#sappy? spicy? hurt/comfort? yes.

[placesyoucallhome]

you know what would fix me? drawing shippy shit yeah totally

[frickinsleepdeprived]

Obanai x reader headcanons bc why not

Just some Obanai headcanons bc I'm bored and need to post something lol hope yall enjoy

...

- when you first bet Obanai, he was obviously pretty distant and cold

- but when you both had to sit next to each other at a hashira meeting, his snake got curious and kinda slithered your way

- it freaked you out a little bit but Obanai made sure you knew that he wasn't going to hurt you

- "relax, it's not like he's going to hurt you, if anything he probably likes you... not too sure why he would though."

- Then after that you guys got paired on missions, got to know one another and get super close, then eventually he finally confessed he has feelings for you

- this guy will only show his affection for you in the comfort of either one of your homes. He is not by any means into PDA

- the only time he displays any form of PDA is when you're both out in public and there's creeps around eyeing you up and down. He'd place an arm around your waist and give whoever is staring a pretty cold glare

- because of the fact that he doesn't eat much, you make sure he eats... or get Mitsuri to ensure he eats because sometimes he's stubborn and doesn't want to listen

- he's really into dark humor, it took a while for you to get used to it though, because yes while it might be funny it's also kinda fucked up due to the subject matter of his jokes. But you enjoy his sense of humor nevertheless

- he's big on movie nights, if you guys are bored and can't find anything to do you're always watching a movie of some kind

- his favorite genre of movies is romcoms, not because they're sappy or anything, but he likes to belittle and berate the main characters with you. However if it's actually interesting to him, he'll stay shut and pay attention

- his kisses are actually rather soft, unlike what a lot of people would think. But how would they know? You're the only one that gets to feel his lips on yours anyways and that's what matters more

- he l o v e s being the little spoon, yes I said it. He loves being held, cuddled, snuggled, he loves it all

- you can't convince me otherwise that you and this guy would pull the craziest pranks on the other hashiras together, but nothing so as to threaten the life of other people

- when you're watching him train or training with him, you like how he doesn't hold back for anyone, not even you. It just shows you just how dedicated he is to getting stronger for the sake of his job. He also likes working you almost half to death just so he can tend to you later lol

- when you've had a rough day, he let's you hold his snake, it's almost like a form of grounding for you. Plus he wouldn't let anyone else but you touch his snake, even if it meant his life

- overall, while Obanai can be a bit cruel and ruthless, he'll always show his soft side for you no matter what. You're important to him and he'd gladly lay his pride on the backburner for you

....

Ayyyeeeeee something wholesome after the spicy headcanons from last night lol. Hope you guys enjoyed these soft Obanai headcanons, lmk what you wanna see next!

[chocochipbiscuit]

Let's start at the top for the writing asks:

1, 5 and 7?

1) do you know how you want the story to end when you start, or are you just stumbling through the figurative wilderness hoping to find a road?

For short fics, like smut or one-off ideas, I don’t mind just writing and seeing where it ends up; I usually have an idea of how I want it to end, but am more willing to surprise myself. (Though arguably, because they’re short, I already usually have an idea of how I want it to end, but don’t feel the need to meticulously plot and bullet-point it out!)

Otherwise: I need to know how a story ends before I feel comfortable writing it. I want to have a clear image of the final scene and the emotional beats, because it’s easier to craft my entire narrative towards it. And because I love happy endings, I have to think about how the characters will resolve their conflicts to earn that happy ending.

(Spicy hot take: I’m not someone who’s drawn to tragedy, in part because I feel like tragedy makes an ending too easy. I already know all the ways that the characters can fail or that the world can hurt them, and I would rather see them triumph. I already know the ‘bad endings’ and consequences, but dammit that’s not what I want to write!)

5) have you ever made a playlist about something you were writing as an elaborate means to procrastinate when you could have been actually writing and if yes drop a link, son

Absolutely not because I know myself too well and even writing ask games like this are dangerous for me because I am so keenly aware that any minute I spend writing an ask meme feels like ‘oh yes, I’ve written today! Validation!!!!’ while not actually putting any words into my WIPs!!!!

….though I will say that I, like many sappy sapphics before me, have been listening to a lot of Howl by Florence and the Machine to psyche myself up for werewolf AU!!!!

7) tell us about the plot of the first fanfic you ever wrote

I don’t have the notebook anymore, but my earliest memory of what would be considered fanfic was some ‘Misty and Jessie totally become friends!’ idea. I loved Pokemon and I don’t think I was actively considering them as a romantic ship, but I remember very clearly being upset that the two main girls in the anime never got to be friends! So I wrote something about a landslide and Misty and Jessie getting stuck together in an underwater cave and having to cooperate to find the way out.

(Questions are from this ask game!)

[keigosbirdie]

FEMALE READER VERSION

Of all Hawks’ secrets, you are the most well-kept.

Version: Female Reader version | Male Reader Version Links: Gifset (art only) | Mood Music

NIGHTHAWK Rating: Explicit   |   Word Count: 13k  | Art: 14 animations, 2 stills (Technically no spoilers, but if you aren’t caught up on the events of the manga you’ll be missing important context. The fic takes place after Hawks’ meeting with the commission.) Synopsis: Casual was the word you used when you first agreed to sleep together. As weeks turned into months turned into a year, those quick and dirty nights blossomed into private moments that earned him little pieces of you. Warnings: Dom!Hawks, Nurse!Reader, animalistic behavior, rough sex, quirk/feather play, light bondage, biting, praise kink, hurt/comfort, secret relationship, talk of past lovers, mentions of death, panic attacks, PTSD, mention of a past, non-canon event. Spicy, then bitter, then sweet.

There was nothing exceptional about your life from an outsider’s perspective. You lived in an apartment on the outskirts of Jaku City, unmarried and childless. During the day you attended medical school where you studied for your doctorate. During the evening you worked as a nurse in the intensive care unit. Then, when you were home, you sat alone for dinner at a kitchen table meant for two.

Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

For the past year, however, an occasional tap at your sixteenth-story window would break up the lonely monotony. The tap was quite a scandalous secret, not that anyone would believe you if you let it slip. Even you still had a hard time accepting the bizarre reality of the situation; but it was real. Just as real his voice, which you could hear echoing faintly through your apartment.

You glanced up from your lukewarm dinner and dropped your fork. For a long moment, you sat in silence, listening intently until you heard it again. It was him; it was his voice. Your heart pounded against your ribs as you shoved out of your chair and jogged to the window. The part between your curtains opened, but when you peeked through you saw only the glow of city lights below a blanket of darkness.

A frown found your face, and a sigh spilled past your lips. You heard his voice; you would never mistake it for another. It echoed casually against your dim walls again, and you turned your head towards the sweet sound. The television was on in the living room. Your heart dropped at the realization. The little square thing sat on your end table and taunted you with his image. 

There he was. Hawks, the winged hero, being interviewed by a woman in a pantsuit. It wasn’t often he did interviews, so you left your dinner to go cold in favor of watching the program.

He was dressed in his hero costume, his visor lifted to rest atop his blond, wind-whipped hair, and his scarlet wings folded politely against his back. A wide grin graced his face as he exchanged charming banter with the woman. She seemed enamored with his expression, but she didn't know him like you knew him. He was smiling, yes, but the edges of his eyes were crinkled with tension. When he chuckled, his wings folded a little harder against his back. His beats of laughter were calculated. Uncomfortable, that's what he was.

He’d been that way a lot lately.

"So, I'm sorry, I have to ask- Every bachelorette in the country is wondering, is there any special lady in your life?" the interviewer asked. It was airy and friendly in intent, but your lip twitched with faint annoyance anyway. Your face fell slack and you leaned back into your chair. 

"Well, I don't know about every bachelorette," he quipped. His face was a little grainy on your old TV screen, but you could see the slight pink in his cheeks. He was cute. So, very cute. It made you miss him that much more. "But my personal life, well, how alluring would I be if I didn't keep a few things a mystery?"

And a mystery it was, to everyone but you.

Thankfully, the woman interviewing him had enough tact to know when to move on. Their conversation mercifully veered away from his sex life—your sex life—and towards his agency. The television was a wondrous thing. His voice rang through your home despite his absence. It brought sadness, but also a bittersweet comfort. Viewing him live stung your soul. You watched until his interview ended with a commercial break, and then decided not to wait up for him again. That would only lead to another sleepless night. 

Still, the window remained unlocked for him as you called it a night. The yellow glow of your desk lamp died with a click, and you climbed into your bed. Sleep was always difficult. Many nights you laid awake as you thought about your ICU patients. The things you saw in the ward were enough to scar anyone. But if it wasn’t work that plagued your mind, it was him.

Casual was the word you’d used when you’d first agreed to sleep together. It was easy to swallow when he only snuck into your apartment at night for sex. For the first few months, that was it. He’d steal into your home through the cover of darkness and you’d share a violently passionate night. Then, he would vanish out your window until he craved you again. Which, thankfully, was often.

As weeks turned into months turned into a year, however, those quick and dirty nights blossomed into private moments that earned him little pieces of you. You realized you were in too deep when it became difficult to be unbothered by the casual daydreaming of others. His face was clipped to girls’ backpacks long before you knew him, but others, covered so openly in his merchandise, began to make you a touch bitter. His sex life had been speculated about in tabloids since his debut, but to keep your mouth shut while your friends contemplated the size of his penis became hurtful and emotionally taxing.

The only one you could confide those pains in was the man who unintentionally caused them, but Hawks was too sweet. If he knew just how much it tore you up, he’d surely break things off to spare you the misery.

You cursed yourself for getting lost in thoughts of him. Bemoaning the casual chatter of others as he gracefully balanced the weight of the world on his shoulders made you feel weak. You allowed your eyes to close, your breathing slowed, and your body relaxed into your mattress. By the mercy of whatever god watched over you, sleep slowly overtook all your other thoughts.

At least until a shuffle and a squeak made you toss in your sheets. A faint light spilled into your room from the window, and a coolness settled into your bed. You shivered. It was the fresh winter air from outside. The cold wasn't the only intruder. It was him. 

The light was dim, but a dark silhouette of flared wings blocked out the moonbeams. Your heart lurched in your chest at the dominant display. It was a habit of the bird in him to fluff up when his blood was hot. His predatory energy kept you submissively silent rather than greet him.

Floorboards creaked beneath his shoes. The pulls of their zippers clicked with the movement. His breath was heavy as he moved to your bed. You caught a vision of your lover’s face. Little flecks of snow followed in. They danced around the brilliance of his wings and settled into his hair. In the blue light of winter’s night, his gold eyes looked dazzling. They also harbored a glint of violence akin to the blown-out eyes of a predator in pursuit of prey.

It was a familiar look from the strange animal. He’d seemed so open and friendly when he’d first snuck into your hospital room to talk, but he shrugged away at hugs and only laughed awkwardly when you told him he was your best friend. He didn't understand that kind of closeness.

You’d learned how deep his discomfort ran through him when the relationship became sexual. His inept understanding of touch translated to violence in the bedroom. Sex was most comfortable for him when he thought of it as a battle. He'd hold you down and force you open. You'd dig teeth into his arms and rip out feathers with your fists. To submit to his pounding was capture, but to overstimulate him until he was too weak to hold you down was victory. Extreme? Perhaps to those who didn’t understand your trust in one another.

He'd at least offer a sappy hello before he pulled his dick out, though. Not tonight. He eyed you as if expecting you to run, as if he'd give chase if you decided to. Fuck, it caused the warmest tingle between your thighs. You’d missed him too badly to try to put up a fight.

He left his jacket abandoned on the floor, which offered a much better view of his slim body wrapped in his black bodysuit. His canines dug into the leather of his glove before he yanked his hand free with his teeth. You laid silent and already breathless. It'd been far too long since you last felt him. Your body was hot with need at the sight of his rigid wings alone. His eyes swept over you as he toyed with the front of his tan jeans. He didn't come very often in uniform. To watch him fondle himself through his costume was- god, was there a stronger word than ecstasy?

“I want you,” he said from your bedside.

"You can have me..." You breathed out. It was intended to sound sultry, but your tone was more akin to a pleading whisper. Your body ached for him before your heart did, after all. Old habits were hard to break.

"You've been waiting for me, like a good girl, haven’t you?" he cooed. Cooed, quite literally. A low and rumbling song reverberated from somewhere deep in his throat. Not a bit of you was avian, but your body reacted instinctively when you heard your mate's call.

"I should reward you."

His visor glinted in the dim light as he pulled it off his face and let it land on the floor. His earmuffs, too.

You bit down your grin as the weight of your mattress shifted under his knee. His ungloved hand neglected the bulge in his jeans to tend to you instead. Warm fingertips slipped beneath your covers and found the skin of your thigh. A small sigh spilled from his lips, and your body trembled.

"You missed my hands on you, didn't you?"

You only managed a nod as his fingers slid up and beneath your pajama top.

Your body sank deeper into your covers when he moved over you. One knee landed on either side of your hips. His bare hand played with your breast while the still gloved one ran through your hair. The leather of the glove was frigid from the cold, but his body radiated warmth. The sweetness of his cologne mingled with the harsh musk of sweat. The smell of him fogged your mind.

The pads of his fingers pinched and tugged at the pink bud he discovered on your chest, which earned him a harsh gasp.

"That's it. I love it when you sing like that," he chimed. His hot breath ghosted over the shell of your ear. Wefts of his hair brushed against your face as his teeth nibbled at your throat. You were trapped beneath the cage his body made. 

"These cute little tits of yours- god."

He wasn't usually so chatty when he was about to mount you, but every grumble that reverberated in his throat added to the tingle between your thighs. He could devour you whole and you would thank him for the honor.

Your hands slid up the sides of his tight bodysuit. The inky black fabric was harsh beneath your fingertips. You traced the patterns of its gold accents around to his back and up towards his wings. He stiffened when he felt you slide nearer to them. Between the plush feathers at the base of a wing, you wiggled a finger until you found the skin beneath. Then you gave the joint a brutal squeeze.

Instinctively, that glorious wing of his outstretched and shivered. The stems of his plumes flexed against your hand as they puffed twice their usual size. The longest of them brushed against the ceiling of your room, dwarfing your bodies beneath it.

You were always in awe of the sheer size and beauty of them.

"F-fuck. Not fair," he growled, and then his teeth sunk hard into your neck in vengeance. The harsh bite only made you desperate for more, so you fisted his feathers in your hand and gave a sharp yank. He gasped a hot breath into the nape of your neck. Fuck. You couldn't take the teasing anymore. 

Your hands relieved him of their cruelty to pull off your shirt. He faltered when your bare breasts were exposed. His golden irises became thin rings as the darkness of his pupils devoured them. The tip of his glistening tongue wetted his lips.

It was your turn to stare with sharp desire as you heard the click of his belt, then the pull of a zipper. You pushed yourself up to get a good view of him working his dick out of his bodysuit. The throbbing muscle hit him in the stomach. The sensation made him hiss between his teeth, and you whimpered in reply. 

"Hhm, you must be really hungry, the way you're staring at it," he mused before he spat into his palm and ran the wetness along the shaft. He quivered at the sensation. You quivered, too.

"Please." Your cheeks were flushed, and your chest quaked with desire. "I want to feel it, please." 

"Oh, don't worry. You’re gonna have all of this. Gotta get that pretty little pussy ready for my cock, though, don't we?" he hummed.

He reached into his plumage and pulled out a long, red feather. The thing wriggled between his pinched fingers as he presented it to you. The way it moved was unnatural, but you timidly took it in your grasp. The look on your face must have been telling of your confusion because he chuckled at your expression. He gave no direction. Instead, he watched with a mischievous curiosity as you turned it in your palm. The barbs vibrated independently of one another against your skin.

Your breath heaved when you realized why he had given it to you. His hands slid down your stomach as a pair of red feathers brushed against your sides. They dipped into the hem of your shorts, then pulled the fabric, sliding them down your legs until you were deprived of them. The cold from the open window seeped into your most sensitive places as his hands caressed your hips.

His fingertips stopped over a series of divots and deformities in your flesh. They were painful mementos of the night you met, and reminders of the sacrifice you had made for him a couple of years prior. He was a stranger when you chose to forgo your own survival to shield him from death. His bottom lip disappeared between his teeth as he relived the agony with you, but placed kisses all over the scars. It felt like a plea for forgiveness, so you ran a loving hand through his hair.

A soft sound spilled from him, and then his head dipped down to drink in the sight of your bare body. You were naked beneath your shorts, so he hummed through gritted teeth when he teased your legs apart. He'd seen it all many, many times before, but the sight of your glistening pink sex brought about his cooing again. The sound was a deep and beautiful melody unlike anything you'd ever heard, but also purely sexual. It was his body's call to yours. It beckoned you like a siren.

“No panties, huh?” he murmured. His breath hitched and vibrated with his lustful song. “You’re already so wet, my god… how about you put that feather of mine to use?”

He sat back on his haunches. Those narrow eyes bore holes into your exposed body as he spat another thick glob of saliva onto his palm. His hand found his cock. His eyelids fluttered at the contact and he groaned softly as he pumped around it. His eyes drank your every movement. 

You spread your legs for his gaze and then brought the pulsing feather between your thighs. He could feel through them, in a sense. The thought alone caused you to exhale a soft moan, but it was anything but soft when the vibration teased your sex. He groaned, too, at the contact. 

Your body flexed and wiggled when you pressed it hard against your clit. The sensation made your eyes roll back. Your slickness dampened its vanes despite its semi-hard state, and your hips ground into the pleasure. He observed. His hand pumped faster with each desperate whimper his feather worked out of you. 

It wasn't long before he couldn't take simply watching anymore. 

The roughness of his stubble dragged along your breast as he closed his teeth around one of your pink buds. He suckled, and your fingers tangled in his hair as his feather jolted from your grasp. It worked your clit without your help, and hot air blew from his nose as he jerked himself off. You used the distraction to sneak a hand between your bodies. You wanted the hot skin of his cock against you. You wanted to touch and play; to taste and feel. A thick whimper spilled out of him when you ensnared his throbbing dick in your palm and squeezed.

His feather stopped pleasing you.

"I didn’t give you permission to touch, did I?" His wings flexed. The feathered limbs grew massive as their quills stood on end in a frightening display. They were beautiful and plush, but deadly weapons all the same. “Testing me, huh? You're that desperate for my cock?”

Yes, fuck yes you were. You opened your mouth to reply, but your voice cut out when he grabbed you by the wrist. He jerked your hand away from his sex, and you whined. Usually, you were a bit of a hardass. It wasn’t easy to make you crumble, so he looked so devilishly proud of himself when you’d submit beneath the weight of him.

His teeth bared in a deliciously appealing smirk. "I’m gonna have to do something with these hands of yours if you’re gonna grab at shit without permission, yeah?"

You nodded a little too eagerly. His voice was heavy and deep with a depraved need to dominate you. To sully your skin with his desire. You weren’t going to stop him.

A cluster of feathers gathered in the air around you. You had nothing to fear, but watching them circle like small predators overhead made your heart pound against your ribs like a drum. They swarmed you and ensnared your wrists. The strength of his quirk easily had you overpowered. Your hands slammed into the headboard, pinned down by his feathers which trembled with excitement. You were now at his mercy.

“You’ll get your hands back when you’ve earned them,” he informed you through gritted teeth, but you were so mesmerized by the features of his face you hardly heard his words. Beautiful, that's what he was. You'd never told him how his appearance left you breathless. It could scare him away if you said such sweet things too often, but you’d held your heart back for so long it only felt fair to let it beat this once. 

“You’re so gorgeous,” you whispered.

He trembled. His eyes widened in startled confusion, and then his cheeks dusted the faintest shade of red. God, that only made your heart thump harder. His did, too; you could feel it rattle through his chest and against your stomach.

"What was that?"

You bit your lip, embarrassed, but echoed the statement a bit more sheepishly. "I said… you're gorgeous."

Your mattress groaned as he folded back onto his knees. The flaming red limbs on his back lowered until they rested against your sheets. Something about that sweet little compliment tore into him like nothing you had ever said before. That desire that flickered behind his eyes blazed out of control. His kisses landed on your knees before he placed a gentle caress of his lips on the innermost part of your thigh. So close to your pussy that the heat of his breath made you slick.

His other glove was abandoned somewhere on the floor, which rendered both his hands bare. A low groan spilled from him as he pressed his thumbs into either side of your heat. His jaw went slack and his breath erratic as he spread you open.

"So are you," he said, but it was muttered so softly you almost didn't hear.

His head dipped down. The tendrils that framed his forehead fell over your midriff as his tongue caressed your twitching flesh. The hot, wet muscle lapped hungrily between your folds. It flicked at your clit, and your legs trembled on either side of his head. His mouth working you open like that was enough to fog your mind entirely.

“You like that?” he cooed between the slurps of his mouth against you. "Oh, I bet you fucking do."

You replied with only a strangled whimper as you tugged uselessly at the feathers that bound you. You were desperate to comb your fingers through his downy hair, to fist it in your hands and press his face hard into you. A low chuckle flowed from his open mouth and tickled your flinching flesh. Another cry tore from your throat.

“My poor baby, so desperate,” he sighed after placing a kiss against your clit.

His poor baby. He hummed that phrase with such possessive intensity. He was right. Even if it was unspoken, you and your body belonged to him and him alone.

The warmth of his palms traveled back up your stomach and squeezed your breasts roughly. “Forcing you to wait so long for me, did I neglect my sweet little Chickpea? Hmm, I better make up for it, huh?"

God, the way his husky voice reverberated against your flesh was the most delicious form of torture. You bit your lip and nodded, and he rewarded you with a finger. It slid carefully into you, and his hand caressed your insides. You cried a loud, indecipherable string of mangled words. All grasp on language left you as he curled his fingers up and flicked his wrist.

“Aw, what are you trying to say, Sweetheart?” he huffed. All the little nicknames only pushed you further into your need for him. “You wanna feel my fat cock push into that pretty little pussy?”

A sharp inhale burned your throat.

“P-please!” you choked. Your voice was cracked and pitiful when it finally tore from you, and a wonderfully wonton sound fell from him.

“Please what, huh? Please what?” he gasped.

“Fuck me! I want it- I want your cock- PLEASE.”

“Ohhhhh, that sounds so pretty comin’ outta your mouth,” came his long, low growl. As a reward for your begging, he dragged the wetness of his tongue along the length of your little pink slit.

The rough material of his jeans slid down your inner thighs as he mounted you. The shaft of his hot, bare cock pressed flush against your sex. Clusters of his feathers bunched behind the bends in your knees and forced them back, which splayed you helplessly open. You watched as he bit into his lip and rubbed himself against your wetness. You couldn't look away as the most intimate part of his body sheathed itself in yours. 

The most delicious pressure overwhelmed your aching senses. Fuck. FUCK.  He moved slowly. It may have been meant as mercy, but to your sex-starved body, it felt torturous. The ridges of his dick caught at your swollen walls before the tip of it pressed agonizingly slow into the bottom of you. 

“Hawks! Oh my god, I can’t fucking take this!” your throat jerked and trembled just like your aching thighs. Your hips pumped in desperation for friction where your bodies connected. “Give it to me, give it- I swear to god- FUCK!”

Once you gave him control of your body, he lost control of his own. The mattress groaned when he slammed into you. His teeth dug into your throat, laying his claim on you as he panted for breath. His loose belt buckle beat at your outer thighs, and your bed frame groaned in protest with each merciless thrust. His hands dug into your flesh and locked you into his jarring pumps. He pinned you down as if he expected you to play the fighting game, but you didn't resist his cock this time. You didn't want a battle. You wanted your lover. Your moaning whimpers broke and cracked as his jerking hips rocked the wind from you.

He pounded into you too fast for your mind to keep up. Your scarred body buckled and stung under his animalistic need, but the shockwaves of pleasure that rolled through your core kept you begging him for more. More. More. 

His mind was so fogged that he lost his focus on his feathers. The clusters binding you down came loose without his influence, and you easily pulled out of them to throw your arms around his neck. His wings spread out and bristled until they were pressed against the walls, puffed and massive. His forehead was against yours. His hot breath puffed in your face, and his beautiful body was pleasured with yours. 

"Fuck, fuck! Please- Let me come inside you," he pleaded. His eyes were hazy and fogged, his mouth was slack and face a deep red. His body’s cooing song was so loud you could feel it in your own chest. The familiar smell of his cologne intermingled with the musk of sex and blurred your mind. You wanted every piece of him he'd give you.

"Y-yes, please, please," you begged between the hard smacks of his skin against yours. 

Your eyes shot open as his pace quickened. His wings… they were falling apart. Those beautiful eyes of his lulled further into the back of his head with each bone shivering slap of flesh. His teeth bared and his lips twitched as he pressed your bodies roughly together. Shivers rolled through his muscles, and those fierce wings of his were reduced to twitching little nubs on his back as he came.

You ran your hands between his shoulder blades as you marveled at his feathers. They littered the air as they weaved feverishly around one another. The gentle touch of your hands brought Hawks down from his high, and his feathers slowed until they lazily spun like autumn leaves. You pulled him down into a tight embrace and buried your face into his hair. He heaved into your chest, and you watched all the little pieces of him flutter around your room in the light of the moon.

He often lost control of his wings when you made love. They'd fluff up and flap wildly when he came, which often knocked shelves from your walls and your lamp from your bedside table. That was the first time he shed his feathers, and you were in awe.

"Are you okay?" he asked. His voice was gravely and shuttered between labored breaths.

“Yeah, I’m just... admiring," you said as you stared over his shoulder. He glanced behind him, and his cheeks tinted the faintest shade of pink when he realized the pitiful state of his wings. The little red feathers spread all around your room stilled in the air and swarmed to his back, returning his iconic limbs to their full glory.

“Er, you managed to pluck me. How embarrassing,” he quipped. You were so sore and exhausted from his sex all you could manage was a little laugh. You were a gasping mess, though, when he finally pulled out of you. The loss of pressure was a relief, but it also left you feeling empty. You laid quiet and trembling as he leaned back to marvel over the mess he made of you. His thumbs spread you open again, and he let out a breathless moan as you felt his come leak from you. His head dipped between your thighs. That beautiful tongue of his flicked out and lapped at the mess on your pussy. The warm wriggling of the muscle shocked your swollen clit and made you cry out, but you couldn't bear to ask him to stop. It satisfied something in you to watch as he licked you clean of your slick and his own come.

When he was content that he'd cleaned you thoroughly, he laid his body carefully beside you in your bed. His fingers tangled in your hair as he locked you into a kiss. You could taste the sex he licked from you on his tongue. 

The sex was always feverish and ravishing, but the afterglow was your addiction. In the beginning, it was rare. To kiss and caress crossed the line into his discomfort, but the more he learned to trust you the more of his affection you earned. The man who feared human touch began to ask for hugs every visit. Kisses became frequent and pleasant the more he let you do it. Then came sex that felt less like vicious wars and more like making love. Yes, after everything you did to earn his intimacy, nothing felt as lovely as lying naked beneath his plush plumage. 

His feathers caressed every inch of your aching body. His warm mouth, still wet from the sex, pressed gentle kisses onto your face. Your head rested against his arm as your breath slowly steadied. His wing flexed and rested on your shoulder as if tucking you in beneath a plush comforter.

“Mm. You like that?” he pondered breathlessly. His fingers trailed up your scarred side until they combed through your hair. There was a ginger softness to the touch that made your heart quiver. He smiled at you, those yellow eyes pierced through the dim light and into your soul. as you reached your hand out to run your fingers under his jaw. 

“Do you need to ask?” you hummed. Your cheeks were still red and your chest quaked as you slowly came down from the high. 

He laughed. What a lovely, airy sound. You hummed in the glory of the moment. And, for the first time in what felt like a lifetime, you could breathe again. Typically, he’d spend his days off kicked back on your living room couch with a tall bottle of something hard in his hand. You’d go a week or so without seeing him when things got tense in the hero world, of course, but in the last two months, you’d had him for only a handful of nights. It was concerning, but you knew better than to ask. No matter how close the two of you had become he would never talk to you about work.

“It's been a while since you last flew in,” you noted as you got comfortable beneath his plumage. His body beside yours was the definition of comfort. Your mind could only be at peace when he was safe in your bed. “It’s nice to see you again, I was worried.”

“I know, it’s been too long. No need to worry, though, Chickpea, I’m right here,” he replied. His slow exhale tangled in your hair, and his hand's gentle touch found your cheek. He offered no explanation for his lengthy absences, but he and his crimson wing caressed you with apologies. 

You relaxed to the sound of his steady breath through the dim blue light of your bedroom. The wing he draped over you was so plush and warm you could easily fall asleep. You might have, if not for the fear of waking up without him. You scooted closer to wind your arms around his chest and bury your face in his neck. 

"I really wish you could stay," you whispered. 

To let your love get in his way was the last thing you wanted, but it was the utterance of a moment of weakness. It was uncharacteristic of you, the pathetic way it sounded, and you felt him stiffen under your arm as he soaked in your request. While there was never a confession of love, you'd tamed the wild bird with years of patience and earnest affection. He was loyal to you. It was cruel of you to ask for something you knew he couldn't give.

“Ah… I would if I could help it, you know that,” he sighed into your forehead, “but I can try to stay until morning.”

“Please. I’d like that.” It came out like the voice of a frightened child, but it was difficult to hide your need for him anymore. 

If you dwelled any further on the possibility of him vanishing, your emotions were going to get the better of you. You played with the feathers draped over your shoulder to calm yourself. A small one by your face was pinched between your fingers as you rolled the barbs around.

"Your wings are filthy," you mused. Dirt particles littered the poor things. You were sure, with some rooting, you'd find a few bugs he’d picked up in the air, too. "Actually, all of you is filthy. You got dirt all in my sheets, bird brain."

"Oh. Shit, my bad," he murmured as he sat upright. You shivered when the warmth of his wing left you.

"Hm, it's fine. Throw your clothes in the wash and I'll get a shower ready for you, sound good?"

“Sounds good.”

The bed creaked in relief when he stood. His frame was slender and small, but his wings at least doubled the weight of him. That was evident with how smothering being beneath him could feel. He kicked off his pants, though his body was still covered by the black and gold bodysuit he wore beneath them. It warmed your heart to see him carry his uniform out of your room and hear him tinker with the washer on the other side of the wall. The sound of the cloth being tossed inside followed by the creak of an opening cabinet seeped through the drywall, followed by the pop of the detergent lid coming off.

He was intimately familiar with your tiny abode. You’d made sure things stayed in the same place so he'd know where everything was the next time he'd visit. You'd been especially anal about it since he'd often be gone for such long periods at a time. When he returned, you wanted your home to feel like it belonged to him, too.

A sensation overcame you as you laid alone in your bed. The sheets were warm from the love you’d just made. Despite his tongue cleaning you off, you could still feel the faint warmth of him inside of you. His contented sigh found you through the wall and your heart burst.

To the rest of the world, he was a hero, but he was so much more to you. You'd give anything to have him completely. For his voice to echo, groggy and sheepish, against your walls every morning. To get to kiss him goodbye before the sun rose, and to welcome him home every afternoon with a warm embrace. For a ring on your finger; a crib in the bedroom. That wasn’t the kind of life that was meant for him, though. As long as he was afraid of you being hurt, those secret nights were all you’d ever have. It made sense. He had enemies, and you could only imagine how your quiet life would turn upside down if you ended up in the pages of a tabloid.

You only spent time together in the privacy of your apartment. Even after two years of being close to him, there was so little you knew about his life separate from you. What little you did know only made you frustrated on his behalf. You held out hope that it could eventually change, for your sake and his.

Preening Hawks was your favorite thing to do with him. There was something special about being across from one another in the shower, naked, warm water rushing over your bodies as your fingers smoothed and placed his dampened feathers. It took the first year of your friendship for him to allow you to touch them at all, so it was an obvious display of his trust in you. Which was understandable. His wings were an integral part of his identity. You watched as he ran his hands over his face and into his hair. His expression was in a relaxed state of bliss as your fingers picked through his plumage.

With his massive wings on either side of you like plush, padded walls, it felt like nothing in the world could get you. His laughter echoed around the small room as he told jokes and stories. It was okay if you didn't have anything to say, or if you just wanted to listen. He would talk for you when you fell short, and that's usually what got you laughing. 

Through the gentle moment, though, you couldn't help but let your emotions get the better of you. During times like those, when his visits were few and far between, your mind danced around the question of why. The possibilities bounced between him either being in danger or losing interest in you. Both were scary thoughts since he had become such an integral part of your life.

"Would you mind if I ask something?" you pondered, which accidentally interrupted a story he'd been telling about an intern of his.

"Depends what it is.”

"Well… there are a million girls out there who'd gladly do this with you," you mused, and it was true, even if it stung a little to remember. "Did you decide to do this with me because it was convenient?" 

That had been your reason, initially. Hawks spent a lot of time hanging around your apartment and he just happened to be wildly attractive. There were no feelings when he’d first asked if he could fuck you. That didn't come until later.

He laughed, and you glared at him.

“Self-doubt, huh? That isn’t like you. Me being away a lot’s really shaken you up, huh?” 

"It's not self-doubt, I'm just genuinely curious," you quipped as you pulled a feather from his wing. They'd moult if they hung around too long, so pulling out the loose ones was a help to him.

"Well… what we have going on is far from convenient," he said. "If that's what I was going for, I'd go after a pro that could keep a secret. It ain't easy to sneak away like this, you know."

So even a pro hero would have to be a secret for him? Did Hawks have any chance at all for a normal life?

“I wanted you, and if I want something, I go for it.”

You swallowed down a breath you’d been holding, but you didn’t say anything else as you watched his eyes dance around the bathroom in thought. 

"And I wanted you because… well, there were a lot of reasons. The night we met was a big one, I guess.”

You looked away. That night felt taboo to mention, considering all the guilt you knew he harbored. Your scars weren’t his fault. Several villains were on a rampage, and your hospital was in the destructive path. You were just another civilian, caught in the crossfire. His feathers tried, but they couldn’t get you out of the building. You’d been partially crushed beneath the rubble. 

“I was sure it was the end of the road for me. It would have been if you and your quirk hadn’t been trapped inside with me. You have a forcefield. You could have used it to protect yourself, but you bubbled me instead. You were gonna die. I was so sure you were gonna die and there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it.”

Still, your lips wouldn’t move. You’d spent ten months in an ICU after you were crushed beneath the weight of two stories of concrete. If not for the healing quirks of EMTs, you wouldn’t have survived at all. If not for your sacrifice, Hawks wouldn’t have, either. Still, it wasn’t his fault.

 “Still hurts to know I couldn’t help you when you needed me most, but when I looked in your eyes, there wasn't a hint of fear. All I saw was determination. I never met someone who was so sure of their choices, even in the face of death," he recalled. Your emotions skirted between sadness and flattery as you heard his thoughts. If only you could live up to that selfless picture of you, now. “I know a lot of pros who could only hope to have that kind of resolve.”

“Damn, when you tell it you make me sound like a badass,” you quipped, and your laughter bounced around the shower stall.

“I mean, what are the requirements to be donned with the title of badass? I’m sure you’re overqualified. Either that or you’re fucking crazy, which is also a possibility.”

You snorted.

“I'm not crazy. My job is to help people after they've been hurt. If I bubbled you instead, I’d be saving every person you’d live to protect. Before they would need a nurse like me. It’s just what made sense.”

He was silent for a moment as he absorbed your reasoning. You tended to be rational, even in the most emotional of situations. But that borderline-robotic way of thinking was a by-product of your own miseries.

You were a nurse in a world overcome by demigods and treachery. Some of the things you'd seen in the OR would haunt you for the rest of your life. And, sometimes, those ghosts came to torment you in your dreams. That made it hard the first time Hawks slept in your bed. You would sometimes wake with tears in your eyes as your voice quivered out sobs. Your past lovers didn't understand that part of you. The broken part. The part that had been poisoned by the darker side of this superpowered world. 

That's what fostered your love for Hawks. When he had awoken early that morning to you crying beside him, he’d only reacted with a patient embrace. He adored the bright parts of you, but he also had a solemn understanding and respect for your darkness. Having that connection through your mutual suffering was a kind of bond you’d never had before him. And now that you had it, you couldn't imagine life without. 

You went back to preening. You pressed up on your knees to reach a bit higher on his wing, and he watched intently. His voice died into silence as his gaze swept over your naked form, which dripped from the steam of the shower. It wasn't a surprise. Often, he would get lost in himself as he observed you, like a curious bird. It felt like a wordless compliment, so you silently allowed his eyes to explore you. Not that his hands and mouth and cock hadn't already drawn a map of you in his mind.

"Whatcha thinking about?" you teased playfully, and he hummed in response.

"How you look at my wings… I like it."

"Everybody looks at your wings," you said dismissively. A half-smile graced your face.

"You’re right. They do. People admire me because of what they’re capable of. It's what people think of first when they think of me, and rightfully so. They're hard to ignore. But when you look at me, you look at my face first, my wings second. It's like you admire them because they're a part of me, not because of what they can do. I appreciate that." 

Your fingers in said feathers slowed to a stop as he spoke. You smiled a little to yourself as you brushed them against a feather. He shivered. "Your quirk is a part of who you are. That's why I like cleaning them for you. It feels like I get to give you something special, but wings or not, I'd still want you."

Falling in love with Hawks was the best and worst thing you’d ever experienced. The pleasure of those beautiful moments seeped into your soul like a warm cup of tea. But the anguish that followed after he flew out your window… there wasn't a simile that could correctly describe the immeasurable pain. 

Your response must have triggered a long series of difficult thoughts for the bird. His head tilted slightly, his eyes hardened in expression and his brows furrowed as he soaked in your confession.

"In the year we've been doing this… has there ever been another man?" he pondered. The question jarred you. Occasionally, he'd get a touch possessive of his time with you. He’d asked a time or two who you were texting. You knew him well enough to pick up the hint of jealousy despite his light tone, but he never asked anything so outright.

“Well, look who's got self-doubt now. You sure are eager for a lot of questions and confessions tonight. What’s gotten into you?” you asked.

He shrugged. “You asked a question, so it's my turn now. Besides, we’ve been close for a couple of years. We've been intimate for half of that. just seems a little silly to keep up the fuck buddies act. Or is it just me?”

Fuck buddies act? You bit your lip. Hard. When he was with you he was so relaxed. This seriousness was unusual, and it made your wet skin rough with goosebumps.

"It's not just you," you confessed. 

For a short while, the bathroom was filled with only the sound of the running shower as you collected your confession. 

"There hasn't been another man since you. I mean… I've gone on dates a few times, but it never got that far," you replied. The moment another man kissed you… Well, kisses felt dirty if they were with anyone other than Hawks. "I know this thing you and I have going on was meant to be a no strings attached kind of affair, but… Well, if I’m being honest with you, it feels wrong trying to sleep with anyone but you. I like what we have, and I've always got the impression that you really do, too."

He didn't say anything. You weren't sure whether or not that was what he wanted to hear.

"Have you?" you asked. "Been with anyone else?"

You’d never asked before. At first, it was because it didn't feel like your business. Then, when the thought eventually made your heart ache, you didn't ask because you didn't want to know. But now that you had come clean, it only felt fair that he did, too.

Air left his nose and his head bobbed back until his wet hair pressed against the shower stall.

"Once,” he confessed, and he sounded ashamed now that he knew you never did. “I used to have this on again, off again thing, before I knew you. I messed with her a few weeks after you and I first… well, you know. But only once, then never again.”

You’d thought it would crush you to learn he’d been with someone else, but it didn’t sting like you thought it would. Probably because you didn't know specifics. If you knew what woman had her hands on him, if you could see it, it probably would destroy you. But the apologetic way he said it put your heart at ease. He mumbled like he knew it would hurt you, and he didn’t want it to. But you weren’t wounded, and your feelings weren’t perturbed. He never promised you anything, just as you’d never made promises to him.

“Why’d you stop seeing her?” you asked as you scooted closer to smooth shampoo suds down in his hair. He only shrugged at first, then sighed in contemplation when your fingers combed along his scalp.

“I’ve never had a place I could go to, you know?” he said. “I’ve never had somewhere like this, where I can lay my head for a little while and just be…”

“Pampered?” you suggested as your hands moved to massage his shoulder blades between his wings.

He breathed out a little laugh, but shook his head. “Yeah, but that’s not what I was thinkin’.”

“Out with it then,” you teased.

“Well… I’ve never had somewhere I’ve felt safe and... cared about?” he said, though his eyes were distant and lost when he said it, as if he wasn’t sure he should have.

“I gotta always be looking over my shoulder. Gotta always have a mask on and hope no one ever sees through it. But here, everything’s relaxed. You couldn’t care less what my ranking on some chart is or how much money is in my pocket. You don't give a shit about heroing or the tabloids. You’re the only person in my life who asks for nothing other than my company. I feel human here. I didn’t want to jeopardize that, or what I had with you. That’s why I stopped seeing her.”

Your mouth went dry. While your nights were long and passionate, you’d never whispered sweet nothings. You’d never told him how much he and his company meant to you because you felt he wouldn’t want to hear it, but he kept coming back. For a year he had clung wordlessly to what little affection you gave him. If he’d told you this a year prior, you would have given him so much more love.

“So you do have deeper feelings for me. Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

He was silent, as you’d expected him to be. He both craved and feared the closeness he’d formed with you. At times he’d drown you in sweet little bits of affection, but, when things got too deep, he would shut down. Through the last couple of years, you’d broken through a lot of his walls, but the cold influence of the commission would always be with him. Even if he was in love with you, he’d never understand how to tell you.

"Because of who I am when I fly out your window,” he began. The reverb of his voice against the shower stall took you off guard. You didn’t expect him to answer. "There are things I know you want from me… things that I can’t give you right now, and you deserve more than that. That’s why I never planned on telling you… Fuck. It was never supposed to be like this…”

He spoke more to himself than he did to you at that moment. There was an internal battle going on in his mind; one you'd never really be able to understand, but you wanted to try. 

"You mean you never meant to get attached?"

His silence was telling.

"It's okay," you said. "We don't have to talk about anything you don't want to." You took a hold of his hand, but he flinched away from you. He was regressing back into old habits. It had been months since he’d last recoiled to your affection. Something was terribly wrong. The recoil was fine. It was okay. Whatever he needed to feel comfortable. "I'm sorry-" 

"No, I'm sorry," he interrupted. He rubbed the wrist you had touched as if you'd burned him. His brow was knit and his mouth became a harsh line. "Sometimes it feels easy and other times it doesn't, but I'm trying."

"I know you are. Like I said, we don't have to talk about feelings." 

He stared at you, and the longer his gaze rested on your face, the softer it became, "I want to try." 

You nodded and wrapped your arms around your naked knees. The shower had been turned off long ago by a cluster of his feathers, but the soothing steam still lingered around you. 

“It's just… this is difficult. One day someone may shoot me out of the sky. The thought of you still being right here, waiting for me, when I can never come back… It... kills me." He paused, his eyes hazed over as he swallowed his emotion down. The rawness in his voice struck such an unpleasant chord that your own eyes pricked with bitter water. "That's why I didn’t want attachments like this. But I didn't mean for all this between you and me. You snuck into me slowly, I didn't even notice until it was too late."

"Is this supposed to be flattering? It sounds like you're likening me to a parasite or something- heartworm," you quipped in an effort to dispel the heavy tension. He smiled, but only for a moment before he rolled his eyes at you. 

"Just… listen to me," he said, and your eyes trained on his as your mouth closed. "If that ever happens… If there comes a day you've been waiting for me, only to find out I'm never coming back, please know that I cared for you."

He didn't use the word love, but that's very much what he was trying to convey. In a way, you’d kind of always knew. It was why he’d said it, how he’d said it, that made your eyes prick with tears at their corners. The thought of what he was implying petrified you. Hawks was so skilled, so powerful, so almighty. Despite all his power, though, he was human, just like you. The night you’d met proved how possible death was for him. Nothing could keep him safe forever, not even your forcefields.

But he’d never talked like this before. He was always so light-hearted and relaxed. His work and the dangers associated with it was off the menu of conversion topics. What had happened to bring all this darkness up now?

"You talk like you’re preparing for death." 

Again, he didn’t reply. His silence was more terrifying than anything he could have said, but trying to pry him open would only break him, it seemed. So you didn’t.

“May I kiss you?” you asked instead. 

He nodded.

You leaned forward and breathed into his ear. He shivered when you placed a gentle kiss on the shell of it. His earring pressed against your lip was a gentle and familiar feeling, but after you heard all he had to say it also felt fleeting. He always had some ulterior motive or hidden reason for every little thing he did. It's as if he said all this because tomorrow would be the day he was gone.

“I’m not preparing to die.” Your kiss gave him the courage to speak. "I have too much to live for. It’s just always a possibility- for anybody, really. But heroes especially. I just wanted it off my chest is all."

He smiled at you, but you’d seen every smile in his repertoire, and this one was faker than your stick-on-backsplash. The air never felt so tense between you. Not even the night you met, dying feet away from each other. It all felt so… heavy. The weight of it pressed hard into your chest.

“Er, this reminds me, while we're on topic, I got some things going on at the agency. I hate to say it, but you won't see me again for a little while. I don’t know how long. It could be a couple of months.” His disposition remained fake casual. His shoulders and face were relaxed as he enjoyed the steam of the shower, but his wings tensed. You felt it in your palms as you preened him.

"You're in trouble," you said. Your mouth went dry as the realization drained the color from your face. 

"Trouble? Me? Nah. Just work stuff."

He spoke with a relaxed air about him, but he couldn’t lie to you. 

"No. You've been acting off all night. You’ve been making all these confessions. Talking about death, telling me you're going away for a while. I know you better than you think I do; something big happened and you're trying to tie up loose ends in case you don't get out of it okay," you rambled, and the more you talked the higher your voice became. It trembled and wavered with building fear. 

He stared at you. That silly face of his melted into a thin line and sharp, angular eyes. Those tricks worked when no one was close enough to see through them, but you knew his genuine smile like the back of your hand. You saw right through his facade, and he was annoyed by the very determination he just prided you for. 

"Can't get anything past you, can I?" 

You didn't whimper, but your eyes became glossy with emotion. It was a strange mixture of panic, sorrow, and rage. You had no idea what he'd gotten into, but you also knew he would never tell. He placed preserving missions above all else, which made sense but was frustrating.

"I don't know what's going on, but you need to get out of it if you're thinking it's something you may not come back from." 

"Things aren't that simple. I chose this life, I gotta follow through."

"No, I chose to be a nurse when I was sixteen and understood the implications of what I'd have to go through. You were fucking six when the commission took you, and they spent all that time gaslighting and taking advantage of you-"

"We aren’t talking about that right now, don't use it against me.” 

"Use it- what? I'm not using anything against you! You’re the one alluding to death! There’s nothing wrong at the agency, there’s something else- something terrible-" 

"Drop it.”

“How can I?!”

"Because I said so." His eyes were narrow and mouth a tight, thin line. You could read him so well. He was regretting this. All of this, because now you were onto whatever suicide mission he was embarking on. But, as his lover, how could you just sit back and silently watch him throw himself into a danger that had even him shaken?

You got louder, and he got louder. You tossed bitter, confused words back and forth until he was screaming. Until you were screaming back at him. Your calm, laid back demeanor slipped through your fingers the moment you realized he could be in over his head. That, if you let him leave, this could be the last night you’d ever spend with him. Your anger was driven by your fear for his life, and his was driven by your inability to let it go. 

He was still screaming. You were still screaming. You were fighting him. He just told you you were the most important person in his life, and you were spitting venom. 

You stopped.

He stopped.

Your hand came to your bare chest as it heaved in an attempt to steady your breath. The other came up to wipe the tears budding in your eyes. He looked away from you, his brow tugged heavily downward, his jaw clenched together in shame.

"Let’s just breathe, okay?" you pleaded.

"I'm sorry."

"Don't apologize," you whimpered into your hand. "Out of everyone in the world, you're the last who needs to say sorry, so don't. It's just- it's not right, okay? You're too… I don't know, selfless? I watch all the time as that gets taken advantage of. Doesn’t it get tiring? Even your name is some dirty secret. I've been sleeping with you for a year and I don't even know what it is-"

"Yes, you do," he argued, his lip wavered with weakness for one vulnerable moment. "You know me- you know my name."

Desperation laced between his words and strung the sentence together. It wasn't easy to see your lover look at you that way, just begging for you to let pieces of him go. It was hard to accept it, but whatever name he went by prior to heroism didn't exist anymore. Neither did the once innocent child it belonged to. You tried to respect that, but it was unfair he was denied a basic human right: to have a name. 

"You're Hawks, I know, I'm sorry… it's just… how much is left of yourself that actually belongs to you? How long until there’s nothing left to give? People have taken so much from you that you’ve become numb to it; do you even know what you're missing out on? Do you even know how lonely you are? When’s the last time anybody even asked if you were okay?"

He realized, then, that you weren't angry at him.

You were angry for him.

His eyes shifted to yours, and he nibbled at his bottom lip before he muttered with the quirk of his mouth: “Well, you ask me that pretty much every time you see me.”

There it was. The crack in your voice. The crinkle of your nose and the tremble of your lip. You cried, and he sat there across from you, still bare as his wings lowered to either side of you. His expression didn't change, and, for once, you couldn't read it. You didn't want to be so upset, but knowing he was in some kind of dangerous trouble that shook even him was too much for you to bear.

"I’m sorry I jumped to conclusions. It’s just… Do you have any idea how many heroes I've wheeled into the morgue? People die on my table all of the time. Every time is just as hard as the last, but the heroes- those are the ones that destroy me. Because every time someone in a cape lands on the table I know their families are waiting for them at home, just like I wait here for you.

"I saved you once, but you're so far away from me, too far for my forcefields to reach you. Hearing you say you’re going away- all I can think of is coming into work one day and finding you c-... covered in a sheet."

His wings moved up from the shower floor. The feathers were dark with dampness as their joints pressed into your back. You sat there like that as he let you cry. Really, what else could he have done? What else could you have done? Of course you were angry. You would be for the rest of your life over how his panned out. His childhood was taken from him, his understanding of human affection was still stunted, even after all the time you spent gently undoing what damage had been done. Now he talked like one wrong move would end it all.

"It's… difficult," he began, though he couldn't make eye contact with you. He usually couldn't when you had discussions like this. "Being a hero isn’t what I imagined I would be when I was a kid. And sometimes I do ask myself: 'what is this all for? There's always going to be a new bad guy. Why does it matter?' And then I think about you…" 

He went silent for a moment; you could see the little battle behind his eyes. The battle between his affection deprived confusion and his need to be closer to you. To explain himself. 

"I think about you and it reminds me there are good people who are worth fighting for. As long as you are here and there are bad people out there that could hurt you, I have to be out there, too. And, yeah, sometimes I get afraid. But as long as I have these wings, I'm going to use them to keep this world safe for you."

He’d never felt so close to you, and yet so far away. He thought even more of you than you anticipated. A part of you felt touched you'd become a cornerstone for his sanity in such a hostile world, but the other part felt sick. If he wanted to fight for you, that was fine.

But to die for you; that would be unforgivable.

The urge to argue the worth of his life weighed heavy on your heart. If you did, he would call you hypocritical, considering your own history of self-sacrifice. It wasn’t the same, though. His self-worth depended on his usefulness to others and little else, and you feared the day that usefulness ran out. What would Hawks be, if not a hero? It should have such a simple answer, like what you would be if not a nurse. But it didn't. It never would.

You leaned forward to pull him into a tight hug. Perhaps when he was anywhere else you were unable to protect him, but right there, in your arms, you'd use whatever you could to keep him safe. Your bubbles, your kind words, anything. 

"I understand," you said, because you knew there were no words that could keep him away from the hero path. It wasn't just a part of his identity; it was all he'd ever known. "Just… don't forget when the heroing is said and done, you'll always have a place here if you need it."

He hummed a small, contented coo at your kindness. Of course, you didn't have to tell him that. He already knew. Why else would he spend so much of his precious little free time cuddled up to you? 

"I'll remember," he promised as his arms and damp wings curled in to squeeze you against him. 

You and Hawks bathed in the comforting darkness of your bedroom. Your window was frosted from the bitter cold outside, but his body heat kept you warm in the safety of your bed. Or nest, rather, as Hawks tended to construct mounds of tangled comforters and wadded up bedsheets to hide in as he got comfortable. You were buried beneath the mass of cloth and the cocoon of his wings as you tried to fall asleep. It was a difficult undertaking since you didn’t know when you’d see him again. You were so tired, but you wanted to be awake to hold him for what little time you had left. 

You wouldn’t have gotten any sleep, anyway.

Often when Hawks slept in your bed you'd awaken at strange hours. Sometimes this was due to your own nightmares. The subject bounced between the traumatic things you’d seen at the hospital and the night you’d met. You'd wake to find that you’d encased your bed in your protective bubble during your sleep, and Hawks' wings squeezed you gently against his chest. Other nights, it was Hawks' anxiety that would keep you awake.

During the day, his guard was discreetly up. He carried carefree conversations as if unbothered, but those well-trained feathers of his were on constant guard. Really, he never had a moment to breathe. This was something you never would have understood the depths of if you weren't woken by his anxiety in the midst of the night. The anxiety he kept bottled during the day often let itself out in the form of night terrors. He'd mumble. Roll. His wings would twitch over you. His face would morph into an agonized expression, and he chirped in distress. A good, gentle shake was usually all it took to pull him out of the bad dream. 

That night his nerves reared their head, though in an unorthodox way. Apparently, you did fall asleep, because you awoke with a small grumble when you felt the mattress groan, followed by a heavy weight draping over your body. You let out a long whine of displeasure, but the weight just got heavier. You turned your head and opened your eyes to find Hawks, but he wasn't gasping in his sleep. He laid over you, wings puffed but flat on either side of your bed as he stared at the bedroom door.

"Hawks? You're squishing me." 

He didn't answer or turn to look at you. Those sharp eyes of his danced around in panic, his feathers raised as they sensed every small movement in your apartment. You dropped your head back onto your pillow with a sigh. 

"What's the matter?" you pondered.

"Shh," he hummed. "I felt something…"

You laid and listened for a short while, but all you could hear was the lady in the apartment above you walking across her floor.

"It's my neighbor."

"What if it's not?" 

Whether the display was the primal instruction from the bird in him to protect his mate or if it was a by-product of the harsh reality of the life he lived, you weren't sure. Either way, his calm and almost lazy facade cracked. When the world was quiet and his feathers could sense every mundane movement in your apartment, his anxiety that those small bumps in the night might be something that could hurt you overwhelmed him.

The little display was an annoyance to your sleep-deprived brain, but his first thought in the midst of his worry was to protect you. That spared him from your groggy wrath. 

"Lay down, McNugget. There's no one there," you grumbled, but he didn't turn his head away from the door. 

Feeling your hand on his face seemed to snap him back into the moment, even if just a little. He leaned into you and encased you in his wings. It felt like a protective gesture, but the warmth you found beneath them made you hum pleasantly. The fluffy white cloth of his hoodie rubbed your cheeks as he cuddled into you. Well, actually, it was your hoodie. 

At one time it was just some old thing you'd snagged from a thrift store on a chilly day. It was much too large for you, though. When Hawks came into your life later on, you'd cut holes out of the back and hemmed it up. That way he'd have a little something to throw on when it got chilly at your place. He never said it out loud, but he loved the thing. He'd go looking for it if you didn't leave it laying out in the living room. 

"I know you usually have a lot to be afraid of, but you don't have to worry about protecting me. I'm a badass, remember?" you whispered into the shell of his ear. His shoulders relaxed just a bit, and he puffed out a little chuckle. 

"Yeah, I know. I just… I want you to be safe. That's all." 

Your gaze softened, though he couldn't see it in the darkness. You didn't need Hawks to protect you. You didn't need a hero. You needed a best friend; a lover. Between the both of you, he was the one in most need of saving.

"Shh," you hummed gently. Your hair lifted from your pillow and danced slowly around your face as if gravity was lost to you. He scrunched his nose as your locks brushed his cheeks, and his wings settled flat as a ring rose from the floor around your bed. The translucent wall came together above your bodies to form a hard, bubble shell.

"You've been the hero long enough. Let me be the protector tonight,” you said. His throat bobbed against your shoulder as his arms wound around you. He settled, but you still felt his unease.

“What’s got your feathers ruffled?”

“You shouldn’t have to protect me,” he said. His voice was muffled since his mouth was pressed into your skin, but you still heard the sadness in it. “I should be taking care of you.”

You blinked as you soaked in his words. For a year you pined for such romantic things to come out of his mouth. Of course he’d wait for a night like that night to say such sickeningly sweet things. The future that used to feel so full of mystery and excitement had become dangerous, uncertain, and disappointing.

“You don’t have to be the hero every time,” you replied.

“But if I’m not a hero, what am I?”

His question was an echo of your fears. The ambient light from your window filtered dimly into your forcefield, but your eyes couldn’t adjust with tears in them.

“I don't know if I have the answer you're looking for, but... Do you remember when I was in the hospital?" you asked. "When you first came to see me you brought a twenty-piece box of chicken nuggets, and while I was trying to eat one you laughed until you were crying because it looked vaguely like a penis.”

“Vaguely? It had balls and everything,” he recalled, and you rolled your watering eyes.

“Whatever. It was stupid, but it was the first time I laughed since I was trapped in that hospital. And, well… when they said I’d never walk again you helped me out of bed. I cried myself to sleep some nights, but you were there, still trying to save me. You were trying to be a hero then, too, but you became my best friend. If nothing else, that's what you’ll always be to me.”

A sound came out of him akin to laughter. You shot him a look, then hooked your finger under his chin. You wanted to see his dumb grin when you berated him for poking fun at you. When his eyes met yours, though, they weren’t crinkled with laughter. They were red and watering.

“Oh, Hawks,” you breathed, and he tucked his face back into your arm to hide his vulnerability. He never cried before. At least not in front of you. He was always the immovable one, virtuous and strong. Moments like this reminded you just how human he was beneath it all.

“I’m right here. I’ve got you,” you assured him in a whisper. Gentle promises spilled from your lips like lullabies, and he clung to every word with heart-breaking desperation. You whispered every sweet nothing you could think of to ease his pain, but you didn’t have that kind of power. 

You had no power at all.

His world always seemed scary to you. You feared for his life every day, but the thought of him being ripped from your arms overwhelmed you that night more than it ever had before. The protective bubble that encased your bed would keep him safe for as long as you could fight sleep, but what of the morning? You’d be safe at home, and he’d be lost somewhere in the dangerous fray of his duties. Far away from your warmth and the apartment he found so much comfort in. 

This would not be the last time you held him. You had to believe that, but what if it was? What if this sleepless night was your last together? 

Tell him you love him, you thought to yourself. Tell him before you never get the chance again. 

You bit your lip as you felt his trembling breaths on your collar. You prepared your lips for the taste of the confession, but he was so vulnerable, more so than he may have ever been before. He didn’t need you to tell him about your affections, he needed you to use them.

You placed a reassuring crown of kisses along his forehead, and he gripped you so hard his knuckles were surely white. 

When you’d cried as a child, your mother would lay in your bed and sing lullabies until you fell asleep. Your voice was untrained and awkward compared to hers, but you tried your best to use it. Your off-key tune echoed back to you in the dome of your forcefield, and your cheeks pinkened with how childlike it sounded. Your embarrassment interrupted your lullaby. He stirred against your chest.

“Don’t stop,” he said. “Please, sing to me.”

You cleared your throat as you gathered the courage to start again. His eyes fell closed as your song settled into the safety of your shield. His feathers relaxed, and his face went slack as sleep slowly overtook him. You sang until his tears stopped flowing. You sang until he was asleep in your arms. For as long as you could, you laid awake. If you succumbed to sleep, so would your forcefield. So would your promise to keep him protected through the night. As time moved slowly forward, sleep inevitably began to settle into you, too. It was as terrifying and as peaceful as death.

“I love you,” you whimpered as you felt your eyes grow too heavy to fight back open. “Please… stay safe.”

Credits: 

A massive thank you to my wonderful friend and editor, @fuwafuwagem​! If you thought the fic looked especially polished, it’s thanks to her efforts!

Also a big thank you to my buddies and beta readers: @dendriticheep​ and @narcolepticroses​! Thanks you guys for being such sweet friends to me ;u;

And a huge thanks to YOU, for reading !

Authors Note:

I’d love to do a lot more fanfictions like these! If you have any suggestions or requests for animations or animated stories like this one feel free to submit it to me!

[limerancy-fics]

Anonymous asked: you write SO beautifully and i was like a sobbing mess how could they be so in love… they love each other so much but they are both so stupid 😭😭😭😭 and i understand now that you say a lot of the feelings happen during the spicy stuff cause omg when they got “married” i was crying and laughing cause only xiaoven would stop the hanky panky to say vows and confess their love like this AND I LOVE YOUR SENSE OF HUMOR SO MUCH!! I LOVE HOW THEY TALK TO EACH OTHER with so much love and tease and playfulness … they are soulmates.. they felt so real to me thank you so much for such an amazing fic.. I’ll leave a comment on AO3 too but i just want to tell u personally how much your work has touched me and alot of others 😭😭😭

— i just keep rereading this over n over again bc it makes me feel so warm n bubbly inside. they are so stupid n so in love and it HURTS!!!! all my spicy is always plot relevant n more than just spicy so it's hard to section out but it makes it better imo!!! i rlly tried to show the intimacy of these 2 ppl who have known each other most their lives n are just. extremely comfortable w each other n know each other so well. but yes they are so sappy n romantic im gonna DIE they're actual soulmates.....wow.....i can't wait for u guys to get the rest of the fic but i wanna let the angst sit for a bit so it's more effective 😌 im rlly glad this silly little au i thought up has been enjoyed by so many ppl already 🥰🥰 TYSM for sending this it rlly made my day

[friendocheaven]

Picnic Ask

Ask and ye shall recieve @theaxolotleastofthesun it’s long af tho, so it’s under the cut.

 1.       Where and When is the picnic happening? (Gonna take this as ideal location and season basically)

a.       Milo: Prefers someplace a bit south—warmer than the northern parts of the Eye. Summer in Sun Elf territory would be nice. Not south enough to get jungle-y and humid (Glim can take heat, but draws the line at humidity), but someplace he could retreat to the blessed relief offered by the shade of a scrubby tree and have a good excuse to eat his favorite spicy foods and sweat to cool down.

b.      Glim: as stated above, he doesn’t do well in high humidity. Also not the biggest fan of excessive heat, but will put up with it for Milo’s sake. Were it up to him though, he would prefer an autumn picnic in a cozy shady glen under a still-full canopy of rich reds and violets and sunny yellows. A sigh of crisp wind carrying with it the first hint of winter.

c.       Remmi: Love’s spring, especially when it’s still early. They love the way the fruit trees look while still flowering and the cool, but warming, breeze. They would most enjoy something near water, but with plush green grass still under foot. The Northern Reservoir is well tended, with bright, blossoming bushes hedging cobbled pathways. The surrounding park stretches most of the way ‘round. Remmi would most like a quiet day at the eastern edge—farthest away from the great roaring falls that lead into the canyon. Bonus if there are frogs.

d.      Hani: Loves the dead heat of summer; the feel of warm sun on his skin. A midsummer, late afternoon picnic after a day of splashing around the Southern Sea would be heaven. Sure, the food might get a little sandy, but it wouldn’t stop him from eating and enjoying every second.

2.       What food and drinks do your OCs bring? (you fool! You’re enabling me to indulge my fascination with food culture!)

a.       Milo: Goes all out on the spice—picnic with him at your own peril. He packs extra-hot kimchi, seasoned roasted garlic cloves, Zevi’s falafel recipe, and a few other side dishes that reflect his upbringing by a Southern Dwarf familiar with Halfling food culture. He also gets pretty excited with drinks, bringing three; an iced ginger tea made with turmeric and black pepper, buttercup and honey hwachae (most non-halflings just call it wine even though it’s usually not alcoholic) because he’s (not so) secretly pretty sappy and sentimental, and Baekse-ju to finish off with a good pair for spicy food and just a touch of alcohol.

b.      Glim: Settles for light, seasonal snack foods. He brings a bunch of fresh cut in-season fruit like apples (that yes, he does cut the skins to look like bunnies like his mother used to), a couple loaves of bara brith made with ground dried fruits and nuts served with butter, and a whole basket of pic ar y maen (cookies with raisins and currants mixed in). He brings spiced virgin cider and a fine local white wine to wash it down.

c.       Remmi: As a professional baker, they refused to bring anything but their best to their picnic. They pick finger-food pastries—the best from their eclectic cooking experience and travels. Beignets topped with honey and powdered sugar—in a basket enchanted to keep them fresh and hot and crisp because they take pride in their work. An impressive assortment of petit fors lined up and packed tightly in another container. Muffuletta finger sandwiches with toothpicks holding them together for the more savory inclined guests. And finally some cranberry pastila which they hadn’t made in years and was their way of flexing their baker’s muscles. They pack a thermos of milk tea and an iced chocolate drink.

d.      Hani: not a big cook. He was hoping Senya would do most of the cooking. It’s not like he’s particularly picky about what he ingests. To be polite though, he brings a crock of bamia—a stew with lamb, okra, tomatoes, and onion—that his mother would make on special occasions. He also brings an impressive array of drinks; sugar cane juice, carob juice, tamarind juice, and iced coffee.

3.       What are your OC’s wearing to the picnic?

a.       Milo: Largely his usual sort of outfit. A sleeveless turtleneck, cargo capris, and combat boots. He does add a lightweight cotton shawl embroidered with geese in shades of red that he got as a wedding gift from Lian. He wears it to avoid sunburn, but once in the shade and eating, he carefully folds it and sets it aside so it doesn’t get dirty.

b.      Glim: A cream colored tunic and brown tasseled cardigan over dark blue leggings, simple but sleek black ankle boots, and finished off with a simple sapphire teardrop pendant on a gold chain.

c.       Remmi: they opt for something simple and comfortable, but fitting for the season. They wear a yellow wide-band tank top under an oversized baby pink cable knit sweater. The sweater is so big it slouches off one shoulder, reaches their knees, and the sleeves hide their hands if they aren’t scrunched up at the elbow. They pair that with slim, washed out jeans, and a pair of tan slouchy boots. As one final touch, they don cherry blossom studs in their ears.

d.      Hani: he goes for something sporty and comfy. A loose and flowy off-white sleeveless crop top over a pair of baggy gray-blue shorts held round his hips by a broad and colorful sash and a pair of greek sandals that he discards almost immediately. To add a touch of class—after all this is a fun outing so why not—he wears golden arm bands just above each bicep. Those stay on longer, but they, too, eventually get unceremoniously dumped into the picnic basket in favor of total comfort.

4.       Which OC brings a musical instrument to idly play?

a.       Surprisingly enough, Hani. Remmi knows a little piano and harp, but those aren’t exactly available at a picnic. Milo has never learned an instrument (though he finds guitar interesting). And Glim tried playing, but sucked at just about everything; and anything he could play he couldn’t play in front of others. Hani, on the other hand, randomly knows how to play—and is good at—the oud (which is like an Arab lute). And yes, he does attempt to play Wonderwall on it.

5.       How quickly does your OC realize there are ants trying to sneak into their food? What do they do about it?

a.       Milo: He’s very perceptive, so it doesn’t take long for him to notice. He proceeds to squish them then mix them into his food for “extra protein” without hesitation. Despite knowing that Milo was raised eating bugs and still does fairly regularly, everyone still looks at him like he’s gone insane.

b.      Glim: He picks up on it when someone else points it out. It’s only then that he realizes that he forgot to activate the insect repellent rune. He curses under his breath and apologizes before quickly moving the picnic supplies a few meters away and activating it then.

c.       Remmi: They spend the whole picnic low-key looking out for this. Whenever bugs start walking toward or flying around their precious gourmet picnic, they nonchalantly close all the containers up tight then swat them all away without breaking the conversation.

d.      Hani: he doesn’t notice until one of the ants bites his tongue as he’s eating. He spits that one out because it was mean, but all subsequent ones he eats. And unlike Milo, Hani doesn’t mix them into anything, he just pops them into his mouth.

6.       Which OC hides under the shade at first before being convinced to come out into the sun? How do they react?

a.       Glim hates the heat. If you can manage to convince him to leave the tranquility of shade, he will be a drama queen about it. Really laying it on thick and moaning about how “the sun is a white hot laser” against his “poor fragile flesh” and that if he continues on he will surely “burn up, dry out, and die!” and other such dramatic nonsense. He gets weirdly poetic when he’s frustrated or cranky. Needless to say, Milo has ceased pushing the issue.

7.       Imagine your OCs spending their time picking nearby wildflowers and watching the butterflies and bees at work.

a.       Milo foregoes this particular activity, choosing this time instead to just take in the scenery. He’s scared he might upset a hive or get stung or bitten by something so he’d rather just sit back and soak up the atmosphere.

b.      Glim is carefully rooting around for four leaf clovers under a subdued parasol.

c.       Remmi carefully plucks and cuts an armful of flowers and stems so they can make colorful flower crowns for everyone.

d.      Hani chases the bugs and small animals, not unlike a dog would. But he’s having fun so it’s fine.

8.       Which OC foregoes a picnic blanket and sits directly on the ground? Are they concerned by the grass stains on their clothes afterwards?

a.       Hani doesn’t care where he plants his butt and cares almost as little about stains.

9.       Which OC brings a chair because they can’t stand the thought of sitting on the ground?

a.       Remmi, but a lot of it is because they don’t want to risk getting their clothes too dirty and also because the ground is never as soft and even as you think or hope. So sitting on the ground, even on a blanket, hurts their butt.

10.   Imagine your OCs falling asleep after eating their food, content and happy.

a.       Milo is one of the first to nod off and lays down in the shade. He kicks his shoes off and lets the sun warm his feet while the shade keeps his face cool. He wakes up to groggily help pack everything back up.

b.      Glim doesn’t actually fall asleep. He just sort of zones out while playing with Milo’s hair and enjoying the breeze.

c.       After loading up on carbs, Remmi dozes off in their chair and wake up with a tender sunburn spread across their nose and cheeks. They vow to never fall asleep in the sun like that again, but they make the same mistake next time.

d.      Hanni has seemingly boundless energy throughout the day, which is a bit unusual for him as he often naps a lot when the sun is out, but is wired by the time the moon replaces it. As soon as they’ve packed everything up and are headed home, though, the excitement wears off and he crashes hard. He’s asleep the whole way back.

[haledamage]

“I like the way your hand fits in mine.” and “I wanted to say “I love you” for the first time without stuttering, but that failed.” for Kira and a Unit Bravo guy of your choice(can both be the same or different ones, up to you)

(these prompts ended up very long and also very different :) I chose Kira/Nate for the first one, it’s sappy and fluffy and kinda spicy because that’s what they’re best at)

Kira felt when someone entered the room behind her, but she didn’t look up from idly plucking the strings of her guitar. She didn’t quite know what she was playing, a piece of some song she’d heard on the radio that had lodged itself in her head a few days ago. She hummed the melody, though she didn’t remember the words.

She smiled at Nate as he sat down in one of the chairs across from her and waited for him to say something, but he just stayed quiet, watching her play. She fought down the urge to stop, to put the guitar away and hide somewhere until he forgot this ever happened. It was an old fear, deeply ingrained and hard to ignore, but… well, this was Nate. She’d seen his music room, such as it was, had watched him play the piano, the violin, the cello, the fucking harp, always looking elegant and timeless and beautiful. It wouldn’t be so bad to show him the same vulnerability.

Besides, if she didn’t want an audience she shouldn’t be playing in the warehouse living room.

He watched in silence for a long time as she abandoned the half-heard tune and headed toward more familiar ones. She sang quietly, barely louder than the gentle drone of the guitar, but she knew he could hear her just fine, vampire hypersenses being what they were. His gaze was like a physical weight, following the way her fingers curled around the neck of the guitar; the gentle spirals of the tattoo on her bicep, visible for once in the t-shirt she wore; the way her hair fell in her face as she leaned over the body of the guitar; the simple, black pick she held between her lips as she adjusted the tuning. She could feel the heat rising in her cheeks at the intensity of his stare.

“Do you have any requests?” She asked, desperate to fill the silence before it got awkward.

Nate didn’t answer her question, instead moving to sit next to her on the sofa and asking a question of his own. “How long have you been playing?”

“Seven years. I picked it up while I was at university. I needed some elective credits and didn’t want to take art.” Kira’s fingers kept moving automatically along the strings, but she was no longer paying attention to what she played. Her attention was fully on the man next to her as he moved closer, close enough that his knee pressed to hers.

“You’re very talented,” he said softly. The tone he used made it sound like a much larger compliment than his words alone would indicate.

“I don’t know about that,” Kira said plainly, “but I enjoy it.” 

“Can you show me?” he asked, and the music stopped mid-chord as she studied him curiously.

“You already know how to play guitar.” She didn’t know that for sure, but it felt right. There wasn’t anything Nate didn’t know how to do unless it required an internet connection.

“Not like you do.”

She wasn’t quite sure what he meant by that. There were only a few other ways to play guitar she could think of, but she didn’t have her slide bar or lap steel guitar here, just her battered old acoustic. “You want me to show you how to play something?”

“Yes.” He smiled at her, warm and sweet. “What’s your favorite song?”

“What’s your favorite book?” she countered with a grin. They’d had that conversation before. Picking a favorite song or book was like picking a favorite star; some things are better in multitudes.

“Touche.”

Even though they hadn’t picked a song, his arm still slipped around her shoulders so he could cover her hand with his on the neck of the guitar.

She had no idea what song they played. It sounded familiar, something that came to her automatically, that she didn’t need to concentrate on to remember. Her attention was captivated entirely by Nate, his chest against her back and his breath in her ear, and his hands in hers. His long, elegant fingers following her direction without hesitation, travelling through a series of chords that she would never be able to remember after they left this room.

The music died off before too long, but they didn’t move yet. She wanted to say something, anything to ease the tension in the air. Mostly, she wanted to turn around and kiss him senseless. He preferred they keep things like that private instead of making out in the middle of the living room where anyone could walk in on them. She wondered if he’d be willing to make an exception just this once.

“I like the way your hands fit in mine,” Nate said suddenly, quietly, as he laced their fingers together. His hands dwarfed hers, almost completely enveloping them, but he was right; it felt like they were made to fit together.

“That is really fucking cheesy,” Kira replied automatically. She laughed at the sour twist to his lips when she said that. She pressed a kiss to his cheek and another to the corner of his mouth to bring his smile back, feeling her face go red again. “It’s okay. I like cheesy. Apparently.”

He chuckled. “You don’t sound happy about that.”

“I’m not unhappy about that. It’s just… unexpected. You’re unexpected.” It sounded stupid to say it like that, but his smile widened as if she’d said something profound and poetic.

“So are you.” That intensity was back in his eyes, dark brown even darker with unspoken promise, and he carefully took the guitar from her arms and set it aside where it couldn’t be in the way.

(the other one is under the cut so I don’t overwhelm anyone’s dash. Vague spoilers for the end of Wayhaven Chronicles, more specific spoilers for one particular dialogue choice option from Adam’s route. Kira/Adam angst and Kira&Felix platonic cuddling ;) )

“It has to be me,” Kira said, fighting not to raise her voice and failing. “I’m immune, but you aren’t. If you come with me, you’ll get hurt. Or worse.”

Adam remained unmoved. “I cannot let you go alone. It’s too dangerous.”

“I don’t care about that! I only care about–” she stopped abruptly as she realized what she was saying. Her words brought a memory rising unbidden from the depths of her mind. 

Herself, bleeding out in a dingy warehouse. Adam kneeling over her, more emotion on his face than she’d ever seen before or since, his hand on her cheek, gentle but desperate. Her voice, broken and far away: don’t worry, everything will be okay; his, full of fear and worry: I don’t care about everything! I only care about y–

She’d thought it was a dream, blood loss addling her mind, filling the gaps in her memory with silly fantasies. The dawning horror on Adam’s face told the truth of it.

Their argument evaporated, leaving them both without its safe familiarity. 

Kira finished the declaration that he hadn’t been able to all those months ago. “I only care about you.”

He flinched like she’d hit him. He wouldn’t look at her, jaw clenched and shoulders tense as he fought to maintain his stoic mask. She took a step closer, and he moved a step back. “You shouldn’t,” he said.

“I don’t think that’s up to you, Adam. I’m not sure it’s up to either of us.” She put a hand on his arm; he was so tense it felt like touching stone, like the man in front of her was carved from marble. Softly, she said, “You must know. I haven’t made any effort to hide it, really. That I’m-I’m in–”

“Don’t say it,” he said desperately. “Please.”

“Adam…”

He moved all at once, pushing past her and walking toward the door as fast as he could without literally running away from her. She bit the inside of her cheek until she tasted blood to keep from calling after him, but the words still played in her head. Why are you so scared to let me love you?

He didn’t look back as he pushed through the door and disappeared, almost knocking it off its hinges with the force of his exit. Kira collapsed onto a nearby sofa and put her head in her hands. “God damn it.”

She didn’t know how long she sat there like that, helpless and frustrated and cursing under her breath, but she eventually became aware of a presence nearby. She wasn’t surprised when she looked up to find Felix sitting silently on the sofa next to her, expression uncharacteristically serious. As soon as he saw her look his way he said, “Do you want to talk about it?”

“No,” Kira said, but with a sigh, she took the shoulder he offered, pressing her face into it while he curled an arm around her. Her voice was muffled in the scarf he wore. “Why do I keep putting myself through this?”

“People do stupid things when they’re in love.”

She wanted to deny it, but she couldn’t. She wanted to say something harsh and snarky about Adam and his stubborn reticence, but she couldn’t do that either. Eventually, she said, “I just wanted to say ‘I love you’ for the first time without stuttering, but I guess that failed.”

“Did it? Looks to me like he didn’t actually let you say it.” Felix gave her arm a tug and she let him pull her down to lay on the sofa. They were both small enough that they could fit comfortably, tangled around each other like a half-human, half-vampire octopus.

“How long were you watching us?” She suspected she already knew the answer.

“Long enough,” Felix confirmed.

Kira felt like she should be annoyed at his meddling and eavesdropping, but she knew there was no malice behind it. He just wanted both her and Adam to be happy, even if he had to prod them until they gave in. “What do I do?”

“Be patient. He’ll come around.” He dug his chin into the top of her head in a decidedly brotherly manner. She poked him in the side to get him to stop. “You know he loves you too.”

She sighed. “I know. I wouldn’t keep putting myself through this shit otherwise.”

“I could lock you both in a closet or something,” he suggested cheerfully. “Somewhere he can’t run away.”

She couldn’t help but smile at that. “Tempting. He might be more willing to start a fight so we kill each other instead of admitting anything that resembles feelings, though.” She wrapped her arms around him in a grateful hug. “Thank you, Felix.”

Felix shrugged, jostling her around as he did. “What are best friends for?”

Kira laughed. “Are we best friends now? Does Mason know you’ve replaced him with me?”

That finally elicited a familiar grin from him. “Don’t worry, Kira, there’s enough of me to go around.” The smile faded again, too quickly. “Are you okay?”

“Not yet. But I will be.” She struggled her way back to a sitting position before she ended up devoured by the couch. “Do you want to watch a movie or something? I need to not think for a little while.”

[supertam87]

My Sassenach - Chapter 10

Hello my lovelies! While scrolling through my dash the other day, i came across a gif-set of this interview and it got me thinking. It’s been an age since I posted any fic, so I decided it was just about time.

As always all my other J/C and S/C fics can be found here.

Love at First Sight Isn’t Real

Did she believe in love at first sight? No, of course not. How could she? Such a ridiculous notion. How could one meet a perfect stranger and just instantly love them. Love. Real love? Lust, yes. That answer felt comfortable to her. Safe. True. Obtainable. She had felt instant lust for several people in her life. Sometimes she had acted on it. Other times not. But Love? No, love at first sight didn’t exist.

Except it did.

And now she knew it. Love at first sight snuck up on you. It crept on silent feet, sidelong, so as to prevent you from seeing it coming. It didn’t tap you on the shoulder or whisper in your ear. It didn’t ease you into the idea, giving you time to let it settle and find it’s home. It overtook you in an instant. A literal instant. It consumed you, besieged you until you were inundated with emotions so powerful, so real that you couldn’t even take air into your lungs. The ability to breathe, to think, to respond simply stopped. You were left with only love. Overwhelming, uncontrollable, insistent love. It could be denied. It could. But not for long. She had denied it, when it swept into her life like a tsunami, washing away all the order and organization and control she had spent more than a decade perfecting.

Her life was just how she had meant it to be. The early days were terrifying, stepping off an abyss into a career she hadn’t anticipated, traveling the world in a way she had always wanted but never expected. It wasn’t always an easy life, or a calm one and true, she had experienced setbacks. Money that should have come but didn’t, causing legal pursuits that went nowhere. Relationships that should have progressed but ended instead. She’d had the overall instability of a nomadic existence and it had suited her. She’d had ups and downs, imperfections and messiness, but it all fit within the confines of her expectations. She had found success, had developed a life and a circle of friends so tight that she would never be alone, never without support. Truly, life was good. Even the terrifying and risky change of careers at an age that any expert would tell you was not ideal seemed to fit. It worked. It may have caused temporary unsettled feelings, but it all meshed within the scheme of her controlled and ordered, beautiful and rather exotic existence.

So when she was asked, during a silly game, for another round of promotion whether or not she believed in love at first sight, she panicked. She was well practiced at covering panic, or any other emotion for that matter. As a model there was no room for 'Caitriona' on the runway, only sass and sex and skin. That’s what she was paid for and that’s what she had learned to provide. Mastered, really. It was serving her well in this newfound form of fame. She was adept at being ‘Cait’. Just as she had learned what she needed to project on the runway, so she was learning what she had to give as an actress, always laughing, joking, answering endless inane questions on repeat and deflecting those that veered too close, with a grace and charm that she was finally old enough to admit came naturally to her. She was made for this. So why did she panic?

The question had caught her off guard, is all. She didn’t want to think about it. It wasn’t panic. It was the fact that true love was a romantic fairy tale that didn’t exist.

Except it did.

And Sam was sitting right next to her, warm and real, smelling like love and sex and contentment. She’d read all the descriptions on-line about what Sam smelled like. Woods, musk, sweat, spice, pine, man. Women went on at length about his smell and what cologne he wore and fantasized about what they would do if they ever got the chance to smell him. She would love to be incensed by that, offended by a sense of female propriety that disdained throwing herself at a man, or objectifying him in that way, except that she had smelled him for the first time, too. She remembered that smell. Creeping through the air, ghosting through her nostrils, into her lungs, dispersing through her respiratory system, traveling through her blood into every cell in her body, changing her DNA, modifying her code, and reprogramming her brain. His scent was insistent. It demanded acknowledgement. Caitriona was unable to describe it in terms of individual smells, though. It wasn’t ‘woodsy’ or ‘spicy’ or ‘athletic’. He smelled like security, comfort, companionship, strength.  To her, Sam smelled like forever. Maybe it was that early infatuation with how good he smelled that confused her and made her think love at first sight existed. Maybe that’s why she panicked. She was asked, and he was there, insistent, demanding acknowledgement. But he’d been joking, right? Playing along for the cameras. How silly. Love at first sight wasn’t real.

Except it was.

Sam had leaned in to her, playfully gazing at her like a puppy in love. Only she could see right into he eyes, those endless pools of blue, deep and fathomless, full of mystery and energy. So much energy. She’d never met anyone with such an endless supply of enthusiastic energy. He was like a bloody Energizer Bunny. He kept going and going and going. Sometimes it annoyed her, like at 5am when he was up for the blasted gym and all she wanted to do was curl into him and sink deeper into the quilts. Most of the time, it amazed her. It inspired her. She was motivated and hardworking, but she was nothing compared to the human tornado that was Sam. He ripped through life, absorbing it’s essence, taking in every experience, always learning from them and then finding a reason to give, everywhere, to everyone. It's like he had so much inside of him that he had to keep giving things away so he didn't explode or combust. He gave everything, except that part of him that was secret, guarded, hidden away from everyone, even his closest friends.

How had she come to know about that part of him? She told herself that she saw it in those eyes, that she'd read it when he looked deep into her own endless blue pools, but that wasn't quite right. True, he had the ability to look deeply into everyone he met, not that he always chose to do so, but she was pretty sure that not everyone who got seared by his gaze saw what she saw. Anyway, it was more like she absorbed it, rather than saw it. She didn't see his soul, she simply knew it. She couldn't explain it, but it was a part of her, as soon as she became aware of its existence. Like there was a void in her that she'd never even paid attention to. It didn't hurt; she wasn't searching for a way to fill it. In fact, she'd never even noticed it until one day, one instant it was filled and she had a sure knowledge that she had always been waiting for it to be filled – that with this completion deep within herself, she would never be the same, and it could never be undone. If she ever tried to explain this, even to her dearest friends, they would laugh and pretend to gag at the sappiness of the description, just as she would if one of them tried to tell her the same. She was far too sophisticated to believe that souls, if they even existed, could connect like that, in some crazy, instantaneous love bond. That wasn't possible.

Except it was.

She'd kissed him, already knowing. She'd actually had her eyes open. She watched his lips, full and soft, parted ever so slightly, pause just a breath away from her own, his fugitive tongue flicking out ever so briefly over his bottom lip. Was it a nervous response? No matter, she found it endearing and erotic and she wanted more than just a flicker of that tongue. As heat started to spark and shimmer inside her, he touched her and his lips were as delicious as they looked. She'd been mad to find out how he tasted. Oh, how he tasted. Sweet and rich, warm sunshine and the sharp tang of, what? Vinegar, citrus? He was mellow and spicy with just enough salt to bloom the flavors. He tasted like nothing on earth she had ever experienced, and she could kiss him, taste him, his lips, his skin, is essence every day and never tire of it. To her, Sam tasted like forever.  The kiss was slow and so sweet. Not tentative, but methodical, searching, seeking, learning. The heat that flashed and sizzled followed the new pathways in her body, the ones that had been forged when she had first smelled him and been forever altered.

She was hot and dizzy, her brain a jumble of muzzy half thoughts when Sam had stopped kissing her, moving to nuzzle her neck, just beyond her jawbone, and whispered her name, 'Caitriona', with such raw sexual urgency that every nerve in her body exploded and she felt her legs literally go weak. But that was just lust, right? The fact that his scent and taste and touch seared her and erased the memory of any other person from her life just meant lust – didn't it?

It was a stupid question. It was a stupid game. Sam loved those stupid games. He loved to smirk and flirt and be naughty, knowing that it would get everyone and their Aunt Fanny riled up, which did nothing but benefit the show. He loved acting just a little bit too familiar with her, knowing that it's what everyone would be talking about as soon as the interview aired. But acting – that was the key word, wasn't it? Sam was just acting. She was just acting.

Except they weren't.

Caitriona had learned on that day when Sam blew into her life with destructive, bruising, tempestuous force that everything was changed. That the moment she saw him, smelled him, tasted him, felt him, she was uncontrollably and irreversibly in love. Just like that. Almost like love at first sight.

=====

Caitriona sighed and dried her hands before leaving the ladies room. She was flustered and prickly. She was in danger of picking a fight with Sam, over nothing, simply to justify her irritable feelings. Things like this never flustered him. It was so annoying! She walked passed him towards the exit without looking at him and he jogged to catch up. He stopped her with a hand at the small of her back. She turned, brows furrowed, ready to bite, but the look on his face stopped her from lashing out. He didn't say anything, merely opened his arms and enveloped her. His hands, his beautiful, graceful hands smoothed her hair, caressed her back, and she sighed, allowing herself to sink into the comfortable security of his embrace.

He didn't ask. He already knew. He simply held her, and whispered into her ear, "Caitriona, don't worry. It's not theirs. It never will be. Even if they know, even if a hundred articles are written and the paps follow us for pictures, it will never be theirs. They can never really know. Call it love, call it lust, don't call it anything, it's doesn't matter. Whether you believe in it or not, whether you acknowledge it or not, it’s real. One day, your heart will drown out your brain, and you’ll stop torturing yourself. This is love at first sight. This is forever.  In the meantime, I’m here and I love you. What you said back there is right; love does take time to grow and develop. But it doesn’t take time to exist. It existed the second I met you. Neither of us could have stopped it. Now we grow it. We nurture it. We spend the rest of our lives feeding it and then reaping the harvest."

Caitriona hugged him closer, burying her face in the forever of his scent and his taste and his feel. Love at first sight did exist. It was real. She could never answer the whys. Why it happened to her. Why she got to have this man, in this life. Why she got to know him so completely and be known by him in the same way. Maybe one day she could be as carefree and unquestioning as Sam, but for now she would give him all her worries and he would carry them – for as long as she needed. And when she finally got to that place where forever didn't terrify her, and love at first sight could exist without justification, he would be there, and he would still love her. And that, she knew, was what love at first sight really was. It was love forever.

[summerstarsandsea]

HAPPY BIRTHDAY @sinningsquire !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!   For you, some Benarmie Fluff. <333

Set in our Big Brothers AU but can be read independently. Warning: copious amounts of sappy fluff and feelings.

- - - -

Wash Away Those Troubles

When Hux has had a bad day, there are signs, and Ben has learned to read them as well as he's learned countless dance moves. Their relationship is often like a dance and sometimes one of them has to take the lead. On the bad days, that someone is Ben.

 The signs: tension in Hux's neck and shoulders. The white-knuckled clench of his fist around the handle of his work bag. The hard line of his mouth and weary eyes which make him look older. If he knew Ben thought that he'd surely find it a bad thing, but, while Ben hates seeing him stressed, the thought of being around to see streaks of silver through beloved ginger hair fills him with a hopeful warmth.

 That particular day is a bad one, starting early and running late and it’s only Wednesday. Hux returns home strung tight, cranky, quiet. He kicks off his shoes and doesn’t even bother to make sure they’re in their proper spot; that’s the first tell that something is wrong.

When Ben asks how his day is he gives a muttered half-answer rather than elaborate on one of his projects or share a story about his coworkers. That’s number two.

 Before he has a chance to get any further, Ben speaks softly.

 "Babe?"

 Hux turns from hanging his jacket up, looking so weary that it makes Ben's heart hurt. But he knows Hux will be okay. He knows that because he’s going to make it so.

 Ben appraises Hux, then makes his decision. He steps forward, slow and fluid, and adjusts the discarded shoes to where they belong. Then he takes Hux’s bag and sets it on Hux’s desk, right where he knows he likes to keep it. He returns to Hux and with a hand on the small of his back guides him to the bathroom. Hux goes without protest and, if he needed another sign, that would be three.

 In the bathroom Ben carefully strips Hux down. He starts at his feet and works up, removing each item and touching the revealed skin with firm, reassuring strokes as he goes. As he slips Hux’s shirt over his head he gives him a quick peck on the forehead and for a moment swears Hux’s mouth curves up a little.

 Ben removes his own clothes quickly and much less methodically. Hux still says nothing but does sweep an appreciative glance over him; Ben takes that as a good sign.

 One hand on Hux's back again, Ben reaches over with the other and turns on the water. He waits for it to get pleasantly warm, then guides Hux in, letting him be first to stand beneath the spray. Ben doesn't need the shower; he had his when he got home earlier. This is for Hux's benefit.

 Ben lathers up a loofah and pulls Hux forward a little so the water drums at his back. Hux’s eyes are lidded and he’s still silent but Ben can tell he’s starting to relax a little. Gently, lovingly, he begins washing in slow circles, starting at Hux’s neck and shoulders and moving down his chest.

 Hux sighs at the feeling and gives Ben a look that’s not quite a smile, but still so incredibly grateful. When Ben moves back up to circle gently across one shoulder, Hux turns his head and plants a feather-light kiss on his wrist. Ben smiles.

 He moves over each arm and then down to Hux’s belly and groin and thighs, letting the foam run down Hux’s long legs. Next he reaches around him to get his back and his ass, which he squeezes gently just for the breathy almost-laugh Hux responds with. When he’s done he hangs the loofah on a little hook and gently eases Hux back so that the water hits his shoulders and cascades down, rinsing it all away. His hands follow the water’s path, smoothing over neck and shoulders and arms and down sides and hips, ensuring the last of the soap is washed away and at the same time comforting Hux with his touch.

 Then, Ben kneels on the hard floor. One at a time he runs his hands over Hux's legs, up and down over the muscle.

 "Hold onto my shoulders," he instructs gently, and Hux does. He lifts one of Hux's feet, both cleaning it and rubbing out the soreness from the busy day. He presses a kiss to the top of it then sets it down and gives the other foot the same treatment.

 Hux watches him, stroking his thumbs over his shoulders in silent thanks. Seeing Ben on his knees gives him...mixed feelings. A little thrill, yes, at the suggestive nature of the position, at being pampered, at the sweetly alluring way Ben looks up at him. But also a desire to pull him to his feet and to eye level and kiss him senseless, or to switch the positions and let Ben know he, too, is worth pampering and worshiping.

 Ben stands, sliding his hands up Hux's sides as he does, sending a shiver through him. Ben pauses and then his arms reach around Hux. He holds his waist with one and with the other reaches behind him to turn the water a little hotter. Hux realizes with a half-smile that Ben thinks he’s cold. He takes advantage of Ben's proximity to lay his cheek on Ben's shoulder and kiss his neck. The pleased little hum Ben makes warms him more than the water ever could.

 To Hux's delight, Ben's hands start moving. They slide firmly up and down his back, finding and working out tension. Hux leans more heavily on Ben and continues bestowing lazy kisses wherever he can without having to move from the cradle of his shoulder.

 After a moment, Ben turns him so that he can better access his neck and shoulders, where he massages firmly with practiced hands. The day’s stress surrenders under his ministrations and Hux relaxes, shoulders slumping, head dropping to his chest, eyes falling shut as he lets out a long sigh.

 Seeing Hux so unguarded stirs something in Ben. He thinks of the time a couple years into their relationship when Hux had a bad outbreak of chickenpox and was reluctant to even let Ben see him unwell, let alone give him medicine or cook him soup.

 Now he trusts himself entirely to Ben’s care, and not in a case of illness or injury, but simply because it was a long day and he’s tired and Ben is here.

 This is a side of Hux that only Ben gets to see; it makes him feel both lucky and overwhelmed with protectiveness, a fierce desire to keep that precious, soft part of Hux safe. Hux the military man, the engineer, the son, the brother, needs no protecting. Hux the man, his funny and thoughtful husband who loves lie-ins and sweets and hates spicy food and wearing scarves, is another story. That Hux is Ben’s and Ben’s alone and the responsibility is terrifying but the reward is endless.

 Ben wishes he could do this forever, watch Hux so relaxed, but he knows they'll start to get all wrinkly soon and that as much as Hux loves a good, warm shower, he also hates wasting water. With one final sweep down his shoulders and a quick kiss to the nape of his neck, Ben removes one hand and reaches for the shampoo - his own, not Hux's. The other hand he keeps on Hux's back, reassuring him of his presence. When he has to pull that hand away to pour a dollop of shampoo into it, he steps close so Hux can feel him there.

 Ben lathers up the shampoo and works his fingers into Hux's hair, darkened by the water but still bright and lovely in Ben's eyes. He massages his scalp gently, scratching a little with his blunt nails, and then combs his fingers out through the strands, over and over. Hux hums contentedly, tilting his head back, endearingly cat-like.

 "Keep your eyes closed," Ben mumbles, then dips Hux’s head under the water to rinse out the shampoo. When he's done he smooths the hair back from Hux's face. Finally he turns Hux to him and tilts his chin up to gently clean his face. This he likes best, he thinks as he strokes thumbs over freckled cheeks. He's unable to resist planting a kiss on each one. Hux's eyes are still closed but there's a smile playing on his soft lips as though he knows what Ben is thinking. Maybe he does.

 Ben finishes his work and gives Hux a slow, lingering kiss, just because he can. It's the sort of kiss that could lead to more and more, but not tonight.

 He shuts off the water and guides Hux out to stand on the mat. It's barely a few seconds and Hux is already shivering in the cool air before Ben wraps their biggest, fluffiest towel around him and dries him off.

 Once that towel is wrapped snugly around Hux, Ben takes a second one, plops it onto his head and ruffles it, drying and mussing his hair simultaneously. Hux makes a little huff of feigned annoyance but doesn't actually try to move away. When Ben lifts the towel again, his hair is sticking up every which way and he's wearing a little frown that Ben can easily picture on a younger, more innocent Hux when he didn't get his way. Ben leans in, smirking roguishly, and kisses at the pout until it starts to slip away.

 "What?" Ben asks. "Don't approve of my methods?"

 He doesn't expect Hux to answer and is pleasantly surprised when he does.

 "I find them highly unconventional, yes."

 Ben laughs and with that the last of the tension eases out of Hux. He looks up and smiles, really smiles, and it makes Ben feel as accomplished as if he’s just won a dance competition. Maybe more.

 Ben, still stark naked himself, guides the towel-bundled Hux to their bedroom, to the dresser, and presents Hux with clothes to change into. Hux takes them and then his eyes sweep over Ben’s body. He reaches into the drawer and grabs a pair of shorts which he tosses into Ben’s face.

 “As much as I appreciate the view, it is actually cold in here, it’s not just me.”

 They dress and then Ben starts to turn back the covers when Hux stops him with a gentle hand to his arm.

 “I thought you’d want to go to bed?” Ben says. “Don’t tell me you’re going to do more work.”

 “Actually.” Hux loops his arm with Ben’s and tugs a little. “I was hoping we could finally watch a movie together.”

 “Really?”

 “Yes, really.” Another tug.

 The smile that lights up Ben’s face is like a shot of warm whiskey or the sun through the clouds. He barely has time to appreciate it, though, before he’s scooped up over one shoulder and carried to the living room.

 Ben handles everything: gathering snacks, picking the movie, arranging them on the couch. As Hux settles in against his chest and pulls a blanket up around them, he decides that a day like today isn’t so bad at all if it ends with him here in Ben’s arms.