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ace-in-a-shopping-cart · 4 years ago

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Day 7

Prompt: There is a string tied around your pinky the end of which leads to your soulmate.

Word Count: 2,647

Main Taglist: (Send an ask to be added or removed!) @starlocked01, @spoopy-turtle, @lizluvscupcakes, @more-fandon-than-friends, @i-cant-find-a-good-username, @vindicatedvirgil, @star-crossed-shipper, @justaqueercactus, @gayboopnoodle, @sanderssidesweirdo, @the-sympathetic-villain, @8-writes Soulmate taglist:(Send an ask to be added or removed!) @elizabutgayer, @melodiread, @tsshipmonth2020, @mikalya12, @8-writes

Note: I modified the prompt a bit. In this world, everyone can see the string tied around the finger. When the string is intact, it’s red like normal. If the string has been cut, it will turn gray and both soulmates will be seen as ‘lesser people’ for denying their destiny. If a soulmate dies, the string will turn black. Another thing to note is that Logan is asexual. It’s briefly alluded to in the beginning but not brought up again.

Virgil wandered the campus, shoulders hunched in a clear indication that he didn’t want to be seen. He was glad to be able to be here at all after what happened in high school. Even so, he made sure to wear the gloves and stay out of people’s ways. The first semester was hell as he still wasn’t sure how to do anything but still tried. It seemed all his teachers had it out for him on day one as soon as they caught sight of those gloves.

It wasn’t until his second semester that he met someone who wore gloves just like him. He was sitting by himself during the time he’d scheduled for lunch, reading a fanfiction off his phone and trying to block out the world. Someone sat beside him and started watching a nature documentary while eating. He glanced over and frowned in confusion. Before he could gather his things to move to a different seat, the person spoke.

“I see you’re just like me.”

Virgil’s frown deepened. “How is that?”

They held up a gloved hand. “How did yours happen?”

Virgil relaxed into his seat. “I don’t know. I was in the middle of math class in high school.”

They winced, nodding. “That’s tough.”

“You?” Virgil didn’t know why, but he felt a burning need to know their story, to know he wasn’t alone in his struggles.

Their wince turned sour, a look one step away from a glare entering their eyes. “I cut it myself. She wasn’t willing to treat me right, didn’t accept my pronouns and sexuality, so I cut it. I know my worth and she didn’t deserve me. As far as I care, she still doesn’t.”

Virgil nodded, almost in awe of them. “I never met mine but they’ve stayed with me for a while now. I’ve always wondered if I was ever going to be good enough for someone or if I was simply too damaged.” He had no idea why he was telling a random stranger his life’s story but it felt too right to stop.

The stranger shook their head. “They cut it, you didn’t. It’s their fault but you’ve had to live with it. That shouldn't have been the case.” They turned to look at him, a fierce expression in their eyes. “If they didn’t want you, they didn’t deserve you, simple as that. You never got to know them or be known by them, thus it is their fault for cutting it. Never blame yourself for the actions of others.”

With that, they put their headphones back in and played their documentary. Virgil felt his phone buzz and looked down to find that he had ten minutes to get to class. He hastily ripped out a paper from his notebook, scrawled his number on it, shoved it over to the stranger, and ran off to get to class.

He didn’t see the stranger again for a few days but got a text from them that night. They chatted late into the night, talking about classes and life outside of soulmates. They commiserated over their lack of soulmates and the shunning it causes. Virgil was able to complain about his gloves and how much he hated them and have someone agree and understand, something he’d never had before. He was able to understand when the stranger, Logan, complained about the stares they got while washing their hands, how they hated everyone looking at the gray string that hung limply from their finger.

Virgil soon found not only a soulmateless companion, but a companion in academic pursuits as well. They seemed to be intellectual peers so Virgil understood most of Logan’s science babble. Logan seemed to have taken a biologist major as they spoke of creatures found in rainforests constantly. Virgil, on the other hand, was in an arts major, focusing mainly on building models of commissioned structures.

Slowly, brick by brick, Logan rebuilt Virgil’s self confidence. They helped him regain his self love, told him how strong he was for surviving the most grueling years of his life. Logan would never let Virgil apologize for the simple things like running late or using the wrong pronouns for them. They always made sure to let him know that they were not upset and were proud of his progress. Virgil’s sense of self worth grew stronger and larger, finally allowing him to see what Logan had known from the start: Virgil’s soulmate didn’t deserve him.

Over the semester, they grew closer, their bond growing strong. Virgil’s panic attacks lessened, he could stand to hear the word ‘soulmates’ without wanting to curl into a ball and cry, he didn’t jump at the sight of a math textbook, didn’t feel the need to hide his high school passions. He grew enough that he could look at the gloves he had to wear with something other than disdain.

Soon, they had decided to room together the next semester. Luckily, their requests were easily approved as it seemed the faculty were more than happy to have the two students without soulmates room together.

They finished their degrees and managed to graduate without dying, which Virgil counted as a plus. Logan simply said Virgil was being overdramatic. Once they graduated, they found an aquarium with a rainforest section that allowed Logan to work with the animals they loved and gave Virgil a lot of opportunities to make or upgrade different terrariums and enclosures. He was also able to design more enrichment activities for certain animals. They saw each other in the back rooms and in the halls. Most times, they ended up sitting with each other to eat lunch as not many people wanted to interact with them.They still lived together in a small apartment as they didn’t feel the need to move.

Over time, Virgil got to know Logan better and knew he was falling for them. One night, he’d accidentally had too much to drink. He leaned against Logan, who’s arm around his waist was the only thing keeping him upright and relatively stable. Logan deposited him on the couch. “Stay here, I’ll go grab you some water to sober you up.”

Virgil whined, reaching out for them. Once he took hold of their hand, he pulled his roommate close. “No! Don’t go!”

Logan sighed but sat down on the couch anyways. Virgil leaned heavily to the side but before Logan could catch him, his head landed in the other’s lap. Virgil wiggled a bit before he managed to throw his legs over the arm of the couch, fully laying down now. He giggled, looking up at Logan. “You’re really handsome.” He muttered.

Logan smiled fondly, a hand reaching out to stroke through Virgil’s hair. “That’s nice, Virge. How about you try to sleep now?”

Virgil shook his head. “No, no sleep. You’re too nice to me.”

Logan’s smile turned into a frown. “How am I too nice to you?”

“You’re very patient with me, never getting angry at me for jumping at small noises, or randomly leaving a room. You take such good care of me when I’m sick. You’ve treated me with more basic human kindness than most people did during college.” Tears started to slide down his temples but Logan brushed them away. “I love you, L.” Virgil curled up, his face pressed against Logan’s stomach.

Logan stayed still the rest of the night, eventually falling asleep. When they woke, Virgil was moving around in the kitchen. “Sorry, did I wake you?” He asked genuinely.

Logan groaned but shook their head as they stood. “No, but I think we need to talk about last night.”

Virgil nodded, turning the burner off so he didn’t burn the scrambled eggs. “Is this about my drinking? I promise that was a one time thing.”

“No, I trust you on that. I’m talking about what you said to me before you fell asleep.”

Virgil nodded again, shakier this time. He put the dish towel he was holding down. “Oh, that.”

Logan nodded. “I only really have one question for you.”

Virgil looked at the counter, pretending to wipe at the already clean surface. “Sure, shoot.”

Logan put a hand on his arm, staying his movement. “Did you mean it?”

Virgil’s head shot up so fast he was sure he popped something. “Of course!”

Logan smiled, leaning over to kiss Virgil’s cheek. “Good, because I love you too.”

Virgil stood there, dazed, for a few minutes while Logan walked away to shower and get ready for the day. When they came back out, they had a discussion of what their relationship was and decided that they were datemates.

As time went on, they stopped sleeping in separate rooms for one reason or another. Sometimes, one of them couldn’t handle the pressure of the world anymore and ended up crying themselves to sleep on the other’s bed, sometimes they were cuddling and talking before falling asleep. Eventually, they simply decided to share a room. With their combined savings, they toured apartments and found one they liked, with a bedroom they could both make theirs.

A few more years went by and they were happy. When around Logan, Virgil could almost forget about the grey string tied to his finger, the string that decreed he was unlovable, unable to marry, unable to adopt. The string and all implications that came with it ceased to exist the moment he caught sight of Logan.

It was in one of those moments that he knew: he wanted to marry this beautiful human beside him, the one holding him close, the one who makes him forget the world, the one who loves him just as much as he loves them. He also knew that the gray strings hidden under their gloves denied their marriage. Only soulmates bound by a red string could get married, adopt, love.

Virgil raised his head from it’s position on Logan’s chest, looking them in the eye. “Marry me.”

Logan chuckled, a hand running through Virgil’s hair. “I’d love to but you know we can’t.”

Virgil shook his head. “If our marriage would never be legal, why should we use legal means?”

Logan’s smile slid into a frown. “I don’t follow.”

“How does a wedding go, babe?”

Logan’s smile returned at the pet name. “It usually involves the soulmates saying vows and swapping their soul strings, which proceeds to glow golden around the base of the finger while the rest of the string stays red.”

Virgil nodded, his smile growing. “So, let’s do that! We don’t need any witnesses if we’re not able to make it legal anyways. What do you say?”

Logan had gotten a look in their eye while Virgil was talking that he knew all too well. His datemate was plotting something. “Well,” he said finally, “if we’re doing this, I’d want to do it as best as we can.”

Virgil nodded, moving to sit up so he could see Logan better. “Like what?”

“You mentioned vows?”

Virgil smiled, feeling excitement and just a bit of anxiety growing. “That’s doable.”

“I could pick up cupcakes instead of a wedding cake?”

Virgil nodded, grinning. “Would it be too much if I were to wear a suit?”

Logan smiled, leaning in to kiss his cheek. “Not if I wore a dress.”

They continued to plan their ‘wedding’ over the course of a few days, both preparing vows in their free time. Virgil was once asked about what he was doing by a coworker but said he was giving a speech at a relative’s wedding, not wanting to give away that what he was doing was technically illegal.

The day they’d set arrived. It was a joint day off so neither had to go into work. Virgil woke up before Logan did, depositing a kiss to their forehead before slipping out of bed. He ate breakfast, making one for Logan to find when they woke up, before heading to the spare bedroom to prepare.

A few hours later, he walked out to the living room they’d decorated the night before. He stood at the arch of paper links, his gloves discarded and suit on. He fidgeted with the edges, wanting everything to be perfect for Logan.

When they walked out, it felt like his breath was sucked out of him. His eyes swept over Logan’s frame, their dress accentuating their features. Logan’s smile could have sent birds singing when Virgil’s eyes finally made their way back up. He held out his hand for them to take as they arrived. “You look gorgeous.” He murmured in awe.

Logan chuckled, dropping their bouquet gently onto the couch. “Thank you. You look amazing as well.”

Virgil gripped Logan’s hands tightly, knowing he was first. He looked directly into their eyes while he spoke. “I’ve chosen you. To be no other than yourself, loving what I know of you and trusting who you will become. In a world that is based on who you were destined to love at birth, I’ve chosen to love you. It is free will but that does not mean it is false love. I will gladly share your name and care for you, in sickness and in health, in fair weather and storms, in every battle life throws at us. I will stand by your side and fight with you. We shall always be equals in this marriage and I would never wish it any other way. I love you and take you, Logan Croft, to be my unlawfully wedded spouse.”

Logan smiled, squeezing Virgil’s hands before beginning. “All I have in this world, I freely give to you. I promise to love you every second of every day, not just for a moment, nor for an hour, nor for a day, nor for a year, I will love you until eternity ends. Until the mountains crumble into the sea, and the oceans rise to consume the land, I will love you with everything I have. I will put you back together when you are falling apart, I will laugh with you, grieve with you. Our love is unique and something I will cherish beyond anything. I found you without the aid of a string, without anything tying our souls together, and our love is stronger for it. We have fought to love, fought to live in a world that does not want us, and we have grown and clung to each other through it all. I cannot tell where I end and you begin and I would have it no other way. I love you with all my soul and take you, Virgil Storm, to be my unlawfully wedded husband.”

They both carefully untied the gray strings around their pinkies, Virgil tying his around Logan’s left ring finger before Logan tied theirs around Virgil’s. Once they did that, they shared a kiss. Logan was the first to pull back, their eyes going down to look at the soul string tied around their finger.

The part tied at the base was now a glowing silver instead of a muted gray. Following the ends, one ended as normal while the other had grown and now connected to one of Virgil’s ends. His own string was also glowing a bright silver while the connecting string was a soft pink.

Virgil stared in shock before locking eyes with Logan. “Do you know what this means?”

“That people who have cut strings can choose their next soulmate? Or that the prejudice against those with grey and black strings is no longer justified? That we could probably go register at a courthouse and be lawfully wedded now? That-”

Virgil surged forward and captured their lips with a kiss. “It means that no one can tell us we are broken. No one can rip us apart.” He whispered before Logan tilted their head up for more kisses.

#tsshipmonth2020 #analogical #soulmate au #virgil sanders #logan sanders #ace!logan #aphobia mentioned #transphobia mentioned #ace writes

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forasecondtherewedwon · 4 years ago

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Do You Tree What I Tree?

Pairing: Peter Parker x Michelle Jones (Spideychelle) Rating: T Word Count: 8730

For @justmattycakes! Happy holidays!!! Massive thanks to @spiderman-homecomeme for organizing this Spideychelle Secret Santa!

Summary: Home from their various colleges for winter break, MJ and her friends make a day out of going to cut down their own Christmas trees. Being alone in the woods—just her, Peter, and an axe—seems like the perfect opportunity to admit that her feelings for her friend have changed.

“Wine and cider!” Peter announces, jabbing a finger at the car window as they pass a rustic-looking roadside sign.

MJ smirks to herself. His touch will probably leave a smudge on the glass, which Flash will painstakingly wipe clean later. She likes Flash much more now than she did in high school—they all do—but she likes to build up a little vindictiveness towards him in advance, for when he inevitably says or does something douchey.

“Whine inside her, is that what you’d do if you could actually get a girlfriend?” Flash asks immediately. Sweet justification for MJ, though she rolls her eyes.

Flash is driving, but Betty trusts his skill enough to smack his arm from the passenger seat, then turn to smile back at Peter.

“That sounds nice. We should definitely stop on the way back.”

“Yeah,” Ned pipes up. “Maybe they’ll have a fireplace too, where we can thaw our fingers.”

“Babe, I won’t let your fingers get cold.”

“Aw, babe,” he croons, reaching over his girlfriend’s shoulder where she sits in front of him to tangle their fingers together.

“Back to your intense lack of dateability,” Flash persists. MJ swears his original asshole persona comes out so much more whenever he slides behind the wheel of his dad’s Cadillac Escalade. “Are you having a lonely winter, Parker? With only your cold lab bench to keep you warm?”

Next to MJ, Peter sighs and mutters, “Same old Flash.” She thinks he says it only to himself, but he darts a look at her and they share a smile.

“Well, I don’t have your L.A. weather,” he allows, artfully changing topic.

Flash will talk for an hour straight about the numerous perks of attending UCLA, including the constant sunshine, the short-shorts, and the absence of his current listeners. The last they all recognize to be a blatant lie, but they like him enough to let him get away with it. MJ has a special sympathy for Flash in those moments; she’s still growing from the girl she was when they were all at Midtown together, when she found it so much easier to edge away from other people or, when she did interact, to speak defensively, insultingly, and with liberal use of the middle finger. Her communication skills have flourished with not being able to see these people in person every day. She’s actually amazed with how she’s clung to them, certain she’d failed to develop the kind of solid relationships people were supposed to form in high school and that she’d just stagger forward through her fine art degree (PoliSci minor) with a wild hope of connecting to other humans through the doodles that she’s developed into graceful sketches, from sketches to oil paintings with sweep and verve.

The five of them are in their second year at their respective centres of learning now and it feels really nice to gather after living by too-brief text exchanges, missed calls, and videocalls that somebody’s roommate inevitably arrives home in the middle of, loud and invasive. When MJ’s speaking to Ned or Flash, they can push through. They have the boisterousness and, in Ned’s case, natural good nature, to conduct two separate conversations at the same time. Betty prefers to hang up and try at a better time, when they can speak uninterrupted. Peter’s different from all of the above. MJ always sees how he blushes, as though he’s being caught talking to her. It makes her flush in return. There’s no reason for them not to be as close as either of them are with any of the others, but conversations with him make her feel different. Without meaning to, their voices lower and they wander away from whatever topic they start with; on some nights, into the most intimate tracks of their inner lives. She gets why he feels caught to be interrupted because it’s disorienting for her too, being dragged back to the larger world, hearing a voice other than his in her ear. She likes traditional phone calls with him the best because she can lie in bed with her phone pressed to her ear and he doesn’t have to know.

“Are we almost there?” Ned says when Flash pauses in his rhapsodizing of Venice Beach.

MJ, sitting in the middle of the backseat, watches her friend unlock her phone and check the map.

“Yes. Under two miles to go.”

“And we’re super sure about this place?” Ned checks.

“Mhmm. A friend of a friend in my French workshop went last year and got the most spectacular Fraser fir,” Betty assures him. “I saw it at her Christmas party. That’s the one you couldn’t go to because you got the flu, remember?”

“Ugh,” he agrees.

“We passed a tree farm awhile ago,” Peter ventures. “That wasn’t it?”

“Betty told me the owners of that farm own this lot too. It’s cheaper to get your tree here because they don’t tend the lot in the same way,” MJ informs him. She likes the look on his face when he listens. She likes the feel of his leg bumping against hers as they traverse the uneven gravel sideroad.

“Yeah, I think I’ll be making up the cost difference paying for a paint job. I can hear the stone chips!” Flash complains. As if he’s ever paid for so much as a tank of gas.

“It’s an adventure, moron,” she says.

“I wasn’t prepared for stone chips.”

“I told you everything in an email last week, when we were planning this,” Betty calmly reminds him. “We should all be prepared.”

It isn’t visible to her right now, but MJ knows her friend has a shiny, compact saw at her feet, tucked into a neat black case, looking bizarrely like a tennis racket. Her own axe is trapped beneath Peter’s shoe so it doesn’t slide forward under Flash’s seat and slice the soles off his shoes. It’s quite sharp. She made sure.

“Listen,” Flash demands, “I’m the transport. Someone else can take care of the less significant details.”

“That is so fucking dumb,” Peter mumbles.

“What?”

“I said, I hope your feet don’t go numb,” he says more loudly. MJ turns her head, like she’s trying to follow the gentle backwards sweep of falling snow with her eyes when she’s really trying to hide her smile from Flash’s suspicious gaze in the rear-view mirror. “Did you wear waterproof boots and warm socks?”

“Of course. About to make winter my bitch.”

Betty twists to catch MJ’s eye.

“You wanna take this one?”

“Go for it.”

While Betty educates Flash on why that is not an acceptable thing for him to say—not with two of his female friends in the car, or ever—MJ drums her fingers on her knees. Her mittens are piled in her lap for now; despite her natural inclination to insult Flash’s ride, it heats up nicely. Plus, she’s tucked between Peter and Ned. She glances to her right to check on the latter and finds him huffing a warm breath on the window. He traces his finger through the resulting condensation, drawing a heart and writing ‘B+N’ in the middle. MJ glances at Peter and he’s already looking at her.

“So, tree?”

“Yeah,” she says. “I’ve been told to keep it under six feet. A measuring tape and a ladder might’ve been helpful, but there wouldn’t have been anyplace to put the ladder once we got the trees on the roof of this thing.” She smacks the SUV’s ceiling and Flash goes, “HEY!”

“You can just choose a taller one,” Peter suggests, “and then cut it shorter.”

“I feel bad about the waste though. It’s a living thing.”

“I can help you with that.”

“Oh yeah?” MJ’s genuinely curious. She knows May prioritizes Hanukkah customs to keep Peter’s connection to both his ethnoreligious traditions and his lost love ones strong, so she doesn’t know how a Christmas tree fits into that.

“Right before you guys picked me up, May had an idea. She thought it might be nice just to get some pine branches for, like, generic winter decorating and to make the apartment smell good.”

“That’s a really good idea.”

“Yeah. I was gonna grab scraps from where other trees had been cut down, but I can get them off whatever tree you pick instead. Or you can. You have the axe.”

“I’ll give you a turn with it if you help me drag my tree back to the car,” MJ bargains with a smile.

“I can definitely help.”

Of course he can. He could probably carry a dozen trees if he felt like it. Over his head. With all the roots and clumps of frozen earth still attached. But the thought of him hauling the tree back with her rather than for her is something she appreciates. As she nods, she gets the fluttery feeling she’s been experiencing more and more whenever he’s called her this term. Their calls have gotten longer. A younger version of herself would be amazed at the way she can now talk for hours without noticing the time slipping past. And it never feels wasted. Actually, when they aren’t talking, MJ misses Peter. She can’t completely put it into words and so she hasn’t. What she’s done, besides continue to answer every time he calls, is offer him a chance to swing the axe she brought. Romantically, there’s room for improvement.

Their overlapping winter breaks are going to end in another week and she’s scared the calls, as treasured as they’ve become to her, won’t be enough.

“There!” Betty cries. She flings her arm across the dash to point.

“That’s the woods,” Flash says, brushing her off.

“No, that’s the driveway! You’re going to pass it!”

The jarring, inelegant jerk of the wheel as he takes Betty’s directions at the last moment tips Ned into MJ and MJ into Peter. They all groan in discomfort, but Flash seems supremely pleased with himself as he straightens the tires. Off the gravel, their passage between the trees is muffled by the packed snow on the laneway other cars have driven over. There’s a dusting on top as today’s thin flurry continues to fall. As she sits up straight following Flash’s terrible Baby Driver impression, MJ feels Peter’s hand on her back, through her coat, and her face gets hot. Unable to meet his eyes in thanks, she leans towards Ned instead and the two of them stare out at the picturesque scene where low drifts spill over the ground and every pine, spruce, and fir—all dusted in white—looks like the perfect Christmas tree.

“Hats on,” Betty instructs as Flash pulls to a stop next to a pickup truck with a tarp already laid out in its bed, awaiting a tree. “Shoelace check. Gloves and mitts secure.”

“You sound like you’re prepping us to jump out of an airplane,” Flash laughs.

He swings his door open while Betty’s trying to get back into her winterwear checklist with the rest of them, letting in a gust of cold air that disturbs the warmth MJ’s hoarded as well as Betty’s good temper. She reaches across the center console and shoves Flash with both hands, pushing him straight out of the vehicle with a “WHOA!”

Betty’s nonchalant as she flips her mirror down and adjusts the positioning of her pompom hat before stepping out of the SUV herself. Peter and Ned pile out, laughing, and MJ climbs out Peter’s side. Flash is next to the car, brushing himself off.

“I’m going to get sick,” he pouts.

“Say cheese!” Ned encourages, snapping a picture as Betty runs into shot to pose next to her victim, cupping his face between her gloved hands.

“Maybe this’ll make him change his mind about the cider place,” MJ notes to Peter hopefully.

“I feel like we’d be stopping there no matter what,” he muses. “It was either making Flash fear hypothermia or Betty sneaking back to the car first and tampering with his brake line or something.”

“So, which way looks good, babe?” Ned asks his girlfriend.

As she told them, this lot isn’t the manicured family attraction the last place was. There aren’t any employees standing around—easily spotted even as they drove past the tree farm down the road in their orange crossing-guard-style vests—or a map marking which areas are which type of tree. There’s just sort of a main track that’s been tramped down by passing feet leading between trees. It’s easy to see for a ways, but beyond that, the forest grows denser. MJ knows Betty did her homework and can identify tree varieties, and she doesn’t actually care which type she gets. She’s here for the experience, and for the idiot next to her who gives her a thrill every time the nylon sleeves of their winter coats rush against each other.

“Hmm,” Betty says, and strides forward through the narrow entrance. From there, things fan out. She taps her bow saw, now loose, against the side of her leg. “Well, what would everyone like to do?”

“I’m going wherever you are,” Ned vows. She shoots him a soft smile.

“Me too,” Flash decides. “You’ll get us in and out of here fast so we can get warm. Not like Parker, who’ll probably get lost in the first five minutes.”

“What?” Peter asks, insulted. “Will not.”

“Oh yeah? How’s your sense of direction without that robot lady in your head?”

“Karen is not a robot lady, she’s an AI.”

“Same diff.”

“It is not. A robot lady is like what they have on The Jetsons.”

“Whatever. Point is, without your GPS, I don’t trust you.”

“Well,” Peter counters, “we can just look at our phones.”

“Already tried that,” Flash informs him. “I don’t get a signal out here.”

Regardless, the rest of them check.

“That’s alright,” Betty persists, trying to be chipper to maintain group morale, MJ’s sure. “It’s daylight, the snow’s not coming down hard, and nobody’s going off alone. Now, Flash, Ned, and I are going that way.” She points, then glances from MJ to Peter. “Do you guys want to stick with us, or…?”

MJ opens her mouth and looks to Peter, shuffling beside her and doing some sort of best-friend telepathy with Ned, based on the stupid, scrunched up looks on their faces. Is he going to say something? He’ll probably want to stay with Ned. It’ll be weird if she speaks up for both of them. But if she doesn’t, when are they going to talk, just the two of them? Since they’ve all been back in the city, everything’s been done in a group—buying presents for friends and relatives, going skating, getting hot chocolate, attending Flash’s ugly holiday t-shirt party (L.A.-themed, so no sweaters allowed). The woods though. The woods are quiet and friendly and private. Snow muffles sound, fresh air and cold wake her up and fill her lungs until they burn with everything she’d say to Peter if she just had this opportunity. No Ned and Betty hanging back to offer encouraging looks, no Flash to ruin everything with a terribly timed innuendo. MJ just needs Peter. Just her and Peter. Please, dork, she thinks, don’t say Ned.

The words come from her.

“I think Peter and I’ll go that way,” she declares, nodding sharply in a direction that isn’t Betty’s.

“Yeah,” Peter adds.

Oh, thank god, MJ thinks.

“He’s gonna get you lost,” Flash warns. He’s already stamping his feet like he’s freezing to death on the spot, though the cold isn’t that bad with the tree cover. “Then he’ll go nuts in the woods.”

“I have an axe,” MJ reminds him flatly. She glances at Peter. “Bring it.”

Peter snorts a laugh.

“No one will be re-enacting anything that remotely resembles The Shining,” Betty instructs. “Meet back here in, how long, do you think?”

“Depends,” Flash says. “How long should we wait before declaring those two missing and sending out a search party, of which I will not be a member, but will be happy to direct from the comfort of the Escalade with a hot drink in my hand and my feet against the heating vent.”

“Dude, don’t do that,” Ned pleads. “You’ll make the whole car smell like your feet.”

“My ride, my rules.”

“Should we just…?” Peter asks MJ. She nods.

“Let’s go.”

“Ok, um, an hour!” Betty decides.

Peter gives her a thumbs up and the two of them follow the path as it diverges, then cut away again, wading through ankle-deep snow where no other tree-hunter has walked today. The sound of Flash goading the other two fades. MJ stops for a minute and turns to watch them march into the trees. She takes a deep breath in and out.

“You good?” Peter asks.

“Yeah.” She hefts the axe onto her shoulder to look more lumberjack-esque (and so she doesn’t slice it into her calf as she walks). “Come on.”

Despite promises to share, she refuses to surrender the tool any sooner than she must. Soon enough, she’s huffing, face passing through damp clouds of her own breath and chilling her flushed cheeks and frozen nose. Balancing her temperature out here is a tricky thing; as long as they keep moving, as they are, she stays warm, but with Peter crunching along in the snow beside her, she’s too warm. MJ bites her mitt between her teeth and unzips her coat a little to let the brisk air circulate around the back of her sweaty neck.

“You’re not gonna catch cold?” Peter asks solicitously.

She shakes her head.

“Ok,” he says, “but it’d be just like you to get sick and say nothing about it while Flash complains all the way home that he is sick when nothing’s wrong with him.”

“The only thing he’s suffering through is his body’s natural rejection of us. He spent too many years thinking he was better than we are just to end up right here, hacking down Christmas trees together.”

“Probably caroling,” Peter guesses.

“Probably. He claims his favourite holiday song is the instrumental version of ‘Carol of the Bells,’ but that has to be a lie.”

“My money’s on something super cheesy.”

“Mine too,” MJ agrees with a grin.

Gradually, she slows, taking in the pine trees around them. Her guesstimation is that some of these go up to ten or twelve feet, but there are shorter options tucked in between. Younger, or those that maybe didn’t get as much light as they grew. She wipes the back of her mittened hand across her forehead, pushing her slipping fleece headband back where it’s been sliding forward.

“So,” she asks, “any of this look good to you?”

She lowers her gaze to find Peter hastily averting his from her face.

“That one?” he says, pointing to a tree at random.

“Peter, that one’s longer than Flash’s SUV.”

“Oh. Right. Um, ok…”

Focusing now, she watches his upturned face and the serious expression that sinks into it, the way snow’s been sinking into her hair. Maybe Betty was right about wearing a hat, though Betty’s hair is also significantly flatter than hers and thus more conducive to hat-wearing. Well, it’ll be fine. They aren’t stranded or anything and the snow’s not getting to them as much as it was when they had to walk across the clearing to reach this stand of trees. They’re sheltered here. As MJ hoped, it’s quiet.

Instead of asking Peter how much of his remaining holiday he’d like to spend with her, or how he feels when she forces him to hang up the phone first (he must notice), or why, exactly, he was so quick to agree to go off into the woods with her when he could just as easily have insisted they all stay together, she criticizes the first tree he takes genuine interest in.

“Crooked.”

“Too dense.”

“Too sparse.”

“Weird empty area.”

“I swear to god, something moved in there, Peter. I do not want a fucking National Lampoon Christmas, ok? My mom will freak out if I bring a live squirrel into our home.”

He’s laughing at her when they finally spot one that looks pretty good: shorter but not squat, full but with soft, long needles rather than nasty ones bent on treating them both to non-consensual acupuncture if they stand too close. It doesn’t look sickly or as though it’s currently inhabited by birds or rodents.

“So young,” MJ does note, assessing its size in comparison to a taller tree a yard away. “Oh well.” She raises the axe and adjusts her grip.

Peter goes scrambling backwards, almost slipping, then tries to pretend he was only calmly moving out of the way, that he is not afraid of the radius of her swing. When he starts babbling about how quickly his body could probably heal from an axe wound (though, with all the crazy shit he gets up to, that’s actually not something he’s experienced yet), she finally laughs at him.

“Relax,” she says. “You can just hold the branches up at the bottom while I chop through the trunk.”

Fearless—and even more determined to prove it now that she’s given Peter a scare—MJ drops to the snow and wriggles under the tree, as close as she thinks she should be while still being able to swing the axe. Peter’s hand makes her jump. She whips her head around, nearly getting a clump of needles in the eye, but he’s only skimming her coat by accident as he gathers the lowest branches away from her. As she asked. Right, he’s not touching her on purpose and he’s not even doing the not-touching activity on purpose but because she told him to. He’s trying to help. Frustrating.

She props herself up on her elbow and takes an awkward whack at the tree. The blade sinks into the bark like it’s supposed to, but it’s still somehow surprising to feel the give. MJ takes a few more tentative swings and the axe sinks deeper, requiring some force to yank it out again. She grunts and hears Peter crouch down behind her.

“Is it going ok? Can I do anything?”

“Umm, maybe be prepared to pull the top of the tree in the other direction so it doesn’t fall on my head. I think I’m almost halfway.”

“Yes, please don’t make it fall on your head,” he requests.

“It won’t as long as you do your job,” she promises gruffly, hewing in once more.

“Do you think this would be easier with a saw?” Peter’s voice is higher now, coming from the other side of the tree. Though the branches fell when he changed position, she can feel them only resting lightly on her as he holds the top of the tree away. Probably standing on his toes.

“Don’t say anything against my axe.”

“I’m not! I was just thinking out loud!”

“A saw,” MJ informs him with another swing, “is not as badass.”

“Good point.”

But is he just agreeing because the tree’s starting to topple and the final swings to break through it take her blade closer to his shins as he dances out of the way? Maybe.

She clambers out and, with the tree now on an angle, is able to chop from an upright position, down on a diagonal until she buries her axe in the snow, then yanks it free.

“Oh, you can lay it down,” MJ tells Peter when she realizes he’s standing there with his arms full of tree, face hidden as he keeps his head pulled back from the branches.

He does so gently and then they stand there in triumph. MJ hurls her axe into the ground.

“Would you quit that?” Peter requests, jumpy.

She grins.

“Sorry. Just really feeling this.”

“I can tell.”

They took their time making their selection and can do one of two things next: either trim the branches for Peter to take home to May right here or drag the tree back to Flash’s SUV and perform the necessary amputations there. They do neither. MJ shrugs her shoulders and flexes her fingers inside her mittens, exorcising the tension of gripping the axe’s handle. She turns, glancing casually around, but really looking for something invisible—a reason to stay. A rational delay before rejoining the others.

“Hold still,” Peter says, as she’s looking back the way they came. The way she thinks they came. They stomped around this area, circling every tree, for a while, so the footprints are a little confused.

“What? If you try to tell me there’s a squirrel in my hair, I’m not going to believe you.”

He smiles softly.

“No squirrel, just snow.”

She stares at her friend warily as he approaches, then sweeps snow from her headband. That’s when she realizes one side of her coat is soaked from lying on the ground. It can’t get through though, it’s just the outer layer. Still, Peter walks a complete circle around her, wiping snow away.

“There,” he says.

MJ sighs.

“Peter…”

“Yeah?”

His face is so open as he looks at her, flakes flying around and between them. Her heart squeezes almost painfully because there have been so many days of not seeing his face without the assistance of a screen. Now that he’s here, it’s too much.

“Umm… how many branches do you think May wants?”

MJ crouches and puts her back to him, feigning being deep in concentration over the fresh Christmas corpse splayed out in the snow. She feels like a detective at a crime scene. Peter exhales heavily behind her, then drops to her level.

“More is probably better, right? She’ll probably take some in to work or try to give them to the neighbours anyway.”

“True.” They both reach for the axe. “Go ahead,” MJ says, quickly withdrawing her hand.

Peter shaves off what he thinks May might like—plus at least an armload more—in quick slices and snips.

“Jeeze, this thing is sharp.”

“I know,” she says proudly.

“I want one. For the suit, I mean. You think that could work?”

“Well, you already have a bunch of less probable-sounding features, so why not a spider with an axe made of webs?”

“Ned’s gonna be so excited when I tell him.”

“I’m excited,” she says, maybe a little too forcefully. It’s not a competition. She doesn’t think he’s already forgotten about her. There’s just some kind of glitch in her brain-to-mouth connection that no Spidey tech could possibly fix.

“I think we’re ahead of schedule,” Peter tells her.

He pulls out his phone to check the time while MJ cleaves into the fallen tree’s trunk, cutting it down to a size more suited to transport and her family’s apartment.

“We could do this in two trips,” he presses. “Take the tree and come back for the branches? Or vice versa?”

“I think we can manage it in one.”

She glances at him and he looks mildly frantic.

“Or two,” MJ amends. “Two would be better.”

Are they finally going to talk? That has to be the reason for Peter stretching this out, doesn’t it? But he moves quickly to grip the lowest branches of the tree, down where MJ severed it, and she grabs those on the opposite side of the trunk. After a jerk to get it going, they slide the tree smoothly over the snow, leaving a fine trail of needles. It occurs to her, as they walk, that she was worried about this part on the way in here, that the tree might pick up dirt from where others have walked, but the ground looks fresh and sparkling in the sun. That’s not familiar.

“Peter? Are we going the right way?”

“What? Yeah. Aren’t we? We have to be. Because the sun was…”

He gestures very unconvincingly overhead and her heart plummets in her chest. For once, not because she’s scared of saying something about her feelings for him and hearing they aren’t reciprocated, but because what Peter’s not saying directly is that they might be lost. And the worst part of that scenario is Flash being right. No, no, no, Peter will not make Flash right, not today.

“It’s been snowing,” she reviews. Stupid and obvious, but facts are soothing to her. “How much do you think it’s snowed? Not that much, right? It can’t have. We must’ve just started walking the wrong way.”

“Definitely. Ok, let’s turn around.”

So, they swing the tree with them and strike out in the opposite direction, not going very quickly as they navigate the trees. They pass the stump they lately created and MJ plucks her axe from the snow on the way past. It just makes her feel better, having it.

Unfortunately, this way isn’t correct either.

“Alright,” she says slowly. “What the fuck.”

“Let’s leave the tree for a minute.”

They set it down. She realizes she’s sweating.

“How could we be lost? How could you be lost?”

“There aren’t exactly landmarks,” Peter says. “It’s just… trees.”

“Maybe we should’ve gone to a place with signposts and neat little rows.”

“That doesn’t sound like you.”

He wanders over to her, watching her with careful eyes.

“I wasn’t this cold when I called today an adventure.”

“Maybe you should zip your coat back up.”

But she’s too warm and uncomfortable to do that just to challenge how he’s calling her bluff.

“Are you scared?” he asks. “You don’t need to be scared. I think we did a lot of circling. We didn’t walk too far in any one direction. I could climb a tree and look around?”

“Climb a tree? One of these trees? The ones covered in snow with the thin branches and the spiky needles?”

“Hey,” Peter jokes, hitting her arm with his elbow, “you’re supposed to be cheering me on.”

“I…” She closes her mouth. He frowns.

“Is something wrong?”

“We’re lost and Flash is going to gloat.”

“Besides that.”

“You’re trying really hard to get us out of here.” That should be a compliment, a commendation, but it sounds accusing as it leaves her mouth. MJ feels on-edge, heart beating all wrong.

“…Should I not be?”

God, she’s being strange. She can feel herself being strange. Everything’s aligning to buy her more time and she’s panicking trying to work out what to do with it. The snow is falling softly all around and she’s auditioning to play the most awkward protagonist in the history of Hallmark holiday movies.

“Are you looking forward to going back?” MJ asks abruptly.

“To the car?”

“To school. In January.”

“Umm, kinda? I mean, it’s going well. But you know that, we talked about this stuff the other day when you and Ned were over at May’s.”

“Yeah.” She’s thinking, staring down at her cut tree, debating how to mention that there’s one thing they didn’t talk about, that she couldn’t bring up, because she felt strange about doing it with Ned there. She goes to continue, unsure of her phrasing, but ready to push onward, when Peter answers, looking thoughtfully up at the pale-grey snow clouds.

“It’s really nice to be home, but I also don’t like living in the past.”

He glances at her to see what she thinks. She’s noticed that he does that a lot, when they’re on a video call. Sometimes, she teases him about it—the way he makes certain assertions sound like questions because he wants her input, values her opinion, thinks of her as wiser than him (she is) though he’s the genius playing around at the upper end of the grading curve in all of his classes.

“Sorry, what were you gonna say?” he asks, spotting the unfinished thought in her expression, how she holds her eyebrows a little too tightly together.

MJ shakes her head.

“It’s nice to have you home.” As Peter’s beginning to smile, swaying slightly towards her, she rambles on, “It’s nice to have everyone home. I mean, I could go longer between having to see Flash in person, but what can you do, right? It’s worth it to have Ned home. And Betty. And you.”

She swallows.

“There!” he shouts, pointing past her. She squints.

“What is it?”

“Our tracks.”

Trusting his superior eyesight, MJ troops after him. Sure enough, their deep treads from earlier are still faintly present—now gentle indents as the snowfall works to even everything out again.

“But we don’t have to hurry back,” Peter says. She avoids his eyes.

“Except we probably do, now that we’ve wasted time being lost.”

“We were never actually lost.”

“Whatever you need to tell yourself so you can sleep at night, Spider-Man. Help me with the tree.”

He does, then hightails it back to collect May’s branches once MJ’s in the clearing with only the little trail left between her and the makeshift parking lot. She pulls her bounty along and through the gap, suddenly back with the rest of her friends.

“Did you manage to lose Parker out there?” Flash asks immediately. “Nice. Up top.”

She rolls her eyes instead of meeting his hand in a high five.

“He just had to go back for something,” MJ explains, expressly for the benefit of Ned and Betty.

“What’d he do, drop some of you guys’ sexual tension in the woods?”

Flushing with the sting in the air and self-consciousness, she walks past Flash. Just close enough to drag the tree over his feet and make him start whining about getting dirt on his blindingly-white designer snow boots. When his complaints cut off, she knows she’s in trouble. It’s like the sudden silence in a horror movie that you just know means nothing good.

“Never mind,” Flash says loudly. “Sexual tension present and accounted for.”

MJ whirls around to see Peter’s arrived and is staring at her with a pleading look on his face. Or he was, until Flash’s words sunk in. Surely, Peter’s fast enough to snatch his keys, toss them to Betty, and have them all climb into the SUV and wheel outta here, leaving Flash behind? But during the holidays? She’d feel bad. He’s lucky.

“Can we just get the trees loaded?” Peter asks, moving to help MJ pull hers closer to demonstrate that it’s not so much a question for Flash as a demand for him to shut the hell up. Flash probably doesn’t understand. He’d need tact for that.

“Fine. And not a scratch on the Escalade,” Flash commands.

He opens the trunk to reveal a set of carefully folded tarps; they’re too ratty to actually belong to him, so MJ’s betting that they’re Betty’s or Ned’s. Those two went on a big, romantic camping trip together right after high school graduation, so these could be remnants. The first tarp crinkles in Peter’s hands as he pulls it out and unfolds it. Beneath the second—removed by Ned—there’s a Burberry blanket protecting the SUV from the tarps. Honestly. Momentarily forgetting about their awkward moment in the forest, MJ catches Peter’s eye and nods at the blanket. The two of them start laughing and soon, Betty and Ned have spotted them and are laughing too. Flash is perplexed, which, as always, is when he gets grouchy and defensive.

“Can we pick up the pace, people?” he requests. “I need a hot drink and an even hotter fire. I can barely feel my fingers.”

“Wait.” MJ frowns and pauses in assisting Peter with dragging the longest tarp onto the roof of the SUV. “I have a tree, Ned and Betty each have trees… Flash, where’s your tree?”

She turns her head and notices Ned just cutting off a gesture of slicing a hand across his throat to insist on her not finishing that question. Betty sighs and explains.

“Flash’s service came back while we were out there.”

“Dude,” Peter huffs, stretching to reach and finish tugging the tarp into place, “you had service? You could’ve texted us to see if we were, I don’t know, lost.”

“This should come as no surprise to you, Parker,” Flash says snootily, “but I had other priorities.”

“Oh yeah?” MJ questions suspiciously.

“He went online and bought an artificial tree,” Betty says with a roll of her eyes.

“Sacrilege.”

“More like brilliance,” Flash corrects. “It has snow-encrusted branches, pre-strung lights, and the thing isn’t gonna die in a week, so it’s better for the environment.”

“Isn’t it plastic?” MJ checks in a slow voice, waiting for him to catch on.

“Yeah.”

“Then the process used to produce it created harmful emissions and when you find it next year and decide to throw it out because you’re no longer ‘feelin’ it’ or whatever excuse you have, it’ll go straight in the trash and from there to one of the many, many local and international landfills that house our city’s waste.”

“You’re pretty judgy for a girl who just fucking murdered a tree.”

“I did my research,” MJ counters easily. “This is a sustainably managed forest. They maintain the trees, protect new growth and transplant saplings every spring to ensure the health of not only the cash crop, but the forest as a whole. Pre-light that, dickhead.”

Feeling flustered, she goes to give Betty and Ned a hand with positioning their tree on the roof. MJ stands on the ledge offered by the open trunk and stabilizes the tree while the others guide it into position.

“Tension,” she hears Flash diagnose under his breath. He’s smart enough to not meet her eye when she glares down at him.

They encounter a small problem while loading the second tree: both Betty and Ned have selected especially full specimens. Side by side, they take up the entire roof, and MJ’s tree is still on the ground with Peter’s mountain of branches, waiting to be slung onboard.

“I don’t think it’ll fit,” Ned says after jumping into the air twice to take a look at the available space (none).

“Neither do I,” she agrees. “Guess it’s going in the trunk.”

“In the trunk?” Flash is there in a, well, flash. He slipped into the driver’s seat, ostensibly to doublecheck their route home, but really to start his seat-warmer and turn the Christmas radio station back on. His distress is juxtaposed against a jazzy rendition of ‘Winter Wonderland.’

“Yeah. There’s nowhere else.”

“Guys, please. Are you trying to get back at me for the sexual tension comment? It’s forgotten. I lied. No tension here. Cut the act and tell me that thing’s going on the roof with the others.”

“While ‘that thing’ is a capitalist nexus, it’s also a precious symbol of everything I love about Christmas,” MJ says firmly, “and it’s going in the trunk of this SUV.”

“Guys?” Flash glances at the other three, but nobody sides with him.

“Don’t worry, Flash,” Betty says kindly. “We won’t use the second tarp to go on top of the roof trees, we’ll line the trunk with it instead. There won’t be any needles, I promise.”

That is definitely not a promise she can make, and MJ’s sure her friend is aware, but she’s taking a shortcut to winning this standoff and MJ admires that. The placating seems to wash over Flash like the spirit of Christmas over Scrooge McDuck. Suddenly, he’s smiling.

“Yeah. We can do that. Of course. But.” Oh no. The smile’s warping. Flash is about to be an asshole again, MJ can see it coming fast on the horizon. “The tree’s going to take up more space than just the trunk.”

MJ peers into the SUV. Shit. He’s probably right.

“Oh,” says Betty, not getting the issue, “well, we can fold the seats down, right? The tree isn’t that tall. Come on, guys, we’ve had real problems. This is nothing!”

She beams at them and Ned wraps an arm around her, hugging her to his side.

“We’ll lose a seat in the back,” MJ says.

She’s profoundly annoyed by the satisfaction on Flash’s face as she’s the one to say the words, point out the obvious. Isn’t she always? It feels like her role in this friend group and she never minds that, never has until this very situation and its inevitable conclusion.

“Somebody’s gotta sit on somebody else’s lap,” Flash singsongs. “And it’s not me because I’m the driver!”

The other four look at each other.

“Betty,” Ned begins, “you and I could…”

“But she needs to be in the front to navigate,” Flash irritatingly points out, “and before you say it, you shouldn’t double up in the front. It’s not safe.”

Maybe they can back over him when they steal his ride and drive out of here, MJ theorizes. She sighs. Loudly. Vexedly.

“I’ll sit on Peter.”

She proceeds to make eye contact with none of them, just fishes a sloppy coil of rope out of the back and works with Betty to feed it over the trees and through the windows. Some cold air will blow into the SUV, but that won’t matter so much to her, she guesses, since she’ll have the benefit of Peter’s body heat. Who needs a seat-warmer when you can have an actual human lap? Ugh, no, not funny, but she tried to consider it in a way that doesn’t make her want to volunteer to sit in the trunk with her tree.

Finally, they lift her tree and Peter’s branches inside, position them, and shut the trunk. Flash is whistling ‘Carol of the Bells’ as he practically skips to the driver’s seat. Betty, far more compassionate, gives MJ a reassuring look before she gets in. Then Peter climbs into the back, taking the middle seat, and glances at her, lingering in the snow. She groans to herself and folds into the car as Ned gives her an encouraging pat on the back.

Maneuvering is awkward. Peter cranes his neck back like his whole body is leaning to make room for her, but it’s not possible—he’s already pressed back against the seat. She sits. He rustles beneath and behind her. Before she can panic and insist on walking home, Ned gets in and slams the door closed (Flash complains).

“Uh,” Peter starts, “do you wanna shift forward so I can buckle my—”

“Absolutely not. If we’re sharing a seat, we’re sharing a seatbelt. I don’t want to end this excursion by flying through the windshield when Flash swerves the car off the road because he sees a snowdrift that looks like a butt or something.”

“Hey! I’m an excellent driver,” he complains, starting the car.

“I could just, like, hold onto you?” Peter offers.

MJ’s heartbeat rockets. She presses the top of her head to the ceiling to ground herself.

“No. We’re using the seatbelt.”

Peter stretches it away from the seat and holds it for her to grab; she passes it back for him to fasten. The second it clicks into place, Flash throws the SUV into reverse and hits the gas. Peter must move his head away from behind hers because MJ’s genuinely surprised not to feel his nose break against the back of her skull.

“Excellent driver, huh?” she questions flatly.

“There was ice.”

“Sure there was.”

Flash winks at her in the rear-view mirror and instead of siding with her, MJ catches Ned chuckling.

“I’m sorry, but it’s funny. You guys look ridiculous seatbelted together,” he says.

But she doesn’t feel so much ridiculous as confused and on alert, swaying with Flash’s accelerations and decelerations (thankfully minor compared to how he started off). Every time, Peter’s hands jump to grab her: shoulders, waist, legs. Once, he grabs her hands and even though she still has her mittens on, dripping melting snow onto the seat on one side and the tree branch she’s clutching on the other, it’s startling.

“Sit still,” Peter tells her when she jerks out of his hold.

“You sit still.”

He laughs.

“I can’t go anywhere—you’re sitting on me.”

“Then try having less bony legs,” she suggests, though they both know the nerd has more muscle mass in one of his legs than the rest of the SUV’s occupants have in their entire bodies combined.

“Right up here!” Betty directs. “We have to pay.”

MJ sags gratefully into Peter, relaxed for the first moment of the short drive from the lot to the tree farm. She tenses up again when they pull in and Betty offers to be the one to hop out and pay for their trees. There is no reprieve from Peter’s lap. She hands over her cash to her friend with a sigh and listens while the trees are removed from the roof, shaken by a machine to rid them of loose needles, and replaced for transport home. When the trunk opens and the tree farm guy slides MJ’s little tree free, she shivers at the cold air blowing in.

“Take off your mitts and put your hands by the vent,” Peter suggests.

MJ looks around and sees that the only vent she can reach is the one their feet are bracketing, down by the floor. She fights the grip of the seatbelt to bend forward. Ah. Hot air on her freezing fingers, plus, she’s out of the draft coming through the open trunk.

“This is better. Thanks, dork.”

She glances back and spots the stricken look on her friend’s face as he watches her, still seated on his lap, but now bent over. MJ sits swiftly upright.

“I’m actually not that cold,” she says, spine rigid beneath her coat and her sweaters.

Peter sighs and, while Ned’s looking out the window to watch her tree get vibrated and wrapped, tentatively offers MJ his hands. If Ned notices that they’re holding hands when the SUV is completely repacked and they’re on their way to the place with the wine and cider, he doesn’t say a word about it. It’s shared body heat. It’s a survival tactic. That’s what MJ tells herself as she finds her and Peter’s fingers moving gently from a perfunctory clasp to intertwining.

They stay that way until Flash pulls off the road at the cider spot, which turns out to be an apple orchard. Well, more than just the orchard; there’s a whole barn here, but fancy, with a designated lot and possibly a restaurant inside.

“This is so cute!” Betty says.

MJ concentrates on shaking her hands out of Peter’s before Flash puts the SUV in park and turns around to see them.

The two of them are the last out of the car and she’s stiff with the silence, listening to their friends laugh and gripe about the cold (Flash) as they wait with Ned’s door open. Before MJ can push through her thoughts and fears to say anything, Peter’s arm comes around her. Her eyes widen. …And he unbuckles the seatbelt. Probably just because she was taking too long. She slips over into Ned’s vacant seat and is about to scramble out when Peter catches her hand. MJ turns.

“Will you tell them we’ll meet them inside?” he requests.

Heart hammering, she relays the message, then looks on as Ned and Betty hustle Flash through the doors before can make another of his unwelcome comments or otherwise interfere.

“I think we really need to talk,” Peter says, after MJ pulls the door closed to preserve what little heat is left in the vehicle.

“We talk all the time,” she argues. She thinks, Yes, please talk to me.

“About a lot of stuff. You know, most stuff.” He wedges his fingers under the edge of his hat to run them nervously through his hair.

“That’s a generalization, but a fair one.”

“But, you know, lately, I’ve been, uh, wishing that we could talk about…”

“…even more stuff?” MJ guesses, hopes.

“Yeah.”

“Me too.”

“You know, our schools aren’t that far apart,” he says, like it’s the first time he’s realizing this.

She smiles wryly.

“I’m aware. That’s why I came out for Thanksgiving first year when you couldn’t make it back to Queens. Even if we did eat take-out shrimp Pad Thai instead of homecooked turkey.”

“And,” Peter adds, “it’s why I showed up at your dorm to help you study for that midterm you were stressing about in October.”

“And why I picked up when you called me every night,” MJ says, quieter. He smiles softly.

“I was talking about the distance.”

Summoning her courage, she looks him right in the eye and lets her still-uncovered hand sneak back over his.

“What distance?”

“You’re my best friend,” Peter starts. “You and Ned.” MJ frowns. Oh shit. Shit, shit, shit, she’s misjudged this, seriously misjudged this.

“Oh. Well. Great. Cool.”

“No, MJ!” he says quickly, noticing the look on her face. He flips his hand under hers so their palms meet. “I’m definitely in love with you, I just mean… Well, oops, I guess I said it.”

She’s pretty impressed with her own control over her facial features—maintaining a slightly-happier-than-neutral expression—when half of her brain is setting off fireworks that seem to be landing and fizzing around on the other half. He’s in love with her. Definitely.

“For as fast as your mind works, your mouth always manages to get ahead of it,” she observes.

Peter’s expression goes from tortured and fumbling to sharp and decisive.

“That’s good advice.”

“What? That wasn’t advi—”

He darts forward and kisses her, hand emphatically clutching hers. There’s a humorous smack when their mouths separate.

“Oh my god,” Peter says, “I forgot to ask if it was ok to do that.”

MJ smirks.

“My only complaint is that you beat me to it when I’ve been trying to figure out how to do that all day.”

“I did wonder,” he admits with a small smile.

“And you couldn’t have helped me out?” she asks, exasperated.

“A big part of being friends with you is knowing you rarely need help. You’re good, like, ninety percent of the time.”

“What do you do the other ten percent?”

Peter shrugs.

“Kiss you and ask if you have plans for New Year’s? By the way, do you have plans for New Year’s?”

He tries to adopt a casual expression but now that MJ thinks about it, she can’t recall the last time her friend looked at her with anything like mild interest. He can’t pull it off anymore, if he ever could. Apparently, she wasn’t always watching that well, because she clearly didn’t know everything.

Peter loves her. He loves her.

“I have a feeling I’ll probably be available,” she tells him. “I have a bad habit of trying to be where you are.”

“I love that about you.”

MJ kisses him quickly, then shoves him away, nearly into the pine tree resting on his other side. Whoops. It’s just that she can feel how easy it would be to get caught up in this moment, and they’re still in the back of Flash’s SUV. People are waiting for them. She takes a deep breath and gives Peter a searching look.

“If we walk in there like this—” She shakes their clasped hands. “—what do I say?”

“Tell them your hands were cold.”

“I… I don’t want to hide it, I just…”

“I know. It’s ok. It’s new.”

“Yeah.”

Peter nods sympathetically. He’s her friend first; he’s not going to push her to speak before she’s ready. (He probably knows he couldn’t if he wanted to.)

She hauls the door open and they stride through the snowy parking lot together. The sun’s already struggling to come out and flakes whip high into the air, catching in the light. They step inside the building to see brightness streaming through the windows, their trio of friends crowded around a table. Flash seems to be making Ned sprinkle cinnamon into his hot apple cider while he films it—presumably to post for the enjoyment of the Flash Mob. (That’s still going. He has a shocking number of followers.) Betty turns and her gaze slips down to their joined hands. She smiles.

MJ has the excuse ready. When Flash and Ned glance over, she’s prepared to tell them her hands were cold.

She opens her mouth.

“Peter’s my boyfriend now.”

#my writing #spideychelle secret santa #spideychelle #spideychelle fanfiction #peter parker #peter x mj #peter x michelle #peter parker x michelle jones #michelle jones #ned leeds #betty brant #Flash Thompson #nettypot

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evolmaze · 4 years ago

Text

paint and brushes

summary - seungmin comes over to grab some art supplies and a dramatic turn of events conspires.

paring - seungmin x reader

genre - fluff, angst, | f2l!au, college!au

word count - 3.6k words

warnings - reader gets a little too lost in their own thoughts at one point, but other than that nothing too big to worry about!

The clock had just struck 6pm, and you felt as though you had been living in this day for years. Time had moved at the speed of molasses, and all you wanted was to sleep, but you couldn’t. Your mind was working at 100mph, helplessly replaying every single interaction you and Seungmin had ever had in hopes of finding something to prove that there was any indication you two were more than roommates, more than friends. But it’s difficult to differentiate when Seungmin was just being nice versus when he was flirting, since the boy had always been sweet, always been kind, always been a fan of light skin-ship; you were at a loss.

You had never told anybody this, but over the past two years of being friends with him, and eventually becoming closer this fall, you had developed a somewhat compromising crush on Seungmin. It was unfair, really, how much you liked him. You two bonded as roommates over shared favorite shows, bands, and an equal hatred for the couple that lived above you, it was inevitable that you’d ever not fall for someone like him. Someone who was considerate, kind, and funny? How could you not feel a certain way about him? Plus, he was an amazing roommate and friend, always willing to go along with your 2am crackhead excursions in the city, willing to listen to your stories about the latest crazy person who came into your work, but most of all, he was always there for you. He had helped you through some of the toughest times in your life, whether he knew it or not, and he never made fun of the things you were passionate about, no matter how stupid he may have secretly thought they were.

So here you sat, by yourself on the porch, the air still slightly warm from the passing summer’s day, wondering how the hell you were gonna get over this. You had told yourself a year ago that you HAD to get over this crush otherwise your friendship would be at risk, you didn’t want to lose him, especially over something so simply as a crush. Sometimes you briefly wondered if there was a chance he could feel the same, but most times you put it to bed instantly because things like this never worked out for you, so why was now any exception?

Lost in your thoughts, you barely heard the door to your apartment open and shut, confused, you looked at your phone, and saw some missed calls and texts from the devil himself; you had completely forgotten he was stopping by to grab some art supplies for a project he was starting.

“y/n/?” he called

“Hey!” you called back, getting up, and walking into your living room. “Sorry I missed your calls, I didn’t hear my phone at all,” you laughed awkwardly, hoping he wouldn’t ask too many questions. “You just needed the paintbrushes and paints right?” you asked quickly, brushing past him to go to your room. You did your best to ignore how nice his cologne smelled, how even in a simple sweatshirt and sweatpants, he still looked amazing. How fluffy and soft his hair looked, and with the addition of his circular wireframe glasses, he literally could not have looked better.

“Yeah,” he said, following you. “Just the paints and brushes, I should have them back by the end of the week, thanks again.”

“Of course,” you said, opening your door, making a beeline for your chest filled with supplies, you kneeled down to open it, and grabbed a bag full of supplies. “This should be everything, if you need anything else just let me know, yeah?” You asked, turning around to face him again, he had followed you in, but seemed to be distracted by something on your desk. You looked down at your desk, and felt your heart drop.

On your desk was your laptop, and open on the screen was a memo entitled “HELP ME OMFG” you had written in frustration the night before, full of confusion, heartbreak, and sadness; you poured your soul into that memo, confessing everything you were too afraid to say out loud, and that included your feelings for Seungmin. Part of you wondered if he had read that far into the piece or not, but decided it would be best to interrupt his obvious reading before he got too far in, maybe it wasn’t too late.

“Seungmin,” you called a little panicked, and he looked up, “the paint?” you asked nervously, holding out the bag.

“Oh, uh, right, sorry,” he said, reaching out to grab it, a slight redness overtaking his cheeks, from the embarrassment of being caught, you assumed. Your fingers brushed each other briefly, intensifying the hue on his cheeks, and emerging new ones on yours. You two stood there for a second too long, even as his arm dropped to his side, your eyes stayed trained on the space in which you had touched. You looked up to find him already staring at you. He looked like he had something he wanted to say, but was afraid to break the peaceful air that had settled between you both.

“Right,” you muttered, clearing your throat, you blinked, trying to rid yourself of the comatose state you were in. “Um, if you don’t have anything else going on tonight, wanna hang out and watch a movie or something? Unless you just want to go home and go to-”

“I’d love to,” he said, grinning at you. “Wanna watch that new thriller they just put on Netflix?”

“Oooh yeah, I’ve been wanting to watch that, let’s do it!” you agreed, grabbing a couple of blankets from your bed, and following him out of your room. You both prepared for the movie, making popcorn, turning off the lights, before settling down on your couch, an extremely comfy couch considering you got it second hand at a thrift shop. You sat next to Seungmin, decently close enough that if you tried, you could touch shoulders just by leaning a little to your right, but far enough away that it didn’t feel too weird.

The movie played on the screen in front of you, and it was good, just as good as the reviews made it sound, so good that even with Seungmin beside you, you felt slightly freaked out. When a sudden jump scare appeared on the screen, you jumped, unconsciously curling into a ball, and hiding your face in Seungmin’s chest. You felt his chest shake as he laughed, amused at your response.

“Scared?” he teased. “Just a little,” you laughed weakly, still willing your heart to stop racing, but with you suddenly being in close proximity to Seungmin, you had a feeling it would take more than a few deep breaths for your heart to slow down. Just as you were about to move back to your original position next to Seungmin, you felt his arm come down and pull you tighter against him. “I’ll protect you,” he mused, and as if it was even humanely possible, you felt your heart hammering even faster in your chest. You wondered if he could feel it beating, you hoped he couldn’t.

A few minutes passed by, no words were exchanged between you both, and yet the initial adrenaline had not worn off yet. You were afraid to move, afraid that any sudden movement would cause him to loosen his grip on you. You would be lying if you said you didn’t thoroughly enjoy sitting with him like this. You two had sat somewhat close before, but never for this long, and thus your heart had still not recovered, and it was almost if as more time passed, it continued to speed up. You tried to relax, really you did, but when you’re that close to someone like him, and all you can smell is him, and all you can feel is his chest rising and falling with each breath he takes, is it anyone’s surprise that you’re not entirely okay?

“Are you okay y/n? Your heart is practically beating out of your chest right now.” Seungmin asked, a hint of amusement in his voice.

“I’m fine,” you croaked out, trying your best to laugh it off. “Just peachy.” You must not have done a good job at convincing him though, because suddenly the movie paused, and you felt him shift beneath you.

“You don’t sound fine,” he questioned, damn him and his perceptiveness, you thought. “Did I do something?”

“No!” you said, biting your tongue as you responded way too quickly. “No, uh, no, you’re fine, you did nothing wrong, you’re perfectly fine, you’re perfect-” you shut your mouth, quickly realizing you were rambling, realizing if you kept talking you’d say something you’d regret. He didn’t say anything at first, and the longer time went on, the more anxious you got, you tried to calm yourself, you really did, but you could feel it in your throat, your eyes, your chest, you felt yourself falling into a pit of despair. It felt like an eternity before he said anything.

“I don’t believe you,” he mused, slightly moving his hand up your arm, goosebumps appearing along the trail his fingers went. You went rigid at the movement of his hand, he sounded like he knew something you didn’t. Maybe he had read far enough into your memo, you mentally cursed yourself for leaving your computer open at all, you prepared for the letdown of the century. “y/n?”

“Yeah?”

“Did you mean what you wrote?” fuck. He did read that far. “Did you mean what you wrote in that memo, about me?”

“Which part?” you croaked, slightly shaking from nervousness.

“All of it.” he asked, his hand still moving up and down your arm. “I just need to know if you meant it or not.” he sounded calm, but his voice wavered a little at the end, how odd. You should be the one who’s nervous not him.

You pondered on if you should lie or not, on one hand, you tell the truth and it’s out there for the world to know, but if not then you have to figure out how to cover up for the memo. It was simple really, you could never hide from him, not about something like this, especially not about this. “I-I meant it, all of it,” you said, holding your breath. Your face could not have been redder than it was at this very moment. You thought back to what you had written last night, what you had written about him specifically.

I literally can’t do it anymore, the love I feel for him is so immense and intense that I can’t hardly take it anymore. I love him with all my heart and there isn’t anything I can do about it. He’s so kind, so generous, so sweet, so thoughtful, so fucking funny, he’s everything I had hoped for and more and I love that we’re friends, I really do, I wouldn’t trade our friendship for anything in the world, except maybe for one thing; I’d do anything to be with him, be with him as more than just friends. Nobody gets me quite like he does, nobody has as much in common, no one understands my weirdness quite like he does. He never complains, he never raises his voice, always agrees to work things out, try new things with me, and never makes fun of the things I enjoy, and I love that about him. You know what else I love about him? His eyes, they’re beautiful, and I especially love when he wears his glasses and his hair is all crazy and fluffy, he’s literally never looked better in his life than he does in those moments, he’s so cute and hot and attractive and handsome, and he can’t ever know I feel this way or I’d literally die right then and there...

And here you were, dying, in his arms, wishing the world would swallow you whole. “I-um” you clear your throat, suddenly needing to be as far away from him as possible. You stood up, missing the warmth from his embrace, but desperately needing to get some air. “I’ll let you sit with that, and I’m gonna go out onto the porch for like two seconds, sorry, oh god I’m so sorry.” you said, tears forming in your eyes as you practically ran outside. You slammed the door shut behind you, doing your best to ignore his calls from the living room. Gripping the railing, you let the tears fall freely from your face. You couldn’t catch your breath, the embarrassment and defeat you felt too much to handle in this moment. It was all too much at once, too many things had happened for it to end up this way, you had worked so hard to become his friend, and it was all over now. You’re not sure how long you had been out there it felt like hours and seconds had passed, you tried to steady your breathing, but you couldn’t, you couldn’t go back in there, face him, face the truth that you had just ruined the one good thing in your life.

You sat down in the nearest chair, facing the street, using the rail to steady yourself as you didn’t trust your legs, they felt like jelly, and with how much you were shaking, you doubted walking would do you any justice. It sucked, it sucked so much that you couldn’t get this feeling to go away long enough to find someone else to fill the void, all you wanted was to have him in your life, and now? Who knows what’s going to happen now.

You heard the door creak open, you held your breath, briskly wiping the tears from your face, a useless thing to do as more continued to stream down your face. You felt his presence approach you, he was hesitant to say anything, you could tell. “y/n..” he said quietly, “are you okay?”

You sighed, taking a deep breath. “Yeah, um, yeah I’ll be fine.” you wrapped your arms around yourself, suddenly freezing despite the warm summer arm. “You don’t have to be here, you know? I know this isn’t what you wanted to hear tonight, and it’s fine, really, just go home, leave me here to deal with it, I’ll be fine, I’ll-”

“y/n.” Seungmin interrupted you, a little sterner this time. You paused, feeling your throat constrict, your eyes continued to water up, pouring down your face. You stared hard at the ground, determined to look anywhere but at him. “y/n, oh please don’t cry, I’m sorry.” he said, sitting down next to you, and pulling you near him.

“Why are you sorry?” you asked, voice weak and small. “You did nothing wrong, I’m the one at fault here, I shouldn’t have ever written anything like that about you, I know it’s weird.”

“I didn’t think it was weird, I thought it was very sweet.” he said, rubbing your arm like he had done earlier, but this time you didn’t feel so awful. “No one has ever said such nice things about me before, I-I should have been straightforward with you, it was never my intention to make you feel so upset, I just thought it’d be funny to mess with you a little. I’m sorry for reading your personal stuff, but if I’m honest I’m glad I did. Otherwise I would have never known how you felt about me.”

“Oh.” you said, not sure what else to say. “Uh, it’s okay, it’s probably better you know anyway. One less thing for me to stress out about,” you said, forcing a laugh at the end.

“You were stressed out about telling me?” he asked, sounding quite concerned. He shifted, so you were forced to look at him. “Why on earth would you ever been stressed to tell me something like that?”

It pained you to look him in the eyes, see how distressed and sad he looked, you had caused that, if only you hadn’t left you computer open, none of this would even be happening. “Why do you think?” you laughed awkwardly. “You’re my best friend, and on any given day, I’d much rather keep stuff like that to myself in order to keep our friendship, then ruin it over one silly crush-”

“It’s not silly!” he said quickly, you scoffed. “Of course it is, look, don’t pity me, I know you don't feel the same way, and I understand that this is probably going to make things really awkward for a while, but try not to forget about me, yeah? Cause I swear I’ll get over it, I’ll move on, cause like I said, it’s a silly crush and yes, I care about you immensely, and I’d be lost without in my life, but if you need space, that’s totally fine, cause if I’m honest I probably need space to-”

“No, no, no.” he said, interrupting you. “y/n, please listen to me. I don’t want space from you, I don’t need it. Your crush is not silly, none of your feelings are ever silly, your feelings are valid and important.” You were looking down at your hands, at some point he had grabbed them, and had yet to let them go, it was a bittersweet feeling to see you hands together, knowing what you knew. “Please look at me.” he said quietly, and you slowly looked up at him, he looked just about as emotionally distraught as you had earlier, it was a weird feeling, why would he be feeling so desperate in this moment?

“Seungmin, are you okay?” you asked, any ounce of your own despair disintegrating the minute you saw him hurting.

“I wish you knew how much you meant to me,” you gasped, what did he mean? What was he saying? “y/n, you are one of the best people I know, you’re kind, you’re caring, you always laugh at all my jokes, even the ones that aren’t funny, and you support me in everything I do, and I just hope that you feel I do the same on some miniscule level, cause no one compares to you, the amount of love I hold in my heart for you is astronomical, and it hurts me to see you doubt us for even a second. I want you to know that your crush is not silly, I need you to know that the instant I read that memo on your computer my heart stopped because never in a million years did I think you would feel the same way I felt about you.”

He paused to take a breath, his recently ramble causing him to blush a deep shade of red, and sudden it was him who couldn’t look you in the eye. “You-you like me?” you said carefully, not sure you could trust your eyes as this was too good to be true. “You like me, Seungmin likes me--holy shit you like me?” you said talking to yourself more than him at this point, getting progressively louder asmore things connected in your head. He laughed, and it was music to your ears.

“y/n yes, I like you, I have for years now, but I didn’t want to say anything in fear of making things awkward, but I suppose we both were thinking the same thing,” he chuckled, and so did you, how crazy was this? Never in a million years did you think him coming to pick up paint would result in this.

“Holy shit, we’re both so stupid,” You two laughed, and you looked back down at your hands again. “I have no idea what to say,” you said, looking back up at him, his eyes bored back into yours and you swore on your life that you’d never seen anything more kind and inviting than his eyes. “I-if 16-year-old me knew she was going to be living out her biggest hopeless romantic dreams in a couple years, she probably would pass away; hell I might pass away if you keep looking at me like that.”

“Like what?” he mused playfully, lightly tracing your knuckles with his thumbs. “Like I can’t believe I ever got this lucky because the prettiest girl on campus feels the same way about me, and I no longer feel like a dumb idiot for thinking about her every day? Because she likes me too, and I literally could not be happier right now. If you told 16 year-old Seungmin that he’d be holding hands with the most amazing girl he had ever had the pleasure of meeting, I think he’d die too; hell I’m gonna die if you keep looking at me like that.”

You laughed, your heart racing once again but this time for much better reasons, “Like what? Like I’ve won the lottery or something, cause let me tell you, I’ve never been so damn lucky in my life,” you grinned. “Holy shit, I can’t believe this is happening.” you whispered in disbelief. “You really like me?”

“Feel my heart right now,” he laughed, grabbing your hand and holding it against his heart, you laughed as you felt his own heart racing just as fast as yours.

“Guess that makes two of us,” you giggled, unable to keep the smile off your face, you dropped your hands back down to your lap, instantly he grabbed yours to hold. “Well, what do you wanna do now?” you asked.

“Well, it’s what? Almost seven o’clock now,” he said checked his phone. “Wanna grab a late dinner?”

You grinned, “Like a date?”

“If you’re cool with that, I’d love to take you on a date.” he said warmly.

“I’d love to go on a date with you Seungmin.”

_______________________________________

a/n: this is my first post ever aha please let me know if there’s anything you’d like to read about, or any improvements you think I could make!

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snapshotsfromhell · 4 years ago

Text

Please For The Love of God Fall Asleep On Top of Me Again I Haven’t Slept That Well Since I Was Five

Belphie x Reader *NOT MC. MC is referred to in the story as Emsie. Gender neutral pronouns for both Emsie and reader. Mentions of Beel. Yandere tendencies. This is pretty much just fluff. Word Count: 5.3k

“If you were to all refer to the diagram on page 66, you’ll see that the devil-plant cell has a rather large vacuole that makes up a large portion of the volume within the cell-” The teacher at the front of the classroom droned as you clutched your cheeks into your hand, fingers digging into your skin just to stay awake.

You have always been a light sleeper, and joining the Devildom exchange program hasn't done anything to help that. If anything, you went from an acceptable 6 hours a night to 4 and a half, mostly due to the overwhelming anxiety of being away from home and the fear that you will eventually be eaten alive while you took so much as a blissful nap. You didn’t understand how the first humans to go through with the program survived.

At least, you didn’t until you actually met them.

Solomon was a rare breed in and of himself, with overwhelming confidence and an air of superiority. Anyone having that many pacts must have an insane amount of charisma and motivation. He was definitely intimidating to a normal human like yourself.

Emsie, however, was a little different. They seemed like an average human, until someone delightfully informed you that they were descended from an angel. More specifically, an angel that was related to the seven demon brothers that they now stayed with, which made you a little wary when you noticed how… touchy the brothers were with them.

It wasn’t the best situation - who in their right mind would want to stay in Hell of all places? Plus you really seemed to be the only human human here. But it wasn’t any worse than it would have been up home. Honestly, you were doing this for the free tuition and scholarship, but you would never say that out loud. You really couldn’t complain outright, though, since you did live in a beautifully large, ornate house with the demon brothers who were certainly great specimens. Lucifer was God’s favorite and damn did it show.

“Y/N?” You snap to attention as the teacher calls on you. “Can you tell the class how the devil-plant gets CO2 from the environment?”

You stared for a moment, hoping your brain unconsciously latched onto some information while you were spaced out. “The stomata in the leaves?” You hope?

The teacher’s lips pulled back to reveal his sharp, jagged teeth in what you assumed was supposed to be a smile. “Yes, good job!”

You understand that some cruelty is typical in the world, but by God you hated it here. You’re too nice for this, dammit! You cried watching a video of lost puppies being rehabilitated! How were you expected to think this was normal?

When you have to participate in dance battles so that your opponents don’t eat you, you know something isn’t right.

When the bell rang, you stood with a rush of vertigo and started gathering your stuff to go to your next class. One more, then lunch, then two more, then home. Well, dorm. Well, house/mansion/hall… honestly, you didn’t have a clue what to even call it.

You shared a room in the House of Lamentation with Emsie, which was both a blessing and a curse. For one, you didn’t show any emotion around them, so the brothers don’t necessarily hate you for stealing their dear Emsie away. But, you did still share a room with them, which made the brothers automatically disinterested in you. Especially the youngest brother, Belphegor, who had made many negative comments about your existence. Outloud. While you were there. Yeah.

It could’ve been worse, you guessed. They could have killed you.

Emsie explained to you once that he was still hurt by the loss of his sister, and how he spent years hating humanity as a whole until they moved into the house. Which only made you massively uncomfortable. And it only worsened when they informed you that he once strangled them in another timeline in front of them in this timeline. But that was before he knew they were a descendent of his sister! So it was fine, right?? A total accident really, he was different now!

(You were not convinced.)

You did have a few moments of solace with Belphegor, though, and you found yourself reminiscing with them on occasion. Okay, often. Okay, maybe more than often... But who cares? You were just evaluating your interactions to make sure he didn’t have some underlying intention to throw you off the roof in the middle of the night. Yeah, that was it.

As you placed your clothing into your respective dresser (adorned with a glorious added padlock to deter a certain avatar of greed), you glanced into the mirror on the wall and jumped at the figure behind you. You turned to them, and came face to face with a demon. A very pissed off and disgruntled demon.

The look on his face only grew in distaste as you held each other’s gaze. Even your breathing seemed to piss him off. And his words… conveyed the same message.

“Are you lost?” He asked, and his tone was just as cold as his eyes.

“Uh, excuse me?”

His upper lip twitched in a snarl. “I asked you if you were lost. This is Emsie’s room, not your’s.” His purple eyes bore tiny holes into your skull as you shifted nervously.

Grabbing the information packet Barbatos had prepared you guys with, you pulled out the room assignment form and held it out for him. From the safe distance of five feet away, of course. “Uh, I don’t know what you mean, but- here. This is my room assignment packet I had to sign when I got here.” He gave it a glance over and then turned his nose up at it, so you set it back down on the table. “I just got here today so- so I can understand the confusion. Um, especially since I didn’t see you at orientation.” God, why did you have to stutter?

You watched as he scrunched his nose into a look of muted disgust at this revelation, but he didn’t say anything. You both stood awkwardly in a tense silence long enough for you to know he wasn’t planning on leaving any time soon.

You cleared your throat, and flinched when he locked eyes with you again. “Uh, if you don’t mind me asking, how did you get in here?” You asked, tucking your hair behind your ear in a nervous habit.

“I was asleep on the bed.”

You could only tilt your head in confusion at first. “You what?” You asked, but when he only offered a raised eyebrow as a response your shoulders tensed and your face went red. “The whole time?!” You sputtered.

He crossed his arms and leaned against the wall behind him. “Yeah? I was taking a nap until you rudely interrupted me,” He cast a look at you with the deepest irritation that you had ever seen on a person’s face. Well- demon’s face. Actually, maybe it wasn’t so surprising...

“I didn’t know that you were- I mean you were really quiet and- how was I supposed to know-” You cut yourself off and wished to silently stop existing.

The demon ignored you as he moved to Emsie’s bed and began pulling the pillow and blanket off, slowly, while maintaining eye contact with you, and- oh okay yeah that’s- that’s terrifying.

He dragged the blanket along behind him as he headed for the door. You really needed to turn this around. “Uh, hey wait! My names Y/N.”

He stopped before the door, unlocking it as he evaluated you from head to toe over his shoulder, and then left, jerking the door open and slamming it closed.

You later learned his name was Belphegor.

Unfortunately, your next class happened to be english (Devildom english. Which apparently is Australian.) with Belphegor and his twin, Beelzebub, who was actually quite sweet as long as you continually gave him food. Which you did, out of fear for your own life.

Belphegor called it ‘manipulation’, you called it ‘innovation’. Feed the gluttony demon, don’t get eaten.

You politely greeted them as you sat in your seat and handed a grateful Beel a Kitkat bar that you ordered on Akuzon a few days ago when you couldn’t sleep. Belphegor shot you a look as you did, so you pulled out another one and held it out to him. Belphagor rolled his eyes and turned his head towards the front of the class. You could see the smallest hint of a smile on his lips out of the corner of your eye.

You handed another candy bar to Beel, who excitedly thanked you again and ate the entire thing whole. Right in front of you. With the wrapper still on it.

You really needed a nap.

Entering the room you shared with Emsie was always a comforting experience. The both of you shared similar interests and decor, so it reminded you a lot of your room back home.

Emsie really was a sweet person, but you did not understand how they could deal with the demon brothers all day by themself. You liked to imagine that the rational part of their brain jumped ship sometime during their stay the year before and aided them in becoming comfortable in Devildom.

You flopped onto your bed face first, groaning as you wiggled your arm out from underneath you to check the time on your phone. Typically, the brothers and Emsie were busy with student counsel business until 5 and it was only 3 now, which gave you time to relax and, hopefully, take a nap, because you hadn’t been sleeping well and you were exhausted.

That was the plan, until the door opened and Belphegor entered with his infamous blanket and pillow.

You flop to your side as you look at him incredulously. “Can I help you?”

“Sure,” he said, “be quiet.” He threw his pillow onto Emsie’s bed and unceremoniously kicked his shoes off while climbing under the covers.

You huffed and sat up, scowling at the lump of blankets on the other side of the room. “I was trying to sleep, you know.”

The blanket moved a bit to show his face, “Well, so am I.”

“You- you can’t just sleep in here!”

“Emsie said I could.”

You rubbed your eyes with the balls of your hand as you groaned, “They said that last year. When they didn’t have a roommate.”

The cocoon sat up, Belphegor’s very much pissed off face glaring at you. If you weren’t in a spat with him and he weren’t a raging, murderous meaniehead, you might consider him to be quite handsome. Alas, everyone has their limits to how awful a person could be to them. And Belphegor had crossed that line for you a while ago.

You pinched the bridge of your nose. “Look, man, I just want one nap.”

“Then sleep. I won’t bother you,” he said, lying his head on his pillow. Then, his eyes sharpened as his brows furrowed and his mouth was pulled into a frown. “Or, do you not trust me?” He questioned, but it was more like a statement.

Did it look like you ever trusted him? Or any of them, for that matter! How were you supposed to relax and get some sleep knowing you were constantly surrounded by demons who could end you in less than a second. Regardless- “That’s not the point. I just have trouble sleeping in the same room as people.”

“People? Or bloodthirsty demons?” He sneered.

You rolled your eyes and scoffed. “You know what? Fine. Do what you want.” You fell back on the bed and pulled the covers up over your head.

The springs of Emsie’s bed shifted as he laid back down. “I will.”

Belphegor fell asleep quickly, but you ended up staying awake until everyone else got back, and when Emsie came in they weren’t shocked in the slightest that they had a surprise visitor. You excused yourself at their entrance, saying you needed to use the restroom.

As you passed them, you caught eyes with Belphegor, and noticed a distinctive glint of smugness in their purple hue.

Dick.

The next day, Belphegor joined you again during your prime nap time. And then the next day, too. And the next. After a couple days you figured out that he was doing it to mess with you. And drive you insane. Which was working.

After class, you had been stopped to discuss a project. You weren’t sure the suggestions you made were coherent or usable. Eventually, they let you go, and you ambled back to the House of Lamentation. You were really looking forward to getting some sleep, because you hadn’t slept more than four hours in the last five days and it was really starting to get to you.

When you walked into your room to find Belphegor splayed on your own bed, however, you knew that probably wasn’t going to happen, and you were more than a little disgruntled at his presence.

“Excuse me? Can you kindly remove yourself?” You approached your side of the room and stared down at him, one hip cocked with your hand on it.

He hummed, his eyes closed as he lifted his hand to his chin to ponder your question. “No,” he said finally.

Tomorrow, you were going to ask Luke how to kill a demon. “Really? You can’t?”

Belphegor lazily opened his eyes to survey your demeanor. “Yeah, I think I’ve lost the ability to move.”

“Do you need any help with that?” You asked, but upon hearing your own words you blushed red, hoping he didn’t take that suggestively the way it sounded.

Belphegor huffed a laugh as he turned over in your bed, pulling your pillow over his head to block out the light and yourself. “No, I think I’m good for now.”

Your eye twitched. “Ahha-ha. Great.”

You watched as he slowly drifted off to sleep, jealous that he even had the ability to do so after rest had alluded you for almost a week straight. Walking over to the dresser, you snatched a pair of pjs out of the drawer and hastily changed.

Now dressed comfortably, you returned to your spot standing over him, crossing your arms over your chest.

“Belphegor.”

No response.

“Belphegor,” you said a bit louder, with a bit more force. He hummed. “Move over.”

“Mnnnnnnn, no.”

Throwing your arms down, you snarled out a particularly vicious “fine,” and climbed onto the bed over top of him, moving towards the wall side, which appeared to have the most room. He removed the pillow from his head to glare at your disturbance. “If you’re not gonna move then you’re just gonna have to deal with me,” you snapped.

The two of you were sandwiched particularly close as you were only given a twin bed and you unabashedly owned 6 pillows. But it was too late to move now. Surely, he would give up eventually and leave.

Instead, you felt him turn onto his side and prop himself up to look at you. “This is how you wanna play it?”

Your mother didn’t raise a coward. “Yeah.”

Belphegor ran his hand through his black and white hair as he let out a breathy laugh. “Fine then.”

Before you could protest, he moved above you and wrapped his arms around your waist, sliding them up your back until they were against your shoulder blades. He then pushed his head into your chest and underneath your chin, his body situating itself between your legs. Then promptly falling asleep. On top of you.

Maybe this wasn’t an exchange program. Maybe you somehow died and tricked yourself into thinking you were attending school because this was your punishment.

“I’m not your pillow?”

“Y/N.” He grumbled against your collarbone, his mouth tickling you as it moved.

You brought one hand up to rest on his back. “Uh, yeah?”

“Go to sleep.”

By the time that Emsie came back to the room, you had long since fallen asleep. Which was truly unfortunate, since neither of you could stop them from taking a picture and posting it to the House of Lamentation chat.

The next day, you got to your room before him and curled yourself into your pillows, hugging one to discourage Belphegor from making the same advances that he did yesterday. You hadn’t slept last night at all after your nap with him and you were not conscious enough to deal with him before a couple hours of shut eye. You heard the door creak open and burrowed further into your covers.

Only to be pelted in the back of the head by his pillow.

“Hey-!” You turned to get up, but you were immediately hindered by his arms wrapping around your waist once more as he haphazardly dragged you back into him. “Oh no, you are NOT spooning me.”

Belphegor shoved his face into the back of your head, “Too late, you’re really soft.”

“I did not sign up for this.”

“Mmhmm.”

“I’ll get Lucifer.”

“Sure you will.”

You relaxed into the bed even as you continued to protest. “I mean it,” you said, attempting to sound menacing.

“Mmmkay,” He pulled his legs forward and tangled them with yours. “Good night.”

“It’s 2:48 in the afternoon.”

But he was already asleep. Your attempted struggles were useless, too, and you eventually joined him in dreamland after scrolling Devilgram for half an hour.

Spookle, How to express to someone the extent that their presence irritates and soothes you? Seriously, asking for a friend.

For the past two weeks you and Belphegor had been, for lack of a better description, napping and cuddling together.

And, while the two of you still bicker, especially when you go to scroll demontok, you had grown to rely on his presence in order to sleep. You went from a crazed, caffeine dependent loon to just caffeine dependent.

“Hey, Belphegor, do you remember the name of the article that Azazel wanted us to read?” You sat crisscross on the edge of the bed with your laptop balanced on your legs, while a reluctant Belphegor sat at the head lazily scrolling through his phone.

“Wasn’t that an optional reading?” He raised an eyebrow at you.

“Well, yeah, but normally when teachers suggest something they do it ‘cause it’s gonna be on the exam.” You brought your hand up and fiddled with your earlobe, scrolling your school's website for the link. “Besides, I think that the influence of demons on the Australian language is really cool.”

He snorted. “You would.”

You whipped a pillow at him, your cheeks flushing. “Shut up.”

Belphegor caught it with ease and pulled it to his chest. “Do you have to do homework now?”

“Well, no, but I feel like I should. Besides, that means I can sleep more later,” You fumbled for your backpack and went to grab out your calculator.

He was quiet for a bit before he muttered, “Later?”

Looking at him quizzically, you nodded your head, “Yeah?”

The two of you stared at each other for a bit and you couldn’t help but feel like you had offended him in some way. You two platonically cuddled, right? There’s no way that he’d see you sleeping alone to be an act of betrayal, right? It’s not like he was getting upset over you blowing off naptime.

Right?

He broke eye contact with you as he grabbed his pillow and got off the bed. “Whatever, I just remembered I had to be at that stupid student counsel meeting.”

“Belphegor, weren’t you supposed to be at the meetings for the past few weeks?” You shut your laptop as you stood up and got in his face. “Lol, it’s a little late now. Lucifer’s been actively complaining to you every night during dinner.”

Belphegor went to step around you before you caught his wrist. He spoke in a low tone as he looked at you, his hair falling in his face and you had to stop yourself from adjusting it for him. “What is it, Y/N?” He frowned.

Yeah, what was it? Why were you so panicked to see him leave? “I, uh, don’t you want to do homework with me? I mean, I can help you out?”

“No, I think you can do it yourself. I’ll just get Beel to help me.” And with that, he pulled his arm from your grasp, marching towards the door and pausing in the doorway. “Besides,” he started, “I wouldn't want to spook you, with me being a demon and all.”

He noticed?

“Don’t look so shocked. You avoid all of us like the plague. The only two places you could ever be found is here and the academy.” He looked over his shoulder at you, and you could feel the burning sensation from his gaze start in your stomach, blood rushing to your head as you felt your eyes begin to water.

Shaking your head, you felt the tears begin to leak down your cheeks, and you watch his expression turn from nonchalance, to shock, to… something you couldn’t place in your growing rage. “What about you, huh? Don’t you hate humans? I know what you did to this timeline’s Emsie. That’s not exactly saint-like.”

You watched as the color in his eyes began to darken, and for the first time in weeks you began to fear for your well-being. You caught your bottom lip between your teeth as you began to feel the panic welling up inside you, and your eyes must have conveyed it clearly, as Belphegor slammed the door open and left you there, on the verge of sobbing.

Really. What a dick.

God, why can’t you sleep?

You’ve tried to, genuinely. You even acquired melatonin, Nyquil, Sleepy Time tea- hell, you went exercising with a somewhat angry Beel the other day! His rage at you over your… disagreement with his brother could not be quelled by any amount of chocolate and he certainly worked you well into the throes of death.

The worst part is that you are fairly certain that Belphegor knows. Each time you see him in class, you could swear that he has some smirk on his face, seemingly satisfied with the bags under your eyes and your disheveled appearance. His relaxed posture almost screams at you ‘haha, so you do need me to sleep, don’t you?’

During lunch you tended to sit with the other exchange student in the cafeteria hall and today was no different as you slammed your coffee onto the table and glared at your fellow humans for the nervous looks they gave you.

“Um, Y/N, we’ve been meaning to ask this, but- uh- are you ok?”

“Oh, I am just peachy thank you for asking,” You answered, grabbing your travel mug and taking a large gulp. Your hands shook with the sheer amount of caffeine you had consumed in the past twenty-four hours in order for you to keep yourself awake. “Why are you wondering?”

“Well, it’s just… you don’t look like you’ve slept for a bit.”

You glared at them with dark eyes. “Astute observation.”

The group looked between themselves, sharing concerned expressions. “Uh...do you want to talk about it?”

With that, you felt the same numbness as when you tried to fall asleep alone, your heart becoming heavier in your chest as you comprehended the question. Did you want to talk about it? What were you feeling? How could you properly convey your emotions? How you felt about Belphegor?

How did you feel about Belphegor?

You blankly stared at the mug in your hands for a solid minute and you’re sure that your friends probably thought you were crazy. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

They all stared at you, sharing glances with each other at your outburst. “Um-what?”

Before they could question you further, you put a hand up to stop them and shushed them when they tried to speak more. “Shhh, no. Shush.” You put your hand down. “I am going to the nurse’s office, where I am kindly going to asphyxiate myself into the sweet release of death.”

“Um, maybe you shouldn’t go by yourself, I can go with you-”

“No,” you cut them off before they could continue, “I need to be alone for a bit.”

You stood up, grabbed your coffee, took one step, and promptly passed out.

On the bright side, you didn’t have to walk all the way to the nurse’s office. Heck, if you look at it in a certain light, it’s almost like you fast traveled there.

Just don’t think about the fact that someone definitely carried you there. Yup, don’t think about it! You slam your pillow on your face in an attempt to smother your shame, but someone quickly pulls it away from you.

“Y/N, please, don’t do that.”

“Oh! Hey, Emsie! How are you doing?” You sat up in the bed and made a poor attempt at fixing your appearance.

“I’m good… how are you?” They peer into your eyes, a temporary bond forming between the two of you, conveying concern that you really didn’t want to see.

You looked away and chose to focus on the content of your surroundings over the context. “Just wondering which unfortunate soul had to do the honor of carrying my lifeless body here.”

“That would be Mammon and Levi,” Emsie snickered into their hand. “You should’ve seen it, it was quite the spectacle.”

You laughed heartily, “Please tell me someone got a video.”

They glanced awkwardly to the side. “Well, Asmo tried to, but, ah, was somewhat hindered.”

“Oh? Lucifer?” You put a hand over your eyes. “How embarrassing.”

There was a moment of silence as Emsie shifted on their feet. “Y/N, are you and Belphegor-”

You sat up and flung the blanket off of yourself. Nope! Nope, not doing that today. “Thanks, Emsie, for watching over me while I was here, it was really sweet of you. But you see I just remembered that I have to complete my essay on Dante’s Inferno for Azazel or he will probably kick me out of class tomorrow ahaha okay nice to see you bye!”

You snatch up your things and turn to them waving nervously as you try to make your escape, only for them to grab your hand and hold it to their chest. “Y/N, you know Belphegor no longer hates humans, right?”

You could feel your throat closing as you tried to look anywhere but their eyes. Maybe he didn’t hate humans anymore, but he did hate you. You really messed up.

You missed him. “Oh, Emsie, you really are the descendent of an angel.”

It’s not that you were afraid of him. You had actually become somewhat reliant on his presence as a whole. But the idea of admitting that you were wrong about him? That you had judged him based off of gossip? That’s what stopped you from apologizing.

Pacing outside of the twins’ room, you considered the possible outcomes.

1. You confess you’re an idiot and he hates you.

2. You confess you’re an idiot and he mocks you.

3. You stand there petrified for a long time and start crying.

4. You leap out the window.

You’re beginning to think that the last option is the best.

Slapping your cheeks with both of your hands, you force yourself to admit to any sense of defeat and knock before you could rethink it. However, it wasn’t Belphegor who answered.

“Beel? Um, would Belphegor happen to be there?” You glanced anxiously at the demon’s face, twiddling with your fingers as you shifted back and forth.

“Belphie isn’t here right now,” he responded gruffly.

You took a deep breath. “Could you maybe... tell me where he is?”

For what seemed like an eternity, Beel stared into your face, surveying your demeanor and eventually coming to the conclusion that you were worthy. Or something. It seemed cool regardless. “He’s up in the attic.”

Your breath caught as you finally realized how close to confessing you were. Butterflies fluttered in your stomach. “How would I get to the attic?” You have never heard of the attic.

“The stairway is over there.” He gestured with his chin. “Y/N?”

You sucked in a breath. “Yeah?”

He had fire in his eyes when you looked at him. “Don’t mess this up.” Was all he said. Then he closed the door and left you standing there, wondering just what in the world he meant by that.

Brushing off Beel’s words, you tentatively stepped away from the door and made your way to the stairway that Beel had indicated. Steeling yourself, you made your slow and steady ascent to the attic, eventually pushing open the door and crossing the threshold into the surprisingly small room. It was cozy.

To the right of the room, you could see Belphegor asleep on a pile of pillows. Strange, you thought, that a demon could look so angelic while asleep. You hesitantly sat next to him, but when he failed to respond, threw caution to the wind and pulled the same move on him that he had on you so long ago.

Straddling his thighs, you burrowed yourself into his chest, letting yourself become lax as you held him. You tensed when you felt his arms come around you, and he hummed as he was roused from sleep.

“I was wondering how long it would take for you to cave,” he said, pulling his head up from the pile of pillows and those violet eyes connected with yours for the first time in weeks.

You felt the corners of your lips pull down as tears built up in your eyes and you blinked them back roughly. “I’m sorry for-”

“Not trusting me?” He finished for you, hands beginning to play with the hem of your shirt at the bottom of your back.

You looked away as the first tear fell down your cheek. “Yeah.”

“I knew.” Belphegor pulled you closer, moving his mouth to your ear as you comprehended his words.

“If you knew that I was... uncomfortable with you, why would you-”

He quickly cut you off, “At first, to tease you. Then,” he smiled, and you thought your heart was going to beat out of your chest as he shyly looked away. “I did like our naps,” he finished. He pulled his head back from yours. “Especially when it lets me see your sleeping face.”

You could feel that same fear as when you two had first argued welling up within the confines of your stomach, creating a massive ball of tension. “Excuse me?”

“Y/N. I really don’t like it when you show others yourself when you are defenseless.” His arms moved from their locked position around you so that his hands could hold your face gently. “It’s something that belongs only to me.”

For a second, you didn’t live in a world where you attended school with demons. “Belphegor-”

“I’d like it if you called me Belphie.”

You blushed heavily, “Um, Belphie, are you not mad at me?”

He shook his head.

You furrowed your brow as the dark circles beneath your eyes made themselves known.

“Then, why did you ignore me for so long?”

He hummed for a bit. “Because I wanted you to realize you loved me.”

Heat grew from your stomach into your chest and you felt your breath stop as he brought his lips to yours. It was chaste, quick and barely there but it made your face heat up and your heart constrict painfully in your chest.

The tears in your eyes fell freely.

“I guess I really do love you, you jerk.”

Belphie grinned and kissed your forehead. “I know you do.”

#belphegor x reader #belphegor obey me #yandere belphegor #yandere #obey me

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craftypeaceturtle · 4 years ago

Text

Sanders Sides Fic Rec

As a heads up! It’ll be very obvious that I prefer Virgil angst and so there will be a definite bias. Just a heads up! All of these will be on AO3 because... it’s the best haha! Also, I’ve only just noticed that a lot of these aren’t necessarily shippy but hey ho! Anyway, here we go!

What Students Teach- mt_reade, 4,000 words.

Hello! My name is Thomas Sanders, and I just finished my first year as a teacher.

I taught a grade one class this year, at a relatively small school. I’ve known that I wanted to be a teacher since I was young, and babysat for the first time. I just love kids so much, and I remembered how much my teachers had an influence on me growing up. I wanted to be able to do that for others. I’ve known for a long time that teaching is the right job for me.

But, what I didn’t know, is that the teaching goes both ways, and the lessons that my students have taught me this year are more valuable than any of the things that I taught them. I’m writing this now to share with anyone who reads this, just precious few of the things that my students teach me.

(I came across this recently but I just love how simple and sweet this idea is! I love how they characterised all the sides in the perspective of children, especially Remus. I feel like it would be easy to write as absolutely ridiculous but he feels still realistic while still being very much Remus!).

I'll Stay Awake (cause the dark's not taking prisoners tonight) - starlocked, 2,000 words, Anxceitmus

Virgil doesn't get to meet his soulmates each night. No, he has nightmares. His roommate decides to stage an intervention.

(I just love this take on the soulmate idea of meeting up in your dreams. I also like that it was no one’s true fault. It would’ve been easy to say that it was all Deceit’s and Remus’ fault for being terrifying but it’s more nuanced than that! There’s not a lot of shippy-ness but it’s still a soulmate au so there we go!)

(don’t) take this the wrong way- delimeful, unfinished, 7,000 words.

Local shark mer Roman finds a tiny mermaid tangled up in a net in his territory, and enlists his siren friend Patton's help to find a way to free the little guy. Unfortunately for Logan, they end up 'borrowing' a human to assist them in untangling the net. Virgil just wants to get out of this nightmare of a situation.

(Maybe I’m just a sucker for merpeople aus, but this is such a good story immediately. Instantly engaging and I’m keeping an eye on it for any new updates. I may also just be a sucker for misunderstandings which is the main conflict so far haha!)

Centaur AU- KieraElieson, unfinished, 10,000 words

Thomas is hired as a centaur groom very abruptly, and is just a little bit lost, but trying his best.

However, when you think of centaurs more as people with animal-like bodies, and everyone else thinks of them as animals with human-like bodies, disagreements are bound to come up.

(So far it’s pretty much setting up the context and characters but it’s done so effectively! The trauma of the characters is handled so well, hinted at and clearly effecting their behaviour, but not so obvious that you immediately know what’s happened to them. Despite being tagged as ambiguous time period, you don’t even really question when the story is set! It quickly grabs your attention and you focus on the story more than any tiny ambiguous details.)

No Longer Alone- Amydiddle, 3,000 words

Anxiety has been living in the basement of Thomas' mind space for almost two years now. A place were all the host's darkness resides. The small side has learned how to take care of himself and how to avoid the sides whenever he goes upstairs.

Tonight's midnight food run goes a bit differently.

(I am so weak for stories about how all the sides formed and first interacted! I think I just fell in love with this concept! Simple but such an interesting fun read!)

The Worst Thing in the World- Arwriter, 6,000 words

Everyone knows Virgil needs to be handled a little differently. He might not like it, but that’s the way it is, and living with the light sides won’t change that. After all, it’s common sense.

Right?

(The first part in a slowly expanding series, the entire series is sooo good so if you like this one then definitely continue reading! It’s such a well written look into their lives, how they handle conflicts and grief. I love Virgil angst where the others get a look into his previous life, no matter how small and sad that look is.)

tales of reverie- cattonsanders, 40,000 words, offscreen Logince.

Roman loves to read bedtime stories to his kids (even if Virgil says he’s grown out of them), but soon Patton and Virgil discover that the story book their dad has been reading to them is actually a portal to the very kingdom they’ve been told about- not only that, but their dad is the prince!

What else will they find as they venture deeper into this new world they’ve found themselves in, and what other, much darker secrets are being kept from them?

(SUCH A CREATIVE IDEA! I love how the plot always kept me guessing but never in a way that felt cheap or misplaced. Characters were introduced and you were left piecing it all together to figure out if they were trustworthy, which is what the main characters are also doing! Will always recommend)

Caught Red Handed- Wholesomereader, 20,000 words

Virgil doesn't like his dad, runs away, and 'accidentally' steals from a local bakery.

Then, the owner of said bakery hires him.

He's in so much shit.

(I love how this is paced and written out. There’s a lot of themes and relationships being built but it still feels easy to keep track of everything and nothing feels swept to the side or neglected.)

Slither Into Your Heart- Jungle321jungle, 6,000 words, unfinished, Anxceit

Deceit didn’t bother to knock as he slammed the door open and glared down to where Remus sat on his bed polishing his morning star.

“What did you do?” Deceit hissed.

Remus gave him a large smile as he looked him up or down, “Do you have the snakes just up there or are they down below too?”

If asked by Patton later, Deceit most definitely did not try to strangle the other side in that moment. Not all.

~~~~

Also known as:

Deceit is turned into a Gorgon. And the new annoying little snakes on his head seem to have an annoying obsession with Virgil.

(Amazing idea, amazing writing, sweet scenes and just! It’s just a nice read! I love how they write Deceit to be this cool tough persona but also named all his new snakes!)

Wings of Anxiety- ShadeCrawler, 7,000 words

Virgil normally kept his wings pressed tight against his back. He never let them out to stretch when he was outside his room. Yes, they got sore after a little while and yes, it rustled his feathers to the point that it took forever to groom them.

But, he couldn’t take them out. He just couldn’t. Dark Sides didn’t have wings. Only Light Sides did.

(Love me some Virgil angst, add in some wings and I’m in! I also love this idea that Virgil was supposed to be a light side all along but circumstances weren’t as fair. Strong self hatred to make a compelling story! Just yes!)

This isn’t what I wanted, but I’ll take it- Simpleton_Cat, 17,000 words, unfinished.

Thomas didn't think he would ever get pets, much less a cat. But here he was, having four cats, Logan, Patton, Roman, and Remus. And then Remus (God, please exorcise the demon that is most definitely in his cat body) brings home two more and then suddenly he's back at the Vet.

Or in other words: Everyone is a cat and Thomas is their owner.

(Again, such a cool idea! I love how this new context for the characters allow for so many new ideas and characterisations. I love Deceit and Virgil’s relationship and how that has shaped, especially how Deceit’s link to lying is written!)

Changing Tides- LadyoftheWoods, 6,000 words.

Virgil ends up overboard of his father's boat during a storm, and expects to drown in the sea. Instead he is rescued by merpeople, in more ways than one.

(Virgil angst plus merpeople- well hello! I love the slowly forming family relationship between the characters. I also love how Virgil reacts to finding out merpeople exist, feels genuine but not too drawn out.)

A Fanciful Dream- AceDetective, 20,000 words, Prinxiety

Virgil could say with certainty that he was no prince. Found by King Thomas’ chef, lost and with no memory of who he was, Virgil spent his childhood running errands in the halls of the castle. When a young King visits and claims Virgil is his brother, Virgil must determine if this is truth or a young King’s hopeful dream.

(While this is very fast paced, everything feels justified and well explained. The confusion between both Virgil and his brother feels so genuine and well written. The quiet slow reaching out makes sense for the both of them!)

Ten Things- LostyK, 30,000 words, unfinished, Anxceit, Royality

When Roman Prince learns that Patton Foster isn’t allowed to date until his older brother, Virgil, is, Roman is crushed. Roman’s twin brother Remus, however, comes up with a plan: find someone who is willing to date Virgil.

And who better to ask than Janus Verona, who according to rumours is willing to do anything for the right price?

(This is one where I kept a close eye to see if it updates, while a silly idea, it’s so well written! I love how Deceit is written as slowly caring and falling in love while still maintaining his persona, just like Virgil! I also love how Virgil is characterised as his usual anxious self but a bit more persona based like before accepting anxiety)

You Can Picani Family You Want- DramaticGarbage, 20,000 words, Analogical, Royality.

Emile finds himself in charge of two small boys who need somewhere to go. It’s going to be a learning curve for everyone.

(If you love found family stuff then this is it! It’s a series of oneshots about different parts in their lives but I love the themes and how the characters progress through each moment. It’s so sweet and rewarding. Plus it has big boi Roman which is always a plus!)

Fatherly Sides- Bright_Sea, 60,000 words, Moceit

There are good and bad days when it comes to being a father. Deceit and Patton learn all about it while raising their four boys.

(Similar to the one above, lots of found family sweet moments all connected by the larger plots and themes. The angst of the larger plot is given the seriousness and gravity that it deserves. I love how trauma is talked about and dealt with in a healthy manner. Everything feels so genuine and realistic!)

Colors- Badgermole, 49,000 words (21 works), Logicality.

A collection of stories where Logan is a young Virgil's dad. Virgil happens to be autistic and has a fascination with colors. Unless otherwise stated: Virgil is aged around early elementary school age with Roman 2 years older.

(Again, with the sweet family moments with minimal angst! I don’t have autism so I can't say whether it’s realistic or not but it’s very well written and covers a lot of autistic themes and everyday life. Actually, read pretty much everything by badgermole as their writing is so good and they tackle a lot of disabled issues!)

Powerless- patentpending, 187,000 words, Logicality, Prinxiety.

“People like us,” Logan had once remarked to Virgil. “Are statistical anomalies.”

(Almost) Everyone in the world has powers. As for those who don’t, well, they’re such a small part of the population - only 0.04% - why would anyone care about them?

Ever since he realized what people mean when they call him Powerless, Virgil Sanders has tried to fight back against the system that oppresses people like him, Patton, and Logan. When Patton’s bakery is targeted in a hate crime, he finally snaps. With the help of a mysterious sponsor, Virgil becomes a villain, ready to remake a broken society. The only thing standing in his way is the world’s most Powerful (and infuriatingly charming) superhero: The Prince, who is hiding the fact that his gilded life isn’t as perfect as it may seem.

(So well written! While fast paced, everything feels so well balanced. Main characters and their plots balanced with new OCs that don’t feel too much and justified in being there. The plot kept me guessing while still feeling justified and interesting.)

Grounded- InstantFire, 18,000 words

No matter your age, punishments are no fun. Despite being no fun, would you be willing to do anything to avoid said punishment?

(I don't know what it is about this piece but it's just sooo good! I’ve reread it so many times, it just won’t leave my mind! I love how it’s carefully written where we don’t quite exactly know what the misunderstanding is until it’s stated out loud for all the characters. Maybe I just have a weakness for Virgil angst and misunderstandings but so worth a read!)

Snow Day- RandomSlasher, 8,000 words

Every year, the sides go to Roman’s realm and spend a few days enjoying the snow. Well…most of the sides. Set pre-Accepting Anxiety.

(SOOOO GOOD! The found family is so well written. Actually, while this is the only mention of Random Slasher because I don’t want this to be too long, read everything and anything by Random Slasher. So well written with some amazing ideas.)

Looking for the Light- OreoButter, 30,000 words

Remus, Deceit and Virgil Dark are Brothers. They had an awful home and now are in the foster system. After being passed from family to family they finally end up with Thomas. Remus is gross, Deceit is a compulsive lier and Virgil has crippling anxiety. Virgil will do anything to protect his brothers, at any cost. The family of three will have to face trial and the truth as they search for the light.

(I absolutely love found family if you couldn’t guess already! But I love how they wrote the sibling relationship between the dark sides, feels so genuine and justified. There is shipping but it feels more like a side plot so!)

Sightless- riverblujay, 9,000 words

Virgil is blind. It's not a big deal though, right? But he hides it, because if the other sides knew they would push him away again. And besides, he's pretty good at faking being sighted...

And the other sides are also more observant than he realizes.

(Again, this is another fic that I keep returning to! Also, I’m not blind or have any partial sight so I can't so whether this is realistic but the conflict and comfort feels so genuine and justified.)

The Black Hole Group Chat- Greenninjagal, 26,000 words, LAMP.

Cat_feelings: [I just have a lot of feelings for you Logan]

Anxi_Tea: [platonic?]

Cat_feelings: [does it matter?]

Anxi_Tea: [you’ve known him for twenty five minutes.]

*** aka a text fic where Logan texts the wrong number and everything goes downhill from there.

(I know text fics can be a little hit or miss but the chemistry feels so real and fun. The characters are still very much themselves, a lot of text fics can feel out of character. I also adore the fact that Virgil is mute so the fic has a reason for why the group chat is used despite them all meeting in person. So good, will always recommend!)

April Fool’s- feduphufflepuff, 5,000 words

This is Virgil's first April Fool's Day with the FamILY, and he has no idea what to expect.

(Love me some Virgil angst and misunderstandings so here ya go! The found family vibes and the comfort and just ah! So good, just go read!)

#sanders sides #virgil sanders #patton sanders #roman sanders #logan sanders #deceit sanders #remus sanders #not my writing #fic rec

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bluecastleheadcanons · 4 years ago

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Karasuno Youtuber Headcanons

Haikyuu YouTube AU!! +plus some coffee shop stuff

Hinata Shouyou

Very chaotic

Does challenges

Storytimes

Loud all of the time

Kenma is his internet best friend and they do collab live streams

They also play online video games together but Hinata socks at them

They both have fun though and people love seeing Kodzuken laugh

Collabs with Lev

Sports videos

He has a part-time job at a sports store

His volleyball highlights

Also surprisingly good volleyball tips and tricks

"SPIKING TIPS FROM THE FUTURE TINY GIANT!!"

Vlogs

He, Yams, Yachi, Tsukki and Kags have a joint channel where they have sleepovers and do fun little skits

In one of those videos they convinced Tsukki to give Yachi a piggyback ride

It was so cute

The whole sleepover thing is very domestic and Yams makes dinner while the other three will wash up after

His fans think he's very cute

Kageyama Tobio

Volleyball highlights

Collabs with Hinata a lot

"Quick attack tips ft the human tangerine"

Doesn't post often

The occasional vlog or challenge

People think Oikawa is his brother for some reason

No one knows why or where it came from

Oikawa has shown up in only one of his videos and it was during a volleyball collab

They spoke once but apparently, that was enough for fans to make this conspiracy that even though they have different last names they were brothers

Yes volleyball Collabs

It's when they (everyone mentioned in this list) all come together and play a couple games

Him, Hinata, Daichi, Yaku, Bokuto, Oikawa and Iwaizumi play for the teams in their areas (since they don't go to college and Iwa's FS doesn't have a VB team) the rest play for their college team

He works at the same place as Hinata

his fans think he has two personalities because he acts so different with Hinata

I forgot to mention but Kags lives with Hinata

Yamaguchi Tadashi

Soft

Does get ready with me plus storytimes

"Get ready with me pt3 ft the time I got lost at the mall"

Reactions

Collabs with Tsukki/lives with

His editing is so cute

Lil effects pop up on screen

He works at a cute cafe

Gets to bake the cakes and breads for the place

He really likes it there

Even if he has to take a train and a bus to get there

baking videos

Teaching Yachi to bake and Hinata and Kags to cook

"Teaching my friends how to adult pt 4 ft Kags, Hinata and Yachi"

Vlogs when he's out with the others and they do it too

He and Tsukki live the furthest away from everyone and travelling up is a huge hassle but he literally doesn't care

Tsukki does but Yams doesn't

This man would climb the sun for his friends

Fans get really sad when its winter and his feckless fade

There's a cute video clip out there from one of the volleyball collabs of Oiks helping Yams with serving

He participates in Sugas mental illness awareness week thing

Him and Yachi usually do the segment for anxiety and panic disorders

His fans think he is baby and forget how tall he is

like damn this man is almost as tall as Tsukki

Tsukishima Kei

Reaction channel

Salty saltyshima

Judges everyone its so fucking funny

His reactions consist of him looking into the camera with a look in disgust and mumbling what the fuck

has one vlog on his challenge and its cus Yams made him make it

Fans ask him to react to Hinata, Kageyama,kuroo and bokuto's channels those are a fan favourite

He reacts to horror movies occasionally

"Why do people find these scary pt12"

Those are funny

"Oh my God, just fucking run!" "What is wrong with you??!" "You are the reason I want to dye my hair" "I knew she was gonna die"

Collabs with Yams featuring soft Tsukki

Take a shot every time this man rolls his eyes or says "tch"

Can and will debate with you

Does something like BuzzFeed unsolved with Kuroo

He's a sceptic

Kuroo flinches at every noises

And Tsukki is here sipping his invisible wine not giving a fuck

"But Tsukki someone died there"

"Someone probably died at the Chipotle we just ate at"

He works at a book store

Yachi Hitoka

Very shy and nervous

Anxious baby

Does get ready with mes

Cute room decor videos

Her video titles are so misleading

"Rearranging my entire apartment because I have anxiety ft the Bois"

And then in the video, she is this 4"11 cutie whose living room is pink

Fans find her videos really cute

Goes to college for interior design and graphic design

Does baking videos sometimes

She cannot bake to save her life but watching her try is entertaining

Sometimes her and Oikawa attempt to cook

"Making angel food cake with the grand king"

Her apartment building is across from the one Iwa, Oiks, Makki and Mattsun live in so when she needs some help and the boys are busy she'll go to them

"Painting my living room for the fifth time this year ft new friends???"

That video was messy they were covered in paint

She has a wall of paint handprints of the people who have helped her

So far: hinata, kags, tsukki, yams, dai, suga, asahi, noya, tanaka, iwa, oiks, kiyoko, and kuroo

Can be seen in some of Matsuhana's skits

Works at the same cute cafe as Yams

She participates in Sugas mental illness awareness week thing

her and Yams do the segment for anxiety and panic disorders

It was highly requested Yams taught her how to bake

Nishinoya + Tanaka

Definitely gaming

Also sports

Work out videos

Parkour

Those dumbass who do the dumbest shit like concrete their heads into a microwave

Please help them

Shares an apartment

Noya can actually draw and does art ticks and tricks

His drawings are really good and he does commissions

He works at an art studio and helps out kids

Tanaka, however, sucks at drawing and people love to see him try

"TEACHING RYUU TO DRAW PT4"

He works at the same sports store as Hinata and kags

They do prank videos

collabs with Makki and mattsun

Those videos are so fucking chaotic

Asahi is usually the victim but after one of their pranks went wrong and Daich walked into it they stopped pranking Asahi for a while

Collabs with Asahi and Kuroo and Bokuto

Sometimes with Yachi, if she needs the extra help

Constantly post photos of each other sleeping

Fans think they are fucking hilarious

Sugawara Koushi

Vlogs

Chaotic storytimes how is this man even alive

Gets Embarrassed very easily which makes all if his storytimes really funny

"I tripped over at the airport...again"

Does advice videos

"What to do when……. Pt21"

His channel has no consistency his videos are all over the place

Collabs with Daichi and Asahi lives with them

Does cooking videos

Swears???

Bleeps out with cute noises tho

He's shorter than he looks

Bc most of his videos are with Daichi who is also short when fans meet him its a bit of a surprise

Collabs with Oikawa sometimes fans like to see them interact

Collabs with Yaku!!

Goes to college for psychology

College vlogs

Gets anxious when posting and overthinks a bit too much

Organises mental health awareness week posts with Iwaizumi, Oikawa, Asahi, Bokuto, Akaashi, Yachi, Yamaguchi and Kenma

Basically where each of them post about me talking health for their assigned topic and some collab like Iwa and Oiks and Yams and Yachi

He does the first post which is where they all do a qna together and fans ask related questions

Doesn't drive so Daichi drives him everywhere

He is very good at taking care of people

Fans think he was some sort of mother spirit in a past live

Sawamura Daichi

Work out videos

Life Advice videos

Has a bunch of bloopers because Suga doesn't know how to knock

There is one blooper video where all it is just Suga walking in on him filming

"My roommate doesn't know how to knock"

Car trips car trips vlogs

He does storytimes in his car

"How I lost my tooth"

Slight lisp because of said tooth

This man drives a lot

If he's doing a storytime in his car and people start honking (not at him just in general) he will look into the camera as it zooms in and a fun Lil tune plays in the back

Grocery vlogs

Personal trainer at a gym

Drives Suga to college

doesn't know how to feel about people calling him daddy

Suga just laughs at him

Is hugely clumsy and trips over everything

The coffee table has missing pieces because of how many times this man has walked into it

Drops his camera and phone daily

Most of his fans are thirst and the other ones thank him

Azumane Asahi

DIYs

I'm talking like troomtroom but actually good and useful life hacks

Does camera work for Suga and started off with that

He looks scary but Suga is the one you gotta look out for

Does tips on how to deal with anxiety

Meditation

Posts calming videos to help you sleep

Photography goals

There are many many compilations of Suga and Daichi bullying him made by fans

Flustered by thirst comments

works at the same coffee shop as Yachi and Yams

Collabs with Tanaka and Noya

Gets bad post anxiety

Anxious boi

Participates in Suga’s mental illness awareness week

His segment is on what to do to help someone having a panic/anxiety attack and what the differences are

Even tho Dai and Suga are more like the parents if those two are doing something stupid or risky Asahi can go from child to parent real quick

Honestly, those two can be complete children sometimes

Very good at taking care of people

He never forgets a thing and he makes life hacks for forgetful people

Daichi and Suga are constantly forgetting things

Asahi thinks he has enough footage of that two forgetting stuff, tripping and just being children in general that he could make at least 5 compilations

Fans actually really like him

Kiyoko Shimizu

THE NON CONTROVERSIAL MAKEUP ARTIST

She's so damn nice to everyone

No one can hate her

Her make-up skills are afuckingmazing

Her looks are always perfect

Her works as a hair and make-up artist for a production school

She appears in Yachi's videos often

I don't really have a lot for Kiyoko

#karasuno #haikyuu!!#haikyuu headcanons #youtuberau

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mrs-hollandstan · 6 years ago

Text

Heaven Ain't Close || Mob!Tom x Reader

Warnings: talk of depression, talk of mob tendencies, talk of not feeling wanted, kissing, brief thigh touching, suggestive actions, language

Word Count: 3,393

Author's Note: Soooooo, here's my mob!Tom fic I've been talking about for a while. This is the one with a wedding/dance flashback that I want to go more in depth with if you guys want. But I thought the whole *spoiler* diving across a table to kiss someone was cute. So yeah, lemme know what you think!

My Masterlist || Add yourself to one of my taglists

The very first warning when you came to New York was to stay away from the mob bosses. Of course... when they looked like Tom it was a little difficult. He was like the blackest of clouds when the sun decided to make an appearance on a stormy day. He was like a clear night sky, stars sparkling and dancing beside a full moon. The first time you met him, his eyes alone intimidated you to no end. Sitting in his office, surrounded in the darkest pieces of wood and carpeting, he toyed with a pen at the edge of the large oak desk, listening to you ramble before his eyes cut to you. They narrowed and you could have sworn your heart stopped in your chest. Against the heeded warning of roommates and friends and students around the university you attended, you started working as a receptionist for one of the most feared men in New York. Someone who didn't put up with anyone's shit. Someone who, with one glance had women scrambling out of his bed and men begging for their lives. He was the silent, deadly type that, equipped with the darkest eyes, could have whatever he wanted with a single, silent stare. But the relationship that developed between he and you was something that had his men, in pairs, looking to each other in surprise and awe. He had been a place to stay if it was late in the night and he didn't want you driving or he felt it was too dangerous for you to be out in New York. He had been a backup plan when you were low on funds. But he never let that happen. He was even your plus one to a friend's wedding which was an interesting situation. He'd agreed to the plus one rather hastily, opting for a black tie suit with your confirmation. Accompanying you to the nearest mall, he insisted on buying two wedding gifts that were honestly added to the registry as a good laugh. The look on the bride and groom's face when they unwrapped a full crystal barware set from Neiman Marcus and a cashmere Trentino throw would have humored Tom to the full extent and the call from the honeymoon had you rolling in pure giddiness. The night of that wedding was the first time you'd seen Tom unwind. It was the first time you'd seen Tom lose his jacket and tie, sipping drinks and watching the bridal party interact. The way the lights around you set his face in haunting shadows and his eyes danced across the dancefloor as he watched strangers dance with their significant others. When you stood and held your hand out, he looked you over, eyes lingering on the bare skin of your legs exposed by your dress before giving you a questioning look. "Let's dance." He hated himself for the way he loved to hear your voice. He wanted to hear you beg, but the adoration and playfulness in your eyes had him taking your nimble hand in his calloused one and following you out to the dance floor where he took you in his arms and twirled you around the other patrons. For once, just one night, he felt human. He felt normal. And he loved it. The way you rested your arm over his, hand heavy in his own as your bodies swayed together, melding with the music. No one paid attention to the both of you. No one knew who he was. No one knew the bad things he'd done and he could let loose. With you in his arms. And towards the end of the night, he cradled you close to his chest, your ear laid over his heart as you wrapped up the night. That night, he came to terms with having feelings for you. He came to terms with his stomach flipping and his heart skipping a beat when you entered a room. And even if you asked, he'd deny moving seats to sit beside you on his private jet just to have your head on his shoulder when you'd fallen asleep. Draping a blanket over your body, his heart nearly turned to mush when you whimpered in your sleep and pressed yourself closer, nuzzling into his shoulder. By the time he was shaking you awake, you were landing and he was off to do whatever he did before he included you in his business. But even after that, he couldn't hide the way his hand slipped between your thighs just to feel your soft skin in the seats of his all black, 1968 Chevy Comaro SS. Windows rolled down, driving fast down the highway just driving wherever, your hair tied back and out of your face. Tom had never thought you were more beautiful than in those few moments, but he'd never admit it. And you never told his men just for his reputation. Just for his business. You knew you couldn't be used against him as ransom. The feelings were there but the both of you didn't act upon it. He looked forward to Monday's just to see his receptionist. It was tradition for you to be on your computer when he came in in the morning, sliding a steaming cup of coffee across the glass table you were perched at with the corners of your lips quirking up when he thanked you quietly. And with business booming, he felt guilty dragging you into mission planning. But he asked nicely and you weren't one to deny your boss. "Okay." Tom looked up when you entered the room, announcing your presence with a sighed word, blueprints in hand. You didn't lock eyes when Tom stood and you spread the plans and blueprints across the meeting table in his large office. Strutting over, he gave you a look over, loving the way you looked in the pencil skirt and blouse clinging to your skin. Leaning in on your hands over the chalked over blueprints, you pointed to the front doors, "Some of you can enter through here. Not you though. The second you walk in this door there's... fifty guns on you." Tom smiled, watching you chew the inside of your lip. Cocking your head, you point to a large, ground level room on the plans, "This is where the newest shipment is. Gressoni just got an arms shipment and this is where it'll be." Pausing again, you sigh and point to a seemingly hidden door around the back, "And this is a maintenance door. This is where you'll go in." Looking up, you lock eyes and Tom gives a nod to show he's been listening. Circling the door on the prints with your finger, you look up again, watching Tom lean in on his own hands, "There's a hiccup in the system Jacobs can breach for about a minute before security is onto yo-" Your eyes widen when Tom nearly lurches over the desk, his lips pressed to yours. He kisses you for a few seconds before pulling back just the slightest, eyes darting all over your face. The deafening silence that rings through the now passion thickened room is nearly too much to handle. Tom licks his lips of your taste, "I won't apologize. That's been long awaited." You shake your head, the breath in your lungs stolen by the man standing before you that has a whole new look to him. Your arms feel like limp noodles as you process what's happened in the last minute, "I-I don't want you to apologize. That uhm... was nice." He nods in return, the feeling in the room shifting to nervous. Abandoning the blueprints, you stand straight and round the table slowly. Tom can't tell if the sound reverberating off of the walls is his heart pointing out of his chest or the sound of your heels. His eyes cut up to your own when you stand before him, "Surely we can't just... leave that there. What uhm... where do we go from here?" He swallows, rubbing his clammy hands together. He shrugs, "S'up to you I suppose. I uhh... I've obviously just... showed you that there's something I have for you as far as feelings go but... if the feeling isn't mutual, that's okay." The idea of his feelings not being reciprocated actually breaks his heart. He's never not had a woman like him before. His heart stutters in his chest when you give a half-hearted laugh, taking that final step forward before your lips press to his gently again. This time the kiss is longer, his lips forced against yours as he presses you back against the table behind you, your bottom slipping onto it. He slips his fingers up under your chin, holding your face up to him. When you pull back to breathe, his lips travel down to your neck, kissing and nipping at the skin, "I can't... my boss... the one person I was warned against is making a move on me." When you scoff, he smiles against your skin, "Doesn't really matter anymore does it? You've got feelings for me, the feelings are mutual. Any friendships that would've been jeopardized because of me, are long dissolved by now then." His touch ignites your skin, fingertips grazing the bare skin of your legs as he leans back. He cocks his head, eyes darting between yours. You smile and his eyebrows furrow, lips pulling up into a smirk, "What?" He asks with a chuckle you've never heard before. It's like music to your ears and brings a wide smile to your own face. Jutting your chin over your shoulder towards his desk, you look back to him, "Can I sit in the chair?" He looks to his own desk, pursing his lips. If no one was in the room, they'd never know that someone else had sat in the boss's chair. No one would know another person had been in it. Looking back to you, he looks you over once before giving an unsure nod of his head. His heart skips again when you squeal, your heels clicking against the polished wood floor of his office until you're standing before the mountainous leather chair you'd seen Tom in so many times. The one that you'd fantasized about sitting in his lap in while he discussed business terms. You lick your lips, taking hold of the arm and turning it, seat facing you. Turning to sit in it, you eye Tom, hands tucked in the pockets of his black pinstriped, three piece suit slacks. Lowering yourself into the chair, you sigh, running your hands over the leather arms. His shoes squeak as he walks forward, "Worth it?" You nod, smiling up at him when he leans against the desk beside you, "So worth it. You have no idea how amazing this is. This chair is like... a dream. This conversation is a dream. That kiss was a dream. God you... if you had known how much I wanted you... how many times I wished you were something more than my boss when I was at my lowest points, you would've kissed me months ago." He cocks his head again, eyebrows knitting together, "What do you mean?" Finding his eyes once more, your shoulders slump, "Well I-I you know-" "No, I don't. What do you mean your lowest? Darling... what have you been through? I told you you could talk to me. You've known since the wedding you could talk to me about anything." "I know, I know, I just don't want to burden you. And if I'm being honest... you probably wouldn't have listened. You would've hear but you wouldn't have listened to what I had to say." "I'm listening now." He pipes up. You click your tongue and shake your head, avoiding his eyes, "Doesn't matter now." "Of course it does." Pulling his leg further up in the desk when he sits on it, he sighs, "Shoot. I'm listening now. Full focus on you." Picking at your nails, your heart pounds. His pressing scares you and you'd much rather not ruin your makeup with the tears that will inevitably fall, "Why are you pushing?" "I'm your boss. You don't hide secrets from me." "That's a double standard." "Fine, I'll tell you about all the babes I've bagged. You first though. You look like you need it." His wide smile fades just the slightest when he sees you're not amused, "Its alright love... you can talk to me. Here," standing, he rounds the desk, walking to the large door of his office, opening it and mumbling something to Harrison on the other side before closing it again and clicking the lock shut. Walking back to you with a sultry strut, he resumes his spot, "there we go. Continue." "What did you say?" You quiz questioningly. He smiles, "Told Harrison I was laying you out. He doesn't question." He replies with a shrug. You click your tongue, "Tom-" "I'm not though. We're just talking. Like I said, Harrison doesn't question." Staring up at him, he cocks his head and gestures his hand out, "Go ahead. Rant to me. I'm all ears darling." Sighing, you pick at a thread on the arm of his chair. Bringing a leg up to cross over the other, you swallow, "I uhm... I dunno. I guess I... just don't feel like I'm worth anybody's time. I'm not worth your time. You're a busy man and I just... I don't want you wasting your breath on me." Tom cocked his head, "I dunno babe, you're pretty damn important. I don't waste my time on you. All those drives up the coast. That wedding we went to. The way I held you when we danced. All of that. I... I'm... in love with you Y/N. If wasting my time is what you think dating me is like... letting me lay you out is like... I'm afraid you're going to be disappointed in most of the relationships you make." "I know. That's... that's what I'm afraid of," he eyes you, watching you look down at your lap, "I haven't... had a boyfriend. Not really. I just... I'm not good enough for anyone. No one really likes me." Tom clicks his tongue but let's you continue, "I just feel trapped. I feel like my life is going in a circle and I'm... I'm not worth it. My life doesn't have any meaning." Tom's eyebrows furrow, "Darling... oh love." Standing, he holds both of his hands out. You take them and stand, a lump in your throat and tears burning your eyes. He sits in your previously reserved spot, placing his hand at your hip and pulling you into his lap. He wraps his arm around your waist, the other hand placed over your knee soothingly, eyes locked in yours. He sighs, his jaw clenching, "You're beautiful. There are a number of reasons that I hired you as my receptionist. You're beautiful, you're kind, you're calming, and the boys love you. They know that you're a sort of calming thing for me. They love the attention they get from you. Walking into all those business meetings? They love that. All that pizza you bring and the smile you wear. You seem beautifully confident and... I honestly... don't think I've ever felt the way I feel for you... for any other girl." He shakes his head, cocking it again. Staring down at him, he grunts when you slouch, your feet thrown over the arm of his chair. Laying your head against his shoulder, his arm binds around your shoulders, head rested over yours, "I don't like hearing you talk about yourself like that. You're beautiful. You're absolutely stunning and I can't imagine life without you. I think a piece of my heart would be missing." You don't move, eyes trained on the veins and ligaments pulsing from his wrist. He leans in and kisses your forehead, "You're worth it darling. And if you'll let me... I'd love to claim you as my own. In secret for now though. Until we can figure out this mission." Placing your hand over his shoulder, you wrestle from his grip, sitting face to face, "Really?" His eyebrows furrow again and he nods, "Yeah... hell yeah... I need a pretty little distraction. You're it if you want." Looking between his eyes, you only saw them swim in hope. Those same eyes that you'd been terrified of months before, were intoxicatingly beautiful. You wanted to get lost in them over and over again. You wanted to lay your had over his shoulder just as you'd done and be held in his protective arms, held to his chest when he was in a meeting. You slowly nodded, almost entranced in his coffee colored eyes. His smile widens, "Yeah? You sure? I swear to you that I'll make you feel like the only girl in the world. You'll feel better once you're with me. I swear. Okay?" You nod, his hand coming up to your neck, holding you in place as he leans in to kiss you again. He hums into the kiss this time, much slower than before. Almost in reassurance. When he pulls back, his lips are dark pink, his head cocked once more before his lips dance with yours for a few more seconds. He tasted like coffee and blueberry muffins, both of which you brought this morning, a favorite of his. Moving your head, your nose nudges his, a toothy smile erupting out over his features. You giggle, "I'm kinda into the forbidden love thing." Tossing your legs down to place your feet on the floor, he hums watching your body shift and move, "I'm kinda into everything, hips and below on you. Those legs." Licking his lips when you stand before him, his legs are spread, eyes locked on the little black pencil skirt that clings to your hips as you sort through the papers on his desk, "Where's the mission briefing?" His brain is consumed with all kinds of thoughts but where the mission statements are the longer his eyes linger on the back of your body. When you turn to look him in the eye, he suddenly breaks from his trance, "What? Oh... the mission briefing... right." He stands, not bothering to step around you before he finds it amongst the mess. Offering it to you, you look straight ahead at the door, a smile on your lips as his heat radiates off of him and straight into your body. He chuckles, his chest pressed to your back, hands braced on the table, "So... what now?" Turning your head, you look at him, eyes dark and playful, "I was going over the plans Mr. Holland." He closes his eyes, giving a labored breath, "Love it when you call me that. So sexy." Giggling, you press your hands over his splayed across your hips and stomach, leaning into his electrifying kiss for what feels like the tenth time. When he pulls back, you lick your lips of him, hands held over his. You stare into each other's eyes for a moment before he swallows, "Should get back to it then?" You nod, throwing your leg around his and stepping from his arms, "Yeah, I don't wanna be the reason you get shot. Being sappy and all." He chuckles, following you again, "If you tell any of those men before I'm ready to admit it... I'll kill ya." Clicking your tongue, his eyes travel to your waist again when you smooth the corners of the blueprints you had messed up, sitting on the desk, down, "What would you do without me?" He hums, tucking his hands in his pockets again, "Probably seize to exist. But I will deny it. I'll deny all relations with you." "Well lucky for you, I don't plan on saying anything." Leaning over the table when he steps the other side of it, Tom nods, "Good. I'd hate to make you disappear." Scoffing, his heart skips a beat at your sudden brazenness, "Yeah... make me disappear... who'd bring you coffee and muffins and who'd bring the boys pizza?" Glancing up, a smile breaks out across both of your faces. Oh yeah, Tom loved you. And you were most definitely staying.

Taglist: @embrace-themagic @delicioustommy @spiderman-n @winters-beauty @smexylemony @lolabean1998 @musiclover1263

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tryingtobeclassy · 5 years ago

Text

so close I could kiss you . . . lee minho

genre: Minho x female!reader, college au, neighbour au

description: Being neigbours with your close friend can only lead to lots of unexpected adventures, but falling for him wasn’t one you had in mind.

word count: 8.1 k

warnings: swearing, alcohol, gets a bit more heated at some points ig

. . . . .

“Is the concept of sleep that weird to you?” you mumbled while squinting at Minho who was standing in front of your apartment door in just his pyjamas and some duck shaped slippers.

He seemed very eager and excited about his idea. In his head it obviously didn’t seem as flawed as it did in yours. Going to get ice cream isn’t as wild as someone would think. But when it’s almost 1 am and he insists on going to a place that’s a whole hour away by car then it becomes a slight problem.

“You’re a liar if you try to convince me you were sleeping”, he says, knowing damn well how messed up your sleeping schedule was.

“Okay fine”, you give in after the minimum effort he had to put into trying to make you change your mind. But to be honest, you were kind of feeling the idea of ice cream so you quickly put on some shoes and grabbed your car keys and the two of you were off to an adventure.

Moments like this weren’t rare. If it wasn’t Minho, it would be you to come up with some stupid idea that the other one would always end up jumping on in instant. Cause that’s what friends are for. When you were just starting university and moving into your current small, but comfy apartment, you never imagined you’d get this close to a neighbour. Especially since you always highly disliked neighbours or having any kind of interaction with them, elevators being the absolute worst. But one day he just knocked on your door asking if you had mayo so he could put it on his pizza, you subtly shaded him for putting mayo on pizza and instead of taking offence he unexpectedly invited you to join him and his roommate Chan. A bold food choice definitely threw you off at first, but you thought he doesn’t deserve to be crossed off for it. Especially since he was mad cute as well. And your decision lead you to a wonderful friendship.

And it lead you to sitting in your car at 1 am while driving towards a specific ice cream shop.

“I have class tomorrow at 9. I’m actually going to die”, you whine as you glance once again at the clock in the car.

“I suggest you simply don’t sleep”, Minho suggested as if it was the most obvious solution.

“Absolutely terrible idea Mr. Lee. I am a weak human and my organism does not wish to die that way.”

“Then have a power nap in class.”

You had a snarky comeback ready for him, but instead just paused for a second thinking about it. “Honestly not a bad idea.”

The rest of the trip there was pretty much just filled with both of you complaining about uni, how it doesn’t let you breathe and how the approaching exams are already stressing both of you. In the end, the trip to get the ice cream ended up as a good way to just get away from all of that stuff and put responsibilities and thoughts about it on side for a bit.

“Do you think you could go alone?” Minho asked once you finally parked in front of a brightly lit ice cream shop, basically no other cars around you except what you assumed were the workers’.

“What? No. Why?”

“I’m literally wearing slippers.”

“And I literally don’t care. The ducks will match well with my Batman pyjama pants”, you answered shoving him out of the car as he was grunting like a small annoying child. “Where’s that cocky confidence of yours when you need it?”

As you managed to get him out of the car, the two of you made your way to the entrance of the shop, but it would be too easy if you just walked in, so instead Minho abruptly stopped you as he grabbed the hood of your hoodie and pulled you back to him almost chocking you in the process.

“Watch it, dumbass”, you complained as you lightly slapped his hand away, but his attention seemed to be on something completely different.

“Look”, he said and pointed towards a poster hanging up next to the entrance door. “It says it’s a special couples offer and they get 15% off if they buy two cups of ice cream.”

Your brows frowned as you read the poster yourself. “I hope you’re not thinking what I think you are.”

“It’s 15% off, you’ll survive as my girlfriend for five minutes”, he said with his signature smirk and grabbed your hand into his.

With your on going complaining, you two finally got inside. The place was pretty much empty. It had one dude moping the floors, some guy who seemed homeless passed out in one booth with a plate where once was a pancake with ice cream and a girl at the counter – smiling tiredly as you approached her.

“What can I get you two?” she asked trying to be nice, but you could see a judgemental spark in her eyes as she scanned the two of you from head to toe.

“I’ll have one mint and one vanilla”, Minho answered obviously not caring about the cashier. “And what would you like, babe?” he added as he gave you the sweetest smile you ever saw him pull on his face.

For a second your process of thoughts was just cut off. As his hand felt warm around yours, his smile even warmer and then the babe being the final hit. You just blacked out for a second as all of it felt really weird.

“I, uh, chocolate”, you somehow manage to get across your lips.

“Just one?” the cashier asked getting your head back to earth completely.

“Two.”

The plan went completely as Minho wanted. You got the ice cream and you got the discount. And you were on your way home, this time Minho behind the wheel while you were still enjoying one of the best ice creams you ever had the chance to taste.

“Oh yea, I wanted to ask you something?” Minho said after he got bored of nothing but silence and the sounds you smacking your lips and finishing the ice cream. “There’s a party at Changbin’s house tomorrow.”

“He’s that one hella rich friend of yours?”

“Yeah. He said both me and Chan get a plus one to bring to the party so I thought you might wanna go.”

“Sure. I’m always down for some booty shaking.”

He just lightly smiled and mumbled a soft ‘great’ in return. So it was settled. You suddenly had plans for tomorrow as well.

Your little adventure soon came to an end as the car stopped in its destined parking spot and both of you went to your own place. You collapsed in your bed immediately, debating how much do you actually have to go to the morning class, but you just really needed the attendance if you wanted to pass.

You kinda regretted your life choices from last night the moment you woke up, but remembering how good the ice cream tasted, you were soon over it. The class wasn’t as bad as you expected. Not really taking Minho’s advice, you ended up drugging yourself with coffee that kept you alive just long enough to get back home and dive back into your bed. It was Friday so nothing to worry about for tomorrow which only means one thing. Napping! If it could be called a nap cause you passed out and slept for almost six hours. It would’ve been even longer if your hungry stomach didn’t rudely wake you up. After finally giving your body some food to survive, it was time to get ready.

You were going to just some house party with a bunch of students so no need to dress too fancy. Just cute enough to feel good about yourself and if so desired to get a lil bit of action as well. So it ended up being new baggy jeans matched with some fishnets underneath, a cute crop top and heeled boots. For a second you felt like some edgy tumblr post, especially when you added dark red lipstick, but you liked it and felt hot and confident.

Just as you were checking yourself in the mirror in the hallway one last time, Minho barged into the apartment while screaming: “Come on, idiot, we’re approaching the moment that crosses the line of being fashionably late into rudely late.”

He subtly checked you out, but gave a not so subtle compliment after it, “You look hot.”

“Thank you”, you said with a satisfied smile on your face and pushed him out where Chan was waiting.

“Am I not getting a compliment as well?” he asked as he pouted trying to fish for some ego boosting words.

You dramatically rolled your eyes, but still told him he looked cute.

“Damn. I was going more for the homme fatale kind of look”, he said, but you could tell from the confident aura he had around him that he definitely believed he pulled off what he intended.

“Whatever you do, just don’t feed his ego anymore”, Chan joked when he saw you were thinking about something else to add to your list of compliments besides cute.

“Shit, you’re right”, you laughed and left it just at cute.

After taking an Uber, cause all three of you planned on drinking, you finally arrived at the party. Despite talking to Changbin here and there, you two weren’t super close. You did know his family was swimming in money, but the house you arrived to was still way bigger than you expected. Perfect size to have a shit ton of students over for a party. Very brave thinking nothing would end up broken. But anyway, the party was already in full operation. Drunk people everywhere drinking and either sitting around and hanging out or dancing to the loud edm blasting from the living room.

You made your way to the kitchen where you found Changbin sitting on the counter with a beer in his hand. He was talking to Felix and a guy you saw like twice, but you believed his name was Hyunjin. He got really excited when he saw the three of you walk in, immediately giving Chan and Minho one of those signature bro greetings while you got a very solid high five.

“Where’s your plus one Chan?” he asked putting his hands around his eyes and mockingly scanning the room.

“Come on, mate, you know all the people I know are the same people you know.”

“We all just kinda hope, you’d finally find some other people to hang out or perhaps even…” he made a dramatic pause while all the boys suddenly acted like they were talking about the weirdest and most wild thing ever when Minho added, “a girl.”

“Y’all are hilarious”, Chan said sarcastically. “I have too much to do. I don’t have time to meet a girl.”

“Yet here you are”, Felix added. “Use the party as an opportunity to meet new people.”

Chan just waved his hands towards them as if he’s trying to blow away all the jokes they were throwing at his account. He took a beer from the counter and disappeared into the crowd.

Hyunjin and Felix were off to their own shenanigans as well so it was just you with Minho and Changbin. Changbin offered you something from all the different alcohol lined besides him on the counter, but from all the various choices, you felt like warming up with some beer first. You drank your beer as you listened to whatever they were talking about with just one ear, your attention mostly observing the crowd.

“Speaking about girls”, Changbin suddenly went back to the first topic, “I always kind of thought the two of you would be a thing by now.”

You almost spat out the beer you were just in the process of drinking, but instead chocked on the gulp you took while Minho just laughed. Both at you and the question.

“Why did you think that?” Minho asked, genuinely curious while you would’ve preferred it if the topic was dropped.

“I don’t know. Both of you have some kind of chaotic energy. I feel like you would fit each other.”

“Well we do”, Minho said, a smirk forming on his lips.

“Yeah, as friends”, you added pushing him so he would drop the creepy smirk going on. “I’m just gonna go dance. You two fuck around as much as you want.”

You finished the last few drops of the beer, left it at the counter and let yourself blend into the crowd. The music was loud enough to get all the way to your bones, making you feel every beat in your heart and making you want to dance until your legs give out. You were one with the crowd, yet still stuck in your own little world as the alcohol and music hit your head. Dancing as if there’s not a single worry in your life. Feeling good and feeling happy. But the little utopia your mind wandered off to disappeared as you felt a hand grab your ass and a male figure invading your private space completely. You looked up to see which guy decided to skip a bit too many steps and come to you so confidently just to see your ex-boyfriend arching above you.

“Can you fuck off? You ain’t wanted here”, you said, your voice clearly heating with anger.

“Come on, let’s do it just once like in the old days”, he smiled cockily and pulled you closer into himself making you even more mad.

“I’ll have to pass on that offer.”

You were trying to push him off of yourself, but the dude was persistent as hell and wouldn’t let you go.

“Fuck off!” you yelled again, but you weren’t managing to achieve anything and everyone else seemed to be too immersed in their own worlds to see what’s happening and give a hand. But suddenly you did feel another hand lightly grab your shoulder while the other pushed your ex away.

“She clearly said to fuck away, bro.”

You recognized Minho’s voice and felt his hand protectively pull you towards himself while glaring at your ex with a warning look.

“And who might you be?” your ex asked with a dumb smile as if he doesn’t care about anything in this whole situation.

“Her boyfriend”, Minho said without hesitation, sliding his arm over your shoulder to make it even more convincing.

You could see the dumb smile fade from your ex’s face as he looked at Minho once again. “Can’t believe you went for some pretty boy while you can have a whole man like me, but okay.”

“He’s a bigger man than you, but whatever makes you feel better”, you spat as he was finally going away and disappeared just like he suddenly appeared.

“Holy shit, I really owe you one”, you added while turning to Minho.

“Wanna say thank you in a form of a kiss?” he asked teasingly.

You rolled your eyes and lightly smacked his chest. “How about a dance instead, lover boy?”

“That will work too”, he smiled and grabbed your hand, turning you around.

“Just tone it down a bit with the moves. I don’t wanna embarrass myself next to your perfect dancing.”

“Yes, ma’am!”

Minho really was such a good dancer. He moved so effortlessly, but still managed to get you to follow his moves without a problem. It was fun getting lost in the moment – just dancing to the music and being playful. It didn’t even feel weird as his body got closer to you, his legs brushing against yours. You could feel his hand being hesitant when he slid it lower on your back, but as you didn’t push it back and instead gave him a small smile, he slowly got even lower and pulled you closer towards him. The next moment your arms wandered around his neck, getting the two of you dangerously close to the point you could even feel his breath on your cheek. For just a second you glanced towards his lips that were so close to you, you could’ve kissed them if you wanted to. But then something snapped inside you as you realized what’s happening and slowly broke the physical contact, giving him just a soft smile at the end.

“Well that was… fun”, you said trying not to be awkward because of the fact you just got so damn close to your friend to the point you could’ve felt his entire body pressed against yours at moments.

“You complain that you would’ve looked bad besides me, but you’re a surprisingly good dancer”, he answered, not seeming like the situation is awkward in any way for him.

His little compliment made you get a stupid satisfied smile on your face. “Thank you, lover boy.”

After that you hanged out for a bit with other people as well. Ended up even playing some beer pong which just got you completely drunk if you weren’t already. When you were on your way to go home, Changbin had to call the Uber for all three of you and safely set you off home, hoping you wouldn’t end up in some ditch along the way.

“Let me know when you assholes get home”, was the last thing he told Chan before the car door closed.

What happened after became all a bit blurry in your memory. You remember the Uber. You remember getting home. But the next time you were fully yourself again was the morning after when you woke up on your couch still wearing what you had the night before. Minus the pants that were thrown on the floor.

You got up with a burning headache as well as pain in your back from the highly uncomfortable sleeping position and ‘bed’. Like some kind of zombie, with small steps and a lot of grunting, you made your way to the kitchen and put all your energy into making coffee. You sat on the kitchen counter next to the coffee machine while waiting for it to be done when your mind started blasting a bunch of memories from last night. Ignoring the major dick aka your ex, the night was pretty fun. You hung out with lots of people, got to play some beer pong, absolutely crushed Woojin at it, danced a bit. And then the memory of you and Minho suddenly came back again and you could feel your cheeks burning up and your heart skipping a beat.

One would say those are clear signs of developing a crush, but you would’ve sworn that wasn’t the case. You believed that was a normal reaction after remembering a moment when you got so physically close to someone, but the fact it was no one else, but a super close friends made the situation a bit weird. For some reason you got worried as if it could impact your friendship with Minho and make it awkward, but common sense was trying to tell you that it really wasn’t all that mention worthy or special in any kind of way.

So you just did your best to push it at the back of your mind and not give it too much thought. And Minho obviously didn’t think much of it as well since nothing changed after that night. No awkward moments, no weird tension. Just you, him and lots of usual dumb shit going on.

Soon enough exams arrived and passed. You were just done with your last one and decided to celebrate so you invited yourself over Minho and Chan’s place where they welcomed you with open arms once they noticed two bottles of wine in your hands.

After a few glasses, all of you were already in Tipsy Land. Chan ended up on the floor whining about life as you were sitting on the couch and putting all your focus onto Minho’s hair you were trying to braid into a beauuuutiful French braid at which you were obviously failing miserably considering your state as well as the length of his hair.

“Wanna just ask random questions and answer truthfully?” Chan asked obviously getting slightly bored as he stared at the ceiling and twirled the glass of wine in his hand.

“Sure. You can go first”, you said while just finishing Minho’s half assed braid that reached only half of his head.

“When was the last time you had sex?”

As the question processed in your head, you squinted at him ready to say something, but Minho beat you to it, “That’s a strong one to start with, don’t you think?”

All three of you laughed before Chan changed it into something a bit tamer, but soon enough you were back to the kind of questions everyone was actually curious about.

“Okay, this one’s for, y/n”, Chan said with a smirk on his face.

“I already hate it”, you mumbled, but you were still interested in what he had to ask.

“If you had to pick someone to date from my and Minho’s little group of friends, who would it be?”

Your eyebrows got almost pierced together as you frowned, but not because of the question that you expected would have made you way more embarrassed than expected, but more because you needed some clarification. “Is that like everyone from the Chan’s Kids group chat?”

“Yep.”

“You two included?”

“Obviously.”

“Changbin already said you would fit me the most”, Minho interrupted with something you completely forgot about.

You felt your cheeks heat again and you weren’t sure what was the reason. But you tried to keep your thoughts collected and not let him know that his little comment got to you. “Well aren’t you feeling confident about that”, you teased.

“I mean, am I not right?” he teased back.

“Can the two of you not flirt while I’m here?” Chan complained after he got back up and proceeded to drink more wine.

“I’m picking Woojin”, you finally said, a dumb smile on your face as you know Minho didn’t get what he wanted.

He suspiciously squinted at you. “Why?”

“He’s sweet and hot.”

“I’m also sweet and hot”, Minho pouted.

“You’re a little bitch”, you joked while pushing him and his cute pout away from your sight. Because you just might give in to him.

“But hot, right?” he asked through a stupid smile as he was obviously enjoying annoying you.

“God, you’re impossible”, you roll your eyes, “sure, a hot little bitch.”

He excitedly punched the air before realizing it was his turn again and thinking of a question. It went on for a few more rounds until Chan got defeated by tiredness and disappeared to his room. You and Minho still weren’t feeling too tired despite the wine, which you completely managed to finish, doing its work.

“I’m kinda feeling pancakes”, you suddenly said and as a response getting a fast head turning from Minho as he stared into your eyes and whispered, ‘brilliant idea’.

This time it didn’t end up with you two going out to get the food, but instead getting everything ready in the kitchen. You managed to find all the needed ingredients so Minho was currently mixing the mixture in a bowl as you were heating the pan.

“You know, you really shouldn’t let me handle heavy machinery when I’m this drunk”, you commented while pouring oil into the pan.

“You literally only turned on the stove and put a pan on it.”

“A heavy pan”, you emphasized, but got only a laugh from Minho.

You offered to try and make the pancakes despite knowing what a complete mess in the kitchen you are. Minho could’ve just taken over the work instead of you and do it properly, but watching you struggle seemed like the more entertaining scenario.

You never made pancakes before and expected it to be easy, but to your surprise – it wasn’t. Or at least it wasn’t because you were either terrible with food or just drunk. Or both. Your first pancake looked like a disaster. But it was your disaster and you were proud of it.

“What do you think?” you asked Minho as your eyes sparkled with excitement.

He looked at it with a somewhat judgy look. “If we’re being honest-“

“We’re not.”

“In that case, it’s the best looking pancake I have ever laid my eyes on. Gordon Ramsay could never.”

“Thought so.” You seemed exceptionally pleased with yourself despite the amount of sarcasm in his sentence.

Putting aside how absolutely wonderful your first try ended up, you still decided to pass the spatula on to Minho and let him do it. Instead of that, you focused on cutting up some strawberries that you luckily found in the fridge. Adding some strawberries to a pancake with Nutella was the second best thing in existence. You were doing a wonderful job with it until suddenly the strawberries weren’t the only thing red. It took you a second to process that you actually managed to cut your finger and it was bleeding out.

“MIIIINHOOOOO”, you scream once the realization hit you.

Turning around and seeing the blood coming from your finger, Minho just grabbed your hand and put it under water. He pulled it out for a second and observed the cut and then just pushed it back under water.

“There’s no need to be so dramatic. It’s not that deep”, he said calmly and you were just super impressed at how well he handled it.

He finished the pancake and turned off the stove so he could order you to go to his room. Entering it, you got hit in the face by the smell of Febreze. You sat on his unnecessarily huge bed while he was looking for some bandages.

“This bed is hella comfy”, you said when your ass felt like it sat on a cloud.

After a little while, Minho finally found what he was looking for so he gently grabbed your hand and cleaned the cut with some alcohol. It stung, but not as much as you expected. It probably really wasn’t as deep as you freaked out in the beginning. He put the bandage and you were as good as new.

“Give me just a sec to really test out the comfiness of this bed”, you said immediately after and threw your body on the bed. Which was a terrible idea cause tiredness instantly hit you like a truck that came out of nowhere. “On a second thought, I don’t think I’m moving.”

“What about the pancakes?”

You got your head up just enough to look at him. “Can you bring them here?”

You were lucky Minho had no food in bed policy and that he absolutely adored your annoying ass cause he really did bring the pancakes to the bed. You managed to eat one before getting fed up and just passing out on the bed once again while he was still devouring the pancakes he had left in his plate.

“Is it fine if I just sleep over here? I literally don’t have the strength to move my legs all the way to my own bed.”

“Sure”, he said as he laid the plate on the night table and whipped his hand into a napkin. “Just don’t grab all the blankets.”

You didn’t expect he’d say yes so fast. He seemed completely chill with you invading his bed and you were more than happy about it because you fell asleep a minute after getting permission to do so. The only problem was the fact you fell asleep on top of the blanket so even if you wanted, you couldn’t grab and drag them away from Minho. Him being nice tho, he didn’t want you to get a cold and somehow rolled you to the side to try and get you off so he could actually cover you instead of the order being all messed up like that.

You slept like a like baby that night. Even almost snuggling up to him to replace him as the stuffed bear you still slept with. Minho’s bed really had to be magical or something because it’s been a while since you got such a good night sleep.

Once you woke up he wasn’t there anymore, but you could still feel the warmth he left behind. You barely made yourself get up and get to your own apartment so you could finally start your day, but it was certainly a struggle to leave such a good bed.

Leaving his room, you found him and Chan seated in front of the tv both eating some kind of form of a breakfast.

“Holy shit, what happened last night?” Chan yelled when he saw you coming out of Minho’s bedroom.

Minho gave him a mysterious smirk while you were the one to roll your eyes, “I just slept over cause I was tired.”

“Sure, you did”, Chan wouldn’t let it go, but he didn’t get more of a chance to joke because you just left their apartment to go to yours.

You tried going on normally with your day. You made breakfast, took a shower, watched tv, but all the time your mind was constantly going back to last night. Nothing of major importance even happened, but for some reason you couldn’t let go how different and good it felt being close to Minho that night. You started overthinking the whole situation. Worrying that maybe, just maybe, your feelings for him weren’t completely platonic anymore. Otherwise how would you explain your heart racing each time you thought about getting closer to him. Even remembering when you danced with him and had a chance to kiss him. What would’ve happened if you did it? Would he back away? Or would he actually have liked? You just couldn’t stop thinking about him, but you were still trying to convince yourself it’s nothing to worry about. It’s just normal human nature to like the presence of another human, right?

Well with those thoughts pushed aside, you tried to keep your cool and not do anything dumb when he asked you the next day to go some grocery shopping. He would always ask you to go with him cause apparently it was too boring and unbearable without you.

“How’s your attempt to eat healthier going?” he asked you while picking up some vegetables.

You let out a deep dramatic sigh. “Terrible. Lasted like twelve hours before I ate a whole box of ice cream.”

“Isn’t that a new record though?”

Your face lit up with a satisfying smile. “It is. Thank you for noticing.”

“You’re getting better by an hour. One day you might get to a whole day”, he teased and your smile instantly turned into a slightly annoyed frown.

“Not all of us have a will as strong as rock to just live on grass.”

He skewered you with a dirty look. “Those are some harsh words for someone who eats at least four times a week at our place.”

Uh oh. He got you there so it was better to just shut up before you lose your lunch for the next day. Minho wouldn’t hesitate to doom you to some instant ramen noodles. You focused on the food around you. You were in the dairy section so you took some milk for yourself, but as Minho can never decide which yoghurt to take, you were getting slightly impatient. You were trying to kill time by just pushing around the shopping cart and then pushed your body on the handle getting your feet on the metal below the cart as if you were five again. You got surprised when Minho’s hands suddenly ended up around you on the handle and his body arching over yours.

“I feel like a dad with an embarrassing child”, he said while starting to push the cart with you still in your stupid position.

You felt your heart race once again as he got so close to you even starting to freak out when his body slightly brushed over your back. You suddenly started realizing that perhaps all the thoughts you were trying to push aside might have been your true feelings. The two of you would share physical contact in the past as well through hugs and similar stuff and yet you never felt like this. You had to admit to yourself that you might actually be in love with your neighbour.

Once again you started thinking about it way too much. Whether it’s actually real or not. You might have just been single for too long and want a guy’s attention. But then why would you freak out at just the mere thought of you ending up dating him. Whatever it was, it was stupid. Because what are the odds of him actually liking you back. He might flirt with you sometimes, but that doesn’t have to mean anything. It’s just how the two of you worked even though it lead to this – you actually catching feelings like some kind of disease.

You refused to go to his place for lunch the next day. Said you already ate. You just didn’t feel like seeing him and getting tired from the rollercoaster of emotions. At the end of the day, you felt like going insane. You just had to get out, but you also had to talk to someone before exploding. So you grabbed your car keys and knocked on their door. Luckily for you, Chan opened.

“Wanna get some fried chicken?” you asked him.

He blinked a few times as a confused look formed on his face. “Aren’t you here for Minho?”

“No.”

He became even more confused. “It’s 11 p.m.”

“Please, Chan. It’s… important.”

It’s hard to tell if it’s his own curiosity about the situation or just the way you looked at him from which he could clearly see that you were distressed, but he accepted your offer and soon enough you were driving through the night to get some fried chicken.

“So what’s up?” he asked trying to get some answers over what’s going on.

“Okay, so… I’m not sure how to really tell you this, but-“, you made a long pause as you were trying to search for the perfect words. But how does one tell someone they’re in love with a friend who also happens to be their roommate. You simply don’t get the instruction for that in some guidebook. In the end, the only and best thing to do is to just say it and finally put it out there. “I think I might be in love with Minho.”

For a second there was nothing but silence and the sound of your car working and rushing through the dark streets. But then, after he finally processed your words, Chan smiled widely.

“Honestly I was just expecting when this would happen, but what I did not expect is that you’d be so serious over it”, he said while a soft laugh escaped his lips.

“Bro, it is a serious thing”, you got all heated up in a second.

“No, it’s a simple thing”, he corrected you. “You like him and he probably likes you. You two just have to figure it out finally.”

Just the hypothetical words of ‘he probably likes you’ made your blood rush to your cheeks. “Why do you think he likes me?”

Chan shrugged his shoulders. “I’m his friend and roommate. I can tell by the way he flirts with you. He doesn’t do that with any other girl. He gets all smiley and excited when he talks about you. Plus you constantly have some weird ass tension going on between the two of you.”

“N-no we don’t”, you stuttered for a second.

He gave you one of those ‘I ain’t buying your bullshit’ looks. “Of course not”, he said, pouring a whole bucket of sarcasm into that sentence. “I literally feel like if you two were left alone in a small room with nothing to do for two hours, you’d just end up fucking.”

“Jesus Christ, Chan, I get it!” you screamed at him as your palms got so sweaty you felt like you were gonna crash into the nearest traffic light.

“Look. I can’t help you in a way to go as your private detective and try to find out how he feels. He never comes forward with his crushes. You’re gonna have to figure it out on your own.”

“But I don’t know how to do that”, you whine just as you arrived to the drive thru for KFC. “Hopefully chicken will make me feel better.”

You ordered a whole bucket for four that was waiting in Chan’s lap for you to get home.

“What if I fuck up the friendship?”

“You won’t”, you get as an immediate answer from Chan. “He cares about you too much to completely break up the friendship over something like that.”

“I hope you’re right.”

Once you arrived home, you took a plate of chicken and Chan went home with the rest as you still didn’t feel like facing Minho. You were tired and simply didn’t have the strength to deal with anything anymore that night. You ate the chicken and went straight to your bed, but couldn’t sleep because thoughts were once again occupying your mind. Thinking about the possibility of Chan actually being right. Thinking about what you should even do.

Before you were able to come up with a proper answer for that, you fell asleep. You still didn’t come up with anything smart even when Minho called you over the next day to help him put up a new mirror in the bathroom. Saying no was your first instinct, but you felt like he would start getting suspicious over why you started avoiding him. So there you were. Sitting on the toilet while looking whether or not the mirror is perfectly aligned.

“A bit more to the left”, you said while intensely staring at it.

“Your left or my left?”

“We have the same left”, you rolled your eyes, but still laughed.

When the mirror finally looked decent, he gave you a high five for good work and proposed some pizza for lunch to celebrate. Despite still trying to get away from him before you decide what you wanna do, you didn’t have a good enough excuse why not, so pizza with Minho it is. But the bathroom door seemed to have a different kind of plan prepared for you as the doorknob broke off into Minho’s hand when he tried opening the door – leaving the two of you trapped inside.

“Are you shitting me right now?” you frown. You tried taking the doorknob from him and putting it back, but it wouldn’t work. And his attempt didn’t end up much different.

“It can probably be opened from the other side”, you said after some observing.

“Yeah, but Chan isn’t home.”

“Can you call him?”

Luckily, at least he brought his phone in with himself, but after calling him, you were doomed to be trapped in the bathroom for at least an hour as Chan had something else to do.

“What the hell does he have so important going on right now?” you asked while getting slightly irritated.

But only after you stopped worrying over how you’re gonna get out and settled with the fact you’ll have to wait for a bit for Chan to let you free, you realized the situation. It was literally what Chan mentioned the night before. Just you and Minho, trapped in a little room with no entertainment. Talk about wild coincidence. For a second you started freaking out a bit, but remembering that it’s literally just Minho with who you constantly spend time alone, your heart rate soon became normal again.

“I wish I could call the pizza man, but no one could let him in”, Minho whined, not getting pizza obviously being his main issue here.

An hour passed soon enough. You were killing time first by just talking, but as you got bored you helped Minho clean his part of the bathroom cabinet, you played tic tac toe with toothpaste on the perfectly aligned mirror, cleaned said mirror. And after almost three hours Chan still wasn’t back. You couldn’t help but feel like he might be doing it on purpose. But as four full hours in there were approaching, both you and Minho started to slowly lose your minds from not knowing what to do.

Once again you were seated on the floor, your backs against the bathtub.

“Have you been okay the past few days?” Minho suddenly asked catching you completely off guard with such a question.

“What do you mean?”

“You seem kind of out of it. Like your head is just floating in the clouds half of the time”, he said and then moved his head to look you in the eyes, the corner of his lips curling up into a smirk. “Perhaps you’ve fallen in love?”

He was obviously teasing you. Just like teachers would do when a kid wouldn’t pay attention in class. But it still made you heat up as if someone pushed your body into an oven. You weren’t sure what exactly to do, but for some reason, being honest felt like the best thing.

“I did. So?”

The attitude came out of nowhere and it certainly managed to throw Minho completely off.

“Wait, seriously?”

You gave him a short nod before turning your head and gaze in front of you so you could break the eye contact because it was becoming too much for you.

“So who’s this lucky guy of yours?” he asked scooting closer to you as if he’s about to hear some hot tea being spilled.

“No one special.”

“Oh, come on, y/n. You always tell me everything.”

“I kinda want to keep this one for myself”, you said while doing all your best to seem chill and not letting the chaos from inside of you get to the surface.

He shut up for a second, but you could tell this wasn’t over yet. He leaned his elbow on the edge of the bathtub to support his head that was now, as well as his upper body, completely facing you. “You worried?”

You gave him a short confused huh as a response, not really sure what he meant.

“You worried he’d turn you down or something?”

“Why would that be stopping me from telling you?”

“I don’t know. I’m just guessing.”

Suddenly there was silence. You glanced at him and saw him warmly looking at you, as if just his eyes are trying to tell you that he will be here no matter what. The silence felt heavy since you could just hear your heartbeat a lot more intensely.

“Then why don’t you wanna tell me?” he asked again, breaking the silence for a second.

Your body still felt hot. Your heartbeat was literally ringing in your ears. You felt as if gravity was pulling your entire body down as it felt heavy. “I guess I’m worried”, you said, your voice barely louder than a whisper.

You mustered just enough courage to not let your gaze drop and kept looking him into his eyes that seemed confused for a second, but then something sparked inside them. At that point your faces were so close that once again if you wanted and had the courage, you could’ve kissed him. But that didn’t work out, unfortunately. You didn’t get to lean over and give him a kiss because it was him who slowly got closer, locking your lips into a very short peck. Simply just brushing your lips against each other. For a second he moved back, as he was trying to tell whether he read the situation correctly. But seeing your lips form into a gorgeous wide smile, his lips quickly found their way back. Crushing against yours into a deep kiss. Another one. And another one. And soon enough his hand grabbed your leg and smoothly pulled you into his lap, your legs on each side of his body. He was kissing you with so much passion as his hands were holding your body, trying to press you as close as he can towards himself.

His lips tasted like mint. His hair felt soft going through your fingers. And it felt warm and safe being so close to him. You felt like you could’ve stayed like that forever, but just a moment later, you heard the door opening and Chan entering the apartment. Both of you quickly got up and fixed yourself before the bathroom door opened and you were finally set free.

“Sorry it took me so long. You two okay?”

“Splendid”, Minho smirked and went out, giving you a little wink behind Chan’s back.

Feeling a bit shaky from what just happened, you slowly went out, but just as you were passing Chan he stopped you by grabbing your arm and quietly asking, “Everything good?”

“Of course. Don’t worry”, you answered giving him just a cheeky little smile to go with it.

You went back to your apartment and threw your body on the couch just wanting to scream from so much joy into the pillow. Although you didn’t really get to actually talk with Minho about this since your mouths were too busy doing something else so you didn’t want to get too excited over it. Perhaps he just wanted to kiss you and end it at it. You never know. You couldn’t tell just where exactly were you standing with him as of that moment.

Being trapped in the bathroom for so long, it was already late afternoon. You microwaved some leftovers since you were starving and then just watched the tv while debating what to do next. But once again Minho was a step ahead of you when he sent you a text just saying to come over.

You didn’t think too much about it and just got up and walked into their apartment.

“You wanna talk about it?” you asked when you saw him sitting on the couch.

He got up, walked up to you and gently pulled you closer. “How about we talk about it over dinner tomorrow?” he asked with his usual confident smile before landing a short kiss on your lips.

“Tomorrow doesn’t really work for me”, you teased which made him just squeeze you in a tight hug.

“You really are impossible sometimes”, he laughed.

But already the moment later he was planting more kisses on you. They felt a lot more hungry this time so it wasn’t all that surprising when you ended on his bed, your hands wandering under his shirt feeling his hot skin and his wandering all over your body slowly undressing you. You never expected that a day that started with a mirror would end up with you passionately kissing Minho and feeling his gentle touch on your naked skin.

The night ended up in the best possible scenario you could’ve thought up in your head and your heart and body were filled with so much joy. Making you wish it would never end.

But the next morning came soon enough. And you woke up in his bed once again. Everything looked the same like last time, but the feeling was different. Just like last time, he was already up, just his presence still laying in bed. You got up and took one of his shirts being thrown over a chair, put it on and made your way outside in search for food. And just like last time you found Chan on the couch with a cereal bowl in his hands.

“Yo, Chan”, you called his name. “This time something happened last night”, you exclaimed all proud and cocky which just made him laugh out loud.

“Heard you’re having a special date tonight”, he added.

“Damn right I am.”

Despite feeling like just boasting the entire morning over your night, you still thanked Chan. Because who knows what would’ve happened if he didn’t give a few words of encouragement. You’d still stay trapped in the bathroom, but the scenario might have played out differently. But it didn’t. And you got what you wanted. You got Minho and it can only get wilder from this point on. And you couldn’t wait to see what the future had in store for you and your favorite idiot.

#minho #lee know #stray kids minho #stray kids #skz #skz fanfic #stray kids fanfic #stray kids au #college au #minho college au #minho x reader #minho fluff #minho fanfic #lee know fluff #lee know fanfic

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chaoticneutralwriter · 6 years ago

Text

Distance and the Heart

You were convinced that you’ll be fine on your own while he’s gone. After all, all you wanted to do was sit at home and watch BTS videos all day. Instead, you go on a ‘date’, break someone’s nose and dig an even deeper ‘Oh-shit-I-think-I-might-like-my-guardian-demon’ hole for yourself.

You should never be let outside again.

guardian demon!Jimin x reader

genre: slice of life, fluff, slow-burn, supernatural, comedy

word count: 8.1k (I DID NOT MEAN FOR THIS TO HAPPEN)

Related works: Unorthodox | Genuine | 3AM Demon | The Grinch Who Stole New Year

A/N: well this got long....LOL UMM Hope you enjoy it! There’s more plot! And be aware of douchey guys! :DD

“You’re going where now?”

“Think of it as a ‘performance evaluation’ meeting; you know, the kind you humans have with your boss to discuss how well or not you’ve been doing your job.” He replies back, adjusting the cuffs on his shirt as he stands before your full-length mirror. You try your hardest not to stare at him from your seat by your desk, in the middle of working on some assignments just to get ahead of yourself for the week, but you find your concentration wavering when your mind clearly found something way more interesting to study.

Jimin is currently dressed in an all black ensemble; a black button down that’s tucked into his black slacks, allowing you the chance to see just how perfectly they hug his thighs and ahem ass. His silvery hair is immaculately coiffed as per usual and as he turns to shrug on the black blazer jacket, embroidered with intricate silver linings, you find yourself very distressed in your seat because your mind is telling you no but your body…. your body is saying hell yes.

You whip your gaze away, embarrassed by your own thoughts and you hope that your guardian demon hasn’t noticed. Damn him for looking so good.

“I’ll try to keep the visit short, but don’t be surprised if you don’t see me for a few days.” Jimin makes the final adjustments to his look, brushing away strands of hair that fall out of place over his forehead before turning to fix you with a stare.

“Don’t worry, take all the time you need.” You encourage, hoping to feign indifference of his departure. It seems to not slip past him as Jimin’s plush lips curl into that damning smirk and to add more insult to injury, he languidly saunters over to you, instantly putting you on high alert.

“Oh cherub, don’t you know I worry that you’ll probably die from missing me so much?” He singsongs and you blanch in response. “But just so you know, I’m only one call away; hell is completely toll free.”

He removes his hand previously stuffed into his pocket to pat you on the head mockingly to which you swat at it before it even makes contact with a single strand of hair. You kiss your teeth, annoyed but he just throws his head back and laughs at you. You curse again because as much as you’re irritated, the tinkling sound never fails to make your heart race.

“Just go already; aren’t you going to be late or something?” You feebly mumble, turning back to stubbornly burn a hole into your laptop screen. You hear a muffled snort; some shuffling and you finally think you’ve got your deserved peace from this nuisance but then—

“No kiss goodbye?”

On reflex, you hurl your seat cushion at his general direction, only for it to crash against your full length mirror noisily (you wince as little knick knacks nearby topples over from the force), the last remnants of his cackling fading into the air and the only thing you can do is huff out loudly, face blazing. But what you find the most frustrating thing however is that you’re not sure if it’s from anger or from the thought of imagining kissing said demon.

After about three hours, you shut off your laptop and place your pencil down to heave a big stretch with your arms high above your head. You wince at the kinks and pops of your joints but you’re satisfied with your finished work. Now you can relax and laze around all you want, maybe even catch up on a couple of RUN BTS episodes that you’ve sadly missed due to being so busy.

“Hey! Y/N, wanna check out this cafe with me?”

Or not…

Jaehee’s voice calls out to your from her place by your door, phone in hand to showcase an instagram profile of said cafe she mentioned. You’re a bit hesitant to be honest, feeling like your energy is all spent from working on school stuff that all you wanted to do now was to essentially become a human rock. Jaehee picks up on it, having known you for a while but she must be desperate to get out because she persists.

“C’mon Y/N! It’s still early and a Saturday plus I know you’re not working tomorrow either!”

You’re caught in between the pros and cons of staying home or going out because although you’re definitely not opposed to going to a cute little cafe to maybe reward yourself with an iced coffee or latte, you definitely dread the thought of the process to getting yourself ready to look presentable to the world when you’re completely comfortable in your PJs. Your indecision shows and like a bloodhound, Jaehee hones in on it and with a last ditch effort of convincing you, she throws in some puppy-dog eyes and a pout.

“Please? I really wanna check this place out with you.”

The loud sigh you let out is enough to have a smile break out widely on her face, needing no words to know that you’ve given in. With reluctance, you drag yourself up out of your chair to get changed.

Guess BTS will have to wait a little longer.

Admittedly the cafe is pretty cute and this iced latte is great so you find the discomfort of being dragged out of the house disappearing. You’re having a good time, laughing at a work story Jaehee is telling you as you’re munching on some fancy looking pastries that should’ve been too good-looking to eat (but that sentiment quickly went away because Jaehee took too long taking photos of it from every angle).

There’s a lull in conversation as Jaehee takes the time to type something out on her phone, you paying no mind as your attention is more on getting the last of this cheesecake in front you.

“So Jason; you remember him right? He’s gonna stop by with a friend of his who just moved here to the city. Do you mind if they join us?”

You’re caught like a deer in headlights, mouthful of delicious desserts. Half of you find that there’s no reason they shouldn’t be allowed but the other half is cringing at the thought of having to interact with people whom you know very little about (Jason has only been a recent thing in Jaehee’s life and from what little times you’ve hung out with him and Jaehee together, you still can’t quite figure out if he’s worth investing in before he’s replaced).

Rationality wins out eventually, finding yourself no real good reason to say no so you bite the bullet. “Sure, I guess?"

When you’re halfway through your latte, Jaehee’s phone vibrates and she picks up.

“Hello?…. Oh you’re here? We’re just inside, come in!” She hangs up promptly with a smile and before you can ask or wonder more on it, the door opens and in walks two guys. You easily recognize one of them as being the one that Jaehee took to the Christmas party as a date so by process of elimination, the other is the friend from out of town.

He’s quite plain looking; a mop of dark hair and with no striking feature catching your eye other than the fact that he seems quite tall and lanky (but the same can be said about everyone you basically meet). The duo approaches just as Jaehee waves them over, her date going in for a hug to which your friend reciprocates while his friend simply smiles politely on the side.

“Jason! Glad you could make it, and you must be Mike right?”

Mike smiles widely and offers a handshake for her, to which Jaehee takes naturally.

“Yeah, nice to finally meet you.”

“And this is my friend and roommate Y/N.”

You smile, taking Mike’s outstretched hand to give a shake as well as giving a simple greeting. Conversations are taken over by Jaehee for a bit before you all collectively decide to leave and walk along the street where the cafe is located. The weather is nice, the air slightly crisp but the real cold was more of something to worry about once the sun goes down.

You file out of the shop and begin your walk, Jaehee and Jason naturally pairing up to chat, which left you with Mike trailing after them from behind. Oh joy….

Your heart is beating a little too hard in your chest for your liking, your small bouts of social anxiety creeping in at now being put in a position to make small talk with a total stranger, a skill you haven’t quite got the hang of in all of your twenty-some odd years of being alive.

“This seems like a really nice place to hang out with your friends huh?” Luckily, Mike’s the first to strike up conversations with you. Pressure relieved, you plaster on a smile.

“Yeah, most of the cafes and popular eating spots are here….”

And that’s pretty much all you get out. You’re starting to get sweaty.

“What would you recommend here?” Mike persists, seemingly not bothered by what you feel is a conversation struggling to continue every other sentence. He still has a smile on his face which makes his otherwise ordinary features appear more attractive, and coupled by his earnestness to keep talking to you, the friendliness and outgoing characteristics of him becomes more apparent. You find yourself impressed by his efforts of keeping the awkwardness at bay.

“Uh, I’ve only tried a few places. So far pretty good in my opinion.”

“So the cafe today was good then? Because what you were eating back there looks really delicious.”

“Yeah, I guess. The cheesecake is all right.”

It pretty much continues with Mike obviously being the more animated out of the two you as he pretty much chats enough for you both. You find out he’s moved here to attend the local university, the same one Jason goes to and that’s how they became friends and that he’s only been here for a little over two weeks. You nod along, offering comments here and there and the last remains of heart palpitations are thankfully gone.

“What’s Tsujiro?” Mike suddenly asks as his gaze wanders to a dessert place you’re coming up on. You pause, can’t help but think how the shop name as well known as Tsujiro could slip under someone’s radar at this point. However, you push it aside because who are you judge; maybe he came from a smaller city or town?

“Oh, uh, it’s a Japanese dessert place; they mainly sell soft serve green tea ice cream in like, tall cups or small ones with other toppings and stuff.”

“Oh wow, I might actually want to try one out. Is it good?” He turns to you, bright eyed and you give a shrug and a wry smile.

“It’s all right.” You say, voice cracking near the end from being unsure. Sure you liked it, but honestly found it too pricey for your taste.

You don’t tell Mike that though (who are you to stop him from wanting to try it out; who knows, maybe he’ll like it).

It seems good enough for him because he makes a beeline into the shop and you call out to Jaehee and Jason to wait up. No sooner, Mike comes out and everyone comments on his chosen concoction from the store; a tall cup of what appears to be green tea smoothie, topped with more green soft serve, a cube of cheesecake (?), sprinkled with mochi and other sweet looking treats. It’s pretty to look at, but the price he tells you were anything but (you’re not surprised).

Your group walks around a bit more until spontaneously deciding the grab dinner once Mike finishes up with his dessert (“not as good as it looked,” he chuckles disappointingly).

The restaurant you decide to eat at however was thankfully. You all make good talk with one another, Jaehee, being the ever better socialite than you, does a good job at covering for you both (you have a sneaking suspicion it’s the alcohol you’ve all ordered with your meal). You feel like you’ve filled your quota of talks and keeping up with pleasantries in the face of strangers, though that doesn’t stop Mike from pulling you into conversations every now and then. You throw in a comment or two to suffice.

Dinner wraps up nicely, the bill is split and you all get ready to leave: Jason with Mike and Jaehee with you. You think you’re in the clear, the slight alcohol enhancing the excited buzz you’re feeling about heading home until Mike calls out to you suddenly at what should’ve been the final exchanges of goodbyes.

“Hey Y/N, is it okay if I have your number? Would be cool to see you again.”

You blink, unsure of how to respond. You seldom give your number out to people you’ve only just met, unless the circumstances are called for (i.e. business related, appointment based, or if it’s long overdue if you keep seeing the person). Snobby or uptight aren’t words you would describe yourself with this, but perhaps a combination of pessimistic and realistic is more appropriate; you’ve long made peace with the fact that at this stage of your life, the chances of acquiring any more life-long friends is zero to none. Nine times out of ten, this will be just another number you’ll have to clear out.

At the nudge of Jaehee’s shoulder, you’re knocked out of your stupor and the realization that you had probably been vacantly staring at him settles as an embarrassed blush on your cheeks.

“O-Oh, uh, you have iMessenger? That’s better to get in touch with me.” You awkwardly reach for your phone to pull up the app and Mike laughs good-naturedly, nodding. You exchange contacts and finally, with a breath of relief, you part ways. Not a moment sooner when you had turned the block to the direction of your house did Jaehee pounce on you.

“So? What do you think of him?” She asks, trying to be on the sly with things but it’s obvious how eager she is to hear.

“Think of who?”

“Mike! Jason’s friend.”

“What about him?” You’re not seeing the significance of the question nor the person in question.

“You know… do you think he's nice? Cool? …. Cute?”

You nearly give yourself whiplash at Jaehee’s choice of questions, turning your gaze onto her expectant ones. You feel your face contort itself into a sort of half grimace and look of incredulity.

“I only just met him? Like he’s nice, I guess…. Really friendly to people he just met— I don’t know.”

Jaehee seems to deflate at your lukewarm response. “Really? That’s it?”

“…. Yeah? Why?”

She sighs, hand tugging to link arms with you. “Never mind.”

The rest of the walk home you’re confused but you’re too tired to really think too much on it at this point. So much so that once you’re in the house, your night routine all blurs together and you immediately fall asleep as soon as your head touches pillow.

The next morning, you wake up with a groan, stretching your limbs but not quite ready to get up out of your cocoon of blankets just yet. You settle by grabbing your phone to mindlessly scroll through your social media, as one does when they’re intent to make Sunday their designated lazy day. You’re surprised to see a notification for your iMessenger, a face you’re not used to seeing. It takes a moment for it to register as the guy you met yesterday, Mike.

“Did you two get home alright?” was his written message in the chat box, sent at a time you knew you’d been passed out in the sleep. You do him the courtesy to text back with an apology on the delayed response and that yes, you and Jaehee did make it home safely.

You go on to open up your other apps, scrolling through your feed, which helps you wake yourself up, more often than not finding BTS content related things. You stop on a video clip compilation of Jimin laughing till he disappears out of frame and it makes you grin. How can someone so cute exist? You hit the ‘like’ button and as you proceed to scroll more, your thoughts shift to the next thing related to said idol.

Speaking of, you wonder if your demon guardian Jimin-lookalike is back.

You swivel your head as best you could but find not so much as whiff of the usual lavender and vanilla scent that never fails to follow him.

Huh….

You get out of bed eventually, making your way to the kitchen to fix yourself breakfast and find that the house is…uncharacteristically quiet.

No, it’s always been this quiet. You correct yourself, because it’s true…or was true. Before….

You huff a sigh, exasperated. Get your thoughts straight girl.

You continue with your day, making up for the lazing around you missed. Every once in a while, your phone pings with a notification; another sent message by Mike. The conversation was nothing of interest, just more casual talks of what you’re doing and going off on that before the topic is changed, most often by Mike once you’ve ran out of things to say.

It goes on like that for a couple more days. He messages first always, and you almost dutifully answer back out of courtesy. He truly does seem like a nice guy, polite and easy-going but as much as your conversations with him were good (at a least you think? There were times you’ve haven’t answered for days because you were being swamped with work and school but that still doesn’t deter him), they were still very surface level; not having gone past being ‘good acquaintances’…or more like ‘one-sided good acquaintances’ because you think you know more about him than he does you.

However, as the days drag on, you find your interest in Mike fading altogether as more other pressing thoughts start to occupy your mind, creeping in and growing like mold.

Where is your guardian demon?

Jimin did say the meeting might take more than a few days but it’s almost been more than a week since he’d left. Do meetings in hell usually take this long? More so, why hasn’t the bastard texted you at all? He’s supposed to be your guardian and right now he’s technically neglecting his end of the contract.

Wait, what are you saying?

You flail your limbs in frustration, lying in bed in the middle of the night. You had told yourself that you were going to be a decent human being and go to sleep at normal people time because you’re absolutely beat from the week’s work but instead of drifting off like you thought you would, you ended up reflecting back on the events and had come full circle to the one being who should’ve been your least concerned.

Even when he’s not physically there, he still manages to wiggle his way into your thoughts. Unbelievable.

You drift off eventually, stubbornly muting any train of thoughts that somehow always seem to lead back to him. You wake up a little on the groggy side, as if you haven’t slept at all but it’s the weekend again so you’re not bothered in rushing to get up. Grabbing your phone, you tap it awake to find a message notification.

Your heart races for a quick second before impassively dropping once your foggy mind has registered the name; it’s Mike. No devil…or demon to be spoken of here. The message preview looks like a good morning text and the beginnings of asking what are you up to and you don’t quite make it that far before brushing it away from the screen; you’ll answer later.

You mosey along with your day contently, taking time to eating breakfast then getting lost on Youtube (to which you, without fail, ended up watching a bunch of BTS related videos from Vlives to Run episodes to Bangtan Bombs) and even being productive like getting ahead of your studies (though you literally spent a little under fifteen minutes on it but hey, progress is progress).

It’s around late evening when Jaehee comes knocking on your door, phone in hand once again and a yet another proposition.

“Hey, wanna head out for dinner with me, Jason and Mike tonight?”

You blink back at her from your nest of pillows and blankets much like an owl, not giving her an immediate response. She stares right back at you and it would seem like you two were having a silent conversation but you have a sneaking feeling that Jaehee can already see your brain working through all the pros and cons of saying yes or no like you’re Doctor Strange seeing all the possible alternative universes in which to defeat Thanos.

“Where to exactly?” You ask after a while with slight trepidation.

“That new Korean BBQ place that just opened up.”

Damn.

She’s got you beat. You’ve been eyeing that place for a while now but just never had the time or occasion to go. Not only was it the first branch to finally open here from being exclusively abroad for so long, but the restaurant is only a few blocks down the street from where you and Jaehee live; a true miracle because you had always figured such a popular restaurant would be located more towards downtown (which meant having to commute via subway, ugh).

And God must’ve cursed you with a gluttonous vice because your stomach rumbles like it had a say in whether you’re going or not, and by the looks of it, you most certainly are.

So with a defeated sigh, and knowing that Jaehee most likely heard your traitorous stomach even from your doorway, you agree.

The two of you meet up with your companions at the restaurant since they were coming from the downtown area so this way it would be more convenient. Jaehee greets the boys enthusiastically, whereas you wave casually, more subdued.

“Hey, Y/N! It’s been a while since we saw each other.” Mike smiles as he comes up to you.

“Uh, yeah it has huh?” You shift a little in place, but you hurriedly follow after Jaehee and Jason who’s already stepped into the restaurant to grab a table. Jason of course, slides in on the bench side with Jaehee…. Which leaves you and Mike on the chairs across. You inwardly sigh out in exasperation. You just want to get through dinner eating the most Korean BBQ you can and with as little small talk as possible.

To your relief, it wasn’t difficult to do once the food starts rolling out and the grill starts sizzling. For the most part, it works because food is always a great distraction but then the drinks starts pouring and you’d be lying if you said you weren’t totally in love with grapefruit flavoured soju now. Luckily, most conversations stay group oriented and Jaehee takes the lead in most of them, so you bounce off of her topics to make it easier for you to not get stuck conversing with just Mike.

As the eating comes to an end and drinks only remain however, you’re left with very little to defend yourself with.

“So did you see the new Venom movie?” Mike asks you with what you could assume was a playful nudge but all it does is nearly make you slosh your drink. You try not to let the annoyance show on your face as you strain to smile back.

“Ah, yeah I did. I watched it online.” You say off-handedly before downing your drink, the sweetness of grapefruit hiding the usual rubbing alcohol burn of the soju, making it far too easy to swallow. You muse absently about how dangerous that can be.

“What? Why didn’t you see it in theatres? It was a great movie!”

It wasn’t that great. But it wasn’t that bad either. You think to yourself but you’re not in the mood to having an extensive discussion with him, head beginning to slightly throb, so you settle to just shrug.

“I didn’t feel like it. Also, didn’t really have the time.”

“Hey, then when we get the chance, maybe we should go see one together.” Mike suggests. You’re about to give a reply that would underlie a soft let down or at least to not get his hopes up when Jaehee exclaims rather excitedly at the suggestion.

“Oh my god yeah! We should! It’s been so long since I’ve actually went to see a movie in theatres.”

“I swear we went to one not too long ago…” Jason comments, trailing off as his thinks back on it.

“That was in summer, and now it’s winter.” Jaehee turns back to you and Mike in front of her, her excitement not seeming to die down anytime soon as she blurts out a little too loudly. “It can be like a double date!”

You nearly choke on the soju you’ve been sipping, covering it up hastily with the loud clearing of your throat and decidedly placing the glass down to reach for the cup of cold water instead.

“Woah you okay?” You feel Mike’s hand on your shoulder; the sudden contact makes your arm flinch in surprise. You hurriedly gulp down the water, letting the coolness wash over the rough patch in your throat before mustering up a stiff smile in assurance.

“Y-Yeah, no, I’m fine! Just…. went down the wrong pipe is all.” Your voice comes out hoarse and you cough again to clear it, chuckling nervously. Jaehee laughs as if you just hadn’t nearly choked to death, though she refills your cup of water generously.

“You need to slow down with that soju. Is it really that good?”

“Yeah!” You jump on the chance to direct your attention elsewhere, “Really good! I like, almost finished this bottle by myself!” You forcefully laugh; feel your cheeks start to heat up, whether from said alcohol or embarrassment. You start to wonder belatedly if you should check with a mirror to see if you’ve gone as red as you usually do when drinking (boy would that be even more embarrassing!).

“You know what, I need to go to the washroom. Be right back!” You hurriedly excuse yourself, the chair wobbling as you get up with a stumble.

“Oh! I’ll come with you!” Jaehee volunteers as she jumps up from her seat, grabbing your arm and dragging you to the ladies’ room. After a quick trip of emptying your bladder, you finally get a look at your reflection as you wash your hands. You’re relieved to find that you’re not completely red, just the slightest shade of pink peeking through your foundation. You note with satisfaction of how high coverage it is.

“Hey, Y/N!” Jaehee calls cheerfully to you as she steps out of her cubicle with a flush. She comes to stand next to you, bumping your hips before lathering her hands with soap and water.

“What?” You ask more concentrated in your attempts at patting away some of the oiliness on your nose and chin.

“I think Mike is really into you.” Jaehee teases, a sneaky smile sent your way but you’re not as amused by the idea as she is. You wrinkle your nose, face scrunching in the mirror in front of you.

“Um, what makes you so sure about that?”

“Don’t tell him I told you, but Mike messaged me before we headed out tonight. He said you and him have been hitting it off pretty well.”

You furrow your eyebrows because that’s not how you see it and you express that much. Jaehee gives you a look that says she thinks otherwise.

“The guy’s just super nervous around you. He really wants to get to know you better. Hell, if I wasn’t seeing Jason, I would go for him.” You can see her efforts in trying to get you to sympathize and though you don’t have much to argue against Mike because he really does seem like a nice guy and hasn’t done anything wrong, you don’t feel…. a connection. At all.

“I mean he’s nice…. I guess? And like we talk, but I just don’t really feel anything? I don’t know….” You reply half mumbling distractedly, not really knowing how to explain but also finding that you don’t really care.

“Is it because of that other guy who saved you?”

You swear the speed in which you turn to Jaehee nearly knocks you off your own feet, heart thudding loudly against your ribcage that you have no time to discern if it’s from the alcohol or the thought of your Jimin impostor guardian demon.

“W-What? Um, no! He’s—We’re not— I mean there’s nothing between us!” You get out, voice raising a little too high that it startles some other ladies who walked in. You shrink back as Jaehee lets out cackles and gives a hearty smack to your back, jerking you forward from the force. She startles you again by abruptly stopping midway to dramatically gasp, eyes wide and gleaming in a way that makes you nervous because inebriated Jaehee is often times too brash and too impulsive for her own good.

“What if you just…. talk to him?”

“Who? Ji—?“ You almost make the mistake of saying his name aloud but you had lit Jaehee to cover for you, even if it was unintentional.

“Mike! You need to talk to him…alone.” She cuts you off, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

“I— I don’t get it…?”

“You need to get a feel for him in person! And this is only the second time you’ve met and it’s always with me and Jason! No wonder you’re not connecting properly!”

“H-Huh?” You’re slow on the follow up because you thought you were still talking about Jimin?

“I’ll tell you what!” Jaehee laser focuses on you and instinctively, your shoulder hunches up to brace for impact. “Why don’t I leave with Jason so we could give you some alone time?”

You blink in disbelief and Jaehee pouts at your lack in response.

“C’mon, Y/N! How about just…thirty minutes? Yeah, thirty minutes! If you’re not feeling him even then…. then you can leave and I’ll never speak of it again."

You think that’s about as good as it’s going to get with Jaehee and your mind processes and contemplates it as well. It’s not ideal but you don’t see any harm in chatting a guy one on one for thirty minutes, if it means you could say at least you tried and it’ll put this entire thing to rest once and for all.

“Okay, fine.” You sigh out with reluctance. “Thirty minutes but that’s it.”

Jaehee squeals and nods obviously pleased and with one last fluff to her hair, she pulls you out of the washroom and back to your table. Jason and Mike are unsurprisingly chatting it up and having a great time with each other (so much so that you think ruefully that maybe they should be left alone). But at yours and Jaehee’s approach, their attention is drawn, both shooting smiles.

“Oh you’re finally back.” Jason remarks, “We got another bottle of grapefruit soju since it’s pretty good.” He picks up the green bottle to give it a shake. Jaehee however, makes to pull him up and out of his seat. He follows obediently, although a bit puzzled.

“Oh sorry, I just remembered I have something to give you Jason so we need to get going.” Jaehee smiles blindingly, cheeks puffing up and eyes creasing as she continues to tug at Jason. “But hey, how about Mike and Y/N finish the bottle? We’ll get the bill this time, our treat! So you just take your time okay?"

“Oh, uh, sure? If that’s okay?” Mike shifts his eyes to you as you awkwardly shuffle over to make way for the other couple. Your eyes dart to him, a nervous laugh bubbling past your lips as you rub your neck.

“Y-Yeah, thanks Jaehee…Jason... No worries... I like grapefruit soju….”

“Great! Then we’ll get going, it was nice seeing you again Mike! Bye Y/N, text me!” And before you know it, Jaehee zips off with Jason in tow and mentally you brace yourself; no doubt that this will probably be the longest thirty minutes of your life.

Okay, Y/N relax. Just have a casual talk with this guy for thirty minutes and then you can leave and go to sleep. It’s not that deep. You think to yourself as you slide into the bench seat across from Mike who cracks open the bottle and graciously fill your glass for you. You take it with a smile and as he raises his up for you to clink against, you do so before downing it without hesitation, the drink still chilled enough that it seems to cool your nerves.

Your conversations with Mike were as you had predicted; nothing of interest to note. You talked movies; about the food you just ate which lead to food preferences to other interests that you don’t go too in depth with (at least on your behalf, Mike doesn’t seem shy on talking about how he’s really into cars).

Eventually, you make the conscious decision of stopping yourself from taking anymore shots of soju because you realized by the second and a half glass, you’re starting to faintly feel the creeping affects of the alcohol, a light misting of inebriation blanketing your mind causing you to find it difficult to recall how much time has passed. So when Mike had offered to refill your glass, you politely decline. The bottle was still a little more than halfway done, and though Mike attempts to get you to help him out, you were steadfast in sobering up by the time you get to leave.

Besides, the alcohol is starting to mess with your sense of judgment in which you can actually feel the deterioration of a rather vital thing to your conscious; a filter.

Which brings you to eyeing your phone surreptitiously from under the table, what should’ve been just a peek to read Jaehee’s text reminding you to call her if you needed anything, turned into a rapidly growing curiosity of ‘what-ifs’ that involve a certain demon.

What if you just…talk to him?

You’re hearing Jaehee’s words echo in your head, though you swear somewhere in the back of your mind they’re way out of context. But the point of it remains; what would happen if you were to send a text to him? Would he be annoyed? Would he text back? Hell, you don’t even know if he’s still alive! What if his boss was unsatisfied with his work and just straight up burned him to a crisp with the infernal flames of hell?! Oh my god! Why haven’t you thought of that before?! Now it’s been over a week since you’ve last heard of him you’re so stupid—!

“Hey, Y/N!”

“…Huh? Oh? Sorry did you say something?”

Mike, who stares at you with a rather glazed look, pulls you from irrationally making one direct call to hell. A quick glance at the soju bottle tells you he’s made good work on it, coming down to the last glassful. A little pink in the face but he still looks way better than you would if you'd down that much soju.

“I was askin’ if you had a boyfriend.”

Oh.

“Um…’s been a while; got too busy with school and work.”

“So…do I have a chance with you?”

…. HUH?

You freeze, doing a double take. “W-What?”

“You know, a chance to be with you…"

Okay so you didn’t hear wrong. That still doesn’t mean you know how to respond to that appropriately. You didn’t want to hurt him because you’re sure it’s liquid courage that’s making him ask this, also the fact that he hasn’t done anything to upset you.

“Aha…whoa uh,” You flounder through a nervous laugh because you’d rather get some sort of response out instead of remain silent. “I uh, I…dunno…?”

“What’s not to know?” He asks rather boldly and you’re completely taken aback. “I thought we had somethin’ goin’ on.”

“H-Hey, I think you’re a nice guy, but I don’t think I'm really looking for a relationship right now. I’m sorry if I lead you on somehow.”

“So would you ever love me?”

Now you’re speechless, can’t really believe just how fast things have snowballed that it almost has your mind sobering up in an instant. You’ve tried your best to let him down gently but it’s like it’s not getting through to him. Perhaps you should take it as a sign as your cue to leave.

“Uhh…I think I should go. You should go too! It’s…late. It’s been nice.” You slide out from the other side, clutching at your purse and phone. Your heart’s pounding in your chest again and you can feel it pulsing in your ear too. You fumble with shaky fingers to type in your phone’s lock code, getting it wrong twice before getting it right to tap on Jaehee’s number. You press the phone close to your ear, letting the dial tone ring as your feet take you out of the restaurant and onto the streets. The chilly night air does wonders in further clearing your mind but it also makes you painfully aware of how hot your face still feels.

“Hey Y/N! How’s the date going?” Jaehee’s cheery voice comes through after the third ring.

“H-Hey Jaehee! Uh..um…I wouldn’t say well…? He might have had too much to drink so he sorta—“ You’re speed walking in the direction of your home, completely tunnel visioning so you fail to notice a pair of heavy footsteps fast approaching you from behind. A force almost knocks you over; you stumble forward in a mess of legs, fighting to stay upright the same time you feel your phone being ripped out of your grasp.

“Jaehee? Is that you? Y-Yeah everythin’s okay! I’m okay! Y/N’s takin’ me home now, drank too much haha! She’s just lettin’ ya know! Yeah, yeah no don’t worry! Okay bye!”

By the time you’ve righted yourself, Mike’s hung up on Jaehee with the bullshit he’s spewed. You’re absolutely livid when you turn on him with a glare so piercing you’d think Jimin would be proud.

“What's wrong with you?!” You yell out, trying to snatch your phone back but Mike who’s significantly taller than you, easily keeps it at bay with minimal effort. It only makes you fly more into a blinding rage.

“W-Wait! Let’s head back to my place and chill?”

“Like hell I would! Give me back my phone!”

“At least walk with me to the subway?”

You’re heaving with effort, energy exerted from your fail attempts at getting your phone and your pause to catch your breath must’ve made him think you were going to agree to his request because he’s looking at you hopefully. You wanted to laugh in his face but you’d rather face the devil himself at this point than be with this guy for another minute.

“I’ll call you an Uber! Now give me my phone!” You seethe.

“C’mon Y/N, don’t be like that. I’ve been nice to you so can you at least—“

You swear steam is coming out of your ears at this point, your hands shaking at the audacity and just when you’ve locked in your choice to rugby tackle him with all your body mass, another voice cuts through the both of you.

“I do believe the young lady said no.” His drawl is a bone-chilling calm that you could almost feel the temperature drop even further by it.

Under the flickering street lamp’s light, you catch a wisp of black smoke; the tendrils trail before fading out of sight over Mike’s shoulder. You follow it up until you reach Mike’s hand — the one holding your phone — where you see extra digits wrapped firmly around his wrist, nails digging into the skin. Mike’s head whips behind him alarmed, to reveal the shockingly beautiful face you’ve come to know.

Jimin stands unperturbed behind Mike who visibly struggles against his hold, even when Jimin is at least a good inch shorter than him. His face an inscrutable mask and eyes swirling a deep garnet, the only thing betraying his utter displeasure.

“H-Hey what the fuck man! Who are—ARGH!!” Mike’s exclamations turns into a howl of pain at the sounds of a crack, hand dropping your phone to which Jimin smoothly catches and lets him crumple to the ground to cradle his wrist. You step back to avoid being in his line of falling, mouth gaping and trying to catch up with what just happened. So far, you’ve only registered that Jimin is here.

“Darling you’ll catch flies if you keep that up.” Jimin tuts, stepping over Mike’s curled up body. He takes your hand and places your phone in it and you’re in such disbelief that you nearly drop it. He still looks immaculate as ever, dressed in an all black except this time he’s wearing a cozy looking turtleneck under a leather jacket and fitted jeans. His hair is styled in the usual way it is — coiffed with a few strands hanging over his forehead with such volume that it made you envious— but you’re shocked to see that it was no longer plain silver; there’s a blueish tint to it now. The sight mesmerizes you.

Jimin goes to say something teasing, you just know it as you see the upturn corner of his mouth but before he can get it out, a shuffling and a grunt from behind makes his face drop back into the frighteningly stony mask again, plush lips drawn into a line. You see Mike stumble to his feet, still clutching at his wrist while trying to burn a hole into the back of Jimin’s head.

It was then that you realize that Mike, a human much like yourself, is staring directly at Jimin and now that you think about it, he had also addressed Jimin when he first appeared just as he does now.

“W-Who the fuck do you think you are?!” Mike growls. Jimin merely scoffs; you don’t need to see his face to know he’s probably rolled his eyes. But instead of addressing the angry man, Jimin slaps on a benevolent smile your way and begins to usher you.

“Come darling, you must be cold standing out here and we really ought to get—“ He cuts himself off by reaching up and catching a flying fist aimed at him. You gasp out in shock at the speed and the suddenness of Mike actually having the balls to try to throw a punch. Eyes wide, you look up to gauge Jimin’s reaction to find that yes, he looks pissed; jaw clenched and eyes burning with hellfire itself.

You let out a surprise yelp as Jimin clamps down on Mike’s fist and with little effort, flips him and begins to drag him off, heading to an alley concealed by shadows. You scurry after him after snapping out of your initial shock, panicked and stuttering out words incoherently because you are not going to have another dead body on your conscious, at least not someone who you actually knew no matter how douche-y he turned out to be.

“I’ll break your other wrist, and then your legs, and then your neck. And if you want a tour of hell, come back three more times.” You hear Jimin spit out between gritted teeth, but you highly doubt it got through to Mike who’s too busy writhing, screaming and cursing from the ground.

“Jimin! Wait, I said no killing! Jimin! Hey, you jerk! Listen to me!” You had to yell over Mike’s voice, wondering how it is that you guys haven’t woken up the whole neighbourhood yet as you push against Jimin’s very firm chest to get him to halt in his tracks.

“Sweetie, not now. I need to enact the Lord’s good graces and teach this petulant human some manners.”

“That does not make any sense! And—SHUT UP!” The incessant yelling from Mike finally gets to you, having heard enough of his voice for the night as you impulsively deliver an adrenaline filled kick to his face. He knocks out immediately.

Jimin drops his hold on Mike’s fist with an unceremonious thump, bewildered. “Way to kill steal from me, pumpkin.”

You gasp loudly, nerves shaken from what you just did and what Jimin has just told you as a new wave of rising panic sets in. “O-Oh my god did I actually kill him?! Is he dead?! I didn’t mean—!”

Your demon guardian throws his head back, a boisterous laughter escaping him as he folds in on himself. You jump back startled and could only stare on in silent horror because of course he would find this funny and would be of no help!

“J-Jimin! This isn’t funny! What are we gonna do now?!”

“Relax darling…” He finally wheezes out, straightening himself up while wiping the corner of his eyes. “He’s not dead, unfortunately; just K.O’ed by a swift kick to the face. Probably broke his nose though so good job on that.”

You gape like a fish out of water and all he does is stare back at you with the lingering traces of a fond smile that has your traitor of a heart skipping a beat. Damn him!

“You—!” You start, huffing and puffing and though words escape you, your fists don’t as you land a hit on his chest. He takes it with little resistant, relenting himself as you let out your pent up frustrations. “You stupid jerk and your pretty stolen face! Just showing up like you own the place without even saying anything to me for more than a week! And then let some other stupid jerk try to get a jump on me! Some guardian demon you are! I could’ve just handled it all myself!”

You tire yourself out by the time you’re done your tirade, strength leaving your arms as they slap uselessly against the leather of his jacket until you stop altogether. Jimin’s quiet, the quietest you think he’s ever been. You refuse to make eye contact with him, staring determinedly down on his shiny black loafers but instead of some snarky comment about owing him for using him as a punching bag, you hear a shuffle of movement and then something heavy drapes over your shoulder, a waft of all too familiar vanilla lavender smell easing whatever remaining tension left in your body.

Your gaze automatically whips up to his. He busies himself securing the jacket to you before his eyes wander to meet yours; the soft brown colour that stares back comforts you.

“You’ve had a rough night darling, and I’m sorry I wasn’t there. So I’ll forgive you for beating up my Saint Laurent jacket and we’ll call it even?”

For a moment, you thought of scowling him and his love for name brand things but all you really want to do now is go home and fall asleep, so you nod softly, giving in. Jimin lets out a quiet chuff of amusement, hand coming up to stroke your hair with a gentleness that has your heart aching with the disgruntlement that you do miss having him by your side.

“Y/N!” A shout freezes you up like cold water being dumped over your head as you whip towards the source of the call. To your astonishment, you see a familiar face running towards you, her figure unmistakable and as she draws nearer, you can see clearly who it is.

It’s Jaehee.

She slows to a stop, panting heavily from how hard she must’ve ran, shoulders slumped as she braces herself on her knees but even then she’s still trying to muster out words in between gasps of breath. “You called and….suddenly Mike was on the phone! Saying how he drank too much? That you were taking him home! And I just…I had such a bad feeling I had to… Are you okay?!”

Jaehee makes to lunge at you but stops midway as she finally notices your frozen, wide eyed appearance and you see with pinpoint accuracy the way her eyes trail from your face to your shoulders to the extra hand on your shoulder all the way up to Jimin who is quite at a loss for words as well.

You watch with baited breath as she squints up at him with a gaze so fixated on analyzing him, a myriad of emotions flitting across her own face before she utters.

“Have I…seen you from somewhere?”

521 notes · View notes

psychospeak-blog · 6 years ago

Text

Won’t Go Slowly // 5

One // Two // Three // Four

A/N: Big thanks to @price-devant-la-cage, @bugheadblueandgold, & @hockeyandstuff91 for beta reading this for me :)

Warnings: Some needle/shot discussion in this one, if you’re bothered by that.

You hated to admit it, but Tyler was right about the date with the history professor. Jeff, it turned out his name was.

It wasn't bad, by any means, but it certainly wasn't good either. He was just so...dry. And he was very nice and tried to keep the conversation going, but there just wasn't any chemistry.

You hated to admit it, but Tyler was right about the date with the history professor. Jeff, it turned out his name was.

It wasn't bad, by any means, but it certainly wasn't good either. He was just so...dry. And he was very nice and tried to keep the conversation going, but there just wasn't any chemistry.

To make things worse, he'd taken you to a fancier restaurant than you were used to. It was lovely, really, but it just wasn't your vibe.

So, now you were were going over to Tyler's for date #2, which still seemed a little ridiculous. As if first dates weren't already intimidating enough, now you were going to have to explain to this guy why he was picking you up at your best friend's house.

You stepped out of your car, grabbing your bag, and making your way into the front door, finding it unlocked,.As per usual.

All three dogs greeted you pretty much as soon as you stepped in the door, tails wagging with excitement.

"Hey, where are you guys going?" You heard Tyler ask as he rounded the corner. Once he sawy you his question was answered and he immediately gave you a once over, letting out a low whistle in appreciation. "You trying to get laid tonight?"

Without even responding, you turned on your heel, heading back towards the front door, but Tyler caught your wrist, "Where are you going?"

"Home," you said, "To get changed."

"Why?" he asked, frowning, "You look great."

"You just said I looked like I was trying to get laid!" Which was not the look you were going for. You'd put a lot of work into the outfit, actually, selecting a deep blue maxi dress with thin white stripes that hung over your body like a column, except from where it was cinched at the waist. The straps were thin around your shoulders, but it had a high neck, so it wasn't like you were showing off cleavage. You'd kept your make-up and hair simple, pulling half of it back and letting the other half fall on your shoulders. You had thought it was the perfect first date option.

Apparently not.

"I meant you looked cute-hot or classy-hot not...slutty hot?" He said, like he wasn't quite sure what to call it, "Don't change."

"You're sure?" You asked tentatively, nerves creeping into your voice.

"Positive," he nodded, "And no pressure, right? You're only just meeting your future husband tonight."

"God," you rolled your eyes, sitting down on the couch, and Gerry immediately started jumping on you.

"See," Tyler said, sliding onto the couch next to you, "he thinks you look pretty."

You laughed, petting the dog behind the ears, "So are you going to tell me anything about this guy, or am I going in completely blind?"

" Well," Tyler started, setting his hands on his knees and leaning forward, "his name is Mark. He's a software developer. And he doesn't have a wife or kids." He was looking at you like you were supposed to be impressed with this fact. In fact, Tyler looked more excited than you felt, which was really weird.

"That's all you know about him?" You gawked.

"Of course not," he assured you, "he ran a marathon last year, and you run. He likes food, and you love baking. You could make him cookies. He also likes watching movies. You like watching movies."

You raised your eyebrows, and you wanted to run your hand over your face, but you'd probably smudge your make-up, so you held back. "You do realize that literally everyone likes food, right? And I'm pretty sure 90% of the guys on that thing have 'watching movies' listed as a hobby."

"Well, I can't find out everything for you," Tyler said, "he did seem to have a great personality though. He's pretty funny, and he seems pretty easy going too, plus he’s good looking.”

You laughed at the last comment, running your hands over your thighs and trying to calm your nerves. It really wasn't like you, honestly, to go on one yet alone two blind dates. But you'd realized that you'd have to start putting yourself out there, no matter how strange it might seem. But that didn't mean first dates got any less nerve wracking.

You'd set up Danielle calling you with a fake emergency, as you always did, but you were now starting to regret agreeing to Tyler's plan to have your date pick you up from here, because that meant you didn't have your car. Not to mention, you'd now have to try to explain to this guy why he was picking you up from another guy's house.

And you didn't want to tell him what you were doing, obviously, lest he feel like a pawn in your dating game. Really, you were just trying to get out of your comfort zone.

" What are we going to tell him?" You asked in alarm.

"Huh?" Tyler asked, looking over at you and clearly confused.

" What are we going to tell that guy...Mark, about why you're here?"

"Oh, I'm your roommate," he shrugged, "You live here."

"I'm your roommate?"

"Mhmm," he said, "That way he knows you have someone waiting up for you."

"Tyler, you don't have to..."

"Too bad, I am," he said with finality, then smiled playfully, poking you in the side, "Besides, you need to tell me all about it afterwards."

He looked at his watch and then sighed, running a hand over his face, "He's late," Tyler mumbled, setting his feet up on the ottoman, "You should have all your dates pick you up from my place."

"What? Why?" you asked with a laugh.

"So I can assess them, " he said, settling back onto the couch, "intimidate them a little bit."

"Intimidate them?" you asked, "Tyler, I'm not one of your sisters."

"Duh," he said, sticking his tongue out at you and then waving his hand, "But the same standards still apply. Mostly. And I generally don't tell my sister she looks hot."

"Standards?" you asked, "God, don't you remember what happened the last time you told Candace she couldn't date that guy? And you think that's going to work on me?"

"Nope," he replied, "But you can't blame a guy for trying."

Finally, you saw a car pull into the driveway and started to hurriedly lint roll dog hair off your dress, smoothing the fabric down when you were done, just before there was a knock at the door.

"So, yeah, just text me if you decide to go back to his place," Tyler said, raising his eyebrows suggestively as there was a second knock at the door.

"Tyler!" you said, swatting him on the arm and rushing to the front door, pulling it open, to reveal a man standing there who was just poised to knock again. "Hi, sorry, my roommate was stopping me from getting to the door."

You looked at him as you spoke and he was, as Tyler had said, good looking, actually. He was slim, hair swept all off to the side, and he had a nice smile. "That's okay," Mark said, "Sorry I'm late,. I got kind of turned around."

"That's alright," you said brightly, turning your head to glare briefly at Tyler, who was standing there watching your interaction with his arms crossed, realizing that he probably hadn't even given the poor guy directions.

"Well, it's nice to meet you," Mark said, and you let out a little 'oh' when he stepped forward, giving you a hug.

When you pulled back, you saw Tyler step towards you, arms still crossed, extending his hand when he got close, "Hey, I'm Tyler."

"Oh, yeah, yeah, I know," Mike said, and you could see his eyes widen slightly, even though he tried to hide it.

Oh god.

And then, of course, they were talking about hockey. And then, somehow, the conversation turned to some golf course you'd never even heard of, and then they were having an in-depth discussion about what club to use off the tee on the seventh hole, and you were just standing there, bored out of your mind.

Finally, you caught Tyler's eye, and his gaze flipped back to you quickly, as if he just remembered you were there. "Oh, uh, you two should probably get going."

Mike somehow seemed surprised to see you still standing there, "Oh, right."

"Don't keep her out too late!" Tyler yelled as you made your way out the door, and you resisted the urge to roll your eyes.

"I mean, I saw the picture you had with Tyler Seguin on your profile, but I didn't think you actually knew him," Mark said after you'd pulled off Tyler's street.

"Yep," you said simply, looking out the window and wondering briefly if he was going to refer to Tyler as 'Tyler Seguin' from here on out. You bit your lip, holding back the tidbit that it had actually been Tyler he'd been talking to the whole time, not you, for worry the guy might lose his mind.

" You look nice," he said, glancing down at your dress even thought you were sitting down and the seatbelt was cutting into the fabric. You frowned, pulling out a piece of blonde dog hair that was woven through an area on your dress that was dark blue.

"Thanks," you smiled softly, looking over at him as he drove, "You do, too."

Thankfully the restaurant you were headed to was actually quite close, which made your nerves calm a bit, knowing that you could walk back to Tyler's quite easily.

Mark pulled out your chair for you, a gesture which was very much not necessary but you appreciated his thoughtfulness. "So," he said, once he had sat down and the waitress had taken your drink orders, "What do you do for a living?"

" I'm an academic advisor," you said, stopping yourself before you said 'at The University of Toronto' because you realized he probably didn't need to know where you worked, not yet, at least. You were so used to dating guys that you met naturally or through friends, bit on a dating site, so you had to remind yourself of this fact.

" Oh?" He said, leaning forward as if he was interested. "What subject?"

"Humanities and social sciences," you said, thanking the waitress as she delivered your drink, and you took a sip.

"I hated university," Mark said, and you pursed your lips, waiting for him to realize what he had said but he didn't.

" Well, I like working there," you said, and then you asked him about what type oif software development he did. It turned out he worked for a construction company and he talked, at length, about how he created a program for inventory management, billing, and payroll. It sounded boring, quite honestly, but you followed along because you always found it interesting to learn what people did at their jobs.

"How long have you been living with Tyler Seguin?" Mark asked.

Oh my God, he was actually doing the thing you were worried about.

" Oh...uhhh.. a year? Two?" You were such a horrible liar and hoped he pick up on it, "We don't really live together, not really, since he's not really there often? But, I mean, we've been friends for a long time so, I just kind of watch his house?"

"Makes sense," Mark said, nodding, and then the conversation fell silent and you were trying to wrack your brain for conversation topics. "So, who's your team?"

"My team?" You repeated, because you were instantly thinking that he was asking you whether you were gay or not, but your rational brain was telling you that shouldn't be the case.

"Your hockey team," he said, taking a sip of his drink.

"Oh, I don't really watch hockey. I mean, I'll watch if it's on, but..." you were absentmindedly using your straw to stir your drink.

Mark's eyes widened from across the table, "But you're...?"

"Friends with Tyler?" you asked, "Yeah, but I've been known him since high school. I'm not friends with him just because he plays hockey."

Mark seemed to find this concept difficult to comprehend for some reason but, luckily, you remembered that Tyler had told you he'd run a marathon, so you brought that up. Not that running was much of a conversation topic, other than the fact that you both did it. Although, you certainly were never running a marathon, so you really didn't care too much about hearing about the hell of that.

The rest of the dinner went much like the first portion, although you were kind of beginning to realize that dinner wasn't the best option for a first date.

When he finally dropped you back off at Tyler's house, you were actually quite relieved that the date was over. Mark walked you to the door which was all very nice and lovely, but you were already pretty certain you weren't going to see him again. You opened the door as you were waving goodbye, and stepped inside, basically walking straight into Tyler's chest.

"Jesus christ," you mumbled under your breath.

Tyler laughed a little, stepping back so you could come inside, looking down at you as you bent to slip your sandals off, wiggling your toes that were now free of their confines. "You didn't even kiss him goodnight," he said, his bottom lip sticking out like he was pouting.

"Yeah, I usually don't kiss on the first date," you said. Unless it was super good, of course.

"Classy," Tyler responded, his eyebrows raised.

And then you thought about how he would even have known that you didn't kiss Mark. "Were you watching through the window?"

"Mhmm," he confirmed, "I was going to turn the porch lights on if he tried to feel you up," he added with a laugh.

You rolled your eyes, making your way further into the house so you could flop on the couch, "Trust me, the only person he wanted to feel up was you."

"What are you talking about?" Tyler asked with a laugh, following you into the living room.

"He was, like, obsessed with you," you said, running a hand over your face, slouched on the couch, "All he wanted to do was talk about you."

"So you spent the entire time talking about me?" he asked, and you didn't even have to look up to know he had a bemused grin on his face.

"No, I spent the entire time trying to direct him to topics other than what you were like in high school, or what you like to do in your spare time," you said.

Much to your chagrin, Tyler started giggling. Like, seriously giggling, and you lifted your hand from where it had been on your face, opening one eye.

"I'm glad you think this is so amusing," you said dryly, petting Marshall who had jumped up on the couch beside you, "I should have just sent you with him and stayed here with these guys."

"He seemed great though, when he was here."

"That's because he was more interested in having a bromance with you than a romance with me," you said, which only got Tyler laughing again, and you just gave him an annoyed look.

He wrapped his arm around you, pulling your head to his chest, as he usually did. "I'm sorry, babe," he said, even though you could still feel him laughing, which really wasn't making his words seem genuine. When he pulled back, he looked at you, "In my defense, it was my first time using Bumble as you, and I may have swiped right on a couple of guys that weren't right for you, but I'll improve, if you want me to?"

"Yeah, yeah okay," you said, reminding yourself of these new changes you were trying to make in your dating life, "Just no more dating talk tonight," you said.

You turned your head, looking towards the direction of his kitchen, "Can I make muffins, here?"

"Umm...yeah," Tyler said, like it was obvious and you shouldn't have even asked, "Only if I can have some though."

"Of course," you said, making your way into the kitchen, Tyler trailing after you. When you stood up from grabbing a mixing bowl, he was looking down at you, leaning against the opposite counter.

"Last time you made muffins, you gave some to my dad and not me," he said, exaggerating a pout, "and it really bummed me out."

"What?" you asked, and then remembered, "Oh, that's because you brought them to me. You could have taken some."

"I was going to," he confessed, "But you just had surgery and I was trying to be nice." He was looking at you like he was expecting to be praised for the fact that he didn't take any of the muffins you made. Yet, when he actually did something considerate, like bringing over the dogs for you or stocking your fridge, he acted like it was no big deal.

He leaned against the counter, alternating between watching you and doing something on his phone as you mixed the batter, and you were humming along to the soft music in the background.

"Hey, Y/N?"

"Hmm...?" you asked, looking up from where you were placing the muffin liners in the tin.

"Just for the record, was the guy I picked out better, or did you like boring history professor more?" He was looking at you hopefully.

You were tempted to lie, really, but you couldn't, "Umm...yours? If I had to choose," you answered, ignoring his fist pump of victory.

You sighed, holding your wrist in one hand, trying to steady the shaking, eyes transfixed on the meaty part of your thigh. You took another deep breath, wrapping your hand harder around the injectable pen and tried to go again, only to stop just when the needle was about to hit your skin.

You bent forward trying to take a few deep breaths because now you were starting to feel lightheaded thanks to the fact that you had been holding your breath without realizing it.

You shook your head, because this was getting ridiculous. You'd managed to give yourself six of these shots already but, by now, your leg was sore, and all of sudden you just couldn't handle it anymore.

It didn't help that you hated needles anyway. Honestly, you were pretty impressed you even managed to do what you had, considering you felt like you were going to pass out when you'd had your blood taken at the fertility clinic.

You tried once more, but didn't even get halfway to your leg before you chickened out. Sighing, you picked up your phone, dialing Danielle's number.

"Hey," she picked up almost immediately, and you launched into your ask.

"I totally would," she explained, "But I'm still at the office. But you could come by, if you want?"

You rest your head in your hands, knowing that her office was 45 minutes from your place. "No, that's okay, I'll figure it out."

"You sure?" she asked, even though you could hear voices in the background, and knew that she was probably staying late to work on a case, as sometimes happened in her job as a paralegal.

"Yep," you said, "We still on for brunch tomorrow?"

"Absolutely," she said, and you let her go fairly quickly knowing she need to get back to work.

You sat there, looking back and forth between the medication and your exposed leg, realizing full well that you wouldn't be able to do it. Unfortunately, both your mom and sister lived 30 minutes away, which seemed ridiculous for something that would take all of 2 minutes.

You picked up your phone, knowing that Tyler was home, because he'd invited you over earlier, but you weren't really sure if you'd have the energy for it. He did say that he would help you with this, though, although this was way different than giving you a ride to the doctor's office. Taking a breath, you picked up your phone, sending a text.

You: Can you help me with something? Please?

Tyler: Yeah. You wanna come here?

Tyler: Or you need me to come there?

I'll come to you, you typed, knowing that the five minutes it took to drive to his house would be better for your mind than sitting there waiting for him.

Tyler: Kkk.

You took another breath, grabbing your bag and driving over there, trying to relax, which wasn't working very well.

There were quite a lot of voices, in the house once you arrived, but you found Tyler pretty much immediately. He smiled at you briefly, waiting for the conversation to come to a natural lull and ducked out, turning off to to the side to face you, "What's up?"

"Uh..." you said, looking at the various faces around you, "Can we go somewhere else?"

Tyler's eyes studied you for a moment before he said, "Yeah, sure," grabbing you by the elbow, and leading you to his bedroom. Once there, he looked at you expectantly, but you were eyeing the open door, so he raised his eyebrows a little, stepping forward to shut it.

"This is a little weird," you stated.

"Okay?" He asked, his head slightly tilted to the side.

"Could you...would you...give me a shot?"

Even though your eyes were focused on his chest, you could see his chin jut foward. "Give you a shot?"

"Yeah, for the egg retrieval," you said, "to get my eggs frozen."

His eyes flicked to yours then, and a soft smile came across his face. "Yeah? You're doing that?"

"I told you I was."

"Yeah, but I didn't know you had actually started the process," he said, even though you were 100% sure that you had, because you very distinctly remembered telling him that you had an appointment at the clinic, "Where do I have to give you this shot? Is it in your ass? It's in your ass, isn't it?"

"No," you laughed, "in my thigh."

He gave you an impish smile and then made a motion like he was about to roll up his sleeves, only he realized he was wearing a short sleeved T-shirt so he didn't have any sleeves to roll up. "Okay, what do I do?"

"There's a video," you said, grabbing your phone and pulling it up, passing it over to him, "Can you watch it...over there?" you asked, gesturing towards the opposite side of the room.

He gave you an interesting look, "I really don't like needles," you said, shivering, "I don't want to hear it again."

"'K," he said simply, basically blocking himself into a corner to watch the video, while you sat down on the side of his bed, pulling out what you needed from your bags and double checking the right dose was set up, rearranging your dress over your legs so the right area was exposed, tucking the rest of the fabric between your legs. You took an alcohol wipe out, sanitizing the area.

"Fuck, that looks sore, babe," Tyler said suddenly, appearing next to you and running his fingers gently over your skin.

"I just cleaned that," you said, with a huff, digging out another alcohol pad.

"Sorry," he replied, "You've been giving them to yourself?"

"Yeah. I just, I don't know, I'm kind of freaking out a bit tonight. And Danielle's still at work and my mom and my sister are..."

"I got it," he said, like it was no problem, like he was less bothered by it than giving you a ride to the airport at 5AM. Like he didn't know why you didn't just ask him in the first place. "I'm just gonna wash my hands, 'k?"

"Yeah," you said, as he went into the ensuite bathroom, noticing his excessive use of "'k". "Tyler, have you been drinking?"

"I've had, like, two sips of beer. I'm good," he said, and you could see him drying his hands off on a towel, making his way back to you. You held out the injection pen and he took it, looking it over.

"I already did everything," you said, "I just need you to...stick it." You shut your eyes, grimacing at the thought, making the motion with your hand.

You instinctively turned your head away, but you could see him dancing around you as if trying to figure out the best way to approach this, bending his knees and then standing up again, moving from one side to another. "I think this is...you're down too low," he said, "C'mon, come in here."

You followed him into the ensuite bathroom, and he pointed at the counter, "Sit up there."

You used your hands to boost you up, and he stepped to you as soon as your butt hit the counter, his hand going to the hem of your dress. "You have underwear on, right?" he smirked even as he flicked the bottom of your dress up.

"Tyler!" you scolded, even though you'd considered this before you'd come over, checking to make sure you where wearing a pair of plain navy blue panties that kept everything covered.

"Chill," he said, " his other hand going to rest on the counter, "I'm trying to make you laugh. You're nervous."

Like you weren't aware that you were nervous.

"You ready?" he asked, and you nodded, squeezing your eyes shut, "Okay. 3, 2..."

"No!" you screamed, gripping his wrist hard and pulling it away before you could even realize what you were doing, but he was already backing up, raising his hands up like he was innocent, even though you could very clearly see the needle in his hand. "Sorry," you mumbled, running your hands over your face.

"That's okay," he said.

"Can you not count down?" you asked, "Just...stick it in me." You squeezed your eyes shut when you heard what you just said, bracing yourself for a 'that's what she said' joke, but nothing came. When you opened your eyes again, Tyler looked surprisingly serious, using free hand to flip his hat backwards, stepping even closer to you this time, between your legs. You turned your head away from the side of the needle, your cheek practically pressed against his chest and, if you opened your eyes, all you would expect to see would be the black fabric of his shirt. Your hand went up, braced on his back, because you needed something to hold onto.

"Okay?" he asked, and you felt like you could hear it through his body rather than coming from his mouth.

"Mhmm..." you agreed, still prepping yourself. You knew his hand was close to your leg and you expected to feel the needle at any second, but nothing came. And, all that you could hear was him breathing, which was kind of heavy, now that you paid attention to it.

"Are you okay?" you asked.

"Yeah," he said, laughing slightly, "I just don't really like needles."

You swallowed hard, and you were still practically tangled up with him and didn't think you could move even if you wanted to, and you could hear water dripping from the tap, that's how quiet it was. "Well, I can..."

"I got it," he said steadily, "Just breathe."

You weren't sure whether he was talking to you or himself, but soon enough you found you were both breathing deeply in unison. You paid attention to that dripping of the tap, trying to figure out if it was slowing down, while simultaneous trying to figure out if the clean smell surrounding you was from his laundry detergent or his soap.

You jumped slightly when you felt the needle pierce your skin, but then tears sprung to your eyes because it stung like a bitch, and you cried out your face scrunching up.

"Fuck, I'm sorry. I'm sorry," Tyler said, his free arm hooking under yours, steadying you. "I'm almost done, okay? I'm so sorry."

You were gripping the back of his shirt in your hand, trying to stay still. Once he was done, he pulled it out of you quickly, and practically tossed the thing across the room, pulling away from you except for that arm at your side, grabbing for the gauze, and you saw a line of blood starting to run down your leg before he pressed the gauze to it, covering it with his palm.

"Shit," he said, pulling it away to look at it, and then replacing it. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," you said, hands gripping the counter and trying to regain your breath, "Some of them are worse than others, I don't know why. I guess if it hits a bad spot?"

He was leaning towards you on the counter, still holding the gauze at your leg, looking at you curiously, and you noticed that his eyes looked strangely glassy and wet. "You're crying," he said softly, taking his hand off the counter and raising it to brush a finger across your cheek, brushing a tear away.

But you weren't, not really. "It was stinging," you explained, "it makes my eyes water."

He nodded, but didn't change his position, so you pulled your arm between your body's gripping his wrist and pulling it off you, seeing that it had stopped bleeding. You pulled the gauze from his fingers, standing up and then smoothing your dress back into place, going to gather everything and get it cleaned up.

He was standing in the middle of the bathroom now,eyes following your movements, and it was oddly quiet, other than the noise from what you were doing. "You need anything?" he asked, "Ice or..?"

"I'm good," you said, as you packed everything back up. You saw him move to run a hand over his face or through his hair and you reached for it quickly, "Wash your hands."

"Oh,h. Right." he said quietly, looking down at his hand where there was a smudge of blood near his wrist. He stepped to the sink, and you heard the running sound of water, followed by the pumping noise of the soap dispenser, which sounded like it was close to empty.

Having gathered everything, you started walking back to his bedroom, suddenly coming to a stop and leaning forward slightly when he walked straight into you, making a small noise, his forearm crossed in frontm of you as if to stop you from following before he pulled back. "You alright?"

"Mhmm,," you confirmed, trying to swallow, "the medication just makes me feel kind of sick. It's worse at night."

"You think you're gonna throw up?" he asked a slight undertone of alarm in his voice, his hand going to your arm.

You shook your head 'no' and then realized it was not a good idea. "As long as I don't move," you said.

He hummed, his hand still around your arm, moving you gently into the bedroom until you were next to the bed, "Lay down for a bit."

"I'm..."

"Just lay down for a bit," he instructed, "It'd make me feel better. Please?"

And you agreed, letting him direct you onto the bed, because putting your head on a pillow and shutting your eyes for just a moment sounded like a good plan. So you did just that, pulling your knees to your chest and just trying to breathe. You could sense he was still standing there, but thought you might be imagining it until you felt his fingers curl just a little in your hair, which was really soothing, actually.

"I think it's the hormones," you said, "I always feel sick when I take birth control. I guess I'm just sensitive?"

"Okay," he said simply.

You quickly felt sleepy, and started to feel goosebumps pop up on your body as you reached that place between sleep and wake, since you were still laying on top of the covers. You could hear Tyler walking away and shifted just slightly, getting a little more comfortable, but them you felt a blanket fall on top of you. "I'll be back in a bit, okay?" Tyler said gently, and you realized his head was extremely close to yours. You felt something on the side of your head, but you couldn't identify if it was his fingers or his lips.

"Mhmm..." you agreed, and you felt another brush through your hair, this time this was definately his fingers.

The next thing you knew, you were opening your eyes to a completely pitch black room, and realized the sun must have set several hours ago. You could feel a warm dog at your feet, but your attention was directed towards the movement to your right, and you opened your eyes to see a bare chest in front of you, the blankets being pulled over it.

You squinted, pushing yourself up on your forearms and realizing where you where. "I should..." you started, but before you could even finish 'go home', Tyler interrupted you.

"Go back to sleep?" he asked, "Yeah, you should."

And then he was pulling the actual covers out from underneath you and, because you were so warm and tired, you were tucking your legs under them, pulling that blanket he'd placed on your earlier around you. Although, apparently, he wasn't satisfied with it, because he fixed it around you, leaving his laying over you, and you could feel him shift down into bed a little further. You did the same, adjusting the pillow underneath you, falling back to sleep quickly.

#wont go slowly #tyler seguin imagine #tyler seguin #series #nhl imagines #nhl imagine #hockey imagines #hockey imagine

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burclay · 6 years ago

Text

Heartbeats: Chapter 11

AO3 Chapter 1

They wound up all sitting in a little restaurant just by where the TARDIS had materialized.

“Wonder if being on a rift in time gets this place better business,” Rose said. She was crammed into the corner of a booth with the others, the Doctor’s arm around her shoulders as they looked over menus.

“More interesting business, maybe,” Ryan said.

“Just more of my business, presumably,” the Doctor said. “There aren’t exactly that many active TARDIS-users. And I haven’t really been here before, either. But we’re good business, don’t you think?”

“I’ll take it,” Graham said.

“Anyway,” Rose said, “I want to hear about what happened on your end while we were human.”

“Mostly a lot of texting about you two,” Ryan said. “Pretty boring, really.”

“Speak for yourself,” Cleis said. “I’ve learned languages that don’t even exist in my time.”

“I figured out how to turn off her translator,” Yaz said, almost apologetic. “And on again, obviously. And learned some ancient Greek besides. What was it, Aeolic?”

“I think so,” Cleis said. “I mean, I just call it regular. And your machine is translating for me now anyway.”

“And what happened between you two?” Rose asked, nodding across the booth at Yaz and Cleis.

“Nothing you didn’t see, really,” Yaz said.

“I asked Yaz to teach me English,” Cleis explained. “And then I was showing her Greek. We saw all of Sheffield together. It was lovely. Although I really think you could use more ocean.”

“You can say that again,” Graham said. Cleis grinned at him.

“Plus,” Ryan added, “both of them were texting me about each other non-stop. Between the four of you I’ve been playing wingman like it’s a full-time job.”

“We appreciate your efforts,” Yaz assured him.

“Everyone’s been very nice,” Cleis added. She had the same wide-eyed expression as Yaz, Rose decided-- a similar sort of wonder when approached with new things. She hadn’t noticed it so much when she’d been Rosie, when Yaz was just a near-neighbor who was learning Greek from her roommate, or even when they’d all been on Lesbos and Cleis was still at home, but now they were both out of their comfort zones again (even if it was just Cardiff), Rose could see that they were interacting with the unfamiliarity in the same way. It reminded Rose a little bit of how she’d felt way back at the beginning of it all, when every new planet had been a miracle.

“So what do we do now?” Yaz asked.

“Can’t let any grass grow under your feet, can you?” Graham asked. “We’re stuck here, yeah? For three days?”

“It’s a valid question,” the Doctor said. “Could go back to the TARDIS. But if we’re here we might as well have some fun.”

“We could always pretend to be proper tourists,” Ryan said. “Do a whole hotel-and-museum thing.”

“I’ve never been to Cardiff before,” Yaz chimed in. “And it’s relaxed enough for the grandads among us.”

“Brilliant!” the Doctor exclaimed. “Love having a plan. Almost as much as I love not having a plan. Really, can go either way, on plans.”

“You just like adventures,” Rose said with a playful nudge.

“Absolutely correct,” the Doctor said. “A million points to Rose Tyler.”

“Oi, that puts Rose ahead of me now!” Yaz protested. “You can’t give out a million at once, it’s not fair.”

“Oh, yeah, because the points system is known for its fairness,” Graham said.

“Fine,” the Doctor said. “A million points to all the rest of you, too.”

“And I’m removing myself from the competition anyway,” Rose added. “Don’t need points. I’m all secure in my worth and everything.”

“Oi, I’m secure!” Yaz said. “Just competitive.”

“There’s a points system?” Cleis asked.

“Not really,” the Doctor said. “I just need something to say when I’m excited.”

“As if you’re ever at a loss for words,” Rose teased.

“Fair enough,” the Doctor agreed around a mouthful of chips. She swallowed with a grin. “Anyway, brilliant! Vacation with the fam. Gang? Team? Did we decide on fam?”

“Think we did, yeah,” Graham said.

“Brilliant,” the Doctor said again.

A few hours later, all six of them were checked into a Cardiff hotel, with a little help from the Doctor’s mysterious ability to get large amounts of cash out of ATM’s (which Rose pointed out might be a violation of their agreement to pretend to be “regular tourists,” at which point the Doctor said regular tourists would’ve brought some spending money with them, and she wasn’t about to put that responsibility on the hapless humans she liked to bring on adventures). It wasn’t quite nighttime yet, but Graham said he was all right with a rest, and everyone else was either tired or incredibly susceptible to the power of suggestion, and so everyone retreated into their respective rooms.

Which left Rose in a hotel room with the Doctor, who seemed in danger of literally bouncing off the walls. One moment she was examining the television with her sonic screwdriver, the next she was jumping on the bed to see if it was soft enough, and still the next she was tinkering with the lamps.

“Don’t break anything,” said Rose, who was leaning against the headboard, flipping through one of the what-to-do guides she’d grabbed from the front desk.

“I’m not going to break anything,” the Doctor said, a lampshade in one hand. “I know what I’m doing.”

“Sure you do,” Rose said.

“Anyway,” the Doctor added, “I’ve got all this weird energy after being Jane. She slept far more than I ever would.”

“Maybe we should go for a walk, then,” Rose said, eyeing the half-dissected lamp. “Find something else to dismantle, yeah?”

The Doctor slammed the lampshade back on the lamp, and Rose cringed, sure the lamp had somehow broken. The Doctor, unbothered, said, “Brilliant! Love a walk,” and immediately began running around the room, picking up her jacket, three pens, and a couple of screws that Rose was sure had come from the television. Rose slipped her shoes on and texted the others to let them know where she and the Doctor were going, and moments later, they were in the elevator to the hotel lobby, both grinning at the prospect of exploring even a relatively familiar city.

The Doctor took Rose’s hand as they left the hotel, emerging onto a somewhat busy street.

“Are you sure we should hold hands?” Rose asked. “I mean, is it safe?”

“What do you mean?” the Doctor asked.

“I mean we’re both women,” Rose said, “or we both look like women, anyway, and this century isn’t always kind to two women holding hands.”

“Anyone gives us trouble, I’ll fight ‘em off,” the Doctor said. Her grip on Rose’s hand only tightened.

“I’d like to see that,” Rose said, smiling. “Pacifist Doctor, trying to fight off some bloke on the street.”

“Yeah, I suppose that’d violate some policies,” the Doctor said. “Still. Rules change all the time. First sign of trouble, I promise.”

Rose laughed, and they walked in silence for a block or two.

“It’s weird, being back in this body,” Rose said finally. “I forgot what being human was like.”

“Me too,” the Doctor said. “Not that I have quite the same relationship with it as you have.”

“I feel so old,” Rose said. “Compared to Rosie, I mean. She was all-- all nervous all the time. I forgot that part of being human.”

“Think that’s just being young,” the Doctor said. “Even I was young once.”

“What qualifies as young for you?” Rose asked, only half teasing. “Hundred years? Two hundred?”

“Pretty much,” the Doctor admitted. “Although, give it a few thousand more years and I’ll say this version of me was young. It’s all relative.”

“Fair enough,” Rose said. She thought about that for a minute, her hand swinging with the Doctor’s. She remembered meeting the Doctor for the first time, feeling like a complete failure until she got in the TARDIS and figured out what she was good for (running, it turned out, and talking to aliens, and solving puzzles lightyears away from home). She had been young then, and her body hadn’t aged, but her mind had. Rosie had been somewhere in the middle-- she had inherited some of Rose’s self-assurance and self-knowledge, but she had still been uncertain of herself, constantly bored, afraid she was wasting her life. The near-immortality of a Time Lord still scared Rose, but she was a much better person than she would have been if she had stayed alone and human, plodding through life not knowing what it was she wanted but knowing her life was not enough.

“Penny for your thoughts?” the Doctor said, and Rose realized she would have just walked right into traffic if the Doctor hadn’t pulled her back.

“Sorry,” she said. “Just thinking about not being human anymore.”

“Good thinking?” the Doctor asked. “Or bad thinking?”

“Good, I think,” Rose said. “I told you years ago, didn’t I? I love this life.”

The Doctor squeezed her hand. The light in front of them turned green, and they started crossing the street.

“Where are we going?” Rose asked.

“No idea,” the Doctor said. “Sorry. Sort of thought if I was directionless enough you’d lead the way.”

“Doesn’t Jack live around here somewhere?” Rose asked. “We could visit him.”

“Somewhere around here, yeah,” the Doctor said. “He still won’t tell me exactly where. After years of prodding. Well, years for me. Not sure how long it’s been for him. Probably years.”

Rose laughed.

“I suppose if I were him I wouldn’t want my alien friend with a habit of unannounced visits to have my exact address,” she said.

“As if he’s never dropped in on me unannounced!” the Doctor exclaimed. “He rode on the outside of the TARDIS to the end of the entire universe one time. Least he can do is let me drop in when I’m in town and bored.”

Rose laughed.

“Do Time Lords have a concept of manners?” she asked.

“Everyone has a concept of manners,” the Doctor said. “Different manners, maybe. And I’m rubbish at all of them.”

“Should’ve known,” Rose said. “Suppose there’s not much use for real manners when you’re saving every planet you come across.”

“Precisely,” the Doctor said. “That’s my excuse, at any rate.”

Rose laughed. She couldn’t get the grin off her face, just walking down the street with the Doctor, making the same jokes they’d always made. Then again, she had never, even at the beginning, been able to suppress a smile with the Doctor around.

A moment later, Rose felt the Doctor freeze next to her. She looked around for the source of concern and realized there was a beeping noise of some sort coming from the nearest alley, and a few of her time senses felt a bit off-- she didn’t even have to look at the Doctor to know that was where they were going next. Together, they sprinted for the alley, stopping short when they got to its mouth and saw an unfamiliar woman standing there, poking with frustration at what Rose thought might be a vortex manipulator.

She was about to say something to the woman, but a quick glance at the Doctor gave her pause-- the Doctor had dropped Rose’s hand and was staring at the woman like she’d seen a ghost, her eyes wide, her mouth open. Rose turned back to the woman, who was looking at them both with an open curiosity and just a little bit of surprise.

“What’s going on?” Rose asked. She tugged the Doctor’s arm. “Doctor? Do you know her?”

The Doctor didn’t respond. She just kept staring at the woman.

“River?” she exhaled, and suddenly understanding crashed onto Rose-- this was River, then. The Doctor’s wife. It had been one thing to accept the Doctor’s marriage when it was a hypothetical, something that had happened in the past and was no longer a concern, but it was another thing to look the woman in the eyes and know that she was at least as important to the Doctor as Rose was.

“Oh, don’t tell me you never thought you’d see me again,” the woman-- River-- said, effortlessly shaking off her surprise and replacing it with seduction. “Who’s your friend? Or, no, don’t tell me, I’m sure I can guess.” She looked Rose up and down with raised eyebrows. “Rose, is it?”

Rose glanced back at the Doctor, who seemed to slowly be regaining her mind.

“That’s me,” she said to River.

“Weren’t you stuck in a parallel universe?” River asked, curiosity back on her face.

“For a bit, yeah,” Rose said. “Got pretty good at dimensional physics, came back here. But-- you’re the Doctor’s wife, yeah?”

“That’s one of my many titles,” River said. She looked back at the Doctor. “This one’s grown no less awkward, then?”

“This one might be more awkward than the ones I traveled with,” Rose said.

“I didn’t know the Doctor back then,” River said. “After all, I like older men.”

The Doctor seemed to have regained her composure. At least, she was together enough to say, “Oi, I’m a woman now!”

“So I noticed,” River said. “How delicious.”

Rose stifled a laugh.

“Oh, no, you can laugh if you want,” River told her. “I take no offense. You’re handling this quite well, by the way, for someone who’s just met the wife of someone I can only assume is very dear to you.”

Rose opened and closed her mouth a few times, trying to figure out how to answer that. The accurate answer, of course, would be that she knew the Doctor had a lot of love to give, or perhaps that she’d thought River was dead, but the former felt too personal and the latter could have caused some sort of paradox.

“Oh, I know,” River said. “This is the oldest I’ve seen you, Doctor. How long has it been?”

“Few years,” the Doctor said. “I really wasn’t expecting to see you again.”

“You know me,” River said. “I’m like a bad penny. Always turning up.”

“Why turn up here?” the Doctor asked. “Didn’t expect to find you in 21st century Cardiff.”

“It was only supposed to be a quick stop,” River said. “I was going to see if the rift here could recharge my vortex manipulator, but it seems to have completely broken it instead.”

“I can’t imagine you’ve been using that thing responsibly,” the Doctor said. “Might’ve overwhelmed it. You know, I have a friend in the area who might be able to fix it. Has a whole secret lab sort of setup around here somewhere.”

“That would be wonderful,” River said.

“Only thing is,” the Doctor said, “he won’t tell me where.”

“Even better,” River said, her smile of a sort that Rose had long since associated with the beginning of an adventure. “Care to help me find him?”

“‘Course,” the Doctor said. “Rose, you coming?”

Rose looked from the Doctor to River, shifting uncomfortably.

“Suppose I am,” she said. “Always good to see Jack, yeah?”

“Brilliant,” the Doctor said. “All right. We should probably start over by where we parked the TARDIS, after last time.”

“What happened last time?” River asked.

“He heard the TARDIS and jumped on,” the Doctor said. “Not on the inside, mind. Rode the outside of the TARDIS all the way to the end of the universe.”

“And he won’t tell you where his secret lab is?” River asked. “How rude.”

“That’s what I said!” the Doctor exclaimed.

It didn’t take them long to get back to the TARDIS. In her recent adventures, Rose had almost forgotten that the sign on the outside of the box was different from how it had been before, but River picked up on it immediately.

“Oh, you’ve redecorated,” she said, already halfway between the Doctor and the TARDIS. “Can I take a look?”

“If you want,” the Doctor said. “I think you’ll like this one.”

River bounded ahead. She didn’t have a key, but the door creaked open almost the minute her hand grazed the wood. It was that, more than anything else, that made Rose realize exactly how important River must have been to the Doctor-- if the TARDIS still opened for her, no questions asked, she must be special.

“Doctor,” she said, before the Doctor could follow. “Do you want me to go so you can be alone?”

The Doctor turned to her with a quizzical expression.

“What do you mean?”

“If you want to catch up with River,” Rose said.

“Oh, no, is this awkward?” the Doctor asked. “I’m sorry, Rose. I try so hard not to make things awkward, and then I do, every time.”

“No, I just mean-- she’s clearly important to you,” Rose said.

The Doctor hesitated for a moment.

“She is,” she said, “but she’s-- she’s not in my life anymore. My time with her is over, for the most part. We fix her vortex manipulator, and she goes on to more and more adventures with me. And I go on, and I never see her again. She doesn’t know it, but I was there when she regenerated into herself, and I uploaded her when she died. I can’t linger with the past. Not when there’s all this future to be getting on with. But you don’t have to stay if you don’t want to.”

Rose reached for the Doctor’s hand, tangling their fingers together. Their eyes met, and Rose saw that deep sadness in the Doctor’s expression, the echoes of so many lost loves. Rose had been one of those, once, and there was always the chance she would be again someday. She remembered her Doctor, in the parallel world, watching him grow old. He had counseled her through that, in a lot of ways, having gone through the reverse so many times before-- she had often seen the same sad look in his eyes.

“I’m with you,” Rose said.

The door to the TARDIS banged open.

“Are you two coming?” River’s voice called.

The Doctor’s expression bounced back to excited, and she dropped Rose’s hand as she ran to the TARDIS, coat flapping. Rose followed more slowly.

Ten minutes later, the three of them in frenetic collaboration had rigged up a cobbled-together machine that would hopefully detect nearby traces of Artron energy, thereby directing them to Jack, who was surely absolutely bathed in Artron energy at this point. And sure enough, the minute they stepped out of the TARDIS, the machine began to glow and vibrate in River’s hands, more intense if she stepped in one direction, less intense if she stepped in another.

“Suppose we’ll have our answer soon, then,” the Doctor said.

River began following the machine, the Doctor and Rose tagging along more out of a vague sense of obligation than anything else. (Well, and they had used one of the Doctor’s earrings in the machine, and she was intent on getting it back when they were done.) They went up and down the darkening streets until the machine was practically jumping out of River’s hands, and then Rose lost track of what was happening for a moment as River bumped into a pedestrian, sending the machine to the ground, where it shattered, its parts skittering across the pavement.

The Doctor immediately dove for the bits of metal on the sidewalk, shouting, “My earring!” River was in the process of standing up. Rose, however, was fully upright, and therefore in a position to notice that it was, indeed, Captain Jack Harkness who River had just run into.

“Rose,” he said, eyebrows raised. “And the Doctor. What brings you here?”

“Just passing through,” Rose said. “Recharging the TARDIS.”

The Doctor had found her earring and was trying to put it in one-handed as she said, “We weren’t even going to look you up until we ran into River.”

“River?” Jack asked. He turned to River, who was far more composed than anyone who had just fallen to the ground had the right to be. “I suppose that’s you.” Jack held out a hand. “Captain Jack Harkness.”

“Pleasure,” River said, extending her own hand in a delicate handshake. “I hear you’re good at fixing things.”

“I’ve been known to do a little repair, on occasion,” Jack said.

“I think Jack’s finally met his match,” Rose whispered to the Doctor.

“This is brilliant,” the Doctor agreed. “Come on, let’s go before they notice.”

Rose took the Doctor’s hand again, and they ducked into a side street, both suppressing laughter. As they got further away, Rose said, still giggling, “I can’t believe your wife flirts the same way as Jack.”

“To be fair,” the Doctor said, “I was very attracted to Jack, back in the day.”

“Ha!” Rose exclaimed. “I knew it! You didn’t hide your feelings well, you know. Even then.”

“Nah,” the Doctor said. “You just know me better than anyone should.”

Rose grinned.

“Good thing you love me,” she teased.

“Good thing indeed,” the Doctor answered.

They walked back to the hotel in comfortable silence. They passed Yaz, Cleis, and Ryan in the lobby doing some sort of puzzle together, and then they rode up in the elevator, which the Doctor was positively delighted about-- “I love elevators,” she told Rose. “Taking us up and down so we don’t have to walk. Absolutely brilliant.”

As they walked in, Rose realized how unexpectedly tired she was. She, or she-as-Rosie, had had a good night’s sleep the night before, and usually Rose with her new Time Lord constitution wouldn’t be tired yet, but now all she wanted was to get into pajamas and curl up underneath some blankets.

Fortunately, the Doctor seemed to be on the same schedule-- “Chameleon Arch,” she explained, after changing into a fluffy dinosaur onesie. “It’s exhausting, turning back from human. Even we’ve got to sleep after.”

“Or use sleeping as an excuse for a dinosaur costume,” Rose observed, already sitting up in bed.

“Oi, don’t mock the dinosaur!” the Doctor exclaimed. “He’s friendly!”

Rose just smiled, looking at the Doctor’s indignant face and messy hair above the green fleece of the onesie. Even like this, she was beautiful, Rose thought, and then she said it out loud, because she hadn’t lived a hundred years and jumped from universe to universe not to say what she thought.

“Thanks,” the Doctor said. “You are, too, for the record. Beautiful, I mean.” She was rocking on the balls of her feet, and Rose rolled her eyes.

“Come on, Doctor,” she said. “Get in bed.”

“It’s not weird to share?” the Doctor asked.

“We’ve shared before,” Rose said.

“You met my wife,” the Doctor said.

“And she knows what I am to you,” Rose said, “and I know what she is to you, and we’ve all come to terms with that.”

“I’m no good at relationships,” the Doctor said. “I don’t know what you’re expecting. Humans are all-- different. And I wasn’t good with dating even when the Time Lords existed properly.”

“Good thing none of us involved are human, then,” Rose said. “Come on, Doctor. You said yourself you won’t even see her anymore, remember?”

“I suppose so,” the Doctor said.

“So stop being such an idiot and come sleep,” Rose said.

“Fine,” the Doctor said, and she made a show of getting in bed. Once there, though, she immediately cuddled up to Rose, and Rose smiled, running a hand through the Doctor’s hair. Some part of her was perfectly content, in that moment, surrounded by soft bedding, the Doctor’s warmth against her, the sweet smell of the Doctor’s hair coming towards her as she tangled her fingers in it.

“Are we girlfriends now?” the Doctor asked suddenly, her voice muffled against Rose’s pajama shirt.

Rose’s hand stilled in the Doctor’s hair.

“How do you mean?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” the Doctor said, lifting her head a bit. “Must be a bit of Jane still in me. I keep thinking about human relationships.”

“We can be girlfriends,” Rose said. “I don’t know if it’s really the sort of word that works for us. Very human.”

“Suppose so,” the Doctor said. “Don’t really need a name, anyway, I suppose. Girlfriend is as good as anything, though.”

“Fair enough,” Rose said. “We can say that. If people ask. I don’t think they will.”

“Never know,” the Doctor said, letting her head drop back down. Rose kissed the top of her head, and then reached over and turned off the lamp with a smile. This was a nice way to fall asleep, she thought to herself. Maybe the only nice way to fall asleep, with the Doctor in her arms, snoring softly in dinosaur pajamas.

It didn’t take her long to drift off, a faint smile on her face. She dreamed of nothing.

#doctor who #dw #writing #fic #thirteen x rose #heartbeats

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lycorogue · 6 years ago

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Gabriel Agreste: A 3-Part Character Study

Part 2: My Headcanon for the Life and Thoughts of Gabriel

Hello again. In the first part of this series I explained my thought process as to why I bothered writing this collection of mini-essay/short story. If you missed it, feel free to go back and read that here.

Alternatively, if you want to hop ahead to my re-write of Gabriel Agreste in order to make him a legitimate sympathetic villain, you can find that essay here.

Now, before we continue with this psuedo-story, I want to throw in just a quick reminder-disclaimer. Below is my headcanon on Gabriel Agreste's history, and a sort of personality study under the assumption that he's similar to the man I know IRL and discussed briefly in Part 1. By no means is there any canonical evidence of any of this being accurate. Also, while I'm trying to explain Gabe's behavior and reasoning, by no means am I justifying or condoning it. You may continue to love or hate or love to hate or hate to love Gabriel however you please.

Anyway, check below the break to read my little pseudo-narrative short story on my headcanon history of Gabriel's life prior to us meeting him in the “Miraculous Ladybug” series, as well as my headcanon of his defining personality trait which might explain his behavior towards Adrien, Emilie, Nathalie, and The Gorilla.

Gabriel was a lonely kid. He was an only child. His parents loved him and cared for him, but they never really connected with him. He was never really all that expressive. His parents tried multiple things to bond with him over, but he was most comfortable alone in his room doing his own thing.

At university he remained a loner. He still didn't really make many connections with the other students. He was friendly with his roommate, and was willing to hang out with him and his friends, but none of the friends talked to Gabriel without the roommate there, and Gabe never initiated any interactions with the roommate. Instead, he focused on his artwork and his fashion design.

When Gabriel was about 25 his professor and mentor commented that his designs were uninspired and stale, and wondered what happened. Nothing had happened. Gabriel was just bored with life. His flatmate suggested he try going out into the world, outside his comfort zone, and observe people in order to become re-inspired. Despite himself, Gabriel agreed. He ended up going to the local watering hole by himself, and hid in the corner to try to people watch. Not even twenty minutes into this experiment, Gabriel decided it was a stupid plan and hurried out, only to run into Emilie. Literally.

If you want to read more about how I believe their first interaction went down, you can find it here.

It was an awkward and playful courtship. Outgoing, social butterfly, extroverted Emilie did everything in her power to keep Gabriel on the edge of uncomfortable as a way of broadening his horizon. She took him out to parties, social gatherings, and just public in general. She also allowed him his private time, but tended to make him try new foods, or would hide his favorite colored pencils in order to force him to try different art mediums. He soon discovered that he enjoyed the new medium of digital drawing more than colored pencils, even though he would always love the classic method.

Emilie pushed him, but Gabriel loved that about her. Every time he was down on himself she would pick him up. Every time he wanted to hide and hibernate she would pull him outside. Every time he was so engrossed in his work that he would forget to eat she would drag him to the kitchen to try out a new recipe she found.

Not everything was sunshine and roses though. There were some significant spats between them. With his life experiences, he grew to hate humanity, while she gladly embraced it. She picked on him for “not being nice” while he considered her wildly optimistic and naïve. He was gruff and callous, while she was loving, and strong enough to not put up with his crap. It only kept a couple of months before she could call him out with a glance.

She was so good for him, and he knew it. He appreciated it. And he was amazed that she picked him. He never once took her for granted, nor did he forget that she could have chosen anyone. He knew she had other options, and yet he was the one who lucked out enough to have stolen her heart. He didn't understand her love for him, for he never felt such a strong compassion towards him before. Still, he basked in the warm glow from her, and thanked whatever Greater Power That Be that she was with him.

His hatred for humanity as a whole waned slightly, mostly because Emilie kept showing him the positive. Every time he wanted to scoff, scorn, or dismiss someone he pictured Emilie's disappointed look, and it helped him become better. She became his consciousness. She became his empathy. She became his moral compass and compassion. She made him want to be better; to be the kind man she somehow thought he was.

Simply put: she became his everything. Life no longer was worth living without her. She was his sun and moon. She was his earth and sky. She was his smile and reason. And soon she became his wife.

He was nervous about not giving her the life that she deserved. They were still in a crappy little apartment covered in his drawings and fabric samples. However, Emilie got her start acting in an independent film created by an old school friend: Andre Bourgeois. While on set one day, Andre's fiance Audrey visited and noticed an outfit Emilie was wearing; an outfit Gabriel made her as a birthday gift. Audrey loved it and demanded to know the designer. Emilie excitedly called Gabriel down to the set where he met the upcoming fierce fashion critic. She thought he was the most inspired designer she had ever met, and gushed about him in her latest article in a big-name French fashion magazine.

Gabriel quickly became The Next Big Thing. He got a sense of pride knowing that he could finally provide for his amazing wife, and they enjoyed their time together inside their new mansion. Gabe doted on Emilie, treating her as both an equal and a cherished princess.

It was Emilie who convinced Gabriel to hire an assistant, and she was the one who pointed out the impressive resume of Nathalie Sancoeur. Emilie even listened in on the interview, and instantly loved Nathalie's personality. She figured that Nathalie could be just as good for Gabriel in his professional life as Emilie was in his personal. It didn’t take much for Emilie to convince Gabriel to hire the stoic woman.

Life was great. Gabriel could do the work he had always loved doing, and he could provide for his beloved wife while doing so. Nathalie helping with the day-to-day duties meant Gabe had more time for his wife as well, because what would be the point of all this money if he couldn't spend time with the reason for his waking? They were happy.

Then, when they were in their thirties, Emilie became pregnant. Gabriel didn't know how to respond. He remembered his own parents' failed attempt to bond with him, and he could sense that he'd have the same difficulties. He wasn't a people person. But he could tell how excited Emilie was, and she convinced him that he'd fall in love once he held their child. So he prepared for this new chapter of his life along side his wife.

When Emilie had Adrien she experienced a new level of love. Gabriel, however, did not. He loved Adrien. He truly did. He didn't realize he could care for anyone outside of Emilie, but there was this new and fragile life needing him, and he cared. He knew he would protect this precious little bean with all his might, but he also knew that Emilie is still his number one. She took up too much of his heart. Plus, the two of them created Adrien, while Gabriel and Adrien could never recreate Emilie.

Gabriel felt ashamed at thinking so, but he knew that while Emilie wasn’t replaceable, as long as Gabriel had her, Adrien could be replaced. It would hurt. A new child would never be the same, but at least with Emilie there was hope of returning to this family unit. He could always have another child; he could never have another wife, another love like Emilie.

Life changed more than Gabriel was ready for now that he was a father. More importantly, now that Emilie was a mother. She started pulling away from Gabe. Motherhood became her, and she connected with Adrien in a way Gabriel just couldn’t. Despite himself, Gabe became jealous of his own son. His own precious child. He reminded himself that he loved his son, but in the quiet of his mind he couldn't deny that he also missed the days when it was just him and Emilie.

The trio had family game nights that Gabriel half-heartedly participated in. They had movie nights that consisted of Gabriel working on his tablet or phone until Adrien passed out. Then he'd shift his son on the sofa so that he could have the space to snuggle up to his wife. They had family outings together: Emilie watching Adrien's glee; Gabriel watching Emilie's.

Emilie eventually called Gabriel out on the distance between her boys. Just like when they were dating and she pushed Gabriel to interact with people in order to make friends, she now pushed him to put in more effort to bond with their son. He wanted to. He really did. He wanted to laugh and play with Adrien the way that Emilie did. He wanted Adrien to run to him the way the small boy raced to his mother. More importantly, Gabriel wanted to make Emilie proud of him; to prove that he was the great father she envisioned him to be. So Gabriel started teaching Adrien about hard work, about applying himself, and about fashion.

It worked for a while. Emilie even loved the idea of their gorgeous little Adrien being the face of her husband’s brand. It felt like a great honor and show of love. But soon it just became an obligation, and both men feared breaking the one thing that tied them together. So Gabriel and Adrien begrudgingly continued with the photo shoots and ads. They both knew, however, that the only real glue holding them together was Emilie.

Then, about a year ago, something happened. Emilie is gone. Gabriel couldn’t accept never seeing his sunshine, his purpose for life, anymore, and hid her in the basement. He had no clue how to tell Adrien, and after so many months of hiding Emilie, he can't find a way to let his son now without breaking the boy's heart. Gabriel fears that Adrien knows about his father's jealousy, and would blame him for Emilie. Gabe is already overwhelmed with his own guilt at not being able to protect her. He can’t survive Adrien possibly adding to it. Adrien is his only family now; his only tie to Emilie, the only part of her still warm.

And Adrien looks so much like her. He acts like her too. Gabriel never noticed that before, and it pains him. He can't lose Adrien, he wouldn't be able to survive it. But he also can't bear to be with his son. Adrien is too much of a reminder of Emilie: her grace, her love of life and people, her kindness, her beauty, and her intelligence. Adrien is also too much of a reminder of Gabriel's guilt. Guilt in not keeping Emilie safe. Guilt in hiding her from Adrien, hoping his son would understand once she's with them again. Guilt about being jealous of his son's connection to Emilie, and the attention and part of her heart he took from Gabriel. Guilt about becoming a villain; hoping the ends will eventually justify the means.

He has to get Emilie back, though. There is no other option. He can't be a good human being without her; he doesn't know how. He can't feel compassionate towards others; he only feels hatred, and envy that he can no longer have what everyone else does. No one else's pain could be more than his. The world was simply there to keep him from his life's meaning, and he is determined to get the Ladybug and Cat Miraculouses in order to change that.

Well... that became a lot longer than I originally planned, but I hope it was an interesting character study. Again, I'm not trying to justify or condone Gabriel's behavior; just trying to explain it. Long and short is that I feel Gabriel is at the very least a sociopath, but may be extreme enough to be deemed a psychopath.

Now, granted, I only took two psych classes in college, so I can’t say for sure, but it FEELS like he’s somewhere on the sociopath spectrum. Especially when compared to this quote:

"The psychopath is callous, yet charming. He or she will con and manipulate others with charisma and intimidation and can effectively mimic feelings to present as "normal" to society. The psychopath is organized in their criminal thinking and behavior, and can maintain good emotional and physical control, displaying little to no emotional or autonomic arousal, even under situations that most would find threatening or horrifying. The psychopath is keenly aware that what he or she is doing is wrong, but does not care.

"Conversely, the sociopath is less organized in his or her demeanor; he or she might be nervous, easily agitated, and quick to display anger. A sociopath is more likely to spontaneously act out in inappropriate ways without thinking through the consequences. Compared to the psychopath, the sociopath will not be able to move through society committing callous crimes as easily, as they can form attachments and often have 'normal temperaments.' . . ."

The quote is from Kelly McAleer, Psy.D, and I found the quote here.

Anyway, there were two more elements of Gabriel’s history that I wanted to put in the above “story,” but I also feel like they would have felt out of place because they didn't specifically showcase Gabriel:

Hiring The Gorilla: I see this happening when Adrien is still about a toddler or so; about age 6 at the latest. The media and crazed fans start becoming too much, and so Gabriel feels the need to hire a bodyguard. Mostly because Emilie refuses to just have Nathalie pick up groceries and the like. She wanted to still go out and experience their city, and take Adrien with, so the couple compromised that she'd have a bodyguard with her. Over the years, though, The Gorilla falls for his charges in a very familial sense. Emilie is like his little sister, and Adrien like his nephew. He loves them and will do anything for them. This love for Adrien is one of the only reasons why he remained in Gabriel's employ after Emilie went missing, especially with the harassment he receives from his employer.

Adrien's Isolation: In Origins we find out that Adrien has been home schooled his whole life. In Malediktator we find out that not only did Adrien and Chloe use to play together as young kids, but also that she is the only one his age he has ever interacted with. Presumably, he hung out with Chloe because of the proximity to the Grand Paris in relation to the Agreste mansion, as well as the connection between the two families thanks to Emilie. In Mr. Pigeon however, Chloe had to introduce herself to Gabriel and noted that she was the mayor's daughter, not Audrey's. Granted, this is probably because the writers hadn't figured out the familial connection or who Chloe's mother was yet, but in-universe it could be because Chloe only ever saw Nathalie, The Gorilla, and/or Emilie, and she was used to throwing the “my father is the mayor” weight around. Anyway, my point being that Adrien could have been the face of Gabriel's clothing line since he was a toddler, and so his parents feared having a celebrity child in public schooling. The oddity though, was that Adrien's name was on Mrs. Bustier's class roster, Chloe knew he would be in her class, and Adrien attempted to get to the school that first day – as seen in Origins. I don't know if it's different in France, but in America a guardian has to register you for school, which means someone had to register him for Mrs. Bustier's class. Gabriel clearly didn't want him to go, and Nathalie didn't seem to be the type to sign him up behind Gabriel's back. Because of this, I believe Emilie was still around during the summer break between the school years, and had decided that Adrien was ready to get back out into the world and make more friends. She probably signed him up and let him know, explaining that he'd have Chloe in his class so he wouldn't feel alone. Adrien was probably ecstatic about this, and talked to Chloe about it. Then, when Emilie... well, whatever it is that happened to her... Gabriel panicked. He couldn't chance losing Adrien, and so he changed his mind about the public schooling. The decision wasn't made soon enough to cancel the registration with the school though, which is why he was still expected that first day. Nathalie probably convinced Gabriel to let Adrien go by invoking “it's what Emilie wanted.”

Anyway, as I mentioned in Part 1 of this series, I had come up with an alternative way of writing Gabriel's character. One that would make him legitimately a sympathetic villain. One that won't be abusive towards Adrien, at least, intentionally. One that could actually make the eventual battle between the Agreste men even more heart wrenching. A way to write Gabriel that could have added so much depth to the overall drama and dynamic of the show.

If you would like to see my thoughts on this re-write, I'll see you at Part 3 of this series.

#ML #Miraculous Ladybug #fantheory #LycoRogue fantheory #LycoRogue Writing #long post #Gabriel Agreste #Hawk Moth #Part 2 of 3 #Life and Times of Gabriel Agreste #minor spoilers #ML spoilers #season 2 spoilers #Gorizilla #Style Queen #Maledikator #Malediktator spoilers #Origins

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clown-bait · 7 years ago

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29 Neibolt ST (Monster Roommate AU) Chapter 9

Hi friends! Heres Chapter 9! Got inspired by that post awhile back about Africa by Toto being played in the sewer and Penny jamming to it. Leech is a huge music connoisseur so I head cannon that she plays a lot of Guitar Hero with Freddy. Also theres slapstick/horror comedy in this one! The story is going to get more and more comedic from here because of the characters that are soon to be involved. Bonus points if anyone can guess which monster(s) I plan on bringing in next!

Warnings: Fluff, Horror, Alcohol

chapter 9

Africa

Pennywise climbed the basement stairs of the Neibolt House in annoyance. Leech hadn't come to see him yet today and as much as he hated to admit it her visits had become the highlight of his day especially when she had the weekend off to spend all her time with him. he had noticed that the more he was around her the more her scent changed, it was something that initially drew him to her in the first place. Her scent started out faintly sweet, but ever since they became intimate it was becoming overwhelming to him. A human would probably describe the scent similar to that of a freshly baked cake or pie being shoved right up against your nose. When he first noticed it, he had caught her looking at him while they had been both been casually chatting doing their chore wheel tasks. Something about her smell changed when she smiled at him. It got worse that night she got drunk while watching movies with the gang. Leech was sitting next to him on the couch and that sweet smell drifted into his nose when she reached over him for the popcorn in his lap. It would get stronger and stronger as their interactions increased Pennywise noticing that he could draw it out of her by doing certain things like putting his hand on her shoulder, or giving her certain looks.

He tried desperately to cope with the strange new feelings, he stopped eating for a bit and avoided her as much as possible. When Dracula finally confronted him he was a confused mess and he was even more confused when the elder vampire helped him realize that this new feeling was lust. After Chucky found out about his terrible affliction the two had begun bugging him non stop about it. Their “helping” him ending up feeding his obsession and he eventually gave in, fully accepting that he had feelings for this nearly human girl. These awful feelings are even worse now having started this…..complicated thing. He found himself with a whole new mess of emotions that he had no idea what to do with other than bury them deep and hope she didn't notice.

When usually he found her Leech would be listening to music or messing with her phone in her room where he'd promptly scare her before flopping down onto her bed to annoy her further. Today however he could hear her shouting passionately at Freddy in the living room, a hobby that they both shared.

“Your ass is mine Kruger I spent an entire week perfecting this solo.”

“Sweet cheeks you weren't even born when this song came out”

The two were in front of the old tv violently playing with fake guitars in their pjs. Leatherface was behind them gleefully hitting a toy drum-set and Dracula sat amused on an old chair.

“Does anyone want to explain this to me?”

“I don't quite know what it is but they have been at this for at least 12 hours now” the vampire exclaimed motioning for the clown to join.

“Have they even slept?”

“I do not think they have, my young apprentice hasn't even fed or bathed yet. Her determination to crush my roommate at this strange musical game is quite admirable.”

“Speaking of, Drac need refreshments!” Freddy called over his shoulder as the song Free Bird headed into its big solo.

“You cant do that! I haven't had anything to eat all day!”

“You’re just mad because you're all alone in this battle. THERES NO ONE TO SAVE YOU LEECH GIVE UP” Freddy shredded on the rock band controller aggressively

“Bite my nearly undead ass Freddy”

“I’m sure the clown does that plenty for you already bitch.”

Pennywise cleared his throat.

“Oh hey Pen, you wanna be a peach and get me some fuel.” Leech said glancing over her shoulder.

“Do I look like your servant? You're perfectly capable of getting it yourself you're just too lazy to go out and practice apparently.”

“OH HE BURNED YOU GOOD BLOODSUCKER”

“There are more pressing matters at hand Penny, asses need to be kicked right now”

“More pressing matters than not starving to death?”

“I’ll live”

“Barely. You look half dead, go sleep”

“Sleep is for the weak” she said turning to him with an absolutely feral look on her face.

“You're taking a break” the clown said as he scooped her up before she could protest. He carried her off to the bathroom where he turned on the shower and pushed her in still wearing her clothes.

“PENNYWISE what the hell!”

“Get clean.”

“But?

“No you can kick Freddy’s ass later” he crossed his arms and watched her expectantly.

“Um….. are you gong to leave?”

“Need to make sure you listen dear. Come now out of those wet clothes.” he said with a lusty tone, shit eating grin now forming on his face. Leech rolled her eyes and shut the curtain causing the clown to groan in disappointment. He nearly began to leave when the curtain reopened he turned back around quickly. Leech was now holding her wet clothing in a nice little ball and a drop of drool left the clowns lips at the sight.

“Hey Penny~” she said with a seductive voice

“Y-yes?”

“Hang these out to dry douchebag” she chucked the ball at his head wet clothes landing smack on his face before the curtain shut again.

“you torture me.”

“Its my favorite hobby.”

Pennywise growled in annoyance and left to find some extra hangers. He knew he kept some somewhere in his clown room where he kept a collection of circus memorabilia. When he opened the door and was greeted with a puff of dust causing him to scrunch his nose in annoyance it'd been a while since he was up here “I’ve been slacking off” he thought aloud to himself as he rummaged for hangers. After finding what he was looking for he decided to try to tidy the place up a bit grabbing a mix tape he had acquired from some poor soul standing outside his ex girlfriends window with a boombox. The clown never really liked the songs on the tape at first but lately they've been growing on him due to….certain circumstances. A few cheesy love songs had gone by and he was halfway done, Pennywise felt himself getting carried away with the current song playing singing along while dusting off an antique mannequin. He removed the clown wig from its head glancing fondly at it now as it was reminding him of a certain almost-vampire a few doors down. The clown found himself serenading it as if it was actually her, picking it up and beginning to dance to the song Africa by Toto. Freddy walked by the door just in time and froze to watch the scene unfold before him in amusement. “My darling little Leech you know I have grown quite fond of you” the clown growled into the mannequins cheek. Freddy had to bite down on his hat to keep quiet. “Whats that? You've fallen for me as well?” The clown dipped the mannequin down kissing its chest as the song came to an end. Freddy gave him a round of applause wiping away fake tears doing everything he could not to explode in laughter. “That was beautiful Jingles.”

Pennywise dropped the mannequin. “H-how long were you s-standing there for?”

“How long have you been in love?”

“I’m not in love. I don't love.”

“You just admitted it to your doll there jackass.”

“WAIT HE FINALLY SAID IT ALOUD?” came Chucky’s voice from down the hall

“NO I DID NOT AND SHUT UP PLEASE”

“This is great, I'm going to tell Dracula he's going to flip out.” Freddy began running for the stairs

“I wish those kids actually killed me in the 80s.” Pennywise mumbled

Just then a scream of terror could be heard from the bathroom followed by a series of curses of the clowns name. “PENNYWISEEEE”

Freddy and Chucky both came back out to look at him.

“What? I'm not doing anything?”

The three monsters eyes grew wide.

“oh no…. I'm not doing anything….” The clown whispered

He bolted to the bathroom busting down the door “LEECH! What hap-” he slipped on a puddle of…. something and comically landed on his back. When he sat up she was covered in a weird black sludge that was shooting out of the shower head and bath tub faucet. The curtain had been yanked off and she was using it as a shield from the strange substance.

“WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT” yelled Chucky

“Also, nice butterfly tattoo under your boobs there Leech” Freddy added

“Its a moth!” Penny said from the floor.

“CAN WE FOCUS ON THE GOO PLEASE?? PEN MAKE IT FUCKING STOP”

“I told you I'm not doing it!”

Leech flopped out of the antique bathtub still clutching the curtains to herself and scrambling backwards into Pennywise as the tub began to overflow.

“AH Leech! You’re getting it all over me!” he yelled .

“PEN STRANGE BLACK GOO IS EXPLODING FROM OUR BATHTUB AND SHOWER HEAD. YOU LIVE IN THE SEWER! STAINS SHOULD BE THE LEAST OF YOUR WORRIES.”

“WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOUR SINK CLOWN” came a scream from downstairs flowed by frantic stomping up the stairs from both Leatherface and Drac

All the boys plus Leech were now staring at the massacre that was the upstairs bathroom.

“JINGLES MAKE IT STOP” screamed Chucky

“I CANT I’M NOT DOING IT”

“DO YOU KNOW WHAT TIFF WILL DO TO ME IF SHE COMES HOME AND FINDS ALL HER BATHROOM SHIT COVERED IN BLACK SLUDGE. I. WILL. DIE.”

Leech reached a trembling claw up to her head and pulled out what looks like a piece of scalp with long hair still attached to it her eyes began to grow wide in horror.

“IS THIS HAIR? WHY IS THERE HAIR IN IT? WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS SHIT” Leech turned around and grabbed Pennywise ruffles.

“DO NOT LET IT GET ON ME THIS IS AN ANTIQUE OUTFIT” shrieked Dracula

Leatherface was hooting and crying. He Began smashing a hole in the wall in panic. Chucky did his best to calm him but ended up being thrown down the hall screaming out in pain.

“WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOUR HOUSE CLOWN” Freddy was shouting.

“EVERYONE SHUT UP AND STOP BEING AFRAID I CANT FUCKING THINK WITH ALL THIS FEAR IN THE ROOM”

“YOU’RE THINKING ABOUT FOOD AT A TIME LIKE THIS??? WE ARE GOING TO DROWN IN BLACK GOO THAT HAS PIECES OF SCALP IN IT! I’M THE ONLY ONE HERE THAT CANT RESURRECT YET! IM GOING TO DIE PEN! IM GOING TO FUCKING DIE!” Leech started hyperventilating and twitching claws out now tearing at the fabric of Pennywise’s costume.

Everyone was frantically “trying” to do something to stop the sludge oozing out of the bathroom Freddy ran up to the shower with a towel in an attempt to plug it up, Dracula was backed up against the corner on the ceiling, Chucky was attempting to stand back up after being thrown like a rag doll and Leatherface was chucking anything he could at the bathroom (mostly hitting Freddy.)

“SHUT UP ALL OF YOU” Pennywise roared rising to his feet, a door materialized behind the clown and he disappeared into it slamming it shut.

“YOU FUCKER! YOU CANT LEAVE ME PEN. DONT YOU DARE ABANDON ME. GET YOUR ASS BACK HERE IM NAKED AND AFRAID AND I FUCKING NEED YOU RIGHT NOW! PENNYWISE THE DANCING CLOWN GET YOUR PASTY RUFFLED BUTT BACK HERE AND STOP THIS BLACK SLUDGE.” Leech was pounding at the wall were the door had appeared still on the floor making big black hand prints on the wall.

Suddenly everything stopped. The boys and Leech all were frozen and panting in fear and confusion. The door reappeared and Pennywise walked out sludge splattered on his costume. “Did ANY ONE here think to turn the fucking water off? No? Just Pennywise? WOW imagine that! I WAS THE ONLY ONE WHO FUCKING DIDNT FREAK OUT AND MAKE THE SITUATION WORSE!!! WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT???? NOW EVERYONE GET OUT SO I CAN FUCKING FIGURE THIS SHIT OUT WITHOUT HAVING YOU SCREAMING BANSHEES TAINTING THE AIR WITH YOUR PANIC AND FEAR!” The usual yellow of the clown’s eyes were almost completely red. He was livid. Not only were his fangs and claws on full display he seemed to be even taller than before looming over everyone in the room. It was truly terrifying to behold. The gang went silent.

“C-can I at least p-put some clothes on?” Leech asked still covering herself with the shower curtain

“OUT.”

“Leaving!” she and everyone else scrambled for the door slamming it behind them.

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Poor Penny he’s having a hard time. I totally head cannon that Pen is a secret plumbing expert since he lives in the sewers. Next chapter is going to have terrifying monster hate fucking so get hype for that friends!

#pennywise #pennywise the dancing clown #pennywise fanfiction #pennywise x oc #pennywise x reader #it (2017)#it fanfiction #monster roommate au

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