#not sure if this needs anymore tags tbh

[theetherealraphael]

so apparently i coin self-indulgent genders now. sorry yall

angredscpgoldic: a gender related to angels, archangels, the colour red, the scp foundation, the colour gold, (especially when paired with red), cats, moths, horror, and anything related to those.

feel free to rb if you feel this also applies to you lol- or if you wanna add an image id! just please credit me if this is used anywhere else lmao

[giantkillerjack]

Ya know. I spent most of my life with horrible painful soul-crushing social anxiety.

And after about 25 years of continuous hard work, suddenly, people started pointing out - to my utter bafflement - that I had, in fact, achieved my lifelong dream of being charismatic. I'm 29 now; I feel comfortable in most social situations, and it is a very rare person whom I cannot make laugh.

I am, undoubtedly, finally, charismatic.

But do you know what I found?

I found that now that I have an understanding of which social rules serve which functions -- Now that I have an understanding of just how much damage my awkwardness was doing to people, well,

I found that, actually, my awkwardness never really hurt anyone at all. People were just judgmental dicks to me about it.

Now that I have the skill-level to (most of the time) creatively vocalize what is in my head as soon as I think it and without fear, I can confirm once and for all what I had always suspected:

I was worth talking to when I was quiet.

I was worth talking to when I was awkward, and when the words in my head took time and patience to hear, and when most of my jokes didn't land. I was worth talking to the whole time.

So I just... I hope that if you've ever wondered whether you are worth communicating with, the answer is yes. Absolutely yes. Each of us has a soul worth sharing - and if you and I were talking, I would happily wait for you to speak (or communicate in other ways) without condescending, and I would never shame you for that harmless awkwardness that so many people feel the need to violently stomp out.

You are worth talking to. You just are. And you deserve people who will speak to you with kindness, with patience, and with the basic immutable respect owed to all people.

(I talk about this with some frequency, both on tumblr and in real life. At some point, maybe I'll gather all my thoughts on the matter into one post. At some point, I wrote about my personal experience trying to build my social skill. But I felt the need to say at least a little bit tonight after seeing this other lovely post, and I'm glad I did. It will happen again.)

[dchuntress]

killing myself postponed (my finals results will come out on the eighteenth and my teachers can't tell me anything before that)

[cjgladback]

For the last several months I've been resisting the siren call of machining while enjoying the new-to-me channel Pask Makes, with its woodworking and tool production.

But yesterday I watched two videos from Adam Savage in a row, with all their semi-chaotic plotting, layout work, and winging it. I now desperately need access to a machine shop and I'm being so brave about it.

That said, I have just downloaded FreeCAD to get as close as I can digitally to that thought process without the metal shavings, blue stained fingertips, and sulfuric lubricant smell. Or at least as close as I can for free.

[natailiatulls07]

Because I liked a boy

Max Verstappen x female!Ferrari!reader

Summary - Ferrari's media editor and a redbull driver get into a relationship, something that her team are not happy about

Warnings - fake hate, Ferrari being petty, swearing

A/n - No hate toward Lizzie or Bella!! I love them both soo much <3

Face Claim: Lizzie Machintosh/ Bella Hadid

-

yourusername

Back in paddock with the team ❤️

Tagged: charles_leclerc carlossainz55

Liked by scuderiaferrari and 87,634 others

username I love Y/n in reddd

username Best media girl ever!!

charles_leclerc Did you like your own post through the team account??

= scuderiaferrari Yes I did 😇

username STUNNING

username The Ferrari employment team know what the people want 😍

f1gossip

Spotted: Y/n L/n, Ferrari’s media editor, seen outside her apartment complex, in Central London, holding three bouquets of flowers. Has she found love in the Ferrari garages??

Liked by username and 43,862 others

username Secret admirer??

username Sooo happy for her!!

username Is this a soft launch kinda thing?? 👀

username It’s either from Carlos or Charles for sure!

= username Babes they both have girlfriends, stop being delulu 😃

= username I mean Y/n is definitely the home wrecker type of girl

= username Wtf shut the fuck up!

scuderiaferrari

Just filmed a new C2 videoooo ✌🏻

Tagged: charles_leclerc carlossainz55 yourusername

Liked by maxverstappen1 and 7,537,846 others

username Girl who gave you those flowers?!?

username Their faces LMAO

username Max liked!! Lestappen continuessss

username Three hotties!!

username When will it be out?!?!?!? I need to know!!

username Not Max casually showing his love for Charles 🥹

f1gossip

Spotted: A few f1 personnels attended a party in Monte Carlo just last night; Max Verstappen, Lando Norris, Carlos Sainz and Y/n L/n (Ferrari’s media editor). However, Carlos and Lando were seen leaving early and Max and Y/n are rumoured to be very very friendly together

Liked by username and 45,724 others

username All looking hot as alwaysss

username Max and Y/n, is this some Romeo and Juliet thing??

username She has the most iconic outfits EVER

username Ferrari and Redbull?!?!? 👀👀

username Those heels omfgggg

username Max not in team wear for once!! 😍

yourusername posted a story

username Not Y/n soft launching!! I can’t!!

username IKR I WANNA KNOW EVERYTHING

username What if it’s Max??! 🫢

username Nahh girlll stop being delulu

username Nooo because they were friendly at that party soo it’s not impossible 🤪

yourusername

Well before the f1 gossip pages get to post, our secrets outtt

Tagged: maxverstappen1

Liked by charles_leclerc and 9,327,645 others

username Wait what?!?!

username The cutest ever!!

username Wait explain!!

= username So basically Max just went up to her and kissed her after his win in front of all the cameras!!

username Oh shittt 🤩

username Max was like ‘fuck the soft launch!!😋’

username Traitor

username Bet she’s gonna share all Redbulls secrets to Ferrari

username If I was Ferrari or Redbull I wouldn’t trust her anymore

username Kelly was prettierrr

yourusername posted a story

f1gossip

Rumour has it: Y/n L/n has lost her job at Ferrari. In her recent instagram story she wrote 'living the unemployed life', does this mean her career with Ferrari is over? Many fans made it call how untrust and unloyal Y/n has become since the launch of her relationship with opposing team Redbull racing driver, Max Verstappen.

Liked by username and 57,256 others

username Thank fuck Ferrari dropped her

username Serves her right tbh

username The song!! because I liked a girl by Sabrina Carpenter

username It's the end of an eraaa

username I wonder what she's gonna do now

= username either relay on Max or join Redbull lmaooo

-

[youreverydayfangirl]

but daddy i love him

pairing: charles leclerc x australian! reader

summary: where people have things to say about your relationship, or in which it all gets to much for y/n

warning: age gap relationship, slutshaming, angst, death threats

a/n: i have a pt 3 planned don't worry guys

pt 1 is here!!! pt 3 is here!!!

f1 masterlist

main masterlist

arthurleclerc has posted one story

caption: best future sister in law

liked by charlesleclerc, yourusername and 24, 386 others

charlesleclerc how is she

arthurleclerc shes fine

charlesleclerc take care of her please

arthurleclerc ofc i will

yourusername HELP whyd you post this one

arthurleclerc cause you low key look weird asf 🤷🏼

arthurleclerc also im legit standing next to you whyd you have to text me

user1 so she got to you

arthurleclerc leave her alone man shes legit done nothing

user2 ew

arthurleclerc how bout you fuck off

yourusername has posted one story

caption: revenge

liked by charlesleclerc, arthurleclerc and 345, 795 others

charlesleclerc hes gonna kill you

yourusername oh well

charlesleclerc how are you

yourusername fine

arthurleclerc im gonna kill you

arthurleclerc take this down

yourusername no you wont

yourusername you like me to much too

arthurleclerc true

user1 slut

user2 going for the more age appropriate one now

user3 cant just have one can you

yourusername has posted

liked by charlesleclerc, olivia rodrigo and 3, 278, 217 others

yourusername happy international womens day. celebrating the women closest to me

tagged: lilymhe, francisca.cgomes, sabrinacarpenter, oliviarodrigo, carla.brocker, yourmothersusername, pascaleleclerc

francisca.cgomes my fav omg

→ yourusername your literally the bestest friend in the whole world

lilymhe hate that photo tbh

→ yourusername wdym you literally look STUNNING

→ user1 shes so not a girls girl

sabrinacarpenter not stop i miss you

→ yourusername i miss you more girl

oliviarodrigo well hangout when your tour finished trust

→ yourusername ofc i wouldn't have it any other way

carla.brocker thank you for dealing with arthur today omg

→ yourusername lol sure anytime

→ arthurleclerc HEYYY

→ user2 ew shes such a slut

→ arthurleclerc pipe down user2

yourmothersusername my gorgeous daughter

→ yourusername love you mummy

yourmothersusername my gorgeous daughter

→ yourusername love you mummy

pascaleleclerc couldn't be happier to have you in our family

liked by creator

pascaleleclerc thank you for taking charles off our plates

→ yourusername ofc but you have to take him on saturday hes getting clingy

→ charlesleclerc heyy

→ yourusername sorry mon amor but its true

user3 she saw twitter and had to shut it down real quick

→ user4 no fr tryna act like they acc like her

yourusername has posted

liked by francisca.cgomes, charlesleclerc and 4, 786, 374 others

yourusername life before i have to go back on tour

tagged: fransisca.cgomes, gomezzzlife

charlesleclerc 🤍

fransisca.cgomes STUNNING

→ yourusername SAYS YOU

user1 acting as if its a chore to be on tour

user2 imagine not liking your fiances comment

→ user3 no fr fr

user4 go die slut

yourusername has posted

caption: race day

liked by charlesleclerc, francsica.cgomes and 128, 879 others

charlesleclerc you look gorgeous today

yourusername charlie 🤍

francisca.cgomes HOT

user1 ABSOLUETLY NOT

user2 byeee

yourusername has posted

liked by sabrinacarpenter, oliviarodrigo and 11, 237, 456 others

yourusername but daddy i love him out now

COMMENTS ON THIS POST HAVE BEEN DISABLED

INCOMING PHONECALL

charles

my love

whats going on

you

charlie

im sorry

you

i just can't do this anymore

its all too much

charles

what

what are you talking about

you

i can't do us anymore

i love you so much

but everythings to much

their all to much

charles

fuck them

they don't know our relationship

they don't know how much i'm in love with you

please we can figure something out

you

i can't charlie

i'm sorry

i just need space

CALL ENDED

charlesleclerc has posted one story

liked by pierregasly, francisca.cgomes and 567, 892 others

COMMENTS ON THIS POST HAVE BEEN LIMITED

__________________________

a/n: part two guys!!! lmk if you want a pt3 becuase i have one planned.

[leclercsainzz]

could you please do a jude bellingham where him and reader claim to be friends but eveyone assumes they’re together??? like they leave flirty comments on each other or stuff like that??

JUST FRIENDS, OR?

PAIRINGS: jude bellingham x fem!reader

TYPE: social media au

yourusername

liked by judebellingham, gioareyna and 585,947 others

yourusername: if you like this, then you like me 😉

view 6,846 comments

judebellingham: let me unlike this real quick

↳ yourusername: boy, yk damn well you like me 😌

↳ judebellingham: i mean, i guess

↳ yourusername: do you like me, like me? or just like me?

↳ judebellingham: 🤫

↳ user: are they flirting or???

↳ user: for two ppl who claim to be “friends” this sure don’t look like “just friends”

user: i swear, it’s so hard to decipher whether they’re flirting or just playing around … like?!?!??

user: how do i like this multiple times??!????!? 😩😩

gioareyna: damn okay, let me unlike this

↳ user: LMAO, PLEASE 😭

user: soooo are you and jude together or?????

user: my fingers hurt from double clicking too much

user: you’re so beautiful, i swear 😍😍😍😍

jobebellingham: when you say, “like” do you mean actually like? like like? or? because i know a little thing or two

↳ user: jOBE! WHAT DO YOU KNOW?!!?? LET US IN ON THE SECRET, PLEASE, IM BEGGING!! 🙏🏼

↳ jobebellingham: as jose mourinho once said, “i prefer not to speak … if i speak, i am in big trouble”

comment has been deleted

user: HELP, diD jOBE DELETE HIS COMMENT?!!? 💀 iT’S NOT THERE ANYMORE WTF?!??

user: stunnin’ 😍

user: can i stop liking this post now?

user: girl are you and jude dating?!???? i need to know

user: 😍😍😍😍😍😍😍

user: ugh, she’s soo pretty wtf 😫

user: YN!!! where’d you get that sweatshirt?!!??

emmachamberlain: pretty girl 😍

judebellingham

liked by yourusername, fedevalverde and 784,930 others

judebellingham: a place like no other .. mi casa! 🤍 #halamadrid

tagged: @realmadrid

view 9,937 comments

realmadrid: 🤍🤍🤍🤍🤍

user: let him cook!!!

adidaslondon: from birmingham to the bernabéu 💫

user: our starboy 🤩

vinijr: hey, judeeeee

yourusername: you’re that guy, huh?

yourusername: that’s my #5 🔥

↳ user: notice how she said “my” and not “our” 👀

↳ judebellingham: #5 on the field but #1 in your heart 😉 @yourusername

↳ user: “just friends” they say

user: unbelievable player! 👏🏼

user: ya’ll see yn’s comment?!!? she said, “MY”

↳ user: i’m telling you, these two are dating

england: 🤩

user: what a guy!! 🔥

user: @yourusername this yo man?

user: my man is currently thriving rn

user: cr7 would be proud

↳ user: missing my goat 😓

user: jude > that one barca dude (i said what i said)

↳ user: “said what i said” who mf?!!??

↳ user: i know who you’re referring to, i agree 🫣

jobebellingham: 🤩🤍

erling.haaland: hi cutie

user: #halamadrid 🤍🤍🤍

user: madrid > barca

↳ user: you mean barca > madrid

judebellingham

📍mykonos, greece

liked by trentarnold66, yourusername and 710,104 others

judebellingham: what a place 🇬🇷

view 7,831 comments

jobebellingham: wow, you’re cool

↳ yourusername: or so he thinks …

yourusername: hey judeeee 🤭

↳ judebellingham: hey pretty girl 👋🏾

↳ user: uMmmm??!?!?

↳ user: “just friends” my ass

user: welcome to madrid 🤍

user: finest player ever, i swear 😍

user: does anyone know if he’s alone on the trip or??

↳ user: why do you care???

user: I WAS JUST IN MYKONOS LAST WEEK 😭😭

user: this mf calling yn “pretty girl” was my last straw 😩

gioareyna: i miss u, cutie 😘

↳ judebellingham: i miss you too 😘

user: harry kane >>>> jude

↳ user: thIs must be a joke, wtf 😭😭

↳ user: did jude miss a penalty shot?!? i don’t think so! harry kane >> jude 🤩 CASE CLOSED! (yes, it’s a joke)

user: jude, the kids miss you, come back home

↳ user: me being delusional like 💀

trentarnold66: 🤩🤩🤩

user: live, laugh, love jude ❤️

user: sirrrr 😍😍

user: dude just stole my girl’s attention from me

↳ user: does your gf happened to be yn?!?

↳ user: nah, i wish tbh 😩

user: he’s so damn fine 😮‍💨

user: i told my mom about us

↳ user: ya’ll delusional, damn 🤣

user: is yn with you or???

user: he wants me 🤭

↳ user: yn, is that you?

yourusername

📍oía, santorini, greece

liked by judebellingham, jobebellingham and 601,101 others

yourusername: a lil vacay photo dump:) 😜

view 5,837 comments

user: jUde’s in greece??!? yn’s in greece?!?? does this mean?!?? they’re in greece together or???!?

gioareyna: 👀 oooohhh

↳ user: oohh?? wdym ohhh??

user: they posted different locations but im pretty sure they’re together!! jude posted a pic in a boat?? now yn?

judebellingham: hey ynnnn 👋🏾

↳ yourusername: heyyy bestie!!!

user: they HAVE to be together

judebellingham: are you following me? 🤔

↳ yourusername: pretty sure, you’re the one following me?

↳ judebellingham: mom did tell me to follow my dreams so;)

↳ yourusername: ooohh is that so??

↳ judebellingham: absolutely, pretty girl 😙

user: ^ iS he flirting ?????

user: don’t flirt with your “friend” challenge: level impossible

user: he can try to be a little less obvious

↳ user: who?

↳ user: jude lmao

user: pretty girl 😍😍😍

user: one chance is all im asking for, yn!!!!!

user: beauty!

jobebellingham: what takes you to greece, young lady?

↳ yourusername: simply lost in the blue and white charm of the greek islands 😌

↳ jobebellingham: and jude???

comment has been deleted

sasha__rebecca: hi, you’re hot! 😍

sasha__rebecca: that’s my girlfriend, ya’ll 😩

↳ yourusername: 😘😘😘

↳ jackgrealish: excuse me???

↳ yourusername: you’re excused, grealo

↳ sasha__rebecca: sorry, jack! my heart belongs to yn

yourusername

liked by sasha__rebecca, masonmount and 585,937 others

yourusername: 🤎🤎🤎

view 5,027 comments

user: how can someone be so pretty?!?? 😩

judebellingham: yo bro who got you smiling like that? 🤔

↳ yourusername: not you that’s for sure(:

↳ judebellingham: and here i thought i was the reason behind that beautiful smile but oh well 🤷🏽‍♂️ …..

↳ user: um????!??? hello??? does anyone else see this??

user: can we all talk about jude’s comment???!???

↳ user: im CONVINCED these two are together

user: i just know jude took these pic

user: gorggg 😍😍😍😍

user: your smile is everything 😩

user: “just friends” they say

user: nah frrr, who got you smiling like that??!?

user: jude, i get it, she’s gorgeous! i’d be obsessed too 😌

user: juDe’s COMMENT AKAKALDNFNXL

user: i pray they’re together ✨✨✨✨🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼

erling.haaland: coffee 👍🏼

↳ yourusername: oh, hey there

↳ user: why is he so random??? 😭😭💀

mikkykiemeney: 😍😍😍

↳ yourusername: ❤️❤️

user: were you and jude in greece together?

user: idc if she’s not a wag but she’s my fav wag 😌

user: her smile broooo 😩😩😩😩😩

user: jude’s real lucky, huh?

sasha__rebecca: let me take you out for dinner 😉

↳ yourusername: anything for you, my love 😘

user: she fine asff 😗

jobebellingham: 🤩

↳ user: watch out for jude 🤣 that’s his girl

user: jude, huh? 😏

judebellingham

📍south of france

liked by gioareyna, yourusername and 701,016 others

judebellingham: recharging with my bro! 🇫🇷🫶🏽

tagged: @jobebellingham

view 7,937 comments

user: you’re telling me that last post is you and jobe?? 🤔

↳ user: LMAOO FRRR 💀

↳ user: i guess yn is “bro” now

↳ user: like bffr, mate 🙄

johnstonesofficial: nice you!

yourusername: cute!

yourusername: bro 😊

↳ user: 😏😏😏😏

↳ user: just say ya’ll dating

yourusername: my fav!!!

↳ judebellingham: 💁🏽‍♂️ i know i am

↳ yourusername: sorry??? i was talking about jobe??

↳ jobebellingham: so inconsiderate, damn 🙄

↳ yourusername: tell me about it

↳ judebellingham: 🙄🙄 i hate you guys

↳ yourusername: we love you tooooo 😘😘

↳ jobebellingham: speak for yourself, yn

gioareyna: good people 🙌🏼

user: jobe is starting to look like jude, i swear

user: 🔥🔥🔥🔥

user: we all agree that’s yn in the last post right?

user: don’t you mean recharging with bro AND girl?

user: they look like twins in that second post

user: my boyfriend and brother in law 😩

user: bellingoal 🤩

user: the genes are STRONG STRONG

user: my favorite brothers ❤️❤️

user: mom and dad bellingham really said, “copy and paste”

judebellingham

liked by trentarnold66, erling.haaland and 711,034 others 

judebellingham: she’s not so bad 🤷🏽‍♂️

tagged: @yourusername

view 6,857 comments

user: FINALLY OMG WOANSKSLX

user: i had a feeling they were together but i was NOT prepared for the hard launch, wtf alssnsodbf

↳ user: you and me both, sister

jobebellingham: about damn time! 👏🏽

gioreyna: it’s official now, i gotta share the loml 😟

↳ judebellingham: sharing is caring after all 😉

↳ yourusername: um????

yourusername: you’re not so bad yourself, mate

yourusername: ❤️❤️

user: i was NOT PREPARED FOR THIS

user: uhhh, hello?????

user: am i dreaming or??????!!?!

user: I MANIFESTED THIS SHIT, IDCCCC

user: so this confirms they’ve been together for a while, right?

trentarnold66: have i been replaced, now that it’s official?

↳ judebellingham: never that

erling.haaland: i feel a bit heartbroken 💔

↳ judebellingham: just to clarify, you left first 🙁

↳ gioareyna: and then there was one left ….

↳ user: well damn 😟 thanks for reminding me 😭😭😭😭

user: my favs, omg!!!!

user: scREAMING ALSLAPDNFjelal

user: ngl i’m a bit heartbroken, but also happy for them

user: we’ve officially lost him, girlies 😩😩😩

user: i’m 💔💔😭😭 but also 🙌🏼🤩😏😉🤩🤩

yourusername

liked sophiaamelia, erling.haaland and 647,750 others

yourusername: i guess the secrets out, huh? 😝❤️

tagged: @judebellingham

view 5,047 comments

user: the first pic literally confirms they were together in greece!! bapsjdndkdjorgbpsndl

user: yn, babe, the secrets been out for ages 🙄 bffr

↳ yourusername: were we THAT obvious?

↳ user: yes, girl 😭😭😭 ya’ll weren’t the best at hiding it tbh

gioareyna: ahhh my man 😍😍😍

↳ yourusername: my*

↳ gioareyna: he was MINE first tho

user: the real madrid jersey 😩😩

judebellingham: 😘😘

judebellingham: i love you, pretty girl ❤️❤️

↳ user: cRying 😭😭😭😭

jobebellingham: 🙌🏽🤩

user: you’re cheating on me, huh??? 😒😒😒

user: “secrets out” as if nobody knew 💀

↳ user: nahh frrr 🤣

user: screaming and crying 💔💔😭 yn, you broke my heart

user: FINALLY!!!!!!! 🙌🏼🙌🏼🙌🏼🙌🏼🙌🏼

trentarnold66: this cute or whatever 🙄 preferably the latter

↳ user: please, trent 😂😂😂

user: they cute!! 🥰

user: favs

user: I CALLED IT, OMG!!! 😏

user: it was about time, girl!!!

[sunrizef1]

All the boys PT2

Pairing: Jude Bellingham x reader, Logan sargeant x sister!reader, f1 grid x reader

Summary: who is reader soft launching???

A/N: yay part 2

Fc: Hannah Harell

Pt 1

___________________

yourusername

liked by logansargeant carlossainz trentarnold66 and 7,303,667 others

yourusername ❤️💋🌹

user1 WHO IS HEEEEE

user2 y/n please 😭

user3 oh look, it’s litteraly Carlos

↳ user4 it’s actually Oscar

↳ user5 that’s Daniel idc

judebellingham 🤨

user6 i don’t even care who it is, they’re so cute

↳ user7 ikr im so happy for her

trentarnold66 😜

↳ yourusername bro why r u here

↳ trentarnold66 girl shut up

↳ yourusername gtfo

user8 ^^^ what is happening with Trent 😭

user9 JUST TELL US WHO HE IS ITS BEEN LIKE SIX MONTHS

user10 she’s so fine

Yourusername

liked by logansargeant masonmount and 5,445,708 others

yourusername happy bday big bro! Please don’t lose ur job, I only talk to you for paddock passes. In all seriousness, I love you and thanks for being the best big brother a girl could ask for ❤️❤️❤️ (surprised you’ve kept it a secret this long).

tagged logansargeant

load comments…

user11 WHAT

user12 BROTHER??????

user13 they’ve been related the whole time? 😭

user14 happy bday Logan

judebellingham happy birthday Captain America

↳ logansargeant thanks mate

liked by yourusername

user15 Jude lmao

oscarpiastri thank god you’ve said it, one less secret for me to carry

↳ yourusername so dramatic

↳ oscarpiastri you try keeping a secret for 15 years. You’d be dramatic too.

↳ yourusername 🙄

user16 siblings????

TWITTER

INSTAGRAM

yourusername

liked by judebellingham carlossainz and 6,788,010 others

yourusername already drunk but f it we ball

load comments…

user17 just the most American caption you’ve ever seen

user18 still shocked from this morning

user19 is she there with her boyfriend???

trentarnold66 ur man is looking 4 u

↳ yourusername y u talking 2 my man

↳ trentarnold66 girl idk im just as drunk as u

↳ trentarnold66 being fr come get him tho

↳ yourusername omw pookie

user20 wait is Trent with them too?

↳ user21 he’s friends with max so probably, yeah

user22 I need pics from the rest of this party asap

oscarpiastri piccreds: me, tf? I didn’t suffer through you making out with your bf in the backseat for this.

↳ yourusername guys, Oscar took the pictures. Everybody clap 4 Oscar.

↳ oscarpiastri I’ll excuse the sarcasm on you being drunk

↳ yourusername boo 🍅🍅🍅

user23 oh she’s so drunk

user24 so her boyfriends there

yourusername added to their story

↳ trentarnold66

DELETE DELETE DELETE

↳ masonmount

LMFAO

↳ oscarpiastri

Hey girl, this isn’t ur close friends

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liked by trentarnold66 judebellingham and 11,001,432 others

yourusername i may have been drunk but I wasn’t wrong (ily Jude, happy 4 years)

load comments…

user24 FOUR YEARS!?!?!?!

user25 the caption lmao

user26 she for sure wasn’t wrong

judebellingham ily2 ig 😒 (happy 4 years❤️)

user27 I’m in love with both of them tbh

user28 I’ve thought she was soft-launching Oscar this whole time dhmu 😭

↳ oscarpiastri no I’ve unfortunately had to witness their gross relationship for years now

↳ yourusername you should learn to be nicer

↳ oscarpiastri don’t make out with him in front of me whenever we’re in the same car anymore and then I’ll be nice to you.

↳ yourusername 😒

user29 what????!!!! 😭

logansargeant woohoo

↳ yourusername 🤨 enthusiasm please.

↳ logansargeant woohoo!

↳ yourusername thx ig

[konuxkii]

UNSPOKEN RULES — SANZU HARUCHIYO

🍥 ₊‧ rivalry, hatred, and sharp words—that’s how things have always been between you and Sanzu. But as time goes on, those unspoken rules start to shift, and the lines between enemy and something else blur. There’s something else beneath that hate—a tension that neither of you can deny, though neither is willing to admit it.

WARNINGS : it's sanzu- he needs his own warning tbh, mild language, rivalry, mutual pinning, implicit flirting, kanto manji arc

PAIRINGS : sanzu haruchiyo x gn!reader

WORDCOUNT : 585

m.list

The first time you crossed paths with Sanzu Haruchiyo, the air had crackled with a mix of disdain and challenge. You had always been on opposite sides—different feelings, different ideologies. He'd looked at you with that arrogant smirk of his, his sharp eyes glinting as though he already knew he could break you. And yet, somehow, you never backed down.

It wasn’t just the rivalry—it was something in the way he made you feel. Every interaction, every snide comment, every insult, it was like a spark igniting in your chest. You hated him, and yet, there was something about him that drew you in. Something dangerously magnetic.

"Still pretending you’re important?" he’d taunted last week, his voice dripping with sarcasm. You hadn’t even flinched. You didn’t need to. But the way his gaze lingered on you, just for a moment too long, made your heart race in a way you didn't want to acknowledge.

Today, it was no different. You stood across from him, facing off in the midst of a tense meeting between Kanto Manji’s factions. He leaned casually against the wall, arms crossed, eyes scanning the room but always drifting back to you.

"Didn't expect to see you again so soon," Sanzu said, his voice smooth, his lips curling into a half-smile. It was always that smile—half teasing, half mocking—that made it impossible to tell if he was genuinely amused or if he was baiting you. Probably both.

You kept your composure. "You're the one who keeps showing up wherever I go like some lost dog."

"Maybe I like the view," he quipped, and this time, his eyes were uncomfortably focused on you.

For a second, you felt the familiar rush of heat in your chest, the same heat that made you grit your teeth and clench your fists. Your rivalry had always been sharp, but lately, it felt… different. The tension was thicker, heavier. It wasn’t just about whatever was going on between you two in Kanto Manji anymore. It was about something else—something neither of you wanted to admit.

"Quit looking at me like that," you snapped, trying to ignore the sudden flutter in your stomach as you looked away from him, god you hated that fucking smirk. "We're not friends, Sanzu."

His gaze darkened, but his grin never wavered. “I didn’t say we were.”

You hated how much you wanted him to say more. How much you wished the words would slip from his lips—the words you both knew were hovering between you, yet neither of you could speak.

Silence stretched out. The room felt too small, the space between you and him charged with unspoken words. The way he was standing—almost like he was waiting for something, like he was testing you—made your pulse quicken. You weren’t sure if he was trying to get under your skin, or if it was something deeper, something rawer than either of you had ever allowed to surface.

"You know, it's funny," Sanzu said after a moment, his tone now quieter, almost thoughtful. "For all the hate you throw my way… you never seem to really mean it."

Your breath hitched, but you recovered quickly, forcing a mocking laugh. "That's rich, coming from you."

He didn’t laugh. He didn’t even smile. He just took a step closer, his eyes locking onto yours with an intensity that made it hard to breathe, as if the two of you were the only ones in the room.

"Maybe I don't mean it either."

The words hung in the air like a challenge—and a promise.

Oh, how you hated him.

@konuxkii 2024 kalli notes : (please tag me in any sanzu fic) I had the sudden burst of motivation to write again soo, with my ever going obsession with Sanzu..who better to write for? Expect more with him honestly. I'm not sure if I wanted to make this a series so for now it's a drabble!! REQUESTS OPEN!!

[bamsywrites]

And Comes Dawn pt idfk tbh

Pairing: Sauron/Halbrand x Reader, Saurons/Halbrand x Galadriel, mentioned Isildur x Reader

Summary: And again, Sweet One is all alone.

Tags: Major tw for blood. Violence, grief, talk of death, crying, angst, some fluff at the end perhaps if you squinted maybe

Notes: not super well edited. But here's some angsty angst. I couldn't bring myself to write about sweet one realizing that Isil is dead. I cried the entire time writing this.

It's just blood.

You reminded yourself of this over and over. Your hands were covered so much that your skin was painted red. It dried and cracked against your knuckles, the smell of it filling your nose. But it was just blood. How many times had you stitched a wound, applied a bandage? This was nothing new. It was just blood.

You took a shaky breath, closing your eyes and exhaling before getting back to work stitching skin together. There was a poison inside the wound, but if left alone, he would surely bleed out. The amount he had lost already was concerning enough. It drenched his clothes, seeped on to blankets, and painted your hands.

It's just blood.

You tied up the stitch and bit off the string with your teeth. The blood-soaked bandage contrasted against pale skin. Too pale. If you touched it, it felt clammy. It was cold but slick with sweat from fever. He was sick. He likely wouldn't get better. You sat back and, without thinking, pressed the back of your hand against your mouth to help sniffle any cry that would come.

It was just blood, but now you could taste it. Metallic and still warm. It wasn't just blood anymore. It was his blood. Your hands were drenched in his blood. Your nostrils were filled with his blood. Your tongue tasted it, your lips stained with it, and you were surrounded by it.

You couldn't stay in the tent. It felt as if it was closing around you, like air was being taken from your lunges. The fresh air on your face did nothing to stop the overpour of feelings. The ache to your soul. Your feet carried you away, the tents and people and horses but a blur as you walked and walked and walked. Until the chatter of soldiers was but a whisper, and the air no longer smelled of burning wood but of salt. The sound of the waves crashing against the shore was what broke you from your haze. You stared out at the horizon. The dream life you had for yourself in Numenor felt miles away. It was a past that didn't even feel like yours anymore.

You were alone.

You had gotten used to friendship and love. You had gotten used to having someone to lean on, to talk to, to laugh with. You had been happy, hope had won out like you knew it would. Yet here you were, alone again.

Isildur was dead, Elendil couldn't bring himself to look at you, Halbrand didn't have much time either. Three days ago, you were in love, laughing with your best friend. Today, you were covered in the blood of your love, mourning a friend whose body could never be recovered.

“Death isn't the end, little one.” The deep voice of your father once told you, not long after mother had passed. “You will see her again. In the smell of the flowers. In the colors of the sunset. She will always be here.”

You had asked him what would happen when he died. He told you he'd always be with you. Anytime you felt a breeze would be him giving you a hug. It wasn't long after that he'd found your grandfather's old books, and he spiraled into insanity. Your heart ached for him now. You needed his warm breath and the strong hug that took all your fears away. You missed the hum of your mothers voice and the way she stroked your hair. Your brother's stupid jokes that always made you laugh.

Their deaths almost destroyed you. They left holes in your heart that could never be filled, but that ache was made easier these past months. Whenever Isildur would smirk and whisper something incredibly stupid into your ear just to make you laugh. Or Elendil would bring you into a hug when he greeted you. Or how Halbrands' presence seemed to calm you. Even Galdriel reminded you of your hard-headed uncle. It all was a bit easier to bear. The missing parts of you weren't so loud. It wasn't so hard to drown out the sorrow.

Now they were gone again.

You fell to your knees, your fingers digging into the sand. A scream ripped through your lungs, quickly followed by deep, gasping sobs. They were so powerful that you were bent over. Memories replayed in your mind, over and over. Your chest ached, and your throat was sore. You cried, and you sobbed until there was nothing left to do but look out over the ocean, watching the gentle waves.

“Why'd you leave me? I wasn't ready to say goodbye, Mama.” You spoke softly, your lip trembling.

You watched the sky change from blue to a beautiful hue of orange and pink, a breeze rustled your hair, and you could smell the smallest hint of lavender. You closed your eyes and inhaled the scent, behind your closed eyes you could see the smirking face of your brother as I leaned in and spoke, with a voice you'd been missing for years, “Did you know the fastest horse in the world is faster than all other horses?”

Perhaps you were crazy, but for a moment, as you basked in the sunset, with the breeze in your hair and a smile on your face, it felt like your family was one once more.

~

By the time you were back in the village, Galadriel had returned. You'd never expected to feel relieved to see that head of blonde hair. You made eye contact with her, and her eyes darted briefly to your hands covered in blood. Instead of any look of condemnation, though,she instead gave you one of respect. Perhaps she'd been told of how you worked tirelessly to heal the wounds of the injured. Perhaps the eruption of the Mountain of Fire had given her some perspective. You two were headed for the same tent, though you stayed a few steps behind. You still did not know where Halbrands' heart was, and if it was truly with her, you'd allow her an uninterrupted reunion. You stayed right outside the tent.

“Better for me if I had done.”

Of course, he spoke to her. You had to remind yourself that it wasn't fair to think that way. He was dying. He could not control when he was awake or when he was asleep. Something about it still stung.

“He needs elvish medicine. Can he ride?”

“I'll have the healers gather provisions.”

With that, you stepped into the tent, and your eyes darted to Halbrand and his to you. The moment he saw you, he moved to get up, but he winced in pain and laid back down.

“I'll get two horses ready. I'll make sure they have what they need.” You told Bronwyn, you feel Halbrands eyes on you, but you didn't look at him. Perhaps that was cruel for the state he was in, but if he was being taken to the elves, he would have more than a fair chance at survival.

“Three horses,” his voice was broken as he spoke.

“Halbrand,” Galadriel spoke.

“No,” he looked at her and then back to you. “I will not leave you here. I will not leave you alone.”

“I do not suspect in the slightest that I will be welcomed in any elven city.” You reminded him, finally looking upon him. His sickly face and pale skin broke your heart.

“Then I will not go.”

“Halbrand,” you shook your head, “you will die.”

“I will not go where you are not welcome. I will not leave you if you can not follow.”

You were about to speak once more, protesting his stubbornness, but Galadriel spoke first.

“Celebrimbor will not turn us away. He will not turn her away.” She looked from Halbrand to you, “He will see the content of her character and the motive of her heart and realize that no darkness lies within her. That what tainted her kin had never touched her. She will ride with us to Eregion.”

[justbelievinginmagic]

im(mortal) - part 1: blood moon.

pairing(s): vampire!enhypen ot7 x fem!reader, series summary: Seven souls struggle with the bitter dregs of eternal life. As they hide amongst human society, they try to discover a cure for their curse, decade after decade, century into century. In their investigations, they find more than they could imagine brewing including a strange magnetic pull towards a human woman. Will they be able to find their humanity once more or will their world crumble beneath the weight of immortality? glimpse: A century-old mansion stood in the middle of nowhere engulfed by an inferno of fire. Seven figures stand in front of it; each with sharpened bittersweet smiles on their mouths as they remember how it all started so so long ago. warnings/tags: Inspired by Enhypen's MVs lore & Enhypen's Dark Moon album (but not really its lore), Vampire AU, sort of Soulmate AU, College AU, heavy science fiction inspiration, ot7 x reader but not poly ot7 (but some are really close tbh), 3rd person POV, use of YN, mature topics, angst, human experimentation, medicine (pills/shots), death, injuries, biting, medical imagery, implied abuse, canonical violence & trauma, vampire lore, blood, Ni-ki as Riki, vomiting, illnesses, fire, arson, no mention of YN this chapter as a heads up! let me know if more tags need to be added! word count: 7.3k -> next chapter series masterlist

Seven different wooden chairs were the only furniture that remained in the large solarium. The wall paper had peeled over the years, revealing different variations of ugly, always baby-blue print. The most recent, which was faded beyond belief, was a lattice print; the one under it was a honeycomb pattern; beneath that was a plain baby blue wallpaper. Chipping. Fading.

There were more echoes of the past. Dark mold clung around ghostly shapes of posters, strangely shaped equipment, and long-gone furniture - the shape of a piano was in one corner and the outline of a fine-china cabinet was in another. The linoleum floor was cracked and warped revealing wooden panels beneath. The room smelt of mildew, and there was the faint sound of dripping water from somewhere.

Sunghoon sat down on his chair, the aged wood creaking under his weight. It was strange. Looking down the row of chairs, he could see ghosts of themselves. Jungwon with his wide dark brown eyes. Sunoo clinging to his stuffed bear that he loved so much. Riki’s feet dangling off his chair, too short for his feet to touch the floor yet. He could smell the disinfectant in the air. It always smelt like bleach and chemicals in the solarium despite the large windows lining the walls. They never were opened, white curtains drawn shut. Even now they remained, yellowed with age and soggy with mold.

He had spent so much time here. They all had but he could walk this room with his eyes shut and he wouldn’t have bumped into one piece of furniture or step on one creaking piece of plank of wood in the flooring.

He let out a sigh; his eyes shutting as he tried to calm his racing heart. This was the exact reason they had to return to the mansion. They needed to. Too many memories, too many connections, too many emotions. Sunghoon hoped Jay was alright.

“I found him,” a voice called out, the tone gentle and melodic as usual.

Sunghoon’s lips upturned as he turned away from the past to look at Sunoo. With his bleach blonde hair peeking out from beneath a beanie, his leathered jacket, and tattered jeans, it was easy to be reminded of reality. Sunoo was not a little boy with dark black hair clinging to a stuffed animal anymore. He hadn’t been for a long time.

The linoleum squeaked beneath Sunoo’s shoes as he walked into the large room.

“Wow,” he breathed softly. “I thought seeing the rooms were weird.”

He sighed out, the sound mimicking the breath Sunghoon had heaved moments earlier.

“It’s weird for sure,” Sunghoon said, rising to his feet after a long stretch with his head tilting back as far as it could before straightening and standing.

There was a rustling like a wind brushing through the room. And with it, the world melted away, glowing faintly, just enough to paint the room in a nostalgic light. The wallpaper was honeycombed pale blue; the ceiling fan overhead spun slowly; the room was casted with natural and gas light. A table sat in the center, circular and covered in a white sheet. 7 dining spots were set, a plate, a fork, and a papered cup, each. Each of their chairs were in their spot – polished wood gleaming in the light.

The sound of piano playing a familiar melody that they all had once help create.

Sunoo smiled at Sunghoon. His hair looked darker now in the allusion, his face rounder. His teeth were duller.

“Sunoo,” Sunghoon pleaded, shutting his eyes. “Please don’t.”

With that, the allusion washed away like a chalk painting on a rainy day, turning grey and muddied until the aged room was all that remained. The younger frowned.

“I hate this place,” Sunghoon murmured.

“Same,” Jay’s voice chimed in.

Their heads swung around to see the other man enter the doorway. He grimaced at the sight of the blue room. Jay leaned on the door frame, his hands resting on either side of the door.

“Jungwon’s all done. You guys ready?”

Sunoo took a deep breath in, and Jay winced.

“Sunoo,” he sighed out, taking a step forward almost instinctively.

“I’m fine,” Sunoo insisted, immediately.

His smile was sweet as a spoonful of sugar, wide eyes gentle as he shifted on his feet. Twisting restlessly, his arms spun a bit as he did so, childlike. Jay raised a singular brow before turning towards Heeseung��s call from down the hall.

He didn’t believe Sunoo for a moment. But all Sunoo did was avoid the elder’s gaze, glancing aside, his gaze gravitating to the chairs this time. His chair looked so tiny now. Was it always that small?

“C’mon,” Jay gestured towards them with his head. “They’re waiting.”

With one final look, Sunghoon left the solarium, passing Jay with a steady look in his eye. Jay returned it, sympathy echoing on his face. Sunoo stood there, his hands moving to play with the straps of his backpack.

“You think I’ll feel better?” Sunoo questioned, quietly.

“We all will once we’re done,” Jay commented, leaning on the door frame. It creaked with his weight tauntingly. Jay glanced down the chairs lined up beside him. His chair was missing an arm now.

“I think it’ll help.” He admitted, not looking at the younger. “You’ve been holding onto it for so long, Sunoo.”

There was a tiny hum in the back of Sunoo’s throat. Jay could feel the emotions radiating off of him, the twisted emotions of nostalgia, hurt, pain, sorrow, and strangely euphoria. Jay didn’t understand how Sunoo could feel any happy memories here.

Sunoo shouldered his backpack off and unzipped it. Inside was a stuffed bear. Greying with age, covered in stitches and makeshift patches of fabric to keep his stuffing from tumbling out. He was damaged but well-loved. Old but cared for. Sunoo plucked the thing up. The fur wasn’t soft anymore despite its age. No amount of cuddling made it more gentle, it was always harsh against his skin. He swallowed, looking over at the bear.

Jay glanced aside.

Sunoo breathed out, a thumb brushing over a glass eye, over the worn silk of the ribbon around its neck. With another shuddering breath in, Sunoo placed the bear on his chair. He sat so nicely as if meant for it.

“It’s time,” Sunoo whispered.

“It is,” Jay agreed, watching as Sunoo picked up his now empty backpack.

With quick footsteps, Sunoo exited the solarium without another look. Jay glanced around it once last time before shutting the door behind them with a clank. The two men walked through the mansion, down a dusty hallway. Their feet remembered each creaky floorboard as they continued onwards.

The foyer was all wood and white peeling paint. A singular electric light hung by a chain above the group of men standing in a semi-circle. Waiting for them.

Jungwon’s face was stoney and serious, but at the sight of the others he offered a tight-lipped smile.

“All good?” he asked.

Jay nodded in reply for the group. “Yeah, just checking out the solarium.”

Sunghoon’s hands trembled he noticed then; he hid them in his jeans’ pockets.

“I’m so ready for this place to be nothing but a memory – for good,” Niki commented from his side, his voice sounding harsh as he glared at the high ceilings. The stairwell nearby casted a shadow over his face.

Heeseung said nothing but there was a tickle in the back of their heads – his agreement palpable. Sunoo was quiet as he went to Jungwon’s side. He didn’t grab his arm, but he huddled close. Jay rubbed his forehead as he nodded.

He wanted all of this to be over.

“Let’s do it then.” Jake said. His fingers began to glow, ember hot red.

Dark red eyes took in the mansion for the last time before they glanced at each other. A solemn nod from Jungwon was all they needed before they crept outside of the mansion. Jake’s hands trailed over the wall; it would be described as reverently if there wasn’t such a deep scowl on his pretty features. His lip was curled back into a grimace as flames licked from his fingertips and onto the century old wood of the mansion. A complicated look flickered over his face as he watched the fire catch, a surge of flames erupting up the white paint and traveling higher and higher until they caught onto the ceiling.

“That should do,” he heard Heeseung’s voice in his head, encouraging Jake to join the group outside the burning mansion. As he did so, Jungwon closed the front door with a heavy slam.

-

With a slam, the door thudded shut, piquing the interest of the two boys peering down from in between the stairwell’s posts. Two small faces pressed against the wooden balusters as they watched a man enter the mansion. White coat, spectacles, and carrying two leather bags that were heavy in his grasp. Behind him stood a trio of nurses in their pastel-mint, perfectly pressed dresses and ivory aprons and caps.

“It’s a doctor,” the elder whispered to his friend. Their eyes widened as they focused back far below them.

The doctor glanced upwards, hearing their small voice. He smiled. His footsteps echoed on the floorboards as he went towards the manager’s office.

“Is someone sick?” the other boy hugging his toy bear whispered back.

“No,” the other shook his head. “I don’t think so. . . “

“Maybe they want to adopt one of us?” the younger offered, fiddling with the bow on the bear’s neck.

“Maybe.”

There was a loud thud as the doctor and his entourage entered the manager’s office. The door’s lock sliding into place was even louder. The youngest flinched, fiddling with the silk on the bow even more, soothingly.

“Let’s go tell the others.” The elder said encouragingly, standing from his spot to rush down the upstairs hall to the bedrooms.

-

Not long later, the orphans stood in a line by height, much to the despair of the eldest who was still shorter than the youngers. Each one was examined. An illuminator shined into their brown eyes, into their tiny mouth. A nurse took down notes that the doctor murmured behind his medical mask.

Tapetum lucidum, negative. Tapetum lucidum, negative. Tapetum lucidum, negative.

Number 6 and 11, primary. Number 6 and 11, permanent. Loose number 11, primary.

Their blood was drawn in multiple small vials later by the nurses. Some of the youngest struggled with the blood draw, afraid of needles and blood. A nurse said with a cool smile, “You’ll get used to it.”

This wouldn’t be the first time they’d line up like this. Sometimes, it was weekly; other times, it was daily. Medical notes needed to be updated frequently was all the doctor said.

Then came the pills. They took at least one with every meal; some of them took more than others. When Jay had asked a nurse why were they taking them (they hadn’t taken any ever before!), she had reassured him it was for his well-being. Good boys take their medicine. She chirped out.

The old white-haired manager welcomed the doctor to set up an office in an unused music room, pushing the piano out into the hallway where it sat, taller than most of the boys.

Rules around the mansion began to change soon after. There would be no more adoption visits, no more potential guardians for the time being. No more new additions to the household either. The orphanage’s manager, the old woman with ashy white hair, had smiled at them around the table at dinner time. Each in their chair donated by the nearby town, mismatched like themselves.

She said this was for the best. That this was a way for them to be good boys of society.

They took their pills that waited for them in a small paper cup.

There was another change. No more outside time. No visits into town. No visitors at all. Their solarium that they had once used for potential adoptive parents to meet them turned into a sort of common room, a living room and dining hall all in one. A table for meals had been set up with a white sheet covering its surface. A collection of their toys sat in a corner with a rocking chair that was nearly falling apart. The piano had been pushed inside by the older boys; two raggedy repatched sofas were there as well to lounge about on. As they grew, a bookshelf was shoved against the wall next to the manager’s fine china cabinet (that they were to never touch or else they’d be punished.) It was where they would live, play, assemble for meals, and assemble for treatment. That was their outside now. A tiny blue wall-papered solarium with humidity fogged windows, covered in white lacy curtains.

They complained at first. These changes were horrible. They loved playing outside on the apple tree’s swing and the nearby flower fields. They wouldn’t go into town but let them play outside, please. But, when any of them tried to sneak outside, their punishments grew.

First, it had been the addition of heavy-padlocked entrances and exits that only the doctor, manager, and head nurse held the keys for. When the youngest stole the head nurse’s key when she wasn’t looking (to go play on the swing on the yard’s apple tree), they were quickly limited to only the manager. When the most-sensitive of the group crept outside a window to go pet a stray cat on the back porch, the isolation room was introduced.

It was a bare dusty thing– an old dance room that was used when there were girl orphans. Once it had become an all-boy’s orphanage, it was left abandoned, cold, and grimy. It was dark; there was only candle-based lighting in that room. Gas lighting was slowly being introduced to the cities and towns of new, and, while some of the house had the trailing, twisting wires leading to easily burnt-out light bulbs, the isolation room didn’t. Two floor-to-ceiling walls of cracking mirrors decorated opposite walls of the room with a barre screwed into one of them. Another wall was old brick, harsh and unwelcoming. It felt like an endless room if you stared long enough into the mirrors. A room where you’d be locked away until you were more well-behaved. To think about your actions. (Which were what? Leaving the house they were trapped in? They didn’t understand why things had to change.) The youngest hated the room.

He became very familiar with the room throughout the following years.

-

It was a slow life. They grew taller; they lost baby teeth; they celebrated birthdays. Their medicine increased and decreased; their rooms grew more familiar. The isolation room became common-place especially as some of the boys edged into teenagerhood. Soon, the doctor moved into the office. Soon, there were even more tests. More pills, even injections. Their halls reeked of antiseptic and the metallic tang of medical equipment. The manager passed away on Jay’s twelfth birthday, but nothing much changed except for the fine-china cabinet being raided and left empty – by who the boys never knew for sure.

The pills continued. The examinations continued.

-

Jungwon was the first to be considered a success by the doctor.

He was no older than ten when he discovered his new talent – speed. Indoor races back and forth in the solarium became easy; in fact, he kept teasing the others that he was faster, faster, faster than them all. But it wasn’t just speed he discovered: it was hunger. A hunger that crawled in the pit of his stomach. A hunger that was a maw to all food.

Hungry. Hungry. Hungry.

Nothing satiated it. Nothing until he snapped at a nurse. Bit into her arm with the feral nature of a dog captured. A fit of anger, a tantrum, the doctor had noted at first until… until… there was a growl, inhuman. Deep in the young boy’s chest. The boy, the sweet friendly boy who hated the pills ever so much, glared up at the doctor. Red eyes, red mouth, white fangs.

Instead of being scolded that evening and tossed into isolation, he was given the sweetest treat he had ever tasted. A red jelly that jiggled like a belly while laughing. But smelt of iron-blood.

He was a success. He deserved to be celebrated.   

The others followed swiftly.

-

Heeseung hated the pills they were forced to ingest. Wake up; pills. Lunch; pills. Dinner; pills. Pills, pills, pills. He hated them. He hadn’t been there the longest – that title went to Jungwon, but he was the eldest of the boys. So, since day one of the doctor’s arrival, he had a higher dose of everything until it was proven unhealthy for the boy. What was unhealthy was difficult to determine apparently. He’d vomit; his stomach cramped. He’d be trembling with chills and hot with a fever within hours. He was bedridden; he was exhausted; he was jittery.

He had seven pills in his cup. Why? Why? Jay had two pills!

He asked why; they didn’t tell him. When his symptoms grew, Heeseung tried to figure out how to feel better. Take more pills, take less. Nothing worked. His body weening from the medicine was just as bad as taking the medicine he realized. His skin crawled. His head felt like it was going to explode. Sometimes he couldn’t bear the sunlight touching his skin. It burned his eyes, forcing him to stay in his room. Once he tried to hide his pills. He tucked them into his pillow, threw them out the window. When it was discovered by one of the trio of nurses, he wasn’t punished. He simply was force-fed the pills rather than allowing himself to drop each tablet on his tongue. That happened for a month. After that he didn’t challenge them again. Grimacing, he’d swallow down the pills pressed against his mouth. Always at the supervision of a too-calm nurse with a sick smile on her perfectly lipsticked lips.

He tried to talk to Jungwon, but Jungwon didn’t talk much anymore. He simply stared. Stared and stared as he sat at the head of the dinner table, plate empty. Eyes empty. When was the last time he saw his friend smile… eat… It scared him. Sometimes Heeseung swore he could hear his voice in his head.

Hungry. Hungry. Hungry.

Can’t. Can’t. Can’t.

Control. Control. Control.

Heeseung would itch and writhe and change until he too couldn’t stand the taste of food. Couldn’t swallow another bite of rice. Until he tried to attack his nurse as she fed him his pills. With aching teeth and a gnawing stomach, he bit his nurse’s hand as she forced the pills down his throat. Heeseung thought her blood tasted sweeter than any treat he’s ever tasted.

That night at the dinner table, there were now only five plates full of food and two bare. It was also the first time Jungwon heard another voice in his head, one that sounded like the eldest without him opening his mouth. Their dark rubied eyes locked.

Hungry. Hungry. Hungry. Heeseung chanted in Jungwon’s head. 

-

The youngest Riki, often called by the nickname ‘Niki’ after he stumbled over his own name in introductions at the orphanage, was exceptionally difficult. He spat out his pills; he’d get placed in isolation. He fought with the others; he’d get placed in isolation. He stole Sunoo’s bear; isolation. Far too often, he was in the locked room. Solidarity confinement to encourage him to play nice. It just made him feel invisible and hurt – especially when none of the boys visited him.

Except for Sunoo who loved to act as older brother to the younger (despite holding his stuffed animal close to his chest everywhere he went in the mansion). He’d sit outside the isolation room’s door, whispering ‘hello’s underneath the door’s gap or peering through the keyhole to see each other and wave his bear’s paw at him. Riki would tease him about his stupid bear, but then he’d cling to his own pillow as the nurses began to inject whatever was in the pills into his arm. It was then proven that he was no troublemaker, just a lost little boy clinging to a pillow as another shot was pressed into his arm. Tears trickled down his cheeks.

Riki hadn’t taken the pills in a while, not like his hyungs. He told his doctor that he liked the pills. Can’t he take the pills again? He wouldn’t spit them out, promise! The injections hurt. His arm would ache. Then, his stomach would ache. Then, his head would ache. He’d toss and turn on the examination table in agony.

It went on for so long. Sometimes the others would hear his cries at night, whimpering for a mother or father that wasn’t there. Eventually, Jungwon would sneak out at night, too fast to catch, and rest on the floor outside of the isolated room to whisper comfort to the youngest.

It’ll be okay. You’re okay.

I’m here, Riki. I’m here.

With the sadness, the loneliness, the pain, there was a violence brewing in Riki after each check-up. He was angry, no, beyond that, he was rageful. He wished the nurses, the doctor, the manager of the orphanage, could feel what he felt – like time had stopped. He found out one day that his birthday had passed with no celebration.

“It was a lesson,” a nurse warned as she drew his blood. “Good boys get to celebrate fun things.”

He watched as his blood filled the vial with disdain. It looked sludge-thick, dark red.

He craved something he didn’t understand right then. His stomach curdled and ached. But food tasted of ash, of dirt, of everything bad. Bad, bad, bad. He refused to eat, gnashing teeth at anything they offered. He wouldn’t even drink a sip of blood when it was finally presented to him. In an unassuming white Dixie Cup. He threw it at the doctor, growling.

“Ungrateful boy,” the doctor hissed out.

Hungry, he thought.

Hungry. Hungry. Hungry.

He needed food, not blood!

They had to restrain him, a shackle on his ankle to the nearby brick wall of the isolation room… until he tore it away from the wall it was mounted in. Until his hunger blinded him in blood-red. Until he was somehow out of his room, on the other side of the locked door. Until he was tearing his fangs into the first person he saw – into the neck of his friend who often came to sit outside his bolted-room door to talk. Sunoo.

-

Sunoo had been born by the bite rather than the pill. Riki had drained him near dry before the nurses had found them in a daze. He was half-dead, and the only way he was recovered was through Jungwon. His blood was siphoned into the dying veins of Sunoo. His venom; his blood; their venom; their blood.

Sunoo’s eyes flashed opened, and he saw only red for a moment. Vermillion haze. Until he saw his friends, his so-called brothers, peering over at him on the makeshift medical bed. His throat ached, but he simply smiled. Fangs and all.

He suffered the most after his transformation. Unlike the others whose symptoms came and went in waves, building gradually before they succumbed, he went through everything at the same time. He couldn’t go into daylight, couldn’t bear the touch of the sun or the glare of lights; he was hungry all the time and would attack for it. He’d try to bite his brothers; he’d eat scrapes he’d find from the night’s dinner; he’d vomit. Anger would overwhelm – he even tore the limbs off his beloved stuffed bear which left him crying inconsolably. He felt like he wasn’t even himself. Unsafe.

Hungry. Hungry. Hungry.

His feet moved so fast one day; some thought he was levitating… until they realized he was. If he was scared or hungry or anything, he’d fly away, hide away in a closet. He’d hug his stitched-up bear close to him, whispering words with sharpened teeth. All the while he hoped this was all a nightmare he’d wake up from.

Sunoo learned, if he tried hard enough, he could live in his mind. Making up a world he loved. Where he felt safe. Sometimes if someone was close to him, they could see his fantasy world too. So bright, so beautiful. Only for it to eventually fade away into this. A mansion of horrors.

-

At this point, the boys had been divided up. Half remained in the solarium, the other half in their bedrooms. The solarium had been converted into a horrible makeshift medical office. White bedsheets were draped about, over the bookshelf, the table, their chairs, the sofa. Everything. Medical equipment – syringes, needles, pills, IV drips. A machine that beeped with their heart beats. They were poked and prodded. Doses were increased.

Jake. Jay. Sunghoon. Grew. Hungry. Hungry. Hungry.

-

Jake had a strange case of side effects. Hot and cold. He was cold. Icy to the touch. He felt half-dead for days before breaking out into a fever. So hot and restless. He’d sink down in icy baths for hours. He felt more like he was half-fish than human sometimes.

He’d rest his forehead against the cool bathtub’s porcelain and breath in and out only for that once icy cold water to become boiling hot. His hands glowed, heat pulsing from them as the water bubbled about him. He’d throw himself out of the tub, scalding hot water sloshing onto the tiles below.

Nurses would run in. Fearful only for him to look at them, eyes strangely bloody, and his hands sparking with fire.

He was locked up like Riki once was. With the addition of flame-retardant gloves and chains tight on his hands. He was quiet when they did so. He grew quieter and quieter as the days passed. With hot flashes, cold flashes, hunger flashes, he felt like a live wire.

Sometimes, when he was bored, he’d stare at the lights, blinding white lights until they’d burst. Until he flooded the electric grid and the entire house suffered power outages. He didn’t know how he did it. All he knew was that he could. Something was wrong.  

One day, when he felt cold as ice with a stomach gasping with hunger, the smell of food disgusted him. The nurse sent to feed him his porridge made the wrong move. Unclasping his shackles, undoing his gloves. He pounced, more monster than man and bit her, drained her. There were no other nurses rushing in; there was no doctor to stop him. Jake didn’t stop drinking, drinking, drinking until it was just him and the corpse of a nurse he’d known for half of his life. He passed out in a fever soon after, still hungry he realized pathetically.

Hungry. Hungry. Hungry.

He was found by the doctor hours later. His mouth was cleaned, his clothes cleaned; he was laying in his bed and not the isolation room. The nurse was gone. Where had she gone? The young teen stared up with blood-red eyes. The doctor smiled and said everything was okay now. He was forgiven.

A cup of blood was handed to him in a paper cup.

Jake took it, knowing he was freed from his cage, his restraints gone, but somehow still a prisoner to a new shackle he didn’t want to bear.

-

From day one, Jay had always listened to the nurses, had listened to their manager, had listened to the doctor. For years, he listened and obeyed. He was a good patient, a good boy. Trusting their words as they fed him pill after pill, shot after shot. No matter how much he cried when his arm ached or his stomach churned. They’d say he was a good boy for taking his medicine. “Why couldn’t you be good like Jay?” He had heard that said hundreds of times.

So, it was funny how miserable he felt. How bad like a rotten apple sitting in the sun. Jay just felt awful. His friends one by one turned into someone unlike themself. Biting, blood, red eyes. Everyone felt angry… he didn’t know how he knew it but he did. Sometimes, if he stared at them long enough, he could just tell.

The nurse was upset today. She was sad and guilty… they tasted like the smell of rain, like salty soup.

Another nurse hadn’t come into care for them. Maybe she was with the others? He couldn’t tell.

Sunghoon was lonely; it tasted like woodchips, like dust in the corners of a room. Jay tried to play a game with him, but soon their different symptoms distracted them. A headache, nausea, exhaustion.   

The doctor was never angry. He wasn’t sad either. He was so joyful at their suffering. Jay could taste it like it was liquid sugar, melting on his tongue. Jay hated him. Sometimes he hoped the doctor could feel it when he glared at him. Sometimes Jay swore he did, when he’d flinch or take too sharp of breath in.

While Jay was one of the eldest, he was one of the last to change fully. He was stuck between food and blood for a long time. Unlike the others, his eyes didn’t turn red when he was given a cup of blood. He drank it down like a good boy, but it didn’t have the same effect as the others. So, they’d mix some blood into his soups, his porridge, his rice. Everything a pale pink. He’d throw it up. Food disagreeing with him; blood disagreeing with him. More tests had him hooked up to IVs, and his blood tested.

The nurses said it was his will not the treatment’s fault. The duo said they saw him hungry during their blood-draws; they said they saw how he’d lick his lips whenever the blood from his own veins dripped into the vial.

Blood called to him like a siren from a fairytale.

The first time he attacked the doctor for his blood was the last time he drank from a human who was awake. Their pain, their emotions flaring, he felt it then. Understood it then. It bittered everything. It hurt. He hated it. He hated it all.

He drank blood from an IV. From a cup. From the jelly the nurses made. Never from another being. Even if his stomach growled and the maw inside him whispered: Hungry. Hungry. Hungry.

Jay refused to be a monster.

-

Sunghoon was last to change. The loneliest. He was kept away from the boys after they turned one by one. Locked away in the solarium, he slept there, ate, read. Every now and then, Jungwon would visit him by the window. One warm hand pressed against the glass, larger than Jungwon’s cold palm.

He felt weak. Not only was he somehow not changing to whatever his friends were – but he was exhausted daily. Laying in the solarium, he began to sleep during the day, staying awake all night. As time pass alone, his tests grew worse. His muscles were deteriorating. Like his body was eating away at him. Pain became Sunghoon.

They whispered; he heard them. Should they use the others’ blood? Their venom? But Sunoo was so feral; he apparently had just begun to adjust. Could they handle another boy acting so erratic?

He couldn’t understand that he was dying. He was in a blur; sometimes it felt like the world would just blend into a watercolored haze, and he’d be outside his body. He knew where the nurses were, the doctor, the other boys. Their hearts, their breaths, their muscles flexed as his deteriorated. It was strange, scary.

It wasn’t until one day there was a horrible cracking sound from his body, unearthly. Inhumanly monstrous but also frighteningly fragile that the doctor simply force-fed him blood. Just regular blood. No venom, no medicine, no Jungwon or Riki or Jay or Heeseung.

It was vile. Blood wasn’t meant for humans. . . was he a human? He didn’t know anymore. The blood was poured down his throat. Head tilted back; nose plugged. Iron-sick, ruby-slick, he’d cough and cough as he sat up from his ‘feeding.’ Blood dripped down his chin, staining his sweater.

“You look better,” said the doctor with a disgustingly joyful smile. A bright light shined in his eyes made him blearily blink.

“Tapetum lucidum, positive.” The doctor said pleasantly, to the nearby nurse before clicking the illuminator off.

Red eyes, red mouth, baby fangs. It took time, but they grew and elongated after two weeks of forced blood drinking 3 times a day. Despite his hunger, Sunghoon hated blood. He didn’t want it; he didn’t want the hunger.

Hungry. Hungry. Hungry.

The next time, on day fifteen, he drank willingly. Not just one cup but seven.

-

The examinations didn’t stop. The medicine didn’t stop. Even after all of this, they were forced to drink this blood and their pills.

The only difference was that they finally weren’t separated. The day they were reunited was strange. Waves of emotions only led to the boys staring at one another like strangers. Some looked so different. Sunghoon hadn’t seen Jungwon in over a year. He almost didn’t recognize him. Riki was taller. Sunoo clung to Jungwon’s arm. Jake looked like a ghost.

“The family is back together,” the doctor cheered as they all sat in the solarium together for the first time in months.

Rubied eyes stared at the doctor, silent.

“Let’s take a photograph to commemorate this!” a nurse chimed out.

There was only one nurse left now – they didn’t know where the second one went. Sitting together on a white draped sofa, the seven didn’t smile. They simply stared as the large contraption was set up on spindly metal legs. With a crack of a light bulb, the photograph was taken.

Their eyes looked eerily pale in the monochrome photo, like a dog’s at night. The doctor was the only one grinning ear to ear. A flicker of a fang was visible in Riki’s grimace.

Photographs of their mouths and eyes were taken that day, too. Sometimes Heeseung wonders if it was all for that from the start.

-

“We should leave,” Jay whispered one night.

The boys - no, they weren’t boys; they hadn’t been boys in a long time – they were men, teenagers with the tempers of children and the hunger of a monster – they sat inside Jungwon’s bedroom, a common gathering place solely due to the bright moon outside of his window. None of them had windows – too much of a risk. But, Jungwon had been such a good boy. Such a success.

Jungwon just simply knew what the nurses and doctor wanted. A doll. A research subject. So he was that, a scientific silent thing. But here he’d stroke his Sunoo’s head as he curled into his lap, still clinging to his bear. Here, Jungwon’s rubied eyes that stared blankly at dinners and breakfasts were round and empathetic as he nodded along with Jay. Here he was himself – as much of himself as he could be with the constant growl of the Beast in his ear.

“We need to get out of here.” He agreed.

“But what if—what if we need them?” A tentative voice asked.

It was a strange thing to feel – a need towards those who had harmed them. A double-edged sword. The experiments hadn’t stopped. The medicine hadn’t stopped. They were still being tested on despite their changes. But… this was all they knew. They’ve never went past the town, never breached past the tree-line. What if it was worse… alone?

Despite their hunger. Sunoo’s voice was fragile.

“We don’t need them,” Riki bit out, arms crossed. As the youngest, he was still the most volatile; Heeseung summed it up to teenage hormones.

There was a beat as a wave of calm settled over them like a cool mist from a forest, like the minty way your mouth felt after brushing them with toothpaste.

“Jay,” Jake whispered, half-scolding.

He knew it was him; Jake never felt so at peace nowadays, only when Jay manipulated the emotions of the room to his will. Jay flashed a bashful smile, red cheeked.

“We don’t need them,” Jungwon redirected the conversation, firmly.

“What could be worse?” Sunghoon bit out, eyes staring up at the moon. His head leaned against the window pane.

“Dying,” it was not said but thought. Each of the vampires could hear the voice of Heeseung echoing in the back of their minds like it was their own thought.

Riki shivered. “I hate when you do that,” he mumbled.

“Sorry,” Heeseung muttered. He didn’t know how to quite control it yet. His thoughts were like a stream connected to a river and that river to a larger ocean. Sometimes they flowed into others.

“Okay,” Jungwon huffed. Sunoo nuzzled into his arm sleepily. “Dying isn’t an option. We can’t.”

“We’ve been through all of this just to die?” Riki added, crossing his arms as he shifted his weight against the wall. “No way.”

“What if we are hungry…?” Sunoo asked.

When weren’t they? Even Jungwon struggled with his hunger, he had bitten his fair share of the remaining nurses. It was silent. What would they do?

“We can stock up before we leave,” Jay said, hand going through his hair as he tried to block out the ranging emotions around him. Excitement, nervousness, fear, anxiousness. It was making him sick to his stomach.

“And after?” Another asked.

“We’ll figure it out.” Sunghoon said, quietly. Optimistically. He raised a brow as he looked over the others. As the fledgling among them, the youngest in terms of whatever this curse was, he was most prone to outbursts for blood. If he could try, they could.

Heeseung looked at the room, once over. “We figure it out,” he agreed.

“Together.”

-

Their break-out wasn’t a simple thing planned in one night under a full moon. It took a month of planning. Of preparing. Stealing IV bags of blood when the nurse was busied – some of them causing problems, so they could grab more. They were hiding them in the glass fine china cabinet in the solarium; it had rested empty and covered by a white sheet for years now. No one checked there. When the cabinet was full, they began tucking the blood bags into pillows and mattresses they had gutted with the strange claws they realized they were starting to have. If they focused, they’d grow, thicken into incredibly sharp nails.

One night, Jungwon even hid some of the pills they were forced to swallow down – just in case – in a place no one would ever look. He was quick, grabbing all he could. Inhumanly fast, he looked this way and that – just waiting for the nurses to return. In his hurry, he grabbed other bottles strewn about that had unknown names - ferrous sulfate, calciferol, allium sativum, melatonin.

It was a cold November night when they planned to leave – but they didn’t know it; after all, experiments didn’t need to know the date, or the time, or the year.

They went off the moon. Each day a sliver of the moon grew and grew larger. It was supposed to be a full moon that night. Yet when the moon peeked around the tall trees outside Jungwon’s window, it was strange. Reddish, bright, bloody.

“It’s fate,” Sunghoon had whispered as they waited in the shadows of Jungwon’s bedroom.

A blood moon for the vampires.

With the doctor drugged, forced to drink down the mixture of pill Jungwon had found (Riki had dropped in his nightly tea like they were forced to down blood), they crept down the stairs.

It was quiet. The snores of the doctor echoed down the hall. Their feet dodged the creaking parts of the wooden floor. The vampires clung to belongings – tied up into makeshift sacks made of bedding. Thick winter coats covered their layers of clothes. Sunoo held his bear.

Heeseung’s voice rang out in their head.

“Sunghoon’s going to get the key.” It was whispered in their minds, almost as if he was afraid that he’d be heard even there.

It was in the doctor’s office.

They froze in the entry-way, the foyer feeling colder by the second despite their inability to feel the chill (really, even their layered clothes were just out of habit – weren’t they supposed to feel cold in winter?) Their breaths were low, dark eyes flickering between each other as they waited. Sunghoon wasn’t the quickest like Jungwon. But he had a sense to him, that was unlike any of them. Like warning bells were built into his head.

It was almost too easy. Until it wasn’t.

“Hey – what are you--?” the doctor cried out, shaken awake.

Were the pills a fluke? Riki’s eyes went wide, frightened at the sound. Sunoo grabbed onto Jay. There was the sound of fighting, grunts. A thunk against a wall.

Jungwon leaned forward, wanting to run to help but Heeseung’s hand reached out to stop him.

“I got it,” Sunghoon yelled out, the sound like a scream in the quiet silence.

He rushed out of the room; the wooden door slamming against the wall. A clambering of footsteps followed him.

“Get back here, you brat,” the doctor yelled.

Sunghoon felt more alive than ever. He ran fast. Riki stared down the doctor, shaking against the doorway. He wanted him to just stop, stop, stop. They had to get out of here.

To his surprise, the doctor did. He froze. Mid step, floating in the air. His sleep-hat caught in the air. Glasses askew. Not only did the doctor stop but so did his friends… no, his family. He glanced around. Jungwon was to his left, hand on the door knob, ready to unlock the door. Heeseung had grabbed Jake’s hand. Sunoo was curling towards Jay. Riki’s breath burned in his throat as he held onto it with all his might. He took a small nervous step… nothing else shifted. He was the only one to be able to step forward.

And he did. He walked over to Sunghoon. His hair was flopping mid-air, teeth bared, fangs sharp. His hand held the key tightly. With ease, Riki slipped it out of his blood-brother’s hand. Bounding over to the door, he turned the lock. There was a chill climbing up his spine, his breath electric in his lungs. Opening the door, he let out his held breath in a single gasp. With it, the world to come rushing to action. But there was no contest, no obstacle now. A door was open with the darkness outside pouring into the mansion.

The boys simple ran out the door, bewildered to how it was opened and unlocked. Sunghoon glanced at his hand for only a moment before ignoring the impossibility of the world and sprinting harder. He’d take the miracle. Maybe it was really fate. Fate for them to escape.

They broke past the tree-line, hooting and hollering as they continued to run and run and run. Away from the mansion and into their new lives.

The doctor huffed and puffed glaring out into the darkness, only made darker under the blood moon. Today’s experiment yielded a result – vampires were faster than a middle-aged man. He would find them one day. He would. The door of the mansion was shut behind a livid doctor with a heavy thud.

[fenkizard]

Hell yea thanks for the tag keebwee!!!

I’m over 5'5 / i wear glasses or contacts / i have blonde hair / i often wear sweatshirts / i prefer loose clothing over tight clothes / i have one or two piercings / i have at least one tattoo / i have blue eyes / i have dyed or highlighted my hair / i have or have had braces / i have freckles / i paint my nails / i typically wear makeup / i don’t often smile / resting bitch face / i play sports / i play an instrument / i know more than one language / i can cook or bake / i like writing / i like to read / i can multitask / i’ve never dated anyone / i have a best friend i’ve known for over five years / i am an only child

@shortkingvince tagging you! No pressure to do this though obv.

Stole this from @starshapedoasis

Rules: Colour the ones that apply to you!

I’m over 5'5 / i wear glasses or contacts / i have blonde hair / i often wear sweatshirts / i prefer loose clothing over tight clothes / i have one or two piercings / i have at least one tattoo / i have blue eyes / i have dyed or highlighted my hair / i have or have had braces / i have freckles / i paint my nails / i typically wear makeup / i don’t often smile / resting bitch face / i play sports / i play an instrument / i know more than one language / i can cook or bake / i like writing / i like to read / i can multitask / i’ve never dated anyone / i have a best friend i’ve known for over five years / i am an only child

Tagging: @danielashdotcom, @mooseyspooky, @blackcelebration86 , @oacest (cause we’re totally friends)

[magicshopaholic]

Interlude: Hyung Line

Or

The one where the three oldest members of the group find themselves in deep shit

Summary: Namjoon returns to see everyone in a crisis. Seokjin has a conversation with his girlfriend, while Hoseok wonders if he's going to lose his best friend. Meanwhile, Yoongi ruminates on an impulsive decision.

Pairing: OT3 x OC (different OCs)

Genre: Humour, fluff, angst

Word count: 11.2 K

Rating: 18+

Warnings: language

A/N: It's been forever since I posted and I bring you... *an aftermath fic*!! Takes place the morning after A Stormy Night.

Tagging: @bbl32 @quarter-life-crisis2 @dreaming-with-happiness @faearchives @margopinkerton @purpleseoul7 @confessionsofamarshlily @jiminjhang @xjoonchildx @tarahardcore @infinitehobi @handfullofcandids @whoisbts @jihopesjoint @kflixnet (drop a message if you want to be added)

Listen to: "dope lovers" by dpr ian

seokjin masterlist | yoongi masterlist | hoseok masterlist | main masterlist

When Hoseok wakes up the next morning, it’s to slivers of sunlight through a soft mesh sort of thing on his face. He blinks and shifts slightly; it’s Chaeyoung’s hair, where his face was buried, and he squints towards the window where an apologetic looking sun has reared its head in the sky after a night of torrential rain.

He relaxes slightly; next to him, Chaeyoung hasn’t moved, her shoulders rising and falling peacefully with every breath she takes. His phone buzzes and he turns to reach for it.

Taehyung [08:45] Anyone need a ride to HQ? I’m leaving in a bit Although no one apart from Jungkookie seems to be in the dorm right now

Namjoon [08:48] I’ll reach on my own. I just got off a flight so I came to my apartment to take a shower.

Seokjin [09:00] I’ll reach on my own too.

Taehyung [09:01] Okay. Where were you last night?

Seokjin [09:01] Never you mind. I have my car.

Yoongi [09:02] Me too.

Hoseok stares at the screen, slowly licking his lips.

Hoseok [09:03] Me too.

Taehyung [09:04] This is not suspicious at all.

Jimin [09:04] I’m at my place with Sooah :D:D:D I’ll be there soon - but everybody don’t forget to be at the restaurant for her birthday lunch! No latecomers!

Taehyung [09:05] I take it your night turned out well after all?

Jimin [09:05] Yessss it did, god bless. I have the best girlfriend in the world - but I’ll tell you about it later. I mean it though - don’t be late for the lunch. Hobi hyung - you can bring Chaeyoung.

Hoseok stomach jolts.

Hoseok [09:06] That’s super random. She’s totally capable of coming on her own, you know? She’s not a kid anymore and I’m not responsible for her anyway.

Jimin [09:08] Errrr I meant because the roads are still a bit flooded so she may not want to walk to the bus stop. But I guess she can come on her own too.

Jungkook [09:09] I can pick her up on my way to the restaurant if you want, hyung. 

Taehyung [09:09] You’re alive??? I knocked on your door at least twice last night but I heard nothing. I thought you died in there or something.

Jungkook [09:10] Oh yeah. I was really tired.

Taehyung [09:10] Lol, I’m sure.

Jungkook [09:10] @Namjoon How was your trip hyung?

Namjoon [09:11] Amazing Didn’t want to come back tbh

Jimin [09:11] That feels great to hear But I have a girlfriend now so I get it

Jungkook [09:12] Gross

Jimin [09:12] Don’t be bitter just because you’re single

Yoongi [09:13] Yeah go get laid instead

Taehyung [09:13] I still don’t know where half of you are though. How was everyone out last night despite that horrendous storm?

Namjoon [09:14] Yoongi hyung corrupting the children since 2013

Yoongi [09:14] Me? I think Hobi is doing enough of that for all of us

Hoseok [19:15] What!  Of course not.  Why even would you say that?  What are you talking about

Yoongi [09:16] Sorry, I meant Seokjin

Seokjin [09:16] Errrrrrrr

Taehyung [09:16] I mean, is it me? Am I the lame one for having stayed home last night?

Yoongi [09:17] You were on your way to HQ last night, weren’t you?

Taehyung [09:17] No?

Yoongi [09:17] Not you

Namjoon [09:18] Did I leave my charger at the dorm?

Taehyung [09:18] No idea Speaking of which, you owe me a lock for my door

Namjoon [09:19] Excuse me?

Jungkook [09:19] Taehyung

Yoongi [09:20] Yeah and you need to return my aux cable. It’s still in your car. I couldn’t charge my phone last night and had to fight Miso to borrow hers

Hoseok [09:20] Wait you were with Miso last night?

Seokjin [09:21] @Namjoon I called you to check about the company HQ sleeping quarters too but you didn’t answer

Jimin [09:21] Oh yeah, Namjoon hyung - you weren’t here to give me a pep talk when my night for Sooah was going up in flames either. I had to call Taehyungie and Jungkook instead and they were no help at all!

Jungkook [09:22] Hey!

Taehyung [09:22] Hey!

Namjoon [09:22] One ridiculous problem at a time, please!

Hoseok frowns, already losing interest. He navigates away from the chat and scrolls through his messages, answering some and ignoring others, his eyes now somewhat getting used to the light of the screen. Just as he’s about to close the app, another message pops up.

Chanyeol [09:15] Up?

Hoseok [09:15] Just about

Chanyeol [09:16] Kk. Listen, are you going home anytime soon?

Hoseok [09:17] To Gwangju? Not part of the plan right now, no. Maybe Christmas? Why?

Chanyeol [09:17] We were planning when to go next. Hayoung’s parents are probably travelling end of the year so we’re trying to plan a trip when everyone we want to meet will be there at the same time.

Hoseok [09:18] And I’m part of that list? Chan, you honour me

Chanyeol [09:18] You’d think you wouldn’t be after 20 years of being friends but hey

Hoseok [09:18] You know Seoul is like a train ride away right? Why do you want to wait to hang out in Gwangju?

Chanyeol [09:19] Home and stuff

Hoseok [09:19] Hella senti, I have to say

Chanyeol [09:19] There’s the added bonus of Hayoung and I having to stay with our respective parents when we go home though

Hoseok [09:20] That’s what I’m saying! Come to Seoul

Chanyeol [09:21] I will… I just have to do a Gwangju trip soon. Hopefully when you’re there too

Hoseok [09:21] Why?

Chanyeol [09:22] Okay don’t say a word to ANYONE But I kinda want to ask Hayoung to move in

Chanyeol [09:23] Hoseok?

Chanyeol [09:24] Dude you’re freaking me out. Is that a terrible idea?

Hoseok [09:25] Nope Just recovering from MY MIND BEING BLOWN My boy’s growing up!!!

Chanyeol [09:25] Jesus You scared the shit out of me for a couple minutes there

Hoseok [09:26] I’m gonna dance my ass off at your wedding

Chanyeol [09:26] Whoaaa. Slow down there pop star

Chanyeol [09:27] Anyway, that’s why I want to go back. I want to do this thing where she’s at her parents’ house and I’m at mine and then I bring up all these rules that we used to have at home when we were kids and then just casually wonder what it would be like if we could make our own rules - in our own home.

Hoseok [09:28] Adorable Just adorable Still waiting for how my Gwangju plans fit into this though

Chanyeol [09:29] Are you kidding? I need you there for moral support!

Hoseok [09:29] So, like… hiding outside in the bushes while you’re talking to Hayoung?

Chanyeol [09:30] No, that would be creepy. But this might be the second most important question I ever ask in my life so I need you there. In town. In the vicinity. So I can plan and maybe make some kind of a grand gesture? Unless it’s stupid

Hoseok [09:30] No! Of course I’ll be there. Just let me know when

Chanyeol [09:31] I will. In any case, it doesn’t look like we’ll be able to go back until at least January so that gives me some time to prep.

Chanyeol [09:32] Thanks though. You’re a good friend. The best actually.

Hoseok stares at the screen, the smile on his face fading. The faint flowery perfume and the scent of skin on skin suddenly seems stronger. Something shifts next to him and he turns on his back with dread, faced with the sleeping form of his best friend’s half-naked younger sister.

—

“Everything okay?”

Seokjin looks up, instinctively locking his phone as Nari walks into the living room, stopping just shy of the edge of the carpet.

“Yeah. Just… the usual.” He shrugs, placing his phone next to him. He bites his lip, suddenly at a loss for words. “Did you sleep okay?”

“Mhm.” She nods, running her fingers through the top of her hair and letting it fall down one shoulder. “You? Was the sofa comfortable?”

“Oh. Yeah, totally.” He tries to suppress the urge to stretch his back. “How about you? Oh -“ He clears his throat when she frowns slightly. “Right. We just did you.”

Nari nods again, this time slower. “Listen, Seokjin, about last night -“

“Nari, about what happened -“

They pause at the same time and Seokjin feels his ears turn red, the same time as she chuckles awkwardly and looks away.

“You go,” offers Seokjin, regretting it almost immediately.

“No, no, please, you can go first.”

“No, I insist -“

Nari stares for a few seconds, looking hesitant. “I just wanted to say… don’t worry about it. We can just forget it.”

Seokjin processes this, his pulse slightly uneven. “Okay,” he says lightly. “Thanks for, uh… letting me sleep over.”

“I think I kind of forced you,” she reminds him. “I couldn’t quite have your hypothermia on my hands. They’d take away my medical license if I let you go back out in that rain. Oh, and take your time returning the clothes,” she adds suddenly. “Although I think that sweatshirt is yours, if I’m not mistaken.”

“Um -“ He looks down at the faded blue sweatshirt and grey joggers she’d lent him last night. “Oh, yeah. I stopped looking for this, like, three years ago. I thought I left it in some hotel in America.”

“Well, it would’ve been on eBay selling for a million dollars if that were the case,” she says teasingly.

Seokjin cracks a smile. Unlike last night when, for a glorious portion of an hour, things had felt almost normal, he feels more uncomfortable than ever. Part of him feels like screaming into a pillow, for it’s occurring to him now what a terrible position he’s put himself and Nari in, not to mention Seulgi, stranded in Big Hit.

“Oh.” The word escapes his lips before he realises. He scrambles off the sofa, running a hand through his messy hair. “I have to go… I need to pick up -“ He looks up at Nari.

“Yeah, no. That’s fine.” She nods. “I hope you don’t feel weird about last night, though.”

“I don’t.” He pauses. “I don’t feel weird about it,” he says clearly, but this isn’t the time to have this discussion. Not while his girlfriend is elsewhere, not until he’s done the right thing by her.

Nari looks like she’s about to say something but shakes her head at the last moment. “That’s good. I guess I’ll see you around?”

Seokjin observes her, bare face and slightly puffy eyes. She's biting her lip - he’d kissed those lips last night, he remembers and waits for his face to get hot again.

But it doesn’t. He nods. “Yeah. See you around, Nari.” He trudges out, squinting slightly at the sun and needing a coffee so, so badly.

“Seokjin.” She’s standing at the door when he turns and her eyes twinkle slightly in a way that makes his stomach leap hopefully. “Thanks for coming last night, though.”

It takes him a moment. “Of course. Happy half-birthday, Nari.”

The roads are unforgiving. Despite a lot of the water having been drained, the streets are still flowing with ankle deep water, leaves and debris strewn around everywhere, and entire roads blocked for repairs. 

Seokjin reaches Big Hit almost thirty minutes later than he’d intended. Just as he’s about to drive into the basement parking, he spots Seulgi walking out of the front doors, one hand on the strap of her bag and the other holding her phone.

He immediately pulls into the front of the building and skids to a stop, accidentally splashing water from a puddle on her ankles.

“What the -“

“Sorry!” he exclaims apologetically, turning off the car and stepping out.

“Seokjin?” Her shoulders relax when she notices him - but she doesn’t smile. “What are you doing here?”

“Well, the roads are crap. Figured you might need a ride home?” he ventures.

“Oh.” She seems hesitant. Even after spending a whole night at the company sleeping quarters, she looks like she’s stepped out a shower and spent thirty minutes getting ready; there isn’t a hair out of place or a single crease in her clothing. Dressed in an ancient sweatshirt - and what he suddenly remembers with a shock are Nari’s joggers - he feels like a complete slob.

“Unless… you don’t want one.”

Seulgi stares at him. For a second, he thinks she might throw her phone at his face. But a moment later she shrugs.

“That would be nice. Thank you.”

It’s formal and slightly awkward, but Seokjin takes it as a good sign when she opens the passenger door and gets in. He drives mostly in silence; he isn’t sure what to say to her and figures he at least owes her a ride to her doorstep before they have this discussion.

This route is shorter, fortunately, and fifteen minutes later when he pulls up in front of her building, he takes a deep breath. Before he can get a word out, though, she speaks.

“We’re done, Seokjin.”

His heart jolts harder than he expected it would. “What?”

She continues looking out of the windshield, but her voice is calm yet steely. “I spent more time yesterday worrying about our relationship than on my presentation. And that’s not me. Neither is getting in the middle of a situation as messy as yours and Nari’s, but -“ She scoffs without humour.

Seokjin isn’t sure what hurts more: the fact that he wasn’t expecting this right now, or the fact that he can’t help but agree with her.

“Seulgi… I know I haven’t been a good partner lately. I know that and you deserve -“

“Don’t tell me what I deserve. Please,” she says, still calm, but this time he thinks he can hear her voice tremble slightly. “I think you tried. Trying to call me the last few weeks, checking up on me last night, picking me up right now… you’ve been raised to be a decent guy.” She shakes her head and looks out her window. “But it really loses its charm when there’s another woman in the picture.”

Shame trickles down Seokjin’s spine but he forces himself to listen to her and absorb every single word. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know what I felt for Nari - and I still don’t, but I never meant to -“

“Really? Is that why you’re wearing a pair of pants with her name printed on them?”

His heart stops.

“What?”

Seulgi scoffs again, but it’s followed by the smallest of sniffs. “God, I was such an idiot.”

Seokjin looks down at the joggers, frowning deeply and scanning his leg to see what Seulgi might have until he spots it: right by the edge of the pocket, in faded Hangul… Choi Nari. 

“No. No, no, this - no. No.” Seokjin shakes his head vigorously, for she's got it all wrong. But for some reason, his mouth seems incapable of saying anything other than no, no, no. 

“Spare me. You're literally in her pants,” she says icily. “God - I'm that girl. The one who started dating a guy with a girl best friend that stopped being just a friend somewhere along the way. Talk about a B-grade k-drama.” She begins gathering her bag and unstrapping her seatbelt.

“Seulgi,” he says hurriedly, “I did not - I swear to you, it's nothing like you're imagining.”

She turns to him and tilts her head, but her eyes are shuttered - apart from being wet. “Really? You weren't with her last night?”

“No! I mean, I was at her house but I wasn't with -”

“Goodbye, Seokjin,” she interrupts him, opening the car door and climbing out. “Thanks for the ride,” she mutters, just before slamming the door shut and walking away. 

Seokjin watches her leave in shock. His heart is beating uncomfortably and he feels sick in his stomach, for as much of a right Seulgi had to do this and as much as he even expected her to, hurting her this way was not something he had ever intended.

He isn’t sure how long he sits out there; it isn’t until his phone rings that he’s jerked out of his trance.

“Hello?” He clears his throat and presses his fingers into his eyes, feeling them get wet as he lowers them.

“Seokjin hyung?” There’s a minor commotion in the back. “The meeting has been pushed back by half an hour.”

It’s Jungkook. Seokjin nods, the meeting seeming like a distant problem right now. “Okay.”

“Yeah, meaning we can probably grab breakfast before it. Do you want the staff to order something for you?”

As if on cue, his stomach churns at the thought of food. “Uh, no.”

“No?”

“Yeah. I’m not hungry.” Before Jungkook can argue further, Seokjin continues. “I have to go. I’ll be there soon.”

Hanging up, he finally pulls out from in front of Seulgi’s building, beginning his drive back home.

—

Sooah’s birthday lunch has been organised in a fancy, chic restaurant in central Seoul, on the top floor with added security and an exclusive invitation list. The sun is mild and there’s a gentle breeze in the air, making the balcony area a popular spot for many of the guests to enjoy the newly improved weather with cocktails and appetizers being served by well-dressed waiters.

Hoseok provides his name at the entrance and enters the party, hoping furtively that the group of girls just outside the building haven't spotted his face. He looks around; evidently, the birthday girl hasn't arrived yet. He declines a passing waiter's offer of a prawn tempura and makes a beeline for the first member he sees.

“Hey, hyung,” he says, slightly breathless as he reaches Yoongi. The older member had ended up bringing Jungkook, Namjoon and Taehyung from the company HQ, especially after the latter two had decided they wanted to drink freely at the party and not drive after that, leaving their cars still parked in the company basement.

Now, Yoongi, who’s been quiet all morning and is holding a glass of what looks like gin, nods in acknowledgement even though his gaze is fixed somewhere on the ground.

However, Hoseok can't begin to wonder what his problem is right now. “Okay, look,” he begins, looking around to make sure there's no one around. “I did something horrible. Well, no, not horrible,” he amends quickly. “It wasn't at all - okay, here's what it is, alright?” He swallows and takes a deep breath. “I hooked up with Chaeyoung,” he confesses in a single breath.

Yoongi, who'd been listening with his gaze still burning into the ground, finally looks at him. “Wow,” he says, raising his eyebrows. “Really? Isn't she, like, fifteen or something?”

“What? No!” Hoseok cries. “She's twenty-three! She's an adult - she’s as old as Jungkook! Well, slightly younger,” he admits.

“How much younger?”

“… eighteen months.”

Yoongi nods, then frowns. “Okay, well… it’s not that bad then. She’s old enough.”

“Yeah, but she’s -“ My childhood neighbour, a family friend, and Chanyeol’s baby sister. “… Chaeyoung,” he finishes uneasily. “Her brother is going to kill me,” he groans, dropping his face into his hands.

“Really? Why?” Yoongi shrugs. “It’s her life, right?”

“I mean, sure. But Chan is really protective of her, especially after their mother passed.” Hoseok doesn’t know how exactly to word it to someone who hasn't been there through it all, watching Chanyeol constantly keep an eye on the most important person in his life. Until she moved to Seoul and he asked me to take over.

“So?” Yoongi shrugs, then takes a sip of his drink. “It's her life,” she repeats. “He can't look out for her forever.”

Hoseok exhales, sensing that Yoongi isn't quite getting the point. “Okay, just imagine that I hooked up with your younger sister.” 

Yoongi grimaces slightly. “Okay?”

“And imagine that I was your best friend, that we grew up together and I saw her grow up and I was… kind of a douche to her back then,” he mutters. “But then everyone grows up and suddenly I’m in the same city as her, you trusted me to look out for her - and instead I ended up in bed with her,” he finishes with a flourish. “What would you do?”

Yoongi squints, clearly trying to process this. “I… I don’t know, that’s a lot to keep track of. And you know what, I don’t have sisters so I really - I mean, I’m not the best person to ask. But you know who is?” he adds quickly, gesturing with his chin at something behind Hoseok.

Hoseok turns to see Namjoon finishing up a conversation with someone, clinking his glass with theirs cheerfully before they part ways.

“He’s your best friend, you kind of grew up together and he has a younger sister.” Yoongi counts them off one by one. “One he’s fairly protective of.”

“Is he?” Hoseok frowns. “Protective of his sister? Like he is with Kaya?”

“Well, it’s not the same situation but he’s protective by nature. And you’re just getting an opinion, not recreating it to the T,” Yoongi reminds him, nudging his shoulder. “He’s your guy.”

Hoseok considers this and nods, making his way over to Namjoon. Namjoon notices him approaching and smiles, which Hoseok returns with a slightly confused one of his own.

“Hoba!” Namjoon exclaims, clapping him on the back and almost knocking the wind out of him. “How’ve you been? Can I get you a drink?”

“Oh, uh… no, thanks.” Hoseok shakes his head but agrees to a wonton on the spread in front of them. Chewing, he observes Namjoon, who looks far happier than he can remember seeing him in recent times. It’s not unexpected, given how long he and Kaya spent apart.

Suddenly deciding he doesn’t want to think about why Namjoon looks so happy, he hurries to speak.

“So, uh… say I hooked up with your sister,” he begins quickly, only for Namjoon’s smile to disappear in an instant.

“You… what?” he exclaims, and his height suddenly seems looming.

Hoseok frowns before rolling his eyes. “Say,” he repeats, “that I hooked up with your sister.”

“Oh. Why?” When Hoseok doesn’t answer immediately, Namjoon raises his eyebrows. “Dude, did you sleep with someone’s sister?”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” Hoseok takes a step back and raises his hands. “I did not sleep with her. We didn’t have sex - like, it was so not like that. Because sex is… we didn’t… I mean, no sex was had,” he finishes, his throat feeling dry.

“So I take it you didn’t have sex?”

“No, we didn’t.” But I may as well have, he thinks, flashes of last night surfacing in his mind. Her hair, her skin, her voice like he’d never heard it before… Hoseok sighs. “I went over to Chaeyoung’s last night and we… fooled around,” he confesses, hoping he won’t be asked to elaborate.

Namjoon is far too sensible to do that, fortunately. “Right. And… that’s a bad thing,” he states, as though waiting for Hoseok to confirm it.

He opens his mouth, knowing what he should say. “No,” he admits after a moment. “That’s the worst part, that nothing about it was bad at all.” He shakes his head even as his chest feels lighter for the first time all day. “It was incredible. And not just the - the hooking up, but being with her, laughing and talking… God, we talked all night,” he remembers, his eyes dropping to the floor.

Namjoon raises his eyebrows again, this time looking somewhat impressed. “Sounds like the dream,” he remarks deliberately. 

“Yeah?”

“Totally. And clearly you know that because you’re getting that same little smile the thought of it,” he points out. “The one you guys used to tease me about?”

Hoseok immediately straightens his face, not even realising he’d been smiling. “Shut up.”

Namjoon shrugs serenely, finishing his drink and helping himself to a second. “You’re worried about her brother, though,” he guesses.

“More than worried.” He shakes his head and drops his face into his hands. “He’s going to think I totally betrayed him.”

“Did you, though?”

“I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking you,” he says urgently. “If I hooked up with your sister - your younger sister - while I’m your friend… what would you do?”

Namjoon frowns uncertainly, apparently thinking about it, then exhales. “I wouldn’t be thrilled,” he admits. “It would feel a little like you were going behind my back? Especially since… well, it’s my sister.” He winces, apparently realising he’s not doing a very good job at explaining this. “No guy ever wants to think about his little sister doing that, least of all with one of his friends.”

“That’s perfect,” mutters Hoseok.

“No, but you know - it’s a little different in Chanyeol’s case,” muses Namjoon, now leaning backwards against the table and pointing at the air, as though it’s an interesting problem he’s solving on an invisible whiteboard. “You actually grew up with him.”

“Isn’t that worse? Because not only did I grow up with him, I grew up with her. And Chan is…” He exhales tiredly. “She won’t believe me, but he’s always been extremely protective of her. Especially since their mom died. Emotionally, physically… I know him - there’s nothing in this world he would prioritise over his sister.”

Namjoon is quiet for a moment. “Is it because their mom died?”

“I don’t know. Probably,” he admits. “He was kind of like the golden child when they were young and she was always a little left out and overlooked… he never admitted it but I know he felt guilty about it. He always tried to make up for it and look after her more - even now, when she moved to Seoul.”

“Well, I can see that,” says Namjoon reasonably. “It’s difficult to see your younger sibling as anything other than a kid, especially when they’re that much younger. You thought of her as a kid, too, if I remember correctly,” he reminds him, irritatingly logical.

“But she’s not a kid anymore,” argues Hoseok. “I did think that at first but… she’s really not. She’s smart and insightful and - and she’s focused on her career. And she’s pragmatic - you know last night during the storm, she had hot water and instant ramen stocked up in case the power went out?” His eyes widen and he shrugs hugely. “Six of us in the dorm and not one of us thought to stock up on food. If I’m not wrong, Jungkook ate a bowl of cold kimchi for dinner while Taehyung ate half a block of cheese. And that was with the power on!”

Namjoon grimaces. “What was happening while I was gone?”

“And she made brownies!” Hoseok exclaims, ignoring his friend. “And they were good. And she was crocheting - she…” He takes a deep breath. “She gave me a crocheted bear,” he tells Namjoon in a low voice. “And I don’t know if she put some kind of spell on it, but for some reason, it won’t leave my pocket.” 

Namjoon raises his eyebrows but Hoseok can’t seem to stop talking - not now that he’s finally saying out loud things that have been swimming in his brain for months.

“She’s cute and she’s funny - and she’s got this killer confidence. Where did that even come from?” he demands. “She used to be all shy and awkward before but now she’s… oh, and she’s started giving advice now? Good advice, incidentally, and I just want to… I just want to talk to her all the time because sometimes it really feels like she can solve every single one of my problems. And honestly, after last night…” Hoseok runs a hand through his hair, glancing at Namjoon’s expression and hating it, “Namjoon, believe me… she’s a grown woman.”

There’s a few seconds of silence where Hoseok fights the urge to yell incomprehensibly into the abyss.

“So… I know you guys don’t really like it when I do this,” begins Namjoon slowly, “but if I understand it correctly, your problem isn’t so much that you slept with Chaeyoung -“

“I didn’t sleep with -“

“- it’s that you’re falling in love with Chaeyoung,” he finishes, nodding as though explaining a rather simple maths problem without wanting to hurt his feelings.

“I’m - I’m not,” murmurs Hoseok, even as his heart sinks for more often than not, Namjoon is right.

“But that changes things,” says Namjoon. “If you actually had feelings for my sister - real feelings, and I was convinced that you weren’t just messing around with her… I would actually be kind of okay with it. It would be weird,” he admits, shuddering a little, “but it wouldn’t be the worst thing. I’m sure it would be the same with Chanyeol. No?”

Hoseok shakes his head. It isn’t as if the thought hasn’t occurred to him, but if there’s one person who knows Chanyeol, it’s him.

“You know, it might? Except, when we were growing up, I was a dick to Chaeyoung,” he admits in a low voice, the shame and guilt bubbling deep in his stomach. “He was protecting her from his parents and his step-mom and other kids… but he was also protecting her from me.” 

He doesn’t say it out loud - he can’t, because it’s too shameful, that the one and only time that Chanyeol ever snapped at him, the only time Hoseok ever felt that he could lose his best friend was when he’d warned him to stop making fun of his little sister.

It had been when they were in high school. Hoseok had taken it way down after that, choosing only to tease her in a more playful way or ignore her altogether, usually when Chanyeol wasn’t around. But it was undeniable that even though they’d moved past it, Hoseok had crossed a line.

Until now.

“I’m the last person Chanyeol will be okay with, being with his sister,” he states, knowing it’s true.

Namjoon doesn’t say anything for a few seconds. “Look, Hobi… that was years ago. You were a kid.” He seems to spot something behind Hoseok’s shoulder. “What’s more important is how she feels about your past.”

Hoseok is about to open his mouth when his phone pings at the same time as Namjoon’s. Similar pings are heard throughout the room and when he checks his phone, it’s to see a message on a group chat.

Jimin [13:04] We’re on our way up. Everyone get ready!

As promised, less than a minute later, they hear the lift open and Jimin’s voice sing-song as he speaks. A moment later, he appears at the doorway with Sooah, his face breaking into a cherubic smile as he gestures to the room with a flourish.

“Surprise!”

All the guests chorus together and Sooah, after gasping and seemingly suffering a mild heart attack, begins greeting people who come forward to hug her. Hoseok and Namjoon hang back, allowing her school friends to greet her first, including Taehyung, while Jimin stands beside her proudly, evidently satisfied with her reaction. It’s then that Hoseok sees her.

“Oh, my God, she’s here,” he breathes, instantly turning away but unable to do so for long. He chances a glance at her as he half-hides behind Namjoon’s broad frame; in an oversized striped pink sweater, a short denim skirt, sheer pink stockings and black combat boots, she looks like an ice cream - a cute, pink, irresistible ice cream with slightly flushed cheeks and long wavy hair. Bubblegum punk, he’d said to her once and here she is, clearly embracing it.

“Okay, the worst thing you can do is be dramatic about this,” warns Namjoon. “Just go and talk to her like everything’s - wait,” he says suddenly. “What did you say to her this morning?”

“Oh. Well, I didn’t want to wake her up, so -”

Namjoon turns around with his eyebrows high on his forehead. “You snuck out?” he whispers loudly.

“No! I mean, technically - but I needed to leave for that meeting and my phone was dead so I couldn’t text her. And I didn’t want to wake her up,” he adds defensively, anticipating the question. “Don’t worry, I left her a note.”

“A note?”

“Yeah, and it was a nice note,” he says shortly. “Whatever I do, I’m not going to screw her over like that.”

They go over to greet the birthday girl after that, once the crowd thins out. Hoseok catches Chaeyoung’s eye for the briefest of moments, feeling his heart skip an enormous beat. But she moves away and he follows her slender figure going to place her present on the gift table.

“... thought it was going to be just a small lunch, you and me. You didn’t have to go through all this…”

“I wanted to give you a surprise… don’t you like it?”

“Oh, of course I do, Chim…” 

Sooah leans up to press a kiss to Jimin’s cheek, who looks mollified when he spots them, followed by Sooah. “Hey, guys,” she says, leaning up to hug them in turn as they chorus their own happy birthdays to her. “Thank you for coming, I know how busy you all are.”

“Where’s Seokjin hyung?” Jimin asks, scanning the room.

“He said he wasn’t feeling up to it. He says sorry,” adds Hoseok apologetically, while Sooah waves a hand. “He did look quite off even during the meeting this morning.”

Jimin murmurs something noncommittal but shrugs, evidently deciding to let it go when Taehyung and Jungkook join them as well, deep in discussion that abruptly stops when they come into earshot.

“Namjoon oppa, Jimin told me you just got back from New Zealand,” says Sooah. “How was it?”

“Oh, yeah, you never told us,” adds Jungkook. “Did you do the ziplining thing this time?” he asks excitedly

Namjoon takes a sip of his drink and shakes his head. “No, no, we didn’t,” he answers, chuckling.

“Oh. Well, you must have gone to Milford Sound - he was obsessed with that place the last time we were there,” remembers Hoseok. “Remember? You wanted to stay there longer but the staff made us leave. That’s the kind of place Kaya would like, too.”

“Oh, yeah. It was really nice - but I don’t know, we never really got around to doing that,” he admits.

“Okay.” Jungkook frowns. “What about that Lord of the Rings hike? That’s right up your alley.”

“Er… no. Didn’t end up doing that either.”

Hoseok frowns. “So what did you do for three weeks?”

There’s a few moments where no one speaks and Namjoon doesn’t answer, opting instead to take a long, slow sip of wine and ending it with a soft smack of his lips, all the while when Hoseok finds himself slowly regretting his question.

“Oh. Oh, God.” He swallows before groaning. Jungkook’s ears go red while Sooah and Jimin snort, and Taehyung claps him on the shoulder as they all disperse, clicking his tongue and winking at him.

“Don’t prolong it,” murmurs Namjoon to Hoseok before he leaves, his eyes clearly on Chaeyoung. “Just be normal with her.”

“Right. Normal.” It’s easier said than done, for Hoseok discovers that he’s barely able to look at Chaeyoung without thinking about last night. His feelings for her were tending towards a problematic region long before this, but something had changed irreversibly last night. There was no scope for denial anymore, he realises, not about his attraction to her or deeper emotions that make his stomach flip.

Worst of all, it’s the looming thought of Chanyeol following him every time she enters his mind. He would lose Chanyeol over this, he knows it. Hoseok didn’t think losing Chanyeol would ever even be worthy of consideration in his mind - until Chaeyoung, looking like a cute, pretty, sensitive ice cream.

He drifts towards the table of hors d'oeuvres, trying to force an appetite. Nothing looks appealing, though, not now, but he scans it anyway hopefully. Someone else arrives at the table, and he smells her before he sees her.

“Hi,” says Chaeyoung, giving him a small smile and picking up a small chocolate at the edge of the table.

It’s too much: her summery perfume, her shiny hair, the memory of her naked rib cage underneath his palms while she sighed his name in a way that would make Chanyeol punch him in the face if he knew. He exhales shakily as she takes a step closer to him; even though they aren’t even slightly touching, the proximity makes his heart race and to his horror, he can feel his jeans tighten.

“What are you doing?” he asks in a low voice, dropping all pretense and turning to her.

She raises her eyebrows. “I’m saying hi,” she answers, not sounding even a fraction as frazzled as he feels. She does look… happy to see him, though. The thought makes his heart leap and hurt at the same time.

“Listen, Chae,” he begins, because he just can’t do this. She nods, looking casual and breezy, her cheeks with a hint of pink still on them. 

“Yeah?”

“Look, last night was… amazing,” he admits, noting how, despite the casual demeanour she’s displaying, a smile begins creeping up on her face as well. Her lips are pink, too, and glossy… “It was amazing and - and you’re amazing.” Her smile widens slightly and her cheeks flush a little brighter and Hoseok feels his strength start to leave him bit by bit. “But it can’t happen again. No matter how I feel… Chanyeol is still my best friend and you’re still his sister and… you are so off limits.”

Chaeyoung doesn’t seem fazed. Her smile fades slightly but not completely and she licks her lips, as though able to see right through him. “It’s a little late for that, I think,” she says lightly, brushing a lock of hair off her neck.

Be still, my heart. “No, it’s not. I mean, it… yeah. Maybe.” He looks at the floor and exhales deliberately, trying to gather his thoughts. “But it can’t go further. I - I really hope you understand, Chae,” he implores, meeting her eyes, wide and doe-like. “You’re amazing,” he repeats, meaning it, “but…”

She doesn’t say anything for a moment, then nods. “Okay.” Giving him that same small, nonchalant smile, she pops the piece of chocolate in her mouth and walks away.

—

Seokjin wakes up from the worst sleep he’s encountered in a while - and that includes the tour they’ve just wrapped up.

It had taken him a long time to fall asleep. Once he’d finally managed to somewhat numb himself to the fact that he’d just been dumped because his girlfriend thought he’d cheated on her, he’d tried to close his eyes and get just a little while of nothingness. But he felt wrung out; he was emotionally so exhausted that it was hard to even sleep, especially because he knew, he knew, that while his break-up with Seulgi was affecting him, it was the fact that he didn't even know how Nari fit into all this.

Well, he knew. He had an idea and he was aware of the general area in which Nari was involved, but all his strength was going into not thinking about that right now because it was a Pandora’s box he didn't want to rifle through at the moment.

Then, of course, the moment he’d tried to catch a few winks, his phone had started buzzing with updates from Sooah's birthday lunch. Jimin hadn't taken it too well when Seokjin had told him after the meeting that he wouldn't be able to make it and while he hadn't been able to bring himself to explain why, something in his expression must have done it for him, for Jimin had abruptly stopped pestering him and told him to stop by if he felt better.

He checks his phone now, realising he's slept through lunch. The late afternoon sun is already dimming, as though warning the city of an early sunset. He sits up on the couch, his back hurting and head pounding and heart racing from the vague dream he'd had of Seulgi imprisoning him in an underground jail while Namjoon appeared as a hologram and read a list of his crimes.

You're a decent guy, but it loses its charm when there's another woman in the picture. 

It was like a sick twist of fate, the momentary relief that Seulgi was breaking up with him until it turned to dread when he realised why she was breaking up with him. And the other woman in the picture… Seokjin runs a hand across his face, knowing that it wouldn't have made anything better if he'd try to explain why he was wearing Nari's joggers in the first place. 

No, I wasn't sleeping with her - not at all. I went to her place in the storm to wish her a happy half-birthday in line with a decades-old tradition, we splashed around in the rain for a while where an accidental kiss took place, and then she offered me dry clothes and her couch for the night because she's a doctor and she was worried about hypothermia.

It sounds ridiculous - not to mention like a rather trite story. He'd taken off the joggers the moment he'd entered the dorm, throwing on the first pair of trousers he'd found in his room before driving away for his meeting. He'd chucked it in the washing machine after getting back and then the dryer, and in the absence of anything else to do except overthink his ended relationship, Seokjin stalks over to the dryer and retrieves the washed joggers. Without sitting back down, he collects his keys and prepares to drive over to Nari's.

It will be therapeutic, he supposes, to get rid of the immediate cause of his break-up. Plus, he would get the opportunity to apologise to Nari again - for staying over last night, for accidentally kissing her, maybe for showing up at all.

As he nears her building, he slows down. The street is still empty, although the water guns are no longer where they were last night. It’s almost as though the evidence of what transpired has been wiped away clean; Seokjin can’t decide whether that’s supposed to be a good thing.

There’s a good chance she won’t be home right now, he realises. But he still parks the car where he had last night and steps out, folded joggers in hand, looking up at the corridor window that had blown away her notes last night. It’s open and gives him a direct view of her front door.

Just then, as if on cue, the door opens. Seokjin’s stomach leaps without warning - for she’s home - and despite the bad day he’s had so far, a ghost of a smile graces his face. 

Nari appears at the door, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear. Seokjin takes a step forward but halts immediately in his tracks when she breaks into a relieved sort of smile and she opens the door wider - and someone else appears into view.

It’s a man. It’s him - Jason or whoever - who she’d brought to dinner at his place. She’d maintained that they were simply colleagues but either she’d been lying or the situation had changed since then, but Seokjin is motionless as he watches Jason kiss her casually on the cheek as she moves aside to let him in.

Maybe it’s the culmination of an already dismal day or it’s the unexpected nature of this discovery, but nothing that’s happened so far has crushed his chest quite so viscerally. Seokjin almost hopes he’s mistaking someone else for Nari or it’s a friendly, platonic, even brotherly situation - he’s grasping at straws mentally, even as Jason steps inside and the door closes behind him.

—

Near the late afternoon, when the sunlight starts to become sparse, the party starts to wrap up. Guests begin saying goodbye, passing by the table piled high with gifts on their way to the lift, many people happily day drunk and stumbling out.

“Did you know Sooah had this many friends?” Yoongi mutters, sidling up to Hoseok. He looks longingly at the drinks table next to them, now with far more empty bottles than when they'd first arrived.

“I didn't know someone could have this many friends,” he admits, somewhat admiringly. Across the hall, she looks appropriately engaged, swaying to the Justin Bieber track playing on the speaker and talking to two people as she sipped on a cocktail with a straw. A little way away, Jimin, Taehyung and two other guys he'd never seen before were aggressively popping to the song while simultaneously filming each other and guffawing.

“Sounds like a lot of work.” Yoongi sighs and shoves his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “When do you want to head out? Because I could use a drink.”

“Oh, is that why you've been sober all day?” Hoseok chuckles. “That’s adorable, hyung. You're like the mother hen trying to get her chickens to walk in a straight line before doing anything else.”

“That's me. Do you see the other chickens around? Namjoon and Jungkook are sharing a cigarette on the balcony,” he notes.

“Jimin and Taehyung are over there, although I’m guessing Jimin will be with Sooah. I don't think they're all Sooah's friends,” he says after a moment. “They aren't close friends at least. I think they're mostly old classmates and stuff that she's kind of in touch with. Jimin just goes all out.”

“He told you that?”

“Not exactly,” he mutters, his gaze moving to the one figure he's been glancing at continuously. Chaeyoung is by the appetiser station again, a clear drink in her hand as she fingers the edge of one of the food cards. Her bottom lip is between her teeth and she's frowning. 

As he watches, a friend of Sooah's joins her and says something, to which she nods and laughs politely. He responds and she shrugs, a bit uncertainly, before picking up a single French fry and popping it in her mouth.

“Did you talk to her?”

Hoseok doesn't bother beating around the bush and inquiring who Yoongi is referring to. “Kind of. Went better than I anticipated, actually.”

“Really?” Yoongi raises his eyebrows. “What did you say to her?”

“Told her last night was fun and all but it can't happen again.” Hoseok turns away from her. “She seemed fine with it.”

“You don't sound fine with it.”

“What do you mean? I'm the one who suggested it.”

“You don't sound fine with the fact that she was fine with it.”

Hoseok glares at Yoongi but doesn’t argue. He turns to Chaeyoung again, this time a bit more alert when he notices her grabbing her sling bag, clearly ready to leave. He follows her pink, wavy-haired figure as she floats over to Sooah and presumably wishes her again before giving her a hug.

He frowns as their interaction continues: Chaeyoung asks her something and Sooah responds easily, tilting her head and giggling as she points to Jimin. Chaeyoung’s face falls for a fraction of a second before it’s replaced with a smile and a nod. They hug again and this time, Chaeyoung starts to leave. 

As she does, she meets Hoseok’s eyes. His heart stops briefly but she simply gives him a casual wave and a small smile, before stepping into the lift and waiting for the doors to close.

Hoseok swallows, his mind going a mile a minute for the next few seconds. “Hyung,” he says, “you’re taking the rest of the chickens back to HQ?”

“You know it.” Yoongi follows Hoseok’s gaze. “You have your car?”

Hoseok nods before clapping him on the back and dashing off in the same direction as Chaeyoung. He takes the stairs two at a time and spills out into the lobby of the building, head darting around and spotting a telltale pair of pink stockinged legs disappearing around the corner outside the glass doors.

He follows her, jogging a bit until he’s within earshot. He calls her name and she turns, looking surprised but not altogether disappointed at his presence. 

“Hey,” she says, as though they’ve coincidentally run into each other on a normal day. Behind her, the sun is far away at the horizon, a bright spot peeking through the clouds as it prepares to set. Right now, though, it’s difficult to pay attention to it.

“Leaving already?” he asks, a little uselessly, but it’s just occurred to him that he has no idea why he followed her out.

“Yeah, I guess. Most people are gone,” she says. “Plus… I don’t really know anybody there apart from Sooah herself. And you,” she adds with a smile when he raises his eyebrows. She doesn’t say anything else but Hoseok suddenly feels guilty, for three hours at a party not knowing anyone can’t be easy.

“You know the other guys, though,” he says after a moment. “Jimin and, uh…”

“Yeah, I was hanging out with Jungkook for a while.” She nods, fingering the strap of her bag. “It’s getting late, though.”

The decent thing to do would be to offer her a ride. He’s on the verge of doing it; now that he’s here in front of her, everything he’d told her earlier today seems vague and blurry and, frankly, unimportant.

“I’m sorry, Chae.”

She frowns. “Oh, don’t be. It wasn’t that bad - like, the food was good and I got a few nice pictures -“

“No, not about that.”

“Oh.” She licks her lips and nods once. “About that… don’t be sorry about that either. I get it - it’s weird. We’re practically family and you and my brother especially are -“

“Nope. Not that either.”

She stares at him blankly. “I’m out of guesses.”

“I'm sorry for…” What’s more important is how she feels about your past. Namjoon, ever the wise one, had touched upon the only element in this mess that could bring Hoseok out of his pit of guilt about Chanyeol: Chaeyoung.

“Yeah?”

He takes a deep breath. “I'm sorry for everything. Everything I did when we were kids, everything I said…” He bites his lip as she processes this, her eyes flickering slightly before they fall to the ground. “I was a huge jerk to you. And I know I was a kid, too, and so were you… but that doesn't mean that it all just disappears when we grow up. I know over the last year we've… gotten closer -” 

Her lips twitch and his cheeks grow warm. He hurries his next words.

“- but I still want to say, explicitly, that I'm sorry. I'm really sorry, Chae.”

Something massive seems to have been lifted off his chest but a dull pressure still lingers, pulsating in rhythm with his heart beat. Chaeyoung nods again, slowly, and meets his eyes.]]

“Apology accepted,” she says softly.

The pressure recedes; she feels more within reach than ever. It seems unbelievable that not twenty-four hours ago, she'd been on his lap in a state of undress, kissing him while it poured outside, making every other thought in his mind disappear. 

“And I'm sorry, too,” she says after a moment, jerking him out of his dangerous train of thought. “I wasn't mean but I was… pretty clingy. Kids get teased mercilessly at that age over a haircut so I'm sure a kid who acted like… well, like me wouldn't have been easy,” she admits, two pink spots appearing on her pale cheeks. 

Hoseok wants to kiss her, so desperately. It takes everything in him to stay rooted to the spot, even though there isn't a single part of him that wants to stay away from her. He should, but for the life of him, he can't quite remember why right now.

Chaeyoung exhales, looking slightly awkward but somewhat relieved - or maybe Hoseok is and he's projecting. Either way, she rocks backwards on the heels of her shoes and shrugs. “Well, I'm going to head,” she says abruptly, the pink tinge on her cheeks still visible. “And… thanks.”

“You're walking?”

“Yeah. After the rain last night it's actually kind of nice. And not totally dark yet,” she adds, looking up at the sky.

He should offer her a ride. 

“Can I walk you home?” he blurts, pausing internally as he thinks about his car in the parking lot.

She looks surprised, too. “Um, are you sure? Don't you have to get back to the party?”

“Oh, no, the party is almost dead, anyway,” he says, waving a hand dismissively. “Even Sooah and Jimin seem to be almost done. I'm sure they'll leave in a bit.”

“And to no one's surprise, she's going back to his place.” Chaeyoung shakes her head. “Wow, I've clearly had one too many mojitos.”

Hoseok snickers. “Don't worry about it. With what I think their plans are tonight, you don't want them in the room next to you.”

She wrinkles her nose and then laughs. “True. But you don't have to walk me home. I'm fine.”

“I don't mind. Really.”

“It's, like, a thirty minute walk.”

“Fortunately, I’m kind of good when it comes to stamina.”

Chaeyoung narrows her eyes and folds her arms across her chest. Ice cream, he thinks instantly, and begins to smile without meaning to.

“Why did you apologise?”

“What do you mean?” He shrugs. “It's the right thing to do.”

“Sure, but why today?” 

His heart starts to race - or skip, and he simply shrugs. “Seemed like as good a day as any.”

Chaeyoung doesn’t change her stance. “Are you sure?” 

The way she asks it, she seems to have caught onto something. It’s too knowing and Hoseok feels his smile getting wider.

“You’re a pain in my ass, caterpillar.”

That makes her laugh - an open, confident laugh and Hoseok’s heart soars.

“Have been, since two thousand four,” she agrees. “Except, obviously, you apologised for all that.”

“You’re going to be a handful.” The words are out of his mouth before he can control them but he finds he doesn’t mind. Chaeyoung’s smile fades slightly and she bites her lip, the sun starting to set behind her.

“You can walk me home,” she says after a moment, turning around but not moving. Hoseok hesitates for the briefest of moments but joins her as she starts walking, their fingers only inches apart.

—

Yoongi drives in silence, while Namjoon, Jungkook and Taehyung sing along to an old song from a TV show. For members of a world famous band, they all sound terrible - but he supposes that is a talent in itself. In the shotgun seat, Jungkook bounces to the song in the passenger seat while Taehyung adds his own ad-libs throughout, but Yoongi has no energy to tell them to stop.

They near the building and he drives into the basement parking, somewhat dreading going up to his studio. He parks and everybody climbs out; Jungkook mumbles something about the gym while Taehyung makes a phone call and they drift away. Namjoon hangs back, waiting for the younger members to leave their earshot before turning to Yoongi.

“Are you alright, hyung?”

“Bitchin’.” He catches Namjoon’s eye and sighs. “Yeah, I’m fine. Had a rough night, that’s all.”

“Because of the rain?”

That, too. “Yeah. The good news is, I get to go edit debut tracks for a rookie group for the next eight hours.” He clicks his tongue.

Namjoon nods. “You want some company?”

“Maybe later. Once you sober up,” he adds, cracking a smile. Namjoon chuckles good-naturedly before clearing his throat. 

“I, uh, didn’t want to say anything in front of the others, but… I found this in the back seat.” He fishes something out of his pocket and hands it to Yoongi. Yoongi opens his hand automatically, his stomach turning weakly when a small, bright green earring falls into his palm.

The hook of the earring digs into his palm when he enters the top floor of the building. Yoongi takes a seat at an empty table in the open floor pantry and pulls out his phone, scrolling through his emails. The floor is busier than usual; some team seems to be celebrating a colleague’s birthday at another table, a cake with white icing and a couple of slices messily cut out sitting in the centre of the circle; one producer sits alone at a table with noise cancelling headphones on and typing aggressively on his laptop. 

Yoongi looks around absently when his eyes land on the coffee station where - something pounds into his chest - he locks eyes with Miso. She holds his gaze for a couple of seconds before turning her back on him and dealing with her coffee. 

The earring feels heavy in his hand and all of a sudden, he feels the urge to hurl it out of the window. There is next to no way it’s making it back to its owner in any case. After Miso had icily got into her car outside the motel this morning and Seungwan had driven her away, Yoongi had walked out of the room and watched her leave, proceeding to smoke two full cigarettes in the chilly morning.

The receptionist from last night had also appeared and he’d offered her a cigarette voluntarily, for she looked rather drained as well. Something about how quiet and isolated the place was, not a sound anywhere or even a breath except for the person next to him, made Yoongi feel so disconnected from everything that he felt numb. It was too early, too cold and too unfair. Next to him, the receptionist had chucked her half-smoked cigarette on the ground.

“You didn’t finish that,” stated Yoongi, not really caring.

She’d glanced at him before turning to look ahead, and Yoongi noticed for the first time the carnage from the storm in front of the motel: tree trucks, piles of scattered branches and leaves, water accumulated and overflowing from a ridge in the ground. 

“Fuck it,” she’d said.

Maybe it was the aftermath of a terrible night or some sort of shared dissatisfaction with the world but fifteen minutes later, they were in the backseat of Yoongi’s car. It was quick, casual and ended almost as abruptly as it began, with both of them adjusting their clothes and going their separate ways with a brief, formal goodbye. 

It seems like ages ago now, with Miso across the room from him, getting coffee outside her studio. Yoongi lowers his head and stares at his phone screen, not reading anything. From the corner of his eye, he sees her turn around and walk in his direction; she would have to pass him to return to her studio.

He can’t think about their argument last night any longer. It’s been rattling around in his mind all day: the rage, the guilt, the desperate desire to sit her down in front of him and read her damn mind. Most of all, there’s an inkling of shame somewhere, deep down, in knowing that his reaction last night had been exactly what she’d expected. 

That’s what it had looked like, at least; her eyes had shuttered over at some point and she’d reverted to the old Miso, the one who seemed to live to annoy him and gave nothing, no indication of who she was or what she was thinking. Her walls that he’d worked so hard to make a crack in had gone up instantly, except this time there was a disappointment there he’d never encountered before.

A flash in front of him jerks him away from the table: a hand appears momentarily, placing a cup of iced coffee in front of him with a small thud, before disappearing. Heart racing in mild shock, he turns to see Miso walking away without a second glance, her fingers wrapped around another cup as she turns the corner of the corridor.

He stares at the cup. Sip it first, he’d say ordinarily, straight-faced with only a hint of irony. You’re just going to have to trust me, Min Suga, she’d say, shrugging and settling into her chair, giving him a challenging raise of the eyebrows.

Yoongi takes a sip of the cold liquid, feeling it coat his throat and savouring the hit of caffeine. After a moment, he gets up and heads down the corridor, stopping at Donghyuk’s studio and pausing before he knocks. 

“Come in,” comes Miso’s voice, dry and uninterested.

Yoongi pushes open the door slowly to see her alone at the console, a laptop open in front of her and a singular lamp at the other end of the room being the only source of light. She looks at him very briefly before going back to her work. It almost seems as though she expected him to follow her; he can’t tell if she’s happy about it, though.

“Thanks for the coffee,” he says.

She simply nods in response, scrolling through something on the laptop.

“Listen,” he says again, placing the coffee on a table next to him and running a hand tiredly through his hair. “I need to tell you something.”

“Okay.”

“Last night…” He trails off for a moment, wishing he’d rehearsed this a bit before coming in here. “Well, firstly, I’m sorry about last night. I shouldn’t have… anyway. Sorry.”

Miso finally turns to him, looks him up and down, and then turns back around. “‘Kay. Is that it?”

“No.” He exhales. “I hooked up with someone this morning. After you left, the receptionist and I… we had sex.” He cringes inwardly at his own words but he can’t fathom how else to say it without mincing words. She’s still looking at her laptop; he isn’t sure if he’s imagining it, but her shoulders  stiffen slightly. “Anyway. I just wanted to let you know.”

There’s a beat of silence. Then -

“So?”

“So?”

“Why are you telling me?” she asks, shrugging and turning around briefly. “I’m not your girlfriend.”

“I know you’re not. But…” He frowns, trying to suppress the annoyance in his stomach that’s already threatening to bubble up. “I’m just letting you know. Transparency and all that.”

“But it’s none of my business.”

Yoongi closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, counts to three and slowly exhales. “Right. Well. It’s just something normal people do, I guess. Talk to each other and communicate when they’re…”

She turns around properly this time, her legs folded and her elbows resting on her thighs. “When they’re…” She raises her eyebrows. “When they’re hooking up? We made out a few times… are you telling me because of that?”

He doesn’t respond; he can barely look at her right now, anger and embarrassment creeping into his chest now.

“This is exactly what I was afraid of, Yoongi,” she says knowingly, as though she’s pointing out an unsatisfactory edit to a track. “I told you to stay away. But you didn’t listen. You stayed, you got attached, and you’re telling me about a one-night stand you had. And now you have some kind of… expectation of me when what you really should have done was stay away right from the start.”

“You know what? I’m starting to think the same thing,” he snaps, shaking his head and going to grab his coffee. “I guess forming an attachment with an ice queen is my lesson.”

“You got me attached, too.” It’s the only thing that makes him stop in his tracks. “And that’s the problem with getting attached - you start to care. And then when you find out something that you can’t help, something that’s out of your control and doesn’t fit the image of me you have in your mind - the damsel that needs saving because, admit it, that’s what I am to you right now - it shatters everything.”

Yoongi grits his teeth, but somewhere his throat starts to hurt. He grips the cup and turns around slowly to see her still sitting in the same position, face and voice unnaturally calm.

He needs to choose his words carefully, he knows, but she makes it impossible to think. “I do care,” he begins slowly in a low voice, staring at the floor. “You can make it out to be whatever saviour complex you want but I do care and I do want to help you and be there for you. What is wrong with you that you won’t let me?” he demands tightly, clenching his fist at his side.

“Because it won’t work,” she continues in that same state of forced calm. “This - this challenge? You can spend weeks and months and do all-nighters and collaborate with whoever you want but it’s not going to work. It’s beyond you now. And once you realise that, it’s just going to be an abandoned project. A file somewhere in your computer you just couldn’t crack. I don’t need to be saved,” she says after a moment. “So it’s better for you that you stop trying. And maybe you won’t be so disappointed anymore.”

Yoongi stares at her, her impassive eyes and slouched figure. It’s exhausting; he’s tired and drained and helpless and she simply moves farther and farther away each time.

“You got it, Kang Chanel,” he mutters. “I’ll stay away.” Not wanting to spend a second longer in here, he turns around and walks out of the studio.

Miso watches him leave, using every bit of strength in her to keep her mind blank, to push every single thought and emotion out and, for just a few hours, focus on something that isn’t her clusterfuck of a life. She spends the next few hours alone in the studio, eating take-out from a box and going on a Zoom meeting with Donghyuk.

When it’s nearly midnight, hours longer than she’d thought she’d stay (but wishing she could for longer), she begins to wrap up, saving and closing demo files and packing up her notebook, when her inbox pings.

“Damn it, Donghyuk,” she sighs, bending over to squint at the screen in the dark. Her heart skips a beat when she sees an instant message from Min, Yoongi. Index finger hovering over the mouse, she takes a deep breath and opens it. It’s a screenshot of what looks like a folder on a Mac laptop, but empty. She frowns when her laptop pings again.

[Prod Suga] [00:02] [screenshot] This is all the abandoned projects I’ve had in ten years. Happy to stay away, but don’t you dare call yourself a project ever again.

—

Thanks for reading. Don't forget to leave a review :)

[fastboatsmojito]

Nightmares - Scott Miller

| a/n; this isn’t technically for Moontober bc nightmares is day twenty seven and I have something different planned, but I woke up about an hour ago from a nightmare myself and this felt like the appropriate response tbh

| cw; just some angst and a little fluff, talk about nightmares, probably very self-indulgent idk what to tell you, one bed trope whoops, not super proofread as per the tags <3

| wc; 800

☾⋆⁺₊⋆

You woke up suddenly, out of breath and sweaty, sitting up and trying to will yourself into thinking about anything else.

“Jesus, you alright?” There was an unfamiliar softness in his voice, probably just from being woken up by your panicked breaths, though you jumped anyway, shaky as you looked over at him, uncharacteristic worry on his face as he sat up.

“Shit sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you up. Just a bad dream.” You mumbled, words caught in the back of your throat proving difficult to come out, both exhausted from a restless sleep and energized from the pure panic and anxiety. That was always the worst part, being too scared of your own subconscious to go back to bed, involuntarily keeping yourself awake to stop yourself from drifting back into the personal hell you’d found yourself in before.

“Do you.. want to talk about it?” His voice still came out low, though the gruff from not having talked on purpose quite yet was peeking through. He wasn’t too sure how to comfort anyone at all - questioning himself more than you, you weren’t so used to it either; his words rather than his voice alone surprising you this time.

You shook your head, less responding to his question - though it sufficed, more trying to shake out the mental picture and get your brain to function correctly because it wasn’t difficult to understand nightmares but understanding why they happen didn’t seem to help much.

You had a sleep journal, you corrected them as best you could in your head after writing them down, you drank stress relieving tea and read articles and books on dream study and what it all means and it helps but it doesn’t fix the deepest, strangest anxieties that build up over time. The bizarre collection of everything you’ve thought about in the last month coming back to haunt you in a way that feels personal because it is.

Your brain knows the absolute worst combination of everything you’ve thought about or seen or heard, and if you eat too much fucking dairy or think about one specific thing for just the right amount of too much time, none of the rest of it matters anymore. And maybe you weren’t doing enough but maybe you just needed someone to tell you that it wasn’t real because hearing it from yourself so often was getting a little old and -

The tears were sudden - they usually are, soft and warm running down your face and you didn’t notice until a tear dropped down onto the hand still clutching your chest.

And then a warm hand was cautiously rubbing your back and your overly-worried coworker was trying to understand. Surprising himself again when a simply reassuring ‘you’re alright’ found its way out of his mouth, yawning quietly after and probably trying not to roll back over and fall asleep - bless him.

If it were just a few days ago you would’ve been shocked at the mere fact you were even in the same bed - a little mixup caused by none other than Javi, but sharing a room was excuse enough to get a little too comfortable for ‘professionalism’.

You gave up on the whole ‘oh I’ll just sleep on this tiny, uncomfortable chair for a few days until it’s sorted’ act days ago, diluting your dignity and climbing into bed with your similarly less than enthusiastic coworker who gave up on that shtick after the first night.

He wanted to go back to sleep - he really did, his eyes were practically closing themselves. But he surely couldn’t sleep next to someone actively crying and though he could be mean and - more accurately; a dick, he wasn’t completely emotionless. In fact he found himself scared that you were hurt or something was wrong and he had no way of fixing it when he woke up to your rushed breaths next to him. He still wasn’t sure he could really do anything, he didn’t tend to have dreams very much at all let alone bad ones.

There was no protocol to go over in his head about comforting a coworker-turned-roommate after a nightmare. He couldn’t exactly control your brain for you, though after a second thought he would if it’d help more than the apprehensive hand on your back.

Once you’d calmed yourself down enough and wiped the slowest string of tears from your cheeks you turned to look at Scott with something akin to a smile in the darkness.

Hoping that it made up for the lack of spoken gratitude that was clouded up in the panic in your head for the quiet comfort he wasn’t really looking to be thanked for anyway.

☾⋆⁺₊⋆

[crystalflygeo]

Intoxicating desire ft Baizhu + gn!reader

cw/tags: This one is more sensual/suggestive than straight up smut tbh. Reader has some experience while Baizhu doesn't and is guided along. Biting kink (reader giving) making out, slight dry humping I guess?? dirty talk if you squint?? idk what to tag

notes: Feeling a little odd/unsure about this one but a little someone inspired me to just post it ehhhh hope someone likes it. Guess it also counts as a lil revenge againts that someone hmmmm. Also yes I like to bite I want to bite him xdcgbhjnmkas. He'll be fine..... probably

“Just tell me if it’s too much” You smiled, warm yet mischievous.

Baizhu is panting already.

The two of you have barely done anything in all honestly, but just the fact of being here, now, with you. Doing this. It was enough to make all his thoughts scatter out of control.

You back a little but still nuzzle at his neck “Are you ok? Your breathing is harsh.”

Your voice is low, velvet, he can feel your breath ghosting at his skin and it makes him shiver. “…Y…Yeah” He manages.

“Should we stop?” There is concern in your tone and you scoot back a little from the spot sitting at the bed, avoiding contact as to not overwhelm him.

Instead, Baizhu pulls you closer eager for the grounding feeling he gets from you, slotting your hips together.

“No… it’s fine.”

Your cheeks warm up as you stare at his sharp golden eyes. One of his hands cups your face and your own arms surround his neck, though you take note of the fast pace of his heart “Are you sure? There’s no need to force it.”

Baizhu just nods, then pulls you in for a kiss. He really doesn’t feel up to talking. Right now, he wants to feel you as close as you can get.

You smile into the kiss and your hands start roaming, fumbling a little with his top. It’s intoxicating… these feelings.

You just want more.

Baizhu inhales sharply and his skin prickles with goosebumps as you slip your hands under his clothes, you lean in once more to kiss at his neck again.

“Ah… darling, what are you…?”

You bite down and Baizhu gasps.

You lap and suck at his neck softly, almost ticklish, threading your hands through his beautiful long green locks, and he shifts awkwardly. It feels so good. Once you’re done with that spot you move to another place down to his shoulder.

“Hng-” He’s desperately trying to stifle any sound wanting to escape from his mouth. Though that doesn’t stop the whimpers caught in his throat, reacting to his quickly heating cheeks.

“Holding back isn’t going to do you any good.” You suddenly mention, and he can almost picture your sly grin. “The whole point is for you to test out all these sensations.”

Baizhu’s glad you’re focused on his neck, he was sure he’d die if you saw his red face.

Both of your hands are at his bare torso now, they’re warm and incredibly soft making him shiver, until you lightly run your nails across his skin. A moan spills out of his mouth, low and needy, and he’s overwhelmingly embarrassed.

What kind of person gets so shamelessly turned on from just a touch like that? He feels stupid. Stupidly exposed. Stupidly turned on.

“Does it feel good?”

Don’t ask something like that!

He doesn’t answer and instead rests his forehead on your shoulder, panting softly. In response you bite again, lower on his collarbone and your right hand brushes down on his pants daringly. He gasps sharply in surprise, a burning heat settling in his stomach.

“Bai come on, tell me.” You mumble with a pout.

Oh, you’re not playing nice.

He nods, head buzzing with pleasure. “Nnng-... Hmmm” He can barely think straight. He just feels. Feels your hands teasing, your hair tickling his skin, your weight pressing on his body, your breath, your lips, his heart rattling, and he feels hot, so hot.

Suddenly his back presses against something soft yet firm: the bed covers. And he realizes he’s now lying on his back while you straddle his hips. Your mouth is hot and you whispers tiny things -he doesn't even know what anymore- while your lips work on his skin.

Baizhu's hands find their way onto your hips and they rest there while you kiss him. Right then you decide to bite yet again (you’re certainly keen on marking him aren’t you?) and his fingers dig on your sides.

You shiver in response and murmur in his ear, and he tries his best not to flinch. His skin is sensitive, his groin is sensitive and he doesn't think he can handle all this contact without exploding.

And then.

Then you grind your hips slowly and his breath catches.

He groans, deep and throaty, and involuntarily bucks into you, cock twitching in his pants.

"Sweet Archons" You hiss out. Clothes and all, you can feel him, and you want him so badly.

There is a pause, a moment of silence as both of you seem to catch your breaths and process what is happening. You look at the man lying under you, he's a totally new sight, so much different from the usual calm and collected Doctor of Liyue you know and love. Instead, his face is flushed, a sheen of sweat already forming, his eyebrows twitch slightly, golden viperine eyes staring right back at you and you can feel the lingering passion, excitement, lust.

For a moment you simply stare, as if analyzing him, peering deep into his being and committing this moment to memory, and it only makes him blush harder, his face getting way too hot. He finally averts his gaze in an attempt to calm down.

At that you blink back to reality, quickly pulling back and away from him -although reluctantly- giving him some space and rubbing at your arm awkwardly, biting your lip in apprehension. Did you just- That was- What was that? Did you go too far? Too fast?

“Um… w-woah” You babble. “Ah s-sorry! I promise I’ll take it slow...” ‘And control myself’ you add in your head, shoulders raising in embarrassment as you curled up and hide your face.

You shake your head, pushing that aside and turning to him.

“Baizhu...?”

The green-haired man lays still dazed and flustered, arm draped over his clearly red-hot face, still catching his breath, he gives a light cough an clears his throat “Hmmm you’re going to be the death of me, my dear...”

At that, of course, you promptly face-plant on a pillow.

[luvistqrzzz]

TRIVIA : LOVE — enhypen hyung line oneshot series

Finding love is not easy they say but what happens when you fall for someone at the most unexpected time in an unexpected way? — whisper a small oops and continue to fall further into the loophole of love.

aka the chronicles of a hopeless romantic soul

PAIRING && GENRE — hyung line x f!reader, can be read as stand alone oneshots, crack, ansgt, fluff, happy ending, more tba in individual fics

TAGLIST — open send an ask or comment to be added (you will be tagged for all the 4 fics) — @flwrshee @aosbie @rsmura @enhastolemyheart @yannew @sophiko22 @www-jungwon @nwjws @in-somnias-world @zzinyl @mrchweeee @ghostiiess @ilovecheese09

PERMANENT TAGLIST — @rikizm @str0l0gy @yenqa @heetoldme @crxzs @s00buwu @nhularin @bunreis @hysgf @mochamvgz @myonos — will be added in all parts

STATUS — to be released !!

AN — TYSM FLO @dollikis FOR THE MAIN BANNER ISTG SHE'S SUCH A GENIUS 🫶🏼🥹 I CANNOT GET ENOUGH OF IT ILYSM FLO my banners for the rest of the fic look like shit 😻🤞🏼 i feel the general summary is so cringe ( if someone comes up w a better one then pls help 😭) ALSO the fics in the series are based on rom com books tbh ive been planning and editing the masterlist for the past two weeks ahaha so idk how to feel about it... technically im still on my writing hiatus but ill try to start working on the fics after exams,,, hope yall look forward to it hehe ^_^ !!

"It was like I was trying to memorize him — in case this was the last time I would ever see him." — (failed) STEPS TO NOT MISS YOUR EX

There were a lot of ways your sister's wedding could have gone wrong but none of them included you crossing paths with your ex who happened to be the assistant wedding planner.  Alternatively, where you were apparently "over" Lee Heeseung but an (almost) disastrous wedding made you think otherwise.

a luvistqrzzz rendition of save the date by morgan matson — [ read here ]

“Here's the thing about writing Happily Ever Afters: it helps if you believe in them.” — LETTERS TO YOU, ME AND THE BEACH

When a crippling writer’s block and an almost broke bank account forces you to move to an old family home, you didn’t expect to cross paths with your arch nemesis from high school, the ever obnoxious, Park Jay. But maybe the series of events that unfold during the summer could help you with a romantic book or two.

a luvistqrzzz rendition of beach read by emily henry — [ read here ]

“Note to self: Do not under any circumstances fall in love again.” — A 1000 WAYS BACK TO YOU

When Jake realizes he doesn't want to be (only) friends with you anymore, you are already moving halfway around the world and he's left alone on the other side of the line. Will it take two oblivious idiots 10 years and more than a hundred missed chances to see the feelings they've been hiding for long?

a luvistqrzzz rendition of where rainbows end by cecelia ahern — [ read here ]

"Well sure, who doesn't need a boyfriend? But realistically, those exotic creatures are hard to come by. At least a quality one.” — A STRANGER'S GUIDE TO LOVE AND CHRISTMAS

For Sunghoon, Christmas is like any other day, only a hundred times more crowded. But then he stumbles across a notebook at the local bookstore. A notebook full of... dares. As he and the anonymous author spend the entire Christmas eve swapping stories and dreams around the city of Seoul, where will it lead Sunghoon to?

a luvistqrzzz rendition of dash and lily's book of dares by rachel cohn and david levithan — [ read here ]

works belongs to @luvistqrzzz do not copy repost or translate my work

reblogs and feedback are heavily appreciated

networks- @hyfenet @enhanet @en-web @k-films