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suddencolds · 2 months

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Atypical Occurrence [2/?]

hello!! 10 drafts and (exactly) 3 months later, I am finally back with part 2 of Atypical Occurrence 😭 You can read part 1 here!

This chapter is a little personal to me. I don't tend to linger on writing scenes like this (in part because they are a little difficult for me), so it took awhile to hammer out the dynamic I wanted. That said, here it is at long last!!

This is an OC fic ft. Vincent and Yves. Here is a list of everything I’ve written for these two! :)

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Summary: Vincent shows up late to a meeting. It just goes downhill from there. (ft. fake dating, the flu, a house visit, and certain revelations)

—

There’s a grocery store that’s a ten minute drive from Vincent’s apartment. Yves picks out ingredients for chicken soup, two different kinds of cold and flu medicine, a new pack of cough drops, a few boxes of tissues, a small thermometer. All in all, it’s less than a thirty minute excursion—something he’s done many times before in uni, where everyone seemed to catch something in the middle of exam season, and a house visit was just a short walk away.

Chicken noodle soup isn’t difficult. He’s made it a hundred times—he’s experimented with a dozen different variations of it. He puts the groceries in the fridge, washes the vegetables, and gets to work.

While the soup cooks, he half watches it, half busies himself with cleaning the apartment—loading up the dishwasher and hand washing everything that doesn’t fit, stocking the fridge and the medicine cabinet with the groceries he’s gotten, vacuuming the floors with a vacuum cleaner he finds tucked behind the fridge.

Then he shreds the chicken, chops a round of fresh vegetables to add to the broth, and waits.

It’s comfortably quiet. Outside, rain drums steadily on the windowpane. It shows no signs of stopping soon. It’s dark enough outside—the sun fully set, the clouds heavy overhead—that the lit interior of the apartment kitchen feels like a warm reprieve.

Yves likes cooking. He doesn’t actively enjoy doing chores, but there’s something comforting to how mindless they are. It’s an appreciated distraction.

The rain outside is loud enough that he doesn’t hear the footsteps, approaching, until Vincent clears his throat from behind him.

Yves jumps.

“You’re up,” he says, spinning on his heels to face him. Vincent looks a little worse for the wear—his hair a little messy, his shirt slightly rumpled from sleep, his glasses perched haphazardly in place.

Yves watches him take everything in—the pot on the stove, the chopping board set out on the counter, the empty paper bags from the grocery run flattened and stacked into neat rectangles.

“And you’re still here,” Vincent says.

“I made soup,” Yves says, by way of explanation. “It’s chicken noodle. I wasn’t sure if you’d be up for trying something new.” He reaches over to lift the lid off of the pot of soup. Steam wafts up from it, carrying with it the faint scent of the aromatics he’d added—thyme, bay leaf, garlic, peppercorns. “Actually, you picked a good time to wake up. I just added in the noodles, so it’s almost done.”

Vincent eyes the pot, his expression unreadable. “Did you leave to get groceries?”

“Earlier, yeah. You weren’t kidding about your fridge being empty.”

Vincent frowns. “I can pay you back. Did you keep the receipt?”

In truth, the price of the groceries is the last thing on Yves’s mind right now. He waves a hand. “Don’t worry about it.”

“It must have taken a long time.”

“Soup is pretty forgiving. You just toss everything into a pot of boiling water and wait. It’s barely any work at all.”

Vincent stares at him for a moment longer. Then he says: “That’s an oversimplification.”

“Not really. Besides, I enjoy cooking,” Yves says. “Thanks for letting me use your kitchen—though, technically, I guess I’m asking forgiveness instead of permission. I’ll clean everything up, by the way.” He’s done dishes along the way, so there isn’t really much to do besides rinse off whatever’s left, load up the dishwasher, and store whatever’s left of the soup in the fridge.

“You don’t have to,” Vincent says, before turning into his elbow with a few harsh, grating coughs. “I can clean up. It’s my apartment.”

“If you think I’m letting you do household chores while you have a fever—”

“It’s not that high,” Vincent interrupts, perhaps a little stubbornly. Yves lets out a disbelieving laugh. He leans over the counter, shifts his weight forwards on his feet to press the back of his hand to Vincent’s forehead.

It’s concerningly hot, still, which isn’t a surprise. Though perhaps the way Vincent blinks, a little tiredly, and leans forward into Yves’s hand is a giveaway on its own.

“It’s definitely over a hundred,” Yves says, withdrawing his hand. “If you don’t believe me, I’ll have you know that I bought a thermometer.”

For a moment, Vincent looks surprised. Then he sighs. “That was an unnecessary purchase.”

“Are you admitting that I’m right?”

Vincent just frowns at him, which—Yves notes—isn’t exactly a denial. “Fever or not, there’s not much I can do except sleep it off.”

“You can go back to sleep after you’ve had something to eat,” Yves says. “What was it that you said? That you haven’t had anything to eat since yesterday?”

“...You won’t leave unless I eat, then,” Vincent says. He says it evenly enough that it barely registers as a question.

Yves smiles at him. It’s not a wrong conclusion. “Exactly,” he says.

—

In between the hallway and Vincent’s kitchen is a small dining area, furnished with a high table and two high chairs. Yves waits until the noodles are cooked just enough. Then he turns off the stove, unrolls a placemat to lay out on the dining table, and carries the pot over.

He gets everything he needs: two bowls, two spoons, some of the fresh parsley he’d chopped earlier, for garnish—and lays it all out.

“I can help,” Vincent says, for maybe the third time.

He’s seated on one of the chairs, which Yves had pointedly pulled out for him, looking like he’s perhaps a few seconds away from getting out of his seat and doing everything himself. It’s just like Vincent, Yves thinks, to offer to help—even at work, aside from all the work he takes on, it feels like he’s always finding some way or other to be useful.

Yves says, “When you’re not running a fever, you can ask me again.”

When everything is laid out, he pulls up a chair for himself, so he can sit across from Vincent—who is still perched on his seat, though he looks a little less like he wants to get out of it. “You didn’t have to wait for me,” Yves says.

Vincent blinks at him. “It would have been rude to get started on my own.”

“Nonsense,” Yves says. “I made it for you.”

He takes a bite. The soup tastes fine. That is, it tastes the same as every other time he’s made it—light and comforting. It’s just one of those recipes Yves thinks he can make in his sleep. Nothing about it is particularly inventive. Still, he hasn’t cooked for Vincent before—not formally, at least, other than the dish he’d bought to Joel’s potluck—so it’s a little nerve-wracking to watch Vincent take a bite.

It’s worse, still, to watch his eyes widen by a fraction. For a moment, Yves wonders if he’s done something wrong—if perhaps, it isn’t to Vincent’s taste, after all. He sets his spoon down. “Is it okay?”

“It’s really good,” Vincent says. “I can see why Mikhail said what he said.”

“What?”

“That your cooking was half the reason why he roomed with you.”

Yves laughs. “So does that mean you’ll forgive me for trespassing?”

Vincent smiles back at him. “I’ll consider it.” Now, with his glasses off, Yves can see his eyes a little more clearly—they’re slightly red-rimmed, his eyelashes long and dark, his cheeks flushed brighter with fever. There’s a little crease at the edge of his eyes which shows up when he smiles.

Yves is caught off guard, for a moment. The tightness in his chest is nothing, he tells himself. Certainly not a crush that he shouldn’t be allowed to have.

A crush. That’s new, too. It’s ironic, considering the terms of their fake relationship. He thinks it’s probably supposed to make him better at this—what better way to feign romantic interest than to not have his feelings be so fake, after all?—but instead, he finds himself at an uncharacteristic loss for words, finds himself stumbling over the most basic of pleasantries.

Of course, he has no intention of acting on his feelings. Vincent is attractive, yes—but he’s also considerate, and attentive, and hardworking enough to go early and stay late, to take on work he doesn’t get credit for. He’s thoughtful enough to entertain Yves’s friends, to have lunch with Yves’s siblings, to fly all the way to france to meet Yves’s family.

But all of that is inconsequential. None of it is going to amount to anything, because Yves knows how to keep his distance. Because Yves needs this—the perks of their fake relationship—more than he needs to indulge in any inconvenient crush. Because he knows enough to know how things would turn out if he were to say something.

That’s the thing. Vincent isn’t cruel. It’s for that reason, precisely, that Yves knows that he’d drop this arrangement immediately if he knew. Vincent would never string him along knowingly, and that’s what makes this so much worse—Yves has gone and gotten himself stupidly attached.

Now that they’re sitting across from each other, in Vincent’s apartment, having dinner, Yves thinks—a little selfishly, perhaps—that this is the best that he can ask for. It is all that he can ask for. Far better to keep up the pretense entirely, far better to pretend that this is all just for show. When they put an end to this arrangement—someday, inevitably—Yves will thank Vincent for everything, and then they’ll go their separate ways. He already knows how it will go. There is no need to complicate things.

It’s quiet, for some time. Yves finishes his bowl first, heads over to the sink to rinse it off, and positions it neatly in the lowest compartment of the dishwasher. When he gets back, Vincent is spooning more soup into his bowl. Yves allows himself to feel a little relieved to see that he has an appetite.

“It’s been awhile,” Vincent says, after some time. “Since anyone’s done this for me.”

“Made you chicken soup?” Yves says, a little puzzled. “If you want the recipe, I can give it to you. I make it all the time.”

“No,” Vincent says. His expression is unparseable. “Just— since anyone’s looked after me, in general.”

“Oh.” Yves finds his mind is spinning. “How long have you been living alone?”

“Since university. I had suitemates, in my second year. Then I got an apartment of my own.”

“Because you like the privacy?”

“It was just simplest.”

Yves thinks back to his years, rooming with Mikhail—the conversations they’d have to have to figure out groceries, to alternate cooking dinner and doing dishes, to manage transportation. He has a studio apartment now, too, but he’s over at his neighbors’ house frequently enough, or otherwise at home with Leon and Victoire for dinner, so it doesn’t really get lonely.

“You have a pretty spacious kitchen,” he says. “I hope you don’t mind that I used your pots and pans. I’ll wash them, I swear.”

Vincent takes in a small, sharp breath. Yves looks up just in time to see him twist away from the table, tenting his hands over his nose and mouth.

“hhIHh’IIKTS-HHuhh-!”

“Bless you!” Yves exclaims. Judging by the way Vincent keeps his hands raised over his face, he assumes that there are going to be more. He rises from his seat, heads back into the kitchen in search for—ah. Six boxes of tissue boxes, stacked neatly into a block. He tears off the thin plastic film around them, removes a box from the pile, and pulls off the tab.

When he gets back to the dining table, Vincent is ducking into steepled hands with another—

“hhih’GKKT-SHHh-uuUh! hh’DDZSChh-HHuh! snf-Snf-! hhh… Hh… hh-HH-hh’yIIDDzsSHH-hHUH-!!”

The sneezes seem to scrape painfully against his throat, for the way he winces in their aftermath. He twists away from Yves to cough lightly, after, into his shoulder, his eyes watering. “Bless you!” Yves pushes the tissue box towards him. “Here.”

Vincent takes a tissue from the box, blows his nose quietly. When he emerges, lowering the tissue from his face, his eyes are a little watery. He eyes the tissue box. “Did you buy these earlier, too?”

“I did,” Yves says. “I picked up some medicine, too. I didn’t know what flavor you wanted, so I got a couple different kinds. And some other stuff—your fridge was getting pretty empty, by the way—in case you needed it.”

Vincent lifts his head to study him, as if there’s something he’s trying to understand. Finally, he says, “Do you do this for all of your friends?”

“What?”

Vincent frowns, as if the subject matter should be obvious. “Cook for them. Get groceries. Clean their apartment.”

“Sometimes,” Yves says. He’s certainly no stranger to stopping by to help—sometimes with homemade soup, or tea packed tightly in a thermos, or something else. Then again, that was easier to do back in uni, when everyone lived within a twenty minute radius. “It depends on what they need.”

“So this is just a Yves thing.”

“What? Showing consideration for my friends?”

“Showing consideration is one thing,” Vincent answers. “You could have left after dropping off the files. You would still have been showing your consideration.”

“I guess that’s true. But at that point, I was already here,” Yves says, with a shrug. “It seemed logical to check up on you.”

“Well, now you’ve checked up on me,” Vincent says. “So you can go.”

Yves supposes this is true.

“Do you want me to go?” he asks.

Vincent says, “It’s late. I assume you have things to get home to.”

“That’s not what I asked,” Yves says.

Vincent says nothing to that.

But Yves gets the message, even without him saying it. If Vincent is the type of person who prefers to be alone when sick, Yves won’t take it personally. He doesn’t want to overstay his welcome—arguably, he’s already stayed for much longer than Vincent had invited him to.

There’s leftover soup in the fridge—enough to last Vincent a couple days, hopefully through the worst of this—and Vincent’s apartment is reasonably well-stocked now. He has something to take if his fever gets any higher; he has all the basic supplies Yves could think of off the top of his head.

And Vincent is a lot of things, but he isn’t irresponsible. He’s shown himself to be self-sufficient more times than Yves can count. There’s no reason why Yves should have to stay and look after him for any longer—no reason, perhaps, aside from the fact that seeing Vincent ill has left him more worried than he’d like to admit.

“Okay,” he says. “I’ll go. But at least let me clean up first.”

He does dishes, leaves the cutting boards and the pot out to dry on the drying rack, transfers the soup to smaller glass containers to store it in the fridge. He returns the vacuum cleaner to the storage closet he found it in. Then, as promised, he gathers his things—not much, just his phone and his car keys—and heads toward the front door.

Vincent follows him to the door, presumably to lock it after he leaves.

Yves steps outside, lingers for just a moment on the doorstep. The car is parked close enough that he hadn’t bothered to grab his umbrella, but now it’s dark out, and it’s raining just as hard.

“I left new cough drops on the kitchen countertop,” Yves says, biding his time under the overhang until he inevitably has to get rained on. “The medicine’s in your bathroom, behind the mirror, with the thermometer. Everything else is either on the counter or in the fridge. Don’t come back to work until your fever’s completely—”

It happens in a moment: Vincent stumbles. Yves is looking at him, which means he sees the exact moment when it happens. Yves doesn’t think, just reacts—he reaches out to grab his arm to keep him from falling entirely.

“Woah,” he says, steadying him. “Are you—”

Vincent’s hand is concerningly warm, even through the fabric of his sleeve. For a moment, he leans into Yves’s touch, though this seems less intentional as it is inevitable. He’s breathing heavily, his eyes tightly shut, his shoulders rising and falling not as soundlessly as usual.

Yves swallows past the alarm he feels percolating in his chest. Had he been about to pass out? Just how high is his fever right now? “Vincent—”

“Sorry,” Vincent manages, through gritted teeth. He makes an effort to regain his balance, to move away. He sways on his feet, and Yves feels the panic in his chest rise anew.

He reaches up and slings an arm around his waist. “Hey,” he says, trying for reassuring. “I’ve got you.”

Vincent doesn’t say anything, to that. He just stands there, perfectly still, his eyebrows drawn together, his shoulders a little stiff under Yves’s touch.

Without letting go of him, Yves shuts the front door gingerly behind him, toes his shoes off at the door again. “I think it would be best if you laid down,” he says. “Do you think you can walk?”

Vincent nods, slowly. Yves tracks the bob of his throat as he swallows.

“Sorry,” Vincent says, again. “I… didn’t expect it to be an issue.”

He’s frowning, hard, as if he’s upset with himself, though Yves can’t quite piece apart why he’d have reason to be. “Hey, no apologizing,” Yves says. “Save your energy for walking.”

Vincent seems to understand that their current arrangement will not change until he’s in bed, so he lets Yves steer him towards the bedroom. It’s a short walk—down the hallway and then off to the left—but Yves spends half of it distracted by how warm Vincent is. Like this, he practically radiates heat.

It’s not until Vincent is settled on his bed, the blankets pulled loosely over him, that Yves allows himself to let go.

Truthfully, the last thing he wants to do right now is leave. But it isn’t about what he wants, and perhaps Vincent would sleep better if he did.

“Are you warm enough?” Yves asks. The words feel heavy on his tongue.

A nod.

“Do you need me to get you anything else?”

Vincent shakes his head.

“Okay,” Yves says. “I guess I shouldn’t overstay my welcome, then.”

Vincent will be fine, he tells himself. At the end of the day, they are only coworkers, and Vincent is one of the most independent people he knows. If Vincent doesn’t want him here, the best Yves can do is comply with his wishes. He straightens. “Text me if you need anything, I mean it.”

He lets go of the blanket, rises to his feet. Only, then—

There’s a hand on his sleeve, tugging.

Yves goes very still.

When Vincent notices what he’s done, alarm flashes through his expression, and he pulls his hand away as if he’s burned.

“Sorry,” he murmurs, again. And just like that, he’s back to how he always is—his expression perfectly, carefully neutral, in a way that can only be constructed. “I’m sorry.” But Yves doesn’t forget what he’s seen. “You can go.”

Yves’s heart aches. He settles back at the edge of the bed, reaches out a hand, settles it gently at the edge of Vincent’s forehead. At the physical contact, Vincent’s breath catches.

And for a second, Yves wonders if he’s made a mistake—if maybe Vincent doesn’t want to be touched, right now. If he’s misread the situation; if Vincent wants him to go, after all. He opens his mouth to apologize.

But then Vincent shuts his eyes. The tenseness to his expression eases, almost imperceptibly, his eyebrows unfurrowing. Oh, Yves realizes. His head must hurt—Yves suspected as much—but if he’s not mistaken, the expression on Vincent’s face right now is…

Relief. Cautiously, Yves traces his fingertips lightly over the edge of Vincent’s temple, combs them slowly through his hair. Vincent’s eyes stay shut, but the furrow to his eyebrows loosens, and his jaw unclenches, just a bit. The change is minute, almost imperceptible. If Yves weren’t paying close attention, he might’ve missed it.

As if he could pay attention to anything else, right now.

Tentatively, Yves cards his fingers through Vincent’s hair, traces slow circles into his scalp, slowly, carefully. He does it until the heartbeat he feels thrumming under his fingertips—quick and erratic—slows. Until Vincent’s breathing evens out, until the hurt in his expression dulls. Until the tension in his shoulders eases.

By the time he finally withdraws his hand, Vincent is fast asleep. Yves fetches a new glass of water for his nightstand, changes out the plastic bag lining the trash can, and lines the cough drops and medicine up at the edge of Vincent’s desk. He flips through folder 2-A, assessing.

Then he heads back out to his car to get his laptop, and gets to work.

—

He doesn’t remember falling asleep.

But when he wakes at Vincent’s desk, it’s to an unpleasant ache in his neck that spreads laterally into his shoulders—probably from sleeping with his head pillowed awkwardly against his arms. He lifts his head.

Behind him, there’s a weak, uncertain breath, and then the sort of cough that makes Yves’s chest hurt in sympathy. It sounds wrong, somehow—too quiet, for its proximity. Muffled.

It’s dark inside, aside from the faint glow of Vincent’s digital alarm clock, the pale green digits cutting into the black. He hears the rustling of blankets, followed by another short, painful intake of breath.

The sneeze that follows is stifled into something. Even stifled, it sounds uncharacteristically harsh—all force, pinched off into a short, muffled outburst which sounds barely relieving, at best.

“hH’ih’iNNGKkk-t!”

Yves blinks. Then he leans over the desk to flick on the lamp. Dull golden light suffuses the desk, bright enough to cast Vincent in form and graying color.

“Are you okay?”

At the light, Vincent’s eyes widen. He looks—stricken, somehow. Then his expression shutters, and he frowns. “Did i—” he stops to cough again into his fist. It sounds as though each breath he’s taking in is an effort of its own, shallow and unsatisfying. When he speaks again, his voice sounds noticeably hoarser. “—Did I wake you?”

Yves opens his mouth to respond. Before he can think up a convincing excuse, Vincent shakes his head dejectedly, as if he already knows the answer.

“Sorry,” he says. “I was - cough, cough - tryidg to be quiet.”

Quiet. As to not wake Yves, presumably. The revelation causes an ache to settle somewhere deep inside of him, heavy and inexorable. Yves is more than certain that this flu is already miserable enough on its own, even without the added challenge of having to be quiet about it. He wants to say, do you really think that’s what matters to me? He wants to ask, how long have you been up dealing with this on your own?

“You don’t have to be quiet,” is all he manages, instead. It’s a miracle that his voice manages to come out as evenly as it does.

Vincent looks like he’s about to say something. But before he has a chance to, he twists away to cough harshly into his shoulder. Now that he doesn’t make an attempt to muffle the coughing fit, Yves can hear just how harsh it sounds.

It’s the kind of coughing fit that just sounds exhausting—forceful enough to leave tears brimming at the edges of his eyelashes, his breaths coming in shallowly.

“Can I get you anything?” Yves asks, when Vincent is done coughing.

Vincent just looks back at him, unmoving. In the dim light of the desk lamp, he looks perhaps more exhausted than Yves has ever seen him—really, he looks as though he hasn’t slept at all. He’s seated with his back against the headboard with a blanket pulled around his shoulders. One of his hands is clenched loosely around it, pinning the corners in place.

“Tea?” Yves offers, because it’s better than saying nothing. “Water, cough drops. A cold compress?” Vincent doesn’t say anything, but Yves thinks, a little helplessly, that there must be something he can do. “Extra blankets? Tissues? Ibuprofen?”

“Water… would be nice,” Vincent says, as if it takes a lot out of him to admit it. Yves blinks, surprised—he had half expected no answer at all. At Yves’s split second of hesitation, Vincent’s frown deepens, his grip around the blankets tightening slightly. “...If it’s not too much trouble.”

Yves has never gotten out of his seat faster. “Of course,” he says. “I’ll be right back.” he swipes the empty glass from the nightstand and heads out into the hallway.

It’s dark. There aren’t many windows in the hallway to let in light from outside, but once he gets to the dining room, it gets easier to see. Judging by how dark it is outside, there are probably a few hours left until sunrise. It’s still early, then. Early enough that it’s quiet, around them—no traffic out on the streets, save for the original car, headed to who-knows-where; no neighbors going about their early morning routines; just the steady trickle of rain on the windowsill. Yves rinses the cup out in the sink, shakes it dry, and fills it again.

When he makes it back to the bedroom, it’s unusually quiet. Vincent is still sitting at the edge of his bed, looking like he hasn’t moved at all since Yves left the room.

Yves crosses the room to hand him the glass. Vincent blinks up at him, a little blearily.

“I got you water,” Yves says, unnecessarily.

Vincent takes the glass from him with both hands, as if he doesn’t quite trust himself to hold it with just one. Yves looks away as he drinks.

When Vincent lowers the glass at last, Yves takes it from him and sets it back into place onto the bedside table. He straightens, turns to face Vincent again. “Any better now?”

Vincent nods. It’s quiet, for a moment. Outside, the rain has nearly stopped—the room is soundless, aside from the thin whirring of the air conditioning. “I didn’t think you’d still be here.”

Yves hums. “To be honest, I didn’t either.” He stifles a yawn into one hand—he’s still a little tired. “I didn’t mean to fall asleep.”

“You must be tired,” Vincent frowns, looking him over. “You came right from a full day of work to check on me. Does your neck hurt?”

“What?”

Vincent inclines his head towards his desk. “I’ve fallen asleep there before. It’s not very comfortable.”

Yves thinks he shouldn’t be surprised, at this point, that Vincent has picked up on something so subtle. “It’s not that bad,” he says, reaching up with a hand to massage his neck. “My neck would probably be sorer if I’d slept through the whole night. I should thank you for waking me.”

“You could’ve taken the couch instead,” Vincent says, a little disapprovingly. “It would probably have been wiser.”

“I wanted to be here so I could keep an eye on you,” Yves says, because it’s true. “Besides, you sat in a chair while I slept in France. That can’t have been comfortable either.”

“It’s not just about that. You—” Vincent raises a hand up to his face, ducks into his wrist for a sudden: “hh-! hhiH’GKT-sSHuh! snf-!” He sniffles, then presses the wrist closer to his face, his expression shuttering. “Hh… hh’IIDDZshH’Uhh-!”

“Bless you!” Yves says, startled.

Vincent blinks, a little teary-eyed, turning over his shoulder to muffle a few harsh coughs into his wrist. “You shouldn’t have slept so close to me. I really don’t want you to catch this.”

He’s frowning, as if it really is a big deal. As if even now, even shivering and feverish, it’s somehow Yves that he’s more worried about right now.

Yves isn’t particularly concerned about that—he has no shortage of sick time to take off of work, in any case. If he does manage to catch this from Vincent, he’ll just stock up on essentials before the worst of it hits. It would be nothing he hasn’t done before. Still, Vincent looks so—well, so tornby the mere possibility of it that Yves wants to say something to comfort him.

“How about this?” he says. “If you’re so worried about it, you can buy me cough drops next time I come down with something, deal? Then we’ll be even.”

Vincent’s eyebrows furrow. “That’s a terrible deal for you.”

“I’ll get sick at some point in my life, anyways,” Yves says, with a shrug. “If this means I get free cough drops out of it, I’d say it’s a win.”

He moves the desk chair over so he can sit down at the edge of Vincent’s bed. Vincent watches him, uncertain. He looks like he’s resisting the urge to say something—to tell Yves to move further away, probably.

“Relax,” Yves says, reflexively. “It’ll be fine, seriously. I know what I signed up for.”

He leans forward, presses the back of his hand against Vincent’s forehead. Vincent closes his eyes. A slight tremor passes through his shoulders at the contact, but aside from that, he stays perfectly still.

“Your fever’s worse than before,” Yves says, withdrawing his hand.

“It’s not.” Vincent’s eyes are still shut. “The temperature is just higher because it’s night time.”

The suggestion is so far from comforting that Yves almost laughs. “You know,” he says, “that’s not very reassuring.” The blanket around Vincent’s shoulders starts to slip, so Yves reaches over and snags an edge of it, fluffs the whole thing outwards to lay it neatly around Vincent’s shoulders, like a cloak. Secures it with a loose knot. “Are you feeling any better than before?”

Vincent does open his eyes, now. He looks as though he’s trying hard to figure out how acceptably he can lie. “I…”

“You can be honest.”

Vincent’s jaw clenches. He reaches up with one hand, his fingers curling around the blanket Yves set down around him.

“My head feels heavy,” he says. He screws his eyes shut, his eyebrows furrowing. “And my chest hurts.” He lets out a short, frustrated breath, as if every sentence is a new and difficult admission. “I’m… not used to getting sick like this.”

Yves’s hands still. “Like what?”

“In any way that would necessitate taking time off from work,” Vincent says, looking away. The discomfort sits, plainly and indisputably, in the way he holds himself—his shoulders stiff, his jaw clenched—everything a little too tense, despite his exhaustion.

Yves stares at him for a moment, considering. In the end, it’s the small, impulsive thought that wins out.

He takes a seat at the edge of the bed, next to Vincent. The mattress dips under his weight.

Vincent has always been taller than him, but sitting down like this, they nearly see eye to eye. It’s a risk, of course, to offer this. He and Vincent haven’t been physically intimate outside of the times where they’ve had to prove their relationship to an audience. But when he thinks back to how Vincent reacted to Yves feeling his forehead, or Yves carding his hands through his hair—if he hasn’t misread, it almost feels like—

Yves opens his arms out in offering, tries on a smile. “I’ve been told I give good hugs. Good enough to cure all ailments, obviously.”

For a moment, Vincent stays perfectly still. Yves has five seconds to overthink all of his actions over the past twenty four hours.

Then Vincent inches closer, ever so slightly, to lean his head on Yves’s shoulder.

Yves curls his arms around him. There’s the slightest hitch in Vincent’s breath, at the contact. Then the stiffness seeps out of his shoulders, and he presses a little closer—as if he’s allowed himself permission, at last, to let go.

His whole body is concerningly warm. “You’re burning up,” Yves says, softly. He reaches up with one hand to run his fingers through Vincent’s hair.

“...I figured,” Vincent says. The next breath he takes comes in a little shakily. “Whoever gave you the review was right. You are a good hugger.”

Yves laughs, a little surprised. “Careful. You’re going to inflate my ego if you keep talking.”

“I can’t help it if it’s true.”

Yves has hugged a fair share of people in his life. He doesn’t think he’d be able to list them all if he were asked to. It’s different, though, being so close to Vincent—so close that Yves can reach out and let his hair fall through his fingertips. He can lift up his palm and feel the rigid line of his spine, the slope of his shoulders; he could reach out and trace the dip of his wrist, the form of his hand. Vincent’s chin digs slightly into his left shoulder. His nose is turned slightly into Yves’s neck—like this, he is almost perfectly still. Yves can feel the warm brush of air against his neck whenever Vincent exhales. He is so close that Yves is afraid, for a moment, that he might hear how badly his heart is racing.

Would dating Vincent be like this? Would this kind of exchange be given and received as easily as anything? Yves wills himself not to think about it. This is nothing, he tells himself, but a simple offering of comfort between friends. To think otherwise would be disingenuous.

They stay like that for some time. Time slows, or perhaps it expands or collapses—really, Yves would be none the wiser. The whir of the ceiling fan and the light rain on the rooftop a constant. When Vincent pulls away at last, it’s to turn sharply off to the side to muffle a sneeze into his sleeve.

“Hh-! hhIH’IIDZsSHM-FF! snf-!”

“Bless you,” Yves says, blinking. The sudden absence of warmth is a little jarring. But Vincent isn’t done.

His eyebrows draw together, and he ducks tighter into his elbow, his shoulders jerking forward. “hHIH’iiGKKTsSHH—! Sorry, I— Ihh-! hHHh’DZZSSCHh—uH-!”

“Bless you again,” Yves says, reaching past him to hand over the box of tissues on the nightstand. He holds out the box for Vincent to take.

Vincent turns away to blow his nose. When he returns, he’s a little teary eyed. The flush on the bridge of his nose hasn’t gone away.

“When I asked you to come over,” he says, “I wasn’t expecting you to stay.”

Yves blinks. “Is it so strange for me to be here?”

To that, Vincent is quiet, for a moment. Yves looks out the window, where he can see the skyline, off in the distance, the dark form of the apartment building across the streets, the street in between lit dimly with golden streetlights.

“A little,” he says. “When I was young, if I got sick, it wasn’t really a big deal.”

At Yves’s expression, he amends: “That’s not to say that my family didn’t care, because they did. No one spent too long in my room—better to not risk catching it, if they could help it—but back then, if I didn’t have much stomach room, my mom always cut fruits for me to leave on my desk. Sometimes she made ginseng tea, too.” he shuts his eyes. There’s a strange expression on his face—something a little more complicated than wistfulness.

“We had a habit of keeping the heat off, in the winters, and closing the windows. But if I was running a fever, my brother always made sure to keep the heat on.” His lip twitches, almost imperceptibly. Then: the smallest of smiles. “Sometimes he’d stay outside my door to talk about his day. He was the class lead, back when he was in high school. It was always something inconsequential, like which of his classmates he liked and which ones he held a grudge against, and why. Almost always for the smallest reasons, like someone borrowing a pencil and forgetting to give it back, or someone tossing the ball to him in gym class.”

“Were you and your brother close?” Yves asks.

“Close is relative,” Vincent says. “I never really knew how to—inhabit his world, I guess. When I moved to the states, and when I decided to stay here, part of it was out of some sort of defiance. I didn’t want to have to follow in his footsteps, because then I could only ever be focused on doing things differently.”

He shuts his eyes. “But I felt close to him, then. When he stood outside my room and told me those stories. Even if they were things I wouldn’t have cared about had they happened to me, I guess. It’s strange how that works.”

“I think I know what you mean,” Yves says. He’s always had a good relationship with Leon and Victoire, though that doesn’t mean they’ve always seen eye to eye on things. “Sometimes it’s less about what they say, and more about the fact that they’re saying it.”

Vincent nods. “They all cared about me in their own way,” he says, at last. “I don’t think I appreciated the extent of it at the time. When you’re a kid, you tend to take everything at face value.”

“Do you regret it?” Yves asks. “What?”

“Not appreciating them more, back then.”

Vincent smiles. “I was just a kid. I suppose it’s natural that I didn’t know better.” Yves has a feeling that that statement is perhaps further reaching than Vincent is making it out to be. “I didn’t think much about it at the time.”

“Do you ever miss being part of a large household?”

“It’s peaceful on my own,” Vincent says, at last. “I usually don’t mind it. I usually have other things to worry about.”

He hasn’t asked if the information is useful to Yves, Yves realizes, a little belatedly. Back then, at Joel and Cherie’s potluck, Vincent had seemed to believe that the only way Yves could possibly be interested in him was if the information could serve their fake relationship, somehow.

The realization settles him. Perhaps Vincent has shared this because he knows Yves cares.

“Your apartment is nice,” Yves says, trying to ignore the insistent beat of his heart in his chest, which all of a sudden seems to want to make itself known. “I can see why you would like living here.”

Vincent tilts his head up towards the ceiling. “It’s not the same, of course. As home. Though that’s a given.” Yves notes the usage of the word: home. Here, instead of home, the clarifier salient, even though Vincent’s done nothing to emphasize it. Could it be that after all these years, Vincent still considers Korea to be home, for him? “When I’ve had people over, it was just for dinner. Not for…”

He looks over to Yves, now. Yves knows what he means, knows how to fill in the rest of the sentence: not for the reason you’re here, now.

“I know I’ve intruded a little,” Yves says, with a laugh.

Vincent frowns at him, his eyebrows furrowing. “I wouldn’t consider it an intrusion,” he says. “You’ve helped me a lot. I just—I’m a little embarrassed that your first time over had to be under these circumstances.”

Your first time over. Yves ignores—well, tries to ignore—the implication that this could be the first out of many. That he might have another opportunity, in the future, to swing by. Vincent hasn’t confirmed anything, and it’s not likely that their fake dating arrangement would warrant another house visit, out of the public’s eye. Yves tells himself that the warmth he feels in his chest is misplaced.

“You don’t have to worry about that. I like seeing you,” Yves says.

Vincent raises an eyebrow at him. “Even bedridden with a fever?”

Isn’t it obvious? “Of course.”

“I’ve been terrible company,” Vincent says. “And even worse of a host. I recall I fell asleep yesterday, only for you to spend two hours cleaning my apartment?”

“Vacuuming is therapeutic.”

“You said that about cooking, too,” Vincent says, narrowing his eyes. “Am I supposed to believe that you enjoy doing all household chores?”

“It’s not like you made me do them. I just wanted to be useful, and your vacuum was easy to find.”

“I’ll be sure to hide it thoroughly next time,” Vincent says, deadpan.

Yves laughs. “It’s like I said,” he says. “I like spending time with you. Even—” To steal Vincent’s words from earlier. “—bedridden with a fever.”

Vincent huffs a sigh, a little incredulously.

“Though, I promise I won’t intrude for much longer,” Yves tells him. “I’ll probably head out in the morning.” He’s almost done with the work Vincent has on his desk—he’d fallen asleep checking over one of the income statements for discrepancies. A few hours should be enough time to make sure that everything is in order. He still has work at eight—he’ll probably be a little tired for it, considering how late he’d slept, but that’s nothing new.

“I’m sorry,” Vincent says, averting his glance. He frowns down at himself, as if he really is apologetic. “You must’ve had other evening plans.”

None as important as taking care of you, Yves catches himself thinking. He can’t say things like that if he wants to keep this—well, this unfortunate recent development, i.e., his feelings for Vincent—to himself.

“It wasn’t just for you,” he says, instead.

“What?”

“I didn’t just do it for you.”

Vincent blinks at him, a little confused. “Are you going to say you get personal gratification out of seeing my apartment clean?”

“It’s like you said,” he says. “I’ve never seen you this unwell. You said this doesn’t happen often, right? When you didn’t show up at work, I…” The next admission feels a little too honest—but there’s a small, unwise part of him that wants to get it across, regardless. “I was really worried. Even though you said you had everything covered, I wanted to make sure you were fine.”

Vincent nods. “I get it. It would be an inconvenience if I were unfit to be your fake—”

“It has nothing to do with that,” Yves interrupts him. His heart hurts a little, with it. “I wanted to see that you were fine because I care about you. To be honest, I think I would’ve spent the entire night worrying if I hadn’t come.” He laughs, a little self-deprecatingly. “It’s a little selfish, I know.”

Vincent’s eyes are very wide.

“Anyways,” Yves says, with the sinking feeling that he’s said too much, “you should try to get some more sleep.” He rearranges the blankets around Vincent, a little unnecessarily, fluffs the extra pillow that’s leaned up against the headboard, and turns away. “It’s still really early. If you’re planning to be back in office next week, it would be best to keep your sleep schedule intact.”

“Yves,” Vincent says, from behind him.

“Hmm?”

“...Thank you.”

When Yves works up the courage to look over, Vincent is smiling, unreservedly, as if something Yves has said has made him very happy.

Yves’s heart stutters in his chest. Fuck.

(On second thought, it might not be so easy to live with these feelings, after all.)

—

At daybreak, Yves drives home to get changed, takes a quick shower while he’s at it, and heads off for work. He yawns through half his morning meetings, adds an extra espresso shot to the coffee he snags from the break room.

The text arrives halfway through the day, just before he’s intending to head downstairs for lunch.

V: When I asked you to bring folder 2-A, I didn’t mean for you to complete my work along with it.

Yves smiles. He’d emailed Vincent the completed work from yesterday’s late-night work session before he’d left. Vincent must’ve seen it.

Y: some genie i met told me your wish was to have your work done before the deadline

V: What are you talking about?

Y: he also told me you were very stubborn about not redistributing your assignments to anyone else Y: so you can’t blame me for taking matters into my own hands

V: Yves.

Y: feel free to check it over for errors :)

#sneeze fic #snz fic #sneeze kink #snz kink #snzfic #- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -#- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - (adding in my a/n under the cut)#i have a lot of thoughts about this chapter as a whole #just editing + finishing off the last 2k of this took me 12 hours T.T #(maybe unsurprisingly) emotional intimacy and caretaking are very hard for me to write;#of the fics i've posted to this blog not many of them focus on the c portion of the h/c just in general?#so this was somewhat uncharted territory for me #i hope it's not too niche to resonate w anyone else 😭🙏#yvverse #my fic #also on a lighter note. i have been looking forward to writing yves caretaking for so long 😭😭😭😭😭

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blushingsneeze · 7 months

Text

His hand cupped around the back of her head as he pulled her to her chest.

“What ar-.” She started to ask.

He sneezed freely over her shoulder, she felt the spray mist over her skin. A deliciously soupy sniffle was all he was able to manage before he sneezed again. This one had been wetter and more productive if she had to base it on sound alone. She tried to lean away to check but his hand kept her face pressed firmly against his chest.

“D-don’t look.” He said through hitching gasps before jerking against her. His other hand moved to cover the lower half of his face as he flushed in embarrassment as mess started to leak down and settle in his Cupid’s bow.

#sneeze kink #sneeze #snz #snzblr #snzfucker #my writing #snz fic

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nametakensff · 5 months

Note

Ummmmmm… ⏰ for Steve??

Thank you so much for the 'Inopportune' prompt, anon! 🥰 Ended up writing 6.2k of S/teve suffering a torturous stuck sneeze that decided to make an appearance at the worst time imaginable 😇

S/teve has been trying to convince the stubborn tickle in his nose to form into a sneeze for hours. It just so happens that he will get his wish, but only when a stunning girl shows up to his work and takes an unprecedented amount of interest in his tickly nose

~~~~~

Content:

M sneezes, M/F (OC made up solely for the purpose of this fic lol), Stuck sneezes, buildups, false starts, manual inducing, tissues, platonic S/tobin, S/teve has a latent sneeze fetish, F OC has a sneeze fetish, sneezing from perfume, scent sensitivity, mentions of photic sneezing, mentions of cold sneezing, sneezing on someone, spray, a little bit of mess but nothing too graphic, sneezing in hands, nose rubbing, embarrassment/humiliation, mentions of masturbation and sex but only a little, S/teve has huge sneezes that he absolutely cannot control

Not explicitly NSFW but pretty close lol. Extremely fetishy

Minors DNI!

Steve had needed to sneeze all. Fucking. Day. It had started the moment he’d rolled out of bed – a distant tickle, not subtle enough to ignore but certainly not sharp enough to give him any kind of release. It was cloying and insistent, and no manner of nose rubbing, sniffling or snorting was doing anything to appease it. He’d sniffled repeatedly as he got dressed and brushed his teeth, hoping to fan the flames and stoke it into fruition. He’d rubbed the tip of his nose back and forth in the way that sometimes helped tip him over the edge of a sneeze just shy of completion. But no. Nothing. All he earned for his efforts was a couple of irritated tears rolling down his cheeks and an unpleasant burning sensation in his nostrils, as if the tickle was actively protesting the provocation.

He’d thought he would sneeze for sure when he’d styled his hair and inevitably inhaled his daily lungful of Farrah Fawcett hairspray fumes. It always tasted disgusting and lingered in his mouth and nose, but he was used to it. Today, the first whiff of the stuff seemed to skyrocket the dormant tickle into overdrive. His chest had jumped violently and the chemical scent seemed to drag the tickle forward through his sinuses; his nostrils began to flare.

“Hh…! HH! Hh-HAH!! HADHTT-!!”

But at the very last moment, when he’d been hanging right on the precipice of release, the sensation receded and the air in his lungs was let go with a startled, disappointed exhalation.

“God fucking dammit.” He’d muttered after several more moments of pleading with his body, eyelashes fluttering as he sniffled and panted, hoping that the manual inhalations would trigger an automatic onslaught of desperate gasps. Nope.

This tickle was definitely on his shitlist. It reared its ugly head again the second he put his car into drive. He’d white-knuckled the steering wheel, tipping his head back and taking in breath after lusty breath. God, but he needed to sneeze so badly.

Much the same as before, the tickle vanished right at the peak of his hitching, leaving him to deflate and scrub desperately at his tingling nostrils. This was fucking insane. A couple of minutes just sitting there and breathing experimentally made it clear that the mounting sensation was quite finished with him for the moment. It was still there, though, retreating back into the deepest recesses of his sinuses with a low grade buzz that left his eyes (and nose) perpetually damp. He swore and pulled out of the driveway, on his way to pick up Robin for their lengthy Saturday shift.

It was as he parked and honked the horn outside her house that the tickle made its unwelcome return. He inhaled deeply through his nostrils, alternating between sniffling and taking breaths through his mouth when that seemed to be stirring the tickle towards completion. He was far too invested in encouraging the sneeze along to care what he looked like when Robin sat down in the passenger seat, but he was sure the face he was making was ridiculous. He sat there and panted like a fucking dog, pressing his tongue against the bottom row of his teeth. Robin was silent next to him, but he could feel her eyes roving over his face as he hitched, and hitched, and hitched…

At last he bristled, one final, stuttering gasp expanding his chest to capacity and yes, he was going to sneeze, he was going to-!

“HAHHHDTTt’-!!”

He held that breath for one second, two seconds, but all at once it was withdrawing, pulling him back from that tantalising edge, bereft of release for the third time that day.

“Nooo, fuck my life!” He groaned, punching the steering wheel and pushing his nose firmly against one upraised palm, violently jostling it back and forth until an audibly damp squishing noise graced the air.

“Don’t tell me you forgot how to sneeze, Dingus?” Robin was giggling next to him, delighted at the sight of his bleary-eyed frustration.

“Haha, hilarious, Robin, thank you. No, it just won’t fucking come out. Dammit.”

He sniffled wetly, sawing a finger back and forth under his nostrils. A quick glance at himself in the front mirror made him grimace – the skin round his nose was looking increasingly irritated, pinkening in response to the repeated manhandling. All this and not even a single sneeze for his efforts.

Robin pressed a packet of tissues into his hand, and he offered a small thanks before blowing his nose. He ignored Robin’s comment about him signing up for a position in the brass section of band sans instrument and pulled away from her house.

“Have you even sneezed once?” She asked as he pocketed the tissues one-handed.

“Nope. Not one fucking sneeze.” He sighed, squeezing his eyes shut hard, for just a moment. The tickle simmered in response, as if in mockery.

“Doesn’t the sun make you sneeze?”

“Usually, first thing in the morning – but no, it should have happened by now. I have no idea what’s going on.”

“Caught a cold?”

He shook his head. He felt totally fine – the only thing wrong was the tickle, rolling through his sinuses in little waves. He blinked, and another set of tears dribbled slowly down his cheeks.

“Allergies?”

“Don’t have any. As far as I know? And nothing’s changed. I just woke up this way. Fuck, it burns, man!”

He reached up and bullied his nose back and forth with a balled-up fist this time, hoping the more aggressive approach would force the tickle to crest. All it did was hurt, and cause him to miss their turn.

By the time they’d pulled into the parking lot at Family Video, he had suffered two more agonising false starts, preceded by lengthy, dramatic buildups that made it a bitch to keep driving, to say the least. He slammed the car door behind him much harder than he would ever allow anyone else to do and strode angrily towards the building, but only made it a few steps before the tickle began to tease him all over again.

He peered up at the sun, knowing it would be useless but pleading with his body all the same. He gasped as the tickle ground against his sinuses, twisting his face into an expression of utter desperation. He’d never wanted to sneeze so badly before, never known his body to both hurtle towards and abjectly prevent the release of it in this cruel back and forth of “will he, won’t he”.

Well, he wouldn’t. Not this time, just like all the other times prior. His breath stuttered, a huge, definitive gasp, but even as it was sucked into his lungs he knew it wasn’t meant to be. It left him in an equally dramatic exhalation, immediately followed by an aggravated “Fuck!!”

Robin was next to him, patting his arm and steering him inside the building. He let her, waiting patiently whilst she unlocked the door and urged him through it.

“You feeling okay, buddy?” She asked, looking amused but genuinely concerned. He sighed and waved her off.

“Yeah, Robs, I’m fine. Kind of losing my mind a little but what else is new, you know?”

He meant to flash a reassuring smile her way, but the lingering tickle twisted it into a partial grimace. She snorted a goofy little laugh in response, and it was enough to make him laugh as well, though that also came out sounding more like a choking cough.

“I’ll cover phones and front desk today, okay, stud?”

“Thank you.”

~~~~~~

This shift was taking forever. Normally the passage of time was assuaged by dealing with customers and joking with Robin, but he was able to do neither, constantly assaulted with the prickling burn of the tickle. It had been hours since he woke up and he still hadn’t managed to sneeze. The false starts were, quite frankly, embarrassing beyond belief. He couldn’t help the way his expression crumpled, the gasps he sucked in, the way his entire body was immobilised by the building desire to sneeze. The best he could do was make sure he had his back turned on any potential spectators. A little girl had pointed and laughed at him, yanking at her mother’s skirt and announcing gleefully “Look, mommy! Funny faces!” That had sure fucking sucked. It totally didn’t make him want the floor to open up and swallow him at all.

It had taken one particularly aggressive false start – one he had been convinced was the real deal, so forceful that his body had been tossed forward with the half-sneeze – to piss him off entirely. He blushed right to the roots of his hair at the almost echoing silence after a monstrously loud “HUUUHHDTT’-!” had torn its way out of his throat, the sneeze cruelly fizzling into nothingness only after he had thoroughly embarrassed himself. Luckily, there had only been an older couple on the other side of the store at that particular moment – their conversation had vanished along with his sneeze, and he made a point of ignoring their curious gazes as he skulked into the back.

This was getting ridiculous. It had been ridiculous for hours, but he wasn’t sure how much more of the abject humiliation and fruitless buildups he could take. His nostrils flared involuntarily, rhythmically twitching like a bunny rabbit as the promise of a sneeze continued to tickle and tease the sensitive walls of his sinuses. He sighed and ran a hand through his hair, leaning against the small counter where Keith would fix himself an endless stream of PB&J sandwiches. Steve noticed that he hadn’t even bothered to put the loaf away from his shift the night prior, and half was already gone. Hungry work, he guessed.

Absentmindedly regarding the bread, his hands reached out to secure the small metal wire that Keith had left lazily untwisted. He didn’t like Keith, but he wasn’t enough of an asshole to let the man’s bread go stale out of spite. It was in that moment, as his fingertips brushed over the tie in question, that an idea lit up his brain.

Looking over his shoulder in case Robin made an appearance, he undid the tie entirely and pocketed it. He didn’t know why the thought of what he was about to do felt so salacious, but his heart was beating in his chest all the same. He made his way into the employee bathroom, locked the door behind him, and with sweating palms, extracted the tie and unfurled it into its full extension.

He looked at that little wire for a moment. Why oh why was he feeling so fucking nervous? It was a simple enough idea – stick the thing up his nose and wiggle it around until he made himself sneeze, replace the wire, then back to work. He wanted to sneeze so badly he could hardly focus on anything else, and yet – this felt…naughty. Dangerous. Like he was pulling his cock out at work and going to town. Which was entirely ridiculous, because it was just sneezing. Maybe the suggestive notion of inserting a phallic object into a hole? He huffed out a disbelieving giggle at that.

“Fucking stupid.” He mumbled, bringing the wire up to his nose and hesitating for just a moment.

Steve started out by teasing the flaring rim of one nostril, getting used to the sensation. It was almost immediately too much to bear, and he yanked his head back, eyes watering. It seemed that the best way to do this was to get it over with, no dragging things out. He paused for a second longer, almost giddy with anticipation, before slipping the wire back into his nose and pushing up until he was met with resistance – the very back of his nostril.

“Hh’HAHH!!”

His chest jumped with a sudden inhale – the inside of his nose was so, so irritated. The tiniest little twitch of the wire elicited an even bigger, lustier gasp of air.

“HUHHHH!!”

God. His heart was fucking pounding, eyes streaming tears as the wire bullied the sensitive walls, driving him mad in response. He’d never known a tickle like this before – he was entirely at its mercy, barely able to continue stoking it into completion with the subtle motions of his hand. He reached out, bracing himself on the wall with one trembling hand. It was coming, at last – he was finally, finally going to sneeze. His eyebrows lifted up, nostrils flaring to capacity, mouth dropping open as he took in one last humongous gasp of air, and –

“Steve?”

He nearly jumped out of his skin at the sudden voice and gentle rapping on the bathroom door, dropping the wire as he shuddered in place. His heart had already going haywire in his chest, but now he swore his soul had almost left his body. The absolute shock, the fear – it was enough to terrify not only him, but the budding sneeze as well. He exhaled shakily, totally sneeze-less, feeling so frustrated he could cry.

“Yeah, I’m in here!” He grumbled, paranoid and hoping his voice didn’t somehow reveal to Robin the embarrassing nature of what he’d just been doing. He ignored the thought that it felt like the time his mom walked in on him jacking off in middle school.

“Okay, sorry!” She sounded concerned, and Steve sighed, running a hand over his face, willing himself to calm down. He sniffled, a distinctly liquid sound – the tickle continued its rampage, ever present but never enough to give him the relief he needed.

“You okay?” He offered back when he sensed her lingering. She would have heard that ridiculous false start before, watched him skulk into the back and not come back out.

“Yeah, I’m fine, just – checking in.”

“I’m fine, Robin. Promise.” He lied before blowing his nose as violently as he could, hoping in vain it would tickle enough to make him sneeze. It did not.

“Well, good. Listen, I was gonna go on lunch but I totally forgot to pack something – I’m gonna go grab a sandwich – I can get you one, too – but I just need you to cover for 15 teensy little minutes?”

He sighed.

“Yeah, it’s all good. Just go, I’ll be out in a second.”

He turned on the tap, hoping she would take the hint and leave.

“20 minutes tops!!” He heard her voice receding.

“Grab me a meatball sub!” He shouted after her. Maybe his irritability would deplete once he had the weight of a huge, greasy sandwich weighing him down and making him sleepy. At this point, he would take any kind of distraction.

He sighed again, sniffling once more and regretting it as the burning tickle brought fresh tears to his eyes, and made his way out to the front of the store.

~~~~~~

It would be just his fucking luck that within 4 minutes of Robin’s departure, one of the cutest girls he had ever seen strolled through the door and, upon witnessing Steve behind the front desk, made a beeline towards him. He willed the tickle to back the fuck off, at least enough so that he wasn’t wearing a permanent grimace of frustration.

Man, but this girl was smoking hot – he didn’t recall seeing her around, but then again, life was no longer high school and he wasn’t constantly crammed in a building with the same faces day in and day out. She didn’t look like a high schooler – she was, what, maybe a little older than him? College kid who was back in town for the holidays? He didn’t have much longer to consider, taking in her auburn perm and the pretty lilac eye shadow she’d daubed across the corners of her eyes.

“Hi.” She said simply, placing her manicured hands on the edge of the counter. She smiled at Steve, and it was radiant. He wished she hadn’t chosen today of all days to suddenly appear in all her mouth-watering perfection.

“Hey.” He offered back, managing to neither hitch or gasp. “Do you need any assistance today?”

She slowly drummed her pretty fingers on the counter – expensive manicure, French tipped nails.

“I’m visiting my girlfriends over summer break and we’re having a pizza party. I was really hoping you might know of any decent romcoms –“ She paused for a moment, eyes flicking to his badge then back up to his face – “Steve.”

He tried so, so hard not to let the way she practically purred his name affect him, but this was feeling more and more like a wet dream by the second. The only way he knew for certain it wasn’t was the evil little tickle, prickling away and making his nostrils flare for just a moment. He hoped she hadn’t noticed but how could she not, making eyes at him like that. He reached up with a crooked finger, allowing himself the briefest of rubs before flashing her right on back with one of his best-practiced smiles.

“I’d be happy to help a customer in need, Ms…?”

“Clara. Call me Clara.”

She flipped her silky hair over her shoulder, a charming gesture that exposed the column of her elegant neck – but Steve had barely a moment to focus on it before a sudden wave of lavender smacked him in the face. She was wearing perfume – an overwhelming amount of the stuff.

Unable to help it, he coughed into an upraised fist, then used his knuckles to quell the tickle that seemed to almost explode in a fizz of sensation. He’d spent all day pleading with his body to make him sneeze, and the second it seemed to want to comply, he wanted anything but. Fuck his life. Fuck it hard.

“Ah, sorry.” He started, hoping his tone came across as easy-going and unselfconscious. “Just a touch of allergies.”

It was a lie – he had no clue what the fuck had gotten into him. Maybe he was getting sick after all – but the last thing he wanted to do was offend Clara. His response seemed to mollify her, her expression of disappointment morphing into a much more jovial countenance. He didn’t want to read into it too much, but she kind of looked a little…excited? He could work with that.

“Aw, that’s too bad.” Clara twirled a lock of her hair round her finger, looking at him with unmasked interest, eyes lidded and pupils blown. Oh, he could definitely work with that. He nodded at her.

“It’s not ideal, Clara, but I can handle it. Not gonna let a little bit of pollen stop me from providing ladies such as yourself with only the best of service.”

He smiled at her again, laying it on a little thick, hoping it would compensate for the way his nostrils kept twitching. It seemed to work like a charm – she looked positively spellbound, gently chewing on her bottom lip, eyes periodically flitting back and forth from his nose and eyes. Huh. Maybe she liked a little bit of vulnerability in her men.

“You’re a card.” She giggled back at him.

It felt good to get back into the swing of easy-going flirtation. It was almost enough for him to ignore the tickle raging in his sinuses. Almost. He sniffled, grinding the knuckle of a forefinger into the side of his nose and squinting one eye shut. It helped to prevent him from launching into another buildup, and luckily Clara seemed not to mind. She reached out to pat him conciliatorily on the arm he had rested on the counter.

“You poor thing. Got a tickle?”

The way she was looking at him right now was a look he was painfully familiar with – those were bedroom eyes she was ravishing him with. But right now? When he looked like…this? Man, who was this chick? He decided to roll with it.

“Such a tickle. It just won’t leave me alone – I’ve been sniffling all day.”

Okay, now that really seemed to work – little spots of red were starting to appear on her cheeks, visible under her expertly applied makeup. She even looked picture perfect when she blushed. He didn’t understand why she was blushing, but it was electrifying all the same.

“Enough about me, though.” He lowered the hand he had been bullying his nose with to rest on top of her own. She shuddered almost imperceptibly. “Let’s find you ladies a movie.”

~~~~~~

Clara was cool and all, but she truly didn’t seem to understand the concept of personal space. She was right up against Steve’s side as he launched into a little spiel about their most popular movies, his own recommendations, and just the odd little bit of movie trivia he’d managed to absorb from Robin that he hoped would really seal the deal of his own expertise. Clara nodded along eagerly, asking him for more details on each and every movie. He got the distinct feeling that she was dragging this out and keeping him talking on purpose. He was happy to oblige, but the malingering tickle was clearly fed up with being ignored for as long as it had been.

He’d launched into two separate buildups already, turning away from Clara and burying his face in the upraised collar of his polo shirt. Each had ended with more embarrassingly loud false starts before he inevitably deflated, turning back to her with an apology and a sheepish smile. Each time she had assured him it was no problem at all, edging even closer. Her pupils were huge.

“So, what are you thinking?” Steve smiled at her.

“Hmm?”

“About the movies? Any idea which ones?”

“Oh! Umm…maybe those ones?” She seemed a little bashful about the suddenly all too obvious way she’d been staring. It was nothing new to him – girls staring at him like he was a total dreamboat. It was extremely flattering, no matter how often it happened.

“Sure thing.”

He reached over her shoulder to grab one of the cassettes she was pointing towards – they were stood almost flush together, the way Clara had angled herself between him and the wall shelves. There was hardly any wriggle room, the corner of a perpendicular row of shelves pressing into his back. Ordinarily, this would have been a simple manoeuvre – a tantalising moment of fleeting physical connection, video tape obtained, guaranteed swooning on any girl’s part. But Clara, instead of melting back against his chest, spun round in surprise, looking up at him with heated eyes.

He wouldn’t have minded this, her breasts almost pushing against his chest and her pretty face so close to his, but that overwhelming lavender scent…It was almost unbearable. Not to mention that her squirming as he leaned forward meant he’d gotten a faceful of tickly, soft perm, just as saturated with the cloying floral scent as the rest of her. The omnipresent tickle exploded with renewed sensation at the double combo of internal and external stimulation.

Fuck, fuck, fuck. He was gonna sneeze. It was so imminent and so overpowering, and he was trapped between Clara and the shelves. Even without the building pressure rendering him immobile it would have required an awkward amount of wriggling to escape his current situation without pressing right up against her. And maybe he would have, if he wasn’t at fucking work, if he wasn’t about to sneeze all over this beautiful fucking girl. He shuddered with a sudden, uncontrollable gasp, mouth dropping open in a desperate gape. He was surprised he didn’t lose all control then and there, but he managed to hold back through sheer willpower. He turned his watering, rapidly closing eyes on her and tried to utter a warning, a plea that she get herself out of his way before it was too late.

“Hh-! C-Clara, I’m g-hh!! Gonnahh-hHH!! HUHH!!”

It was too much. Hours and hours of teasing torment, the tickle playing with him, bringing him to the peak of release then pulling him back over and over – it was all about to come to an end. He’d done all he could, he’d warned her; now he simply had to give in and let his body work himself up to that long sought-after release.

His nostrils flared to capacity, the round ellipses of them even more apparent in contrast to the sleek, pointed shape of his nose at rest. His eyebrows rose in a beatific acceptance of the approaching climax; his mouth hung gently open, pink tongue curling as he gasped. His lungs filled with air until they could fill no more.

“HhUH! HUHH! HUHHDTt-!!”

He couldn’t help the way his chest swelled and jumped, expanding with every desperate inhale, but even through the sneeze-induced paralysis he could have sworn Clara moved closer still. There was enough room for her slender figure to weasel her way around him, enough time as the mounting sensation rendered him frozen, but no. They were almost face to face. It was mortifying – he couldn’t believe what was about to happen. But he hurtled towards the climactic release all the same, and for a few seconds whilst he held onto a final inhalation in statuesque serenity, his mind turned blank and all he could focus on was the sweet anticipation of a truly colossal surrender.

And so, it was happening. It was finally happening. He was vaguely aware of Clara pushing her body up against him, nuzzling into him, and then it was exploding out of him in a dizzying rush of air and spray.

“HUUUUHHHHRISSSHHHHAHHHH!!!”

Ohh fuck. That felt so fucking good. He trembled with it, forced forward and into Clara, bracing himself with one hand on the wall shelf. He barely had a moment to luxuriate in the release before the tickle flared again, even more insistently, and he was gasping and cringing into a second monstrous sneeze.

“AEGK’TISSSSSSHHHHHHH’IEWWW!!”

That one felt even better. The pleasure of an itch well scratched sent a delicious commotion of goosebumps up and down the skin of his arms. But again, he wasn’t finished. He inhaled deeply, lustily, surrendering entirely and beckoning in a third explosion.

“HAHHH’YISHHHHHIEWWWW!!”

He let it do as it would with him, rocking him forward and sending a shiver down his spine. He almost moaned at its conclusion but was shocked to feel yet another sneeze beginning to swell. He tilted his head back, inviting it in – when he was brought back into himself by a gentle little gasp that was decidedly not his own.

Fuck. Clara. She was clinging to him now, pressed between him and the shelves. He was suddenly all too aware of her presence; the soft, fluffy hair rubbing against his cheek. He could have died of mortification. He wanted to, but his body wanted to sneeze even more. He managed to lift his shaky free hand around Clara’s shoulder and up to his face, just a moment too late as the fourth barrelled through him. It doused his fingers with a heavy spray as they lingered a foot away from his flaring nostrils.

“TISHHHHHHHHH’UUUU!!”

He snuffled, finally bringing his hand to face for the next one – and just in time. The harsh sneeze brought not only a fresh dousing of spray, but the dams of his sinuses finally burst, and a splattering of light mess graced his palm.

“HH’RIIISSSSSCHHHH!! HAH’AEGK’TSCHHHHIEWWW!!”

That sneeze brought a friend, just as messy and violent. God, would it ever end? He was getting lightheaded from the sheer force of the releases, in equal amounts pleasurable and exhausting. He sniffled hard, the sound thick and crackling. He felt like if he could just get the residual tickle out in one last, huge explosion, he could put an end to it. Even as the sneeze built, he continued to sniffle, fanning the flames of the tickle and increasing the irritation beyond what he thought his body capable. This was going to be big, even for him.

“HAHHHdTT-!! HAHHHH’GITTSCHHHHHH’IEWWW!!!”

Holy fuck. He couldn’t help the little moan of pleasure that escaped him afterwards, clutching his dripping hand to his face. He stood there, almost swaying, as he came back to himself. What a fucking fit – definitely the worst he’d had in recent history, even worse than the ones brought on by the cold he’d managed to catch last Christmas.

After a couple of seconds of sheer, self-indulgent bliss, he realised Clara was embracing him, rubbing a tentative hand up and down his back as he practically leant over her, pressing her into the shelf. He hadn’t realised quite how much the sneezes had thrown him forward and backed her up – she was practically sandwiched in place. His face flushed and he withdrew in a sudden clumsy scramble, ignoring the pain of the shelf that prodded into his back and managing at last to put some space between them.

Clara was red in the face, looking absolutely dumbfounded. It was bad enough, that he had practically smothered her at his place of work, but worst of all, his eyes could make out the distinctive darkened patches of moisture all over her pretty pink blouse. His sneezes, all over the fabric, so damp that it was almost clinging to her skin in places. Now he really wanted to die.

“Fuck, I am so, so sorry-!” He scrambled for a clean tissue one handed, his other hand still precariously pressed against his messy face, then started dabbing ineffectively at the saturated fabric of her blouse once he managed to yank one out of his pocket.

“No, it’s – it’s fine, honestly.” She said, gently taking the tissue from him and resuming his work, and he just had to take her word for it. She looked shy, but not disgusted. If anything, she looked – no. Surely the fuck not.

He extracted another tissue and turned away from her, grimacing as he wiped his hands and face clean. He hesitated for a short moment, glancing around the store and finding it empty – sweet Jesus in heaven, thank you. It took him several tissues to successfully blow his nose, but once he’d finished, he felt brand new. Completely purged of the tickle, he was an irritation-free man.

“Bless you.”

He turned around, a fresh wave of mortification crashing over him. The damage to her shirt had barely been dented by the measly little tissue. He’d effectively super-soaked her. It took all his remaining energy not to cringe and flee into the back of the store.

“I’m so sorry, Clara. I totally sneezed all over you. I promise I’m not getting sick. Shit.”

She smiled at him as he fumbled over his words, appearing not the least bit worried about getting sick at all.

“Honestly, Steve. It’s okay.”

He caught himself just before he cocked his head at her like a dog. This was not a normal response to being sneezed and spit on. Maybe she was just really, really kind. The alternative was much more ridiculous – he wouldn’t entertain it.

“You’re being so nice about this but I feel like such a jerk. I’ve been needing that all day and I just – couldn’t control it.”

“I could tell.” She giggled, looking more than okay to be in receipt of that information. Okay, so maybe she was more than just kind. He smiled back at her, relieved in more ways than one. Fuck, it had been great to sneeze, and being able to do so – making a total fucking mess of himself in front of a beautiful girl, who even seemed to like it – he would never curse his bad luck again. Deciding to test the waters a little, he rubbed a finger under his damp, flaring nostrils, delighting in the way her eyes followed the motion.

“Actually, it smells great and all but I think your perfume might be bothering me a little. Not that that’s a bad thing. I’d rather sneeze like that all day than be stuck with a tickle that won’t go away.”

He flashed her one of the cockiest grins he could muster. She looked like she was about to swoon.

“You really helped me out there.”

“Really?” She all but sighed, stepping towards him – and bringing with her a fresh wave of lavender.

“Y-yeah. Sorry, Clara, I’m gonna-!”

He managed to bring a new tissue up to his nose, quaking as an earth-shattering double raced through him and exploded into the soft paper.

“HAGK’TISSSSSSHHHH!! AESSSHHHHHUUU!! Ohh, god. Bless me.”

Clara offered him a breathy ‘Bless you’ of her own, which he thanked enthusiastically, making a show of wiping his nostrils clean. This seemed to have an almost hypnotic effect on her, broken only when he asked her if she’d still like to rent any movies.

“What?” She blinked her big, pretty eyes at him. He smiled.

“Want me to ring those movies up for you? These two, right?”

He reached for the tapes she’d been after and held them up for her to consider.

“Oh. Um. Yeah, those would be great, thanks.” She seemed embarrassed, like a spell had suddenly been broken and she finally realised she’d been making the sultriest bedroom eyes at him in the middle of an open store again.

He nodded, making his way back to the desk and gesturing for her to follow. He was almost euphoric as he updated her information on the computer. If one could experience afterglow from sneezing alone, he was definitely there. He just wanted to laze around and bask in the joy of being entirely tickle free, completely purged of all irritation. Maybe it wasn’t so bad, being teased and tormented like that, if the final result felt so damn good.

“Here you go! All set.”

He handed her the tapes with a winning smile and she took them with a little smile of her own. His eyes drifted to the speckled fabric of her blouse, still drenched with the result of his sneezing.

“Listen, I know you said you don’t mind but I still feel real awful about ruining your top. Will you let me pay for dry cleaning?”

She fixed him with another heated glance, twirling her pretty hair round her finger.

“I’d rather you use the money to take me out sometime.”

He grinned.

“Yeah? I can make that happen. You have a number I can call?”

Steve was grinning like an idiot and waving goodbye to a giggling Clara when Robin nearly made him jump out of his skin for the second time that day.

“What the fuck was that?”

“Jesus, Robin! That’s it, I’m getting you a bell.”

The irritation he intended to exude was clearly lost in translation, likely due to the fact that he couldn’t stop the smug grinning. Robin jabbed him in the ribs with her finger until he squirmed in protest.

“Who was that?”

He set about stacking tapes, enjoying the way Robin’s frustration built as he turned away from her. She poked him harder.

“Steve, tell me who that crazy hot girl was and why she was still making eyes at you even after you snotted all over her right now.”

He groaned. He mustn’t have heard her come back in – which made total sense. He could have been on another planet for how out of it that sneezing had made him.

“How long were you watching?”

“Long enough.” Robin smirked, before handing him a sandwich. He took it gratefully.

“You’re a saint, Robs.”

“Worked up an appetite?” She smirked at him, taking a bite out of her own. Keith would have chewed them out for eating out front, but Steve couldn’t care less. He practically tore into his own, getting sauce all over the tip of his nose with the sheer voracity of his bite.

“You could say that.” He mumbled round a mouthful of bread and meat. “Her name is Clara.” He offered before taking another huge bite.

“I’ve never seen her before.”

“Me neither. Think she’s from out of town, visiting friends. Didn’t really ask. College girl.”

“She was cute. And totally weird.”

“That’s a fucking understatement. I can’t believe I sneezed all over her and she still wants me take her on a date.”

“Steve, you’re great, but believe me, if I could figure out what the fuck it is you manage to do to charm these girls, I would bottle that shit and make a million in sales overnight.”

“Hmm. This felt different though. I think she – maybe liked me more? After I started sneezing? She kept giving me these eyes, Robin – and I wasn’t even trying.”

“Well,” Robin started with a gentle slap on his shoulder. “If you figure it out, let me know. Maybe all I need to do is start sneezing on the girls I like.”

“Shut up, man!” Steve called after her as she sauntered away, laughing through another huge mouthful of food.

He didn’t know what the fuck this girl’s deal was, but with any luck, she would let him know in the back of his car. Or in the back of a movie theatre. Or in her bed. And he hoped she was wearing that perfume when she did.

#I had so much fun writing this. like. so much #s/tranger t/hings #nametakenfic #sneeze fic #sneeze kink #snz kink #snzfucker #sneeze fucker #snz fet #snzblr

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prohistamine · 9 months

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M Allergies, 1.6k words

I'm back with another fic gang. This time featuring two high society exes reuniting at a fancy gala. In proper prohistamine fashion this one features allergies, a character with the fetish, and fun power dynamics.

Be warned! somewhat explicit sexual content and general unforgivable horniness

“Lovely of you to come, truly I’m so glad to see you both.” Lorna shook the minister's hand in hers, firmly and warmly. A handshake practiced a thousand times over. “Ms. Windsor arrived a few minutes ago I believe, I’m sure she’d be delighted to catch up on your party's substantial victories in the recent election.”

As he turned away Lorna selected a flute of champagne from a passing waiter's tray and took a healthy sip. She’d need it to get through the rest of the night. She turned towards the door, ready to resume her assessment of each new guest as they arrived, but when she saw the man who’d just walked through the doors her stomach dropped. His dark hair was shorter than the last time she'd seen him, falling in waves around his face. He looked smug as ever, and when he caught her eye he started walking her way.

“Colin,” she murmured through gritted teeth, “I didn’t think you’d be caught dead here.”

Colin grinned thinly. “Ah well, you would assume I’d choose to be petty, you always thought the worst of me.”

She scoffed. “That is a charitable way to describe two years of you repeatedly lowering my expectations.”

“Now Lorna, can’t we put the past behind us? What is it we always said, not to let pleasure interfere with our business?”

“Stirring up unnecessary rumors will interfere with business. Don’t you think it’s a bit soon for us to be speaking in public? The dust has barely settled, people will talk.”

��‘Oh the worst fate!” he said in mocking horror, “to be the victim of gossip! Do you think we’ll make it out alive?”

“Oh of course, because you're so above petty politics. I’m the one who’s obsessed with gossip and you just let it roll off your back.”

“Do you think you could say that again for me? Maybe I can get it on tape.” He smiled and rubbed at his nose absentmindedly.

“You know what? I’m glad you came. I really missed that familiar little headache you gave me. It's this sort of… gentle throbbing at the base of my skull? I’m just not the same without it.”

“I knew you missed me. I missed the exercise I got from our conversations, we should really make a habit of it.” He rubbed his nose again, with more intention, and was she imagining it, or was the motion accompanied by the faint sound of wetness?

“Are you just here to flaunt your ability to get yourself out of bed?” Lorna asked, “ Because if so, point proven. This is kind of an important night for me.”

“Ah well, I’m glad you recognize my presence as the achievement it is, but I do have something to-” he cut himself off with a sniff and a scrubbing at his nostrils, “something to discuss. I have to ahh- hehh-” Lorna recognized the face he was making immediately, the far away look in his eye, the crease between his eyebrows. His buildup was, as always, dramatically long before he snatched his handkerchief out of his pocket and sneezed into it twice “AaaSCHU! AaaeSTCHU!” As always, there was no attempt to stifle his violent outburst. He looked up at her blearily, “Ah, pardon me.”

There was a faint smirk in his tone. Lorna scowled. Of course this would happen, just what she needed when she was already struggling to maintain her composure.

“Bless you.” she managed to say, intent on keeping her voice even. She wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of having a reaction.

“Thank you I- oh there's- Aaah- ahh- AhGHSHUU! AESHTEW! AEGHEEW! Huhh. There were more.”

Despite her frustration, the familiar heat was rising in Lorna’s stomach and traveling down between her legs. Composure be damned, she leaned forward and hissed into his ear.

“Are you doing this on purpose?”

He chuckled. “Oh that would have been brilliant. I’m not that cruel, I'm afraid, or that creative. It must be the floral decorations. I’m desperately allergic, you see.”

Oh he was fucking loving this.

“People will stare you know. You’re embarrassing yourself.” She was looking for any way to take back power in the conversation, and she realized she’d been sloppy the moment she spoke.

“Embarrassing myself?” he asked smugly, “Oh you’d love that wouldn’t you.”

“I’m leaving.”

“C’mon now Lorna, I do have something important to discuss. How about we go out onto the balcony to talk. No worries about prying eyes, and the fresh air will be good for my nose.”

Lorna cast a glance at the large glass doors leading out to the south balcony. They had fabric drapes in front of them, placed intentionally for anyone desiring a conversation away from the eye of the press. Regardless of the privacy they’d have once they got there, people would be sure to notice the two of them leaving together. The smart decision would be to tell him she wasn’t interested in talking, but she desperately wanted a break from the crowd, and, pathetic as it made her feel, she wasn’t sure she could pass up the chance to continue watching him sneeze. It had been months since she’d had the pleasure, and she was beginning to feel like a woman starved.

“Fine.”

“Marvelous.” he said, words slightly muddled with congestion.

They made their way across the room, no doubt incurring the whispers of several guests.

Once they’d stepped outside and shut the doors behind them, Lorna turned to Colin only to see his face skewed in preparation for another sneeze.

“Hehh- Hhh- HhhSTCHU! HaAGHSHEW- I ha- hhh hhASHEW! I haahh- hadn’t realized it was …it was-” he held the handkerchief in front of his face expectantly as he struggled through the sentence, head tilted back as he gulped in air to fuel the fit, “ATZSHUU! ASHEWW! R-realized it was so… ahh- AschUUu! so cold out here.”

A sufficient chill had settled in the air since the sun had set, something Lorna hadn’t even considered. Colin was wearing nothing but a simple suit jacket, and he’d always been incredibly sensitive to changes in temperature. Just going outside in cold weather usually caused him a small fit, and the combination with his fall allergies was having quite the effect. He blew his nose into the folds of his handkerchief and then geared up for more.

“heeSGHEW! EESGHEW! HESHEWW!! Hehh- haaahh- ahh- ASHEW!” He was bending at the waist now with the force of them, and reached blindly to his left in search of the balcony railing, which he leaned on for support once he found it.

“Huhh-hhhh-hhoh god- heeehSHUUH! EESHEW! HEERGHSTEW! ESH-ESH-ESHU!!

The fit was punctuated by three violent little sneezes that tripped over each other to be released.

Since the moment he’d first sneezed, Lorna had felt like she was putty in Colin’s hand. His intimate knowledge of just what his allergies did to her gave him a maddening and tantalizing power over her. However, as he desperately wrenched forward with sneeze after sneeze, one hand shakily clasping a handkerchief to his face and the other doing its best to keep him upright, it was hard to see him as holding any kind of powerful position. For the first time that night she felt a twinge of pity for him. The feeling both frustrated her, and, of course, only served to further arouse her.

His fit finally subsided, and he slumped against the railing, gasping for breath.

“Sorry,” he managed, too exhausted to sound properly smug.

“Don’t be,” she couldn’t help but reply, her voice high pitched and obvious. She was so wet that she was worried it might actually start dripping down her legs. They both stood there for a moment in silence.

“So,” he started, still somewhat breathless, “about the election-”

“Colin-” she interrupted him, “I appreciate the effort to resume our professional relationship, but I don’t think I can listen to you talk about politics after that performance.” She knew she had admitted defeat, but in the face of his sniffling, shivering frame she found she no longer desired to one up him. What she really desired was to fuck him, to ease him open with her fingers and fill him up until he couldnt see. That or be fucked by him, bent over and begging for it as he held her by the hips with his big hands.

“I understand,” he said, “another time then. Perhaps then, before we go inside, I could talk to you about something expressly unprofessional.”

“Have at it Colin,” she said, trying not to sound like she was begging for it.

“There's something I’d like to show you. I warn you, it’s somewhat inappropriate.”

She felt her heart flutter in her chest, “I can handle that.”

He took a step toward her and then took her wrist. He guided her hand forward, lowering it beneath his waist and then pressing it between his legs where an erection was straining against the fabric of his dress pants. She moaned audibly at the surprise.

“Do you see what you’ve done to me?” he murmured into her ear, “this is what happens to me now, every time I sneeze. I can’t help it.”

“Colin,” her voice was strangled.

“How am I going to explain this to future lovers? You know how I get in the spring, I’ll be hard constantly. What will I say if they notice my cock twitch every time I sneeze? Every time they sneeze?”

Lorna’s clit was throbbing. Colin gave a liquid sniff, and she moaned again, body shuddering against his. Her hand closed slightly around his cock and he gasped sharply.

“My nose still itches terribly,” he murmured, accentuating the statement with another sniffle, “It would feel heavenly to rub it on something soft.”

“Please,” she begged him.

He leaned down slowly, placing a hand firmly on her hip, and dragged his nose across her shoulder, rubbing it in the nape of her neck. She trembled at the feeling of his soft nostrils, shifting as they rubbed against her, leaving her skin slightly wet.

“Fuck, that feels nice,” he said softly. She could do nothing but whimper in response.

She let it go on for a moment, their bodies intertwined, her hand on his cock and his nose buried against her. It took everything in her not to pull him into a kiss. Instead she stepped back, and wiped her shoulder with her hand.

“Thank you,” she said, wrangling her voice back to her well-practiced professionalism, “for that stimulating conversation on politics.” She took a moment to compose herself, taking a long deep breath and then continuing, “I have a gala to host, and you have one to attend. I think it best we continue this conversation later, after the guests have left. Perhaps in my personal chambers. You’d have to be discreet about staying behind of course, we wouldn’t want my guests to suspect we’re doing something illicit.”

Colin looked taken aback, and then broke into a wide grin, “Of course ma’am.”

She turned towards the door and then, before opening it, turned back towards him. “This does not mean I forgive you, " she said sternly.

Colin’s eyes sparkled. “Of course not.”

#snz kink #snz blog #snz #snzblr #sneezefucker #sneeze kink #snzfic #snz fic #my writing

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hetchiew · 3 months

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An allergic florist naming the flowers and bouquets she sells after the sneeze(s) she experiences when interacting with them…

Daisies? No, they’re hihh!! ish-ish-ISH-IshIEW!!

Lavender? That’s Hehh- hih! ! —HAT’shIEW!!

A bouquet with chrysanthemums and lilies? Oh boy… hih! hiH!! huh-HAHH!!!—ACTshIEW—ATishEW!! Huh!!-AKTISHH-KISHH-ISH-ISH-ISHH-ISHIEW!! …huh! Hahh!!—HATSCHIEWW!!!

And customers having to imitate her sneezes to order the flowers? Possibly even another person with allergies going to buy some and ending up with the wrong bouquet because they couldn’t stop sneezing themselves??🥴🥵

#it’s my first time writing sneeze spellings… I hope they’re okay!😅#snzblr #sneeze kink #sneezefucker

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whumpusgumpus · 3 months

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SNZ COMMISSIONS OPEN !!

STARTING AT JUST 8$‼️

So I'm in a tough spot in life rn, and a fellow freak like y'all needs some help! Starting at just 8$ per sketch, I'm opening up my snz commissions. I don't have a comm sheet yet, but l've drawn tons of snz and am going to be uploading much more in the near future. The prices are as follows:

8$ digital torso and up sketch

12$ torso and up digital sketch+color

18$ torso and up digital sketch+render

(From first to last +5,+8,+15) for an additional person (whumper or caretaker perhaps 😏)

I take Cashapp and Paypal! I ask for payments up front before I begin. Each commission takes approximately 1-5 days✨

Sorry for the lack of examples, a beotch is in a PICKLE but ty y'all for reading, and I look forward to hopefully drawing some yummy stuff for y'all

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whumpster-dumpster · 1 year

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Caretaker catching the bug that the contagious whumpee's got and feeling guilty for disturbing them with badly suppressed coughs and sneezes when they're supposed to be resting

#whump #whump prompt #writing prompt #sickness #caretaker turned whumpee #coughing #sneeze

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suddencolds · 3 months

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insatiable appetite [1/?]

sooo... this is one of the thirstiest things i have written—and also one of the only times i've written a character with the kink, ever T.T warnings in advance for mess, character getting sneezed on, implied contagion, possible ooc-ness, & me writing this entirely with my d instead of my head

ivan and till are from al//ien sta//ge (a very fun watch which will only take 30 mins out of your life; i really recommend it!!). that said, this fic takes place in a modern au setting, so feel free to read it without any prior context :)

special thanks to @6pmsoup for sending me a very cute alnst doodle of these two which altered my brain chemistry permanently

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Summary: Till shows up to a dinner outing with a brewing cold. Ivan suffers. (est. relationship, kink!Ivan, ~2k words)

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For all Till tries to hide it, Ivan can tell immediately.

There’s this: Ivan has been paying attention to Till for most of his life. A full decade before they’d gotten together officially, and some more—this is how long Ivan has had to observe his tells. Always from the sidelines, always with a detached air of indifference that, in reality, was anything but.

All the signs are there the night before. Till, turning up the thermostat a couple degrees higher than he usually keeps it. Spending a little too long in the shower and using up almost all of the hot water. Clearing his throat one too many times in the morning before Ivan leaves for work, his smile distracted, the rasp of his voice nearly indistinguishable—but only nearly.

Now, Till is here for dinner—it’s a dinner they’ve had plans for a couple weeks now, at one of the nicer restaurants downtown, in celebration of Till’s recent promotion. Ivan had booked the reservation a couple weeks in advance.

When Till arrives, stepping out of a taxi cab, he’s wearing a scarf, even though the weather is too warm for it. Ivan steps up to meet him.

“Sorry I’m late,” Till says. “Traffic here was the worst I’ve ever seen it, swear to god.”

“Was it cold outside today?” Ivan asks, a little pointedly, tilting his head towards his scarf.

Till looks at him, his expression unreadable. Then he nods. “Colder than usual, for this time of year.”

“Strange,” Ivan says, just to be difficult. “But the weather forecast says it’s the same temperature today as yesterday.”

“It’s probably just windier today,” Till says, readjusting his scarf around his neck. His face is a little flushed.

“Your voice sounds a little off, though.”

Till clears his throat with a scowl. “You must be imagining it,” he says. “It always sounds like this.”

No admission, then. That’s fine. Ivan will get the truth out of him at some point. He lets Till guide him into the restaurant.

It’s a nice restaurant—worth the hassle of the reservation, Ivan thinks. Each table is set with flowers arranged tastefully in long glass vases, empty wine glasses turned on their heads. The server—who leads them to their table in a small, private booth—is wearing a suit.

It’s a shame, really. Ivan has a feeling that he won’t be able to pay attention to any of that tonight.

They sit. Ivan looks down at the menu, picks out something at random in a matter of seconds. Truthfully, he can hardly think of anything less worth his attention right now. He turns his attention to Till instead—Till, who’s seated directly across from him, the scarf still around his neck, obscuring the lower half of his face.

Till sniffles, reaching down to turn the page, and oh. The sniffle is terribly liquid—has he been sniffling like that all afternoon? Perhaps it’s a good thing that they work at different offices—Till at a law firm, Ivan as a senior manager at a consulting company—because Ivan certainly doesn’t think he’d be able to get any work done with Till sniffling like that.

It’s not two minutes later that Till is reaching up to wipe his nose against the back of one knuckle. All in all, it’s discreet. Just a quick brush of the fingers against his nose, which is still hidden under the scarf. Though, the look of sheer ticklishness that passes over his features for a brief moment there is...

“What are you thinking of ordering?” Ivan asks.

“I can’t decide,” Till answers. He turns the page again. “It’s between the ribeye steak and the… snf! The pork belly. Is this the kind of place that skimps on the portion sizes?”

“Not from their Yelp reviews,” Ivan says. “You know, if you really can’t decide, I can flip a coin.”

“I’ll pick,” Till says. “Why? Hungry already?”

He looks up, now. His eyes are a little watery. There’s a faint flush over the bridge of his nose. Ivan thinks that if he reached out and touched him, he’d probably be running warm. The thought is almost unbearable.

“Your taxi did take forever to arrive,” Ivan says, by way of explanation.

“Did you really wait that long?”

He looks uncertain, for a moment. Ivan says, “Not at all. But you know, I’m always impatient when it comes to you.”

Till rolls his eyes, but it’s fond. “There was a meeting that ran late. I wasn’t avoiding you.”

“Is that also a part of your new position?” “I guess so, yeah.”

“I can see why they were eager to promote you, then,” Ivan says. “How productive can late afternoon meetings be, anyways?”

Till snorts. “Not that important. It definitely could have been an email instead. I was about ready to doze off.”

He sniffles again. “Okay. I think I know what I want.” The way he says know betrays the slightest hint of congestion.

“At long last,” Ivan says, just to be a little bit of an ass. “I’ll call over the waiter.”

He flags their waiter down, waits for Till to order first.

“A spiced apple cider,” Till adds on, at the end, with the slightest of coughs. “Hot, if you can.”

That’s new, too. Till seldom orders hot drinks at restaurants, though he’ll drink tea without complaint if it’s offered. Perhaps his throat hurts, then, from the cold that has clearly started to settle in his system. Subtle, still, but Ivan is familiar with colds like this. He knows it will probably only be a few hours before this deceptively “small” cold turns into…

Ivan orders, too, and thanks the waiter, who leaves with a curt nod. When he looks back over to Till, there’s a… strange something to Till’s expression, a slight distractedness. Irritation.

Ivan swallows hard. He should look away.

He should, but then, Till’s breath hitches. He pulls the scarf higher over his face preemptively, as if he anticipates having something to have to cover for. The sharp intake of breath that follows is breathy, though Ivan can hear Till’s voice in it. He should really look away.

Instead, he takes the scene in, painstakingly, little by little, as Till’s shoulders jerk forwards. As Till presses a hand to the scarf, presses the fabric closer to his face, to muffle a sneeze into his fingertips:

“hhH-Ih!! hiHH-’IESCHH-eew-!”

God. It sounds utterly miserable, the harsh release of it scraping against his throat, the spray tearing into his scarf. It’s the kind of cold sneeze that is undeniably telling: this is going to be one hell of a cold. It’s not very quiet, either, even muffled into the fabric.

For more reasons than one, Ivan is glad they’re in a private corner of the restaurant, not somewhere more public.

“Bless you,” he offers, once he can trust himself to speak. It’s a good thing that Till is too distracted to look up at him right now. Ivan isn’t sure he can keep what he’s feeling off of his face.

Truthfully, he isn’t sure he’s going to be able to endure a whole night of this.

The problem here is that Till—Till, of all people; Till, who Ivan has been pathetically in love with for almost as long as he can remember—has no idea about Ivan’s… relatively niche interests. That is to say, he has no idea what effect it has on Ivan when he does that.

“Thanks,” Till says, a little stuffily. He sniffles again, lowering his hand.

Ivan can’t help it. He knows he shouldn’t pursue this line of questioning, but he can feel his self-control dwindling by the second. “Don’t you think it would be better to take off your scarf, now that we’re inside?”

Till freezes. “Y-You know what,” he says evasively. “It’s pretty cold in here.”

Ivan tilts his head in question. “And just how do you plan on eating like that?”

“I’ll take it off when our food comes.”

“I can ask the waiter to turn the temperature up, if it’s a problem,” Ivan says.

“It’s not a problem.”

Ivan rises from his seat. Till watches him, perplexed, as he heads to the opposite side of the table, where Till is seated.

When he gets there, he stops. Stands, unmoving, so he can study Till from above.

“What are you—”

Ivan reaches out, settles his palm across Till’s forehead. As expected, it’s warm. Not quite feverish, which is a good sign, but warm enough to be notable.

“Just how long were you intending to hide this?”

Till stares back at him, wide-eyed. “Hide what?”

Shouldn’t it be obvious? “The fact that you have a cold.”

“I didn’t think it was worth mentioning,” Till says, slowly.

“Hmm.” Ivan drops his hand to his side. He is a little concerned, now. “We could’ve called a rain check.”

This time Till really does roll his eyes. “For the reservation we planned weeks ahead?” he sniffles again. “That just sounds completely and utterly unnecessary. Are you the type of person to call things off just over a little cold?”

Ivan leans over, tugs down the edge of Till’s scarf. Till bats his hand away just a moment too late, cups his other hand over his face to shield his face from view. For a moment, he looks faintly mortified.

Then his expression settles into something more disgruntled. “What are you doing?” he hisses.

So uncooperative. “Let me see,” Ivan says. Slowly, gently, he pries Till’s hands away from his face, and then—because the restaurant is dimly lit—tilts Till’s face up slightly so that it catches more of the overhead light.

Till’s nose is redder than usual. He’s probably been rubbing it all afternoon, if the redness that percolates into his cheeks is any indication. There’s a damp, liquid sheen on the underside of his nose.

“What’s there to see?” Till says, a little crossly.

“Your face, since you’ve been so intent on hiding it under that scarf,” Ivan says, leaning in to get a better look.

Till scowls at him, but there’s no heat to it. “You see my face every day.”

“On the contrary, I don’t see it nearly enough,” Ivan says. “And you hardly ever get sick. Is it so wrong for me to be concerned?”

Without looking, he reaches behind him with one hand to grab a couple cocktail napkins. The other hand he keeps held up to Till’s cheek.

But then, Till’s breath hitches. “Wait,” he says. Panic flashes through his face. “Ivan, move, I—”

Oh. Well, seeing as there’s no way he’ll be able to get the napkins over in time, it looks like he’ll have to improvise. If Till wants to cover, Ivan can help with that. He moves his hand to cup it loosely over Till’s mouth. Not a second too late, it seems. Till jerks forward unceremoniously, his nose twitching, his eyes squeezing shut.

“hHheh-! HHh’EIITShHh’yYiew!” he gasps sharply. Two? “Hh-! hHiiH’DSSCSSHh-IIew!”

The jolt of the sneezes is practically electrifying—all of that force, brought to an abrupt halt behind Ivan’s waiting palm. He feels the expulsion of air against his skin, the warmth of Till’s breath, feels the slight dampness behind his hand as the spray mists over his fingertips.

Ivan swallows, hard. Thank god it’s so dark here, otherwise Till might notice what this is doing to him.

“Bless you,” he says, withdrawing his hand at last to wipe it on one of the cloth napkins. It comes out slightly raspier than he intends it to, though perhaps it’s a miracle that he’s still able to talk at all. “Some cold, hmm?” Belatedly, he hands Till the stack of napkins.

Till practically snatches them from him, turns aside to blow his nose wetly into the top few. The way he sniffles afterwards suggests that his nose is still very much running.

“Do you have no self preservation? It’s as if you want to catch this,” Till says, drawing back with another sniffle.

Oh, Ivan thinks, fighting back a shiver. That would be far from the worst thing.

#sneeze fic #sneeze kink #snz fic #snz kink #my fic #i needed to get this out of my system 😭 i know its unpolished #i thought i was already baring my soul with the ki//ll//er pe//ter fic but this is so much worse #special apology to my dear friends who have been forced to listen to me talk nonstop about al//n//st (you know who you are) (and if you see #this i'm personally sorry 😭) maybe someday i will write something for them that is less unhinged and perhaps more in character #the thought of kink!iva//n just took hold of me and then this fic materialized #still experimenting with different flavors of writing him... balancing my understanding of his character w this specific kink flavor was #an experiment for sure. like how do you balance concern and desire/selfishness?#i couldn't figure it out so just leaned very hard into the latter #also the 1/? is a placeholder; writing this was already testing the limits of my courage LOL #if i sit here i'll write another 200 disclaimers because i'm embarrassed to be posting this so i'll just schedule the post now

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