#not just a single strand. an entire damn clump

[i-eat-deodorant]

it's shedding season

[pahrak-the-sinnoh-slizer]

Sunflower and Waterlily

The entire sky was pouring down, and still, she couldn’t get a single damn second of silence.  Cars honked their horns, pedestrians shouted, and in the middle of it all, Savitri stood on the curb under a never-ending sheet of rain.  Her long black hair pressed against her face in a wild lattice of clumped strands, making it difficult to see much of anything.  She couldn’t care less even if she had the energy to actually try.

“Hey, what are you doing?!”

Ordinarily, the question would’ve just faded into the background noise around Savitri, with the assumption it was meant for someone else if she gave it a thought at all.  On this particular occasion, she was shocked into focus by the rain’s dance upon her head abruptly ending.

Savitri turned slowly.  A bright pink umbrella was responsible for shielding her from the weather, held by an out-of-breath woman with short, curly red hair.  After taking a few more gasps, the stranger said, “You’ll get seriously sick if you stand out in the rain like that!  Ah, you’re already shivering…”

That was news to Savitri.  She blinked her dull gray eyes, still unsure what was even happening let alone how to react to it.

“Here—come with me.”

She took her by the arm and led her into a nearby restaurant before Savitri processed a single step.  All of the sudden she was sitting in a booth, the other woman’s coat wrapped around her shoulders and a piping hot coffee in her hands.

“What were you doing out there?  Are you in some kind of trouble?  Do you need a ride?”

A long silence passed.  The stranger let out a breath, relaxed her shoulders, and sat back.

“…Sorry.  I’m probably overwhelming you, aren’t I?  I swear I’m not trying to be pushy, I just saw you out there and…well, anyway.  My name is Kelda!  What’s yours?”

Savitri just stared.

“…Um…that’s okay, if you don’t want to tell me.  Is your coffee good?  Can I get you anything?”

Her thoughts finally catching up to her, Savitri set aside her remaining reluctance and raised both hands, signing, “This isn’t going to work.”

Kelda inclined her head sharply.  “Oh…oh!  You’re mute?”

Savitri nodded.

“Ohhh, I see!  I, um, uh…sorry, but I don’t actually know sign language…”

Internally, Savitri reflected on how unsurprised she was to hear that.

“…Ah!  I know!”  Kelda fished her mobile phone out of her purse and smiled at Savitri.  “How about texting?”

Savitri cocked her head.  At this point, she realized, she had developed a morbid curiosity to see just how long this stranger would keep going, so she took out her own phone and exchanged numbers.

>Savitri: Are you always so quick to kidnap people?

She watched Kelda shrink back behind her phone.  “Mmm…”

>Kelda: So sorry! >_<  I panicked and got carried away!  I just wanted to help, honest! :D

Savitri raised an eyebrow.

>Savitri: You know *you* don’t have to text, right?

“Oh, right!”  Kelda giggled.  “Habit I guess!”

>Savitri: Why does your text look like that??

“What?  It’s cute!”

>Savitri: If you say so…

“Hmph…well, anyway.  What were you doing standing out in weather like this, Savitri?”

Savitri glanced out the window as she thought about her response.

>Savitri: I was hoping the rain would drown it all out

“Huh?  Drown what out?”

>Savitri: All of it.  It’s all just so loud and chaotic and irritating.  I was chasing relief, not that I found any.

Kelda opened her mouth but stopped before any words came out.  She took quick looks at Savitri, her phone, the window, and the empty booths surrounding them, and eventually typed something.

>Kelda: I’m sorry I interrupted you. “-_-  Is it any quieter in here at least? ^_^

Another long silence.

>Savitri: Yeah.  I guess it is.

Kelda grinned and slumped back into her seat.  To Savitri’s surprise, she started smiling too.

***

Savitri and Kelda stood on the curb as a never-ending sheet of rain poured onto their shared umbrella.  Cars honked their horns and pedestrians shouted, but Savitri found that the closer she pulled Kelda, the farther away all the noise seemed.

With a glance over her shoulder, Kelda signed, “Look!  It’s where we had our first date!”  She added meaningless little flourishes and elegantly wove each sign into the next; Savitri watched each move closely, enamored with the “voice” she had developed.

“Oh,” she signed back, “you mean the kidnapping?”

Kelda pouted.  “I did not kidnap you!  Honestly—”

Savitri cut her off by gently weaving her fingers into the hand she was signing with.  With her free hand, she signed, “I’m glad you did.”

She tried to hold her sour expression, but Kelda had her smile back in seconds.  She kissed Savitri’s hand, then Savitri kissed her cheek, and finally their lips met.  Strength momentarily failed Kelda: the umbrella slipped from her hand, and she and Savitri laughed together under the relentless rain.

[river-bottom-nightmare]

i want dick grayson to be annoyingly perfect in the smallest of unimportant ways. and i want it to irritate the living hell out of everyone around him

every now and then, jason and dick will go to different chili dog carts around the city, and dick will sit and nod in agreement as jason nitpicks the food, occasionally offering his own two cents. the conversations are tense and if the topic strays from anything except food jason books it, but it’s progress, and dick’s grateful. but he doesn’t understand why jason always growls at him when he’s preparing his chili dogs, chalking it up to jason’s obsessiveness about that food in particular. dick figures he’s probably doing it wrong. until one day, jason bites out a rough question, asks him how he did that. dick’s confused, until jason points out, “you tear open the top of the ketchup packet in a perfect line every time. and you get all of the ketchup out of the packet in one smooth squeeze, and you never get any on your fingers, and i don’t understand how.”

roy was, arguably, a better archer than ollie. green arrow had been birthed from the island, from the trauma of survival. roy, however, had been practicing since he was a kid, and now that he was well into his twenties, he could safely say he was one of the best shots in the world. he could beat all his friends at darts, shoot an apple off wally’s head, and was generally pretty awesome. or, he would be awesome, if only dick fucking grayson would stop making every single shot of anything he threw in a trash can. no matter what he was throwing away, no matter the angle, no matter the wind or rain, as long as the trashcan was in eyesight, anything dick tossed would inevitably end up inside the garbage. sometimes, dick barely even glanced at the damn thing, just took note of it a threw the trash, expecting it to land in the proper place. and it always did. the worst part was, dick didn’t even seem to notice it. he wasn’t actively trying to make every shot. when asked, dick just shrugged and said “we had some pretty good knife throwers in the circus.”

tim’s memories starting out as robin were a whirlwind, a push-pull of bruce’s mistrust, then bruce’s acceptance, of dick’s fear and hesitation, then of dick’s love. he still remembered dick making the two of them hot chocolate in the kitchen after a day of training, tim’s muscles sore and entire body aching but the feeling of pride, because he was good enough to be robin, he knew he was. he hadn’t expected that to happen anytime soon again, given the way their relationship had fractured after tim had left dick’s batman, a terrified fury in his eyes. yet, he’d been proven wrong when, after a particularly rough arkham breakout, alfred asked both dick and tim to stay instead of returning to their own apartments. just because the manor brought back a feeling of warm nostalgia, however, doesn’t mean it kept the nightmares away. he came down to the kitchen and saw dick already up, moving around the stovetop. with a knowing look in his eyes, dick grabbed another mug to make tim some hot chocolate. tim was washed over with a feeling of relief, of acceptance. dick slid the mug towards him and tim took a sip, letting the rich chocolate warm him up from the inside. it was delicious. his little sigh of pleasure must have been audible, but then he remembered something he noticed. “dick. did you use alfred’s recipe for this?” and dick laughed, responded with, “nah. too much work. i just sort of tried to remember what was in hot chocolate, and eyeballed most of the ingredients. i’m glad it turned out good though. no clumps too, that’s good.”

donna didn’t care how old she got, playing in the park with dick never got old. as one of her oldest friends, the two of them could just walk around the park, in companionable silence, just letting themselves relax and enjoy the moment. so, of course, dick would break the silence and ask if she had any earbuds, because it was getting to quiet for him. donna laughed, and reached inside her pocket, fingered past the keys, and grabbed the headphones. the tangled little ball that came out made her sigh, and she pulled on an earbud to loosen it, only managing to make one of the many knots tighter. then, dick took the headphones out of her hands with a here, i got it, and with a few quick tugs, the tangled monstrosity unraveled easy as breathing. then, completely unaffected, he handed her an earbud, putting the other in his own ear. “i’m the one who’s got a lasso,” she said, ignoring dick’s snort and quip about how earbuds and a lasso are two completely different things, donna.

cass hadn’t expected to enjoy such a gentle, graceful form of athletics, but after a few lessons, it had become apparent that ballet could be far from gentle. it pushed her, made her practice and strengthen herself, and she’d fallen in love with the art quickly. however, the most frustrating part of the entire thing had little to do with actually dancing. the school bruce had helped pick out was prestigious, which meant a strict dress code, which meant her hair had to be in a bun. unfortunately, her hair never seemed to want to cooperate. after her latest attempt, falling into a mess of hair at her nape that had so many locks falling out, cass contemplated how mad the teacher would be if she showed up in a ponytail. at that moment, dick peeked into her room, having heard her frustrated noise, and asked if he could do anything to help. cass pointed to the mess of hair, not even remotely contained by the hair tie, and blew a strand out of her face. dick smiled with understanding, then came into her room, grabbing the comb on her bed and standing behind her in front of the mirror. he smoothed her hair with the comb, then pulled it this way and that, twisting and turning and wrapping until, two minutes later, a picture perfect bun sat atop her head. cass blinked with surprise. “first try,” she said, staring up at him, but he just shrugged and said, “it’s not that hard. you want me to drop you off?”

bruce could admit that he rather enjoyed undercover missions. it was an extended game with high stakes, a test of his own acting skills. with makeup changing his face, an expertly made wig, and a demeanor completely different from both brucie wayne and from batman, he swept through the crowd of greasy men, looking for a specific contact. then, he caught sight of someone specific indeed, though they weren’t his contact. eyebrows raised in a what are you doing here? gesture, he slid onto a barstool. from behind the bar, dick offered him a blinding smile, cleaning a glass. he tapped his wrist twice, a clear message. undercover, same as you. then, dick grabbed a couple bottles from underneath a shelf, flipping them in his hand and pouring with grandeur. bruce noticed he hadn’t put any alcohol in his little mixture, only making it seem as if he had. the flashy moves were entertaining, bruce could give him that. dick slid him the drink and bruce took a sip, eyebrows raising in brief surprise. “this is good. bartending?” dick put the bottles and the lemon away, unimpressed. “it’s not like it’s hard. just mixing a couple ingredients. no biggie.” bruce was fairly certain bartending was more difficult than that, but just then, his target came into view. 

steph understood some of the bats’ frustration with dick, she really could. he hadn’t exactly been a welcome and opening batman, that’s for sure. regardless, as the few masks left in gotham had to work together, and she’d gotten to know the man pretty well. and she enjoyed his company as nightwing much more than batman. she dropped onto his balcony in his bludhaven apartment, announcing her presence in that loud-subtle way. dick was nestled in a couple blankets on the couch, going over a couple files, apparently just back from patrol if the small bandage on his neck and bags under his eyes were any indication. nevertheless, he brightened when he saw her and she nodded when he asked if she wanted to spend the night. he moved some of the papers to make room for her on the couch, but she flitted into his bathroom, going through the nail polish bottles she knew he had, and grabbing a shade of red that caught her eye. she tossed him the bottle and put her fingers in his lap, talking aimlessly about a movie she watched with cass. dick seemed to relax amidst her jabbering, and he shook the bottle a couple times before opening it and focusing on her right hand. but as he started, steph paused her rambling and focused on him instead, holding her hands gently and brushing paint onto her nails. he managed to cover her entire nail in three easy strokes, smooth and glossy, not a hint of paint on her skin. the nail was practically perfect. oh god she was jealous. “got a lot of practice with this, grayson?” she asked, and laughed at dick’s mock-offended of course not!

damian wasn’t one for photography, and he could grudgingly admit drake was far better at that particular skill than he was. however, his art class had promised to cover all types of media, and had upheld that pledge. the next two weeks were dedicated to photography, and their final project for the unit had to be a small collection of photographs. animal photography, of course, was damian’s chosen subject, and the knowledge that animal photography was one of the hardest skills to master only had damian wanting to do it more. days later, however, he could admit that it was trickier than expected. how had he never noticed how active his animals were? they never sat still, and every single picture came out blurry. grayson, upon coming across him in the manor grounds, noticed his futile attempts and asked if he could help. damian acquiesced the camera to grayson, who looked through the lens, finding the right angle and background, adjusting the focus settings slightly. then, he let out a sharp whistle and snapped his fingers. in nothing short of a miracle, damian’s pets pasued to look at him, only for a second, and the shutter clicked furiously. damian flipped through the photos, a good many of them clear and wonderful. damian snapped in irritation when dick ruffled his hair and said, “now you try!” it definitely wasn’t as easy as grayson made it look.

babs didn’t really know what she was expecting when she broke up with dick. there was hurt on both ends, and distance for a while, and she had no idea how much she’d miss him. but after a couple months of working together, of remembering that underneath the romantic tangles, their friendship was strong, she’d gotten to the point of dick randomly dropping by her apartment again. the downside was, dick kept randomly dropping by her apartment again. he stole her snacks and messed up her filing system and was so irritating that barbara almost forgot how relieved she was at having one of her best friends back. fortunately, it did come with benefits, because when he was bored, he did some of her chores for her. pausing in the doorway, she smiled at the sight of dick folding her clothes and putting them away. the gesture was platonic now, but no less appreciated. she pushed her wheelchair forward, and in greeting, dick told her how much he wanted to steal all her patterned socks. babs reminded him they wouldn’t fit, and laughed at his pout. dick grabbed one sock off the top of the laundry basket, then dug his hand into the pile of clothes randomly, coming up with the second sock in an instant. folding them together, he repeated the process for each pair. “that...that was fast. you got all of them?” babs asked in confusion. “yes? why, did you expect some to be missing?” was dick’s reply as he shook the wrinkles out of a sweater.

wally was never surprised. he knew dick better than probably most people in the world. he’d gone from frustrated and jealous of dick’s random talents, to admiring and appreciative, to just accepting them as a fact of life. dick’s phone never cracked if he accidentally he dropped it. dick never buttoned up shirts wrong, aligning each button with the right hole perfectly on the first try. dick could plug in usb ports the right way. dick always remembered which light switch was for which room, no matter whose house they were at. dick could pop a cd out of its case without ever smudging the disk, holding it by the rim perfectly. and dick always seemed to know when wally needed a day off, to just visit their old haunts, grab some ice cream, and spend the day talking away on a rooftop. that was just something his best friend could do. and wally would never tell dick, but underneath his fake irritation at it, but he loved him for it.

tag list:  @comicsandhoney @birdy-bat-writes @elles-shitposts-personified @subtleappreciation @screennamealreadyused @pricetagofficial @catxsnow @astroherogirl @yesboopityboop @dangerduckjpeg

[writingsbychlo]

stone walls (01) | void!stiles

word count; 15,462

summary; stiles is a witch for king Derek, and pretty evil. he’s given a test subject in the forms of a traitor from the Argent kingdom who was found stealing on their land. he wasn’t supposed to fall in love with her.

notes; this is kind of a medieval/royalty au, and he’s not really a witch with magic, but in those times, his talents would have been considered witchcraft. 

warnings; reference to abuse, torture, blood, gore, violence, sickness, near-death experiences, abduction, arson, sacrifice, murder.

There had once been a brightness that had shone in Stiles’ eyes. The same whiskey-brown colour that his mother’s had been, the same fair skin, speckled with moles and soft brown hair that could never quite seem to be tamed. 

The burning of the Hale castle was heard of by every Kingdom known. The youngest prince had been betrothed to one of their princesses, and everything had seemed bright. Stiles remembered their home palace, it had been larger, and full of life. Soldiers had been buzzing around, and his favourite place had been the gardens, his mother had taken him to visit them on every journey they had taken before the wedding between Prince Derek and Princess Kate had been due to take place.  

Two weeks before the ceremony was upon them, Kate had arrived in horse and carriage, his mother and father, both being part of the royal escort to welcome her, had been present as she made her way through the halls of her new home. That night, the walls had been scorching hot as flames curled up into the night sky, the screaming sounds of terror echoing out of every window, door and passageway in the castle. 

Burns and scars still crawled along his father’s arms from where he had pulled a sleeping Stiles from his bed and raced through the halls to get him out. Stiles had tended to those injuries himself, with the limited medical knowledge he knew from what his mother had taught him, but the man had never been the same.

His mother hadn't been so lucky. The last memory he’d had of her was her lips pressing to his forehead as she tucked him into bed, promising she would teach him all about herbs and how to write with the curly signature he admired so much when he woke up in the morning. When the fires had finally stopped burning three days later, Kate had been gone, her belongings, her carriage, every trace that she had ever been there had vanished. It had rained for the entire day, thick plumes of smoke billowing up into the air and he had spent the day searching through the charred rubble until his fingers were burned and bleeding, his body covered in soot and ash as he coughed and screamed for his mother.

It was on that day that the hail kingdom had gone dark, a young Prince Derek crowned King at the tender age of seventeen as everything warm and bright within Stiles slipped away, as though it had gone up in flames with his mother and the Hale family who had protected them. That day, Stiles had grown dark, his young screams of revenge muffled as his father had held him close, but they had always stood true.

His studies no longer centred around healing and medicine, but instead around how to use his knowledge to his best possible advantage of harm. He wanted to know how to protect himself, not how to heal. He’d been defenceless and weak when he had lost his mother, and he wouldn’t let that happen again. The bright spark in his eyes had slipped away over the years, as he hid himself in the deepest darkest spots within the newly rebuilt castle he could find, perfecting his trade over the years, the darkness that had bloomed that day had grown, infecting every part of his soul until he’d truly earned his nicknames over the years, the Hale kingdom coming to know him as exactly what he was; Void.

Stiles grunted as deep footsteps echoed along the floor of the stone corridors outside of his chambers, a single brow arching as the heavy wood scraped against the stone tile as it was forced open by whoever had decided to bother him with their presence today. Placing down the small purple flowers he was in the process of wrapping in twine around the stems, he paused, waiting for the person to make their purpose known.

The angry face of his king met him, a snarl on his lips as he tossed forward the body in his grasp, the figure falling to the floor with a loud cry, a flurry of torn rags and messy hair meeting the floor, catching themselves on their hands and knees before rocking back to kneel, looking at their scraped and bleeding hands as they wiped them on the ripped dress hanging on their shoulders.

He glanced between the girl on the floor and the man who had delivered her, a bored look in his eyes, and he sighed as he gave in, rounding the collection of wooden desks he worked behind, his fingers flexing as he gripped his hands behind his back, coming to stand before his king. “Hmm, you brought me a gift?”

“I brought you a scrap of rags that I found in the woods, just on the border of the Argent kingdom. She was hiding up in the trees, I had to pull one of the hunting dogs off of her when she tried to run.” Stiles’ lips curled up at the story, a dark grin twisted on his features as he came to crouch before her, two of his spindly fingers hooking under her chin to direct her face up to his, and he scanned his eyes over her features, carefully. 

“And what exactly is it that you would like me to do with her, your majesty?” Derek snarled at him as he spat the words, and Stiles simply smirked up at him, cocking a brow as the girl tore her face from his grasp, a chuckle spilling from him at her bravery as he stood back to his full height. 

“I don’t care what you do, just make sure when she dies she sends a message to keep their spies off of my fucking land.” With that, the man was gone, a twist of fur and capes and the door was slamming shut as he left, leaving him in silence with the girl still sitting on the floor. Holding a hand out to her, she glanced wearily between his face and his hand, before slipping her own into it. The second he had a grip on her, he was yanking her roughly to her feet, a yelp leaving her as her arm jolted in its socket from the force of the pull, and she stumbled over her own feet as he dragged her across the room.

In the furthest corner, a grimy set of bars she hadn't quite noticed until now were slid open with a grating whine of rusted metal on metal, and shackles soon fastened tightly around one of her wrists, the cold metal soothing over her skin as she found the other being threaded through the bars of the wall.

Tugging at the restraints, her jaw fell open, and she stood idly in the small cell, looking around in the darkness. On unsteady feet, she raced back toward the barred door that was sliding closed, stopped only by the pull of the chain around her wrist as she approached them, and her captor stood over her carefully, grinning down at her as her hands came up, fingers curling around the metal as she watched him.

He expected her to put up a fight, to shake on the bars and scream for help, but instead, her eyes just watched him, scanning over his face, before flickering over the room, still as she took in the messy desktops he had, laden with books, plants, bowls and boxes. 

“The shackles aren’t necessary, you know. I’m not going to run. I don’t think I could get very far if I tried.” 

“Hm, and I would believe a word someone who was found travelling from the Argent Kingdom for what reason, exactly?” He growled, his own hands grasping the bars in anger and he shook them, the girl stumbling back in shock as she backed into the shadows, a wicked smile on his face as he watched fear take place in her body, his eyes narrowing on her barely visible form. “I lost everything because of your people. Everything!” His voice had risen from the usual eerie calmness it held to a loud roar, his chest heaving as he glared at the space she stood. “You have one purpose, and that is to serve as a walking blood bag that I can use to drain for experiments and sacrifices.”

With that, he spun on his heel, making his way back over his table, fingers dancing along the wood as he picked back up the purple flowers he had been working with, wrapping the thin strands of thread around the bases in clumps. The rattle of chain sounded in his ears, his jaw clenching at the sound and he flicked his eyes back over to the cage, watching as her messy head of hair came back into view, her eyes sweeping curiously over his work station, and he reached out, slamming closed the pages of the books he’d been reading from.

He’d been damned if she was getting any information on their Kingdom from him.

“They’ll dry faster if you press them first.”

His fingers stilled in their motions, the tight-binding around the gathered stems of his final bundle, his eyes flicking up to peer at the shadows, barely catching her movements within, but he could hear the rustle of the chains and fabric of her tattered clothes as she sunk to the ground, a deep sigh leaving her as she settled onto the stone. “Be quiet, or I’ll silence you myself, and you don’t want that.” Glancing between a set of heavy books and the plants in his hands, he shook his head, continuing on with the twine wrappings he had set off on.

It was quiet for a long time, and he had moved on from wrapping the purple flowers, having hung them in the window with rays of sun shining through in order for them to dry, having moved on to sitting in the comfortable seat across the room to read by the time you were speaking once again. He tuned you out, instead choosing to focus on tidying up the counter around him, his every nerve thrumming with the need to do something and he cleared his throat, working in his own mind as he popped the lids from the many glass jars lining the shelves, stuffing ground up herbs and dried flowers inside of each one, his nose scrunching up occasionally as they occasionally let out a smell he wasn’t as fond of, the scent hanging in the air and he could practically taste in in his mouth. 

Your commentary had continued on, and he was growing irritated by your constant slew of questions, your commentary to each action and your little laughs to yourself as you cracked jokes that only you were finding funny, and he rolled his eyes, biting at the inside of his cheek as a threatening growl rumbled in his chest. “I thought I told you to be quiet, or else?”

“There’s not much you can do to me that hasn’t already been done.” You sighed, his body stilling for a second as he looked over at you, a single brow raised, but your attention wasn’t on him, instead, you were peering around his room, looking at anything you could see, presumably planning the best way for you to get out. 

He was rather proud of his chambers, he took good care of them, and he’s carefully chosen where he would reside, in the furthest corners of the castle, the rooms being smaller but he enjoyed the distance he got from the others, not wanting to be easily found, and he smirked, knowing that there wasn’t a chance you would be able to find your way through the maze of corridors without knowing where to go. “I could cut out your fucking tongue.”

Your jaw snapped shut, your eyes finding his and widening as you looked at him, and he watched as you swallowed thickly, nodding as silence enveloped you both once again, and he scooped up a dish, taking your arm in his and pulling it harshly as your body slammed into the metal bars, wincing but staying quiet. Flicking up the blade of the knife he carried in his pocket, he placed the dish underneath your arm, pressing the blade firmly against your skin, dragging it across your arm as crimson red began to flow rapidly from the cut. 

Your fist clenched as the muscles of your forearm tightened, rivers of blood dripping from your arms and collecting in the small wooden container, but you never flinched, your eyes cast downwards as you bit at your tongue, arm shaking slightly once he released you, and his brows raised as you continued to allow the blood to drip from your arm, gathering in the jar. “Good girl. Now keep your fucking mouth shut while I work, and consider this a warning.”

You didn’t speak again after that, and he was once again plunged back into his own silence, only the thoughts in his mind to keep him company as he busied himself, your presence almost slipping from him entirely, until you shuffled or took a particularly deep breath, once again reminding him that you sat locked in the cage in the corner of his room, the remnants of the old prison-cell serving him perfectly for this occasion. 

That night, he had pushed a single thin blanket through the bars for you, no words spoken but your hand reached out to take it, dried blood still crusted tp your flesh, your skin inflamed in some patches where you had scratched it away in irritation, a simple ‘thank you’ being uttered, the gesture catching him off guard as his brows furrowed, merely humming in response as he moved around the room, blowing out all the candles until the room was in darkness.

He felt uncomfortable in his own bed that night, the sound of another person's breathing being something he was unfamiliar with, and his skin crawled as he felt crowded in. He’d made sure to move away to the furthest parts of the castle to be alone, and now he wasn’t, the thought sickening him as he rolled over, relaxing his tensed jaw as your own steady breathing lulled him into a more relaxed state, despite how much it made him feel unsettled. 

With a final glance at the dark cage in the corner, he shut his eyes, burying his face into his pillow and tuning out the sounds around him.

Stiles wasn’t used to having company while he worked, and you liked to make your presence known. He wasn’t sure whether or not you knew you did it, but you tended to hum under your breath. Different tunes each day, and depending on your mood, they would be louder and happier ones or slower and quieter, more sombre melodies. There were many factors that would affect how you felt; they ranged from the weather to the quality of your own sleep, to reflections of his own mood, and even whether he would drain you that day. 

He would be begrudging to admit that he somewhat enjoyed having the silence that normally surrounded him now filled with the subtle hums of tunes under your breath, and he had even caught you singing quietly to yourself a few times when he had returned, only for you to go quiet again, retreating back to the wordless forms of your songs when he closed the door, making his presence in the large bedroom known. 

You often went quiet after the times he would drain you, the thick silence would drip back into the room for hours on end, and those hours seemed to drag on for days as he awaited the time that you would pick back up your filling of the quiet. You were a puzzle, you were something of an enigma and he didn’t quite understand. 

You never tried to escape, he was dark and twisted and incredibly fucked up but he wasn’t used to having a prisoner and he wasn’t good at it. He left keys lying around and often got himself way too close to the cages, within reach where you could easily grab him and yet you never made a move. You had made yourself comfortable hidden in the shadows, your head resting on the wall as you snuggled against your mattress, a blanket he’d used to mop up dried blood when he was finished with you could now be found often sitting over your body and covering you, just enough to keep you warm. 

You never even flinched, any time the blade met your skin, you were still as a rock, arm held out to him and face twisted away as your blood dripped into a bowl for his uses in spells and testing the effects of new ingredients, and your features hadn't once flickered to even show an ounce of pain. He used the same place, a gash on your arm that would barely close before he would use it again. 

At some point, you had ventured out to press your cheek to the bar, watching as he worked, and it had unsettled him for a little while, until he paused long enough to observe you and realised that you weren’t making notes or observing him, searching for escape routes. Instead, you were just watching him work and taking an interest in his movements. 

It wasn’t long after that when you began to ask questions, and while at first he had been irritated by the motion, he found himself becoming oddly fond of it. You asked good questions, you asked him about his passions and you were a surprisingly quick learner, and he found it rather beneficial to himself when he talked aloud to you because it only helped him to confirm things to himself. He was finding himself less and less angry with your presence, finding it easier to have another person around him for every minute of the day, because the more you spoke the larger the range of topics had become. 

After simply asking him about what he was doing, you had moved on to asking him about his book collections and his flowers and herbs, to asking him about his passions for spellcasting and mixing, something between harm and health, and that had led him to ask you questions in return. You had told him your favourite books, and songs, and the way your mother had taught you how to knit and stitch when you were young, and that by the time you were eleven you could make your own gowns and dresses. You were deeper than he knew, and the more he found himself happier and more relaxed in your company was even more concerning for him, because he was tasked with killing you when the time came, you were a bargaining chip and a prisoner, and he wasn’t supposed to get close to you.

He wasn’t supposed to get close to anyone, because the last time he allowed himself to care, he lost it all. 

The weeks were ticking by, faster than he could possibly imagine, more diaries getting fuller and fuller as he scribbled his notes and spells down, the worn leather growing weaker and lighter, the pages changing from crisp and pure to torn and weathered, scratched with ink stainings and splotches, taped down herbs and doodles to compliment them. He had been on a high with you, the drainings becoming less and less frequent as he tried to give you longer times to heal, because what had once been an easy task had begun to morph into something that made him feel slightly sick to his stomach each time he entered the dark cage to reopen the wound on your arm. 

In the last couple of days, your questions had become less frequent, your humming quieter and raspy and your appearances at the cage door rarer by the hour. You were quiet, quieter than you had been in weeks, and he gave you space but was slightly frustrated. Not only at you for your sudden lack of interest but also in himself for being so bothered by it in the first place, because Stiles Stilinski didn’t get attached, he didn’t do feelings and emotions and he certainly didn’t have enough time to care about what others thought of him. Stiles Stilinski was void, and he liked it that way, and he was damned if any girl in a cage with pretty eyes and a sharp mind was going to change that. 

“Stiles?” He was labouring over his workbench when you first spoke today, and his teeth ground together in irritation as his foul mood overlapped upon hearing you calling out to him, your voice droning on repeat in a low whine in his ears as he slammed down the book in his hands, your voice cutting off as he turned to look at you. Your hands were wrapped around the bars of the cage, your body leaning against the cool metal as he looked at you, eyes narrowed and jaw clenched, his fists almost painful as his nails dug into his palms by his sides. 

“What do you fucking want?” He hissed, your jaw dropping as you peered at him from within the shadows, and he knew he wasn’t angry at you, he was just in a bad mood, but you were an easy target for taking his anger at the day out on, the memory of losing his mother on this day all those years ago was flashing through his mind, leaving a bitter taste in his mouth and a storm clouding his judgement.

“I don’t feel so good.”

“Boo fucking hoo. Get over it, I couldn’t care less that you’re feeling a little under the weather.” He scoffed, and you let out a low groan at his words, your head thumping against the bars as your head dropped against them and he rolled his eyes at your dramatics. 

“No, I really don-”

“Shut the fuck up! Just be quiet, okay? I'm busy!” His temper bubbled over, and he heard you huff quietly, the silence settling over the room in uncomfortable tension before the chains wrapped around your wrists rattled, and you were slipping back into the shadows to rest in the corner of the cell, and he breathed out a sigh of relief. 

Once he had calmed back down, he continued to shoot sly glances over to where he assumed you do be within the darkness, slight guilt clawing at his gut as you continued to sit in silence, but he rolled his eyes, knowing you would just be sulking in the corner because he had shouted at you. He worked quietly at his workspace, rearranging the jars on his shelf and relabelling those that had become worn and faded from all his use. 

He refilled each glass container, the quiet in the room reminded him of before you had been delivered to him, and an unusual sense of loneliness was creeping into him as the tense silence continued to drag on. It wasn’t until quiet rapping came on the door that he sighed out in relief as he paced across the room in large and rapid footsteps, smirking at the trembling servant standing outside of his door, a tray of food held out to him as he accepted it, dismissing her with a mumble in thanks, the door slamming shut behind her as he relocked the bolts. 

“Eat.” Placing the dish of broth down in front of the barred door, dropping a spoon to the floor beside it for you with a clatter as he took his own food across the room, sitting under the grated window as the final rays of the sun shone through across the large chair in the corner beneath it, the cushions warm from the heat and his book lay on the edge of the seat, and he settled down comfortably to read his book and enjoy his food. 

He was barely ten pages in, halfway through his food as he looked up, expecting to hear some kind of comments about the meal, when he noticed that the dish was still sitting on the cold stone, wisps of steam waving into the air and dissipating as he sat before him, and he placed down his spoon, a growl on his lips as he ducked down the item in his hands to stare at the vacant spot for a moment.

“Eat your damn food, no wonder you feel bad. What use are you to me if you die before I can get any more blood out of you, hm?” The snarky comment left his lips before he could stop it, and he waited to hear your sarcastic retort, something telling him you were listening to him, and yet evidently, you were still ignoring him. 

He wasn’t in the mood for your pathetic sulking, and so instead he chose to go back to his reading and his food, knowing that if you wanted to act like a child then he would surely let you. You would cave eventually and give in, this was the first meal you’d had in twenty-four hours and he knew how much you complained about him only giving you the one meal a day, and he hoped you’d get over it soon, because he was starting to miss your commentary on his every little action. 

Your silence was making him feel more alone than he had in a long time.

By the time it was getting too dark for him to see the words printed on the pages, he gave up, the dishes long discarded and he had moved through another few chapters of his book, deeply enthralled in the story he had chosen, a chill sweeping through the room. Getting up, he checked the windows were all locked, before moving around the room and lighting the few torches, an orange glow lighting up the stone tiles of his room walls, and he set off on piling logs and kindling into the stone fireplace. 

He watched as the flames curled up, a scowl on his face as the thick smoke disappeared up through the chimney as warmth began to spread through the room, and he lifted a metal safety grate over the exposed flames, unwilling to let the past repeat itself as he pridefully put all precautions in place.

Void spied the bowl of food still sitting by the cage doors, untouched as he glanced at it over at it. Steam was no longer curling up, and he frowned, moving to crouch by the door as he looked at it, even the spoon sitting in the same place it had landed all those hours ago. “I know you’re angry at me for shouting, but you need to eat!”

You didn't even shift, not even a grunt in response to his words and anger raced through his body once again, his jaw twitching and he scooped up the meal from the floor, uncaring toward its cold state as he swiped the collection of metal keys from his side counter, the bundle jingling loudly as he unlocked the door, sliding it out o the way with a loud clang as he growled at you.

“Fucking eat!” 

He waited, your silhouette barely moving and he felt furious, dropping the bowl to the floor as some of the food sloshed over the edge of the dish, spilling out onto the tarmac and wasting the broth meal as you remained still, and he tipped his head back in a long groan, before stepping towards you and crouching down. You didn’t shift, even at his close proximity and he hummed in irritation, finger raising to swipe some hair from your face as your head hung low, and he gasped at the coolness of your skin under his touch, all anger seeping away as worry took over his body.

“I need you to say something now, okay?” His voice was shaking toward the end of his sentence, and he tipped back your head to rest against the cold stone walls, and he became eerily aware of just how cold it actually was within these walls, the darkness making it much chillier than the rest of the room was and your eyes stayed shut, and he squinted, unable to find movement in your shoulders or chest. “Now would be a great time for one of your stupid comments.”

His teasing went unheard, and he fumbled for the collection of keys, scooping them up and quickly undoing the chains around your wrists, his arms scooping you up under your legs and behind your back as he lifted you into his arms. Your body slumped into him, and his heart raced with panic as he removed you from the cell, cursing under his breath as you lay like dead-weight in his arms. 

He dropped you down onto the bed, shaky fingers delicately brushing the hair the was glued to your clammy skin away from your face, his hands skimming along your body as he searched for anything to clue him in, the pale colour of your shining skin scaring him deeply as he looked at the deep purple rings around your eyes and the blue tint to your lips.

Dark red blood was staining the sleeve of your worn and ripped jacket, and his fingers hooked under the end, pushing it up your arm and grimacing as he took in the still running wound, white torn flesh from the place on your arm that he’d been taking blood from wasn’t healing, and your veins could no longer be seen under your skin, deflated around the purple and blue bruises, your skin gaining a yellow tint toward the edges before fading out into sickly white, skin even paler than his own. 

He rushed around the room, gathering up bundles of supplies and medicines in his arms as he tried to think back on what his mother had taught him about healing all that time ago when she had still been with him. With a bowl of warm water beside him, he balanced it on the covers, dipping in a soft rag and wiping it gently over the dried blood trails on your arm, taking both the old and fresh blood from the wounds, dipping it back in the water and ringing it out carefully.

Once he could see the damaged flesh, he pinched it together, glad you were unconscious for it as he lifted the metal pin up to one of the flames on the torches around him. The tips of his fingers were burning slightly from the pain, but he held out until the tip of the pin was glowing orange, before bringing it away and waving it in the air as he rubbed his sore fingertips from the heat exposure. 

Threading the needle carefully, he looked up at you, biting his lip and pressing a delicate kiss to your forehead, mumbling an apology into your skin and pinching the skin tightly as he focused on it, pushing the needle through the flesh and suppressing the churning of his gut and the desperate urge to wretch as he felt the needle pierce your flesh. He had never been good with needles, and yet he knew he had to keep going. 

Weaving the thread through your skin was tortured for him, your muscles and nerves twitching under his touch as he did and he whispered the most soothing thing she could think of as he worked, despite knowing it was falling on deaf ears. Once he was done, he was careful to wrap it in soft fabric, pinning the bandages carefully and running his knuckles over it. 

The skin around your wrists was raw and bruised from the heavy shackles he’d had you wearing, and he massaged the skin carefully, before picking up a fresh cloth and wiping the sweat, dirt and grime from your skin as he adjusted you into a more comfortable position. He took a spare blanket, hanging it between items of furniture as he warmed a blanket in front of the fire, taking a seat beside you on the mattress after he had cleared away all the sides and herbs he had used in his best bid to cure you.

He sat beside your bedside, your good hand clutched in his as he worried beside you, the blanket he had warmed up over the fire laying over your body, and he was happy to see the colour returning to your skin as your body warmed back up. His cheek had been resting on the edge of the mattress as he sat on the floor, his eyes just drifting shut when he felt your body twitch, his head snapping up and a second later your body jolted, a loud cry leaving your lips as you tried to bend your arm, and his hand closed over your wrist to hold it down as he leaned over you.

“Woah, woah, woah. Take it easy.” He mumbled, and you let out a pained sigh, your eyes watering as the pain shot through your body, and he bit on his lip, rubbing a hand over your shoulder as your bottom lip trembled. 

“Shit, it hurts. It really fucking hurts.” 

“Yeah, well, you should've told me before it got bad!” His voice was higher than usual as he spoke, and you fixed him with a cold glare, an odd sense of relief filling him as your attitude was coming back in droves already. 

“I fucking tried!” You snapped, wincing as the movement rocked your body and you struggled to sit yourself up, allowing him to help you as he positioned a pillow behind your back, frowning as he thought back on the way he had acted all day, and his eyes avoided yours, but your hand landed on his upper arm as he adjusted the sheet around you. “Thanks, for helping me. For patching me up. Also, this blanket is really warm.”

“I hung it over the fire to bring your temperature up.” He sighed, shaking his head and sitting on the edge of the bed beside your legs. “I should have listened to you this morning. I didn’t realise how cold it was in there, and the state you were in.”

“S’okay. I am starving though, did I miss lunch?” His jaw dropped as he looked at you, a surprisingly genuine laugh leaving him as he studied you before he was nodding, motioning to the darkness outside of the windows and your eyes widened as though you only just came to realise the late hour the day had moved onto. 

“I’ll get someone to bring you something to eat, alright? Take it easy.” You simply nodded at him, and he made his way to the main door, lifting heavy bolts and locks across the wood as he flagged down the nearest maid he could find, growling out his instructions as she nodded, fleeing the second he dismissed her, pride filling him upon knowing that even if you weren’t, at least some people were still scared of him. When he turned back to you, your fingers were picking at the loose threads of the blanket, your eyes locked on him already. “Can I keep this blanket?”

“No. It was my mother's and it lives on the chair. What do you need it for?” He tipped his head toward his favourite lounging place, a large and comfortable looking chair in the corner, worn but still plush-looking cushions sitting on the seat - the original resting place of the soft knitted piece - and your fingers stilled, smoothing over the surface as you shrugged at him, avoiding his gaze.

“Said it yourself, it gets cold in there. An extra blanket would be nice.” 

He swallowed, glancing between the cell in the corner and your form sitting on the bed, tucked under all his cosy sheets and lit up by the warm light coming from the fire, the crackling of logs filling the room as he took quick steps over to you, taking a seat on his usual side of the large bed as a prominent gap formed between your two bodies. “No, no you’re not going back in there.” Your brows raised at him, and he made himself busy with other tasks to avoid having to acknowledge the way you were looking at him made him feel. “You’ll be out here with me, from now on.”

“That sounds.. nice.” He merely nodded in response, his back still turned to you as he struck up a match, lighting the candle on his bedside as a comfortable quiet fell over the pair of you, and now that you were awake and sitting beside him, he once again felt a little less alone in the world.

You were sicker for longer than he expected, and it worried him for a while when your condition showed no signs of improving. Your body could now be found curled up on the covers beside him, the two of you rigid as your backs faced away from one another at opposite sides of the bed. 

You slept long hours, and often went so quiet in the night that he had to roll you over just so that he could check you were still breathing, and buy the mornings your arm would be brushing his as the two of you inched closer to the middle of the bed progressively during your unconscious states. You were tired, and sluggish, and for almost two weeks you never left the bed. Your skin grew paler and you grew weaker, and you didn’t eat as much of your meals as you used to, despite how much you insisted you were hungry. Deep bags hung under your eyes, the same pale and sunken look that he had gained himself after his mother had died, locking himself away as he refused to eat and go outside, and he had opened the curtains a lot and often helped your shuffle across the bed to sit on his side so that you could look out through the bars. 

In the third week since he had removed you from your cage, you got up on your own, shuffling uncomfortably in your clothes and wrapping your arms around yourself self-consciously, surprising him as you made your way over to him with cautious steps, and he resisted the urge to rush over to you in a bid to help you walk better. You had requested a bath, and a chance to wash your clothes, in which he had graciously accepted both. A wing to his room in which you had never been in was shown to you as your arm looped through his, your shaky and weak fingers clinging to his arm as he guided you through and tried to suppress the urge to scoop you up into his arms and carry you, because he knew how badly you needed to regain your own ability to walk, even if you had nowhere to go. 

You were still a prisoner, you were still just a bargaining chip, and he had to constantly remind himself of that, even if you now shared more than just his bedroom. 

You had bathed, and he had given you sets of his own clothes to wear as he disposed of the torn and blood-soaked rags he had left you in since the day you had arrived with him. You were smiling to yourself when you reemerged, your hair still wet and dripping along the cloth you had wrapped yourself in as you snuggled down into his clothes, and he had helped you back into bed before checking on your arm. You had fallen asleep before he had even finished rewrapping it, the sleeves of his shirt falling over your palms as your other hand sat in a loose fist, clutched to your chest as your nose buried into your hand, breathing even and soft but stronger than it had been, and his cheeks had flared with a very subtle warmth that he hadn't experienced since he was a child. 

That bath seemed to have been the trick, because the following morning you had been awake before he had been, colour seeping back into your skin as your fingers danced over the spines of the books on his bookcase, pulling some out and checking the titled, before adding them to a stack that had been growing on a stool beside you. 

The collection was one that you quickly worked through, taking a seat in his chair when he wasn’t using it and reading under the warmth and light of the days sunrays, taking up in idle conversations with him when you found parts of books you particularly enjoyed, or things you needed to talk about, and when you grew bored of the tales, you would stand on the other side of the workbench and watch up close as he did his tasks. 

A routine formed between the two of you, very quickly; a steady schedule that was quickly becoming uncomfortably comfortable for him. The mornings would be spent with the two of you eating breakfast together, a luxury you had teased him for lightly for a while as he had only allowed you one meal a day, to begin with, before he would leave you for his meetings and to go to the markets. You would read, and he would come back to find you deep in a new book from the shelf or snoozing in the chair with his mother's blanket tucked over you. 

He bought you a notebook and quill almost two months in, because the afternoons had come to consist of you watching him work, handing up different pots as he taught you the names and uses of different things, he allowed you to help him in wrapping and grinding plants and flowers, topping up the bottles and boxes of ingredients lining his shelves, and your own book was quickly filling up much like his own, your handwriting quite the opposite to his, neat and swirling and eligible, as his own barely readable chicken scratch filled the pages. 

He had worried at first, that he was going to return each morning and find you gone, find the room empty and the door hanging open from where you had smashed open the key lock and undone the bolts, or that you had climbed from the windows after pulling off the bars. He was waiting for the bubble to pop, for the day he would come back and find the room trashed, scratch marks on the door and a weapon in your hands as you tried to flee, and yet all you ever greeted him with when he returned was a barley present flick of your lips in a smile and a nod of your head, perhaps even a verbal greeting if you were in a particularly good mood. 

You were becoming a part of his life that he found hard to ignore, hard to deny that he wouldn't miss when he eventually had to give you up, and the summer heat faded as he found himself growing closer to you. 

Longer nights and shorter days brought fewer meetings or trips to the market and more time sealed away in his room as the temperatures dropped and your healing continued. Your arm was no longer red and inflamed, visible veins with blue and purple skin, but was instead back to its normal shade, a slightly raised patch of pinky-white pale skin with a red rim as a scar in the shape of a long slash found itself on your arm instead, and he often found himself racing it with a frown when you rolled your sleeves up to your elbows. 

He never felt guilty, not in his sacrifices or killings, but this he had felt guilty for because even if nothing else, he was beginning to look at you more like a friend than anything else. During the conversations you filled the extra time with, the chats you shared deep into the night as candles flickered and blankets were wrapped around shoulders for heat, you had learned more about him than anybody else ever had, he’d unwittingly bared his soul to you.

He knew so much about you in return, like your favourite meals or your preference on the genre of books you liked to read, and yet he still felt like he knew nothing. The more he learned, the more questions he had, the mystery that you were was becoming more and more tangled as he went, and yet he enjoyed getting to know you, in a way he had never experienced before. 

Stiles had friends, Scott and Derek and Lydia among them, he was used to having friends, but the more he awoke in the mornings to find your body almost pressed to his as your eyelashes fluttered against your cheeks, or the way your eyes connected with his and your smile was just soft enough to make him want to smile back, or the way it felt more right to have your body working beside his with quiet laughs and innocent brushes or arms and bodies then it did alone that made him realise this was soon becoming something more than friendship to him.

By the time the winter had rolled around your sickness had passed, and the chill of the season was setting in. He clenched his jaw, the chattering of your teeth and barely visible shaking of your body was irritating him, and he glanced across to the side of the bed you were laying on, your eyes closed as you hovered as close to the edge of the mattress as you could, huddled under the thin blankets as you clutched them to your chin.

You took a deep breath, and he watched for a moment as you calmed, rubbing at the red tip of your nose, before burying it in the covers and rubbing your hands together, and a growl left his lips as your shivering picked back up. “Your fucking teeth chattering is driving me insane!”

You managed to still your body, a muffled apology leaving you as you adjusted yourself under the sheets, and he let out a long sigh, placing his book down on his lap and reaching a hand out, patting at the vacant space between you both.

“Just fucking roll over before I get irritated.” He swiped his hand up, and you paused, before shuffling over in the bed and moving your body closer to him, letting out a satisfied sigh as you gained some warmth as you moved closer to the centre of the large bed. He leaned over, pulling the covers back up over your shoulder as you nuzzled down into the pillow, his fingers brushing your skin. “Shit, you really are cold.” 

“Mhm.” Your eyes were squeezed shut, snapping open with a squeal as he scooped his hands underneath you, tugging you up until you were resting between his thighs, your cheek pressed to his chest as he wrapped his arms around you, picking his book back up. Your body was stiff and tense, uncomfortable against his own and he rolled his eyes, glancing down at you as you avoided his eyes. 

“Oh, relax. I can’t concentrate with you shaking the bed with all your shivering, and the cold has never really bothered me, but I have a lot of body heat. I can’t have you getting sick again, so just go to sleep.” The aggressive tone he normally held was more of a struggle to get out now, and he huffed as you curled your arms around his body, getting yourself comfortable as you settled into him. 

He let out the breath he was holding, his stomach sagging under you and his muscles relaxing as your body curled around his, an unfamiliar feeling settling in his gut at the feeling of having someone holding onto him so comfortably. He ran his fingers over your body beneath the covers, noting the tears and rips in the thin material, the same rags you had arrived in the day you’d been brought here to begin, and he could understand your problem with the cold. 

Clearing his throat, he settled his hand on your hip, tucking it underneath the flimsy material of your top to stroke along your side and warm you up, the goosebumps that had been covering your body beginning to settle and disappear as you warmed up. “I’ll get you some warmer clothes tomorrow.”

Your face turned into his stomach more, a smile on your lips as you squeezed your arms around him, the silent thank you not going unnoticed, and the silence that enveloped the room hung heavy for a few minutes, the flicking of the pages as he thumbed them over with his one hand, the other still tucked under your shirt, tracing patterns into your skin absentmindedly as his natural tendency toward fiddling took over. It wasn’t until his fingers brushed over the collection of raised scars on your hips that he stilled, pressing down on the spot and you squirmed under him, swatting at his arm sleepily. 

“I noticed these when I pulled you up from the floor all those months ago. What happened?” You snorted at him, cracking an eye open to look at him before you rolled over, propping your arms on his stomach, your chin resting on top of them as you looked at him. You were judging him for his lack of subtlety in the asking of the question, but instead of acknowledging that, he simply raised a brow, the frown on his face not moving. “Tell me.”

“Alright, alright. Pushy.” You muttered, rolling your eyes at him and he scowled at you, glaring at you for your attitude but you seemed unaffected by it. He continued to poke at the collection, running his fingers over the raised flesh, waiting for you to continue. It was a moment before you did, your bottom lip clenched between your teeth as you nibbled on it for a second, shaking your head and shrugging, before settling yourself back down into his chest, your eyes closing again. “It’s where Gerard would cut me.”

His fingers stilled, body tensing and eyebrows furrowing. He closed the book in his hand, discarding it quickly as he waited for you to say something else, elaborate or explain that it was a lie, but you seemed to just have accepted it without expecting him to question it. You let out a sudden groan as he moved you unexpectedly, your body curling in on itself as he ripped the covers from your form, a knee on either side of your legs as he lifted up your shirt to expose your hip, and he smoothed a thumb over the cluster of pinkish-purple marks. “But, there’s a lot?”

“Yeah.” You seemed to give in, sitting yourself up a little and looking down at the healed injuries, smirking proudly as you looked at them, but his eyes were narrowed on you as he waited. “He tried to carve the Argent ‘A’ into me when he first took my prisoner and I kicked him off. He didn’t like the fact that I ruined the symbol, so he added another cut every time I disobeyed him.”

Stiles wasn’t quite sure how to handle this information, the cogs in his mind spinning as he reeled at the idea of you locked in another cell, bleeding and tending to your own injuries after refusing to do whatever it was that he had wanted from you. “You weren’t born in the Argent Kingdom?”

“No. I was born here.” He almost felt as though he’d been winded as he looked up at you, your gaze questioning as you looked at him, your brows raised and you licked over your lips. “They took me prisoner when I was younger. My mother and father died, I didn’t have much to work from and I accidentally wound up on their land, stealing apples.” You were far from the person he had assumed you to be, his jaw hanging slightly slack, and he looked between your eyes and the scars on your hip in confusion.

He moved before he had thought about it, pressing a kiss to the bundle, your muscles twitching under him as he did and he moved between cuts, pressing a light kiss to each one, your hand coming down to thread into his hair carefully as he did, and he made sure to press his lips to each one before dragging your top back down, his hand tucked under the fabric, palm covering the scars as he blew out the candles still flickering, his body covering yours as he lay atop you, just enough to cover you without crushing you. 

It was a moment before you moved, your hands pulling the covers back up and you timidly wrapped your arms around him, shuffling and clinging to him as you relished in the warmth he was providing you, your cheeks heated in the darkened room as his hands held you protectively to his body. 

“Would you like to walk to the markets with me tomorrow?” 

“Really?” You practically buzzed with excitement, rolling onto your side to grip onto him tighter as you peered at him in the dark, and he could still make out the grin on your face, and he had to suppress his chuckle at your excitement, choosing to simply nod in response as his eyes closed. “You’d take me out, even dressed like this?”

He frowned, shaking his head and inching closer to you until the tip of his nose was brushing your forehead. “We’re going out to get you new clothes. I need some new plants and jars, so we can pick those up too. Nobody will say anything to you.” You opened your mouth again to speak, and he groaned as he heard the intake of breath, your jaw snapping shut when he huffed. “Just go to sleep before I regret not being horrible to you.”

“You’re being nice to me.”

“No. I’m not nice, I’m just being less awful. There’s a difference.” He muttered, his fingers tightening their hold on your hip in warning of your arguing with him, and you didn’t speak, muffling the sound of amusement you made as you settled into sleep, and while the coldness had never bothered him before, he couldn’t deny that he enjoyed the warmth you provided when your body was pressed up against his.

Neither of you ever bothered to speak about what had changed between the two of you, but it was clear that something had. 

His touch lingered longer on your skin when he was around you now, and he was closer to your side whenever he possibly could be. The gap between you on the bed had quickly become nonexistent, the cold nights meaning he would hold you closer more often, and it had quickly become familiar to him to have your body pressed up to his during the night as your hands wrapped around his body and lips pressed to your hairline whilst your heart beat steadily against his chest, in a comfortable rhythm with his own. 

As promised, he had walked you down to the marketplace the next day, the excitement on your face as he finally allowed you an escorted trip away from the room you’d been locked up in for half a year had almost made him smile, your arm looped through his as your unsteady almost skips took place beside his even and long strides. He had glared daggers at anyone that had sent you unusual looks, your body draped in the large material of his own clothes as you waited for new garments. 

You had purchased a selection of loose-fitting pants and jumpers, skirts and even some dresses, the bundle building in your arms as you mumbled about not remembering the last time you’d actually had any new clothes of your own to wear, clutching them to your chest and waiting patiently as he moved between the other stalls and gathered the thinks he needed for himself. When you had returned home, he’d cleared a drawer in his dresser, for you to unpack them into, and the more you spent time with him, the more reluctant he was to let you go. 

You were becoming more and more intertwined with his life, his shoulders felt lighter when he was talking to you, or able to watch you work, and when your chin would rest on his shoulder from behind as you watched him work, your arms looped around his waist as you tried to stay out of the way but still wished to observe. You made his bad days feel a little easier, when he was in a bad mood you were able to soothe him, his eyes closed as he sat back against the bed, face pushed into your neck and arms around your waist as you read aloud to him or told him about your own projects and what you had been up to. 

He knew he should let you go, that he should stop letting the bond between you get so deep and meaningful. It kept him up on the occasional night, as he listened to your steady breathing and relished in the warmth of your body, that he was only going to end up hurting himself in the long run. He couldn't keep you prisoner forever, one day the king would come back for you, or he’d have to let you go himself and you’d run from him never to return. It only ended in him getting hurt, and yet he couldn't help but dig himself in deeper, drown in you a little more, because being around you was such a sweet taste in his mouth and he wanted to savour that, before it turned bitter and made him only the more darker, stormier, angrier version of himself that he would undoubtedly become when you left him. 

He was closer to you than he should be, the urges bubbling up inside of himself making him feel like he had to hold himself back more and more, because you confused him. He liked it when your fingers scraped over his scalp as you played with his hair and the way he sometimes wanted to get even closer to you, to be in your face, his lips pressed to yours as your body wrapped around his entirely, the two of you practically becoming one. He didn’t like the guilt that came with that feeling, the anger at himself for being too scared to take it that final step and let himself become yours entirely, to claim you as his.

He was used to having fear from others, but he also wasn’t used to having love, and you supplied him with enough for him to suffocate in, and die happily. So, in order to gain as much as he possibly could before you were inevitably torn from his arms, he made the most of every touch you gave him, every second of time he got with you, and every time you’d let him brush his lips across your cheek or sweep loose hair behind your ear, or lace his fingers with your own on the nights the two of you would lay in bed, facing one another on the pillows and talking until the darkness passed on the sun was once again cracking across the horizon to signal in a new day. 

Adjusting himself in the pillows, you shifted in his arms, his fingers stilling their movements from tracing patterns along your skin once again as he waited for you to get comfortable, and you eventually huffed out, trying to continue in you reading of the book before you were once again stopping as you looked up. Your arm was aching as you tried to hold yourself up to read the book, your thigh shifting from where it had been draped over one of Stiles’ legs as you leaned up, stretching your arms above your head as cracks and pops sounded, a relieved sigh leaving you. 

“This isn't working. My neck hurts.”

He chuckled at your words, his hand dropping to smooth along your thigh through the cover as you sat up further, rolling your neck from side to side as your body adjusted from the awkward pose you had been in. “It was your idea to read in bed.”

“I know that.” You scoffed, his brows furrowing at your tone and he let out a warning growl, your eyes rolling at him and he pinched your thigh, your body jolting as you scowled and rubbed over the spot. “That was uncalled for.”

“You sassed me. Don’t sass me.” He watched as you swung a leg over his waist, a smirk curling on his lips as you settled yourself onto his upper thighs, balancing the book on his chest. His hands found your waist, tugging you up closer until you were seated in his lap, and he popped his legs up behind you, letting you lean back on his thighs for support. His hands slipped down to your mid-thighs, fingers digging into the supple flesh on either side as he squeezed gently. “Better?”

“Much, actually.” You wiggled in his lap, and he bit down on his lip to choke down the sound he wanted to release, your voice soon picking up again as you began to read to him. For a while, he was able to focus on the words you were saying, his eyes closed as he listened to you speak to him about the different ways to preserve and use herbs best. It wasn’t until you jumped in his lap, his eyes opening suddenly as you let out a small yell, the weight of the book sitting on his ribs being lifted as you held it up before him. “Look!”

“What am I looking at, dove?”

“This! It says you should press wolfsbane and then powder it, instead of hanging it to dry!” You looked at him pointedly, letting out a long sigh as you marked the page of the book before throwing it to your side, a cheeky grin on your lips as you leaned down. Poking at his chest, you made a proud noise in the back of your throat, and Stiles tried to ignore the way you were practically buzzing in his lap. “That’s what I told you! All the way back on the first day, when you locked me up in that cage over there!”

His lips dropped into a frown at the mention of the abandoned cell in the corner of the room, the thought of you in there again making his stomach twist with nausea. He huffed out at the thought, and you leaned in further, your chest almost pressed to his and you pinched at his cheek, your breath fanning over his face.

“Now, now, Void. Don’t pout.” You grinned, and he rolled his eyes, raining a hand to poke at your side as you teased him, and he swallowed thickly. Your mouth opened, presumably to make another snarky comment, the attitude and humour he hated to admit that he’d grown so fond of beginning to shine through again. Instead, though, the fingers pinching his cheeks flattened out, your hand smoothing around until your nails were scratching lightly in the short hairs at the back of his scalp, a sigh falling from his parted lips at the feeling.

Watching you carefully, his eyes dropped to your lips as you licked at them, before you were leaning into him, your lips pressing to his delicately, a barely present kiss being placed to his lips as you bumped your nose against his, the breath between you both sharing as you moved your lips with his in shaky rhythms. The tension fled from his body, his hands flying up to hold onto you, his fingers in your hair as he groaned lowly into your mouth. 

He had been kissed before, but this kiss was different. This kiss was one that someone wanted to share with him, not one that was being given to him as maidens from around the palace threw themselves at him for one night to be able to say they tamed the darkness for a few hours. Your hands were cupping his cheeks, before smoothing down his shoulders to rest on his chest, your own body relaxing atop him as he pressed back with force. 

He leaned back into the pillows, pulling you with him until your hair was framing around his face as you kissed him, his tongue snaking out to lick along your lower lip, a whine leaving you as he did. His tongue tangled with your own, your breathing becoming lighter as you panted above him and pride swelled in his chest at the needy way your hands scrunched into fists in the material of his shirt, nails scraping at his pecs through the fabric.

Teeth practically clashed, as the kiss moved from shy and experimental to heated and sloppy, fingers grasping as you both dragged in raspy breaths, your lips meshing together in a connection that was long overdue, feelings rushing to the surface as overwhelming arousal flooded through the both of you, the air around you heating up. Tilting his head to the side, he earned himself a deeper access to your mouth, relishing in the whimper you rewarded him with as his tongue travelled the inside of your mouth, memorising the feel of kissing you so intimately.

Your hips ground down into his, a grunt falling from his mouth as you did, the sound muffled between wet and smacking kisses as his cock twitched in the thin pants he wore to sleep in, your hips repeating the motion, and he couldn't hold back the thrust of his hips up into yours this time, a cry falling from your lips at the feeling. You pulled back, pushing yourself up with your hands spread on his torso and he chased your lips, propping himself up on his elbows as he followed you.

The complaint he was about to voice died in his throat as you used your new position to rock your core down against him more firmly. “Fuck, darling, you need to stop.” He mumbled, and he slid down from your face to gain a bruising grip on your hips, moving you to a halt as you became steady in his lap once again. Your cheeks were flushed, eyes wide as you peered at him cautiously, and a blush crawled up your cheeks. “What are you doing?”

“Kissing you? Or at least, I was..” Your words trailed off in a whisper, your hands pulling back from the grip on his top so you could play with your fingers nervously, and he could feel your legs twitching around him as you considered bolting from your position, his hold tightening to keep you where you were.

“Why?”

“Because I wanted to?” You offered, and he ran a hand over his face, huffing at the way you were practically answering his questions with more questions, and he fixed you with a stern glare. The silence between the two of you hung thick and awkward in the air, your eyes leaving him as you squirmed in his hold, uncomfortable with his stare on you. 

“Why did you kiss me?” He had taken on his deeper tone, the cold and menacing one that had always gotten him answers before now, and you sighed, your body practically deflating under his gaze as you let out an aggravated sound, dragging a hand through your hair. 

“Because I wanted to! Because I like it when you start rambling about all your herbs and mixes when you’re working, and that you let me sleep in the bed with you, and that you let me read your books at night! You also have really nice lips!” Your words were near-shouted, and you crawled away from him, pushing his hands from you as a scowl took over your features. “I thought that would have a better outcome, but I’m getting the feeling I was wrong and that I’ve messed things up, so I think it’s about time I headed back into the corner an-”

A loud growl tore from him as he wrapped his fingers around your wrist, tugging you back onto the bed as you tried to stand up, and he rolled your body under his, caging you in with a hand either side of your head. “Don’t you dare fucking mention that. I told you that you sleep here with me now, where you belong.” Your eyes widened at the tone of his voice, and he smirked lowly, dipping his head down to press a kiss to the corner of your mouth, before kissing along your jaw and down your neck, two fingers on your chin gripping tightly as he tipped your head to the side, exposing your collarbone to him. 

Nipping at the sensitive skin, he grinned as you moaned, finally letting the sound through when he found the sensitive patch of skin that made your back arch into his chest and your eyes slip shut. Sucking on the patch of skin, he made quick work of nibbling and licking at the patch, until a large red blemish appeared that would soon sink into an even larger purple bruise. “You’re giving me really mixed signals, here.”

Your words were slurred as you wiggled under his hold and he smirked, pulling back to look at you. Dipping his head down, he let one of his hands drift up to cup your cheek, his lips pressing to your own delicately, a sweet kiss being left on your lips as he bumped your nose aside, tilting his own head until he was letting his tongue dip out to meet yours between your parted lips, a slow and passionate exchange as you whimpered into his mouth, kissed breathless and flushed when he finally pulled back. 

“That clears up nothing. But I’d really like to do it again.”

“I intend to keep doing that with you. A lot.” He whispered, rolling onto his side and shuffling up until he was buried back in the pillows, a satisfied smirk on his lips, and he wiped the edge of his mouth with his thumb, poking your side with his foot as you continued to pant and stare at the ceiling. “Get up here before I kick you from the bed.” 

You scoffed at his warning, smacking idly at his foot as he nudged you, before rolling up onto your hands and knees, crawling along the bed and collapsing down beside him, his nose burying in your hair as your body pressed up to his side, the warmth from you spreading over his skin. Your leg came up to sit over his waist as your cheek pressed into his shoulder, and he stretched his head to the side for you as your lips tickled over his throat in feather-light kisses. 

Dropping a hand to your thigh, he gripped tightly at the exposed skin that was revealed from your nightgown, a grunt leaving him as your lips worked sloppy to leave marks on his neck. He dared to trail his fingers up, searching for the edge of your gown and his fingers toyed with the material once he found it, subtly inching it up further, one of your hands sliding over his chest to lace into his hair. Tilting his head toward you with the hand on his cheek, you guided his lips back to your own, a satisfied hum sounding from him as he puckered his lips to return the affections.

Kicking your feet at the covers, you tried to inch them up your body, and he chuckled as you pulled away, yawning into his shoulder as you hid your face. Leaning over you, he placed the book on the side table, catching it just before it fell from the edge of the mattress. Taking the covers in his hand, he tugged them up over your figures, huffing as you placed a hand on his chest and forced him back down into the bed, your form slumping against him tiredly as you buried your face into his neck.

Running his hand over your back, he leaned to the side, blowing out the final candle keeping the room alight and plunging it into darkness, tiredness sweeping over him, too. The warmth you spread to his chest was now no longer just from your body pressed to his, but filled him internally as you curled up against him, a smile tilted on his lips as he nudged his nose into your hair, his eyes sliding shut.

That night, he slept with kiss-swollen lips and a slightly off-pace heart, skipping beats and pumping erratically as your legs tangled with his. His mind had been spinning for hours afterwards, balancing out the pros and cons of allowing himself to sink into the idea of being in a relationship with you. The former heavily outweighed the latter, and he was somewhere between irritated and amused at himself for it, the idea that he might actually be capable of having a normal concept like love or affection was foreign to him, and he let himself drift off in distraction when you subconsciously nudged your nose into the spot between his neck and his shoulder, your lips brushing his skin, and his arms had wrapped around you tighter as he let unconsciousness take him. 

He noticed a considerable difference in you after that night, one that made his lips quirk into a cheeky look every time he thought about it, or studied the way you had begun to act. He was having a different kind of effect on you. His kisses had originally made you flushed and pink-cheeked, and now you teased him just as much as he teased you. 

Your nervous hands that would sit on his cheeks or chest would now wander, tugging at his hair or scratching at his chest lightly, enough to make him shiver and growl as he held onto you tighter and pulled you in closer. Your once sealed and soft lips were now more kiss bitten and swollen, your tongues playing together in familiar patterns as you sucked on his lower lip and batted your eyes at him in ways that made him breathless and dizzy. You took up all of his time and thoughts, letting him spend his days laying over you on the bed as your neck became littered in purple marks from his teeth moving across them, and his lips sucking at the skin until he was satisfied with his print being on your flesh. 

It never went too far, for the first time in his life he was enjoying something in moderation, he wasn’t rushing or struggling, but instead, he had faith that you didn’t want to run off anyway, that you wanted to be with him as much as he wanted to be with you, and so as the ice melted away in to spring and dead trees began to blossom once again, he found that he didn’t care if ting never went further than just your hips rocking up into his through layers of clothing as your mouths pressed together and you panted into one another's mouths, because what he had gained with you was more than physical, it was spiritual. 

It wasn’t just the affectionate side of you that had changed, but the mental side too. You were becoming more and more like him with every passing day, you were learning enough from him that you’d even begun to make recommendations and suggestions during his work, mixing your own little recipes and he was incredibly proud of how far you were coming. It was like you were made for him, a perfectly twisted match to his dark soul, and the more he got to know you the more it became true. 

You were a team, a unit, and the power of the two of you together far surpassed his power alone, even if it was simply that the feeling of no longer being alone made him more confident and sure in his own abilities than he ever had been before. He felt like the purpose of taking on a darker trait had finally come to light, long-buried and forgotten as he had gotten lost in the fear he inflicted onto others. He wanted this power, these abilities, that automatically instilled fear just at the mention of his name all as a method to protect someone, and now he had someone to protect. 

He had someone to defend, to care for and shelter, and yet you were also able to take care of yourself. You were strong-willed and determined and sharp, you were a jagged piece that fit his own cracks and splinters without cutting either one of you, he had a partner in an attack and someone to channel his power toward. You gave him direction.

Days felt more meaningful, he had the time to take on new hobbies once he had someone to complete all of his work with, and he no longer felt useless and bored during the time he spent off, because he didn’t have a shrouded goal to work towards anymore, a hidden ulterior in his own mind that made him feel unaccomplished when he didn’t work. Instead, he was fully aware of everything he did and you made him feel better about himself, you made him feel like the best version of himself. 

The only wrinkle in his joy, the only problem he had with his own joy was the knawing guilt he held every time he looked the front door tightly again, the way if you got too close to it his eyes would still flicker over to you untrustingly as he watched to see whether this was the moment you were going to bolt, and yet you never did. Now, he felt obligated to give you the benefit of the doubt, he felt like he owed it to you to try and give you freedom, because it was the last step he had to take before he could wholly, and completely believe that you were as invested in a future as him as he knew he was in having a future with you. 

He was selfish, and insecure, and he just had to take the leap in giving you the choice to come back to him, to give you the ability to leave and live your life, and simply trust that at night you’d crawl back into bed beside him instead of leaving his bed colder than it has ever been before.

That moment of reckoning, that day in which he would give you a chance to make the decision for yourself came as a split-second decision on one of the days that the spring rain was just clearing up, warm and humid heat sitting int he air as dark clouds loomed overhead and blocked out some of the sun’s light, and yet it was still a bright and warm day, because you had woken up in a good mood and forced him to enjoy it too. 

It had been quiet between you, only the flick of the pen across paper and your humming as you tinkered with different activities around the room as you had yet to decide what it was that you actually wanted or do was filling the silence, and he was more than content just sharing the space with you, occasionally looking up to watch as you move around. You had made the space your own as much as it was his, and his attention was torn between you, and the activity he had chosen for himself all those hours before.

He let out an indignant huff as you plucked the drawing pad from his hands, his fingers reaching out for it as you held it further out from your body, and he gave in, slumping back into the cushions lining the seat and shooting you a glare, his brows furrowed as he looked at you. “What do you want?”

“Well, fine.” You muttered, handing the pad back to him and crossing your arms, a pout on your lips as you looked at him and he smirked, taking the book from you and opening it back up to the page he was on, and you sighed, turning from him to walk away, his hand shooting out to grasp your wrist. Without looking up, he tugged you toward him, holding the book away from him as he made space for you to settle into his lap, his smirk only widening as you grinned, crawling into the seat and settling your legs across his own, your arms looping around his neck.

He adjusted the sketchbook to rest against your legs, his free arm sitting low on your waist as his fingers smoothed along your hip, your hands holding his face in your hands as you kissed at his cheek, his eye and nose scrunching up as you did. And the charcoal stilled on the paper as he waited. “I’m trying to draw.”

“Mhm, what are you drawing?” You continued to trace your lips along his skin, eventually giving in as you reached his neck, ending the exchanges with a final nip to his jaw before pulling back.

“You.” You straightened up, looking over at his drawing as you gasped with excitement, and he snickered at the way your body sagged in disappointment when you looked at the sketch, taking in the flowers on the paper. He looked at you carefully, and you placed a hand over his face, pushing him away from you, but you laughed as you did, and he grinned, biting playfully at the finger over his mouth. Instead, he lifted up the tattered paper bundle, holding it out to you and flipping through previous pages. “I normally draw you when you’re doing something.”

He held the book out to you, watching as you looked over the drawings carefully, your fingers brushing the edges of the paper and you smiled at him, handing the pad back to him. “You’re cute.” His lips pursed, and he raised up the block of charcoal in his hands, drawing a solid black line along your skin and you groaned out in irritation. “I take it back, you’re just annoying.”

“Don’t tell me I’m cute.” 

“Why not?” You were teasing him, and he leaned up, capturing your lips with his in a slow kiss as he pulled you in closer to him. He teased his lips over yours, your hands coming up to hold his face once again as you tipped your head to the side, granting him deeper access as he sucked on your lower lip. 

“I’m not cute, I’m fucking terrifying.” He argued, and you rested your cheek against the top of his head, a hum sounding from you.

“Are you planning to kill me?”

“No.”

“Are you planning to hurt and torture me?”

“No.” He spoke through gritted teeth, jaw clenched as he realised what you were getting at and instead he just shifted in the seat, dragging you down until your body was pressed up to his, your legs stretched out over the seat and your head resting on his shoulder so you were fully seated in his lap. He wrapped both of his arms around you, toying with the strings on the front of your dress, tugging on them until they fell loose, and you took a deep breath as the corset loosened. “I like you in dresses. They make you look-”

“Feminine?” Your mouth practically spat the word, but you let him undo the knots along the front, tugging at the stiff material until it was loose on your chest. 

“I was going to say powerful.”

He scowled at you for your assumption that he would insult you, before he was inching his hands up your legs, taking the heavy skirt of your dress with him, a smirk on his lips as you allowed him to, his fingers skimming over soft flesh until they were sitting in the middle of your thigh, his nose trailing along the underside of your jaw, and you let out a happy sigh for him.

“You and I could do great things, you know.” He mumbled, lips latching onto the spot beneath your ear, sucking lazily on the skin as you squirmed under him, a gasp sounding out as you twisted in his arms the moment he began to nip and bite at the sensitive place, and he licked over the spot, a proud smile on his lips at the red mark showing up on your wet skin. “We could rule the fucking world.”

“Together?”

“Always.” He growled the word out, his lips smashing into yours as you mewled under him, parting your lips for him the second he sucked the lower one between his own, his tongue snaking out to tangle with yours. The wet muscles dragged together, a breathy moan slipping into his mouth and dying out as his mouth moved relentlessly against your own in heated patterns.

You shifted, a groan falling from his lips as you turned in his hold, your arms looping around his neck, your fingers moving to play with his hair and tug on the soft locks to tease him, handfuls of the hair woven between your fingers as he continued to kiss you sloppily, the sounds echoing around the room, and his fingers tightened their grasp on your thigh, anchoring you to him as you shared the passionate embrace. 

When the burning for oxygen became too much, your mouth parted from his, your eyes still closed as you panted for breath, his own needy gasps washing over your lips each time, and your eyes only opened when you felt him run his thumb over your lips. He admired the swollen and darker colour of them, knowing he was the reason you looked quite so dishevelled, warmth bursting in his chest as he took in your flustered and flushed appearance, a small smile pulling on his lips when he backed away. 

“Stop staring at me.”

“You look beautiful when you look all fucked out.” He grinned at you wickedly, your cheeks flooding with more heat as you laughed, standing up carefully and brushing the skirt your dress back into place, and he followed suit, his hands on your hips as he looked down at you, licking the pad of his thumb and smearing away the charcoal that was still present on your skin. Your face scrunched up as he did, a grimace forming, and you rubbed your palm over the skin roughly until the wet feeling was gone, the dark smudge disappearing too, red and irritated skin taking its place. “I need a new sketchpad, and some more candles.” 

You looked up at him, nodding as you began to adjust the corset of your dress back into the correct place, and he lifted his hands from your hips to take the string between them, pulling tightly, your back straightening and a gasp sounding from your as the material clung around your torso. “Are we going to the markets, then?”

His gaze was focused on the intricate lacing across your torso, his fingers tugging on each strong carefully as he laced it back up, his eyes barely flicking up to yours for a second, but the edges of his lips pulled up in a barely present smirk. “No, I smell like soot and smoke, and I have some things to finish up.”

“Oh.” Your face fell, your eyebrows furrowing, and he tied the strings tight at the top of your breasts, the mounds swelling beneath the dress, his knuckles brushing against the plump flesh lightly as he retracted his hands, letting them smooth back over your sides.

“Why don’t you go and get them, and we can have a bath when you get back?”

Your eyes widened, your face splitting in a bright and beaming smile, and you were practically bouncing in your place as you watched him. “You want me to go alone?”

“Yes, but be quick, because it won’t take me long to find someone to heat water and fill the tub for us, and I’m not waiting for you if the water starts getting cold.” You nodded happily, and he took your hand in his, guiding you towards the large bolted door at the front of the room. His fingers stilled over the cold metal, doubting his movements for just a second as he glanced at you, before unlatching each bolt and lock individually, the heavy wood creaking as it fell open, and you peered out excitedly into the hallway. 

You’d been out many times by his side, but he could practically sense the anticipation and excitement rolling off of you as you stared out at the castle corridors, and he dipped his head as he waited for you to be ready, his body warm and tingling as he took in the joy he had given you. Instead, he reached for the hooks, taking his favourite fur and draping it carefully over your shoulders, tucking it securely around you for warmth, and he let out a deep breath, his dark eyes finding yours.

“You know where you’re going?”

“Yes.” You nodded firmly, and he grinned, taking a small sack, the dirty material sitting in the palm of his hands as he took out a few coins, placing the cold metal into your palm and folding your fingers over it, holding your hand in his.

“This should be enough. If anything happens, if anything seems off, you find a guard. You ask for Scott, and tell them you’re under my protection, okay?”

“What if they think I’m lying?”

He chuckled, shaking his head. “Nobody would optionally associate themselves with me, little dove.” Your free hand smoothed up to cup his cheek as he looked at you, eyes wide and skin warm under your touch as you stared at him, a look he had never quite seen in your eyes before shining through. 

“I would.” 

The simple words winded him, and he let out a breath he didn’t realise he was holding, nodding as he leaned into you, an arm wrapping around your waist to bring you flush up to his chest as he kissed you, deep and slow. There was no frantic need in this kiss, no lust or desire, just affection and longing, your lips sliding together in an intimate and meaningful exchange, your body buzzing with thrill under his hands as you looked forward to the trip. 

“I’ll be back soon. A sketchpad and more candles.” You nodded to yourself as you confirmed your small list, and he let out a small hum, not quite trusting his voice as he choked down whatever emotions were bubbling up within him. 

You turned towards the door, your body freezing in the entrance as you rocked on the balls of your feet, almost afraid to leave on your own, and despite his own worries about letting you out of his sight, he placed a hand on your lower back, feeling the way you relaxed into his touch, tension leaving your body as his he pushed you forward a little, taking your first step over the threshold, a small squeal leaving you. You turned, pressing a final kiss to his lips that he barely had time to return, before you were clenching the fist with the coins in, giving yourself an affirmative nod.

“Here I go.”

“Here you go.” He returned the words, slightly strangled in sound as he watched you step back, walking away from him as his touch left you, his hand falling back to rest at his side, and you turned your back to him, never once glancing over your shoulder as you bounded along the corridor quickly, disappearing from his sight once you rounded the corner. 

A strange mix of pride, anxiety and longing churned in his gut, but despite it all, he smiled, closing the door and for the first time since he’d allowed you out of the cell, he left it unbolted, choosing instead to trust that you would come back to him, that you cared for him as much as he did for you. 

[itsclydebitches]

You asked for prompts, so how about jaskier/geralt unexpected skill (can he slash or gen)

Drabble #2! (I’m so sorry these are taking forever 💜) 

A Cut Above the Rest

Pairing: Jaskier/Geralt

Warnings: None  

Word Count: 1,371

"So there I was: pants down around my ankles, half-blinded by ink, my precious lute the only thing standing between me and a certain death via cuckolding. Well, I don't need to tell you that death was the preferable option. To destroy one's instrument is tantamount to destroying one's soul and the day I use my darling as a second-rate bludgeoning weapon is the day you need to cart me off to the hospital, Geralt. In fact, that would be a damn useful form of identification, wouldn't it? Okay, should we ever be in a position where a doppler is attempting to swindle you with my perfect visage, you need only imply that a single pass is sufficient for tuning and if I don't immediately chastise you then you'll know—”

"You don't need to do that." 

Jaskier paused in the act of pushing his bangs out of his face. A second later he scoffed. "Geralt, if you really think that after everything we've been through there isn't at least a chance of that happening...." 

"I mean your hair." 

It was far from their first misunderstanding. Jaskier's thoughts tended to meander, backtrack, tangle together until you were navigating a maze rather than a conversation. Geralt knew he was unlikely to hear how Jaskier had escaped one of his more violent persurers, nor would they likely finish developing a contingency plan for rogue dopplers. That was what had first drawn him to Jaskier. Not his beauty or even his talent for music—a witcher didn't care for such things. Rather, it was his ability to change and abandon topics at the drop of a coin, yet never hesitated to pick another back up again. Jaskier wanted to talk to him. 

Geralt could count on one hand the number of people who could say the same.

He smiled, a tiny quirk of the lips across the fire, hidden by shadows. Jaskier was now engrossed in examining the rat's nest that had taken up residence on the top of his head. The sides were so long that when he pulled them front they hung past his nose. "Geralt Roger Eric—"

"Don't." 

"—du Haute-Bellegarde—" 

"I regret telling you that." 

"Are you trying to insinuate that there's something wrong with my luxurious locks?" 

Geralt snorted. "Not insinuating, telling, because there's nothing luxurious about them right now. Neither of us have had a real bath in weeks. You haven't had a cut in months. It's a fucking mess." He enjoyed the comically gaping mouth for a moment. "Unless you're planning to grow it out?" He fingered his own white hair, now down past his shoulders. 

Jaskier seemed to consider it. "I could braid it..." 

"You won't." 

"I might!" 

"You just want to braid mine." 

Instantly Jaskier had cleared a foot between them, elbows on his knees and hands clasped. He went so far as to pout. "Can I?" 

"No." 

There was much grumbling as Geralt stood, placing hands on the small of his back to hear the popping there. He snatched up their shared satchel and dug to the bottom, past extra shirts and dried fruit to reach the pouch he'd stashed away. It was easy to miss and by Jaskier's expression he'd never stumbled across it before. 

"I can cut yours though," Geralt said, drawing the string to reveal three scissors, a comb, and a bottle of oil. "If you want."  

"You can cut hair?" 

Everything was divided into pre and post in Geralt's mind. Pre-meeting Jaskier. Post first kiss. Pre-that winter night together. Post the scar on his left thigh, taking an arrow so Jaskier wouldn't have to. There was a time—far back in the pre-version of his world—when those words would have caused him to shrink back, fleeing from perceived rejection. Of course Jaskier didn't want Geralt to touch him. Of course he wasn't good for cutting with anything other than a blade. Now though, happily drifting in the post of it all, Geralt just raised an eyebrow. 

"I can do a lot of things you don't know about." 

"So you keep insisting. Funny how you have trouble proving it." 

Lair. He'd proven a great deal just an hour before, Jaskier splayed out on their bedroll, making enough ruckus to scare off the wildlife. His look sent Jaskier chuckling as Geralt retrieved what was left of their water. 

A worthy sacrifice and if it meant Geralt had to hike back to the stream before morning, so be it. He let the container warm by the fire for a moment, stretching his hands. Summer was just around the corner and in truth they didn't need the fire at all, but the extra heat had encouraged them both to keep their shirts off and it wasn't as if Geralt was about to complain about that. 

Water warm, Jaskier dipped his head as Geralt poured the skein directly over his head. The spluttering was music to his ears. 

"You're supposed to wet it gently!" 

"Oh? You're an expert?" 

"More than you it seems if you can't even get me properly wet... wait. Bad phrasing. Or good phrasing. Not sure you deserve a round two though—ow!" 

Geralt sat and pulled Jaskier against him, just leaving enough room to begin combing through the strands. "You're a child. Even Lambert didn't fuss this much." 

"Lambert?" 

"Asshole. Prick. Once used a shirt of yours to wipe his ass." 

A string of curses sounded through the night air. Geralt simply hummed and continued untangling a particularly troublesome knot. 

"I know who Lambert is, thank you," Jaskier said. "I'm just trying to picture a scenario where you, Lambert, and a pair of scissors doesn't end in a bloodbath." 

A fair enough assumption. "Probably would be like that if we hadn't been doing this since we were kids." Geralt splayed a hand against Jaskier's neck, encouraging him to dip his head forward again. The light was long gone and the fire now dying, but Geralt didn't need either to see. He chose the smallest pair of scissors and set to work. "There used to be a lot more of us... before the attack, the trials. Vesemir said he didn't have time to deal with us all so everyone learned to cut hair and you got three choices after that: wear it long, cut it yourself, or get a brother to do it for you. We realized after leaving Kaer Morhen that a decent cut went over better with employers, so we'd practice each winter. Got pretty damn good at it too." 

Jaskier cast a knowing look over his shoulder. "And goes over better in the brothels?" 

"Hold still." 

"My dear Geralt, is that a lack of denial I hear?" 

He tugged sharply on a clump of wet hair, soaking up the laugh it produced. 

Geralt worked steadily, but with an appreciation that drew a simple trim out into an indulgence for the both of them. Once Jaskier had accused Geralt of petting him like he did Roach which was... not an entirely inaccurate comparison. Luckily, both seemed to enjoy it. It was easy enough to shorten his hair so it was no longer getting in his eyes, much harder though to cease playing with it. 

Still, there were other ways to spend one's night. 

"There." 

"All done?" 

"Mmhm." 

Jaskier ran a hand through his hair, encouraging the strands to curl. Geralt took advantage of his distraction and lay his chin on Jaskier's shoulder, pressing a kiss beneath his chin. 

"Do you like it?" he asked, tasting smoke against skin. 

"How should I know? It's not like I carry a mirror with me." 

He could have easily made some crack about Jaskier's vanity, but the night was warm and his tolerance inexplicably high. Besides, anything Jaskier might have had to say about his own beauty was true enough. The moonlight confirmed it and though a normal witcher might not care for such things... Geralt had never been a normal witcher. 

"Then I guess you'll just have to trust me." 

Jaskier might have whispered a "Very well," but if he did it was lost between them, Geralt's lips on his and one hand twined in his hair. 

[maxbradley]

[2011]

Break Me

----------

“No…” The entire frame shook, trembling. The gloved hand covered upon quivering lips to suppress an immediate scream. Another shriek rang in the heated chamber, hitting the high roof and all around Max’s body. Beads of sweat kept on descending to the dark hardwood floor, soaking it all up. He couldn’t fathom what came next. A figure robed in stone blue donning a turban with the horns of a bull stood in front of the helpless creature, bound and chained. A fallen angel. Red hair and bare flesh exposed. The black dog had never seen her before, but the way she belted out her anguish as they beat and raped her snapped his lethargic mind back to his own—

“So, what have we learned?” The man in robes had his back to the onlooker. A hand reached in and pulled out a handle attached to a long strand, “Respect authority?” The creature sobbed, “What authority?! Da—nngh!” Another crack of the whip. “You think I’m enjoying this??” “Damn you! ALL OF YOU!!” More shrieks and more blood spilled on the black and white checkered floor. This couldn’t be happening. It wasn’t happening. This isn’t happening! “Boss!” What? “Don’t you think we’ve done enough?!” “Shut it!!” He didn’t sound normal. Void of pride—Not a single laugh burst from his larynx. Not a chuckle; just the crazed grunts forcing the sharp animal hide into the ivory skin, shining a ruby red. The similarities were too much. Sandy brown hair clumped to his skull in damp strands when the turban finally fell off— “NO!” The leader recognized that voice anywhere. Max Goof bolted to the door for his life. “Intruder!” Bradley Uppercrust threw the slimed whip to the cohort, “Finish it!” Before he turned around and sprinted up the black metal stairs— The loud clanks of the platform got closer to the kid. He ran back through the tunnel nearly tripping on the stone— A hand thrust into the robe and brought out the Gamma communication device— “Lock the door!” The other didn’t bother to listen. He wrestled with the velvet tapestry and practically jumped up the stairs, advancing 3 steps at a time as far as his legs could stretch— “Come on!” grabbing a stronghold on the shimmering handle and trying to pull the heavy wooden slab open. It wouldn’t budge. The golden eye on the opposite side was all of a sudden mocking—glittering with malice. “Max— Pushing the door in. Nothing. “Max.” A hand pressed on his shoulder. … “What, are you doing here?? WHAT— The boy whirled around and nearly smashed the jaw. Even with blood spurting of his mouth, it seemed that Brad didn’t feel a thing—“What the hell are you doing here I TRUSTED YOU!” “LIKE HELL YOU DID!” A black hooded figure peeked from the hidden entrance, “Boss?” He slammed Max against the stained glass window and shielded him from the other’s view— “Get back in there and finish the goddamned job!” The cohort scuttled back into the cave. Something foul welled up inside the kid’s being, driving him to vertigo and hysteria— “Let go of me—“What the hell are you doing here?” repeating the same question over and over while leading him to the nearest door on the other side of the grand steps. Max kicked and spat, doing everything to squirm away from his supernatural grasp. “Let go!” failing to burn holes into hell-filled eyes. Max couldn’t look him in the face, darkened beyond comprehension—a flash of red within the orbs disappeared just as quick when the barrier opened— “WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING HERE?!” Max’s body reeled to the hardwood floor of the storage room. Metal beams leaning against the bare claustrophobic walls clattered violently as the door slammed shut. Thick rolls of linen fell out of the shelves and almost hit the lying weight on the ground with a thunk. He looked up in time to a shattering of glass, a small mirror that swung off the hook of the other side. The man in stained robes took a hard foot on the boy’s stomach to which he yelped in pain before kicking him on the side—“I fuckin’ trusted you, Goof.” The same dress shoe dug the neck to the cold surface— “Brad!” Choking—“Bra--!” Now laying on top on him, the high priest pierced his incisors into Max’s shoulder, not to pleasure, but to harm—“Aagh!— Wrapping a hand around the windpipe while the other took out a foreign object from the hidden pocket, “I could kill you right now.” The glint of silver in the moonlight— “No!!” Jutting away from under the predator and clambering to his sore feet before tripping on a loose piece of cloth into the wall without a door. “You were not supposed to know about this. Ever—” For as long as you live. The point was inches away from his gut. The dog palpitated, breathing frantic—about to vomit—“Please don’t! Don’t!” “Good night, Goof Boy.” Max bought himself time the only way he knew how. He threw a quick punch to Bradley’s stomach and began wrestling with the hand carrying the dagger— Knowing that the possessed jock wouldn’t quit, he had to play his trump card. “You wouldn’t—” A rough tongue went up the neck and down to the shoulder blade, the boy pulling the fabric out of the way, letting a trail flow down tan flesh. The mouth kissed where the jugular veins connected, and traveled up with the exposed muscle to Adam’s Apple. When the grip on the weapon loosened, he took his chance to bury it within the other – The man growled in sudden fury and fought back even as the dagger hit the wood. Max tasted blood, but not just within Bradley’s mouth. Both tore away from each other. He could feel his lip split under the tongue’s pressure— “Brad!” Wrapping himself around the bloodied cloak, “Brad—” whispering as sensual as a child could be, running his palms within the damp keratin, “fuck me.” It was as if, he wanted to wipe away the memory of what he had just witnessed. “Bradley, fuck me.” The thick brows furrowed together and two calloused hands shook the boy’s shoulders violently— “Are you insane?!” Throwing Max into the metal beams— “Why would I want you now?! WHY?!” White hot tears from the rejected soul. The young man began to speak in a language not his own, “You will stay here until I come back. I’m locking the door.” “Brad! Wait!!” “You’re not going anywhere.” The wood shocked back in place—Max stumbled to the tiny window filtering in the light of the full moon with a loose beam and broke it open. He could feel the glass cut into his arms as the projectile flew from his mouth, “uggh… no..” spitting out the excess. He couldn’t cease his flagrant weeping. He fell to the floor and buried his reddened face into gloved hands… What have I gotten myself into?!

----------

[polymathemawrites]

Restart in Recovery Mode Chapter One

Cw: mentions of past suicide, gore, ptsd, severe trauma, depictions of injuries, drugs

Gordon begins recovering from Black Mesa, not that he’s aware that’s whats happening

4 Hours after Xen

Gordon is contemplating the tangled mess of his hair in his bathroom mirror. He'd had to cut the hair band out and with it had come a mess of dried-blood clumps and tangled hair. This is the last step before he can wash Xen off of him, wash Black Mesa clean from his skin. He's already pried himself out of the HEV suit, each excruciating piece after the other taking more time than the last as he'd gone from extremities to core.

The morphine injection site is a mottled bruised red from the sheer amount of drug the suit had been pumping into his system and it's a brilliant collar that rings his neck. It's the last thing his eyes focus on and the last thing that is sharp clarity when he takes his glasses off and carefully places them on the bathroom countertop. The spray is hard and hot and he closes his eyes against it and lets his body shift sideways till his weight is held up by the frankly freezing shower wall but he doesn't have the energy or ability to keep himself upright long enough for the arduous task of scrubbing away days of trauma. So it's the cold tile wall and the water running down the drain tinged red and slow mechanical movements.

He can't see them clearly for shit, but each swipe of the ragged washcloth reveals new bruises. The HEV suit had clearly kept him alive but at a toll he should have been recovering from in a hospital instead of his rent-past-due apartment.

Fuck that, he wasn't going to a hospital where the government could track him down and put a bullet in his brain.

Predictably it wasn't the state of his body that was the most arduous task to clean up but his hair. Matted up blood, viscera he couldn't even hazard a guess as to the source of, and torn strands all made their way down to the drain to clog it up for Future Gordon to deal with.

Stretching his hands, his hands fuck, both of them God, stretching his fingers through slowly untangling strands felt like literal euphoria. Almost as good at the first hit of morphine from the suit. Which fuck, that wasn't a pleasant correlation to make actually, was that going to be a problem for Future Gordon too? Had he managed to get himself dependent on morphine too?

A week wasn't enough to give him withdrawals most likely, and as the last big mat gave way so did the tangle of his thoughts. The water felt so good, just having something touching his skin that wasn't the skin tight pressure of the HEV suit, to feel the movement and sharp sting of air against him. None of the others had been very tactile and Gordon well, he was, is. Just the sensation of his own hands, of the brush of the cloth over his skin is enough to nearly bring him to tears. Finally managing to wash his hair does, and he cries silently, hanging his head under the fall of water.

He's safe, but he's not safe, he isn't sure he'll ever feel or be safe again. But this is enough for now, this singular moment in time where it is him, heat, silence. Joshua is with his sister in Arizona for the summer, he's safe and far away from Gordon and the mess he's made of his life.

He doesn't bother with a towel, he doesn't have the physical strength to prop himself up long enough to dry himself. Instead he crawls into his bed, wet hair on the pillows as if he could give a single fuck because it's an actual pillow, it's his pillow in his bed, in the relative quiet of his suburban neighborhood apartment in this small not-so-gated community.

Before he's even fully stretched out on the bed the thick scrambling fingers of sleep are reaching up to pull him down. Thick as gossamer, tangling and tugging on his consciousness. There is a moment of strange deja vu as the last thing his blurry eyes register is not the pain-red-brown-green of the bruising of his jugular but a faintly pleasant and nigglingly familiar blue. Sleep has a stranglehold on him and he's down before the slow caress of a hand down the bare expanse of his spine can even register.

18 hours after Xen

Gordon wakes up extremely dehydrated, his head throbbing, stumbling to the bathroom finds the rest of his body is a mess of similar aches and pains. When he's swallowing naproxen via handfuls of water brought from the tap to his mouth by cupped hands, he manages to catch sight of his blurry reflection in the mirror.

After putting on his glasses he finds he sort of wishes he hadn't. He looks in the words of a dead extraterrestrial or somefuck entity, a bit shit. He feels worse than he looks. His stomach is threatening to eat itself, his throat is dry, his skin is simultaneously on fire and numb. His nude form is absolutely painted with bruises.

In the bright mid-day light coming in through the frosted glass of the bathroom window he can make out the faintest ring of scar tissue around the circumference of his right arm. While walking around his apartment naked had been the first thing a young adult Gordon Freeman had done when he rented his first apartment solo, he was begining to feel entirely too underdressed and unshielded. After finally getting the damned thing off, not having the thick layers of insulation protecting him against the rest of the world made him feel naked even with the pullover and slacks he pulled on. Summer in New Mexico wasn't a pleasant season to be pulling on a cardigan but he pushed up the AC to compensate, the sound of the overhead vents pushing out recycled air was familiar in a nausteating way.

When he was stuck in Black Mesa all he could think about was getting out, getting free, breathing the sun-baked air of the outside world. Standing now in his living room he could not fathom the idea of going outside. Loud, uncompromising, dangerous. He needed therapy, probably way more help than even therapy, he needed a bleached brain. This wasn't like walking in to the garage to find his father in the family van, brain matter splattered on the driver-side window from where he'd shot himself in the head. This wasn't like the years of moving and pulling up roots, of never making friends for longer than a few months, this was so much more, so much thicker.

Fuck.

Fuck, fuck, fuck, and the quiet is closing in on him, the sound of the AC isn't enough, his own breathing is going fast, his heart feels like a violent creature burrowing into his chest, he's sweating and cold all at the same time. He probably bruises his pelvis slamming against the kitchen counter in front of the wall-mounted telephone but whats one more bruise to a body full of them. His hands scramble against the receiver and the number pad, the dialtone is the counterpoint to his mental breakdown.

"Hello, this is Tommy Coolatta!"

"T-tommy, hey, hey bud it's, it's Gordon." "Hello Mr. Freeman! It's so good to hear from you!" In the background there is a bark, Sunkist.

Gordon bends double against the counter till his forehead hits the faux marble, cool sinking into his skin, he laughs short shaky sounds, his heartrate crescendos, a cresting wave, it feels like rapture when it drops.

"Hey, how are you, how are you doing?" Please don't ask it back, he's not sure how he could even respond, he doesn't know.

“I’m really good! I was about to take Sunkist to the dog park, would you like to come?”

He doesn’t think his nerves can stand it but he says yes anyway.

[frostedrage]

Fucking Honesty...

Exhilarating described it aptly.

Not unfamiliar, that surge of power, the rush of spellcasting, of mastering new knowledge, of pitting herself against the intangible fabric of the universe and forcing it to obey. But still thrilling. Still ecstasy in so very many ways. 

And losing herself in it kept her busy. Kept her mind preoccupied, away from thoughts that had chased themselves ragged through her mind, leaving her unable to sleep, angry and with no one handy to take such rage out upon. Of all the times for Seifer to not be readily at hand...

Knowing full well that ignoring the issue would resolve nothing, Anna set out to do precisely that. Ignore it. Absolutely ignore it with all the inflexible willpower she’d developed over years of necromancy, opposition and hatred. When she put her mind to something, nothing had yet stopped her. This couldn’t possibly be different, and so Anna had fled to the depths of Coerthas to hide from her own thoughts in a wild bloody rush of spellslinging and stabbing. 

With blood freezing on her ankles, snow clumped in her hair, the rush of aether flowing through her veins, Anna kept the thoughts at a comfortable distance. Very good at pretense, she acted as if her mind wasn’t circling back to the situation with Seifer, to their shared history, to the frightening, undefined future. 

And realizing she’d fallen into pretending she wasn’t thinking about what she was thinking about, Anna snarled, blew a nearby tree into burning splinters and stalked back to the small makeshift camp she’d tossed together earlier. A loose stump with a rough cushion, a small fire ready to be lit, a heap of blankets--although Anna missed the luxuries she’d once demanded, she found such things to be... less of a priority than they had been. 

Swathed in heavy wool, the fire burning at her feet, Anna set her elbows on her knees, her chin in her hands and fixed her eyes on the wavering flames. 

All right. Let’s think about it. 

Problems always had simple solutions, once they’d been broken down to the essentials. The same process surely worked for relationship problems, and oh how she grimaced at even thinking such a thing. 

Gods, they’d never had “problems” before. They’d just done what they were going to do, regardless of what anyone said, even each other. 

...which, of course, was the thing which had caused... problems... 

Gods damn it all. 

Anna gritted her teeth. Fucking honesty. Never again would she engage in such a stupid waste of time, sitting and sorting out feelings and relationships and... Ugh. She loathed it. And that loathing was the greatest assistant. She hated what she had to do so very much that Anna’s determination buckled down to ensure it only had to be done once. 

Essentials. First step--break the problem down into the essentials. All right. The essential issue, as far as she could see, was that neither she nor Seifer had ever been happy together. And the complication to that issue was, quite frankly, that she would kill him before giving him up. 

Oh, she knew if he stated baldly that he wanted another and left, she’d allow it. And Anna would even give him a brief period before returning to simply kill him. For all that she occasionally played with the idea of letting him go, Anna didn’t actually believe it would happen. Nor, it seemed, did Seifer have any inclination to give her up. 

So. They weren’t happy, but they wanted each other. 

All right, now what? 

Teeth grinding together, Anna dug her claws into her palms, sitting upright and staring at the fire with all her might. As breaking the problem down that far didn’t immediately present a solution, she clearly hadn’t reached the essentials. Time to push further. Gods, why was this so hard? Anna knew she had intellect, will and wit; all three coming together had always brought her success in the past. And none of it had been this gods damned difficult. 

An impatient puff of air blew a few strands of her shimmering hair from her downy cheek; she settled her elbows on her knees, plopped her chin back onto her palms and fixed her gaze on the fire. 

Essentials. Bare essentials. If neither of them had been happy, there had to be a why behind that. Sex had never been a problem; their proclivities matched perfectly, as did their ferocity and strength of desire. Morals--or the lack thereof--never caused an issue; they saw eye-to-eye on many points and hadn’t argued over whether what the other did was wrong. Only inconvenient. Ambition... They shared it. Tastes, they also shared, albeit she loved mint and he didn’t.

Anna blinked. Her brow furrowed. 

What the fuck? They should’ve been perfectly happy. Both of them even sought out reasons to fight with each other because neither of them enjoyed bland, lifeless conversations. And those fights often ended in bed, with each well satisfied and often chatting easily or laughing. 

What was missing then?

Unused to grappling with problems that couldn’t be immediately solved with the application of magical force, Anna scowled at the fire. Perhaps she was overthinking the entire thing. They’d gotten along just fine in the past, indiscretions and arguments aside. And hadn’t she been remarkably generous? Two lovers. Not one, but two she had promised he could have. Considering Seifer’s tendency to wander, that allowance of such in her statement of what their marriage would be had merit. And didn’t limit him to only the same two. If he wished to drop one and find a new lover, Anna would only complain if he tried keeping more than two at once. 

Who could possibly ask for more than that? Why had he been so damnably insistent that i-

Anna frowned, her ears sagging back against her hair. Closing her eyes, she thought hard, dredging up his face when she’d turned to look at him after stating her terms. What had been on his face? What had it been? Disappointment? If he thought she’d let him run loose without so much as a say in the matter...

Teeth worried at her lower lip. She thought harder, wishing this was simply a matter of killing enough people. Not disappointment, exactly, but... something similar. And Anna scoffed. Had he imagined she’d do the same thing all over again? Fighting against his damnable nature that sent him chasing after any woman that caught his eye? 

...not... that he’d done much of that during their marriage. 

Anna frowned. 

Now that she actually thought about it, the only lover Seifer had taken had been Narasen, and even that had been after she’d broken her own demands by bedding Kona. He’d had opportunity, certainly, but... 

Was it... possible that Seifer could manage commitment...? Anna’d considered it, briefly, when they’d first become lovers, but expecting too much of him felt like putting a noose about her neck. She hadn’t looked for more than another bond between them, strengthening those already present; something else to share. If he’d been looking for something else...

Anna’s jaw clenched; her eyes sparked with a sudden, sharp fury. 

“Gods damned idiot if you wanted something more why the fuck didn’t you say so?!”

Her abrupt, furious shriek brought a drift of snow down onto her shoulders. The icy powder chilling her neck did nothing to cool Anna’s temper, and the fire gusted up, flaring brightly in sympathy. 

How dare that bastard make her do all this work? Where the fuck did Seifer get off acting mopey and morose after years of not saying a single fucking word to her? If he’d wanted a lover and a wife instead of a good fuck and a partner in crime, he gods damned well should’ve said so. 

And he hadn’t even offered being faithful...! Made her demand it, suspect it wouldn’t last, break it herself...! The ass.

Knuckles white, Anna threw her blankets off and snatched her staff from where it leaned against the cliff wall. The need to absolutely murder something had taken over; she wouldn’t be able to think straight until surrounded by corpses and coated in the ash they gave off after being incinerated. 

And once she had calmed a bit, she would clean up and then go throttle him.

[iwannafuckyexiu]

A TEASE A DAY BRINGS YOU CLOSER TO YOUR DEATH  005

FACEPALM-KUN AND THE ABANDONED RAMEN between the yandere, sunshine boy, tsundere, shy boy, kuudere, which one would you choose?

Y/N stretches his arms, yawning as he makes his way towards the school gate in a drowsy approach. He ended up getting home by eleven thirty at night and stowed into the arms of Morpheus at two in the morning, scrubbing off the filth on his body before he went to sleep - which took the most time, even more than the time used to scroll through his phone.

The mob before the school invades Y/N's sight as he walks along the sidewalks towards the gate. "Damn what's with that crowd, is like a celebrity coming to our school or something?" he mumbles, nearing the horde, he recognises them as reporters from all the biggest news platforms in Japan, "oh wait, our school is filled with celebrities."

Spotting a familiar person whilst he attempts to wedge his way towards the entrance, he taps the guy's shoulder, "Hey, blonde guy it's you again."

"Heyyy! "

"What?!" the blonde guy yells through the rowdy flock of reporters, head yanking in Y/N's direction, his brows crumpled up and his eyelids tapered as he tries not to get squeezed to the side by the others.

"You know what's going on?" Y/N squints his eyelids as he gestures towards the mass of people in front of the school gate with his chin.

"I don't know, look yourself!"

The blonde guy tweaks his head back and thrust himself through the reporters with brute force, Y/N closely tracking behind his back, hand suspended mid-air throughout the entire fatiguing process of mashing into people and making an attempt to enter the school grounds without letting any reporters in.

"Wow, intense exercise early in the morning," Y/N comments as he walks along the corridor to his class with the blonde guy beside him, not minding that his uniform is wholly crinkled up and hair coiled with strands poking out, an untroubled grin stretches his cheeks.

"Oh, here's my stop, I'll see you later!" they pass by the class 1a door and Y/N bids his farewell to the blonde guy with a blow kiss - in which the latter clicks his tongue then turns his head away to (his scarlet neck rats him out).

Katsuki sits in his seat, his head lowered whilst he passes time with his phone in his palms on his table blatantly when a book is flung into his vision. He curls his hand into a fist and bashes the table, clacking his tongue in crossness.

"Who the fu-"

"Yep!" a radiant voice inserts before he can finish his sentence, even without looking up, Katsuki can pretty much guess who it is from the tonality and 'harmonious' book on the table.

"Midnight's lookin' hot on the cover there, don't ya think? " Y/N says as he bends over to flash a teasing smirk at Katsuki, crooking his head to the side, a brow raised at him.

Katsuki 'hmph'ed at the remark, ruby eyes never veering to look at Y/N, mumbling so tacitly that Y/N can barely hear it, "Fucking pervert." That's something new from the usual 'asshole' and 'fucker', Katsuki's updating his vocabulary too, damn.

To his unfriendly words, Y/N only lets out a faint chuckle, he sparingly flicks the side of Katsuki's head, "I heard that." Katsuki doesn't yell or shout at him for the action but he scowls and responds Y/N with a middle finger - which the latter gives a classic wink to.

"Aye Izuku," he greets as he strides towards his next target he is going to scourge. Y/N ruffles through Izuku's fluffy broccoli curls with one hand and the other chucks a long cardboard tube at the boy. "Here's an All Might poster since I couldn't bring the ice cream," he answers when he sees Izuku's puzzled cast on his features.

"Thanks!" Izuku says, dipping his head to convey himself, the corners of his eyes curving into arcs as wells as his pinkish lips.

"Also," Y/N begins while he tows a seat from the currently empty desk beside, straddling the chair with his arms tending on the top rail, "did you speak to that hedgehog there after school or something yesterday?"

"...how did you know?" Izuku first nods his head then twists his head and questions Y/N, green pupils peering agape at him.

"Saw it when I was running to work."

"Ah ... yeah, he said he's going to be number one from now on."

"Ahahahah, sounds like him," Y/N quenches a howl as he peeps at Katsuki from the side, visualising him shouting at Izuku like a tsundere schoolgirl: 'I-I-I'm going to be number one from now on, don't you bastard underestimate me!!'. The imagination of Katsuki doing that is too wicked, too wicked - Y/N heaves a sigh to himself at the overly whimsical thought.

"Also-oh, Aizawa's here I'm gonna go back."

As Y/N's words died down, he inches his way to his seat at the back of the room to prevent that yellow condom from calling him out for not being in his seat again, he's not one for attention you know.

"Good work on yesterday's combat training, I saw the video and results," Aizawa heaps slight praise to his students, his hand setting down his stack of papers on the desk at the front. "Bakugou, you're talented so don't act like a kid," his sagging eyes slothfully roves to Katsuki as he speaks of him briefly, gaze full of disdain.

"I know," Katsuki shifts his gaze to his left whilst he says with an overt frown, leaving the rest of the class dumbfounded at his unexpectedly composed temper.

"Hey slap me."

"Ow-oh my god, it's real."

"And Midoriya," Izuku instantly straightens up and tucks his arms atop his lap at the mention of his name from Aizawa, "you settled it by breaking your arm again, huh? You can't keep making the excuse that you can't control your quirk. I don't like saying the same thing over and over again. But as long as you fix that issue, you'll have a lot of things you'll be able to do."

"Feel a sense of urgency, Midoriya," Aizawa winds up his remarks on Izuku, in which the boy replies him with a firm 'hai! ', gushing with a youth's determination.

"Now let's get down to homeroom business, I'm sorry I didn't warn you beforehand but today I'll have you ..." letting his voice dwindle off, Aizawa has everyone put their heart in their mouths.

"Is he gonna say that he's resigning?"

"...Decide on a class representative."

Everyone sets about hoisting their arm up and screeching for Aizawa to pick them, almost sounding like a certain 101's theme song: "pick me! ". To all the ruckus going on in the classroom, Y/N just huddles his head between his weaved arms on the desk and sinks into sleep's deadly arms.

"Silence!"

The class quietens down at once straight after Iida's shout, and all eyes are bonded to his now-standing figure. Iida clinches an arm high up in the air but interposes to his classmates, "This is not something that just anybody could do! This is a job that requires leadership skills! Everyone's trust in you is required in order to be a good leader ... so we should vote! "

"Why did you suggest that?"

"We even don't know each other very well yet, how are we supposed to trust?" ribbit ribbit queries, stoking up the other students' pertinent comments.

"Everybody's gonna vote for themselves anyway."

"That's exactly why the person with most votes should become class president," Iida prods up his glasses with his fingers, the lens glistening in the artificial light, he turns to Aizawa (who's nearly asleep), "don't you agree, sensei?"

"Tsk whatever, just choose one before class ends," Aizawa says moodily and zips his yellow sleeping bag up to return to his slumber, making sure it's soundproof.

So everyone agrees to use the method Iida suggested. One after another, they walk to the front to vote for the most suitable person to be class president, including Y/N who awoken when Iida silenced the class. And too waspish from his interrupted nap, he scratches his mark beside the first name he sees on the blackboard and walks back to his seat as if a zombie.

Bypassing to when they reveal the final results of the mini-referendum, Izuku got three votes, sealing his class representative position, and Yaoyorozu got two votes, making her vice president.

"Deku? Who voted for him?!"

And Katsuki is back to his regular self, brimming with rage. The class now think that maybe a calm Katsuki isn't that bad, they want that him back.

、、、

"That took too fucking long!" Y/N grumbles to the mustard and ketchup duo as he cautiously rambles towards the table they're on, balancing a warm (and heavy, Y/N doesn't forget to mention) bowl of noodles on his tray.

"You could've chosen something else to eat you know ramen's one of the most popular choices between students," Denki pokes fun at him with a suppressed smile by his lips, then giggling at the boy's strange posture while he settles the tray onto the table.

"I was just craving it too much, after rewatching Naruto and Shippuden over last night."

"Ai ..." Y/N emits a lasting and theatrical sigh, he sways his head at Denki. "You won't get it, bro," he says perplexingly, acting profound and inscrutable to the two.

"But I get you," the ketchup of the duo who has been silent for the past conversation finally speaks, giving the male opposite him a 'yes I get you bro' expression which Y/N responds with his hand pounding on his chest lightly.

Y/N lifts his chopsticks up, dredging up a clump of noodles from the soup, ready to eat it all up when a resonant toll sets off within the canteen.

"Just as I was gonna take a sip," he snarls and tosses his chopsticks in the bowl, pressing his lips together as he gets up from his seat, "Shitting hell, in the single moment I just blank out a bit they all run out."

Y/N ventures out the canteen and around the hallways, he attempts to pinpoint where exactly the others are but he only ends up astray from his destination. And on the fourth time of laying his eyes on the same wall after roaming around, again and again, his mentality snaps.

"AHHHH, DENKI YOU FORGOT TO BRING ME ALONG!" Y/N howls in the hallway to his heart's content, off-track in his breakdown, not noticing the presence nearby, "first I don't get to eat my ramen, then I get lost." He leans against a wall and slouches down to perch himself on the ground slowly, the lesions from the day before twinging as his skin smears against the solid surface.

"What fucking sorcery is this?!"

Finally quelling down, Y/N turns his head to skim his surroundings when a dim figure by a wall grasps his eyes, he shrinks his eyelids at the direction, "Hold on, is that a person there?"

"H-"

"You better shut your fucking mouth up or I'll disintegrate you," before he even speaks the silhouette lashes out at him and shows himself from the shadows.

His voice is husky, coarse and guttural, but tone simmering through into Y/N soul with spite and malice. Giving a hasten glimpse at his appearance - slender yet fit figurine, unkempt but appealing ultramarine locks - Y/N supposes the face behind those slightly greyed but dainty and slim fingers is not bad too.

"Okay, okay," Y/N says in a reposeful manner, taciturnly distancing himself from the clearly perilous man just close by, his features malformed into a grovelling cast.

"Tsk tsk tsk, looks good but seems too yandere," Y/N mutters in a low tone, darting a sidelong glance at facepalm-kun, his tongue pricking out to moisten his chapped lips.

"What?"

"Nothing." Y/N works towards a canon ball shape, burrowing his head further into his knees to minimise his existence to the brink.

The man hums shortly then reaches his hand towards Y/N direction, he intimidates him, "Don't tell anyone about me, or else ..." His single veined eye pops in Y/N direction menacingly, sending the latter's hair and goosebumps raising in cold blood.

Even when Y/N sets back to his class, he can still recollect the blood-curdling aura the man dispersed from a single stare. Worn out from the taut tension with the man before, Y/N drapes himself across his desk as he gapes at one place blankly until Denki calls him.

"Y/N! Y/N!"

"Where did you go just now?" Denki asks, eyes enlarged at Y/N's figure without the slightest cut since he didn't find him beside him during the drill, which gave him a great shock.

"Oh, uh ... the bathroom you know, I had to pee real quick," tilting his head to the side to act above suspicion, he gives Denki an answer full of faults.

But Denki doesn't uncover him, he plaits his fingers through Y/N's hair, tousling his curls, he says to him with fondness. "You're lucky it's just a fraud or you might just get in trouble with the villains."

Hahhahhahahhahaahhahaa.

He did.

"But it's a fraud this time, so I'm fine!" Y/N draws a viscid grin to show, he lifts his brows at Denki and provokes, "see, you can pinch me to test!" Denki hoists a hand up and harshly nips at Y/N's waist, muting his laugh as he sees the boy's twisted expression from the force of it.

"Ow ow ow! Not that hard!" yelling at him whilst also smacking his hand away repeatedly, Y/N gnaws on his bottom lip as the mark throbs for a few seconds, his E/C irises blazing holes through Denki.

"Hm, just as noisy as always," Denki jokes with him, stroking his chin with two fingers in a pondering position.

"Tsk."

"Oh, there comes Aizawa, I gotta go back to my seat."

"Talk to you later, see you~"

"Can I say something?" Izuku steps up all of a sudden, fists clasped by his sides, chin tipped upwards with determination. "I think-I think that Iida is more capable for the position of the class president! He managed to calm the crowd down during the drill, so I think he's the most suited for this job," the poor boy's body quavers slightly as he announces to the class, eyes meandering everywhere.

"I agree with Midoriya."

"Me too, Iida was kinda a good leader just now."

"Like everyone literally just stopped talking when he flew up and said his thing."

"Same."

"Alright, if you're all done with that, then listen to me." Everyone hush down at the din of Aizawa's sluggish voice.

"We'll be participating in a rescue simulation for your basic hero training class," Aizawa starts lazily, ignoring everyone's roars at how excited they are for the event and resumes to speak, "this time you can decide whether you will wear your hero costume or not, because for some people it may be restricting."

"We're going there by bus since the training is going to be outside of the school grounds," he explains whilst he removes his hands that were propping himself up from the desk.

"That's all, now get ready."

TO NOTE

soooo updates are gonna be slower after this chapter because my holiday's ending! yayyyyyyy

but yeah updates will be slower and most likely too slow.

[ad-drew]

The Shaman Society | An Excerpt, Part 7

And I’m back with another excerpt from my WIP! Second draft continues to come along well, as I’m a little more than 1/3 of the way through it now. Once I’ve finished this draft, I’m cnosidering opening it up for betareaders, if anyone’s interested. I’m not really sure where in the process you’re supposed to look for betareaders though, so maybe that’s too early?

In any case, enjoy the new excerpt, with Christine being way too kind for her own good, and Rei being super protective.

Tagging: @mania-junkie-writes​

If you want to be added to my humble tag list, just send me a message and I’ll be happy to do so!

---

After paying for the saddest meal of a single ham and cheese sandwich, a side of carrots and dip, and half a pint of milk, Rei carried her tray towards the back of the cafeteria. Goddamn, these lunches were getting worse. And for three bucks? Freaking highway robbery.

“Still can’t believe your cousin is a shaman too,” said Christine, pulling in stride next to her. She’d opted for the ever classic PB&J, and a side of celery. Chocolate milk, of course. “I guess she did sort of have an intimidating vibe, but who’d have guessed?”

“Yeah, tell me about it.” Rei turned through the back row of tables towards the far corner of the cafeteria. “Not much better on the job, either. Still got a massive pole shoved up her ass.”

“Oh, I’m sure it’ll get better. You haven’t known each other long, is all. I mean, you’re family, right? You’ll work it out.” Christine paused, blinking towards the corner of the room. Behind the vending machines sat a small, lonely table, falling apart with several loose stools. Rei and Christine always sat there, if only because no one else ever did. At least, not since today. “Who’s that?”

Rei squinted at the figure. No telling whether it was a guy or girl, due to the overly large hoodie, with hood pulled tight around the head. The student sat hunched over a food tray, but wasn’t eating. Just staring, as though lost in thought. Or maybe there was some fascinating riddle buried in their sandwich.

Taking a few steps closer for a better angle, Rei tilted her head to see a few dangling strands of blonde hair falling from beneath the hood, along with a taped nasal splint over the figure’s nose. “The fuck? It’s Jessica.”

Christine let out a quiet gasp. “What on earth is she doing here?”

“Beats me. That’s our table.”

“I meant at school. I’d have thought she’d take a few days after what happened. Do we talk to her?”

Rei stiffened. “What? No. Why?”

“Uh, because she was attacked by monsters? Because she watched her friends die? Because she saw you in your shaman getup?” With each point Christine made, Rei’s grimace deepened. “Besides, she is at our table.”

“Alright, fine.” Rei huffed towards the table. And here she’d been hoping not to cause another scene on her first day back. “Just don’t go forgetting who we’re talking to.”

Jessica jumped so high when Rei and Christine sat down, she nearly fell out of her seat. When she steadied herself, she snapped a look back and forth between them with wild, bloodshot eyes. Rei stared in surprise. She’d only ever seen Jessica Palmer as the perfectly groomed pretty girl with flawless hair and preppy makeup. The girl sitting across from her was a disaster.

Jessica blinked through fresh tears, wet lines streaking into a sticky mess on her cheeks. She hadn’t put on makeup today, and if she’d showered this morning Rei couldn’t tell. Tight clumps of unbrushed hair hung like a sickly veil in front of her face. She peered out through the blonde strands, eyes puffy and soaked. Less Jessica Palmer, more Creepy Drowned Girl from The Ring.

“So…” Rei cleared her throat. “Why are you at our table?”

“Rei. Tact,” said Christine, with an exasperated glare. To Jessica, she added, “I’m so sorry for what happened, I mean it. Is there anything we can do to help?”

Rei grumbled, but remained silent. Damn it, Christine—way too caring for her own good.

Jessica’s entire body broke into a rapid stutter, fingers tapping incessantly across the tabletop. Words came out in cracked, breathless sentences. “I—I wasn’t sure… Didn’t know where else to—I can’t… I’m not…”

When Jessica’s voice fell into indistinct whispering, Christine offered a consoling nod. “It’s okay, take your time.”

Ever so slightly, the jittering in Jessica’s arms and legs lessened. Her voice remained a hoarse whisper. “They think I’m crazy. But I’m not—I need to know I’m not crazy. Please, tell me I’m not crazy.”

“Who thinks you’re crazy?” As if sensing the imminent snide comment, Christine shot another look towards Rei. Damn. Christine knew her too well.

Jessica gazed across the cafeteria towards a pair of tables near the center. A group of girls in short skirts and low cut tops sat at one. At the other, boys with neat haircuts and T-shirts two sizes too small, showing off their barely developed teen muscles. They laughed and joked, their overbearing voices carrying loudest over the mindless chatter of the cafeteria. The typical crowd Jessica usually ran with, outside of Tammy and Sarah. Bunch of popular pricks.

“When I told them what happened, they said I was—they said awful things. For getting Tammy and Sarah killed. Said I was making it up. Or high. Or…” She choked on a hiccup, grabbed at the sides of her head. “But I’m not! What I saw… It was real! Wasn’t it?”

Well, shit. Yesterday had screwed with Jessica something fierce. For good reason, maybe, but still—she was a wreck. And as cathartic as it was seeing Jessica wallow in some of her own medicine, given the circumstance, the whole thing left a bitter-sweet tang on the back of Rei’s tongue.

Keeping her voice low, Rei leaned in and said, “No, you’re not crazy, alright? Those monsters that attacked you, what you saw—it was real.”

Jessica sucked in a quivering breath, combined with what sounded like half a sob and half a laugh. Relief spread across her tear-streaked face, and with a nervous swallow she looked straight at Rei with all the wonder of a child discovering candy for the first time. “What was all that? The thing attacked that us, what you did—what you were wearing. And that weapon… You fought those monsters?”

Rei looked away. “It’s—it’s complicated. Nothing you need to worry about. Honestly, the less you know the better.”

“Oh. Right.” Jessica shrank into her seat, once again staring at her food. Her voice squeaked, barely audible over the chatter of the cafeteria. “You saved me. Both of you. I could have died like Tammy and Sarah, but you saved my life. After everything I’ve done to you, how awful I’ve been… Why?”

Christine balked, her brow lifting. “Look, I know we don’t get along, and yeah, you’ve been…not great to me. But it’s like we told you yesterday. That doesn’t mean we want you dead.”

Rei forced an angry snort through her nose. Staring Jessica dead in the eyes, she said, “If I’m being completely real, Jess, you’re a bitch. To me, to Christine, and anyone else who doesn’t fit your perfect little mold. If I never had to see you again it would be too soon.”

Christine’s mouth fell open, but Rei continued, “But you’re still a person, and my job is to protect people. Even the ones I hate. So yeah, I wasn’t gonna let you die, and I’m sorry I wasn’t in time to save your friends. But that doesn’t mean we’re suddenly on good terms, got it?”

“Rei!” Christine leaned in with a harsh whisper. “That was too far!”

“No, it’s fine,” said Jessica, shrinking deeper beneath her hood. “I deserved it. For what it’s worth, I won’t give you two anymore problems. I swear.”

Rei entered a silent argument with Christine, both shaking their heads at each other and whispering without words. She knew that look. Whatever Christine was thinking next, she wasn’t going to like it. Sure enough, Christine flat out ignored Rei’s insistent muttering, turning back to Jessica with the mother of all horrible ideas.

“So, we have a Physics test next week.” When Jessica looked at her, Christine smiled. “Maybe you’d want to come by my place later, and we can study? Might take your mind off things.”

Before Jessica could answer, Rei grabbed Christine’s hand and pulled her away from the table. “A word. Now.”

When they were out of earshot from the table, Christine yanked her hand away. “Rei, what’s the matter with you?”

“‘What’s the matter?’ Look, I get it. What happened to Jessica was awful, and you feel sorry for her, but come on! This is Jessica Palmer! The same girl who’s tormented you the past three years, even before you came out! And it only got worse after that, you remember?”

“Do I remember?” Christine’s brow fell low in a cold glare. “It’s been my life, Rei. That’s not something you forget. But that doesn’t mean I can’t show a little compassion. She’s clearly in a bad place, and I don’t see anyone else trying to help her. We’re the only other ones who even know what happened!”

“Okay, sure, show some compassion. Doesn’t mean you have to invite her over for a damn study party!”

“Look, it’s not like I’m trying to be besties with her or anything, and nobody knows the shit she’s done to me better than I do. Obviously. But it can’t hurt to show her some support, right?”

“Of course it can hurt. Because we know her. She’ll turn right back around and treat you like shit, the way she always does.”

Christine huffed through her nose and glanced towards the table. Jessica sat staring at her food tray, twiddling her fingers together. “Maybe, but people can change. If you give them the chance.”

With a frustrated groan, Rei pinched her fingers against her eyes. “Know what? Fine. You wanna go study with your arch-nemesis, have at it. I got other things to do tonight, anyway.”

[ephemeral-writings]

ninety-four; sehun

14. wind

sehun x reader

word count: 1.5k of something that started too long ago and barely got finished now whoops

The bleachers were filled to the brim with students, teachers, and parents alike. Everyone wanted to witness the football championship of SM High. You personally didn’t know a thing about the sport except how to win which was to run the double-pointed end ball to the other side. You weren’t even going to pretend you knew which side was your school running.

But speaking of running, you watched as the players warmed up, some running, others stretching. Player Ninety-four was especially under your radar even while you squeezed through the throngs of spectators to where your best friend was supposedly seated.

“Over here, Y/N!” You spotted Yeseul in the third row to the field, waving you over. Naturally, you checked your vicinity to see if one, was it safe to walk down the steps, and two because you felt his stare. You cursed Yeseul under your breath for shouting your name so loud. No doubt was it a sly tactic to catch his attention.

Oh Sehun, SM High senior football player and co-captain, was staring straight at you. Yeseul had caught wind, courtesy of her boyfriend Kim Minseok, that the stoic jock had taken an interest in you. You hadn’t believed her at first, brushing off the matter since there was no way Oh Sehun would suddenly find you pleasing to the eyes or charming to no end. There was just no way.

However, when you finally reached Yeseul and sat down, you looked up again, and he was still staring at you, as if his eyes had followed you through the whole journey down the metal bleachers. It wasn’t until Minseok in his matching jersey, save for the number ninety-nine etched on his back, ran up to Sehun and clapped him on the back did he look away.

“What was that?” Yeseul gasped. “He was practically undressing you with his eyes!”

An older couple who sat a row in front whipped their heads back, shooting Yeseul a scandalous look.

“Jesus frick, can you not, Seul?” When you agreed to watch the game with her, you were only interested in testing out the theory that someone as hot at Oh Sehun could be interested in you, not for an opportunity for her to embarrass you in front of the whole football team.

It took a bit of convincing to get Yeseul to shut up about your non-existing love life, and focus on her boyfriend on the field. Minseok was a great player as far as you could see. He wasn’t the largest guy but he was agile as heck. You watched as he snuck up on the guy from the opposite who had the ball clutched under his arms, and within seconds, Minseok had him tripping and toppling over. Yeseul was all for cheering for her man at the top of her lungs.

You weren’t going to deny staring at Sehun(he was part of the game, so-- yeah), and you’d be damned if you denied finding him ten thousand times more attractive. It was different than seeing the Oh Sehun in your literature class half-heartedly listen to lectures; different than him sitting in the cafeteria table amongst his teammates, and not bother to engage in their conversations. You had never seen Oh Sehun in his element-- in this element-- in which he’s passionate and driven to win.

You found yourself drooling over his physique that seemed to epitomize that of a football player-- broad shoulders, huge pecs, thick thighs. It was the middle of autumn. Were you really getting hot and bothered right now?

As the scoreboard drew closer and closer, both teams being equally good, every one watched with bated breath as player Eighty-eight from your school ran from 40 left field to the end zone on the right. One of the player from the opposite team was literally head-to-ass chasing him. However, the guy was quickly taken down by Sehun as Eighty-eight successfully made the touchdown. The crowd went roaring. After almost two hours of investing yourself in the sport, you were quick to immerse yourself in cheering along. You screamed until your throat itched.

“C’mon! Let’s go!” Yeseul grabbed your arm and weaved you out of the bleachers, dragging you to God-knows-where.

It was dark, but you picked up the sound of a mass of baritone voices cheering and the noise got clearer the more you walked. Coming to a clearing, the stadium lights blinded you momentarily, and you realized that Yeseul had released you from her grip to run to her boyfriend. Minseok whole-heartedly took her in his arms and spun her around like the princess she was. That didn’t make you feel lonely at all. All the while, all the sweaty boys in uniform couldn’t care less about the couple, and proved so when the captain, you assumed, announced a party at his house.

The mass of sweaty young men produced a evident sound of approval, as well as clangs of shoulder pads hitting against each other as some chest bumped in the air.

“Hey, Seul,” you interrupted, jabbing a thumb over your shoulder. “I’m gonna take off now.”

“What? No! You have to come with us,” she pleaded softly, but her eyes were threatening.

“Yeah, Y/N. And you know who would love you there as well?” Minseok leaned in and grinned at you suggestively. You blushed, but make no acknowledgement to what--- who he was implying.

“It’s cool. I’m a little wiped out after all, that, so I don’t think I can handle a party.” You chuckled weakly to further emphasize your fatigue. It wasn’t particularly something you wanted to spend your Friday night doing, partying with a bunch of people from your school that you don’t even know. Plus, you had a test on Tuesday that you really should be studying for.

“Ugh, fine, killjoy. You owe me a hangout this weekend, okay?” Yeseul idea of hanging out consisted of binge watching shows while painting her nails. You never understood the concept of multitasking, especially when you knew for a fact that Yeseul couldn’t understand a single word the people on screen said without reading the captions. Nevertheless, you gave her your word, and heading off in the direction you came in from. The stadium was already empty of its spectators, and remnants of the events was made obvious from the single custodian who was weaving about the bleachers, picking up the rubbish lousy people had left.

You were nearing the gate when someone’s scuffing of shoes had you turning around. Never would you have guessed that it was Sehun who was approaching you. With a short jog, he eventually stood in front of you, and being that this was the first time you ever had direct interaction with him, you were pleasantly surprised to see how much taller he was than you; you had to crane your neck to stare at the man in the eyes.

“Hey, Y/N, right?” Sehun had to mentally remind himself to come off easy, and pretending he was unsure of your name would surely do the trick.

You, on the other note, was dumbstruck that the Oh Sehun had finally decided to approach you, after what with all the teasing coming from your best friend and her boyfriend slash his teammate that had started just shy of four months ago.

Had it not been for Sehun’s sudden sneeze, you would’ve been caught staring at his handsome face for a second too long. He was doned in a grey hoodie with the school’s logo across his (broad) chest and a pair of black sweats, a combo that should’ve deemed warm enough for the autumn night, but you noted the clumped up strands of hair that stuck to his face and realized his sweat have gone cold from the chill air.

“Bless you,” you offered with a small smile. “And yes, that’s right. Did you needed something, Sehun?”

“No, I don’t. I just...Did you needed company walking home?”

It was quite an odd sight to see the infamous perpetual poker face morph into one of a more boyish nature; Sehun even had the audacity to blush.

“Isn’t there an after-party that requires the captain’s presence?” You chuckled good-naturedly.

“Co-captain, actually, and not really. They’ve had tons of party after a win and I usually bail out, and that never stopped them from partying,” Sehun explained. “Plus, I’m beat, so, yeah.”  

“Well, if that’s the case then your presence in walking me home is welcomed.”

Sehun, who had been hanging on your every word, grinned at your witty remark, and glad that you hadn’t rejected his offer. Unfortunately, before he could say something possibly clever back, his nose began to itch again.

“Bless you,” you said, unable to stop the giggles from slipping out.

“Thank you,” Sehun sheepishly scratched his temple.

“How about we stop by the cafe near here, and I buy you a drink as a thank you?”

Sehun was more than happy to oblige, and as you got to learn about Oh Sehun through an autumn trek, you figured your best friend wasn’t entirely crazy, but you were apparently. Crazy.

Crazy for Sehun, and just luckily, he was thoroughly whipped for you. 

[kpopandcream]

Moon Day - II

Pairing: Dongmin x Reader & Yoongi x Reader

Genre: Fluff, Angst, Humour.

Warnings: Strong language, Implied smut, some dark themes.

Jungkook told you about Min Yoongi many times. How he didn’t take to strangers. How he preferred to stay unknown. How he thrived in the underbelly of society where he could do what he wanted without anyone caring. Yet, after many short talks about him, all of that information still seemed to land on deaf ears. You couldn’t remember a single thing about him except for his name, which landed you in a puddle full of milk and under a confused stare.

Word Count: 7k

Part: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9

Masterlist

Namjoon was blubbering on about god knows what and you didn’t particularly mind it. Sometimes, he’d ask a general question which Yoongi would give a one or two-word response to just to placate him. You, on the other hand, would instigate some of his babbles, catching Yoongi’s eye whenever you expected him to be annoyed but, under his serious demeanor, you watched for the small smiles and exhales of laughter.

To your surprise, Namjoon wasn’t that heavy and you managed to keep your strength for most of the way. He lived a few blocks past you, which was weird because you could’ve sworn Jungkook said you were the only person he knew who lived in this area. He called it ‘expensive’ and didn’t understand how a student could live here but, if that were the case then, just how old was Namjoon? This piqued your interest and you made a mental note to ask Kook about it later.

Joon (he said he preferred when people called him that) quieted down then, head lolling and you could feel the energy sapping from him slowly. Yoongi didn’t seem panicked, as if he’d done it all the time, but you were damn tired. The warmth of your house was the only thing on your mind, your brain tired of thinking and eyes tired of watching.

“We’re close?” You phrased the claim as a question, taking advantage of the small beat of silence.

“We’re here.”

Yoongi sounded strained and you lowered your head to see under Namjoon’s chin to see him struggling with keys in his pocket. The three of you had stopped in front of a thin, black building with long windows and large doors. Yoongi motioned you forward and you leaned the half-awake man against the wall of the building. He raised his arm, waving a hand and half mumbling something you didn’t bother to pay attention to. You simply watched his movements, making sure he’d keep himself upright and waited for Yoongi to unlock the lobby door.

The jangling of keys and occasional car passing by filled your ears with temporary noise but you hated it. You wanted music, so you hummed to keep yourself busy. Somehow, the two of you got Namjoon safely inside and in the elevator. The man clung to you, professing his love by saying how grateful he was to have friends like you there for him.

“You bet your ass you are,” Yoongi responded for the first time in a sentence longer than three words since you’d been together and you were shocked when he continued, “Jackson wouldn’t do this for you.”

“Hey!” Namjoon exclaimed loudly, earning a light shush out of you and a small apology before continuing his very intense assault on Yoongi. He extended a finger and wagged it as menacingly as he could at his friend, eyebrows scrunched together as if they were a puzzle needing to be solved and mouth curled into a frown.

“That’s… mean.”

You smiled at this, getting out first on the sixteenth floor while continuing your humming. There was no more speaking until Namjoon was in his bed. You stayed in the front of the unlocked apartment, choosing to focus on how clean everything was instead of the fact that you’d basically let two men, stronger than you, lead you into one of their houses. The faint alarms that would’ve gone off much sooner if you hadn’t been this tired started sounding and you secretly wondered if they were going to abduct you or something, but chose to believe in Jungkook’s friends. He wasn’t the worst so his friends had the be the same level of okay.

You waited for Yoongi to messily lay Namjoon down, shuffling your feet to the beat of the song in your head. The man dropped water off in his friend’s room before shutting the door and facing you.

“Was that Nas?”

You blinked. “What?”

“The song you were singing- uh, humming. Was it Nas?”

He walked out of the apartment and you followed, half wanting to ask if Namjoon would be okay alone but your brain was confused from the random start in conversation and you dismissed the question. He locked the door and walked to the elevator, not looking to see if you were coming but obviously expecting a response.

“H- How did you know?”

He shrugged, pocketing his keys and pressing the button for the elevator multiple times, as if that was supposed to make it come faster. “He’s one of my favourite artists and that’s one of my favourite songs. I’d know it anywhere.”

“Really?” The ends of your lips picked up and you couldn’t deny you were excited to meet another fan of the same music as you. He nodded, seemingly detached from the conversation and you hesitated in continuing. Slowly though, you managed to push forward and not let your fear get the best of you. You searched for his eyes as you spoke, trying not to look away when they landed on yours.

“That’s so cool. I’ve never met anyone who likes the same Nas, much less old school rap or anything that I listen to really.”

His eyebrows raised slightly to show a bit of surprise at you, walking into the elevator and taking his gaze from yours. He fixed it on the ceiling of the elevator after he hit the ground floor button and muttered, “who have you been talking to?”

“Scrubs,” you chimed, and this, he cracked a smile at.

You spent the elevator down in a stale silence, you shifting your weight back and forth and looking at the floor. Only when you got to the ground floor did he say something in response- well, kind of.

“Thank you.”

“Sorry?”

He held the lobby door open for you to leave the building. “I said thank you. I’ve been doing that for days straight now and I’m beyond tired so, thank you. It was… nice to have some help.”

You disregarded his acknowledgement of your help and attached yourself to another part of his small speech.

“For days? Is he okay?” You placed worry on your face, bowing your head as a small thank you for holding the door open for you and then walking a few paces outside the building. You inhaled slowly, taking in the late summer air.

Yoongi pressed his lips together, as if he was trying to find a way to backtrack so he could erase what he’d said. He waved a hand around lightly, settling on, “just break-up coping, I guess.”

“Oh. I’m sorry,” you found yourself saying immediately. He gave you a curious look and you felt the need to reiterate what you said. You rambled, faster than you meant to.

“Sorry to him, you know, because he’s going through a break-up and everything. Not to you because you’re not like going through the- actually no, sorry for you too because you’re tired and have to deal with that and you must have your own problems. Yeah. Sorry. That was confusing, wasn’t it?”

You forced out an awkward giggle, hand coming up to tug lightly at a clump of hair coming out of your bun. He smiled again, and you found it quite endearing.

“You say sorry too much.”

“No, I don’, I’m just trying to be polite because you just met me,” you retorted, finding an odd offense in that statement. He simply nodded.

“Meaning you’re not nice to people you’re close to?” He was instigating you and you knew it, and a small fire in you kindled. It was like he was challenging you and you loved a challenge. He remained the same half-annoyed, half-amused look the entire time as well and you felt him egg you on with just a stare.

“Is anyone? You can be meaner to the people you’re closer to because they know it’s a joke.”

“That seems backwards to me,” he deadpanned, looking you square in the eye. You opened your mouth to respond, wanting to ask if he acted any different to other people or the people he was closest to but he seemed to steal your words and rearrange them to make a completely different sentence.

“Do you need a ride home or something?”

You blinked again, struggling to find words and nearly hating how often he’d caught you off guard and made you look like a fool. You said no before you could think.

“I live just down the road,” you stated, using your thumb to point behind you. “Why do you ask?”

He struggled to come up with a response to that as well, drawing out a low ‘uh’ before stringing together a sentence. “Just don’t want to leave a girl stranded on the streets so late. It goes against the moral code I should have.”

“Should?”

Yoongi shrugged once more, easily thinking on his feet. That was something you weren’t too good at yourself and you found yourself admiring that about him. He fit his hands into the pockets of his thin, leather jacket and said, “mom raised me with the right values but I must’ve lost them somewhere along the way.”

“Ah,” you hummed, choosing not to say ‘mood’ to something for once. You shuffled your feet a bit, mulling over his response before deciding to continue on.

“I’m, uh, I’m okay though, honestly. I know my way around town well enough so.”

You nodded, more so trying to convince yourself than him. He simply looked at you for a bit longer than usual and then tore his gaze away, angling his head backwards.

With a thin smile, he rushed through his sentence. “Well, thanks again.”

“Yeah, no problem.” You pushed a tired smile on your face and he seemed somehow comforted by it, the muscles in his jaw visibly relaxing.

Turning to leave, he waved a small goodbye and you felt a bit disappointed to see him go. You raised your hand as well and turned in your spot, biting down on your bottom lip. You shouldn’t have been thinking about ways to get him to stay and talk but you were. There was a settled tug in his direction that pulled you from your stomach, the little words left unsaid and questions unanswered stretching themselves thin between you.

You hated this feeling but continued away for a few steps. It wasn’t until the tapping of shoes against pavement and a hand lying on your shoulder stopped you. Your heart seemed to pick up, always doing that when you were the slightest bit surprised by what was happening and you moved away from the hand, turning to see who it was.

You were faced with Yoongi again, his lips parted as he breathed and eyes a little wider than previously. He didn’t bother to make an excuse or apologize for frightening you in the slightest, just simply went in for his question.

“I forgot to ask you. Uh- could- could you not tell Jungkook we met?”

You paused, confused even more than before and pulling out a small, “why?”

He dismissed this quickly, which wasn’t a surprise to you really, simply waving his hand and looking mildly distressed to have to explain it. “It’s a long story, just… promise?”

He stuck out his pinky finger and you hesitated, making a face. Your mind reeled, and you felt like you were choosing between a friend and someone you hardly knew and didn’t know whose side to take. He pushed his finger the slightest bit closer to you and you stumbled for words.

“But you need to tell me why at least one day,” you spluttered, looking him in the eye. There was odd desperation there and you didn’t know how to feel about it.

Quickly, he sighed, “yeah, sure, yes. Just- just, please, promise.”

You locked fingers with him, mumbling, “fine, I promise. You’re really odd.”

He pulled his finger away from yours, seemingly reassured and with the first large grin of his you’d seen that night.

“I know.”

Soojin sat down beside you, sighing deeply as she sunk into the chair. She had a large coffee firmly place in her hand a grim expression on her face. You glanced at her briefly before returning to your chemistry calculations.

“What is it?” you asked lowly, knowing you weren’t going to end up finishing your work before going home at that point. If there was someone else around you, you felt the need to talk, especially when it was someone you enjoyed spending time with. You’d stopped in the middle of your equation but kept your eyes on the paper to make it seem like you had the intention of doing something.

“School,” she responded quietly, waving a hand around tiredly and narrowing her eyes as she spoke, “it’s so…. You know?”

You chuckled, letting your thoughts click so you could finish what you were writing before putting down your notebook.

“You’re overthinking, Soojin. It’s literally only been a few days since the semester started.”

“Exactly? I’m already exhausted, how am I supposed to last until the end of the year?”

“Last until reading week. That’s all the matters,” Sehun grumbled, looking half-asleep himself. There were deep circles under his eyes and his hair wasn’t styled like usual, his hand running through the growing strands that fell just over his eyebrows. He’d walked into your usual study area with his own coffee cup and you had to resist a laugh as he stumbled into a chair of his own, settling with another groan.

Soojin stuck her hand out in his direction pointedly, turning her head to face yours completely. You were completely unfazed as she spoke. “See? Sehun agrees-”

“He always agrees with you,” you interrupted, but she went on as if she didn’t even hear you.

“- so we should all just drop out and create a band and get famous or something.”

Sehun lifted his cup in agreement, both of them choosing to ignore that you’d pointed out their unspoken alliance, then downed what was left in his cup. You simply hummed, thinking of what to say as you stuffed your books into your much too small backpack. When you’d placed yours words together well enough, you decided to speak.

“You’re almost finished your undergraduate and quite possibly university forever, Soojin. You should stop being so upset- unless the real reason you are upset is because you don’t want to leave.”

She blinked at you then simply took a sip of her coffee. Once again, choosing to ignore what you were pointing out, she relatively changed the subject. “Five years has been too long.”

Sehun snorted, fiddling with his empty cup and keeping his gaze on that. He wore all black today, with cut-off sleeves for his shirt and rips in his jeans that his other hand picked at. “That’s what you get for choosing to do a joint teacher’s college and science major.”

Soojin pitched her voice up higher than usual and repeated what he said with an unpleasant mockery of his face on hers. He copied her, wiggling his head back and forth, drawing a hiss from her. You hid your smile, knowing if they saw it, they’d feel pressured to continue and you didn’t want to hear their half-hearted bickering all night. You leaned forward, snapping your fingers between their faces and asked them to stop because you had a headache.

“She started it.”

You couldn’t figure out what to say without chuckling lightly. “So be a grown up and end it, Sehun.”

“Fine, mom,” he grumbled, leaning back in his seat again. He averted his gaze to the students filtering by and Soojin turned her attention to a message on her phone you couldn’t see. You debated taking out your work again, noticing the beat of silence and hoping maybe, just maybe, you wouldn’t have to stay up tonight after everyone left.

There was no such luck.

“I can’t believe we’re graduating,” Soojin murmured, pulling in her bottom lip as she picked at the lip of her coffee cup. “It feels so weird, like we’re going to really have to grow up. Less scary than leaving high school but still... still terrifying.”

Sehun hummed lowly in response before riling up his arm. You followed his gaze, hating and loving how little of an attention span he had as you spotted the garbage can about ten paces behind you.

“Watch this,” he said, the slightest bit focused as he narrowed his eyes and tossed his cup. You did as he said, following its journey through the air and watching it hit the wall just above the garbage can. It bounced in and you let go of the breath you didn’t even know you were holding. He clapped his hands loudly then raised his arms in triumph with a large and silly grin on his lips.

You looked at him mildly in admiration for being so oddly carefree. Soojin, however, was not as impressed.

“Correction,” she said swiftly, raising a finger with a perfectly painted finger nail painted red, “I can’t believe he’s graduating.”

He simply narrowed his eyes and hissed, causing the two of you to hiss back before Soojin turned to you to change the topic once again.

“Where’s Dongmin?” she asked as she fiddled with her phone case, pressing in on the softer parts of it. You checked your phone, which you hadn’t done since your last conversation with him and hoped to see a text but were faced with nothing. A shrug came through your spine.

“He said something about being late and that he’d meet us at my place.”

Sehun frowned before mentioning, “didn’t he say he had that placement interview today?”

You simply nodded, resisting the urge to check your phone once more because it was always in vain. “It was this morning. He hasn’t told me how it went.”

Soojin placed her hand on your shoulder, rubbing in circles just how your brother taught her to do when she asked how nurses comfort their patients. Her eyes met with yours, free of contacts and returned to the deep brown you found a home in so many years ago when you’d first met.

“He’ll be okay. It probably went okay. You know how he is, he’s always the hardest on himself. I’m sure he did well. Don’t worry too much,” she attempted to reassure you. You pushed a smile for her sake, looking to Sehun who nodded.

He nearly added but receive a phone call and raised his finger to put the conversation on hold. Turning his head, he spoke under his breath almost as Soojin made you look at her again.

“Hey,” she murmured, gently, always knowing when her words reached your ears and when they didn’t. “Really, it’ll be fine. It’s only one out of the four major auditions he’s landed. One mistake he thinks he made won’t be so bad. He’s really a great actor. You know it, I know it, he knows it. Relax, okay?”

You removed her hand from your face, groaning, “Soo, that’s not it. Today was the company he’s wanted to go to for nearly all his life. I’m scared for him. He’ll be crushed if he doesn’t get in and, you’re right, I know how he is which is why I can’t tell you he did well because he cracks under intense pressure. Sure, he’s a great actor but sometimes he can’t hide that.”

She blinked, a somewhat solemn look on her face before she pressed her forehead to yours and hummed, “I know. I’m scared too but… just talk to him tonight, okay? And stop checking your phone, it’ll only freak you out more.”

You smiled lightly at that, saying an okay but not necessarily agreeing to stop checking your phone. Sehun interrupted then, turning your attention to his phone which was pulled far from his mouth.

“Jungkook said he’ll drive us to yours if you guys pay for his lunch.”

Soojin and you glanced at each other warily before agreeing. Thinking about taking the public transit was enough to put you in a fouler mood so you’d okay anything at this point. Sehun gave us the details of where you’d have to be in about ten minutes, so you started to collect all your things and placing them in your bag. Soojin copied you, letting Sehun walk out first as he was still on the phone with Jungkook. He was always so quiet when they spoke on the phone, it was like they were a part of a secret cult no one knew of. Not that you ever bothered to really ask.

Soojin strung her arm around your shoulders, pulling you closer to her and she perched a fair smile on her lips. You noticed the smudging of her red lipstick from the coffee cup and told her about it quietly. She didn’t really seem to care, however, simply half-heartedly rubbing at it.

“You okay?” you asked, noticing the far off look in her eyes as you started your way to the front doors and she snapped back into reality.

“Hmm? Yeah, I guess. Just tired.”

“Sure,” you hummed, watching her correct her gaze to fit the filtering students and the blush spread on her cheeks with a coy smile.

Dongmin had his head leaned against your knees, a drink in his hand and a frown on his lips. Your suspicions were right and he was beating himself up over  small mishap in his lines. He forgot a part so he ad-libbed until he found the spot he remembered and continued on. To you, it sounded professional. To him, it was a detrimental mistake. You'd been on your balcony for a while, sitting on the floor of it. He had a lump in his throat and you couldn't think of anything to do other than hug him. He held you tighter than usual and you squealed for a moment, not expecting it. "I'm sorry, did I hurt you?" He quickly loosened his grip, keeping you at arms length. You sighed. "No," you mumbled before placing yourself back in his arms. He didn't say anything for a while, just standing on your balcony with his back pressed against the railing. You kept your head on his chest, eyes closed but mind racing at a million miles a second. It was hard in moments like this to forget your own will. The smell of his cologne filled your nose and the way his clothes brushed your skin distracted you and the way his fingers always found the most sensitive parts of your skin made it worse. It was ridiculous, to sit there and assume he felt this strongly about you- that he wanted what you wanted from him, but you couldn't help yourself. The faint sound of his heart beating and the way he ran his hand through the ends of your hair made your brain cloudy. It filled with thoughts of possibilities and what-ifs and maybes and you hated it. Sometimes, you hated him for making you feel that way; but then he detached himself from you and mumbled something about needing a drink and awkwardly laughed and that also went away. Everything eased in his presence like it did when you were wrapped in the warmest blanket or when you were just waking up from getting enough sleep. Something about him reminded you of home and the way he pulled away and walked inside bothered you. "You coming?" He had his hand on the doorknob, head leaning inwards and a calm smile on his face. You shook your head, leaning against the railing with arms crossed, taking his place. "In a bit." He pressed his lips together before nodding and entering your house again. You were alone for a while, left to process for a moment before realizing you had to at least attempt to host for your friends. With a shaky hand through the top of your hair, you moved some of it and exhaled slowly. The way your thoughts moved without him was clear and there was sense but too much to process. Too much to see or pay attention to and listen to. Too much to understand and so little left in you to understand. With a shallow breath in, you went inside as well and faced your friends with a smile. Now, however, he had his head leaning against your knees. His smile was radiant and loose, laughing robustly at something stupid Jungkook said. One hand created a small shelter around a tall beer can and the other cupped your ankle. It was almost as if he was subconsciously keeping you beside him because you knew for sure your legs weren't that comfortable but he wanted them to be. You couldn't help but drift in and out of the conversation, paying attention to bits and pieces but never a full sentence or thought. Ahro was lying down beside you, curled almost into a ball and everyone else was scattered amongst the floor and other sofas as if they owned the place. You didn't particularly mind. You wished they owned your house with you, thinking it would make you feel less alone. "No, no, shhhhh," Soojin hushed lowly, laughing for a beat before shaking her head and clearing her throat of it. "No, seriously, listen. It's an important dream, I promise, it's funny." "Oh my god, just say it already," Sehun grumbled and you somehow decided to pay attention here. He took another sip of his drink, swirling his glass cup as if he was a classy, upscale man in a suit. It was relatively ridiculous to see. Ahro hummed a yes in response as she shuffled her fingers throughout Jungkook's hair, the tips of which were newly dyed pink. With a small grin, Soojin complied and hushed everyone again, pulling up a proper chair and straddling it. Dongmin leaned his head up to look at you, cheeks slightly pink and eyes brighter than sunshine. You couldn't help but find a grin on your lips, which he returned. "Okay! Okay, quiet down everyone, I'm about to start." Soojin shushed everyone again, waving her hands for everyone to lower their volume. This eventually got Jungkook and Ahro to stop their side conversation and pay attention and Soojin hummed happily in response. "Okay. Okay yes, OKAY. Okay. So this is how it started-" And from then on, she explained a large and complicated dream about her being in an all-boys school and how she had to hide the fact that she was a girl to survive. Somehow it turned into an alien story and how she was kneeling in front of a star ship before she woke up in a jolt. "I swear I Astral projected into another parallel universe though, it was- it was so amazing? And so real?" She attempted to explain but everything sounded far off and questionable. You cracked a smile at this, not knowing what to say. "Haven't you Astral projected before?" Ahro instigated, placing a pink finger nail on her chin as she did so, which led Soojin into another large story. She waved her hands around as she did so, making Jungkook crack up and Sehun's sturdy demeanor break with larger than life laughs. Dongmin tugged a little on your pant leg and you leaned down to hear him whisper, "how are we friends with them?" "This is your doing," you responded with a chuckle, catching his unbearably large smile as you spoke, "you introduced me to them." "Actually, Soojin's been your friend since grade school," he corrected, pulling away slightly to look you dead in the eye. You nearly retorted but Soojin huffed, "will you two stop interrupting me? You're ruining the story." "Yeah," Ahro drew out, making a suggestive face at you. You stuck out your tongue at her as Dongmin apologized lightheartedly to Soojin. She simply waved it off, taking a small sip of her drink before continuing. "We have to remember I was a child here but it was so cool. Everything was like this mystical blue colour and the lakes glistened in this way that almost made it look fake. It was so real to the point that it felt fake." You stopped pretending to care, looking at everyone's faces as they reacted. Beside you, Ahro had never looked so peaceful. She'd been the youngest of you all but always the most stressed. Anything could set her off if you breathed in the wrong direction but tonight she seemed better. Lighter. You were happy for it, looking at her watch Soojin with a ridiculously softened push upwards from her lips. Jungkook was wide awake, eating food and throwing in jabs as always. He threw a piece of popcorn at her, muttering, "Soojin, stop telling lies, Santa doesn't like liars." She paused, confused, but the others laughed and you couldn't help but play along. There was a kindness in his voice, one you hadn't heard in a while and you were pleased at its reappearance. Soojin and Sehun were building off each other, letting the others talk but furthering their jokes and stories into grandiose works of art. They were mostly being ridiculous but it was amazing because Soojin only let her guard down so many times. It was nice to see her be comfortably herself around people she wasn't completely close with but still at peace with. She was a rocky creature, one who didn't play by the rules but you supposed that's why she got along so well with Sehun. They both were the definition of what they called 'edgelords' but they were fun when they didn't put up a front. The sound of the front door sliding open shushed you all and you leaned your head to at least attempt to see your brother walking in. A wall blocked your view but you still called a hello and Seokjin said one back. His head popped into the living room, waving a hand and pushing a smile. There were deep circles under his eyes and you couldn't help but frown as he shuffled around in the front. Dongmin's hand fell from your leg as you walked to your brother, mildly worried. The chatter behind you continued quietly but you could tell they were also unsteady. "You okay?" you asked quietly as you entered your small foyer that led to the bedrooms. Seokjin had hung up his jacket and was pushing off his shoes as he responded. "Just tired. Had to work a double today," he murmured, steadying himself with one hand against the wall. You nodded, not knowing what to say. You pressed your lips together, crossing your legs as you stood and clasping your hands together shyly. "Want me to ask them to go home?" you managed, thinking of it as you picked at your nails and made direct eye contact with him. He wouldn't say yes, he wasn't the type but you were going to ask anyways- and kick them out anyways. He kissed his teeth, shaking his head before ruffling your hair as he walked past you into the living room. His slippers made a small sound against the floor as he walked to get himself a drink of water. Your friends spoke to Seokjin as if he was one of their own and it was nice to see how they got along. You wondered if they saw his expression as he leaned against the wall with a glass of water in his hand and a tired smile or if they cared. No one really seemed to confirm that suspicion until Ahro exaggerated her yawn and sat up in her spot. "I know it's dumb to say this but I'm dead tired," she interrupted, cutting Soojin off in the middle of her sentence. Soo almost made a comment about it but you stole her spot. "Me too. It's only eleven but I feel like I haven't slept for years." "Tell me about it," Seokjin drawled, cracking a smile before lifting up his drink and downing the rest of the water. With that, he retreated to his room and said a small goodnight and you figured maybe they'd all get the hint. "Sleepover party?" Dongmin suggested, catching your eye and you snorted. "You can sleep outside." You returned to the living room, fixing up a blanket that was strewn across the floor and half-watching everyone clean up their mess. Jungkook retreated to the bathroom, telling Sehun he'd only be a minute and hurrying away. Dongmin grasped your attention again, hitting your heel with his own, asking you to move so he could grab what was under the sofa. You moved as he responded with a light, "nothing I'm not already used to." You held back your smile as he referenced a night you two couldn't find your way to your apartment and ended up sleeping outside on a bench. You'd both woken up with stiff necks and about a million missed calls when you charged your phones once again but it was a nice memory, one that you would think about when you felt lower than usual. "Shut up, you complained the whole time walking home," you continued, not wanting to let the conversation die. He blinked, taken aback as he stood up with nearly 4 cans of assorted drinks in his hands. He pointed inwards, making a shocked face as he said incredulously, "me? you were the one that asked me to carry you up the stairs." He began to walk away as you laughed, shocked he remembered that. You threw down the blanket over the end of your sofa and followed him to the kitchen, throwing your response back at him. "Imagine walking nearly three kilometers in six inch heels and then tell me you wouldn't ask to get carried up stairs!" He raised a spare finger up at you, foot pressing on the peddle to the garbage can to open the top as he said, "I never said you didn't have the right to complain, just that you did it just as much as I did." You simply mocked his way of speaking and scrunched up your nose, placing your hands on your hips as you did so. He chuckled at you, brushing much too close to you to get past you and the forming smile on your lips disappeared in the wake of his cologne. You placed your gaze on the floor for a moment, blinking before composing yourself again. You couldn't let all these dumb encounters mean anything special. It would only cause you pain and you knew it. Leading yourself on was the worst thing you could do. This emotion seemed to intensify in your chest as you thought more about it and something itched at the back of your mind. You nearly remembered something but there was something blocking it, like a word being on the tip of your tongue and your brain not working fast enough to think of it. It hurt your head so you scrunched up your eyebrows and shook your head, trying to rid yourself of the feeling while simultaneously hoping no one saw you. You'd been having this problem for a while, where feelings would surge under your skin but you couldn't place why or how and it hurt to think about it for too long; hurt in the sense that you got madder and madder the more you couldn't think of what you wanted so you'd have to drop it. You tried speaking to Seokjin about it but he called it normal and said the memory or feeling would come back and make more sense eventually. You'd never gotten to that point and you didn't want to tell him that. For some irrational reason, you felt he'd judge you and that was something you never wanted in your life. You didn't want him to think less of you because it was hard to have the person you valued most think you were of less value. It would hurt more than you could bear so you never tries to speak about it more, hoping it would go away by itself. "You okay?" Soojin's voice ripped you out of your thoughts, eyes meeting yours with worry. She had to dip her head down to meet you at eye level, always being just the slightest bit taller than you and making fun of you for it your entire life. You nodded, raising your hand to rub at some of her smuged lipstick with your thumb. She let you. "Just tired, like I said." She searched your eyes, not knowing what was wrong but sensing something. You wished she wasn't like that. She knit her eyebrows together very slowly and you watched the way the skin on her face was pulled downwards by her sudden frown. With a small movement, she gave you a comfortable hug and you found yourself grateful for it. "Talk to me if something's wrong, okay? That's what I'm here for." Her voice was soft and she was obviously trying not to make it obvious you weren't feeling that great. You simply nodded, grasping her tighter and she reciprocated it. No matter how hot and cold she was, Soojin was always there for you, that was something you couldn't deny. It overwhelmed you to have at least one friend you felt would never betray or deny you. "Let's roll out," Jungkook called, and you opened your eyes to see him waving a small hand around. Sehun was already at the front door, slipping on his shoes as Soojin let go of you. "Call me tonight or something?" Her shoulder raised as you walked with her to the front door. "Y-yeah, I'll talk to you about Dongmin and stuff," you affirmed, snaking your arm around her waist and she smiled. "You know me so well, y/n. Only here to support if I get gossip in exchange." Her hand fell on top of your head and you snorted, shaking it off. "It's not gossip if he told me to tell you about it." She kissed her teeth, rolling her eyes slipping on her sneakers as the other converged in the foyer, speaking amongst themselves. Dongmin was nowhere to be found but that didn't quite worry you. He never left or came on time so you didn't wait for him to say goodbye to everyone else. "See you in hell tomorrow," Sehun grumbled, giving you a tighter hug than usual and you found yourself comforted. "So exciting," you hissed before saying your goodbyes to Ahro and Jungkook. They both gave you hugs, getting silent. They either said nothing when they were together or were full of snippy comments and there was no in between. You were quite happy to see them be silent, noticing they got along better when they were like this. "Want to get lunch tomorrow?" Ahro suggested as she pulled away from your hug. "I'd love to," Jungkook interrupted, still eating his stupid popcorn and grinning, "what time?" "As if I'd ever be caught dead with just you in public," she snipped back, shouldering her thin jacket and you exhaled lightly. Placing a hand on Jungkook's shoulder you shook your head. "That's gotta sting." He shrugged, humming a small, "I'm used to it. I'll just get her back another time." "You can try," she sang, closing her eyes as she unlocked your door and opened it. She waved goodbye, not waiting for you to say a yes to her offer for lunch and leaving. You waved as well, letting the four of them filter out of your house one by one. Soojin gave you one final smile before pressing a kiss to your forehead and telling you to text her. You waved her away and closed your door with a small smile as Dongmin appeared. He looked a bit shocked they'd all left without him, eyes just slightly wider than usual. However, being faced with you seemed to comfort him just slightly. "Assholes," he huffed, stuffing his hands in his pockets, "I can't believe they left me again." "Well, if you take forever," you trailed off, quirking up an eyebrow but he simply gave you a winning smile and pushed lightly against your shoulder with his index finger. "I don't take forever, everyone's just taking too little time." You nodded, pretending to agree and he knew it. "Sure." He narrowed his eyes at this, taking a few steps towards you to close the distance. He was taller than you and he could easily have you caged against the wall if he wanted to but he stopped before your feet hit your closed door. He simply looked at you and there was something in his eyes that somehow conflicted. They darted between both of yours, unsure and you felt how shallow your breath threatened to get. Before he had a chance to say anything, you stammered out a question.

“Do you want me to walk you down?”

He blinked, nodding slowly. “S- sure.”

A/N: lmao yikes this is really long but it’s to make up for how far away this update was from my first post. I hope you guys enjoyed it though and that you’ll continue to read! I think the Astro fans might like the next update a little more? Thank you for reading though, honestly, and any feedback is greatly appreciated so leave me a question in my askbox if you have one. If not, have a great holiday break and I’ll see you guys with the next one :)

[docleech]

Monster World Dream

i told myself i wasn’t going to wake up at 4 AM if I didn’t have to anymore but I just had the weirdest fucking dream and I need to write it down somewhere before I forget because it was some Studio Ghibli shit and it was god damn terrifying. I don’t know if the single chocolate chip cookie I had before bed was enough to cause this or if my brain has just been under so much stress lately it finally just went “fuck you, suffer” but LORD. This has some storytelling tropes that @cohobbitation knows fucking terrifies me too.

so the premise of everything was that for some reason in the human world it was raining near constantly and there was so much water that the world, as a whole I shit you not, was becoming more and more flooded out and it was assumed no one knew as to why. Now I say “human world” because there was also a “monster world” that humans just used to make up scary monster stories to make children behave but they were mostly unaware that these things they would end up telling as stories would eventually manifest themselves into a new monster over time to populate said world.There were also stories of people that were half monster, half human that could walk between the worlds freely but as a human you’d never know because they were very good at making themselves look like everyone else to blend in. That’s what I was but I had run away from the monster world because it’s miserable and terrifying there and had been passing as a normal human for a long time because I didn’t want to be part of the issues the monster world caused for the humans. Also, notably, being a hybrid in the monster world was just as bad because you weren’t seen as a “true monster” and were often considered a sub-race, forced into slave labor or servitude of some pure bred monster, which is why many hybrids left to hide amongst the humans.

I was going to some odd school and it was the lunch period, so we were all sat up on the rooftop watching the waters as it slowly consumed everything. By now the humans had created some methods to try and fight or avoid the flood waters, like building high walkways made of extremely sturdy metal to get to and from places or water proof structures that were meant to eventually be able to be submerged because no one knew if this would ever stop and the humans were getting ready to have to deal with having an entirely water planet. However it was while we were up there, talking and eating, that we started to notice that the waters were receding. Sometimes this happened and the flood waters would disappear for maybe an hour while it continued to rain but after some time they would come back to exactly how they would be. Liquids did not like to follow the laws of physics in this dream world, nor did they like to always be in the same place.

Now, with waters like this both good and bad things were often kicked up and left behind when they’d go away. Little waterlogged treasures or, in my unfortunate case, bodies. There would always be the body of some poor soul that would be there waiting, and while many people used the time the water was gone to go down to ground level and scavenge I did not like to because I always ended up finding the nightmare fuel. Today I decided I would go down with my friends because maybe it wasn’t so bad but just as we were getting ready to go back inside and go out some of the school bullies cut me off from the door, taunting me by saying “don’t look now but I think you’ve found something” and pointing towards the water where there was, in fact, a really pale naked dead woman just floating on by before something drug her beneath the water again. They laughed and slammed the door in my face, locking it too, so I had to take the long way down.

By the time I got to the soggy wet ground the waters were just a trickle, there was no body, and my friends had already wandered off to do their own thing so I followed suit and started to look for stuff. As I wandered I started to notice these long black strands of hair were being pushed towards me from somewhere and started to clump around my feet, prompting me to try and find the source LIKE AN IDIOT and as I came up to this weird stairway like structure where it seemed to be getting the worst one of my teachers (who was wearing the face of someone from my old job, one of the really cool coaches I worked with) came up behind me and scared the shit out of me. He wanted to know why I was sneaking around like I was, being all careful and ready for the jumpscare that eventually came from someone else, and by the time I had looked over to tell him I was trying to find someone the hair leading me to that spot was gone and the stairs no longer had that edge-of-your-seat feeling of suspense to them. Not seeing anything he just shrugged and said “Well I found something cool, come follow me so I can show you” and we departed.

After following him some way to a thing that felt more like an abandoned parking structure than anything and we were going downstairs instead of upstairs and this was a concern because the waters would be back soon. Being the half hybrid thing I also started to get this feeling of “we shouldn’t be here” because I recognized we were coming up on one of those liminal spaces where the worlds overlapped each other and made it very easy for monsters of hybrids to appear. As we were going downwards I tried to explain to him that maybe it was a bad idea to be there but he didn’t listen and before I got really frustrated with him we happened to pass by the ONE car in the entire building (it was my IRL car? Somehow?) and these three guys standing around it. They weren’t trying to break in or anything they were legitimately just standing there trying to figure out how this car hadn’t been washed away in some of the initial flooding because it was covered in algae and barnacles and other things to indicate extended submersion and while I was asking them what they were doing Teacher Guy wandered off again.

That sense of dread was really growing so I went to follow him again down into these wide tunnels  but just as he was turning a corner I stopped because I realized we had fully passed into the monster world now, which had made me lose my all human appearance. I had weird bird features on my face but the most noticeable bit were my legs and feet, which were bird feet from the knee down that had three taloned toes on the front and one on the back ankle bit. The exact moment the worlds passed through one another forced me to reveal my true self and I knew we were both in a lot of trouble now.

I ran to try and catch up to where Teacher Guy had gone but as I came up on the corner he had turned I started to hear these noises of pain and wet, crunching sounds and the shadows that were cast up on the wall I could see showed me that the “Guardians” had gotten to him.

These Guardians have been some of the most terrifying things I have ever dreamed up, not because of how they looked but because of how they kill someone. Basically, they looked like oversized tall terracotta pots with lids that were very innocent looking at first but if you were a trespasser then suddenly they’d have these two mile long tongue-arms that would come out from just under the lid, wrap around a victim and squeeze all the blood and guts out of them like a sponge before shoving the mangled body into them to digest. Dream me was terrified of these things and I don’t blame dream me for that fear at all.

Just before I could turn around to go back the way I came before the Guardians found me too my watch alarm that I had set to let me know when to return to a safe place to avoid the waters went off, alerting the Guardians just around the corner that someone else was there. I bolted up a nearby emergency staircase as I heard the clanking of angry pots coming after me (they moved by cartoonishly bouncing after people, how that didn’t break them I don’t know) because thankfully they couldn’t go upstairs but their tongue-arms followed me up most of the staircase.

Eventually the Guardians couldn’t chase me anymore but I reached a part of the stairs that was going to have to force me to run by more to get to this pipe I wanted to crawl up that would lead to some upper walkways of the monster world area where I thought I would be safe. I couldn’t go back to the human world with the rains starting to pick up because whatever liminal space I popped out of was going to put me miles underwater and I wasn’t about to deal with that so I thought maybe I could wait it out somehow.

But I had to run by eight Guardians that I know would trigger the minute I got anywhere near them but they can’t climb up pipes so I thought that was my best bet. Steeling myself I eventually darted to the other side of that small room and lept onto the pipe bolted to the wall, starting to climb up it as fast as possible. All the Guardians were pissed off down below, angrily and loudly hopping up and down while their tongue-arms tried to catch up to me. I out climbed the appendages to the walkways I wanted to be on and started to run across them towards this massive open room I had never seen before but the Guardians followed me down below and what they had done was grab on to the walkways and were going “hand over hand” to keep up with and try to catch me so I had to constantly stay moving to avoid them.

This massive room was sort of like a super large work room that had these huge turning wheel generators in them that a lot of enslaved hybrids were working at. They were either in or on the wheels making them turn and the machines were pumping water up into these pipes that went to what I could only assume was the human world to cause massive, MASSIVE amounts of rain and water.

BASICALLY the monsters were flooding out the humans on purpose and I can only assume it was because they wanted to kill all of them so they could live in the human world instead. I discovered this and wanted to stop it so I ran all across the walkways, with the Guardians hot at my heels and causing a scene down below which was drawing attention to myself, until I was able to get onto one of the generator wheels and try to mess it up somehow. But this was the point in the dream where the Guardians had managed to catch up to me and yank me off of the wheel towards the ground below and I woke the fuck up because I did not want to see what happened after that.

This was the singularly weirdest dream I can vividly recall in recent months. Even right now as I sit here typing this out I can hear the sounds the generator wheels made in my head and the “roo-uwah, roo-uwah” noises the Guardians made whenever their tops would open when they bounced. I don’t know if it means anything and I hardly doubt it past being just a weird ass dream but... Good lord it was a fucking trip.

[saturatethe-written-whitewa-blog]

oikawa week 2017, day 1.

oikawa week 2017, day 1: lust/chastity

pairing: oikawa tooru & terushima yuuji

for a reason none other than my unnecessary particularity/thoroughness about things, i’ve decided to set all of the fics for oikawa week in a fantasy AU although none of these fics are connected unless stated so; this is the only fic that’s obviously non gen but the rest of the fics are unspecific enough that they’re open for interpretation and really i’m talking too much

❝I been doing stupid things, Wilder than I've ever been, You've become my favorite sin.❞ —Bad Decisions, Ariana Grande.

The day slows down, just for the busy, tired ones, so the minutes feel longer than they really are, and Tooru notices with aching clearness just how many pass between sips of oxygen. Tooru sits idly on a chair, as vacant and influential as the winds that pass from an open window, looking at the mess of his room until something thrills him with a scream or until he tucks back a strand of hair that tickles his lashes in a playfulness he can't appreciate.

His thoughts leak slowly, frustratingly, almost nothing. Tooru thinks they too are resting with empty glasses in a space of familiarity like he was, but he finds himself expending his bored sighs often enough he'll have nothing left for the weekdays.

Tooru leans back on his chair, wastes another sigh thoughtlessly and peels the collar of his shirt off of his chest. He reaches for his phone, fingers a pencil instead. He flicks that back on the desk disapprovingly, finding his phone where he left it; face-down and silent.

He dials Yuuji's number, glad his fingers don't trip over themselves as he mutters it like malicious malediction. Yuuji answers two rings too late, and Tooru can already imagine the dead ladybugs he would always find outside Yuuji's window; Tooru had always thought their colors would bleed in a funeral of washed rainwater, for Tooru had been taught that dead things were ugly shells of a brilliance that ceased to exist. Tooru only learns that their legs fall off at the prod of a stick, and they make the most hideous crunching noise whenever he steps on it with his sandal.

Yuuji grunts, the sound of men who've had Tooru's strange schemes darted quickly, painfully in their minds like sedation you can still feel hours later.

"Say, Yuu-chan, what would you say to an opportunity to spend time with me?" was what Tooru had told him, and Yuuji chortles two rings too pleasant too Tooru's ears.

"Doesn't this lake have wild hippocampi?" Yuuji asks cautiously. Tooru doesn't answer for a few seconds, kicking off his shoes and dipping his feet into the water.

The water was cool, not the kind that made Tooru shiver; not a lot of things made Tooru shiver, only dead spiders by his doorway, spilled ice cubes and a lover's touches. It was so sickeningly cliche, an excerpt from a year-long writer, a painting only discovered by those passionate enough. Of a lake undiscovered, sung to by songbirds perched on trees that listen with the carefully-constructed hum of their leaves, with its edges shallow and sparkly enough that Tooru could coax Yuuji into the water and laugh at their childishness.

"A family, I think," Tooru says, "don't worry too much about it, Yuu-chan! As long as you don't kill a baby then you have nothing to worry about!"

Tooru turns around and sees Yuuji, muttering curses at the blades of grass that tickle his skin as he bends them under the weight of his wriggling butt. Behind him, Tooru sees entire lifetimes of a forest told by the single hour Tooru's borrowed from it, the unshakable trunks they cross while Tooru crosses his eyes trying to discern cricket from decomposing leaf.

"Yuu-chan are you- are you scared?" Tooru's face goes alight with the idea, and he's never seen Yuuji turn so quick to correct one of his sentences.

"Who wouldn't be scared? They're literal seahorses but that's not the point, they could kill me or you- why aren't you more scared by this?" Yuuji looks at him accusingly, and Tooru smiles carelessly.

"Like I said, Yuu-chan, as long as you don't kill a baby then you have nothing to worry about! Just like people, really," Tooru's satisfied with his answer, and he continues playing ripples with the water. Yuuji stares at the lake with its water spread innocently for Tooru, who's finger deep in it, and in ten minutes he could draw a diagram with Tooru's blood about how hippocampi are worlds different from human beings right after a large, angry one emerges out of the center of the lake and crushes Tooru with its powerful jaws as they make whatever noises hippocampi make.

It's a disturbing image, and Yuuji is the last person to want to see crystal blue washed red when he only wanted Tooru to brighten his day with his dumb charm. He considers reaching for Tooru's fingers, finger, even, even if they're wet until the knuckle and blissfully unaware of danger.

Yuuji's content and malcontent on his pit of dirt and grass, linking his own fingers together behind his back as clouds swirl above him and Tooru, who's just screamed when he splashes water onto himself. Yuuji snickers, tells Tooru he got what was coming.

In the eyes of a young rose, beautiful and yawning to its mother earth, with its thorns untrimmed and virgin, the two lovers that sat at a length that they would begin to miss the other's fingerprints were bittersweet. Brightness and vivid color in their eyes, inside a place that lived and died in the earthly tones they were close. It would watch, with dewdrops caught in its eyes, until sunset comes and the lovers leave, and its petal close over its eyes like a whispered lullaby, like death.

Tooru fawns over a seashell that peeks out of the sand shyly, striped and grooved in a fashion that both of them could admire. Tooru puts in his pocket, keeps it in his memory.

Nothing exciting happens after, a few minutes of Tooru digging through the sand until he gets too scared he'd break a nail and Yuuji looking at Tooru's back, at the looseness of a shirt he's seen Tooru wear from a time even before they became lovers, imagining the expressions of Tooru's face.

The skies darken above him, a massive being that Yuuji learns not to mind. Yuuji has his hands folded over his knee, his heart beating in patterns that mess when Tooru calls his name. Tooru's the only thing that reels his eyes, the only thing that ever will, for Yuuji found himself often looking at his side, disappointed when Tooru wasn't there, smiled when Tooru was.

"Oh my God, Yuu-chan, look!" Tooru shouts, loud enough that Yuuji's definitely shocked. "It's a baby hippocampi!"

"If you kill it I'm going to kill you before the parent hippocampi come to kill you."

"And then we can die together! Aww, how romantic of you, Yuu-chan!" Tooru swoons dramatically, and Yuuji shakes his head.

"Come on, Yuu-chan, it's cute!" Tooru says. He points to the shallower ends of the lake, deep enough Tooru doesn't dare venture into because his shorts couldn't roll back any further than he had them (and the sight of Tooru’s thighs, pale as cleaned fossil, were only a marvel when Yuuji was kissing them undone.)

The baby hippocampi swam in waters of its own enjoyment, wide-eyed and thick-necked. The color of its skin reminded Yuuji of the plumage of a peacock, neck arched and head held high, or of a dragonfly that zips over water. It was an awkward little thing, like all baby animals were, with limbs too long and minds too new to be able to do anything with either. It clicked when Tooru beckoned it over, moving in awkward, unfinished hops that Yuuji almost laughed at.

"Tooru, I swear, don't kill it," Yuuji warned.

"Oh please, Yuu-chan, the only killing I'm going to do is stopping its heart!"

"Oikawa, what the actual fuck."

"I meant stopping its heart because of how god damn charming I am!" Tooru argues, holding his arms out wide for the baby that hopped aggressively.

Yuuji can only shake his head, smiling in anticipation when he notices a clump of dirt that gathers after it's been splashed on.

Ten minutes later, Tooru was soaked enough that Yuuji's had a good laugh about it ("Boo hoo, Yuu-chan, I got to play with a baby hippocampi!") and when another hippocampi peeks its head from a deeper portion of the lake, Tooru's the first one to run away, at the distressed cries of the confused baby. Yuuji has a good laugh about that, too.

"I mean, at least we didn't die, right?" they had told each other, agreeing pleasantly. Yuuji held Tooru's hand then, told him that he could smell the lake on him. They agree to stop at Yuuji's room to get a change of clothes and a drink a squeeze of summer shirts and four packed puffs of relief later.

They forget the drinks, but remember to take off Tooru's clothes. They kiss, not knowing why, roll against Yuuji's walls, knowing they wanted something.

Tooru traces his fingers up Yuuji's side, bumping over a hipbone that slanted beautifully. Tooru's reminded of ancient Greek sculptures that bend their marble bodies in vague scenery, swooned at now by young, starry-eyed, contemporary artists. Tooru's touch was light, as if not really there, as if cleaning the folds of a shirt that Tooru took great care to remove in their earlier frenzy. It makes Yuuji shiver, makes the hairs of his body prick the air where they want to be handled by the warmth Tooru cradles in his palms.

Tooru utters a promise, one that makes Terushima nod his head back. The way they fall onto the bed is delicate, gentle like the way Tooru holds Yuuji's face in his hands as he kisses him; but it's also loud, tangled and bursting, like the drizzle that raps its beginnings onto a curtained window.