#not playing music...but i would be happier if i let myself just lose myself in it but then idk. im bad at like Setting aside time for thing

[mellotronmkll]

Does anyone else get the thing of like you're already so obsessed with something that you're like it would probably be good if I was less obsessed with this / I need to shut up about this but at the same time you constantly find yourself thinking I have Got to get more obsessed with this. I have Got to get more obsessed

[astoldbyaja]

Bark like you want it! -Ch. 6~AU Demon Slayer~

Pullin' out the coupe at the lot

Told 'em fuck 12, fuck SWAT

Bustin' all the bells out the box

I just hit a lick with the box

Had to put the stick in a box, mmh

Pour up the whole damn seal, I'ma get lazy

I got the mojo deals, we been trappin' like the '80s

She sucked a n*gga soul, gotta Cash App

Told 'em wipe a n*gga nose, say slatt, slatt

I won't never sell my soul, and I can back that

And I really wanna know, where you at, at?

I ground my hips with the beat of the music, flipping my hair and rotating my hips in a circular motion that made me smile as the music continued playing. I let my hands roam my body in happiness as I was engulfed in the ocean of people just wanting to forget their problems. I was one of them! I didn’t want to think about Akaza or Kyojuro or their lust of my body. No tonight it was all about me. A group of women came over, complimented my beauty and asked if they and their boyfriends could dance with me. It was a total of six.

I’ve seen then on campus before, so I was a bit familiar with who they were. I nodded and the men kept it respectful, only sensually touching their girlfriends who occasionally ground their hips and bodies on me of which I didn’t mind. Suddenly the music transitioned into 40 Cal by Hairatage and I was ready to really cut lose to the beat of the music!

I got some haters talking, they've been getting rookie nails They want to go to war, I chew 'em up just like my fingernails I roll with shadows, fuck the jail I can't afford the bail, but if I do they know I get it poppin' like the 40 Cal!

I curled my arms over my face, my braids over my face and popped my chest out immediately shaking my ass with the sharp rift of the music. Everyone was going crazy at the sharp music. The club was truly brought to life, the heat rising from everyone’s fast body movements and the smell now a mixture of different sweat. I wanted to drink tonight, I wanted to fuck tonight! I wanted to do whatever the fuck I wanted! As more relaxed dance music began to play, I began to move from the dance floor, letting my body droop against the bar. Since I needed to have my wits about me, I decided a water was the best I was going to get tonight. My heart was fluttering from utter happiness, the adrenaline overtaking me. My body was begging for more fun, the crowd felt as if it were calling me back into it.

I just needed to catch my breath. I pulled my phone from my dress’ pocket, happy it had a zip up fold so I would never lose it. I checked my messages.

Mitsuri: How are you doing?

Me: All good, shouldn’t be out too long. Hope your date is going well!

Mitsuri: Aw good I’m glad and yes it’s going well. Text me when you’re on your way home!

Me: Will do!

Kyojuro: Hey hope your night is going well. I heard you were going out to the club tonight. If things get weird with anyone there, don’t hesitate to reach out.

Me: Thanks, I’m good. Have a good weekend.

I did not need to ask him about his day, his evening or anything! His intentions were not pure, and I would refuse to think he could actually convince me otherwise.

Akaza: WYA

Me: The Unholy

Akaza: *Typing…* With who??

Me: Me, myself and I.

Akaza: Why didn’t you tell me you were going dancing! I would have loved to go dancing with you.”

I stiffened.

Me: That sounds like a date and I don’t do dates.

Akaza: So you’d rather go straight to the really sweaty work out then?

Me: I’m going back on the dance floor.

Akaza: I’m on my way over there.

Me: Fine then I’m leaving.

Akaza: Don’t be like that. Come on I can throw down! Besides nothing would make us both happier than to feel that ass grinding up on my-”

I tucked my phone back in my dress and looked at the bartender who was on the other side of the bar. He was a tall man with a handsome face and long flowing black hair.

“Hi, I’d like to pay for the water!” I replied waving to him. The man turned and smirked at me.

“On the house since you made my night with that hot dancing of yours!” he called out before winking at me. I smiled and dipped my head some in embarrassment.

“Thank you!” I called out. However, a flash of long black hair and a big grin is all I could make out before me.

“Hey cutie, how ‘bout I buy you the next round!” a boisterous voice said. Standing before me was a tall man in a black fishnet tank and green baggy jeans was leaning over the bar, cheek planted in his palm. I blinked rapidly.

“You wish to buy me another round of water?” I asked. He snickered.

“Of course! Gotta stay hydrated if you plan to dance again!” he said. “The name’s Karaku! I see you a lot on campus, so that makes us classmates in a way. What’s your name?”

Our campus was pretty big how exactly did he see me?

“Yara!” I said over the heavy music which only made the man lean in a bit so he could hear

“Yara? Wow that’s a pretty name! Never heard it before! So that’s makes you my first!” he said. I gave a polite smile however I wasn’t sure where this conversation was going, and I really wanted to dance to a few more songs before it was time to call a cab. “Say you have some really pretty hair, Yara, it makes you look like a goddess! Black women have the most exotic hair styles!”

And now he’s lost my attention and my tense face at his compliment told me so. I didn’t like the word exotic being used to describe me or anything on me. Made me feel weird.

“Thanks!” I said stiffly before leaning off the bar and trying to wave a goodbye to him, before he caught my hand.

“Say, I’m here tonight with three of my brothers! We’ve been studying hard cramming for the upcoming midterms you know how it is, and we were wondering if maybe you’d like to dance with us!” he offered before point pointing over my shoulder toward the very end of the bar where three men, identical to Karaku, were looking at me with different emotions on their faces. One looked to be glaring slightly, nodding his head up at me as if saying ‘sup with his eyes. He wore a red tank and black jeans. I could see the two sleeve tattoos that covered his muscular arms.

Waving happily beside him was a man in a black tank top under a yellow jacket and brown shorts. His wrists were wrapped with yellow bands and yellow beaded necklace sat loose on his neck. Beside him was a nervous, almost sad looking man in a blue and white striped uniform and he looked almost nervous.

Woah, I had never seen a set of quadruplets before, and I couldn’t help but look from then back to Karaku who just smirked.

“Wow, and all four of you want to dance with me, why?” I asked. There were many cute and attractive women in the club tonight and it made me suspicious that a group of men wanted to just dance with me when there were so many other options.

“Absolutely. The way you moved on the dancefloor was just stunning. My brothers and I couldn’t take our eyes off you! You seem like a lot of fun, Yara! So how’s about it, one more dance before the night ends?” he asked.

Suddenly, a beat popped in my ears from above and my eyes widened as well as my smile as the remix version of Enya’s Only Time, Crunk in Time, was playing. I couldn’t wait anymore I had to pop off tonight. I smirked at Karaku.

“If you and your brothers can keep up tonight, then sure, one dance.” I replied before pushing off the bar, taking his hand and guiding him to the dance floor, my hips dipping and swaying from side to side with the beat of the music. I noticed the three brothers moving off the bar and following us to the dance floor and slowly approached me with pleased looks on their faces as they each stood in a perfect square around me.

“I’m Sekido!” the brother in red said harshly making me jump a bit, but I smiled nonetheless from genuine amusement. He stood in front of me.

“I’m Urogi the fun one!” the brother in yellow said as he stood on the left of me.

“Ha as if!” Karaku shouted from behind me, his hand already palming my bottom which I didn’t mind.

“And I’m Aizetsu!” the brother in blue said on my right. He looked nervous almost.

“I’m Yara!” I said with a smile noticing how all four of these men smelled really good. I liked that. The men were moving their hips with the beat of the music as was I.

I began to move my hips in a circular motion so a part of me would graze each of the men’s body giving them each an inch of attention. I began to silently lip sync Enya’s part smiling at all of the men’s amused faces. The looks didn’t look malicious. Everyone around us was swaying themselves waiting for the real fun to start.

“Who can say where the road goes, where the day flows only time. Who can say where the road goes, where the day flows only time (SHAKE THAT-)

My mind was gone, captured by the beat of the music as everyone threw their hands up and shook their bodies giving their all to the music.

“GET CRUNK WITH IT, GET LOOSE WITH IT!” everyone sang shaking their hips and grinding against the partners. Karaku and Sekido kept their hands on hips grinding their hips on me when they could, while I had my hands on Aizetsu’s and Urogi’s cheeks smiling and laughing with them as they moved their bodies against my sides.

“SHAKE THAT ASS REAL FAST THEN DROP! SHAKE IT LIKE A SALTSHAKER! SHAKE IT LIKE A SALTSHAKER! SHAKE IT LIKE A SALTSHAKER!” people sang and shake it I did. I could feel my ass vibrating on command of the music digging into Karaku’s crotch.

“Fuck yes fucking shake it Yara!” the green dressed brother yelled behind. I let my hand move through my braids moving it to one side of my neck as I felt a pair of lips press into my neck from the man behind me. I told my mind to take note of it, but I found it hard from the hands moving over my body and beneath the top of my dress! I gasped realizing it was Sekido’s hand cupping one of my breasts and before I could attempt to push back, which would only get me blocked by Karaku, I feel the angry man’s tongue going down my throat. I realize my wrists are being held down by Urogi and Aizetsu, stopping me from pushing back against the man in front of me.

He's dominating my mouth, not letting my tongue get away from his as he explored every inch of my mouth.

“Sorry, Yara, but we had to see for ourselves what was so special about you!” Urogi said happily. I finally had the courage to bite the tongue that was invading me and Sekido leaned back with a growl.

“Naughty bitch bit me!” he snarled.

“Yes, Akaza was speaking so highly of you, I am sad to admit I was actually getting a little jealous.” Aizetsu told. What the fuck! Akaza… Oh damn these guys must be a part of the Kizuki.

“So, how’s about it Yara, want to play with us for a little bit? I promise you’ll enjoy every… inch of us.” Karaku purred, his tongue sliding up the shell of my ear. I stiffened heavily feeling that the grips on my wrists would not be loosened. Sekido wasn’t even going to wait fo a response because his hand came up to grip my throat as his face leaned in to mine to kiss me again.

But my feet acted fast, kicking him right in the groin.

“FUCK!” he snarled in pain as he was now caught up in the wave of dancing and being shoved into the crowd

I felt the grips on my wrists loosen and I used this time to move into the crowd and let the many shoulders push me about. I was looking for a way out of the crowd, the exit, and the four brother as a means to get away from them. I pushed my way from the crowd and pressed myself to the wall. I quickly grabbed my phone and texted fast.

Me: 911 (You shared your location)

Kyojuro: On my way! Find somewhere to lay low until I get there!

I could see Aizetsu coming from the crowd and hurried down the closest to me. I was looking for an emergency exit if anything, but I was luckily coming up on the front of the club. Where I could hide once out there, I didn’t know. The Unholy wasn’t a big place and it felt they would easily know I was in the lady’s restroom if I tried to hide there, and I didn’t need to get cornered there! Just as I was pushing myself out the door, I was immediately caught by someone I didn’t want to see.

“Yara! Wow your hair looks amazing!” he snapped catching my shoulders. I wanted to pull back, but he wouldn’t let me go.

“Please let me go, Akaza, I need to leave!” I said hurriedly looking over my shoulders. They could come at any minute! Okay, I couldn’t hide my fear through anger any longer. I was scared and I was scared shitless. I tore from Akaza’s hold and began to move down the sidewalk putting distance between me and the club. Akaza was speeding up behind me taking my hand.

“Hey woah what the fuck happened?” he yelled in panic. I needed to get out of here. I didn’t want his hand touching me. He’s one of them, they’re one of them! As I walked, a familiar shade of yellow was skipping in front of me.

“Yara, I found you!” Urogi said happily and I gasped as I saw red, blue and green appearing. I quickly back tracked and jumped behind Akaza.

“You stay the fuck away from me! All of you or I swear to God I’ll scream!” I threatened. Akaza looked at me then the four men who were walking up to him calmly and collectively.

“What the fuck did you do!” he snapped. Sekido just growled with annoyance.

“The cunt bit me and kicked me in my dick!” he snarled.

“Oh, calm down, Akaza, we were just trying to test her, to make sure she was being loyal to you and to the gang is all.” Karaku said with a purr.

“She attracts a lot of male attention whether she knows it or not. It’d be very upsetting if another guy tried to step in on what’s yours.” Aizetsu said with a pout.

“You’re all insane!” I snapped trying to step away from the group, but Akaza took my hand and wouldn’t let go as he held his other hand up.

“Okay can we all just calm the fuck down! Why the hell were you four out anyways when you were supposed to be… running errands?” he snarled. I could tell errands was code for something else. Sekido scoffed angrily.

“We earned. The club was our last errand. We saw your little toy here dancing like she’s single and couldn’t help our curiosity and thought we'd join in a dance!” he explained.

“The fuck is that supposed to mean! It seems like you wanted to do more than just dance!” I snapped still struggling from Akaza. He looked at me angrily noticing me pulling back.

“Will you please stop that!” he yelled before looking at the brothers. “Your business was not with her; you all should have left her alone!”

“Oh come on, you shared your last toy with us, we figured she was a new one to share with us!” Urogi told. My eyes widened.'

"Mother fucker." Akaza said shooting him a glare so dark, it almost caused me to miss the sound of tires screeching around the corner and now we all looked as I saw a black 2022 Toyota Tundra was jumping the curb of the sidewalk making us all jump back. I followed Akaza’s hand to the hem of his jacket and down to the back of his pants and the way he gripped the handle of his gun made my eyes pop as he pulled it from his waist band.

Gun! GUN! GUN! DANGER, DANGER, DANGER!

Popping out of the bed of the truck was Kyojuro and Sanemi, with pistols in their hands, all the while, Uzui’s window was down in the driver’s side, a very large gun in his hand that looked like it fired multiple rounds. Obanai’s body was sitting outside on the passenger window with two Glock pistols in his hands.

I looked at the four brothers to see guns in their hands pointed at the truck, and I felt my mind was ready to explode.

I noticed Kyojuro and Akaza’s guns were on each other, and I could tell they were waiting to take each other out, however I was in the line of fire.

I just wanted to dance and maybe fuck tonight. I wanted to have a wild and fun night and then go home and sleep the weekend away. Why was that so fucking hard!

[joshhhhhhhhhhhhhhh]

Feeling such a difficult-to-succinctly-describe set of emotions with this. I've been into Love Live for nearly 8 years at this point. It's been a series of ups and downs, can't deny there have been times where my passion for the franchise has wavered, but I hold the franchise as a whole very near and dear to my heart. When I got into Love Live, School Idol Project was already past-tense, Sunshine was awaiting its second season, and the "spinoff" series then known as Perfect Dream Project was in its infancy, but very much still existed.

Superstar, then, was the first part of the project that I got to experience in real-time as it was brand new - to look at that first street visual and pick out which girls had enough of a character design to be part of the group, to hope for some such group names to win and other group names to definitely lose, just to completely invest myself in, really. It was exciting seeing the next main series in the franchise begin, you know? All of this plays out, I latch onto Chisato, I eagerly anticipate their songs and their music videos and most especially their TV anime. And hey, that first season was great! Quintessentially Love Live distilled down to a pretty perfect execution, the only real problem being a surprising lack of ambition and not exploring its cast as thoroughly as it should've. I genuinely appreciate the 5 girl structure - previous groups have definitely had more and less fleshed out girls as some are relegated to gimmick character traits. 5 felt like a refreshing take that would give each girl further time to shine.

And then yeah, we know where the story goes. Season 2 comes out, and I just find it such a painfully mixed bag of a season. The exact fear was realised - it's not just that there are 4 new girls, it's that 2 of them are insanely hardcore gimmick characters, 1 of them is basically a sidegig for one of the gimmick characters, and then Kinako is fine actually. And it doesn't stop there, because new antagonist force Wien Margarete is here too, to just yell and be stubborn and only ever interact with Kanon. The entire season moves at a snail's pace because basically nothing happens except when Kanon and Margarete are on screen together, but that's a minority of the runtime because we need to see Natsumi try to go viral. It was a painful watch, and in a very real way shot down my hopes of Superstar really being all that good when I genuinely don't like nearly half the cast by volume now.

That was all over 2 years ago by now. There's been a lot of Love Live since then, although the only truly long-form thing was Genjitsu no Yohane, which was like ultra spinoffy such that like what do you want me to say lol. I don't feel like I've engaged with actual serious Love Live in a long time, the wait's been that long. Let alone Superstar, which is the branch of the franchise that's... not quite sure what word to use here. Most relevant? Most interesting? Least predictable? Like it's not the one that's my favourite but I suppose it's the one that feels like it holds all the future potential, or something. Anyway. I don't even know how to reflect on those 2 years anymore. I didn't like seeing people call Superstar shit now or automatically hate the new characters but also I didn't exactly like season 2 and you could axe the entire new cast and I'd be happier for it. I didn't like s3 pessimism but also I wasn't exactly eager for it either. I wanted to, and still want to like Superstar.

And all of that brings us to today. Episode watched, SubsPlease used because I wanted webvideo instead of a TV rip. The OP was genuinely beautiful, I'm really glad I'll get to hear it every week. The ED was comparitively lacking, I'll admit. We've still got Liella no Uta each time though which is always fun. Still looks fantastic, still sounds really nice. No new songs this episode aside from OP and ED but I mean it's Love Live like I'm expecting good shit.

The episode itself... I think at best I'd call it good in spite of itself. There's this whole thing with Love Live antagonists and joining the groups they're antagonising where it can feel artificial because we've seen the OP like we know the full group size, but I mean I'm not that level of petty or plot-brained like I'm happy to see the conflict play out. Margarete is... eh? For a conflict running on from the last season I don't think we've seen enough of her to be sympathetic, she's kind of just a brat. But then Kanon is our perspective character and is trying to understand her, and that's cool, right? I like her justification for moving away from Liella and working with Margarete and her eventual group too - I think that's a good opportunity for growth on both sides and they didn't do it in like a really overdramatic way that results in dumb conflicts where characters aren't just talking it out. Like it works, is the point. It's just that for all that, I'll still see Shiki on screen with her stupid steampunk goggles and get annoyed. I think I can like this season, I'm open to liking it, I have some fondness for what we've had in this first episode anyway. It's just the direction season 2 took is so hard to... I guess reconcile. I don't know. We've got 11 more weeks of this. Let's see what happens, I suppose.

[the-gentler-gamester]

Happy ST4 Anniversary, nerds!

One year on since this moment in the first episode changed the trajectory of my life.

Now. Gather round, children. It's story time.

Let's dial the clock back.

- It's January 2008. I'm sitting alone in a dark cinema. The film I'm about to watch is Sweeney Todd. I. Am. Hyped. Suddenly this young lad appears on the screen. I watch the film and fall in love with it. I watch the credits thinking, "who played Anthony? I gotta remember that name. Kid will surely go places!"

- I do remember the name. And saw it crop up several times over the years. Twilight, The Mortal Instruments. But I was never more than just a casual admirer. I was always pleased to see him though.

- Then came the realisation he was a musician too. (Oh hey look, it's also the one year anniversary of Run On/Devil in Me!) I checked out some of his band's music and wasn't too keen (at the time that is. Low-key obsessed now.) It was little too hard-core for me. Although I did think it was pretty cool when I saw that they'd tour and Glasgow would occasionally be on the list. Alas I never went to any of their shows. (THE REGRET IS SO REAL)

Then... he fell off my radar.

- Stranger Things S4. Up until this point, I enjoyed the show. But never called myself a "fan"! So, I never really kept up to date with filming etc. Anyway. I sit down to watch the new series. Literally right after the title sequence, the name flashes up on my screen. I sit bolt upright.

"Oh... you're back."

You know that way when you see someone's name in the opening credits of something and think "I wonder who they're playing. I gotta keep an eye out" but then you're so swept up in the action, you forget? And before you know it, it's over and you sit there thinking "wait... I didn't see them..." Yeah! I should have clicked right then who he was playing... hindsight huh?

- The series progresses and come episode 5, I FINALLY see the face I've been waiting for. And something changes in me. It's hard to explain. I'm immediately intrigued and by episode 7 I'm ALL IN. This character, man!

- I have quite a few friends who love the show. And we're all collectively losing our minds. For several different reasons. I would have these amazing conversations with each of them. And while the world falls in love with Eddie, I'm inexorably drawn back into the fold by that same blond-haired, blue eyed boy who has been tucked away in my heart, waiting for the moment when I finally realise he's been there all along.

- My focus has been shifted back to him. I revisit all our previous connections with new eyes (AND ears!) All the while, the friendships I have are being fed constantly. Daily, nerdy conversations are my life. I've never smiled and laughed so much. All of this also allowed me to reconnect with people who had drifted away from me. Not intentionally. But life (and a pandemic) gets in the way. This series opened a gateway to allow so much positivity into my life. More than ever before.

- While deep diving into his past, I discover things that open my eyes further. The realisation that he was many years sober and clean after battling addictions made my heart hurt. But also instantly made me feel a deep pride in how far he'd come. I would watch videos of him interacting with fans and talking so openly and honestly about his struggles. Both with addiction and his mental health. I respected him so goddamn much for his honesty. And made me more honest about my own struggles.

Despite the darkness though, there is his sunny disposition. A laugh and smile that always makes me smile too. And there's the pure kindness and truthfulness he radiates. I was pulled in. There was no resisting.

- As odd as it sounds, everything combined gave me an entirely different outlook on life. I was happier than I'd been in such a long time. And then came the convention appearances. Oh boy. What a crazy ride that's been!

- After the initial "I can't afford this!" drama, I got my own shot at him in November of 2022. He was everything I expected and so much more. Kind, warm, chatty and an absolute sweetheart. Even though our literal first interaction was him shaking my hand, looking at me with squinty eyes then asking "have we met before?" No babe, we haven't but I've known you far longer than I realised. And our tale is a very long and complex one. Maybe one day, I'll be able to sit with you and share it myself.

Thank you. For everything. I'm so incredibly grateful that you came into my life. I owe you so much. My words, gifts and hugs will never be enough.

TL;DR - Happy S4 Day! And if you didn't know already, I fucking love one James Metcalfe Campbell Bower.

[therandomestwriter]

Kicking it old school. 😅

THE MUSIC SHUFFLE QUIZ!!!

So basically how it works is that you put your music on shuffle and for each statement/question, you answer it with the name of the song that comes on shuffle. it's funnier if you're completely honest as well. I found these questions on another forum and thought i'd post them here for a bit of fun.

1.How Are You Feeling Today?

Already Over, Pt. 2 (Red)

2.Will I get Far In Life?

Fallen (Imagine Dragons)

3.What Is my Best Friend's Theme Song?

I’m Not Yours (Angus & Julia Stone)

4. What is/Was High School Like?

The Other Side of Hollywood (Cheyenne Jackson)

5.What is The Best Thing About Me?

Lose Myself (TobyMac)

6.How Was Yesterday?

Wait a Minute! (WILLOW)

7.What is my Love Life Like?

Wild (John Legend & Gary Clark Jr)

8.What will my Parents Say To me?

Joe’s Life (Trent Reznor & Atticus Ross)

9.What Song Will They Play On My Funeral?

Happier Than Ever (Loveless)

10.How Does The World See Me?

Baby It’s You (JoJo)

11. What do My Friends Really Think Of Me?

Ho’ihi interlude (WILLOW)

12.What is the World Keeping a Secret Of Me?

Bleed For You (Our Last Night)

13. How Do I make Myself Happy?

New Girl (Labrinth)

14.What Should I Do With My Life?

Powerful (Major Lazer ft. Ellie Goulding)

15.Will I Have Children?

Hallucinogenics (Matt Maeson)

16. What is Good Advice?

Kiss Me at the Gate (The New Monarchs)

17.What does everyone Else Think Of My Current Life?

Blow Top Blues (Lionel Hampton)

18.What Type Of Men/Women Do I like?

Let Me Let Go (Citizen Soldier)

19.Where Will I Live?

If You Were Me (Lindsay Lohan)

20.What Will My Dying Words Be?

Mars (Yeah Yeah Yeahs)

21.Where will I get married?

Underground Tactics (Hpntk)

22.If someone says "is this okay?" you say?

Cardigan (Taylor Swift)

23.What do you like in a guy/girl?

I Used to Care (Louyah)

24.What is life's purpose?

Beautiful People (Ed Sheeran ft. Khalid)

25.What is your motto?

He Said She Said (Ashley Tisdale)

26.What do you think of your parents?

Play With Fire (Nico Santos)

27.What do you think about very often?

Start of Something Good (Daughtry)

28.What is 2+2?

My Man and I (Sister Rosetta Tharpe)

29.What do you think of the person you like?

Butterflies (Zendaya)

^—- this is actually a cute answer.

30.What is your life story?

Boom, Boom, Boom, Boom! (The Venga Boys)

31.What will you dance to at your wedding?

Logical (Olivia Rodrigo)

32.What will they play at your funeral?

Dark Center of the Universe (Modest Mouse)

33.What is your hobby/interest?

Logical (Olive Rodrigo)

^—- Don’t know how she popped up again lol

34.What's the worst thing that could happen?

Paper Doll (Bea Miller)

35.How will you die?

Oh No!!! (WILLOW)

^—- hahahaha.

36.What is the one thing you regret?

Wildest Dreams (Taylor Swift)

37.What makes you laugh?

Touch the Sky (Kanye West ft. Lupe Fiasco)

38.What makes you cry?

Lights On (Big Grams)

39.Will you ever get married?

Dead Dolphin Sounds ‘aid brain growth in unborn child’ Virtual Therapy (Bring Me The Horizon)

^—- And I thought Fall Out Boy had long song titles. 😅

40.What scares you most?

Cake by the Ocean (DNCE)

41.Does Anyone Like you?

Power (Ellie Goulding)

42.If you could go back in time, what would you change?

Keep Holding On (Avril Lavigne)

^—- Awww, this makes me sad. 😔

43.What hurts right now?

Already Over (Mike Shinoda)

44. My make out song is:

Birds (Cajsa Silk)

45. My day will be like:

Give Your Heart a Break (Glee Cast)

46. I'll have a good day, If i can just hear:

Kdv (Missio ft Shug)

47. Next time infront of a crowd, I'll say:

War Stories (Billy Joe Armstrong)

48. My message to the world has always been:

California (Lorde)

49. Somewhere in my wedding vows, I'll include:

Dance Monkey (Kurt Hugo Schneider…)

50. My best friend is like:

Strawberry Blush (John Legend)

51. My alter-ego is:

Thnks fr th Mmrs (Fall Out Boy)

52. Right now, I feel:

Picture in my Pocket (Missio)

53. My innermost desire is:

Swish Swish (Katy Perry ft Nicki Minaj)

54. What makes me happy is:

A Real Hero (College & Electric Youth)

55. My birth was like:

Night on the Sun (Modest Mouse)

^—- Well I am an Aries that was born at night, so… 😅

56. My theme song:

We’ve Got Everything (Modest Mouse)

57. My deepest secret is:

Can You Feel the Sun (Missio)

58. If I reached the top of Mount Everest, what I would scream:

Passionfruit (Drake)

^—— Interesting choice of word lol.

59. My favorite thing to do is:

Domine (Adrián Berenguer)

60. The story of my life is:

Water Music Suite: Minuet (Danny Wright)

61. At my funeral they’ll play:

Move (Keep Walkin’) (TobyMac)

62. When I’m drunk I say:

Cotton Candy Land

(Stevie Nicks and Chris Isaak)

63. Behind my back, my friends think I am:

Black Bull (Foals)

64. If I got lost on a desert island, I would yell:

Why you mad (Louyah ft Gervs)

65. When I’m in the shower, I sing:

Cold (Post Malone)

^—- I mean that could happen. 😅

66. My love of life was inspired by the song:

Peak (Drake)

67. Highschool was like:

Lost in Paradise (Rihanna)

68. My family is described by the song:

Say It (Rihanna)

69. How will you die?:

Kiss Me (Lucy Hale)

70. To cheer myself up I:

Move Your Body (Sia)

^—- Accurate.

[tamlinsimp]

Do you have any songs that you associate with Tamlin? I have a few that fit him after Feyre left the Spring Court, and though I do love a good sad song, I wonder if you or your followers have anything happier to add? I'm also happy to discover more sad songs, too, though. ;)

Here's my list:

Someone You Loved – Lewis Capaldi [excerpt: I'm going under and this time I fear there's no one to save me, This all or nothing really got a way of driving me crazy; I need somebody to heal, Somebody to know, Somebody to have, Somebody to hold, It's easy to say, But it's never the same, I guess I kinda liked the way you numbed all the pain; Now the day bleeds, Into nightfall, And you're not here, To get me through it all, I let my guard down, And then you pulled the rug, I was getting kinda used to being someone you loved]

Before You Go – Lewis Capaldi (TW: this song is about losing a family member to suicide, but before I knew that about this song, I thought it was fitting for Tamlin losing Feyre to Rhysand and the Night Court) [excerpt: I fell by the wayside like everyone else; I hate you, I hate you, I hate you; But I was just kidding myself; Our every moment, I start to replace; 'Cause now that they're gone; All I hear are the words that I needed to say; When you hurt under the surface; Like troubled water running cold; Well, time can heal but this won't; So, before you go; Was there something I could've said to make your heart beat better? If only I'd have known you had a storm to weather; So, before you go; Was there something I could've said to make it all stop hurting? It kills me how your mind can make you feel so worthless; So, before you go]

What Could Have Been – From “Arcane” by Sting, though my favorite cover is by Aloma Steele [excerpt: I hope you know we had everything; When you broke me and left these pieces; I want you to hurt like you hurt me today and I want you to lose like I lose when I play; What could have been; Oh, what could have been; Why don't you love who I am? What we could have been]

Monster – Imagine Dragons [excerpt: If I told you what I was, Would you turn your back on me? And if I seem dangerous, Would you be scared? I get the feeling just because, Everything I touch isn't dark enough If this problem lies in me. I'm only a man with a candle to guide me, I'm taking a stand to escape what's inside me. A monster, a monster, I've turned into a monster, A monster, a monster, And it keeps getting stronger.]

Thanks for humoring me! :)

P.S. If this doesn't fit your blog, feel free to delete. No hard feelings.

Hi anon,

I actually have a few and they are Filipino love songs. Still sung in English but are considered "filipino" music. But some of the ones that specifically reminds me of Tamlin in ACOTAR are The Scientist by Coldplay and Somewhere Only We Know by Keane. Ugh, ki/lls me. I'm going to listen to those! If you know have playlist specifically for Tamlin, let me know :)

[seriouslysnape]

HIii! I was wondering if you could write something Fred (6th/7th year) x Gryffindor Reader (i know u dont usually write him) maybe something where reader and fred are best friends and shes in love with him but she thinks he dosent like her that way with a fuffy ending? maybe some angst not too much tho thank youuu <3 if you dont want to write fred (😭) you can write it for lupin (6th/7th year)

__

His Favorite Girl

Fred Weasley x Gryffindor! Reader

Warnings: Language.

Word Count: 3,430

“Woah. Guess I had more to drink than I thought.”

__

The Gryffindor common room. An ever changing space for all Gryffindor students to unwind, study, or party, depending on the occasion. The common room was always crowded from wall to wall after a Quidditch match, especially when Gryffindor reigned victorious. The players all filed in, bursting with good energy and an itch to celebrate their win. Oliver Wood exploded inside first with an unmistakably beaming smile spreading across his face.

The Gryffindor students who hadn’t been able to make it to watch the match automatically knew that they had won based on Oliver’s visible jubilant mood. You were one of the unfortunate ones that hadn’t been able to make it, but you knew that the team would bring the party to you. The Weasley twins came bopping in next, George carrying a very happy Harry Potter on his shoulders. Harry leapt off of George’s shoulders before the tall twin could knock him into the top of the doorframe.

Your sights automatically set on the other Weasley twin. Fred was beaming with delight at their impressive win. Fred was damn proud to be a Gryffindor, and beating the brakes off of Slytherin was one of his favorite pastimes. He couldn’t be any happier at this moment. It warmed your heart to see him so joyful and full of glee.

You raked over his tall, slender yet muscular frame. His signature red hair was damp with sweat and parts of his face were caked with dirt.

Fred caught your stare, his smile never leaving his face as he gave you a friendly wink. You closed the Potions book in your lap, getting up from the sofa with a silent hope that your thumping heartbeat wasn’t obvious to anyone.

It was a hard thing to do. Keeping your ever growing crush and admiration for Fred Weasley under wraps was becoming more and more difficult as time went on. The seemingly simple solution (as all of your friends had told you) to do would be to “just tell him” how you felt. But it was MUCH easier said than done.

There were so many things that could possibly go wrong if you were to confess your feelings to Fred. You would be running the risk of ruining a beautiful friendship that had done nothing but blossom over the last seven years if he didn’t share that same admiration. You didn’t want to lose your best friend just because your heart felt differently than his.

At the same time, you wanted to tell him every scrap and ounce of how your soul felt lost without him. There had been a few times over the years where you had an opportunity to lay your heart out on the line for him. Each time you had this heavy feeling in your chest letting you know you needed to make a move.

You built up the courage each time, but were interrupted by George or another one of your friends before you could bite the bullet. You knew it wasn’t healthy to keep this holed away in yourself. Your love would only grow more. The more days that passed, the more you began to wonder how different your life would be if you never told him. Not to mention that graduation was only a few months away, and there was always the risk of losing contact with him when you went separate ways.

That is, IF you were to go separate ways.

On the other side of the coin, there was always a chance that Fred possibly did harbor the same admiration for you. That would totally change things in the long run. The idea of starting a romantic relationship, possibly getting married, and having a family was nothing short of perfect.

But you had to get to that point first.

Everyone rallied around Harry, shaking him excitedly and singing their praises to him for his incredible Snitch catch. Suddenly, blaring and thunderous chatter filled the common room as more exhilarated students piled in. Within the hour, a sea of Gryffindors occupied the room, complete with blasting music and an ungodly amount of alcohol.

Oliver had gathered a crowd of first years in one corner of the common room as he retold every solitary second of the match from his point of view, starting from the very beginning. The wide eyed first year wizards and witches were on the edge of their seats as they listened to his story, some of them beginning to wonder if they had what it took to be great Quidditch players.

On the other side of the room, you were settled once again on the sofa with Alicia Spinnet and Katie Bell, who were seated in the arm chairs across from you. They were exhausted from playing all day, but that didn’t stop them from engaging in some girl talk.

Alicia and Katie were your dearest friends, and they were the only ones who knew about your crush on Fred. A crush that had quite honestly evolved into something much more. They were always keeping an ear out to see if Fred said anything remotely leading them to believe that he might like you back. As surprising as it was, Fred never really outwardly spoke about his romantic side.

Speaking of, Fred and George were in another corner of the room with Harry and Ron, doing God only knows what. Fred was considerably tipsy, but nothing even close to plastered. You had seen Fred drunk before, and needless to say, it was a hysterical sight.

“So, [Y/N],” Alicia spoke up, her dark skin looking extra glowy from the fire roaring in the fireplace; “Fred was awfully excited to come back to tell you that we won.”

Katie perked up, her head lifting from where it had been leaning on the back of the chair.

“Yeah! The first thing that he told George was that he couldn’t wait to tell you the news. Although, I guess Oliver kind of told everyone before Fred had the chance.”

“Really? He said that?” You asked, sitting up a little straighter.

Alicia nodded vigorously, gripping Katie’s forearm with elation. Alicia and Katie had never tried to set the two of you up, mainly because you had begged them not to. That didn’t stop them from trying to be the ultimate wingwomen. They believed that you and Fred would be a stellar couple. They were convinced you were made for one another.

They both feared that you’d never make an attempt to make it happen.

“He sure did. I heard him myself.” Katie replied.

Alicia glanced over her shoulder to make sure no one was listening before leaning forward closer to you. Her voice was quiet, loud enough so only you and Katie could hear as she spoke.

“Graduation is coming up quickly. You’ve got to tell him.” She advised.

You sighed heavily. If you had a galleon for every time one of them had told you that, you’d be a wealthy woman. They just didn’t seem to get that it just isn’t that easy. You wouldn’t deny that proclaiming your deepest secret to someone didn’t scare you. It was terrifying to offer your heart and soul to someone, even when you knew that they might get broken as a result. You didn’t want to live with a broken heart.

But you didn’t want to live always asking yourself “what if”.

Before you could respond, a figure plopped themself next to you, his familiar scent sending flutters all through you. Fred basically snuggled up next to you, wrapping his arm around your shoulder. Despite the fact that you weren’t dating, Fred was comfortable enough with you to get extremely close, which didn’t help your situation at all.

Alicia and Katie held down their snickers and giggles at how you were clearly flustered. You tried not to wriggle too much under Fred’s hold, and draw any attention to yourself. He was your best friend, and you knew how to play it cool when he was around.

“Hi, [Y/N].” Fred slurred loudly over the noise.

You laughed softly at the smell of Firewhiskey that was radiating off of him. You weren’t much of a drinker, but you’d have a drink with Fred from time to time.

“Hey, Fred. Congratulations on the match.” You complimented.

Fred grinned proudly, looking down at your slumped body. His eyes were beginning to glaze over from the alcohol, but he looked as sober as ever. He had a certain look in his eyes that you couldn’t identify.

“Thanks. Those bloody Slytherins got what they deserved.” He stated.

“Oliver seems over the moon with how it went.” You remarked, smiling as you looked behind you to see Oliver now standing on a table as he continued telling his thrilling tale.

When you turned back to Fred, you couldn’t help but notice how Fred hadn’t taken his eyes off of you. The butterflies in your belly were going totally bananas now. His gaze did eventually shift to the Potions book that was placed next to your feet, and he let out a guttural sound. He reached for it, noting that it had obviously been put to good use in the last several hours.

“Have you been studying?” He questioned, holding the book in his hand.

You sheepishly nodded, aimlessly reaching for the textbook. An offended look crossed Fred’s face as he held the book far out of your reach. Damn his long arms.

“I have a test on Monday. Advanced Potions is kicking my ass this year and I’ve just barely been getting by so I have to study extra time.” You expressed, laughing at your fruitless attempt to get the book back.

His sharp jaw fell open a tad and he stretched back even further to ensure you didn’t get the book back for now.

“You’re kidding me. I missed my favorite girl at the match because she was stuck in the common room studying for a TEST?” He acquired, not even aware of the weight behind his choice of words.

You felt your smile fade into more of a bashful expression. Your body slinked back into the cushions, forgetting all about the book. His words rang in your word.

Favorite girl.

Fred Weasley’s favorite girl.

Alicia and Katie were both wide eyed and jaw dropped at what he had just said. They were looking back and forth between the two of you like they were at an intense tennis match.

Fred was so aloof and oblivious to the fact that he had literally just melted your heart with a single sentence. You spent so much time with Fred that you just didn’t understand how he couldn’t see it.

Fred knew you backwards and forwards. He could see straight through you when you were lying or when you were sad, but claiming you were fine. He always remembered your favorite treats from Honeydukes and how you liked hot Butterbeer on cold winter nights. It made him happy to hear you talk about your favorite Muggle novels or tell him about something funny that happened in McGonagall’s class. He knew you better than anyone.

But why couldn’t he see the way you were yearning for him?

“You missed me?” You asked, shrinking even further into the cushions.

Fred looked at you as if that were the dumbest question he had ever been graced with. He lowered his arm at your sudden demeanor change, gently putting the book in your hand. Alicia and Katie leaned in carefully, eager to see where this conversation was going. Much to their disappointment, Fred didn’t get a chance to answer due to another member joining you on the couch.

George landed less gracefully than Fred had, basically landing on top of you and smothering you. Your shrieks were muffled in George’s Quidditch robes, Fred wrestling his brother off of you.

“Hey! George, get off of her.” He grunted, heaving his brother’s very limp body off of you.

Alicia threw her hands up in defeat at the interruption, Katie falling back into her chair. So close, yet so far. You gasped for air as George fell on the open seat next to Fred. George was way further gone than Fred. He was barely even able to keep his eyes open, let alone get any real, complete thought across.

“Nice timing, George.” Katie said sarcastically.

You gave her a menacing look, not wanting her to bring it up. George snorted, and his sentence came out more as one incoherent word.

“Did I interrupt something important?” He heavily slurred between hiccups.

You rolled your eyes. Leave it to George to ruin this for you. You were discouraged that your chance had been shot down once again, but it wasn’t George’s fault. You were just glad to see your friends in such high spirits. Soon enough, the rest of the party goers had crowded towards the center of the room where you were. The party raged on well into the night, a complete celebration with dancing, singing, and more drinking.

As easily as the party could’ve carried on and on, eventually the famed players’ exhaustion caught up with them and they all slowly dwindled down and sauntered off to their respective dorm rooms. You hugged Alicia and Katie goodnight, knowing they’d be passed out in their beds by the time you got up to your dorm room.

You spoke to Harry and Ron for a bit, giving Harry a friendly kiss on the top of his head for his winning catch. His pasty white cheeks went red as he and Ron retreated to their room in a fit of blushy giggles. That left just you and the twins in the common room that was now completely trashed. Empty cups and half spilled bottles of alcohol were scattered about, people even leaving behind some of their school stuff to be recollected in the morning.

George was a mumbling, intoxicated mess. He was close to falling asleep, and Fred wanted to get him to bed before he was completely unable to stand up. You’d be up for a while cleaning up the common room. You always hated leaving a room knowing it was messy, so you didn’t mind picking up after everyone. Fred knew you’d stay behind to clean up, but he didn’t want you to have to do it alone. He draped his babbling twin over his shoulders, grimacing at how George was usually heavier when he was drunk.

“I’m going to run George upstairs and then I’ll be back to lend you a hand.” He smiled, ignoring the things that George was trying to say to him.

“You don’t have to. I can handle it.” You said, tossing a handful of cups away.

“I know you can. I just don’t want you to be lonely is all.” He said, turning on his heel and marching up the boys’ dormitory stairs with George.

You felt a warm flush course through you at his words once more. You weren’t sure why you were extra sensitive to him tonight. Sure enough, Fred returned a few minutes later, almost stumbling into the wall at the bottom of the stairs. You both laughed as he gave a witty comment.

“Woah. Guess I had more to drink than I thought.” He said, walking into the room once he steadied himself.

“Is George okay?” You asked, accepting the pile of empty bottles that Fred placed into your trash bag.

You usually hand cleaned for the first few minutes, but would eventually grow bored and cast a spell from your wand to finish the work. It was seldom that the common room was this quiet, so you liked to bask in the silence for a little after there was a party.

Fred scoffed with a nod.

“Oh, yeah. He’ll be fine. Nasty hangover in the morning, but there’s a potion for that.”

As usual, the two of you were tired of cleaning, so you waved your wand with a quick cleaning charm. You both watched in amazement as the trash and everything else whisked around the room into trash bins, leaving the room spotless. You put your wand in your back pocket with a satisfied hum. Usually, this would be the time where you went to bed, but you were getting that familiar heavy feeling in your chest.

It immediately dawned on you that you had a perfect chance here. No one was around, and no one would be around for more than enough time.

“You want to sit and chat for a bit?” Fred questioned, noticing your dazed look; “You seem like you’ve got something on your mind.”

The fireplace was still occupied with a cozy warm fire, which was very inviting. You nodded, following Fred to the same couch you had been on earlier. The common room was beyond peaceful now, your head almost lulling onto Fred’s shoulder in relaxation.

Oddly enough, you weren’t freaked out now. In all the past times you had tried to do this, you were a jittery mess and could barely get a word out without stuttering. You felt so at ease now, as if this was something you did often. You hadn’t even had a drop of alcohol tonight, so you couldn’t blame it on that.

“So what’s up?” Fred questioned after you didn’t initiate a conversation.

He had unknowingly opened a door that you knew you had to take. It was now or never.

“I’m just thinking about some things.” You admitted.

Fred’s curiosity was sparked now. He was always interested and willing to hear what was going on in your mind.

“What kind of things?” He pressed on.

Your sights were set on the flames in front of you, causing you to miss the way that Fred was looking at you with such fondness and care. He was cherishing every passing second of this moment.

“You and me.” You confessed.

Fred was filling with anticipation, not sure where you were going with this. He raised a brow.

“What about us?” He replied.

You took a breath.

“Fred, what did you mean when you said I was your favorite girl?” You queried.

Fred looked into your eyes that were peering up at him in a puppy-like way. He noticed that you were expecting an answer. Fred, as confident as ever, responded with a voice like butter, his accent a little thicker.

“Because you’re my favorite person in the world.” He revealed.

Your heart caught in your throat and your breathing hitched. So far so good.

“I am?” You asked to confirm

Fred’s arm that was around you pulled you in closer. You were being flooded with such a sense of intimacy that it was overwhelming. Your nose was level with his chin, and you were so close to his face that you swore you could hear the blood flowing through his face. Fred knew what was happening now, and he was ecstatic about it. He had wanted you all along, but never knew how’d you’d react. The last thing he ever wanted to do was scare you off.

He thought about all the times he had seen you upset, and how it hurt him when you were pained with something. He always wished for nothing but happiness for you. He didn’t want to ruin things because of how he felt.

But now he was sure that you’d be here to stay.

“Absolutely you are. You’re all I ever think about.” He whispered, stroking your face with the side of his thumb that was wrapped around you.

This didn’t feel real, but felt all too real at the same time.

“Why are you whispering?” You smiled softly, whispering back to him.

He smirked, and whispered again.

“Because I want you to know how much I love you.”

A cannon of confetti seemingly exploded all throughout your body. Shock, desire, lust, love, want, everything went through you all at once. This wasn’t at all how you had imagined this happening, but you were happy that it did. It was very fitting for the two of you.

“Kiss me.” You whispered once more.

He lowered his head and his lips caught yours in a feverish way. All the pent up feelings from the last 6 years all loaded themselves into the kiss. It was a huge weight off of your shoulders.

“I love you,” You professed once Fred pulled away; “You don’t know how long I’ve waited to tell you that.”

Fred chuckled lightly, responding before kissing you again.

“I think I have a pretty good idea.”

[bonjour-rainycity]

Making Amends

Summary: Five years, you thought he was gone for good. After the War, he disappeared. Now, after months of zero contact, he shows up at your bridal salon. A somewhat bitter Reader and a post-FATWS Bucky

Pairing: Bucky x F!Reader

Word count: 2381

Warnings: Mentions of past violence and killings, adult language

I sigh, securing the train of the dress so it doesn’t drag against the floor. The dress is stunning, as they all are. This one—pouffy, ivory, grand—has a bateau neckline and falls to the floor in a long, glittering train.

The glitter gets everywhere.

I bend down, trying to wipe some of it off my pants leg, then work on my blazer. Every day, only black clothes. It’s tradition, but a stupid one — the glitter stands out on my clothes more than it does on the white dresses.

“Miss, someone’s here to see you.”

I grit my teeth, digging my hands into the fabric of the dress. The receptionist is young — barely out of her teens, really — and still quite new at her job. She, like others, disappeared on that awful day five and a half years ago.

The day I lost everything.

And she’s here today because of my friends’ sacrifices.

I try to remind myself to be patient. “We’re appointment only, Lydia. Tell her to call, make an appointment, and come back then.”

“R-right,” she stammers, and I can hear the bottoms of her heels scraping against the floor as she shifts her weight. “It’s just—well, he said it’s really important, and wouldn’t take no for an answer.”

That gives me pause. He?

As a product manager at a bridal salon, my day is mostly spent in the company of women. Brides, their mothers, bridal parties, wedding planners, etc. There’s the occasional fiancé, father, brother, friend come to support, or a groom shopping for a dress, but overall, men tend to stand out.

“Fine, send him in,” I allow. It’s obvious he’s not listening to Lydia, but I know I’m more intimidating than she is. I’ll tell him to schedule an appointment. “And then do me a favor — there’s a list of designers on my desk upstairs. Can you give their offices a call and update the contact info for each brand representative?”

She sounds relieved. “Sure, no problem.”

As the sound of her heels meeting the ground fade away, I breathe in the sweet, floral-scented air. We’re under-booked today. There are only a few brides occupying our east fitting rooms, so I’ve decided to spend my afternoon in the west, making everything look perfect for the weekend ahead. Having this section alone — just me, the soft piano music playing over the speakers, and the dresses — is almost peaceful.

It would be peaceful if I were anyone else.

I continue to straighten the dresses. Everything needs to be perfectly spaced, meticulously tucked and folded to make each dress impressive in its own way. There’s no room for imperfection, here.

The sound of heavy boots clicking on the floor rings through the empty room. “Hey, Doll.”

My body runs cold.

That voice. I know it well.

My mind flashes to late nights, stealing smiles and kisses, tight hugs, adoring eyes.

And then falling to the ground in grief. Changing outfits to attend my second funeral of the day. His. And, after years of grieving, healing, and suffering through, one chance to fix it all. The joy of having him back. Locking eyes on the battlefield.

And then nothing.

Nothing.

All my air leaves me in one, quick, sigh. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

I turn, both dreading the sight and longing for it.

And just like that, standing between two rows of eggshell and pearl and ivory, he’s here.

Dark denim jeans, a deep blue shirt—long sleeve, knowing him—a grey button-up open on his chest, and two thick gloves, despite the summer heat.

I cross my arms.

He purses his lips together and raises his eyebrows, crossing one foot over the other casually. “So, bridal, huh?”

I feel my jaw clench. “I’ve got to make a living, don’t I? Evidently you do, too.” I can’t stop the bitterness from seeping into my voice.

He sighs that long-suffering sigh, one that tells me he’s more resigned than upset. “I wanted to come back.”

I turn my attention back to the dresses, walking down the row of gleaming white. “No one was stopping you.”

He turns to face me as I continue my inspection of each and every gown. “It’s not that simple. I—I was working hard. I had to get freed from him.”

I grit my teeth, fighting the urge to feel something. But of course, I do. Ever since I’ve known Bucky, he’s been wrecked by the things he’s done and terrified he’ll be called to do them again.

Terrified that he’ll lose his mind once again to the assassin.

When I saw him on TV, in a random news report from months ago, I’d broken down into sobs. I’d fallen to my knees and said prayer after prayer of thanks. Because the clouds had faded from his eyes. The fear, the ever-present dread, was gone. He stood taller, more assured —

Happier.

I knew then, that somehow, he’d gotten the Winter Soldier out.

I bend down, fluffing layers of crinoline in a ballgown. “You’ve been in the news.”

He hears the accusation in my voice. You’ve been back for months.

He approaches me slowly, coming to stand in front of me as I straighten. “I had a job to do.”

“What, the new Captain America doesn’t allow cell phones?”

He ignores the jab. “Doll, I had to wait to make sure, to be sure, but I’m safe, now. I’m not him anymore.”

“Bucky, I always felt safe with you,” I whisper, the emotion nearly winning. “I loved you more than anything. And despite what you said — that you loved me, too — you just left. Five years I waited for you. I didn’t think there was any way I would ever see you again, and then by some miracle, after so much loss, you came back! We fought in a war together. We killed. And we won. And then you disappeared. It’s been six months! I-I mean, I hate to think the worst, Bucky, but I really thought—” I cut off my words then, unable to continue without dissolving into tears.

His jaw tightens in that heartbreaking way it does when he’s sad, and he reaches forward. When I don’t protest to his gloved hand on mine, he pulls me into a hug. I want to melt into him. I want to collapse under nearly six years of unresolved grief, stress, worry, and let him hold me up, let him bear this burden for just a few minutes.

But that’s not the way I’m made.

I’ve entrusted my heart to him too many times.

And every time, I’m left alone and broken.

I push myself out of his arms, wiping my tears away quickly. Once again, the dresses act as my anchor, my distraction. I gather one in my arms, crossing the aisle to re-hang it in its proper place.

Bucky watches from a distance.

His hands are tucked into his pockets, and he looks at me sadly for a while before his eyes turn to the ground.

Silence falls between us. The only noises are the coos of elated brides and their adoring guests coming from the east side of the building.

After a while, Bucky raises his head towards me. “Does working here make you want it?”

I sigh. He can’t do that. Can’t come in here after so much time away with zero contact and then casually ask me stupid questions. “Want what?”

“You know,” he shrugs, leaning against the receptionist’s desk. “It. A wedding, a marriage, a…life.”

I purse my lips, shaking my head. I reach to adjust a hanger slightly out of my arm span, trying my hardest not to sound sad. “I’m not the kind of girl you marry, Buck. Not anymore.”

He scoffs, making a face. “What does that even mean?”

I turn on him, more than done with this conversation. “Exactly that! I see it every day — brides come in here, all starry-eyed, happy, innocent. They’ve got love, or at least the excitement of planning their ‘big day,’ and they just glow with all the life in them. I don’t have that, not anymore. I—” I lower my voice, gritting my teeth against the emotion that attempts to fight through. “I’ve killed people, Bucky. For a long period of time, that’s all I did. And, look, I’m really, really happy for you being able to heal and move on and be freed, but I can’t do that. I can’t come back from who I turned out to be.”

“That’s bullshit. You did what you had to do.” He pushes himself off the receptionist’s desk, adamant. “Every life you took was to stop the slaughter of others. You can’t blame yourself for that.”

“I can.”

We stare each other down.

He’s always had a good stare.

Steady, intimidating, unwavering. It’s like he can see into the depths of your soul and know he can outlast you.

But I work with furious mothers of the brides.

I raise an eyebrow, showing him I will not back down from this challenge.

He blinks and moves his gaze past my right shoulder. Something shifts in his eyes. “You’ve got a client.”

I force my expression to soften, maneuvering around Bucky to grab the clipboard from the receptionist’s desk. I give him a look that clearly says do not move, and hurry to the front door to welcome the bride and her guests in. Amidst the flurry of excited chatters, gushing about wedding plans, and a clear description of what she does not want, I check them in on the clipboard and take them to the east wing to meet a consultant. When I return, Bucky is exactly where I left him.

He smirks at me. “What the hell was that? Your voice rose like three octaves.”

I roll my eyes. “It’s called customer service.”

He shrugs, leaning against the desk in a way I should not find ridiculously attractive. “Well, why don’t I get any of that?”

I grit my teeth. “Because they are going to buy a dress, which will pay my salary, which will make me happy. You on the other hand, have caused me nothing but anger, sadness, and worry.” I blink, absently shocked that all that truth escaped despite my best efforts.

Something flashes in Bucky’s eyes—regret, maybe—but he covers it well, tilting his head to the side and keeping his playful tone. “Really? Nothing but that? Gosh, I must have been a terrible boyfriend.”

I dig my teeth into my lower lip, staring down at my clipboard. It’s been six months. You may as well continue with the honesty. You don’t know the next time you’ll have a change to talk to him like this. “Buck…” I approach him slowly, buying myself time. Too soon, I come to stand in front of him. “You were a great boyfriend. I…” I sigh, shaking my head. “I thought you were it. I didn’t want anyone else. And we were happy, overall. You know—up until you disappeared without so much as a text and ignored me for six months.”

A muscle twitches in his cheek. He leans forward, locking his eyes with mine. “We were good together. I loved you, more than anything, I—well Doll, I still love you. And look, I know I’ve messed up. In more ways than seems is humanly possible, but I,” he sighs, shaking his head. “I’m as clean as I’m ever gonna get. I shouldn’t have disappeared without warning. I should’ve called when I left Wakanda. I should’ve let you hear from me rather than seeing me on the news. I should’ve come back and done the work to rebuild what I broke. I’m sorry. I really am.”

I feel the clipboard digging into my stomach. I don’t move. I stare at him, terrified of the way his words, the honesty in his eyes, makes me react. Too easily, my walls are coming down. “What did you come here for?”

“I—just,” he digs his hands into his pockets, sighing lowly. “I’m back in town. And I’m here to stay for a while. If you’d allow it, I’d like to try to make amends.”

Don’t do it, I beg myself. Don’t set yourself up for more pain.

In the face of my silence, he nods slowly, taking on a look of sad understanding.

“I work till seven.” The words rush from my mouth before I can stop them, before I can think of the consequences. I grip the clipboard even tighter.

Bucky raises an eyebrow, the start of a smile tugging at the edge of his lips. “Yeah?”

“Yeah,” I nod, my heart racing at the prospect of being with him again, of maybe fixing things. “I live in the same apartment.”

He grins fully now, but at my stern look, attempts to wipe it off his face. I’m still mad at him, he shouldn’t get too comfortable yet.

But the light doesn’t leave his eyes and, despite my fear that this will all turn out terribly for me, I feel my own lips threatening to turn up.

He pushes himself off the desk, standing closer to me than I think either of us intended. “Can I take you out?”

I release a long breath, not moving from my spot despite our proximity. “Yes.”

He nods slowly, not pulling his gaze from mine. “It’s a date.”

“It’s a trial period,” I correct, unable to keep myself from teasing him a little.

He tilts his head to the side, laughing indulgently. “Alright, I deserve that. Then, sure, I’ll pick you up at eight for our trial period.”

He smirks cockily at me, winking in that way he knows makes my knees weak, before turning and swaggering to the door.

Despite our play, he’s not getting off this easy. There’s a lot we have to work through, and we might not even be compatible anymore — he knows that, too.

But for just this moment, I allow myself to enjoy feeling comfortable with him, joking like we used to. When his gloved hand reaches for the doorknob, I call after him, keeping my tone light. “You’re on thin fucking ice, Barnes.”

He turns his head to mine, nodding solemnly in a way I didn’t expect. “I know, Doll.”

A/n Whoops, couldn’t get this one out of my head after seeing Bucky in FATWS, so here’s some angst, bitterness, and hopefully a little hope! 

|masterlist|

[zuluc]

anonymous requested: i've been thinking about what to request for the past 3 days and i think i've finally got it. can i ask for kaeya or diluc with a crush that's a depressed bard that always composes sad songs and lyrics? here's the twist, though. their songs and lyrics start to cheer up as the two of them become closer friends!

pairing: diluc x gn! reader

style & genre: written; fluff

warnings: none

notes: i decided to do diluc for this one because I think it’d have a great impact on him as a person as well, and i’m here for more fluff with him 🥰 i made the lyrics myself for the sake of this fic please go easy on me all i know about music is playing the violin/viola also this is long

i changed the prompt a bit if that’s alright!

“Who are you exactly?” Diluc eyes you strangely when you look at him with a blank stare. In one hand you have a notebook and in the other is a lyre. You walked in only moments ago, actively avoiding anyone’s eyes as they knew you weren’t from town. You just wanted to go straight to the owner of the tavern and hope to share what you had in that book of yours.

“A bard,” you say. You look around to see a few of the townspeople staring back while the others cheer happily with each other as if an exciting thing had happened. “Do you have room for a performance?”

Diluc raises an eyebrow and crosses his arms. You didn’t appear to have any double meaning or ill intention in your words, rather, your eyes were just void of any glint of mischief he usually saw in a certain person. But to waltz in one day and ask for something like this so casually, you really weren’t from there.

“Sure, just don’t steal anything.” He is skeptical of you as he is of any one else but you didn’t need to know that. You were used to it after all. He directs you to the side of the bar that was supposedly the “performance stage” but it didn’t matter. Anywhere was fine with you.

The townspeople gradually stop their chatter as you quickly tune your lyre, playing a chord once the strings were ready. The tune that escapes into the air effectively silences any remaining voices. The song you were going to start wasn’t one they would usually hear in this city of freedom and apparently cheerfulness.

Your fingers hook at the strings, releasing them with ease as a soulful melody fills the entire tavern. The chord was of the lower register and hummed deeply. Diluc flicks his eyes over to you as he cleans a glass and sees your own eyes are closed. 

When the night has passed

For then will I be free

Will they see me trample dust

Or let me keep my feet

Your book is open and he can see the words you were singing on the pages. It looks like you just started this line of work given how many pages were left in that book, assuming it was your only one as all you came in with were those two items and a small bag of mora. 

He doesn’t notice how much of an effect your song had until he scans over the tavern patreons. Your voice carries through, swaying through the people to where it grazes a piece of their hearts to reminisce forlorn memories. But your words felt soulful as if they had come from your own experiences. A thought passes over his head which causes his heart to pang before quickly shaking it off when he realizes the feeling.

Ah, so you were this type of bard. 

Diluc just thinks he’ll only see you one time so he lets the thought pass through.

Once your song ends the drunk townspeople cheer loudly among themselves. You are taken aback by all the noise but bow politely to them for their reaction. You take your things as they call out for you to do another song and you shake your head.

“Maybe another time,” you say with slight sorrow to your face or words. They accept the answer and continue on their night and when you turn to leave, Diluc can’t stop the words that come out of his mouth. 

“Why not stay for a drink?” You look at him incredulously and he crosses his arms, “Call it payment for your services. They seemed to enjoy it.” You make cautious movement as you make your way to a stool. Diluc sets out an apple cider vinegar drink and you sniff at it. Once you take a sip you notice his face at the corner of your sight. The edge of his lip is slightly quirked up as he sighs while cleaning a glass.

It seems they weren’t the only ones who enjoyed the song.

--

Mondstadt was a city that was very welcoming in comparison to all the other places you spent time at. The people were either unwilling to hear your music or had particular reactions to the pieces you shared. To them, it seemed you didn’t understand that bar music was supposed to be lively and something to dance to. Not something to feel sad about.

But you wanted to share it anyways for your songs are one of the few things in life that you are proud of. One of the few things that have filled the emptiness of yourself that you lost those years ago and maybe, just maybe, sharing them will help you feel in some way. To you, these songs are sorrowful, but they shouldn’t just make people sad. That’s why you were quite surprised at the reactions at Angel’s Share  as opposed to those from other places.

They should elicit emotions of nostalgia. Or maybe, you just hadn’t found the right experience to make them happier.

--

You come back a few nights later and Diluc is working the bar yet again. When he lifts his head, his shoulders sag in relief seeing that it is you. Venti had come by a few times after hearing about you and kept pressing the owner about letting him on the stage as well. 

He was rejected numerous times in tandem with being asked to pay up for his drink tab.

The same book and lyre are still in hand when you head towards Diluc like you did that first night. He places the glass in his hands down and gives you a nod of his head, “Welcome back.”

“Thanks,” You look around and see that the tavern is even fuller than the last night you performed. It seems word had got around of your songs and they had all been waiting patiently for nights now. That was what an attendee had said to you outside the door anyways. “Do you mind?” You gesture to the stage.

“Go for it,” Any sense of caution that seeped through his words when you met him was near to nonexistent now. Maybe it was the impressions you left on the townspeople and their word of mouth the past few days. A depressing bard in the city of freedom in comparison to the other bards was news, especially when this bar had a wonderful voice to listen to.

The bar quiets again with the numerous greetings and cheers in seeing you up there. You flip open your book and thumb through the pages before settling on one song near the middle. It was a two-parter.

Your fingers pick at the strings lightly, slowly adding pressure thus causing the volume to increase subtly. Diluc shifts in his spot as he tries to focus on the tasks at hand but there really isn’t anything he is going to lose if he wants to listen.

I ran far in the depths of that same night

They chased me off as they truly had hoped

But I lost my way and wandered far

Met and saw numerous things was how I coped

The townspeople are yet again taken by your voice and melody that they had started to move with the music. Diluc decides to abandon his tasks for a little while, now aware how your music allows him to reflect as you intended. 

He sees these events before him. The death of one close to him and the loss of someone beside him whom he thought he could trust wholeheartedly. You stop singing but continue with plucking at the strings that calms the atmosphere. It is solemn and relaxing, almost putting the drunkest of the bunch to sleep but through sheer willpower they stay awake to listen on.

Happy and cheerful those that I have seen

But they were not accepting of me

Sharing the harsh reality of these mysteries

How will one otherwise feel so free?

The song ends and a round of cheers erupts, louder than the first night as there were more people. Diluc snaps out of his thoughts and wordlessly fixes you another drink that you take again, albiet still a bit shyly.

“Your lyrics,” Diluc begins and you tense at the sound of his voice, “From experience I assume?” He is straightforward, you should know this from the gossip around town. There was nothing in it for you to hide anything from him or anyone else so you tell him.

“Yes. That’s what makes good music, does it not?” You take a sip of the beverage. It must be a different one as it is much sweeter than the apple cider vinegar. “When you can relate to the words yourself. I simply want to share that with the people for reasons even I am unsure of.”

Diluc hums and doesn’t look you in the eye for his next words.

“I see. Your voice is quite nice.”

--

You both managed to continue with light chatter that night and he learns that you are staying in Mondstadt for quite a bit. You had no set plans to be in a specific place at any specific time so what was the rush to leave? Among this he is aware of how you speak. There is an ambiguous sorrow in your words from the effect of your past, he believes, that share no optimism but realistic choices that would completely stop the conversation. 

But he was the same so it continues. 

His past is the reason for his own apprehension when speaking with strangers but you were a little different. You outright told him your objective and you were just a bard who wanted to share their experience. 

You learn this of him and it was the first time that you felt light when speaking with someone.

--

“Y/n!” They learn of your name after the third night you show up which is another few nights after the second. Some take your music as a lighthearted joke in contrast to their free lives while others pay close attention to the words and sway with the tune.

You give a small grin in acknowledgement before sitting in the stool in front of Diluc. Throughout the weeks you had gotten to know each other a little better besides the titles of The Sorrowful Bard and Diluc of Mondstadt. You were just y/n and he was Diluc.

You always make a point to talk to him before performing, giving a small insight into the meaning behind your words. Last time replayed the sleepless night and doubts as you wandered Teyvat and the time before that was a retelling of an animal that accompanied you for the last months of its life.

“It knew it had to go yet it decided to follow me, spreading that sadness of loss to me as I was attached.” You said to him that night with dry eyes.

All you tell him is that this song is a little different from your other ones.

He shows more of himself to you, actions he wouldn’t typically show to others if it weren’t for a certain motive or purpose. But you were not threatening nor wanted something from him. Diluc put a bit of trust in you for that.

You never sing more than one song each night because you want them to take in the words of each song carefully. Like that animal, you wanted to share the sadness but allow them to see the great memories.

This night contains your fourteenth or fifteenth song and it is fairly new. You wrote this in the early hours of the morning with a newfound emotion bustling inside your chest. You were scared when waking up, but felt reassured when there was a hint of melancholy there among an unfamiliar emotion.

The tavern goers look at you with hopeful and excited eyes. You feel warmth in your heart as you remember the times a few of them have come up to you telling you that your music has made it easier to sleep. That your music is inspiring; sad, but inspiring.

You play a chord and Diluc raises a brow in hearing a lighter tone. Underlying is that first low tone in your first night, indicating that you plan to keep a sense of your usual. 

Then I stumbled in, seeing the light there

Unexpected welcoming I was greeted by

At first there was nothing then passed a while

Uprising something foreign for me to finally cry

Even if your eyes are trained to the floor, they are in his general direction. You didn’t know what you were feeling and you sure didn’t want to push it. 

He has his entire attention directed at you. 

You pluck higher notes much different from the chords you were accustomed to, messing up in a few that no one seemed to notice. You straighten yourself and look over the entire bar, settling your eyes on him for a bit too long for him to notice.

And so thankful am I

To be able to do such as that

And never is it unwelcomed

The beats in my soul are no longer flat

Your eyes stay staring at him and the cheers drown out. Diluc’s hand raises a few centimeters from the counter but you have already picked up your book and instrument and left.

The drink is untouched as he follows after you, thanks to Charles.

--

You feel like you can’t breathe but there is physically nothing blocking your airway. You assumed it was due to the collection of body heat in the tavern but even the cool night air did nothing to soothe the burning in your face. 

Why did I look at him? Why was he looking back? What does this mean?

“Y/n!” You gasp at the sound of his voice and as you turn around you hope that it was just in your head. Your mouth opens and closes but you can’t speak. you don’t know what to say.

Truthfully, he doesn’t either. 

Diluc didn’t know what to expect when you told him it would be different. He definitely didn’t expect for the song to be about him. He had deducted this reasoning and confirmed it when your eyes met and to you leaving.

In that room he felt the same: his face was warm and his heartbeat picked up when you lingered your gaze on him. He didn’t know what this feeling was either. 

Neither of you are speaking, the breeze brushing through.

“I’m sorry!” You say, bowing your head so he cannot see the tears of confusion, frustration, and something else running down your face.

“Why are you apologizing?” He is near you now and he can feel you jump at his touch on your shoulder. When you don’t push him off he moves his gloved hand to cup your face to lift it up. This is the first time he’s seen you cry. 

Ironic, given your songs. 

Diluc lightly presses his thumb to your cheek to brush off a tear. “Apologizing is for if you’ve done something wrong. You have done nothing of the sort.”

“Are you sure?” You say without hesitation. It is an automatic response, built upon the hardening of your heart and soul through your travels. Diluc chuckles, a small smile on his face.

“I am sure.”

--

You strum lightly, a newfound lightness to you that almost everyone has noticed. Your songs still have that sorrowful reality to them but at the end they have changed. Seeing more of the graceful and fulfilling beauty of life.

Diluc still fixes you drinks after every performance and indulges you in conversation. This time around, however, he leans in closer and places his hand closer to yours.

And you are thankful to feel that emotion.

[sonderthroughthestreets]

Hi! Idk what came over me but I thought an AU where Sander’s kid is anti-Bowie was the most hilarious thing thanks to @hidden-joy @kylesbishops and @sanderijzermans so I wrote it skdjdj

Disclaimer: it’s all fun and chaos and I don’t really know anything about how to write kids

x, x, x, x, credit to the chaos 🤪

The day Sander Driesen hears the words come out of his child’s mouth is the day he wonders if this is his child at all.

He’s standing there, leather jacket, white t-shirt and all, bleached hair icy even in the summer sun, and he looks down at the small stature in front of him. Grey-green eyes, dark locks and an air of confidence that could only be learned from a certain music-loving individual fill his sight. There’s so much innocence standing before him but a driven insistence breaks through the words spoken.

“Dad,” he hears. “I don’t know how to tell you this, but...I don’t really like David Bowie all that much.”

Sander thinks he’s lost his senses. He is definitely not hearing right. Hell, he’s only a man in his early thirties, he could not be this hard of hearing already. He tries to brace himself on the couch from falling over. Shit, he’s also too young to feel this frail.

“Wh-what do you mean you don’t like David Bowie all that much?”

The question comes out in gasps of air, ragged and winded, like he can’t believe what’s happening. He feels like his world’s spinning, like he’s entered another dimension, like there was no way, absolutely no way, his child doesn’t like David Bowie.

Denial is a pretty powerful thing, though...

See, when Alexandra Driesen was born, she brought light and life to Sander and Robbe’s eyes. She had a chubby face and squishy cheeks and eyes the colour of a summer storm. Her dark hair had been a blessing to match Robbe’s. Everything about her was as perfect as it could get. And then came the perpetual frustrations of parenthood with the screaming and the crying.

Sleep was something to be cherished at the Driesen-Ijzermans household. A few day-naps here and a doze-off there. But God, oh God, did Alexandra know how to cry in the middle of the night. Robbe and Sander spent hours upon hours holding her and swaying her and rocking her on a chair. Sander had read that sometimes music helps so he’d even done all that. Bowie usually floated in the shriek-filled room during these times and yet, Alexandra just wept.

“Come on, baby, just a little bit of sleep. Don’t you get tired of screaming all night?” Sander asked in that exhausted tone of parentese. He held her against the crook of his neck and walked around in sweats until he saw Robbe enter the room with blood-shot eyes and curls disarrayed.

“She’s still crying?” he asked with a rasp in his voice.

“She literally won’t stop and I don’t know what to do, I’ve tried everything. I’ve even got Bowie on for her,” he said.

Robbe took her from his arms and swayed her a little, cooing and kissing her tiny head.

“It’s kind of loud, though,” Robbe said to him as he then stepped over to turn off the music.

And in an instant miracle, the house was all quiet.

It seems that’s what’s always happened and Sander just hadn’t noticed it. Alexandra settled into Robbe’s chest and stretched her mouth in a heavy yawn. Her warmth radiated and glowed through Robbe, but Sander was stunned. He’s completely shocked.

“You-she-“ he stuttered clumsily for a bit. “But it was Bowie,” he said weakly.

How could his own daughter not feel at peace with Bowie? It was a connection he held with him, something connecting him and Robbe and what he hoped would connect their child to them in this little family.

“Hmmm,” Robbe hums pensively. “Maybe Bowie’s not her thing.”

“Not her thing?” Sander just about exploded. Then he suddenly remembered Alexandra’s finally gone to sleep and whispered, seething. “That is not our child!”

“Biologically, no. Legally and emotionally, yes,” smirked Robbe. “Calm down, babe, she’ll learn to like him soon enough. For now, how about we hold off on Bowie for a bit, yeah?”

He swayed her just a little more, just to really make sure she’s easing into sleep and then set her gently back down in her crib.

“How long?” Sander muttered and Robbe gave him a confused look. “How long without Bowie?”

Robbe contemplated.

“Maybe we give it six months or so,” he said.

And now it was Sander who wanted to weep. -

As the months and years went on, Alexandra had gone on without her Bowie-loving phase, only mildly being interested in the lightning bolt plushies and the songs blasting on road trips and the shirts Sander would get for her. Robbe says it just takes time for kids to get into stuff. That it’s better to leave it there in the open for them than to shove it down their throats.

“It’s barely any shoving,” Sander had grumbled.

“I know, babe. But I know how you can get sometimes,” Robbe had placed a soothing kiss upon his lips.

Still, Sander’s worries were increasingly growing.

Then a few years later, they’d adopted another beautiful girl. Mia was a radiant vision of blonde curls and brown eyes. They held a similar warmth that Robbe’s eyes held and Sander couldn’t be happier to lose himself in pools of coffee or dark, earthy soils or any other sort of metaphor for his favourite kind of brown.

To his relief, though, Mia loved listening to Bowie. She loved playing with the lightning bolt plushy and wearing all the shirts and as she grew, she and Sander had lots of music jam sessions blasting Bowie throughout the house. Alexandra was enticed into joining for a bit in the beginning but as time went on, Sander found it that she was making more and more excuses to not be in the same room when Bowie was mentioned.

“Uh, I got homework, Dad,” she’d nervously run her fingers through her hair.

“Uh, Papa needs help with dinner I think,” she’d run out with a tight smile.

“Group project due soon. Léon’s being a piece of shit and not pulling his weight at all.”

“Language,” Robbe would chastise coming around the corner.

“He’s being a dick?” she suggested.

“Fuck him.”

“Sander!”

“Sorry.”

Her interests lay instead in skateboarding with her friends, headphones in her ears listening to rap: BROCKHAMPTON and Stormzy with even a little Ed Sheeran in the mix, and keeping her hair as short as possible. She’d had a bit of a habit wearing overgrown shirts like Robbe did. But Sander found that endearing and he didn’t really think it was a case of ‘not-like-other-girls’ syndrome. He and Robbe just let her wear whatever she wanted.

And in fact, it was at thirteen years of age that Alexandra came out to the family as a boy. Sander remembers it clearly with them all huddled on the couch looking at the person in front of them with beady eyes, waiting.

“Dad, Papa, Mia. I think I’m a boy. I think I’m trans and I’d like to formally introduce myself to you all. I’m Alexander, or just Alex. And I use he/they pronouns.”

Sander had wanted to tear up, emotions flooding inside his rib cage. Happy tears, though, a joyous occasion where his son felt comfortable enough to tell them about this part of himself. That he and Robbe had created a space where he felt safe enough. Loved enough.

“I kept Alexander ‘cause, Sander,” he gestured to Sander. “But really, Alex is fine.”

And Sander wanted to cry all over again.

They’d all been encased in a huge family hug with Mia chirping that she’d ‘always wanted a big brother.’

Robbe and Sander had been quite supportive of it all, calling the school to change both the name and preferred name and asking if Alex was considering wearing a binder or getting a proper haircut. “Yes” to the haircut. “Hold off for a bit” on the binder. He’d whined a “Daaaaaad” when Sander ruffled the short brown locks. Most of Alex’s friends were cool with it, too and while it wasn’t all smooth sailing, he’d never run out of love from his family.

It was a big change and everything, but Sander thought, well...as long as he had his Bowie-loving children, it was all fine. -

It’s his worst nightmare. It’s the stuff that haunts you from the depths of the worst kind of hell, making your limbs feel like jelly. He’s cursing every name and divine entity and he’s really hoping Robbe’s right about those parallel universes because he’d love to hop over to the one where this wasn’t happening right now.

Sander’s having a hard time even looking at Alex in the eye.

“Dad?” he hears his concerned voice.

“I think I need to sit down,” says Sander, grabbing the armrest of the couch, lowering himself onto the cushion.

“It’s really not a big deal,” says Alex.

“Not a big deal?” Sander looks at him with wide eyes. “My own son hates David Bowie.”

“I never said I-“

“The man who infinitely changed my life. Space Oddity, Life on Mars, Ziggy Stardust, Ashes to Ashes. None of them?” Sander waves his arms. “You’re telling me you like none of them?”

“They’re...fine, I guess,” Alex shrugs innocently with a cringe to his face.

“Fine?” Sander squeaks.

“What’s fine?” Robbe trudges to them overhearing the conversation.

“Your son hates Bowie,” Sander squints his eyes at him.

“I do not,” says Alex. “I’m just pretty indifferent to him. He’s not exactly my style,” he shrugs, his hoodie moving with the movement.

“And what is your style?” Robbe laughs as he comes up behind him to rub his shoulders. He looks up at Sander with long lashes and a questioning smile stretching across his face. They share one of those ‘parenting looks.’ The ones where they know it’s not all that serious. But Sander thinks it is.

“A bit of rap, a bit of hip hop, some pop, some mainstream,” Alex lists off. “Not exactly the ‘80s vibes in me,” he laughs.

Robbe cheers as their tastes in music are quite similar and he proceeds to carry out their very own handshake they’d created when Alex was nine. There’s a different one with Sander. Sander, who’s getting more and more agitated by this revelation.

“Oh, okay,” he pats his knees and stands up. “Well, if you two are having such a grand time hating Bowie and bonding over your own music, I’ll just take myself and leave. No child of mine doesn’t like David Bowie,” he says dramatically.

“Sander…” Robbe looks at him.

“Dad…” says Alex.

“No, no. It’s fine. Really,” he begrudgingly walks out of the living room, almost knocking into Mia on the way.

“What’s with him?” she blinks twice and points a finger back.

Robbe sighs as he looks back at Alex.

“Your father, he…” Robbe puts a hand on his shoulder. “Bowie’s practically his life and so are the two of you, so I guess it’s really important to him that you like him, too. He’s just gonna need some time with all this.”

His eyes are apologetic and he gives him a half-smile, hand leaving his shoulder.

Alex takes in the words while Mia wiggles herself onto the couch and finds the tv remote beside her.

“You finally told him about Bowie, huh?” she gives him a gravely sad look. One that says he’s about to be doomed.

Alex just lets out a stressed breath as Robbe follows to go find Sander.

What’s so special about David Bowie anyway?

————————————————————————

Part 2 is coming! IM SO SORRY SKDJJF I just need sleep and rest

[beautifulletdownfics]

Nothing To Him - A Harry Styles One Shot

Harry Styles is a liar.

He lied your whole relationship.

He promised to love you forever and then he walked away.

A lovers to nothing break up fic feat. blisters, heartache & two sides to one story.

Word count: 15k (Sorry! You’re going to want to open this little pal in a browser window probably. Eek)

Story Playlist:

The First Lie: Damn This Love - Thirsty Merc The Second Lie: Do You Remember - Jarryd James The Third Lie: Nebraska - Oh Wonder The Fourth Lie: I Saw You - Jon Bryant The Fifth Lie: Here We Go - Emily Hearn The Sixth Lie: Crying Dancing - Nina Nesbitt , NOTD

+

MY MASTERLIST.

+

The first lie was that you were different.

Harry felt different with you.

You just slipped into his routine and his life. You didn't buy into the spectacle of it all. You told him on your first date that you didn't play games, and that it wasn't often you connected with someone on an intellectual or emotional level. Harry sat there and listened to the woman across from him say she didn't expect to finish the date still attracted to him.

And he fucking loved it.

The next morning he called you at quarter past eight, because he figured you either started work at eight-thirty or nine o'clock, so he'd catch you on your commute or just before you walked into the office. You answered your phone like you would a business call. He teased you for it, but really he was just glad you answered at all. It felt like getting test results telling Harry he was in the clear.

The truth was when Harry first met you at the birthday party the night before he'd been angling towards you being a hookup. He saw you across the bar as soon as he arrived, gaze zeroing in on your legs in That Dress, his ears leaning to the sound of your laugh pulling eyes from around the room. Harry wanted you, and he'd been through a bit of a dry spell. You radiated the kind of energy Harry could get drunk on, the sort of body he wanted to lose himself in for a night.

It was almost an hour before he managed to edge into the same circle of bodies as you. You knew the birthday girl the same way he did; through work. Harry caught early on that you didn't still work for his record label, but did a few years before and stayed in touch with everyone. You seemed like the kind of person who collected people, who everyone wanted to keep in touch with. Harry just wanted to touch you.

Two tequilas in he got you to himself.

You were good at flirting, which excited Harry initially. You had a quip for everything or an interesting addition to each story he told. You were well-read and well-travelled, and you weren't hesitant in showing Harry that you had opinions and ideas of your own. Over the years he'd become good at getting people to talk, good at asking questions that make someone share themselves because the alternative—Harry sharing himself—wasn't something he could do. But something about you and the way you framed questions made Harry feel like it was safe to share a little more, you'd disarmed him quietly, and by the time he noticed Harry didn't feel the need to protect himself anymore.

"That's bullshit," you'd told him when he said he wasn't all that into contemporary fiction. You hated the artsy elites who listed off the Hemingway's and the Kerouac's and the Vonnegut's as though the only literature worth mentioning came from lifetimes ago. Your hair swished back and forth at your cheeks as you shook your head emphatically, "You're being lazy. Imagine saying the same about modern music."

Harry's lips ticked up into a smile, and he raised his eyebrow in concession, "That would be bullshit," he agreed, thinking of the album he'd just released and how he wanted to know if you'd listened to any of his stuff. (Very quickly he decided he probably didn't want to know because it stuck Harry the answer would be no.) His eyes couldn't pull away from watching your lips as you spoke, admiring the shade of lipstick you wore.

"Right," you continued, "Modern fiction teaches me about myself, about my life. It gives words to what my friends and I are experiencing. The classics are amazing—don't get me wrong—but I don't see myself in them."

"Seems like your criteria stem from narcissism," Harry was sure he had you there. He grinned at you happily.

"Exactly," you agreed without hesitation, "Maybe 'Hills Like White Elephants' is genius, and as a woman, I should be grateful to Hemmingway for horrifying his audience in 1927 with a normalised view of abortion but … I don't think he wrote that for me. He was challenging ideas then. I feel more connection and loyalty to an Instagram poet who's painting the world that actually matters to me, the world I'm trying to survive now."

Harry hums into his drink and says nothing. He expects you to back away a little, or ask him some question that watered-down your view and opened up the table to his. But you don't. You let your view sit on the slice of the bar between you and don't apologise for it.

"There's a reason artists burst out of every generation," you add, sitting forward on your stool. "If the classics were the perfect form, the perfect commentary of humanity, then there'd be no need for anyone after them to bother trying to put the world and life into words, or pictures, or music. You can't just dismiss a generation of voices because some smelly, old, white, university hasn't decided to name a building after them yet. I don't think being published as a little orange Penguin Classic is the singular hallmark to good literature."

He didn't entirely agree with you, (he thought it was vital to learn from the past, thought those great authors you reeled off and dismissed set the benchmark artists today should aspire to) but Harry liked hearing your thoughts and seeing the passion burst out of you. He liked seeing how you didn't second guess yourself or try to soften your opinion by asking for his. You just said what you thought, and that was always one of his favourite characteristics in a person.

That night you met him, you were the designated driver for a few of your friends. He should have noticed the way you switched to pineapple juice after you finished your first drink, but he was too busy trying not to look at the curve of your thigh when you crossed one leg over the other. Trying to ignore the smell of your perfume or how you kept licking your lips and he wanted to taste them, desperately. Harry didn't like to say anything when he offered to buy you another gin and dry. Still, when it eventually came out in conversation—that you were strictly only having one tonight—he felt his excitement deflate. His warm buzz suddenly felt pervy and presumptuous.

"Well, that's bloody annoying, isn't it?"

His response surprised you, "Me getting my friends home alive?"

With his hand comfortably resting over your knee, Harry shook his head, "I was hoping to go home with you."

"Oh."

You blinked at him, not having expected him to be so bold. You didn't hate it though, you felt the twinge of realising you were going to miss something that could have been good. Could have been great, probably. The last time you had sex had been … sad. And disappointing. Still, you hadn't come out to meet anyone tonight, why the sudden rush of despondency? These were old work colleagues you rarely saw, and you figured it would be a night of catching up before six months of not seeing each other because life got in the way.

Then Harry asked for your number. Asked if you'd go out with him the next night. He didn't beat around the bush with it, he wanted to see you again and told you so. The way you said you would filled him with relief but also fear. Harry knew he'd need to really deliver with you, he couldn't half-arse it. He was terrified he'd overshoot it and lose the change to be someone who impressed you.

He settled on a Sunday evening picnic where the two of you ate takeaway on a beach towel at the top of a park halfway between your houses. Something told Harry you would be happier with him underplaying the date than you would be getting taken to an expensive, showy restaurant. You wore jean shorts and a long sleeve jumper which churned his body more deeply than the dress with the split from the night before. He was hooked.

"Do you not like olives?" Harry asked, sucking the oil off his fingers after just depositing one into his mouth. You instantly loved the way the inflection of his words rose at the end of his sentences, and you'd mock him for it your whole relationship.

You looked at the plastic container sitting between you, you'd been picking at the cheese and crackers, the antipasto was not your thing, "They don't seem like something humans should eat … Salty and rubbery with a tiny stone on the inside? No, thanks."

A laugh burst out of Harry's mouth as he picked up another green olive, "More for me then."

"I'm happy about the rosemary in these though," you held up a cracker before digging it into the hummus, a plastic-stemmed wine glass with a dry rose in your free hand, "You got the fancy ones."

"Only the best," Harry returned with a smile and then went on trying to playfully wedge more information from you about the secret poetry Instagram he was convinced you had. He was already feeling buzzed from the wine, but more from the way you kept looking at him and he couldn't catch a hint of you being anything other than yourself.

You didn't go home together that night either, despite The Kiss at the end next to his car. Despite Harry's hands on the back of your thighs as things got heated. The way the tips of his fingers feathered against the elastic of your knickers, just slipping under before pulling away. Your chests heaving together in a rhythm you'd never found with anyone else.

He felt like he had just auditioned for a part he wasn't sure yet that you were going to give him. Wine always heightened his anxiety, so Harry also wanted to appear controlled and measured. He wanted to be as thoughtful as you were. As connected to himself as you were to all your wonderful opinions and facts. There was some part of him that feared taking you home too soon might risk that being the only night Harry got. So he pulled away, kissed your cheek and promised to call you later on.

Somewhere along the line, Harry decided he wanted more than a little bit. He was greedy. Harry wanted the whole pie all to himself.

That was a theme, him wanting more. Even now, months since you've seen or heard from him. Harry always knew how to get you to take that one step out of your comfort zone, take that little bit extra risk. Letting go of him in one way felt like small release valve finally letting go. A tiny bit of your safety net tucking closer around you. A little quiet moment to take stock and check every part of you was still connected, still there. A deep breath in. A short pause of calming silence. Like getting your heart back … But then finding it didn't fit in your chest the same way anymore.

So you found it particularly cruel to have received a follow-up email from his assistant this week, checking to see if you were able to attend his show tonight.

The show that six months ago Harry drew you a mock ticket for and hand-delivered to you sitting outside in his garden with a tea and a biscuit. Even then, even as his girlfriend, you'd feigned not knowing if you could say whether you would attend. Now it felt foreboding, the way you'd pulled your features together thoughtfully and told Harry you'd have to see closer to the date. You waited just long enough for him to switch over into thinking you were serious before you laughed and told him of course and where else would I be?

Where else would I be, was right, in a sense. Because this is still your city, and you're here tonight. It's not his anymore. He moved soon after you broke up … Relocated to one of his—what was it you used to mockingly call them?—" location" homes. Houses you never saw in person. Places he never took you. Either Italy or France. Somewhere he could hide, be creative, recenter himself. All three of those things filled you with dread for different reasons.

Were you really going to go tonight though? Walk in through the front door of the venue with a ticket and barcode on your phone, sit in a crowd and listen to Harry for two hours? Look at him from across the room and just take it on the chin?

It certainly seemed you were dressed for it. And you were out of the house with time to get there. Would you get off the train at the stop though? Would you walk down the street with the bright sign his name lit up? Would Harry even know if you didn't go?

Part of you wonders if his assistant didn't mean to email you. Maybe she forgot you were no longer in Harry's life? Perhaps it was a scheduled email she forgot to stop? Probably it was Harry just being fucking nice, and polite, and worrying about how you'd feel if you were uninvited. Or if he didn't check in on you while he was here.

You accepted the reminder too easily and scolded yourself for it. His team was expecting you. Harry was expecting you. And now, sitting on the train and counting down the stops you felt caught. Felt like he had you again, even if it was just winning whatever tonight was.

Harry did always enjoy the chase. Admitted it himself, admitted to loving the beginning of meeting someone. Loving the audition process, the figuring each other out, the get. The Catch.

You wonder now if it was the chase he liked back then. Was it a thrill having you make him feel as though he had something to prove? Or was it Harry experiencing for the first time not having the upper hand, not having even the tiniest amount of weight around who he was count for anything. Now it felt like Harry was nothing but upper hand.

Whatever it was—the Chase, or your endless facts, pancakes on a Sunday morning—the part of Harry's lie about you being different that hurts the most is the way you bought into it so proudly. Wore it later as his girlfriend like a badge of honour. As though it signalled to others you'd been hard-won, and Harry was lucky to have you.

Different turned out to be such a dirty word.

Different turned out to mean nothing. To get you nowhere.

All different got you was Nothing To Him.

+

The second lie was that he saw a future with you.

Harry didn't shy away from talking about it. He made plans for you both.

Sometimes it was in the moments right before you both fell asleep at night, or in the final seconds before the kettle finished boiling. Always in some small window where his mind drifted and sat comfortably stagnant when all there was to think about was the next holiday you'd take together. Or what breed of dog you might have one day. Whether you wanted your kids to be close together in age or have larger age gaps between them. What you thought about silent retreats in Thailand.

He stored your answers away in the file full of you in his head or added them to the note on his phone with ideas for gifts for people or things going on in their lives he wanted to remember.

"My family have always had cats," he told you one night, fingers drawing circles around your bare kneecap, your naked thigh resting across his stomach, "When I'm settled I'd want to get a few of my own."

It was one of those hot summer nights no position felt comfortable for sleep, you raised your arms up over your head and stretched out further on the mattress, fingers dangling off the edge of the bed to feel the cold stream from the air conditioning unit above, "I don't trust cats. Isn't there something about them being evolutionarily build to hunt their owner?"

Harry turned his head to face you, "A fact for everything," he recited fondly, his common quip for your always having an answer for everything, "I'll let the cats hunt me, you'll be spared."

"As long as I can name them," you murmured, your eyes finally closing.

Close to three months later, an hour into unsuccessfully putting together a flat-pack shelving unit in Harry's garage, you heavily plopped yourself down on the concrete floor and hailed defeat. You tossed the small, silver Allen key onto the floor in Harry's direction and rested your chin in your palm.

A few minutes of watching his embittered attempts passed before he spoke.

"Hey Sulky, I can feel you looking at me," Harry was frowning at the short piece of timber in his hand, he was holding it next to what was supposed to be the base of the structure. This was your second attempt at pulling apart the shelves and starting again while you cursed the entire Swedish furniture empire. You were enjoying seeing Harry's stubborn frustration immensely.

He could be such a man sometimes.

"Yeah, 'cause you're hot," you said, mocking him dreamily.

"Ha ha," he drawled, rolling his shoulders back to try to regain his focus.

When he paused a moment later and looked up at you, his arms dropped as his brow softened and he let out a breath.

You grinned at him, "I'm pretty cute too, right?"

"All this shit is going to end up living on the ground because you're sabotaged the assembly!" He gestured wildly at the tools and spare paint colours for the house lying around you. His bike parts and the weird assortment of garden tools Harry collected were leaning against the wall waiting to be put on their new home as well, the shelf neither you nor Harry were skilled enough to put together.

"Baby," you began, but Harry waved you off, and you saw genuine frustration start to emerge on his face, "Okay! Okay, I'm sorry," you stressed, "Are you sure we're looking at this thing from the right way around? Maybe the designer meant for it to be wonky?"

He rolled his eyes at you. As if the mere thought anyone would design anything to look like the mess currently on the floor was purely preposterous—his temper for small frustrations on full display.

"Don't be rude!" You admonished, "It's a fucking shelf, we can do this, Harry."

It took you another hour and a half, but when it was done, Harry draped his arm around your shoulders, kissed you on the head and told you that you were the person he wanted by his side of all his future crisis. Someone to say to him, whatever the challenge was, it wasn't beyond him, wasn't something he couldn't handle or wasn't capable of.

You felt like you were floating that night.

It was one of those few times you could see your imprint on his life. See some evidence of it. There were shelves in his garage only there because you told him he needed storage there, and then you pushed him to keep trying assembling them. It was some proof you'd been in his life. An impression of your influence. A memory that would hover in his garage forever.

Two days after putting the shelves together, you and Harry had an argument about the plastic tubs he went off on his own to buy for all the loose bits and pieces he wanted to go on the shelves. You were annoyed he didn't purchase wooden ones, and he couldn't understand why it mattered that they were white plastic which would apparently be impossible to keep clean.

It's a garage, he thought, who's cleaning their garage?

And because arguments always dredge up things that they aren't supposed to, you made a jab about your relationship being secret.

You said something like, If I'd been able to come with you, we wouldn't be having this row!

Harry knew what you really meant straight away. You'd been together for more than nine months at that point, and nobody knew about it: nobody but your families and very very closest friends. There were no photos of Harry having lunch with you at a cafe, or of you walking a few steps behind him at the shops. Nobody had snuck a picture of you backstage at a show of his. He'd never appeared on your social media, even by suggestion, and Harry had never taken the risk including you on any private Instagram Stories.

Those photographs didn't exist, because those circumstances never had. There wasn't even a celebrity paper trail linking you to knowing Harry, let alone dating him. Harry didn't dedicate performances to you, or even to an unnamed significant other. You never got a song or an album dedication. Harry was so adamant on nobody getting wind of the relationship that sometimes it felt like … Like he enjoyed the sneaking around. The having a secret. (Later on, when you reflected on the relationship once it was over, you really weren't sure how there'd never been even one instance of you being seen coming or going from Harry's house. Hindsight made that feel suss to you.)

Most of the time you liked it, though, liked not having any fuss or interruption to your life but sometimes—a lot of the time—it felt like something silently eroding you from the inside—a silent acid eating your spirit.

But you'd never tell Harry that. Then anyway. Now … You're not sure what you'd tell him now.

The truth was a lot of the time you weren't sure how you'd managed to keep it going so long. Part of it was obvious, maybe, like not being in public together. But still, surely after being together months and having arguments about shelves you could afford a platonic appearing coffee trip or going for a run at the same time, together?

Instead, you'd gear up and run in opposite directions down his street. Or Harry would stay in the car while you went in for the coffee. You'd sit in a nosebleed seat if you went to a show, sneaking through some fire exit and into the main hallways of a venue with the public to get to it. You looked like a sad woman attending a gig on your own, not the girlfriend of the star.

Nobody would know you even knew the man up on stage. That you had something in the slow cooker at home for you both to eat when you got home, or that he'd stolen a tube of your favourite lip balm and had it in his blazer pocket for his set. Nobody would guess you made him late for the soundcheck with just a smile and the undoing of a zip.

Seeing him tonight would be just like it always was, you and Harry from across the room. But then not like always, because Harry wouldn't see you tonight. You wouldn't have the taste of a good luck kiss on your lips. Or the sound of Harry's warm-up in your ears. Yours was always an invisible connection that was kept invisible by design, and now being broken up, it looked no different than together. Not really.

Tonight though it would only be you seeing Harry. Like you see him on late-night talk show promotions and billboards. Like the times you get into an Uber, and his song is playing. How strange it feels, to have your heart crack in your chest again while also lifting somehow. Singing along with a song about you. Or hearing his laugh or even just Harry speaking, and being able to picture the exact expression that would go along with it.

Every raised inflection. Ever breathy giggle. Every brow crease at a thought that Harry was chasing or somehow unable to articulate. All of those turning into you picturing what he looked like every time he knew he was disappointing you. Every whined sorry and all the instances of him loving on you to move your mind away from his deficiencies.

"What's the plan for Y/N?"

If your relationship with Harry was a t-shirt, that would be the slogan across the chest. Those would be the words under the cartoon impression of you banging your head against a wall Harry's standing on the other side of.

How will Y/N get in? Who's staying behind with Y/N? Where will I meet up with Y/N?

There was always a question. Always a plan for you and it was decidedly separate to the plan for Harry. His team organised a second car or an earlier flight for you. A back entrance or some other smokescreen to keep you concealed. In the beginning, it felt like a kindness, but in the end, you were embarrassed by it. The bother, the way what started as a careful consideration for your wellbeing turned into something rotten that painted you a different colour to Harry and his public inner circle, the circle you were never invited or initiated into.

It was exhausting. But Harry assured you it was for the best.

You wonder what the future he saw for you really was though. How much further did Harry see a life like that going? A life with you perpetually operating under cover of darkness. A life of you decidedly not existing. Not really.

So when he said he saw a future with you, you're really not sure what Harry meant.

Did he mean one day he saw himself lifting the veil and telling the world he had a Someone? Or did he mean that he saw himself forever hiding you, forever living that lie?

Maybe he actually saw nothing.

Sometimes you could be convinced the fact Harry hid you was an action pointing to a more profound truth.

That the future he saw was an imagined indulgence; a convenience, and a comfortable lie. Comforting on a temporary level, like bowling alley bumper rails or the plastic covering on a new watch face. The fake sense of security—of protection, of immaculacy—was just that, artificial and temporary. It ceased to exist the minute you plucked the corner and pulled back the protective layer. Crashed as soon as the bumpers were flipped down.

You were a secret only Harry had any power over. He led from the front because you didn't know there was any other option. And in letting yourself be that, you made yourself easily dispensable.

Disposable. Replaceable. Erasable.

Which is precisely what happened when he left.

Harry left, and the You of the two of you ended. But more than any other relationship ever could, the silence that followed felt deadly. It wasn't just a relationship that once was, it was a relationship that never was. A year of your life made no imprint on his. Nobody looking at him could know there was anything—anybody—missing, and maybe that was the whole point.

Maybe that was the design of it.

+

The third lie was that you could tell him anything.

Harry's golden rule always was honest communication.

There's no such thing as an overshare, he'd say when you naturally hesitated.

He was all about that. All about hearing what was worrying you, or the mundane things that were going on in your world. Sometimes you felt like maybe it was an act because nobody had ever found your family, or your friends, or your life in general as interesting as Harry seemed to. He was always telling you he loved hearing the funny text conversations going on, or who was having a row and why, or what each of your friends was stressed about in their jobs or relationships or themselves. And Harry always said he loved hearing it from you the most.

(Now, that struck you as a strange thing to say. Where else would he hear anything about you? Harry was the only line connecting you back to him. You didn't have mutual friends or people who'd known you both before you dated each other. There was nobody for Harry to hear anything from. It's not like your friends were going to reach out to him with gossip about you. Not like how you could sneak a look at update accounts or read about his performance online while he was away.)

Still, you loved the stories he told from the road, ate them up. The missing coffee mugs where everyone got their caffeine fix served in wine glasses and lemonade tumblers for almost two whole weeks. And then the tour t-shirts accidentally ordered in bulk in children's sizes that Harry hand-delivered them to a local children's charity. The crumbs of gossip Harry picked up about who in his team was sweet on who (he loved a setup, loved watching crushes silently and awkwardly orbit around each other).

Your secrets were safe with him, he promised. He wouldn't ever judge you. Wouldn't dismiss your feelings or what kept you awake at night next to him. So you did it. You believed him. And you slowly drained everything inside of you into him. Harry got all your stories, even the ones you vowed to leave exactly where they sat in your past. Even the ones you felt like might kill you to dredge back up. The ones that made you look like a shitty friend or sister or daughter. He got them all.

And even now, he's still got them.

"What's the biggest lie you ever told?" He asked you one night in his kitchen, both of you elbow deep in making dinner. Harry rolled out the lines of gnocchi and cut the inch long pieces while you pressed them over a fork to decoratively indent them. (Although Harry likes to tell you how when he was in Italy he learned in patterns weren't just aesthetic—it was all about soaking up more of the sauce, For the sauce, of course! He'd sing out in an Italian accent, proud of himself.) "Like, a proper lie," he clarified, "Not like how you told my mum you didn't take sugar in your tea when you first met her."

You hinged your knee out to attack his calf for the teasing comment but then rolled your lips together in thought, "I lied to my parents a lot growing up," you told him honestly. "I think about eighty per cent of the time I wasn't where I told them I was. Definitely wasn't with who I said I was with."

Harry shook his head as he rolled out the next lump of dough, "No, I mean like … Like a lie."

A moment passed as you thought more deeply about the question, travelled around your memories until you landed somewhere suitable, "I lied to my boyfriend at university," you begin. "A pretty bad one, I guess."

"And the lie was …" Harry prompts.

"I told him I was a virgin before him."

Harry eyes raised, and then he nodded, accepting it, "I think that's probably a common one, really."

"I thought he'd like me more if I said it," I admitted quietly, pausing the work with your hands. "Wasn't too proud of losing my virginity in a tent in the sixth form … And I mean, at that age you just so desperately want to be the version of you that you think the people around you will like the most. A whole group of us went camping at someone's grandparent's farm during the summer holidays. Not sure how our parents let us, to be honest. Anyway, I had awful, painful, embarrassing sex in a tent with a guy named … Dylan Fraiser."

You were surprised by how long the name took to come to you. Years ago, that was such a defining event in your life. Now it hardly mattered at all anymore.

Progress, you thought.

"A tent," Harry winced.

"Really came back to bite me in the arse when my uni boyfriend went on to tell a group of his mates he was my first and—

—Tent Guy was one of them?" Harry guessed. Correctly.

"Yep. Small towns are a curse."

"I promise never to have sex with you in a tent," Harry teased, grinning at you over his wine glass and then leaning over to kiss your temple. He looked down at the line of gnocchi pieces you'd made together proudly, "We're alright at this."

"Hmmm," you hummed, now lost in the past, "I told that uni boyfriend him I loved him … I didn't though," you say without thinking, shrugging as the words came out, "I thought he was boring. But it was cool to have a boyfriend, so I didn't break up with him … Guess I've told more whoppers than I thought."

Harry gives you an understanding look, "I've said I love you to protect someone's feelings too. Thought it might come a little later, that I was just not feeling it as quickly as them."

It should have made you question whether Harry meant I love you with you. But it didn't. He was speaking in the past tense, and you were imaging that version of him being younger than the almost thirty-year-old you were dating. Now though … You wonder what love meant to Harry when you were together. Whether your wires were crossed by different definitions. Even now, you couldn't vilify him. Not completely. He was too thoughtful in general, there'd be a reason for it. There always was with Harry.

"What's your biggest lie?" You turned the exercise back on him, smiling as he refilled your wine glass and skipped a few songs on the playlist. These were your favourite moments with Harry. The end of the day, where you were the only thing on his to-do list. There wasn't a lingering work call, or a meeting to prepare for, an email to reply to. Harry was just finishing his day with dinner and some time at home. With you.

Harry gave you a withering look, "I think you know already."

"I don't," you said because you really didn't, "What was it?"

"There's no way I'll ever do anything else with The Band," he said tonelessly as he turned to rinse his hands in the sink, unable to look at you while he said it. And even then, Harry didn't admit to the lie. Didn't name it. He just said what the truth was instead.

"Why wouldn't you?" You asked, instead of what you were sure Harry thought you'd ask.

You weren't interested in why he told that particular lie though, the answer to that was pretty apparent to you: he cared about his fans—they all did—and didn't want to disappoint them. And they probably hadn't been able to deal with thinking about the ripples ending it completely, right off the bat, would have caused. Saying you were taking a break was a much nicer way to let a world of fans down. An easier pill to swallow than 'We're done' straight off the bat.

You gave Harry time to respond. He fiddled with the gnocchi pieces in front of him, waiting for the water to boil in the pot behind you both, "Not sure, really."

He was lying now, and you could tell. He was ashamed of the truth.

"You're not sure?"

"I just wouldn't, there's no one reason. No big thing. It's not like I hate them all or anything, I just …"

There was one big thing, though. And it was typical Harry to not be able to name it. He was always so in denial about his own arrogance, about what it was that drove him. Harry thought he was above them. His success since The Band far outweighed anything any of the others had done. Going back to that would be diminishing for Harry's career. Wouldn't help him any. He was stronger on his own, more successful. More widely appreciated. That chapter of his life was done, it had been a stepping stone—yes, a life-defining one—but Harry had moved to bigger and brighter stages on his own.

"It's not what you think," he told you lowly when you didn't ask anything further.

It was so typical of Harry to not see the forest for the trees. To not see how he, yet again, was blurring and confusing the lines between a business decision and an emotional, personal one. He was speaking about The Band emotionally, but his reason for distancing himself from it was all to do with business.

"It's not?" You asked plainly.

"I don't think I'm better than them or some shit," Harry said, "I just … That part of me is done. I'm not who I was back then, and I don't want to go back to that person."

"You also wouldn't get anything out of it," you prod, knowing that you shouldn't have. But it was true. So much of Harry's life was a business decision. Everything was so carefully done, so deliberately set into place by him and his team that results and his successes were almost guaranteed.

At the time, you didn't understand how he couldn't see it. Or you couldn't believe that he didn't. He was so calculating, and he hated you telling him so. But he was. He liked to say he wasn't defined by his job, but Harry's whole life was defined by his career, by the who he was.

He loved to spout off his public shit about staying grounded and having a life away from being Harry Styles ™, but he didn't let anyone see even a skerrick that life. The only thing Harry ever let be projected about him was his job, that was all was ever on the table for discussion. And so it was hardly surprising that became who he was away from the cameras and lights as well.

Hiding you was a business decision, you figured out in the aftermath of The End. It was his way of keeping the narrative about his music and career on track. As soon as there was a You, Harry's private life would distract from his real focus and goal, his career. And you mean, it's not like it didn't work for him. Because here you were, standing outside in the chilly night looking at his name up in lights.

Harry's name always looked so good up on billboards and the fronts of stadiums. You always used to tell him even the letters of his name were visually pleasing, they looked good together, like they fit. So you stand on the street across the road from tonight's venue and take it in—HARRY STYLES, SOLD OUT—for several minutes.

You don't know that you're ready for this. Seeing him. You've so perfectly avoided it until now. Until you felt like there was a promise you made lifetimes ago you now can't break. Even if you felt like he'd broken a thousand promises between the two points in time.

Where else would I be? you'd said when he first drew that stupid mock ticket.

Where else, indeed.

You scuttle across the street and sneak between people to get yourself in through the doors. Dodging lenders selling merchandise and ticket holders excitedly covering their painstakingly planned outfits with t-shirts Harry—aided by his perfectionism, you were sure— probably spent months deciding on.

The barcode won't scan though. And the usher at the door doesn't appreciate you pulling your phone back and trying to adjust the backlight, as though that will help the loud, angry sound his scanner is making each time he aims it at the email on your screen. He eventually reads part of your email and then tells you that you need to stand off to the side, barks something gruffly into his walkie talkie and dismisses you in favour of getting through the backlog of people behind you. You're filled with a white-hot embarrassment as you shuffle over and stand under a neon EXIT sign. A moment later you step forward and ask him to try again, but that doesn't get you anywhere different, and you think you're going to get in some kind of trouble when he insists Just stand back over there for a moment.

Your feet have already started hurting in your too-tight boots when finally the wall behind you opens up, and you very quickly come face to face with Harry's assistant.

"Y/N," she smiles, "I thought I said in the email to call me when you got here?"

You're dumbstruck, you didn't read the email, not properly. "I … I …"

"It's good to see you again," her smile hasn't moved, and it's genuine. She reaches one hand out towards you and deposits a VIP lanyard around your neck, "Follow me."

You get halfway down the emergency exit, and she sidesteps a security guard through a doorway, leading you into the veins of the backstage area where there's a familiar buzz of busy people you'd not realised you missed being around until now. Your heart is racing because you weren't prepared for this. You'd been deliberately dragging your feet getting here, and you've arrived barely fifteen minutes before Harry's due to go on stage. She's walked you right to the side of the stage where there's a curtain just to your left and scaffolding all around. You can hear the audience, and you know that one step through that curtain will take you to the pit side of the stage, where you'd seen Harry's family stand during shows before.

"He wanted to say hi beforehand but," his assistant looks at her watch, "But it's a touch too close now so are you okay if I leave you here for just a second? I'll be back in …" her eyes go back to her wrist, "Probably about twenty-five?"

"That's fine," you nod dumbly. "Are you sure this okay?"

You're looking around wondering if this is where Harry meant you to be. Really, you're sure this isn't where he intended you to watch his show at all. A few people are milling around but nobody you recognise, and you figure the majority of them are probably venue employees. Harry and his band would only walk through here at the very last second. He didn't like standing around beforehand with anyone who wouldn't be on stage with him. Harry got in his zone and needed to stay there.

When you look back at his assistant she's giving you a look you don't want to read too deeply, but it almost looks like pity, "Of course," she tells you, "I'll be back by the end of the first song."

"I might go stand through here now," you point to the curtain, preferring the thought of standing in the dark by yourself than waiting for Harry to walk straight past you during his thirty-second countdown. "Is that okay?"

You get a nod, and she tells you to grab a drink off the table behind you. Leaving you with your heart rattling and the heaviest lanyard you've ever worn burning through your shirt to your chest.

Finding a spot to watch the show was easy. You picked the furthest side of the pit, under the concrete overhand of the seats above, and stand in the shadows, only half the stage in your line of sight. It felt like a little cave almost, and you lean your back against the cold concrete and tap your boots together on the ground below you.

The area starts filling around you as members of Harry's team finish their part in preparing him for the show. There are a few women wearing belts with makeup brushes and combs peaking out of them, and two familiar faces from Harry's executive team. They don't see you, though, and you're glad. You watch the roadies' torches flash on the dark stage as they neaten up leads and manoeuvre over amp boxes double-checking the guitars are in the right order for the sets.

There's a movement in your periphery that draws your attention back, the group of people who joined you in the pit all gravitating towards something back at the curtain. And it's not until one of them steps to the side that you see the floating head that's poking through the dark material.

Harry.

He's staring right at you: no expression on his face, just his searching, green eyes that stop when they see you standing in the dark as far from him as you can possibly be. He takes half a step forward, and the shoulder of an expensive suit peeks out. You hear in your head echos of a moment in Harry's living room unpacking a delivery from Gucci, the way you nearly choked on your tea at the cost of a tailored trouser and his half frustrated dismissal, 'It's nothing, that's standard for me.' You felt small at that moment, thinking about how one of Harry's suits could pay for your education for a year, and that would be nothing for him.

You feel small now too. This isn't the space you're supposed to occupy.

The shadow of a frown barely cross his features, but then Harry tries to pull his dimples up to give you a small smile. But it's testing, it's not a confident smile or one he looks sure he's giving. Like he's smiling at someone he's not sure will smile back.

There's no way I'll ever do anything else with the band, he'd said.

But that wasn't the biggest lie he'd told, just the most public, the widest.

His deepest, biggest lie was you.

+

The fourth lie was that he loved you.

Harry was the one to say it first.

It came out like a compliment. A response to a fact of yours he'd particularly liked. A sort of well done, that was a good one.

It was nearly two months since you'd met, and what started as three or four dates a week morphed into you staying at Harry's house most nights. You spending your weekends off work trailing around after him on his errands or to work things, or hanging out alone at his place until he returned from them. A couple of times, you went to the same exercise class, which involved the two of you going separately and not interacting at all. Still, you'd peek at him from across the room and have to hold your giggles for later when Harry spent the hour concentrating beyond anything you'd ever seen just to stay in the seat of the spin bike.

Saturdays and Sundays he started taking off too though, around a month into dating you. No more 6am weekend PT sessions or midday conference calls with creative teams. The only work Harry allowed himself to do on weekends was housework. Laundry. Food prep. Touching base with his mum.

"Did you know blueberries are actually false berries?"

"No, I did not know blueberries are actually false berries," Harry parroted back to you. You catch the half rolling of his eyes at you where you're sitting up in your favourite spot on the bench next to the hob, peering at him keeping careful watch over breakfast: blueberry pancakes. He was wearing just his pants, chest bare and cool in the autumn morning air. You were rugged up in leggings and a sweater, unsure how he could stand being in such a state of undress.

"It's true," you reaffirmed your tidbit, popping a false berry into your mouth while Harry—with far too much concentration for the job at hand—dropped the small round berries on top of the batter sizzling in the pan. "Berries by definition are fleshy, pulpy ovary fruits that have their seeds embedded on the outside. Blueberry seeds are on the inside. So they aren't really berries."

"Ovary fruits?" He questioned, with a look of mild distaste.

Your shoulders dropped as you realised Harry knew less than you thought he did, "All fruit are ovaries, Harry. Think about it."

He does for a moment, and you can practically see the cogs turning. Harry thinking about how fruit grows on their plants and bushes and shrubs. The fact of what an ovary is when it comes to basic anatomy. And when he comes to the full circle of it, he groans, "That is so weird."

"I think it's cool," you grinned. "Like a little bit cannibalistic in a way."

He barked out a laugh at that, "I don't think that's what it is."

"Well, maybe not technically," you conceded, "But it's something … Really makes you rethink eating eggs."

"Oh my god," Harry was truly laughing then, "Stop, please."

"Sorry," you peeped with a cringed look, tossing back half a handful of the small, round fruit in front of you.

He was shaking his head at you, laughter bubbling out between his perfectly straight teeth, and then it just slipped out, "Fuck, I love you."

The words didn't bump over any hesitation. I love you, Harry said.

Your stomach dropped instantly, but the fond happiness dancing across Harry's face didn't go anywhere. He didn't look back at the pancakes or to where your hands were wringing together on your lap. Harry held your gaze and didn't dodge away from what he said at all. Like he knew you'd need a moment with it, that you weren't expecting him to just come out with that.

"I love you," he repeated after a moment, smiling when he saw your lips start to turn up, "I mean it."

Hearing him yell the same words through the microphone from stage sizzles your heart a little, like the pancakes that day crackled in the pan as Harry pushed himself into you on the kitchen floor. You remember the feeling of his hands under your clothes, your leggings barely halfway down your thighs before he was claiming you in a wave of lust, pushed by the new, invisible force in your relationship—love.

The floor under you now vibrates as everyone gets to their feet to join Harry dancing through his first song. You stare at him, daring him to look over at you but knowing he won't. The longer you stand there, the more you thaw out to it, the more you find yourself with a smile on your face and a slight sway to your hips. His music is fun and familiar and feels like clicking into place.

It's mesmerising. He's mesmerising.

You don't like admitting you'd forgotten how good at this he was. He has the whole crowd eating out of the palm of his hand. Even his crew around you are grinning ear to ear and singing along. Sharing private jokes between them and cutting dance moves in small groups as they watch the show. It's fun. And it reminds you that so much of your relationship with Harry was like that. That there were countless nights spent dancing in the living room or screaming at laptop screens doing board game nights with his family.

You'd forgotten that you could laugh so hard your belly hurt and that Harry was one of the few people who'd ever been able to get you to that point of joy. Watching him throw joy off the stage now at thousands of people was reminding you how very good Harry was—used to be—at making you feel like the only person in the world to him.

"Babe," his giggles filtered down the hallway and into the bathroom where you were plucking your eyebrows, "Babe! Come … Come see this."

You rolled your eyes as you put the tweezers down and padded into his living room, not at all surprised to see Harry pretzeled on his yoga mat in a fit of laughter. He did this a lot, called you away from a task or from work for something hilarious that ninety-nine per cent of the time wasn't hilarious at all. You'd end up snorting out laughter of your own though, at him.

Now, Harry had one of his feet hooked behind his neck while the other was prostrate on the floor behind him.

"You're doing great, baby," you condescended lightly, tilting your head to the side and frowning at his position. It looked awful and not at all calming, let alone comfortable. He wasn't a very good advertisement for yoga at all.

"They say this one's great for—great for," he giggled too much to get the words out, his arms holding his torso back so his legs would do what he wanted them to, he took a deep breath, "It's meant to be the yoga colonic."

Harry was heaving with laughter as he finally got it out, his position faltered, and you watched as his limbs all fell back to the mat as he leant forward cackling. You were grinning too, amused by how amused he was.

"Been feeling backed up, have you?" You asked him, crossing your arms as you hitch one hip out.

He rolled over on his back and wheezed out the final string of laughter, one hand holding his lower tummy as if it ached from the whole spectacle, as his other hand reached out for your ankle, "Come down here with me."

"Hmm," you hummed, pretending to be unhappy to be dragged down on top of him, your hips resting on his thighs as your chin propped up on your hands at his chest, "It's very entertaining how entertaining you find yourself," you mused.

Harry rubbed the tears from his eyes and then settled his hands on your back, breathing in the pleasant weight of you there, "I just—I was thinking about what they think the yoga colonic is going to do." His giggles started again, "Imagine being in a class and it literally working? Everyone just—everyone just shits themselves!"

You can feel his laugher, his bones pushing yours up as his whole body fills with his happiness. The stream of tears coming from the corners of his eyes start again as he squeezed his eyes shut while the sound of Harry's deep, uninhibited laughter filled the whole house again.

The memory brings back a smile, like so many with Harry do.

But there's still the Too Fresh Sting of your final moments with him, your last moments with him. You've not seen him since that evening months ago where you both yapped at each other things that couldn't be unsaid, unhappinesses that couldn't be reverted or unadmitted. It wasn't like the fights you had about Harry's casualised view of money and how he'd drop thousands of pounds on seemingly nothing without thinking how small it could make you feel. Or the times you'd snap in frustration when Harry tuned out of you complaining about an issue with your friends he deemed as superfluous or rooted in something silly or not as essential as the Important Thing He Was Planning. He could be so dismissive when he didn't think something mattered highly enough on his scale of measuring things.

The Harry dancing around on stage in front of you wasn't the man who said you were independent like it was a dirty word. Yelled across the kitchen that it was too easy for the two of you to be apart, you didn't miss him enough. The man who told you he didn't feel like you needed him, thought you were always standing with one foot out the door the whole time you were together. And you can remember being flabbergasted (still are, really) by what he was saying because it just wasn't true at all. You? Too independent? You spent every night at his house, and were at Harry's beck and call the whole relationship. And you can hear all the times you said 'what would I do without you?' when he talked you off a ledge or had answers to questions you believed to be unanswerable.

You can see how it was another classic example of Harry telling a non-truth to cover up what was really there. To distract from his own shortcomings. He accused you of what he was feeling, of his flaws. Making them your problem meant he didn't have to be vulnerable. Didn't have to take a risk his business manager hadn't guaranteed. Didn't have to gamble on your future together.

In the relationship, he always had the upper hand. And maybe you did have one foot out the door emotionally, but that was only because you had to. Harry never invited you in with him completely. You were always on the outer. After nearly a year of dating you were still The Girlfriend He Didn't Have.

But I fucking love you, he'd said when he sensed where that night was going. Like Harry had a list of grievances, and it wasn't until he got to the end of reading them out to you that he realised where it landed him. He told you he loved you as though it would erase all the things about you he seemed to dislike so much. Things about yourself you apparently couldn't see.

Hindsight has taught you that if anyone was too independent, or hesitant to commit fully in that relationship, it was Harry.

Halfway through his set, Harry's assistant comes over to check on you, and you end up chatting for a few minutes about how you've been. She speaks to you like there was some club you were a member of and she missed your meetings. Although neither of you references the breakup, or acknowledge in another life you had a lot more to do with each other, the unspoken things weigh on your chest. You find yourself wiping away a quiet tear when she walks back over to the main group watching Harry.

Of course, that's when he teeters over to your side of the stage and looks straight at you. His expression falls instantly, and you're sure that he only meant to glance at you in passing, but what he sees has him doing a double-take and fixing his gaze on you for two lines of the song he's midway through. He tugs on the collar of his shirt and Harry's eyes are desperately trying to read what you're thinking, just like that day he told you he loved you at the end of the breakup, as though you'd forget everything that came before it.

You stick your thumb out to him and give him your best fake smile. Like he might be led to believe you were crying about something else. As if you hadn't just pulled his attention from a room full of people who'd paid for his attention tonight. At that moment you think the fact there's a secret love and life between you must be too obvious to everyone else. There's a connection, something whirls around the room between you and it feels threatening and perilous to how you've been trained to think things have to be.

You wait until Harry turns and goes the other way across the stage before you push off from the wall and walk out.

At first, love was an encouragement between you. It was approval, a showing of appreciation. Love was a promise that was just for the two of you. A declaration that validated everything you were doing together. Love was a feeling that proved what every action meant.

Then, love was a bandaid, was a line used in desperation to fix something unfixable, and you walk the world with skun knees now because of it. Love was never just love. It was used to fix the wrong things.

And in the end, nothing healed at all.

+

The fifth lie was that he'd always fight for you.

Harry promised you that the two of you would make it work.

You'd make up after every argument, big or small. The little ones that were those tiny bickerings in the car which somehow roared into yelling matches. Or when one person's grumpiness from the day leaked into your evening together. You always expected his call or the long sigh that would precede his apology. You never got halfway home to your house if you left his after a row. He'd call and beg for you to come back, that nothing was worth you physically leaving being near him. You left knowing before the night was done the two of you would reconcile.

Until it was That Fight you were leaving after. The one that began The End.

It started because Harry was overseas for a few weeks. While he was away, you suggested the two of you going on a holiday together during the summer. An anniversary trip. From the other side of the world, it was easy enough for Harry to worm his way of out of it. He went off on a tangent about there being no holidays (rest) for the wicked and then got you talking about something else until you forgot how you'd been sold on the idea of lying on a beach with him for a week.

When Harry got home, you had it stored in an unhappy little pocket in your mind. Top of the agenda for when he returned.

"Can we talk about the holiday thing again?" You asked his first night home.

He sighed against you, his body gearing up for a reunion that didn't involve speaking, lips attached to your neck while his hands danced around the band of your bra, "Do we have to right now?"

"Well," your instinct was to back away from the tension rising between you, "I'd like to."

Harry pushed his hair up off his face and briefly looked at the ceiling, "I don't see how we can, babe. It's too hard, logistically. Just take a week off work and stay with me here."

"I already stay here," you counter, "I'm talking about a holiday somewhere. A beach. Or a ski resort. Something fun and different."

"Those places are all busy," Harry complained, his hands off you. He started to pack the dishwasher from dinner.

"I just want to go away with you, do something normal, you know?"

He clipped the side of the sink with a dinner plate and swore angrily under his breath, "Fuck."

"Don't get angry."

"I'm not fucking angry," he growled, tossing your forks into the plastic crate, "I just fucking got home, and you're straight into this. No 'I missed you so much' or 'It's so great to see you'… Just straight into going on a holiday as if I have endless time to mess about."

"What do you mean? We've just eaten dinner together, you told me all about your trip. I said I was happy to have you home!"

"Yeah, well, feels like you just don't give a fuck that I'm back."

You frowned at him starting to get annoyed yourself, "I cried on our FaceTime call on the weekend because I missed you! You have a lobotomy since then?"

"Don't yell," Harry instructed quietly like he was chastising a child for not controlling themselves.

"What's this about, Harry?" You asked. "Why is it such a crime for me to want to go away with my boyfriend?"

He sighed again, "It's not."

"Right," you crossed your arms over your chest and wondered how many times he could wipe down the chopping board.

Probably one more time.

"So …"

"So what?" Harry repeated, "What do you want from me?"

His words and their harshness shocked you, and that was the exact moment you started worrying this was going to turn into Something Else. Not just a Normal Fight.

"I want you to tell me why you're so annoyed by this?"

It would have been so easy for you to break down and scream about how insane it was that you were talking about celebrating your first anniversary with him and the relationship was still a secret. How badly you wanted to throw that out there, but there was a wise fear in you which said that would be a death wish. (That fact haunts you today, how you knew he'd never step out with you. There wasn't any hope in you or promise from him it wouldn't always be that way. You knew your place and where the boundary line was, don't push past this point. And you always behaved. Never peeped out of your box.)

"It's like you don't even need me," Harry said bitterly, "You're so fucking independent. What's the point?"

"What are you talking about?" You gushed, nearly swallowing your tongue when he turned back to look at you for the first time.

"You don't need me," he accused, "You've always got one foot out the door."

"I don't," came your defence, but you both knew it was the truth. You were halfway out the door because you hadn't been invited all the way in yet.

"You don't want this life with me," Harry shook his head, "You've never been happy where we are. Relationships don't work that way, you can't just keep demanding the same thing hoping you'll wear me down. That's not fair."

Tears shake out of your eyes slowly as your body catches up with what he's saying, "Harry."

"It's not fair!" He repeated loudly. "You can't keep on about it."

About what? You want to ask him because you hadn't mentioned a holiday until the week before. That's not what he was really angry about. He was talking about The Secret. And his guilt was showing. His anger was misdirected, aimed at the wrong thing. He muttered something to himself you didn't hear.

"I didn't hear that."

"I said," Harry looked up at you, and when your eyes clicked together you saw surprise rise and then quickly disappear as if he hadn't expected to see you there. "I said, I don't think we can keep doing this."

"You don't think we can keep doing this?" You repeated it because the words hardly sounded like English the first time you heard them.

I don't think we can keep doing this.

Harry stood across from you with no expression on his face. And it took a few moments for him to own up to what he said, but he does. He nods his head once, awkwardly, and then nods again.

"We can't keep doing this," he tells you, sounding defeated, and then his voice rises again—in pitch, not in volume—"But I fucking love you!"

But I fucking love you.

As if that was enough.

It was days of you expecting a call, and a make up that never came. Expecting the fight for your relationship Harry promised you he'd always put up. You wanted him to prove that you were someone he couldn't do without. You hated the thought of him walking around his house and not feeling the absence of you as some impossible weight he couldn't bear.

"Y/N!" Your name sounds out behind you, but you keep walking, an instantaneous decision that pretending not to hear her might work.

Unsurprisingly, it doesn't.

Harry's assistant keeps chasing you down the hall she initially led you through, calling your name and eventually getting you to stop and turn around because, well, you can't keep pretending she's not there forever.

"I'm just finding a loo," you lie.

"There's one this way," she points over her shoulder, in the direction you both came from, "Harry said if you tried to leave I had to go with you, which, for my own dignity I'd really prefer not to have to do."

You find yourself scoffing, "Who said he's in charge of how long I stay?"

Her expression softens somewhat, "He just wants to see you after."

How dare he think he can control this still, you think.

You know she's not the person to be frustrated with. You should be frustrated with yourself first, for coming, and then with Harry for deciding he could orchestrate this … This whatever it was. Still, you find yourself biting out your reply, "He saw me from stage," you tell her bitterly.

"And he'll have seen that you're not there anymore," she replies patiently,, "It'll throw off his focus if he's worried you've gone home halfway through."

You fall into step beside her but can't give him the win, "Quite frankly, it's not my concern or responsibility anymore if his focus is thrown or not."

She wordlessly points out where the bathrooms are just in front of you. You're trying not to make eye contact with anyone who's in these backstage hallways. They feel like ghosts from a life that's not yours anymore.

The first time you met any of Harry's People you'd felt absolutely mortified. The whole thing felt awkward to you, meeting assistants and managers and creative directors. Putting faces and humans to jobs done for Harry. He was a lot of people's boss, and it made you uncomfortable because you'd not seen that side to him before. You knew things like how hot he liked his showers and what yogurt he liked on his muesli in the morning.

That first—and only—step into his professional world, was in a venue just like this one where Harry was filming a music video for a few days. The stage was set up like it was for live a show, and you overheard someone saying setting up for a shoot was more involved than for an actual performance. Harry wanted you to see what this part of his world looked like and despite them not fitting in either of the Friends or Family categories you'd laid out for People Allowed To Know About You, his "Team" were people Harry felt safe introducing to you. (NDAs were a powerful thing) He led you through the hallways by the hand and stuck his head into every room with a cheery, 'Hullo, just bringing Y/N around to meet everyone.'

You remember one person declaring they were happy to be meeting you. Harry was too young to be married to his job, they said with a relieved tone, That it was good he'd found his Someone. Harry beamed at that, looking down at you as if thinking, Yeah, I have found my Someone.

Now you stand back in the pit side of stage, and Harry looks down at you with a hesitation that makes you more uncomfortable than when you were watching him film that music video. His assistant has brought you back to where his team are standing, and you feel more than one set of eyes take stock of you returning, a shared glance between a manager and the girl shadowing you. A wide-eyed exchange that says, That was the last thing we needed. When Harry comes to the side of stage between songs, he's hunting for a bottle of water, but you can see he's come to that side because his eyes are focused on hunting for you.

When he sees you've returned, he slowly takes a sip of water, eyes not leaving yours. You feel like he's admonishing you in his head, seeing how weak you were, that you ran away after a little eye contact. There's a distaste there, you think, and as he's putting the cap back on the bottle, Harry opens his mouth like he's going to try to say something to you, but he stops. He frowns at his hands as he puts the bottle down and then turns away, bringing the microphone back up to his lips and slipping back into entertainer mode.

"In a lot of ways, I hate this next song," he starts slowly, speaking over the band as they begin to slow down the tempo of the night. A smoke machine whirls to life and pumps out a few big clouds, shrouding the stage behind Harry. "I really hate it."

He pauses. And your insides freeze in your chest. You're hanging off his every word, just like every other body in the room. Harry stands right on the front of the stage, toes almost touching the drop off. He's looking out at the audience and lets the microphone hang at his side. Makes no move to keep talking. Was he looking for someone out there, or was he running over what he was about to say in his head? Rehearsing it, making sure it was exactly what needed to be said.

Where you used to see thoughtfulness you now see calculation.

Give nothing away. Sell only the product. Push the song. Let people come to their own conclusions.

"This is a song about," he says carefully, a crack to his voice that sends adrenaline shooting straight down your legs, "About regretting that you've hurt someone. And about the helplessness of wishing you could make them forget what you said, but … Knowing you can't take it back."

You watched Harry trail around to the upright piano on stage and sit himself down on the stool. He stares at his hands hovering over the keys for a moment too long, but you're sure Harry's audience would let him take a hundred more. You see what perhaps they don't—the hesitation. You'd witnessed it enough to spot it, even across the stage in the dark from thirty feet away.

He's not sure about playing the song.

You think about contacting him by telepathy. Saying, I'll leave so you can go back to your show. You don't have to pretend I'm not here, I'll just go. Like I wanted to. Like I tried to.

But he plays it.

You've not heard it before, but the rest of the room has, and they sing along with him. You hear a couple of thousand people sing with your ex-boyfriend about him regretting the way he treated you. And you're almost able to talk yourself out of believing it's about you, you can nearly reason with yourself that it's kind of vague. Other than naming the cafe he'd sat in the car park of a hundred times waiting for you to return with a takeaway, it could be about anyone, really.

But he sings out a line and looks straight at you, and his eyes say it's yours. The song. The apology that's not been said yet.

I get the feeling that you'll never need me again.

His voice cracks again as he sings it. And the hurt part of you says it's just a vocal technique Harry's trained to call on at any time. It doesn't speak to anything other than a creative choice on his part. But the vulnerability is hard to ignore, the low hanging, remorseful unease in the room. He fumbles a string of notes on the piano as he sings and you're hit by the overwhelming need to make him stop.

Witnessing whatever he's currently feeling with this song is more uncomfortable than you've ever been, and a switch in you to protect him flicks on. You look around at his assistant, his manager, trying to see if there's even a hint of anyone else feeling like this moment needs an intervention, needs to be stopped.

The song ends. And you're glad.

Harry takes a few moments on stage to get ready with a guitar for the next song. He doesn't come over to your side of the stage for a drink, or to ask the roadies for anything. Instead, he flies straight into the next section of the set. Seemingly recovered from the heavy moment you felt as though you nearly drowned in. He'd never sung about you before.

Nothing remotely personal about your relationship ever left Harry's house.

And you find yourself wishing it would all just go back there.

+

The sixth lie was that he wouldn't break your heart.

Harry did though.

He broke your whole life.

So when he comes off stage at the end of his gig, there's little in you that wants to hang around. As soon as the lights go down and you see Harry's silhouette cross the back of the stage and hop down the stairs to the floor, your gut churns, and you wish you were one of the people in the rest of the venue. The ones now turning and slowly filing out of the building. Going back to their lives peacefully.

Instead, you're ushered behind the curtain again, into the small area that's immediately buzzing with life. You watch Harry as if he's moving in slow motion though. As soon as his boots hit the concrete floor somebody is tugging the suit jacket from his shoulders and swapping it for a grey hand towel that he uses to wipe down his face. His hand pushes his hair up over his head as he smiles at a handful of people, and then his eyes find yours. The smile drops, and he takes a steadying breath in.

"Y/N," he says loudly. Straight. Without expression. It's a statement, but also you sense a question there too. As if you might not turn out to be the person who was standing there. He holds your gaze over and through the people walking around and in front of him. He's handed a bottle of water and offered a second one which he takes, "Y/N," he says again, pulling his head back to beckon you over.

You roll your lips together when you've made it to the vacant space in front of him. Harry passes you the extra water bottle and cracks the lid off the one he keeps for himself. You grip yours with both hands but don't make any move to open it. Standing in front of him didn’t feel like you thought it would. It’s less of a kick I in the gut, and more a reinforcing of things that you’d figured out since being without him.

"Hi," he says hesitantly, briefly looking at someone behind your left shoulder. Then, you feel his eyes back on your face.

You speak to his forehead, not ready to have things inside you unlocked by eye contact, "Hello."

"This way," Harry says after a moment, running the towel down his sweaty face again.

He leads you down a hallway, wiping his face on the towel two more times as he walks. Harry continuously looks over his shoulder at you to make sure you're still following him, as if there was somewhere for you to hide in the concrete hallway. When he gets to his dressing room door, he kicks it open and holds his arm out to let you in first. The room smells like his cologne, a whiff of his final moments before going out on stage and a time portal back to mornings you'd spritz it on yourself before leaving the house, it was your scent then too. There was a small sofa and table, a long mirrored table with his laptop open next to a stack of papers, his screen saver bouncing back and white photos across the locked screen. His overnight bag and its contents were sprawled out over the floor in the corner next to where you can see his phone charging.

"You look good," is the first thing he says to you. Trying to pull your attention probably. Maybe hoping to get on the front foot charming you. You could tell him he looked good as well, particularly in the cream suit they had him in tonight, but you were sure there were no shortage of people who already had.

"Your show was good," you deflect away from the personal, eyes tracing the bottles in the corner of the table, "Great setlist."

"Needs a shakeup, if we're honest. Getting stale," Harry shrugs, and you see it in the mirrored wall. He's still standing by the closed door, watching you walk into the centre of the room and take stock of what's around you. "How have you been?"

"Fine."

Harry coughs uncomfortably, "Thanks for coming, wasn't sure you would."

"I wasn't sure either."

You sense Harry realising this conversation was going to be exactly as difficult as feared it might be, he nods his head and moves over to the sofa but doesn't sit down, "Did you want a seat?"

"I'll sit here," you perch yourself on the chair in front of his laptop, crossing one leg over the other and hitching your elbow at the back so you're facing Harry. Keeping the room between you.

Harry sits on the arm of the small, burgundy sofa, and tosses the towel onto the seat next to him, "Looked like you were a little upset there for a moment."

"My boots are new," you quip, kicking your top foot out towards him, "Blisters."

He sighs again, and you start to feel chastised, but there's a more substantial part of you that stubbornly bunkers on down to playing this role, taking power when you'd never had it with Harry before. He knew it wasn’t blisters that had emotion welling up in you during his set. But just the same it wasn’t his place anymore to be privy to your feelings. And you weren’t going to let him gallantly try to take it. You weren’t old friends who could pick up where you left off. You were broken lovers.

"I just thought we could do with talking," Harry says finally.

"You could have uninvited me, you know, I assumed—Well, it's not like I've been expecting to still attend any of your shows the last six months. This one didn't have to be different."

He almost looks hurt, "You live here."

"How was Italy, Harry?” you turn the conversation around abruptly because you didn't like where it was going, and he was starting to frustrate you. You didn’t need him pointing out you lived in this city alone now since he left. As if you didn’t know.

Where watching him on stage hit you with longing and heartbreak, memories you found yourself irrevocably attached to, being in the same room as him now is only making you see the real Harry. The one who's so good at rearranging the energy in the room to make you feel you need to give more of yourself. The one who's an expert at asking a leading question and relying on the other person to be vulnerable first, lead the charge out the gates.

The man who lied to hide you every day for nearly a year, even when it was hurting you more than protecting you. The hurt from him was worse than the invasion of your privacy would have be. The distrust you felt didn't counteract the security you were still afforded by anonymity. The way you felt you still had something to prove—something to earn from him—and that you just needed to earn the right to your place in Harry's life.

"I've missed you," he said finally, "Just …"

"You've been lonely?" You raise your eyebrows at him.

"What?" Harry's defences click into place, "No, it's not that—obviously yes, I've been lonely—but also I just—I miss you."

You start nodding, and your gaze drifts around the room, "Yeah, I … What exactly do you miss, Harry? Because—I mean, it was kind of shit, don't you think?"

"Shit?" he looks horrified, "What was shit?"

"Harry," you say simply, telling him to cut the bullshit with your expression. "Come on."

"I loved you," he declares loudly, proudly, “We had a great time together. I don't think it was kind of shit at all."

That's when you feel tears come to your eyes. Of course he didn't think it was shit. He still didn't see where the problem was. Couldn't see it. He would go right back to That Fight and keep going the way you had been if he could. Harry would keep living that life with you, he would have kept on going the same way. You'd still be the secret. A fight about a holiday would have resolved itself with compromise and make-up sex, and you would have gone right back to sneaking out of venues and pretending not to know him in crowded rooms.

Your lips turn up in a smile of sorts as your tears beg to fall but don't, "You haven't changed," you state with a small, incredulous laugh, "You've not figured it out. Nothing's changed," you repeat, shaking your head.

Harry's confusion is plain, and if he thought your tears were because you miss him there's something like a flicker of doubt, as if he's reading what's in front of him again and maybe getting a different story.

"You can't have a life with someone who doesn't want anyone to know you're in their life," you state simply.

And that was it, really. That was the nuts and bolts of it.

The secrecy eroded any meaning your relationship with Harry had. The doubt that cast. The burden on you to continually prove yourself, to audition for the role every day only to never graduate from understudy.

You watch Harry's throat constrict tightly as he thinks about the words that come from his mouth, "I loved you," he repeats, "I didn't want anything outside of us to fuck us up."

"You can't control the world that way, Harry," you're observing him carefully, "You definitely can't control people that way. I get why we started that way, but a year in, Harry? A year."

He looks at his feet, and it's the first bit of remorse you've ever seen him show over it.

"I know you loved me," you keep going, "But you can't use that as some bandaid for the lying, for the hurt that was. You can't erase the consequences because you thought you were protecting me or us or yourself. The truth doesn't cancel out the hurt of the lie."

Harry's still starring at his boots, "You could have said something."

You blink once.

"Fuck you," bursts out before you can stop it, and Harry's eyes snap up to yours, you laugh at his nerve and rise to your feet, "Fuck you, Harry. I couldn't have. I felt like I had to earn it. Like maybe I was one gold star away from getting there. And then when I did push it, you ended it."

"That's not—

"—It is," you insist, shaking your head at him, "You put all your insecurities and shortcomings on me and then had the nerve to tell me you loved me as if I was the defective cog in the wheel. As if you saying you loved me put all the onus on me spoiling it."

"I'm a private person—

You put your hand up to silence him, turning on your heel to face Harry as your pacing halts, "Stop. I don't … I don't care," you breathe out simply, "I really don't. Our relationship wasn't The One. It's one we'll both learn from for the ones that are coming. I hope you learn from it," you add quietly, "Because I have."

"Y/N," Harry says your name like it's an idea he's unsure of.

"That song wasn't about me, was it?" You ask because on stage he said it was about regretting hurting someone and there's been no hint of a 'sorry' from Harry since.

His brow creased, "It is. I am. I wanted you to hear me play it tonight. It's for you."

You smile, the idea that you've grown beyond this situation blooming inside you, "You've not said it."

"What?"

"You haven't said you're sorry," your head shakes again, a fresh wave of your new perfume—the one that's just yours—filling your nose, "You've said you missed me. And that I look good, but you've not said you're sorry. You can put an apology into the song on stage, but you can't admit you were wrong to the person you wrote the song about."

His shoulders sink, just the slightest amount, and you know that you've seen enough. You've said enough. He's not going to have an epiphany on this, not in this conversation with you. You've gone as far as you can with this. As far as you're willing to.

"I'm going to go," you take a step forward, "Thanks for the song, your voice sounded really nice on it."

And you walk passed him with just a final wave and the slightest touch to his shoulder. He doesn't move from his seated position, but his neck cranes and he watches you leave. Eyes hunting your back for answers, like the manuscript for what just happened might show up there. But it doesn't, and you slip out the door, the clip from your shoes fading from his hearing quicker than he wanted it to.

Your insides are shaking by the time you make it out onto the street. No part of you wants to turn back and look up at his name in lights again. You're done with seeing the best of everything in him. Harry's one of the shitty boyfriends you'll tell someone about one day in the future, and they'll call him a dickhead with anger dripping from their tongue, promising to never treat you the same way.

And they won't.

You'll both have bumped and bruised your way into each other's lives, and there'll be a satisfying click with them there wasn't with anyone else. You'll have journeyed through all the maybes and not-quites, and you'll land in that forever place with the person who wears the badge of Yours with a fervour nobody before them has.

And Harry … You'll go and be Nothing to Him.

+

My inbox is here

[wrenhyperfixates]

A Kiss at Midnight

Pairing: Loki x reader Summary: At Tony’s New Year’s Party, you notice Loki is upset. He’s hesitant to tell you what’s wrong, but when he finally confesses, the coming year suddenly seems so much brighter. Warnings: mainly fluff with just a tiny bit of angst A/N: Happy New Year everyone! May it be filled with nothing but love and joy. Thank you all for supporting me. I’m looking forward to producing even more content in the coming year! Enjoy :)

Tag List: @lucywrites02 @frostedgiant @lunarmoon8 @twhiddlestonsstuff @lokistan @thelokiimaginechroniclesficrecs @gaitwae​ @whatafuckingdumbass​

Disclaimer: Gif not mine

Yet another party was raging on around you. There had been far too many this past year, in your opinion. At least this one wasn’t just because Tony was throwing it on a whim. No, tonight was New Year’s Eve. Even so, you would argue that the music was blasting just a little too loud, and everyone was shouting just a little too much. Maybe those were directly affecting each other, you thought with a small laugh.

You glanced over to where the God of Mischief, your best friend, was standing, looking rather glum. After having made the rounds, you were on your way to the corner he had sequestered himself in. If there was anyone who disliked these parties more than you, it was Loki. Too many people, too many glares, he would tell you. It made your heart break a little more every time. Despite your best efforts, you’d only found one reporter willing to write an article on Loki in a positive light, and they only ran a small, though considerably popular, blog. Everyone else just seemed to think it too much of a risk. All these depressing thoughts brought a frown to your face as you approached the god.

“Darling, is everything alright?” he questioned once you reached him. “Are you feeling ill? Or perhaps it is just this blasted party?”

“The second one, I suppose,” you chuckled. “I’m more worried about you, though. How are you doing?”

It still always took Loki aback for a second when you asked him something like that. He smiled at you and took your hand, running his thumb over your knuckles. It made your heart skip a few beats. Yes, he was your best friend, but you wished he was even more than that. But he needed this friendship, you knew, and you wouldn’t take that from him if the feelings weren’t reciprocated. And let’s face it, it was unfathomable that he did return them. After all, you were just you, and he was a literal god. You pushed the thought out of your mind as he replied.

“Oh, same issue as you, really. You know these parties are not really my speed,” he said, wrinkling his nose. “I must say, however, that they are far more bearable when you are by my side. Dare I say, even enjoyable.”

You giggled a little as that beautiful glint you loved returned to his eyes. “Then perhaps you’ll indulge me and join me for a dance?”

“I suppose I will,” he sighed in mock exasperation. “But only because you asked so nicely.”

Still holding your hand, he led you to the dance floor. Of course, as soon as you made it there, a slow song began to play. Just your luck, you thought, though you weren’t sure if it was good or bad. On the one hand, you were getting to dance with your crush. On the other, it was a painful reminder that was all this was; you weren’t actually dating the beautiful god.

You shyly smiled up at Loki, afraid you were about to make a fool of yourself. Knowing he was far more graceful than you, you let him take the lead. Your right hand stayed clasped in his left, as his other hand guided your left one to his shoulder before settling on your waist. He gently tugged you closer so that your chests were pressed together, your head naturally dropping to rest on his shoulder. It seemed to surprise him that you didn’t mind being so close, but once he got accustomed to the idea, he placed his head atop yours. It was a perfect moment, and you pushed all your anxious thoughts out of the way so you could just enjoy it.

“Thank you, Loki. For dancing with me, I mean,” you said as the music stopped, lifting your head but standing just as close. “That was amazing.”

“Thank you, too, darling. I thoroughly enjoyed myself. I do not suppose you would want to stay and dance again?” he asked, uncertainty obvious in his voice.

Before you could answer, Peter came pushing through the crowd, calling your name over the constant noise. You gave Loki an apologetic look and pulled away to greet the boy as he reached you.

“The foosball table is finally open!” Peter exclaimed. “Mr. Bucky is just finishing his game with Mr. Rogers, and then it’s all ours. Oh, and hi Mr. Loki. Do you want to come too? You can play the winner.”

“That is alright, spiderling. I will skip, but thank you for the generous offer. You two have fun.”

“Ok. If you’re sure,” you said. You squeezed Loki’s hand one more time before leaving. “I’ll see you later, ok?”

He nodded his head and walked in the opposite direction Peter led you. You sighed, assuming that he went back to his corner. Was it bad you already missed being held against him? Probably, but you couldn’t help it. Maybe if you were lucky, he’d still be in the mood to dance again later. Even if it wasn’t another slow dance, maybe he would hold your hand as he spun you round the floor.

After three games of foosball with Peter, two of which you lost, you got a couple Shirley Temples: one for you and one for Loki. Unfortunately, he wasn’t where you expected him to be, and your eyes scoured the room to find him. It was like he had disappeared. Then you spotted the door to the roof and were struck with the gut feeling that you’d find him out there. Still holding the drinks, you pushed the door open with your back. Your eyes immediately landed on Loki, his arms leaning on the railing as he stared off to some unknown point in the distance.

“Hey,” you said, offering him a glass, which he accepted with a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. You leaned back against the railing, too. “I was looking for you. What are you doing our here?”

“Just taking a break from the crowd, I guess,” he replied with an unconvincing shrug. “How did your game go?”

“I lost, but it was fun.”

“That is good.”

“Yeah.”

You lapsed into silence, some unspoken issue in the air between you. The last thing you wanted to do was pressure Loki into telling you what was going on, but you could see something was wrong. It upset you that he didn’t trust you enough to let you in, but even more than that, you were upset that he was going through anything in the first place. Instead, you decided to focus on something positive.

“Here’s to another year of friendship,” you said, raising your glass in a toast. “I look forward to it, Loki.”

“Yes. Another year of...friendship,” he echoed, halfheartedly lifting his drink, too, though you could tell he was doing his best to be more enthusiastic.

“Ok, that’s it. Tell me what’s up. You know you can trust me with anything, right?” you asked, laying a hand on his arm.

“Yes. After all, it is like you said; we are friends.” He practically spat the last word, and you involuntarily flinched away from him a little, feeling bad when a look of hurt danced across his features. “I am sorry, darling. I should not have lost my temper. You’ve done nothing wrong.”

“Maybe so, but something’s wrong. I know you didn’t mean it, but I also know that something is bothering you.”

“Oh, darling.” He set your drinks down on a nearby table and cupped your cheeks. “What did I ever do to deserve you?”

“You were just yourself, Loki,” you replied, putting your hands on top of his. “That’s what you did.”

He closed his eyes for a moment, and when he reopened them, his blue-green irises bore deep into your soul. “If I confess something to you now, do you promise to tell no one else?”

“Loki, of course. Your secret’s safe with me.”

His eyes searched yours for another minute before he backed away from you. Your hands dropped to your side as he paced a little. You already missed the contact. He was still obviously on the fence of whether or not he should tell you whatever was on his mind. You nervously rocked back and forth on your heels as you felt his own palpable anxiety in the click click click of his shoes on the floor. Suddenly, he stopped in front of you and stared at you for another moment more.

“I am in love with you,” he blurted out, visibly cringing at his lack of eloquence. He took a deep breath and tried again. “What I mean to say is, well, what I said. I am in love with you. And while I value your friendship more than anything else in this world, I have come to desire more.”

“What?” you gasped in utter disbelief. “Loki. I don’t believe this.”

“It is ok if you do not feel the same,” he said, taking a step back. “Nothing has to change if you do not want it to. But, please, I do not want to lose you completely.”

“No, Loki,” you hurried to fix the misunderstanding. You took a step forward so that the distance he’d put between you was gone. “I don’t believe it because I do feel the same. I just never imagined that you did.”

“You truly do?”

“With all my heart.”

At the same time, you both moved to close the gap between you, kissing each other with a passion too long hidden. As you stood there, two hearts becoming one, you could hear the people inside begin the countdown. You pulled away, eyes shining and lips red.

“I propose a new toast,” you began. “To our new relationship in a new year. To our love.”

“To our love,” he echoed again, much happier this time. “Forever and always.”

“Forever and always.”

As the countdown reached its end, you and Loki kissed again, sealing the promise you’d made. Here with Loki, you knew one thing for sure: This was going to be a good year.

[donutloverxo]

Nude

Run through - Steve wants to try new things so he takes a painting class with a nude painting subject. Only the woman he has to paint are you, Peppers assistant and his crush.

Pairing - Steve Rogers x reader

Word count - 2k

Masterlist is linked in the bio!

Steve Rogers was many things. He was an artist, an amateur cook (who really does try), a loyal friend, a good citizen, a soldier. Yet when people looked at him, they only ever saw the captain. His friends called him cap. He'd go weeks without hearing his own name. Sometimes he felt the lines were blurred. When did Steve Rogers end and Captain America begin?

He had a big wake up call when he confronted Tony, saying he wasn’t iron man, it was an alter ego. To which Tony said that Steve was basically captain America. And Steve couldn’t argue or disagree, because it was true. He didn’t want to lose himself in his work anymore than he already had. His therapist told him to make healthy boundaries, which is what he’s going to do.

So he ordered some colors and pencils online and got to work on his art, for the first time in a long time. It was exhilarating and freeing. He could lose himself in it, go on for hours without thinking and seeing anything but the colors and his canvas. Which was extremely rare for him. He could rarely ever shut his brain off or run from his traumatic memories.

Everyone could see the visible change in him. How he seemed happier. Clint even joked about it saying

“Cap must be getting some”

To which Steve only snorted. There was no room for anything as complicated as a relationship or sex in his life, not right now.

But wouldn’t it be nice? To have a woman to hold and to paint. To love and care for. He didn’t let himself delve too much into that fantasy. Because even if it was a nice escape once in a while, he knew that while Steve Rogers might make a good partner, Captain America would certainly not. He would never subject any woman to deal with either of them.

With some encouragement from Sam and his old friends he started attending painting classes at his alma mater, the Brooklyn College, every Saturday evening. It helped him make some friends. He didn’t know if he could call them friends. Most of them were too different from him. They seemed like different types of 'tortured artists'

When he heard that there would be a nude subject to paint the next class, he was a little bit hesitant. Such a thing would’ve been scandalous in the 40s. But he was trying to open himself up and that meant pushing his comfort zone, even just a little bit.

When he set up his canvas, oil colors and brushes that Saturday he expected male subject. He didn’t however expect to hear a woman’s voice. He was too focused on his set up to look up, whatever. He didn’t care if it was a man or a woman. There wouldn't be anything erotic about it. This was strictly professional and educational.

He looked up to take a good look at his subject, when he felt as if his soul was knocked out of him. There you stood, his crush, Pepper Potts' assistant, and the woman who turned him down.

“You know back in my day they used to play elevator music” He said to drown out the awkward silence. Even after all this time, he still didn’t know how to talk to women. He had had a crush on you since the moment he laid eyes on you. You were always so funny and sweet. Asking him and everyone about their day, if they were doing well. Always willing to help others.

When he let it slip that he likes banana bread, you baked him a whole loaf of it, which chocolate chips so ‘so you think of me when you have them. They’re my signature of sorts' you had said proudly. Of course he’d be thinking of you when he ate it. Overthinking actually. Wondering If you like him as he likes you, or if you’re just being your sweet self.

“Oh we still have that!” You chirped “but not in um professional or business buildings like these”

He just nodded. Tapping his foot impatiently. You would get off in just six floors it was now or never. “Hey uh – what are you doing this Friday?” he asked shyly.

“Oh just watching some Gordon Ramsay with my dog probably. I have no life” you laughed at your own self depreciating joke “Why?” you tilted your head.

“I was thinking, maybe we could get dinner? Only if you uh – you wanted to, you're free to say no” he promised. Maybe he should’ve asked you to ‘hang out' or 'for a coffee' like most people these days. But he felt that was no way to treat a lady, especially one like you.

“Oh Steve” he was already disappointed upon hearing your tone “I would’ve loved to. But even though we don’t work together, it wouldn’t look good you know? I mean I don’t care much for 'my image'” You said making air quotes “But I don’t, it’ll be complicated” You looked completely defeated. As if it hurt you to say no more than it hurt him to hear it.

“I completely understand” He nodded “no hard feelings” he gave you a smile as he watched you walk away. It did break his heart a bit, but he’d respect your feelings.

He looked at you taking off your satin robe revealing your bare body to the class of twenty or so artists. His breathe hitched. Your hair flowing down your back and covering a bit of your left breast, your soft stomach and thighs, the patch of soft curls at your core, your nipples hard against the chilly air, and how your stomach rolled a bit as you sat uncomfortably on the stool. You were beautiful. A work of art even. There was absolutely no way he could do you justice. He started drawing an outline on his canvas. You would very well be his best subject.

You looked around a bit, your fingers holding onto the stool for dear life so you could stave off the anxiety and feeling of being so exposed. Then your eyes landed on him. You thought you were dreaming, maybe you didn’t see properly, so you did a double take. Then you were frozen on the spot. There he was, Captain Rogers, the first Avenger, the man you often dreamt about, sitting right in front of you while you were naked as the day you were born.

You had no idea what you should do. This was literally like a nightmare come true. If you flee it would look bad, if you didn’t it might look worse. You decided you’d follow his lead. So you peeked a glance at him from the corner of your eyes and saw him, sketching you? Holy shit Steve Rogers was drawing a nude portrait of you. What has your life become?

You had always been insecure about your body. You knew magazines, porn and movies were meant to feed people lies to get them to buy more things. That didn’t make you feel any less bad about not looking anything like the women in them. You tried to remind yourself that you have many things going for you. Like your supporting family, your loving friends, your cute labrador, your amazing job.

Speaking of your job, exactly why you turned Steve freaking Rogers down! A man that looks like him asking you out and you say no. Your friends flat out laughed in your face at your unfortunate predicament, where the cake is right there but you can't eat it. Now that you thought about it, it was funny.

Your co-workers weren’t kind to you. Even on your best day you didn’t look anything like the women you worked with, who would stab you in the back the first chance the get. You were kind to everyone, but you knew by now not to expect the same treatment back. Which was why you had to say no to the beefy blonde. You didn’t want to be branded as the ‘office slut’.

Which now you were sure you would be. You didn’t know Steve enough to know he’d be willing to keep this a secret. He didn’t seem like someone who would do that to you. But you still couldn’t help but think the worst.

You squirmed and shivered in the chair for a good part of the next two hours. By the end your back was sore and you did everything you could to avoid looking at Steve, only sneaking glances here and there, while he seemed too engrossed in his work.

You had done this a couple of times before, to accept your body for what it is and get comfortable with it. If you weren’t going to love it no one would do it for you. Finally the time was up and the artists were asked to pack up for the day.

You quickly got up from your stool putting the robe back on. You turned your back to Steve, stretching your muscles. You couldn’t wait to lay down on your comfy bed and just get out of here. But you knew you needed to have that inevitable conversation. You probably would never be able to look Steve in the eye after this.

You walked towards him as he was cleaning up his work station. “Fancy seeing you here” You cringed at your embarrassing attempt at a British accent.

“Hey there” He gave you a bashful smile scratching the back of his head “I didn’t expect to see you here”

“Right back at ya” you returned his smile, no longer feeling on edge. It was strange how his presence served to comfort you.

“You do this often” he asked casually. You couldn’t really hear any judgement in his tone, not what you would expect from a hundred year old.

“No not really. It just uh – I’m trying to love myself. Which I already do! Of course” you let out a nervous chuckle “just trying new things and stepping out of my comfort zone”

“That makes two of us” he said as he was done packing his bag, which he was deliberately doing at a slow pace. He didn’t want to leave. Not yet.

“Can I... Look at your painting?” You asked nervously. You didn’t know if you wanted to see his interpretation of your naked body, what if it was bad? But what if it was good? What if he was impressed by you...

“Uh it’s not done yet. And frankly I’m not that good”

“I seriously doubt that. I’ve seen the sketches in your office” You caught your slip of tongue. You couldn’t let him know about your borderline unhealthy obsession with him.

“Well, have a look then” he relented showing you his canvas.

You let out a breathe you didn’t even know you were holding at the painting. It was breath-taking. The woman looked like you, but why was she so beautiful and graceful? In the painting she was sitting on a stool, like you, in front of a tree admiring a rose in her hand. She was naked as well. It reminded you of classic Greek paintings where women weren’t perfect, but were celebrated for their imperfections.

“It’s amazing Steve. I – do I look like that?” You stammered not being able to tear your eyes off the painting.

He shook his head at your shock “On the contrary you look much better I’m glad you like it”

“You’re a great artist” you gushed

“I don’t know about that. I’ve seen much better” he said humbly.

You would argue with him. But you knew it would be of no use. Looking at the beautiful woman in the painting gave you the surge of confidence you needed “Steve, does the offer for that dinner still stand?” You straightened your back looking up to lock eyes with him.

“Yes” He blurted without even thinking “how about tomorrow evening?” He asked.

“Yes that will be awesome! You can pick me up at seven. I’ll text you the address“ you said making an mental note to do so.

You could hardly wait for your date. You didn’t really care about what your co-workers would think of you. As long as you were happy their opinions didn’t matter.

Tags will be in the reblog! If you want in on the taglist click the link in the bio or send me an ask!

Please do not steal or repost my works. Reblogs are welcome.

This was actually a request. But I can't fir the life of me find the person who requested it. I hope you see it babes❤

[spencer-reid-in-a-pool]

Three’s a Crowd

Summary: When Geralt leaves you and Jaskier behind to go hunt, you are pulled into spending the day in town with Jaskier. Fluff and mischief ensues. 

Warnings: None!

Pairings: Jaskier x genderless reader *(see A/N)

Square Filled: Kissed to keep quiet

Word Count: 2,595

A/N: Here is my second submission for the 2021 Witcher Bingo! @thewitcherbingo While this is a genderless reader fic, there is a scene involving the reader with jewelry, so that could be seen as “feminine” if you really squint. Of course, boys and theys can wear jewelry too! Also, thank you to @toss-a-coin-to-your-stan-account​ for letting me use a hilarious phrase they came up with! 

Tags: @ayyyyitswednesdaymydoods @blackjay04 @mxsmwndr @bravelittlesunflower @weaselbee04

----------------------------------

Truth be told, I was glad when I realized Geralt had left without us. Were my feelings hurt? A little. But I forgot about it when I realized it meant I got to sleep in. 

However, I was only a few minutes into my next bout of sleep when the door to my room came crashing open. 

“(Y/N)!” the cause of the commotion yelled. Jaskier. 

I didn’t even open my eyes. I should have known this would happen. Sleeping in? Never heard of it. 

“What?” I snapped. 

The door closed and I heard footsteps coming closer. Then all of a sudden, the covers were yanked off my body and I felt his rough hands shaking me. 

“Geralt left without us! Can you believe him?”

My eyes shot open and I pulled the covers back over. But not before glaring at Jaskier, who looked genuinely concerned about the whole thing. 

“Yes, actually, I can believe him. And I was trying to sleep in. Do you mind?” 

Jaskier scoffed and took a few steps back, raising his hands in an apology. 

“Fine, fine. I see that I am more worked up about it than you are. Although normally it is just me that you two tend to leave behind,” he said, a bit of a sad look gracing his features. But in a split second it was gone and replaced with a much happier one. A mischievous one. Oh no. 

“Come on, let’s go find something to do! I cannot simply sit in this dusty old inn, wasting away as the hours go by,” said Jaskier as he fell onto the foot of my bed dramatically. “I am far too beautiful and talented for that.”

I sighed. “If I come with you, will you be quiet?”

“Absolutely not.”

Well, at least he was honest. 

~

The town was far more active than I expected it to be at this time of day. I wonder what there was to do. 

Currently, I trailed behind Jaskier through the groups of people crowding around the shops and stalls in the market. At least he was easy to spot with his lute strapped to his back. 

“Jaskier,” I called to him. I didn’t think he would hear me, but he stopped and turned to look for me. 

Once I caught up, I huffed and said, “Do you honestly carry that thing everywhere we go?”

He gave me a look as if to tell me I was insane.

“Of course! You never know when musical inspiration might strike.” 

I rolled my eyes, but honestly it was one of my favorite things about him. His antics never failed to make me laugh. 

“So do you have a plan for us, or are we to wander aimlessly through the town square?”

“Does this not suit you, my friend? Oh please, do tell me what sits so heavily on your heart!” Jaskier announced dramatically. 

I laughed and he smiled back at me. How childish. 

“Fine. I want to find some food. Lead the way, lute boy.” 

Jaskier gasped indignantly. But there was a twinkle in his eye that let me know he was happy. We often played this type of game with each other. Feigning annoyance or being dramatic or something of the sort to make the other laugh. It was almost a contest, although there was never a clear winner. Simply spending time with the other was enough. 

“Anything for Your Majesty,” Jaskier declared with a bow.

~

Eventually we came to a stall that looked to be selling sweets. The colors and textures of the food caught my eye from afar, and as soon as I saw it I grabbed the sleeve of Jaskier’s doublet to pull him over. 

“Oi, this was very expensive you know. Try not to rip it, hmm?”

Ignoring his comment, I continued to pull him over until we were in front of it. 

“Ohh, I see. Finally found something you’d like? I knew you would come around.”

I let go of his sleeve and he turned to the man selling the sweets. 

“How much are your goods, fair merchant?”

While Jaskier talked to the man, I looked around at other stalls in the area. A jeweler’s stand caught my eye next. I knew anything over there would be too expensive, but I wanted to look anyway. 

As I turned back to Jaskier, he had bought both of us a piece of candy from the man, and I took mine from him with a smile. 

“Thank you, Jaskier. You didn’t have to pay for mine.”

He unwrapped his candy quickly, and glanced at me with that crooked smile that makes women and men alike weak in the knees. 

“I wanted to. Now- where to next?”

My eyes betrayed my mind, settling on the jewelry that I knew would be too expensive to even consider purchasing. 

Jaskier followed my gaze across the square to the bits and baubles I was focused on, and a forlorn look fell onto his face. 

“Darling, I don’t mean to put a damper on things, but I can smell how expensive that place is all the way over here.” 

I sighed and looked up at him. 

“I know, but I just want to look. Can we, please?”

His face softened, and he gave me a small nod to signal it was okay. I didn’t even try to hide my happiness when I grabbed his hand and pulled him around the square for the second time today. Not once did he complain, which I felt very undeserving of. 

I realized how large his hand was in mine, and I truly couldn’t remember if I had ever touched him in this way before. Of course, I had imagined it countless times. It felt nice. 

I think that both of us knew we were crazy about the other. We were both just too scared to say anything. Or maybe we were just comfortable with the way things were, without a label. 

Either way, I couldn’t suppress the tingling feeling in my fingers as I let go of his hand when we made it to our destination. And gods, it didn’t live up to any expectation I had formed in the past few minutes of wondering. 

There were rows upon rows of every kind of jewelry you could imagine. Necklaces, rings, bracelets, barrettes, brooches... there were simply too many to name. Numerous golds and silvers alike glistened in the afternoon sunlight, enough to take your breath away if you weren’t careful. 

“Wow,” Jaskier breathed next to me. 

“I think this shop is worth more than both of our lives put together. Especially yours,” I murmured so only he could hear. 

“I- what does that even mean?”

Before I could comment something smart back, the lady caught us in her sight and came over with a smile plastered across her face, ready to try and sell us something. 

“How can I help you two today?”

Jaskier and I glanced at each other, not sure of what to tell her. 

“Uh, we’re just looking for now. Thank you though,” I said in a bit of a hurry. 

She seemed content with that, nodding slightly and then walking away to help someone else who would probably actually buy something. 

Once more I couldn’t help but stare at all the rows in front of me. I think I could look at them forever, imagining myself wearing all the pieces to some fancy ball or banquet. 

The only thing to drag me out of my thoughts was a small, timid tug on my sleeve. I turned and saw Jaskier looking at me. But he wasn’t really looking directly at me. His mind seemed to be elsewhere. 

“We should go,” he said in a low tone. 

“What? What’s wrong? Five more minutes. Let me dream a bit longer.”

He looked over me and around me before looking behind himself. 

“No, I think we should really go, okay?”

“You’re acting weird, Jaskier. What’s got your doublet in a knot?”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the merchant woman walk towards us once more. Everything seemed fine until Jaskier turned to see what I was looking at, and then the woman seemed a lot less friendly. 

“Hey!” she yelled loudly, drawing attention to us. 

My eyes widened and I looked at Jaskier, who was now stock still next to me. It was then I noticed that a gold chain was dangling out of his pocket that wasn’t there before. 

“Shit,” he hissed. 

Without another word he grabbed my hand, and we took off running. We weren’t the only ones however. Behind us, I heard thundering footsteps and the sound of metal on metal. The guards were after us. 

“Jaskier, did you really swipe something off that woman’s stall?”

He turned over his shoulder slightly to look at me as we ran, but didn’t say anything. Maybe I was crazy, but there was a hint of a smile on his lips. 

He had a death grip on my hand, and it didn’t let up as we ran through the streets taking twists and turns trying to lose the guards behind us. It was exhilarating, to be honest. So much so, that a laugh bubbled inside me and burst out before I could stop it. 

“You’re crazy!” I yelled to Jaskier over all the noise and the rush of the wind. 

He chuckled breathlessly, exhausted from the sudden sprint we had started. 

“Just keep running! And don’t let go of my hand- I don’t want to get separated.”

I smiled to myself and looked down at the ground where my feet met the dirt in a rhythmic sort of way. And once again, I laughed. Only this time, Jaskier laughed with me, out of breath and unashamed. Running this way with him, hand in hand, was freeing. I felt so alive. I didn’t care where he was leading me- wherever it was, I would follow. 

Jaskier pulled me around one last turn, and then into an alley. The guards were significantly farther behind us now. Even so, we cowered into a dark corner of the alley, and tried to catch our breath. However, when we looked at each other, a fit of giggles overtook us both. 

“That was..”

“That was-”

We both spoke at the same time and stopped at the same time, causing us to giggle once more. My chest and stomach were aching from the lack of air, but it was a small price to pay for how happy and carefree I felt right now. 

“So, what in the gods names did you take, Jaskier? And why?”

His smile fell a bit before he dug into his pocket where I had seen the gold chain earlier. But before he could get it all the way out, a familiar sound of thundering footsteps began to get closer. 

“Shit,” Jaskier hissed, shoving the chain back down into his pocket like before. 

He suddenly grabbed my arm and pulled me farther into the corner, but there wasn’t much room left. 

“Jaskier, we’re gonna get caught!” I whispered. 

His eyes scanned the area frantically and then came back to settle on me. By the sounds of it, the guards would be on us any minute now, and we would be caught. 

In a split second, his mouth fell open a bit and he looked as though he had an idea. Without saying anything, he reached up and pulled the hood of my cloak up on my head, before shedding his doublet, leaving him only in his white undershirt. He threw his doublet into a passing carriage, and grabbed me roughly by the shoulders before turning me around and placing me roughly against the cold, stone wall. 

“Jaskier, what the f-”

Right as the guards rounded the corner, Jaskier shoved his face onto mine and kissed me feverishly, pushing his body against mine until my back hurt against the hard wall behind me. Needless to say, it threw me off a bit, especially when he pulled my hood to the side so that it shielded both of our faces from the guards who were now running directly past us, paying us absolutely no mind. 

Only when the sound of their feet faded into the distance did he pull away, eyes wild and hair sticking up in every direction imaginable. The only sounds that could be heard now were our heavy breaths, though we were still so close together it could have easily been mistaken as just one. 

“Um, Jaskier...”

“I’m sorry,” he croaked in a hushed whisper. 

“Uh, well, actually. I think the guards are coming back. Don’t you hear them?”

For a second, a look of utter confusion overtook his face. But almost as soon as it had come, a devilish grin replaced it. 

“Actually yeah, they’re quite loud, aren’t they? Just to be safe...”

This time, both of us met each others lips at the same time, and it was much more pleasant than the first one. Our mouths moved in sync, in perfect harmony, as they had meant to all this time. His hands came up to hold the sides of my face tenderly, causing my hood to slip away and a rush of cold air to make me shiver. However, as soon as I wrapped my arms around his shoulders to bring him closer, the coldness was replaced by warmth, and I smiled into the kiss. Not once did he break from his aggressive, almost hungry kisses, and neither did I. We had both wanted this for so long, and neither of us wanted it to end. 

Unfortunately, I had to pull away for air, so I begrudgingly stopped kissing him. But that didn’t stop him. He continued kissing me, on my cheeks, down my neck, and finally on my forehead, one last, gentle time. 

“Why hadn’t we done this before now?” I gasped. 

“Well,” he said in between kisses down my neck and face, “Geralt is usually around and...”

He stopped to place a gentle, final kiss on my lips, much different from the desperate ones before. 

“Three’s a crowd after all.” 

I smiled dumbly at him, still panting, and he mirrored my euphoria. 

“Oh, right,” he muttered, pulling out the chain from his pocket. 

“I got this for you.”

He reached out to me, danging a gold chain off his fingers. It was decorated with my favorite stones and colors, and it almost brought a tear to my eye. He remembered my favorite things?

“Jaskier, you stole that for me?”

He opened and closed his mouth several times before scratching the back of his neck. 

“Uh, yes? I just- I saw how badly you wanted something from there and I couldn’t help but imagine how beautiful this would look on you. Before I knew it, I had it in my hands and was making to put it away.”

Rolling my eyes, I gave him a laugh and took it gently from him. 

“Thank you so much. Truly... it’s wonderful.” 

Jaskier smiled shyly at me, not at all matching the fierceness I had seen on him moments ago. 

“Shame about your doublet though. I seem to remember you saying it was quite expensive.”

He chuckled and kicked at the dirt, flipping his hair out of his eyes. 

“Yeah, well, there will be others. Now, let’s go. We probably shouldn’t hang around here.” 

I smiled before placing the necklace around my neck, making sure it was covered by my clothing. 

“Lead the way, lute boy.”

[latte-fairytaekwoon]

Ateez: Going On We Got Married

Kim Hongjoong:

Anxious was the word to describe Hongjoong when he was about to meet his 'wife'. He kept looking over at the camera man, waiting for the signal that would allow him to open the door to the room where you were already waiting in, another camera crew capturing your reaction as well.

"I can go in now?"

Getting the ok, Hongjoong took a deep breath and opened the door. He peeked his head in and burst into a nervous giggle when he saw you. You in turn, covered your face to hide your blushing cheeks. The situation was just so funny and new to both of you rookie idols that you couldn't help but be shy.

"I guess I'll introduce myself. Hi, I'm Ateez's leader, Kim Hongjoong." He bowed to you.

"Hi, I'm [insert group name and position], L/N Y/N." You responded awkwardly.

The staff couldn't help but chuckle and 'aww' at your cute interactions.

"We're already like a newlywed couple. Can't even look at each other in the eyes." You pointed out.

"I'm sorry, it's just....... it makes me more nervous knowing I got such a pretty wife." Hongjoong confessed.

His comment made you cover your face once again.

"Oh thank you. You're very handsome as well." You complimented him, and Hongjoong swore his heart stopped for a minute.

"Can we get you two to pose together for a few pictures for the fans and viewers?" The director asked.

It was awkward at first, trying to figure out how to position yourselves.

"Is it ok if I touch you?" Hongjoong wanted permission before laying any finger on you.

You nodded and he instantly wrapped his arm around your waist, pulling you close to him. Both of you could feel your hearts pounding against your chests, you wondered if the other could hear it. But the awkwardness was soon gone and you both got very comfortable with each other, capturing some very cute and adorable photos that the viewers were going to eat up. In no time, were you guys about to become the most popular couple, both on and outside the show.

Park Seonghwa:

It had been a month into your 'married' life and it was time for a new challenge chosen specifically by your fans. Seonghwa and you entered into the location given to you and were confused when you guys saw it was a daycare center. You both looked at the director for an explanation.

"The challenge fans wanted to see you do was the daycare challenge. For the day, you'll transform into caregivers and take care of the kids here."

Both you and Seonghwa looked dumbfounded.

"What is this?" You laughed slightly at the situation your fans decided to put you in.

"Ahh really Atiny?" Seonghwa shook his head.

Soon you both changed into the proper attire and after going through a quick tutorial with the women in charge, you guys proceeded to go meet the kids. It actually proved to not be so hard and both of you were having fun with them. It surprised both of you to see you were actually good with kids.

"I had so much fun." You told Seonghwa when you went back to your 'home.'

"You were so good with the kids. They really loved you." Seonghwa said as he picked at his plate of food.

"You were not bad yourself. Remember the baby that wouldn't stop crying until you held him? I bet Atinys will love it." You smiled at the memory.

Seonghwa blushed and was hesitant to ask, but he really wanted to know.

"Do you think you'd ever want kids?"

You instantly lit up at the question.

"Of course I do! I'd love to have a family of my own one day."

Seonghwa wasn't surprised, he knew you were the mom in your group, just like him. It was something you two bonded over when you first met. You looked up from your food to see him staring intently at you.

"What?" You asked.

He only smirked before saying "I bet we'd make really cute babies" and winking at you.

You almost choked on your food, causing Seonghwa to laugh at your flustered state. You blushed intensely and threw a towel at him.

"Yah Park Seonghwa!" You nagged at him.

Jeong Yunho:

Yunho and you looked at the place you were staying at during the duration of your 'marriage'. It is definitely cute and had a lot of room. You two looked around the place like little kids, excitedly pointing out so many things. It was when you both looked at your bedroom that reality hit: you were going to be sleeping with a total stranger cause room only had 1 bed.

Yunho looked over at you and could sense how tense you got. Quickly, he nudged you with his elbow.

"If you want, I'll do something to really annoy you and we get in a fight." He suggested

"Why would we do that?" You asked, completely baffled by his suggestion.

"So you can send me to sleep on the couch and you sleep here. You know, like an actual married couple." He actually held two thumbs up and had a goofy smile on his face.

You burst out laughing at him. He never failed to make you laugh.

"No, I'd feel bad. Besides, your long limbs wouldn't fit in the couch."

Soon nighttime came and both of you were getting ready to go to bed. Yunho was currently in the king sized bed, playing around on his phone when you came out of the bathroom, face clean and makeup free. Yunho dropped his phone and just stared in awe.

"Stop looking at me like that! I'm already self conscious about being bare faced in the camera." You exclaimed.

Yunho only smiled lovingly at you. "Trust me, you have nothing to be self conscious about. You're absolutely beautiful."

You blushed but quickly got over it and got into bed with him.

"You better not kick me in your sleep." You warned him.

"I won't. I'll just do this."

With no warning, Yunho tangled his long arms and legs around you, encapsulating you into a giant embrace.

"No! Stop! I don't like it!" You shouted half heartedly.

"Don't lie, you know you love it. And if you don't, get used to it. You're stuck with me for a long time.... wifey." He teased you.

Kang Yeosang:

"Eek! I'm going to fall!"

You squealed as you tried to balance yourself on Yeosang's skateboard. It was the challenge set for you: you two had to share with each other your favorite hobbies and experience them together. The day before, you already had Yeosang try out [insert hobby here] and you two had lots of fun.

Now it was his turn and he was already excited about showing you his skateboarding skills, but nothing made him happier than teaching you a few things.

"No no no. It's ok. I got you ok?"

Yeosang carefully held your hands, slowly pulling you forward as you kept both feet on the board, trying not to think about losing your balance.

"What if I fall and mess up my face? I'll lose my source of income!"

Yeosang chuckled. It was one of the things he loved about you: your sense of humor even when you were scared to death.

"Don't worry. I won't let you fall, I'll catch you."

You and Yeosang shared a heartfelt smile and continued on with him pulling you. Everything was going great, until a dog suddenly rushed past both of you, making you lose your balance and almost toppling to the ground. Luckily, true to his word, Yeosang stopped you from getting hurt, locking you in a tight embrace. You both stood still for a moment, getting over the shock of what could have happened.

"Are you ok?" Yeosang asked, looking you up and down to make sure nothing was damaged.

"Yeah.... I'm fine. Thank you."

Neither of you let go for a while, you just stared into each other's eyes, simultaneously leaning on closer and closer before one of the staff following you two accidentally sneezed, making you two remember where you were.

"Are you going to add special effects and a drama ost in the background when this airs?" You asked so casually causing the entire staff to burst out laughing.

"Please play either the Goblin soundtrack or Boys Over Flowers, make it more sentimental." Yeosang added.

He picked up his skateboard.

"I think we've had enough for today."

"Yeah. I don't want to have my life threatened once again." You agreed.

"I told you I'd catch you didn't I? And I did. But now you need to catch something..." Yeosang paused and looked at you.

"What?" You tilted your head.

He hesitated before reaching into his sweater and then pulling out a finger heart.

"My heart!" He exclaimed in a cute voice.

Choi San:

From the start, you two were viewer's favorite couple. Your interactions were just so cute and adorable they couldn't help but eat them up. San was especially happy when he found out you were to be his 'wife', he already admired you since you debuted, but with this new experience, he knew for sure he had fallen for you.

It was more than a month into your marriage and you two had yet to share your first kiss. Everyone else already had theirs but you two. It just seemed you two never had the perfect opportunity to do it. But San was determined to make the moment, not for the fans or viewers but for himself. That's how you two ended up on a late night picnic date.

"Oh my God San!" You almost cried at how beautiful the scene was.

There were lights decorating the nearby trees, flower arrangements at every corner and fake candles around the blanket for your picnic.

"I hope I like it." He said shyly.

"I love it! Oh my God! It's beautiful." You couldn't help but hug him tightly.

You spent most of the date eating the delicious food he prepared and overall talking, with music playing from his phone. When a certain slow song came up, he stood up and held his hand out to you.

"May I have this dance?"

Of course you couldn't refuse him. Not when he smiled at you with his pure and sweet smile. You stood up and allowed him to wrap his arms around your waist, you in turn put them on his shoulders. You two just swayed to the music. You could hardly look at him in the face, you were still too shy around him.

San, however, took his chance and proceeded to dip you like in the movies, catching you by surprise. You looked at him and saw something different in his eyes.

"Can I...?" He asked you.

You smiled and nodded, knowing full well what he wanted. San leaned down and softly pressed his lips against yours. You returned the kiss, your hands going to to the back of his head. Even when he lifted you back up, San never broke the kiss, he simply deepened it and pulled you closer like his life depended on it. He completely forgot about the cameras and didn't care at that moment.

When he finally pulled back, he scanned your face to see your reaction. You were blushing and smiling widely at him.

"Was it ok?" He asked.

"It was perfect. You're perfect." You assured him, pecking his lips once more before laying your head on his chest.

San released a breath he didn't know he was holding. He felt truly happy having you in his arms. He simply grinned like a fool in love.

Song Mingi:

"Everyone, today as you can see, my lovely wife and I are going to cook breakfast together. As you all know, I'm actually an expert in pancakes."

You only rolled your eyes at Mingi's comments towards the camera, knowing full well he can't boil water to save his life. You were so focused on mixing the batter, you didn't notice he took one of the cameras and started coming closer to you with it.

"Here we see our pretty Y/N barefaced. She looks even more beautiful than she usually does today."

You looked over to see a camera all over your face, flustering you.

"Stop." You told him, trying to hide your face.

"I'm only trying to share your beauty to the world! Let me finish!" He protested, trying to film more of your face.

You responded by holding up a wooden spoon and threatening to swat him with it, making him quickly run away.

"This should count as domestic abuse!" He exclaimed.

You had Mingi watched the pancakes while you tried to set up the table. You took your time trying to make everything look as pretty as possible when a high pitched scream made you run back into the kitchen.

"What did you do?!" You shouted as you took in the smoke emanating from the pan.

"I swear I didn't do anything!" Mingi shouted.

"Yeah I can see that!"

You proceeded to put out the smoke that was now causing the smoke detector to go off. You thanked god none of the staffs were there with you at the moment cause they would have been losing their minds.

Once you got the situation under control, you looked at the completely burnt pancakes, your hard work gone to waste. You blinked slowly, trying to process what happened.

"I'm sorry Y/N....I really didn't mean- Oh god. You're mad aren't you?"

You looked over at poor Mingi, who looked so guilty and afraid of your reaction. You couldn't find it in yourself to stay mad at him.

"It's ok. I'm glad no one got hurt."

Mingi was taken aback when you hugged him, laughing softly at the situation. He started laughing with you.

"Does that mean you'll allow me to help you again?" He asked with hope in his eyes.

"Not a chance."

Jung Wooyoung:

It was finally the part of the show where you two had to meet your parents. Wooyoung and you were very much nervous even if it was just for fun and entertainment. You all met up at a restaurant and introduced everyone. It was difficult at first, your families trying to get used to being filmed and you two trying to make sure everyone was comfortable. But soon both your parents were having a good time poking fun at your expense.

"Honestly mom, what was your reaction when you found out who I was marrying?" Wooyoung had a smile plastered on his face.

"Truthfully.....I'm still not sure how she puts up with you and your loud mouth." His mom spoke honestly, causing everyone to erupt in laughter.

Wooyoung simply poked his cheek with his tongue, not very amused by the comment.

"If you ask me, I thought he'd get annoyed with Y/N." Your dad piped in.

"Why me?! What did I do?!" You exclaimed at your father's comment.

"You hardly talk and when you do, you tend to nag like an old lady."

Now it was Wooyoung's turn to laugh at you, and you simply glared at him.

"I do not!" You protested.

"Yes you do!" Wooyoung said.

The conversation soon took a better turn.

"In all seriousness sir, what kind of guy would you prefer your daughter to marry?" Wooyoung couldn't help his curiosity.

"Well I...."

All of you looked forward to his answer.

He turned to look at Wooyoung and patted his back.

"I actually like you for her very much."

Everyone was surprised by that, even Wooyoung himself.

"Right? I feel like they have such good chemistry together. I'd want Y/N as my actual daughter in law."

You blushed when his mother added her opinion.

"Would you guys consider dating for real?"

You and Wooyoung looked at each other. Sure things started off rocky with you, but over time you learned to put up with each other and found out you actually complimented each other. Wooyoung's extroverted personality helped you become less shy and not worry too much about things, whereas your calm nature helped Wooyoung to have more patience and self control. You actually couldn't imagine what it'd be like without each other in your lives anymore.

"Well I mean.....our parents approve, our fans ship it and we definitely are cute together....what do you say?" Wooyoung winked at you.

Choi Jongho:

It was the final filming of the show. Jongho and you were supposed to sit down and look back at all the fan favorite moments you had together and also answer a few questions they left for you.

"Is there any clip you hope made it into the top 5 moments?" The director asked.

"For me it's when I serenaded Y/N on our first date." Jongho answered.

You smiled at the memory. "That was cute."

"Were you surprised by my beautiful voice?" He asked you.

"I was more surprised by the fact you split my apple in half." You responded.

"I see how it is. You only like me for my strength, not my talent." He fake pouted, causing you to laugh.

You guys had your eyes fixed on the screen, watching the clip of when you first met and the reactions you had backstage without the other knowing, now watching what each of you really thought.

"Wow! You seriously thought I was going to be a boring stick in the mud!" Jongho was offended when he saw your interview when you said you thought your marriage would be boring.

"I'm sorry! You came in all intimidating onto the set! I was scared of you!" You explained why you thought that way then.

"You were scared?! You were wearing all black when I saw you! I thought you were planning to hex me or something with your creepy aura!" Jongho exclaimed.

"My stylist picked that outfit!" You said.

"Is her stylist here? I want a word with them."

The rest of the filming spent in laughs and reminiscing about the past weeks between you two and eventually the cameras stopped rolling and it was officially over............

It was over on the show, but not for you two.

"I'll pick you up after we're done with recording ok? I love you Y/N." Jongho smiled and pressed a kiss to your lips.

Gifs not mine. Credit goes to their respective owners.

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Okay, meta of the scene in ep 5 between Shu Yi’s Dad and Shi De.

Shame on me, because I have to digress at the very beginning even, because that piggy back scene reminded me of something Sam said in an interview, and that is that Yu’s body felt soft to the touch, like a cat’s, and that it is totally a good thing. In the way he molds himself to Shi De’s back, and later slithers off him into the bed, I must say, I totally see it, what he means, and I am loving it. He’s probably very good at winding himself out of your hold when he doesn’t want to be there, and fitting himself to every part of your body when he wants to. Bendy, non-resistant, viscuous, long, warm limbs, I can just imagine the morning stretches. And yeah, I would totally try to pet him, even at the dangers of scratch and bite.

Back to topic:

That scene with Dad. I laughed out loud several times, it is amazing, but also heart wrenching and a psychological roller coaster of course, but I loved how the acting toed the line between serious and comical at times. How Shu Yi’s Dad seems so much like Shu Yi in some moments, when he angrily stalked over towards a wide-eyed Shi De – with Shu Yi on his back-, or later the end of the scene, his impulsive face journey, and how you can see where Shu Yi got his bearings and mannerisms from. Great choice of actor, great acting, I laughed so hard.

On to the psychological ride that is this scene:

So, we’re still digesting the piggy back ride with Big Cat Shu Yi, and there he comes, Dad, dorky and enthusiastic and overbearing, already in Shu Yi’s apartment, with food and presents, but so happy to see his son.

And he comes face to face with a doe eyed, clumsy looking, caught in the act-mannered Gao Shi De, and of course that phallic symbol in Dad’s hand has to be broken for effect (You know, the phallus shaped snack that Shu Yi really likes, that Shi De will take to him later?).

And the music and all plays into the comedic aspect, but also into the role that Shi De takes on here, which is to a point calculated, I believe. It’S the playing weak he will be accused of later. He still tries to win Dad over by playing a more submissive role, not offending his pride, but allowing for his authority, still trying to maybe appease him for Shu Yi’s sake, to make him maybe come around without having to play hard ball.

Dad prowling over menacingly, shushing him, only to take the shoes… yeah. Laughed. His priority is his son, even if he is misguided about what he needs to protect his son from. A thought: The relatives, not the love of his live. But, of course, that is easier said than done, because Dad, too, is entangled in family and corporate webs.

But first things first, Shi De takes his big cat to the bedroom, and this time the statue and rabbit on the window can look on, because nothing scandalous is happening, the snow globe with the Statue of Liberty seems gone, no more freezing American secrets to disturb, it seems.

And is this the look of a man wo just decided that he wants to marry the one sleeping in front of him, again, and over once more? Yes, it is.

It is also the look of a man, who decided to try and win over his fiancé’s dad once more, because even if he knows Shu Yi will stand at his side against him, the happier future he wants for Shu Yi would be with Dad on their side, because despite it all they are close, so close they share mannerisms and face journeys.

So, he showers, in Shu Yi’s space probably owned by Dad, washing off past mistakes, preparing to be his best self when meeting Dad downstairs again. Also? Making Dad wait for him, what a power move, Shi De is capable all right.

When he finally comes down to meet Dad, he takes on the role of a more submissive junior again, polite and respecting authority, because he is the one who asks something that Dad thinks it is his to give, and thus hehas the disadvantage, or at least wants to appease Dad by making him feel that way.

He plays along Dad’s rules, apologizing for breaking a promise that was a set up from the beginning, and he knows.

He presents the documents of his ‘worthiness’, humbly apologizing for them to be lacking in Dad’s eyes. Dad keeps eating, not paying back any of the respect he is shown, still to caught up in his entitlement.

Dad’s remark of it being the betrothal presents is meant to ridicule Shi De’s efforts and love.

Shi De gives him one last out, when he overlooks the tone, and just says yes. You can see it as my dowry, being totally honest and unoffended, as a move of power.

And Dad falls into his trap, out of arrogance, out of underestimating Shi De. Ridiculing something, that is not his to judge, laughing. Entitled: You are never getting into my family.”

Edit: for further intricacies about dowries and betrothal presents in Asian cultures, go here a post by @noona96n​ that gives more sense to it. I’ll leave my take before reading here nonetheless, because the gist is there, lol. But that reading of the beginning of the scene with the documents and the dowry and dad’s entitlement makes more sense. 

And that is when Shi De changes course.

Leaving the submissive pose behind, sitting down at the table, an at least equal partner at the bargaining table.

And what he says, that he can let Shu Yi into his own family, because they are accepting him with open arms? It is a strike that is powerful, proving that equality, if not superiority.

It reminds me of when Shi De said in their first encounter after America, that he will accept the deal, because he knows Shu Yi will never be happy without his father’s approval.  Dad should have seen it then, maybe he did and forgot, and underestimated again.

Shi De is a psychological menace when it comes to bargaining and debating, and don’t you make the mistake to underestimate that. Now they are playing hard ball.

Because he brings Shu Yi’s happiness into it, something he knows is something Dad cares about deep down, even if he is misguided how it should look like. It also plays into parental duties and responsibilities and being a good parent, supporting your child and accepting and loving him for who he is.

He appeals to Dad’s guilt over that, all the while putting him in his place, because he, Shi De has that love that loves Shu Yi unconditionally and wants what makes him happy, he has parents that will love him and may take Dad’s place if he does a job that is lacking.

t’s also a hit to Dad’s fear of losing Shu Yi, that he admitted to in the bar, when saying not only daughters can leave their families. He treatens to take Shu Yi away into a new family.

Shi De builds himself up as Dad’s equal here, with a love that is true for Shu Yi, and also one that chooses Shu YI’s happiness. He’s saying, if they are to be competitors for Shi Yi’s love, Shi De might just come out winning, so Dad should rethink his course.

And Dad realizes then, that he has underestimated Shi De, he has leaned back in his chair while Shi De leans forward. He’s not laughing anymore.

Shi De is very confident in enunciating the syllables, leaning forward, no cowering in his eyes any longer. Everything about his posturing is dominant now. Demanding respect, not asking for it any longer.

So much that Shu Yi’s Dad is backed into a corner, offense his only defense: Are you threating me?

Now it is Shi De who is laughing. What a terrifying opponent in a negotiation. Business man and alpha males through and through… ah, alpha, wasn’t that the project that Shi De… anyway.

Shi De’s reaching out an olive branch, trying to soothe the situation for politeness sakes. All instruments in the psychological engineering of that scene.

And Dad has to give that credit, even if he gives it the tone of an insult.

“You played weak before.”

I am not sure if he means Shi De portrayed himself as weaker than he was, or if he meant play dirty. In any case, he misjudged Shi De. Edit: I think it means playing dirty. Which dad has done, too. Edit’s Edit: Although @noona96n post on the japanese subs ead in me into an iterpretation of playing weaker than he is again... I am torn. both, both is good.

And Shi De again pretends not to hear the tone, just takes it as face value, not letting Dad getting personal. But also, Shi De delivers a lethal blow:

Reminding Dad again, that yes, Shi De played that game for Shu Yi’s happiness, thus having the moral higher ground, but also reminding him that yes, he chose to play the game that way, dirty if he must, with all the capabilities he now proved to have, and that he is not afraid to sacrifice on personal levels, or his pride, to get what he wants, which is ultimately a happy Shu Yi.

Also reminding him of the emails, how dirty he COULD play, leverage that Dad until now maybe thought he still had, but that Shi de now holds over him.

You can see how Shu Yi’s dad doesn’t have anything to set against that. So, he just turns to an insult, trying to put Shi De down again.

But Shi De twists it in his mouth, taking it as confession, just to rile up Dad. Then calling him Dad/Father-in-law, to remind him that with how things are looking now, this is the foreseeable outcome of their future, one where Shi De gets his way and Dad doesn’t.

Edit: @noona96n‘s post on the japanese subs and marriage and family in Asian culture led me to believe that Dad’s scolding of calling Shi De an ungrateful creature/child, as if he was in fatherly position to do so, made Shi De trap him with the question, if he had accepted the marriage/Shi De as his child, and he calls him Dad. I also think that Dad was really impressed by Shi De’s negotiation Skills, and maybe because of that slipped up like that... For those interested, sometimes we have interesting conversations in the comments and notes, lol.

I correct myself; I think that was the lethal blow, lol.

And Dad can only turn to blind rage, lashing out with anything that comes to mind. How the incident in the company still might cost him that future with Shu Yi. Hm. Sus.

You know, the incident, where someone maybe paid a lot of money to destroy/test Shi De’s company and future, by stealing the title alpha, ahem, project alpha from him, only for Shi De to rebuild what alpha means from the ground up, out of his resources, to present it to Dad’s company? Yeah, am I getting this right? Metaphors and all?

Anyway, Shi De has his capabilities and team and support to trust he will resolve that matter, so he is not in the slightest intimidated by that veiled threat.

He concludes by turning back to politeness, thanking Dad for his criticism/warning and paying back some respect to his authority, by bowing and promising to not let him down. Being the bigger man and all.

Then he steals the food Shu Yi likes, that Dad brought, out from under him. Because he CAN.

Yeah, that frustrated face journey by Dad is everything.

But. Maybe someday, when he gets over his pride and anger, he will even be impressed by his future Son-in-law, because yeah, Dad just met his match on a psychological scheming business war-fare level. He got his a... handed back to him.

He HAS to see how that will be good for Shu Yi to have in his corner, eventually.

Edit: After reading @noona96n ‘ post on weddings and family in Asian culture, I believe that interpretation fits the beginning of the scene better, but I do think once Dad rebuffed Shi De’s ask to marry into the family so harshly, Shi De really went into ruthless negotiation mode, to prove to Dad who thinks him unworthy of his world, that he can scheme and negotiate with the best of them, it is not a negotiation of Shu Yi’s future as much as they are pithing their negotiation skills against each other, and I believe Shi De succeeds in impressing Dad, which leads to Dad’s slip up in scolding him like achild, also maybe letting slip he knows of the stolen project, even though everyone has signed confidentiality agreements.