#she said the word one time you guys! ONE. TIME.

[luminni]

I have a feeling Johnny would try and set up Simon with one of his friends

like

“M’ tellin ya mate yer going tae like ‘er,” Johnny teased, bounding a couple steps in front of Simon, turning back to him and rocking back and forth on his heels, hands shoved into his pockets to protect them from the cold. As Price often quipped, the 'scott can't stand still for the life of him.'

“Mhm,” Simon just grumbled in response.

“See mate, That’s the attitude that scares all the girls away.” Johnny commented, hands outstretched and exaggerated.

“Whatever.” Simon huffed, shaking his head. Johnny wasn’t wrong, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d done anything with a girl that wasn’t a quick lay, and even then it had been months, not to mention going out on a proper date. Well, a date was a stretch, you were Johnny’s close friend for a couple years. He had heard of you, but never met you and now Johnny was insisting that he go on a date with you because he was convinced it was going to work well, Simon wasn’t convinced in the slightest.

“She’s real nice though- so put away the tough guy act big man- girls don’t like that.” Simon couldn’t believe he was getting dating advice from his sergeant, so he just doubled down and kept scowling but Johnny kept pressing. “I'm telling you she's a real sweet girl, kinda lass who would try tae make a crying baby laugh on the tube or go and feed some mangy stray dog, perfect for a prickly bastard like yerself.”

“Okay okay, Jesus. ’s not like ’m going to scare ‘er off on purpose.” Simon relented 

“You better not, gettin' laid might do ya' some good man, calm yer ass down a wee bit” Johnny chuckled

Simon would have yelled at him for that comment but his friend cut him off, “‘Kay we’re ‘ere,” Johnny chirped, “Gaz and his girl should be inside already and she’ll be ‘ere soon,” Johnny said, pushing his Lt. through the pub door.

Johnny had invited Kyle and his girlfriend for a kind of double date situation because he thought having another girl there would help you feel more comfortable, something Simon couldn’t argue with. Why Johnny’s single ass would be attending was a mystery.

and he's been playing both sides

“Ya like serious guys right?” Johnny had asked you out of the blue, a week or so prior while hanging out at your flat.

“Uh yeah sure? I mean I guess so, more than immature assholes like you.” You had joked back across the small kitchen.

“Well,” He had began, unphased by your teasing, “There’s this guy I work with-”

“Don’t even.” you cut him off

“Wha'?!” he whined

“Don’t try and set me up with one of your military bros,” you warned, “I’m not interested.”

“Jus' 'cause yer last dates 'ave been busts doesnae mean you shouldn't keep tryin’,” He pleaded, catching the sponge you threw at him, “He’s a real good guy, kinda intimidating but you’d like him, promise!”

You glared at him before going back and forth, Johnny was really trying to sell this guy, and he wasn’t wrong, your last three dates had been nothing short of disasters. So, after lots of pleading -and a couple tasteful photos from them at the gym- you agreed. So as you walked closer and closer to the pub, your nerves were buzzing. Just gotta get past his tough exterior is all, Johnny’s words of advice rang through your head. Thankfully he had invited another one of his friends there along with his girlfriend, you would have been hyperventilating if it was just going to be you and some guys. As you reached for the door, you could only hope Johnny was right about this guy.

So, who would be surprised when it actually works out, when Simon actually falls in love with you and your sweet smile at first site. When you find his corny and sometimes morbid jokes genuinely funny, having to cough around your drink to prevent spitting it out.

Johnny's just happy Simon might finally chill out, and he won't have to listen to you complain about failed dates every other week.

[melminli]

Pink Pony Club

summary - you weren't expecting much from your evening in a shitty bar, but then you saw a pretty woman sitting next to you.

pairing: cho hyun-ju x fem. reader

word count: 1.2k

contains: wlw, angst w/ comfort, fluff, a bit transphobia, pre squid game au

a/n: hyun-ju was my fav this season and i literally love her so much - she deserves the world and more😔💕

the request.

You looked bored at your drink while you caressed its round surface with your index finger. Your friends had finally managed to drag you to one of their favorite bars and, you didn't really enjoy being here, as you had expected since it was pretty, well - straight.

You were fine with it at first, when you all sat down at a table and just talked and laughed together. However, after a while a group of men sat down at your table - with everyone's permission, of course, but you still weren't the biggest fan of that decision. The only reason you didn't mind was that your friends seemed to be having a genuinely good time with the guys and that they weren't too bad. You still excused yourself from the table after a while, because one of them wouldn't stop subtly flirting with you even when did not hide your lack of interest. Sitting lonely at the bar counter wasn't too bad, you guessed.

I'll just finish my drink and then leave. You thought to yourself, still bored, and glanced subtly at the woman next to you after noticing how she seemed to be moving around quite nervously for a while. “Hey, are you alright?” you whispered to her in a soft voice after you moved closer to her side.

She returned your gaze slightly surprised and seemed to try to make herself even smaller after your attention was focused on her. “Ah, yes everything is fine. there is nothing to worry about…”

A few guys a little further away from you suddenly started to cackle ugly after she finished talking and you didn't miss how the woman next to you turned her eyes back to the counter - obviously feeling uncomfortable by what they were saying.

“Did you hear that voice? It's even deeper than yours!” he said to his friend, who only agreed with a shocked look on his face as he pointed his hand in your direction. “Come on man, that's not fair! Have you even seen how rugged that dude is? I mean you do realize that's not a real - you know…”

You took an annoyed breath as you looked across the room and bit your tongue to keep you from spitting in their hideous faces. Though, it was pretty hard to restrain yourself since you really wanted to. "Assholes.” you just uttered while staring at their heads with a hateful look, imagining them exploding.

“Just ignore them…” said the woman next to you with a gentle voice after noticing your reaction. “What they say doesn't bother me anyway.”

And even though she said that you knew it did because it always did. You returned your attention back to her and introduced yourself to her after taking the last sip of your drink. “And what's your name, pretty?”

She seemed to be caught off guard a little when she heard you say that. “Oh, ehm…” she stumbled a little over her words. “It's ehm Hyun-ju. My name is Hyun-ju.”

You smiled. “Pretty like you. It suits you.” you complimented her and noticed how the weird guys from the corner were still watching you. “Hey, do you want to get out of here?” you asked and were glad when she nodded. “Well, come with me, I know a good spot,” you told her and took her hand in yours.

You gently pulled her off the chair with you and led her out of the stuffy bar, feeling like you could breathe again when your nose met the fresh air. “I was really close to beating those guys up,” you told her as you walked hand in hand with her. Hyun-ju giggled lightly, as if it was hard for her to imagine you doing something like that. You looked at her in disbelief. “What, you don't believe me? I'm totally serious, really!”

She tried to hide her smile, but barely managed it. “No, I believe you.” she replied, but you weren't really convinced by her answer. You just hummed when you finally noticed the store. “Look there! I hope you're hungry, because this place makes the best japchea.” you told her happily while holding the door open for her because a long time had passed since you last went to this little restaurant.

Luckily, there weren't many people here at this time of day, so you managed to get a good seat for two. “Sorry, I didn't even ask if you wanted to eat japchea. They also have lots of other things if you want, my treat.” you winked at her and Hyun-ju noticed how you cuddled your hands against your cheeks, as if they were still warm from the alcohol.

“Thank you, but japchea is fine. I will trust your recommendation,” she replied shyly and watched as you shouted your order with two fingers in the air to the chef, who gave you an all-clear with his thumb. “They don't have a waiter here, so…” you explained, automatically putting your hand back on hers without really noticing.

Well, you didn't until Hyun-ju's eyes turned to it and it was only then that you realized you were probably being a little too handsy. “Oh, I'm sorry about that.” you quickly apologized when you quickly pulled your hand back. “I really didn't mean to make you feel uncomfortable or anything, you're probably not even into other women?” you let the question hang in the air, while you simultaneously cursed yourself for even asking that.

Hyun-ju blinked slightly in surprise while she played nervously with her hair. You knew at that moment that you had fucked up and prevented yourself from showing your disappointment. Unknown to you, she was thinking about something entirely else right now. So she was flirting with me the whole time? I didn't even realize, how embarrassing. “Are…are you?” she asked tensely, almost slapping her hand over her face at her stupid question. Of course she is, she just said it.

You laughed lightly with one eyebrow raised. “Do I like women? Hell yeah.” you just said, finding it a little funny how she acted right now. cute.

Hyun-ju was used to attracting the attention of girls before starting her transition. She even had a few relationships with them and liked it, but dating was one of the many things that became more than just difficult for her after she officially came out. “I'm a trans woman,” she finally said, even though she knew that you knew.

You just leaned forward with a grin. She hadn't turned you down, that's all you cared about. “I know,” you said, watching how she shyly avoided your gaze while crossing her arms in front of her. “You don't have to hide. I meant it when i said that you're very pretty.”

Hyun-ju slowly met your gaze and this time it was her who initiated physical contact with you. She held your hand softly. “I think you're really pretty too,” she said, and at that moment, you were both pretty glad that you went to that shitty bar today, even if you'd never go there again.

[cherrygirlfriend]

pairing: frat!rafe x tutor!reader synopsis: reader attends a frat party where the theme is to dress up as your type warnings: fluff! wc: 1.3k i got this idea from the wonderful @rafeyscurtainbangs and it had me dead because it's so funny and i can picture him wearing that… i also tried out a new kinda formatting for funsies ^_^ also i'm surprised i’ve never posted for frat!rafe? anyway first fic for 2025!

you'd never really been much into parties, your best friend constantly trying to get you to go to some of the various parties the social butterfly had gotten invited to, but you simply held up the book you were in the middle of and let out a soft hum as a way to say that you had your own plans. after some more pleading, lexi always gave up trying to convince you to come and left you in your own devices, returning in the early hours of the morning, trying to be as quiet as possible yet waking you up every time.

but this time, all the girl had to do was mention the frat party she was going to that night when you let out a sigh and told her you'd come with her. maybe there was a second reason you wanted to go, other than to just please your friend.

"we're having a party this friday."

you chuckled, turning your gaze from the book in front of you to the boy next to you, "you're in a fraternity, rafe. i'm pretty sure that happens every friday without exception."

your words caused the boy to roll his eyes, yet the small grin you'd grown to like still remained on his lips as he repositioned his backwards cap, "yeah, but it's a themed party. you should come."

"why?" you furrowed your brows in suspicion and confusion as to why he'd want you to attend, "what's the theme?"

"you're supposed to dress up as your type."

"and what are you going as? some kind of variation of jennifer from jennifer's body? or regina from mean girls?" you let out a small snort.

"guess you'll have to come if you wanna find out." the boy poked your forearm with the rubber end of his pencil, licking his lips, "i wanna see what kind of guys you are into. i bet it's some thrifty hipster dudes or some broody bad boys that secretly get hard for poetry and emily dickinson and shit."

you felt your cheeks warm from the memory as you placed the backwards cap on your head. you looked in the mirror, clad in loose jeans that hung low on your hips so it'd show off the calvin klein logo on your underwear, and a sweatshirt adorning the logo of your university. the outfit you wore looked just like something rafe would wear during one of your tutoring sessions. hell, he probably had.

lexi looked at you with raised brows, the muscular girl who usually wore dark, baggy clothes looked strange in the blue sundress she'd borrowed from you, her biceps basically protruding from the short sleeves, the girl's short black hair pulled up into a tiny attempt at a ponytail, wearing some simple makeup that you'd helped her apply.

"you're going as a frat guy? to a frat party?" she snorted, taking in your ensemble, "damn, you date so little that i had no idea that's the type of guy you were into."

you rolled your eyes, throwing her the handbag that she'd asked you if she could borrow, "and you're going as...?"

"a straight girl." lexi said, her usual shit-eating grin taking over her lips.

"in that case, you could've just worn like, a grey hoodie, those flared leggings, and a pair of white nike air force ones. most straight girls here do. i think you've failed at your assignment."

"shut up."

you were surprised by how many people actually dressed up according to the theme, especially over the number of frat boys wearing different types of skirts and dresses, some of them even sporting poorly done makeup looks on their faces.

having gotten separated from lexi almost the moment you arrived to the party, you were now leaning against the living room wall, hiding a part of your face behind a red solo cup half-full of some sort of concoction you'd found as you looked around. you'd always been better at standing aside, observing what everyone else was doing, rather than trying to join in.

you lifted the cup to your mouth and drank some of the nasty liquid, nearly spitting it out when you spot rafe chatting to his friends, just about managing to swallow it before you keel in laughter.

he stood confidently in a grey cardigan strewn over a white button-up that was so small on him it actually turned into a crop top, showing off the lower part of his abs, a faint happy trail as well as a defined v-line leading to a short black pleated skirt, his calves covered by black socks that ended just below his knees.

it seemed that your amusement had caught rafe's attention, as the moment you'd finally managed to straighten yourself up, the boy was strutting over to you, his hands on his hips in a way that almost caused you to go into another laughing fit.

"what's so funny?" rafe asked with lifted brows as he reached you, looking over your outfit with a pleased look on his face before gesturing to his own, "you don't think i look hot?"

"oh, definitely. the hottest." you snorted, bringing the drink to your lips and taking a small sip before pursing your lips in thought, "so, what's your type? britney spears?"

the boy's brows furrowed at that, "huh?"

"you look just like her in one of her music videos." you explained, your lips falling open in shock as his eyebrows continued to remain furrowed, "you don't know 'baby one more time'?"

"i haven't seen it." rafe shrugged, "what, you can't recognize who i'm trying to dress as?"

"i can't say i do. who?"

"i'm dressed as you."

you knew that if you were able to see yourself, your eyes would comically widen the moment the words left rafe's lips; and as you looked at him up and down, you realized, that his outfit was something you'd usually wear; just more lewd. "you're... dressed as me?"

"yeah. and clearly you're dressed as me."

"based- based on what?" you laughed incredulously, feeling your cheeks light up, bringing the cup to your lips and drinking just so you'd be able to hide a part of your face from the boy.

"well," rafe snatched the cap on your head, placing it on his instead, making his entire ensemble look even goofier, as he took hold of the front of your sweatshirt. "i'm pretty sure i've worn this exact same outfit."

"that doesn't mean anything… plenty of guys wear this." you mumbled from behind your cup, only to have rafe grab it from your hands, your eyes widening as you watched him finish it in one swallow, scrunching up the cup and throwing it on the floor somewhere.

cupping your chin with his finger and lifting it up so you were looking up at him, rafe brought his face closer to yours, his ice-blue eyes looking into yours in a way that made you feel like you were naked as his lips twisted into a knowing grin, "it doesn't?"

"n-"

before you could finish denying it, rafe's lips were pressed against yours; your eyes still wide open when his free hand slid to your waist, pulling you closer to him.

slowly, you felt yourself melt into the kiss, your eyes automatically closing as your lips moved against his. your hands were pressed against his chest, slowly moving down to feel his defined abs over the sheer button-up.

you could feel rafe's grin against your lips before he even pulled away, looking down at you with a knowing look on his face, the boy licking his lips causing you to bite down on your lower lip, your head spinning from just kissing him.

"so, that didn't mean anything, huh?"

[atebyflowers]

︎ ︎ ︎ ︎ ︎ ︎ ︎ ︎ ︎ thinking about masturbating on the phone with mean ellie . . you guys weren't dating — not even close. and she was very adamant about needing her personal space and not wanting anything serious. so it was embarrassing for you, to be calling her so desperately, at such a late time in the night. you were staying with your parents away from college [and her] for the winter break, and had tried everything you could to get your release. even resorting to watching old videos of the two of you together, but nothing was working.

of course you debated it for a while, afraid she'd be mad you woke her up or interrupted a hook up between her and another girl. but you gave it a chance anyways, eventually to horny to give a fuck what she responded. "who is this?" she questioned, her tone no different than it was most of the time — causing you to let of a sigh of release, at least she wasn't sleeping. "ellie?" you said, your voice immediately hitting her ears with recognition. "oh hey it's you" she responded, you on the other end — layed underneath your sheets, desperate for something out of her. "did you need something..?" she asked, breaking you out of your minute long silence. "yea actually" you spoke, hearing a shuffling on the other end before actual words. "well? what is it, kind of busy here babe" she added. you were hesitant again, something about actually hearing her voice scared a bit of sense into you.. but not enough to erase the ache your body felt. "i... um.." you paused, hoping she'd somehow catch on. but you knew you were out of luck when she told you to speak up and stop wasting time. "i can't make myself cum" you spit out, another sigh of relief, heavier than the first one, leaving your body.

it was silent on her end fo a moment before she started to laugh to herself, "you called me because you're horny? jesus y/n.. didn't know you were this much of a whore" she responded, "well go on then, touch yourself for me baby" — the only instructions you needed before slipping your hands down to your cunt, heavy breathing being received on her end as you toued with your clit. "that's it.. let me hear her" she spoke, referring to your body as separate people. you, moving the phone lower towards your wetness, "speed up" she ordered — and you did just that, the sounds of your juices and fingers merging in harmony as you let out soft noises, careful not to be loud. "i need you s-so bad els.." you confessed pathetically, "mmm i bet huh, can't even make yourself feel good without me.. such a stupid slut" she said, getting a few more desperate whines out of you. m close els.." you told her and she hummed, "you wanna cum for me baby? let me hear how desperate you are for me" her words sent you dizzy. "y-yes- i wanna cum for you fuck, wanna-"

you were cut off by a beeping noise, the line going dead just as you were about to release.

"ellie??" confused, dizzy and egar for the orgasm you had been waiting for all week — you received no response, prompting you to sit up, opening the chat with a single shaky hand and texting her.

y/n: what happened?

you sent, and minutes went by before she responded. you — sitting sweaty and uncomfortable as you waited for something, attempting to call her back twice but receiving no answer. . until your phone finally went off.

from ellie: sorry. bedtime sweetheart. meet me when you get back to town, maybe i'll let you finish in person ;)

she responded, your mouth left agape as you read the text.

fucking bitch you whined to yourself, irritated, a few tears welling in your eyes as you were left with nothing but a cramped hand and leftover wetness still unfulfilled. you should've known it was to good to be true, how quickly she responded to your initial needs . . she really did love torturing you as much as possible.

︎ ︎ ︎ ︎ ︎ ︎ ︎ ︎ ︎

a.n: this is unedited so ignore any spelling mistakes please and ty 🙌🏼

[lemmesayimyourbiggestfan]

frontman x reader whos a player but not because of debt but because she was investigating with gi-hun and ju-hon and got in the limousine and then in-ho falls in love with her and gets her out of the game with him like at the end of the season

can u also like not write it like a hate love relationship? like readers conflicted but still likes in-ho

Keeping you safe

Hwang In-ho x reader

hiii, pleasure writing your request! hope it’s the way you imagined :)

Word count: 3,3k

Warnings: violence, murder,…

Requests are open! i would also like to write something about Jun-ho or the salesman, so hmu

When you jumped into the limousine after Gi-hun you didn’t consider its consequences. Jun-ho trusted you to keep your eyes on Gi-hun at all costs and you were going to keep your word, even when it meant making yourself vulnerable.

The gas was sweet on your tongue and Gi-hun already slumped down on the plush leather of the limo seats. But you were wide awake, somehow defying sleep’s influence, shaking, still processing what the deep voice implied and Gi-hun demanded. “Put me in the game. But leave her out of it.”

Those words were followed by a dry laugh. You knew that meant there was no way out of it now. You started whispering into the intercom to Jun-ho, saying how sorry you were. His panicked voice was cut off by you turning off the device while you prepared yourself for the Frontman’s reaction, closing your eyes and taking shallow breaths.

“No. Those are my games and my rules. Might make them more interesting, don’t you agree, player 456?”

Then the gas started rising up from the floor. Gi-hun grabbed your hand, rumbling about how sorry he was. You smiled wearily, pressing his hand. “It’s okay, Gi-hun.” You both knew it wasn’t. It was as far from ‘okay’ as possible.

His fingers went limp and you resigned, waiting for the inevitable. With muted senses you watched the tinted protection shield go down. Behind it was the man in the mask himself, looking at you over his shoulder. Just when his gloved hand hovered over his mask, shrugging it off, you were engulfed in darkness.

***

After the first game, you thought that nothing could surprise you anymore. As much as Gi-hun tried to keep you from all the bloodshed, even he couldn’t cover your eyes and ears every time there was a gunshot. Still pale and shaken, digging dirt and blood from beneath your nails, you sat on your bed with the provided food in your lap, watching your surroundings. At least Gi-hun could be happy he found here his long lost friend, with whom he was now talking. You still didn’t speak to anyone else. You were scared that if you did, they would be dead by tomorrow.

You barely noticed there was any commotion until the sudden silence peaked your interest. There was a skirmish between three guys, two of them working together, which made the outcome of the fight quite obvious. There was another player stalking towards the group, trying to break up the fight.

“I said save the lecture for your own damn kids.” one of the guys shouted at him. That’s when you noticed the player’s still frame, like a cat before launching at its prey. And you were right; within a blink of an eye, he put both of the guys on their backs, not even breaking a sweat. You looked closer at him, reading the number 001 on his back. Even from afar you could see how deadly calm he was while choking one of them. After a moment the rage left his body and he released his grip. You didn’t expect the applause that followed his actions. You exchanged a look with Gi-hun. Were you the only one who sensed something foreboding?

You turned your attention back to the food in your lap and decided that even though you weren’t hungry, you desperately needed the energy. But in your mind, all you could think about was the player 001. Was he a police detective like Jun-ho or a former marine like Jung-bae or Dae-ho? Or something else entirely?

It took you a while to get out of your head and notice that his bed was right next to yours. With a sigh, player 001 sat down, grabbing his unfinished food. Just then he noticed your searching look and gave you a tentative smile.

“Hello, sir,” you began, looking down at your hands. A sudden wave of nervousness came over you. “I’m Y/N. Do you mind telling me your name?”

“No bother, Y/N,” he replied and you stared at his lips, at how perfectly they formed your name. “I’m Young-il. Nice to meet you.”

“You too,” you grinned at him in response, holding out your hand that he tentatively shook.

“Nice moves there,” you pointed your chin to the middle of the dormitory where the fight took place. “You could teach me if you had time, I’m terrible in combat.” A lie. Jun-ho himself taught you how to hold yourself and how to hold a gun. You were just trying to find out who Young-il was.

“If we have time, yes.” he nodded absentmindedly, scooping up a mouthful of rice.

“Do you mind me asking? I was just wondering if you have any children.” you said carefully.

“No, I don't.” Young-il replied, suddenly his gaze sharp.

“Well, I just thought that, based on your reaction to what that other player told you-“ you searched for the answer in his closely guarded expression. “You lost your child, didn’t you?”

Young-il didn’t say anything to that, his cutlery going limp in his hand.

“I just- I’d know that look anywhere. I know it’s not something to bond over,” you gave a startled laugh, fidgeting under his everlasting gaze, “but if you’d like to talk about it-“

“Thank you.” He reached out and squeezed your hand. His touch was calloused and warm. “I mean it.”

You smiled softly, squeezing his fingers in response. “I know.”

Preparing yourself for lights out, you couldn’t ignore his lingering gaze following your movements. Thankfully Gi-hun approached you and sat next to you on the bed, guilt visible in his expression.

“I’m so sorry, Y/N. I never wanted to drag you into this. And I’ll do everything in my power to keep you safe-“

“Don’t worry about that, sir. I can take care of myself. Anyways, I was only following Jun-ho’s orders. It had nothing to do with you.”

Unconvinced, Gi-hun sighed and moved to his own bed, not having the energy at the moment to argue with you. You finally lay down, moving the thin blanket over your body, curling up on your side.

“I overheard you talking about Jun-ho, and I couldn’t help but notice how familiar that name sounds to me,” Young-il broke the silence, looking at you with curiosity in his eyes.

“Well, he used to work as a police detective so that’s why you might know him.”

“Oh, yes, that might be possible,” Young-il gave you a restrained smile. “And he is to you-?”

“A friend. I used to work as a secretary in his department, that’s all.” you smiled back.

“Oh, sorry to pry.” he looked at his hands.

“Not at all.” He looked into your eyes and your eyes crinkled with another smile. Only when he looked away did you turn around in your bed. A few minutes later you heard Gi-hun and Young-il talking and even though you didn’t want to, it was impossible to not overhear. Young-il was explaining the story of why he’s in the games and why he chose to continue playing - how his pregnant wife was gravely ill and he needed the money due to her medical bills. Somehow, this answer shocked you, even though you shouldn't have been thrown off by it. Of course he was married.

Only after the whole dormitory fell silent did you finally fall into a fitful sleep.

***

“Thank you, Young-il.” you whispered to him, gratefully touching his shoulder. Young-il turned his gaze your way and the corners of his eyes crinkled under the influence of a smile. Only his supportive words during the six legged pentathlon could calm you down, which resulted in you successfully completing your mini game. The memory flashed through your mind - tears welling in your eyes, hands shaking as you reached again and again for the gong-gi pebbles. You could sense your teammates’ growing unease but that even worsened your situation. After the third attempt, Young-il grabbed you by the elbow, leaning closer as he said: “Ignore everything else okay? Just listen to me and focus.”

You nodded, bewildered eyes setting again on the pebbles. You were kneeling in a puddle of blood, which didn’t exactly help calm your nerves.

“Just concentrate. I know you can do it. Look at you, all flushed red and focused. This look suits you.” The pebbles balanced on the knuckles of your hand, just one more throw. You looked up at Young-il, lips slightly parted. Were you hearing correctly? Maintaining eye contact, you threw the pebbles op with a sudden surge of confidence and caught them flawlessly. Everyone cheered and you were hoisted up by your team, but all you could hear were Young-il’s last words whispered in your ear: “Good girl.”

Now he was looking at you, this new tension between you two palpable.

“Anytime.”

***

While you tried to act nonchalant, it was just impossible. The way Young-il now watched you at all times drove you crazy, feeling his gaze like a branding on your body. You were grateful for keeping a watch during the lights off, thinking that it could distract you from your own dirty thoughts. But it was quite the contrary.

Overlooking the silent dark room, those words echoed in you even more soundly. Good girl. With a sigh you stretched out your legs, trying to ignore the tightness in your underbelly. You were annoyed with yourself. Why did the words of a stranger make you feel this way? Words of a married stranger, more like it.

“You seem distracted.”

You jumped at that impassive raspy voice. Thankfully, once Young-ho sat down next to you, he couldn’t notice your flushed cheeks due to the impassable darkness. Your shoulders touched and to your surprise he didn’t immediately move away.

“Oh, it’s nothing, really.” you smiled with your head bowed, nearly chuckling at how clueless he must be.

There was an awkward silence following your reply, so, without thinking about it, you said: “Thank you again for today, truly. You helped me a lot.”

Young-il looked at you, searching for something in your expression. Apparently he found it. “You think about that a lot, don’t you?”

“Sorry?” you stumbled over your words, not knowing how to react, what to say.

“My words alone made you quiver. Now imagine what my tongue could do.” he whispered, teasing you, a spark in his eyes.

“Young-il-“ you breathed out, suddenly aware of how close his face was to yours. You felt your underwear getting wetter by the minute. But you put that all in the back of your mind as you said: “I know you are married. Expecting a child, even. You shouldn’t say things like that.”

He blinked, taken aback. “Does that bother you? Or are you bothered by the effect I have on you?”

You sighed, looking away from his handsome face. Was he sent here just to test your boundaries?

“I still have enough self control to know right from wrong.” But your body wasn’t in line with your thoughts.

Young-il stared at you for a moment, then sighed, irritated. “My wife and my child are gone. I just don’t enjoy talking about them in past tense. I joined the games out of misery, nothing more. Are you happy now?”

You froze, looking at the way his arms formed into fists at his sides. It was like having ice cold water poured all over you.

“Young-il, I’m so-“

“Don’t be. It’s been a long time.” Eyes meeting, he smiled at you tentatively. You squeezed his warm hand and he relaxed, loosening his fist.

“Right now, I don’t care about anything but you.” He caressed your cheek with the back of his hand, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear. Moving closer, he kissed the bruise already blossoming on your jaw. And you let him.

“I don’t want to scare you away with my… infatuation. But right now, I’m so desperately weak for you.” Your breathing hitched as he moved his lips to your ear.

Just when you thought he would kiss you, he suddenly pulled away.

“I’ll take over the watch. You should sleep, muster some energy for tomorrow.” You nodded as if in a trance. He helped you stand up and led you to your bed. Young-il left you standing there, leaving only the whisper of his lips branding your cheek.

***

The third game was a whirlwind of movement. Only thanks to Young-il were you still alive and breathing. Every time a number was announced, he firmly grasped your wrist and dragged you with him wherever he went. Not that you were complaining - you were so overstimulated by all the commotion that you were glad you could keep up with him.

When one player tried to separate you from him, Young-il bared his teeth and kicked him square in the chest. “She’s mine,” There it was, the cold expression and clenched jaw. Even though you were on the brink of dying, a shiver ran down your spine.

You made it safe with your group into one of the rooms and soon were walking out to play the last round. You knew exactly what the woman’s voice was going to announce and you were right: “Two.”

Young-il was already moving, pushing people out of your way. Everything seemed to go smoothly, until you reached the room; a player was already inside.

“Get out.” Young-il growled and reached the man, trying to get him on his legs and out of the room.

“We were here first,” the player whimpered. You noticed other players running to the door you were standing next to and panicking, you closed it, pushing your whole body against it.

You looked over your shoulder at Young-il, wanting to see if he was any closer to pushing the player out through the doors. But you froze when you saw he was holding the man in a headlock, choking him. All you could do was stare.

Young-il was looking straight back at you. And with one smooth motion of his arms he broke the man’s spine, leaving him staring at the ceiling, going limp in Young-il’s grip.

“I’d do anything for you, Y/N.” Young-il said, slowly getting up. You couldn’t tear your gaze from the lifeless body on the ground.

Only when he knelt in front of you did your eyes meet his. He grabbed your cold, shaking hands, kissing the knuckles while staring into your eyes.

“You’re scaring me,” you whispered, a tear rolling down your cheek.

“You poor thing,” Young-il said absentmindedly, wiping your tears away. “I can keep you safe, Y/N. I promise. All I’ve done was to prove that to you.”

“It’s scaring me how far you’re willing to go for me,” you sobbed, fighting the urge to flinch when he caressed your cheek. Still, you couldn’t find a reason to hate him. All the things he was saying were true, he did all of this for you, he killed a man for you, for your own safety.

The lock on the doors clicked and you closed your eyes, letting yourself be guided by Young-il out of the room. You knew that if you looked once more at the corpse, you would never let Young-il touch you again.

So you kept your eyes closed, choosing the easier path.

***

When the lights went out, all you could do was hold Young-il as hard as possible and count the minutes until the slaughter was over. Head against his chest, you concentrated on the sound of his heartbeat, every other sound pushed into the background. His hand was on your lower back, holding you as close as possible.

“I want to go home.” you whispered, clutching the front of his T-shirt like a small child. It was all a mistake. You shouldn’t be here.

“Okay, you will, okay? When we disarm the guards, you stay hidden, but once we take control of the rest, you have to come to my side, you understand?”

You nodded into his chest. Young-il kissed the crown of your head before leaving you under the bed as the guards tried to take control of the situation.

After many gunshots fired, you were crawling to the group of players formed in front of the main doors. Without hesitation you claimed one of the smaller guns for yourself. Somehow, the familiar weight of it calmed you down a bit. Young-il looked at you with tenseness.

“Keeping secrets, I see.” In reply you just loaded the gun, staring back.

Gi-hun looked your way over his shoulder, sending you a quick nod. The group exited the room, moving quickly down the corridor. Young-il stayed back, moving slower than the rest. Once the first guards got in your way, he pushed you to the side, saying: “This way!” Looking over your shoulder, everyone was shooting at the enemy, moving the other way. You looked back at him, unsure.

“You wanted to go home, didn’t you? Well, this is it.” seeing how indecisive you were, he sighed, “You trust me, don’t you?”

Hesitant, you followed his lead. You took the side stairs up and you got a bad feeling in your stomach. Young-il didn’t bother to check the corners, nor the other stories as you climbed the stairs. He walked like someone who knew this place, someone who wasn’t scared that he might be shot.

You stopped in your tracks, aiming your gun with a trembling hand. Young-il, upon noticing you were not following him, turned around. There was something like betrayal shining through his demeanour.

“You’re going to explain.” you said, trying to keep your voice and hand steady.

“Oh, Y/N, I think you already know.” Young-il pointed out, a corner of his lips curling up. He took one step towards you.

“What. Is. Your. Real. Name.” you said through gritted teeth, cocking your gun.

“Hwang In-ho.”

All this time, he was the long lost brother Jun-ho was trying to find. You felt the sting of betrayal in your bones.

“Was any of this real?” Tears stung in your eyes and you hated yourself for being so vulnerable.

“Oh, baby,” In-ho sighed, walking to you, kneeling in front of you again. The muzzle of the gun touched his forehead, which he seemed unbothered by.

“Everything.” he said, looking up at you.

“I keep trying to hate you,” you whispered, trying to muster at least some hatred that would make you pull the trigger. “It would be so much easier if I did.”

In-ho reached out and gently took the gun from your trembling hand. He threw in on the ground, making it slide on the floor.

“I know,” he whispered, grabbing your hips with his hands. He stared at you yearningly. There was a burning ache in your chest clawing its way into your throat.

“Stop looking at me like that.”

“I can’t. And I don’t think you want me to either.”

The worst part was that he was right.

“I know I should stay away from you, but I can’t. It’s not that simple.” A sob tore out of your throat, making it hard for you to breathe. There were so many emotions in you that your head was spinning. All you knew was the fact that you couldn’t hate the one person who deserved it the most.

“Stay with me, love. I beg you,” In-ho said hoarsely, gripping you harder, trying to make you understand. “You will be safe with me. I will not break that promise.” His eyes were filled with hope. “You felt it too, I know.”

You closed your eyes, composing yourself and your thoughts. You knew it was wrong. But you always had a weakness for the forbidden.

In-ho stood up, taking your face in his hands. He kissed your forehead, your temples, your jaw. And when he kissed you on the lips, you let yourself melt into the touch, forgetting everything else.

“You’ll be the death of me.” you whispered against his lips and he smiled into the kiss, knowing you were his.

[navybrat817]

Ficlet Friday?

A slightly buzzed Bucky just being the cutest or in love or both. Definitely a fluff-ficlet. Your choice on which Bucky 😉

I tried to make it fluffy, nonnie, but it does have a touch of angst. Sorry!

Pretty Girl

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Female Reader

Word Count: Over 700

Warnings: Tipsy Bucky, encouraging friends, slight angst

You were reading a book in the lounge when laughter rang out through the hall, a smile touching your lips. The guys decided to do a “boys' night out” and it sounded like they had a good time. Between being heroes and the trials and tribulations they all went through, they deserved it.

“Hey! Pretty girl!”

You didn't turn toward the sound of Bucky’s voice immediately as much as you wanted to. Glancing around, you were the only one in the lounge, so who was he talking to? It would mean everything for him to call you pretty, but you were just… you.

“Steeeeve. I don’t think she heard me,” Bucky loudly whispered.

“Then say it again with feeling,” Steve loudly whispered back.

“Got it.” Bucky sucked in breath which gave you enough time to cover your ears. “HEY! PRETTY GIRL!”

“Jesus Christ, I can hear you guys,” you confirmed, shutting your book. There went your quiet evening. “I guess stealth isn’t your strong suit tonight.”

You shrieked when Bucky suddenly sat beside you, casually throwing an arm over your shoulders. Okay, he was still stealthy, and he looked amazing in his jeans and henley. “There’s my pretty girl. I missed you,” he smiled.

“Um…” You looked around to find Steve, Thor, Sam, Joaquin, and Clint hovering by with expectant looks on their faces. You tried to come up with something witty, but all you said was, “What?”

Bucky chuckled, his cheeks a bit more pink than usual. “My pretty girl is adorable, isn’t she?” he said over his shoulder before looking at you with hearts in his eyes.

You leaned in to get a closer look at him, catching a small whiff of liquor mixed with his cologne. “You’re tipsy,” you said. How was that possible?

“No, I’m Bucky. And you’re pretty,” he smiled, the dreamy look still in his eyes. “Pretty eyes, pretty smile, pretty voice. Even your name’s pretty.”

As happy as you were to hear those things, even as your heart pounded, you looked to the guys for help because Bucky couldn’t be serious. “How?”

“My apologies,” Thor spoke even louder than usual. “I shared some of my Asgardian liquor with Barnes and Rogers and… Well-”

“Bucky hasn’t shut up about you,” Sam cut in, rolling his eyes. “‘My girl is the prettiest girl there is.’”

“‘Isn’t my girl brilliant? And so kind!’” Clint mocked.

“‘Her smile just lights up the room’,” Joaquin added.

“Guys, c’mon. It’s sweet,” Steve smiled before he said, “‘I’ll bet her kisses even taste pretty.’”

Heat filled your cheeks. Bucky didn’t deny a thing, so they were telling the truth, weren’t they? “But I’m not-”

The former Winter Soldier placed a hand on your cheek, drawing your attention back to him. “Don’t look at them, pretty girl. Look at me.”

You did, and it made you want to cry. Because you weren’t his girl. He was only saying these things because he was tipsy. “Okay. You had your fun, so why don’t you get some sleep?”

His smile fell away. “No,” he muttered, pulling you into his lap in the blink of an eye and putting his face in your neck. “I’m fine right here.”

His lips against your skin had you shivering, and it wasn’t possible to break from his hold. Being this close felt like a dream, but he was tipsy and you had to be the responsible one. “Um… a little help?” you asked.

“Of course.” Thor stepped forward. “Allow me.”

You smiled at the God of Thunder. “Thanks, I…” You stopped when he draped a blanket over you and Bucky. Where did that even come from? “That wasn’t what I-”

“And some water,” he smiled as Bucky nuzzled your neck with a happy moan. You tried not to let that moan turn you on. You had to be good. “Men, let us take our leave.”

“Behave, jerk,” Steve said as Thor shuffled everyone from the room.

“Shut up, punk,” Bucky snarled, nuzzling you again. The lights dimmed, too. It was almost romantic. “Not you, pretty girl. You can say whatever you want.”

You had to laugh. Laughter was better than worrying about what would happen in the morning. “So, I’m your pretty girl?”

“Yep,” he said with a smile. “All mine.”

“Okay, Sarge,” you smiled sadly. “I’m your pretty girl.”

Relaxing in his hold, you could pretend until he was sober that you were.

Love and thanks for participating in Ficlet Friday! ❤️ And this one may be fun to continue.

[tension4mari]

hiii so ive had this idea for a while now but i just dont have the skills to write it myself, its not really a reader x character but more of a maybe actor!reader x the actor of the character if u get me??😭😭

so the idea is actor!reader plays a character that is also played as the love interest/partner of hwang inho (lee byung hun's character) and during their scenes together (in can be like a cute/lovey dovey interaction between their characters or u can also make it a sex scene or both if ur up for it🤷‍♀️🤷‍♀️) reader just keeps messing up her lines or having trouble staying in character because she keeps getting flustered/shy by lee byung hun causing them to redo the scene over and over again so him and the whole cast just keeps laughing and teasing her about it😣😣🙏🙏🙏

I got you! NOW. I'm not the best at writing smut ^-^ so bare with me here!

✮⋆˙Paring - Actor!Reader x Actor!Lee Byung-Hun

Summary - Just read 😭-

๋࣭ ⭑⚝Working with Lee Byung-Hun was always hard for you. Seeing his handsome sharp features always had you in a chokehold. You didn't know exactly what it was about him that drawled you in with him. Was it his hair? personality? His amazing acting skills? You just couldn't put your finger on it.

๋࣭ ⭑⚝You were now in the indoor filming set with your crew getting ready to film you and Lee's part of the movie. Your roll was acting as his wife. Finally getting in check you get up and walk over to the set getting ready to film both of you guys part.

๋࣭ ⭑⚝"Ready 'y/n'?" called out one of your supervises "Yeah! All good to go" you said "You got it!" Lee walks onto set and you swear you could feel the wind get knocked out of you. Looking straight in your direction "You're all set 'y/n'?" he says coming closer. "Mhm!' you quickly say, stepping back just a little to create a distance you don't need between the two of you.

๋࣭ ⭑⚝"That's great, let's start" Lee say's "

The sence was simple. All it required was for you to get pulled over from your waist by Lee and get told a few words. See? not so hard, you told yourself.

๋࣭ ⭑⚝"Aright, take one... Go!" the director called out.

Soon enough Lee came towards you, gradually grabbing you from the waist, speaking from his angelic voice, "I've heard what happened while I was at work. Are you alright Mylove?" He says and you can feel your face start to burn up "Yes I'm fine, I wasn't caught in the crossfire fortunately" you Stummer out "Thats wonderful to hear Love, I was worried sick about you" he spills Getting closer to you. This was the part you were supposed to kiss at, and God, were you not ready once he pulls in, face slowly but surely inches from yours Comes in and kisses you.

๋࣭ ⭑⚝You pull back and throw your head to the side, Lee frowns and askes you what's wrong. And all you could do is shake your head and backup "Um uh- nothing, Its nothing!" all of the crew members are staring and starts to crack up. "Y/n, what the hell was that!." you coworker says jokily while dying from laugher, "Hey that's not even funny! You guys are a joke" you defend yourself while covering you face with your hand, Lee hand comes up to yours and pull your hands down so he can see our face "Oh God, and look even her face is burning with red!" Another coworker says laughing "Ughhh! you guys are the worse!" you say while turning away.

๋࣭ ⭑⚝You both ended up having to redo the sence more than 3 times each time you were messing up

๋࣭ ⭑⚝'Im calling in a break" you hear your director say Lee then turns to you "Y/n, I need to speak to you" "oh.. Yeah, um what's up?" "privately" he says. He leads you towards his trailer and open the door so that you can walk in first.

๋࣭ ⭑⚝You both are inside his trailer and he speaks "So. What was al of that about earlier?" "uh..Huh? i have no idea what you're talking about" you mumble looking away. He grabs your chin softly and make you look at him "Don't pay foolish with me. You know exactly what I'm talking about." he says, staring at you daring for you to lie again.

๋࣭ ⭑⚝"I- ok. I admit it. I've got a crush on you Mr. Byung-Hun." "..." it gets quiet for a moment, he's still staring at you. But then he leans forward and kisses you. "Mm, how long? he says while breaking from the kiss looking at you. "Uhm, two years." "Really? two years? why'd you didn't say anything earlier' 'Y/n'"i feel the same way." "Well i can only assume since... you just kissed me." You speak "You got a mouth on you, you know That?" He says grabbing your waist. "Yeah... I do, are you going to do something about that?' "I might just have to." he say

๋࣭ ⭑⚝ "Oh yea?" "Yeah" He says kissing and sucking on your neck gradually. You let out a small moan that has him ushering to get more out of you. He pulls his knee up in between your tights , onto your cunt. "Oh, fuck-, that feels good" you say out of breathe from all of the moaning you've been doing. He pulls his knee down which causes you to frown at the loss of friction. "C'mere" he says pulling you towards the couch.

๋࣭ ⭑⚝"He sits down, pulling his cock from his pants. "Take off those." He says hurriedly wanting to feel you on his cock immediately. You take off your jeans along with your panties in a quick swift.

๋࣭ ⭑⚝You climb ontop of Lee's lap slowly sinking down on his shaft "Fuck- You feel amazing" you only hum in agreement. He then starts moving his hips, throwing his head into the crook of your shoulder.

๋࣭ ⭑⚝"Mmp-i need to feel more of you" he says as he stuffs inch after thick inch into your cunt. "Shit, I don't think I can take anymore-". He lifts up his hips fucking you deep and hard, thrust after thrust.

๋࣭ ⭑⚝"You're doing so good for me. J'-Just take it-,hmhp. I know you can" He mutters against the skin of your neck.

๋࣭ ⭑⚝The way he fucks his way into your tight pussy you thought you saw stars. "M'm close" you spoke , pussy hugging his cock. Ah! shit!" you screamed while arching your back further.

๋࣭ ⭑⚝Lee quickens his thrusts, adjusting to the rhythm. You moan once more, cumming on his cock. He continues to fuck into your hips none stop, He grunts loudly as he cums hardly into you.

๋࣭ ⭑⚝ "I want to take you to dinner 'y/n'." Lee spoke softly. "Yeah?" you said turning to look him in the eyes. "This weekend." "I'm up for it!, Can't wait till then" you say laughing

๋࣭ ⭑⚝He thinks you're the most beautiful person he's ever seen when you laugh. "Well, that's settled. We have to get back on set before breaks over. he voices.

Bro- this is so bad I WANNA CRY.

I am also so SORRYYYY this took so long to write. I had to start this over 4 different times 😔 i just cant- UGHHHH

[grison-in-space]

One of my favorite teaching moments was the time that one of the students in my class (a Classics double major that had long since forgotten that anyone else in Genetics Lab might have humanities interests) snapped the opening lines to another student out in the middle of a play argument. I gasped at him, the other student demanded to know what the first had said, I provided my own translation ("I'll rape you in the ass and mouth, cockslut Aurelius and ass-hungry Marcus") and formally made the point that we do not say shit like this unless we expect to stand by our words when someone unexpectedly understands them. Then we got into a brief argument about whether irrumare is better translated as "to skullfuck" or "to rape one's face" and a much longer discussion about the way that toxic masculinity relates to homosexuality and prescriptive sexual behavior.

For the record, what aetherograph is referring to is actually the Roman verb irrumare itself. It is a violent word, and while all the folks above are right that Romans and Greeks alike had a lot of moral panic surrounding men being the receiving partner of penetrative sex, irrumare is specifically more threatening and insulting than, say, pedicare: you're specifically muting the person and potentially blocking their airways here, making them even more vulnerable. It also implies very strongly that the penetrating person is controlling the movement: this is not a verb that can be translated synonymously to "blowing" a person, for example. The word means to forcibly fuck a person's mouth, an act so degrading that it is beyond imagination that an upstanding man would or could tolerate it without being forced.

These are Bad Words to a Roman, and I think translations should incorporate that as well as trying to convey the violence of the words. I really don't like translations that try to downplay the extent to which Catullus 16 is a very, very vivid rape threat in response to (inferred) loss of masculine status on account of spending too much time and attention with female lovers. I think there is a tendency to be delighted by profanity and obscenity themselves in the hallowed halls of literature, and certainly this is one hell of an ancient Italian poetic tradition that continues well into the modern day. But I also think that obscenity and poetry both exist to turn strong feelings into meaning, and I think Catullus' poetry is most powerful and effective when we stop thinking about how naughtily he was saying something and start thinking about what exactly he was saying as he did it.

Catullus certainly is one of the Roman poets that fucked, but Catullus 16 is not a romantic poem but a violent one. (This isn't that uncommon for Catullus, who writes vividly about sex, emotion, and violence as recurring themes and can be almost as aggressive to women as to men. One of his other famous ones, Catullus 11, involves him feeling spurned by a lover and declaring that his friends Furius and Aurelius should go tell her that he says he hopes she's happy with all her many suitors, her three hundred lovers, none of which she truly touches despite the rupture of their thighs; another (Catullus 58) has him complaining that his lover whom he was so attached to is off lying in the back alleys fucking all the "grandsons of Remus," AKA any Roman who shows up and hikes up his tunic.) He was also very capable of mushy sweetness! But the anger is always there lurking beneath the surface.

He was a complicated guy. His poetry is constructed in careful layers of meaning around astonishingly raw emotions, glittering and artistic to behold. He was absolutely a man of his own time and place, which makes him translator catnip. But that time and place was Imperial Rome, and translators ought to work to communicate exactly what sort of place Rome could be, too.

you cant even begin poems with "i will sodomise and facef uck you" anymore. because of woke .

[sierrale8ne]

40 DAYS AND 40 NIGHTS CHAPTER SIXTEEN

thought i’d be lying if i said ‘i didn’t want you to myself.’ when you look me in my eyes and, tell me that it’s mine, i…

pairing wnba!paige bueckers x singer!oc

taglist @thaatdigitaldiary @ohbueckers @wbbgetsmewetter @rosemariiaa @tndaqlifwy @pboogerswbb @xxloveralways14 @makethemhoesmad @slvt4her @luvapaigeeyy @hedidnotpleaseme @paigesbabygirl @mopopshop @omg-imtumbling @numberonepartyanth3m @wbb4l @authentic-girl03 @slut4uconnwbb @unadulteratedcyclepaper @kplum10 @fuddfanatic35 @avvwritesstufff @paigesluver @bueckersbitch @ryywyd @lupinqs

warnings long chapter (9.3k words), sexual content (fucking filth, you’re welcome!)

kalena speakss 🪽! i’m so so sorry for the wait, i’ve been lazy and also interrupted multiple times while writing. anyways, there’s nothing i’ve enjoyed writing, more than paige and maraye’s story. so, i thank you guys for all the support since it’s dropped and all the interactions and comments and anons, y’all truly make me laugh. i have an epilogue and around two bonus chapters planned so be on the look out for those. i’d love some live reactions to this one if you guys are up for it! anyway enjoy the finale with my babies, i put pen to paper for this one!

July 2025 — Indianapolis, Indiana

“You can’t answer your phone now?”

“Pa—”

“My girl just treatin’ me like I’m chopped damn liver.”

“Pai—”

“Who you with?”

“Paige!” I finally cut in, shaking my head and tapping the FaceTime button on the screen. “Shut up for a second, and pick up.” I groan.

The sound of the call connecting, finally comes through, and I can’t help but press the photo button when I see her, all laid out on her hotel bed with an arm behind her head. Her face is flushed, hair slightly sweating from her first All-Star practice. A pout graces her lips and her eyes squint as she scowls.

“Hi.” I grin.

“What’s so important that you can’t answer my calls?” She asks again, staring at me intensely through the screen.

I roll my eyes at her eagerness. Our plane landed early that morning, and after getting checked in at our respective hotels, Paige had practice and I went out to do some shopping. “I’m tryna find an outfit for our date.” I explain, looking over at the girls next to me who attempt to help me out.

“You by yourself?” She asks. Her eyebrows furrow, and knowing Paige, I know she’s pissed that I didn’t ask her to come with me. 

I shake my head, panning the camera to reveal both Nika and Azzi next to me. I’m not sure how this came about, but a few texts and an invitation later the two were joining me at the mall. 

“You didn’t tell us that Raye looked this good in person!” Nika speaks into the phone. I cover the lower half of my face with my hand, an attempt to hide my growing blush. 

“And for good reason.” The blonde replies before turning her attention towards me. “Baby, you ignorin’ me to hang out with them? That’s how you feelin’?”

I’ve spent the last hour and a half understanding why Nika and Azzi were Paige’s best friends. They were involved, and not in that nagging annoying way, they cared. They cared about Paige and wanted to keep her happy. Which in turn, meant they cared about my business with the woman.

I laugh at Paige, my attention still not fully on her as I assume she’d want. “I’m not ignoring you. I need to find an outfit, blondie.”

“Y’know you could wear a trash bag and I’d still wanna take you out, right?”

“That’s what I said!” Azzi sings into my ear. “But I will say, this one is perfect.” The girl says. Azzi holds up one of the two-piece sets I was yet to try.

“Girl you gotta try it on. I like it too.” Nika affirms.

Suddenly my phone is an afterthought. “Really? It’s not too casual?”

“Lemme see.”

“It’s Indiana. I promise this isn’t casual.” Azzi explains.

“Hellooo?”

“Your ass would look perfect in this skirt tho’. Wear this one!” Nika shakes the outfit on the hanger a little more harshly.

“Ight now I really need to see it.”

I look back and forth between the two women, both outfits fitting completely different vibes. The denim co-ord in Azzi’s hands would accentuate my hips and my tits, which Paige simply would fall out over. The black set in Nika’s hands might stop us from going out to dinner all together.

“P, what’s the dress code?” I turn back, looking down at her astonished face on my screen. Her lips slightly parted eyes blown wide.

“So know you remember I exist?” She teases.

I give her a tilt of my head, enough to let her know I want her to shut up. “Dress code, please?”

“Uh-I-I dunno. Nothin’ too fancy, nothin’ too casual.” Paige shrugs.

“Well whatchu wearin’?” I ask.

I know my choice of words should’ve been picked a bit better because Nika snickers beside me and Paige lets out a laugh, sending me that smirk of hers that makes my knees go a little bit weak in the store. 

“Ayo?” Paige jokes, covering her mouth with her palm.

“Paige Madison.”

“I’m wearin’ jeans!” She finally answers when her laughter dies down. “Jeans and a black tee, maybe a jacket. I dunno yet.”

I huff, looking back at the options the three of us have picked out. Paige was right, what I put on didn’t really matter. At least not as much as I thought it did. But this is our first date, my first date with a girl, with Paige— who isn’t just any girl. 

So I pick up the set in Nika’s hands, the black fabric running through my fingers. It is perfect. “I’ll see you tonight, okay?”

Paige nods, her lips folding into a small grin. “Tonight.”

—

I run my hand anxiously down the side of my jeans, catching a glimpse of the white patchwork on the knees and taking a deep breath outside the door. I’m nervous. Which is a feeling I’m not very used to yet. 

In my entire 23 years of living, I think I’ve only ever been on three first dates. Two in high school and one in college with Nyla. Though, I don’t really think I could ever consider that a date.

Either way, the number was slim to none which left me with zero clue of what to expect tonight. Especially from Maraye.

She was unpredictable. Nothing about her ever completely the same. She kept me on my damn toes, which was great but also so confusing at the same time.

I knocked on the hotel door softly before digging my hands into the pockets of my Kith jacket. Along with my black baggy jeans, I threw on a simple black shirt and a jacket. She might’ve never said it out loud, but with the way she always looks at me when I wear it, I know that black is Raye’s favorite color on me. As is mine on her.

My fingers are decorated with silver rings. I have on two different chains, the first is a simple one with a cross and the second is my diamond 5 chain. I figured that a first date calls for pulling out all the stops. 

My stomach suddenly bubbles with anxiousness and my pulse is heard in my ears as I wait for her. This is it. Our first date, and the more I repeat it in my head, the more surreal it sounds.

I was right about not knowing what to expect with Raye, because I knew she’d look good but I wasn’t ready for her to look this damn good.

She wears this black two piece. The skirt is long and low waisted, giving me a view of the fine lines of her abdomen, a thin waist chain and a navel piercing, both gold that make my mouth water. The matching shirt falls off of her left shoulder, a velvet bunch of material that is ruched on her side. 

All Raye ever wears is gold, which doesn’t change now, her rings are thin bands, and there are bracelets adorning her wrists from Van Cleef and Louis Vuitton. She’s dripped down in it, and it makes her glow even more than normal. Her scent, Chanel no.5 as per usual, travels up to my nose and I swear I could pass out from getting my eyes on her alone.

“Goddamn, Miss Carter.”

“Gimme a second, sorry.” She laughs, a pure and bright laugh that makes my eyes go wide.

I clear my throat, nodding my head while shamelessly raking my eyes over her. “Got all dressed up for me, huh?” I say, taking Maraye’s invitation to enter her room, the door closing behind me.

She scoffs. “You fuckin’ wish.” And if it weren’t for the fact that I heard from her own mouth that this outfit was specifically for tonight, I would have believed her. “I look good tho’?”

I nod almost immediately, my head moving before I could really even process what she just asked me. Because she looks damn good. Not just her clothing, the fine lines of each of her tattoos are shown off by what she wears, and her hair is completely different from when I saw it just this morning. Her curls blown out and trailing down her shoulders. She looks like a fucking model.

“You look—fuck. Raye, are you serious? You look gorgeous, ma.” I say, still almost breathless. “Y’know, I actually brought sum for you.”

“Why?”

I laugh at her reaction. “I mean, your birthday was yesterday. I was supposed to give it to you at the house, but someone was tryna get in my pants all night.” Raye instantly breaks eye contact with me at that, eyes traveling to the ceiling.

I dig into my back pocket, grasping the thin box in my hand before showing it to her. It’s simple, a thin sleek white that looks perfect against her hands.

Maraye looks at me skeptically, her eyebrow raising before she darts her eyes down at the box. She pulls the lid off carefully and I watch her intensely. The way she pouts at the thin line of jewelry in the box. There’s a gold Angel pendant in the center. 

“Paige.” She starts, and her feet are moving in an instant. She brings an arm to my cheek cupping it before leaning into me and placing her lips on my other cheek. “It’s beautiful.”

“Yeah? You like it?” I can feel my skin get hot and I lick my lips.

“Mmhmm. Love it, blondie.” Maraye nods, a grin spreading across her cheeks and I swear I see her blush just a little. “Imma wear it tonight.”

I can’t even hide my face, completely taken aback. “Y-you don’t have to. Really, it ain’t a big deal. If y’ont like it—”

“No. I do like it and I am wearing it.” She reaches down for my wrist, pulling me further into the hotel room. “Help me put it on.” Raye smiles, and just like that all my nerves are gone. Because she’s here, just like I want her to be. She’s all dressed up, saying all the right things, and smiling that smile that makes me forget that we do have places to be. 

I take the gold chain in my hands, raising my hands over her head and taking my spot directly behind her in the full length mirror. I clasp it, looking at how that pendant sits perfectly on the glistening hollow between her collarbones. 

“It’s perfect.” My arms settle around her waist, my chin in the crook of her neck. I watch her watch the two of us in the mirror, her fingers tracing over where it decorates her neck in gold. “It’s a cute angel.”

I hum and press my lips against the column of her neck. “My angel, yeah?” And I know I live for the way her face blushed at it. Her ears visibly reddening and her eyes darting away from me in the mirror.

Raye’s head turns to meet mine, her glossed lips immediately catching my attention as they curl upwards into a smile. Then she nods. A simple fucking nod that makes my entire body feel hot. We’re inches apart, I can see the gears in her head turning. I just know Raye thinks she’s slick, but I catch the way her eyes move down to my lips anyway.

“C’mon. Let’s go.” She murmurs, breaking our intense gaze with a slight stutter. I peel my arms off her waist and step back. She reaches for her purse, tossing the black YSL bag onto her shoulder and doing one last look over the room before looking back at me. 

All of a sudden the resolve I’ve attempted to have over the last 24 hours is out of the window. All I can think about is taking her right here, I don’t care about dinner. I care about the face she’d make under me, my name off her tongue, how fucking good I know she’d taste on mine. She looks like a dream, that fabric hugging every curve of that perfect—

“We’re gonna be late.” 

I lick my lips for what feels like the 50th time since I’ve been here. Stalking over to her, I immediately wrap an arm around her waist, pulling her into me until I can feel her belly piercing pressing up against my abdomen.

“I’m makin’ you mine, the second dinner is over.” I mumble, my lips dangerously close to hers.

She’s enjoying this, the way I visibly go crazy for her. The way I stop holding back because frankly, I don’t think I have to anymore. Raye doesn’t have to say it, but the way she arches her body into mine and grips at my bicep lets me know it’s turning her on too. Or at least I’ll pretend it does.

“Coulda done it last night.” Raye shrugs. “Or this morning.” She says pointedly. Her other hand reaches for mine on her waist, tugging it off and pushing it to my side. She spins on her toes, placing one kitten heeled foot in front of the other as she reaches for the door. 

I don’t even wait a second before my hand meets her ass.

“Paige!”

“Ain’t no way you thought I wasn’t gonna do that at least once.” She frowns at me, stepping to the side of the open doorway and looking at me expectantly.

“Walk in front of me.”

“Ma—”

“In front. Go.” Raye grits through her teeth, and when she looks at me like that I know better than to ignore her. I step through the doorway, watching behind me as she shuts it behind her. “You’re so annoying.”

I don’t answer, rather sticking my hand, palm up, for her to take. And she does. It’s then when I know that this is where I’m supposed to be, with her holding my hand. It’s simple, but still I think it makes my body react like it never has before.

She interlocks her fingers with mine, the coolness of her rings press into the sides of my fingers. She’s smiling, again. I drag her behind me, trying to get used to the feeling of our hands together, but all it does is mess up my head more. 

“You look really pretty by the way.” She murmurs, her eyes are glued to the floor when I look at her. I know my hand is sweating as a reaction to her compliment, and I don’t know what to do besides muttering a ‘thank you’ with a cheeky smile. 

I know I’m fucked. All I’m thinking now is that I have to make it through dinner. That’s it.

Get through dinner.

—

When I look away from our waiter— who has just informed us that a mistake was made in the kitchen and that our appetizers would be on the house— and over at Paige, she’s rolling her eyes and taking a sip from the wine she hated, but still insisted on getting an entire bottle of. She did it to make me happy, of course, even though I insisted that it wasn’t an issue for her to get her beloved Shirley temple.

She’s kissing her teeth, setting down the wine glass before picking up a slice of focaccia bread and smearing it in butter. “We need a different waiter.”

I can’t help but laugh at her sudden statement. “You’re being dramatic.” I say, following suit in throwing some bread into my own mouth.

“He tryna fuck you.” She points at me. I find her jealousy and blatant vulgarity amusing, especially when our waiter had to be no older than 18 years old. 

I lick the crumb from the corner of my lips. “And how would you know that, Madison?”

“Bro was lookin’ at you how I look at you. And that’s sayin’ something.” She says loudly, as if it’s obvious. My eyes go wide as I attempt to get her to quiet down. Paige did a good job of getting us a secluded table. Throw in the soft jazz that played and the ambiance of the low light, she did wonderful at making dinner as romantic as she could.

But it was obvious that dealing with our waiter was not in her evening plans.

“Stop it, no he wasn’t.” I brush her off, reaching for my nearly empty first glass of wine. The scent travels through my nose, just barely adding to my growing tipsiness. 

“And you're just flirting back. Smilin’ all big and shit.” Paige groans. “Showing all 32 is crazy.”

Her adamant attitude makes me smile, “He works in service, I’m being nice!”

“Flirting.”

“That boy prolly hasn’t even graduated high school yet, Paige.” I roll my eyes.

“You’re flirting.”

“You just love arguing wimme, huh?” I ask, leaning on my elbows to peer into her eyes across the table. 

She grins, crossing her arms as she leans into me in the same way I am. “Were you not the one all hot and bothered by me yelling at you on the plane?”

I smirk at the memory. The way her eyes turned dark when I suggested she talk to me like that again. How she was so set on keeping her word but still fell victim to my antics on her lap. And I was so close to getting her how I wanted her if it hadn’t been for her fucking stubbornness.

“See that was me flirting.” I say, trying to get that event out of my head before I’m proving Paige right and getting all bothered again. 

She shakes her head at me, scratching at her top lip with her thumb. The blonde takes her attention off me when that waiter comes back with our food. My blackened salmon and shrimp glistened in the sauce it came with. Alongside Paige’s ribeye steak, mashed potatoes, and broccolini.

She took control of the conversation with ease, allowing him to set down our plates before refilling our glasses of wine. I didn’t even spare a glance at our waiter because in my head, I’m thinking that there isn’t a moment in the last few months where Paige has looked hotter to me than she does right now.

I’d like to think that her choice of all black was purposeful because she knows how I react to it, but everything else has me losing my train of thought every few seconds into our conversations and whatever else that boy is saying to the both of us. Her Rolex watch gleams in the light each time she moves, the same with the diamonds of her 5 chain and earrings. Paige’s hair is slicked back into a bun that, outside of her wearing it down, might be my favorite style of hers.

I watch her intently, each movement of her fingers and arms. The way she licks her lips. Even the fake smile she gives to the waiter. Her fingers wrap around her glass, raising it slightly and tipping it towards my own. It’s then when I realize I’ve been doing nothing but staring and that I should probably follow suit.

“Be more slick next time.” Paige chuckles, our glasses finally clinking together. Her lips are just slightly glossed, a mixture of a sheer pink that makes them look even more beautiful than they already are when they touch the glass.

I take a heady gulp of my wine before reaching for my fork and knife, collecting them in one hand and draping the black cloth they came in over my lap. “Says the one who been staring at my tits all night, thinkin’ I didn’t notice.”

Paige tries to hide the face she makes, she really does. But when mine finally meet her blues, she folds almost immediately, swiping a hand over her chin and licking her lips with a gentle laugh. 

“I dunno what you’re talking about.”

I look down at my plate while Paige does the same, my mouth heavily watering when I get a glimpse of my food, but even more when I see Paige’s plate.

“Madisonnnn.” I sing. My recent abuse of her middle name has made her smile all night, but this time she doesn’t. Mostly because she knows exactly what I’m asking for.

She shakes her head, preparing to cut her medium-rare steak, “absolutely not.”

“It’s my birthday.”

“Yeah, yesterday.”

“C’mon, just one bite.” I pout, hoping that it does what it normally does, and that is get her to crack.

She cuts a bite of the steak making sure to swipe it against the garlic butter on the plate before feeding it to herself. “You haven’t even tried your salmon yet, angel.”

On instinct I run my heel against her inner calf, moving it up higher until it’s up against her thigh. Paige’s eyes snapped to mine and I stuck out my lip, playfully batting my eyelashes at her. 

“Please, baby?” I murmur softly. The pet name feels foreign on my tongue, not just because It’s my first time saying it in reference to Paige. I genuinely can’t remember the last time I’ve used it at all.

She swallows her steak and I watch her hand travel under the table. Paige gives me that fucking smirk, gripping my ankle and holding it in place against her lap to stop my antic. “Try your food first.” 

I tug my ankle away from her and drop it to the floor, huffing before taking a bite of my perfectly seasoned salmon.

“How is it?” Paige asks, tapping a finger against the edge of the table.

I let the food melt on my tongue, “it’s amazing.” I mumble, following it with a sip of wine.

Paige nods in approval, cutting a piece of her steak as she did once before. She dangles the fork in my face like a dog with a toy. “C’mere, mama.”

I smile, not even bothering to hide it from her as I lean in some more, taking the bite she offered and letting the fork teasingly linger in my mouth. 

“Good?”

I dance in my seat. “Good. I think mine tastes better tho’.”

And Paige rolls her eyes. Scooting backwards from me and getting back to eating. Happily getting her own playful revenge on me as she does so.

—

“You were what?” I ask, nearly choking on air as I laugh.

I sit on the edge of my hotel bed, foot bouncing eagerly as I talk to Raye through the wall that separates the main room from the bathroom in which she entered the second I got the door open. I’m guessing the multiple glasses of wine was a bad idea for the both of us. Especially tonight, because I’m going crazy now that it’s just me and her.

I’m supposed to be all ears to our conversation, to her telling me about her nerdy high school endeavors. And I am finding amusement at every bit. 

Then, each time I blink, I’m thinking about her in that skirt. How her ass sits perfectly in it. The glistening glow of her waist chain on the perfectly defined abdomen, the curves of her hips. 

I can hear her groan over my laugh, before the water of the sink begins running. “Theater, Paige. I did theater. Quit laughing, you idiot!” She yells out.

“You were a thespian? Like for real?” 

The water cuts off, and her heels click against the bathroom tile before muffling against the carpet. Raye’s hips sway as she approaches me, 

“You were a lesbian jock. And you still are, so shut up.” The grits, slipping the heels off her feet and standing between my legs. Her words don’t even click in my head, all my attention is on her.

I reach my hands up to her thighs, gripping them through the fabric. “Put on a show for me then.”

“That was the best line you could come up with?” Raye asks, a laugh freeing itself from her throat. Her hands tugged mine off of her body, leaving my palms cold from her absence.

“You tellin’ me you got something better?”

“Mmhmm.”

When she steps back I swear I’ve died and gone to heaven. Slowly, Raye pulls that black top off of her head, showing off her gorgeous, navy, lace bra. It cups her tits just right, complementing the brown of her skin and the gold of her jewelry so good I wanna rip the rest of those clothes off.

“‘Member what you said last night? Teach you and you’ll teach me, or whatever?” She breathes. I just nod again, reaching forward for Raye’s hip. 

She smirks, sending my entire body into orbit. I’m soaked through my boxers and my jeans, completely enthralled by the way she looks before me. 

Raye bores those perfect brown eyes into mine while she hooks her thumbs in the waistband of her skirt. “Wanna teach me sum then?” She tells me. I should’ve known that we couldn’t go more than five minutes in this room together before I was wanting to fuck her raw. Slow and deep and carnal and fucking raw. Wanting to give her everything that she’s never had before. 

I shoot up to my feet, watching her skirt pool on the floor. She steps out of it, rolling her neck up to look at me through her lashes. 

My eyes gaze over her body once more, how the lace on her hips clings to them. Her hair, bombshell curls— that I still don’t think I really ever got over— flipped over to one side and tattoo’s that decorated her skin in that perfect ink. 

“I've been tryna take my time with you.” I groan, running a palm over my chin, “makin’ this shit so hard.”

She catches me by surprise when she throws her arms around my neck, arching her chest towards my face. The line of her cleavage is even more defined by the simple moment.

“Teach me.”

I take a breath. “On everything, I ain’t stopping when I start.”

“Teach. Me.”

—

I swear Paige is kissing me before I can even finish my words. Lips on my harsh and certain. The first time, she was so delicate; like she was trying to figure me out. The second time was desperate, and I’m sure if it wasn’t for us getting interrupted she would’ve turned me out in the studio that night. The third time was like a goodbye. Short and sweet, but full of everything we were yet to say.

This one? It’s like oxygen after drowning. Maybe it was all the strain we’ve been feeling since our fight, or all the sexual tension that we’ve been tiptoeing around over the last 24 hours. But I feel like I’m floating, like her hands that dig into my hips let me become one with the sky as her lips dance on mine.

Paige tastes like perfection. Not anything I can specifically point out except for the wine and the slight sweetness from our shared Oreo cheesecake. 

I pull back, breaking the suction of our lips. She eyes the line of saliva that connects us, and I know it turns her on because Paige doesn’t even bother licking it away. She just brings me back, sliding her hands to my ass and gripping it as she entangles our tongues.

I suck on her hers sloppily, feeling myself grow wetter when she moans into the kiss. My hands cup her jaw angling my head just right so I can get more of her, more of anything.

In a swift movement she’s throwing off her jacket, the sound of it crashing to the floor muffled by the sound of our kisses. She’s turning me over, backing me towards the bed until I hit the foot of it. Paige lays me down, her action so gentle compared to the way she digs into my hips. 

All of a sudden I’m hyper aware of it all. Of how I’m standing here in nothing but carefully picked lingerie, letting Paige fucking Bueckers kiss me within an inch of my life. How desperate I must seem for her, but she doesn’t care, equally as needy for me. 

“Mine all fuckin’ night.” She murmurs on my lips, pulling away to lick her own as we both catch our breath. The coolness of her chain drags against my clavicle, making me gasp into her. Paige shakes her head, looking at me like she can’t even believe I’m real, before tilting my head with her hand at my jaw. Her lips attached to the line of it. “Gon’ fuck you till you can’t take it.”

I’m nodding, cupping her head to hold her there. I search her hair for the hair tie that holds her bun together, finding it and tugging her locks free so it falls down her shoulders. Paige kisses her way down my neck, finding my sweet spot almost too easily. 

My other hand darts under her shirt to tug at the waistband of her jeans, moaning breathlessly when she sucks on that spot right where my neck meets the top of my chest. “Fuck.” I groan, deciding that the quicker I get these clothes off, the quicker I get to leave her bed a fucking mess. “Take this shit off, P. Now.”

I tug at the hem of her black shirt and Paige pulls back from me, lips swollen and wet, to ruck her shirt off and toss it on the floor. I trail my eyes over her body; muscular shoulders tanned from the sun of summer, sports bra clad to her chest, line of her abs and that obvious V that leads down into her pants.

It’s the hottest thing I’ve ever seen.

She cages me in with her arms, which flex at every subtle movement. Paige starts with the kissing again, first with a bite to my earlobe before she trails lower and lower. Over the tattoo down the side of my neck, until she meets my chest. “You so perfect, angel.”

I hum, feeling myself get wetter and wetter with each word she says. “Paige.”

“Mm?” She purrs, looking up at me with her lips attached to the swell of my breast.

“Been—mmph— been wantin’ you for months, baby. Stop teasing and fuck me.” I stutter, allowing my fingers to tangle in her long blonde locks. 

Paige curls her arm under my body, grounding my hips with one hand and unclipping my bra with the other. It comes easy for her, and my mind briefly travels to that place where I’m wondering how many girls she’s had to have done this to for it to be that simple. She peels my bra down my arms, tossing it behind her as well. The way she looks at me, like I’m prey, makes me realize I don’t fucking care. I can’t care, not when it’s just me and her.

“I gotchu, baby. I do, jus’ lay back.” Paige says. She licks up the center of my body before turning her head to lick at my nipple, swirling her tongue around it messily. She wraps her lips around it, sucking on my tit like it’s a pacifier. “So fine. Shit unreal.” 

She does the same to my other breast, squeezing the flesh in her hand, biting at my nipple. She’s nasty. As I expected her to be, with the way she’s been acting since I met her. But this, the worshiping of my body is something I’ve never had before. With anyone.

Paige trails sloppy kisses down my torso, leaving hickeys on my stomach that I know I’m going to have to cover up in order to wear my outfit tomorrow.

She gets settled between my legs, trailing her nose against the hem of my panties. “Need this pussy, ma. Needa taste you.” She bites at the lace, snapping it against my inner leg and I whimper.

Her thumb curls into them, being slow and gentle with the way she tugs the clothing down my legs. “This okay?”

“Yeah. It’s okay.” I nod, lifting my hips to aid her. “So okay.”

In response she grins at me, kissing across my pelvis down to my inner thighs. Her eyes glued to mine, blues dark with how wide her pupils have dilated, before they dart between my legs to my soaked cunt. “Fuck, Raye.” She groans, pressing her thumb to my clit.

“P, I need—”

“No fuckin’ way you been keepin’ this from me.” Paige shakes her head in disbelief, kissing my thigh softly. “Gonna make it mine, baby. I swear.” 

She’s leaning in at that, running her tongue up through my folds with the softest lick that makes my eyes roll instantly. I toss my head onto the pillows, letting her grip my inner thighs as she speeds up. 

“Pussy tastes fuckin’ incredible, mama. So sweet.” Paige groans, lapping at my cunt like she hasn’t eaten in ages. Her lips wrapping around my clit, tongue running on the underside of it. She’s a fucking pro, garnering reactions that I’ve never had before.

My fingers grip the sheets beside me, back arching off the bed. “God, P. F—uck!” I croak, my moans coming out louder and louder as she eats me dry. “Shit, baby.”

Paige’s free hand is reaching for mine, releasing the sheets from my grip and replacing it with her own. She interlaces my fingers and that’s when I shoot up, looking down at her with my jaw slack. 

I watch her, my wetness coating her mouth and the tip of her nose, her tongue licking up and down my folds and teeth nipping at my clit gently. It makes me mewl, her name and curses of pleasure the only thing I can give her. 

She was sloppy—messy and unrefined in a way that shouldn’t have worked, but somehow it did. Paige’s mouth was nothing like the careful precision I had expected from her. Instead, it’s driven by pure want, a raw, desperate hunger that has my legs trembling around her head and my hips bucking into her mouth.

She has me feeling nothing but wanted. Wanted and wanted and wanted.

Paige pulls back for air, biting at her lips that are completely covered in my slick. She spits on me with nothing but filth. Watching as the trail slips past the folds of my cunt and past my asshole, she blows on it, the cool air making me shudder and squeeze her hand even harder. 

“Oh! Keep going, baby. I can take it.” I groan, pulling her closer to my throbbing pussy.

“Gon’ take it just for me?” 

“For you, P. Just for you.” 

She suckles on my clit once more, “could die eating you, baby. Just fuckin’ perfect, Raye.” She pants. 

“Fuck,” I breathe, my head tipping back as Paige nudges her teeth around my clit, sucking hard, pinning her palm to my hips to hold me steady. “Paige, you—oh my God—”

Paige hums against my pussy, and the vibration sends a jolt of pleasure through me that makes me cry out, my hips bucking again. 

I can’t decide which was more overwhelming—the relentless pressure of her mouth, her eyes staring up at me, or the sheer dedication she put into it, like nothing else in the world mattered but getting me off.

Then her warm tongue was dipping into me for a second, fucking into me with precision, curling up in search of my spot. My hand flies to her hair, tugging the soft locks between my fingers, holding her face between my legs for a second. My legs shake warningly, that knot in my abdomen feels like it’s seconds away from snapping.

“You’re so fuckin’ good at this,” I manage, my voice breaking on the words as Paige’s eyes flutter shut while she all but made out with my cunt. “How are you so—shit—so good at this?”

Her chuckle vibrates through me, and the blonde pulls back to apply pressure to my clit with her fingers, licking her lips clean. “Ion think you want me to answer that, ma.”

She doesn’t even look at me, simply scissoring my folds apart and diving back into me. She’s right, I don’t want to know, so I let myself fall into her skilled tongue. My control slips, the confident front I’ve been trying to keep all day slipping into vulnerability. 

I gasp, squeezing her hand as tight as I could. My eyes roll once again, “P, I’m gonna—”

“Cum in my mouth, pretty,” Paige moans into me, her voice muffled but insistent, large and veiny hand pressing into my hip to keep me in place.

The words sent me tumbling over the edge. My entire body tensing and back arching off the bed as a wave of pleasure crashes over me, pulling a strangled moan from her lips. I swear the world went white for a moment, every nerve in my body alight with sensation. Paige laps it all up, my cum pooling on her tongue.

She fucks me through it, her tongue slowing down and sucking coming to a stop. When Paige looks at me, hair all mussed and lips swollen, chains and earrings still dancing in the light— I decide right there that this is actually the hottest she’s ever looked. All decorated in the aftermath of my sex. Looking like this for me.

She licks her lips clean before kissing from my thighs up my abdomen. She licks at my navel, tugging my piercing between her teeth. 

Paige continues up my body, suckling on the inside of my breast until another hickey forms, dark purple against the brown of my skin. “I’m gonna be livin’ between your legs from now on. Fuckin’ perfect.” She grins, leaning up to attach our lips.

I groan against her lips, pulling my hand away from hers to unbuckle the belt that holds her jeans. “You’re so good.” I praise, popping open the button on them. 

“Fuck you good?” She responds, helping me out and tugging down her jeans and her boxers simultaneously. “Needa feel you on me. Need that shit.”

I break the kiss, feeling my heart beat so harsh in my chest. I curl my fingers into the band of her bra, and Paige raises her arms to help me get it off. 

My eyes immediately fall to her chest, her supple tits and pink nipples. She’s breathtaking, and I want nothing more to wrap my lips around them and suck. I trail to her abs, practically shocked that a woman could look this fucking amazing in front of me. They dip even lower to her cunt which is positively soaked. 

I can’t help but grin because I know it’s all for me. “Come get it, baby.”

Before I know it Paige wraps her arms around my hips, mirroring my smile as she flips us over settling her back against the headboard as I straddle her.

It’s right then when I get to see all of her. Legs spread apart for me, so fucking wet that I swear we’re both about to leave this bed a dripping mess. Her thighs are so damn muscular.

I let my mind drift to what it would feel like riding them.

Paige grips my thighs, throwing my right leg over hers and slotting our legs together. My eyes go wide, watching my legs tremble with I don’t know what. Nervousness, excitement, arousal. 

“You okay? We don’t have to do anything else, I promise.” Paige looks up at me with crystalline blue eyes. Her hand running up and down my thigh, the other gripping my side and trailing her thumb over my rib tattoo.

“No, I want to.” I brush her off, looking down at how our cunts are slotted together, inches away from touching. 

Paige bites her lip, running a hand back to grip my ass and tug me closer. “Put that pussy on me then. Ride me, ma.” She instructs.

I’m nearly falling out at the raunchiness of her words. I’d be an idiot to not listen to her, especially when she looks at me like I’m a piece of meat.

I grip the edge of the headboard with one hand, the other gripping her shoulder as I roll my hips down to meet her cunt. I gasp at how fucking soaked she is against me. “Oh fuck, P.” I stutter, feeling her clit press up against me.

“You’re so damn pretty, Raye. Fuck— oh my God.” Paige’s head hits the headboard, a moan tumbling past her lips. Loud, and it’s easily the prettiest thing I’ve ever heard. “Look how fuckin’ wet you get for me, soakin’ me up, baby.”

Her hands grip my hips, forcing my hips back and forth against her, grinding my cunt against her in the exact rhythm she wants. 

“Oh. Oh—mmph—yeahhhh, baby. You feel so fucking good.” I whine, feeling that tension in my stomach, already overstimulated from my last orgasm.

Paige meets me halfway, bucking her hips up at me and I feel that inevitable connection that comes with the throb of her clit. “Shit. Shit, ma! This pussy fuckin’ perfect, baby.”

She’s matching my rhythm, fucking me back with fervent bucks of her hips. My nails dig into her shoulders, darting my head down to look at where we connected.

I’ve never in my life felt something this good before. It’s so intimate. The way she holds me and talks to me and feels every little thing that I’m feeling too. I don’t want to stop, I want to keep going, laying up with her all fucking night if I could.

“P—aige! ‘S so good, baby.” 

“Fuck!” She shouts. “So close. You’re doin’ fuckin’ amazing baby.” Paige encourages. She sends a slap to my ass and I keep going for that feeling. That look of euphoria and approval that makes me wanna ride her better and harder and faster. 

I’m louder than I’ve ever been before, growing closer and closer to that peak. “So wet, P.” I hiccup, my eyes glued to the wetness between the both of us, how I’m damn near slipping from how much she’s giving me.

“I know. Can hear it, angel.” Paige moans, digging her nails into the skin of my ass. “So messy, huh? Just creamin’ for me, Raye. Gonna make me cum.” 

“Baby.” I cry, throwing my head back as that same feeling from earlier returns. I think I might explode.

She reaches for my neck, squeezing her hand around my throat and I’m losing concentration. It’s so hard to stay focused when she’s choking me like that, pulling my attention back to her and her fucked out face. If it wasn’t for the pleasure I felt in my core I could’ve probably come from that alone.

“Gimme one.” She groans. “Cum with me, ma. Need that shit. Need that cum all over my pussy. We almost there, c’mon.”

“Oh my— fuck. Fuck!” A scream rips through my throat, and I’m following through, clutching my hand on hers around my neck. Paige’s mouth falls open, pretty, high pitched cries leaving her lips as we finish together. I think both of us saw stars.

I can’t even control the sounds that leave me, mewls and cries and curses that make me mimic a damn sailor. Between the both of us, I can only hope we don’t run into anyone else on her hotel floor because if they didn't hear me before, they definitely heard us just now. 

My legs shake and the second Paige releases my neck I’m trembling into her hold, feeling light-headed after drowning in pleasure like that. She wraps her arms around my waist, nestling her lips against my cheek as I catch my breath.

I can feel her heart beating against mine, her breathing mimicking my own. Her body is so warm against me, it’s a feeling that I never want to get rid of. I think I could spend the rest of forever like this, holding me and kissing me just like this.

I don’t even dare move my legs away from hers. Instead, I turn my head, kissing her in a suffocating kiss that she whimpers into before kissing me back, licking at my tongue and gripping my ass. 

“We’re doing that all the time, baby. Holy shit.” I sigh. Paige chuckles into my mouth, biting my lip and tugging it back.

She just knows exactly how to get me worked up, how to get my heart racing, my mind running in laps, and my cunt dripping for her. 

“Jus’ wait. Got so much more to teach you.”

—

“Swear, Imma knock you up one day.” I grumble in Raye’s ear, running my free hand over her tits and the hickeys I’ve made sure to leave there all night. She might have to wear a turtleneck to the All-Star game tomorrow night because there’s no way she’s gonna be able to cover them all.

She probably takes me for a joke. Which is fine. But in my head, if you got rid of all the anatomical inaccuracies that would make it physically impossible, I am certain that the way she’s been making me feel all night is more than enough for me to fuck her dumb and get her pregnant with my kid. That’s how fucking good she’s been.

“Prettiest fuckin’ tits. Swear.” I sigh in disbelief. Maraye is gorgeous. Has been since the second I laid eyes on her through the TV. Gorgeous in sweats and a stained t-shirt, in a floor length gown, in a mini skirt that gives so little to my imagination. But seeing her naked, like this, gets a reaction out of me that is anything but holy. 

Her back is hot and sweaty against my chest, soft groans escaping her mouth as my fingers toy with her clit from behind. 

The minute Raye stood in front of me, stripping her clothes and pushing her tits in my face. Her body glowing int the hotel light as she begged me to ‘teach her,’ I knew it was fucking game over.

I’ve made it my mission to make each experience worthwhile with everything I did to her tonight. Dragging her into the shower and letting her sink to her knees as she ate me out, I swear she was lying about having never done it before because she made me cum so hard I almost passed out. I took her again as soon as we got out, bending her over the sink and fucking my fingers so deep that she was squirting on the floor. 

She rode my abs when we got back in bed, covering them in her own cream and then shocking me by licking it all off. I decided then that I need her again and again and again, in every possible way that I could have her.

Which brings us to right now. I circle her clit over and over, splaying my other hand over her stomach and tucking my head into her neck to watch. Strings of her slick sticking to my fingertips that I pull back for her to see. 

“You been such a good girl for me tonight, takin’ everything I give you.” I coo against her skin. “My perfect angel.” I hum.

“Paige, just—mm— just like that.” I keep going, slow and deliberate circles because I know that anything else might send her thrashing against my body on the hotel chair.

“Yeah? You like that?” I whisper, kissing her neck in a much different manner than the one in which I’m touching her with. I spread her folds with my index and ring fingers, teasing her hole with my middle. “Don’t even need to get ‘em wet. You did it for me, ma.”

I sink my finger inside, relishing in the way she swallows up my whole finger and coats in arousal. Raye can take more, I know she can, I saw her take nearly my whole hand an hour ago. But I’m being gentle, so one is enough for now.

She tosses her head against my shoulder panting heavily, as if her throat won’t let her moan the way she wants to. She’s so damn soaked, the sound of my finger slowly sliding in and out bounces off the walls. I can feel it dripping out of her, down her ass and drenching my legs through my plaid boxers.

Raye curls her arm around my head, pulling me closer to her neck. I bite my lip, curling them deep inside into her spot. “Ah! Baby, baby! God, right there.” She squeals, digging her nails into my nape.

“You’re so damn beautiful, angel. Jus’ taking me so good.” I nod, holding her body as close as possible so I get that perfect look. That perfect view of her pretty cunt when I slip in a second finger.

That’s what gets her to thrash on my lap, attempting to shut her legs from me but I hold them open. Raye cries out my name, over and over and over again like a prayer. “Don’t fuckin’ stop. Please, m’ so close,” she moans.

“Stretchin’ you out so good, yeah? Gotta get you ready for me. Strap you so good when we get back. Do you so good, ma, I swear.” I speak gently.

I know her tells flawlessly now, how she lets her mouth fall open with nothing but choppy breaths passing into the air. How she grips on anything, eyes rolling into her skull. She’s close, about to make a mess on the last clean surface in the room but I don’t care.

Raye tips her head towards me, chasing my lips with her own. I let her, locking our lips in a slow kiss that feels just like the first time. Her tongue navigates my mouth, her teeth clashing with mine. She’s moaning haphazardly into my mouth, getting distracted by my fingers.

It fills me with a sense of pride I’ve never felt before.

“Wanna ruin it, Raye.” I groan, sucking her bottom lip before pulling back. “It’s mine, yeah?”

She nods rapidly, her legs shake and her moans make my ears ring. “Paige!” Maraye drags out my name, making me feel on top of the whole fucking world.

“This my pussy, ma? All me?”

“Shit. It’s y-yours. I promise.” I rut my fingers inside faster, attempting to ignore the sting in my arm. “I’m cumming, I’m cumming.” She hiccups. Her cunt squeezes me tight, and I know she’s right there.

“Gimme that shit, Raye. Make a mess for me, baby. I need that.” I murmur, “Y’know I’m right here. Just gimme that.” 

A cry tears through her mouth, the loudest she’s been all night. Raye’s eyes are glued shut and she’s coming again. I never want it to end, if it were up to me, I’d take her out on the balcony right now but I know her. She’s trembling.

I ease my fingers out slowly, wrapping my arm tighter around her waist and circling her clit to work her through it. 

When she finally comes down, her body trembling and her chest heaving, I don’t pull away immediately. I stay right where I am, gently kissing at her ear and mumbling sweet nothings. My touch softened as I helped Raye ride out the aftershocks.

“Fuck,” Raye finally breathes, her voice hoarse and unsteady. She lets out a breathless laugh, her hands falling to the sides of the armrests as she stares up at the ceiling in an attempt to find her thoughts again. “You ever fuck someone else like that, I swear to fucking God, I’ll kill you.”

I can’t help but grin against her skin. It’s completely Maraye, something only she could do after sex. She curls into hold, wrapping both arms around my neck and I let her, anything that lets me get her close like this. 

“You remember what I said about making you mine tonight?” I ask, tracing circles on her lower back.

She nods. “Is that not what you just did for the last four hours?” A breathy sigh escaping her mouth. 

“That’s not what I’m talking about.” I laugh. Suddenly all the air in my lungs is missing, the words I want to say getting lodged in my throat. Raye has this way of making me forget that I’m probably the most confident person on the planet. “I—um, I want you to be my girlfriend. Just me and you, Raye.”

I watch her eyes go wide as she tugs her t-shirt back over her exposed upper body. “Wh- you don’t think it’s too soon?”

“Do you?”

“No! No, I just, are you sure?”

“Am I sure that I want you as my girlfriend? Are you kidding?” I adjust her position in my lap, helping her get settled on my lap with her face to mine. She presses her palms on my bare chest, those eyes glued to mine with the slightest smile. “Yes. I want you. Only you, Raye. I don’t care if it’s too soon, ‘cause I’ve spent the last two and a half months waiting for you to be mine. I’m making you my girl. Who gives a fuck if it’s too s—”

She cuts me off without hesitation, I think I might go drunk from how many times she’s kissed me tonight. Raye starts with soft pecks, each one causing a groan to slip past me. “Yeah.”

“Mm– yeah what, angel?” I ask, smiling all against her lips. “Gotta say it.”

She breaks the kiss, smiling right back, all teeth and gums and I think she looks fucking beautiful. “Yes, Paige. I’ll be your girlfriend.”

—

September 2025 — London, England, United Kingdom 

“So, what’s your type?” Amelia asks me, popping a fry into her mouth. She sits across from me in this booth at Morley’s Chicken, cameras surrounding the both of us. “Y’know, other than blonde and pretty with blue eyes.”

I have to hold back my giggle, because this is her thing. She flirts with all her guests while also seemingly trying to get little bits of information from my life. That’s why I know she’s describing herself, and not the girlfriend that waits for me at home in LA.

Home. A place where love is nurtured and bloomed, a place that I now can only ever associate with Paige. She’s perfect, patient, communicative, funny, slightly annoying but in a way that makes her comfortable and charming. She’s my home now.

“That’s exactly my type, actually.” I nod, wrapping my lips around the straw of my fruit punch juice box. “To a T.”

“Really?” Amelia’s accent sticks out to me immediately, making me giggle. “What’s funny?”

“I like your accent.” I say. “But yea, that’s exactly my type.” I repeat, trying my hardest to fight the growing smirk on my lips. When this episode is edited and Paige sees it, I just know she’s going to be all smiles.

Amelia nods, a posh grin and an adorable shrug of her shoulders being sent my way. “Well obviously. You wouldn’t be on a date with me then, I suppose. You are just seeing me right?” She continues with the bit.

“Of course.”

I let my mind wander off to Paige the minute I say that. It’s early here, which means she’s probably asleep back in LA. Cuddled under the covers of my bed that is slowly becoming our bed. At the apartment with my name on it but clothes and shoes and snacks that could only belong to Paige. She’d woven her way into my life, into my home, into my music. So that even now, when I’m countries away, and talking about my music career, she’s all I can think about. Because there was nothing like being with Paige. 

And I got to call her mine.

All mine.

[melminli]

Dirty Cash (Money Talks)

summary - you had nothing against your colleague, but you weren't stupid enough to be fooled by his innocent smile and appearance since you knew exactly what kind of corrupt person was hiding behind that costume. after all, you were wearing the same one.

pairing: (gong yoo/ji-cheol) the salesman x fem. recruiter reader

word count: 1.4k

contains: talk about gambling + death and murder, sexual tension?, crack and just evil morals tbh

a/n: i watched maybe the first fifteen minutes or so of bullet train, but i thought of the two funny dudes from it while writing this bcuz their dynamic was funny af. also, i will use the actor's name in this fic since the character itself doesn't really have an official one that was mentioned in the series!

You straightened your tie with your free hand while watching your train approach from the side. The station was always pretty empty at this hour, which saved you the jostling and squeezing as you entered. After that, you sat down comfortably with a light sigh - next to the free seat beside your devilishly handsome colleague. “Are you alright? Don't tell me that you had a exhausting day?” he asked you worriedly with his typical innocent smile on his face but you've known the guy for a while now and you knew exactly how dishonest he sounded right now.

You returned his gaze for a second, uninterested, before turning it back in front of you to observe your surroundings from the window. “Exhausting day? Don't make fun of me or I'll punch you in the face,” you replied monotone and Gong Yoo didn't doubt your statement for a second - or Ji-choel as you preferred to call him since you weren't a big fan of nicknames. “I had a great time punching those bastards in the face one by one. It feels kinda therapeutic, so I'm actually feeling pretty good right now,” you told him, talking about the subject as if you were talking about the weather.

Your colleague grunted with delight at your good news. “And I would never disagree with you on that.” he said and then just watched your figure silently for a while before speaking up again. “Since you're in such a good mood, would you be willing to play a more private game between the two of us?” he suggested, making you look at him in utter disbelief.

“A private game? With you?” you repeated, amused and laughed in his face. “Hell, no. But don't worry, I'll let you know next time I want to get totally screwed by a freaky pervert,” you added, your voice dripping with sarcasm. Which will be, never.

“Come on, don't be like that,” he asked you sweetly. As sweet as the wolf who pretended to be the mother of the seven little goats before he ate them all one by one. “It's just a tiny, harmless game. It's been so long since we've played anything together.” he complained to you earnestly as if you actually cared, and you didn't.

Yeah, you remembered the last time very clearly, even if you would much rather prefer that you didn't. You hummed. “Is that so? Huh. I mean, it could be because you almost killed me in a fucking game of tic-tac-toe the last time, but that's just a theory.” You said with a shrug, clearly still resenting him for that. However, he just rolled his eyes unaffected by your grudge. “But you didn't, right? It was the other guy who got the bullet in his head.” He replied, not even remembering his name. Not that he had to.

You just glared at him while you rubbed your forehead. “Yeah, maybe. But I'm tired of risking my life just because it makes you horny and you can jerk off to it.” You made your feelings on the matter clear. “You know that the whole living on the edge of death thing isn't really my cup of tea. At least try to understand me a bit here, too.”

I suppose she's not entirely wrong, I could give it a try. I never thought about it like that before, did I? He thought to himself in his head as he ran his tongue over the back of his teeth while he pondered. How selfish of me. “So what exactly do I have to do, to convince you?” He asked you while he already had a few ideas in mind.

You grinned. “You know that very well, don't play dumb.” You demanded as you leaned closer to him so that he could hear what you were singing softly. “Money talks, money talks - dirty cash, I want you, and dirty cash, I need you, oh ~”

He raised an eyebrow, not particularly surprised. “So you want to play for money?” He repeated it, not outright rejecting your request. “Don't you have enough of that already? You're really insatiable when it comes to cash and now you want mine, too?” he joked just to get you worked up.

Though, you didn't get the slightest bit offended by what he said. “Can you ever have enough money? Besides, I'm not forcing you to give it to me, am I?” you said with a smile, already knowing that he would agree to your terms. “But if you want me to play with you, I want eight million won for every round I win.”

She's so greedy for someone who is already more than wealthy. “Aren't you exaggerating a bit? Most people don't earn that much in a month,” he continued his act of - whatever this was - because he just loved arguing with you.

“So? We both have the same salary, I know you can afford it,” you said, holding a hand in the air as soon as you felt that he wanted to stretch this unnecessary conversation even more. “You have to decide now what you want to do or I withdraw my proposal again.”

Gong Yoo closed his mouth and started grinning even wider. “You don't even want to know what kind of game I want to play?” he asked curiously, nodding and accepting whatever you wanted as soon as he saw that you actually weren't interested. You couldn't even imagine how gladly he gave in to you at this moment. “All right, I agree with your request.”

You stood up with your briefcase in hand after your station was announced. “Good. Text me when you have something in mind, I'll be there as long as it fits timewise.”

Your colleague continued to watch you with a look on his face that used to make you more than just uncomfortable back in the day - though it didn't even bother you in the slightest now. “You don't want to accompany me to the...office?”

You smiled while the train started to slow down. “Au revoir, Ji-cheol.” you just said your goodbye to him and stepped out of the doors. You didn't even spare the poor guy a second glance when he waved his hand at you from the window. She can be so heartless sometimes, he thought to himself, even if you were like this pretty much all the time. I'll have to think of something good to ask for in return should I win. I'm definitely not going to hold back when there's this much money at stake.

You didn't give a second thought to anything as you made your way home after a day's work like any normal citizen would do. However, your steps slowed considerably when you noticed a beggar in your field of vision and even though the rest of the crowd ignored the man and his entire existence, you couldn't help but focus your full attention on him. You looked at your watch, I've been off work for a while now. But even then, you couldn't help but notice that he was one of the people on your list to recruit for the game. He'll still be here tomorrow, but I don't mind another round of Ddakji. I love money more than anything - but I'm not doing this job for only that since I don't even have anything against working a bit of overtime when it comes to this.

“Excuse me,” you spoke to the man with a polite smile on your face, and he only submissively avoided your gaze as he listened to you. After all, one rarely approached people like him and why would they? He held his cup of loose change out in front of him, probably expecting you to give him a small donation, but you wanted to give him so much more than that. Even if the guy didn't know it right now - you wanted to give him another chance in life, so that he wouldn't continue to be just a miserable failure.

You ignored his donation cup. “I was wondering if you might have a moment because I'd like to make you an offer,” you continued politely and the man met your gaze at that. Yeah, you were really looking forward to what was about to happen - after all, you were known for letting your opponent only win if you allowed them to.

[whtybsshe]

I can tell their whole rant is not worth reading by the fact that

:they can’t properly see that Hinata was NOT the one said “Be at peace!” It was Neji.

If you can’t read the notes I made, everytime when Neji or Hinata speaks, the speech bubble either has a little pointer at him or her. Even if the panel shows Hinata, it doesn’t mean she’s the one saying it. Two, even if it’s a translation, it does not make sense for Hinata to say“But you need not suffer any more. Be at peace! But you’re wrong cousin Neji…I can see it now even more than me…” does it now?? Like can’t you figure out that contextually it sounds weird!

The other points that they make sound like “Guys, well yes she did experience abuse but IT WASNT THAT BAD😅😅GUYS she smiled like two times so IT WASNT BAD AT ALL GUYS😅😅😅 trauma is bad 😅😅but well assume she doesn’t have it😊😊😊because it serves my personal narrative☺️☺️☺️☺️”

But I as a Neji Stan, should be the bigger person here and actually logically explain to the ENTIRE SEVEN HUNDRED NOTES that Hinata neither conformed to system, or fought the system.

The hate Neji fans have towards Hinata (idk if OP is a Neji fan so scratch that, any fan in particular) comes mainly from his death as a side branch and we all hate that, im gonna agree with you there. But I think the entire thing got twisted to the point where everyone has this misguided narrative that “Neji actually tried to fight the Hyuuga system whereas Hinata didn’t, she’s a privileged princess that took advantage of Neji.” Which, it’s totally wrong because truthfully? Neither of them did. Well yes Neji might’ve made Hiashi acknowledge him but that was ALSO because 1) Hiashi felt a responsibility to his late twin brother. 2)It is constantly repeated that Naruto had a huge impact as well. So it wasn’t just the effort of a young fourteen year old no matter how much of a genius he might’ve been. Later in Shippuden we never see Neji against the clan, in fact, in SD, in Ninja Storm (I think) Neji is always portrayed to be prideful of his herritage no matter the shitfuckery that goes on and even if he’s a side branch in the eyes of the clan, he keeps it as a badge of honour and status to anyone else. And one can argue that him being against the clan but also prideful of it can exist as two mutually exclusive truths , yes. But they also can’t. We don’t see Neji actually challenge the system again, because the writing doesn’t allow for the Hyuuga subplot to develop, plain and simple.

Now everyone will agree with me on this paragraph, why can’t anyone agree that the same exact case IS for Hinata and pull out the dumbest shit from the asses to justify this twisted vision that they have of Neji and Hinata.

Now I got sidetracked a bit so im coming back to OP post and some interesting points that they made.

-She did have a carefree childhood thanks to her friends and teachers. The last words are what people should focus on. The happiness she might’ve felt during her childhood does not clash with the battered relationship she had with her father. Now according to Naruto Shinden: Parent and child day, Hinata could only remember the smell of blood and kunai. She as trained from day 1 to be a clan head. Thats exploitation, abuse, both physical and mental . Even if she doesn’t piss herself from fear seeing him, it’s sure as hell mentioned that Hinata still dreads him from underneath. All the good things happened outside of her home. She did experience trauma. Her behaviour as a “weirdo” at first, and everything I said in the above paragraph is TRAUMA. You can’t zig zag your reasoning trying to question her every step. That is TRAUMA, point blank period.

And then the all famous as the OP quoted: “It's correct to point out what she had to go through, surely having such enormous pressure on her shoulders at such young age and not being able to deliver is harsh on everyone, but pointing out her position as a victim is often done either to dismiss her implication and endorsement on her clan's slavery system and/or to downplay Neji's own experiences with the abuse of the Main Family. Not only did he have to endure a similar type (meaning: worse) of degradation from Hiashi, but also had to experience the threat of physical torture and/or murder shall he disobey, something that Hinata canonically never was hinted to suffer from.” End quote.

It’s the all famous Struggle Olympic no jutsu!!!!!😍😍😍😍😍🥰🥰🥰🥰😘😘😘

As I mentioned above, Hinata did suffer from physical abuse. Even if it’s in the guise of training, that’s things she did not have a good experience to say the very least.

I think we keep downplaying the fact that Hinata got kidnapped by foreign ninjas way too fucking much. They would a) murder her b) train her to be a weapon and pair of binoculars c) rape her (shes young then, but what if they kept her for more years?) to get Byakugan individuals afterwards

By using the Hyuuga affair example:

You don’t endorse the Hyuuga system by defending Hinata, along with Hizashi and Neji that have been quite literally the actual victims from start to finish of the entire Hyuuga affair.

Most important point: Don’t compare the suffering of two charachters!!! “Oh Neji has had it more difficult than Hinat therefore I reject the validity of all her struggles!!!”

Neji ACTUALLY recognising her pain (I want to discuss about this in a separate post but just keeping this here for now), he actually says he” to be at peace “, he does say that as well in the anime (although worded differently cause interpretation and translation and all of that)

It’s true that Hinata has not experienced what Neji has, but that doesn’t mean she hasn’t been abused by a clan that glamourises power and birthright status over anything else. Why is it so necessary to compare them in this way, rather than capture their differences and nuances in actual meaningful way.

First point of the last point: The Hyuugas system was never mentioned or properly addressed in shippuden (not filler episodes) LET ALONE BORUTO. We can’t conclude whether they actually abolished the system, but neither can we claim that they didn’t. The Hyuugas are only mentioned as a “changed clan” and Hiashi “a changed man” so the abolishment does happen in some way.

Second point of the last point: We have absolutely no clue of how the seal is practiced or applied. The only thing we know is that Hizashi got it as the younger twin. That doesn’t mean that it’s the standard practice used to decide who gets the seal and who doesn’t. The reason is that it is never even mentioned, the seal itself is barely brought up after the chuunin exam.

Also on an interesting note: somebody pointed out that since Hiashi and Hizashi were twins, both had the automatic right to be clan head no matter who was born earlier (this according to inheritance law I don’t have enlightenment of) hence the seal was used to settle the place of the clan head beforehand. I think it’s a pretty solid and logical reasoning which also proves the point of what I said above.

I know it sucks for Kishimoto to end it this way without putting an end, but that’s basically what happens.

Idk if I’ve put my thoughts well into this, but to conclude this entire post: it’s the writing, not the charachter. That goes for both Neji and Hinata.

Shyness, a scapegoat.

Or, Hinata endorses slavery -but she's cute so who cares?

There’s something quite incredible that happens with Hinata as a character and her loyal stans who fiercely defend her actions. There're a few things to point out about this particular topic and I can't start anywhere but on the main reason as to why she's left off the hook.

Let's establish this: Personality traits aren't synonyms for someone's ideology.

Let me expand on this: Hinata is shy, mostly quiet, and superficially "nice" to the people around her -therefore, her mannerisms clash with (or rather, disguises/downplays) her actions and/or what she supports. No one denies Hinata is soft-spoken, yet she downplayed the psychological and emotional trauma that Hizashi's torture at the hands of her father brought on Neji, putting herself as a victim of the same level as her cousin (the "be at peace" line she says during the preliminary rounds become particularly malicious when you have this specific context, because how could Neji be at peace with his role after such cruelty?)

Over and over, her stans use two specific arguments to defend her behavior, so I shall try to break them down:

1- “She was disowned and/or was too young to do anything”: While both of these statements are true, particularly in the first part when this issue is introduced, and I’m sure many anti-fans complain about her inaction, the fact that the only thing pro-fans take for “action” is to specifically stand (meaning, rebel) against Hiashi is very telling of their bias.

Hinata taking a stand against the slavery of her clan is just as easy as showing uneasiness with the situation (something she did not, never, at any point), or understanding Neji’s resentment. Instead, she acknowledges Neji’s anger only to quickly brush it off: paraphrasing, it will be something along the lines, “Oh, you’re annoyed because you’re a slave, you should get over it because I had it rough too” -the fact that she canonically knows the problem it presents to enslave people (let's remember: she witnessed her father torturing Hizashi as to "remind him" of his place), yet believes it to be something to “be at peace with”, it’s the thing we’re pointing out when saying she endorses her family's, let's call it, tradition.

However, It’s not only with Neji Hyüga with whom she displays no discomfort about their situation, the same happens with her interaction with Ko Hyüga during Pain’s arc; he expressively tells her he will be "never forgiven" (implying that he will be punished) should she get injured; yet, despite knowing this, she jumps in to “save” Naruto, fully aware of her incapacity to fight someone who literally destroyed Konoha by himself and not caring about Ko’s destiny at the hands of the Main Branch. [If this doesn't show how Hinata is, quite literally, not even minimally capable to be a commander in any single spectrum of the title, then I don't know what will. She's literally prioritizing her own feelings and/or desires over the lives of those under her command. It's true that she's not the heir of the Hyüga clan during this time, yet she's still in a superior position.}

In regard to this specific argument her stans use in her favor, let’s add something else to question it: Ko would have been punished non-other than Hiashi and Hanabi Hyuga, he specifically mentions both of them; which means that her sister, who is five years younger -eleven/twelve years old at this Arc’s time- acknowledges her position and the branch family members' (lower) place and takes immediate action over that difference. So either Hinata's [young] age has nothing to do with her (in)action on the matter of her family's enslavement practices, or Hinata isn't even as smart as Hanabi to understand how her clan works. So under this premise, she's either endorsing slavery or incredibly moronic, your choice.

[And to those who might want to use the "she knows how her clan works, she just never wanted to use her privilege to hurt lower members": There's not a single panel to support this. Not a single one. Furthermore, Ko's situation and her speech to Neji during the Chünin Exams point out she did nothing on the matter because she simply didn't care about them, too preoccupied with Naruto and feeling sorry for herself for not being acknowledged the way Hanabi was. Hinata is, simply, bad at fighting. She isn't squandering her potential for her sister's benefit, she is, simply put, bad.]

The argument “Hanabi and Hinata were raised differently” has no hold other than in fandom mentality, for they differed at the beginning simply on their training:

Source

Hiashi trained Hanabi whilst Hinata trained with Kurenai, but that only seemed to happen after her graduation as gënin, for all we know, and for what is pointed out in Hanabi's entrance in the First Databook, Hinata was raised as the Hyuga heir until her first graduation when she proved to be not in the standards expected for an heir her age. Even back then, Hanabi wasn't "officially" Hiashi's successor.

2- “She was afraid of Hiashi since he was/is her abuser”. While it’s true that Hiashi downgraded her and psychologically mistreated her when constantly demoting her value and, in exchange, raising Hanabi’s, there are few things to say about this:

a- It’s established in the Databook that she had a pleasant childhood, and while having carefree infancy doesn't exactly contradicts the idea of Hiashi being verbally abusive to her, it does clash with the idea of her being absolutely (that is, completely) scared of him rather than sad for the degradation.

Source

b- The relationship between Hinata and Hiashi dramatically changed during the second part of the manga (after the Chünin Exams, she’s seen smiling and bringing tea to both Hiashi and Neji), to the point where even when “disowned” she got no Cage Bird Seal (meaning, she still was part of the main family and therefore still possessed the privileges that came with it) and how Hiashi, even when away, went out of his way to ensure her safety (such as forcing Ko to protect her). To claim that she was “still afraid” of her father when there’s not only a single indication of her uneasiness but there’re quite obvious displays of their good-terms relationship it’s grasping at straws to defend something that doesn't exist. And while it's true that trauma can't be easily overcome, there's no indication of Hinata experiencing such a thing (claiming "internal struggle" is not a valid counterargument because, while plausible, is not canonically established during the second part of the manga).

c- It’s correct to point out what she had to go through, surely having such enormous pressure on her shoulders at such young age and not being able to deliver is harsh on everyone, but pointing out her position as a victim is often done either to dismiss her implication and endorsement on her clan’s slavery system and/or to downplay Neji’s own experiences with the abuse of the Main Family. Not only did he have to endure a similar type (meaning: worse) of degradation from Hiashi, but also had to experience the threat of physical torture and/or murder shall he disobey, something that Hinata canonically never was hinted to suffer from.

It could be reasonable to spare Hinata from any responsibility on the matter during the first part (I, personally, since she displayed enough knowledge about the matter and what it entailed, don’t think so), but during Shippuden -when she’s not young anymore by shinobi standards and her relationship with Hiashi is shown to be better, the arguments in her favor collapse completely.

Are we forgetting that those who see abuse/harassment and do nothing about it might as well be endorsing it?

To simply claim “oh, well, the real villain is Hiashi because he’s the one actually enslaving people” without taking into account those who are in power and decide not to intervene (every single Hokage, including now Kakashi and Naruto, who changed nothing), and those who know what the system entails yet also display no discomfort/do nothing (Hinata might not have “real power” but she still is part of the Main Family and keeps quiet when she could easily reach to her sister and speak about her discomfort with the matter), it’s simply looking at the superficial reflections of the issue -instead of taking care of the roots.

And truthfully, the fact that somehow Hiashi is the villain for enslaving his people (as I’ve said, they put the entire weight of the Hyuga clan’s problems solely over his shoulders despite the existence of a political system that supports him), yet his words during the war are taken by Hinata's stans as inexorably proof of the change that apparently her (alongside Neji) brought it’s quite… striking, to say the least. More considering that he was a character already proven to lie/hide important truths from (cadet) clan members before.

In addition, the Branch Family still possesses the Cage Bird Seal, while the main branch doesn’t: which means that, first, there’s still a distinction between both families that goes beyond political positions inside Konoha and goes into a physical difference: ones are marked while others aren’t -and second, whether Hiashi still performs torture or not doesn’t deny the quite real possibility of him re-incurring in such behavior, the threat of physical violence still stands for the branch family.

Taking care of the seal is also a task quite easy to do, should they truly want to take care of it, I’ll put here some ways to resolve it at the top of my mind:

1. There’s no canon proof nor mention that the Cage Bird Seal can’t be removed. Neji states that the seal disappears when those with the mark die, yet, he might not know if it can truly be erased or not, since with that knowledge many branch members might seek freedom.

2. Even if we take Neji’s words as truthful, and we believe the Seal can’t be removed, there’s absolutely no evidence to state that the seal can’t be counteracted by another seal (a technique similar to the one Orochimaru used against Minato’s seal).

3. The main family could easily get the seal so the Byakugan gets sealed when any member dies and the threat of someone torturing another member through it gets “nullified”.

Nothing of this is shown in the manga nor brought up by these individuals.

Source

Why is Naruto claiming this, if the Hyuga changed already? It's true that he was away for a long time, but are the changes Hiashi spoke about so little or subtle that Naruto wasn't able to see them during the duration of Shippuden? Which character are we calling a liar then, Hiashi, or Naruto?

And I’ll add this here, for good measure: Hinata might as well be endorsing slavery (she is, in fact, canonically endorsing it), and it will be fine from the narrative’s point of view because the manga ended with these issues not only not resolved, but accepted as the “lesser of all evils”; the problem here are her stans trying to save her from the implications of condoning such actions -when there’s no substance for their claims.

She either agrees with the Hyuga practices or she doesn’t, in this specific case, there’s no middle, no gray areas, because even ignoring the matter (despite knowing its existence), makes her an accomplice. You can still like her and very much enjoy her, but that doesn’t mean she’s free from problematic characterizations, as every single character introduced by Kishimoto. Edit to add: I received long ago an interesting ask that said: "You want Hinata, after everything she got through, to get the Seal?" and while that wasn't my point it further proves my point of view: if her stans are aware of what being marked implicates why are they looking the other way when it comes to the branch family situation? Why are they specifically ignoring Hinata's very purposefully dismissal of the matter? Why is Hinata the only character who needs to be spared? Her stans excuse Hinata's inaction because she was "too young", but condemn Neji, who's just a year older, for lashing out at her because "she's shy and nice" without minding his background and how Hinata is the embodiment of the Main Family that tortures him and he loathes.

Hinata's background allows us to understand where she comes from and why she's the way she is, yet it does not justify her behavior.

Context is for understanding, not condoning.

[redgoldsparks]

Once again, Shay Mirk created a template end-of-year-reflection zine, which you can download for free here. I can confirm that filling these out makes an excellent New Years Eve party activity :) All of the lines and writing in solid black are Shay's, and all of the words and images in various colors are mine. Transcript below the cut.

instagram / patreon / portfolio / etsy / my book / redbubble store

My Packed Year! To end 2024, I say: "We did it, holy shit" filled in by Maia Kobabe

An outfit I loved this year: It's giving casual wizard.

These foods were my MVPs: black tea, yellow curry, avocado bagel, Ricola lozenges

A quote or song lyric on my mind: "I know exactly what I want and who I want to be". -Oh No! by Marina

This year I said hello to: Japan! First international travel since 2017, I took my mom <3

And I said goodbye to: Illusions and false hope.

One way I changed this year: I took weekends while working on a book (but I would like to also take evenings...)

A book I read: The Chromatic Fantasy by HA, Electric Bones by Hazel and Bell, The Guy She Was Interested In Wasn't A Guy At All by Sumiko Arai

A TV show or movie I love: Strong Island documentary by Yance Ford

An animal I saw: Solo! (my cat) also Crimini and Cloudy (my sibling's cats)

A plant I like: money plant from Ren

An event I remember: SFZF! San Francisco Zine fest with friends! First time ever going as an attendee and not tabling.

An activity I enjoy: Making zines with friends.

Lightning Round!

I love my friends

I went to LA, NYC, Maine, Colorado, Seattle, Japan...

I built new connections

I joined Authors Against Book Bans

I miss my grandparents <3

I want more time to make gifts and food for others.

[cressidagrey]

Such A Mystery - Part 9

Pairing: Max Verstappen x Colette Leclerc (Original Character)

Summary:

Max Verstappen fell in love at the ripe old age of 12 and never looked back.

Colette Leclerc really regrets posting that particular Taylor Swift Lyric to her private Instagram account, because it made George Russell go insane.  

The rest of the world has absolutely no idea that the Dutch Lion and Charles Leclerc’s twin sister have been a couple for 15 years and are expecting a baby. 

Warnings: 

Pregnancy, Mention of multiple miscarriages, Pregnancy complications, George Russell Bashing (he's probably really nice in real life but in this, he's the bad guy, sorry), Jos Verstappen, We have apparently now reached the time where I also bash Ferrari. I am sure they are super nice in real life too. They are not in this.

Author Notes: Huge thanks to @llirawolf for holding my hand through this. Chapter 8 of...who knows.

It felt like forever. He knew it wasn't. It must have been minutes until the car door was ripped open and Charles slipped in right next to him.

It wasn’t until the doors were slammed shut behind Charles that Max dared to look at the Monégasque.

His heart skipped a beat at the sight. Charles was still in his racing suit just as him, the suit itself streaked with sweat.

The moment the car door closed, the car started riving.

"Merde," Charles cursed. Max could only agree. "I am sorry, that it took this long."

Max gave a sharp, jerky shake of his head. "You don’t have to apologize," he somehow managed to get the words out. "I’m just..." he trailed off, a shaky exhale escaping him. "How could you make it here so fast?" he asked, casting a quick glance in his friend’s direction.

Charles snorted. "Your press officer had a shouting match with Ferrari's,“ he said simply.

If Max wasn’t so focused on not completely losing it, he might’ve been amused with the mental image. But at the moment, he could only shake his head.

Next to him, Charles let out a sigh. "Are you alright?" he asked quietly.

"No. You?" he gave back.

"I don't have a bad feeling," Charles said quietly. “Not worse than it has been for days at least.”

Twin Telepathy was apparently a thing as far as Charles and Colette were concerned. 

Quite frankly, till this day, it still weirded Max out. They just seemed to know when the other one wasn't feeling well. 95% of the time, they got sick at the same time. They communicated more easily with each other than with anyone else, and regardless of what game they played...they needed to be put on opposite teams, because otherwise nobody had a chance against them.

Max was well aware of Colette and Charles' strange connection. Even if he didn’t fully understand it. They both had some sort of sixth sense when it came to the other one, and it sometimes felt like they were talking in secret code.

"What’s it telling you right now?" he asked, his voice barely above a rough whisper.

Charles turned to him fully at that, and Max saw the way his eyes swept over him, taking in every aspect of his appearance.

Max could only imagine what Charles was seeing. He felt like a walking wreck, and there was no doubt his appearance was mirroring that.

"Colette is in pain," Charles finally said, his voice strangely quiet. "She’s scared."

That answer felt like somebody shoved a knife into Max’s stomach. He inhaled sharply, the breath catching in his throat. “Of course, she is,” he hissed through clenched teeth.

Charles seemed to sense what he was thinking, even without being telepathically connected through whatever the hell Colette and him had going on. The Monégasque reached out and took a firmer hold of his hand, the grip almost crushing.

"Don’t," Charles said firmly, his voice leaving no room for arguments. "Don’t go there. We’re gonna get to her as fast as we can."

There was a brief moment of silence, as Max tried to collect himself. He focused all his attention on the pressure of Charles' hand on his, and somehow, it actually helped.

"I feel so goddamn useless," he finally admitted, his voice rough with emotion. "I want to be with her."

"You want to try calling her before we are in the air?" Charles suggested.

That was not a bad idea, not at all. Max let out a low and slightly shaky exhale, swallowing hard. “Yeah,” he nodded. “Yeah, I…” he had to stop and clear his throat. “Yeah, I’ll try to call her.”

His hands were shaking when he pulled out his phone out of the backpack that somebody had handed off to him, already packed. Regardless of all the drama that had gone on in the RedBull garage during the year… if it really mattered, the people in there pulled off minor miracles.

Within minutes, his entire day - hell, his entire week - had been packed for him, with all the essentials of clothes and everything else he would need.

He had almost forgotten about the phone in his shaking hands, but now he just stared at the screen for a moment. His fingers were trembling so badly that just unlocking the phone was a challenge in itself.

Jimmy and Sassy were on his lockscreen...a picture that Colette had once sent him when he had been away for one of his races...the two of them laying on top of her on their couch...

Every other time Max saw the photo, it made his heart do a little funny jump. Now though, it made his chest ache. It felt like a sharp stabbing pain, and for a moment, he just sat there and stared at the picture.

Then he called her.

It rang. And it rang, and it rang again. With each passing second, that horrible knot in his stomach tightened a little more. With every ring of the bell, it got harder to breathe.

Finally, to Max’s immense and enormous relief, the line connected.

"Hey, Maxie. I put you on speaker," Victoria's voice came over the phone, sounding surprisingly calm.

A shiver of something resembling dread ran through Max, at the sound of Victoria’s voice. But he pushed past the feeling.

His thoughts were once again running wild - was it a bad sign that Colette wasn’t the one speaking to him? Or was he just overreacting..?

“Hey,” he forced the word out past the lump in his throat. "How are you feeling?" he asked, pleading for Colette's voice. Was it selfish that he just wanted to hear her tell him that everything was going to be okay?

"Better now," Colette's voice came, sounding slightly hoarse.

The words were like a shot of adrenaline, and for a moment, Max actually felt a little lightheaded. “Liefje.” He closed his eyes, just hearing her voice sending another wave of relief through him. “Are you okay? How is Bébé?”

"Bébé has decided that they would rather be born today, so I would suggest you hurry up," Victoria said drily.

"Seems like the kid already inherited Max's need for speed," Charles quipped. "How are you doing, Coco?"

"I'm good," Colette's voice replied, and Max could only imagine the eye-roll that was currently happening. He knew his girlfriend, and he had no doubt that she had been glaring at Victoria ever since the phone was put on speaker.

"Where are you?" she asked, her voice suddenly turning much softer. "You're coming, right?"

"Coming," he assured her, his heart aching. "We're coming, I promise."

"I know. I’m not worried." She sounded like she meant it, but Max could easily imagine the anxiety in her eyes.

"You'd better not worry," Charles said, and then added, "I’m keeping him from doing anything dumb."

Max shot Charles a dirty look at that, bt he swallowed down the annoyed protest and focused back on Colette instead. “Just…hold on a little longer, okay?”

"It's not like I can go anywhere else," Colette replied, her voice slightly amused. "I’ll keep our little speed demon in there a little lo...." She broke off and let out a quiet hiss of pain, her voice once again cut off by what Max suspected to be a particularly painful contraction.

“Colette,” he said sharply, all kinds of emotions washing over him, one by one. “Liefje, just…just breathe through it, okay?”

There was a second of panting, then, he heard her take a deep breath. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m okay,” she finally said. “Just…hurts like hell.”

He swallowed and clenched his free hand tightly into a fist, fighting against the urge to just jump out of the car and start running towards the airport.

Colette being in pain was not something he could deal with.

He heard her take a few more deep breaths, and he just sat there, waiting and listening and feeling absolutely useless.

"How long until you get here?" she asked after a moment, her voice breathless. He could see her in his mind, his sweet girl, sitting on the bed and clutching her belly as another contraction hit her.

"We're not even at the airport yet," he told her, and damn it, why were his eyes suddenly burning. "We’ll get there as soon as we can, okay? Just...hold on a little longer."

"What your dad said..." Colette said with a shaky voice.

"I know," he said simply, the grief raw in his voice. Neither of them were ever really going to get over the two babies they had lost. They had learnt to live with the pain, they had dealt with the heartbreak an grief...but it was always going to be scar for them.

"Max, if something…" she began, her voice a little wobbly. He could tell that she was crying, by the way her breathing got a little more hitched and ragged.

But she suddenly cut off and gasped, letting out an even breath. Another contraction..."Hey, nothing is gonna happen," he quickly said, trying to soothe her. "Nothing. I'll be there soon. I'll be there before you know, and our child will meet their parents. We will be fine, we will get through this. You, and me. Together."

"If something happens," Colette continues. "If..."

"No," he cut her off, the word coming out as a growl. "Nothing is gonna happen. You will not talk that way. You’re going to deliver a gorgeous and healthy baby, and I won’t hear anything else."

"Max..." she protested, but Max wasn’t having it.

"You’re not going anywhere," he said firmly, putting as much steel in his voice as he could. "You will be fine. Our baby will be fine, and I will be there soon and I will hold your hand and you can threaten to geld me and all of it will be okay. Just breathe.” 

He could hear the sound of her breathing, deep and even. She was trying to steady it, and Max gripped his phone tighter. He didn’t know if he was trying to hold himself together, or if he was trying to hold on to the sound of her voice.

The seconds ticked by, and then another contraction hit, and he heard her gasp out another ragged breath. Max felt like he was going to crawl out of his own skin. The idea of her in pain was like an invisible knife twisting a little deeper in his gut, each time.

"We need to go," Charles said suddenly. "We need to get into the plane." The car slowed down at that moment. "Coco, listen to me. I am going to be absolutely fucking furious with you if something happens to you," Charles told her fiercely. 

"Trust me," Colette’s voice said, sounding slightly tired. "I am very, very motivated to stay alive."

That was good. That was a good sign. If she was still being sarcastic and even a little bit cheeky…it was good.

"Just hold on," he told her again, the familiar feeling of helplessness seeping into his bones. "Just keep hanging on, for me. I love you."

“I love you too,” the words were as immediate and as fast as the sunrise each morning. "Hurry up, dammit."

"I’m trying," he replied, his voice hoarse. "I’m trying. We’re at the airport now. We’ll get there as fast as we can-" he had to stop, when he heard her let out another pained gasping sound, as another contraction clearly hit her hard.

“Goddamn,” he exclaimed, all of his muscles tense with the urge to do something. He wanted to help her, he wanted to be there to comfort her…but more than anything,  he was terrified of losing her. "Liefje, just keep breathing, okay? Breathe and stay calm."

"I’m trying to," her voice was breathless, and he knew that she was probably trying hard to fight the urge to cry out. Oh God, he hated that. He hated seeing her in pain, he loathed feeling this utterly useless.

"Go. Love you," she told him.

"I love you," he told her emphatically, wanting to say something more, but then Charles impatiently gestured at him to hurry up and get out of the car. "I...I’ll see you soon, okay? Just hang on, okay?"

"Yeah," he could tell that she was trying even harder to control her voice, trying to put on a calm and steady front for his benefit. "Just..." she cut off and let out a gasp, another contraction evidently hitting her hard. "...just hurry up before this baby decides to make their way out before you arrive, okay?"

"I will," he promised through gritted teeth. "I will, goddammit, I will, just…hang on."

He heard Colette’s pained panting, and each of her breaths was like a stab in the gut.He hated having to hang up on her

Everything in him rebelled at that. How could he, how could he possibly abandon her like that, how could he let her take on this pain and fear all by herself, without him there to hold her hand...but goddamnit, he had no choice.

He took a shuddering breath and pushed past the urge to scream, to slam his fist into something, anything. His mind was a whirlwind of emotions, ranging from the desperate need to get to her, to overwhelming panic, to anger at the universe for forcing them apart and for putting her through this pain.

Into the plane they went…it was probably the shortest amount of time between entering a plane and taking off Max had ever experienced. 

Before too long they were up in the air, flying towards Nice.

The minutes ticked by, each one passing by like a century. Max would sit in restless agitation at his seat, his mind racing back and forth. Every thought and memory came back to Colette. He just wanted to be at her side, he just wanted everything to be okay…

And instead he would be stuck on this plane for 6 hours.

He would be stuck on this goddamn plane for six hours. Six hours, each one of them filled with the knowledge that the love of his life was giving birth to their child, and he was not there to support her, to hold her hand and reassure her that everything was okay.

It was driving him absolutely insane. He couldn’t take it, he just wanted to be there, with her. He could vividly picture her, sitting in the hospital bed and gripping the rails, her face screwed up in pain as she fought through another contraction. And he was not there to comfort her.

"Maman is with her. Your sister is with her. Lorenzo and Arthur too." Charles said at that moment. “We aren't there but everybody else is."

"How can you be this calm?" Max asked him, dragging a hand through sweat damp hair.

"Don't mistake calm for not being worried," Charles said evenly, his eyes tracking Max's restless pacing of the plane. "I am worried. For her, for you and for the little one. But freaking out isn't gonna do anyone any favours right now."

"I know,” Max said, his voice still strangled tight with stress. He just couldn't get any of the images out of his mind - her struggling and fighting her way through the pain, looking more vulnerable and pale than he had ever seen her...and he was not there.

“Besides, I shouted at Ferrari’s PR and got it out of my system, so currently, I am feeling quite calm.” Charles said darkly. “I imagine that’s going to change again when I am sure that Colette and the baby are alright.”

Max just stared at him. Charles had done what?

If there was a religion that Charles Leclerc believed in then it was Ferrari.

Charles Leclerc was their golden boy. Their Il Predestinato. There was no good-natured fobbing to be had about Ferrari regardless of what issues there had been had through the years, and there had been a lot.

Charles worshipped Ferrari like a malevolent goddess. He didn’t want to hear any criticism of his team and Max had given up on that a very long time ago. 

Charles and Colette both could be the most stubborn people Max had ever match. The only one who could match their stubbornness were each other. 

"You did what?" Max stared at him, utterly flabbergasted. Charles was an absolute Ferrari fan and loyal to the very core…why the hell would he yell at the PR people?

"Why...? What did they do?"

"They weren't even going to tell me that something was wrong with Colette," Charles said darkly. "I knew it. I knew that something was off. But they didn't say anything. It was one of Red Bull's PR Staff that got me out of the cooldown room. Ferrari wouldn't have said anything to me. Ferrari didn't want me to leave either. They wanted to debrief, they wanted me to give interviews,"

Max had to resist the urge to swear. He had been so focused on the fact that he was not with Colette that he hadn't even processed the fact that Ferrari had actually kept her labour a secret from Charles, simply to make him stay and do his goddamn job for them.

"You know that that is not normal, right?" he asked him drily. "I am not telling you that everything is perfect at Red Bull but Christian would never fucking stand for that."

"You know I never expected it," Charles told him, his mouth a thin hard line. "We are the drivers. We are the stars. But we come second. First and foremost, we are assets to the team. What Ferrari wants, Ferrari gets. We drive, we get podiums, we hold the trophies, and we smile for the cameras. Everything else comes second. It doesn’t matter to them. To them, only the trophies matter. "

"That's what they want," Max told him, anger seeping into his voice. "But that's not how it should be. Ferrari is wrong. If something is wrong with your loved ones, they have no right to keep it from you like that. Especially not for the sake of a goddamn interview."

"I know," Charles said, his lips thin with bitterness. "But there's not much I can do about it, is there? We may be the top drivers on the grid, but we drive the car that the teams give us. There's only so much that we can do when the team has power over pretty much every aspect of our career. And believe me, I am going to pay a fucking price for doing what I did. I just don't care at all. It's Colette," he said sharply. "I love all my siblings. I do. I love Lorenzo and Arthur. I would do everything for them. But they aren't my twin. They aren't the second half of me," Charles said simply. "Ferrari be damned."

Max hadn't thought that he was ever going to hear these words out of Charles' mouth but here they were.

"What the fuck did Jos say by the way? What did Coco mean?" Charles demanded.

"He gave an interview to Sky Sports," Max said, fury still embering deep in his gut.

"Of course he did." Charles said, not sounding surprised at all. "What did he say?"

"Confirmed the relationship...and the pregnancy," Max said clenching his teeth. "And if that wasn't enough...he made a...comment about how it had taken us long enough to have a baby."

There was a sharp indrawn breath as Charles absorbed that. "...What?" Charles said after a moment, his voice strangled. "...he made that comment in public? Are - are you serious?"

"I never told him about the two...miscarriages," Max said quietly. "I couldn't deal with whatever well meant advice he was going to have...but I...We lost two babies," Max said weakly. "My father went out there and confirmed our relationship and the pregnancy without talking to either of us. He just made that decision because it's "ridiculous" that we kept it a secret for so long. An it’s making me furious. This wasn't his decision to make. This was ours."

"Yes," Charles said, his jaw clenching. "It was. Your decision. Nobody else’s. He had absolutely no right to do that. Goddamn it, I have never liked that man, but I've never had the urge to punch him as much as I do this very moment."

"You and me both," Max said. The anger he was feeling would have been burning through him like a damn inferno if he hadn't been so worried about Colette.

"This should have come from us," Max repeated quietly. "Not from anybody else."

"It still can come from you," Charles said.

Max paused, looking up at him. "Are you saying we should..." he began uncertainly.

"You want to tell the entire world that you love my sister and that she is having your baby? You have an Instagram account and a phone with an internet connection," Charles said drily. "Tell them the truth. Your truth."

Max opened his mouth and then closed it again. Charles had a point. It was obvious what the news was going to be now if people had seen Jos's interview.

But he wanted to be the one to tell the world. He wanted it to be on his terms. He wanted it to be public but on his public terms. Not his father's.

"Are you ever going to ask my sister to marry you?" Charles asked him suddenly.

The question caught him completely off guard. "...What?" He said blankly, stunned by the change of the conversation.

"You gave her a ring when you were both 18 that you both insisted was only a promise ring," Charles said drily. "Are you ever going to replace it with the real thing?"

He thought back to that ring that still sat on Colette's finger to this day. A simply gold band with a tiny heart-shaped diamond.

He had given it to her in 2016, after his very first Grand Prix win in Spain. He had gone out and bought it that very same day to be exact.

He had bought Victoira a handbag the first time he had scored his championship points...but the first time he had won...he had bought Colette that ring.

"Apparently the baby is only going to have your surname too, because you have an agreement," Charles continued. "Do I actually want to know what that agreement was?"

"We were 18. Both our father's would have probably killed us, if we came to them and told them that we were engaged," Max said with a sigh. The Leclerc's had always been supportive of their relationship but Hervè Leclerc had very much thought that both Colette and him were far too young to get married. 

Jos on the other hand...Max didn't even want to imagine that screaming fit.  "So I gave her that ring and we agreed that..."

"You agreed that..." Charles repeated slowly, silently urging him to continue.

Max let out a deep sigh and dragged a hand through his already messy hair, mussing it up even more. "We agreed that we didn't really need a piece of paper to tell us what we already knew," he said simply. "Colette and I had been together for 6 years at that point, we already knew and accepted that we were going to be together for the rest of our lives. It was just a matter of when. So we decided that we didn't need a damn piece of paper to know that we were committed to each other. We already knew that, without a doubt," Max said simply. "It was a promise ring. To love and to cherish, till death us do part. One day we would do it properly, but till then...that ring was a promise."

Charles stared at him. "Let me get this straight. You have been married to my sister for 10 years?" he asked him sharply.

Max winced. Okay. Put like that, it sounded kinda bad. "We never had the actual wedding," he said sheepishly. "We both know it wasn't necessary for us, so...we kinda just...never got around to it."

"I mean, I did ask your father for her hand in marriage when it was clear that he wasn't going to be there...when we eventually did it properly...but...for us that ring was… It was more than enough," Max said quietly. "I knew damn well that I would be with her for the rest of my life. She knew it. We both knew it. And that ring was a symbol between us that sealed the deal. We both knew that it was going to be for forever and always. It was a promise. A promise to always stay by each other’s side. No matter how badly things fell apart around us. No matter how much the world wanted to tear us to apart. We were going to stay together, come hell or high water. We didn't need a paper to prove that to us or the rest of the world," Max said firmly.

Charles stared at him for a couple of long moments, processing this. Max was well aware that, from an outside perspective, it might sound weird. That they had been so young, but so utterly certain that they were going to spend their lives together.

But he and Colette had been together for years. And he had seen how strongly they had bonded over the years, seen what they had been able to deal with as a team, as one, and how they had come through every single thing that the life had thrown at them together.

"You two are utterly ridiculous," Charles finally said drily. "You didn't get engaged because as far as you two were concerned you already got married years ago."

Max winced a little bit and couldn't really refute it. If he were to be honest, he'd have admit it did sound utterly ridiculous, when Charles spelled it out like that.

But that just...that was how badly they had known right from the very beginning that this was it for them. They didn't need a piece of paper to tell them what they already knew.

"I'll ask her properly," he promised Charles. "I already got the ring. But Colette doesn't want to overshadow Lorenzo and Charlotte and I knew that she wasn't going to want to have a big party while pregnant so I figured I would just wait."

Charles was slightly taken aback by his words, before he gave a small smile. "She'll definitely say yes, you know," he said, the corner of his eyes crinkling with affection.

Max smiled in return. His heart ached with the thought of her. "I hope so," he said quietly, feeling like there was a hole in his chest where his heart was supposed to be. "I really, really hope so."

[starfilmz]

THOROUGHFARE | UNSURE FEELINGS, DRUNKEN CALLS

⤷ A JJ MAYBANK SOCMED AU .ᐟ

──── you never expected that swapping socials with your call of duty duo would change your life — whether for better or worse, you're still not sure. friendships are made and something much more begins.

thoroughfare masterlist ──── 05 | 06 | 07

a/n: chap 6 has been a bitch to post bc tumblr couldn’t handle it but VIOLA it has arrived. this chap became a mix of smau and written fic so we doin something here 🤔 ofc it’ll still be social media based do not fret, but i feel like these written ones are needed for this. not betaread obvs so mistakes are everywhere!! lmk your thoughts, expectations, or how u see this fic ending cuz it is soon 😝

john b stood up as soon as he heard the whirring sound of his best friend’s motorcycle. it came to a stop when he stepped out on the château’s porch, leaning against one of the posts with his arms crossed. jj looked disheveled and as much as he wanted to say “as per usual”, the boy walked towards the house as if he ran into several bushes on the way.

he had a frown on his face as he faced john b. “i don’t know what do,” he finally spoke, his expression morphing that tells john b he didn’t want to admit to that. “long distance relationships are weird and, i’ve experienced worst that weird, man, you and i both know that and i—“

“alright, calm down,” john b grabbed the boy’s shoulder before he could go on another self-destructive tangent. “let’s talk about this, okay? pope said he’s on his way with beers.”

jj sighed, running a hand through his blonde hair. “it feels unfair for her that i’m making a big deal about this. it’s the whole rafe thing again! honestly, i genuinely think i overreacted.” he sat on the closest couch on the porch with furrowed eyebrows.

john b followed him, an amused expression on his face. jj noticed this, raising his eyebrows at the boy. “what’s so funny?”

he shook his head, his curls falling slightly to his side as he looked at jj. “when’s the last time you acted this way towards a girl?”

“oh, don’t start, jb.”

“i’m sorry, okay? look, you don’t need to be thinking this hard, man, alright?” the boy chuckled, patting his friend firmly on the back. “yn’s a good person, i can tell, and…” john b looked around as if anyone else but the two of them were around. he leaned closer towards jj, who didn’t think twice to do the same.

“from what i’ve read from sar’s phone, yn’s just crazy for you.”

this changed jj’s solemn expression into a mixture of lovesick, curiosity, and excitement. “i mean, that’s natural, right? she agreed to be my girlfriend so it’s natural for her to like me.” his words sounded defensive which made john b’s eyebrows rose.

“what i’m trying to say, jj, you don’t have to freak out just because you don’t know who’s around her. long distance is weird, i agree, but are you going to be like this every time she hangs out with people you don’t know?”

jj lowered his eyes, a tiny wave of shame washing over him. “no.”

“right, and i’m not trying to say don’t be jealous— you can’t help it, you like the girl,” john b held one of the blonde’s shoulder. “and if i were to give you an advice, man to man, thinking in your shoes, if you find long distance so much, why don’t you do something about it?”

jj looked up at john b, confusion etched all over his face. “what are you—“ and as if something clicked in his mind, john b nodded, confirming his thoughts. “isn’t it too soon?”

“what’s too soon?” both boys visibly flinched as pope made his presence known, beer bottles in hand. “i had to swipe this from my dad’s stack so you guys better fill me in.”

you couldn’t help the smile at john b’s story, giving it a heart as scrolled off the app. you would send a response, something about not leaving him in the streets because you guys still have a game session planned tomorrow, but you decided not to.

they were probably still at the boneyard, a place where they usually throw their parties as you’ve learned previously from jj, and they’ve shared enough stories about those to let you know those parties don’t end easily.

you sighed, sliding further into your bed as you hugged your pillow. was it silly to feel the way you do now?

you aren’t ready to fly out to see the boy you’ve been dying to see, but you want to, and you tell yourself you’re okay seeing them have fun, but as you stare deeper into your bedroom wall, you’re beginning to doubt that.

you took a deep breath, closing your eyes in an attempt to sleep and brush off your thoughts, but as soon as you do, your phone rang beside you. you moved the pillow and raised your phone, seeing jj’s profile picture and username across your screen.

jj was calling you.

you sat up, answering the phone, and placed it on your ear. loud music greeted your first, along with voices you’re not familiar with.

“—you can’t just leave her like that, jayj!” a girl harshly whispered against the speaker and it made you think she was either kiara, cleo, or sarah.

“hello?” you finally spoke, and when you did, everyone on the other side seemed to quiet down. you heard some kind of harsh slap, along with a small ‘ow!’. you didn’t recognize the rest of the voice before, but you were definitely aware someone had slapped jj.

“jj? you there?” you called once more, tone lighter in amusement. “i’m gonna hang up on you if you don’t talk.”

that seemed to catch the boy’s attention as he began sputtering away. “no, no, don’t, hello! look, i’m sorry, i’m being peer pressed right now—“

“don’t say that!” a deeper voice interrupted him.

“—and i just wanted to hear your voice…” from the way jj was talking, you could tell he was drunk, though you did believe that slap before sobered him up a bit. “i missed you, yn.”

“it’s only been a day a whole, jj,” you chuckled, leaning against your pillows. despite your answer, you couldn’t help but feel the same way. “but i missed you too, jay.”

“i’ve been building up the courage to call you all night and, i don’t know, i just wanted to hear from you before my lights go out,” jj laughed at his own words, a drunken expression all over his face you imagined.

“build up the courage? i’m your girlfriend, jay, you could call me whenever you want.” you answered, a small smile on your face.

there was a beat of silence from him and you thought it was a sign that he’s close to getting conked out, but his next words proved otherwise.

“can you say that again?” he whispered, almost like he’s hiding, which was most likely from his eavesdropping friends. “about the girlfriend thing, please?”

you hummed a playful tone, the instinct to tease jj was strong and it almost won if it weren’t the way your cheeks heated up at his voice, the way he sounded so soft and near the phone as if he was saying it directly in your ear.

“i’m your girlfriend, jj maybank. you happy?” you had to roll your eyes despite no one being with you hearing your sappy voice and attitude, anything to keep the butterflies in your stomach at bay.

“so happy, you don’t even know, baby,” the nickname came to you as a shock, but it didn’t felt wring hearing it from jj. if anything, you wanted to make him say it again. “i’m just so— oh my god, so happy. i’m your boyfriend, you’re my girlfriend— oh, bliss!”

you couldn’t help the laugh that bursted from you as jj’s voice doubled in volume. “i have a girlfriend! and she really likes me!” jj’s speaker managed to get the sound of what sounded like a crowd cheering at his embarrassing announcement, making you chuckle even further.

“alright, hands off the phone, okay— john b, take him, please? before he announces more details about yn?” another voice took over the call, and by the way the boy, who you now know is john b, responded with a ‘yes, ma’am’, you assumed it was sarah who came to the rescue.

“hey, sarah,” you greeted her. “having fun?”

“oh, we are, but no so much for jj tomorrow.”

“i can imagine, you’d think he’ll be able to live with that?” you joked.

“babe, he has no choice,” sarah responded with a laugh. “but for now, john b’s taking him back to the château to properly conk out.”

“that’s good to hear.”

“so,” she started and you already picked up the teasing tone in her voice.

“so?” you chuckled, amused at her.

“still unsure of visiting your hopeless boyfriend? was his very public and loud declaration of love for you enough?”

you hugged the nearest pillow, a warm smile spreading across your face. you felt a lot more at ease and mind solely focused on jj. “it’s enough.”

thoroughfare taglist: @yumwhy @beeskisses @callieyanderechan @udpoota @vivian-555 @popesbby @whatisoutside @roryology @readinghoes @mytimeiswaiting @marleymarleymarleymarley @urmotherlvr @fruitcakerafe @bobobellabo @max23b @mirellef2001 @bearbear21 @cassiewritessalot @baocean @ayy1234567 @lmaowhatt @scaroooos @mbella607 @dylsdaily @1mcrazybutcute

big apologies to the peeps that wanted to be tagged but aren’t here cuz i might’ve missed yall bc and for the people that are written on here but weren’t notified pls refer to this post :)

[ssa-dado]

Annoyingly Yours - SOS

Aaron Hotchner x fem!bau!reader Genre: fluff, angst though it's more like ♫ LOATHING, UNADULTERATED LOATHING ♫ Summary: At 33, Aaron Hotchner prides himself on discipline and control... until you become his deskmate. With quirks that seem to clash against his precision, you’re nothing short of maddening. Even your breathing seems to provoke a visceral reaction in him... surely out of frustration, right? Not out of... attraction?! Warnings: None, just wanted to clarify the story is set in 1998, before Hotch became Unit Chief (Gideon and Rossi were charge instead). Word Count: 4.4k Dado's Corner: Based on this ask sent by the loml @c-losur3. Made a few tweaks because I can. And because I’m evil. Enter Aaron “convinces himself he hates you while secretly nursing a big fat crush” Hotchner. A timeless classic. Hope you like it.

masterlist

“People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use.” - Søren Kierkegaard

Written in blue gel ink on a neon pink sticky note, it sat smugly atop the pristine case file Hotch had spent hours perfecting the night before.

No signature, no admission of guilt.

Just a bright, audacious square of defiance left to mock him.

In all his years as a profiler, he’d never encountered a case this easy to solve. Hell, he wished his active investigations were even half as simple as this. Because only after approximately half a second of analysis, the profile of the Unsub was crystal clear:

Female. Early 20s. A twisted sense of humor. A fascination with philosophy, particularly the existential, though occasionally dabbling in absurdism. Works in law enforcement - specifically, the BAU. Only writes in blue ink because she needs her words to stand out as much as her personality does. Likely has a compulsive habit of arriving to work early but never early enough to beat him to the office.

And there she was, the Unsub, strolling through the entrance just as the clock struck 6:01.

“Good morning, Hotch,” you said without even glancing in his direction, as if you somehow sensed his irritation wafting across the bullpen.

You were the Unsub.

His polyglot, sarcastic, sticky-note-vandalizing deskmate.

Case closed.

“Why did you leave me this?” he scoffed as his fingers carefully peeled back the neon pink square from the folder.

The glue resisted just enough to be infuriating, threatening to leave a smear on what he privately considered his masterpiece - a report so cleanly written that it might one day serve as the gold standard for FBI rookies.

And now, his file, had been vandalized.

It bore your mark.

“Educational purposes,” you said airily, as you dropped into your chair facing his own, a complete lack of regard for the disruption you caused just by existing in his vicinity.

He despised it.

That your desk had to face his, ensuring that every time he so much as lifted his gaze, he was met with the perpetual source of his unease, was nothing short of torture.

Why couldn’t you be like his last deskmate? That moron at least had the decency to leave him alone unless absolutely necessary.

The most small talk he’d ever inflicted was the occasional, self-congratulatory monologue about whatever barely-legal college girl he’d managed to con into bed last Friday night with the oh-so-irresistible revelation that he was FBI.

At least after spewing his bullshit, the guy would shut up and return to his self-inflicted misery, no doubt haunted by the limitations of his pitifully small brain.

You, instead, were far too smart - too sharp for your own good, really - but still your humor was as broken as his own. You had the same, if not more, level of drive. And for some inexplicable reason, you shared his obsession with arriving early.

It was maddening.

It was his thing - his small act of rebellion against a world that had always expected more from him than he could give.

His hours of solitude before the office filled with noise, before the madness and the demands of others hijacked his peace. Those few precious hours were his escape, his refuge, where he could think, where he could breathe.

But no, you had to show up too. Every damn morning.

“Educational purposes?” He echoed flatly, regretting, for the hundredth time, that he ever encouraged you to speak before his second cup of coffee.

“Yes, Hotch. I’ve never seen you use a sticky note,” you retorted, as if your reasoning were completely rational and not mildly absurd. “So, naturally, I assumed you didn’t know they existed. Thought I’d be kind of me to introduce you to the concept.”

“You’re hilarious,” he deadpanned, the sarcasm sliding off his tongue with a sharpness that matched the ache now forming at his temples. “I know what sticky notes are. I don’t use them because they’re impractical. They always leave glue residue, it’s annoying.”

Since for some reasons he felt the need to emphasize his point, he held up his sacred notebook - a worn, leather-bound treasure he treated like an extension of himself. “That’s why we have these. To take proper notes. Like agents. Not middle schoolers.”

But you didn’t even flinch.

Instead, you leaned back in your chair, the movement slow and casual, yet just enough to make him irrationally nervous that you might tip over. “They don’t leave residue if you close the case fast enough. The glue won’t have time to dry. But I guess if it takes you ages to solve something, that’s not really the sticky note’s fault, is it? Sounds more like a problem with the agent.”

His jaw locked so tightly it was a wonder his teeth didn’t crack.

The nerve of you.

He hated how his body betrayed him like this, the faintest tingle at the back of his neck, the way his pulse faltered and then stuttered, because his decision to remain silent didn’t let his voice do the stammering instead.

Oh, he wanted to argue.

Desperately.

To lay out an irrefutable case demonstrating, that the fault lay not in the man who would undoubtedly climb the FBI ranks faster than anyone dared imagine but in the cheap adhesive some factory somewhere had slapped onto your stupid pack of hot pink sticky notes.

And all he wanted, absurdly, was to prove you wrong.

Not just wrong. Spectacularly wrong.

But instead of offering a retort worthy of his reputation, he exhaled sharply, forcing his jaw to unclench.

He leaned forward slightly, his dark eyes locking onto yours, narrowing into the kind of look that could silence seasoned agents, suspects, and even Gideon when necessary.

Yet somehow, it had no discernible effect on the 21-year-old profiler sitting across from him - the one who’d been in the BAU for barely three weeks and already seemed impervious to his most withering glares.

As if in response to his futile attempt at dominance, your smirk widened, as though you could hear the unspoken debate raging in his head. Worse, it looked like you were enjoying the fact that you’d managed to rattle him.

And God help him, he felt rattled.

“How many of those sticky notes do you have?” he finally asked.

Your response was almost immediate.

“As many as you need,” you said as you pulled open your top-right drawer – the drawer that had come to symbolize everything he couldn’t categorize about you.

It housed your so-called “essentials”: pencils, a collection of elastic bands you had an infuriating habit of launching at him when the mood struck, and the same six markers in various states of decay - probably relics from your high school days. There was a stapler in there too - one he had to admit, with no small amount of shame, he borrowed from time to time.

But then there were the other items. The ones his categorically organized brain couldn’t quite justify sharing space with stationary essentials.

A box of tea - the kind of black tea with a scent so strong it practically sucker-punched him from across the desk every time you brewed it, chocolate bars that mysteriously appeared and vanished like contraband…

…and, as it turned out, the dreaded sticky notes.

They were hidden beneath the tea box, of course - because why not force him to think about the assault on his nostrils that would begin precisely three hours and twenty-seven minutes from now?

You lifted the box, revealing the fluorescent pink squares of doom, a shade so bright it only made the pain going on in his head since the first moment you opened your mouth today even worse.

“I only have hot pink, though,” you announced, holding the sticky notes up.

“…And?” he asked, raising an eyebrow. “Am I not allowed to use hot pink? Do you have a problem with that?”

“On the contrary,” you said, your lips curling into that infuriating smirk again. “I’m impressed. I thought you’d whine about a color demasculating your sacred reports.”

He felt his pulse thrum in his ears at that.

He almost - almost - wanted to tell you that you were looking at a man currently wearing pink socks under his neatly pressed slacks. A pair that had, unfortunately, turned pink during his first solo attempt at laundry in college and had somehow managed to stay in his rotation all these years, as a reminder that even the best could make mistakes.

But he didn’t.

Not because he was embarrassed - he wasn’t - but because he knew you’d twist it into something else entirely, another jab, another laugh at his expense.

And the last thing he needed right now was more of this.

Whatever this was.

Instead, he picked up the hot pink sticky notes, tapping them against his palm. “I’ll take them, we’ll see if it’s really the agent’s fault."

By mid-morning, to his reluctant surprise, the sticky notes had become one of his favorite tools - not just for their undeniable practicality but because they gave him the perfect weapon to deliver a dose of your own medicine.

And you deserved it. Absolutely, unequivocally deserved it.

After all, it wasn’t him launching elastic bands at his deskmate with sniper-like precision at ungodly hours, the faint thwack cutting through the quiet bullpen as the band landed squarely in his lap, while he was clearly trying to work. This, from the same person who’d managed to fail their firearm certification twice

It wasn’t him leaning subtly - though not subtly enough - to sneak a peek at his case files because your own workload wasn’t challenging enough to hold your attention. Still too new to the team, you’d only been sent into the field once, a prisoner of the bullpen and endless paperwork. Yet, despite the monotony, you remained undeterred, tirelessly determined to prove your worth at every possible turn.

And it certainly wasn’t him disrupting the flow of the day by asking if his coffee needed refilling when he was clearly already immersed in work, only to return moments later with an extra steaming cup - and a piece of chocolate from that drawer - placing it without a word on his desk like it wasn’t an unnecessary intrusion. Because you were just kind like that.

It wasn’t him rolling up the sleeves of his shirt, the fabric bunching unevenly around his elbows - a motion so predictable it had practically become your tell when you were wrestling with a puzzle more stubborn than the agent that solving it.

Nor was it how your forearms inevitably transformed into impressionist paintings of smudged blue ink, the accidental artwork often bleeding onto the cuffs of your shirt, leaving the unfortunate soul seated across from you utterly derailed from whatever he’d been about to jot down, unable to look away.

It wasn’t him who dressed like that.

Had a brain like that.

A voice like that.

A face like that.

No.

It wasn’t him. It was you. And that was the problem.

Because for all his irritation, for all his carefully constructed disdain, he couldn’t stop noticing. Couldn't stop looking. Couldn't stop… what exactly?

…Right.

Couldn’t stop scribbling down his meticulously crafted revenge, which he would plant squarely on your desk the moment you wandered off to refill your coffee.

“We are all born ignorant, but one must work hard to remain stupid.” – Benjamin Franklin

Thought you might enjoy something to ponder while you’re busy ignoring the typo you made on page 7, line 15 of your report.– A.H.

He placed the sticky note precisely in the center of your desk, ensuring it was impossible to miss. Satisfied, he returned to his seat, feigning an air of indifference as he watched you from the corner of his eye.

It didn’t take long.

He didn’t look up when you arrived, but he heard it - the subtle shift in your breathing, the gasp as your eyes widened. The pages of your report rustled as you flipped through them, and the sharp exhale that followed told him you’d found it.

“Unbelievable,” you muttered, more to yourself than him.

Never had a sound been so soothing to his ears.

And yet - he should have known better.

He barely had time to blink before the loud thud of your hand slamming onto his desk jolted him upright. He looked up to find you standing over him, your eyes gleaming with a smugness so infuriating it made him want to wipe it off your face.

His gaze darted down to the sticky note you’d slapped in front of him, and -

Oh.

Hotch stared at it. Then stared some more.

There, in all its crude glory, was what could only be described as a "creative interpretation" of a very specific part of the male anatomy, staring back at him from the bright pink square.

“The proportions are all wrong.” He deadpanned.

And then you, with all your infuriating composure, leaned on his desk.

Close. Too close.

"Oh, I’m sorry, Agent Hotchner," you said, raising a brow. "If you want it anatomically correct, maybe next time you should hand me a reference photo."

His brain short-circuited.

For a horrifying moment, he couldn’t think of a single word, but only at the implication of what you said… you couldn’t mean that… right?!

“Not yours!” you blurted out, your hands flailing in a frantic attempt to erase the moment. “I didn’t mean- I wasn’t asking for- I just-”

"And I certainly wouldn’t-" he cut in, his own voice breaking due to the sudden clumsiness of his own tongue.

But the damage was done.

Your cheeks turned the same vivid shade as the neon pink sticky note still plastered defiantly on his desk. He felt his own face burning, and the back of his neck prickled uncomfortably, like his own body was actively rebelling against him.

Both of you were way too stunned to say anything that wouldn’t somehow make it worse.

Hotch’s mind raced for a way to defuse the situation, but every possible response felt like it would either escalate the embarrassment or reveal… something he wasn’t ready to confront.

And then, mercifully - or perhaps not - your survival instincts kicked in.

“I’ll just… uh… get more coffee,” you muttered, backing away from his desk like it might physically combust if you stayed a moment longer. You turned on your heel, clearly aiming to escape the bullpen as fast as humanly possible. “Do you want some?”

He blinked, thrown off by the question. “Yes, thanks. Black,” he replied automatically, his voice still a little stiff.

As soon as you were out of sight, he allowed himself to crumble. His left hand dragged across his face, fingers pressing against his temples as if they could massage the ridiculousness of it all out of his brain.

Stupid. The whole thing was so stupid.

A slip of the tongue, a misstep, blown completely out of proportion.

And yet, here he was, sitting at his desk, undone by a pink sticky note and a fleeting moment of awkwardness.

With a low, frustrated groan, he let his hand drop, hitting his forehead against the heel of his palm in a futile attempt to snap himself out of it.

Focus. He needed to focus.

He stared down at the open case file in front of him, its neatly typed words mocking him with their clarity.

He knew they were legible - he’d written them himself.

But right now, the letters blurred into meaningless smudges on the page, overridden by a far more vivid image - your face.

Flushed. Wide-eyed. Flustered.

This was ridiculous. He was ridiculous.

Just a joke, he reminded himself. Just a stupid, ill-timed joke.

And yet his chest still felt tight, his pulse erratic, like he’d run up the stairs two steps at a time.

His gaze flicked to the sticky note still sitting on the edge of his desk, as bright and offensive as the moment it had first been slapped down in front of him. Without thinking, he grabbed it, crumpling it in his fist.

There. Problem solved. Gone. Out of sight, out of mind.

He could move on.

But then his hand stilled, his grip loosening as he stared at the crumpled ball of paper.

His pulse still raced, his mind still spiraled, and all because of… this.

A rational man would throw it away. Rip it into pieces, toss it into the trash, and let it become a fleeting, forgotten memory.

He should throw it away. He would throw it away. Any second now.

But his hand didn’t move.

Instead, and against every shred of common sense he prided himself on, Hotch smoothed the crumpled edges as best he could and opened his desk drawer, tucking it far into the back, behind a few other things he pretended not to care about but couldn’t quite get rid of.

Hidden away, out of sight.

Safe.

From what? From you? From himself? He didn’t have the answer, and he didn’t dare linger on the questions.

Instead, he closed the drawer with more force than necessary, ignoring the faint tremor in his hand - but even as he turned his attention to the files in front of him, the pink still lingered in his periphery, an afterimage burned into his mind.

Of your flustered face.

Adorable.

So adorable that, over time, that sticky note became far from the only item inhabiting that drawer.

Aaron Hotchner - the very man who had once scoffed at your so-called “miscellaneous essentials” drawer - now secretly had one of his own.

A collection of odd, seemingly random things: items you had given him, thrown at him in moments of boredom, or those ridiculous little tokens you’d started exchanging lately that blurred the line between teasing and genuine thoughtfulness.

Because that’s what deskmates did, right?

They shared. They joked. They exchanged these odd little tokens of camaraderie that somehow made the job less crushing.

Except this felt like something more.

Maybe you were more than deskmates. Maybe even… friends?

And he wasn’t the only one who noticed.

Gideon, had been starting to observe the two of you like he was profiling a particularly complex unsub, his sharp, knowing glances making Hotch feel like a bug under a magnifying glass.

Then there was Rossi, who took an almost perverse delight in making his observations less subtle. "Synergy," he'd say with a pointed smirk, the kind that made Hotch’s jaw tighten. "It’s a rare thing, you know, finding compatibility like this. Magic, really."

They saw something. Something neither of you was ready to admit.

And ominously - no, deliberately - they decided to exploit it.

Because that’s what bosses did.

The BAU was chronically understaffed, perpetually fighting against the outdated perception that profiling was glorified guesswork. The pay wasn’t anything to write home about, either. Most cases were worked from behind desks, saving the budget for the bigger field assignments.

But what the BAU lacked in glamour, it tried to make up for in partnerships - teams so seamlessly synchronized they became the backbone of the unit.

Apparently, you and Hotch had become one of those teams.

What had started as two distinct desks - two well-defined territories with clear boundaries - had slowly morphed into one chaotic shared space.

A 5’x5’ no-man’s-land where it was impossible to tell where your workspace ended, and his began.

Like now.

The oversized map of your current case sprawled across the desk, forcing you both into closer proximity than either of you would normally allow.

You were perched on his side of the desk, tracing potential paths and patterns, completely absorbed in piecing together the unsub’s geographical profile.

He told himself he was focused. Jotting down victim locations. Marking points on the map with  little red magnets.

Totally immersed in the task at hand.

Except he wasn’t.

Because the occasional brush of your arm against his felt electrifying in a way it had no right to be.

Because your voice, low and steady as you murmured your observations, felt less like background noise and more like the only sound in the room.

And yet, this closeness, this seamless partnership, felt natural.

Effortless.

Distracting as hell.

So distracting that by the time he placed the last magnet, he realized he’d miscounted. One victim left, and no magnet to place them.

“Hotch,” you said softly, your eyes scanning the map, “It looks like we might’ve missed a pin for Daniel Hardman.”

How diplomatic of you.

How unnecessarily kind, considering it was entirely his fault.

He’d miscounted the magnets - a mistake caused by a momentary lapse in focus when, mid-count, you casually asked him if he wanted to go watch the first Star Wars prequel with you next year.

It wasn’t just the advance planning that sent his mind reeling - though the thought of you penciling him into your future like that was disarming enough - it was the fact that you remembered he liked Star Wars.

A detail you had no business remembering, and yet, somehow, you did.

“Yes, sorry. There are more in my drawer,” he said, standing quickly to fetch them himself. But before he could stop you, you were already at the drawer, pulling it open.

“It’s the second one-” The words barely left his mouth before he heard the gasp.

“…from the top,” he finished weakly, already knowing what you’d seen.

There they were. Your tokens. In his drawer. Staring right at you.

The gun casing from the bullet you’d proudly handed him after finally earning your firearm certification on your third attempt. You’d declared, almost giddy, that you’d never be a burden to him again, and maybe it was his lessons, you’d added shyly, that had helped you finally overcome it. He wasn’t sure what had struck him more: the pride in your voice or the fact that you’d thought of him at all.

A framed solo photograph of the two of you from that year’s Thanksgiving spent stuck in the bullpen, drowning in case files while Rossi and Gideon insisted on a makeshift dinner with takeout. You hadn’t hesitated for a second, throwing an arm around him for the picture and leaning into him like it was the most natural thing in the world. For you, maybe it had been. For him, it had been anything but.

Every single elastic band you’d launched at him -143, though he’d never admit to counting.

A single stray hair tie - the one you’d used to tie his hair into a ridiculous fountain one day when his fringe had gotten so long it kept falling into his face. He’d left it like that the rest of the day, silently cursing himself for how much he didn’t hate it.

An unopened pack of hot pink sticky notes, the only color he now allowed himself to buy, though he’d never admit why.

And, of course, every sticky note you’d ever left him, arranged in chronological order - except for one.

The “caricature,” the crude drawing that had started his ridiculous collection. That particular sticky note hadn’t stayed long in the drawer. Somehow, it had made its way home with him, “inexplicably” framed and placed on his bedside table.

It now sat next to his alarm clock, the two most irritating objects in his life.

Both constant reminders of things he couldn’t seem to escape - one for its relentless insistence on dragging him out of bed every morning, and the other for how it made him feel every time he looked at it.

And now here you were, looking up from the drawer, eyes wide. “Hotch…”

He tensed, his pulse quickening with each step you took toward him… what were you doing?

Without a word, you opened your drawer—the infamous "essentials" drawer he thought he knew like the back of his hand.

Except this time, its contents had changed.

Because right on top, perched like a cherished keepsake, was a photo he hadn’t known existed.

Another one from that Thanksgiving night.

The one photo taken moments later, when you’d decided, in your infinite ability to wreak havoc, to joke about “capturing a moment” and had wrapped your arms around his head, holding him still as you planted a kiss on his cheek.

His expression in the photo was pure indignation, eyebrows furrowed in protest - though it also captured the deep rouge spreading across his cheeks.

“This one is my favorite,” you said, laughing as you held it up for him to see. “You’re so red in it, it’s hilarious.”

He stared at the photo, feeling the telltale warmth creeping up his neck, threatening to betray him all over again. His ears burned as he managed to mutter, “Never been kissed by a woman before.”

The words hung in the air for a beat too long.

You blinked, your laughter abruptly halting as your mouth fell open in shock. “Wait, seriously? Are you-?”

He sighed, cutting you off before your pity or disbelief could spiral out of control. “I was joking,” he said, voice flat and utterly deadpan. “I’ve been kissed by women. Multiple.”

You burst into laughter again, this time doubling over. “Oh my God! Why did you say it like that? Multiple! Hotch,” you said, gasping for air between giggles, “you’re killing me.”

“No,” he muttered under his breath, shaking his head as he turned back to the map in front of him. “You’re killing me.”

You didn’t hear him, thank God - or if you did, you gave no sign. He wasn’t sure which would have been worse.

A moment later, you were back at his side of the desk, the missing red magnet in your hand. You held it out to him, your smile still warm, still lingering. “For the record,” you said, your voice softer now, “I think it’s kind of sweet. That you framed it, I mean.”

His hand hesitated as he reached for the magnet, his fingers hovering just over yours. Something so simple suddenly felt unbearably complicated.

Delicate.

He couldn’t seem to figure out how to take the magnet without brushing against your skin - not that he didn’t want to.

He just wasn’t sure if he should.

“It’s a good photo,” he said at last, his voice quieter than usual, his eyes flickering up to meet yours briefly before darting back to the map.

Safe. Neutral.

But you didn’t retreat.

If anything, your smile only grew.

“Yes,” you said, voice just as quiet. “It is.”

---

taglist: @beata1108 ; @c-losur3 ; @fangirlunknown ; @hayleym1234 ; @justyourusualash ; @khxna ; @kyrathekiller ; @lostinwonderland314 ; @mxblobby ; @oxforce ; @person-005 ; @prettybaby-reid ; @reidfile ; @royalestrellas ; @ssa-callahan ; @softestqueeen ; @theseerbetweenus ; @todorokishoe24

[itneverendshere]

the fireworks are through, here we are, me and you - r.c

pairing: rafe x bartender!pogue!reader (bartender!reader universe)

decided to get back into writing with something smaller and just in time for the NYE! i'm a bit late (obviously) but wanted to write a little piece for my first universe, since it's so dear to my heart! hope all of you add a good, fresh, amazing start to 2025 and if you didn't, it will get better 💘

Rafe Cameron had never cared about New Year’s Eve—never cared about anything that came with it, really.

No resolutions, no countdowns, no stupid superstitions. For years, the only thing NYE had ever been to him was an excuse to get high, shit-faced, or both. Another party, another distraction, another night to drown out the noise in his head. 

This year was different, he had you.

“Tell me if it gets too much, okay?”

“Baby, I’m fine,” you reassured him, placing a hand on his chest to calm him down.

Rafe nodded, but you could see the gears turning in his head. He was watching you out of the corner of his eye every second, quietly assessing if you were comfortable, if you were happy.

You leaned against the marble kitchen island, sipping something fizzy from a crystal flute, half-listening as he introduced you to another one of his college buddies. He had his arm slung low around you, the tips of his fingers brushing the hem of your dress like he couldn’t help himself.

“You still good?” he murmured, leaning close so that you could feel the warmth of his breath against your ear. 

You tilted your head to look at him, catching that pretty face that never failed to make your knees weak. 

“Yeah,” you confirmed, though the truth was you felt a little out of place. You still weren’t used to this crowd, their polished laughs and overpriced cologne. Maybe you’d never be.

But Rafe made it bearable, he always did.

His eyes traced the curve of your cheek, the way the fairy lights strung across the patio reflected in your eyes. You didn’t notice, busy scanning the room, but to him, you were the only thing worth looking at.

“You’re lying."

Your brow furrowed as you looked back at him.

“What?”

“You’re not fine.” He moved impossibly closer, his free hand brushing a stray strand of hair from your face, “You always do that little thing with your mouth when you’re uncomfortable.”

You rolled your eyes, but the corner of your lips twitched. “I’m fine, really. It’s just...not my scene.”

His hand dropped from your face to your hip again, pulling you a fraction closer, like he needed to feel you against him to believe you were really there. 

“Okay, let’s eave,” he said, his tone so earnest it made your chest ache.

“Baby,” you sighed, placing a hand on his chest to keep him from spiraling into full protective mode. “You’ve been looking forward to this. I’ll survive a few hours of rich-kid bullshit. Promise.”

His jaw ticked, but he didn’t argue. Instead, he pressed a kiss to your temple, “Don’t care about the stupid party,” he murmured against your skin. “Just wanted to spend the night with you.”

You rolled your eyes again, but this time it was more for show.

“You’re such a sap.”

“Only for you.” The words slipped out so easily, like they’d been sitting on the tip of his tongue all night. He meant every damn syllable.

The night wore on and he stuck to your side like glue. It was endearing, in a way, as he introduced you to his university friends, always with some kind of proud little flourish—like saying your name was his favorite thing to do. 

“This is her,” he’d said more than once, his chest puffed up slightly, like just having you on his arm made him the luckiest guy in the room.

The way he looked at you made it hard to stay annoyed. Everyone was polite enough, but Rafe didn’t let any awkwardness linger, always guiding the conversation, nudging you in with a soft “Tell them about that time…” or offering a quick compliment like, “She’s way better at that than I ever was.”

And when one of his friends said something vaguely pretentious, you felt his hand tighten ever so slightly on your waist before he cut in with a sharp, “Yeah, okay, Benji, but tell them about the time you puked on your mom’s Birkin.” His grin was all teeth, but his tone was light—he was still playing nice, but only because of you.

By the time the countdown was close, the party had spilled outside.

The chilly night air nipped at your skin, but you didn’t mind—especially when Rafe shrugged off his jacket and draped it over your shoulders without a word.

“Thanks,” you murmured, pulling it tighter around you. It smelled like him—clean, with just a hint of that cologne you loved.

He didn’t respond, just tugged you closer, his hands settling on your hips as he leaned down to look at you. “What are you gonna wish for?”

“What?” you asked, caught off guard by the question.

“At midnight. What are you gonna wish for?” His blue eyes so intense they made your stomach scream.

You laughed, trying to brush off the sudden seriousness in his tone. “Don’t know. A winning lottery ticket, maybe? Health?”

But he didn’t laugh, just kept looking at you like you were the answer to every question he’d ever had.

“What about you? Do you know what you’re gonna wish for?”

His lips twitched into the faintest smile, his eyes never leaving yours. 

“Already got everything I need.”

“Be serious."

He shrugged, the gesture almost sheepish, like he hadn’t just dropped a bomb on your heart.

“I, uh...might’ve wished for you last year,” he admitted, “Didn’t know it was you at the time, but...yeah. Turns out the universe actually listens sometimes.”

You stared at him, completely floored.

“You’re such a fuckin' dork.” You shook your head, trying to tamp down the stupid grin spreading across your face. “You really did the whole thing last year?”

“The whole thing,” he nodded, completely unashamed. “The grapes, the red underwear, the running around the block with a suitcase—”

“No,” you said, giggling now. “You did not.”

“Swear to God,” he shook his head. “Felt so fucking stupid at the time, but...worked, didn’t it?”

You arched a brow, fighting back a chucke. “It didn’t work. It’s all just superstitious bullshit.”

He shrugged, pulling you even closer. “You’re here in my arms, I’m pretty sure it did.”

You opened your mouth to argue, but before you could, the countdown began. 

Ten seconds, then nine, then eight…By the time it hit one, his lips were on yours, the sound of fireworks and cheers fading into the background. All you could feel was him—his hands on you, his breath mingling with yours, the quiet hum of contentment settling in your chest.

Maybe he was right. Maybe the universe had been listening.

“Happy New Year,” he murmured against your lips, his voice hardly audible over the cheers and music around you. His forehead rested lightly against yours, his eyes still closed, he couldn’t pull away just yet.

“Happy New Year,” you echoed, your voice teasing. “Though I guess you’re feeling pretty smug right now, huh? Thinking you manifested all this.”

He hummed, his hands trailing up your sides. “Damn right I am. How else do you explain it?”

“I don’t know,” you replied, “Maybe it’s just dumb luck. Or—crazy idea—you charmed me all on your own.”

“Nah,” he said, beaming now. “Luck’s never been my thing. But you? You’re somethin’ else, baby. Don’t think I stood a chance once you walked into my life. If this is what I get every year, I’ll eat a whole fuckin’ vineyard’s worth of grapes next time.”

You snorted, “Don’t push your luck, Cameron. The universe might get tired of your whining.”

“Not whining,” he said, brushing his nose against yours. “Just thinkin’ about how lucky I got. Don’t know what I did to deserve this, but...shit, I’m glad I did it.”

“You’re just lucky no one got that on video. Kook Prince Cameron running around like a maniac? The scandal.”

“Don’t care,” he said simply, his tone so sure it made you pause. “Would’ve done it ten times over if it meant finding you.”

He didn’t how someone could be so completely themselves and still feel like his, you were made just for him.

“Rafe…”

“I mean it. You’re everything I ever wanted, baby. I didn’t even know it until you came along. Can’t imagine my life without you.”

Your breath hitched, the vulnerability in his voice wrapping around your heart and squeezing. When he kissed you again, the fireworks in the sky had nothing on the ones between you.

For once, he didn’t need the haze of a party or the numbness of a bottle to feel like he belonged, with you, he already did.

“You’re such a fucking romantic,” you whispered against his lips, your tone soft enough to take the edge off the words.

His cheshire grin returned.

“Guess you bring it out of me.”

You weren’t just someone he loved—you were it for him. His north star, the one thing that made the chaos in his head quiet. When he pulled back from another kiss, his eyes searched yours, a flicker of insecurity showing up.

“Was it dumb?” he asked suddenly, his voice hesitant.

You blinked, still dazed from the kiss. “What?”

“All that shit I said. The universe, the grapes…all of it. Was it too much?” He tried to laugh it off.

You shook your head, smiling in that way that always knocked the wind out of him. 

“Not dumb. Kind of crazy, maybe, but sweet. Really sweet.”

His lips turned into a lopsided grin, relief flooding his features. 

“Good,” he said, his voice firmer now. “’Cause I meant every word. Don’t tell anyone, though. Gotta keep up my rep.”

You laughed, and the sound was like a balm to his soul. He’d fight the whole fucking world to keep that laugh in his life. Your hands slid up to rest on his chest, your touch soft, familiar.

Safe.

“Tell me about this rep of yours.”

Rafe smiled to ear to ear, the devilish glow in his eye making your heart race.

“Y’know, bad boy, troublemaker, heartbreaker…” He trailed off, his smirk turning cocky. “And, uh, not to brag, but pretty great in bed.”

You froze for half a beat, pushing at his chest.

“Oh my God. Why would you even—ugh, you’re impossible.”

“What?” he asked innocently, though his expression betrayed him. “Just stating facts, baby.” 

The teasing in his tone enough to make you groan.

“You’re disgusting,” you shot back, biting your lip to keep from squealing like an love sick fool.

“Disgustingly good-looking,” he corrected, leaning closer. “And disgustingly in love with you.”

You rolled your eyes so hard it was a miracle they didn’t get stuck.

“Nope. I take it back. I take all my kisses back.”

“You can’t do that!” He straightened, looking mock-offended.

“I can, and I just did.” You crossed your arms, stepping back just far enough to make him frown.

He followed instantly, tugging you back by the waist. “That’s not how it works, baby,” he said, dipping his head so his lips hovered just above yours. “You give ‘em to me, they’re mine. No refunds.”

You tried to glare, but the way his voice dipped on the last two words made your entire body shudder.

“See,” He murmured, pressing a kiss to the corner of your mouth. Then another. And another. He trailed them down to your jaw, his grin widening with each one, “All mine.”

You raised a brow, trying to act unimpressed even as his voice sent shivers down your spine. “If this is your way of trying to get laid, it’s pathetic.”

“Pathetic?” he repeated, mock horror lighting up his features. “Baby, you were literally begging for it last night—”

Your jaw dropped, your cheeks flaming. “Rafe!” you hissed, shoving at his chest, but he didn’t budge.

“What?” he said, all fake innocence, even as his face turned downright wolfish. “’m just being honest. You said you liked it when I—”

“Don’t you dare finish that sentence,” you warned, but he could hear the laugh bubbling just beneath the surface.

“Uh-huh,” he hummed, his nose brushing against yours as his lips finally, finally captured yours. 

The kiss started slow, his tongue tracing the seam of your lips until you gave in, parting them for him.

The second you did, he deepened the kiss, his tongue sliding against yours with a possessiveness that made your toes curl. He tasted like whiskey and mint, your favorites. His hand tangled in your hair, pulling just right as he claimed your mouth like it was his job.

You moaned softly into the kiss, your fingers curling into the lapels of his shirt to keep yourself standing. He took that as encouragement, biting down gently on your bottom lip before soothing the sting with a slow, wet drag of his tongue.

“Thought you were taking all your kisses back,” he muttered against your lips, his voice taunting as he pulled back just enough to make you chase him.

“Still considering it,” you panted, though the way you tugged him closer said otherwise.

His lips were on yours again, it made your head spin. His teeth grazed your lip again, and when you gasped, he licked into your mouth, groaning softly as he tasted you. When he pulled back just a smidge, a thin string of spit connected your mouths, and the sight of it made your cheeks burn all over again.

“Y’know,” he said, his voice husky as he used his thumb to wipe the corner of your swollen lips. “If you keep kissing me like that, we might have to skip the rest of this party.”

You tilted your head, narrowing your eyes at him, “You think I’m that easy to distract?”

“Don’t need to think,” he mused as his hands slid lower, resting on the curve of your ass. “Pretty sure I just proved it.”

You sighed, but it wasn’t with exasperation—it was amusement, adoration.

Your your fingers brushed the collar of his shirt as you traced his cheek, “Skipping the party, huh?” you murmured, your lips brushing against his just enough to drive him crazy. “What would we even do instead?”

His hold tightened on your skin, his voice dipping into a near growl as he answered, “Baby, I can think of a few things.”

The heat in his eyes made your cheeks flush, and this time around you didn’t attempt to hide the shit-eating smile taking over your face.

“You’re not even a little subtle, are you?”

“Not when it comes to you,” he admitted, his thumb tracing lazy circles on your hip as he leaned in, his lips ghosting over yours again.

Happy Fucking New Year to him.