#procrastinates on writing by writing about writing

[genomesoldier]

draw to pass the time :)

individual images below the cut ^_^

[writingsoftarnishedsilver]

mc just falling asleep on ominis's lap and he's like i can't move like ever now. sebastian please get me a book

Trust and Torment | Ominis Gaunt x Reader

ANON! Thank you sm for your ask, this was so cute ;.; gave me a few new HCs for Ominis as well that I included heheh :')

I got an ask not long ago ab how I go about writing and stuff, so with this one, I visualized my general thought process is for when I start (excuse my chicken scratch writing). Not sure how helpful it'll be but I thought why not! <3

Words: ~3,200

Tags: Mentions of Smut, Pining, Romance, Fluff, Reader Insert, Female MC, No Y/N, No Hogwarts House

The faint crackle of the torches filled the quiet space, their warmth radiating in uneven waves that brushed against the cool stone walls of the Undercroft. The scent of parchment mingled with ink and the smoky aftermath of spell-fire. Ominis sat on the couch next to you, relaxing into the softened edges of the cushions—a familiar, worn comfort shaped by years of use.

Your shoulder brushed against his, a fleeting touch, but it sent a ripple of warmth through the air between you, one that lingered beneath his skin long after the contact had passed. The faint sound of your fingers turning the pages of your book mingled with Sebastian's muttering and sighing from where he sat across the room, scratching at his Arithmancy homework.

Study sessions like this had become the norm for the three of you in seventh year. What used to be lively gatherings filled with procrastination and teasing in years past had quieted into focused companionship, the looming specter of N.E.W.T.s demanding most of your attention. Tonight was no different.

Ominis seemed, as always, the picture of calm. His steady fingers brushed the braille of his book, the other hand resting neatly in his lap. But beneath his composed exterior, his thoughts were fraying. Sitting this close to you, with the faint scent of your shampoo wrapping around him, your shoulder occasionally brushing his own, he was hopelessly distracted.

It was maddening, really, how easily you unraveled him—how the simple press of your body against his own could splinter his focus into something delicate and dangerous. Because the truth was, Ominis rarely wanted to touch anyone at all.

Touch was not something he easily welcomed. His family had made sure of that—cold, distant, cruel as they were, touch had only ever been associated with pain or control. Even with his friends, Ominis had never been particularly tactile. The exceptions had been Sebastian and Anne, the only ones who had ever felt safe enough to let close. And then, of course, there was you.

You, who had never asked permission outright, but whose touch had never been unwelcome. You, who reached for him in passing—soft brushes of your fingers against his sleeve when you wanted his attention, the warm press of your palm to his arm when laughter had made you lean into him, the absentminded way you tucked his hair behind his ear when he was too deep in thought to notice it falling forward. He had never stopped you.

He never wanted to.

Because the truth he could never voice—perhaps even to himself—was that he was painfully, desperately touch-starved. And when it came to you, your touch was the most desirable of all.

It was getting harder to pretend it didn’t affect him. Harder to keep himself from leaning into it, from seeking it out. Harder to ignore the way his heart beat faster whenever you shifted closer, the way his fingers itched to reach for you in return.

This was just studying. Just work. He told himself that over and over again.

But the longer you read, the slower your movements became, and Ominis didn’t miss the way your shoulder leaned just a little more heavily into his. At first, it was subtle—your head dipping slightly, then snapping back up. A small shift, barely noticeable. But then it happened again. And again.

Ominis barely had time to register what was happening before you gave in entirely, your head resting against his shoulder with a sigh so soft he almost didn’t hear it.

His entire body locked up.

Oh. Oh.

He didn’t dare move. He didn’t even breathe. His brain, usually sharp and composed, blanked completely, drowned out by the deafening drum of his heartbeat in his ears. Your weight was warm and solid against him, pressing into his side in a way that sent his thoughts spiraling.

Surely this was a mistake. You were tired. You hadn’t meant to—

Then you shifted again, tilting, your warmth slipping lower.

And before he could even begin to process what was happening, your head slipped from his shoulder entirely, settling against his lap.

Ominis nearly had a heart attack.

The book in his hands slipped from his fingers, landing on the couch beside him with a dull thud. His breath caught so sharply in his throat that he thought he might choke on it. Every muscle in his body tensed so violently that he might as well have been Petrified.

Your head. Was in. His lap.

His brain was screaming. His body was screaming. His entire existence was screaming.

The soft press of your cheek against his thigh burned hotter than fiendfyre, and he was terrified to move even a fraction of an inch, as if any shift might wake you—or worse, alert you to what you’d done.

A chair scraped against the stone floor, the sharp sound slicing through his unraveling thoughts. Ominis didn’t need to see Sebastian to know that he had just turned, and, judging by the way the air shifted, was now staring.

“Well, well,” Sebastian mused, and Ominis could hear the smirk in his voice. “Look at that.”

“Don’t,” Ominis hissed, his voice sharp but barely above a whisper. His entire being was already on the verge of short-circuiting, and Sebastian Sallow’s commentary was the last thing he needed.

Sebastian made a thoughtful sound, far too amused for Ominis’ liking. “You know, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you look so… flustered,” he drawled, clearly relishing every second of this. “It’s adorable, really.”

Ominis’ hands hovered uselessly in his lap, his fingers twitching, aching to move, but paralyzed by the sheer catastrophe of the situation.

“Sebastian,” Ominis bit out a warning, his voice low and laced with something dangerously close to desperation.

Sebastian, of course, did not care.

The scrape of his chair echoed again as he stood, his footsteps far too leisurely as he strolled across the room.

“So,” Sebastian continued, his voice all casual-like as he stood over where Ominis sat on the couch. “Have you told her yet?”

Ominis’s stomach plummeted. His head whipped toward Sebastian, his pale eyes narrowing in immediate alarm. “Told her what, exactly?”

“Oh, you know,” Sebastian said breezily, tone far too innocent to be anything but dangerous. “How you feel. How you’ve been pining for her for years, how the mere sound of her laugh sends you spiraling, how you—”

“Sebastian,” Ominis hissed, his entire body going rigid as heat flared up his neck, spreading fast. His hands clenched into fists at his sides, as if gripping onto whatever composure he had left. “Will you shut up?!” His voice dropped to a hushed, frantic whisper, sheer panic creeping in. “What if she hears you?!”

Sebastian snorted. “Trust me, she’s not hearing anything right now. She’s completely out.” A pause. Then, far too smugly, “Although, if she was awake, this would make for a fascinating conversation.”

Ominis groaned softly, dragging a trembling hand down his face. He couldn’t do this right now—he couldn’t. His mind was already in tatters, barely keeping him together beneath the searing weight of you pressed against him. His heart was hammering so hard he was convinced it was audible, each heavy beat a taunting reminder of just how doomed he was.

“Look—”

“I am looking,” Sebastian interrupted, entirely unrepentant. “And she looks very comfortable. Entirely content, all cozied up in your lap like that.” His voice dipped into mock sympathy. “Honestly, I think she’s found her new favorite spot. Looks like you’re stuck here, mate.”

Ominis’ lips parted, but nothing came out. His thoughts were too much—too loud, too scattered, an impossible mess of holy hell what do I do and I can’t move I can’t move I can’t move.

Sebastian, because he was insufferable, only continued.

“And look at you,” he mused, his tone brimming with pure mischief. “All flustered and red in the face—Merlin’s beard, Ominis, her face is practically on your di—”

“Enough!” Ominis snapped, his voice a desperate whisper, his entire body burning. His hands hovered uselessly above his lap, fingers twitching, aching to do something—anything—but he didn’t dare move. He turned his head away sharply, as if that might somehow shield him from Sebastian’s relentless torment.

Sebastian laughed, warm and unbothered. “Relax, Ominis. I’m only joking.” A beat. “Mostly.”

Ominis wanted to die.

Sebastian sighed, entirely too pleased with himself. “Well, I suppose I could be a decent friend and leave you to your little—” he waved a hand vaguely, “—situation.”

Ominis felt the shift in the air as Sebastian moved, as Ominis heard the the lazy, purposeful way he strolled toward the exit. Finally.

But then—panic struck. He had no idea how long he'd be down here, now idea how long he'd be unable to move.

“Wait,” Ominis blurted, his voice sharper than he intended, but still quiet, tinged with something between resignation and pleading.

Sebastian paused. “Hmm?”

Ominis hesitated. He hated the way his fingers twitched at his sides, how stupidly vulnerable he felt, trapped in this moment, utterly helpless beneath the weight of something he wanted—ached for—but could not handle.

He swallowed hard, forcing his voice to remain even. “Could you… bring me something from dinner?”

Sebastian was silent.

For a moment, Ominis thought his friend was about to pounce on his uncharacteristic uncertainty, dig into it, use it to fluster him even more.

But then Sebastian chuckled, softer this time. Genuine.

“Of course,” he said, still teasing but gentler now. “Anything for the lap-bound prince.”

Ominis clenched his jaw. “I hate you.”

Sebastian only hummed, entirely unfazed. “I’ll make sure it’s something easy to eat,” he added, far too cheerfully. “Wouldn’t want you disturbing her.”

Ominis groaned, his face burning all over again. “Just go.”

With one last low chuckle, Sebastian finally turned and stepped out, the door creaking closed behind him.

Silence fell over the Undercroft once more.

Ominis exhaled a breath, but it did little to steady him. His thoughts were racing, still frayed beyond reason.

And you—blissfully unaware, still peacefully asleep in his lap—remained the greatest, most tormenting comfort of all.

Every part of him was acutely aware of you. It was overwhelming, like he’d been plunged into a dream he desperately didn’t want to wake from.

His fingers twitched at his side, his hand hovering uselessly in the air before retreating back to the couch, clenching into the fabric as if to anchor himself. He wanted—Merlin, he wanted so badly to touch you, just a simple brush of his fingers over your hair, something small, something to savor. But the thought sent a wave of panic crashing through him.

What if it woke you? What if it startled you? What if you looked up at him, bleary-eyed and confused, and he had to explain why his hands were trembling, why his breath was uneven, why he couldn’t stop thinking about you?

The mere idea of it made his stomach twist violently.

Yet his mind wouldn’t settle, wouldn’t let him rest. His thoughts churned, slipping into dangerous territory before he could stop them. Was this moment as perfect to you as it was to him?

No, of course not.

You were asleep, utterly unaware of the emotional devastation you had just unleashed upon him.

But still…

Sebastian, as infuriating as he was, was right. Your face was dangerously close to Ominis's pelvis, to the very peak of his torment.

Of course he had imagined you down there before. A million times. Your face, your mouth—Merlin, your mouth—and all the wicked ways he had dreamed of feeling it, of having it wrapped around him. It was a dangerous, recurring indulgence, one he had forced himself to bury, to ignore, to pretend didn’t exist.

But this wasn't that, he reminded himself sharply.

You weren’t here to torture him, to tease or tempt, to unravel him piece by trembling piece. You weren’t even aware of what you were doing to him—of how you had always done this to him, effortlessly, unknowingly. You were just… sleeping. Soft and trusting, warm and utterly oblivious, curled into him as if it were the most natural thing in the world, as if you belonged there.

So even as his body betrayed him, as heat coiled low in his stomach and his blood turned traitorous, as the cruelest corners of his mind whispered every half-buried thought, every shameful fantasy he'd ever had of you—he could not let his mind wander further.

Ominis forced himself to exhale slowly, counting each breath in a desperate attempt to steady the erratic rhythm of his heart. In and out. In and out. But it wasn’t helping—nothing was. His body was taut with restraint, his nerves raw beneath the unbearable weight of you.

And then, another thought crept in, unbidden.

Was his lap even comfortable enough for you?

It was ridiculous, laughable even, that of all the things he should be worried about right now—his lack of control, the way his thoughts teetered on the edge of something dangerous, the sheer agony of wanting something he could never have—this was what took root in his mind.

But it did.

Because you were still there, still sleeping, still soft and warm and so impossibly close. And Ominis had never been… particularly built. He was lean, all sharp angles and bony joints, nothing like Sebastian, for example, who was solid in a way that made people feel secure when they leaned against him. Ominis, though?

Was he enough? Was he warm enough? Soft enough?

Did you even feel comfortable? Or were you simply too exhausted to move?

Ominis’ throat tightened. His jaw clenched.

Stop it.

He shook his head sharply, forcing the thought away before it could spiral further. It was ridiculous.

He let out a low, shaky sigh, tilting his head back against the worn fabric of the couch. His eyes fluttered closed, as if shutting them might help him breathe, might help him find some semblance of control.

Minutes passed—or maybe it was hours, he wasn’t sure—before his restraint began to crumble.

His fingers twitched at his side, brushing against the edge of his robe, as though testing his resolve. He swallowed hard, heart pounding in his chest.

Don’t do it. Don’t move. Just sit here. Be thankful she’s even this close.

But his hand betrayed him.

Slowly—hesitantly—he let his fingers lift from the couch, hovering for an agonizing moment before finally—finally—settling gently on your shoulder.

He froze. Held his breath. Waited.

You didn’t stir.

Encouraged by your lack of reaction, he let his hand shift, his fingertips ghosting over the curve of your shoulder, barely daring to make contact. He moved so carefully, as if even the air around you might betray him.

And then—

His fingers brushed against the soft skin of your cheek.

Ominis stopped breathing.

Oh, this was—this was worse. This was so much worse.

You were so warm. So soft.

It was unbearable. It was blissful.

It was a catastrophe.

His fingers lingered, just for a moment, before moving again, his touch impossibly light as he carefully tucked a stray strand of hair behind your ear. His throat felt tight, his pulse hammering so hard he thought it might shatter him from the inside out.

He shouldn’t be doing this. He knew that. He shouldn’t be indulging in something so selfish, so fleeting. And yet he couldn’t stop.

Being blind, Ominis had grown up with people making assumptions about him—about what he wanted, what he needed. One of the most common, most infuriating notions was that he must long to touch their faces, to “see” them with his hands. Strangers would offer their cheeks, their chins, without hesitation, as if they were gifting him something precious. He hated it.

To him, it had always felt invasive. Hollow. An empty gesture that lacked the intimacy people so foolishly believed it conveyed.

But you?

You had never offered. Never asked him to touch your face. Ominis wondered if it was out of politeness, or if you simply didn’t want him to. Maybe you thought he’d recoil at the idea.

And yet—selfishly, shamefully—Ominis had wished more times than he could count that you would bring it up. That you would offer, not out of pity, not because you felt you should, but because you trusted him enough to let him. To let him know you.

But you never had.

And now—

Now, he had his chance.

His fingers mapped the soft curve of your cheek, brushed against your jawline, and trailed down the delicate bridge of your nose. Every touch was feather-light, as if he was terrified he might shatter you, might shatter himself.

His fingertips ghosted over the curve of your chin, tracing the soft slope with a gentleness he hadn’t known he possessed. Every tiny detail of you was being burned into his mind now: the smoothness of your skin, the faint warmth radiating from you, the way your breathing remained steady, peaceful, as though his touch didn’t disturb you in the slightest.

It was intoxicating. It was terrifying.

It was everything.

His thumb brushed against the edge of your jaw, and his chest ached with the weight of everything he'd never said, everything he secretly felt. A quiet storm of longing and guilt swirled inside him, tightening in his throat, stealing the breath from his lungs.

What would you think if you knew? Would you pull away? Would you be offended by his presumption? Or would you—

He refused to finish the thought.

Ominis let out a slow, trembling breath, his thumb tracing one last, fleeting touch before he forced himself to pull away. His hand drifted back to your shoulder, retreating to safer ground, while the other, still trembling faintly, lifted to cradle the back of your head.

And then you shifted slightly in your sleep.

A soft, barely-there sigh escaped your lips as you curled just the slightest bit closer to him, seeking out his warmth as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

Ominis's breath hitched. The tension bled from his frame, melting into something warmer, something deeper—something that made his heart ache in a completely different way.

Because you were here. With him. Safe and peaceful, trusting him enough to let your guard down in a way that left him utterly, completely speechless.

And finally—mercifully—the storm in his mind began to quiet.

Ominis let his head tip back against the couch again, his fingers brushing absently against your shoulder as his eyes slipped closed.

He didn’t realize when his breaths grew deeper, slower, or when the exhaustion that had been tugging at the edges of his mind finally overtook him.

All he knew was that you were there.

Safe. Close.

By the time Sebastian returned, juggling plates of dinner, Ominis was fast asleep—his head resting against the couch, one hand still gently cradling the back of yours.

[starrygazers]

if touch could speak.

˖ ࣪⭑ ⸱ I'm working on a longer fantasy au piece for Mydei that I hopefully will see to finish :c also procrastinating on studying for my midterms lol. also I'm sorry if I write about Mydei's immortality a lot I hope it doesn't get repetitive lol, I just love this aspect of his character and I think it has so much potential

˖ ࣪⭑ ⸱ tags : hurt with comfort? established relationship, Mydei's touch-starved lol

˖ ࣪⭑ ⸱ featuring : Mydei x gn! reader

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

His hands are rough. They've wielded spears, taken countless of lives, and crawled back from death.

He doesn't belong among the dead or the living. Castorice looks at him like he's an anomaly, because he knows. His hands have knocked on death's door time and time again, and it never opened for him.

He doubts it ever will. Castorice never meets his eyes.

Mydeimos has learned from the past, taking his experience and applying it for the future that he knows he'll live to see. If everyone around him is doomed to agony, then he will keep to himself. If he is destined to walk a path paved from the bodies of his loved ones, comrades, teachers, and kingdom, then he will build walls as tall as the gods he worshipped.

He'll stay by his lonesome, where he can't hurt anyone else. Where no one else can hurt him. The only touch that he delivers is that of death, a warrior's farewell, from the tip of his spear.

Mydeimos has always fared himself a strong warrior. He didn't know his defense could crumble so easily, in such a short time, by just a mere touch from you.

Then again, he is a warrior of Castrum Kremnos, once thought to be undefeated, crumbling under the touch of a god, and he thinks you're a deity.

When you touch his cheek, Mydeimos feels warmth course through his body. It's a different kind of fire ─ not so much the adrenaline he gets during battle. It's a softer, kinder, gentler fire. It doesn't swallow him whole, it blooms slowly, leaving curious tingles where your skin ends and his starts.

When he leans his head to your touch, he feels rejuvenated. He thinks back of the lessons he had as a child ─ this must be what the gods feel when they drink ambrosia. A sweet sensation he wishes would last forever.

When he takes your hand in his, he feels something he rarely has the chance of holding ─ life. Your pulse, blood coursing through you. You're here, whole, with your warm smile and soft words.

Mydeimos' hands are rough. They've wielded spears, taken countless of lives, and crawled back from death. Yet, when he wraps his arms around your frame and pulls you closer to him, he hopes that it can convey the things his pride would never allow him to say:

I love you, please stay.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

©2025 starrygazers. do not repost, copy, translate, modify, or use for AI.

˖ ࣪⭑ ⸱ if you liked this, consider buying me a ko-fi! (˶˃ ᵕ ˂˶) .ᐟ.ᐟ

[agneslovestheinternet-blog]

FUCK YOU, don't leave me

Part Three: Heat (Part One, Part Two)

Gally x Fem!Reader, NSFW!!

Considering your antics last month, your friends are shocked to see that both you and Gally have been allowed to come to bonfire night tonight. They would have been shocked to see both of you entering the woods only minutes apart, if they had noticed. Although this imminent confrontation is going to end in a very different kind of heat; the type that threatens to change your dynamic forever.

Genre: enemies to lovers, SMUT (starts abt 4.1K words in there’s lots of exposition)

Word Count: 7.3K  Read Time: 25 minutes (it’s a long one, ik, bear with)

Warnings & Info: protected, drunk p-in-v sex, despite the fact that both characters are drunk when they have sex there is very clear implied, physical, and verbal consent!! slight mutual masturbation, missionary, virgin!Gally & virgin!Y/N, underage drinking, strong language, “we shouldn’t be doing this” vibes, Gally's thoughts in green, Y/N's thoughts in blue

Author’s Note: I’ve never written smut before but I have had sex so how hard could it be? I hope you guys love this part; I absolutely loved writing the woods scene and I truly think it is the best writing of this whole fic thus far so tell me what you think! Part 4 will be the final part!

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As you were cleaning the med-hut, Gally was changing out of his work clothes, taking a moment to wipe his face with a clean towel and inspect the muscles in his arms, feeling suddenly self critical. He had never really cared about his appearance before, but something about the content of his dreams lately had him wondering things he’d never wondered before, like if his hair was cut too short or if his muscles didn’t compliment his height. He cursed at himself for acting like a dumb teenager with a crush, but that didn’t stop him from picking out his best shirt, (the one he never wears while working), and running his hands nervously through his hair. He walked out of his hut quickly, trying to shake the thought of what expression might be on your face when you see him tonight. 

Now that you were back in your hut that you shared with all the Glade girls (Elsie, Lireale, Gia, Ariana and now, supposedly, tonight’s greenie who hasn’t remembered her name yet), you peeled your Med-Jack uniform off methodically. You hesitated over your clothing trunk before changing into the closest thing to a nice outfit The Glade affords you; a deep red, v-neck top with a small black bow in the middle of the v (courtesy of Lireale’s sewing skills) and black pants that are tighter fitting than your work pants. You were grateful that all of your roommates were already at the bonfire, as you were sure that at least one of them would’ve asked you snidely who you were trying to impress tonight, if they had watched you pick this outfit.

If everyone’s going to be staring at me tonight, I might as well look good.

You ran your fingers absentmindedly through your hair as you tried to shake the feeling that this idea of Alby’s was going to go terribly wrong. You were pretty sure Gally had moved past his murderous rage from that night, but that still left his regular rage, and that’s not much better. Although he did offer to stay home tonight which suggests a lack of rage entirely and besides that he’s probably been too distracted lately to want to come after you. Feeling you’d procrastinated enough, you walked to your door, prepared to face whatever fresh hell this night had in store for you.

As it turned out, there wasn’t much hell to be had currently. You and Gally had both been greeted by your respective friend groups with shock and delight. They were trying to be non-invasive and avoid pointed questions about how the hell you managed to be here tonight, but you both noticed their eyes darting between you two in the dim light of the bonfire, waiting for the tension to break. After settling into the festivities with a lot less apprehension, you decided to make a pit stop at Frypan’s table, to ask for something you knew you shouldn’t.

“Hey Fry!”

“Hey Firecracker,” you cringed at the nickname. “How’s your night going? Are you thinking of setting the place on fire again?” his eyes flashed mischievously.

“No no, my arson days are behind me, Fry. I could use a drink though,” you slipped in, slyly, hoping Alby hadn’t gotten to him first.

“Shit, you know Alby would kill me if I gave you one,”

Fuck, he had gotten to him first. Either that or he was just demonstrating common sense, you thought to yourself. It was actually the former. The day after the incident last month, Alby had forced Gally to clean out his entire stock of his drink and hand it over to Fry for safekeeping. He had also forbidden Fry from giving Gally any of the ingredients to make more. When Alby had finished with you earlier that night, he had marched straight up to Fry and made him promise under threat of a week spent in The Pit to not give you or Gally even a drop of alcohol tonight. Frypan had tried to tell him that Gally utterly terrified him at the best of times and he was sure he already hated him for taking away all of his drink in the first place. He further explained that you were a friend of his and because of those reasons combined he didn’t think he’d be very good at resisting either of you, but the leader wasn’t having it.

“Pleeassee Fry. You know bonfire nights are the only nights I ever drink. And I’ve been doing really good this month,”

“I don’t know…” Fry was getting nervous. On the one hand you had a fair point, one he’d already considered you’d make. On the other hand, he had just gotten back into Alby’s good graces after an incident of his own two months ago that involved an out-of-control smoke bomb and he didn’t want to jeopardize his leader’s favor.

“Just one glass, I promise I won’t do anything stupid. I just want to hang out with my friends,” Fry looked nervously from left to right, half expecting Alby to appear and scold him on the spot. But against his better judgement and in line with what he told his leader would happen anyways, he reached behind him and filled a mason jar of Gally’s signature elixir.

The night had quickly blurred into an orange colored haze from there. You downed your jar as quickly as you could, feeling the familiar warmth of it spread first to your cheeks then to the rest of your body. You laughed with your friends, played a convoluted drinking game with your fellow Med-Jacks, introduced yourself to The Glade’s newest female greenie (promising her that you weren’t normally this chatty), and got dared to take your top off by an equally drunk Slicer who’d always had a thing for you. You didn’t comply….obviously. And yet, through all the camaraderie and the feeling that things were finally getting back to normal after the horrors of this last month, you couldn’t shake the feeling that you were being watched. You’d turn your head to try to find the pair of eyes responsible for this feeling, but that only led to more blurry vision, the alcohol in your system disagreeing with the movement. 

“I’m going for a walk,” you blurted out suddenly to Lireale, who’d been singing an abstract melody over a very out of tune guitar Thomas was absentmindedly strumming.

“What! Are you crazy?” she slurred back at you, trying to snap her mind back to reality to keep you from doing something excessively stupid for the second bonfire night in a row.

“I just need some fresh air,” 

“Are you fucking kidding me Y/N? We live in a Glade; this whole place is fresh air!” she hissed. You couldn’t help but giggle at her outburst. But something was nagging at you and you just felt like you had to get away from people for a while.

“I’m just gonna walk to the little river past the deadheads and then I’ll come back. Promise,” Lireale’s expression shifted from shock to exasperation. It was clear she wasn’t winning this fight and there wasn’t much use in arguing with you; you’d always been stubborn to a fault.

“Fine. But if you’re gonna go skinny dipping, make sure you keep your clothes right next to the water so no one can come over and steal them from you,” You smiled at Lireale’s practical advice, rising from your seat in the grass and giving her an unsteady kiss on the forehead before taking off in your desired direction.

Gally watched your slightly stumbling figure disappear into the darkness of the woods, his interest piqued. He’d been stealing glances at you all night, trying to ignore how much he liked the shade of your top and how he never noticed that you got even prettier when you got drunk, with your hair all astray and a giddy look on your face. Every time he’d feel that familiar heat of desire bubble in his chest, he would dig his fingernails into his palm, trying to use the pain to bring him back to reality. Despite his terrible nail-biting habit leaving his fingernails flush to the skin, they still left small crescent shaped markings and he was beginning to believe they’d become permanent with how often he was having to police his own thoughts.

His looks had gone from quick glances to several uninterrupted seconds of staring as more of his drink began to flood his bloodstream. He’d let Alby believe that he’d given his whole stock to Frypan, but he’d swiped a bottle from an undisclosed personal store under his bed before heading out for the night. No fucking way I’m doing tonight sober, he’d thought to himself before taking the first swig.

So now here he was, plenty drunk with his eyes blurry, his cheeks flushed, and his groggy mind just now beginning to realize that maybe adding copious amounts of alcohol to an already stiff inner cocktail of repression, frustration and desire wasn’t exactly the best way to calm his racing thoughts. He tried to snap out of his lustful haze by tuning back into the spirited conversation his friends were having around him as they lounged on the grass.

“...would fucking kill him before he even tried. Right Gally?” Ben asked indignantly, clearly looking for backup.

“What? Kill who?” Gally muttered, trying to focus his eyes on Ben’s face and figure out what side of this undoubtedly pointless debate he should be on.

“Minho wants to fuck Y/N,” Zart stated bluntly, flashing Gally an evil grin as he watched Minho’s eye widen with fear.

“I do not! I just said she was kinda hot!” Minho blurted back, his voice slurring. He did not want to start a fight with Gally over this of all topics and he was regretting ever mentioning this opinion in Zart’s presence, who he should’ve known wouldn’t keep his mouth shut.

“And I said don’t even think about it because you’ll fucking kill him if he gets within ten feet of her,” Ben finished with an arrogant tone. He was unaware of the sudden tension that fell over the group as they watched Gally think over this information. They were hoping they hadn’t set him off like last month’s incident when one of them, (no one could remember exactly who), revealed that Builder’s crush on you that made him pick a fight with you in the first place.

“Why can’t you shanks ever focus on anything other than girls?” Gally hissed, hoping his blatant hypocrisy wasn’t showing on his face. The group breathed a collective sigh of relief as he seemed no more angry at this prospect than he normally would be.

“Because we’re teenage boys,” Newt piped up from the corner, smiling to himself as he took a deep sip from the mason jar in his hands before passing it to Ben.

“And fantasizing about girls passes the time faster,” Ben continued, taking another sip from the jar and shuddering at its bitter taste. The rest of the circle grunted in agreement as he passed the jar to Zart.

“And we’re all pretty sick of just fucking our hands in the shower every morning!” Zart finished grandly, holding the jar in his hands in front of him like he was making a toast. This sent a chorus of raucous laughter through his friends and Gally went an even further shade of red. He was hit with the flashback of the fantasy of you that had him partaking in that very activity this morning when he suddenly realized he probably shouldn’t be around his friends anymore tonight. Too many eyes are on him and too many potential questions could be formed about just what had gotten him so flustered these past few weeks. 

“Alright guys, I’m turning in for the night,” Gally stated which elicited disappointed groans from all. “Hey somebody has to keep you shanks in line when you’re all hungover tomorrow,” he glared at a small group of the youngest Builders in The Glade, who had been listening in on the conversation without participating. Gally rose to his feet slowly to avoid stumbling like a drunkard and began taking off in the direction of his hut, nodding curtly at the goodbyes his friends called out. Minho scrambled to his feet upon realizing Gally was leaving and rushed to catch up with him, though his head was spinning quite unpleasantly.

“Hey Gally! I’m sorry about that. I’m not gonna do anything with Y/N, I swear. I’m just-I’m really drunk, man, and we were talking about our types and, ya know, which of the girls in The Glade are closest to it and someone brought her up and all I said was-” he rambled nervously as he half jogged next to Gally’s surprisingly swift gait.

“Jesus, Minho, calm down,” he shoved a forceful hand against the Runner’s chest. “I don’t give a shit man, I know it’s all talk,” he dismissed as he took up walking again. 

“Yeah all talk definitely definitely,” Minho repeated breathlessly, relief washing over him as he realized Gally hadn’t noticed how he was spending more and more of his dinners in the Med-hut with you these past few weeks. The increased closeness that was tentatively budding between you two wasn’t anything yet but whatever it was, it definitely wasn’t all talk.

“Get some sleep, man, Ben said you guys are running the outer sections tomorrow,”

“I will, in a bit. ‘Night Gally,” Minho stopped for a moment and willed himself to calm down. It’s nothing, he thought to himself as he meandered his way back over to his friends. I barely know her; we just started talking, he continued in his head. Gally probably won’t murder me if I make a move…probably. He was so preoccupied in his own anxiety that he failed to notice that Gally had veered very distinctively off course.

“Where the fuck is that shank going? I thought he was going to bed,” Zart exclaimed, watching Gally cross from the path he’d been on towards his hut to a path towards the woods.

“I don’t know, it’s Gally mate,” Newt responded, trying to sound nonchalant but secretly logging this in his mind to ask his friend about later when he was sober and during daylight hours. “Hell’ll freeze before we figure him out,”

Nobody from Gally’s circle of friends in the grass had seen you slip into the woods ten minutes earlier. And nobody from your group of friends by the bonfire had seen Gally change course to follow in your footsteps. The Glade remained blissfully unaware of the imminent collision of its two most-at-odds members. 

Gally wouldn’t have been able to tell anyone what made him change course for the woods at that specific moment. He knew he really shouldn’t have, and that the fallout of you two meeting face to face again would most likely end in strict punishments for both of you. But he couldn’t bring himself to care at that moment. He couldn’t deal with the searing heat that was coursing through his body just beneath his tanned skin for even a moment longer. 

Gally was steaming mad. Not at Minho, for thinking you were attractive, not at that Builder from last month for having a crush on you, not at Alby for punishing him, Newt for questioning him, his crew for making fun of him, the entire Glade for whispering about him or even at you for so consistently irritating him. He was enraged with himself for a multitude of reasons; letting his otherwise unperturbed mind be corrupted by mindless teenage sex fantasies, looking at you that night in the Med-hut when he should’ve just kept his eyes to himself, feeling the distinct burning of lust boil in his stomach, for the first time since he had arrived in The Glade. So he was going to do something about it.

He marched through the pitch black of the woods with a renewed vigor that sent a little more coordination through his drunken body. He finally spotted you in the exact spot you had told Lireale you would be in; sitting next to the little pond past the deadheads, your right hand absentmindedly stirring the still water. 

“Y/N!” he barked, making you startle as your ears took in the sudden gruff tone piercing through the silence of the woods.

“Gally?! What the hell are you doing here? Did you fucking follow me??” you yelled, spinning around to face him and jumping to your feet, ever-familiar venom searing through your body that was at peace moments ago.

“No!” Gally snapped back, his voice not reflecting the brief panic now filling his mind. He hadn’t thought about what he’d say to you until right now. “I’m just so fucking tired of this shit!”

“What the hell are you talking about now?”

Gally faltered slightly, trying to find a justifiable reason to be as upset as he was. Without warning, he found an abundance of them that began pouring from his lips like a suddenly opened dam.

“All of this! This whole last month; it’s been fucking ridiculous! You burned both of us for no fucking reason and now we have to tiptoe around everybody here like we’re fucking criminals. We had to apologize to each other like we’re fucking five years old and come to this stupid bonfire night again this month because Alby wants us to put all this shit behind us; but fuck that! I can’t fucking stand you, Greenie!”

Fuck, she looks really…

“Good! Glad we’re on the same fucking page Gally. And it wasn’t for no reason, you dumb shank; you called me a slut in front of the entire Glade! Did you think I’d just lie down and fucking take that?? And you’re not the one Alby threw in the pit every night for a month straight; count your fucking blessings, asshole, at least everyone doesn’t think you’re a deranged fucking arsonist!”

Is he seriously doing this now? I know his timing is always shit but…

“Are you fucking kidding me?! Everybody always thinks you’re just the defensive one but you start fights just as much as…”

“Me?! I would be perfectly happy to never get into another fight again but every time there’s something to complain about, we all have to hear it from….”

“You know that’s not true. Face it Y/N; you fucking love this!”

Silence snapped into place like the final piece of a puzzle as soon as those words left Gally’s mouth. You felt the heat of your anger traveling up to your cheeks but also down to your stomach, creating a dizzying sensation you weren’t familiar with. You barked a forced laugh to try to diffuse this new feeling.

“I love this? What the hell is there to love about this?!”

Is this why I’m always so mad at her? I mean what the fuck kind of coping strategy is…

“This is the reason you and I can get through all the bullshit of living in this prison. Because if we’re fighting with each other, we can’t really think about anything else,”

We’re insane. I think he might actually be…

“Right, so what am I supposed to do, thank you?”

“Maybe it’d be a nice change of pace,”

You both hadn’t noticed it, but you had been stepping closer to each other this entire exchange. You were no more than six inches apart now, breathing heavily, both sets of eyes roaming the other with greedy contempt, almost hungrily.

“Fuck you, Gally,” you finally managed to spit out, almost breathless, the heat in your stomach coiling into tight knots. “Fuck you, Y/N,” he hissed back, positively burning up now.

And suddenly, as if this had been the plan all along, Gally was grabbing your waist and pulling you into a hot, angry, pent-up kiss. His calloused hands grabbed at your hips as his tongue explored your mouth vigorously, finally connecting the heat that had been building up in both of your bodies. He was kissing you like you were the last woman on earth. And you might as well have been.

Despite any protests you should’ve had, you let yourself enjoy the sensation of being manhandled by Gally. He was feeling you up desperately, his hands now slipping underneath the fabric of that damn red v-neck top, snaking their way up your back and then back to the front, his fingers fiddling with the underwire of your bra. He felt his blood rush downwards to where he really wanted you and he was sure that with you pressed up against him, you could feel it too. He disconnected his lips from your mouth and started trailing hot kisses down your neck, sending stifled moans and gasps tumbling from your lips. You pulled away slightly and he adjusted his head to look you in the eyes.

“Are we really fucking doing this?” you questioned, trying for the same angry tone you had used before but your voice was too breathy now.

“Yeah. Fuck it,” Gally responded hoarsely, surprisingly accepting of this objectively insane situation.

“Then let’s go to your hut,” 

“Are you serious?” Gally questioned, only to be absolutely sure this wasn’t just a convoluted revenge plot.

“Deadly,” you whispered back. The heat in your stomach was now replaced by an intense pulling sensation. You needed him. In ways he couldn’t give you while you were both standing fully clothed in the middle of the forest.

Gally disconnected his arms from your body and grabbed your hand, pulling you towards the original path he had told his friends he was taking. That felt like a lifetime ago. Bonfire night was still going strong in the distance, so undercover of the intense darkness of The Glade, you and Gally snuck in the back of his hut and he shut the door as quietly as he could. 

He crossed the room to where you were now sitting on the edge of his bed, (just like you had been in all of his fantasies over the past three weeks), pulled your red top over your head and threw it in a ball on the ground. He admired the expanse of soft skin that was now open to him as he stood above you. He wanted to really take it in now, not like that quick glance in the Med-hut, and several tension-filled seconds passed with his eyes roaming your chest greedily, watching it rise and fall with a quickened pace.

“Are you just gonna stare at me or are you gonna fuck me?” you snapped bravely. You could tell that the alcohol in your system had drafted that response. Gally shook his head slightly to break his gaze and looked apprehensively in your eyes.

“Are we sure this is a good idea?” he faltered, hot guilt washing over him as he began to consider the consequences of this action for the first time.

“It’s a terrible idea,” you replied, chuckling slightly. You tried to look him in the eyes but couldn’t tear your blown pupils from his lips, which you wished dearly were planted back on your neck at this moment.

“We’re both really drunk,” Gally continued, tentatively running a calloused hand over your shoulders. You felt yourself ease into the contact, your heart rate rising to match your shallow breathing.

“We’re also not supposed to be anywhere near each other,” You lifted your arm to run a hand over Gally’s forearm. The strong muscles from years of manual labor felt like heaven under your soft touch. The Builder’s breath hitched at the innocent contact, feeling a mixture of comfort and lust spread through his body.

“We hate each other,”

“Well we don’t have to right now,” You let a smile spread slowly across your face.

Consequences be damned.

Gally didn’t respond to this statement, he just pulled his blue shirt off of his body and threw it on top of your red one. This triggered an avalanche of movement from the both of you as two sets of shaking hands flurried to undo belts, boot laces, and waistbands, worried that if they moved any slower, all momentum for this batshit idea would be lost.

When the movement finally slowed, you were both down to your underwear, you laying on Gally’s bed with your head on the pillow, your hair forming a halo around you. Gally was still standing at the side of it, his toned chest heaving, and you beckoned to him with your finger. You had both come to a non-verbal conclusion that the less you talked during this exchange, the better, and so a comfortable silence fell over the hut.

Before he joined you on the bed Gally rummaged in his bedside table for a small object he had long given up on ever using; a condom. These had started coming up in The Box every month as soon as the girls did. Alby had begrudgingly given a few to every guy in The Glade, muttering that he didn’t want anyone having sex in the first place, but if they did, he certainly didn’t want to increase the population.

Gally eased himself onto the bed, straddling your body, setting the small foil packet next to the pillow. He lowered himself down to you agonizingly slow, arms bent on either side of your shoulders. You rose your head to meet him, pink lips and alcohol-laced breath meeting once more. You pulled out of the kiss for a moment to bite down on his lower lip which triggered an uncharacteristic whimper to fall from his lips. He took this as a signal to begin placing needy kisses down your neck again, and though the heat of his lips felt divine on your skin, you wanted to move on to the main event. After all, you didn’t drunkenly strip down to your underwear in the living quarters of your worst enemy just to make out; if you’re going to make a terrible decision, at least see it through.

You started tracing your hands down his abs, hitching your fingers in the waistband of his boxers. Gally started a little at the contact, grateful that his face was pressed against your collarbone so you couldn’t see his blush deepening. He’d never had anyone touch him like this and he was quickly becoming addicted to it. All the fantasies he had conjured up of you in the past three weeks couldn’t hold a candle to the real thing. 

He felt his blood throbbing in his cock as he left several purple hickies on your chest, lavishing in the moans you made whenever he’d bite down. He finally pushed himself up on his knees, shifting from side to side as he pulled his boxers off awkwardly, leaving himself now totally exposed. You took his cue, unhooked your bra and shimmied out of your panties, throwing them both off to the side. You both took a moment to admire each other, having to stay very still to avoid the blurred vision that came when you moved too fast.

He raked his eyes over your chest, admiring the curve of your tits that were previously concealed in your bra. Fuck, she’s hot. Without thinking about it, he reached for his cock with his right hand, slowly pumping himself as he trailed his eyes to the wetness pooling between your legs, his eyes widening and the knot beneath his navel begging for release.

You took your time admiring his hulking frame and the muscles flexing in his right arm as he quickened his pace, sliding his hand up and down his surprisingly-massive cock. You liked seeing Gally like this; his jaw slack, eyes glued to you, cock leaking precum that made his calloused hand glisten in the low light and most importantly, his mouth kept firmly shut. It was such a turn on, you reached your own right hand down to your heat and slipped a finger inside, pumping slowly and growing wetter by the second, preparing yourself for him. I can’t believe I want him, but I really fucking do.

As if he had read your thoughts, Gally took his right hand from his cock and his left from his waist to grab your thighs with both and spread them further apart. You removed your right hand from its place between your thighs and gently grabbed his cock, trying to mimic the pumping motion he had been doing moments before. 

Ohfuckohfuckohfuck. Your hand on his cock felt about a hundred times better than his own and it was all he could do to suppress a moan. He let himself throw his head back, his eyes rolling, before the part of his brain that hadn’t gone fuzzy from the friction finally remembered what he was supposed to be doing. He put his large hand over yours and guided it back to its place next to your body. He then reached for the foil packet sitting next to the pillow and ripped it open quickly, sliding the slick latex over himself clumsily, needing to adjust it several times. He felt his cheeks grow hotter, feeling embarrassed at his lack of experience being shown so plainly but he shook it off quickly.

He gripped your waist with his left hand and with his shaking right hand, gently guided his cock to your slick opening. Lining up his tip to your willing hole, he pushed his hips forward slightly when a searing pain suddenly wracked your body.

“Fuck!” you exclaimed suddenly, jolting Gally out of the beautiful relief he had begun to feel. You grabbed his cock instinctively, keeping him frozen in place with just his tip sheathed inside of you.

“What? Are you ok?” he asked worriedly, his heart rate rising with anxiety. He was sure at this moment that you had realized how colossally stupid this was and you were going to shove him off of you, slap him square in the face and then run straight to Alby, who would ensure you’d never get this close to him again.

“I’m fine, it just stung a little bit. I’ve never done this before and…fuck, Gally you’re a lot bigger than I thought you’d be,” your voice was light and as soon as those words left your mouth you began to regret it. You watched a small smile spread quickly across the Builder’s face.

“I’m…big?” he repeated slowly. He’d never tell you, but this appraisal from you about his size had his heart leaping. Like any teenage boy he was naturally insecure in that department and hearing you use that adjective sent his ego inflating to a massive size.

“Fuck off! I’m a virgin, everything’s big to me,” you reasoned hotly, not wanting him to get any cockier than he already is. You were pretty sure that Gally would be considered big to any girl, regardless of their experience, but he didn’t need to know that you thought that. You let your grip around his cock go slack. Your body still wanted more of him even if it was going to prove slightly difficult now.

“So am I. I’ll just, uh, go slower? And you tell me how it feels, ok?” he responded with a softer tone that was laced with uncertainty. He didn’t know what the fuck he was doing anyways so he would welcome the feedback regardless. You nodded slowly and he lined himself back up, pushing slightly inward again, watching your face scrunch up with pain again. He stopped, pulling back slightly.

“Hold on, I think I know what might help,” you said, readjusting your body until your hips were angled up instead of parallel to the bed so he’d be thrusting down, not forward. “Try again,”

“You sure?” he raised an eyebrow at you, beginning to worry this wasn’t going to work at all. Despite his long history of negative emotions associated with your presence, he found his mind cut through his lust with concern; he really didn’t want to hurt you.

“Positive,” you nodded, meeting his eyes with a determined gaze. 

Gally lined his cock up to your entrance for the third time, not having to bend over so much due to the new angle. He braced for your pained whimper as he pushed his hips down towards you but he got no such sound in response. Though it still stung slightly as he pushed his tip inside of you, a warm, pleasant pressure spread slowly beneath that feeling, starting to overpower it.

“Are you good?” Gally asked, trying to conceal the shake in his voice from the mind-melting pleasure he was getting from finally being half inside you.

“Yeah, keep going,” you muttered, trying to get used to the warm feeling of your body enveloping him.

He obliged quickly, sinking more of his cock slowly inside of you, gripping your waist tightly now. He was now realizing that it was going to be difficult not to cum after one stroke as the new sensation of your heavenly inner walls already had him teetering on the edge. The experience of his cock filling you up felt more and more natural the deeper he thrusted. He finally bottomed out with a groan, his pelvic bone now pressed against yours.

“Gally,” you moaned softly and he could definitely tell that it wasn’t a moan from pain. His cock twitched inside you at the sound. She’s moaning my name. I can’t believe this is real.

“Feeling good, Y/N?” he stuttered back, the pressure underneath his navel building up massively as he began to slowly thrust his hips back and forth, watching your face intensely for any sign of discomfort. Your face flushed at the sound of your name falling from his lips. He is big.

“Yes, fuck me faster,” 

You had meant for it to be a command but it came out in the form of a whimper. Nonetheless Gally complied quickly, cutting the time between each stroke in half, experimenting with pulling more of his cock out of you just to slam it back harder the next time. Your moans had begun to fill the air around him, just like he imagined they would. The feeling of your pussy wrapped so tightly around his cock, pulling him in, was so otherworldly it blew any sexual release he’d ever given himself with his own hand right out of the water. 

He forced himself to open his eyes and look down at you, your body recoiling from each thrust, sending your tits rippling in a hypnotizing circle. He stared down at where his cock disappeared inside you, practically drooling from the sight. He tightened his grip on your waist, now using his arms to pull your hips back and forth on his cock, instead of him thrusting his.

You started seeing spots in the corner of your vision at this new move. You could feel your wetness leaking down from where his cock was sliding in and out of you and the pressure was building in between your hips. You marveled dumbstruck at what little strength it took for him to move your entire body so easily. 

“Keep…going…like…that,” you managed to sigh between moans, your hands now reaching up to his shoulders, fingernails digging into his tanned skin. This stinging sensation sent shockwaves through Gally’s body, who now locked into his task with laser focus. He listened to the faint squelching noises of your wet core taking his cock so well as he slammed your hips repeatedly against his, even harder now.

“Fuck Y/N. You’re…so…tight,” he was having a harder time pulling you off his cock to thrust harder due to how hard your walls were gripping him.

“Gally…you’re so-….big. Fuck! You feel…sooooo…good,” you moaned back, almost crying from the feeling of how well his massive cock was filling you up. You felt like you were about to be ripped apart from the strength of his thrusts, but you just dug your fingernails into his back deeper and squeezed your eyes shut, letting the pleasure roll over your body.

Gally was trying to hold out for your orgasm but at the sound of his name leaving your lips again in such a sensual tone and the praise you were giving him for his efforts, he just couldn’t hold it in any longer. He felt the heat surge into his pelvis and barely had any time to warn you.

“Y/N…sorry...I’m gonna-” but his sentence was cut off by you pulling him down into another sloppy, wet kiss. As you pulled away from him slightly to bite down on his bottom lip, he felt his pleasure finally curl to a finish. He thrust violently into your pussy and held his position deep inside of you, feeling his warm cum spurt out of his pulsing cock and into the condom. He let out a few very undignified moans into your mouth, and was too high off the feeling of you wrapped around him to feel embarrassed about it.

“I know you didn’t-” he started, slowly opening his eyes to meet your glazed ones underneath him. You were coming down from the high a lot quicker than he was, your lack of climax not really bothering you as you somehow knew this wouldn’t be a one-time thing.

“It’s fine. Next time,” you nodded at him with a wink, watching the shock color his sweaty face.

“Wait,” he paused briefly, pulling his leaking cock out of your pussy, eliciting a groan from both of you, “‘Next time’?”

“Yeah,” you sat up gingerly to meet his eye level. “Isn’t fucking me better than fighting with me?”

“Well, yeah…”

He withdrew his legs from around you gingerly, reaching for the towel he’d used to wipe his face before he left for bonfire night. He removed the condom wrapped around him slowly and tossed it gently into the garbage by his bed. He then focused on wiping both of you down, trying to ignore the slight spin the room had now. He was still reeling but was trying to be functional. It’s certainly a hard line to walk between; hating someone so much yet cumming harder than you ever have while inside them. The mix of annoyance and need he felt while looking at you was curdling in his stomach, making him feel slightly nauseous.

“...but I didn’t think there’d be a next time. I didn’t think there’d be a first time. I mean; what the fuck is this?”

You took the towel from his hands and finished wiping yourself clean, then swung your shaking legs over the edge of the bed, turning your head to face Gally. You felt the absence of him inside you like a chunk had been taken from your flesh. You hadn’t realized how much attraction had been simmering under your hatred for him until the tension finally broke. But despite your confused feelings, you were determined to gain the upper hand on him and win the war of indifference.

“You’re seriously pulling a “what are we”?” you chuckled.

“No, fuck no,” he recoiled with disgust that was slightly forced. “Y/N, we're both drunk. I kinda thought we’d regret this in the morning and never talk to each other again,” He hoped that wasn’t the correct assumption.

“Is that what you wanna do?” you posed innocently, standing finally and turning to face him with your hands on your hips. You tried to keep your desire for him out of your tone and you weren’t sure if you were succeeding.

“Not really, no,” he muttered, dazed at his new view of you, his eyes scanning up and down your body. His cock gave a weak throb, somehow still slightly hard even after its monumental release.

“Ok well then, let’s just do this. But maybe, sober and not like, directly after biting each other's heads off? We don’t have to talk, just meet up and…” you trailed off suggestively, posing this proposal as you searched his floor for all the clothing items you had haphazardly tossed there. Gally reached down for his boxers and pulled them over his half-hard cock.

“You sure? I feel like you’re just gonna get really mad at me and we’ll have another thing like last month and I really don’t wanna-”

“Oh my fucking god Gally do you want to fuck me or not?? What is your fucking deal?” you snapped, pulling your shirt over your head and reaching for your pants, forgetting about underwear entirely. Gally suddenly knelt down in front of you, gripping your wrists in his strong hands.

“Of course I want to fuck you again, shank! You think I can cum like that from my own hand? I just think we hate each other and this is gonna end terribly. I’m trying to avoid getting burned again; literally” he accented the last word with an acidic tone, all the dizziness from his orgasm now completely worn off and irritation at your attitude replacing it. 

“Clearly the only time I don’t hate you Gally, is when you’re inside me so let’s just do that and we’ll be fucking fine!” You shook your wrists from his grip and finished pulling your pants up in a huff.

“Fine,” he turned from you to pick up his shirt.

“Great,” you stood up with your boots in your hands and sat at the edge of his bed to put them on. You both dressed the rest of the way in a stubborn silence, with you realizing you had forgotten your underwear and just opting to shove them into one of your large pockets and Gally trading his tough cargo pants for linen shorts. He usually slept in just his boxers but he didn’t want to be undressed around you any more than he had to be. The argument that sprouted took both of your attention from your confusing feelings of lust and fondness towards one another and back on a much more comfortable plane; arguing came as easily to you two as breathing.

You finally stood fully dressed and made your way to the door. You had your hand on the doorknob, ready to make your escape when Gally broke the silence.

“Wait Y/N. Are you good?” He didn’t clarify what exactly he was trying to check that you were good with but between the concerned look on his face and the earnestness of his tone, you could tell he was strictly referring to your trial and error in the bed earlier. Gally’s stomach was twisting into knots as you thought over your response with your back still turned to him. He was torn between genuine concern for your wellbeing and embarrassment at treating his enemy so gently.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” you answered, turning to face him and nodding with wide, honest eyes. You tried to conceal the ambiguous pang that rattled your chest as you realized his care for you. Sure it was the bare minimum but this was Gally; kindness is not a strong suit of his.

“You’re not hurt?” he clarified, keeping his tone matter-of-fact.

“Um, I’m a little sore. Like I might have trouble walking tomorrow,” you broke out into a playful grin to diffuse the tension, “but that’s a good kind of hurt, you know,”

“Ok,” he nodded to reassure himself, chuckling slightly and relaxing slightly at your appraisal of the situation. “Can’t wait to see you limping around the Med-hut tomorrow,” he cracked sarcastically, returning your grin.

You scrunched your nose up and narrowed your eyes as you put your hand back on the doorknob. “Fuck off Gally,” you muttered without your usual flair as you swung the door closed behind you.

You snuck back to your hut in silence, realizing that was probably the only time you’d ever said that phrase and didn’t really mean it.

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Tags: @katie-tibo @my-little-universes @cthood @decaffeinatedpuppygiver

[milkoomi]

Hi I adore you and your blog, you definitely inspire me. Do you have any advice for students who are behind in their studies?

hi lovely anon!! thank you so so much for your kindness and support towards me and my blog! it means so much to me that there are people like you who get inspired because of what i’ve created! so thank you!! 🤍

academic track reset tips. ᥫ᭡

falling behind is extremely anxiety inducing and can feel disastrously overwhelming. i promise you, i’ve been there before and i completely understand the dread that comes with it. you feel one too many steps behind everyone else and it feels like the workload is suffocating you. but i promise you can get yourself back up and on track again!

let’s begin …

୨ৎ — gentle reminders

first and foremost, i want you to know that you will be okay. things happen in life that we can’t always control, but i promise it’s 100% okay! you will get through this and you will get back to where you need to be! you aren’t a failure just because you’re behind.

think of it this way: let’s say you have a really good book that you’ve been reading for fun (or maybe there’s a show you’ve been watching!) but you had to take some time away from reading, but with any good book or show you’re watching, you can always come back to it and pick up where you left off! it isn’t going anywhere!

faustina’s official guide to getting back on track:

୨ৎ — emotional & situational processing

take some time to process your emotions because i’m sure there’s quite a few things you’re feeling right now!

let your feelings flow

cry, scream into a pillow, angrily scribble all your emotions and thoughts onto paper; just do whatever it is you need to do to let your feelings out (in a healthy manner of course). give yourself some time to feel your emotions, but don’t let it draw on!

journal dump: write down everything you’re feeling and thinking, talk about how stressed out and anxious you are, vent about how disappointed you feel. just dump it all in writing!

reach out to a loved one: if you need a shoulder to cry on, don’t hesitate to talk to someone close to you! your friends, family, and other loved ones are there to support you!

reflect on your situation

i personally either wrote in my journal, talked to my therapist, or even just simply thought about my situation alone, but take some time to reflect on what’s going on.

how’s your health? could there maybe be some underlying mental/emotional/physical health issues causing you to fall behind?

what does your day-to-day schedule/routine look like? do you have enough time during your days to focus on school while still being able to balance your work/personal life?

what does your work load look like? do assignments & exams pile up too quickly for you? are you maybe unintentionally procrastinating? maybe there are things outside of school that have been piling up?

it’s good to answer these questions for yourself and figure out what exactly is causing you to fall behind. what’s going on at the core of it all? once you find your answer(s), it’s time to start reworking and tweaking some things.

୨ৎ — health check-up

sometimes our health can hinder us from staying on track, keeping up with school, and even keeping up with things going on outside of school! maybe we’ve been getting sick more recently and our bodies have been putting more energy into fighting off infections that they’ve become weaker and lack the energy to do other things. or maybe our mental health isn’t where we need it to be. maybe we’re experiencing a depressive episode or there have been things going on in your personal life that have been causing you immense amounts of anxiety that’s leading your focus away from your studies.

physical health

schedule a doctor’s appointment! you could probably get yourself a note to bring to your school/professors that could allow you a grace period for you to get caught up with your studies! it’s also good to have regular doctors visits to make sure your physical health is where it needs to be.

fuel for your body! are you eating well enough? are you staying hydrated? make sure your body has all the nutrients it needs to stay energized! sometimes we don’t realize we’re neglecting our nutritional needs, so be sure to have any and all necessary meals and that you’re getting enough hydration!

recharging every night! are you getting enough sleep? is the sleep you’re getting good? do you feel well-rested when you wake up? be mindful of your body’s energy! sleep is extremely important and lack of sleep can cause lack of motivation for just about anything, so be sure you’re getting a good night’s rest every night.

mental health

self care! i can’t stress enough how important self care is in your daily routine. please always take care of yourself. do something that makes you happy and make sure you’re giving your mind what it needs.

counseling! lots of schools, if not all schools have counselors on their campus. if therapy isn’t a financial option for you right now, please don’t hesitate to seek out your school’s counselor. they’re there to help you through whatever it is you may need! (& it’s quite literally they’re job!)

୨ৎ — rescheduling your schedule

think about your current daily routine. there might be some things within your routine that just might not be working out for you. you might have too many extracurriculars, maybe your work hours are overloaded and take too much of your time, or maybe you’re not setting aside enough time in your day to work on schoolwork.

lessen your load

while having extracurriculars is wonderful for your academic career, sometimes you can have too many of them. keeping up with club meetings, late night/early morning athletics trainings, events that take place during your class times; there’s a lot of things that extracurriculars do that may be taking a lot of your time away from you and your studies.

keep your extracurriculars to a minimum: 1-2 max! you have so much time to build up on extracurriculars for university admissions and job applications, i promise! but you have to consider your current schoolwork load and make sure you’re able to balance both extracurriculars and your studies!

if you are trying to balance your school & work life, be sure you remember what takes priority: your studies! if you feel like your work schedule is overpowering your time to study, it may be time to lessen your work hours.

talk with your bosses! set up a meeting with your mangers or send them an email letting them know you need to start working less. let them know that your studies take priority right now and you need the time to focus on school.

part-time over full-time! being a full-time student and a full-time employee can lead to burn out. while it is possible to balance both, it’s definitely 100x harder. it’s okay to work part-time! and just remember: your studies will lead you to a better job!

weekly planning

you might want to start creating a general plan for your week! it doesn’t have to be super detailed, but have at least an overview of what your week will look like!

create small task lists! have certain days contain a small, achievable list of tasks to complete! again, detail doesn’t matter, you don’t have to write down specific assignments but you can write which classes you want to work on for those days!

for each day, have an hourly schedule! maybe from 5am-6am to you want to be up & out of bed and by 12pm-2pm you want to get some schoolwork done! don’t feel the need to create something extravagant and go by each hour, keep it as general as possible.

the key is to keep your weekly (or even daily) planning simple! don’t try to jump right into having detailed schedules and plans, that can cause more stress than help.

designated study days

to go off of weekly planning, try setting aside specific days during your week that are entirely dedicated to getting schoolwork & studying done!

my personal schoolwork/study days…

saturday/sunday (i try to dedicate at least one of those days to rest, relaxation, & more personal things! so maybe one week saturday will be my work day and sunday will be my rest day)

monday - wendesday (mondays & wednesdays are the days i have class, but i’m off from work mon-wed so i have so much more time on mondays & wednesdays to get some work or studying done!)

of course, you can start off small! i actually encourage you to start off small! maybe two days out of the week will be your designated days or maybe you’ll only have one day out of the week! and that’s okay!

୨ৎ — baby steps lead to giant leaps

from my previous points, i really emphasized simplicity & starting off small. here’s why: slowly chipping away at something will still show great amounts of progress!

don’t feel like you have to take on huge amounts of work to get back into the swing of things. if anything, biting off more than you can chew will cause you to choke on even more stress!

step 1: talk with advisors/counselors/teachers

the first step to officially getting back on track in school is meeting with your advisors, teachers, and pretty much any faculty members that will help you! (and i promise they will help you! it’s their job to make sure you succeed as a student and they’ll always encourage you to reach out for help!)

step 2: meet with tutors

there is absolutely nothing wrong with having a tutor! they do more than just help with understanding class content! they also help you with time management, organization, and study techniques/methods! plus, 9 times out of 10, those tutors are fellow students, so they know and understand better than anyone else what it’s like dealing with the stress of school as a student!

step 3: riding the completion coaster

this is the part where you can start completing assignments/tasks that need to get done! again, don’t overload yourself! start small! this is where slowly chipping away at your assignments comes in!

prioritize! which classes take priority? which assignments have the closest due dates? what exams are coming up the soonest? whatever needs to get done first is your first priority!

pomodoro method! i’ve talked about this productivity-time technique a plethora of times here on my blog, but it’s a wonderful work method that not only encourages you to get work done within a set amount of time but it also allows you to get very much needed breaks in as well!

tina’s productivity tip: there’s this little method i’ve created for myself where i write down on a little sticky note or separate piece of paper “prizes” that i get for when i complete an assignment or task called “recognize the prize”! the prizes are super simple things that still make me really happy (incorporating psychology techniques here lol)! i keep that little sticky note/paper with my prizes close by so i can remind myself what i’m working towards!

examples of how i do it…

assignment: lab workbook ch. 4, pages x & y

prize: take a break to eat a kitkat bar (i love kitkats hehe)

task: study for 1 hour

prize: watch one youtube video (no longer than 20 minutes)

assignment: online homework

prize: play a video game for 20 minutes

final notes —

falling behind sucks, but it happens and i hope you know that it’s completely normal! just remember: being behind & needing to catch up does not, and never will, define you as a failure. we aren’t made to be perfect students; there’s no such thing as a “perfect” student. strive for progress, not perfection!

you have the ability to get caught up with your studies! please don’t best yourself up for not being where you want to be right now. show yourself some grace because you’re only human at the end of the day.

with lots of love, faustina 🌷

[inkedinfusions]

𝐞𝐛𝐨𝐧𝐲 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐠𝐨𝐥𝐝 | geto suguru chapter 3

⊱𖤓⊰ | In which you, a thief, meet the lost prince of the kingdom.

── ★ ˙ ̟ . ⚜️ .ᐟ.ᐟ masterlist

⊰–prev next–⊱

𝟎𝟑 | 𝐞𝐬𝐜𝐚𝐩𝐞

chapter word count: 3.5k

content warnings: normal warnings for the tangled movie lol

a/n: Only two chapters left after this one! Fun fact about this fic, I watched the Tangled movie easily like ten times in between rewinding the scenes and just me procrastinating writing but still wanting to feel productive.  

Thanks for reading!

“𝐎𝐎𝐔, 𝐃𝐎𝐍'𝐓 𝐋𝐈𝐊𝐄 𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐓,” you say when the light of the lantern illuminates a skeleton pinned to the side of the tunnel.

“That’d be you if they left you hanging there,” Suguru jokes, only smiling wider when you turn to glare at him.

“Not funny.”

“It is a little,” he presses, chuckling when you turn away to avoid showing the grin that worms its way to your face. “So, Starlight, where did you come from?”

“Classified information, sorry princess” you immediately say. “I’d ask the same, but I don’t think you have an answer other than your tower.”

“You’d be correct.”

“And I’m not supposed to mention the hair, or the mother, or the frog.” You nod along with Suguru, who confirms each thing you won’t find out, only ever saying something different about his lizard.

“It's a chameleon, actually,” he corrects. 

“Uh actually—shut up, nerd,” you tease. “But changing the topic—if seeing the lanterns is like, your life’s desire or something, why haven’t you gone before?”

“That's because… well…” he says, trailing off when stray rocks fall from the ceiling above you. 

“Starlight—?” Suguru begins, tensing when a familiar neigh breaks the silence, light suddenly flooding the tunnel. 

“Oh shit,” you say when the guards appear from the corner, making the tunnel jostle. “Run!”

You both sprint through the tunnels until you come to the exit. But it is too soon to cry for victory, as there is only a ledge and a broken bridge greeting you on the other side. There are two tunnels below, but one gets crossed off your list when Jogo and Mahito—the Curses—burst through it. How the hell did they find you? You question when they glare up at you.

“Who’s that?” Suguru asks.

“They don’t like me,” you say, cursing your rotten luck. 

“Who’s that?” he repeats when the guards appear, surrounding you.

“They don’t like me either,” you answer. 

Then, to top it all off, the horse with a personal vendetta against you gallops out of the tunnel. 

“Who’s—” Suguru starts. 

“Let’s just assume nobody here likes me,” you retort, searching for alternative routes.

“Here,” he says, handing you his pan. 

You almost drop it, caught off guard, and you can only watch as he throws his hair like a rope, accomplishing getting it to wrap around one of the abandoned wooden structures the miners once relied on. 

“Hey—!” you shout at Suguru when he jumps, although your worry is short-lived as he swings in the air and safely lands on another platform of dirt below. Well, that's another way to solve the dilemma of escaping. 

You have no such tricks up your sleeve, so your eyes dart around the cliffs, rivers and abandoned tunnels, trying to piece together a plan, anything. The captain and the guards approach, swords at hand, and you have no choice but to swing the kitchen saucepan you had been left with. 

You clumsily attack the guards back, somehow managing to strike the captain straight in the face, knocking him out cold. The other three follow, each taken down by the weirdest weapon you’ve ever wielded. A hit to the side of the head, to the back of it, up their chin. And just like that, all four men lay to your feet. 

Their swords and armor clang as they hit the ground, and you allow yourself a moment to breathe, looking at the saucepan with appreciation. 

“Next thing I’m buying is definitely one of these,” you say with a grin, throwing it up in the air and catching it as it falls. “Maybe he’ll let me keep it—Whoa!”

You barely dodge a blade that is aimed at your chest, and a quick glance tells you that the horse with the gold colored eyes is responsible for your almost impalation. 

“What the hell—” you huff as you parry, getting dangerously close to the edge, “—is your problem?”

In an unfortunate set of events, the horse manages to send your weapon flinging down, pointing his own at your neck while you put your arms up in defeat. First the lizard—chameleon, rings Suguru’s voice—, and now the horse. Animals had to have something against you, this was getting ridiculous. 

“Another chance?” you ask the horse with a nervous smile, when a strand of black hair wraps itself around your hand. 

“Hang on!” you hear Suguru yell. 

You look at him, then at the horse with a triumphant grin. You salute him as you are pulled away, soaring through the air like a free bird. Not quite free yet, of course, but close enough to it you can taste it on the tip of your tongue. 

So you’re swinging now, to freedom—and oh shit, also directly at the Curses. 

“Careful!” you hear Suguru yell, like it's not something that should be obvious. Still, you narrowly avoid getting stabbed by their blades, somehow moving your body out of the way.

“Aha!” you shout, delirious with adrenaline. “You should see your stupid—!”

A sharp thud interrupts you just as your brain registers pain. Groggily, you try to make sense of the situation, your hands and legs thrown to your front with the momentum. Your torso, however, was stopped by an exposed beam, stealing all the breath on your lungs. 

That's not the end of it, because why would it be? You climb the aqueduct you landed on, taking note of the situation once more. The universe is clearly against you today, more so than it has been all your life.

“Come on!” you yell at Suguru when the horse starts kicking a beam, managing to form a makeshift bridge between them and Suguru. You grab his hair with all your might when he jumps, only just succeeding by the skin of your teeth. Jogo and Mahito start to run after him and you follow, sliding down the wooden pipeline like butter on warm toast. 

You jump off it when the beams that hold it up start to fail, tucking and rolling when you fall. You help Suguru with his enormous amount of hair—you really should do something about it, this can't be convenient—and start running towards the mine the Curses didn’t come out from. Foolish mistake on your part, but you won’t know this until much later. 

The Curses aren’t the only thing you have to run away from, because a resounding boom alerts you of the dam’s failing. Wood and nails fly away as it breaks, and water swallows everything and everyone on its path, even taking down a massive pillar of rock, which is set to fall right on top of Suguru and you. 

Miraculously, you step into the tunnel just as the pillar touches the ground, even grabbing the stray saucepan at the last moment. Your relief is once again short lived when water starts to fill the tunnel, and that is when the second bad news comes in; it's not actually a tunnel—or rather it was, but has since been blocked away by rocks. 

You frantically start to push the rocks blocking the way, hitting some with the pan when your efforts become clearly futile. Suguru, bless his heart, dives underwater to see if there are any loose rocks there. He comes back up as agitated as you, only pausing from his struggles when you hiss. 

Scarlet blood oozes out of your hand when a particularly sharp rock interrupts your search. You curse—now is not the time to get needlessly injured, and a look at Suguru’s helpless eyes as water begins to reach your shoulders tells you everything you need to know. 

You follow his example by diving too, but the lack of light makes it difficult to even see your hands in front of you, so you come back up, gasping for air. Suguru attempts to do it again, but you pull him back up before he can drown. Maybe you're only delaying the inevitable, but you’ll be damned if you let him die first. 

“There’s no point to it,” you say, as desperate as him. “It’s pitch black down there, I doubt even Satoru would be able to see.”

He stops flailing around, looking around with resignation. You look down at the murky water and sigh. Death by drowning was lame as hell. You always thought you’d go out in a cooler way, not trapped in a tunnel with no escape, where your body would probably never be found.

“...Who’s Satoru?” Suguru asks, his soft voice breaking the silence. 

“Who’s…?” you ask, dazed, before his words register in your mind. “Oh. The guy back at the tavern. That’s his name. Six Eyes is just an alias.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.” 

He twitches. 

“I’m so, so, sorry about all of this,” Suguru apologizes, looking at you with his defeated, purple eyes. “Mother was right. I never should’ve done this.”

“It’s not like I’ve been nice all the way through. Maybe if I hadn’t hurried us into the tavern, none of this would've happened.”

It's clear that Suguru wants to argue against you, but falls silent at the look in your eyes. 

“Y/n,” you say after a beat.

“Y/n?”

“Y/n L/n. Starlight is, believe it or not, also just an alias.”

“Never would have guessed,” Suguru says, attempting to break the atmosphere with a joke. You respond with a weak smile, appreciating his effort. 

“I have magic hair that glows when I sing,” Suguru says immediately after. You do a double take, looking for any signs that he might be messing with you when his eyes widen in realization and he repeats, “I have magic hair that glows when I sing!”

Before you can ask him what he means, he begins to mumble something about a flower and shine, and to your utter surprise, his hair starts to light up. One thing is the way the sun hit his hair, turning threads of it golden. Now though, it is as if it’s completely made of gold, the light it emits being enough to illuminate the tunnel. 

You both inhale a deep breath when the water completely fills up the place, but thanks to Suguru’s magical, golden hair, you manage to find a loose rock. It's a chain reaction; with one rock out of the wall the rest follow, releasing you both into a nearby stream. You gasp for air as you grip the edge of the river, flabbergasted. 

“We are alive!” Suguru celebrates, jumping out of the stream at the first opportunity. 

“His hair glows when he sings,” is your reaction, dumbfounding and reality breaking. 

As you are having your well deserved breakdown, Suguru stands at a rock on the edge of the river, pulling out his hair from the flow of water. “Y/n!” he calls out, but you don’t answer, too busy with ranting at his lizard, who also got carried away by the same stream. 

“His hair glows when he sings,” you repeat to it, watching as he looks at you with a no duh expression. Are you losing your mind?

“Y/n-”

“Why does his hair glow?” you ask the small animal, frantic.

“Y/N!”

“What?” you snap back at Suguru.

“It doesn’t just glow,” he clarifies, a knowing smirk on his face. The chameleon sports an identical smile, a strange expression to see on a small creature. 

“Why is it looking at me like that?” you ask, agitated, totally nonchalant, not even bothered by it.

The sound of crackling wood fills the echo of the woods, accompanied by the song of crickets and the rustle of the leaves. Smoke rises up above, joining its whiter, fluffier cousins, the clouds, in the sky. You’re sitting next to Suguru on a log next to the fire, warming up after your daring escape. 

The stars light up the sky, aided by the bright moon, and with the help of the fire, the darkness of the woods is not so eerie. That is also not the slightest bit hindered by the fact that you’ve got company, and that said company apparently has magic hair, capable of lighting up even the darkest of situations. 

Suguru’s soft hands cradle your own calloused, injured one, wrapping a lock of ebony hair around it until it runs out. You want to question him, maybe look for the logistics of his god-like power, but you chose to stay silent, not wanting to disrupt the fragile peace you had achieved. 

But once a chatterbox, always a chatterbox, so you open your mouth anyway and begin spewing out whatever random crap you can think of. 

“This is totally not suspicious and I'm totally not freaking out right now,” you start. “Just another normal evening, with a normal person, with normal hair that glows. Mundane day.”

Suguru chuckles, losing focus for a moment and wrapping the hair too tightly against your wound, which you reward with a hiss. “Sorry,” he grumbles under his breath. “It’s been a strange day for me too.”

“You’re telling me you don’t usually get chased down by guards, found by old enemies and trapped inside a cave filled with water? Shocker.”

He smiles, looking down at your covered palm. “Just don’t… don’t freak out on me,” he says. 

You nod, already freaking out internally. But you make efforts not to show it, so you guess that must count for something. Suguru closes his eyes and starts reciting what you think he said at the cave earlier, the one with the flower and glow and shine, only this time it is a longer verse, and you watch fascinated as his hair lights up once again. 

It goes from ebony to golden in mere seconds, small strands of light flowing through it as though it is made of pure sun rays. He could tell you his hair was made by the sun itself and you would believe him, too blinded by its light to think otherwise. 

His verse ends moments after the strand in your palm lights up, sending a tingling sensation through it. You think maybe it's your imagination, but you can see it has fully healed by the time Suguru removes his hair from it. 

“Oh thats—” you clear your throat, “—that’s… nice, uh—”

“Don’t freak out?” he asks, sheepish. 

“I’m not!” you say with the biggest, fakest smile you can muster. “Why, are you? No, no, I’m so calm right now. Uh, by the way, since when have you done that? Or your hair—when has your hair done that…” you mumble, straightening up when you remember something from the morning. “Is that why you asked me what I wanted with your hair earlier? Does your mother know about this?”

“She’s the only other who knows, I think,” he answers, bringing a hand to his nape. “I mean, other than the ones that cut it when I was a baby.”

He pulls away a shorter strand at the base of his neck, showing it off to you. It stops past his shoulders, still long but no longer radiant the way his ebony hair is. Instead, it reminds you of ink as dark as a void or a moonless night, still beautiful but—

Beautiful?

“And that’s why I never left. Mother said it was too dangerous to even attempt, that the ruffians who cut it were still out there, somewhere,” Suguru continues, snapping you out of your second freak out. 

“Do you want to go back? After this, I mean.”

“I—Well—” Suguru sighs. “It's complicated.”

“...I get that.”

“Mhm. So,” he says, his eyes crinkling with the teasing smile that begins to appear, “Y/n L/n?”

You shrug. “It’s just my name. None of that ‘Starlight’ that is printed in my wanted posters.”

“How does a thief get stuck with such a… uh…,” Suguru trails off.

“Such a cheesy name?” you ask, one eyebrow raised. “Yeah, you can thank Satoru for that. But then again, I think ‘Six Eyes’ is the shorter end of the stick.”

“You named each other?”

“It wasn’t intentional, believe me,” you say. “We hit the same target once—some rich dude's house—and he started calling me ‘Starlight’ when I refused to give him my name as a way to annoy me. He then proceeded to trip over something and alert the guy, who then called the guards. I guess they heard us bickering or something, because next thing we know, there are wanted posters without likeness and those nicknames. But you know, such is the life of an orphan turned thief.”

“Oh,” Suguru says, something akin to sympathy in his eyes.

“Don’t—Don’t look at me like that,” you say, flustered. Satoru and you would usually gloss over the tragedy of both your stories with humor and jokes, and nobody else had actually cared since—well, never. 

He tilts his head to the side, confused. “Like what?”

“You—well—never mind,” you say, standing up abruptly, shattering whatever tension had been forming between you and him. “I’m going to find more firewood. Be back in a bit.”

“Sure,” he says, and you swear he sounds disappointed. But that only makes your ears heat up more, so you pick up your pace into the woods. 

About halfway through, when you almost collide with a tree, you realize the light of the full moon is not enough to see. So to avoid any more injuries—even if they can be healed by Mr Magic back there—you sit down on an exposed root to wait for your eyes to acclimatize themselves. 

With only the sounds of nature to accompany you, you reflect back on the day you’ve had so far. You stole the royal circlet, got chased in the woods, found a tower, got knocked out and ripped off by the tenant of said tower, got to know the dreams of ruffians and thugs, got chased again, almost died, and discovered Suguru’s magical powers.

All in all, it was a productive day. Of what exactly? Who knows. 

You twirl your hand around when you can see better in the dark of night, flexing and stretching your fingers, forming a fist and then letting go. It doesn’t hurt as much as it did when it was cut open—more accurately, it doesn't hurt at all. 

But old scars and calluses are still present in your skin, so you think that maybe this power only heals recent injuries, or that it focused solely on it for its urgency. Maybe then that power could be used for healing old injuries too, for erasing the marks that blemish your skin, unfitting of a lady. But you haven’t been a proper one in so long, so why start now?

As you trace your palm up and down, following the line of where a would should be, you think about the soft hands that held your own. The smoothness wasn’t a surprise—he never left the tower, for god’s sake—but the gentleness was. 

When was the last time someone held you delicately? 

You ponder on this question for the next few minutes while you scavenge for firewood, not quite finding an answer you like. The ladies at the orphanage never brought corporeal punishment down on any of the kids that resided there, but neither did they sing you lullabies at night. The guards aren't exactly nice when they arrest thieves, and the closest you had to family was Satoru, with whom playful punches and teasing words are plentiful.

But never had you felt that warmth, that feeling of safety, as when you sat on that log, contemplating the fire you had brought to life, and lent your hand to Suguru with no questions asked. 

You sigh, bringing a hand up to your face, so that maybe the coldness of it could help bring the heat of your cheeks down. This doesn’t make any sense—you need to get a grip, and quickly. You met this guy today and you would say goodbye tomorrow or shortly after it. You can’t afford to get attached, not to someone who deserves someone better, someone who is not a thief, someone with softer hands. 

You think of some stupid question on the way back, something to extinguish that tension that you had felt before, finally finding one when you catch a glimpse of the fire. 

“So—hey, princess!” you yell from the neck of the woods. “Is there a chance I am getting powers now? Since you used that magic on me or something—” you stop dead in your tracks, worry tightening your face when his back is to you, his shoulders tense. “Are you okay?”

“Huh?” Suguru turns, dazed, like he hadn’t noticed you arrived. “Yeah, just… lost in thought,” he is quick to say. 

You stay silent for a moment, giving him time to explain should he want to, but when he doesn’t, you just shrug and drop some of the firewood into the fire, saving some for later. You then plop down and get comfortable in mother nature’s mattress: grass. 

“Night, Suguru,” you say.

“Good night, Y/n,” he answers, distracted.

[evilyodastwistedworldofevilness]

So you guys ever heard of Will Wood? Yeah me neither.

It was a whole new sound and now it's in Lego form! I finally made another Lego Will Wood set after a year and 5 days! This probably took like a few weeks to make however i am a professional procrastinator so whoops!

More photos and a whole lot of text under the funny line!

Wow look at those guys go! I had a lot of fun designing this though unfortunately i don't really think this set could exist in the real world without some real major changes like most of these parts just straight up exist (no brick modified 1x2 with masonry profile in very light gray!?! what ever shall we do!?) however Studio 2.0 does a button that converts most of the non-existent pieces into real pieces

and it allows you to see how much the set would cost and let me tell you this thing would cost a pretty penny at $1095 dollars and 74 cents. Yowzers that's def a lot of money. My guess is that the minifigures are mostly responsible the huge price. (41 dollars for some olive green pants with black boots!?) Also the fact this set is made up with about 2987 pieces. That also might be partly why.

Anyway here's some more stuff

You can see the top two images as tiny photos in the Better than the Alternative room. Originally the third image would also be included but I thought that one brick with the screaming old man was really funny so Normal Will got left behind. Originally the therapy scene from the Love Me Normally music video would've been part of the main build but I couldn't really find a good spot to put it in so it was scrapped.

i dont remember why Memento Mori Will is sideways. I know it was an intentional choice.

I could only find one version of the night mic logo so I decided to recreate it but really quickly i decided to put my own spin on it instead of trying to make an accurate version. Since it's Lego and stuff I tried censoring it a bit but y'know uhhhh

yeah

I also had the idea to include the documentary crew from the Real Will Wood movie but I had the idea like realllyyyy late so I didn't really have a spot for them so I just opted to include Chris Dunne on the Love me normally section

actually typing this out i probably could've included them in like the hallway on the first floor but oh well

okay heres the characters okay im too lazy to write anymore ok buh byeeee

next post will have some wip photos n stufffffff ok weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

[pumpkinsy0]

Ermmm any curly and Angela interacting w Dallas hcs pls

u already KNOW🗣️🗣️🗣️

•curly hates dally bc he steals tims attention, duh already said it before, but angela doesnt rlly have a specific personal reason for hatin dally, normally she would write guys like him off but she thinks hes wayyyyyy too involved in her life for him to do that + shes sick of hearing about him from sylvia, they want him GAWN

•sometimes tim tells curly (and if its not too dangerous for her, angela) to do something for him for dally they will procrastinate the hell out of it purposely until tim basically yells at them to do it, even when doing it its begrudgingly

•idc whhaaattttt u think, under nooooo circumstance will dally hit on angela like EVER even if its to get back at tim for hitting on sylvia. but lets say it does happen, he would gave to be drunk off his mind and even then it doesnt last long. angelas never giving him the time of day and is whooping his ass, THEN curly and tim do it, and tim will always be livid over it

•pony jokes that curly just has a crush on dally he doesnt wanna admit, the whole “boys bully u cause they has a thing for u” idea, and curlys held himself back from shoving pony very roughly into a metal pole countless times, he just hopes dally never hears it cause dallys especially not gonna take him seriously then especially

•when tim was walking around looking for dally for messing up his tires, curly was actually w him trying to find him too!! just at a different part of the drive in so u didnt see him. he wanted to see dally get his shit rocked and tim did end up fighting him, curly was just the instigator 😭😭 he could not waittttt to tell angela

•dally got bit by curly during the shepards vs curtis rumble, that bite got a lil infected and for weeks dally wouldnt shut up about it to tim🙄🙄 angela and tim were proud of curly, a lil concerned, but proud overall❤️curly was just a menace that whole rumble tbh he put up a good fight

•angela helps to patch up tim after a fight and unnnfortunatellyyyyy dally is aware of this so when he gets beat up near the shepards house he goes to her to get patched up. after bribing her is ONLY when she helps him, does she go rough while doing it as her way of rebellion??? yep!!!! dally complains a lot but he knows to shut his mouth before she kicks him out, plus he wants to get in and out before the shepard parents come home

•they make dallys life a living hell, but i don’t think they would ever rat him out to a straight up ENEMY of his/police officers, against what ppl want u to believe they dont want him dead

•when dally was part of the shepard gang, he kept coming over to their house even though NOOOObody else from the gang rlly does and he loved messing w curly and angela, he was like that annoying order brother u GENUINELY didnt like, he forced himself into that role. im talking eating their food, busting into their room without knocking, leaving clothes around etc etc, just an aggravating freeloader

•dally would sleep on the floor and as revenge curly and angela would “accidentally” kick and step on him, dally would get annoyed enough to get the point and leave so he never stayed longer than 2 RARELY 3 days

[its-not-a-pen]

haha i found it! the ask that kicked everything off!

it's april 2023 and i was bored during the uni midterm*, and i thought to myself, "hey you know what would be a fun, quick, passing distraction**? i should draw a comic version of that funny tumblr post about the second century warlord." i decided to make the chinese title "the story of yu zhi", which was a fairly typical naming convention for traditional chinese stories, yu zhi being the warlord's name according to op's notes. ^here i was probing for what the characters for the name might be, since there are many different ways to write it. im proud to say the fish pun made it into the comic, as did my invention of the warlord's name--which my dumbass managed to write incorrectly, despite the fact i invented it***

*had a 50 pt essay due in 4 weeks that i was procrastinating **only one of those things proved to be true

*** i guess that in order to draw a convincing comic about a dumbass, one must also be a dumbass. such is my commitment to my craft.

Hi!!! I'm a HUGE fan of your second century warlord story. i must have read it five or six times by now, it never fails to lift my mood. I love how it manages to be a compelling character piece, an insightful philosophy on murphy's law, perseverance and serendipity--and hilarious history shitpost all at the same time. I have a question, would it be accurate to write yu zhi as 余知 ? I thought it would be a fitting translation, 余 [surplus] is also one of the Hundred Family Surnames and 知 means [knowledge]。 "surplus knowledge" and a deficit in luck describes our warlord huang mi perfectly! P.S. i love how it's great for fish-based puns too, 鱼 [fish] and 余 [surplus] being homophones >:))) P.P.S. please let huang mi's name actually be 黄米 [yellow rice] that would be SO funny.

i have decided to refrain from giving any canonical (lol) characters for huang mi's name, since my literacy is so limited and people like you keep on coming up with much cooler spellings than what i may have originally had in mind. i will say that what i did originally have in mind for huang mi was "yellow rice," because, like you said, that is very funny if not particularly cool

[aysrin]

despite everything, it's you! (+ extra hat closeups below)

[chalkrub]

so i remembered daily comic day this year and i am paying for it

[littlecrittereli]

I am not who I was

Alt Version:

It's been a while since I drew Chris prior to Decoded... Also this rendering is ass, I am not good at shaDING ASJDAKDS

[thedemonsurfer]

Okay, yes, but also no.

This is a very useful series of checkpoints, but it presents the idea that you need to have a complex structure set up before you can begin writing.

And I dunno about you, but that kinda thing just doesn't work for me. So imma try to revise things into something that might be more useful.

How Do I Plot A Book (like this fool right here)?

0. You Are The Master Of Your Own Destiny

Whenever I talk about making an outline, folks always seem to shrivel up like shrinky dinkys at the idea of being 'limited'. But, here's the thing:

You wrote the outline.

You can change the outline at any time.

Keep this in mind at all times. Is a scene you planned not working? Ditch it. Came up with a new idea? Add it into the outline. The outline isn't a static cage that you HAVE to stick to, it's a roadmap to help keep you from getting lost, written by YOU.

Start with an idea

Okay agreed, 100%, but also a little redundant if you're looking up how to plot a story. I assume you came here with an idea in hand already.

2. Outline your Plot Structure

Introduction STOP. Pull up your writing medium of choice: a word processing program, the notes app on your phone, a piece of paper. Got it? Good. I want you to write down 4 things for me.

What is this story about? Examples:

A disgraced war hero adopts an orphan who resembles the demon he failed to defeat.

A should-be-dead man escapes a magical prison, but frees more than just himself; also there's kissing.

A kid meets a friendly robot who helps him escape an elaborate trap; they become family.

Where does this story start? What is the Really Cool Thing in the middle? Where does this story end?

These key points (Beginning, Middle, End, and Core Concept) are the backbone of the story. More importantly, they are words on the paper.

Congratulations, you have started plotting your story for real!

3. Take Notes

Start writing down information you think is important. This includes world-building facts, character trivia, and plot points that you'd like to hit. Do not worry about being thorough! I know you've sat there and daydreamed up some stuff already, so start writing it down.

For plot points, try to arrange them in roughly chronological order as you think of it now-- but be open to changing things in the future. The more ideas you come up with, the easier it is to figure out where the next one slots in.

4. Tell A Friend, Sort Of

Start writing out your story as if you're telling it to a friend. You can use an actual friend for this, but you have to use a medium that keeps records (so type it, don't speak it aloud unless you're also recording yourself).

Don't worry about structure or fancy headings or terms like 'falling action'. Ideally the format should be something like "Okay so there's a guy, and he used to be the Count of this city-state, right? But then he caused a curse so he got locked in a magic prison for like 10 years. And then this other guy, actually the Count's Doctor-- he ends up finding him in a pub after he escaped that prison". And so on and so forth.

It's okay if you don't have everything yet! You just started, you'll have time to work things out later. The important part is that you summarize the events you want to see happen, in chronological order. If your story is episodic rather than having a continuous narrative, bullet points of things you want to see happen works just as well.

Congratulations, you've started your outline!

5. Add, Revise, Rinse, Repeat

Here's where things get personal-- as in, it depends on how you, personally, write best, and my advice might become extra useless. But basically: look at what you need and then give it to yourself.

Are you most comfortable writing chronologically? Then take a look at your outline and see if you have enough information to start writing the story from the beginning. If not, head to your notes section and do some more daydreaming until you know how you want to begin, then start writing.

Do you not have a clear idea of the beginning, but you do have some scenes strongly in mind? Go ahead and write them now! At worst you'll have to scrap the scene later, but you'll have something down, and you can use that something to build other things.

Do you have dialogue for some scenes, but not the action? Well go ahead and write the dialogue! Put in a brief summary of what the action around it should be ("it's night time and he's mad about getting stabbed") and then go. Same thing with description with no clear dialogue-- summarize what should be there, but leave it for later.

Always be adding to your notes, revising your outline, adding more scenes you think would be cool. Try out different ideas, see if events can't be moved around. The further you get the more solid things will become.

6. Some Experience Needed

A lot of the stuff in the original essay, like foreshadowing, subplots, etc; aren't things you can just sit down and come up with on the fly. Sure, you can think of one or two, maybe, but inspiration tends to hit in the moment, when you realize 'oh shit I can tie these things together here, and that becomes foreshadowing over there'.

Unfortunately, the only way to get better with those kinds of things is experience. Pay attention to some of your favorite stories and see how they did things, and really analyze why it worked on you. Write down notes: what did the character do here? what happened there? how was this bit foreshadowing?

7. Pacing

Pacing gets its own category because I legitimately don't know how you're supposed to learn this any way other than experience and intuition. If you write a lot, eventually you will get a feel for 'this scene is too fast' or 'there needs to be a longer gap between these events". As far as I know there are no shortcuts, just tens of thousands of words under your belt. Don't worry about it for now, just do your best, and you will improve.

8. General Advice

Start a graveyard document. Eventually you will write a scene that just does not work for whatever reason. Instead of trying to force it to fit so you don't lose all that work, move it to a separate document. If you've ever heard the term 'kill your darlings', this is what it's referring to: cutting a section that you really like because it's not working.

Don't kill your darlings, rehome them. You'll be surprised at how much easier it is to accept. You can can always pull a scene back in if you find a new place for it, or mine it for tidbits.

You will get stuck. Accept this. You will always be able to find your way back out. Maybe you'll have to delete a previous section because you wrote yourself into a dead end, maybe you'll have to leave it for another day, maybe you just need to talk it over with someone.

It does not have to be perfect the first time. Or the second, or third. I'm most familiar with writing fanfiction, which is published pretty raw-- but normal books aren't published chapter by chapter with the ink still drying. Normally you finish your draft, then go back months later and revise the whole thing. If what you're writing is a more traditional book, you can always fix things later. If you're writing a fic, you can still fix things later.

It's okay to give up. Maybe you've changed your mind and you don't like your story anymore. That's fine! Save it somewhere and then forget about it. Don't delete it, just keep it. Maybe one day you'll come back-- and if not, you still have the experience from your attempt!

However, try to stick with it. You know your brain best; if you know you're prone to fits of self depreciation and feeling like what you make is 'bad', try to ride those out before giving up. Maybe your story is fine, actually, and your brain just hates you extra hard right now.

Writing is fucking hard. Inspiration can only get you so far, there are going to be points when you're slogging through it a word at a time. This is normal, you aren't struggling because you're 'bad'.

There is no such thing as wasted effort. All effort is experience, all experience is growth.

Uuuh yeah that's what i got, happy writing

How do i Plot a Book?

1. Start with an Idea:

Begin with a clear idea or concept for your story. This could be a theme, a character, a setting, or a unique scenario.

2. Outline Your Plot Structure:

- Introduction: Set the stage by introducing your main character, the setting, and the initial situation.

- Inciting Incident: Present a problem or event that disrupts the status quo and sets the story in motion.

- Rising Action: Develop the plot by introducing conflicts, challenges, and obstacles that the protagonist faces.

- Climax: Reach the story's highest point of tension and conflict where the protagonist confronts the main challenge.

- Falling Action: Address the aftermath of the climax, tying up loose ends and resolving subplots.

- Conclusion: Provide a resolution to the main conflict, wrap up the story, and show the character's growth or change.

3. Create Well-Defined Characters:

- Develop your main character (protagonist) with clear goals, motivations, and flaws.

- Introduce supporting characters with distinct personalities and roles in the story.

4. World-Building:

If your story is set in a unique or fictional world, develop the setting, rules, and details necessary for readers to understand the environment.

5. Conflict and Stakes:

Ensure that your story has compelling conflicts that drive the plot forward. Make the stakes clear to the reader.

6. Subplots:

Develop subplots that add depth and complexity to your story and intersect with the main plot at various points.

7. Foreshadowing:

Use foreshadowing to hint at future events and create suspense.

8. Pacing:

Balance action, dialogue, and introspection to control the pace of your story. Speed up or slow down as needed for dramatic effect.

9. Themes and Messages:

Consider the themes or messages you want to convey through your story and how the plot can reflect them.

10. Outline Chapter by Chapter:

Create a chapter-by-chapter outline that details what will happen in each section of your book. This doesn't need to be overly detailed, but it can serve as a roadmap.

11. Writing and Revising:

Start writing your book based on your outline. Be open to changes and revisions as your story develops.

[kayawolfhorse]

When Gem first startles upright, she’s not sure what had awoken her. The tower is dark and the night hums, and her bed is tantalizingly warm. However tempting it is to slink back beneath the covers, her fingertips prickle and her curiosity grows. She can’t just leave the greater mystery at large.

Rubbing the sleep from her eyes, her brain seems to clear with her vision, and the sound outside sharpens: howling.

Stepping out onto the half-balustered walkway is like throwing her door open to the sea; she’s at once engulfed. The shadowed forest below her reverberates in every direction with the call of the wolves hidden within, and the strength of it, muffled no longer by her tower’s walls, sends a chill down Gem’s spine. Their song is all-encompassing, and each voice that sings it is as unique as it is indistinguishable from the rest. It’s beautiful; it’s haunting. She couldn’t parse out how many wolves there are if she tried.

The summer breeze is gentle against Gem’s arms as she stands and listens. It's unlike anything she’s heard before, incomparable to her dogs’ excited yips or warning growls. If she were to assign it human emotion, she’d call it somber in tune, and near-joyous around the edges. Something at the base of her throat pinches, and she resists the urge to howl back.

The call crescendos in its final chorus; in its wake, the voices begin to taper off. A few lone howls hold the melody after the rest are through, and though it’s impossible to tell from whence exactly they come, Gem swears they’re somewhere across the river that divides her and Impulse’s base from the alien biome across the way. Turning towards it, she freezes.

Her fingers fumble on the straps of her elytra. Her pajama pants billow between her frantic movements. She just barely remembers to slide into her boots—without socks, much to her chagrin—before leaping off of the tower’s lip.

Pearl comes further into focus the closer Gem gets, and her form is all-too familiar, all-too foreign; it’s Pearl. She’s wearing a scarlet cloak that Gem doesn’t recognize, and the parts of her face that aren’t obscured by shadow are made sharp beneath the pale light of the full moon. She’s standing in the middle of the bridge as if she’s waiting for the others to arrive for a meeting. Her grip on the railing beside her is tight.

Her lip twitches when Gem’s boots meet the cobbled deck, but her head remains bowed.

“Pearl?” Gem ventures. Finally, Pearl looks up. Her eyes are marred by darkness and framed in red.

“Hi,” Pearl says, and her voice is rough, like nails scraped along the bark of a tree. Gem had missed her so much.

“‘Hi’?” Gem demands. There’s a typhoon swirling in her chest. She forcefully shoves it down. “You’re gone for six weeks without a word of explanation—Impulse too, for the matter—and when you randomly show up in the middle of the night, all I get is a ‘hi’?”

Pearl smiles slightly, hesitantly, like she expects her lips to be cracked. “Figured it was a good place to start.” She tilts her head in a half-shrug. Her hood falls behind her ear and exposes a trail of crimson that makes steady tracks around her jaw.

Belatedly, Gem realizes that she’s reaching out, and decides to go through with it, touching a fingertip to the shell of Pearl’s ear. Pearl flinches. The storm at Gem’s core stills.

“Pearl.” The roof of Gem’s mouth turns dry. “Pearl, you’re bleeding.”

“Am I?” Almost distantly, Pearl drags the heel of her hand through the blood that trickles down her neck and pulls it back to inspect it.

“Should I call someone? Should—Pearl!” Gem leaps forward as Pearl brings her hand to her mouth and licks the blood smeared on her palm. “Why would you do that?”

“Had to… make sure it was mine,” Pearl mumbles. She’s swaying on her feet. Gem can’t decide if she should reach for her again.

“Why wouldn’t it be yours?” Gem asks, bewildered. “You’ve been up to some weird things this season, but blood isn’t one of them.”

“We bled the same,” Pearl says. “My heart wasn’t my own.”

“Who’s ‘we’, Pearl?” Gem’s properly concerned now. Pearl can’t be dazed from blood loss after so little spilled—is she wounded elsewhere? What else would explain this… off-ness?

“Nobody important,” Pearl says. Her breathing is ragged. She looks as though she’s about to fall over. “He abandoned me. Everyone did.”

Gem catches Pearl as she stumbles. Pearl leans into her, hard. Gem clutches beneath her arms and around her back.

“I was alone, Gem,” Pearl whispers. “It was just me and Tilly. Now she’s gone, too.”

“You’re not alone here,” Gem says. Softness is not something that comes naturally to her. She tries anyway. “I’m here. The others are, too, I’m sure of it.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Pearl says. “They cast me out.” A pause. Her teeth flash in the darkness. “I killed them.”

Gem doesn’t doubt that. She doesn’t doubt that, wherever Pearl and the others went, death held a heavier note than it does on Hermitcraft. Pearl is different than she was two months ago. Gem can work with this.

“I’ve killed, too,” Gem tells her. “We can talk about it tomorrow, if you’d like.”

“Tomorrow.” Pearl slowly nods. “You won’t leave?”

“I won’t leave,” Gem promises. “I’ve got tea and bandages in my castle. No offense, but you look terrible.”

“I’m sure I do,” Pearl says. Humor graces her tone like color returning to pallored cheeks. Gem squeezes her. Pearl rests her head against Gem’s hair.

The blood that lines Pearl’s face is dried and flaking. Drowsiness tugs at the back of Gem’s mind. There’s water to be boiled and leaves to be seeped.

Together they stand in the quiet night and hold each other’s warmth.

[inumbrapugnabimus-maybe]

here have this very messy doodle of wild

[wisteriagoesvroom]

a couple of people have asked for a carlos POV of in theory and actually. thinking about it. it's pretty funny. imagine being carlos, carlos who gets everything in his life he's ever wanted carlos, carlos who feels he has nothing further to prove to anyone carlos (this is a lie btw), carlos who gets saddled with OSCAR, who barely tolerates him, as an executive assistant.

oscar who shows few emotions. doesn't give a f about seniority. thinks carlos is incredibly arrogant (he's not wrong here but, like recognises like.) oscar who knows carlos can't even do his own expenses without having an emotional support espresso or spending half an hour whining to oscar even though he did it himself years before oscar even joined, etc etc.

and carlos has to. endure it. while oscar blatantly ignores his charm offensive and his attempts at being jovial and his bad bilingual puns and carlos, because everyone usually loves carlos, and he-- he just. he cannot for the life of him figure out why he's also so compelled by this australian dude. doesn't know what to do with himself. just keeps interactions to a transactional minimum and puts up a front like he is soooo curt and uncaring about everything but. the warmth seeps through anyway, a vine that's destined to grow despite his attempts not to let it.

so what, if carlos lies awake in bed with racing thoughts too late at night thinking of revenues and EBITDA and platinum tiers and air miles. so what, if this sometimes bleeds into thoughts regarding his work-life balance or lack thereof, and therefore, oscar's stupid little hair swoop, his frown. his insane excel sheet formulas that even carlos, MBA graduate, takes a second to understand. oscar and his indifference and his scary efficiency and the way he talks a bit too fast when he's tipsy and his ice cold hands.

(at the christmas party with yuki. carlos pretends not to listen but hears every word. why would oscar tell yuki all that, and not him, when he’s tried to ask about oscar's interests before? anyway.)

and then. the christmas gifts happen and carlos thinks he's crossed a line. was the terrarium too far, he wonders. normally people love it when carlos is thoughtful like that. his exes even said so. but no! oscar takes the terrarium, the one carlos made a specific detour for on an airline that he couldn't even get miles on!

and oscar just. stares, and stares at the terrarium. then he gives carlos this...look. and it gets embarrassingly intimate and carlos "really does have to go take his call" even though the client did say it is fine to switch to email because, christmas. yeah. and then he's thinking about it the whole way back to madrid too.

then oscar QUITS on CHRISTMAS DAY (rude) for no explainable reason and carlos is like oh my god is it really ME. how can anybody not like ME ? reddit, AITA???

so carlos mulls on it. carlos wants to atone. just maybe. set things straight. let oscar know that. actually. all feelings aside, he was really an excellent EA and carlos wishes him the best with everything. he maybe sends a text to thank him with those very words. but christmas eve comes and goes, and so does christmas day, and there's no reply at all from oscar. what the hell, carlos thinks. no i can't have him leave and there's so much in my email that i – i didn't even say. he just. needs to let oscar know that he appreciated it.

(he doesn't know what "it" is per se. just that. he feels strongly. so he needs to do something about that.)

soooooo then carlos, who values for family more than anything in the world, spends christmas day just only half paying attention to things going on and thinking jesus, what did i do. and his sisters are like, hermano, please just. get it together and sort this out if you care so much. we'll be fine with mamá and papá and piñón okay there's roast ham for days. and his ma is like: "if you are visiting someone at least pack some dessert. where are your manners". and carlos is like "what". and his mum is like: "did i not teach you anything at all. are you or are you not a sainz". so carlos just takes his tiramisu and his sister's teasing and. he goes. might even try to pull a favour from a client to use a private jet and get there in time.

he flies back to the city in a fit of possible stupidity to try and clarify... his feelings for oscar his professional record and integrity.

and then. oscar is. actually HAPPY he is there.

(carlos knows he's happy, not because oscar's face changes. but because oscar puts his actual plant shears down in order to talk to him. which in oscar-world is a very big deal really. before, oscar always used to look like he wanted to stab carlos with a pen when carlos spoke to him. and if carlos were truly honest with himself, and hindsight being 50/50, well– he'd say that actually, the times oscar looked like he wanted to stab him were actually some of the moments he felt most alive.)

and the rest is... well.

you know how it ends.