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letsgobarbs · 17 hours ago

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The Wedding (Acacius Marries His Priestess)

Summary: This is part of the His Priestess universe but can be read as a stand-alone. Acacius marries his Anaticula.

Pairing: Marcus Acacius x Former Vestal!Reader (No use of y/n, terms of endearment are used.)

A/N: Anaticula means little duckie/duckling. Vestals were initiated at ages 5~7ish and served the temple for 30 years before they were permitted to marry, and Acacius is described to be a decade older than the Reader in the original story. I had meant for this to be a nice, fluffy wedding. But then I got my period in the middle of writing this and this grew progressively hornier... so it's a wedding and the wedding night.

Warnings: PDA, loss of virginity, oral sex (both receiving), eating ass (f!receiving), cum eating, unprotected p in v sex, discussions of having children, food play.

“You must cry.” The Vestal begged.

“Why must I cry? I happen to be very happy today, the tears are not forthcoming.” His anaticula sounded almost petulant, this was not the first time they were having this discussion. Acacius gently stroked his thumb over the side of her finger; their right hands were bound together by wool ribbons, fingers interlocked.

“The bride has to cry during the wedding procession, show some reluctance and modesty—”

“I am so joyous, I would skip to my husband’s home if I could.” Acacius snorted into his cup of wine, spilling some of the liquid over its edges. He made no effort to suppress his chuckle as he placed the wine down to wipe at his mouth. His lips were still curled into a grin, he found he hadn’t been able to restrain it since he awoke this morning. He cannot decide which sound is sweeter, his name on her lips or her address of him as husband.

“—it is Roman tradition.” Her friend insisted.

“I don’t believe I would like to invoke the Roman tradition of kidnapping women for marriage.” Oh, but Acacius had wanted to invoke it several times a day leading up to their wedding. They had been reduced to chaste kisses and clasped hands, always chaperoned by a hawk-eyed matron who would squint at the most gentle caress he dared to share with his betrothed. Now his wife. Her father and brother had insisted it was for his own safety, so their anaticula didn’t attack him again as she had in her office— forcing an honourable man to wed her, they had teased.

Acacius felt they were having far too much fun at his expense. Because all this honourable man wanted to do was haul her over his shoulders and carry her off to the nearest cave. He wanted to hide her somewhere, not even share her shadow with the world; keep her trapped underneath him until all she could see was him. Alas, he had to settle for buying a domus near her father’s home. He has ensured nobody would interrupt them for the next few days so he could take her over every surface, wall and square foot of the floor before letting her up. Let their pleasure and love strengthen the pillars of their home.

He had spent over a decade with only his hand for company, but now the few meagre weeks of abstinence riddled his brain with insistent need. His skin buzzed with excitement, a current working its way up his limbs, as it would before a battle, at the very thought of having his Priestess to himself tonight. He had thought up so many ways to unleash that tigress he had encountered in her office.

“You know it is not just about that… The lares will be upset. Your household deities have guarded you for so long, they will be upset to see you spurn their protection for the gods of your husband’s home. You must cry to let them know you do not leave them willingly.” Acacius paused at the words, he had no lares; there were no spirits of ancestors or deceased family to call upon.

He had been orphaned young, his whole family was lost to illness and he hardly remembered them. He had long lost faith in the deities and gods. But perhaps marriage was making him sentimental, even if ineffective and symbolic, he did not want his Priestess to go without protection. The shrine in his new home was fashioned with a single wooden statue of Vesta he had carved, it bore a distinct likeness to his Priestess, along with rose-scented incense— reminiscent of her scent. However, he couldn’t invoke her own spirit to protect her now could he— that was for his protection.

Acacius had given up his previous tools of protection. All his equipment had been military commissioned; as a General, he did not believe in using a weapon that his soldiers could not afford; sometimes well-made weaponry was the difference between life and death, and his life was not more valuable than any of theirs. His gladius was the only weapon he had owned— the very one he had used to defend himself in the Colosseum.

Acacius had melted the sword to make two identical daggers— one of which he had gifted to his Priestess as a betrothal gift, the other he had kept for himself. An engagement ring had also been made from the same metal, which she now wore on the third finger of her left hand where it would connect to her heart. It had felt right to slide that ring onto her finger; it was only fitting that the woman who had rescued and protected him had a piece of the blade that had guarded him. He had vowed to never fight another war. After all the victories and bloodshed across the world, he had returned home to submit at her merciful feet. And there had never been a defeat sweeter than losing himself in her, especially not when he had won her too.

There had been enough metal left over to form a thin betrothal medallion, engraved with their visages sharing a kiss along with two clasped hands on its back. He knew his Priestess wore the medallion around her neck, a gold chain could be seen disappearing into her tunic, the disk surely nestled between her bosom. Acacius wondered if he should convince her to place the token in their shrine. After all, their love had protected and sustained them both through difficult times. He knew it would guide and watch over any children or descendants they might have.

“Did you want me to cry, Acacius?” She asks him as she draws closer, resting their bound hands on his thigh, easing the stretch of the muscles of his arms and shoulders. He really should unbind their hands, they were sitting beside each other, so he had to stretch his arm across his torso to grasp her hand. But judging by how tightly she held him, she did not want to let go either.

He shook his head no, he did not believe he could stomach seeing her reluctance to marry him even if it was feigned. He had even offered for them to stay with her family if she was unwilling to part with them since she had lived apart from them for the last three decades.

“Are you sure? I could shed some false ones… maybe get closer to the smoke so it would make my eyes water”—Acacius kissed the irresistible little moue off her lips—“If I don’t cry then everyone will say you have married a disobedient wife who will tyrannically dominate your home.” She continued her exaggerated words anyway. She didn’t know that he planned to acquiesce to all her commands and requests, he could swim across oceans blazing with fire just to see her smile— he had done worse for much less.

Acacius watched the sway of her earrings, the metal catching the light from the setting sun behind her. He hadn’t been able to look away from her since he had lifted her flammeum for their wedding ceremony. The flame-coloured veil glittered around her, casting a warm golden glow upon her skin. His priestess was not one for dull colours, but she looked radiant in her white tunic and stola.

He pressed a soft kiss to her cheek, then trailed gentle pecks all the way to her ear where he nibbled on the soft, petal-like skin of her ear lobe before he widened his jaw, tongue reaching out to capture her earring into his mouth. Acacius savoured the coolness of it in the warmth of his mouth as he gently suckled on the jewellery, relishing the shiver that went down her spine. He nuzzled the loose coil of hair behind her ear, knowing she enjoyed the scrape of his beard on her skin— he heard the hitch in her breath. He released the earring in his mouth, letting its wetness streak across her neck.

“You can cry for me… later when it is just the two of us.” He whispered to her. But his words did not have the intended effect on her. He watched her eyes waver before skittishly looking over his shoulder, her own shoulders tensed and curled away from him. Acacius retreated and saw the nervousness painting her face, her lips pursed and brows slightly furrowed.

He playfully nudged her nose with his, “What is it, anaticula?”

He heard the harsh gulp of her throat, her eyes frantically looking around for the right words. When she looked at him again, her gaze was hesitant and embarrassed. His Priestess cupped his jaw with her free hand, her fingers pinched his earlobe in retaliation before her thumb softly stroked under his eyes. Acacius melted into her loving touch, his eyes drooping shut.

“You woke so early today…” She smelled of her gardens— flowers, herbs and fresh earth.

He had awakened well before dawn, but he felt rested and replenished. Usually, the bride and her mother would collect flowers from their garden to weave a wreath on the day of the wedding. But his anaticula’s mother had already passed away. He knew the other matrons of her family would gladly help her, but Acacius had wanted to weave her wedding crown himself. He had decided so when he saw her wear a wreath the day she was to be unjustly punished for unchastity.

He had sneaked into her room, woken her up with cakes collected from the kitchen before stealing her away to the gardens so they could make her wreath. He had chosen marjoram for honour, love and joy; rosemary for fidelity and loyalty; lavender for devotion; sage for long life; verbena, basil and mint along with roses, lilies and violets. The crown had ended up a bit too heavy but she wore it with grace.

“And you also went hunting with my father and brother.” An animal had to be sacrificed for the wedding. Acacius had decided to hunt a wild boar himself. The entrails of the animal were read by the auspex for omens and the approval of the Gods. It would not have mattered what the auspices prophesied, he would have hunted every animal in the city until the omens were read in his favour. But the first boar had been enough, the omens had signified a joyous and lasting marriage. After the offerings had been made to the gods, the animal was cooked for their wedding feast.

“Then you cooked in the kitchens as well.” He hadn’t cooked, he had made the bread needed for their wedding ceremony. It was not supposed to be made by the groom. But in the absence of his Priestess, during the months he had believed her to be dead, Acacius had perfected making bread in the kitchens she used to feed the poor. He had wanted that bread to be offered to the gods, he had wanted that bread to be fed to his bride. It was another token of his devotion.

“The ceremonies were so long.” She was right, Acacius thought the Pontifex Maximus would never stop talking and praying and chanting. He suspected the man dragged out the wedding ceremony solely out of spite that his Priestess had lied about her death. But he had not heard a single word of the chief high priest, his Priestess had stood before him and he was lost in her adoring, twinkling eyes.

He had always believed her eyes to be wondrous, always bright with mirth and mischief, they found joy in the smallest pleasures of life. A single gaze from her could fall on him like a soothing salve as well as disturb his constitution— make him restless with need and desire. His heart always trembled when she looked up at him through those full lashes. But today her eyes had looked so captivating with the kohl lining them that Acacius had almost stumbled in an effort to get to her. He had blindly signed their marriage contract, unwilling to take his eyes off her for too long.

The only time he had lost sight of her today was when he had cried during her consent of their marriage, his own tears blurring his vision. Theirs was a union of equals, he would never make demands on her wealth and personhood, and she was free to keep the name her parents had graced her; all Acacius had wanted was a chance to spend his remaining life by her side, and the privilege of belonging to her. So he had been dumbfounded and overwhelmed when she had forgone the blessed and auspicious name Gaius to lovingly and proudly take his name during her vows.

Ubi tu Acacius, ego Acacia. Where you are Acacius, there I am Acacia.

He had not deserved the honour, the name meant very little. It was not what his parents had called him; neither was it a name that held any high esteem in terms of legacy and social standing, nor was it the name bestowed upon him by the people. Acacius was always preceded by General and it was a name tainted with the blood of the innocent. But she had taken that piece of himself he was most ashamed of for herself. And in doing so, she had breathed a new life into it— she was what gave his name honour and worth.

And he was proud to be her Acacius. Ubi tu Acacia, ego Acacius. Where you are Acacia, there I am Acacius.

He had broken the bread he had made over her head, careful not to drop crumbs in her hair, before handing over half as an offering to the Gods. Acacius had fed her that bread, her teeth gently grazing his fingertips, affectionately nipping at them, before she had taken the same piece to feed him. And the bread was sweeter where she had bitten into it. But far sweeter was her mouth when he had sealed their marriage with a kiss.

There was a rightness, a sense of tranquillity, that had settled about him at the conclusion of the ceremony as their hands were being tied. For the first time, Acacius had been content and at peace. His mind was serene, devoid of the usual demons that haunted him; his heart could taste the rising joy within him, and he could pluck the excitement from the air.

“So you must be very tired tonight…” Her words had tapered into mumbling, which was so unlike the woman he knew. Acacius figured she was hoping to avoid their wedding night which was a surprise since she was so receptive to his advances.

“One of the women gifted me this… salve. Some ointment they got from a trader.” He knew he wouldn’t need to pry for answers, she would work her way to telling him her concerns eventually.

“And all the other matrons have been looking at me with these faintly pitying looks. At first, I just thought it was because I did not have a mother… but they sat me down last night for the most interesting conversation.” Her hand left his face to pick a grape before offering it at his lips. Acacius obediently accepted the fruit in his mouth.

“They said my wifely duties would be very difficult.” She looked at him, as if awaiting a reaction.

“Why? I plan to be the most amenable of husbands, dulcissima.” He dropped an affectionate kiss on her palm.

“Because of your size, Acacius. They said you would be very big, like a bull”— Acacius choked on the second grape she had shoved into his mouth, a strange sound between a strangled laugh and a cough escaped his mouth—“And it would hurt me very much but I should just lay back and endure. I do not want to endure…”

Acacius took a moment to appreciate her aggrieved face, “Anaticula, did you not enjoy our play in your office—”

“Yes, about that. It is most uncommon I am told. But that bodes well for our marriage—” he huffed a laugh at the sagely nod she gave, he would have loved to hear her explain to an elderly matron how he had kissed her between her legs. Was that why he had been receiving odd and appreciative glances all day? He felt a flush climb up his neck, how many women had she told?

“I did enjoy it… but do men do it to compensate for the pain after they have taken their pleasure?” He blinked at her, it wasn’t an unreasonable conclusion based on what she knew.

“I assume… it should not be too difficult, right?” She said, almost as if convincing herself, “I’m told it is quite nice sometimes…”

“I swear to not do anything that doesn’t please you tonight, dulcissima.”

“Everything you do pleases me.” She gifted him a soft smile.

“Even when you believe it will hurt you?” He couldn’t help but tease her.

“I know you won’t mean to.” And she sounded so certain that he felt a tender spot in his heart give away. He could still taste her essence on his lips. If all she allowed him tonight was to drink from her nectar, he would happily pass away on his knees with his head still buried between her thighs.

“Carissima, I will enjoy our nights together, and I expect you will find your pleasure as well. I will ensure it, because it brings me more joy and gratification than you can imagine—”

“Can the newlyweds please be mindful that the guests are trying to eat their meals?”

His wife reared back with a soft gasp before turning to face her brother. Acacius was pleased to know he held the same effect on her as she had on him. Because he had been heedless of their wedding party all day. Their guests had been raucous, tittering and chatter filled the air; the wine flowed freely and the food was plentiful. Many people had come up to speak to them, but the conversations never extended beyond pleasantries and congratulations.

After all, he was no longer an important political force and the highest echelons of society still didn’t know of his Priestess’ influence amongst the people. It was baffling how disconnected the aristocrats could be from those they considered lowly. Moreover, their guests were too busy ingratiating themselves with their young Emperor who was in attendance with his mother.

His wife had pointed out no less than three women who had thrown themselves at Lucius, quietly snickering to him when they were rejected. According to her, a prospective paramour had tough competition in both Fortuna and Ravi— who shared a very interesting history. His anaticula loved gossip, it was the most endearing thing about her. And she had informed him with great relish how both Macrinus and Ravi had been lovers once who chose to lead very different lives after earning their freedom. Macrinus had been different then, but he had slowly rotted and corroded just as his owners had. Ravi would go out of his way to help those Macrinus owned, Lucius and Fortuna included— grieving for the man he used to be. She believed the Emperor would be sharing his lovers. Acacius didn’t care as long as none of them came to disturb him and his wife.

Acacius pulled his wife to stand, urging the wedding to its final ritual. He unbound their hands, so she could pray to the lares of her father’s home and bid them goodbye. He wordlessly assured their household gods that he would take care of her and keep her happy while leaving an offering of food and coins at their shrine. He watched as his wife’s eyes glazed over with tears, helplessly his hand found her arm offering her warmth and comfort.

“If the lares are unwilling to part with you, tell them they can find you in my home.” He whispered to her. The words pulled a teary huff of laughter from her.

“I miss my mother.” She quietly confessed. And Acacius felt his heart break for her. He gently wiped at the tears on her cheek, his nose stinging with his own tears as she leaned into his touch.

“She would have been the happiest at this match”—Her father told her, as he handed his wife a clay mask resembling her mother’s face—“take her with you to your new home. Let her guide and protect your family.” Acacius was grateful for another addition to their shrine.

He could think of no better protector than her mother. Acacius had been young and barely literate when he had arrived in Rome and the woman had shown him enough grace and favour to educate him along with her children. It was at her behest that her husband had trained him as a soldier. As a General, he had learned that diplomacy and negotiation prevented unnecessary bloodshed. While he was no politician, these were skills he had learned as a youth when he had watched the woman run her household and business. He remembered anaticula’s mother to be remarkable, shrewd and protective— qualities that he was grateful ran to her daughter as well.

She lit a torch from their hearth and passed it to the matron of honour before her father and brother tearfully embraced her to say their goodbyes. As he had no family of his own, this man— his mentor— had served the role of his father in all the wedding rituals while his wife’s brother had served as her guardian. There was an uncertainty in the air, even as the guests had begun the wedding chants and songs. As a groom, he was supposed to put on a show of forcefully ripping his bride from the arms of her family. But he knew his wife did not agree with this particular tradition so he waited for her lead.

She reached out for him and he pulled her closer by the hand, kissing her knuckles as she stood by his side. But instead of walking together, Acacius stooped to carry her, his arm coming under her hips to offer her a perch, another arm supporting her knees. He shouldered past the curtains and flower garlands on the archway of their door to walk out onto the street.

The entire city seemed to have shown up to see her married; in addition to the passers-by, those who used the charitable services she offered had shown to throw honeyed almonds and walnuts at the newlyweds— shouting their blessings and good wishes for her. Her arms found purchase on his shoulders as she looked over them to wave at someone in the crowd. His wife, overwhelmed and astounded at the love people had for her, buried her face in the crook of his neck, and his skin burned with the tears she shed there. Acacius soothingly rubbed her hip and placed a chaste kiss on her arm. He couldn’t help but feel so proud of the woman he loved.

She sniffled and collected herself as they neared the neighbourhood crossroads, “Acacius put me down, we have to worship the shrine at the crossroads.” He heaved her higher in his arms to readjust his hold on her and bring her closer to the shrine at the crossroads. She placed a ceremonial coin to the protective gods of the shrine along with some food a boy had carried for her.

Her friend Aquilia, another former vestal, served as the matron of honour and led their group to his home. While her marriage was not as long as was required for the role, her husband’s love for her had persevered through the three decades of her duties in the Temple. Acacius liked the man, he had vowed to take no other woman in his life and had kept his word. Although, he was still upset that all of the Vestals had suspected his anaticula was alive when he had believed her to be dead, but they had not thought to inform him.

“Surely you don’t intend to carry me all the way home.” She spoke into the curve of his shoulder. He most certainly will carry her to their home.

“I’m too heavy, you’ll tire yourself.” He didn’t grace that with a response. He had carried men heavier than her; in the heat of the battle he had lifted drawbridges and ship towers. She should know better than to question her husband’s strength, he hadn’t earned his physique without the heavy labour.

She gave a resigned sigh, he felt her warm breath down the back of his neck. She nuzzled behind his ear, and took a deep breath before her tongue lapped at the sensitive skin. Acacius shivered and his knees weakened, his grip instinctually tightened on her so she would not fall.

“Carissima, wait… we are on the street.” He hissed through his teeth while she quietly laughed. She could not have tasted anything other than the light sheen of sweat he had worked up in the warm evening. His anaticula picked a honeyed almond stuck in the folds of his toga and apologetically offered it to his mouth, Acacius did not forget to kiss her fingertips for the gift. She took another sweet treat for herself that had been trapped in a crevice between them.

Acacius finally set her down when they approached the new domus, allowing the Pontifex Maximus to utter some more prayers while his wife smeared the fat of the boar to honour Ceres, and the fat of a wolf to honour Rome on their doorposts. She tied the wool strings that had bound their hands to the handle of the door. He felt the first stirrings of impatience, to be so close to their home and not have her to himself was making his hands twitch.

The guests clamoured to warn her to not step on the threshold as she entered her new home— doing so would insult Vesta and bring bad omen. But Acacius simply lifted her again, with an arm under her waist and knees so that her feet were as far from the threshold as they could be and carried her into their home.

Only their family followed them inside and watched her light the hearth of her new home with the fire from her father’s home. Acacius extinguished the torch and threw the wood at the audience gathered at their door who rushed to catch it.

It seems his wife was becoming impatient as well because she had begun the prayer and offerings at their shrine without him. Acacius bent to unlace her sandals, removing the single coin she had stashed in her footwear and placing it at the feet of the wooden Vesta in the shrine.

“Does that statue… look a bit like me?” She murmured. She had yet to discover the depths of his devotion.

Acacius offered her a lamp and a bowl full of water, “I give you fire and water”—she touched both items—“You are the Domina of this household and master over everything that resides within its walls, including your husband, Carissima.”

He kissed his wife before turning to his guests, resolutely ushering them out of his home and unceremoniously closing the doors on their teasing and obscene jeers.

You stared at the nuptial bed. It was small— too small. It would barely fit just Acacius, and that too only in width, because one end of the bed lifted into a curve they would have to rest their back against so their feet didn’t hang off the other end. Or perhaps this wasn’t the nuptial bed because it was here, out in the open courtyard, rather than in your husband’s sleeping quarters. But the bed was finely made, with sturdy wood and soft cushions decorated with roses and crocus petals— a current tingled in your belly at the sight of the aphrodisiac flower. That won’t be needed.

Acacius returned in a huff after seeing off your guests, plopping down on the chaise— because really this can’t be called a bed. You looked down at him, resplendent under the glittering moonlight; it made the grey hairs in his curls glimmer silvery. The torches around the atrium cast playful gold shadows across his face. Instead of a white toga as was the custom, he had chosen to drape the red cloak you had made for him all those years ago, its gold embroidery gleamed against his tanned skin.

But it was his eyes, that made your heart flutter with the verses of love you didn’t have words to express. Acacius managed to make even the cold, luminous moon burn bright and hot in his eyes. Sometimes the way he looked at you still made your heart feel raw and vulnerable. You had waited thirty very long years for him to simply look at you— to recognise you. While you had loved him for as long as you could remember, never once had you hoped for his love too. Your younger self would be in disbelief had you told them one day he would be your husband.

“Are you hungry?” He asked while stretching out his hand for you.

You hurriedly shook your head, your insides were suffused with enough love and awe to sustain you for a lifetime. He pulled you to sit on his lap, his thigh felt strong and firm under your bottom.

Acacius stroked your back, his hand was large and warm as it reached up to cradle your neck; his fingers calloused and firm as they massaged away any tension. Your head lulled back over his hand, a soft sigh escaping your mouth. He leaned forward, another hand coming over your waist pulling you closer into the heat of his chest. You gasped as Acacius kissed along your exposed neck, his beard deliciously scraping against your sensitive skin as his lips lingered over your beating pulse before reaching your upturned chin. He playfully bit your chin.

You turned in his arms until both your legs framed his waist and you had straddled his lap. You pulled at the wool of his toga, removing it from his shoulders so it lay spread beneath him before your hand slid into his hair; the curls wrapping around your fingers as you claimed his lips with yours. The force of the kiss pushed him down until his head was leaning over the backrest of the chaise.

What you lacked in experience you made up for with need and desperation. There was a groan from his chest and his arms wrapped around your waist to haul you closer to him— something hard was prodding at your thigh. You reverently traced the shape of his lips, feather-soft kisses to the plump cushion of them, light licks over the swooping edges. But you craved more, more, more. You needed to feel his tongue against yours, you needed to be closer somehow.

Your hand wrapped around his throat, fingers barely reaching the sides of the thick muscles. His heartbeat thundered on your fingers and then onto your palms as you slid your hand up to cup his wide, square jaw. You dug your fingers into his jaw to pry his mouth open. Acacius parted his lips to allow you to explore his mouth, you stroked and delved deeper in the chase for his tongue. He closed his lips around your tongue and suckled. His tongue met yours now, teasing and confident before he released you, placing a gentle kiss to the tip of your tongue and then on your closed lips.

“How do you want me, dulcissima?” He purred against your lips.

You did not know what he asked of you, “Desperate.” You answered honestly.

Acacius laughed. A loud, free sound that made your heart race.

“For you? Always.” He promised as he guided your hips to sit directly on that hard, throbbing part of him. He did feel large.

“I will not do anything you do not wish me to, anaticula. Tell me, what do you want from me tonight?” His tone was breathy as if words were difficult for him.

“Everything.” You didn’t want to waste another second. It didn’t matter how much it would hurt, but you needed a part of Acacius within you, physically and in every other way you could possibly consume him.

“Are you sure?” He confirmed even as his hands had already unpinned your veil allowing it to fall behind you. But he waited, for permission, for something as small as a nod while he fingered the Hercules knot tied at your waist— a sign of your chastity.

“Yes.” Your voice barely about a whisper. Acacius pulls the wool at your waist, both hands fisting your girdle around the knot, and breaks it with apparent ease instead of untying it. He then pushed your stola down over your shoulders until it pooled at your waist. Anticipation curled in your belly as he slowly pulled at the tiny bows that ran down your shoulders and along the sleeve of your tunic. Each tug of string was a sensual display of possessiveness and desire— his eyes were raptured on the swathe of skin as more of you was exposed to him. The tunic too fell at your waist, pooling over his lap and yours; only a plain binding lay between him and your breasts. And instead of unwrapping you, slowly as all his other actions had been. Acacius swiftly and impatiently tugged the fabric down.

You both gasped at the movement, the cloth dragged across your sensitive nipples causing them to stiffen and bloom towards Acacius. The winds were blowing colder in the night than they were during the day. A shiver ran down your spine as you sat bare on his lap, he made no moves. Acacius just stared with intoxicating eyes; they roved over your body, studying your face, the slope of your neck, the expanse of your chest, the curve of your shoulder, the length of your arms and the swell of your belly until finally, they settled on the betrothal medallion that hung in the valley of your breasts.

Even as you held still for him, allowing him to look his fill, the experience of being displayed thus was new and uncomfortable— no man had seen you this way. But it was not unwelcome. He looked breathless and awed, his hand faintly trembling as he brushed your nipples with the back of his fingers. The touch was so light, lighter than a feather, but it incinerated you, it sent a fiery current down to your womb which contracted; there was an insistent throb between your legs.

But whatever sensation you felt seemed dwarfed by his reaction. Acacius shuddered. His eyes were wide and glassy. You placed a hand over his heart, its pace wild and erratic. Abruptly, he dug his fingers into your waist, lifting you off his lap and stood with you. Your clothes fell to your feet, and you fisted his tunic to guide it over his head. You regretted that he chose to wear the tunic that fell to his calf, the longer fabric took a few scant moments longer to be pulled over his head but the wait was torturous. His underwear swiftly followed yours on the floor.

Acacius was better than anything you could have ever imagined. Better than those marble statues of gods and heroes, better than art and most certainly better than those erotic drawings you bought on the streets. He looked unworldly, bathed in both the cool of the moon and the warmth of the hearth. He had been stripped to his basest form now both hardened warrior and wild beast with the eyes of a man in love. Your husband.

You laughed then, wide and happy, “You are divine, Acacius.”

He answered with a chuckle, light flickering over the dimple on his cheek, “You do not see yourself, carissima.”

He held nothing of himself back as he allowed you to touch him; he sighed as you caressed his scars as if you relieved him of the pain, his breath hitched as your fingernails raked over the hair on his chest, he gasped as you scraped over his nipples. The planes and hills of his body leaned into your palm as you explored all the ways he was different from you.

He did not stay still under your ministrations for too long and his lips fell on yours without reserve, his hands cupped your ass using it to pull you closer towards him. Your arms wrapped around his neck like a garland of love, a hand buried in his hair in a silent command for him to never stop kissing you, another hand exploring his broad shoulders, the stretch of his back and the bulk of his arms. You decided Acacius had to be naked until the sun rose tomorrow so you could study every freckle and spot on his body.

His kiss was raw, elemental— there were no gentle explorations and tentative touches. Acacius claimed and conquered, his lips on yours were hard and insistent while his hands on your body were rough and restless. He touched where no decent man would linger, using your delighted and shocked gasp to enter deeper into your mouth; you clung to his shoulders to keep up with his pace and only his hands held you upright.

A calloused thumb grazed your nipple before he pinched and pulled at the sensitive flesh. You bit into his lip, giving it a sharp nip in response and Acacius groaned into your mouth. He kneaded the flesh of your hips, but his fingers slipped as they moved to the inside of your thighs. You were dewy and wet for him, the hairs and skin surrounding your sex were covered in slick moisture.

He lazily explored your folds, his fingers parting and squeezing as they pleased until he bought his tips right against the bundle of nerves at the apex of your slit. You ground your hips against his curled fingers when he stilled his motions, desperate for the friction as your pleasure built, steadily climbing up your spine while he nipped under your jaw before receding to watch the sway of your hips to and fro, to and fro over his hand, smearing it with more of your sticky fluid.

“Please…” You begged him. And Acacius moved his fingers then, in dizzyingly tight circles on your nub, his calloused finers offering just the right roughness needed for your muscles to seize. Warm currents coursed through your veins as you trembled and shuddered through your release in his arms— your skin overheated against the cold air. The hair on his chest dragged against your erect nipples causing more of your limbs to twitch; he held you close through your pleasure, his fingers unrelenting until the little bud was oversensitive to touch.

You rested your weight against him, your legs feeling too soft under you and took his flat nipple in your mouth wanting to give him the same pleasure he gave you. You gazed up through your lashes as he brought the hand that had been between your legs close to his mouth and groaned as he licked a wide strip from the side of his wrist to the centre of his palm. Your tongue lapped over his nipple to mimic the movement before encircling the little peak, you toyed it between your teeth and Acacius greedily shoved three fingers into his mouth to taste you— a soft breathy moan escaped him.

He pulled you off his nipple, your lips making a soft pop sound as they left his flesh slightly red. His hand curled into your braids as he pulled you by the head, “Taste yourself on my tongue, anaticula. Sweeter than honey…”

Your tongues met again in a dance of their own before you suckled his tongue as he had yours, drinking him in. You weren’t particularly sweet, but something about your taste mixed with the spit of his mouth sent a heady thrill through your body which made your toes curl. His hands roamed your body again, finding the spots and places that were sensitive, he lingered there with light touches and tender caresses— surprising you entirely when he sharply pinched your waist. You pushed deeper into the strength and heat of his body as your waist rolled with his unruly touch. Acacius swallowed the surprised moan from your mouth.

He had always been so… staid, controlled and solemn that you had expected Acacius to be such in his intimate moments as well— respectful and gentlemanly. There had been a wild, unpredictable demon that had come out to play in your office all those weeks ago but you had attributed his actions then to the high tensions and unresolved conflicts. But he was here now, lurking in the dark gaze of his desire, the tremble of his lips and the urgent grasp of your body. He could barely contain himself.

And it made you realise just how much of him you had yet to learn. Like the rest of the world, you had seen the dignified General. You knew the reluctant conqueror and the grieving soldier. You had met the loyal friend, the protective family, the kind elder in him. But you were unacquainted with this man before you— unrefined and almost savage under the influence and vulnerability of his own wants and impulses.

It filled you with a childish, stupid sort of rage to know that others had seen him as such. He had lovers before you, while you were trapped in a temple. He was so familiar with the female body, while you had to flounder for answers. It made you all the more resolved to erase all those previous embraces and lovers from his mind. You clutched him closer still, his cock insistently pressing into your belly, the tip leaking and smearing a wet patch across your skin.

From this day forward, there will be no other for either of you. It had been an entirely new discovery to know you were a jealous, shrewish sort of wife who could not even bear that her husband thought about another lover even in passing. Should your husband ever tire of this marriage, he will have to squeeze the life out of you himself to be free of you. And this realisation was entirely unsurprising, that you would be content with such a death. You only had one life and one heart but if you had more, those too you would gift to Acacius.

You guided him to sit on the chaise again, and despite his forceful and desperate advances, he went obligingly— never once pulling his mouth away from yours, pulling you to sit on his lap. But you evaded his embrace and knelt between his feet the only way you knew how; like a devout priestess kneeling at the altar of her deity— like a lover submitting at the pulpit of her beloved.

Your eyes trained on his phallus, you had seen the male form before on statues, art and even in ceremonial rites to ward off evil; but you had never seen one quite as wide or large as his— your fingers barely touched as you wrapped your hand around him. He hissed as you gripped him and stroked to its base, pulling some of the skin and exposing the angry bulbous head that was leaking clear beads of liquid. You moved to taste him as he had tasted you, but his hands framed your face, halting it in its descent.

“What are you doing, anaticula? That is not for wives to do.” Of course, it wasn’t. It hadn’t been the old matrons who taught you how to suck a man’s cock. No husband from a respectable household would expect this from his wife. But you wanted this. And before shame could eat away at your courage you confessed to your husband.

“But… I want to.” Ever since you had felt his tongue between your legs, there was very little you had thought of. You couldn’t bear the idea of never sharing this intimacy with him.

“You can explore all you like later. I can’t— I won’t last if you toy with me now…” His thumb caressed the apple of your cheek, his torso hulking and leaning over your knelt form.

“But we have all the time in the world, Acacius.” You struggled against the hold he had on your face, and stretched your tongue out of the confines of your mouth when he wouldn’t allow you closer to him. You barely tasted that small drop on the weeping slit of his cock on the tip of your tongue with a short cat-like lick. Acacius shivered.

He spread his legs wider and gave you a chaste kiss on your lips before lowering your mouth to his cock. The tip of it nestled against the curved roof of your mouth, the flared head pressing against the wrinkled ridges behind your teeth and it already felt so full. It was ticklish if not altogether strange sensation and you took him deeper until he was touching the more sensitive and softer part in the back of your mouth, your hand coming up to stroke the rest of his length that was left outside.

You realised you could do this forever as your eyes closed shut. Your tongue was pressed to the vein that ran along the underside of his cock which thrummed with his heartbeat. It was like you were holding his beating pulse, his very heart, in your mouth. You felt his thigh quiver under your hand, and you chanced a curious glance up at your husband to behold the sight of him trembling, his teeth clenched and jaw twitching with the effort to remain perfectly still. And yes, you realised, you could do this forever— just hold him in your mouth until he lost his composure and grew desperate enough to fuck into your mouth.

Acacius frowned at you, he looked dark and forbidding, “I know that look in your eyes, put away whatever idea you just came up with, wife.” He spoke through gritted teeth and his chest racked with the effort to breathe.

You started moving your head, slowly at first as Acacius guided your hand to stroke over his length as he liked— tightening your grip and twisting your wrist. You hollowed your cheeks to envelop his cock tighter and suck him deeper inside your mouth, relaxing your throat to adjust to the fullness in your mouth. Perhaps, your husband was to be cursed with the most selfish sort of wife because you stopped looking for his reactions, his cock was in your mouth for your pleasure alone and whatever he might glean from it was secondary in your mind.

He smelled of musk, sweat, the floral powder used to scent his clothes and something so addictingly Acacius. You rubbed your thighs together, the arousal had pooled from between your thighs to coat your ankles and feet under your folded legs. You hated to feel him receding from your mouth, sucking him as your head moved up, swirling your tongue around him to taste him before coaxing him deeper into your mouth again. Experimentally, you brought a hand to the sac hanging heavily under his cock, testing its weight and the hairy texture of the skin, gingerly massaging it until it drew tight in your palm.

His cock jumped in your mouth as his hands entangled in your braids to pull you off him. But you suckled him with a petulant whine, refusing to be wrested off him. A warm, salty and slightly bitter taste filled your mouth while he wrenched your head off him, the rest of his spend falling in spurts across your face and neck. What a waste…

Acacius glowered down at you, mouth agape and panting, “You are going to be the death of me… One of these days you will kill me.” His eyes were focused on your tongue as you licked the side of your lips to taste more of him. And he watched as some of his cum glittered on your skin as it trickled down until it was halted in its path by the gold chain hanging from your neck. He lapped at your skin, collecting his cum from the chain and depositing it into your mouth with what could barely be considered a kiss, his tongue surged into your mouth until you had cleaned his thick release off it.

You felt a smug satisfaction as you noticed that he was still shaking, a bit unsteady on his feet as he stood and lifted you onto the chaise. You thought you could consummate your marriage now, but to your confusion he knelt before you— his cock looking much flatter, softer. You felt your lower lip wobble as Acacius guided you to lean back. Was it supposed to do that?

“What did you think was going to happen?” He chastised you.

“I had no reason to believe he would just go soft like that… can’t you make him go up again?” You whispered, a bit uncertain of the male anatomy. Would you not be able to consummate your marriage tonight?

Acacius leaned over to kiss your pouting lips, “It comes back faster when you’re younger.”

You adoringly caress his bearded cheek as he smiles down at you, an uncertain vulnerability curved about that smile. You struggled to think of what to say to him, he could be old and decrepit and you would still be glad to have him as your husband. You had still wanted him a few short hours ago when you had been expecting pain and shame on your marriage bed, and you wanted him more now that he had shown you pleasure and wonder instead. You loved him not because of his prowess in bed but because of the simple fact that he was Acacius— steadfast, loyal, protective, kind, and loving, oh so loving.

But complex sentences evaded your mind as his lips closed around your nipple, he lingered there with his teeth and tongue before moving just a bit below to bite under your areola. He insistently sucked the flesh of your bosom into his mouth until it came away with a small bruise. His lips traversed down your body in a sensual dance of kisses, nips and almost painful bites. He spread your legs and groaned at the sight of your arousal smearing large patches of your limbs.

“So wet for me, anaticula.” His voice was breathless.

“You’re perfect.” You settled for simpler words that were just as true. He was perfect. Acacius huffed a warm burst of laughter.

“I’m glad you think so, wife.” He chimed even as his gaze seemingly searched for the sincerity in your eyes.

“I love you.” You offered him another nugget of truth.

You watched as the colour rose from his chest to his neck, Acacius shyly smiled before obscenely licking at your arousal and suckling another bruise on the inside of your thigh. He was marking you.

You squirmed with anticipation, feeling his hot breath on your cunt as he spoke, “Don’t worry, he’ll be back just as we have prepared you some more.”

“Here, hold these for me.” He spread your thighs and pushed them towards you, your hands came under your knees to hold yourself open for him as he had commanded.

His mouth on your cunt was a reunion like no other. Acacius remembered every sensitive spot and fold of your sex. But the swooping in your womb had more to do with the sight of him rather than the pleasurable feeling of his tongue on your slit— his mouth attached to your cunt, eyes glazed over with a half-awake and half-asleep look in his eyes, lashes gracefully fluttering as he tasted you, a patch of his cheekbone shimmering under the lamp light where the slick from your thighs had smeared across his face.

Gone was the urgency with which he had devoured you previously in your office, he was instead languid and slow. But there was a fervour in his grip and his fingers painfully dug into the flesh of your hips. He toyed with one of the lips covering your opening, sucking it into his mouth and nipping it with his teeth before doing the same with the over. His tongue roved over your sex sometimes just the tip, lightly and ticklishly grazing over a sensitive spot, and other times he was insistent, tongue flat against your folds as he roughly lapped up your essence.

You grew desperate as he purposely avoided that crest right at the apex of your sex that would ensure you would see stars behind your eyes again. And you grind your hips against his face, hoping to catch the needy spot against his nose, or his lips or even his chin— the lightest of touch there could set you off, you were so close, the tension curled so tightly inside you. There was a resounding smack in the air, it didn’t occur to you that Acacius would hit you until there was a tingling on the side of your ass, the impact making you gush into his mouth.

“Of course, you would enjoy something like this,” He murmured. And he laughed. He had the audacity to laugh as his lips closed around the exposed little bud, the vibrations of his amusement travelling straight into your nerves. You came undone with a shout, your eyes unseeing while your veins felt alit with delicious flames coursing through them followed by warm currents that doused your body in a dreamy languor. You lost your grip under your knees, letting your legs fall apart in the most inelegant fashion but still spread so wide for your husband. Acacius moved away with a teasingly tutting at you, and you whimpered at the loss.

“Hold them for me again,” He said. And you obediently took your position, hands under your knees, lifting your trembling legs so you were entirely exposed for him.

Acacius took your clitoris in his mouth again, his tongue encircling the oversensitive bud. You felt his thumb gather some of your slick before going down to the ring of muscles far below your cunt. You gasped his name in surprise as his digit followed the same dizzying circles around the ridged fig-like skin surrounding that opening.

“Is this alright? Do you trust me?” You gave a hasty wordless nod for both questions.

Acacius pressed two fingers into your cunt and suddenly it was all a bit too much. His tongue flicked the bundle of nerves, the intrusion of his fingers felt foreign and the thumb circling your other hole was sending waves of pleasure to muscles you hadn’t realised could be used for such a purpose. He watched you restlessly whimper and whine with half-lidded eyes as you squirmed at his touch. He released the nub of flesh from his mouth, making soothing sounds as he comforted you.

“Relax for me, let it happen, my love, do not fight it.” He said as he curled his fingers inside you catching some dormant set of nerves which threw you into another release. You came with a gasp, still shaking and quivering as he pressed soft kisses to the inside of your thigh. You hadn’t yet descended from the heights of your pleasure, your muscles feeling fuzzy and boneless when he flipped you over. Your head rested sideways over the backrest of the chaise as Acacius guided your own hands to your ass.

“Spread yourself for me, wife.” His tone clipped and terse. You had thought yourself past surprise and shame but were still so unprepared for the feel of his tongue against your anus. His tongue burned hot against the ring of muscle as he held it in place while his fingers found their way inside your cunt again, three this time instead of the two before. And this time he lets you grind yourself on his face. You are mindless and hazy with pleasure, there is no real pace or rhythm to your hips.

His hand curved around your waist so he could curl his fingers into your clit, providing delicious friction as you swayed your hips. His fingers lazily dragged in and out of you, his beard scraped against your sensitive skin, and his tongue pressing hot and wet against the opening of your ass, burrowing inside despite your haphazard movements. Acacius gives you a deep hum of approval the more desperate and determined you grow in pursuit of another release.

It crept up on you, steadily climbed your spine, long and drawn out rendering you utterly silent as your body gripped and convulsed barely being able to hold itself up. For several moments you were lost to the world, Acacius circled and patted the erect bud of nerves until you stopped twitching while another had soothingly stroked and petted over your shivering skin. He turned to lay you on the chaise, pressing an affectionate kiss to your parted lips and covered you with his own body, whispering soft praise and encouraging words as his legs entangled with yours— you gasped at the feel of his weight, another throb coursing down your sated sex, you clenched around the tip of his cock as he bullied his way inside.

As he had promised, it did not hurt. But you felt full, and far too relaxed and pliant to be overwhelmed even with the slight burn of the stretch. Dazed, you noticed the wet patch on the backrest where his hand gripped— you had drooled. It was worse, your release had coated his cloak underneath you, it glistened against his face and it dripped down his chin, his neck, his chest.

“Dulcissima, you have to let me in, please— you’re strangling me. Breathe—” Acacius was tense, speaking through gritted teeth, his words breaking from his effort to breathe. And your body complied with his request, you could never deny him. And you felt complete once he had nestled inside you, filling not only your cunt but your heart and your soul. Your gaze was wondrous and awed as you held him inside you, you clenched around him trying to pull him impossibly closer still.

He gasped before kissing you again, trying to hold most of his weight off you. You stay that way, connected in more ways than just the physical, locked together in both love and ecstasy— your hands exploring his warm skin and the strong contours of his body. A surprising laugh bubbled up your throat when you realised Acacius had broken into goosebumps, his hair raised alert and small bumps ran along his arms.

His forehead pressed against yours and you nudged his nose with yours gazing into the eyes of your beloved seeing the love and adoration reflected there. He softly caressed your cheek and your temple, “I haven’t done this in years,” he confesses. Years?

“Good.”

He chuckles at your response, “Good? It means I won’t last long…”

“You don’t have to. It is done, is it not? The consummation.”

He pecks your nose, “We aren’t done until you come all over my cock, anaticula.”

And then he moves, in sufficiently long and deep strokes that have your eyes rolling back, grinding his hips so the hair above his cock rubs against the erect nub above your opening. Your nails dig into his back, the coil of pleasure winding tighter at your core.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered into the skin of your neck.

“It doesn’t hurt.” You told him as your hips rolled to meet his thrusts.

“I’ve done you a disservice—” Why was he talking? Did he expect you to hold a conversation? All you could manage was a broken keen when he rubbed the most perfect spot on the inside.

“You’ve been trapped in a temple for thirty years, you deserved to see the world, take a few lovers, but I have trapped you instead.”

“No—” He couldn’t possibly be saying these things while his arm wrapped under you to massage your anus.

“You can roam the world, freely conduct your business— take over Rome if you want to— I’ll follow you… anywhere. I’ll go.” He wiped the tears that slipped out of your eyes before continuing, “But this is what you will do at the end of every day, anaticula.”

“You will go about your dreams and ambitions and then you’ll come home every night into my arms, my bed, with my cock buried deep in your cunt. Do you understand?” He brutally snapped his hips into you while you responded with some sound between a sob and a laugh.

“Say it, say it to me. Tell me you’re mine.” He commanded, his eyes overcome with a zealous light. His fingers dipped into the tight ring of your ass. You could feel his cock all the way in your throat.

“We’ll have to train this hole of yours open if you do not want children, carissima. This is where I will fuck you next. But you’ll take me, like a perfectly biddable wife— into your heart, into your body. It is my home, and you will not cast me out—”

“I want them— I want children, everything you give me— please please please— Acacius.” You begged.

“I’m yours. Your wife, your lover, your whore— please, Acacius—” You weren’t sure what you were asking of him. But your husband, ever the provider, brushed his fingers against your clit and you shattered under him with a distorted scream. You convulsed and shook underneath him with no effect as his weight pressed down on you. And your husband followed soon after, shivering and groaning as he painted the inside of your cunt with his warm seed; your walls fluttered around him to milk every last drop of it.

“Daughters… wife. Give me daughters, ones who take after their mother in both looks and heart.” He prayed to you. Acacius stayed that way for several long moments, reverently kissing your warm and sweaty skin while you felt him softening inside you. You clenched around him in distress, hating the inevitable loss as he slipped out of you.

You had watched with great interest as he had stumbled away from you, admiring the sight of his ass, wishing you can sink your teeth into it. And with even more interest, you stared at his cock as he returned with a wet cloth to clean you both along with a tray of food he had prepared. The both of you had ravenously polished off the feast of olives, cheese, fruits, stuffed dates, spiced cookies, bread and sausages. Your husband had plied you with more wine before dipping his strawberries in your cunt to eat them; they tasted sweeter that way he had claimed and you hadn’t believed him until you had cleaned up honey from his cock which had tasted impossibly sweeter to you.

You lay on him, sleep still evading you because you knew you had to address his words when he had been inside you. Your back leaned against his chest, and Acacius had parted his legs to make room for your bottom between them. Another reason sleep was not possible, this chaise was too small for both of you— you told your husband as much.

“You should have seen the one they brought before, it was much smaller… So I built this one.” He chuckled.

“You built this bed yourself?” You whispered, appreciating the work and polish under new light. You thought he only worked on smaller projects.

He hummed in response, “And the bed in our chambers. Don’t worry, I made that one palatial.”

“So why aren’t we there?” You laughingly demanded.

“Because I wanted the heavens to witness our consummation, dulcissima.” And your heart fluttered again.

“I still quite like this one, despite how small it is… It’s our marriage bed and I’ll be fucking you on it as often as I can.” Despite, how sated and spent you felt, heat still curled in your belly at his promise.

“You know, Acacius”—you turned in his arms to face him, chin resting against the swell of his stomach, you gazed up at him with imploring eyes—“You have done me no disservice. I wanted to marry you.”

You couldn’t hold in the words any longer, “You can never imagine yourself as some chain around my feet… you make me brave. You bolster me, make me feel safe— like I will always have someone on my side.”

He sweetly caressed your spine, “I’ll never give you cause to be disappointed in our marriage, anaticula.”

“You couldn’t disappoint me if you tried, Acacius.” You struggled against the insecurities in his mind, before realising that only time will reassure him.

“I love you,” Acacius said, not as a confession or a desperate sigh, but in the same steady way he would voice a fact.

“I love you, too,” You whispered against his chest.

“Are you sore?” He gently asked.

You were, not just between your legs but also in your heart— you shook your head in denial. Just a little white lie because you knew that having him close, having him inside you could cure all ails.

Acacius watched the sun rise, as he would on most days of his marriage— casting his wife in an ethereal glow, the rays shining down on all the marks he had left on her body while she languorously rode his cock to their shared bliss.

#marcus acacius #pedro pascal #pedro pascal characters #gladiator 2 #marcus acacuis #marcus acacius x reader #marcus acacius x f!reader #marcus acacius x female reader #marcus acacius x you

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husbandhoshi · 1 day ago

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HELLLL YEAAA part 2 of responding to commentary about my own fic. literally vibrating w excitement w how annoying we are but i love it i love u <3

its funny bc this plot point was like THE FIRST plot point i had come up w for this fic. ITS MY FAVORITE LITTLE THING. i had to include it

UGH i didnt want to clip the whole thing for space reasons but YOU GET IT. this is also one of my fave scenes bc its just Framed so well in my mind. literally so glad that you also see the vision. and i debated so long ab the dialogue and the restraint and the subtext and Everything. ugh. you see me.

SIBLINGS CAN BE SO PERSONAL!!!!!!!!! once again feeling vindicated for the sibling arc. god bless sibling trauma. and to be validated by a Younger Sibling too... <3

OKAY wait now i was gnna clip the rest but it would just be redundant. RE your final thoughts on the fic i'm truly so floored. i knowww that i've been rolling it around ever since i posted but i think as time as gone on i've become more and more proud of it. like really i think it was so easy to lean on a central metaphor that i forgot how to write other stuff so this was not only a challenge but rlly rlly refreshing to write too. i am literally so thrilled that the characters and places (for being fictional vague places) seemed real and enjoyable and Whole!! and moreso i'm glad that the central characters were believable.... that they weren't just caricatures of the trope. AWOOO this is actually so personal to ME too ... the idea of choosing things for Yourself. that ur environment doesn't make or break u. idk

but most of all i want to thank YOU for being here from day 1. like even when this was a baby idea & originally pwp like all of my fics are. you have read and re-read and come up w new things altogether and this wouldn't have been half as good if u weren't along for the ride. literally u have the insight possessed by a far better writer and u see The Point even before the point is formed. but you know all of this. MWAH love u deeply unconditionally and always . million thanks always

title: royally screwed [m]

pairing: joshua x f!reader

wc: 30.8k in total; part 1: 15.4k, part 2: 15.4k summary: between remembering last night’s party and pleasing your unrelenting family, you think being a princess is hard enough. then you’re thrust into an arranged marriage to royal darling joshua hong—straight-laced, infuriatingly obedient, and everything you’re not. pretending to be the perfect couple? impossible. notes: romcom + smut (part 2), modern royalty!au in which yn is the princess of cotria/joshua the prince of acros (both fictional), enemies to lovers, arranged marriage, quarterlife crisis/coming of age, very very slow burn. lots of swearing, lots of alcohol, lots of feelings. [read part 1 here!] (please)

You decide June looks good on Acros. Unlike in Cotria, now sure to be perspiring with tourists, the downtown here is comfortable, inviting, even. At home, you’d be shoulder-to-shoulder with three other people right now.

This is one of the things you like about this country: it seems to be intentionally idyllic. It’s becoming more clear to you that Joshua’s parents weren’t actually in need of anything from you other than a status boost. You suppose they’re learning the hard way what exactly that comes with.

Jeonghan’s car, or rather, the car Jeonghan happens to be in (he couldn’t drive his way out of a paper bag, try as he might), pulls up to the curb. He’s fresh off a stint of good press, meaning months of speeches, ribbon cutting, and run-ins with parliament and journalists and business moguls all vying for a bite of a future king. You’d add yourself to that list, but you know you’re at the back of the line—you practically live there now, but you’re not sure if things could have happened any other way.

You watch him step out of the van, never windblown even though he likely just got off a flight. Always with a smile, too, one tired but recognizable, so different from the plasticky ones he wears on TV.

The first thing he does when he gets out is throw his arms open for a bear hug. “Hey, cricket,” he says, voice wrought with jet-lag. “Missed you.”

“Glad you had time for one more stop,” you murmur, squeezed into the million-thread count of his shirt.

“I always have time for you,” he replies, which is decidedly untrue, but you don’t have it in you to say that. All you do lately is get into arguments, and you’re not looking to add your brother to your hit list.

(He hugs Jihoon, too, since you all practically grew up together. Is that your gun, or are you just happy to see me? Jeonghan jokes. Jihoon’s reply: It’s my gun. It’s always my gun.)

The second thing he does is push the brim of your baseball cap down.

“The paps,” he warns, as if they were the boogeyman.

“If they can’t recognize us, they need to get better at their job.” Jeonghan rolls his eyes. “For God’s sake, Jeonghan, we’re all wearing matching hats.”

No, you are not kidding. Jeonghan, blue, you, red, and Jihoon, green, a la The Powerpuff Girls, which was a joke you made about six years ago and could not let go of.

“Whatever,” he laughs. “Aren’t you supposed to be showing me around? This is your domain now.”

“Don’t get excited. I just got here.”

“What do you need to go shopping for, anyway?” he asks, now walking side-by-side with you.

“I ask that question every day,” Jihoon replies, glancing at Jeonghan as if to say Women, right?, save for the fact that the both of them have exactly zero game.

“Somi’s birthday!” you exclaim, two ticks too loudly. “Stuff, I dunno. Just trying to get used to this place.”

“This isn’t exactly Rodeo Drive, you know.”

That, Jeonghan is right about. You’re sure there must be a shopping district somewhere in Acros, but definitely not here. Here, the streets are lined with dense cherry plum trees, wine-stained and fragrant. They frame driftwood-paneled shop windows housing kitschy art galleries, mom-and-pop bakeries, and patioed bistros with striped awnings.

An elderly couple passes you. They smile and wave, visible even under the shade of their parasol, either blissfully unaware of your status or too wise to care.

“I know,” you waver. “Whatever. I'll just get Yunjin to find me something for the party.”

Your eye wanders to the jaunty facade of a music store. The sign flaunts handmade, cursive letters with a curly treble clef in the lacquer of old paint. In Cotria, the same sign would be neon, Hollywood-esque, vain.

“Party?”

“Let's go there,” you interrupt, hoping to run your big mouth over with some more talking. Of course Jeonghan wouldn’t be cool with any party, nonetheless the one Somi was planning on throwing, but, either by habit or wishful thinking, the news just tumbled right out of you.

“Party?” Jeonghan repeats. He trails close after you, hoping to grab the door before you can. Such is what he had been taught, after all, which came more naturally than navigating big-brotherhood. “Jihoon?”

Jihoon shrugs, and opens the door before the both of you get there. You’ve trained him well.

“It’s a small thing,” you tell him. “Close friends only.” It’s not technically a lie—small is relative, and it’s not your fault Somi has two hundred-some close friends.

Inside, you notice the shop is bigger than it looks from the outside. In the front, their nicest pianos: the glossy Yamahas, the baby grands. a lone drum set, on sale, the hi-hat sparkling under the LED lights. And finally, guitars hung from the wall like posters, some lime green and child-sized, others sanded down so the mahogany glows.

“You already know what I’m going to say,” Jeonghan says, the lilt of his voice verging on not-so-casual.

“Then don’t say it,” you reply flatly. “You went to those parties too, by the way.”

“Used to, but—” Jeonghan sighs because he’s beat, and he knows it.

You absentmindedly flip through a book of sheet music—Alfred's Essentials of Music Theory. behind it, 40 Taylor Swift Songs for Piano.

“You’ve been good, I hope?” you cut in. “Not too tired?”

“No,” Jeonghan says. “I've been great. You?”

You can’t read his expression. Old Jeonghan would tell you that he’s ready for a nap, that he hates sleeping on airplanes, that his hands still get sweaty when he gets in front of a crowd and the camera flash hurts his eyes. New Jeonghan never complains, either because of some drastic change in his character or because he feels like he can no longer complain to you. Both hurt your feelings in equal measures.

“I called, you know.”

“I was busy, cricket.” He holds up a copy of Complete Advanced Piano Solos and wrinkles his nose. He's hoping you’d laugh with him about it, but you’ve already moved on, now fixated on the shining columns of electric guitars. “I wanted to ask about, you know, all the new stuff going on.”

“You mean my arranged marriage?” The words feel stiff in your mouth.

The arranged marriage I'm doing for you? I split my heart open for you, and that’s the thanks I get?

You avoid Jihoon’s tentative glare to look at your noodled reflection in the polish of a red Fender. You think of Joshua, of a corny rendition of Here Comes The Sun and a pick between his teeth, cradling a guitar held by a linty, ten dollar strap.

Then you think of what he said on that piano bench—that somehow he could have prevented this. Actually, this might have been all your fault. One too many shots, and you ended up setting feminism back five centuries.

“Y-yeah.” You watch Jeonghan’s silhouette appear behind yours. “Has it been okay, at least?”

Okay is a complicated word to use. It’s hard to say, even for you.

It would certainly be TMI to tell Jeonghan that you’ve been kissing a lot more often. First it was under the flimsy guise of practice—We have to be ready for our dinner tomorrow, Joshua had said, to which you readily agreed. You couldn’t be the unwilling victim of another headline like KISS OR MISS! It would be terrible for your ego, even more so than your public image.

Yesterday, though, as you were winding down for bed, Joshua had come out of the shower, damp white tee and all. A sorry, unspeakable part of you willed you to posit—Hey, maybe we need a refresher? You couldn’t even get halfway through your sentence. Hell, his glasses even came off.

You really only liked each other past 9 PM—you still couldn’t quite manage to get through a conversation like normal people. At this point, you had a 50/50 split in terms of who would cast the first terrible stone of petty disagreement. The only thing we have going for us is a dubious physical attraction, seemed like way more of a mouthful than okay, though.

“Yeah, it’s been okay.” You look around. There's a decent amount of mediocre acoustic guitars on the back wall, more than enough to scratch the itch of someone too afraid to defile something more honorable. “Hey, don’t wait up for me. I think i might buy something.”

—

[august 10, 2:57 pm; a dress fitting.

In the ten-foot mirror of the boutique dressing room, you watch Yunjin yank the ties of your corset into a punishing knot. Your mother watches behind you, perched on the chaise.

“Regal and radiant,” she reads aloud, the shiny cover of a magazine between her hands. “Finally, some good news.”

“About you and Joshua?” Yunjin asks.

“Ye–ow!” you wince. “Yeah. We went out to dinner yesterday.”

The dinner: an exhausting, stuffy affair at an Italian restaurant with two Michelin stars. You came in a nice dress, Joshua in slacks and his best button-up. Smile, wave, a kiss on the cheek. You fed him a spoonful of dessert, a stiff, too-sweet panna cotta. It was either raspberry or strawberry—you were too distracted to really notice. Instead, you’d been practicing the steps, the motions of a true love.

Should we hold hands over the table? Joshua had asked.

I don't think we have to. Your hand had curled over the napkin on your lap, as if the thought of his touch physically stung.

“This is a nice color,” your mother interrupts. She pinches the fabric of the skirt up at your waist, watching the way it bunches over your hips. “It's suitable.”

Suitable. Right. The dress for your engagement ball, suitable. Just like you, newly suited for the engagement.

You watch your image in the mirror. It’s taller, more regal, likely the product of Yunjin squeezing all the air out of you, Or worse, the penetrating gaze of your mother over the top of the tabloid.

You blink hard; you waver. ]

[august 20, 10:13 pm; a quiet return to acros after a day at the beach with somi and soonyoung.

The castle sleeps, warm under the soft glow of candlelight on marble. You pad through the halls, carefully, as to avoid waking the entire country with the thwacks of your still-wet sandals. Hopefully Joshua is sleeping. He'd certainly ask questions, either about if bikini tops really need all that padding or what the SPF of your sunscreen was.

You approach your room, where the lamplight from the cracked door oozes into the hallway. There's a determined rustling noise coming from the interior. Incriminating. Holding your breath, you cast a long glance into the thin slice of bedroom you can see from where you’re standing.

There sits Joshua, cross-legged on the bed. Between his legs, the guitar you bought him. It must have finally shipped. He’s tied the gift ribbon it came with to the guitar strap, a woven linen with an offensively bright jacquard pattern.

A hesitant A major chord, then G major, offkey. Hm, he hums aloud. Then you notice his phone propped on a pillow, a Youtube tutorial rumbling in the background. He tries the G major again. Better, he says, pumping a fist into the tired air.

God, what a dork, you think. But you don’t walk away.]

–

From the garden, the Acrosian moon renders the city blue, like ink from a spilled well.

It’s quiet out here, you notice. The forest spills into the sky, and the scent of roses lies heavy on your skin. You’re seated on the bench beneath the sculpted gazebo, a worthy centerpiece, and you revel in the coolness of the granite, the bated still of the air. You like this garden better than the one at home, although it’s entirely possible that you’ve been conditioned into hating all topiaries, no thanks to your parents.

It's only when you hear the quiet click of footsteps behind you that you realize you’ve lost track of how long you’ve been outside. You’re now able to tell them apart–these, Joshua’s, steady and purposeful, sound like they have a heartbeat.

You don’t turn around to greet him. “So you finally had enough, huh?” you ask instead, sliding to the left so he can sit beside you.

“How'd you know?” he chuckles.

“I'd like to think I know at least a little about you.”

“I appreciate it,” is his reply, surprisingly warm.

Just a few hours earlier, your parents had come to visit. They cooed and giggled and connived alongside Joshua’s parents before launching into a very long, very serious discussion about your engagement ball. You’ve learned not to sweat the small stuff, the small stuff being the color of the napkins, the members of the string quartet, the hors d'oeuvres. But then it got weird: the symbolism of the color of your nail polish, which journalists were allowed to watch you make out, when and how Jeonghan was supposed to announce his presence during all of this.

Then things got critical, which really sucked. No one was safe this time, not even Joshua. You lasted about an hour, Joshua about forty-five minutes more. You wonder what his breaking point was. Maybe it was his mother finally telling him off for having more than three buttons undone whenever he wore a dress shirt.

In the silence, you feel an inexplicable peace. Maybe this is the only time you can get along; underneath the same moon, the same stars, the divide doesn’t feel quite as wide. You let your mind clear, first, past the fog of Somi’s birthday bash, glittery and blinding in your mind’s eye, past Jeonghan’s tired shoulders in the music store, past all the magazine covers and photo ops. The heavy reality feels heavier in your stomach, but you’re no longer as scared, although resignation looks like acceptance when you whittle it close enough to the bone.

“Have you ever been in love before?”

Joshua’s voice is so low, it takes you by surprise. You look to your side and see his eyes, shaded by the long curl of his lashes, trained on the sky, his expression unreadable. There’s a piercing sincerity to it, one you haven’t seen before.

“No,” you reply, the answer coming to you faster than any regret ever could. “How could i?”

“So all the boyfriends before, just…?” he trails off. He's referencing the magazines, all the covers with full size photos of you and the model of the month holding hands by the riviera, sharing a martini, kissing outside a nightclub. There are too many to remember, but you’re surprised he’s aware of any at all.

“It was just stupid fun. I dunno. We hung out, had sex, whatever. It was never serious. I didn't tell them about anything at all; I was okay with them not really knowing me, at least, not as anything other than a party girl, the runaway princess, etcetera. We didn’t owe each other anything.”

“Sounds lonely.”

“Sometimes,” you answer. “But it was fun. I don't regret it. I just never saw room for them in all of this.”

Joshua hums, low and deep.

“And you?” you ask, incredulous. “In love?”

“In university,” he says after a brief pause. “There was a girl. I think I loved her more than I had ever loved anything else before.”

“What? Who?” you interrupt. “Do I know her?”

“No.” Then, a quiet chuckle. “No one did. She was a civilian, a normal girl. She wanted to be a biologist, I think. it was either that, or a nurse. We snuck around a lot. Probably more than you did.”

“Can I ask what happened?”

“I told her I'd marry her. I thought if I wanted it enough, it would happen. I'd go to my parents, profess my love, and all our rules would fall away somehow. Just like that.”

Suddenly, it feels like there is a gaping wound in your chest. Every new word seems to draw the bloody edges of your skin further apart.

“Well, they didn’t,” Joshua continues. “I broke her heart. and I learned that all of this would never go away. Not for love, not for anything.”

There is an impossible hollowness inside you. You imagine Joshua, twenty-one and bright-eyed at Cambridge, hiding beneath the arch of the cobblestone bridge, the long one behind the quad, to carve hearts into the limestone. There's a girl wrapped in his jacket, her laughter like bells. She draws him close, runs a delicate hand through his hair, a shorter cut, more sporty than it is now. The night is still just as kind, forgiving, as it is now, and the moon still round like a young pearl.

“And that’s why you’re…you know.” You pause. The words all feel stuck to the roof of your mouth. “You like the rules.”

“Because it would mean that it didn’t end in vain. That it wasn’t really my fault.”

“You don’t want to mess up again. I get it.”

“Yeah.”

You notice your arms are touching, that they have been touching. Somehow, you don’t want to move away.

“Why are you telling me this?” you ask.

“Not sure.” Joshua sighs, having fully abandoned the filter he normally speaks to you through. “I don't think we’re so different. I don't know. It feels good to tell someone.”

“Do you still love her?”

“No. I don't think I can.”

“I'm sorry,” you swallow, feeling the familiar lump in your throat.

“Don’t be. It wasn’t your fault.”

It’s getting cold, the twilight breeze now coming in from the sea. A silence, now sticky, caustic, settles between the two of you. The thought of Joshua, hopelessly in love, a line you hadn’t even dared to cross, seems to wind itself deep into your neurons.

“No really,” you insist. “I'm sorry. I gave you a hard time—no, I've been giving you a hard time. I didn't know.”

“You don’t have to do that.”

“What?”

“Be nice to me. No one’s watching.”

“I know,” you say, a foolish conviction rising in your stomach. You almost feel silly, juvenile, for never really baring your heart like how he had. You’re not sure which was worse.

You turn to look at him, really look at him. He's framed by the haze of the violets, the gentle curtain of the willows.

“Says the real you?” Joshua asks.

“Yup,” you laugh. “Usually is. You probably get the worst of it, to be honest.”

“She’s not so bad.” He returns your gaze; it’s honest, unsearching. “According to the real me, by the way.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

There are no words left. In fact, nothing quite says more than the way you now sit together, hands close enough to touch, without quarrel, complaint, or a yearning to prove yourself to some invisible standard. Instead, you enjoy the quiet calm, the way it drapes itself across the garden, the city, the quick of your heart. Now that you think about it, it’s the first time you’ve been able to do this without feeling like you were putting on a show.

This time, you think it’s real when you lean against his shoulder, and he leans back, chasing your warmth.

And it certainly seems to stay real when your hands find each other. You realize he does it the same way every time—the gentle skim of his fingertips down your hand before your palms meet, gently, forthright.

And it’s here, in the uncertain glow of the summer moon, where you think you’re the closest to ever knowing just what Joshua had been talking about earlier.

His hand curls around your cheek, holding you, wanting to see you clearer still, and he kisses you. It's not the practiced motion of an ill-conceived love, nor a hungry, blind stumble in your unlit bedroom. No, this time, it's as if you are being drawn back, wonderfully, slowly. Joshua kisses you as if it's the first time, as if to undo all the other times.

And somehow, almost by magic, the fountain song and the phantom photographers, the parents and the press, the world and everything in it, finally draw quiet.

–

“So,” Jihoon says, reloading his pistol. “You ok? Don’t you hate the range?”

You push your earmuffs aside to hear him better. “What?”

“I said, don’t you hate the range?”

“Well,” you balk. Jihoon puts the gun down and leans against the booth, looking at you from behind the glare of his safety glasses. Behind him is the paper target of a man with five bullet holes through his head. “I think I've gotten used to it.”

This is all true—you did hate the range, but it’s where you can always count on finding Jihoon on a Sunday afternoon. Better people went to church, but Jihoon preferred to terrorize the poor center circle of a bullseye.

“Hm.” He picks up the pistol again, stares down its iron sights. “Somi need anything for her birthday?”

“She needs a new man,” you reply, and Jihoon laughs.

Bang. Bang.

“But, no, I'm getting her that vintage Cartier watch she’s been wanting forever. They were auctioning it off in Paris.”

“Right, since it’s time for her to get a new boyfriend,” Jihoon deadpans, although he can’t quite get it out before he chuckles. “What about Soonyoung?”

“They cannot get together. You’re just being messy.”

“Sure, I'm the messy one. Didn’t they sleep together?”

“That was, like, two years ago. Drunk.”

Bang. Then a click–the clip’s empty. “By the way—you decided if you’re going to Cotria this weekend? Jeonghan will be back again, you know.”

You pause, watching Jihoon reload the magazine, shiny bullet by bullet. You definitely know Jeonghan’s coming home—minus all the time you spend on Find My Friends, you were always acutely aware of when he was in town. The real question is if you wanted to see him again. Usually, you’d count down the days, make plans at all your favorite restaurants, buy a bottle of cheap wine to split over a shitty Godzilla movie. That was when you still talked.

The last time you saw him was when he visited you in Acros. After the music store, you milled around a couple shops, walked through an art gallery. (Remember when you got lost at the Prado? he had asked. You were staring at that painting with all the butts.

Kinda, you had replied noncommittally. All Jeonghan did lately was start his sentences with remember, like he wanted you to forget who he was now.)

“I dunno,” is what you land on. “I'm busy.”

“Well, Jeonghan asked me.” Jihoon takes down his old target and sets up a fresh one, another formless, black silhouette.

“Asked you what?”

“If I could ask you to come.”

“Does Josh know?”

“He actually already helped with arrangements for you to go back,” Jihoon replies, palming the gun again. “He said only if you wanted to, though.”

The tightness in your chest seems to coil over itself once more. Joshua had asked you about Jeonghan over breakfast one morning, before handing you a coffee and a croissant to soften the blow. You had been talking a lot more lately, which, somehow, you didn’t mind. If he wasn’t making fun of you, he was actually a decent listener.

You watch Jihoon steady his arms.

Bang. Bang. Bang.

–

Like all of your great ideas, it began in the back of a car.

Surprising, maybe. Accidental? Never.

You’re getting ahead of yourself, though. It really started earlier tonight, at the charity event you attended with Joshua.

Lesser beings would blame the wine, a cheap chardonnay only fit for sorority girls on a Friday night. Naturally, you and Joshua were responsible for downing about half the bottle—a fun amount, you’d like to say, although you admit you were surprised at your date’s ability to hold his alcohol.

You, however, can peg the real culprit: a reasonably slutty dress, removed from the annals of Somi’s closet, back when she was less of a Paris Hilton and more of a Princess Diana.

The evidence: damning. As you were getting ready—Can you zip me up? you had asked Joshua, fiddling with the rollers in your hair, already a generous ten minutes late. Then the slow, lingering skim of his touch, molasses up the hollow of your spine. At dinner, a warm hand on your knee. You didn’t hang around much longer after that, but walking to the car was a wondrous excuse for the flat of his palm to find the small of your back, fondly, comfortably, as if you had known each other for years.

Since you had spoken in the garden, certainly you had acted like more of a couple. It came more naturally, likely due to the fact that you had no idea if you were actually a couple or not. You suppose it doesn’t matter at the end of the day. Well—sort of.

Now, you’re just being obtuse. What you’re really trying to do is explain how your hand found its way down Joshua’s pants in the back of your limousine. And still, found is too generous of a word. But you digress.

The short version: you kissed Joshua. Jihoon parked the car out back, you had gotten tired of Joshua glancing at you through the side of his eyes, and you kissed him. Regrettably, this hasn’t gotten boring yet. You enjoy the way he searches for your touch, the part of his soft lips.

Sometime between the third and the tenth time your tongue found its way into Joshua’s mouth, Jihoon removed himself from the situation—he was always good at that part. Two wandering hands later, your palm skimmed over the front of Joshua’s slacks. No big deal, except he was half-hard and he moaned in your mouth like he was doing the ad-libs in a Cupcakke song.

“Whoops,” you had babbled. This whole night, you’d been searching for the brakes on the clown car winding through the horny fog of your horrible, vexed mind.

“Fuck, sorry,” Joshua replied just as quickly, the words seeming to slip back down his throat.

Then you had stared at each other and blinked, hard, as if that would erase the fact that, one, the prince of Acros had just cursed approximately half an centimeter from your face, and two, you’d now crossed a bridge that could not be uncrossed.

You could no longer lie to yourself about the fact that you are hopelessly attracted to Joshua. You don’t even know if you want to lie anymore. You still thought of the time you ran into him, birthday suit and all, all those weeks ago in the bathroom. And, yes, you had wondered how big he was, although you blame Somi for planting that evil idea in you.

Hence, with God as your witness (since Jihoon was no longer there), you had said, “I can help, you know. If you want.”

You didn’t expect Joshua to nod so quickly. Then again, you now know yourself to be a poor judge of most things, especially ones relating to whatever this is.

“Do you want to?” he had asked, eyes fogged over.

“Yes. really.” Then you stopped. “Is this your first—”

“No. Does it really seem like it?”

Okay. You’ll have to unpack that later.

So, finally, here you are. Somewhere along the line, your shame had fallen to the wayside, and a new desire now rocks you.

“Could’ve just asked earlier,” you tease, thumbing the buckle of Joshua’s belt.

“Should’ve known you’re not one for subtlety,” he laughs softly, his eyes fixed on how you undo the clasp. It’s a silly comment, but all the blood still rushes to your cheeks at the idea of him wanting you not just now, but all night. “Next time.”

“Really now.” The button at his waistband proves difficult with your new nails, so you instead sit your hand on the tent in his pants, palm him over the fabric. “You’d let me do this in the washroom of a charity ball?”

Delightfully, you watch him squirm. He doesn’t fight you, instead, uses his hands to bring you closer so you can feel his voice on your skin. “You’d be surprised,” he replies.

“His highness,” you say before returning to the wretched button, “Fooling around at a formal event? Scandalous.”

“Says the walking scandal,” Joshua laughs again, nipping at your earlobe. Then a sigh, breathy and tortured, as you finally peel back his slacks.

“Isn’t this about the time where you be quiet and let me do my thing?”

“Is that an order?”

“Yeah, since you seem to like them so much.”

He opens his mouth to complain, but you’ve beaten him to the punch. Skin meets skin; you watch his eyes flutter shut, the slow fall of his shoulders as he exhales.

Fuck, you think to yourself. If that’s all it takes for him to get hard— you force the thought back to where it came from. You’re getting ahead of yourself. Already, you’re reveling in the lewd image before you: the nation’s darling prince, legs spread and slack-jawed in the back of a limo, dizzy at the thought of a pretty girl playing with his cock.

Your hand wraps around his length, pulls it out of his briefs. Feeling the weight, heavy and warm on your palm, makes your skin prickle. He is big, but even if he wasn’t, the way he gasps into your ear when you start pumping him is enough to satisfy.

You start slow, just to be a little mean. He's longer than you expected, you realize. A turn of the wrist at the base, a little more pressure, and you hear him groan, loudly, shamelessly, as he tips his head back.

“Feels good?” you ask, voice lower than a whisper. You know it does—you’re not inexperienced by any stretch of the imagination, but something about turning the prince into putty makes the months of horrible foreplay worth it.

“Yeah,” he says, part sigh. “Really good.”

“Good.” Then you hold out your palm in front of his mouth. You tell yourself it’s a litmus test for his freak-o-meter, but there’s a part of you that wants to make this the best handjob of his short, unexciting life.

First, he looks at you, wide eyes unblinking. There's already a flush, pretty and pink, across his cheeks, the column of his neck. Then, it clicks. He spits into your hand, and you watch it trail down the plush curve of his lips, his chin, the ridge of his adam’s apple. The color spreads to his ears; his mouth twists shyly. Oh, he looks perfect, maybe even more than perfect like this.

As if drawn by a magnet, you kiss him, and your hand finds his cock again. The friction alone draws out a low whine from Joshua’s chest, enough for you to feel the sound on your own tongue. Emboldened, you pump faster, harder, loving the way his hips kick up to meet your touch.

Still, he gives no indication that he’s close. Something tells you he has more stamina than you think, which surprises you. Thirty minutes ago, you thought he was a virgin.

“Josh?” you murmur, your lips brushing over his. “Wanna taste you.”

He meets your gaze, expression unreadable. You think maybe you’re moving too fast, that you’ve crossed some sort of boundary, until you feel the shadow of his hand move, first on your waist, then up the back of your neck. He gathers your hair in one hand, easily, as if he’s done this many a time before, and you get the message.

You wet your lips, swollen at this point, and bow your head. You’re running on something crazier than adrenaline at this point—even seeing the bead of precum at his tip is making your jaw feel heavy.

The first taste, always thrilling, sends sparks to your cunt. You seal your lips around his cockhead, feeling its weight on your greedy tongue, and he pulls your hair just enough to make you moan.

“Were you thinking about doing this all night?” Joshua asks, voice deceptively innocent.

You can’t answer. You don’t want to. He tastes good, he even fucking smells good, and you want him bad. Instead, you take him to the base, feel him bump against your palate as you try not to gag. You can’t fit him all the way, so your hands make up the slack. He's even bigger fully hard, and already, you feel the ache in your cheeks, your temples.

“Fuck, you must have been.” A groan, low and slutty. “Doing so good for me.”

You can’t tell if he’s being genuine or if this is his version of dirty talk, but it’s working. His hand is gentle, restrained behind you, letting you lead. The worse part of you wonders what it would take for him to break, but that’s a project for another time.

Honestly, he doesn’t need to do much—again and again, you chase the feeling of his cock deep in your throat, enough to bruise. You don’t even care if you gag around him; when you do, he pulls your hair back, just enough to make your scalp prickle wonderfully, seemingly oblivious to the fact that you like it.

You feel heady with arousal. You start to wonder how he is in bed, if he’d hold your hair like that, run his mouth like he is now. He's vocal, more than anyone else you’ve been with, and every little noise goes straight to your core, makes your thighs squeeze together pathetically. By now, you’re sure you’ve ruined this set of panties.

“ ‘m close,” he says between breaths. “You don’t have to—”

Stupid, stupid boy, you think. You don’t think you’ve wanted to do anything more. So instead of answering, you look up at him, eyes big and watery, and you suck hard. with your tongue nestled underneath his cockhead, right by the vein, it’s almost too easy.

He groans, loud, satisfied, and you feel his release fill your mouth. Even after swallowing, it’s enough to run down your chin, get your makeup all smudged, and you like it. If you weren’t in trouble already, you are now.

“Ah, I made you a mess,” Joshua says, gravelly and intimate. With one hand, he takes the handkerchief out of his suit jacket and cradles your jaw with the other. “Hold still.”

“You,” you manage after clearing your throat. “You don’t have to sacrifice your pocket square.”

“Yes, I do,” he chuckles. He wipes the corners of your mouth, your aching chin, and it almost makes you cry. “You literally gave me head in the back of a car. The pocket square can go.”

He draws you up to his chest so you can rest your head on him. There’s a warm, melty feeling between your ribs, minus what you had just swallowed. Inexplicably, even as the horny fog clears from your brain, you still want to be close, closer than close and then closer still.

“Head? I don’t like hearing you use normal people slang.” You pout, and you feel his laugh radiate from beneath his skin. “Good head, at least?”

“Oh, please. Better than good,” he answers. “You’re perfect. perfect.”

“Yeah, yeah,” you start. Then he shuts you up with his mouth over yours, and you forget to think about liking him, loving him, or marrying him—this, you think you can do.

—

“We’re in Barcelona!”

You’re greeted by a pocket sized Somi and Soonyoung as they grin at you from your phone screen. They look to be on the balcony of a hotel suite, both wearing their matching silk robes.

“Wow,” you reply. “And where was my invite?”

“We did invite you, bitch,” Somi says, pulling down her sunglasses to look at you. “You said you were busy.”

“Well, I mean…” you uncap a bottle of nail polish. “That's not untrue.”

“The ocean needs you,” Soonyoung whines, clutching his chest. “We need you.”

“I'm sorry! Josh and I have been doing engagement stuff.”

“Josh? Since when were you on a nickname basis?”

“Whatever,” you interrupt. “What are you guys gonna do today?”

“Beach,” Soonyoung responds brightly, with Somi’s Don’t let her change the subject! loud in the background.

To be honest, you don’t even know the answer to her question. It just sort of happened, which seems to be the new normal for you. You’re also trying to pull apart last night–the freak-o-meter test came back inconclusive, and, for some reason, Joshua fell asleep with his arm over your middle. (Actually, you can think of a few reasons why he did that, but you’re not really sure how to feel about any of them.)

“Ugh, I miss you guys.” You wipe at your pinkie toe, having smudged the polish beyond repair. “Drink a little extra sangria for me. And by little, I mean a lot.”

“You’re still coming to Somi’s birthday, right?” Soonyoung asks.

“Yes, of course she is,” Somi replies. “Unless you can’t. Which I totally understand.”

“I still can,” you lie. “It just has to be more low-key than usual.”

“No paparazzi,” Somi says. “And I'll tell everyone to keep you on the down low. Super duper down low.”

“No way.” Damn, you curse to yourself—you keep screwing up painting your big toe. “Seriously?”

“Anything for my queen,” she giggles. “Pitbull is also confirmed, by the way. Secret Pitbull now.”

“Good, because that’s the only reason I’m coming.”

“Boo, you whore.” Somi wrinkles her nose at you playfully. (Is she being serious? Soonyoung asks in the background.) “Also, I'm still waiting for my update on the whole prince thing. I've been very patient.”

“No updates. Nothing to report,” you insist. Frustratingly, your cheeks are hot, like you’re in secondary school all over again.

“You fucked him, huh?”

You bite the inside of your cheek.

“Halfway. Maybe.”

The combined sound of Somi and Soonyoung’s gasps rips apart your phone speakers, and you draw in a big breath. I did it for the plot doesn’t quite seem like the right justification, not like it used to be. The plot never used to involve the M word, love, or any sort of feelings at all. Now things are more confusing than late-stage Grey’s Anatomy, but good luck explaining that over the phone.

“So you do like him,” Soonyoung says, saucer eyes sparkly on-screen.

“I don't know,” you answer. It’s true, you don’t. To you, like was flirting over text and french kissing. Paradoxically, you had told Joshua all of that, and he still decided to do whatever he did to you on the ledge of the fountain all those days ago. It felt like he ate the heart right out of your chest. Then you had to go and suck his dick, which never made anything less complicated.

“Oh please. Look at you,” Somi laughs. “Yeah, you do.”

Fuck. You’ve smudged all the polish off your big toe again.

–

Not much surprises you these days, but you can’t say you were expecting to see your riding boots to be the first thing you see when you arrive home in Cotria.

The second thing you see is Jeonghan, smiling at you in his big, stupid riding helmet, camo-printed because he bought it when he was 15 and his head never grew much bigger since.

“For old times sake?” He then holds your own helmet up by the straps, and whatever twinge of annoyance you had felt earlier makes way for something softer, more forgiving. “Everything's set up outside.”

It doesn’t take you much time to take him up on the offer. If anything, a long ride usually solves all your problems, and you definitely have problems that need solving.

You saddle up in the stables, wordlessly, moved by habit. It seems to be the same for Jeonghan, too. Even Peanut acts like it hasn’t been years since he’s seen him, and he noses at the box of sugar cubes like he always does. Then again, horses don’t hold grudges, at least, not like you do. Even Joshua seemed more optimistic about this encounter than you did.

“So you're back back,” you say, hooking your feet in the stirrups. “Or do you have more jet-setting to do?”

“Back back,” Jeonghan replies. “Missed home too much.”

He cocks his head towards the old riding trail, the one that loops the long way through the woods. The gesture is but a formality—it’s the only path you ever take. Still, you follow behind his horse, watching the beige swoosh of Peanut’s tail the same way you did when you were a little girl and things were far simpler than they are now.

Under the cornflower sky of a near-autumn, the forest seems endless. A flock of geese split the sky in two; a warm breeze haunts the canopy, scattering the afternoon light. The dirt under you is soft, peaty from the morning rain. The hoofbeats are silent today.

Jeonghan’s horse slows so that you ride side-by-side.

“Hey, cricket?”

“Yeah?”

“I…” Jeonghan clears his throat and pauses, quite unlike him. “I wanted to come out here to talk.”

“Everything ok?”

“Yeah, I…” Another pause. “I know things haven’t felt normal between us. For me, at least.”

You almost drop the reins. A strange, floating feeling is set off in your body, like a flare.

“Yeah,” you reply. “I was kinda hoping you would say that.”

“I'm sorry.” A hard swallow. “I haven't really been the best brother, have I?”

“Well, not…not really.” Quickly, frenetically, words bob up in the back of your mouth like you’re playing whack-a-mole. You had been waiting for this conversation to happen for so long, you realized you hadn’t planned much further than that. “It felt like you’d changed. A lot.”

The wind feels like ribbons around you. You sway back and forth on Astrid, as if on a boat.

“Was it the birthday party thing?” you ask. “I didn’t mean for it to…you know.”

“Actually, that was my fault.” Jeonghan smiles bitterly. “I shouldn't have let Mom and Dad run me over like that. You should’ve been there. It was never really the same without you.”

“Well, I should've come,” you admit. “So we both fucked up.”

“Maybe,” he chuckles. “But the rest—definitely my fault. I made myself busy because I felt like I had to.”

You’re growing to really hate that word. Jeonghan had to grow up, Joshua had to break up with his first love, you had to learn to pick up all the pieces of both of these things and try to fit them back into your life.

“You didn’t even look back.”

“I was scared, cricket. That if I kept looking back, I wouldn't be able to go forward. And I didn’t want to leave you behind, but I did. I think there was a happy middle somewhere, I just couldn’t find it.”

“Jeonghan, you’re not really making sense right now,” you say, flattened, and he laughs.

“I don't even know what I'm saying. I think I'm trying to say that I just want you to be happy. And that I'm sorry.”

You bite your lip, as if to distract yourself from the strange pressure in your throat. You think you want to cry, but you’re not sure.

“But are you happy?” you ask. “With the coronation and everything? Did you even want this?”

“I am, believe it or not. I know you don’t, but I'm not lying. Somewhere along the line, I started liking all of the talking, the traveling, the interviews. I like that I can help people. Some of it sucks, but not all of it.” He laughs, finally one that sounds like something you can remember. “Not everything you have to do is bad.”

“Jeonghan, I'm getting married because of you. Because of this,” you say, trying to keep your voice from cracking. “I don't know how to do this. Any of this, not like you, not like Mom, or anyone.”

This, in fact, does make Jeonghan stop. He stills and falls silent. At once, it seems the forest goes quiet too.

“Don’t get married, then.” You don’t respond, so he says it again. “You don’t have to go through with it. Not for my sake, at least.”

“What?”

“I've been thinking about it ever since it happened. I can talk to everyone. You’d rather not be with the guy, right?”

Your tongue freezes in your mouth. You thought you had an answer, but it refuses to come out.

“I have a duty to protect you, too. I’ll be fine with or without the press.”

“Jeonghan,” you say quietly. Many moons ago, you would have laughed at the word duty, but instead, your stomach turns over and over and over. “You don’t have to.”

“I want to,” is his simple answer. “I want to because I care about you. We can figure out the rest.”

Something in your bones feels heavy. You’d also been waiting to hear those words, but it didn’t feel as freeing as you thought it would. You think about Joshua, his books and his perfectly placed bookmarks, his dumb dad jokes, the way he reaches for your hand, fingertips before palm.

“Can I think about it?”

“Of course. The engagement ball is probably happening either way, but it’s no big deal. Bigger engagements have been called off in far worse circumstances.”

You’re having trouble believing him, but you have no other choice. Your life would certainly get a lot easier if everything were to just end. No more press releases, scripts, or awkward pictures. And no more worrying about if you could go out on the weekends or just how much of yourself to give up to make things work.

“There's no rush.” He turns to look at you with the same wild shine in his eyes that you’d grown to miss so much. “Truce?”

That, somehow, you’re much happier to hear. You thought you’d be angrier than this, feel the usual metal-red of your gut, but all that’s left is a sobering feeling of relief, of home. At last, things feel close to normal.

“Truce.”

So you ride and ride, but a decision doesn’t come to you as easily as you thought. The sunset breaks; the word duty clings to you, unshakable, unrelenting.

—

Somehow, you have gone full circle: at the end of a long day, you find yourself back at the piano, much like you did when you were seven, and the only thing you could do right was play Hot Cross Buns.

Joshua had bought an unreasonable amount of music books, half guitar for him, half piano for you. You’d forgotten just how much you had liked playing until that night, many nights ago, when you and he had first muddled through that duet.

Yesterday, you and your parents had tea at the waterfront before you had left the country. You were still undecided on the engagement; frustratingly, the needle hadn’t moved much in either direction since Jeonghan had raised his proposal to you.

Congratulations, your mother had told you, right over her cup of oolong.

For what?

You’ve risen to the occasion. You’ve grown up.

To you, this was not a compliment. You didn’t know what it was. You had twisted the ring on your finger, back and forth, a habit you picked up after all the time you spent wearing it. You wondered if somewhere, you had become exactly like Jeonghan, molded and spun into someone unrecognizable. Maybe that was why Joshua finally seemed to like you.

Have you practiced for your first dance? your father asked, and you no longer had time to worry about the state of your personality—you had other fires to put out.

Really, that’s why you’re at the piano today. You thought you could play the damn tune and somehow remember all the ballroom dancing lessons you had taken when you were younger. Unsurprisingly, it hasn’t worked yet.

There’s a knock at the doorframe. “Come in,” you say, already knowing that it’s Joshua. No one else does that; Jihoon barges in and just starts talking, and you can hear Joshua’s parents from a mile away because of all the jewelry they have on.

“Just wanted to see what you were up to,” Joshua says. He leans against the frame of the piano, already dressed down for the night.

“Nothing,” you reply. “Just magically hoping that I remember how to ballroom dance.”

“Well, first things first, you can’t dance sitting down.” He chuckles, and you pull your lips tight.

“I'm serious, Josh,” you whine.

“You really don’t remember?” He gives you one of those looks, one that you’re quite used to now, with the judgmental wrinkle of the brow. “Didn’t you take lessons?”

“Yeah, like…fifty million years ago.”

“I couldn’t tell,” he says, grinning something foolish. “You don’t look a day over fifty.” Then he offers you his hand, which you take, and he easily pulls you from the bench.

“Flattered,” you say, unable to push down the corners of your smile. “You gonna teach this senior citizen a few moves?”

“Perhaps, as my good deed for the day.” He holds your hand, still firmly in his, and slides it up his arm to rest on his bicep. “Left hand here,” he tells you.

“Are you flirting with me?”

“Not yet,” Joshua laughs. “The ballroom hold ring a bell?” His other hand finds your free one, and you interlace fingers simply, easily. Then, the warmth of a hand between your shoulder blades, one that draws you to his chest.

“I think the only dancing I know how to do is half drunk in the dark. Can’t exactly throw it back on you in front of God and country.”

Joshua grins, a big one, and you, traitorously, feel your cheeks get prickly.

“I wouldn't want God looking at you like that,” he teases.

“And country’s already seen it all.”

“They should consider themselves very lucky, then.” His eyes meet yours, lit by the scattered light of the chandelier. “It's my turn to ask you to let me lead.”

“Fine,” you pout, noticing that familiar warmth in your stomach.

Joshua begins to count your steps off (one, two, three—ow, that’s my foot! —sorry!). He’s patient with you, more patient than you think you deserve. His hand seems to slot perfectly into the curve of your back; his gaze settles onto you in a way that makes your chest feel heavy, molten.

“For someone who goes out so much, you have a terrible sense of rhythm,” Joshua says, teasing.

“Hey,” you object. “Maybe I just have a bad teacher.”

“Oh, so it’s my fault now?”

“Well, I'm not about to blame Britney Spears.”

Joshua laughs, and the sound is so close to you, you can feel it on your skin.

“I still think it’s the student’s fault.”

“Me?!” Perfectly timed, your sock-clad feet collide (yours, striped and fuzzy, his, plain white). “Impossible.”

“Too distracting,” he murmurs, and you notice how unfairly pretty his eyes are. “You bump into me, criticize me, you look at me like that…”

You feel dizzy. You don’t know what Joshua’s doing to you, but it’s mean. Your face is warm, and normally you’d blame it all on the alcohol but you haven’t had any. Worst of all, the soft part of you, the lizard-brained, impulsive part, can’t stop thinking about his lips and how they would feel on yours.

It’s a thought you don’t let linger, much like all of the other half-thoughts you have, and you kiss him, as if it was a reprieve from the terrible, horrible way he’s making you feel. (It isn’t.)

“You talk too much,” you tell Joshua, right against his lips. “Not enough teaching.”

“I'm putting you in remediation.”

“Devastating.”

“And giving you homework.”

“Whatever shall I do?”

Joshua answers that question for you. He kisses you, once, twice, still not enough, and, somehow, things feel more simple than they ever had before.

—

Jihoon’s eyes are dark, dagger-sharp in the rearview mirror.

“We’re coming up,” he says. “A few minutes out.”

“I know,” you answer. Yunjin was successful, almost too successful, in her task of finding you an appropriately revealing dress for a newly engaged twenty-something at the party of the year. The filmy silk stretches around your thighs; the cowl neck flirts with the neckline of the bikini top you have on underneath.

You look good, probably better than how you’ve looked in months. And yet, for some reason, you don’t feel good, at least, not how you’d thought you’d feel on the way to the only event you’d been looking forward to this year.

Somi’s gift rattles in your lap. It’s covered in this loud, hot pink wrapping paper unbecoming of something you had spent years tracking down on the antiques circuit. Normally, you’d have a laugh with Jihoon about it, maybe take some selfies in the car, but instead, you find yourself spinning your ring around your finger like you always seem to do these days.

You think of Jeonghan, of Joshua. Of course, what you do or don’t do on your best friend’s birthday is none of their business (although, very inconveniently, Jeonghan did have some event this weekend, and Joshua was traveling). But still, you think of the boldface headlines, the whispering gossip forums, the washed-out image of you in your little dress on the cover of a cheap magazine. This wasn’t exactly a tame party, and things weren’t just about you anymore, not like they used to be.

Marking your arrival isn’t the GPS nor Jihoon, rather, it’s the firefly buzz of the cameras outside your limo as it’s forced to come to a stop. You squint, trying to see past the tint of your windows, and see Somi, radiant in her birthday tiara, as she pushes through the crowd. Behind her is the villa she rented, illuminated by pink and gold strobe lights.

You crack open the car door and are met with a stifling deluge of camera flashes. Music pulses through the air, enough to feel beneath your heels.

“Who's my favorite princess?” Somi exclaims, throwing her arms open. “You made it! you look hot.”

“Not as hot as the birthday girl,” you reply, and you let her squeeze the air out of you in a wonderful, bone-crushing hug. “What's with all the cameras?”

“Professional photographers. Just wanted something to remember the night by, because we are blacking out.” She giggles, already tipsy. “Come, come, we’re doing shots inside.”

“Without me?”

“We’ll catch you up.”

Somi drags you by the hand through the sea of people, and you watch the cameras follow as they always do. She leads you up the stairs, underneath the towering balloon display, and into the foyer, already darkened, lit only by a disco ball chandelier and the neon backlights.

You spot Soonyoung by a champagne tower that seems twice his size, as promised. He's in a leather jacket, no shirt under, and you watch his eyes light up as they meet yours.

“A shot for her highness,” he shouts over the music.

“I thought this was champagne.”

“Tequila's close enough.” He laughs, eyes upturned, bright like gemstones.

The first shot goes down easy. it always does. So does the second, unsurprisingly. Around the third is when Somi tells you that the strippers are coming in an hour. (—Strippers?! —Not everyone has a fiancé, you know.)

And, just like that, you’re back to the beginning. It’s hard to think over the ridiculously good Kesha mix the DJ is playing, but, terribly, you think you’re starting to understand what Jeonghan was talking about. You’re still not sure how you feel about duty, responsibility, sacrifice, those heavy words that feel impossibly heavier in your mouth, but all you know is that, as much fun as you’re having now, it comes at a fair price.

Somi told you nothing, no compromising pictures, no drama, would reach the press, but, as hard as she may try, you feel like enough people have laid eyes on you already that someone was bound to hear something. If not now, then definitely in a few hours when everyone’s on at least two and a half substances, and all bets are off.

Briefly, you recall your appearance at the derby, the memory like a shard of glass. You had stood guileless next to Joshua, tripping over your words because you hadn’t cared enough to read the damn briefing, and he had covered it up with a dad joke or two. Coming up with those abominations must have been hard enough for someone whose first book was the Oxford Dictionary, but you don’t even think God and all his angels could cover up this. More than that, the thought of everyone having to try anyway makes your gut twist.

Someone tells you to smile for a selfie. You recognize her, but you don’t remember her name (Amelia or Alicia, one of Somi’s friend of a friends. On second glance, there are definitely more than 200 people here). Let's dance! another voice shouts in your ear.

Your head hurts. You hate the idea that Jeonghan might be a little right, but you hate even more that you’re starting to agree with him. Maybe you need another shot.

“Your gift,” you say, fighting over the chorus of Your Love Is My Drug. “Somi!”

“Oh my god, you did not!” she squeals. She clasps her hands over yours, wrapped around the box, and draws them to her. “Let me take it to the table. I’ll meet you by the pool—oh, oh, there’s a hot dog stand out there too!”

“Actually,” you start. You’re not that drunk, not yet, but now you think you can feel the ground start to sway under you. it wouldn’t be too far a stretch to say that in half an hour, after a little time at the bar, you’d probably be spending the night, no question. “I think I have to run.”

“Aw, really?” Somi tilts her head and squints, as if trying to read your mind.

“I am so sorry,” you tell her, as sincerely as one can over a pop song from the 2000s. “Swear I'll make it up to you.”

“Life stuff, right?”

“Yeah.”

“It's ok,” she says. “Really really. Go home, figure your shit out, and we can have our own party.”

She holds your joined hands to her heart. Whatever look you gave her, she believed. That, or she knows you better than you think.

So you leave. The car ride home is silent. Jihoon doesn’t ask questions, and you can still hear the sound of the music ringing in your ears, on and on and on.

–

You think the worst thing you’ve ever woken up to was the Crazy Frog ringtone of one of the guys you had slept with during university.

The second worst has got to be five voice memos and three consecutive missed Facetime calls from Somi, which is the first thing you see upon opening your eyes.

“Oh fuck,” you murmur, still coming to. Your bed is empty, but you see Joshua's suitcase in the corner of the room. He must have come home early this morning, while you were still sleeping.

You crack open your text messages.

–OH MY GOD.

–I AM SO SO SORRY.

–someone must have gotten paid off for last night’s pictures…i had no idea i swear

Then a voice memo. Then another voice memo. then a PopCrave Twitter screenshot: YOU CAN TAKE THE PRINCESS OUT OF THE PARTY–OR CAN YOU? followed by the worst, most incriminating photo of you and Soonyoung, arms linked, throwing back a shot.

“No, no, no, no.” You squeeze your eyes shut, feeling the stone-cold drop of your heart to your feet. “Fuck. Fuck.”

Shit. You have to find Joshua and make it right.

Somehow, you thought it wouldn’t matter, that you didn’t care what did or didn’t get out as long as you were able to have a good time—you desperately search for that same feeling, knowing that it’s long, long gone. You don’t even think you truly ever believed that.

You race down the palace hallways, ones that feel far more familiar than the rigid bastions they were when you first got here, but it’s Joshua who finds you before you find him. Or rather, it’s his voice you hear, trickling out from behind the library door.

Suddenly, you’re five again, and you’re spying on Jeonghan talking to your parents. You peek through the crack of the doorframe. As Somi would say, nightmare blunt rotation: there stands Joshua, surrounded by both sets of parents, and no one looks happy.

“We knew it,” another voice says—your mother. “We’re sorry, but we said this would happen.”

“It’s no matter. There’s nothing left to do but call the engagement off.”

The room goes quiet. You notice your hands are shaking. Your face feels numb.

“You’re right. I don't think anyone’s getting what they want out of this, anyway.”

“We’ll cancel the ball. There’s no way around it. Likely a relief, right, Joshua?”

The moment seems to squirm, suspended in time. This is what you were waiting for, right? Your parents were right—no one wanted this anyway. You certainly didn’t, and now you get your get out of jail free card. On top of that, you get to hear what you’d been expecting all along—that Joshua never liked you, that this was fun and all, but he’s ready to stop playing pretend.

“I…I disagree.” You freeze. “She's my fiancée. I made a commitment to her, and I'm not going to walk away.”

“Joshua, my dear, this arrangement was never going to work. You can be honest.”

This is the part where Joshua nods, does his perfectly symmetric smile, and agrees. This is what he does, what he’s been doing since forever. The story always ends the same way. That was the point.

Instead: “I am being honest. Since when was it illegal to go to your best friend’s birthday party? I don't care what the rest of the world has to say. She’s not who they, or you, think she is.” Through the door-gap, you watch the pursed, resolute draw of Joshua’s lips. “You didn’t even invite her here to talk about her own engagement. You never once gave her a chance.”

A stunned silence falls over the room.

“I’m sorry, but this is how I feel. I won't let you take another girl I love from me. Not again.”

Your hand flies over your mouth, and something twists deep in you, like you’re drowning from the inside out. You can’t, won’t, believe what you just heard. That somehow, beyond all the fighting, the quiet nights, the snide remarks and the fake smiles, that Joshua loved you? Loved? Enough to say all that to the people that ruled his life with an iron fist? None of this made sense, but nothing’s made sense since you got here.

The room erupts into noise, peals of voices all colliding into each other, and you do what you do best—you leave.

—

No one talks about that morning. You don’t even think anyone knows you were there—part of you wishes that you actually weren’t, so you didn’t have all this on your mind. (Joshua, later that day: I got you something from Seoul. From his suitcase, a bottle of soju. Just kidding. Then a jade bracelet, so vibrant it looked like the ocean.) No one talked about Somi, and no one talked about the party.

In fact, everyone had just rolled on as usual, all the way to the end of the week, the day of your engagement ball. Even you did. The word love felt so big, so burdensome, when Joshua had said it to his parents, but you didn't mind it on you.

The lingering touches, late night talks, tea made the way you like—nothing really had changed much since shit hit the fan, but now you knew that was the label. You guess that when you told Joshua you had never been in love before, you were really telling the truth. Either that, or he was just saying whatever the hell he needed to stop your engagement from imploding.

Still, you found yourself still reaching for him. There was an unfamiliar comfort about his nearness. You woke up this morning cradled to his side, and, for once, it wasn’t a scene you wanted to erase.

Now, your hairstylist hoses your blowout down with hairspray. You’d spent the better part of this morning sitting in different chairs, hair, makeup, nails. A part of you waits for the other shoe to drop: Joshua’s mother would waltz in and tell you, Surprise! You’re a single woman again, just as you should be.

It never happens. You’re wrapped in various mists and creams and powders, all the while fielding all the same questions about the ball (—Excited for tonight? Yeah, of course. —How does it feel being the surprise couple of the year? Surprising.)

It’s not until Yunjin comes in, wheeling in your giant, sparkly engagement gown, all Italian lace and satin brocade, that things feel real.

The dress itself is beautiful, a pale champagne number, gathered at the waist with a smattering of crystals down the train. Earlier, when you’d first tried it on, it looked like a costume fit for the girl playing wife. It was another smothering thing that hung on you, just like everything else in your life.

Today, you watch your form tall in the mirror. You meet her eyes, her uncertain mouth. It’s you, for sure, but there’s a stillness about you that you can’t quite put a finger on. Maybe Joshua’s demeanor was contagious.

Yunjin laces your bodice up, careful eyelet by eyelet—“You’re nervous, huh?”

“Is it really that obvious?”

She laughs. “Breathe. You’re not getting married. Not yet, at least.”

“Yunjin, isn’t it weird that no one has talked to me about Somi’s birthday? Everyone on the planet saw the leaks.”

“Maybe they finally learned to stop giving a shit. You looked hot, you had a good time, end of story. It’s not like anyone died.”

True. She grabs your shoulders and looks at you through the reflection of the mirror.

“Smile. Enjoy yourself. You look so, so beautiful.” You take a deep, soaking breath. You think about Joshua and all the sharp edges of his voice when he said he loved you. You had argued with him a lot, and you had never heard him like that. “You want this, right?”

Well, when she puts it like that? Yeah, you do. You think you really do.

—

The Great Hall is unrecognizable when you stand before it; the pink and white zinnias have been replaced by bouquets of calla lily and eucalyptus, the arched ceilings, once cold and imposing, now are bathed in the buttery, warm glow of candlelight. And the too-big space, usually empty, is now filled with partygoers, radiant in their best dress.

You stand at the top of the grand staircase. A thrill, anxious and skittering, runs up your bones. You’re reminded of your last big public showing at the derby, of the sea of microphones and the eye of the camera and the crowd, all staring you down.

You run through the cruel motions. First, a curtesy, so slow you think the audience can see you tremble. Then you take the first step down the stairs, and you watch them turn to you like the tanned halo-faces of sunflowers.

There, in the center of the crowd stands Joshua, unwavering. He's wearing a deep blue tuxedo, unfairly flattering (though, the lone curl of hair falling into his eyes is strong competition). Meeting his gaze, you watch the corners of his mouth fold up in a way that reminds you to breathe. In, out. You’ve got this.

Every step, you feel like you’re learning to walk for the first time, like you've lost your sea legs. Amongst the guests, you spot Jeonghan, next to him Jihoon. Then back to Joshua, like your eyes can’t stay away. He shoots you a covert thumbs up—you’d expect nothing less from the corniest man on Earth—but, nonetheless, it makes the long walk to the center of the room feel much shorter, despite the torture devices on your feet (Louboutins, not broken in).

One, two steps, and you’re face to face with your fiancé. Your heart is still racing, thrumming against the cage of your bodice like it's trying to escape. You’re sure the whole congregation could hear it if not for the quartet that’s come to life, now playing the opening notes of Blue Danube.

Yes, that’s right, you tell yourself. You still have to dance in front of the whole fucking country.

Before you crash out and make this a national emergency, you feel the warmth of Joshua’s touch. Fingertips before palm, always the same, he finds your hand, like he manages to do every single time.

“I’ve got you,” he says, low enough for only you to hear. And for the first time, you believe him.

—

Really, you could have gotten away with saying nothing. It would be much easier, to be honest.

The ball had gone off without a hitch so far. The music was good, the food even better, and your parents were somehow silenced, instead opting to dance among the crowd like they were young again. Still, you can’t seem to put your mind at ease. With everything that had happened this week, Jeonghan’s offer only seemed to weigh heavier, more urgently upon you. And of course, there was the matter of Joshua choosing to opt into your engagement, against all odds.

You realize you had gotten quite good at running away from things—your family, your responsibilities, the media, even Joshua—not knowing how to bear the weight of an impossible duty. Actually, you thought it was a royal failing until you had seen Joshua in the library that morning, jaw set, unbending.

“Hey, Josh?” you ask, with a few bats of the eyelashes to soften the blow.

He tilts his head in that way he does, and his gaze softens. Damn you, you think. Trying to distract me with those horrible, pretty eyes.

“Can we talk about Sunday?”

“What about Sunday?” He still looks confused, and you know the look well enough at this point to know he’s not faking it.

“Um…Sunday morning. After the party,” you say slowly, as if giving yourself time to back out, just in case. “I heard you talking with our parents.”

In an instant, his expression changes, and his eyebrows roll into their usual furrow. You feel his hand falter behind your shoulder blades.

“Oh,” Joshua’s voice drops. “That.”

“I’m sorry,” you say, realizing all you do is apologize. “It was supposed to be a small thing, no cameras, I barely even stayed—.”

“Hey, it’s ok,” Joshua interrupts. “You didn’t do anything wrong. You don’t have to explain yourself to me.”

“I-I know,” you fib. The thing about pretending is that you’ve both become so good at it that you have trouble believing him. “It’s just that I also heard what…what you said.”

Somehow, the wrinkle between his brows grows deeper.

“I said a lot of things that morning.”

You press your lips thin, feeling what you’re about to say ball up on your tongue. Easily, you could change the subject; you didn’t have to know anything, really, you could stay silent and let the world work around you, just as you had been taught. But you watch the soft twist of Joshua’s gaze, how he studies your expression, and you know you can’t go back to how things used to be.

“You said you…” You take a hard swallow. All the blood in your body only wants to exist in the apples of your cheeks, away from your brain where you need it most. “You loved me.”

At once, the world spins off-axis. You feel the anxious flutter of Joshua’s heart under your palm, and your own stomach flips in its cage. The L word coming out of your mouth seems ten-thousand times more ridiculous than anything he could say, probably because you can’t remember the last time you actually said it and it came out all wrong.

He must feel the same way. For once, he can’t meet your eyes. His mouth opens and then closes, as if hoping to delete what you had just said. Maybe you would just keep dancing, beat by beat, and this would all go away.

Silly girl, you think, traitorously. Pick a damn side. Either he likes you or he doesn’t. The problem is that, somehow, both options hurt your feelings.

“I mean, I totally get it if you just said it to keep up the act,” you cut in. “There are a lot of reasons why this is a good idea.”

“The act?”

“Well, yeah,” you reply. “Isn’t that what this is? Haven’t we just been lying to everyone? To ourselves?”

Joshua’s hand at your waist stiffens before he draws you closer to him. You expect him to roll his eyes, do one of those exaggerated sighs that he does when you’re being difficult.

Instead he leans in, close enough for you to feel his voice against your skin.

“Do you think I was lying back there? Or now?”

Your heart lurches.

“I—no, but.” You pause. Every single coherent thought you’ve ever had scatters to the wind. “Well.”

“Because i’m not,” Joshua says, this time, more softly. “Not about this. Or us.”

“But how? Why?” You bite the inside of your cheek, feeling your chest swell in a way it never has before. “You’re perfect, and I'm…I’m me.”

“That’s why,” he answers, simply. “You’re smart, funny, honest—sometimes too honest, even. You reminded me there was a better version of me that I had left behind. One that wasn’t perfect, but was happy.”

He holds you in his gaze the same way he did in the garden, carved by moonlight. An impossible warmth fills your skin; at once, it feels like, in your vision, there is only him, like you're in a cartoon.

“At the same time, I understand if—” Joshua starts.

“I feel the same,” you blurt out. “I…I don’t know what this is, and I don’t think I ever really did, but I want to try.”

You watch the surprise write itself all over his doe eyes, his unfairly rounded cheeks. From by the hors d'oeuvres, nosy Jeonghan peeks over the shoulder of another guest, already familiar with your lack of volume control. You watch him grin something stupid, triumphant.

“You’re uptight, judgmental, and you make the worst jokes. But I…I think I might be falling for you too.”

Saying it is like getting peeled back, terrible layer by layer, like you wrapped a hand around your heart and ripped it out your chest. And yet you’re glowing, newly-bitten with something that feels like freedom.

“I thought you said I was perfect,” Joshua says, the pink of his lips already unraveling into a smile. This one, you think, finally reaches his eyes.

“Shush, you—” And amongst a chorus of Kiss! Kiss! Kiss! (which would be, quite frankly, humiliating in any other scenario), you finally give in to your adoring public, and kiss.

—

The walk back to your bedroom is a blur. All you remember are hands—hands on the small of your back, hands riding up the length of your thigh, hands in your hair, pulling at your roots. You remember hands, and the taste of Joshua’s mouth.

It’s a walk you are not proud of, one that you’re glad happened in the dark, with all the guests gone home.

“Did I tell you how beautiful you are?” Joshua says, pressed to the hollow of your neck as you fumble with the handle of the door to your room. “Couldn’t take my eyes off you. No one could.”

Then his lips on yours, before you finally remember how to open a door.

“Fuck, Josh,” you breathe between kisses, stumbling backwards until your back hits the vanity. “Need you, need you so bad.”

He bites your lip, lets you sigh into his mouth.

“Dress, off,” you tell him, and you lean forward on the table. Obediently, Joshua gets to work. His touch feels fiery, electric on your skin.

In the mirror, you’re able to see the damage: your lipstick, smudged beyond repair, your blown-out pupils under your heavy lashes. There’s a hickey on your collarbone.

“Now you have me wishing you'd wear one of those party dresses,” Joshua murmurs, still working at the lacing at your waist. “Far easier to take off.”

“Really. The same ones that got me in big trouble with you lot?"

"For what it's worth," he replies, before kissing the back of your neck, then the ticklish space under your ear to make you laugh. "I always liked you in those. Even before we met."

"No way." He’s finished with the lacing; your dress falls to your feet in a glorious heap of silk and lace, leaving you in your slip. Another kiss to your jaw, your cheek. "You hated them."

"I almost bought a copy of Insider, the one with the cover of you in the black dress with the long sleeves."

"Shut up," you laugh again, somewhere in between kisses. He’s talking about Soonyoung's new year's eve party, a few years back. You were getting out the back of a cab, alcohol-flushed and on a phone call with God knows who. "I still have it, you know. I could wear it for you one of these days."

"Don't tempt me." Joshua kneels, bending down to undo your heels. You feel him press his lips to the back of your knee, your thigh. “Friday. Dinner?”

“Done.”

Then he stands back to full height and leans into you, just so you can feel him. Like clockwork, your skin prickles wonderfully even just thinking about blowing him in the back of the limo, that night he had held you down on his cock.

Joshua must see how you squeeze your legs together. He pushes your slip up over the curve of your ass; you feel the rough of his hands over your skin, over the flimsy lace you have on for underwear. Then, before you can say a word, he pulls the waistband back, meanly, enough to tug on the hood of your clit, and lets it snap back against your skin.

“Oh, fuck,” you keen. You had no idea you were so sensitive, but Joshua’s foreplay game was way better than you thought. “Please, Shua.”

“Oh? So you like when I'm a little mean?”

You watch your face in the mirror flush pink, your bitten lips fall open in surprise. He pulls tight on your panties again, loving how your eyes squeeze shut.

“Maybe.” You pause, humiliated. Fuck it, the cat’s already out of the bag. “Yeah.”

Joshua’s hands are warm, so warm, when they peel the fabric down your trembling thighs.

“Legs apart, darling,” he tells you, mouth pressed to your shoulder. “So you like to boss me around the castle, but now you want me to tell you what to do? Is that so?”

Before you can answer, you feel a finger along the seam of your cunt. You can’t see Joshua’s face in the mirror, but you can sure see yours, and you hate how even the smallest of touches has you drooling. Then a touch to your swollen clit, just rough enough to draw a gasp from you.

“I-it’s different,” you protest. Two fingers now, both rolling your clit under them. A whimper tumbles out of your chest, and your hips seem to be moving on their own accord. “Didn’t know you had…experience.”

“Still not sure what made you think otherwise.” A quiet chuckle, then the slow, agonizing push of one of his fingers inside you. “Fuck, you love that, huh? Soaking my hand.”

“Yeah…” The vanity table suddenly feels too crowded to support the weight of your body, especially like this, as Joshua continues to work your clit with his other digit. Feeling your body surge again with heat, you push aside your makeup bag, all your stupid little bottles, so you can prop yourself up on your arms.

Another finger, and your legs are shaking. Quickly, he seems to have figured out how to hit your g-spot every time, every pump of his hand knocking into you just the way you like.

“I think it was how annoying you were that did you in,” you finally answer, trying your best to put up a fair fight. “Kinda detracts from your sex appeal.”

“Annoying?” Joshua asks, right up against the shell of your ear. like this, you can see him in the mirror, and it almost sends you over. the dark hair in his face, the insatiable look in his eyes. Then a third finger, and your eyes roll back. “Am I annoying you? Doesn’t really seem like it.”

Your body answers for you. You feel yourself tighten around his fingers, fuck, you’re so close, you feel your head start to spin. You watch your reflection shake her head, glassy-eyed and dumb.

He laughs cruelly. His free hand reaches up to find your tits, and, over the slip, he grabs one, rough like he’s a meaner man, like he’s slutting you out.

At once, you feel the lightning heat of your release. You cry out, airy and high-pitched, and feel your body rock against Joshua’s as he pins you between himself and the vanity.

“There you go,” he murmurs. His hand slows, letting you ride out your high, before he pulls out. “Wanted to do this ever since I kissed you that night.”

“Which night?” you ask, catching your breath. A kiss to your shoulder blade, the nape of your neck.

“The night you taught me to kiss. Or rather, tried to.”

Ah, yes. The night you told him what Shark Tale was, and the night you made out for so long, you felt it on your lips in the morning. Dumb fucking Joshua, stupid and in love. The affection that surges through your body makes you mad.

“You needed lessons.”

“Not really, don’t you think?”

“Bed. You’re talking too much,” you insist, turning around to see him. “Also, you’re wearing too much.”

“Back to arguing with me, I see. Can’t stay away.” Joshua’s shit-eating grin prompts you to yank his tie impatiently, shutting him up. It comes off easily, just as his belt and the waistband of his slacks. (You weren’t about to let them best you a second time).

“Maybe ‘cause you find a way to be difficult about everything.” You wrinkle your nose, and Joshua’s grin only grows wider. “Don’t make me give you another order,” you warn, fully aware that since you guys got here, it’d been him doing the orders.

You pull your slip over your head, now only in your bra, and lay back in the bed. You think of all the sleepless nights, then the ones spent talking, the ones in his arms. To think they would all culminate to this, to you now watching Joshua undo button by button with a desire unlike any other you’ve felt—it would almost be unbelievable if you weren’t doing it right now.

Like a striptease, you watch his chest peek out between the linen of his shirt. He's wearing a necklace today, one that settles meanly between his pecs. As he moves lower, you can’t help but notice the outline of his cock in his briefs, the spot of precum on the fabric.

Traitorously, you feel your mouth water. The shirt comes off, and your lungs fill with another shaky breath.

You know you’re both letting your freak flag fly (one of you more surprising than the other) but it’s in this moment, caught in the lamplight, that you realize how much things have really changed. Still, you’re not able to tell Joshua that this is the first time you’re sleeping with someone you might be in the L word with, but you think he sees it too, or at least, reads the look on your face.

You feel the dip of the bed underneath as he joins you.

“Are you ok? That wasn’t too much, right?”

“No, it was…it was good. really good,” you admit, feeling your face heat up again. “I just…I dunno. I like you a lot, that’s all.”

“Hm?”

“I—” you stutter, and your mouth freezes up again. “I said I like you a lot.”

“Sorry, I just wanted to hear you say it twice.” He sees the dismay on your face and smiles. “Hm…I like you an adequate amount. On a good day.”

Against your will, you crack the fattest smile you think your body is capable of. “You are the worst. The absolute worst, and I still want you to fuck me.”

Upon hearing this, Joshua does not waste time. That he does—it isn’t long before he has your knees hiked to your chest, cock between your pussy lips.

“Say you want it,” he whispers. You feel the cold kiss of his chain on your chest, the slick rock of his length between your legs. He's so hard, so big, your cunt already aches at the thought of it.

“Want it.” Your voice comes out small, breathy. You would fight back, but you’re realizing you quite like this side of him. “Please.”

When the head of his cock presses into you, there is no hiding. Already, you moan, sweet and loud, feeling the familiar pressure in your gut.

“K-keep going,” you babble. Fuck, he barely fit in your mouth and now he’s stuffing your cunt. You wrench your eyes shut, listening to him talk you through it (—Look at you taking me so well. Feels good, huh? You’re so beautiful. Honestly, it’s a miracle Joshua’s ex never had a royal baby with how much they must have fucked.)

Your second orgasm comes quickly, not long after Joshua bottoms out. He groans right in the space where your neck meets your shoulder, and it’s the best noise you think you’ve heard in your life.

The third comes slowly, more intensely. With your knees to your chest, you think you can feel Joshua all the way in your stomach. Every stroke fucks the sound out of you, his cockhead right up against your g-spot as he fills you again and again. Sometime between orgasm two and three, he’s pulled your tits out from your bra, left marks across your chest.

“Want you to touch yourself,” he tells you, voice low.

Mindlessly, you listen. One hand finds your nipple, the other your clit, and you let yourself get lost in the feeling.

“F-feels good, Shua.” He enters you again, all the way, and the pleasure is white-hot. “O-oh, fuck,” you warble.

“You’re so good at listening to me, you should do it all the time,” he murmurs. “There you go. Take it, take it, just like that. This must be what I have to do to get you to be nice, hm?”

All you can do is stare up at him, positively fucked dumb, and take it, just as he told you to. One, two strokes, and you feel yourself get impossibly tight; “Fill me, need it, need it,” you whine, delirious. Everything from the look in his eyes, the flushed sweat over his brow, his collarbones to the way his expression responds with every word you say, makes you wonder why you wasted time fucking anyone else.

When he comes, he bites your shoulder, hard, and it’s what you need to follow soon after. You feel so fucking full, so satisfied, you think you could die happy here.

Joshua flops down on the bed next to you, boneless. You think he’s about to say something akin to that you should have put a towel down, but he doesn’t. Instead, he pulls your body to him, lets you feel the warmth of his skin play against yours.

He’s murmuring wonderful things to you, which you would gladly reciprocate if words weren’t coming to you one letter a minute. It’s not your fault though—you need to recover physically, emotionally, spiritually after getting the soul fucked out of you.

Then, “Me or you shower first?”

You groan as a response.

“I’m serious.”

“Together?” you offer weakly.

“Fair chance we won’t just be showering then.”

“Oh nooo.”

That’s all Joshua needs to whisk you to the bathroom, where, indeed, he seems to be right yet again.

—

The spring morning washes over Acros like a second skin. The birdsong rouses you; through the curtains comes sunlight from the garden, spackled on the wall as if spots on a doe.

It’s been almost a year since your parents had told you that you were marrying Joshua Hong, prince of Acros. Six months since he had told you he had loved you. Two months since you and Jeonghan had pulled off your first joint production at the youth theater (a roaring success). One month since you were fully, fully moved in, Astrid and Jihoon included.

After your engagement ball, you and Joshua had agreed to take it slow, as slow as two people who had very publicly announced their wedding could. But still, somehow your parents, both sets, could tolerate the two of you wanting to do things the right way. Perhaps they were still shocked things worked out as well as they did.

“Morning,” you call out. The bed beside you is cold. “Josh?”

You’re surprised he’s up. Last night, he went out with you, Somi, and Soonyoung. Somehow, he had drunk enough to get up and solo karaoke a Whitney Houston song, although you’re suspecting the alcohol was just a cover for his true intentions.

Then you look out the window. You spot Joshua, seated on the bench overlooking the garden. This time of year, the roses are in full bloom, their bright heads reaching for the sky in brilliant red and gold.

When you go to join him outside, he’s no longer at the bench. You actually don’t know where the fuck he went, but it’s no matter. Here, you’re able to appreciate the beauty of the season, the rolling green of the country you’re now calling home.

It was also here where you had your first real conversation with Joshua without fighting, funnily enough. Now, you’d say the both of you were more agreeable, but that’d be a lie—somehow, you think you actually enjoy bickering with him, but that’s a conversation for another day.

Behind you, someone (Joshua) clears his throat.

“Now, what are you—” you say, spinning around. It was too damn early for games, but Joshua had no shortage of bad ideas.

It’s then that you see Joshua behind you, on one knee. His smile tells you everything you have to know, and every thought in your mind freezes in an instant.

“When I first saw you, I knew I would marry you,” he starts. That's a joke he’s probably been saving for months now, but instead of rolling your eyes, you can’t help but laugh, like you’re a broken soundboard. “No, really.”

You stand there, immovable. Of course you had to be in your pajamas (his shirt and boxers, really), no makeup, hair untouched. And yet, you can’t imagine anything more perfect.

“You drive me crazy,” Joshua continues. “In every way possible. I can't imagine life without your laugh, or your thinking face, or how you always need to have an answer for everything.”

He produces a small box. It’s different from the first one, the one he used all those months ago when nothing mattered. Inside it, a new ring, something far simpler and more beautiful.

Joshua says your name, wonderful and reverent in his mouth. “Darling princess of Cotria, I'm asking you to marry me. Again.”

And you say yes, for the very first time.

[END]

#IDK WHYYYY u think ur review is lackluster. literally reading ur thoughts makes my brain grow larger.#feedback #mutuals #cat

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