn apart.

You were exactly where you belonged.

#Jujutsu Kaisen #jjk x reader #sukuna x reader #Ryomen sukuna x reader #sukuna fic #Ryomen sukuna #Sukuna #jjk #jjk sukuna #yandere sukuna x reader #yandere reader #unhinged reader #sukuna x male reader #sukuna x m!reader #jjk x male reader #jjk x m!reader #angels fics •°. *࿐

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niccolites · 17 hours ago

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sorry i'm actually deranged and i can't stop thinking abt it

like the bit in season 2 where shane deliberately shoots a man in the knee so he'll get eaten so shane has a chance to get away to be able to get medicine back for carl

like so soap coded but way earlier for him to do smth fucked like that. like ur son gets sick and you don't have any medicine for him beyond the over the counter painkillers you nabbed from your medicine cupboard when you packed up and left

soap is immediately packing up to head into the city to get what you need. you aren't sure how to define your dynamic, given johnny was one of your husbands close friends at work and now he wakes you up in the morning by grinding his hard-on into your backside

not everyone at your camp knows that you were married before this, but enough know that you feel ashamed when johnny gives you a wet kiss before he leaves, taking some guy with him, a mechanic you think

comes back without him but does have the medicine that you need, a gash in his leg and a strange, off look on his face

johnny tells everyone some fabricated story of what happened, that the mechanic tripped on the way out of the pharmacy, went down before he could save him

later, you sit beside your son, feeling his temperature start to finally go down, johnny next to you, one hand on your son's shin, the other around the curve of your waist. he'd let you treat his leg, stares down at you with a wild look in his face even as the rest of his face remains passive

johnny tells you what really happened. both of them had been too slow, cut their legs up on the glass trying to break into the pharmacy and they had been stumbling up the road, leading a mob of zombies with them

he tells you he shot the mechanic in his other leg, took the medicine and left him to be eaten. "ah had to get back tae ye. both ae ye," he says, blood still spattered on his hand as he brings it up to your cheek. "ah would never leave you or the wain alone out here."

it's meant as a vow, but it tastes like a threat when he kisses you

i can't write a zombie apocalypse au for johnny bc it was just be beat for beat shane walsh plotline from the walking dead. except way worse way earlier

#amc was so brave to write soap fan fiction in 2010 like that was crazy #anyway johnny starts referring to your son as 'our son' like. maybe a week into the apocalypse if he is showing some restraint #pretends like you weren't married before. to one of his friends no less #calls ur dead husband ur ex when johnny is the reason he's likely dead. he's so deranged i just took my bra off #nic talks #johnny mactavish

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soulfullofold · 1 year ago

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smash or pass feat. random wikipedia articles from my bookmarks folder: stromatoliths, the mythological motif of the world-egg, baklava, apollo's belt, mithridatism, Benten Kozō / 弁天小僧, nubecula minor.

STROMATOLITHS SMASH

WORLD-EGG PASS

BAKLAVA SMASH

APOLLO'S BELT SMASH

MITHRIDATISM PASS

弁天小僧 thank you for the kanji SMASH

NUBECULA MINOR SMASH

#asked and answered #lore #ask box meme response #smash or pass #THANKS this was fun!!!#no deliberation needed these were immediate

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junemary · 27 days ago

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Fengcui are ridiculous. They're fully making out at this point but they REFUSE to acknowledge it out of pure spite they NEED to get the upper hand the other one must be the one to confess first!!!! Can you imagine? Sticking you tongue 5 inches down someone else's throat and still have the guts to say to THEIR FACE that they're coming onto you and you don't get it- have they fallen for you? Ooh how interesting, maybe elaborate on that? No? Well fuck you then. And then they do it again. And then they sacrifice themselves for each other MULTIPLE TIMES. Only to share the most disgustingly sweet romance that is CLEAR to everyone around them yet it remains!!!! Unspoken!!!! Even to each other!!!!

#it's like. no matter how much they progress in the relationship #the game between them never ends #it only takes on different flavor #book seven has been quite 👌 good #I think the decrease in quality in the boling and guangqian arcs were in fact real #but rn book 7 feels a lot like the initial arcs #which to me is delicious #I think either the translator or the author was lost in the transitional stage of the protag's relationship #like Cui buqu #at times #I think he showed an amount of deliberate vulnerability that wasn't worth the gains? then again this is par for the course #I wasn't yelling when they were fake kissing for the job cause it was obviously the only logical way to distract the enemy #so this actually follows the same logic but in that instance I felt like it was detrimental to the integrity of the character's personality #like it felt too indulgent I guess? as a private person myself #I couldn't help but be like 'noo girl your secrets!!!' in the boling arc #also too many characters that were there for no reason #look it wasnt very good ok the villains were all over the place #decision making skills suddenly vanished #also feng xiaolin died?? for no reason at all like why would you kill a beautiful woman.#it made no sense and fhe stalling to get feng ciao agter her body was discovered?? like as a reader #that felt like a disastrously failed mission for both cbq and fx #and then they're like 'they took all of them down!!' bro when??#all they did was run around #tell lies #and kiss #and they're so correct for that but don't go telling me this was a job well done cayse it wasn't!!#that final speech cui buqu gave yang yun? like 'you lost. I set fire to house' like they shouldn't have let him utter a word!#IMMEDIATE arrow launching. like the plot doesn't need to be complicate for me to be believe they're smart. just needs to make sense!#peerless #wushuang

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jellogram · 10 months ago

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One time in 7th grade a boy gave me a love letter and I showed it to my friend and she pulled out a love letter from the SAME BOY so we went to tell someone else about this insane situation and she ALSO got a love letter from him. This boy gave three girls (who were friends) all love letters.

You might think this would end with us fighting over him, but nope. We were PISSED at this boy. We fucking CHASED HIM DOWN and tackled him into the grass and cussed him out.

Imagine you are a 7th grade boy and you decide to maximize your luck by declaring your love to three different girls but instead they figure it out and team up and you get absolutely football tackled by them in full view of your classmates while they call you a little bitch.

So ladies if your man ever two-times you, just remember that aligning yourself with the other girl/s and taking him the fucking ground IS in fact an option.

#i am proud of this tbh #we really got his ass #it was immediate too #there was no deliberation about what we should do #we put two and two together and we were like. we need to take this motherfucker down a peg #i dont think we even hit him it was just like. humiliation more than violence

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neverendingford · 2 years ago

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#hmmmm. the game night was very underwhelming. I committed to playing Catan and then other people showed up and played smash bros #and ngl I kinda wanted to just throw in my cards and play smash bros instead #got called 'he' IMMEDIATELY by some dude so that was hmm and then someone noticed and was like 'let's all say our pronouns #and several dudes were visibly uncomfortable about saying pronouns and made jokes about it and were deliberately obtuse #so honestly pretty meh vibes overall. I really don't want to make a neckbeard gamer bro stereotype but ummmm. sorry those were the vibes #anyway not for me I think #also there was zero chaos energy at all. I need manic energy to feed off of #I did my best to sow a bit of chaotic fun and no one played off it either.#honestly just very boring. I lowkey shoulda stayed home #I learned what app people use to coordinate groups though. so I guess I'll look at that now. maybe find some other groups #the city I live is really is kind of a dead end though. so not a lot of opportunity. I'll keep hunting though #I just want to find wildly adhd people is that too much to ask. I need chaos and jokes and laughter and objects thrown through the air #I cannot take boring small town talk around a small table.#and like. I've met neckbeard gamer bros who I loved and got along with super well. they were mad adhd. but like. ugh. I can't stand boring #I can't stand calm. I need them to be hopped up on neurodivergence #I wish it were socially acceptable to get up and go 'sorry you're all very nice but you're very boring I'm going home now'#like. no offense but I hate it here bye #tag talk

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heritageposts · 1 year ago

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I'm reading about how Israel, in the immediate aftermath of the 1948 Nakba, deliberately replaced olive trees and other indigenous flora with European plants. This ecological disaster, which is now proudly hailed under the banner of 'making the desert bloom,' was done to 'de-Arabize' the landscape, and to cover up - often with fast-growing European pine trees -the ruins of Palestinian villages that were destroyed by Zionists forces.

And I just need everyone to read this passage from Pappé, because the symbolism of what happened to those European pine trees in the desert speaks for itself:

The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine, by Ilan Pappé (2006, p. 227-228.)

#free palestine #israel #gaza #this is under ch 10 'The Memoricide of the Nakba' - > 'Virtual Colonialism and the JNF'#''olive trees had popped up in defiance of the alien flora planted over them fifty-six years ago.''

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whorelaud · 1 month ago

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꒦꒷ ﹏ destory me on camera ¡

pairing best friend!rafe x OF creator!reader

summary Rafe finger fucking you for you OF content, not because he's been dying to lay his hands on you, and carress every curve of your body, after only being able to admire such view through the screen.

contains smut, fingering (obvi), cameras, squirting, spit as lube, dirty talk, praise & degradation, teasing, brief mention of rafe jerking off to your videos, perv rafe...? wc; 2k

a/n this had me insane i needed to do it omff i hope you enjoy as much as i did writing it!! bsf rafe is such a whore he needs his own appreciation :p

"Pretty please, Rafe?" Your lips jut into a pout, eyes innocently fluttering up at him. Your hand lightly trailed up his thigh, landing right around his crotch, where his cock was already leaking with pre-cum, desperare to be caressed by your pretty, delicate fingers. "C'mon, you don't want to be mean to your best friend, do you?"

"You're insane, you know that?" He barely managed to stutter out a breath, arms haunched over the couch, where he was struggling to maintain his position, and hold back from pushing your head down on his cock.

"Is that a yes?" You excitedly perked up, face mere inches away from Rafe's. You planted a small kiss to his cheek, moving away before he could process the gesture. "Thank you, I'll make sure you won't regret it."

"Do something before I change my mind, then." He shot back, causing you to shove his arm. A breath knocked out of his chest at the lack of warmness when you moved away to stand to your feet. His gaze followed your figure, halting just around your cleavage, where your boobs laid exposed to the chilly air, barely covered by the sheer, see through top you were wearing.

Rafe's gaze furrowed upon landing on the hand you offered him, hesitating to accpet the touch till you further explained. "You don't think I'm gonna let you fuck me here, do you?" You questioned, sly grin plastering across your lips. Rafe's throat dried at the statement, failing to keep his compusure, and feign nonchalance over whatever the hell stunt you were pulling on him. "Let's go to the room, I already have the camera set up."

"You do?" He mumbled, letting you drag him towards your room. You nodded, twisting the doorknob open, and revealing the set up you had going on, camera adjusted over the bed, the same view he was used to witnessing through the screen while he secretly got off to your videos.

"I've got to be prepared," you giggled, letting go of his hand, and throwing yourself on the bed with a thud. You plopped your arms on the bed, crossing your legs seductively, as your skirt rid up your thighs, revealing the plump flesh hidden beneath the material. That alone had Rafe's cock stirring in his pants, desperate to explore your whole body, dive in your pussy till he no longer could coherent normal words out. "Knew you'd agree to this."

"What made you sure I was gonna agree to this?" He cocked his head to the side, fingers finding your ankle, as he deliberately traced the soft skin, leading all the way to your thighs. You tilted your head back, groping your tits through the fabric, the action immediately earning a grunt out of Rafe.

"I know my best friend," you shuddered out a breath, tugging the sheer of your top down, causing goosebumps to instantly break out across your chest. "You wouldn't say no to this."

"Fuck, yeah I won't." He hissed, grasping one of your tits in his hold. He squeezed the fatty flesh, kneading and carressing your nipple in between his fingers, until it was hard and perky. His attention settled in between your thighs, admiring the wet mess he made out of you, a wet patch visible through your lace panties. "While you look fucking great in those, I need them off your body now."

"Relax, Rafe, I'm not goin' anywhere." You teased, gliding your tongue over your teeth, as you leisurely tugged at the strings of your panties, merely to mess with Rafe, and get a reaction out of him. "Why don't you get the camera rolling first? Then I'll give you what you want."

"Fuck, how do I start this thing?" Rafe mumbled, pressing random buttons to get the camera started. His gaze fixed on the small lense, gulping at the sight of you practically half naked on the bed. Fuck, you looked surreal, out of world, he wished this wasn't just for content. "Is it on?"

You nodded upon spotting the little red light, waving him over with your hand. "How are we doin' this?" You asked, shuffling around for Rafe to squeeze himself behind you, quickly relaxing in his arms after he adjusted his position. A yelp almost shrieks past your parted lips as Rafe's hardon brushes over your lower back, clearly as turned on as you were, probably ever more. "Comfortable?"

"Don't worry about me," he hummed in your ear, bunching your hair to the side, where he could catch glimpse of your figure loose in his hold. He began by toying with the necklace hugging your neck, trailing his hand all the way down to your cleavage. From soothing circles turned into him groping you through the fabric, kneading the skin in his hand, the moans you mewled out like music to his ears. "Moaning like a fucking slut, huh, that feel' good?"

His name threatened to leave your mouth, washed down by a gasp when his lips brushed over the blade of your shoulder, littering wet, open-mouthed kisses to it as his fingers continuously massaged your tits, immediately releasing them when he tugged the fabric down. You buried your face in the crook of his neck, teeth grazing over his throat, far overwhelmed by the pleasure from the touch.

"You gonna let me fuck you in front of that camera?" Rafe whispered, mostly to you, dragging his hand down your lower stomach, past the waistband of your skirt. He pushed it up your waist, gaze settling on the camera lense as he fingered at your panties, sliding then beneath the fabric, as he toyed with it back and forth, the action teasing, causing you to arch your back. "Such a desperate slut, aren't you? Dying for my fingers to fuck your needy pussy."

"Mhm," you nodded, lips pressing into a thin line to contain your whines from scooping out, not wanting to come off needy, though your body language spoke otherwise. "Fuck me, please, destroy me on camera for everyone to see, 'want your fingers inside me."

Using the arm wrapped around your waist, Rafe pressed you down as he managed to slide the lace panties off, the action casual, yet deliberate, oblivious to your fucked-out state, and the mess he created out of you.

He almost chuckled, amused by the ragged whine that escaped your throat, lips parting with awe, as Rafe glides his digits up and down your folds, fingering at your sensitive clit, making you squirm in his arms. It felt heavenly, most times, you had to fake your reaction for content, but with Rafe? It came flawlessly, his fingers worked magic.

He traced your hole with the tip of his long digits, collecting your juices in the process of sliding his fingers up and down your hole, until your cunt was drenched with your arousal.

Pride swelled his chest, knowing he was the cause of this, as well as the whines you kept letting out, far too gone to acknowledge the camera yet rolling. Rafe used your parted lips as an opportunity to slip his fingers inside, taking in the sensation of your hot spit gliding over the digits, desperately licking off your juices clean.

A groan knocks out Rafe's mouth, as his fingers exit your mouth with a pop, the sound causing him to twitch in his pants. He was rock hard, it was starting to hurt, he could not wait to get off while remincing over your little moans that displayed how eager you were to have him, feeding into his sick fantasies.

"So good with your fingers," you praised, encouraging him to continue rubbing circles to your clit, flicking the nub over and over again, till your cunt was slick with (your) spit.

"Such a fucking whore." He murmurs, lips ghosting over the shell of your ear. His attention fixed on your cunt, hole gripping around nothing, and leaking with your juices. Turned on was underestimating how Rafe felt in the moment, heat pooling past his neck, until it settled on his face, tinting his cheeks a deep shade of red.

"Fuckkk..." You trailed off, fluttering your lashes through hooded eyes. Your body jerked as Rafe spread your folds with his fingers, revealing your glistening nub, coated with a glossy layer. "You like playing with your best friend's pussy baby?"

Rafe palmed your cunt at the statement, the gesture spiraling a wave of pleasure through your insides. Rafe's grunts were barely audible, though they were loud and clear like music to your ears, only for you to hear and enjoy.

The latter eventually decided to quit teasing you and line his fingers with your entrance, tracing them up and down, only inserting the tip of his digits to test you. You whined in protest, wiggling for a fraction, anything to help with your pent up sexual frustration, one only Rafe, your best friend could relieve.

He easily slid a finger inside, immediately engulfed with the warmness of your cunt, as you clenched around him, growing blinded by pleasure. He moved slowly; with a purpose, exploring each and every inch of you, afraid he'd miss out if he didn't pay you enough attention.

"Such a pathetic doll, letting your best friend ruin your pussy with his fingers." He grunted, fastening his pace, and lining his other finger with your hole.

"Yes yes yes yesss," you threw your head back,

as Rafe inserted another finger inside you, pumping them in and out of your hole, till you got used to his digits stretched you out. "Fuck me, please, 'wish it was your cock instead!"

"Bet you do," he heaved out a breath, scissoring his fingers inside you to explore every corner. "You'd like that, huh? Wanna fuck you dumb like a pathetic lil slut."

Rafe continued fucking you with his fingers, main focus on your face as it twisted with pleasure. His calloused digits repeatedly moved inside you, hitting your sweet spot in the process, and causing desire to spiral through your insides, coating every blood vessel and vein.

"You like fuckin' me like this?" You questioned through a whine, littering kisses to the curve of Rafe's jaw. "Much better than jerking off to my videos, don't you think?"

Fuck, you knew.

You chuckled when you recieved no response from the latter, a mere whimper as he thrusted his fingers inside your hole, rather pleased with himself, hoping this was your actual reaction, and not just for content.

"Come on my fingers," he demanded, request filthy,

something he fantasized about in the dim of the night. "I know you're close."

He was right, in the span of seconds, your climax built up, indicating you were close everytime Rafe would apply pressure, or use his thumb to rub your clit, spiking more and more heat through your body.

Your orgasm reached its peak, coming hard as you squirted all over Rafe's fingers, with Rafe riding his digits through your orgasm, not stopping even when your legs trembled as you came down from your high.

Rafe's fingers dripped with your sweet arousal, liquid tracing along the veins kissing up his arms. The sight alone had him a fucking mess, you dare make it worse when you bring his fingers to your lips, and suck his fingers clean.

The latter observed in awe, spit pooling in his mouth, as desire fogged his vision, eager to get a taste of your lips now glossed with your arousal.

A grin formed on your lips, quickly closing the distance seperating you in a chaste kiss, one breaking the boundaies you built for your friendship. Rafe's lips moved desperately over yours, licking into your mouth for the mere purpose of tasting you.

That didn't last long, interrupted when you inched back, just enough to whisper out your next words. "Pizza?"

"What?" Rafe's caught off gaurd by the question, too sudden for him to process it.

"Should we get pizza?" You asked, sitting up straight. "I'm hungry."

"Did we not jus–"

"That was for content!" You reasoned, face immediately growing hot. "It's done now, take care of your business and come on out, you drained me out, I'll help you out next time."

"There's a next time?" He nearly choked on his own spit.

"Only if you're up for it..." You shot back, searching for a reaction out of the latter.

Up for it? Screw that, he'd fuck you right now if he could.

#rafe cameron #rafe cameron x reader #rafe cameron x you #rafe cameron x y/n #rafe cameron fluff #rafe cameron smut #rafe cameron imagine #rafe x you #rafe x reader #rafe cameron outer banks #rafe obx #outer banks #outer banks x reader #outer banks smut #drew starkey

2K notes · View notes

hoonstqr · 1 month ago

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force me and choke me till i pass out - p.sh

warnings: smut! mdni! choking kink, slight degradation, backshots, spanking, unprotected sex, if i missed smth, lmk! note: the way i immediately ss these pics because wtf?!?!? hybe never close the gyms. need him to manhandle me like a ragdoll, free use anytime!! also pls ignore any mistakes, not proofread. don't like it? don't read it.

“What did you just say?” Sunghoon asks as he stops thrusting into you to process what he just heard.

“I’m asking you to choke me.” You repeat your words, your voice a little shakier than you intended. Your heart races as you feel the heat rising to your cheeks, a mix of arousal and embarrassment.

Sunghoon stares at you momentarily, his eyes darkening with lust as he tries to understand your request. He’s never done anything like this before, but your gaze tells him it’s something you need. “You’re sure about this? I don’t want to hurt you baby.”

You nod, trying to keep your voice steady. “I trust you, hoonie. Please.” The words come out in a breathy plea, and Sunghoon couldn’t refuse you. He leans in closer, his grip on your neck gentle at first, a question in his eyes. You nod again, urging him to go further.

His hand tightens around your throat, the pressure not painful but thrilling. You gasp, feeling your body respond instantly to the new sensation. Your pussy clenches around his cock, and he groans at the sudden change in tightness. The power dynamics shift and you can see the excitement in his eyes as he realizes you’re not just okay with this—you’re craving it.

Sunghoon starts to move again, his strokes a little slower and more deliberate as he chokes you. You were seeing stars cause of the delicious tension between your legs and the warm hand squeezing your neck. You can feel the blood pulsing in your ears, heightening every sensation, and making the pleasure more intense. The headboard slams against the wall in rhythm with his thrusts, echoing through the room.

He leans in closer to your ear, his hot breath tickling your skin. “You like that, don’t you? Tell me how much you like it, slut. Such a nasty girl. Made me wait so long for this.” His voice sends shivers down your spine.

You whimper, your eyes rolling back as you struggle to form words. “Y-yes, I like it, N-nghh” you manage to get out, the pressure on your throat making your voice squeak.

Sunghoon smirks, his grip tightening just a fraction, and he resumes his punishing rhythm, his hips snapping into you. Your ass cheeks burn from the friction against the bed, but it’s a sweet burn that mingles with the pleasure coursing through you. Your juices smearing on the sheets, and each smack of his hips against your ass fills the room with a lewd, wet sound that only serves to turn you on more.

Your eyes water, but it’s not from pain—it’s the overwhelming rush of pleasure that’s building up in your core. Your hands desperately claw at the bed, trying to find something to hold onto, your legs trembling as you try to keep yourself in position.

“H–hoonie, gonna c-cum,” you stutter out, your vision blurring around the edges.

Sunghoon’s grip tightens just enough to make your breath hitch, and his strokes grow more erratic. “Yeah? Cum for me, baby. Let me feel it around my cock. I want to see you lose it.” His voice is gruff, thick with his own need as he watches you teeter on the edge.

The pressure builds and builds until it’s all you can focus on—his hand around your throat, his cock stretching your ass, the sound of skin slapping together. Then it hits you like a tidal wave, your body convulsing in the throes of a powerful orgasm. You can’t hold back the choked scream that rips from your mouth as your orgasm spasms around his shaft.

Sunghoon’s eyes widen as he feels your walls clench around him, milking him closer to his release. He can’t believe how hot you look, your cheeks flushed, your eyes watering, and your worn-out state. He buries himself deep inside you, the head of his cock reaching for your cervix. You feel the pulse of his climax, ropes of cum filling you up as he empties himself into you.

His grip on your throat relaxes as he comes down from his high, his breathing ragged and heavy. You both lay there, panting, your bodies sticky with sweat and the aftermath of your intense coupling. Sunghoon’s eyes are glazed over, a look of pure satisfaction etched on his face as he looks down at you. You feel his cock soften inside you, but it’s not the end.

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heeluvv · 13 days ago

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THE BEST.ᐟ

pairingᝰ.ᐟ 02z x reader

genreᝰ.ᐟ smut

warningsᝰ.ᐟ oral (f), overstimulation, multiple orgasms, slight tit/nipple play, etc. (wc 5.366k)

natty's notesᝰ.ᐟ request, mdni, hate comments will be deleted.

"y/n, who do you think would be better?"

jay's voice pulled you out of your distracted haze, making you glance up at him with a confused tilt of your head. his expression was casual, but the subtle smirk curling at the corner of his lips told you otherwise.

you blinked, processing his words, but truthfully, you hadn’t been paying attention to any of their conversation. for the past thirty minutes, the three of them had been bickering back and forth, their voices fading into background noise as you remained engrossed in your phone, too uninterested to care about whatever stupid argument they were having this time.

"about what?"

your voice came out flat, uninterested, as your gaze flickered between jay, sunghoon, and jake, who sat right beside him.

but the moment sunghoon opened his mouth, your breath hitched, your body going rigid at the sheer audacity of his words.

"who do you think is best at giving oral?"

your phone nearly slipped from your grasp, your heart stuttering in your chest as you stared at him, eyes wide, lips parting slightly in shock.

were they serious?

the air thickened immediately, tension settling heavily between the four of you, and you could do nothing but sit there, staring at them, trying to piece together how the hell this conversation even started.

"bro, i'm literally number one—the best pussy eater you’ll ever know."

jake’s voice dripped with confidence, his smirk cocky, self-assured, as he shoved jay back playfully, as if the argument was already settled. jay barely reacted, only rolling his eyes, his expression unreadable, before giving a slow, mocking nod.

"yeah, okay."

the way he said it was so dry, so unconvinced, that it only added fuel to the fire, jake’s lips parting slightly as if he was about to argue his case again, but then both of them turned back to you.

waiting.

expecting.

your mouth felt dry, your skin suddenly feeling too warm, as their intense gazes bored into you, waiting for you to weigh in—waiting for you to choose.

but how the hell were you supposed to answer that?

your brows furrowed deeply, your expression a mix of disbelief and confusion, as you finally found your voice.

"how the fuck would i know?"

your response came out half incredulous, half exasperated, because, seriously—what the hell kind of question was that?

yet, despite the absolute insanity of this conversation, the atmosphere in the room had shifted.

the tension had thickened, intensified, and as you met their eyes again—jake’s cocky smirk, jay’s dark amusement, and sunghoon’s unwavering gaze—you realized something.

they weren’t just joking around anymore.

they wanted to prove it.

"if you're thinking the same shit as me, consider it not happening."

your voice was firm, unwavering, but the slight waver in your breath didn’t go unnoticed by them. the tension in the room had become almost suffocating, their gazes too heavy, too intense, and you needed to put some distance between yourself and whatever the hell this was turning into.

you pushed yourself up from the couch, your movements sharp, deliberate, as you made your way toward the kitchen. but just as you expected, they were right behind you, their footsteps close, too close, and you could already hear the low chuckles, the occasional shoves, as they jostled each other for space, acting as if this was some kind of game.

"please, y/n."

jake’s voice came first, smooth, persuasive, and just as you reached the kitchen counter, you felt his presence at your back, his hand reaching out to gently grasp your wrist, stopping you just short of putting any real space between yourself and them.

"these fuckers won’t stop until proven wrong…"

his words were half-exasperated, half-taunting, but the way his fingers tightened around your wrist, firm yet careful, sent a sharp shiver down your spine. you swallowed hard, feeling the warmth of their bodies closing in, sunghoon now leaning against the counter, his smirk lazy but his eyes dangerously sharp, while jay stood just a step behind jake, arms crossed over his chest, his gaze never once leaving yours.

they were serious.

and no matter how much you tried to ignore it, pretend like you weren’t affected, there was no denying the heat that was now thrumming in the air, curling around you, settling deep in your stomach.

jake barely had time to react before sunghoon shoved him aside, his movements quick, determined, completely unwavering as he made his way in front of you. his presence was overwhelming, the heat of his body so close, too close, as his hands found your waist with ease, thumbs pressing into your skin just enough to make you shiver.

his gaze was dark, unreadable, but the sly smirk playing at his lips told you everything you needed to know.

"let me prove them wrong, baby..."

his voice was low, smooth, thick with undeniable promise, and before you could even think about protesting, he was lifting you effortlessly, placing you onto the cool surface of the countertop. the contrast between the chill of the marble and the burning heat of his hands sent a shudder through you, and you barely had time to react before you felt his fingers hooking onto your waistband, dragging your shorts down slowly, torturously, as if savoring the moment.

"you’ll see why i’m the best out of the three, baby..."

his lips brushed against your ear, his breath warm, teasing, sending a wave of anticipation curling low in your stomach.

"gonna make you feel so good, you’ll be begging for more..."

the words dripped from his tongue like honey, and your breath hitched as he tossed your shorts aside, the fabric landing in a heap right in front of jay and jake’s shoes.

but he wasn’t done.

his hands moved with practiced ease, slipping beneath the delicate fabric of your panties, fingers curving just enough to drag them down the same way, slow, deliberate—torturous.

the second he let them fall from his fingers, your breath stalled, because the moment your bare pussy was revealed to them, a low, collective groan filled the space around you.

"fuck."

jay’s voice was hoarse, jake sucked in a sharp breath, but sunghoon?

he simply spread your legs wider, his hands gripping onto your thighs as he dropped to his knees, his hungry gaze locked onto you like he was starving.

the warmth of his breath fanned over your core, and before you could say anything, a soft whimper escaped you, completely unbidden.

he leaned in slowly, deliberately, his breath ghosting over your inner thighs, sending a shiver rippling through your body. his lips pressed down softly, warm and teasing, leaving a trail of heat as he inched higher, higher, his grip on your thighs tightening just enough to keep you in place. the anticipation was torturous, every small movement setting your nerves on fire, your breath coming out in uneven exhales as your body tensed under his touch. the way his lips lingered, the way his breath fanned over your skin—it was all too much, yet not enough.

your gaze was locked on him, pupils blown wide with both desire and trepidation, but no matter how much you tried to focus on sunghoon, you couldn’t ignore the two other sets of eyes burning into you from across the room. when you flicked your gaze upward, jake and jay were watching you intently, their expressions unreadable, though the subtle smirks pulling at their lips told you everything. there was something predatory in their stares, something that made your breath hitch, something that told you they were just waiting for you to break.

jay moved first, stepping closer, invading your space without hesitation, his presence alone enough to make your skin prickle. his fingers came up to trace over your cheek, soft, featherlight, a stark contrast to the intensity in his eyes. the way he looked at you was intoxicating, possessive, like he was already staking his claim before anything had even happened.

"gonna let sunghoon please you, doll?"

his voice was low, velvety, dripping with amusement, but there was something darker laced within it—something that made your stomach coil in anticipation.

"though he wouldn’t be as good as me..."

his fingers ghosted over your bottom lip, his touch barely there, yet enough to send a wave of heat through you. his words hung between you, heavy with implication, but before you could even think of responding, before you could process anything beyond the heat pooling low in your stomach—

sunghoon’s mouth was on you.

your reaction was instant, visceral, uncontrollable.

your body jolted, your thighs twitching as his lips wrapped around your most sensitive spot, his tongue flicking out in a slow, deliberate motion that had you gasping sharply, your nails digging into his hair.

"uh—fuck..."

your hands moved on their own, fingers tangling into his soft strands, your grip tightening without thought, without control, whether it was to ground yourself or push him deeper, you didn’t even know. he worked you with steady, calculated precision, his tongue dragging through your folds, lapping up your arousal with a hunger that made your head spin. his lips sealed over your clit once more, the suction intense, perfectly timed, before his tongue flicked over the sensitive nub, slow at first, then faster, sharper, sending pleasure rocketing through your body.

the heat in the room became suffocating, your skin damp, flushed, your breathing coming out in short, uneven gasps as sunghoon devoured you like a man starved. the contrast between his firm grip on your thighs—keeping you spread open, exposed, vulnerable—and the way his tongue worked against you, wet and warm and so precise, had your head falling back slightly, your body already on the verge of unraveling.

you could hear their breathing, could feel their presence surrounding you, the weight of their gazes pressing into your skin like a physical force. every time you moaned, every time your hips twitched involuntarily against sunghoon’s mouth, you knew they were watching, knew they were reveling in the way you slowly fell apart beneath their touch.

and god, you were so close to breaking completely.

"are you gonna cum, baby?"

sunghoon’s voice was low, muffled, his lips brushing against your drenched core as he peered up at you, his dark eyes burning with intensity. the sight alone nearly undid you completely—his mouth was slick with your arousal, his chin glistening as his tongue worked you over with expert precision, never once faltering in its relentless pace.

your breath came in short, ragged gasps, your chest rising and falling erratically as you locked eyes with him, your vision hazy with pleasure. your lips were parted in a silent moan, your mouth forming a perfect "o" shape, unable to articulate anything but breathy, desperate whimpers. the way he was eating you out—starving, greedy, determined—had you on the edge, your thighs trembling violently as you struggled to keep yourself upright on the counter.

but then—he changed the rhythm, and your body convulsed at the sheer intensity of it.

his tongue, once flicking and swirling over your clit in calculated, teasing strokes, now plunged deep inside you, the wet muscle thrusting in and out rapidly, fucking you with a pace so relentless, so overwhelming, that your hands flew to his hair, fingers tangling desperately as you pulled harder, unsure if you were pushing him away or pulling him closer.

"oh—fuck!"

your voice rang through the room, shameless and nearly desperate, the pleasure coursing through your veins making you feel boneless, weightless, completely undone.

"cum for me, baby," he murmured against you, the vibrations sending shockwaves straight to your core, your walls clenching around his tongue as he pushed deeper, his grip on your thighs tightening, keeping you exactly where he wanted you.

"show these fuckers I’m the best..."

his words were cocky, possessive, demanding, and he only doubled down, his tongue working even faster, his lips suckling harshly on your clit before diving back in, drinking you down like he couldn’t get enough.

the coil in your stomach tightened to the point of snapping, and you could do nothing—nothing but give in.

your head tilted back violently, your back arching off the counter, your thighs squeezing around his head as pure, white-hot pleasure crashed over you like a tidal wave.

"m’gonna cum—fuck, hoonie!"

your shattered moans filled the air as your orgasm ripped through you, your entire body trembling from the intensity, your nails digging into his scalp as you came completely undone against his mouth.

sunghoon groaned in satisfaction, lapping up every last drop, his tongue lazily flicking over your sensitive clit, as if he wasn’t ready to let you go just yet.

jake didn't hesitate for even a second, shoving sunghoon aside with ease, his hands immediately cupping your face, his palms warm and firm against your flushed skin. before you could even register what was happening, his lips crashed against yours, hungry, demanding—claiming. his kiss was rough, unrelenting, his teeth catching your bottom lip, sucking harshly before letting it snap back into place, the motion sending a shudder down your spine.

your head was spinning, still reeling from your orgasm, but jake didn’t give you a moment to recover. without a word, he dropped to his knees, his broad shoulders spreading your thighs even further apart as he settled between them, his heated gaze locked onto your swollen, glistening core.

"fuck, princess…"

his voice came out in a low, sultry purr, his breath hot against your skin, sending goosebumps trailing up your arms. his hands smoothed down your inner thighs, fingers digging into the soft flesh, thumbs tracing slow, lazy circles—teasing.

"you look so fucking good like this..."

he pressed an open-mouthed kiss to your thigh, then another, his tongue flicking out to lick at your sensitive skin, the contrast between the cool air and the heat of his tongue making you tremble involuntarily.

but he didn’t linger there for long.

within seconds, he had your legs spread impossibly wide, his grip tightening as he dived in without warning, his mouth latching onto your clit immediately, sucking with an intensity that had you arching off the counter with a sharp gasp.

"oh—fuck, jake, wa—!"

your words dissolved into a choked moan, your body shuddering violently as the overstimulation hit you like a freight train, the pleasure almost too much, too soon.

but jake? he wasn’t letting up.

his tongue moved in sync with his lips, alternating between harsh, deliberate sucks and slow, teasing licks, as if he was determined to break you down completely.

"c’mon, baby," he murmured against you, the vibration of his voice sending sparks straight to your core, his hands keeping you firmly in place as he continued to devour you with no mercy.

"you can take it. i know you can."

jake didn’t wait for a response—he never did.

without hesitation, his tongue plunged into you, the wet muscle curling and flicking with an unforgiving pace, leaving no room for teasing, no time to adjust. his movements were relentless, messy, his lips and tongue working in tandem, coaxing wave after wave of pleasure through your already overstimulated body.

the sounds that filled the room were obscene—the lewd slick of his tongue against your soaked folds, the wet, desperate moans that spilled from your lips, and the deep groans vibrating through jake’s chest, sending shocks of pleasure through your core. your arousal was everywhere, spreading over his lips, his chin, dripping down his jaw, though if anything, it only seemed to spur him on.

"fuck, jake—oh my god—!"

your voice trembled, your breath hitching between ragged gasps, your thighs beginning to shake uncontrollably as the pleasure mounted too fast, too intense. your hands gripped at the counter, nails scraping uselessly against the cool surface as your head tilted back, eyes squeezed shut from the overwhelming sensations.

but jake wasn’t letting up.

"fuck—this pussy’s so fucking good…"

his words were muffled against you, but the husky, wrecked tone of his voice sent another pulse of heat straight to your core. before you could even think, before you could brace yourself for the inevitable, he dove back in, his tongue thrusting deeper, curling against the soft, sensitive spots inside you, his lips latching back onto your clit with a devastating finality.

it was too much.

your body tensed violently, back arching as the orgasm slammed into you like a tidal wave, white-hot pleasure consuming every inch of you, your vision going blank, your mind fogging over completely.

your eyes rolled back, mouth parted in a silent scream before a shattered moan ripped through you, your legs trembling furiously as the release crashed over you, leaving you utterly, completely undone.

jake groaned in satisfaction, lapping up every drop, his grip firm as he kept you pinned down, refusing to let you escape the pleasure—not until he had taken everything from you.

"j-jake, I can’t—!"

your voice broke, strangled and trembling as your body shuddered violently, the overstimulation burning through you like fire. you could barely breathe, your chest heaving as your hands gripped uselessly at the counter, trying to ground yourself, trying to escape the relentless pleasure that refused to fade.

but jake? he wasn’t done.

his lips were still latched onto your clit, his tongue still flicking, slow and precise, dragging out every last aftershock, refusing to give you even a second of respite. his hands tightened on your thighs, keeping you spread wide, holding you firmly in place as your body twitched and convulsed beneath his mouth.

"p-please—fuck, I can’t—" you sobbed, tugging weakly at his hair, trying to push him away, your mind dizzy, overloaded, completely undone. but jake only groaned against you, the vibration making you jolt, sending another shockwave straight through your exhausted body.

but then—

suddenly, his warmth was ripped away.

a sharp growl filled the air as jay yanked jake back, his grip tight and unforgiving, the air between them thick with tension. jake wiped the slickness off his chin with the back of his hand, his lips shiny and swollen, his eyes glazed with hunger as he glared up at jay, clearly displeased at being interrupted.

"bitch, you already had your turn."

jay’s voice was low, rough, dripping with possessiveness, his gaze locked onto you, hungry, dark, dangerous. he stepped forward, closing the space between you in an instant, his fingers trailing up your trembling thighs, his touch searing against your oversensitive skin.

"now it’s mine."

your breath hitched, your body still shaking from the aftermath, but jay wasn’t about to give you a break.

his hands moved gently, fingers trailing along your damp cheek, smearing the stray tears that had spilled so effortlessly. his touch was soft, almost tender, but the way his eyes burned into you—filled with the utmost, raw hunger—told an entirely different story.

jay didn’t speak right away, just watched you, admiring the way your breath hitched, the way your lips parted slightly, still swollen from the way you had been biting down on them, desperate to contain your moans. he leaned in, so close you could feel the warmth of his breath ghosting over your lips, teasing you, tempting you. but just as you pushed forward, chasing the kiss, he pulled back, a wicked smirk playing on his lips.

"so needy for me, doll?"

his voice was low, teasing, the deep timbre sending chills down your spine. he let his lips trail along your cheek, barely pressing against your skin before drifting lower, down to your jaw, where he lingered just a second too long, his lips barely brushing against you before he finally let his kisses deepen.

his once sweet, featherlight pecks turned into open-mouthed kisses, hot and wet, his tongue darting out to soothe each spot before his teeth grazed against your skin, sucking down just enough to make sure his mark would be there tomorrow.

"jay, please…"

your moan was nearly breathless, a mixture of desperation and impatience, your fingers gripping onto him, nails digging into his shoulders, but jay was in no hurry. he wanted to take his time—to watch you come undone beneath him, to savor every sound, every shiver he could pull from you.

his lips continued their torturous descent, drifting lower, his kisses growing wetter, sloppier, his hands curving under your shirt, bunching the fabric in his fists as he dragged it up. he took his time, his lips leaving a heated path down your stomach, pressing kisses along the dips and curves, his breath fanning over your sensitive skin, making you shudder.

but it wasn’t until he finally reached the apex of your thighs, his face mere inches from your aching core, that you truly felt the heat of his gaze, the weight of his hunger.

jay exhaled deeply, his hands gripping your thighs firmly, spreading you open as he took in the sight before him.

"fuck… look at you, doll."

his voice was thick with need, his eyes locked onto you with an intensity that made your entire body burn.

jay’s fingers barely grazed your aching clit, the lightest touch sending a jolt through your overstimulated body, but before he could go any further, a sharp voice sliced through the thick tension in the kitchen, making you flinch.

"that's cheating."

the words dripped with amusement, edged with challenge, and when jay’s fingers stilled against you, his jaw clenched in mild annoyance, you knew exactly who had spoken.

sunghoon.

leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, his sharp gaze was trained directly on you, his tongue clicking disapprovingly as he shook his head. jake, lounging lazily beside him, let out a low chuckle, his smirk only widening as he tilted his head at jay.

"fucking cheater."

"oh, shut up…" jay’s voice was barely above a murmur, a quiet growl of irritation mixed with amusement as his hand glided lower, fingers trailing teasingly along your inner thigh, making your breath catch in anticipation. he leaned in, so close that you could feel the warmth of his breath ghosting over your aching core, sending a shiver through your already sensitive body.

his lips brushed against your skin, and he let out a low, knowing chuckle, one laced with pure mischief, pure possession.

"just wanted to touch my precious doll…" he murmured, his tone mockingly sweet, but there was an edge to it, something darker, more possessive curling at the ends of his words. "guess if I can’t do that, then…"

he let the sentence trail off, leaving the thought unfinished, leaving you hanging in that space of need before—a sharp gasp tore from your lips.

jay wasted no time, his tongue dragging slow and deliberate, a single, flat lick up your soaked folds, the heat of it sending a shockwave straight through you. your thighs twitched, body jerking slightly, and a whine spilled from your throat, drawn out and helpless as he lingered just a second too long, letting you feel every bit of him, letting the wet heat of his tongue press against you fully.

your hands fisted his hair, toes curling, but nothing could prepare you for the way he finally reached your clit, his tongue flicking the swollen bud, a sharp contrast to the slow, languid strokes before.

"fuuuck, jay—!"

your voice broke, the pleasure hitting you too fast, too strong, your thighs trying to snap shut, but his hands kept you spread wide, his nails digging into your skin as if to say—you’re not going anywhere.

jay’s movements were slow, deliberate, each stroke of his tongue against your clit sending waves of pleasure coursing through your veins. his mouth was hot, wet, merciless, his lips wrapping around your swollen bud before sucking lightly, the sensation making your thighs tremble in his grasp.

a deep groan rumbled through his chest, the vibrations shooting straight through your core, making your body jolt as his tongue delved deeper, pushing into your entrance at an agonizingly slow pace. the stretch was new, the feeling intimate, filthy, and it had your walls fluttering, gripping his tongue tightly, pulling him in further.

"oh—s-shit…!"

your breath hitched, a sharp gasp escaping as your hands scrambled for something to hold onto, your body on fire from the overwhelming sensation. your eyes flickered open, and what you saw only made the heat pool even deeper in your stomach.

they were watching you.

sunghoon, jake—both standing there, their dark gazes locked onto you, silent, intense, their chests rising and falling with slow, controlled breaths. but you didn’t miss the way their jeans strained painfully, their bulges prominent, unmistakable, the fabric doing nothing to hide just how much this was affecting them.

sunghoon was the first to move.

he pushed off the wall, his footsteps measured, predatory, and before you could even react, his large hands tangled in your hair, his grip firm, possessive as he tilted your head up, forcing your dazed gaze to meet his.

"look at you…" his voice was low, taunting, his thumb brushing over your swollen lips, his eyes dripping with dark amusement. "so fucking pretty like this."

then, without warning, he crashed his lips against yours, swallowing the desperate moans spilling from your mouth. the kiss was hungry, feverish, all clashing teeth and tangled tongues, as if he was devouring the remnants of your sanity. your lungs burned for air, but you didn’t care, gasping against him only to have him steal the breath from your lips again.

and then—another pair of hands.

jake moved next, stepping into place like it was second nature, his touch searing as he reached for your shirt, his fingers brushing over your flushed skin as he dragged it up, up, up. your bra followed suit, the straps slipping off your shoulders before he tugged the cups down, letting your breasts spill free, the cool air making your nipples pebble instantly.

"fuck," he breathed, his voice raspy, thick with want, his hands already pushing your thighs further apart.

his lips met your skin a second later, hot and wet, tongue swirling over one nipple before his teeth grazed it lightly, tugging just enough to send a sharp jolt of pleasure straight down your spine.

you whined into sunghoon’s mouth, your back arching instinctively, and that only spurred jake on, his hands palming your tits, squeezing, kneading, his thumbs brushing over your sensitive peaks before his mouth latched onto the other one.

and through all of it—jay never stopped.

his tongue still delved deep into you, his lips still wrapped around your clit, the sinful combination of their hands, their mouths, their touches pulling you further and further into madness.

your thighs trembled violently, the overstimulation coursing through you in waves as jay’s slow, deliberate licks kept you teetering on the edge, his lips never once losing their rhythm. the contrast between his agonizingly slow pace and the sharp, sudden flicks of his tongue against your swollen clit had you completely breathless, your moans dissolving into whimpers against sunghoon’s mouth.

but just when you tried to push yourself further into the kiss, just when you needed the distraction from the unbearable pleasure building in your core, sunghoon suddenly pulled away, his lips leaving yours with a slick pop.

jake followed suit, detaching himself from your chest, his wet lips grazing your sensitive nipple one last time before he leaned back, both of them now watching you, taking in the state you were in—eyes hazy with lust, lips swollen and parted, chest rising and falling in sharp, unsteady breaths.

"fuck, jay—please don’t stop…"

your voice wavered, laced with desperation, your fingers tightening in his hair as you rocked your hips against his mouth, seeking more, needing more. but just as you thought he’d give in, a sharp sting spread through your inner thigh, a loud slap echoing in the heated kitchen.

a loud, broken whine ripped from your throat as your body jerked, your leg twitching from the impact.

"take what i fucking give you, doll," jay growled, his voice low, rough, sending a chill down your spine. his fingers gripped your thighs, spreading them even wider as he dived back in, his tongue moving faster, deeper, more relentless than before, his lips latching onto your clit as he sucked so hard your entire body shuddered violently.

your head tilted back, falling against jake’s shoulder, your body feeling weightless, on the verge of crumbling apart. his hands immediately wrapped around your waist, securing you against him, his lips pressing soft, almost mocking kisses along the side of your neck.

"gonna cum, baby?" jake murmured, his voice taunting, teasing, his lips brushing against your ear as his fingers traced up your trembling stomach. "gonna make a mess again, aren’t you?"

all you could do was whimper, nodding furiously, your hips rolling desperately against jay’s face, chasing the release that felt so impossibly close yet so painfully out of reach.

your entire body convulsed, waves of pleasure crashing down on you with an intensity that left you trembling. your thighs clamped around jay’s head, but he didn’t budge—instead, he moaned against you, the vibrations pushing you further into bliss, his tongue languidly stroking through your folds, savoring every drop of your release.

"fuck—fuck, jay!"

your voice broke into a scream, your back arching sharply, fingers gripping onto whatever you could find—jake’s arms, the edge of the countertop—anything to ground you as your orgasm ripped through you with overwhelming force. your breath came in sharp, gasping pants, your chest heaving, mind completely blank from the aftershocks.

but jay? he wasn’t done.

he kept going, his tongue lazily dragging through your slit, collecting everything you gave him, groaning deeply like he was addicted to the taste of you. it was too much, the overstimulation bordering on unbearable, and you whimpered, your hips weakly shifting away, but jay held you in place, his hands gripping your thighs tightly as he licked you clean, whole, ruined.

with one last slow swipe of his tongue, he finally pulled away, standing up, his chest rising and falling heavily, his lips, chin, and jaw glistening under the dim kitchen light.

when your hazy vision cleared, you were met with three pairs of eyes, all trained on you, all filled with dark amusement and heated satisfaction.

"baby, tell us now…"

sunghoon’s voice was low, coaxing, his fingers brushing damp strands of hair away from your face, tucking them behind your ear so gently it sent shivers down your spine. his gaze searched yours, expectant, confident—like he already knew the answer.

but you couldn’t speak.

your lips parted, but nothing came out, your throat too dry, your mind too foggy, either from the intensity of your orgasm or the impossible choice laid before you.

"come on, princess," jake murmured next, his lips ghosting along your cheek, his voice dripping with cocky certainty. "it’s me. i know it is."

his hands skated over your sides, his fingers sinking into your waist possessively, and for a moment, you thought maybe he was right—maybe it was him—maybe—but all you could do was whimper softly, a weak shake of your head following soon after.

"i… i c-can’t…"

your voice was small, breathless, barely audible, but they all heard it.

jay, still catching his breath, raised a brow, his gaze tracking over your shaking body, your parted lips, your chest still desperately seeking air.

"what do you mean?"

his voice was gentler this time, but there was something demanding behind it, something that said tell me now.

you swallowed thickly, eyes flickering between them—sunghoon’s intense gaze, jake’s lazily confident smirk, jay’s piercing eyes that never wavered from yours.

"i… i can't c-choose…"

the words left you in a whisper, your lashes fluttering as you dropped your gaze, feeling the heat of their stares consume you whole.

"you three are the best."

silence.

"fuck."

three voices, three reactions—jake’s grin widening, sunghoon clicking his tongue, jay exhaling sharply, shaking his head slightly before running a hand through his hair.

you barely had time to register their expressions before jake grabbed your chin, forcing you to meet his eyes once more.

"guess we’ll just have to take turns ruining you, then, princess."

natty's notesᝰ.ᐟ hoped you liked it !!

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