#number 30 from the inspo !!

[slumpcd]

hands were up and under their shirt, letting his fingers play with the hard nipples. one foot moved to push their legs wider, " spread 'em baby. " mouth by their ear, " as wide as you can. " max loved feeling the night breeze hit his skin as they stood hidden in the narrow alley. // @svftlove

[wildemaven]

strangers : poolside | dave york

pairing: dave york x f!reader word count: 6622 content warnings: 18+ blog; ANGST, soft!Dave, established relationship, miscommunication (like a lot), mentions of alcohol and food, workaholic Dave, morning breath, Dave’s stupid phone, talks of marital woes, slight exhibitionism, breast/nipple/clit play, a random handsome stranger, jealous Dave, talk of having or wanting children, a kiss of fluff, implied/alluding to infidelity (there is none, reader just doesn’t know this), reader is mentioned wearing lingerie and a bathing suit- but zero description features, no age given but it’s implied she’s at least over 30, no y/n, established relationship, this is au- no Carol or kids, if I missed anything let me know. notes: ahh! I’m so nervous for this chapter!! But so excited for it also. I’m so glad I took my time with it so it could be exactly what it needed to be— which is kinda of a roller coaster of emotions. While the story is completely fictional, this has felt very cathartic to me because I dealt with a lot of similar thoughts/feelings as the reader. Anywho! Biggest thank you to @gnpwdrnwhiskey for literally holding my hand through this and helping me work through it. 💕 strangers masterlist | previous | next | inspo board | playlist

The soft glow of the television bathes the hotel room in a soft ambient flicker. Faint colors and scene changes adjust the room’s atmosphere. Actors silently exchanging words back and forth, expressions all the more dramatic with the muted volume. The movie you’ve been looking forward to seeing, long forgotten, playing out in silence across the screen. 

As expected, the bed is better than anything you have ever slept in. Its plush mattress, divine and soft. Similar to what you assume it might be like to doze off among the clouds. It braces your bodies with ease through shifting positions as the evening extends into the early hours of the next day. 

The intricate structure of lace and mesh material felt exquisite on your skin. Molding over your body like it was made for you and only you. The cups of the teasing bra cradling the weight of your breast, pushed up on display, enticing enough to bring a man to his knees— the plan at least. Taking your time, admiring yourself in the bathroom mirror once everything was in place. Your eyes roaming over your body, letting your hands follow suit. Imaging all the ways Dave would map over your skin in the same manner. The prospect for what was to come was thrilling. Desire blooming in your veins. Arousal warm and already pooling in the crotch of your panties. It was evident, your body filled with pent up lust, ready to be satiated by your husband. 

You delicately dotted drops of perfume to your skin— base of your throat, behind your ears, inner wrists. The warmth  from your pulse points amplifying the lush fig and sandalwood notes, blending with your natural pheromones instantaneously. Before rejoining Dave, you slipped a hotel robe over your body, concealing the lacey number with wild anticipation.  

His hands, gentle where they met your body with a soft caressing motion. Not rushed or seeking more than they were ready for. Blazing heat emitted from him, scorching your skin with a fieriness you so desperately craved. They stilled. Lingered. 

Dave. Your voice cautious, velvety sweet, calling out to him. 

The sounds that fell from his lips were beyond anything you could have prepared for. A booming roar reverberated through him. Filling the room. Consuming you. As quickly as the rousing fuse had been lit, it had just as quickly fizzled out mid burn. 

Dave’s snoring was like a shock to the system. The warm buzz of arousal dissolved into a cold emptiness as you lay in bed alongside Dave’s sleeping form. No amount of lace or lack thereof, seemed to be enough to seduce the sluggish man, already nodding off when you had come slinking out from the bathroom. Propped up on pillows, his eyelids growing heavy with each forced blink as stared blankly at the television. His dinner plate picked over and discarded onto the nightstand. 

This scenario you knew all too well— and regularly. The build up, always so hopeful. The prospect of Dave having his way with you, pure exhilaration. Your body so desperate, in need of a release that didn’t hail from a hurried moment alone with a tiny vibrating wand before crawling into bed with Dave’s sleeping form.

Your brain refused to shut off as you lay staring up at the ceiling, willing away tears. You finally settled on the only thing that made sense at this early hour.  He no longer desired you like he once did. No amount of time or vacations away could restore that connection. Then there was also that outcome that you dreaded the idea of entertaining— maybe it just wasn’t you he desired. 

*

The whole evening had been on a constant loop. Replaying and taking precedence over your usual fictional fantasies that unfolded upon entering a heavy slumber. The hotel suite balcony offered a reprieve from the room, quietly sipping your coffee alone. 

It was mid morning when you decided to crawl out of bed, in desperate need of something to numb the dullness that settled behind your eyes. Sleep did little to ease the tornado of thoughts that swept through your mind as the sun rose over the coast of California. Your brain had a funny way of tormenting you with fabricated information. On high alert the minute it sensed uncertainty, in search of answers to unasked questions.

As the coastal fog burned off, you were able to properly take in the view. A colony of gulls flew by, their collaborative squawking was every bit as annoying as it was captivating. 

Fellow early risers strolled the sidewalks below, coffees and large water bottles in tow, all absorbed in their little private worlds. Couples hand in hand, in search of  the perfect ocean view to start their day. A strange feeling of resentment had crept in. These strangers, carrying on with their lives, seemingly unaware of the jealousy you harbored for their happiness. 

Your thoughts trail back to Dave and the evening again. It was only the first day and the optimism around this vacation was starting to wane. 

“Shit— I must have really needed some fucking sleep.”  Dave groans as he joins you on the balcony, his hands rubbing the sleep from his eyes. The sheet wrinkles embedded into the side of his face matched the similar ones on his cotton pajama pants and gray sleep shirt. His sleep etched voice is one of your favorite things to wake up to each morning. “I don’t even remember falling asleep at all.” 

His body molds into yours, caging you in against the edge of the balcony. He’s warm and soft first thing in the morning. Like a moth to a flame, his lips find your skin. Tiny wet pecks from the base of your neck to your temple. 

There was a point in time where things in your marriage felt very easy and Dave wasn’t always so invested in his work. You never felt like you were competing with files and phone calls for his undivided attention. The infatuation he held for you was palpable, leaving little room for doubt or worry. 

When you met Dave there was an enigmatic quality about him. Neither of you were in a relationship or seeking out one, but also not completely opposed to the prospect of exploring one if something happened to fall into your laps. A chance meeting at a bar when his drink had literally fallen into your lap led to the rest of the evening spent tucked away in a dimly lit booth. The buzz of alcohol had you talking his ear off, and he allowed you to do so, consuming every little detail about you. 

Dave shared minimal information about himself. Very on brand for his reserved but alluring demeanor. Aside from basic introductory  facts, the only real thing you knew about him was his recent discharge from the military and his onboarding career in the CIA. 

By the end of the night, you felt there was something intriguing about Dave, completely drawn to him. He was kind, generous and clearly the greatest listener. Ideally, he was someone you could see yourself with, wanting to know the ins and outs of who he was. So much so, you gave him your number. Scrawled across a beer soaked napkin, the ink bleeding out as each digit was carefully written out. He even said he’d call, leaving you with a kiss on your cheek before rejoining his buddies and calling it a night. 

It was a week before you heard from him again, nearly giving up any hope he would be even remotely interested in you. 

You learned that Dave’s walls were strong. Built of the strongest concrete. Resistant and impermeable to the elements. Over time his walls couldn’t withstand the depth at which you were willing to endure for him. Slowly crumbling and exposed. Finding that underneath the rubble was a man who was all in. A man who loved hard and never once made you question his loyalty to you. 

“We can blame it on the jet lag.” You laugh softly into the coffee mug, taking another sip— definitely in need of more. 

“Good morning, Honey.” He says, nudging his aquiline nose into your cheek, instinctively turning into him. 

“Morning, Babe.” Dave turns you, the top of your robe slides off your shoulder— exposing the lace set you were still wearing.  

“You’re still wearing it. Didn’t even get the chance to peel it off of you like I wanted to last night.” Pulling at the robe belt, the front falls open. Dave’s eyes widened, taking you all in, his irises now a deeper shade of his usual brown. “

“Yeah, well—“ You huffed, suppressing the impulse to acknowledge the hurt that was still ever-present. 

“Fuck— Baby, I’m sorry. I'm two for two now. Let me make it up to you?” 

Dave’s hands breach the inside of your robe. His hips flush to you— he’s hard, morning wood ready and eager. His deft fingers slide up the length of your spine, your skin covered in goosebumps once he reaches the clasp of the bra. 

“Morning coffee breath— I’m gonna go brush my teeth.” Your head swerves his oncoming kiss, pulling the front of your robe closed again. 

A hitch in your confidence. Curling in on yourself as you dislodge your body from where he has you pinned. That hot coiling response building in your lower abdomen, moments ago desperate for the way Dave wants you, now subsiding to a low simmer.

“You— um, have those calls you still need to make this morning?” You ask him, standing half way through the door, turning enough to catch the sunlight illuminating the bafflement on Dave’s face. 

“Uh— Yeah. Still need to make those calls.” Dave’s dejected tone hits you like a bucket of ice. His head hanging and palms digging into his eyes. 

“How long do you think it should take?”

“Few hours, give or take. Done by noon at the latest.”

“Okay. Maybe, if you’re up for it when you’re done— maybe we can go to the pool? Lounge a bit. Have some drinks. I got some new bathing suits, and have been dying to wear them. I think you might even like them.” An olive branch in the form of you served on a platter wearing minimal clothing. The likelihood of Dave accepting is rather favorable. 

It’s unmistakable, devouring you— all conspicuous like and intense. Surveying every inch of your form leaning against the doorway. 

Up the length of your smooth bare legs. The front of the robe flapping with the ocean breeze offering a peek of thigh and black lace. The fingers of your free hand toy with the collar, making it lay askew across your chest. A single breast exposed to cool morning air, nipple tight against the sheer material. 

His gaze finally meets yours, shoulders lowering to their normal level. The slightest lift at the corner of his mouth, tip of his tongue gliding over his full bottom lip. Both of you landing on the same page, temptation reciprocated with blatant irresistibility. 

“Yeah— Yeah, we can definitely do that.” He replied, his smile widening, the corner of his eyes crinkled— the Dave you fell in love with all those years ago in his truest form. 

“Okay. I’ll order us some breakfast then. More coffee too. I drank the whole pot.” There’s a giddy feeling erupting inside of you. It seems like it’s been ages since you’ve seen Dave smile— genuinely smiling. 

“Not surprised by that one bit. Hey—“ Capturing your attention before you’ve completely left the balcony. “I love you, you know that right?”

“Of course I do. I love you, too.”

Maybe it’s complacency that makes you feel like things within your marriage are stagnant, even borderline dull as of recently. The lack of regular intimacy, a normal thing all couples encounter at some point through their years together, not a telltale sign of extramarital meandering. Maybe that’s also not a bad thing. Just a season of life. A small hiccup in your otherwise normal and loving relationship. 

*

As promised, it’s noon by the time Dave wraps up his final phone call and you’re both sitting atop the roof of the hotel. Basking in the sweltering rays of the California sun is exactly what was needed after being cooped up in the room all morning. 

Breakfast in bed while Dave paced the length of the balcony. One phone call after the next, all varying in degrees of duration and intensity based on how animated Dave’s hand gestures and contorted expressions were. You had delivered his plate of eggs, sausage and toast during his first call, leaving it on the small table along with a fresh pot of coffee. He kissed you and mouthed a ‘thank you’ before sinking his teeth into the burnt buttered bread and continuing his meeting or whatever it was he was doing. 

The minute he walked in announcing he was finished, your two piece suit was on and you were throwing Dave’s swim trunks at him from across the room. Tote bag containing pool lounging necessities— sunscreen, sunglasses, current book, wallet —was packed and waiting by the door. Your sheer excitement filled the room, a contagious feeling in the way Dave was mildly laughing at your frantic antics. 

Either you both were the only ones staying at this hotel or no one else found joy in a gorgeous rooftop pool like you did. In the few hours spent lounging poolside, there was one, maybe two, other guests that also had an afternoon by the pool on their itinerary, too. There was a silent understanding among everyone that they stay in their respective spaces, evenly spaced out.  

No one was complaining though. Fewer people meant less people lined up for cocktail refills at the bar. Fewer obnoxious conversations you didn’t have to drown out while focusing on the romance novel you were close to finishing. Zero avoidance of bodies in the water while Dave and you took a dip to cool off. Aside from visiting the pacific, this is how you intended to spend the rest of your days in California. 

The moment you dive into your book, time and everything around you becomesa faint distraction from the fictional world you're absorbed in. The sheriff with his cowboy drawl and ridiculously handsome mustache, falls for the sweet baker. A reunion of past lovers, doing life together somewhere on the east coast in the small town they both reside in. A typical smitten cowboy vying for her love and attention at any chance he gets. There’s a permanent smile plastered across your face, dog-eared corners for future you to return to with the intention to relive the passages all over again. Page by page, you’re so engrossed with their whirlwind romance— you never want it to end. 

The book consumes you longer than you planned for. So much so, you're unaware of the fact that Dave is no longer immersed in the LA Times he picked up in the hotel lobby earlier. The inked paper now folded neatly and discarded on the ground next to your tote.

Dave’s tortoise colored shades blocking out the sun and hiding the fact that he’s passed out. For how long, you’re not sure. Breathing is light and rhythmic. His usual thundering snore trades for small puffs of air from his parted lips. His bare golden chest, now a pale shade of red— shit!

Folding the current page of the book, tossing it to the end of your lounge chair, you sit up in search for more sunscreen for Dave, and yourself. Sifting through the contents of your tote, finding the bottle conveniently at the bottom. Hating the feeling of residual lotion getting between your jewelry, you remove your rings and toss them into a secured pocket inside the tote. 

“Dave? Babe, wake up!” Gently nudging his bare shoulder to wake him. 

“Hmmm—“ Dave grumbles a string of incoherent sleep laden words, lifting his head in your direction. 

“Sorry. You passed out and I was so caught up in my book, I didn’t realize the umbrella shade wasn’t covering us anymore. You’re not completely burnt, but we’ve been here for a while. Sit up and let me put some more sunscreen on you.” You motion for him to sit forward, then squeeze a heaping amount of lotion in your hand, tossing the back into the tote. 

Dave hissed, his back arching as you smooth the lotion over his warmed skin, allowing himself to ease into your touch after a few tensed moments. His head hangs below his shoulders as you continue to work the sunscreen over every inch of him that’s exposed to the blazing sun. 

“Fuuuuck— that feels nice.” He groans when your touch switches to a different pressure. Adjusting your focus from protecting him from the harmful rays to pampering him, working out the built up tension he carries around daily. 

Your fingers dig into the meat of his back as they glide up the length of his spine, pinching and squeezing over the rounded muscles of his shoulders. Thumbs pressing into the tender spot in his neck he’s been rubbing at for the better part of the last few weeks, craning his neck to the side. So relaxed you can barely make out his mumbled appreciation. “That fucking knot has been bothering me— Ouch! Fucking hell, woman!” 

“Shh! So dramatic.” You laugh, easing up on the pressure. Your hands still lingering, smoothing over his broadness, taking advantage of the closeness. 

“Oh, quit it. Those hands always were fucking magic, though. Already feels better when I move it.” Demonstrating how limber and loose it feels, rolling his head from side to side. 

Were. His use of past tense doesn’t go unnoticed. It might have just been an unintentional slip, but its use isn’t lost on you in the slightest. It feels like it’s been ages, since you had explored each other—  more than just a fleeting brush of hands. Reveling in an endless honeymoon phase, well beyond the traditional sense. You can only assume he had that same realization too, hence his choice in using were instead of are. But this moment feels too good to dwell on the logistics of proper past and present tense, so you push the thought aside. 

“I’m sure if you play your cards right, there’s plenty more magic these hands can do later.” You playfully purred, not missing the way Dave’s eyebrows jut up from behind his sunglasses— that catches his attention. 

You settle back into your lounge chair, sliding the straps of your bikini top down and off your arms, turning it into a makeshift strapless top as you prepare to cover yourself in a fresh layer of sunscreen. 

 “What are you doing?” Dave tilts his head forward, just enough so he can peer at you over his glasses. 

“What does it look like I’m doing? I’m reapplying some on myself, too.” Running the oily lotion up your arms and shoulders. 

“Here. Let me help you. Seems only fair.” His hand reaches out to you.  

“It’s fine, Dave. I can manage.” 

You’re not sure why you're shocked by his offer. Probably because you just assumed he would be diving back into reading up on worldly news. Top slimy politician was fighting for his life against rather damning accusations— the man is guilty, solely based on public opinion polls and your inherent duty as a woman to always believe the woman. Research shows more couples are putting their careers first, waiting to have children well into their thirties— that one does catch your eye, making a mental note to snag the article at some point. Sure, you can manage, but you also don’t want to. Not with him right here, so willing and capable. 

“Don’t be stubborn, Baby. And don’t think I won’t drag that sweet ass of yours over here if I have to. Give me the bottle and sit down.” 

It feels incredible. You have to remind yourself that you’re both in a public setting. This isn’t the time nor the place to let the salacious side of you self-indulge, but Dave’s hands are inducing the most carnal thoughts and it’s taking everything in you to not haul him back up to the room. 

Dave had practically hauled you into the chair. Maneuvering you both into a comfortable sitting position, his legs spread and feet planted firmly on the ground and you practically sitting in his lap. 

The task at hand is long forgotten, no longer a priority or even a relevant thought as you melted into him. His chest firm against your back, thighs caging and tight against your own. 

It’s when his hands cup your breast that nearly sends you into another dimension, so brazen and menacing. A practiced musician, slowly plucking each string of his beloved instrument as the chords play the intro to his well rehearsed song. Rolling your peaked nipples between his fingers, the fabric of your top adding just the right amount of pinched pulsation. Your eyes fluttering shut as your head falls back onto his shoulder, stifling a moan as pleasure surges through you. 

“I swear to god, Dave— fuck! Someone is going to catch us! ahh! Y-you need to s-stop before…” 

“Hmmm. I don’t know, Baby— I think you want them to see. Want them to catch my hands all over you. Hear the sounds I’m able to pull from you. I could probably fuck you right here and no one would even care.” Dave murmurs into your ear. A husked sonorous tone that has you completely surrendering to him. 

He seems to have this whole thing thoroughly thought out in a brief amount of time. Keen to his surroundings, already having scanned the entire area, aware of the people situated in cabanas on the far corner of the pool— paying no mind to either of you. His methodical nature takes hold, even as exposed as you are, he’d never put you in any situation he didn’t have complete confidence in. 

“Dave—“ Your body writhes with each continuous change in motion, the way he’s oscillating between a dizzy tweak of your nipples and the sudden dart of his tongue grazing your ear lobe. 

“You’d like that wouldn’t you. It’s been so long— fucking miss the way you feel, Baby.” Fuck. He’s not wrong. 

You might have even mentioned you would be into it at some point. All vulnerable and the slightest possibility of being detected. It was more thrilling than you had expected it to be. You weren’t even ashamed how you were so absolutely turned on by your own boldness. 

“Please—“ 

“I bet you’re fucking wet for me too. Hmm? Would take much— pull those skimpy little bottoms to the side, bet I’d slide right in.” God you were! Unquestionably so, and throbbing. 

His hand traveled to where you’ve been craving him for so long, fingers brushing the top of your bathing suit bottoms.  

“Christ! Don’t you d-dare put those lotion covered fingers anywhere near my— Fuuuuck!”

Dave wouldn’t dare, but that doesn’t mean he won’t work around it. His hand cupping your clothed mound, your eager hips rocking against the heel of his palm. His face smashes into your cheek when he feels how wet you are, your bottoms sticky with arousal and clinging to your pussy as he slides two fingers back up to your aching clit. Groaning as he takes your lobe between his teeth and gently bites down. 

“Tsk tsk!” Clicking his tongue in a menacing manner. “Eyes open, Baby. Need you to keep watch, can’t have anyone seeing you while you fall apart.”

You’ve missed this side of him. Spontaneous sex was always something that was a regular occurrence in your early relationship even well into your marriage. You always looked forward to the days he’d come home without so much as a hello when he walked through the front door. His briefcase and coat were abandoned somewhere in the entryway— I missed you so much today. Need you right now —and then he was fucking you like a starved man against the wall in the hallway. 

“Dave—“ Your lashes flutter, the sun unforgiving as you fight to keep your eyes focused on your surroundings. Your body so desperate for pleasure, so willing to succumb, just needing a little help to get there.

Each tender circle he draws over your clit has your brain muddled with bliss. A restrained whimper escapes, doing your best to concentrate as Dave continues to work you into a euphoric mess. But it’s so hard when your body has been yearning for this, all of this, for so long. 

Your nails bite into his thighs as your lower abdomen begins to tighten. 

“Baby, you’re gonna have to be quiet. Those gorgeous sounds are gonna get us in trouble.” Fuck! Almost there! So fucking close—

BUZZ BUZZ BUZZ

“Dave— is that…” The lounge vibrates, halting Dave’s movements. The orgasm that was just starting to barrel towards you, vanishing from your grasp. 

“Shit! I, uh, think someone saw us—“ What?! No one is even paying attention!

Dave extricates himself from the chair, adjusting his sunglasses and his pronounced erection bulging under his swim trunks. He hastily grabs for some things as you sit perplexed by the sudden change in his demeanor. Your sexy audacious husband is gone before your eyes— leaving you with the tight lipped cryptic Dave, who you can’t seem to get a read on. 

“What the fuck, Dave!” Watching as he slips on his sandals and throws his shirt over himself, playing no mind to a single button. 

“Let’s finish this later— when we get back to the room, hmm? I’m gonna… go get us more drinks.” He says as he kisses the top of your head and heads in the direction of the bar. Hoping he brings back some shots, because you’re gonna need something strong to take the fucking edge off. 

“Yeah— sure…” You say. Stunned and breathless.

*

You're not sure if you want to cry, scream or laugh as you crawl back into your chair. Maybe a mixture of all of them. What a sight that would be. 

That brief glimpse of the fun adventurous Dave was intoxicating, even now your body is still buzzing and aroused. There’s a pang in your chest at how quickly he was able to mold back into the man you’ve needed for the past year, yearned to have back. Then instantly closed off and distant as if it never happened. Maybe the sun was getting to you, that whole moment some fucking hallucinated fantasy. 

Rather than dwell on it, you push the hurt aside. You reach for your book and settle back into the chair. Finding where you left off and jumping back in with the handsome sheriff, who literally worships the ground that this woman walks on— must be nice. 

“S’cuse me ma’am. Sorry to bother you, but is this seat taken?” A deep voice breaks your concentration, realizing he’s in fact asking you if the unoccupied seat next to you is available. 

A man in his mid forties, maybe early fifties is standing at the foot of the chair next to you. Your sunglasses hide the fact that you're giving him a once over, noting every detail about this random stranger who’s decided of all the empty seats, he wants the one next to you. 

His hair is slightly disheveled in a deliberate manner. Peppered streaks of gray throughout his curly locks. He’s wearing green and red plaid swim shorts and a worn dark blue t-shirt, kind of an odd pairing but it seems to work for him. You notice a dimple hidden beneath the gray scruff that almost hides his angular features. He seems harmless and rather handsome— plus, it would be rude to turn him away with no explanation. 

“Nope. Feel free to use it.” You smile at him kindly and go in search of the words you had just read. 

“Thanks so much.” He says as he removes his shirt and settles down on the lounge chair. 

“Of course. It’s no problem at all.” You tell him. 

You don’t even dare to look in his direction. You imagine this is what Eve felt like, tempted and allured by carnality in the form of an apple. Except your carnal desire is a fizzling orgasm your husband couldn’t even be bothered to deliver, now reawakening at the sight of this beautiful man. 

You would never act on anything, even as beautiful as he was, you were married and you love Dave— but that didn’t mean you couldn't admire, sunglasses masking your lingering eyes. 

“I’m Joel by the way. Joel Miller.” His hand outstretched to you, that damn dimple even more pronounced when he smiles. 

“I take it you’re not from around these parts are you now, Joel.” You give him your name and return the handshake— his grip is rather firm, but friendly. 

 “What gave it away?” He laughs. There’s a hint of southern drawl woven into his rich voice. 

“Well, you don’t seem like the California boy type for starters. Not that that’s a bad thing— I just get the impression you’re far from home.” You fold another page and drop your book into your bag, your attempt at reading sidelined again. 

“You’d be correct then. Texas— born ‘n raised. Since we’re makin’ impressions, I’m gonna guess you’re not from ‘round here either?” He looks over to you, his arms crossed over his tanned chest. The breeze catching a few of his curls, tossing them about. 

“You would also be correct. So what brings you all the way west, cowboy?” 

“My daughter, actually. She’s gettin’ married this week. Fiancé’s family is out here and they’ve got connections and what not, so they’re able to do it here at the hotel. They put me up in one of the suites, bein’ I am the father of the bride an’ all.” 

“Oh! Congratulations then. I’m sure you’re so excited then.” 

“Yea’. Crazy seein’ her all grown up an’ goin’ off on her own. Still got one more though. She’s turning 16– little wild thing she is. Keeps me on my toes, but I love her for it.”

You get the sense that being a father is one of his favorite things. He hasn’t stopped smiling since he started talking about his kids. 

“You and your wife must be so proud.”

“Nah, no wife— or girlfriend. Jus’ me and my girls. So, now that I’ve bothered you with my life story. What brings you out this way to California?” 

What am I even doing in California? You think to yourself. It’s then you catch sight of your husband at the bar. Dave is already looking in your direction, leaning against the wood counter, waving at you with his phone glued to his ear. 

“See that guy over at the bar? The one talking on the phone.” You wave back at Dave. You pick up on the shift in his demeanor from where you're sitting. His jaw clenched and brows furrowed enough you can make out the deep lines across his forehead. If you didn’t know any better, you would think he was shooting daggers at Joel— but you do know better, and that’s exactly what’s happening. “That’s my husband. We’re supposed to be here relaxing— not working. But he’s over there taking a phone call, when he was going to grab us more drinks and I’m here relaxing. Maybe one day he’ll actually show some interest in me again— until then it’s just work work work. Geez— I’m sorry to dump all of that personal shit on you. Like you even care about a stranger's marital problems.”  

“No need to apologize— I get it. My ex and me had our own issues. Tried to work through them, for the sake of the kids n’ all.” He says, waving off your apology.  

“I’m guessing it didn’t go so well?” You look out over the pool, catching a few gulls passing over. You can already sense his heavy answer before he even gives it to you. 

“Well, she’s my ex for a reason. But it’s for the best. And not saying that’s what’s gonna happen for you. We love our kids and do this whole co-parentin’ thing better than when we were married. Umm— y'all got any kids?”

“Uhh— no, no kids. Yet… I think? I mean, we both talked about once our careers were established we would start trying. And we did try for a bit, but never got pregnant, which we were okay with— figured it would happen when it happens. But now, I’m not really sure if it’s what he wants anymore.” You pick at the polish on your nails. 

You realize it’s been awhile since you and Dave readdressed the conversation about having kids. It’s always been idling in the back of your mind. Becoming a mother was something you would love to do. With Dave never really ever being present or interested in any sort of in-depth conversation, you haven’t really discussed where you both stand now on the topic. 

“Have you asked him?”

“No. I haven’t. I probably sh—“

You’re cut off when Dave reappears, holding nothing but his phone and wallet. 

“Hey, Sweetheart!” There’s a hint of irritation in his voice, his tone a slightly higher pitch than usual, though he tries to hide it as he bends to kiss the top of your head. 

“Babe, this is Joel. He’s here for his oldest daughter’s wedding. Joel, this is my husband Dave. Where’s our drinks?” Attempting to ease the weird tension he brought back with him instead of your drinks. . 

Dave’s glaring at Joel. His lips pressed in a tight line and his nostrils flared. Irritated? No, it’s jealousy. He’s jealous and it’s oozing from him. Dave was jealous at the attention, all innocent and friendly, that you were receiving from another man. 

“Uh, nice to meet you.” Dave reaches over you, taking Joel’s hand in his. He’s friendly enough, even though his smile looks rather forced. “We hate to run out on you like this, Joel— we’ve got dinner reservations later on and the sun is starting to get to me. You don’t mind if we head to the room early, Babe.”

“Yeah, of course, Baby. Let’s go— you probably need more water and some rest before dinner.” You get up from the chair to pull your cover up dress on and begin to gather everything between yours and Joel’s chair, throwing it haphazardly back into your bag. “It was so nice meeting you, Joel. Hope your daughter has a beautiful day and you have a great time.”

“Thank you. Now you two get outta here and enjoy your evening. My brother is wanderin’ around somewhere. I’m sure he’ll end up here at some point. Nice meetin’ y'all.” Joel says, giving a cordial nod and a two finger wave. 

You call out to Dave when you realize he’s already halfway to the exit, hoping he’ll snap out of whatever this thing is he’s doing. Knowing it’s more than just the sun that’s bothering him. 

“Dave, what’s going on? Are you okay?” You ask, stepping into the elevator with him. 

“I’m good. Got a bit of a headache. Probably just too much sun.” His thumb smashes into the floor number. The elevator doors slowly obstructing the rooftop view. 

*

The walk back to the room felt like it was never ending. The slap on your sandals against the carpeted floor and exchanged hello’s with the sweet old lady dragging far more bars than she could handle were the only sounds echoing through the long hallway. 

Dave’s body, all broad and inflexible, blocked the room door as he searched for the key card in his wallet. 

“Dave? Are you going to talk to me and tell me what’s actually going on?” You ask softly. 

The door beeps and Dave pushes it open. He seems to not have lost all his senses because he holds it open for you. 

“Dave, will you at least look at me— please?” You toss everything you’re carrying onto the bed, watching him walk over to the floor to the large windows. 

Even from behind, you know he’s wearing his sharp scowl. Proven by the way his hip is cocked out and on hand resting on his waist, head hanging with his attention on the floor. Too embarrassed to acknowledge he might have overreacted up at the pool. 

“Dave, were you jealous?.” You ask, your voice velvety and sweet. Taking a few tempered steps, you close the distance between you and where he’s standing, needing him to know everything was okay. You smooth over his solid back, all brooding with his shoulder blades tightly drawn together. One hand sliding around to his chest and the other reaching for the hand hanging at his side, intertwining your fingers with his, your grip tightening around him. “Baby— you were, weren't you? It’s okay if you were, you know. It’s obviously a natural reaction to have. I know I’d react the same way if it were you and some gorgeous woman. But baby, you know I only have eyes for you and only you— always. I love you, Dave.”

“I love you and I’m sorry.” Dave sighs, his hand squeezing back. I overreacted and shouldn’t have— it's implied without him actually voicing it, but you know he means it. 

“Did you still want to go out for dinner? If you’re not feeling up to it, we can just order in again so you can rest.” You ask him, resting your nose and lips against his sun warmed skin, breathing him in. 

His aroma is pungent, but familiarly pleasant. A subtle note of coconut blends with his trademark spicy musk and sweat. It reminds you of the summer while you were dating, Dave whisked you away to Rehoboth Beach on the coast of Delaware. Renting out a beach house on the water where you spent every morning watching the sun flee the horizon from the front porch. Evenings spent walking near the water’s edge, recounting your favorite parts of the day and dreaming of a future together.

“Yeah, we can still go out. I just— I need a minute. Gonna get some fresh air.” He says, turning his head to tell you over his shoulder. 

“Okay. I’m going to take a quick shower then.” You kiss the nape of his neck before you leave, grabbing the robe off the accent chair as you head to the bathroom. 

At the flick of the switch, a soft glow of light cascades from the decorative wall sconces. Everything becomes very automatic as you move through the room, placing the robe over the sink,  ridding yourself of your pool attire, thrown into a growing pile in the corner of the room. Intent on unwinding, trusting the spray of hot water will alleviate the weight of today’s tension before going out with your husband, until you hear Dave’s voice fading as he walks out into the balcony, muffled by the distant waves and passing cars. 

“Hey, Ashley. It’s Dave, sorry about earlier…”

Ashley. It’s light and beautiful, and yet feels like the most threatening thing to have ever pierce through your heart. All your emotions flowing, congealing as one giant mass within your ribcage. Its numbness best describes the way you feel, hollowing out the pain in your chest. It's too much to deal with or even believe. You shut the door, avoidance being one of your worst traits— but if you don’t confront it, it doesn’t exist. 

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[revasserium]

₊‧⁺ HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME — and thank you everyone for sticking around this lil blog of mine for as long as you have, and to all the new friends — welcome!!!

so as a little treat for both you and me, i've decided to do a tiny (and i do mean quite small!!) event as a present to all of you, and hopefully as a source of inspo to me on this here day of my birth, neigh on 30 years ago.

₊‧⁺ RULES, RULES, RULES — now to receive your little gift, all you have to do is:

send me an ask with a drabble idea (this can be a self-ship, or an oc x character, or an x-reader!)

gimme a premise (you can be as detailed as you want, or as vague as you'd please)

and i have 30 minutes (from when i decide to start writing your drabble) to write something that's under 300 words and post it!

there are no limits to the number of asks you can send in (so feel free to send in multiple if you have multiple ideas!)

please do specify if you want sfw or nsfw (though i will say, i tend to write sfw stuff better)

the idea is to cap it at 30 reqs/drabbles, but... who knows if i'll get that many so we shall see!!! :)

this will go on for 30 days (see the pattern here?) and close on october 15th, after which i will attempt to compile a masterlist of all 30 drabbles for your perusal and optional admiration.

₊‧⁺ FANDOMS OH ME OH MY — and here are the fandoms i write for!

haikyuu!!

wind breaker (satoru nii)

one piece (live action)

love and deepspace

boku no hero academia

all answers and posts with this event will be tagged #☂ rain's 30 under 30 so please feel free to either follow along or mute/block as needed! ( ˶ˆᗜˆ˵ )

[avengersassemble-fics]

All I Wanted

chapter 02 "remember to slow down" master list previous chapter ‣ ‣ ‣ next chapter word count 5.3k (fuck) ☆ cursing ♡ smut dress inspo bc im a visual person

The days that followed that night were a delicate dance, or like stepping on eggshells. There was an unspoken tension between you and Jake that hadn’t been there before, at least not ever that you two would acknowledge. It was like that one drunken night back in college, when Jake had come by for a visit when he could manage to slip away from flight school and a night on the town turned into barely making it back to your small student apartment. You two never spoke about that night. Ever.

And now, there was a second night you two wouldn’t ever speak of. When he finally became aware of your guilt.

So what do two people do when there’s tension they can’t address? Ignore it, and throw themselves into “busy” routines. Jake had a routine where he went for a run every morning at 7AM, which left you alone to shower and leisurely wake up at your own pace. By the time he’d return by 8:30 on the dot, you’d have breakfast ready for him when he finished his shower. You weren’t sure if he ever noticed the way your gaze lingered on the beads of sweat that would slip down between his abs.

If he did, he never said anything about it. But.. Jake did notice it, how couldn’t he? He was watching you like a hawk, knowing better than anyone else the turmoil in your mind. You were an overthinker, and even though he had begged you to stop fighting this, stop fighting him, you were too damn stubborn to listen.

Just like he had caught you admiring him, Jake admired you. When he’d get back from his runs and could tell you had showered because your hair still was damp, he would spend the next several hours watching as it dried. He’d be able to see the way your skin glowed from whatever lotion you had used afterwards, and he could smell it from even the farthest side of the room.

And despite the busy routines, there were moments that betrayed the cracks in the facade. When there were moments of laughter, they were quickly followed by silence that suffocated the room. Or the times where Jake goes to pass you in the kitchen and his hand sweeps along your waist as he brushes past, there’s an unspoken weight to it. There were even a few times where you’d start to say something and catch yourself, deciding it best to leave it be. Jake did it too. You both noticed it.

Putting aside whatever was brewing in that house between you two, the facade had to go on.

Invited to your parents 30th wedding anniversary, Jake and you had to buckle up for a night of normalcy, or whatever you two deemed normal at this point. At this point, lying to your family and friends had become the easiest part of this marriage!

Figures.

Your parents weren’t shy when it came to throwing around money, which sounds confusing considering you had been drowning in medical bills and credit card debt before your knight in shining fighter jet came to your rescue. Their money was theirs, they paid for your college education which not a lot of people can say they got the same luxury, but beyond that you had to make it on your own. You were fine with that, it’s what you always expected.

To be fair to them.. You didn’t tell them you were sick. Maybe if they had known, they would’ve helped, but you never wanted to know for sure. You had been dead set you could handle it yourself and Jake was the only one who could see that while, yes, you could.. You’d never be happy or you again without some kind of shoulder to lean on.

You mentioned money because the sheer cost of renting out Meanwhile Brewing, a craft brewery and taproom in south Austin, was a number you couldn’t comprehend. It put into perspective how deep their pockets were to have been able to rent out a place of this magnitude, including bottomless drinks. 

When Jake and you arrived, he had insisted on helping you out of the truck, feigning it was due to your attire, but really he wanted a chance to hold you even for a moment. From the second he saw you walk out of the closet the two of you shared, he was taken back.

Satin warm toned silver, thinly strapped, hugging the best of your curves and valleys and falling just to the mid of your calf, not to mention the slit on the side that came to the midpoint of your thigh. And don’t even get him started on the way the neckline draped elegantly just over the crest of your breasts.

It was going to be a long fucking night, and Jake needed to help you out of the truck. It was a desperate attempt to get his hands on you that worked perfectly in his favor. As soon as he had your feet firm on the ground, Jake let out a low whistle of appreciation.

“Remind me to thank your mother for picking this number out for you,” Jake said before letting his grip on your waist go (reluctantly). The way your face scrunched up and you hit his arm made him grin.

“Shut up,” you mumbled and adjusted the fabric. Fuck.. Was he wishing he was satin fabric right now?.. Yes. “You don’t mean that.”

“Can’t a man compliment his wife?” Jake asked as you linked your arm with his and started to walk through the parking lot towards the back of the property, where already music was blaring and chatter was being made. “Or at least compliment her mom?”

“Oh I’m sure my mom would love some compliments from you,” you encouraged him as you two made it to the epicenter of the gathering. There were groups scattered over the grounds, and you were.. Kind of amazed your parents had this many friends. “I’m not even the tiniest bit surprised she got your measurements down to the smallest millimeter.”

“Don’t remind me,” Jake said as he readjusted his sports coat. It was a nice cream that complimented your dress. And your mother got his whole look tailored just perfectly. “Drink?”

“Gonna need it,” you admitted and he laughed, low and close to your temple as he pressed a kiss to the top of your heads.

“Coming right up,” Jake said before taking his arm from yours and disappearing towards the taproom. You looked around the party in search of your parents.. There was no way you wouldn’t be able to pick them out from this crowd-

The sound of obscene laughter and cute snorts filled the air and immediately you were drawn to it. It was an all too familiar sound you grew up with and used to agonize over when you feared judgment from your friends. Now, it was easy to find them in this large expanse of night sky and warm bulbs lights strung around the buildings.

Just as you neared your father spotted you and his expression softened. 

“There’s my girl,” he said and went to wrap his around around your shoulder, which you returned by encasing his side. Your mother was mid sip of a drink when she hummed. 

“You came!” She exclaimed and you laughed slightly. 

“Jake and I wouldn’t miss this,” you reassured her. 

“Where is that handsome sailor anyway?” She asked looking around. You had to bite back a laugh. The fact your mother was this sprung out so early in the evening would ensure some fun. 

At Jake’s expense. 

“He’s just getting some drinks for us,” you explained and your father was quick to take hold of his other half, already knowing where this was headed. 

“Let’s get some water in you sweetheart,” he said and you could see the care in his gaze. He led her away towards one of the buildings and disappeared from your view. 

It was touching, it was.. what you had always wanted. To be looked at like that. 

“Is that you, (L/N)?”

Forced from your thoughts, you turned to the new intrusion and faltered slightly. 

“Ben?” You asked with a slight smile. 

Ben was your high school sweetheart, the guy you had the second most first with (second to Jake of course). While Jake had been the hot star football player, Ben was the hot marching band drum major. Two total opposites. Jake was walking charm, Ben had kept that charm for the right people who knew him best. The only things they had in common were.. well that they were hot. 

And Ben still was. While Jake was ashy blonde and green eyes, Ben was black hair and deep brown eyes that screamed warmth. You hadn’t seen him since you two broke up during sophomore year of college. Just before Jake visited actually. 

Ben’s eyes danced over you and you felt something flicker through your mind. They were eyes that had seen you before, but it had been so long that he needed a reminder. 

You saw the way his gaze lingered on your hand. You knew what he was going to ask when he met your gaze once more. 

“Married?” He asked and you nodded. 

“I am,” you admitted. Ben shook his head a bit, though you knew he wasn’t being serious. “You?”

“No,” he said quickly before clearing his throat. “Nearly, but no.”

“I’m sorry,” you offered and he shrugged. 

“Nothin’ to apologize for. Just wasn’t meant to be,” Ben said and glanced you over one more time. “Do I even need to ask who the lucky guy is?”

Your brows furrowed slightly at his question. “I don’t know.. do you?”

Ben laughed and you found yourself reliving the past. What was it with all the memories recently. 

“My money’s on anyone but Seresin,” Ben joked but when your expression didn’t change, but his did - into a frown. “Shit. Seresin?”

“Yeah,” you said and Ben shook his head. “Seresin.”

“Huh,” Ben said and you found yourself.. on edge. Speaking of, where was Jake anyways? “That.. surprises me. I guess I should’ve known when I saw him-“

“You saw him?” You asked and he nodded. 

“Yeah in the taproom-“

“Sorry,” you barely excused yourself and headed in that direction. You managed to get through the turf grass to the taproom and stepped inside. 

Just as littered with people as the outdoors, you scanned your eyes over the different faces and figures mingling. That was until you found him, talking to a blonde who was too close for your comfort. 

Never once did you seriously consider this. You told yourself you’d rather not know what Jake did while deployed, or who he did. It wasn’t your business, not really. This wasn’t real!

So why did it hurt so much to see him let a woman stand that close, let her hand linger on him, let her look at him like she was? Like she wanted to steal him away and fuck him in the back of the truck he drove you two here in?

Too engrossed in the blonde and her figure, to your perspective, he didn’t notice you. You slipped back outside and the nearest drink you could manage to get in your hand was quickly down your throat and then came another. As you held this one though, your hand trembled slightly. 

Retreating outside felt like a necessary escape, that same unsettled feeling of guilt settled in. You didn’t have a right to be upset. Jake wasn’t yours, not really. He could’ve been fucking other women for the last year and it wasn’t your business if that was the case. 

Lost in your thoughts, a hand to your back startled you and you looked up to meet that all too familiar gaze. 

“Woah- you ok, sunshine?” Jake asked and you bobbed your head in a nod. He eyed the drink in your hand, then down to the two he was holding onto. 

“How’d you get that?” He asked and you shrugged. 

“Taproom.”

You could see his hesitation, that raised brow and quick glance over of your stance. Defensive. 

Shit. Jake wasn’t stupid. You must have come looking for him and saw him chatting to the complete stranger who had approached him. 

If things weren’t already tense enough, it’d be worse now. Jake didn’t want to fold completely though. 

“Is that so?” Jake asked in a measured tone.

You saw? 

"Yup," you replied, maintaining a façade of nonchalance.

You saw. You saw him with someone else, and even though the rational part of your mind knew you had no right to feel upset, the emotional turmoil bubbled beneath the surface.

Jake’s jaw was uncharacteristically tightened as he could only nod and let out a small grunt. When you did finish the drink in your hand, you took the one he had gotten you that now became your third drink of the evening.

Unfortunately, for you, Jake didn’t leave your side for the rest of the night. Drink after drink, he was forced to watch you get sloshed, trying to mingle with your parents and keep you in check. He wouldn't classify you as a messy drunk, but at this moment you sure as hell were teetering on the line. You could barely hold a glass without a tremble in your hand.

What Jake didn’t know was the tremble wasn’t from your inebriation.

“Maybe we should slow down a bit,” he tried to tell you around 10 o’clock. He had hoped your parents were going to be wrapping up this thing, but turns out old people like to party too. “You can barely catch your footing.”

“Maybe you should mind your business,” you said with a roll of your neck. “Hubby.”

Jake’s eyes narrowed at your tone. Those around the two glanced over with slight concern but more so annoyance. Again.. You were teetering on that fine line of becoming a pain in his ass tonight.

“(Y/N)-” he tried to grab your hand but you pulled away from him a few steps.

“I’m gonna go find someone who won’t lecture me.. Mmm.. Ben,” you said over your shoulder and Jake swore he saw God at that moment. A quick flash of him at least.

“Excuse me? Woah hey-” Jake said as he followed behind you as you walked along the perimeter of the turf grass, between the brewery and the taproom. He grabbed you by the arm and spun you back into him, careful to not be too forceful but luckily with a few drinks in ya, you were nimble. “Did you just say Ben? As in your ex Ben who played the clarinet?”

“Saxophone,” you corrected and Jake rolled his eyes. “Y’know he’s the only person to tell me he was surprised we got married?”

“That’s because he’s an idiot,” Jake tried to say and you turned to face him with a scowl.

“You’re an idiot,” you mumbled and Jake scoffed.

“Sorry, what was that? I couldn’t hear you,” he said as he leaned in with his ear and you pressed your finger into his chest.

“I bet you could hear that blonde,” you muttered and Jake hesitated.

“That’s what this is about?” He asked and you shook your head no, taking a few steps back but he was quick to match each one. “The chick in the taproom?”

“Oh so you can hear,” you laughed and Jake nearly growled. Whatever escaped his throat was heavy and irritated. You’d be lying to yourself if you said you didn’t like it.

..Why?

“So you’re drunk and jealous, is that it?” Jake asked as he towered over you. “It was nothing.”

“I’m not drunk.. Or jealous,” you tried to argue but the way your eyes couldn’t focus and the knot in your stomach told you otherwise, so you cleared your throat. “She wanted you.”

“Sunshine, even your mom wants me.”

“Gross,” you said with a shake of your head, missing the way he grinned. “Please don’t ever say that again.”

“You started it,” Jake said and couldn’t help but laugh. But his laugh which normally was sweet to your ears only further annoyed you. His dumb laugh, dumb sandy hair, dumb perfect smile..

“Don’t laugh at me,” you mumbled.

“Then stop being ridiculous,” Jake argued. “I would never dream of pickin’ up someone at your parents' party, which I came to with you.. You think that low of me?”

You hated that he was talking with reason, making sense. But it didn’t ease that knot in your stomach that was screaming at you that he had liked the other woman’s attention.

“No,” you finally admitted. “Never.”

“So you’re not mad at me?” He pressed as he stepped closer, drawing your hands towards his chest and running his thumb over the back of your wrists.

Dumb smile, dumb eyes, dumb touch..

“No,” you whispered. “Never mad at my aviator.”

“That’s my girl,” he whispered and lifted your hands so he could place a quick kiss to your knuckles. While you felt a flush of warmth through your spine at his words, it was only then that Jake seemed to notice the true tremble in your hands and his grip tightened slightly. 

“I’ll text your dad and let him know we’re goin’ home,” Jake stated, more so than asked, you were mid-grumble when he shook his head. “How many times do I have to keep telling you to stop fightin’ me?”

“One more time,” you challenged and Jake felt his heart drop. He was sure you weren’t aware of what you were doing to him but jesus fuck was he starting to lose his cool.

“C’mere,” Jake practically growled. He dipped low to hook his arm with ease under your ass and lifted you up and onto a shoulder. With a yelp you clutched onto his back and scowled at nothing as Jake’s legs started back towards the parking lot.

“Put me down, Seresin,” you commanded weakly. Really, there was a tight knot in your lower belly. You felt him tighten his grip on your thighs.

“No can do, Seresin,” he countered and you huffed.

With ease, Jake was able to walk you to his truck, with you thrown over his shoulder. You gave up fighting and let him carry you limp to the truck. With ease, he opened the passenger door and set you in the seat and even buckled you in.

“I put you down,” he said with a shit eating grin and you rolled your head away from looking at him.

“Shut up,” you muttered and he laughed.

“Oh come on, ease up lightweight,” Jake chuckled as he closed your passenger door. With him having to walk around the truck to get into the driver seat, it allowed you time to stew a little bit.

Why was Jake so.. Jake? Y’know? Perfect. He could piss you off but then easily make you smile and laugh and be comfortable again. He just threw you over his shoulder to take you home - his home, your home. At the end of the day.. He was always there each night.

Maybe you were a little tipsy, because you don’t even remember the drive. The only thing that shook you from your thoughts was your door being pulled open and Jake undoing your belt and watching you with a raised brow.

“Do I need to throw you over my shoulder again?” Jake asked. You shook your head.

“Nope,” you declined, making sure the p popped in the air. Jake stepped aside and you slipped out the seat to the rocky ground, your bare feet meeting the dull rocks. Jake, in turn, grabbed your heels from the floor of the passenger side and followed you to the house, hand just at the small of your back to guide you up the steps.

Wordlessly you two went to your room and you were immediately letting your hair down from the clip that had held it up all night. Jake, as watchful as ever, took his sports coat off and tossed it onto the bench at the edge of the bed, and started to undo the buttons of his shirt.

“Unzip me?” You asked him and he was all too happy to do so. Jake stepped up behind you, one hand on your hip and the other finding the small zipper on your back and tugging it downwards

Fuckin’ hell. The more skin exposed to him, the more he realized there was no bra under this dress of sin. The fabric fell open as the zipper ended at your hips and he was reluctant to take his hand away. Very fucking reluctant.

“Thanks,” you said breathlessly and he had to watch as you disappeared into the bathroom, holding the dress up by your chest. Jake ran a hand over his face. His patience and control was paper thin. How was he going to.. Handle this? Handle you? The thought of how bare you were, how easily he could get his hands on you was making him get hotter by the second.

Cooling his thoughts, the bathroom door reopened and there you were once again in one of his shirts, and it fell high on your thighs (those soft merciless thighs). You crawled into bed and stared at him and he felt uncomfortable under your gaze.

“What?” Jake asked, hating how his tone sounded nervous. You didn’t notice.

“You called me a lightweight,” you said and Jake nodded.

“Because you are-”

“You wanna talk about lightweight?” You asked him and Jake scowled slightly. “You remember right?”

“C’mon don’t bring it up,” Jake whined, having undone his dress shirt and tossed it onto the bench as well.

“You got so fuckin’ hammered that night when my roommate turned you down,” you said before giggling. “And I mean.. it was brutal.”

“Yeah and you were a mighty piece of work that night too,” Jake reminded you and you groaned softly, covering your face with your hands. “Being a baby over your loser ex breaking up with you.”

“You didn’t seem to mind.”

It was a mumble but he heard you loud and clear. The night in question was never brought up, yet here you were.. being so fucking casual about it. 

“Maybe not,” Jake admitted.

Fall, Sophomore year at UT. October 12th. 

Reeling from your just two week fresh heartbreak thanks to Ben breaking up with you via text, you weren’t totally surprised when Jake showed up at your apartment after days of radio silence. Unexpected but so appreciative of his efforts, you had done your best to welcome him with open arms. 

And that led him right into your roommates arms. Or, atleast that’s what he wanted that night. He was immediately smitten with the walking sex that was your roommate, and for some reason.. that bothered you. 

She mentioned going to a party, he was all for it. And he fit right into the frat boy scene, getting to drink beer with the guys of the house and have women ogle at him all night long. Sure, he’d manage to catch you and here and there, but beyond that you were left to drink by yourself. 

“There you are,” your roommate managed to find you at some point in the night. You were a few beers in by then. “Where’s your army guy?”

“Navy,” you corrected but she didn’t react. “I dunno. Disappeared awhile ago.”

“He asked me out,” your roommate admitted and something in you dropped. Probably just the alcohol. “Don’t worry- I said no. I couldn’t do that to you.”

“It’s none of my business,” you mumbled and sipped the lukewarm beer. Disgusting. 

“Oh come on, you’re totally into him,” she said and nudged you. 

“We’re just friends. I mean I’ve known him for like.. six years?”

“So?” She asked with a raised brow. “He drove all the way here from San Diego.. For you. If that doesn’t scream he’s into you or desperately wants to fuck you then I don’t know what does.”

Her remark stayed with you through the rest of the night. Finally getting tired of the smell of the frat house and the increasingly intoxicated crowd, you pushed your way through to find Jake, who was just finishing wiping the floor with a group playing pool. 

“Hey,” you said over the music, placing a hand to his arm. Jake turned to face you and grinned. 

“There’s my sunshine,” he said as he threw his arm around your shoulder. “My favorite person.”

“You’re drunk,” you commented and he chuckled. 

“Doesn’t change nothin’,” Jake said and kissed the top of your head. “Still my favorite person.”

“Okay pilot, why don’t we head back?” You asked and after some persuasion he agreed. 

Getting Jake back to your place was a challenge in and of itself. He was chatty with anyone who walked past, it seemed like he was really laying into you as you walked through the campus, and he was just a handful. Jake never got like this.. But this trip so far was a lot of firsts. 

When you managed to get him back to your place and through the front door, you both were a stumbling mess. Alcohol induced laughs and chatter flowed fine between you two. You eased him to sit on the couch and he sprawled out, throwing his arms over the back of the couch and looking you over. 

“I’m gonna change,” you said and disappeared into your room. Stripping from your jeans and shirts, you slipped on some shorts and your fingers grazed over the new shirt you plucked from your closet. It was Ben’s. Still, you slid it on and walked back into the living room and Jake’s brows furrowed.

“Oh come on.. you’re really gonna keep wearin’ his shit?” Jake asked as he stood, moving closer to you.

“It’s just a shirt,” you argued and he shook his head.

“Take it off.”

“..What?” You asked dumbfounded, but Jake’s eyes.. they were dark and clouded, and so fucking hot.

Without another word, Jake lifted his shirt up and over his head, exposing his perfectly toned body underneath. His abs had abs, there was light hair over him that trailed low. And you meant low. Finally able to tear your eyes away to meet his gaze, he was watching you taking him in.

“Take it off,” he repeated, his voice low and intimidating.

You weren’t sure what it was that made you obey but fuck did you carefully lift your shirt off, exposing your soft flesh underneath, only concealed by the old bra you were wearing. But Jake didn’t seem to mind, his eyes lingering on your chest and the way it rose and fell with heavy breaths. Then, he handed over his shirt.

Taking it from him and putting your arms through and over your head, you looked down at the decal before looking up to meet his gaze.

“Better,” he whispered.

There was a tension, a shock in the air as you both lingered before one another. You most definitely weren’t confident enough to make the first move, so lucky for you - Jake was confident enough for the two of you.

“Do y’know how fuckin’ stupid he is?” Jake asked as he closed the gap, his chest so close you swore it warmed you up. “Giving’ you up?”

“Jake-“

“Stop,” he whispered, his head dipping lower as he edged closer. “You’re all I can think about. Even with all this distance between us you drive me fuckin’ wild.”

His fingers lightly traced a path along the curve of your jaw, leaving a trail of tingling sensation in their wake. With a gentle tilt of his head, and his dog tags hitting your chest, Jake captured your lips in a kiss that melted you.

It was slow, tantalizing. His lips moved against yours with a tender urgency, like if he stopped this would disappear. He was kissing you as if savoring the taste of something forbidden and sweet. His hands cupped your face, holding you in place while his tongue darted out over your lower lip, begging to be let in.

And you let him. Jake’s tongue swirled with yours, eager to feel every bit of you he could, like he had been dreaming of devouring you for years. Your hands splayed across his chest, feeling every nook and cranny his chiseled front had to offer. And when your hands danced lower to the waistband of his jeans, an enticing growl escaped his throat. He broke the kiss, letting his lips linger with yours as he breathed you in, and you did just the same.

“Fuck be careful,” he warned you but you shook your head. “You don’t know how long I’ve thought about this.”

“Enlighten me,” you whispered. A small smile broke out over his face and he took you up on the challenge. Picking you up, hands on your ass, he hoisted you up and you wrapped your arms around his neck, and legs around his waist. His arousal was evident as you felt him pressed against you.

Kissing along his jaw, Jake carried you with ease to your room, plopping you down on your flimsy full size mattress before climbing on top. One of his knees pushed your legs open, the other encased your side, and he was back to kissing you with nothing but hunger.

Neither of you could get a bearing, grasping at each other for anything you could get your hands on. Your fingers tugged on his hair, ghosted over his back and chest, even grabbed his ass when he grunted at. Jake, on the other hand, was feverishly putting his hands under your shirt, cupping your breasts over your bra before mumbling between your lips.

“Thought about feeling your tits for so long,” he muttered against you and you nearly whined. “Let me see you , baby.”

He expertly was able to slip a hand behind your back, undoing the hook of your bra with ease. Now completely loosened, Jake lifted off the shirt he just made you put on (his shirt goddamn it) and your bra followed. Exposed to the chilled air, Jake’s gaze was hungry, soaking in the sight of you. His fingers grazed the side of one of your breasts.

“So fuckin’ beautiful,” he mumbled before leaning down to kiss your neck. His breath was hot, tingling you through your spine and you fought hard to not make a sound, really not wanting him to know how much he was affecting you. But this only seemed to stir him on, and he fully cupped your breast.

“Not gonna make a noise for me?” Jake muttered against your skin, rolling your nipple in between his fingers as he other hand went to your opposite breast. “I bet you sound so goddamn good.”

You wanted to fold badly, let him hear what was bubbling underneath. He nipped at your neck and your eyes fluttered shut, your breathing feeling like it was nonexistent. Everything about this was wrong, but he felt so so right.

Just as suddenly as you two started this, you both froze when the front door of the apartment opened, signaling your roommates return. Jake’s hands stopped, his lips froze, and it was like all sober cognitive reasoning flooded both of you.

Jake and you never spoke of that night.

But tonight was the first mention of it in years. Jake and you were in a standoff, staring at one another with lingering tension and unanswered desire.

“Much unhappiness has come into the world because of bewilderment and things left unsaid.” ― Fyodor Dostoevsky

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[daisykihannie]

Daisy Hannie’s Invisible Ask Game

I saw @felixknow do this and i love the concept so much that i wanted to give it a shot. Inspo credit goes to them~

I have created a list of 100 fake text/ drabble prompts. These prompts are a mix of fluff, smut, crack, and angst. Including various troupes like friends to lovers, friends with benefits, pining, enemies to lovers, fake dating, accidentally sending nudes/sexting, and more!

⇢ ˗ˏˋ My Ask Box is Open! ࿐ྂ

You can request any number 1-100 and a corresponding member of Stray Kids and/or Ateez. You can also do a combination of members from either or both group and even request ot8 versions or group chat versions.

If you do not include a member but give me a number, or only give me a member but no number then it will become dealer’s choice.

But as you can probably guess, there’s a catch.

You will not know the prompt you requested until the texts/drabbles are posted!

sound like fun? send in a request<3

Update 140824: These are the numbers that haven’t been picked yet: 1, 2, 5, 6, 10, 11, 12, 15, 24, 30, 31, 32, 34, 36, 38, 39, 40, 41, 43, 46, 47, 48, 49, 51, 52, 53, 54, 58, 59, 61, 62, 63, 65, 66, 67, 71, 72, 73, 79, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 89, 91, 95, 96, 98, 100

Feel free to tag any anon requests with an emoji or whatever you’d like. I currently only have a small few designated or claimed anons so it’s mostly free reign~

[doodle-girl]

The Monsters of Eastridge: DOAI Playlist

Description: At this point, might as well make a playlist for everything. Welcome to my own personal demon-filled hell, this is mostly based on lyrics, vibes, or both 🎃 (Edit: Due to recent fixations, this now also includes some Sitcom AU stuff.)

(Yeah this is made mostly for @spookmuth but also just anyone else who’s interested in my music taste/how my thoughts work. Will update the post whenever the playlist updates, have fun! Also footnotes will be in brackets because I like footnotes)

Edit: Now on spotify! Courtesy of @witheredallium <3

“Happy Face” by Jagwar Twin [I have had an animatic for this jangling around my brain for actual several months oh my god]

“Turn the Lights Off” by Tally Hall

“A1 - It’s just a burning memory” by The Caretaker [Yeah idk how well this actually fits since it’s based on a song from like. The 30s. But I think it’s obligatory for any analog horror ever lol]

"I Can't Decide" by The Scissor Sisters [This one I got inspo from havoc-bloom's playlist/clip of Pastra finding it. A few of these are, actually, lol] [Edit: I have now realized just how well this fits Clyde in the sitcom au and I am once again plagued by art ideas 👀]

"I'M Sane" by Axie [Me when I torture the innocent with horrid monsters and become one myself. but I'm a little silly about it teehee~ 😜]

"The Circus" by Toby Fox [This popped up on shuffle when I was drawing Clyde once and my brain refused to let go of the vibes™ ever since]

"Animal Cannibal (Possibly in Michigan)" by Buckshot Princess [I would've put the one by Karen Skladany but it's not on apple music 😔 sad. This cover's really nice tho]

"The Dismemberment Song" by Blue Kid [Same reasoning as "I'M Sane," nyehehe. Also this song really feels like it's ripped out of a musical number. If you told me it was I'd believe you.]

"The Mind Electric" by Miracle Musical

"Horror Show" by K-Modo [You ever just. Think about why Lankmann does the things he did? Like what's his game here?]

"Dance of Corpse (feat. Hatsune Miku)" by Kikuo [this might also spiral into an animatic lol. Anyway do me a solid and go look up the music video, turn on the official english subtitles and come back to me.]

"The Nowhere King" by The Centaurworld Cast

"Nothing Changes" by Jewelle Blackman, Yvette Gonzalez-Nacer, and Kay Trinidad [this musical makes me feel. so many things. And I just think the vibes/lyrics of "why try when you'll only end in misery" might fall into the category of vibes here idk idk]

"Murders" by Miracle Musical

"Kitchen Fork" by Jack Conte [I don't remember exactly why I put this here rn but I just know this is an Alex song. It's so beautifully haunting and passionate stg] [Edit: yeah definitely an Alex song]

"Meet Me in the Woods" by Lord Huron ['kay I know the vibes are probably off but look at the lyrics and tell me it shouldn't go here]

"A Crow's Trial" by Vane Lily [Look man I can’t explain this one exactly but just trust me on it]

"You're F****d" by Ylvis [Yeah I put this one here as a joke song. Every single character in here is SO doomed by the narrative, I'm sorry Alex but it's true. teehee~]

"UNCANNY / ft. KAFU" by kian [I actually couldn't find this one on apple music but galactinqq was right about this being an Alex song and I'm putting it on the post]

"Raising the Dead!" by Jessica Law [Styx, you madlad, this is SUCH a Lankmann song oh my god]

“Hymn for a Scarecrow” by Tally Hall [“Simon isn’t even in the series yet, though” My guy it’s called Hymn for a Scarecrow and it’s Tally Hall what else do you want me to do. I love Simon so much I miss him already <3]

“Break My Mind” by DAGames

“In the Mood” by Glenn Miller [this one was in Vol 1! So I found it and I’m putting it here <3]

“Pictures” by Kyle Allen Music [I mean technically the series is videos but whatever. This song fits sue me]

“Ruler of Everything” by Tally Hall [I saw the words “mechanical hands” on a DOAI fanart once and it jumpstarted an idea that refuses to leave me. Turns out it fits VERY well holy crap]

"I'll Be There for You (Theme from Friends)" by The Rembrandts [shoutout to froggydrawz's own sitcom AU playlist for more material for me eheheheh ✌️ I'll be putting a few of those here]

"I'm Still Standing" by Taron Egerton [sitcom exclusive because canon Alex is fucking dead /lh]

"Digital Silence" by Peter McPoland

"How Far We've Come" by Matchbox Twenty [another sitcom one nyehehehe. This AU has me by a chokehold unlike any other AU I've been into istg]

"Who is She (Reprise)" by Kimiko Glenn [I apologize for those who came here for a normie-ass DOAI playlist, I promise it started out that way but y'know that's fixations for ya. Anyways I added this one on a whim because it gave off veldigun!Alex AU vibes. Might fit with other stuff idk do with that what you will ¯\_(ツ)_/¯]

"Soft Bitch" by Rio Romeo [pretty sure it was spookmuth that made a sitcom AU art inspired by this song and I love it]

"Runaway" by AURORA [secret-spirit if you see this at all just know this was your doing (/pos). This is like, my favorite AURORA song and seeing you do an Alex art in the whiteboard to this song sparked a primal "holy shit" moment in me]

"Lose Control" by Teddy Swims [I was doodling in the DOAI whiteboard when my mamá started playing this in the other room and my brain immediately went "oh my god what if Clyde and Winfrey"]

"Soft Apocalypse" by Charming Disaster [Once again, everybody give it up for Styx's music taste, this is making my brainworms go mad with art ideas 👏👏👏 sitcom AU song, btw]

Side note, might hit a word limit here? So Imma have to continue this list in a reblog, just look through those for more if ya want✌️

[unmanageable-day]

Time with you

inspo : Kyuhyun - Time with you

pairing: best friend!Scoups x female reader

genre: angsty almost friends to lovers, unrequited love aka friendzoned :(

word count: 2k-ish

warning(s): drinking alcohol (and maybe none other than that)

a/n: not really grammatically checked. i’m just emptying my drafts lmao this has been in my draft for a very long time. would greatly appreciate your feedback and thoughts! :-) also, the gif credit to the rightful owner (@ scoupsy)

It was another night when you and your best friend, Choi Seungcheol drank your lives away while going through the so-called quarter-life crisis. You with the story of ‘almost’ for the nth time. Almost getting promotion in your job, almost dating with guy A, almost being match-made with guy B, almost picking up a fight with a coworker (which means almost losing your job), and the most recent ‘almost’ was you almost getting back together with an ex who you didn’t like that much. Seungcheol and his much higher alcohol tolerance had drank more bottles than you. He just broke up after five years of relationship, and he couldn’t even cry his eyes out. Not to mention, he just lost a sponsorship for his new project. Isn’t it a perfect night for these best friends to abuse their livers?

“I say let’s just get married if by 30 years old we don’t have a significant other,” he said, his eyes were looking anywhere but you.

You chuckled. “You’re drunk, honey.” He didn’t sound serious or sincere to you, at least now after he sipped three shots in a row.

Both of you were turning 26. Old enough to get married, some people would say. You never gave it a deep thought, especially since most of your friends hadn’t gotten married either. They were either too enjoying their lives, too busy with their jobs, not wanting to be in a committed relationship yet, or they just want to go solo. Let’s be honest, having that one person to spend with for the rest of your life doesn’t always mean a happily ever after ending. On the other hand, you know being married and raising a small family with children is one of Choi Seungcheol’s dreams. You would absolutely be happy for him if it came true any sooner.

He chuckled while pouring beer and soju mix. “I know, but I think I’m sober enough to discuss this thing. What do you say?”

“Even if I agree and say yes right now, you will probably not remember anything tomorrow.”

“Hey, I said I’m sober enough,“ he scoffed as he raised his glass. “Y/N let me tell you, I might look unserious like this, but you have no idea I have tons of husband material.”

“Well, okay I guess, if you want to be my husband that much..” you shrugged, still laughing lightly at the nonsense you two were having that night. And finally Seungcheol knocked himself out that you had to call Jeonghan and Mingyu to pick him up.

The next day, Seungcheol insisted he did remember almost everything he said last night. You still didn’t think of it seriously, so you just responded with a quick ‘yeah’, ‘right’, and ‘okay’. Meanwhile he wanted to have proper documentation about your “agreement”. As you thought it was ridiculous, you just gave him a pinky swear and you excused yourself to go to a company dinner.

---

27th birthday

There was nothing special. Both you and your dear friend were single, and in fact, enjoyed going solo. Your circle of friends tried again to make you go to blind dates. You did, just for a little appreciation to your friends, although you knew it’s just not going to happen. Same thing with Seungcheol’s friend who always offered him to introduce some juniors from their college or school. This time, Seungcheol always refused. Not ready to build rapport and start a new relationship would be his number one excuse, which would always be understood by others.

28th birthday

Your friends started to cheer that you and Seungcheol should end your friendship and begin a real romantic relationship because you two were always seen together.

“Are you nuts?” You chuckled and pretended to give a disgusted expression to him.

“Don’t come to me when it’s apocalypse and I’m the only man left,” he hissed.

29th birthday --- Seungcheol’s POV

Lately I had been feeling anxious and I can’t comprehend what was wrong. But isn’t it normal for people to be anxious when they’re about to end their 20s? Or is it just me who had been denial about this real, like real, adulting phase?

Without realizing it, I often found myself imagining what the future would be like if it is with you; what would it be like to spend the rest of my life with you. I remember the times we walked together. Well, many times. But when did you become such a precious person to me?

The picture of us being together for a lifetime was getting clearer. Somehow I became so sure about it. That’s when I know, I want to live as your significant other. I want to live with you who never stop nagging but I won’t complain. Even when you’re a worse picky-eater than me, more suck at doing house chores and cooking, disorganized, and sometimes talk in your sleep, but I think I can live with that.

I had never so anxious and thrilled at the same time on my birthday in the past 3 years. I didn’t know why I had to wait until it was our 30th birthday.

A few days to 30th birthday

Seungcheol had been walking around back and forth in his studio for minutes. Once in a while, he looked at the calendar and a ring with flower diamond accent sitting on a personalized leather ring box he put on his desk. He just turned 30 last month and Jeonghan, without being asked, held a birthday party for him. This month you would be turning 30 and he already marked it in his calendar with a lot of drawing.

It was counting days until your birthday. As far as he could remember, not even once you or anybody else had said a word about you seeing someone. He was certain of it. This is it.

He quickly went through a list of restaurants to make a reservation on that Friday night. Let’s not go overboard, he thought to himself as he passed some fine dining restaurants from the list. His final choice was a new sushi restaurant. Okay, it’s not anything fancy, he reassured himself. He didn’t want to make it obvious although he couldn’t hide his excitement and his racing heart.

Just as the sun had set, Seungcheol dialed your number. Unusually, you picked up in less than five seconds.

“Y/n, hi! I’ve got something to tell you!”

“Me too!”

“Great! Let’s meet up?”

After hanging up the phone call, with his dreamy eyes, Seungcheol stared at the ring he chose carefully. Right, I’m gonna do it today! In front of a big mirror, he spent a good amount of time just to pick an outfit that he usually wears.

He arrived first at the restaurant and took his time to practice breathing slowly. As soon as he received your text that you were coming soon, he became restless. The lines he had been practicing in his head now started to blur. Please don't ruin it, he begged to himself.

“Hey. You sound very excited on the phone. Did something good happen?” Trying to manage his cool, he welcomed you and poured a glass of water.

Smiling ear to ear, you nodded vigorously. Seungcheol softly smiled looking at you.

Without words, you lifted your hand, exposing the back of your hand, all your fingers lightly wriggling. For a second, Seungcheol didn’t notice what you were trying to say. Until he remembered that you didn’t like to wear accessories and jewelry with too much accents standing out, including a diamond or even gemstone with bright colors. Yet a silver ring with a cat’s eye gemstone now was stuck prettily around your left ring finger.

Seungcheol forced an innocent smile at you. He shook his head a few times, pretending not to understand anything. Deep down inside, he wished it was not what he was thinking. He wished it was just another piece of jewelry you bought for yourself.

“I’m getting married! Jisoo proposed to me last night!” you squealed as quietly as possible.

“Jisoo.. which Jisoo?” he asked weakly after clearing his throat several times.

“It’s Hong Jisoo! You didn't forget him already, did you?” Your eyes widened and blinked twice. “It’s Jeonghan’s friend. He even came to your birthday party. You even hung out together, the three of you.”

He groggily faked a laugh. “Oh, we did?” He stole a glance at you who were staring lovingly at the new ring. “... am I too late?” he whispered to himself, his hand clenching the suede box hidden in his pocket.

“Hm? What is it that’s too late?” you asked, completely oblivious.

A fake cough slipped out of his mouth. He wore his famous sulky expression. “No, I mean... isn’t it too late that you just told me now? You should have called me last night.” Seungcheol knew sulking was one of his famous traits. And this time, it helped so much to hide his true feelings.

“Wait. But… how did you… since when did you and he…” Seungcheol found himself unable to finish his sentence. It’s not like he really wanted to know or anything. He was too dumbfounded to figure out that after all this time, it was only him who had been thinking about the future of you both. Apparently it was just a one-sided excitement that only he felt.

“Sorry,” you muttered slowly. “You must have thought that this doesn’t make any sense.” You tried to read his expression. Seeing him gulping his water, you did the same before telling your story.

You carefully told him that it started last year, specifically on the new years’ eve when Jeonghan held a party in his house. Seungcheol was there too. What he didn’t know was that you and Jisoo spent some time together after losing a game, which led to going to a convenience mart just to buy candies because Jeonghan suddenly wanted it. You found him very easy going despite his serious and quiet look. Not to mention when he lost it in games with Jeonghan, he became somebody else–and you liked it. He didn’t seem pretentious. He was even never trying hard to look good despite he had that gentleman image. It was interesting to see such different personalities in one person.

You didn’t want to think about him seriously as a romantic relationship was not your priority that time. Jisoo probably thought alike, since he never really made a bold move. Yet you two would always find time, or rather time (and Jeonghan) was in favor of getting you together. Nonetheless, both of you still never declared anything. It started like a situationship, you would say.

Until one day, he wanted to make sure that you both shared the same feelings. Since then, Jisoo and you started to discuss your plan for the future. But again, your relationship hadn’t gone public.

“We didn’t tell anyone until we were sure of ourselves and our plans,” you concluded. “I’m really sorry, Seungcheol. I never meant to keep a secret from you, especially when it comes to something big like this.”

Another forced smile was curved on Seungcheol’s lips. “It’s okay. I understand,” he said, trying as hard as he could so his voice wasn’t trembling. “I’m happy for you, Y/n.”

You wore a big smile and looked relieved. “Thank you. Sincerely, Seungcheol, thank you.”

He flashed a smile before pretending to be busy looking at the menu. “Since today is a happy day, we should celebrate it,” he cheered.

“You’re right. It’s on me.”

In the end, he let you choose all the dishes from appetizer until desserts. It was difficult for him to stay focused. The ring in his pocket felt as heavy as his heart, but he knew he shouldn’t show it to you. He didn’t want to ruin the precious friendship you’d had for only God knows. He didn’t want to be remembered as someone petty who couldn’t support his best friend’s choice. He didn’t want you to hate him, and possibly leave him if he started to act out crazy.

[artyandink]

amoralism | twelve

SUMMARY: You and Dean Winchester are the top agents from Major Crimes. You’re also assigned as partners on the same case- a crime syndicate is running loose and buying out most of downtown New York. He hates you cause you hate him. You hate him cause you think he got in his position with his daddy’s influence. But this case is personal to one of you more than the other- and you may be getting too personal for comfort.

TW: Chuck. That’s all it is.

Song Inspo: Feeling Good by Michael Bublé

SERIES MASTERLIST

bureaucratism

President Chuck Shurley wasn’t like other presidents. He didn’t have the gravitas of Roosevelt, the poise of Kennedy, or the eloquence of Obama. No, Chuck was more of a “deer-in-the-headlights meets caffeinated-squirrel” kind of guy. And if the public knew just how haphazardly he started his mornings, well…let’s just say the stock market might crash out of sheer panic.

Chuck’s mornings began in the most predictable way possible: with an alarm clock blaring at an ungodly hour. The digital numbers on the clock flashed 5:30 AM, casting an eerie red glow across the darkened room. The harsh sound of beeping echoed off the walls, loud enough to wake the dead—or at least the leader of the free world.

But Chuck was having none of it. Still deep in sleep, his hand shot out from under the covers, flailing around wildly until it made contact with the clock. After a few moments of blindly slapping the top of the clock, he managed to hit the snooze button, silencing the infernal beeping for a glorious nine minutes.

In the brief moment of silence that followed, Chuck’s body relaxed, sinking back into the mattress as he let out a contented sigh. But before he could drift back into unconsciousness, the alarm blared again, sending a fresh wave of panic through his half-asleep brain.

This time, Chuck groaned as he rolled over and opened his eyes, squinting at the blinding red numbers. With a resigned sigh, he reached over and turned off the alarm properly. There was no escaping it now—the day had officially begun.

Chuck sat up slowly, rubbing his bleary eyes as he tried to force his brain to wake up. It was a struggle every morning, as if his body was rebelling against the very idea of consciousness. He fumbled for his glasses on the nightstand, squinting until the blurry room came into focus.

His bedroom was what you might expect for a president: luxurious, spacious, and impeccably clean. But for all its opulence, it still had Chuck’s personal touches scattered here and there. A stack of comic books sat precariously on the nightstand, a Captain America figurine stood guard on the dresser, and a half-eaten box of Twinkies was hidden in the drawer.

Sliding out of bed, Chuck shuffled his way to the bathroom, his feet dragging across the plush carpet. He flicked on the lights and winced at the sudden brightness, his eyes narrowing into slits as he blinked in the mirror.

The man staring back at him was disheveled, with a mop of bedhead and pillow creases etched into his cheek. His eyes were still puffy with sleep, and his glasses sat crookedly on his nose. Not exactly presidential, but then again, it was still early.

“Morning, Mr. President,” Chuck mumbled to his reflection, offering himself a lazy salute before reaching for his toothbrush.

He squeezed an excessive amount of toothpaste onto the bristles—enough for two people, really—and started brushing. It was a vigorous process, more of a scrub-down than a clean-up, and the foam quickly built up in his mouth, turning into a frothy mess.

Chuck wasn’t one for subtlety, and his morning routine was no exception. As he brushed, he paced around the bathroom, checking his hair, inspecting his stubble, and occasionally pausing to make ridiculous faces in the mirror just to see how silly he could look.

After what felt like an eternity, he finally spat out the toothpaste and rinsed his mouth, giving his reflection an exaggerated grin. His teeth were sparkling, if a little too brightly—perhaps he’d gone overboard with the toothpaste again.

Next came the shower, which, for Chuck, was a battle of wills. On the one hand, he loved the warmth and relaxation of a hot shower; on the other hand, he knew that once he stepped out, the cold reality of the day would hit him like a ton of bricks. But duty called, and so, with a dramatic sigh, he turned on the water and stepped in.

The shower was quick, efficient, and slightly chaotic, as Chuck managed to knock over every bottle of shampoo and conditioner on the shelf. By the time he was done, the floor was a slippery mess, and he nearly wiped out twice as he climbed out and grabbed a towel.

Wrapped in his fluffy robe—embroidered with “POTUS” on the back, a gift from some well-meaning advisor—Chuck made his way to the kitchen. His stomach growled in anticipation, and he rubbed it absentmindedly as he contemplated what to eat.

Chuck wasn’t much of a cook. In fact, his culinary skills were limited to microwaving, toasting, and, on particularly adventurous days, scrambling eggs. But today, he was in the mood for something special, something that would really set the tone for the day.

Cereal. But not just any cereal. Today was a Cap’n Crunch kind of day.

He rummaged through the pantry, pushing aside the healthier options—granola, oatmeal, something that looked suspiciously like cardboard—until he found the bright red box. With a grin, he grabbed it and poured himself a heaping bowl, the sugary scent wafting up to greet him.

As he reached for the milk, his phone rang, vibrating loudly on the counter. Chuck jumped, startled by the sudden noise, and nearly dropped the milk in his haste to answer it.

“Hello?” he answered, his voice still a bit raspy from sleep.

“Good morning, Mr. President,” came the chipper voice of his assistant, Becky. “Just wanted to give you a heads-up on your schedule today.”

Chuck’s stomach sank a little as he realized what was coming. The dreaded schedule rundown. He glanced longingly at his bowl of cereal, which was rapidly getting soggy, and sighed.

“Go ahead, Becky,” he said, trying to sound more awake than he felt.

“Well, first up, you have a meeting with the Joint Chiefs at 8:00 AM. They’ll be discussing the new defense budget and—”

“Wait, wait, wait,” Chuck interrupted, waving his free hand in the air as if she could see him. “Do we really have to start with that? Can’t we, I don’t know, ease into the day? Maybe with something less…defense-y?”

There was a pause on the other end of the line, and Chuck could practically hear Becky rolling her eyes. “Mr. President, this is important. And besides, after that, you’ve got a briefing with the National Security Advisor, so—”

“Let me guess,” Chuck cut in again, his tone dry. “More defense stuff?”

“Pretty much,” Becky replied cheerfully. “But after that, you have a lunch meeting with the Senate Majority Leader. That should be a little less intense.”

Chuck groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Becky, remind me again why I signed up for this job?”

“Because you wanted to make a difference,” Becky replied without missing a beat. “And also because you were the only candidate left standing after that scandal involving the goats.”

Chuck grimaced at the memory. The less said about the Goat Incident, the better.

“Right,” he muttered, resigning himself to the day ahead. “Anything else?”

“Oh, just a quick note: the First Lady called and wanted to remind you about the charity gala tonight. Black tie, starts at 7:00 PM sharp.”

Chuck’s eyes widened in alarm. “The gala? That’s tonight?”

“Yes, sir,” Becky confirmed, clearly amused by his panic. “And don’t worry, I’ve already got your suit and tie picked out. Just make sure you show up on time.”

“Great, great,” Chuck said, his mind racing as he tried to remember the last time he’d even thought about the gala. “Anything else?”

“Just one more thing,” Becky said, her tone suddenly more serious. “The press has been asking a lot of questions about the incident at the summit last week. They’re looking for a statement from you, so you might want to be prepared.”

Chuck winced. The incident at the summit had been…well, let’s just say it hadn’t gone according to plan. But that was a problem for later. Right now, he had to focus on getting through the day.

“Thanks, Becky,” he said, trying to sound more confident than he felt. “I’ll handle it.”

“Of course, Mr. President,” Becky replied, her voice brightening again. “I’ll see you at the office.”

Chuck hung up the phone and stared down at his now thoroughly soggy cereal. The day hadn’t even started, and he was already feeling overwhelmed. But there was no time to dwell on it—he had a country to run, after all.

With a resigned sigh, he shoved a spoonful of cereal into his mouth, grimacing at the mushy texture. It wasn’t the breakfast of champions, but it would have to do.

Once breakfast was out of the way, Chuck shuffled back to his bedroom, determined to at least look the part of a confident, capable president. He flung open the doors to his walk-in closet and surveyed his options. Row upon row of suits hung neatly on hangers, each one tailored to perfection and carefully labeled with the occasion it was meant for.

But despite the impressive selection, Chuck found himself stumped. Did he go for the classic navy blue? Or maybe the gray pinstripe? And what about the tie? Was it a power tie kind of day, or should he go for something more subdued?

As he pondered his options, his phone buzzed again, this time with a text from Becky: “Don’t forget the blue suit.

It’s the one I picked for you.”

Chuck sighed in relief. Sometimes, it was nice to have someone else make the decisions.

He grabbed the blue suit and laid it out on the bed, then turned his attention to the tie. After a few moments of deliberation, he opted for a simple red tie—a classic choice that wouldn’t draw too much attention.

Getting dressed was an exercise in patience and coordination, two things Chuck wasn’t exactly known for. But after a few minutes of struggling with his tie and nearly tripping over his own feet, he managed to pull himself together.

He checked himself in the mirror, adjusting his tie one last time and smoothing down his hair. The man staring back at him looked every bit the president, even if he didn’t always feel like it.

But there was no time to dwell on that now. The day was waiting, and so was the rest of the world.

With a final deep breath, Chuck grabbed his briefcase and headed for the door, ready to face whatever chaos awaited him. After all, if he could survive the morning, he could survive anything.

Or at least, that’s what he told himself as he braced for the day ahead.

President Chuck Shurley wasn’t what most people envisioned when they thought of a president. In fact, he wasn’t what most people envisioned when they thought of a fully functional adult. His mornings were chaotic, his days filled with barely organized mayhem, and his nights ended with the quiet terror of knowing he had to do it all over again. But if anyone knew how to navigate the unpredictable seas of Chuck’s life, it was his sister, Amara—who just so happened to also be the First Lady.

The sibling relationship was unconventional to say the least. While most First Ladies were the spouses of the President, Amara was Chuck’s older sister, the one who had always been there, guiding and, occasionally, strong-arming him through the rough patches of his life. Their bond was the foundation of Chuck’s presidency, and while the world saw her as the serene, supportive figure beside him, Chuck knew the truth: Amara was the real force to be reckoned with.

It was after one of his more frantic mornings—complete with cereal disasters and a narrowly avoided wardrobe malfunction—that Chuck found himself sitting in the Oval Office, trying to mentally prepare for the day ahead. His phone buzzed, signaling an incoming message from his assistant Becky: “Amara’s on her way over. She wants to talk.”

Chuck sighed. Amara’s talks were rarely just chats—they were more like interrogations wrapped in silk, pleasant enough on the surface, but always digging deeper, trying to unearth something Chuck would rather keep buried.

Not five minutes later, Amara swept into the room, her presence commanding and yet somehow soft, like a storm that wasn’t quite sure whether it wanted to wreak havoc or simply pass by. She was dressed in a chic, tailored suit, her dark hair pulled back into a sleek ponytail, and her expression was as unreadable as ever.

“Chuck,” she said by way of greeting, her voice carrying that familiar mix of affection and exasperation that only a sister could muster. “We need to talk.”

Chuck offered her a smile, though it was a little strained around the edges. “Good morning to you too, Amara. What’s on the agenda today? Let me guess—another lecture about how I’m not taking things seriously enough?”

Amara didn’t return the smile. Instead, she crossed the room with purposeful strides, coming to stand directly in front of his desk. “This isn’t a joke, Chuck. We need to discuss your security.”

“Ah, here we go,” Chuck muttered under his breath, leaning back in his chair and rubbing his temples. “I’m fine, Amara. The Secret Service is on top of things. I don’t need you worrying about me.”

But Amara wasn’t having any of it. She folded her arms across her chest, her eyes narrowing as she studied her brother. “You were nearly killed in that suicide bombing last month, Chuck. And that wasn’t just a random attack—that was a targeted attempt on your life. You can’t just shrug it off like it’s no big deal.”

Chuck shifted uncomfortably in his seat, the memory of the bombing still fresh in his mind despite his best efforts to bury it. It had been a routine event, a charity dinner at a downtown hotel, when all hell had broken loose. The blast had come out of nowhere, the force of it rattling his bones, shattering glass, and leaving a ringing in his ears that had taken days to fade. He’d been lucky—unbelievably so—but luck wasn’t something you could rely on forever.

But Chuck was nothing if not stubborn. “I’m not shrugging it off,” he insisted, though his tone was more defensive than confident. “But what do you want me to do, Amara? Hide away in a bunker? Cancel every public appearance? I’m the President, for crying out loud. I have to be out there, doing my job.”

Amara’s expression softened slightly, but there was still a steely determination in her eyes. “I’m not saying you should live in fear, Chuck. But you need to be smart about this. We can’t afford to take any more chances. The security detail might not be enough next time.”

Chuck sighed, running a hand through his hair in frustration. “I trust my team, Amara. They’re the best in the business. They won’t let anything happen to me.”

“I’m not questioning their abilities,” Amara replied, her voice gentler now. “But even the best teams can be outmaneuvered. You have enemies, Chuck—powerful ones. And they’re not going to stop just because you got lucky once. We need to be proactive.”

The seriousness of her words hung in the air, and for a moment, Chuck was quiet, his usual bravado slipping away. He knew she was right, deep down. The attack had shaken him more than he cared to admit, and the thought of another attempt on his life was enough to make his stomach churn. But there was a part of him—a large part—that refused to live in fear, that clung to the idea that he could somehow carry on as if nothing had changed.

“Okay,” he said finally, his voice subdued. “So what’s your plan? How do we ‘be proactive’ without turning me into a paranoid wreck?”

Amara took a seat across from him, the tension in her shoulders easing just a bit. “For starters, we need to increase the security around your public appearances. That means more thorough checks, tighter protocols, and maybe scaling back some of the events that aren’t absolutely necessary.”

Chuck grimaced. “So you want me to cancel half my schedule? That’s not exactly going to look good, Amara. People will start asking questions.”

“And we’ll have answers ready,” she countered smoothly. “We’ll frame it as a temporary measure, just until we’re sure the threat level has decreased. But more than that, Chuck, you need to start taking your personal security more seriously. No more late-night strolls without protection, no more impromptu detours. You need to stick to the plan.”

He couldn’t help but chuckle at that last part. “You know me, Amara. Sticking to the plan isn’t exactly my strong suit.”

Amara’s lips twitched into the barest hint of a smile. “Then maybe it’s time you learned, little brother. This isn’t just about you anymore. It’s about the country, about the people who depend on you. You have a responsibility to stay safe—for them.”

Chuck leaned back in his chair, the weight of her words settling heavily on his shoulders. He knew she was right—he’d known it from the moment the dust had settled after the bombing. But admitting that meant confronting a reality he wasn’t sure he was ready to face.

For as long as he could remember, Chuck had always felt like he was in over his head, like he was playing a role he wasn’t quite cut out for. Becoming President had only magnified that feeling, amplifying his insecurities and fears until they sometimes felt insurmountable. And now, with the added threat of assassination hanging over his head, it was all too easy to let those fears take control.

But then he looked at Amara—calm, composed, and as unshakable as ever—and something inside him steadied. She believed in him, believed that he could do this, and that gave him the strength to keep going, to face the challenges head-on.

“Alright,” Chuck said finally, his voice firm. “We’ll do it your way. But I’m not going to live my life in a bubble, Amara. I need to be out there, doing my job. We just have to find a balance.”

Amara nodded, satisfaction flickering in her eyes. “That’s all I’m asking, Chuck. Just be careful. You’ve got a lot of people counting on you, and we can’t afford to lose you.”

The sincerity in her words caught Chuck off guard, and for a moment, he was at a loss for how to respond. Despite their frequent clashes and differences, there was no denying the depth of their bond, and the thought of how much Amara had already done for him left him feeling both humbled and grateful.

“I know,” he said softly, meeting her gaze. “And I’m counting on you too, Amara. I couldn’t do this without you.”

Amara’s expression softened, and for a brief moment, the stern First Lady persona melted away, revealing the caring sister underneath. “You’re stronger than you think, Chuck,” she said gently. “You’ve come this far, and you’re going to make it through this too. We just have to be smart about it.”

Chuck nodded, absorbing her words like a lifeline. “Yeah. Yeah, we will.”

They sat in silence for a moment, the tension between them easing into something more comfortable. Despite the gravity of their conversation, there was an underlying sense of unity, a shared understanding that they were in this together, no matter what.

Finally, Amara rose from her seat, smoothing down her suit as she prepared to leave. “I’ll talk to the security team about the new protocols,” she said, slipping back into her composed First Lady demeanor. “And I’ll have Becky coordinate with you on any changes to your schedule.”

“Thanks, Amara,” Chuck said, genuinely appreciative of her support. “I’ll try not to drive everyone too crazy with my…improvisations.”

Amara’s lips quirked into a wry smile. “Just try to keep the improvisations to a minimum, okay? The Secret Service would appreciate it.”

Chuck chuckled, the tension in his chest easing a little. “No promises, but I’ll do my best.”

As Amara turned to leave, Chuck called out to her one last time. “Hey

, Amara?”

She paused in the doorway, turning back to look at him with a raised eyebrow. “Yes?”

“Thanks,” he said simply, his voice laced with a rare vulnerability. “For everything.”

Amara’s expression softened once more, and she gave him a small, genuine smile. “Anytime, little brother.”

With that, she was gone, leaving Chuck alone in his office, the weight of their conversation lingering in the air. He took a deep breath, trying to steady himself for the day ahead. The challenges were mounting, the threats looming larger than ever, but with Amara by his side, Chuck felt a little more equipped to face them.

He still wasn’t sure how he was going to navigate the turbulent waters of his presidency, but one thing was clear: he wasn’t going to do it alone. And with Amara’s guidance, maybe—just maybe—he could find a way to steer the ship in the right direction.

Lunch in the White House was supposed to be a grand affair, or at least that’s what President Chuck Shurley had imagined before he actually became the President. He’d pictured long tables filled with dignitaries, crystal glasses clinking, and silver platters overflowing with food. Instead, most days it was just him, a small table set up in one of the many dining rooms, and a staff member awkwardly hovering nearby in case he needed something.

Today was one of those days.

Chuck sat at a round table in a private dining room just off the Oval Office. The room was ornate, with heavy drapes, thick carpets, and enough gold trim to make a pharaoh blush. But instead of feeling like the leader of the free world, Chuck felt a little like a kid playing dress-up in his dad’s suit.

He glanced at the table, where his lunch had just been placed: a modestly-sized plate with a sandwich—turkey on rye, a bowl of soup that he couldn’t quite identify, and a small side salad that looked more decorative than edible. Next to it was a glass of water and a lone apple, shining under the lights as if it were some forbidden fruit that had found its way onto his tray by mistake.

“Well, this is…something,” Chuck muttered to himself as he picked up the sandwich. He eyed it suspiciously, as if it might suddenly spring to life and start talking. “Not exactly what I had in mind when I thought about lunch at the White House.”

He took a tentative bite of the sandwich, chewing slowly as he let his thoughts drift. It wasn’t bad, exactly, but it wasn’t particularly good either. The turkey was a little dry, the bread a little too chewy, and the lettuce a bit too wilted. It was the kind of meal that wouldn’t be out of place in a hospital cafeteria, which only added to the surreal feeling that had been following him around since the day he’d been sworn in.

“Could be worse,” Chuck mused, trying to look on the bright side. “At least it’s not another one of those fancy dinners where I have to pretend to know what all the forks are for.”

He chuckled to himself, taking another bite as he glanced around the room. The walls were adorned with portraits of past presidents, all of them looking stern and dignified, as if they were silently judging his every move. Chuck could practically hear them muttering among themselves, comparing notes on his performance.

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” he said aloud, addressing the silent audience of former leaders. “I’m not exactly a Lincoln or a Roosevelt. But hey, I’m trying, okay?”

He wasn’t entirely sure why he was talking to the walls—maybe it was the isolation of the job, or maybe it was just that he’d always had a habit of rambling when he was nervous. Whatever the reason, it made the room feel a little less empty, so he kept going.

“Anyway, I bet you guys had some pretty weird lunches too, right? I mean, Harding probably had to deal with some Prohibition-era weirdness, and I bet Nixon had more than a few awkward meals.” He paused, tapping his fingers on the edge of the table. “Come to think of it, Kennedy probably had a great time with his meals. That guy could charm anyone.”

Chuck’s mind wandered as he stared at his plate, which was quickly becoming less appealing with every bite. The soup, which he’d been avoiding, sat there like a murky mystery, daring him to try it. He wasn’t sure what kind it was—potato? Leek? Something else entirely?—and he wasn’t particularly eager to find out.

“Well, here goes nothing,” he muttered, picking up the spoon and dipping it into the bowl. He hesitated for a moment, then brought it to his mouth.

The taste was…bland. Not bad, just not memorable. If the soup had a personality, it would be the kind of person who never took risks, always played it safe, and probably collected stamps as a hobby.

“Okay, that’s enough of that,” Chuck decided, pushing the bowl away and focusing on the salad instead. It was small, more garnish than a real side, with a few sad-looking leaves of lettuce, a couple of cherry tomatoes, and a drizzle of what was probably supposed to be vinaigrette. He speared a tomato with his fork, popping it into his mouth. It burst with a sour tang that made him wince.

“Who knew a tomato could taste that aggressive?” he muttered to himself.

Chuck pushed the salad aside, feeling like he’d done his duty by at least trying everything on the plate. The apple, however, remained untouched. He picked it up, weighing it in his hand as if it might reveal some hidden secret. The fruit was pristine, almost too perfect—no bruises, no blemishes, just an unnaturally glossy surface that practically screamed “processed.”

He rolled it around in his hand, thinking about all the bizarre twists and turns his life had taken to get him to this point. Who would have guessed that Chuck Shirley, of all people, would end up here, in the White House, holding a waxy apple and trying to pretend he knew what he was doing?

“I wonder if Washington ever had to deal with this,” he said to no one in particular, imagining the first president sitting in a similar room, dealing with the mundane problems of running a country. Somehow, he doubted it. Washington had probably had bigger things on his plate—like, say, founding a nation.

Chuck shook his head, chuckling at the absurdity of it all. “Well, at least I’ve got the easy part, right? Just keep the country running, avoid starting any wars, and try not to choke on a lousy apple.”

He set the fruit back down, deciding that he wasn’t quite ready to tackle it yet. Maybe later, when he had a bit more time to contemplate life’s mysteries.

His phone buzzed on the table, and Chuck glanced at it, seeing a text from his assistant Becky: “Meeting in 15. You ready?”

Chuck sighed, the brief respite of lunch already coming to an end. He quickly typed back, “As ready as I’ll ever be,” and sent the message, knowing that he was never really ready for these things. But that was the job, wasn’t it? Always moving forward, always dealing with the next crisis, whether he was ready or not.

With one last glance at the half-eaten sandwich, Chuck pushed his chair back and stood up. “Well, I guess that’s that,” he said to the room, grabbing his water glass and taking a long drink. He could hear the faint sounds of activity outside the door—staff moving about, phones ringing, the constant hum of a place that never really stopped.

As he walked to the door, he gave one final look around the room, as if hoping to find some last bit of wisdom hidden among the portraits or in the shadows of the ornate decor. But there was nothing—just the quiet, persistent sense that he was a little out of his depth, that he was still playing catch-up in a game that had started long before he’d ever even known he’d be a part of it.

Chuck squared his shoulders, taking a deep breath as he reached for the door handle. “Alright, time to get back to work,” he told himself, his voice a little more confident now, a little more certain. After all, he might not always feel like he was cut out for this job, but he was here, and he was doing it. And that had to count for something.

As he stepped out of the dining room and into the bustling hallway, he couldn’t help but glance back at the table one last time, where the apple still sat, untouched. It almost seemed to mock him, a reminder of the little things that always seemed to slip through the cracks, the tiny details that no one else ever noticed but that somehow always seemed to matter.

Chuck gave it a small, rueful smile before turning away for good, leaving the room behind as he headed off to tackle the rest of his day. There would be more meetings, more decisions to make, more crises to manage—but at least he’d have a story to tell the next time someone asked him what lunch in the White House was really like. And who knows? Maybe he’d finally get around to eating that apple.

Chuck Shurley sat at his massive oak desk, drumming his fingers against the polished wood. His schedule for the day was a neat, orderly list, meticulously prepared by his assistant, Becky. Meetings, briefings, a photo op, lunch (which he’d probably end up eating alone again)—it was all just so predictable. Too predictable. For a man who once wrote best-selling books full of excitement, danger, and drama, the reality of the presidency was...well, it was a little boring.

He sighed, glancing out the window at the meticulously manicured White House lawn. The groundskeepers were out there, trimming hedges with the same precision they brought every day. Everything was perfect, nothing was out of place. Which, if he was being honest, was exactly the problem.

The intercom on his desk crackled to life. “Mr. President?” Becky’s voice was bright and cheery, as it always was. Too bright, too cheery for someone who was about to bring him yet another stack of dull briefing papers.

Chuck leaned forward and pressed the button to respond. “Yeah, Becky?”

“Your ten o’clock is in fifteen minutes,” she said, her voice tinged with the kind of energy that suggested she’d already had three cups of coffee this morning. “Should I bring in the briefing materials?”

Chuck sighed again. “Sure, bring them in.”

A moment later, Becky bustled into the room, a thick folder of papers clutched in her arms. She was wearing her usual office attire—an overly colorful blouse and a skirt that might have been fashionable in the nineties but was now just…retro. Her enthusiasm was as bright as her wardrobe, and it was infectious, even if Chuck wasn’t quite in the mood for it.

“Here you go, Mr. President,” she said, placing the folder in front of him with a flourish. “All the details for your meeting with the Joint Chiefs. I color-coded the important points!”

Chuck blinked at the folder. Of course she’d color-coded it. She always did. “Thanks, Becky,” he said, trying to muster some enthusiasm. But as she stepped back, ready to leave him to his reading, he couldn’t stop himself. “Becky, wait a second.”

She turned back to him, eyebrows raised in curiosity. “Yes, Mr. President?”

Chuck leaned back in his chair, searching for the right words. “Do you ever feel like things are just...too calm around here?”

Becky tilted her head, confused. “Calm, sir?”

“Yeah, you know, like everything’s just...routine. Predictable.” He gestured to the folder. “I mean, look at this. Meetings, briefings, photo ops. It’s all the same, day in and day out. Where’s the excitement?”

Becky blinked, clearly trying to process what he was saying. “Um...you want more excitement, sir?”

Chuck nodded emphatically. “Yes! I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m glad the country isn’t in chaos or anything, but it’s like...there’s nothing happening! Everything’s under control, and I’m just...here. Sitting in meetings, signing papers. There’s no adventure.”

Becky chewed on her lip, thinking hard. “Well, sir, I think it’s good that things are under control. It means you’re doing a great job as President! No crises to deal with, no wars to fight—just smooth sailing.”

Chuck frowned. “But that’s just it! Smooth sailing is boring. I used to write stories, Becky. Stories full of action and drama. Now look at me—I’m the most powerful man in the world, and the most exciting thing I do all day is pick out a tie!”

Becky furrowed her brow. “I...I guess I never thought about it like that. But, Mr. President, we’re running a country here. It’s supposed to be stable. Exciting is usually bad in politics, isn’t it?”

“Maybe,” Chuck conceded, “but still...it feels like I’m stuck in a loop. And it’s not just the job—look at my lunch! I had the same thing three days in a row last week. There’s got to be more to being President than this.”

Becky’s face brightened suddenly, as if she’d had a brilliant idea. “What if we mixed things up a bit? I could schedule some more interesting meetings for you, or maybe plan a surprise event or two?”

Chuck sat up a little straighter, intrigued. “Go on…”

“Well,” Becky continued, warming to the idea, “we could set up a meeting with some, uh, more unconventional figures. Like...like artists or writers or inventors! People with big ideas, who aren’t just talking about policy all the time.”

Chuck’s eyes lit up. “Now you’re talking! That’s the kind of thing I’m looking for. Something different, something that makes me feel alive again!”

Becky was getting excited now, too. “Or what if we organized a surprise visit somewhere? Like a school, or a hospital—or maybe even a local diner? Something that’s not on the schedule, where you can just...I don’t know, interact with regular people. Get out of this bubble.”

Chuck smiled for the first time that morning, a real smile. “I like it. Let’s do that. Let’s shake things up a little.”

Becky beamed, pleased that she’d hit on something that made him happy. “Great! I’ll get to work on it right away, sir. This afternoon, maybe we could—”

“Wait,” Chuck interrupted, holding up a hand. “There’s something else.”

Becky paused, mid-thought. “Yes?”

Chuck leaned forward, lowering his voice as if he were about to reveal a state secret. “I want you to plan something big. Something no one expects.”

Becky’s eyes widened. “Big? Like...how big?”

Chuck grinned mischievously. “Big enough to get people talking. Something that’ll shake up this place and get everyone out of their comfort zones.”

Becky hesitated, clearly unsure of what he meant. “Are we talking about a policy announcement, or...?”

Chuck waved a hand dismissively. “No, no, nothing like that. I mean something more... fun. Something that shows I’m not just a boring old politician.”

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[vigilxnte-shit]

i can see you || matt murdock x éliette de castillon || one-shot

summary: éliette de castillon is 19 years old and engaged to a 22-year-old law student. as far as everyone is concerned, she’s eager to marry and lead a god-fearing life, but a certain blind classmate of her fiancé can’t help the way she takes over his senses.

word count: 2,993

warnings: angsty kind of?? STEAMY. MAKING OUUUUUT. no smut but it gets kind of close, el is engaged to another guy while making out with matt. mentions of emotional abuse. also not edited and its 2:30 AM as i’m starting this

a/n: I DO NOT CONDONE CHEATING this is a one-off instance where it’s lowkey kind of hot and also el’s fiancé sucks ass. once again thanks to yuna for the inspo <3

this is an 18+ blog. minors dni. || masterlist

matt murdock saw the world in a different way than most. he had lived without his sight since he was nine, moving through a world on fire with as much grace as one could muster. he smelled every tear leaking from an eye somewhere in the room, heard each cry and moan and shout as he walked the streets at night. matt murdock couldn’t see, but he could feel, a reality that often made the world seem loud and undefeatable and evil.

and then he met el.

el smelled like vanilla and cashmere wood, a scent matt had picked up on half the girls in his classes- clearly, it had to be sold out at the mall right now. despite that, despite it’s overuse, it smelled different on el, unique, warm and soft and scrumptious. it was the first thing his senses picked up on when she sat next to him on the clubhouse fireplace. he’d smelled the exact fragrance on foggy’s date from last friday, but this time it was intoxicating. this time it was enticing.

he turned to face her then, ready to make a move based on scent alone. he didn’t need anything else, he wanted his lips on her skin, but as he turned to her he paused.

her heartbeat was racing. her breath was jagged and raspy, choppy, uneven, a sensation that he knew too well. her temperature was rising, he could taste the salt in the budding tears, and he knew he had to say something.

“hey, are you okay?” he asked. he sensed the turn, could tell she was facing him now, but she remained speechless for the shortest moment. she was taking him in. he was used to that. 

“your breath picked up,” he explained softly. the last thing he wanted was to raise her anxieties, to spike that precious heartbeat even more- he just wanted to explain himself. “it sounded like you were about to hyperventilate.”

he heard her heartbeat begin to slow, the milliseconds between beats starting to lose their numbers and her lungs taking in their oxygen more slowly. he didn’t let himself smile on the outside, but he felt it internally. he’d done something to help.

“i…i’m okay, thank you.”

in that moment, matt could have sworn the floor had given out and sent him straight to heaven. her voice was soft and warm, laced with the smallest hints of a foreign accent on the end of the words- french, he would later learn. in the moment, though, he didn’t care. god himself could not have bestowed a damn about the origin of her accent, all that matt knew was he wanted her to start talking and never stop.

éliette de castillon became his own phantom that night. he went to bed with her voice echoing in his head, with the scent of her vanilla perfume stuck in his nostrils that he hoped would never leave. the sound of her slowed, peaceful heartbeat, the gentle warmth in her cheeks- she was a walking lullaby, a fresh cup of chamomile tea on a chilly winter’s night. and sure, he couldn’t tell what she looked like. he had no clue what her skin tone was, what shade of hair she had or the color of those undoubtedly gorgeous eyes. but matt could see éliette de castillon, and that vision was enough to make her his very own patron saint.

he spoke with her three more times before she married samuel joseph. two more parties; both garish and loud and overstimulating, leading to them heading outside to talk on the local playground for hours; and one fateful five-o-clock in a maintenance closet. 

it was an icy december evening, three days before the end of the semester. the last party they had been to was a fortnight prior, and el had been haunting him since. he’d learned to zero in on her scent amongst the hundreds of girls wearing the same one: she paired it with a caramel body wash and the natural fragrance of her skin, just defined enough she stood out in the overcrowded smellscape, and he knew she passed by him at least once a day. her heartbeat varied in an out, and he usually heard her humming to herself- musicals, pop songs, classic rock. anything. she could have hummed to a sports broadcast, and he would have listened with the fascination of a child in a space museum.

she’d told him at that party she didn’t want to marry sam. that she was desperate and terrified of him, that he mocked her smallest mistakes and encouraged his friends to do the same. she was only marrying him to get away from her foster parents, to escape the life she’d lived in italian catholic purgatory ever since frank had left for the military. she had let matt hug her, and he’d spent each of those fourteen days dreaming of the day he could experience that again. her body was perfect, everything he’d dreamed of. she’d felt like she was made for his arms, the way her waist dipped in right at his arms’ height, her head perfectly on his shoulder and that irresistible vanilla signature strong in his nose. she’d only pulled away after a second too long, and she’d stared at his lips after- he felt her hesitation, the wheels turning in her head as she debated and then shut down the second sam announced his arrival.

he hadn’t been able to focus in class. he’d barely even updated foggy on his love life, too busy thinking about the chances of talking her into breaking it off. he could not care less about preserving his friendship with sam, about keeping things in line with the future district attorney, as he gratuitously called himself. no, matt only cared about taking the dove clean out of sam’s hands before he could clip her wings. 

even now, walking down the hallway from the library, matt thought of it. he felt around with the cane he didn’t need, almost swinging it as he dreamed of their embrace and her heartbeat and her voice and the way she spoke french. his heart had been dropped in her backpack, carried around with her all day, and matt didn’t care to get it back. she could keep it, she could stomp on it, she could toss it out the window and run it over with her car- it was hers to keep and destroy if she wanted. 

he made it almost to the entrance, head in the clouds and feet about to join it, when his nose picked it up. he froze in his tracks and his cane with him, sniffing around, trying to figure out it’s direction. that was el’s perfume. undeniably, definitively el’s.

before he knew what he was doing, he followed it. he had the thought to fold up his cane and toss it in his bag, to drop the act of needing it and just find her, but in the end he didn’t even need it. the smell got stronger, and he paused as his fingers brushed another’s.

“hi, matt.”

it was like sunshine on a spring morning, a fresh-baked cookie after a long day. he couldn’t think straight, all he could muster was vanilla warm sweet as he reached for her hand. 

“el, we need to talk.” 

he couldn’t see her furrowed brow, but she didn’t protest, letting him drag her back up the hallway. she asked for an explanation, checked to make sure he was okay, but he didn’t answer. he walked to the closest supply closet as fast as his feet would carry him, following the closest smell of bleach to get him there.

when he pulled her into the closet, she hesitated. he couldn’t blame her- this was sudden and so shocking, even he didn’t fully process what was happening. he couldn’t give her an answer, though, just pulled her in and locked the door behind them. 

in the tiny closet, he barely remembered to switch on the lights. he hung his backpack on the hook and took el’s messenger bag off her shoulders, not answering her questions. once both bags were safely hanging on the back of the door, he pulled his glasses from the bridge of his nose, tucking the rectangular lenses into the water bottle pocket on the side of his bag. 

“matt, what is going on,” she demanded. “you’re acting so strange, we’re in a supply-”

her mouth stopped the second his hands touched her face. she froze completely, and he couldn’t help but pause to take in the entire sensation. her stunned silence, the sensation of her cheeks heating, her speeding heartbeat and that damned perfume. the silence was a perfect backdrop as he slowly traced his thumbs over his cheekbones, the bridge of her nose, her lips.

“don’t marry sam.” it was whispered, reverent, a sign of worship. a show of devotion. 

he heard her breath catch and felt her eyes searching his. the whole room felt like it was rising in temperature, like at any second foundation would collapse and the ceiling would cave in on them from the sheer tension in the room. 

“matt.” her voice was near silent, quiet as a dandelion seed, it would have carried away on the wind had they been outside. her soft, fragile fingers covered his, a second frame for the beauty he held between his hands. “matt, you…i can’t just…”

“you can.” he nodded, biting his lip with an air of certainty. “you can. you can tell him no. you can take it back, tell him you’ve changed your mind, and leave him behind.” one hand dropped from her face, taking hers and kissing each of her knuckles. “el, he isn’t good for you. your sparkle fades the second you hear his voice.”

“what would i tell him?!” she squeezed his interlaced hand, never taking her eyes from his intense, gorgeous, unseeing gaze. “what would i say? i can’t- i can’t just leave-”

“it’s your life, el.” the sentence lingered, hung in the air and stagnated. he had fired the bullet. “it’s not his.” 

verbal lightning had struck the room. all that remained was stillness and electricity and static, two people and their frazzled minds and a life-changing decision.

she wasn’t saying she loved sam. that was what matt kept saying to himself, that in the midst of it all, in the silence and the conversation and the nights at parties, she had never once declared that she loved sam. 

and now el was silent. quieter than a nun during the eucharist, than the falling snow on the night they’d first met. no words escaped her lips, and he could taste her strawberry lip balm even with the distance. he sensed it as her eyes dropped to his own lips, her focus undivided and her heart rate slowly climbing. he could hear the blood rushing, imagined the pink in her cheeks.

slowly, he released her left hand. he moved his right forward to hold her waist, his fingers brushing the soft polyester of her shirt. his left pinkie and ring finger curled just under her jaw, a gentle tug, a silent request.

“tell me to stop,” he whispered.

“no,” she answered.

the distance between them was closed in seconds. el’s lip were the softest paradise he’d ever experienced, soft and hydrated, coated with a strawberry flavor that could have been candy. he stole kiss after kiss from her lips, her breath escaping in delicate whimpers between lips and touches and emotions. his right hand found its way slowly up her side, his languid fingers coming to her neck- not to squeeze, just to hold. 

“can i go further?” matt whispered. his free hand migrated from her cheek to her hair, lightly gripping a handful and pressing his forehead to hers. “tell me if you don’t want this, el.”

she nodded. he smiled at the feeling of her hair as she did, still holding it gently.

“words, el.”

“i do.”

he didn’t know it at the time, but he’d think of those two words for years. he’d spend days agonizing over them, weeks on his knees in the church, begging god to bring his el back so she could repeat it over the altar this time. he’d spend five years wondering how she was doing, if she was okay, if she’d lost her sense of flight. 

but for now, it was enough. it was enough for him to tighten his grip in her hair and slip his tongue past her lips, kissing her as though she was the only thing he had ever wanted, the only prize he could ever dream of winning. 

he had to press her against the wall, press one hand to the wall next to her head to stabilize himself. she tasted like summer breezes and cozy nights, like a strawberry shortcake on a blanket in the middle of june. each breath stolen was a treasure for his collection, a moment to add to the track for each time he felt unmotivated or lonely or sad. she giggled when he bit her lip, tugging the bottom between his teeth with a slightly harsh nibble. 

“you’re an angel, el,” he whispered, fastening his hold in her hair to pull her head to the side. “you’re a goddess. too heavenly to be on this earth.” with his newfound angel, matt’s lips trailed to her jawline. he left open-mouhted, sloppy, and passionate kisses down her features and onto her neck, nipping at the skin and sucking a bruise to her collarbone.

a mistake that would haunt him for the next half a decade. 

suddenly, el’s eyes snapped open. “matt, stop. i can’t.” 

without hesitating, he pulled away. his stomach dropped, his sightless eyes blown wide and beautiful despite the panic rushing over him. had he done something wrong? had he upset her?

he waited in agonizing silence, listening as she straightened her clothes and fixed her hair. there was a sadness in her movements, a slowness and hesitation that he began ignoring as soon as she picked up her bag and stopped his world from spinning. 

“matt, you’re amazing,” she said softly. he recognized the edge of tears in her voice. he had no clue how to fix that. 

“you’re kind, and you’re smart, and you’re so handsome.” matt felt his heart sinking. he didn’t care for the compliments, he didn’t care for the praise- he wanted her. he wanted her in his life, in his house, in his bed. he couldn’t move as he heard her swallow.

“and i really hope you find a girl even have as spectacular as you.”

with those words, el stepped out into the hallway, shutting the door behind her. at first, matt thought to follow her. chase her down, get on his knees if he had to, tell her he would take her to the courthouse tomorrow and make her a murdock if it would get her out of this. 

he didn’t, though. he listened as her steps synced up with the cracks in his breaking heart, waiting for her to leave the building, to get to her dorm. he never moved the entire time, just sat and listened and thought. 

he pushed the thoughts out of his head- of her, miserable and afraid, living on the whims of an idiot lawyer and his pastor paychecks. he thought of how she said sam had never hugged her like that, never held her or listened to her thoughts, and how she had just walked right back into that fate. how she had stared freedom in the eyes and been too scared to step forward. 

matt couldn’t sleep that night. he tossed and turned, replaying el’s whimpers in his head, touching his lips and wishing it was her. he knew he couldn’t do it. he couldn’t just let her accept such a loveless destiny, leave her to a shadow of loneliness and way too many kids on an upstate farmhouse.

he got out of bed at 6am, the morning sun fresh in the sky as he ran to her dorm. he’d never been before, only been told the address, and after much trial and error he arrived at #96. he cleared his throat and made the sign of the cross before reaching forward, his fist balled to knock, when he heard someone clear his throat.

“don’t bother.” it was a neighbor down the street, just returned from grocery shopping. “they moved out last night. not sticking around for winter, so they headed out early.” 

matt tilted his head, his heart dropping. “...they?

the neighbor nodded. “yeah, the pastor’s kid and his fiance. gone like magic this morning. didn’t give us much warning, either.”

matt just nodded. “thank you.” he stared at the door for minutes as the neighbor walked away, desperate, listening for any signs of life from the other side- nothing but buzzing electricity and the occasional mouse. 

matt spent the next five years thinking about her. she came to mind every time he dated someone new, each time he went to church and smelled vanilla perfume. he tried to find a facebook, an instagram, a linkedin- anything that might tip him off to where she went, how she was doing. it didn’t work. she may as well have vanished from the earth…or so he thought. everything changed one rainy day in hell’s kitchen, when éliette joseph stepped off the c-train. she walked fifteen minutes in the pouring rain, the scent of the city and the petrichor so strong that matt couldn’t even pick out her familiar vanilla perfume. he couldn’t pick up anything about her- the flushed cheeks or the beating heart or the humming of a broadway showtune. he had nothing to tip him off, nothing to prepare him for the moment the door to Nelson & Murdock swung open and his angel walked right back into his life.

[thedaythatwas]

How to be Alone

Summary: Goro Akechi has 30 days to vacate his apartment. If only moving on were half as easy as moving out.

CW: alcohol, emetophobia, run-of-the-mill violent thoughts from Akechi, and more repression than you could possibly fathom

This is just a little snippet of a post-canon Akechi character study I've been working on! I want to share it here on tumblr as a standalone oneshot. Please don't expect any tension to be resolved <333 because that's not happening here <333

Big thank you to my lovely betas, lambsear (ao3), @cardiganbear, and @cloudysonder. Another massive thanks to @chaoticconstellation – thank you for all of the inspo and motivation (and for making me aware that apartments that evil-looking exist!)

House Hunting (or, I'm not hung up on you anymore, but here's why I hung up)

Shopping for apartments online was hell.

Akechi was no stranger to feelings of mind-numbing rage. Even so, there was something about the website he was using to search for a new living space that made him particularly angry, even by his own standards. His cursor drifted across its screen, its interface lagged, and despite his perfect internet connection, it seemed as though every thirty seconds the damn thing refreshed itself. 

Akechi wasn’t sure where exactly he was looking to live; his requirements for a new place were the vague but apt key terms, ‘Tokyo,’ ‘cheap,’ and ‘studio.’ Unfortunately, his criteria seemed to be mutually exclusive. A room of his own would cost an arm and a leg; a room with a roommate or two would take a doable (albeit still exorbitant) chunk from his savings. It was tragic, really, that Akechi would be at risk of causing grievous bodily harm to himself and others if he were forced to share a living space. Forking over cash he didn’t have was quite literally his only option. 

Akechi might have been able to search out some middle ground between striking gold beneath the streets of Kichijoji and committing another homicide if he had the luxury of time to plan his move. He had always been scrappy, even if he was seldom lucky. 

Time, however, was something that Akechi didn’t have. That, of course, had to do with the circumstances that had pushed him to bearing the indignities of online apartment hunting in the first place.

On February 3rd, Akechi had woken up in his bed. This was strange for a number of reasons. One: he didn’t make a habit of waking up when his bedside clock brightly proclaimed it to be 8:37pm. 

Two: Goro Akechi was supposed to be dead. 

And, joy of all joys, he was not. Upon registering this unfortunate new development in the saga of misfortunes that was his existence, Akechi had rolled over, buried his head in his pillow, and screamed. When soreness in his throat informed him that screaming was no longer a viable way to spend his time, he had walked to his near-empty kitchen and grabbed the frilly bottle of expensive single malt scotch that Shido had given him the day he had reported to his office to confirm Wakaba Ishikki’s death.

Akechi had been saving the bottle for the day he won.

Well. Cheers to that one. 

He had sat down on the linoleum tile floor and taken a large swig out of the bottle. Presumably, he’d repeated the act a number of times, because the next morning he’d woken up in his bed – again, ironically, with no memory of how he’d arrived there – and promptly thrown up on himself. 

He’d tossed his unlucky shirt in the garbage, along with the bottle he’d found lying knocked over and bone dry on the kitchen floor. He really had always hated it.

After spending several days lying in his bed, only leaving it to periodically feed himself one of the instant ramen packets he stockpiled in the one cabinet in his kitchen he actively used, Akechi had washed his sheets and moved on.

What else could he do?

He had contacted Sae Niijima first, because while he had been spending several days laying horizontal in a dark room, adding an abstract collage of broth splatters to his sweatpants and trying to convince himself that any of his recent decisions actually mattered, Akira Kurusu was probably behind bars giving testimony that would damn Shido and potentially put himself away for good in the process. 

And like hell was he going to let Joker one-up him by rotting away in jail while Akechi – clearly, the most deserving party in this scenario on both counts – walked free.

As soon as he’d heard the click of his phone connecting to Sae’s, Akechi had come in guns blazing announcing his intent to march down to the police station and confess to everything he’d done. He would gladly go down with Shido’s ship if it meant he could anchor him well and truly to rock bottom. 

The elder Niijima sister had rolled shockingly well with Akechi’s punches. After expressing mild surprise that he was alive, Sae had efficiently talked him off his ledge.

“Do you want Shido to be locked away for life? If your answer is yes, I suggest you stay well away from my case. I have a strategy, and it will be much less effective if I have to account for the testimony of a magical teenage assassin confessing to cognitively killing some of Japan’s most powerful men just as they’ve begun to take me seriously.” 

Akechi had never answered her question, because Akechi didn’t want Shido to be locked away. Not like this, anyway. What he had wanted hadn’t involved Kurusu, and yet, here Kurusu was in the center of it all, robbing Akechi of his chance to make Shido’s fall really hurt. 

Still, Akechi had come to terms with the fact that what he wanted and what he would get were two very different things in regards to the fate of Masayoshi Shido, and to this brave new world where Akechi was meant to be long dead. 

What he had done was take a deep breath, swallow down his very reasonable retorts – he had at least five – and ask about Kurusu. 

His inquiry was fruitful, if aggravating. Akechi hadn’t been naive enough to expect that any update on Kurusu wouldn’t be aggravating. 

Per Sae, it wouldn’t be long until Kurusu was released from juvenile detention (implied: so long as Akechi didn’t butt in). Apparently, his extended posse had banded together, and Sae doubted it would be more than a few weeks before he was out. He was actually on track to have his criminal record completely overturned.

Kurusu was relying on the power of friendship to not only avoid a life sentence, but to completely exonerate himself from the year he had spent galavanting around the Metaverse, stealing hearts and minds and Akechi’s life’s work, too. One might say that Akechi was less than enthused. Mostly, because he was near certain that using the force of true love to outrun his mistakes would actually work for Kurusu, because he was Kurusu, and of fucking course it could.

He hadn’t told Sae as much, but he sensed she’d intuited his frustration from his chorus of ‘...I see,’ ‘...I see,’ ‘...I see,’  through the phone, each repetition darker than the last. 

With that sorted, Akechi had told Sae in no uncertain terms that she was not to tell Kurusu or any of the other Phantom Thieves that he was alive under any circumstances. She said that she would respect his wishes. She hadn’t asked any follow up questions. It was a refreshing change of pace from the back and forth that talking to the rest of Kurusu’s loyal followers always seemed to entail.

Then again, this was Sae. She had been a fixture in his life long before she had become a mainstay in Kurusu’s.

That little detail out of the way, Akechi had been prepared to hang up. Before he could, Sae had invited him to coffee. Bewildered, Akechi had accepted.

“You are aware, I presume, that I’ve killed more people than the number of cases you’ve litigated over the course of your entire career, aren’t you?” Akechi had said as soon as he had slid into the stiffly upholstered booth across from Sae at the too cold, overly gray café where they had agreed to meet the following day. “Including among them Wakaba Isshiki and Kunikazu Okumura.”

Sae had pulled her credit card out of her sleek handbag and rapped it on the table between them.

“I am. Could you give me your order Akechi-kun? Drinks are on me today.”

Akechi had ordered a black drip coffee – far from the best he’d ever had – and the two of them had talked about his future, not his past. 

Sae told Akechi that she would be willing to hire him as a personal assistant. She couldn’t swing him a position interning in the public prosecutor’s office; it went without saying that Akechi ought to stay as far away as possible from any branch of law enforcement for the foreseeable future. Sure, very few people recognized him nowadays – the demiurge had fallen and taken Shido’s influence with it, and Akechi had been out of the public eye for a sufficient number of news cycles for even his most avid fans to lose interest – but it seemed unwise to tempt fate. 

They both knew that most of Shido’s conspiracy was still at large. As repentant as their former leader was, his sentiments were not widely shared. Shido had done more damage than a single change of heart could fix. 

All this to say, Akechi would be keeping a low profile. Not that he would have acted otherwise, regardless of who might want him imprisoned, or who might want him dead.

Akechi was, quite frankly, tired.

His employment would hinge on agreeing to take his high school equivalency and college entrance exams before the next university matriculation cycle. Akechi had, more or less, finished his final year of high school. Unfortunately, the less in that statement meant that he had never actually graduated. Still, he could easily pass a high school equivalency exam – an inconvenience, but a bureaucratic necessity, and hardly an insurmountable one. Before his life had gone to shit, he had been on track to get top marks on his entrance exams. It wouldn’t be difficult to keep himself versed in the material he needed to know in order to pass with flying colors.

He didn’t have strong feelings for or against Sae’s vision for his future. Akechi had been slated to die long before he had shot shut the bulkhead door on his father’s ship. He had gone to cram school because it was what the detective prince was supposed to do, and he had excelled at it because the world had told him that he couldn’t. He wasn’t like Makoto Niijima, with her good marks and bright future. 

Sae would pay him for doing this, though. More, she had that earnest look in her eyes behind the stoic contours of her face that suggested she really thought she was doing what was best for him. 

Akechi had agreed to her terms. 

Besides, he’d always been told that college wasn’t in the cards for him. The idea of proving those people wrong lit something up inside him that he hadn’t realized had been smothered until then.

Akechi would work for Sae on weekdays and study on weekends. She would check in with him once a week to confirm that he was indeed making progress on his personal studies and to assign him new memos and forms to copy edit. So long as he was on track, she would pay him another week.

It had all sounded so easy. Too easy. Akechi needed to ask.

“Why?”

Sae had taken a long sip of her cappuccino. “Why what?” 

“You know what.” Akechi had crossed his arms, his mouth drawn in a hard line, “Why this?”

Sae had set her cup down onto her saucer without so much as an audible clink. “Is it really so difficult to believe that I’d want to help you?”

“You pity me.” He’d said it like a fact, because it was a fact, and he didn’t take kindly to it. 

Sae hadn’t looked surprised to hear Akechi’s words. She raised her eyebrows.

“No, I don’t. And I’m not absolving you, either. You made choices that hurt people, and you need to face consequences for that. But, Akechi-kun…” 

Sae paused, as if weighing her next words on her tongue. “Goro. You were sixteen.”

Akechi didn’t know which part of her addendum offended him most: Sae’s use of his given name – he’d bristled, he couldn’t remember how long it had been since someone had been presumptuous enough to call him Goro – or her implication that he hadn’t known exactly what he was doing back when he first approached Shido. 

She hadn’t seen how proud he had been when Shido handed him his first pistol. She hadn’t been there each time he’d pulled its trigger. Akechi had stopped feeling anything about his hits after he’d downed a handful of targets. Through it all, he’d never felt remorse. He’d even smiled, the first time.

That smile hadn’t lasted, of course. It had fallen right along with Ishikki. Still, everyone knows that it’s your first reaction to a thing that really counts. 

Her eyes on his were resolute, as if she were daring him to object. She wasn’t budging. 

Sae had sounded awfully confident for someone who had absolutely no idea what she was talking about.

Akechi remembered their long days at the police station and the late night dinners Sae would treat him to after, when he’d watch as she scarfed down cheap conveyor belt sushi and let her dignified mask slip like the rice that fell from her chopsticks to her perfectly starched dress shirt. He remembered their constant shop-talk that always seemed to border on something more personal. 

Sae knew what it was like to prove yourself in a world that wanted to see you fail. He remembered watching her come undone in October, how he almost felt bad as he watched her slip further away from her sister, and from him.

Gripping his mug hard enough to put its handle in peril, Akechi had bitten back the urge to inform Sae that he was eighteen years old now, and had done very bad things continuously from age sixteen through now, thank you very much. He was suddenly aware of exactly how juvenile it would sound if he did.

He decided that Sae could call him what she wanted. ‘Goro’ didn’t feel wrong, he supposed. It just felt new.

She was wrong about him, but he had let her continue without correction. 

“You did things that were unforgivable. What our system did to you was unforgivable.” She took a sip of her cappuccino. The action was smug, somehow, like she knew just how much she’d gotten away with when Akechi kept his silence. At least she was self-aware. “Masayoshi Shido is being brought to justice, and Kurusu-kun isn’t facing anything that he can’t handle. This will be over soon.” 

Akechi could hardly believe that. While he had faith in Sae’s legal prowess, Shido was just one head of a veritable hydra of corruption and intrigue. Rooting out his conspiracy would air out Japan’s dirty laundry in a way that he doubted the powerful men who soiled it would permit. It would be dangerous business to try.

He couldn’t fathom that Shido was a problem that had an imminent expiration date. He was supposed to be Akechi’s Gordian knot. Shido was his arms race, his mutually assured destruction. Unraveling him couldn’t possibly be so simple, and it couldn’t possibly be done without Akechi. 

Could it?

Where the hell did that leave him?

Of course, Sae’s words were meant to be encouraging, even if Akechi could actively feel his vision tunneling and his pulse jackhammering up. He clamped that feeling down and shoved it somewhere to sort through later – or never – as Sae pushed on.

“I want you to move forward. I don’t see any reason for you not to. That’s where you’ll find justice.”

It all sounded so scripted. Akechi wondered how many times she had practiced her little speech in the mirror after she’d drafted it on her legal pad. He knew it was her standard practice for high stakes days in court. Sae never let slip that she was nervous, but that didn’t mean she never was. 

While Akechi was almost flattered that she considered him worth a rehearsal or two, her dedication had been proving to be rather inconvenient that day. A Sae who had decided she needed to win seldom lost. The Phantom Thieves had helped her reorient her sense of justice towards good ends, but there was no version of Sae who wasn’t as stubborn as the one they’d encountered in her casino.

Fortunately, so was Akechi. 

“I’ve earned execution ten times over.” 

He barely managed to keep his words level as he forced them out. It was vexing that he needed to remind the woman sitting across from him – a public prosecutor with one of the most gleaming case records Tokyo had seen in recent memory – that per the word of her own law, he deserved to die. 

She tucked a wayward strand of hair neatly behind her ear and clasped her hands together on the tabletop between them.

“And I’m telling you that executing you doesn’t help anyone,” she hadn’t raised her voice, but Akechi could hear it harden with authority, “Learn to be a better person. You still have plenty of time to grow. Don’t forfeit this opportunity that you’ve been given to do that.”

He scoffed. “And if I can’t?”

“Then don’t. But I think you can.” 

She had said it without hesitation, like she really believed it. At that realization, Akechi let out a laugh that bordered on a snort, the kind he never would have allowed to slip through his throat when Sae had known him as someone else.

“You’re all insane.”

She hadn’t seemed surprised by his outburst as she took a long drink from her cup. As she swallowed, clearly unperturbed, Akechi found himself wondering if he’d given her too little credit, or himself too much. Probably both.

Sae’s lip quirked up. “Maybe. But I’ve realized that you need to be a little insane to believe you can see the world change for the better. Your teammates helped me learn that.”

Akechi’s hackles raised. “They are not my teammates.”

“Oh really?” She set her cup down onto her saucer, “I think Kurusu-kun would disagree.” 

That half-smile of hers persisted, like she thought she knew something he didn’t. “You know, he asked about you earlier this week. He seemed riled up. I think he would want to know that you’re alive.”

It didn’t even take eyes to notice Akira Kurusu’s bleeding-heart obsession with who he thought Akechi was. It practically radiated off of him in waves you could touch, like he was some sort of sad magnet for homicidal lost causes. Sae wasn’t telling Akechi anything he couldn’t have reasonably inferred, knowing what he did about Kurusu. 

If Sae said that Kurusu was ‘riled up,’ he knew that Kurusu must have been near hysterics. Well, per the yardstick of Kurusu’s typical emoting capacity. He could envision the way Kurusu’s lips had probably gotten all drawn, the way they tended to when he tried to hide that he was feeling more than he let on. 

Kurusu didn’t wear his emotions on his sleeve, but he wasn’t impossible to read if you knew what you were looking to find. His brow had probably furrowed, his fists had probably clenched, and his eyes had probably gone just short of misty. 

Akechi wasn’t sure how he felt about that mental image.

“Well, we can’t always get what we want, now can we?”

“I understand, Goro,” Sae stared him dead in the eye as she said his given name, leaving Akechi no option but to immediately take a good long drink of burnt coffee from his mug. “But consider it for me, won’t you? I don’t think that it would be a bad idea for you to build a support network for yourself.”

 Akechi cursed to himself. He should have known that she wouldn’t let this topic lie so easily.

Akechi grit his teeth. “I don’t think Sakura or Okumura would take kindly to seeing me.”

“Then don’t see them.” She said it matter of fact, like it was that easy. “But, for the record, I think that Kurusu-kun would.”

Of course Kurusu would. Even a child who couldn’t add two and two could piece together that Akira Kurusu would probably lop off a limb to have been in that booth with them that day. The idiot had wished Akechi back into existence and into his life, and he would again if he could.

That was why he couldn’t know that Akechi was alive. 

Well, it accounted for half the issue.

The other half rested on the fact that Kurusu had been the first thing to cross Akechi’s mind in that half second that passed between realizing he was alive and resolving to scream about it. He hadn’t had the decency to fully leave Akechi’s thoughts ever since, with the exception of the several hours he had spent blackout drunk. 

Somehow, that last bit was less than reassuring. 

Even worse, none of it was exactly new. 

The long and short of it was that Akechi needed to get himself clean, and he couldn’t very well do that if Kurusu came chasing after him. 

And so, he made his words as sharp as he could muster. “I think that Kurusu-kun should get a grip and realize that I very sincerely tried to murder him.”

Sae stared him down. He was under no illusions – this was an interrogation. It was a surprise when her gaze softened. 

She hummed. “Do you regret it?”

And wasn’t that a loaded question? 

He regretted that it had all amounted to nothing. He regretted that Shido had played him for a fool, and that on the evening of November 20th, he’d gone home and damn near cracked open his bottle of Shido revenge scotch. He regretted that at some catastrophic point in the past year, besting Joker had become something bigger than besting his father, and that just as soon as Akechi had thought he’d managed it, the metal on metal scent of blood splattering onto the interrogation room’s table from Kurusu’s too-blank face became something he needed to forget. 

Of course, he also regretted that he’d been tricked, and that he’d wasted several nights wide awake thinking about the way Kurusu had looked at him that night in the bathhouse, sweat on his brow and droplets of steam condensed on his irritatingly long lashes, like he had really wanted to be there with him, listening. 

His brief brush with insomnia had cost Akechi twelve dollars in drugstore coffee, five dollars in sugar-free energy drinks, and at least three years of his life, if you accounted for the carcinogens that made up the latter. Akechi did.

At least he’d saved that bottle of scotch. It had gone to waste anyway, but it was more about the principle of the thing.

But he couldn’t very well explain any of that to Sae. So, Akechi had lied.

“No.”

“I see.” If Sae was disappointed in his answer, she didn’t show it. She gave him a nod, drummed her fingers on the table, and checked her watch. “Let me know if you change your mind. I’ll keep your existence to myself until you tell me to do otherwise.”

Sae had swallowed down the last of her drink, and that was that.

Since that day, his life had gone on. He spent his weekdays looking over Sae’s contracts and his weekends grinding out practice problems from study books. Sometimes he would work in his apartment. He’d draw open the blinds and spread his papers across his bed – he had a desk, but it was cramped, his chair was stiff, and he’d never really brought himself around to using the space as it was meant to be used. 

Other days, Akechi camped out in cafés around the city. He operated under the assumption that any place that had the audacity to charge 700 yen for a barely passable latte must have presumed he would use said latte as an all-day pass to free wifi and a climate controlled workspace. Akechi felt vindicated in taking full advantage.

He found that the more tasks he had to fill his time, the less liable his mind was to wander. 

Not that it was always easy. It had been hardest at first, when more mornings than not the was filled with the urge to lay under his comforter and rot through the day. He’d learned quickly that when that urge struck, it was best to call Sae and pick up an extra stack of whatever she could push off on him before her work day started. He would chip away at it during the daylight hours and catch up with his other tasks at night, a can of cold brew in one hand and a highlighter in the other. 

He never slipped behind Sae’s expectations for him, because he was Goro Akechi, and he didn’t let himself lose if he could help it. Still, it wasn’t lost on him that he wasn’t supposed to be alive. Sue him if that got to him once in a while. 

He hadn’t planned for any of this, and if he did anything besides move straight through it all, the shiny paint of productivity he’d slapped over his unplanned extension pack to living would slide right off. It would become obvious that there was little holding his life together besides spite, busywork, and a lawyer who had willfully decided she wouldn’t let him quit as her part-timer, or as anything else. 

Thinking about that never did him any good, so he didn’t. Fortunately, Akechi was no stranger to doing what needed to be done first and wondering how on earth he had managed it after the fact. 

Now, he needed to move forward. So he did.

That wasn’t to say his strategy always worked. 

It tended to happen late at night, when Akechi didn’t have the energy to stop his thoughts from drifting to the subjects his wiser, more conscious self refused to engage. 

Typically, that meant Joker. No. It always meant Joker. Shido, too, but it was infuriating, really, how even those thoughts tended to meander back around to Joker, too. 

As Akechi had taken his post-hibernation shower months ago, his sheets in the wash and grease sloughing from his hair in the suds of overpriced shampoo, Akechi had come to a number of resolute conclusions about the state of his life. Namely, if he was going to continue to live it, he had a few non-negotiables.

To start, he would keep a wide berth from any news outlets covering the Shido trial – he was sure there would be more than a few. He’d find a way to get his hands on another, cheaper bottle of something high-proof. He would learn to use one kitchen appliance besides the microwave. The oven, maybe.

And, of course, he would keep himself far, far away from Akira Kurusu.

Akechi would have liked to think that his thoughts always seemed to land on Kurusu out of force of habit. After all, he’d spent months tracking his every move. He’d never quite learned to think like Kurusu – he doubted that anyone could – but Akechi certainly knew the timetables of the trains he took to get around town, the names of his managers at each of his (many) part-time jobs, and which vending machines he preferred to get his snacks from. 

Had he strictly needed to collect so much information on the leader of the Phantom Thieves in the name of reconnaissance? Perhaps not. It wasn’t as though knowing that Kurusu routinely arrived at his station around three minutes before his scheduled train would actually give him an edge in battle. 

(Akechi of the past had tried to posture that it might, but Akechi of the past was an idiot, and Akechi of the present could admit that.)

He had never been one to half-ass, though, and Kurusu had always been so interesting. His calendar protested his reprioritization, but there was nothing new or surprising about that. The detective prince’s life had been a scheduling impossibility, and Akechi had managed regardless. More than managed, really.

Tragically, ‘reconnaissance’ couldn’t account for the way Akechi’s vision tunneled around Kurusu. It couldn’t explain away the thoughts Kurusu always managed to coax out of his head and into speech. 

So, no. Akechi wasn’t stupid enough to believe that his continued fixation on Akira Kurusu was ‘force of habit.’ It was something much more dangerous, and he couldn’t afford to allow himself to succumb to it. Not after everything.

If Akechi was going to live a life, that life would damn well be his own. He refused to live for anybody but himself, and that included Akira Kurusu.

Still, the version of Akechi that lay awake in his bed at 4am, strung out on caffeine, had been known to have other thoughts from time to time. When his eyes were bloodshot and jargon swirled on his ceiling, he thought back to the look on Kurusu’s face when he had caught his glove. Cocky – Joker always was — but something more behind that. Akechi could only describe it as the expression of a boy missing something he hadn’t yet lost. 

It had taken him too long to realize that Kurusu had known exactly what the glove had meant from the moment it had been thrown. It had taken him even longer to realize that Kurusu had understood it better than Akechi had. 

It was enough to make him want to tear Kurusu apart, nice and slow, piece by piece. It was almost enough to make him want to reach for his phone.

He didn’t, of course. There was a lot of power in ‘almost.’ It meant that he was in control.

It was easier during the day. Sae always had something to shrug off on him if he needed it. 

Of course, there was also the pesky matter of his father.

That day at the café, Sae had mentioned that she’d spoken to him. Shido had said that he wouldn’t implicate Akechi in his trial. Apparently, he’d expressed regrets about his treatment of his son. 

Akechi hadn’t asked her for more information. She had already said too much. 

Once, there had been nothing Akechi wanted more than to hear his father drool out how big of a mistake it had been to leave him. Now, the thought of Shido feeling at all guilty, or heaven forbid, apologizing to him, made bile rise in the back of his throat.

Just one hit, and Akechi would want another. There would be nothing of him left. It was a trend, it seemed, that Akechi needed to learn when to keep well enough away from people he’d let spin him in circles.

Fortunately, he had always been a quick study.

Akechi hadn’t tried to contact him, and he and Sae hadn’t discussed Masayoshi Shido any further since. 

Given his track record with all things luck and Shido related, Akechi really should have expected that decision to come back and bite him. 

The rabid dog that was the universe’s refusal to let Akechi live his life in peace caught up to him one day in early June. Coming home from a coffee shop, mini-mart sushi in hand, he’d seen it. 

He had thirty days to vacate his apartment, because of fucking course he did.

Akechi felt six years old again. Seeing the notice pasted to his apartment door, he may as well have been holding his mother’s hand. He felt it clench around his pudgy fingers tight enough to hurt. He knew that she didn’t mean it. He knew that she hadn’t meant to fall behind on rent, either. He knew that some nights at her club were lucrative, and that some mornings, she couldn’t find it in herself to get out of bed. Their income had never been stable, and neither had their address.

But his mother wasn’t there, she hadn’t been for a long time, and Akechi was the only one responsible for the little crescent-shaped indents in his palms as he stared at the paper on his door and tried to will it away with the sheer force of his – in his humble opinion – very justified righteous anger.

He’d called Sae immediately, right as soon as he’d ripped down the notice, gone inside, and poured himself a drink. Apparently, all of Shido’s hidden assets had finally been frozen. Even if he wanted to continue to pay Akechi’s rent, he couldn’t. Akechi hadn’t been affected until now because Shido had, prior to recent events, had his apartment bills set to auto-pay from one of his more clandestine bank accounts. 

That was something that even now made the part of Akechi’s brain that had stayed young and poor recoil. To have so much cash that a transfer of that size could simply be counted on to go through every month, no risk of declining – from an auxiliary checking account – seemed almost gluttonous. 

Well, the payment had finally bounced, it seemed. Nobody was untouchable. It would have been more gratifying if Akechi weren’t the one being left high and dry. He had hung up the phone and downed the last of his drink. His mediocre room-temperature sushi forgotten, he’d taken a seat on his floor, opened his laptop, and typed in a preliminary search for Tokyo-studio-cheap. 

That brought him to now. It was remarkable, really, how his day had only managed to get worse and worse in the hour that had passed since then.

Staying in his current apartment simply wasn’t an option. Akechi had tucked money into his savings account during his time as the detective prince, of course, but even the sizable amount he had slowly accrued for himself over the last several years wouldn’t be able to cover more than a month or two of rent in the place Shido had picked out for him. It had a separate kitchen, living, and sleeping space, alongside a full bathroom. It was fully renovated and featured in-unit laundry. It even came with a parking spot (not that Akechi owned a car, could drive, or feasibly use his space in the garage in literally any capacity). 

All of it had been an undeniable power play on Shido’s part. The place really was too much for him. It was a needless show of excess – an in-your-face sort of look what I can do for you, aren’t you scared to lose it?

Sure, Akechi could spend three years worth of residual earnings on thirty extra days in this place, but all it would do was buy him time, not to mention drain the last financial cushion he had left. He needed to put down a deposit on another place, after all. His bank account would be running on fumes after that, and rent at his new place would be due almost immediately. 

Fuck. He’d almost forgotten his utilities. His phone bill. His Wi-Fi. He didn’t need to be a genius to know that any day now, those expenses would hit him too.

Shido would be burning in hell for a whole host of reasons – Akechi knew this, because he’d spent the last several years of his life passively looping his long, long list of them through his head like a rallying cry. It was always a solid hit that got his head where it needed to be to do whatever he needed to do. This newest slight was a tiny drop of water in the ocean of ways his father had wronged him. 

Still. If there was any justice in the world, Akechi would be allowed to spit on his father during his fiery descent. Just a little bonus to him for needing to go through this after everything he’d already endured.

All roads led to moving. May as well get it done sooner rather than later. 

Akechi would need to pick up a second job to somehow come up with the difference between his dwindling savings account, Sae’s weekly commission, and the cost of living accommodations that would let him avoid adding to his death toll. It would be a less insulting prospect if any of the studio apartments he would be able to afford after that looked remotely liveable.

This one said that the paint on its walls might contain traces of lead, and that its landlord wouldn’t be held liable for medical damages that resulted from it. That one had visible mold on the bathroom tiles, even in the very obviously postured online listing photos. He shuddered to think of the state of that shower if he saw it in the flesh. 

Every listing Akechi had looked at so far seemed to come with its own set of shockingly diverse hazards, their one continuity being that they evoked similar feelings of dread in the pit of his stomach. The ones that didn’t come with a laundry list of health and safety violations stated up front that they required an application pre-screening. Akechi’s credit score was perfectly fine – the detective prince had always paid off his statements in full, and on time. What he didn’t have were two good references. As it turned out, that was rapidly proving itself to be a serious problem.

Even on a webpage with the best user interface imaginable, the experience would have been bleak. That said, Akechi might have felt slightly less homicidal if the website didn’t reload every single time he clicked the back-out arrow after he decided he wasn’t (yet) desperate enough to risk braving exposed wiring in his combined living-bedroom-kitchen-foyer-bathroom space.

It wasn’t as though Akechi hadn’t expected this would happen – he just hadn’t expected it to happen now. He had wanted to be able to really plan his move. The fact he’d even thought that taking his sweet time could be an option for him was proof that he’d let his guard down. 

He clicked on another listing. Wonderful. This one was just under 150 square feet. He honestly hadn’t known that was legal.

Well. Actually. 

He paused. Zoomed in.

On second glance, maybe it wasn’t so bad. It looked clean, recently renovated. The move-in date fit his needs. It was small, sure, but it seemed like the space was well allocated. He mentally crumpled up his commitment to learning how to use an oven. It wouldn’t be happening in a place of this size, but maybe that was for the best, anyway.

He decided to click the button to arrange a tour with the landlord. Maybe his situation wasn’t so dire after all.

Of course, that was when the website decided to crash.

The noise that wrenched its way out of his throat wasn’t unlike how he expected a dying cat might sound. He slammed his laptop shut and rubbed the heels of his palms into his eyelids. 

He needed another drink.

He poured himself a coffee mug of vodka and water. It was like vodka and soda for people who barely had the means to buy themself vodka, and for whom also needing to buy mixers felt like adding insult to injury. It was disgusting, but a disgusting necessity. Today, his crime against good taste was the housing market’s fault.

He took a sip, grimaced, and climbed into his bed. He propped himself up on his pillows and took another long drink. It didn’t taste quite so bad now that he’d whet his palate. 

Fuck. He hadn’t even had the chance to change when he’d gotten home. He undid the top buttons of his dress shirt where they pinched at his neck. It wasn’t as though Akechi had anyone to look nice for, nowadays, but his wardrobe hadn’t gotten a radical overhaul since the detective prince’s fall from notoriety. He’d worn designer shirts then, he’d wear designer shirts now. They looked slightly worse for wear, but at least that meant they were incrementally more comfortable to wear out now than they had been back in the day.

Not by much. He sighed as the stale air conditioning of his room hit his skin. He took another sip of his drink. Then another.

It wouldn’t be so hard to find that listing again. He was pissed on principle. Websites should work. Apartments should be bigger than closets. You should be able to beg a landlord to let you live in a closet-sized apartment on a website that at least functioned halfway decently.

He took another good long gulp from his mug.

He could have really gone for coffee, right then. Not the glorified overpriced milk you could get from any old chain. The good stuff.

It had been a long time since he’d had good coffee. 

There was only one place Akechi had ever had truly, honest-to-god good coffee.

His cellphone was lying at the foot of his bed.

He could send him a text, right now. Something clever. Akechi knew that no matter what it was, it would shock him, but it needed to be witty, too, because he would expect nothing less. He would kill to see the look on his face. He would look down at his phone, see Akechi’s name light up his screen, and his eyes would get all wide and scared. 

You’ve been alive all this time? 

They would meet up, and Kurusu, he’d be miserable, he’d probably cry or do something equally sappy, and – once he really processed – he’d be mad as all hell. Akechi would laugh at him, say something as snarky as the situation demanded, and watch the anger melt right off of Kurusu’s face in real time. 

Akechi would finally have pulled one over on him. He’d finally win. He could feel the rush already. 

Kurusu wanted to lose so bad, it was embarrassing, really.

Right as fantasy Kurusu threw himself at fantasy Akechi, real Akechi felt a wave of cold dread wash over him.

He walked to the sink and poured his final few sips of vodka water down the sink.

No. Hell no. 

He turned on the tap and splashed cold water on his face. It dripped down his neck. He couldn’t bring himself to mind as it trickled down to the collar of his undone shirt.

He was better than this. He knew damn well that the only one ‘losing’ in the situation his addled mind had cooked up was himself. 

It had only taken half a drink to get him there. 

Fuck. He doused his face in more water for good measure.  

He walked back to his bedroom, unlocked his phone, and scrolled through his message logs to find his last conversation with Akira Kurusu. Taking care not to click anything damning, he swiped to delete it.

There. It was over. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t done that sooner.

He rinsed out his mug and poured himself a glass of water from the tap. It didn’t need ice – he’d already confirmed that it was sufficiently chilled.

His laptop was still on his kitchen floor. Akechi took a seat, cross legged, and reloaded the webpage he had been on previously. Surely, he’d have more luck this session. Maybe he’d even find a place larger than 150 square feet. 175 seemed like a reasonable goal.

He would make this work. He was moving apartments, and he was moving on. He’d managed far more difficult things in the past. 

He looked at his phone, sitting on the floor to his right. He tapped the display once. 

No new messages. And why would there be?

He sighed and got to work.

[indigovigilance]

Aziraphale, Kermit the Frog, and Fraggle Rock

Inspo from @crowleys-hips, images shamelessly ripped from original post:

The costumes and set design in the Book of Job episode were supposedly inspired mostly by The Ten Commandments but I’m ignoring that for right now because this is more fun. Now that I’ve written it, this is actually one of my dark ones.

Ready? Let’s go.

read on Ao3

The Frog Prince

[Source]

Kermit, created in 1955, was originally an abstract character without a defined species. He did not [officially] become a frog until The Frog Prince episode in 1971. At the same time, he gained his pointed collar. Kermit is not the prince in this retelling, but is one of the many frogs, who don’t believe that the Frog Prince is actually human and try to convince the Frog Prince that even if there is a curse, they don’t need to try to break it, being a frog is great!

Sing out for the swamp and sing out for the ooze The life of a frog is the life you should choose Sing out for the mud and sing out for the bog It’s ever so jolly just being a frog We love the old mud hole, we say that we soak The feeling’s so good that we just gotta croak The muck and the mire, the slush and the slime Are the reasons a frog has a wonderful time

It’s a very weird musical number. I have exactly one semester of music theory under my belt but it sounds awfully minor key to me.

It’s very much about bullying someone who doesn’t feel like they belong into conforming. Exchange “frog” for “angel” and we’ve got a pretty on-the-nose parallel story here.

Two Interpretations

First: Aziraphale is a prince among frogs whose unique identity is being ignored. The ones he has turned to for help are ignoring his pleas and insisting that their way is the best way, even though it is clearly not.

Second: Aziraphale is the frog! Kermit gained his collar when he finally began to solidify as a character with a set identity. Both of these themes apply to Aziraphale’s arc in Book of Job.

*topic change*

Jim Henson & Richard Hunt

Coming back to the extreme queer theming of Season 2 (God bless you GO production team) we have a nod to Jim Henson and Richard Hunt. Much like Pterry and the Notorious NRG, both men began their artistic journeys very young. Henson began in high school, where he began developing what would later become the Muppets; he continued his work on puppets on Sesame Street. He is the creator of Kermit the Frog. He’s also well-known for The Dark Crystal and Labyrinth, other queer culture mainstays. Some years later, at 18 years old, Richard Hunt shot his shot and asked for a job puppeteering on Sesame Street in 1972; he got it. He would continue to work as a puppeteer with Jim Henson on the Muppets and related works until he died in 1992 at the age of 40 due to complications of AIDS.

Gone But Not Forgotten || Terry Pratchett

If you have not read my meta on Terry Pratchett’s representation in the Final Fifteen, I will link it at the bottom as well and highly suggest you read it. It’s not necessary reading for what comes next, but it is relevant.

Richard Hunt was openly gay and heavily involved in the New York gay community during the AIDS epidemic. He was in a relationship with a painter named Nelson Bird, who died of AIDS related complications in 1985. There is some speculation that Fraggle Rock Season 5 Episode 7 is an artistic representation of Richard Hunt losing his partner. In that episode, Wembley makes a new friend, Mudwell, played by Richard Hunt, that he abruptly loses at the end of the episode following a confession of mutual affection. You can follow the link below to watch the full episode. The final-fifteen parallel content begins at 12:30:

Gone But Not Forgotten (Fraggle Rock S05E07)

The loss is followed by a conversation between two characters that centers around remembering those who have been lost by keeping the things and memories they left behind, and the partner who [survived] goes through rituals of grieving.

If you scrolled past it but would like to read it now, here’s a link to my meta Terry Pratchett’s representation in the Final Fifteen.

[desafinado]

ooh if you’re taking requests I would love to ask for something kaveh related,, I love him and his recent appearances have me going feral

I was thinking maybe something with an artist s/o?? with his whole arts and romance thing I think it would be so cute 😭 sketching out his building ideas and such together..I just crave kaveh content tbh

✎, ੈ♡ kaveh with an artistic s/o

°｡⋆ kaveh x reader 

°｡⋆ artsy stuff, sickening fluff (yk the drill), love, beloved, dear

note: reader is described to be an appreciator of all art in general (visual arts and writing specifically)  just take what resonates lol, but yeah ^^ also ahh i wrote a song sorta similar to this concept before called “art museum” so i took inspo from that skjfsdf

if you think about it, everything you see has its own artistry, its own beauty; beauty is in the eye of the beholder after all. among all the things and people, however, you found kaveh to be the most beautiful thing of them all.

his creations were just as beautiful, of course. you couldn’t help but adore the details, the aesthetics, the everything. he was clearly someone who created with his heart on his sleeve, and it was why you admired him so dearly.

and while you had this respectful and deep admiration for him, he would only praise you for giving him such inspiration in the first place, whether it be the art you create or the love you give him.

he’d watch in awe, seeing you create visuals that make him swoon, and write words that almost bring him to tears.

if he wasn’t dating you, he’d still definitely be your number one fan.

that being said, you are dating, so expect that you do the most nerdy art things together; going to art museums, painting and wine dates, simply sitting in the living room and reading each other poetry (or even making some).

“hmm, and you were there, a heavenly body, a star, whose presence i had been blessed with.” “k-kaveh! you don’t need to read every poem… haven’t you flustered me enough, today?” “i wasn’t reading that time, beloved.”

everything reminds you of each other; when you both get home, you spend the first 30 minutes telling each other of everything you saw today that reminded you of each other.

more so, when it’s art. you both could go on for hours.

“i saw a newly installed statue today, i think it was a representation of spring, blooming and such?” “hmm… sounds lovely, i’d love to see it and interpret it for myself.” “well, for me, it only ever reminded me of you.”

helping each other with your arts; i mean, art is a form of expression and you think kaveh brings out the best in you vice-versa.

he’ll ask for your opinion on sketches, how he can improve and get his feelings across better. he’ll often feign naivety and ask you to help him draw it, just so he can get you to hold him closer.

“dear… i truly haven’t a clue what you mean. could you maybe guide my hand and help me understand?”

you know what he’s doing, of course, but you’re not complaining. you’ll even tease him and whisper softly into his ear; he asked for it after all.

when you’re writing, painting, sketching or doing anything at all really, you can expect him to be watching. he’ll hum in agreement or gently speak some words of affirmation.

when he notices you being a bit stuck, a bit uninspired and frustrated, or simply overworked, he’ll be quick to coax you into bed to cuddle.

he knows how easily you might get into your head, overthinking your work, critiquing every small detail, so he’ll simply get you to stop thinking period.

he’ll stroke your head, caress your cheeks, and mindlessly draw circles on your neck, while reading you your favorite poetry.

if all else fails, he takes you out to see the sunset/sunrise (whichever is more convenient). underneath the dance of colors, the borders between day and night, he reminds you how beautiful the world is. without over complicating everything, the world simply creates all its wonders as they are.

he won’t let go of you until you get a well deserved night’s rest, and you can always expect to be right there when you wake up.

and you wake up to see that lazy smile of his, slightly squinted eyes and groggy morning voice; there’s a tenderness as he greets you a “good morning, beautiful.” and you know feel all your worries melt away.

you think he’s a being way beyond any piece of art, because he gives you reasons to face the next day, and have the courage to express yourself.

that and you can kiss him silly until you can only say each other’s names.

requests are open!! please do not repost on other sites.

[ladylooch]

Hi, can you please write a timo meier imagine based on this video https://youtu.be/xzZ_oHesy-s, it doesn't have to be christmas themed. Thomas Bordeleau goes undercover at Sharks' Ice (public indoor ice rink owned by the sharks organization, including the sharks offical practice rink) wearing an earpiece while timo, tomas hertl, and erik karlsson tell him what to say and ask through the earpiece and thomas walks up to reader and her friends including the little kids that are with them, who were playing hockey, asks them about their favorite players, reader says timo, and one littie girl in the group points exposes her crush on timo, embarrassing reader, not knowing that timo was listening to the whole thing, so then Bordeleau starts asking reader her age and stuff, and then timo comes out and walks up to reader from behind, which surprises her?

A/N: FIRST OF ALL, I could write an entire dissertation about this video. Specifically at 2:30 when the little kid doesn’t know who Timo is. Timo’s. Damn. Face!!!!!!!!!!! Absolutely hilarious. Also at 2:02 I went absolutely FERAL at how he was leaning against the table. Good god, I need a minute. Don’t even get me started about 2:45 when the Timo thinks we just ruined Santa for that little girl and looks terrified at the camera. I literally kept coming back to the video for more inspo and I just started laughing so much that I got distracted every time.

In conclusion, Thank you for this video 😘 It has given me life. I will be rewatching this frequently.

Word Count: 1.2k

Warnings: None!

Your nanny kid, Gia, is just about to combust at the sight of the Zamboni finally clearing off the ice. She is bouncing on her tiny, Bauer skates with excitement next to the other kids.

“Y/N!” She shrills. “It’s happening! We are gonna go!”

She’s been looking forward to this event for weeks. She wasn’t even sad when her parents weren’t able to make it with her. She knew you would take her. You would show up even if they wouldn’t. Not just because you’re paid to, but you’re a huge Sharks fan and have a glint in your eye for a certain number 28. You know he’s going to be here and your skin buzzes with similar anticipation to Gia’s. Although, if you’re being honest, you’ll probably stay dead silent when it comes time to meet him. This is really Gia’s show, you’re just along for the ride… and the money.

The Zamboni doors close and the little kids shuffle onto the ice with their guardians. The kids were able to bring their sticks, so they skid along to the various pucks the Sharks ice staff tosses onto the slick surface. You’re a decent skater and wind your way around the rink with Gia as she works on carrying the puck.

“Good job!” You encourage her when she is able to keep it on her stick the entire lap. “You’re getting so good, G!”

“I know!” She beams.

A few Sharks players trickle onto the ice including Thomas Bordealau and Erik Karlsson. You have to admit you’re a little disappointed when you don’t see Timo. You thought the flyer said he would be here? Maybe he will be later. Or maybe he couldn’t make it after all.

Thomas Bordeleau skates by once, doing a once over of the two of you as Gia stick handles the puck perfectly. He nods his head in admiration and skates closer.

“Hey ladies, how are you today?”

“Thomas! I’m great!” She cheeses excitedly.

“You know my name, can I know your name?” He wonders.

“I’m Gia! And I’m the biggest Sharks fan you’ve ever met!” 

“Wow! Really!? I don’t know. You’re pretty little.” He holds his hand over her head and she swats at it.

“Not for long. I’ve grown a half inch in the last month.” She’s so proud of that and boasts at him with a smirk.

“Whoa, you’ll catch up to Sharkie in no time.” He points to the Sharks mascot racing kids down the ice around us.

“Yeah.” She grins, showing off her missing front teeth.

“So, Gia who is your favorite player?” He asks.

“Ummmm, well probably Timo Meier because she’s obsessed with him.” She points at you with a glint in her eyes. 

“I wouldn’t say that.” You try to play it off. I mean, she isn’t wrong. The man is beautiful and you have certainly admire his ass…ets a time or two.

“You stalk his Instagram every day.”

“No.”

“You were this morning. You were like, he looks the best in blue suits.” She adjusts her tone to mock you. This kid. If she think’s she’s getting a Happy Meal after this…. 

“Ah… okay. I guess I need to be more mindful of my social media consumption in front of young eyes.” You cough. 

“It’s all good. Timo’s a good looking dude in those tight suits.” Thomas chuckles, pausing for a moment. “What’s your name?”

“Y/N.” 

“Nice to meet you. I’m Thomas. What do I have to do to be your favorite player?”

“Look like Timo.” You joke, trying to keep the mood light. He bursts out laughing, tossing his head back. You hear a slight noise buzzing but can’t quite put your finger on where it comes from.

“I don’t know. He’s a little stuffy with all the suits he wears.”

“No way. He looks like a gentlemen. Then he gets on the ice and blows people up with his checks. It’s hot. You could learn something from him.” The slight buzzing returns, but it’s louder and sounds more like laughter.

“Okay, PR is telling me I need to tell you that I’m currently mic’d up.” Thomas snorts, squeezing his eyes shut as he laughs harder.

“Oh.” Your smile drops. Okay now, it’s not as funny.

“And Timo is listening.”

Your mouth drops open in horror and surprise. 

“Great.” You say with gritted teeth, looking down at Gia who watches the exchange with curious eyes. You’re trying to play it off like you’re not absolutely panicking at the idea of your hockey crush overhearing you obsess about him

“Do you wanna say hi?” Thomas quips, eyes dancing with amusement. 

“Ah…. Hi?” You say, cheeks flaming red.

“He says hi back. Wants to know how old you are.”

“Oooookay.” You laugh off, suddenly. Thomas stares back at you expectantly. “Ah… his age.” You respond with a shrug. 

“And Gia is your…?”

“Nanny kid.” You murmur, watching as she skates along to the boards to retrieve the puck she just shot off the dasher. “Gia, be careful. There are a lot of people out here.” You turn back to Thomas.

“You got a boyfriend?”

“Maybe the person asking you these things should come ask me himself?” You snort, rolling your eyes.

“Okay.” He shrugs then skates off without another word, on to the next group.

But Timo never appears. 

As you’re leaving later, hand in hand with Gia, you see the rest of the Sharks players head out as a big group. Thomas elbows Timo in the ribs and you look away, wanting to die all over again. Not only did you obsess about him, but he never came out to pursue it any further. Knowing you’ll never actually have a chance is a disappointment you’ve never experienced.

“We are going to McDonald’s right?” Gia asks you, all innocent now that she wants something.

“Ah, I don’t know.”

“You promised!” She wails instantly, little face scrunching in irritation.

“She worked pretty hard on the ice as your wing woman, I think you should take her.” You hear a voice behind you. You know it’s Timo and your cheeks instantly flame pink. 

“I don’t know about that. She was spreading secrets out there. Can’t reward that.”

“What if it ends up getting you a date?” Your stomach flip flops. You take a calming breath, looking away like you’re contemplating.

“I guess it depends on with who.”

“Him!” Gia shouts. “Oh my god, are you gonna pass out?”

“Gia, get in the car.” You laugh, shaking your head as Timo chuckles with you. “I think you’ve helped enough.”

“Yes! She says yes!” Gia insists instead.

Timo grins, then looks at you to confirm.

“You going to actually ask me or do we need Thomas to do that too?”

“Can I come to McDonald’s with you?” You close your eyes, tilting your head back and laughing.

“Never picked you as a happy meal guy.”

“I’m a Big Mac guy, but if a happy meal gets me a date, I’m in.”

“No…” You say to him. His eyebrows bolt up in pure panic. “To your earlier question, No, I don’t have a boyfriend.” Relief is visible on his face, making a warm bubble fill your chest. 

“That’s good. Would be kinda awkward seeing him at McDonald’s.” 

“Are we going to McDonald’s or what!?” Gia screeches out the door.

“You sure you wanna go?”

“Yeah. Something tells me you’re worth it. I’ll follow you.” He winks, then walks away to his expensive, black car, leaving you to wonder if this is actually real life.

You find yourself smirking at that image, a year to the day later, while you, Timo and Gia visit that McDonald’s again to recreate your first date.

[archipelago-of-the-lustrous]

Gems in Progress. Chapter 1: the main idea

Hello! Finally the first real post of this blog!

I think it would be nice to not hide the ideas and the way i'm creating this new gem society, and show my work flow and progress in this blog. It will be tagged as #gems in progress, and all the posts will be numbered.

All the explanations will be under the cut.

The inspo

First, I need an inspiration behind the whole aesthetic and new culture these gems people will have.

i already had the idea of setting this Gem Society in a complete opposite to the canon one: on the mountains. So, i opted for the main geographical inspiration to be the Alps.

In my previous iterations of this "gem archipelago" i already had some ideas: an archaic society, roughly similiar to European late Bronze Age- early Iron Age.

From the public library of my town i borrowed this amazing (albeit a bit old- but if you know me, you also know i LOVE old stuff!) and giant book called "Peoples and civilizations of ancient Italy", a super important and informative book series about the pre-Roman societies of Italy.

This in particular is Volume 4, specialising on the ancient civilization of Northern Italy: in particular two of my interest, localized on and near the Italian Alps, the Golasecca culture and the Atestine culture.

This is a rough map of the more or less territories I will use as a base for the setting of my Mountain Archipelago. Deep magenta is he ones i'll use more intensely as a base for my setting, as landscapes and archaeological findings, while lighter magenta will just be referenced, and less archeological sites will be used as a references from that provinces. (original pic from Wikipedia)

Using the SOIUSA (International Standardized Mountain Subdivision of the Alps) partition of the Alps system, the zones i'll mostly use as a base are in the Eastern Alps (coloured in light magenta); precisely I'll mostly use:

28, Southern Rhaetian Alps 29, Bergamasque Alps and Prealps 30, Brescia and Garda Prealps 31, Dolomites 32, Venetian Prealps

And in just few bits and pieces:

11, Lugano Prealps 15, Western Rhaetian Alps (only the southernmost parts) 16, Eastern Rhaetian Alps (only southern parts) 17, Western Tauern Alps (only western parts)

Very important for the civilization of my gems will be the complex system of glacial lakes and rivers that exist in the Lombard Prealps and i will translate to my new Island of the Lustrous. The Gems dont need water to survive, but the Lakes that will characterize the place where they live will bring a special climate for their other needs (sun, textile industry, woodcutting, etc)

Then, later, using my dear Mindat (BEST site for geologists), i'll figure out which mines and minerals come from these specific places IRL, and use exclusively them for the cast of OCs that will live in this Archipelago. (Here, as an example, all the mines and mineral findings in the Orobie Alps in the Lombard Prealps)

Unfortunately, I'll have to say goodbye to some of my (too many) old HNK OCs... :( but i'll gain new. However, now its not time to think about the characters. Firts, I need to figure out where and how they will live, then I'll be able to shape a cast of characters.

In the next chapter of GIP (Gems in Progress):

making a map of the region, and figure out the climate. Then after that we can pass to the society... slowly and steady...

[h00nerz]

h00nerz 1k celebration!

˚⁎⁺˳. ⊹ wowowowow we did it!!! thank you so much for 1k followers!! to celebrate, i am going to be hosting a oneshot game! below i will list the rules as well as some prompts you can use to send in! thank you again!!

RULES!

⊹ i will be accepting requests for mostly txt members, though you may also request enhypen or nct (maybe skz too) members and i may accept if i have enough inspo

⊹ to send a request, please send me the idol of your choice as well as a number from the prompt list. you are also welcome to include some plot points you would like to see, feel free to get as specific as you’d like!

⊹ i don’t write smut, pregnancy or any super dark themes so don’t ask please

⊹ if your request doesn’t inspire me, i might not write it.

⊹ please be patient and nice!! if you’re rude or try to rush me, i won’t do your request.

⊹ UPDATE : please send more hyuka and soobin requests pls pls pls pls pls i’m not accepting anymore for anybody except for him

PROMPTS!

i used this post and this post to come up with a list!

1. “shit, i think i’m in love with them.”

2. “i could never say no to you.”

3. “they would be so mad if they found out.” “fuck ‘em.”

4. “i’m tired of having to pretend we hate each other.”

5. “why are you crying?”

6. “i wish i met you sooner.”

7. “i told you not to fall in love with me.”

8. “let’s not go back. not ever.”

9. “i’d shout it from the rooftops if i could.”

10. “you know i only tease you cause i love you.”

11. “you’re cute when you’re jealous.”

12. “we should compare hands. y know, science.”

13. “you’re lucky that you’re cute.”

14. “i just wanted to make sure you’re okay.”

15. “you feel like home to me.”

16. “how about a kiss before i go?”

17. “you always see the good in people. even me.”

18. “let’s go somewhere. just you and me.”

19. “we’re a team.”

20. “i’m not ever leaving you.”

21. “don’t listen to them.”

22. “i love you. every single thing about you.”

23. “i’m not blushing. i don’t blush.”

24. “friends kiss each other, right?”

25. “i was sort of hoping you needed me. is that selfish?”

26. “i want to deserve you. i’m trying to deserve you.”

27. “just let me look at you for a little bit.”

28. “i never realized how much i needed you until you weren’t there.”

29. “look at me.”

30. “is this what you think love is?”

31. “i didn’t know where else to go.”

32. “you don’t mean that.”

33. “i can’t pretend anymore.”

34. “you’re all i can think about.”

35. “i am so very in love with you.”

36. “it’s you. it’s always been you.”

37. “i cannot stand you, and yet, i cannot fathom being away from you.”

38. “you are everything. everything.”

39. “no one will ever come close to you.”

40. “you’re so cute when you’re half asleep.”

41. “i’ve kind of been in love with you since we were kids.”

42. “you don’t have to pretend around me.”

43. “all i want is for you to look at me the way you look at them.”

44. “can i convince you to stay?”

45. “close your eyes.”

46. “i really want to kiss you right now.”

47. “everyone else might be buying it, but i’m not. what’s wrong?”

48. “don’t change the subject. i saw you crying.”

49. “i can’t get you out of my head.” “…thanks?”

50. “i feel weird when you’re around.” “do you have a fever?”

[writingwenches]

about me: call me Ed or Eddie~ In my 30s, I work too much to afford to live. Currently live in my own perfect apartment, it’s too expensive, but I’m surviving! I recently moved from an extremely conservative area of the USA Gulf Coast to one of the most liberal states in beautiful mountains with perfect weather. Life’s a struggle, but it’s fun with good buddies! Hit me up anytime, anywhere~

words of fiction

Freedom From (Peasant OC; rags to riches plot) + family tree (fic spoilers) + mothers side Aemma Velaryon (Rhaenyra's nightmare daughter/worst enemy) Aegon and the Targtower Family Roadtrip (family bonding) Helaena and Her Gays (Helaena's queer in my AU)

links

Westeros Zodiac • AU Canon Character Lore • Face Claims to Use • Ask Games • Other's OCs • Fic Recs • Role Playing Guide

disclaimer — feel free to use any of my characters as silly lil pawns or side characters or target practice in your own stories. If anything here gives you muse, use it! Message/Tag me, I’m excited to see where it takes you~

original character tags

Aemma Velaryon

Rhaenyra's eldest daughter. She is angry, and sad, and everything in between. Currently a ward of Queen Alicent. [aesthetic inspiration – Hozier singing "Take Me to Church" at the Victoria Secret Fashion Show]

Lynora Lannister

Grew up as a lowborn peasant, in the backwoods of the Riverlands. She is living in a horror story. Be careful what you wish for, you might just get it. She generally has no idea what is going on in this game of thrones. She can not yet read, she grew up thinking the Freys at The Twins were Lord Paramount of the Riverlands. The targtowers/courtly ladies have convinced her that Lord Larys Strong is the father of Rhaenyra’s bastards rip

Cinda Lannister

Younger Sister to Lord Jason Lannister, Lady of Coin for the Red Keep, First Lady of Honor to Queen Alicent. Childhood crush of Aemond Targaryen. Her age is described as "almost too old to bare children." Aemond has proposed to her on numerous occasions through his youth (and beyond) and she has refused him every time. (Lady of Coin makes sure the cooks/servants have the coin they need to perform their job, a “lower” job, fit only for a women, because it requires speaking to servants lol)

Pyter Royce

The Lord of Runestone, inherited after the mysterious death of his aunt Rhea Royce. He has no proof, but he knows the Targaryen scum was to blame, and he plans to take his revenge on whichever Targaryen he comes across first.

Rahul Qorgyle

Former heir to Sandstone, but after being kicked in the head by a horse, he developed a mental disability.

Beal Marlow

A theater troop actor from Essos, angered the wrong Prince of Astapor and had found himself hiding from the Good Masters in Westeros. He has become a legendary playwright in King's Landing, stealing his ideas from diaries of Old Valyrian's before the Doom. Looks suspiciously like Rahul Qorgyle.

Maeria Estermont

The feisty daughter from the second richest house in the Stormlands. Her parents are known for being embarrasing and harassed Maeria a place in the Red Keep as one of Princess Helaena's Lady in Waiting. Maeria thinks the princess is batty, and has a hard time holding her tongue where insults are concerned.

Oletta Redvyne

the heir to The Arbor, a dragon pit is currently being constructed on the island, mentally engaged to Aegon Targaryen since the age of three, has shaped her entire personality around him, there is no option other than Aegon. There is a small chance she is poising him. (Face inspo: Havana Rose Liu)

Ivyanne Tyrell 🏳️‍🌈

engaged to Aemond Targaryen on numerous occasions against her will, trapped in the Red Keep, living in a horror story. Aemond Targaryen’s number one hater, a sword lesbian. The only child to Lord and Lady Tyrell, there is a rumor she was caldron made. She would rather die than marry a man, and her parents seem to think removing a few fingers could make her see reason. They were wrong. If she is to die, she will die free. On again, off again with Helaena. What started as a way to annoy her nemesis, Aemond, Ivy sometimes finds herself dreaming of the princess. Ivy believes that Lyn MUST marry Aemond, if she has any hope to be free of him. (Face inspo: masc Kirsten Stewart in a dress)

Cordelia Lannister

Younger niece of Lady Cinda Lannister, by way of an elder brother. Both Cordelia's parents passed when she was younger, as has been living as a ward of Cinda, in the Red Keep, most of her life. She is supposed to be a friend to Princess Aemma, but she finds the princess extremely tiring. She has never had to make a decision for herself, and doesn't know if she will ever be able to. She doesn't want the life planned out for her…but what other choice does she have? Her age is described as "almost too young to bare children."

Tatsu of Nossos 🏳️‍⚧️

A Nobleperson from Nososs, a place ruled by dragon lords long ago, but they all died out. Legendary fighter, “dancing master” to Lady Ivyanne. Living as a trans woman in King’s Landing. Maesters are fascinated by Nososs, but most refuse to speak with her for close-minded reasons. Wants to go home more than anything else in the world, but knows she’ll never be able to (unless…)

Emelda Florent

Niece to Queen Alicent, through the Queen's Mother, Lady Floret. Emelda is the only daughter to the current Lord Floret. No one seems to get her name correct, choosing the simplified “Emma” instead. She longs to join the Faith of the Seven, but her father is requiring her to marry to improve their station even higher. Why can't having one queen in the family be enough?

Ima Shett

Thinking is hard, and it is nice when other people do it for you, just like how Lady Ima does her reading, by having someone else do it for her. Illiterate by choice, for the grace of the gods. Life would be so much simpler if Ima could marry her brother, the future Lord of House Shett, Ser Qyle Shett. She is reminded that this is a disgusting thought every time she brings it up, even though the Princess Aemma "gets" to marry one of her uncles. It's just not fair.

Joy Waters

An unremarkable girl, born in a brothel to a whore in King's Landing named Joy, how original. Everything changed for Joy the day a young Prince Aegon Targaryen found himself in her company. He had brought a long a costume for her to wear, and she obliged, and he left, not bothering to take back the scrapes of fabric. But, this was no ordinary fabric, this was the uniform of a maid of the Red Keep, a prestigious position, not held but just any daughter of a whore.

Ryver Erenford 🏳️‍⚧️

The Bolton's got most of their inspiration from the horrible tales of Red Ryver. Born into the body of a woman, Ryver longs to be the best knight and man the Realm has ever seen, even if he has to murder everyone along the way.

Oswalt Frey

The ally, best friend and follower of Ryver. Os once spit his pants in front of a filled crowd of a tourney. His manhood was legendary, and its the current courtly gossip about the Freys. Os is pretty embarrassed by the whole situation.

original lore

Nososs

geography based on Japan, on the other side of the known world, pre-Dawn society, former dragon lords, noble pilgrims

House Stone

Inspired by Mongolian culture, the Newest House of the Seven Kingdoms, sworn as loyal vessels to House Stark, and named a noble house by King Viserys I Targaryen after their economic rise from the sale of ice.

Vaestal Virgins

Old Valyrian Goddess of Luck, Dragonfire, Virgins and Dragondreams // Inspired by the Vestal Virgins of Ancient city of Rome

Tropicos

Coming Soon...